The Gospel is the Power of Yahuwah

Time to Preach the Gospel in Norway

2011-11-09T15:23:00.002-08:00

Tired but some how not ready to sleep.
On the way to Stavanger
where the gospel will be preached
Dreamt of the royal family again
and my connection with them
could it be that
i am really royalty
let's see!

Pray for all in authority!

2010-12-27T01:53:00.000-08:00

Yahuah has given us the weapons we as followers of Jesus have in order to establish his kingdom in our world. The main weapon is prayer. So pray for kings and all those in authority, including the Bildeberger group and the wicked leaders like Ahmedinejad! Our weapon is prayer!
Yahuah be with you! No power is greater than the power of Yahuah and when the prophets prophets there words had the final say in what happened in many nations!

How does one get blessed?

2008-07-07T00:06:00.000-07:00

Yahuah is all around. We may not percieve him but he fills the heavens and the heaven of the heavens. Yahuah is a faithful God and in the context of Yahuah I would like to ask the question how do we get blessed? The answer lies in the Bible. This is obvious for this is the book that Yahuah had written, the most blessed book and the most influential book in all history. Well Jabez gives us one way to get blessed. In the covenantal relationship Jabez had as an israeli he could cry out to Yahuah in the context of the covenant that Yahuah would bless him. He cried out and asked Yahuah that he would bless him richly, repeatedly and intensively. The Bible records that Yahuah answered Jabez cry. We ought to cry out a little more also huh?

Saint Antony: The Way of Perfection

2006-11-19T15:07:00.001-08:00

INTRODUCTION

“…The demons, as if breaking through the building’s four walls, and seeming to enter through them, were changed into the form of beasts and reptiles…altogether the sounds of all the creatures that appeared were terrible, and their ragings were fierce.
Struck and wounded by them, Antony’s body was subject to yet more pain. But unmoved and even more watchful in his soul he lay there...”[i]

This kind of battle against demons is foreign to most people of the 21.century. The strict and extreme asceticism of the Desert Fathers does not have a good reputation either, in our hedonic age were pleasure and prosperity is the way to fulfillment. My own interest in St. Anthony stems from a love for the desert and desert retreats, for the vastness, beauty, silence and solitude of it. Nevertheless, St. Anthony, the 3rd century hermit from Egypt, did not go to the desert to enjoy the beauty, though at one point he did say that he loved the place. No matter the reason he went, what he found was temptations and demons, confronted with his fears, limitations and inclinations, in his quest for purity and perfection.

In writing this paper, I will have to try to put aside some of my presumptions and prejudices against asceticism, which mainly stems from the fact that I have grown up in a North European, Protestant environment. Many of us have an admiration for simplicity and a longing for solitude, but at the same time we often regard ascetic endeavors as a suspiciously Catholic way of trying to earn salvation by works. Christianity has always had to deal with questions concerning the relationship between soul and body, the sacred and the profane, and it seems to have answered these questions differently, in different contexts at different times. My purpose with this paper is to investigate St. Anthony’s asceticism: it’s geographical connections, it’s Biblical basis, it’s theological implications and it’s historical context and consequences

Sources
In my investigation I have been more interested in the ideological background and implications of Antony’s asceticism, than in discussing whether the actual events took place or not. “The Life of St. Antony”, the classic biography about the hermit Antony of Egypt, is written by the contemporary bishop of Alexandria, St. Athanasius. The Life or Vita (in Latin) of Athanasius might not be a historically authentic biography, but it gives a good insight in the thinking of that day and of the view people had of Anthony, since Athanasius was a contemporary of him. The accuracy of St. Athanasius is in many cases, however, confirmed from other sources.
The Life terms Antony ‘unlettered’, but he may have dictated his teaching. A series of seven letters ascribed to him exist, but their authenticity is questionable. They where written originally in Coptic, and a part of those survived. Versions of all of them exist in Georgian and Latin.[ii] I have chosen to use the seven letters, The Letters of St. Antony the Great in Derwas J. Chitty’s translation, as a source of reconstructing Antony’s teaching, as these letters were impacting the Church. Other sources I have used are secondary literature, mainly about the life of St. Antony, the Desert Fathers, desert spirituality and asceticism.

I have called this paper “The Way of Perfection” because of the Bible verse St Antony presumably was called by: “if thou wilt be perfect…”[iii] In his asceticism, Antony strived for perfection and called for a repentance in body and soul to purify them both. The subtitle also needs a commentary. In Antony’s own words it would probably be more correct to say: “His battle against the fallen self”. Antony does not use the word ‘flesh’ much in the documents that I have investigated; nevertheless, he uses other expressions that correspond with the meaning of “flesh” as it is expressed in Paul’s writings. “Antony’s battle against the flesh” was the title I had before I even started investigating him, and it reflects my associations to a dualistic battle between Spirit and flesh, good and evil. At the starting point of my research, I wanted to find out to what degree Antony, as a representative for the desert fathers and the early monastic movement, were influenced by dualistic thinking, and to what extent they were based on an authentic Biblical understanding. I found that the “flesh” was a good notion to discuss, in that connection, because it involves metaphysical aspects as well as ethical, and it is a central Biblical notion which can be used in placing Antony’s asceticism in a Biblical context.

I. THE HISTORICAL AND GEOGRAPHICAL SETTING

St. Antony was born in an Egypt where Greek was the dominant culture and language. He was also born of Christian parents, in a time where Christianity was spreading rapidly, taking over the cities, but still victim of waves of persecution.

The religious and philosophical center of Egypt, Alexandria, was a vast and tolerant city of two nations, Greek and Egyptian, with the Jews as a third nation[iv]. From the middle of the 3rd century the Christians grew in numbers, and Alexandria became a center of Christian learning. The great theologians and Church Fathers Origines and Clement, had both their seats in Alexandria and were both influenced by a Greek love for discussion and the desire to find a rational basis for their beliefs and ideas, which in turn led to great confusion and strife in the Christian world[v]. The bishop Clement sought, according to Waterfield, to reconcile Greek sciences with the Holy Scriptures. He also claims that Christianity was influenced by Plato and of his view of the world as an imperfect copy of an ideal world, with the conclusion that the present world was of no importance. We will investigate this claim and the historic background more thoroughly in the part about Antony’s place in the history of asceticism.

Egypt is mainly a desert country, except for the rich and fertile areas along the river Nile, as it was in the time of St. Antony. From his time and forward more and more people were moving out of the cities and fertile areas to desolate places, to almost inaccessible places in the desert and the mountains. From AD 200 there was a series of terrible persecutions of the Christians by Roman Emperors. The end of the 3rd and the beginning of the 4th century has been called “Era of Martyrs”, and thousands escaped to the desert during this time.

Otto F.A. Meinardus says in Monasticism of Egypt,[vi] that one major reason for the withdrawal of the Christians into the desert was their periodic persecution; another reason was probably their desire for solitude, detachment and the possibility of living a Biblical life of renouncement, as they understood it. The desert life was as much warfare as solitude though;[vii] it was an ambiguous retreat: a separation from the distractions and pressures of ordinary human community, but the wilderness held more significant challenges and dangers.[viii]

In the desert the pilgrim was deprived from everything given. The inner life could freely play its part without being choked by the impressions of busy city life. The silence made it possible to hear ones thoughts more clearly, and hopefully even the voice of God, when the mind had calmed down into the pace of the desert. But demons where also met in the desolate places, when the senses were deprived of its usual stimuli, and lack of food and sleep made its well known impact on the human organism and the ascetic started seeing things others did not. Whatever caused these visions; they were taken as a part of the spiritual quest and made usually sense theologically. In the Bible Jesus also meets the devil after a long fast. But even if it was the fast that caused him to see the evil one, it does not diminish or reduce the reality, importance or impact of the experience.

‘Pagan’ means ‘rural’ or from the countryside, and refer to the heathen costumes that still lingered in the countryside. Christianity grew first in the cities, while the countryside was still heathen. The Christian cities where therefore surrounded by pagans and pagan costumes. Paul called the pagan gods demons.[ix] And in this case the unseen spiritual powers took the forms of Egyptian animal gods, inhabiting deserted temples, statues, caves and desert areas. Stories of the warrior-monks of the desert fighting demons showed how Christ was turning back worldliness and paganism, spreading his lordship, even over the demon-filled desert.[x]

The outsiders’ view of the monks were, according to Benedicta Ward in The Lives of the Desert Fathers, that they lived as true citizens of heaven. They where the walls of the cities, keeping the world in its being. They were defenders and guardians of the world’s peace, armed against the demons for the sake of mankind. Prayers were a great action to be fulfilled in the society, purifying the atmosphere by their presence. The monk was a focus of spiritual power for his neighbors. The view the monk had of himself, on the contrary, was primarily as the poor man, the sinner, defined by his own need. He kept the walls of the city by being involved with mankind in the deepest sense. They also made the desert blossom through their agricultural projects, and it was rare for anyone in need to be found near the monasteries. At the same time they mocked the world with their own poverty. [xi]

The desert is a simple place where you only have to worry about three things: beating the temperature, finding food and water, and not getting lost. This simplicity; the desert’s relentless pitting of man against the elemental forces of nature, and the great joy and beauty to be discovered in it by those who mastered it, parallel the spiritual understanding of St Antony. The desert was like a macro cosmos of the human self, where the passions of the flesh were engaged in a continuous battle for supremacy and dominion over the soul. Just as thirst led to death if water was not found, so could passions lead to spiritual death if not properly trained and tamed.

One of the Fathers said: “God beareth with the sins of those who live in the world, but He will not endure the sins of those who live in the desert”.[xii] There were somehow other rules for the desert dwellers than for ordinary people; they were like soldiers on the battlefield who would die if they were not awake and fit.

II. ST ANTONY AS THE “FATHER OF MONKS”

St. Antony was not the first monk[xiii], but very much thanks to bishop Athanasius of Alexandria, he was later to be called “the Father of Monks”. Athanasius motives for writing his biography might have been mixed. Antony was already a popular figure, and if he could attach Antony to his side of the battle against the Arian heresy, he would probably win more support. Nevertheless, it is not unlikely that Antony had an orthodox faith; many of the letters attributed to him and stories about him are testimonies of that.

As mentioned St Antony was not the first ascetic. Already holy men were living as solitaries on the fringes of villages. Antony’s distinctive contribution was his transfer of the monastic life from the periphery of established communities to the isolated and barren wilderness.[xiv] When he, after 20 years solitude, came out of his fortress, he persuaded many to take up the solitary life. “And so, from then on, there were monasteries in the mountains and the desert was made a city of monks…”[xv]

Renunciation of the world had nourished the growth of Christianity from the start. Within cities, Christian philosophers and teachers learned from the ascetic lifestyles of their non-Christian counterparts[xvi]. There were two distinct forms of monasticism evolving at this time:
1) Anchoritic monasticism: a hermit living alone or in small ascetic houses (from the greek word anachorein, to withdraw, to leave
2) Cenobitic monasticism: cenobite – from koinos bios “common life” a more elaborate form of village asceticism, later to dominate monasticism.
Gradually, the withdrawal from the world in these lifestyles, practiced often in the towns and villages of Egypt, became separate spatially as more and more ascetics withdrew into the desert.

III. THE LIFE OF ST ANTONY

The Life was according to the author Athanasius, written and dispatched to the monks abroad, so that they might lead themselves in imitation of Antony, for “Antony’s way of life provides monks with a sufficient picture for ascetic practice”[xvii]

Antony was born between 250 and 252 A.D. of wealthy parents, and reared in a Christian manner. He had already as a child certain ascetic traits, for he was always content with what he had and always obedient to his parents. Six months after he lost his parents and was left with a much younger sister to take care of, he received a calling from God. It was a call he understood to mean renouncing the world, through the words of Jesus quoted in the gospel of Matthew 19:21: “If thou wilt be perfect, go and sell all that thou hast…” As a wealthy boy of about 18 or even 20 Antony started on a path of renunciation.[xviii]

Antony’s spiritual journey into the desert was in two stages according to Tim Vivian in his book Journeying into God:
1) an evangelical stage of hearing and heeding to God’s call, and 2) a leave-taking, a separation which became geographical, in a further and further movement into the isolation of the desert, until he moved to a fortress in what he called the “inner mountain” far to the south of Alexandria, were there were no other humans. In spite of his increasing inaccessibility, he became a destination for pilgrims; he had a constant stream of visitors, and he was forced to be involved with people and their affairs.

What were Antony’s motives for withdrawing from the community? Was the responsibility of caring for home and a younger sister too much for him, or was it a real call from God? Maybe it was a mixed motivation. We will never know, but we do know that he was not the only one who understood the Christian call for perfection in this manner, although his response to the call became a pattern for later generations, and an ideal of Christian piety throughout the monastic revivals of Church history.

Antony’s leave-taking started with a visit to a man who lived a solitary life in the neighboring village, to learn from him. At first Antony also remained close to his village, and whenever he heard about a zealous person he went to him to learn. The devil, Athanasius writes, could not bear seeing such purpose in a youth, and attempted to lead him away from the discipline, through memories of past pleasures and the thought of the rigor of virtue that awaited him. Antony overcame these temptations and others with faith, prayers and fasting. [xix]

Did Antony regard salvation to be accessible to every Christian? I have not found any quotations of Antony that speaks directly about salvation and how a person is saved and what it exactly involves, but he does speak about the grace of God on the way to perfection. The enemy fell and his power diminished because “ the Lord made his sojourn with us”[xx] The healings Antony did, were also not from Antony himself, but “the Lord bringing his benevolence to effect through Antony.”[xxi] After he was almost killed by demons, Christ revealed himself in a beam of light and came to his rescue from the assaults of the demons.[xxii]

It has been suggested that this part of the biography is very much meant as a confrontation with the heresy of Arian. Robert C. Gregg argues in his introduction to The Life[xxiii] that Athanasius, throughout the book, demonstrates how an orthodox understanding of salvation controlled Antony’s discipline and advance in virtue. The victories and miracles were not his own accomplishments, but works of Christ. The instance with the beam of light clearly bears the stamp of Athanasius’s Nicene Christology – “the help and deliverance of creatures can derive only from the Son’s divine brilliance”.[xxiv]

Antony himself writes in The Letters of St. Antony the Great: “by the Spirit we were sanctified by Christ”[xxv] So it is not by works, although he says in another place: “unless each one of you hate all nature of earthly possession, and renounce it and all its works… he cannot be saved.”[xxvi] Here it looks as if asceticism is necessary for salvation. The soul labors until God has pity upon him and purifies him. He seems to advocate a cooperation of man’s labor and God’s grace.

In a prolonging of the question above, we can also ask: did Antony receive deification and merit through discipline? Athanasius’ story start with a conversion, “to the convertibility of one en route to Christian salvation.”[xxvii] Here the answer to the earlier question might lie: Athanasius’s Christian salvation means consistently deification. Antony became a man-god by the god-man; or in the words of the Church Father Ireneus on Jesus: “He became as we are that we might become as He is.”[xxviii]

Antony’s goal was to be a ‘lover of God’, and therefore he did not allow any distractions to draw him away from God.[xxix] He seemed to long for a complete identification with Christ, and in many instances in the biography it also seems that Athanasius depict Antony as deified or at least in the very likeness of Christ. When Antony comes forth from the tombs he had been living in, after 20 years of solitude and ascetic life in chapter 14, he comes forth as someone who has been initiated into the old, pagan mysteries, where the neophyte was buried/laid in a coffin and raised again to new life and union with the godhead. “ Antony came forth as though from a shrine, having been led into divine mysteries and inspired by God” [xxx] and he did all kinds of good deeds.

Athanasius’ Antony says that God works for good with everyone who chooses the good; and that we need to die daily to avoid sinning.[xxxi] Is Antony putting a yoke on his shoulders, is it a burdensome path he has chosen, a legalistic way? When the devil first tempted him, that was one of the fears he brought up in him: the thought of the rigor of virtue and the great labor that was ahead of him, but he overcame this temptation, and later Athanasius writes that Antony bore the labor with ease.[xxxii]

This leads us to another question: whether his asceticism was excessive and in some way pathological? Many times he did not sleep in the night, ate only bread and salt once a day, slept often on the bare ground and so forth. Still his asceticism was far more moderate than many of the hermits that came after him. Balance and equilibrium was highly valued by him. When he came forth in chapter 14, he was neither fat nor emaciated from fasting and combat with demons. He also argued that the “straight path” of Isaiah 40:3, in his interpretation one of discipline, is the natural way of the soul.[xxxiii] At the same time he ‘yearned to suffer martyrdom’[xxxiv] as many other devoted believers of that time. It is as if excessive asceticism takes the place that martyrdom and natural suffering for Christ had in the lives of the early believers.[xxxv]

Battle against demons:
Who are the foes in Antony’s battle? Some of them are: the passions, the belly, the body; particular elements that stem from two main sources of spiritual downfall to be found in Antony’s design: the fallen self, and the demons. The latter will help us to understand the former. The confrontations with the demons might be connected with Antony’s purpose to fight the flesh for the sake of perfection. At the same time The Life says that the demons actually fear the ascetics.[xxxvi]

The Vita suggests that the devil starts his attack with a certain kind of ‘intellectual interruption’. First when Antony has expelled the demons’ temptations from the interior of the mind, the demons begin to attack externally. They also work hardening of heart, selfishness, sensual desires and all kind of sinful attributes, all of them deceits whereby they make us their slaves: “we serve as bodies for them [the evil spirits]”,[xxxvii] and “they [the evil spirits] envy us at all times, with their evil counsel, and hidden persecution, and subtle malice, and spirit of seduction, and their blasphemous thoughts, and their infidelities which they sow in our heart every day.”[xxxviii] The demonic denotes everything that was hostile to man, also summed up all that was anomalous and incomplete in man.

Battle against the flesh:
The other great source of downfall in the Life is the human, fallen self, capable of just as much spiritual unrest and destruction as the demons. The difference is the self’s ability to being transformed into good, while the other remains forever evil. On the other hand, Antony is clear that neither the body nor the demons were created evil from the beginning: By the freedom given by God, angels became demons and the human self – body and soul, became a distraction and hindrance along the ascetic path. This brings us to Antony’s understanding of ‘body’ and ‘flesh’

IV. ST ANTONY’S NOTION OF THE ‘FLESH’ COMPARED WITH THE BIBLICAL NOTION

One of the things Antony warns the monks against is “the pleasures of the flesh”.[xxxix] Here he is most likely to mean the body only, for he also warns explicitly against lewd thoughts and vanity, which in Paul’s understanding might have been characterized as ‘fleshly’ as well. Some scholars claim that in the Life, the body is not evil, but simply misused, and thus evil in its effects. Properly transformed back into its created state, it is a wholly good gift and blessing from God. Through ascetic discipline we are reclaiming ourselves from the fallen state.

In The Letters Antony uses the expression ‘heavy body in which we dwell’.[xl] We can here see that the body is something which draws the soul or the spirit down towards earthly things, material things, which is not of the good, clearly shown in this quotation: “Jesus knew that the devil derives his power from the material things of this world.”[xli] Another place he uses the expression ‘body of corruption’: “Our intellectual nature, hidden in the body of corruption – not from the beginning, - and is to be freed from it.”[xlii] He also says that the rational man knows himself in his intellectual substance, not to be dissolved with the body.[xliii] The expressions ‘intellectual body’ and ‘intellectual substance’[xliv] appear to be synonymous with ‘spirit’ or the ‘rational soul’ in Antony’s vocabulary. The quotation indicates that the soul’s goal is to get free from the body, as in Gnostic and other Greek teaching. But does this mean freedom from the body as such, or freedom from the dominion of the body? The answer to that question would actually clarify whether Antony is dualistic oriented or not (which I will discuss more further down).

Lets go on to look at some definitions of the word ‘flesh’:[xlv]
Flesh – sarx – has various senses: i) the human in contrast to the divine; ii) fallen and sinful nature in contrast to human nature as originally created and dwelling in communion with God; iii) the body in contrast to the soul. ‘Flesh’ is applied generally to the whole animal creation, and is used both in NT and OT with a variety of meanings: physical, metaphysical, and ethical, the latter especially in Paul’s writings. In his writings it most often denotes degeneracy, weakness; counterpart of divine strength.[xlvi] The literal translation of the word ‘flesh’ to Hebrew is ‘basar’ which stems from a root that denotes its freshness. Can also mean ‘body’, ‘person’, ‘mankind’, ‘self’, ‘skin’.[xlvii] Gen. 6:12 says that all flesh had corrupted their way on the earth”, and Psalm 78:39: “… they were but flesh. A breath that passes away and does not come again”, speaking about the temporality of the human flesh, here probably a soul-body constitution.

When ‘flesh’ is used in the second sense of the above definition, it is important to distinguish it from ‘body’ – soma. In Gal 5:19-21 Paul lists the works of the flesh and mentions ‘sedition’, ‘heresy’ and ‘envy’, which has no special connections with the body, and must be understood to include also aspects of the soul. To find a similar expression in the Hebrew Bible, we need to go to the word ‘yeser’. In the 2nd century B.C it meant something like ‘disposition’ or ‘possibility to choose’. In the Dead Sea Scrolls the word ‘yeser’ implies ‘human creatureliness’ in the sense of corporality and desire. In rabbinical texts it means ‘inclination’, ‘urge’, ‘desire’, ‘tempter’. “Yeser hara’ can be translated as the ‘evil inclination’ and in that sense it can be compared with both Paul’s and Antony’s notion of flesh – the evil impulse which dwells in the body (it is not the body). However, they cannot be taken as completely coinciding notions, on the bases of the differences in worldviews, even inherent in the languages.[xlviii]

In canonical Judaism the spiritual life is not being trained, nor is the body being destroyed as a thing evil in itself.[xlix] To the Semites in the earliest times the soul was simply the physical breath, always closely connected with the body. The Egyptian conception was that the soul was a concrete entity that left the body at the moment of death, and it was not holier than the body.[l] The seemingly ascetic practices in Judaism depend on a dualism of pure an impure, clean and unclean, rather than on a dualism of body and soul. It was the holiness of God that called forth certain restrictions with respect to the world and the body, and the restrictions were usually only for brief periods to effect ritual purity.[li] The ascetic impulse of the Essene community came, according to Mircea Eliade’s Encyclopedia of Religion, from non-Semitic sources, possibly from a dualistic Zoroastrian origin, but could also have been a natural heightening of the Levitical, priestly purity. Others argue that the dichotomy in the Qumran community is not even between soul and body, but between the present age and the age to come, and that many of the ascetical tendencies in the NT, was of an eschatological nature as well and could not be interpreted in dualistic terms.[lii]

Both in Romans and Galatians we can clearly see a dichotomy of ‘flesh’ or ‘sinful nature’ and ‘spirit.’ “Walk in the Spirit, and you shall not fulfill the lust of the flesh. For the flesh lusts against the Spirit and the Spirit against the flesh.”[liii] ‘Flesh’ has here an ethical and metaphysical connotation that we can recognize in Antony’s ‘pleasure of the flesh’ and his notion of the ‘fallen self’. Paul continues: “…if you live according to the flesh you will die: but if by the Spirit you put to death the misdeeds of the body, you will live.”[liv] Being “led by the Spirit of God” may involve progressively putting to death the sinful appetites of the lower, sinful nature. We can ask what comes first, the leading of the Spirit, or the putting to death, disciplining of our flesh? 1. Cor 9:27 talk explicitly about the disciplining of the body, bringing it into subjection; 2. Thimothy 2:4 teach us to endure hardship as a soldier, and in verse 22 to flee our youthful lusts. Paul meets many difficulties and experiences persecution, and in this context, he writes the verse: “When I am weak, then I am strong”[lv]. Antony is quoting this Scripture in chapter 7 in “Life”, to encourage ascetic life. Antony seems to impose on himself, some of the sufferings that is imposed on Paul by others or circumstances.

An article on asceticism in Encyclopedia of Early Christianity[lvi] states that Paul’s attitude to marriage and celibacy is more eschatological than ascetical motivated. In opposition to Marcion, the Church Father Tertullian protests against the rising tide of ascetic denial of marriage in his time. In OT it is clear that marriage and childbearing were national fundamental virtues in Israel. He who would “walk by the Spirit”[lvii] must turn away from all works of the flesh, but this is no angel-like spirituality or “hating of one’s own flesh” in the Neo-Platonic or Oriental dualistic meaning, no one-sided bodily exercise and mortification: “for physical training is of some value, but godliness has value for all things”.[lviii] The article in Encyclopedia of Early Christianity[lix] also argues that there is no sharp dualism between body and soul in Paul. His ascetic stances are rather motivated by a belief in the imminent return of Christ, a sense of shortness of time. Antony is interpreting many verses literally, that might have been interpreted in an eschatological context. The shortness of time referred to in the Scriptures, Antony reads as an attitude to life in general: “As we rise daily, let us suppose that we shall not survive till evening…”[lx]

O. Zockler argues in Encyclopedia of Religion and Ethics that acts of ascetic discipline and training in virtue are contemplated in the NT as allowable, or even as necessary according to time and circumstances, in the sphere of Christianity.[lxi] Paul himself submit to fastings, watchings, cold, nakedness, etc;[lxii] and ‘bruises’ and ‘subdues’ his body after the manner of athletes.[lxiii] The body in Corinthians though, has a positive connotation in being called the “Temple of the Holy Spirit”.[lxiv] The body is sown in corruption, but raised in incorruption.[lxv] It is the seed of the resurrection. All creation awaits this redemption.

