Genesis 13 & 14: Abram Saves Lot

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Abram and Lot Separate (ch. 13 v. 1-18)

Abram was very rich in livestock, silver, and gold, and Lot also had flocks, herds, and tents. The land could not support them both and there was strife between them. Abram didn't like this fact, and decided the best way to fix it would be to separate, he told Lot to choose a direction to spread out and he would go in the opposite direction.

Abram and Lot get along, but they are getting in each other's way a bunch. So Abram looks at the situation and finds a simple solution to the problem. Seems good to me.

Guzik reminds us that Abram actually disobeyed God by bringing Lot along in the first place. He links this to the strife between the two of them.

Lot settled near Sodom and Abram settled in the land of Canaan. The Sodomites were wicked, great sinners against the lord. And the land of Canaan was currently had Canaanites and Perizzites dwelling there.

It makes me wonder why they chose these places. Lot decided to settle down near a bunch of sinners and Abram decided to settle in a land which is already filled with two different groups of people. Perhaps it is like this everywhere (or at least everywhere decent). Maybe there are people everywhere, and in particular sinners everywhere. *shrug*

A second time, God has promised the land of Canaan to Abram even though there are already people in the land. This time he specifically says that he will give his offspring the land forever. He also says that his offspring will be uncountable.

Once again, how is this fair to the people already there?

Abram Rescues Lot (ch. 14 v. 1-16)

There was a bunch of war in the area where Lot had settled down and at some point he got taken along with a bunch of other people. Abram heard word of this and took 318 trained men and was able to save Lot along with others.

Sounds good, Abram is basically a hero here right? Heard a member of his family was in trouble and went and saved him.

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Abram Blessed by Melchizedek (ch. 14 v. 17-24)

Malchizedek (who apparently also benefited from Abram's victory) blessed Abram. Abram then told him he could have a tenth of everything. He replied that he would take people, but for Abram to keep the goods for himself. Abram replied that God told him not to take anything from the king, otherwise he would be able to claim to have made Abram rich.

I'm a little confused by the 10% thing and then the "I won't take a single thing". Perhaps it was 10% of everything Abram had? Whatever, the heart of the matter is Abram doesn't want to take anything from the king and it seems that Abram has set the terms in such a way that was either fair, or if anything in favor of the king. It actually seems like pretty good diplomacy here, Abram got what he was actually after, the safety of his nephew, and he was fair (or more than fair) to his neighboring lands. If they have dealings in the future you would expect them to go well.

There's only one aspect of this that seems a little off to me, he told the king of Sodom that he doesn't want to take anything so the king can't claim to have made him rich in the future. Put yourself in the king's shoes there, do you feel a little insulted? I'm actually not sure myself, but this angle did occur to me. Perhaps he would just laugh it off, or perhaps he would even say "you're right, I would use that as leverage on you in the future" and he would respect him for being shrewd. Who knows.

Very minor point, but interesting, from Guzik here. He says that Abram is not supposed to let another man claim he has made Abram rich because the credit is supposed to go 100% toward God.

What was good about today's reading?
Abram dealt with a few difficult situations in a pretty reasonable way. But I already mentioned that didn't I? I think this whole "find the good and put it in green" thing is a bad idea, when I come across good I highlight it along the way, and I really do try to give the benefit of the doubt as much as I can. I think it is a good idea for me to keep trying to make sure to find any good parts I can and bring them up (and please, call me out on it if I miss something), but I don't like the way this is going. No more of this green text.

For the verses of note page:

--Diplomacy--

Genesis 14:22-24 Share the spoils of war

"But Abram said to the king of Sodom, "I have lifted my hand to the LORD, God Most High, Possessor of heaven and earth, that I would not take a thread or a sandal strap or anything that is yours, lest you should say, 'I have made Abram rich.' I will take nothing but what the young men have eaten, and the share of the men who went with me."

