So I've been wondering lately just why there is such a difference in the way God is portrayed in the Old Testament and the more forgiving, compassionate messages of the New Testament.
I mean, did He have a midlife crisis or something?
But then I thought, no...I bet he sent Jesus because everyone thought He was this horrible, smitey God and He wanted to correct that impression.
For God so loved the world, John tells us, that he gave His only begotten Son.
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4 comments:
I think God was just pi ssed off a lot more at his people back then. No matter what he tried to do they jsut wouldn't listen, not that it is any different today, however, I think he jsut got fed up and was like, "Me-dammit, these people just don't get it. I'll send me down there in human form and give them an example to follow. I mean, I'm God, for crissakes."
I think he was also pissed at how poorly his word was interpreted ie. pharaisees, sadducees, etc.; he was always dogging these guys. For example, he freaked out on the money changers in the temple and was like "Hey jackasses, you are missing the freakin point here! It's not how big your offering is."
Now I'm sure he is still pissed at us but he can just kick back and say, "Look, I gave these tards plenty of help, and I'll continue to do so, but they have to do it themselves. Let me try loving them for a few millenia and see what that does... whoops! I droppped something down there. I think it hit near Indonesia somewhere...."
Just a note about the comment from Trickish Knave: when Our Lord turned the money changers out of the temple, it wasn't about the size of their offerings. That's another story (the widow's mite). It was because they were profaning holy ground by selling doves for worshippers to offer, by changing other coins of the Roman realm for shekels (the only currency recognized in the temple), etc.; in other words, debasing the dwelling place of the Holy of Holies.
I think that by doing that, Our Lord was showing that the old offerings are not only ineffective, but actually make a mockery of the true offering, which is himself. He offered himself as expiation for our manifold sins, so that we no longer have to make these worthless, purely symbolic offerings anymore.
About the Tsunami: I wondered if this was a sign of the end times. As Andy mentioned in a previous post, no man knows the hour or the day, but a disaster of this magnitude certainly signifies something. Then I wondered why there? Why a place like that? Certainly Tom DeLay was missing the point entirely by suggesting that God was punishing South Asians for not being Christian (and of course some of the dead were Christians too). How can we assume that God is as small-minded as we are? He told Jeremiah that His ways are not our ways, after all. Then I wondered why, if it's a punishment, He wouldn't punish us and our mean, corrupt, cruel, hypocritical little culture. But my fiance, who is wise, reminded me that there is immense suffering in our culture too; it's just not as evident and spectacular as the suffering caused all at once by the tsunami. We have loneliness, emptiness, broken homes, materialism, the everyday occurence of people using each other for gratification. A different kind of suffering, but I would venture to say that our culture is interiorly as devastated as those nations have been exteriorly by the natural disasters.
From Julia, Andy's neighbor
Wow, some interesting things being posted here.
Some quick responses: I don't think I can buy that the Old Testament God is a different one than in the New Testament. It doesn't make a lot of sense...and besides, there's the whole genealogy of Jesus that takes us back to people who worshipped the God of Abraham and Isaac, et al. Plus, what happened? Old Smitey God retired? Or there was a battle? Hostile takeover? You'd think there'd be some textual support for that somewhere.
I also can't really buy the idea that we are a race that can't live up to God's expectations. First because I believe some people actually do, in rare cases; secondly, because I'm one of the people that believes in the perfection of God's plan, so I don't really accept that he would create a race of humans and then say, "Oh, shoot. They're not working out." I know there's support for that in the Old Testament (i.e., the Flood) but I still don't buy it. I mean, if humans didn't have flaws and weren't susceptible to temptations, then what would even be the point of having a God and rules and stuff?
I think perhaps what Trickish Knave was getting at was in the Old Testament you have a culture of people using God's word to consolidate their own power and, in the case of the money changers, finding ways to profit at the expense of the faithful.
And I don't see that the tsunami is necessarily indicative of the End Times; the planet has seen large-scale disasters before. But I think Julia's responses were very interesting.
I also heard an interesting theory that the change in viewpoint on God reflected a cultural shift similar to what happens in the Oresteia; namely the movement from a culture of shame to a culture of guilt. It's a subtle difference, but I thought it was interesting.
I'm inclined to agree with that last bit of Andy's. But, of course, I'm inclined to feel that God is not but a human construct, and thus capable of these vast changes in personality. It's not the god that changed, it's what people needed their god to be that changed.
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