Episode 140: Avoiding ”Torah Terrorism”–a beginner’s guide to not destroying your witness (and your family)

When I wrote The Bridge: Crossing Over into the Fulness of Covenant Life, it was for the purpose of bringing people together who didn’t understand one another. On one hand, we had the burgeoning “Torah movement” of Christians who were discovering the delights of the Sabbath and Festivals, and the benefits of eating cleaner and on the other hand we had their families who were taught that this was legalistic. And no one was really behaving themselves or really listening and so people got needlessly angry and when people are angry, they are very likely to believe the worst about one another. And so they did–and we all forgot that we were saved at the Cross and not when we came to a certain level of knowledge. I gave a talk like this a couple of months back to an online group and I am recreating it from my notes today. My notes will be in the transcript at www.theancientbridge.com but it will not be the usual full transcript.

If you can’t see the podcast link, click here.

So, this is a bit different–no full transcript, I went from these notes and added a lot more so you might want to catch the actual podcast this time around.

I want to mostly talk about the problems with a lot of the teachings and propaganda and mantras and paradigms within the HRM and MJ that I see causing problems

  1. One of the most important things is that people largely don’t read the Bible correctly—we look at what was happening in the Biblical accounts and see things as ideals instead of descriptions. But the Bible, and I was reading Sandra Richter’s The Epic of Eden the other day and she made the point that I absolutely agree with—the Bible isn’t endorsing or canonizing Hebrew or Jewish culture or any other culture. The Bible is critiquing all human culture and shows how God is leading us out of our own worldly kingdoms into His Kingdom. Biblical heroes are also often monsters. They do terrible things. We were never meant to make excuses for them—when we see bad behavior the Bible, being a wisdom text, is inviting and even demanding that we engage viscerally with the story. We aren’t supposed to read it and be unmoved. Sometimes we will be thrilled and at other times we will be utterly disgusted. We will have questions about things that outrage us with no answers given. According to Yeshua, Moses even gave laws that were basically allowances for evil—slavery, and patriarchy, and alternatives to wartime rape. And it’s okay to react to that and even grapple with it as Jacob grappled with the angel of the Lord. If we aren’t struggling with the text then we aren’t really reading it as it was written to its ancient Near Eastern audience. When people coming to Torah aren’t taught that–that Torah is wisdom literature designed to promote critical righteous thinking and to serve as really a training manual for Israel’s judges, it gets misused as a very black and white list of do’s and don’ts with no discernment allowed for when to make exceptions, when to place one instruction before another, when one even invalidates another. Obviously now we see that chattel slavery, which Moses allowed, goes specifically against the commandments to love neighbor and foreigner both. We keep pushing the envelope of love, and we look back with gratitude that the world has come so far from the brutality of the ancient Near Eastern world of Abraham, Moses, and David that a lot of these laws were very avant-garde when they were given in terms of protecting women and children and foreigners and the vulnerable, now horrify us because the Cross has changed how we view everything.
  2. Everyone who has given their allegiance to Yahweh through His Son, no matter what name they call Him by, is our brother and sister. Period. Salvation is about allegiance, not about how much Torah we think is still in play.
  3. If you wouldn’t be willing to die on a cross for someone, don’t be too keen to overturn their tables. Or engage in polemic with them—ie name-calling—because it meant something in those times that it doesn’t mean now. And overturning tables was a prophetic act that only applied to the Messiah, just FYI. When we do it, it’s usually just bad behavior.
  4. Don’t forget your salvation—it’s easy when gaining knowledge (and not yet knowing how to figure out if it is true or not because Torah peeps dish out just as much nonsense as mainstream Christians, if not more) to forget what we know. And what we know is the very real experience of the New Creation, the very real changes in our lives, after we made that decision for Jesus. Although a lot of people scream and shout about not being saved by Torah, their words and actions are the opposite.
  5. No one keeps Torah, some people just keep a few more commandments than other people. And Christians aren’t lawless, they keep more than half (58%) of what can currently be observed (42%). Your average “TO” keeps maybe 8% more. And, sadly, the mainstream Christians who are keeping that 58% are more likely to be keeping the weightier matters of the law than TO peeps. These are mantras—TO and lawless, which don’t apply to anyone. I have found that once people are aware of it, the gulf between us really radically decreases. The Hebrew Scriptures have multiple words for sin—and different levels. The lowest is chattat, meaning an oopsie. You had no idea you were sinning and it wasn’t on purpose, you aren’t in rebellion. The worst is pesha, high-handed rebellion, spit in God’s face while you are purposefully doing something He really hates, like oppressing people. I’ll talk about this more later but God really does differentiate through the Torah, Prophets, and Writings. All sins are not created equal.
  6. Don’t get prideful about the easy stuff, like resting on the Sabbath and throwing the right parties, and eating cleaner. That’s why those aren’t included in the Matthew 25 separation of the Sheep and the Goats but caring for the vulnerable is the only criteria mentioned.
  7. It is important to keep in mind what an image-bearer is and is not. An image-bearer is quite literally a representative of God’s character on earth—the language used actually makes us out to be the equivalent of ANE idols, tselem, which were supposed to be indwelt by the spirit of the deity it represented. The people saw the idol and they were supposed to remember that god or goddess. It’s the things we do in public that show people God’s character, right rulings, justice, righteousness, and generosity. Speaking of fruit—we have to be careful about zeal. Because holy and unholy zeal are juxtaposed in Galatians 5. When we make the grave mistake (and I think almost everyone does it) of neglecting the NT and focusing on the Torah, we can become dreadfully unbalanced and even violent in our speech, actions, and in our faces. And people can’t see the love we are to have for one another because it has been replaced by anger, and anger can grow the wrong kind of zeal. Now the works of the flesh are obvious: sexual immorality, moral impurity, promiscuity, idolatry, sorcery, hatreds, strife, jealousy, outbursts of anger, selfish ambitions, dissensions, factions, envy, drunkenness, carousing, and anything similar. I am warning you about these things—as I warned you before—that those who practice such things will not inherit the kingdom of God. But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. The law is not against such things. Now those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. If we live by the Spirit, let us also keep in step with the Spirit. Let us not become conceited, provoking one another, envying one another.
  8. The three-year tree requirement (lesson from the fruit tree). Learn, study, and keep your mouth shut. People who have recently made major shifts lack the understanding to rightly divide the new information they are getting. Being a Berean cannot be accomplished by listening to YouTube videos and just taking people’s word for things—if the Bereans had just taken Paul’s word for everything, they wouldn’t have bothered studying.
  9. Anger at the church compromises our discernment and judgment. They aren’t wrong about everything and, in fact, they are right about most things. You know, we are blinded to what we are blinded about. God opens eyes. Folks get ridiculously frustrated just because they preach and people don’t believe them. It doesn’t work that way. One, we have to have credibility with the people we are talking to (or they will be stupid to just take our word for everything) and also, they have to be receptive when we do it, plus, we can’t be behaving like unloving jerks. Speaking the truth in love—it isn’t done with a club or a machete. Pro 28:9 Anyone who turns his ear away from hearing the law—even his prayer is detestable.–>this one gets abused a lot. Hardly anyone would turn their ear from hearing Torah—the only question is how much has a person been conditioned to believe is still in play. This isn’t about rebellion, it’s about blindness and goodness knows we are all blind.
  10. Hebrew is not a unique language—it is very similar to many other languages of that region in antiquity. The idea of “returning to a pure tongue” is Rabbinic and much later than Biblical times. Also, Paleo-Hebrew isn’t a secret language, it’s a font like Times New Roman. This whole idea about the pictographs having meaning was created within the last hundred years because it took archaeologists a while to even figure out that it was Hebrew after they first found it in 1870 and at first they believed it was Phoenician. But the pictures were typical of the early origins of language and represented sounds and not concepts. This means that there are no ancient documents describing any such language, as the font went out of use in the 5th century BCE when the Aramaic language came to be used.
  11. Calendars and Names. I think there are five or six “Biblical calendars” out there. I know a guy who has actually preached all of them and has condemned as damned and stupid those on any other calendar than the one he is on right now. First, he was on Rabbinic, and then first-sliver, this is about ten years ago and he beat people to death with it. Then some folks preached dark moon conjunction to him and he was all over that and yelling at people. Then lunar Sabbath. Then the Jubilees calendar and now he is teaching Enoch calendar—and he isn’t the slightest bit humbled by how many times he has been “wrong.” He always thinks “Now I have got it!” And he is far from alone. Same thing with Names. I don’t even know how many names our floating along out there. And then there are people who will tell you that if you don’t say the Name exactly right, your prayers won’t be heard—but that’s right out of ancient magic beliefs, the idea that if you say the Name, just so, that you can control the god or goddess or demon and they have to hear and obey you. I have even heard it taught that if you are using Jesus that any miracles you receive are from the devil and not from God!
  12. A lot of what is taught by the HRM and MJ is simply not true but is passionately held to as though it is Scripture and I have taught some of it myself. Hislop, genetic hierarchies, etc. patriarchy, Hebraic vs Greek vs ANE. C&E. Marriages in crisis because not honoring vows to love them when they haven’t changed. And so we get all these memes filled with urban legends, lies, and outright propaganda from nonsense books and teachings that get aimed at Christians over Christmas and Easter that aren’t founded in one iota of archaeological evidence. But people made a lot of money writing books that weren’t researched or documented or footnoted, and sometimes when there are footnotes, they just refer to other books with no footnotes. There’s a reason why the people who really seriously study don’t teach this sort of thing. And why so many ministries have quietly removed these teachings from their repertoire.
  13. Pagan vs cultural. This is a biggie. There is a huge difference between something being idolatrous—which is actually bowing down to and serving another god, on purpose, and giving that god credit for the works of Yahweh—and something being simply cultural. Perfumed oil was placed on the head and feet of idols. It was also done to Yeshua—does that endorse paganism. The Egyptian tree of life was the acacia—does this mean that the paneling in the Holy of Holies and the Ark of the Covenant was pagan? For that matter, the Egyptians also had a portable shrine that looked a lot like the Ark. The ancient world also served their gods with sacrifices, unleavened bread, and hymn singing. Why were they also done for Yahweh? Because they are cultural ways of honoring the divine. It’s what you do with them that decides whether or not they are idolatrous.
  14. Fake names—hurting and angering the Jewish community by pretending to be Jewish and behaving badly online and putting them in danger of being hated even more. There is nothing to be gained in denying who we were when we came to faith and putting on what amounts to airs. And it is a real point of contention with other Christians, who see it as ridiculous and cultish. Our identity is in Christ—if Apollos and Junia, of all people, didn’t change their names when they were named after a false god and goddess respectively, then why do we feel like we need to do it? We can have no greater identity than we have in Messiah. Took me a lot of years to learn that I wasn’t a second-class citizen and I even wrote a book about it, King, Kingdom Citizen.
  15. Don’t call people unclean as an insult—we all have corpse impurity. And all it meant was that you couldn’t go within a certain distance of the Temple or a city. And unclean animals are only unclean as corpses and for food. We can ride them, have them as pets, and we can have pigs on the farm to deal with the trash and all that. Everything is clean for something or another. Clean just means in its proper place or proper state.
  16. Bad scholarship. If you can’t ask questions then don’t listen to someone. If they won’t give you their sources then what they are telling you cannot be credited as truth. Just because something shocked you or gave you a warm feeling doesn’t make it correct—we’ve all been misled by our emotions and our body’s reactions to those emotions. It’s rarely the Holy Spirit endorsing something we hear.
  17. Genealogies and pointless arguments—Titus 3:9 But avoid foolish debates, genealogies, quarrels, and disputes about the law, because they are unprofitable and worthless. 10 Reject a divisive person after a first and second warning.
  18. Truth is that we need to be looking out for people more than we do. In congregations it is easier—we mustn’t dare be so afraid of confrontation that we are unwilling to have a pretty short leash on the people who are new. We need to remove this false idea that they are expected to produce ministerial fruit right away and that is very counter to how churches are traditionally run. You know, we love those new people because they are so excited and energetic, but they are also generally foolish. Not foolish meaning stupid but lacking wisdom and perspective. The OT definition of a fool is someone who doesn’t understand their place—and the place of a new student isn’t to go out trying to teach the world and that causes so many problems with people coming out of mainstream churches and into more of an awareness of Torah

 



Are Easter and Christmas really based upon Babylonian (or any other) paganism? A collection of research articles.

