The God of Jesus, the God of the Old Testament

The God of Jesus was the God of the Old Testament, the same God that his hearers had always been worshipping.
For most of the last two thousand years, it would not have been necessary to say so.
It was central to the Church’s understanding of the Bible, that the relation between God and his people is a continuous history, beginning with Abraham and coming to a climax with Jesus Christ.
One and the same God, from Genesis to Revelation.

This continuity seems to be coming under question again.
And yet it can be demonstrated from the words of Jesus himself.

He quotes the actions of the Old Testament God as the actions of his own God

He speaks of the creation which God created (Mark ch13 v19), and describes how he made mankind “from the beginning male and female” (Matthew ch19 v4), both actions which Genesis attributes to Israel’s God.

He quotes the words of the Old Testament God as the words of his own God

For example, he quotes ‘I am the God of Abraham” as something which “God” said, using it as evidence that God is “not the God of the dead but of the living”- Mark ch12 vv26-27
He does the same thing implicitly, at least, whenever he quotes the words which God spoke in the past;
Such as “I desire mercy and not sacrifice”- Matthew ch9 v13
Or “My house shall be called a house of prayer…but you have made it a den of robbers”- Matthew ch21 v13

He quotes the prophecies of the Old Testament God as the prophecies of his own God

For example, “Behold, I send my messenger before thy face”- Matthew ch11 v10
Or “You shall indeed hear but shall never understand”- Matthew ch13 v14
Or “This people honours me with their lips, but their heart is far from me”- Matthew ch15 v8
He claims himself to be fulfilling what God promised in Isaiah (Luke ch4 v21), and indeed everything “that is written of the Son of man by the prophets” (Luke ch18 v31).
He accepts as valid the prediction of the coming of Elijah- Matthew ch17 v11
And he not only acknowledges but repeats Daniel’s prophecy about the forthcoming “Abomination of desolation”- (Matthew ch24 v15

He accepts the laws of the Old Testament God as the laws of his own God

Thus he tells the healed leper to “offer for cleansing what God commanded”- Mark ch1 v43
He complains that the Pharisees neglect the commandment of God- Mark ch7 vv9-13
He discusses which are the most important of the commandments – Mark ch12 vv28-31
Even as he offers fresh understanding of the commandments, he denies any intention of abolishing them outright.

He identifies the Jews as the children of God

Thus he tells the Syrophoenician woman that he was “sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel”, and that “the children” should be fed first- Matthew ch15 vv24-26
Similarly he tells his disciples, when he first sends them out to preach, that they should go only to “the lost sheep of the house of Israel”- Matthew ch10 vv5-6
The Jews are “lost sheep”, not because they are worshipping the wrong God, but because they have wandered away from the God they’ve always worshipped. His function is therefore to call them back to the same God.

He calls them “children” when he is contrasting them with the Gentiles.
Even when he is warning them of the danger of being displaced by those coming “from east and west” (Matthew ch8 v11), he is still calling them “the sons of the kingdom”.
The whole point of the parable of the vineyard (Mark ch12 vv1-9) is that the relations of God with his people, in the Old Testament and through into the New Testament, are to be seen as a single continuous history.

The Jews themselves don’t understand him as offering a different God

When he first begins teaching in the synagogues, they are astonished only because “he taught with authority”- Mark ch1 v22
Their next response is that “they glorified God”- that is, the God they had always worshipped.
And when they’re struggling to give him a label, they continue to associate him with the same God;
“He is Elijah, or Jeremiah or one of the prophets.
“Can this be the Son of David?”
They would have reacted very differently if they believed he was pointing them towards a different God, but that thought does not occur to them.

Every time he uses the word “God”, he fails to say that he means a different one

“Whoever does the will of God…”- Mark ch3 v35
“No-one is good but God alone…”- Mark 10 v18
“Have faith in God…”- Mark ch11 v22
“Render to God the things that are God’s…” – Mark ch12 v17
“You do not know the power of God…”- Mark ch12 v24
“Heaven is the throne of God…”- Matthew ch4 v34
“You cannot serve God and mammon…”- Matthew ch6 v24
“God clothes the grass of the field…”- Matthew ch6 v30
“With God all things are possible…”- Matthew ch19 v26
With many other examples, including all references to the power of God, or the Spirit of God, or the kingdom of God.

Every time he uses the word “God”, his hearers will take it for granted that he’s talking about the God of Israel, the God of the Old Testament.
If that’s not what he means, then he has a moral obligation to say so.
He would also need to say so because the difference between the two Gods would be an essential part of his message.
Yet he never does.
The obvious conclusion is that there’s no need for him to be making any distinction, because he’s talking about the same God that his people have always known.

