The Bible and violence

The definition of what constitutes violence has changed over time. In the twenty-first century, the definition has broadened considerably to include acts that used to be seen as acceptable. They defined anything that destroys the ecological environment as a form of violence. Violations of purity and sanctity are seen as a kind of violence that defiles the land, its people, and the sanctuary. It is accompanied by disgust on the part of the biblical writers. Historian Susan Niditch says the range of war ideologies in ancient Near Eastern culture can be seen by understanding attitudes toward war in the Hebrew Bible. In the Hebrew Bible warfare includes the Amalekites, Canaanites, Moabites, and the record in Exodus, Deuteronomy, Joshua, and both books of Kings. God commands the Israelites to conquer the Promised Land, placing city after city "under the ban". The Hebrew verb ḥāram (חֲרֵ֤ם) connotes complete annihilation (New Revised Standard Version is “utterly destroy”; Deut. 7:2). The noun which is derived from the verb ( Historian Susan Niditch says "the root h-r-m links together several biblical non-war and war usages of the term ... under the heading of sacrifice." Over half the occurrences of the verb and noun for the root ḥ-r-m are concerned with the destruction of nations in war. C. L. Crouch compares the two kingdoms of Israel and Judah to Assyria, saying their similarities in cosmology and ideology gave them similar ethical outlooks on war. Both Crouch and Lauren Monroe, professor of Near Eastern studies at Cornell, agree this means the ḥerem type of total war was not strictly an Israelite practice but was a common approach to war for many Near Eastern people of the Bronze and Iron Ages. For example, the 9th century Mesha Stele says that King Mesha of Moab fought in the name of his god Chemosh and that he subjected his enemies to ḥerem. Levine says this indicates that Israel was still, as late as Deuteronomy, making ideological adjustments with regard to the importation of the foreign practice of from its source in the surrounding Near Eastern nations." However, the later usage of the term, such as its usage in Numbers 18:14-17 and Deuteronomy 7, indicates that items and first-born children were supposed to be set aside as so that they could be redeemed by the Priests. ==Biblical narrative==

Book of Genesis Old Testament professor Jerome F. D. Creach writes that Genesis 1 and 2 present two claims that "set the stage for understanding violence in the rest of the Bible": first is the declaration the God of the Hebrews created without violence or combat which runs counter to other Near Eastern creation stories; second, these opening chapters appoint humans as divine representatives on earth as caretakers, to "establish and maintain the well-being or shalom of the whole creation". Creach says that violence is seen in these verses as an intrusion that disrupts this design. He decides to exterminate all, restarting creation with Noah and those humans and animals with him on the Ark. , c.1600 In Genesis 18–19 God resolves to destroy the cities Sodom and Gomorrah, "because their sin is very grievous". God promises Abraham that he will spare Sodom if as few as 10 righteous people can be found there. The cities are destroyed, but angels save Abraham's nephew Lot and most of his family from the destruction. While fleeing, Lot's wife (unnamed) is turned into a pillar of salt for turning back to see the destruction of the city's inhabitants and plants. God tests Abraham by demanding that he sacrifice Isaac, his son (Genesis 22). As Abraham is about to lay the knife upon his son, God restrains him, promising him numberless descendants. Joseph (Genesis 37–50), Jacob's favorite son, is sold into slavery in Egypt by his jealous brothers. Joseph prospers after hardship, with God's guidance, and saves his family from starvation. Book of Exodus and Book of Leviticus (1877) A new pharaoh sees that the Israelites in Egypt have become many and fears they might aid Egypt's enemies (Exodus 1:8–10). The Egyptians make the Israelites "serve with rigour" and their lives become "bitter with hard service". Pharaoh orders two Hebrew midwives, Shiphrah and Puah, to kill the newborn sons of Hebrew women, but they disobey him. Pharaoh then orders his people to drown these children. Moses, a Hebrew raised by Pharaoh's daughter, one day encounters an Egyptian beating a Hebrew. He slays the Egyptian and flees Egypt. God hears the plight of the Israelites and sends Moses back to Egypt to bring them out of that land to Canaan. At one point during the journey back, God intends to kill Moses, but he is saved by his wife Zipporah (Exodus 