The Christian Bible is split into two divisions, the Old Testament and the New Testament. The Old Testament, the first division, focuses mainly on the history of the creation of our world, specifically the history and religion of the people of Israel. The second division, the New Testament, mainly focuses on the life and religious teachings of Jesus and the beliefs of the Christian church. Although the New Testament acts as an extension/continuation of the Old Testament, a main difference between the two if the characterization of God and his relationship with humanity. In both divisions, although God condemns those who are guilty of sinning and does so in a way that can often be seen as quite wrathful, his loving side is depicted a lot more in the New Testament than in the Old Testament. …show more content…
In the Old Testament, in the Creation Story (Genesis), God proves how vicious he can be with his punishments when he punishes the serpent for allowing Eve to touch the tree of knowledge. The Bible states, “And the lord God said unto the serpent, because thou hast done this, thou art cursed above all cattle, and above every beast of the field; upon thy belly shalt thou go, and dust shalt thou eat all the days of thy life,” (Gen. 3.14). Right then and there God exhibits his power over all living things. God has a very strong opinion about the life that he’s created and always has consequences for things that he finds wrong with the world. In the Flood, while conversing with Noah, God says, “The end of all flesh is come before mel for the earth is filled with violence through them and, behold, I will destroy them with the earth,” (Gen. 6.13). The God being depicted in the Old Testament is very merciless and seeks full divine judgment for all things he
The first question that Lamb raises is if God’s anger in the Old Testament is justifiable. In other words, can God be concerned with Love and still kill people in his anger? Lamb argues that God 's anger, although sometimes extreme is justified and necessary. To prove his point, Lamb uses the story of Uzzah (2 Sam. 6:1-8). In this story, King David recovered the Ark of The Covenant and paraded it throughout Israel in the back of an ox cart. In front of a large crowd of Israelites the Ark became unstable and Uzzah reached out to steady it, because of this God killed Uzzah instantly. At first this seems completely unjustified, it looks as though Uzzah was just protecting the Ark. But, the more we look into God’s motives, the more it makes sense. First, God commanded the Israelites to carry the Ark by two long poles that attach to the side of the Ark, and he was very clear about this. Second, by killing Uzzah in front of all of these people, God sent a message that said his laws shall not be disobeyed. It
In The Epic of Gilgamesh and the novel Genesis, we are shown gods and the biblical God who both enforce their ideas of justice against those they deem wicked. This is depicted multiple times in both pieces of literature, the most notable being the floods unleashed by God in Genesis and the gods in The Epic of Gilgamesh. The punishments inflicted on humankind are similar because the deities in both texts share their own concept of justice, fueled by human emotion. Throughout both stories these omnipresent beings deal with humans in a somewhat callous way, sometimes showing compassion but mainly displaying their powers to punish humans.
Current strengths: My punctuality is excellent, for example I am up to date with my diary and my class attendance is excellent.
In Genesis, God interacts with Adam by speaking to him face to face. Whether God was giving out instructions or punishment to Adam and Eve, he was always doing it on a personal level. The usual portrayal of God as an omniscient being is instead replaced as mentor to Adam and Eve who is trying to help them understand their existence. This close relationship is shown even when man does something wrong. The only rule that God gives to Adam is that he must not eat from the tree of knowledge of good and evil. Adam and Eve go on to break the singular rule and be punished; but not to the extent most would think. Before partaking of the fruit God says that, "the day that you eat of it you shall die"(Genesis). Instead of dying, Adam and Eve are removed from the garden and go begin their lives. God punishes them for their actions, but also gives clothes and allows them to take the knowledge they have gained from the tree. Even after breaking the one rule that he has set for them, God allowed them to keep the knowledge they gained to begin mankind. This grace towards humanity is shown once again with Adam and Eve's children, Cain and Abel. Cain kills Abel after God accepts Abel's offering and not his own. Even with Cain having killed his own brother, God still does not punish Cain severally; "you will be a fugitive and a wanderer on the earth"(Genesis). This punishment is especially seen as inadequate as Cain goes on to settle in Nod and have his own family. This mercy by God shows that he was unable to punish humanity even for the most serious of offenses. This lack of punishment shows God's sympathy for mankind because of his close relationship with them. This close relationship stems from God's close bond with mankind because of their similar image and knowledge. This relationship that began as two very similar beings, has further blossomed as God has given great responsibility to
A very good question to ask a Christian is: What is the gospel? Shockingly many Christian have the same belief, but different answers. Reading this book opened up my eyes and helped me understand more about what the gospel is. In this book it explains in four chapters these four main points: God, Men, Christ, Men. First, it explains who God is, he is the creator of the heaven, earth, human and animals, he is also perfect, almighty, and compassionate. Yes, all those things are true about god, but there is also a view of god that people do not like to hear. God does not leave the wicked unpunished. God loves righteousness and justice. In Genesis 6:11 the bible says that the world was corrupted and full of violence so god said to Noah that he was going to put an end to it and he did. Since god is a perfect god and cannot see sin in order to clean the world of sin he had to send down his wrath.
