As you know, Wednesday is Question and Answer day here on the blog. Last week in this space I posted the following here...
Question from a Reader:Why Are Jews So Special?
Dear Neale Donald Walsch: CWG really knocked me out! I couldn’t put it down; found it astonishing at several points; mak¬ing perfect sense at others; laughed out loud, and was a bit puzzled after two or three “reads” of the same sentence. I will re-read it with pleasure and I treasure it. How grateful I am to you for daring to publish this material. A question: since I am Jewish, why are the Jews “the chosen people”? Love and blessings to you. Phyllis, Stamford, CT.
Neale's Response:
My dear Phyllis, The Jews are not “the chosen people.” All people are “the chosen people.” The Jews have simply been historically far more conscious of God’s covenant with them than most other peoples; they have paid attention to it; they have hon¬ored it. It is the same way the United States sees itself among the world’s nations. The U.S. says this is “one nation, under God.” Well, all nations are “under God.” Yet few nations have had the consciousness to place “in God we trust” on their coins. It is a question of consciousness. It is a question of how nations and peoples see themselves. It is not a question of which people God has chosen, but which people have chosen God.
In the Comments section of that blog last Wednesday I found the following...
Dear Neale,
First of all, I thought that your response to Phyllis was nice. Your point about being conscious of God is very important. Presumably your position is, approximately, that one determines, by one's own consciousness and actions, how "chosen" one is; so no one is barred from being "chosen."
The problem is, however, that 'chosenness' is not JUST about what WE think about it. It is also (even mainly) about what God Himself has said about the case. And, following statements in Deuteronomy, God seemingly HAS declared the Jews as being chosen in a certain sense. So that brings us back to Phyllis's question: "Why are the Jews 'the chosen people'?'"
There are of course many possible answers to this question. My own take on it would be that God chose the Jews to do a certain job, namely to respect and protect the covenant. It is their job to be such priests. And if they do their job nicely, and take on that responsibility, they will be holy.
One important point here is that the fact (if it is a fact) that God has assigned certain tasks to the Jews is no guarantee for that God does not assign similar tasks (for example, protecting other scriptures than traditional Jewish ones) to non-Jews; and it is no guarantee that God does not assign non-similar tasks to non-Jews.
In fact, one may very well be of the opinion that God custom-designs different religions in all societies, cultures, and ages, in order for all sincere souls to have a chance to find Him. And if this is the case, one might say, using Neale's way of framing things, that everyone really IS chosen; it's just a matter of one's own individual consciousness and action to determine HOW one is chosen.
Sincerely,
Bo C. Klintberg
Editor/Author, Philosophical Plays
http://philosophicalplays.googlepages.com
While I appreciate the author's expansive observation that God may have chosen other people as well, what I would like to do now is to simply take a look at the Source that this writer has used as the authority in this matter. Bo Klintberg writes...
"...following statements in Deuteronomy, God seemingly HAS declared the Jews as being chosen in a certain sense."
The problem with this assertion, from my point of view, is that...
...it assumes the Book of Deuteronomy to be an authoritative Source as to the wishes and desires and intentions of God.
Do you think that it is?
If you want to be utterly horrified at some people's thoughts about What God Wants, sit down one night and read, from start to finish, the Book of Deuteronomy. But don't read it aloud to your children. It will scare the heck out of them.
The Book of Deuteronomy says that if a man marries a woman and finds that she is not a virgin, and if her family cannot prove that she was a virgin before her marriage, “she shall be brought to the door of her father's house and there the men of her town shall stone her to death.”
Is this truly What God Wants? Can we use this writing as the authoritative Word of God?
The Torah also says that, if found to be in an adulterous relationship, both the man and the woman are to be taken to the city gates and also stoned to death.
And God is concerned about other real life matters as well. Apparel, for instance. A woman “must not wear men's clothing…for the Lord your God detests anyone who does this,” the Torah says.
Also, “Do not wear clothes of wool and linen woven together.”
Then, too, only certain people are welcome in God’s house of worship. If you happen to be a child born out of wedlock, you cannot go to there. No illegitimate child, “nor any of his descendants may enter the assembly of the Lord, even down to the tenth generation.”
Also, if a certain part of your body happens to be injured in an accident or as a result of war, you cannot join with other worshipers of God, either. The Bible says: “If a man's testicles are crushed or his penis is cut off, he may not be included in the assembly of the Lord.”
These are words right out of the Bible. Do they upset or embarrass you?
"Those words are in the Bible?", you might ask. Yes. Turn to Deuteronomy 23:1-2, New Living Translation.
"Oh," you might say, "one of those modern Bibles."
Yes. The King James Version has it this way: “He that is wounded in the stones, or hath his privy member cut off, shall not enter into the congregation of the Lord,” but it means the same thing.
And I have some startling news for women who take some of those self-defense classes that are offered these days.
"Really?", you could ask.
Yes. They can find themselves in a lot of trouble with some of what they learn in those classes.
For the Bible says, “If two men are fighting and the wife of one of them comes to rescue her husband from his assailant, and she reaches out and seizes him by his private parts, you shall cut off her hand. Show her no pity.”
Oh, and there are also had some thoughts in these scriptures about children who don’t obey their parents. These are probably not thoughts that many mothers would have, but the Bible says this is What God Wants...
Kill them.
According to the Torah, God says to kill them.
"I don’t believe that," you might exclaim.