In the gospel of John the ‘flesh’ denotes human nature in contrast to divine nature: “The Word became flesh”, but not sinfulness. Flesh in Christ was only in the “likeness of sinful flesh”. Yet, he was tempted, experienced hunger, suffering and death, and his body was not glorified before after the resurrection. This leads us to the question whether Jesus needed to fight his flesh, and whether he gave his followers an ascetic pattern to follow. In Matthew 6:16 Jesus anticipated fasting, but His disciples did not emphasize it during His lifetime,[lxvi] and this attitude coincides with St Paul’s doctrine of Christian freedom.[lxvii] He excludes here any emphasis on such practice as necessary.

The temptations of Jesus in the wilderness can be read as a preparation for his ministry as earlier mentioned. It lasted for 40 days, as Israel’s wandering in the wilderness, lasted for 40 years. In both cases the stay in the wilderness was never an end in itself, but a stage on the path to freedom and fruitfulness. In the case of Israel, they had come out of Egypt, but Egypt had not come out of them. They rebelled and they fell into temptations, and several of these temptations had to do with the desires and cravings of the belly. Even one of Jesus’ temptations was connected with the body and the belly: the temptation of making stones to bread. Jesus overcame the devil’s temptation with Scripture, as did Antony on many occasions.[lxviii] Jesus said: “Watch and pray, lest you enter into temptation. The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak”.[lxix] He seems here to encourage vigilance to a certain degree, even though this was said in the context of the garden of Gethsemane. “The Jesus of the gospel was not ascetic”, claims the writer of the article in Encyclopedia of Early Christianity, on the basis of Matthew 11:19: “The Son of Man came eating and drinking”. Even so, the blessings on the poor and the woes on the rich in the Sermon of the Mount suggest an association of spiritual wealth with earthly poverty. The call to forsake one’s parents and sell what one had, the article argues, were again eschatological motivated.[lxx]

The meaning of the word ‘flesh’ in the Bible seem to gradually extend from a physical to a metaphysical to an ethical sense, and according to the Encyclopedia of Biblical, Theological, and Ecclesiastical literature, there is no idea of essential sin as lying in the flesh. Flesh in itself is neither bad nor sinful. It is the heart that gives entrance to sin and puts itself in Gods place, and by this the inner man, the spirit, looses his energy to govern the flesh, and the flesh starts opposing the divine commands, and gives rise to the “lusts of the flesh”. Both selfishness and sensualism, has then their seat in the flesh, and is signified in Gal 5:19 as “works of the flesh” Those interpreters who consider it as meaning, exclusively the bodily, sinful side of human nature, may fall into the errors of the Manichaens.[lxxi]

VI. ST ANTONY IN THE HISTORY OF ASCETECISM

Let us start this part with a definition: ‘Asceticism’ is derived from the Greek word for ‘training’ or ‘exercise’, ‘practice’. The ‘athlete’ was one trained, and one might be an ‘athlete’ in virtue. The ascetic became the spiritual athlete of Church History.[lxxii]

“Every system of morals enforces the discipline of the will”.[lxxiii] Ascesis is discipline, a practice of denying self for a higher goal. The average peasant’s life in the time of Antony, was involuntarily ascetic. The extreme nature of the desert monk’s asceticism may be seen in this context. Asceticism was designed to help the monk achieve apatheia – a clearly focused “single” and pure heart. This is also a stoic ideal that Clement upholds.[lxxiv]

One of the tasks Antony gave himself, was to achieve a state of ‘unceasing prayer’, a constant communion with God. To acquire this state required training, both of body and spirit. The powers of the body were ‘dragging down’ the soul of the monk with their habits, and had therefore to be tamed. Those habits could for instance be tamed through:
- fasting
- vigilance
- poverty
- denying oneself comfort
- concede little time to the body
As a part of his asceticism, Antony also went to great lengths to foster in others and in himself, intellectual (in the meaning of ‘spiritual’) attitudes as humility, patience, gentleness, love, and chastity, always striving to view one’s life as one of continually new beginnings.

In investigating Antony’s place in the history of asceticism we need to consider the different forms of asceticism and look at possible roots and streams of thoughts concerning them. According to T.C.Hall[lxxv] we can differentiate between these two conceptions in the history of asceticism:
1) Disciplinary asceticism: Discipline of the body for some ultimate purpose. Preserves the original meaning of the word.
2) Dualistic asceticism: Not training, but destroying the body or negation of its importance, that the soul may be free. Based on a metaphysical dualism which separates soul and body, God and the world, material and spiritual, into sharply contrasted realities.
Some practices that seem ascetic might be the mere survival of past costumes or work as symbols of self-mortification.[lxxvi] To primitive man a famine was viewed as an infliction of demons, and self-inflicted periods of hunger (fasting) could be the remedy for the conciliation of the demons. We can also separate between an inward form of asceticism (prayers in the heart, control of the mind etc) and an outward form (fasting, poverty, sexual abstinence and so on). Both forms of asceticism were already known to classical antiquity, especially in the teachings of Pythagoras and Socrates downwards. The Stoic school, the Cynics and the later Platonists beginning with Plutarch all valued the ascetic habit of life. The moral strictness and the earnest demand for virtue, formed the connecting link between the Jewish, Christian ideal of life and the ‘wisdom’ of the Greco-Roman philosophers.[lxxvii]

“Very early in its history the transformation of Christianity from a life to a philosophy of life began”, T.C. Hall claims. He argues that this change is already evident in several NT books, notably the Ephesians to Hebrews, with influence of Philo and Alexandrine Judaism. The Judaism with which the Christian Church found herself dealing was often not that of the OT, but a Hellenistic Judaism based on Greek dualism. The Jewish Philo of the 1st century equates quite significantly ‘philosopher’ and ‘ascetic’.[lxxviii] In Neo-Platonism the Oriental mysticism was united definitely with Greek metaphysics. Asceticism was the way of freedom from the fleshly. The way of salvation was escape from the body by pure thought or reason. The Letters of St Antony talk about the need to attain self-knowledge – love for the true self, and thereby for God. “For he who knows himself, knows God”.[lxxix] Here we can sense a connection to Gnostic teaching on knowledge (‘gnosis’) as a way to salvation and the Socratic “know thyself”.

In Hall’s opinion, the influence of Origen and of the Neo-Platonic conception on the Oriental Church was to emphasize dogma and the details of rituals on the basis of an extreme literal interpretation of Scripture.[lxxx] Eliade’s Encyclopedia of Religion characteristically calls Origen the “father of monastic theology”. [lxxxi] Hall goes on to argue that this development culminated in what he consider to be the ‘world-flight’ of Paul of Thebes, in his retreat to the desert. He also argues that this was only the logic of the transposition of Christian values preached by Cyprian and Origen, and that the heretical Manicheism and Gnosticism, fought by the Church, had eventually forced upon the Church their dualistic Oriental conception of life. From there the path was short to the hermit seclusion and the absolute isolation of the individual, as in the case of Antony and Simeon Stylites.[lxxxii]

Antony practiced asceticism alone in the fortress of the ‘Inner mountain’ for 20 years, until he came out, ‘pure in his soul’, maintaining “utter equilibrium, like on guided by reason”[lxxxiii]. Athanasius draws quite a stoic picture of him, according to its apatheia[lxxxiv] ideal: His soul was “not constricted by grief, nor relaxed by pleasure, nor affected by either laughter or dejection”.[lxxxv] Antony resembles here, in my opinion, more a stoic philosopher or an oriental Buddha, than a Semitic Jesus who cried, was angry, suffered and was troubled at times. Nevertheless, Antony came out of his solitude healing, comforting, and helping, in line with a Christian compassion ethics, and in the likeness of Jesus’ ministry after his 40 days of solitude and fasting in the wilderness.

Scholars, like Chitty, seem to disagree deeply with T.C. Hall and answers the question of Antony’s possible dualism differently: “Nothing could be further from St. Antony than any kind of Manichaen dualism”.[lxxxvi] Chitty supported his assertion with the quotation I earlier used in the ‘flesh’ part, in Antony’s own words: “our bodies where made for the resurrection”.[lxxxvii] It was in his theology made good, and it will once again be restored to its good function. Antony used to say: “The mind of the soul is strong, when the pleasures of the body are weak”[lxxxviii], he did not say: “when the body is weak”.

Antony himself speaks on asceticism in chapter 22 of Life that much prayer and asceticism is needed, but he also gives a warning in The Letters that many who have pursued asceticism throughout their life, was killed by lack of discernment.[lxxxix]

VI. THE IMPACT OF HIS BATTLE AND HIS TEACHINGS

Antony confronted the Church and its members with a radical definition of Christian identity and purpose. He became a “type of the Christian, the ideal portrait of the human being, as he should be”. The behavior and pursuits of the ascetic set the terms for the Church’s ideal of the life of devotion. Antony’s regimen became integral elements of ascetic piety: the importance of work, the role of scripture in prayer and exorcism, practice of fasting and sleeping on the ground, simple and harsh dress, and disregard for bodily needs and pleasures.[xc]

St Antony inspired many to follow an ascetic path. The Church Father Augustine was one of those who were greatly affected by St. Antony’s example as it is found in the Life. Even one of the emperors wrote to him for advice. The anchoritic ideal, personified in Antony and much of what he stood for, could be incorporated into the communal life of the monasteries. During each monastic revival, they looked back to ancient Egypt, to inaugurate a new Egypt and they called upon St. Antony, his example and his writings.[xci]

Much has happened in the history of the Church as well as in the history of asceticism since Antony’s time, and there has clearly been a later negative view of the body as sinful in itself. The practice of asceticism were at times corrupted as an end in itself, making the monk even more carnally minded than before he started his ascetical practices. There have been many examples of excessive, pathological and more or less hysterical mortification that shows a clear contempt for the body and almost a masochistic quest for pain and humiliation. In other instances asceticism in the Church has given birth to great saints and deep teaching. And it is not always easy to discern the difference. One way to discern could maybe be to ask if the motivation of the ascetic endeavors is a positive one, one of seeking God and his kingdom.

Antony’s goal was that of perfection and purification, but he also knew that the human nature was weak and fragile. Antony likened the discipline of the body with the shooting of arrows: if you draw the bow too hard, it will break.

CONCLUSION

Were my presumptions and prejudices affirmed during this research? I guess I feared somehow that my investigation of Antony’s asceticism would prompt me to follow in his footsteps in a literal manner. If Antony’s life and endeavors was an ideal to me as a Christian, it means that I would have to stay unmarried and live a strictly ascetic life if I wanted to be a devoted follower of Christ. Celibacy has been highly celebrated in the Catholic and Orthodox Church since Antony’s time, in spite of the value the Bible places on marriage and children. I will of course not blame Antony solely for this development, but still we must admit that he is an important contributor to the monastic development with its focus on celibacy and an ascetic lifestyle.

I feel that the material I gathered and read was not substantial to draw a final conclusion on Antony’s dualistic tendencies. On one hand I can see that Gnostic and Greek streams of thought and practices probably influenced him to some degree, on the basis of similarities of teachings, practices, phrases and expressions. However, a certain similar phenomenon placed before in time, is not necessarily the cause of the later phenomenon. Besides, two similar words used in a different contexts can have totally different meanings, and opposite, two different words can have the same meaning. My knowledge of the history and of the original languages I am referring to in this paper is very limited. Therefore I had to depend in great length on secondary sources that didn’t always document their argumentation very well. I had to deal mostly with their conclusions, as was the case with T.C. Hall who promoted the view that the early hermits were dualistic and pagan influenced, while Paul and the apostles were not, at least not to that degree. The ones that claimed the opposite view (that the hermits did not have dualistic traits) documented their claim even less.

The changes that occurred in theological emphasis and understanding of asceticism in late antiquity could also have developed from within Christianity itself, according to the Church’s need, time and context. Many Biblical scriptures are in a kind of ‘seed’ form and can be taken in several different directions. Everything can be used and misused. Also Paul adapts his message to his adherents and to the context. His theology seem to evolve from life lived and events experienced, and his epistles were written to peoples at different levels with different needs. I agree with the scholars who do not see in Paul or any of the other Biblical figures an urge to excessive asceticism. But even if Antony were influenced by non-Biblical sources, it does not need to undermine the authenticity of his teachings.

Through this research, I have learned to see Antony not as a person who is either right or wrong, and whom I need to follow or reject. Instead, I now see his life as a parable of an inner journey, his asceticism and renouncements as ideals of inner attitudes of devotion, detachment, generosity, endurance and trust. In this way I can relate to him and his spiritual inheritance in the middle of the world I am living in. The desert becomes a place in my heart, a desert which I can go to and have my solitude and my battles.

“In the desert of the heart, let the healing fountain start; in the prison of his days, teach the free man how to praise.”
W.H. Auden.

“The desert is where, in profound and deepest silence, and only there, you hear the breaking of idols”
Tim Vivian

NOTES

[i] Athanasius, The Life of Antony and the letters to Marcellinus, p. 38

[ii] See Archimandrite Kallistos Ware in the foreword of The Letters of St. Antony the Great, translation by Derwas J. Chitty
[iii] Matthew 19:21
[iv] See Gordon Waterfield, Egypt.
[v] See ibid.

[vi] See Michael W. Mcdellan, Monasticism of Egypt, p. 92

[vii] See Athanasius, The Life, Introduction, p. 7
[viii] See ibid., p. 8
[ix] 1 Cor. 10:21
[x] See Diana Severance, Exorcizing the Desert, www.christianitytoday.com/ch/64h/

[xi] See Bendicta Ward SLG, The Lives of the Desert Fathers, Chapter II
[xii] Quoted by James Goehring, Exorcizing the Desert, www.christianitytoday.com/ch/64h
[xiii] ‘monk’ is derived from monachos, Greek word for ‘solitary one’
[xiv]See Athanasius, The Life, Introduction, p. 8
[xv] Ibid., p. 42
[xvi] See James Goehring, Exorcizing the Desert, www.christianitytoday.com/ch/64h

[xvii] Athanasius, The Life, Introduction, p. 2
[xviii] See ibid., p. 30-31
[xix] See ibid., p. 33-35
[xx] Ibid., p. 52
[xxi] Ibid., p. 92
[xxii] See ibid., p. 39
[xxiii] See ibid., p. 12
[xxiv]Athanasius, The Life, quote by Robert C. Gregg in the introduction, p. 13
[xxv] The Letters of St. Antony the Great, translation by Derwas J. Chitty, p. 27
[xxvi] Ibid., p. 15
[xxvii]Athanasius, The Life, quote by William A. Clebsch in the preface, p. xv.
[xxviii] Quote from ibid., p. xvi
[xxix] See Tim Vivian, Journeying into God, p. 9
[xxx] Athanasius, The Life, p. 42
[xxxi] See ibid., p. 45
[xxxii] See ibid., p. 33-36
[xxxiii] See ibid., p. 46
[xxxiv] Ibid., p. 66
[xxxv] See also Timothy Ware, The Orthodox Church, p. 22
[xxxvi] See ibid., p. 54
[xxxvii] The Letters of St. Antony the Great, translation by Derwas J. Chitty, p. 19
[xxxviii] Ibid., p. 18
[xxxix] Athanasius, The Life, p. 72
[xl] The Letters of St. Antony the Great, translation by Derwas J. Chitty, p. 20
[xli] Ibid., p. 11
[xlii] Ibid., p. 22
[xliii] See ibid., p. 9, my cursive
[xliv] Ibid., p. 27
[xlv] See glossary in The Philokalia, p. 361
[xlvi] See Encyclopedia of Biblical, theological, and Ecclesiastical literature, p. 593

[xlvii] See The Hebrew-Greek Key Study Bible, King James Version
[xlviii] See G.H. Cohen Stuart, The struggle in man between good and evil, p. 81 and 115

[xlix] See Encyclopedia of Religion and Ethics, Vol. 2, editor James Hastings p. 65
[l] See The Encyclopedia of Religion, chief editor: Mircea Eliade, p.110
[li] See Encyclopedia of Early Christianity, editor Everett Ferguson, p. 104
[lii] See ibid., p. 104
[liii] Gal 5:16-17
[liv] Rom 8:13
[lv] 2. Cor. 12:10
[lvi]See Encyclopedia of Early Christianity, editor Everett Ferguson, p. 106
[lvii] Gal 5:16
[lviii]1. Tim. 4:8
[lix]See Encyclopedia of Early Christianity, editor Everett Ferguson, p. 105
[lx]Athanasius, The Life
[lxi]See Encyclopedia of Religion and Ethics, Vol. 2, editor James Hastings p. 74
[lxii] 2. Cor. 6:5
[lxiii] 1. Cor. 9:7
[lxiv] 1. Cor. 6:19
[lxv] 1. Cor. 15:42
[lxvi] Matt. 9:14
[lxvii] Gal 5:1ff
[lxviii] See Exodus, Luke 4 and Matthew 4
[lxix] Matthew 26:41
[lxx]See Encyclopedia of Early Christianity, editor Everett Ferguson, p. 105
[lxxi] See Encyclopedia of Biblical, Theological, and Ecclesiastical literature, editor McClintock, Vol. 3, p. 593-595
[lxxii] See Encyclopedia of Religion and Ethics, Vol. 2, p. 73
[lxxiii] T.C. Hall in Encyclopedia of Religion and Ethics, Vol. 2, Introduction to “Asceticism, p. 64
[lxxiv] See Encyclopedia of Religion and Ethics, Vol. 2, p. 75
[lxxv] The author of the introduction of “Asceticism” in Encyclopedia of Religion and Ethics, see Vol. 2, p. 63
[lxxvi] Wearing sandals had for instance no ascetic significance in warm countries, but in cold countries it became a symbol of self-denial. See Encyclopedia of Religion and Ethics, Vol. 2, editor James Hastings p. 63
[lxxvii] See Encyclopedia of Religion and Ethics, Vol. 2, editor James Hastings p. 73
[lxxviii] See Encyclopedia of Religion and Ethics, Vol. 2, Introduction to “Asceticism, p. 63
[lxxix] The Letters of St. Antony the Great, translation by Derwas J. Chitty, p. 14
[lxxx] See Encyclopedia of Religion and Ethics, Vol. 2, Introduction to “Asceticism, p. 67
[lxxxi] The Encyclopedia of Religion, Vol. 10 p. 35
[lxxxii] See Encyclopedia of Religion and Ethics, Vol. 2, p. 67
[lxxxiii] Tim Vivian, Journeying into God, p. 23
[lxxxiv] Meaning ‘control of passions’, Cassian rendered it ‘purity of heart’. See glossary in The Philokalia, p. 361
[lxxxv] Athanasius, The Life, p. 42
[lxxxvi] The letters of St. Antony the Great, translation by Derwas J. Chitty, quote from introduction, p. ix
[lxxxvii] Ibid., quoted by Chitty on p. ix
[lxxxviii] See Tim Vivian, Journeying into God, p.18
[lxxxix] See The letters of St. Antony the Great, p. 23
[xc]See Athanasius, The Life, Introduction, p. 6-7
[xci] See ibid., p. 15-16

Mona

Saint Antony: The Way of Perfection

2006-11-19T15:07:00.000-08:00

Thoughts on Righteousness 1st Tishrei 6007

2006-09-22T23:53:00.000-07:00

Yaua has laid on my heart the vision of establishing Faith Learning Centres all over the earth. The origin of this vision comes from Jeremiah chapter 5. There it states that Yaua tells Jeremiah to run to fro in the streets of Jerusalem to see if he could find any one doing mishpat (justice in Hebrew) and seeking after emunah (faith in Hebrew). If he were to find one man doing mishpat and seeking emunah Yaua promised to pardon the whole city. It is clear from the passage that mishpat and emunah, justice and faith/ faithfulness are key and fundamental to Yaua's administration of his forgiveness on earth. When Yaua is looking at the cities of the earth he is clearly looking for mishpat and emunah. They being so important gives us an imperative to understand what they are and practice them. In order that we may practice them we must learn what they are or be taught them. Thus was born the concept of faith learning centres.
These centres are envisaged as places where faith and righteous justice will be applied to all area of life. The Faith Learning Centres are envisaged as the House of Yaua or Beit Yaua, for in them it is his mishpatim and his emunah which will be explored. Faith is so fundamental to the life of the righteous that Habukuk was given the revelation "The righteous shall live by his faith" or "beemunato yihyeh ha tzadiq". The Tzadiq shall live by his faith. We are also told in the New Testament that "This is the victory that overcometh the world, even our emunah" So the victory over the kosmos (world) is faith.
We ought to note that the Holy Spirit when teaching the Apostle John could have used many different words to indicate what it was that overcame the world. But he simply chose emunah or pistos in Greek. Thus we see that all of the world's success and lies and tribulations and challenges are overcome in emunah or faith. Thus the faith learning centre can effect victories in the fields of education, politics, economy, hard sciences, social sciences, history, Maths etc, in all the areas which men live, if the righteous wants to have victory he needs to focus on faith applied in each and every particular area which the kosmos (the world) is involved in.
When I pondered what educational fields should the Faith Learning Centres be involved in a number of scriptures came to mind. The first was that of Isaiah 2. Where we are told the nations will no longer be educated in war but will learn of the ways of Yaua from Yaua in the mountain of Yaua's house. We see then that in these least days Beit Yaua is the centre of education for all nations. And in these days it is Yaua who will teach the nations his ways. They will seek him out to learn of his ways and to walk in his paths. The Torah or Instruction will go from Zion and the Davar Yaua or the word of Yaua from Jerusalem. Thus the centre of the world's education in the last days will be Jerusalem and Zion. Thus it is imperative the Faith Learning Centres are focussed on learning from Jerusalem and the vision for the centres was given in Jerusalem. The teacher is Yaua and clearly it will be the one who leads us into all truth who will teach all the nations that is the Holy Spirit.
This process of Yaua educating the nations in his ways is to take place in the context of Yaua's justice. He will judge the nations and rebuke many nations. Having rebuked them thay will begin to turn their spears into pruning hooks and their swords into ploughshares. Thus we see a process of reeducation taking place at the instigation of Yaua. They will not learn war any more, thay will change their ways and begin to learn Yaua's ways. They will first begin to stop lifting swords against one another and afterwards they will stop learning milchamah (war). The Faith Learning Centre Beit Yaua movement is part of the Holy Spirit's education plan for the nations. We will begin to practice that alternative education which will be needed in the days to come when the world will be full of righteousness. We are told very clearly that this present age is reserved for fire even as the last one was reserved for water. The world to come after the fire will be a world in which righteosness dwells as opposed to sin. The fundamental root of the world to come and the tendency is righteousness whilst that of the present age is sin. The sin will be burnt away and the righteousness constitution will replace the sin constitution. The sinful nature is replaced by the righteous nature. We in the Church are the righteoueness of God in Christ Jesus and this righteousness is the fundamental root in the world after the fire.
The Faith Learning Centre movement builds on these fundamentals. Yaua Tzidkenu is the name not only of out saviour Jesus Christ but of the city which he builds. Righteousness then is fundamental to education in the Faith Learning Centre and will be the grounds upon which Yaua will judge mankind. They will each community, be judged in the light of his righteosness and justice will then be executed. Jesus will be the main judge in that time and he will be assisted by the saints. Those who have be sanctified by faith in Yeshua. That is us in the Church. THis we can take up at another time.

Om navnet Jahuah

2006-06-29T01:00:00.000-07:00

Jahuah (Herren) Zeh Shmi le Olam Zikri Dor Dor
2 Mos 3:15

La Kristi ord bo rikelig blant dere, så dere lærer og formaner hverandre
I all visdom med salmer or lovsanger og åndelige viser or synger med takknemlighet i deres hjerter for Gud. (Koll 3:16).

Jesus om Faderens navn
1 Jeg er kommet i min Fars navn. (Joh 5:43)
2 Slik skal dere da be: Fader vår, du som er i himmelen:
Hagiastheto to onoma sov(Gk)
La ditt navn holdes hellig! El. Hellighet vorde ditt navn. (Mat 6.9)
3 Far, herliggjør ditt navn! (Doxason sou to onoma!)
4 Jeg har åpenbart ditt navn for de mennesker du gav meg av verden. (Joh 17:6)
5 Bevar dem i ditt navn, som du har gitt meg (Joh 17:11)
6 Og jeg har kunngjort ditt navn, og skal fortsatt kunngjøre det, for at den kjærlighet som du elsket meg med , skal være i dem, og jeg i dem. (Joh 17:6)
7 Han sier: Jeg vil kunngjøre ditt navn for mine brødre. Midt menigheten vil jeg lovsynge deg.

Folket om Faderens Navn
Baruch ha ba beshem Yaua! Velsignet være han som kommer i Jahuahs (Herrens) navn, Israels konge.