Read this first part carefully:

Ministry 101: No matter how carefully or clearly anyone expresses themselves, their intentions, and their beliefs, others will always use what you say to justify what they decide to do. If it happened to Yeshua/Jesus, Moses, Paul (who actually wasn’t all that clear), Peter, John, etc…then it will be doubly true for the rest of us. I haven’t endorsed Christmas, nor do I condemn those who celebrate. My one and only goal has been to clean up the house of God and our witness. When we distribute falsehoods in service of an agenda (and trying to take down Christmas and Easter are HUGE money-making agendas and even idols within some crowds) then we are playing by the rules of the world and we are destroying our credibility. People deserve the respect of being presented, not with manipulative horror stories of dubious authenticity, but the truth so that they can work out what they are going to do with God. When we strip them of that ability, we are subverting the authority of the Holy Spirit. I love the Body of Messiah. I love the Gospel. But I refuse to oppose anything with lies and bad information. God doesn’t need me to do that in order to accomplish His will. He desires we be truthful, that we encourage people toward righteousness, hold them responsible when they need to be held accountable and then to get out of His way. Just FYI, as a free ministry, I in no way profit from any of this. My goal isn’t to prove that Christmas and Easter aren’t pagan, but to take out the trash that is tossed around twice a year by people who should instead be committed to the truth. I give them the truth so that they make make their own choices, free from manipulation and propaganda.

I believe sometimes that our desire to control the outcome (when people are committed to getting others to stop celebrating C&E in this case, at any cost) leads us to fearfully resort to the world’s tactics. But it isn’t our job to control anyone–Yahweh doesn’t even try to control us like that so how dare we with others?

*************

An increasing number of Hebrew Roots ministries are backing down from, and retracting, the once very common teachings about the hypothetical ancient pagan origins of Christmas and Easter. However, the memes and googled pages that lack, and sometimes falsify, any sort of substantiation for their supposed archaeological claims are probably never going away. People lifted them long before the ministries retracted them. It’s a veritable pandora’s box. And people are willing to pour huge amounts of money into ministries that support and promote this, so it will never go away entirely.

So, twice a year, a month before Christmas and a month before Easter, I have posted a list of the research from myself and some others addressing a lot of the Easter/Ishtar accusations and the Tammuz/Lent misunderstanding, where we actually probably got colored eggs (from the Jews and fron fasting, not the pagans), etc. I decided in 2019 to just go ahead and make a big note of it so people could access it whenever they wanted to but then Facebook discontinued notes in October so I had to put this all here instead. This is provided for informational purposes, and I hope no one will force this stuff onto other people’s private walls and embarrass them. I don’t work that way and so I pray you won’t use my (or anyone else’s) research that way either. Share to your own social media platforms, if you so desire, but in my experience–jumping onto someone’s meme with a thousand likes where they are feeling really knowledgable and like they are doing a service to God and publicly humiliating them just doesn’t work. It almost always backfires so let’s be gentle, wise and kind. I have never forced this information on people but over the past six years, I have seen some amazing progress in this area. These claims are dying because they are being exposed to the truth.

You all probably know I don’t celebrate Christmas or Easter but do celebrate and teach the Feasts. Please don’t believe the lie circulating out there that I ever did this to “get in good with my Christian friends and family” because they really have never seemed to care whether I celebrate or not and I move so often that I never have any friends to speak of who would care either. I stumbled across this information accidentally while researching the defiling of the Temple back in early 2015. As I studied Babylonian, Assyrian, Hittite, Egyptian and Canaanite mythologies, I stumbled across the startling fact that I couldn’t substantiate a single thing I had ever heard. When I moved on into Gero-Roman times, I also came up empty on the Mithraic and Saturnalian claims. In fact, I recently discovered that there were no claims whatsoever that Christmas had pagan roots until the 12th century. I absolutely will discuss this stuff with anyone else who has read the source material I cite. But I will ask if the material has been read so that we are sure to be on equal footing. I will not argue with opinions when we have actual facts available. This is too emotional a subject, and it is needlessly divisive for all the wrong reasons. I have ministered to people who have ruined their families over this, and even their marriages.

In general, people often just honestly don’t know how to discern a good from a bad source and so books with titles like, “101 Facts About Christmas” are mistaken for actual researched and verified works of scholarship. In actuality, anyone can publish a book that says anything these days–and you can call anything a fact. No one is going to do anything about it. The only thing you can do is refuse to pass along anything that does not pass archaeological muster, and to learn to ask polite questions about people’s sources. In general, they won’t have anything–and I don’t say this to be unkind, it hasn’t honestly occurred to them that they should have proof, or that proof is anything other than “it looks legit to me” or “it’s obvious” or “my teacher says it is true.” But 21st-century monotheists without a shared cultural worldview will never be able to correctly judge or understand anything ancient based on our modern context. People hear these things from someone they love and respect, and so you have to be careful when challenging it. Good people get caught up in believing things without asking for proof if enough people are saying it–there is always the illusion of credibility in numbers. But if we are going to teach people that they are pagans for doing something, we need to have more than opinions. This was a death penalty offense in ancient Israel, and facts were required to make such an accusation.

If you want something added to the list, please send it to me. I will only consider material that actually has legitimate sources cited–I am not likely to watch any video or listen to any podcast that isn’t from a recognized expert. Too many videos and podcasts and googles pages come with grandiose claims but isn’t enough to claim “Tertullian said such and such” without a reference to exactly where I can find it. I verify everything. (Just FYI, Tertullian never said anything about Christmas because it didn’t exist during his life).

Nimrod teachings

On my radio show for kids (airing daily on I Will Gather You Radio and weekends on Hebrew Nation Radio), we covered Nimrod as part of exploring Genesis verse by verse (although that’s going to have to change when we get to Lot and his daughters) but these teachings are still entirely based on scholarly, peer-reviewed materials:

Nimrod and the Bible https://contextforkids.com/2022/05/02/episode-56-nimrod-and-the-bible

Nimrod: The Man, the Myths, and the Legends https://contextforkids.com/2022/05/09/episode-57-nimrod-the-man-the-myths-and-the-legends/

Christmas ones are on top, Easter below.

NEW! (2023) Christmas, Paganism, and Church History— https://fyreis.substack.com/p/christmas-paganism-and-church-history?

NEW! (2023)–Challenging December on Trial—https://www.youtube.com/live/RiE9DplP7Ro?si=eWqtE3g615WBfBZA and https://www.youtube.com/live/fLwcJ9y_vpI?si=_ARvFxSExZu9pqKc

NEW! From an atheist with a Masters in History who is trying to clean up the misinformation spread by his fellow atheists https://historyforatheists.com/2020/12/pagan-christmas/

NEW! Are Christmas and Mithras related? https://historyforatheists.com/2016/12/the-great-myths-2-christmas-mithras-and-paganism/

NEW! Just How Pagan is Christmas really? https://talesoftimesforgotten.com/2019/12/08/just-how-pagan-is-christmas-really/

NEW! Origin of Christmas Trees https://talesoftimesforgotten.com/2018/12/05/the-origins-of-the-christmas-tree/

NEW! I hate Santa Claus, personally, but this is interesting https://talesoftimesforgotten.com/2019/12/07/the-long-strange-fascinating-history-of-santa-claus/

How do I personally feel about Christmas and Easter? (Don’t believe the lies and “OPINIONS” out there, get it from my own mouth, er, fingers) http://theancientbridge.com/2016/02/so-what-about-christmas-and-easter-from-my-rewrite-of-the-bridge-crossing-over-into-the-fullness-of-covenant-life/

My friend David Wilber wrote an article addressing the controversy https://davidwilber.me/articles/should-christians-celebrate-christmas

Confronting the Atheist “Many gods were born on Dec 25th” claim. (Yes I know December 25th isn’t Messiah’s birthday either but let’s not pass around Atheist propaganda) http://theancientbridge.com/2017/10/q-how-many-pagan-gods-were-born-of-virgins-or-even-born-on-december-25th-a-zero/

And another on the same topic by James-Michael Smith https://www.discipledojo.org/blog/pagan-jesus

Were Horus and Osiris really born on December 25th? http://theancientbridge.com/2016/01/this-is-the-beginning-of-months-for-you-egyptian-calendars-the-birthdays-of-the-gods-and-why-goshen-was-the-best-of-the-land/

What is Jeremiah 10 actually talking about? Should we twist Scripture to fit our anti-Christmas (or any) agendas? http://theancientbridge.com/2015/10/confronting-the-memes-pt-7-did-jeremiah-condemn-christmas-trees-or-are-we-being-anachronistic/

I covered the topic of whether Jeremiah and Isaiah were talking about Christmas trees in their idol polemics on my radio show last year http://theancientbridge.com/2019/12/episode-39-isaiah-and-the-messiah-part-6-441-23-jer-10-habbakuk-2-and-christmas-trees/

A balanced look at the origins of Christmas and the modern ethical dilemmas with celebrating https://www.derekpgilbert.com/2018/12/23/merry-non-pagan-christmas

One on December 25th
https://triablogue.blogspot.com/2008/12/december-25-and-paganism.html

Hippolytus, in the third century, made a comment about December 25 being the date of the birth of Messiah in his commentary on Daniel. This article explores his comment and context further. Please note, this is not posted here as a defense of that date but as historical context to the date. https://www.facebook.com/groups/233047447490355/permalink/581281752666921?sfns=mo

Is Christmas really tied to Sol Invictus? https://web.archive.org/web/20140721141415/http://chronicon.net/blog/christmas/sol-invictus-evidently-not-a-precursor-to-christmas/

