Subject:

        Was Jesus Christ a Jew? ‑ Dr. Wesley A. Swift

   Date:

        Sat, 4 Aug 2001 11:35:38 ‑0700

   From:

        "Bob Jones" <[email protected]>

     To:

        "Willie Martin" <[email protected]>

  Was Jesus Christ a Jew?

                     Dr. Wesley A. Swift

Tonight we are speaking on a subject which the Church must learn

to understand. There are

many people who are under a strange delusion, finding themselves

serving a fake set of ideas,

which are very disturbing to them in the light of what they know

and see round about. There are

many who have been told that Jesus Christ is a Jew, and therefore

The Most High and Savior of

their Christian faith comes out of a race which hates Christianity,

does all that it can to destroy it,

and is now working insidiously all over the United States to get the

Bible and prayer out of our

schools, and to take the Name of Jesus Christ out of every phase of

our national life.

Now this is hard for some people to understand. They ask, How

could Jesus be a Jew, with all

Jews fighting everything that relates to Christianity and His Name?

Of course the great confusion

that exists in the minds of many is in the fact that they have been

ill‑informed concerning who the

house of Israel actually is, and they do not know that there is a vast

distinction between the house

of Israel (the descendants of Abraham) and the people called Jews

today. But we can establish for

you clearly apart from these phases of identity that Jesus Christ is

not a Jew, or else all the

foundations of Christianity have been wasted upon something that

is fatuous and that has no

foundation whatsoever. We will also establish this very clearly for

you on the basis of Christ's

time, as well as facts which are self‑evident as key points within

the faith of Christianity.

I tell you that I am not following the Jew: I am following the

Incarnate Revelation of The Most

High. Before you ask me, Is Jesus Christ a Jew? I ask you this

question: Is Yahweh a Jew? We

have Jesus' own words in Matt. 23:33 in which He turned and told

the Jews that they are serpents

and a generation of vipers. He was not talking about the symbol of

Lucifer's kingdom. He said

they are Lucifer's descendants. I want to emphasize the fact that

one of the first things that Jesus

did in that conversation was to deny any family relationship. (This

is also one of the important

records of the book of John.) He denied any relationship with them,

and in the instance when they

were creating great pressures upon Him, Jesus made this

statement: "I am of My Father, and you

are of your father." Therefore, I want to point out something that is

most significant concerning

Christ. First, let us go to Isaiah 7:14, and read what it says about His

birth. "Therefore Yahweh

Himself the Eternal One shall give you a sign: Behold, a virgin shall

conceive and bear a Son, and

shall call His Name Immanuel" (which is "Yahweh with us ").

For further revelation on this subject we turn to Isaiah 9:6.

(Remember, Isaiah is an Israelite but he

is not a Jew.) It reads: "For unto us a Child is born, unto us a Son is

given: and the government

shall be upon His Shoulder." Who is He? "His Name shall be called

Wonderful, Counselor, The

Mighty,Yahweh, The Everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace." They

are referring to the fact that

He is The Everlasting Father, that He Is The Prince of Peace; and in

this identification, His

Embodiment as Messiah would be the Embodiment of the Life of

Yahweh.

Now let us for a moment recognize that it was not until the violation

of Divine law by Lucifer and

his intermingling of nefarious forces with the races (before the

coming of your Race) that there

ever existed a Jew upon the face of the earth. It is also noted that

these unassimilable forces are

referred to in the Old Testament as Jehudi, which word is

translated Jews. We realize that the

Bible (the King James version) which we have, like the Vulgate,

had also been guided in its

translation by a great number of Jews who, professing to be

Hebrew and Greek scholars, thought

to cover up many phrases that related to the identity of Christ and

words referring to them and

their own relationship to world situations; but they were unable to

efface the most important

phrases concerning Christ and Who He was.

Therefore we have these facts in writings of the Apostle Paul who,

without question, is the greatest

authority of the New Testament outside of the declarations which

Jesus Himself made. We believe

the doctrine of the Church is founded upon the contents of the

writings of the Apostle Paul and

the Words of Jesus. Their premise was also that the continuity of

The Scripture meant that the

Word of Yahweh of the Old Testament continued in the

development of the truths of the new.

