Talk:The Bible and violence

The Bible and Genocide

My edits which clarify that acts of complete extermination of an ethnic group of humans are acts of genocide (by definition) was reverted with the justification that "that's an interpretation". It is not an interpretation, it is the definition of genocide.

See the revision diff

Gråbergs Gråa Sång, I would like this reversion to be reverted. ----Cowlinator (talk) 21:08, 20 August 2020 (UTC)

See also

• genocide on wiktionary
• genocide in the meriam-webster dictionary
• genocide in the cambridge dictionary

According to WP:REVERT, the explanation for the reversion is inadequate. Cowlinator (talk) 21:30, 20 August 2020 (UTC)

Cowlinator Minor thing, your ping didn't work (see Help:Fixing failed pings).

I'm not saying genocide should not be mentioned in this article, it most certainly should. It's in the lead and the word appear about ten more times in the body, and there's WP:RS to base such content on (probably, as I think you said, enough to base an article on). That said, I don't think it's a good idea to include the word in the Narrative section. In my biased view of the topic, there's probably considerable disagreement in sources what (if any) parts of the Bible counts as genocide, historicity aside. Text about this fits hand in glove in sections 3 and 4.

The "The Hebrew Bible and Genocide" section you inserted as written is WP:OR. Who says "There are 6 instances of the Israelites committing genocide, as commanded by God, in the Hebrew Bible."? Why should "instances of the Israelites committing genocide, as commanded by God" be specifically "sectioned"? There's a lot of violent stuff going on on these pages, everything not on the ark being drowned, David collecting his dowry, people looking at the ark (the small one), and more.

That's my view. DimadickPaleoNeonateErmenrichJenhawk777, other interested, do you have opinions? Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 08:34, 21 August 2020 (UTC)

Genocidal actions in the Bible should probably be highlighted, either in their own section or in a section about divinely sanctioned violence. However quoting dictionary definitions seems useless. We need reliable, third-party sources which specifically call these acts genocide. Dimadick (talk) 08:41, 21 August 2020 (UTC)

Without checking sources, I'm pretty sure there are genocidal acts in the Bible that are not divinely sanctioned. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 09:02, 21 August 2020 (UTC)

I can give citations for the destruction of the Amalekites being genocide and even people wrestling with that fact (but of course, it’s not clear if the Amalekites ever existed). But I agree: the word genocide shouldn’t be in the narrative section, and I’m not sure it needs its own section.—Ermenrich (talk) 12:04, 21 August 2020 (UTC)

I think using the biblical term herem and what it meant would be more appropriate than a modern term, for these reasons: first, this page is about what the Bible says and genocide is not a biblical term.

• Second, the Bible says the Amelekites were completely wiped out, only to refer to them again later as existing after that original claim was made. In fact, there are Biblical statements referring to other peoples whom the Bible claims were wiped out continuing to exist as well--such as the Canaanites--who have apparently lived on as the Lebanese according to DNA. Either the Bible says contradictory things--and it often contradicts itself without apology--or perhaps we misunderstand the meaning of herem. Scholars don't really know which and we can't just pick for ourselves.
• Third, not only do we not fully understand the meaning of herem, but the definition of genocide is also debated. I have no problem with using those RS which say these are acts of genocide, within the section, and then discussing its meaning and application, but I vote for not titling the section with it, because that makes assumptions about meaning that no RS makes.

However, that requires that the rest of this discussion be included, and I think that means I agree that it should be a section of its own.

I believe I had this in this article at one point, and if it isn't still here then my favorite nemesis reverted it, but I have always thought it needed to be here.

Yes to a section, no to using genocide in the title, yes to discussing it within the section. Jenhawk777 (talk) 18:36, 21 August 2020 (UTC)

I'm confused as to how whether the Amelekites were completely wiped out or not, or whether there is a contradiction, has any relation to whether it is genocide. All reliable sources consider the Nazi extermination of the Jews to be genocide. There are documented survivors. Genocide does not require there to be zero survivors.

