Biblical Representations of Violence

When we analyse biblical representations of violence we must recognise, as Jonathan Klawans says, that ‘it matters whether the violence in question is

and Paradigm', Man n.s. 26.2 (1991), 281-98; David Riches, ‘The Phenomenon of Violence', in D.

4 Schmidt and Schroder (eds.), Anthropology of Violence and Conflict, pp. 3-4; Aijmer and Abbink (eds.), Meanings of Violence, pp. xi-xiii; Riches, ‘Aggression, War'; Riches, ‘Phenomenon of Violence', pp. 8-11.

5 As I discuss in ‘What Ends Might Ritual Violence Accomplish?: The Case of Rechab and Baanah in 2 Samuel 4', in Saul M. Olyan (ed.), Ritual Violence in the Hebrew Bible, New Perspectives (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2015), pp. 12-13, my thoughts on ‘ritual' and ‘ritualisation' are informed by Catherine Bell, Ritual Theory, Ritual Practice (New York: Oxford University Press, 1992), pp. 41 and 90-2, and Stanley J. Tambiah, A Performative Approach to Ritual (London: Oxford University Press, 1979), pp. 199, 121 and 124. celebrated, legitimated, merely tolerated or even condemned'.^[1161] Generally, violence perpetrated against characters whom biblical narrators favour is framed as illegitimate. In turn, violence perpetrated by favoured characters is tolerated, legitimated or celebrated. The Bible depicts violence carried out by a variety of agents who represent the range of character types featured in the biblical anthology more generally. Violence attributed to human characters may be presented as legitimate or illegitimate, depending on the social context within the narrative.

The process of analysing how biblical authors portray violence carried out by various sorts of agents must address how the literary context shapes our understanding of the featured violence as well as whether the type of violence is utilised in biblical theologies. We may also identify when parti­cular types of violence might be generalised in subsequent post-biblical contexts in the service of purported ‘sanctified' violence. I include violence associated with patriarchs within folklore-type narrative that functions as the foundational story for Israelite and Judean origins and state formation; individuals in civil legal codes; priestly violence in cultic prescriptive codes; violence carried out by prophets within historiographic narratives as well as books attributed to prophets; Israelite and Judean kings within historio­graphic narratives surrounding the royal court, including acts of war, political rebellions, coups and assassinations; violence attributed to kings of neigh­bouring polities, presented as aggressors and/or agents of the deity; and finally violence attributed to divine beings across and throughout biblical genres, which is the most theologically charged.

Patriarchs and Foundational Figures

Biblical patriarchs appear as agents of violence primarily in narratives depict­ing skirmishes over territory as well as narratives featuring interpersonal violence. Abram leads a rescue battle against nine kings (Gen. 14). Levi and Simeon lead an exceedingly deceptive attack and slaughter the men of Shechem (Gen. 34). While they claim their motivation for the attack is retribution on behalf of their sister Dinah, the narrative facts betray less sympathetic motivations considering that their father Jacob condemns their actions and that they take substantial material goods, animal properties and human captives. Judah subjects his daughter-in-law and sexual partner to symbolic violence by denying her resources and threatening her (Gen. 38). Moses kills an Egyptian man in angry response to seeing him strike a fellow Hebrew (Exod. 2:11-12). Joshua and subsequent leaders engage in offensive and defensive group combat throughout the narratives in the books of Joshua and Judges. Biblical narratives assume that violence is an aspect of attaining territory. Folklore about founding figures is prominent within biblical tradi­tions. While cases of interpersonal violence sometimes feature ambivalence regarding the particular figure's actions, in most cases the perspective sym­pathetic to the patriarch or leader character is privileged.

Especially regarding territory, biblical narratives assert that Israelite char­acters rightfully acquire land. In terms of theology, divine provenance and divine endorsement of Israelite and Judean claims to the land exhibit sig­nificant historiographic and political ideologies. Within the narrative world, if we entertain the perspective of the inhabitants of Jericho (Josh. 6:1-22), for example, they might disagree with Israelite claims to the land as well as divine endorsement of the taking of their town. We have no extra-biblical evidence that indicates actual Israelite military takeover within the region, much less the mass killing of Canaanites.^[1162] Rather, biblical and archaeological data exhibit continuation of Canaanite culture within Early Iron Age settlements.

