Have you heard the story of Uzzah? He was a follower of God who was struck down by God for daring to try and protect God’s special box. And today his story provides a troubling example of believers desperately trying to find someone, anyone to blame so they don’t have to blame God.
So I wanted to remember him - without excusing God.
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Excellent article Jon, and I will comment further later on, either under my own name, or a pseudonym, as may be needed. My first thoughts are though, that you need to get different relatives :)
ReplyDeleteI, too, would like to put in my pennyworth about the Uzza story, but I`ll wait until Joseph has posted.
ReplyDeleteAs for Jon getting different relatives, remember, Joseph, you can choose your friends but not your relatives.
I took it as a joke, but anyway: I can't choose my relatives, but I can and sometimes do choose the way in which I spend time with relatives.
ReplyDeleteMancott, Over to you really. I mean I reckon Uzzah had it coming, given that for calling a person with receding hair "bald", caused the same God to be so pissed he had 42 children mauled by bears...bet that taught them a lesson they won't forget.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Joseph that Jon`s article is well worth a read. What you understand about the Uzzah story depends, I think, on whether you believe that the Bible is literally the Word of God, or that it is the word of men, a human composition not inspired by God, so, I would echo Jon`s suggestion, "Did this actually happen".
DeleteFor me the more you read the Bible with eyes and a mind free to decide, it seems to me that the actions and reactions of God are more like the actions that humans would make, rather than those of an all-powerful, all-seeing, all-knowing, all-understanding Almighty God.
The picture painted in the Bible about the Ark is that it was a vitally important part of Israel`s existence, and God made sure that this is how they viewed it. So, if it was so important, enough for God to slay Uzzah for simply touching it ( Jon has explained this) ,why did God allow the Ark to disappear out of Israel`s sight and their daily life? The Bible is silent about this. After the sacking of Jerusalem by Nebuchadnezzar in 586BCE, when the people were taken into exile, the Ark is not mentioned again, apart from a brief mention by Jeremiah, a verse in Hebrews and again in Revelation. It has disappeared. At the time of the exile and the return from Babylon the Ark isn`t mentioned. Following this neither is it said to have been placed in the rebuilt Temple in Jerusalem. It has disappeared. Yet previously it was a vital part of Israel`s life, even being lugged around for forty years in the desert wilderness wanderings.
The Old Testament we have today is the result of two (incomplete and not entirely accurate) versions of the history of the people, one version compiled by a writer from the northern tribes, and the other by someone in Judah. These two versions (two Creation stories, two Flood stories, and many more doublets) ,following the northern Israelite tribes being dispersed by the Assyrians, were spliced together, redacted, bits taken out and bits added, this being commenced, probably, whilst the people were still in exile, and completed later on their return around 4BCE or even later. Done for reasons at the time.
My view is that the story of Uzzah was added at this time, a time of political "Jahweh Alone". Reason? To emphasise the need for utter obedience to the One God, a powerful God, and the attempt by the priests to achieve a complete elimination of the worship of other deities, and to weld the "new" nation together -- in effect all singing from the same hymn sheet.
My reading of the Bible now, leads me to believe that the god of the Bible is a god fashioned by the leaders at that time, for their political needs of the time, and nothing more.
"Jahweh" should be Yahweh, of course. (fat fingers)
DeleteOf course none of it happened. It's all chicken shit. If there is a God, he should cover his face in shame at the carnage and suffering he has created. When I look at the world around me ......The worst part of all of this is the belief that God is holding "the world" in his hands, and we need do nothing to make things better. THAT doesn't help -- at all.
ReplyDeleteI think, in fact, a lot of it did happen, but not in the way portrayed in the Bible. I`ve come to think of the bible as an onion, lots of layers. They need to be carefully peeled away, by searching out each layer. Is what is written in the Bible verified by history?: archaeology?: geography?: studies of the Bible as literature?. Dr John Thomas was quite unaware of what has been found out about the writings in the Bible since his day. Unfortunately, Christadelphians who believe in the Bible as the inerrant word of God, most don`t feel the need to look much further than what they read as they daily and slavishly follow Robert Robert`s Reading plan.
DeleteMancott, I believe you may have touched upon a few things that I observed a long time ago, but firstly, and mainly to clarify, for the unaware. Christadelphians generally believe that only they do daily Bible readings, and are taught that all other denominations do not. This is blatantly false, but their young people seem to believe it, probably out of ignorance. The reality is that there is nothing unique, special or otherwise about the reading plan, dozens of different reading plans exist and are used by other denominations, and this included myself prior to my becoming a convert to Christadelphianism.
DeleteMy observation is that when done in a group setting, the most senior Christadelphian figure present would tell the others what the passage meant, and would, intentionally or otherwise, effectively shut down anything to the contrary, perhaps even quoting pioneer writings to add force to that. Group Bible readings that I attended as an evangelical Anglican were a very different affair, far more open and constructive, and crucially, much more likely to encourage the attendees to go, as you suggest, "onion peeling", by reading other material and thinking for themselves.
I cannot comment either, without mentioning, that as far as I could see, all that slavish Bible reading that the Christadelphians do, seemed to go in through their eyes, and head off out through their ears without touching the bit in between at all, given the way that they have, and continue to, behave.
You obey, and half the time you get zapped anyway. You join up, and half the time you get your eternal dirt nap anyway. I'm judged "unworthy?" I judge THEM unworthy, and I want none of the primitive and illogical sludge they're peddling, because it isn't worth having. The only religions more stupid and comical are Mormonism and Scientology. Shove this pig slop up your arses. You have made your lives unworthy of being lived.
ReplyDelete