Bad seed, bad harvest

“Yeshua presented another parable to them, saying, ‘The kingdom of heaven may be compared to a man who sowed good seed in his field. But while his men were sleeping, his enemy came and sowed tares among the wheat, and went away. But when the wheat sprouted and bore grain, then the tares became evident also. The slaves of the landowner came and said to him “Sir, did you not sow good seed in your field? How then does it have tares?” And He said to them, “An enemy has done this!” (Matthew 13:24-28)

Within 150 years of the founding of the original Messianic community, poisonous spiritual seeds were sown into the budding soil of the church. These viruses were venomous and highly contagious, and their toxicity infected many branches on the olive tree. The resulting infection polluted Christian attitudes, theology, behavior and a balanced Last Days vision for nearly two millennia. 

These bad seeds are what is known today as ‘Replacement Theology.’ These tares have contaminated much of the Body of Messiah. Most believers carry this ‘spiritual corona virus’ within their souls, unaware of its malevolent influence.

Pagan roots of Jew-hatred

The exiled twelve tribes found themselves scattered across what is today Iraq, Iran and Turkey. After Alexander the Great’s conquests, Jewish expatriate communities settled into the pagan societies of the Mediterranean. By the time Pontius Pilate became prefect (Greek, hēgemṓn) in Judea, Jew-hatred had a broad following inEgyptian, Greek and Roman societies. Two excellent historical sources on this are: Greek and Latin authors on Jews and Judaism, (Menachem Stern, 1974) and The Anguish of the Jews (Edward H. Flannery, 1965). What was it that pagan anti-Semites didn’t like about the Jewish people?

Persian anti-Semitism

Initial Persian attacks against Jews began in the royal court and were motivated by professional jealousy. But the official charges focused on disloyalty to the king – as expressed through Daniel’s obedience to the covenant and his refusal to worship any God except YHVH (Daniel 6:11). The three Hebrews had been thrown into the fiery furnace for a similar reason – because they refused to worship Babylonian demons (Daniel 3:1-12, 16-18).  Daniel already had a reputation in Nebuchadnezzar’s palace for keeping himself separate from eating non-kosher Babylonian royal foods (Daniel 1:8).

Haman (called the ‘enemy of the Jews’ in Esther 3:10; 7:6; 8:1) was infuriated by the Jewish people’s separateness and their refusal to assimilate into Persian religious and social habits: “Then Haman said to King Ahasuerus, ‘There is a certain people scattered and dispersed among the peoples in all the provinces of your kingdom. Their laws are different from those of all other people and they do not observe the king’s laws’” (Esther 3:8).

Greek anti-Semitism

Jews dwelling in in the Greek Empire saw themselves as living in an impure land (see Hosea 9:13; Amos 7:17). The sons of Jacob were guided by the biblical perspective that “all the gods of the peoples are idols” (Psalm 96:5; see also Judges 2:12; 2 Samuel 7:23, 1 Corinthians 8:4-6) and that YHVH had given the Jewish people an irrevocable national calling which involved separateness and priority (Numbers 23:9; Romans 11:28-29; 1:16).

“To the proud heirs of Pericles, Aristotle and Homer, this aloofness was an insufferable arrogance.” The Greeks were convinced that anything non-Greek was primitive and barbarian, and “they naturally resented rival claims to superiority or privilege on the part of a people they considered politically and culturally undistinguished” (Flannery, Anguish, pages 6-7).

Roman anti-Semitism

Cicero the Roman statesman and philosopher (circa 50 B.C.) spoke irately of Jewish separateness:

The Jews “sit apart at meals, and they sleep apart … They abstain from intercourse with foreign women … They adopted circumcision to distinguish themselves from other peoples by this difference. Those who are converted to their ways follow the same practice, and the earliest lesson they receive is to despise the gods, to disown their country, and to regard their parents, children, and brothers as of little account … The religious ceremonies and observances of that people were very much at variance with the splendor of this empire and the dignity of our name and the institutions of our ancestors. And they are the more odious to us now because that nation has shown by arms what were its feelings towards our supremacy” (www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.02.0019%3Atext%3DFlac.%3Achapter%3D28; Pro Flacco 28:69).

The Roman Stoic philosopher Seneca (teacher of Nero, circa 50 A.D.) spoke similarly against the Jews. The Jews, though defeated by Rome, managed to preserve their separated lifestyle and their strong commitment to YHVH’s laws.  “The customs of that most accursed nation have gained such strength that they have been now received in all lands. The conquered have given laws to the conquerors!” (in Augustine, The City of God, VI, 11; www.newadvent.org/fathers/120106.htm).

The Roman historian Tacitus (circa 100 A.D.) adds: “The other practices of the Jews are sinister and revolting, and have entrenched themselves by their very wickedness … But the rest of the world they confront with the hatred reserved for enemies. They will not feed or intermarry with gentiles” (https://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Roman/Texts/Tacitus/Histories/5A*.html).

Celsus, a Roman anti-Christian philosopher of the 2nd century A.D., declared: The Jews “pride themselves on … being possessed of superior wisdom, and keep aloof from intercourse with others, as not being equally pure with themselves” (www.earlychristianwritings.com/text/celsus.html; V, 41).

Pagans responded with anger and hatred to Israel’s divine calling to be separate and distinct from other nations (as per Numbers 23:9). Since Israel’s calling and gifts remain irrevocable even in our day (Romans 11:28-29), it should come as no surprise that most modern nations (whether pagan or baptized) respond to God’s choosing of the Jewish people with similar anger and hatred.

Early Christian anti-Semitism

By A.D. 100 the bad seed of  anti-Semitism was firmly planted in the Roman Empire, the garden of the Gentile Church. Within two hundred years these bad seeds would blossom and proclaim that:

Here are some quotes from Church Fathers which underscore these teachings:

God has rejected the Jewish people – “For inasmuch as the former (ed., the Jews) have rejected the Son of God, and cast Him out of the vineyard when they slew Him, God has justly rejected them, and given to the Gentiles outside the vineyard the fruits of its cultivation” (Irenaeus, Against Heresies, Book IV, Chapter 36; www.newadvent.org/fathers/0103436.htm)

Gentiles are the new Israel – Justin Martyr was born in Neapolis (modern Nablus, Samaria) about 100 A.D. He declared that “Christ is the Israel and the Jacob. Even so we, who have been quarried out from the bowels of Christ, are the true Israelitic race” (Justin Martyr, Dialogue with Trypho, Chapter 135; www.newadvent.org/fathers/01289.htm). There is no little irony in seeing a Samaritan insist on calling himself ‘a true Jew’ while denying that right to real Jews.

In another quote, Justin takes a prophetic passage directed to the Jewish people and insists that it can only be applied to Gentile Christians: “‘Therefore, says the Lord, I will raise up to Israel and to Judah the seed of men and the seed of beasts.’ (ed., Jeremiah 31:27) Since then God blesses this people, and calls them Israel, and declares them to be His inheritance, how is it that you (ed., Jews) repent not of the deception you practice on yourselves, as if you alone were the Israel, and of execrating the people whom God has blessed? For when He speaks to Jerusalem and its environs, He thus added: ‘And I will beget men upon you, even My people Israel; and they shall inherit you, and you shall be a possession for them; and you shall be no longer bereaved of them.’” (ed., Ezekiel 36:12). Trypho the Jew responds: “What, then? Are you Israel? And speaks He such things of you?” (Justin Martyr, Trypho, Chapter 123; www.newadvent.org/fathers/01288.htm)

The Jews are actually Esau – “We are Israel … Let therefore no Christian consider himself alien to the name of Israel … The Christian people then is rather Israel … But that multitude of Jews, which was deservedly reprobated for its perfidy, for the pleasures of the flesh sold their birthright, so that they belonged not to Jacob, but rather to Esau” (Augustine, Expositions on the Psalms, Psalm 114:3; www.newadvent.org/fathers/1801114.htm)

Circumcision is a sign of judgment on Jews – “For circumcision … was given for a sign – that you may be separated for the other nations and from us, and that you alone may suffer that which you now justly suffer” (Justin Martyr, Trypho, Chapter 16:2)

Positive prophecies about Israel “cannot be understood in a literal signification” – ‘Spiritual’ Christians should re-interpret positive prophecies about Israel, presenting them instead as positive prophecies about Gentile Christians only (Origen, On First Principles, Book IV, 19-22; www.newadvent.org/fathers/04124.htm)

God’s purpose in concentrating worship in Jerusalem was only to destroy it – “Why Jerusalem was destroyed? … This is what God did. He made Jerusalem what we might call the keystone which held together the structure of worship. When He overthrew the city, He destroyed the rest of the entire structure of that way of life” (John Chrysostom, Eight Homilies against the Jews IV:6:9; https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Eight_Homilies_Against_the_Jews#VI_3)

There will be no restoration for the Jewish people – “You did slay Christ, you did lift violent hands against the Master, you did spill His precious blood. This is why you have no chance for atonement, excuse, or defense” (John Chrysostom, VI:2:10; https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Eight_Homilies_Against_the_Jews#I_6)

The Jews have irrevocably lost their calling in God – “I have endeavored to show that the Jews, according to what had before been foretold, had departed from God, and had lost God’s favor, which had been given them in past time, and had been promised them for the future; while the Christians had succeeded to their place, deserving well of the Lord by faith, and coming out of all nations and from the whole world” (Cyprian, Three Books of Testimonies Against the Jews; Treatise XII; https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Ante-Nicene_Fathers/Volume_V/Cyprian/The_Treatises_of_Cyprian/Three_Books_of_Testimonies_Against_the_Jews/Preface)

King David prophesied God’s rejection of the Jews – “But after the Jews for the plots which they made against the Savior were cast away from His grace, the Savior built out of the Gentiles a second Holy Church, the Church of us Christians … And David prophesying of both these, said plainly of the first which was rejected, I have hated the congregation of evil doers ; but of the second which is built up he says in the same Psalm, Lord, I have loved the beauty of Your house … For now that the one Church in Judea is cast off, the Churches of Christ are increased over all the world … Agreeably to which the prophet also said to the Jews, I have no pleasure in you, says the Lord Almighty (ed. Malachi 1:10) and immediately afterwards, For from the rising of the sun even unto the going down of the same, My name is glorified among the Gentiles.”  (Cyril of Jerusalem, Catechetical Lecture 18:25; www.newadvent.org/fathers/310118.htm)

The new Gentile celebration of Easter must replace the accursed Jews and their Passover – “At this meeting the question concerning the most holy day of Easter was discussed, and it was resolved by the united judgment of all present, that this feast ought to be kept by all and in every place on one and the same day … And first of all, it appeared an unworthy thing that in the celebration of this most holy feast we should follow the practice of the Jews, who have impiously defiled their hands with enormous sin, and are, therefore, deservedly afflicted with blindness of soul. For we have it in our power, if we abandon their custom … Let us then have nothing in common with the detestable Jewish crowd … Since, therefore, it was needful that this matter should be rectified, so that we might have nothing in common with that nation of parricides who slew their Lord…it is most fitting that all should unite in desiring that which sound reason appears to demand, and in avoiding all participation in the perjured conduct of the Jews … (Eusebius, Life of Constantine, Chapters 18-19; www.newadvent.org/fathers/25023.htm)

The Jews are forever to be the slaves of the Gentile Church –  “‘And the one people shall overcome the other people, and the elder shall serve the younger’ (ed., Genesis 25:23) … Only that saying, ‘The elder shall serve the younger,’ is understood by our writers, almost without exception, to mean that the elder people, the Jews, shall serve the younger people, the Christians … When it was said, ‘The one people shall overcome the other people,’ and ‘the elder shall serve the younger,’ that prophecy meant some greater thing. And what is that except what is evidently fulfilled in the Jews and Christians?”

(Augustine, The City of God, Book XVI, chapter 35; www.newadvent.org/fathers/120116.htm)

The above quotations throw a spotlight on how the enemy’s poisoned seed began to sprout in the field of the Christian church.

Doing plastic surgery on a Jewish book

The Church Fathers sketched their anti-Semitic theological conclusions on the quickly drying cement of Christian theology. Even though 95% of the Scriptures were written by Jews and over 92% of the Bible’s content concerns the Jews, the bad-seed influence of these anti-Semitic theologians decisively affected Christian theology. From the second century A.D. onward, Bible commentators, teachers and preachers tended to apply positive scriptural promises for Israel exclusively to the Gentiles, while ascribing all negative promises for Israel to the Jewish people alone. Today this is still standard practice for the vast majority of Christendom, including for many of my dear friends.

There are two main results here:

Another result of centuries of Christian ‘bad-seed attitude’ toward the Jewish people needs to be mentioned. Anti-Semitic presuppositions color and distort biblical teaching about Last Days Jewish destiny. Negative paradigms about the Jewish people actually pervert biblical understanding and result in anti-Semitic eschatology (Last Days teaching).

Augustine - perverting the meaning of the Chosen People

Augustine reinterpreted Israel’s chosenness to mean something negative. According to his novel teaching, Jews were actually chosen to be punished continually by God down through the corridors of time. The Jewish people no longer have any positive role to play in history. No positive developments can happen to them until after Israel repents of rejecting Yeshua.

On January 5, 1897, the semi-official Vatican Jesuit periodical Civilta Cattolica published an article ‘The Dispersion of Israel over the Modern World.’ The Vatican declared that God cannot be involved in a Jewish return to Zion, using language and theology taken straight from St. Augustine:

The same Augustinian refusal to acknowledge God’s love and grace in a Jewish return to Zion was voiced by Papal Secretary of State Cardinal Rafael Merry del Val in a 1904 correspondence with Theodore Herzl. “As long as the Jews deny Christ's divinity, we cannot take a stand favorable to them.”

Pope Pius X declared to Herzl in a face-to-face private discussion on January 22, 1904:

All followers of Yeshua are challenged by this history. Can we acknowledge it, repent for it and take pro-active steps to support the restoration of the Jewish people?

Bad seeds in our day

Augustine could point in his day to the destruction of Jerusalem as a support for his teaching that Jews would be fated to wander the earth until the end of time. Today, however, he would have difficulty in making the same point. This is because for the first time in nearly 2,000 years the Jewish people have returned to their Land of Promise and are making it bloom.

There is a miniscule ultra-Orthodox Jewish sect in Jerusalem called Neturei Karta (‘the guardians of the city’ in Aramaic).  They strongly believe that the Jewish people should never have set up a secular state but should have instead become ultra-Orthodox Jews living under Muslim domination. Neturei Karta refuse to accept the validity of the State of Israel and proclaim that the Jewish state will soon be destroyed. Who would have thought that Augustinian anti-Semitism would be preached by a backwater of ultra-Orthodox Jews in a Jerusalem ghetto? Truth is sometimes stranger than fiction.

Unfortunately, this same anti-Semitic teaching is being recycled by some in our day. Back in May and June 2012 I wrote two newsletters analyzing the teachings of Art Katz (https://davidstent.org/he-being-dead-still-speaks/) and Dalton Lifsey-Thomas (https://davidstent.org/prophesying-the-destruction-of-zion/). You can peruse these articles for a more in-depth explanation of their belief that the modern state of Israel will be totally destroyed ‘according to Scripture.’

