The psychic smiled upon seeing the wealthy couple waiting for a reading intuiting from her familiar spirits that their future looked promising. She hoped they would purchase further services and perhaps even partner with her helping her restore her own fortunes in the competitive occult arena where mediums and fortune tellers were readily available.
When the tarot cards confirmed her intuition she predicted that the husband’s investments and public influence would increase and his wife would overcome infertility and depression. However, after paying the basic fee the couple declined further services hinting that they doubted her abilities were real.
After the couple left the psychic realized that they must have thought that what they had just participated in was some innocent tourist adventure and so she cursed them. A year later, unable to secure big clients in time, her own business adventure completed its tailspin into bankruptcy.
Denise offers the prompt word “restore” to be used in this week’s Six Sentence Stories.
I have been studying Biblical Hebrew primarily using the YouTube videos from the Aleph With Beth channel by Andrew and Bethany Case. The Bible Society in Israel offers the Hebrew Bible with a dramatized audio reading and dictionary. They have also translated the Greek New Testament into Modern Hebrew and made this available with an audio reading. One can add a column to compare two versions of the text. As an alternative, I have also used the Step Hebrew Interlinear Bible.
I recommend all of these resources if you are interested in learning Biblical Hebrew. If you have other resources you are using that you find helpful, let me know. I still have a long way to go.
My goal is to be able to read the Masoretic text found in the Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia without needing a dictionary. I am not there yet. Here is a song by Miqedem on Psalm 23 that I am trying to understand by hearing it sung without following along with the Hebrew-English text.
The Old Testament was written in Biblical Hebrew. Douglas Petrovich provided evidence that the Israelites possessed an alphabet centuries before Moses. If that’s true there is no longer a compelling reason to follow theories like the JEDP/Documentary Hypothesis which claimed that Moses could not himself have written the first five books in the Bible because he did not have the means to do so. Moses had what he needed to write those books and the Israelites were able to read them.
I used to think that Aramaic was the language Jesus spoke. However, Jeff A. Benner provided evidence that most of the New Testament was originally written in Hebrew which was also the language spoken by Jesus and his early followers. If that’s true then what we have today are translations of the Hebrew originals into Greek from which English translations were later made.
Some early form of Biblical Hebrew may have been the original “one language” (Genesis 11:1KJV) spoken until the time of the Tower of Babel. For arguments for and against this, including Isaac Mozeson’s Edenics, see Bodie Hodge’s discussion of language before the time of Moses. Mozeson notes that many Jewish commentators see this one language as Biblical Hebrew. For further information on his view see A Garden of Edenics 2021.
Weekly Bible Reading:Daniel (Audio), Hosea (Audio) 24 Cheshvan, 5782, Chayei Sarah: ParashatGenesis 23:1-25:18; Haftarat1 Kings 1:1-1:31 Commentaries: David Pawson, Daniel, Part 46, Hosea, Part 47, Unlocking the Bible Bible Project, Daniel and Hosea
Joe tossed the letter into the box not as a keepsake but as one of those things he didn’t have time to sort through at the moment. More than two decades later while cleaning the basement he noticed the box and went through its contents. He found his father’s letter at the bottom. Reading it for the first time he realized his father was not scolding him in spite of their disagreements but rather offering him assistance should he need anything during that tense period when he decided to move away from the family home.
Having a rebellious son now of his own Joe understood what must have been going through his father’s mind. Although he and his family reconciled shortly after his move, it wasn’t until he read his father’s letter that he began wondering just how much of his past was lived under misconceptions of what was actually going on.
Denise offers the prompt word “keepsake” to be used in this week’s Six Sentence Stories.
And God said, Let there be lights in the firmament of the heaven to divide the day from the night; and let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days, and years:
John Sanford and Christopher Rupe provide evidence that our galaxy is near the center of the universe in a paper at LogosRA. They write, “Astronomical data shows that the universe displays a striking pattern in its arrangement. Not only that, the universe may have a central position and it appears that our galaxy is at or very near it—far from what we would expect from a random, cosmic accident.“
Here is a summary of the evidence offered for that view.
Redshift Data Regardless of whether we are in an expanding universe or not the galaxies furthest away from us have a stronger red shift. This is evidence that we are near the center of the universe. Edwin Hubble who discovered this redshift phenomena realized this. However, he found it philosophically intolerable, but not disprovable. Sanford and Rupe remark, “the cosmic redshift phenomenon clearly revolves around our own location, and this when taken at face value indicates we are near the center.“
Galactic Shells In 1977 William Tifft discovered that the galaxies were patterned on their redshifts forming concentric spherical shells around our galaxy at the center.
