The Violent Old Testament God in Sunday School Yesterday

[_CaliforniaKid]

I would dispute that characterization of the God of the Old Testament. This kind of impression comes mainly from only reading the "cool" stories, which the LDS Old Testament materials do tend to focus on on. Most LDS (and to be fair, most Christians) glide over the wisdom literature, the prophetic literature, and the legal literature; all of those give a much fuller picture of who the ancient Israelites were worshipping. Just the concept of chesed (roughly "loving kindness"), which is frequently attributed to Yahweh, puts a damper on the idea of God having a baseball bat ready to beat the crap out of everyone and anyone.

I beg to differ, Aristotle. The God of the wisdom and prophetic literature is often quite the capricious meanie, especially to those who are not of his chosen people. I'm always a bit baffled, for instance, by people who whose favorite Old Testament book is Job. How is the God of Job any less capricious than the God of Abraham? Abraham's God wants him to kill his own son, but at least he stops him before the act is committed. Job's God kills Job's family and afflicts all kinds of suffering on Job just to prove a point, and when Job complains about it, God's response is basically, "I'm bigger than you, so shut up and don't question me." We find a more progressive deity in the prophetic literature than in Leviticus or Joshua, but he's still a far cry from being the embodiment of unconditional love.

[_Nightlion]

The resolution is easy. Jesus is not Jehovah. That never made a bit of sense to me.

Noah began the world again with eight souls. They were decent saints no doubt but righteousness got away from them soon. All the world was probably in spiritual shambles until the reformation of Shem who ruled Salem under his father, Noah, (those guys were still living long lives) Shem was the High Priest, Melchizedek. The Salem culture repented to become Zion which got right up there with Enoch's and supposedly translated. Why did it have to leave earth as well? Because the majority of people after a few hundred years had rejected the gospel and trampled it in abject apostasy. There was, Nimrod, a possible SOP and the wickedness of Babylon which is another name for apostasy. Apostasy from what? From the gospel of Zion after the flood.

Abraham was taught by Melchizedek. We have little to no scripture from the post flood saints. There were prophets still who were not from Abraham, like Jethro, and Balaam, with the line to the brother of Jared. We just do not know the circumstances of the great apostasy of the post-deluvian non-Abrahamic peoples.

Those whom the Lord sent Israel against had sinned against the gospel and cast out the prophets and blasphemed God with their idolatry for hundreds of years and a thousand or so before the Lord began to slay them. (Beside the fallen at the tower of Babel. Although that could have been quite a few.) None of the people were ignorant of the true God. We see this suggested time and again.

The Lord did use the wars with those whom Israel destroyed to help make them a nation. Rather than open the earth and swallow them whole he chose the way he did for a wise purpose that I doubt we can begin to appreciate.

Jesus warned the LDS to get it right or they too will be swept off the holy land as a pollution. D&C 84:59

Jesus is Jehovah.

3 Ne. 11: 14
14 Arise and come forth unto me, that ye may thrust your hands into my side, and also that ye may feel the prints of the nails in my hands and in my feet, that ye may know that I am the God of Israel, and the God of the whole dearth, and have been slain for the sins of the world.

Alma 13
17 Now this Melchizedek was a king over the land of Salem; and his people had waxed strong in iniquity and abomination; yea, they had all gone astray; they were full of all manner of wickedness;
18 But Melchizedek having exercised mighty faith, and received the office of the high priesthood according to the holy order of God, did preach repentance unto his people. And behold, they did repent; and Melchizedek did establish peace in the land in his days; therefore he was called the prince of peace, for he was the king of Salem; and he did reign under his father.

Anyone know where it is suggested that Salem was also taken? I can't find it.

[_huckelberry]

I would dispute that characterization of the God of the Old Testament. This kind of impression comes mainly from only reading the "cool" stories, which the LDS Old Testament materials do tend to focus on on. Most LDS (and to be fair, most Christians) glide over the wisdom literature, the prophetic literature, and the legal literature; all of those give a much fuller picture of who the ancient Israelites were worshipping. Just the concept of chesed (roughly "loving kindness"), which is frequently attributed to Yahweh, puts a damper on the idea of God having a baseball bat ready to beat the crap out of everyone and anyone.

I beg to differ, Aristotle. The God of the wisdom and prophetic literature is often quite the capricious meanie, especially to those who are not of his chosen people. I'm always a bit baffled, for instance, by people who whose favorite Old Testament book is Job. How is the God of Job any less capricious than the God of Abraham? Abraham's God wants him to kill his own son, but at least he stops him before the act is committed. Job's God kills Job's family and afflicts all kinds of suffering on Job just to prove a point, and when Job complains about it, God's response is basically, "I'm bigger than you, so shut up and don't question me." We find a more progressive deity in the prophetic literature than in Leviticus or Joshua, but he's still a far cry from being the embodiment of unconditional love.