Here are some quotes from Katz and Lifsey-Thomas which underscore these teachings:

Prophesying the total destruction of the Zionist vision is bad seed

Many Jews believe that if one scratches a Christian, one finds an anti-Semite. We thank God that there are many Gentile followers of Yeshua whose life and actions show this charge to be a lie. Yet at the same time, the propagating of Zion’s total destruction cannot be interpreted as a love note to Israel. Those who teach it are sucked into the dragnet of classical Christian anti-Semitism, even if they do good works for Israel at the same time.

Three essential vitamins are needed to disinfect the field of bad seeds and its poisoned harvest.

One, God’s heart is close to Israel. They are “a people close to His heart” (Psalm 148:14) and God is not an abusive father. To say that “Jesus took personal responsibility for … the slaughter of a million Jews” and only thus would His “divine vengeance and wrath … be finally satisfied” (Covenant, p. 24) reveals what seems to be a toxic understanding of God’s fatherhood. The strident focus on an angry God snuffing His people is so far out of line with the Biblical record that it is sad that any corrective reminders are necessary.

Two, in Ezekiel 37 YHVH restores the Jewish people to the Land of Israel by a work of His gracious Spirit – while they are still not believers (Ezekiel 37:9-14). Only after the Jewish people return to the Land do they come to faith, in the prophet’s vision. To deny that today’s Jewish return to Zion is an act of a gracious God, and to insist that no return is possible until Israel repents and comes to faith – this teaching violates the prophetic word of Ezekiel 37, and it sets up conditions opposed to those in the prophecy. Grace is unmerited favor. God shows unmerited favor to Israel in Ezekiel 37. For some, that grace showered on Israel is unsettling.

Three, the goal or schwerpunkt of the resuscitation of Israel in Ezekiel 37:10 is to transform the entire Jewish people (37:11) into an exceedingly great army. This army will fight Israel’s and God’s enemies as per Psalm 83:1-5, Zechariah 12:1-9, Psalm 110:1-3, Isaiah 41:14-16, Ezekiel 34-39, etc. The Augustinian scenario where the Jews have no prophetic future except to cry “uncle!” melts like a wax statue before the prophetic vision of Ezekiel’s army.

Careful gardening is needed to pull out the weeds and remove the bad seeds. The enemy has taken much time and care in his goal to infect the body of Messiah. We are challenged by the Lord to invest the needed time, care and love as we help fellow believers (even if the cadre who pushes this false teaching is rather small) to “examine everything carefully, to hold fast to that which is good, and to abstain from every form of evil” (1 Thessalonians 5:21).

How should we then pray?

Your prayers and support hold up our arms and are the very practical enablement of God to us in the work He has called us to do.

In Messiah Yeshua,

Avner Boskey

Donations can be sent to:

FINAL FRONTIER MINISTRIES

BOX 121971 NASHVILLE TN 37212-1971 USA

Donations can also be made on-line (by PayPal or credit card) through: www.davidstent.org

Flash floods in the desert

In the Israeli desert there are scrubby bushes that thrust their way up through the desert floor. They tenaciously hang on to life in the sun-beaten wilderness, like the Jewish people have done throughout history. Psalm 126 is birthed out of the heart of the Negev desert. The psalm draws spiritual and prophetic inspiration from the wastelands south of Beersheva. and breathes life into promises which seem shriveled up. Our gaze is lifted to the amazing day when hope will become sight for the Jewish people – indeed, for the whole planet as well (see Romans 11:15).

We’re dancing up to Zion

“A psalm of ascents” (Psalm 126:1a). This declaration was sung three times a year during the pilgrim feasts, as the sons of Israel made their way from every point in the Promised Land up to the Holy City of Jerusalem: “Three times in a year all your males shall appear before YHVH your God in the place which He chooses – at the Feast of Unleavened Bread and at the Feast of Weeks and at the Feast of Booths. And they shall not appear before YHVH empty-handed” (Deuteronomy 16:16).

The national Jewish songbook had a special folder of tunes called ‘the Psalms of Ascent’ (Psalms 120-134). These were chanted with joy and dancing as the Hebrew pilgrims wended their way up to Zion. “You will have songs as in the night when you keep the festival, and gladness of heart as when one marches to the sound of the flute, to go to the mountain of YHVH, to the Rock of Israel” (Isaiah 30:29).

Who would have thunk it?

“When YHVH brought back the captivity of Zion, we were like dreamers” (Psalm 126:1b).  The Jewish exiles in Babylon were dumbfounded when King Cyrus decreed that they could return from the lands of their captivity (see Ezra 1:1-4). They pinched themselves in unbelief, and those who did return to Zion and rebuilt the House of YHVH shouted for joy at this amazing prophesied turn of events.

“Then our mouth was filled with laughter and our tongue with joyful shouting” (verse 2). There was intense national celebration, perhaps similar to the Victory Parades in Moscow (1945), London and New York (1946) after the defeat of Nazi Germany and Japan. The Hebrew word ‘rina’ is used here, describing the full-throated battle cry common in Middle Eastern culture (see 1 Samuel 18:6-7).

“Then they said among the nations, ‘YHVH has done great things for them’” (verse 2). God’s amazingly gracious and redemptive dealings with Israel caused the nations who got word of this to praise the name of YHVH of Israel. Certainly King Cyrus was one of those who made such a declaration (2 Chronicles 35:22-23). This spiritual principle lies at the heart of Psalm 117, where the nations are called to praise YHVH because of His covenant faithfulness to the Jewish people. This is a key to God’s dealings with the nations – for then. for now, and for days yet to come.

“YHVH has done great things for us, and we’ve become joyful” (verse 3). YHVH’s name is a covenant name, and every Jewish person calling on His name remembered the covenants He had made with Israel. “O give thanks to YHVH, for He is good, for His covenant faithfulness is everlasting” (1 Chronicles 16:34). The entire Jewish nation was filled with thanksgiving for the incredible Restoration to Zion that they were witnessing.

Hebrew word plays – ‘captivity’ and ‘return’

All Hebrew words are built on root stems. Sometimes one can find two different words/meanings which have similar roots. This allows for beautiful word plays in the Hebrew Scriptures. Psalm 126:3 uses the word ‘shuv’ – it can have two different meanings, depending on context and form. Here is how it looks in Hebrew: “Restore (SHUVa) our captivity (SH’Vitenu), YHVH!” In 2 Chronicles 30:9 the prophet uses these two ‘shuv’ homonyms a total of four times, intertwining shades of meanings involving captivity, repenting, and returning from exile/captivity.

The psalmist is penning the 126th psalm in the Land of Israel. He has seen firsthand the amazing First Return from Babylon under Ezra and Nehemiah. The event was actually happening as he wrote the psalm. But now in verse 4 he is calling on YHVH the covenant God to complete His redemptive work and fully restore the Jewish people from their world-wide Exile (see Deuteronomy 30:1-7).

“Restore our captivity, YHVH, as the streams in the South” (verse 4). What has been done through Ezra and Nehemiah is amazing – so amazing that we have difficulty believing it on some days, says the psalmist! But now, bring us ALL back home: “Save us, YHVH our God, and gather us from among the nations, to give thanks to Your holy name and to glory in Your praise” (Psalm 106:47).

Gently down the stream

The Hebrew wording unpacks the phrase “streams in the South.” ‘Ka’afiqim baNegev’ is the exact phrase. The Negev is a semi-arid desert area south of Beersheva. For the most part one cannot live there. There are two reasons for this – little rain, and a soil that immediately ‘soaks up’ (that’s the Hebrew meaning of Negev) what little rain there is.

When it rains in the Negev, the silty loess soil (Löß; https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loess) causes the water to skate across its surface and build up into wild channels of rushing water. These ‘afiqim’ (flash floods) cascade down (either to the Dead Sea or to the Mediterranean) as a wall of water moving at great speed (40 miles/60 km. per hour) and sometimes attaining a height of 30 feet/9 meters (see www.timesofisrael.com/desert-highways-flood-as-rains-lash-israel/ for a recent example).

Irrigation through tears

Crops can grow in the northern Negev when there is rain. Ancient farmers knew that the season of sowing would only bring a harvest if sufficient rains came at the right time. The psalmist hands over to us a prophetic vision: when there is no rain, let our intercessory tears for Israel’s restoration be the water that does the trick!

As we put our hand to the plough of Jewish restoration – whether in intercession, in supporting the Messianic remnant, in helping Jewish people to return home, in sharing the precious gospel seed with Jewish people (see Romans 1:16’s Jewish priority!) – as we labor with tears, there is a promise of reaping a real and significant harvest.

“Those who sow in tears shall reap with joyful shouting. He who goes to and fro weeping, carrying his bag of seed, shall indeed come again with a shout of joy, bringing his sheaves with him!” (verses 5-6).

God’s word of promise – that Israel will return to her homeland, will embrace her Messiah, and will bring life from the dead to the nations of this world (our national calling in Isaiah 49:5-6; Romans 11:12, 15) – is rock-solid prophecy based on the unchanging nature of our covenant-keeping God.

How should we then pray?

Your prayers and support hold up our arms and are the very practical enablement of God to us in the work He has called us to do.

In Messiah Yeshua,

Avner Boskey

Donations can be sent to:

FINAL FRONTIER MINISTRIES

BOX 121971 NASHVILLE TN 37212-1971 USA

Donations can also be made on-line (by PayPal or credit card) through: www.davidstent.org

Clarifying the Deal

The U.S. ‘Deal of the Century’ was released in Washington D.C. on  Tuesday January 28, 2020. Here is some bite-sized perspective to help understand what is going on.

“It’s for your own good”

The phrase “it’s for your own good” usually means that you are being forced to do something which is neither enjoyable or desired. The authors of the ‘Deal of the Century’ lay out many solutions which they believe are “for your own good” – for the good of the Israelis and for the good of the Palestinians. But the devil is in the details, as Friedrich Nietzsche would say (“Der Teufel steckt im Detail”). A contract may look fine at first glance, but a thorough reading can unveil problems and hidden agendas. Small issues can ultimately cause a deal to self-destruct.

Why did all Palestinian groups reject the Deal?

The Palestinian leaderships (jihadi Hamas, Islamic Jihad and terrorist PLO/Palestinian Authority) totally reject the Deal for many reasons, including the following:

The Islamist perspective is simple: any territory which has been conquered by the armies of Islam at any point in history cannot revert to non-Islamic rule. To allow a Jewish state and any Jewish control of lands conquered by jihad in 638 A.D. is considered heretical. Palestinian history from the 1920’s has marched to the drumbeat of a constant refusal to accept Jewish existence in Gaza, Jerusalem, the West Bank, the Galilee and the Golan.

Why have some right-of-center Israelis responded somewhat positively to the Deal?

The Israeli right wing accept parts of the Deal:

Israelis understand that the U.S.A. is Israel’s warmest ally and that Trump is by far the most Israel-positive President in U.S. history. For the most part Israelis (including Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu) want to honor Trump and his country – even if there are strong reservations and concerns about some of the Deal’s details.

Why are significant portions of Israel hesitant about the Deal?

A majority of Israelis reject certain parts of the Deal:

Most Orthodox and traditional Jews (over 20% of Israeli Jews) strongly object to the Jordanian Waqf (Muslim religious council) controlling the Temple Mount – meaning that Jews are forbidden from praying on Mount Moriah. Mixed signals from U.S. officials regarding the freedom of Israel to annex areas (first, Ambassador Friedman’s encouragement followed by Jared Kushner’s clear denial) has also raised the issue of trust and believability on the part of many Israelis.

“Did God really say …?”

In the Garden of Eden Satan spoke through a serpent, cynically casting doubt on God’s clear commandment: “Indeed, has God said, ‘You shall not eat from any tree of the garden’?” (Genesis 3:1). A handful of American teachers with a Middle Eastern focus are raising doubts about YHVH’s commitment to His own word and covenant promises. One website recently stated that the attempt to slice portions off from the Jewish homeland and to hand them over to Israel’s sworn and murderous enemies has little significance, and that it has nothing to do with the principle of dividing the land.

The prophets Joel and Zechariah speak of a Last Days’ process of dividing the Jewish homeland (see Joel 3:1-2 and Zechariah 14:1-2). That process peaks with a military invasion of Jerusalem and the return of Messiah Yeshua (Zechariah 14:1-4). Today’s events catalyze that process and move it forward. But YHVH still honors His covenant promise of Genesis 12:3. He still brings judgment on the troublers of Israel (see Joel 3:2). God’s clear prophetic plumbline – the Bible – stands strong in our day:

Learning from history?

Someone once said that what we learn from history is that we learn nothing from history. This proverb is unfortunately true regarding the efforts of the nations to divide the Land of Israel – whether it be into large slices or into bite-sized chunks.

Back in 2005 the world focused briefly on the dividing the Land of Israel (and the withdrawal of Israelis from land promised to them by YHVH), when Prime Minister Ariel Sharon removed over 9,000 Israelis from 25 farms and settlements in Gaza and the West Bank. Here are some articles considering the overwhelmingly negative results of that withdrawal. It makes instructive reading in light of similar events and dynamics today:

“Would that they were wise, that they would discern their future” (Deuteronomy 32:29)

Here are some penetrating comments from the time of the 2005 withdrawal, with thoughtful application to the present:

“Israel's mistakes are not unique for a democracy – French appeasement of Germany in the 1930s or American incrementalism in Vietnam come to mind – but none other jeopardized the very existence of a people” (www.danielpipes.org/2861/the-gaza-withdrawal-a-democracy-killing-itself).

“President George W. Bush on Monday told Ariel Sharon, Israeli prime minister, that he supported Israel's planned July pullout from the Gaza Strip, while telling him not to expand Jewish settlements in the West Bank” (Financial Times, www.ft.com/content/ec584920-aaa8-11d9-98d7-00000e2511c8).

“Dov Weisglass, a close confidante of Sharon and his former chief of staff … stressed that as a result of the Gaza pullout, the US and the world recognized Israel’s right to the settlement blocs … This understanding, he added, was the ‘single biggest diplomatic achievement since 1948.’ Since then, Weisglass said, all the diplomatic gains Sharon made for Israel within the framework of the disengagement have since been lost … As for the Hamas takeover of Gaza after the disengagement, Weisglass said it was ‘the most difficult moment for me. It was totally unexpected’” (www.jpost.com/Arab-Israeli-Conflict/Former-chief-of-staff-Ariel-Sharon-designed-Gaza-disengagement-to-save-West-Bank-settlements-412213).