2–4). Moses asks Pharaoh to release the Israelites, but Pharaoh responds by demanding more work from them. Moses repeats his request several times as the Plagues of Egypt afflict the Egyptians, but Pharaoh refuses until the tenth plague, when God kills all firstborn people and cattle in Egypt, apart from those of the Israelites, who are protected. The biblical author writes that God hardened Pharaoh's heart (Exodus 7:3–4; 9:12), and that Pharaoh hardened his own heart (Exodus 8:15, 32: 9:34), and that his heart hardened in response to the demands with no attribution (Exodus 7:13,22). The Israelites are allowed to leave, but God again hardens Pharaoh's heart, and Pharaoh changes his mind, and sends an army after them. God saves them from the army by drowning it in the Red Sea. At Mount Sinai, God gives the Israelites the Ten Commandments and the Covenant Code (Exodus 20–23). These laws include thou shalt not kill, eye for an eye and laws about slavery and other things. Capital punishment is prescribed for some crimes. Animal sacrifice in the form of burnt offerings is mentioned, and it is prescribed that an ox that kills a person is to be stoned. The Code states that "And a stranger shalt thou not wrong, neither shalt thou oppress him; for ye were strangers in the land of Egypt." and "Ye shall not afflict any widow, or fatherless child." The Israelites promise to follow these laws (Exodus 24:3). The Israelites break their promise by worshiping the Golden Calf. God is angered by this and intends to "consume them", but Moses persuades him not to do so. Moses is also angered, and he breaks two stone tablets with God's writing. On Moses' command, the Levites kill about three thousand people (Exodus 32). God has Moses make new stone tablets, and gives Moses the Ritual Decalogue, which states in part "Take heed to thyself, lest thou make a covenant with the inhabitants of the land whither thou goest, lest they be for a snare in the midst of thee. But ye shall break down their altars, and dash in pieces their pillars, and ye shall cut down their Asherim" (Exodus 34). The Book of Leviticus concerns laws for priests and sets out detailed rules for animal sacrifice. The Holiness code, Leviticus 17–26, sets out a list of prohibitions, and the punishments for breaking them. Punishments include execution, sometimes by stoning or burning. Book of Numbers c.1900 God orders Moses to count "all that are able to go forth to war in Israel" (Numbers 1). God hears the people "speaking evil" and punishes them with fire. Moses prays, and the fire abates. The Israelites reach the border of Canaan, but due to reports from spies they refuse to enter, and wish to return to Egypt. God is angered, and tells Moses "I will smite them with the pestilence, and destroy them, and will make of thee a nation greater and mightier than they." Moses persuades him not to, but God declares that the Israelites will now wander the wilderness for forty years before they can enter Canaan. They are attacked by Amalekites and Canaanites (Numbers 13–14). In Numbers 15, a man is found working on the Sabbath. God orders him to be killed and he is stoned. Korah and a group of men rebel against Moses and Aaron. God destroys them (Numbers 16). The Isralites "murmur" about this, and God punishes them with a plague (Numbers 16). At Hormah, a Canaanite king fights the Israelites, and the Israelites promise God that if he gives them victory over this people, they will destroy their cities. He does and they do. The Israelites speak against God and Moses, and God sends venomous snakes that kill many of them. Moses prays for the people, and God helps them (Numbers 21). The Israelites conquer the cities of Sihon, king of the Amorites, and they "smote him, and his sons, and all his people, until there was none left him remaining; and they possessed his land." (Numbers 21). When the diviner Balaam beats his donkey, it speaks. Balaam later prophesies on the future of the Israelite's enemies (Numbers 22–24). God orders Moses to "Harass the Midianites, and smite them", and to again count "all that are able to go forth to war in Israel" (Numbers 25–26). God tells Moses "Speak unto the children of Israel, and say unto them: When ye pass over the Jordan into the land of Canaan, then ye shall drive out all the inhabitants of the land from before you, and destroy all their figured stones, and destroy all their molten images, and demolish all their high places. And ye shall drive out the inhabitants of the land, and dwell therein; for unto you have I given the land to possess it." and "But if ye will not drive out the inhabitants of the land from before you, then shall those that ye let remain of them be as