Are Obelisks (or Christmas trees for that matter) really Phallic symbols? http://theancientbridge.com/2015/06/confronting-pseudo-archaeological-memes-pt-2-are-obelisks-really-well-you-know/

This is actually well researched and I am familiar with many of his cited sources and the scholarship of the works he cites https://web.archive.org/web/20170128161856/http://historum.com/blogs/sankari/621-december-25-no-connection-tammuz-saturnalia-sol-invictus-mithras.html

How did the early Church come up with December 25th? Well, it’s actually pretty interesting https://www.biblicalarchaeology.org/daily/biblical-topics/new-testament/how-december-25-became-christmas/

Is Christmas based on Saturnalia? https://www.idolkiller.com/post/is-christmas-based-on-saturnalia

Usener’s Christmas – an article by Roman Historian Stephen Hijmans, an undisputed expert in Roman history and all things related to Sol Invictus. https://www.academia.edu/987479/Useners_Christmas_A_Contribution_to_the_Modern_Construct_of_Late_Antique_Solar_Syncretism_in_M._Espagne_and_P._Rabault-Feuerhahn_edd._Hermann_Usener_und_die_Metamorphosen_der_Philologie._Wiesbaden_Harrassowitz_2011._139-152

Dr Heiser’s take on whether Christmas is pagan https://nakedbiblepodcast.com/podcast/naked-bible-195-is-christmas-a-pagan-holiday/
and a transcript of the podcast here: http://nakedbiblepodcast.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/01/NB-195-Transcript.pdf

Easter/Lent articles

NEW!! From an atheist with a Masters in History who is trying to clean up the misinformation spread by his fellow atheists https://historyforatheists.com/2017/04/easter-ishtar-eostre-and-eggs/

Was there really an Ishtar Sunday? Did the Queen of heaven dip eggs in baby blood? http://theancientbridge.com/2015/10/who-was-the-queen-of-heaven-and-did-she-really-dip-eggs-in-the-blood-of-infants-ezekiel-8-in-context-part-2/

Is Lent related to Tammuz? What do we know about Tammuz? http://theancientbridge.com/2015/09/who-was-tammuz-and-why-and-when-were-the-women-weeping-for-him-ez-8-from-the-ancient-near-eastern-context/

Did we get Hot Cross Buns from Ishtar? http://theancientbridge.com/2016/04/wwie-what-would-ishtar-eat-baking-cakes-for-the-queen-of-heaven-jeremiah-7-in-context-part-2/

Atheists debunking the Eostre/Ishtar myth. https://historyforatheists.com/2017/04/easter-ishtar-eostre-and-eggs

A balanced, responsible article relating the origins of Easter and the Passover vs Resurrection question: http://theancientbridge.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/12/Americas_Favorite_Holidays_Candid_Histories_-_3._Easter-1.pdf

Is Easter from Ishtar? by Tim Hegg https://torahresource.com/does-easter-come-from-ishtar/

From an admitted pagan who actually does some really creditable research into her own religion https://bellejar.ca/2013/03/28/easter-is-not-named-after-ishtar-and-other-truths-i-have-to-tell-you/

Another pagan who went looking for deep roots and didn’t find them http://cavalorn.livejournal.com/502368.html?thread=7943520

How abstaining from eggs gave the world Easter eggs–after having chickens for two years this made total sense. http://www.christianitytoday.com/history/2010/february/how-fast-of-lent-gave-us-easter-eggs.html

How the 33rd Day of the Counting of the Omer might have given us egg hunts (I learned a lot of ancient near eastern context from the book “An Egg at Easter” by Venetia Newell – impeccably researched and very easily had online). https://www.facebook.com/tyler.rosenquist/posts/10213621802363307

Miscellaneous articles

A very well researched video from Andre-Philippe Therrien covering the problem with using Hislop’s The Two Babylons, and all books based on it, as sources https://youtu.be/MM3rhY5vGPc

Before anyone counters with Hislop or any works based on Hislop (which would be anything making Nimrod associations), please read this article from Ralph Woodrow, who made a career, and a lot of money, off of writing a book he never researched himself (called Mystery Babylon) based entirely on Hislop’s writings. http://www.equip.org/article/the-two-babylons/

Everything we do know about Nimrod historically and in literature throughout the ages. Everything else is late date urban legends. Van der Toorn is an incredible scholar. http://www.godawa.com/chronicles_of_the_nephilim/Articles_By_Others/Van_der_Toorn-Nimrod_before_and_after_the_Bible.pdf

Does neo-paganism have deep roots, as many adherents claim? A great and honest article by a neo-pagan http://www.patheos.com/blogs/allergicpagan/2015/06/07/a-brief-history-of-neo-paganism/

Excellent scholarly book on the history of the Christian calendar and celebrations https://www.amazon.com/dp/0391041231

How can we tell if an observance is pagan, or just cultural? http://theancientbridge.com/2015/12/pagan-or-cultural/

Resources from Matthew Higdon (I haven’t checked out most of these but I am very familiar with some of the scholars)

For Christmas:

Andrew McGowan, Ancient Christian Worship: Early Church Practices in Social, Historical, and Theological Perspective (Baker Academic, 2014), 249–59.
Stephen Nissanbaum, The Battle for Christmas (Vintage, 1997).
Susan K. Roll, Toward the Origins of Christmas (Kol Pharos, 1995).
Paul Bradshaw and Maxwell Johnson, The Origins of Feasts, Fasts, and Seasons in Early Christianity (Liturgical Press, 2011).
Martin Connell, “The Origins and Evolution of Advent in the West” in “Between Memory and Hope: Readings on the Liturgical Year,” ed. John Baldovin and Maxwell Johnson (Liturgical Press, 2000), 349–71.
Joseph F. Kelley, “The Origins of Christmas” (Liturgical Press, 2014).
Thomas J. Talley, “The Origins of the Liturgical Year” (Liturgical Press, 1991).

Tom Holland, “The myth of ‘pagan’ Christmas,” Unherd: https://unherd.com/2020/12/the-myth-of-pagan-christmas

For Easter:
N. T. Wright, The Resurrection of the Son of God (Fortress, 2003).
Christopher Bryan, The Resurrection of the Messiah (Oxford, 2011).
Pinches Lapide, The Resurrection of Jesus: A Jewish Perspective (Wipf and Stock, 2002).
Dale C. Allison, Jr., Resurrecting Jesus: The Earliest Christian Tradition and Its Interpreters (T&T Clark International, 2005).
Paul Bradshaw, Passover and Easter: Origin and History to Modern Times (U Notre Dame, 2000).
Then there’s the usual fare by William Lane Craig, Mike Licona, and Gary Habermas.
Personally, I’ve found the most fruitful books on this to be scholarly dialogues: “Jesus’s Resurrection: Fact or Figment?: A Debate Between William Lane Craig and Gerd Ludemann” and “The Resurrection of Jesus: John Dominic Crossan and N. T. Wright in Dialogue.” They furnish the reader with a sense of the relative strengths and weaknesses of each position.


Episode 52: Isaiah and the Messiah 16–The Third Zion Song–Rejoice! Your Husband Reigns!

This chapter looks rather odd when it isn’t taught as the (almost) grand finale to Isaiah 40-55 but when taught in context, it is a real tear-jerker. We are invited into the joy and relief of a desperate woman who has been deserted, scorned and bereft as her husband returns for her and restores her to his side. What a love story!

We’ll also be talking about another “manufactured controversy” about the word ba’al–because that is what Yahweh calls Himself here. Uh oh…

Transcript below, don’t expect much on the editing front!

********************

Isaiah and the Messiah 16—Third Zion Song

 Okay, this is part sixteen of Isaiah and the Messiah and the second to last installment before we jump into the Gospel of Mark, which uses Isaiah 40-55, which we have been studying, as its foundation—namely the Greater Exodus. We have the original Exodus out of Egypt that is just referenced all over the place in Scripture, Exodus “lite” which is what I call the return of the exiles out of Babylon and back into the Land but fell short for two reasons: (1) only a small number of the Jews returned because Babylonia was a safe and comfortable and prosperous place to live, barring a few isolated incidents, and (2) it only returned them to the Land while they were still very much estranged from Yahweh’s favor.

Now, last week’s lesson on the Fourth Servant Song, the Song of the Suffering Servant, gave Israel the solution to that estrangement problem. Since Isaiah 49 (and hinted at in 42), we have been awaiting the coming of the Servant who would regather Israel not to the Land (as that was Cyrus’s job) but to Yahweh. At the same time, the Servant would also bring salvation to the ends of the earth and specifically to the nations. But how? Isaiah 52/53 gave us the answer—through the suffering and death of the Servant who would take all the avon, iniquity, of Israel upon himself. How does this all work logistically? It doesn’t say. But like all of the different promises of deliverances we have seen in Deutero Isaiah (40-55), Israel is repeatedly commanded to trust Yahweh, accept that His promises are a done deal and good, and praise Him and to start living as delivered people in anticipation of what He has sworn by Himself—the highest oath possible.

Hi, I am Tyler Dawn Rosenquist and welcome to Character in Context, where I teach the historical and ancient sociological context of Scripture with an eye to developing the character of the Messiah. If you prefer written material, I have five years’ worth of blog at theancientbridge.com as well as my six books available on amazon—including a four-volume curriculum series dedicated to teaching Scriptural context in a way that even kids can understand it, called Context for Kids—and I have two video channels on YouTube with free Bible teachings for both adults and kids. You can find the link for those on my website. Past broadcasts of this program can be found at characterincontext.podbean.com and transcripts can be had for most broadcasts at theancientbridge.com

Throughout this series, I have been quoting from the English Standard Version, the ESV.

Now, chapter 54 starts with the commandment to Zion, Jerusalem, to sing. In fact, this entire chapter is a Zion song and, frankly, makes zero sense without the announcement of the grand plan of Yahweh, and the success of His Servant, in chapter 53. So let’s just look quickly at the synopsis in the last two verses of the chapter

11 Out of the anguish of his soul he shall see and be satisfied; by his knowledge shall the righteous one, my servant, make many to be accounted righteous, and he shall bear their iniquities.
12 Therefore I will divide him a portion with the many, and he shall divide the spoil with the strong, because he poured out his soul to death and was numbered with the transgressors; yet he bore the sin of many, and makes intercession for the transgressors.

Remember those three mentions of many because they will come up again this week, okay?

Israel is being told that the Servant will successfully bring them out of their estrangement from Yahweh. Is there any greater cause for rejoicing?! If you have ever read Nehemiah’s prayer in Neh 9, you have seen that the returning exiles knew that everything between themselves and Yahweh was not kosher—sure, they were back in the Land but they were still occupied. They were not living in the Lord’s favor. John the Baptist will also echo this when he baptizes for repentance for the forgiveness of sins. Yahweh’s presence had never returned to the Temple, and so things were not right between themselves and Him. But the Servant in Isaiah 53 is the solution—and Isaiah 54 is written as a reflection of that promise. It is a love song to a bereft and languishing spouse from her returning husband.

