5 Times the Bible Was Way Ahead of Its Time

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The Bible is one of the oldest books still around today. It is certainly among the most ancient texts that continue to be read by everyday people instead of being examined solely by scholars. As such, there are a number of passages that can make modern people look askance at the book that is said to be the direct record of God’s own words. The sheer number of casualties detailed in the various battles and the long list of people who were killed can make modern readers squeamish. Add in the repeated mentions of slavery, servitude and pervasive understanding that women were second class citizens and people begin to wonder if they should listen to this ancient text.

What many people do not think about is that when modern people look at the Bible, they look at it through the lens of the 21st century and with the benefit of millennia of accumulated hindsight. Of course practices seem outdated when they are examined thousands of years later. When placed in its historical context, however, the Bible does not look outdated at all. In fact, it was radically progressive. Here are five times the Bible was way ahead of its time.

Women of power and importance.

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The vast majority of the ancient world was filled with intensely patriarchal cultures. Men were in charge, and women ranged from being second class citizens to little better than slaves. Men were strong and dominant. Women were submissive, obedient and weak. This was the culture that the Bible was written in and the expectations that people had about gender roles. Some of the stories in the Bible reflect this culture, but there are a great many that buck tradition. Phoebe was a deacon in the ancient church and was entrusted with carrying Paul’s Letter to the Romans more than 700 miles from Cenchreae, Greece to Rome. Esther saved her entire nation and brought down a man who had the ear of the king of Persia, an empire notorious for its terrible treatment of women. The clever Jael and Judith killed generals and commanders of armies. Mary Magdalene financed the disciples with money that was her own, not a husband or brother’s money. The culture may have been patriarchal, but the women of the Bible were not submissive or weak-willed by any means. Instead, the Bible made it a point to remember those women who were strong and clever rather than doing what so many ancient cultures did and attempt to erase the existences of women who dared to rise above their expected station.

Punishments were based on crime, not class.

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Much of what people view as outdated in the Bible is the long lists of laws in the Old Testament. After all, no one with any sense today believes that it is a good idea to stone people at the city gates. That said, the laws listed in Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy were advanced for their time. Under the laws written in the Old Testament, people were punished according to their crimes, not their social class. A thief was a thief regardless of whether he was a poor man or a rich man. This was not the case in most ancient Near Eastern law codes. The famed Code of Hammurabi, for instance, lists different punishments for people of different classes. Crimes against those who were seen as being of a higher social class were punished more harshly.

The focus on crime instead of class was good news for Israelite women as well. Women were essentially the lowest class in most cultures. As such, crimes against women, especially rape and adultery, were treated lightly in most Near Eastern law codes of the time, if the man was punished at all. Mosaic Law, however, punished men who harmed women more harshly. In cases of adultery, most Near Eastern law codes let the man go free but killed the woman. In ancient Israel, the man was killed as well as the woman. Similarly, in cases of rape, Mosaic Law held that the women was not culpable in the crime so long as she had cried out for help.

Human dignity held above property concerns.

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Mosaic Law is based in large part on the idea that mankind is made in God’s image. As such, humans are to be treated with a certain level of inherent dignity and respect. Following this logic meant that crimes against other people were considered more heinous than crimes against property. Under Mosaic Law, and later Western laws which followed a Judeo-Christian model, crimes such as murder, assault and rape are seen as far more serious than burglary, theft or vandalism. In the Old Mesopotamian codes, however, the reverse was true. Crimes against property were punishable by death. Crimes against other people were punished with fines. The Code of Ur-Nammu says, “If a man commits a robbery, he will be killed,” but “if a man commits a kidnapping, he is to be imprisoned and pay 15 shekels of silver.” Property is valued higher than human life. The exact opposite, however, is found in Mosaic Law. The Book of Exodus reads, “if a man steals an ox or a sheep, and kills it or sells it, he shall repay five oxen for an ox, and four sheep for a sheep,” and “whoever steals a man and sells him, and anyone found in possession of him, shall be put to death.” To modern readers, valuing human life over property is common sense, but this was not common at all during the Bible’s time.

Limited number of capital crimes.

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To contemporary eyes, the list of capital offenses in the Bible seems excessively long. For the time, however, the list was surprisingly short. There are only about two dozen capital crimes listed in the Bible and several of them are variations of the same offense. Marrying a mother and daughter, for instance, is a kissing cousin to incest as they will be sharing the same man and marriage bed. Similarly, being a medium and practicing witchcraft are essentially two names for the same thing. Most the crimes listed are also serious crimes. Incest, murder, giving false testimony in a capital case, kidnapping, enslavement of a fellow Hebrew, rape of a married or betrothed woman and child sacrifice were all considered to be capital crimes. The Code of Hammurabi, on the other hand, saw kidnapping and rape as worthy only of fines. Murder was not a capital offense either, and the emphasis on outlawing child sacrifice in the Bible and later in the Quran suggest that the practice was extremely common. As for making sexual crimes such as adultery or lying about a woman’s virginity a capital crime, these were serious matters when a family’s entire inheritance and future hinged on being able to identify the father of a child in the days before paternity tests.

Fewer and gentler methods of executions.

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The idea that death itself is the only penalty meant to be paid in a capital case is an idea that did not emerge until after the Enlightenment in Europe. The concept was completely foreign to ancient peoples. Instead, executions were meant to serve as a warning to others who might commit similar crimes which meant making them as gruesome, drawn out and painful as possible. The Assyrians were especially creative with the torturous methods of execution they concocted. Flaying and frying in oil were both popular. Centuries later, Rome famously turned murder into mass entertainment in the Colosseum, and medieval Europe adored going to see people hung, drawn and quartered. The Bible, on the other hand, lists very few acceptable methods of execution. According to Mosaic Law, the method of execution for the majority of capital crimes are hanging or stoning. Burning is allowed in two instances, a priest’s daughter becoming a prostitute and a man marrying both a woman and her daughter. The latter is arguably a form of forced incest. Outside of Jesus’ death, crucifixion or impalement is mentioned briefly, but it is explicitly stated that the person must be dead and removed from the stake or cross by nightfall. This is excessively cold comfort to those facing such a death, but crucifixion and impalement were used in other cultures to create deaths that lasted for multiple days. Rome was careful to ensure crucified men survived on the cross as long as possible. Similarly, stories of people surviving for days on stakes can be found in Assyrian literature as well as the tales of Vlad the Impaler. In contrast to many ancient cultures which seemed to be in an unspoken competition to come up with the most torturous methods of murder, biblical death penalties were reasonably quick deaths and seem positively mundane.