why does this verse say chidlren are plunder?

Deuteronomy 20:10-14
New International Version



10 When you march up to attack a city, make its people an offer of peace. 11 If they accept and open their gates, all the people in it shall be subject to forced labor and shall work for you. 12 If they refuse to make peace and they engage you in battle, lay siege to that city. 13 When the Lord your God delivers it into your hand, put to the sword all the men in it. 14 As for the women, the children, the livestock and everything else in the city, you may take these as plunder for yourselves. And you may use the plunder the Lord your God gives you from your enemies.


anyone have any response to this? Why is this ok by God? even children are plunder?
i really hope this gets approved even though the topic is not probably very faith building. but id want to know an explanation if anyone has any.

Thanks Melach for asking questions. Always good to do so. I am no expert, but I will try a bit of an off the cuff answer. Here's the KJV:

"When thou comest nigh unto a city to fight against it, then proclaim peace unto it. And it shall be, if it make thee answer of peace, and open unto thee, then it shall be, that all the people that is found therein shall be tributaries unto thee, and they shall serve thee. And if it will make no peace with thee, but will make war against thee, then thou shalt besiege it: And when the LORD thy God hath delivered it into thine hands, thou shalt smite every male thereof with the edge of the sword: But the women, and the little ones, and the cattle, and all that is in the city, even all the spoil thereof, shalt thou take unto thyself; and thou shalt eat the spoil of thine enemies, which the LORD thy God hath given thee."

The Old Testament is written for the benefit of Christians. Things that are written are stories describing physical events and the like, but these are really intended to have a spiritual meaning. Just like the parable of the sower was a physical-sounding story in the New Testament, it had a spiritual meaning. For example, 'seed' was really meaning the word. 'Good ground' was those who hear the word and bear fruit, and so forth. The entire Bible is written in this parable fashion, as we read in Mark 4:34 and in Psalm 78:1-2.

Christ's resurrection signaled a change. The world was in darkness, so after the resurrection, God intended the new Christians that were created to engage in spiritual warfare to take back what the Satan had claimed. Fortunately, as Christians go forth with the gospel, the gates of hell share not prevail against them, and God delivers the spiritual enemies into the hands of his own. However, it is a spiritual warfare, not a physical one. The weapons of a Christian are not carnal, but are mighty to the pulling down of strongholds.

When a Christian comes to a person who is not in Christ they proclaim Christ, the gospel. Remember, Jesus is the prince of peace, so proclaiming peace is like proclaiming the gospel, proclaiming Christ. If that person receives the gospel, then that person becomes the Lord's servant. And if that person does not receive the gospel, then God delivers that person into the hands of the Christian, spiritually speaking. The Christian smites the non-repentant person with the word of God (the sword spoken of in this Deut 20 passage). That simply means that the gospel will take effect. It doesn't mean the Christian abuses the non-believer verbally. Remember, how the Bible says that if a person doesn't receive the gospel to shake the dust off your feet and to move on. In Deut 20, males are put to death, meaning something like all who reject the gospel will die in their sins. The women, little ones, and cattle are parable words for those who do receive the gospel and so they are taken as 'spoil', so to speak. They are taken unto the Christians. Whoever believes will be saved and whoever does not believe will be condemned. Cities, of course, are groups of people, and so the Deut 20 passage can be talking about congregations, and groups, but I used a person in my explanation to make things easier to understand.

Christians 'eat' other believers in the sense that they fellowship with them. Peter was told, "Rise, Peter; kill, and eat." In other words, once Peter was converted (born again), he killed the sacrificial lamb Christ in the sense that he ate and drank Christ's body and blood spiritually, and ate in this manner with other believers. Similarly, in the New Testament, some disciples were hungry on the sabbath and they picked ears of corn and ate. The 'corn' was a parable word for converts to Christ, and the hunger that the disciples had was for the word and fellowship.

So, again we read,
"When thou comest nigh unto a city to fight against it, then proclaim peace unto it. And it shall be, if it make thee answer of peace, and open unto thee, then it shall be, that all the people that is found therein shall be tributaries unto thee, and they shall serve thee. And if it will make no peace with thee, but will make war against thee, then thou shalt besiege it: And when the LORD thy God hath delivered it into thine hands, thou shalt smite every male thereof with the edge of the sword: But the women, and the little ones, and the cattle, and all that is in the city, even all the spoil thereof, shalt thou take unto thyself; and thou shalt eat the spoil of thine enemies, which the LORD thy God hath given thee."

Another name for this is "the spoils of war". And as far as we know, it was never put into practice,

The children are part of the booty when victorious. Plunder is what has been won in war, ergo to the victor go the spoils.

The chapter is addressing the Laws of Warfare and the context is "when you go to war against your enemies" and plunder is considered to be all that is valuable to the enemy. This category of enemy has it a little better than those 'in the cities of the nations that the LORD your God is giving you as an inheritance (v.16)' where none are to be left alive "so that they cannot teach you to do all the detestable things they do for their gods, and so cause you to sin against the LORD your God (v.18)."

This is why i never read the NIV.. It is a terrible translation..

(Deuteronomy 20:10-14) "¶ When thou comest nigh unto a city to fight against it, then proclaim peace unto it. {11} And it shall be, if it make thee answer of peace, and open unto thee, then it shall be, that all the people that is found therein shall be tributaries unto thee, and they shall serve thee. {12} And if it will make no peace with thee, but will make war against thee, then thou shalt besiege it: {13} And when the LORD thy God hath delivered it into thine hands, thou shalt smite every male thereof with the edge of the sword: {14} But the women, and the little ones, and the cattle, and all that is in the city, even all the spoil thereof, shalt thou take unto thyself; and thou shalt eat the spoil of thine enemies, which the LORD thy God hath given thee."

