{"id":65247,"date":"2019-11-05T11:48:17","date_gmt":"2019-11-05T09:48:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/?p=65247"},"modified":"2023-05-31T07:41:02","modified_gmt":"2023-05-31T04:41:02","slug":"the-challenges-of-one-god","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/the-challenges-of-one-god\/","title":{"rendered":"The Challenges Of One God"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Monotheism is a powerful idea. On the one hand, it creates new problems. In a polytheistic system, the destruction of a temple is painful, but it is not a reason for a theological crisis. It may simply mean that other gods have defeated, or even outvoted, my own god, as we read in some of<\/span> the Sumerian city laments<\/span><\/a>.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

For a monotheist, however, this is a major crisis, and entire biblical books (such as Ezekiel) are focused on this problem precisely: how can <\/span>our<\/span><\/em> God abandon us? Even more profoundly, the question of theodicy (\u201cwhy do bad things happen to good people?\u201d) only arises in a monotheistic worldview. Then we have to struggle to explain how an omniscient (all-knowing), omnibenevolent (all-good), and omnipotent (all-powerful) God can allow pain and suffering in the world. If there is no omniscient, omnibenevolent, omnipotent God, there is no question.<\/span><\/p>\n

So how does Assyria conquer Israel? The monotheistic answer is given in Isaiah 10:5: \u201cWoe! Assyria, rod of My anger \/ in whose hand, as a staff, is My fury!\u201d This short line encapsulates a fundamental theological teaching. If Assyria is ascendant, it is not <\/span>despite<\/span><\/em> God, but because of God.<\/span><\/p>\n

This is not the only view found in Tanakh. Elsewhere, it is implied that the various nations have their own gods \u2013 assigned to them by God Godself. (This view is developed and defended by Ramban \/ Nachmanides, most elaborately in his commentary on Leviticus 18:25.) The prophets object to that, however, in passages such as this one, or Amos 9: \u201cLook, I brought Israel up out of Egypt \u2013 but also the Philistines from Crete, and the Arameans from Qir!\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

This sort of radical monotheism, clearly prominent in prophetic thinking already in the days of Isaiah and Amos, does have a theological downside, however (besides the issue of theodicy): if God is God of the whole world, what makes Israel special? Or, as Amos (9:7) says, \u201cAre you not just like the Ethiopians to me, O Israelites?\u201d Universalism comes at the expense of particularism, and if \u201cAssyria is the rod of my wrath,\u201d Israel and Assyria are, theologically, not so different after all.<\/span><\/p>\n","image":{"ID":65248,"id":65248,"title":"is10-dollar","filename":"is10-dollar.jpg","filesize":0,"url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/11\/is10-dollar.jpg","link":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/the-challenges-of-one-god\/is10-dollar\/","alt":"","author":"7","description":"","caption":"","name":"is10-dollar","status":"inherit","uploaded_to":65247,"date":"2019-11-05 09:48:07","modified":"2019-11-05 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