• @CeeBee@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    Stoning was torture, as well as a form of punishment

    By today’s standards, absolutely. But in those days and in those cultures, it wasn’t.

    Those were teachings, and commandments by god to torture various people for various reasons.

    No they weren’t. The example of Job wasn’t God torturing him. It was Satan torturing him. The ultimate point of which was to show that people can/will be persecuted for their faith. Now a discussion on why it was allowed to happen is a completely different discussion.

    I’m not sure what your point is with Proverbs 19:18. All it says is to “discipline your son (children)”.

    Proverbs 13:24 - oh I see, you think disciplining with a rod means to beat the kid. Except the rod that’s referenced with discipline is the kind of rod a shepherd uses. And a shepherd doesn’t beat their sheep, they use it to guide by applying pressure here or there to coax the sheep to go a certain direction, and only when needed. That’s the discipline that’s being taught. Firm guidance to correct the path a child is on. It’s the same theme with God’s people being called “His flock”. A shepherd cares for all the sheep under his care. Even in one of Jesus’ parables he mentions a shepherd who leaves the flock to find a lost sheep and bring it back to the flock. All of these analogies are about diligent care.

    Deuteronomy 17:2-7 - Executing someone for violating laws isn’t anything new and is not torture. Many countries still do it in some cases. We can debate the ethics of capital punishment, but our viewpoints are biased by modern standards. We have established governments and comprehensive legal infrastructures in place. We can call emergency services if something bad is happening or even a lawyer to deal with non-life threatening issue if it’s a legal matter. None of that existed back then. The constraints that ancient people had to work with, compared to modern times, necessitated a more “brutal” approach (for lack of a better word) to maintain order.

    So to equate the ancient, yet simplistic, way of maintaining order with torture is entirely disingenuous.

    edit: formatting