Exodus 20:7 tells us not to use God’s name in vain, this is the third commandment that is given to the nation of Israel. It says, “You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain, for the Lord will not hold him guiltless who takes his name in vain.” God’s people are His image-bearers. Most people understand this as simply swearing, and it certainly can mean that, but it means significantly more than that.1
The Hebrew word we translate as “vain” (שָׁוְא – shav’) and often is translated as falsely, lie, lying, vain, vanity. Think about the depth of that for a minute. Shav {shav}; comes from the same root as the Hebrew word show’ שׁוֹא in the sense of desolating; evil (as destructive), literally (ruin) or morally (especially guile); figuratively idolatry (as false, subjective), uselessness (as deceptive, objective; also adverbially, in vain).2 In other words, you are giving up your commission as an ambassador of GOOD – TOV – GOD giving it up for the opposite, to be an agent of destruction, idolatry, or deception.
In ancient culture, your name meant something. It had value; it told others who you were. And the same is true with the name of God. His name has meaning and power. It’s holy. Therefore, we shouldn’t use it as if it’s empty, hollow, worthless, or in vain.
From the earliest biblical writings (e.g., Genesis, Exodus), God’s name (often represented as YHWH, sometimes transliterated “Yahweh”) has been profoundly revered. Archaeological finds from the Dead Sea Scrolls at Qumran (which date from roughly 200 BC to AD 70) show extreme care taken by scribes when writing God’s name, indicating the reverence the ancient Hebrews held.3
Misconceptions About “Taking the Lord’s Name in Vain”
Misunderstandings often occur when people assume the third commandment merely prohibits using God’s name as an expletive. While profanity is a blatant violation, there are other forms of misuse:
1. Swearing Falsely: Invoking God’s name to lend credibility to a lie or breaking an oath that was made in His name.
2. Empty Rituals: Reciting God’s name thoughtlessly through rote repetition or superstition, stripping it of genuine reverence.
3. Hypocrisy: Claiming to represent God-in speech, action, or attitude-while behaving in a way that contradicts His character and Word.
These violations flow from failing to acknowledge Scripture’s teaching that our speech should be truthful, pure, and honoring to the Lord (cf. Ephesians 4:29; James 5:12).
Broader Implications in Scripture
In the Old Testament, God’s name symbolizes His covenant presence among His people. The prophet Malachi delivers a strong rebuke to priests for not honoring God’s name (Malachi 1:6-14), showing divine displeasure toward leaders who degrade His name by their actions.4
In the New Testament, the principle deepens. Jesus teaches us to pray, “Our Father in heaven, hallowed be Your name” (Matthew 6:9). This “hallowing” is the observation of God’s holiness; it is the polar opposite of treating His name in vain.
Proper Use of the Lord’s Name
Rather than merely avoiding sin, believers are to cultivate a holy approach to God’s name:
1. Worship and Awe: Scripture exemplifies worshipers who honor God’s name in praise (Psalm 29:2: “Ascribe to the LORD the glory due His name…”).
2. Prayer: Jesus’ model prayer begins with magnifying God’s name (Matthew 6:9).
3. Evangelism and Testimony: Speaking of God’s name reverently when sharing faith with others, representing God’s character faithfully.
When we use God’s name in prayer, worship, or conversation, we affirm His nature and maintain the holiness that sets Him apart from all creation.
Connection to Christ and Salvation
The New Testament teaches that Jesus is the fullness of God’s revelation. His resurrection (1 Corinthians 15:3-8) affirms all He taught, including the necessity of honoring God’s name. Indeed, the apostles proclaim that “there is no other name under heaven given to men by which we must be saved” (Acts 4:12).
This underscores the idea that God’s name and His power to save are inextricably linked. If we believe that God became flesh in Jesus Christ, rose from the dead, and offers salvation, then how we address and regard His name is vitally important. It is more than mere words; it is our lifeline.
Conclusion
Taking the Lord’s name in vain encompasses every misuse or trivialization of the divine name-whether through profanity, false oaths, or hollow rituals. The commandment, rooted in the holiness of God’s name, remains relevant both in ancient and modern contexts.
From historical manuscripts like the Dead Sea Scrolls to modern theological research, the evidence consistently points to the enormous weight the biblical writers placed on God’s name. The consistent accuracy and transmission of these passages through centuries underscores how believers have guardrailed the truth about such matters. Respecting and revering that name is integral to honoring who God truly is.
For those within the faith, this observance also becomes a testimony of devotion. For those investigating Scripture’s claims, seeing how God’s name is treated with the utmost seriousness offers insight into the Bible’s broader moral and theological framework.
Indeed, “the name of the LORD is a strong tower; the righteous run to it and are safe” (Proverbs 18:10). Let it ever be used with reverence and awe.5
Kitz, Anne Marie (2019). “The Verb *yahway”. Journal of Biblical Literature. 138 (1): 39–62. ↩︎
I have done justice and righteousness; do not leave me to my oppressors. Psalm 119:121 NASB
Justice and Righteousness – In a sense of Old Testament sovereignty, YHWH exhibited himself differently than the other “gods” the people of Israel were formerly aware of in Egypt. YHWH was concerned with a covenant partnership between Him and His chosen people that would be his ambassadors, and it was much established on the notion of two things – Justice and Righteousness. The Hebrew for righteousness is the word ṣedeq which typically takes a gloss of an ethical, moral standard based on the nature and will of God. In other words, the Lord is righteous.1 Justice is the word mišpāṭ. It is the divine governance of the created order. The way that God intended things to operate and called – TOV.
You may remember that the priestly breastplate or breastpiece of judgment (Hebrew: חֹשֶׁן ḥōšen) was a sacred breastplate worn by the High Priest of the Israelites, according to the Book of Exodus. In the biblical account, the breastplate is termed the breastplate of judgment (Hebrew: חֹשֶׁן מִשְׁפָּט ḥōšen mišpāṭ – Exodus 28:15), because the Urim and Thummim (Hebrew: הָאוּרִים וְהַתֻּמִּים hāʾūrīm wəhattummīm) were placed upon it (Exodus 28:30). These elements of the breastplate are said in the Exodus verse to carry the judgment (Hebrew: מִשְׁפָּט mišpāṭ) of God concerning the Israelites at all times. According to the Talmud, the wearing of the Hoshen atoned for the sin of errors in judgment on the part of the Children of Israel. 2 So as you can see, justice was a theme tied carefully into the way that the priest represented God to the people and the people to God and “justice” played an important measure.
When you first think about justice, you might think about a court, perhaps even words like wrath, or anger, judgment, malice, retribution, avenging, some notion of getting what is deserved. But those thoughts are actually contrary to the grace notion and justice of God. That was exactly His point to Israel. YHWH was different and was going to redefine what justice meant and looked like to His people. Yet 3500 years later it seems many Christians are still holding to the kind of justice that God said was contrary to His very nature.
Mišpāṭ is to cooperate with God in bringing His order to the world. It is to extend the Garden to the rest of creation, a task, by the way, that was given as the Prime Directive in the Genesis account. “Let Us make mankind in Our image, according to Our likeness; and let them rule over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the sky and over the livestock and over all the earth, and over every crawling thing that crawls on the earth.” “Rule over” does not mean exploit. It means to care for, to tend to, to cultivate, to nourish, to protect—it means precisely what God does and would do with His own creation. Insofar as you bring God’s “rule” into your world, you do mišpāṭ. Notice please that this is active involvement, not theoretical or passive contemplation of engagement.3
Exodus 34:6-7 is the key text that you are likely tired of me regurgitating. God is benevolent, compassionate, gracious, slow to anger, full of ḥesed (no English equivalent), truthful, preserving ḥesed for generations, forgiving, providing oversight; and in these features partners with us as his treasured possessions in covenant order. TOV has a good deal to play into this. In Genesis we see God using his “priests” to continue to cultivate God’s sense of order and do good. The Torah then becomes the handbook of life until Jesus comes. Living in justice and righteousness means living in devotion to the will of God committed to being a complete representative of the Creator as much as humanly possible. The first century word for that is “agent,” and Yeshua is a full expression of what that means; He becomes the fulfillment of identity and purpose based on justice and righteousness.