There is nothing in the KJV about plundering Children.. Yes they took the woman and Children as servants..

15 Thus you shall do to all the cities which are very far from you, which are not of the cities of these nations.

16 “But of the cities of these peoples which the Lord your God gives you as an inheritance, you shall let nothing that breathes remain alive, 17 but you shall utterly destroy them: the Hittite and the Amorite and the Canaanite and the Perizzite and the Hivite and the Jebusite, just as the Lord your God has commanded you,



The people living in cities FAR from them are distinguished from the people groups who are partially, mostly or entirely Nephilim. Which must be utterly destroyed. Here is how the Lord Himself directs the Israelites to deal with THEM:


1 Samuel 15:
2 Thus says the Lord of hosts: ‘I will punish Amalek for what he did to Israel, how he ambushed him on the way when he came up from Egypt. 3 Now go and attack Amalek, and utterly destroy all that they have, and do not spare them. But kill both man and woman, infant and nursing child, ox and sheep, camel and donkey.’ ”

Because apparently God was okay with that. Also, back then, Israel was the nation God had chosen for His inheritance, and these children could have become part of the Israelite community. The males would have been circumcised. Prior to that, their ancestors would have been under he domain of other spirit-beings. So there was an advantage to the children in being slaves of Hebrews as opposed to worshipping other gods.

Where is there any evidence that Amalek had Nephilim? They attacked Israel in the desert, and were to be wiped out.

The Amalekites, and other people groups, are mentioned with the Anakites in the land, and we don't know exactly how "infected" they were mingling with the other Nephilim there, but God made it clear that even NURSING BABIES were to have sword run through them. God distinguishes those listed groups to utterly destroy, from those where only the men were to be destroyed.

NUMBERS 13
33 There we saw the [h]giants (NEPHILIM) (the descendants of Anak came from the giants); and we were like[i] grasshoppers in our own sight, and so we were in their sight.”

Amalekites and children of Anak are mentioned in that chapter, but I see no reference to their intermixing. I think some people feel more comfortable with the LORD's command to Israel to wipe out Amalek if they can somehow paint Amalekites as not purely human. But I don't see evidence that they were Nephilim.

ok. Obviously you can believe what you like.
But the evidence is that God allowed the women and children of other idol worshipping heathen to be spared.

Even amongst supposedly pure human groups, we see that some of them were Nephilim.

Here we see David trying to weed out the impure "humans". These are the Moabites, from which King David's grandmother came!


2 Samuel 8:2

New King James Version

2 Then he defeated Moab. Forcing them down to the ground, he measured them off with a line. With two lines he measured off those to be put to death, and with one full line those to be kept alive. So the Moabites became David’s servants, and brought tribute.


David recognized that one of the traits of the Nephilim was unnatural size.

.
I have seen passages in the Bible regulating the treatment of slaves but
yet to find one prohibiting slavery. I'm not saying there are no passages
prohibiting slavery, just that I've yet to come across one.
_

Would you prefer they be killed along with the men? Letting them live and taken as plunder at least gives them a chance to grow up knowing the one true God.

People accuse Yahweh of being a cruel petty tyrant. Here's an example that shows this isn't true. First He tells them to make an offer of peace; and only if they refuse, then kill all the men. But He allows the women and children to be spared.

the same people who say this will also condemn a country like russia today. why? because "that was back then" which is a bad argument. these nations were far from israel so "offer of peace" means "we take your land for free" lol. one of the most islamic tricks in the playbook. but i guess thats where mohammad copied his method from?

for one God spared the women and kids .

God is God what ever He does can only be Godly .

So those whom God ordered to do these things in Deuteronomy 20 disobeyed God?
"The Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord" (Job 1:21).

Romans 13:4



https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Deuteronomy+20&version=NASB

Slavery in America, though of all transported to the Americas during that time America purchased the least percentage of that human cargo that was for sale, was due to the bible approving slavery.

Jews could own slaves, just not those in their own tribe.
And come the day when God rules the world, according to their holy book, guess who shall in total be their slaves? Gentiles!

The Amalekites, Perizzites, Hivites and Jebusites don't exist beyond the old testament because God commanded every last one of them be slaughtered.

Men,women,pregnant women,newborns,children, and even the animals. All. Without exception.

This thought seems to have been cut off/left unfinished.

God making regulations to reduce/prevent abuse does not necessarily mean He approves of men's practices.

Here (<- link) is an excellent resource that lays out how slavery in ancient Israel was
superior in every way to how slaves were treated in other ancient cultures. Laws indicate
that in Israel the fate of slaves was not nearly as harsh as their conditions elsewhere.

Furthermore, it is noteworthy that the entire formal presentation of law in the Torah
begins with the laws of slavery. After the introductory verse in Exodus 21:1, “These are
the rules that you shall set before them,” the Torah commences with the laws of slavery.
This is unique among the law codes of antiquity.

The reason for this placement of slavery laws in primary position, and for the relatively
beneficent treatment of slaves in Israel, is clear. Israel’s national experience had been
one of slavery. Indeed, the people had emerged as a unified nation during the period
of slavery in Egypt. This experience was so central to Israel’s consciousness that it never
forgot its roots. It permeates the Bible, and thus explains both the position and the
particulars of the laws of slavery in the Torah.

That’s actually one of the more mild examples from the Bible of children being dealt with in seemingly peculiar ways. In Numbers and 1 Samuel there is a verse or two about them being order to kill children.

From my perspective, God doesn’t really view people the same way most people view people. I think God loves us in a moral sense, but we’re so far beneath Him that we’re disposable. God values people when they’re useful and loyal. If they aren’t useful then they’re like dead tree limbs to be cut off and tossed into the fire. Just my opinion of course.