In November I flew to San Francisco where I attended I attended the  Meeting of the Evangelical Theological Society (ETS), The Annual Meeting of the Evangelical Philosophical Society (EPS), The Evangelical Philosophical Society Apologetics Conference and The Annual Meeting of the Society for Biblical Literature (SBL) and American academy of religion.(AAR). While I would love to give detailed commentary on each session, to do so would require several blog posts of inordinate length, instead I will simply summarise what went down.

I arrived in San Francisco at around 4pm  on the 15^th. I presented my first paper at 8:30am the next morning. My paper was a critique of Walter Sinnott Armstrong’s arguments against divine command theory meta-ethics. Armstrong contends that the nature of moral obligation is best explained by identifying moral obligations with the natural property of harming others without justification, and, focusing largely on Craig’s work, argues this is superior to divine command ethics. I argued: (a) his argument fails to note the conditional nature of Craig’s (his main target’s) contention that if theism is true moral obligations are best explained as divinecommands (b) Armstrong’s does not provide a better account of moral objectivity (c) Armstrong’s account is not more economical than a divine command theory. (d) Even if it were an economical account, it does not explain various features of obligation such as (i) the social nature of moral obligations (ii) the fact that moral obligations constitute a decisive reason for acting and (iii) the specific moral content of obligations; as well as a divine command theory. All in around 30 minutes!!! The paper was very well received, with several people asking me to forward them a copy. I plan to get it published later this year.

In my Atlanta paper I argued that Nicholas Wolterstorff’s reading of the Canaanite conquest accounts in Joshua can also be applied to the account of Saul exterminating the Amalekites in 1 Sam 15.

First, the so-called ‘genocide accounts’ in 1 Sam 15 are part of a broader context that includes the rest of Samuel and also other canonical books, such as 2 Samuel and the book of Chronicles. When one reads the whole sequence, one observes that while 1 Samuel 15 describes Saul, at God’s command, exterminating the Amalekites, later passages in Samuel and Chronicles proceed on the assumption this never literally happened.

The key passage is God’s command to Samuel, “strike [nakah] Amalek [the Amalekites] and utterly destroy [haram] all that he has, and do not spare [hamal] him; but put to death both man and woman, child and infant, ox and sheep, camel and donkey.”[1] The text goes on to explicitly state that the Amalekites were all wiped out:

“So Saul defeated [nakah] the Amalekites, from Havilah as you go to Shur, which is east of Egypt. He captured Agag the king of the Amalekites alive, and utterly destroyed [haram] all the people with the edge of the sword. But Saul and the people spared [hamal] Agag and the best of the sheep, the oxen, the fatlings, the lambs, and all that was good, and were not willing to destroy them utterly; but everything despised and worthless, that they utterly destroyed.” [2]

A few verses later (15:33) the text records that Agag, the sole survivor, was executed. So, read literally, this passage states that all the Amalekites were killed and all their livestock were either destroyed or taken as plunder to be sacrificed to God at Gilgal.[3]

Now the language of “defeated” (or struck), “utterly destroyed”, the reference to “sparing” and to livestock parallels the language of the command in 15:3. Given this, it seems implausible that we should interpret the command in verse 3 as literal but the fulfilment, just 4 verses later, as hyperbolic; the text requires that the command and fulfilment be read in the same sense.

That said, when one reads this passage as part of as a single narrative a literal reading appears untenable; the proceeding text states quite emphatically that the Amalekites were not, in fact, literally wiped out. In 1 Samuel 27:8-9 David invaded a territory full of Amalekites:

“Now David and his men went up and raided the Geshurites, the Girzites and the Amalekites. (From ancient times these peoples had lived in the land extending to Shur and Egypt.) Whenever David attacked an area, he did not leave a man or woman alive, but took sheep and cattle, donkeys and camels, and clothes. Then he returned to Achish.”

Not only does this text affirm that the Amalekites still existed but the reference to Egypt and Shur states that they existed in the very same area that Saul ‘utterly destroyed every single one of them’ in in the previous passages. Moreover, David took sheep and cattle as plunder; again, livestock was another of the things Saul was said to have already eradicated.

After the text has told us that Saul “utterly destroyed all the people”, including King Agag, and despite the text telling us that when David attacked an area (the very same areas as Saul) he did “not leave a man or woman alive”, three chapters later we read that a sizeable Amalekite army attacked Ziklag![4] David apparently pursued this army and fought a long battle with them and 400 Amalekites fled on horseback!![5] Where are all these Amalekites coming from?

These are not the only examples. In 2 Samuel 1:8 an Amalekite took credit for killing Saul –but didn’t Saul “utterly destroy all the people”? In 1 Chronicles 4:43 Amalekites were still around in battle-ready numbers during the reign of Hezekiah who reigned after Saul and David.

Read literally, the narrative affirms both that the Amalekites were and were not totally wiped out. This apparent contradiction in the Samuel narrative is not subtle. Those who put these books into a single narrative would have been well aware of the obvious contradictions mentioned above. These editors were not mindless or stupid. If we read 1 Samuel 15 in the broader context of the rest of Samuel and also alongside other canonical books, such as 2 Samuel and the book of Chronicles then the text cannot be sensibly claiming that 1 Samuel 15, 1 Samuel 27, 1 Samuel 30 and 1 Chronicles 4 are all literally true accounts of battles with the Amalekites.

Further, while David’s battle texts appear to be relatively matter of fact records, 1 Samuel 15 appears to be highly hyperbolic and contains obvious rhetorical exaggeration. Saul’s army was said to be 210,000 men, which would make it larger than any army known at this time in antiquity. Moreover, we are told that Saul struck the Amalekites from Havila to Shur. Shur is on the edge of Egypt, Havila is in Saudi Arabia. This is an absurdly large battle field. “It’s impossible to imagine the battle actually traversed the enormous distance from Arabia almost to Egypt”[6] Daniel Fouts notes that exaggerated numbers are common forms of hyperbole in Ancient Near Eastern battle accounts.^[7]

