Oh dear I am so bad at this. I won’t be able to answer as directly as I ought because not a good enough theologian or a writer . . . and my knowledge of the Bible is quite ropey too so need to be quite open to being contradicted . . . . feel free (I am shrugging my shoulders).
The nature of the Kingship of God . . . [this is something that has been bugging me a lot for some time . . .]
I am thinking about how Moses warned the Israelites to stay off the mountain because to go onto it would be certain death . . . so only he Moses was the priest with direct contact with God. Indeed, in one of the psalms it says that it was only the intervention of Moses that prevented God, in His fury, from wiping them out altogether. . . .
For the early Israelites, then, God was a King to be obeyed regardless because the consequences of not doing so would be dire punishment. . . . . .(the Strict Parent) well actually Very Strict Indeed; you could even say Tyrannical. . .
Over and against this you have the passages in the prophets, particularly Isaiah but many others as well, who, through the centuries, begin to unravel and come to terms with the true nature of God: particularly His compassion, and the overwhelming love that He has for ‘his people’, especially the poor. . . . . . (I put 'his people' in commas because we are still arguing about who 'his people' actually are ("I've got to be one of them right?")
Finally we have the complete mystery of Jesus, born poor and dying alongside common criminals at the hands of a foreign power, denounced by his own people as a heretic. So what does this (and he, Jesus) tell us about the true nature of God's kingship?
Our concept of what a king is has to be based upon human historical models and even the best of them (King David perhaps?) cannot come close to the true nature of the kingship of God . . . so perhaps what I should have said was that God seeks to change our perception of what kingship means . . . doesnt sound as good though . . .
The word ‘revelation’ might be useful here: God using time and all of history and holy people as a way of revealing Himself to us step by step [just as He does to us as individuals.]
Yes of course you are right to say that ‘He will always know better than we’ but it is also true that He has, some might say foolishly, given us as human beings incredible power on this little planet of ours to do right and wrong and to judge and control . . . .for good or ill.
In a psalm, ‘You are all of you sons of the Most High’ . . . . and in another psalm (might be the same one not sure) He condemns the judges who judge without understanding . . . which takes me onto the last bit about the way in which we judge.
I must own to being a bit disingenuous here because I was really thinking more in terms of political leaders who make the laws and whose judgment in sexual cases can indeed be astonishingly draconian and cruel so that even the old Jewish rule of ‘An eye for an eye’ seems kindness itself in comparison. . . ( a American friend of mine was sentenced three years ago to 55 years in prison. After several appeals he has been re-sentenced to 75.) This is in a democracy though, so the political leaders are "only doing what the ordinary people (thats us) want".
Am I doing any better Blackstone? I nearly started doing what I complained to you about a few weeks back and highlighting bits from your post but I knew that really would be asking for trouble . . .