In the book of Colossians we discover that this revelation means

that Yahweh is both Spirit and

Soul, and can be embodied; so Spirit, Soul, and Body is the fullness

of Yahweh, and you are in His

image, and you are also Spirit, soul, and body. The body of the Man

Christ Jesus was the image of

the Invisible Yahweh. We want you to know that this was the

revelation of Eternal Deity and

regarding Christ, we read these words in the first chapter of

Colossians: "Who is the Image (or

Body) of the Invisible Yahweh, the firstborn (begotten before) of

every creature. "Then Paul tells

you here in the book of Ephesians as well, that by Him were all

things created, that is by Jesus

Christ. "For by Him were all things created that are in the heavens,

by Him were all things created

that are in earth, visible and invisible (that means spiritual or

material), whether they be thrones,

or dominions, or principalities, or powers: AII things were created

by Him and for Him: And He is

before all things, and by Him all things consist." If we did not have

anything to talk about, we

would say that this was proof conclusively that Jesus Christ could

not be a Jew, because He was

before any Jew existed. He was before all things, and by Him all

things consist. We point also to

this: "He is the Head of the body, the Church, Who is the beginning,

the first born from the dead,

that in all things He might have the preeminence." (Colossians

chapter 1) It pleases the

Administering Spirit that His Embodiment will be the fullness of all

in all. That is in your Bible,

and these are the facts concerning the Person of Christ. He is the

Author, the Creator, the Maker,

the Producer of the universe; and the embodiment of all this in the

physical body was His purpose.

I think it very important, then, that we also turn to things that are

most significant in this

prophecy. It is no wonder the enemy, the higher critics, the forces

of darkness want to do away

with any super‑element in our faith. If you could destroy that

super‑element, you might destroy

the whole foundation of Christianity, and you might challenge the

Being of Christ Himself. So in

this instance they try to do away with, and they would like to take

out of the story, the prophecies

of Isaiah that a virgin shall conceive and bear a Son. They want to

change it today to "a young

woman". I can assure you that the text said a virgin, and this was

the intent. This fact is brought

forth as one of the mysteries known back in the days, of Enoch.

After his heavenly experience,

Enoch also included in his revelation "The Pillars of Enoch" that

Yahweh Himself would come

forth through a virgin in a body, the fullness of Deity, the fullness of

Divine Creative Power.

Now we turn to the record in Chapter 1 of Matthew concerning the

genealogy of Christ, and this is

"The book of the generation of Jesus Christ" He is referred to here

as "the Son of David, the Son

of Abraham". David was not a Jew; he came out of Jesse. You will

discover that he is out of

Ephraim and actually out of Joseph. David was given a royal line

over Judah, but not one drop of

the blood of David is in the veins of Jesus.

We discover the fact in the book of Luke that Mary was of the house

of Levi. The house of Levi

was not Jew. The house of Levi could never be called Jews by

anybody, nor could Judah be called

Jewish, nor can you call the other ten tribes Jews by any stretch of

the imagination, for they were

not identified with the Kingdom of Judah. Jews are trying to

identify themselves with the house of

Abraham by saying they are Judeans, and that they descended

from Judah. They only dwelt in the

land of Judea, but they were never citizens of the house of

Abraham, nor did they come through

Judah.

We read the whole genealogy in the book of Matthew from the days

of Abraham on down "... and

Eleazar begat Matthan; and Matthan begat Jacob; and Jacob begat

Joseph the husband of Mary",

and it was Mary of whom Christ was born. So it would not make any

difference in all the

genealogy of the house of Joseph, as far as the blood stream of

Christ was concerned, for Joseph

was not the father of Jesus Christ. He was only the adopted foster

father, and thus added a

rightful title as foster father to Jesus. (The Jerusalem Bible footnote

(Matt. 1:1) says "... Joseph

legally the father of Jesus ".) But Jesus held the title by His right as

King of Kings and proved

that in His Own conversation with the people of Jerusalem, as we

will introduce to you.

In the Bible we have no genealogy as to who Mary is. Mary is the

only physical embodiment and

contact of Christ. Here in Matthew it says: "... Mary, of whom was

born Jesus, Who is called

Christ". Nowhere in the genealogy, if you go back to the Old

Testament, was the mother ever

mentioned. It always tells which father begat whom down through

all time. Why was the mother

mentioned here? Why did it not mention the mother down through

all this course? Because one of

the facts of this time in history was that the Virgin Mary was the

mother of Christ and His only

physical contact on earth. Was she a jewess? Absolutely not!

