{"id":43370,"date":"2018-11-04T19:31:04","date_gmt":"2018-11-04T17:31:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/?p=43370"},"modified":"2022-05-31T18:56:13","modified_gmt":"2022-05-31T15:56:13","slug":"unconditional-love","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/unconditional-love\/","title":{"rendered":"Unconditional Love"},"content":{"rendered":"
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In Exodus 33, God recites the divine attributes to Moses: \u201c\u2018The Lord! \u00a0the Lord! a God compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in kindness and faithfulness, extending kindness to the thousandth generation, forgiving iniquity, transgression, and sin; yet by no means does [the Lord] wholly acquit, but visits the iniquity of parents upon children, and children\u2019s children, upon the third and fourth generations\u2019\u201d (34:6-7). <\/span><\/p>\n

Our verses are anticipated in the Ten Commandments, where God, warning Israel not to bow down to or worship idols, declares, \u201cFor I the Lord your God am a jealous God, visiting the guilt of the parents upon the children, upon the third and fourth generations of those who reject Me (<\/span>son\u2019ai<\/span><\/em>), but showing kindness to the thousandth generation of those who love Me and keep my commandments\u201d (Exodus 20:5-6). <\/span><\/p>\n

Note the dramatic shift in emphasis: Whereas in laying down the law, God begins with the threat of punishment, here, in the wake of apostasy, God leads with the possibility of forgiveness. Moreover, in stark contrast to the formulation in the Ten Commandments, the recitation here contains no reference at all to divine jealousy.<\/span><\/p>\n

But the two texts differ in an even more powerful way. In Exodus 20, God speaks of showing kindness (<\/span>hesed<\/span><\/em>) to those who love God and keep God\u2019s commandments; after the Golden Calf, however, God sets no limits on who may be the beneficiary of divine grace and compassion. God\u2019s love, it seems, is unconditional. <\/span><\/p>\n

And yet the heavy emphasis on God\u2019s mercy should not blind us to the fact that divine judgment it is still very much present. Focusing exclusively on divine mercy would run the risk of creating the insidious illusion that \u201cone can just get away with anything.\u201d As \u00a0Richard Elliot Friedman points out, God reminds us that even in the context of divine mercy, \u201cthere is still justice.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

The message of these verses in Exodus\u2014and of Jewish theology more broadly\u2014is that although compassion, mercy, and forgiveness are at the very heart of who God is in relation to the world, one may not simply assume that God will forgive. Faith is striving, and although forgiveness is available when we fail, judgment is real\u2014and striving remains obligatory.<\/span><\/p>\n","image":false,"embedded_video":"","video_duration":"","show_fb_comments":true,"credit_media":""},"tile":{"top_caption":"Unconditional Love","main_caption":"Faith is striving, and although forgiveness is available when we fail, judgment is real\u2014and striving remains obligatory.","main_caption_size":"1","sub_caption":"","preview_embedded":"","preview_image":false,"preview_video":"","external_link":"","link_for_pay":false,"tile_gallery_items":false,"credits":""},"alternate_tile":{"top_caption":"","main_caption":"","main_caption_size":"1","sub_caption":"","hide_media":false},"tile_group":{"preview_image_url":false,"main_caption":"","sub_caption":"","":null,"popup_package_extra_content":"","read_time":""},"home_color":"","home_gallery_top":"","home_gallery_middle":"","home_gallery_book":"","home_gallery_bottom":"","seo":{"seo_title":"","seo_description":"","seo_default_title":"","seo_default_description":""},"old_create_date":"","links":false,"send_noty":false},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43370"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/50634"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=43370"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43370\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":105309,"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43370\/revisions\/105309"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=43370"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=43370"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=43370"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}