Relational Sanity Pt 7: We can’t make people love us, or even act decently towards us, so why even try?

It is a difficult thing, dealing with people who hurt others so casually that they don’t even remember the things they have done (or perhaps they do remember and just don’t care enough to admit it) but, like many things in life, their cruelty is absolutely out of our control.

I see people on a regular basis, struggling for significance in the eyes of people who have absolutely no desire to love them, validate them, or even be decent to them. And that was me, for many years, so I do absolutely understand the need for approval. So what changed? I took a good hard look at the people who do this, the ones who I called “runaway freight trains” in my last blog post, and started asking myself:

“Great googly moogly, why on earth would I want the approval of anyone who is so casually callous?”

And more importantly, “Why would I want to continue to give this person free reign to marginalize me in this game of theirs that only they determine the rules of?”

The truth is that too often we willingly place our mental health into the hands of liars, manipulators and people who just generally have no conscience left.

You have to know me, I can still remember the three really cruel things I did to people in elementary school. I don’t hurt people so casually that I forget about it, and that is an excellent thing (even though I used to see it as a curse) because it keeps me from speaking my opinions, doing whatever it is I want to do, and lashing out every time I get in the flesh. It isn’t that I don’t still do those things from time to time, but my conscience tortures me afterward. I simply cannot imagine hurting someone and forgetting it – unless I said something that was taken the wrong way and the person didn’t tell me, but that isn’t really forgetting, that is just not realizing what I did to hurt someone. (Which is why it is good to confront people when they seem to say something out of character, because we all say idiotic things from time to time that sounded better in our heads)

But not everyone is like that and in fact for many people, the feelings of others don’t even register as an afterthought because they are utterly irrelevant. Oftentimes this happens when a person is so assured that they are right, and in right standing, that they do not question themselves or their actions – like King Saul. And there is nothing that anyone can do to change that. Some people enjoy being self-satisfied, so confident in their rightness that they are not even willing to question themselves in private — or perhaps they did long ago but decided to push away their doubts, searing their consciences to the point where they really are no longer able to see or care about their wrongs. If this is the case, then the person is no longer even worth our pity, and certainly not our continued support, and definitely not worth being in contact with! After all, they have ammunition, and they have diligently trained themselves to fire it off — do we really owe it to them to stand close enough to make it easy?

Unless we are small children, a relationship with this sort of person really is our own choice, and we have the power to step out of it. But the first step is giving up the fight to make ourselves more lovable to that person, because wanting their love, their approval or their repentance puts them in the position of having authority over our peace and happiness. It is tantamount to knowingly submitting to a wicked tyrant and trying to win him over by playing the game by his rules. Unfortunately, people like this have no respect for those who not only willingly play their game, but who also allow them to win every time! They merely tolerate the person, who has become nothing more than an outlet for their continued cruelty. Loving a person is different than trying to gain their love. We are required to love, but nowhere does scripture tell us to go out and win someone at any cost – it is a pursuit rooted in selfishness. Yes, even when it is simply a child desperately wanting the love their parent refuses to give, not selfish in terms of being evil or malicious, but simply centered in meeting one’s own needs. In this life, we oftentimes have to go without those things we desire, and sometimes we don’t get what we need because the only person who can give it refuses to do so.

Just think about it – say you are in a church with a pastor like this, or an adult child of a parent like this. A parishoner can always walk away from the abuse, just as an adult can walk away from a parent – but when the parishoner stays, they are giving their approval that leadership should function in this way, and when the adult goes back under the authority of an abusive parent, they also are giving their consent to the abuse. Tell me, why on earth would an abuser stop abusing when the object of their abuse gives them permission and opportunity to do so? If the abuser is callous enough to hurt people without caring, why would they see this situation as anything other than confirmation that they are right? As long as people stay and tolerate it, the abuser is going to feel as though they are in the right and justified to continue (that being said, if everyone leaves, they might simply say that it is the devil attacking them, but you can’t do anything about people’s delusions – such people who are callous about the feelings of others are generally hypersensitive about themselves to the point of paranoia, which is why they attract enablers around them to feel misplaced sympathy).

