I SUPPORT THE PALESTINIAN "BOYCOTT, DIVESTMENT,
SANCTIONS" MOVEMENT
by Frank Newton
Thursday, March 21st to Friday March 22nd, 2024
Yesterday morning a negative comment about the "BDS movement" wandered onto my computer screen. Since I had never heard of this movement, I looked it up on the worldwide web. I found its website at https://bdsmovement.net/. This website (on its opening web page) stated that "The Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement works to end international support for Israel's oppression of Palestinians and pressure Israel to comply with international law."
I support the Palestinian "Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions" movement for five short reasons and one long reason.
Five Short Reasons
(1) Any opinion which is anti-Muslim is anti-Semitic. When the interests of Muslims and the interests of Jews collide, it is a corruption of thought to use the word "anti-Semitic" to mean "anti-Jewish." People who dismiss this statement as "frivolous" are themselves frivolous.
(2) The Jews are not the only people who have a right to exist between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea. Our vision is that anyone who lives there has the right to live there.
(3) Anyone who lives in a refugee camp between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea has a right to have a government which has provided a series of steps to move all refugees out of refugee camps into houses of the sort which are built by Habitat for Humanity.
(4) Moreover, there is no obligation for anyone who was frightened by soldiers into abandoning a house they previously owned, to contribute by sweat equity or in any other way to the building of a new house for them. The government which raised and paid the army which frightened the refugees into abandoning houses they previously owned is responsible for providing new houses to those refugees, houses which are not located in refugee camps, free of charge to the refugees. The houses should be built on the principle of canvas for canvas, wood for wood, stone for stone, well for well, and sheep for sheep. If the previous habitation was of canvas, then "Thy tents shall be thy home" applies. But wood for wood, stone for stone, well for well, and sheep for sheep also applies.
(5) The Bible -- the Hebrew Bible -- contains statements contradicting the vision given above in reason #2 that anyone who lives between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea there has the right to live there. Those statements in the Hebrew Bible contradicting the vision are false, null, and void, because the higher law they purport to come from is contradicted by every respectable higher law known to the wise people among us.
The statements in the Hebrew Bible which claim exceptions to that vision will be listed in part, quoted as listed, and discussed in part below, in the section called One Long Reason, and the part called Five Quotations.
One Long Reason
You will find the false, null, and void statements in the
Hebrew Bible denying the right of certain persons, tribes, and ethnic groups to
exist between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea, and in the
neighboring lands, in these Bible verses and others:
Deuteronomy
3:1-11, condemning the Amorites and Bashan.
Deuteronomy 20:16-18,
condemning Canaan because they do not worship Yahweh.
Deuteronomy
25:17-19, commanding the Israelites to blot out the memory of the Amalekites
under heaven, because the Amalekites attacked the Israelites when the Israelites
were marching to Canaan.
Joshua 6:16-21,
condemning Jericho.
First Samuel 15: verses 1-33, condemning Amalek, and condemning King Saul of the Israelites because Saul refused to kill King Agag of the Amalekites.
Alas for these verses in the Hebrew Bible, commanding the slaughter of the people of Canaan between the River Jordan and the Mediterranean, and in the neighboring lands! What Holy God can stomach these commandments to slaughter people?
Who can comment on such troublesome verses? But then, who has even read all of the fat holy books of the Jews and the Christians and the Muslims, from their first letter to their last? Who has read all the fat commentaries on these fat holy books? Who can comment on all these fat commentaries? It is more than any sinful generation of the twenty-first century after Jesus can handle! And yet -- we have to try.
Depriving people of their right to exist and live between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea was wrong in Bible times. And it is wrong today. And the fact that the claimed exceptions in Bible times were built into the wall of the Holy Bible gives no condonement to deprive Palestinians of the right to live, freely and in enjoyment of houses, wells, and sheep, today.
Distributed Wickedness
There is no all wicked nation. Some of Pharaoh's Egyptians were wicked, some of the Canaanites were wicked, some of the Israelites were wicked, some of the Babylonians were wicked, some of the Romans were wicked, some of the Americans are wicked, some of the modern Israelis are wicked, all of the Nazis were and are wicked -- the Nazis are a political party, not a nation -- some of the Germans were and are wicked. It is that way with every human nation.
And going past the nations, to the holy books -- there are holy books which are profound, very deep, filled with the presence of God, and useful for salvation; but there is no perfect holy book.