Profetene om Faderens navn
1 Jeg er den jeg er. Eheyeh asher eheyeh (2.Mos 14)
2 JEG ER sendt meg til deg. Eheyeh shelachani eleichem (2 Mos 14)
3 Jahuah, deres fedres Gud, Abrahams Gud, Isaks God, og Jakobs Gud har sendt meg til dere. Dette er mitt navn til evig tid, så skal de kalle meg fra slekt til slekt.(2 Mos 3.15)
4 Jeg er Jahuah. Jeg åpenbart meg for Abraham, Isak og Jakob som Gud Den Allmektige.
Men ved mitt navn Jahuah var jeg ikke kjent av dem. (2 Mos 6:2-3)
5 Jeg er Jahuah, det er mitt navn. Jeg gir ikke noen annen min ære eller de utskårne bilder min pris. (Jes 42.8)
6 Men derfor reiste jeg deg opp, at jeg kunne vise deg min makt , og mitt navn kunne bli
kunngjort over hele jorden. (2 Mos 9:16, Rom 9:17)
7 Du skal ikke misbruke Jahuah din Guds navn. (2 Mos 20.7)
8 På hvert sted hvor jeg lar mitt navn minnes, skal jeg komme til deg og velsigne deg.
9 Slik skal de legge mitt navn på Israels barn , og så vil jeg velsigne dem. (4.Mos 27)
10 Og alle de hedningfolk som kalles ved mitt navn. (Am 9:12, Ap Gj 15)
11 Da vil jeg gi folkene nye, rene leper, så de påkaller Jahuahs navn og tjener ham med ett sinn. (Sef 3:9)
12 På den tid skal de kalle Jerusalem Jahuahs trone. Og alle folkene skal samle seg der, til
Jahuahs navn i Jerusalem. (Jer 3:19)
13 Se, derfor lar jeg dem denne gang kjenne, ja, lar dem kjenne min hånd og min styrke, og de skal vite at mitt navn er Jahuah. (Jer 16:21)
14 Derfor har og Gud høyt opphøyet ham og gitt ham det navn som er over alle navn, for at
i Jesu navn skal hvert kne bøye seg, deres som er i himmelen og på jorden og under
jorden, og hver tunge skal bekjenne at Jesus Kristus er Jahuah , til Gud Faders ære.
Produced by Beit Yaua: AMH, tmhylton@hotmail.com mob 48865272

Sayings of Spirit

2006-06-26T06:47:00.000-07:00

Be Glad and Rejoice, Oh People! for today we live. Live well then and sow the seeds of a beautiful tomorrow. (23/06/06)

May your night dreams be pleasant.
May your days be filled with the fruit of their sweetness.

Yaua bless thee abundantly!

Ordet Jaua

2006-03-22T03:11:00.000-08:00

Warning: This Message May Change Your Life! Read At Your Own Risk!

Jaua Faderen av himmelen og jorden elsker dere.
Hør Hans Ord

Jaua, Faren og Sønnen og Hellige Ånden, Gud av Sannheten sier til oss:
Vend deg til meg og bli frelst, hele du vide jord!
For jeg [Jaua] er Gud, og ingen annen.
Jeg har sverget ved meg selv, et sannhetsord har gått ut fra min munn,
Et ord som jeg ikke tar tilbake:
Hvert kne skel bøye seg for meg, hver tunge skal tilstå meg troskap.
Om meg skal de si: Bare hos Jaua [Herren] er frelse og kraft. (Jesaja 45:22-23)
Bibelen sier: Alle har syndet, og de har ingen del i Guds herlighet.
Det betyr du har syndet og jeg har syndet og syndens lønn er døden .
Sier vi at vi ikke har synd, da bedrar vi oss selv, og sannheten er ikke i oss. Derfor vi må dø!!!
Men Bibelen, Ordet av Jaua, sier også:
Guds nådegave er evig liv i Kristus Jesus og dersom vi bekjenner våre synder, er han [Jaua Faren i Himmelen] trofast og rettferdig, så han tilgir oss syndene og renser oss for all urett!
Du må be Jesus å komme i din hjerte NÅ! Hvis du bekjenner med din munn at Jesus er Herre(Jaua), og tror i ditt hjerte at Gud oppreiste ham fra de døde, ska du bli frelst. Med hjertet tror vi så vi blir rettferdige for Gud, med munnen bekjenner vi så vi blir frelst. Skriften sier "Ingen som tror på ham, skal bli til skamme". For her er det ikke forskjell på jøde og greker [nordmann og utlending]. Alle har den samme Herre, og han er rik nok for alle som påkaller navnet Jaua , skal bli frelst. Jaua sier til Jesus: Du er min sønn, jeg har født deg i dag. Be meg, så gir jeg deg folkene til arv og hele jorden til eie. Jesus sier til oss: Kom til meg, alle dere som strever og bærer tunge byrder, så vil jeg gi dere hvile. Når du tror på Jesus blir alle ting nye. Du kan sier . Jesus sier til oss: Kom til meg, alle dere som strever og bærer tunge byrder, så vil jeg gi dere hvile. Når finner du en Bibel og leser og ber til Jaua å finner en menighet at tror Bibelen er ordet av Gud og Jesus er Gud og Faren er Gud og Hellig Ånden er Gud og de er EN!
Når du tror på Jesus blir alle ting nye. Du kan sier For å be om mer opplysning skrive til: edieslv@hotmail.com

The Ethipian hand of faith and other poems

2006-03-12T07:20:00.000-08:00

The Breath of Life

It was when the breath of life was
Beathed into that lump of conscious
Clay that it became he and lived

It was when the breath of life danced
Its way into that perfectly
Formed sculture of the envy of
Rodin, of Vigilante of Muller
That it became he and lived

Oh they can imitate the handiwork perfect
But life they they don’t have to breathe.
The scupltures stand, unspeaking unliving

And there life is drained.

Life is Near
“Open your eyes” he said
and it is possible you will see life
For it not far from any one of you
Creation of your creator God
For you are in his image
Though fallen and scorned
You have fallen from grace,
Where you used to be
Before you fell

Seek life, he said
And you will find
For it is not hidden
That you can not live it
Its keys are ever
Next to your hand
Just take them and
Open the door.

Death is Swallowed up in Victory

The sacrifice of relationships
Water thick
In the dry morning air
Signals conflicts unbound by flesh
And blood

Invisible and mind heart weapons
Fight a battle with mind and spirit

The battle eternal in its consequences
Yields not to suggestion of truce and treaty
Nor to suggestion of futility
And that which has gone on
Has gone on too long

But unrocked and untainted by passing of suns
Passings of clouds , passing of rains
Continues.

For death lives and therefore does conflict
The only end , the only completion
Is death of death,
The rule of life
Eternal invisible, holy and righteous.

Many a sacrifice occurs
(come)
man flesh dies and blood is sprinkled
but life continues and judgement is set

for the battle in flesh is not a battle of flesh
and flesh it is which can not win
for the life is not the blood
but the life is in the blood.

Battles end comes, death of flesh but then theres the end
To which some were fighting
For some never breath never find life upon
Which is eternity is found

But some ressurect in brand new stead
Continue liberate for never ending ages ‘
Though nations may come and nations may go
This sun may die and new suns arise

Though heaven may pass and earth be sacrificed
Those of life will continue past all
For they are they who dwell in “I am”
There there is no past, no present, no future
For “they are” what “they are”
The “I am that I am”
Perfect righteous, the seers of God
The sons of eternity
The lights of the world.

The Ethiopian Hand of Kush

Looking back over the drudgy dusty past
Strewn with the skeletons and the bones of dead relationships
Which live only in the memory
As ghosts and memorials
To where you have come from

Looking forward in the Face of hope
Stretching the eye of your mind
To that which will breath
As these memories have once lived
That which will breath into your existence the substance
Of hope, flesh and blood
Strecthing to God, stretching the Ethiopian hand of faith
And recieving your answer “Now all is possible!”
All is possible for him who believes

Trying to breath into another life
That breath that brings only life
Trying to walk on that same cushion of air
On that same salt filled sea of life

Desiring that the torrents of the Red sea be parted
By two walking hand in hand in hand
Step by step by step
And the sea parts and dry ground appears
Firm established

I have called out her name
In the darkness of the midnight air
I have reached high above the heaven and earth
And like incense my prayers have floated on air.

And i have felt the need to stretch out my ethiopian hand
To exalt this prayer
This hope, this intention
To the right hand of God.

Eternal love

I was a wanderer
Drifing along on this world
Living according to my own ways
Sinful ways
Young and ignorant.

Then I came across a cross.

There was blood flowing down that cross
And a man hung there
Ha had a spear through his side
And nails in his wrists.

Bleeding he was,
The drops of blood flowing down that cross,
bleeding like his life was being
Poured down to the dusty ground

Where the drops of blood were falling
Making first a puddle
And then sinking into the earth.

I looked up over the head of thet bloody tree
Above the head of that man
Three words
Simple and sweet
Stood,
Motionlessly eternal in the air

I love you.

Awake oh servant of -lh

2006-02-28T10:07:00.000-08:00

Awake and sing to him who died for your sin!
Friend here is a wake up call for the sevants of -lh
Awake oh Muslim, to light and to truth!
You cite a Quran?
But where are the early manuscripts?
Where is the blood of Jesus?W
here the the love of your enemies?
Where is the Son of God?
Where is the truth?
Where is Jesus died and risen?
Where is the conqueror of death?
Where is the peace in the heart?
Where is true righteousness when a man is permitted to beat his wife?
Where is true justice when a man is commanded to kill until Allah's religion is the only one?

Yea the day indeed came when men thought they were doing a service to God when they killed Christians as Jesus prophesied!!!
Where is love Yaua with all your heart, soul and strength?
Where is love your neighbour as your self?
Where is the crucifxion?
"I have been crucified, crucified with Christand I live no longer I but Christ lives in me and the life I now live I live by the faith by the faith of the son of God who loved me and gave himself for me
Did Machmad love you and give himself for you or was he a sinner like the rest of us?
Where is truth?
Yea you can quote a 1200 year old book and even imagine it to be scientific.
Devils know secrets!!!!

But Yaua calls for us to love?
Where is God is love?
Where is For God so loved the World that he gave his only son?
Where is "I am he that liveth that liveth and was dead behold I am a live forever?

You imagine you know a bit of basic science a little bit ahead of time.
Vanity of vanities!!!!
The Greeks worked out the circumference of the planet 2500 years ago, is that written in your book?
Yea all nations pagan included have knowledge of secrets!
We are taught that in these lasts days there will be signs powerful enough to decieve the elect if that were possible.
I assure you the Quran is not one of them.

You read the Quran and read the Bible then pray to God without using the name made up in the last 1700 years
Ask him: Was Jesus Crucified?Is Jesus the saviour?Seek with a pure heart and you won't be Muslim for long!!!
Yaua guaratees that those who hunger and thirst for righteouness will be filled.
Where is the peace in your heart?
Where is the Holy Spirit in your Heart?
Where is the Father, Son and Holy Spirit
Wake up oh Muslim and listen.

Machmad needs yours prayers he is uncertain about his judgement day.
We need Jesus prayers he is the judge of judgment day!!!

If the blind lead the blind they will both fall into the pit!!!
As for knowledge, it will pass away
As for love of the God who is love, it abides for ever.

The days of the CAIN religion are numbered.
The days of love are without number.
Wake up oh Muslim and turn to Yaua through Jesus Christ his son and you will find rest
for your hungering soul which will toss and turn as long as you choose the way of error over truth.
Wake up I say!

Edi Nachman, one voice.

Temple of Yahu: Elephantine

2006-02-21T01:42:00.000-08:00

ELEPHANTINE (Greek version of ancient Egyptian Ibw "the country of the elephants," Aram. Yb), the largest island in the Nile, opposite Syene (ancient Egyptian Swn "market," modern Aswa@n). The island was always the administrative center of the southernmost province of Egypt, controlling the first cataract and the main frontier post en route to Nubia, but during the Achaemenid occupation (525-402, 342-332 B.C.E.) the military garrison (Aram. haila) increased in importance. The rab haila "commander of the army" had military jurisdiction over Upper Egypt as far as Memphis, though he lived in Syene. Syene was a port of call for contingents of the various ethnic elements of the empire (Persians, Phoenicians, Chorasmians, Medians, Assyrians, and Babylonians), with chapels for their divinities and the administrative seat of the Achaemenid civilian governor (fratarak).
In Syene a number of tombs of Semitic peoples have been excavated (Kornfeld). Under the Achaemenids a Jewish military colony (Aram. haila yhwdya) was established in the city of Elephantine, with a temple (Aram. agura < Assyro-Babylonian) to Yaho (Vincent; Porten, 1968a; idem, 1968b; Grelot; Dandamayev; Bickerman; Bresciani, 1968).
Documents pertaining to the fortress and the Jewish military colony are written in Aramaic on papyrus and ostraca (here designated AP and numbered as in Cowley); the oldest is dated to 495 B.C.E. (AP 1). They were found mainly in the residential quarter of Elephantine. They reveal that Jews of the haila received monthly salaries, partly in cash and partly in kind (cereals and oil; AP 11).
According to AP 30 and 31, the temple of Yaho predated the conquest by Cambyses in 525 B.C.E. and was destroyed around 410, so completely that archeological excavation has so far brought no trace to light (Bresciani, 1968, pp. 367-68; idem, 1992, pp. 978-98; Porten, 1968b, pp. 379-80). The origin of this Jewish colony is problematic, though it is now generally accepted that it was part of the large-scale immigration into Egypt that began under Necho in the Twenty-Sixth Dynasty. During the Achaemenid period settlements of Jews, as well as other peoples, multiplied throughout the Nile valley. Certainly the Jews of Elephantine in particular revealed characteristics not consonant with orthodox monotheism: They venerated the temple of Yaho on the island (members of the colony who had moved to Migdol in the Delta sent "greetings to the temple of Yaho in Elephantine"; Bresciani, 1960); because of living close to and at times intermarrying with Egyptians, they assimilated beliefs and customs leading to a religious syncretism somewhat characteristic of the nonmonotheistic Judaism before the exile (Yaho had an associate, Anath-Yaho); they were also apparently ignorant of the deuteronomic reforms and the paschal rules (Vincent, pp. 562 ff.). These characteristics seem to prove that some Jewish settlers in Egypt left Judea (and Samaria?) before Joshua's reforms and some may have come to Egypt directly from exile in Babylonia after Cyrus' edict permitting reconstruction of the temple in Jerusalem. This conclusion could explain the fact that, at the beginning of the 5th century B.C.E., some Jewish settlers spoke and wrote only Aramaic.
Certainly the settlers on Elephantine believed that they had the right to practice their own cult in the temple of Yaho, which had been built legally, undoubtedly during the period between the destruction of the temple of Jerusalem (586 B.C.E.) and its reconstruction after Cyrus' edict, in 538 B.C.E. (Bresciani, 1992, pp. 90-91). The destruction of the temple of Yaho on the island was total. Everything was burned or stolen by Egyptian marauders, with the support of the Persian governor Vidranga and his son Nefaina, head of the garrison at Syene, while Arsames (see ARˆAÚMA), the satrap, was at Susa in 411-408 B.C.E. Although no architectural traces are left, there are texts revealing that the Elephantine agura had five porticos of stone blocks on stone columns, as well as hinged bronze portals and a cedar roof; the cult objects included gold and silver basins. Of the various possible causes for the conflict between Egyptians and Jews were the proximity of the Jewish quarter to the temple area of Khnum and the influence of religious authorities in Jerusalem, who wanted to eliminate the heterodox temple at Elephantine (Bresciani, 1992, pp. 97-98). In fact, they subsequently permitted the Jewish colony only an altar for incense and offerings.
The latest surviving Aramaic document from the Jewish colony on Elephantine is dated after the end of the first Persian domination in Egypt (ca. 404 B.C.E.); it is a letter sent to Elephantine from Memphis in the first year (390 B.C.E.) of Nefertiti (Twenty-Ninth Dynasty).
The Aramaic documents found on Elephantine throw light not only on the life, society, and laws of the Jewish military colony but also on the Egyptian environment in which it operated, as well as on its relations with Persian authorities in Egypt. It is important that among the papyri of Elephantine there are examples of literary texts intended for readers of Aramaic: a translation of Darius I's great cuneiform inscription at B^sotu@n (q.v.) and a translation of the Akkadian "Romance of the wise Ahiqar" (minister of the Assyrians Sennacherib and Esarhaddon; Cowley, pp. 204-48). Bezalel Porten and Ada Yardeni were able to recover from the latter the erased text of an Aramaic customs register of sea trade for the year 475 B.C.E. (C3.7). Another fragmentary text may be the Aramaic version of an Egyptian story about a man called Bar Punesh (AP 71; Grelot, pp. 427-32; cf. Bresciani, 1990, p. 825 n. 2).
No other Jewish colonies as stable as that of Elephantine were established until the Ptolemaic period, when, in 154 B.C.E., the refugee Onias obtained permission to found a new temple in the territory of Heliopolis, in the country of Bubastis (Leontopolis, now Tell Yahu@d^ya "the hill of the Jews"). It remained active until its destruction in 71 C.E.; it can be identified with "the altar in the center of the land of Egypt" in "the city of the sun" (Heliopolis; Isaiah 19:18-20; Bresciani, 1986, p. 45).
Bibliography: E. Bickermann, "The Diaspora. The Captivity," in W. D. Davies and L. Finkelstein, eds., The Cambridge History of Judaism I, Cambridge, 1968, pp. 342-58. L. Borchardt, "Nilmesser und Nilstandsmarchen," APAW, 1906, pp. 13 ff. E. Bresciani, "Papiri aramaici egiziani di epoca persiana presso el Museo Civico di Padova," Rivista di Studi Orientali 35, 1960, pp. 11-24. Idem, "Egypt: Persian Satrapy," in W. D. Davies and L. Finkelstein, eds., The Cambridge History of Judaism I, Cambridge, 1968, pp. 358-72. Idem, Assuan, Il tempio tolemaico di Isi, Pisa, 1978. Idem, "Oracles d'Égypte et prophe‚ties bibliques," Le monde de la Bible 45, 1986. Idem, Letteratura e poesia dell'antico Egitto, Turin, 1990. Idem, "La sixieàme satrapie: L'Égypte perse et ses se‚mites," in O. Abel and F. Smyth, eds., Le livre de traverse: De l'exe‚geàse biblique aà l'anthropologie, Paris, 1992, pp. 87-99. A. E. Cowley, Aramaic Papyri of the Fifth Century B.C., Oxford, 1923. M. Dandamayev, "The Diaspora. Babylonia," in W. D. Davies and L. Finkelstein, eds., The Cambridge History of Judaism I, Cambridge, 1968, pp. 326-42. G. R. Driver, Aramaic Documents of the Fifth Century B.C., Oxford, 1954. E. Edel, Die Felsengräber der Qubbet el Hawa bei Assuan, pt. 2. Die althieratischen Topfaufschriften, Wiesbaden, 1967. P. Grelot, Documents arame‚ens d'Égypte, Paris, 1972. L. Habachi and H. Riad, Aswan: The Town of a Glorious Past, Cairo, 1959. W. Kornfeld, "Judische-aramäische Grabinschriften," WZKM 61, 1967, pp. 9-16. B. Porten, Archives from Elephantine: The Life of an Ancient Jewish Military Colony, Berkeley and Los Angeles, 1968a. Idem, "The Diaspora. The Jews in Egypt," in W. D. Davies and L. Finkelstein, eds., The Cambridge History of Judaism I, Cambridge, 1968b, pp. 372-400. Idem and A. Yardeni, Textbook of the Aramaic Documents III, Winona Lake, Ind., 1993. A. Vincent, La religion des Jude‚o-Arame‚ens d'Ele‚phantine, Paris, 1937. E. Volterra, "'yhwdy' e '÷rmy" nei papiri aramaici del V secolo provenienti dall'Egitto," Rendiconti della Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei, Classe di scienze morali, storiche e filologiche, ser. 8/18, 1963, pp. 131-73.
(Edda Bresciani) www.iranica.com

Rabban Gamaliel the Elder was a Christian!

2006-02-12T09:59:00.001-08:00

Rabban Gamaliel the Elder was a Christian!

2006-02-12T09:59:00.000-08:00

Saint Gamaliel the Elder, Jewish Tanna Christian Saint, Son of Hillel and His Role in Christian Tradition

One of the most interesting themes in the literature of the late second temple period and late antiquity onwards is the treatment of well respected Jewish personalities. In this category of tradition is included Saint Epiphanius of Salmis' Panarion where in the section on the Ebionites he relates the death bed conversion of Hillel II and his assistant Joseph and Severus of Minorca's record of the conversion of all the Jews on the island of Minorca in the 4th century due to the reception of the bones of St Stephen the first Christian martyr. One of the more enduring traditions of this kind is that relating to the first century Jewish sage known in Jewish tradition as Gamaliel the Elder the first to receive the title rabban in Jewish tradition. In Jewish tradition "When he died the honor [outward respect] of the Torah ceased, and purity and piety became extinct" (mSotah xv:18). Christian tradition numbers him among the saints, not just a believer but a saint. He is a figure who appears in visions and reveals things to people and is one of the eyewitnesses of the trial and crucifixion and resurrection of "Jesu Christ" as Gamaliel calls him in one of his revelations below. The purpose of this paper is to explore the features of the traditions regarding Gamaliel which have been handed down in the Church from the first century onwards. Whilst the historicity of the tradition would be difficult to confirm at least we can trace some of the lines of the story of Gamaliel among the Christian from the time of Christ through the 7th century.

Sources
The sources we have pointing to the relationship of Gamaliel to the Church are some of the most interesting and most difficult to come by in Church hagiography. Gamaliel is a saint of the Eastern Church. He appears in the Greek manuscripts of New Testament, Syriac, Ethiopic and Arabic sources. He appears in Christian sources before he appears in Jewish sources, and the Churches tradition regarding him start with the first century Acts of the Apostles written in koine Greeks. Here Gamaliel not only enters Church tradition but the scene of history. The next source we have is the second century pseudipigraphical Clementine Recognitions. These are traditions handed down in the Church of the East, in Syriac. They propose to be the work of Clement of Rome who wrote the early Epistles to the Corinthian Church. We then have the apocryphal work the Gospel of Nicodemus. These are second or third century documents. When we reach the 5th century we have the interesting tradition of the priest Lucius finding the bones of St Stephen the Christian proto martyr of first century Jerusalem. Here in his tomb was found the body of Gamaliel. We also have a 5th century document called the Gospel of Gamaliel (Bausmark 1906. p253) which relates his eyewitness record of the trial, crucifixion and resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ. The book originally went the title of the Lament of the Virgin (Laha Maryam in Ethiopic) but in the second half where Gamaliel is clearly the writer, she is not mentioned at all. The Martyrdom of Pilate is another document assigned to the Gospel of Gamaliel with the record of Gamaliel the eye witness where Pilate is exonerated and shown to be a believer in the resurrection.
Approach
Gamaliel the Elder is respected greatly in both the Church traditions and in the Rabbinic traditions. What is even more interesting is the two biographies he is given. He dies as a great and wise tanna and he dies as a Christian saint. Perhaps he is finally the great bridge all the ecumenists are looking for. In Rabbinic tradition he is to be son of Simon, son of Gamaliel. He comes into the fore in about 20 AD and is held to be the successor to the seat of nasi in the Sanhedrin. He is the first to hold the seat without an assistant and the first teacher to be granted the title rabban (our Rabbi). According to tradition he dies 18 years before the destruction of the Temple and is succeeded as nasi by Simon his son. The epigram which Rabbinic literature gives to him speaks of the respect with which he was held:
When he died the honor [outward respect] of the Torah ceased, and purity and piety became extinct"(Sotah xv: 18).
Historically we know that he was an important Jewish leader of the first century, while the New Testament says nothing of his father and his position as nasi, it confirms that he was part of the Sanhedrin, a doctor of the law and respected by the people. Luke, in the Acts of the Apostles records all this along with the fact that he is a Pharisee and the teacher of the Apostle Paul. To Luke the term Pharisee was descriptive and not necessarily written with a negative connotation for Paul himself claimed to be a Pharisee in the Acts of the Apostles. Gamaliel flourished then from about 20 AD to 52 AD, this was the period in which the Church first grew up. If he was nasi in this period then while he headed up the party of the Pharisees, Jesus said: “The Pharisees sit in Moses' seat, so all that they say to you, observe and do”. Which could be a way of saying they have the authority to make halakah for the disciples. Since Gamaliel is held to sit at the steps of temple mount and issue letters from there it is likely he saw Jesus in action or heard him teach and perhaps even dialogued with him.

