God in the Old and New Testaments

DEFENSE

This claim has elements of both truth and falsehood.

It has an element of falsehood because God is depicted as both just and merciful in both Testaments. Anyone who reads the Old Testament encounters many descriptions of God as loving and kind: “The Lord [is] a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness” (Exod. 34:6; cf. Num. 14:18, Deut. 4:31, 2 Chron. 30:9, Neh. 9:17, Ps. 86:5). And anyone who reads the New Testament encounters many mentions of God’s wrath: “It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God” (Heb. 10:31; cf. Matt. 25:41, Rom. 1:18, 2 Thess. 1:8–9, Rev. 20:11–15).

Both the Old and New Testaments thus depict God as stern and as kind, and the passages in question illustrate two of his attributes—justice and mercy—which he possesses and displays eternally. Therefore, there aren’t two different Gods in the Bible, but one God who displays both attributes.

This is not to say that there are not differences in emphasis. There are, and they have to do with the different stages of God’s plan, by which he progressively reveals himself to man (CCC 69).

The earlier portions of Scripture were written in a very violent period, and they reflect the character of the time. In the Old Testament, polytheism was a real threat to the Israelites, and there was constant oppression and exploitation of the poor and the weak. God thus used the image of himself as a powerful, heavenly king to warn the Isra- elites against polytheism and oppression—the sins that are regularly singled out for the strongest condemnation in the Old Testament.

When Jesus came, a new phase in God’s plan dawned—a phase in which God made himself vulnerable and offered himself on the cross, underscoring in the most dramatic way his love for mankind (John 3:16). The impact of this event naturally colored the way God is revealed in the New Testament and balances the emphases found in the Old.