thorns in your eyes, and as pricks in your sides, and they shall harass you in the land wherein ye dwell. And it shall come to pass, that as I thought to do unto them, so will I do unto you" (Numbers 33). Book of Deuteronomy Deuteronomy begins with a review of previous stories, including a battle between the Israelites and the Amorites (Deuteronomy 1:41–44), and the destruction of Rephaim by the Ammonites with Yahweh's help (2:21), along with similar other displacements. Deuteronomy 2:31–37 records the complete extermination of the people ruled by Sihon king of Heshbon. Similar treatment, at Yahweh's command, was given to the people under Og king of Bashan. Scholars do not agree on the theme of Deuteronomy 7, but part of that theme includes the command the Canaanites must be cleared from the land for Israel to maintain her purity. The nations listed were all larger and stronger than Israel. Deuteronomy 19 imposes the death penalty for premeditated murder, establishes cities of refuge, and also imposes the lex talionis: "life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot" thereby limiting vengeance (verse 21, NRSV). although rabbinical scholars debate whether this is to be interpreted as a requirement for self defense, or a metaphor for financial liability. This chapter also urges the extermination of the Amalekites (verses 17–19). Deuteronomy 28 contains blessing and curses: blessing, including the defeat of Israel's enemies, if Israel obeys; and curses if Israel disobeys. These curses include disease, famine, defeat and death in warfare, insanity, abuse and robbery, enslavement, and cannibalism due to extreme hunger. Similar threats appear in the following chapter (29) and in Deuteronomy 32. Book of Joshua , c.1452–1460) God commands Joshua to take possession of Canaan (Joshua 1). Joshua conquers a total of 31 city states ruled by kings as listed in chapter 12 of Joshua. The Jericho-woman Rahab aids two Israelite spies, and she and her family are promised to be spared in the coming conquest if they hang a scarlet thread in the window (Joshua 2). The Israelites enter Canaan, carrying with them the Ark of the Covenant. Several kings ally together to fight the Israelites. The people of Gibeon, learning of the city's destruction, tricks the Israelites into a peace-treaty. Joshua goes on to conquer more cities but never completes the conquest (Joshua 10). More kings gather to fight the Israelites. The Israelites defeat and kill them all. Joshua 11 commands the hamstringing of horses. Joshua finishes most of the conquest of Canaan, with the exception of Gibeon and possibly some Canaanites and Amelakites: "For it was of the LORD to harden their hearts, to come against Israel in battle, that they might be utterly destroyed, that they might have no favour, but that they might be destroyed, as the LORD commanded Moses." "And the land had rest from war" (Joshua 11). Later on, Jael hammers a tent peg into an enemy commander's head while he slept after fleeing from a battle (Judges 4:21). Towards the end of the book, an unnamed Levite's concubine is raped, and dies shortly afterwards. The Levite dismembers her, and has parts of her body distributed across Israel to inform people about what happened (Judges 19:29). This triggers a civil war between the Benjamites and the Israelites that kills thousands of people. Books of Samuel In the Books of Samuel, The Israelites war with the Philistines and are defeated at the Battle of Aphek. The Philistines capture the Ark of the Covenant, but God makes his displeasure known, and they later return it. The ark arrives at Beth-shemesh, where God slays fifty thousand men for gazing upon it (1 Samuel 6). Samuel urges Israel's people to "put away the foreign gods" and serve only God, which they do. The Philistines attack and are defeated at Mizpah. Samuel commands Saul "Now go and smite Amalek, and utterly destroy all that they have, and spare them not; but slay both man and woman, infant and suckling, ox and sheep, camel and ass" (1 Samuel 15:3). Hamas may refer to verbal or even ethical violence. "Sometimes the word refers to extreme wickedness (; ) where physical violence may or may not be [involved]." "The term Hamas sometimes appears as a cry to God in the face of injustice (Jer. 6:7)." Exodus 23:1 and Deut. 19:16 characterize a false witness as (a “violent witness”). The notion that a false witness threatens life and well-being appears in fuller form in the Psalter." Creach writes that the prophet "Amos 1:3–2:3 uses 'akal' to indict Israel’s neighbors for various acts of cruelty during war (e.g., the Ammonites “ripped open pregnant women in Gilead in order to enlarge their territory”; 1:13) and