The Old is New Again

I have slowed down on my postings here, but I’m still on track to read the entire bible this year. And the more that I read the more I come to realize how little I walked in its footsteps before now. More specifically I referring to the old testament. What I mean is that I viewed it through ‘Christian’ eyes until now. I lost sight of the fact, or never saw it, the book is Jewish. Very tribal. God’s promises were for the here and now. That is this life, this world.
As a kid I remember thinking the old testament had all these crazy laws that didn’t apply anymore and some fantastic stories to boot. It is so very different from the new testament. I realize hundreds of years separate the writings of old and new testaments and the old covers hundreds of years during the writings, whereas the new was written over a span of less than 100 years. The world views really changed drastically.

I’m only up to the period of King David, but so far there is no idea of a heaven or hell. No afterlife. This theology doesn’t seem to come about until later.

Which raises many other questions for me. Why didn’t the writers of the old testament write anything about it? Did they know of anything after this life? Did they not believe in it? Who first wrote about this? Jesus spoke about it at length. He obviously believed it to be true. Why the shift?

The other thing that really stands out is the amount the first few books write about serving other gods. The bible slams and decries other religions/gods and implores the Israelites not to serve or worship these other gods. I guess I always imagined these gods as symbolic. They couldn’t be real, right?

The bible never says they aren’t real. Several times it refers to Yahweh as the true and living God, but doesn’t go out of its way to say that these other gods are thin air or someone’s imagination. They worshiped this one god without denying the existence of others. One thing I keep reminding myself of is the idea of just having one God was a revolutionary moment in the history of man. There were many gods to serve and they were in charge of different things. This view lasted through the time of the Greeks. Paul even addressed it during his time in Athens.

I used to wonder why modern day Jews didn’t have the new testament in their bibles.  I beginning to realize the two are a lot further a part then just a few pages.

~ by bart on March 27, 2008.