There is also a sense of communal justice in the Bible, particularly for Israel.
Two Modes of Biblical Justice according to the Bible Project4
Retributive/Recompense This mode of justice is like the punishment/reward system in a court of law, ensuring there is recompense, repayment, or acquittal for just or unjust behavior. If you steal five dollars, you have to pay back five dollars. If you’re wrongly accused of stealing five dollars, you should not have to pay, and you should even be repaid for the trouble of being accused. Deuteronomy 25:1 – If there is a dispute between men and they go to court (lit. to the mishpat, place of justice), and the judges (Heb. shophetim) decide their case, and they declare the innocent to be in the right, and they will declare the guilty to be in the wrong.
Restorative This mode of justice is about making sure that everyone in the community is treated fairly and given what they are due. It’s about granting people rights by changing unjust practices or laws. For example, in Deuteronomy 18:1-3, the Levites didn’t inherit land because they served all the tribes by working in the temple. And so, the other tribes were to give a tithe (one tenth) of their produce as offerings in the temple. This temple tax is called the Levites’ mishpat (“their right,” see also Deut. 21:17 “right of the firstborn”). In Israel, there was another group in their society who had unique mishpat: the quartet of the vulnerable, meaning the widow, orphan, immigrant, and the poor.
Deuteronomy 16:20: “That which is altogether just shalt thou follow, that thou mayest live, and inherit the land which the LORD thy God giveth thee.”
The first words: “That which is altogether just” are just two words in the Hebrew “tsedeq tsedeq.” The same word is repeated twice. In Semitic languages when a word is repeated it usually indicates that the word is to be intensified or emphasized. 5
We don’t live under communal Israel and their laws though. So, what do we make of all this? I want to finish with a sense of deconstructing our modern views and what we want justice to be based on our desires of God for our life and world as compared to what the Bible presents it as. Christians demand justice so much today. People who have been offended, abused, victims of racism, etc. They are all crying for justice. Certain politicians have been accused of sexual harassment and the victims are demanding justice. What do they want? They want to see that person punished, resign from office, put in jail. What is it that they saying? The victim wants to see the perpetrator suffer as they suffered. They want fairness, eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth. Is that what God is talking about as a condition to inherit what God has given you? 6
We know this wasn’t the way of Jesus. In Matthew 5:38-39 Jesus is clear not to repay evil for evil or as it says in Deuteronomy 16:20; “tsedeq tsedeq” which could be rendered as “just justice.” 7 There is indeed the need for justice, and we should pursue justice, but we must pursue a just justice, and that isn’t ours to address but God’s and God alone. In other words, justice isn’t for you… let it go and let the Lord heal. Perhaps occasionally we are part of the agents of that justice, but more often not.
Psalm 96:10-11a, 13Say among the nations, “YHWH reigns; Indeed, the world is firmly established, it will not be moved. He will judge the peoples with equity.” Let the heavens be glad, and let the earth rejoice… Be before YHWH for He is coming; He is coming to judge the earth. He will judge the world in righteousness and the people in His faithfulness.
Notice that God’s judgment is in the positive. It’s not brimstone and fire. He judges with equity; He judges in righteousness and in His faithfulness. He judges to SAVE the humble of the earth. Interesting that we often associate God’s judgement with God’s wrath. It is a common human desire to let God handle our enemies with vengeance. Sometimes life doesn’t seem fair when horrible people seem to have great success in life. We want God to judge the wicked in anger. Vengeance is a powerful human desire. But the answer to vengeance is vindication, not judgement. “Vengeance is mine, says the Lord… for YHWH will vindicate His people” (paraphrased from Deut. 32:35-36). To vindicate (God acting in judgement) is a completely different word in the Hebrew language: יָדִ֣ין (yadin).
Covenantal commitment is a flowing stream, this Biblical understanding of justice should inspire us to not only critique the world as it is, but to align ourselves with that which is Godly in the universe, working towards the day when all human beings are nurtured, respected, and be reclaimed to the identify that God has purposed them for.
Ironically, perhaps your need for retributive justice around you is exactly what is holding you back from the kind of relentless covenant partnership that God has destined you for. Perhaps today is the day you simply let God be the judge. Let God be the agent of restoration and use you as His hands and feet to physically manifest grace, love, compassion, and mercy which means healing.
Stigers, H. G. (1999). 1879 צָדֵק. In R. L. Harris, G. L. Archer Jr., & B. K. Waltke (Eds.), Theological Wordbook of the Old Testament(electronic ed., p. 752). Moody Press. ↩︎
Zevachim (Hebrew: זְבָחִים; lit. “Sacrifices”) is the first tractate of Seder Kodashim (“Holy Things”) of the Mishnah, the Talmud and the Tosefta. This tractate discusses the topics related to the sacrificial system of the Temple in Jerusalem, namely the laws for animal and bird offerings, and the conditions which make them acceptable or not, as specified in the Torah, primarily in the book of Leviticus (Lev 1:2 and on). The tractate has fourteen chapters divided into 101 mishnayot, or paragraphs. There is a Gemara – rabbinical commentary and analysis – for this tractate in the Babylonian Talmud, and no Gemara in the Jerusalem Talmud. ↩︎
The Jewish New Year (Rosh Hashanah) in 2025 will begin on October 2 and end on October 4. The American New Year (New Year’s Day) in 2025 will fall on January 1.
Rosh Hashanah (Hebrew: רֹאשׁ הַשָּׁנָה, Rōʾš hašŠānā, lit. ’head of the year’) is the “observed” New Year in Judaism, (although as I will get to, it is more complicated than that). The biblical name for this holiday is Yom Teruah (יוֹם תְּרוּעָה, Yōm Tərūʿā, lit. ’day of shouting/blasting’). It is the first of the High Holy Days (יָמִים נוֹרָאִים, Yāmīm Nōrāʾīm, ‘Days of Awe”), as specified by Leviticus 23:23–25. Current tradition has Rosh Hashanah beginning ten days of penitence culminating in Yom Kippur, as well as beginning the cycle of autumnal religious festivals running through Sukkot.
Rosh is the Hebrew word for “head”, ha is the definite article (“the”), and shana means year. Thus Rosh Hashanah means “head of the year”, referring to the day of the New Year. But Rosh Hashanah itself can’t really be found in the Biblical text itself.
Abandoned old spooky church in Vergalijo (Navarre, Spain)
In ancient times, there were four different New Years on the Jewish calendar. Each had a distinct significance:
The first of the Hebrew month of Nisan, the New Year of Kings, was the date used to calculate the number of years a given king had reigned.
The first of the Hebrew month of Elul was the new year for tithing of cattle, a time when one of every 10 cattle was marked and offered as a sacrifice to God.
The first of the Hebrew month of Tishrei was the agricultural new year, or the New Year of the Years.
The 15th of the Hebrew month of Sh’vat, known as Tu BiShvat, was the New Year of the Trees.
Although the Torah refers to Nisan as the first month of the Jewish year, the first day of the month of Tishrei emerged as what we now know as Rosh HaShanah. This is an example of something that isn’t really Biblical but became the norm for some reason.
So, as you will see the celebrated New Year wasn’t really as biblical as it became traditional. (Remember the fiddler on the roof “TRADITION!!!”)
