Category Archives: Weekly Scripture Readings

Blog Scripture Readings for 5-17 Through 5-23-15

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THIS WEEK’S SCRIPTURE READINGS FOR STUDY AND DISCUSSION:

Parashat B’midbar — Numbers 1:1 – 4:20 
Haftarah — Hosea 2:1 (1:10) – 2:22 (20)*
Prophets — Jeremiah 17:1 – 23:40
Writings — Song of Solomon 5:1 – 8:14; Ruth 1:1 – 3:18
Testimony — 1 Peter 5:1-14; 2 Peter 1:1 – 3:18; 1 John 1:1 – 3:24

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.

* Verse numbers in parenthesis refer to the verse number in Christian Bibles when it differs from the Hebrew Bible or Tanakh.

Weekly Blog Scripture Readings for 5/17 through 5/23/15.

 

WARNING: Some Thoughts on Divine Judgment

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The dictionary definition of judgment: “a decision of a court or judge; a misfortune or calamity viewed as a divine punishment.”

The Bible speaks a lot about judgment. When we read about the subject of judgment in the Bible, it’s always about the other guy: someone in the past, or someone in the future, or someone that we consider to be more wicked than we are. The problem is that our pride prevents us from thinking that it is something that could happen to us.

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Judgment is nothing more than suffering the consequences of our actions. It’s simply a function of the law of cause and effect. If you jump off of a building, you’ll suffer the consequences of your actions when you hit the ground. Similarly, when we break YHVH’s commandments, we will suffer the consequences. It’s a matter of degrees. To the degree that we obey his commandments, we’ll reap the blessings of obedience. To the degree we disobey them, we’ll reap the negative consequences (Lev 26:3ff cp. 14ff). For most of us, our actions with regard to obedience to YHVH’s laws are a mixture of both good and evil, so we’re reaping both blessings and curses at the same time.

Coming out the mainstream church, most of us have been so indoctrinated with the doctrine of YHVH’s love and grace, that we have a skewed view of his judgments. No one ever talks about judgment. Add to this the idea of the pre-tribulation raptures, and the idea of divine judgment is shoved further into the back of many believer’s minds. If a preacher does talk about divine judgment, they’re often accused of being judgmental, and that shuts down the conversation. No one wants to talk about it since it messes with people’s false view of a totally loving and gracious Elohim, and it also forces people to face the facts of their own sinfulness and wickedness and the fact that they deserve his judgments for their disobedience.

Beyond this, most of us have developed a theology of our own making whereby we excuse and justify ourselves in the comfort zones of our sin. Our hearts become hardened at that level and we often justify ourselves by comparing ourselves to someone who, in our mind, is a worse sinner than we are, thus making ourselves feel Continue reading →

 

Divine Judgment for Disobedience to YHVH’s Torah-Word

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Leviticus 26:1–46, Blessing and curses are based on obedience to YHVH’s Torah-Word. The corollary to this passage is Deuteronomy chapter 28. These judgments come upon a people who have forgotten their Elohim because they have been blessed materially and in their self-sufficiency have forgotten who the source of their blessings is, and that their blessings are contingent upon obedience to YHVH. These principles are universal, yet how we tend to forget the cycles of history that repeat themselves over and over again like the unstoppable turning of giant millstone grinding into powder those who refuse to learn the lessons from the past. Each generation proudly asserts it’s exceptionalism and that, somehow, it’s immune to YHVH’s inexorable and immutable principles of divine judgment. Only in the perfect hindsight of history can we see the fallacy of this assumption. Ancient Israel failed to learn these lessons as have subsequent nations who claimed to follow the Bible.

Judgment, Divine

In the case of America, and Great Britain before her (and other Christian nations as well), there was in former times a national consciousness of core biblical values and, to one degree or another, a public acknowledgement, acceptance of and respect for the God of the Bible. However, as a nation becomes blessed, it reaches an apogee of prominence, power and wealth where it becomes rich and increased with goods and no longer needs Elohim — or so it thinks. It become fat and forgets the source of its wealth and falls into a state of self-sufficiency leading to spiritual blindness to recognize its true spiritual state (recall YHVH’s warning to a lukewarm church in Rev 3:14–22). This can happen to individuals, churches and to whole societies.

Because YHVH loves his people and wants to walk among them, to be their Elohim and to bless them (Lev 26:12), when they disobey him and walk in ways that are harmful to their well-being, like any loving parent, he is forced to discipline them. Again and again he sends them his prophets and watchmen to warn them that they’re on a path of self-destruction. But because their hearts are uncircumcised, they refuse to humble themselves and repent (Lev 26:41). It’s the same old story over Continue reading →

 

The Biblical Social Welfare System

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Leviticus 25,  Chapter 25 lays out Israel’s social welfare and economic system. Basically, it was a capitalistic economic system where private individuals owned property and small businesses and controlled the means and productions of goods and services. This is not the case in a purely socialistic (or Marxist or communistic) economic system where the government owns most of the property and controls the means and distribution of goods and services.

Do government hand outs in the Bible?

Do government hand outs in the Bible?

