The GOP runs entirely on spite, stubbornness and selfishness.
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Someone should tell these “Christians” to set aside the Old Testament and focus on the New Testament instead.
Or just read the Old Testament, which is full of the same thing as the New Testament; namely, condemnation of the rich and the powerful being shitty to the poor, the sick, and the strangers. (It’s not as if Jesus’ teachings came out of nowhere, after all.)
But they’re not reading the Bible, they’re repeating a carefully curated collection of separate verses, devoid of context, that allow them to believe God agrees with them on everything and approves it whenever they grind their heel down on a human face.
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You’re not wrong, I spent many, many hours reading the Old Testament as well.
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I neglected to finish my original thought. The point I was making about New Testament vs Old Testament is that Christians are taught that the ancient divine (and sometimes cruelly punitive) laws and prophecies of the Old Testament were fulfilled in the coming of Christ, who said that there was a new, two-part law that superseded the old one:
Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.
The blessings mentioned in the Beatitudes in the New Testament are also part of the foundation of Christianity. Many correlations to these can also be found in the Old Testament.
“Christians” who cling to the laws of the Old Testament out of a desire to control and punish people who are different from themselves, and rationalize their own unchristian words and behavior while ignoring the new law put in place by Christ as stated in the New Testament, are missing that point.
That doesn’t mean that the Old Testament isn’t full of great stories, or that it isn’t a sacred text or wisdom literature to many people, but according to Christ it shouldn’t be viewed as law by his followers - though the so-called great commandments also had their basis in the Old Testament.
But you’re right, many people who claim to be leading Christian or “Biblical” lives are picking and choosing Biblical laws and commandments to justify their own ugly words and behavior and their attempts to control and punish other people. I washed my hands of religion some time ago but still find the cultural and historical aspects interesting, and still admire people who strive to live compassionate lives without being commanded by an external authority to do so.
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