Rape in the Bible

Again EB starts off an article with the claim that the Bible condones raping women. The writer presumes to think for its readers, entering in opinions about just how bad of a crime rape really is. It says "How anyone can get their moral guidance from a book that allows rape escapes me." Now, after butchering the English language, it again attacks the Bible using its own opinions, that the Bible condones rape, without looking at the actual text. Again it fails to realize that the Bible frequently tells stories of the Israelites' wrongful acts, but that by no means shows that the Bible is condoning what they are doing. Let's take at look at their so-called "examples":

1) Murder, rape, and pillage at Jabesh-Gilead (Judges 21. 10-24): First off I would like to ask a simple question: Where was the rape? It never says it outright in the verse, and therefore requires some very large assumptions from EvilBible in order to make this work for them, which they do without a thought. EB uses this syllogism: "The virgin's relatives were killed. The men who killed them took the virgins in. They got married, so it must have been equivalent to rape (notice EB also assumes the marriage was forced)" Syllogisms do not contain perfect logic, for example "fish can swim. I can swim. I must be a fish." Therefore, there is no reason to believe that this actually contained rape, let alone repeatedly. There were even regulations for how to deal with said regulation. Give them a peace offer (Deut 20.10-14). This verse even goes on to show how war captives were to be treated, as follows:

1. Provide them with housing (taking them in)
2. Allowing them 1 month to mourn.
3. Then allow marriage
4. If they divorce, no mistreatment.

Where's the rape? You should know by now.

2) Murder, rape, and pillage of the Midianites (Numbers 31.7-18): Almost the same thing as above. Again, they say "Clearly Moses approves of rape of virgins". Apparently EB sees the word virgin and immediately thinks rape. Rape, or even sex, is never mentioned in the entire verse. The process above still applies, as well.

3) More murder, rape, and pillage (Deuteronomy 20.10-14): Let's make a little checklist, shall we?

• Murder: This is war, and peace was rejected, God even commanded to offer peace.


• Rape: Still only says as much as the above two, rape's been inserted by EB.


• Slavery: The word that here was translated as forced slavery can also be translated to simply mean work, which here could easily be a form of indentured servitude. Also, I already talked about how slavery in the Bible's time, not the same as America's early history: http://debunkedevil.blogspot.com/2009/10/slavery-in-bible.html

4) Laws of rape (Deut 22.28-29): Here Mariano was a great resource by providing the etymology of the verse. The word used here, translated as rape, is the Hebrew word shakab, meaning lying down. Taphas is the Hebrew word for catching, handling, taking hold, and isn't used. If you look at most other translations it merely says "a virgin, who is not betrothed, and he lays hold of her and lies with her." Where in the verse does it say the intercourse was forced? The verse even ends with "and they were found". It doesn't say he was caught, THEY were caught. This shows that they were engaging in fornication, not rape. This made them have to get married because the woman was not even previously betrothed.

5) Death to the rape victim (Deut. 22. 23-24): Here it is interesting to note than EB has been citing the NLT, and now switches to the NAB for the remainder of the article. The NLT's verse is even farther away from citing rape, while the NAB is closer, and therefore suits EB's purpose, deliberate misinterpretation, better. The NLT says "suppose a man meets a young woman, a virgin engaged to a man, and has sexual intercourse with her..." Again, no rape. This is fornication, and both are punished for it. They cannot get married like #4 because she is already engaged, so they must be punished, and God has rules set for that. Also, there is a part EB conveniently left out in the very next verse. It says "But if the man meets the engaged woman out in the country, and he rapes her, than only the man must die." Sound like condoning rape to you?

Also, for those who would point out the "but" to mean it meant it in the first part as well, literal translations of the first one say "but she did not cry out", and in the countryside crying out is far less likely to help at all. This shows that the woman was in fact raped, while if she didn't cry out people would know it wasn't rape.

6) David's punishment- Polygamy, rape, baby killing, and God's "forgiveness" (2 Samuel 12. 11-14): To start God is punishing David for polygamy and adultery, so condoning that is out of the question. Deuteronomy 17:15, 17 says: "You shall set a king over you...He must not take many wives, or his heart will be led astray." Let's try another checklist:

• Rape: Absent. Lying with the neighbor is his wives committing adultery, no rape.


• Polygamy: Present. God punished David for it.


• Baby Killing: Present. God judged David because David had made followers of God look like hypocrites for committing adultery with Bathsheba. Capital punishment, explained here: www.debunkedevil.blogspot.com/2009/10/murder-in-bible.html


• Forgiveness: Present. The punishment for adultery is death, but God forgave David. Funny thing is, for EB this should be a bad thing.

7) Rape of female captives (Deut 21. 10-14): This was cited earlier in order to show that there wasn't rape, see the process at the end of #1. The process showed that they must be married in order to have sexual relations. None of this was forced, including the marriage. There's not rape, once again EB inserts a very disturbing misinterpretation.

8) Rape and the Spoils of War (Judges 5. 30): Again there is rape inserted by EB's author. None actually in the verse. A girl for each man means as a slave, not a sex slave. Furthermore, this was actually a lyrical poem sang by Deborah, not meant to be interpreted literally like has been by EB.

9) Sex Slaves (Exodus 21. 7-11): I have already dealt with this in my slavery post: www.debunkedevil.blogspot.com/2009/10/slavery-in-bible.html. A quick refresher, this never says sex anywhere, nor implies it. These were laws handling the treatment of female slaves, nothing more. It even states that a man may marry her to one of his sons. This must occur for any sex; otherwise it would be fornication, which the Bible is patently against. Women were sold into slavery by their families or willingly went in order to pay off debts that they owed, which was more like indentured slavery, a term that didn't exist at the time. Apparently EB sees "woman" and "slave" and immediately thinks "sex slave".

10) God Assists Rape and Plunder (Zechariah 12:1-2): Again EB takes a verse out of context, and those who use biblegateway.com or another such site in reference to this (Good idea, by the way), pull up just one more verse after this. It reads: "Then shall the Lord go forth, and fight against these nations". Another translation of verse one "Behold, the day of the Lord cometh." This verse has Israel being defeated for turning away from God, and then God will come to redeem them. The rape described here is the disgusting acts of other nations, and God punishes them for it when he redeems Israel. Hardly condoning rape.

Conclusion: Thus ends Evilbible.com's unfounded rant about the Bible condoning rape. It should be known by now that it clearly doesn't, in fact just the opposite. There is a clear difference between it being in the Bible, and the Bible condoning it. Also, massive assumptions aren't acceptable as evidence. It doesn't explicitly say rape in 90% of these verses, that part is inserted. It helps to understand the slavery side of this as well, so check it out. My link was posted in one of the answers above. Thanks!

My friend Mariano also has a thing or two to say about this, in a more detailed way than I: http://atheismisdead.blogspot.com/2009/04/atheism-bible-rape-evilbiblecom-and-dan.html
and for another perspective:
http://reformedanswers.org/answer.asp/file/99778.qna/category/ot/page/questions/site/
About fornication:
http://www.bible.ca/s-premarital-sex.htm