1 Samuel 15’s use of the language of “utterly destroying” [haram] populations “with the sword”, is the same phraseology as that is repeatedly used hyperbolically in Joshua. This language also appears to have been used hyperbolically in 1 Chronicles 4. 1 Chronicles 4:41 states “they attacked” [nakah] and “destroyed them utterly” [haram] but only a few verses later we read that the survivors fled to Amalek where they were later all “destroyed” [nakah] a second time.[8] Likewise, the language of killing all inhabitants with the sword is also used hyperbolically in Judges, “after Judah puts Jerusalem to the sword … its occupants are still living there ‘to this day’ (Judg. 1:8, 21)”[9] Similar language is used hyperbolically in the prophetic writings; Paul Copan argues,

“[T]he biblical language of the Canaanites’ destruction is identical to that of Judah’s destruction in the Babylonian exile—clearly not utter annihilation or even genocide… God said he would “lay waste the towns of Judah so no one can live there” (Jer. 9:11 NIV).  Indeed, God said, “I will completely destroy them and make them an object of horror and scorn, and an everlasting ruin” (Jer. 25:9 NIV).  God “threatened to stretch out My hand against you and destroy you” (Jer. 15:6; cp. Ezek. 5:16)—to bring “disaster” against Judah (Jer. 6:19).  The biblical text, supported by archaeological discovery, suggests that while Judah’s political and religious structures were ruined and that Judahites died in the conflict, the “urban elite” were deported to Babylon while many “poor of the land” remained behind. Clearly, Judah’s being “completely destroyed” and made an “everlasting ruin” (Jer. 25:9) was a significant literary exaggeration.”[10]

Compare for example the language of God’s command to “not spare” the Amalekites, to “put to death both man and woman, child and infant, ox and sheep, camel and donkey” with the account of Judah’s defeat to the Babylonians in 2 Chronicles 36:16-17:

“But they mocked God’s messengers, despised his words and scoffed at his prophets until the wrath of the Lord was aroused against his people and there was no remedy. He brought up against them the king of the Babylonians, who killed their young men with the sword in the sanctuary, and did not spare young men or young women, the elderly or the infirm. God gave them all into the hands of Nebuchadnezzar.”

This was written to a post-exilic audience who knew full well that not every one of them had been killed. They, as the descendents of the survivors, knew that Judah had been exiled and was later restored under Cyrus; a fact pointed out only a few verses later.[11]

So we see in 1 Samuel that the author(s) juxtaposed several accounts. One tells us that Saul wiped out all the Amalekites at God’s command using obvious rhetorical exaggeration and language known to be hyperbolic and the other, presented in fairly realistic terms, tells us that the Amalekites continued to live in the land as a military threat. Assuming the author was an intelligent person, we are at least owed an argument as to why the literal reading should be preferred in this context.

Craig suggests an argument: “Samuel’s rebuke of Saul in I Sam. 15.10-16” suggests Saul is condemned by Samuel for not “following God’s instructions”. Now, as I noted above, the text tells us that Saul did carry out God’s instruction to kill all the Amalekites; it was livestock, not humans, which were initially spared. Saul is rebuked for taking sheep as spoil. Nevertheless, one could argue that in Samuel’s amplification of his rebuke of Saul he is rebuked for not taking the command literally; see the immediately proceeding verses:

“Samuel said, “Is it not true, though you were little in your own eyes, you were made the head of the tribes of Israel? And the LORD anointed you king over Israel, and the LORD sent you on a mission, and said, ‘Go and utterly destroy the sinners, the Amalekites, and fight against them until they are exterminated.’ Why then did you not obey the voice of the LORD, but rushed upon the spoil and did what was evil in the sight of the LORD?””[12]

Craig appears to be arguing against a hyperbolic reading of 1 Samuel on the grounds that such a reading appears to contradict part of the Samuel narrative; he seems to be suggesting that a literal reading coheres better with this part. I would argue that the crucial issue is whether the hyperbolic interpretation is more plausible than the literal one.

Even if Craig is correct about Samuel’s rebuke, it does not follow that a literal reading is more plausible than a hyperbolic one. As argued above, a literal reading creates incoherencies in the narrative; it puts the whole account of 1 Samuel 15 in contradiction with the rest of the 1 Samuel narrative – particularly 1 Samuel 27-30. It also puts the account in contradiction with the account of Saul’s death in 2 Samuel 1 and the narrative of 1 Chronicles 4.

It is hard to believe the author(s) of the final form was meticulously careful to avoid making a minor incoherence in 1 Samuel 15:17-19 and yet was oblivious to the multiple obvious contradictions I have highlighted above. Taking 1 Samuel 15 as a highly hyperbolic account reads as a much more coherent narrative.

It is far more plausible to think that the author was willing to allow some minor inconsistencies in one part of a narrative that is not supposed to be taken as literally true in its details anyway rather than that he intended a highly contradictory literal reading. I think the conclusion one should draw is that the Holy War narratives appear to be highly hyperbolic accounts of victory that the author, elsewhere in the text, quite candidly affirms are not literally true accounts.

“The topic of God’s command to destroy the Canaanites was the subject of a very interesting exchange at the Evangelical Philosophical Society session last November at the Society of Biblical Literature Convention in Atlanta. Matt Flannagan defended the view put forward by Paul Copan in his Is God a Moral Monster? that such commands represent hyperbole typical of Ancient Near Eastern accounts of military conquests. Obviously, if Paul is right about this, then the whole problem just evaporates. But this answer doesn’t seem to me to do justice to the biblical text, which seems to say that if the Israeli soldiers were to encounter Canaanite women and children, they should kill them (cf. Samuel’s rebuke of Saul in I Sam. 15.10-16).”

Craig raises an important issue. In God and the Genocide of the Canaanites I, II and III I defended Nicholas Wolterstorff’s take on the Canaanite massacre in “Reading Joshua”.[1] Wolterstorff argued that the book of Joshua is a highly figurative, hagiographic and hyperbolic account of Israel’s early skirmishes and it is not intended to be taken literally in its details. My adaptation of Wolterstorff’s argument consists of three points.

First, taken as a single narrative, and taken literally, Joshua 1-11 gives a contradictory account of events to that narrated by Judges and also to that narrated by the later chapters of Joshua itself.

Second, those who put these books into a single narrative would have been well aware of the obvious contradictions mentioned above. These editors were not mindless or stupid, particularly if we hold that God spoke through them.