This started when the Babylonians, among whom the Jews lived under the captivity that began the diaspora which then some jews associated as a “Day of Judgment” each year to which the Babylonians believed the “gods” assembled in the temple of Marduk to inscribe the destiny of every person. Well, what is a bit crazy is that the Jews adopted these ideas and borrowed the elements to shape their New year, Rosh HaShanah believing that Yahweh also acted in the same way choosing the good and wicked (yes making God the author of evil); and that for 10 “in between” days you could repent before the book of life was sealed for the new year. Eventually this is going to become the reformed view of God actually ordaining the lives of those who would win the cosmic lottery in a sense of being “chosen” or predestined and laced to a lot of PSA beliefs. (We would see predestination as God simply seeing ahead of time the consequences of free will choices but would agree it is also more complicated than that.) Does it sound messed up, rather un-Biblical? Yea it is! Even though according to the Torah it was NOT the beginning of the year, it officially became the Jewish New Year because of this traditional thought as well as other thoughts such as believing that the world was created on this day (also not of biblical origin.) In the second century the Mishnah basically made this official. It was actually a very visible picture of 2nd temple Judaism walking farther away from the scripture and God than being rooted in Him.
Getting back to the Biblical text…
On exactly the tenth day of this seventh month is the day of atonement; it shall be a holy convocation for you, and you shall humble your souls and present an offering by fire to the Lord. You shall not do any work on this same day, for it is a day of atonement, to make atonement on your behalf before the Lord your God. Leviticus 23:27-28 NASB
So the original intent of the New Year was that it would be a day to humble our souls. Imagine that. Humility is a forgotten word in both Hebrew and American culture.
But when the rest of America celebrates the New Year it isn’t a biblical date either! But we can still own this sort of thinking for Jesus. For example, by many reasons, traditionally Yom Kippur is the most solemn day of the year. It is a day of fasting, repentance, self-reflection, and a return to holy thinking. Those are GREAT things we should want!
The root word used in Leviticus is kāpar which has a glossed (regularly known as or thought of but not necessarily correct) meaning of “to cover,” or “conceal” which is also tied to reformed theology. Some have (IMHO) wrongly asserted that the word then would mean to “cover sin” as such to pacify the wrath of the deity in this case Yahweh by making atonement such as I explained the Babylonians believed about the gods and the temple of Marduk. It is suggested then that sin was covered until Christ could rightly atone. Sounds good, and likely what you might have heard at church, but more traditionally based on the gods of the exile than biblically accurate. There is very little evidence for this view. As many scholars have pointed out, the connection is at best weak as the Hebrew root is not used to mean “cover.” To say it correctly, the Hebrew verb is never used in the simple or Qal stem, but only in the derived intensive stems. These intensive stems often indicate not emphasis, but merely that the verb is derived from a noun whose meaning is more basic to the root idea.[1]
Ok so what does that mean or what is a better view? (Kippūr) is the word for Atonement that is also used today in the name of the Jewish holiday yom kippur “day of atonement” (also associated with a Biblical new year) which was the tenth day of the seventh month, Tishri. This solemn day was the only day of fasting prescribed for Israel. It was celebrated by a special sin offering for the whole nation. On that day only would the high priest enter within the inner veil bearing the blood of the sin offering (cf. Heb 9:7). A second goat was released as an escape goat to symbolize the total removal of sin.[2]
Jewish tradition ultimately adopted here a synthesis (not always elegant) of the two views. Throughout the Day of Atonement, the liturgy bemoans the burden of sin we labor under, and our inadequacy to measure up in God’s sight. But at the end of the day, in the Ne’ilah (Closing ) Prayer, the burden of sin is gone; the Jew is confident of having achieved forgiveness, by a combination of human repentance and divine mercy, and proceeds forward refreshed, optimistic about our power to do good in the world under God’s guidance.”[3] In other words, despite some terrible history, the final idea of the Hebraic New Year comes back to be pretty Biblical. God has always forgiven. (We actually didn’t need Jesus on the cross for that part contrary to many people’s opinions, but the cross accomplished a slew of other things we did need. God has always offered complete forgiveness.)
The New Year is about a return to what is of God – TOV.
Most of you know that X44 has done a good bit of research in this area. Here is a link to our video series on atonement:
If you want to read a better version I would suggest this:
Better views of atonement:
Well first let’s get the word right.
Leviticus 16 – gives us the instructions for the day of Atonement. Notice in Lev 16:2 is the noun for atonement (a place not an action).
Aaron must make a burnt offering (the gift) and a sin (purification or decontamination) offering before entering the Holy place. So, there is a gift to God to say, “Hey I want to spend some time in your presence” and a purification offering. There is no wrath debt or substitution to be seen here.
2 goats are selected for Israel: The sin offering goat and the goat that will “bear the sin”. Lots are cast to see which goat fulfills which role.
The “Sin” offering goat
Both goats are called a sin/purification/decontamination offering and the reason is that is that the lots have not been cast yet over these two. So, since we don’t know yet which ones going to be the actual sin offering, they’re both referred to that way. We don’t know which one’s going to be for the Lord, which one was to be for azazel.
a better way to translate “Atonement” here is to make expiation with it, or to make a purging with it. The whole notion of the sin offering is decontamination and purification. It is a reset back to holiness. (starting to see new year implications yet?)
Propitiation or Expiation (KPR language)
Both words presuppose that there is a barrier that must be removed to overcome sin. We need to look to see what is acted upon in order to translate KPR correctly. As we noted atonement language means to cover or purge but is the issue with humans, God, or sin?
Propitiation: means that the barrier lies within God himself; thus, it is usually interpreted as an action to satisfy divine wrath against sinners. This was the pagan concept of sacrifice, but Christians who hold to this say that God’s justice must be exercised, and sin must be paid for in order to receive forgiveness and the aversion of God’s wrath. (This is PSA language)
Expiation: means that the barrier lies outside of God, within humankind and/or a stain they leave on the world (sacred space), it is often interpreted as an action aimed at removing sin. To cover, wipe, or to purge sin.
Mercy Seat Translation-This is a common translation, reading the ESV, this is not a good translation although it’s a traditional one. More literally, if atonement (kapper) means to purge then kapporeth (noun) should be the place of purging. In other words, we would really focus on the location not the result, because calling it the mercy seat is sort of reading the theological result into the lemma. That’s why it’s not a great translation. The place is the cover of the Ark in the Holy of Holies which is the footstool of God’s throne. This is a throne room scene.
The Scapegoat or the goat for azazel
The propitiation view (punishment). The goat bears the sin and wrath.
The azazel refers to the location (the desert) which theologically if the place where sin and evil lives or belongs (not in God’s camp)
Azazel is a proper name. This was the leader of the fallen angels/demons in 2nd temple Judaism. The goat transports the sin to Azazel.
Because the goat was bearing the sin (carrying) it could not be a sacrifice because God only gets spotless pure animals (what does that do for your New Testament theology of the cross if Jesus was imputed our sin?)
One more issue here is the laying on of hands and confessing Israel’s sins over the goat. Some argue that this is the connection that all laying on of hands must equal that the animal is bearing sins and the laying on of hands is the transfer. In this instance this is true. But as we saw in every instance of hand laying it is not about sin, so we cannot jump to conclusions when we deal with other sacrifices that as we saw don’t deal with that concept. Laying on of hands is about setting something apart or consecrating it for a task.
Atonement Conclusions
Goat 1- the purification offering, is to cleanse the temple objects. Blood is not applied to anyone.
The scapegoat is sent to Azazel. So, sin, the forces of death, are removed from the camp. This connects God is rescuing his people from the forces of death.