--Family--

Genesis 14:14 Go to extreme measures to help family

"When Abram heard that his kinsman had been taken captive, he led forth his trained men, born in his house, 318 of them, and went in pursuit as far as Dan."

--Interpersonal Conflict--

Genesis 13:9 Abram prevents further conflict with Lot

"Is not the whole land before you? Separate yourself from me. If you take the left hand, then I will go to the right, or if you take the right hand, then I will go to the left."

--Justice--

Genesis 13:12,15 God promises other people's land to Abram, agian

"Abram settled in the land of Canaan...for all the land that you see I will give to you and to your offspring forever."

What Does the New Testament Say About Interpersonal Conflict?

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I have recently finished reading the New Testament and I am collecting my thoughts about what I read in this series of posts. Today I am writing about what the New Testament says about Interpersonal Conflict. Other entries in this series:

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1. Slavery
2. The Apocalypse
3. Women
4. Violence
5. Sexuality
6. Obedience
7. Fear
8. Blasphemy
9. Wealth
10. Binary Thinking
11. Faith
12. the Afterlife and Free Will
13. Suffering
14. Family
15. Forgiveness
16. Love

When it comes to dealing with interpersonal conflicts, the New Testament has a fair bit to say. As is typical with the Bible, the quality of that advice is somewhat of a mixed bag, some is good, some is bad, and some is contradictory. We'll start with what is probably the most cited in my experience, the golden rule (Matthew 7:12). This is great advice, and many would argue that it is the basis of all morality, we are basically just talking about empathy here, putting yourself in someone else's shoes and treating them like you would want to be treated in their place. The mistake many Christians make is that this originated with Jesus, which is just ludicrous. Not that this is such a bad thing, the fact is the golden rule is in the bible and it is a good thing, but an honest person has to acknowledge that it was around before Jesus.

In addition to simply stating the golden rule, there are a number of verses which I would argue are good corollaries it. Titus 3:3 tells us to remember the mistakes we have made in the past, and give other people leeway when they make mistakes. James 3:10 reminds us that a thoughtless word can be really harmful to someone and and urges caution. Colossians 4:6, Titus 3:2, and 1 Timothy 2:8 tell us to be polite to people and to avoid quarreling, even when we disagree with people (I like this as long as we still allow friendly disagreement and discussion). Phil 8-9, 14 tells us that polite requests are better than orders, and finally Matthew 18:23-34 tells us that when people are kind to us, we should pay it forward. I think all of these things make sense through the lens of the golden rule, and I like them all.

The next most often quoted verse is turn the other cheek (Matthew 5:39). While there are situations where this is the appropriate action, I think it is poor advice for everyday life. I agree that if someone "strikes" you it is usually not the best idea to "strike" them back, if we do that we are going to be retaliating all the time and getting into endless cycles of violence. But allowing someone to repeatedly harm you just sets you up for a lot of pain, and telling people that this should be their default move sets them up to be taken advantage of. Turning the other cheek is of course in contrast to eye for an eye (Matthew 5:38), which Jesus is saying is not the right thing to do. If we look at what the rest of the new testament says about eye for an eye, we can find verses agreeing with Jesus (1 Thessalonians 5:15 and 1 Peter 3:8-9), hilariously enough though, there is a verse (2 Thessalonians 1:6) which disagrees with him. 

1 Peter 2:12 tells us to act honorably, even in the face of slander. This verse I like much better than turn the other cheek as the idea is more to rise above the bad things other people are doing to you, rather than telling you to let them keep doing it. Another verse that is also commonly quoted and sort of fits into this narrative is Matthew 5:44 which tells us to love our enemies. I've never been entirely sure what this means, if it means you should allow them to keep harming you like "turn the other cheek", then I hate it. If it means that you should rise above your differences, and try to consider your enemies as people and try to make peace, then I like it.