I agree with Dimadick that there should be a section about genocide containing 3rd-party sources. I realize now that the way I wrote the section was original research, so I'm fine with that section being removed, but it should be replaced with a much-needed section about genocide as described by Dimadick. ----Cowlinator (talk) 19:11, 21 August 2020 (UTC)

Here's what I have, from Dozeman, Thomas B.; Shectman, Sarah (2016). "Exodus". In Yee, Gale A.; Page, Hugh R. Jr.; Coomber, Matthew J. M. (eds.). The Pentateuch: Fortress Commentary on the Bible Study Edition. Fortress Press. JSTOR j.ctt1b3t6qt.11. {{cite book}}: Invalid |ref=harv (help)

The conclusion of the story is a divine speech to Moses, which turns from the present battle to the future genocide of the Amalekites. YHWH swears vengeance against the Amalekites and predicts the elimination of their memory from under heaven (Exod. 18:14). The genocide of the Amalekites is prophesied again by Balaam (Num. 24:20) and repeated by Moses to the second generation (Deut. 25:19) before YHWH commands Saul to fulfill the oath by exterminating the nation through the execution of the ban (1 Sam. 15:3).

And slightly further down (ignoring some further commentary as done by the rabbis and early-medieval church):

Alastair Hunter states the problem of the divine curse on Amalek in contemporary discussion: “We ignore at our peril the potential for violence built into the Bible” (92–108). She notes that the Amalekites become the archetypal victims in the Pentateuch, in that the divine instruction to destroy the nation is given on several different occasions, while the circumstances of the war are never clearly stated. In spite of the lack of clarity over the conflict, the presentation of the Amalekites illustrates the rhetorical device of portraying the victim or cursed nation as the aggressor in order to justify their elimination. The result is that the Amalekites exist only to be exterminated. The literary strategy of the Bible to victimize the Amalekites as the cursed enemy has allowed later readers to empty the term of its historical meaning, so that it can be reappropriated in new ways to disenfranchise others. The result is that the word Amalekite becomes a cipher for the enemy, whomever it may be. As a consequence, the perpetuation of violence becomes a religious obligation, whether it be the “war on terror” or the “politics of Amalek” waged by West Bank settlers against Palestinians (Masalha, 127–31).

The commentary also uses genocide to describe the attempts of pharaoh to kill all the Israelite children as well as the death of the firstborn.--Ermenrich (talk) 19:24, 21 August 2020 (UTC)

@Ermenrich and Cowlinator: Well, I have to say I can't directly answer Cowlinator's question except to say I have seen it presented that way, but your argument about the Jews is a good one. I concede. And these quotes are great. They should definitely be included. I concede completely to the brilliant and well referenced Ermenrich as well. Jenhawk777 (talk) 20:18, 21 August 2020 (UTC)

Good source, great find. We should include any commentary about the Pharaoh's genocide as well, I had not considered that. ----Cowlinator (talk) 22:06, 21 August 2020 (UTC)

There's also the flood, but I'm not sure if sources call that genocide (Extinction events in the Bible?). In NT there's Massacre of the Innocents. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 11:11, 22 August 2020 (UTC)

A ping catched my attention. I see that the above is mostly solved already (thanks Ermenrich). For the flood, while it can be considered violence, I'm not personally familiar with it being called genocide (I can't say I searched a lot but sources that I know mostly describe it as a borrowed myth that perhaps had inspiration from a previous local natural catastrophe, other than the theological aspects like the symbolism of the rainbow, etc). —PaleoNeonate – 21:37, 23 August 2020 (UTC)

References

corporal

@Ermenrich: I noted you removed corporal and replaced it with criminal, but I think you have removed the broader term and replaced it with a more limited one. Corporal simply means physical, so it refers to all physical suffering which would include any punishment of criminals as well as others in those days. Criminal punishment would not include punishment of children and slaves and so on, so it's more limited. Perhaps a rephrase is warranted. Jenhawk777 (talk) 20:38, 25 June 2021 (UTC)

I actually just reverted the IPs changes to what the text read before. My objection to corporal is that it does not include capital punishment (stoning for adultery, for instance).—Ermenrich (talk) 21:29, 25 June 2021 (UTC)

Hi Ermenrich! Corporal does include capitol if you think about it: death is pretty physical. But perhaps for clarity it would be appropriate to add capitol to the list there. I have no problem with that. It's in the body of the article. Go ahead and do so if you feel strongly that it should be mentioned. I support you. Jenhawk777 (talk) 03:42, 26 June 2021 (UTC)

