(urth) The Wizard

[Daniel Petersen]

    'Though I think a Christian should be able to defend the OT *also* in
strictly Jewish terms.'

Agreed.  That's partly why I'm not down with the OT God is just the best
they could come up with at the time theory.  I think they were already
worshiping a good, holy, beautiful God.  And many of them were worshiping
him beautifully - that's why I take exception to the one-sided construal of
God as nasty in the OT when there is SO much beauty in that library from
both God and people - it's just not as simple as 'here's some evidence of
brutality, etc., so it's clearly not legit'.  Sometimes I wonder if I'm
reading the same OT as its critics (and 'friends').

These strike me as FAR more fundamental to a good reading of the Bible's
> own doctrine of God than incidences of 'genocide'
>
>
> What's in the injunction to spare no breathing Canaanite that warrants
> those quotes?
>

Whether we consciously realise it or not I think we all take the word
'genocide' to have built into its definition a negative moral judgment -
that it is a word that describes a certain kind of evil and injustice, a
large-scale *murder* (wrongful killing). If a holy God did command the
Israelites to completely eradicate the Canaanites, then by definition that
God cannot have committed or commanded 'genocide' as understood in the way
I have just described.  There must have been divine justice and goodness in
what he willed.  I tentatively went into that before, especially where I
emphasised that it's always important to remember God can eternally
console, compensate, and surpass all that one suffers in this fallen life,
including being unfortunately part of a people he decided had to be done
living this life (goes for the Flood too - and indeed, the fact that every
human dies one way or another).  The promise of a New Heavens and a New
Earth (even already in the OT - e.g. Isaiah) shows too that God doesn't
value some ethereal state over a bodily one, but that we have to WAIT for a
renewed bodily existence that is not suffering from the effects of sin.  I
believe that billions of people taken out of this life too early and so on
are going to be rejoicing in a glorified material life infinitely greater
than this one and not a one of them will be complaining about the earlier
phase.  But, of course, it's understandable that we struggle with
bitterness and unbelief in this veil of tears.  (Also, I should mention, of
course, that if we believe in God as Judge at all, we have to make room for
him to condemn the wicked - in this life or the next.  But both OT and NT
teach consistently that he does so exceedingly reluctantly and does NO
injustice in his 'final call' on everyone.)

    'I'm convinced Jephthah's daughter lived a long life, but most
commentators have historically assumed otherwise -       all because the
story is laconic and suggestion goes a long way.'

This is an important example story:  either way it is interpreted in regard
to his daughter, it was NOT a divine command that he do this, but his own
conception of how to live as an Israelite in a book that records a time
when everyone was 'doing what was right in their own eyes'.  There's TONS
of that kind of stuff in the OT as well.  Just because some bloke
dismembers a woman, doesn't mean God approved of it!  Yeesh.  Explicit
context is important as well.  (That's not directed to you - just a general
vent.)

But yes, I take your point about what's *un*said in both Wolfe and the
Bible.  I think what I'm trying to say here about a truly, recognisably
good God in the OT (even if at times inscrutable - a theme the OT writers
often take up, but from a place of trust and worship) is really crucial to
understanding the theism in Wolfe's fiction.  I'm convinced he draws from a
GOOD God in the OT very strongly to write his own modern Exoduses and so
on.  And that he draws from that as much as from the NT and later Catholic
doctrine.

-DOJP

On Sun, Mar 11, 2012 at 5:42 PM, <entonio at gmail.com> wrote:

> No dia 11/03/2012, às 01:55, Daniel Petersen <
> danielottojackpetersen at gmail.com> escreveu:
>
> 'Those of us who stand by the whole canon should be ready to defend it
> with more than just saying the people who wrote it were savages.'
>
> I tried to take a tentative stab at that in my earlier comments.
>
>
> Yes.
>
>  'no amount of descriptions of יהוה‎ as merciful can make up for actions
> by him which seem to contradict it. Other things may, but not simple
> adjectives. '
>
> I believe I said God's mercy in the OT was emphasised continually by both
> ascription *and* actions.  And, frankly, the ascriptions DO matter very
> much in the way the Bible works, I think.  But yes, they are always
> accompanied by their embodiment in divine action.  I would begin by
> pointing to the mercifully active CONTEXT that surrounds the Canaanite
> massacre and so on.  That is, the grace of CREATION itself (and again I
> emphasise that the opening chapters of Genesis portray a mighty AND
> amazingly near, gracious, gentle, patient Creator - and just the sheer joy
> and goodness in the very creation itself reflecting God's worthiness to be
> praised and trusted.
>
>
> Indeed. Gensos starts off tenderly.
>
> But also the divine compassion toward and rescue of the Israelites (which
> I already pointed to).  Furthermore, there is the plan for redemption of
> all humanity that unfolds from the earliest moments and then right through.
>
>
> Though I think a Christian should be able to defend the OT *also* in
> strictly Jewish terms.
>
>  These strike me as FAR more fundamental to a good reading of the Bible's
> own doctrine of God than incidences of 'genocide'
>
>
> What's in the injunction to spare no breathing Canaanite that warrants
> those quotes?
>
> and so on (which I certainly never said needed to be glossed over -
> indeed, I tried briefly to take a direct look at them and reason from my
> premises of God's goodness as to how to understand them in that framework).
>
>
> I think context is very important when reading the OT, and by that I mean
> not simply the explicit context but everything that isn't said. When we
> read Wolfe we are aware of an immense untold backstory, and it isn't
> different with the OT. Those books build on a lot that we have no direct
> access to. And our assumptions may lead us astray. For instance, I'm
> convinced Jephthah's daughter lived a long life, but most commentators have
> historically assumed otherwise - all because the story is laconic and
> suggestion goes a long way.
>
>
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