“The author spoke of acute bodily illness- of a mental disorder which oppressed him” (pg. 204). Edgar Allan Poe was a very dark and mysterious author but all these stories related to Poe's life in some sort of fashion. House of Usher is about Roderick, his sister and the Narrator (a long time friend of Roderick’s). The siblings live in a large mansion that their family has lived in for centuries. The house is very dark and seems to have a spooky, evil feel to it. Roderick and his sister are ill, he decides to write a letter to his old friend the Narrator and ask him if he would come and take care of him and give him some company. Roderick and sister have a very unhealthy, unnatural and disturbing relationship, that results in the destruction of their lives and family estate.
God’s guidance often comes in violent forms, punishing humanity for going astray of his wishes or attempting to raise themselves up to god-like status. First, in the beginning of Genesis he attempted to control Adam and Eve by withholding knowledge, telling them that
John Ernst Steinbeck Jr. was born on February 27, 1902 in Salinas, California. He was one of three children, and the only male, born to John Ernst Steinbeck (father) and Olive Hamilton (mother). Growing up, John’s family lived in a small town where he would spend his summer working on farms and ranches. Working on the farm gave him inspiration to write about the scenery, and many times, he would write whenever he had free time in the laboratory of Spreckels Sugar Company. Seeing the migrant workers also gave John an opportunity to see the hardships and troubles that many go through just to stay in the United States, and he would use this to create stories later on in life
In “Genesis”, God has a fatherly relationship with the humans and as a result he chooses to bring a flood to destroy all of mankind for a specific reason. God chooses to kill all of humankind because they are noxious beings and need to be destroyed to rid the world of poisonous beings. “When the Lord saw that man had done much evil and that his thoughts and inclinations were always evil, he was sorry that he had made man on earth,”(6:5-7). God created humankind and because of the way their perilous acts he decided to destroy his
The names “Old Testament” and “New Testament” are inherently theological in nature. Because there is a difference distinctly built into giving them different notations, it implies that there are differences between each the Old Testament and the New Testament, whether it is subtle in nature or obvious in nature. To Christians, the difference means that the Old Testament contains dealings between God and the world and even some of the rules made are made irrelevant by the interactions of Christ Jesus with the world. One of the differences between the New Testament and the Old Testament is the way each of the Testaments describe God and God’s nature. The Old Testament describes an angry God, one who only created the world and was obsessed with laws and rules. The New Testament describes a loving God who redeemed the world. The different ways the Old Testament and New Testament describe God and his nature are very much influenced by their perspective of God. By the rules, actions, and laws God made, the early writers of the Old Testament made their judgements about God and wrote those perspectives into the books of the Old Testament. The writers of the Old Testament did the best they could with the information they had and got some things about God right, but also got things wrong. The writers of the New Testament and therefore, Christian believers understand God better.
Did you know that the Holy Bible was written over 3500 years ago ("When Was the Bible Written?" - Biblica. N.p., n.d. Web. 21 Sept. 2016.)? In Genesis 1-4, by God this book was written over thousands ago. This story in the Bible is about one great God putting everything we know into existing and creating human however one of the human named Cain gets jealous of his younger brother Abel and kills him. Ultimately, the story portrays the relationship between creation story, jealousies, love, murder and punishment in mankind. In return of God’s creation being jealous, God states the punishment upon Cain however, God still shows love by letting Cain Know that if anybody body tries to kill will suffer sevenfold vengeance (The Norton Anthology World
In both stories, the gods are respected and feared in some way, but at some point, humans displease the gods. To enforce His authority over all living creatures, the god in Genesis “saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth,” so He fashioned an immense flood to rid the world of the evil that He brought about (King James Version, Gen. 6.5). However, not all humans continuously sinned; He spared Noah and his family because he remained so devoted to God, then later made a promise that “waters shall no more become a flood to destroy all flesh” (Gen. 9.15). Likewise, in The
In the beginning of Genesis, God expects humans to be subordinate to him, and refuses to tolerate defiance. He sees no excuse for disobedience, and punishes Adam and Eve. God expects everyone to be perfect and castigates for every mistake.
The Old Testament is the largest part of the bible nestled behind the leather binding in the front of the book. Unlike most books, told from one-person or even two this is comprised of multiple, some stories even having two different versions in another point of view; over time it has become a large collection of ancient texts written and re-written by different authors and editors over the many years. The stories show the ancient Israelites, they show the laws, and rituals, which make up their religion and the small embers, which will one day, turn to a flame that is Christianity. The Jewish people view these stories as collected in what they call the Torah, is the collection for what makes up their history and the promise that God gave to them, as well as their laws and what they worship today. For the Christians the Old Testament is still seen as sacred, but most place a stronger importance to the New Testament.
Christians see Jesus as continuous with the God of Judaism. A collection of Christian writings was added to the Jewish scriptures known as the Old Testament, or Hebrew Bible. The Christian writings, called the New Testament, record the life and teachings of Jesus. They also describe the development of the early church and explain what faith in Jesus means. The Christian Bible includes both the Old and New Testaments. Some Christian groups also accept as part of the Bible a collection of writings called the Apocrypha.