Paper 97 Overview: Evolution of the God Concept Among the Hebrews

The Hebrew spiritual leaders achieved a remarkable theological evolution by deanthropomorphizing their concept of Deity without transforming it into an abstract concept comprehensible only to philosophers. Through gradual developmental stages, they formulated a concept of God that ordinary people could grasp, enabling them to conceive of Yahweh as a Father figure to the race, if not yet fully to individuals. This transformation from a tribal volcano deity to a universal loving Creator represents one of the most significant evolutionary religious developments in human history, preparing the way for Jesus' later revelations.

The concept of God's personality, while clearly taught at Salem during Melchizedek's era, became vague during the Egyptian exodus but gradually evolved in Hebrew consciousness through successive generations of spiritual teachers. From Moses to Malachi, an almost unbroken development of God's personality occurred in Hebrew thought, with each major prophet contributing nuanced expansions to the concept. This continuous refinement of the God concept demonstrated greater consistency than other theological attributes in Hebrew religious thinking, eventually creating fertile spiritual soil for Jesus' ultimate revelation of the Father in heaven, thus completing a remarkable evolutionary cycle from primitive tribal deity to universal loving Creator.

The spiritual leaders of the Hebrews accomplished what no others before them had managed: they deanthropomorphized their God concept without converting it into an abstraction comprehensible only to philosophers. Even common people could understand and relate to the mature concept of Yahweh as a Father figure, if not yet of individuals, then at least of the race as a whole. This theological development represented a crucial evolutionary step in religious history, bridging primitive anthropomorphic deities and abstract philosophical concepts of Deity.

The concept of the personality of God, while clearly taught at Salem during Melchizedek's time, became vague and hazy during the exodus from Egypt but gradually evolved in the Hebrew consciousness from generation to generation through the teachings of spiritual leaders. The perception of Yahweh's personality demonstrated more continuous progressive evolution than many other divine attributes in Hebrew theology. From Moses to Malachi, an almost unbroken ideational growth of God's personality occurred in the Hebrew mind, which was eventually heightened and glorified by Jesus' teachings about the heavenly Father.

The pressure of hostile surrounding peoples in Palestine compelled the Hebrew sheiks to recognize the necessity of confederating their tribal organizations into a centralized government for survival. This political centralization afforded Samuel an opportunity to function effectively as a teacher and reformer, establishing a more cohesive religious identity. Samuel descended from a long lineage of Salem teachers who had preserved Melchizedek's truths within their worship forms, and his extraordinary devotion and determination enabled him to withstand the nearly universal opposition he encountered when attempting to redirect Israel toward worshiping the supreme Yahweh of Mosaic times. His efforts were only partially successful, winning back approximately half of the Hebrews to the service of a higher concept of Yahweh, while the remainder continued in tribal god worship and adhered to lower conceptions of Yahweh.

Samuel was a practical reformer who could act decisively, sometimes overthrowing multiple Baal sites in a single day with his associates; he emphasized action over preaching and teaching. He possessed a clear concept of Yahweh as creator of heaven and earth, famously declaring, "The pillars of the earth are the Lord's, and he has set the world upon them." Samuel's most significant contribution to the development of the Deity concept was his revolutionary pronouncement that Yahweh was changeless, forever the same embodiment of unerring perfection and divinity—a stark contrast to the prevailing view of a fitful, jealous God of whims who frequently regretted his actions. This stability in approaching Divinity marked the beginning of the destruction of primitive magic and biological fear, introducing humans to a universe of law and order governed by a dependable Deity with final attributes.

In the tenth century before Christ, the Hebrew nation fragmented into two kingdoms, with truth teachers in both divisions struggling unsuccessfully to stem the reactionary tide of spiritual decadence. These efforts to advance Hebrew religion made little headway until the appearance of Elijah, a determined and fearless warrior for righteousness who restored to the northern kingdom a concept of God comparable to that held in Samuel's time. Elijah's opportunities to present an advanced concept of God were limited because, like Samuel before him, he was primarily occupied with overthrowing Baal altars and destroying idols of false gods. His reforms faced enormous difficulties, including opposition from an idolatrous monarch, making his task even more challenging than Samuel's had been.