The truth is, that as much as we would love for the person to see our patience and kindness and respond by feeling badly about what they are doing, we give them no reason to question themselves (even if they wanted to). Our patience and kindness generally amounts to enablement, and turning a blind eye while others are abused by this same person. It is a bad enough thing to quietly tolerate our own abuse, but to ignore the cries of others? This is when we become oppressors by proxy, why? Just to get the abuser to be nice to us. That is too high a price tag for approval.

The epistles tell us repeatedly that the leaders of the church (and by extension, parents and bosses and really all leaders) are to be our example for godly behavior, that we should in fact imitate them. But what do we do when their behavior should not be imitated? Do we stay and give our silent approval? Do we have the right, with our continued presence, to send a message to others that this is in fact the way a leader should treat the Body of Messiah? Brethren, there are a great many ways to bring the Name of God to vain in this world, and one of the worst ways we do it is by behaving abusively or following those who do. We do not have the right to drag the Name of God through the dirt by following evil, arrogant men and women who slaughter the flock and don’t even look back, or remember. Until we start caring more about the reputation of our King than we do about getting along with those who have no desire to love, we will continue to do violence to His Word and His character.

People don’t change behavior that is coddled and encouraged – why should they?

In closing I will say this, we are going to be rejected and abused in this life and we have to learn to expect it, but before we go feeling betrayed and wounded we need to take a good hard look at who it is who is hurting us. Is that person good or evil, are they an encourager or someone who ignores everything good you do and only harps on the mistakes? Is the person only ever present in any real way when the opportunity is there to humiliate you? Are they only kind to you when you approve of the evil they do to others? Are they volatile? Can their favor be bought with money? Is this person the same in private as in public? Do they hold their loved ones to different standards than they hold you to? If the person who has done evil to you is evil, then rejoice. You do not want the approval of that type of person, because the approval of an evil person is generally only given if they see some evil in you to approve of. Their disapproval speaks more highly of you than their approval ever would anyway.

The truth is, that we spend far too much time seeking the approval of the very people whose disapproval should be a badge of honor.

Relational Sanity Pt 6: Remorse, reflection, responsibility and repentance

Often in our lives we are faced with people who are harmful, plowing through the lives of others like freight trains that have jumped the tracks. We can break these individuals down into two groups — the people who feel remorseful when they see the pain they cause and those who don’t. As there is no use whatsoever in talking about the second group (because they don’t care and therefore will not change), I am going to focus on the first – using King Saul as an example.

As we read through the accounts in I Samuel, we see that Saul is a very tormented individual – literally. God sends an evil spirit to vex him and Saul ends up struggling with it for the rest of his life instead of repenting and turning his life around. As we know, this is the point where David enters into the picture, having been brought to the palace in order to play music to soothe Saul by sending the evil spirit away for a time. Unfortunately, jealousy and paranoia get the best of Saul and he returns David’s service with violence. Saul throws spears at David; Saul conspires to have David killed in battle under the pretext of securing a dowry, and he even sends soldiers to his bedroom at night in an attempt to kill him. David escapes and spends years living in the wilderness of Israel, hiding in caves as Saul hunts him.

Twice during this time, David has the opportunity to kill Saul but he instead uses the opportunity to show Saul that he can be trusted. On both these occasions we see that Saul is grieved and filled with remorse when he sees that he has wronged David. But what exactly does remorse amount to?

Saul felt bad, and he briefly remembered David as a son, his loyal servant. He sees that the effects of his pursuit have been harmful, he feels guilty, and he goes home. Remorse is good as it shows the humanity of Saul, his ability to perceive that he has harmed someone else, but Saul never seems to reach the next step. You see, remorse can come from a place of empathy or it can come from a place of self-centeredness. There is a big difference between feeling bad for causing someone else pain, and simply feeling bad because we don’t like that the results of our actions have been negative. I think that Saul fell into the second category.

