Posts by David

44

The Jewish perspective of the OT according to poster David_Jay

by deegee in

i note your comments in the following threads regarding the jewish perspective on certain old testament (ot) events:.

https://www.jehovahs-witness.com/topic/5700922233585664/when-you-stop-think-about-why-would-gods-chosen-people-old-testament-need-army?page=1&size=10 ,.

https://www.jehovahs-witness.com/topic/6065451475927040/why-didnt-god-also-reveal-himself-canaanites-just-he-did-moses-burning-bush.

David_Jay

Tor,

It's not the last of me. I know what it is like to be a Jehovah's Witness. I was one myself for about a decade. I also know what it is like to leave everything and everyone behind.

But I didn't leave because of any of their false doctrines or failures. My aunt was raising me during my teen years, and she was one of Jehovah's Witnesses and that is how I got mixed up with them. I had no idea I was Jewish at the time (nor why Hebrew came so naturally to me whenever the language came up in Watchtower publications--I grew up speaking a rare Jewish language called "Ladino" which is based on Hebrew). But once I learned who I was and that I got baptized while still having connections to Judaism and even the State of Israel, I made the decision to leave. I told no one, but I began preparing to leave with a set date, prepared a place for me in the real world, learned what I needed to in order to return to my people, and left exactly as I planned without looking back. One day I was a ministerial servant and regular pioneer giving a talk from the platform, the next day I had moved out of the flat I shared with my best JW friend who was like a brother to me.

No one came after me once they learned why I left. No one talked to me or looked me in the face if I ever passed them on the street. And they spread vicious rumors about why I left after I was gone and chose to believe these instead of the truth.

But I didn't leave because of anything bad they did or taught or because I predicted this horrible behavior of theirs (I knew they would handle it the way they did). No, I left because I am an honest person...or at least try to be. I also strive to be a man of honor.

It has been said that in a certain way Jews don't have "beliefs" in the same way Christians do. For Jews it is not believing in a creed with a faith free of doubt that matters. For Jews it is how you live your life day to day. To me it doesn't matter what creed you make claim to, even if you hold on to Watchtower theology. What matters is how you live your life.

It is not honest to stay in a group you are not really a part of, especially if they expect you to adhere to a creed with belief above and beyond reason. It isn't honest to them or to you, especially you, because these people won't love you unless you adhere to their creed with some static notion of belief.

The way Jews see it, living honestly is more righteous than believing in things with all your heart but living a lie. It's what you do that matters because the world is effected by your actions. True, your convictions are where things start, but many people fail to live up to their creed of choice when put the test. So what you say you believe and what you put faith in while all is peaceful is not really a good measure of what you really are when the time calls for courageous action.

Easier said than done, I know, and of course I can't really tell you what to do or judge you for staying or leaving. But you don't have to believe in God to be godly. As a Jewish proverb states: "Pray as if everything depends on God, but act as if everything depends on you." When good people don't do what is good, what is right, what is honest, God disappears. God isn't there in a person's claim to faith in God. God is there when you do (not just believe in) something good. An atheist can therefore be the greatest example of God sometimes this way while a theist can be the worst. Whatever you do, may it be more than static belief in something good, may it be doing something good.

9

Second Temple Judaism's Iranian Connections - something to think about

by fulltimestudent in

jw
friends

the jw's (and many other christians) believe that their religious beliefs are derived from yhwh who personally taught men of old the truth.. this view is not supported by evidence, on the contrary, when we consider the religious beliefs of neighbouring peoples, we can find evidence that the jewish elite were influenced by the religious beliefs of their surrounding neighbours.. this short video purports to demonstrate a connection between jewish thinking at the start of second temple judaism and the iranians who practised zoroastrianism.

.

i (at this time) find the suggestion that the jews conflated their yhwh with the zoroastrian divinity somewhat difficult, but its worth thinking about.. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bglgcnjz7_8&t=269s.