Now, some things you have to understand before we start—this is written from a totally patriarchal point of view in a culture where an unmarried, widowed or childless woman was in extreme danger or at least very vulnerable to hardship. She wasn’t educated. She couldn’t get a respectable job. Her only hope was to get married or remarried and that would be very difficult for a barren woman. Who would want her? She would be presumed cursed. A divorced woman wasn’t much better off—who would want someone that another guy wasn’t happy with? An unmarried older woman was probably from a family so poor as to not be able to afford the dowry or perhaps she was too skinny or unattractive. Simply put, once a woman was judged to be barren or was abandoned, she was considered cursed and wasn’t regarded any more highly than an immoral woman. It would be assumed that she was at fault. Such women were entirely at the mercy of men’s desires—unless they had wealth or became prostitutes there was no way to be independent. You can see why God hates divorce! It left women without hope.

But starting in chapter 40 and continuing through 52, Yahweh was continually speaking to instill hope in abandoned Israel, telling them that there would be restoration in the future. In Isaiah 53, He gave the game plan for their restoration. And in these last two chapters, 54 and 55, there is a call to rejoice and start living like a restored woman. In 56, the gentiles are assured that they are included in the big happy family as well and that their sacrifices will be just acceptable to Yahweh.

54 “Sing, O barren one, who did not bear; break forth into singing and cry aloud, you who have not been in labor! For the children of the desolate one will be more than the children of her who is married,” says the Lord.

Hey, Isaiah 53 was good news, and very good news indeed! Your iniquities are atoned for and intercession will be made for your transgressions! You will be counted as righteous! This is the language of full restoration to the relationship they were still longing for during the days of John the Baptist. What better cause for singing could there be? Happy days are here again, we might sing today.

I want you to notice the poetic, “the children of the desolate one will be more than the children of her who is married” because it is an echo of Hannah’s prayer in I Sam 2:5b “The barren has borne seven, but she who has many children is forlorn.” Of course, this is a total dig at Peninah, her husband’s concubine who tormented her, and in Isaiah it is contrasting Israel’s reversal of fortune with Babylon’s. The reference to “her who is married”—that word translated married is betulah and is the same exact word translated as virgin when Babylon’s fate is being discussed in Isaiah 47:1—you remember the reference to “virgin daughter of Babylon.” This is an oath that Israel’s children will indeed one day outnumber the children of Babylonia and I have one thing to say—what children of Babylon? Exactly. There are no Babylonians anymore—haven’t been for a long, long time. Babylon had its day but it was stripped of honor when it was absorbed into larger Medo-Persian Empire and later by the Greeks and then the Parthians. Yet, Israel endures to this day and there is no way to calculate how many have been born to her since the giving of this prophecy.

2 “Enlarge the place of your tent, and let the curtains of your habitations be stretched out; do not hold back; lengthen your cords and strengthen your stakes.

How different does this sound than this lament from Jer 10:20, before the exile?

My tent is destroyed, and all my cords are broken; my children have gone from me, and they are not;
there is no one to spread my tent again and to set up my curtains.

To me, this sounds like a complete restoration of what was lost. In ancient times, the setting up, caring for and repairing of the tent was considered to be a woman’s job. That’s the mini-context lesson here, but in broader terms, let’s look at the grand promises being made here. “You’re going to need more space.” That’s what “enlarge the place of your tent” means. “Let the curtains of your habitations be stretched out” means “Girlfriend, you are going to need more fabric—well, skins actually. Get yourself over to goats r us.” That Hebrew word for “stretched out” by the way is yattu and is seen repeatedly in descriptions of Yahweh “stretching out the heavens.” They were supposed to see it in terms of a woman putting up a tent to shelter her family. But that’s not all! She is also told to lengthen her cords and strengthen her stakes. She is commanded not to hold back in her preparations—obviously, her family will expand beyond her wildest dreams. Why?

3 For you will spread abroad to the right and to the left, and your offspring will possess the nations and will people the desolate cities.

This is actually a rehashing of some ancient promises that might be familiar to you. Let’s look at Gen 22:17-18 and 28:14:

I will surely bless you, and I will surely multiply your offspring as the stars of heaven and as the sand that is on the seashore. And your offspring shall possess the gate of his enemies, and in your offspring shall all the nations of the earth be blessed, because you have obeyed my voice.”

Your offspring shall be like the dust of the earth, and you shall spread abroad to the west and to the east and to the north and to the south, and in you and your offspring shall all the families of the earth be blessed. 

Again, just like verse two that was a restoration from the woeful conditions of Jer 10:20, here we have a repetition of Yahweh’s ancient promises to the forefathers Abraham and Jacob respectively. What has Yahweh been telling them since chapter 40? He always keeps His promises, forever, it is His very nature to be faithful even when we are unfaithful.

But how will Abraham’s offspring possess the nations? At first glance, it sounds very militaristic and certainly, groups like the Qumran community saw this as a violent takeover of the nations by the Messiah where they would have positions of honor—but this is very worldly thinking and not in keeping with God’s revealed character, throughout Isaiah 40-66 to redeem, deliver and save whether people deserve it or not. It is so much His nature that the Servant was willing to suffer terribly in order to bring it about. God’s love and faithfulness plus the Servant’s love and obedience equals salvation for not only Israel but the nations and this is how Zion’s children will possess the nations—by absorbing them into faith in the one true God just the same way Cyrus’s Kingdom absorbed the former Babylonian Empire—only without violence this time. We see pictures coming together as we come to the end of deutero-Isaiah. Pictures that Mark will use in the writing of His Gospel hundreds of years together. Pictures that make little sense and sit as unfulfilled promises without the identification of Yeshua as the Messiah of Israel and also the world. Through Yeshua, Israel conquers the world—not through battle but through the willing sacrificial act of its perfect son.

4 “Fear not, for you will not be ashamed; be not confounded, for you will not be disgraced; for you will forget the shame of your youth, and the reproach of your widowhood you will remember no more.

Fear not—you know what that means—a salvation oracle. Now, I didn’t mention it before because I was saving it for now, but before this verse, there were already two identifiers of Zion as the formerly abandoned wife in verse one where she was called barren and bereft. Here we have two more references to the shame of her youth and the reproach of her widowhood. No one is saying that it never happened—no, Zion was shamed and suffered the reproach of other nations. Reproach meaning disapproval, criticism, and even rebuke. Think pointing, shaking their heads and laughing at the ruinous heap of Zion and the Jews being marched off into forced exile with little more than the clothes on their backs not because she was conquered but because it meant that her God had either abandoned her or was defeated. And it is tempting to make this about the return from exile, but it can’t be because these terms are all about being abandoned. This is estrangement from husband language within a patriarchal system where men have all the power to elevate or destroy a woman, to sustain her or to starve her. Its something we can hardly imagine in modern times, the sad reality of what would happen when a woman was abandoned by her husband. Yahweh is promising an end to their abandonment, and the post-exilic prophets, the prophets who preached after their return from exile, made it clear that it did not end when they came back from Babylonia. The Spirit of God never returned to the Temple, they had to completely change how they performed Yom Kippur, and they were never allowed to rebuild the Ark even though they rebuilt everything else. But here is a promise—one day it will end. You will be fully restored to Yahweh’s favor as a wife taken back by her husband. It will be so good when that happens that you will forget you were ever abandoned. Yes abandoned, we will see that in a few verses.

5 For your Maker is your husband, the Lord of hosts is his name; and the Holy One of Israel is your Redeemer, the God of the whole earth he is called.

This verse really messes some people up who want some words to be inherently pagan but that word translated as husband in “your Maker is your husband, the Lord of hosts is his name” is bo’alay, and the root word is ba’al. That’s right. The word used repeatedly for the false gods of Canaan and elsewhere. Ba’al Hadad, Ba’al Peor, Basketba’al, and baseba’al—okay, maybe not those last two. I just told someone this about a month ago and they were pretty upset. But like Elohim and kyrios and Christos and a great many other Hebrew and Greek words, these are generic titles. Nothing inherently pagan about them. They are descriptive words. Just like master, lord, god, and the like in English. Ba’al can mean owner, husband, master, ruler, etc. It can refer to a pagan god or to a woman’s husband or to a slave’s master. It’s just a word and only the context makes it good or bad. But not the word itself. The word itself is a neutral thing devoid of meaning until we see what goes with it. I know a lot of folks act like internet and congregational bullies trying to clean up our language and get certain words out of usage, but it ends up being misguided. I mean, even the word satan can just mean your opponent in court or wherever. You might not like him but that doesn’t make him evil. Maybe you’ve done something where you need to be opposed in court, I have no idea.

Let’s read this again because I want to look at the whole thing:

5 For your Maker is your husband, the Lord of hosts is his name; and the Holy One of Israel is your Redeemer, the God of the whole earth he is called.

Wow. Your Creator is also your devoted and committed covenant partner/husband, Yahweh Tzva’ot is His Name, the Holy One of Israel is your go’al, your kinsman redeemer who will save you from peril, the God of Israel? No, the God of the whole entire earth he IS called. Who calls Him that? No one at that time, no, this is again the work of the Servant in bringing salvation to the ends of the earth.

6 For the Lord has called you like a wife deserted and grieved in spirit, like a wife of youth when she is cast off, says your God.

Again, the sorrow you felt in estrangement is not a forever thing. You were deserted. You were grieved in Spirit and cast off. But, Yahweh is calling you back to Him. Yahweh has remembered you. And now we get to two of the most disturbing verses in the Bible, for me.

7 For a brief moment I deserted you, but with great compassion I will gather you.
8 In overflowing anger for a moment I hid my face from you, but with everlasting love I will have compassion on you,” says the Lord, your Redeemer.

Wow, He actually did desert Israel. He actually did hide His face from Israel. It isn’t even theoretical—it says so right here. For how long? Forever? No—for a brief moment. But what’s a brief moment for Yahweh is a heck of a long time for us! It seems like forever. Why? Overflowing anger. Read Ezekiel 8-10 sometime. Read Kings and Chronicles. Read Jeremiah 34 sometime and see what was the last straw, when they released all their debt slaves that they had been holding for more than six years in order to appease Yahweh, they even performed the ritual of the covenant of the pieces to ratify their oath to do it but then they changed their mind and took their slaves back. They were idolaters, yes, but worse—they were Pharaoh reborn by not letting Yahweh’s people go. And so, they went into exile and after seventy years of allowing the Land rest Yahweh forgave and took them back and Malachi tells the horrible story of men divorcing their wives over nothing and the people dishonoring Yahweh through blemished sacrifices, etc. etc. He had forgiven them but because they had not repented there was still that estrangement between them. I am not saying everyone, because obviously you have great faithful men like Zerubbabel, Nehemiah, Ezra, and Haggai and others. But Israel had not repented, and we see that throughout Isaiah 40-55. Yahweh forgave for His own sake, but things weren’t right between them.

“With great compassion I will gather you.” How? That’s the task of the Servant in Is 49:5.

