Does Yahweh weep or care?

[marco]

I attended a funeral service this morning where the following lines were sung (based on Ezekiel 36)

I the Lord of snow and rain
I have borne my people's pain.
I have wept for love of them.
They turn away.
I will break their hearts of stone,
Give them hearts for love alone.....

Presumably the speaker is the elusive Yahweh. The service paid by Jews to him is second to none, and if he was aware of his people's pain he doesn't seem to have responded. He, not they, turned away.

Oddly enough there is something deeply enchanting, alluring in the sung lines and truth does not seem to matter: sentiment is all.

Is there any truth at all in the words?
Why would anyone want to say that Yahweh wept for anything?
Are the words no better than a pop song?

[marco]

Is there any truth at all in the words?
Why would anyone want to say that Yahweh wept for anything?
Are the words no better than a pop song?

Having invited dissection I will admit that the words filled me with enormous sadness; perhaps it was the music, and the suggestion of stone hearts and tears. The hymn invited emotion and perhaps that is what religious texts do: God is constantly appealing (forget his tsunamis, earthquakes, floods and fires) for humans to be nice to him and he gets terribly upset at their neglect.

The song is no pop song but it has popular appeal. We reduce Yahweh to tears because it makes him less frightening, less imaginary and draws us magnetically to him, out of strange sympathy.


In this way falsehood becomes Truth.

[ttruscott]

Jeremiah 9:10 “I will weep and wail for the mountains and take up a lament concerning the desert pastures� (NIV).

God Weeps for His People
Posted on August 28, 2017by Claude Mariottini
In my previous posts, The Tears of Jeremiah and The Tears of God, I have attempted to demonstrate that the prophet Jeremiah was the embodiment of God to the people of Judah. The words of Jeremiah to Judah were the words of God to his people. The tears of Jeremiah were the tears of God as God expressed his grief over the apostasy of his people.

In his article, “The Tears of God in the Book of Jeremiah,� David Bosworth said that in the book of Jeremiah, “YHWH weeps more often than Jeremiah does, and even Jeremiah’s tears embody the tears of YHWH.� He also said that while the prophet Jeremiah is known as “the weeping prophet,� the focus of the book is on “the weeping God� (Bosworth 2013:24).

YHWH attests to HIS emotional connection with HIS people no matter how HE is scorned.

[marco]

YHWH attests to HIS emotional connection with HIS people no matter how HE is scorned.

He may well attest but actions speak louder than words. Please supply evidence of more than attestation. I'm thinking he had an excellent opportunity in Europe in the forties but sadly he declined to get involved for "his people."

Please don't tell me the children who were gassed had some prearrangement to expose Hitler as bad.

[William]

[Replying to post 4]

marco: Please don't tell me the children who were gassed had some prearrangement to expose Hitler as bad.

William: I think it is within the bounds of reason to say that such might well be possibly the case...

As a consequence the world seems more in agreement as to what is bad, than they collective did before the event.
Exposing the bad might have a good effect.

From some data I skimmed on the internet, Stalin erased far more many millions than Hitler did. Why do we focus on Hitler specifically? Because there is some Jewish 'God' not involved in the Hitler Story enough to answer the prayers of the victims?

[marco]

As a consequence the world seems more in agreement as to what is bad, than they collective did before the event.
Exposing the bad might have a good effect.

From some data I skimmed on the internet, Stalin erased far more many millions than Hitler did. Why do we focus on Hitler specifically? Because there is some Jewish 'God' not involved in the Hitler Story enough to answer the prayers of the victims?[/color]

I think we condemn Stalin with equal ferocity, William. The millions who vanished under Stalin were largely anonymous victims of his political ambitions while the children who went by train to various concentration camps more immediately stir our sympathy because they reach our hearts more quickly.

Good does eventually result from evil: many gay men had to die before it was seen as grotesquely unjust. Witches were hunted when the Bible was deemed to speak Truth. Killing millions in order to obtain the lesson that wickedness should not be tolerated is expensive in human suffering. It reminds me of the story by Charles Lamb where he explains that roast pig was discovered by accident when a Chinaman burned down his house and had his fingers burned when he touched the burnt flesh of a pig. The taste was good, so in future people burned down their houses in order to enjoy roast pig. There is something of what you say in this story.

[Elijah John]

Oddly enough there is something deeply enchanting, alluring in the sung lines and truth does not seem to matter: sentiment is all.

Is there any truth at all in the words?
Why would anyone want to say that Yahweh wept for anything?
Are the words no better than a pop song?

You of all people appreciate poetic language. Song lyrics, hymn lyrics are poetry. (at their best, anyway).

Poetic truth runs deeper than literal truth.

Marcus Borg said as much in his book Speaking Christian in his chapter on the Creed. The book is an attempt to help non-Fundamentalist Christians in their endeavor to come to terms with concepts and dogma long literally believed, but now questioned by those who embrace historical Jesus scholarship and findings.

One solution his (Episcopal) congregation employs is to sing the Creed. Then literalism is not as much an issue. Song and it's attending lyrics are a matter of the heart, not the head. The heart doesn't quibble about such things as "just the facts".

[Realworldjack]

[Replying to post 2 by marco]

Oddly enough there is something deeply enchanting, alluring in the sung lines and truth does not seem to matter: sentiment is all.

Is there any truth at all in the words?

