If God is what the Bible says...?

Question

If God is ALL-LOVING,
all-knowing,
all-merciful,
perfect,
then why would God be so imperfect and humanized as to say in the Bible such jealous things like
Exodus 20:3
"You shall have no other gods before me.",
and Exodus 20:5
"You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I, the LORD your God, am a jealous God, punishing the children for the sin of the fathers to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me..."

Or such UNloving and violent things like
Exodus 22:18
"Do not allow a sorceress to live.",
and unloving and violent things like
Judges 9:56-57 "Thus God returned the evil of Abimelech, which he committed against his father in killing his seventy brothers. And God also made all the evil of the men of Shechem return on their heads, and upon them came the curse of Jotham the son of Jerubbaal."

How can our loving God be so humanized to be jealous and vengeful? How can God be all-loving and do harm? Or, "return evil" when God is not evil?

I think God IS all-loving and all-knowing. I don't think humans are, and humans wrote the Bible.

So, God can be jealous AND perfect? Jealousy is GOOD?

No, I refuse to believe that.

I thought jealousy was a sin. I thought vengence was a sin. Isn't envy bad? Wrath bad? If so, then doesn't God sin according to the Bible?

Answer 1

All these pseudo-Greek attributes were thought up by Christian theologians who were often very short-sighted. A few of them were clever (Augustine comes to mind), but they ended up hogtying theology and forcing in contradictions.

Of course, without the theologians, Christianity is still a contradictory mess.

Answer 2

I can see by your last comments on a previous question, that you "refuse to believe" certain truths. This doesn't change the fact that they are true, it only means that you "refuse" to see them as truth, the same as a person who is colorblind can refuse to believe that what they see as brown is actually red.

Now as for this question, if a a judge fines a criminal or sends him to prison for his crimes, does that mean he is a bad judge? Why no of course not, because the judge is just, he is required by law to punish the criminal who broke the law. God is what He is completely and with no variance. To say that God is love, means that love would not exist and CANNOT exist outside of God. You know how much He loved us, He came to earth in the form of a human to die for us. He satisfied the fine for breaking the law. If you believe that God is all knowing and all loving, then you mus believe He is HOLY. Since God is Holy, then the unholy cannot come into his presence lest they be consumed. If you believe in God, you must believe in the other side of the coin which is evil. These other "gods" were in the image of man made beasts and people worshipped these idols of gold, wood, and bronze and MEN set up rituals and sacrifices, even human sacrifices, to worship these "gods" they made. God used the word "jealous" to describe Himself to show that he is not some mere statue made with mens hands, but that He and He alone is the only true living God with emotions. God must punish sin, because sin is the breaking of the law. God made the law and gave us a conscience of right and wrong. To just sit back and let man sin all he wants with no justice, would be unjust and sinful. For a person to "believe" or "think" God is this way or that way and to refuse the truth that He has laid out to us in His word, is to create an idol, a "god" of your own liking and choice. The problem is that you can believe in that "god" and pray to that "god" all you want, but he cannot hear because he doesn't exist. You can't pick and choose the kind of attributes you want to apply to God, such as love, peace, and harmony, you must include Holiness, and never forget that He is Just! Peace.

Answer 3

Your understanding is what is imperfect. God is 'jealous' because he doesn't want anyone to get lost worshipping bits of wood or clay. What POSSIBLE good would THAT do anyone? OTOH, what better use of ones time is there than to give glory to the One True God and Creator of the entire universe?
As to the 'unloving' violence, a sorceress was one who caused harm. How ELSE were they supposed to rid themselves of such a person? In that society?
And as to returning evil, a mirror is not you, but it does return your image, doesn't it? How is it vengeful to reflect your own actions back at you?

Answer 4

One of the Bible principles is that a person has the ability to make morals choices, but then he lives with the consequences of those choices.

Isn't it something that if people are murdered, then God is to blame for letting that happen. But if God stops a mass murderer such as Abimelech who had killed 70 members of his family in a single bloodbath, then God is evil for stopping him.

You are aware that the Bible word "sorcerer" refers to someone who practices human sacrifice, usually of children and women? Do you really want such people not to be stopped?


Just as the government of a country has the right to do things to stop evil people, such as arrest them, fine them, jail them, and if needed even execute them, so God has that right. Unlike the government, he has perfect understanding of the situation, perfect knowledge of what the person has done, and a what they will do in the future. So he is able to make what is the correct decisions on what to do.

Answer 5

El was the chief god at Ugarit. Yet El is also the name of God used in many of the Psalms for Yahweh; or at least that has been the presupposition among pious Christians. Yet when one reads these Psalms and the Ugaritic texts one sees that the very attributes for which Yahweh is acclaimed are the same for which El is acclaimed. In fact, these Psalms were most likely originally Ugaritic or Canaanite hymns to El which were simply adopted by Israel, much like the American National Anthem was set to a beer hall tune by Francis Scott Key. El is called the “father of men”, “creator”, and “creator of the creation”. These attributes are also granted Yahweh by the Old Testament.

Answer 6

Because God isn't constrained by human standards, He has the right to punish and/or "off" someone if He deems them worthy of it. Besides, the whole sorceress thing was in order to maintain the purity of Israel's people. From a Christian perspective, witchcraft draws upon the powers of demons to cast spells, so it makes sense that God would be so "ticked" about it. He should be "jealous" because if He knows He's the only true God, it's only natural for Him to be angered by people worshipping other gods.

Answer 7

Think of it like a parent of a child who refuses to acknoledge his parents. Instead he calls his friends parents Mom and Dad and his own parents he addresses as Mr. and Mrs. Jones. Would it be uncaring and unloving for the parent to want thier child to refer to them as his parents?
God does not want his people being mislead by imaginary gods, or worse, Lucifer. A father is not unloving to correct a child on the wrong path in life, no matter how the child perceives it. An unloving father is one who ignore his child and lets his child do whatever he wants.

Answer 8

The bible was written by man. And by the argument that God is perfect and man is not, which is why he supposedly saves us from our sins, then...once the words come from the hand of man, it is automatically corrupt.

Dang! I think I just proved God. God is the thought, not the words. Although, because He left it all up to us and man is corrupt, we screwed ourselves. But, doesn't that bring a fault in God? And God has no faults? O.K. I just disproved Him. I feel better.

Answer 9

There is a lot in the bible that - I believe - we who are living in the year 2007 don't unterstand or can't translate as it is a different time and society. As far as God being jealous - yes! He is. He is God and wants us to worship him. He is God and He makes the rules. That is just the way it is.

Answer 10

God doesn't exist. that's why the Bible is like that. For more go to http://godisimaginary.com