J-D

That may be your impression, but my impression is different. I'm happy to record the fact that we have different impressions and leave it at that.

Malachi151

Well, I'd like to see your examples of when God is acting in a loving or altruistic way, etc. Do you have some examples?

Anat

Aren't there plenty of examples of Jesus promoting violence? Bringing sword rather than peace, pitting children against parents etc? It's the same cat and mouse game as YHWH plays with his believers.

Malachi151

Not really. There are a small handful, not even a handful actually. Out of all the stuff attributed to the Jesus character, only perhaps 2 passages really reflect any violence.

JEST2ASK

I disagree ... e.g. Matthew 13:40 Therefore the Tares are gathered in burned in the fire so it will be at the end of the age (41) The Son of Man will send his angels ...(42) and will cast them into the furnace of fire , there will be wailing and gnashing of teeth ...(51) Jesus said unto them Have you understood all these things ...or Matthew 24 the fortelling of the time of tribulation (a fore-runner to Revealtion and echo of Daniel) Vs 31 ... He will send his angels .... 51 and will cut him in two.... there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth .... Matthew 25 : 41 .... then he will say to those on the left hand ... depart from me into the everlasting fire prepared for the deviland his angels ...(46) And these will go away into everlasting punishment ...

I also believe there is a passage where he likens the Kingdom to the return of a ruler who orders all who did not bow down to his authority to be brought before him and killed ....

All in all (IMO) in spite of the appeal to Love your enemies ... there is much in the N.T that simply echoes the violence in the O.T. they just have God/ Jesus acting at a later time (judgement day - end of the age - whatever) ... but the same theme (IMO).... payback / revenge

Malachi151

Ehh... saying that in the future there will be suffering is quite different from a) having gods that engage in violence (like the Greek gods) b) having a message that encourages people to act violently.

There are a couple of cases of both a and b in the NT, but overall, it is much different from the stories of the OT, where God is violent or encouraging violence pretty much all the time.

dzim77

While I don't agree with your view of God as 'wicked' as you are asserting...

It is true that the NT claims that when Jesus returns the second time, he will come with 'a sword', to righteously judge the whole earth. In the OT, judgement just tended to occur on this side of death rather than the other side of it. But the Bible is clear that all will be judged by God.

In his days on earth (his 'first coming') and the current age, Jesus comes as the 'Lamb of God' offering his life "as a ransom for many". In his second coming, Jesus will come as 'The Lion of Judah'. So you can see that God is consistent in the OT and the NT as a righteous judge, offering grace and salvation to those that would accept it.

douglas

This makes sense to me. I was taught that part of the "revelation" of Jesus was that God was not vengeful, but forgiving and compassionate to enemies. The vast majority of stories in the NT seem to support this.

I've wondered if these "violent God" OT stories served a dual purpose. On one hand they kept the Hebrew people from straying too far from doctrine, but also served as a sort of warning to the enemies of the Hebrews. A Don't cross us or our God is going to kick your butt! kind of warning. In fact, I've always assumed that they were simply made up strictly for these purposes. Is there any non-biblical evidence that any of these God induced butt-kickings ever actually occured? Such as...

2 Kings 19:35 (New International Version)
"That night the angel of the LORD went out and put to death a hundred and eighty-five thousand men in the Assyrian camp. When the people got up the next morning—there were all the dead bodies!"

I would think a heavenly being swooping down from heavan and destroying 185k people would have been recorded somewhere other than the bible? (I could probably look and find the answer myself, but I'm not sure where to look, plus I'm lazy)

Anat

douglas, those events looked very differently from the Assyrian perspective. see Sennacherib: the Year - 701. Sennacherib captured Lachish and its environs - the best agricultural land available to Judah - and placed a huge fine on Hezekiah. I think Finkelstein interprets this to mean that the economic burden caused public disapproval of Hezekiah's religious reforms, thus the reversal in religious policy under his heir, Manasseh. The miraculous events in 2Kings 18 look like political spin by the reformers, whether from Hezekiah's times or more likely, Josiah's - the survival of Hezekiah's rule interpreted as a sign that God was pleased with him and his policies, but when considering the consequences for Judah, it is obviously an attempt to save face despite considerable losses.

Since the stories of the HB were not written contemporanously (and many of them discuss events that never happened in the first place) one should aee them as propaganda, and should always ask whose propaganda is it?

J-D

Since there is no God, of course there are no examples of God acting in a loving or altruistic way, but there are examples in the Old Testament of stories about God acting in such a way, for example:

Giving the children of Israel food and water in the wilderness.

Sending ravens to feed Elijah.

Empowering Elijah and Elisha to perform various beneficial miracles.

Telling Isaiah, Hosea, and Micah to preach peace, love, and mercy.