David_Jay

Ruby456,

It depends on the Jew, I suppose. Since the culture and religion are not based upon the Scriptures (the Scriptures are a product and not the basis of foundation of our beliefs and society), and since those Jews who are literalist often also believe that the Torah predates the Exodus, Moses, even Abraham and the foundation of the world, the religious aspect of Judaism is really a facet of that relativism. Judaism is not an exercise in being in static form like Christianity, for example, outside of some forms of Orthodoxy.

In fact, the latest and fastest growing movement among Jews since the end of the 20th century is the post-denominational, post-rabbinical movement. To a degree one might say this demonstrates very much its ability to bend with the times.

Of course there are also the humanitarian (secularist) Jews, and they might be said to be in the forefront of things along with the religious Reform Jews.

44

The Jewish perspective of the OT according to poster David_Jay

by deegee in

i note your comments in the following threads regarding the jewish perspective on certain old testament (ot) events:.

https://www.jehovahs-witness.com/topic/5700922233585664/when-you-stop-think-about-why-would-gods-chosen-people-old-testament-need-army?page=1&size=10 ,.

https://www.jehovahs-witness.com/topic/6065451475927040/why-didnt-god-also-reveal-himself-canaanites-just-he-did-moses-burning-bush.

David_Jay

John_Mann,

Actually the idea of the "five-facet" soul is more an aspect of Jewish mysticism and Chassidic thought. Jewish ideas regarding the soul as an immaterial, immortal aspect of humans belongs to the realm of Jewish philosophy and late Hebrew theological speculation. The immediacy of this concept held by some Jews (definitely not all) cannot be made directly from Scripture.

As such it is out of the realm of the purpose of this thread, which is to offer a Jewish perspective on the "Old Testament." While Chassidic teachers often saw the various words in Hebrew as indicative of five separate facets of the soul, this idea is by no means universal to Judaism.

If you are interested in learning more from the source, you need to look up Chabad, an Orthodox Hassidic movement. Chabad has a unique outreach program and various websites and programs to introduce people to Jewish Hassidic thougnt.

9

Second Temple Judaism's Iranian Connections - something to think about

by fulltimestudent in

jw
friends

the jw's (and many other christians) believe that their religious beliefs are derived from yhwh who personally taught men of old the truth.. this view is not supported by evidence, on the contrary, when we consider the religious beliefs of neighbouring peoples, we can find evidence that the jewish elite were influenced by the religious beliefs of their surrounding neighbours.. this short video purports to demonstrate a connection between jewish thinking at the start of second temple judaism and the iranians who practised zoroastrianism.

.

i (at this time) find the suggestion that the jews conflated their yhwh with the zoroastrian divinity somewhat difficult, but its worth thinking about.. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bglgcnjz7_8&t=269s.

David_Jay

P.S.: The critical analysis and Jewish history marks a path a bit different from the video. As I mentioned the connections made in the most critical of approaches in Judaism are that the monotheistic concept came from Sinai/Moab sometime after the Hyskos were ousted from power in Egypt.

9

Second Temple Judaism's Iranian Connections - something to think about

by fulltimestudent in

jw
friends

the jw's (and many other christians) believe that their religious beliefs are derived from yhwh who personally taught men of old the truth.. this view is not supported by evidence, on the contrary, when we consider the religious beliefs of neighbouring peoples, we can find evidence that the jewish elite were influenced by the religious beliefs of their surrounding neighbours.. this short video purports to demonstrate a connection between jewish thinking at the start of second temple judaism and the iranians who practised zoroastrianism.

.

i (at this time) find the suggestion that the jews conflated their yhwh with the zoroastrian divinity somewhat difficult, but its worth thinking about.. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bglgcnjz7_8&t=269s.

David_Jay

It is quite odd for me as a Jewish man to see that this is any type of news to people.

Jews recognize that much of the ritual and even style of our Hebrew worship was shaped by the ancient world we lived in. Our worship style has the earmarks of the ancient Mesopotamian world we were part of, and it extends far back further than the Second Temple era. The religious connections predate our time in Egypt, and festivals like Passover may have connections to the world Abraham came from with alterations to these Mesopotamian feasts made to give them new meaning in our Jewish context as we ourselves were shaped by history.

