When the Bible Has Been Weaponized Against You
In our last season of our Searching the Sacred podcast, we centered everything around one question:
“He said to him, ‘What is written in the law? What do you read there?’” — Luke 10:26
We used that verse to explore how we hold, read, teach, and apply the Bible. To pair with that series, we’re beginning a new blog series around these verses:
“they shall beat their swords into plowshares
and their spears into pruning hooks;
nation shall not lift up sword against nation;
neither shall they learn war any more;
but they shall all sit under their own vines and under their own fig trees,
and no one shall make them afraid.” — Micah 4:3–4
Because what do we do when the Bible itself has been weaponized? When Scripture has been used as a sword, its passages as spears?
Many people have walked away from the Bible altogether, and we understand why. It can be painful to open a book that has caused so much harm. Sometimes, when we awaken to new possibilities, we need distance from what has hurt us.
At 40 Orchards, we’re trying to do the next part of the work: turning those weapons into gardening tools. It’s not easy, but it’s possible.
For us, some of the most powerful transformations have come through the narratives of women, whose stories were given to me as warnings:
Don’t reach for the fruit like Eve.
Don’t take matters into your own hands like Sarah.
Don’t lie and manipulate like Rebekah.
Strong, independent women were examples of what not to be. At the time, those messages felt more like a paintball than a spear. They stung, but the pain faded, and I moved on. Over time, though, I realized how those lessons had built up in me. They taught me to doubt my desire, stifle my creativity, and hold back my boldness.
The Bible was used against my trust in myself, especially when combined with certain verses from the Pauline letters. (That’s a post for another day.) So how do we turn these weaponized passages into tools for growth? We reclaim them by wrestling with the stories, together, in community.
In circles where we’ve looked at Genesis 3, we’ve noticed Eve’s curiosity and autonomy as gifts, not curses. We’ve paused over the words that are in the story, like “desire,” and the ones that aren’t, like “sin.” We’ve found new understandings each time. When someone leaves a circle seeing Eve as a source of life—which is what her name means, after all—my own ability to honor desire grows stronger. The weapon becomes a compass.
In Genesis 16, I’ve seen how focusing on Sarah often made me miss Hagar. Sarah was doing what her culture told her was acceptable, even when it harmed someone else. She wasn’t rebelling; she was conforming. And that makes me ask: when have I followed cultural norms toward my own comfort and ignored the harm done to others? This story, once a spear, becomes a pruning knife, cutting away my blindness.
And in Genesis 27, we’ve wrestled with Rebekah’s actions in light of God’s promise in Genesis 25 and her own divine encounter in Genesis 24. Why do we call her trickery wrong, yet celebrate David’s as a holy strategy? We’ve heard stories of people using ingenuity to survive and protect. We’ve honored Rebekah’s resourcefulness. The sword becomes a plowshare.
This work is slow. That’s part of why it’s hard to choose it. Not every passage can be turned, but the act of wrestling itself is a turning. Sitting in community, seeing and being seen, this becomes more than Bible study. It’s the work of beating something old into something new. And we can only do that if we’re willing to face what’s old. The good news is, we don’t have to face it alone.
Here are some suggestions of steps you can take:
Listen to some podcast episodes that might help. Start with the most recent series on how we read the Bible. Start with the episode, Is the Bible Inerrant? Or if you want to explore some of the same women listed above, you could check out this one on Eve and Genesis 3, and this one on Rebekah.
Join a Scripture Circle, in order to have these kinds of conversations in a community. We have a drop in circle coming up on November 11, and another in January.
Think about passages you need to rebuild, and read alternative commentaries to listen for new interpretations. Two we love about the biblical narratives of women are Reading the Women of the Bible by Tikva Fryer Kensky and Womanist Midrash by Dr Wilda Gafney.
The wrestling is worth it. We can reclaim Scripture from the hands that twisted it.
Steph & Lisa
