Hi crazyheart:

I think our perception of God has changed, and will continue to change. (See my latest entry in "Are Atheists Fools?")

I don't know whether God changes or not but our very human perception of God certainly has.

Since god is a human concept, as humans change so does the concept.

Pure logic.

LL&P

Spock

Hi crazyheart,

Do those hundered other adjectives include loving, gracious, gentle and compassionate or are they all decidedly negative?  The popular notion that the God of the Old Testament is wrathful is pure laziness where it isn't pure ignorance.

Appearances are decieving.  I suspect that many Christians do not know the Hebrew scriptures any better than they do the Greek ones and most don't know the Greek scriptures all that well either.

That is also a selective reading of scripture.  Jesus portrays God in decidedly different ways in several parables.

Neither really.  God remains who God is and we remain who we are.  God is loving and compassionate and when provoked (something that is allegedly difficult to pull off) very demonstrative of God's displeasure.  We are not always aware and we don't go out of our way to gain awareness, particularly if the search proves too difficult.  Make it easy or we don't care.

Jesus adds a perspective.  One which is taken from the Hebrew scriptures which should be the first clue that without a deeper knowledge of them ourselves we are inclined to think Jesus is more inventor than interpreter.

They are the one and the same God.  The problem is our perception.  We percieve poorly because we study infrequently if at all.

Laziness.  That's all you need to know about it.

Grace and peace to you.

John

I'm inclined to agree with RevJohn, with the addition that the focus on the OT is often that of the most sensational but then that is not much different than what most people like to focus on anyway.

For me, and this is only my interpretation and may be a lazy one at that, the OT reflects the early struggles of a nation forging its way and with any such struggle there were hardships.  People tend to remember hardship more than the good times and pass that information down the line, one thinks, in the hope that future generations don't repeat the journey.  Love is viewed as harsh as the conditions.

By the time of the NT, things are getting a little easier - no more trudging through the desert, a begrudging peace, foundations have been built upon.  There is time and energy to enjoy a wedding, drink wine and philosophize.  Love is viewed as gentle as the times.

As RevJohn says, God is the same, it is perceptions that change.  The perception is of the past as much as the present.

LB

God is a child who amuses himself, going from laughing to crying for no reason, each day reinventing the world to the chagrin of hair-splitters, pedants, and preachers, who try to teach God his job as Creator. 

Elie Faure, L'Esprit des formes, 1927

I believe as others.  What you have in the OT is an older concept or perception of God.  In the NT we see in Jesus a new perception of God.

Shalom

Mate

I think the difference in the personality of God reflects the differing views of the people at those times when those books were written. And specifically the writters of the books, have greatly defined and moulded God's character to their own will and purpose. But then I am no scholar of the bible. I only have a passing understanding through other books that refer to it.

Hiya, Mate.  I'm thinking that RevJohn does not adhere to that perspective, and neither do I.  There is a belief out there in the wider post-Christendom culture that the OT and NT present different faces of God AND that the NT is superior in some way.  I don't buy either of those positions.  If, as RevJohn points out, we are willing to spend time with the Hebrew Scriptures, we will find a passionate, compassionate God who yearns for relationship with us.  If we don't skim the Greek Scriptures, we will see that Jesus is sometimes very unreasonable (cursing the fig tree for not producing fruit out of season!).  There is a lot of judgement and demands placed upon us by both testaments, and a lot of abounding grace and love too.

peace

I think that our concept of God evolves as our knowledge, consciousness and wisdom evolve.

This much seems obvious (except, perhaps, to some fundamentalists.)

The interesting question is: Does God evolve?

If, as I believe, God is the self-generative totality of being, in a state of synthesis, then God self-evolves as the cosmic totality evolves. Before God evolved us humans, IT would not have had the range and intensity of human emotions. In and through us, God became passionately enraptured, but also experiences the depths of despair that only consciously aware beings like we humans experience.

The Easter metaphor, which plunges God-become-flesh into deepest despair and from there to highest ecstasy, is a very poignant metaphor of God having become emotional in and through us.

To suppose that God possessed an emotion approximating human love before there were humans seems impossibly illogical. God evolved human love as it evolved humans.

If God self-evolves as we evolve, and we are co-evolutionaries in that sacred process, then we, in co-creation with God, are consciously and purposely evolving God. This may seem a blasphemous or unorthodox concept to many, but I believe it to be so. By consciously co-evolving ourselves and our world we co-evolve God.

What could be more meaningful than that!?

Divine co-evolution is an idea and action whose time has come.

Don't tell me this is satanic; I've been told before.