And now the Lord says, he who formed me from the womb to be his servant, to bring Jacob back to him; and that Israel might be gathered to him—

“With everlasting love I will have compassion on you,” This is the first of three references to the concept of everlasting in Isaiah 54, the Hebrew word Olam. And there are folks who like to make this word mean something other than forever but I am telling you, we don’t want to go there. We want God’s promises to be forever, and His love and His faithfulness. We don’t want a God who will abandon His chosen people just because they act the same way everyone else acts because then we are pretty much toast and subject to a whimsical god like the gods of the nations. Because, lemme tell you, if He is not a forever kind of God then He will tire of our antics. Would have a long time ago.

9 “This is like the days of Noah to me: as I swore that the waters of Noah should no more go over the earth, so I have sworn that I will not be angry with you, and will not rebuke you.

This is where it sounds like the logic begins to break down if we are not treating this as a salvation oracle. Is Yahweh never going to be angry at anyone again, will no one ever be rebuked again? Well, read Malachi, which was written after this happened. So, we need to go for context here—what has been the context of this entire section, the last fourteen chapters as well as the chapters before those?

What kind of anger and rebuke is being referred to here? Obviously, collective anger and rebuke against the nation as a whole, aka wrath from Yahweh directed at the entire nation. That, in fact, never happens again. Oh sure, there are wars and holocausts and pogroms and all sorts of terrible things—but not from Yahweh’s hand and I can prove it in the following verses. In the time of Noah, everyone suffered as a whole, except Noah and his family. In Egypt, all of the children of Israel suffered as a whole—well, except for Moses of course. All of the Northern Kingdom of Israel was taken away and permanently exiled. All but a remnant of Judah was exiled to Babylonia. Yahweh, up until this point, has treated Israel as a collective entity when it comes to disciplining them. But it wouldn’t happen again—the reason? It never works. The evil of the group cannot be destroyed, only the evil in individuals—and that is the secret of why the Cross of Messiah works when the Torah historically falls short in actually changing people on the inside.

10 For the mountains may depart and the hills be removed, but my steadfast love shall not depart from you, and my covenant of peace shall not be removed,” says the Lord, who has compassion on you.

I love this—“whatever you see around you that looks permanent, they are like mist in a strong wind compared to the endurance of my love for you.” And this refers to “my covenant of peace.” In Deutero-Isaiah, chapters 40-55, the word covenant only appears four times. The first two, when the Servant is being introduced as the one who will be made “a covenant for the people” and “to the people” in 42 and 49 in the first and second Servant Songs. Now that the mission of the Servant has been fully revealed in Isaiah 53 and Zion is being told to prepare for an end to her estrangement from Yahweh her husband, we hear about Yahweh’s covenant of peace that cannot be removed.

Remember what Isaiah 53:5 said about the Servant’s death? “Upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace…” The Servant is Yahweh’s covenant of peace with both Israel and the world that cannot be removed.

11 “O afflicted one, storm-tossed and not comforted, behold, I will set your stones in antimony, and lay your foundations with sapphires.

Afflicted means poverty-stricken, someone who is storm-tossed has no stability and one who is not comforted is in despair so this paints a very tragic and pathetic picture of Zion, Jerusalem. “Behold” marks a change in focus and in fortune. “I will set your stones in antimony and lay your foundations with sapphires”—antimony is this gorgeous shiny silvery metalloid. Go look up a picture of it later, just lovely. But sapphires? Nope. Although translators often use this, sapphire was not known in this area of the world until much later, in Roman times. Lapis Lazuli is probably what is being referred to here. Not a big deal, just geological historical trivia for you. A medium-blue stone streaked with what looks like gold. It would be gorgeous.

12 I will make your pinnacles of agate, your gates of carbuncles and all your wall of precious stones.

Sometimes you just have to close your eyes and imagine the raw beauty. We’re so used to cut gemstones now that we often can’t appreciate the beauty of so-called semi-precious stones. My father is a geologist and so we learned a lot about stones growing up. Agate is earth-toned, but it is layered and so when you cut it, it is lined with beautiful patterns. Carbuncle is like a garnet, probably red. Zion in her restored glory is like the geology of creation on full display—like Yahweh showing off His creativity just for the sake of showing off His creativity.

13 All your children shall be taught by the Lord, and great shall be the peace of your children.

Here we have peace mentioned again. Why? Well, like the Servant in Isaiah 50:4, they have become limmudim of Yahweh—the disciples of the Lord. The Servant has made it possible that restoration of relationship is so complete that children are learning directly from the Lord. The beauty of Zion, in all her restored glory, is as nothing compared to this sight. I want to quote from John Oswalt’s NICOT on Isaiah 40-66, you know it is my favorite commentary to quote from. He is very articulate:

“The disciples of the Lord, the ones filled with His Spirit, are no longer at war with God. They are thus no longer at war with themselves. They are not at war with others; they no longer need to destroy others so that they can aggrandize themselves. They are no longer at war with God’s creation; they do not need to carve their initials in it. Such persons have a wholeness within themselves, and that wholeness affects all their relationships.” (pg. 428)

Isn’t that just beautiful? That, right there, is the ultimate fruit of Isaiah 53 and the completed mission of the Servant.

14 In righteousness you shall be established; you shall be far from oppression, for you shall not fear; and from terror, for it shall not come near you.

The Messianic age—no oppression, no fear, no terror. It will not be the ways of the world that serve as their permanent foundation, but God’s righteousness through the Servant. But what about until then? Remember that Yahweh said he would no longer be angry with or rebuke Israel?

15 If anyone stirs up strife, it is not from me; whoever stirs up strife with you shall fall because of you.

Until the Olam Haba, the world to come, the age of Messiah, eternal life—whatever you want to call it. Well, God’s people will know strife and trouble. BUT, and this is a big but, it will not be Yahweh’s formal wrath on the nation. The Holocaust was horrible, but it was thankfully confined to one region on the planet and so cannot be seen as God’s wrath against the Jewish people—nor the pogroms, not the Inquisition, or any localized persecution of the Jews. By even going there, these people proved that they were not acting on behalf of God but against Him. Look at the mighty thousand-year Third Reich! They stirred up strife and worse against the Jews. It lasted twelve years. Twelve horrible, destructive years—but not a thousand. The Russian Empire—swallowed up by communism. Traditional Catholicism—swallowed up by the reformation and now a pale shadow of what it once was, plagued by scandal. And what about the Jews? Restored to Israel, growing again, prospering again while all the empires that have tried to destroy them are lying in ruins. They thought they were acting for God but they were acting against Him. He keeps His promises. Israel will never ever fall. I think of this whenever I hear people who claim to be Torah pursuant referring to the modern-day Ashkenazi Jews as Khazars and worse. They will go the way of all the others in time. No one escapes.

16 Behold, I have created the smith who blows the fire of coals and produces a weapon for its purpose. I have also created the ravager to destroy;
17 no weapon that is fashioned against you shall succeed, and you shall refute every tongue that rises against you in judgment. This is the heritage of the servants of the Lord
    and their vindication from me, declares the Lord.”

I mean, this is the final word of all final words on the matter. Romans 8:31 again, “If God is for us then who can be against us?” And God is against us when we move against His people. Not when we disagree with them—goodness, they are as human as the rest of us. That isn’t anti-semitism, that’s just acknowledging their fallibility individually as humans. But stirring up strife with hem, wronging them, trying to kill them, depriving them of dignity and life and profession. Not only will we not succeed in the long run, but we will be spitting in the face of God who has preserved them as a witness to His continued power to preserve, redeem, deliver and save. It isn’t that we can’t succeed against the Jewish people, it’s that we can’t succeed against God—who has said very clearly that their heritage is survival.

Now, on a related note because we see that Yahweh did in fact desert Israel briefly and in His anger He hid his face from them.

Did Yahweh turn his face away at the cross?

Yes, but it wasn’t because He cannot look at sin because, if that were true—well, we would all still be lost in our sins. Yahweh hid His face from Israel in His anger, and abandoned her for a moment. Yeshua, the Servant, was the perfected representative of Israel. If not her favorite son, her ideal son. To take on the transgressions, iniquities and sins of Israel, He also had to face her estrangement from God—for a moment. Otherwise, He wouldn’t have taken on all of her wounds—that wound being the most terrible.

Next week we will end this series with Isaiah 55 and the beginning of Isaiah 56. Looking forward to having you back with me for this exciting conclusion to Deutero-Isaiah.

 



Episode 39: Isaiah and the Messiah Part 6: 44:1-23, Jer 10, Habbakuk 2–and Christmas Trees?

It’s crazy that this week just happened to be when this section of Scripture fell into place. Isaiah 44 contains the longest and most detailed idol polemic in all of Scripture and provides the context needed to understand Jeremiah 10:1-16 as well as Habbakuk 2 and even helps to understand Psalm 115. This week we are going to read Isaiah as well as portions of Jeremiah, Habbakuk, the Babylonian Erra Epic, Herodotus and Hittite writings in order to understand the ancient idolatrous mindset and why Yahweh was fighting so hard for the hearts and minds of His people in exile.

Transcript below, only moderately edited so please ignore the small stuff.

***********************

Isaiah and the Messiah 6—Is 44:1-44:1-22

I hope you’ve been following this series from the beginning as we are now in part six of exploring Isaiah Chapters 40-55 in preparation for our Gospel of Mark studies that pull heavily from these chapters of Isaiah to explain and undergird the ministry of Yeshua/Jesus the Messiah. Isaiah isn’t easy to understand—very complex historically, very easily taken out of context with cherry-picked verses by anti-missionaries who want to undermine faith in the Savior, but we have been going through it verse by verse taking into consideration the literary, historical, contextual, the different voices speaking—all that jazz—in order to strip away the mystery of what Yahweh is saying through His prophet to the exiles in Babylon about their imminent freedom. Yahweh is fighting the mindsets of the grandchildren of those who were exiled for their gross idolatry, who were brought up in Babylon and know no other life, who have been living as a conquered people and who have been told by the world around them that they were conquered only because their God was conquered and that they will never go back to the Land because historically no nation has ever returned from exile. They are so deeply enmeshed in the polytheistic worldview that it has become their own worldview—especially since they were henotheists before the exile and not monotheists. As we see from the Scriptures, Israel never exclusively worshipped Yahweh until after the exile was over—before then He might have been at the top of their worship pile, but He was still one among many gods in direct violation of the first and second commandments.

Much of what we have covered so far has been Yahweh publicly challenging the nations and their gods in order to show that any other so-called are powerless and actually non-existent. It has played out with courtroom language with a summons to court, presentation of evidence and witnesses and several idol polemics delivered by the prophet in order to show how illogical idolatry truly is. The end message is—there is no hope for Israel other than Yahweh, and He is promising to deliver them, and no one will get in His way because no one can.

Hi, I am Tyler Dawn Rosenquist and welcome to Character in Context, where I teach the historical and ancient sociological context of Scripture with an eye to developing the character of the Messiah. If you prefer written material, I have five years worth of blog at theancientbridge.com as well as my six books available on amazon—including a four-volume curriculum series dedicated to teaching Scriptural context in a way that even kids can understand it, called Context for Kids—and I have two video channels on youtube with free Bible teachings for both adults and kids. You can find the link for those on my website. Past broadcasts of this program can be found at characterincontext.podbean.com and transcripts can be had for most broadcasts at theancientbridge.com.

