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[Frumple]

It's called luck. To use the obvious christianity as an example, if you had replaced OT YWHW with some other psychopathic rage beast that the text happened to claim is female (say, Lloth) you still probably would have the same results we have now, assuming it got the same historical breaks. That's really just about all there is to it.

[Dutchling]

Didn't whatever religion(s) Judaism originated from have both a male and a female god anyway?

[Flying Dice]

They cribbed from the mythos of a few hundred earlier religions, so any question about the religions Abrahamic faith is derived from both needs and deserves the mathematician's answer.

[Sergarr]

Didn't whatever religion(s) Judaism originated from have both a male and a female god anyway?

I've heard that the YWHW was originally a highly aggressive warrior god, which eventually absorbed the traits of all other gods in the pantheon until he became the omnipotent creator-type god that is so popular today.

[Helgoland]

Didn't whatever religion(s) Judaism originated from have both a male and a female god anyway?

I've heard that the YWHW was originally a highly aggressive warrior god, which eventually absorbed the traits of all other gods in the pantheon until he became the omnipotent creator-type god that is so popular today.

I heard the same thing: YHWH was originally a tribal god (there's even some oblique references to the existence of other gods in the bible...), and then someone noticed that 'He's the best!' is easier to defend using the lemma 'He's the only one!'.

[4maskwolf]

Didn't whatever religion(s) Judaism originated from have both a male and a female god anyway?

I've heard that the YWHW was originally a highly aggressive warrior god, which eventually absorbed the traits of all other gods in the pantheon until he became the omnipotent creator-type god that is so popular today.

I heard the same thing: YHWH was originally a tribal god (there's even some oblique references to the existence of other gods in the bible...), and then someone noticed that 'He's the best!' is easier to defend using the lemma 'He's the only one!'.

Here's the real question I have: does it matter to any major degree?  Any evidence we have nowadays of this would be tenuous at best, seeing as how most of the records of that time are gone, so I doubt there would be enough evidence to convince a rational thinker one way or the other.

[scrdest]

Didn't whatever religion(s) Judaism originated from have both a male and a female god anyway?

I've heard that the YWHW was originally a highly aggressive warrior god, which eventually absorbed the traits of all other gods in the pantheon until he became the omnipotent creator-type god that is so popular today.

I heard the same thing: YHWH was originally a tribal god (there's even some oblique references to the existence of other gods in the bible...), and then someone noticed that 'He's the best!' is easier to defend using the lemma 'He's the only one!'.

Ah yes, monolatry. IIRC the part about 'god hardening pharaoh's heart' in Exodus is one piece of evidence, with the original text having RA being the one doing the hardening, which has the added bonus of not making YHWH look like a massive ponce for no reason.

[4maskwolf]

Also, on the note of other gods being mentioned in the Jewish texts: I think what that is trying to indicate, particularly since they and their priests rarely actually do anything, is to show that Adonai is the true god, and that these people believe in fakes.  I'm sure some Christians would interpret it as the devil in various guises luring other people astray.  I honestly don't know.

Also, why are we writing out the Jewish name for God, exactly.  That actually could offend some Orthodox Jews, so...

[SealyStar]

A large group of my friends has been involved in an ongoing game of internet Diplomacy for the last few days. I realized how far they've gone with it when I encountered them holding some kind of RL peace summit where two alliances were discussing the cession of Burgundy to the winning side in exchange for a truce.

I think the use of

Spoiler: Don't click if Orthodox Jew (click to show/hide)

YHWH

is to specifically differentiate the Hebrew and later Christian and maybe Muslim? (I'm a little lost on theology) god from the other hypothetical gods. For what it's worth, a lot of Jews apparently object to writing out "God", too, and do "G-d", so that's not an option.

[Arcvasti]

Also, why are we writing out the Jewish name for God, exactly.  That actually could offend some Orthodox Jews, so...

Frumple likes saying it that way because he feels that saying God is a way of disassociating the Christian deity from the things that went down in the Old Testament because its bad PR.<-Slashed for potential inaccuracy. I may have been thinking of someone else.

EDIT: In his own words

[EnigmaticHat]

Yeah, but what's reason behind that cultural difference?

Why in Europe, Middle East, India and even China (IIRC) the creator-type god is the father figure, while in Japan, it's the mother figure? What's the reason behind this abnormality?

That's not necessarily true though.

Remember that the creator figure in Greek mythology was a mother figure (mostly), which means that the ROMAN creator figure for a lot of history was a mother figure.  So most of Europe had a mother figure creator at one point.

Also remember that the Japanese don't/didn't exclusively believe in Shinto, they also imported Buddhism and Christianity, and mixed Shinto with Chinese beliefs.  Also reading the wikipedia article (I don't know a lot about Shinto) it looks like it has both a female and male creator figure.

[4maskwolf]

I think the use of

Spoiler: Don't click if Orthodox Jew (click to show/hide)

YHWH

is to specifically differentiate the Hebrew and later Christian and maybe Muslim? (I'm a little lost on theology) god from the other hypothetical gods. For what it's worth, a lot of Jews apparently object to writing out "God", too, and do "G-d", so that's not an option.

I was more specifically asking why that name, I used the name Adonai for a reason.

[smjjames]

Didn't whatever religion(s) Judaism originated from have both a male and a female god anyway?

I've heard that the YWHW was originally a highly aggressive warrior god, which eventually absorbed the traits of all other gods in the pantheon until he became the omnipotent creator-type god that is so popular today.

He definetly comes off as a war god at times in the bible.

[smirk]

Didn't whatever religion(s) Judaism originated from have both a male and a female god anyway?

I've heard that the YWHW was originally a highly aggressive warrior god, which eventually absorbed the traits of all other gods in the pantheon until he became the omnipotent creator-type god that is so popular today.

He definetly comes off as a war god at times in the bible.

As an aside, some of you folks might enjoy reading Isaac Asimov's Guide to the Bible. It's a really neat overview of the historical context in which the Bible's various books were written. It's informative without being the dreary academic slog you would imagine, because Asimov knew his way around a page.

[Putnam]

What is it with people thinking that I want them to stop doing what they're doing just because I disapprove of a part of it :I