Prose – Page 32 – Poetry, Short Prose and Walking

Exploration 97 – The Hebrew Revelation

For those celebrating Shavuot this Sunday rather than last Sunday, Chag Shavuot Sameach!

There is evidence that Revelation was originally written in Hebrew. However, the original is unavailable and the manuscripts one has are rare and suffer from corruption. That means the surviving Greek texts, also not original, are still valuable as sources, but it raises interest in these surviving Hebrew manuscripts.

The following three videos by Justin J. van Rensburg provide some of this evidence and some of the insights one can learn from considering these sources. See Hebrew Gospels for more information.

In the first video he shows how to obtain photos of the manuscript of Revelation, a transcription and a translation. Then he provides an argument that this manuscript is an authentic copy of a chain of copies leading back to the original manuscript that was written in Hebrew. Finally, he uses this manuscript to resolve a puzzle in Revelation 22:2 that mentions that the Tree of Life was on both sides of the river having twelve different fruits.

He continues in the second video to resolve another puzzle: Is Yeshua or Satan the “morning star” referred to in Isaiah 14:12-14 especially considering that translations from the Greek of Revelation 22:16 also refer to Yeshua as the “morning star”. Given evidence from the Hebrew manuscript, Satan is the “morning star”, but Yeshua is the “morning light”.

Justin van Rensburg brings out the significance of this confusion (starting about 12:00) by referring back to Isaiah 14:12-14 where Satan (the “morning star”) claims he will make himself like the Most High. One of the ways Satan did this was by giving Yeshua the same title in the Greek version of Revelation that he himself had from Isaiah.

The third video provides evidence through Hebrew puns and direct quotes from the Old Testament that the original autograph was written in Hebrew.

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Weekly Parashah Readings
Parashah: Behaalotecha, 19 Sivan, 5782 – June 18, 2022
Torah: Numbers 8:1-12:16
Haftarah: Zechariah 2:14-4:7
Brit Chadashah: 1 Corinthians 10:6-13; Revelation 11:1-19
Resources: Chabad, Hebrew4Christians, Weekly Torah Readings, Calendar

Waterfall – Friday Fictioneers

It was a long, double waterfall. Two geologists were arguing. One said it was over a hundred million years old. The other said with all that rushing water the entire formation would erode to sea level in less than ten million years.

Some bet their worldviews one way; some, the other.

I’ll admit I had an opinion, but so what, they might ask. I just hoped the waterfall would stick around until our vacation was over knowing eventually it, and quite a bit of everything else, would all wash away.

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Rochelle Wisoff-Fields offers the photo by David Stewart below as the prompt for this week’s Friday Fictioneers.

Key – Six Sentence Story

The only thing Gerald wanted was that key dangling from the neck of the sorceress who said as she offered him an apple squishing the worm popping its head from the core: Take another bite.

He tried to recall what he was doing there as she charmed him explaining, But, Gerald, you know you’re addicted and it’s time for your medication. To prove her point she unlocked his chains with the key to show him just how pathetically weak he had become. Besides, she loved watching her victims go through the agony of deciding what they really wanted: freedom or wormy delights?

Thankfully for Gerald the fog cleared in time for him to remember why he entered this godforsaken kingdom of enchantment in the first place. Unchained he rushed off to resume rescuing his wife kidnapped by Snakindegras, a particularly ornery dragon he couldn’t wait to get his hands on, while the witch with the apple screamed in the distance: Run, Snaky, run!

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Denise offers the prompt word “key” to be used in this week’s Six Sentence Stories.

Edge – Six Sentence Story

On one side of the path there was a perilous, downward sloping edge. He walked this mountain trail to reach home.

He crawled when winds blew to avoid being thrown into the abyss. When rainstorms poured he rested knowing those dark clouds would soon move on.

When grisly goats, demonic dragons or other ugly forms of monstrous nonsense blocked his way he told them where to go. Only the foolish hesitated to obey.

