Category Archives: Scripture

Scripture Studies

New Video: What the New Testament Says About Clean and Unclean Meats

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In this video, Natan discusses controversial passages in the New Testament that many Bible teachers use to invalidate the Old Testament dietary laws, and he shows how their arguments are illogically invalid.

  • What does it mean when Mark says, “And he [Yeshua] declared all foods clean”?
  • What about Peter’s vision of the sheet with unclean animals?
  • Will prayer over food sanctify unkosher food?
  • What did Paul mean when he said that “nothing is unclean of itself”?
  • What did Paul mean when he told us to let no man judge us in the things we eat?
  • Did Yeshua and Paul tell us to eat whatever is put before us when we’re at someone’s home, even if it’s unclean?

Find the answer to these questions in this video.

A free study guide is available at http://www.hoshanarabbah.org/pdfs/food_for_thought.pdf.

Watch this video at

 

Blog Scripture Readings for 4/14 through 4/20/13

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Parashat Achrei Mot – Kedoshim — Leviticus 16:1 – 20:27
Haftarah — Amos 9:7-15
Prophets — Jeremiah 4:1 – 11:23
Writings — Job 9:1 – 15:35
Testimony — Acts 20:1 – 24:27

Most of this week’s blog discussion points will be on these passages. If you have general comments or questions on the weekly Scripture readings not addressed in a blog post, here’s a place for you to post those. Just use the “leave a reply” link below.

The full “Read Through The Scriptures In A Year” schedule, broken down by each day, can be found on the right sidebar under “Helpful Links.” There are 4 sections of scripture to read each day. One each from the Torah, the Prophets, the Writings, and from the Testimony of Yeshua. Each week, the Torah and haftarah readings will follow the traditional one-year reading cycle.

Weekly Blog Scripture Readings for 4/14 through 4/20/13.

We are instructed in Vayikra/Leviticus 23:15-16: “You shall count for yourselves – 
from the morrow after the Shabbat, 
from the day when you bring the Omer of the waving – seven Shabbatot [weeks], they shall be complete. 
Until the morrow after the seventh Shabbat 
you shall count fifty days; 
and you shall offer a new meal offering to YHVH.”

This is the 3rd week of the counting of 7 weeks.

 

Same Play, Different Actors

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An Overview of Jeremiah 1–8

Jeremiah chapters 1—8. Jeremiah prophesied to ancient Israel some 2800 years ago. What relevance could a bearded and robed prophet from the Middle East have to us living in the 21st century? The answer is simple: People are people! Only the actors, costumes, sets and venues change.

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So what social and spiritual issues burdened the old prophet’s heart?

  • Israel worshipped other gods besides YHVH Elohim (Jer 2:5).
  • Their religious leaders didn’t know Elohim (Jer 2:8).
  • False prophets filled the land (Jer 2:8) who predict only ear-ticklying nicety things (Jer 6:11).
  • Religious people relied on their own efforts—programs, man-made religious systems—instead of relying on the Spirit of Elohim to lead them (Jer 2:13).
  • The fear of YHVH Elohim was gone from the land (Jer 2:19; 5:24).
  • Israel had turned to false eastern religious systems (e.g. pantheism and earth worship, Jer 2:27).
  • The abominable practice of abortion/infanticide was socially acceptable (Jer 2:34).
  • The fatherless and needy were not being defended (Jer 5:28).
  • The religious system was full of self-appointed leaders who were con artists who lacked spiritual power (Jer 5:31).
  • False spiritual leaders were popular among the people (Jer 5:31)
  • The people and spiritual leaders were given over to greed and covetousness—i.e., the love of money (Jer 6:13; 8:10).
  • Everyone had rejected the Torah (Jer 6:19).
  • People refused to repent of their wicked sins (Jer 8:6).
  • The land was full of false spiritual teachers who didn’t know the Torah, and who spoke falsely (Jer 8:8–9).

From Jeremiah’s day until now, are things really different in our society or even in the church world?

 

Men Respect Your Wives by Keeping Your Distance

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Leviticus 15:19–24, The laws of niddah apply to a women in her menstrual cycle. This is an area that many take for granted, but not YHVH in his Torah. A woman’s body produces life or death depending on whether an egg has been fertilized or not during her monthly cycle. There are many spiritual ramifications to this, and YHVH does not treat this matter lightly. While her egg is passing from her body she is in a state of impurity since, in a sense, death is occurring (an unfertilized egg is passing out). It is a time of grieving and emotional turmoil for the woman. This is NOT the time for a man to approach his wife. To do so, as already noted, is strictly forbidden (Lev 18:19).

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Consider the benefits to the marriage of the husband and wife separating themselves sexually and emotionally at this time each month, and how it can benefit and enrich a marriage. The man learns self control and selflessness in that he is given the opportunity to be extra solicitous of his wife’s needs without expecting anything in return. What’s more, how much sweeter their time of intimacy will be when the do come back together intimately. The old adage, absence makes the heart grow fonder, could apply here.

