Far be it from you to do such a thing, to slay the righteous with the wicked, so that the righteous fare as the wicked! Far be that from you! Shall not the Judge of all the earth do what is just?” vs. 25
Genesis 18:20-26
While it’s hard to imagine anyone having a conversation with the Lord, this ancient story is both familiar and instructive. When Abraham catches wind of the impending destruction of Sodom he is immediately concerned because his nephew, Lot, and his family had chosen to live there. To protect them he urges the Lord to reconsider, saying that it wouldn’t be just to slay the righteous with the wicked. While we might dismiss the imaginative bargaining session which follows, the story does point to one of the tragic consequences of any war. No matter how just we perceive our actions to be, the innocent will suffer along with the guilty. In fact, they often suffer more. In recent years our hearts have broken at the sight of the hundreds of thousands of lives that are lost in warfare because of what is so callously termed “collateral damage. While Abraham presumes that the Judge of all the earth will do what is just, we cannot say the same for humans. Through the years we’ve fallen in love with war as a means of settling disputes and perceived threats, and the result has been devastating. And always it’s the innocent who are the biggest losers!
Thought for the Day: Why do humans love war?
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