Who's got the scoop on Moses?

Originally posted by FreakyKBH
You are an arm-chair, Monday morning quaterback

...insulting to true students of the discipline.
...obvious and certain as your divorcement from reality

heh-ho. Discipline? Of studying a great, big Magical Elf that created time, the universe, mankind and reality itself? That inspired a book so full of contradictions, errors and outright plagarism that this Magical Elf must be somewhat less than "perfect"?

Go on, tell us again about Frogstomp's "divorcement from reality".

Originally posted by whodey
Perhaps if a group of Sodomites surrounded your house and demanded that you come out so that they may "know you", if you know what I mean, as they did in Sodom, then you may feel differently about the justice of their fate. Then again you may be into group rape, I can't really say for sure.

Whodey,

Genesis 18:16 Then the men set out from there, and they looked toward Sodom; and Abraham went with them to set them on their way.
17 The LORD said, "Shall I hide from Abraham what I am about to do,
18 seeing that Abraham shall become a great and mighty nation, and all the nations of the earth shall be blessed in him?
19 No, for I have chosen him, that he may charge his children and his household after him to keep the way of the LORD by doing righteousness and justice; so that the LORD may bring about for Abraham what he has promised him."
20 Then the LORD said, "How great is the outcry against Sodom and Gomorrah and how very grave their sin!
21 I must go down and see whether they have done altogether according to the outcry that has come to me; and if not, I will know."
22 So the men turned from there, and went toward Sodom, while Abraham remained standing before the LORD.
23 Then Abraham came near and said, "Will you indeed sweep away the righteous with the wicked?
24 Suppose there are fifty righteous within the city; will you then sweep away the place and not forgive it for the fifty righteous who are in it?
25 Far be it from you to do such a thing, to slay the righteous with the wicked, so that the righteous fare as the wicked! Far be that from you! Shall not the Judge of all the earth do what is just?"
26 And the LORD said, "If I find at Sodom fifty righteous in the city, I will forgive the whole place for their sake."
27 Abraham answered, "Let me take it upon myself to speak to the Lord, I who am but dust and ashes.
28 Suppose five of the fifty righteous are lacking? Will you destroy the whole city for lack of five?" And he said, "I will not destroy it if I find forty-five there."
29 Again he spoke to him, "Suppose forty are found there." He answered, "For the sake of forty I will not do it."
30 Then he said, "Oh do not let the Lord be angry if I speak. Suppose thirty are found there." He answered, "I will not do it, if I find thirty there."
31 He said, "Let me take it upon myself to speak to the Lord. Suppose twenty are found there." He answered, "For the sake of twenty I will not destroy it."
32 Then he said, "Oh do not let the Lord be angry if I speak just once more. Suppose ten are found there." He answered, "For the sake of ten I will not destroy it."
33 And the LORD went his way, when he had finished speaking to Abraham; and Abraham returned to his place.

_____________________________

Without revisiting all my old arguments about Jewish hermeneutics in general being much more open than Christian hermeneutics tends to be, there are some interesting features of this story, that I’ll just offer in outline—

(1) Note that Abraham is willing to argue with God, without even being asked his opinion—and even to lecture God on justice! “Far be it from you...!” Abraham fairly thunders at his God. This may seem alien to many Christians, but in Judaism it is not. You are expected to make your argument, even against God; argument “for the sake of heaven” (i.e., for the sake of truth and justice) is a sacred act. Traditional Jewish Torah study itself takes the form of argument.

(2) God implicitly accepts Abraham’s argument, and trumps him: “If I find in Sodom some fifty righteous men, I will spare everyone for their sake.” Now the negotiations begin... They get down to 10, which appears to be God’s final offer, for he was finished speaking to Abraham and went on his way.

One commentator (I think it was in the Talmud, but I can’t recall for sure) proposed that Abraham thought there were at least 10 good people in the city, including Lot and his family!

Now, Gen. 19:3 indicates that everyone in Sodom, “to the last man” were their to rape Lot’s guests. So maybe there weren’t 10...?

(3) In an interesting, and perhaps poignant, commentary, Jewish scholar Abraham Joshua Heschel interprets the phrase in verse 33, v’avrahim shab le’m’komo as “And Abraham is still standing there!”—in his place (makom). For Abraham, the argument is not over...

Now, I am not going to lobby for any particular reading of this story—and, for me, that is what there are: stories. But what I am trying to point out—the only thing I’m trying to point out— is that, in the Hebrew tradition, it is not unthinkable to challenge God, in fact a tzaddik, a righteous person, may be required to do so...

And from that perspective, though I do not claim to be a tzaddik, but only a benoni, I will not try to bend any of these stories to make what seems to me unjust (e.g., genocide) just, simply because it comes from God’s action or God’s command...

See my related post on froggy’s “Joshua” thread:

http://www.redhotpawn.com/board/showthread.php?threadid=48280&page=3

I tried to post my previous comments about Torah being story, from the "Spiritual Quotes" thread--but got an "inappropriate post" message, and an automatic deletion!!! I've filed a protest... 😠

Here's the thread, about midway down the page for anyone interested...

http://www.redhotpawn.com/board/showthread.php?threadid=20465&page=27

EDIT: The deleted post also said Hi! to David C, and a reiteration of my lack of belief in the Magical Elf--maybe that's what did it? 😉

Originally posted by whodey
Perhaps if a group of Sodomites surrounded your house and demanded that you come out so that they may "know you", if you know what I mean, as they did in Sodom, then you may feel differently about the justice of their fate. Then again you may be into group rape, I can't really say for sure.

