As you all know I am very skeptical of faith and religion and the dogma taught by religion. I mostly focus on the big three religions of Christianity, Judaism and Islam (sorry Apu, I know your religion is swell, too). Christianity, obviously, gets most of my attention simply because it is with what I am most familiar. I have a question regarding the 1st commandment of the Ten Commandments.
"Thou shalt have no other gods before me." -King James version
I would like feedback to this question: What "other gods?"
Is the god of Abraham admitting other gods exist but we shouldn't put them above "him?"
If god is the only god, then why make reference and warn us about other gods?
Just curious.
5 comments:
The Bible refers to multiple gods in various instances. The most intriguing to me is when The God says of Adam "The man has become like one of us." Who is Us?
I’ve been veerrrrry slowly working my way through Karen Armstrong’s History of God. She says what I had sort of figured was the case: that the earliest stories of the Abrahamic religions developed during the time of, and in many ways are derived from or closely related to, the other religions of the Middle East between 2000 and 1000 BC.
Early on, the Hebrews saw their god as one among many; their concept of Him was similar to the views other cultures of the region viewed their gods. It took a long time before they adopted the view that all the other gods weren’t real gods at all, and YHWH evolved from the local tribal god to something more universal and multi-faceted. It’s been an interesting book so far.
I also read Karen Armstrong's The History of God, in fact I read it twice. It seems God, capital God, has been what man needs him to be.Karen Armstrong is an interesting theologan. She was once a catholic Nun and left the convent and began her own search for who God is. She now is a professor of Judo-Christian studies, maybe in Georgetown? I think. Her book about leaving the convent is Through the Spiral Staircase. an appropriate name.Then of course there are the gods of money, greed, power, sex etc.
OH, OH THEOLOGIAN. MISSPELL
ANOTHER OH,OH, THE BOOK IS THE SPIRAL STAIRCASE
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