I thought Smiths comments were clear and well aimed. Considering your objections, I think your reading of Job is formed by point of view of Jobs accusers (who are of course accusers of God) You are wrong about what God wanted Abraham to do. What I see is that Gods relationship to his people is the closest thing to unconditional love that I know of.

[_Themis]

I thought Smiths comments were clear and well aimed. Considering your objections, I think your reading of Job is formed by point of view of Jobs accusers (who are of course accusers of God) You are wrong about what God wanted Abraham to do. What I see is that Gods relationship to his people is the closest thing to unconditional love that I know of.

I think Consig understands well what we get from the Bible with this statement

I think it is normal for human beings, both as individuals and as a society, to take the attributes that they think of as good, multiply them to perfection, and then attribute those attributes to God. Today, we tend to think of love as a good attribute, and so we say that God has perfect love. We also think of forgiveness as being positive, and so attribute perfect forgiveness to God.

I think the Bible will do more to teach us about how the ancients thought and acted then on what God is supposed to be like.

[_huckelberry]

Themis,

I thought your quote from Consigliere post was the posts most interesting observation. Yes the people in the Old Testament were happy to see God protecting them against enemies

Today we have matured and see Gods relationship to war to be like a referee in a football game, obligated to not take sides. Prayed to by Christians north and south in the American civil war God had no dog in the fight.

Naw, we are just the same as those people 3000 years ago.

[_Themis]

Themis,

I thought your quote from Consigliere post was the posts most interesting observation. Yes the people in the Old Testament were happy to see God protecting them against enemies

Today we have matured and see Gods relationship to war to be like a referee in a football game, obligated to not take sides. Prayed to by Christians north and south in the American civil war God had no dog in the fight.

Naw, we are just the same as those people 3000 years ago.

Like I said, the Bible shows us what the ancients were like, not God. Not that different from us.

[Guest]

I thought Smiths comments were clear and well aimed. Considering your objections, I think your reading of Job is formed by point of view of Jobs accusers (who are of course accusers of God)

Hardly. Job's accusers were accusing Job of having done something to merit punishment. If anyone accused God, it was Job himself. Thus God's rebuke in the last several chapters. God basically spends two chapters talking about how powerful he is, followed by: "Will the one who contends with the Almighty correct him? Let him who accuses God answer him!" And so Job ends up chickening out and repenting. At the end God gives Job a new family, but frankly, his old family is still just as dead. In his eagerness to test Job, God shows remarkably little concern for the people he kills along the way.

What I see is that Gods relationship to his people is the closest thing to unconditional love that I know of.

Unconditional love doesn't generally massacre people for being disobedient. God seems to unconditionally love the Jewish people as a collective, but that doesn't stop him from repeatedly slaughtering (or allowing to be slaughtered) huge numbers of individual Israelites and Jews. Think Assyrian conquest, Babylonian conquest, etc. God's unconditional love for his chosen Jewish people also tends to manifest itself in indiscriminate slaughter and judgment on other ethnic groups.

Let's look, for instance, at some of the things Isaiah has to say about God's judgment on children:

13:17-18 - "See, I will stir up against them the Medes . . . Their bows will strike down the young men; they will have no mercy on infants, nor will they look with compassion on children."

14:21-22 - "Prepare a place to slaughter his children for the sins of their ancestors; they are not to rise to inherit the land and cover the earth with their cities. 'I will rise up against them,' declares the Lord Almighty. 'I will wipe out Babylon’s name and survivors, her offspring and descendants,' declares the Lord."

51:20 - "Your children have fainted; they lie at every street corner, like antelope caught in a net. They are filled with the wrath of the Lord, with the rebuke of your God."

Examples could've course be multiplied, but you get the point. Anyone who thinks the God of the prophets and wisdom literature is some kind of unconditionally lovey-dovey fellow needs to take off the rose-colored glasses.

ETA: Why is the board software automatically abbreviating "could.of course" as "could've course"? Shades?

[_CaliforniaKid]

The resolution is easy. Jesus is not Jehovah.

Very Marcionite. :)

[_huckelberry]

Californiakid, I do not think anybody ever engages in unconditional lovey dovey. I do not believe anybody anywhere should engage in something like that.

I find myself wondering if you take Job as a story of real people or that it is supposed to have been taken that way . I had supposed that it is clear that it is fiction and engages is the sort of exaggeration that fantasy uses to create questions. Yes it is designed to ask why Israel receives harsh treatment.

I cannot hear God answering with self aggrandizement. I hear God answering Job with love. Your complaints I do not experience as relevant to a poem. Yet as a poem it should be troubling. Why is life harsh and dangerous?
Why do we die?

How do we live with honor and courage knowing that we all die? Isnt that what Job is wondering about?

[_moksha]

Could be the ancient Israelites were the skinny kid getting sand kicked in his face by the beach bully. However, with a good diet and strict regimen of oral story telling while in captivity, they were able to show that bully a thing or two with a God of retribution.