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Denise offers the word “edge” to be used in this week’s Six Sentence Stories.

Proverbs 16:7 – “When a man’s ways please the Lord, he maketh even his enemies to be at peace with him.” (KJV)

Exploration 95 – Humanistic Righteousness

In those days there was no king in Israel: every man did that which was right in his own eyes.
Judges 21:25 King James Version

In the comments to my post last week on demons, Oneta Hayes reminded me that I missed a whole class of demonic activity. The demons I missed were those that appeared “beautiful and compelling”. I pointed out the obviously ugly ones, but I missed the attractively strong delusions of unbelief that could be described as humanistic righteousness.

That is sometimes called self-righteousness, because one’s righteousness is based on following what is good in one’s own eyes. Self-righteousness justifies the ethics of humanism because humanism acknowledges no other ground than man: our reasonings, our wants, what we experience with our senses or our emotions. It is what grounds the ethics of ideas like effective altruism where one optimizes the amount of “good” one can do on a monetary basis. See Peter Singer’s The Most Good You Can Do: How Effective Altruism Is Changing Ideas About Living Ethically.

No matter how good this appears to be if it is not what Yeshua (Jesus) wants us to do, it is not good. It can’t be, because there is nothing good outside of His will.

O give thanks unto the Lord, for he is good: for his mercy endureth for ever.
Psalm 107:1 King James Version

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Weekly Parashah Readings
Parashah: Bamidbar, 5 Sivan, 5782 – June 4, 2022
Torah: Numbers 1:1 – 4:20
Haftarah: Hosea 2:1 – 2:23
Brit Chadashah: Romans 9:22-33; 1 Corinthians 12:12-30
Resources: Chabad, Hebrew4Christians, Weekly Torah Readings, Calendar

Vegetable Stand – Friday Fictioneers

No one tended the vegetable stand hidden in the hills. There was an open box where one could put coins and bills to pay for the vegetables all marked with prices. Customers made their own change from what was in the box.

Some took vegetables without paying. Some took some (and sometimes all) of the money in the box. Others put more money in the box than they were asked to. Others in repentance returned money or something as exchange for what they shouldn’t have taken.

At the end of the season enough remained to make the next year possible.

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Rochelle Wisoff-Fields offers the photo below as the prompt for this week’s Friday Fictioneers.

Ever Simmering Fluid – Six Sentence Story

The heretic hunters smirked as the paralyzed man was slowly lowered through the roof to the Master’s feet. Their ever simmering fluid of righteousness popped its cork when they heard the Master declare, “Your sins are forgiven.”

Some thought, “Just who does he think he is?” They argued that only the demon possessed would say stuff like that.

The Master waited for the heretic hunters to catch their breaths. The paralyzed man waited also since he couldn’t do much of anything until he first heard words, spoken with the proper authority, like, “Arise, pick up your bed, and walk.”

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Denise offers the word “fluid” to be used in this week’s Six Sentence Stories.

For what really happened see Luke 5:17-24.

Exploration 94 – Demons

To paraphrase Andrew Wommack: If our lives aren’t supernatural, they’re superficial.

Through much of my life I didn’t believe that demons really existed. They made interesting characters in spooky stories, but from a superficial perspective psychology seemed to explain them away as personality disorders. That unbelief in them undermined, but it did not crash, my belief in the rest of the supernatural.

To counter that unbelief in demons and reaffirm a belief in the supernatural I remember reading M. Scott Peck’s People of the Lie on evil and Raymond Moody’s Life After Life on near death experiences. However, my grounding view of demons came more from movies like The Exorcist than the Gospels.

Sentimental New Age influences also crept in. The movie Labyrinth offered a view of the demonic that seemed simpler to cast out if only I could remember the magic spell. I began to realize it was easier to tell a demon he had no power over me than to actually stay free from demonic addiction. However much New Age spirituality invitingly plays with the demonic, it brings no authority with it to boss demons around.