uses those war crimes of surrounding peoples to draw a parallel with Israel's mistreatment of the poor, thus elevating economic injustice to the level of war crimes." (2:6–8). Elijah called down fire from Heaven to consume the sacrifice, then followed this display of God's power by catching and personally killing all the prophets of Baal; he twice called the fire down from heaven to consume the Captain and the fifty men with him sent by the King (2 Kings 1:10); Elisha called bears from the woods to maul the 42 "youths" who mocked him, and visited leprosy on Gehazi his deceitful servant, (2 Kings 5:27); Amos pronounces judgment on the nations including Israel offering a vision of Divine judgment that includes a swarm of locusts and divine fire; Ezekiel said, "The word of the Lord came to me" repeatedly pronouncing violent judgment against the nations and Israel, As a response to the violence of the wicked, numerous psalms call on God to bring vengeance on one's personal enemies, for example Ps. 109 calls for vengeance on the entire family as "payment" to the Psalmist's accusers beginning with his children including his wife [https://www.biblestudytools.com/lexicons/hebrew/nas/ishshah-2.html and all his ancestors New Testament .] Gospels In the Gospel of Matthew, Herod the Great is described as ordering the execution of all young male children in the vicinity of Bethlehem. Matthew 10:34 and Luke 12:49–51 reference Jesus as saying he comes to bring fire or a sword. G. Stroumsa writes that these verses are sometimes interpreted as violent, but he goes on to reference Theissen as saying they are actually about conflict in the family. The cleansing of the Temple is sometimes considered to be a violent action by Jesus. There are also multiple sayings of Jesus that oppose violence, such as Turning the other cheek and the passage about Jesus and the woman taken in adultery. All four Gospels conclude with a narrative of Jesus' arrest, initial trial at the Sandhedrin and final trial at Pilate's court, where Jesus is flogged, forced to carry his cross through Jerusalem, and then crucified. The metaphor of sacrifice is used in reference to His death, both in the Gospels and other books of the New Testament. In each Gospel these violent events are treated with more intense detail than any other portion of that Gospel's narrative. Scholars note that the reader receives an almost hour-by-hour account of what is happening. Apocalypse The Book of Revelation is full of imagery of war, genocide, and destruction. It describes the Apocalypse, the last judgment of all the nations and people by God, which includes plagues, war, and economic collapse. Some other books of the Gospels also use apocalyptic language and forms. Scholars define this as language that "views the future as a time when divine saving and judging activity will deliver God's people out of the present evil order into a new order...This transformation will be cataclysmic and cosmic." For example, Jesus uses apocalyptic speech in Matthew 10:15 when he says "it will be more bearable for Sodom and Gomorrah on the day of judgment than for that town," and in Mark 14:62, where he alludes to the book of Daniel with himself in the future "sitting at the right hand of God." Bailey and Vander Broek go on to say, "In the material about John the Baptizer there also appear apocalyptic images: 'the wrath to come' (Luke 3:7); 'the axe ... lying at the root of the tree' (Luke 3:9); the Coming One with 'winnowing fork ... in His hand' (Luke 3:17); and chaff burning with 'unquenchable fire' (Luke 3:17)." The Book of Revelation has been used to justify violence and has served as an inspiration of revolutionary movements. According to Richard Bauckham, the author of the book of Revelation addresses apocalypse with a reconfiguration of traditional Jewish eschatology that substitutes "faithful witness to the point of martyrdom for armed violence as the means of victory. Because the Lamb has won the decisive victory over evil by this means, his followers can participate in his victory only by following his path of suffering witness. Thus, Revelation repudiates apocalyptic militarism, but promotes the active participation of Christians in the divine conflict with evil". ==Theological reflections and responses==

