Ideal Worlds

Israel and Greece are cradles to two great ancient civilization. However, people from these two cultural entities have very distinct ideas of want kind of “perfect” society they want to build up. Briefly, an ideal society in Israeli’s heart is a “pure” world with one ultimate god and peoples with pure devotion to this god. On the opposite side, classical Athens is more likely to build a “state of conscious” where there are powerful gods and wise human beings.
The book of Amos is basically a story about how god destroyed Israel and then restored it. The reasons why god Yahweh did this were because that he wants to establish his fame and build s pure Yahweh-worshiping city. As we all know, gods are men made. These spiritual totems are actually tools for people to express their wishes and explain the unpredictable. By creating Yahweh, this sole god, Israeli made a “judge of the world”. The ideals of ancient Israel are all based on this god. First feature of this ideal society is purity which means only one god can be worshiped. The second one is equality of peoples that is every one in this society are supposed only to do their job. This can prevent people from getting greedy. “You alone have I singled out of all the families of the earth; that is why I will call you to account for all your iniquities.” (Book of Amos, 3:1-2) The “iniquities” in this quote means greedy and disloyalty to the god. Israel then becomes an example of being destroyed and restored by this “judge” god. From this source we actually can dig in a little deeper. The ideals of Israel are not only building a one-god and equal society but also having this god to do al the punishment and settle down the conflicts. “But let justice well up like water, Righteousness like an unfailing stream.”(Book of Amos, 5:24) At the mean time Israeli endued the god with great power, they also thrown all the responsibilities to the god. Israeli does not really care about being controlled by a big god as long as