The Genesis of Judaism and Monotheism

The beginnings of Judaism came about in the mid-13th century. The Hebrew Scriptures also known as the Christian Old Testament dates back between the times of 700 and 400 BCE. One of the main instructions that was given to the Hebrew people was to be monotheistic and only serve one God, however for the Hebrews this was a struggle for them to follow this guideline. The instruction of being a monotheistic people came from an important list in the Hebrew Scriptures called the Ten Commandments. These Ten Commandments appear in the twentieth chapter Book of Exodus in the Hebrews scriptures. In this chapter God gave the prophet Moses the rules for the Hebrew people to abide by and live by. The first commandment that God gave Moses was “You shall

God also had informed them that if they decided to break this sacred rule he would punish them by death. Despite God’s word and instructions the Hebrew people totally disregarded what they were told and became corrupt by creating many other gods to worship other than their one true God. Because of their disobedience their God became angered and wanted to kill them, however, Moses pleaded with God to not kill his people (Exodus 32:7-14). When Moses came back down from the mountain he saw how out of control his people had gotten. He had also become anger and he burnt the calf, grounded it into powder, and scattered it into water and made the people drink it as part of their punishment (Exodus 32:19-20). The next day Moses told the people how great of a sin that they had committed and he said that he would go ask the Lord for omission from their sin (Exodus 32:30). Moses even sacrificed his name in the book of life in order to spare the live of his people. He pleaded to the Lord “But now, please forgive their sin—but if not, then blot me out of the book you have written (Exodus 32:32)”. However, God replied saying that whoever had sinned against him b worshipping the calf was to be punished. Because of their disobedience God struck the people with a plague (Exodus

Once they lost hope and faith they began to become disobedient by creating and serving other gods. They looked to other deities and fail to recall the specific and all around one of the most important rule that was given to them. Because of their disregard of rules they were punished. The simple fact that they were so quick to build not one but many other gods because they were tired of waiting on Moses to come back from talking to God, shows how they really struggled with