Uniformity of the Cosmic Microwave Background From all directions we see a uniformity in the cosmic background radiation. Were we not at the center we would not expect to see this uniformity.
Symmetry of the Cosmic Microwave Background In 2001 the Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe found evidence for a cosmic north-south pole and equator centered around our galaxy.
Spatial Distribution of Galaxies As Sanford and Rupe put it, “galaxies appear to be organized into gigantic web-like structures, and these structures form concentric rings around our own special position“.
On the fourth day of creation God created lights in the firmament for signs. Sanford and Rupe suggest: The universe’s countless galaxies may be designed for no other purpose than to be seen by us in these last days – so that it might be clear to all humanity that “The heavens declare the Glory of God…” (Psalms 19:1)
Weekly Bible Reading:Ezekiel (Audio), Daniel (Audio) 17 Cheshvan, 5782, Vayeira: ParashatGenesis 18:1-22:24; Haftarat2 Kings 4:1-4:37 Commentaries: David Pawson, Ezekiel, Part 44, Daniel, Part 45, Unlocking the Bible Bible Project, Ezekiel (34-48) and Daniel
Tom could not see how to get from where he was to where he wanted to be. Nor did anyone have a suggestion outside of praying that he get well soon.
In desperation he resigned himself to whatever would happen hoping he could get his house in order before it did.
While sitting outside in the warm summer air Tom’s appetite returned and his death influenced fantasies left him. Within an hour and without any evident treatment to credit with the change he suddenly found himself where he didn’t think it was any longer possible for him to be. He got better.
Denise offers the prompt word “treatment” to be used in this week’s Six Sentence Stories.
We are in the year 5782 in the Jewish calendar. It represents the number of years since the creation based on the ages of people in the Bible. This would put creation in 3761 BC (that is, 5782-2021). However, others using various biblical texts calculated this differently. For Luther the creation occurred in 3961 BC. For Kepler it was 3993 BC. For Josephus it was 5555 BC.
Robert Carter gives reasons for these discrepancies in his Origins interview. At about 23:00 in the video he offers as an estimate 4220 BC as the year of Creation using the Masoretic text. This estimated date has a range from 3822 BC to 4339 BC. If that estimated date is correct, the earth would be about 6241 years old within a range from 5843 to 6360 years old.
Given these estimates of the age of the Earth we can construct more detailed chronologies of when things happened. Those with competing chronologies can do the same with their estimates. The problem with having a very old estimated age of the Earth is that we also know rates of erosion or entropy. The older the estimated age, the more likely it will be falsified by some rate of decay. For example, a fossil cannot be older than the time it would take for erosion to wash the fossil away.
The Biblical account also provides the means by which the Earth (and universe) began. God was responsible through creation meaning there was an all-powerful intelligence right at the beginning.
Those who reject such a starting point need to come up with some plausible way for the universe that we see today to even be here. They need to provide a coherent explanation of a starting point and identify mechanisms for any evolutionary steps taking us from that starting point to our current state before entropy of some sort washes it all away.
Weekly Bible Reading:Ezekiel (Audio) 10 Cheshvan, 5782, Lech-Lecha: ParashatGenesis 12:1-17:27; HaftaratIsaiah 40:27-41:16 Commentaries: David Pawson, Ezekiel, Part 42 and Part 43, Unlocking the Bible Bible Project, Ezekiel(1-33)
In his basement Brian kept books on mystical mathematics, astrology, post-modern literature, psychic philosophy and occult guides featuring faeries, demons, muses, mother goddesses, and witchcraft practices promoting what was in effect a year-long Halloween for him. As he read those books he was charmed by the writing, but nonetheless they failed to relieve him of his self-loathing and depression.
During a particularly low period and after persistent nagging from a friend who insisted that he had nothing of value to lose by doing so Brian started listening to an online audio Bible along with commentaries. Following a suggestion for deliverance in one of the commentaries he destroyed any occult object he could find in his house including books, tarot decks, pendulums, crystals, and horoscopes all stuff he picked up over the years to help him see into what he thought were innocent spirit realms. Who knows where the devil loves to hide?
Today, far removed from those times and looking back, Brian sees his former ways like the viewer of a video asking himself how he could ever have been that guy, but glad he no longer was.
