Tag Archives: Word of Elohim

What is the Book of Deuteronomy all about?

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More Insights About the Book of Deuteronomy

In stark terms, YHVH warns the Isaelites in Deuteronomy of the struggles Israel will have as it walks between two world: the lower world that attaches itself to man’s soul and attempts to pull him downward, and the upper world that pulls the spirit in man heavenward.

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Deuteronomy presents Torah (as does Ps 119) as the way to be spiritually, physically, mentally, emotionally, materially elevated before Elohim and in the eyes of the surrounding nations (Deut 4:6).

In Deuteronomy, YHVH lays out two extremes: blessings for obedience and curses for disobedience; curse for following the ways of this world, and blessings for following the Word of YHVH. But seldom do individuals find themselves in one extreme or the other, for few are either totally worldly or totally heavenly in the orientation of their lives. They are usually caught up somewhere in the middle ground between the two: not totally evil and not totally good. Their lives are a mixed bag of good and evil, blessings and curses, and a double-orientation toward the heaven and the world. The Bible calls this double-mindedness (Jas 1:8; 4:8), and Yeshua decries such an individual (Matt 6:24, “one can’t serve both God and mammon”). The Bible also calls this being lukewarm­—being neither hot nor cold, and YHVH hates this as well (Rev 3:15–16). Such an individual, if he isn’t careful, can find himself feeding spiritually more from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil rather than the tree of life.

YHVH lays out the highest spiritual ideal for Israel: to be wisdom in the sight of the nations (Duet 4:6), to be the head and not the tail, to be the greatest and not the least, and to be the lender and not the borrower. Such a position of status is possible thanks to following the Torah. He wants the best for his people, but achieving such is conditional on their obeying him. Many people make claim to believe in the God of the Bible, to love him and many even claim to follow and to obey him—just ask them! But in reality, do they? What are the fruits of their lives? Their true spiritual status is based on what they do, not what they profess with their mouths!

Deuteronomy affirms the sufficiency of Torah. The Torah is the Word of Elohim and nothing more needs to be added to it. It is the full revelation of YHVH when it says not to add to the Word of Elohim (Deut 4:2; 12:32). It is the bedrock of the Scriptures and the bedrock of truth. If Torah is the bedrock of YHVH’s word, then the Ten Commandments are the cornerstone in that foundation of truth, which Moses reiterates in Deuteronomy five. The rest of the Scriptures are just commentary or elucidations on Torah, or Continue reading →

 

What Was Yeshua’s View of the Torah?

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A Study of the Sermon On the Mount

Understand the Bible in Its Proper Context

The Bible was written, for the most part, if not totally, in the Hebrew (or Aramaic) language by Hebrew people who spoke Hebrew, lived in a Hebrew culture, practiced the Hebrew religion and worshipped and served YHVH Elohim, the God of the Hebrews. What defined the Israelites’ spiritual relationship to their God—YHVH Elohim? It was the Torah, a Hebrew word that literally means “the teachings, precepts or instructions in righteousness of Elohim” as delivered through his servant and prophet Moses to his people, the children of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob (Israel), known as Israelites. The Torah is recorded in what is commonly called the Books of the Law, the Books of Moses, the Pentateuch or the Chumash, or what we would call the first five books of the Hebrew Bible: Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy. These books, called the Torah, or instructions in righteousness of Elohim, were delivered word-for-word and letter-for-letter to Moses and the Hebrew Children of Israel and forms the foundation for the entire Bible: both sections, the former and latter covenants referred to in Christian circles as the Old Testament (i.e., Hebrew Scriptures) and the New Testament (i.e., Apostolic Scriptures). For the people of Israel in Yeshua’s day, the Torah of Elohim, given through Elohim’s servant Moses, formed the central teaching document that regulated and governed every aspect of life, culture, family relationship, marriage, society, religion and its relationship with surrounding nations.

The Torah: Central Teaching Document for Israel and Messiah Yeshua

If the Torah is the central teaching document around which the nation and people of Israel, including the writers of the Bible, revolved, then what did the long awaited Messiah of Israel think of the Torah? After all, the Jewish rabbis and sages for hundreds of years had believed and taught that the Messiah would be the ultimate expositor of the Torah, that he would answer all of their unanswered questions about the Torah, and that he would be a righteous Torah-observant and Torah-teaching king who would rule the nation of Israel, like King David, and bring the nation into a one-thousand-year era of prosperity and peace called the Messianic Age (i.e., the Millennium).