When Elijah departed, his faithful associate Elisha continued his work with invaluable assistance from the lesser-known Micaiah, collectively preserving the light of truth in Palestine during a period of widespread apostasy. This era was not characterized by theological progress in the conception of Deity; indeed, the Hebrews had not yet even ascended to the Mosaic ideal in their understanding of God. The era of Elijah and Elisha concluded with the better classes of society returning to the worship of the supreme Yahweh, witnessing the restoration of the concept of the Universal Creator approximately to the point where Samuel's teachings had left it, preserving but not substantially advancing the highest concepts of Deity from previous generations.

The protracted controversy between the adherents of Yahweh and the followers of Baal fundamentally represented a socioeconomic clash of ideologies rather than merely a difference in religious beliefs. Palestinian inhabitants were deeply divided regarding attitudes toward private land ownership: the southern Arabian tribes (Yahwehites) viewed land as an inalienable divine gift to the clan that could not be legitimately sold or mortgaged, invoking Yahweh's supposed declaration that "the land shall not be sold, for the land is mine." In contrast, the northern and more settled Canaanites (Baalites) embraced practices of buying, selling, and mortgaging land as fundamental economic activities.

The term "Baal" itself signified "owner," with the cult founded on two principal doctrines: validation of property exchange contracts and the belief that Baal controlled rainfall for soil fertility. The Baalites typically owned houses, lands, and slaves, forming an aristocratic landlord class centered in cities, complete with sacred sites, priesthoods, and ritual prostitutes. This socioeconomic controversy transformed into an explicitly religious issue during Elijah's time, particularly after Ahab's murder of Naboth to seize his land. Elijah reframed the Yahweh-Baal land dispute as a moral and religious matter, launching a vigorous campaign against the Baalites that pitted rural populations against urban domination. Under Elijah's influence, Yahweh was elevated from one deity among many to Elohim, the one God, marking a definitive triumph of monotheism over polytheism.

A momentous step in the transformation of the tribal god Yahweh, long served through sacrifices and ceremonies, into a God who would punish wrongdoing even among his chosen people came through Amos, who emerged from the southern hills to denounce the criminality, drunkenness, oppression, and immorality prevalent in the northern tribes. Not since Moses had such powerful truths been proclaimed in Palestine, signifying that Amos transcended the role of mere reformer or restorer of previous teachings. He functioned as a genuine discoverer of new concepts of Deity, boldly proclaiming much about God that had been taught by predecessors while courageously confronting the widespread belief in a Divine Being who would tolerate sin among his supposedly chosen people. For the first time since Melchizedek, human ears heard the explicit rejection of the double standard of national justice and morality, as Amos declared that Yahweh would judge the Hebrews by the same moral standards applied to other nations.

Amos portrayed a stern and just God who would not discriminate between Hebrews and other peoples when punishing wrongdoing, directly challenging the egoistic doctrine of the "chosen people" and provoking bitter resentment among many Hebrews. He proclaimed Yahweh as "God of all nations" and warned that ritual observances could not substitute for righteousness. Before he was ultimately stoned to death, he had spread sufficient truth to preserve the doctrine of the supreme Yahweh and ensure the continued evolution of the Melchizedek revelation. Following Amos, Hosea revived the Mosaic concept of a God of love, preaching forgiveness through repentance rather than sacrifice. While Amos awakened the national conscience to recognize that Yahweh would not condone crime and sin among the chosen people, Hosea struck the initial notes of divine compassion and loving-kindness that would later be developed more fully by Isaiah and his successors.

As various prophets proclaimed warnings of punishment for personal sins among the northern clans and others predicted calamity for the southern kingdom's transgressions, a widespread arousal of conscience and consciousness emerged among the Hebrew nations. It was in this environment of spiritual awakening that the first Isaiah appeared and began teaching about God's eternal nature, infinite wisdom, and unchanging reliability. He portrayed Yahweh as saying, "Judgment also will I lay to the line and righteousness to the plummet," and offered comfort to the troubled Hebrews with messages such as, "The Lord will give you rest from your sorrow and from your fear and from the hard bondage wherein man has been made to serve." Isaiah's concept of God combined justice with mercy, inviting people to reason together and promising that though their sins were as scarlet, they could become white as snow.

