Chuck, I responded on the topic of the Golden Rule and the Ten Commandments and what is in them. I don't believe in a god, so I don't want to discuss anything beyond what is written in the text. If you want to have a discussion about God's love for Old Testament prophets, you'll need to have it with someone else. *For me,* there is no god and no god's love, etc. *For me,* you are just projecting your human wishes onto the stories of the Bible, and one can argue that God hates humanity and wants to give it suffering and pain and death for his sadistic amusement as effectively as claiming that God loves humanity. *For me,* there is no God to do any loving or hating, so I don't see any use in having a conversation about God.
But the Ten Commandments are written down for us to see. They do exist and have existed for thousands of years. They are interesting in themselves, for what they discuss. Very interesting set of inclusions and omissions. Even the order of them is interesting, and the fact that Moses is killed before reaching the Promised Land for violating one of them (well, he himself doesn't violate, but his followers do when he does not keep enough oversight over them. According to the story--it is a fiction, of course, but fictions carry meaning too.)
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