Gamaliel in the First Century
Gamaliel is mentioned twice in the New Testament. In the first place it is in the narrative of Acts chapter 5. Luke[1] is writing Acts to a man called Theophilus[2] who he calls Most Excellent (kratiste). He is writing to Kratiste Theophilus to assure him of the things, which were being taught to him as a catechumen. Luke asserts that he had investigated all the events accurately and is clearly respected by Theophilus. The identity of this man is uncertain.[3] In his record Luke has described the birth of the Church and how it had begun to spread its good news though Jerusalem. By the time Gamaliel is introduced the Church is made up of at least 5000 brethren, the women and children being in addition. The Church was born on Shavuot 30 AD. In chapter 1 Jesus commissions the Church from Jerusalem and taken up (eperthee) into heaven and disappeared into a cloud. In chapter two the 11 apostles appoint a replacement for Judas (Yehudah). And spend time in prayer with 120 disciples, women, Mary and Jesus brethren. The twelve have the job of bearing witness to resurrection of Jesus. On Pentecost the Holy Spirit falls on the apostles and they begin to speak in tongues and prophesy. Peter proclaims the Gospel in Jerusalem and 3000 men join the Church. The proclamation continues in chapter three in the temple with Peter and John taking center place. They are witnesses that God raised Jesus from the dead. In chapter four Peter and John are arrested by the “captain of the temple (stategos tou herou) and the Saducees” arrested because they were preaching the resurrection (anastasin) in Jesus. At that same time the number who believed reached to 5000. This meant they outstripped both the Pharisees and the Essenes according Josephus’ numbers. They were now the fastest growing sect in Jerusalem and perhaps the biggest. Peter and John performed a miracle in Jesus name.
Gamaliel and the motif of protection of the Church
The next day the rulers (archontas), elders (presbeterous), scribes (grammateis) along with Annas the high priest, Kaiaphas, John and Alexander who were members of the high priestly race (genous) met to try Peter and John.
The apostles were on trial for the first time. They are questioned:
Ev poiaai dunamei ee Ev poiooi onomati epoieesate touto humeis;
In what power or in what name did you do this?
Peter proclaims Jesus as the only name under heaven given among men that men could be saved. The court release Peter and John but forbids them from speaking in the name of Jesus.
In order that it may not spread further among the people,
Let us warn them to speak no more to any man in the name (NASB Acts 4:17))

The church made the threat of the rulers a subject of prayer and continued to proclaim “the word of the Lord”. At this point Luke describes the Church as having everything in common with a system to receive property of new members. In chapter a couple die for claiming to have sold property and given the proceeds to the community, this was lying to Holy Ghost.
Peter and John continued preaching and miracles continued to happen. People were coming from cities (poleoon) near Jerusalem. The High priest and the Sadducees arrested them and locked up in public jail (teereesei deemosia). In the morning they were to be tried but the officers (huperetai) who went to take them to court found the prison empty. They had been released by an angel and told to preach in the Temple which they did from dawn. The strategos and his huperetais went to the temple brought gently for trial again. The Sanhedrin is convened. The high priest says:
We gave you strict orders not to continue teaching in this name, and behold you have filled Jerusalem with your teaching and intend to bring this mans blood upon us (NASB Acts 5:28)

The high priest feels that Peter and John are accusing them of killing Jesus.
Peter and the Apostles claim that they must,
Obey God rather than men. The God of our Fathers raised up Jesus, whom you had put
to death by hanging him on the cross. He is the one whom God exalted to his right hand as a Prince (Archeegon) and a Savior (Sooteera), to grant repentance to Israel and forgiveness of sins. And we are witnesses of these things. And so is the Holy Spirit whom God has given to those who obey him. (NASB Acts 5:30-32)

The chief priests are reacting to this accusation, that they are guilty of shedding the innocent blood of Jesus. Luke notes that the ones listening were cut (dieprioto) and
Eboulonto analein autous autous
Intending to slay them (NASB Acts 5:33)
The Apostles lives were threatened according to Lukes record and the element that saved them may have only been the intervention of Gamaliel as the representative of the Pharisees.
It is at this point that Gamaliel is first introduced to history[4]. In the story of Acts into which Gamaliel is introduced it is the first introduction of the Pharisees and hence perhaps the tannaim into the narrative. Luke identifies him by his name, Gamaliel, with a number four other factors:
1 He is a certain Pharisee
2 He is a teacher of the Torah (nomodidskalos)
3 Honored (timios) by all the people
4 He commanded (ekeleusen) that Peter and John be put outside
We find that that Gamaliel in relation to the Sanhedrin has enough authority to command the defendents to be put out of the court and to address the court and expect them to be listened to. We may wonder who he commanded to take them out and did his authority equal the high priests? Luke then gives a speech or a summary of the speech of Gamaliel.
Men of Israel, take care what you propose to do with these men
For some time ago Theudas rose up, claiming to be somebody;
And a group of about four hundred men joined up with him.
And he was slain and all those who followed him were dispersed
And came to nothing. After this man Judas of Galilee rose up in the
days of the census and drew away some people after him, he too
Perished and all those who followed him were scattered.
And so in the present case, I say to you, stay away from these men
And let them alone, for if this plan or action should be of men
It will be overthrown; but if it is of God, you will not be able to overthrow
Them; or else you may even be found fighting against God (Acts 5: 35-38)
We see then according to Luke’s record Gamaliel spoke with favour almost in defence of the Church and may have saved there lives. But he does not claim that Gamaliel is a believer. This appears in later traditions. The motifs represented here of Gamaliel is protection and observation and reserved judgement (gather evidence to ascertain the truth or falsehood) of the message. For this Gamaliel the teacher of the Torah with authority to command the proceedings of the court, a movement will be known by its fruit (App 2)
Our focus is on Gamaliel’s role. We see here perhaps a pattern of the trial of the prophet Jeremiah. He was tried for speaking about the destruction of the temple. Precedents were cited regarding how past prophets Urijah and Micah were treated by authorities[5]. Then one man rose up in support of Jeremiah so he was not killed. Perhaps Luke has patterned this trial a little along the lines of the trial of Jeremiah.
The role of Gamaliel in the defence of the Church is interesting. Firstly we see that the intention of the unidentified listeners was to kill the apostles. Gamaliel intervenes at this point. His main message appears leave these men alone. But his message is also maybe this Jesus is a prince and a saviour. Maybe he is seated at God’s right hand and granting repentance (metanoian) to Israel and forgiveness of sins (aphesin harmatioon). For Gamaliel and perhaps for the tannaim he represented of beit Hillel, the message of the Church at this point appears to be possibly a message from God. The theme of Gamaliel's defence of the apostles is expanded in Christian traditions of the second century. We will seek to look at the later traditions regarding the role of Gamaliel in light of this first Lukan exposition. Most scholars see this intervention of Gamaliel in the trial of the apostles as the catalyst for the later traditions on Gamaliel. He is a kind of Christian fifth column in the midst of the Jewish authorities. He remains among his people with the permission of the apostles in order to protect the Church from too much destruction. This is one of the themes in the second century traditions regarding Gamaliel which we turn to now.
Gamaliel in the Second and Third Century Syriac Traditions
The Recognitions (Anagnoseis) of Clement are a kind of philosophical and theological romance. It is one of a category of literary traditions including Clementine Homilies and two Epitomes. The Recognitions have been preserved in a Latin manuscript. In their present condition they are dated to early part of the third century. There authorship is uncertain. They appear to have Jewish Christian or Ebionite sympathies and to be unsympathetic to the apostle Paul.[6] They are quoted by Origen in 231 in his commentary to Genesis.[7] And they contain a large section from Bardesanes De Fato. The Recognitions claim to come from Clement of Rome traditionally the fourth bishop of Rome from the turn of the first century. However some believe he has been confused with Flavius Clemens the kinsman of Emperor Domitian. The translation we will use that from The Ante Nicene Fathers (Roberts and Donaldson). Recognitions consists of 10 books which are in many places parallel to the Clementine Homilies. However the story relating to Gamaliel and the Church is only in Recognitions[8]. In Book 1 chap we find scenes described reminiscent of those in Luke 5. Clement[9], the narrator, relates stories regarding the relationship between the Apostles, Annas and Gamaliel and the people of Israel. From chapter 39 the coming of the True Prophet is described. It is Simon Peter who is teaching. He described how baptism was instituted in place of sacrifice. The chapters then speak of Advent of the True Prophet, Rejection of the True Prophet, Call of the Gentiles, Success of the Gospel and the Challenge by Caiaphas.
In these chapters Peter relates some of the story of Jesus. He came, he selected 12 apostles and 72 disciples as had Moses. He performed many miracles but he suffered from the 6th to the 9th hour and rose again. He was accused of being a magician or some pretended the body was stolen. However the truth prevailed, "So that the priests at one time were afraid, lest haply, by the providence of God to their confusion, the whole of the people should come over to the faith" (ANC, VIII 89)

The priests often sent and asked for a discussion with the Apostles as to whether Jesus was the Prophet Moses had foretold.
For on this point only does there seem to be any difference between us
Who believe in Jesus, and unbelieving Jews.
But while they often made such requests to us, and we sought for a fitting
Opportunity, a week of years was completed from the passion of the Lord
The Church of the Lord which was constituted in Jerusalem was most plentifully multiplied and grew, being governed with most righteous ordinances by James, Who was ordained bishop in it by the Lord (ANC VIII, 89)

So we see Simon Peter in the tradition sets the date of the events to be related to Passover 37 AD. On that day the twelve apostles came together with a very large multitude. They related what they had been doing as James requested. It is Caiaphas the high priest who sent priests to the Apostles repeatedly to arrange a debate. The Apostles regularly put it off waiting for a more opportune time. The day comes and the Church decides to go to the temple to testify publicly. The scene is set where the various Jewish sects are refuted by the Apostles.
The tradition in the Recognitions is a variant on the tradition in Acts. Gamaliel is the apparent impartial protector. In the scene in the Recognitions Book I:65, he stills a tumult set off by the Churches teaching against the temple status quo in Jerusalem The scene is a public discussion initiated by the high priest. The apostles refute the Sadducees, the Samaritans, the Scribes, the Pharisees, and the Disciples of John the Baptist. Caiaphas then arises and seeks to undermine the teaching of the Apostles about Jesus. Caiaphas looks at Simon Peter and tells him not to preach Christ Jesus any more, Simon Peter replies that sacrifices are over with and God is not pleased with the Sacrifice and that the temple will be destroyed. This causes an uproar and Gamaliel as in the Acts above, intervenes to quell the storm. However the narrative has a number of differences to Luke’s narrative some of which are interesting to us.
The first insights are two comments by Simon Peter the narrator of this part of the book. He tells us that Gamaliel was actually a follower of Jesus Christ and a brother in the faith. These comments assign motives to Gamaliel's activity, which identify him as a secret believer, like Nicodemus in the Gospel of John (chap 3) who came by night to talk to Jesus.
When I had thus spoken, the whole multitude of the priests, were in a rage, because I had foretold to them the overthrow of the temple. Which when Gamaliel, a chief of the people, saw—who was secretly our brother in the faith, but by our advice remained among them—because they were greatly enraged and moved with intense fury against us, he stood up, and said,593 ‘Be quiet for a little, O men of Israel'... (CR LXV)
Then, when profound silence was obtained, Gamaliel, who, as we have said, was of our faith, but who by a dispensation remained amongst them, that if at any time they should attempt anything unjust or wicked against us, he might either check them by skillfully adopted counsel, or might warn us, that we might either be on our guard or might turn it aside;—he therefore, as if acting against us, first of all looking to James the bishop, addressed him in this manner ( CR LXVI)

So we see that the second century tradition maintains Gamaliel's role as an impartial defender of the Church but asserts that he was also a secret "brother in the faith", who by the permission of the apostles "remained amongst them" in order to avert injustices and wicked acts intended against the Church. Interestingly the Hebraic branch of the Church represented by the apostles suffered little from persecution in the early years. The first martyr Stephen was a Hellenist and he in later tradition is associated with Gamaliel.
The tradition of Gamaliel’s secret belief is interesting. And we find in later traditions that it is with the other secret believers who were people in high authority among the Jews in the first century whom Gamaliel is associated with, namely Nicodemas (App 4) of John 3 and Joseph of Arimathea who took possession of Jesus body after his crucifixion. Joseph was a rich man and Nicodemas a teacher of Israel of high rank. Thus to the Lukan story, aside from many other added details we find a second level of narrative explaining motives for Gamaliel's actions.
In the Clementime narrative we see a competition between Caiaphas the Sadducee and Gamaliel the secret brother. Caiaphas is suspicious regarding Gamaliel’s intentions and of course quite rightly so.
Another interesting feature of the narrative which Recognitions has is a focus on the place where the Apostles stood to conduct their apology. The LV it says they "we went up to the temple, and, standing on the steps together with our faithful brethren" and when they returned for the continued debate the next day with Gamaliel at the helm the notice says
There we found a great multitude, who had been waiting for us from the middle of the night. Therefore we took our stand in the same place as before, in order that, standing on an elevation, we might be seen by all the people.
That is they went to the temple and stood on the steps so that they could be seen by the people. According to Jewish tradition Gamaliel stood on steps to make his decrees and issues his letters. Not only so but according to Neusner one of the distinguishing features of pericope related to Gamaliel the Elder, in the Mishnahh, Tosephtah and the Talmuds is relating the place he was standing when an event was taking place. We can not show this parallels are any more than coincidence but clearly in this tradition the apostles stood on steps in the temple and in Jewish tradition Gamaliel did. In both cases there seems to be some kind of emphasis on that place. This comment is an aside and so we turn back to the development of the traditions. We turn to the continuation of the theme of Gamaliel in the second and third centuries.
In the Gospel of Nicodemus also known as the Acts of Pilate another tradition arises which can be dated at least to the second century. It like the later Gospel of Gamaliel has a focus on the exoneration of Pilate. The book begins with a certain “Ananias, an officer of the guard” who is learned in the law and through the scriptures came to know Jesus Christ. He indicates that he had searched for reports from the time of Jesus Christ and found one written in Hebrew. This document he translated from Hebrew into Greek “for the information of all those who call upon the name of our Lord Jesus Christ”. These documents may have been mentioned by Justin Martyr but were almost certainly mentioned by Tertullian (Chandler, p.158). Ananias gives the date of the event as the 19th year of Tiberius Caeser, the fourth year of the two hundred and second Olympiad on the eighth day before the kalends of April, or the 25th of March. This would place it in about the year AD33. Ananias claims the record is that of Nicodemus. Gamaliel first appears in the council of priests and scribes who are named as the main accusers of Jesus. The council consisted of Annas, Caiaphas, Semes, Dathaes, Gamaliel, Judas, Levi, Nephtalim, Alexander and Jairus and the “rest of the Jews”. The story deals with the testimony of Nicodemus and Joseph of Aramathea and their persecution for being sympathetic to Jesus. A number of miracles occur, for example Joseph is arrested and imprisoned in a room with no windows. Jesus appears to him and transfers him supernaturally to his house in Aramathea. In one recension of the book[10] a group go to Galilee to bring some witnesses to describe Jesus’ activities in Hades. Those who went were “Annas and Caiaphas, and Joseph and Nicodemus and Gamaliel” We should notice that in this listing Gamaliel is seen with Nicodemus and Joseph but he is connected with the council not the believers[11]. In the whole book he does not say a word but is with the council in their investigations. The tradition then in this documented connected him with these two secret believers independently of the tradition of him as a secret believer in Recognitions.

Gamaliel in the fourth and fifth Century
The Acts of Pilate sees Gamaliel as among those investigated the miracles around the trial, crucifixion and resurrection. In one second century tradition he is a believer, in the other he is an investigator. The two documents which point him as the witness and the author have him writing the story of the trial crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus. Here we see Gamaliel the eye witness. He does not do speeches but writes about what he saw. For Mingana the translator of our documents, these are two Egyptian documents. However the manuscripts he used were in Garshuni that is Arabic written in Syriac characters. Rendel Harris notes,
The two documents before us are concerned, the one with the spiritual history of Pontius Pilate, who is made over into an accepted and glorified saint, accepted in the Church on earth and glorified in the Church in heaven; the other with the sorrows of the Virgin, not this time at the cross, but rather at the empty tomb” (WSII, p164) So what does Gamaliel have to say? In regard to the Martyrdom of Pilate after the completion of the narrative we have:
And I Gamaliel had learnt the art of writing, the science of Judaism and that of the Apostles our fathers, and had also stepped in the science of philosophers until I had acquired the knowledge of the right answer, and learnt the mystery of the resurrection of the Lord Christ, and the miracles which he performed, and what happened to the vizier of the Emperor, and to Galil8us and the Emperor Tiberius, and I put all to writing and composed it as a memorial of the holy resurrection (WSII, p200)
As in the Jewish tradition, Gamaliel likes to write. Some have argued the Apostle Paul was like his teacher in this respect. The interesting thins about these narratives is Gamaliel general invisibility. Although they may be pseudipigraphs Gamaliel is by no means a central or important character he is simply the narrator. The Pilate documents calls itself “the history of Pilate, the Governor of the city of Jerusalem”. It talks of the fact that in it “it makes mention of Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus, the venerable chiefs” (WSII p.242). Then Gamaliel gets his first introduction:
The story is told as found in the copy written by Gamaliel and Horus (Anaius) the good, pious and respectable teachers in all things dealing with God. They wrote it because they were present with Joseph and Nicodemus and witnessed the ordeals of Christ which became the source of our life, and his glorious resurrection (WSII, p.244)
Mingana sees a connection between the Anaius here called Horus in some manuscripts and the Ananius who translated the gospel of Nicodemus. If this is the case we may see that the presence of Gamaliel with Nicodemus and Joseph in this document may come from connection with the early tradition as seen in the acts of Pilate above. However since those comments are introductory it is possible they come from the narrative it self. We find in this document a narrative of post crucifixion events. Jesus is buried by Joseph and Nicodemus and the following events are related. After some time a plot is hatched by Judas’s sister to kill Pilate. When this is mentioned suddenly the narrative is interrupted by the first person comment of Gamaliel.
After this wicked company of Jews resolved to kill Pilate with his wife and children and to plunder his possessions, when I, Gamaliel learned the conspiracy of these wicked people I did not neglect the matter, but I hastened to Joseph of Arimathea, who had shrouded the body of the Saviour, and I disclosed to him the conspiracy. (p250)
Here we see Gamaliel perhaps playing out the role assigned to him in Recognitions above. There as a secret believer he was left to be among the people lest they sought to doing anything wicked on unjust to the Church. Gamaliel becomes the secret spy of the Church. The text then moves back into narrative and Gamaliel continue to relate the story. It centres on Pilate, Joseph and Nicodemus. A confirmation of his role as secret informant is confirmed in his next interruption to the narrative. "This is what the angel Gabriel told the venerable chiefs Joseph and Nicodemus. And these two blessed ones sent for me, in secret, me Gamaliel, I the weak Gamaliel, was the disciple of those blessed ones "(p265).
We see here also an addition to the tradition. Gamaliel now describes himself as a disciple of Joseph and Nicodemus whom he respects greatly. Thus we find in the traditions he is naturally related to these two teachers and find himself in a position as their student. In the Lamentation of the Virgin, Gamaliel is again seen as a witness, one who sees all the events as they unfold. He again, very rarely, interrupts in storytelling in the first person.
And I Gamaliel was following with the crowd” (WSII, p.201) and “At that moment I followed the crowd and my fathers Joseph and Nicodemus, because fear did not allow the Apostles to come to the sepulchre and witness what happened to Him. They were hiding in every place from fear of the Jews. I Gamaliel, walked with the crowds and witnessed all what happened in the tomb of my Lord Jesus, and the great fight that Pilate undertook against the High Priests (WSII, p.210).

We see then in this last statement of Gamaliel that he is seen as a witness of the events of the death and resurrection where the other apostles were hidden and unavailable. We notice also that he calls Jesus his Lord. From these traditions it is apparent that he is a believer through the ministry of Joseph and Nicodemus his “fathers” and that he is a believer before Jesus is crucified. The end of the text tells us “These (words) have been written by Gamaliel and Nicodemus, the venerable chiefs, and they placed them in Jerusalem, the holy city, and in all the districts that surround it” (WWII, p211). With these two texts we almost 70 pages of the purported writing of Gamaliel, with traditions contained in them going back to the second and first century. They overlap with the gospels and give us a tradition which is held by the Coptic Church and other Eastern Churches. However the Gamaliel traditions do not end here. We move to our final fascinating scene in the history of Gamaliel in the Church. In this scene further additions are made to the tradition.
Gamaliel in the 5th Century
Interestingly this scene connects with the theme of honour which is linked with Gamaliel in the traditions relating to him in the Jewish community. “When he died the honour [outward respect] of the Torah ceased, and purity and piety became extinct"(Sotah xv: 18).” says the Mishnah This last story we will look at starts with the issue of honour. During the fifth century, the story goes a priest by the name of Lucian “of the country of Jerusalem” and who is counted among noble had a vision. He went to sleep on a Friday awoke to find an ancient man who was noble in stature and who wore a long beard dressed in a white robed with golden crosses embroidered on to it. This noble man had a golden rod in his hand and he spoke to Lucius saying: "Go and with great diligence open our tombs, for we be lain in a place dishonest and of despite. Go thou therefore unto John bishop of Jerusalem and say to him that he lay us in a more honourable place."
Here we see that word honour again. The speaker is looking for a more honourable home. It seems that it is not only by chance that these bodies need to be moved for this man is sent in order to resolve a present drought in Jerusalem: “And because that drought and tribulation is through the world, God hat ordained to be debonair and merciful to the by our suffrages and prayers”. Lucian asked the man who he was. The man replied:
I am Gamaliel, which nourished the apostle Paul and ensigned him the law of my fathers, and he that lieth with me is Saint Stephen, which was stoned of the Jews and cast out of the city for to be devoured of beasts and birds, but he kept him, to whom he kept his faith, without hurting and I with great diligence took up the body and with great diligence buried it in my new tomb. We see some interesting additions to the tradition of Gamaliel in his speech here. We see firstly that he took and buried the body of the Christian proto martyr Stephen. Secondly we see that now Nicodemus is assigned to him as his nephew, an interesting addition to his relationship with Nicodemus. This would no doubt help to explain his closeness to Nicodemus in the Gospel of Nicodemus; it also helps to explain why it was Gamaliel and Nicodemus who wrote the Lament of the Virgin together. Thirdly the notice that Nicodemus received baptism by Peter and John reflects a parallel tradition helps by 9th Century Byzantine Patriarch, that Gamaliel himself received baptism at the hand of Simon Peter and John. Fourthly we see a tradition that Nicodemus was saved from death because of the priests respect for the house of Gamaliel. The vision Gamaliel continued:
Nevertheless they took away his [Nicodemus’] all his substance and deposed him from his principate, and beat him strongly and let him lie for dead. And then I led him into my house, where he lived after but a few days, when he was dead I buried him at the feet of Saint Stephen. And the third that is with me is my Son , which in the twentieth year of his age received baptism with me and was a clean virgin, and learned the law of the God with my disciple. And Ethea my wife and Selimus my son, which would not receive the faith of Jesu Christ, were not worthy to be in our sepulchre. thou shalt find them buried in another place and thou shalt find their tombs void and idle.
Thus we find now a family assigned to Gamaliel, an unbelieving wife and son, Ethea and Selimus. We also see a believing son Abibas. Abibas was a fellow student of the Apostle Paul in this tradition. The entrance of Paul places us back in Acts where Paul claims he learned Torah from Gamaliel. The Recognitions are believed by some to be anti Pauline documents although he is not directly mentioned. This suggests that this tradition is from another source to that of the recognition.
After the vision Lucius prays and asks God to confirm that the vision was true by sending it two times more. Saint Gamaliel as he is called then appears the following two Fridays. He indicated to Lucian where he could find the tombs. After the last vision Lucian went to the bishop of Jerusalem. They went to the place and dug and found the tombs and moved them to the Church of Sion. They ordained them honourably in that new place and rain began to fall and the drought was ended.
Thus we see a number of literary traditions in 1st to 5th century regarding the role of Gamaliel in the Church. We have a whole family assigned to him and a lot of witnessing but no legal rulings. His role was to work as a Christian spy among the Jews. With such a strong tradition among the Christians regarding Gamaliel we might ponder the idea of this affecting Gamaliel’s treatment in Jewish tradition. As respected as Gamaliel was he is mysteriously omitted from the rabbinic chain of Torah authorities:
Tradition [Jewish] does not represent Gamaliel as learned in the Scriptures, nor as a teacher, because the school of Hillel, whose head he undoubtedly was, always appears collectively in its controversies with the school of Shammai, and the individual scholars and their opinions are not mentioned. Hence Gamaliel is omitted in the chain of tradition as given in the Mishnah (Abot i., ii.), while Johanan b. Zakkai is mentioned as the next one who continued the tradition after Hillel and Shammai. Gamaliel's name is seldom mentioned in halakic tradition (JE. Gamaliel)
Although Schechter and Bacher assert that the reason Gamaliel is missing from the chain of tradition is because he was not seen as a great scholar of the Torah. I would like to suggest that the greatness of his position and his reputation really excludes this as a reason. He is at the same time held in great respect regarding the very honor of the Torah and yet eliminated from the chain of tradition representing the transmission of the Torah. It is here where Christian tradition may be able to help give an explanation of his omission. Is it possible that the Church great respect for Gamaliel was known by the Rabbis, and this lead to their downgrading of his position? Perhaps this should have been the controlling thesis of this paper? But it was not. In this paper we have look at the Church traditions regarding Gamaliel. We have found it to be widespread and in some sense consistent. Gamaliel got his own wife, his own nephew and his close teachers in the Christ faith his nephew Nicodemus and his friend Joseph of Arimathea, these three acts as the witnesses to the truth of the resurrection among the Jewish first century elite. But when we ask why was Gamaliel so innocently invisible in most of the traditions regarding him. He never does any amazing miracles, he does not take an obvious role in the Church like his disciple the apostle Paul, he simply speaks, writes and defends. Why did gospels get written in his name? And perhaps it is simply this role as impartial fifth column defender of the faith that lead to his interesting role. There is another possible reason why he was chosen to write, to appear to Lucius and to witness the death, burial and resurrection of Jesus Christ in these traditions. This reason clearly unacceptable today but perhaps foremost in the mind of the Eastern Church. They held the tradition that he witnessed and wrote of these things simply because they thought he did.

Reference List
Chandler, W.M., The Trial of Jesus (Georgia: Harrison Co, 1976)
WSII Mingana, A. Woodbrooke Studies Christian Documents in Syriac, Arabic And Garshuni, Edited and translated with a Critical Apparatus (Cambridge: W. Heffer and Son Ltd, 1928)
The Clementine Recognitions, The Ante Nicene Fathers, Vol VIII, (www.ccel.org)
“Gamaliel”
Hennecke, E New Testament Apocrypha. English translation edited by Robert Mcl (SCM 1963)

Bibliography
“Gamaliel” Jewish Encyclopedia
“Gamaliel” New Catholic Encyclopedia
Neusner, J. The Rabbinic Traditions about the Pharisees before 70. Leiden , 1971: Brill. I-III. Second printing: Atlanta, 1999: Scholars Press for South Florida Studies in the History of Judaism.
Appendix 1
From Luke's and Paul's reliable historical records[12], three things are apparent: Gamaliel once had a disciple who was extremely zealous for the law of his fathers and under Gamaliel excelled beyond most of his peers. This same disciple of Gamaliel then became the head of a sect, which spread like wild fire to the "uttermost parts of the world" and rocked Israel. Gamaliel warned the Sanhedrin to leave the "wildfire" Church alone. It is possible that the message they were bringing could be from God, and if the council resisted it they could find themselves fighting against God and they would not overthrow the work of the Church. Gamaliel in the New Testament is never seen to oppose the preaching of the name of Jesus. The council forbade them to preach but Gamaliel had advised "Refrain from these men" in public (See Acts 4-6). The role attributed to Gamaliel can perhaps bring light on later traditions regarding him.

