The Bible is never an easy book to understand. And sometimes the Bible is a weird book. But once in a while the Bible’s stories and word pictures are pretty much insane.

The verses below are all weird… and perhaps a couple of them are insane…

I don’t know what I think about these verses. I mean, I have a hard time believing that God had much to do with writing them… I’m not saying that it’s not possible…. I just have a difficult time believing they’re… you know… “inspired.”

The following words are weird… sometimes violent… sometimes downright masochistic…

But are they inspired? I don’t know…

Consider the following verses…

Deuteronomy 23:1 ESV

No one whose testicles are crushed or whose male organ is cut off shall enter the assembly of the Lord.

This seems mean. And it seems to be something that Jesus wouldn’t like. Of course, I still have my testicles…

Deuteronomy 25:11-12 NASB

If two men, a man and his countryman, are struggling together, and the wife of one comes near to deliver her husband from the hand of the one who is striking him, and puts out her hand and seizes his genitals, then you shall cut off her hand; you shall not show pity.

Wait. Is she mistreating the genitals? I mean, is she just grabbing them? Lovingly? Still, even if she was trying to hurt the genitals, should we really cut off her hand? What about youth pastors who give kids wedgies? Cut off a finger or two?

Genesis 38:8-10 NASB

Then Judah said to Onan, “Go in to your brother’s wife, and perform your duty as a brother-in-law to her, and raise up offspring for your brother.” Onan knew that the offspring would not be his; so when he went in to his brother’s wife, he wasted his seed on the ground in order not to give offspring to his brother. But what he did was displeasing in the sight of the LORD; so He took his life also.

Okay… so we know the story of Onan… he’s rather famous! So he spills his semen on the ground rather than putting it in the wife of his dead brother. Apparently, God gets angry at things like this… so God killed Onan…

Ezekiel 23:19-20 NET

Yet she increased her prostitution, remembering the days of her youth when she engaged in prostitution in the land of Egypt. She lusted after their genitals as large as those of donkeys, and their seminal emission was as strong as that of stallions.

Size mattered back then, too…

Deuteronomy 22:20-21

If, however, the charge is true and no proof of the young woman’s virginity can be found, ²¹ she shall be brought to the door of her father’s house and there the men of her town shall stone her to death. She has done an outrageous thing in Israel by being promiscuous while still in her father’s house. You must purge the evil from among you.

Interesting… we ignore the above verse, but we don’t mind using that one “anti-anal sex” verse in Deuteronomy to promote “God’s/our” views on homosexuality…

1 Samuel 18:25-27 ESV

Then Saul said, “Thus shall you say to David, ‘The king desires no bride-price except a hundred foreskins of the Philistines, that he may be avenged of the king’s enemies.’” Now Saul thought to make David fall by the hand of the Philistines. And when his servants told David these words, it pleased David well to be the king’s son-in-law. Before the time had expired, David arose and went, along with his men, and killed two hundred of the Philistines. And David brought their foreskins, which were given in full number to the king, that he might become the king’s son-in-law. And Saul gave him his daughter Michal for a wife.

Can you regift foreskins?

Exodus 4:24-25 NASB

Now it came about at the lodging place on the way that the LORD met him and sought to put him to death. Then Zipporah took a flint and cut off her son’s foreskin and threw it at Moses’ feet, and she said, “You are indeed a bridegroom of blood to me.”

Can you imagine being that poor kid? Wow.

Judges 3:19-25 ESVAnd Ehud reached with his left hand, took the sword from his right thigh, and thrust it into his belly. And the hilt also went in after the blade, and the fat closed over the blade, for he did not pull the sword out of his belly; and the dung came out.

So lots of biblical things came back to balls, foreskin, and poop….

What do you think about these verses?

Are they inspired?

And if you’re a man, are you still eligible for communing in God’s assembly?