Lewis Black explains the OT. WARNING - COPIOUS FOWL LANGUAGE!!!!!!!

Clergychikita, thank you for the explanation of how you feel and why.

Crazyheart, here I go... but I do not have the answers. I only have questions and some answers that work for me.

I see God with potential to be whatever God pleases or decides to be. That is, God being God.

For me, God has many angles and if I have a sincere wish to know God, I cannot simply say"God" like it sums up all God is. It is, for me, more. I feel I need  to know the aspects of God. For me, it is like knowing anyone. They are more than their name. For Hebrews, that is why there were so many words used for God. They offer the nature of God, the character of God, even what Goid does... there is a long list of them.

As a Jew, with only the Hebrew Scriptures (OT), I never saw that anceints worshipped a  primarily vengeful and cruel God. God was not one dimensional or stagant or unchanging in the the words they recorded. I see belief in a strong and gentle God. A strict God who also understands and is patient....The light and the shade. Remember, Jews believe good and evil both are created by God. They do not have a competing deity who God struggles with. The satan can only do what God allows. So, their God has dual qualities from the get-go

For me, to not see cruel vengenance, I have to look no further than Bereshit(Genesis). Remember, I do not read literally.  I read what they spoke about in their understadning, in their way in their time.... God who creates not out of compulsion, but what?  That God makes in God's image? Why?  That God worries about Adam being alone. Why? When they break rules, they are not killed.... Why? When I read of Cain and Abel, is there cruel vengenance? Not as much vengenance as some have sought in history or seek in many places in this world today where the death penalty exists. Why?

Yes, there are stories that sound quite cruel and horrid. I also know that if anyone read stories I have written about my mom they would see a mean, vengeful and wicked person. It is not, though, how I see her. Far from it, actually. It is not what I would want another to think I feel or how I would want her seen by them. Yet, I cannot do anything about what it stirs in others or what filters they filter through or what standards they hold a parent to.... except, to explain that is not what I meant where I did not mean what they took from it.   

I also see Jesus as multi-faceted.

To know a person or even a persona, one has to get to know the many emotions, the motivations, the fears, the anger, the love..... the vast array of often paradoxical emotions.

Peace,

StevieG

Hi clergychickita,

If all Mate is trying to say is that the New Testament is more recent than the Old Testament then I have no argument with that.  If, however; he is attempting to advance the nonsense position that the New Testament is better than the Old Testament then the gloves are off.

Indeed.  Those positions only exist in the wider post-Christendom culture because the works of Mr. Scofield whose word reintroduced the heretical position of supercessionism to Christendom were embraced by Christian Fundamentalism which has been its own worst enemy and a thorn in the flesh of the universal catholic church.

Very well put.

Grace and peace to you.

John

I hate to disagree with a friend and one who is always thoughtful - but like RevJohn I think it is not a radical discontinuity between Jesus and Judaism understanding of God - yes there is a shifting human perspective but as John points out within the OT there is the same God as the God Jesus spoke about.

What happens is as human understandings shift and get revised so do the models used to describe God - thus the question for today is how does our present model show what was implicit in the older models.... my claim is the process model of the divine/human relation, and how Jesus showed the divine/human relation as one of the love of God for the world, was radically related, and in how Jesus identified with the world as it was, and that is how God relates is in harmony with the Hebrew Bible and the New Testament. For example the opening myth in Genesis is a God who becomes and is supremely related and works toward beauty - and God saw it was good.

Models and language are problematic when we take an analogy and make it literal - for example does God evolve?  Yes and no - yes when it is analogy of our experience and no if we speak of who God is in Godself.   By this I mean there is a consistent God, who eternally loves and relates and that never evolves, for God is the supremely related one.   At the same time God relates to each context out of the aim toward ( beauty, harmony, compassion, intensity, novelty and Justice) moreness.... the aim becomes a lure and is relational and the aim is consistent and contextual.

Good question, Crazyheart!

I have no problem believing that the Spirit we call God evolves along with its creations. Long, long ago, before man even exisited, this God did not even "know" of mankind, morals or rules of behavior. As the creative force continued, Its only purpose was to create a cosmos and this cosmos evolved with greater complexity. Did the Spirit "learn"? Not like we do, but rather I think the Spirit took the "stuff" of one form and created the next. So, when you come to mankind, man did not "evolve" directly from a monkey, but rather through time, the Spirit took the stuff of the monkey and mankind evolved, almost "morphed". So the monkey remained a monkey and mankind resembled the previous form, but was different.