Third, while Judges reads more like “down-to-earth”[2] history, a careful reading of Joshua shows it to be full of ritualistic, stylised accounts and formulaic language. I supported this third point with research into Ancient Near Eastern conquest accounts. Studies show such accounts are hyperbolic, hagiographic, figurative and follow a common transmission code. Comparisons between these accounts and the early chapters of Joshua suggest Joshua was written according to the same literary conventions and transmission code. I suggest these three points, taken together, provide compelling reasons for thinking that one should interpret the text as a hyperbolic, hagiographic and figurative account of what occurred; it was not meant to be taken as literally true in all its details.

Craig’s objection to my position (and that of Paul Copan’s whose position is very close to mine) is a reference to 1 Samuel 15. Craig referred specifically to verses 10-16, where Samuel rebuked Saul “because [Saul] has turned away from [God] and has not carried out [God’s] instructions.”[3] The instructions in question were given in verse 3; God commanded Saul, “Now go and strike [nakah] Amalek [the Amelekites] and utterly destroy [haram] all that he has, and do not spare [hamal] him; but put to death both man and woman, child and infant, ox and sheep, camel and donkey.”[4] Craig suggests this “seems to say that if the Israeli soldiers were to encounter Canaanite women and children, they should kill them”. I think Craig pushes an important objection here.

Before, responding it is important to note that Craig’s own position on the Canaanite issue, the one that the Questioner referred to, Question 16: Slaughter of the Canaanites, is actually largely in agreement with the argument I gave in Atlanta.

Craig, like me, accepts a divine command theory of ethics whereby an act is obligatory if, and only if, a loving and just God commands it. We also agree that the critic’s appeal to the Canaanites is, contrary to what is often alleged, at best an argument against scriptural infallibility, it is not an argument against a divine command theory of ethics per sé. Craig and I also agree on the implications of a divine command theory for this question. We agree that given that the wrongness of an action consists in its being forbidden by God, and given that God does not issue commands to himself, it follows that he has no duties; and hence, God is under no obligation to not kill anyone and has a right to do what he likes.

We also agree that this response is insufficient, because even if God has no duties the question still arises as to whether one can coherently claim that a loving and just person could command such activities and this is the real issue in the objection. Can one coherently suggest that a perfectly rational, fully informed, just and loving person would command killing non-combatants in a particular conflict?

Further, although we offer different reasons for our conclusions, we also agree that this claim is not incoherent. In at Atlanta I offered the following example:

Many ethicists contend that while the claim its wrong to kill innocent people  is correct as a general rule, it can be overridden in rare circumstances of “supreme emergency”,[5] when the alternative to killing non-combatants is to tolerate significantly greater evils,  and the consequences of refraining from killing are significantly bad. Whatever one thinks of this position, it cannot be dismissed as conceptually incoherent. If a proponent of an absolutist position on killing non-combatants examined the arguments and concluded that in rare circumstances of supreme emergency, killing non-combatants was not wrong, then it is implausible to suggest their concept of goodness was so radically at odds with prior beliefs that “good and evil would trade places” and that their position consisted of mere word games. This position may be false but it’s not obviously incoherent.[6]

So, like Craig, I am willing to grant that it is conceptually and epistemically possible for a just and loving person to allow rare exceptions to rules against killing if there is some greater good involved. In fact, something like this view is widely accepted in contemporary ethics; threshold deontology, act utilitarianism, rule-utilitarianism, situation ethics, rossian deontology all accept this conclusion. I do not think one can dismiss it as obviously incoherent.

Where Craig and I appear to disagree, then, is over whether Wolterstorff’s (and Copan’s) argument can be applied to 1 Sam 15. In Atlanta I argued, albeit briefly, that it can. Copan and I make this case more fully in our forthcoming chapter in “The Ethics of “Holy War” for Christian Morality and Theology” in Old Testament ‘Holy War’ and Christian Morality: Perspectives and Prospects (IVP Academic).

In my next post, Response to William Lane Craig’s Question 225: “The ‘Slaughter’ of the Canaanites Re-visited” Part II, I will spell out in more detail why I think each of Wolterstorff’s three premises apply to 1 Sam 15.

Blogger and Online Publication
Robert R. Cargill, University of Iowa, Presiding
11/19/2011
4:00 PM to 6:30 PM
Room: Room TBD – Hotel TBD

Robert R. Cargill, University of Iowa
Welcome and Introduction (5 min)

Alice Bach, Case Western Reserve University
Can Blogging at 3 AM Be Considered Scholarship? (25 min)

Madeleine Flannagan, University of Auckland and Matthew Flannagan, Independent Scholar
Blogging a Short-Cut to Peer Review: How to do it Effectively (25 min)

Juhana Markus Saukkonen, University of Helsinki
Sense and Practicality: Building a Historical GIS Online (25 min)

Richard Price, CEO Academia.edu
Academia.edu: The Past, Present, and Future of Scholarly Social Networking (25 min)

The session will conclude with: Q&A discussion with Richard Price. (25 min)

RELATED POSTS:
We’re Going to San Francisco!

I felt very out of my depth. Meeting Alvin Plantinga whose writings inspired me to take philosophy as a theological enterprise seriously was truly amazing and when Al changed the standard jokes (if you’ve seen a few of his lectures you’ll know what I mean) in both his key note addresses for jokes about New Zealanders it was something else. To have the greatest living philosopher of religion acknowledge the sole kiwi in the audience was something I did not expect.

“Last year I spoke at only the Apologetics Conference and the Society for Biblical Literature Meeting but this year I will be presenting at all three.”

Even more humbling was being asked to speak on the Evangelical Philosophical Society’s panel presentation to the Annual Meeting of the Society of Biblical Literature, which was running at the same time. Me, the blogger from MandM, presented alongside Richard Hess one of the best Evangelical Old Testament scholars in the world, Paul Copan, the President of the Evangelical Philosophical Society, an expert on God and Morality, and Randal Rauser, a top Analytic Theologian, who has done some great work getting theologians to take analytic philosophy seriously with Notre Dame’s Michael Rea, an outstanding philosopher of religion and meta-physician as chair. It was truly unreal engaging in a discussion on the relationship between divine command ethics and the Old Testament conquest narratives with these people. I kept wondering when they were going to realise they’d made a mistake inviting me! Even more so when one considers that the audience gathered to hear us and ask questions included people like Eric Seibert, Christopher Wright, Doug Geivett and William Lane Craig – all prestigious scholars who easily should have been presenting instead of me! The experience was extremely rewarding. There were various positive reviews of the panel from the Evangelical Philosophical Society, William Lane Craig, Claude Mariottini and various observers. I learnt a lot and discovered, somewhat to my surprise, that I could intelligently contribute in discussion at this level and that these other scholars were interested in what I had to say.

