Tag Archives: bribes

The Story of the Exile of Israel and Judah—
The End of the Independent Hebrew Kingdoms

October 28, 2024Bible storiesahaz, babylon, betrayal, bible, blessings, bribes, buildings, death, deception, destruction, disasters, egypt, evil, failure, fire, god, hezekiah, hoshea, illness, imprisonment, injustice, israelites, jehoahaz, jehoiachin, jehoiakim, jews, josiah, kidnapping, law, massacres, money, moral influences, morality, murder, nebuchadnezzar, pagans, poverty, promises, prophecy, punishment, reward, samaritans, scapegoating, selfishness, temple, theft, violence, war, zedekiahR. A. Absalom

Where the Samaritans came from, according to the Jews

Jotham’s son Ahaz was an evil king of Judah, so God sent the kings of Israel and Aram to fight against him and defeat him after God had promised they wouldn’t defeat him.¹ After God predicted Assyria would destroy Judah, Ahaz got the king of Assyria to instead help him attack Israel, by giving him all the gold and silver from the temple of God.

Hoshea, the next king of Israel, was an evil traitor. When the king of Assyria found that out, he took Hoshea prisoner and conquered his country, putting an end to the kingdom of Israel. The people of Israel were exiled to Assyria, becoming the Ten Lost Tribes. The king of Assyria sent foreign pagans to settle in the former land of Israel, becoming Samaritans.

How Hezekiah used the gift of success

Ahaz’s son Hezekiah was the most righteous king Judah ever had. So God made him successful at everything. Hezekiah successfully convinced God to let his people break God’s law by celebrating the Passover in any way they wanted.

He successfully rebelled against the king of Assyria, so God told the king of Assyria to destroy Judah. But righteous Hezekiah kept the king of Assyria from conquering Judah by giving him all the gold and silver from the temple of God (which his father had already given to the king of Assyria). After Hezekiah successfully convinced the king of Assyria not to conquer Judah, the king of Assyria continued to try to conquer Judah, as God had commanded him, until God got him killed.

Hezekiah got sick, and God sent a prophet to tell him that he would never recover. But Hezekiah successfully convinced the never-changing God to change his mind, and so he recovered anyway.

Men from Babylon came to visit Hezekiah, and he showed them all the treasure and stuff he owned. The prophet told Hezekiah that now that the Babylonians knew about all that treasure, they were going to steal it all some day. And they would kidnap and castrate some of Hezekiah’s descendants. Righteous Hezekiah said he didn’t mind that, since he wouldn’t be around when it happened.

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The Story of the Evil Kings of Judah—
David's Dynasty Starts to Approach Hitler Levels of Evil

July 7, 2024Bible storiesahab, ahaziah, asa, athaliah, bribes, censorship, death, evil, family, god, illness, imprisonment, incest, israelites, jehoram, jehoshaphat, jews, judgment, marriage, massacres, money, morality, pointlessness, punishment, rehoboam, reputation, theft, warR. A. Absalom

Rehoboam, the first king of Judah, was evil. He and his cousin Maakah had a son named Abijah, who succeeded him as king and was also evil. With God’s help, Abijah killed half a million Israelites.²

The next king of Judah was Abijah’s son Asa, and he always did what was right in the eyes of the Lord. Asa brutally oppressed his own people, led them to steal building materials from the king of Israel, and imprisoned people when they criticized him. He took money from God’s treasury and used it to pay the king of Aram to fight against God’s people Israel. God was displeased with this, because he had wanted to fight against Israel himself. So then Asa developed a severe foot disease, and he died two years later.

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The Story of Samson and Delilah—
Brawn and No Brains

March 8, 2022Bible storiesbetrayal, blindness, bribes, buildings, coercion, deception, destruction, escape, failure, foolishness, fornication, god, hair, imprisonment, love, massacres, miracles, mistakes, nagging, philistines, revenge, samson, secrets, self-defeating, slavery, sleep, spying, suicideR. A. Absalom

Samson got a new girlfriend, named Delilah. Samson’s enemies, the Philistines, paid Delilah to figure out Samson’s secret weakness, so they could capture him. So Delilah asked Samson three times how such a strong man could be successfully tied up, and Samson gave her three false answers.

Each time, Delilah tied him up the way he suggested while he was sleeping, and then woke him up by telling him the Philistines had come for him, but Samson easily broke out of his restraints. Delilah kept nagging him every day, saying if he really loved her, he would tell her how to drain his strength and allow his enemies to capture him. So he did.

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The Story of Balaam’s Ass—
God Can't Make Up His Mind

July 11, 2021Bible storiesangels, animals, balaam, blessings, bribes, canaanites, curses, foolishness, genocide, god, hypocrisy, injustice, israelites, miracles, murder, obedience, prophecy, punishment, self-defeating, theft, violenceR. A. Absalom

The Israelites wanted to peacefully pass through the country of the Amorites on the way to Canaan. But the king of the Amorites wouldn’t let them, because God made him stubborn. So to punish the king for what God had made him do, the Israelites murdered all the Amorites, stole all their possessions, and took over their land. When Balak king of Moab found out about this, he was terrified of Israel. So he decided to hire Balaam, a prophet of God, to curse God’s chosen people. Great idea, Balak. /s

Balak sent messengers to Balaam to ask him to come and weaken the Israelites so Moab could defeat them, but God told Balaam not to do that, so the messengers returned to Balak without him. Then Balak sent more messengers to Balaam and offered him a large reward for cursing Israel. For some reason, “God” changed his mind and said Balaam should go with them this time.

So Balaam got on his donkey and started to go with the messengers to see Balak. But when God saw that Balaam was going with them after he had told Balaam he should go with them, God was very angry. So God tried to get Balaam to stop by putting an invisible angel in his way. Balaam’s donkey could see the angel standing in the road with a sword, so the donkey turned away from the road. Balaam beat his donkey to get it to get back on the road.

Then while Balaam was on a narrow path between two walls, the donkey saw the angel again, and it crushed Balaam’s foot against the wall. Balaam beat his donkey again, but there was nowhere the donkey could go, so it lay down, and Balaam kept beating it with his staff.

Then God enabled the donkey to talk, so it could tell him that it had a good reason not to keep walking, and that he had no good reason to beat it. God also enabled Balaam to see the angel. The angel told Balaam that he was being reckless by going down the straight and narrow path to meet Balak, and that if his donkey hadn’t turned away, the angel would have killed Balaam, but spared the donkey.

Balaam said he had sinned by going with Balak’s men when God had told him to go with Balak’s men. He was going to go back home, but the angel that had been sent to stop him from going to meet Balak told him to keep going and meet Balak.

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Reductio Ad Absalom

For the message of the cross is foolishness.

Tag Archives: bribes

The Story of the Exile of Israel and Judah—
The End of the Independent Hebrew Kingdoms

Where the Samaritans came from, according to the Jews

How Hezekiah used the gift of success

The Story of the Evil Kings of Judah—
David's Dynasty Starts to Approach Hitler Levels of Evil

The Story of Samson and Delilah—
Brawn and No Brains

The Story of Balaam’s Ass—
God Can't Make Up His Mind