For example, Ziony Zevit proposes that the notion of herem, often trans­lated ‘utter destruction' or ‘ban', which we find in Deuteronomistic narra­tives, was modelled after Assyrian practices.⁸ The earlier Moabite Mesha stele describes a similar approach of Moabite king Mesha against Israelites in the town of Nebo, which he devoted to the deity Ashtar Chemosh. Moreover, John J. Collins observes that in Deuteronomy's story, the deity commands ‘utter destruction' of towns with immediate proximity, whereas combat at distant towns followed typical war mores (Deut. 20:10-20; cf.Deut. 7).⁹ This suggests that the story of wiping out these people served to explain how Israelites or Judeans came to displace previous inhabitants.

An intimately related topic is the characterisation of Canaanites as a threateningly bad influence on Israelites. In Numbers 33:50-6, Yhwh tells Moses to tell the people that their divinely endorsed possession of the land hinges upon driving out, though not killing, the current inhabitants lest they trouble the Israelites. We might infer from Numbers 33:52 that the specific issue with the current inhabitants has to do with the cultic objects and places that the Israelites are commanded to destroy. This indicates that the issue with current inhabitants is that their cultic objects and places somehow threaten the exclusive covenant loyalty that Yhwh demands from the Israelites, and in the final verse (Num.

Knox Press, 2000), pp. 107-43; Ann E. Killebrew, Biblical Peoples and Ethnicity: An Archaeological Study of Egyptians, Canaanites, Philistines, and Early Israel, 1300-1100 B.C.E. (Atlanta, GA: Society of Biblical Literature, 2005); Peter Machinist, ‘Outsiders or Insiders: The Biblical View of Emergent Israel and Its Contexts', in R. L. Cohn and L. J. Silberstein (eds.), The Other in Jewish Thought and History (New York: New York University Press, 1994), pp. 35-69.

8 Ziony Zevit, ‘The Search for Violence in Israelite Culture and the Bible', in Bernat and Klawans (eds.), Religion and Violence, p. 30.

9 John J. Collins, ‘The Zeal of Phinehas: The Bible and the Legitimation of Violence', Journal of Biblical Literature 122.1 (2003), 7. about to gain just as he is about to drive out the current inhabitants. Similarly, Deuteronomy 7 demands exclusive covenant loyalty to maintain the land and commands destruction of various cultic items. But, notice the striking differ­ence here: rather than driving out the current inhabitants, the Israelites are to ‘utterly destroy' them (Deut. 7:2). Collins and Zevit agree that Deuteronomistic negative portrayals of Canaanites were directed at disfa­voured behaviours or groups of Judeans around the time of Josiah, who is credited with broad social and cultic reforms in the late seventh century bce.^[1163] Leviticus 18 further negatively characterises Canaanites and exhibits rare and harsh associations of behaviours with Canaanites. Likely dating to sixth-century priestly sources, the authors utilise the notion that the Canaanites were driven from the land and add that the land spewed them out because they had specific abominable behaviours. The warnings against various behaviours serve as prescriptive norms rather than accurate descrip­tions of the behaviours of Canaanite people. Bible-based notions of divinely endorsed ‘conquest' as well as takeover of less-worthy original inhabitants have been used as models in modern propaganda.

Individuals in Civil Legal Codes

Apart from narratives about foundational figures, how does the Bible repre­sent violence within society in general? The biblical anthology includes several civil legal codes, which distinguish between various types of agents and victims within society. Various agents and human victims include the free Israelite man, wife, children, servants and resident aliens. As literature, civil legal codes are prescriptive in nature and include both apodictic and casuistic formulations. On the one hand, biblical civil regulations share a great deal in common with diverse ancient Near Eastern legal codes, suggesting veracity in their portrayal of actual mores. Civil legal regulations likely respond to the sorts of civil dilemmas that happened across these societies. On the other hand, we do not have a firm sense of how such regulatory codes were carried out or how the featured violent acts and violations may have occurred. Civil legal codes exhibit well the contested nature of violence, that is, how harmful acts may be considered legitimate from certain perspectives and illegitimate from others. If an individual is found guilty and punished with physical harm or loss of status, such punitive physical or social harm is presented as legitimate acts that achieve justice. Individuals punished might contest the legitimacy and justness of the vio­lence enacted upon them.

