The Lion, The Lamb and The Blood: Nothing in all history impacts the human race like the death and resurrection of Christ. But this generation, for the most part, fails to see the heart of the matter, and few seem to make the connection between the blood of Christ and their own eternal destiny.
The Christian who has fathomed the meaning of the blood of Christ has seen the heart of God as He is touched by our sin, in both His judgment and His mercy. Christ told us: "For this is my blood of the new testament, which is shed for many for the remission of sins." (Matthew 26:28)
Paul said: "...being now justified by his blood, we shall be saved from wrath through him." (Romans 5:9)
And John wrote that Christ: "...and washed us from our sins in his own blood." (Revelation 1:5)
In the fifth chapter of Revelation (vs. 1-5) John describes his vision in which no one is able to open the book sealed with seven seals. Then he is told that the Lion of the tribe of Judah has overcome, to open the book, but when John looks for a lion, he sees a lamb (vs. 6), a lamb that has been slaughtered, to which the four and twenty elders sing a "new song" saying: "Thou art worthy to take the book, and to open the seals thereof: for thou wast slain, and hast redeemed us to God by thy blood out of every kindred, and tongue, and people, and nation." (Revelation 5:9)
The Blood of The Lamb: When God determined to slay the first born in Egypt. He provided a way of escape for the sons of Israel, who dwelt there as slaves. They were to slay a lamb and put some of its blood around the doorways of their houses. The blood was the evidence that a lamb had been killed and the first born in those homes would be saved from death.
The issue here was life and death, and the shedding of blood was the means by which the animal was put to death. "For the life of the flesh is in the blood: and I have given it to you upon the altar to make an atonement for your souls: for it is the blood that maketh an atonement for the soul." (Leviticus 17:11)
Wherever blood was used in sacrificial offerings, it signified that death had taken place. However, the death of animals was not sufficient for meeting the penalty of man's sins, as is explained in Hebrews. "For it is not possible that the blood of bulls and of goats should take away sins." (Hebrews 10:4)
The needed sacrifice was found in Christ. "Forasmuch then as the children are partakers of flesh and blood, he also himself likewise took part of the same; that through death he might destroy him that had the power of death, that is, the devil; And deliver them who through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to bondage." (Hebrews 2:14-15)
When the prophet Isaiah described the coming of a suffering servant to redeem God's people, he pictured Jesus as a lamb, led to the slaughter, dying for the people "to whom the stroke was due." (Isaiah 53:7-8)
Just as the lamb was put to death to save the first born Israelites from death, Jesus was slain that we might be saved from death in the day of judgment. John the Baptist, therefore, introduced Jesus by saying, "Behold the lamb of God that takes away the sin of the world." (John 1:29)
Expressions such as "the cross of Christ" and "the blood of Christ" are euphemisms that always signify Christ's death. We are cleansed, washed, sanctified, and justified by His blood only in that His blood means His death. Paul could write that: "For he hath made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in him." (2 Corinthians 5:21)
He underwent God's judgment on our behalf, so that in the day of judgment we might receive a favorable verdict, and thus be justified. In effect, the judgment has already take place on the stake for believers, who "by faith" are "justified by His blood." (Romans 5:1, 9)
Some Twisted Ideas: The principle of Jesus undergoing judgment on our behalf by dying our death is simple enough, but many kinky ideas have been derived from expressions referring to His blood.
Some hold that the blood of Jesus saves us because it was special and divine. A gospel song has as its theme the idea that "just one drop of His blood" will cleanse you from all sin. If that were true, There would have been no need of Jesus' Death. One can lose a lot of blood without dying!
The fact is, the blood of Christ was ordinary human blood, as stated in Hebrews 2:14, that He shared the same kind of flesh and blood as those He came to save. There was nothing magic about His blood; it served the same purpose for Him as it does for all mankind. The giving of His blood meant the giving of His life. It was not the blood that was different, but the person. Jesus was the sinless Son of God, Thus He could pay our penalty for our sins.
Sometimes heard is the statement that we are baptized in order to "meet the blood of Christ." This sounds as though it is the blood of Jesus, and not His death, burial and resurrection that really counts. Scripture does not suggest this, but does say: "Know ye not, that so many of us as were baptized into Jesus Christ were baptized into his death?" (Romans 6:3)
Baptism (immersion) is somewhat similar to a death, burial and resurrection, as Paul writes: "Therefore we are buried with him by baptism into death: that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life." (Romans 6:4)
The significance here is not in "meeting the blood" but in being united with Christ in His death (Romans 6:5).
Others misunderstand Jesus' statement that we are to eat His flesh and drink His blood (John 6:53), interpreting this to mean that in the communion the wine (or grape juice) actually becomes His blood. Of course, it doesn't. Jesus explained, "It is the spirit that quickeneth; the flesh profiteth nothing: the words that I speak unto you, they are spirit, and they are life." (John 6:63)
It is in a spiritual sense that we fill ourselves with the body and blood, the very life, of Jesus, as expressed by Paul: "Christ lives in me." (Galatians 2:20)
We are told about baptism: "...preach the baptism of repentance for the remission of sins." (Mark 1:4); "...preaching the Baptism of Repentance for the Remission of sins." (Luke 3:3)
Therefore, baptism is very very important and every Christian should be baptized.
Some of the most popular hymns give the praise to the blood of Christ. We sing of being "washed in the blood of the Lamb," of the One "whose blood can cleanse each spot," and "There is power, power, wonder-working power in the precious blood of the lamb."
Such expressions would be ridiculous were they meant in the natural sense. But when taken in the spiritual and Biblical sense, they express wonderful and mighty truth. By His death Jesus cleanses us and performs the wondrous work of redeeming us from sin and thus from death at the final judgment.
The Lion: Like a lamb being led to the slaughter, Jesus willingly submitted to crucifixion that the final penalty for our sins might be met. His death demonstrates that God's laws are important, a life and death matter. While it may be politically correct to make no discrimination between moral values, and even ignore Biblical standards altogether, the fact is that Christ died because God takes His Laws very seriously.
His death also demonstrates God's tremendous love and mercy, in that He would give His Son that we might not suffer the final death at judgment (for our sins), but might have life and immortality. By sacrificing Himself Jesus gained a great victory over the world, sin and death, making Him worth to "take the book and open the seals thereof." (Revelation 5:9) But in John's vision Jesus is also identified as the Lion of the tribe of Judah. (Revelation 5:5)
After Jesus, the lamb, was obedient even unto death, God raised Him up, exalted Him, and gave Him all authority in heaven and on earth. No longer is He the lowly lamb, submitting to the abuse of evil men who oppose God. Now He is the King, reigning on the throne of God until it is time for Him to take the throne of David, and will return at that time to judge the world in righteous judgment. (Acts 2:30-31; 17:31)
It is fitting for us to sing about the blood of Christ, if by this we have in mind the value of His death for us. To acknowledge His death, burial and resurrection is also to acknowledge our debt to Him. Following the example of Christ, Christians are to humbly obey the Father, and be willing to suffer tribulation and the persecution of the oppressor in patience. "Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new." (2 Corinthians 5:17)
To glory in His death is a sham unless we put ourselves at God's disposal, to be used as His servants to please Him. And to allow the Judiazed Judeo-Christians to blaspheme Christ with the pagan celebration called "Easter" is a shame we will never be able to live down. We will be forgiven for it, but the shame we will have to bear forever, because we would not protect the name of our Savior and give the proper honor to His death, burial and resurrection as we should have done.
Ishtar/Easter
In this study we want to explore the relationship between Easter and the goddess Ishtar, and why the celebration of the Easter holiday is a great abomination to Almighty God. We will explore the history of the goddess Ishtar as well as her various attributes and names that she was called in different ancient cultures. We will also find out exactly what God has to say about this adulterous, idolatrous worship of Easter/Ishtar in these in time days.
Let's begin with the fact that the word "Easter" is not in the Scriptures. Some may say that it is Acts 12:4, but they haven't done their homework. Let's look at Acts 12:4: And when he had apprehended him, he put him in prison, and delivered him to four quaternons of soldiers to keep him, intending after Easter to bring him forth to the people.
The word is not Easter. It is a corrupted translation of the Greek word "pascha" which means "Passover," from the Hebrew word "pasach" meaning "to pass over." If you don't believe this, look it up it is #3957 in the Strong's Concordance Greek Dictionary.
Most often in trying to explain to people that the Easter worship is in fact the worship of the goddess Ishtar, their immediate reply is that they are worshiping Jesus, and that the Easter worship is the celebration of the risen Christ, His resurrection from the dead. What does it really matter if the word Easter is a transliteration of the word Ishtar? We are still worshiping Jesus Christ and His resurrection. God knows the intent of our hearts.
True enough, God does know the intent of our hearts. But God also knows the utter abomination of this Easter/Ishtar worship, as well as the fact that most are caught up in this worship in ignorance.
To drive this point home, that you cannot worship another god or worship at the feet of Ba’al and say that you are worshiping Christ; is a Satanic lie straight from the pits of hell. For there will be people, on the day of judgment, who will say to Christ: “Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven. MANY WILL SAY TO ME IN THAT DAY, Lord, Lord, HAVE WE NOT PROPHESIED IN THY NAME and IN THY NAME HAVE CAST OUT DEVILS? and IN THY NAME DONE MANY WONDERFUL WORKS? (Christ does not deny their statements, but He does say to them) And THEN WILL I PROFESS UNTO THEM, I NEVER KNEW YOU: DEPART FROM ME, YE THAT WORK INIQUITY.” (Matthew 7:21‑23)
(KJV)
So while these people did many wonderful things in the name of Christ, they were not worshiping Him, they were worshiping another god, yet because they did have a little faith, they could do many things in His name.
This is exactly the same thing that occurred with the Canaanite woman whose daughter was vexed with a demon: “And, behold, A WOMAN OF CANAAN CAME OUT OF THE SAME COASTS, AND CRIED UNTO HIM, SAYING, HAVE MERCY ON ME, O LORD, THOU SON OF DAVID; MY DAUGHTER IS GRIEVOUSLY VEXED WITH A DEVIL. But HE ANSWERED HER NOT A WORD. And his disciples came and besought him, saying, Send her away; for she crieth after us. But HE ANSWERED AND SAID, I AM NOT SENT BUT UNTO THE LOST SHEEP OF THE HOUSE OF ISRAEL. THEN CAME SHE AND WORSHIPED HIM, SAYING, LORD, HELP ME. BUT HE ANSWERED AND SAID, IT IS NOT MEET TO TAKE THE CHILDREN’S BREAD, AND TO CAST IT TO DOGS. (Here Christ is calling the woman a dog, which to most Christians today would be reprehensible, when even the word nigger strikes fear in their hearts. Think how much fear that His word would strike in them if they had heard Him say that?) And SHE SAID, TRUTH, LORD: YET THE DOGS EAT OF THE CRUMBS WHICH FALL FROM THEIR MASTERS’ TABLE. (Here she accepted His words, and did not take offense at them, for she recognized the truth in His words, that she was NOT one of His Israel Children) THEN JESUS ANSWERED AND SAID UNTO HER, O WOMAN, GREAT IS THY FAITH: BE IT UNTO THEE EVEN AS THOU WILT. AND HER DAUGHTER WAS MADE WHOLE FROM THAT VERY HOUR (Now Christ DID NOT HEAL HER DAUGHTER, but the woman from Canaan, her faith made it possible for her daughter to be healed).” (Matthew 15:22‑28) (KJV)
Here we can see the woman from Canaan land, her daughter was healed through His name, not by His actual deed, but her faith healed her daughter; just as those Christ was talking to when He said I never knew you. They were Christians in name only, and were not true worshipers of Christ. For they worshiped another god not the Lord Jesus Christ, even though they professed to be worshiping Him.