Citation style tag

@Susmuffin: The tag for an unclear citation style is confusing me. What exactly are you referring to? I have looked at the citations and except for one reference, #136, they all use the citation templates that are on everyone's editing page. They are all the same style, except 136 which uses Harvard, which is also perfectly copacetic. Unless you are putting an article up for FAN or A status, there is no requirement in WP that all references in an article must use the same citation method. What is unclear about any of that is unclear to me. Please explain - or just remove the tag - that'll work too. Jenhawk777 (talk) 04:00, 26 June 2021 (UTC)

Thank you! Jenhawk777 (talk) 20:31, 26 June 2021 (UTC)

Luizpuodzius

Gostaria de saber caso possa interessar e poder traduzir se a tradução é pertinente.(I would like to know if you are interested and to be able to translate if a translation is relevant) att 187.20.18.68 (talk) 12:41, 5 January 2022 (UTC)

This is the English Wikipedia, so you are expected to communicate in English. You have written on a page meant for discussing the WP-article The Bible and violence, but this link may have something you find interesting:Wikipedia:Translation. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 13:58, 5 January 2022 (UTC)

Hi IP, I suggest that if, in the future, you come to have recommendations for me to make Wikipedia better, please insert them in my talk page to avoid xenophobic comments. Dr. Loo^{Talk to me} 23:07, 19 March 2022 (UTC)

May someone explain why is the "Hamsa" (Yiddish!) word in the article in the first place?

I don't see how this is relevant to the article. And is misspelt as 'Hamas' BeanBandit54 (talk) 16:29, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

Is this a serious question? Read the section of the article about it. It's identified by WP:RS as a Hebrew word "hamas" meaning violence, used frequently in the Hebrew Bible.--Ermenrich (talk) 17:09, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

Fair enough, my bad. How is it relevant to the article though?

There are problably dozens terms that mean harm and voilence in Hebrew. What is the purpose of it being in the article? BeanBandit54 (talk) 17:16, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

It’s discussed by reliable sources as relevant to the topic of violence in the Bible.—-Ermenrich (talk) 18:06, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

Please elaborate in what way do you understand it to be relevant. I believe you ar enot just taking info out of context and adding it to the article just because it 'seems' relevant to you. The two words in question are not even mentioned once in the article in the text below. BeanBandit54 (talk) 18:11, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

I don't find it relevant. WP:reliable sources do. And I struggle to see how the Hebrew word for "violence" would not be relevant in the article about violence in the Bible.--Ermenrich (talk) 18:17, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

I am happy to explain to you why it is not relevant.

First off, it's a word. There are, surely, many words in Hebrew that are used to describe voilence, right? You woudn't list them in the article would you? Because this is not an article about "terms related to violence in the Bible", this is about the topic of voilence. Also, if you think about whoever added the words, and consider the current political situation you can see why someone would want to add this in there. Or is it just a coincidence?

If you think there is any relevant context that explains why the terms are relevant to the article I think you will need to add it to the article, not just state someone wrote about the words as inportant.

If you want this to be relevant to the context of the article you need more context on how is it relevant. Provide the context and add it to the article. BeanBandit54 (talk) 18:32, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

If you have WP:RS discussing other Hebrew words meaning "violence" in the Bible, bring those sources and edit the article. You saying "There are, surely" is not good enough. A WP-article on any topic is supposed to be a summary of WP:RS about that topic. Sometimes we come fairly close. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 18:42, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

"The two words in question are not even mentioned once in the article in the text below." I don't get your point here. Why should those words turn up in, for example, The_Bible_and_violence#Sociological_reflections_and_responses? Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 18:23, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

they would, if they are relevant to the whole article, which they are not :D BeanBandit54 (talk) 18:32, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

Still not with you. In a WP-article, content in one section does not have to appear in every other section. As a WP:OTHERCONTENT comparison, see Slavery#Etymology. You don't see slavic tribes mentioned in other article sections. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 18:39, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

This here is not an article on words or etymology. This is about the whole topic in the context of the Bible. I will give you an exampe, you have an article on Math, where you start with explaining the words and what they mean, because in math the words are necessary to undesratnd math (the topic). The topic here is the violence in the Bible. The bible is not a textbook on violence. This is to say "Where you see 'hamas' in the bible in Hebrew, this means - x". Are you with me now? My poin is, if these terms are relevant, we need context how are they relevant. BeanBandit54 (talk) 18:52, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

