It’s a bit preachy keen, but someone “Liked” it, and so I’ve elected to share it.
In the faith communities referencing Moses, competition for power and wealth through subscription and the many demonstrations of devotion and loyalty have produced some bloody “competitions” across time and space. The pious have long fought among themselves — schisms will do that — as well as taken aim at external enemies.
Has as much not been the way of the world?
This day is a little different: we may see one another through what we have to say, and hearing and seeing more, we may think a little more as well.
Moses challenged politically absolute power and with the guidance and power of God removed from it the Jews and the “mixed multitude” that would join them. Not much has changed. No one likes to be tyrannized.
The Jewish liberation story and much else about Judaism proved potently attractive enough to inspire uptake — give Hillel the Elder some credit — by the “restive of Rome”, i.e., those tiring of the brutality and excesses of the powerful. Even with eased conversions, the tribal ethnolinguistic culture (perhaps) could not begin to absorb the numbers, and the Romans looking for a new answer may have had other cultural needs better addressed by Jesus / Paul.
With Christianity in place, General Constantine finds his mission, and about 300 years later, General Muhammad develops his.
The Jews: they appear to worry much less about subscription, power, and wealth, and it’s pretty clear where and how the Hebrews have settled.
Aside: in 12th Century Hungary, laws designed by a Christian government to discriminate against Jews were upon activation applied equally to Muslims (ref. Raphael Patai’s _The Jews of Hungary).
This may be the best time to get off the medieval merry-go-round by looking forward while leaving some attitudes and beliefs plus archaic doctrines and methods far in the past where they belong.
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