What if the bible were rewritten?

[SteveII]

You are zeroing in on a few of the stories. There are many many places where God shows mercy and a willingness to withhold judgement. Every one of the objectionable stories you are thinking of involved judgement for individual and/or systemic wickedness (which was clearly spelled out prior to the judgment). To support your characterization of God, you would have to show that he did not have the authority to judge wickedness OR that withholding judgement would have resulted in more good (at some point in the future timeline).

The fact that some stories exist where god acted in anger and with extreme violence tell us that it is part of his nature.  I don't have to show that god isn't authorized to judge, I only have to point out that he is free to act and willing to take certain action, and you have a god who can and will do anything at anytime, and is unstoppable.

Job was "blameless and upright; he feared God and shunned evil."  There was no  wickedness to judge; no judgment to withhold.  When the devil complained that Job's good behavior resulted in god's protection, god did not defend this sensible idea.  Instead, he unleashed satan to massacre Job's children and servants and afflict him with disease and misery and suffering.  At the end, god himself chastised Job for expecting an explanation for what he had suffered.

In other words: even being a good person and devoted follower of god doesn't mean he won't unleash savagery upon you and your family for the purposes of 'testing' you.  And you'd better like it, because he doesn't appreciate someone who questions his methods.  I find that terrifying.

Most of you are missing a very big component. Yes, God is omnipotent, but he has created a world of beings with freewill. Knowing we would choose to sin, he, from the very beginning, planned for a process of redemption (the NT): The Edenic Covenant (Genesis 3:15); Abrahamic Covenant (Genesis 12, 13, 22); Davidic Covenant (2 Samuel 7).

There is a doctrine of God's foreknowledge which I find philosophically appealing: God (with an infinitely powerful mind), surveyed all possible worlds in which he created beings with freewill, and with knowledge of what every being would freely choose to do in any given circumstance, actualized the world with the greatest eternal good.  This includes his interactions, his commands, his answers/no answers to prayers, and of course an eventual plan of redemption.

Then I'll ask you the question I've asked a few others: if --instead of granting us free will-- god was to decide our fate for us, would he ever send any soul to hell?  And if not --if every person whose fate was decided by god went to heaven-- isn't that the best possible outcome?  Hasn't god consigned billions of people to eternal torment by leaving it in our hands?  How is that "the world with the greatest eternal good"?

You seem to be confusing anger with acting in anger. There is no indication that God acted rashly or hastily. 

Regarding Job, he understood the point God was making and concluded:

Job
42 Then Job replied to the Lord:

2 “I know that you can do all things;
    no purpose of yours can be thwarted.
3 You asked, ‘Who is this that obscures my plans without knowledge?’
    Surely I spoke of things I did not understand,
    things too wonderful for me to know.
4 “You said, ‘Listen now, and I will speak;
    I will question you,
    and you shall answer me.’
5 My ears had heard of you
    but now my eyes have seen you.
6 Therefore I despise myself
    and repent in dust and ashes.”

You think that God is somehow bound by what we consider just or fair. That is simply not the case. All life is to be considered a gift of God and if it is taken (or other calamities befall us), we are so far from being able to comprehend the bigger picture, we can only trust God that it is for the greatest possible eternal good. Terrifying?, yes, if you are not looking at the end game. 

Regarding your hypothetical if God created beings without freewill, would he send them to Hell (which is best defined as eternal separation from God). No, that would not be within the character of God being the greatest conceivable being. But we do have freewill, so the burden shifts to us.