Appendix 2
. He brought up two cases[13]. The two precedents used in Gamaliel’s example are Judas of Galilee and Theudas. Historically there was a Judas of Galilee and he did arise during the period of a census just as Luke asserts here, he is mentioned in Josephus War 2:8:1 and in Antiquities 18:1:1.
The territory of Archelaus was brought under direct Roman rule and a man of equestrian rank at
Rome, Coponius, was sent as procurator with authority from Caeser to inflict the death penalty. In his time a Galilean named Judas tried to stir the natives to revolt, saying that they would be
Cowards if they submitted to paying taxes to the Romans, and after serving God alone
Accepted human masters. This man was a Rabbi with a sect of his own, and quite unlike other.
(Jos J War 2:8:1)
We see that the revolt of this Judas took place in the time of Coponius who ruled from 6-9 AD. This agrees with the period when Quirinius legate augustus of Syria did the census in about 6 AD. The census clearly had the purpose of assessing the population for taxation purposes. This was why Judas was protesting. It was a very appropriate time for Judas to arise for it was the very time when Rome took direct control of Judea. Before this Herod and his son Archelaus were controlling Judah, but at least they were converts, but in AD 6 The Romans were taking complete control of the land and assessing it directly for taxation purposes. This event would have had great prophetic significance for the messianically oriented parts of the Jewish population. This Judas is the same as that mentioned by Gamaliel. Further details tell us he was a Gaulonite from Gamala.
As for the Theudas mentioned by Gamaliel he would need to arise before 6 AD, this raises a possible historical problem. Josephus mentioned a magician called Theudas who arose around AD 44-46 who persuaded people to follow him to the river Jordan, where he would divide it. Fadus sent a troop against him and killed many of his followers. Some scholars hold that it is the same Theudas being referred to and either Luke or Josephus has erred. I hold that two Theudases over the forty year period is historically probable. Luke refers to the earlier one[14] and Josephus to the later.

Appendix 3
Gamaliel would have watched the development of the Church, from 30-32 AD, when Peter and John performed the miracle in the name of Jesus and were tried. Then having been locked up they were found preaching in the temple courts, until 52 AD when it is traditionally held that he died.
It is not only likely that Gamaliel heard Jesus and was probably present in about AD 6 when Jesus was speaking to the doctors of the law in Jerusalem, it is also likely that Jesus heard Gamaliel in his many visits to Jerusalem. It is Gamaliel who is traditionally held to have spoken on the subject of disciples that there were four kinds:
An unclean fish, a clean fish, a fish from the Jordan, a fish from the Great Sea. An unclean fish Who is that? A poor youth who studies Scripture and Mishnah, Halakha and Aggada and is without understanding. A clean fish: who is that? That's the rich youth who studies…and has understanding. A fish from the Jordan…is without a talent for give and take. A fish from the Great Sea… has a talent for give and take (Nathan, 166)
And it was Jesus who said:
Follow me and I will make you as fishers of men
And The Parable of the Net
47“Once again, the kingdom of heaven is like a net that was let down into the lake and caught all kinds of fish. 48When it was full, the fishermen pulled it up on the shore. Then they sat down and collected the good fish in baskets, but threw the bad away. 49This is how it will be at the end of the age. The angels will come and separate the wicked from the righteous 50and throw them into the fiery furnace, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.
51“Have you understood all these things?” Jesus asked.
“Yes,” they replied.
52He said to them, “Therefore every teacher of the law who has been instructed about the kingdom of heaven is like the owner of a house who brings out of his storeroom new treasures as well as old.” (Matthew 13 NASB)
We see then parallels between these two contempories in the traditions attributed to Gamaliel and the traditions of the Church regarding Jesus view of men[15]. There are also coincidences in numbers for example Gamaliel is said to have 500 disciples. Jesus also appeared to 500 disciples after rising from the dead as testified by the apostle Paul in 1Corinthians 15. As respected as Gamaliel was he is mysteriously omitted from the Rabbinic chain of Torah authorities:
Tradition does not represent Gamaliel as learned in the Scriptures, nor as a teacher, because the school of Hillel, whose head he undoubtedly was, always appears collectively in its controversies with the school of Shammai, and the individual scholars and their opinions are not mentioned. Hence Gamaliel is omitted in the chain of tradition as given in the Mishnah (Abot i., ii.), while Johanan b. Zakkai is mentioned as the next one who continued the tradition after Hillel and Shammai. Gamaliel's name is seldom mentioned in halakic tradition (JE. Gamaliel)
Although Schechter and Bacher assert that the reason Gamaliel is missing from the chain of tradition is because he was not seen as a great scholar of the Torah. I would like to suggest that the greatness of his position and his reputation really excludes this as a reason. He is at the same time held in great respect regarding the very honor of the Torah and yet eliminated from the chain of tradition representing the transmission of the Torah. It is here where Christian tradition may be able to help give an explanation of his omission. In the first century the Church had protection inspired by Gamaliel. His word was fulfilled the Church was not overthrown but increased from strength to strength in his lifetime. According to the record in Acts thousands of Jews joined the Church, including not a few Pharisees and not a few priests.

The tradition among the Jews, although based on only two sources inidcates that he was possibly the son of a mysterious Simon. This Simon is supposed to be between him and his supposed grand father Hillel the Elder. These are all traditionally from the House of David. If this were the case we would have an immedate reason as to why Gamaliel would have a reason to relate to Jesus and his disciples. Jesus was from the House of David and so potentially a legitimate heir to the throne of David and Gamaliel was from the same family. Gamaliel's advice in Acts(4-6) shows one who had interest in messianic movements and this we would expect of someone from a Tanna from the house of David in Jerusalem in the first century. I am sure the people of this house had great theological problems with the ruling Edomites (Idumeans), Herod and his family. The family of Herod could in no way be seen as legitimate heirs to the throne of David but would have been tolerated for the sake of peace and relations with Rome. All this I admit is only probable. However if it were true we would expect a tradition of relations between the house of Joseph (Jesus's father) and then the house of Jesus, which in the first century would have been the Church, the group of those supporting the cause of the son of David, Jesus, and the house of Gamaliel, another Davidic house in Jerusalem. Perhaps we can see a parallel in the modern day Abu Huwa family of the Mount of Olives. They are more than 10,000 strong and all Abu Huwa are seen as connected. You insult one you insult them all. Thus with this hypothesis of the expected relatioship let us turn to the traditions, which no doubt had an original historical core which was later, perhaps embelished. Later embellished.

App 3: Clementine Recognitions
Chapter LV.—Public Discussion.
“However, as we were proceeding to say, when the high priest had often sent priests to ask us that we might discourse with one another concerning Jesus; when it seemed a fit opportunity, and it pleased all the Church, we went up to the temple, and, standing on the steps together with our faithful brethren, the people kept perfect silence; and first the high priest began to exhort the people that they should hear patiently and quietly, and at the same time witness and judge of those things that were to be spoken. Then, in the next place, exalting with many praises the rite or sacrifice which had been bestowed by God upon the human race for the remission of sins, he found fault with the baptism of our Jesus, as having been recently brought in in opposition to the sacrifices. But Matthew,587 meeting his propositions, showed clearly, that whosoever shall not obtain the baptism of Jesus shall not only be deprived of the kingdom of heaven, but shall not be without peril at the resurrection of the dead, even though he be fortified by the prerogative of a good life and an upright disposition. Having made these and such like statements, Matthew stopped.”
Chapter LXV.—Tumult Stilled by Gamaliel.
“When I had thus spoken, the whole multitude of the priests were in a rage, because I had foretold to them the overthrow of the temple. Which when Gamaliel, a chief of the people, saw—who was secretly our brother in the faith, but by our advice remained among them—because they were greatly enraged and moved with intense fury against us, he stood up, and said,593 ‘Be quiet for a little, O men of Israel, for ye do not perceive the trial which hangs over you. Wherefore refrain from these men; and if what they are engaged in be of human counsel, it will soon come to an end; but if it be from God, why will you sin without cause, and prevail nothing? For who can overpower the will of God? Now therefore, since the day is declining towards evening, I shall myself dispute with these men to-morrow, in this same place, in your hearing, so that I may openly oppose and clearly confute every error.’ By this speech of his their fury was to some extent checked, especially in the hope that next day we should be publicly convicted of error; and so he dismissed the people peacefully.”
Chapter LXVI.—Discussion Resumed.
“Now when we had come to our James, while we detailed to him all that had been said and done, we supped, and remained with him, spending the whole night in supplication to Almighty God, that the discourse of the approaching disputation might show the unquestionable truth of our faith. Therefore, on the following day, James the bishop went up to the temple with us, and with the whole church. There we found a great multitude, who had been waiting for us from the middle of the night. Therefore we took our stand in the same place as before, in order that, standing on an elevation, we might be seen by all the people. Then, when profound silence was obtained, Gamaliel, who, as we have said, was of our faith, but who by a dispensation remained amongst them, that if at any time they should attempt anything unjust or wicked against us, he might either check them by skillfully adopted counsel, or might warn us, that we might either be on our guard or might turn it aside;—he therefore, as if acting against us, first of all looking to James the bishop, addressed him in this manner:—
Chapter LXVII.—Speech of Gamaliel.
“‘If I, Gamaliel, deem it no reproach either to my learning or to my old age to learn something from babes and unlearned ones, if haply there be anything which it is for profit or for safety to acquire (for he who lives reasonably knows that nothing is more precious than the soul), ought not this to be the object of love and desire to all, to learn what they do not know, and to teach what they have learned? For it is most certain that neither friendship, nor kindred, nor lofty power, ought to be more precious to men than truth. Therefore you, O brethren, if ye know anything more, shrink not from laying it 95before the people of God who are present, and also before your brethren; while the whole people shall willingly and in perfect quietness hear what you say. For why should not the people do this, when they see even me equally with themselves willing to learn from you, if haply God has revealed something further to you? But if you in anything are deficient, be not ye ashamed in like manner to be taught by us, that God may fill up whatever is wanting on either side. But if any fear now agitates you on account of some of our people whose minds are prejudiced against you, and if through fear of their violence you dare not openly speak your sentiments, in order that I may deliver you from this fear, I openly swear to you by Almighty God, who liveth for ever, that I will suffer no one to lay hands upon you. Since, then, you have all this people witnesses of this my oath, and you hold the covenant of our sacrament as a fitting pledge, let each one of you, without any hesitation, declare what he has learned; and let us, brethren, listen eagerly and in silence.’”
Chapter LXVIII.—The Rule of Faith.
“These sayings of Gamaliel did not much please Caiaphas; and holding him in suspicion, as it seemed, he began to insinuate himself cunningly into the discussions: for, smiling at what Gamaliel had said, the chief of the priests asked of James, the chief of the bishops,594 that the discourse concerning Christ should not be drawn but from the Scriptures; ‘that we may know,’ said he, ‘whether Jesus be the very Christ or no.’ Then said James, ‘We must first inquire from what Scriptures we are especially to derive our discussion.’ Then he, with difficulty, at length overcome by reason, answered, that it must be derived from the law; and afterwards he made mention also of the prophets.”

Appendix 4
1. Matthew 27:57[ The Burial of Jesus ] As evening approached, there came a rich man from Arimathea, named Joseph, who had himself become a disciple of Jesus.Matthew 27:56-58 (in Context) Matthew 27 (Whole Chapter)
2. Mark 15:43Joseph of Arimathea, a prominent member of the Council, who was himself waiting for the kingdom of God, went boldly to Pilate and asked for Jesus' body.Mark 15:42-44 (in Context) Mark 15 (Whole Chapter)
3. Luke 23:51who had not consented to their decision and action. He came from the Judean town of Arimathea and he was waiting for the kingdom of God.Luke 23:50-52 (in Context) Luke 23 (Whole Chapter)
4. John 19:38[ The Burial of Jesus ] Later, Joseph of Arimathea asked Pilate for the body of Jesus. Now Joseph was a disciple of Jesus, but secretly because he feared the Jews. With Pilate's permission, he came and took the body away.John 19:37-39 (in Context) John 19 (Whole Chapter)

Ph

otius of Constantinople
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Photius of Constantinople, chief author of the great schism between East and West, was b. at Constantinople c. 815 (Hergenröther says "not much earlier than 827", "Photius", I, 316; others, about 810); d. probably 6 Feb., 897. His father was a spatharios (lifeguard) named Sergius. Symeon Magister ("De Mich. et Theod.", Bonn ed., 1838, xxix, 668) says that his mother was an escaped nun and that he was illegitimate. He further relates that a holy bishop, Michael of Synnada, before his birth foretold that he would become patriarch, but would work so much evil that it would be better that he should not be born. His father then wanted to kill him and his mother, but the bishop said: "You cannot hinder what God has ordained. Take care for yourself." His mother also dreamed that she would give birth to a demon. When he was born the abbot of the Maximine monastery baptized him and gave him the name Photius (Enlightened), saying: "Perhaps the anger of God will be turned from him" (Symeon Magister, ibid., cf. Hergenröther, "Photius", I, 318-19). These stories need not be taken seriously. It is certain that the future patriarch belonged to one of the great families of Constantinople; the Patriarch Tarasius (784-806), in whose time the seventh general council (Second of Nicæa, 787) was held, was either elder brother or uncle of his father (Photius: Ep. ii, P. G., CII, 609). The family was conspicuously orthodox and had suffered some persecution in Iconoclast times (under Leo V, 813-20). Photius says that in his youth he had had a passing inclination for the monastic life ("Ep. ad Orient. et Oecon.", P. G., CII, 1020), but the prospect of a career in the world soon eclipsed it.
He early laid the foundations of that erudition which eventually made him one of the most famous scholars of all the Middle Ages. His natural aptitude must have been extraordinary; his industry was colossal. Photius does not appear to have had any teachers worthy of being remembered; at any rate he never alludes to his masters. Hergenröther, however, notes that there were many good scholars at Constantinople while Photius was a child and young man, and argues from his exact and systematic knowledge of all branches of learning that he could not have been entirely self-taught (op. cit., I, 322). His enemies appreciated his learning. Nicetas, the friend and biographer of his rival Ignatius, praises Photius's skill in grammar, poetry, rhetoric, philosophy, medicine, law, "and all science" ("Vita S. Ignatii" in Mansi, XVI, 229). Pope Nicholas I, in the heat of the quarrel writes to the Emperor Michael III: "Consider very carefully how Photius can stand, in spite of his great virtues and universal knowledge" (Ep. xcviii "Ad Mich.", P. G., CXIX, 1030). It is curious that so learned a man never knew Latin. While he was still a young man he made the first draft of his encyclopædic "Myrobiblion". At an early age, also, he began to teach grammar, philosophy, and theology in his own house to a steadily increasing number of students.
His public career was to be that of a statesman, coupled with a military command. His brother Sergius married Irene, the emperor's aunt. This connexion and his undoubted merit procured Photius speedy advancement. He became chief secretary of State (protosekretis) and captain of the Life Guard (protospatharios). He was unmarried. Probably about 838 he was sent on an embassy "to the Assyrians" ("Myrobiblion", preface), i. e., apparently, to the Khalifa at Bagdad. In the year 857, then, when the crisis came in his life, Photius was already one of the most prominent members of the Court of Constantinople. That crisis is the story of the Great Schism (see GREEK CHURCH). The emperor was Michael III (842-67), son of the Theodora who had finally restored the holy images. When he succeeded his father Theophilus (829-842) he was only three years old; he grew to be the wretched boy known in Byzantine history as Michael the Drunkard (ho methystes). Theodora, at first regent, retired in 856, and her brother Bardas succeeded, with the title of Cæsar. Bardas lived in incest with his daughter-in-law Eudocia, wherefore the Patriarch Ignatius (846-57) refused him Holy Communion on the Epiphany of 857. Ignatius was deposed and banished (Nov. 23, 857), and the more pliant Photius was intruded into his place. He was hurried through Holy Orders in six days; on Christmas Day, 857, Gregory Asbestas of Syracuse, himself excommunicate for insubordination by Ignatius, ordained Photius patriarch. By this act Photius committed three offences against canon law: he was ordained bishop without having kept the interstices, by an excommunicate consecrator, and to an already occupied see. To receive ordination from an excommunicate person made him too excommunicate ipso facto.
After vain attempts to make Ignatius resign his see, the emperor tried to obtain from Pope Nicholas I (858-67) recognition of Photius by a letter grossly misrepresenting the facts and asking for legates to come and decide the question in a synod. Photius also wrote, very respectfully, to the same purpose (Hergenröther, "Photius", I, 407-11). The pope sent two legates, Rodoald of Porto and Zachary of Anagni, with cautious letters. The legates were to hear both sides and report to him. A synod was held in St. Sophia's (May, 861). The legates took heavy bribes and agreed to Ignatius's deposition and Photius's succession. They returned to Rome with further letters, and the emperor sent his Secretary of State, Leo, after them with more explanations (Hergenröther, op. cit., I, 439-460). In all these letters both the emperor and Photius emphatically acknowledge the Roman primacy and categorically invoke the pope's jurisdiction to confirm what has happened. Meanwhile Ignatius, in exile at the island Terebinth, sent his friend the Archimandrite Theognostus to Rome with an urgent letter setting forth his case (Hergenröther, I, 460-461). Theognostus did not arrive till 862. Nicholas, then, having heard both sides, decided for Ignatius, and answered the letters of Michael and Photius by insisting that Ignatius must be restored, that the usurpation of his see must cease (ibid, I, 511-16, 516-19). He also wrote in the same sense to the other Eastern patriarchs (510-11). From that attitude Rome never wavered: it was the immediate cause of the schism. In 863 the pope held a synod at the Lateran in which the two legates were tried, degraded, and excommunicated. The synod repeats Nicholas's decision, that Ignatius is lawful Patriarch of Constantinople; Photius is to be excommunicate unless he retires at once from his usurped place.
But Photius had the emperor and the Court on his side. Instead of obeying the pope, to whom he had appealed, he resolved to deny his authority altogether. Ignatius was kept chained in prison, the pope's letters were not allowed to be published. The emperor sent an answer dictated by Photius saying that nothing Nicholas could do would help Ignatius, that all the Eastern Patriarchs were on Photius's side, that the excommunication of the legates must be explained and that unless the pope altered his decision, Michael would come to Rome with an army to punish him. Photius then kept his place undisturbed for four years. In 867 he carried the war into the enemy's camp by excommunicating the pope and his Latins. The reasons he gives for this, in an encyclical sent to the Eastern patriarchs, are: that Latins
fast on Saturday
do not begin Lent till Ash Wednesday (instead of three days earlier, as in the East)
do not allow priests to be married
do not allow priests to administer confirmation
have added the filioque to the creed.
Because of these errors the pope and all Latins are: "forerunners of apostasy, servants of Antichrist who deserve a thousand deaths, liars, fighters against God" (Hergenröther, I, 642-46). It is not easy to say what the Melchite patriarchs thought of the quarrel at this juncture. Afterwards, at the Eighth General Council, their legates declared that they had pronounced no sentence against Photius because that of the pope was obviously sufficient.
Then, suddenly, in the same year (Sept. 867), Photius fell. Michael III was murdered and Basil I (the Macedonian, 867-86) seized his place as emperor. Photius shared the fate of all Michael's friends. He was ejected from the patriarch's palace, and Ignatius restored. Nicholas I died (Nov. 13, 867). Adrian II (867-72), his successor, answered Ignatius's appeal for legates to attend a synod that should examine the whole matter by sending Donatus, Bishop of Ostia, Stephen, Bishop of Nepi, and a deacon, Marinus. They arrived at Constantinople in Sept., 869, and in October the synod was opened which Catholics recognize as the Eighth General Council (Fourth of Constantinople). This synod tried Photius, confirmed his deposition, and, as he refused to renounce his claim, excommunicated him. The bishops of his party received light penances (Mansi, XVI, 308-409). Photius was banished to a monastery at Stenos on the Bosphorus. Here he spent seven years, writing letters to his friends, organizing his party, and waiting for another chance. Meanwhile Ignatius reigned as patriarch. Photius, as part of his policy, professed great admiration for the emperor and sent him a fictitious pedigree showing his descent form St. Gregory the Illuminator and a forged prophecy foretelling his greatness (Mansi, XVI, 284). Basil was so pleased with this that he recalled him in 876 and appointed him tutor to his son Constantine. Photius ingratiated himself with everyone and feigned reconciliation with Ignatius. It is doubtful how far Ignatius believed in him, but Photius at this time never tires of expatiating on his close friendship with the patriarch. He became so popular that when Ignatius died (23 Oct, 877) a strong party demanded that Photius should succeed him; the emperor was now on their side, and an embassy went to Rome to explain that everyone at Constantinople wanted Photius to be patriarch. The pope (John VIII, 872-82) agreed, absolved him from all censure, and acknowledged him as patriarch.
This concession has been much discussed. It has been represented, truly enough, that Photius had shown himself unfit for such a post; John VIII's acknowledgment of him has been described as showing deplorable weakness. On the other hand, by Ignatius's death the See of Constantinople was now really vacant; the clergy had an undoubted right to elect their own patriarch; to refuse to acknowledge Photius would have provoked a fresh breach with the East, would not have prevented his occupation of the see, and would have given his party (including the emperor) just reason for a quarrel. The event proved that almost anything would have been better than to allow his succession, if it could be prevented. But the pope could not foresee that , and no doubt hoped that Photius, having reached the height of his ambition, would drop the quarrel.
In 878, then, Photius at last obtained lawfully the place he had formerly usurped. Rome acknowledged him and restored him to her communion. There was no possible reason now for a fresh quarrel. But he had identified himself so completely with that strong anti-Roman party in the East which he mainly had formed, and, doubtless, he had formed so great a hatred of Rome, that now he carried on the old quarrel with as much bitterness as ever and more influence. Nevertheless he applied to Rome for legates to come to another synod. There was no reason for the synod, but he persuaded John VIII that it would clear up the last remains of the schism and rivet more firmly the union between East and West. His real motive was, no doubt, to undo the effect of the synod that had deposed him. The pope sent three legates, Cardinal Peter of St. Chrysogonus, Paul, Bishop of Ancona, and Eugene, Bishop of Ostia. The synod was opened in St. Sophia's in November, 879. This is the "Psuedosynodus Photiana" which the Orthodox count as the Eighth General Council. Photius had it all his own way throughout. He revoked the acts of the former synod (869), repeated all his accusations against the Latins, dwelling especially on the filioque grievance, anathematized all who added anything to the Creed, and declared that Bulgaria should belong to the Byzantine Patriarchate. The fact that there was a great majority for all these measures shows how strong Photius's party had become in the East. The legates, like their predecessors in 861, agreed to everything the majority desired (Mansi, XVII, 374 sq.). As soon as they had returned to Rome, Photius sent the Acts to the pope for his confirmation. Instead John, naturally, again excommunicated him. So the schism broke out again. This time it lasted seven years, till Basil I's death in 886.
Basil was succeeded by his son Leo VI (886-912), who strongly disliked Photius. One of his first acts was to accuse him of treason, depose, and banish him (886). The story of this second deposition and banishment is obscure. The charge was that Photius had conspired to depose the emperor and put one of his own relations on the throne---an accusation which probably meant that the emperor wanted to get rid of him. As Stephen, Leo's younger brother, was made patriarch (886-93) the real explanation may be merely that Leo disliked Photius and wanted a place for his brother. Stephen's intrusion was as glaring an offence against canon law as had been that of Photius in 857; so Rome refused to recognize him. It was only under his successor Antony II (893-95) that a synod was held which restored reunion for a century and a half, till the time of Michael Cærularius (1043-58). But Photius had left a powerful anti-Roman party, eager to repudiate the pope's primacy and ready for another schism. It was this party, to which Cærularius belonged, that triumphed at Constantinople under him, so that Photius is rightly considered the author of the schism which still lasts. After this second deposition Photius suddenly disappears from history. It is not even known in what monastery he spent his last years. Among his many letters there is none that can be dated certainly as belonging to this second exile. The date of his death, not quite certain, is generally given as 6 February, 897.
That Photius was one of the greatest men of the Middle Ages, one of the most remarkable characters in all church history, will not be disputed. His fatal quarrel with Rome, though the most famous, was only one result of his many-sided activity. During the stormy years he spent on the patriarch's throne, while he was warring against the Latins, he was negotiating with the Moslem Khalifa for the protection of the Christians under Moslem rule and the care of the Holy Places, and carrying on controversies against various Eastern heretics, Armenians, Paulicians etc. His interest in letters never abated. Amid all his cares he found time to write works on dogma, Biblical criticism, canon law, homilies, an encyclopædia of all kinds of learning, and letters on all questions of the day. Had it not been for his disastrous schism, he might be counted the last, and one of the greatest, of the Greek Fathers. There is no shadow of suspicion against his private life. He bore his exiles and other troubles manfully and well. He never despaired of his cause and spent the years of adversity in building up his party, writing letters to encourage his old friends and make new ones.
And yet the other side of his character is no less evident. His insatiable ambition, his determination to obtain and keep the patriarchal see, led him to the extreme of dishonesty. His claim was worthless. That Ignatius was the rightful patriarch as long as he lived, and Photius an intruder, cannot be denied by any one who does not conceive the Church as merely the slave of a civil government. And to keep this place Photius descended to the lowest depth of deceit. At the very time he was protesting his obedience to the pope he was dictating to the emperor insolent letters that denied all papal jurisdiction. He misrepresented the story of Ignatius's deposition with unblushing lies, and he at least connived at Ignatius's ill-treatment in banishment. He proclaimed openly his entire subservience to the State in the whole question of his intrusion. He stops at nothing in his war against the Latins. He heaps up accusations against them that he must have known were lies. His effrontery on occasions is almost incredible. For instance, as one more grievance against Rome, he never tires of inveighing against the fact that Pope Marinus I (882-84), John VIII's successor, was translated from another see, instead of being ordained from the Roman clergy. He describes this as an atrocious breach of canon law, quoting against it the first and second canons of Sardica; and at the same time he himself continually transferred bishops in his patriarchate. The Orthodox, who look upon him, rightly, as the great champion of their cause against Rome, have forgiven all his offences for the sake of this championship. They have canonized him, and on 6 Feb., when they keep his feast, their office overflows with his praise. He is the "far-shining radiant star of the church", the "most inspired guide of the Orthodox", "thrice blessed speaker for God", "wise and divine glory of the hierarchy, who broke the horns of Roman pride" ("Menologion" for 6 Feb., ed. Maltzew, I, 916 sq.). The Catholic remembers this extraordinary man with mixed feelings. We do not deny his eminent qualities and yet we certainly do not remember him as a thrice blessed speaker for God. One may perhaps sum up Photius by saying that he was a great man with one blot on his character---his insatiable and unscrupulous ambition. But that blot so covers his life that it eclipses everything else and makes him deserve our final judgment as one of the worst enemies the Church of Christ ever had, and the cause of the greatest calamity that ever befell her.
WORKS
Of Photius's prolific literary production part has been lost. A great merit of what remains is that he has preserved at least fragments of earlier Greek works of which otherwise we should know nothing. This applies especially to his "Myriobiblion".
The "Myriobiblion" or "Bibliotheca" is a collection of descriptions of books he had read, with notes and sometimes copious extracts. It contains 280 such notices of books (or rather 279; no. 89 is lost) on every possible subject---theology, philosophy, rhetoric, grammar, physics, medicine. He quotes pagans and Christians, Acts of Councils, Acts of Martyrs, and so on, in no sort of order. For the works thus partially saved (otherwise unknown) see Krumbacher, "Byz. Litter.", 518-19.
The "Lexicon" (Lexeon synagoge) was compiled, probably, to a great extent by his students under his direction (Krumbacher, ibid., 521), from older Greek dictionaries (Pausanias, Harpokration, Diogenianos, Ælius Dionysius). It was intended as a practical help to readers of the Greek classics, the Septuagint, and the New testament. Only one MS. of it exists, the defective "Codex Galeanus" (formerly in the possession of Thomas Gale, now at Cambridge), written about 1200.
The "Amphilochia", dedicated to one of his favourite disciples, Amphilochius of Cyzicus, are answers to questions of Biblical, philosophical, and theological difficulties, written during his first exile (867-77). There are 324 subjects discussed, each in a regular form--question, answer, difficulties, solutions---but arranged again in no order. Photius gives mostly the views of famous Greek Fathers, Epiphanius, Cyril of Alexandria, John Damascene, especially Theodoret.
Biblical works.---Only fragments of these are extant, chiefly in Catenas. The longest are from Commentaries on St. Matthew and Romans.
Canon Law.---The classical "Nomocanon" (q. v.), the official code of the Orthodox Church, is attributed to Photius. It is, however, older than his time (see JOHN SCHOLASTICUS). It was revised and received additions (from the synods of 861 and 879) in Photius's time, probably by his orders. The "Collections and Accurate Expositions" (Eunagolai kai apodeixeis akribeis) (Hergenröther, op. cit., III, 165-70) are a series of questions and answers on points of canon law, really an indirect vindication of his own claims and position. A number of his letters bear on canonical questions.
Homilies.---Hergenröther mentions twenty-two sermons of Photius (III, 232). Of these two were printed when Hergenröther wrote (in P. G., CII, 548, sq.), one on the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin, and one at the dedication of a new church during his second patriarchate. Later, S. Aristarches published eighty-three homilies of different kinds (Constantinople, 1900).
Dogmatic and polemical works.---Many of these bear on his accusations against the Latins and so form the beginning of the long series of anti-Catholic controversy produced by Orthodox theologians. The most important is "Concerning the Theology about the Holy Ghost" (Peri tes tou hagiou pneumatos mystagonias, P. G., CII, 264-541), a defence of the Procession from God the Father alone, based chiefly on John, xv, 26. An epitome of the same work, made by a later author and contained in Euthymius Zigabenus's "Panoplia", XIII, became the favourite weapon of Orthodox controversialists for many centuries. The treatise "Against Those who say that Rome is the First See", also a very popular Orthodox weapon, is only the last part or supplement of the "Collections", often written out separately. The "Dissertation Concerning the Reappearance of the Manichæans" (Diegesis peri tes manichaion anablasteseos, P. G., CII, 9-264), in four books, is a history and refutation of the Paulicians. Much of the "Amphilochia" belongs to this heading. The little work "Against the Franks and other Latins" (Hergenröther, "Monumenta", 62-71), attributed to Photius, is not authentic. It was written after Cærularius (Hergenröther, "Photius", III, 172-224).
Letters.---Migne, P. G., CII, publishes 193 letters arranged in three books; Balettas (London, 1864) has edited a more complete collection in five parts. They cover all the chief periods of Photius's life, and are the most important source for his history.
A. Ehrhard (in Krumbacher, "Byzantinische Litteratur", 74-77) judges Photius as a distinguished preacher, but not as a theologian of the first importance. His theological work is chiefly the collection of excerpts from Greek Fathers and other sources. His erudition is vast, and probably unequalled in the Middle Ages, but he has little originality, even in his controversy against the Latins. Here, too, he only needed to collect angry things said by Byzantine theologians before his time. But his discovery of the filioque grievance seems to be original. Its success as a weapon is considerably greater than its real value deserves (Fortescue, "Orthodox Eastern Church", 372-84).
Editions.---The works of Photius known at the time were collected by Migne, P. G., CI-CV. J. Balettas, Photiou epistolai (London, 1864), contains other letters (altogether 260) not in Migne. A. Papadopulos-Kerameus, "S. Patris Photii Epistolæ XLV" (St. Petersburg, 1896) gives forty-five more, of which, however, only the first twenty-one are authentic. S. Aristaches, Photiou logoi kai homiliai 83 (Constantinople, 1900, 2 vols.), gives other homilies not in Migne. Oikonomos has edited the "Amphilochia" (Athens, 1858) in a more complete text. J. Hergenröther, "Monumenta græca ad Photium eiusque historiam pertinentia" (Ratisbon, 1869), and Papadopulos-Kerameus, "Monumenta græca et latina ad historiam Photii patriarchæ pertinentia" (St. Petersburg, 2 parts, 1899 and 1901), add further documents.