Did that Messiah, who we know to be Yeshua (Jesus), uphold or abolish the Torah of Elohim given to Israel? How did he view the Torah? What did he teach his disciples and followers about the Torah? These are very important questions with which each of us must deal, for if we claim to be followers of Yeshua the Messiah (or Jesus Christ) and if you call yourself a “Christian,” which literally means “a little Christ,” hadn’t you better know what he thought of the Torah so that you can line yourself up with your own namesake?

Let us take an exploratory journey through the pages of the Sermon on the Mount. Let us Continue reading →

 

The Blessing and Glory of the Torah—Readjusting Prejudicial Mindsets

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Exodus 20:1, And Elohim spoke all these words, saying.

The following is an excerpt from a larger article on the subject of the Torah, which can be found at http://hoshanarabbah.org/pdfs/torahprimer.pdf.

What Is the Essence of the Torah?

Let us answer the question by posing a question. Why do you call yourself a believer, Messianic, Christian or otherwise? Why do you believe that the Scriptures are the Word of Elohim? Why are you currently reading this teaching article? Why were you created and what is your purpose in life? What is the meaning of life and what is your future destiny? Is there a Supreme Being in this universe and what does he expect from you, as a human, if anything at all? Does he care about you personally, and if he does, does he have anything to say to you about life – and about your life, in particular?

Torah reading in a synagogue with a hand holding a silver pointer

Very few humans alive, or who have ever lived, have answers to these questions. Most humans simply exist. Few actually live with purpose and meaning to their lives.

But you are privileged, for you are about to learn the answers to which so-called philosophers, sages and religious luminaries have been seeking since man has existed. Tidal waves of religion, philosophy and politics have swept across this planet carrying away peoples and nations promising to answer men’s most perplexing questions. Though volumes have been written, though countless libraries are full of millions of books, scrolls, papyri, clay tablets, documents and computer files, the answer to it all is surprisingly simple. In fact one word: It is T-O-R-A-H! The Torah of YHVH-Elohim is the Light of Truth from the Originator of Light and Truth. And it has been miraculously transmitted from heaven to earth, from the infinite to the finite, from the spiritual, boundless, eternal, omniscient and all wise mind of Elohim to the limited confines of physical existence on earth. Like a beam of Light shot through space from the great beyond, penetrating the darkness of human existence that Light became the written Torah, the Word of Elohim in the form of a Torah scroll written in Hebrew script of the set-apart Hebrew tongue (lashon kadosh) thousands of years ago.

The Torah-Word of Elohim forms the very bedrock foundation of the Scriptures. The spiritual building of the Prophets, Writings and Testimony of Yeshua rests squarely and securely upon the foundation of the Torah without which the rest would instantly crumble into nonexistence. Elohim was so determined to make that foundation so rock solid that he literally dictated it audibly letter-for-letter and word-for-word to the man Moses, who like a stenographer, wrote down exactly what he heard. This become the Books of the Law of Moses, or the Torah of YHVH Elohim. None of the Prophets or Writings in the Tanakh, though the inspired and infallible Word of Elohim, were so transmitted. The only words in all of Scripture that approach this level of purity and perfection are those words of the Written Word or Torah made flesh; namely, the words of Yeshua as recorded in the Gospels of the Testimony of Yeshua.

The level of one’s understanding of  the written Torah is the key to having a deep and abiding understanding of Yeshua, the Living Torah, and ultimately of having a blessed, a right, eternal relationship with our Father in heaven. ­Having a deep walking-it-out understanding of the Torah will also determine one’s level of rewards in the Kingdom of Elohim — whether YHVH bestows the title of The Least or The Greatest upon one (Matt. 5:19).

Below are quoted some deeply held, age-old convictions that the Jewish sages have lived and died for regarding the Torah. As you read them, please keep in the forefront of your thoughts the concept of Yeshua, the Living Torah-Word of Elohim, who was made flesh Continue reading →

 

New Video: The Torah Revealed from Genesis to Revelation

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Do you have a biblical paradigm based on doctrines and traditons of men, or on the light of biblical Torah-truth? The Torah-law and Yeshua, the Living Torah-Word of Elohim, are indivisible. One isn’t opposed to the other as the mainstream church would have you believe. It’s time to remove the spiritual sunglasses that filter out the light of Torah-truth as revealed from Genesis to Revelation.