Neither of these goats are punished. It’s about expelling or purging God’s space (so Expiation!). The first goat (the one that dies) is more about cleaning the throne room of the stain of sin. The scapegoat doesn’t get killed (he’ll probably die in the desert).
This is all about resetting sacred space (getting back to Eden)
New Testament
The Exodus is the primary motif of what is going on at the cross, but the Biblical authors do see the day of atonement being fulfilled in Jesus. We see Jesus as all 3 actors in the Day of Atonement: The purification offering goat, the scapegoat, and the priest.
1 John 3:8- Christ came to destroy the works of the Devil. Both Exodus and Day of Atonement deal with this concept.
Romans 3:21-26, 1 John 2:1-2, 1 John 4:10, Heb 13:11-12, Matt 27:28-31, Heb 9:18-26, Heb 10:8-17
Addressing PSA notions of the Day of Atonement:
Neither goat is taking the place of anyone
Neither goat is getting wrath poured out upon them
The goat doesn’t make a payment for forgiveness but is the one who carries it away. Remission.
Expiation (defined as purging) is the action taken- like the goat taking the sins back to where they belong. Not only does he take it back to where it belongs, he defeats it for good!
Sin is seen as the forces of death and they have no place in sacred space, Jesus removes them by his blood and carries them out of the camp. Dissolves them- His blood is the ultimate ritual detergent.
Jesus is the place where heaven and earth meet (the “mercy seat”) he’s not the propitiation to satisfy God’s wrath. This is a rescue of humanity and the world from the powers
The Day of Atonement was all about resetting holiness in sacred space and not about appeasing God’s wrath. It was about purging the sin from God’s presence
CONCLUSION:
Whatever date we want to associate as the New year, the idea biblically has always centered around a return to TOV – the way that God intended. Jesus shows us the way back after much brokenness to what God asks of us. To be TOV. To reflect on how to live in Holiness, Devotion, and Tribulation. How to Live in the Joy that we were created for. To bring Heaven to earth. To Celebrate Life here and now in the name of Jesus. To return to what is Holy and who we were made to be – a Set Apart Holy Royal Priesthood.
[1] Harris, R. L. (1999). 1023 כָפַר. R. L. Harris, G. L. Archer Jr., & B. K. Waltke (Eds.), Theological Wordbook of the Old Testament (electronic ed., pp. 452–453). Chicago: Moody Press.
[2] Ibid.
[3] Gordon Tucker, in Abraham Heschel, Heavenly Torah as Refracted through the Generations (ed. and trans. by Gordon Tucker, Continuum International Publishing Group, New York, 2007), p. 169.
This article is a 20-minute read. The YouTube version of the discussion is at the Bottom of the page and is an 80-minute listen.
Human beings- We are the most incredibly unique, wildly powerful and intelligent beings ever created but also make some of the most awful decisions, repeatedly, on a regular basis.
The Bible is beautifully simplistic and at the same time houses unsearchable depths of God’s wisdom and goodness.
Of course, the Bible says a lot, everything we need, but there is also quite a bit that it doesn’t simply say. We know very little of what Jesus’s life was like for the better part of three decades, however through extrabiblical material such as historical research of that period, calendars, Jewish and rabbinical practices, and harmonizing the gospel narratives, we can gather much about his life that was not said in the pages of scripture. What we do know is that as soon as Jesus walked in obedience through baptism, he was led by the spirit of God into the wilderness.
Matthew 4:1. “Then Jesus was led by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil.”
The humanity of Jesus is certain, but often eludes us, most of us struggle to fast for one full day, let alone a 40 day and 40-night stint. Utter depletion was upon Jesus, and then came the tempting by ha-satan, and testing by God. What follows is three questions and three rebuttals. The result is Satan fleeing and spiritual beings ministering to Jesus. Although the Bible doesn’t say it, clearly there had been some equipping in Jesus’s life.
and said to Him, “If You are the Son of God, throw Yourself down; for it is written, ‘He will command His angels concerning You’; and ‘On their hands they will bear You up, so that You will not strike Your foot against a stone.’” Matthew 4:6 NASB
Ha-satan misquotes Psalm 91. Yet Jesus doesn’t correct him and simply notes that this is a test of YHWH and infers that to accept this challenge would be forbidden. The fault is in the demanding of Humans of God. God is not the captive genie of my three magical wishes. Jesus makes this clear yet so many Christians today pray in a way that is rival to what Jesus states here. We make demands of God.
“Throw yourself from the Temple” has several other eye raising implications. Some have a hard time asking God for anything personally as it seems to be at odds with really believing in the will of God and the way that God weaves everything to serve His purposes. Can we demand without the eyes to see such things? Do our demands circumvent His intentions? Sometimes in the Bible, such as with Moses we see God heeding the requests of man and altering what would seem to be His better will. But should we really ask God of that. Does asking God to be a way maker mean asking Him to come to our desires rather than posturing ourselves to simply come to His? Do we not throw ourselves from the Temple rather than throw ourselves on His mercy and sovereignty?
Regardless of where your theology lands, there is much going on behind the scenes of Jesus’s interaction with the challenger and it parallels a story in the Old Testament. Most of us know the story of the exile from slavery out of Egypt and through the Red Sea, but often what’s overlooked is also what the Israelites overlooked in the wilderness. We know that both the Israelites and Jesus had just come out of the water before heading into the wilderness. In the Bible, water often signifies chaos. In the beginning, when the spirit of God was hovering over the waters of the deep, the gives us a description of what life, before God interacts with it can look dark, uncontrolled, violent, and unpredictable. As God brings forth land, we first see the life breathing characteristic of the creator of the cosmos.
In the same way, a believers baptism signifies the reaction to an interaction with a life breathing God. They are lowered into the chaotic waters of life for the last time and are risen into a brand-new life.
The hope and promise of a new life are exactly what Israel stepped in to when they stepped out of the Red Sea. The final ascent up the shores on to free land for the first time began the echo of Psalm 136:12 with a mighty hand and outstretched arm; His love endures forever. Just like baptism, this step into their new life was simply the beginning. It was the beginning of a new way of doing things thus signifying the importance of being trained and equipped to withstand the seemingly impossible giants that stood in the way of the final journey to the promised land.
A voice is calling, “Clear the way for the Lord in the wilderness; Make smooth in the desert a highway for our God. Isaiah 40:3 NASB
There is one more connection between wilderness and water. In a D32 consideration, God is at war with other fallen spiritual beings and their slave masters, eventually overthrowing them with the greatest symbol of substitutionary sacrifice being Jesus as the Passover Lamb. At first glance the “horse and the rifer thrown into the sea” it would seem that the slavemasters are completely annihilated, and the earthly force is, but it would seem that the spiritual ones connected with the gods they formerly and will continue to serve will somehow find their way back into the Israelite camp. perhaps this is partially a sign of their continual grumbling and demanding that God do what they want and insisting that it is His fault that they are in such a terrible mess. Are you starting to see the connection of the fallen spiritual beings influencing humanity to make demands of God? This isn’t simply grumbling but a severe violation of the first (and greatest) commandment.
The wilderness becomes God’s classroom in obedience and allegiant devotion to God. In many ways today it still is.
The wilderness is harsh and uncontrollable. We want to live in places where we are in control, so we build cities. That is why cities in the Bible are associated with RA not TOV. We don’t like the testing and trying of the spiritual beings in our lives, so we bulldoze the wilderness and build concrete jungles instead. Unfortunately, that becomes a sign of the RA over the TOV. Humankind actually seems to have very little control and when they think they do it is typically a sign they have been manipulated by the RA of life. We feed our self-delusional fantasy that we are self-sufficient as we are duped by the aggressors.
