[Book Review] "Jehovah Unmasked" by Nathaniel J. Merritt

I read someone's comments in Facebook mentioning about a book called "Jehovah Unmasked". I googled about it and managed to find an abridged version in PDF format. After printing it out last night, I went to sleep as I was tired. I woke up early in the morning about 5 am plus, still thinking about the topic, and decided to read the PDF book - found that it was quite interesting. The author was involved in Jehovah's witness and mainstream christianity for a number of years, before turning to buddhism for 12 years, and then began to study on christian gnosticism. He concluded the Old Testament god is not the true God, and there was no need for penal substitution, nor is there any eternal torment - and that Jesus came to reveal the true God, our heavenly Father, God of Love to us.

Here's sharing some interesting excerpts from the book:

"There are many such commands to fear Jehovah. I ask again, why would a supposedly omnipotent god be so insecure and egotistical as to command mere humans to fear it? The truth is, the real God makes no such commands. The Supreme Being utterly lacks Jehovah’s monumental ego, insecurity, and barbarism. Jehovah is manifestly a phony. He is the liar and the Father of lies! SATAN! The True God is Perfect Love (1 John 4:8, 1 Corinthians 13), hence no one has anything to fear from the Divine because “There is no fear in Love, because Perfect Love casteth out all fear.” (1 John 4:18) Actually, the entire verse reads: “There is no fear in Love; but Perfect Love casteth out all fear because fear hath torment. He that feareth is not made perfect in love.” That is crystal clarity. There is no torment or fear in the God who is Perfect Love.

Religious institutions are all about power and control and money. Your fear of God is what gives them power over you. If there is no fear of God, there is no power over you, no control, and no money. It's as simple as that. "Know the Truth, and the Truth will set you free!" (John 8:32). The True God judges or torments no one."

Yes, I believe the truth sets us free from illusion and ignorance, to know God as Love.

Christ came to set us free of the elohim: “And having disarmed the Archons and authorities, Christ disgraced them publicly, triumphing over them by the cross.” (Colossians 2:15 NJMV) Jesus Christ also imparted Gnosis (personal experiential Knowing) of the True God of Love, the Most High God, who dwells within us all, yet is covered over by our own ignorance and delusions. Christ did not come with any nonsense about original sin, “divine” wrath, hellfire or any of the other dark and negative lies attributed to him by the Catholic church under the power of Satan/Jehovah. Jesus did not “die for our sins” for the True God does not hold us responsible for the wretched state in which we were created and born, and is not a rageaholic demanding some sort of sadistic “satisfaction” via the agony and torture of blood sacrifice. All such teachings are the doctrines of devils, of the elohim, of Satan/Jehovah. The True God is unconditional Love. The books of the Nag Hammadi Library discuss these matters in greater detail, so I refer the reader to them. http://www.gnosis.org/naghamm/nhl.html

Yes, I believe Jesus came to set us free from the false god and his lies, and imparts personal experiential knowledge of the true God of Love, the Most High God, who dwells within all of us. I remember Jesus said that eternal life is knowing the one true God (our heavenly Father, not the Old Testament god), and Jesus Christ whom He has sent.

The word "enemy" occurs 96 times, "enemies" 251 times, "wrath" 139 times, "anger" 229 times, "rage" 18 times, "destroy" 230 times, and "kill" 82 times in connection with Jehovah in the Old Testament. I ask you; why would an  all-powerful, all wise, all good Loving God have enemies?

That's true, if the true God who is all powerful, all wise and all good and loving has enemies, why would Jesus pray "Father, forgive them for they know not what they are doing"? Instead, Jesus might as well have prayed "O Lord of hosts, may you smite these Roman soldiers who nailed me to the cross and these Pharisees for mocking me". But yea, the fact that Jesus prayed to the Father for forgiveness shows that our heavenly Father is definitely different from the petty and vengeful god of the old testament - our heavenly Father is Love, and Love keeps no records of wrongs. Jesus understood that the Romans and the Jews crucified him out of their ignorance and blindness by the religious Old Testament god.