Five Worst Bible Verses

I feel lucky to live in the United Kingdom, and although 58% of the country identified as Christian, religion does not get brought into politics very often. The only recent debate in which religion featured predominantly was the same-sex marriage debate. The same cannot be said of the United States in which Christianity features heavily in every debate. Religion should be a private affair, between you and your God, not with the rest of the country. As a irreligious person this might really anger you, so here are five bible verses that contradict the idea that the God of the bible is a loving God.

1.       God kills 42 children: 2:23-24

"Elisha left Jericho to go to Bethel, and on the way some boys came out of the town and made fun of him. "Get out of here, baldy!" they shouted. Elisha turned around, glared at them, and cursed them in the name of the Lord. Then two she-bears came out of the woods and tore 42 of the boys to pieces."

That’s right, God killed 42 children just because they called his prophet bald.

2.       God condones slavery: 1 Timothy 6:1-2

“Those who are not slaves must consider their masters worthy of all respect, so that no one will speak evil of the name of God and of our teaching. Slaves belonging to Christian masters must not despise them, for they are their brothers and sisters. Instead they are to serve them even better, because those who benefit from their work are believers whom they love.”

Perhaps God would have been on the side of the Confederacy during the American Civil War, because apparently he’s perfectly fine with slavery.

3.       God on rape: Deuteronomy 22:28-29

“Suppose a man is caught raping a young woman who is not engaged. He is to pay her father the ‘bride price’ of fifty pieces of silver, and she is to become his wife, because he forced her to have intercourse with him. He can never divorce her as long as he lives.”

This really gives you an insight into how women were once treated. They are the property of their father until they get married. Basically, according to this bible verse. If you have 50 silver pieces, you can rape any woman who is not married or engaged, you just have to marry her afterwards. Poor you. I tried to find out how much 50 silver pieces is in today’s money but ‘piece’ is a rather undefined amount and silver is significantly less valuable today than several millennia ago.

4.       Killing innocent babies: Psalms 137:8-9

“Babylon, you will be destroyed. Happy are those who pay you back for what you have done to us – who take your babies and smash them against a rock.”

Apparently murdering babies is cool with God. At this stage I’m not too sure if I’m reading the word of God or the word of Joffrey Baratheon.

5.       Human sacrifices: Judges 11:30-32

“Jephithah promised the Lord: If you give me victory over the Ammonites, I will burn as an offering the first person that comes out of my house to meet me when I come back from victory. I will offer that person as a sacrifice.”

If you read the rest of the verse he ends up sacrificing his daughter, at no point does God intervene and stop it. But it was all OK as his daughter was fine with it, the only thing she was upset about was that she would die a virgin.

In my opinion you have the right to follow any religion: even if I feel that the religion is full of hate and a poor source for ‘moral’ behaviour. That’s your choice. But you don’t get to try and enforce your religion on the rest of society.

When all Christians stop trying to force their religion on other people, I will stop pointing out the parts of the Bible that are really nasty.  

If you want to find even more bible verses that should be condemned, visit www.evilbible.com

Note: The bible I used for these quotes is the Good News Bible, published by “The Bible Societies/Collins” which is a division of HarperCollinsPublishers. I used the 2004 version.