The Torah considers a woman to be unclean for at least seven days, even if her flow lasted only one day. So at the minimum a man is to be separated from his wife (giving her an emotional break) for at least seven days, if not longer. On the eighth day (at the minimum) or the next day after her flow has stopped, she is no longer considered unclean (The ArtScroll Tanach Series Vayikra, p. 247). Eight is the biblical number signifying new beginnings. In this case, eight relates to the new cycle of life that begins as the woman’s body begins to produce a new egg with the potential for new life to occur.

 

Dealing With the Communicable Disease Called Sin

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Overview of Parshiot Tazria-Metzora (Lev 12–13 and 14–15)

Often these two parshiot are combined in the yearly Torah reading cycle depending on how the Jewish calendar falls for the year. Their combining together is likely due to the fact that each is relatively short and deals with related subjects: namely, the ritual purity laws. As we shall see, the causes of ritual impurity involve sin issues. The Torah prescribes procedures that the afflicted person had to follow in order to be deemed cleansed and thus be readmitted into the camp of Israel. All the rituals prophetically pointed to Yeshua’s atoning death on the cross.

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These two parshiot dealing with diseased and unclean persons immediately come after the laws concerning clean and unclean meats (Lev 11). What the Israelites ate as well as the state of their physical bodies was an important aspect of holiness in the eyes of YHVH.

From these two parshiot, we learn that an unclean person could only become clean through the atoning blood of a sacrificed animal or through ritual cleansing of water by which he was reconciled to Elohim and brought back into the camp of Israel. What can we learn from the juxtapositioning of these subjects (i.e., the laws pertaining to unclean meats and unclean people) in the Torah? Simply this. Man can easily become impure and defiled because of his innately depraved, crooked, and wicked heart that is at enmity with the laws of Elohim (Jer 17:9; Rom 8:7). Since the fall of Adam, man has been in a state of impurity from Elohim. Thus, sin separates him from the presence of Elohim and from his fellow Israelites. Only the sin-atoning blood of Yeshua can bring him to a place of purity where he can be reconciled to the Kadosh (Holy) One of Israel, and become part of the camp (i.e., the congregation of the saints or kadosh ones) of YHVH.

Leviticus 12:1–8 deals with the purification of women after childbirth. Adam Clarke in his commentary states that in the woman’s having to bring a sacrifice after the birth of her child, Elohim keeps up the remembrance of the fact that through woman, sin entered the world. He also keeps up the memorial of sacrifice to show that the state of a sinner, howsoever deplorable, is not hopeless. In every ceremony, we may see both the justice and the mercy of Elohim. Hence, while we have the knowledge of our spiritual impurity, we have also the knowledge of our cure—the sacrifice of an innocent animal, which always points to Yeshua who once and for all, in his sacrificial death, cleansed us from sin’s impurity. Continue reading →

 

New Video: Food for Thought—You Are What You Eat

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In this video, learn the heart and spirit behind the biblical dietary laws. This issue involves a whole lot more than just health—it’s about holiness. Following the biblical dietary laws help…

  • us to control what goes into our mouths, so that we’ll be able to better control what comes out of them.
  • to teach us self control.
  • to teach us how our scruples about what we eat physically directly relates to what we eat spiritually.
  • to show us how a biblical diet can help hold the community of redeemed believers together, and helps the saints from assimilating into the world.
  • to raise our level of consciousness on the subject of holiness by teaching us how to separate the holy from the profane.
  • us to place a greater value on our bodies as the temple of the Holy Spirit.
  • to sharpen our spiritual acuity so that we’ll get more out of the Word of Elohim.
  • to become more holy (set-apart from the pollutions and defilement of this world) as YHVH Elohim is holy (set-apart).

 

 

Blog Scripture Readings for 4/7 through 4/13/13

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Parashat Tazria-Metzora — Leviticus 12:1 – 15:33
Haftarah — 2 Kings 7:3-20
Prophets — Isaiah 62:1 – 66:24; Jeremiah 1:1 – 3:25
Writings — Job 2:1 – 8:22
Testimony — Acts 16:1 – 19:41

Most of this week’s blog discussion points will be on these passages. If you have general comments or questions on the weekly Scripture readings not addressed in a blog post, here’s a place for you to post those. Just use the “leave a reply” link below.

The full “Read Through The Scriptures In A Year” schedule, broken down by each day, can be found on the right sidebar under “Helpful Links.” There are 4 sections of scripture to read each day. One each from the Torah, the Prophets, the Writings, and from the Testimony of Yeshua. Each week, the Torah and haftarah readings will follow the traditional one-year reading cycle.

Weekly Blog Scripture Readings for 4/7 through 4/13/13.

We are instructed in Vayikra/Leviticus 23:15-16: “You shall count for yourselves – 
from the morrow after the Shabbat, 
from the day when you bring the Omer of the waving – seven Shabbatot [weeks], they shall be complete. 
Until the morrow after the seventh Shabbat 
you shall count fifty days; 
and you shall offer a new meal offering to YHVH.”

This is the 2nd week of the counting of 7 weeks.