But prior to the Shoah, antisemitism and anti-Judaism sentiment rose to the point that Gentile people got most of their "firsthand" information about the Jews and our history from Christians. The Church had made the Hebrew Bible it's own document, and in so doing often reshaped its interpretation to fit its needs, often claiming that its views had merely been transferred from Judaism to Christian exegetes.

After the Shoah there has been a greater emphasis on dialogue with the Jewish people by Christianity, and the discovery of the Qumran scrolls did much to lift the "exclusive scoop" Christians claimed of the Bible back to the peoples who were responsible for its foundations.

Add to this that about the same time the Roman Catholic Church gave a nod to critical analysis of Scripture and ever so slowly the rest of the world began to see that the Jews draw a line to their neighbors more than the heavens when it comes to these matters.

The Jewish explanation of these facets is still not fully believed by many, and there is even a pseudo-religious movement that is intent to change the Mesopotamian connection into one that begins with Egyptian religion, even though the critical analysis agrees with Jewish history and it's claim to have adopted things from its more immediate neighbors (not that there is no connection between Egyptian and Mesopotamian religion, as a matter of fact).

In the end, if you have been exposed only to the Jehovah's Witnesses and their literalist approaches, you might still be surprised by information like this. It's very, very old news to Jews. People often think we don't know these things because in the past Christians have drawn their own ideas over these matters and presented them as Jewish history, but you are late to the party if you think it's news. Even as early as the 1950s, the Catholic Church disavowed such previous views and currently its own study Bibles identify the same links regarding Jewish religion to its Mesopotamian neighbors.

The shadows of the Watchtower are very dark and have robbed too many of seeing the world as it truly is.

44

The Jewish perspective of the OT according to poster David_Jay

by deegee in

i note your comments in the following threads regarding the jewish perspective on certain old testament (ot) events:.

https://www.jehovahs-witness.com/topic/5700922233585664/when-you-stop-think-about-why-would-gods-chosen-people-old-testament-need-army?page=1&size=10 ,.

https://www.jehovahs-witness.com/topic/6065451475927040/why-didnt-god-also-reveal-himself-canaanites-just-he-did-moses-burning-bush.

David_Jay

Wrapping Up the Scroll: The Last Three Questions

If you have followed up to now, you realize that the Jews have a view of themselves and their Scriptures that don't match anything you learned in JW land.

You might also already sort of know, more or less, what the answer to the last three questions are (and why they are grouped together too), namely...

Was there a literal Exodus from Egypt to the promised land?
Is there any part of the OT that should be taken literally?
Are there any Jewish scriptures outside of the OT which were communicated directly by God to the Jews/Israelites?

We pretty much answered the last question already in that if the Jews don't necessarily recognize the Hebrew Scriptures as a product of a direct communication by God (or at least don't have a dogmatic answer for this), then they don't have an answer to the last question. In a way all of the religion of the Jews in inspired, but it doesn't mean the same thing to us that this means to JWs.

Did God directly communicate other Scriptures to other peoples, something like, again, the Book of Mormon to the people who once inhabited the USA? Did, as the song goes in the musical, The Book of Mormon, 'ancient Jews build boats and sail to America?' These other Scriptures were not the product of our people, so we can't judge one way or the other. You will have to decide for yourself. We don't have anything in our theology that goes about saying that this is an impossibility (though the arguments for the validity of the Book of Mormon being what it claims it is, is pretty low).

Is there any part of the Hebrew Scriptures that can be taken literally? Of course. Go back to the original illustration about The Miracle Worker. Is any of that literal? Indeed, yes. Which parts? You have to do the footwork yourself and compare the script to the actual life accounts. Which parts of the Hebrew Scriptures are literal and which are not? Well, I don't have the space to tell you all of that.