When we have done harm and feel badly, there are two paths we can take. The first is to reflect upon our actions and question them, and the second is to refuse to question our actions while simply regretting the results. For example, let’s pretend that I always speak my mind and I hurt you. I can either question whether or not I have the right to say whatever pops into my mind, and really analyze whether I am acting in a destructive, harmful and sinful way, or, I can simply regret that you were hurt by what I said and go on as though I haven’t done anything wrong, feeling badly that you feel badly, but under the delusion that I am justified. I submit that this is what Saul did, that he never took any time to reflect on whether or not his actions were evil. He said the right words, and then went home because he felt badly, but as we see he started up the pursuit again as though nothing had ever happened.

But perhaps he did reflect on his actions, which might have been why he went home. It is possible. Upon reflection, one has to make the next choice; do they accept responsibility? Responsibility says, “This poor guy, I have been chasing him for years, that’s on me. I chucked the spear at him, I commanded the soldiers to go kill him in the night, I have led the armies against him. No one else was responsible, it was me and I was wrong.” Now, the fact that he continued chasing David shows that he either didn’t reach this phase, or he decided that he was justified – but taking responsibility is meaningless if we have not rightly judged our actions. It is certainly easy to justify our sins towards others, even when they are innocent of evil against us. The human drive towards self-justification is a powerful one. But someone who truly takes responsibility for their actions in a righteous way will follow it up with repentance.

Saul spoke the words, but he never showed true repentance until the day he died. He continued to chase a man who was not his enemy, trying to kill him, and all because David was honored by the people. It is really too bad, because we see that God changed Saul’s heart when He made him king. That means that Saul had the opportunity to be a David, to found a great dynasty, to destroy the Amalekites and be a righteous man.

Now contrast this with David, who took another man’s wife, got her pregnant, and treacherously had her husband killed. When confronted with very great sins, he showed immediate remorse, he reflected, he accepted responsibility and he repented and never did anything like it again. That’s why David was a man after God’s own heart and Saul was not.

This is a lesson for all of us. Do we plunge ahead assuming that we are right and simply regretting that sometimes our methods injure the innocent, as though they are acceptable losses – or do we pause when we have damaged someone and re-evaluate ourselves? If our remorse does not lead to reflection, responsibility and repentance then we will have squandered our new hearts, and risk becoming illegitimate – regardless of whether we are kings or paupers.

Why did I place this under the “relational sanity” category? Because not only do we have to rightly judge ourselves in this area, but we also have to recognize that words do not always reflect true repentance. Actions over time reveal the fruit, but words are easy. We must forgive, but we do not need to trust someone who has been doing evil. Nowhere is there a biblical mandate to trust anyone, and not trusting Saul saved David’s life on more than one occasion. David looked at the fruit of Saul, his actions, and refused to trust him. David didn’t turn that mistrust into betrayal or take the opportunity to do evil, but he also wasn’t going to throw that mistrust out the window and act like a fool either. We must be gentle as doves, yes, but also wise as serpents.

Honor, Shame, and the Kiss of Esau (and why I think it was genuine)

(Edit on 11-23-15: This was one of my first “teaching” blogs, so it is a bit rough, but I still agree with what I presented)

I have been studying the concept of honor and shame in the ancient near east and it has quite literally transformed how I see everything in the scriptures, but I think this week was the first time it actually made me laugh.

As I have been learning through this year’s Torah and Haftarah cycles with Rooted-in-Torah.com and WisdominTorah.com, the ancient near east had (and still has in some cultures) what is referred to as a “zero-sum” economy in terms of honor and shame – there is only so much honor to go around within a peer group. If I want to get more honor, I have to get it at the expense of everyone else. Now that doesn’t mean I have to get it dishonestly; it just means that if I do something epic and my honor increases, then yours decreases if we are in the same group. This is why “Saul has slain his thousands and David his ten thousands” was such a big deal to Saul because David was being seen as having more honor than the King.

So anyway, here we have Jacob and Esau, the sons of Isaac. They constitute a peer group, with Esau having a higher level of honor than Isaac due to his first born status. In addition, Esau is what we would call a “man’s man” in that he is a hunter, very manly in appearance, and his father’s favorite. He was also a ladies man, having a couple of wives while Jacob still had none. Jacob systematically, through uncharitableness (is that a word?) and deception, steals the honor which was Esau’s by birth (his ascribed honor as first born). First, Jacob fails to feed his hungry brother as we are commanded to do (even according to the near eastern hospitality laws of the time), and next through deceiving his blind father (Lev 19:14). Now, all the reasons and all the failings of the other people involved aren’t an issue here because we are going to look at this from Esau’s point of view.