Since coming back from Atlanta, my professional employment prospects have improved; while I still do not have full-time work, I am doing work on an increasingly steady flow of short-term projects. I have been asked to contribute and co-write articles to four up-coming books edited by the likes of William Lane Craig, Paul Copan, Steve Cowan and Jeremy Evans; three of which I have written in the last four months. I have also written a dictionary article on Old Testament Ethics with Paul Copan. One of the top Philosophy of Religion Journals has asked me to write a review of John Loftus’s “The Christian Delusion” given that I was quoted on the blurb of the book and though it is not totally confirmed, it looks like this will be published shortly. I have done research for a television documentary on God and Morality for an Australian film maker I met in LA on the way back from the conferences in Atlanta. I have been invited to be part of a research group on personhood which contains some leading theologians and biblical scholars connected with the Society of Biblical Literature. I continue to get opportunities to do research and collaborate on projects like this from overseas.

The local scene has also improved; shortly after I came back from Atlanta, I was approached by a South Auckland church to help out with Sunday preaching and teaching their youth group. This has seen me preaching pretty much weekly and teaching once a fortnight. Laidlaw College have asked me to guest lecture on the history of western epistemology and tutor for them and the North Shore home-school group have me teaching a series of critical thinking classes for them this term based on my Friday Fallacy series.

I also have found myself regularly being asked to give lectures and talks. I have been asked to present two seminars on the ethics of abortion and one on divine command ethics at Auckland University for various campus groups. I have also been contacted by an Australian apologetics organisation about possible speaking engagements over there; I have been asked to discuss the ethics of war on a TV panel, a UK radio show is also talking with both Madeleine and I at the moment about us doing a couple of shows with them on religion and ethics. The possibility of a discussion or debate at Lincoln University, again with Madeleine, on the issue of religion and public life is also on the cards.

The schedule does not stop there; I also look set to contribute to two major conferences at Auckland University in July, the Naturalisms in Ethics Conference and the Australasian Philosophy of Religion Association conference. In attendance at these conferences will be Yale’s John Hare, Notre Dame’s Mark Murphy, DePauw’s Erik Wielenberg and Baylor’s Trent Doughtery. Dougherty is an epistemologist; epistemology is not my area so I know of him only by his reputation, Facebook and his contribution to the Prosblogion. Hare and Murphy are easily two of the best Christian Ethicists in the world and Wielenberg is the best critic of divine command ethics writing today. The thought of presenting my ideas before these people is truly daunting and humbling.

Prior to going to Atlanta, I would be lucky to get this many opportunities over a period of several years yet here we are not even half way through the year and I have found myself suddenly in a much more productive mode than I have been in the 5 years since I graduated.

I joke with my friends that for someone who does not have a full-time academic appointment I am extremely busy doing academic work; research if it is to be substantive takes many hours. However, reliance on short-term contracts like these makes things very tight and down to the wire for our family. I continue to make applications for something more full-time and long term in the hope we can stop living hand to mouth; we are waiting to hear on several applications at present. In the mean time all I can do is keep pressing forward.

Going to Atlanta has helped our situation immensely; suddenly in New Zealand and around the world people have started to take some notice of my work. I still remain a bit bemused that an obscure New Zealand analytic theologian, who, shortly after getting his PhD, turned to blogging as an outlet for the things in his mind, was even invited to go to Atlanta but since returning I have certainly noticed a definite change in how, even within New Zealand, people are responding to my work. I remain humbled and thankful for all our supportive readership. One thing that truly amazed me in Atlanta was how many people I met who read my work and appreciated it – “they read my work?” was always my natural response; surely I should be reading them.

When I went to Atlanta I realised I had been given a lucky break; there are thousands of philosophers and theologians who need a break and I should not expect the offer to be repeated. However, it seems set to be happening again. In November this year the Evangelical Philosophy Society’s Annual Meeting will be held from 16-18 Nov 2011 in San Francisco, contemporaneously, it will also hold its Annual Apologetics Conference from 17-19 Nov 2011 and the Society of Biblical Literature’s Annual Meeting will run from 19-22 Nov 2011 also in San Francisco.  I have been asked to speak at all three.

The Evangelical Philosophy Society have asked me to present a paper criticising Walter Sinnott-Armstrong’s criticisms of divine command theory. The abstract has gone through peer review and been accepted. This paper will be an updated version of my series of blog posts on this issue:
Walter Sinnott-Armstrong, William Lane Craig and the Argument from Harm Part I
Walter Sinnott-Armstrong, William Lane Craig and the Argument from Harm Part II
Walter Sinnott-Armstrong and the Moral Scepticism Objection to Divine Commands
Walter Sinnott-Armstrong and Infantile Religious Morality
Walter Sinnott-Armstrong on God Morality and Arbitrariness

The Society of Biblical Literature have asked both Madeleine and I to present on theological blogging and how one can use it to supplement publications in raising one’s profile as a scholar. MandM is now one of the most widely read theological blogs and is one of the highest Google Page Ranked blogs for its niche and I have become known in my field as a result of it. The Society of Biblical Literature has waived their requirement that only PhD level Theologians or Biblical Scholars are allowed to present, to enable Madeleine to present with me.

To be asked to speak at these two highly prestigious conferences is an honour; far more people submit abstracts than get accepted so we were very content with having our two abstracts confirmed. But then a few days ago William Lane Craig emailed me and asked me to be one of the select few scholars who are invited to speak at the Evangelical Philosophical Society’s Apologetics Conference. I will be speaking on the topic “Can God Command Evil? The Problem of Apparently Immoral Commands.” This made my day.

Last year I spoke at only the Apologetics Conference and the Society for Biblical Literature Meeting but this year I will be presenting at all three, the Evangelical Philosophical Society’s Annual Meeting as well, and Madeleine has been asked to present.