The wilderness is God’s sacred place, what is left of the earth as He created it. When we attempt to reconstruct it in our image, we lose a connectivity to God and His sacred space. For Israel, the wilderness gave the Word of the Lord, the light and cloud they followed, the learning of grace and mercy, and unending provisions. They learned to heal and worship. They learned to trust and seek. If you have never met God in the wild and untamed placed of His sacred devotion you are likely missing what He has always desired to give to you. Perhaps when we dwell within the city limits, we need to remember to be a wilderness witness. Or maybe we just weren’t intended to live in the concrete jungle and trying to do so could actually be rival to God’s design.
We are in desperate need to be trained and equipped to withstand the seemingly impossible giants that may stand in the way of our journey through this life. If we move too quick, we can miss an important element of God’s character displayed in Matthew 4.
“Then Jesus was led by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil.”
The word tempted is the Greek word peirazó. to make proof of, to attempt, test, tempt, but here it is used in the negative sense, a RA sense.
James 1:2-4. My brothers and sisters] consider it nothing but joy when you fall into all sorts of trials, because you know that the testing of your faith produces endurance. And let endurance have its perfect effect, so that you will be perfect and complete, not deficient in anything. (NET)
Conversely, in this passage, the Greek word for trials is dokimion, meaning- a testing or what is found approved. This testing, or a process or being made complete by the testing of our faith, is very good or Tov.
Both words in this form have significantly similar meanings, however the word tempted in Matthew 4 is in the negative form, or Ra (peirazō) meaning “tempt” by means of luring. This is not a character trait of God. Later in his letter, James 1:13 states “When tempted, no one should say, “God is tempting me.” For God cannot be tempted by evil, nor does he tempt anyone.” Although God will not tempt, he still can use the corrupt schemes of the evil forces as way to test our character. This again is a parallel to God seemingly handing Job over to the fallen spiritual beings (sons of God) for the testing of his character to be found worthy of righteousness and faithfulness to YHWH.
James uses a rare Greek verb, peirázō, meaning “to try, to test.” God does not test anyone with evil. It’s not simply a matter of testing. It’s a matter of attempting to persuade someone to do something evil (and, of course, God is the one who determines what is good and what is evil).
How often they rebelled against Him in the wilderness and grieved Him in the desert! Again and again they tempted God, and pained the Holy One of Israel. Psalm 78:40-41 NASB
Asaph uses the Hebrew verb nāsâ, which means “to put to the test, to try, to prove, to assay.” In other words, they didn’t ask God to do something wicked. They simply acted as if He weren’t God. God doesn’t test us with evil, but we often attempt to test Him, and in so doing, we engage in evil as a means of assaying Him. We disconnect while He attempts to reconnect. This is the exact opposite of what our design and destiny is.
When Israel came out of a 400 plus year stay in RA-Egypt, this nation of people needed to be taught how to do things the way of God’s kingdom. Had the Levitical law been lived out according to its intention, this nation of people would have had such profound impact, other nations would have not helped but take notice and be drawn in to such a beautiful culture. They would have renewed the earth. They were meant to grow grapes as big as their heads that their world would have travelled great distances to partake in. This is the lost “analogy” of what it meant to bear fruit. To have fruit that the entire world sought after and desired. And what could be better than that? Well a fruit that was naturally given and produced by God, it didn’t require any toil. This is the mosaic of what a gift from God was intended to be in our lives… the epitome of what it meant to bear fruit in His kingdom. We were the possessors and recipients of a bountiful harvest that required little if anything from us with enormous blessings.
A contranym is when one word can have two different meanings. Although today we don’t use the word kingdom in our everyday language, we often operate under the ruling of many kingdoms. Our nation is often viewed as a kingdom, if not the strongest kingdom of all kingdoms in the eyes of many. We tend to create our own mini kingdoms either by our nationalities, our blood lines, or even our homesteads. The time we spend investing in these areas can certainly look like worship or idolatry, but what trips us up is our tendency to build vertically (like a city). God has a kingdom which cannot be shaken regardless of our efforts to rebel against it or the attempts of the dark evil forces to lure us away from him. The way God’s kingdom operates is contrary to the ways of the world. God’s kingdom is horizontal, signifying the gift and purpose of diversity amongst all the people. No one person is better or higher in stature, but all created equal although incredibly different. There is but one king amongst a sea of brethren. God’s kingdom is built solely on the foundation of love that never ceases to bring forth life. To this day, our universe is constantly expanding. New stars are being born and galaxies discovered. If we can see through the mess of our daily lives, we can also see new life being formed each day around us. God never stops producing and expanding. This is what you and I were made to do. This is our purpose as the church. We were created by THE life source, the author and perfector of life, the well that never runs dry, but God is also aware of the effect that the kingdoms of this world can have on our nephesh. Although we don’t use the word nephesh in our daily language, contextually here it is important. Although Hebraically nephesh is defined as our soul, we often think of our soul as a separate part of the entire whole of who we are. Our nephesh is every part of who we are down to the deepest part of our composition. Our nephesh is all encompassing and when we bow down to kingdoms of this world, or in the case of the Israelites who had been under to rule of a tyrannical system for over 400 years, it takes reconstruction upon one’s nephesh to learn once again or for the first time the SOP or standard operating practices of God’s kingdom.
According to scripture, the wilderness can often produce the greatest bounty of fruit within our lives. As the kingdom of world tells us to gather from around us to store up treasures in our barns, Jesus continues to teach and to guide us to the truth that true life can only be generated from the inside out. He uses examples of that of a mustard seed. He gave them another parable:
“The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed that a man took and sowed in his field. It is the smallest of all the seeds, but when it has grown it is the greatest garden plant and becomes a tree, so that the wild birds] come and nest in its branches.” Matthew 13:31-33
The wilderness is what’s considered a liminal space. Liminal is translated as threshold as in the threshold of a doorway. It’s a space that is not quite outside yet not fully inside either. It’s a transition point. It’s the place where we know we are not where we used to be, but we are not yet where we are intended to go. Our tendency is to view these times in life in a negative context, however in God’s kingdom, what can only be produced through tastings in the wilderness has the potential to produce the highest dividend in our lives, yet we see it through a negative lens and put our best foot forward to get out of the spaces and seasons of life as quickly as possible. Many of us are praying for breakthrough in areas of our lives, but at the same time we are not willing to allow God to teach us what the breakthrough may look like and how to get there. These liminal spaces will force us quickly to realize how much control we still desire of our own lives and see clearly the personal kingdom we’ve created.
We know there’s much about Jesus’s life that we are unaware of, but what we do know is that directly out of baptism he was led by the spirit of God into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. At the end of this wilderness season, immediately angels came to minister to him. Matthew 4:11. This opens up the door profound displays of the goodness of God’s kingdom displayed through the life of Jesus. In fact, John said this
“Jesus did many other things as well. If every one of them were written down, I suppose that even the whole world would not have room for the books that would be written.” Yet, God has an even bigger plan for the whole of humanity operating through the Kingdom of God. Jesus is recorded saying this in John 14:12. “Very truly I tell you, whoever believes in me will do the works I have been doing, and they will do even greater things than these, because I am going to the Father.”
The only pathway for us to experience this type of life, a land truly flowing with milk and honey from the core of who we are, is to be built up, equipped and empowered by God in liminal spaces. The world calls the wilderness Ra. The Israelites did too. They had everything they needed to survive and were on a journey to thrive, but still found themselves not just complaining, but being so caught up in only what they knew that they didn’t have the faith to trust God with what they don’t know.
“That night all the members of the community raised their voices and wept aloud. All the Israelites grumbled against Moses and Aaron, and the whole assembly said to them, “If only we had died in Egypt! Or in this wilderness! Why is the Lord bringing us to this land only to let us fall by the sword? Our wives and children will be taken as plunder. Wouldn’t it be better for us to go back to Egypt?”