A fascinating example is the case of the hypothetical wife who attempts to assist her husband as he fights with another man by grabbing that man's ‘shameful parts’, most likely referring to the man's genitals. Deuteronomy 25 relates several types of civil judicial matters, and 25:11-12 directs the reader to cut off the hand of the well-meaning wife who has grabbed her husband’s opponent’s genitals rather than spare her. There is no directly comparable ruling for a man. The closest comparanda are the following cases from Exodus 21. If a man attacks another who dies, the attacker should die (Exod. 21:12); if a man ambushes another in order to kill him, he should die (Exod. 21:14); if men are fighting and one strikes another with a stone or fist and the injured does not die, the striker must pay for the injured person’s loss of time (Exod. 21:18-19); if a man strikes his male or female servant, and the servant dies straight away, the abusive master is punished, but not killed; if the servant lives a couple of days before dying, the abusive master is not punished since he has already lost his own human property (Exod. 21:20-1); if two men are fighting and one accidentally injures a pregnant woman such that she miscarries, the husband may exact punishment on the other man; if the pregnant woman sustains further loss, the man who has injured her is liable for equal injury - life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, burning for burning, wound for wound, bruise for bruise (Exod. 21:22-4). These examples clearly exhibit a social hierarchy reinforced within the judicial system and legal code, topped by the free man. His wife has less privilege but far more than the owned man or woman who is treated as property. While the lex talionis obliges the man who has accidentally injured a pregnant woman to render equal for her loss, ultimately the man is protected from disproportionate retribution. That is, the husband is not granted judicial permission to kill the man who has injured his wife. Bringing this back to the case of the wife in Deuteronomy 25:11-12, she is not equally protected by lex talionis. There is no explicit indication in Deuteronomy 25:11 that the man’s genitals have been permanently injured. If we entertain the possibility that the genitals are permanently injured, then we might understand that the loss of the woman’s hand is supposed to be equal to the man's loss of functional genitals. Such supposition could then be analysed, contested, rejected, or accepted. If it is the case that cutting off the woman's hand is punishment for merely grabbing, but not necessarily permanently injuring, another man's genitals, then she suffers a disproportionate punishment that reflects male hegemony. Much later, early medieval commentary from Rashi states that the rabbis considered the cutting off of the woman's hand to be figurative. She must pay a sum contingent upon the social status of the men initially fighting in order to rectify embarrassing the man. This interpretation of the mutilation of the woman indicates rabbinic analysis, contestation and rejection of the initial formulation of the literary case. This example is one of hundreds of biblical civil legal statements that we may fruitfully analyse in order to study the intricacies of legal codes as literature as well as the social norms proffered through them and the accompanying violence.

More directly pertaining to theologies, across the ancient Near East, legal codes are presented as endorsed and received from the gods. Likewise, biblical poetry often refers to Yhwh as a just deity and even judge, using legal models. Based on legal models, biblical authors utilised notions of retribution and enactment of judgement, punishment and justice to frame historical experiences of political and military misfortune as acts of the deity, as justified enactments of violence against humans. A central feature of the theological logic that certain biblical authors developed in order to bolster their interpretation of the situation of Judeans in the world and especially their relationship to the land and their patron deity is the notion of ‘abom­ination' relative to notions of purity and holiness. At risk of oversimplifying, the basic idea is that gods are holy, and things set apart for gods are sacred. Interaction with sacred things, places and people requires purity. In turn, impurity can hinder enactment of rituals that are purportedly key to main­taining the relationship between the people and deity. Similarly, abomination can threaten the presence of the deity, in that the deity might leave or cause individuals or the whole people to leave (Lev. 18:24-30; Deut. 18:12; Jer. 2:7-8; Ezek. 33:26; Mal. 2:11; 1 Kgs 14:24; 2 Kgs 16:3; 2 Kgs 21:2,10-16; 2 Chron. 33:2; 2 Chron. 36:5-8; 2 Chron. 36:14; Ezra 9:1,11,14). ‘Abomination' is a constructed category that is contingent on social norms and interested stances within any given social group or literary corpora that features such a category. Within the biblical anthology, abominations include various disfavoured sexual acts such as many forms of incest, bestiality, and sex with a menstruating woman (Lev. 18; Lev. 20); disfavoured types of divinatory practices (Lev. 20:6, 27; Deut. 18:10-12; 2 Kgs 21:6); failing to distinguish between clean and unclean living things (Lev. 20:25; Deut. 14:3); non-Yahwistic iconography (Deut. 7:25-6; Deut. 27:15; 2 Kgs 21:7; 2 Kgs 23:13); offering animals with blemish (Deut. 17:1); ritual killing ofhumans (Lev. 18:21; Lev. 20:2-5; Deut. 12:31; Deut. 18:10; 2 Kgs 16:3; 2 Kgs 21:6; 2 Chron. 28:3); abrogating exclusive covenant loyalty (Deut. 13:14; 17:2-4; 20:18; 32:16; 2 Kgs 21:1-5); women wearing clothing associated with men and men wearing clothing associated with women (Deut. 22:5); making a vow offering to Yhwh using an animal or goods that have been given as payment to a prostitute (Deut. 23:18); remarrying one's ex­wife (Deut. 24:4); using unfair weights and measures (Deut. 25:13-16). This range exhibits that the biblical category ‘abomination' includes both regula­tions that we might label ‘civil' laws as well as rules that we might label ‘ritual' or priestly laws.

