"The book of Proverbs repeatedly praises child abuse, saying that the bruises (or "blue stripes of the rod") are an indication of a well-trained child. Otherwise, God constantly has people killing children, and sometimes even eating them. Remember when Lot tried to satisfy a rape mob by offering them his own virgin daughters? Remember when Jephthah murdered his own child as a sacrifice to God? There's four books in the Old Testament where God demands that we sacrifice our firstborn sons, so the story of Abraham being ready to kill his own kid pales in comparison to what God demanded later on. How's that for family values! And don't think that all this Old Testament stuff didn't apply to Christians; Jesus said that He came to fulfill the law, not to change it, that not one jot or tiddle of those old Mosaic laws change under Him, and He said that anybody who didn't follow all of those old Mosaic laws would be called "least in Heaven". He even criticized the Pharisees for not murdering disobedient children the way God commanded."