Foretold Messiah 2 a Voice giving The Word to His servants

In the previous chapter we have seen that already soon in history Jehovah God promised a solution against the curse of death.

Already in the first book of the Bible (third  chapter) there is spoken of the “Seed of a woman” (virgin birth) what would become a reality many centuries later, God His saying or His Word becoming a reality, His Word becoming into the flesh, Jesus being that sent one from God, born in Bethlehem.

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
(John 1:1 NHEBJE)

But when the fullness of the time came, God sent out his Son, born to a woman, born under the law, that he might redeem those who were under the law, that we might receive the adoption of children.
(Galatians 4:4-5 NHEBJE)

Now the birth of Jesus Christ was like this; for after his mother, Mary, was engaged to Joseph, before they came together, she was found to be with child from the Holy Spirit.
(Matthew 1:18 NHEBJE)

Satan or the adversary of God going to be bruised by the one who would be born to help and even save the seed of Abraham.

I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and her offspring. He will bruise your head, and you will bruise his heel.”
(Genesis 3:15 NHEBJE)

Since then the children have shared in flesh and blood, he also himself in like manner partook of the same, that through death he might bring to nothing him who had the power of death, that is, the devil, and might deliver all of them who through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to bondage. For, truly, he did not come to help the angels, but to help the seed of Abraham. Therefore he was obligated in all things to be made like his brothers, that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in things pertaining to God, to make atonement for the sins of the people. For in that he himself has suffered being tempted, he is able to help those who are tempted.
(Hebrews 2:14-18 NHEBJE)

He who sins is of the devil, for the devil has been sinning from the beginning. To this end the Son of God was revealed, to destroy the works of the devil.
(1 John 3:8 NHEBJE)

Because of the many sins of all people it was necessary to reveal to the world who would be the one to follow and to have the relationship between God and man restored. Jehovah God declared Himself to be well-pleased with him.

A voice came out of the sky, “You are my beloved Son, with you I am well pleased.”
(Mark 1:11 NHEBJE)

Since the dove was a symbol of peace or freedom from judgment (Gen. 8:8-12) many people there around the river Jordan could see the Holy Spirit’s presence like a dove signifying that this man standing there (Jeshua or Jesus) would bring salvation to those who were willing to turn to him. The Voice of God authenticated Jesus by alluding to Psalm 2:7 and Isaiah 42:1.

I will tell of the decree. Jehovah said to me, “You are my son. Today I have become your father.
(Psalms 2:7 NHEBJE)

“Behold, my servant, whom I uphold; my chosen, in whom my soul delights?I have put my Spirit on him. He will bring justice to the nations. He will not shout, nor raise his voice, nor cause it to be heard in the street. He won’t break a bruised reed. He won’t quench a dimly burning wick. He will faithfully bring justice. He will not fail nor be discouraged, until he has set justice in the earth, and for his law the coastlands will hope.” Thus says God Jehovah, he who created the heavens and stretched them out, he who spread out the earth and that which comes out of it, he who gives breath to its people and spirit to those who walk in it. “I, Jehovah, have called you in righteousness, and will hold your hand, and will keep you, and make you a covenant for the people, as a light for the nations; to open the blind eyes, to bring the prisoners out of the dungeon, and those who sit in darkness out of the prison. “I am Jehovah. That is my name. I will not give my glory to another, nor my praise to engraved images. Behold, the former things have happened, and I declare new things. I tell you about them before they come up.”
(Isaiah 42:1-9 NHEBJE)

Jehovah could have made an end to Adam and Eve there in the Garden of Eden and/or could have created straight ahead new people who would be willing to be faithful to Him. Straight there in the Garden Jehovah God could have  made an end to those sinful people and could have made and end to the punishment He had given to the first man.  God is not such an unrighteous non-loving god He would have had so many people suffering, to come to earth in a later stadium (as so many believe God would have come to earth in the form or guise of Jesus) to fake His temptation (because God cannot be tempted) and to fake His death (because God can not die, Him being an immortal Eternal Spirit) and after such a theatre act, leaving the people still suffering for many centuries (like we still have to suffer). No, God wanted people to see His creation and His works, letting the world see that His creatures also could be clean of heart and spirit and that a man could be faithful to the Will of God. The world had to come to see that Jesus is that person of flesh and blood who is able to do the Will of God, and to live accordance His Will and regulations.

The other servant of God, king David, is the predecessor of Jesus. Out of his seed Jesus would be born. When David made his songs for His Most Beloved Master Creator he seemed to intended to speak of his own case and experience but the Holy Spirit led him to use language, which in its full meaning can be applied to none but the servant Jesus himself.

Sacrifice and offering you did not desire, but a body you have prepared for me. You have not required burnt offering and sin offering. Then I said, “Behold, I have come. It is written about me in the book on the scroll. I delight to do your will, my God. Yes, your Law is within my heart.” I have proclaimed glad news of righteousness in the great assembly. Behold, I will not seal my lips, Jehovah, you know. I have not hidden your righteousness within my heart. I have declared your faithfulness and your salvation. I have not concealed your loving kindness and your truth from the great assembly.
(Psalms 40:6-10 NHEBJE)

Jesus also did not pray to himself nor asked people to pray to him.  Jesus taught people to pray to his heavenly Father, the Only One True God.

Let your Kingdom come. Let your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.
(Matthew 6:10 NHEBJE)

He was withdrawn from them about a stone’s throw, and he knelt down and prayed, saying, “Father, if you are willing, remove this cup from me. Nevertheless, not my will, but yours, be done.”
(Luke 22:41-42 NHEBJE)

Jesus was fully aware of his predestination and the task given to him by the Divine Creator. In the Old Writings, we shall see, the Most High gave His Word to mankind to come to see and hear His many servants, like Moses,Joshua, Samuel, Gad, Nathan, Jeremiah, Ezra, Nehemiah, David, Solomon, Isaiah Ezekiel, Daniel, Joel Amos, Obadiah, Micah, Zephaniah, Zechariah, Malachi who would prepare the world for the one to come and to tell the people what they had to do to live according to the Will of God. They all prepared the way for the prophet who would further explain the Will of God and who would live according to that Will. Jesus was going to make all those previous teachings clearer to understand, for those who by that time still did not see what God wanted from them.

Heavens declare God, but not many people come to see it. The ancient prophets therefore told about the one servant who would be sent by God to declare the Good News.

But Jesus, perceiving that, withdrew from there. Many followed him; and he healed them all, and commanded them that they should not make him known: that it might be fulfilled which was spoken through Isaiah the prophet, saying, “Behold, my servant whom I have chosen; my beloved in whom my soul is well pleased: I will put my Spirit on him. And he will proclaim justice to the nations. He will not strive, nor shout; neither will anyone hear his voice in the streets. He won’t break a bruised reed. And he won’t quench a smoking flax, until he leads justice to victory. And in his name, the nations will hope.”
(Matthew 12:15-21 NHEBJE)

He came to Nazareth, where he had been brought up. He entered, as was his custom, into the synagogue on the Sabbath day, and stood up to read. The scroll of the prophet Isaiah was handed to him. He opened the scroll, and found the place where it was written, “The Spirit of the Lord is on me, because he has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives, recovering of sight to the blind, to deliver those who are crushed, and to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord.”
(Luke 4:16-19 NHEBJE)

God is an immortal Singular Spirit Being, to Whom no man can do something, but Jesus being a mortal being is that one spoken about whose heel would be bruised with nails on the wooden stake. The world had to come to see that there was that man of flesh and blood, like all of us frail, apparently destructible or possible to be put to death, now becoming both a lamp and a reed, humble, but not to be broken, and the “light of the world“.

Being killed, God was going to take him out of the dead, so that the world would have a proof that man can step out of death. In case God would have come to the world and would have faked His death and having come out of the dead, we naturally would still have no proof at all that man can resurrect. Now with the resurrection of Jesus we should have no doubts at all. What God did with him He is willing to do with us also. That is one of His promises.

For those who would have doubts, Jesus after his resurrection showed himself, proving it was him, who is of flesh and blood and not a spirit like his heavenly Father is a Spirit.

God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.”
(John 4:24 NHEBJE)

As they said these things, Jesus himself stood among them, and said to them, “Peace be to you.” But they were terrified and filled with fear, and supposed that they had seen a spirit. He said to them, “Why are you troubled? Why do doubts arise in your hearts? See my hands and my feet, that it is truly me. Touch me and see, for a spirit does not have flesh and bones, as you see that I have.”
(Luke 24:36-39 NHEBJE)

They not only could see Jesus, they also could touch him and feel the wounds he had endured. In his resurrection we should have the hope for our resurrection and should have faith that Jesus is that sent one from God, who is the Way to God and for the whole world the light.

When therefore it was evening, on that day, the first day of the week, and when the doors were locked where the disciples were, for fear of the Jewish leaders, Jesus came and stood in the midst, and said to them, “Peace be to you.” When he had said this, he showed them his hands and his side. The disciples therefore were glad when they saw the Lord. Jesus therefore said to them again, “Peace be to you. As the Father has sent me, even so I send you.”
(John 20:19-21 NHEBJE)

Again, therefore, Jesus spoke to them, saying, “I am the light of the world. He who follows me will not walk in the darkness, but will have the light of life.”
(John 8:12 NHEBJE)

We all should come to believe in him who is that sent one from God and the Messiah, the giver of life.

Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in me will still live, even if he dies. Whoever lives and believes in me will never die. Do you believe this?” She said to him, “Yes, Lord. I have come to believe that you are the Messiah, God’s Son, he who comes into the world.”
(John 11:25-27 NHEBJE)

Preceding

A solution for a damaged relationship 3 Insight and prophesies given

Foretold Messiah 1 First mentioning

Out of the seed of Eve

First mention of a solution against death 4 A seed for mankind

First mention of a solution against death 5 Evil its law of death

First mention of a solution against death 6 Authority given to the send one from God coming out of the woman

First mention of a solution against death 7 Human sacrifice

Messianic prophesies 1 Adversary – Root of the first prophecy

Messianic prophesies 2 Adversary – Root of the first prophecy

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Additional reading

  1. Nature of the Bore according the first books
  2. The 1st Adam in the Hebrew Scriptures #4 The Fall
  3. The 1st Adam in the Hebrew Scriptures #5 Temptation, assault and curse
  4. The 1st Adam in the Hebrew Scriptures #7 Promise and solution
  5. The 1st Adam in the Hebrew Scriptures #8 Looking for the 2nd Adam
  6. Creator and Blogger God 3 Lesson and solution
  7. Looking for a primary cause and a goal that can not offer philosophers existing beliefs
  8. Reading to grow and to become wise concerning the most important thing in life 2 Prophetic and poetic writers
  9. Reading to grow and to become wise concerning the most important thing in life 3 Light and wisdom in words
  10. A Tool to shed light over the qualities in our life 2 Jews for a Messiah
  11. Torah hanging on two commandments and focussing on a Mashiach
  12. Fog, brass and light for the eyes
  13. The habitual misreading of John 1 and the ‘Word being God’ #1
  14. The habitual misreading of John 1 and the ‘Word being God’ #2
  15. With child and righteousness greater than the law
  16. A birthday passed nearly unnoticed
  17. Marriage of Jesus 10 Old and New Covenant
  18. Exceeding Great and Precious Promise
  19. Trusting, Faith, Calling and Ascribing to Jehovah #10 Prayer #8 Condition
  20. Through faith in Jesus Christ for all those who believe
  21. When believing in God’s existence and His son, possessing a divine legislation
  22. Soon it shall be Erev Pesach and Passover 2019

+++How I Went from a Servant to a Friend John 1515

Related

  1. Genesis 3
  2. Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden
  3. 929 Project: Genesis 3 – who dumped whom?
  4. Various Voices – The Serpent
  5. The Genesis of Grace 3: The Pinnacle of Creation,
  6. Original Sin
  7. The Fall and Redemption of Our Work (Matthew 11:29)
  8. It is Finished
  9. Destroying Fairy Tales: The Snake Satan in the Garden as the Anointed Cherub (Genesis 3)
  10. Genesis 3 and 4: The Hereditary Stain
  11. Fixing up Gen 3:19
  12. Day 171: Banished! Punishment or Protection?
  13. In summary
  14. Crushing the Enemy’s Head
  15. Why mortality? To learn.
  16. Fourth Sunday of Easter
  17. Identity: In Christ or in crisis? (Part 1)
  18. Daily Devotional – Genesis 3:1-24
  19. God Promised..
  20. The Lord’s Faithfulness from the Beginning
  21. Voices and Choices
  22. Meditation Monday: Here I Am
  23. Sermon of December 16, 2018 — “Right Time, Right Place, Right Person”
  24. Sincere Service to the Lord
  25. Wednesday Wake-Up – Adam vs Jesus – Romans 5
  26. Journey to Bethlehem week 2
  27. From Chaos to Communion
  28. We are all adam
  29. How I Went from a Servant to a Friend
  30. Being a servant of all
  31. Just a signpost
  32. The Eternal Word and Light
  33. Lamp on a Stand
  34. The Light of the World
  35. The Light Reveals the Glory of God
  36. Christ, the Light of the World
  37. ‘Light of the World’
  38. Shine The Light

Foretold Messiah 1 First mentioning

Jewish and Christian literature since the time of Yeshua or Jeshua have pointed to Genesis 3:15 as the first reference to the Messiah in the Torah.

Genesis 3:15 NHEBJE I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and her offspring. He will bruise your head, and you will bruise his heel.”

Here, because of the serpent’s seduction which brought separation between man and God, we see that God had already set in motion His grand plan for sending the Messiah (a seed) to redeem us back to Himself. This is what He tells the crafty serpent:

“I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring [seed/ zera] and her offsprin g [seed/ zera]. He will pound your head, and you will bite his heel.” (Artscroll Tanach)

Banished from the garden with Adam and Eve, we follow Cain and his descendants to determine if he carries this promised seed. But as we emerge from the waters of the Great Flood, we find that they have perished.

File:Nuremberg chronicles - f 9r.png
Adam and Eve Forced to Labour – Schedelsche Weltchronik or Nuremberg Chronicle

Though the world had to be on the look out for a woman bringing forth a child, born under the law, all the descendants of Adam and Eve having flesh and blood in common, the child of that woman would also share those.

Hebrews 2:14 NHEBJE Since then the children have shared in flesh and blood, he also himself in like manner partook of the same, that through death he might bring to nothing him who had the power of death, that is, the devil,

That devil or adversary of God would become bruised, damaged in such way that each adversary of God would be able to recognise that they are wrong to go against the divine Maker of the universe. For that reason God provided the solution of a man proving that man can keep pure and honest to Its Maker unlike the first human beings (from the beginning of times) and many of their descendants.

1 John 3:8 NHEBJE He who sins is of the devil, for the devil has been sinning from the beginning. To this end the Son of God was revealed, to destroy the works of the devil.

Though the world had to see that this child of that woman would not receive everything like that. It also had to work for his living and had to be tempted like any body else. He also had to suffer, but this time even more than many other people. He was not the only one to be brought to death by others; He also would also not be the only innocent one to be brought to death.

God is an eternal Spirit Being Who can not be tempted, not be killed by any living being or something else. He is also a loving God Who had a wonderful Plan for mankind and wanted it to be fulfilled. Therefore he gave man a second chance, by providing some one with the same attributes as Adam, being created from the nothingness, made to be a living soul with flesh and bones and blood. Jesus said

Luke 24:39 NHEBJE  See my hands and my feet, that it is truly me. Touch me and see, for a spirit does not have flesh and bones, as you see that I have.”