So this week we studied Vayishlach, which covers Gen 32-36. And here we find Jacob on his way back into the land, decades later. Jacob sends a messenger to let Esau know that he is coming and the messenger returns with word that Esau is coming with 400 men. Is he coming to fight? Oh yeah, I believe he was.

From Esau’s vantage, this meeting was a long time in coming. He is no longer living with his mother and father, possibly because he was so disgraced at that point that he just up and left – having lost face with the community three times. First when he sold his birthright, the second when Jacob stole the blessing, and the third when he realized that he was not honored in the eyes of his parents on account of his wives. So I think he went to where he was going to be honored.

So he hears now that Jacob is coming, and I don’t think the priority of the 400 men was to be an army, I think they were primarily witnesses to see Esau kick his brother’s butt to the curb and help only if required. Esau has been waiting for decades to get his peer-group honor back and this is his chance. He can crush his little brother like a bug (and if you don’t think that he looked on his twin as his younger brother, then you probably don’t have front line experience with fraternal twin boys because this is something I hear every day).

So what happens? He and his buddies are coming towards Jacob’s camp and first they see 220 goats, 220 sheep, 30 mamma camels with 30 babies, 50 head of cattle, and 20 mamma donkeys with ten babies. These are presented as a gift for “Esau my master.” I saw a very conservative estimate in a paper this morning that put the value at about $97,000. This was a tribute worthy of Solomon. Additionally, here come the wives, and all the children, and last of all Jacob. What does Jacob do? He bows down 7 times, signifying Esau as his king in near eastern tradition. And then his wives and children bow before Esau as well. To top it all off, Jacob tells Esau that the sight of his face was like seeing the face of God.

In front of 400 witnesses.

Do I think that Esau was glad to see Jacob? Oh yeah I do. Do I think that he was thrilled to be treated with such honor, given such kingly gifts? Absolutely. Do I believe that all of Esau’s honor was restored in his own eyes as he accepted his brother’s fealty, and as he got to say in front of witnesses that he was so great that he had no need of Jacob’s gifts? You betcha.

I also think that Esau’s invitation to Jacob, to come and live as his vassal was absolutely genuine,and that he was thinking that his father’s prophecy about breaking off the yoke of his brother was coming to pass; his brother was going to serve him and acknowledge him as king for the rest of his life.

I also believe that all that honor vanished into thin air when Jacob promised to follow him and then did not. Esau waited, and Jacob never came, and he realized that once again, he had been made a fool of by his brother – bought off and manipulated, that he had missed his opportunity to give Jacob the smack down he had been dreaming of for many years. And even worse — it had all played out in front of 400 witnesses.

Now why did I laugh? It really isn’t very funny because this is about real people, but it played out in my mind like a movie and the situation was just so dysfunctional that I couldn’t help myself.

I realize that this take on it is very much a departure from how many folks teach this, and I am certainly not saying that this is right and everyone else is wrong — it’s just another way of looking at it, another possibility in terms of honor and shame in the ancient near east. We all have part of the picture. The Bible is a book about real people who lived real three-dimensional lives and there is more to the situations than we see in black and white.

THIS IS NOT the most amazing revelation you will ever read.

I know this has nothing to do with my post but my new glasses and my book finally arrived! My kids tell me they make me look 10 years younger but I think they just want a new computer game….

Every once in a while, someone will send me a teaching they want me to watch because it has confused and upset them and they want my take on it (or they want to trick me into denying Messiah – but we’ll just assume the best in this post and stick with the first group). I will pull up the video or post or podcast and one of a few things will happen:

1. It will be advertised as the most amazing revelation I have ever heard. Really? Because Yeshua (Jesus) and Moses and Daniel have given me some pretty amazing revelations and I have yet to see anyone top them. I just won’t listen to anyone who thinks so highly of himself. Even Yeshua and Moses didn’t say that sort of thing about their teachings.