The message of Jesus to the Jews is never, at any time, “I’m offering you a better God than the one you’ve been worshipping”.
The message is always “We worship the same God, but I understand what he wants better than you do.”
He believes himself to be part of that single continuous history of the relation between God and his people.

a reply to: DISRAELI

Consider the possibility that the teaching that his Father was not the so called God of the OT was removed to create this continuity in the scriptures... We know for a fact that things were changed to suit the religion that was trying to be promoted...

The Few people that actually made the effort to understand that this was not the same God were dismissed as Heretics, and disposed of in almost every case...

And the fact remains... Its completely impossible to reconcile the actions of the OT God with the teaching of Jesus...

They are opposites in every sense of the word

a reply to: DISRAELI

He quotes the actions of the Old Testament God as the actions of his own God

He speaks of the creation which God created (Mark ch13 v19), and describes how he made mankind “from the beginning male and female” (Matthew ch19 v4), both actions which Genesis attributes to Israel’s God.

Those are things self evident.
The world exists so someone made it.
Men and women exist, so it was made that way.
Those would be true of any religion.

When he shows up and confirms that they are the same there will be many that will not believe because their spirit is set on damnation.

originally posted by: Akragon
Consider the possibility that the teaching that his Father was not the so called God of the OT was removed to create this continuity in the scriptures...

Once we start playing games like that, the possiblities are endless and the exercise is pointless.
I'm going to confine myself to reading and aiming to understand what we've already got.

And the fact remains... Its completely impossible to reconcile the actions of the OT God with the teaching of Jesus...

The fact remains that Jesus understood himself as speaking under the authority of the OT God, so that has to be the starting point.
So we need to start with the resemblances, not the differences, and work from there.
In the first place;
The teaching of Jesus said "You shall love your neigbour as yourself".
The teaching of the OT said "You shall love your neighbour as yourself" (He was quoting directly).
Jesus saw himself as following up and completing what his God was doing in the OT, so our task is look for an understandng of how that works.

a reply to: jmdewey60
Yes, but he's quoting from the scriptures which describe the God of Israel as doing it.
That was my point.
In the OT, the Creator is also the God who is dealing with Abraham and Moses and the prophets, and Jesus was accepting and working with that standpoint.

a reply to: DISRAELI

Yes, but he's quoting from the scriptures which describe the God of Israel as doing it.

Jesus was a Jew, so he quotes the Jewish scripture.

In the OT, the Creator is also the God who is dealing with Abraham and Moses and the prophets, and Jesus was accepting and working with that standpoint.

That is not so clear, so I think Jesus avoids getting into that.

originally posted by: jmdewey60
He was a Jew, so he quotes the Jewish scripture.

Yes, he treats the God of the Jews as identical with his own God. That is the essence of this thread

"In the OT, the Creator is also the God who is dealing with Abraham and Moses and the prophets, and Jesus was accepting and working with that standpoint."
That is not so clear, so I think Jesus avoids getting into that.

I think it would be more true to say that it doesn't even occur to him that anyone might want to distinguish between them.
When he says "God", he means the Creator and the God of Israel

a reply to: DISRAELI

Something that might be more worth your time is to explore the implicit messages in the Bible of the existence of reincarnation. Abraham, King Solomon, and Jesus Christ were all the same person, all the same God. Of course, that's just my take on the Bible. But reincarnation is definitely in the Bible (not necessarily that those three are the same person, that is far too subtle for a fool to decipher), you just have to read in-between the lines and use something called critical thinking.

a reply to: iosolomon
I have a number of threads in mind for the future, but I don't propose to wander away from the Christian understanding of the Bible.

a reply to: DISRAELI

The teaching of Jesus said "You shall love your neigbour as yourself". The teaching of the OT said "You shall love your neighbour as yourself" (He was quoting directly).

I have to think that this was why the Son of God was a Jew in the first place, because they had that in the Law.
Here were people who had the right idea, if you were someone like Jesus who could highlight the good parts.
In comparison, you had the Roman Imperial cult that said basically it is their own private city gods who tell them to loot and plunder their neighbors.

a reply to: jmdewey60
Yes, this follows on from my series on the Law. where I was arguing that the Pentateuch laws had a mixed origin, partly from God and partly from man.
The task is then to "highlight the good parts", as you say, i.e the parts which come from God. As Jesus does when he distinguishes between "they shall be one flesh" (which comes from God) and "you can get rid of your wife" (which comes from human "hardness of heart").

a reply to: DISRAELI

Yes, he treats the God of the Jews as identical with his own God. That is the essence of this thread

I think you are taking a logical leap here.
He does not clearly identify the Old Testament god.
My personal belief goes along with the New Testament where it says that the old covenant was administered by angels.
I think that when Jesus meets the devil in the wilderness, it is an allusion to Moses meeting the angel in the burning bush claiming that he was the sole representative of God.
Jesus was replacing that angel, so did not "remove his sandals" in his presence.