But there is a lot of less footwork involved since scholars have done a lot of the footwork for you. For a Jewish perspective on what is literal and what is not, you can start with the Jewish Study Bible. But don't be surprised if you need to dig further. Expect to. And you may be surprised that the Roman Catholic Church and mainstream Christianity have come to many of the same conclusions we have, but again you will have to do some work to see where this is so. I suggest the NRSV Oxford Annotated Study Bible and the NABRE. The New Jerusalem Bible is a good choice too, but make sure you have the edition with the full footnote apparatus.

And don't be surprised if you find that some Jews see some parts of Scripture as literal, and some do not. Remember, we are "Israel." We wrestle with God. We challenge the Scriptures, unlike Christians who attempt to make everything fit in with all the texts. You can't judge all Jews but what one Jew or some Jews say. You can only hear the various views and leave it at that.

Now, was there a literal Exodus from Egypt? Historians and archaeologists believe so, and this ancient aspect of our Jewish history predates the Scriptures. The evidence does support that under the reign of the Hyksos dynasty, Semites came to live in Egypt and eventually found themselves driven into slavery after the Hyksos were driven out. Some scholars believe the exodus of slaves came in waves, some suggesting three.

How many left? Probably a lot less than what is written in the Scriptures. Remember, the book of Exodus is not the source of the stories of our slavery and exodus from Egypt. This comes from our own history. Every nation in the ancient world had its gods, and we attributed our redemption from slavery to our God, just as any other nation or tribe would have done. In some ways the stories of my ancestors are merely typical of what you will find by examining any ancient history of any ancient peoples.

To conclude, like The Miracle Worker, our Scriptures are not pure fiction or merely mythologies borrowed from other nations of the ancient world around us (though some of what you find is fiction and some of it is borrowed). There are reasons for this.

The reason some of you reading this might find a lot of this surprising or hard to grasp or even accept is because of your exposure to the Jehovah's Witnesses. For them the Bible is a source of revelation from God. As such, the Bible must be the guide for all religion. If it is to be this guide, then its words must be true, and that truth must be fact. If they are not, then any religion based solely on the Bible can't ever be right.

Judaism has never based its beliefs solely on the Bible. We wrote the Bible. It came a long time after the events therein. And we didn't write the things down in order to have a guide for our religious beliefs and doctrines. If you were an ancient nation, you had religious beliefs and doctrines already. From what we believed came the Scriptures and not the other way around.

This may be fascinating, but at the same time it is also upsetting. Being so obsessed with the Bible should have made the Witnesses and their Governing Body equally obsessed with learning the facts behind the Book they believe to be the ultimate source of revelation from God. If they wanted to know what it meant, they should have at least considered the Jewish view first. Where they have done this in a few places, to a large extent this still has not happened. What I am writing here is not new, but some of you who have spent years studying the Bible as one of Jehovah's Witnesses are just learning of these things for the first time. In my opinion, you should have learned it to begin with. If the Bible is so vital to the Jehovah's Witnesses, none of this I have written should come as a surprise. No one, not even the one who composed the OP should have a question for me.

You don't have to be Jewish to know the Jewish perspective. And you can't understand the Scriptures correctly (even the New Testament) without having a grasp of that perspective to begin with. The idea that this is not the starting place or even any part of the Bible education of Jehovah's Witnesses is, for lack of a better word, sad. Even the Catholic, Orthodox, and mainstream Protestant study Bibles are filled with accurate information about the Jewish perspective (maybe not as deep, but it's there).

So that's it. I finished sooner that I expected. Feel free to ask any further question on the subjects presented. I will try to get back to each as soon as I can. Just remember, if you are seeking to discuss religion with me or even try to get me to consider your religious views on Jesus or the like, I don't think that is appropriate. Nobody comes here to get preached at, and I am not looking to make people into Jews either.

Hopefully now your eyes are a little more open to how blind and deaf you had been due to the failure of the Watchtower religion to teach people about the Scriptures of the Children of Abraham, the nation of Israel, the Jews.

