Another point about whether the Christian God and Jewish God are the same centers on what is now called the Arian Heresy. Until the Nicene Creed in 325 when the Trinity became dogma and the following 50-year power struggle, there were many Christians who agreed with the theologian Arius that Jesus was NOT God, but the first created being or some other representative of God. That view did not conflict with the Jewish idea of monotheism.
That view was later declared heresy and could cost you your life. But the idea has not completely died. There are some Christians who are Arian. The defeat of Arianism is what probably permenently separated Christianity and Judaism.
Unfortunately, once you start introducing new facts (“Arian Heresy”, whassat?) into an already ethereal argument, the divorce from reality becomes even greater.
So dogma has been argued about, sometimes violently. Sounds like an anti-religion statement to me, but what’s your point?
Not anti-religion as much as anti-dogma. My point is that nothing about religion is as settled and clear as some people like to proclaim. [sub]Hint: I’m on your side in this.[/sub]
I like the concept of 6 billion gods. In reality, that’s exactly what we have anyway. You don’t know if your interpretation of god exactly matches your christian kin’s interpretation (much the same as not being able to know exactly what pain feels like in another person), if you know what I mean. So actually, everyone has a separate god. Makes sense to me (except for us athiest/agnostics…we NEVER get a god! No fair!)