Whoever does not do righteousness is not of God, neither is he who does not love his brother. {1 John 3:10} The one born from that woman showed the world he was righteous and loving, even so much loving the others, that he was willing to give his life as a payment for the sins of mankind.

1 John 3:7 NHEBJE Little children, let no one lead you astray. He who does righteousness is righteous, even as he is righteous.

Romans 2:13 NHEBJE For it is not the hearers of the law who are righteous before God, but the doers of the law will be justified

Adam and Eve had heard God telling what they where allowed to do and what not. They heard His Law, but did not take it at heart. They were no doers of the law of God. It can well be that they were listeners, but their own inner voice was stronger for their heart than the Voice of God. they ignored His wish not to eat from the tree of knowledge.

By their disobedience sin came into the world and by it death came over them and their descendants. by their act of disobedience posterity was now also damned. But from their offspring would come some one who would have a stronger mind, a stronger will able to put his own will aside, for doing the Will of God.

Romans 5:12 NHEBJE Therefore, as sin entered into the world through one man, and death through sin; and so death passed to all men, because all sinned.

Luke 22:41-42 NHEBME He was withdrawn from them about a stone’s throw, and he knelt down and prayed, (42) saying, “Father, if you are willing, remove this cup from me. Nevertheless, not my will, but yours, be done.”

In the hour of his death he may have had it not easy and could have preferred to avoid him to be taken prisoner and condemned to death, but much more the favour of the Most High Elohim, he gave himself to that Only One God, having faith in Him. And by himself offering himself up for others, the gift in favour of the one man, יהושע  Messiah, overflowed to many.

Mankind has to know that the favourable gift is not as by one having sinned, for indeed the judgement was of one to condemnation, but the favourable gift is of many trespasses unto righteousness. Because the first Adam sinned or trespassed, the divine Maker kept to His warning that they surely would die. From that moment of taking the wrong decision man brought knowledge of good and evil to man but also knowledge of feeling fear, pain and death. By the first Adam death did reign over man but when the temptation was shown the real face of the righteous man, those who receive the overflowing favour and the gift of righteousness shall reign in life through the promised one, יהושע Messiah.

Romans 5:15-17 NHEBME But the free gift is not like the trespass. For if by the trespass of the one the many died, much more did the grace of God, and the gift by the grace of the one man, Yeshua the Messiah, abound to the many. (16) The gift is not as through one who sinned: for the judgment came by one to condemnation, but the free gift came of many trespasses to justification. (17) For if by the trespass of the one, death reigned through the one; so much more will those who receive the abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness reign in life through the one, Yeshua the Messiah.

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Preceding articles

Out of the seed of Eve

First mention of a solution against death 4 A seed for mankind

First mention of a solution against death 5 Evil its law of death

First mention of a solution against death 6 Authority given to the send one from God coming out of the woman

First mention of a solution against death 7 Human sacrifice

Messianic prophesies 1 Adversary – Root of the first prophecy

Messianic prophesies 2 Adversary – Root of the first prophecy

File:Bowyer Bible Volume 2 Print 177. The First Family. Genesis. Bloemaert.png
Adam and Eve Forced to Labour – Bowyer Bible Volume 2 Print 177. The First Family. Genesis.

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Additional reading

  1. Looking for a primary cause and a goal that can not offer philosophers existing beliefs
  2. An openingschapter explaining why things are like they are and why we may have hope for better things
  3. Account of origin of man, sin and death
  4. Possible problems with two Accounts of the beginning of human race
  5. Moment of getting knowledge and its consequence
  6. United flesh and knowingly actions
  7. The 1st Adam in the Hebrew Scriptures #3 With his partner
  8. The 1st Adam in the Hebrew Scriptures #4 The Fall
  9. The 1st Adam in the Hebrew Scriptures #5 Temptation, assault and curse
  10. The 1st Adam in the Hebrew Scriptures #6 Curse and solution
  11. The 1st Adam in the Hebrew Scriptures #8 Looking for the 2nd Adam
  12. Scattered, broken, thwarted reflection of God
  13. Fog, brass and light for the eyes
  14. God’s wrath and sanctification
  15. Immortality, eternality – onsterfelijkheid, eeuwigheid
  16. God’s will is that all sorts of men should be saved
  17. The Real ‘Choice’
  18. In a few days time it will be 2020 years ago that the Messiah was born
  19. Sinners do not turn away from God

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Further reading

  1. The Dark Lord (Part One): Samael, Satan, and the Adversary of God
  2. Warning to The Body of Christ – God Will Not Be Mocked
  3. Love and doubt: the central truth of existence
  4. DailyPearl 25/6/17: Salvation: Redemption before the fall
  5. Tip of the Day, August 31 Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin
  6. The Fall of Man Into Sin
  7. Eve Speaks – The “Fall of Man” from Another Perspective
  8. How Did the Moral Fall of Adam Affect the Human Race?
  9. Questions for March 29th on Genesis 3
  10. Genesis 3:16-24

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A solution for a damaged relationship 3 Insight and prophesies given

Those people coming from the first man and woman in a certain way got infected by the wrong choice these people made.

See No Evil (film)
See No Evil (film) (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

God gave a free will to the human beings He created. He did not want them to go wrong or to have it bad, but because they objected to His ruling or His position, He gave them the right to take care of the world themselves how they wanted to do it themselves. He had given them the free will and now they were totally responsible for all the choices they were going to make themselves.

God Himself does not causes bad things to happen to His people but He allows the things to evolve like man lets it evolve and as such allows also to happen things which are not so pleasant for man but are consequences of their acts, they had chosen themselves to do. God allowing such things, good and bad, to happen to man sometimes is to remind man of his position and to let them feel that sin has a price.

You should look at the Creator as a Father who does like any parent, wanting to have the best for his kids, also giving them instructions not to be mean, but to help them on their way of growing up. The omniscient God can see what the ravages of man’s sin looks like, and He desires to spare them for such bad things. For that reason He also gave His Word so that man could learn from it, could see how other people in the past lived their way in this world of good and evil.

God knew very well why it would not be good for man to eat of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. It was not because He didn’t want them to taste something good or wanted to hold something good back from them. God was well aware of the destruction and devastation knowledge of good and evil could cause to man.

As children of those who chose the other way than God had prepared for man we still have to reap the effects of that choice today. Man should come to recognise that all he has to to endure in life is not placed on them by the Divine Creator God, nor by an extraterrestrial devilish being called Satan, but by our own choices and unwillingness to submit to God His direction for our life.

God does not hate man nor does He hate the world, but He would like it that man comes to love Him and comes to recognise Who He is and what He has done for mankind. Throughout history God always has been around and was always ready to be there for those who wanted Him to have Him nearby and helping them.

God has been very patient with man, but He also wanted to limit the time man would be going on his own stupidity. Therefore he offered mankind His Plan with the promise of a saviour, who would shown man Who God is and how to come closer to God. To give mankind a second chance, God provided what is called a second Adam. Again God provided a ‘new’ fresh ‘man‘ of flesh, blood and bones, who could proof that man was able to put his own man’s will aside to come to do the Will of God. Jesus is that promised one who managed to do that. He is the only begotten beloved son of God who is given to us to show us the Way to God and who made things told in the ancient times clear, giving insight to those who did not see yet.

In the next series we shall look how God kept His first promise made in the Garden of Eden, to bring forth a person who was to bring an end to the sting of death. We shall look how God repeated several times His promise of a solution against the curse of death and how He provided signs to which we could get to know when it was the moment that promise became a reality, so that nobody should doubt that the promise made in the garden had become into the flesh. (John 1:1)

In the next postings we shall show you how in the ancient times God prepared the way for that light for mankind to come and how hope could grow to come closer to the times of the coming Kingdom of God when the best theocratic system would be there to have this world organised in the best way, bringing peace to all people.

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Preceding articles

A solution for a damaged relationship 1 All vegetation for food except one fruit

A solution for a damaged relationship 2 Sinful nature

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Additional reading

  1. It is a free will choice
  2. Choices
  3. For those who make other choices
  4. Your life the sum total of all your choices
  5. When Bad Things Happen
  6. Bad things no punishment from God
  7. The 1st Adam in the Hebrew Scriptures #6 Curse and solution
  8. The 1st Adam in the Hebrew Scriptures #7 Promise and solution
  9. The 1st Adam in the Hebrew Scriptures #8 Looking for the 2nd Adam

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Further reading

  1. The Heart of the Problem
  2. Fundamentals of Human Nature Part II
  3. Look Yourself in the Mirror
  4. The Choice is yours…
  5. Making Choices
  6. A Victim of My Own Choices
  7. The Truth About the Conscience
  8. Triggered
  9. Get the Correct Mental Grasp
  10. When darkness looms 2
  11. From good to bad
  12. Battle lines?
  13. Dare I Ask: What If…..?
  14. Our Parents Were Right.
  15. People: Good, Bad, & all those in between 
  16. I Made My Decision
  17. The Price is Right: How a Game Show Reflects Real Life
  18. Why do bad things happen?

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Messiah for all + 2016 statistics

2015 February 10 we saw “A beginning with many false starts” getting this blog in its starting block.

I know you could ask why an other Christian blog when there are already so many. there are also many ‘antichrist-blogs‘ and even more atheist bloggers at work. In that wood of blogs it is not bad to have one blog more from a blogger who wants to use Blogger or Word Press to go deeper in a matter not many are interested in but is of utmost importance. This world needs much more bloggers warning for the coming difficult times and willing to bring a subject different than the mainstream subjects of the popular blogs, and willing to work or blog for Christ.

This world has become a dark place, literally and figuratively and man can use some beacons of light on this globe. In that darkness lots of people do think they are safest when they hold on to other people. Many do not see that Some One is holding out a stretched arm to pick them up out of the swamp and to guide them to dryer and better places.

There is so much to distract man that most people are lured away from God and do not feel interested in spending time at religious matters.

I did not want to get off on the wrong foot, because what I have to defend is too precious. Confronted with so much hate from certain Christians I not only wanted to show the love a Christian does have to have and have to show for others, but found it the utmost important that more people came to understand that Jesus Christ is the Way to God and not God himself.

We also are aware that many people are afraid to question certain theological matters and are afraid to have doubts. They should not worry. With “Are people allowed to have doubts” we opened the lever and put the light on green to come with us on a voyage in the world of God’s Word. To go on our way we first looked ad the “Background to look at things“.

To come to understand where mankind is at this moment and why there is so much sorrow we do have to look at the early beginnings of mankind. For this reason we have to look at the total beginning of the world. “The very very beginning 1 Creating Gods” should shed a light on the beginning of universe and the first human beings. In two different series we looked at the beginning of the world and the beginning of all problems in this world. From those articles people should come to see what happened at the beginning of mankind and how man himself got trouble over him.

In those articles we also showed how the Divine Creator took care that there would be a solution for what man brought over himself. It is that solution which is the main focus of this blog. It is namely a Saviour, a Kristos or Christ, which God promised and 2020 years that Messiah was born and offered himself up for the whole mankind. He gave his all soul for all other souls (= living beings). It was by not doing his own will, but by doing the will of his heavenly Father, the Only One True God, that Jesus opened the Way to God.

There may have been “A multifold of elements in creation and a bad choice made” God has given all people the freedom to choose which way they want to go. The article “First mention of a solution against death 1 To divine, serpent, opposition, satan and adversary” is the opening to showing the solution which is there for everybody to see, if they are willing to open their eyes.

When you know there has entered a tempter in the life of man and how man wants to go for certain choices it is clear how man could come in such problems. (see about the “First mention of a solution against death 3 tempter satan and man’s problems“) In fact we can see that there are still to many people who do not want to know about God and about solutions for a better life He has provided. Though I am convinced that when more people would come to know God and come to know the solution God has provided for, namely God His only begotten beloved son, less problems would be in the world, because many more people would take on the right attitude which God wants them to take on.

When more people would come to know that seed for mankind, and come to follow the teachings of that master teacher rabbi Jeshua, we would be facing a nicer community of lovers of God who are open for those who do not know God yet and want to help them.

In the past two years I showed how “Out of the seed of Eve” has come a son of man who was willing to give his life for all sinners and how he was able to restore the relationship between God and man.

In the coming or next years I want to continue on this way, to proof how there is Only One God and how Jesus is the sent one from God, the son of man and the son of God, who has cleared the way to a better way of life, and ho he shows us the Way to God.

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Life may be going with ups and downs. Knowing that not many people do want to hear that Jesus is not God, I do know I am not presenting a preferred or much liked subject. As such I also do not count on so much likes and so many followers. But I do hope I can reach some hearts and can  come to let people think harder about the subject of the trinity and the nature of God and of the nature of Jesus.

In 2015 this blog got 1 716 views from 1 226 visitors, presenting me with 20 likes and 30 comments, for 83 posts published.

In 2016 1 393 visitors came along to offer me 1 849 views with only 8 likes and 12 comments on the only 14 published (or new) articles.

I noticed most visitors came from the United States of America (1055), followed by the United Kingdom with 122, Canada with 95 and Australia with 63 views. Belgium was only good for 35 views, which is not much and one more than South Africa.

Next to articles written under my name you can find also articles written in name of the Christadelphian community, specifically around Relating to God, and articles from guest-writers.

I am very gratefully you came along this blog and do hope to have you as a visitor more than once.

Looking forward to your next reading on this site, I wish you all the best for 2017.

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Preceding articles

Are people allowed to have doubts

Necessity of a revelation of creation 4 Getting understanding by Word of God 2

First mention of a solution against death 3 Tempter Satan and man’s problems

First mention of a solution against death 4 A seed for mankind

Messiah for all 2015 in review

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Additional reading

  1. A way to look for Christ, the Bible, Word of God
  2. In a few days time it will be 2020 years ago that the Messiah was born
  3. 2020 years ago, the road was opened
  4. 2020 years since
  5. Bloggers for Christ and Bloggers for Peace
  6. Where do we stand in the backdrop of Charlie Hebdo Massacre ?
  7. The Most Hated Family in America
  8. Choose you this day whom ye will serve
  9. For those who make other choices
  10. Choices

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Further reading

  1. A world in need, ours to heal…
  2. Closure For Your Old Year; Clean Slate For Your New One
  3. New Year, Same God
  4. Reflections on 2016 — Learning To Be Full Of Grace And Truth
  5. The Neglect of God
  6. Beacons of Light in a World of Darkness
  7. 2017 – the year of faith
  8. Gotta look to find
  9. The Sword of the Spirit
  10. Postmodernism
  11. Faithful Friday: New Year, New You
  12. What I’m Up To
  13. Rated E For Everyone
  14. A Clean Slate
  15. The Path You Walk
  16. Running the Little Race
  17. Don’t Be Ashamed Of Your Story
  18. Inner strength
  19. Lateness To Church
  20. A Modern Day Ruth
  21. The Bible Is Open To Interpretation?
  22. Vulnerability…
  23. Help from Heaven
  24. Humanism vs Christianity
  25. Thank you Jesus
  26. Something’s Afoot! Distractions on The Rise and In Disguise…
  27. Separation And Divine Preparation
  28. Confessed Envy, Soothed by Hope
  29. The Works of His Hands, The Fruit of My Life
  30. 5 things you need to know about Christian blogging
  31. Consumerism, Coveting, and Clothing
  32. Calling All Christian Bloggers! Share Your Blog
  33. Calling All Christian Bloggers and Book Reviewers! Share Your Blog!
  34. Veritas Domain’s 10 Years Anniversary of Blogging!!!
  35. 2016 Reading Statistics
  36. American Flowers Week 2016 — By the Numbers

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Out of the seed of Eve

The seed of Eve

In the previous postings we have seen that immediately after Adam and Eve sinned, the Divine Creator Jehovah determined that there would be offered a solution for mankind by a symbolic mannin or woman who was to bring forth a seed, or son.