Too often I forgot that it is only through exercising the authority of Yeshua (Jesus) that I had any hope of being victorious when facing a demon. Eventually I saw them manifest through their effects like addiction, anger, illness or sin on my life and the life of those around me.

As disciples of Yeshua we are sent to heal the sick and cast out demons among other things (Matthew 10:8). If we don’t know how to go about that, we could prayerfully start with ourselves. If Peter’s shadow is any indication of what is possible (Acts 5:15-16) we may not have to say a word before the demons scatter.

Weekly Parashah Readings
Parashah: Bechukotai, 27 Iyar, 5782 – May 28, 2022
Torah: Leviticus 26:3-27:34
Haftarah: Jeremiah 16:19-17:14
Brit Chadashah: Matthew 21:33-46; 2 Corinthians 6:14-18
Resources: Chabad, Hebrew4Christians, Weekly Torah Readings, Calendar

Detour on the Merry-Go-Round – Six Sentence Story

That detour Brian didn’t have to take took decades. When troubles knocked some sense into him, he lacked the sense to ride those blessings home. Sliding on curses he went where no one needed to go.

When Brian found his way home he told us, “If I knew how easy it would be to jump off that merry-go-round I’d have done it long ago.” Regretting the waste of life, he added, “Why didn’t you tell me?”

We were so glad to see him none of us saw any need to remind him just how often we had told him.

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Denise offers the word “detour” to be used in this week’s Six Sentence Stories.

Proverbs 15:32 – “He that refuseth instruction despiseth his own soul: but he that heareth reproof getteth understanding.” (KJV)

Exploration 93 – Not To Swear or Not To Swear Falsely (Matthew 5:33-35)

³³Again, ye have heard that it hath been said by them of old time, Thou shalt not forswear thyself, but shalt perform unto the Lord thine oaths:
³⁴But I say unto you, Swear not at all; neither by heaven; for it is God’s throne:
³⁵Nor by the earth; for it is his footstool: neither by Jerusalem; for it is the city of the great King.
Matthew 5:33-35 King James Version

Matthew 5:33-35 is the kind of passage that I’d likely skip over, because I didn’t understand it. Is Yeshua replacing the law of not swearing falsely in YeHoVaH’s name with not swearing at all?

Nehemia Gordon translated the problematic portion of verse 34, rendered by the KJV as “Swear not at all”, from the Hebrew manuscripts in The Hebrew Yeshua vs. the Greek Jesus, page 65, as “you must not swear by anything falsely”. George Howard translated this portion of the manuscript as “But I say to you not to swear in vain in any matter” (page 21).

The difference is between not swearing at all and not swearing falsely (or in vain) by anything, let alone by YeHoVaH’s name. The Hebrew text does not prohibit swearing, but swearing falsely. Now that I understand. It makes sense.

According to Gordon, Yeshua countered a Pharisaic teaching that permitted one to swear falsely as long as it was not in the name of YeHoVaH. Gordon writes, “This strange doctrine was based on an over-literalization of Leviticus 19:12, “you shall not swear falsely by My name.”” (page 65-66). According to Howard, this raised a striking contrast between the Greek and Hebrew texts: “In the Greek, Jesus appears to revoke the law; In the Hebrew, he internalizes and radicalizes the law, but does not revoke it.” (Hebrew Gospel of Matthew, page 213)

What this tells me is that we need these Hebrew manuscripts to better approximate what the original autographs actually said. It also increases my suspicions that the Greek manuscripts were translations from a Hebrew source since this Hebrew manuscript still makes sense.

Weekly Parashah Readings
Parashah: Behar, 20 Iyar, 5782 – May 21, 2022
Torah: Leviticus 25:1-26:2
Haftarah: Jeremiah 32:6-44
Brit Chadashah: Luke 4:16-21
Resources: Chabad, Hebrew4Christians, Weekly Torah Readings, Calendar