Richard Rohr calls “liminal space”—a particular spiritual position where human beings hate to be, but where the biblical God is always leading them. Many of the greatest stories are messages of stepping positiviely out of liminal space. Abraham, Joseph, David, Jonah, Ruth, Mary and so many others.
Let us not be so quick to judge the lack of faith and the desire to control of that of the Israelites. This is us, too. We have bought in to the lie that these wilderness seasons of life, surrendered to God, cannot produce far greater than what we could ask or imagine. We are all too familiar with liminal spaces. We can be in multiple wilderness seasons at the same time, or around the corner from another one. Eschatologically, we are in a liminal space. Jesus has defeated the forces of darkness and provided for us a pathway to exceptional life, but we are still waiting his return, and a culmination of all things made right. The question becomes whether we as the bride of Christ are willing to receive from this wilderness season the chiseling, purifying, and equipping that is necessary to present ourselves as a spotless bride.
“so that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish.” Ephesians 5:27.
Maybe today, we don’t necessarily seek to create wilderness seasons or find the liminal spaces, but in humility we can begin to see the power within them. Most of us are somewhat lofty in our thinking, even if we think poorly of ourselves. We still allow the Ra to have more say over our lives and the lives of others than the Tov that God has for us. Exquisite goodness was on the other side of this forming season for the Israelites, yet they threw it all away for the slavery that was familiar to them.
We are designed in the image of God and thus we are designed to bring forth life in everything that we do, yet if we are not allowing God to do the work beginning on the inside of our minds and hearts, lasting fruit cannot be produced.
“I am the true vine, and my Father is the gardener. He cuts off every branch in me that bears no fruit, while every branch that does bear fruit he prunes[a] so that it will be even more fruitful.
You are designed to bring forth fruit and bring it abundantly. Be the one today who considers it pure joy when you face a trial of many kinds, believing that the testing, the equipping, the chiseling, the forming by the hand of God, can produce a steadfastness within us that leads to complete wholeness and maturity, unshakable by the feeble attempts of a broken world.
Written by Dr. Will Ryan with Special Guest Paul Lazzaroni
Luke, I am your father! Every 80’s and 90’s guy knows exactly the implications of this phrase. Today we live in a fatherless world. There are so many implications of this, but one of them is the Christian mainstream claiming things of the Lord, yet in actuality is far from the galaxy of their father. I would urge a return to covenant living.
“As for Me, behold, My covenant is with you, and you will be the father of amultitude of nations.” Genesis 17:4 NASB
In Hebrew Av hamon goyim means Abraham would be the father of many, those inside and outside of his immediate family – the regathering of the lost nations (Deuteronomy 32). Today, Christians believe they are faithful to the same God, Yahweh; but if we would have lived during the time this sentiment was expressed to Abraham (the intended audience of the text) I doubt our modern-day actions or fruit would have been recognized as the kind of devotion or allegiance God was asking for. As I write this, Four Southern Baptist theologians and pastors intend to ask messengers to this year’s Southern Baptist Convention annual meeting to adopt the Nicene Creed as part of the denomination’s official faith statement and it begs the question, what does it look like in a modern world to fulfill what Yahweh asked of us?
According to Rabbi Shraga Freedman, “Even when non-Jewish nations recognize the existence of a Supreme Being and the need to serve Him, they advance many distorted notions of what He expects of His creations. Throughout history, their warped perceptions of religious devotion have caused untold pain and suffering to myriads of innocent human beings.”[1]
At first contemplation you might realize that if you aren’t observant to the Torah then you certainly can’t claim Abraham as his spiritual father, and thus what His father Yahweh asked of Him and those to come. You aren’t of the same lineage. But Jesus also redefines a few things for us, and I am thankful for that!
Skip Moen interjects, “God promised that Abraham would become the father of many goyim, that is, the father of many who do not descend from his biological line. But this does not mean these goyim are free to make up their own religious practices. What it means is precisely what James said at the Jerusalem council in the first century. “For from ancient generations Moses has those who preach him in every city, since he is read in the synagogues every Sabbath” (Acts 15:21). We must remember that the promise to Abraham is predicated upon a prior statement, namely, “Walk before Me, and be blameless.” It is hardly conceivable that walking before Abraham’s God is a matter of personal taste.” [2]
I have written a couple of books on the return to covenant practice. That doesn’t mean that all modern Christians should go back to observing the law, but it might carry some implications. I am saying quite clearly that modern day Christianity is a better picture of unfaithfulness than faithfulness. The primary mission of Jesus was to a lost and carnal world to be reconciled back to Yahweh. The religious leaders of His day had become the farthest from His father. I am not sure that has changed any today.
Jesus was observant. This is a call back to being holy, to leave everything on the beach having no other idols before you and completely follow the Lord. Today if you and your family are largely indistinguishable from those of the world you likely aren’t living by the covenant given. The God of Abraham well might be trying to get your attention by calling out your name and urging you to come back into the fold of his love compassion and mercy. Thankfully that calling is from Yahweh and not a “Darth Vader” father figure that has left this world lacking in so many ways. Return to what is TOV.
[1] Rabbi Shraga Freedman, Living Kiddush Hashem, p. 31.
People often ask what Expedition 44 is and I think I answer the question differently every time someone asks (you can read in its entirety what expedition 44 means here.) I believe the answer is similar to the way Paul expresses the attaining of knowledge through scripture leading to personal intimacy with God as the mystery of the Gospel in Colossians 1. As there isn’t just one way of expressing the deepness of the gospel; similarly, there isn’t simply one explanation of what Expedition 44 means. The simple phrase “expedition 44” is an idiom that represents the entire essence of the journey of sanctification to become truly set apart from the world and fully given unto the LORD. This expressions also points to everything that God gave and is reclaiming that is described as “TOV” or good.
In devout traditional and Messianic Judaism, for generations they have been committed to readings of the Bible daily as a way to train their children to hand down the precepts of holy living but also as a way to continually live wholly committed to the Lord each day. The word parashat (which means portion -a shortened form of Parashat HaShavua) describes the section of scripture that is to be read each day in traditional and messianic devout Judaic circles. In this way the Bible is perhaps mapped out such as a curriculum scope and sequence would be for teaching your family how to live for the LORD.
Today many traditional and Messianic Jews follow a daily reading in their personal lives, but their are still regular and daily public readings in many communities. “Torah Reading” often referred Biblically to the ceremony of removing the scroll (or scrolls) from the Torah ark, chanting the appropriate excerpt with special cantillation (trope), and returning the scroll(s) to the ark. It is also commonly called “laining” (which means “to read”).[1] Regular public reading of the Torah was introduced by Ezra the Scribe after the return of the Judean exiles from the Babylonian captivity (c. 537 BCE), as described in the Book of Nehemiah.[2] In the modern era, Orthodox and some Messianic Jews practice Torah reading according to a set procedure almost unchanged since the Talmudic era.[3]
Every once in a while, there is a pattern to which evangelical Christians get back into traditional OT or Jewish Hebraic customs. Everyone probably knows someone that has done this, and churches often lead similarly by doing seder dinners, or partaking in some of the other OT initiatives. There seems to be a regular debate in Evangelical Christianity as to whether Christians may benefit from such observance. For me it was attending Moody Bible Institute in the 1990’s when it was the center training for Jews for Jesus. I became aware of the reason the devotion to Torah pointed people towards the Lord in regular reminders of living holy. In this way the law might be seen as a guidepost to keep people on tract until the Messiah would reconcile all things through His atoning work and once again offer intimacy to unblemished relationships to walk with the father as had been lost in Eden. This path is called sanctification and leads to a renewed eschatological heaven and earth and re-instated Eden like kingdom both in this life and into the next. But it isn’t so much about the distant future as it is about living out each and every day for the Lord, the here and the now of devotion unto the LORD.
