The Hump of the Camel

Last year I wrote about David Peterson’s Engaging with God and how it radically transforms our view of Christian assembly by showing that the New Testament never describes, or intends, such meetings to be for worship. Inasmuch as “worship” forms a part of Christian life, it is transformed from the Old Testament temple-locus of God’s presence, to the concept of Christ and his people being the temple and the priesthood, and therefore Christian living itself is our “spiritual sacrifice.”

Judges 20: a nation confronts gang-rape

⁴ So the Levite, the husband of the murdered woman, said, “I and my concubine came to Gibeah in Benjamin to spend the night. ⁵ During the night the men of Gibeah came after me and surrounded the house, intending to kill me. They raped my concubine, and she died. ⁶ I took my concubine, cut her into pieces and sent one piece to each region of Israel’s inheritance, because they committed this lewd and outrageous act in Israel. ⁷ Now, all you Israelites, speak up and tell me what you have decided to do.”

⁸ All the men rose up together as one, saying, “What you did was both illegal and rather gross. ⁹ All of us will go home. No, not one of us will stir from his house, but the whole of Israel must keep silent about this thing for the sake of its impact on community cohesion. ¹⁰ As for you, we will give you what you deserve for this outrageous act done in Israel. It’s eighteen months in solitary for you, Sonny…

Another holiday, and another Islamist atrocity. If reports so far are to be believed, the perpetrator in New Orleans was, once more, a recent convert seeking to prove his credentials by waging war on the infidels – meaning Christians, Jews, atheists, idolaters, and Muslims either apostasising or not sufficiently zealous. Since that includes most people in New Orleans, the indiscriminate slaughter is seen to be a feature, not a bug. It’s maybe not for nothing that in Genesis 16:12 the angel of Yahweh prophesies that Ishmael “will be a wild donkey of a man, and his hand will be against everyone, and everyone’s hand against him; he will live in hostility toward all his brothers.”