2. I will see the “teacher” whom it came from, roll my eyes and tell the person to not worry about it. There are a lot of people out there who have quite literally gone bonkers. Some got into gematria and kabbalism when they weren’t even firmly rooted in the scriptures and it just drove them insane and now they are recruiting people into their delusions (note: gematria and kabbalism are deep mystical Jewish writings and the Rabbis themselves tell people not to even look at them until they have been deep in Torah study for 40 years BECAUSE it drives people who are not grounded crazy), and I have seen the arrogance and volatility that comes over a person when they do this – or maybe it just exposes what is already there, I don’t know. Others are so determined to have exciting teachings and to be seen as great revelators, and special, that they stray too far from the actual material and pull things literally out of thin air (like Jerusalem being replaced by a small town in Texas, or Utah or something).

3. I will hear that they received the revelation in a dream, a revelation that cannot be proven from scripture and has been revealed ONLY to them. Now, people who know me know that I dream all the time and sometimes I share the content of those dreams when they can be of use to the Body – but they are never doctrinal, and they never reveal anything that you can’t get anywhere else. In fact, when I do share something, I will often have someone say, “Oh my goodness, I have been hearing that same message from so many people lately!” There is always going to be confirmation out there.

4. The teaching is needlessly complicated, so much so that one has to suspend disbelief at some point and take the teacher’s word for it. I am going to state something very clearly here – there is nothing that can be taught from the scripture that cannot be built up to logically, piece by piece, until we arrive at the truth – without making huge jumps. Now that I am learning the ancient near eastern context of the scriptures, I understand that the Targums (written before the time of Messiah, in Aramaic, and reflected the way that the rabbis of the time saw the scriptures), when they speak of Messiah, are not making blind but very logical leaps based on their first hand knowledge of covenants, suzerain kings, royal messengers, near eastern law, adoption, righteousness and justice, honor and shame. In other words, if you lived when they lived, you would not have to take it on faith once Yeshua opened up the scriptures and showed you what was there. You’d facepalm and wonder why you didn’t see it before.

5. The teaching is divisive, placing one group in Messiah above another when scripture supports that nowhere. Of course, the person teaching this is always in the “above” group, and I find this akin to white slave owners telling their black slaves that the Bible justifies what they are doing and then refusing to teach them to read and write so they just have to accept it as true, or redefining what certain verses mean once they do read them.

6. The teacher is pointing to his or herself as “the only one who is telling the truth.” Or the teacher will say that anyone else who looks at the same data and sees it differently is a liar. That’s just another way of saying, “don’t verify what I am saying by hearing anyone else out, you’d better follow me.” There is no room for disagreement, no two ways to view a verse, and no reasonable way for an intelligent person to honestly arrive at a different conclusion.

You want to know what the GREATEST REVELATION YOU WILL EVER HEAR is? If you are reading this, and you already know that Yeshua (Jesus) is Messiah and that His Word is eternal and that our Heavenly Father is our great King and Father through adoption and Covenant — then you’ve already heard it. The rest is cake. And the cake doesn’t need to be loaded down with decorations and sprinkles and plastic figurines and candles. If you are like me, and you have cake in the house, then you want to eat it until it is all gone and then you want to call up the bakery and get more. If we would treat the Word of God like that, like it is the most amazing revelation we have ever heard, if we would devour every single chapter, scraping away the excess frosting and all the glitz and glam piled on top of it and just eat the cake in context, then we would be wise.

Why read what someone in the 18th, 19th or 20th century thinks about what Abraham was doing if they don’t know what he knew? Find out what Abraham knew and then his life will open up to you in amazing ways. Abraham wasn’t a 21st century Christian or a 21st Century Jew. He didn’t think the way we think, and things that make sense to us wouldn’t make sense to him and vice versa. Study in such a way as to render yourself able to discern if someone is teaching the truth, not through feelings (which are often counterfeit) but through knowledge. Truly, things that I had “a positive witness of” years ago I now realize just appealed to my emotions. A positive witness to me now, is that when something is preached, I immediately discern connections all over the place. For example, when I learned about the ancient near eastern honor/shame based culture I immediately thought of examples in scripture that had never been clear before that knowledge. It was like rockets going off in my head, bursting my ignorance in certain passages that had bothered me. Now I see it everywhere.