God having His Book of Life and death had placed the name of that Send one in it, and as such this saviour was already there in the mind of God before Abraham was born. Jehovah did not predetermine from the beginning that Adam and Eve would sin and that the ransom sacrifice provided by means of Jesus Christ would be needed. From the beginning God allowed man to have a free choice and to use it according to their wants.

Lucas Cranach the Elder (1472-1553): Adam and ...
Lucas Cranach the Elder (1472-1553): Adam and Eve. Beech wood, 1533. Bode-Museum, Berlin (Erworben 1830, Königliche Schlösser, Gemäldegalerie Kat. 567) (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

There was no “throwing down of seed,” before Adam and Eve sinned. Following the rebellion but before the conception of offspring by Adam and Eve, Jehovah foreordained the appearance of the “seed.”

The act of adversary had to come to an end. The 1st man had made the wrong choice and let himself be carried away with bad thoughts. Both were mislead by thoughts which went on in their mind. It was an act of adversary which is called the devil or satan in the Bible.

When Adam and Eve went in against God’s Wishes, they themselves became adversaries of Allah/God (satan).  When Eve chose to eat from the forbidden fruit she committed an act of insubmission, going against the Will of God. By doing that she did wrong and sinned against a holy God; going against His righteous laws. Following her bad thoughts she committed sins against God His love, against His name and cause. Therefore God took action and delivered a judgement over them. When He did that, as a loving Father would rebuke His children He also spoke a prophecy that gave hope to their offspring, saying to the serpent:

“I shall put enmity between you and the woman and between your seed and her seed. He will bruise you in the head and you will bruise him in the heel.” (Genesis 3:15)

From the beginning, the identity of the promised “seed” was a sacred secret or a mystery of God. About those mysteries God declared they would become clear for the lovers of God in due time, not at the time of man but at the time of God.

This prophetic statement revealed that there would be a seed, which would not have to be literal children, or offspring, though later he declared also by His Word seed would come from the tribe of King David. This meant that this promised seed, God His speaking, would only become a reality “after” King David, as an offspring of this great man of God. That also means that the promised seed was not yet in the heaven with God, though the thought of it was already there with Him … in God’s mind.

The origin of the seed and the being of the seed originated by God. Like everything came into existence from nothing, by the Speaking of God, it also was the Word of God that gave existence to the seed. By God’s Power, the Spirit of God, a woman got pregnant with the send one from God. And this only happened many many years, even centuries, after the first sin of man, long after Adam was created and Cain and Abraham were born.

All who came after Adam and Eve in a way were from the devil (satan) because they all came forth from a man and a woman who were under the spell of treason to God. As such all born on this earth came under the same spell or from the same “father”.

John 8:44 NHEBJE  You are of your father, the devil, and you want to do the desires of your father. He was a murderer from the beginning, and does not stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaks a lie, he speaks on his own; for he is a liar, and its father.

1 John 3:10-12 NHEBJE  In this the children of God are revealed, and the children of the devil. Whoever does not do righteousness is not of God, neither is he who does not love his brother.  (11)  For this is the message which you heard from the beginning, that we should love one another;  (12)  unlike Cain, who was of the evil one, and killed his brother. Why did he kill him? Because his works were evil, and his brother’s righteous.

Many would not like to hear it, but everyone who does not carry on righteousness does not originate with God, whilst the others do. And the one who proved never to go against the Will of God is the one who most of all can claim to be son of God. More than that, this special envoyé was placed in a particular way in the womb of a devout Essene young lady. She bore the pains of insult and of birth as well having to see how her son was being slaughtered. When her son was of age and went public, it was God Himself Who declared that man standing in the river Jordan to be His only begotten beloved son.

Luke 3:21-23 NHEBJE  Now it happened, when all the people were baptized, Jesus also had been baptized, and was praying. The sky was opened,  (22)  and the Holy Spirit descended in a bodily form as a dove on him; and a voice came out of the sky, saying “You are my beloved Son. In you I am well pleased.”  (23)  Jesus himself, when he began to teach, was about thirty years old, being the son (as was supposed) of Joseph, the son of Eli,

From the 1° Adam and Eve, the first parents, came forth all people. From the 2° Adam were to come forth those who would choose to follow Jesus and to love God. Like the 1° Adam was part of a creation now the 2° Adam was the beginning of a new creation. Both those creations came into existence by the Speaking of God. God‘s Voice sounding and bringing into being. From the beginning this Voice or God’s Word was with God. And from the beginning of mankind God’s Word, His promise for a solution, was with God also. God His Word was to come in fulfilment much later, bringing a very important person (a god) to man, by whom no new creation could come into being and everything would have stayed the same as after the fall of man. But now, that promised seed brought a new world for mankind.

John 1:1-3 NHEBJE  In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.  (2)  The same was in the beginning with God.  (3)  All things were made through him. Without him was not anything made that has been made.

That important man (a god), the seed of the woman but also seed of King David, was a deliverer who would destroy the one really represented by the serpent, namely, the great serpent and enemy of God, “Satan” the “Devil”.

Revelation 12:9 NHEBJE  The great serpent was thrown down, the old serpent, he who is called the devil and Satan, the deceiver of the whole world. He was thrown down to the earth, and his angels were thrown down with him.

From the early times many people would be deceived. From the revelation of St. John we can figure out that the devil and satan would have a “seed.” It would require time for the two seeds to be brought forth and for enmity to develop between them. This happened not before the fall of man, but long after. Both seeds came into existence even after Adam and Eve their act of disobedience. When the brought forth children, soon came a time that we could see that the seed of evil was again planted and a brother killed his own brother.

Jehovah also foresaw the result of the enmity between his woman and “Satan” and between their opposing seeds. Although Jehovah would allow the seed of God’s woman to suffer a bruising in the heel, in God’s due time, the seed would bruise the serpent, or satan the devil, in the head. In the meantime, Jehovah’s purpose unfailingly advanced through the chosen genealogical line down to Jeshua the Kristos or Jesus Christ.

Jeshua or Jesus, like he is most know in Anglophile countries, was of the natural seed of Abraham, through his mother Mary (Miriam); he was of the tribe of Judah; and both naturally through Mary and legally through his adoptive father Joseph, he was of the line of David.

Some may say

“It was not until Jesus was begotten by the spirit, thus becoming a spiritual son of God, that he became the ‘seed of the woman’ and the seed that was to bless all nations.

This occurred at the time of his baptism by John in the Jordan River, 29 C.E. Jesus was then about 30 years of age. The holy spirit, coming upon Jesus, manifested itself to John in the form of a dove, and God himself acknowledged Jesus as his Son at that time.

Matthew 3:13-17 NHEBJE  Then Jesus came from Galilee to the Jordan to John, to be baptized by him.  (14)  But John would have hindered him, saying, “I need to be baptized by you, and you come to me?”  (15)  But Jesus, answering, said to him, “Allow it now, for this is the fitting way for us to fulfill all righteousness.” Then he allowed him.  (16)  And Jesus, when he was baptized, went up directly from the water: and behold, the heavens were opened to him, and he saw the Spirit of God descending as a dove, and coming on him.  (17)  And behold, a voice out of the heavens said, “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased.”

John 3:3 NHEBJE  Jesus answered him, “Truly, truly, I tell you, unless one is born anew, he cannot see the Kingdom of God.”

With that rabbi who came to declare his heavenly Father, a new generation could start. A new seed be fertile. By the 1° Adam death had entered the world, now by the 2° Adam life could once again enter the world. Consequently, God’s promise,

“I shall surely multiply your seed like the stars of the heavens and like the grains of sand that are on the seashore,”

has a spiritual fulfilment and means that others, who “belong to Christ,” are added as part of Abraham’s seed and shall also be able to enter the Kingdom of God to enjoy a non-ending life.

Genesis 22:17 NHEBJE  that I will bless you greatly, and I will multiply your seed greatly like the stars of the heavens, and like the sand which is on the seashore. Your seed will possess the gate of his enemies.

Mark 9:41 NHEBJE  For whoever will give you a cup of water to drink in my name, because you belong to the Messiah, truly I tell you, he will in no way lose his reward.

1 Corinthians 15:22-24 NHEBJE  (22)  For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ all will be made alive.  (23)  But each in his own order: Christ the first fruits, then those who are Christ’s, at his coming.  (24)  Then the end comes, when he will deliver up the Kingdom to God, even the Father; when he will have abolished all rule and all authority and power.

Authority was given by the heavenly Father to Jesus, who was to be called King of the Jews. He was not like and brought animosity at the time of the Romans in Jerusalem. The ill feeling against him and his followers continued after his death. We can see that in this way the great serpent satan the devil produced “seed” that has manifested the bitterest enmity toward those who have served God with faith like Abraham, as the Bible record abundantly testifies. Continueously adversaries of God or satans tried to block or hinder the development of the woman’s seed. Jesus also had already warned his listeners about what man can produce or which seed man can saw.

Matthew 13:24-30 NHEBJE  (24)  He set another parable before them, saying, “The Kingdom of Heaven is like a man who sowed good seed in his field,  (25)  but while people slept, his enemy came and sowed tares also among the wheat, and went away.  (26)  But when the blade sprang up and brought forth fruit, then the tares appeared also.  (27)  So the servants of the householder came and said to him, ‘Sir, did you not sow good seed in your field? Where did these tares come from?’  (28)  “And he said to them, ‘An enemy has done this.’ “The servants asked him, ‘Do you want us to go and gather them up?’  (29)  “But he said, ‘No, lest perhaps while you gather up the tares, you root up the wheat with them.  (30)  Let both grow together until the harvest, and in the harvest time I will tell the reapers, “First, gather up the tares, and bind them in bundles to burn them; but gather the wheat into my barn.”‘”

We all shall have to bring forth seed, people who sincerely love God and want to step in the footsteps of master Jeshua. The real followers of rabbi Jeshua shall try to be stronger than the temptations those adversaries of God bring. They shall try to proof they are worthy the sacrifice that man brought and by whom blessings have come all over them who have faith in him and who love his heavenly Father the Only One True God.

At the times of the apostles it was not easy. The enmity reached its height, however, in the persecution of the spiritual seed, particularly in that displayed toward Jesus Christ.

Acts 3:3-15 NHEBJE  Seeing Peter and John about to go into the temple, he asked to receive gifts for the needy.  (4)  Peter, fastening his eyes on him, with John, said, “Look at us.”  (5)  He listened to them, expecting to receive something from them.  (6)  But Peter said, “Silver and gold have I none, but what I have, that I give you. In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, get up and walk!”  (7)  He took him by the right hand, and raised him up. Immediately his feet and his ankle bones received strength.  (8)  Leaping up, he stood, and began to walk. He entered with them into the temple, walking, leaping, and praising God.  (9)  All the people saw him walking and praising God.  (10)  They recognized him, that it was he who used to sit begging for gifts for the needy at the Beautiful Gate of the temple. They were filled with wonder and amazement at what had happened to him.  (11)  And as he held on to Peter and John, all the people ran together to them in the porch that is called Solomon’s, greatly wondering.  (12)  When Peter saw it, he responded to the people, “You men of Israel, why do you marvel at this man? Why do you fasten your eyes on us, as though by our own power or godliness we had made him walk?  (13)  The God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, the God of our fathers, has glorified his Servant Jesus, whom you delivered up, and denied in the presence of Pilate, when he had determined to release him.  (14)  But you denied the Holy and Righteous One, and asked for a man who was a murderer to be granted to you,  (15)  and killed the Prince of life, whom God raised from the dead, to which we are witnesses.

Paul refers to the prophetic drama to illustrate, saying:

“Just as then the one born in the manner of flesh [Ishmael] began persecuting the one born in the manner of spirit [Isaac], so also now.” (Galatians 4:29)

And a later report, in reality a prophecy, describes the Kingdom’s establishment in heaven and the devil’s being hurled out of heaven down to the earth, with only a short time to continue his enmity. It concludes:

“And the dragon grew wrathful at the woman, and went off to wage war with the remaining ones of her seed, who observe the commandments of God and have the work of bearing witness to Jesus.” (Revelation 12:7-13, 17)

For sure the world shall have to face a terrible war, bigger and more fearful than the Great War. It shall be a war between people who claim to be fighting in the name of Allah/God, but they will be deceivers. Children and parents shall have many discussions with each other. Their internal, war between families shall be just part of the bigger picture where nation shall fight against nation and many shall ridicule religion and spit on the God of gods. Then we may see a war against the remnant of the woman’s seed which shall end when ‘Satan is crushed under their feet.’

Romans 16:20 NHEBJE  And the God of peace will quickly crush Satan under your feet. The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you.

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Preceding

The very very beginning 2 The Word and words

Means of creations

First mention of a solution against death 1 To divine, serpent, opposition, satan and adversary

First mention of a solution against death 2 Harm or no harm and naked truth

First mention of a solution against death 3 Tempter Satan and man’s problems

First mention of a solution against death 4 A seed for mankind

First mention of a solution against death 5 Evil its law of death

First mention of a solution against death 6 Authority given to the send one from God coming out of the woman

First mention of a solution against death 7 Human sacrifice

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Additional reading

  1. Creator and Blogger God 3 Lesson and solution
  2. The Existence of Evil
  3. Epicurus’ Problem of Evil
  4. People Seeking for God 2 Human interpretations
  5. Philosophy hand in hand with spirituality
  6. Being Religious and Spiritual 5 Gnostic influences
  7. A fact of History or just a fancy Story
  8. Lord in place of the divine name
  9. OT prophesies and the NT fulfillment of them
  10. Jesus begotten Son of God #10 Coming down spirit or flesh seed of Eve
  11. Matthew 2:1-6 – Astrologers and Priests in a Satanic Plot
  12. Nazarene Commentary Matthew 3:7-12 – Opposition and Two Baptisms
  13. Nazarene Commentary Luke 2:39-40 – The Young Child Grows
  14. Nazarene Commentary Luke 3:3-6 – John Preaches Baptism of Repentance
  15. Nazarene Commentary Mark 1:1-8 – The Beginning of the Good News
  16. What is the truth asked also Pontius Pilate
  17. Imprisonment and execution of Jesus Christ
  18. Hebraic Roots Bible Matthew Chapter 27
  19. Death of Christ on the day of preparation
  20. Truth, doubt or blindness
  21. The Seed Of The Woman Bruised
  22. Authority given to him To give eternal life
  23. Marriage of Jesus 8 Wife of Yahweh
  24. Sayings of Jesus, what to believe and being or not of the devil
  25. The Devil Not A Personal Super-Natural Being
  26. Satan the evil within
  27. Autumn traditions for 2014 – 2 Summersend and mansend
  28. Autumn traditions for 2014 – 3 Black Mass, Horror spectacles and pure puritans
  29. Autumn traditions for 2014 – 4 Blasphemy and ridiculing faith in God
  30. A New Year and a New Person
  31. Christ having glory
  32. Hotbed of Satanism or the Satanic capital of Britain
  33. Christians at War? Christians using violence?
  34. 2015 the year of ISIS

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Further related articles

  1. When God Has Spoken!
  2. Hearing God’s Voice
  3. Is God Speaking?!
  4. The hidden message that was in front of me
  5. Small Voices
  6. Wisdom for the Day
  7. 1 Samuel 3:10 Are You Listening?
  8. Courageous Communications
  9. Blessings
  10. The 90 Day Challenge, Day 28 -“Recognizing God’s Voice”
  11. Focused!
  12. Significant in Christ

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First mention of a solution against death 7 Human sacrifice

In the previous articles about the solution for man and offerings, we talked about the way human beings looked for ways to restore their relationship with God and how they wanted to please God with offerings.