“PM Ariel Sharon’s decision to fully implement the unilateral withdrawal from Gaza …  created conditions that enabled Hamas and Islamic Jihad to amass large quantities of advanced weaponry. A similar move in the West Bank … would likely put Israel’s heartland, including its main economic and industrial infrastructure and Ben-Gurion Airport, under an unacceptable threat. Those are just some of the factors that must be given serious consideration with regard to any similar move in the West Bank. These potential threats … [cast] serious doubts on the wisdom of ‘experts’ who keep pushing for additional withdrawals in the West Bank … The debate over the interpretation of the clear and present danger emerging in Gaza following the disengagement holds the key to saving Israel from the dangers attending the creation of a Palestinian state in the West Bank” (Maj. Gen. (res.) Gershon Hacohen, Senior Research Fellow, the Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies; https://besacenter.org/perspectives-papers/gaza-disengagement-lessons/).

“Following 10 years since the disengagement from the Gaza Strip, it appears that most of the expectations the Israelis had from the measure were not met … particularly in the security and political spheres . The gap between the aspirations and the results is wide … It appears that most of the security events in the south over the past decade were the result of the disengagement. The withdrawal from the Gaza Strip created a new reality that contributed to the Hamas takeover of the Gaza Strip, a steep rise in weapons smuggling, the strengthening of terrorism, and the ensuing cycle of escalation” (Col. Shmuel Even [Ret.], IDF Intelligence Branch; www.inss.org.il/wp-content/uploads/systemfiles/adkan18_2ENG_3_Even.pdf).

Last of all, a recent comment about Trump’s Deal of the Century: It “has some overwhelming obstacles to implementation in the short term, not least its calls for the demilitarization of the Gaza Strip.  Hamas has no intention of de-militarizing and the PA has no power in the strip to force it to. The deal also calls for the PA to stop incitement and paying salaries to Palestinian prisoners convicted of terror attacks – something it has repeatedly refused to do so despite strong international pressure, including funding cuts. (Colin Rubenstein, https://aijac.org.au/op-ed/the-opportunity-of-trumps-deal-of-the-century/).

Dividing the land – a present and future reality

US Navy Admiral Hyman G. Rickover once said that “the devil is in the details, but so is salvation.”

As the nations stumble and attempt to lift the heavy stone of Jerusalem (Zechariah 12:3), most might not be aware that they are touching the apple of God’s eye (Zechariah 2:8). They may be motivated by wanting to solve an intractable problem, by wanting to gain fame for achieving the unattainable, by insuring a smooth supply of oil in a dangerous part of the world, etc.

Whatever the case, God’s plumbline for the world is the word of God, and His foreign policy for the nations is linked to their treatment of Israel, their heart-attitudes to the Jewish people.

Here are some thoughts about how God will even use blind world leaders to establish His plans and to close ‘His Deal’:

How should we then pray?

Your prayers and support hold up our arms and are the very practical enablement of God to us in the work He has called us to do.

In Messiah Yeshua,

Avner Boskey

Donations can be sent to:

FINAL FRONTIER MINISTRIES

BOX 121971 NASHVILLE TN 37212-1971 USA

Donations can also be made on-line (by PayPal or credit card) through: www.davidstent.org

The deal of the century

“Like any dealer he was watching for the card that is so high and wild, he'll never need to deal another” (Leonard Cohen, Stranger Song, © 1967 Sony/ATV Music Publishing).

In 1987 Donald Trump’s book “The Art of the Deal”  was number 1 on The New York Times Best Seller list for 13 weeks. Some quotes:

The ultimate deal

Of all the deals that Donald Trump has made in his life, the prospect of establishing peace between Israel and the Arab-Islamic world would certainly rank way up there as ‘a big deal.’ In November 2016 Trump noted: “That’s the ultimate deal . . . As a deal maker, I’d like to do … the deal that can’t be made” (www.jpost.com/Israel-News/Trump-Israeli-Palestinian-peace-would-be-ultimate-deal-472404).

November 2017 saw the initial development of the deal (www.timesofisrael.com/no-trump-doesnt-call-mideast-plan-deal-of-the-century/). Senior advisor to the President Jared Kushner, chief negotiator Jason Greenblatt, deputy national security adviser Dina Powell, and Ambassador to Israel David Friedman worked on it. The first economic part of the plan “Peace to Prosperity” was released 22 June 2019 in Manama, Bahrain. The political part of the plan is to be released on Tuesday January 28, 2020 in Washington.

The economic plan (likened to the Marshall Plan to rebuild Western European economies after World War II) proposes a $50 billion investment fund for 179 infrastructure and business projects, to be funded mostly by Arab states and wealthy private investors. Most of the money would be for the West Bank and Gaza, as well as $9 billion going to Egypt, $7 billion to Jordan, and $6.3 billion to Lebanon. The proposal (www.whitehouse.gov/peacetoprosperity/) includes:

Palestinian leaders boycotted and immediately condemned the conference.  Former Israeli Ambassador to the U.S. Michael Oren explains, “The word yes does not exist in the Palestinian vocabulary. They never said yes, not to the United Nations, not to the Brits and not to anyone else … Anyone who conditions the process on a Palestinian agreement condemns it to failure … The outline should be directed at the majority of the Israeli public and the majority of the Sunni Arab world” (www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/275144).

One month after Bahrain, in December 2017, Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas cut ties with the Trump administration after the U.S. recognized Jerusalem as the capital of Israel. In May 2018 the U.S. moved its embassy to Jerusalem. It also cut hundreds of millions of dollars in annual aid to the Palestinian Authority citing the PA's refusal to take part in the administration's peace initiative.

The birth of the political deal

On January 23, 2020 Vice-President Mike Pence invited PM Netanyahu and contender Benny Gantz to Washington for the presentation of the ‘deal of the century’ (www.whitehouse.gov/briefings-statements/statement-press-secretary-regarding-visit-prime-minister-benjamin-netanyahu-israel/) on Tuesday January 28.

Though the official presentation of the plan is under wraps, major aspects of the plan have been wrapped only in cellophane, and they have been leaked to the media over the past few months (www.swp-berlin.org/10.18449/2019C20/; www.inss.org.il/publication/path-trump-peace-plan-applying-israeli-law-settlements/). Here are those fuzzy-but-soon-to-be-clarified details:

Three political concerns

Daniel Pipes, noted authority on Islam and the Middle East, raises three concerns about this plan (www.algemeiner.com/2019/04/11/anticipating-trumps-deal-of-the-century/):

Palestinian Islamists are not that ‘into’ peace

Saeb Erekat, the secretary general of the Palestine Liberation Organization, said in a January 22 2020 tweet that Trump’s proposal is “the fraud of the century.” Arafat’s Fatah recently accused Hamas chief Ismail Haniyeh of siding with Trump and Netanyahu, of being a promotor for the “deal of the century” (https://aawsat.com/english/home/article/2059836/fatah-says-haniyeh%E2%80%99s-tour-aimed-promoting-%E2%80%98deal-century%E2%80%99)

The main Arab power blocks in the West Bank and Gaza see the weakening and destruction of the Jewish state as a long term realistic goal. Whether the worldview is jihadi (Gaza’s Hamas and Islamic Jihad) or Fatah/PLO in the West Bank, all Palestinian sides officially declare their deep hostility to any and all U.S. proposals. If Hamas, Islamic Jihad and Fatah/PLO do not accept the plan, then one cannot speak about two sides to this deal. Europe and Russia are opposed to American influence and strategies here as well.

In June 2019 Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said that he “was not in any way confident that the process would lead to a successful conclusion” (www.jpost.com/Middle-East/Pompeo-opens-up-about-Trump-peace-plan-in-closed-door-meeting-591415). In light of this statement, it might be helpful to remember two other quotes from “The Art of the Deal:”

Change you can’t believe in

The upcoming U.S. elections reveal deep cracks in the American body politic. In days past President Obama made and implemented his policies unilaterally – “with a pen and a phone.” President Trump has moved the U.S. Embassy to Jerusalem with the same pen and phone.  Former U.S. Ambassador to Israel Dan Shapiro recently stated:

President Obama’s deputy spokesman Mark Toner, said much the same in his Daily Press Briefing, Washington, DC  November 10, 2016: “Since Israel’s founding, the administrations of both parties have maintained a consistent policy here and that is recognizing no state as having sovereignty over Jerusalem. And we remain committed to this long-standing policy – we, the Obama Administration” (https://2009-2017.state.gov/r/pa/prs/dpb/2016/11/264237.htm).

Dividing Jerusalem from God’s perspective

One of the clearest passages dealing with the return of Messiah Yeshua describes how He will judge all nations based on their actions regarding the Jewish integrity of Jerusalem:

“For behold, in those days and at that time, when I restore the fortunes of Judah and Jerusalem – I will gather all the nations and bring them down to the valley of Jehoshaphat. Then I will enter into judgment with them there on behalf of My people and My inheritance, Israel, whom they have scattered among the nations, and they have divided up My land” (Joel 3:1-2)

President Trump has done more for the security and the protection of the Jewish people than any other U.S. President bar none. But it is important to remember that the Bible trumps the perspectives of even the best U.S. President. Daniel Pipes wryly notes, “So far, Trump has been ‘the most pro-Israel president ever,’ but as the Bible reminds us, ‘put not your trust in princes’” (Psalm 118:9).

How should we then pray?

Your prayers and support hold up our arms and are the very practical enablement of God to us in the work He has called us to do.

In Messiah Yeshua,

Avner Boskey

Donations can be sent to:

FINAL FRONTIER MINISTRIES

BOX 121971 NASHVILLE TN 37212-1971 USA

Donations can also be made on-line (by PayPal or credit card) through: www.davidstent.org

Dress rehearsal in Jerusalem

At least 47 world leaders are flying into Israel and ascending to Jerusalem. They’re coming to attend International Holocaust Day, the commemoration of the 75th anniversary of the Red Army liberation of the Nazi death camp Auschwitz/Oświęcim on January 27, 1945.

“47 delegations of kings, presidents, and other world leaders” are showing up in the Holy City, proclaims the Times of Israel (www.timesofisrael.com/with-10000-officers-police-gear-up-to-protect-massive-holocaust-commemoration/). The Jerusalem Post puts it this way: “Kings, queens, princes, presidents and prime ministers will all be converging on Jerusalem – as in the fulfillment of some biblical prophecy” (www.jpost.com/Israel-News/Standing-at-the-intersection-of-inconvenience-and-history-Comment-614865).

Jerusalem is the “city of the great King” (Psalm 48:2). YHVH “loveth the gates of Zion more than all the dwellings of Jacob” (Psalm 87:2). One of YHVH’s names is “YHVH who has chosen Jerusalem” (Zechariah 3:2). The city has huge spiritual and geo-political significance. Is there any significance in this solemn gathering of world rulers?

Anti-semitism – never again?

The goals of this gathering, the 5th World Holocaust Forum, are multi-faceted – jogging the memory of a forgetful world; seeding educational efforts which would inoculate societies against resurgent anti-Jewish genocide; consolidating a concerted international effort to block the Islamic Republic of Iran’s acquisition of murderous atomic weapons.

G.W.F. Hegel once said, “We learn from history that we do not learn from history.” An awareness of the Jewish Holocaust did not prevent genocide-like atrocities since then, whether in Cambodia, Rwanda or Syria/Iraq.  Education is not a panacea or a magic bullet which will sap the demonic strength of Jew-hatred. There is a spiritual root here, as Yeshua’s half-brother James tells us: “What is the source of quarrels and conflicts among you? Is not the source your pleasures that wage war in your members? You lust and do not have; so you commit murder. You are envious and cannot obtain; so you fight and quarrel” (James 4:1-2).

The Scriptures teach us that the source of anti-Semitism is satanic: “The devil has come down to you, having great wrath, knowing that he has only a short time. And when the dragon saw that he was thrown down to the earth, he persecuted the woman who gave birth to the male child” (Revelation 12:13-14). The Jewish people have given birth to Messiah Yeshua, and are God’s key to world revival. Nazi, Communist and Islamist attempts to annihilate the Jews all share a similar spiritual root.

The director of Palestinian Media Watch Itamar Marcus states that unless the religious roots of anti-Semitism are confronted head-on, “a mere ceremony giving homage to the past while ignoring the present … (ed. will have) no impact on the future” (www.jpost.com/Opinion/Palestinian-Authority-fights-Jews-to-defend-all-humanity-614876).

Quiet on the set!

The Hebrew prophets describe a sober day when all the leaders of the world will gather around Jerusalem, but not for pro-Jewish reasons:

Whereas this week’s gathering of world leaders is benign, it is nothing like the concerted international military attack in days to come. The end result of that invasion of Israel will be the return of Messiah Yeshua.

Gathering of world leaders for judgment

When Messiah returns, He will call the leaders of all nations to a conference in Jerusalem. All nations will have turned against the Jewish people, according to Zechariah. All nations will then be judged by Messiah Yeshua:

World leaders in the days of Moshiach (Messiah)

The days are coming when anti-Semitism will be banished from this world. Those will be the days when Messiah Yeshua sits on David’s throne in Jerusalem. Then all nations will ascend to David’s City with a transformed heart:

All nations will honor, worship and obey the God of Israel. They will honor and prioritize the people of Israel as well:

The 47th Psalm speaks of a future gathering quite different in nature than the present one which approximately 47 world leaders are attending.

The day of small things

We in Israel are thankful for the international focus on the Jewish people, on the international official rejection of anti-Semitism, and for our ‘fifteen minutes of fame’ (to paraphrase Andy Warhol). But let’s keep on track with what is yet to happen, realizing that anti-Semitism is far from dead, the nations are far from cured, and Israel still has some distance yet to go, and some battles yet to fight.

How should we then pray?

Your prayers and support hold up our arms and are the very practical enablement of God to us in the work He has called us to do.

In Messiah Yeshua,

Avner Boskey

Donations can be sent to:

FINAL FRONTIER MINISTRIES

BOX 121971 NASHVILLE TN 37212-1971 USA

Donations can also be made on-line (by PayPal or credit card) through: www.davidstent.org

Iran and the Prince of Persia

The Islamic Republic of Iran (Jomhuri-ye Eslāmi-ye Irān) is top headline news. Modern Iran is known in the Bible as ancient Persia. The peoples of ancient Iran included the tribes of Persia, Elam and Media (see Acts 2:9). Today a jihadi Shi’ite Islamic dictatorship rules Iran’s 82 million people. Iran is the second largest country in the Middle East and the world’s 18th most populous country. Let’s look at what the Bible has to say about Iran and its peoples.

The background of Iran’s three major peoples

The Bible describes Darius, Cyrus and Ahasuerus as all being kings of Persia (see Isaiah 21:20; Esther 1:14), though they were not all from the same tribal background.  Ectabana was the capital of the Medes (Ezra 6:2), and King Darius (the friend of Daniel the prophet) was Median (Daniel 9:1). Susa or Shushan was the capital of the Elamites (Nehemiah 1:1; Ezra 4:9; Esther 1:2, 5) where many of the events of the Book of Esther took place. Persepolis (or Pārsa near Shiraz) was the capital of Persia, Cyrus II the Great being Persia’s most famous king. The modern territory of Iran encompasses these capitals.