I am not sure how the Spirit works, but I can feel the spirit within. I think all living beings have the spirit within. Some day we will likely morph into a being of higher complexity, perhaps simlar to an angel????

As for the Old and New Testament Gods, Jesus did throw out the old idea of the wrathful God and even the Jewish laws and commandments in favour of two guidelines for living. His view of God was different and more compassionate. From where I stand, Jesus saw God as a mirror of Man and related to Him as if he were a Father. I don't agree with this. I believe Jesus was mistaken, but he got closer to what God might be like. To me, God does NOT intervene in the lives of his creations. God is the creator. The creator is the glue that holds everything together. We have free will. This means that we are designed to make decisions which will determine our own destiny. Yes, prayer helps. Psychological comfort is good for the soul. Most of what we believe may not be "real". It doesn't much matter. If I believe that good works always come back, they likely will. I will create my own reality. That is how it all works. So prayer is reinforcing beliefs and confirming values. It is good. Is God listening? Yes, as long as YOU are listening to yourself.

I think this is the crux of the issue - and is always the core of literature or communication of any sort, but particularly the written word and no matter the language.

How often do you hear an author or artist lament that the reader "didn't get it"?  Or two people read the same work and both have completely different opinions - if this was not so book clubs would be awfully boring.

There is also the need, particularly in tumultuous times, to express hidden messages to the reader.  Fairy tales that were actually political statements, puppet theater making social commentary and poetry using images to express emotions.  These were written in the language of the time, to a people who understood the need for, and the content of, the message being conveyed.  The connection would be made to the words because of the experiences, cultural and social, of both reader and author.  If a reader does not understand those times, can not empathize with the cultural issues, then the whole message that the author is trying to convey may be lost.

As I write I think that what I am expressing will be understood, in my mind the words upon the screen make perfect sense to me; sometimes I will edit thinking to myself, well that is so obvious it does not need to be said.  It is isn't until the words are read by another and their interpretation revealed that I suddenly realize that what is obvious to me is not to another.

The simple statement "I love you" can be written and interpreted many ways; a mother to child, the lovers, familial or the abused who will hear those words and know they are signal that pain is about to follow.  The reader brings their own lives to the work, they will view, read or hear their story mixed with the presented and it will become a new.  Each time those words are read the meaning changes and the message passed on from reader to reader morphs into something new.  In a written work, it is not the characters who change or the author's intent, but becomes a new creation by the people who read it and pass it on.

As I dash off to Parry Sound, I leave feeling I have not fully expressed what I mean.  I expect that I will ponder this question further and my thoughts will grow and change.  I may return with a different perspective and may or may not write on that - so even the author can change with time but may not have the opportunity to expand their work, to make it clearer, and what will be left is an unfinished work.

LB

I was working on the proof of one of my poems all the morning, and took out a comma. In the afternoon I put it back again.      Oscar Wilde

lumbylad said:

"As for the Old and New Testament Gods, Jesus did throw out the old idea of the wrathful God and even the Jewish laws and commandments in favour of two guidelines for living. His view of God was different and more compassionate."

I'm afraid I'm going to have to disagree with you here.  Matthew 5:17-18: "Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets: I have come not to abolish but to fulfill.  For truly I tell you, until heaven and earth pass away, not one leter, not one stroke of a letter will pass from the law until all is accomplished."

Of the two "guidelines" (love God with all your heart/soul/mind, love your neighbour as yourself), Jesus said: "On thse two commandments hang all the law and the prophets"  (Matt 22:40) -- in other words, they are the foundation of the law, not the replacement for it.

As for Jesus' God being more compassionate -- I think it's what you focus on.  I believe God is compassionate in both testaments, but also has some expectations.  Here's some tough love from Jesus:

"...many will say to me, 'Lord, Lord.... I wil declare to them, 'I never knew you; go away from me, you evildoers.'" (Matthew 7:22-23)

"You snakes, you brood of vipers!  How can you escape being sentenced to hell?" (Matt 23:33)

shalom! =)

Humans view gods as the most powerful beings in existance. They manipulate us, and use us as toys. AND YET... humans can make gods say anything we want. Does that answer your question?

In part this quote is an example of supercessionism - built on the anti judaism -  Also the quote illustrates a dependency on classic supernatural theism -( and creation out of nothing and this is not rejccted as beginning philosophic position) - yes it is rejected but the rejection is still modern liberal thought, for there are other ways of thinking about intervention - that is a God who is relational and has an aim which is offered to each moment - this moves us to more complexity and God adds to each  moment a novel aim in harmony with the original airn toward beauty - This understanding of God reframes the question - it is not so much God evolves but God works with what is, at one point very simple reality, to create more beauty, and that is an evolving reality and is still going on.  God is supremely reactive and relational.