The first human beings had the Tree of Life and the Tree of Knowledge, symbolizing potentialities or possibilities that God has made available to Man, who is free to choose and explore as much as he pleases, even to separate himself from God, like the Prodigal Son from his Father.

Man had made his choice and had to leave the Garden of Eden, trying to build up a decent life. Though now he had to work hard for everything and was aware he had disgusted or displeased God. First there was only the Most High Divine Creator of all things Who was above Adam and Eve and above all other living creatures, the plants and animals. There was no hierarchy.

Hierarchy (from the Greek ἱεραρχία hierarchia, “rule of a high priest”, from ἱεράρχης hierarkhes, “leader of sacred rites”); ranking of objects into grades, orders, or classes of increasing dominance or inclusiveness + specific type of social organization in which members are divided by status or especially authority – people on a “ladder”

The first story were we saw human beings ‘fighting’ for a place or rang order is the one of Cain and Abel. Slowly hierarchy entered the human system. From simple hunter-gatherer tribes to complex, modern industrial societies we can find a hierarchy which is loved by people. Some scholars argue that gender played a central role in the formation and functioning of stratification systems. They showed that women’s exclusion from social life placed them in an inferior position, resulting in lessened life chances and status. While women’s standing in social and economic life has improved over the past half-century, women are still restricted by gender roles and patriarchy. Rich literatures examine the impact of family structure, occupational segregation, devaluation of women’s work, and sex-based pay gaps.

We also can see that the colour of skin, the place of origin, became important to place people on a step of the ladder. One’s racial and ethnic background or ethnicity, also greatly came to influence one’s life chances. When not belonging to the troop it could well be that people saw the person suitable to be used as an offer to the gods.

Human life was looked at as something very special and was considered by many as the most valuable material for sacrifice. The killing of a human being, or the substitution of an animal in place of a person, has often been part of an attempt to effect communion with a god and participation in his divine life.

We may find two primary types of human sacrifice: the offering of a human being to a god and the entombment or slaughter of servants or slaves intended to accompany the deceased into the afterlife. The latter practice was more common.

The realisation of human sacrifice to the promotion of the earth’s fertility may explain why the phenomenon has been most widely adopted by agricultural rather than by hunting or pastoral peoples.

The region where the Austronesian languages are spoken spans over 200 degrees of longitude from Madagascar to Easter Island

In a study published in Nature1, Joseph Watts, a specialist in cultural evolution at the University of Auckland in New Zealand, and his colleagues have analysed 93 traditional cultures in Austronesia (the region that loosely embraces the many small and island states in the Pacific and Indonesia) as they were before they were influenced by colonization and major world religions (generally in the late 19th and early 20th centuries).  {On Human Sacrifice (Article Nature)}

By mapping the evolutionary relationships between cultures, the team suggests that human sacrifice and social hierarchy co-evolved. Although societies can become more or less stratified over time, societies that practised sacrifice were less apt to revert to milder degrees of stratification.

Clearly there were different ways to look at the sacrificial bodies. They could be seen as something very special and very worthy but also as something they did not want in their community and found good enough to give to the gods. More than animal sacrifice human sacrifice helped to stabilize hierarchy, and conceivably, therefore, had a common role in the development of highly stratified societies that generally persist even today. Instead of killing the one in power a substitute was taken to receive for some time divine status and then was put to death. Sacral kings (considered to  embody gods of vegetation) were sacrificed when their vigour declined, in order to prevent reciprocal effects on soil fertility. In various places in Africa, where human sacrifice was connected with ancestor worship or veneration of the dead, some of the slaves of the deceased were buried with him, or they were killed and laid beneath him in his grave.

Aztec cosmogram in the pre-Hispanic Codex Fejérváry-Mayer—the fire god Xiuhtecuhtli is in the centre

There were also places were people thought the elements of nature, like the moon and the sun, needed human nourishment, which led to sacrifices in which thousands of victims perished annually in their rituals, like by the Aztecs. The Incas confined such wholesale sacrifices to the accession of a ruler.There were instances of human sacrifice in Peru and among tribes of North American Indians.

All human societies have been shaped by religion, leading psychologists to wonder how it arose, and whether particular forms of belief have affected other aspects of evolved social structure. According to one recent view, for example, belief in a “big God” — an all-powerful, punitive deity who sits in moral judgement on our actions — has been instrumental in bringing about social and political complexity in human cultures.

The network of small and island states stretching from Madagascar to Easter Island  — challenges that theory. In these states, a more general belief in supernatural punishment did tend to precede political complexity, the research finds, but belief in supreme deities emerged after complex cultures have already formed 2.

Joseph Watts, a specialist in cultural evolution at the University of Auckland in New Zealand, who worked on the study, wanted evidence to examine the idea that “big Gods” drive and sustain the evolution of big societies. Psychologist Ara Norenzayan at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, Canada, has suggested that belief in moralizing high gods (MHGs) enabled societies to outgrow their limited ability to police moral conduct, by threatening freeloaders with retribution even if no-one else noticed their transgressions3, 4.

Watts says

“Austronesian cultures offer an ideal sample to test theories about the evolution of religions in pre-modern societies, because they were mostly isolated from modern world religions, and their indigenous supernatural beliefs and practices were well documented.”

The believers in moralizing high gods (MHGs) got in their system some people who got control by aligning themselves with those supreme deities and then making lists of things people could and could not do. We can imagine their way of getting more power by making the people afraid with ideas of suffering or torture (in the underground or hell) and by the possibility to become a target of offering. For centuries certain religious organisation or churches made their followers afraid of doomplaces and told them that they could buy themselves free from those torture chambers by giving money to their church. People could buy indulgences.

The granting of indulgences was predicated on two beliefs. First, in the sacrament of penance it did not suffice to have the guilt (culpa) of sin forgiven through absolution alone; one also needed to undergo temporal punishment (poena, from p[o]enitentia, “penance”) because one had offended Almighty God. Second, indulgences rested on belief in purgatory, a place in the next life where one could continue to cancel the accumulated debt of one’s sins, another Western medieval conception not shared by Eastern Orthodoxy or other Eastern Christian churches not recognizing the primacy of the pope. {Indulgence –
Roman Catholicism, encyclopaedia Britannica}

A Catholic bishop granting plenary indulgences for the public during times of calamity. Note the almsgiving in the background. Wall Fresco by Italian Artist Lorenzo Lotto, Suardi, Italy, circa 1524.

Certain faithgroups or churches wanted their believers to believe that offerings could reduce the the debt of forgiveness of sin. The offers could exist out of many gifts but also by the performance of good works in their life (pilgrimages, charitable acts, and the like) and if their offerings were not yet sufficient they would get a lesser penalty after they died, by temporarily suffering in purgatory instead of eternal suffering in hell. Indulgences could be granted only by popes or, to a lesser extent, archbishops and bishops as ways of helping ordinary people measure and amortize their remaining debt.

In different cultures an other way was less bloody, having the sacrifice taking place by going under water. Whilst in Mexico young maidens were drowned in sacred wells, others found it sufficient to have an immersion. As such we can find Celtic rituals. Whilst the burning of children occurred in Assyrian and Canaanite religions and at various times among the Israelites, it became a custom by the Israelites to be cleared of sins by immersion to enter a new life. John the Baptist as such came to immerse his cousin Jeshua, Jesus Christ, who was the long awaited Messiah. About 40 days after Jesus’ birth, his parents had brought the customary sin offering permitted in the case of the poor,

“a pair of turtledoves or two young pigeons.” (Luke 2:24; Leviticus 12:6-8)

The offerings and human sacrifice legitimises political authority and social class systems, functioning to stabilize social stratification. It was also an ideal way to get rid of unwanted people or to take care that those who stood in the way could disappear from the scene.

In this way the Nazarene Jeshua an annoying person and possible peril for the security and peace in the Roman empire and in the Jewish community. Though it was not thought him to be an offer, several thought it better to give him away to be killed instead of the vigilant or robber Barabbas. Pilate knew that it was out of jealousy that the chief priests and elders wanted Jesus out of the way, i.e. being killed.

“Give us Barabbas!”, from The Bible and its Story Taught by One Thousand Picture Lessons, 1910

The man being called to be crucified did not have his roots in the right soil because nobody thought anything good could come out of Nazareth. (John 1:46; 7:41, 52) Although he was a perfect man and a descendant of King David, his humble circumstances did not impart to him any “stately form” or “splendour” — at least not in the eyes of those who were expecting the Messiah to come from a more impressive background.
Spurred on by the Jewish religious leaders, many were led to overlook and even despise him. In the end the crowds saw nothing desirable in the perfect Son of God.

Matthew 27:11-26 NHEBME  (11)  Now Yeshua stood before the governor: and the governor asked him, saying, “Are you the King of the Jews?” Yeshua said to him, “So you say.”  (12)  When he was accused by the chief priests and elders, he answered nothing.  (13)  Then Pilate said to him, “Do you not hear how many things they testify against you?”  (14)  He gave him no answer, not even one word, so that the governor marveled greatly.  (15)  Now at the feast the governor was accustomed to release to the multitude one prisoner, whom they desired.  (16)  They had then a notable prisoner, called Barabbas.  (17)  When therefore they were gathered together, Pilate said to them, “Whom do you want me to release to you? Barabbas, or Yeshua, who is called the Messiah?”  (18)  For he knew that because of envy they had delivered him up.  (19)  While he was sitting on the judgment seat, his wife sent to him, saying, “Have nothing to do with that righteous man, for I have suffered many things this day in a dream because of him.”  (20)  Now the chief priests and the elders persuaded the multitudes to ask for Barabbas, and destroy Yeshua.  (21)  But the governor answered them, “Which of the two do you want me to release to you?” They said, “Barabbas!”  (22)  Pilate said to them, “What then shall I do to Yeshua, who is called the Messiah?” They all said, “Let him be crucified!”  (23)  But he said, “Why? What evil has he done?” But they shouted all the louder, saying, “Let him be crucified!”  (24)  So when Pilate saw that nothing was being gained, but rather that a disturbance was starting, he took water, and washed his hands before the multitude, saying, “I am innocent of the blood of this man. You see to it.”  (25)  All the people answered, “May his blood be on us, and on our children!”  (26)  Then he released to them Barabbas, but Yeshua he flogged and delivered to be crucified.

In the time before Jeshua the ancient temple courtyard was the altar for offering sacrifices. This foreshadowed God’s provision, according to His will, for a perfect human sacrifice to ransom the offspring of Adam. (Heb 10:1-10; 13:10-12; Ps 40:6-8)

This man, born in Bethlehem, at his immersion was proclaimed by God Himself to be the “Only begotten beloved son of God“. Nobody had managed to fully do the will of God neither could have brought a perfect sacrificial body in front of the Most Divine God. This time that man managed to put aside his will and managed to keep all the time to God’s Will. He was the living proof that man, if he wanted, could keep to God’s Commandments. Still to today there are religious groups in Christendom who want others to believe no man would ever be capable to keep God’s commandments, and therefore Jesus would have to be God himself. This idea makes of God a very cruel God Who imposed Laws to man which He knew they would never be able to keep. But God is a God of love and order Who does not asks more of people than they can endure or do. That what God asks of mankind Jesus managed to fulfil and by doing God’s Will all the time, not going against the Will of God, he was not at any time an opposer or adversary of God.  Jesus him being a perfect human being made the sacrifice of his life acceptable in the eyes of God to be the best ransom that could be paid for making an end to the curse of death.

God even expanded the gift of Christ to mankind by declaring all those who have faith in Christ’s sacrifice, righteous on the basis of their faith. By believing in Jesus Christ and following his teachings, when they after their immersion try to keep to the commandments of God,  they are viewed by God as sinless while in the flesh.

Romans 3:20-26 NHEBME  Because by the works of the law, no flesh will be justified in his sight. For through the law comes the knowledge of sin.  (21)  But now apart from the law, a righteousness of God has been revealed, being testified by the Law and the Prophets;  (22)  even the righteousness of God through faith in Yeshua the Messiah to all those who believe. For there is no distinction,  (23)  for all have sinned, and fall short of the glory of God;  (24)  being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Messiah Yeshua;  (25)  whom God set forth to be an atoning sacrifice, through faith in his blood, for a demonstration of his righteousness through the passing over of prior sins, in God’s forbearance;  (26)  to demonstrate his righteousness at this present time; that he might himself be just, and the justifier of him who has faith in Yeshua.

Romans 5:1-2 NHEBME  Being therefore justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Yeshua the Messiah;  (2)  through whom we also have our access by faith into this grace in which we stand. We rejoice in hope of the glory of God.

Differently than in other religions where every time a new sacrifice is needed, the blood of Christ is for ever and makes that no other sacrifices have to be made.

Romans 5:9-10 NHEBME  Much more then, being now justified by his blood, we will be saved from God’s wrath through him.  (10)  For if, while we were enemies, we were reconciled to God through the death of his Son, much more, being reconciled, we will be saved by his life.

Romans 8:1-7 NHEBME  There is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Messiah Yeshua.  (2)  For the law of the Spirit of life in Messiah Yeshua made you free from the law of sin and of death.  (3)  For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God did, sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, he condemned sin in the flesh;  (4)  that the ordinance of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit.  (5)  For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit, the things of the Spirit.  (6)  For the mind of the flesh is death, but the mind of the Spirit is life and peace;  (7)  because the mind of the flesh is hostile towards God; for it is not subject to God’s law, neither indeed can it be.

 

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References:

  1. Watts, J., Sheehan, O., Atkinson, Q. D., Bulbulia, J. & Gray, R. D. Nature http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/nature17159 (2016).
  2. Watts, J. et al. Proc. R. Soc. B 282, 20142556 (2015).
  3. Norenzayan, A. Big Gods: How Religion Transformed Cooperation and Conflict (Princeton Univ. Press, 2013).
  4. Norenzayan, A. & Shariff, A. F. Science 322, 5862 (2008).