But now you are no longer ignorant concerning this matter. You will be presented with the facts in this lesson that the Easter worship is indeed the worship of the goddess Ishtar, and not the worship of Jesus Christ, as you have been taught to believe. It is up to you to discern the truth of this matter from the facts that will be presented. He that heareth, let him hear; and he that forbeareth, let him forbear. If you forbear, then your blood shall be upon your own head. If you hear the truth of this matter, then repent.
Let's begin with the fact that nowhere in the Scriptures does God tell us to worship the resurrection of Christ, what Easter is supposedly all about. Therefore, the Easter worship is a Tradition of Men. What does the Scripture tell us about the traditions of men? "Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, after the rudiments of the world, and not after Christ." (Colossians 2:8)
Beware, lest the traditions of men spoil you. Why? Because they are not of Christ and they will lead you astray. Furthermore, what more do the Scriptures have to say about those who would insist that it is Christ whom they are worshiping at Easter, according to the tradition of men? "Wherefore the Lord said, Forasmuch as this people draw near me with their mouth, and with their lips do honour me, but have removed their heart far from me, and their fear toward me is taught by the precept of men." (Isaiah 29:13)
The people do honor the Lord with their lips, lip service, but their hears are far removed from Him, because their fear, their reverence, and their worship of Him is taught by the precepts and traditions of men. The Easter worship is a tradition of man, and its origin comes from the worship of the pagan goddess Ishtar. God tells us over and over throughout the Scriptures to leave behind those traditions of men, to come out of mystery Babylon.
On that note, let's look at the history of the goddess Ishtar and her connection with mystery Babylon, meaning confusion, from the root word Babel. To fully understand the origin of the worship of the goddess Ishtar and her subsequent history, we must find go back to the origin of mystery Babylon and understand from whence this worship evolved, even back to the garden of Eden.
We know from God's word what the true nature of the sin in the garden was, a sexual relationship between Eve and Satan, and from this relationship Cain was born. Cain was the son of Satan, the serpent, called the devil. Cain was the founder of ancient Babylon in Sumeria, and history bears this out. In Genesis 4, the Scripture tells us that Cain built a city and named it after his son Enoch. Archaeologists have uncovered ancient city that is called Erech located in what we know today as Iraq, the land of Babylon.
The king of this ancient Babylon was known as Sargon, which translated means King Cain. To make a long story short for the sake of sticking to the subject of Ishtar, Cain made deities of Adam and Eve. He called them Anu and Ea, later known as Ishtar. His other chief deity was Bel, a form of Baal, another name for Satan.
Without digressing too far, a thorough study of the evolution of mythology and most world religions will lead one back to ancient Babylon and Cain. For a more thorough study concerning Cain and his conquests, order the book "Sargon the Magnificent." Now that we have taken you back to the beginning, to the origin of this worship of Ishtar and where it comes from, let's now move onto Ishtar herself. Let's find out what Ishtar is all about, the stories and myths about her, what was involved in the worship of her, and what that worship signified. The following passage is an excerpt from "The Encyclopedia of Religion, Vol. 7: "Inanna, the Sumerian astral deity representing the planet Venus, was known throughout the Mesopotamian world; the Akkadians (and later the Assyro-Babylonians) called her Ishtar. For both the Sumerians and the Akkadians, she was the principal goddess in their respective pantheons. Inanna-Ishtar's closest counterparts to the west are the Canaanite Astarte (called Ashtoreth by the Hebrews) and the later goddesses of Greece and Rome, Aphrodite and Venus.
One of the most important myths about Inanna-Ishtar concerns her relationship to the shepherd god Dumuzi-Tammuz, who is probably a divination of an actual early ruler of Uruk (Erech, the city Enoch of Genesis 4). Although the myth has many variations, its basic outline can be reconstructed from the Sumerian 'Inanna's Descent to the Netherworld,' the Akkadian parallel 'Ishtar's Descent,' and recently translated fragments of the 'Death of Dumuzi,' as well as various laments for Dumuzi and a large set of 'Sacred Marriage' texts.
According to these sources, Inanna and Dumuzi have a passionate love affair and marriage. Subsequently the goddess wants to visit the underworld ruled by her enemy and sister Ereshkigal, probably to rule there as well as in heaven. After bedecking herself with jewels and finery, Inanna descends and is met at the gate by a servant of Ereshkigal, who at various stages removes her garments. Finally she approaches her sister naked and humiliated. Ereshkigal fastens on her the 'eyes of death,' turns her into a corpse, and hangs her body on a stake.
Inanna's servant, worried after three days of her absence, fashions creatures who descend with revivifying materials. They bring her back to life and she reascends to earth, accompanied by frightened demons who wander with her from city to city in Summer. When she returns to Uruk she finds her lover Dumuzi not bewailing her plight in the underworld, but actually celebrating it. She sets after him the demons, who after a long chase overtake and torture him and drag him down to the underworld.
There are many variations of this myth, but its importance lies in the love affair between Dumuzi-Tammuz, who comes to represent the annual dying and regenerated vegetative cycle, and Inanna-Ishtar, the embodiment of the generative force in nature. In their intercourse she fecundates the growth cycle of spring.
This came to be ritualized in an annual ceremony in which the king, representing Dumuzi-Tammuz, entered into a hieros gamos, a sacred marriage, with a sacred temple prostitute, representing Inanna-Ishtar, and thus sympathetically brought regeneration to the land. Their intercourse was, in a sense, the resurrection of the dead god, and lamenting turned into rejoicing. The popularity and geographical spread of this myth and its ritualization are attested in Ezekiel 8:14, where the prophet condemns the practice followed by some Jerusalem women lamenting for Tammuz." (The Encyclopedia of Religion, Vol. 7)
Let's look at this passage from Ezekiel for a moment. "He said also unto me, Turn thee yet again, and thou shalt see greater abominations that they do. The he brought me to the door of the gate of the Lord's house which was toward the north; and, behold, there sat women weeping for Tammuz. The said he unto me, Hast thou seen this, O son of man? turn thee yet again and thou shalt see great abominations than these." (Ezekiel 8:13-15)
You see, the Lord is condemning this practice of worshiping Ishtar and lamenting for Tammuz, and calls it a great abomination Easter worship is an abomination to God. Let's reflect back upon the story of Ishtar and pick out some of the key points. Notice the resemblance of the story of Ishtar to that which is written in the Gospel about our Savior, Jesus Christ.
As Ishtar descended, she was stripped and humiliated; Jesus was stripped and beaten in humility. Ishtar was killed and hung on a stake; Jesus was crucified on a stake. Ishtar was resurrected after three days; Jesus rose from the tomb on the third day. By now it should be quite obvious to you why Easter is in fact the worship of Ishtar.
Satan has taken the truth about Christ and overlaid it with the worship of Ishtar, bringing it into the church through the traditions of men and presenting it as the celebration of Easter, a transliteration of the word Ishtar. Satan knew the purpose of this earth age and has tried repeatedly to subvert God's plan. He tried to corrupt the seed line in the garden so that Christ could not be born and die on the stake.
Satan failed at that attempt, so he used his offspring, Cain and the Kenites (the sons of Cain) to propagate false religions and myths that have a resemblance to the truth. In order to create confusion and disbelief so as to deceive God's children. For every positive there is a negative, and Satan is the Great Imitator.
Remember, Satan's whole thrust is to be worshiped as God. Let's for a moment review a few more of the characteristics of Ishtar, not losing sight of the story of Ishtar and what the ritualistic worship of her represented, the resurrection of the dead god. Ishtar was also known as the Queen of Heaven (there is a large denomination that openly prays to the Queen of Heaven). Ishtar was connected to the planet Venus, called both the "morning star" and the "evening star." Ishtar was worshiped as female in the morning and male in the evening. You should also note that in Isaiah 14:12, Lucifer, another name for Satan, is called the son of the morning. The name Lucifer itself means "the morning star." Ishtar is also called the goddess of fertility, from another one of her notorious legends. As the legend goes, an egg fell from heaven one day and landed in the Euphrates river. Some fish managed to roll the egg to shore, hence the tradition of rolling Easter eggs.
Then several doves (a symbol of the Holy Spirit) descended from heaven and incubated the egg and hatched the goddess Ishtar, the goddess of Easter. The egg became the universal symbol for fertility, and as such can be traced to pagan ritual and worship worldwide. Like the egg, the rabbit became part of the Easter tradition because it too was a symbol of fertility in ancient Egypt. Let's now look at how this practice of worshiping the goddess Ishtar/Ashtoreth/Astarte was promulgated by the children of Israel. Pay attention to the word "groves." The Hebrew word for groves is "Asherah," a form of Ashtoreth/Astarte, pointing right back to Ishtar. "And the children of Israel did secretly those things that were not right against the Lord their God, and they built them high places in all their cities, from the tower of the watchmen to the fenced city. And they set them up images and groves in every high hill, and under every green tree: And there they burnt incense in all the high places, as did the heathen whom the Lord carried away before them; and wrought wicked things to provoke the Lord to anger: For they served idols, whereof the Lord had said unto them, Ye shall not do this thing." (2 Kings 17:9-12)
Using the Strong's Concordance Hebrew dictionary, let's look at the word for "groves."
groves...
Hebrew 842. 'asherah, ash-ay-raw'; or 'asheyrah, ash-ay-raw'; from Heb. 833; happy; Asherah (or Astarte) a Phoenician goddess; also an image of the same:-grove. Comp. Heb. 6253.
Hebrew 6253. 'Ashtoreth, ash-to'-reth; prob. for Heb. 6251; Ashtoreth, the Phoenician goddess of love (and increase):-Ashtoreth. The Asherah was a phallic symbol, shaped in the image of the male organ.
Again, the children of Israel participated in this heathen ritual of worshiping Ishtar, the "grove worship," and wrought wicked things that provoked the Lord to anger, after being commanded not to do this thing.