We don’t need the super deep stuff, folks. It’s really interesting, but what we need FIRST is to understand what is plainly there as the people to whom it was written in the first place would have seen it. I hate to break it to you, but the Bible wasn’t written for us. I mean, it was written for our benefit, but it was written by and to the people of the time it was written in. It wasn’t written the way I write things, so that hopefully anyone can understand it. If the Bible was written by me, it would be 100 times as long and with too many commas. The Bible was written to people who lived in certain places and knew certain things, it was meant to convey concepts, not to be absolutely specific. It is truthful, which is different than precise. For example, my turtleneck is red and that is the truth, but precisely, it is maroon. The fact that it is maroon does not mean I lied when I said it was red, it just means that I did not give all the information. The Bible doesn’t explain what a Covenant is, but it didn’t need to because everyone knew. The Bible doesn’t explain why people made sacrifices to God, because everyone knew. The Bible doesn’t explain how Yeshua (Jesus) could be the literal heir of King David even though genetically He wasn’t from that line, because everyone understood adoption. The Bible doesn’t explain what the Lake of Fire is because everyone knew, nor does it explain She’ol (the grave or hell). Our problem is that we don’t know, and we don’t always want to find out so we assume that the people telling us what they think actually know. We just want to pretend that the Holy Spirit, who could teach the first century believers all things whatsoever out of scripture because they did know the context of it, can overcome our absolute ignorance of historical context and do the same. If we know the context, then the Spirit will in fact teach us all things – but the Spirit imparts spiritual things, not historical knowledge; so if we do not know what they knew, we will not understand what it is the Spirit is trying to communicate to us. That is not a failing on the part of the Spirit, but personal limitations based upon our understanding.

So we need to study to show ourselves approved. The Bereans only had to study the scriptures, but we also have to study out what the Bereans knew that we don’t.

Questioning Everything – did Pilate write to Tiberius about Yeshua?

It really chaps my hide when believers post hoaxes about our Savior, especially ones that are easily knocked down by anyone who knows even a little bit about the historical context of the first century. This link (his_letter) will take you to a ludicrously falsified letter purportedly from Pontius Pilate to Tiberius Caesar, written by a discredited man and published in a discredited book that is still on the market called The Archko Volume. The writer was convicted of fraud in an ecclesiastical court! If the author had known about Roman culture he would have written it entirely differently, but he assumed that Christians would be so overcome by the blue-eyed blonde haired Gentile-ish Jesus that they would not ask any questions. For the most part he was right, but actual scholars were quick to knock him on his tuchus. I read this back in 2004 while I was a Pentecostal and right away I knew something was wrong but I lacked any knowledge of the historical realities of the Imperial Cult of Rome. I recently revisited it because I saw several people posting it and with my current knowledge I saw right away what was wrong with it. I will mention only a few.

Now, I say if he could do all these things, which he did and many more, as the Jews all testify, and it was doing these things that created this enmity against him– he was not charged with criminal offenses, nor was he charged with violating any
law, nor of wronging any individual in person, and all these facts are known to thousands, as well by his foes as by his friends–I am almost ready to say, as did Manlius at the cross: “Truly this was the Son of God.”

See the part I underlined? I want to teach you about the Imperial Cult of Rome, from which only the Jews were exempt.

Dead Caesars were worshiped as gods and once a year every Roman citizen (and non-citizen) was required to make a sacrifice to them, in public. Being polytheists, the people didn’t really care and they all did it — except for the Jews, they refused and would revolt every time it was pressed. This was very distressing to the Romans, who had never met with such resistance on such a thing and in the end a deal was struck; Jews would pay a special tax and be exempt.

Now, Tiberius, like a few other Caesars, made up coins declaring himself to be the “son of god” because his “father” Octavius had already been deified by the Senate. Ever wonder why Yeshua (Jesus) made the comment about giving to Caesar what is Caesar’s and to God what is God’s?

Mark 12:14-17 And when they were come, they say unto him, Master, we know that thou art true, and carest for no man: for thou regardest not the person of men, but teachest the way of God in truth: Is it lawful to give tribute to Caesar, or not?