44

The Jewish perspective of the OT according to poster David_Jay

by deegee in

i note your comments in the following threads regarding the jewish perspective on certain old testament (ot) events:.

https://www.jehovahs-witness.com/topic/5700922233585664/when-you-stop-think-about-why-would-gods-chosen-people-old-testament-need-army?page=1&size=10 ,.

https://www.jehovahs-witness.com/topic/6065451475927040/why-didnt-god-also-reveal-himself-canaanites-just-he-did-moses-burning-bush.

David_Jay

tor1500 asked:

So, after reading all your info. how is one supposed to walk this life out...What does God require of us?....Is there going to be a resurrection, a new earth a new heaven ? What say ye?

Now it's not that I am ignoring your questions in total and, for instance, answering John_Mann and not giving you the same respect for some reason.

It bears repeating that for many ex-Jehovah's Witnesses, religion has been used as tool of negativity in our lives. Mine too. Just because I went back to the religion of my ancestors upon leaving (I was unaware of it, mostly, as a child and became a JW as a teenager), being a practicing Jew doesn't mean I am all "hunky-dory" with religion now. Anyone can take any religion, even any type of secular non-theist philosophy or rule, and use it to control and abuse others. I have had my fill, and I am sure many of my fellow ex-JWs have as well.

If you have questions on what you should do religiously or what religious view you should have, etc., there are ways you can find healthy alternatives to the type of religion Jehovah's Witnesses preach. These groups have their teachers and preachers and web sites. Not all are "evil, abusive" religions either. If this is really your choice, go to the source.

Jews don't believe that God requires people not under a covenant with God to adopt our views. We don't think you aren't "saved" unless you "believe in God," or that you will go to hell for being atheist or agnostic or refusing a label of any type regarding your personal convictions. We also don't think that you won't have a place in the world to come we hope for if you are a just person. You didn't do anything good or evil to warrant you being born into this world, so if there is indeed a next, I doubt God will require you to do more to enter the next phase of existence. Be grateful for today, and live thankfully not because thanks will get you more life, but because you have life to begin with. Be in the here and now, and if there is a God, let God be God and take care of the rest.

As for how my previous post gave you some of your answers, you should note from reading it that definitive answers or "one answer for everybody" just isn't the Jewish way. If there is a God, what God may demand of you would likely be different from what God asks of me. We are not the same people.

And my personal convictions may not be very helpful to you. If you think this information is a lot to process, you don't want into my head, and I am not up to debating with you on what I should believe or not. Technically speaking, Jews aren't into what one believes, and I am not here to defend our beliefs or advance them. I am only doing this to help ex-JWs (and current ones reading this) to see that the Watchtower way is definitely not as correct as it claims.

44

The Jewish perspective of the OT according to poster David_Jay

by deegee in

i note your comments in the following threads regarding the jewish perspective on certain old testament (ot) events:.

https://www.jehovahs-witness.com/topic/5700922233585664/when-you-stop-think-about-why-would-gods-chosen-people-old-testament-need-army?page=1&size=10 ,.

https://www.jehovahs-witness.com/topic/6065451475927040/why-didnt-god-also-reveal-himself-canaanites-just-he-did-moses-burning-bush.

David_Jay

John_Mann wrote:

I thought the role of Ezra (not necessarily during the exile) was unanimous among Jews. I'm Catholic and the Jewish tradition we inherited says Ezra played a major role in the making of what we call OT.

This is a good example of the vast difference between Jewish thought and the way some Christians, especially Jehovah's Witnesses (that even ex-members can accidentally hold over after leaving the Watchtower), think.

I never said that the role of Ezra was not unanimous among Jews. I merely said that "it's not the only worthy hypothesis that can be considered."

Unlike much in Christianity that restricts an individual to usually one (and often very exact) view, as you might have noted already this is not the way Jews do things.

Jews almost unanimously, hands down, understand Ezra as having a distinct role in re-publishing (even refashioning) the Hebrew Scriptures, especially the written Torah. In fact, much as a Catholic would call the apostle Paul by the name "Saint Paul," Jews generally speak of "Ezra the Scribe," and not just as "Ezra."