However, the capitalistic system that YHVH gave to Israel contained some quasi-socialistic checks and balances in that greedy or exceptionally gifted and ambitious individuals couldn’t excessively rich at the expense of the poor. Socialistic economic philosophy demands that the wealth of the nation be equally distributed among everyone including the poor. This may sound good in theory, but it doesn’t work. In reality, socialism stifles individual initiative by punishing (often through taxation and other means of wealth confiscation and redistribution by the government) those who, through hard work, sacrifice, initiative, and inventiveness have become wealthy. So, it stands to reason, why should the wealthy work hard if the fruits of their labors will only be confiscated and be given to the poor or the “have nots, ” or to those who refuse to work?

At the same time, capitalism is also a flawed system, since in time, the wealthy often end up owning own much of the land and control most of the wealth. Human nature being what it is, the greedy wealthy will turn a capitalistic system into oligarchic capitalism where only a few rich capitalists control nearly everything including the economic and political systems. This is the end times system that is described in Revelation 13 and 18 and is called Babylon the Great. Such a system ends up enslaving people through economic and political means, and creating a veritable serfdom of those who are under its rule (see Rev 18:13, 23).

With these things in mind, as you are reading through chapter 25, note how YHVH instructed the poor to be cared for. There was no government welfare system based on taxing the producers and giving to the non-producers. Everyone worked. In fact, the Torah commands everyone to work for six days, and then to rest on the seventh day (Exod 20:9). Sloth and laziness wasn’t an option.

Notice how debt was handled, and how people worked to pay off their debts. Bankruptcy wasn’t an option.

Notice how the jubilee year prevented the wealthy from acquiring all the land, and how every 50 years there was a redistribution of land, so that those who through sloth or mismanagement of their resources lost their land. Such individuals were mercifully given a second chance to start over again and learn from their past mistakes. Lending to the poor was encouraged, and the charging of interest was prohibited.

As you read through this chapter, consider how YHVH deals with the perennial social and economic ills that have plague the world from time immemorial compared to how men currently deal with these same problems, and usually end up making the problems worse.

Though it would be difficult to implement such a system in our highly collectivized and industrialized society of today, it is likely that in the future, during the Millennium, when the Torah will be the rule of the earth and agrarianism will likely be the dominant paradigm, that such a Torah-based system will once again be put in place.

 

Should Men Wear Beards?

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Leviticus 19:27, You shall not shave around the sides of your beard.

Some Torah scholars say that there is no place in the Torah, or anywhere else in the Scriptures, that explicitly commands men to wear beards. Others who are of the opinion that men should wear beards agree that while there may be no direct command to wear a beard, the Scriptures give an implied or indirect command to do so. In other words, it’s assumed that men will have a beard. I am of the latter opinion.

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Some will point to Leviticus 19:27 and 21:5 in attempts to prove that men are to wear beards — that they are not to shave their beards. In reality, this command related specifically to shaving the beard in honor of the dead according to some ritual the ancient pagans practiced. In other words, YHVH is telling the Israelite men not to shave their beards as the pagans did in honor of the dead. What exactly that pagan practice was, we don’t know for sure.

Can these two verses be taken as a prohibition against a man shaving his beard? Those who say no will say that there is no direct command in the Bible to have a beard, but if you do have one, don’t shave it in honor of the dead as the pagans did. Those who say yes will say that these two verses imply a command for men to have a beard; that is, how can you cut something that you don’t already have? There are well-meaning people on both sides of this debate.

These things we know for sure. Aaron the high priest had a beard (Ps 133:2). Yeshua had a beard or else Isaiah 50:6 was a false prophecy. Ezekiel had a beard (Ezek 5:1), Ezra had a beard (Ezra 9:3); David had a beard (1 Sam 21:13); and many Israelite men wore beards (2 Sam 10:4-5; 1 Chr 19:5; Jer 41:5). It is also a religious Jewish tradition to this day for men to have beards, and we know that this tradition is rooted in antiquity.

In addition to this, sometimes a man comes to a point in his life that his hair refuses to grow up top, and wearing a beard can be great compensation for this loss, although this isn’t a scriptural reason for sporting a beard.

As for me, I have chosen to wear a beard. At the very least, it’s quite a Hebraic thing to do. Besides, Yeshua had one, and I like imitating him as much as possible.

Beyond this, what you do is your choice.

 

Blog Scripture Readings for 5-10 Through 5-16-15

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THIS WEEK’S SCRIPTURE READINGS FOR STUDY AND DISCUSSION:

Parashat Behar – B’chukotai — Leviticus 25:1 – 27:34 
Haftarah — Jeremiah 16:19 – 17:14
Prophets — Jeremiah 10:1 – 16:21
Writings — Job 40:1 – 42:17; Song of Solomon 1:1 – 4:16
Testimony — James 3:1 – 5:20; 1 Peter 1:1 – 4:19

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 5/10 through 5/16/15.

 

Blog Scripture Readings for 5-3 Through 5-9-15

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THIS WEEK’S SCRIPTURE READINGS FOR STUDY AND DISCUSSION:

Parashat Emor — Leviticus 21:1 – 24:23 
Haftarah — Ezekiel 44:15-31
Prophets — Jeremiah 3:1 – 9:26
Writings — Job 33:1 – 39:18
Testimony — Acts 25:1 – 28:31; James 1:1 – 2:26

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 5/3 through 5/9/15.