Speaking to the fear-ridden and spiritually hungry Hebrews, Isaiah proclaimed, "Arise and shine, for your light has come, and the glory of the Lord has risen upon you," and declared that the spirit of the Lord had anointed him to preach good tidings to the meek and bind up the brokenhearted. This Isaiah was followed by Micah and Obadiah, who confirmed and embellished his soul-satisfying gospel while boldly denouncing the priest-dominated rituals and fearlessly attacking the entire sacrificial system. Micah specifically condemned "the rulers who judge for reward and the priests who teach for hire and the prophets who divine for money," while teaching about a future day free from superstition and priestcraft when each person would live according to their own understanding of God. This represented a truly remarkable age of spiritual awakening, with these prophets offering emancipating messages more than two and a half millenniums ago, and only the stubborn resistance of the priests prevented them from completely transforming the bloody ceremonial Hebrew worship.

While several teachers continued expounding Isaiah's gospel, Jeremiah took the next bold step in the internationalization of Yahweh, God of the Hebrews, by fearlessly declaring that Yahweh was not preferentially aligned with the Hebrews in their military struggles against other nations. He proclaimed that Yahweh was God of all the earth, all nations, and all peoples, not merely a tribal or national deity. Jeremiah's teaching represented the culmination of the rising wave of internationalization of Israel's God, as he definitively proclaimed that Yahweh was universal, not just the god of Hebrews. There was no Osiris for Egyptians, Bel for Babylonians, Ashur for Assyrians, or Dagon for Philistines—only one God for all peoples. This perspective participated in the broader renaissance of monotheism occurring throughout the world, elevating the concept of Yahweh to a Deity of planetary and even cosmic significance, though many of Jeremiah's associates found it difficult to conceive of Yahweh apart from the Hebrew nation.

Jeremiah also preached about the just and loving God described by Isaiah, declaring, "Yes, I have loved you with an everlasting love; therefore with loving-kindness have I drawn you," and asserting that God "does not afflict willingly the children of men." He characterized Yahweh as "righteous...great in counsel and mighty in work," with eyes "open upon all the ways of all the sons of men, to give every one according to his ways and according to the fruit of his doings." However, Jeremiah was accused of treason during the siege of Jerusalem when he stated, "And now have I given these lands into the hand of Nebuchadnezzar, the king of Babylon, my servant." When he advised surrender of the city to the Babylonians, the priests and civil rulers cast him into a miry dungeon pit, illustrating the intense conflict between evolving religious concepts and entrenched political and priestly establishments.

The destruction of the Hebrew nation and their Mesopotamian captivity would have significantly benefited their expanding theology if not for the determined resistance of their priesthood. Resentful over the loss of their national god, Jewish priests invented elaborate fables and multiplied miraculous events in Hebrew history to restore the Jews' status as the chosen people of the newly internationalized God of all nations. During captivity, the Jews were substantially influenced by Babylonian traditions and legends, though they consistently improved the moral tone and spiritual significance of the Chaldean stories they adopted, even as they invariably modified these legends to glorify their own ancestry and history.

The Jewish priests and scribes had a singular focus: rehabilitating the Jewish nation, glorifying Hebrew traditions, and exalting their racial history. However, their efforts to reshape Hebrew theology were significantly challenged by the presence of a young and indomitable prophet, the second Isaiah, who fully embraced the concepts of a God of justice, love, righteousness, and mercy previously taught by the first Isaiah and Jeremiah. He preached these divine attributes with such compelling effect that he made converts among both Jews and their captors. This young prophet's teachings were so beautiful and profound that despite the hostile priests' attempts to dissociate them from him, they were eventually incorporated with the writings of the earlier Isaiah in chapters forty to fifty-five. No prophet or religious teacher from Machiventa to Jesus attained the high concept of God that the second Isaiah proclaimed, teaching a God of universal creation and upholding, who could say, "I have made the earth and put man upon it. I have created it not in vain; I formed it to be inhabited."

The practice of regarding Hebrew experiences as sacred history while treating the records of other peoples as profane history has created significant confusion in human understanding of historical interpretation. This difficulty arises because no secular history of the Jews exists. After the Babylonian exile, the priests meticulously prepared a new record of God's supposedly miraculous dealings with the Hebrews (the sacred history portrayed in the Old Testament), then systematically destroyed all existing historical records of Hebrew affairs. These eliminated documents included "The Doings of the Kings of Israel" and "The Doings of the Kings of Judah," along with several other relatively accurate records of Hebrew history, creating an irreparable gap in objective historical understanding.

