The Old Testament clearly displays that the Israelites were the “Chosen” people of God and while there are many events that show destruction of other civilizations, conversion was certainly acceptable to Old Testament thinking. Judaism is not a conversion religion, but it is not opposed to taking in those who will obey the laws of the tradition, and worship Yahweh. The attitude of the Bible is that the Israelites had committed many sins, but would always be forgiven by God. This is evident in Isaiah 4:1 which states, “ Israel needs to be comforted and she will receive more from God” (NIV Isaiah 40:1) While Judaism and the doctrines and texts had many violent moments, there were also peaceful resolutions for many of the stories, and within the laws of the Jews, even when it came to those outside the traction. While some Jewish law called for the elimination of evil, which may have referred to those who were worshipping idols, or who held power over the tribal people, there were also ways of dealing with these issues which required peace from the people who were considered “Chosen” by God. Judaic law and violence were often dependent on who was carrying out the law, and how it was interpreted. There was still a tradition of allowing for interpretation and prophecy in the Old Testament. The Old Testament that is adopted by Christians is not called this by the Jewish people. The Tenakh, and the first five scrolls, being the Pentateuch were studied by the holy men of the Jewish tradition, and interpretation was always being revised. There are also other books that record the events of the Jewish tribes, the Apocrypha which, will not be considered for purposes of this paper. However, this is a collection of stories that bring light to ...
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...to join them, such as Ruth, they were also not involved in destroying what they saw as being outside of their own ways. They simply chose to remain separatists. To this day the Jews are in diaspora, and some remain “Orthodox” while others are reformed. There is assimilation, and they have always faced this. As it was thousands of years ago, things have not changed much. The Jewish law is not one of destruction or conversion, but of keeping to their own ways, and insisting that no one get in the way of this. As the “Chosen” people of their God, they believe it is their right to maintain what they see as divine providence, and promised lands and ways.
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Works Cited
The Bible, New International Version.
Rubenstein, R. (1992) After Auschwitz: History, Theology, and Contemporary Judaism, Johns
Hopkins Jewish Studies. 2nd Ed.
Notably, Bultmann’s approach is less as a debunker and more as an interpreter: his idea of the NT is a kind of pure theology written in the poetry of narrative. Therefore, the narrative elements are not important they are means of expressing a theological insight born of an encounter with God. Particularly, Jesus’ the death and resurrection are not two separate events, or two halves of one event. Christ simultaneously is crucified and God resurrects him to conquer death, is a singular event. As a result, the act of proclaiming Christ transcendence of the fallen world results in the person experiencing an encounter and relationship with Christ. Therefore, faith is an act of trust in this encounter and Christ's resurrection is an ongoing activity within the kerygma, and historical "facts" become irrelevant. Bultmann is criticized of denying the actual resurrection; perhaps it may be more accurate to say he redefines it.
Judaism is a religion with an excess of 13 million believers located mainly within the United States and Israel. Of all the religions practiced today, Judaism is one of the oldest. The roots of Judaism can be traced back over 3500 years to the Middle East with a lineage that descends from Abraham as a patriarch. With Abraham as a common ancestor, Judaism is considered one of the Abrahamic faiths alongside Christianity and Islam. The historical events within the Bible of Judaism’s past, all the way back to Abraham, have molded the beliefs and traditions practiced by Jewish adherents today.
Studying the Old Testament is not as straightforward as some may think. Being able to recall stories of the Bible does not necessarily mean you have a thorough grasp on the history of Israel and the surrounding nations. Some people read and discuss the Bible without a solid understanding of the history and social issues that were going on at the time. Being able to relate to the stories in the Bible and struggle with some of the same problems faced by the people in the Bible gives you a greater appreciation for the works in the Bible. I feel that having a firm understanding of all the related history of Israel gives a student of the Old Testament a far greater understanding of why these stories are in the Bible and what was meant to be learned from them. In this paper I give brief, yet significant, explanations of the Old Testament from the death of King David to the Maccabean revolt.
An instructive and stirring string of verses, this passage from the Bible holds great relevance not only for the Ancient Israelites to whom it was spoken, but also acts as a herald to Christians today. This passage forms part of Moses great oration; his instructive teaching, advice and counsel narrated to the second generation of Israelites who required redirection before moving forward into what God had for them. Similarly, it is also relevant for all Christians as we remember what our faithful, loving and powerful God has done in the past, and what he requires of us to move forward.
The Book of Romans Romans is a very important addition to the Bible. This is written by Paul to the Roman church. Much of Romans is showing the righteousness of God in different ways. “Romans road” passages are a great description of how to lead someone to christ (His saving righteousness).
Four books of the Bible, referred to as the Gospels, summarize the good news of Jesus Christ. The four books of the Gospel are Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John.