All Scripture this week is taken from the ESV, the English Standard Version because that is what my interlinear is in. And unlike my usual MO, I will be saying Yahweh instead of God and Lord because there are so many different voices speaking back and forth in Isaiah 40-55 that it will help eliminate confusion. Otherwise, I always use titles because I don’t like to use His name carelessly or casually. Just a personal preference.

Last week we started with a “but now” which forced us to backtrack into chapter 42 and we have the exact same thing today, so we have to backtrack into chapter 43 briefly—remember that no “therefore” or “but now” or “yet” or any conjunction exists on its own and has to be evaluated within the context of what went directly before. Chapters are pesky but necessary—but we can’t be bound by them in our studies. We can’t even just study one chapter without taking what went before it and often what comes after, into context. And today is going to be heavy in simply reading Scripture—we are going to delve into Jeremiah 10 and also Habbakuk 2—plus I am going to read from the Babylonian Erra Epic.

26 Put me in remembrance; let us argue together; set forth your case, that you may be proved right.
27 Your first father sinned, and your mediators transgressed against me.
28 Therefore I will profane the princes of the sanctuary, and deliver Jacob to utter destruction
and Israel to reviling.

To review, Israel, in this mock court case, has been telling Yahweh that they have been wronged, that He is blind to their cause and deaf to their complaints, and they haven’t accepted that their exile was their own fault. But right here Yahweh flat out tells them that the entire nation—even back to Abraham and Moses and Aaron—have been sinning against Him from the start and have only themselves to blame. That would chill anyone to the bone. And yet—we have another turnaround—their sin and God’s wrath isn’t the end of the story. Let’s move on into chapter 44:

 

44 “But now hear, O Jacob my servant,
Israel whom I have chosen!

Chosen for what? As Yahweh has said repeatedly, they were chosen, for His sake, to be witnesses of His mighty works and His glory. His faithfulness, grace and power—that He is unique and the gods of the nations are fictional. He says “Hear” and what does He want them to hear?

2 Thus says the Lord who made you,
who formed you from the womb and will help you:
Fear not, O Jacob my servant,
Jeshurun whom I have chosen.

Fear not—what have we learned that means in Isaianic poetry? This is a salvation oracle. Let’s look at His promises of deliverance:

3 For I will pour water on the thirsty land, and streams on the dry ground;
I will pour my Spirit upon your offspring, and my blessing on your descendants.

Here we have two parallelisms in a row and remember that parallelism is where you have two phrases saying the exact same thing with different wording. Yahweh says He will pour “water on the thirsty land” and “water on the dry ground. He immediately follows it up with another parallelism, equating pouring out “my Spirit on your offspring” and “my blessing on your descendants.” Spirit is equated with blessing and offspring with descendants—but wait, there’s more—the two parallelisms also parallel one another and give us the key to translating some of the verses in the past chapters about pouring out water in the desert—things that never happened historically with the return from exile. The pouring out of water is equated with the outpouring of His spirit. But wait—this didn’t happen either—at least not during the return from Babylon. But Yahweh has spoken it and so it must happen—when did it end up happening? At Shavuot/Pentecost after the resurrection where the Holy Spirit was poured out on the Jewish believers in Yeshua who were gathered at the Temple to pray. We see this, of course, in Acts 2. If this was referring to the exiles, it would not say “your descendants”—it would say “you.” But as for now, the exiles are still “dry ground” spiritually, which we will see in painful detail in the writings of Nehemiah, Ezra, and Malachi. They needed the empowerment of the Spirit to truly change, but it wouldn’t be happening anytime soon.

4 They shall spring up among the grass like willows by flowing streams.
5 This one will say, ‘I am the Lord’s,’ another will call on the name of Jacob,
and another will write on his hand, ‘The Lord’s,’ and name himself by the name of Israel.”

 

These verses really solidify for me that this is something that didn’t happen until Yeshua’s time. We have people, obviously not native-born Israelites, claiming that they belong to the Lord, calling on the name of Jacob, writing the Lord’s Name on his hand (a mark of servitude in the ancient world), and naming HIMSELF by the name of Israel. These are things that no native-born would need to do. No, this is clearly speaking of the ingrafting of gentiles who freely chose to become part of Israel through belief in and association with the Messiah of Israel. Notice that these are all acts of individuals, and not of a nation as a whole.

6 Thus says the Lord, the King of Israel and his Redeemer, the Lord of hosts:
“I am the first and I am the last; besides me there is no god.
7 Who is like me? Let him proclaim it. Let him declare and set it before me,
since I appointed an ancient people. Let them declare what is to come, and what will happen.
8 Fear not, nor be afraid; have I not told you from of old and declared it? And you are my witnesses!
Is there a God besides me? There is no Rock; I know not any.”

 

Last week we talked about Regnal names—kingly titles. Here we have Yahweh, His personal Name, Melek Y’Israel—which proclaims the allegiance they owe to Him, Redeemer—this is more intimate, as the go’al was close kin who would save a person from distress, Yahweh Tzva’ot—Yahweh of armies—proclaiming His might and ability to save. Of course, we have seen this proclamation over and over again—“I am the first and the last; besides me there is no god,” and the specific word is elohim here, a generic term meaning “mighty one” that often refers, in context to the gods of the nations—as it does here. Again—first and last is a reference to the ancient law of continuity where polytheistic gods do not exist apart from the system, they are not like Yahweh, outside of time and space and having created them. If the universe and time all dissolved, Yahweh would still exist because He is first and last—He alone can exist apart from what He has created. Pagans saw their gods as part of creation, dependent on it, working in cooperation with it and needing it even. They were trapped by the confines of space and time and history just like humans were. So when Yahweh says, “Who is like me?” He is literally pointing all this out—no one claims to have a god that is anything like Yahweh, He is utterly foreign to their way of thinking. That is what it means to be first and last—and He has been communicating this to His people from the beginning—they can witness that it is true! That is why they were created in the first place!

Funny quick story here. In the Septuagint, the third-century BCE Greek translation of the Hebrew Scriptures, they didn’t include the last bit “There is no Rock; I know not any.” The reason why is because they had already begun becoming very sensitive to how Yahweh was portrayed in the Bible—and they didn’t like comparing Him to a rock—even if it was His own words.

The next bit I am going to just read straight through with only a few notes and then I am going to read Jeremiah 10:1-16 and not simply the few verses that are generally taken out of context, and Habakkuk 2. We’re going to talk about how they are very similar and how well they line up with the section of the Erra Epic which describes in detail how the idol of Marduk in Babylon was manufactured. All comments in brackets are my comments

 

9 All who fashion idols are nothing, and the things they delight in do not profit. Their witnesses (their worshipers) neither see nor know, that they may be put to shame. (the Psalm 115 curse on those who worship false gods) 10 Who fashions a god or casts an idol that is profitable for nothing? 11 Behold, all his companions shall be put to shame, and the craftsmen are only human (they are the created, not the Creator). Let them all assemble, let them stand forth. They shall be terrified; they shall be put to shame together.

 

12 The ironsmith takes a cutting tool and works it over the coals. He fashions it with hammers and works it with his strong arm. He becomes hungry, and his strength fails; he drinks no water and is faint. (because he is only human) 13 The carpenter stretches a line; he marks it out with a pencil. He shapes it with planes and marks it with a compass. He shapes it into the figure of a man, with the beauty of a man, to dwell in a house. 14 He cuts down cedars, or he chooses a cypress tree or an oak and lets it grow strong among the trees of the forest. He plants a cedar and the rain nourishes it. 15 Then it becomes fuel for a man. He takes a part of it and warms himself; he kindles a fire and bakes bread. Also, he makes a god and worships it; he makes it an idol and falls down before it. 16 Half of it he burns in the fire. Over the half he eats meat; he roasts it and is satisfied. Also, he warms himself and says, “Aha, I am warm, I have seen the fire!” 17 And the rest of it he makes into a god, his idol, and falls down to it and worships it. He prays to it and says, “Deliver me, for you are my god!” (He is worshiping and depending upon something that couldn’t even create itself)

 

18 They know not, nor do they discern, for he has shut their eyes, so that they cannot see, and their hearts, so that they cannot understand. (Psalm 115 again) 19 No one considers, nor is there knowledge or discernment to say, “Half of it I burned in the fire; I also baked bread on its coals; I roasted meat and have eaten. And shall I make the rest of it an abomination? Shall I fall down before a block of wood?” 20 He feeds on ashes (because that’s what was done with the rest of the same exact piece of wood); a deluded heart has led him astray, and he cannot deliver himself or say, “Is there not a lie in my right hand?”

Whoa, the right hand—remember what Isaiah said earlier, that Yahweh was holding on to Israel’s right hand, putting them at His left hand? Well, idolaters are standing at the left hand of idols. The contrast is very stark and very deliberate.

 

It looks silly to us because we get it now, how ridiculous this is. But to a polytheist, it was not so obvious. It was the context of their whole life—making idols and using them to placate, mollify, serve, and manipulate their gods. Now, I want to read from Jeremiah 10, and not just the few verses used out of context that people use in their zeal to discredit Christmas Trees, which I don’t like either but I am not going to use Scripture out of context in pursuit of an agenda—find another way, okay? I am going to read all of them and especially the ones that make it clear that this is referring to actual idols to whom people would go to seek wisdom and counsel and help.

10 Hear the word that the Lord speaks to you, O house of Israel. 2 Thus says the Lord:

“Learn not the way of the nations, nor be dismayed at the signs of the heavens because the nations are dismayed at them, 3 for the customs of the peoples are vanity. A tree from the forest is cut down and worked with an axe by the hands of a craftsman. 4 They decorate it with silver and gold; they fasten it with hammer and nails so that it cannot move. 5 Their idols are like scarecrows in a cucumber field, and they cannot speak; they have to be carried, for they cannot walk Do not be afraid of them, for they cannot do evil, neither is it in them to do good.” (no one would suggest that anyone would think it necessary to point out that a Christmas tree can’t walk or talk of do good or evil. They are compared to scarecrows for a reason—because they have been carved into the shape of a human being but people stop quoting this section once they get to the end of verse five because the context becomes clear).

