Morally Coherent or Capricious

When Scripture offends: does it indict God or expose human presumption?

The name of the Lord is a strong tower

“The name of the Lord is a strong tower; the righteous man runs into it and is safe” — Proverbs 18:10 ESV

Imagine the city under siege: stones and sparks fly, defenders cram behind battered gates, and a few high towers promise refuge from arrows and fire. Now imagine a modern skeptic standing beneath that same language, holding so called morally incoherent bible texts like a torch: “Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated” (Romans 9:13 ESV). The torch throws both light and heat; it reveals passages that prick conscience and unsettle modern moral intuition.

That tension is real. It is honest. The question we must face is not whether these texts offend—they will to some—but what the offense proves. Does the Bible portray a capricious deity, a callous judge, and a God who plays favorites for no good reason? Or do the incendiary lines of Scripture sit within a larger, morally coherent portrait that explains, not excuses, what shocks us?

There is an old adage that you should name and answer prospects’ objections up front so they can decide for themselves whether your offering fits their needs; this piece takes the same posture: we’ll surface the skeptic’s chief objections—moral coherence versus a capricious, callous, prejudice deity—answer them plainly from Scripture, and let both believers and skeptics test whether these texts indict God or invite further searching.

Skeptical Pillars

Bible and Judeo-Christian critics often set their rejectioin argument on four pillars. Each is a lived moral intuition given theological shape.

Moral coherence — whether God’s actions, judgments, and promises across Scripture cohere into a single intelligible moral character rather than contradict one another.

Capriciousness — the charge that God acts on whim or impulse, changing mind or favor without consistent moral reasons.

Callousness — the judgment that God is indifferent to suffering, issuing or permitting severe judgments that seem disproportionate to human wrongdoing.

Divine prejudice or favoritism — the claim that God arbitrarily chooses some for blessing and others for condemnation, undermining human dignity and moral accountability.

These are not rhetorical slurs; they are moral tests people apply when deciding whether the God of Scripture is worthy of trust and worship. The text of Romans 9 and the Jacob–Esau material are strong raw materials critics (so-called Christian and not) bring to bear on these tests. They sound like decisive proof to many, which is why the texts have to be read carefully, in context, and against the wider canon.

Read these lines where they sit

“I am speaking the truth in Christ… that I have great sorrow and unceasing anguish in my heart. For I could wish that I myself were accursed and cut off from Christ for the sake of my brothers… They are Israelites, and to them belong the adoption, the glory, the covenants, the giving of the law, the worship, and the promises.”

— Romans 9:1–4, ESV

Paul begins not with abstraction but with anguish. His grief for Israel sets the emotional tone: this is not a cold doctrine but a lament over covenant estrangement.

“Though they were not yet born and had done nothing either good or bad—in order that God’s purpose of election might continue… she was told, ‘The older will serve the younger.’ As it is written, ‘Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated.’”

— Romans 9:11–13, ESV

This is the scandal. Before birth, before merit, before action—God chooses. The skeptic reads this as favoritism or cruelty. Paul presents it as purposeful election.

“What shall we say then? Is there injustice on God’s part? By no means!… ‘I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.’”

— Romans 9:14–15, ESV

Paul anticipates the moral objection and answers it not with philosophical defense but with divine prerogative. Mercy, not merit, is the axis.

“You will say to me then, ‘Why does he still find fault? For who can resist his will?’ But who are you, O man, to answer back to God?”

— Romans 9:19–20, ESV

Here is the rhetorical rebuke. It is not a silencing of moral concern—it is a boundary marker. Human vantage is limited when interpreting divine action.

“What if God, desiring to show his wrath and to make known his power, has endured with much patience vessels of wrath prepared for destruction, in order to make known the riches of his glory for vessels of mercy… even us whom he has called, not from the Jews only but also from the Gentiles?”

— Romans 9:22–24, ESV

This is the shape of the drama: wrath endured, mercy revealed, glory extended. The text does not flatten human agency—it frames it inside covenantal history.

