Originally posted by Danteindoubt
Most conversions I’ve ever heard were of the echoes of old men talking… 
You mentioned that the argument hasn't held water with you... can you explain at all why this is so? I too don't like it but from my position in this life, I find it too difficult to challenge God in this way.
If God says something is this, and a created thing says it ...[text shortened]... back burner...
Can God ever kill people and be justified? Why or why not?
Thanks guys!
You mentioned that the argument hasn't held water with you... can you explain at all why this is so? I too don't like it but from my position in this life, I find it too difficult to challenge God in this way.
Dante, if I tried to take away your struggle with such questions, in exchange for easy answers, I would be a thief! (Think about that.)
All I can do, since I am not a theist of any kind anymore (though I stress that I have no desire to convince you, nor will attempt to convince you in any way, to relinquish your own religious faith: “May it be for you and others a path of blessing...” )—all I can do is point to a couple possibilities within the texts themselves that you might wrestle with:
(1)
Israel means “one who wrestles-struggles-contends with God.” Every
ben/bat Yisrael is a wrestler-struggler-contender with God.
(2) Judaism is fundamentally a covenantal religion, not one of submission. In a covenantal relationship, either side may argue their case, and present arguments for renegotiation. Argument can be a form of “contending” in which one shows high regard for the other—indeed, Jewish Torah study takes the form of argument over all the possible meanings of the text (in the Hebrew, there is always a plethora of possible meanings!), using the arguments recorded in the Talmuds and the Midrashim as a framework. [I know I’m being very simplistic here, but perhaps you get the idea.]
(3) Examine very carefully all the aspects of Abraham’s argument with God over the fate of Sodom (it is an argument about justice).
(4) The story of Abraham and Isaac (the
aqedah) seems to be taken by Christians as a story fundamentally about Abraham’s submission to God, even to the point of killing his son Isaac. Jews read that story different ways, but that is not a prominent one. I will give you a couple examples, just for flavor—
(a) Yes, Abraham submitted to God in his willingness to sacrifice Isaac—and he was wrong to do so! No
Tsaddik (just person) would do such a thing, even if commanded by God. In this case, Abraham did not show the courage he showed in the case of Sodom. Fortunately, God did not allow him to carry out the sentence.
(b) In the Hebrew, Abraham hears two voices: first, that of
ha’elohim (literally, “the gods;” although the form is also used for a singular reference to “the god” ) in Genesis 22:1; then the voice of an angel of YHVH (the particular, unpronounceable name of the God of Israel), telling Abraham not to kill Isaac.
In this second interpretation, Abraham’s real faithfulness is in listening to the second voice, rather than obeying the first one. So the story is, in part, about how to discern what is really the divine “voice.” One that asks you to commit sacrificial murder is not it.
This story is also simply taken as Israel’s “sacred myth” prohibiting child sacrifice.
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Now, I am not going to make an argument for any of these interpretations, nor for Jewish hermeneutics (which is
so different from most Christian hermeneutics). I have before, and you can find threads on here where these debates have taken place. It’s not that I’ve changed my mind (I especially like (a) above), but it’s just not where I’m at anymore.
Nevertheless, the above should give you enough to wrestle with for awhile, if you wish. Happy struggling! 🙂