• 1:3 Jonah escapes from the omnipresent god by fleeing to Tarshish. Yes, he was being stupid. So?
• 1:7 The sailors determine that Jonah is the cause of the storm by casting lots. And what? Does SAB deny that this is how the ancients did things? Does he deny that God may have influenced he outcome? What?
• 1:12-15 Jonah believes that by throwing himself into the sea, the storm will die down. Even more absurd is that it worked. Just the same old bigotry against the miraculous. Never mind a coherent argument against it.
• 1:17 God makes "a great fish" [Jesus said it was a whale (Mt.12:40)] to swallow Jonah. And Jonah stayed in the fish's belly for three days and three nights. Never mind the fact that a human could not survive in the belly of a fish or whale for three days and nights. Never mind that this is just bigotry against the miraculous again. For the fish thing see here. SAB is looking "very like a whale".
• 2: 1 Jonah says a little prayer from the fish's belly. And the problem is, what? Just the miracle stuff again?
• 2:10 God talks to the fish, and it vomits out Jonah upon dry land. Ditto. I guess SAB doesn't talk to his dogs?
• 3:5 Everyone in Nineveh (pop. 120,000) turned to God? Jonah must be one hell of a preacher! Perhaps; Billy Graham does even better, but there is also evidence of a swing towards monotheism in Nineveh about Jonah's time. This was also some time after some stuff like an eclipse got them thinking.
• 3:4 Jonah prophesies that in forty days Nineveh shall be overthrown. But it didn't happen because God repented (Jonah 3:10). See here.
• 3:8 God wants the "beasts" to cover themselves with sackcloth and "cry mightily unto God." Actually, no. The king of Nineveh is the one who says he wants this, though he's probably exaggerating in typical Oriental fashion.
• 3:10 God repents of the evil that he had planned to do, contrary to the Bible verses that claim that God does not repent. See above. Plus, despite his repentance, God does destroy Nineveh a little over a century after Jonah, in Nahum 3:1-7. Well, duh. Like they had stayed on the right course in the intervening period...
• 4:4 God asks Jonah, "Do you have any reason to be angry?" What? Three days in a fish's belly isn't enough? Nope, unless you only argue by outrage.
• 4:6-7 God prepares a gourd to shade Jonah's head. Then he prepares a worm to destroy the gourd. What a clever guy! Yes, it's called an "object lesson" and the use of physical materials for such lessons is still practiced even today in schools. I guess SAB thinks teachers who do this are "clever guys" too.
• 4:11 God argues for the sparing of Nineveh by saying they "cannot discern between their right hand and their left hand." So, God spares them because they're stupid? More like "innocent" in this case. Plus, God argues for Nineveh by saying he should be concerned for so many (120,000) people and animals. Even though there is no violence here, it bears mentioning that God has never had a problem destroying large numbers of people or animals before. Yes, and they all received plenty of time for repentance beforehand; this was Nineveh's "first warning". In terms of SAB's examples, here's how long they had: Some of the biggest incidents would include the Flood in which everything on Earth was killed, after 120 years of warnings from Noah then there's the "Twin Cities of Sin,"Sodom and Gomorrah, after unknown numbers of years with Lot there then all the cattle and firstborn of Egypt, after a year or more of warnings from Moses and from lesser plagues ... I think I'll stop there, but you get the idea. Yes, we get the idea that SAB thinks all these people were just sitting around playing tiddlywinks when God judged them for it.

Micah

• 1:7 Other cultures' religious beliefs and symbols are associated with prostitutes, and should be destroyed. Of course. And SAB would also be tolerant of Aztec human sacrifices, right?
• 1:8 God will "wail and howl" and "go stripped and naked." Actually, it is Micah who says he will do this. SAB is confused by the lack of English connective phrases.
• 1:12 "Evil came down from the Lord." This conflicts with other verses that say God is good. See here.
• 2:1 Micah says "woe" to those that devise evil here, but only two verses later, God says he is devising evil against "this family!" Actually Micah refers to those who devise evil on their beds -- and in the next verses refer to those who oppress the poor and take their property. God's "evil" (the same word noted in the link above) is a calamity of judgment -- lex talionis, an equitable punishment.
• 2:3 God devises evil against a family. Again, calling into question whether or not God is good. See above.
• 2:11 Micah says some prophets are playing to the people's desires by only prophesying good things, like wine and "strong drink." I guess Judah liked to party in those days. Probably. And other than a cheap joke, what's the point?