Please find also to read:

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Preceding articles:

Gone astray, away from God

Forbidden Fruit in the Midst of the Garden 3

Forbidden Fruit in the Midst of the Garden 4

Creation of the earth and man #3 Of the Sabbath day #1 the Seventh day

Necessity of a revelation of creation 5 Getting understanding by Word of God 3

Creation of the earth and man #6 Of the Sabbath day #4 Mosaic codes, Sabbaths and Sunday

Creation of the earth and man #17 Man in the image and likeness of the Elohim #1 In the image and after the likeness

First mention of a solution against death 1 To divine, serpent, opposition, satan and adversary

First mention of a solution against death 2 Harm or no harm and naked truth

First mention of a solution against death 3 Tempter Satan and man’s problems

First mention of a solution against death 4 A seed for mankind

First mention of a solution against death 5 Evil its law of death

First mention of a solution against death 6 Authority given to the send one from God coming out of the woman

Not trying to make the heathen live like Jews #2

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Additional reading

  1. People Seeking for God 3 Laws and directions
  2. Seeing or not seeing and willingness to find God
  3. Displeasures and Actions of the Almighty God
  4. Being Religious and Spiritual 1 Immateriality and Spiritual experience
  5. Counterfeit Gospels
  6. Disobedient man and God’s promises
  7. Redemption #2 Biblical solution
  8. Not about personal salvation but about a bigger Plan
  9. Religious people and painful absence of spring of living water
  10. An unblemished and spotless lamb foreknown
  11. Sayings of Jesus, what to believe and being or not of the devil
  12. For the Will of Him who is greater than Jesus
  13. Trusting, Faith, calling and Ascribing to Jehovah #3 Voice of God #3 A voice to be taken Seriously
  14. Trusting, Faith, Calling and Ascribing to Jehovah #8 Prayer #6 Communication and manifestation
  15. Trusting, Faith, Calling and Ascribing to Jehovah #10 Prayer #8 Condition
  16. Trusting, Faith, Calling and Ascribing to Jehovah #18 Fulfilment
  17. Bad things no punishment from God
  18. Thought for the third day of the Omer
  19. How is it that Christ pleased God so perfectly?
  20. Wishing to do the will of God
  21. Worship and worshipping
  22. Solstice, Saturnalia and Christmas-stress
  23. Be an Encourager
  24. Expenses, costs – Onkosten, uitgaven
  25. Actions to be a reflection of openness of heart
  26. Thanksgivukkah and Advent
  27. Purify my heart
  28. Immortality, eternality – onsterfelijkheid, eeuwigheid
  29. A concrete picture of what is to come in the future
  30. Phoenicians sacrificed infants
  31. A Living Faith #6 Sacrifice
  32. Self-preservation is the highest law of nature

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Further reading

  1. Animal Sacrifice in Ancient Cultures
  2. The Ceremony of the Goddess of Knowledge in Bali
  3. River Ganges ‘The Offering’
  4. Bali Religious Ceremonies to Invoke the Safety, Gratitude and Protection of God
  5. Human Sacrifice In The Ancient Mysteries, Paganism, Druidism and Satan The Founder of
  6. King Killers of Ancient Ireland
  7. Human Sacrifice, Ancient Gods and Lady Fern
  8. Bible 2016: 13 June Daily Bible Reading
  9. II Kings 23
  10. A Reflection of the Heart
  11. Ark First, Altar Next
  12. Numbers 7
  13. Leviticus 4; The Sin Offering
  14. Leviticus 6:14-23; The Priests Grain Offering
  15. Parasha Naso (an accounting of)
  16. A Story of Two Fathers and Two Sons
  17. Showdown
  18. A Living sacrifice before God
  19. Giving All
  20. Jesus as an Offering
  21. Ascended, offered life
  22. His Witness
  23. Is it important to tithe?
  24. Please God
  25. Hoping God is Pleased, While Knowing He Is Not
  26. Who Are You Trying to Please?
  27. The need to please!
  28. Man of Faith
  29. Regaining Soulfulness
  30. Pray to Receive Forgiveness (Repost)
  31. God or Man Pleasers
  32. Suffering Is Not For Nothing
  33. Trusting God’s Promise
  34. Kingdom Economy
  35. Relationship, Better than Choice
  36. When All You Have Is Enough
  37. Is the Bible fact or fiction? Yes!
  38. Empty Oaths or Missing the Real God
  39. Are there two Gods in the Bible?
  40. Two Gods and Two Countries
  41. Watchtower Study June 5, 2016—Being Faithful Leads to God’s Approval
  42. An Offering Prayer
  43. Did Jesus believe in sacrifice?
  44. Bible 2016: 13 June Daily Bible Reading
  45. The Vedic rituals, their innovative nature and contribution to the early knowledge
  46. Vayikra: Offering
  47. Animal Sacrifice, Leviticus, and Penal Substitution
  48. Despite naysayers, archaeologists assert thesis about child sacrifice in ancient #Carthage
  49. It’s not just ancient Roman propaganda: Carthaginians really did sacrifice children
  50. Ancient Greek stories of ritual child sacrifice are true, study claims
  51. Carthaginians sacrificed own children, archaeologists say
  52. Bakra Eid – A Religious Ritual or Calories to Waste?
  53. Irfiction: Payback
  54. Holi Mubarak*
  55. When my mother was a Voodoo priestess, animal sacrifices and my broken heart
  56. A Mosque, Some Mosaics, and a Whole Lot of Raw Meat: the streets of Istanbul
  57. Sacrificing in the city
  58. Anthropology Friday: Animal Souls
  59. The Politics of Sacrifice
  60. Ode to Eternal Justice
  61. বলি কি সত্যি দরকার ?

First mention of a solution against death 4 A seed for mankind

Vanity and the hope to be as God, knowing everything and being able to do everything, man made the wrong choice, going in against the Will of God, disobeying His mitzvot not to touch or eat of the tree of knowledge of good and bad.

The Divine Creator is a God of order, clarity, Who does not tell lies (= always telling the truth) and does not create chaos or confusion. (1 Corinthians 14:33) Man should have known that God always told the truth. But by letting his thoughts wander about, he was caught by his own bad thoughts that God would keep something hidden from him or did not want to give him what he also should own.

As He had promised they would get to know life and death, He cursed them to the hard labour which they previously never had to do. And having made out of dust, God told them they would return to it, becoming dust again, meaning to die and then to decay. (Genesis 3:19)

 (Genesis 3:19 ASV): “in the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread, till thou return unto the ground; for out of it wast thou taken: for dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return.”

In the previous chapters we discussed that what happened to Adam and Eve still happens to us every day. Temptation today still follows the same pattern with us as it did with Eve in the Garden of Eden. Always there is first the arousing of desire; then the mind, seizing upon that desire, rationalizes it to make it seem reasonable, proper, and profitable. Then the will acts — and often immediately confusion, guilt, blame, and a sense of limitation follows without fail. The process is absolutely relentless.

Adam and Eve thought, like we often do, that we can hide ourselves. We may think that we have hidden things we did from the eyes of man, and oftentimes many of us are deluded into thinking that because no human being knows about our guilt, nothing has happened.

Yet within us, whenever we yield to evil, a darkness falls and death tightens its grip upon our throat. {Ray C. Stedman}

When addressing the evil God shows His understanding and shows His willingness to provide help in their hopeless situation. It is not that man shall be able to escape for what they have done. No, there is the curse for the woman and for the man. and to the evil or the adversary of Him, Jehovah says

Genesis 3:15 NHEBJE  I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and her offspring. He will bruise your head, and you will bruise his heel.”

The evil or satan shall become subject of a war  to the “death”. The thoughts Eve had, would now also come to her children, dwelling in them they shall be troubled by desires, vanity, and other bad things, bringing them into captivity to the law of sin which is in their members

Romans 7:18-23 NHEBJE  For I know that in me, that is, in my flesh, dwells no good thing. For desire is present with me, but to do that which is good is not.  (19)  For the good which I desire, I do not do; but the evil which I do not desire, that I practice.  (20)  But if what I do not desire, that I do, it is no more I that do it, but sin which dwells in me.  (21)  I find then the law, that, to me, while I desire to do good, evil is present.  (22)  For I delight in God’s law after the inward man,  (23)  but I see a different law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity under the law of sin which is in my members.

For those who have that incapacity to be fully correct or without fault, God did not want that they would not have to face total destruction. Speaking out His judgement over Adam and Eve the Divine Creator spoke about a future saviour. Some one who would be able to break the curse of death. Between the bad thoughts and the way of righteousness shall be a battle. Those who would like to follow their own self-love and what made Eve from this world shall find tribulation and lots of problems in this world, not strong enough to fight them. Though others who not want to be of that world shall be able to be stronger and find their way out, though the world may hate them.

John 15:19 NHEBJE  If you were of the world, the world would love its own. But because you are not of the world, since I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you.

John 16:33 NHEBJE  I have told you these things, that in me you may have peace. In the world you have oppression; but cheer up! I have overcome the world.”

Yes, there will be one coming, by the promise of the Most High, who can call himself the only begotten son of God. Though the mind of the flesh may be hostile to God (Romans 8:6-7) this provider foreseen by God in the Garden of Eden, after the fall of man, long before Abraham, is the one we all have to look for and have to find. In him we shall have to put our faith to come away under the curse of death. He is the only man who succeeded to be without fault. He always managed to do God His Will. Though he was tempted many times (in the desert, in the square of the village and in the town, in the temple, in the garden of Gethsemane) he never gave in to the temptation, always wanting to do God His will instead of his own will.

Luke 22:41-42 NHEBJE  He was withdrawn from them about a stone’s throw, and he knelt down and prayed,  (42)  saying, “Father, if you are willing, remove this cup from me. Nevertheless, not my will, but yours, be done.”

The writer of Bereshith notates God’s declaration that there shall be a separating of the serpent (the evil, the temptation) from the woman, and tells about the provision of a solution, which we shall hear about in later books as well. In the third chapter of Genesis we find  the basis for the first promise of redemption which must be interpreted allegorically. In that light, the serpent stood for what it proclaimed:

“Ye shall not surely die” (v. 4).

This error was an emanation of the thinking of the flesh called “the carnal mind” by the apostle Paul, which, he declared

“is enmity against God” (Romans 8:7).

Moses lets us understand that there in the Garden of Eden was the base of our problems. There the first man and woman doubting God and His honesty, they becoming adversaries or enemies of God. Eve her thoughts are represented as the creeping animal, a serpent which became “the father of lies“, and all who endorse or proclaim error are considered as its seed, or children.

John 8:44 NHEBJE  You are of your father, the devil, and you want to do the desires of your father. He was a murderer from the beginning, and does not stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaks a lie, he speaks on his own; for he is a liar, and its father.

 

English: Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil עב...
Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil עברית: חטא עץ הדעת – ד”ר לידיה קוזניצקי (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Accordingly, in the allegorical signification of this statement, the serpent represents the spirit of error and deceit as it emanates from the carnal mind. It is frequently used for those who oppose the Truth (Psalms 58:4; 140:3; Matthew 23:33; Revelation 12:9), manifesting themselves as adversaries of the righteous. Its error stemmed from its presumption in reasoning upon Divine law from the standpoint of the flesh. This philosophy caused Eve to view the forbidden tree anew, and its attractive appearance aroused in her the latent propensities of the flesh which then became active and demanding.

“The lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life”

which John teaches is

“not of the Father, but is of the world” (1 John 2:16)

were inflamed, and became “the word of the serpent” made flesh in her.

Adam and Eve wanted so much to have that knowledge of good and evil. Their aspiration to own that knowledge was fed by their lust for more. Paul calls such ‘wants’ “lusts” and gives them the title of sin in the flesh (Romans 8:3), or “sin that dwelleth in me” (Romans 7:20).

Romans 8:3 NHEBJE  For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God did, sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, he condemned sin in the flesh;

The sending of that son is God’s solution for mankind. Though evil shall do everything to try to destroy him, it shall not succeed.

Michelangelo Bounarotti - The Fall and Expulsi...
Michelangelo Bounarotti – The Fall and Expulsion of Adam and Eve – detail (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

By the offspring of the woman the world shall come to see a Virgin Birth where “It” (AV), a singular seed, shall “bruise” (AV), or “Shuwph” = to crush (Job 9:17).  This enmity which had come into existence, between man and God, is seeking the destruction of the higher interests of man. While it will inflict injury, this enmity is subject to the ultimate conquest of man.

The sorrow of woman consequent upon the Fall brings God now having a woman bringing life to a man, but this time not without pain. Also the seed God provides shall bring lots of pain to his mother and generations shall look up at that miserable pain this son of hers had to endure.

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Preceding articles

Creation of the earth and man #22 Man in the image and likeness of the Elohim #6 Spirits, spiritual bodies and illusory perception

Necessity of a revelation of creation 1 Works of God and works of man

Necessity of a revelation of creation 4 Getting understanding by Word of God 2

Genesis – Story of creation 6 Genesis 3:13-24 Enmity and curse

Forbidden Fruit in the Midst of the Garden 1

Forbidden Fruit in the Midst of the Garden 2

Forbidden Fruit in the Midst of the Garden 3

What others think about the tree of knowledge of good and evil

A multifold of elements in creation and a bad choice made

Not trying to make the heathen live like Jews #1

Not trying to make the heathen live like Jews #2

First mention of a solution against death 1 To divine, serpent, opposition, satan and adversary

First mention of a solution against death 2 Harm or no harm and naked truth

First mention of a solution against death 3 Tempter Satan and man’s problems

Necessary to be known all over the earth

Next: First mention of a solution against death 5 Evil its law of death

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Additional reading

  1. Challenging claim 4 Inspired by God 3 Self-consistent Word of God
  2. Creator and Blogger God 3 Lesson and solution
  3. Possibility to live
  4. Dying or not
  5. A learning process for each of us
  6. Together tasting a great promise
  7. The Devil Not A Personal Super-Natural Being
  8. Satan the evil within
  9. Satan or the devil
  10. Lucifer
  11. Redemption # 1Biblical doctrine of salvation
  12. The Song of The Lamb #3 Daniel and Revelation
  13. Story of Jesus’ birth begins long before the New Testament
  14. Marriage of Jesus 10 Old and New Covenant
  15. God Our Refuge
  16. On the Edge of Believing
  17. What is life?
  18. Dying or not
  19. Mortal Soul and Mortal Psyche #6 Summary
  20. People Seeking for God 5 Bread of life
  21. When believing in God’s existence and His son, possessing a divine legislation
  22. The redemption of man by Christ Jesus
  23. Suffering redemptive because Jesus redeemed us from sin
  24. Looking for a primary cause and a goal that can not offer philosophers existing beliefs
  25. 1 Corinthians 15 Hope in action
  26. How we think shows through in how we act
  27. Not staying alone in your search for truth
  28. Doing the works of God
  29. Being fit to take care of a garden
  30. Be holy
  31. We have a choice every day regarding the attitude we will embrace
  32. Aim High: Examples of Godly Characters to follow
  33. Trusting, Faith, Calling and Ascribing to Jehovah #10 Prayer #8 Condition
  34. Mortal Soul and Mortal Psyche #2 Psyche, the word
  35. Departed Souls Await Judgment

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Further reading

  1. Daily Reading: 29 March – The Fall – Genesis 3 ~ paradise lost
  2. The Original Sin
  3. Were We Ever Cursed?
  4. The fall of “The Fall” Part 2
  5. Genesis 3 – would you Adam and Eve it?
  6. Why We Sin…and the Truth That Sets Us Free
  7. Death, Life, and Trees
  8. Fear & Loathing In… God?
  9. Significance of Jesus wearing a crown of thorns?
  10. Christ’s Sacrificial Love
  11. Children of the Free
  12. How Great The Fall
  13. Practising Ministry 5: It All Went Wrong
  14. Pastor Wrinkles: Unintended Consequences Pt. 5
  15. Pastor Wrinkles: Unintended Consequences Pt. 6
  16. Tradition or the Bible – your choice.
  17. The Answer for Pain
  18. More Grace Needed Here!
  19. A Tale of Two Skywalkers
  20. Redemption and Restoration
  21. The Poetry of George Herbert: “The Sacrifice” (Pt. 2)
  22. Rejoicing in Christ
  23. In A Perfect World…
  24. Reasons not to compromise with theological compromisers
  25. No Longer Slaves!
  26. +++
  27. Further reading
  28. Is Eve Responsible?
  29. To The Weary…
  30. Ripped from the headlines: Bring on the so-called “Catholic” guilt
  31. Empathy and Guilt
  32. 5 Steps: Overcoming Guilt
  33. Guilt and Regrets
  34. The Voice of Guilt
  35. Guilty of Being Human
  36. Living With Guilt
  37. Guilt, Shame & the Atonement: A Foreword
  38. Daily Obstruction: Religious Obstructions
  39. No More Guilt
  40. Guilt Free
  41. Condemnation Never Comes from God
  42. It’s On You, It Always Has Been
  43. Here’s to You: Your are Right in His Sight
  44. Who is evaluating you?
  45. The Offerings in Leviticus (1 of 2)
  46. The Offerings in Leviticus (2 of 2)
  47. Perfectly Imperfect
  48. The Path to your Potential
  49. No short cuts to heaven..!
  50. The Purpose in it All
  51. Not For The Faint Of Heart
  52. Redemption
  53. Deliverance
  54. What Lie We Often Fall For
  55. Why does God allow deception?
  56. The Father of Tall Tales
  57. The Father of Lies
  58. Satan, Who? Is Satan Real?
  59. Dear Father of Lies
  60. Look at the Lamb (Day 8)
  61. The Importance of Biblical Discernment
  62. God Is and We Aren’t
  63. Jesus Free Man From Sin
  64. Are people willing to die for something they know is a lie?
  65. Liars & Murderers – God Says They Are The Same!