Abraham fought ancient Iranians

Noah’s son Shem sired eight boys: “The sons of Shem were Elam, Asshur, Arpachshad, Lud, Aram, Uz, Hul, Gether and Meshech” (1 Chronicles 1:17; Genesis 10:22; 14:1, 9). Elam (one of the founding tribes of the Iranian people) had Semitic origin – he was descended from Shem. Elam was not descended from Abraham or Ishmael, and the Iranians are not Arabs. Abraham is actually descended from Shem’s third son Arpachshad (Genesis 11:10-26) and the chosen line of promise comes through Israel and not through Iran. Abraham battled the ancient Elamites when he freed Lot from a kidnapping raid (Genesis 14:1-17). That was the first biblical encounter between ancient Persia and Abraham.

A prophetic dream about Iran

King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon turned to Daniel the Hebrew prophet to get divine revelation about a troubling dream he had (Daniel 2:32, 35, 39). Part of his dream involved a statue whose breasts and arms were solid silver. This silver breast symbolized a kingdom of silver (Persia, rising to the fore just after Babylon) which would nevertheless be inferior to Babylon and its glory (the statue’s golden head). Later down the prophetic road Persia’s superpower status would give way to a third kingdom, Greece (Daniel 11:2 – the bronze belly and thighs). Alexander the Great and his future Greek kingdom would “rule over all the earth” (Daniel 2:39; 8:20), and Greek triumphs would overshadow Persian accomplishments.

Cyrus the Persian Liberator

The Bible tells us that Persian King Cyrus II the Great proclaimed a ‘jubilee’ in 538 B.C. – the freeing of the Jewish people from the prison of Babylonian exile. Historically speaking Cyrus became for the Jewish people what Simón Bolívar was to be for the Hispanic countries of Venezuela, Bolivia, Columbia, Ecuador, Peru and Panama – El Libertador (the Liberator):

God raised up Persia’s Cyrus and gave him divine strategies, opening the gates for the Jewish people to return to their promised homeland of Israel. This historic honor was reflected in how President Harry Truman saw his own recognition of the State of Israel as Cyrus-like in nature (www.commentarymagazine.com/articles/i-am-cyrus/).

Cyrus the Persian stumbling block

Later in Cyrus’ reign Samaritans and Arabs sent fake news to the Persian court, trying to block the rebuilding of the Jewish Temple. They had a measure of success, for Cyrus believed their bad report: “Then the people of the land discouraged the people of Judah, and frightened them from building, and hired counselors against them to frustrate their counsel all the days of Cyrus king of Persia, even until the reign of Darius king of Persia” (Ezra 4:4-24). Though the Persians were at first liberators, they later became obstacles to the redemption of Zion, according to the biblical record.

Mass murder on the Persian watch

The Book of Esther lets us in on the inner workings of the Persian court.  The Persian Empire (under Haman’s influence) nearly carried out a total genocide of the entire world Jewish population (see Esther 3:6-15; 4:7). YHVH’s strategic pre-positioning of Mordecai and Esther (as well as a sleepless night for King Ahasuerus) brought deliverance for Israel from the mouth of the Persian lion. Persia would eventually become a blessing to the Jewish people, and the defeat of anti-Semitic Persian forces in due course became an official biblical holiday – the Feast of Purim  (Esther 9:23-28).

The prince of Persia

The angel Gabriel reveals that world superpowers are influenced and often controlled by demonic principalities. Paul backs up this assertion in Ephesians 6:12: “For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the powers, against the world forces of this darkness, against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places.”

The angel Gabriel told Daniel, “But the prince of the kingdom of Persia was withstanding me for twenty-one days. Then behold, Michael, one of the chief princes, came to help me, for I had been left there with the kings of Persia … Then he (ed. Gabriel) said, ‘Do you understand why I came to you? But I shall now return to fight against the prince of Persia; so I am going forth, and behold, the prince of Greece is about to come’” (Daniel 10:13, 20).

The recent American  MQ-9 Reaper drone strike against Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (Quds Force) chief Qassem Soleimani is significant in light of this spiritual context. According to Israeli journalist Ehud Yaari, the  taking down of this Persia-based mass murderer “is the most important assassination from the Jewish point of view since the assassination of Reinhard Heydrich, the architect of the Final Solution, in Prague in 1942 … This man was the brains and the engine of the Iranian machine that is trying to wrap the Middle East in the arms of an octopus … He was the head of the octopus in this regard”

(www.algemeiner.com/2020/01/05/veteran-israeli-analyst-says-assassination-of-soleimani-second-only-to-execution-of-holocaust-architect-reinhard-heydrich/).

Patience is a Persian virtue

The recent limited military hostilities between Iran and the U.S.A. are not the last act in this drama. Iran’s intelligence services are known for displaying “tremendous sophistication and guile” (The Secret War with Iran, Ronen Bergman, p. 355). They are “effective and determined adversaries” (ibid. p. 381) Back in March 2005 the CIA, Mossad and Canadian CSIS tracked Lebanese Hezbollah as they developed networks in Montreal (with Iranian support – code-named Operation Double-Edged Sword; ibid. p. 211). This was part of Tehran’s worldwide insurance policy in the event of a frontal war against America – in this specific instance, the execution of terrorist attacks across North America. Israeli journalist and Iran specialist Bergman defines the confrontation here – “a titanic struggle between… an aggressive ideology-driven Islamic revolutionary regime … and… a complacent, satisfied society that thought it had put its existential fears behind it” (ibid. p. 380).

How should we then pray?

Your prayers and support hold up our arms and are the very practical enablement of God to us in the work He has called us to do.

In Messiah Yeshua,

Avner Boskey

Donations can be sent to:

FINAL FRONTIER MINISTRIES

BOX 121971 NASHVILLE TN 37212-1971 USA

Donations can also be made on-line (by PayPal or credit card) through: www.davidstent.org

The Messianic movement – the last 50 years

The Book of Judges describes Jewish history at that time as repeating cycles of forty years (Judges 3:11; 5:31; 8:28; 13:1). This newsletter considers some of the major seasons in the Messianic Jewish movement over the past 50 years. There is room for praise to God here, as well as opportunity for thoughtful consideration. What are the fast-moving challenges confronting both the Messianic Jewish movement and the larger Jewish world community?

From Hebrew-Christian to Messianic Jewish

During the first part of the 20th century Jewish believers in Jesus basically had only one place to go for fellowship – the denominational and non-Jewish churches. For Jewish believers these churches ended up being agents of ethnic and cultural assimilation. Within the span of one generation many children of Jewish believers no longer saw themselves as Jews and no longer participated in the wider Jewish community.

The healthy desire for Jewish believers to meet with other Jews presented a unique challenge. And churches were not necessarily a safe place for Jews and Jewish identity. The wraith of anti-Semitism lurked just below the surface among many Gentile Christians. The terms ‘Jew’ and ‘Jewish’ were suspect. ‘Judaizing’ was used as a curse used to describe any continuing link between Jewish people and their culture, lifestyle and traditions. The stopgap solution was the establishment of small fellowship groups with a Jewish emphasis. Jewish believers in Jesus didn’t call their meetings ‘Jewish.’ The safer term of self-definition was ‘Hebrew Christian.’ The concept of a Jewish congregation scared many Hebrew Christians. It met with strong disapproval from most Gentile Christians as well.

Were these Hebrew-Christian fellowships simply the last whistle stop on the train to assimilation? How would a visible and healthy Jewish community of faith come into existence, and how would that torch be passed to the next generation?

Two earthquakes shaped the answer to these questions. The first was the Holocaust, where murderous anti-Semitism had a Christian-looking face and where the world turned a cold shoulder to Jewish survival. The birth of the State of Israel out of the ashes of Auschwitz put the Jewish nation back on the stage of international history. Jews now had a national focus and their own homeland. This renaissance triggered awareness of the Bible’s prophetic promises about Israel’s restoration.

The second earthquake was the Six Day War in June 1967. Israel defeated five Arab enemy armies and restored Jewish control to the mountains of Israel and the united city of Jerusalem.  The Jewish ‘David’ had defeated the Arab ‘Goliath.’ The shock waves of Jewish survival and victory injected a new dignity and joy to Jews worldwide, including to Jewish believers in Jesus.

Within seven years of 1967 a new wave of Jewish leadership took the helm of the Hebrew-Christian movement. The new name ‘Messianic Jewish’ replaced the older terminology. A bolder use of Jewish cultural expression quickly found its feet. Most of these new leaders were Charismatic in theology and practice, and had come out of the hippie movement and the Jesus revolution. They had a vision for revival and for fulfilling the great Commission in their generation. Bold evangelistic outreach and street witness was also part of this new Jewish movement. Messianic music (a blend of folk-rock, klezmer and cantorial) exploded across the airwaves. And some Messianic leaders began to build Messianic Jewish congregations.

A developing middle-class movement

The original Hebrew-Christian fellowships were plucky little groups. Many of the participants had been broken on the wheels of life in their journey to Yeshua. “For consider your calling, brethren, that there were not many wise according to the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble. But God has chosen the foolish things of the world to shame the wise, and God has chosen the weak things of the world to shame the things which are strong” (1 Corinthians 1:26-27). But now, the new leaders of the fledgling Messianic movement wanted their congregations to be more ‘normal,’ more middle of the road. They wanted the social composition of their members to mirror the larger Jewish community – more upwardly mobile professionals, more emotional stability, more Jewish families, etc.

As the movement grew, congregational buildings were purchased and educational frameworks were established. And the revolutionary hippie roots of some Messianic Jewish leaders gradually transformed. New benchmarks for success were set. Rather than Neil Young’s cry in his hit ‘Ohio’ (“We can change the world, re-arrange the world” - released in June 1970 after the Kent State shootings), the zeal of the radical was giving way to the complacency of the bourgeoisie.

And the same social dynamics which saw dropping attendance and observance in Reform and Conservative Judaisms began to affect the Messianic movement. Within twenty years the majority of attendees at Messianic congregations had become non-Jews. The Messianic Jewish movement was moving from a radical adolescence to a contented adulthood. The radical vision of its founders was being assimilated into the American melting pot. The Messianic Jewish movement could no longer be accurately called ‘a Jewish people-movement.’

Zionist or pro-Zionist?

An Israeli acquaintance once described for me the difference between Zionists and pro-Zionists. Zionists move to Israel, he said, while pro-Zionists send money. The Messianic Jewish movement (like most Western Jews) has tended to lean toward pro-Zionism. It is easier to be pro-Israel that to move to Israel. Life in Israel is challenging on many levels. Sometimes there are even legal difficulties inhibiting Messianic Jews from immigrating to the Jewish state.

The grandchildren of Orthodox Judaism

The famous Pentecostal spokesman David du Plessis used to say, “God has no grandchildren.” By this he meant that religious belief and life are not automatically passed on to the next generation. A personal and life-changing encounter with the God of Israel is foundational to the process.

Most of the grandparents of the new Messianic leaders been Orthodox Jews. These grandparents had become non-observant or less traditional after leaving the ghettos of Europe. The new Messianic leaders for the most part had little first-hand knowledge of their grandparents’ religion. Ironically, secular Jews (who also knew little of Orthodox Judaism) often accuse Messianic Jews, faulting them for believing in Yeshua: “If you had only known real Judaism (ed. meaning Orthodox Judaism), you would never have embraced Yeshua!”

This rejection has struck deep into the hearts of Messianic Jewish leaders. Some said, “Perhaps if we learn more about Orthodox Judaism – even become more Orthodox in our lifestyle and faith expression – then we will be accepted by the larger Jewish community.” So the fruit of rejection incrementally began to permeate the Messianic Jewish community. Some leaders began to study Orthodoxy and to move their congregations into a warmer embrace of rabbinic liturgy.

These dynamics helped birth two theological emphases. The first now taught that Messianic Jews are under the Mosaic Torah, and that Jewish identity is primarily manifested in rabbinic and Orthodox ways. This viewpoint is held by significant minorities within the Messianic Jewish movement. The second viewpoint denigrates the deity of Messiah Yeshua. This second view is trumpeted by a very miniscule stream on the outskirts of the Messianic Jewish movement.

Responding to the tidal wave of anti-Semitism

German Jews and French Jews at the turn of the 20th century believed that the future of their Jewish communities was bright. There were up to 100,000 Hebrew-Christians walking the streets of Europe in those days. But the demonic genie of anti-Semitism had escaped from Pandora’s Box, and the writing was on the wall. From the pogroms of Eastern Europe to the Dreyfus riots in Paris, the marching of leather jackboots was echoing from Munich to Moscow. Most Jews hoped and prayed that this dark night would soon pass, but most could barely imagine the malevolence of the Holocaust spirit climbing up out of the abyss.

Where is it safest for the Jewish people?

If the Israel Defense Forces had been around in the days of Hitler, it is possible that the Nazi High Command would have had to face the cold steel of Israel Air Force bombs. But the State of Israel came into being only after the close of WWII. Jews were not safe in most countries of the world in those days. Today anti-Semitism is becoming a global epidemic. Headlines are crowded with news about the rise of physical attacks on Jews in the Diaspora from both white supremacists and black racists. Jihadi forces are targeting the Jewish state and Jews everywhere. Safety for the Jewish people is at a premium in many nations today.

When the going gets tough

A football coach for the Corpus Christi Green Hornets was the first (1953) to say, “When the going gets tough, the tough get going.” This pro-active approach to threats and challenges is encouraging for us as well. The rising triple threats of a reborn jihadi spirit, a reborn Nazi spirit and a resurgent leftist hatred of the Jews and their state – all must be confronted with pro-activity. God is certainly not at a loss for words nor at a loss for divine strategies in dealing with these hellish schemes. We who follow the Lord of Armies need to listen up and shape up for the challenges.

Ezekiel’s army

God’s End of Days strategy brings the Jewish nation back to their Promised Land. It is the Holy Spirit drawing the children of Jacob back, yet the majority of Israel’s Jews are not yet filled with the Holy Spirit (Ezekiel 37). The day is soon coming when God’s Spirit will fill the Jewish people in Israel with spiritual life. He will cause them to rise up and stand on their feet. The prophet describes them turning into an “exceedingly great army” (Ezekiel 37:10).

How should we then pray?

Your prayers and support hold up our arms and are the very practical enablement of God to us in the work He has called us to do.

In Messiah Yeshua,

Avner Boskey

Donations can be sent to:

FINAL FRONTIER MINISTRIES

BOX 121971 NASHVILLE TN 37212-1971 USA

Donations can also be made on-line (by PayPal or credit card) through: www.davidstent.org

When glory shatters the night

Hanukkah is the Festival of Lights. Nine burning candles remind us of the amazing victory of the Maccabees, high priestly heroes of the faith and Special Operations Forces of Israel over 2,000 years ago (see https://davidstent.org/maccabees-wanna-bes-and-fake-news-the-real-story-of-hanukkah/).

Many of us think of Hanukkah as a kind of Jewish Christmas, with lights, scrumptious food and plenty of gifts. The biblical source of the holiday is mostly unknown to Christians and also to most Jews. Here is the inside story on this holiday.