[1] With Bruce, Rackham, Ramsay, Harnak, Thornton and other I hold that Luke the companion of Paul wrote Acts of the Apostles.
[2] It has been argued by RichardAndersen that this Theophilus is the High priest of the same name mentioned by Josephus. See http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Pantheon/2454/theosub/THEOSUB.htm
[3] I personally think there is some weight to the argument that this Theophilus is the son of Caiaphas high priest in Jerusalem in about 37 AD whose daughter was Johanna and may also be mentioned in the Book of Luke.
[4] Interestingly this is the first mention of Gamaliel in history and he appears in a section of Luke whose source is not historically valuable but is a “worthless doublet” according to Kummel (1973,174). Needless to say Bruce, Rackham, Withering Spoon III do not agree.
[5] Jeremiah's trial is in Jeremiah 26. He proclaimed his word in the name Yahwah and told them to do to him as they pleased, but warned that if they killed him they would bring innocent blood on “yourselves, and on this city, and on its inhabitants; for truly Yahwah has sent me to you to sepak all these words in your hearing.” Two cases of past prophet trials were cited. The High Priest perhaps understood Peter’s charge to be having the same consequences. Jeremiah was saved by Ahikam the son of Shaphan whilst Peter and the Apostles were perhaps saved by Gamaliel.
[6] See the Catholic Encylopedia for and introduction: http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/04039b.htm
[7] Philocalia, cap 22

[8] This perhaps indicates that we are not dealing with the Ur texts but a text with later additions to the story.
[9] He is the narrator in the book and we will for simplicity’s sake call the author by that name
[10] Called Christs Decent into Hades in Henneke.
[11] See Henneke: NT Apocrypha: Gospel of Nicodemus
[12] See CK Barret Acts, ICC
[13] There is a historical problem with the cases sighted.
[14] We have no historical confirmation as to his existence but because of Luke excellent trustworthiness as a historian we need to exercise caution in assuming he made an error here.
[15] Harvey Falks, Jesus the Pharisee is an orthodox Jewish Rabbis view on Jesus as an Hillelite Pharisee which would clear place him next to Gamaliel.

Hillel II and his Joseph : Christians?

2005-12-29T09:27:00.000-08:00

The Conversion of Hillel II and the Apostle Joseph in light of Lofland and Sonovd
Lofland and Sonovd (LS) analyze conversion "motifs" into six categories: Intellectual, Mystical, Experimental, Affectional, Revivalist and Coercive. Each motif is viewed in five dimensions being the degree of social pressure involved, temporal duration, the level of affective arousal, affective content and the belief participation sequence. We will use this model to discuss Epiphanius’s description of the conversion of Hillel II and his assistant Joseph.
Epiphanius starts by relating the tradition that the Gospel of John and the Acts were translated into Hebrew and stored in secret in the city of Tiberias the seat of the Jewish patriarch. One person who related this tradition to Epiphanius was one called Joseph the Apostle who lived in the time of Constantine the Elder. The Apostle Joseph was "given the rank of count by that emperor and received the authority to build a Church to Christ in Tiberias, in Diocaeserea, in Capernaum". Joseph relates to Epiphanius the story of his and Hillel II’s (Hillel) conversion.
When Hillel was dying he asked for the one who was then bishop of the neighbouring city of Tiberias and obtained from him the holy bath as he was leaving this life. He pretended that it was a medical matter. He sent for him through the aforesaid Joseph as being a physician, caused everyone to go outside, and besought the bishop, "Grant me the seal in Christ". So he summoned the servants and directed them to prepare water, as though on account of the sickness he was going to use the water to offer some assisstance to the patriarch, who was gravely ill. They did as they were directed they did not realise what was happening. The patriarch alledged the need for privacy and was granted baptism and the holy mysteries. Epiphanius (p96)
We see then that in the case of Hillel the sequence of his conversion meant he believed prior to participating in the first act of a believer, that of baptism (although he had clearly read parts of the New Testament, it is not emphasised). In looking at our conversion motifs only the Intellectual or Mystical motifs have this sequence. We do not have many details regarding his conversion, but it is clear that Coercive, Revivalist and Experimental can be ruled out not only on this criteria but on various others as well. No information is given regarding Hillel’s relationship with the bishop but perhaps the fact that he called this bishop and could feign medical reasons points to some prior relationship with the bishop. But in light of the fact that Hillel’s assistants had no idea what was going on, and the sequence of conversion, we may rule out an Affectional motif conversion. This leaves only Intellectual and Mystical motifs. There is no evidence in the narrative to indicate any vision or spiritual experience of any kind, so the class of motif suitable for Hillel would appear to be Intellectual and not Mystical. And indeed it appears to fit the circumstances well.
Hillel had time to read the translated scriptures of John’s Gospel and Acts which the Apostle Joseph mentions to Epiphanius. He would read them privately due to the high degree of what might be called negative social pressure through his position. It is clear that the social pressure on the patriarch of the Jewish community to convert would be minimal. However the fact that he initiated the baptismal process himself indicates there was indeed some level of affective arousal, and inner illumination this could explain how one so protected by Jewish social forces and by those opposed to the message of the gospel could conclude that he desired baptism.
Hillel did not just receive baptism but also “the holy mysteries” which would in all probability refer to the mysteries of the body and blood of Christ in the Eucharist. He then participated over the next few days in teaching sessions or Christian fellowship with the bishop. He gave an offering, which is the traditional procedure in the Orthodox Church just before receiving the Eucharist, and shared a New Testament scripture with the bishop “ … it is written that through the priests of God things are bound and loosed on earth, and (that) these things will be loosed and bound in heaven”, as Christians are wont to do. He finally confirmed to those near him at his death, that the treatment by the medicine of the bishop meant all was well (reminding us of the well known hymn “It is well with my soul”).
Thus from the little data we have Hillel would seem to fit perfectly into the Intellectual conversion motif, and the model seems to explain this conversion quite well.

The Conversion of Apostle Joseph
The rites for the conversion of Hillel had an impact on Joseph the Apostle. He was troubled by the rites which he had spied out secretly. And these troubling thoughts after an extended period of time culminate in Joseph’s conversion in a way distinct from that Hillel. After Hillel passed on Joseph opened a secret repository and found Matthew’s Gospel and Hebrew translations of the Gospels of John and Acts. This find added vexation to his troubled mind. He then began to read the gospels and later noticed the power of Christ’s seal over sorcery and to have visions of Jesus Christ. Jesus told him “I am Jesus whom your ancestors crucified; but believe in me” (Epih 99). He did not obey the dream and fell ill. His health situation became critical and it appears he then had a near death experience where Jesus appeared to him and told him that he would heal him if he believed him. Joseph promised he would and recovered, however went back to unbelief again on recovery. He fell ill again. This time Jesus did not appear to him but it appears a secret believer from among the elders of the Jewish community came and shared the gospel with him whispering “Believe Jesus who was crucified in the time of Pontius Pilate, who preexisted as Son of God, and later was born of Mary, who is God’s Messiah and rose from the dead and who will come to judge the living and the dead” (Epiph 99). No doubt this message secretly given by an elder of his people would have surprised him and perhaps released him from some of the negative social pressure against conversion. It is clear from these events that Joseph had ample opportunity to hear the gospel. However despite all these things he still hesitated and did not believe.
After this he received another vision and experience where Jesus appeared to him and healed him, saying “See I heal you: get up and believe” (Epiph 99). He recovered but still persisted in unbelief. Finally Jesus gave his last appearance where he chided Joseph for his unbelief and promised a sign “So that you may be fully convinced, if you wish any sign from God to be worked in my name, call upon me and I will do it.”(Epiph 99). Joseph decided to test this last vision, he was clearly partially convinced because Jesus promised the sign so that he would be fully convinced. He decided on exorcism. He had two obstacles working against him, doubt and shame. To try to deliver the man publicly would be embarrassing. He took a madman indoors, took water, did the sign of the cross on it and sprinkled the madman, saying “In the name of Jesus the Nazorean who was crucified, come out of him demon, and may he be healed” (Epiph 99). The man was delivered , as a result Joseph got a reputation, but he still did not convert or make a commitment. After this Joseph had a change of job and was granted the revenue of the apostleship. He moved to Cilicia and made friends with the local bishop. From this man he requested a copy of the gospels and began reading them secretly. Whilst he was reading them some of the Jews who were not pleased with his activities as apostle burst in on him and caught him reading the gospel. He was then duly punished. Clearly his reputation as one of the close assistants of Hillel and as a respected authority in the Jewish community was now compromised. This would have lessened the negative social pressure which would have worked against conversion. It was the bishop who took him in hand after he was beaten by the Jewish community. He was then later thrown into the river Cydnus by his Jewish brethren and left for dead. He was effectively buried by his Jewish brethren and thus all negative social pressure was gone, to them he was clearly no longer a part of them. The fact of this persecution would have given him an honored status in the Christian community as a martyr. He was then granted the holy bath, having been saved.
Clearly this was not a conversion of the same motif as Hillel. If we look at it in terms of our model we find that he had begun to participate in elements of the Christians faith before he was converted (not the least of which would be the suffering for the name of Christ). This participation also included discourse with the bishop and reading the holy scriptures. The temporal duration until conversion is apparently quite long and so we have two main motifs of LS which appear to fit his case, Experimental and Affectional. The Intellectual motif can, perhaps, also be considered but he had too much contact with the Christian community, through the bishop, to be converted under the Intellectual motif. Clearly the social pressure towards conversion was very low if we look at the whole conversion period, and the evidence does not point to very much affective arousal, although he did have contact with an unnamed bishop ahead of conversion. Despite the fact that there were mystical elements in his conversion experience with the repeated visions of Jesus, it was not these which appear to be the key factor in his conversion. Indeed the way he treated the last and perhaps most challenging of these visions, was to test it. This along with the continual consultation of the scriptures in secret suggests perhaps that he was testing the waters to see the truth of the faith. (I say this word truth deliberately knowing it may be controversial in the light of modern day research into conversion, but it is clear from the evidence that Joseph was testing something and that seems to be the truth as to whether Jesus was Messiah or not.) In all the experiences he went through there is no indication of much affective arousal, but curiosity as to the message of the gospel seems to have driven him until the end. Perhaps the final decision was taken out of his hands by the persecution he suffered at the hands of his brethren. He was effectively buried by the Jewish community before he was granted baptism by the Christian community. My evaluation then is that the best category for Josephs conversion among the conversion motifs of LS is that of the Experimental motif. And it appears to fit Joseph’s conversion as well as the Intellectual motif fitted Hillel’s.

Bibliography:
Lofland, John and Skonovd, Norman. “Conversion Motif.” Journal For the Scientific Study of Religion, 1981, 20 (4) 373-385
Epiphanius, The Panarion of St Epiphanius, Bishop of Salamis, (trans: Amidon, Philip, S.J.) (New York: OUP 1990)

Jesus the Magician a partial answer

2005-12-21T11:32:00.001-08:00

Book Report on Jesus the Magician 21 12 05 Tony Hylton UHL
Introduction
Jesus the Magician by Morton Smith is his attempt to produce a portrait of Jesus based on the traditions among Jesus’ detractors who opposed or did not follow him. He asserts “Jesus the Son of God” is pictured in the gospels; the works that pictured “Jesus the magician” were destroyed in antiquity after Christians got control of the Roman Empire” (Smith 1978, ix). For Smith these two pictures are initially contradictory[1] and apparently both “legends”. It is apparent on reading the book that the only outsiders Smith really wants to listen are those he can interprets as accusing Jesus and the disciples of being magicians. Although Smith includes a lot of sources in his work and is runs counter to the present liberal consensus against the miracles of Jesus. It is clear that his only intention (in establishing the facts of the gospels that he affirms) is to confirm his thesis that Jesus was a magician and not something else but you don’t really get the feeling that for Smith there was a possible alternative for Jesus.
The book contains some very good information for understanding some aspects of the New Testament and the ministry of Jesus and of parallel ministries but in terms of objectivity, it lacks greatly.

Development: Knowledge
Smith believes we need to listen more to Jesus opposition to counter what he calls a bias in the research on Jesus up until 1978. Through researching into what outsiders had to say Smith intends to address this imbalance and to give us “Jesus the Magician”. As he says himself
This book is an attempt to correct the bias by reconstructing the lost picture from preserved fragments and related materials, mainly from magical papyri, that New Testament scholarship has generally ignored (Smith 1978, vii).
Although Smith says we are to listen to the outsider it is clear from reading the book that the outsiders we are to listen to carefully are those Smith perceives as calling Jesus a Magician. As you read it becomes clear that the exercise Smith is about is one of labeling Jesus as a magician.
Outline and Argument
Smith’s book is 222 pages plus contents and preface of 9 pages, and was published in 1978 by Harper and Row Publishers. The book consists of a preface, 8 chapters and two appendixes, notes follow but are not always referenced in the main text. The notes are organized according to page numbers and the issue they refer to are not numbered but capitalized titles. The sections of the book are as follows:
The Book has the following chapters:
1 Suppressed Evidence and Perennial Problems 1
2 The Historical Framework 8
3 What Outsiders said- Evidence of the Gospels 21
4 What Outsiders Said – Evidence Outside the Gospels 45
5 What Outsiders Meant 68
6 The Marks of a Magician 81
7 The Evidence of Magical practices 94
8 What the Evidence Shows 140
The book proceeds in chapter one with the thesis that the evidence of outsiders point to a perspective of Jesus as a Magician. However much of this evidence has been suppressed. This establishes the problem. The next two chapters investigate and extract the outsider views of Jesus. Smith then reviews the meaning of magician in late antiquity using the two terms goes and magos. The review is selective. At the end of this chapter and life of Jesus is given according to this mish mash of outsider views. Smith then moves on to a comparison with Apollonius of Tyana whose life parallels that of Jesus. He then moves on to parallels between the Gospel evidence and Magical Papyri. He shows some apparently striking parallels. He finally come to the conclusion that out of three options from the period, that of Jesus Christ, Son of God (gospel), Jesus the Magician (opponents), Jesus the God (the primitive Church).
He concludes that Jesus the Magician is the most realistic portrayal. This is not necessarily historical. Magician is a social type and is an alternative to Divine man.
Conclusion
For me it was interesting reading but methodologically unacceptable, too much anachronistic use of data and too much eisegesis by Smith. He made the evidence say what he wanted it to say and was selectively critical of data.

Smith was born on May 28th 1915 in Philadelphia Pensylvania. He completed his Ph. D in Hebrew University from 1940-44 in classical philology under Professor Schwabe. His subject was Tannaitic Parallels to the Gospels. He then went to Harvard and trained under A. D. Nock, Werner Jaeger and later Robert Pfeifer.It lead to a thesis on Judaism in Palestine before the Maccabean revolt Palestinian Parties and Politics that shaped the Old testament.
. he He started teaching in Brown University From 1950 to 1955 and moved to Drew froim 1956to 1957 and finally to Columbia University in 1957.
In 1958 Smith claims to have found a fragment of a letter from Clement of Alexandria in the library of Mar Saba. He published a facsimilie in 1973. It was the mention of a secret gospel of Mark. He wrote the book Clement of Alexandria and the Secret Gospel of Mark (Camb Mass: Harvard 1973). No Western Scholar was allowed access to the fragment. Many think this fragment was a forgery. When he wrote the Jesus the Magician he was Professor of History at Columbia University. The book was some what critiqued by James Robinson and H. D Betz. He completed the revision of the work at the University of Tubingen being hosted by Martin Hengel. He finished in August 1977. Smith dies in 1991.

1 Suppressed Evidence and Perennial Problems
Smith claims he is looking for the Jesus of the average Galilean, or Jesus of Jesus opponents.
A. Two sides to an argument (Evidence has been suppressed)
B. In the case of Jesus we particularly want to hear other sides
C. If the historical Jesus be defined as the common cause and starting point of the movements that
took their rise from him, then the more movements we can see the more lines we can trace
back, the more accurate the result
2 The Historical Framework
A.No interpretation will show us the man as he saw himself. All are outside views.
B. Matter on which the gospels agree we have no reason to question there reprots (p8)
C. No reason to question the unanimous report that Jesus attracted attention as a miracle worker
D. Cures performed by Jesus made him famous.
E. Because of the NT social and medical background of the Near East, Jesus won followers
through miracles.
i. Mark’s witness 10
ii. Q’s Witness 11
iii. Matthews witness 12
iv. Luke’s Witness 13
v. John’s Witness 14
F. Whatever their individual historicity , they prove that Jesus was remembered as a miracle worker in the earliest Palestinian Churches, through combined effect.
G. One piece of evidence against Jesus being a miracle worker. The group of texts where Jesus
refused to do one. But this shows he did them and he might be challenged to do them.
a. Mark and Q indicates Jesus himself was why he was rejected: prophet without honor
b. Paul indicates it was the cross why he was rejected. For his case Mark is earlier.
H. The whole Jesus tradition can be understood from the fact that Jesus was a miracle worker.
a. if his actions are beneficial he is considered holy, following the holy power.
b. If the followers begin to think him Messiah, and they grow fast and civil authorities feel threatened, he is in trouble.
I The miracles can not be understood from the purely didactic tradition.
Pharisees: Teachers of the law were not made over to be miracle workers
Apocalypticists: These were not made into miracle workers
Mircle workers: Could easily be made into a prophet or teacher of the Law.
J. From all this evidence it seems Jesus attracted attention and followers as a miracle worker.
a. exorcist
b. healer
H. Why crucified? He was popular through Miracles (John 11:47)
I. Resurrection, Teaching, Messiah belief “evidence of the gospels is always suspect and often self contradictory’.
J. We look for Jesus social identity. Among the social types:demoniacs,divine men,prophets, magicians.
With connotations: messiahs, prophets, deceivers, brigands, charlatans.
Gamaliel’s speech
K. Gamaliel’s speech is “Christians propaganda”
L. In propaganda Jesus social type is of Theudas and Judas, a teacher and pretended miracle worker
M Luke shows how Christians thought intelligent unbeliever should see Jesus social type.
What did those who were not followers have to say on Jesus social type?
3 What the Outsiders Said- Evidence in the Gospels
Here Smith argues that the gospels were produced “to answer the attacks on the Church circulated by opponents of the Church”…Some of the opposition they report is “wholly imaginary (that of demons), more is put into the mouths of groups that had little or nothing to do with Jesus (Herodians or Pharisees)”
Common opinion
Family and Towns People
Herodians and Pharisees
High Priests
We may reasonably suppose that the outsider pictures of Jesus discernible in the gospels is mainly that of the scribes and the high priests of Jerusalem.
The images of Jesus are for Smith as follows:
Rabbi (disciples and some outsiders)
Teacher
He did some preaching (no evidence he was accepted as legal authority by disciples only)
His legal teaching didn’t arouse any popular opposition
Negative Outside Opinions
He had libertine practices (eating with sinners, neglect of fasts, sabbaths, purity rules) gave trouble with scribes
He had dubious parentage
He had a lack of formal education
He had a humble trade
He faced rejection from his townspeople and family
He was unable to perform any miracles in his home town
He was accused of being insane by his family
He was possessed
He had a demon
His miracles were done by magic
He was a Samaritan.
He raise JB from the dead
He had JB living in him.
He controlled demons through JB.
He cast out demons by Beelzebul.