Robert Carter, The Amazing Braided Baramin Concept Is Intrinsic To Creation, (about 4:30 in the video)
In Genesis we read that God created (bara) creatures which came forth after their own kind (min). From here we get the term baramin, a created kind. A baramin may contain a single species, such as mankind being the only species within its own baramin or a baramin may contain many different species, coming and going, but staying within their own kind as they change. That means what is fundamental is the baramin, not the species.
Peer Terborg notes that pluripotent baranomes provide the source for the diversity of life we see today. Life did not start from something simple and evolve into something complex. It started wondrously complicated, designed for change.
That means that Adam was not a primitive human being who evolved into us over time. He was more advanced biologically than we are.
This view of life and change based on DNA does not require deep time to reach the sort of world we experience today. Indeed deep time, even one hundred million years of deep time, would destroy the fossil record through erosion many times over or destroy life itself through genetic entropy. Deep time, along with evolution, are modern myths unworthy of our attention.
I used to have a science fiction view of reality. I thought our species would continue for hundreds of millions, if not billions, of years. We would visit other planets inhabited with intelligent life and settle uninhabited worlds. I did not realize that mutations would stop all of that no matter how many spaceships we sent to other stars.
Today, I don’t think there is life of any sort on those distant planets. The reason is because there is no known mechanism for life to pop into existence outside of God’s deliberate creation.
That realization put a brake on my former fantasies and having given up on the schemes of Man my prayers took root in desperation. We live after the Fall revealed in Genesis and before the Kingdom prophesied in Revelation. It is humbling to realize that there is no way out of this but the coming of the Lord. There never has been. Maranatha!
George was told that the fall colors this year were particularly beautiful near the nature center and so he went there and followed a trail leading from the picnic tables by the river.
He hadn’t thought that he had ever been there before, a place where parents would take young children, but then the fountain of his memory opened. He recalled that there should be a loop up ahead of this trail leading back to the center and sure enough there it was with the remembered rustic rail fencing and signs. He also remembered his father and uncle slowly walking behind him while his mother and aunt were waiting for them with sandwiches and pie.
As George returned to the nature center, having forgotten all about the foliage, a rush of regret and remorse led to repentance, something he should have expressed decades ago, for all of his idle words and rebellious deeds directed against his family. Leaving the center he felt a burden lift from his heart opening a future he had not imagined was even there before, but which had been waiting for him all this time.
Denise offers the prompt word “fountain” to be used in this week’s Six Sentence Stories. I was thinking of the last two verses of Psalm 138.
The genetic evidence strongly suggests that Y Chromosome Adam/Noah and Mitochondrial Eve were not just real people, they were the progenitors of us all.
After the Fall, Adam named his wife Eve. (Genesis 3:20) Today geneticists talk about Y Chromosome Adam and Mitochondrial Eve. The controversy is over estimates of how long ago they lived. If the estimates are over fifty thousand years ago, and you believed it, that would strongly show the Bible is wrong. If the estimates are under ten thousand years, and you believed it, that would confirm the biblical account.
The Bible also mentions a global flood with three couples, Noah’s sons and their wives (Genesis 6-8). This population bottleneck should appear in the genetic record as well and indeed one can find it. Nathaniel T. Jeanson and Ashley D. Holland in 2019 “confirm a 4,500-year history for human paternal ancestry”.
At about 25:00 in the video below John Sanford provided seven lines of genetic evidence supporting the idea of a literal Adam and Eve.
(1) Mitochondrial Eve (2) Y-Chromosome Adam (3) Population Bottleneck (4) Designed Variants in Genome (5) Babel Dispersion (6) Ape-to-Man Refuted (7) Genetic Entropy
Does that make you look at yourself differently? Do you still think that you are evolved stardust? None of us are.
Additional information on Adam and Eve and other science topics can be found at LogosRA.
I will include the Parashat Torah readings and Haftarah selections from the rest of the Bible in this set of readings since yesterday the reading of the Torah began again in Genesis. I will be using the Chabad.org calendar to find the name of the reading and the Jewish Virtual Library for the verses involved.
Weekly Bible Reading:Isaiah (Audio), Jeremiah (Audio) 26 Tishrei, 5782, Bereishit: ParashatGenesis 1:1-6:8; HaftaratIsaiah 42:5-43:11 Commentaries: David Pawson, Isaiah, Part 38, Jeremiah, Part 39, Unlocking the Bible Bible Project, Isaiah (40-66) and Jeremiah
Poetry, Short Prose and Walking 