Conclusion Concerning the Long Reason
John Kay, a rock and roll bandleader, wrote in his song "Spiritual Fantasy": "The wise men came together in the hope to free mankind of the rubbish that had gathered in God's name."
This is the challenge to Jewish, Christian, and Muslim theologians (we listed them according to the antiquity of their religions): to work their way through their holy books to abolish and deny all holy writings stating that some people living between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea have no right to exist or to live there; and to abolish and deny all holy writings commanding massacre.
Frank Newton
Five Quotations from the Holy Book of the Scriptures of the Jews
[I have chosen to quote these Bible passages from an English translation of the Bible which is out of copyright, the King James Version, called by some older generations of Episcopalians and librarians the Authorized Version. From an edition which shows English speakers how to pronounce the vowels in names, by marks over them. -- Frank Newton]
1. Deuteronomy 3:1-11
-- Then we turned, and went up the way to Bă´shăn: and Ŏg the king of
Bă´shăn came
out against us, he and all his people, at Ĕd´re-ī, 2 And
the LORD said unto me, Fear him not; for I will deliver him, and all his
people, and his land, into thy hand; and thou shalt do unto him as thou didst
unto Sī´hŏn king of the Ăm´ôr-ītes, which dwelt in Hĕsh´bŏn. 3 So
the LORD our God delivered into our hands Og also, the king of Bă´shăn, and all
his people; and we smote him until none was left to him remaining. 4 And
we took all his cities at that time, there was not a city which we took not
from them, threescore cities, all the region of Är´gŏb, the kingdom of Og in
Bă´shăn. 5 All these cities were fenced with high walls, gates, and bars, beside unwalled towns
a great many. 6 And we utterly destroyed them, as we did unto
Sī´hŏn king of Hĕsh´bŏn, utterly destroying the men, women, and children, of
every city. 7 But all the cattle, and the spoil of the
cities, we took for a prey to ourselves.
8 And we took at that time out of
the hand of the two kings of the Ăm´ôr-ītes the land that was on this side Jôr´dan, from the river of Är´nŏn unto mount Hẽr´mon; 9 (Which Hẽr´mon the
Sĭ-d ō´nĭ-ans call
Sĭr´i-ŏn, and the Ăm´ôr-ītes call it Shē´nir;)
10 All the cities of the plain,
and all
Gĭl´e-ăd, and all Bă´shăn, unto Săl´chah and Ĕd´re-ī, cities of the
kingdom of Og in Bă´shăn, 11 For only Og king of Bă´shăn remained of the
remnant of giants; behold, his bedstead was
a bedstead of iron; is it not in
Răb´bath of the children of Ăm´mŏn? nine cubits was the length thereof, and four cubits the breadth of it, after
the cubit of a man.
2. Deuteronomy
20:16-18 -- But of the cities of these people, which the LORD thy God doth
give thee for an inheritance, thou
shalt save alive nothing that breatheth:
17 But thou shalt utterly destroy
them; namely, the Hĭt´tītes, and the
Ăm´ôr-ītes, the Cā´năan-ītes, and the Pĕr´ĭz-zītes, the Hī´vītes, and the
Jēb´u-sītes;
as the LORD thy God hath commanded thee;
18 That they teach you not to do
after all their abominations, which they have done unto their gods; so should
ye sin against the LORD your God.
3. Deuteronomy 25:17-19 -- Remember what Ăm´a-lĕk did unto thee by the way, when ye were come forth out of Egypt; 18 How he met thee by the way, and smote the hindmost of thee, even all that were feeble behind thee, when thou wast faint and weary, and he feared not God. 19 Therefore it shall be, when the LORD thy God hath given thee rest from all thine enemies round about, in the land which the LORD the God giveth thee for an inheritance to possess it, that thou shalt blot out the remembrance of Ăm´a-lĕk from under heaven; thou shalt not forget it.