Texts of violence have produced a wide variety of theological responses. Various views Historian Paul Copan and philosopher Matthew Flannagan say the violent texts of ḥerem warfare are "hagiographic hyperbole", a kind of historical writing found in the Book of Joshua and other Near Eastern works of the same era and are not intended to be literal; they contain hyperbole, formulaic language, and literary expressions for rhetorical effect — like when sports teams use the language of “totally slaughtering” their opponents. John Gammie concurs, saying the Bible verses about "utterly destroying" the enemy are more about pure religious devotion than an actual record of killing people. Gammie references Deuteronomy 7:2-5 in which Moses presents ḥerem as a precondition for Israel to occupy the land with two stipulations: one is a statement against intermarriage (vv. 3–4), and the other concerns the destruction of the sacred objects of the residents of Canaan (v. 5) but neither involves killing. Biblical scholars such as John H. Walton and Kenneth Kitchen also concluded that violent language relating to biblical warfare was hyperbolic, based on comparisons to the language of other literary cultures. As part of the many reflections on religious violence inspired by the Abrahamic religions that followed 9/11, John J. Collins wrote a short book called "Does the Bible Justify Violence?". In the book he reviews the passages in the Bible describing violence done by God, commanded or promised by God, and done by people, as well as how these texts have been used by religious people and governments throughout history. Near the end of her book, she says: "My re-vision would produce an alternative Bible that subverts the dominant vision of violence and scarcity with an ideal of plenitude and its corollary ethical imperative of generosity. It would be a Bible embracing multiplicity instead of monotheism." Likewise the Priestly author adapted the myths and rituals of the ANE and the specific traditions of the ancient Israelites to forge different meanings for blood sacrifice than their neighbors had, specifically in the elaborate and precarious rituals on the Day of Atonement when the High Priest had to enter the Holy of Holies and the presence of God; in their work the Priestly authors also attempted to express the transcendence and unity of God who is yet in a relationship with humanity with all its variable sinfulness. In Geller's reading the blood is not magical nor is the animal just a substitute for a human sacrifice; instead blood is at once an expression of the violence of the fallen world where people kill in order to eat (unlike Eden) and the blood itself becomes a means for redemption; it is forbidden to be eaten, as a sign of restraint and recognition, and is instead offered to God, and in that action the relationship between fallen humanity and God is restored. The Priestly authors underline the importance of all this by recalling the mortal danger faced by the High Priests, through the telling of the deaths of Nadab and Abihu when God refused their "strange offering" and consumed them with fire. According to David Clines (and contrary to his own assumptions), only 3.3% of words in the entire Hebrew Bible relate to violence (with even less being attributed to God), stating: Others Evan Fales, Professor of Philosophy, calls the doctrine of substitutionary atonement that some Christians use to understand the crucifixion of Jesus, "psychologically pernicious" and "morally indefensible". Fales founds his argument on John Locke’s statement that revelation must conform to our understanding. Philosopher and Professor Alvin Plantinga says this rests upon seeing God as a kind of specially talented human being. Historian Philip Jenkins (quoting Phyllis Trible) says the Bible is filled with "texts of terror" but he also asserts these texts are not to be taken literally. Jenkins says eighth century BCE historians added them to embellish their ancestral history and get readers' attention. Old Testament scholar Ellen Davis is concerned by what she calls a "shallow reading" of Scripture, particularly of 'Old Testament' texts concerning violence, which she defines as a "reading of what we think we already know instead of an attempt to dig deeper for new insights and revelations." She says these difficult texts typically have internal correctives that support an educative reading. The first systematic reflections on the problem of evil by Jewish philosophers is traceable only in the medieval period. The ancient books of the Hebrew Bible do not show an awareness of the theological problem of evil, and even most later biblical scholars did not touch the question of the problem of evil. While there are secular responses to the problem, the problem of evil is primarily a challenge to Christianity. The Christian response is based on an understanding of evil as limited; it cannot be correctly understood on a simple scale of pleasure vs. pain, since the National Institute of medicine says pain is essential for survival. There are three main types of response. The