Priests and Prophets

Priests and prophets appear as social, religious and sometimes political authority figures in biblical historiography and books attributed to prophets. How does the Bible represent violence associated with priestly and prophetic agents, and what literary aspects are at play? As with civil legal codes, ritual codes that feature priests as agents of violent acts are prescriptive. We can only speculate to what degree a historical practice of such regulations were enacted. For example, we do not know if actual priests subjected individual women whose husbands suspected them of adultery to the violent and humiliating ritual of drinking ‘bitter waters' that cause her physical harm (Num. 5:12-31). Likewise, we cannot provide clear evidence as to whether or how often potential priests were subjected to structural violence of denied access and participation in priestly duties on account of physical character­istics deemed to be disqualifying blemishes (Lev. 21:17-24). Leviticus 17:3-4 requires that someone slaughtering an animal must bring part of it to the tabernacle for the deity, and the consequence for failing to do so is being ‘cut off from the people. Such exclusion might imply physical violence, and would certainly involve structural violence of denying access to the commu­nity and group self-identification (see other examples of this punishment in Exod. 31:14; Lev. 17:9-10; Lev. 19:8; Lev. 23:29; Num. 9:13; Num. 15:30; Lev. 20:3-6). Within the narrative world of the text, there are plentiful cases of violence that are presented as legitimate within ritual or priestly actions and institutions.^[1164]

One case of violent ritual that is deemed illegitimate across several biblical books is ritual killing of humans. While Exodus 13:2 and 22:29-30 feature the deity requiring human firstborns along with first fruits and animal firstborns, Exodus 34:19-20 differs by specifying that substitutes for firstborn human sons are accepted. Numbers 3:12-13 differs further by identifying the Levites as a collective substitution for all firstborn Israelites. We also have biblical data pertaining to killing of one's chil­dren at times of calamity. Jephthah secures military victory by promising a burnt offering to Yhwh of whomever is exiting his house when he returns from victory, and he follows through despite that the victim is his only child, his daughter, who does not protest her ritual killing (Judg. 11). The king of Moab staved off defeat and sent the Israelite army fleeing by ritually killing his eldest son and heir apparent as a burnt offering, presumably to his patron deity Chemosh (2 Kgs 3:26-7). These stories exhibit killing of human children as an effective means of securing a deity's assistance in war. Elsewhere, this practice is portrayed nega­tively. In the story of Abraham securing the deity's promise of descen­dants and possessions, Elohim requests killing of his son as a burnt offering, and he carries out the request until the last moment when the deity provides a substitute (Gen. 22). While it is possible that an earlier version featured Abraham completing the ritual killing of his son (Gen. 22:16-19), the substitution in the canonical version of the story might indicate an attenuation of the idea that Yhwh would desire ritual killing of humans.^[1165] Deuteronomy 12:31 and 18:10 explicitly denounce the practice. Oracles in Micah 6:6-8, Jeremiah 19:4-9 and Ezekiel 16:20-1 imply that Judeans have made such offerings, but Micah suggests that they are ineffective in procuring Yhwh's favour and Jeremiah objects that Yhwh never asked for such a thing. Within the Deuteronomistic history, the practice is so clearly portrayed as illegitimate that the narrator accuses disfavoured kings Ahaz (2 Kgs 16:2-4), Manasseh (2 Kgs 21:1-16) of the practice.^[1166] The narrator utilises the notion as a rhetorical tool to portray them negatively, and the negative portrayal of Manasseh in particular furthers a theological apology for the downfall of Judah. Considering this literary history, we may reconsider the rhetorical work undergirding New Testament texts that portray the crucifixion of Jesus as a ritual killing that accomplishes positive outcomes.^[1167] The notion that Theos himself would decree ritual killing of his ‘only son' builds upon prior traditions of ritual killing of humans, yet stands in contrast to biblical condemnation of the practice.

