I'm Genuinely Torn Now...Judaism or Christianity

Off Topic Politics & World Issues
41

Hey Quasi:

Your post illustrates why talking about religion often causes discord and fragmentation. Two reasonably intelligent people can read the same source material and come to completely different conclusions.

Of course, were it not so, there would only be one Christianity, and not the thousand denominations and sects that there are.

You read a passage in which God tells Moses that he will “deliver” the land of Canaan to Moses and the Hebrews, and you don’t see the implications. You can’t expect Moses to have thought that the Canaanites, Hittites, Jebisites and the rest would just scoot over and let the Hebrews move in next door. If you take control of a large piece of land that is currently occupied by someone else, that is a military action. There will be casualties. If you wish to avoid reprisals, you enslave and destroy the people. Moses was a Bronze Age man and he understood this implicitly. Why don’t you?

And Joshua? This is incontrovertible. The very first words out of God’s mouth: all those plans I made with Moses? All those people whose land I promised he was gonna have, well, it’s up to you to take it, kid. But hey, don’t worry, I got your back on this. “No one will be able to stand against you.” In other words, you are going to fight all these people, and you are going to win. And God already told Moses what to do with those people (kill everybody except the young women and babies), so no need to reiterate for Joshua.

I’m not sure why you are insisting so strongly on this tiny point: “well, yeah, God may have told people to go out and commit acts of genocide and violence, but that wasn’t the very, very most firstest thing he ever said to them, so I’m right and God would never tell people to commit violence in a dream.”

Huh?

Whatever.

One thing you need to realize about me is that my disagreeing with you on a forum has absolutely nothing to do with whether or not I like you or don’t like you in real life. I’m great friends with Pushharder and Chushin but we used to argue like a bunch of motherfuckers.

I’m sure that if I met you in real life we’d get along fine. I might tease you a bit in Japanese for my own amusement and that of the other patrons of the izakaya, but rest assured I would mean nothing rancorous by it. :slight_smile:

And if I knew your birthday, I might not actually send you a card, but I would certainly wish you a happy birthday.

43

[quote]Varqanir wrote:

[quote]Aragorn wrote:

Ahahahahaha! … Did you just channel DarkNinja?

Varq, I am absolutely convinced if you were a biblical history sunday school teacher it would be the single funniest class ever. I am laughing ridiculously.[/quote]

Good catch. I was actually thinking of DarkNinjaa as I was writing that… although the “hard pipe hittin’ niggas” line was a direct consequence of swapping Pulp Fiction quotes with Big Kahuna earlier on another thread.

And believe it or not, quite a lot of people have told me that I should be a minister. Including my grandparents and a few clergymen.

Scary thought. [/quote]

I appreciate the Marcellus rape quotes very much a lot. One day I’ll slip in a “Gon’ get medieval on yo ass” just for you, when you least expect it.

I always had daydreams about becoming a church minister and swapping out the actual written verse of Ezekiel with the extended Tarantino cut, just to giggle to myself when nobody realises, or righteous high five anyone that does.

44

I think you need a .gif to show this “righteous high five”. I envision the high five from Anchorman… hopefully you get that reference.

Varq, we’ll agree to disagree. As you said, multiple people can read the same thing and get different meaning/understanding from it. For better or worse.

I simply hope you took more away from what God said in those lines than ’ prepare to smash some face and kick some ass’, like His promise to be with His people, providing for them, etc.

45

[quote]Quasi-Tech wrote:
I think you need a .gif to show this “righteous high five”. I envision the high five from Anchorman… hopefully you get that reference.

Varq, we’ll agree to disagree. As you said, multiple people can read the same thing and get different meaning/understanding from it. For better or worse.

I simply hope you took more away from what God said in those lines than ’ prepare to smash some face and kick some ass’, like His promise to be with His people, providing for them, etc.[/quote]

Shall do you a video instead, I envision such an earthshaking high five as this.

Man I can’t wait for Anchorman 2, there’s some odd aura around Anchorman that I can’t escape from.

46

[quote]pushharder wrote:

“I will punish the Amalekites for what they did to Israel when they waylaid them as they came up from Egypt.”[/quote]

The Amalekites hated the Hebrews for their freedom.

The one thing that always bugged me is that fact that Jethro, high priest of Midian, takes Moses in, give him a job, and gives him his daughter Zipporah as a wife, then how does Moses repay this? By wiping out the Midianites. Yeah, okay, they worshipped idols, but so had Moses before he left Egypt. I always kind of wondered how Zipporah felt about this.

In my mind’s eye I see a young American, leaving his homeland in 1931 to get away from the desolation of the Depression and the specter of the crooked union boss he shot and killed. He ends up in Japan, down on his luck on the streets of Hiroshima, where he meets a jolly Buddhist priest who gives him a job sweeping the temple. Our boy spends a few years there, learning the language and culture and falling in love with the priest’s daughter, whom he marries. In due time, his wife bears him a son, but sensing the winds of war, he returns to the States with his family in 1939, joining the Army Air Force shortly after Pearl Harbor. He becomes a bomber pilot, and as luck would have it he is the one selected to fly the Enola Gay on that crisp August day in 1945.

