hermeneutics

In the book of Joshua, God commanded the Israelites to take the land of Canaan by conquest and utterly destroy its native inhabitants. If a nation attempted to do that today, we'd call it mass genocide. If someone said God had told them to do it, we'd call them a religious terrorist. How can we make sense of the violence of the Hebrew Bible in light of the life and teachings of Jesus Christ?

I was asked to describe my view of Scripture, so I wrote this short reflection as a depiction of how the Bible has come alive to me in recent years. Scripture is no longer a reflection of myself, but is a summons to know the world of life.