So Jews believe that even G-d cannot bridge the gap?

John Dominic Crossan argues that what we refer to as lepers would have at that time actually meant anyone who was ritually unclean and that Jesus' healing of them consisted of allowing them to eat at the table with everyone else. I'm down with that. The miracles--other than his being God and Man--don't, to my mind, add much to the story, while His repudiation of formulaic observances and accretions does make the story a revolutionary one. But that's not the heart of the story, at least to my mind.



I've always thought that the Old Testament God was rather a Learish figure, too enraged by his children to cope with the world as He'd made it. But in experiencing life as a man, He comes to comprehend what it is to be human. From this perspective, the most important moment in the New Testament is Christ's lament on the cross: Oh Lord, Oh Lord, why hast thou forsaken me? That even God would be driven to despair if he were a man is what makes the final reconciliation of men and God possible.

Timothy --



I do not by any means speak for all Jews -- in my house, let alone the world. But it's not so much that G-d can't as that he doesn't. Think of the rat in the maze. The scientist could simply bring the cheese to the rat. The rat can't think of any reason he shouldn't. The scientist won't, however, because his purpose wouldn't be served by doing so.

That gives a new slant on the expression, "the big cheese."

David - one quibble from a Christian -



We do not think of God as standing "outside the law." Rather the law is an expression of God's essence, which is love; God could no more exist without the law than could goodness exist without honesty. Jesus was the embodiment of the law, its living fulfillment.



When, in the gospels, Jesus breaks Jewish law, e.g. by healing on the Sabbath, we take that to mean, not that Jesus was outside the law, but that the rabbis had misunderstood divine revelation and that God had never intended people to be barred from doing good on the Sabbath.

There is but one law for all, namely,

that law which governs all law,

the law of our Creator,

the law of humanity, justice, equity --

the law of nature, and of nations.

-Edmund Burke (1729 - 1797)

David, the way you're setting it up, it's not a maze, it's a wall--if we can't get to the cheese, and the cheese won't come to us, why do we worry about the cheese in the first place?

Timothy:



Because the cheese is so desirable and we've a covenant with G-d that says we will some day achieveb it, though only through His intercession.