/lit/ - Literature

The more I read the Gospels the more I realize that there are an awful lot of people that have taken verses specifically applying to Jesus Himself and tried to universalize them to apply to all humans, and civilization more broadly.

Like the line during the Passion about "put your sword back into its sheath." People read this as Christ endorsing pacificism broadly but I just don't think that's the case. Christ doesn't want Peter to defend Him from the mob because if the mob doesn't take Him, He won't be crucified, and then the entire reason for Him being incarnated on Earth won't come to pass. It's not a general forbidding of violence, it's a specific instance where Jesus cannot let one of His followers interfere with His destiny.

And there's tons of verses like these, where I've noticed certain people (many of whom aren't really Christian) try to make them apply to humanity as a whole, but in the context of the Gospels they apply specifically to Jesus, or to a specific situation He is talking about or dealing with.

OP, I'm Catholic and we literally read from the Old Testament at every Sunday Mass. It's not overlooked at all.

Quite frankly I think the New Testament doesn't make sense without the Old Testament. Jesus doesn't make sense without the generations of prophets and fathers who came before Him, preparing the way for the final salvation of all mankind.

I mean, pic related, Jesus literally meets and talks with Moses and Elijah during the Transfiguration. The Old Testament was the preparation of the way for Christ.