Why do Christians read the Old Testament? (church, Revelations, prophet)
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A more important question is why do Christians pick and choose between the OT and the NT based purely on which text conveniently helps to bolster whatever point they are trying to make at the time?
Are you serious? Those books are chock full of quotable passages that can be manipulated to foist your personal point of view on others and claim that "God said so".
I put this here because to a certain extent it relates to Christianity, Atheism and Judaism. I'm a Catholic Christian and even among Catholic Christians in America there is a little bit of disagreement on this. However, in all my studies of theology I can't understand why some Christian denominations give so much reverence to the Hebrew Bible. In Catholicism it is called the Old Testament and we live under the New Testament i.e. those were the old ways of doing things, now here are the new ways of doing things.
My favorite Gospel is the Gospel is the Gospel of John because John makes it very, very clear that the Christ defied Judaism from the beginning starting with the wedding at Cana. In fact, John makes it very clear that repeatedly the Christ rejects Jewish Leaders who want to call him, "Rabbi." He makes it very clear he is not one of them. In fact, John in his wisdom shows how Mary Magdelene after the resurrection of the Christ recognizes him for what he is, "Rabbouni" (Which means teacher in Aramaic). In other words, calling him by a proper title unrelated to Judaism.
Now, how this relates to atheism is that when I go to atheist cites ninety percent of what they disagree with comes from the Old Testament. The vast majority of the rest comes from the writings of Paul, who was a Jewish convert. As a Catholic Christian Paul and his writings are not as authoritative as something like the Gospel of John. In other words, I recognize he was an important figure but not necessarily the authoritative figure like John would be, who was there himself and knew the Christ.
Now, this relates to Judaism only because I can never expect to understand the Hebrew Bible as well as a Rabbi. They specialize in it and all Hebrew writings. It's always odd to me when Christian denominations seem to think they can understand the Jewish book better than the Jews themselves. It's even more odd when you bring up important Jewish Scholars and thinkers liker Moses Monaides and they don't know who you are talking about. But ultimately, it's their book and of course with all their years of study their going to understand better than I do. I don't attempt to study because, well, I'm not Jewish.
So, why do some Christians pay so much reverence to the Old Testament, Hebrew Bible, Tanakh?
As a Christian many lessons can be learned from the entire Bible
What did the first Christians use when convincing people to put faith in Jesus as the promised Messiah?
By what means were people awaiting the arrival of the Messiah (the Christ)?
What was the time of his arrival, what would be the circumstances of his birth, his ministry, his death.
Valuable lessons can be learned from the Hebrew Scriptures
That is why Paul was inspired to write in 2 Timothy 3:16,17 " All Scripture is inspired of God and beneficial for teaching, for reproving, for setting things straight, for disciplining in righteousness,17 so that the man of God may be fully competent, completely equipped for every good work."
In Luke 24:27 Jesus used the Hebrew Scriptures, "And starting with Moses and all the Prophets, he interpreted to them things pertaining to himself in all the Scriptures.
Many of those first Christians were not learned men or women. They were ordinary people just like modern day Christians yet through holy spirit and prayer and meditating on what was read they were able to understand the scriptures.
The OT is not the Hebrew or Jewish Bible. At best it is an inaccurate interpretation of the Tanakh.
I suspect it is read rather than the Tanakh, because it supports the Christian concept of the Messiah while the Tanakh does not.
The OT is a purely Christian view and has little relationship to Judaism.
yet few people ever question why the OT was ever written when the Tanakh was available.```Even today it can be read online without the Christian interpretation.
HERE
A more important question is why do Christians pick and choose between the OT and the NT based purely on which text conveniently helps to bolster whatever point they are trying to make at the time?
It's because the OT and NT are in sharp contrast sometimes.
The OT seems very violent and ruthless in comparison to Jesus' teachings.
Are you serious? Those books are chock full of quotable passages that can be manipulated to foist your personal point of view on others and claim that "God said so".
Exactly. If you want to prove someone is "evil" or "wrong", you have tons of stuff to choose from, whereas Jesus is much more consistent.
The OT is not the Hebrew or Jewish Bible. At best it is an inaccurate interpretation of the Tanakh.
I suspect it is read rather than the Tanakh, because it supports the Christian concept of the Messiah while the Tanakh does not.
The OT is a purely Christian view and has little relationship to Judaism.
yet few people ever question why the OT was ever written when the Tanakh was available.```Even today it can be read online without the Christian interpretation.
HERE
Might want to check out Isaiah 7:14 for starters
To be honest, I've tried to get a copy of the Tanakh to compare it to the Old Testament to see what the differences are. Unfortunately, it's not something easily done. However from what little I have been able to find at book stores and from that link, all the same books are there.
However, However, I know one of the major, major differences in the book is that in portions, such Psalms, the Tanakh mentions the Jewish God by name repeatedly YHWH (I think it is pronounced Yahweh) whereas in the Christian translation we replace it with something like, "Lord." I don't know exactly when this was done or why.
Also, from my readings of the Old Testament even the Prophetic books make little reference to any Messiah. In other words, if you perceive the Old Testament as being some kind of Prelude to the Christ or to the New Testament it is not. My perception is that it is its own system. The Torah dealing with why there is sin, how this sin causes enslavement, how it is remedied, and what rules need to be put in place to maintain that remedy--many of which the Christ defied.
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