Generally, ritual acts of violence are presented as divinely ordained, justified through sanctification because the deity has given directives for such acts. Similarly, biblical prose and prophetic books occasionally feature various prophets as agents of violence. For example, Elijah commands the killing of a mass of rival prophets (1 Kgs 18:40). While this killing is not explicitly labelled as pious or commanded by the deity, Elijah remains in the deity's favour. The narrative implicitly condones his violent acts and devalues the lives of his rivals. The model of divine sanction for priestly, prophetic, and ritual acts of violence is noteworthy. While biblical examples are specific and limited in scope, later authors generalise the model in order to present arrays of social, political and ritual violence as sanctified, justified by association with the divine. Some individuals even claim to be priests or prophets, associating themselves with biblical figures as a means to further their claims to authority. When such utilisation of biblical traditions involves justification of violence, we can identify motivations and means within the immediate social and political contexts of the agents. The biblical anthology is not a direct source, per se, of violence, but rather agents have invoked biblical models of sanctification as a rhetorical tool for presenting their actions as divinely inspired, ordained or commanded.

Kings of Israel and Judah

Second to the deity, human kings are portrayed as being responsible for the bulk of biblical violence. As with patriarchal characters in Torah narratives, kings are lead agents in war in royal narratives. Killing in war is presented as a normal, legitimate occurrence, and biblical characters celebrate success in war and the great numbers that warriors kill (1 Sam. 18:7; 21:11; 29:5). In addition to gaining and defending territories, kings adjudicate civil matters that involve punitive and retributive violence, and respond to challenges to their royal authority. Assassinations and coups abound in the royal courts featured in biblical historiography. This literature purports to maintain association with court records while clearly providing a Judean Jerusalem- centred spin on events as well as weaving throughout Deuteronomistic theological interpretations of Israel and Judah's successes and misfortunes. As the following examples show, acts of violence associated with royal agents that enjoy divine endorsement within the narrative are presented as justified, especially violence that serves military and political gain or maintenance. However, violent acts carried out by characters who are not favoured within biblical historiography are cast without approval.

The Judean queen Athaliah reigns for six years after Jehu assassinates her son, the previous ruler, in a bloody coup. She secures the throne by killing the remaining royal sons. 2 Kings 11 does not include the typical formulas utilised to frame the lives of Judean and Israelite kings; 2 Chronicles 24:7 calls her wicked; and the people rejoice when she is assassinated and the city becomes tranquil (2 Kgs 11:20; 2 Chron. 24:21). While the narrative casts her violent acts as illegitimate and the violence done to her as justified, she calls out ‘Treason! Treason!' before men drag her out of the temple, condemn her followers to death and kill her. The priest in charge of the conspiracy to assassinate Athaliah crowns king a 7 year old (2 Kgs 11:21-12:2). Both Athaliah and the priest Jehoiada kill for political gain and personal security. Jehoiada and the young king Joash are favoured within the narrative and portrayed as having the deity's favour, whereas Athaliah is not favoured. This difference is exhibited in how their respective violence is portrayed as justified or corrupt.

Another fascinating case is the character who assassinated Athaliah's son prior to her reign and murder, namely Jehu. The narrative in Kings is more sympathetic to Jehu than to Athaliah, however the deity's purported aven­ging for Jehu's coup in Hosea 1:4 makes Jehu's overall portrayal ambivalent. He has the deity's favour and is chosen to become king of Israel and to end the house of Ahab and Jezebel (1 Kgs 16:1-7; 19:15-17; 2 Kgs 9:1-13; 10:30). Jehu has a decree from the deity to act violently against Ahab, and he accomplishes a bloody coup, killing royals and a temple full of people through deception, and reigns over Israel for twenty-eight years. Those he kills are portrayed as lacking the deity's favour. To the degree that this leads the reader to lack sympathy for these victims, this mechanism of divine favour and disfavour dehumanises them.