Well, it’s right there, plain as day: “If a man has a stubborn and rebellious son who does not obey his father and mother and will not listen to them when they discipline him, his father and mother shall take hold of him and bring him to the elders at the gate of his town. They shall say to the elders, ‘This son of ours is stubborn and rebellious. He will not obey us. He is a profligate and a drunkard.’ Then all the men of his town shall stone him to death. You must purge the evil from among you.”
Based on these words I have an honest question: Is the Book of Deuteronomy an authoritative Source on the Word of God and the Intentions of Divinity?
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To believe that one sacred text is inspired by God and another not is to again assert oneself as the only beholder of truth. It is, in fact, loudly professing one's ignorance. The interested seeker, if choosing to do so, would be surprised at how similar one sacred text is to anoother. They are in fact more similar than they are not.
Until we come to this realization we will continue to make each other wrong and make ourselves right, which leads to liscense to do whatever we choose to each other. Because after all WE HAVE IT RIGHT and THEY HAVE IT WRONG!
These Texts as with many Sacred Texts are written by people who have likes and Dislikes, and are IMHO a reflection of their times. The question one has to ask is what would be the point of writing such a rule book for Mankind, and then leaving it with a certain group of people who have no knowledge of other civilizations, within a world that they have not yet aware of?
How would this work for God and what is the benefit for such a set of rules and regulations? Would we not find the same rules elsewhere, within other civilizations? If one were to write a Policy Manual for an organization to standardize its practices, would you not make it global to the organization or would you just make relevant to a certain group of people within a region.
The point here is that the Pentateuch was written by people of their time who were trying to make sense and gain control of a world that they found themselves in. It is no more authoritative than any other sacred text. In fact, if these Sacred Texts were not so old, many of us would not pay any attention to them, they are only authoritative because we say they are or enough of us say that they are and then try to convert or force others to agree as well. This of course leads to many of our ills today.
At the end of the day, who gets to say what is authoritative and what is not? Is not God the Creator and the great lover of our souls much bigger than a set of texts that talk about what we can and cannot wear, eat, marry, etc…
Peace
Quotation from Cunningham Geikie DD, “The Life of Christ”
“…….There is much, besides, to which I can only allude in a word. He demands repentance from all, but never for a moment hints at any need of it for Himself. With all His matchless lowliness, He advances personal claims which, in a mere man, would be the very delirium of religious pride. He was divinely patient under every form of suffering,--a homeless life, hunger and thirst, craft and violence, meanness and pride, the taunts of enemies and betrayals of friends, ending in an ignominious death. Nothing of all this for a moment turned Him from His chosen path of love and pity. His last words, like His whole life, were a prayer for those who returned Him evil for good. His absolute superiority to everything narrow or local, so that He, a Jew, founds a religion in which all mankind are a common brotherhood, equal before God; the dignity, calmness, and self-possession before rulers, priests, and governors, which sets Him immeasurably above them; His freedom from superstition, in an age which was superstitious almost beyond example; His superiority to the merely external and ritual, in an age when rites and externals were the sum of religion; all these considerations, to mention no others, explain the mysterious attraction of His character, even when looked at only as that of an ideal Man.”………
I am always at a loss for words. I thank the Lord for men who can articulate so well. I underlined because it is Jesus who created the brotherhood of mankind, under one God, one Father but many children. Many fathers/gods does not produce one but many separate families so to speak.
Jesus acknowledged the value of women to a culture that did not. Jesus loved the slave and gave them the only way to true peace and contentment in a culture that did not value them as people. Nor did they value children. Jesus did not come to change the society of the day, He came to change hearts.
I am quoting from Cunningham Geikie again.
"....It was left to Christ to proclaim the brotherhood of all nations by revealing God as their common Father in Heaven, filled towards them with a father's love; by His commission to preach the Gospel to all; by His inviting all, without distinction, who laboured and were heavy laden, to come to Him, as the Saviour sent from God, for rest; by His receiving the woman of Samaria and her of Canaan as graciously as any others; by His making Himself the friend of publicans and sinners; ..by His equal sympathy with the slave, the beggar, and the ruler; by the whole bearing and spirit of His life. And above all by His picture of all nations gathered to judgment at the Great Day, with no distinction of race or rank, but simply as men. In this great principle of the essential equality of man, and his responsibility to God, the germs lay hid of grand truths imperfectly realized even yet. Thus it is to this we owe the conception of the rights of individual conscience as opposed to any outward authority. There was no dream of such a thing before Christ came. ....."
Dear Neale,
I chanced upon your book "Conversations With God (1)" yesterday evening and have been able to read a few pages of it. I have also visited your blog to learn more about you. I have been captivated by your narrative and writings, not simply by what you say but because my own consciousness and inner voice have been telling me similar things. I believe in the truth of what you say not simply because you say it but because my consciousness confirms to me they are true.
I have often found myself pondering the kind of questions you put to God and proposing to investigate them deeply when I can afford the time. Your book convinces me that I am not out of my mind in questioning some things accepted by many without question as orthodox truths - a mindset that is responsible for much misunderstanding and conflict in our world.
I unfortunatley had to return the book to the owner after a few hours yesterday so I am still limited in my ability to discuss the contents. I intend, however, to buy the three volumes of the book immediately and hope to communicate with you again.
Thank you for putting your experiences in writing. They have given me enormous encouragement.
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