Firstly, I don't think I would be offering them my daughters instead of the angels.
Secondly, your distasteful attempt at a personal attack makes it far more likely that you would be on the outside of that house on that night ,if it was at all possible.
Thirdly , since neither Moses , Joshua, Abram or Lot did anything to the offenders, the very raising of the Sodom story , makes me wonder just how devoid of defenses for Moses and Joshua you "christians" are

Originally posted by David C
[b]...insulting to true students of the discipline.
...obvious and certain as your divorcement from reality

heh-ho. Discipline? Of studying a great, big Magical Elf that created time, the universe, mankind and reality itself? That inspired a book so full of contradictions, errors and outright plagarism that this Magical Elf must be somewhat less than "perfect"?

Go on, tell us again about Frogstomp's "divorcement from reality".[/b]

LMAO

Originally posted by vistesd
Whodey,

Genesis 18:16 Then the men set out from there, and they looked toward Sodom; and Abraham went with them to set them on their way.
17 The LORD said, "Shall I hide from Abraham what I am about to do,
18 seeing that Abraham shall become a great and mighty nation, and all the nations of the earth shall be blessed in him?
19 No, for I have chosen http://www.redhotpawn.com/board/showthread.php?threadid=48280&page=3

Excellent post! I would rec you if I could. I only wish I had more intelligent threads such as this on the matter. You are correct in that righteous men do in fact challenge God from time to time as they question God's sense of justice that may seem harsh to them. It reminds me of Moses's plea with God to spare the Israelite people after they repeatidly transgressed against him and he was ready to destroy them and start over. In fact, God comprimised with Moses and allowed them to live. However, God still wound up getting his way in the end. He simply let them wander in the desert for 40 years until they all died off. Then the new generation went in to possess the land. There seem to be areas of compromise regarding how God goes about accomplishing will, however, his will, will be done one way or another. The same can be said of the people of Sodom. Once God casts judgement, nothing can prevent the outcome. We are nonetheless welcome to discuss the matter even though we may not understand his righteous ways. We may even be able to relieve the harshness of such judgements as did Moses with the children of Israel.

Originally posted by whodey
Excellent post! I would rec you if I could. I only wish I had more intelligent threads such as this on the matter. You are correct in that righteous men do in fact challenge God from time to time as they question God's sense of justice that may seem harsh to them. It reminds me of Moses's plea with God to spare the Israelite people after they repeatidly t ...[text shortened]... be able to relieve the harshness of such judgements as did Moses with the children of Israel.

Thanks, Whodey. I thought you would take it in the spirit in which it was intended. 🙂

Originally posted by frogstomp
Firstly, I don't think I would be offering them my daughters instead of the angels.
Secondly, your distasteful attempt at a personal attack makes it far more likely that you would be on the outside of that house on that night ,if it was at all possible.
Thirdly , since neither Moses , Joshua, Abram or Lot did anything to the offenders, the very r ...[text shortened]... ry , makes me wonder just how devoid of defenses for Moses and Joshua you "christians" are

It was not meant to be a personal attack. It was an attempt at getting you to realize that your sense of justice is skewed as is mine. You were attempting to defend a group of individuals who were wicked, not only in the sight of God, but in our sight as well. God is the only one who sees all things for what they are and not you or I. As vistesd indicated, we are able to argue with him about the matter or even make railing charges of injustice against him. However, his will, will be done in the end despite all of this and that will, will be a righteous outcome.

Originally posted by whodey
It was not meant to be a personal attack. It was an attempt at getting you to realize that your sense of justice is skewed as is mine. You were attempting to defend a group of individuals who were wicked, not only in the sight of God, but in our sight as well. God is the only one who sees all things for what they are and not you or I. As vistesd indicated ...[text shortened]... is will, will be done in the end despite all of this and that will, will be a righteous outcome.

Sorry , but it was intended as a personal attack.
There's not even a whisper that the people in Canaan were wicked, unless living where the Israelites wanted to live was being wicked.
Maybe if one of them used rocks as pillows they could have dreamed up the god given right to stay on their land, alive that is.

Confession: I am not a monotheist, but something of a monist.

The basic creedal statement of Judaism is: shema yisrael YHVH eloheinu YHVH ehad, “Hear O Israel, ‘the one who is,’ our God, ‘the one who is’ is one” (translating YHVH here according to its verbal form; more properly: “that/who is-was-will be&rdquo😉. Now, I read this monistically (think a little bit Zen or Taoism), and that is the strain of Judaism that I have spent the most time studying.

The interesting dilemma is how to put that together with the whole notion of covenant, argument, struggling-with-God, Talmud, etc. I can’t make a case for it yet—that’s why this is just by way of confession—without further study (people like Rabbi Rami Shapiro). I can see some ways in which it might be done, but find none of them satisfactory thus far...

Really, that’s all I can say about it, and admittedly it’s not much. I just need to track down some of the rabbis and scholars who have wrestled with the dilemma before me. I have no urgency about it, just an interest. And, again, I can’t even begin to make a case...yet. I just wanted to be clear about where I’m coming from...