No one has addressed this yet, I've posted it in two threads on this subject in the past 2 days and it has been ignored.

John 8
44 You belong to your father, the devil, and you want to carry out your father’s desires. He was a murderer from the beginning, not holding to the truth, for there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks his native language, for he is a liar and the father of lies

He calls the Jews' father the devil.

John 8
56 Your father Abraham rejoiced at the thought of seeing my day; he saw it and was glad.

He then names their father Abraham.

These two quotes are said within minutes of each other by Jesus.

Why would Jesus call their father the devil and then name their father as Abraham if he worshiped the Abrahamic god? The Jews even name their father Abraham after Jesus calls their father the devil, if Jesus wasn't addressing Abraham as being the devil, why didn't he correct them on their mistake?

Jesus only refers to the OT because it was the predominant scripture at his time and in the area he preached. I quote Jesus' words, that does not mean I worship the Christian god. Why does it have to be different for Jesus? You don't teach algebra to students by reading from a calculus book.

originally posted by: jmdewey60
I think you are taking a logical leap here.
He does not clearly identify the Old Testament god.

Look again at the headings of the OP.
He takes the words of the OT God and treats them as the words of his own God.
He takes the actions of the OT God and treats them as the actions of his own God.
In everything he says, it is implicit that they ae one and the same God.
I think that gets close enough to identifying them.

a reply to: DISRAELI

For example, he quotes ‘I am the God of Abraham” as something which “God” said, using it as evidence that God is “not the God of the dead but of the living”- Mark ch12 vv26-27

Jesus was making an argument and using a quote from the book of Exodus to illustrate the point.
He quotes from it but does not verify the veracity of it, but goes on to make his own independent claim about who and what he thinks God is.

He does the same thing implicitly, at least, whenever he quotes the words which God spoke in the past; Such as “I desire mercy and not sacrifice”- Matthew ch9 v13 Or “My house shall be called a house of prayer…but you have made it a den of robbers”- Matthew ch21 v13

He is quoting the Prophets in both cases.
Jesus tells the Samaritan woman that they do not know what they worship.
They had practically the same Torah as the Jews, but did not accept the Prophets, so to Jesus, they had it backwards.

a reply to: DISRAELI

I'm going to confine myself to reading and aiming to understand what we've already got.

You call it a game?

This is a stark reality my friend... its a fact, the writers of the NT changed things to suit their purposes...

Don't believe me? What day was Jesus executed?

Well that depends on which version of the events you read... the earlier version of the events gives the original found in Mark... John changed the date to make his execution become the proverbial lamb sacrifice...

The fact remains that Jesus understood himself as speaking under the authority of the OT God, so that has to be the starting point. So we need to start with the resemblances, not the differences, and work from there. In the first place; The teaching of Jesus said "You shall love your neigbour as yourself". The teaching of the OT said "You shall love your neighbour as yourself" (He was quoting directly). Jesus saw himself as following up and completing what his God was doing in the OT, so our task is look for an understandng of how that works.

Well this is your thread... DO as you wish...

Love thy neighbour eh... How does that line up with Kill the enemy... Destroy and claim his lands, rape and pillage his territory and his people... Leave nothing alive not even the women or children...

Sigh

Its impossible my friend... the teachings of Jesus can not be reconciled with the OT God...

you're only left with two options...

1. Jesus and the OT god are one... Thus, the atrocities within said book are just as much Jesus doing as the OT god

or

2. Jesus and his Father are one, and his Father is not the same God as the OT God, and the people of the OT did not know the true God until Jesus came... Like he said

No one knows the Father save the son, and no one knows the son save the Father...

Without the shepherd, the sheep were at the mercy (or lack there of) of the wolf (Imposter)

a reply to: 3NL1GHT3N3D1
The point of that passage is "You think your father is Abraham, but your real father is the devil, instead of Abraham".
They say v39, "Abraham is our father", but he then corrects them and says that IF Abraham was their father they would behave differently .
He is not identifying Abraham with the devil, but treating them as two rival candidates for the status of "father".

originally posted by: jmdewey60
He quotes from it but does not verify the veracity of it, but goes on to make his own independent claim about who and what he thinks God is.

His claim about God is not independent at all.
It is a logical deduction from what he has quoted, and entirely dependent upon it.

a reply to: DISRAELI

His claim about God is not independent at all. It is a logical deduction from what he has quoted, and entirely dependent upon it.

He could have made the exact same claim without the quote but he was dealing with people who only accepted the literal interpretation of the scripture.

Jesus was not like a Pharisee who studied scripture to figure out theories, he knew these thing, and did not come to that knowledge through deduction.