Will our people continue in this abominable practice of worshiping Ishtar/Easter and provoking the Lord to anger? Let's look at another instance of this practice among the children of Israel. "But they hearkened not: and Manasseh seduced them to do more evil than did the nations whom the Lord destroyed before the children of Israel. And the Lord spake by his servants the prophets, saying, Because Manasseh king of Judah hath done these abominations, and hath done wickedly above all that the Amorites did, which were before him, and hath made Judah also to sin with his idols." (2 Kings 21:9-11)
What was that Manasseh did? From the Reader Digest "Great People of the Bible and How They Lived." "Inside the Jerusalem temple he placed an image of Ishtar, the Assyrian goddess of love and war, associated with the planet Venus. In her name, priest and male worshipers engaged in ritual sex with 'holy' prostitutes housed in the temple, a practice that was supposed to promote the fertility of crops, herds and families (akin to the rebirth or resurrection from the dead)." (Great People of the Bible and How They Lived)
Manasseh brought the worship of into the temple, the house of God. The priests performed ritualistic sexual orgies with the temple prostitutes to worship the fertility goddess and promote the symbolic resurrection of the dead god.
Manasseh was not the only king to bring this worship into the temple. King Ahab under the influence of his wife Jezebel also brought the worship of Ishtar into the house of God. "And Ahab the son of Omri did evil in the sight of the Lord above all that were before him. And it came to pass, as if it had been a light thing for him to walk in the sins of Jeroboam the son of Nebat, that he took to wife Jezebel the daughter of Ethbaal king of the Zidonians, and went and served Baal, and worshiped him. And he reared up an altar for Baal in the house of Baal, which he had built in Samaria. And Ahab made a grove; and Ahab did more to provoke the Lord God of Israel to anger than all the kings of Israel that were before him...But there was none like unto Ahab, which did sell himself to work wickedness in the sight of the Lord, whom Jezebel his wife stirred up. And he did very abominably in following idols, according to all things as did the Amorites, whom the Lord cast out before the children of Israel." (1 Kings 16:30-33; 21:25-26)
Ahab, through the influence of Jezebel built an altar to Baal and also made groves. Remember the groves were for the worship of Ishtar, from the Hebrew word Asherah/Ashtoreth. Let's now go to these end times and see what God has to tell us about this Easter/Ishtar worship. "And the angel of the church in Thyatira write; These things saith the Son of God, who hath his eyes like unto a flame of fire, and his feet are like fine brass; I know thy works, and charity, and service, and faith, and they patience, and thy works; and the last to be more than the first. Notwithstanding I have a few things against thee, because thou sufferest that woman Jezebel, which calleth herself a prophetess, to teach and to seduce my servants to commit fornication, and to eat things sacrificed unto idols. And I gave her space to repent of her fornication; and she repented not. Behold I will cast her into a bed, and them that commit adultery with her into great tribulation, except they repent of their deeds." (Revelation 2:18-22)
King Ahab suffered that woman Jezebel, his wife, and brought the worship of the goddess Ishtar into the House of God. Do you suffer that woman Jezebel? Are you still practicing your worship of Easter, whose worship goes to Ishtar and not to Christ? God has given you His warning. He has given her space to repent of her fornication, and she repented not. Where do you stand, with Christ or with Jezebel?
In this study we have presented you with the facts and history concerning Ishtar/Easter. You have had the opportunity to see that the worship of Ishtar and the ritualistic sexual orgies were symbolic for the resurrection of the dead god, the very thing Christians purport to be celebrating the resurrection of Christ.
Easter is a tradition of men and is taught by the precepts of men. It is an abominable, idolatrous and adulterous practice. Jesus said "follow me," not the goddess Ishtar. You must be aware of the wiles of the Devil. Satan has cleverly inserted the worship of the goddess Ishtar into the church, calling it Easter, by slightly twisting and corrupting the truth and perverting the minds of God's children, causing them to provoke the Lord to anger.
They Call It Holy: South African evangelist Rodney Howard-Browne has introduced Charismatics to what he calls "laughing revivals," in which people may roll on the floor and laugh hysterically. At Oral Roberts University at a recent Howard-Browne meeting, Our President Richard Roberts "ended up on the floor laughing." His father, Oral Roberts, said the phenomenon signaled the arrival of "another level in the Holy Spirit." (The Sword & The Trumpet, Winter 95 Box 870, Chandler, Texas 75758)
In reporting on "holy laughter" at a camp meeting in 1994, Warren Smith, writer for SCP Newsletter, said that pastors were stumbling around the church stage "drunk" with "holy" laughter, which was considered "proof" of the "power of the spirit" over them. Both Trinity Broadcasting Network (TBN) and Pat Robertson of the 700 Club have endorsed "holy laughter." But Smith suggests that Christians should examine it very closely, as it just might be from Satan rather than from God. (His article may be obtained from Spiritual Counterfeits Project, Box 4308, Berkeley, CA 94704. It is in newsletter Vol. 19.2)
Immigrants Recruited: According to the St. Petersburg Times, as confirmed in the Washington Times. The U.S. is secretly recruiting more immigrants in more than 100 countries. The secret recruitment is part of a program in which the United States tries to encourage immigrants from places that are "under represented in the current cultural mix."
This report, from Criminal Politics (Feb. 95) says that the object of the plan, out of the offices of the Jew Henry Kissinger is to "diversify" all non-Jewish races. Beginning in January 1995, 55,000 foreigners, from such places as Mongolia and various African countries, are to be awarded visas for permanent resident status. Suzanne Lawrence, a spokeswoman for the State Department, is quoted as saying, "it is to diversify the existing pool of immigrants." Criminal Politics points out that it is no longer possible for White Gentiles to identify themselves as such without being accused of racism and bigotry, and children may be conditioned so that they will never identify themselves with their heritage. (Criminal Politics, Box 37812, Cincinnati, OH 45222)
Culture Change: "Ethnic conflict is a worldwide phenomenon." Donald Horowitzx. "Plural societies" (with culturally divergent ethnic groups) are "defined by descensus and pregnant with conflict." Authoritative population projection indicates that within the lives of some people now living, the United States is destined to become a thoroughly multiracial, multi cultural society in which non-Hispanic Whites will constitute only a minority of the population.
The largely unconsidered result of past and present immigration policies is that the United States is in the process of changing the racial and cultural composition of its population to a degree probably unprecedented in human history, except for situations involving the military conquest of a society by a foreign aggressor. (Ethnic Conflicts Abroad: Clues to America's Future? by Glaister A. and Evelyn E. Elmer, published by The American Immigration Control Foundation, P.O. Box 525, Monterey, VA 24465)
A New Threat: Dr. Alvin J. Schmidt, professor of sociology at Illinois College, Jacksonville, IL, writing in The Lutheran Witness, of December 94, describes how multiculturalism threatens the church and the Gospel. For example, he says, grade-school books present pagan beliefs of American Indians as valid religious practices, because all religions are of equal value, and the Ten Commandments are held as merely the reflection of a certain culture, and thus no better than any other culture's code of moral behavior. Multiculturalists argue that all cultures are morally relative, and not to be criticized. We are not to brand as immoral the Hindu practice of suttee, which required burning alive the husband's widow on his funeral pyre, nor the bloody human sacrifices practiced by the Aztec, Mayan Indian or the Jewish Ritual Murders.
Many multiculturalist writings present pagan religions in a favorable light while denouncing Western (Christian) culture. Even witches are presented positively. The anti-Bias Curriculum encourages grade-school teachers to tell their children that witches were not "bad," but women "who really helped people." It also tells teachers to instruct pupils in holidays other than Christmas and to support the children who do not celebrate Christmas.
"The message is clear," Schmidt writes. "Christ's Great Commission of going into all the world (cultures) and making disciples is politically incorrect. Christianity has no greater claim to God's truth than any other culture's religion... multiculturalism will further erode our nation's morality, largely derived from Biblical norms." (The Christian News, 2/27/95)
Child Slavery: Levi's is using "thousands of children (who) toil like robots in Bangladesh sweatshops that churn out Levi's and other garments for the blue jeans barons," according to a reporter for a British newspaper who recently toured the factory. He discovered children working 16-hour days, six days a week, children who were fired if they got sick and were working and living in squalor. The marketing efforts of Levi Strauss have met with great acceptance among homosexuals. American Family Association began promoting a boycott of Levi Strauss products (Levi's, Dockers, Britannia clothing) when the company cut off financial support of the Boy Scouts of America because they would not allow homosexuals and atheists to be scoutmasters. (AFA Journal, 2/95)
Land of The Free: A compassionate man who was telling the Gospel message on the street was arrested by State police, handcuffed and taken to jail. A judge sentenced him to six months probation and ordered him not to witness on that street. His case is being appealed by the Christian Law Association. Attorney David Gibbs III says, "It is a frightening thought that...telling another person about Jesus Christ could be classified and punished as criminal activity by a court in the United States of America." (Minutemen Alert, 3/95)
But it is just such false teachings as that above which has caused our people to miss the True Doctrine of Christ:
The Lion Out of Judah
From listening to the Judeo-Christian preachers, ministers, evangelists, and etc., which I will refer to from here on to save space and time, as Judeo-Christian teachers; preach and teach lies about the Lord Jesus Christ that I am presenting the following for your review and study. Key Questions which we will try to answer are as follows:
1). Was Jesus a Jew?
2). From where does salvation come?
3). Does this study relate to world events today?
First let's take a look at the word Jew. If you will take any good encyclopedia you will find that there was no such thing as a Jew at the time Christ was on the earth. Second that the letter "J" did not become part of the English Alphabet until some time around 1500. Then Strong's Exhaustive Concordance in the Greek Dictionary of the New Testament relates the following:
Jew...
Greek #2453. 'Ioudaios, ee-oo-dah'-yos; from 2448 (in the sense of 2455 AS A COUNTRY); Judean, i.e. belonging to Jehudah:-Jew (-ess), OF JUDEA.
Greek 2448. Iouda, ee-oo-dah'; of Heb. or [3063 or perh. 3194]; Judah (i.e. Jehudah or Juttah), A PART OF (or place in) Pal.:-JUDEAN.
In the 4th chapter of the Gospel according to the Apostle John we find the record of some astounding teachings of Jesus. In His conversation with the Samaritan woman at the well near the town of Syhchar, He made it plain that salvation was very different in character from that which the Jews (Pharisees) had been teaching the people. But He also said that salvation is of the Jews. This makes the passage puzzling in the English language, and it has led too many people astray: Causing them to believe a lie; and it needs careful study if it is to be correctly understood, as we shall see.
Why is it so important to understand this particular portion of the Bible? It is important for Christians to understand ALL of the Bible, but this passage is of special significance because of the current, but erroneous, opinion among many that Christianity arose out of Judaism, that there exists a Judeo-Christian value system, that Jews have their own covenant with God which circumvents Jesus Christ and His atonement, and that the United States has a special obligation to the religious political Zionist state of Israel. In short, a correct understanding of this Scripture helps to place the above issues in their proper perspectives.