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First mention of a solution against death 3 Tempter Satan and man’s problems

In the previous postings we have seen that the “serpent” is no ordinary “beast of the field.”  Later portions of the Bible seem to imply that its subtle words were supplied by what man came ‘to believe’ or ‘see‘. Their action or attitude against God made them an adversary or satan.

The “quickness of perception” made their “voice of flesh” trouble their mind and made them to become an adversary of God instead of them becoming like God, though they still want to be the same as God and even today many want to play for god. This is what brings the world in a lot of problems.

File:The Phillip Medhurst Picture Torah 18. Temptation of Adam and Eve. Genesis cap 3 v 6. after Raphael.jpg
Temptation of Adam and Eve. Genesis cap 3 v 6. after Raphael

The tempter for many became a ‘person’ or active figure called “Satan” or the devil. This Satan or adversary is the power of evil, the rebel against God. Hence the serpent has usually been treated by artists symbolically; Raphael pictures it as partly human, possessed of a woman’s head, a woman’s brain without her nobler soul. Certainly the serpent’s cunning words suggest human nature arguing with itself; the baser, beastly parts stirring the mind to ambition and rage and fear.

‎In the garden of Eden, the two mysterious trees, one of life and death, the other of “the knowledge of good and evil” were not for man. Their idea of being “as gods” was very temptive and when the woman saw that the tree was good for food and had taken of the fruit thereof and had also given it to her husband, they effectively came to know “good” and “evil“.

They found that knowledge, even at its best, is but a poor substitute for innocent purity. Most startling of the grim facts made clear to them, was that they had disobeyed their Divine Maker and thus lost their sense of joy and security with Him. They could imagine He would not be pleased with their act and therefore hid ashamed for Him. Going against the Will of God they had taken into their hearts selfishness and suspicion and fear. Darkened of mind and sin-stained of body, they were no longer willing to be fully seen, to gaze and be gazed upon. They grew secretive, furtive. They began to clothe their naked bodies with leaves, and they crouched among the trees to hide from God.

‎Before their act of insubmission they were never afraid of each other, of animals or of God. But now, after they failed to comply to God’s Will, they clearly knew they had done something wrong and even felt not sure any more about themselves. Never before had they avoided their Creator who was there Father. But now when He came to them in the garden “in the cool of the day” and when He spoke to them sadly of their fall, Adam answered trembling from his hiding place, and showed how contemptible indeed that fall had been. His personal resources had failed him. Perhaps he did not come to see that  if anything is withheld from us, we may be sure that it is not absolutely for our good. He came to understand that his heart and soul (his flesh, heart and spirit or thinking) had failed. His downfall brought with it that he sought excuses. He did not want to to take the lowest place. He sought with crafty, coward words to shift his blame upon the woman, and even upon God, which shows how a state of sin can affect us.

Genesis 3:12 NHEBJE  The man said, “The woman whom you gave to be with me, she gave me of the tree, and I ate.”

Putting the blame on his wife, to consider her responsible for his misdeed, is something which those who do wrong still try to do today. From that first sin those two first people their offspring got ‘bad examples’ and got the genes of troubled minds. Though

“Genetic predisposition made me do it”

is no excuse and is doing the same as Adam did. Eve also quickly learned from Adam trying to use an excuse to plead her innocence and freedom. The term “deceived” seems to mean “cause to forget”.  It may be an onomatopoeia to the serpent’s hissing (i.e. hissi’ani). The New Testament mentions Eve’s actions in 2 Corinthians 11:3 and 1 Timothy 2:14.

2 Corinthians 11:3 NHEBJE  (3)  But I am afraid that somehow, as the serpent deceived Eve in his craftiness, so your minds might be corrupted from a sincere and pure devotion to Christ.

1 Timothy 2:14 NHEBJE  Adam was not deceived, but the woman, being deceived, has fallen into disobedience;

But than we got to hear of some solutions.

1 Timothy 2:15 NHEBJE  but she will be saved through her childbearing, if they continue in faith, love, and sanctification with sobriety.

Once again we hear about certain conditions or some commandments of God, namely to continue in faith and love or charity (o. agape) and holiness with sobriety or modesty or with self-control.

Because the 1st Adam had hearkened unto the voice of his wife, not only listening to her and not pointing to her what she was thinking was wrong, but following her, he also was at fault and should have to bear the consequences like any person who does something wrong has to bear the consequences.

Man was taken out of the earth, from dust. Because both had not listened to God they had to see it was serious what God had said about life and death. Now they were going to feel what it meant knowing life and death. Knowing good and bad things of life and losing life.

Genesis 3:17-22 NHEBJE  To Adam he said, “Because you have listened to your wife’s voice, and have eaten of the tree, of which I commanded you, saying, ‘You shall not eat of it,’ cursed is the ground for your sake. In toil you will eat of it all the days of your life.  (18)  Thorns also and thistles will it bring forth to you; and you will eat the herb of the field.  (19)  By the sweat of your face will you eat bread until you return to the ground, for out of it you were taken. For you are dust, and to dust you shall return.”  (20)  The man called his wife Eve, because she was the mother of all living.  (21)  Jehovah God made coats of skins for Adam and for his wife, and clothed them.  (22)  Jehovah God said, “Behold, the man has become like one of us, knowing good and evil. Now, lest he put forth his hand, and also take of the tree of life, and eat, and live forever…”

Biblia Pauperum illustration of Eve and the Se...
Biblia Pauperum illustration of Eve and the Serpent (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Adam should have been following God’s word, but he followed his wife’s word and broke God’s specific command or mitzvoth. Each created being has received like Adam and Eve a free choice either to follow God His Words or to deny them and to go astray from God. Adam and Eve had heard what could happen (cf. Genesis 2:15-17). Now it was too late to turn back.

The whole creation now had to bear the consequences of the fall of mankind and nature.

Romans 8:18-23 NHEBJE  For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which will be revealed toward us.  (19)  For the creation waits with eager expectation for the children of God to be revealed.  (20)  For the creation was subjected to vanity, not of its own will, but because of him who subjected it, in hope  (21)  that the creation itself also will be delivered from the bondage of decay into the liberty of the glory of the children of God.  (22)  For we know that the whole creation groans and travails in pain together until now.  (23)  Not only so, but ourselves also, who have the first fruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting for adoption, the redemption of our body.

Nature became involved because man now being on his own trying to look for his daily edible food started also hunting the animals, which had to become fearing man and going into their defence. As such animals and plants also became a victim of the fall of man. But God is a God of love and He does not like it when His creatures do have to suffer. God is on the side of His creatures. Therefore He provide a solution for them, but it had to come form man itself. Like the first man or Adam had to make the right choice the new or second Adam, the man for the new beginning had to make the right choice too.

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Preceding articles

The very very beginning 2 The Word and words

A multifold of elements in creation and a bad choice made

Forbidden Fruit in the Midst of the Garden 1

Forbidden Fruit in the Midst of the Garden 2

Forbidden Fruit in the Midst of the Garden 3

What others think about the tree of knowledge of good and evil

First mention of a solution against death 1 To divine, serpent, opposition, satan and adversary

First mention of a solution against death 2 Harm or no harm and naked truth

Next: First mention of a solution against death 4 A seed for mankind

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Additional reading

  1. Creator and Blogger God 3 Lesson and solution
  2. Human beings and creation
  3. Coming to understanding from sayings written long ago
  4. Challenging claim 4 Inspired by God 3 Self-consistent Word of God
  5. The faithful God
  6. A voice cries out: context
  7. The Devil Not A Personal Super-Natural Being
  8. The Devil or Satan
  9. Satan the evil within
  10. Lucifer
  11. Atonement And Fellowship 4/8
  12. Suffering redemptive because Jesus redeemed us from sin
  13. Words of God to stand and to be followed and to believe
  14. How we think shows through in how we act
  15. Be holy

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Further reading

  1. What does the Story of Eden Tell Us? Is it about Sin?
  2. The Calling of Genesis 3
  3. Daily Reading: 29 March – The Fall – Genesis 3 ~ paradise lost
  4. True Love and The Fall
  5. Adam and Evil
  6. The Original Sin
  7. The Fall of Humanity
  8. The fall of “The Fall” Part 2
  9. Devotion Week #1: Created and Fallen
  10. Wrong suggestions. Be watchful
  11. Recap: What Every Christian Should Know About Genesis 1-4
  12. Genesis 3 – The Fall
  13. OT Reading – January 6
  14. Adam and Evil (It’s Not My Fault!)
  15. The Fall of Man
  16. Mission Failed: The Fall of Man & Woman
  17. Pastor Wrinkles: Unintended Consequences Pt. 3
  18. Pastor Wrinkles: Unintended Consequences Pt. 4
  19. Adversary. Accuser. (Zechariah 3:1)
  20. My Adversary
  21. Attacks from Within
  22. Watch What You’re Fighting
  23. When we stumble
  24. Satan-Proofing Your Life
  25. Satan, the Adversary, and The Child of God – Pastor David
  26. The Tempter and the Christian
  27. The Christian’s Adversary
  28. A Tool of the tempter
  29. The Adversary’s unending reminders
  30. The Blessing of Adversity that Rises to Meet Us in 2016
  31. Demon o Demon
  32. Oppression’s Absence
  33. Vision of Jesus Tempted in the Wilderness
  34. Do not stand in my way, adversary!
  35. God always has the better answer
  36. Some Thoughts on Colossians: Colossians 1 and the Old Testament
  37. God’s Voice Of Truth
  38. God Is On Your Side
  39. Victory Over Satan
  40. What are your intentions?
  41. Listen Not To Your Adversary
  42. Know Your Enemy Pt 2 – His Agenda
  43. Daily Dose of Encouragement — Push-A-Door-War
  44. Will the Almighty Hear Me?
  45. Remain steadfast in the faith (1 Peter 5:8-9)
  46. Love First: Why The Body Positivity Movement Is So Important
  47. Those Impossible Situations…
  48. Children not needing mothers and fathers is demonic idolatry
  49. Know how you are in Christ, because Adam and Eve didn’t
  50. The Fall Of Man
  51. 2. The Fall
  52. Gospel Theology (Pt. 3) – Original Sin
  53. A Dose of Theology – Hamartology
  54. Elder Thaddeus of Vitovnica: “In nature, there is an order for all things, but with man there is chaos”
  55. Fear & Loathing In… God?
  56. George Hunsinger and Reading Barth with Charity
  57. Jonathan Edwards Week – Edwards and Atonement (Pt. 2)

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You may also find more on the artist Raphael at:  Raphael Italian, 1483–1520

 

 

Not trying to make the heathen live like Jews #2

In the previous postings we have seen that man had to be reminded to his own choice to be without God as their Commander and because off that choice got a reminder of their mortality.

We by know should see the significance of the introduction of the Sabbath commands being associated with the provision of manna.

For many people Mosaic law in the Bible can be confusing and often also in Judaic groups we can find lots of debates about certain laws to be followed in what sort of way. Many Christians do not like to talk so much about those laws and which ones we have to follow.

Critics of Christendom and Christianity and non-believers often question how there can exist such a god who is so demanding.  Some even find that Judaism, Christendom and the Muslim world do have a very cruel and petty god.

In many religious groups the question is posed which laws we still do have to follow.

According to some

” There are definitely some bizarre statutes, such as not being allowed to mix two kinds of fabric, or not cooking a goat in its mothers milk. There are also all the dietary restrictions of not being allowed to eat certain “unclean” animals such as pigs, not to mention all the sacrificial laws to atone for sin. These things seem drastic and at the very least, unnecessary. Now obviously most Christians don’t follow any of these. So what are we supposed to do with it? We know that God is the same yesterday, today, and forever. So what has changed? {What are we gonna do with this Torah?}

The fall of man
The fall of man (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

In the previous postings we have shown that all relates to mankind’s decision to take a certain attitude to God. We need to understand that because of sin we were not able to relate to God as he intended it. By man’s own choice he became separated from his own Creator. For this reason god made a structure so that they could often enough be reminded of Him Divine Creator.

In the previous writings you could see that God provided physical and spiritual food for man and gave them rules to follow so that they could have an easier life. He also demanded from them to respect Him as the Only One True God and not to make any graven images of Him.

We also could see how God provided already from the beginning of the fall of man, a solution in the person of Jeshua, Jesus Christ, the sent one from God who could bring salvation by showing the world a man was able not to do his own will but to rightly follow the Will of God.

Before the placed one on earth

Before the only begotten son of God was placed on the earth, all believers where still in a situation to be compared with God’s people in Egypt. But now we do have Jesus, God’s faithful Son who is called out of Egypt, filling up what was lacking in the first faithless son, Israel.

First Israel, God’s son, broke the covenant and deserved God’s wrath. Like at the beginning in the Garden of Eden, God‘s promise brings the one and only working solution for mankind. It is not by doing certain works that the liberation shall come over us. It is by the Gift of Grace that we receive freedom, but that would not liberate us from following certain orders made by God.

Galatians 4:3-5 NHEBJE  So we also, when we were children, were held in bondage under the elemental principles of the world.  (4)  But when the fullness of the time came, God sent out his Son, born to a woman, born under the law,  (5)  that he might redeem those who were under the law, that we might receive the adoption of children.

Completion of Israel’s designation

God his only begotten Son Jesus Christ (Matthew 3:17), whom God loves and with him God is well pleased, is the one who came to complete all that Israel was designed to perform. Some Jews got to see that, but also some non-Jews. Therefore the Jews started wondering if those new converts also had to fulfil all the requirements of the Jewish or Judaic and Mosaic Laws.

Those Jews who had chosen to follow their Masterteacher Jeshua as the Messiah had also some who came to compare the old Jews and the new ‘Jews’ or converted goyim, people from all nations and all sorts other religions. The news of the conversion of the Gentiles is received with joy (Acts 15:12). They could see how many thousands of Yehuḏim there had come to be ardent for the Torah.

Torah and morality for man to follow

For generations since Moses the Jews had their preachers in every town, and it was been read aloud in the synagogues every Sabbath how to conduct oneself. As such it was questioned what the new converts had to avoid. Had they to worry about anything that has been contaminated by idols, immorality, the meat of strangled animals, and the tasting of blood?

The Jews had their Mosaic Law as a great bulwark of morality, and there was excuse for wondering whether pagans could keep its moral precepts, without observing it entirely. So this party, which did not represent the church at Jerusalem, (Acts 15:13 ff.), came to Antioch and insisted that circumcision and the Law were necessary for those who wished to enter the Messianic kingdom on earth, and be saved. The Judaizing party had evidently little following outside Jerusalem.