There are quite a few verses that tell us not to judge one another. I think this is good advice to a point, in life we come in contact with a huge number of people, and we make snap judgement of them. Largely this is simply by necessity, we have to judge who is trustworthy, we have to judge which situations are safe (which is largely dictated by the people who are around), and we have to judge who we think is the most capable to  accomplish whatever task is at hand. While we judge people very quickly, it is important to allow our initial impressions to change with new evidence, you don't want to think someone is crap because they were having a bad day when you met them. If that kind of thing is what the bible was talking about I would like it, but it doesn't read that way to me, Matthew 7:1, Luke 6:37, Romans 14:1-12, and 1 Corinthians 4:3 all simply say to not judge people. It's possible it is supposed to mean what I said, but I read it as not to judge at all, and I'm not even sure how to function that way, you simply have to make judgement about people to survive in society without being taken advantage of. Hilariously, 1 Corinthians 2:15 goes back on all of this, and says that if you are spiritual you can be judgmental of everything, and you are not subject to the judgement of others. Basically, we will judge you but you can't judge us back. This is the religion that I recognize. Of course, the bible tends to try to have things both ways, and in John 8:7 we are told to not judge people by different standards than we judge ourselves (he who is without sin should cast the first stone). This is a good message, and to the credit of most Christians it is the one they tend to focus on, but you have to acknowledge that both perspectives are in the bible.

I have heard Christians say to each other a number of times that they have to "get good with God", which just may be a reference to 2 Corinthians 7:12. While this might sound like a good thing initially, I would tend to ask why they need to "get good with God". Did they do something wrong? Many people interpret this to mean they need to ask God for forgiveness, when what they should be doing is fixing things with whoever they have harmed. Indeed, the verse itself suggests that we don't need to worry about the person who was wronged, but getting good with God is the primary concern. This is crap. Another idea that sounds decent until you look more closely comes from Matthew 5:25-26 and Luke 12:58 which tells us to try to settle legal matters out of court. On the surface this seems like a good idea as going to court is costly for the individuals involved as well as society at large. If we can solve our conflicts without the court it is better for everyone. But if we look at the verses more closely this is not the purpose here, they are in a situation where going to court will likely result in being thrown in prison. Once that reason is removed the command in the verse loses its meaning.

Given that this post was a little more schizophrenic than I would like, I would like to take a second look back at it. If you look at the concentration of verses, it becomes pretty obvious to me that the New Testament is overall pretty good on interpersonal conflict. More than anything it talks about variations of the golden rule, which is great. Also, most of my problems here are subtleties which can potentially be interpreted in different ways. In fact, in my experience, most Christians do interpret them in the reasonable fashion, which either means I'm being too nitpicky, or the average Christian is better than their holy book (I imagine it is a bit of both). But you have to admit that some of the verses I've highlighted here are pretty ridiculous.

1 Peter 2

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A Living Stone and a Holy People (v. 1-12)

If I'm understanding this correctly, this section is a metaphor of the building of the church. The congregation are the living stones and Jesus is the cornerstone.

Seems like a fine metaphor to use, when we talk about creating any group we talk about building it, building a community for example, why not use the metaphor of actually building with stone? There are a couple of verses I wanted to single out and discuss.

v1 "So put away all malice and all deceit and hypocrisy and envy and all slander."

We are off to a good start in this chapter, here's a bunch of things that are bad for you, and bad for the church if you are a part of it, don't do these things. The only thing I will add here, is that it might be tempting to complain that this is obvious, but I think that would be misguided. Even if something is obvious to you, there is value in having it pointed out. Perhaps you know something is bad, but you might do it anyway without thinking about it too hard. Then if someone makes a point of it you might reevaluate and correct your own behavior.  

v12 "Keep your conduct among the Gentiles honorable, so that when they speak against you as evildoers, they may see your good deeds and glorify God on the day of visitation."