But having this universal view doesn't mean that there can't be other equally possible ways that things actually worked out in the construction of the written Hebrew Scriptures. No one knows 100% for sure what happened as Ezra the Scribe did not make a documentary called "The Re-publishing of the Jewish Bible After We High-Tailed It Out of Babylon," and especially since Ken Burns was not born yet.

Even the best critical approaches can only produce a theory on how things were done by Ezra, what part he actually played. At best, the critical view can only suggest that Ezra the Scribe was likely responsible for the Priestly Code material added to Torah (which is "P" if you subscribe to the Documentary (or Wellhausen) Hypothesis).

The Roman Catholic Church generally agrees with this view, while simultaneously holding a conservative and liberal view of what was done by Ezra the Scribe in this regard. In the United States, for instance, while the majority of Catholics seem to favor the use of the official U.S. Catholic Bible translation, the NABRE (an excellent translation), its critical apparatus (which strongly supports the argument of Ezra's part in the production of "P") is generally disregarded and protested by a large number of churchgoers. In fact, a growing number of American Catholics are refusing to use the NABRE, adopting the use of the Revised Standard Version, 2nd (Ignatius) Catholic Edition for personal use instead. Study versions of the RSV-CE 2, while still employing sound critical methods, resort to a more moderate and even conservative lean in the presentation of explanatory footnotes. The view of this large number of faithful Catholics is that the Documentary Hypothesis is not necessarily correct, which means that Ezra did not have as large of a role as critical analysis claims. So the Catholic Church is not unanimous on this issue either, and the Holy See does not require Catholics to reject a more traditional view over the critical approach in the study of Scripture.

That being said, the Jewish view, even when it holds to different theories, does not downplay the importance and historical significance of Ezra the Scribe and the part he played in the finalizing of our Scriptures. Exactly what it was, however, cannot be determined with accuracy, and this leaves ample room for educated guesses without diminishing the importance of Ezra.

44

The Jewish perspective of the OT according to poster David_Jay

by deegee in

i note your comments in the following threads regarding the jewish perspective on certain old testament (ot) events:.

https://www.jehovahs-witness.com/topic/5700922233585664/when-you-stop-think-about-why-would-gods-chosen-people-old-testament-need-army?page=1&size=10 ,.

https://www.jehovahs-witness.com/topic/6065451475927040/why-didnt-god-also-reveal-himself-canaanites-just-he-did-moses-burning-bush.

David_Jay

(Tor, while answering all your questions immediately will take us off subject--and this is NOT a lesson in what the Jewish religion teaches about such things, but instead the PERSPECTIVE of Jews on their Scriptures [please see the OP and my first reply]--some of your questions are about to be answered here as we cover the next question. To learn more about what Jews believe religiously follow the instructions I have in the second post of this thread.)

THE STUBBORN, REBELLIOUS, AND CHALLENGING CHOSEN PEOPLE OF GOD: Why we are called the nation of "Israel" and not the nation of "Abraham"

"For whatever reason God chose to do this, I am sure we can all agree it was pretty unjust either way, and most here would have a bone to pick with God after all was said and done."

You could see the nods of agreement in the audience. If it had been a Southern Baptist church, such audience agreement would have been salted with an "Amen!" from a few congregants...except that you would probably never have had such agreement from Christians from any denomination if that message had been preached from their pulpits.

No. These were the words of a rabbi. This was his subject during one Shabbat service after our Torah portion was completed. It had just covered one of those parts of the Bible where the Jews were commanded to kill all their enemies in a battle of exterminating genocidal proportions.

And yes, you read it right. The rabbi and his congregation felt the reading of Scripture showed God as acting unjustly, with some agreeing that they would let God know personally how dissatisfied they were with God's behavior.

Ladies and gentlemen, I give you the Chosen People, Israel. Ta-da!

Not what you were expecting, eh, my Watchtower-educated children? Well, that's us. God's "chosen people" in all our glory. Take it all in. We just had a reading from God's inspired Word, and as we have characteristically done since the days of Abraham, we took issue with what God had to say.