Paul’s language in Romans 9 is intentionally sharp. He begins in grief for his kinsmen and for the inscrutable shape of God’s dealings in redemptive history (Romans 9:1–5 ESV). The chapter’s examples—Isaac over Ishmael, Jacob over Esau—are not isolated moral case studies but narrative pointers: God’s purpose runs according to promise rather than simple biological descent. Paul’s rhetorical rebuke—“Who are you, O man, to answer back to God?” (Romans 9:20 ESV)—is no invitation to silence moral questioning; it is a reminder that human vantage is limited when history is held within an unfolding covenantal drama.

Genesis 25–27 supplies the narrative texture behind Paul’s examples. God’s oracle to Rebekah—“Two nations are in your womb… the older will serve the younger” (Genesis 25:23 ESV)—is prophetic and precedes human action, but the narrative that follows refuses tidy moral categories. Esau sells his birthright for a meal (Genesis 25:29–34 ESV). Jacob secures Isaac’s blessing by subterfuge (Genesis 27 ESV). Both brothers are morally compromised at points; both are participants in a story where human sin and divine purpose intersect. To isolate the line “Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated” and treat it as a stand-alone moral verdict flattens the text’s rhetorical and narrative density.

The phrase “hate” in Semitic usage often functions to mark relational rejection or preference in covenantal terms rather than modern psychological loathing; the idiom is stark by design. Likewise, Pharaoh’s hardening—sometimes ascribed to Pharaoh and sometimes ascribed to God—functions within Exodus as both human stubbornness and judicial confirmation (see Exodus 7–9). God’s hardening, in the narrative, exposes and judges a prior human refusal; it is judicial pedagogy, not arbitrary puppeteering.

Read these passages as nodes in a larger story—promise, rebellion, judgment, mercy—and the raw materials of the skeptic’s case look different. They remain difficult. They do not, on careful reading, automatically prove caprice.

Where the skeptic’s tests meet Scripture

When the argument turns on moral coherence—do God’s acts and words add up?—the question is whether the Bible’s various portraits (judge, father, redeemer) contradict or combine into one moral character.

When critics accuse capriciousness, they mean God’s decisions are whimsical—driven by impulse rather than consistent moral reason.

When callousness is alleged, the complaint is that God tolerates or executes suffering gratuitously—indifference rather than measured judgment.

When divine favoritism is charged, the worry is that election or selection demonstrates arbitrary partiality and diminishes human agency.

These short clarifications appear where the terms matter in the argument, not as abstract glosses. They aim to keep the conversation honest and precise.

Why the skeptic’s case is intellectually earnest but incomplete

There are three clarifications that narrow the gap between the charge and a balanced answer.

First, election in the Bible is primarily covenantal and teleological (towards an end goal). God’s selection of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob sets in motion a covenant through which blessing flows to nations (Genesis 12:2–3 ESV). The moral question shifts: selection is not an isolated preference but a means to a redemptive end. Seen this way, election is an instrument for mercy, not merely a trophy for a chosen few.

Second, Scripture persistently holds divine sovereignty and human responsibility together. The narrative accounts attribute stubbornness and sin to human agents in the very same stories that speak of God’s ordering. Pharaoh repeatedly resists; God confirms the hardness as a judgment that brings God’s name into posture for deliverance and demonstration (Exodus 9:16 ESV). Moral agency is not erased by divine action; Scripture portrays both operating without collapsing into simple determinism.

Third, many judgments recorded in Scripture are presented as corrective and protective responses to entrenched evil. The moral logic of covenant law treats persistent injustice as corrosive to communal life; divine acts of judgment in that framework aim to preserve the covenant order and to defend the vulnerable. Those judicial acts will unsettle modern sensibilities; but the presence of unsettled strangeness does not prove moral incoherence.

None of these moves removes difficulty; they reframe it by showing how the biblical economy measures actions against covenantal promises and purposes rather than against a flattened modern sense of fairness.

