Is the god of Christ the god of Jews?

Here's a summary for a little hypothesis I have invented and been pondering on for a while.

Is the god of Christ the god of Jews?

I won't spend a lot of time giving references in the hope that the people here know the background information.
I'm sorry if you don't, but I'm too tired to dig through books right now.

So, consider the things we think Jesus Christ said (irrelevant if that was his name, or one person), he spoke of love and unity, and the kingdom of god here on Earth, a kingdom that is available to anyone, if (s)he opens the heart to the great mystery (God) and sees.
He spoke of the unity of all things and the manifestation of the realization of that unity is love, and that everyone who achieves that realization becomes just like he was - one with the father, God.
Almost Buddhist-like, yes? But that's another story altogether.

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Now the god of the Jews - Jahve.
First see - the god of Jews, not the god of the world, only Jews were his chosen people and the only promised land was the land of the sandy Jerusalem and the territories around. He also proclaimed to be the only god and had a lot of other characteristics that by christian and nowadays standarts were not very pleasant, not a god of love at all.

So here comes Jesus and teaches about the universal God that is everything among people that generally were Jews and who also had only one god, but that god was tribal. So I think it is not a far too leap to assume that the Jews mistook Jesus god for Jahve, because they knew that there was only one god, and the others were devils, and if Jesus was talking about a God, then he was referring to Jahve

The people who didn't make that association were prosecuted and gradually disappeared, they were called the gnostics.

So here's what I think happened - the Jews together with Roman government assimilated christianity and transformed it into Catholicism, a new faith, a combination of the old judaism and the new christianity.
The real christianity disappeared with the gnostics, and the main reason for it was that a god of love is not a very good god to organise state and people around, and not a very good support mechanism of the priestly caste.

This is all in very few words, I hope you get the general idea and can fill in the blank pieces (with your knowledge) which I leaped across to save time and my fingers, because this is enough starting material for a Masters degree paper.

 

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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Expounding_of_the_Law

 

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Please no links to long articles. Save my eyes and speak your mind, just as I honoured your time and didn't post an article of 20 pages.

 

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I have thought for YEARS that the God of Christ and the God of Abraham were not one and the same.
In fact, I started a book based on that very concept about 5 years ago (yes it is slow going).
To be honest, I am not so sure about this...

However, I think there is ample evidence to support the idea that Jesus was not talking about Abraham's God at all, rather trying to convert people away from Abraham's God.
I rarely bring it up because I can't support it as well as I'd like to right now.

I wish I had more time to delve into the distinct differences between what Jesus taught and what the early Jews saw as God(s), but I think reading the New Testament in proper context and taking the Coveneants into close consideration, one could easily support that argument.

I am late for beinging my sister to the doctor right now, and have to go, but I hope to come back to this very soon.

 

Jesus started out as jew , and interpreted the jewish YAHWEH in his own way as his god ......
It is only Paulus that changed this into christianity , and opened up for
non-jews to join to the movement ..... Paulus had a lengthy discussion with Jesus brother James about it , and at last James gave in .......

So yes , the christian god started as Yahweh ......

 

Sorry, I was just trying to point out the source of what is apparently the standard interpretation, which is mentioned in the very first paragraph of the article I linked to:

"[sup]17[/sup] Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil.

[sup]16[/sup] For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled."

My personal view is that Jesus (as described in the bible) saw himself not as serving a different God but as clarifying His message.

But I also think the idea of God has changed over time, and modern Christians have different ideas to the Hebrews of Moses' time (as described in the bible). Modern Jews probably do too. Despite all the mention of death sentences and stoning in the old testament, I believe there's a quote in the Talmud warning that a court who executes more than one person in seven years is overly bloodthirsty.

 

Interpretation can not go further than the linguistic meaning of the words. If you pass that line, you're into creation of something new.

A question: taking in mind the old testament only, can you interpret the god depicted in it as the god of love and unity?

I can't, it's too contradictory, therefore I think that right from the start it couldn't be the popular idea of Jahve, as he is described in the old testament.

 

Funny , I have never seen the christian god as all-good ,loving and so on ....
I see him as a complex character shaped by the people who invented him ......sometimes revengefull ..... almost evil .....especially in the old testament ( which is accepted by christians as a part of the bible I think )...........

 

Funny , I have never seen the christian god as all-good ,loving and so on ....
I see him as a complex character shaped by the people who invented him ......sometimes revengefull ..... almost evil .....especially in the old testament ( which is accepted by christians as a part of the bible I think )...........

I think I mentioned it once in the religions forum ....god is not omnibenevolent .... that is a phrase invented by atheists ...

http://www.en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Omnibenevolent

 

Exactly. My point is that nowaday christians are not christians at all, but catholics and everything that has sprung out of catholicism.
Christianity is not compatible with the god of the old testament.

 

I think you should moderate it to :
The concept of god in catholic christianity today is not totally compatible with the concept of god in the old testament ...........

There are many christian sects today ....some even very old .....as the coptic church .......from which the ethiopian church has sprung , and they claim connections with the jewish god .....

All very tricky .......

 

By christianity I understand that which may have been said by Jesus and that which has been said similar to it, nothing else.
There is no christianity today, because it's all infused with judaism.
Gnostic writings are more in tune with the things Jesus said.

I'll leave it at that, just my position.

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Don't forget us Protestants, we disapprove of much of what the RC's teach too.

 

And don't forget that thousands of Jews in Jerusalem accepted Christ in the first century.

 

modern day christianity, sure.
im not sure how familiar you are with more archaic, non-catholic christianity....
there have been several groups throughout the last thousand years that have embraced the same values as judaism, while believing in the divinity of jesus christ.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amish
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Menonite

these are but a few.

however, i do agree with the core of what you are saying here.

 

I would guess that one of the events with greatest impact on Christianity/Catholicism was becoming the official religion of the Roman Empire: it spread it widely, but as always happens when a large number of people sign nominally up to a religion, diluted its fervour.

It also forged a Church-State bond which took centuries to break.

Regarding Protestantism, I think that depends on the reformer. From what I've read, Anglicanism seems to have been created through selfish motives (the King wanted a national religion controlled by him, not a foreign one controlled by the Pope).

I think Luther's motives for reform were more in line with Jesus' teachings.

 

Rebuttal

I'm a Christian so stop reading now if that offends you.

Asking if the God of the Jews and the Christian God are the same is NOT the same as asking if the God of the Old Testament and the God of the New Testament are one and the same.

NO: Christians and Jews DO NOT worship the same God. Christians recognize the Divinity of Christ, Jews do not. This is more than mere semantics, this is a critical point.

YES:The Old Testament God (Yahweh) and the New Testament God are the same God.

The Bible is one contiguous unit, the inspired Word of the Living God.

 

That should not be a reason to write improperly.

On what do you base your assumption? Please provide some arguments counter to those already mentioned here.

Preaching is forbidden in this forum.

 

most importantly, we have been derailed a bit here.

the god of jesus was most certainly the same diety worshipped by jews at his time...otherwise, i dont see the point of his outrage at the temple vendors.

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this would be like pat robertson (american televangelist) disrupting a pagan ceremony "because they were doing it all wrong". as funny as it sounds, it is highly unlikely.

 

Good point! I'll think about it.