We are faced with THE IMPOSSIBLE TASK OF MAKING THIS CLEAR TO THOSE WHO HAVE LITTLE DESIRE TO STUDY DETAILS, and THOSE WHO DEMAND A MORE SCHOLARLY EXPLANATION. We hope this presentation will meet the needs of everyone. For those who dislike details, please make an effort to "hang in there;" for we believe the results will be worth while.
FIRST: A Synopsis of John 4:5-26:
Verses 5-6: Jesus and His disciples traveled from Judea in the south to Galilee in the north, and stopped on the way at a water well outside of Sychar, a town in Samaria.
Verses 7-8: A Samaritan woman came to the well for water. Jesus asked for a drink.
Verse 9: The woman wondered why Jesus talked to her because she perceived He was a Jew, and Jews shunned Samaritans.
Verse 10: Jesus told her that if she knew the gift of God and Who was speaking to her, she would ask Him for living water.
Verses 11-12: The woman didn't comprehend what He meant. She noted that He had no container with which to draw water, and besides, did He think He was greater than her forefather Jacob who dug the well and drank from it?
Verses 13-14: Jesus told her that the water from the well would not satisfy thirst indefinitely, but the living water He gave would produce eternal life.
Verse 15: The woman still didn't comprehend, but was eager for such water that would prevent her having to come back to the well repeatedly. She wanted to reduce her work load.
Verses 16-18: Jesus told her to fetch her husband, but she confessed she had no husband, whereupon Jesus acknowledged she told the truth, for she had lived with five men and the present one was not her husband.
Verses 19-20: The woman immediately perceived that Jesus was a prophet because He knew the intimate details of her life. Defensively, she then appealed to her religion and her forefathers, contrasting her beliefs with those of the Jews who worshiped at Jerusalem, and ascribing to Jesus the religious beliefs of the Jews.
Verses 21-24: Jesus disavowed His connection with either Jewish worship at Jerusalem or Samaritan worship at Gerizim, and said the hour was near when no one would worship at either place. He said she didn't comprehend what she worshiped, and that "we know what we worship for salvation is of the Jews." He said the hour had come when true worshipers would worship God in spirit and in truth, for such the Father seeks to worship Him. He said God is spirit, therefore whoever worships Him must worship in spirit and in truth.
Verse 25: The woman said she knew Messiah was coming and He would show them all things.
Verse 26: Jesus then told her that He was the Messiah.
Mandatory considerations for a correct understanding: A superficial reading of this passage of John's Gospel will not suffice to render a correct interpretation. We must study it very carefully.
In Verse 9 the Bible doesn't state that Jesus was a Jew. The woman ASSUMED He was a Jew. We're not told why she assumed this; perhaps it was because she knew He was traveling FROM Judea to Galilee.
The Bible often records the statements and opinions of the people in it, but their statements are not necessarily true unless the text is clear that God agrees with them, or that the statement is given to them by God. An obvious example of this is when Calaphas the High Priest accused Jesus of blasphemy. (Matthew 26:65)
Note also in verse 9 that the Bible doesn't say that the Samaritans hated the Jews, but that the woman said the Jews had no dealings with the Samaritans. The Old Testament and history tell us that the Samaritans were a mixture of the tribes of Israel with outsiders and that is why the Jews shunned them. It was primarily the Jews who were the snobs, although the Samaritans were not guiltless.
It is obvious that Jesus was not snobbish - He was not only passing through their land which the Jews would not do (and He would not walk in Jewry because the Jews sought to kill Him John 7:1) - but was conversing with one of them, another act forbidden by the Jews. This tells us that JESUS DID NOT PRACTICE THE RELIGION OF THE JEWS in this matter.
Verse 10: Jesus initiated a "witnessing" situation in which He offered universal salvation to the woman. He was doing His Father's business by giving an open invitation to a non-Jew to become a child of God. He was contradicting everything the Jews believed about Messiah.
Verses 11-12: The Samaritan woman considered herself a descendant of Jacob who was the patriarch of all the 12 Tribes of Israel. She thought of Jacob as a great man. She considered herself to be as true to the laws of Moses as the Jews, maybe more so. She was partly correct, for the Samaritans did not practice Rabbinism as the Jews did.
Also the Scriptures attest that the Jews only gave lip service to the Laws of God as given to the Israelites by Almighty God: "For had ye (Jews) believed Moses..." (John 5:46)
Thus we have it that the Jews did not believe Moses, nor did they teach the people to obey God Laws, they taught them to observe the Tradition of the Elders (which later became codified as The Talmud) which is totally opposite.
The Scriptures further attest to the fact that Jesus did not recognize the leadership of the Jews, and that they were not the legitimate rulers of Israel by: "Therefore say I (Christ) unto you, The kingdom of God shall be taken from you (because you do not deserve to possess it, as you have no right to it), and given to a nation bringing forth the fruits thereof (to the rightful heirs of it)." (Matthew 21:43)
Verses 13-14: Jesus was teaching with metaphors - figures of speech. Living water obviously meant eternal life. He was giving her the gospel of salvation message. Like the Roman Centurion whose servant needed healing (Matthew 8:5-13) and the Canaanite woman whose daughter needed healing (Matthew 15:21-28),
Jesus demonstrated throughout His ministry that salvation was available to anyone, not to the Jews. He found great faith among some non-Jews.
Verse 15: The Samaritan woman dwelt on worldly things, not understanding that Jesus talked to her of spiritual things. God's primary concern is with our spiritual condition, but the Samaritan woman repeatedly focused on her worldly desires. You and I often do the same thing.
Verse 16-18: The woman was a sinner but Jesus did not condemn her to hell for that. He was truthful and firm, but kind. This again tells us that He was not a Jew because the Jews, according to the Bible, were exclusivists. They would not have talked to the Samaritan woman, much less have offered her kindness and salvation. Remember the account of the good Samaritan, recorded in Luke 10:30-36.
Verses 19-20: Because Jesus obviously knew the woman's sins, she at once acknowledged Him as a prophet, but human nature being what it is, she retreated defensively into her own mind-set, i.e., that her religion was just as good as the Jewish religion. She inferred that Jesus was like all other Jews, demanding that she worship at Jerusalem.
Verses 21-24: Did Jesus demand that she confirm to Judaism by worshiping at Jerusalem? No, He did not. Instead, He told her that all true worshipers of God would soon worship Him in spirit and truth and that no true believer would worship at either Jerusalem or at Gerizim (the Samaritan place of worship).
Why did Jesus use “We?": Why did Jesus use the plural we in v. 22? It is important that we turn to John 3:11 and 14:23 for similar situations. In John 3:11, for example, He was talking to Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews. Nicodemus had asked how he could be born again, whereupon Jesus said, "...I say unto thee, WE speak that WE do know, and testify that WE have seen; and ye receive not OUR witness." He used the plural four times, and the situation is closely parallel to the one with the Samaritan woman. His use of WE was much like our editorial WE. Therefore the conclusion that He meant His Father God and Himself.
In Spirit and in Truth: What does it mean to worship God in spirit and in truth? For this answer we go to the two great commandments given by Jesus: Love God genuinely and thoroughly (and strive to bring our characters into line with His); and Love our neighbors as ourselves (Matthew 22:37-40)-treat others as we would like to be treated, commensurate with the principles of the New Testament.
This is the worship that God is seeking. Jesus gave this message to the Samaritan woman and the people of Sychar. He didn't tell her to go to Jerusalem and worship with the Jews; there is no record that He told her to seek out some synagogue OR church to attend.
The Jews wouldn't have received her anyway, and He knew that the temple at Jerusalem would be destroyed a few years hence. The change from old covenant to new covenant was now being implemented. The Samaritan woman and many residents of the town became Christians. Jesus stayed with them two days and taught them.
Is Salvation from the Jews?: Now we back up a bit and deal with that troublesome clause in verse 22: "...for salvation is of the Jews." (KJV)
Considering the whole context thus far, did Jesus promote Judaism? It is clear that He didn't. If He didn't promote Judaism, how could salvation be of the Jews? We just learned that He told the woman of Samaria that He was the Messiah, the Living Water. Wouldn't it be a contradiction for Him to tell her that in Him was salvation and then turn right around and tell her that salvation was of the Jews? We know that elsewhere (John 14:6) He said: "I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh to the Father, but by me." What, then, is our answer?
The answer will be found by understanding the entire New Testament, history, and the language of this passage. The preposition OF in the KJV (salvation is OF the Jews), or FROM in several other translations, does not accurately reflect the Greek. The Greek language was far more specific than English when using prepositions.
For example, FROM in English could mean that a person walked from the house, but we wouldn't know whether the person was in the house and walked out of it, or standing against the outside wall and walked away from it. Not so with the Greek. We would know exactly what happened if the Greek preposition "ek" were used; the person would have been inside the house and walked out of it, for "ek" means OUT OF. And that's the preposition used by the Apostle John when he recorded Jesus' saying that salvation is OUT OF the Jews. We will return to this later.
However, knowledge about this preposition is insufficient for a complete answer to the problem. The next language barrier is the word JEWS. This may come as a surprise to many, but it is impossible for Jesus to have used the word JEWS, for the simple reason that the word did not exist in His time. It didn't arrive on the scene of history until the Greek or Latin Bible was translated into English hundreds of years later, and then it had to evolve into its present form. Here's how it happened.
Who were the Judeans?: Judeans were inhabitants of southern Palestine, the area called Judea (Judaea). This was where Jerusalem and the temple were located. Judea is the same as Judah, and Judah was the tribe of Israel that was allocated that geographical area when all twelve tribes conquered the inhabitants of Palestine in about 1400 B.C. The patriarch of the tribe was the fourth son of Jacob, who was the son of Isaac, and Isaac was the son of Abraham.
Jacob, who had been renamed Israel (Genesis 32:28) by God had twelve sons, each of whom was the patriarch of a tribe of Israel, each of which received a portion of the land of Palestine. God had already planned that the "legal" lineage of Messiah would be through Judah, for in Genesis 49:10 Moses wrote: "The scepter shall not depart from Judah, nor a law-giver from between his feet, until Shiloh come; and unto him shall the gathering of the people be."
The Tribe of Judah was the largest of the twelve and the most influential. It had the place of leadership. God simply said that it would continue in this position until Shiloh, Who was Messiah, came Messiah would then take the leadership and receive the allegiance of the people. We now know that Jesus Christ's legal linage was traced through Judah back to David and to Abraham, and those who believed on Him gave Him their allegiance in fulfillment of the prophecy quoted above. He took the scepter from Judah.
At the time of Christ's ministry, mixed blood existed in Judea. Not all of its inhabitants were descended from Judah. Many were Edomites, descendants of Esau. However, the Edomites had submitted to circumcision in about 130 B.C. and therefore became co-religionists with the Judahites, who by then were practicing Rabbinism which had been developed during the exile in Babylon.
Some Judeans (were Jews), therefore, were those who practiced the religion with which Jesus clashed. Rabbinism was a conglomeration of the context of the Old Testament, Babylonian mysticism, and human rationalizations, it is referred to in the New Testament as the "Tradition of the Elders," (Matthew 15:1-3) and is known today as Talmudism, or Judaism. Its rulers were entrenched at Jerusalem at Judea.