To comprehend the devastating pressure and inescapable coercion of secular history that terrorized the captive and alien-ruled Jews into completely rewriting their history, one must examine their perplexing national experience. The Jews failed to develop an adequate nontheological philosophy of life, struggling with contradictory religious concepts about divine rewards and punishments. After five hundred years under foreign rule, the honest Jews searching their scriptures became increasingly confused. One prophet had promised divine protection for the "chosen people," while Amos had warned that God would abandon Israel without moral reformation. The scribe of Deuteronomy had portrayed the Great Choice between good and evil, while different prophets had proclaimed various paths to salvation—from Isaiah's beneficent king-deliverer to Jeremiah's era of inner righteousness, from Ezekiel's deliverance through devotional service to the second Isaiah's redemption through sacrifice. These conflicting messages led to profound racial disappointment and confusion that ultimately contributed to the failure of Jewish leaders to recognize and accept Jesus when he came.

Historical records reveal that there were never twelve tribes of Israelites. Only three or four actually settled in Palestine, with the Hebrew nation forming through the union of Israelites and Canaanites rather than through conquest. Despite priestly claims, the Hebrews never drove the Canaanites from Palestine but instead intermarried with them extensively. The Israelite consciousness originated in the hill country of Ephraim, while the later Jewish consciousness developed in the southern clan of Judah, with the Judahites consistently attempting to defame and discredit the northern Israelites in their historical accounts. The elaborate Hebrew history begins with Saul rallying northern clans to defend fellow tribesmen against Ammonite attacks, achieving victory with approximately 3,000 men and being elected king by his troops in recognition of his leadership. When priests later rewrote this narrative, they inflated Saul's army to 330,000, added "Judah" to the list of participating tribes, and claimed Samuel had crowned Saul by divine direction, establishing a "divine line of descent" for David's Judahite kingship.

The most extensive distortion of Jewish history involved David, whose complex rise to power was significantly sanitized in the official narrative. Historical evidence indicates David entered a Philistine alliance with 600 men against Saul, before being dismissed by the Philistines who subsequently defeated Saul. David established his small army's headquarters in the non-Hebrew city of Hebron, where his followers proclaimed him king of the new kingdom of Judah, a territory composed mostly of non-Hebrew elements who were primarily nomadic herders dedicated to the Hebrew concept of land ownership. David built his power through strategic marriages and military actions, eventually establishing Jerusalem as his capital after making a compact with the Jebusites. The priests created two contrasting accounts of David's ascension: the secular history showing his army making him king, and the sacred history depicting the prophet Samuel divinely selecting and anointing him as Saul's successor. This pattern of historical revision continued throughout Hebrew history, culminating in the Babylonian captivity when the Jews developed their concept of destiny as God's chosen servants and formulated the religious doctrine of immortality that would later influence Christianity.

The spiritual leaders had instructed the Israelites that they were a chosen people not for special indulgence or divine favor monopoly but for the specific service of carrying the truth of the one God to all nations. They promised the Jews that fulfilling this destiny would establish them as spiritual leaders for all peoples, with the coming Messiah reigning over them and the world as the Prince of Peace. However, after being freed by the Persians and returning to Palestine, the Jews fell into bondage to their own priest-controlled code of laws, sacrifices, and rituals. Just as the Hebrew clans had rejected Moses' farewell oration about God in favor of ritualistic sacrifice and penance, these remnants of the Hebrew nation rejected the magnificent concept of the second Isaiah for the rules and ceremonies of their expanding priesthood.

National egotism, misguided faith in a misconceived Messiah, and the increasing dominance of the priesthood effectively silenced the voices of spiritual leaders (with exceptions like Daniel, Ezekiel, Haggai, and Malachi), and from that time until John the Baptist, Israel experienced progressive spiritual decline. Nevertheless, the Jews never abandoned their concept of the Universal Father, maintaining this understanding of Deity into the twentieth century after Christ. From Moses to John the Baptist, an unbroken succession of faithful teachers transmitted the monotheistic torch while rebuking corrupt rulers, denouncing commercialized priests, and urging people to worship the supreme Yahweh. Though as a nation the Jews eventually lost their political identity, the Hebrew religion of sincere belief in one universal God persisted in the hearts of the dispersed exiles because it effectively preserved the highest values of its adherents. The Jewish religion conserved moral values despite its philosophical deficiencies and aesthetic limitations, allowing it to endure while presenting a clear, vivid, personal, and moral conception of Yahweh that ultimately led to the idea of the Universal Father.