ABSTRACT
This chapter explores divine commands for violence in the Hebrew Bible and classical rabbinic literature and argues that understanding God as the specific authorizer of violent conquest and killing can in fact serve to diminish, rather than augment, human inclinations to violence. It shows that classical rabbinic interpretation of the Hebrew Bible draws upon a stream of biblical thought that sharply distinguishes between divine authorization for violence and human authorization for violence. One might wonder whether it would be harder to dissuade groups who revere such scriptures as sacred from violent action, compared to communities who likewise express a desire to conquer territory using violence, but do not refer to “divine commands.” Rather than treating scriptural portrayals of violent conquest as inherently promoting violence in present-day communities, a more judicious approach recognizes that those same scriptural portrayals of violence also have the potential to increase scriptural communities’ opposition to collective violence.