• 3:2-3 Plucking off skin, flesh from bones, eating human flesh, flaying off skin, breaking bones, chopping bodies in pieces, making human stew. All figurative language for what the powerful did to the poor and helpless. Does SAB have problems with figures of speech like, "These high bills are killing me"?
• 3:4 When they "cry unto the Lord ... he will not hear them: he will even hide his face from them at that time." Yes, and the problem is? What? Argument by outrage (see above)?
• 3:5 Some of God's prophets tell lies. God says that they bite (with their teeth). Yes. So? Is SAB frightened of figures of speech?
• 3:9-12 Because the leaders of the nation were corrupt, God is going to punish everyone. "Everyone"? That's not what it says. It says, "Therefore shall Zion for your sake be plowed as a field, and Jerusalem shall become heaps, and the mountain of the house as the high places of the forest." This would hardly affect the peasant class.
• 3:11 "The prophets thereof divine for money." Some things never change. They don't for Skeptics either. See here.
• 4:3 "They shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruninghooks: nation shall not lift up a sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more." Well, it's a nice thought, but Joel 3:10 says just the opposite. But what do you expect from a "God of Peace" (Rom.15:33, Heb.13:20) who calls himself a "man of war"? (Ex.15:3) See here. As Ecclesiastes says, there's a time for war and a time for peace.
• 4:5 So, Micah says we can have our gods, but they'll keep theirs. Well, how many gods are there? Lots of them. All but one is worthless. Does SAB think that saying "Allah is the god of the Muslims" means that we think Allah is real?
• 5:2 "But thou, Bethlehem Ephratah, though thou be little among the thousands of Judah, yet out of thee shall he come forth unto me that is to be ruler in Israel; whose goings forth have been from of old, from everlasting." The gospel of Matthew (2:5-6) claims that Jesus' birth in Bethlehem fulfils this prophecy. But this is unlikely for two reasons. Which are answered here with conceptual data on NT use of OT prophecy here.
• 5:6-15 More ranting from a demented god. More argument by outrage from a demented Skeptic. He plans to destroy cities, tear gentiles in pieces, and "execute vengeance in anger and fury upon the heathen, such as they have not heard." Praise God. They were doing nothing but playing checkers when He decided to do this.
• 5:12-13 "Burn more witches! Destroy the images of gods who aren't me!" sayeth the Lord. "Argue by outrage again!"
• 5:15 Speaking of that "fury," is God supposed to get furious? See here.
• 6:2 The earth is set upon strong foundations and therefore does not move. See here.
• 6:3 God dares ask, "What have I done unto thee? and wherein have I wearied thee?" Ha! Where do I begin?! We'll start with the Flood, Excuse me for cutting into the list, but God is speaking to people at a specific time and place. Beyond that it's just more "argument by outrage".
• 6:8 "O man, what is good; and what doth the LORD require of thee, but to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God?" Well, it's a nice thought, but there are a few things more that Micah forgot to mention. Like you must believe certain unlikely things or you will be tormented forever in hell (Mk.16:16, Jn.3:18, 36); Hello? Action follows thought; if you do not believe certain things, you will not do what Micah says. you must kill witches Ex.22:18, homosexuals Lev.20:13, those who believe differently than you Dt.13:6-10, disobedient children Dt.21:18-21, etc. All of which would be under the rubric of "justice" -- and if SAB wants to argue, let him do it by more than mere posturing and begged-question outrage.
• 6:13-16 In the same chapter that God asks, "What have I ever done to you?", God says he going to punish his supposed "chosen people" with more destruction. And he wonders why the Israelites keep turning away from him. Wrong order. They turned first. Then the punishment came. And they were warned that this would happen in Deuteronomy. SAB's attitiude makes inane his implied question above, "Why should God punish me for what I believe?"
• 7:16-17 Thanks to God's intervention, Judah's enemies and neighbors will become powerless and dumbfounded and submit to God only in fear. Yes, and the problem with this is, what?
• 7:18 This verse claims that God's anger does not last forever, "because he delighteth in mercy." But Jesus says that God punishes some people mercilessly forever in hell (Mt.25:46). And he "delighteth in mercy," then why does God act without mercy? What makes SAB think that God's punishment must always be accompanied by anger? As for mercy, SAB doesn't know the meaning of the word in context.