Finally, select stories featuring Joab and Abner in 2 Samuel feature four types of violence: defensive, retributive, punitive, and, for the involved kings, politically strategic violence. Abner was the captain of the Israelite army and Joab was the captain of the Judean army. Joab's brother Asahel relentlessly chases Abner, who kills Asahel, presumably to protect himself. There is no explicit justification or rejection of this killing, but Abner's words suggest that he gave Asahel warning and opportunity to cease and that he did not set out to kill Asahel (2 Sam. 2). Joab and his other brother Abishai, in turn, kill Abner as retribution for Abner killing their brother (2 Sam. 3:27-30). It is vital to know that Abner was Saul's captain and had placed Saul's son Eshbaal on the Israelite throne after Saul died in battle (2 Sam. 2:8-9). Subsequently, Abner defected to the Judean king David, purportedly because Eshbaal challenged Abner for sleeping with one of the dead king Saul's concubines (2 Sam. 3:6-21). Eshbaal understood this act to suggest that Abner meant to claim the position of the former king. Abner's defecting to David is politically advantageous to David in gaining Israelite loyalty and territory. David mourns for Abner, and the narrator blames Joab for killing him in retribution for his own brother's killing. However, it is also politically advantageous that Abner is dead and there­fore not a potential rival for Israelite loyalty, especially considering his successful military career and that he was Saul's relative. While the fate of Joab's brother Abishai, another central figure in David's army, is not covered in the narrative, Joab too is assassinated. Once Solomon gains David's throne, Joab is among several figures who are killed in order to secure Solomon's position (1 Kgs 2). Joab's killing has clear political strategy since Joab backed David's heir apparent, Adonijah, Solomon's elder brother (1 Kgs 1). Suspiciously, the story goes that, from his deathbed and in private, David himself condemned Joab for the very acts that benefited David's authority (1 Kgs 2:5). It is not a coincidence that politi­cally exigent assassinations are rendered with such nuance in the narrative.

As these examples attest, royal violence is more political than religious. While divine endorsement of successful royals is assumed, assassinations, such as the assassination of Saul's son and king of Israel, Eshbaal, whose death leads to David acquiring kingship over Israel (2 Sam. 4), are not presented as particularly godly, pious, or holy acts that everyday Israelites, Judeans, or subsequent religious audiences are to emulate. Rather, we may recognise that royal violence was part of ancient realia, so biblical authors include such violence in their writings.

The greatest theological impact of royal violence portrayed in biblical narrative centres around the figure of David, the first Judean king who also gained the throne of Israel. He is characterised as a ‘man after Yhwh's own heart' (1 Sam. 13:14) as well as a sneaky, rogue mercenary; a warrior who has killed tens of thousands; ruthless acquirer of political power; and adulterer who conspires to have an innocent man killed. After attempting to cover up taking Uriah's wife, David conspires to have this loyal soldier killed (2 Sam. 11). In this case, Yhwh does punish David by causing the baby to die (2 Sam. 12:15). Reconciliation of these characterisations of David requires scholarly textual and literary inter­pretation. In a non-critical setting, however, interpreters have developed apologetic explanations to bridge the cognitive dissonance. One result is the narrative possibility of an exemplary pious person who nonetheless commits unjustified violence.

Neighbouring Kings

Non-Israelite and non-Judean kings appear as both aggressors and agents of Yhwh. Within historiography kings of more powerful polities exert structural and physical forces against Israelite and Judean kings and populations. Political subjugation and military defeat occurred as a fact of life in the ancient Near Eastern geopolitical landscape (see map 31.1). Literary represen­tations of such events include theological interpretations that serve to apol­ogise for subjugation and defeat. The idealised situation is that the patron deity ensures the safety, health, thriving, and possessions of his or her loyal people. Therefore, if a people suffers, the question arises as to why the patron god did not or could not protect them. The creative and theologically safe explanation is that the patron chose not to protect his or her people from the neighbouring king, and the god's motivation for choosing not to protect and even facilitate attacks by utilising aggressive kings against the people is key. Rather than portraying the patron god as unjust and failing to uphold his or her covenant promises, we read that the people must have fallen short of their obligations to the patron god thereby abrogating the covenant. We see this shared theological logic in biblical as well as other ancient Near Eastern literatures.