Mary is of the house of Levi, so by no stretch of imagination could

she be called a jewess. Levi

was given for the true priesthood from the days of Aaron right on

down to the present time; the

ministry was called the ministry of Yahweh "forever" . Let us turn

back to the hour of the birth of

Christ. This was in the days of Herod the King of Judea, and there

was a certain priest named

Zacharias (his wife was Elisabeth of the daughters of Aaron). John

the Baptist was born of

Elisabeth, and Christ came forth from the womb of Mary. Now

Elisabeth and Mary were cousins,

one family, one household. In Luke 1:36 we read (as the angel

addresses Mary): "And, behold, thy

cousin Elisabeth hath also conceived a son in her old age." Now

this will help us to understand.

The priesthood of Aaron was continued in the Levitical priesthood.

This proves Mary was of the

household of Levi.

We bring to your attention, for we have the evidence referred to

time after time, that the Body of

Christ was born of Incorruptible Seed. If you want to go back in the

miracle pattern of religious

philosophy, you will discover that as far as Adam is concerned he

was the issue of Yahweh; he was

His life, he was the Seed which He begat in the earth for

establishing the Race from which would

come His Kingdom.

As we called to your attention before, in the sixth day (era) Yahweh

created and consummated

through these geological ages of His time, the making of

everything in the universe. He had even

made man. "Male and female made He them", but on the eighth day

He said, "there is no

Adamite to till the soil", and He brought forth Adam, the very issue

out of Himself. Do you know

what the Apostle Paul tells us in Corinthians concerning Jesus?

This was the Body of Yahweh, the

second Adam; and as Adam is the issue of Yahweh, so Christ is the

second Adam. But He was also

the firstborn of every creature, because He was before all things,

and by Him all things consist.

Jesus began to preach one day, and He challenged the people: "Do

you know before Abraham

was, I was?" If, then, He was before Abraham, those who think the

Jews started with Abraham

would be forced to conclude that Jesus (having been before

Abraham) could not have been a

relative of the Jews. When Abraham went out on the plains of

Moreh, he met an unknown

personage; the one whom He met for the first time was called

Melchizedek, the great mystery title

of the eternal priesthood of the Eternal Yahweh. The Apostle Paul

tells you in the 7th chapter of

the book of Hebrews who Melchizedek was: He was without

beginning of days, or end of life, the

Eternal Priest and King forever. There is only one individual without

beginning of days or end of

life; and He, my friends, is Jesus Christ. John was exiled to the Isle

of Patmos for the testimony of

Jesus Christ. Suppose I introduce you to the fact that, according to

the book of Revelation, while

he was there and while he was meditating, Yahweh appeared

before him? He heard the sound of a

trumpet; and as he turned, he beheld the beautiful spectacle of

radiant Majesty and Light. He saw

Deity standing before him; he threw himself to the ground; he

heard the words: "I am Alpha and

Omega; I am . The Ever‑Living Yahweh." John says he trembled

before the symbol of Majesty.

The voice said, John stand upon your feet. You walked with Me

along the shores of Galilee; I am

Jesus. And he beheld and knew that The EverLiving was the Very

One with Whom he had walked.

"Fear not. I hold the keys of death and the grave. Stand upon your

feet." Do you suppose that

The Almighty Yahweh is a Jew? Yahweh save the world!

When Christ was twelve years old, He, His mother and Joseph (His

foster father) went down to

Jerusalem. He became separated from them. Do you know where

they found Him? In the temple,

confounding the wise men and the scribes; He knew more than

they did. He was expounding to

them the mysteries of the Scriptures, for He has put them together.

From that time on, Christ was

busy on these things. Oh, you say, He was working in the carpenter

shop? He lived in the City of

Nazareth? Not very much. You want me to prove that to you?

Joseph of Arimathea owned the tin

mines of Cornwall in Britain and, being of the true stock of the

Kingdom of Israel, he was one of

the most powerful members of the Sanhedrin. His ships ploughed

up and down the coasts of

Europe, through the Pillars of Hercules, and in the Mediterranean.

