flood of violence

A mere six chapters into the Bible, God decides to kill every living being on earth—every bird, every animal and every human. (Gn 6-7). Why birds and animals had to suffer and die for the sins of mankind isn’t made clear but save for a handful on a boat they are all said to perish under swirling holy water. These same waters swallowed terrified mothers and their infants, screaming little boys and girls, men and women. All washed away as God scrubbed the earth clean of wickedness. Ah, can’t you just see the new world sparkle!

A critical examination of The Flood should include a study of the Epic of Gilgamesh (a much older myth sharing some twenty major points strongly suggesting the Israelites simply stole the story). However, rather than focusing on this fact, the complete lack of archaeological evidence of such a flood, or the sheer absurdity of thinking one could possibly gather every species “that breathes” from the far reaches of the planet, I think more profound truths might be discovered by asking a few questions.

What was accomplished with The Flood? What was the long-term benefit of the most violent act in all of literature — was all the killing worth it?

The Bible itself shows God’s attempt to wash away wickedness to be the most miserable failure of all time. In the chapters immediately following the slaughter of all slaughters, wickedness spreads as quickly as the flood waters did. And God responds to this new human wickedness with more divine wickedness. Faced with the problem of sin in Sodom, he chose to incinerate the valley’s inhabitants with “fire and brimstone” (Gn 19:24). Jealous that the children of Israel were worshipping idols, he chose to murder the transgressors, commanding men to take up their swords and “kill your brothers and friends and neighbors” (Ex 32:27-29).

The biblical message is loud and clear. Violence purifies, destruction is righteous and bloodshed redeems, and this message has validated brutality for two thousand years. The idea of a punishing God justifies the violent actions of the punishing parent, authority figure, and nation.

When Martin Luther King, Jr. won the Nobel Peace Prize he said, “Nonviolence is the answer to the crucial political and moral questions of our time; the need for man to overcome oppression and violence without resorting to oppression and violence. Man must evolve for all human conflict a method which rejects revenge, aggression and retaliation. The foundation of such a method is love.” King eloquently articulated the weakness of violence, describing it as “a descending spiral” which begets “the very thing it seeks to destroy.” He said that violence does not diminish evil but only multiplies it: “Through violence you may murder the liar, but you cannot murder the lie, nor establish the truth. Through violence you murder the hater, but you do not murder hate.”

God’s violence only begat more violence. He drowned the wicked but not wickedness, incinerated sinners but not sin and murdered idolators but not idolotry. As King said, violence doesn’t eliminate wickedness but multiplies it. At the very best, violence is a short term solution. To reach our full potential as human beings—as humane beings—we will have to learn to resolve problems without resorting to violence and this begins with a devotion to compassion not to the dangerous delusion called God.