My Third Response to Yisroel Blumenthal || The Hope of the World and the Mercy of God

Yisroel,

Thank you for your post. I’ll respond to the section below. 

“The message of the Christian Scriptures maligns and denigrates the God of Israel. According to the Christian Scriptures, the Creator of every soul allows no-one to approach Him unless they travel through the “mystery-path” of the trinity. According to the Christian Scriptures The One who lovingly you provided you with life even while you were sinning doesn’t have the mercy to forgive your sin without a blood offering. And the Christian Scriptures teach that men and women must direct their devotion to a man who lived and breathed just as themselves.

You call this a message of “hope”?!

The message of the Jewish Scriptures is that God is close to all who call upon Him with sincerity (Psalm 145:18). The message of the Jewish Scriptures is that God forgives the sinner on the basis of sincere repentance (Isaiah 55:7). And our holy prophets proclaimed that every inhabitant of this earth is subservient to no-one but the One who created them all (Zechariah 14:9).

That, my friend, is the hope of the world.”

Again, you’re only telling part of the story. The part you’re telling is absolutely true! And wonderful! And sublime! But it’s not the whole story.

What’s more, you are unnecessarily erecting a partition between propositional truths suggesting “never the two shall meet.” But these precious truths are in no way at odds.

For example: Jesus claimed to be the Creator and God of Israel. And there is good reason to believe He wasn’t lying. Saying that these claims “malign and denigrate the God of Israel” based on the predisposed assumption that He was lying is nothing but circular logic. If He lied and was only a mere man, then I would agree with you that the New Testament is an abomination and an affront on the Hebrew scriptures. But what if He was the divine “Son,” “child,” “mighty God,” “everlasting Father,” and Davidic King that Isaiah prophesied of? If He was (and Jewish Gospels and epistles written by Jewish apostles tell me He was), then the only one maligning anything is the individual that claims Jesus was a liar. That would be maligning the God of Israel. That would be denigrating the Holy One. 

Concerning “hope,” what magnifies hope more: A distant God who draws near when we ask Him to, or a God who wraps Himself in human flesh to draw near even when we did’t ask? What would inspire hope more: a high and lofty One who is full of mercy, or a high and lofty One who is full of mercy who draws near to man by entering into the story with the creation He loves? Why do you speak as if the GodMan is reason to be sad? The good news of the Jewish New Testament is that the “Holy One of Israel” who Isaiah saw “high and lifted up” became a “child,” a “son,” and a “bondservant” unto death. And all for love! All for mercy! The King of Kings became the “Servant of rulers” (Is49:6) and washed our feet. The lofty One became the lowly One and drew near. Now that is reason to be glad in God! The fact that God never suspends one of His attributes to exercise another awakens my heart to sing. The merciful God you speak of took on flesh and tabernacled among us! Amazing. 

Erect partitons if you want. But it’s unnecessary. And unsatisfying. Partitions and reductionistic theology invariably rob God of His glory–the glory of His meekness, humility, kindness, mercy and love. This is the hope of the world–God. 

The same circular reasoning used to unnecessarily reject the wonder of the incarnation is also being used to drive a wedge between the mercy of God and blood atonement. This too is unnecessary. Why make enemies out of friends? Mercy and atonement are in no way at odds with one another. God is merciful. And God does provide atonement through blood. His mercy motivated Him to atone for our sins. The fact that blood shed is required for the remission of sins does not stand to belittle or contradict the mercy of God–it makes much of it! It proves it.

To suggest that God being merciful and God being propitious are antithetical theological categories is not only wrong but unnecessary. There is no legitimate reason to divorce these truths or to pit them against each other. Moreover, if you want to, you must first do a lot of deconstruction of passages in the Tanakh that clearly teach the necessity of the appeasement of God’s wrath (another category that often suffers abuse by being pitted against other legitimate categories). Propitiation, blood atonement, and substitution are not Christian thoughts. They are Jewish through and through. The provocation of God and the propitiation of His wrath was a conspicuous part of the story as set for in the Pentateuch and repeatedly reinforced through the Prophets. 

According to your logic, the thought of the shedding of Jesus’ blood should make us all wonder “Why didn’t God have mercy on us?” According to your line of reasoning, the two (blood and mercy) are at odds. But scripturally speaking, they are not. It was because of His great love, mercy, and kindness that He has so generously atoned for my sins through the shedding of His blood. 

“In my place, condemned He stood, sealed my pardon with His blood. . . Hallelujah, what a Savior.”

According to your reading of the Scripture, man is reconciled to God because of His mercy and our repentance. According to my reading of Scripture, man is reconciled to God because One was “pierced for my iniquities” and “bruised for my transgressions” so as to “justify many.” And in my reading, His mercy motivated this sacrifice. And in my reading, this mercy is reason for joyous repentance and loving obedience. Which magnifies God’s mercy more? Mercy and repentance? Or substitutionary atonement? Who says these categories are mutually exclusive? And on what grounds? 

If the Scriptures don’t drive wedges between realities and propositional truths, then neither should we.
 

Affectionately,

Dalton

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