Well, you seemed to have settled this question in your mind, in the former statement when you say, "truth does not seem to matter: sentiment is all". So then, how can you go on to ask such a question, when you seem to have already settled on the answer?

Having invited dissection I will admit that the words filled me with enormous sadness; perhaps it was the music, and the suggestion of stone hearts and tears. The hymn invited emotion and perhaps that is what religious texts do:

After conversing with you many, many times, you seem to me to be a very poetic thinker, who is very well versed, and you also seem to be the emotional type. There is certainly nothing wrong with this, because we are all emotional beings, with some of us being more emotional than others.

I have discovered there is nothing we can do about such things. In other words, if we would like to be more emotional, there is nothing we can do about this, and those who would like to be less emotional seem to have no control over their situation.

As an example, when I was younger, I would witness folks coming to tears over certain things, and I longed to be able to share this emotion with them, and tried desperately, but I could not shed a tear. In fact, there was a certain point in my life, which lasted a good number of years, where I do not know if there would have been anything at all which would have caused me to cry, to the point I began to think something must be wrong with me.

On the other hand, I have a number of friends, who become emotional very easily, and seem to cry over the least of things, and they wish they could overcome this but seem to be helpless.

The bottom line is, we all have emotions, and we handle, express, and feel these emotions differently from one person to the next, and it seems that many times, we have no control over how we may express, or feel these emotions.

However, no matter how we feel, or express our emotions, all of us should be aware of the fact that, we should never act, or make decisions upon what we may be feeling emotionally. Therefore, hymns can indeed stir the emotion, whether this would be the intent, or not.

The hymn "Amazing Grace" was written by one who had become convinced that he was an undeserving sinner, who was saved solely by the grace of God, and wrote a hymn in order to describe what he was convinced he had experienced, and this song can very well, and has stirred the emotions of millions of folks around the world.

However, simply because a hymn can cause such stirring of the emotions, does not cause the content of the hymn to be correct. So then, the only way for this hymn to have any real meaning at all, is if the content were to convey a truth. In other words, no matter how much your emotions may be stirred by this hymn, if the content is false, then all you have is a, meaningless emotion.

The whole point here is, if you have determined in your mind that Christianity must, and has to be false, then you can confidently ignore any sort of emotions you may feel, concerning anything to do with Christianity, and acknowledge it to be, a meaningless emotion.

[Menotu]

[Replying to post 1 by marco]

Yahweh is a lot like Donny Trump: a big, pompous blowhard that's not as concerned about his constituents than he lets on.
They're both quick to blame others, avoiding all responsibility and only care about how they're perceived, from my experience.

[marco]

Oddly enough there is something deeply enchanting, alluring in the sung lines and truth does not seem to matter: sentiment is all.

Is there any truth at all in the words?

Well, you seemed to have settled this question in your mind, in the former statement when you say, "truth does not seem to matter: sentiment is all". So then, how can you go on to ask such a question, when you seem to have already settled on the answer?

The words, "truth does not SEEM to matter," do not indicate a settled opinion; the opposite, in fact, since we know things are not always what they SEEM.

The question: "Is there any truth in the words?" invites interpretations that do indeed overturn what SEEMS to me to be the case. In fact I am asking that my view through a dark glass be illuminated, and truth shown to be where I blindly did not see it.

The question concerns Yahweh and opinions other than my own, possibly wildly erroneous one, are requested.

After conversing with you many, many times, you seem to me to be a very poetic thinker, who is very well versed, and you also seem to be the emotional type.

Was that pun intended, Realworldjack? You may build ideas out of shadows in a cave, like Plato's, while the real thing is elsewhere. We spill ourselves unintentionally at times or under cover of anonymity we are what we are not. The fixed opinions you fix to me are no more than requests for answers, perhaps from real world jacks, who might be seated with lunch break sandwiches, taking a break from the their daytime toil on a grass bank somewhere.

However, simply because a hymn can cause such stirring of the emotions, does not cause the content of the hymn to be correct.

And that brings us back to the OP. When I heard the hymn, emotion seemed - seemed - to be everything that mattered, but I reflect that truth may well come wrapped in sadness. We learn too late, sometimes.

In the Bible, Yahweh's only abode, there are moments of emotion that point to a truth deeper than their advert: I think of David's beautiful lament for Jonathan




“A gazelle lies slain on your heights, Israel.
How the mighty have fallen!
Tell it not in Gath,
proclaim it not in the streets of Ashkelon,
lest the daughters of the Philistines be glad,
lest the daughters of the uncircumcised rejoice.
Mountains of Gilboa,
may you have neither dew nor rain,
may no showers fall on your terraced fields.
For there the shield of the mighty was despised,
the shield of Saul—no longer rubbed with oil.

closing with the heartfelt lines:


I grieve for you, Jonathan my brother;
you were very dear to me.
Your love for me was wonderful,
more wonderful than that of women.
How the mighty have fallen!
The weapons of war have perished!�

Far more than the valiant but sinful king or the boy hero these words penetrate the centuries with their real emotion. They are not: "Yahweh wept". The gazelle to start and the broken weapons of war to finish convey far more than their earthly images. I suppose, for some, "Jesus wept" conveys the same trauma and sadness. But when Yahweh tries, it seems we have falsehood, not truth.

Perhaps I am wrong.