Positive Outside Opinions
He was a prophet (He reportedly refused to claim – that he was a prophet sent by “the Lord”(Yahweh) or
that what he said was “the word of the Lord”.
He was Eliyahu (most often)

Pagans and those whom he delivered thought:
He was a god
He was a son of a god
He was the Messiah
He was the Son of Man

4 What the Outsiders Said- Evidence Outside the Gospels
Up until this point Jesus is nowhere accused of being a goes or practicing goetes or of being a magus and of practicing mageia. Here Smith first witness is Josephus:
a. Josephus is cited as first as saying “Jesus the so called Christ” 20:200
Clearly this is Smith’s first outsider testimony from outside the New Testament and it doesn’t say goes or magus but Christos. It is also the testimony of a Jew in Palestine.
b. The second testimony of Josephus says:
At that time ( ) there lived Jesus, a man (), if be proper to call him a man. For he was a doer of miracles, a teacher of men who receive with pleasure. And he led () many Jews and many of the Greeks () this was the Christ. And when, on accusation by our leading me, Pilate condemned him to the cross, those who formerly loved () did not cease (to do so) , for () he appeared to them on the their day , again alive, while () prophets kept saying these and ten thousand other incredible things about him. And to the present () the tribe of Christians, named after him, has not disappeared’ (p46) Joseph 18: 63

This citation is typical of the way Smith treats his evidence. He rewrites the evidence in some cases. As we can see in this case by turning to what he puts in the brackets. He doesn’t look at other textual sources so much as rewrite the text to fit his presuppositions
In this first example of a treatment of an outside source he changes the text as follows:
Text Smith’s Imagination
Sophos (wise) Sophist
T’alethe (truth) t’asebe impiety
- who said that
- they asserted that
theion propheton pseudopropheton

He refers to these changes in his notes at the back of the book. We notice that even though he made all these changes, this first and earliest external evidence mentions neither goes or magos.
But Smith notes that after making the changes he got what he was looking for “Messiah and miracle worker, with a claim to be more than man- the combination is just what we should have expected” (p46)
It makes us wonder who is “we”?
c. Rabbinic Stories: Rabbi Eliezer
T Hullin, II 24, (4th century)
B. Abodah zarah 16b- 17a (6th or 7th century)
Midrash Qobelet Rabba I.8.3
Here the discussion is about Ben Stada who is not Jesus. Mary the hairdresser, may Magdalen gets a mention. Stada brought spells from Egypt in his flesh and was arrested and executed in Lud.
Smith goes on to read Matthews story as a response to this accusation against Ben Stada.
Smith admits a number of things in attempting to use this evidence, two show the weakness of it for his case: “in the case of Jesus particularly, this practice of concealed reference has been carried to the extreme by manuscript copyists to avoid censorship”. (He also notes Rabbis are ignorant of chronology and guilty of absurd anachronisms as well as referring to their enemies with abusive nicknames and puns).
Thus he concludes “It is often difficult to tell to whom passages on Ben Stada refer.

Although in this second set of outsider opinion magic has not been mentioned regarding Jesus Smith can say
“The charge of practicing magic is now familiar” (p48)
“The accusation that he had been in Egypt and learned magic there, though it now appears for the first time” was the reason for Matthews story.
Eliezer’s discussion (on Ben Stada) and Matthew are contemporary.
He concludes no doubt feeling he has proved nothing “Where ever Jesus learned his magic, his fame as a healer lived on”. (p48)
So for Smith the fact that Jesus healed made him a magician. In Smith mind definition of magician in late antiquity is irrelevant he assumes Jesus is a magician because he healed people.
d. Roman Commentators on the Church Movement:
Suetonius on riots of Crestus in Life of Claudius 25:4, and “Penalties were imposed on the Christians, a kind of men holding a new superstition of magic” other translation “anew and maleficient superstition” Life of Nero 16:2 dated 122
Tacitus written 115 from Annals XV.469 p51

d. Justin Martyr and the Counter Gospel
Dialogue with Trypho 137:2 p54-55
Pliny to Trajan Letters X. 96

e. Lucian (120-185)p56-57
f. Celsus and Origen
Against Celsus (247 AD) p 59
g. Tertullian 200AD p61
h. Gems and Images p62-3
i. Older Magical Papyri contain Jesus in them see p63 for illustration.
Summary this evidence contains memory of his “miracles, inference of his magic” p64

5 What the Outsiders Meant
Here Smith finally gives a selective number of definition of magicians
He gives two definitions of Magician from the period. The one from Roman Law from the Jurist Paulus (200's AD) "Any who perform, or procure the performance of, impious or noturnal sacrifices, to enchant , curse or bind anyone with a spell, are either crucified or thrown to the beasts. Any who sacrifice a man, or make offerings of his blood, or pollute a shrine or temple are thrown to the beasts or, if people of position, are beheaded .It is the prevailing legal opinion that participants in the magical art should be subject to the extreme punishment, that is either thrown to the beasts or crucified: but magicians themselves should be burnt alive. It is not permitted for anyone to have in his possession books of magic art.If they are found in his possession, when his property has been expropriated and the books burned publicly, he is to be deported to an island, or if he is of the lower class, beheaded. Not only the practice of the art, but even the knowledge of it is prohibited." This law is said to have been in effect from 81 or 82 BC.[2]
Smith also cites Paulus on prophets and astrologers. (p 77)

6 The Marks of a Magician
7 The Evidence of Magical Practices
This is really the central part of Smith thesis and here he consulat many of the Magical Papyri and seeks to draw parallels to the gospels. These include:
PGM
IV 1930-2005
I:54ff
VIII:2ff
XIII 78fff
IV 475-830
IV 154-221
LXI. 10ff
IV 320
I 312
VII 559ff
IV 146
III 541
III 263
III 327
V 231ff
XIII 277
XIX b
V 136
I 117
Hippolytus Ref VI
DMP XXI 10ff
And other sources such as Book of Secrets I.I
Against Celsus II:9-12
Lucian Philopseudes 26ff
Lucan Pharsalia VI 624-830
B. Sanh 106a
Book of Secrets I.i

The Baptism of Jesus, the Eucahrist and the Lord's prayer are all considered to have magical elements and to have parallels in magical practices.
The evidence Smith puts forward as evidence of magical practices is most interesting. They include such examples as the following:
Having sanctified yourself in advance and abstainedf from meat(?) and from all impurity, on any night you wish, wearing pure garments , go up on a high roof. Say the first (prayer of) union when the sunlight is fading…having a black Isaic band over your eyes…When the sun rises, greet it…reciting this (hereafter specified) holy spell, burning uncut frankincense…While you are reciting the spell, the following sign will occur: A hawk flying down will stop (in the air) in from of you and, striking his wings together in the middle (in front of his body), will drop a long stoneand at one fly back, going up into heaven. You take up that stone and having cut …engraved and pierced it…wear it around your neck. Then at evening, going up to your roof again and stading facing the light of the (sun) god, sing the hymn (specified) sacrificing myrrh (etc) …And you will soon have a sign, as follows:A fiery star, coming down , will stand in the middle of the roofand…you will perceive the angel whom you besought, sent to you, and you will promptly learn the counsels of the gods." (p98)
8 What the Evidence Shows
Appendix A The Pharisees in the Gospels
Appendix B Jesus vs. the Prophets

The Preface contains some very important information for the reader. The books search is avowedly interested, not in the historical Jesus but in “reconstructing the lost picture of Jesus from preserved fragments”. Smith mains sources are the magical papyri and he notes in the preface that “the major magical papyri are manuscripts dating from the third century A.D. , and later”. Thus it is important to be aware of their late date but also that some of those manuscripts, he notes “refer to Jesus” thus indicating for some scholars that they were Christian in origin and so there use in that case would be quite anachronistic. Smith does not see a problem in either their late date or the occasional reference to Jesus, arguing that Titus and Acts cites pagan poets and there works can not be assumed pagan. Another important source for Smith case is Philostratus Life of Appollonius. He notes that this is a “third century composition” and it has been argued that it was modeled on the gospels (he does not give us a source) but he notes his belief that Petzke, Traditionen has “refuted” the idea.

1 Suppressed Evidence and Perennial Problems
Smith lays out his pretext that there are always two sides to an argument. If we really want to know what happened in the life of Jesus, we need not just the gospel because they give the favorable side but the opponents ideas are as important for Smith. However he accuses the Church of destroying most of the evidence. Nevertheless he has found enough to reconstruct an image of Jesus in the eyes of his opponents. “A picture of Jesus” notes Smith, based only on the gospels, has about “as much historical value as a portrait of Charles de Gaulle or Mao Tse Tung drawn exclusively from Gaullist or Maoist publications. We must try to hear the other side to” (p 7). He sees NT scholarship oversight on the area of the opponents to be “amazing” and one that needs addressing.
2 Historical Framework

Smith accept the basic historicity of the gospels. Believing the basic facts on which they agree to leave little room for doubt. See page 9 “He was born in Palestine..grew up in Galilee, was baptised by John the baptist, formed a band of his own followers, and went about with them mainly in Galilee, but at least once visited Jerusalem and there was arrested and crucified- on these matters the gospels agree; we have no reason to question there reports”
“Nor is there any reason to question their unanimous report that Jesus attracted attention as a miracle worker”
Smith challenges the Liberal Exegetes of the scripture citing modern day examples of miracle reports (p 10) and notes that the Gospel represents Jesus as gaining popularity as a miracle worker because he did so:
“These facts have been rejected as unedifying by liberal exegesis; we must look at the evidence” (p 10) He reviews the evidence for miracles in Mark, Q, Matthew, Luke and John. He sums up “all major strands of gospel material present Jesus as a miracle worker who attracted followers by his miracles2 (p14)

[1] However he later goes on to argue that Jesus was called son of God because he was doing magical acts.
[2] Paulus Sententiae receptae Paulo tributae XXIII:15-18 in Baviera, FIRA

Jesus the Magician a partial answer

2005-12-21T11:32:00.000-08:00

Bless us in Israel and Yahuwah will Bless you

2005-11-17T12:02:00.000-08:00

Dear Brothers and Sisters

I'm sorry this is not personalI'm very busy in this day an hour of the Lord's blessingYahuwah be with you
I'm so pleased you have a burden for the Islamic world.
We need to be praying for this "world outside the ark.In the days of Noah most of the people were outside the ark and a few were inside.
Just the other day an ex muslim taxi driver puton a Christian worship tape and told me Jesus was everything to himHe worships every friday in a neighbouring village called bir naballahHe asked me if I could find an English edition of the tape.
The song he played was I worship you almighty GodThere is none like you.The Muslims are along with their Secular that group of peoplewho refuse the present day ark of the baptsim of Jesus.He saves us have died and risen again.Yahuwah has opened up a door for me to minister over the next four weeks in Mount Zion FellowhipJerusale, so please pray for the wisdom of Yahuwah forthe path I should take.
Please pray for our provision. Our rent was due 2 days ago and we are trusting Yahuwah for the provision.
This month I have placed hundreds of tracts in Jewish post boxes please pray they will find good soil to grow in.
The Grace of Jesus be with your spirits
Edi

Time to Gather in the Fruits! Succot!

2005-10-27T04:44:00.000-07:00

This week is the week of ingathering. I have decided to gather in the fruit of all the papers which I started writing over the last two or three years. That is the outstanding ones. May the Lord Yahuwah whose name my son has begun to use grant favour to me in this work
Edi

Palestinian militant turned peacemaker

2005-09-27T05:46:00.000-07:00

By Raffi Berg BBC News Online
Walid Shoebat vividly remembers the tumultuous days of June, 1967, when Israel and its Arab neighbours were at war.
For six days and six nights, Walid and his family hid in the bathroom of their home in Jericho, as fighting raged outside.
"On the sixth day, everything went quiet," Walid told BBC News Online. "My father was listening to Arab radio and the news said: 'We cleansed Jerusalem of the Jews'. Then we opened the door and there was this Israeli tank with the Star of David flag standing in our street!"
Less than a week after the war began, Jordan had been repelled from the West Bank, Israel had taken over and the map of the modern Middle East had been redrawn.
A humiliating defeat for the Arabs, the Israeli victory spawned a new generation of young nationalists determined to restore lost pride, vanquish the enemy and establish a Palestinian state.
"From kindergarten we were taught that Jews were dogs," said Walid. "We were taught that Jews were the converts of monkeys, that Jews were Sabbath breakers and prophet killers. We even considered Arabs in pre-1967 Israel traitors because we could not understand how they could co-exist with Jews."
'To die as a martyr'
As a teenager in the mid-1970s, Walid joined the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) and became a local activist - printing fliers, organising demonstrations and confronting Israeli troops.
I started thinking, really the Jews didn't do us any harm Walid Shoebat
"My whole dream was to die as a shaheed [martyr]. At demonstrations I would open my shirt hoping to be shot - but the Israelis would never shoot at the body, so I never succeeded," he said.
One day, in the middle of a riot, Walid was part of a group which snatched an Israeli soldier who was trying to quell the violence.
They beat him senseless and tried to lynch him, before he was rescued by troops and the group fled.
"We ran to a monastery where the nuns protected us - even they hated the Jews!"
Walid was eventually caught and imprisoned in the Muscovite Prison in Jerusalem, but was released after a few weeks.
He returned to violence straight away, bombing an Israeli bank in Bethlehem.
'How do you explain this?'
The course of Walid's life took a turn when his parents sent him to the United States to get a better education.
Walid enrolled in Loop College in Chicago, where he became president of the Palestinian Students' Association, raising funds for the PLO and recruiting volunteers to fight in Lebanon.
He eventually moved to California, where he met his current wife, a Catholic from Mexico.
"I wanted her to convert to Islam," he said. "I told her Jews had corrupted the Bible and she asked me to show her some examples of this corruption. At this point I had to go and buy a Bible and I started reading it and I saw the word 'Israel' all over it. I had to be brutally honest - the very word I hated the most was throughout this book!
"I thought: 'How do you explain this?' Then I started thinking, really the Jews didn't do us any harm but we hated them and accused them of all this horrible stuff. I began to think more openly."
In the mid-1990s, Walid went to a family reunion in southern California where a row broke out after he defended the biblical matriarch Rachel, whom his uncle had called a "Jewish whore".
" 'You deserve to be spat at'," my uncle said, "and they threw me out the house".
"I realised they knew nothing about history, all they knew was the same propaganda that I had been taught."
Speaking out
Walid's convictions led him to renounce violence and convert to Christianity but it was at a price: his family disowned him and his own brother threatened to kill him for abandoning Islam.
I hope that by speaking the truth I will open other people's eyes Walid Shoebat
His disappointment with his own family's ideology and remorse at the folly of his youth strengthened Walid's resolve to speak out against militancy as a way of solving the Palestinian problem.
"Yes, there is personal risk to myself. If I went back to my village of Beit Sahour I would live five minutes, I can guarantee it. But I hope that by speaking the truth I will open other people's eyes."
"I chose to speak out because I was a victim, as a child I was a victim of this horror. Now I see other victims, millions of them, kids.
"I was taught songs about killing Jews. You need to get rid of the education system where they are teaching this type of thing and get rid of the terrorist groups. It will take a generation, but until then, there's not going to be peace, it doesn't matter what kind of land settlement you have."
A militant-turned-peacemaker, Walid wants to meet the Israel soldier he tried to kill almost 30 years ago.
His voice cracking with emotion, Walid said he would offer the soldier his hand and say to him: "'Please understand, we were just children, brainwashed to kill you, to hate you.' I would seek his forgiveness."
Story from BBC NEWS:http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/1/hi/world/middle_east/3430077.stm

The Wicked Rabbis of Arad and Yad lachim

2005-09-22T06:10:00.000-07:00

Dear Friends
Yahuwah be with you,

Israel today is interesting
Since March 2004 a group of "men in black" called Gur Chasidim (Haredim Orthodox Jews like Muslim terrorists ) have been persecuting and I mean persecuting a group of believersin Arad south Israel. These guys hate Jesus and the Church, perhaps more than Saul of Tarsus did, if that is possible!.
I place four Rabbi's at the top of the Anti christ club in Israelat the moment. These guys are so anti Christ, they are even irritating the secular police force. They will do almost anything,to get at Jesus and the Church. This means they qualify for theRomans condition. They break the Torah to defend what they think is the torah. They and their discples are seriously decieved.The disciples think the same 20-30 Messianic believers are trying to kidnap and baptise 400 Jewish children. These anti Christ Rabbis, are part of the hosts of wickedness are namedRabbi Dov Lipshitz (this man is evil personified, I am sure his wicked acts are known through out heaven and earth). He is the chairman of Yad lachim a group of the wicked , who burn bibles and attack believers on every front and behind!Rabbi Bentsion LipskerRabbi Yosef AlboRabbi Mordechai Volkovich.These last three sanction spitting, cursing, hating, burning bibles, hitting believers,abusing children in ways you can not imagine.Pray for these guys. I am sure their names have been blotted out of thebook of life, if ever they were in there.Bind the evil spirits which possess and control them,we have authority.
Life is good in Israel in Jerusalem. Yahuwah is good so life is good.My wife and child are doing well and evangelsim is going full spped ahead. Please pray for us.
If you want to see some prayer letters go toyeshuaisyahuwah.blogspot.com
I hope you are wellplease write me Edi

If Yeshua the Nazarene is the Messiah

2005-08-27T18:23:00.000-07:00

We are grateful Oh Lord.

We are grateful oh Lord for your goodness and your mercy
We look to you Oh Yahwah , for life and light and love.
Knowing that all you give us is good and just an true.
You oh Yahwah are all we need , all we need.
You are so great and wondrous, in your good things, toward us.
Bless your Holy Name.
Righteous King who cared for us in our time of need,
When you saw us fatherless and helpless
you became our father and our helper.
When you saw us in destitution,
you moved your sovereign right hand and strengthened us.

Oh Beloved, How I have loved you.
I have seen in you my family of the future.
Children and childrens children,
I have seen in you even to perpetual generations.
The generation of the upright, I have seen in you.
I have seen in you my glory reflected back to me.
This is why I love you.
For is not my glory the best thing for all things?
When my glory, which is life, enlivens it enlivens forever.
For I am life and my glory (glory) is life shed abroad.
My Children, Be My Children.
My Children, Be My Light.
My Children, my hope givers, Be.
That those around you will see in you light.
Will see in you my glory shed abroad.
For indeed I have spoken concerning you,
that you will be conformed to the image of My Son.
In his heart is justice,
My justice is in your heart too, by my Spirit.
In My Son’s heart is righteousness,
And in your heart also is righteousness through my Spirit.
My Son is full of loving kindness through My Spirit.
In you also is loving kindness through My Spirit.
What then do you need to do to allow My Spirit to flow through you?
What do you need to do to allow my Spirit to spread my justice,
Righteousness, faithfulness and loving kindness to the world around you?
What do you need to do?
Children, What did Adam do to be given the garden of God?
What did Adam do to be given Eve?
I tell you my children
He was who I created him to be.
He was my child.
He trusted me, he tended the garden.
Pruning the vine, tending the figs, caring for the Olive tree.
He was who I created him to be.
My children, you who are born of My Spirit,
You in whom I have shed abroad my love in your hearts,
Be in the Spirit.
Pray in the Spirit.
Sing in the Spirit.
Speak in the Spirit.
Love in the Spirit.
Be to my sheep those who bring a word that sustains the weary.
Pray in the Spirit for my Covenant of Peace to be established.
Pray that I might gather my sheep from the ends of the earth.
Pray that I might deliver my sheep from the hands of them
who are killing the sheep and eating their flesh
through evil speech against my Prince Beloved.
Who are eating their flesh by speaking evil things over this nation,
Evil things against the Lord of Israel.
Pray that I would deliver.
Pray that I would heal.
Pray that I would strengthen the sickly,
Comfort the wounded, the hurt and the bruised.
Pray that I would hear the pains of my people
As they rise to my throne from the broken hearts, the wounded children.
Pray my children, my bride, be their intercessor.
For my children perish for lack of knowledge,
My children perish for lack of knowledge of my Son.
For he is the obedient one,
He is the merciful one,
He is the physician,
He is the good shepherd,
He gathers the chicks under his wings.
Pray for my sheep, my children,
That they might know where to turn for their healing
That they might know where to turn for their strengthening.
I have sent you here my children,
That you might be to my sheep,
My Prince Beloved.
The shepherds of Israel kill the sheep
By keeping them away from the key of knowledge
Even the Prince Beloved Messiah and his Spirit.
The fat sheep, my children, are taking the clean water
For themselves and muddying the waters,
That when my needy and lean ship cometo drink,
There is but muddy water.
These fat sheep are bullies.
They know not compassion,
They know not who their neighbour is,
They know not how to love
My Prince Beloved.
He said Because of lawlessness the love of many will grow cold.
My children you have the law of the Spirit of life
Operating in your souls. Yield to it.
Let the Spirit of Life , enable you to become a life giver.
Yes a giver of life .
For indeed the Father has granted to The Son that he might give life
To whom he will.
As Messiah is so you are in the world.
Pray that life will be given.
Pray for the Old Jew who knows not that I am there and I care.
Pray for the young Jew who is being taught not to know
Whether I am there or not.
Pray for the middle aged Jew, who believes I am there
But does not understand my Prince Beloved sits at
My right hand and awaits for his heart and mouth to say
Baruch ha ba be shem Adonai
Awaits his welcome.
For, my children, it is necessary that my people
Appoint for themselves he who will be their King.
For this charge I have given them Appoint for yourselves elders.
Pray, my children, that they will choose him whom I choose.
I gave them the choice life or death, blessing or cursing.
In Joshua I gave them the choice :
Choose this day whom you shall serve.
At the time of Elijah I gave them the choice:
How long will you halt between two opinions?
If Yahwah is God worship him, if Baal him.
So it is today today, my children.
I give my sheep the choice.
If Yeshua the Nazarene is Messiah, take his yoke upon you
And he will feed you and he will heal you
And he will guide you be living waters and will
Establish the Covenant of Peace, so that all the
Harmful beasts will leave the land and you may go in
And out and enjoy safe pasture.
So that the fig tree will blossom
And there will be fruit on the vine,
So that the olive tree will not fail
And the cattle will give forth their milk
And the sheep their wool.
If Yehoshua the Nazarene be your King,
Serve him even as I have chosen him.
Look into the light of the countenance of my
Prince Beloved and see the justice of his heart,
The compassion of his ways,
the faithfulness of his disposition.
Look into his eyes and see the fiery love of his care,
The cleansing purity of this same fire.
Love him for he is your husband.
You will no longer call him master but Husband,
For you are his bride and he is your Beloved,
My Servant Beloved.

Evangelistic Ramblings

2005-08-23T01:29:00.000-07:00

Yesterday was a little more difficult to share the gospel. I shared with Ronald, Torstein,Nayoum and Veronica. But Torstein had been quite an awkward athiest to deal with. He's the kind of guy who can't even believe Jesus was crucified let alone raised from the dead. He thinks it's all a story. Of course he never studied the history, he just heard the RE fairy tales. But he rejected them and thinks that he's on the same ground as historic Christianity. Nayoum doesn't like to talk about religion. You to your faith me to mine. I tellyou this Vietnamese government has done a great job in planting unbelief in their people. Veronica was waiting for Mum and Dad so we ran out of time real quick. So I started to think was I wrong to pray against the Anti Christ Yad Lachim of Israel this morning. Jesus said we should pray for our persecutors, so we need to pray that these Anti christ spirits behind Yad Lachim in Israel will be broken of the orthodox Jews who are controlled by them. We bless Israel in doing this. We bless everybody and this may mean taking authority over lying spirits. So I did this in a moment of inspiration this morning. These persecutors of Jesus Christ needs to be stopped. When we are persecuted we really need to rejoice for our reward in heaven really is great. But also when we praise God the avenger and our enemy is silenced (Pslm 8). We see Yahuwah's victory.
Anyway I was fishing around for reasons why the evangelsim wasn't going so well. But then I met Anna. And here we were again, someone open. My friend Daniel the African Author joined me with Anna and her friend. Her friend (who was very unbelieving) had to leave to catch the bus. But Anna did not try to escape. She wanted to finish the questionaire. She was wonderfully open. So all my meandering went to nothing. I was to continue sharing and to expect the end of Yad lachim.
The evil spirit which inspires it will not prevail against the Church. Like the Apostle Paul its leaders will be set free. Pray especially fo Rabbi Dov Lipshitz (or something) the most notorious anti christ spirit in Israel at this time. He founded the organisation and like Saul is raging against the Church. While you're their pray for Benjamin the french men who fights the Church at every turn.
Well I can say the the dream the Lord Jesus gave me regarding preparing a questionaire and using it for evangelism here in Porsgrunn enabled me to share the gospel with many more people than before. But yesterday was harder than the day before.
You may wonder what is the point of my evangelism. Am I planning that every one I meet will be born again and follow Jesus Christ for ever? Well that would be nice, but I'm not at that level of faith, yet?. No my goal is to proclaim the gospel. Each person who agrees to fill out my questionaire gets an opportunity to hear the gospel. Anna heard it yesterday and others the day before.These people then are privileged with the opportunity to recieve the eternal transforming effect of the gospel of Jesus Christ in their lives. If they will only believe the whole force of God's powers, Yahuwah's power toward salvation is there to help them. The measure of this power is the resurrection and ascension of Jesus Christ. The gospel releases that much dunamis power into the heart of the believer. If only they will believe.
I also have opportunity to pray for those who fill out the questionaire. This may be the most important means of the goal. Because at the end of the day souls are saved because people pray. That was just a little bit poetic, so I'll repeat it:At the end of the daysouls are savedbecause people prayIts not so much what we sayit really come down to how we pray.They say a picture is worth a thousand words
I say prayer is worth a thousand wordy sermons
and its true your saved
through the word you heard
but the word needs roots
in order to bear fruit
it needs roots and soils
and water which takes toil
the toil of you and me
in the prayer rooms
the prayer rooms of our life

Now one will be saved one day
and another on another'
one will be saved in my sight
another through a brotherfrom the otherside of the world

But prayer opens the preachers mouth
to speak the word of power
prayer shows the Church's desire
to connect with resurrection power

The enemy can no longer devour
through his oh so deceptive power
the people we pray for
in resurrection power.

