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The main surprise for me was that the Old Testament does not portray an angry vengeful God (as it seems to if you just hone in on random parts) but instead portrays an incredibly loving one.
" (as it seems to if you just hone in on random parts) "
I'll try again to sum up my answer to your question. I believe that the Bible should be read as a whole (with both the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament and the New Testament) and that it gives a story as a whole. The Bible tells the story of God's love for mankind.
Thank you for watching the video Sanhillian.
Anyway, I agree with you that in order to fully understand the New Testament, one must read the Old Testament. I realize that most Christians read the Bible devotionally as opposed to critically. They read it as a thread in much the same way we are taught to read a book. There's a beginning, a middle story and an end. In other words, it is read horizontally and not vertically so the idea is, things are written in some kind of order. For this reason, Christian readers are impressed to believe that things found in the book Ezekiel must agree with what is in the book of Zechariah, things in the book of Nahum must agree with things in the book of Joshua or things in the book of Matthew must comply with what is found in the book of Micah.
This does serious injustice to the writers as I believe many of them wrote independent of each other, sometimes with opposing views if you play careful attention.
That being said, my original point was, that while reading the O.T is necessary to allow the N.T to make some sense, the O.T contains some rather odious details attributed to its god and some of those who claimed to speak for him. These details are not lost on the critics who constantly bring them up and Christians find themselves having to defend why their O.T god condoned and/or ordered slavery, murder, mayhem and other craziness while on the other hand they are trying to sanitize him with the N.T. As I said elsewhere, it is like trying to hide that drunk, perverted uncle in the family who keeps making appearances at the wrong time and trying to tell the world he is not as bad as the record shows.
I don't know... hard to see whats so loving about killing everything on earth except for 1 boat full of creatures.
Quite! I was agreeing with you. Sandhillian was saying that his god only appears bad if you 'hone in on certain parts of the OT'. I was saying that his god only appears good if you do exactly the same thing.
Quite! I was agreeing with you. Sandhillian was saying that his god only appears bad if you 'hone in on certain parts of the OT'. I was saying that his god only appears good if you do exactly the same thing.
Well, I believe that many Christians (I am not Christian) will pick and choose things from the old testosteronement, and ignore other things, depending upon how they feel about women, gays, body mutilation, incest, etc. The old testament is full of contradictions, and many Christians tend to follow much of the advice anyway.(detest homosexuality) They say "that's the OLD covenant" when they want to eat lobster and wear mixed cloth, but when it comes to God, they call his murderous actions "just." And he said Incest was ok back then. Old covenant, but same god. Did he take a chill pill in the new Testosteronement? (I call it the testosternement, because there are men writing this stuff, and pretending to speak for god.) Second hand information ? Granted, hygiene is a good thing, and being kind is, too. Loving God is great. Loving Jesus is, as well for those who do, but wouldn't it be better to ignore some of the insane things in the bible altogether ? Many Christians don't put much stock in the old testament. God was always testing people. Seemed like a weird game, to me.
I don't know... hard to see whats so loving about killing everything on earth except for 1 boat full of creatures.
I agree that there are things in the Old Testament/Hebrew Bible that make God sound vengeful and fearsome. All I can relate is my own experience. When I read the Bible all the way through from cover to cover the overall impression I was left with (to my surprise) was of how amazingly loving and forgiving God is. Both parts are necessary to tell the story of God's relationship with and love for mankind.
Last edited by Sandhillian; 09-18-2009 at 09:39 AM..
Reason: clarify
You know, you're right, but can you then explain to me why some people still refer to it and/or expect us to follow some of its antiquated, primitive rules and stories as relevant to today?
Thank you in advance.
Nope, I can't explain it. Really. Out with the old, in with the new.
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