Joseph was a good man; he

laid Jesus in his tomb. This is a matter of history. You can go to

Rome today and see where

Joseph paid constant duty from one country to another.

Suppose I tell you that all during his youth, up to the time He was

30 years old, He was in

Europe? Jesus was here, and He was there; He was preaching. You

say, You cannot prove that.

Yes, I can prove it. I am going to show you something here that you

will remember. In Luke we

have the story of how Christ was baptized, and after Lucifer

assaulted Him with temptation, He

was away for awhile. After He returned to the City of Nazareth, He

went down to the temple to

preach. When He stood up with authority and power (for He had the

symbol of authority; they

had handed Him the scroll) and He talked, the people said, Who is

this? Is this Joseph's son? Is

this Joseph of Nazareth's boy; or who is this? Now, my friends, if

Jesus had been constantly in

attendance here, if He had been growing up here since He was

twelve years old, they would not

have guessed or pondered who this was who stood up to preach.

I will show you something significant. If you turn to 1 Timothy 3:16

you will read these words

concerning Jesus: "And without controversy great is the mystery

of Godliness, Yahweh was

manifest in the flesh, justified in the Spirit, seen of angels,

preached unto the nations, believed on

in the world, received up into glory. "If Yahweh was manifest in the

flesh, He was justified in the

Spirit, and He preached unto the Nations ‑ when did He do that? He

did that before He

commenced the three year ministry which was to be historic, that

went up to His crucifixion. Now

I can prove to you that over here in the records, We have Christ as

He returns from having been

in a far country. As He arrives at the seat of Customs of the local

government, they want to collect

taxes from Him. Jesus turns to His disciples, saving, Of whom do

the kings collect taxes, of their

own or of strangers? (Here was, King Herod collecting taxes from

Jesus) Jesus, not to argue with

them, said, Go down and catch a fish. They brought a fish to Him,

and He said, Take the money

out of its mouth. They found there the golden coin with which to

pay the taxes.

What I want to point out to you is that Jesus Christ had been

outside the country and had returned

at this instance. He had been preaching in a far country, and the

records show that He paid taxes

and paid customs. The Jews recognized He was a stranger. More

than that, in another instance we

can show you something which is significant to this pattern. You

remember, in the book of John

there are many mysteries; they are only mysteries because the

Church never applied itself to these

many things, and these are also correlated with evidence that we

discover all through the writings

of Matthew, Mark, and Luke; but especially in John are these things

made known. I read here in

John concerning that which Jesus was speaking that the Jews, the

Pharisees, the chief priests, and

the officers came to take Him. The high priests in the time of Christ

were fatuous, and came in the

line of the Canaanites. They were not the true seed of Israel. That is

why Jesus told them: "I am of

My Father, and you are of your father. "

In John chapter 7, He tells the chief priests and officers that came

to take Him, I am going to be

here a little while, and I am going into the Spirit whence I have

come. "You shall seek me, and

shall not find me; for where I am going you cannot come." So it is

obvious: Where Jesus was going,

the Jews could not go. Yes, He was going to heaven. Well, then, the

Jews could not get there.

The Jews said, "Where will He go that we can not find Him? Will He

go to the dispersed among

the nations? Will He go there and teach them?" The priests and

Pharisees asked the officers,

"Why have you not seized Him? Why did you not bring Him?" And

the officers answered, "Never

spake man like this man". Then spake the Pharisees, "Are ye also

deceived? Have any of the

rulers or the Pharisees believed on Him?" Nicodemus (who visited

Christ by night) stepped up.

"Now listen: The Law does not judge any man before it hears him."

They said to him: "Oh, are

you also one of His disciples? No prophet comes out of Galilee."

The Jews said He was not a Jew;

they said He was a Galilean.

Now, remember, the Galileans were not jews. You say, prove that.

All right, let's turn to the sixth

chapter of John. Jesus Christ had twelve disciples. One of them

was a Jew; that was Judas

Iscariot. All the rest came out of Galilee, out of the household of His

selection. He asked them a

question concerning His identity, and Simon Peter said: "Master,

where shall we go? Thou hast

the words of eternal life. We believe and are sure that Thou art the

Christ. " That means the

Embodiment of Yahweh, the Very Son, the Embodiment of The

Most High.