This is all a fantastic honour for someone who only a few years ago was rising at 5am and stacking shelves in a supermarket till mid-day while his wife worked full-time and whose sole theological output was writing blog posts. While things have dramatically improved for me, things are still tight and difficult for us. Madeleine remains partially-disabled and in constant pain from a car accident and this limits her capacity to work full-time; she is going to be admitted to the bar in a short while but there are very few openings for legal positions for recent graduates that are part-time. In addition to these obvious challenges, we have a child in the autistic spectrum who cannot go through the school system and needs full-time attention at home, whom it is very hard to find baby-sitters for. We have continued to battle ACC over their dubious refusal to continue to pay Madeleine’s accident compensation. I am able to do this research, writing, and speaking work but things are tight. Preaching does not pay a lot, and short-term contracts to speak or write are just that: short-term. We are surviving through the grace of God but it is difficult. The results of last year’s trip to Atlanta have been hugely beneficial and we want to keep the momentum going so we have starting saving for Madeleine and I to go to San Francisco. If you, our reader, appreciate what we do and want to assist us that would be greatly appreciated. Last year total strangers from all over the world generously donated and we were able to pay for the airfares and associated costs to get me to Atlanta and I remain incredibly grateful for this. I do not like asking for money but the realities are that we need help raising the $5,000 NZD we need to get to San Francisco. For this reason if you believe in MandM’s work and would like to support us in going to the US in November please visit our support page.

Both Madeleine and I remain grateful to our many readers. We are always amazed how often we run into total strangers who read our writings and the correspondence we get from people all over the world is extremely encouraging. We thank you for reading and contributing to our work, your support and encouragement has enabled us to get this far.

Back in 2009 I wrote “Abraham and Isaac – Did God Command the Killing of an Innocent?” This post addressed a dilemma several philosophers have raised for those Christians who take the patriarchal narratives in Genesis in literal manner. It seems plausible that Christians who do this are committed to an inconsistent triad,

1. If God commands an action x then x is morally required;
2. It is wrong to kill innocent human beings;
3. God commanded Abraham to kill an innocent human being.

These three propositions are inconsistent; 1 and 3 entail the denial of 2.

To respond to this triad, I appropriated a thought experiment provided by John Hare; I wrote:

One example Hare notes, is particularly interesting, “Perhaps (to get more bizarre) God could have willed that we kill each other at the age of 18, at which point God would bring us immediately back to life.” Hare asks us to imagine a world, in which, when people of a certain age are killed they immediately come back to life. He opines, quite plausibly, that if this were to be the case then killing people at this age would not be wrong or at least, not seriously wrong. One of the reasons that killing people is wrong in the world we live in is because people stay dead. If they were only unconscious for a split second and came back to life in full health then arguably killing a person would not be the serious wrong we believe it is.

I suggested that, a careful examination of the text reveals that Abraham’s actions occurred in a context where he knew his son would not stay dead but would come down the mountain with him and live on to adulthood to father children of his own. I argued this fact resolves the dilemma,

Once this is realised, I think it is evident that [1], [2] and [3] are consistent. If one assumes, for the sake of argument, that the Patriarchal Narratives are literally true then it follows that [3] is true only if a certain context is assumed. God commanded Abraham to kill his son in the highly unusual context where Abraham knew that his son would not stay dead but would come down the mountain afterwards and live on to adulthood to father children of his own. Proposition [2] is defensible only in a context where people do not know these sorts of things; the rule to not kill the innocent applies to a world where people do not come back to life after they have been killed. Hence, the story of Abraham and Isaac, if taken literally, does not entail that God commanded something immoral or contradictory.

What I later discovered is that Paul Copan sometimes reads this blog and he, on reading my post, summarised my argument and appropriated it (with acknowledgements)  in chapter 5 of his latest book Is God a Moral Monster: Making Sense of the Old Testament God.

Enter Randal Rauser. In the paper he presented for the SBL panel, Rauser made a remark on the Abraham and Isaac issue. Copan responded by summarising his argument, which was an appropriation of my argument. Rauser responded with an analogy, which he has since put up on his blog:

“Yeah, what if?” I thought cynically. But that was my inside voice. With my outside (audible) voice I replied: “So what if a virgin child could be raped and then miraculously made a virgin once again? Would the rape of the child still be evil?” That didn’t go over well, I think. But I don’t see the difference.”

Here was my point. Let’s grant, for the sake of argument, that God demanded the killing of a child and then immediately resurrected that child. Would that make it all better? Well there would still be that little matter that the child was killed by dad… “Dad, it’s good to be alive again and all, but you did decapitate me, and that kinda stinks, you know?” (Talk about an awkward moment at the Thanksgiving dinner table.)

And likewise a child that was devotionally raped and then had their virginity miraculously restored (physiologically and psychologically) could still say, “Dad, it’s great to be a virgin again and all, but you did rape me, and that kinda stinks, you know?”

My recollection is that Rauser’s comment did go down well initially. It was after a few exchanges that the audience became less enthusiastic. But putting audience reactions aside, does this response work?

As I noted in my response to Rauser on the night, I do not think it does. That is because I think there is a difference between killing someone and their being immediately restored to life and raping someone and their virginity being immediately restored. It is this: what makes rape wrong is not that it takes away a person’s virginity, the act is still a grave moral evil if a non-virgin is raped. What makes rape wrong is some other feature of the act. Killing is different. It is quite plausible to say that one of the major things that makes killing wrong is that when you kill someone you deprive them of their life. In fact, several of the most prominent analyses of the morality of killing in the literature make this point.

Michael Tooley and Peter Singer, for example, argue that killing is wrong because it frustrates a being’s desire to continue in existence. If a person is killed and yet continued in existence then this wrong-making property would not be instantiated and so, on this analysis, killing would not be wrong. Similarly, Don Marquis argues that what makes killing wrong is that it deprives a victim of a future of value, a future the victim would have experienced had they not been killed. David Boonin argues that what makes killing wrong is that it frustrates a being’s ideal desires to continue living. Some Kantian views assume this too; the reason killing is considered disrespectful or demeaning on their view is because it shows a desire to destroy the person, to deprive them of all the goods of their future and so forth. I am not endorsing any of these theories, I am simply pointing out that it is plausible to say that, whatever it is that makes killing wrong, is tied up with the fact that killing ends a life.

