Actually, my Bible professor was a rabbi, and I took a midrash course later with another rabbi, so I'm not relying on Christian pastors or Sam Harris or whatever to tell me what Jews thought about stuff. Doing that would... probably not work too well, I agree.
I just think, from what I have read and studied as well as what was then built upon by Christians, that blood sacrifice was A Thing for ancient people. If Judaism has moved past this and is less interested in blood as valid currency between mortals and the divine, I'll trust you on that (since you undoubtedly know better, and anyway I find it totally believeable). It's... probably a good thing for that sort of ritual to fall out of vogue.
Christians can't really toss it aside, though, not fully. They've got that whole "Christ died for us and the blood of the lamb washed away our sins" thing that's sort of important to them, and it means that they've staked a lot more on preserving this assumption that gods like blood, and give preferential treatment to people who offer up the best blood. Without the assumptions behind blood sacrifice as an idea and a practice, the crucifixion makes no sense (and I don't mean in the literal "wtf no this makes no sense" way, I mean that it's not even coherent within the narrative).
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Date: 2011-01-28 08:13 pm (UTC)From:I just think, from what I have read and studied as well as what was then built upon by Christians, that blood sacrifice was A Thing for ancient people. If Judaism has moved past this and is less interested in blood as valid currency between mortals and the divine, I'll trust you on that (since you undoubtedly know better, and anyway I find it totally believeable). It's... probably a good thing for that sort of ritual to fall out of vogue.
Christians can't really toss it aside, though, not fully. They've got that whole "Christ died for us and the blood of the lamb washed away our sins" thing that's sort of important to them, and it means that they've staked a lot more on preserving this assumption that gods like blood, and give preferential treatment to people who offer up the best blood. Without the assumptions behind blood sacrifice as an idea and a practice, the crucifixion makes no sense (and I don't mean in the literal "wtf no this makes no sense" way, I mean that it's not even coherent within the narrative).