They are relevant because they are how violence is discussed in the Hebrew Bible. This is not a math article. See, e.g., conceptual history for an idea why scholars might find it important to discuss how violence appears in the Bible linguistically (what terms with what range of meanings, in what contexts). In any case, since WP:reliable sources do discuss these terms in the context of violence in the Bible, saying that you do not personally find them relevant is, well, irrelevant from Wikipedia's standpoint.--Ermenrich (talk) 19:08, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

these sources have given context that is missing here 82.103.76.217 (talk) 21:14, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

BeanBandit54 Hello, jumping in here as a former contributor to this article, and probably the person who wrote most of that. IMO Ermenrich is right. The terms an ancient people used to describe their world, and their definitions, tell us about who those people were, what kind of world they lived in, and how they responded to that environment. Accurate definitions matter. They describe meaning, value and use - behavior - attitudes and beliefs.

I will go out on a limb here and say pretty much everyone recognizes that language matters, that it shapes our perception of reality - or at the very least - reflects our perception of reality. (This is known as linguistic determinism or linguistic relativity.) The words we use and choose are revealing. This is something you are well aware of or you would not be arguing that this article is political and biased. The language we use influences our thoughts and perceptions of the world around us.

That isn't the real problem with this article though - which I too have always had trouble with.

I worked on this article when I was a new wikipedian. I originally had a whole section on peace - which to me seemed relevant in a discussion of the Bible's views on violence, which should include everything the Bible has to say on this topic, pros and cons - and the other editor who was already invested here, deleted it all. That made the Bible seem more focused on violence than it actually is - imo - but there was no budging him. He interpreted the title as limiting the discussion to just violence. I finally gave up and left. He eventually got kicked off of WP. If you want to better balance this article, I suggest an addition not a deletion. Add in all the ways the Bible is anti-violence and pro-peace. It's been several years and this article needs updating anyway. Don't gripe: rewrite. Writing content takes a real commitment, but it's a much better expenditure of time. Condense what's here, get good quality sources, and go for a better balanced, more broadly representative of current scholarship article, with a more neutral pov. It needs it. That's what we do here. I wish you well. Jenhawk777 (talk) 21:00, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

Well, making an article better is not always done by just adding more to it. The topic is violence, so it should be dealing with violence. Just mentioning the words and their usage does not make them informative to the article if their role is not contextualised so that the reader knows why they are important. Mentioning them would be relevant to the topic if the article was dealing with a semiotic or lexical study. Or if it was dealing with analyzing how often violent words were used. If it was it would have been completely different article with a completely different title.

And if let's say you argue that these type of studies are important to the current articles topic, you need to contextualize this.

The way they are right now is out of place in my opinion and are weird. I'm not going to argue anymore. Just explaining my point for the last time. 82.103.76.217 (talk) 21:22, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

this is me, didn't login, sorry BeanBandit54 (talk) 21:23, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

BeanBandit54 I think what we are all trying to say to you is that it is in context already. It is in the context of the Bible. It is in the context of how language is used in the Bible by the people who were part of writing the Bible. What other context could this article, titled as it is, possibly have? Jenhawk777 (talk) 04:03, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

I agree with Jenhawk that the current version of the article isn’t ideal (things like unattributed quotes, for instance, maybe also POV), but as they also say, the terminology of violence is still important.—-Ermenrich (talk) 13:21, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

BeanBandit54 I have now moved the various definitions in response to your concerns about context. You and Ermenrich, Gråbergs Gråa Sång and 82.103.76.217 will have to determine whether or not that is actually an improvement. Jenhawk777 (talk) 19:30, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

Without looking at anything in depth, I think that the gist of the edits is an improvement and that I trust you to do a good job, Jenhawk777!--Ermenrich (talk) 20:03, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

Bless you! That's one yes then. And thank you so much for the compliment. Ditto back at you! Jenhawk777 (talk) 20:10, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

Echo that. But you (Jenhawk) messed up my Hamas (disambiguation) edit ;-) Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 20:33, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

