God is a monster, therefore He doesn't exist

Whenever discussion arises between believers in God and believers in the big bang as to the relative merits of the Christian explanation of origins vs. the atheistic explanation the atheist will invariably turn to one or other biblical passage which recounts a divine mass execution order - the Flood, the death of all Egyptian firstborn, or the annihilation of the Canaanites. At this point the believer is expected to squirm and to acknowledge that he has lost the argument. This author has yet to find a formal development of the argument from the biblical record of God's dealings with human beings to the non-existence of God. Yet believers are expected by atheists to abandon belief in a supreme creator God on the grounds that He ordered such "atrocities". In his book, "The God Delusion", Richard Dawkins trots out the old line (albeit in more colorful prose than most atheist bloggers can muster):

The God of the Old Testament is arguably the most unpleasant character in all fiction: jealous and proud of it; a petty, unjust, unforgiving control-freak; a vindictive, bloodthirsty ethnic cleanser; a misogynistic, homophobic, racist, infanticidal, genocidal, filicidal, pestilential, megalomaniacal, sadomasochistic, capriciously malevolent bully.

Megalomaniacal?! Really, Prof. Dawkins, I mean to say. The Creator of the universe deluded by His own greatness? Racist? I mean to say; the one who claims to be the Creator of races racist!? Unforgiving! Are you serious? (Try Jonah 4:10-11.) Misogynistic!? The one who claims to have made us male and female a womanhater? You need to pare this list down. Anyway, to the point. The reasoning seems to go like this: the biblical God is a monster; therefore He doesn't exist. Let's get logical - that's just not logical. One can certainly argue (wrongly) from the biblical record that the

biblical God is a nasty kettle of fish; but to deny His existence on moral grounds doesn't cut the logic mustard.

In defense of Dawkins, immediately after the above tirade he does say, "It is unfair to attack such an easy target. The God Hypothesis [i.e. the belief that God exists] should not stand or fall with its most unlovely instantiation, Yahweh." Dawkins, at least, is smart enough to recognize the lack of logic in denying God's existence on the grounds that one who claims to be God would commit such acts. Yet he cannot resist harping on the point; later in the same book he says,

The book of Numbers tells how God incited Moses to attack the Midianites. His army made short work of slaying all the men, and they burned all the Midianite cities, but they spared the women and children. This merciful restraint by his soldiers infuriated Moses, and he gave orders that all the boy children should be killed, and all the women who were not virgins. "But all the women children, that have not known a man by lying with him, keep alive for yourselves" (Numbers 31:18). No, Moses was not a great role model for modern moralists.

He seems intent on using such examples to make believers fidget, fumble, flinch, and, hopefully, fade. He certainly sought to use this trick in his recent TV series, "The Root of All Evil?". Repetition may be irksome, but it can be effective. Let's repeat: the argument against the existence of a supreme Creator on the grounds that one who claims to be that Creator acted amorally (in one's opinion) just doesn't fly. So, believers, the next time someone pulls the old trick on you, ask him (or her) if he is arguing against the existence of a sovereign God or against His moral standards. Get them to stick with the subject.