Jesus would not walk in “Jewry": We see in the King James Version that Jesus would not walk in "Jewry" (among the Jews or Pharisees) any longer because the Jews sought to kill Him. (John 7:1) The English word "Jewry" is "Ioudaias" (Judean) in Greek, but modern translations no longer use "Jewry." For example the New American Standard Bible (NASB) sates: "And after these things Jesus was walking in Galilee; for He was unwilling to walk in Judea, because the Jews were seeking to kill Him."
It is unfortunate that we have not been taught the exact truth about these expressions. What this verse simply means is that those who practiced the religion head-quartered at Jerusalem wanted to kill Him. Actually, the King James Translators had the right idea - they recognized that "Jewry" was the religion of the Pharisees, and not that of the Israelites.
In our time most people think of the Jews as the people of Israel but that's not correct. An Israelite was one who had descended from Jacob/Israel and who practiced the moral, civil, and ritual laws given by God to Moses. In Jesus' time the Jews may or may not have descended from Jacob/Israel, but they practiced Rabbinism. Jesus fulfilled all things given by God to Moses, whereas the Jews held on to the shell only, and have been trying to take back the birthright their father Esau sold to Jacob/Israel.
In a yet more faithful version (paraphrase) of the New Testament, we could render that portion of John 7:1 this way: "...He was unwilling to walk in Judea, because the Rabbinate was seeking to kill him."
Antithesis of Christianity: Today, the term "Jews" should denote those who adhere to the "Talmud," the bible of Rabbinism, although many Jews are secularists. In any case, the beliefs of Jewish leadership are the antithesis of true Christianity. We can see this antithesis operating from ancient times right up to the present.
For example, Gershon Mamiak, in the June/July 1989 issue of "Midstream," a Jewish publication, praised Caiaphas the High Priest and his colleagues for condemning Jesus. He said: "Their rejection of Jesus' teaching is one of the glorious episodes of Jewish history." (The Two Trials of Jesus, pp. 29-32)
This statement by Mamiak might be construed as genocidal Christian-bashing, the reverse of what Jewish leaders think is anti-Semitism. If someone were to say that Hitler's rejection of the Jews was one of the glorious episodes of Gentile history, all hades would break loose in the mass media and that person might even be sued.
An apology would be demanded and probably received, just as in the case of the Rev. Bailey Smith of Oklahoma, who several years ago said that God does not hear the prayers of Jews. He became, overnight, unbearably controversial; the media just wouldn't let it rest. He finally recanted and "joined" them.
Probably most Jews depend upon their rabbis for knowledge of the "Talmud" and its interpretation, just as most Christians, unfortunately, depend upon their Judeo-Christian teachers and other teachers for explanations of the Bible. And it is certainly true that practically all Christians are ignorant of Rabbinism-Talmudism, better known as Judaism. This is why they still think of Jews as the people of Israel and vice versa.
Was Jesus A Jew?: We are now prepared to ask the vital question: was Jesus a Jew? Given the above historical and Biblical evidences and current Jewish opinions, it is impossible for Jesus to have been a Jew. Add to that the fact that He was born without a human father and was conceived by the Holy Spirit in a virgin, we can see the absurdity and blasphemy of calling Jesus a Jew, or in believing that Christianity rose out of Judaism. It is also a mistake to believe that Jews are a race, even though many of them believe that one must be born of a Jewish mother in order to be a Jew. In reality, the Jewish community is composed of religious factions and secularists within a more or less pluralistic culture.
Let the reader be informed hereby that I venture upon my theme as an Israelite or non-Jew, addressing other Israelites including Christians. The theologian may find nothing new with respect to Christ as the Son of Man unless it may be the writer’s point of view, and especially the nationalistic implications arising therefrom.
Concerning the latter we beg the reader’s indulgence with respect to the unity of the theme; for I find that such unity is justified by the attitude of Judaism toward the modern political state as well as its historical attitude toward the Christian religion, both of which may be described in a word as disintegrating.
This is by no means the first defense of the postulate that Christ was not a Jew. Ebionitism, “the earliest of the heresies,” rested upon the same false assumption that is herein called into question. That heresy denounced Paul and the other apostles who carried Christianity to the Israelites without first converting them to Judaism. The Ebionites were Judeo-Christians; more Jewish than Christian. Hence, this is but a new answer to an old fallacy in the light of the present. In a book of this limited size and well-nigh boundless scope, much must remain unsaid. We have aimed to state the case for the affirmative of my postulate, cover the main points as outlined, and give my conclusions backed by ancient and modern sources.
Timeless is given to this theme by the recent growth in assertiveness of the Jews throughout Christendom. Such growths have been shown by history to have recurred repeatedly, and to have ended invariably in a catastrophe cor the Jews. The present tendency in that direction is aggrieved by the tacit assent; not to call it timidity, of certain occupants of Christian pulpits, who by their acquiescence in the Jewish boast that they have given us Christ and our religion, put themselves at an enormous disadvantage before the Israelite world, if not in their own consciences. Their place is in the synagogue.
What then? Must the Israelite world come to the rescue of Christianity from the clutches of modern Ebionitism as did the Greek Christians before and after the Apostle Paul? We Israelites have been accused of cowardice for tolerating this situation. A Jewish writer (Marcus Eli Ravage, A Real Case Against the Jews, Century Magazine, January 1928) has accused us of cowardice because we have refrained from speaking our minds in all frankness about Judaism and the Jews. Courtesy on the critic’s part might have discovered reasons more compatible with good manners, assuming that he was able to do so.
However, this volume accepts the challenge of the critic above mentioned, and I shall leave nothing unsaid that I think needs to be said concerning Judaism and the Jews as the accidental background of Christ and Christianity. Since plain speaking is demanded by our critics and their spokesman, they shall have it, and they have themselves to thank for it.
We must advert also to another challenge; one that more nearly concerns the churches if they wish to escape modern Ebionitism; it is that of a blunt, outspoken old Israelite who said to me, “If God is a Jew, what have we Israelites to do with your religion?” What indeed? Does Christianity meet that challenge today?
We must emphasize the fact that Judaism and the Jews is primarily a collective problem. We are obliged to “indite a whole people,” since it is a concrete challenge that is before us. Individual exceptions are of secondary concern, and must wait till the larger issue is disposed of.
If any hold otherwise the burden of proof rests upon themselves, that much can be shown without going outside of the Old Testament; and backed up by historical analysis and the revelations of archeology and anthropology, there is logically no room for doubt that Galileans and Judeans were no more than neighbors to each others from the time of Rehoboam, son of Solomon, with Judaism as a common cult or “religion” between them, down tot he time of Christ.
Individuals are moreover a matter of individual and personal relationships, and the adjustments thereof require much time and attention. Organized society is also an individual, collectively speaking, and its demands are immediate, especially whenever a coup d’etat is threatened. We can not stop to ask if there are any well disposed persons among those who challenge us and put us to our proofs, especially when they maintain an alien attitude toward our social, political and religious ideals.
A race or people is not to be judged by its best nor its worst, nor by a chance neighbor or acquaintance whom one may like or dislike. Hence, in this case we must rule out the Hebrew prophets just as we do the Jewish criminals of the present day, and likewise the Jews whom we happen to know as individuals; a few among the millions. In a word, Judaism and Jews must be judged by religious ideals, and adherence to those ideas in mass. As Israelites, as Americans, we ask no more for ourselves, and within our own domain it is our right and our duty to resist whatever is hostile thereto.
In treating this subject as a collective problem it is not intended to exculpate the individual Jews, if indeed that were possible. But it is intended to stress the mighty power of the group over its component parts. That mighty power may be best observed in sub-human animals, as in the herd, drove, pack, flock, swarm and gang. Among humans, strengthened by the powers of speech and superior organization, by ancient traditions and psychology, a common purpose to prey upon one’s environment may eventuate in a tribe with a parasitic organization and objective.
We invite the attention and the serious study of those interested in the social sciences, and particularly the Jews themselves, to this aspect of their history, and especially to the formative influence of the Talmud upon them for this very purpose. Nobody loves a parasite, or at least nobody should. If my criticisms of the Jews may seem harsh, we rely for their justification on the facts herein presented, on the evidence to be found in the Talmud and other ancient sources, and on present-day criticisms by a thin scattering of Jews against their race and its leader.
In confronting the Christian world one must allow for a wide divergence of views in scriptural exegesis. It would be too much to expect unanimous accord with the views herein expressed, but it is not too much to hope that in the midst of disagreement there may be no disharmony. I have done my utmost to avoid doctrinal differences among Christians.
And Christians of all degree must remember that Israelites outside of the churches have a stake in the purity and perpetuity of Christianity, if on nothing more than social and political grounds. For Christianity is not a hide-bound racial cult, but a tolerant world religion.
In America, at least, it is a nation declared by the courts to be a Christian nation that guarantees liberty of religious belief to all, as well as disbelief; but let Judaism gain the upper hand as it has done in Soviet Russia, and its creed of atheism is proclaimed for all, while the Jewish cult remains untouched.
Let not Christian theology, therefore, be offended at the attempt of undrained minds and hands to draw a line of demarcation between that which is sacred and inviolable, and on the other hand its accidental background, the Judaism of antiquity, too primitive and changeless to command respect, to say nothing of reverence and adoration. Such minds and hands are at least free from the influence of Jewish traditionalism, and for that reason may the more clearly grasp the fact that Christianity belongs to the present and the future, not to tradition, no, nor even to the church alone, but to the entire Israelite world, because it is essentially an Israelitish religion, not based on Judaism; its Founder NOT a Jew and therefore an Israelite as the “Son of Man.”
Thanks and appreciation are due to my many friends, the value of whose counsel and constructive criticism is beyond estimate. Jacob Elon Conner, New York City, 1936. (The title of this book is “Christ Was Not A Jew,” an Epistle to the Gentiles (Israelites), by Jacob Elon Conner, A.B., Ph.D., and was published in 1936). While reading this remember that whenever he mentions Gentiles, that in most cases he is saying Israelite or Israelites, but there are a few cases in which the word Jew would be better used. And whenever he uses the word Jew, in most cases, it should be Israelite. But I suspect that the author did not know the Israel Truth and so made these errors because of it.
Why should Christianity, since it is a world religion, be tied back to the locale of its origin? This little planet on which we live is such a tiny speck in the wide expanse of the universe to deserve so much attention from the Creator of all things visible and invisible. And can anyone but a Jew, in these modern times, persuade himself that his people alone is the “chosen people” of the Almighty? Such colossal egotism is as pitiful as it is contemptible. Christ’s message is universal; it need not be restricted to the narrow confines of this little world, to say nothing of a mere handful of its people, overburdened with conceit.