I'm honestly not even really sure what to make of this one. We start with a command to be honorable, which sounds good. But then these people are going to call you evildoers anyway. Alright, fair enough, there's a group of people who are going to hate you anyway, but even in the face of that you should be a good person. But then it says they will see your good deeds and glorify God. It would seem to me that they can either call you an evildoer or they can recognize your good deeds and glorify God, but how can they do both? Perhaps it has something to do with that "day of visitation". I don't really know what that means, is that when they die? Maybe that is supposed to be when Jesus finally comes down to those people personally. Actually that kinda makes sense, the command says be good around people even when they treat you like crap, eventually (once Jesus helps them see the light) they will reflect on their interaction with you and view you favorably. I wonder if I'm on to something here, I'm curious what the Christian commentaries will say.

Guzik seems to generally agree with this idea, cool.

Submission to Authority (v. 13-25)

It is the will of God that you be subject to human institutions as well as to God. You should do good and silence the ignorant people who speak against Christians.

This is interesting, it says you should follow human leaders. It would wonder how you could follow this verse if the human institution and the word of God were in conflict though. Obviously you would expect that the answer would be to listen to God, but how do you then follow this instruction. I suppose perhaps it lies in the meaning of "be subject...to every human institution". It would appear to me that this means to follow every rule, but is there another meaning that I'm not seeing? 

Servants should be subject to their masters even if they are unjust. Jesus suffered even though he didn't deserve it, you should follow in his footsteps. It is a good thing if you suffer, you should be like Jesus and do not get angry or threaten in return.

First of all, what does 'servant' mean? It might mean slave, I looked at different translations and some say slave instead of servant. Some say household slaves or domestic slaves. I can't believe I'm going to write this, but the slavery itself is somewhat beside the point here, the bad thing is that the servants are supposed to be good to their masters even if they are unjust. What the hell?

As always, it is interesting to see how a Christian would try to defend something that is so obviously terrible. Guzik says the following "If we must endure hardship because of our Christian standards, it is commendable before God." Here is the good ol' Christian persecution complex again. But I would argue that what he is saying isn't even in the text. It doesn't seem to be talking about dealing with hardship from being Christian, it's just deal with hardship because your master is a piece of shit. Why should you have to take that?

He also quotes Meyer who said "Our case is like that of a criminal who had better bear quietly a sentence for a crime he has not committed, lest by too much outcry he induce investigation into a list of offenses, which are not charged against him, because they are not known." So basically, he's comparing this situation (being a slave with a shitty master) to a criminal who is in jail for a crime he didn't commit, but who should keep quiet because if they investigate too much they will find another crime for which he does deserve to be in jail. What a terrible analogy, the criminal deserves jail, he's just in there for the wrong thing, the slave was just screwed over by the world.

This is great, Gill's take is that the Jews thought that they shouldn't be slaves, and this verse along with others. Wow, so according to him the Jews tried to be anti-slavery and the bible put a stop to that idea. Amazing. If Gill is correct, this would have been a perfect time for an all loving God to jump on this opportunity and say "Yes, you are correct you should not be slaves to anyone. But that goes for everyone, not just you guys." Christians will often argue that slavery was just the way it was back then and it is unreasonable to think he would just put a stop to it. As terrible as that argument is, given this idea from Gill it is that much worse. Here is a perfect opportunity.

Up until the end here, I really though I was going to have a day where all of the summaries were good, and then BAM, right at the end, slavery. You almost got one through bible, you almost made it one day without being horrible.

For the overview post (If you think I should add or remove stuff from this list please let me know, I think it would make good conversation)

Good:

2:1 malice, deceit, hypocrisy, envy, and slander are all bad things.

"So put away all malice and all deceit and hypocrisy and envy and all slander."

2:12 Act in an honorable manner even in the face of slander.

"Keep your conduct among the Gentiles honorable, so that when they speak against you as evildoers, they may see your good deeds and glorify God on the day of visitation."

2:13 Follow all rules of earthly government

"Be subject for the Lord's sake to every human institution..."

Bad:

2:18 Slaves, respect your masters even if they are unjust to you

"Servants, be subject to your masters with all respect, not only to the good and gentle but also to the unjust."