{"id":37263,"date":"2020-10-08T01:13:39","date_gmt":"2020-10-08T05:13:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/admin.patheos.com\/blogs\/bibleandculture\/?p=37263"},"modified":"2020-08-28T20:15:00","modified_gmt":"2020-08-29T00:15:00","slug":"who-is-god-part-twelve","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/bibleandculture\/2020\/10\/08\/who-is-god-part-twelve\/","title":{"rendered":"Who Is God?&#8212; Part Twelve"},"content":{"rendered":"<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC \"-\/\/W3C\/\/DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional\/\/EN\" \"http:\/\/www.w3.org\/TR\/REC-html40\/loose.dtd\">\n<html><head><meta http-equiv=\"content-type\" content=\"text\/html; charset=utf-8\"><meta http-equiv=\"content-type\" content=\"text\/html; charset=utf-8\"><\/head><body><p><a href=\"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/55\/2020\/08\/51P-kwoipWL._SX320_BO1204203200_.jpg\" class=\" decorated-link\" target=\"_blank\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/55\/2020\/08\/51P-kwoipWL._SX320_BO1204203200_.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"322\" height=\"499\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-37174\"><\/a><\/p>\n<p>BEN: Chapter 3 raises the whole issue of anthropomorphism. What is interesting to me is that God himself uses anthropomorphisms of himself\u2014 it\u2019s not just that the Hebrew writer says \u2018and God\u2019s nose burned\u2019, it\u2019s that God says to Moses, you can\u2019t see my face, but I\u2019ll put my hand over you, and you can see my back. Now this is very striking language. Of course, the <a href='https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/library\/mormonism' target='_blank'>Mormons<\/a> have a field day with this arguing God must actually have a physical form, taking the language quite literally, which is surely a mistake. Would you say that God\u2019s use of such language at Sinai is just another example of God coming down to a level and revealing himself in a way Moses can understand? What is the significance that God only does this with Moses, not even with Moses and Aaron, and not with God\u2019s people in general? Does God play favorites, or should we just take this as an indicator that God had a special relationship with Moses?<\/p>\n<p>RICHARD: Moses really was very special. Just previously, when God was angry with Israel because of the golden calf, God proposed to disown the people and create a people composed just of Moses and his descendants. Only Moses comes into God\u2019s presence, speaks with God as with a friend, intercedes successfully for the people, and so on. Moses actually asks to see God\u2019s glory as a personal favour, not as something (like the Name) to share with the people. But what does he see? Just a fleeting glimpse of dazzling light, I guess we should understand. The revelation of God\u2019s character in words actually says much more about God.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>BEN: Chapter 3 raises the whole issue of anthropomorphism. What is interesting to me is that God himself uses anthropomorphisms of himself\u2014 it\u2019s not just that the Hebrew writer says \u2018and God\u2019s nose burned\u2019, it\u2019s that God says to Moses, you can\u2019t see my face, but I\u2019ll put my hand over you, and you can [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":91,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-37263","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v21.1 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Who Is God?--- Part Twelve<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"BEN: Chapter 3 raises the whole issue of anthropomorphism. What is interesting to me is that God himself uses anthropomorphisms of himself--- it\u2019s not\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"noindex, follow\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Who Is God?--- Part Twelve\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"BEN: Chapter 3 raises the whole issue of anthropomorphism. What is interesting to me is that God himself uses anthropomorphisms of himself--- it\u2019s not\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/bibleandculture\/2020\/10\/08\/who-is-god-part-twelve\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"The Bible and Culture\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2020-10-08T05:13:39+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2020-08-29T00:15:00+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/55\/2020\/08\/51P-kwoipWL._SX320_BO1204203200_.jpg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Ben Witherington\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Ben Witherington\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"1 minute\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/bibleandculture\/2020\/10\/08\/who-is-god-part-twelve\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/bibleandculture\/2020\/10\/08\/who-is-god-part-twelve\/\",\"name\":\"Who Is God?--- Part Twelve\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/bibleandculture\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2020-10-08T05:13:39+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2020-08-29T00:15:00+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/bibleandculture\/#\/schema\/person\/67da39aff728f9d015878d198839df4b\"},\"description\":\"BEN: Chapter 3 raises the whole issue of anthropomorphism. 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