Are you really that terrible?

I found myself pondering this a few days ago:

Am I really such a horrible person, that God cannot even stand to look at me?

I was raised in a Christian home, and the Christian line of thinking seems to indicate that we’re all just terrible, horrible people that God can’t even look at. We’re that bad. Having been separated from the Christian way of thinking, this question came to me the other day. I mean, what is it that I’ve done, that is really so bad? Now, I’m not saying that I’m a saint, or that I’m completely without sin, but…

…have I really done anything THAT terrible?

Let’s turn to the bible here for a bit (The Jewish Bible of course). What is it that God, time and again, is completely focused on in the Torah as the source of all evil? If I had to pick one thing, it would have to be…

Idol Worship.

I don’t know about you, but I don’t worship idols. In fact, no-one I know worships idols. So what else do we have. The Ten commandments? Let’s list them:

1. Have no Gods
2. Don’t make idols
3. Don’t take the name of the Lord in vain
4. Remember the sabbath and keep it holy
5. Honor thy father and mother
6. Do not murder (‘Thou shalt not kill’ is mistranslated)
7. Do not commit adultery
8. Do not steal
9. Do not bear false witness
10. Do not covet thy neighbor’s stuff

Now, these actually only apply if you are a Jew. There’s a different set of laws for now Jews. You only actually have 7 to worry about! Here they are:

1. No Idolotry
2. Do not murder
3. Do not steal
4. Do not commit sexual immorality
5. Do not blaspheme
6. Do not eat meat from an animal that is still alive
7. Establish a court of law

See anything in there that you’ve broken? If so, then you need to talk to a Rabbi to figure out what you need to do. I.e. is there any chance for you to be absolved. You could go to your priest/pastor, etc..but if it were me, and pretending that I were still a Christian, it wouldn’t be hard to convince me to see a Rabbi had I broken one of these. Why? Because these originated in the Jewish bible, and we know whether or not there is anything that you can do here. I mean, sure you could just pray to Jesus for forgiveness (I am of course assuming that you’re in that majority), but wouldn’t it be best to play it safe and do everything that you can to make sure you’ve been absolved? Breaking one of these is after all, a bit of a big deal, right? Where else do you have a short list of things that God specifically said not to do? Make sure you’re okay with God people!

Back on topic. I’ve broken a few of these. In my younger days, I stole from a local store a few times. I knew it was wrong. I did it anyway. Now that I think about it, I’ve never really thought about needing to be absolved of that sin. It would seem I need to take my own advice and speak to my rabbi about it!

Do not blaspheme. Respect God basically. Think I’m okay. It’s long been my thinking that you shouldn’t do anything to anger God, when he could probably kill you simply by not thinking about you any more.

Establish a court of law. Well, I haven’t done this personally, but we do have courts of law. Surely we’re good here.

Now, let’s look at the additional Jewish commandments.

Remember the sabbath. I’m working on that right now. It’s both easy and difficult at the same time. You really have to figure out how to do it correctly.

Do not commit adultery. Good here too. Especially since the definition of adultery, in the Jewish Bible, really only applies to married women (no, I’ve never cheated on my wife if that’s what you are thinking right now. But there was a time during my divorce process that I was with my current wife).

So, going over it, I do need to speak with my rabbi about some of the things I did in my younger days, but other than that, I haven’t broken any of the other commandments. Which brings us back to, am I really that bad of a person that God cannot even look at me? The Christian line of thinking, really makes me feel like God would have to be really overly sensitive to the smallest of infractions. And the truth is, I’m not even sure what those infractions would be. Once again, I’m not perfect, but I’m not a bad person either.

Right now, the thing I need to work on the most is being more actively involved with helping the poor. God is big on justice. And a large part of that is giving to the poor and doing at least a little to make sure they are taken care of.

In many ways, I’m starting to wonder if the Jewish approach to sin, is much easier than the Christian one. I no longer feel like I’m a horrible, evil person 99% of the day. My current understanding of sin and repentance, is that once you realize you’ve done something wrong, you need to correct it. If you don’t even know you’re doing something wrong, how can it be justice to receive the full punishment for it? Now, that’s not to say that you should just do whatever you want, and turn a blind eye toward figuring out how God wants you to live your life. On the contrary, we should all be actively striving to better understand what God wants from us, and what we should be doing to be more pleasing to God. Through this process, surely we’ll realize things that we’re doing wrong that we never realized before. But the point is, then you simply need to correct the problem and move on.,

Now, naturally, if you decide that there’s something that is very basic to your nature that you need to change, that is of course a completely different discussion, but keep in mind, that our God is very understanding and forgiving. Just do the best that you can.

That’s how I see it anyway.

 

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