God is a Dick – Part II: Elijah and the Prophets of Baal
This week we look at Yahweh’s mean and violent side. 1st Kings, Chapter 18, shows a god that teases and toys with unbelievers before slaughtering them in large numbers.
Ahab, seventh king of Israel, married the ever-popular Jezebel and built a temple to the god Baal. Elijah, prophet of Yahweh, led the struggle to remove the cult of Baal from Israel. A duel of the deities ensued. Elijah told Ahab to gather all the people of Israel and 450 prophets of Baal at Mt. Carmel. Ahab complied. When everyone was gathered, Elijah laid out the ground rules. Two bullocks would be prepared for sacrifice and placed upon piles of wood. Then the prophets of Baal and Elijah would try to get their respective gods to ignite the wood and claim the sacrifice. The followers of Baal were allowed to choose their bullock and go first. They plead with Baal from morning until noon to take the sacrifice.
And it came to pass at noon, that Elijah mocked them, and said, Cry aloud: for he is a god; either he is talking, or he is pursuing, or he is in a journey, or peradventure he sleepeth, and must be awakened. And they cried aloud, and cut themselves after their manner with knives and lancets, till the blood gushed out upon them. [1KI 18:27-28 KJV]
So god, speaking through Elijah, is clearly not the good of good sportsmanship. By itself, this would be forgivable, if unlikable. The behavior becomes more childish when it’s Elijah’s turn.
And he put the wood in order, and cut the bullock in pieces, and lad him on the wood, and said, Fill four barrels with water, and pour it on the burnt sacrifice, and on the wood. And he said, Do it the second time. And they did it the second time. And he said, Do it the third time. And they did it the tird time. And the water ran round about the altar; and he filled the trench also with water. [1KI 18:33-35 KJV]
Nobody likes a showoff. Fire from the heavens on cue apparently isn’t impressive enough. God has Elijah soak the wood with water first to make the task harder. Well, needless to say, “the fire of the LORD fell,” and the sacrifice was claimed. The people of Israel, fell to the ground and praised god. Faith just isn’t very important in most of the Old Testament. It’s good enough for the people of Israel to worship Yahweh because he scares the crap out of them.
At that point, the loving and benevolent Yahweh calls to the prophets of Baal and forgives them for being misguided (like the rest of Israel), and accepts them as new worshippers. Well, no. Actually, he takes a slightly different approach.
And Elijah said unto them, Take the prophets of Baal; let not one of them escape. And they took them: and Elijah brought them down to the brook Kishon, and slew them there. [1KI 18:40 KJV]
That’s right. This deity, who is supposedly the same god of “turn the other cheek,” resolves the situation with mass murder.
Let’s review. God is jealous because people are worshipping one of the other gods. He decides to prove himself because faith without proof doesn’t matter (yet). His prophet mocks and belittles his adversaries. He throws down in a public display of power and wrath, showing off unnecessarily, well beyond the original rules of engagement. Having humiliated and defeated his opponents, he murders them. Dick.
~I AM~
July 3rd, 2005 at at 2:25 pm
What a dick.
July 3rd, 2005 at at 6:21 pm
I freakin’ love this series.
Don’t stop don’t stop don’t stop.
July 3rd, 2005 at at 6:27 pm
Terry Pratchett has treated the topic of jealous gods in his typically hilarious, tongue-in-cheek way in the Discworld novel ‘Small Gods’ – if you haven’t read it yet, you absolutely SHOULD! The man is a master of satire and sharp wit; not to mention laugh-out-loud funny.
July 3rd, 2005 at at 7:36 pm
I haven’t read that one, but I read “Good Omens,” which he wrote with Neil Gaiman. That’s an excellent book.
July 3rd, 2005 at at 8:45 pm
Figures I read this after my trip to the book store!
July 3rd, 2005 at at 9:15 pm
That’s funny, I just got “American Gods” by Neil Gaiman (and also a 1st edition of the Sandman hardback series). I never thought to ask you guys if you liked him or not.
I almost wanna go to church for sermons like these. Ofcourse, they probably don’t bring up many of the parts where god is an infantile dick in the regular churches. I would be one of the people making a scene in church if they talked about the interesting stuff.
July 3rd, 2005 at at 11:09 pm
Here’s another vote for “Small Gods”. I’ve enjoyed all the Discworld books, but this one blew me away. Highly recommended.
July 4th, 2005 at at 1:05 am
Keep ‘em commin….
July 4th, 2005 at at 1:25 am
WATER?
Right!
The only mistake the Baal boys made was not having seen boy scout water!!!
This was a setup by Elijah from the beginning!
July 4th, 2005 at at 9:48 am
Another great disection of scripture. I can’t wait for the next one.
July 5th, 2005 at at 2:44 am
As I recall the story, one day some kids were teasing Elijah saying “Go down, you bald head,” and our man-o-god reacted by summoning up some bears to rip the kids to pieces.
July 5th, 2005 at at 10:05 pm
Charles:
That was Elisha. 2 Kings 2:23-24.
July 6th, 2005 at at 1:44 am
My mistake.
July 6th, 2005 at at 4:36 pm
You go man. What I never did in fact GET. Why if this god could set a pile of water saturated wood on fire, Why then was the same god unable to selectively take the lives of the baal priests? More slight of hand, more swindlers and just think if you don’t agree with my interpretation then apparently I have the right , NO the duty to put you to death. You’d think people would finally get the simple fact that their god is, NOT
July 6th, 2005 at at 6:32 pm
This is funny, but is it too easy? Picking apart the inconsistancies of religion is no trouble at all. Virgin birth, Resurrecton, transubstantation, and Bible double-speak is childsplay.
Anyway, keep up the good work. If we can’t laugh at the Crazies…who can we laugh at?
July 6th, 2005 at at 6:47 pm
I’m not going after inconsistancies. I’m going after god personally. The point of this series is not that the bible is false. The point is that even if it were true, Yahweh wouldn’t be worthy of worship.
July 6th, 2005 at at 7:18 pm
Yes sir, I can see that. And I appreciate your wit and arguement. I suppose that arguing that god isn’t worthy of worship is like arguing that god prefers Moses to Mohamed. You start with a benchmark of existance, either way you are giving human qualities to the phantom, which is part of what got us into this mess. Don’t get me wrong. I’m loving your work, this series got me to hang around this site. But even if you are successful in an arguement with a believer, that god is a dick, they will still walk away believing in god, dick that he is.
I guess my problem is, I see everything as an arguement with some Jesus-freak. This arguement, while full of both vemon and giggles, leaves the loser with a new image of god. Which is really no better than he started.
That being said. I am Anxiously looking forward to the next installment! I like to argue, I’m sure it’s not an unheard of quality in the atheist blogosphere.
Nothing but Love.