Shall we give, or shall we not give? But he, knowing their hypocrisy, said unto them, Why tempt ye me? bring me a penny, that I may see it.

And they brought it. And he saith unto them, Whose is this image and superscription? And they said unto him, Caesar’s.

And Jesus answering said unto them, Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and to God the things that are God’s. And they marvelled at him.

What is the back story here? I told you that they had to pay a tax to be exempt from this sacrifice to dead Caesars, and there were the Pharisees who believed they should go on paying the tax so as to refrain from idolatry, and the Herodians, who were Roman lackeys and would have probably just loved to sacrifice in order to not pay extra taxes (which is why they were mentioned in verse 13). That was the real question, would Yeshua promote idolatry or not? Either way He answered, one of the sides was ready to pounce – the Herodians would scream rebellion or the Pharisees would scream idolatry. So Yeshua took the coin and looked at the “son of god” inscription and pretty much made it clear to them that by even possessing the coin, they were already accepting Tiberius as the son of god and if they wanted to give to God what is rightfully His (sacrifice and worship) then they should give Caesar back the money that says that he is the son of god. So the tax was upheld as a way to satisfy both parties and break no Torah law. In other words, by giving up the money in the form of this tax, they were throwing the profession of divinity back in Caesar’s face. Hope that makes sense.

So what does that have to do with the aforementioned letter? Pontius Pilate was required to worship Caesar as a god, and serve Tiberias as the son of god. The penalty for not doing so was death — just ask the early Christians once they made the break with Judaism in the second century! Once the split happened, they were no longer able to pay their way out of the requirement to sacrifice once a year to these false gods. Many caved in and many died. To even propose that Pontius Pilate would dare to suggest that he was almost ready to say that Yeshua was the Son of God would be a treasonous offense. He would have been executed. It is an absolute impossibility. And yes, Pilate was a jerk but to hand over the name of his own Centurion who did commit treason by saying it (especially if he commiserated with him)? Great googly moogly, I don’t think so.

Another problem with this letter is at the beginning — the suggestion that the officials would not eat with Pilate. The priesthood was terminally corrupt, they were buying into the priesthood and weren’t even Levites, much less priests. They were carnal, and believed that there was no resurrection, no final judgment and so they took their rewards in this life – which is why they had no problems with running the corrupt money changer tables on the temple grounds. They were also murderers. They weren’t the types to feign holiness when there was political power to be had in this lifetime. This isn’t Aaron and Phineas here, this was a bunch of pretenders.

And let us not forget the physical appearance of Yeshua. The scriptures themselves prophesied that he would be a man of unremarkable appearance, but Pilate’s letter make him out to look like Thor or Captain America.

Is 53:2For he shall grow up before him as a tender plant, and as a root out of a dry ground: he hath no form nor comeliness; and when we shall see him, there is no beauty that we should desire him.

It is a Greek-inspired mind that wants to worship a beautiful Man, not a Hebrew. It is what Valerie Moody calls “my big fat greek mindset.” Greeks were obsessed with physical perfection (Socrates was a noted exception to that, and they killed him, go figure). If Yeshua was beautiful then everyone would have followed Him! Hey, a man who gives out free food, heals the sick and is drop dead gorgeous? I’d be first in line!

Finally, Messiah claimants were rising up and causing a ruckus at Passover every few years – this wasn’t new or unique. Pilate had seen this happen before, and he usually had to squelch the rebellion that ensued. He had no reason whatsoever to write to Tiberius about this. And frankly, given the circumstances surrounding the disappearance of the body — he sure as heck wouldn’t want to.

There are so many more historical fallacies in this letter that I could write another five blogposts on it, but I prefer to stick with scripture so I am not going to do that. I simply wanted to address some glaring errors that were easily explained.

In the end, if something looks too good to be true, it probably is, and the more it appeals to our excitement and flesh — well, that is exactly how you bait a hook to catch a fish. And when we post things and don’t do our research into whether it is even reasonable or even logical, then some atheist who does know the culture is going to shred us and discount everything we say. Why shouldn’t he? When we are so quick to believe whatever we see, does he have any reason to take our Bible-thumping seriously?