freewill defense by Alvin Plantinga assumes that a world containing creatures who are significantly free is an innately more valuable world than one containing no free creatures, and that God could not have made a world containing complexity and freedom without including the possibility of evil and suffering. The soul-making theodicy advocated by John Hick says God allows the evil of suffering because it produces good in its results of building moral character. Christian ethicists such as David Ray Griffin have also produced process theodicies which assert God's power and ability to influence events are, of necessity, limited by human creatures with wills of their own. In one version of this, Jon Levenson resolves the problem of evil by describing God's power not as static, but as unfolding in time. Toby Betenson writes that "Theodicies mediate a praxis that sanctions evil". Generally, Christians ethicists do not claim to know the answer to the "Why?" of evil, pain and suffering. Alvin Plantinga stresses that this is why he does not proffer a theodicy but only a defense of the logic of theistic belief in the face of evil's reality. Genesis and violence at creation In 1895 Hermann Gunkel observed that most Ancient Near Eastern (ANE) creation stories contain a theogony depicting a god doing combat with other gods thus including violence in the founding of their cultures. For example, in the Babylonian creation epic Enuma Elish, the first step of creation has Marduk fighting and killing Tiamat, a chaos monster, to establish order. "The fact [the Genesis creation account] was likely part of the last stages of the creation of the Pentateuch may indicate that the portrait of God in Gen. 1:1–2:4a was normative for those who gave the Old Testament canon its present shape. Hence, it seems that the account of God creating without violence in Gen. 1:1–2:4a “now serves as the overture to the entire Bible, dramatically relativizing the other cosmologies." These stories in Genesis are not the only stories about creation in the Bible. In Proverbs 8, for example one reads of personified Wisdom being present and participant in creation. There is also what is called the "agon" (meaning struggle or combat) model of creation in and in which God has victory in battle over the monsters of the sea. Historian theologian Christopher Hays says, there is similarity to the Canaanite myths in these Hebrew verses. However, he also says the differences are more pronounced than the similarities. In this, the Bible story is dissimilar to both the Memphite story and the Babylonian in that the Hebrew Bible says the divine gift of working with God in creation is limited to humankind, meaning, for the Hebrews, humans alone are part of God's being. This sense of honoring or empowering humankind is not in any of the Mesopotamian or Canaanite myths. Scholar author Phyllis Trible looks at these instances from the perspective of the victim, thus making their pathos palpable, underlining their human reality and the tragedy of their stories. Some feminist critiques of Judges say the Bible gives tacit approval to violence against women by not speaking out against these acts. Beginning with the larger context, the decline of Israel during this period can be traced by following the deteriorating status of women and the violence done to them. The promise of life in the land turns into chaos and violence. The biblical authors see this as the effect of the absence of authority such as a king (Judges 21:25): violence against women occurs when government fails and social upheaval occurs. Non-violence and Shalom The term for peace in the Hebrew Bible is SH-L-M. It is used to describe prophetic vision and ideal conditions, and theologians have built on passages referencing it to advocate for various forms of social justice. The violence of Hell The concept of hell as a place of punishment in the afterlife arose in Second Temple Judaism and was further developed in the Christian tradition. Judaism subsequently moved away from the idea of an afterlife, yet there are Hebrew Bible verses indicating early Jewish thought did contain some belief in one. For example, Isaiah 26:14 which is part of proto-Isaiah (chapters 1–39), speaks of "the dead who live no more" as being "punished and destroyed". And Daniel 12:2–3, which is generally believed to date to the second century BCE, asserts "Many of those who sleep in the dust of the ground will awake, these to everlasting life, but the others to disgrace and everlasting contempt." The word Sheol, seen as the resting place of departed spirits, appears 65 times in the Hebrew Bible, and the term "Tartaros" appears frequently in Jewish apocalyptic