For more than two thousand years anti-Semitism has plagued the Jews, however, the term has only been around for about thirty years (Strack 594). Due to the hateful accusations and of those who did not understand their religion, Jews, as a scorned people, gradually became more exclusive and intolerant of other religions. Because of Judaism’s strict adherence to their own beliefs and unwillingness to consider any alternatives, Muslims and Christians have scorned and persecuted Jews.
Later on in history Judaism and Jews caught even more flack. In Europe which was very strong in the early Christian Church; Jews were a clear minority. Because the Church kind of ran Europe, prejudice and anti Semitic laws came about. One in the sixth century was the Justinian Code, the Jews couldn’t read their Bible in Hebrew, and Jews couldn’t testify in court against Christians. Specifically in 533 Jews couldn’t marry Christians, work with them, hold a public office or appear on the streets of Holy Week. These ideas continued and became violent.
telling her, “You will not die; for God knows that when you eat of it
The Old Testament and the Bible itself has been studied extensively for centuries. Archeologists and Scholars have labored and pondered over texts trying to decipher its clues. It does not matter how many times the Old Testament has been studied there will always be something new to learn about it or the history surrounding it. In the book Reading the Old Testament: an Introduction, the author Lawrence Boadt presents us with a few different authors of the Old Testament that used different names for God and had a unique insight into the texts. These four sources are titled P for priests, E for Elohim, J for Jehovah, and Y for Yahweh (95). These four unique sources help us realize that there is more than one author of the Pentateuch. These authors took the text and adapted for their culture. This independent source is used by scholars to help gain insight into what was behind the texts of the bible so we are not left with an incomplete picture of what went into the creation of the bible. Julius Wellhausen used these four sources to publish a book to able us to better understand the sources and to give it credibility with the Protestant scholars at the time (Boadt 94). These sources that is independent of the bible as in the DVD Who Wrote the Bible? and the Nova website aide in shedding light on the history that surrounded the writers who wrote the text and what inspired them to write it in the first place. The DVD shows the discovery of The Dead Sea Scrolls and the extensive history of the texts and all its sources in an effort to try to find exactly who wrote the bible (Who Wrote). These scrolls have aided scholars immensely by giving us some of the oldest known manuscripts of the bible in the world today. It shows that the bible w...
Every Christians today knows the story of Jesus birth. The story of how Mary and Joseph travel to Bethlehem for a censes declared by the Roman Empire. While not being able to find an inn to stay in and Mary getting ready to give birth, they stow away in the cave where the animals were kept. While there Mary gave birth to a son and called him Jesus. While Jesus was in a manger a heavenly host of angles came down and also Shepard’s from the field came and rejoiced the savior was born. This is where the typical nativity scene comes from. Unless you have a Doctorate and teach a History of the New testament class and go into fine detail about the story, then story this is what people hear. Well this is for History of the New Testament so the fine details are what we are looking for. Most people do not realize that the story they tell every Christmas is actually a combination of two stories. The birth story is told in the Gospels of Luke and the Gospels of Mathew but each tell a very different version of what actually happened and that is what leads to people questioning the accuracy of the bible today.
The Book of Job The Book of Job Job was a righteous man who lived in Uz. He had seven sons and three daughters. He owned seven thousand sheep, three thousand camels, five hundred yokes of oxen, five hundred donkeys and many slaves. Each year, he held a banquet where Job would have each of his children purified.
The Old Testament serves as a foundation for the teachings of God, while the New Testament continues to build and preserve God’s principles. The Old Testament and New Testament have a very unique relationship, as they are complementary to each other. The Old Testament contains many prophecies that are fulfilled in the New Testament. God can be viewed as fearsome in the Old Testament, whereas God portrays a friendlier and more compassionate persona in the New Testament. Although there are many differences between the two, there are also many similarities due to the heavy influence that the writings of the Old Testament had on the books and passages of the New Testament. An example of similarity between the Old Testament and the New Testament can be examined between passages from the First Book of Samuel and the Gospel of Luke, located in the Old Testament and New Testament respectively.
Not all Jewish communities continued on their faith with YHWH. Before the exile, many communities began to scatter all over the Middle East, Egypt and Babylon; however, the exile...
Globally there are an estimated 2.2 billion Christians and 1.8 billion Muslims alive today. Both of these religions have adapted passages, and epochs from the Old Testament. Though the roots of these religions are similar, interpretation of these ancient texts vary between the two faiths. The book of Genesis, the plight of Noah, and the struggles of the Israelites when enslaved by the pharaoh, are told differently between the Bible and the Quran. Though the themes of these stories remain largely the same in both books, there are subtle differences which make each version unique.