The Hebrew Bible and the New Testament both contain narratives, poems, and instructions which describe, encourage, command, condemn, reward, punish and regulate violent actions by God, individuals, groups, governments, and nation-states. Among the violent acts referred to are war, human sacrifice, animal sacrifice, murder, rape, genocide, and criminal punishment. Violence is defined around four main areas: that which damages the environment, dishonest or oppressive speech, and issues of justice and purity. War is a special category of violence that is addressed in four different ways including pacifism, non-resistance, just war and crusade.

The biblical narrative has a history of interpretation within Abrahamic religions and Western culture that have used the texts for both justification of and opposition to acts of violence. There are a wide variety of views interpreting biblical texts on violence theologically and sociologically. The problem of evil, violence against women, the absence of violence in the story of creation, the presence of Shalom (peace), the nature of Hell, and the emergence of replacement theology are all aspects of these differing views.

The definition of what constitutes violence has changed over time. In the twenty-first century, the definition has broadened considerably to include acts that used to be seen as acceptable. Modern scholarship on violence in the Bible tends to fall into two categories: those who use modern ethics to critique what they see as the violent legacy of monotheism, and those who approach the topic from a historical and cultural perspective. The Bible reflects how perceptions of violence changed over time for its authors and its readers.

Biblical writers defined and interpreted violence in culturally specific terms based upon the values of the age in which they lived using their own themes, cultural explanations, and theological logic. They defined anything that destroys the ecological environment as a form of violence. They depict scheming, arrogant and dishonest speech, especially speech aimed at oppressing the poor, as violent in both cause and effect. Violations of justice are defined as particularly egregious forms of violence. Violations of purity and sanctity are seen as a kind of violence that defiles the land, its people, and the sanctuary. It is accompanied by disgust on the part of the biblical writers.

Warfare represents a special category of biblical violence and is a topic the Bible addresses, directly and indirectly, in four ways: there are verses that support pacifism, and verses that support non-resistance; 4th century theologian Augustine found the basis of just war in the Bible, and preventive war which is sometimes called crusade has also been supported using Bible texts. Historian Susan Niditch says the range of war ideologies in ancient Near Eastern culture can be seen by understanding attitudes toward war in the Hebrew Bible. In the Hebrew Bible warfare includes the Amalekites, Canaanites, Moabites, and the record in Exodus, Deuteronomy, Joshua, and both books of Kings.

God commands the Israelites to conquer the Promised Land, placing city after city "under the ban". The Hebrew verb ḥāram (חֲרֵ֤ם) connotes complete annihilation (New Revised Standard Version is “utterly destroy”; Deut. 7:2). The noun which is derived from the verb (ḥērem) is sometimes translated as "the ban" and it denotes the separation, exclusion and dedication of persons or objects to God which may be specially set apart for destruction (Deuteronomy 7:26; Leviticus 27:28-29). Historian Susan Niditch says "the root h-r-m links together several biblical non-war and war usages of the term ... under the heading of sacrifice."

Over half the occurrences of the verb and noun for the root ḥ-r-m are concerned with the destruction of nations in war. C. L. Crouch compares the two kingdoms of Israel and Judah to Assyria, saying their similarities in cosmology and ideology gave them similar ethical outlooks on war. Both Crouch and Lauren Monroe, professor of Near Eastern studies at Cornell, agree this means the ḥerem type of total war was not strictly an Israelite practice but was a common approach to war for many Near Eastern people of the Bronze and Iron Ages. For example, the 9th century Mesha Stele says that King Mesha of Moab fought in the name of his god Chemosh and that he subjected his enemies to ḥerem.

The Hebrew scholar Baruch A. Levine notes that Deut.7:1-11 shows that Hebrew ideology has evolved since the writing of Exodus 33:5-16, with its addition of the ban (see Exodus 20:19,20). Levine concludes that this is one of several indications, including extra-biblical evidence, that ḥērem was a later addition to Hebrew thought. Levine says this indicates that Israel was still, as late as Deuteronomy, making ideological adjustments with regard to the importation of the foreign practice of ḥērem from its source in the surrounding Near Eastern nations."