dear designs...
"Yes Jews, converts, all reevaluate the ideas and concepts surrounding 'God', ask moshe."...have they re-evaluated the way they relate to God or do they maintain that through the "law" and the testimony of the prophets (isaiah 8:16-17) is the way that God would have them relate to Him?...paul describes a new way that men are to relate to God, through His Son whom the "law-abiding" prophets foretold.
"The obvious problem with 'Paul' whoever that was is his understanding and condemnation of Judiasm."...Jesus condemned the practices that the priests of the law were doing too...it had devolved to practices that showed no mercy(john 8:5-7) and God even withdrew His protection from those that practiced it...Jesus warned those that would listen to Him that there would be a time when they should flee Jerusalem (matthew 24:15-16)and they did, but the jews that were confident in God's continued protection after denying His Son were slaughtered.(hosea 4:6-7)
"Its like an outsiders view, someone who writes authoritatively about something they have not experienced from the inside."...but you concede that there have been re-evaluations of judaism since the time of paul...which means to me that what they thought and practiced back then could very well be something quite different than what is thought and practiced now especially considering the temple sacrifices and all the pagentry and homage accorded to the priests has ended.
"Saying Muslims do to it is not much of an alleviation to what Christians practiced with approval from the highest ranks of the Church."...why not?...the muslims have never stopped practicing it, from the inception of islam it has been condoned by teachers and followers alike. the "authority" of the church structure (meaning catholicism) became debased in more ways than practicing slavery but that there were many (followers and lay teachers) that didn't approve of their practices can be seen in the fact that there was a split from the catholic church and a reformation. slavery as a practice of the church is not taught in the NT but it is taught in the koran so a re-evaluation of what is taught isn't needed.
"Both the 'Jesus' character of the Gospels and Paul use the 'Slavery' metaphor in their preaching, Jesus even telling people to be a 'Slave' of himself."...Jesus showed that He thought of Himself as a slave by washing the feet of His disciples and he said His followers were to be slaves of each other which again denotes an equality between "brothers" instead of a master/slave relationship, humility was to be practiced not "lording it over others".
"But here again Judaism in that same era had a very complete answer to these age old issues"...what is that answer?
"NT never addresses them which only leads to the supposition that the NT was monkeyed with by some non-Jewish half educated, in terms of Judaism, individuals."...the selection of writings may very well have been done by all non-jewish people but that doesn't mean that the writings were by the type of people that you describe...again...the judasim practiced then has undergone a lot of changes since the jerusalem temple was destroyed and that is not a supposition.
love michelle