Today some wonder if we as modern Christians would be better off spiritually in devotion unto the LORD returning to the way of the Torah; I and many others feel that particularly evangelical Western Christianity would seem to be far better off returning to the prescription of Torah in seeking devotion to God than simply believing that we no longer need to exercise or are bound to any of the Old Testament ways of pursuing sanctification. In many ways we have failed to live out our NT calling as those given to a holy royal priesthood far worse than the ancient Israelites that God handed over to exile that didn’t have the revelation of the Messiah or the New Testament.
We are supposed to have spiritually surpassed the ancient vestiges of old, but in reality, have fallen far from them.
To be clear, once Jesus came and commissioned us to be disciples, the mission was to leave everything of the world on the beach and completely follow Him. This was a returning to our original intent in the garden to walk (halach) daily in intimacy with the Lord. Our daily devotion or (work) would be to keep and cultivate what had been given. Today through Christ we are commissioned back to the original Edenic calling as a set apart royal priesthood whose mission should be to walk in devotion unto the Lord keeping and cultivating or reclaiming what was lost or defiled and giving it new life and purpose in the Jesus Kingdom. But some have deducted that we don’t simply not meet this description, but we even seem “less devout” than those under the Law that were handed over to their sinful premonitions and experienced exile. Where does that “put us” 2000 years later?
Expedition 44 is about not only returning to perhaps practicing some of the ancient ways to get “back on track”, but to then fulfill our New Exodus calling to return to an “ALL IN” or “SETAPART” way of I Peter 1:9 commissioned living as those claiming and living out the life that Jesus offered to us as disciples.
This year the Parashat Emor is the 31st weekly Torah portion in the annual Jewish cycle of Torah reading or to be read on 8 May 2024 / 10 Iyyar 5784. As I shared earlier, parashat simply means portion and “Emor” means to say or speak over. You hear parts of this in evangelical Christianity (particularly in charismatic circles) today by speaking into or over someone as a statement of faith or belief. This is sometimes associated with the “word of faith” movement. There are many modern suggestions to this such as the recent song by Charity Gayle – I Speak Jesus. We often speak “Jesus” into or over others believing the words of the Spirit will manifest. Last week at TOV we did this over our children.
The “emor” text is found most specifically in Leviticus 21, but there are many texts that also support this such as Ezekiel 44. (The 44 is not a coincidence but that’s a longer explanation). In Hebrew a complete text is often defined by the first word such as in the Shema – “hear”… this text is similarly is “speak”… emor el-haKohenim benei Aharon, “say to the priests, the sons of Aaron…” The text then goes on to give instruction on several things such as service in the tabernacle, prohibition of pagan nations, and lots of specific kehen (priestly) requirements. The charge of Leviticus 21 is for the Kohen (priests) to lead the way for a nation of people that are to be set apart from the world unto the LORD.
To be specific, much of the text is specifically towards Aaron’s descendants. There are three “classes” within the structure of Jewish society: the Kohen, the Levi and the Israelite. The Kohanim are the physical descendants of Aaron and would offer sacrifices and one of which would function as the high priest. Contrary to most people’s understanding, the other descendants of Levi were assigned to other roles of the temple service (maintenance related – call them the custodians of the temple, notice the foreshadow of Christ type humility, -they served the people). The Kohanim, then, are a subset of the Tribe of Levi.
Some have wondered why the Kohanim were “set apart” in this way from the other Levites. The Bible doesn’t really give us the answer, but oral and rabbinical tradition says they refused to contribute gold or partake in the sin of the Golden Calf and were so zealous for the LORD that they slew 3,000 of the instigators of the rebellion. (The golden calf likely started off as being a pedestal inviting Yahweh to ascend to as a throne but eventually became worshipped by the people and likely some of the Levitival priests instead of Yahweh Himself. This is what actually became the sin, not the building of the calf.) Previously, it was also said that the Levites continued the practice of circumcision while in Egypt, when the other tribes of Israel had abandoned the practice. Perhaps after the golden calf account the kohanim were set apart as those that were undefiled and would “make a way” or “make right” or represent the people before Yahweh. They functioned as the remnant that represented God to the people and the people to God.
That was actually the calling to “all Israel”, but they failed immediately and thus only a small percentage lived out the calling. You may remember God in Deuteronomy 9:13-14, God saying to Moses, “Let me alone that I may destroy them.” Israel failed God very early in the story and continued to do so over and over. Today according to I Peter we are all charged with this royal calling of priesthood. That’s what x44 is all about.
Kiddush HaShem (“sanctifying the Name,”) means that we honor the Name of the LORD by giving up our lives to and for Him. Christ is our example of complete sacrificial humility painting the picture of how then we are asked to be image bearers as living sacrifices. Kiddush HaShem (“sanctifying the Name,”) means that we honor the Name of the LORD by giving up our lives. We die to ourselves that we may receive full life in Jesus.
To the ancient Hebrew, when Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego were faced with the fiery furnace of Nebuchadnezzar’s design, they did not presume that the LORD would perform a miracle for them, but fully expected to give up their lives for the sake of kiddush HaShem in Daniel 3; but God does something more, He offers life where death was presumed. This foreshadows the NT when Jesus leads us in a “new exodus” to give up our lives (lay them down) and accept new life in and through Him. This new life takes us back and reinstates us to the original priestly calling of Eden. To be a “living sacrifice” wholly and completely given to the Lord.
The second part of the parashah lists the eight main mo’edim which are the appointed times of the Jewish calendar where families are “set apart” in what is referred to as mikra’ei kodesh or “times in which holiness is proclaimed” (Lev. 23:2). These are the yamim tovim, in English we simply refer to these as Jewish Holidays.
The Sabbath – weekly observance and day of rest where your family comes together with Yahweh.
Pesach also called “Passover.”
Unleavened Bread.
Firstfruits also called Reishit Katzir.
Shavuot also called “Pentecost” or “Weeks.”
Yom Teru’ah also called “Rosh Hashanah.”
Yom Kippur also called the “Day of Atonement.”
Sukkot also called “Tabernacles” or “Booths.”
These were intended to bring your family out of the world “back” to being set apart before the LORD. Can you imagine life as a Christian today if we set aside from Friday night until Saturday night to simply do nothing but promote Jesus in our families? And then strategically planned 7 “vacations” a year with the sole plan of living each day as best we can in accordance to what God has given us. Christianity might be viewed differently. But the reality of this is that we were even called to more than that in the Great Commission of Jesus to discipleship.
When Christ calls disciples, the intention wasn’t just to be called back to God once a week and 7 times a year; but was even more, to never return to the world. You don’t need 7 times a year or even a special day weekly to be reminded to get out of the world if you never return to the world. Therefore, the new exodus was to completely be set apart, more than what the law called for! So fast forward to Jesus and the great commission to be and make disciples – modern Western Christianity seems to be waaaay off the mark. Therefore, some would assert that we as 21st century Christians may need to return to the ancient ways (first fruits thinking of the law) to get back on track and then eventually we can live completely set apart as Jesus’ disciples into the new royal priesthood calling reclaiming what was lost into the New Kingdom.
If this article sounds like a journey you would like to begin pursuing, truly making the Yahweh the LORD of your life and finding the course of discipleship with Him; we have a community for you. The community of TOV. A community devoted to seeking what it means to live wholly given to Jesus – ALLIN.
“Leyenen”. Yiddish Word of the Week. Leyenen is the popular term for the public reading of sections of the Torah and megiles […] on Shabes and holidays. […] a designated member of the community (the leyener) who would have to spend time memorising the proper way to read the text
“8”, Nehemiah, Tanakh, Mechon Mamre.