This fact makes all the difference because when you kill someone who immediately comes back to life, the property central to making killing wrong has been removed from the act – the person is not dead. When someone is raped and their virginity is restored the property that makes rape wrong is still there. This is why I think Rauser’s example does not work and this is what I said to him at the SBL panel; when a person is raped and their virginity is restored, they have still been subjected to a horrific wrong, the wrong of being raped. But when a person has been killed and their life has been restored, they have not been subjected to a great wrong — yes they have for a split second been killed but the act occurs in a context where the properties which make killing a great wrong were not present. So I think Rauser’s critique of Copan and myself on this issue fails.

There are numerous other issues here that I could go into such as the fact that raping a person and restoring their virginity is logically impossible in a way it is not with killing. Also, the fact that God intervened to prevent Abraham killing Isaac and so on but here I simply wanted to address the main difference between us.

These four conferences ran over a period of two weeks, in roughly the same place, and overlapped each other – thousands of people attended them.

There is no way I can do justice to everything that occurred so here are some highlights.

I did not attend many sessions of the ETS as it ran parallel to the EPS. However, the highlight for me of what I did see was a rigorous address by Tom Wright on justification and the new perspective on Paul. This was followed by a lively panel discussion on this issue with Tom Wright, Thomas Schreiner, Frank Thiemann.

I thoroughly enjoyed my time at the EPS, this was an excellent three days. I attended numerous sessions. My hosts laughed at how I was constantly seen going back and forward to various Hilton conference rooms between sessions, I could always be found engaging in rigorous discussion during the Q&A sessions or simply involved in an intense conversation dissecting the issues just raised with other attendees. It was a fairly intense time intellectually but I really enjoyed it.

Space prevents me doing justice to all the excellent papers I heard. There was an interesting paper on the role of ridicule and irony in convincing people of basic beliefs, which combined ideas from Kerkigaard and Reid. Another I enjoyed was an interesting discussion on inclusivism, the view that people who have not heard or accepted the gospel can be saved through Christ’s atonement if they are invincibly ignorant and respond in faith to the minimal revelation about God they do have. I heard some fascinating discussions on whether it is possible for God to issue insincere commands and how the issue of Abraham relates to this; questions of whether the fact that one’s epistemic peers disagree with you provides grounds for reducing confidence in your beliefs.

Mike Austin delivered a thoughtful paper on the Canaanite issue, noting that on an influential moral theory, Rossian deontology, that duties to not kill are prima facie duties which can be overridden in certain circumstances and so God could, in principle, command killing the innocent. There was also a really interesting paper by Gary Habermas on the latest theories regarding the Turin Shroud. Frank Beckwith criticised evangelical appropriations of Aquinas. Mike Licona offered a synopsis of his new book. Paul Copan spoke on how naturalists declare the glory of God. All these sessions were associated with vigorous and thoughtful discussion.

The two most technical papers were William Lane Craig’s response to Peter Van Inwagen and Alvin Plantinga’s paper “A New Argument against Materialism.” Van Inwagen has argued for Platonism, the view that abstract objects have real existence independently of God. Craig, a fictionalist, argued Van Inwagen had not really responded to the nominalist and fictionalist alternatives. Plantinga, in a packed out plenary session – by packed out, I mean a good thousand in attendance – argued that the counter-factual test for causation shows that if materialism is true then beliefs cannot cause behaviour. This involved Plantinga making some really interesting moves such as rejecting the standard view of impossible counter-factuals. Plantinga was particularly good in the Q&A.

What was striking for me was not just the calibre of the papers and the philosophical seriousness of those in attendance but also the obvious evangelical Christian commitment of the attendees. There was a strong sense that even when offering critique we were working together to better each other’s papers in the service of God. It was quite weird for me to be in a context where both of these things were conjoined. It was also surreal to find myself in the same room as numerous people whose work I had read and respected for years and yet I was able to discuss and critique their work face to face. This mixture of intellectual rigor, fellowship and spirituality was perhaps most evident at the reception. There, while we mingled with Philosophy greats, like Alvin Plantinga, everyone paused for a talk on the importance of prayer and religious devotion in spiritual formation. My entire experience to that moment as a Christian had been that when people spoke of the latter they did so at the expense of the former. It was refreshing to see the kind of spiritual wholism those present aspired to.

Another thing that totally blew me away was how many people read MandM and recognised me on sight. On the first day I sat next to a woman who told me she knew my wife from the net. Later I heard someone walking past say “I read that guys work, he has a good website.” A few Philosophy professors approached me and said things like “it’s good to meet you Dr Flannagan” and they’d relay how they regularly read my work online.

On Thursday, we drove to Johnson Ferry Baptist Church for the EPS Apologetics conference. This church was huge. I have never seen a church of this size in my life. It was three stories high and had literally hundreds of rooms. It had numerous lecture theatres, a gymnasium, a two-storied church auditorium, a dining room, bookstore and so on. Over 1,500 people turned up to hear Alvin Plantinga give his plenary talk. Plantinga presented his paper “Science and Religion where the Conflict Really Lies.” He rebutted arguments that evolution shows that God does not exist and then offered a summary of his evolutionary argument against naturalism. What was a little disappointing was the aggressive response of some questioners who were horrified that  evolution and atheism may not *be* the same thing. In the Q&A, however, Plantinga, quite typically, provided gracious but effective responses exposing with humour the fallacies in the objections raised.

After the talk I went to the book signing session only to discover a huge number of Americans who read MandM, knew who I was on sight and wanted my thoughts, ideas or even to be photographed with me (go figure!?). One biblioblogger made a point of snapping at least one papparazzi-style shot of me every day which he then published on his blog. Madeleine kept emailing me links to blogs and Facebook status updates of people present at the conferences excitedly rattling off a list of their favourite scholars that they’d met that day that had me in them. It was surreal.

The business end of the conferences occurred on Saturday where I had two presentations to give. The first was on Saturday morning where I presented my paper “God and the Genocide of the Canaanites,” an updated and modified version  (thanks to the many people who interacted with it on this blog and others) of the infamous blog post I published back in January, which will soon be published in Come Let us Reason edited by William Lane Craig and Paul Copan to be published through B&H Academic.