And why should Christianity be held to the belittling postulate; let theologians take notice, that it is the heir of traditions not its own, filthy, absurd traditions sometimes, and that, too of an unfriendly people, for which it has been wont to apologize needlessly? What part has a world religion with a mere ethnic cult with which it is logically irreconcilable? Christianity has learned to be tolerant; but it must not learn to compromise. Judaism is forever intolerant and forever compromising as a cult must ever be. It is time for Christianity to scrap Judaism and its demoralizing influence, lest it lose altogether the confidence and respect of the world. In preparation therefore a careful distinction must be made between what Judaism is and what it has borrowed or stolen from sources older than itself.
In whatever part of the world Christ appeared He must needs be detached from its localizing influence in order to belong to all mankind. The early Christians, naturally, with their Judaistic background failed to detach Him completely. Save for the Greek Christians of Antioch and elsewhere along the Mediterranean coast, Christ’s message, humanly speaking, bid fair to be smothered or absorbed into its background of Judaism.
Had He appeared in Greece, Persia or elsewhere, the same obstacle would have been presented; the difficulty of getting free from the influence of the background, as conveyed by those who delivered His message to mankind. That message must be cleansed from the defiling contact with the primitive cult of Judaism with which it has no necessary connection. It did not derive from “the law, the writings and the prophets,” nor from the Israelite racial deity Jahweh, but direct from a higher contact than man ever knew. He tolerated what belonged of necessity to His background, but all the while pointing out “a more excellent way.” It is absurd to say that He and His message derived from the crass materialism of His Judaistic surroundings.
The transcendent wisdom of Christ is nowhere seen to better advantage than in His attitude toward law and order, though His message to the world was spiritual and therefore directed toward the individual rather than toward organized states. He even counseled obedience to the conquering Romans, which was wormwood to the sullen and resentful Jews. Likewise His doctrines today are in support of “the powers that be,” law and order under duly constituted authority, whereas Anti-Christ is forever anti-national.
The world is still echoing with the attack of Jewish bolshevism upon Christian Russia, while the latter was embarrassed along with ourselves in the greatest of all wars. And now the scope of its devastation is widening and reaching to our shores, and again Anti-Christ is gloating over the prospect of another victim while it preaches non-resistance and “internationalism,” though its own name is Judaism. Its program is as follows: First defile, then destroy.
You may read its purpose in the Jewish Talmud, you may find its program (no matter who wrote them), in the Protocols. Its blight may be read in the press, seen on the screen (and today on the television) and on the stage, heard in the radio, and felt in business and government everywhere. It has even attacked the last stronghold of free speech, namely, the pulpit, both through its demoralizing traditionalism and its paid apologists. It works under the disguises of nihilism, bolshevism, communism, socialism, pacifism and internationalism, discarding any label as soon as it become odious and taking refuge under a new one. But its one unchanging and secreted name is Judaism.
It keeps in the dark as long as it can find dupes to obey its orders. It works its sinuous way toward an open defiance of both state and church, just as it did in Russia. Beginning with small insolences, too slight to be resented openly, this Jewish attack upon state and church stealthily crawls toward a higher objective when it can dominate the scene. For more than two thousand years, as anyone may read in ancient history, the morals and methods of Judaism have been the same. For verification, “search the Scriptures,” but don’t forget also to search the historians who are not Jews, such as Tacitus, Pliny, Suetonius, Strabo, besides such moderns as Gibbon, Renan, Lanciani and many more. In view of the past and the present of Judaism, to remain uninformed is to court disaster.
There are many devout Christians who say that it makes no difference to them from what race Christ came from. This is but expressive of an attitude of personal loyalty to Christ, commendable in itself, but treasonable in effect to His mission. It is an equivocation of position arising from intellectual indolence of incapacity to think, and it yields the whole question as to the divinity of His source. It ignores the patent fact that the Founder of Christianity, had He been a Jew, could never have been a Savior of the Israelites.
Hence, even at the risk of brushing aside certain Christian traditions, such as “the Son of David,” which Christ Himself came through David’s son Nathan, and other traditions hallowed in art and son, sooner or later the stark truth stands out before us demanding recognition, and woe be to those who persistently ignore it. The truth demanding recognition is that Christ, as the Son of Man, was a Galilean, and the Galileans were not Jews, in race, though in part Judaised in religion and nationality. It is RACE that counts, for “A stream must rise from a source higher than itself,” and Judaism was no such source for Christianity. “Men do not gather grapes of thorns nor figs of thistles” (Matthew 7:16) so said Christ.
A Message To The Israelites
Chapter I: Deals with the historical-racial proofs that Christ was Not a Jew by showing that Galileans were not Jews.
Chapter II: Displays the fallacy of accepting the totally inadequate data extant of a genealogical character. Hence, no family or dynastic issues are involved.
Chapter III: Explains how and why the Judeo-Christians limited the matter to genealogy instead of considering the broader racial aspects as they logically should have done. The advent of Christ has the breadth of humanity in interest, and has no concern whatsoever for the re-establishment of a Jewish state.
Chapter IV: Summarizes.
Inasmuch as we have no trustworthy genealogical data we may dismiss all evidence of that character. The purpose of those genealogies was to establish a claim to “the throne of Davie” a throne which did not exist, which did not interest humanity in the least, and a claim that Christ repudiated with ridicule. This claim was a dream of the Judeo-Christians; and the Jewish Talmud made irreverent, and even salacious sport of it.
Fortunately, there remains the historical-racial approach which broadens and ennobles the theme into worthy proportions, thus eliminating the faulty genealogies. It is through history and its adjuncts, anthropology and archaeology, that it is possible to establish the difference between any modern race and the Jews. Neither the Galileans nor ourselves need to prove hat we are not Jews; the line of demarcation has been drawn by nature as well as by history with its adjuncts. The historical-racial proof, and that alone, is valid and sufficient.
Chapter I
Galilee and The Galileans
“Galilee of the Nations” (Gentiles)—that is what the prophet Isaiah(Isaiah 9:1) called it, and such indeed it was, all of it, east and west of the Jordan, Gentile in race though partially Judaised in the cult of the Jews, and from time to time also in nationality. It was Gentile long before Joshua led his tribes across the Jordan, claiming their territory and finally settling among them, but not exterminating them as their Jahweh had commanded. Nearly six hundred years later it was left Gentile again when Sargon overwhelmed the Israelites, scattered the ten tribes aborad, and replaced them with other Gentiles.
Finally it was left wholly Gentile in 164 B.C., when Simon Maccabee removed the Jewish infiltration out of Galilee back to Judea. Thereafter it was kept strictly Galilean beyond the time of Christ by the well-known antipathy between the Judeans of the south and the Galileans of the north. Fifty years after Christ, the governor of Galilee, Josephus, the Jewish historian, describes the Galileans as a people wholly unlike the Jews in temperament and ideals; so different indeed that they could not have been of the same race.
There was a taboo against intermarriage between them as recorded in the Jewish Talmud. In a word, Christ as the Son of Man was a Galilean, and the Galileans were not Jews. This is the verdict of history. (Houston Stewart Chamberlain, “Foundations of the Nineteenth Century,” Vol. I, p. 206, “There is, accordingly, as we see, not the slightest foundation for the supposition that Christ’s parents were of Jewish descent.”) It is also the verdict of nature which she stamped upon the characteristics of Galilean and Jew. If any hold otherwise the burden of proof is upon themselves.
The Canaanites: Palestine, the western arm of the “fertile crescent,” had been inhabited by Gentiles for more than a thousand years when Joshua appeared with his Hebrew tribes bout 1300 B.C. These Gentiles or non-Jews were not even Semitic, but were Aryan like ourselves; members of the Caucasian or White Race, known to the Jews or Hebrews as Canaanites. The history of the Aryans in all that part of the world goes back some centuries beyond the year 4000 B.C. Hence, the Hebrew tribes came as raiders or invaders, just as the Midianites or Arabs came on many a subsequent occasion. They succeeded in establishing themselves in the homeland of the Canaanites as most unwelcome guests.
In fact, they claimed all this excellent territory as their own by prior right, saying that it had been given to a legendary ancestor named Abraham centuries before they arrived to lay claim to it; an argument that failed to appeal to the Canaanites with any show of justice. It did not strengthen the argument of the raiders when they insisted that their own tribal deity, Jahweh, had so ordered it, because they were his “chosen people.” The long and bitter struggle that followed for possession was much like the Semitic raids that followed later when the Midianites continued to push northward into the delectable lands of the fertile crescent, reaching down through Palestine.
It was a struggle that was disgraced by many deeds of treachery and savage warfare, which are duly set down in the annals of the invaders as acts of valor and heroism on their part. After 225 years of more or less desultory fighting under leaders called “judges,” Saul of the tribe of Benjamin was chosen king about the year 1075 B.C., and they continued the fighting, sometimes among themselves and again with their neighbors. Saul was succeeded by David of the tribe of Judah, the southernmost of all except that of Simeon, a vassal tribe.
David about 1030 B.C., established his frontiers farther to the south with his capital at Jerusalem, the Hebrews being still a united people, though with a strong admixture of neighboring races. Judea is a barren, hilly country of meager natural resources but well adapted for defense, a good stronghold for an outlaw chief as David was in his younger days. As a home for a prosperous and peace-loving people it was far less desirable than Galilee; a fact grudgingly admitted in the Jewish proverbs.
David was followed by his son Solomon about the year 1000 B.C., who reigned 30 years, thus completing a period for the three kings of a little over 100 years, the only brilliant and fairly stable epoch in the history of the Hebrew people. It was a costly season of lavish display of kingly power in the erection of buildings by hired labor in Jerusalem. Moreover, it was at the expense of the people of fruitful Galilee and Samaria, who profited little by the up building of Jerusalem though they had to pay the bills. Consequently it left a discontented and debt-ridden people for Solomon’s successor to deal with.
Disunion and Its Consequences: Thus it was the ten tribes of the north who had the most to pay and the least gain by this royal extravagance, and they brought their grievances before Solomon’s successor. Rehoboam, son of Solomon, as if to counter-balance the reputed wisdom of his father, showed his ineptness to rule by adopting a course that was grasping, short-sighted, typical Jewish therein, and had its logical result in the division of his realm into the two petty kingdoms of Judah and Israel, the former with its capital at Jerusalem and its people known as Jews (Here we can see the confusion of the author, in that he cannot distinguish between the tribe of Judah and the usurpers known as the Jews).
Judea being without natural resources found it profitable to attract worshipers to that city. Hence, they resisted all attempts to set up places of worship elsewhere. This chapter has but little to do with the fortunes of the Kingdom of Judea. In fact, had it not been for the tragedy of the Crucifixion of Christ about 1000 years after Solomon, Jerusalem would figure only incidentally in the whole scheme of Christ’s life and message. For His mission, His labors, His teachings, His disciples, His surroundings were Galilean, except on rare occasions. Jerusalem as the national capital and metropolis in His time has drawn an undeserved attention to itself, away from the principal theater of His mission.