^ The exceptions being that most communities (except for Yemenites) ceased in the early Middle Ages to translate the Torah reading into Aramaic as was done in Talmudic times. In addition, in Talmudic times, the one receiving an Aliyah would read his own portion, but most communities today have an institution of a Baal keriah who reads on behalf of all of those receiving Aliyot.
I remember one time when I was young, my father took me to hear a great lecturer on the Shroud of Turin. The gentlemen that was giving the lecture had a Ph.D. in something and came off as very intelligent. It was one of the first times in my young life I ever heard someone speak with this kind of wisdom or understanding. I remember thinking, “maybe someday.” Well perhaps I have arrived, perhaps not. Some people know that the Biblical names we say in English aren’t really accurate. They aren’t the way they would have been pronounced in Hebrew or Greek they are the English versions of the words. For instance, in this lecture the scholar kept saying, “Yeshayahu.” I asked my dad what that meant and He whispered, “Hebrew for Isaiah.” Little did I know this would end up turning into a significant part of my life path.
Biblical Hebrew (or classical Hebrew) was an ancient language that some say emerged in the 10th century B.C (or 1,000 B.C.) and perhaps earlier. Some believe it was the primary language given by God. During the Roman Period Biblical Hebrew “evolved” beyond recognition. The Jewish Diaspora (or spreading of the Jews) changed the pronunciations to be unrecognizable in many ways. Languages got mixed & new dialects were made. Eventually Biblical Hebrew got so minced that it was unrecognizable and basically “died.” But it’s even more complicated, Jeff Benner addresses the issue like this,
“The Hebrew texts of the Bible were originally written with only the 22 letters of the Hebrew alphabet, which only represent consonantal sounds. As no vowel sounds were originally included in the text, they had to be memorized. As you can imagine with the Diaspora and passing on of the language orally in through different dialect and slang things became very difficult to know exactly what words were what. Around the 10th Century AD, a group of Jewish scribes called Masorites, created a system of dots and dashes, called nikkudot or vowel pointings and added these to the hebrew text. These vowel pointings served to supply the vowel sounds to the text in order to codify the pronunciation. The Masorites also included notes in the margins of the text. Prior to the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls, the oldest Hebrew manuscript known to exist is the Masoretic text called the Aleppo Codex which was written in 826 A.D. This text is considered the most authoritative Hebrew manuscript and all future editions are based on this text.”
But the problem therein lies that by 826 A.D. most scholars would believe we had already lost the core of what Biblical Hebrew once was. Are you starting to see the issues?
Hebrew experienced a revival in the 19th century – and there was a push to bring back the Hebrew language, what we know was “Modern Hebrew” came as a result.
This was part of the Zionist Movement, or National Revival Movement to create a state/home for Jews and was an instrumental part of dispensationalism. During this movement, Eliezer Ben-Yehuda, a lexicographer (dictionary writer/editor), prepared the first modern Hebrew dictionary. With the new dictionary, people started using Hebrew again and speaking 1 language. Because of the influence of European languages (remember, the Jewish Diaspora and evolving mentioned above?), Hebrew changed as a language. By the medieval period, we know of three main oral reading traditions: Babylonian, Palestinian, and Tiberian. Numerous medieval biblical manuscripts have survived representing these oral reading traditions with different vocalization sign systems.
(SOURCE: A comprehensive description of Babylonian vocalization is presented by Yisrael Yeivin The Hebrew Language Tradition as Reflected in the Babylonian Vocalization -Jerusalem: The Academy of the Hebrew Language, 1985).
Modern Hebrew and Biblical Hebrew are different. For instance, the basic word for “I” changed, and words from outside languages came into modern Hebrew, essentially, a Biblical Hebrew “speaker” wouldn’t understand a Modern one and vice versa. In this way a someone that knows modern Hebrew often cannot really easily read the Hebrew Bible. They are “that” different. Because of these things and several others, there is a good bit of “acceptable” linguistic variation. Biblical Hebrew has been hard to track for many reasons.
Mark Ward sheds some light into this, “In New Testament times, the disciples were noted as Galileans, probably indeed because of their accents. What was the “right” way back then to pronounce Kiriath Jearim? And was it FIL-uh-steen or fuh-LISS-teen—or something else entirely? Who can know? I’m not saying we can’t know anything about ancient pronunciation of Hebrew and Greek words; I’m saying it cannot serve as the standard for how you pronounce names in the Bible today. Take that impossible pressure off of you.”
We simply “do not know” and because of this, some scholars have gone to great lengths to try to show why one pronunciation or another may be better, but we are so far removed and there are so many complications to this argument that instead of the scholarly community getting particular about all the various possible pronunciations, for the most part, there is a loose grace that comes with the ground. In Hebrew thought, there is never really an absolute “correct” way of seeing something anyway. The ONLY correct “view” is God’s view, and no one has those exact eyes.
So now, you will better understand how TOV specifically gets interesting.
Most people reading this know that Tov is the Biblical Hebrew word that describes God’s handiwork as “good” [tov]. The Hebrew word tov would best be translated as the word “functional” in terms of God’s order (algorithm may be a better modern word to describe what God does here in regard to devotion) in contrast to this word is the Hebrew word “ra”. These two words, tov and ra are used for the tree of the knowledge of “good” and “evil”. While “ra” is often translated as evil it is best translated as “dysfunctional” or “chaotic”. In the Bible we see narratives such as good-evil, tov-ra, order-disorder, function-disfunction, peace-chaos and so on and so forth, and they all describe the contrast of everything that becomes rival to the ways of the Lord.
Tov becomes a one word Idiom to describe all things as intended by God with the idea of a journey to being what you were fully designed to be from the eyes of God both in a sense of your person and the community that represents God.
In Ancient or Paleo Hebrew each character makes a picture that has a loose description of its intention. The above from “strongs” will help you understand this ancient Hebraic idea.
You might notice if you look up the word “good” that different sources or commentators handle meanings and even the pronunciation of the word slightly differently. This just goes back to the idea above that we really do not know what the original word exactly sounded like and many different scholars have suggested differences of opinion and research.
Transliteration takes the letters from one language (in this case, Hebrew) and puts them into another while trying to preserve pronunciation as best as possible. This presents challenges when languages like Hebrew have different sounds than English and have changed immensely over time. For example, one of the sounds in Hebrew that’s hard to carry over in English is the kh sound. It appears in words like chesed (steadfast love, lovingkindness) and sounds like phlegm coming out the back of the throat.
You may see the word TOV written by some commentators as “tobe” where as others may suggest “towb” or somethings different. Sometimes this is a variation in vocabulary and tense but most often it isn’t. In Hebrew the V, W, and B English sounds are very close.
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HOW TO PRONOUNCE TOV: So specifically, when we pronounce TOV, scholars can agree on a few things; in Hebrew you emphasize a strong syllable, and in this word, it is at the beginning. T and O are strong and for the most part are pronounced like “TOE” in English. (However, this is complicated because in modern Hebrew this O often can take on an “A” sound. You might be familiar with this when people say, Mozel TAV with a long A sound rather than Mozel TOV with a short O sound.) Then when you get to the end of the word TOV (particularly in Biblical Hebrew), the emphasis almost fades to nothing. You end with a nearly slurred WVB sound in English. Therefore, TOwvb may be the closest thing (transliteration) you would understand in English (but don’t give to much emphasis to any of the “w” “v” or “b” sound, they should softly fade together.) It comes off as a strong “Toe” with a fading wvb sound. All that said, TAV, TOWB, TOBE, TOVE, TOV and likely other ways of saying it, are all “acceptable” especially when spoken in English! As I alluded to above, only God knows.
EXPEDITION 44 