Crushed between two kings

Alexander the Great died of typhus fever (or of poisoning) at age 32 in Babylon on June 10-11, 323 B.C. His demise took place in palace of Nebuchadnezzar II – the king who had destroyed Solomon’s Temple and initiated the Exile of Judea (587-6 B.C.). A conference was immediately held in Babylon (the Partition of Babylon – https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Partition_of_Babylon) to determine how Alexander’s great empire would be divided. Mutinies, assassinations and finally many years of ‘succession wars’ occurred – the wars of the generals (Διάδοχοι or ‘successors’ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diadochi; 322-301 B.C.). The four main power blocks ended up being Ptolemaic Egypt, Seleucid Mesopotamia and Central Asia, Attalid Anatolia, and Antigonid Macedon. All four kingdoms were finally subdued by Rome. Seleucid Syria was conquered in 64 B.C. and Ptolemaic Egypt was annexed in 30 B.C.

The Hanukkah wars of liberation occurred between 167 and 160 B.C. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maccabean_Revolt; www.oxfordbibliographies.com/view/document/obo-9780195393361/obo-9780195393361-0031.xml). The Greek Seleucid King Antiochus IV of Syria was beginning to lose hold of his empire. Rome’s eagle shadow was looming over the Mediterranean, and Antiochus was forced to retreat with his tail between his legs from Egypt and head back toward Syria (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gaius_Popillius_Laenas; https://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Roman/Texts/Polybius/29*.html; also Livy, The History of Rome, book 45, chapter 12: www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.02.0168%3Abook%3D45%3Achapter%3D12).

The Book of Daniel prophesies these events:

“At the appointed time he (ed., Antiochus IV, the Seleucid King of the North) will return and come into the South, but this last time it will not turn out the way it did before. For ships of Kittim (ed. Romans ships from Cyprus; https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kittim) will come against him. Therefore he will be disheartened and will return and become enraged at the holy covenant and take action. So he will come back and show regard for those who forsake the holy covenant” (Daniel 11:7, 29-30).

The nation of Israel was nearly unanimously following the Scriptures in those days. As well, amazing devotional literature was written down during that season, including the Wisdom of Yeshua ben Sirach (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sirach). However, there was a group which had embraced the worldview of Alexander the Great. They felt that the Bible was a primitive book and that the Jewish gifts and calling were inferior to the ‘glory that was Greece.’ They attempted to establish centers of Greek culture in the heart of Jerusalem, to abolish circumcision and to get Jerusalem recognized by Greece as a Greek city or ‘polis,’ fully dedicated to a Greek deity.

“In those days lawless men came forth from Israel, and misled many, saying, ‘Let us go and make a covenant with the Gentiles round about us, for since we separated from them many evils have come upon us.’ This proposal pleased them, and some of the people eagerly went to the king. He authorized them to observe the ordinances of the Gentiles. So they built a gymnasium in Jerusalem, according to Gentile custom, and removed the marks of circumcision, and abandoned the holy covenant. They joined with the Gentiles and sold themselves to do evil” (1 Maccabees 1:11-15; https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=1+Maccabees+1&version=RSV)

There is no greater fury than a king scorned

Antiochus IV, having been humiliated by Rome, decided to vent his anger on the Jews of Judea who were not willing to abandon obedience to YHVH and His word. His desecration of the Temple and systematic destruction of Jewish faith and practice is described below from four sources – the prophet Daniel, the historian Josephus, the Book of Hebrews and 1 Maccabees :

  1. “Forces from him will arise, desecrate the sanctuary fortress, and do away with the regular sacrifice. And they will set up the abomination of desolation (shiqutz hameshomem). By smooth words he will turn to godlessness those who act wickedly toward the covenant” (Daniel 11:31-32a)
  1. “Now it came to pass, after two years … that the king came up to Jerusalem, and, pretending peace, he got possession of the city by treachery. At which time he spared not so much as those that admitted him into it, on account of the riches that lay in the Temple. But, led by his covetous inclination, (for he saw there was in it a great deal of gold, and many ornaments that had been dedicated to it of very great value) and in order to plunder its wealth, he ventured to break the league he had made. So he left the Temple bare, and took away the golden candlesticks, and the golden altar [of incense], and table [of shew-bread], and the altar [of burnt-offering]; and did not abstain from even the veils, which were made of fine linen and scarlet. He also emptied it of its secret treasures, and left nothing at all remaining. And by this means cast the Jews into great lamentation, for he forbade them to offer those daily sacrifices which they used to offer to God, according to the law.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                       And when he had pillaged the whole city, some of the inhabitants he slew, and some he carried captive, together with their wives and children, so that the multitude of those captives that were taken alive amounted to about ten thousand. He also burnt down the finest buildings; and when he had overthrown the city walls, he built a citadel in the lower part of the city … And when the king had built an idol altar upon God's altar, he slew swine upon it, and so offered a sacrifice neither according to the law, nor the Jewish religious worship in that country. He also compelled them to forsake the worship which they paid their own God, and to adore those whom he took to be gods. And he made them build temples, and raise idol altars in every city and village, and offer swine upon them every day. He also commanded them not to circumcise their sons, and threatened to punish any that should be found to have transgressed his injunction. He also appointed overseers, who should compel them to do what he commanded. And indeed many Jews there were who complied with the king's commands, either voluntarily, or out of fear of the penalty that was denounced.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                              But the best men, and those of the noblest souls, did not regard him, but did pay a greater respect to the customs of their country than concern as to the punishment which he threatened to the disobedient; on which account they every day underwent great miseries and bitter torments. For they were whipped with rods, and their bodies were torn to pieces, and were crucified, while they were still alive, and breathed. They also strangled those women and their sons whom they had circumcised, as the king had appointed, hanging their sons about their necks as they were upon the crosses. And if there were any sacred book of the law found, it was destroyed, and those with whom they were found miserably perished also” (Josephus, https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/The_Antiquities_of_the_Jews/Book_XII, chapter 5, paragraph 4)
  1. And what more shall I say? For time will fail me if I tell of … [those who] escaped the edge of the sword, from weakness were made strong, became mighty in war, put foreign armies to flight. Women received back their dead by resurrection; and others were tortured, not accepting their release, so that they might obtain a better resurrection; and others experienced mockings and scourgings, yes, also chains and imprisonment. They were stoned, they were sawn in two, they were tempted, they were put to death with the sword; they went about in sheepskins, in goatskins, being destitute, afflicted, ill-treated (men of whom the world was not worthy), wandering in deserts and mountains and caves and holes in the ground (Hebrews 11:32-28, with quotes from 2 Macabbees 6:21-30; 7:7-36; see also biblegateway.com/passage/?search=2+Maccabees+5&version=RSV)
  1. But many in Israel stood firm and were resolved in their hearts not to eat unclean food. They chose to die rather than to be defiled by food or to profane the holy covenant; and they did die. And very great wrath came upon Israel (1 Maccabees 1:62-64)

Judah the Macabbee’s army – a precursor of Ezekiel 37

Antiochus’s religious rampage was parried and blocked by a national revolt led by the High Priestly family of Mattisyahu or Mattathias. This descendant of Aaron fled from Jerusalem due to the Greek persecutions, settling in Modi’in near the present Ben-Gurion Airport.

The story of their guerilla warfare campaign against the far superior forces of Greek Seleucia is amazing. 1 Maccabees 3-16 brings us the entire story of these operations. The prophet Daniel sums up that period:

The Scriptures commend the Jewish military fighting force. Their exploits are lovingly prophesied and recounted in both the Hebrew Scriptures and the New Covenant. They are a model of faith, courage and military valor. They are a prophetic precursor of God’s End of Days Jewish army described in Ezekiel 37:9-11, Isaiah 4:13-16, Psalm 110:1-3, Zechariah 12:1-9, etc.

The rising mist of anti-Semitism

A reborn Nazi-like spirit is currently overshadowing the nations. Anti-Jewish attacks are blooming across Europe and North America like dandelions after a spring rain. Middle Eastern jihadi forces call for and implement strategies to destroy the Jewish people and their state. No one is exempt from these influences – no country, no political party and no religious stream. As it was in the days of Noah (Matthew 24:37) and Hitler, so it is again manifesting in our day. These sober realities are very much a part of today’s Christmas context, just as King Herod’s slaughter of the innocents in Bethlehem was part of the original Christmas story 2,000 years ago (Matthew 2:1-18).

In Nehemiah’s day the defenders of Jerusalem labored with a trowel in one hand and a sword in the other:

In the same way, our celebration of Messiah’s birth should not cause our grip to slacken as we grasp the spiritual weapons God has given us in defense of YHVH’s chosen people.

Ardent intercession for the Jewish people – their protection (Psalm 122:6), their salvation (Romans 10:1; 1:16) and their entering into their amazing world-transforming calling (Romans 11:12, 15) – is very much a high priority during this season.

Though the mists of darkness rise and divisiveness increases, let’s remember the God of Israel’s promise to the sons and daughters of Jacob. It is precisely when things get darkest in the world that God’s light will shine brighter than the Star of Bethlehem on His Jewish people. The days of light and glory are very much ahead of us! “Arise, shine; for your light has come, and the glory of YHVH has risen upon you. For behold, darkness will cover the earth and gross darkness the peoples. But YHVH will rise upon you and His glory will appear upon you. Nations will come to your light, and kings to the brightness of your rising” (Isaiah 60:1-3)

How should we then pray?

Your prayers and support hold up our arms and are the very practical enablement of God to us in the work He has called us to do.

In Messiah Yeshua,

Avner Boskey

Donations can be sent to:

FINAL FRONTIER MINISTRIES

BOX 121971 NASHVILLE TN 37212-1971 USA

Donations can also be made on-line (by PayPal or credit card) through: www.davidstent.org

YHVH will have war against Amalek from generation to generation

Edom had a grandson named Amalek (Genesis 36:12) who walked in his grandfather’s spiritual boots. Amalek also had murderous hatred and jealousy against Jacob’s seed (Genesis 27:41). Moses and Joshua had to confront the seed of Amalek on the desert battlefield of Rephidim (Exodus 17:8). Here is where the famous Bible story came to pass, where Joshua saw military victory as long as Moses’ hands were lifted up (Exodus 17:9-13): “So Joshua overwhelmed Amalek and his people with the edge of the sword.”

The murderous intentions of Amalek and Edom would continue throughout history (see Ezekiel 25:12-14; 35:15; 36:5; Obadiah 1:10-21, etc), even to our present day. YHVH commanded Moses to “write this in a book as a memorial and recite it to Joshua, that I will utterly blot out the memory of Amalek from under heaven.” Moses built an altar and named it ‘YHVH is My Banner.’ And he said, “YHVH has sworn: YHVH will have war against Amalek from generation to generation” (Exodus 17:14-16).

Edom, aka Amalek aka Palestinian

The Edomites invaded the Land of Judah in 601 B.C., settling in the area between Hebron and Bethlehem. This area was named Idumea, and King Herod and his dynasty were Edomites – the arch-enemies of the Jewish people. They murdered the Jewish farmers there, and occupied the Jewish homeland. Here is how the God of Israel describes their acts and their heart. He also prophesies over Edom about divine judgment which will come upon them at the End of Days:

The modern Palestinian movement has settled in the heart of these lands. Whether in Gaza (the Philistine base camp), in Hebron (the Edomite stronghold) or in Nablus (the Samaritan headquarters) – the Palestinians have had the extremely bad fortune to appropriate chunks of the homeland promised by YHVH. As Ezekiel and Obadiah prophesied, when God’s enemies occupy the Jewish homeland, they come under the curse of Genesis 12:3.

Jihad, the Muslim Brothehood and the Jews

The Gaza Strip was promised by God to the Jewish people (Numbers 34:1-6). Prime Minister Ariel Sharon decided to disengage from that area, mistakenly believing that the world community would prevent radical Islamist jihadi forces from attacking Israel – or at least that Israel would not tolerate even one rocket attack from Hamas or Islamic Jihad.

The hard light of reality shows that Sharon was deceived, and in actuality Gaza has become an Islamist dictatorship firing tens of thousands of rockets against Israel’s civilian population. “YHVH will have war against Amalek from generation to generation” (Exodus 17:16).

Because the Islamist takeover of Gaza was initially gradual, and because Israeli politicians and generals for the most part do not grasp the spiritual aspects of jihad and caliphate, Israel has not responded quickly and decisively enough to this clear and present danger. Our enemies continue to be a thorn in our side (Numbers 33:55; Joshua 23:13; Judges 2:3).

God’s calling on Israel is found in Psalm 118:10-14:

Wise war

Proverbs 20:18 counsels us “By wise counsel wage war.”  Proverbs 24:6 adds, “For by wise guidance you will wage war, and in abundance of counselors there is victory.”

On the morning of Monday November 11, an Israel Air Force airborne vehicle targeted and eliminated one of the top Islamic Jihad (IJ) terrorists in Gaza. This man was responsible for planning and directing many of the deadly rocket attacks on Israel’s civilian population. He was a high value target for some time, and the IAF was waiting for actionable intelligence. The safe room where he and his wife were hiding was the only room destroyed in that three-story building.

Islamic Jihad’s response was to declare open war on Israel’s civilian population. Over the past three days over 360 rockets have been fired by Islamic Jihad. Most have been blown out of the air by Israel’s Iron Dome anti-rocket missiles. Some have landed in open fields, and a few in civilian areas. So far there are no fatalities.

IJ has vowed to intensify rocket attacks. So far they have extended their reach to Modi’in and Latrun, 30 kilometers west of Jerusalem. They may well continue a game of brinksmanship.

Two possible developments: Hamas (the Muslim Brotherhood-related jihadi group) may feel the need to protect its jihadi credentials and enter into the fray. This would escalate the conflict in major way. Another possibility is significant Israeli casualties requiring a land invasion of Gaza.  The coming few days are strategically significant here.

Avoiding war or winning it?

Israel’s civilian population is highly frustrated and angry at this low-intensity bubbling conflict. Most Israelis believe that it is possible to crush the jihadi forces only by a land invasion. But most Israelis also know that their leaders are hesitant to do so for a variety of reasons – world pressure and Israeli civilian casualties being two factors here.

How should we then pray?

Your prayers and support hold up our arms and are the very practical enablement of God to us in the work He has called us to do.
 
In Messiah Yeshua,
 
Avner Boskey
 
Donations can be sent to:
 
FINAL FRONTIER MINISTRIES

BOX 121971 NASHVILLE TN 37212-1971 USA
 
Donations can also be made on-line (by PayPal or credit card) through: www.davidstent.org

Morphing the Torah

Approximately 2,930 years ago, the ten tribes of Israel rebelled against David’s family and dynasty (1 Kings 12:1-19). Led by Jeroboam ben Nevat (1 Kings 11:26-40), a special forces commander, 84% of the Jewish people rejected YHVH’s chosen and anointed king. The Bible lets us in on the secrets of Jeroboam’s heart:

Rebellion against David’s House led to rebellion against David’s city Jerusalem. It then morphed into rebellion against God’s divine calendar (see Exodus 12:2; Leviticus 23:1-2).

