Genocide

I've often been troubled by Bible stories about genocide. It seems like a good portion of the Old Testament is devoted to stories about the God wiping out entire nations - men, women and children - either through the Israelites or other means. I've been told that killing the children of wicked nations was actually an act of mercy, because if they were allowed to grow up in such a corrupt society they would certainly become evil themselves, and God would be forced to judge them for their wickedness. This explanation has never sat well with me, for a number of reasons.

1. The Old Testament really doesn't include the concepts of heaven and hell. The idea of people being damned for their evil actions or unbelief is definitely post-Old Testament. And the idea of an "age of accountability" before which children are not responsible for their actions is arguably post-New Testament. So, at least from the Israelites' perspective, genocide couldn't have been about saving children from God's wrath. In fact, as far as I can tell, being wiped out is the ultimate expression of God's wrath in the Old Testament.

2. The idea that killing babies is merciful is pretty hard for me to swallow. Couldn't they have rescued and raised as Israelites? Wouldn't this have been far more merciful? Besides, this thinking would seem to support to euthanasia and the abortion of disabled babies, which I think most Christians who defend OT genocide would oppose.

3. If it was merciful to eradicate an "evil" race of people back then, is it still merciful today? Would it have been merciful to wipe out the Germans in World War 2, or the Soviets in the Cold War? If this sounds absurd in the modern world, why was it less absurd back then? (See this post.) What was it about the Amalekites and the Edomites that made them so irredeemable? Has humankind really progressed so much since ancient times, that societies were far more evil then than even the worse ones today, or that such societies were beyond help then, whereas now they often improve dramatically in just a few years? (So much for humanity being in decline.)

4. How can we say that entire nations, meaning every single person within them, deserved God's wrath? Were there really no good men and women among them? (And if so, what has changed? Why are there no purely evil nations today?) Why would God use such a blunt instrument as war to bring judgment to evildoers? Why not just strike the guilty ones dead? Throughout the Old Testament God punishes innocent people for the sins of their neighbors or kings. How is this just?

5. There is a great deal of evidence in the OT that as the king goes, so goes the nation. Good kings, both Jewish and Gentile, lead their people to righteousness and obedience, and wicked kings lead them to idolatry and depravity, generally with very little resistance. And yet it is usually the king's subjects who bear the brunt of God's wrath. (See 1 Chron 21, especially v.17.) Why? If God felt the need to bring an end to a nations wickedness, couldn't he have killed the wicked king and replace him with a righteous one, a la Saul and David? Not only would this be more just (or at least, more merciful) but it would increase the number of righteous nations, rather than simply decreasing the number of unrighteous ones. And if God determines who becomes king (as Jesus and Paul seem to think) how can He punish the people when the leader He gives them leads them astray?

6. God makes a point of saying that the Israelites were no better than the nations they conquered, and the prophets tell us they even surpassed other nations in wickedness. But God is patient with Israel, because of a covenant made with their forefather Abraham. (Another covenant, with David, allows a dynasty of almost entirely wicked kings to rule Judah for centuries. These kings lead Judah into great evil, and the people of Judah ultimately suffer the consequences of their kings' actions. Likewise Israel is scattered forever because of their wicked kings.) If God can be patient with Israel, ultimately redeeming them and never ceasing to love them, why does he not do this for other nations? We like the idea that God loves every person equally and immeasurably. The OT demonstrates (and states explicitly) that God loved (loves?) Israel more than others. Why? Surely it is not a special genetic trait of the Israelites that they are redeemable, whereas the best possible fate for other wicked nations is to be annihilated quickly, to save their descendants from God's wrath. I think we must admit that God could have dealt much more mercifully with wicked gentile nations. If annihilation is a mercy, it is a small mercy, like that of a judiciary system which kills convicts who could be rehabilitated, and sees itself as merciful for sparing them still crueler punishments.

7. I'm not aware of any Biblical mention of genocide as an act of mercy. On the contrary, it is generally portrayed as an outpouring of God's wrath. I doubt that the author of Psalm 137 was writing out of compassion for Babylonian babies.

There are other arguments in defense of the supposedly God-ordered OT genocides, most of which I find similarly unconvincing, but which I will not deal with here. If you'd like to take a look at some of the Biblical stories of genocide and commands to carry out genocide, here are a few: Num 31, Deut 2, 7, 20, Josh 10, 11 (note v.20), 1 Sam 15, 27, Est 9. Of course circumstances differ, and some of these genocides may be easier to excuse than others (some may not even be genocides in the strictest sense) but mercy - for children or anyone else - doesn't seem to have much to do with any of these cases.