literature where it refers to a place where the wicked are punished. All the references to gehenna (except James 3:6) are spoken by Jesus himself. Jesus also taught that punishment in Hell would be by degrees (an idea Dante later developed) with one servant receiving a lighter beating than others, hypocrites receiving more condemnation than others, and so on. Steve Gregg quotes Douglas Jacoby as arguing that most modern exegetes reject the view aionios always represents an infinity in time. Josephus used the term to describe an imprisonment that lasted three years. For example, Aquinas' Hell differs from the Hell described by C. S. Lewis in the Great Divorce. Lewis's Hell is filled only with those who have chosen it rather than repent and submit to God. Jerry Walls in his book Hell: The logic of damnation, looks at the 'traditional popular view', the 'modified orthodox view', the 'traditional Calvinist view', and others". Miroslav Volf justifies the doctrine of final judgment by saying it provides a necessary restraint on human violence. Tim Keller says it is right to be angry when someone brings injustice or violence to those we love and therefore a loving God can be filled with wrath because of love, not in spite of it. Oliver O'Donovan argues that without the judgment of God we would never see the love in redemption. According to Steve Gregg, there are three primary views of Hell in Christianity. First is Hell as the righteous condemnation of rebels and evildoers like Hitler where God will not mitigate the misery by any degree. Marcionism and supersessionism As the early Christian Church began to distinguish itself from Judaism, the "Old Testament" and a portrayal of God in it as violent and unforgiving were sometimes contrasted rhetorically with certain teachings of Jesus to portray an image of God as more loving and forgiving, which was framed as a new image. Marcion's teaching was repudiated by Tertullian in five treatises titled "Against Marcion" and Marcion was ultimately excommunicated by the Church. Supersessionism According to Michael Vlach, "It is undeniable that anti-Jewish bias has often gone hand-in-hand with the supersessionist view." It has three forms: punitive, economic or structural supersessionism. The church took its universally held traditional interpretation of Revelation 20:4-6 which is called Millennialism, and its hope of the thousand-year reign of the Messiah on earth, centered in Jerusalem, ruling with the redeemed Israel, John Gager makes a distinction between nineteenth century anti-Semitism and second century anti-Judaism, and many scholars agree, yet there are also many who see early anti-Judaism and later anti-Semitism as the same. sees the development of anti-semitism as part of the paradigm shift that occurred in early modernity when the new scientific focus on the Bible and history replaced the primacy of theology and tradition. Christopher Leighton associates anti-Judaism with the origins of Christianity, and anti-semitism with "modern nationalism and racial theories". ==Sociological reflections and responses==

Jože Krašovec describes the ancient Near Eastern (ANE) context in which the stories and text of the Hebrew Bible originated, in which gods were identified with peoples, and the flourishing or destruction of a people were a reflection of the power of its god or gods. While the ancient Israelites conceived of their deity as one being in contrast to the polytheistic conception of its neighbors, they remained like other ANE peoples in considering themselves a single whole unit in relationship with god. From this foundation arose notions of the nation flourishing or failing together as a whole rather than individually, and the view that individual sin leads to communal suffering and collective punishment. René Girard, historian, literary critic, and philosopher of social science says that, "desire is mimetic (i.e. all of our desires are borrowed from other people), that all conflict originates in mimetic desire (mimetic rivalry), that the scapegoat mechanism is the origin of sacrifice and the foundation of human culture, and religion was necessary in human evolution to control the violence that can come from mimetic rivalry, and that the Bible reveals these ideas and denounces the scapegoat mechanism." Jacques Ellul says: "I believe that the biblical teaching is clear. It always contests political power. It incites to "counterpower," to "positive" criticism, to an irreducible dialogue (like that between king and prophet in Israel), to antistatism, to a decentralizing of the relation, to an extreme relativizing of everything political, to an anti-ideology, to a questioning of all that