Gentiles, Judaizing Christians and Jews

In Jerusalem many thought that Paul was teaching all the Jews who are among the Gentiles to forsake Moses, saying that they ought not to circumcise their children nor to walk according to the customs. Therefore they requested the assembly to meet. Concerning the Gentiles who believe, the apostles have written and decided that they should observe no such thing, except that they should keep themselves from things offered to idols, from blood, from things strangled, and from sexual immorality. Then Paul took the men, and the next day, having been purified with them, entered the temple to announce the expiration of the days of purification, at which time an offering should be made for each one of them.

Acts 21:17-26 NHEBJE  When we had come to Jerusalem, the brothers received us gladly.  (18)  The day following, Paul went in with us to James; and all the elders were present.  (19)  When he had greeted them, he reported one by one the things which God had worked among the Gentiles through his ministry.  (20)  They, when they heard it, glorified God. They said to him, “You see, brother, how many thousands there are among the Judeans of those who have believed, and they are all zealous for the Law.  (21)  They have been informed about you, that you teach all the Jews who are among the Gentiles to forsake Moses, telling them not to circumcise their children neither to walk after the customs.  (22)  What then? They will certainly hear that you have come.  (23)  Therefore do what we tell you. We have four men who have taken a vow.  (24)  Take them, and purify yourself with them, and pay their expenses for them, that they may shave their heads. Then all will know that there is no truth in the things that they have been informed about you, but that you yourself also walk keeping the Law.  (25)  But concerning the Gentiles who believe, we have written our decision that they should keep themselves from food offered to idols, from blood, from strangled things, and from sexual immorality.”  (26)  Then Paul took the men, and the next day, purified himself and went with them into the temple, declaring the fulfillment of the days of purification, until the offering was offered for every one of them.

An elaborate list of “do” and “don’t” items

A turn was made in history of man when the sent one of God had proven that man could do the Will of God and presented himself as an offering for all sinners. Jesus himself also knew that said that the Sabbath was made for man. (Mark 2:27).

Mark 2:23-28 NHEBJE  It happened that he was going on the Sabbath day through the grain fields, and his disciples began, as they went, to pluck the ears of grain.  (24)  The Pharisees said to him, “Behold, why do they do that which is not lawful on the Sabbath day?”  (25)  He said to them, “Did you never read what David did, when he had need, and was hungryhe, and those who were with him?  (26)  How he entered into the house of God when Abiathar was high priest, and ate the show bread, which is not lawful to eat except for the priests, and gave also to those who were with him?”  (27)  He said to them, “The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath.  (28)  Therefore the Son of Man is lord even of the Sabbath.”

The Fall of Man
The Fall of Man (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Jesus reminded the Pharisees about their attitude concerning observing religious rituals; like they declared that joy was more important than observing religious rituals, but could not see how on the Sabbath certain things could be done. The gleaning on the fields by the apostles was not considered stealing according to Deuteronomy 23:2, but the rabbis were more concerned about the day on which it happened and felt it belonged to an act of their elaborate list of “not to do”  items relevant to the Sabbath. For them it was a serious violation of one of the items on this list.
When the disciples began to pluck the heads of grain, in the eyes of the religious leaders they were guilty of 4 faults: reaping, threshing, winnowing, preparing food.

At this time, Rabbis filled Judaism with elaborate rituals related to the Sabbath and observance of other laws. Ancient Rabbis taught that on the Sabbath, a man could not carry something in his right hand or in his left hand, across his chest or on his shoulder. But you could carry something with the back of your hand, with your foot, with your elbow, or in your ear, your hair, or in the hem of your shirt, or in your shoe or sandal. Or, on the Sabbath, you were forbidden to tie a knot – except a woman could tie a knot in her girdle. So, if a bucket of water had to be raised from a well, you could not tie a rope to the bucket, but a woman could tie her girdle to the bucket!
{Guzik commentary on the Gospel of Mark}

What they did not understand is that Jeshua never violated the mitzvah or God’s commands in any way. He took time to study God’s Word and did everything to live according to it. Jeshua with his disciples went to different places and wherever they came they took time to worship God and to observe the Sabbath.

For this sent one from God, who did not want to do his own will (which he would have done in case he himself was God, like some think)would not have approved of his disciples violating God’s commands to observe the Sabbath. But for him there was a big difference between the laws of God and the laws made by man. He could see that by time man added rules had come in the Jewish tradition, which had more to do with man made legalistic ways than with God His Ways.

Human need more important than religious ritual

A very often overlooked issue is the one of the needs of man and of the regulations for man in this time of age.

We do live in a world where man can reign, but where man has also many needs. People do have to eat and to be taken care for, every day and not just one day of the week not. When people would not be treated one day in the week it could well be that they would die that day, because of not having had the right treatment. But not only for life matters it was important to recognise that man could and should be able to do certain things which he would or would not do on the other days of the week. It could be for relaxation, for entertainment, or for making himself wiser, etc..

Also people had to take care for others, and our of love should also sometimes do things which would demand work.

Can you imagine those who do believe in God and do find we do have to keep Sabbath, but take a taxi or public transport, watch television, want to have shops open for getting what they want, want to go to the theatre and have people working for them, so you could say they are not concerned that those people then would do something against the Will of God and would loose their life? This would be very unloving and very selfish.

Sabbath from Friday sunset to Saturday sunset

Those who say Christians do have to keep to the Sabbath Law should then keep Sabbath from Friday sunset to Saturday sunset and should abstain of any form of work but also of any relaxation which would have others working, like watching television, going on the internet, wanting medical care, etc.

Those who say the Sabbath is Sunday should look at Jeshua which day he kept. That was the Jewish Sabbath and not what they call the Lord’s Day. God’s Day of rest was from what we now call Friday-night until the time sun goes down on Saturday and not when the clock strikes 12 on Saturday night until Sunday 12 pm..

It is not by days that we can be separated from God, but by our acts of doing wrong. It is sin which alienates us from God not the keeping of one or an other day in a different way than the other days.

To remind our position in the universe of God

God had given the Law to Moses so that people could be reminded of their Creator and of their position in the creation. God’s law shows us that we are not able to attain righteousness through laws, but by making our own right choices like the sent one from God made the right choices from his own, not pushed by any other person.

The first Adam did not keep to God His Wishes and his descendants were not better. Though the descendant of the tribe of David, showed he also had could reason to be a beloved son of God. As the second Adam he also could not attain righteousness through the law. He like any man could sin, something only God can not, but he always made the right choices, following not his own will but the Will of God.

Because of being infected by the fall of man we are unable to be without spot. For us week human beings it is difficult to keep to God’s standards. His ordinances may be set apart from the human rules, but that does not yet mean that we can’t be able to become set-apart our selves (being holy).

Fulfiller of Law

By only doing God’s Will and not the one of his own, Jesus proofed to God and to mankind that man is able to keep to God’s Will. By his way of living and giving himself for mankind he opened the way for a restored relationship between God and mankind.

For centuries man had tried to live according to God’s regulations, but did not seem to succeed. Now there was this Nazarene man who succeeded. By doing so he fulfilled the law and liberated all others from the Old Ordinances bringing them under a New Covenant, a New Regulation. By the sealing of his death a start was given to a New World.

Jesus died as a perfect payment for all the past, present, and future sins of all people. Though now people do have to recognise that sacrificial offering and have to come to see that Jesus is the Way to God now.

Matthew 5:17 NHEBJE  “Do not think that I came to destroy the Law or the Prophets. I did not come to destroy, but to fulfill.

In a certain way do we not need the Mosaic Law any more, when we accept Jesus as our new law giver. God gave him authority to teach the world and to judge the world. We are by Christ Jesus Justified by faith. So it is up to people to follow Jesus or either to ignore him like many ignore Jesus his heavenly Father, the Only One God.

Through Christ Jesus righteousness is granted to us, and not any more by the Mosaic Law. He nailed the law and its consequences unto the stake. Through Jesus the sacrificial laws have been nullified and the temple curtain has been torn to allow all who know God to come to him, unrestricted, through the Holy Spirit.

Ephesians 2:8-16 NHEBJE  (8)  for by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God,  (9)  not of works, that no one would boast.  (10)  For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared before that we would walk in them.  (11)  Therefore remember that once you, the Gentiles in the flesh, who are called “uncircumcision” by that which is called “circumcision,” (in the flesh, made by hands);  (12)  that you were at that time separate from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers from the covenants of the promise, having no hope and without God in the world.  (13)  But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off are made near in the blood of Christ.  (14)  For he is our peace, who made both one, and broke down the middle wall of partition,  (15)  having abolished in the flesh the hostility, the law of commandments contained in ordinances, that he might create in himself one new man of the two, making peace;  (16)  and might reconcile them both in one body to God through the cross, having killed the hostility thereby.

Ordering works and ways of living

From the Jews there were ordered works of Torah, but those who came to Christianity should have to see that Jesus nailed the Old Covenant to the stake and as such did not have to keep to certain laws of food and customs.

Paul had also come to see that certain Jews did more live like gentiles and therefore questioned a.o. Cephas how he who lived not like a Jew, could force the Gentiles to live like Jews.
The Jews by birth who followed Jeshua understood that a person is not justified by works of the law but through faith in Jesus Christ. Jeshua’s followers believed in the Nazarene man to be the Messiah, the promised sent one from God. They were convinced that by works of the law no one will be justified.

From the 1° Adam onwards all man had been with sin except Christ Jesus. Jeshua did not become a servant of sin. Those converts to the teachings of Jeshua died to the Mosaic Law so that they might live to God. They should walk and live by faith in the Son of God, who loved us and gave himself for us all.

Galatians 2:14-21 NHEBJE  (14)  But when I saw that they did not walk uprightly according to the truth of the Good News, I said to Cephas before them all, “If you, being a Jew, live as the Gentiles do, and not as the Jews do, how can you compel the Gentiles to live as the Jews do?  (15)  “We, being Jews by birth, and not Gentile sinners,  (16)  yet knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law but through faith in Jesus Christ, even we believed in Christ Jesus, that we might be justified by faith in Christ, and not by the works of the law, because no flesh will be justified by the works of the law.  (17)  But if, while we sought to be justified in Christ, we ourselves also were found sinners, is Christ a servant of sin? Certainly not!  (18)  For if I build up again those things which I destroyed, I prove myself a law-breaker.  (19)  For I, through the law, died to the law, that I might live to God.  (20)  I have been crucified with Christ, and it is no longer I that live, but Christ living in me. That life which I now live in the flesh, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself up for me.  (21)  I do not make void the grace of God. For if righteousness is through the law, then Christ died for nothing!”

False teachings unsettling minds and burdens

In the early times of Christianity already false teachers could be found and people who disturbed others by their teaching and unsettled others their minds. The assembled meeting of Jewish brethren unanimously resolved to select representatives and send them to the ecclesiae so that they could hear how the view was made under the direction of the Holy Spirit after prayer and wise consult. By word of mouth the message was given to the other ecclesia.  They agreed that it was for the Holy Spirit and their meeting that had decided not to lay upon others any burden but this indispensable one,  that they had to avoid whatever has been sacrificed to idols, the tasting of blood and of the meat of animals that have been strangled, and immorality. They in first instance had to keep themselves free from these things.

Acts 15:24-29 NHEBJE  Because we have heard that some who went out from us have troubled you with words, unsettling your souls, to whom we gave no commandment;  (25)  it seemed good to us, having come to one accord, to choose out men and send them to you with our beloved Barnabas and Paul,  (26)  men who have risked their lives for the name of our Lord Jesus Christ.  (27)  We have sent therefore Judas and Silas, who themselves will also tell you the same things by word of mouth.  (28)  For it seemed good to the Holy Spirit, and to us, to lay no greater burden on you than these necessary things:  (29)  that you abstain from things sacrificed to idols, from blood, from things strangled, and from sexual immorality, from which if you keep yourselves, it will be well with you. Farewell.”

As such old customs like bringing certain offers, tithing, were not necessary any more, because even by the Jews there were ones who did not like it and tried to escape from it.

From several parables and sayings form Jeshua, Jesus Christ, we do know that it is much more important to live according to the spirit of the Law, be it Mosaic or any other law, than to the letter.

End of the law

Those people who say they are Christian should follow the teachings of the master-teacher, rabbi Jeshua, and should accept his words about himself, his heavenly Father and about how we do have to live.

He also gave a golden rule which should guide us through our life and be our goal to love God and God His creation, like Jesus loved us we should love ourself and one another.

John 13:34-35 NHEBJE  A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also must love one another.  (35)  By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”

John 15:12-13 NHEBJE  “This is my commandment, that you love one another, even as I have loved you.  (13)  Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends.

John 14:21 NHEBJE  One who has my commandments, and keeps them, that person is one who loves me. One who loves me will be loved by my Father, and I will love him, and will reveal myself to him.”

Romans 10:4 NHEBJE  For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes.

Colossians 2:6-17 NHEBJE  (6)  As therefore you received Christ Jesus, the Lord, walk in him,  (7)  rooted and built up in him, and established in the faith, even as you were taught, abounding in it in thanksgiving.  (8)  Be careful that you do not let anyone rob you through his philosophy and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, after the elements of the world, and not after Christ.  (9)  For in him all the fullness of God’s nature dwells bodily,  (10)  and in him you are made full, who is the head of all principality and power;  (11)  in whom you were also circumcised with a circumcision not made with hands, in the putting off of the body of the flesh, in the circumcision of Christ;  (12)  having been buried with him in baptism, in which you were also raised with him through faith in the working of God, who raised him from the dead.  (13)  You were dead through your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh. He made you alive together with him, having forgiven us all our trespasses,  (14)  wiping out the handwriting in ordinances which was against us; and he has taken it out of the way, nailing it to the cross;  (15)  having stripped the principalities and the powers, he made a show of them openly, triumphing over them in it.  (16)  Let no man therefore judge you in eating, or in drinking, or with respect to a feast day or a new moon or a Sabbath day,  (17)  which are a shadow of the things to come; but the body is Christ’s.

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Preceding articles:

Not trying to make the heathen live like Jews #1

Genesis – Story of creation 6 Genesis 3:13-24 Enmity and curse

Creation of the earth and man #3 Of the Sabbath day #1 the Seventh day

Creation of the earth and man #4 Of the Sabbath day #2 Days 1,7,8 and 50

Creation of the earth and man #5 Of the Sabbath day #3 Ceasing from the works of the flesh

Creation of the earth and man #6 Of the Sabbath day #4 Mosaic codes, Sabbaths and Sunday

Creation of the earth and man #7 Of the Sabbath day #5 Respecting the day on which Christ Jesus rose from the dead

Creation of the earth and man #8 Of the Sabbath day #6 If it be necessary to keep Sunday

Were Gentiles excluded from entering the synagogue?