The God question contains to be a regular topic, so here is how Process answers it.  One could do a similar exposition on Jesus or any other Christian symbol. For example if things are created by relationships and have self determination, one could form a understanding of Jesus the man who is so open to God that his consciousness has become God consciousness, and then the early community saw this and named him the Christ. The Christ is another word for creative transformation - those events that change reality forever.

But notice the term God is basic to the tradition.  What I am going to say can be supported by a biblical understanding but for the sake of economy I will only glance in that direction.
 
What is know as classic theism is in tension with the biblical view and modern consciousness.  Language like immutable and omnipotence are problems.  Immutable  means what happens in the world has no real impact on God.  Omnipotence means only God has real power and has all the power and that is a problem in the face of tragedy - god sends floods and shootings and we know that such a god is immoral.

So Process offers a way to understand prayer.  Perfection means that God loves perfectly.  This means a radical openness to human experience.  God takes them into God’s reality. Thus perfection means perfect vulnerability... God is changed by experience and is consistent in God’s intentions - offers the divine lure of eros and beauty to every situation in a form that is appropriate to each entity.  Then the entity takes that lure and makes it concrete and offers it to others and God, for the next moment of becoming.

So God like all other entities interacts with others.  “The difference is that God interacts perfectly with all creatures.  The creatures interact very imperfectly with only a few.”

We use the word panentheism. Note it is not pantheism.  Panentheism means that everything is in God.  Yet God is distinct from the world - there is an otherness or transcendent experience of God. What happens to the world happens in God and God transforms what has happened in light of God’s aim and offers it to the world in the form of beauty , compassion, and justice.  These are emerging qualities and grow in strength and meaning.  All things ‘prehend through internal relationships.’  This later concept is a basic metaphysical given about all reality - God and all sentient reality share this.  This is a form of deep empiricism suggested by William James... and such a view aids scientific exploration - offers a better theory than reductionistic- mechanistic - materialism.

As well as the world being in God - and having its own district reality - God is in the world. “There is nothing in which  in which God is not present. “   This is the idea that the Holy Spirit works in us.  It is not identical with us but it means that find God when we look within.  The religious disciplines help value up this experience because this is the nature of their function.

God knows only what has happened and is now happening.  In that knowing God knows what is possible and what is not possible.  However, God does not know exactly what will happen in the future.  Humans make real decisions which  God has to consider.  We have real consequences on what while become.  Thus real inderminism about the future.

This allows us to escape the issue of Nietzsche - if humans  are to experience freedom God must be denied.  This view is based on the mistaken idea that God is in complete control - has all the power.  God does not self-limit Godself - there is real power to influence held by all sentient reality.  God’s power is one of persuasion.  God is the influence to more value and God is the influence that opens up the future for us.  “God is the source of alternative real possibilities among which we decide, moment by moment.”  We are lured by God, and the action in response is ours.  God is the source of strength for the  good.  God is the source of love that is for the other- that is in the best interests of the ‘other.’

Such a view is, I think biblical.  For in the myth of Genesis one, God is becoming and works with ‘stuff’ to create - it is not out of nothing.  And one of the many names for God is “I will be what  I will be” or the great I am is a becoming process.

I leave other questions of everlasting life in God for now. But it can be held in two senses: objectively in God and a subject experience in God.  If all things affect what is becoming and if God is eternal all that has made a positive difference remains in the memory of God. And it is logical to suggest that we may have a subjective experience in the memory of God.  Resurrection is creative transformation where reality has been changed for ever, and it is embodied, that is material in the sense of all things that are are actual... there is difference from the old form, but transformation has changed material reality.

I agree with Shadow.

Back about 2000 and some years ago, I believe that people decided that religion needed a little revamping. Whether the One God was portrayed as vengeful or compassionate, around that time people changed it so that the One God would be 100% love and caring and happiness. They probably did this to get more people to convert to their religion that promised the delugional hope that everything will one day be all flowers and hugs. They were probably trying to scare off the Romans from their land, either by attempting to create an army of religious believers or by placing superstitious fear in the invading Romans. And it kinda worked considering all the Romans became Christians.

Psychologically, people evolved and began to think that everything needed to be perfect. Being human just wasn't good enough anymore so they took away any form of humanity that had been attached to the One God and replaced it with the impossibility that is perfection. Personally, I'd rather that Christians still believed in their original version of the One God, maybe people would start accepting the fact that flaws are normal and ok, and that evil is necessary for the continuation of life.

Just my opinion.