The Lay of The Land in Galilee: Neither Israel of the ten tribes nor the smaller nation of Judah (and Benjamin) was able to withstand a first-class power; and though Israel had by far the greater numerical strength, the strategy of her position was particularly unfortunate from a military point of view. For Israel lay directly in the path between the two strongest nations of the times, Egypt and Assyria, and these two were perpetual enemies. It was a well-beaten warpath, consisting in part of a valley that stretched across the southern part of Galilee. The valley itself was a most desirable asset from every point of view, except that the circumstances noted converted it into a disastrous liability.
It is the Valley of Esdraelon, containing the Plain of Jezreel, the Field of Armageddon, and it is probably the most famous battle-ground in history. The central part of it is distended like a pouch, with mountain spurs sticking into it like so many needles from different sides and angles. The eastern end leads into the deep trough of the Jordan and to the fords thereof, whence a feasible route northeastward leads toward Damascus and Assyria. The western end narrows to a pass as it approaches the Mediterranean Sea, and then circles around the base of Mount Carmel, standing like a sentinel with his foot in the water, guarding the entrance into Galilee.
Then bending sharply southward goes this ancient war-path all the way to Egypt, through a long coastal valley known as the Vale of Sharon, with a low range of foothills guarding this eastern flank known as the Shephelah. But the pass around Mount Carmel is rough and rocky, and therefore unsuited to the needs of large armies. Besides, a better avenue to Esdraelon is offered by three other routs leading thereto from the Vale of Sharon, and one of these, the Valley of Dothan, gives swift and easy access to the eastern end of the Valley of Esdraelon.
This it was used by both Egyptians and Assyrians for attack or defense, according to need. Naturally, both Egypt and Assyria endeavored to retain the Kingdom of Israel as an ally, and this kept the Israelites guessing as to which was the stronger at the moment, and their foreign policy was shaped accordingly. But this makeshift policy was certain to prove fatal in the end, for the stronger power was sure to remember how undependable the Israelites were likely to be in an emergency when they were most needed.
Deportation of the Ten Tribes: Sargon, (Tiglath Pileser III, who assumed the ancient title of Sargon) King of Assyria, remembered. Besides he was too good a strategist to overlook the necessity of shutting out the Egyptians completely from the Plain of Esdraelon, which was a veritable cross-roads in all directions. His own necessity and the fickle support of the Israelites forced him to crush the Kingdom of Israel. And he crushed it. This was in the year 722 (or 721) B.C. And he did more than that; for he removed the shattered remnants of the tribes of Israel and scattered them throughout his wide domain. And it is important to remember that they never came back; they were the “ten lost tribes of Israel.” As many as 27200 (Encyclopedia Britannica, see “Galilee,”“Samaria,” etc.) were removed, and we are told (2 Kings 17:18) that “there was none left but the tribe of Judah only” in Judea. It must have amounted to a “clean sweep” in Galilee, including the Valley of Esdraelon, for this was the key position in all that territory. It was harsh treatment for the Israelites, to be sure, but not so harsh as total extermination, which the Israelites had been commanded by their Jahweh to mete out to the Canaanites in the first place.
Sargon Brings Back the Gentiles: There was something like poetic justice in the fact that Sargon went farther afield than the Semite world for a population to replace the Israelites he had removed from Galilee. He now brought in from various parts of his wide dominions “men from Babylon (2 Kings 17:24) and Cutha, and from Ava and from Havath and from Sepharvaim,” regions of both Aryan and Semitic stock, but none of “the chosen race.” Well might Isaiah down in Jerusalem, speaking of these events, call the land “Galilee of the Gentiles,” for Sargon wanted no more of the undependable people whom he removed.
The Nordics in Galilee: Over the long route to his ancient enemy in Egypt; a route which Sargon now controlled throughout, he led among his cavalry forces some strange wild troopers form the north, each of whom rode his horse as if he were a part of the animal itself. These were Scythians, otherwise known to Old Testament writers as “Gog and Magog.” Certain it is that they struck terror into the hearts of the people of Judea by their formidable appearance and their skill in horsemanship. They rode withthersoever they would outside of the walled cities, while the Hebrews could only rave at them. It was these warriors, no doubt, that on returning from Egypt made at least one settlement in Galilee known as Scythopolis, later as Beth Shean, and now as Beisan. It is the most commanding point in Galilee; and it is significant that Scythopolis commands the fords of the Jordan, and by virtue of that fact it is the gateway into what was Assyria from the direction of danger.
The Scythians: And who were these terrifying Scythians, or whence came they? The came from that northern region we now know as Russia, the ancestral home of the people of the white skin, the Indo-Europeans or Caucasians. Anthropologists are now telling us that those broad steppes from the Volga eastward saw the origin and nurture among his domesticated animals, not only of the Russians, but also of the Celts, Teutons, Gauls, Greeks, or predominantly the racial strain known as the Nordics. It was the people of this region, following the southward course of the Volga and the Caspian Sea to the frontiers of Asia Minor, that had ventured in the remote prehistoric past toward warmer climes and easier conquests, down through Iran into India and Mesopotamia.
It is these northen whites whom we have recently learned to have been the predecessors of the Semites in the Land of Sumer and throughout Asia Minor, and who have been called “The Makers of Civilization.” (I.A. Waddell, L.L.D., C.B., E.E.I., “The Makers of Civilization,” (19299). Same, “Indo-Sumerian Seals Deciphered.”) There is a long-standing tradition among the Russian Orthodox, descendants of the ancient Scythians, that the Virgin Mary was of their race. As a tradition it is far more believable than that of a Jewish origin, the Jews have been twice ejected from Galilee and kept separate by racial antipathies.
The Gauls Invade Asia Minor: At a much later date another European element was added to the population of Asia Minor within easy striking distance of Palestine. These were the far-wandering Gauls who split off from the army of Brennus in 278-77 B.C., roamed over northern and southern Asia Minor, and finally settled in what became Galatia, named for their race, a name enshrined in the epistles of the Apostle Paul. (Acts 16:6; 18:23; 1 Co. 16:1; Gal. 1:2; 2 Ti. 4:10 and 1 Pe. 1:1)
And we must not overlook the possibility of their name having been given to Galilee itself, as well as the sea of Galilee, and especially the region of Gaulani’ is on the eastern shore of that sea. Both Scythians and Gauls were noteworthy warriors, kindred in spirit if not in blood with those of Galilee who held back the Roman legions, and whose fearless devotion to the cause of freedom and independence won the admiration of their enemies. Moreover, like the Galileans, they fought with system rather than with Semitic passion and guile.
Grecian Galilee: Of all the Gentile influences within and around Galilee the Greek was by far the most pervasive and important. One might read of the Decapolis in the New Testament without dreaming of its extent and its thoroughly Greek character. It lay just east of the Jordan from Samaria and western Galilee and was about the same in area as the two combined. Its commerce and contacts with the world outside was by way of the Valley of Esdraelon, thus affording for over three hundred years before Christ an intermingling of the populations that made all Galilee cosmopolitan. In the time of Christ the extent of this intermingling, backed by the Roman power which was exercised through the medium of the Greek language, had not only kept back the marauding Arabs but had pretty thoroughly Grecianized all Galilee. From Nazareth as a center there was Scythopolis only twenty miles away, Tiberias and Tarichaeae five miles nearer, while less than ten miles to the north were Roma and Sepphoris; all Greek cities.
The coastal cities of what had been Phoenicia and Philistia were now all Greek in language and culture. Even in their court proceedings and legal documents the Romans ruled the country through the Greek language because it was already well known throughout Palestine when the Romans came. Greek names and words were slipping into local Aramaic, as witness most of the names of Christ’s disciples. “It is impossible to believe that our Lord and His disciples did not know Greek,” (George Adam Smith, “Historical Geography of the Holy Land,” p. 608. Same, pages 599 and 608, the Decapolis (ten cities) consisted at first of Scythopolis (west of Jordan), Pella, Dion, Philadelphia, Gerass, Gadars, Raphans, Kanatha, Hippos (and by courtesy) Damascus, each with its cluster of villages. At least ten more cities were added later.) and whenever they crossed to the east side of Jordan or the sea of Galilee they were in Greek territory and were surrounded by Greek civilization. Even the non-Greeks, the Jews and Syrians throughout Juda, as well as in Samaria and Galilee, had to learn Greek if they had any dealings with the Romans. The Hebrew was a dead language in the time of Christ, as already stated, and the Old Testament was therefore translated into Greek for the benefit of the Jews themselves.
Origin of the Greek Influence: The beginning of the Greek influence in this region dates from 322 B.C., when the soldiers of Alexander the Great found the region east of the Jordan to be highly desirable but sparsely occupied. They proceeded to occupy it at once, for they were yet to learn that the reason it was available was because of its exposure to attack by the Arabs. But they were soldiers, the world conquerors, and they were soon joined by colonists from the Greek world. These had only to cross the sea to Mount Carmel, whence it was a journey of forty miles across Galilee to the fords of the Jordan. Each of the ten cities that they founded had a considerable extent of surrounding territory, sprinkled over with a loose scattering of villages; all of which were organized into a confederacy to resist the Arabs. And there was much need of it, for at one time the Arabs had the Greeks badly worsted, and would have driven them out had it not been for the timely assistance of Pompey and his Roman legions. Thus the Roman power, an oppressor in Greece, was welcome as a liberator in the Decapolis.
The Decapolis Under the Romans: Under the Romans the Decapolis, or eastern Galilee, reached a high degree of development, “colonnaded streets, the arch, the forum, the temple, the bath, the mausoleum in florid Doric and Corinthian.” Some had an amphitheater or two, some of them, as at Gadars and Kanatha, had temples that were very beautiful in classic Greek style, and their religion was throughly Greek. There were paved roads and other public works, such as the aqueduct at Gadara which brought water from a point thirty miles away. Omitting Damascus, which was included in the Decapolis by courtesy, the Decapolis embraced most of the territory southeast of the sea of Galilee, extending eastward to the desert and southward as far as Philadelphia. Four of these cities, Pella, Scythopolis, Gadara and Hippos, possessed contiguous territory, making a solid belt of Greek control along and across the Jordan, so that for a considerable distance a very important stretch of that river was a Greek stream.
“The Decapolis (George Adam Smith, Historical Geography of the Holy Land, pp. 602 and 607) was flourishing in the time of Christ’s ministry. Gadara with her temples and her amphitheaters, with her arts, her games and her literature, overhung the Lake of Galilee and the voyages of her fishermen. A leading Epicurean of the previous generation, the founder of the Greek anthology, some of the famous wits of the day, the reigning emperor’s tutor, had all been bred within sight of the homes of the writers of the New Testament. Philodemus, Meleager, Menippus, Theodorus, were names of which the one end of the Lake of Galilee was proud, when Matthew, Peter, James and John were working at the other end. We can not believe that the two worlds which this one landscape embraced did not break into each other...We have ample proof that the Kingdom of God came forth in no obscure corner, but in the very face of the kingdom of this world.”