Now, sure he was only following orders, and sure he was doing the Right Thing, killin’ them wicked Japs and ending the war, but I gotta wonder… how much nookie do you think he would have got after that?

48

I think Limp Bizkit wrote a song about that there “nookie” once.

49

[quote]pushharder wrote:

Great yom in the boker, I hope this was a tongue in cheek reference to modern day terrorists.[/quote]

Of course. And modern day casus belli. Incidentally, Moses was the CIC, just like President Bush. And both claimed to be getting their instructions from the Almighty. :wink:

No more so than does a six-thousand year old universe.

Okay, ASSUMING that Moses was really a historical figure, and
ASSUMING that he actually was put into a basket as an infant, and
ASSUMING that he was rescued by the daughter of Pharaoh, and
ASSUMING that he was raised in the royal household as an Egyptian, then yes, I believe that the ASSUMPTION that he would worship the gods of Egypt is a pretty fair one. He certainly didn’t worship YHVH, because as you will recall God had to explain who he was when Moses encountered the burning bush in Midian. So we must ASSUME that he either worshipped idols, or else he was an atheist. Which would you say is more likely? And yes, I am fully anticipating a “make an ASS out of U and ME” riposte.

My money is on the SPECULATION that she worshipped YHVH long before she ever met Moses, just like her daddy and her sisters. Can’t prove it, of course, but we do know that she was familiar with the Abrahamic circumcision ritual, which stands to reason inasmuch as Midian was a son of Abraham.

I only bring up the idolatry of the Midianites because that was the casus belli for wiping them out: they worshipped idols, and some of the Israelites were joining in.

Well, we are talking about religion, after all. One often finds oneself skirting the borders of fantasyland. And anyway, you know what they say: exegesis saves!

Yes indeed.

50

[quote]See, Varq, my clergy prospect (I was told the same thing as you many times in the distant past), the preface to God-driven genocide is always deep, deep depravity. The Canaanites had it in spades just like the pre-flood civilizations. They were a child torturing and sacrificing, idol worshiping bunch of low lifes if there ever were some.

When the Lord gets “deeply troubled” about the “great wickedness” practiced by those whom He has created the blade eventually falls.[/quote]

Well, then, perhaps you’ll indulge me in a little speculation.

This all being the case, and given our society’s proclivity for child torture, child sacrifice and idolatry (child abuse, abortion and American Idol), what kind of punishment… or “God-driven genocide” to use your words, do you think the “deep depravity” and “great wickedness” of our society deserves?

Will we suffer the fate of Sodom and Gomorrah, of Amalek and Midian, or perhaps of the Hebrews themselves as they were conquered and exiled by the Babylonians?

“Indeed I tremble for my country,” the man once said, “when I reflect that God is just.”

51

[quote]Varqanir wrote:
…
You read a passage in which God tells Moses that he will “deliver” the land of Canaan to Moses and the Hebrews, and you don’t see the implications. You can’t expect Moses to have thought that the Canaanites, Hittites, Jebisites and the rest would just scoot over and let the Hebrews move in next door. If you take control of a large piece of land that is currently occupied by someone else, that is a military action. There will be casualties. If you wish to avoid reprisals, you enslave and destroy the people. Moses was a Bronze Age man and he understood this implicitly. Why don’t you?
…
[/quote]

Hmmm…
I read different words in Ex 3:8. And my caviling may open up a different view here.

Nowhere does it say “deliver.” “I shall descend to rescue it ( My people) from the hand of Egypt and to bring it up from that land to a good and spacious land, to a land flowing with milk and honey, to the place of the Canaanite, the Hittite, the Amorite, the Perizzite, the Hivvite, and the Jebusite…”

No “deliver.” Note the word “spacious” (or perhaps “wide”). Perhaps spacious enough for many people? Then lets look at the 6 tribes: were they indeed exterminated, at a stroke? Not the Canaanites, since they oppressed Hebrew tribes throughout the Deutoronomic history. The Hittities? No, the most famous cuckold, Uriah, was a Hittite in service to David. The Jebusites? Jerusalem was a Jebusite city until David conquered it, hundreds of years after the revelation to Moses. As for you reference to the Midianites, oh, yes, there was a battle, sparing the virgin women, but Midian survived as a tribe and as a kingdom until the age of the early Prophets; Isaiah refers to them as a threat and as a rich tribe, whose camels would come and “cover your land.” Midianites and Hivvites probably persisted until the Assyrian conquest. And so on.

Moses lived in the Bronze Age, true, but in this passage, he is more than a BronzeAge man. He is an astounded man: witnessing a burning bush, hearing the voice of God, who then relates a catalogue of impossibilities which Moses is to accomplish. Moses is portrayed as a doubtful man: doubtful of his speech, doubtful of his powers, doubtful of the possibility of defying Pharaoh, freeing his people, and bringing them to that land flowing with milk and honey. But not doubtful of God’s presence and mission. (Until that mortal error at Meribah.)

I read here prophecy, not a military mission. The other tribes might disappear, over the centuries, but at God’s direction or God’s discretion, and not that of Moses or Joshua.

