Did Yhwh Condemn The Nations When He Elected Israel?

Abstract

"Among the prominent themes within the OT, YHWH’s election of Israel to be his special people is especially significant. This motif pervades the individual corpora in the canon; it is given particular expression in the benefactions bestowed on Abram (Gen 12:2), reiterated in the covenant ceremony at Mount Sinai (Exod 19:5), affirmed throughout Moses’ sermons in Deuteronomy (Deut 4:37; 7:6–7; 10:15), proclaimed by the psalmist (Ps 135:4), and maintained by the prophets (e.g. Isa 44:1). However, the idea that YHWH chose one specific group to be his special people has offended many people in the modern world, for whom the ideals of equality and equal opportunity are very important. Some have wondered why YHWH would limit himself to one group of people and not give the same opportunity to other people to serve him. Others have moved beyond the issue of equal opportunity and argued that the idea of election leads to violence because it defines all other nations as the “other” who must be kept at a distance or even destroyed.1 In this view, election creates a binary universe, in which the elect and the non-elect exist in mutually antagonistic categories until one or the other is destroyed"