The Plain of Esdraelon:“What a plain it is,” says one, “with it are associated the names of Deborah, Barak, Sisera and his murderer, Jael, the Midianits or Arabs, Saul and the Philistines, Gideon, David and Jonathan, King Josiah and his defeat and death at the hands of the Egyptians at Megiddo, Elijah and the mound of Tel-el-Kassis where he is said to have slain the prophets of Baal, Jehu and his ride from Beth Shean, the camp of Holofernes, the elephants and engines of Antiochus, Cleopatra and her ladies, Pompey, Anotony, Vespasian and Titus, Greek colonists on the way to Decapolis, Christian pilgrims, later the Moslems, then the Crusaders, Napoleon in his time, and the conquest of the Turk in the latest world war. All this and much more has passed in review within sight of the hill on which stands the village of Nazareth.”
Nazareth: A broken range of foothills, rising sometimes into considerable elevations, bounds the northern limits of the Plain of Esdraelon, and near the middle of the distance between the Mediterranean and the Sea of Galilee is Nazareth, the boyhood home of Christ. Nazareth is so centrally located with reference to the routes of traffic that it could not escape being a cross-roads of travel in many directions. “It was no obscure village in the backwoods as some have imagined, for the caravan route from Damascus to the seaports of the Mediterranean, and southward to Egypt, rounded the hill whereon stood this village. It is ‘a lovely spot, worthy of the encomiums of Antoninus the Martyr who likened it to Paradise.
Nazareth is usually represented as a secluded and an obscure village...You can see from Nazareth the surrounding country, for Nazareth rests in a basin among hills; but the moment you climb to the edge of the basin, which is everywhere within the limit of the village boys’ playground, what a view you have! Esdraelon lies before you with its twenty battle fields. There is Naboth’s vineyard, and the place of Jehu’s revenge upon Jezebel; there Shunem and the house of Elijah: you see thirty miles in three directions. It is a map of Old Testament history.” Toward the north one could see another road, “between Acre and the Decapolis, along which legions marched, and princes swept with their retinues, and all sorts of travelers from all countries went to and fro...All the rumor of the empire entered Palestine close to Nazareth, the news from Rome about the emperor’s health, the changing influence of the great statesmen; about Caesar’s last order concerning the tribute, or whether the policy of the procurator would be sustained; all this would furnish endless talk in Nazareth, both among men and boys.” naturally, the temperament of the Galilean was by no means as austere as was that of the Judeans, for he had far wider contacts with the world; and it was a pleasant world, with no savage deserts near at hand encroaching on his view as it was in Judea. It was a happier, gayer, freer, saner life than surrounded him.
A point so centrally situated, though there may not have been a village of Nazareth in Sargon’s time, was too important strategically to allow any Israelite to be left there. It would have been a splendid post for reconnaissance over military movements throughout the whole Plain of Esdraelon, and therefore no place in which to permit an enemy to live. It is a long, long time from the days of Sargon to those of Christ, but its Gentile character is attested by the Jews themselves in their cynical remark, “Can any good thing come out of Nazareth?” Also, “Look and see; for out of Galilee cometh no prophet” ignoring Elisha, the field of Elijah’s labors, as well as Deborah, Jonah, Hosea and possibly Amos and Nahum, according to some authorities.
Other Deportations: The fortunes and misfortunes of the Kingdom of Judah must claim our attention at this point for the sake of clarity. After the deportation of the ten tribes by Sargon in 722 B.C., the magnificent realm of Solomon had shrunk to a miserable remnant consisting in the main of the tribe of Judah. These Judeans, or Jews, as they came to be known in history, could point the finger of scorn at Jeroboam, “who made Israel to sin” that is to say, he was so wicked in their eyes as to lead a rebellion of the ten tribes against the unbearable taxes imposed by the Judeans for up building of Jerusalem. And he followed this up by establishing places of worship in the territory which had revolted; outside of Jerusalem, which the Jews considered unorthodox; it is easy to see why, it cut off the revenues of Jerusalem to a sad degree.
But Judea’s turn came later, when the natives thereof were also overwhelmed and carried off into Babylonian captivity. Assyria had been overthrown by the rising power of Babylon in 606 B.C., and it was the King of Babylon who despoiled the treasures of Jerusalem and laid waste the land. Then was there lamentation in Jerusalem indeed, and the people of Samaria and Galilee are said to have enjoyed a delightful season of tranquility while the Jews were shut up in Babylon.
About half a century later Babylon fell to Cyrus, the Persian, who permitted the Jews to return to Jerusalem, and many, but by no means all of them, did so. Those who remained found that they could make money in Babylon even in captivity. Meanwhile some of them had found the northern nations a pleasant place of refuge, and in 164 B.C., Simon Maccabee returned them all to Judea, leaving Galilee strictly non-Jewish again.
This was the second purging of the Jews from Galilee before the Christian era. The racial differences between the Jews and the Galileans were too marked for the comfort of the latter, as one may see from the writings of Josephus, the Jewish historian, who about seventy years after the birth of Christ was the Roman governor of Galilee. That difference was remarkably well demonstrated after the fall of Jerusalem to Titus, when the Galileans, though defeated, clung to their homes. The Jews on the contrary agreed among themselves to scatter over the world, banded together as a predatory tribe, as one may read in their Talmud, thus contenting themselves with the role of an anti-national parasite. The Galileans were not parasitic stock.
The Galileans as Proselytes: We go back again to the year 722 B.C., and the deportation of the ten tribes by Sargon. We do this to understand how and why and to what extent these strangers brought in by Sargon accepted the religion, and eventually the nationality of Judaism, though they were all Gentiles and predominantly Aryan in race. The seven and half centuries that elapsed from that date to the birth of Christ is a very long period and many changes might occur in such an interim, even the conversion of an entire race to a new religion.
Such things have happened in our own generation. In European history the same lapse of time would take us back beyond the days of Magna Charta in England, and two centuries before the fall of Constantinople to the Turk.
Hence, it is by no means surprising that in a period of equal length these strangers imported into Galilee and Samaria; it was all Samaria at that time, became Judaised in religion and nationality, proselytes of the people whose homes they were forced to occupy, and whose empty synagogues stood open before them. Some measure of sympathy for the vanquished and dispossessed Race may be imagined, for this was a beautiful land from which they had been evicted, and the fact that the dispossessed had seized it by violence some five hundred years earlier would scarcely be remembered against them. (Study taken in part from Pastor Comprea)
The Lion out of Judah: Let us return now to our original question: did salvation come from the Jews? What did Jesus mean when He made that statement?
First let's look at Matthew 2:6: "And thou Bethlehem, in the land Juda [Judah], art not the least among the princes of Juda [Judah]: for out of thee shall come a Governor, that shall rule my people Israel."
Matthew quoted from Micah 5:2 in the Old Testament which was a Messianic prophecy: "And thou, Bethlehem, house of Ephratha, art few in number to be reckoned among the thousands of Juda [Judah]; yet out of thee shall one come forth to me, to be a ruler of Israel; and his goings forth were from the beginning, even from eternity."
As you can see, it predicted that Christ (Messiah) would come out of Bethlehem of Judah. The Greek preposition "ek" is used, just as John used it to record Jesus' conversation with the Samaritan woman. Messiah, our salvation, was to come "out of" the land of Judah.
When Jesus was born in Bethlehem and the magi came searching for Him, King Herod inquired of the chief priests and scribes about the birth place of Messiah. They told him that the prophet Micah had predicted that it would be Bethlehem. That's why Herod then had all the male infants in Bethlehem two years old and under killed.
Now look at Hebrews 7:14: "For it is manifest that OUT OF Judah [Judeah] has sprung our Lord..."
Finally, the book of Revelation refers to Jesus Christ as the Lion OUT OF the Tribe of Judah. (Revelation 5:5) He is the One who triumphed over Satan and death, the One who will return to judge the world.
With all these facts in mind, the only reasonable conclusion I can reach regarding Jesus' conversation with the Samaritan woman is that in reality He was saying to her: "You don't understand what you worship, but we (Father & Son) understand, because salvation comes OUT OF Judah. I am the Lion of the Tribe of Judah, the Messiah Who was foretold by the prophets. I will give you eternal life if you believe on me."
We believe that anyone who studies these Greek Scriptures in the Gospels of John and Matthew, knowing that they link with Old Testament predictions, and also links them to the book of Revelation, will see that this makes sense and avoids contradiction and confusion.
It is faithful to the Old and New Testament contexts, to the Greek and English languages, and to history. it shows that salvation came out of Judah in the person of our Lord Jesus Christ, AND NOT FROM THE JEWS. And if one will reflect carefully on it, it explains many religious, political, and social errors of our time.
Some Current Considerations: There has been an enormous onslaught of disinformation fed to the public about the "special status" of the Jews. The nation's foreign policy in the Middle East has been dominated by special consideration for the Jews. Billions of dollars of our taxes have been wasted in support of "Israel," in spite of the unconstitutionally of doing so. Such support is unconstitutional because our government is not supposed to favor one religion over another.
It is maddeningly ironic that Christians have been forced to support the Rabbinic religion and the atheists of "Israel," while our own children were for many years barred from religious meetings on the campuses of our public schools. This condition has come about largely due to the efforts of Jewish organizations in America.
The anti-Christ system has been quite successful in molding public opinion via the mass media. Although Hollywood has been the worst offender over the years, currently we see many TV productions such as "scientific" documentaries, "historical" docudrama and others which also mis-educate the public and form mistake opinions.
Much propaganda is placed right in the scripts of entertainment programs where people least expect it, and cultural patterns and mannerisms exert strong influence on the viewers. Thus they are brainwashed.
Sadly, Christians are not immune to this deception. Matthew 24:24 tells us that Satan will, if he can, deceive even the elect. We see telltale evidence of this deception not only in the Christian community's overt acts, but also in its unconscious habits, even sometimes in the casual remarks of ministers and television preachers.
Many of them have "bought" error from the world via its mass media, and have rejected truth from unpopular sources. We've known of evangelical churches to enthusiastically permit an anti-Christ personally to speak from their pulpits, while rejecting a genuine Christian who wanted to correct the errors being taught by the former.
This mass mind-set created by the media is indicative of the condition of the world just prior to the second advent of Jesus Christ as depicted in numerous Bible passages, such as Daniel 7:25, 2 Peter 3:3-10; Jude 1:6-18; and Revelation 17:3-18, 21.
Jesus commanded us to: "...Come out of her, my people, that ye be not partakers of her sins, and that ye receive not of her plagues." (Revelation 18:4)
Many Christians have succumbed to some of those sins, one of which is regurgitating anti-Christian disinformation, or being silent about some truth that might hurt their reputations. They shun some of their brethren who are telling them the truth because those brethren are thought to have spiritual halitosis.
This was written in defense of Christian beliefs, not as a polemic against Jews or Judaism. Only God can judge the human heart; we have no desire to assist Him in that matter. We hope you will see the intense importance of this information and will ACTIVELY help distribute it.