I think it’s good to share information and engage in conversations about Christ. I noticed this community has a lot of “religious” posts but I’m often seeing common misconceptions and a lot of negativity or hopelessness.
Are religious posts encouraged on this forum? I have been working on a series of posts over on the christianity . win and I’m wondering if there would be more conversation by posting here
My problem with Christianity is that the new testament does not reconcile well with the Old testament and we get two very different Gods in the way they preach and act. The Old Testament God is vengeful and speaks to jews and tells them to carry out war and genocide and sleep with other women than their own wives and even tells Abraham to sacrifice his son. Then the new testament God is pacifist, turns the cheek and gets murdered. Doesn't sound like the same God that flooded everyone out. Then he suicides himself as a sacrificial lamb? It's difficult for me to understand. The flesh of my flesh blood of my blood sounds like cannibalism or blood ritual.
I agree it is difficult to understand, depending on the depth in which someone wants to investigate. On the surface it could be explained as a war between God and those that have rebelled, with humanity participating in a fluctuation between with or against YWHW.
I think Dr Michael Heiser does a great job at engaging that differentiation between the Old and New Testament experiences. I also think the Eastern Orthodox Church does a great job of demonstrating the differences. Most likely the primary hookup for you would be tied to ideas inherited from Penal Substitutionary Atonement and the “heaven or hell” concept which I understand have come from the ideas which started (or became more prominent) somewhere around the time of “Dante’s Inferno”
I don’t have a firm footing in this area yet, to the extent that I can have some discussion about it. However I have found there is a direct connection between occult (demonic, pagan etc) worship and cannibalism. Looking into what “sacrifice” and “remembrance” meant in ancient cultures has helped to actually support the realization of the true body and blood of Christ.