(This language should sound familiar if you have listened to the whole series with Yahweh making demands that the gods of the nations do something, anything, good or bad to prove they are real)

6 There is none like you, O Lord; you are great, and your name is great in might.
7 Who would not fear you, O King of the nations? For this is your due; for among all the wise ones of the nations and in all their kingdoms there is none like you. 8 They are both stupid and foolish; the instruction of idols is but wood! (again, no one is seeking counsel from a Christmas tree) 9 Beaten silver is brought from Tarshish, and gold from Uphaz. They are the work of the craftsman and of the hands of the goldsmith; their clothing is violet and purple; they are all the work of skilled men. 10 But the Lord is the true God; he is the living God and the everlasting King. At his wrath the earthquakes, and the nations cannot endure his indignation. (the big national idols were carved from sacred wood, and covered from head to toe with beaten sheets of gold and silver and dressed up like kings and queens)

11 Thus shall you say to them: “The gods who did not make the heavens and the earth shall perish from the earth and from under the heavens.” 12 It is he who made the earth by his power, who established the world by his wisdom, and by his understanding stretched out the heavens. 13 When he utters his voice, there is a tumult of waters in the heavens, and he makes the mist rise from the ends of the earth.
He makes lightning for the rain, and he brings forth the wind from his storehouses. 14 Every man is stupid and without knowledge; every goldsmith is put to shame by his idols, for his images are false, and there is no breath in them. 15 They are worthless, a work of delusion; at the time of their punishment they shall perish. 16 Not like these is he who is the portion of Jacob, for he is the one who formed all things,
and Israel is the tribe of his inheritance; the Lord of hosts is his name.

Habakkuk 2:18-19 has a short section as well that is useful:

“…when its maker has shaped it, a metal image, a teacher of lies? For its maker trusts in his own creation when he makes speechless idols! Woe to him who says to a wooden thing, Awake; to a silent stone, Arise! Can this teach? Behold, it is overlaid with gold and silver, and there is no breath at all in it.”

Now, let’s compare this to the Erra Epic. Tablet 1 contains the following imprints. In context, Erra, the warrior god, is challenging Marduk, the king of the gods, because the idol in Marduk’s temple had lost its luster. Marduk explains that he left his dwelling when he caused the great flood. Everything in () is my commentary.

 

(Marduk speaking)

“As to my precious image (aka idol), which has been struck by the deluge that its appearance was sullied
I commanded fire to make my features shine (because it is overlaid with gold) and cleanse my apparel (evidently it wears clothing)

When it had shined my precious image and completed the task
I donned my lordly diadem and returned…. (when his idol looked suitable again, he returned his essence to it)

…I sent those craftsmen down to the depths, I ordered them not to come up
I removed the wood and gemstone and showed no one where…..
Where is the wood, flesh of the gods, suitable for the lord of the universe, (every culture I have come across seemed to believe that only certain kinds of wood were suitable to be the “flesh” of an idol – in this case, the wood is from the “mesu” tree)
The sacred tree, splendid stripling, perfect for lordship,
Whose roots thrust down a hundred leagues through the waters of the vast ocean to the depths of hell,
Whose crown brushed Anu’s heaven on high?
Where is the gemstone that I reserved for {damaged}?
Where is Ninildum, great carpenter of my supreme divinity, (Ninildum is the idol maker)
Wielder of the glittering hatchet, who knows what tool, (although we would think of a hatchet only in the hands of a lumberman, in this case the hatchet is the tool of a crafsman – hatchets are way smaller than axes and oftentimes in ancient languages they had one word for tool and context determines which one is being referenced)
Who makes it shine like the day and puts it at subjection to my feet?
….
Where are the choice stones, created by the vast sea, to ornament my diadem?” (big city gods were crowned with real crowns just as they were dressed with real clothing)

I am also going to include a quote from Trevor Bryce’s excellent work, Life and Society in the Hittite World, p 157—He writes, ‘In the latter part of the New Kingdom, the statues of the gods set up on bases in the sanctuaries of their temples were life-sized or larger. They were made of precious and semi-precious metals – gold silver, iron, bronze – or else of wood plated with gold, silver, or tin and sometimes decorated with precious materials like lapis lazuli.’  We have actual information on the statuette of the goddess Iyaya, ‘The divine image is a female statuette of wood, seated and veiled, one cubit (in height). Her body is plated with gold, but the body and the throne are plated with tin.’

So, we see a lot of similarities between the Era Epic, which is taking this project absolutely seriously and the Bible, which is not. But both are describing the same exact phenomenon—the creation of an idol out of sacred wood, covered with hammered precious metals, clothed in the finest fabrics, ornamented with precious gemstones, and polished until it shines, etc. I understand that a lot of people hate Christmas trees and want to discredit them, but that isn’t what this is about. It just isn’t. And I think the people who originally taught this knew it because I don’t see any other reason for ignoring most of the text and the other prophetic passages that go with it. Also, a dead tree wasn’t a symbol of fertility—that’s what sacred groves were for. When good kings came to power, they cut down the sacred groves—not to bring the trees inside, but to burn them outside the city gates in order to defile them. The first rule of sacred tree club is don’t cut down the sacred tree—or it isn’t sacred anymore. A dead tree isn’t a fertility symbol unless you carved it into an Asherah or one of the other fertility goddesses. Throughout Assyrian and Babylonian and Egyptian art, we see carved representations of people around trees with what looks to the untrained eye like boxes and ornaments and some ministries have colorized them to enhance the effect—but I have seen one of these up close at the St Louis Museum and have verified what ancient Near Eastern Scholars and archaeologists say—they are people using pinecones (you can see that it is a pinecone from up close) to pollinate the Tree of Life and the “boxes” are actually baskets they are filling with the fruit of the Tree of Life. We know this because we have cuneiform tablets and other writings of the mythologies giving testimony to this. If we want to be against Christmas trees, we can point out the waste of resources involved and the gross commercialism of the holiday in general and the terrible debt racked up that cannot be said to be done in the Name of our Messiah. But Christmas trees really aren’t more than five hundred years old and Germanic, not ancient Near Eastern. Let’s not use the Bible out of context in order to serve agendas—it is dangerous business and, I believe, disrespectful to the precious Word we have been gifted with. We can’t criticize people for saying, “That’s not what that means to me” and then turn around and do it ourselves. Okay, lecture over. Back to the text:

21 Remember these things, O Jacob, and Israel, for you are my servant; I formed you; you are my servant; O Israel, you will not be forgotten by me.
Remember what things? Well, the language isn’t entirely clear so we have a couple of choices. Either (1) He is telling them not to forget how ridiculous idols are. I am not extremely fond of that option, or (2) all the deliverances of the past that He has been reminding them of. Maybe that’s it. Or (3) what He tells them in His next breath—namely “you ARE my servant. I FORMED you.” Then he repeats “you are my servant” and then “you will not be forgotten by me.”

I think this is the right option because He tells them to remember and then He says they will not be forgotten. There is a definite chiastic structure here, which I can’t explain on the radio. I need charts and I could pretend to have a chart here but that would just be rude. So what is the result of not being forgotten by Yahweh?

22 I have blotted out your transgressions like a cloud and your sins like mist; return to me, for I have redeemed you.

I HAVE blotted out your transgressions, remember that is pescha, willful and rebellious high-handed offenses that are not covered by the sacrifices. That word translated as blotted out can also be translated swept away, which makes more sense when the process is being compared to dispersing a cloud. We also see included in all this that the chattat sins, the unintentional sins, being swept away like a mist. So we have Yahweh forgiving not only the greatest of their offenses but also the least—this is a total and complete forgiveness. Again, we keep coming across this radical grace that is being extended to the exiles, who certainly aren’t repentant before Him and most of them won’t even end up leaving exile—they will choose to stay, and those who do go back, a lot of these guys marry pagan women. Although we don’t see them engaging in idol worship again, Malachi has them doing plenty of other horrible things. And yet, God extends this amazing grace to them and forgives it all for His own sake, which He says repeatedly—not because they are deserving but because He created them to be His witnesses and unless He wipes the slate clean, He is not going to have any witnesses.

He says, “Return to me for I HAVE redeemed you.” Again, speaking of the future as though it is already a done deal. Although they cannot see their redemption, it is absolutely real. He is calling on them to acknowledge the reality of His salvation before they can even see it—while they are still wallowing in denial as to their culpability in this whole terrible mess.

And we just aren’t that much different today, are we! So often when something terrible happens to us we blame it on Satan, or on other people being jerks when really it is often the natural consequence of our own insufferable actions. We behave boorishly on social media, and they exile us from their wall by unfriending or blocking us, and we say “They can’t handle the truth!” Well, more likely they can’t handle our incessant caterwauling. No one wants to be preached at all the time in their own cyber living room and especially not by people who really don’t know as much as they think they do and aren’t as mature as they think they are. If we exhaust people, they are going to preserve their peace by giving us the boot. Nothing mysterious or mean-spirited and not necessarily an aversion to the truth—just an aversion to us. Well, that’s how the Israelites were treating Yahweh. They were sitting in a well-deserved exile, and first they called Yahweh blind and deaf to their rights, and then they feigned complete ignorance at having actually earned their exile—blaming in on His incompetence instead—and they didn’t worship Him in exile as they should have, but heaped their sins up in His face and yet He forgives because He is kinder, more patient, more everything good and grace-filled than we are. He is the God who remembers, and who forgives. He is just unreal.

 



Rosh HaShanah, the Gezer Calendar, and the “Higher Criticism” Myth of Akitu Origins

There is a needless debate within some movements about supposed Babylonian origins of the upcoming Leviticus 23 Fall Feast, which goes by the names of Yom Teruah and Rosh HaShanah, but in reality, is never formally named in Scripture. Unlike Pesach (Passover), Shavuot (Pentecost), Yom Kippur (the Day of Atonement), and Sukkot (the Feast of Tabernacles), the first day of the Biblical month of Tishri is in many ways described but never actually named. It is described as a day of shouting or of the sounding of the shofar (translated “trumpet” in English), but it is never actually given a name–which is why it has been labelled by people with names suited to its function in both the religious calendar of months, and the agricultural/civic calendar of years. It therefore has no wrong names, just names that convey different meanings that are often misunderstood and misrepresented.

Yom Teruah, with Yom bearing the Hebrew meaning of “day” and Teruah being one of the sounds that is made with a shofar (an animal horn used as a “trumpet”, pictured above–this gorgeous specimen is an 18th century German shofar currently in use at the Great Synagogue at Duke’s Place in London). On this Feast Day, in the synagogues, the shofar will be blown 100 times, and I can tell you from the personal experience of having performed the entire liturgy on the shofar, it is exhausting and requires a lot of practice. It is a beautiful thing to hear.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9IOhuNG0bdE

The first day of Tishri is also called Rosh HaShanah, meaning “head” (rosh) of “the year”–and this is where the confusion comes in and accusations of pagan origins get made. So stick with me, the “year” beginning at this point, as opposed to the “months” beginning in the Spring, is actually documented both archaeologically and Biblically when we know what to look for. I am not going to go into every Biblical instance, because some of it requires more groundwork than I can lay out in a blog post of this nature, but I will tackle the verses that back up the specific archaeology I will cite here. All Bible references are from the English Standard Version.

Exodus 34:22  “You shall observe the Feast of Weeks, the firstfruits of wheat harvest, and the Feast of Ingathering at the year’s end.”

Lev 25:3-4  “For six years you shall sow your field, and for six years you shall prune your vineyard and gather in its fruits, but in the seventh year there shall be a Sabbath of solemn rest for the land, a Sabbath to the Lord. You shall not sow your field or prune your vineyard.”