4. Joshua 6:16-21 -- And it came to pass at the seventh time, when the priests blew with the trumpets, Jŏsh´u-ȧ said unto the people, Shout; for the LORD hath given you the city. 17 And the city shall be accursed, even it, and all that are therein, to the LORD; only Rā´hăb the harlot shall live, she and all that are with her in the house, because she hid the messengers that we sent. 18 And ye, in any wise keep yourselves from the accursed thing, lest ye make yourselves accursed,when ye take of the accursed thing, and make the camp of Israel a curse, and trouble it. 19 But all the silver, and gold, and vessels of brass and iron, are consecrated unto the LORD; they shall come into the treasury of the LORD. 20 So the people shouted when the priests blew with the trumpets; and it came to pass, when the people heard the sound of the trumpet, and the people shouted with a great shout, that the wall fell down flat, so that the people went up into the city, every man straight before him, and they took the city; 21 And they utterly destroyed all that was in the city, both man and woman, young and old, and ox, and sheep, and ass, with the edge of the sword.
5. First Samuel 15:
verses 1-9, 13-15, 17-21, portions of 22-23, 24, and 32-33 -- Săm'u-el also
said unto Sa̤ul, The LORD sent me to anoint thee to be king over his people, over Israel; now therefore hearken thou
unto the voice of the words of the LORD.
2 Thus saith the LORD of hosts, I
remember that which Ăm´a-lĕk did to
Israel, how he laid wait for him in
the way, when he came up from Egypt.
3 Now go and smite Ăm´a-lĕk, and
utterly destroy all that they have, and spare them not; but slay both man and
woman, infant and suckling, ox and sheep, camel and ass. 4 And
Saul gathered the people together, and numbered them in Tĕl´a-īm, two hundred
thousand footmen, and ten thousand men of
Jū´dah. 5 And
Saul came to a city of Ăm´a-lĕk, and laid wait in the valley. 6 And
Saul said unto the Kĕn´ītes, Go, depart, get you down from among the Ăm´a-lĕk-ītes,
lest I destroy you with them; for ye shewed kindness to all the children of
Israel, when they came up out of Egypt.
So the Kĕn´ītes departed from among the Ăm´a-lĕk-ītes. 7 And
Saul smote the Ăm´a-lĕk-ītes from Hăv´i-lah until
thou comest to Shûr, that is over
against Egypt. 8 And he took Ā´găg the king of the
Ăm´a-lĕk-ītes alive, and utterly destroyed all the people with the edge of the
sword. 9
But Saul and the people spared Ā´găg, and the best of the sheep, and of
the oxen, and of the fatlings, and the lambs, and all that was good, and would not utterly destroy them; but everything that was vile and refuse, that they
destroyed utterly. . . . 13 And
Samuel came to Saul: and Saul said unto him, Blessed be thou of the LORD: I have performed the commandment of the
LORD. 14
And Samuel said, What meaneth
then this bleating of the sheep in mine ears, and the lowing of the oxen which
I hear? 15 And Saul said, They have brought them from
the Ăm´a-lĕk-ītes: for the people spared the best of the sheep and of the oxen,
to sacrifice unto the LORD thy God; and the rest we have utterly
destroyed. . . . 17 And
Samuel said, When thou wast little in
thine own sight, wast thou not made the head of the tribes of Israel,
and the LORD anointed thee king over Israel?
18 And the LORD sent thee on a
journey, and said, Go and utterly destroy the sinners the Ăm´a-lĕk-ītes, and
fight against them until they be utterly consumed, 19
Wherefore then didst thou not obey the voice of the LORD, but didst fly
upon the spoil, and didst evil in the sight of the LORD? 20 And
Saul said unto Samuel, Yea, I have obeyed the voice of the LORD, and have gone
the way which the LORD sent me, and have brought Ā´găg the king of Ăm´a-lĕk,
and have utterly destroyed the Ăm´a-lĕk-ītes.
21 But the people took of the
spoil, sheep and oxen, the chief of the things which should have been utterly
destroyed, to sacrifice unto the LORD thy God in Ḡĭl´găl. 22 And
Samuel said . . . 23 . . .
Because thou hast rejected the word of the LORD, he hath also rejected
thee from being king. 24 And
Saul said unto Samuel, I have sinned: for I have transgressed the commandment
of the LORD, and thy words; because I feared the people, and obeyed their
voice. . . . 32
Then said Samuel, Bring ye hither to me Ā´găg the king of the Ăm´a-lĕk-ītes. And Ā´găg came unto him delicately. And Ā´găg said, surely the bitterness of
death is past. 33 And Samuel said, As thy sword hath made women
childless, so shall thy mother be childless among women. And Samuel hewed Ā´găg in pieces before the LORD
in Ḡĭl´găl.
[Please let me know, if I have copied
any letters of the King James Bible verses wrongly. -- Newton]