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Additional reading

  1. Condemnation of the World and Illustration of Justification
  2. Why Sabbaths or Sabbath plural “shabbatot”
  3. Holy Sabbath
  4. Do we need to keep the Sabbath
  5. Are Christians required to keep the seventh day Sabbath?
  6. The Sabbath: Is it a special day for Christians?
  7. Sunday and the Sabbath (Pdf doc)
  8. We’re allowed to willfully break the Law of Moses
  9. Seven full weeks or seven completed Sabbaths and ascension of Jesus
  10. Communion and day of worship
  11. More looking for similarities
  12. Bible, helmet of health, salvation and sword of the spirit
  13. Solution for Willing hearts filled with gifts
  14. Promise given in Garden of Eden
  15. The one who set the standard
  16. Mediator
  17. Actions to be a reflection of openness of heart
  18. Atonement and the race been bought
  19. Running the battle
  20. Glory of God appearing in our character
  21. Get Your Wonderful Disease-proof Human Body

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Further reading:

  • Did Jesus teach the Law of the Old Testament to the Jews?
  • What are we gonna do with this Torah?
  • A Case For Sabbath Observance
  • Keeping the Old Testament Law
  • You Are Judged According to Your Beliefs
  • Tithing
  • Shabbat Nachamu (thejc.com)
    The Shabbat after Tishah b’Av is called Shabbat Nachamu, meaning the Shabbat of comfort. It is named after the first words of the haftarah from Isaiah 40, “Comfort, comfort my people”.
    After the deepening mourning of the three weeks for the Temples’ destruction leading up to Tishah b’Av, (culminating in not eating meat or bathing in the days preceding the fast), this Shabbat brings comfort and relief.
  • Parsha Emor: Is There A Shabbat In Other Realms? (jewishpress.com)
    In our Torah reading for holidays, we not only recite the laws of holidays, we include Shabbat, and oddest of all, some laws about sacrificing animals. What do all these laws have to do with one another? In this video, Rabbi Fohrman makes a fascinating argument about how Shabbat works and shows that there are shabbatot in different realms.
  • Shabbat Chol Hamo’ed Pesach (thejc.com)
    In general, it is fair to characterise the Torah commentators of the Middle Ages such as Rashi, Avraham ibn Ezra or Ramban as looking to provide the real meaning of the text.
    This contrasts with the Chasidic writers of the last 300 years, who often afford themselves considerable latitude and allow the words of the Torah to soar and lead us to a truth and meaning well beyond the original context. Such interpretations may not obviously explain the literal meaning of the words but can be powerful insights into our spiritual lives.
  • The Early Christians of Philippi (catholicexchange.com)
    Lydia was a business woman who dealt in purple cloth – she is therefore sometimes referred to as “Lydia Purpuraria” – Lydia the Purple-Seller.  She evidently had roots in Asia Minor (Turkey) for she was said to be of Thyatira … an ancient city there (in a region curiously called “Lydia”).  After being baptized, Lydia generously let her home in Philippi be
  • Note on the Physical Land of Israel: Who Inherits the Land of Israel – Christian or Jew? (ilyston.wordpress.com)
    This irrevocable promise to the seed of Abraham has been expanded.  It is no longer bound to the land of Palestine.  In Romans 4:13, we find that Paul states that Abraham is the “heir of the world.”  This is also stated in Psalms 25:13: “His soul shall dwell at ease; and his seed shall inherit the earth” (Cf. Psalm 37:9, 11, 27).   Thus, it would seem that the promise of the land has extended to the entire world.
    This is not merely a Pauline distinctive.  We also find this idea in Jewish intertestamental writings.

Not trying to make the heathen live like Jews #1

Man living in Garden of Eden in Days of God

At a certain time in history of the universe the Divine Creator made “from the dust of the ground” a human being. Just with dust man would be nothing so there had to be a spark or something special to bring the material to live. The “essence” of the being for man came  from God Who is the “Supreme Being” Itself.

Michelangelo's painting of the sin of Adam and...
Michelangelo’s painting of the sin of Adam and Eve (the Fall of Man) (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

The Eternal Spirit Who Is Who He is the Being in Itself made man in His own image by His Voice and by “a spark”, or particle, scintillated from His Divine Nature, giving the being life, having intelligent faculty and existence independently of the substantial organism with which it is associated.

Man felt lonely and got a partner, a mannin or woman, called Eve. Together they could sojourn freely in the Garden of Eden. In essence they where good and had the free will to stay good, by keeping to the ordinances of their heavenly Father.

Seventh day Day of rest for God

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/c/c4/Merneptah_Israel_Stele_Cairo.JPG/300px-Merneptah_Israel_Stele_Cairo.JPG
The Merneptah stele. While alternative translations exist, the majority of biblical archaeologists translate a set of hieroglyphs as “Israel“, representing the first instance of the name Israel in the historical record.

They too came to understand the days of God and how they should honour Him and respect His creation. For them the seventh day was also a day of rest where they could show how much they loved their Creator. We do not know whether the earth’s first population organised themselves by means of a seven day week. Whereas other periods of time or various calender units based on the time the earth takes to revolve once around the sun (the day, month and year) are based upon observable movements of stars and planets, the seven day week has no such basis-that can be found only in the explanation in Genesis. As the time passed days, month and years got names. A Rosh Chodashim (head of the months) came to exist next to a month of the salvation or Chodesh ha Yeshuah,  a month of redemption or Chodesh hageulah, a year of recompense and many others.

From beginning the stars, planets and man’s being may have been very complex and not understandable for man. Darkness and light made a difference for him giving him an idea of a time element. But the things man did not know seemed to worry them. Also the matter that That Holy Spirit they could not be seen made their mind weary. They started wondering how This Spirit could order days and demand them to take rest or have  period of inactivity, relaxation, or sleep, on a certain day and not to eat from a certain fruit-tree, calling it the Tree of knowledge of good and evil, which was going to bring life and death over man.

Organisation of days and food provision

In case man had decided to organise his living according to periods of seven days nowhere can we find proof that God said they would be punished for not resting on the seventh day. They had total freedom of choice about this. In fact, God gave no instructions about how the seventh day should be spent until after the nation of Israel had been brought out of Egypt (the Shemoth) and led miraculously through the Red Sea into the wilderness of Sinai. Being a large community, they needed a good and regular supply of food and water, but in desert conditions these were very scarce. The people soon complained, and wished they were back in Egypt. A further miracle brought them their food. Each morning around their camp

“there was on the face of the wilderness a fine, flake-like thing, fine as the hoarfrost on the ground” (Exodus 16:14).

The food was called “manna“, and could be collected for six days each week.

This was literally food which could be eaten. On the first five days each week any manna not eaten that day, but kept overnight “bred worms, and became foul”.
On the sixth day, if a double portion was collected, it would keep fresh for use on the seventh day when no manna was available. Moses asked them to eat that manna that day for that seventh day is a Sabbath to Jehovah God. Therefore they could not find any manna in the field. Take attention that Moshe or Moses says it was a ‘day of rest for Jehovah’ and not ‘day of rest for man’.
In this way the pattern of work and rest was enforced for the nation of Israel:

Exodus 16:25-26 NHEBJE  Moses said, “Eat that today, for today is a Sabbath to Jehovah. Today you shall not find it in the field.  (26)  Six days you shall gather it, but on the seventh day is the Sabbath. In it there shall be none.”

Six days of gathering and one day of rest: God’s activity in Creation thus became the example for His nation. For the first time in the Bible, the word “Sabbath” is used. It means simply ‘to cease‘ ( to bring or come to an end), and is used to describe the day when the manna discontinued falling down from heaven and the Israelites rested from their labours, as God had from His.

Laws to control the activity of the nation

In those days of Moses and his people shortly after the manna was first provided, it also was the moment in time that God gave through Moses laws to control the activity of the nation. Today those written rules are mostly known as the Ten Commandments by which people where told to have only One True Eternal Spirit God of Whom no graven images where to be made. Of the people was also demanded in the fourth commandment to remember the Sabbath day and to keep it holy or sanctified, which means to have it been kept apart, not being it the same as other days. Also it was told they could work six days but the seventh day they should take a Sabbath to the Lord their God. In it they had not to do any work .

Exodus 20:8-12 NHEBJE  “Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy.  (9)  You shall labor six days, and do all your work,  (10)  but the seventh day is a Sabbath to Jehovah your God. You shall not do any work in it, you, nor your son, nor your daughter, your male servant, nor your female servant, nor your livestock, nor your stranger who is within your gates;  (11)  for in six days Jehovah made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested the seventh day; therefore Jehovah blessed the Sabbath day, and made it holy.  (12)  “Honor your father and your mother, that your days may be long in the land which Jehovah your God gives you.

As for the manna, so for all of Israel’s activities the pattern would be six days of labour followed by one day of rest. We may not forget for man to be able to stay alive he had to work hard. Everything had to be done by hand. Labour was at first not a  physical toil done for wages, but was a necessary act for providing food. In the early days in the Garden of Eden there did not exist a difficult or arduous work or effort. they had not to strive or work hard for something, but when then opposed God, Adam and Eve had been disobedient to God‘s commandments, Jehovah sentenced them and their descendants to hard toil in order to produce their necessary food.

We also can find the Psalmist referring to such work which was done until the evening (Psalm 104:23). From the fall of man onwards the daily work he had to do became a constant reminder of his mortality; the certainty that he is “dust, and to dust (he) shall return” (Genesis 3:19).

Significance of introduction of Sabbath commands

God’s people experienced many wonders by God and by them they could survive. God freely provided their daily food, but they had to work to gather it, except on the seventh day. The difficulty of walking through the dessert and gathering food was to make them conscience of the punishments brought upon the world as a result of Adam‘s disobedience.

The day they had not to gather the food from heaven, they had to remember what they had received the previous days. That day of not to provide for their food they could contemplate and take more time to think about God. That day of rest, on the Sabbath, would give man time to meditate on God’s works and to let him identify himself with God, and with the completion of His creation, when He was able to review

“everything that he had made, and behold, it was very good” (Genesis 1:31).

Measures to bring man back to God

Though man could see all the wonders of God and they had received brains to create things themselves as well, they wanted more. God had given their mind to think and to make their own decisions. At one point in time they choose to go their own way, against the Will of God, and throughout history many times they went astray, but God always came back to them to help them out.

It was from that moment when Adam and Eve had revolted against their Maker that God had to take measures to bring them back to their senses and back to Almighty God, the Most High.

When Adam and Eve where expelled from the Garden of Eden and had created a family, their descendants also could not always follow the Way of God, wherefore the Elohim gave them more rules and regulations so that they could keep themselves on the safe path.

Man choose to create their own regulations and wanted to create their own calendars and wanted to say what to do what they ever wanted on whatever day. But for God not all actions of man were acceptable. He clearly told them what would be appropriate for man to do and what would be an abomination in the eyes of God.

Showing willingness to come to God

Throughout the ages lots went wrong and often God came back into the picture to guide His people back onto the right track. Already from the beginning of the fall of man God provided a solution for their sin, but first they also had to show they where willing to come to God again. Every individual has now the own choice to choose either to be for God or against Him, to follow His ordinances or to refuse the right to God to demand certain things from man.

In later writings we shall come to see how the promises of God for the solution against the fall of man became a reality which took away the many chains the people had gotten over them by the years.

In subsequent readings you shall, hopefully, come to see how a Nazarene man, called Jeshua, today better known as Jesus became the man who brought salvation and who is the embodiment of Israel. Those who follow that Nazarene man and call themselves Christian should know who that man is and what his teachings are, but also keep to his teachings, so that they can be part of the Body of Christ and be part of the (new or renewed) true and faithful Israel.

Finding difficulties to keep to God’s Laws

It took many centuries but God’s people Israel bounded to the Mosaic Laws often found it a burden, therefore the loving God foresaw also an abrogation of many laws. Jesus namely was to come to install the New Covenant between God and man, which would do away with, or annul, especially by authority given to Christ Jesus, several Judaic Laws.

Those who would embrace the faith of Abraham could make their choice for God sealed, not by worldly proofs, but by spiritual proofs. They would not have to have a real body circumcision but should be circumcised by putting on Christ in baptism, thus partaking imputatively of the literal circumcision of which Christ was subject under the law, becoming the children of Abraham, and heirs of the promises made to him.

Bartolomeo Montagna - Saint Paul - Google Art Project.jpg
Saul of Tarsus was called by Christ and became an apostle who taught the gospel of Christ and founded several churches in Asia Minor and Europe in the first-century world of the common era.

The Jew Saul of Tarsus took some time to come to understand God’s new ordinances but by the new light having come he made a testimony that we can face a world where there is neither Jew (believing descendant from Abraham’s tribe) nor Greek, Roman, or Goyim (gentile; a non-Jewish person or an unbeliever), but that all have the free choice to go their way. There would neither be a servant nor freeman, neither male nor female, or no distinction in the eyes of God, all being made equal and all having to make their own choice. And those baptised into Christ should all be one in Christ Jesus, liberated by him.

Galatians 3:27-29 NHEBJE  (27)  For as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ.  (28)  There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free man, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus.  (29)  If you are Christ’s, then you are Abraham’s seed and heirs according to promise.

Children of promise made free

United in Christ Christians should not be barren any more having broken forth knowing they are brethren and sisters and as Isaac was, being children of promise.  Though still being born according to the flesh the mind we received can be used to come to knowledge and with the right insight making us to make the right choices. Those who choose to follow Christ Jesus are children of the free: by the freedom wherewith Christ has made us free.

Galatians 4:27-31 NHEBJE  (27)  For it is written, “Rejoice, you barren who do not bear. Break forth and shout, you that do not travail. For more are the children of the desolate than of her who has a husband.”  (28)  Now you, brothers, as Isaac was, are children of promise.  (29)  But as then, he who was born according to the flesh persecuted him who was born according to the Spirit, so also it is now.  (30)  However what does the Scripture say? “Throw out the handmaid and her son, for the son of the handmaid will not inherit with the son of the free woman.”  (31)  So then, brothers, we are not children of a handmaid, but of the free woman.

Those liberated by Christ should not take up the old burdens but should face the Saviour Jesus who is the new Genesis (New World), by who’s life we can see the embodiment of the new Exodus.

We should come to see that Jesus is fulfilling Israel’s history and  bringing it to a climax.

 

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Preceding articles:

Genesis – Story of creation 6 Genesis 3:13-24 Enmity and curse

Creation of the earth and man #3 Of the Sabbath day #1 the Seventh day

Creation of the earth and man #4 Of the Sabbath day #2 Days 1,7,8 and 50

Creation of the earth and man #5 Of the Sabbath day #3 Ceasing from the works of the flesh

Creation of the earth and man #6 Of the Sabbath day #4 Mosaic codes, Sabbaths and Sunday

Creation of the earth and man #7 Of the Sabbath day #5 Respecting the day on which Christ Jesus rose from the dead

Creation of the earth and man #8 Of the Sabbath day #6 If it be necessary to keep Sunday

Were Gentiles excluded from entering the synagogue?

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Additional reading

  1. “Before” and “after” the Big Bang
  2. Science, belief, denial and visibility 1
  3. God giving signs and producing wonders
  4. What is life?
  5. Dying or not
  6. Possibility to live
  7. Blindness in the Christian world
  8. A learning process for each of us
  9. Creator and Blogger God 3 Lesson and solution
  10. People Seeking for God 7 The Lord and lords
  11. A prophet to restore
  12. Story of Jesus’ birth begins long before the New Testament
  13. With child and righteousness greater than the law
  14. Entrance of a king to question our position #2 Who do we want to see and to be
  15. Marriage of Jesus 8 Wife of Yahweh
  16. Marriage of Jesus 10 Old and New Covenant
  17. Hosea Say What?
  18. Born to Shine not to fear!
  19. Commemorating the escape from slavery
  20. Days of Nisan, Pesach, Pasach, Pascha and Easter
  21. Do we need to keep the Sabbath
  22. Vayikra after its opening word וַיִּקְרָא, which means and He called
  23. In case you find contradiction between Old and New Testament
  24. Together tasting a great promise
  25. Deliverance and establishment of a theocracy
  26. Glory of God appearing in our character – The Face of Moses and Law on Tablets of stone
  27. Atonement And Fellowship 6/8
  28. The Law of Christ: Law of Love

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Further related reading:

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