Scripture’s answers: close, canonical, and unmistakable

1. Sovereignty with formative purpose. Paul’s potter metaphor (Romans 9:20–21 ESV) suggests authority directed toward an end. A potter shapes vessels for different uses in service of an overall design. Paul’s point is teleological—that is, oriented toward a purposeful end. God’s election is not random or reactive; it unfolds toward a goal rooted in promise, mercy, and covenant.: God shapes a people for mercy and glory (Romans 9:23 ESV), not to exhibit arbitrary power.

2. Justice and mercy are held in tension, not contradiction. Deuteronomy affirms that “all his ways are justice” (Deuteronomy 32:4 ESV), while the Psalms remind us that the Lord is “merciful and gracious” (Psalm 103:8 ESV). The biblical narrative repeatedly shows that holiness requires judgment and that mercy offers restoration. The cross summarizes this economy: sin is judged and mercy is enacted (Romans 5:8 ESV).

3. Election is instrumental, not capricious. God’s choosing of a lineage (Abraham → Isaac → Jacob) constructs a channel for redemptive history. Election’s moral logic is not to magnify privilege but to form a people destined to be a conduit of blessing (Galatians 3:8–9 ESV).

4. Human responsibility persists. Paul calls for faith and repentance (Romans 10:9–10 ESV). Even in texts discussing hardening, Scripture often records human resistance prior to divine confirmation, preserving moral agency as meaningful and consequential.

5. The cross reframes accusations into revelation. If God were capricious, the divine becoming incarnate, undergoing humiliation and death for enemies, would be unintelligible. Instead, Christ’s work reveals the heart of God: sovereign love that bears cost to redeem (Romans 5:8 ESV).

These answers are not evasions. They are canonical corrections to the skeptic’s categories—reshaping moral questions by insisting on covenantal purpose, the centrality of the cross, and the coherence of God’s character across Scripture.

A character apologetic: who God is in the canonical whole

If the forensic charges fail, the Bible’s steady answer is a portrait of moral unity.

God is holy. Isaiah’s cry—“Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts” (Isaiah 6:3 ESV)—names an otherness that refuses that which corrodes life. Holiness explains why corruption cannot be left unjudged.

God is just. “Righteousness and justice are the foundation of your throne” (Psalm 89:14 ESV). Justice is covenantal, defending the weak and restoring order.

God is merciful. The Psalms and prophets sing of compassion: “The Lord is merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love” (Psalm 103:8 ESV). Mercy is the thread that explains election’s end.

God is faithful. “For the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable” (Romans 11:29 ESV). Faithfulness secures promises across generations.

God is sovereign with purpose. “I will have mercy on whom I have mercy” (Romans 9:15 ESV) affirms control directed toward redemption rather than arbitrary domination.

God is relational. The arc of covenant—promise to Abraham, the covenant with Israel, incarnation, the church—reveals a God who intends fellowship with creatures, not mere display.

Taken together, these attributes form a moral cohesion: judgment arises from holiness; mercy issues from covenantal love; election serves mission; sovereignty orders itself toward reconciliation in Christ.

Back at the tower

Proverbs promises refuge—“The name of the Lord is a strong tower; the righteous man runs into it and is safe” (Proverbs 18:10 ESV). Romans 9 will sting; it is meant to break human presumption. But when the critic’s torch is allowed to illuminate the whole canon—from promise to prophetic judgment to the incarnation and the cross—the light clarifies rather than obliterates. The tower stands not because its owner is whimsical but because the owner is holy, just, merciful, faithful, sovereign with purpose, and oriented toward relationship. The charge of caprice loses purchase when the Bible’s narrative arc is allowed to set the terms of moral judgement.

If these passages trouble you, do not turn away: read slowly, compare passages, let the cross govern interpretation, and press the questions into the text. The Berean practice—examining Scripture with eagerness and humility—remains the surest discipline (Acts 17:11 ESV). The invitation is to pursue the story to its center, where scandal yields to revelation.