Indiana

In the new testament, God was only hard on the religious elite, who always missed the point.

Absolutely correct! The Pharisees where Jesus' perennial sparring partners on that front, and Jesus had very few kind words to say about them.

As far as not holding people to personal standards, that's explicitly in the Bible, too. Peter at the Council of Jerusalem, Acts 15:10 (talking to some Pharisees who infiltrated the Church, incidentally):

"Why do you try to test God by putting on the necks of Gentiles a yoke that neither we nor our ancestors have been able to bear?"

And the "test God" language here is especially notable, because most of the times that shows up in the Bible, it's the Devil himself doing it. This language isn't ever used about Thomas's doubts. It's an expression of deep distrust in God's ability or goodness, particularly by people who should know better (or at least who would know better if they were who they claim to be); an identification that the person doing the testing is just doing it for personal gain, not for their own faith or edification; and an unwillingness to change their mind in the face of evidence.

Sound familiar?

People literally died in the New Testament for testing God like this. That's the game they're playing here. They're playing the parts of the Pharisees to a T.