The basic thesis of this paper was that the accounts of Genocide in Josh 6-11, if taken literally, contradict the accounts of the conquest in Judges and Joshua 13-17. Given that the final editor of the Canon juxtaposed these accounts, and was not stupid, he must have not intended both to be taken literally. I suggested that Wolterstorff’s position, that the former were hagiographic history and highly hyperbolic, made best sense of the evidence.

To my considerable surprise it was well received. Given some of the tone of the questions directed at Plantinga, I was worried I might have upset the more literalist attendees but instead there was real interest in my idea that the Joshua narratives were not literal accounts of what happened. I later heard that William Lane Craig had said I’d had the biggest attendance of the break-out sessions that day, and I was inundated with people asking me questions afterwards so that I had to go into over time.

Particularly amusing was the response to an illustration in my talk I gave as an example of hyperbolic and hagiographic writing, the claim that the All Blacks annihilated their opponents whilst touring the northern hemisphere. This is obviously hyperbole and, as any kiwi knows, it is also a form of hagiography (the All Blacks are revered after all). After the talk, a US rugby player told me he really appreciated this illustration; he also told me that if his team ever played the All Blacks he expected that his team would be annihilated and that the annihilation would not be hyperbolic!

The second presentation was positively terrifying. I was on a panel at the SBL Conference. The SBL Conference was not only the biggest of the fourconferences but is the biggest annual gathering of biblical scholars in the world. Naturally it is a gathering of the world’s best biblical scholars in one place too. The panel topic was “Is Yahweh a Moral Monster?” and I was talking on how the holy war passages related to divine command morality. This was really scary. First I was on the panel with some pretty good scholars. Richard Hess, from Denver seminary, is a world class old testament scholar. Paul Copan of Palm Beach Atlantic University, the President of the Evangelical Philosophical Society has just published a monograph on Old Testament Ethics. Randall Rauser is a theologian from Canada who has also published in this area. The chair was the distinguished Notre Dame Philosopher, Michael Rea. Moreover, the audience contained numerous high-level scholars including Christopher Wright, William Lane Craig, Doug Geviett and many others. Each panellist was slated to speak for 20 minutes and then there would be a long Q&A afterwards. I was terrified.

Despite being gripped with panic, the talk went well. Everyone in the audience I spoke to said they found it interesting and I eventually settled into the Q&A with increasing confidence. The panellist’s presentations were all very interesting. Richard Hess argued that the cities the Isrealites were commanded to attack in Deut 20:16 were forts not population centres.  Paul Copan argued that the Bible does not support slavery, as that term is understood in English, but rather tolerated a form of indentured servitude. Particular suprising was the presentation from Randal Rauser. Prior to thetalk I had expected to be radically at odds with his views but I was surprised on how many basic issues and methods we agreed. Both of us, for example, advocated a more canonical approach, one that stressed the divine author of the final form as opposed to focusing on individual authors of pericopes in addressing the issue. We did disagree over some exegetical questions, how to interpret herem, for example, and we did sharply disagree over whether a particular analogy he used was valid.

What I was even more pleased with, however, was the positive feedback from the audience regarding the Q&A. William Lane Craig said he found our discussion “hugely interesting and helpful!” This was a sentiment repeated by numerous others including Doug Geviett and Mike Licona. Mary Jo Sharp said “this discussion was outstanding” and Claude Mariottini said that he considered it the best of the sessions he attended. It turned out to have had the biggest turn-out of any EPS presentation at the SBL to date.

So now I am back in NZ, having presented papers that began as blog posts on a international stage and have done so successfully. The opportunity was truly amazing and I thank all MandM supporters and readers who have supported me in doing this. I also need to thank Paul Copan and William Lane Craig for the opportunity to do so. I truly enjoyed the challenge and relish the opportunity to do it again next year in San Fancisco.

RELATED POSTS:
Georgia on my Mind
Joshua and the Genocide of the Canaanites Part I
Joshua and the the Genocide of the Canaanites Part II
Did God Command Genocide in the Old Testament?
A Selection of Matt’s posts on Divine Commands

Looking at internal textual evidence, Wolterstorff  argued that the accounts of genocidal slaughter recorded in Joshua were hyperbolic and should not be taken literally. Joshua was a hagiographic account of various skirmishes Isreal had and it was a mistake to read it as saying God actually commanded Genocide.

Wolterstorff’s paper fascinated me because it resonated with another book I had read in 2006. In, On the Reliability of the Old Testament,  Kenneth Kitchen wrote a comprehensive critique of biblical minimalism, addressing the charge that archaeology showed that the total conquest and genocide the book of Joshua records never happened. Kitchen contended that Joshua did not teach a total conquest. Kitchen pointed out that it was common in Ancient Near Eastern historiography to write highly hyperbolic accounts of battles involving the gods sending meteors onto the enemy, campaign’s  being completed in a day and victories involving the  killing of every single member of the enemy. Both Mernphath and Mesha had written in the 1200′s and 600′s, respectively had used similar language to claim they had destroyed Israel. Such accounts were hyperbolic.

I heard this talk just over a year ago. Since then my adjunct contract has finished, I graduated with a teaching diploma in May and have been earning a living on the short term contracts to teach here and there, all of which dried up with the close of the school year, donations from speaking engagements and those received via this blog. It has been a tough year. Yet what  began on that November Tuesday back in 2009 has proved extremely fruitful. I began turning thoughts around in my mind, asking questions and piecing ideas together.  A month later, in December, I began discussing some ideas with Paul Copan. A philosopher in Poland wrote to me out of the blue asking me what I thought of the Canaanite Genocide he then passed my thoughts onto others. I had an interesting exchange on the issues with Lydia McGrew. I began chasing down Kitchen’s sources and in January I tentatively wrote up some of my ideas in Joshua and The Genocide of the Canaanites Part I and Part II.

These posts have been extremely well read. The huge number of backlinks received make those posts some of the most linked to pages on this blog and the critical comments have been overwhelming, almost impossible to keep up with especially as they began to spread out on the net turning up on other blogs, message boards, facebook pages and so on. I suddenly found, people from all over the world contacting me on facebook and by e-mail to ask me questions and talk to me on my ideas. The secular blogosphere increasingly began to take notice of what I had written.

In just a few months, offers to publish on this issue in upcoming anthologies began to come in. I discovered I was appearing in footnotes of major publications. I found myself debating Raymond Bradley, an Emeritus Philosopher of Philosophy and a world class logician. I received offers to speak at the annual meetings of the Evangelical Philosophical Society (EPS) and the Society of Biblical Literature (SBL); the latter will be in the form of a panel discussion where I am taking the place of Christopher Wright (!)