OOPS! So sorry! Did you fix it or do you want me to? Jenhawk777 (talk) 22:12, 15 January 2024 (UTC)

Nevermind, I just meant you removed the section I was linking to (with reason), it's not an issue. I "fixed" it with a self-revert. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 08:17, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

Made a comment on Wiktionary:[1]. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 09:03, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

Excellent discussion there. I did not know there was a similar word in Arabic, but should have guessed, I suppose, from recent events. Not being political myself, I often don't think of these things. Good thing I have you! Is there anything we need to do to the article in light of this? Jenhawk777 (talk) 18:42, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

I don't think so. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 20:03, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

Gråbergs Gråa Sång Relooking at this article after all this time has made me question some things. There are four kinds of violence listed in the definition section - why the heck isn't the article organized around those? Why mention four categories then do nothing with them? The author was too preoccupied with conflict with the other editor I'm afraid. AAarrggh! Jenhawk777 (talk) 18:48, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

Reorganizing around the four types sounds reasonable to me - if you feel up to doing it that is! I'm not likely to be too much help on this, I'm afraid.--Ermenrich (talk) 18:51, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

Are we talking about the "The biblical writers ... define violence as a problem in four general categories" wording? I'm looking at the cite, 1 academic, ctrl-f-ing "catego" and I'm not seeing it as of now. Author speaks of "Recent scholarly interest in violence in the Old Testament falls into one of two primary, if uneven categories." That is quite different. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 20:02, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

There are two sources, Creach and Lynch. I haven't checked them. Which one do you have that said 'primary' categories? That would have been good to include as well! What a crap job I did here! Jenhawk777 (talk) 20:08, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

I was quoting the [2], placed at the end of the WP-sentence I quoted. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 20:14, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

Okay Creach. The source for the last part is Lynch and the google books only previews up to page 35, so it will require some actual time and effort to run that one down. Sigh. I'll do it in a bit. Jenhawk777 (talk) 21:56, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

It's not at the Archive or the Open Library. I may be reduced to a resource request. Jenhawk777 (talk) 21:59, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

Gråbergs Gråa Sång I found it! It's available on the Cambridge core at MyLibrary! You can see the whole book. Lynch is the source of the four "categories" that aren't really categories but are kind of... I took out the term and just included the four things. I have now provided correct page numbers for each claim - more citations. Citations are absolutely correct. Check it out! Which throws me back to - why isn't this article organized around these? Maybe because it's not a good idea to follow one book too closely? Anyway, it makes me feel a little better knowing that under extreme stress and doing not very good work, I still sourced things correctly. Jenhawk777 (talk) 05:11, 19 January 2024 (UTC)

@Jenhawk777 In general, for this kind of article (The Bible and X, Exodus, Saul and whatever) it makes good sense to me, and I think a lot of readers, to start with the texts/Biblical narrative (not necessarily at the very top). It's blunt but understandable and has an amount of logic. In this case it makes the point that there is a crapload of violence in the Bible, which I consider an important point.

Since that ancient (but archived and preserved) time you, me, Aleph and Jytdog managed to agree that "book by book" was at least improvement, that part has pretty much stuck, though evolved and improved with some academic additions, and I think that is basically good. Looking at it again, I think some trimming can be in order, for example David's and Joshua's doings has a lot detail (and probably separate WP-articles). There's also some sections like those about Hell and Marcionism and supersessionism that seems to stray off topic quite a bit, perhaps they can be shortened and/or moved to other articles too. That would give more room (we're at 11,153 words atm) to add some more on-topic scholarship. If there are any good such, but I wouldn't be surprised.

I glanced in a cited Creach-book [3] and saw this heading: "Approaching texts that seem to promote violence". My knee-jerk reaction is that such scholarship is mostly off-topic for this article, it's Christian thinking (?) for a Christian audience.

That's my rant for today, as usual worth every cent you paid for it. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 17:44, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

I have mostly a foggy impression of one bad feeling after another with this article. Jytdog got banned, Aleph stopped speaking to me. I am not inclined to spend time on it because of that I suppose. It needs it, but I am not up to it - at least not yet. Someone else will come along and be willing to do more than complain - someday. Jenhawk777 (talk) 20:05, 21 January 2024 (UTC)