Jesus said: "Have not I chosen you twelve, and one of you is a

devil?" While that may be just a

name you call somebody, to Christ it was a generation of Lucifer.

Jesus turned to the Jews on

Solomon's porch, and said: "Ye are of your father the devil, and the

lusts of your father ye will

do. I am from above,‑ I am of Yahweh, and ye are of the devil. I am

Yahweh's offspring, and ye

are the devil's offspring. "You say, is that in the Bible? That is in the

book of John, which you

have. John also says: "He spake of Judas Iscariot, ... for he it was

that should betray him."

In John 7:1 we read: "After these things Jesus walked in Galilee ‑

For he would not walk in jewry,

because the Jews sought to kill Him. "You understand that in

Galilee He would not be among the

Jews. The brethren of Jesus, the friends of Jesus, and the

Galileans (the people of the community

where Christ lived) went down to Jerusalem; but there, no man

dared speak openly of Him for

fear of the Jews. Let us turn to the words of Jesus in the eighth

chapter of John. He makes the

declaration concerning His purpose. He went over to the temple

and all the people came, and He

taught them, saying: "I bear record of Myself, and My record is true.

"The Pharisees said: "Your

record is not true." So we have the Jew Pharisees denying Christ.

He said: "I know whence I came

and whither I go, but you cannot tell whence I come, and whither I

go." They asked, "Where is

your Father?" Then Jesus said: "If ye had known Me, ye should

have known My Father also."

These words spake Jesus in the treasury, as He taught in the

temple. And no man laid hands on

Him. For His hour was not yet come. Then Jesus said, "I go My way

and ye shall seek Me and die

in your sins. Whither I go, ye cannot come ... And He said, ye are

from beneath: I am from above; ye

are of this world, I am not of this world."

So Jesus said, You are of a different race, a different origin, a

different background. Let me tell

you about the whole Race of Israel. Turn to John 17. John records

that Jesus praised the Father,

and in this declaration, the Man Christ Jesus in the body is

unveiling for posterity facts

concerning the Eternal Spirit: "I have manifested Thy Name unto

the men which Thou gavest Me

out of the world. Thine they were, and Thou gavest them Me,‑ and

they have kept Thy Word .... I

pray for them. I pray not for the world, but for them whom Thou

hast given Me,‑ for they are

Thine ... and Thine are Mine."

Jesus said, I pray for those whom thou hast given Me. I have given

them Thy Word, because they

are not of the world, even as I am not of the world. I do not pray that

you take them out of the

world, but keep them in it, and protect them from evil. "I am not of

the world." He was the

Almighty Ever‑Living One from heaven. That is why one of the

mysteries you find in the book of

Hebrews is quite clear. He said your Race was a Race of strangers

and pilgrims here. Yahweh put a

gracious forgetfulness over you, so you would do the job which

you were sent to do.

No Israelite was related to a Jew; and if he married one, he could

not enter the temple, nor could his

posterity.

You say, I thought Jesus was a Jew. No; Jesus could not be a Jew!

If He was The Almighty

Yahweh, if He was Holy Seed, if He was Incorruptible Seed, if He

was before all things, that would

be impossible.

In John chapter 12 the Pharisees said, We have got to do

something about this man. Perceive ye

how ye prevail nothing ever since He raised Lazarus from the

dead? Many knew of this miracle.

People all over the world were learning about the fact that Jesus

had raised Lazarus from the

dead, and they had gone after Him.

Now great nations sent ambassadors and messengers, and certain

Greeks who were important

people came to worship Jesus. They said to Philip of Bethsaida,

"Sir, we would see Jesus." Then

Philip and Andrew and the others came to Him saying, Men are

coming from these lands and

places and they want to see you. Jesus answered: "The hour is

come that the Incarnate Revelation

of Yahweh should be glorified."

The Pharisees said, We had better stop Him; the whole world is

coming out to see Him. And

therefore we have the testimony of this impact, where the chief

priests consulted how they might

put Lazarus to death in order to stop acceptance of the truth.

Yahweh walked among them as The

Messiah. He raised a man from the dead and they were so filled

with hatred and jealousy that they

wanted to put him to death again! Don't talk about brotherhood to

me! I don't want any part of them!