claims either power or dominion (in other words, of all things political)...Throughout the Old Testament we see God choosing what is weak and humble to represent him (the stammering Moses, the infant Samuel, Saul from an insignificant family, David confronting Goliath, etc.). Paul tells us that God chooses the weak things of the world to confound the mighty..." Genocide Because of the orders to completely destroy the enemy, several scholars have characterized certain biblical passages as divine commands to commit genocide. Examples include the story of the Amalekites (Numbers 13,14), the War against the Midianites (Numbers 31), and the battle of Jericho (Joshua 1–6). Old Testament scholar Eric Siebert considers divine violence as "violence which God is said to have perpetrated, caused, or sanctioned." Specifically, this includes (1) violence which God commits without the use of human agents (e.g., sending down fire on Sodom and Gomorrah); (2) violence God commissions, typically unbeknownst to those who are being commissioned (e.g., using Babylon to punish the people of Judah for their sins); and (3) violence which God directly commands (e.g., ordering the Israelites to wipe out the Canaanites)." In the archaeological community, the Battle of Jericho has been thoroughly studied, and the consensus of modern scholars is the battles described in the Book of Joshua are not supported by the archeological record, and are not consistent with other texts in the Bible. For example, the Book of Joshua (chapter 10) describes the total extermination of the Canaanite tribes, yet at a later time Judges 1:1-2:5 suggests the Canaanites lived on. Similarly, claims in Numbers 31 that 12,000 Israelite soldiers exterminated the entire Midianite population (except for enslaving 32,000 virgin girls) and destroyed all their towns, without suffering a single casualty, are held to be historically impossible, and should be understood as symbolic, not least because other biblical books set in later times still refer to the Midianites as an independent people, such as Judges chapters 6–8, where Gideon fights them. Sociologists Frank Robert Chalk and Kurt Jonassohn question "the applicability of the term [genocide] to earlier periods of history, and they have also questioned the judgmental and moral loadings that have become associated with it." Since most societies of the past endured and practiced genocide, it was accepted as "being in the nature of life" because of the "coarseness and brutality" of life. Scholar Nur Masalha writes that the "genocide" of the extermination commandments has been "kept before subsequent generations" and he also writes that those commandments have also served as inspirational examples of divine support for the slaughtering of enemies. Scholar Leonard B. Glick states that Jewish fundamentalists in Israel, such as Shlomo Aviner, consider the Palestinians to be like biblical Canaanites, and that some fundamentalist leaders suggest that they "must be prepared to destroy" the Palestinians if the Palestinians do not leave the land. Arthur Grenke quotes historian, author and scholar David Stannard: "Discussing the influence of Christian beliefs on the destruction of the Native peoples in the Americas, Stannard argues that while the New Testament's view of war is ambiguous, there is little ambiguity in the Old Testament. He points to sections in Deuteronomy in which the Israelite God, Yahweh, commanded the Israelites to utterly destroy idolaters whose land they sought to reserve for the worship of their deity (Deut 7:2, 16, and 20:16–17). ... According to Stannard, this view of war contributed to the ... destruction of the Native peoples in the Americas. It was this view that also led to the destruction of European Jewry. Accordingly, it is important to look at this particular segment of the Old Testament: it not only describes a situation when a group attempts to totally destroy other groups, it also had a major influence on shaping thought and belief systems that permitted, and even inspired, genocide. Arie Versluis says, "...indigenous populations have also appealed to the commandment (in Deut.7) in order to justify the expulsion of their colonizers. This fact is illustrated by the example of Te Kooti...in the nineteenth century, because he viewed the Maori as the Israelites and he viewed the colonizers as the Canaanites." Historian and author William T. Cavanaugh states that every society throughout history has contained both hawks and doves. Cavanaugh and John Gammie state that laws like those in Deuteronomy probably reflect Israel's internal struggles over differing views on issues such as the issue on how to wage war. ==See also==