This same dynamic gnawed its way into mainstream Judaism 1,000 years later, when rabbinic authorities changed the Jewish New Year from its biblically mandated place just before Passover, to today’s so-called Rosh Hashanah (‘Head of the year’) in the Fall.

The Jewish New Year

According to the Bible there is only one Jewish New Year and it is not in September. “Now YHVH said to Moses and Aaron in the land of Egypt, ‘This month shall be the beginning of months for you; it is to be the first month of the year to you … On this day in the month of Aviv, you are about to go forth’” (Exodus 12:1-2; 13:4).

This God-mandated Hebraic calendar (with the New Year being at Passover) was observed in the days of Esther and Mordechai. The casting of lots (the purim) began “in the first month, which is the month Nisan” (Babylonian name for biblical Aviv; Esther 3:7). The  Jews of the Persian Empire in Queen Esther’s day still celebrated the biblical Jewish New Year in the Spring, fourteen days before the Feast of Passover.

But the influence of Babylon and the Babylonian Exile waxed great. Diaspora Jews gradually moved away from biblical foundations in a number of areas (https://davidstent.org/the-blast-of-the-shofar/). The Hebrew calendar was one of those areas. Babylonian calendar names (based on Babylonian demons) were substituted for biblical Hebrew names. The first month in the Hebrew calendar Aviv was renamed Nisan (from the Akkadian nisānu, meaning ‘sanctuary’ or ‘sacrifice’, or possibly from Sumerian nisag meaning ‘firstfruits’). The seventh month of the Hebrew calendar, Eitanim (‘the strong ones’), was renamed Tishrei (from the Akkadian word tašrītu or ‘beginning’). This process of replacement is acknowledged in the Jerusalem Talmud: “For Rabbi Hanina said, ‘The names of the months came up with them from Babylonia’” (TJ, Rosh Hashanah, 1:2, 56d).

By the Second Century AD the rabbinical authorities codified the timing of the Jewish New Year, moving it from the biblical Spring date to an Autumn date in order to better fit in with politically correct Babylonian social trends. Rabbi Judah the Prince (the editor of the Mishnah) made a valiant attempt at justifying an obvious departure from the biblical New Year date, when he proclaimed circa 200 A.D. that there are actually a whole bunch of New Years. He explained that there are “four New Years – on the first of Nisan is the New Year for kings and festivals; on the first of Elul is the New Year of the tithe of cattle…; on the first of Tishrei is the New Year for years, for release and for jubilee years, for plantation and for tithing vegetables; on the first of Shevat is the New Year for trees” (TB, Tractate Rosh Hashanah, Mishnah 1, 2a).

The dynamic of doing plastic surgery on God’s heart and commandments is all too human. In the days of Jeremiah, YHVH warned of this trend: “For My people have committed two evils: They have forsaken Me, the Fountain of living waters, to hew for themselves cisterns, broken cisterns that can hold no water” (Jeremiah 2:13).

When in Rome

Followers of Yeshua tend to honor the national customs wherein they live. It’s commonplace for believers to celebrate the calendars of those nations. Today the Western world follows the pagan Roman calendar (Gregorian version), and most believers have no problem acknowledging the Gregorian New Year. In the same way Jews living in Israel acknowledge the secular/religious celebrations here connected with the rabbinic New Year.

But that doesn’t mean that followers of Yeshua, whether Jewish or Gentile, should forget the biblical calendar and abandon our biblical foundations.

If it’s Jewish, it must be kosher!

There is a proverb, “A specialist is someone fifty miles from home.” To some Gentile believers, anything coming out of Israel or the Jewish people must automatically be ancient, revered, deeply spiritual and worthy of imitation. But a problem exists here: many Jewish traditions were established and made legally binding by those who rejected Yeshua’s Messiahship, the original Messianic Jewish apostolic leadership and the New Covenant teachings.

Here are three examples:

The language of rabbinic blessings

After the destruction of the Second Temple, a theology of blessings (berachot) was crystallized requiring Jewish men to pray only in the words of approved liturgical texts. The immediacy and value of spontaneous Jewish prayer was submerged. This eventually morphed into the modern Siddur/prayer book. Rabbinic theology sees merit and reward in praying these fixed prayers (similar to liturgical patterns in some Church streams) and discourages personal spontaneous prayer. Amazingly, this Orthodox tradition has been adopted by some Messianic congregations as the ‘authentic Jewish’ way to pray.

The prayer shawl/tallit

The God of Israel commanded the Jewish people under the Mosaic covenant to make fringes (tzitzit) on their everyday garments. Every Jew’s clothing had fringes. This was to remind all Jewish people of their national calling and responsibility, as well as the real possibility of spiritual failure. It was to be worn on every garment that Jewish people wore on a daily basis. It was not a special item of clothing to be worn only at prayer. 

YHVH also spoke to Moses, saying, “Speak to the sons of Israel, and tell them that they shall make for themselves tassels on the corners of their garments throughout their generations, and that they shall put on the tassel of each corner a cord of blue. It shall be a tassel for you to look at and remember all the commandments of YHVH, so as to do them and not follow after your own heart and your own eyes, after which you played the harlot, so that you may remember to do all My commandments and be holy to your God” (Numbers 15:37-40)

The centuries of Jewish exile morphed the carrying out of this commandment into a smaller prayer shawl worn only in synagogue, and/or a four-cornered tasseled undershirt. Today most Jews see this tallit as the fulfillment of the commandment, and are unaware of God’s original intentions. This is also true of many Messianic Jews and Israel-friendly Evangelicals. Wearing a rabbinically approved tallit is considered a necessary expression of Jewish spirituality in some of these circles.

The divine commandment in Numbers is of course part and parcel of the Mosaic covenant. Fringes are not mentioned anywhere in the New Covenant as a requirement. If Jewish believers choose to wear fringed garments or even use fringed prayer shawls, that is part of our freedom to do so in Messiah. But it is not a necessary or required expression of Jewish or biblical spirituality.

Legally binding traditions and spiritual emphases

After the destruction of the Second Temple in 70 A.D., rabbinic authorities meticulously determined how sabbaths, feasts and fasts were to be kept. New theological accents were introduced which bolstered rabbinic authority. For example, Shavuot/Pentecost would now be rabbinically connected to the giving of the Mosaic covenant, even though no biblical evidence exists for this tie-in. The Mosaic emphasis here was probably a counter-reaction to Acts 2 and the inauguration of a New Covenant “not like the Mosaic covenant” (See Jeremiah 31:31-32). Similarly, the Feast of Trumpets would be morphed by rabbinic thought from a biblically joyous feast to one of mourning and dread or awe.

The Bible does not connect the Feast of Trumpets to sadness, mourning or incipient danger. Numbers 10:10 refers to it as “the day of your gladness in your appointed convocations.”  These were actually happy celebrations of great joy. Psalm 81:1-3 refers to singing aloud, making a joyful shout, raising up a song by striking the tambourine, harp and lyre – and all this on the Feast of Trumpets. The shofar blast was a reminder to YHVH of His promises over the Jewish people (Numbers 10:10). The Hebrew word teru’ah (from the root ru’a) has another secondary meaning in Hebrew – a powerful shout-out of rejoicing – as used in the following passages: “Shout to God with a voice of joy!” (Psalms 47:1-2);  “Shout joyfully to God, all the earth!” (Psalms 66:1); “Shout joyfully to the God of Jacob!” (Psalms 81:1).

The concept of the High Holidays being a season when one’s name is inscribed in the Book of Life had no biblical basis. That once and for all event is really connected to the bloody atonement made by Messiah Yeshua (see 1 Peter 1:18-20; Revelation 7:14; 12:11).     

For many Gentiles who love Hebrew roots, it’s worth considering that the modern celebration of Shabbat celebration owes the majority of its traditions to later rabbinic decisions and not to Scriptural commands.

Messianic Jews and Gentiles who love Jewish ways should know what the Scriptures say. They should understand how rabbinic traditions have developed. That includes understanding how some of these traditions actually fog or distort the biblical focus of the feasts.

The numbers game

The Scriptures do not establish the date of Creation with anything approaching crystal-like clarity. But rabbinic authority has decided on such that date, and traditional Jews use that rabbinic dating system. According to that dating, we have entered into the year 5780. Most Messianic Jews and Gentiles who love Jewish faith expressions also tend to use the rabbinic dating.

But, as in the days of Jeroboam, it is essential to make this point clear: the rabbinic dating system regarding the date of Creation is not God-breathed, nor is it accurate, When believers blindly use this rabbinic dating, an unwittingly spiritual dependence on rabbinic authority is set in motion – and that rabbinic authority denies Yeshua’s deity and Messiahship, the authority of the New Covenant, etc.

Another Jewish tradition used by some is tied in to kabbalah (Jewish black magic). This reveals itself in the use of gematria. It is becoming fashionable in certain Messianic and Christian prophetic circles to use gematria as a form of ‘Christian fortune-telling.’ This involves making proclamations about hidden meanings in the coming rabbinic calendar year, based on the numerical-alphabetic value of the year in question. This mystical and occult interpretative technique removes logic and biblical discernment from the interpretative process. Instead, a squirrely hermeneutic is substituted which seemingly appeals to superior Hebrew knowledge, but which in fact lacks biblical basis and kosher qualifications.

These dabblings into Jewish mysticism are sometimes trumpeted by some Gentile believers who lack sufficient ability and discernment in these matters. Unfortunately even some Messianic Jews are getting on the same rickety bandwagon. These above-mentioned rabbinic influences can exert an unhealthy pull on believers who may have started off positively inclined toward Jewish subjects.

It is our heart’s prayer that all dear believers stay far away from these non-kosher aspects of rabbinic theology, tradition and mysticism. They are not only spiritually unclean. They also come from a worldview that denies the reality and power of Israel’s Risen Messiah.

What’s in a name?

The biblical name of the Feast of Trumpets holiday is Yom Teru’ah, the day of blowing/trumpeting/sounding of the shofar or ram’s horn (Numbers 29:1). It is also called zichron teru’ah (a memorial of blowing) in Leviticus 23:24.

Suggested reading

If you would like more in-depth consideration of these issues from a biblical standpoint, get the book “How to Messianic without becoming meshuggeh” available at https://davidstent.org/books/. Happy reading and happy belated Feast of Trumpets!

How should we then pray?

Your prayers and support hold up our arms and are the very practical enablement of God to us in the work He has called us to do.

In Messiah Yeshua,

Avner Boskey

Donations can be sent to:

FINAL FRONTIER MINISTRIES

BOX 121971 NASHVILLE TN 37212-1971 USA

Donations can also be made on-line (by PayPal or credit card) through: www.davidstent.org

Making room in the Bible for the Jewish people

The Bible is chock full of prophecies specifically given to the Jewish people. What happens when Gentile believers re-interpret those Jewish promises away from the Jewish people? Most Christian use of Scripture ignores its Jewish context and simply replaces it with a Gentile Christian context. This is Replacement theology, practically speaking. Even my best friends do this on a daily basis.

Let’s look at this problem, and then try to bring some biblical balance.  The Bible says that cursing, making light of or ignoring the Jewish people is a biblical no-no (see Genesis 12:3; Jeremiah 30:17). Is there a more excellent way of using the Jewish Scriptures – one that will not separate the Jewish people from their promises, while at the same time allowing Gentile believers to apply the relevant spiritual principles to their own lives?

A diamond is forever

The Apostle Paul gives us a solid foundation for understanding and using the Jewish Scriptures: “From the standpoint of God’s choice they (the Jewish people) are beloved for the sake of the Patriarchs (Abraham, Isaac and Jacob) – because the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable” (Romans 11:28).

Simply put, all of the promises originally spoken over the Jewish people still apply to the Jewish people. They are all valid prophecies and they will certainly come to pass for the sons and daughters of Jacob. These promises, like diamonds, are forever. They are the family jewels of Jacob’s children.

Staying honest

How are we to honor the original and lasting intent of the Bible (2 Timothy 2:15) in our teaching, preaching and calls to intercession? Whenever we use a Scripture passage which talks about Israel, let’s ask ourselves some basic questions:

Discovering that the Bible really is a Jewish book

If nearly all of the Bible’s prophecies are about the Jewish people, God must have a reason for that.

God is calling for a radical reformation in the Body of Messiah. His challenge to us all – can we let the Bible mean what it says? Will we allow those prophecies to breathe, giving honor to God’s word by honoring His original intent?

“Does that prophecy actually refer to the Jews and their destiny?” (first illustration)

A movement of worship and intercession is spreading across the planet. Christian believers are glorifying the God of Israel and calling on Him to bring repentance, renewal and revival to their own nations. Scripture passages are often drafted and pressed into the service of these movements. A closer look at these passages almost always reveals that the verses used are actually prophesying specific destiny over the Jewish people.

One example is Isaiah 60:1-3, 12, 14:

“Arise, shine; for your light has come and the glory of YHVH has risen upon you. For behold, darkness will cover the earth and deep darkness the peoples. But YHVH will rise upon you and His glory will appear upon you. Nations will come to your light, and kings to the brightness of your rising … For the nation and the kingdom which will not serve you will perish, and the nations will be utterly ruined … The sons of those who afflicted you will come bowing to you, and all those who despised you will bow themselves at the soles of your feet. And they will call you the City of YHVH, Zion of the Holy One of Israel” (Isaiah 60:1-3, 12, 14)

This passage is not a declaration that the church will bring revival to other Gentiles. It is definitely a declaration that Israel will bring revival to all the nations (which is part of her prophesied destiny; see Romans 11:12, 15).

How to use this passage honestly? It’s a two-step process:

  1. One, proclaim that YHVH will shine His light on Israel and through them He will bring light to the Gentiles. This is a high strategy for God and we all need to make it part of our strategy as well
  2. Two, encourage people to appeal to the God of Jacob to shine His light upon their own nations as well

This two-step process keeps us honest:

  1. Point one above declares that Isaiah 60 is a prophecy over the Jewish people. It is our privilege to proclaim this prophetic promise over Israel
  2. Point two above is our own prayer response, though it’s not what the prophecy is stressing. We ask God to shine His light on our nations – but without weakening the biblical promise for Israel, and without turning our prayers over our own nations into false prophecies

“Does that prophecy actually refer to the Jews and their destiny?” (second illustration)

Here’s another example of how to use scripture honestly:

“So now, our God, listen to the prayer of Your servant and to his supplications, and for Your sake, O YHVH, let Your face shine on Your desolate sanctuary. O my God, incline Your ear and hear! Open Your eyes and see our desolations and the city which is called by Your name. For we are not presenting our supplications before You on account of any merits of our own, but on account of Your great compassion. O YHVH, hear! O YHVH, forgive! O YHVH, listen and take action! For Your own sake, O my God, do not delay, because Your city and Your people are called by Your name.” Now while I was speaking and praying, and confessing my sin and the sin of my people Israel, and presenting my supplication before YHVH my God in behalf of the holy mountain of my God… (Daniel 9:17-20)

Daniel’s intercessory prayer is highly specific. It focuses on the Jewish people, their sins and their prophetic destiny. If we want to use this scripture passage to encourage other nations and peoples to intercede for their own countries, the same two-step process applies: One, recognize and proclaim that Daniel is interceding for Israel’s repentance, restoration and salvation. This is a high priority for God. It should be our high priority as well. Two, encourage people to appeal to the God of Jacob to bring repentance, restoration and salvation to your own nations. If we follow this two-step process, we walk in God’s ways, honoring His prophetic intentions and His heart for Israel. We enter into God’s burdens without weakening the biblical promise for Israel, and without turning our prayers over our own nations into false prophecies.

