{"id":84308,"date":"2020-11-30T16:34:19","date_gmt":"2020-11-30T14:34:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/?p=84308"},"modified":"2020-11-30T16:34:19","modified_gmt":"2020-11-30T14:34:19","slug":"who-is-worse-god-or-man","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/who-is-worse-god-or-man\/","title":{"rendered":"Who Is Worse: God Or Man?\u00a0"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"entry-content\"><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[281],"tags":[],"acf":{"old_id":"84308","type":"no","iframe":"","writer":78133,"related_cahpter":"623","type_929":"2","show_author_image":false,"old_create_date":"","old_url":"","post_main_content":{"description":"Who would you prefer to be punished by?\r\n\r\n","content":"<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Towards the end of his reign, King David transgresses the principle of not counting the Jewish people, and instructs Yoav to conduct a census. God is furious and sends the prophet Gad to allow David to select his punishment (II Samuel 24). The choices are: \u201cShall a seven-year famine come upon you in the land, or shall you be in flight from your adversaries for three months while they pursue you, or shall there be three days of pestilence in your land? David responds: \u201cI am in great distress. Let us fall into the hands of the LORD, for His compassion is great; and let me not fall into the hands of men.\u201d David decides that punishment from God is preferable as ultimately God will be merciful, but man is relentless.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">What&#8217;s the significance of this story to our chapter? Have David&#8217;s motivations shifted over the course of his life? In verse 5 of the psalm, David says &#8220;In God, whose word I praise, in God I trust; I am not afraid; what can mortals do to me?&#8221; At first blush, this verse seems to say the opposite of what David tells Gad later on. David boasts that his trust in God makes him fearless against man.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">However, a closer reading shows there is a difference. When Gad comes to David he lays out possible punishments that ALL come from God. The question is in which way does David want the punishment to be meted out. In that instance, David realizes that punishment from God meted out by man is the worst option. In our psalm, David&#8217;s mortal pursuers are not being sent by God. They act alone. In such a case David is not fearful of man for he knows that God will protect him.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p>Image: William Blake, God Judging Adam (detail), 1795 \/ wikimedia<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","image":{"ID":64989,"id":64989,"title":"is6-God_judging_adam_blake_1795","filename":"is6-God_judging_adam_blake_1795.jpg","filesize":0,"url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/10\/is6-God_judging_adam_blake_1795.jpg","link":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/whose-side-is-the-prophet-on\/is6-god_judging_adam_blake_1795\/","alt":"","author":"7","description":"","caption":"","name":"is6-god_judging_adam_blake_1795","status":"inherit","uploaded_to":64988,"date":"2019-10-30 16:26:33","modified":"2023-10-31 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