Lev 25:8-11 “You shall count seven weeks of years, seven times seven years, so that the time of the seven weeks of years shall give you forty-nine years. Then you shall sound the loud trumpet on the tenth day of the seventh month. On the Day of Atonement you shall sound the trumpet throughout all your land. And you shall consecrate the fiftieth year, and proclaim liberty throughout the land to all its inhabitants. It shall be a jubilee for you, when each of you shall return to his property and each of you shall return to his clan. That fiftieth year shall be a jubilee for you; in it you shall neither sow nor reap what grows of itself nor gather the grapes from the undressed vines.”

So, we have a few things here, we see that the Fall Feasts are celebrated “at year’s end.” This Hebrew word is tequpat, from the lemma tequpah, and serves as the direct object of the sentence referring to the end of the agricultural year. Forms of this word are only used three other times in Scripture, referring to the end of Hannah’s pregnancy and the beginning of Samuel’s life in I Sam 1:20, the completion of the sun’s circuit to the end of the heavens in Psalm 19:6, and designating the timing of Joash’s assassination to the end of the year in II Chron 24:23. Each time it is used, it has the meaning of the ending of one cycle and the beginning of another–in the case of Ex 34:22, the end/beginning of the agricultural year which happened at the fall harvest and kicked off the “season of our joy” when all the hard work of the harvest year was done and all that was left to do was plant the new barley crop in anticipation of the early rains, and whatever preservation work was required for winter.

We also have a different kind of new year cycle celebrated in the month of Tishri, and that is the “shemittah” cycle. This referred to the seven-year cycles of the Land of Israel, which go beyond the scope of this particular teaching. Suffice it to say that each year in the seven-year cycle had specific commandments associated with it as far as the distribution of the second/third tithe. The seventh year, in particular, was associated with release from debts and a freedom from all agricultural labors. Every seventh seven years was even more significant as lands were restored to their original owners who sometimes had to sell them to pay off debts. This all formally began/ended at Yom Kippur, as we see in the above verses.

Tishri 1 was also the day that Israel’s kings had their official coronations, and they counted their reign years according to this yearly event. For example, if a king died in the month of Elul, the previous month, his son would take the throne and would count the remainder of the month as the first full year of his reign, just as his father also got a full year’s credit for that eleven month year before his death. But he would not have his coronation until Tishri 1–after all, that was when the animals were mature, the fattened calf was really fat and still a calf, all of the produce of Israel was available for the event. Who would want to have their coronation in the Spring when the only fresh crop was barley? Blech. Not really very glorious…

So, although we see in Ex 12:2 that we have the beginning of months in the Spring, marking the beginning of the religious year, the Israelites celebrated the beginning of actual years in the fall, according to an agricultural and civil schedule, as opposed to the Babylonians, who celebrated their New Year festival in Nisan. But wait–there’s more! I can actually show you archaeological proof, found in 1908 in a dig at ancient Gezer, 20 miles from Jerusalem. This 10th century BCE calendar (below), manufactured 200 years before the Assyrian exile and 400 years before the Babylonian exile, is a paleo-Hebrew witness of the ancient “year” calendar of the time of the Davidic Monarchy.

Here is the translation, courtesy of Rainey and Notley’s The Sacred Bridge: Carta’s Atlas of the Biblical World (it is the gold standard of Biblical atlases, generously donated to my ministry by my anonymous benefactor who I only know as Jennifer):

Line 1: His two months: Ingathering His two months: Sowing

Line 2: His two months: Late Sowing

Line 3: His month: Chopping Flax (for grass)

Line 4: His month: Barley harvest

Line 5: His month: Harvest and measuring

Line 6: His two months: Vine harvest

Line 7: His month: Summer fruit

(signature) Abiya

Line one corresponds to the 6th through 9th months of the Hebrew calendar; line two to the late sowing of the 10th and 11th months; line three to the 12th; line four corresponds to the barley harvest of the first month, and line five to the second month. Line five refers to the vine harvesting of the 3rd and 4th months, and the seventh line wraps it up with the summer fruit harvest (specifically, olives). This is an agricultural calendar, arranging the months of the year according to what was happening in the fields. It begins with the “ingathering at the end of the year” referred to by Ex 34:22 and ends with the harvesting of the olives that would have been pressed and preserved as oil before the long winter months of rains and waiting.

Ancient people thought about the world differently than moderns. Whereas we think in terms of calendar years (Jan), fiscal years (April), election years (November), and school years (August/September), they thought in terms of religious, legal, and agricultural years. The religious year of “months” began in the Spring month of Nisan. The civil year of second tithe determination, debt remission and kingship began in Tishri, the seventh month in the Fall. The agricultural year began with the ingathering in the fall, as the Gezer calendar highlights.

And so, in the Fall, Tishri 1 can be called Rosh HaShanah, “head of the year” and be an entirely accurate description. Life radically changed in the fall, as the cycle of one agricultural and civil year ended and another began.

Now, as for the High Criticism claims that Rosh HaShanah has its origins and timing in the Akitu festival of ancient Babylon, I first need to explain what “higher criticism” is. Sadly, it was a method of Biblical criticism that was very popular in the eighteenth, nineteenth and early twentieth century but has now fallen into disfavor based on the windfall of archaeological evidence gathered over the last 150 years. “Lower” or textual criticism is a way of evaluating the Biblical text via actual documents–one can use it to evaluate textual differences between manuscripts. It is useful when manuscripts don’t match up exactly, as in the case between the modern Masoretic Hebrew Bible and the earlier manuscripts found in the Dead Sea Scrolls. But Lower criticism uses actual evidence. Higher criticism, on the other hand, is a very subjective approach to the text that is highly dependant on theories and sometimes, purely wishful thinking. Higher criticism is based on some pretty significant assumptions–and challenges the legitimacy and authorship of the Scriptures. According to much of higher criticism, the Torah was not written by Moses, who might have been nothing but a fictional character–but was penned during and after the Babylonian exile by various groups. Higher criticism is where the ideas of the “Deuteronomy hypothesis,” lunar sabbath, and the Babylonian Akitu origins of Rosh HaShanah came from. Higher criticism tends to want to find “natural” and “non-divine” origins in everything–it actively undermines the historical authenticity of the Bible’s claim that it was written when it was claimed to be written, and by who it was claimed to be written. Sabbath just has to be tied to ancient lunar cycles, it couldn’t possibly be divinely ordained, and the Feasts need to be explained away as copies of Canaanite celebrations, again, they can’t possibly be of divine origin. According to this line of thinking, the Jews in exile, desperately seeking to remain a people, wrote the Bible in order to give their beliefs more credibility. That is the nutshell view of higher biblical criticism. It has also greatly affected many teachings about the origins of Christianity, many of which are based on unproven or disproven theories.

Anyway, the idea that Rosh HaShanah is based on Akitu is completely unsubstantiated–purely theoretical. Not only is there no proof, but there are factors weighing against it. First of all, I have no reason to believe the Bible was first written during the exile. I believe that the Bible is telling the truth when it talks about Moses writing everything down. Heck, I believe that Moses, Aaron, Mirian, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob are real people. I believe they celebrated the Feasts, all of them, before the exile. I don’t think that the priestly class created the Bible as job security. You can call those wild assumptions, but I presume that no one would take the time to read this is they didn’t take the Bible as a truthful document.

Akitu was a twelve-day spring barley harvest festival dedicated to the state god Marduk. It began on the 21st of Adar and ended on Nisan 1 or on Nisan 1 and ended on Nisan 12 (there is some debate among scholars with most, I believe, favoring the latter). This was the “beginning of the year” in the Babylonian empire. As a matter of fact, the word akitu is related to the Sumerian word for barley–akiti. I am not going to go into a lot of detail about the Akitu festival, but to compare it to Rosh HaShanah and the accompanying shofar blowing and the liturgies–I just don’t see it. Akitu was in the spring, RH is in the fall. Akitu was a 12-day festival, and RH is one day. Akitu was about the barley harvest, the lowliest of the harvested crops, whereas RH was celebrated in the time of wine, oil, and late fruits. At Akitu, the king of Babylon was subjected to a debasing ritual (which involved him being stripped of all honor, dragged by the ear, and slapped, all grave insults in the ancient Near East), and RH has no such equivalent–on the contrary, it was the day of ancient Israel’s coronations. Akitu involved the parading around of the idol of Marduk, and on RH we see no evidence that there was any sort of equivalent.

In short, we need to be very wary of accusations over the “real origins” of this or that celebration or observance because we will oftentimes find the roots of such theories in the very higher criticism which has come under scholarly disfavor. Sadly, it was commonplace for people to float hypotheses as plausible when they really had nothing more than a supposition. Others who read them did not always realize that they were untested opinions and treated them as fact. Accusations are serious business, and should not be leveled without serious proof. It is not enough to assume that there might be pagan origins of this or that–we must know. The death penalty for idolatry in the Bible is death, and anyone who made an accusation without first-hand evidence would be put to death themselves. We have grown too lazy, and have taken our American concept of freedom of speech as a right to make accusations without any sort of proof. There is no proof whatsoever in the Babylonian origins theory of Rosh HaShanah, all we have are untested hypotheses that cannot be considered as anything more than opinions. So, perhaps it would be wise to drop the accusations and the vitriol, and simply be glad when people observe the High Sabbath of Tishri 1, honoring the King of Kings as a worldwide body.

Referenced works: (I am including some online sources that I have found to be reasonable–as many internet pages devoted to exploring paganism are not based on the ancient literature and archaeology but on modern legends, so let the reader beware–always make sure that actual experts in the field are being cited. For example, the opinion of a linguist is not the same as the educated conclusion of an archaeologist in some matters and the opinion of a numismatist would bear little weight in linguistics!)

Rainey, Anson, and Notley, Steven The Sacred Bridge: Carta’s Atlas of the Biblical World, Second Edition, Carta Jerusalem, 2014, pg. 42

(online sources on Gezer calendar here and here)

Van Der Toorn, Karel Dictionary of Deities and Demons in the Bible, Second edition, Brill, 1999, pp543-548

Oshima, Takayoshi, The Babylonian God Marduk from Leick’s The Babylonian World, Taylor & Francis, 2007 pp. 348-360

Sommer, Benjamin The Babylonian Akitu Festival: Rectifying the King or Renewing the Cosmos? Journal of the Ancient Near Eastern Society (JANES), Volume 27, 2000 – available online

(online sources on Marduk and Akitu here and here)

In the interest of fairness, I am going to include a resource that I treasure highly and did use quite a bit in my studies, but delves quite a bit into higher criticism of the origins of the festivals. It remains, however, the most brilliant work on the Psalms every written and is considered the definitive work by both Jews and Christians worldwide. I include it so that you can see how higher criticism is worked into the books published in the mid-twentieth century (in this case, first printing 1962). It does not, however, detract from his ground-breaking analysis of the Psalms themselves, and Mowinckel agrees that the Jewish tradition of RH being associated with kingship did not come from foreign influences (p. 123)

Mowinckel, Sigmund The Psalms in Israel’s Worship, Eerdmans, 2004 pp 106-192