The most prominent examples of the Judean god Yhwh purportedly using non-Israelite and non-Judean kings are Assyrian king Sennacherib, Babylonian king Nebuchadnezzar and Persian king Cyrus. Around 721 bce the polity of ancient Israel, including its capital Samaria, was defeated. Assyrian king Shalmaneser laid siege to Samaria and his successor Sargon oversaw Samaria's fall. Two decades later, Assyrian king Sennacherib laid siege to Jerusalem. While other Judean towns were damaged, the Assyrians left without entering Jerusalem. Isaiah 10:5-19 speaks of Sennacherib as the instrument of god's own anger, and casts the Assyrian king's military threats and actions as results of the Judean deity's decrees. Jerusalem will suffer just as Samaria has suffered, and the theological apology lays blames on the people. The Judean deity is portrayed as being in control of the geopolitical landscape. Once he accomplishes his goals by means of Sennacherib, the deity

will deal with the powerful and haughty Sennacherib, who purportedly credits himself with his accomplishments that are ‘actually' the prerogatives of the Judean god. Notice that Yhwh is the agent of violence against his own people through the Assyrian king as well as against the Assyrian king, and theological justifications serve to legitimate the violence. Similarly, Babylonian king Nebuchadnezzar appears as the means for the Judean god to enact his will against Judeans, who carry the blame for their misfortunes. Ezra 5:12 states that the god of heaven gave the Judeans into Nebuchadnezzar's hand because they provoked the deity's anger and includes the fact that doing so led to the destruction of the Jerusalem temple and the forced migration of Judeans into Babylonian exile. Prior to destruction, Jeremiah pleads with the Judeans to submit to Nebuchadnezzar's political subjugation in order to avoid a worse fate, and he does so by claiming that Yhwh has determined that the Babylonian king will dominate Judean lands and people (Jer. 27:6). Likewise, 1 Chronicles 6:15 continues this characterisation of Nebuchadnezzar as lacking agency in the downfall of Jerusalem and the exile of Judeans. Casting the Judeans' own patron deity as the agent of violence rhetorically disarms these powerful kings. However, the theological precedent of a patron deity causing the suffering of his or her own people is ominous (see below). The biblical anthology does feature a prominent positive example of Yhwh using a non­Judean king to benefit the Judeans. According to 2 Chronicles 36:22-3 and Ezra 1:1-4, Persian king Cyrus allows the exiled Judeans to return to Jerusalem and rebuild their temple. Isaiah 44:28-45:7 credits Yhwh with Cyrus' political and military successes, even applying messianic terminology to Cyrus. While this example is positive for the Judeans, Cyrus defeated the Babylonian forces, and the Babylonian version of Cyrus' success at the expense of Babylonians utilises shared theological logic in crediting the Babylonian patron god Marduk with Cyrus' successes (Cyrus Cylinder, BM 90920). Additionally, it is note­worthy that Egyptian kings are not presented in this manner, as instruments of Yhwh's agency. In the exodus narrative, we do see the motif of Yhwh ‘hardening pharoah's heart', which has a similar rhetorical effect in that it detracts from the Egyptian king's agency (Exod. 7:3-5, for example, and throughout Exod. 4-14). However, there is no apology for the pharoah's oppression of the people as being something Yhwh intended in order to punish the Israelites.

Divine Beings

The biblical anthology features many instances of violence that feature divine beings as agents. Generally, divine beings are utilised within explanations of violence in order to provide a theological layer of interpretation to the events at hand. That is, divine beings are the central aspect of theological apologies and explanations for violence, and we may analyse what rhetorical payoff there is for shifting instances of violence away from human agency. These cases impact theologies contained within both the Hebrew Bible and New Testament. Even passages that we might label ‘utopian' visions or fantasies are predicated on successful divine violence against parties cast as enemies of favoured deities (Isa. 11; Rev. 21-2).