“Does that prophecy actually refer to the Jews and their destiny?” (third illustration)

Here’s a third example of how to use scripture honestly:

“In that day I will raise up the fallen booth of David and wall up its breaches. I will also raise up its ruins and rebuild it as in the days of old, that they may possess the remnant of Edom and all the nations who are called by My name, declares YHVH who does this. Behold, days are coming, declares YHVH, when the plowman will overtake the reaper and the treader of grapes him who sows seed – when the mountains will drip sweet wine and all the hills will be dissolved. Also I will restore the captivity of My people Israel, and they will rebuild the ruined cities and live in them. They will also plant vineyards and drink their wine, and make gardens and eat their fruit. I will also plant them on their land, and they will not again be rooted out from their land which I have given them, says YHVH your God” (Amos 9:11-15)

Amos’ prophecy is very specific. It talks about:

If someone would want to use this scripture passage to encourage nations and peoples to press in to God through worship, the same two-step process still offers help here, though it should be stressed that worship is not the subject of Amos 9:11: One, proclaim that Amos is prophesying the Jewish people's physical and spiritual restoration and salvation. This is a high priority for God. It should be our high priority as well. Two, encourage people to worship the God of Jacob. If we follow the first step of this two-step process, we will be walking in God’s ways, honoring His prophetic intentions and His heart for Israel – without weakening the biblical promise for Israel, and without altering the meaning of Amos’ prophecy.

A little less boasting, a lot more equipping

Two thousand years ago the Apostle Paul called out a warning to Rome’s Gentile believers: “Do not boast against the (original Jewish) branches” (Romans 11:18). To teach that YHVH’s gifts to the Jewish people are revocable and have now morphed into Gentile and not Jewish gifts – this is precisely the boasting against the Jewish people that Paul condemns in Romans 11:18, 20.

Leaders and teachers in the Body of Messiah need to get out of our easy chairs and start teaching what the Bible actually says about these issues. A daily dose of Vitamin J (kosher teaching about the Jewish calling) is long overdue. Paul calls us upward: “And He gave some as apostles, and some as prophets, and some as evangelists, and some as pastors and teachers, for the equipping of the saints for the work of service, to the building up of the body of Messiah – until we all attain to the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a mature man, to the measure of the stature which belongs to the fullness of Messiah. As a result, we are no longer to be children, tossed here and there by waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, by craftiness in deceitful scheming” (Ephesians 4:11-14)

Mañana (tomorrow) is good enough for me

One of our ministry emphases focuses on the urgent need to equip believers – so that we will all be pro-actively ready for the restoration of Israel. Occasionally some believers respond to the challenges with these words:

Brothers and sisters, the time for hesitation’s through. Let’s stop the delaying tactics. Let’s own up to our lack of prophetic courage.

Let the Jewish people back into their own tent

In your devotions, in your Bible reading, in your preaching and teaching, allow the Jewish people into your tent. According to Romans 11:24 it is actually their own tent –“their own olive tree”. But do make room for the Jewish people, and allow them back into their own Bible, their gifts and their calling.

How should we then pray?

Your prayers and support hold up our arms and are the very practical enablement of God to us in the work He has called us to do.

In Messiah Yeshua,

Avner Boskey

Donations can be sent to:

FINAL FRONTIER MINISTRIES

BOX 121971 NASHVILLE TN 37212-1971 USA

Donations can also be made on-line (by PayPal or credit card) through: www.davidstent.org

By the rivers of Woodstock

It’s fifty years on since a half a million young Americans flowed down the Interstates to converge at Bethel in western New York State.  Smack dab in the middle of Max Yasgur’s cow pasture, the Woodstock Aquarian Festival of Music and Art morphed into a muddy stage which would showcase the counterculture generation.  Hundreds of thousands got up and danced to the music, swaying to the songs and promised dreams.

Carlos Santana explains:

Michael Lang, the event’s main organizer, similarly opines:

Rolling Stone magazine stated that Woodstock was:

Now that 50 years have come and gone – the same amount of time as a biblical jubilee (see Leviticus 25:8-13) – what perspectives can we take away from the rock festival that was in Bethel – musically, socially and spiritually?

The saffron-robed swami and I

Woodstock began with Sri Swami Satchidananda leading at least 400,000 American youth in invoking the spirit of the Hindu deity Ram.

In 1991 it was revealed that over the years at least 11 women, including two of Satchidananda’s former secretaries, had been coerced into having sexual relations with him.

The saffron-robed swami had just shrink-wrapped ancient polytheism and given it a new Aquarian rock 'n' roll packaging – his present to the youth of the Western world. To paraphrase Bob Dylan, the times of Judeo-Christian spiritual consensus were rapidly changing.

A text with a context

Woodstock flowered at the end of the American Sixties. A lot had gone down in the previous twenty years:

President Eisenhower had challenged America to give a wide berth to a carnal materialism which spurned biblical and spiritual realities. His 1954 State of the Union address declared:

The spiritual thirst of America’s youth had found little that was appetizing in increasingly liberal and anti-supernatural traditional forms of Christianity and Judaism. This irresistible spiritual hunger was about to crash into an immovable American religiosity.

Francis Schaeffer remarked that “the hippies of the 1960s did understand something. They were right in fighting the plastic culture, and the church should have been fighting it too ... More than this, they were right in the fact that the plastic culture – modern man, the mechanistic worldview in university textbooks and in practice, the total threat of the machine, the establishment technology, the bourgeois upper middle class – is poor in its sensitivity to nature ... As a utopian group, the counterculture understands something very real, both as to the culture as a culture, but also as to the poverty of modern man’s concept of nature and the way the machine is eating up nature on every side” (Francis A. Schaeffer, Pollution & the Death of Man).

A hard rain’s gonna fall

An entire generation of baby boomers grew up with a nuclear Sword of Damocles hanging over their heads. The Cuban Missile Crisis of October 1962 seeded existential fear across the continent. Why plan for a distant retirement when faced with the clear and present danger of total human destruction? The ‘American Dream’ was beginning to look like an illusion. The assassinations of John F. and Robert Kennedy as well as of Martin Luther King shook the stability of a nation.

These and other pressures colored developing social dynamics:

Disintegrating values were leading to disintegrating boundaries.

This was the matrix from which Jefferson Airplane sang out at Woodstock:

Look what's happening out in the streets!

Got a revolution, got to revolution

One generation got old, one generation got soul! 

This generation got no dissertation to hold

Pick up the cry! Hey now it’s time for you and me - Got a revolution, Got to revolution”

(“Volunteers,” Marty Balin & Paul Kantner, © BMG Music)

The Who’s stunning performance at Woodstock threw the spotlight on a similar message:

Things they do look awful c-c-c-cold. I hope I die before I get old…

Why don’t you all fade away and don’t try to dig what we all s-s-say

I’m not trying to cause a big s-sensation. I’m just talkin’ ‘bout my g-g-g-generation

(“My Generation”, Peter Townshend,© Brunswick/Polydor)

The disillusionment with Western materialism in general and with America in particular bubbled up into what many see as the anthem of Woodstock – Canned Heat’s ‘Going up the country’ –

I’m gonna leave this city, got to get away.

All this fussin’ and fightin’ man, you know I sure can’t stay

So baby pack your leavin’ trunk, you know we’ve got to leave today

Just exactly where we’re goin’ I cannot say but we might even leave the U.S.A.

(Alan Wilson, © Sony/ATV Music Publishing LLC)

Outwards appearance and secret societies

Mark Twain once declared, “Clothes make a man. Naked people have little or no influence on society.” Woodstock was famous for tie-dye t-shirts, fringed jeans and skinny dipping. Those outward manifestations nevertheless had a significant influence on Western society.

A music/social philosopher Bill Mankin offers some insight on this point:                                                         

The circle of life

The promise of a new generation that Woodstock hoped for – that utopian dream of a turned-on world, a transformed humanity and a new spiritual age – rapidly fell by the wayside. The nightmare of the Altamont Speedway Free Festival (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Altamont_Free_Concert) barely four months later saw an African-American stabbed to death by Hell’s Angels bodyguards while a white British rock-blues band (the Rolling Stones) played Sympathy for the Devil and Under my thumb. “Altamont became, whether fairly or not, a symbol for the death of the Woodstock Nation” (Mark Hamilton Lytle, America’s Uncivil Wars: The Sixties Era from Elvis to the Fall of Richard Nixon, p. 336).

The Rolling Stones were not the cause of Woodstock Nation’s collapse. The spiritual pillars of the Aquarian Age had been tottering from the outset. And the moral compass of the movement was giving a false reading of the true North from the get-go. It is said that the apple does not fall far from the tree. In the end the hippies of Woodstock did not walk that differently from their fathers.

Joni Mitchell, famed Canadian singer-songwriter, has a verse which might sum up this aspect of the Woodstock journey: “And the seasons they go round and round. Painted ponies go up and down. We’re captive on the carousel of time. We can’t return we can only look behind from where we came and go round and round and round in the circle game” (Joni Mitchell, © Siquomb Publishing Company).

Searching for Paradise Lost

The spiritual yearnings which were part of the warp and woof of the rock festival crystallized in another Joni Mitchell song ‘Woodstock.’ According to David Crosby, Mitchell captured the feeling and importance of the Woodstock festival better than anyone who had actually been there. Her anthem describes a spiritual journey to Max Yasgur's farm, making conspicuous use of sacred imagery and comparing the festival site with the Garden of Eden.

Well, I came upon a child of God. He was walking along the road

And I asked him, “Tell me, where are you going?”

This he told me. Said, “I’m going down to Yasgur’s Farm

Gonna join in a rock and roll band.

Got to get back to the land and set my soul free”

Well, then can I roam beside you? I have come to lose the smog

And I feel myself a cog in something turning

And maybe it’s the time of year, yes and maybe it’s the time of man

And I don’t know who I am but life is for learning

We are stardust, we are golden. We are caught in the devils bargain

And we got to get ourselves back to the garden

(Joni Mitchell, ‘Woodstock’ © Sony/ATV Music Publishing LLC)

The Woodstock Generation was suddenly cut adrift. Within a year the three ‘J’s (Jimi, Janis and Jim Morrison) were dead of drug overdoses. But many of hippies soon came into a deep spiritual encounter with the Messiah of Israel, Yeshua, during the Jesus Revolution of the late Sixties and early Seventies. A significant number of these were Jewish people, and some of them became the leaders of the Messianic Jewish movement around the world and in Israel.

Who remembers the Babylonian Hit Parade?

Over 2,600 years ago Judah was crushingly exiled to Babylon. The Jewish people may have lost their homeland, but they didn’t lose their common sense. They realized that God had exiled them to a foreign land (Psalm 137:4). The prophetic restoration and future of their people lay in remembering the national connection between the scattered Jewish people and their Promised Land (verse 5). Indeed, every Jewish wedding shouts out these words: May even the high joy of my wedding day pale in comparison to YHVH’s promises to doubly restore the Jewish people – spiritually through the Messiah, and physically to the Land of Israel!

In the same way that no one today remembers the ancient Babylonian Top Forty, the Jewish people also no longer remember the Hebrew melodies we were forced to sing beside the Euphrates River 2,600 years ago.  But do the Jewish people still remember the fact that most of Jacob’s sons and daughters are not in Israel, but still reside in the lands of our Exile (2 Kings 17:23; 25:21; Ezra 5:12; 9:4; 10:16; Isaiah 5:13a; Jeremiah 16:13-15; 29:13-14; 30:10-11; 16-18)?

Many Jews in the Exile have lost their memory. We have forgotten Zion and are desperately trying to fit in to the lands of our enemies (see Ezekiel 39:25-29; 20:38). And all the while we are afraid that if the Gentiles remember our connection with the Land of Israel and realize that we are only ‘strangers in a strange land,’ they will turn on us and do us evil (Ezekiel 34:5-6. 11-16; 20:32). France once threatened their Jewish community with something similar (https://archive.jewishagency.org/jewish-community/content/24142).

Most English-speaking Jews in the Exile have forgotten these truths, just as they have forgotten the language of Zion and the layout of Jerusalem’s hills. When world leaders remind our people of our need to remember Jerusalem and to be loyal to our people or homeland, this is a divine call for the Jewish people to wake up and press in to know our God!

How should we then pray?

Your prayers and support hold up our arms and are the very practical enablement of God to us in the work He has called us to do.

In Messiah Yeshua,

Avner Boskey

Donations can be sent to:

FINAL FRONTIER MINISTRIES

BOX 121971 NASHVILLE TN 37212-1971 USA

Donations can also be made on-line (by PayPal or credit card) through: www.davidstent.org

Double trouble and double blessing

One day in the Hebrew calendar is connected to devastation. The fifth month (known as Av or Ab) witnessed the destruction of two Jewish Temples – Solomon’s and Herod’s. That catastrophe (ḥurban in Hebrew) and its spiritual significance are unpacked in the prophetic Scriptures. These tragic lessons still resonate for us today.

Building the Temple was a good thing

Distancing our hearts from YHVH leads to severe shaking

On the day of Solomon’s dedication of the Temple, YHVH prophesied that Solomon’s dynasty would eventually undermine the spiritual foundations of the House. This would lead to the destruction of the Temple and the Exile of the Jewish people:

The ecumenical encounter between Babylon and Zion

The iron fist of Babylon broke into Jerusalem on the 7th of Av, 587 B.C. and completed the full destruction of the Temple by the 10th of Av.

Jewish tradition blended those two dates together, synthesizing the Ninth of Av as the memorial day. Since that time Tisha B’Av has become a day of mourning and fasting.

Throughout Jewish history, many tragedies fell upon the Jewish people on or about the 9th of Av, including:

The Ninth of Av is a day when many Jews remember these tragedies, humble their souls and hope for better.

How does God view Tisha B’Av?

Zechariah was a prophet who ministered at the same time as Haggai, during the era of Nehemiah.

The God of Israel notes that He had not established the Fast of Tisha B’Av. That decision had been taken independently by the spiritual leaders of Israel. Mourning and fasting have an important place, but they are no substitute for a repentant heart. Lack of repentance had led to the destruction of the Temple and to the Exile. God was looking for a change of heart in Judah – repentance, confession and return to the prophetic words of the Scriptures. And that repentance was still largely lacking in Zechariah’s day:

God was speaking clearly: it’s not another fast day which is needed. Real turning back to YHVH is what’s on the agenda.