(Now for extra credit, and relevant to the question of extermination at God’s command, what is the connection between the King of Amelek and the Book of Esther?)

52

Confound it, Doc, how do you expect me to make sweepingly general statements if you’re just gonna come in here and fill in the details that I merrily omit?

No, I appreciate your gentle (I said gentle, not gentile) and erudite chastisement, as always. Toda raba. :slight_smile:

53

And Haman, of course, was an Amalekite.

54

Of course, this is a puzzle, because the book of Samuel tells us that Agag, king of the Amalekites, was captured, and all his people were “totally destroyed with the sword.” But then, Haman may well have been a descendant of Agag himself. Josephus refers to Amalek as a “bastard”. I guess his descendents were sneaky bastards.

55

[quote]Varqanir wrote:
And Haman, of course, was an Amalekite.[/quote]

BIngo…and I am agog.

56

[quote]DrSkeptix wrote:
I am agog.[/quote]

Oooh.

Puntastic as ever.

57

[quote]Varqanir wrote:

[quote]pushharder wrote:

Great yom in the boker, I hope this was a tongue in cheek reference to modern day terrorists.[/quote]

Of course. And modern day casus belli. Incidentally, Moses was the CIC, just like President Bush. And both claimed to be getting their instructions from the Almighty. :wink:

No more so than does a six-thousand year old universe.

Okay, ASSUMING that Moses was really a historical figure, and
ASSUMING that he actually was put into a basket as an infant, and
ASSUMING that he was rescued by the daughter of Pharaoh, and
ASSUMING that he was raised in the royal household as an Egyptian, then yes, I believe that the ASSUMPTION that he would worship the gods of Egypt is a pretty fair one. He certainly didn’t worship YHVH, because as you will recall God had to explain who he was when Moses encountered the burning bush in Midian. So we must ASSUME that he either worshipped idols, or else he was an atheist. Which would you say is more likely? And yes, I am fully anticipating a “make an ASS out of U and ME” riposte.

My money is on the SPECULATION that she worshipped YHVH long before she ever met Moses, just like her daddy and her sisters. Can’t prove it, of course, but we do know that she was familiar with the Abrahamic circumcision ritual, which stands to reason inasmuch as Midian was a son of Abraham.

I only bring up the idolatry of the Midianites because that was the casus belli for wiping them out: they worshipped idols, and some of the Israelites were joining in.

Well, we are talking about religion, after all. One often finds oneself skirting the borders of fantasyland. And anyway, you know what they say: exegesis saves!

Yes indeed.
[/quote]

Yes, Moses was an atheist (versus the greek understanding of giving worship the greek gods). He was a Hebrew and his foster mother raised him that way as she recognized he was a hebrew boy. Everyone knew he was hebrew, but daughters get what daughters want.

58

[quote]Varqanir wrote:
Of course, this is a puzzle, because the book of Samuel tells us that Agag, king of the Amalekites, was captured, and all his people were “totally destroyed with the sword.” But then, Haman may well have been a descendant of Agag himself. Josephus refers to Amalek as a “bastard”. I guess his descendents were sneaky bastards. [/quote]

Almost there.

Agag was the hereditary name of the Kings of the Amalekites (who were the scion of Esau). In showing mercy to Agag, Saul defied God’s command, thereby losing his kingship. The next day, Samuel hews Agag to pieces. So the legend goes: in that one night, Agag conceived a son. (Or perhaps Agag had a son who survived, since the old and the young cannot be killed together in battle.)

Because of Saul’s defiance, Agag’s line returns generations later, as Haman the Agagite, whose plan is to exterminate the Jews of the Persian Empire. Their savior, of course is Mordecai, who is 10 generations of descent from Kish. Kish was Saul’s father. Thus, within the logic of the Old Testament, Saul’s sin is rectified by his descendent, Mordecai, against the descendent of Agag, Haman.

59

[quote]Brother Chris wrote:

He was a Hebrew and his foster mother raised him that way as she recognized he was a hebrew boy. Everyone knew he was hebrew, but daughters get what daughters want.[/quote]

See, I wonder about that. Exodus 2 tells us is that he was recognized by Pharaoh’s daughter as being a Hebrew baby, and that she hired Jochebed to be his wet nurse, but as soon as he was weaned it says that Pharaoh’s daughter raised him as “her son”, even giving him an Egyptian name (mo’uses: “drawn from the water”). I find nothing indicating that she raised him as a Hebrew, nor anything in the subsequent verses that indicate that “everyone knew” that he was a Hebrew. Yes, twice the scripture reminds us twice in the same verse (2:11) that the Hebrews were his people, but I read this as a narrative device, not as indicative that Moses’ origins were widely known, though they may have been known to him.

In any event, inasmuch as the Egyptians were definitely worshipping idols, and indeed that the Hebrews themselves were worshipping idols (remember how quickly they reverted to idolatry when Moses was getting the Commandments, under the direction of Aaron, no less), I find it unlikely that Moses worshipped nothing at all. This is, as Push said, speculation on my part, but it seems the likeliest situation.

60

I’m so glad we turned a troll post into something informative and educational.

Please do continue, this is good reading on my break.