Related to the theological explanations that feature the patron deity using a non-Israelite and non-Judean king against his own people, this same theological apology for military misfortunes appears without reference to human kings as well, making the deity the direct agent against his people. The Moabite patron god Chemosh gives his sons and daughters, meaning the Moabite people, into captivity under the Amorite king Sihon (Num. 21:29). 2 Kings 3:26-7 implies that Chemosh responds positively to the ritual killing of the eldest son of the king of Moab by aiding the Moabites in battle against the Israelites. In Jeremiah 44, Judeans credit the Queen of Heaven with their misfortunes, using the shared theological apology described above.^[1168] They argue against the prophet Jeremiah with their reasoning that Judean mis­fortunes began only when they stopped honouring the Queen of Heaven (Jer. 44:17-19). The casting of the Queen of Heaven as the divine agent responsible for Judean misfortunes stands as a competing explanation for the fall of Jerusalem within the biblical anthology, which primarily features Yhwh as the divine agent of his people's suffering. For example, Jeremiah 21:3-7 features Yhwh fighting against his own people with the Babylonian army and sabotaging Judean weapons. In Ezekiel 9, Ezekiel sees Yhwh command a group to go throughout Jerusalem killing all but a select few, not sparing young or old or women or children. Recall that crediting one's own patron deity with his or her people's suffering is an assertion that one's patron deity remains the most powerful god despite evidence, specifically the suffering of his or her people, to the contrary (see also 2 Kgs 21; 2 Chron. 36). Alternative explanations include the notion that Yhwh has abandoned and forgotten his people (Ps. 74; Ps. 79; Ps. 89:46-51; Lam. 5:19-22) or that the Babylonians and Judah's neighbours the Edomites are to blame (Ps. 137; Obadiah).

Aside from theological apologies for communal calamity, the biblical anthology is stocked with imagery of Yhwh as a divine warrior who, for example, treads upon people in vengeance such that his clothes are splattered with blood (Isa. 63:1-6). His sword devours flesh and he makes his arrows drunk with blood (Deut. 32:34-43). Collins observes that two of the oldest biblical passages portray Yhwh as a warrior (Exod. 15; Judg. 5).^[1169] The divine captain of Yhwh's army visits Joshua at the beginning of his campaigns in Canaan (Josh. 5:13-15). Yhwh sends plagues and causes suffering both directly (Num. 11:33; Num. 16:46; 2 Sam. 24:15; Zech. 14:12) as well as through his agents such as Messengers of Affliction, Death and Pestilence (Ps. 78:49-50), the Messenger of Yhwh (Exod. 23:23; Isa. 37:36).

As discussed, biblical data indicates that, despite the vast quantity of humans that Yhwh purportedly kills, the Judean deity did not prefer to receive human ritual killings. While several texts indicate Judeans and Israelites viewed ritual killing of humans for Yhwh as legitimate (Exod. 13:2; Exod. 22:29-30; Judg. 11; see also 2 Kgs 3:26-7; Micah 6:6-8; Ezek. 16:20-1), elsewhere substitutions of animals or living service of humans appears as a less violent preference (Gen. 22; Exod. 34:19-20; Num. 3:12-13), and select texts reject the legitimacy of ritual killing ofhumans (Deut. 12:31; Deut. 18:10; Jer. 19:4-9; 2 Kgs 16:2-4; 2 Kgs 21:1-16).

Several biblical texts look forward to divine violence in the future.^[1170] Daniel 10 and 12 feature Michael as the divine prince and protector of Yhwh's people. Collins suggests that biblical apocalyptic literature is char­acterised by forbearance in the present that foresees eschatological vengeance.^[1171] The War Scroll (1 QM) anticipates battle between the Sons of Light and Sons of Darkness, and Revelation anticipates battle between opposed camps of divine beings, the heavenly deity and his associates versus ‘Satan' and his associates. David Frankfurter proposes that particu­larly violent biblical fantasies in New Testament apocalyptic texts (1 John, 2 Thessalonians and Revelation), which might have served rhetorically to dissipate violence, can nonetheless be utilised as canonical models for dehumanising others and instigating the destruction of perceived enemies.^[1172] Within early biblical interpretation, Collins emphasises the theme of reserving the right of punishment of enemies for the deity rather than humans in the present moment, and he cites rabbinic and Pauline interpretation of Deuteronomy 32:35 as an example.^[1173] This is possibly related to the political and military dominance of other polities over Judean societies, which we can trace from the Neo-Assyrian and Neo­Babylonian empires, through the Persian Empire, to the Greek and Roman Empires.