Consider also the prophecy of Ezekiel 20, given on the 10th of Av, hammering home the same message.

What God called for among the Jewish people in Zechariah’s day – He is still calling for today.

My Jewish people need to turn back to our God, repent of our rejection of David and His dynasty (1 Kings 12:16-19) – our rejection of David’s Greater Son Yeshua the Messiah (Isaiah 53) – and our rejection of His gracious New Covenant (Jeremiah 31:31-34). We need to learn the biblical lessons of Tisha B’Av. National mourning without national repentance will not tip the balances.

Double prophetic blessing

A day is coming when Israel will repent with a whole heart (see Zechariah 12-14). In that day Tisha B’Av will not be memorialized with mourning and fasting, but with joy, gladness and cheerful feasting: “Then the word of YHVH of armies came to me, saying, ‘Thus says YHVH of armies, The fast of the fourth, the fast of the fifth, the fast of the seventh and the fast of the tenth months will become joy, gladness, and cheerful feasts for the house of Judah; so love truth and peace’” (Zechariah 8:18-19).

Isaiah proclaims that a future Temple will be established on the Temple Mount, known as YHVH’s House of Prayer: “Even those I will bring to My holy mountain And make them joyful in My House of Prayer. Their burnt offerings and their sacrifices will be acceptable on My altar. For My House will be called a House of Prayer for all the peoples” (Isaiah 56:7).

God will heal the Jewish people’s wounds. He will rebuild our land and our promises. Messiah will rule and reign in our midst.

How should we then pray?

Your prayers and support hold up our arms and are the very practical enablement of God to us in the work He has called us to do.

In Messiah Yeshua,

Avner Boskey

Donations can be sent to:

FINAL FRONTIER MINISTRIES

BOX 121971 NASHVILLE TN 37212-1971 USA

Donations can also be made on-line (by PayPal or credit card) through: www.davidstent.org

Two hearts beat as one

God, like the U.S. Marines, is always looking for a few good men. “For the eyes of YHVH move to and fro throughout the earth that He may strongly support those whose heart is completely His” (2 Chronicles 16:9).

Men and women judge by outward appearances and behavior, but the God of Jacob sees deeper still. “YHVH said to Samuel, ‘Do not look at his appearance or at the height of his stature … for God sees not as man sees, for man looks at the outward appearance, but YHVH looks at the heart’” (1 Samuel 16:7).

YHVH’s radar searches out mankind, and pings loudly when our hidden thoughts appear on His screen. “As for you, my son Solomon, know the God of your father, and serve Him with a whole heart and a willing mind. For YHVH searches all hearts, and understands every intent of the thoughts” (1 Chronicles 28:9).

One of the wisest man who ever lived shares a secret with us: “Watch over your heart with all diligence, for from it flow the springs of life” (Proverbs 4:23).

God may turn a cold shoulder to the proud. He may scorn those who scorn Him or His people the Jews (see Genesis 12:3). But He wants us to know that “the sacrifices of God are a broken spirit. A broken and a contrite heart, O God, You will not despise” (Psalm 51:17).

Israel – God’s passionate choice reveals God’s heart

God’s choosing of Israel is not merely an eschatological strategy. It is a matter of the passions of His heart:

Israel – God’s litmus test for our hearts

The God of Jacob wants to know what is hidden in our hearts. One of His goals in the 40 years of desert wanderings was to expose the deepest thoughts of His Jewish people: “Remember how YHVH your God led you all the way in the wilderness these forty years, to humble and test you in order to know what was in your heart” (Deuteronomy 8:2).

YHVH’s prophetic spirit wants to reveal the things we sometimes want to conceal. “But if an unbeliever or an inquirer comes in while everyone is prophesying, they are convicted of sin and are brought under judgment by all, as the secrets of their hearts are laid bare. So they will fall down and worship God, exclaiming, ‘God is really among you!’” (1 Corinthians 14:24-25).

God’s choosing of Israel goes all the way back to Genesis 12:3. It did not begin in 1948.

The choosing of the Jewish people is a challenge to the nations. It is a challenge to Christianity and to Islam, to Communism and to Fascism. How will the nations respond to God’s priority call on Jacob? How will they react to satanic attempts to destroy the Jewish people, their state and their divine calling?

A passionate theological heart for Israel

God cares about all peoples, but at the same time He takes great pains in the Scriptures to emphasize to the nations that He has a priority heart for the Jewish people.

In a passage specifically spoken to Jerusalem, Zion and Judah, the God of Isaac declares His tenderness toward the Jewish people: “See, YHVH the Lord comes with power and He rules with a mighty arm. See, His reward is with Him and His recompense accompanies Him. He tends His flock like a shepherd. He gathers the lambs in His arms and carries them close to His heart. He gently leads those that have young” (Isaiah 40:10-11).

In a similar prophetic declaration, John the Baptist’s father Zechariah eloquently proclaims YHVH’s passionate salvation and defense of the Jewish people:

Any theology about the Jewish people needs to start at the same place where God starts – His deep love for the Jewish people and His passionate embrace of the daughter of Zion. Since “the plans of YHVH stand firm forever, the purposes of his heart through all generations” (Psalm 33:11), our teachings on Israel must begin where His love for the Jewish people begins – His embrace of Jacob (see Ezekiel 16:3-14).

True confessions

In my travels I sometimes bump into perspectives which sidestep God’s biblical choosing of Israel. At times it sound like some of these teachings concentrate on anything but what the Scriptures teach concerning Jacob, anything but God’s radar love for the Jewish people.

Let’s stop for a moment and re-calibrate our radar. Why not focus on what 95% of the Scriptures teach concerning God’s irrevocable calling and gifts for Israel? Why major on involved eschatological schemes while simultaneously disregarding God’s overrunning cup of love for Jacob’s children? Why attempt to strike a PC position vis-à-vis Middle Eastern nations while concurrently adulterating the priority call on Israel (often an offense to Gentile minds)?

Let’s remember the Apostle Paul’s heart confession, “Brethren, my heart’s desire and my prayer to God for them is for their salvation” (Romans 10:1).

“For the word of God is living and active and sharper than any two-edged sword, and piercing as far as the division of soul and spirit, of both joints and marrow, and able to judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart!” (Hebrews 4:12).

How should we then pray?

Your prayers and support hold up our arms and are the very practical enablement of God to us in the work He has called us to do.

In Messiah Yeshua,

Avner Boskey

Donations can be sent to:

FINAL FRONTIER MINISTRIES

BOX 121971 NASHVILLE TN 37212-1971 USA

Donations can also be made on-line (by PayPal or credit card) through: www.davidstent.org

Jewish roots - authentic identity in the midst of broken branches

One of the main deliberations in the Messianic Jewish movement today is, “What is true Jewish identity, and what is authentic Messianic Jewish identity?” Some Gentiles who are interested in things Jewish ask a similar question: “What are the Jewish roots of our faith, and how can Gentile believers embrace those Jewish aspects which are kosher/acceptable in God’s sight?”

Paul prophesies that a day is coming when the majority of the Jewish people (the natural branches) will be re-grafted in with great power and fruitfulness into their own Jewish olive tree of faith: “How much more will these who are the natural branches be grafted into their own olive tree?” (Romans 11:24). He also speaks of Gentile believers in Yeshua as wild olive branches “grafted in among the (Jewish believing) branches and have become partakers with them of the rich root of the olive tree” (Romans 11:22). The Greek here literally says ‘partakers with them in the root of the fatness’ or ‘partakers in the rich sap’ which comes from the root of the tree).

Déjà vu all over again

Not so long ago – only 2,850 years back – the Jewish people found themselves in a spiritual pickle. The God of Jacob had promised, “For YHVH will not abandon His people on account of His great name, because YHVH has been pleased to make you a people for Himself” (1 Samuel 12:22: see also Psalm 94:14). But ten tribes rose up in rebellion against the House of David:  “When all Israel saw that the king did not listen to them, the people answered the king, saying, ‘What portion do we have in David? We have no inheritance in the son of Jesse! To your tents, O Israel! Now look after your own house, David!’ So Israel departed to their tents … So Israel has been in rebellion against the house of David to this day” (1 Kings 12:16, 19).

This rebellion significantly influenced Jewish spiritual and physical history. Fateful decisions were made.

The northern Ten Tribes still worshiped YHVH, but Israel had become physically and spiritually sick, and in rebellion against Jacob’s God.

Listen, O heavens, and hear, O earth, for YHVH speaks. Sons I have reared and brought up, but they have revolted against Me. An ox knows its owner, and a donkey its master’s manger, but Israel does not know! My people do not understand! Alas, sinful nation! People weighed down with iniquity, offspring of evildoers, sons who act corruptly! They have abandoned YHVH. They have despised the Holy One of Israel. They have turned away from Him. Where will you be stricken again as you continue in your rebellion? The whole head is sick and the whole heart is faint. From the sole of the foot even to the head there is nothing sound in it – only bruises, welts and raw wounds, not pressed out or bandaged, nor softened with oil (Isaiah 1:2-6).

Eventually the southern two tribes of Judah also rebelled. Davidic kings, Levitical priests and the common people all joined in forsaking YHVH: “Now the word of YHVH came to me saying, Go and proclaim in the ears of Jerusalem, saying, ‘Thus says YHVH, I remember concerning you the devotion of your youth, the love of your betrothals, your following after Me in the wilderness through a land not sown … For My people have committed two evils: They have forsaken Me, the fountain of living waters – to hew for themselves cisterns – broken cisterns – that can hold no water’” (Jeremiah 2:2-3, 13).

What an incredible scenario! The people whom God chose, and the royal dynasty that YHVH had chosen – all turned against Him. Even so, God remained faithful and still remains faithful to His covenant with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob: “Thus says YHVH, If the heavens above can be measured and the foundations of the earth searched out below, then I will also cast off all the offspring of Israel for all that they have done, declares YHVH” (Jeremiah 31:37).

A precious remnant remains

The God of Jacob will never abandon His people, even when the sins of the majority of the people are grievous: “Who is a God like You, who pardons iniquity and passes over the rebellious act of the remnant of His possession? He does not retain His anger forever, Because He delights in covenant faithfulness” (Micah 7:18).

Paul echoes this prophetic promise: “In the same way then, there has also come to be at the present time a remnant according to God’s gracious choice” (Romans 11:5).

Ministering to a people beset by apostasy

Israel had moved into full blown rebellion and apostasy. As a result, the Hebrew prophets faced challenging problems as they attempted to minister to Jacob’s children.

How to minister to a rebellious and apostate nation? This tension comes out most clearly in the story of three Jews – Elisha, Jehoshaphat and Jehoram:

Elisha would have refused to honor the King of Israel’s request for a royal audience. He consented to show up and minister only because of the presence of a descendant of the House of David at the meeting. Some thoughts here:

A decisive rejection

When Messiah Yeshua the Son of David presented Himself to Israel, the Zenith of prophetic revelation came face to face with His Jewish nation. Though many Jewish people did happily receive Yeshua, the majority of Jacob’s leaders did not. As the Psalmist prophesied, “the Stone which the builders rejected has become the Chief Cornerstone” (Psalm 118:22) Peter added that Yeshua “is the Stone which was rejected by you, the builders, but which became the Chief Cornerstone” (Acts 4:11).

This rejection of Messiah brought a measure of darkness and suffering to my people. Through it all, though YHVH has not rejected us as a people, we have experienced increased woe. We have also experienced an extended national Exile – both spiritually and physically – because of our leaders’ rejection of Messiah.

Part of our national rebellion expressed itself in Jeroboam’s day in the way we developed unauthorized and inauthentic religious traditions. In the same way, after Israel’s religious leaders rejected Messiah Yeshua, the non-Levitical Pharisaic leaders developed many unauthorized and inauthentic religious traditions. Some of these new Jewish traditions leave no room for Yeshua, and they sidestep the biblical need for Messiah’s atonement.

We Messianic Jews often find ourselves stepping onto this creaking bridge of Jewish tradition. Truth is, certain beams in that spiritual structure cannot bear the weight of Messiah’s glory. Nevertheless, the pull of these traditions often remains very strong in the souls of some Messianic Jews. 

Searching for our roots

In the 20th century modern African-Americans have searched for their roots in the writings of Franz Fanon, Stokely Carmichael, Eldridge Cleaver and Alex Haley’s Roots TV program. Italian Americans cast a longing eye toward their past roots in Hollywood epics like The Godfather. Jewish people in America look to Fiddler on the Roof and Schindler’s List for a glimpse of Eastern European roots. The American melting pot may slowly be dissolving ethnic and cultural backgrounds, but some of these ethnic streams are very much trying to keep ‘roots memories’ alive.

I agree that the Black Panthers and the Cosa Nostra may not be the best role models available. And for many North American Jews, the wider Jewish community no longer sees its identity as defined by Orthodox Judaism. Our forefathers in Poland, Ukraine and Russia were not happy with the strong religious control they faced, a very real part of shtetl life. Their emigration to the New World included a deliberate choosing of American civil rights and democratic and secular ways. It is we, their grandchildren, who sometimes look back longingly and unrealistically to an Orthodox Judaism lifestyle, hoping that a dream-like sojourn in Tevye’s world will confer true and authentic Jewish identity upon us.   

Today significant streams in the Messianic Jewish community advocate that there is only one authentic Jewish lifestyle, and that it is rooted in the Mosaic covenant. They believe that an authentic Jewish life looks a lot like Orthodox Judaism. These folks add that non-Jews don’t need to follow the Mosaic Law – unless of course these non-Jews want to be part of Messianic congregations …

Continuity and discontinuity

Jeremiah 31:31-34 prophesies that YHVH is bringing forth a New Covenant, “not like the covenant which I made with their fathers in the day I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt – My covenant which they broke, although I was a husband to them, declares YHVH.”

The New Covenant described by Jeremiah is not like the Mosaic Covenant. The New Covenant is not a renewed Mosaic Covenant, but a truly New Covenant.

As Messianic Jews struggle with the ramifications of this passage (and with others, like Galatians 3:19-25) we will hammer out our own authentic identity. Then we will be able to offer true hope and light to Israel and to the world. Only then will we successfully proclaim Messiah Yeshua’s atonement and the gift of the Holy Spirit to our people, many who are experiencing brokenness in many ways.

How should we then pray?

Your prayers and support hold up our arms and are the very practical enablement of God to us in the work He has called us to do.

In Messiah Yeshua,

Avner Boskey

Donations can be sent to:

FINAL FRONTIER MINISTRIES

BOX 121971 NASHVILLE TN 37212-1971 USA

Donations can also be made on-line (by PayPal or credit card) through: www.davidstent.org

By continuing to use the site, you agree to the use of cookies. more information

The cookie settings on this website are set to "allow cookies" to give you the best browsing experience possible. If you continue to use this website without changing your cookie settings or you click "Accept" below then you are consenting to this.

Close