Yahuwah said "Ask me for the nations
and I will give them to thee"
Jesus said "Ask and you will be recieve"
To the sons of God
thats you and me who believe in Jesus
whose blood has set us free

to ask with faith
for the souls of the living dead
is to recieve and to see them set free.

Rise up oh Church
Rise up on the wings of prayer'
let Yahwuah hear your voice of praise
let the devils despair.

For as we pray they have to move away
they can't stay in a house
for which we really pray the deciever is decieved
the lier's in the fire
because the fiery sword of the word of Yahuwah
has split him through from head to toe.
Oh sons and daughters of the Father of Jesus Christ
Awake and seek
Awake and cry out
Yahuwah will hear you
for it's him its all about
We pray from the blessingof the spiritual fount
Jesus Christ the blessed God
will let the prisoners out.

So my goal is to meet to know and to pray for. All the souls
who hear the gospel have the potential tobe changed by the grace of Yahuwah the grace of Jesus Christ.

Questionnaire Evangelism

2005-08-18T08:44:00.000-07:00

Dear friend.

Thanks for taking a looking at my blog. You'll be one of the first. I've been staying in Norway for 5 weeks now. And the Lord has impressed upon the fact that if I really am to live of the gospel I'll have to preach it. Now I have no problem talking about preaching it, but preaching it is another thing. I have an added problem, I don't speak Norwegian. But hey most of the young people in Norway speak a little English, even if the old people don't. And I've had the distinct impression that the Norwegian Church is top heavy. It might just be my circles, but it seems to be a problem. So how do I stop sittiing on my laurels and start sharing the gospel. Going down to the street corner and sounding the trumpet is not such an attractive option when it seems that Porsgrunn is a town with -5 people per square meter. But what is the possibility. Well I've been watching the Apprentice and Donald Trumps little army. I am most impressed with their creative ways of dealing with their 24 hour deadlines. Why am I not using my talents for Jesus Christ? He is after all not only my employer but the saviour of my soul? Well I was wondering and praying and I know you can pray about a thing until the Kingdom comes(quite literally) but the time comes when a man has to be embarrassed at the hours the Apostle Paul put into his work. A man has to stand up and do something!. No more talking abiout the call but living the call. But how do I talk to these guys without then running a mile and looking at me funny? I dreamt two days ago that I created a questionnaire. As usual Yahuwah gave me Acts 4 with Peter sharing the gospel. The only purpose of my questionnaire is to give the people a chance to "hear" the gospel. So I got up and designed a questionnaire. I did not ask the people: Do you believe in God? But I wrote John 3:16 and asked, Do you believe God loves the world?. I did the same with Acts 4, Romans 3:23 and Romans 6:23 and Romans 10. God is assumed in the whole questionnaire. It had one purpose: Give the people a chance to hear the gospel. This was mu alternative to writing a letter to many Pastors and Churches asking for support. I want and need support. But I really need to preach the gospel. I need to do the word of Yahuwah. Well I quickly printed off my first set of 40 questionnaires. I would have done 70 if it were free, but when I found out it was half a kronor a copy I dropped it to 40. May the Lord forgive my focus on "all these things will be added unto you". Half the time I act like a hirleing, may Yahuwah forgive me. We must get the gospel to the young people of Norway. They need the gospel.How will they hear without a preacher. Well in one day I had perhaps 20 conversations in English. And at least 20 people had heard and thought about John 3:16. That was yesterday. I met backsliders and communists, rebels and young innocents. They shared there thoughts on the gospel, not on preliminaries. Now I have names to be prayed for, so maybe I'll share there thoughts with you one day. Meanwhile please pray for:Espen B, Caroline B, Irena Y, Adam, Tiina O, Dennis K, Per, Kim B, Annabel H, Liv G, Kyo K, Karine T., Tord, Stefan, Soban, Morten, Camilla B, Eda S, Dangne G, Anita A, Fryer U. You may be wondering how I got to speak to all these Norwegians. Well it varied. First I would gently approach, me a 5 foot 11 black guy from London, I would say "Excuse me do you speak English". Those who said no were immediatly missing the opportunity of hearing the gospel. Those who said "yes". I would ask "Would you mind filling in my questionnaire?" "What's it about?"Religious beliefs, I've heard that Scandinavia has one of the lowest percentage of believers in all western countries.
I'm an atheist
Thats ok that's exactly what I need to hear about.
They accept my invitation and we're off.
Or I would hitch and the dirver or their friends would answer my questions and I would fill them in. I filled out three questionnaires with drivers. One was a backslider and one was a priest of some Hu regligion. And one had a best friend who was a believer. All conversations extended beyond the journey time by 15 minutes to perhaps 45 minutes.
I had one person who was in the state Church pray a thorough prayer commiting her self to Jesus. After this I'm sorry to say but like Philip the Evangelist I pray for her and entrust her to Yahuwah, who does hear and answer prayer.
So folks I hope this is encouraging.I sow only the seed of the gospel. Yahuwah gives the increase. We who are evangelists must PREACH the gospel.The rest of you:PRAY for us and your friends. We are sent to your friends!Pray for my new acquantances to receive protection from the devil's deceptions and that the Lord of the harvest will send other messengers to them.
The Grace of Jesus be with you all!
PS I have a gospel website:yeshuaisyahuwah.blogspot.comThis speaks the gospel in Israel
all the best Edi

Letter to Janel

2005-08-15T04:29:00.000-07:00

Edi Nachmana servant of Yahwah Elohei Israel
To newly created newly born Janel, called to "lead her people" by the spirit of Yahwah in the ways of Yahwah, the ways of Tzedekah and Mishpat.
Grace to you and peace from God our Father and our Lord Yeshua the Mashiach.
I was really glad to hear you are not only well but recreated in the image of Yeshua. May the Elohim lead you to the whole truth and away from other paths.Things are going well hear. I am praying about the next step. My visa is out on the third of March so I'm expecting some miracles these next two weeks. I am seeking to sing to the Lord more and more and this releases his glory and then he speaks. As Sister Ruth says
Praise until the Spirit of Worship comes Worship until the glory comes...Stand in the glory" In your present time I recommend taking short scriptures and putting melody to them and praise God for everything. He will bless you more and more with his voice. Don't forget the voice you heard in your experience. He will lead you so that you can lead others. And continue not to worry, for it never helps. Today Today today today Today Todah leElohim, is our concern.
Write a lot and read out loud Isaiah 61 1-3 for 10 minutes daily and it will begin to take your further along the path Yahwah is taking you if you will leave behind the past and operate as the new creature revealed in Isaiah 65, 66 and New Covenant.
Yahwah used to abide in a physical temple, made of stone. He now abides in you and me and all the saints. So don't be surprised if God sends you more people to ask about Him, because he has now set you apart for his call on your life . To lead. The way up is down in the Kingdom of God.
There is an anointing with oil, this is an outward sign. This would be your immersion in water, and there is an anointing of the Holy Spirit, this is immeersion of the soul in the Spirit of God.
The first sets you apart publically in front of people to tell them Yahwah has selected you for special service. The second gives you the G-d ability to fulfil the calling.This is called Grace, Chen or Charin,(Eng, Heb, Greek). If indeed you heard the voice in your Spirit and then Yahwah put the same words on the mouth of your friend, then he has marvellously confirmed his word spoken to your heart, by his servant carletta.
(2) As if to say "My child I see you even in the midst of the 500 and have chosen you so come down for today I would take dinner in your house" He had the preacher speak out a word of knowledge which as G-d who inspired him to speak, and G-d who inspired you to listen, knew you would heed. This is a part of prophecy and agrees with the scripture (1 Cor 14 23-25)
"if the all the assembly comes together in one place and....all prophesy, and un unbeliever or unlearned one comes in, he is reproved by all , he is discerned by all. And so the secrets of his heart are revealed . And so falling down on his face, he shall worship Elohim , declaring that Elohim is truly among you"
(3)So the Preacher revealed your heart to such a degree that among 500 you understood he was talking to you. This has happened to me many times. Then the Spirit gave you one of the purposes of your going forward (to lead) and he spoke also in the mouth of his servant Carletta as if to reveal the thoughts he had just placed in your heart.
(4)This infilling or anointing of the Holy Spirit is to give you, after years or months of yielding to the Spirit teaching you and leading you in the path of G-d, will enable you to indeed lead.
(5)You are greatly blessed to have Yahwah touch you so wonderfully. But why be surprised that if you pray for revelation of truth that you recieve the Spirit of Truth, which Yeshua said would lead his talmidim into all truth.
Since now you are blessed with G-d dwelling inside you. You are as you observed different. You need to remember the pattern for this is how God will teach you a thousand times over in the future.
(1) You hunger for truth knowing you don't have it
(2) This hunger and humility means G-d will pour grace into you.
(3) He will lead you to people and places where his Spirit is working.
(4) He will speak to you, in you and through you.
(5) He will empower you to recieve the answer to what you cried out for
(6) He will reveal the answer to you.
(7) "freely you have received freely give"
Blessed are you Janel among the Jewish women of this age to be chosen by the Most High G-d to lead his children into the love of the truth of the G-d who is love.
(6)I'm blessed to be priviliged to hear of such a wonderful experience of yours. To begin to counteract the loneliness, and don't worry, I say all this to remind you not to teach you as though you don't know, because you published a book.
(7)Write down what you are feeling trying to decribe as honestly and as acurately as possible what you are feeling.
Write down what you fear losing, as accurately as possible , along with the excitement of what you felt that night when you were immersed in spirit.
And remember in everything
You are now a temple a house of the Holy spirit.
Ask G-d to reveal to you what exactly this means.
For every question you have G-d has the best answer. He will answer you with the same intensity you put the question to him with.
He will answer you with the same level of specification you use in asking the question.
(8) Truth Janel, is higher than culture, its higher than physical family and friends , its higher and all forms of Sheqer. Now remember G-d is called Elohei Emet and Yeshua said The word of Abba Elohei Israel is Truth, that his Spirit is the Spirit of truth and that He is "The way the Truth and the Life"
If you live according to my word You shall know the truth and the truth will set you free"
Our ability to recieve knowledge of truth is directly related to our willingness to obey Elohim ha Ab. If we are willing we become friends not just servants. If we are unwilling the truth comes in parables in every area where we are not willing to abide.
If we yield to the Father and are willing to yield to his Son(heir of all things), his way of seeing the world, his plan for mankind, then their is no limit to what Yahwah will do in and through.
As Yahwah once said to me "There is power in my name my son use it for the glory of my name"
Perfect love casts out fear. May be you had a taste of that love.
Well Janel, forgive me if you percieve this as a lecture. I have not said all I could say.
I was really gald to hear a real substantial email from you.
Thank you for remembering me in your prayers. Although I'm sure you don't include me in your Bahai prayers. Because as I understand the Spirit working in the Kingdom of Yahwah is not the same Spirit operating in the Islamic or Bahai or Budhist or Hindu religions. So I do not drink from these cisterns. I seek to drink from the will of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, and the Spirit of Yahwah.
I feel like my letter is a little mechanical or harsh please forgive me.
Read the book of Ephesians, there are two wonderful prayers which you can read in the first person or which will bless you and others.
I suggests you look for whereever you come across the Spirit of Yahwah or Elohim in the bible, and begin to understand who came and started to live in you and what infinite potential is available if you will lose the old and embrace the new. Don't try to mix stuff. The first two commands are very clear about that.
You can not have two husbands, only one is permitted. These other spiritual influences are called strange fires or gods.
Yahwah is El Qana. You can not lead your people based on a position of uncertainty based on mixing spirits.
Pursue love and earnestly seek spirituality of the bible.
Grace of Yeshua be with you

Prayer Letter from Israel

2005-08-15T04:28:00.000-07:00

Dear Prayer partners,
May I call you that in line with what Yahwah our God is teaching me at this time, I hope you have a few moments to join with me in prayer for a few important issues.
Yahwah has shown me that Jesus is everything and that we are in a covenant through him with our heavenly Father. Jesus came to execute many of the blessings of the children of Abraham and what Yahwah showed me today and over the last few days was that everything we do as believers for the Kingdom is an expression of the New Covenant.
This morning and last night I realised that to bless Israel was to come in line with the promise of God to Abraham. "They who bless you I will bless". To bless Israel is not a political thing. When we bless Israel we are seeking that they come into the covenant blessing which comes through Jesus Christ. But if they come into those blessing so do we. So I blessed Israel this morning sayiong "May Israel be fruitful and multiply, fill this land and subdue it". I then decided to begin to believe for souls to be saved. May be 52 a year but it was too small, but more than I ever see. Then for as many as possible, but was this not too general. Finally I asked Yahwah and he gave me "Unless Yahwah builds the house thay labour in vain that buildeth".
So I trust that we do our part of the covenant to witness for Jesus he will do his part and give us fruit. A girl came up to me in the university Pearl by name. She said I saw you again on the Bus with a blond girl (I told her it was my wife) and an old lady. She asked what we were talking about. Well it happens that the old lady was a believer and we recognised it from a book she was reading. So we got talking. Now Pearl has heard the whole gospel and had some thing to read. Please pray for her. She has an Afro American mentor who is a believer and 87 years old. Pearl will be forgiven and enter the New Covenant soon I believe.
Pray for Sam he is the ex muslim who came to Jesus last month. He will go home this week.Pray that he will be rooted in a Church and fruitful.
Pray for Yahwah to send labourers to Jerusalem School and to touch the Muslims and Christians students with the new life of Jesus and pray for their families. Pray especially for Sharihan, Salem B, Ibrahim H, Reem A, Yousef M and Laura A. I will give you more names next time.
Pray for their families as well because they are young people pray for his mercy and forgiveness to be granted them.
Mona did a drama in Church today and it went down very well, please pray for her to flourish evangelistically in this field of her gifting. Pray that we will have many divine appointments with people like Pearl and Sam who are looking for truth. Jesus wants to save all of Israel and we can be his hands and feet.
God's love is greater than we can imagine and with our prayers millions of muslims and Jews will come to the forgiveness of sin and the righteousness as it is in Christ Jesus.
Please pray also for Shmuel Golding, who used to Jerusalem's top anti missionary, Micheala Lawson, another and Benjmin from YAD Lachim, again a very anti christian organization and Barukh from Aish ha Torah. Pray for Rabbi E Sprecher and the Ascent youth hostel with Big Mo, a Jewish Orthodox New Age center where they teach what can only be described as hindu and buddhist meditation up their in Safed. Talking of Safed please pray that the Lord of the Harvest will send many labourers up thier their is a spiritual dirth of Christians in Safed. Pray also for Nancy Bergen and waht used to be mount Zion fellowship, they are turning into a oneness Church which is very sad for they ought to be a part of the revival which will come because of you prayers.
Remember we are just reminding Yahwah of what he promised to do and so will do, to answer those who call on him.

Ok I have overloaded this prayer letter but even if you only pray once for Yahwah to send labourers to these Jews and Arabs it could be enough.
Pray that Yahwah will forgive all their sins and grant them eternal life in Jesus Christ his son. Pray for his mercies upon them.

The Grace of Jesus be with you

Prayer Letter for Souls

2005-08-15T04:26:00.000-07:00

Dear Believers
I pray all things are well with you spirit, soul and body.
Its a long time since we chatted, met or spoke. But I say now Greetings in the name of Jesus our Lord (Yeshua Adoneinu).

Do you know that most Jews religious or otherwise have never read Isaiah 53? This is because in the Synagogue thay read the Torah and the Haphtorah through each year. The Haphtorah is from the prophets and does not include Isaiah 53. So on the outreach below I made it a goal to have some read Isaiah 53 with me in Hebrew and ask them who they thought it was referring to.

You know I am living in Jerusalem and have been for the last four years. I write to you to solicit your prayers. I don't know if you will read this email or not but if you do and you have a moment please agree with me in prayer for God's will in the following.

Last week a group of 8 Koreans and myself went on an outreach to Eilat and Tel Aviv. It was a time of great blessing and I believe some people were or will be saved through the outreach and our prayers.

Please pray for the following people who showed interest or prayed a prayer for salvation. (Like Philip and the Ethiopian Eunuch, we did not have time to stay and nurture their souls but left their details with a Christian Youth Hostel in Eilat to follow up).

(i) Gabor (about 25)a Hungarian who asked Jesus to come into his heart and to be Lord. Pray he will be baptised in water and the Spirit and join a church.

(ii) Amir, (about 20) a Muslim who read with us many scriptures in Hebrew. And finally when the wall broke said I like to hear you talk like this and gave all his details for follow up. He was given Nicki Cruz to read.

(iii) Alicah: A Qabbalistic Jew who read with us Isaiah 53, and some of John and Matthew and Acts in Hebrew. Who was so touched by the teaching of Yeshua that I left him my Hebrew Bible.

(iv) Lilach, who had just never thought about the issue of what she would do if she died tonight and God asked her Why should I let you into my house? She was introduced to some scriptures for the first ime in her life and perhaps to the gospel message.

These are just four divine appointments I and my partner Sun (a Korean) had.

But if these four enter the Kingdom our week will have been well spent. Please pray the the others touched by the outreached who i have not named.

Pray especially that they will have other labourers sent to them to help the along the path of eternal life and that Jesus will become really real to them as well as the Church.

The main prayer is I bessech you, Lord of the Harvest (Adon Ha Katzir), send forth labourers!

The harvest in Israel Is plentiful and the labourers are so few you wouldn't believe it! Pray for Jesus, the Lord of the Harvest to sent more labourers here.

Finally join me in prayer for my colege fees which are due this month. I must pay the Center for the Study of Early Christianity, 2975 dollars and they being people of faith have waited with amazing patience. And pray for my beautiful wif Mona who is pregnant with our first child.

May the Grace of Yahwah our great Father and Jesus his wonderful Son and our Lord and the Comforter who strengthens us to do the Father's will, be with you all Amen

lots of grace to you

Organisaton Contact details

2005-08-15T04:21:00.000-07:00

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People of Peace

2005-08-15T04:18:00.000-07:00

Dear friends,

Shalom to you from Jerusalem. I hope you know the Messiah Yeshua and hence are people of peace. If not my exhortation to you is to turn back to God. return from doing your own ways and your own thing to the way of Yahwah, God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob and the God and Father of our Lord Yeshua the Messiah.
This is the message we need to send out to Jerusalem, Israel and the seventy nations. Jerusalem first because it is the seat of the rule of Abraham's seed. And Yahwah said of Abraham, "In your seed all the nations of the earth shall be blessed"
How will they be blessed? By practicing the way of Yahwahwhich Abraham's seed the Messiah and his sent ones will teach them . When the nations, including Israel, beginning to walk the way of Yahwah, then he will bring upon them what he has promised.
We may reasonably ask the question what is the Way of Yahwah?
Yeshua the Nazarene gave us the answer very clearly
I am the Way the Truth and the Life no one comes to the Father but by me. So what do we see when we see Yeshua.
The first public act we see Yeshua doing is going to John for Baptism. Why did he who was greater come to his inferior for the baptism of repentance?
The Nazarene Messiah gives us a very clear reason
"In order to fulfil all righteousness"
He wasn't here to do the outward pharasaic legalistic righteousness but to do all righteousness. So if we follow Yeshua the Nazarene, will will do righteousness, not for public performance but secretly.
The way of righteousness is expressed in fasting?
But not the fasting as we percieve in a religious manner. The fast of righteouness is "To loosen the bonds of wickedness"
In other words it is first setting a man free from wickedness himself and secondly it will begin to set his family free from wickedness, his community, his nation and the earth.
"As for the proud one his soul is not right with in him; but the righteous shall live by his faithfulness" So we are faithful in opposing wickedness, faithful in trusting Yahwah to deliver the earth from the control of the violent, the unjust, the oppressor, the unfair, the unforgiving. First we are set free then we set others free throug Messianic power.
Yeshua the Nazarene practiced this kind of fasting. He said "I will drink no more from the fruit of the vine until I drink it new with you in my Fathers Kingdom" His fast was a fast until the final establishment of the Kingdom founded on righteousness and justice" A kingdom free from all wickedness.
Will you repent and turn to delivering the earth from wickedness?
Fasting is to loosen the bonds of wickedness, to undo the bonds of the yolk. The yolk of idol worship is a heavy yolk to bare, as is the yolk of the cares of this world, decietfulness of riches and a stone Torah with no spirutal power of understanding.
The Pharisee's "tie up heavy loads and lay them on men's shoulders; but they themselves are unwilling to move them with as much as a finger"
This is the stone of the Pharisees but the Spirit of Messiah is an easy yolk and a light burder for he is meek and humbel hearted, not just humble for a day as the fasters of the time of Isaiah.

Letter from Israel to Vila

2005-08-15T04:15:00.000-07:00

Dear Vila,

Thanks for your reply, its good to hear you are having so much joy.
By praying the will of the father you will stay in your God ordained destiny. Its amazing, last wednesday night, I think, was Rosh Chodesh.
It means it was the beginning of the Biblical year. However it was more than that. According to some scholars calculations it was also the beginning of the 7th millenium. The bible says a day is like a thousand years to Yahwah, so we have just entered the Shabbat of creation. This means we are close to the personal return of Adon (Lord Yeshua). The angels said to the disciples as Yeshua's ascension, that this same Yeshua whom you have seen leave will return the same way you saw him go. Yeshua is coming back. What's more he is in a glorified eternal body because he was resurrected from the dead and he put on immortaLITY. wOW. The book of Zechriah says that when he returns he will return to the mount of olives. Its amazing that he turned up to Paul and knocked off his high horse back in the first century. What's most amazing about this appearance was that it took place after the ascension. After he sat at the right of the Father.
Psalm 110 tells us about Yeshua postuion now. He is a high priest in the order of Melchisedek. He is the same yesterday today and forever.
However while he's sat there having his enemies made a footstall what are we to do to relate to him?
We have his Holy Spirit as a guarantee of our inheritance in God's kingdom. The Spirit will lead into all truth. But we must bind in the name of Yeshua the Nazarene, the spirits of error and all other spirits which are not from Yeshua.
Yeshua has also been appearing at meetings linked with mount zion fellowship.You can chack this on revival.org.
It is really amazing how God is speaking in Jerusalem at the moment.
We are near judgement day and for every word we speak or have spoken we will have to give an account for it.
Here is a prayer which if you pray it every day and then open the Bible at Random God can begin to guide you and teach you. If you have any questions just write me.
Heavenly Father
Your will be done in my life today
I pray that I will go where you want me to go
see what you want me to see,
hear what you want me to hear,
live as you want me to live
say what you want me to say
fellowhip with who you want me to felloship with,
learn what you want me to learn,
Your will be done in my life today,
I bind, break and destroy any plan, scheme or
work of the enemy which would seek to hinder
your will being done in my life to day.
In the name of Yeshua of Nazareth.
Amen.
Learn this and pray it every day. Its so importan that we follow not just any god, but the God of Israel, and his Messiah Yeshua of Nazareth. He is the true God and eternal life, the God over all so called gods.
Jeremiah says As for the gods who did not create the heavens and the earth that shall disappear from under the heavens and the earth.
If we follow other gods and spirits, for every idol has a demon behind it, we bring a curse on our selves and the God of Israel loves us but at a distance for he has compassion not intimacy with us. We are Paul says, the bride of Messiah. so if we go with another spirit its like adultery. And Yahwah says You shall have no other gods besides me and You shall not commit adultery (read Ezek 16).
So Vila let us seek to purify our temples and not allow any tinges of idolatry (adultery) or contamination, for our God, Yahwah is God who loves so muach that he tries to keep us away from the false fires. See Isaiah 50 As for you who light your own fires, go walk in the light of you fires , this is what you will recieve from my hand, you will lie down in torment"
But to us Vila, who are called to be blameless and holy in a wicked and perverse genration, he is the God of all comfort . Our joy is not that of the wicked in Habukuk, read it, nor the dancing and partying of Israel while Moses was on the mountain. No No No.
Our joy is born from singing Psalms ahyms and Spiritual songs to the Lord, making melody in our hearts to Yahwah.
He loves those who rejoice and work righteousness.
We need ask him to cleanse our temple of all defilements by his Holy Spirit.
Lots of grace and love to you.
Any questions just write me.
Ps work is happening and Yahwah is Good.