The Moral Failings of Christianity - New Testament as a Shield

[Oswald Acted Alone, You Kook]

This could be interesting, but here's my response:

It seemes to me you're saying that the punishments from God are too rough.

Well, around the time when the law was written, the Isrealites knew nothing but of slave matters. They needed these laws in order to behave themselves. Now today we know better.

Another thing to remember is that, even since the decision made in the Garden of Eden, humans are evil and deserve everything bad that happens to them.

[Oswald Acted Alone, You Kook]

Well I could write up a whole bunch of stuff about this notion and why it's utterly repugnant. Might be a good future topic for the series, so I'm not going to get into it for now.

So you believe that people are good or neutral by default, not evil?

[Oswald Acted Alone, You Kook]

By the way, Dibble, what faith are you? And do you realize that the Old Testament is much less organized than the New Testament, things came from different sources (Job is said to have come from places such as Arabia), and that not everything is literal/and/or true in the Old Testament?

He's a devout athiest.

[Oswald Acted Alone, You Kook]

Hey, by the way, are you (Dribble) going to make a thread about exclucivism?

(That's the idea that those who were never exposed to the Bible/Jesus are going to Hell by default)

[Oswald Acted Alone, You Kook]

I don't know that saying the New Testament is used as a "shield" for the old test is valid.  I grew up in church and the view I am generally presented is that the Old Testament is a book of history and law, that law being the old covenant of God.  With the old covenant replaced by the new covenant (Jesus dying on the cross for our sins) then the "law" section of the old testament is no longer meaningful, having been "covered by the blood of Jesus Christ" so to speak.  That only leaves the history sections of the bible for the New Testament to shield.

Comparing the New Testament and the Old Testament, they have very different subject matter.  The new testament covers a span of nearly four decades while the old testaments purportedly covers several millenia, from the beginning of time until the birth of Jesus Christ.  It is hard to see how the New Testament can be used to "shield" the teachings of the Old Testament if the OT covers vastly different subject matter and much of it is made irrelevant by the New Testament anyway.

I can see how you could think of the emphasis on the new testament as a "shield" to the old testament because it is the NT that is taught to new believers and emphasized in most churches and personal bible studies.  This is going back to the idea of most of the old testament being invalid.

I can already see you typing up your response, pointing out how you have already discussed the genocide the israelites committ in Joshua, the way God toys with Job like a cat with a mouse, the way violence and unethical acts seem so common in the old testament.  Honestly, I cannot answer those charges with my christian face on.  The old testament was compiled over thousands of years during periods where what we consider "human rights violations" were common place, when personal and societal moral codes were still in the early stages of development.  In my honest opinion, the only reason that Christianity retains the old testament is because it still retains its Jewish heritage (and because that's the way things have always been).  The Christian religion really does not need the Old Testament to be doctrinally sound, in fact, getting rid of it would make its moral code much more air-tight.

Given that Jesus was educated in Old Testament manners, and that he has a cameo in it, the OT is probably just as valid.

[Oswald Acted Alone, You Kook]

The Christian religion really does not need the Old Testament to be doctrinally sound, in fact, getting rid of it would make its moral code much more air-tight.

seeing how the NT quotes the OT hundreds of times and doesn't go beyond what the OT said would happen, the NT would look like swiss cheese if you remove the OT from it.  And swiss cheese is far from "air-tight".  In fact, having the NT in agreement with the OT, as it already is, makes it air-tight.

When did I become John Fitzgerald Sexgod Kennedy?


Anyway, please explain how the unconditional love of the old testament God melds with the highly judgemental, sadistic God of the old testament?

He must have been quoting both of us and accidently deleted your quote box.