The Old Testament Was Written Out Of Fear

Penalties of Death in the Old Testament:

The First Penalty:

2 Chronicles 15:13 ... whoever would not seek Yahveh, the God of Israel, should be put to death, whether young or old, man or woman.

Exodus 22:20; whoever sacrifices to any god, except to Yahveh, shall be utterly destroyed.

Deuteronomy 13:6-9 If your brother, or your daughter, or the wife of your bosom, or your friend, entices you secretly, saying, 'let us go and serve other gods’, you shall kill him;

The Third Penalty:

Leviticus 24:16 … He who blasphemes the name of Yahveh shall be put to death; all of the congregation shall stone him.

The Fourth Penalty:

Exodus 31:14-15 … You shall keep the Sabbath, because it is holy for you; everyone who profanes it shall be put to death; … whoever does any work on the Sabbath day shall be put to death.

The Fifth Penalty:

Leviticus 20:9 … For everyone who curses his father or his mother shall be put to death;

Deuteronomy 21:18 … If a man has a stubborn and rebellious son, who will not obey the voice of his father or the voice of his mother ... Then all the men of the city shall stone him to death with stones.

All of these Laws telling the people not to kill. But then we have this:

The Sixth Commandment:

Exodus 20:13, Deuteronomy 5:17
You shall not kill.

The Sixth Penalty:

Exodus 21:12 … Whoever strikes a man so that he dies shall be put to death.

Leviticus 24:17: … He who kills a man shall be put to death.

So here we have all of these laws declaring death to law violators. Since God does not do the killing, humans have to do it. But then the writers of the scriptures turn right around and say, do not kill, for if you do, we will have to kill you. So then do the ones who killed the killer get killed too – since they killed the killer? I mean, which one is it? Do we kill or don’t we? Does the reason for death really matter – take a look at the reasons listed in the Bible so far for killing someone.

These contradictions are no doubt the best reason for writing a New Testament. It isn’t like advocators of the old law could just say, “Ignore what you’ve just read; check out this New Version instead.” Oh but actually, that is just what they did – in the New Testament. The New scriptures were written in a way to validate or fulfill the old laws so that the entire Old Testament wouldn’t have to be scrapped.     

The Seventh Commandment:

Exodus 20:14, Deuteronomy 5:18
You shall not commit adultery.

The Seventh Penalty:

Leviticus 20:10 … If a man commits adultery with the wife of his neighbor, both the adulterer and the adulteress shall be put to death.

Obviously, these are man-made laws, utilized only by man-kind, otherwise, who would carry out these deathly sentences? An all powerful, omnipotent, Creator does not need human hit-men to kill.

I am sure the Source/Creator of our beings could easily extinguish us without using stones if these laws were intended to be true by the Creator. But of course, not even God can destroy that which is eternal, because God cannot contradict God’s self; that is to say, an eternal being can never contradict being eternal. We were created eternally so we must remain eternal – since that is what eternal means.

 

e-ter-nal

1.          Lasting or existing forever; without end or beginning

2.          Valid for all time; essentially unchanging

Deuteronomy 22:22

If a man is found lying with the wife of another man, both of them shall die; the man who lay with the woman, and the woman …

Having multiple wives, or keeping concubines, or having sex with prostitutes, is not adultery in the pages of the Bible; adultery in the Bible consists of creating doubt about paternity, i.e. having sex with another man's wife.

The Eighth Commandment:

Exodus 20:15, Deuteronomy 5:19
You shall not steal.

The Eighth Penalty: For stealing slaves…

Exodus 21:16 … Whoever steals a man, whether he sells him, or is found in possession of him, shall be put to
death.

Obviously, this passage was meant to use God as a fear tactic to prevent other believers from stealing property – the property being slaves, or other material things. 

Do you not suppose that the One who created you can see beyond what human-kind can see? Do you suppose you could come up with something that the Creator of your being did not see coming? The Source of all Life has seen your every move and your every thought from before your physical birth. You cannot surprise God. Every adulterous encounter, theft, murder or deviate thought your skin has experienced was known in advance. That is why we are not punished by the Creator; God is not disappointed in you for something God knew you would already do; we are only punished by others who are living a life just as blindly as we are. The human part of us is continually surprised and uninformed of the Soul’s intentions, so that leads to a gross level of misunderstanding about what humans believe we should be doing here on Earth.

However, if you read the “Commandments” closely, you will be able to see just how self serving they actually are. For example; if one doesn’t believe in the same religious doctrines as the writer of the scriptures, you must die. If you have a rebellious son, the son must die. If your wife has sex with anyone else, the other two must die. If you steal something from the writer of the scripts, you must die, and on and on. Do these things really strike you as something God, who is lacking nothing, would be concerned with? God is not fearful, and all of these commandments are written in the language of fear – the writer was afraid to lose something or be out of control of something. That is to be expected from humans, with such a limited perspective on the whole of things.

Sure, your Soul has the same unlimited vision as the Creator since there is no separation between them, although the human experience has been deprived of this glorious information, but that doesn’t mean you can’t live like you can see something glorious about your life. If you live your life by the fearful ideas of others, you have doomed yourself to repeat their life. Why not live your own life? At the very moment that you think you are going to behave out of a feeling of fear or anger, try to imagine reacting out of love instead. There are too many examples to list, but you know what circumstances usually draw these emotions out of you. Next time, pause and take a breath, and refocus your reaction onto a loving one – just to see how it all works out. After the event is over, review it in your mind and consider, “This must be what it is like to think on an enlightened level all of the time.”

Then let it all go, and move on in peace.

-      JB Lewis