Quote:
| And once again, in jumping in to clarify to BelovedBird, you're Christianizing the whole thing. |
This made me laugh! Look at the OP, this whole thread is supposed to be about
Christian perceptions of Jews (and by implication, other non-christian faiths), not Jewish!. Methinks you are "Judai-izing" the whole thing, rather than vice versa!
We understand that Jews have a different concept of what "chosen" means -- and a preferable one, in my opinion -- but the OP was asking about the Christian concept of "chosen" --which means that you get to go to heaven rather than hell -- and how to reconcile it with God's love. That is what BM and I have been talking about.
BB -- in fundie Christian circles, some do talk about themselves "God's chosen". It's very big in testimonies, which generally start with how messed up the person was until they found God, and how hard God had to work to get through to them, and how they finally submitted to God's love -- the implication being that God "chose" them. Of course, they would also say that God "chooses" everyone equally but not everyone "chooses" God back, but that begs the question (for me) about why God doesn't maybe try a little harder with those holdouts if He really loves them. Anyway, the logical flip side of this belief is that those who haven't chosen God are wrong in whatever they have chosen. Ergo the "I'm right, you're wrong" tendency. Most Christians aren't obnoxious about it, of course, but that undercurrent is always there because of the belief that Jesus Christ is the only Way, and it can be abused. I understand that it is a radically different definition of the word "chosen" than how it is understood in Judaism.
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