 

Who was the God of the Old Testament?

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John 1:1, The Word was Elohim. Is Yeshua or the Father the God (Elohim) of the Old Testament (Tanakh)? For many believers in Yeshua, there is confusion as to who it was in the Godhead who interacted with the Israelites in the Tankah. Was it the Father or the Son? In the minds of the apostolic writers, there was no confusion about this.

Yeshua, in his preincarnate state, was the One that YHVH Elohim the Father used to both create (John 1:3; Col 1:16; Heb 11:3), and then to interact with mankind. He was the Word of YHVH Elohim, the Father, who become flesh and dwelt among men (verse 14). This truth is easily confirmed in several passages in the Testimony of Yeshua (New Testament).

First, Yeshua himself claims to be YHVH or the I Am of the burning bush (see John 8:58 cp. Exod 3:14). The Jews viewed Yeshua’s claim to be deity as blasphemous, which is why they picked up stones to kill him (John 8:59). Next, Yeshua in declaring to the Jewish religious leaders that “I send you prophets, wise men and scribes: some you will kill…” (Matt 23:34), he is claiming the rights and prerogatives of YHVH — a right and role that solely belonged to YHVH in the Tanakh.

Yeshua also declared that no man has seen the face of Elohim the Father (John 5:37). Yet Continue reading →

 

Knowing How to Add & Subtract May Not Always Be a Good Thing

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Deuteronomy 4:2, You shall not add to the word that I command you, nor shall you subtract/diminish from it. YHVH warns his people against adding or subtracting from his written Word elsewhere, as well (Deut 12:32; Rev 22:18–19). Men seem inclined to ignore YHVH’s command in this regard.

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Whole religions have been founded based on disregarding this prohibition. Some claim to be Bible-based (e.g. Mormonism with their Book of Mormon and rabbinic Judaism with its Talmud) and some do not (Islam with its Quran). Who is the author of and real power behind adding to, subtracting from or twisting YHVH’s Word? (See Gen 3:1ff and Matt 4:3ff.)

What did Yeshua warn the religionists of his day against in this regard? He said, “Thus have you made the commandment of Elohim of none effect by your tradition” (Matt 15:6) and, “Howbeit in vain they do worship me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men” (Mark 7:7).

What are some examples of traditions and theologies in the modern-day Christian and Jewish religions where YHVH’s Word has been superseded by man’s traditions?

What are some traditions and doctrines of men you have turned away from in order to bring yourself into greater alignment with YHVH’s Word? How is your life better for it? What has been the reaction of those around you in response to your aligning your life more closely with the truth of YHVH?

 

 

The Torah and Testimony—A Stone of Stumbling

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In the following several verses we see an amazing prophecy concerning the two houses of Israel who, generically speaking, have become the modern church and the rabbinic Jews.

Here Isaiah prophesies about the canonization of the Bible into two subdivision—the Torah (or loosely speaking, the Old Testament) and the Testimony (the New Testament). He also predicts that each of these two religious groups (the Jew and he Christians) would spiritually stumble over or have a problem with the identity of the Messiah, who is the Stone of Stumbling and the Rock of Offense. In general, as we shall see, the Christians struggle with the pro-Torah message of the Old Testament (or Word of Elohim), and the Jews reject the message of the New Testament (or Testimony of Yeshua) about the Messiahship of Yeshua.

Bible for the world

Isaiah 8:14–15, Stone of stumbling. Both houses of Israel (Ephraim and Judah; i.e., the Christian [see notes at Gen 48:14,16] 48: and the Jews) have stumbled over the stone of stumbling, who later on is identified as Yeshua, the Messiah (1 Pet 2:4–8; Rom 9:32–33; 1 Cor 1:23). The non-believing Jews stumbling over the Messiahship of Yeshua who is the Living Torah-Word of Elohim incarnate (John 1:1,14), while the Christians stumble over the Written Torah, which they claim was abolished and is minimally relevant to them.  This stone of stumbling is an obvious reference to Yeshua who is a stone of stumbling to both houses of Israel (i.e., the non-believing Jews and the Christians.) The Christians stumble over or reject (at least, in part)Yeshua who is the Written Torah-Word of Elohim (John 1:1). The non-believing Jews, on the other hand, reject Yeshua, the Living Torah-Word of Elohim who came in flesh form (John 1:14). Continue reading →