This all seemed to me to be quite ridiculous. Here I am, an unemployed theologian, a relatively recent graduate who wrote some ideas in a blog, suddenly I was being asked to speak alongside William Lane Craig, Alvin Plantinga and over 20 of the world’s top evangelical scholars?

In addition to having published a more popular version of the work in a mainstream magazine, I have now updated the original post into an article which has been given a solid offer of publication as a chapter in an edited book. In addition, I have four other publications on the issue forthcoming next year and in less than 24 hours I will fly to Atlanta, Georgia, USA to deliver my EPS and SBL talks. I am terrified, humbled and overwhelmed by how providence has moved in the last 12 months. The practical support I have received from people all over the world, as well as the untold comments from people all over the world who have stated appreciation for what I had written has been truly overwhelming.

It is so hard to fathom that I am at this point. In 1997 I completed a masters thesis on Alvin Plantinga’s reformed epistemology. At that time I dreamed of going to the US at some point to hear Plantinga speak. It never eventuated, I got married, had kids and heard Plantinga was retiring. I figured it would never happen. I saw an advertisement for the Atlanta EPS conference last year and saw that Plantinga was the key note speaker. I did not even submit a paper because I was convinced it was too much of a long shot, they’d never want me and how would I raise the funds to get there? In 2008 I was involved in organising some speaking engagements for Bill Craig in Auckland. After the last event I walked Bill and Jan back to their hotel and said goodbye. Half jokingly I said to Bill, I’ll see you at a conference in a few years. At the time I was employed to stack shelves in local supermarkets and I thought to myself that what I said was probably wishful thinking. If you had told me 12 months ago that my ideas on hearing Wolterstorff’s lecture would see me speaking at a conference alongside these people and that I would be publishing with them – just one year later – I would have told you you were nuts.

I have no idea what the future holds, or where this all is going. Tomorrow, I leave New Zealand to head to Atlanta to spend 10 days with some of the best Christian Philosophers in the world. People whose works I’ve been reading and admiring for years are now treating me, at least for a time, as a collegue. I really do not know what this means, what God is doing or what his plans are. I really hope and pray that some employment working in my field will eventuate from this but all I can say at this stage is thank you to all readers of MandM who have believed in my work. Without your daily visits and comments and links MandM would not have risen to its current prominence in the blogosphere or its position in Google, which it needed to to get my work noticed. (I am also very aware of the no-small efforts and skill of my wife on this front). I must thank Paul Copan for making this happen and opening doors for me – his support and encouragement has been tremendous. Thank you again to those who have supported us financially, kept us in your prayers, believed in me, encouraged me and who have recommended this blog to others. I feel overwhelmed and humbled by your support. The prospect of sharing some of my ideas to audiences that contain scholars of this magnitude is probably one of the scariest undertakings I have done to date, and I have addressed some scary audiences! Thank you everyone for this opportunity.

I’ll try to pop into the blog from Atlanta and I will definitely write an update when I get back. Please continue to pray for me and for Madeleine back in New Zealand holding down the fort with the kids, the blog and sitting her final Certificate of Professional Legal Studies examinations (the NZ equivalent of the US Bar Exams) while I am away. Please also pray that the conferences happening in Atlanta touch people’s hearts and minds and draws them into a closer and more thorough knowledge of God.

What’s in Georgia? Well it is this years location for the annual conferences and meetings of the  Evangelical Theological Society (ETS), the Evangelical Philosophical Society (EPS) and the Society of Biblical Literature (SBL). Each organisation’s events dove-tail the others so that they all run between 17-23 November 2010 in pretty much the same location.

Anyway, in addition to the  Canaanite blog series being the catalyst to Matt’s receiving invitations to co-author chapters in edited books with Philosophers of Religion and Old Testament Ethicists  working at the top of the international field on the subject of Old Testament Ethics (see the upcoming publication list on Matt’s profile page) Matt will also be speaking on this topic in Atlanta.

At the EPS Apologetics Conference, Matt will speak on “God and the Genocide of the Canaanites” (full details here). The following day he will join Palm Beach Atlantic University Professor of Philosophy  and Ethics and EPS President Paul Copan, Denver Seminary Professor of Old Testament and Semitic Languages Richard Hess and Taylor University Associate Professor of Historical Theology Randal Rauser at the SBL Annual Meeting for a panel discussion entitled “Navigating Old Testament Ethics” (full details here). He’ll also be attending bits of the ETS conference too.

This is an incredible opportunity for Matt. Not only does he get to go somewhere where most of the Philosophers and Theologians at the top of his field will all be gathered in one place and meet them all but he gets to present his work to them and speak alongside them. The potential for Matt to obtain more research and speaking opportunities coupled with the fact that attending the EPS is seen in the evangelical academic world as one of the best ways to obtain employment makes this an opportunity that we are determined for Matt to take up.

The problem is cost. Almost every other speaker in attendance has institutional backing. Financially this translates to their respective academic departments funding most of their attendance. Matt does not have institutional backing. EPS President Paul Copan, who personally invited Matt to take up these speaking opportunities, is aware of this and has generously offered to help Matt out with accommodation and to and fro conference travel. This brings the total cost down considerably but we are still chasing a total of $2,481.55 NZD ($1746.52USD) to get Matt there.

From simply talking to friends about this opportunity we are aware that people who are able to would like to help Matt get to these conferences so we have decided to take a step of faith by accepting the speaking offers and purchasing the tickets. Given our employment woes and battle with ACC over my injury compensation being wrongfully discontinued, this has made things rather tight but we have faith we will get through.

If you would like to help, our support page has various donation options. We would also greatly appreciate the word being spread, so if you are a blogger or you have website, please consider linking to this page.

The SBL Annual Meeting is the largest gathering of biblical scholars in the world. Each meeting:

• showcases the latest in biblical research,
• fosters collegial contacts,
• advances research, and
• focuses on issues of the profession.

At this meeting, scholars benefit from sessions on religion, philosophy, ethics, and diverse religious traditions.

You can register here.

If you would like to donate to help Matt get to America to speak at the SBL Annual Meeting please visit our support page.