Chosen but not Only

Christian groups like the Jehovah's Witnesses and Mormons (and many other "restoration gospel" movements) share a common earmark: they generally teach that being "chosen" by God is exclusive to being the "only" people of God.

These (and even older religious groups) have made such similar claims and connections for themselves that they have too often projected their definitions on "chosen" upon us. While it is also not correct to say that some Jews have not arrogantly made a similar connection, for the most part our theology doesn't make the same connection between being "chosen" of God and being the "only" people of God.

A very ancient part of Jewish theology teaches that God communicates with all peoples and nations. Some Jews teach that God offered all peoples the Torah, shopped it around until he got to us, and we decided to go into contract with God. This contract (or covenant) includes the responsibility of being a light to the nations, to work with God in redeeming us all from a world infected by our own failings, that of the Jews as well.

That makes us "chosen" for the purposes "spelled out" in the contract, but not "chosen" as in the "only" people or "only" religion God works with.

And the fact that God offered us this covenant also means God knew what God was getting into.

God's Chosen People, Not Always Obedient

Note that while we are called the children of Abraham, we are also called the nation of Israel. Have you ever wondered why the two names, and these particular two names? And why not just the children and "nation" of "Abraham"? Why does the nation get the name of Jacob, and then his second name "Israel"?

That is because we are in a covenant or contract with God. We are not slaves anymore as we were in Egypt. We are partners in God's purpose for the world. And just like any other contract relationship, the partners don't always see eye-to-eye.

Like our forefather Abraham, we often question God. (Genesis 18:16-33) And like Jacob, we actively "wrestle" with God and thus gain for ourselves the same name of "Israel."--Genesis 32:27, 28.

This seems to be part of the reason God has chosen us, or so one theological theory of Judaism suggests: God is "learning" how to deal with humanity and grow through his dealings with Israel.

Yeah, this flies in the face of the JW interpretation of Malachi 3:6 (which we understand that God doesn't change in reference to his covenant with us, not that God cannot change intentions, views, or the mind of God). But Jews have come to learn that God is not bound to the limits of the static description of God found in Scripture.

God says that despite being question by and wrestling with our forefathers, that God nevertheless love them. And even today we don't always agree with God. We often wrestle with his ways. And it appears that we have been chosen to play this very part.

As such you can probably see how and why we are not limited to following Scripture exactly as written all the time. Sometimes yes, other times no.

The biggest difference between how Jehovah's Witnesses (and many Christians) use Scripture is that they seem to follow them as closely as possible, even when there are contradictory commands to deal with. Jews on the other hand challenge Scripture, we question the Lord, we wrestle with God.

And that is what you should expect from the children of Abraham, from the nation of Israel, the Chosen People of God.

44

The Jewish perspective of the OT according to poster David_Jay

by deegee in

i note your comments in the following threads regarding the jewish perspective on certain old testament (ot) events:.

https://www.jehovahs-witness.com/topic/5700922233585664/when-you-stop-think-about-why-would-gods-chosen-people-old-testament-need-army?page=1&size=10 ,.

https://www.jehovahs-witness.com/topic/6065451475927040/why-didnt-god-also-reveal-himself-canaanites-just-he-did-moses-burning-bush.

David_Jay

Thanks for the comments, Grreat Teacher and John_Mann.

John, as to your question about Ezra composing the Hebrew Scriptures while in Babylon: It is unlikely that anyone among the Jews was composing Scripture to a large extent during the Babylonian exile. It was a very dark time for my people.

To discuss this in complete detail would hijack this thread down a different course, but the short of it is that the Scriptures began to shape into the form as we might recognize them during the Davidic dynasty era.

During the exile it was likely only the royal family in exile that had any access to these texts, and while they weren't forgotten during this time and some work could have been done during this time, it was likely after the exile that Scripture began to really develop into the finalized form we know now. It is commonly held that Ezra may have had some hand in this but it's not the only worthy hypothesis that can be considered.

David_Jay

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