NazareneSpace Blog

Unequal Weights and Measures and the Counter Missionaries – Video Teaching

We must raise $575 by the end of the day Tuesday or our account will go into the negative. In these uncertain times, we need your support more than ever. The time is short, and there is much work to be done. This is no time to pull back from the great work in front of us!

As I have said to you many times, I look on this work as a co-operative one with me, and all of you combining our resources together in order to get the job done of helping to teach this great truth to all in the world who will listen. Thank you so much from the bottom of my heart for your continued support, you are the ones who make it all possible by your contributions and your prayers for our work. I truly appreciate your help in every way.

If you can make a one time donation of $500 or $1,000 dollars to support this work.

Now is time to step up to the plate!

Donations can be sent by Paypal to donations@wnae.org.

Or click HERE to donate

He is the Brightness of His Glory

He is the Brightness of His Glory
By
James Scott Trimm

We read in the Book of Hebrews:

1 In the days of old, YHWH spoke to the fathers in many times and in many manifestations, through the prophets.
2 It came to pass in the last days, He has spoken to us by His Son, who He appointed to be heir of all things, by Him who created all the worlds.
3 Through appointment, He, is the brightness [Zohar] of His glory, and He is the Maker of all things by the power of His Word, and who has accomplished by His power, the cleansing of our sins. Behold, He sits in high places to the right hand of the Sh’kinah.
(Heb. 1:1-3 HRV)

What does this mean “He is the Brightness of His Glory”? In the original Hebrew as found in the Munster Hebrew text of Hebrews this word is “ZOHAR”. Of course many know that there is a book known as the Zohar, but fewer know the original significance of the term. The Hebrew word ZOHAR appears only twice in the Tanak. One of these is in the Book of Daniel:

And they that are wise, shall shine as the brightness [Zohar] of the firmament, and they that turn the many to righteousness, as the stars; forever and ever.
(Daniel 12:3 HRV)

The other is in the Book of Ezekiel as part of Ezekiel’s description of the “Likeness” of Elohim:

Then I beheld, and behold, a likeness as the appearance of fire. From the appearance of his loins and downward, fire: and from his loins and upward, as the appearance of brightness (Zohar), as the color of electrum.
(Ezekiel 8:2 HRV)

This brings us to Ezekiel’s vision of the Merkavah (Divine Throne-Chariot):

23 And under the firmament were their wings conformable, the one to the other. This one of them had two which covered, and that one of them had two which covered, their bodies.
24 And when they went, I heard the noise of their wings like the noise of great waters; like the voice of Shaddai–a noise of tumult like the noise of a host. When they stood, they let down their wings.
25 For, when there was a voice above the firmament that was over their heads, as they stood, they let down their wings.
26 And above the firmament that was over their heads, was the likeness of a throne, as the appearance of a sapphire stone. And upon the likeness of the throne was a likeness as the appearance of a man, upon it; above.
27 And I saw as the color of electrum, as the appearance of fire round about enclosing it, from the appearance of his loins and upward. And from the appearance of his loins and downward, I saw as it were the appearance of fire, and there was brightness round about him.
28 As the appearance of the bow that is in the cloud in the day of rain, so was the appearance of the brightness round about. This was the appearance of the likeness of the glory of YHWH. And when I saw it, I fell upon my face, and I heard a voice of one that spoke.
(Ezekiel 1:22-28 HRV)

The “firmament” mentioned by Daniel is that which is above the four living creatures in Ezekiel 1:22. The Zohar is the brightness of the likeness seated on the Merkavah (Throne-Chariot).

It is this brightness which is the namesake of the book known as the Zohar. This is what the book called the Zohar says about the ZOHAR:

It is written: And they that are wise, shall shine as the brightness [Zohar] of the firmament, and they that turn the many to righteousness, as the stars; forever and ever (Dan. 12:3). There was indeed a “brightness” (Zohar). The Most Mysterious struck its void, and caused this point to shine. This “beginning” then extended, and made for itself a palace for its honor and glory. There it sowed a sacred seed which was to generate for the benefit of the universe, and to which may be applied the Scriptural words “the holy seed is the stock thereof” (Is. 6:13). Again there was Zohar, in that it sowed a seed for its glory, just as the silkworm encloses itself, as it were, in a palace of its own production which is both useful and beautiful. Thus by means of this “beginning” the Mysterious Unknown made this palace. This palace is called Elohim, and this doctrine is contained in the words, “By means of a beginning (he) created Elohim.”

The Zohar is that from which were created all the creative utterances through the extension of the point of this mysterious brightness. Nor need we be surprised at the use of the word “created” in this connection, seeing that we read further on, “And God created man in his image” (Gen. 1:27).

A further esoteric interpretation of the word Bereshith is as follows. The name of the starting-point of all is Ehyeh (I shall be). The holy name when inscribed at its side is Elohim, but when inscribed by circumscription [i.e. between the two Ehyeh’s. v. Ex. 3:4.] is Asher, the hidden and recondite temple, the source of that which is mystically called Reshith. The word Asher (i.e. the letters, Aleph, Shin, Resh from the word Bereshith) is anagrammatically Rosh (head), the beginning which issues from Reshith. So when [15b] the point and the temple were firmly established together, then Bereshit combined the supernal Beginning with Wisdom. Afterwards the character of that temple was changed, and it was called “house” (beit). The combination of this with the supernal point which is called rosh gives Bereshith, which is the name used so long as the house was uninhabited. When, however, it was sown with seed to make it habitable, it was called Elohim, hidden and mysterious. The Zohar was hidden and withdrawn so long as the building was within and yet to bring forth, and the house was extended only so far as to find room for the holy seed. Before it had conceived and had extended sufficiently to be habitable, it was not called Elohim, but all was still included in the term Bereshith. After it had acquired the name of Elohim, it brought forth offspring from the seed that had been implanted in it.

(Zohar 1:15a-15b)

In the book called the Zohar the Zohar is likened to a “seed” which is elsewhere called the “Son of Yah”. The Zohar says that the Most Mysterious (the Infinite One) created a palace for himself called Elohim into which he placed his Zohar (brightness) like a seed sowed of himself, in much the same way that a silkworm encloses itself in a cocoon. The “seed” is elsewhere known as the “Son of Yah”. The book called the Zohar also says of the Zohar that he “is that from which were created all the creative utterances”.

Now we can better understand what Hebrews means when it says:

Messiah is the Zohar of His glory. He is the namesake of the book known as the Zohar. Messiah is the brightness of the likeness which Ezekiel saw upon the throne. Messiah “is that from which were created all the creative utterances” in that “He is the Maker of all things by the power of His Word.”

In these uncertain times, we need your support more than ever. We must raise at least $1,200 to cover bills hitting our account tonight (2/18/25). The time is short, and there is much work to be done. This is no time to pull back from the great work in front of us!

If you can make a one time donation of $500 or $1,000 dollars to support this work.

Now is time to step up to the plate!

Donations can be sent by Paypal to donations@wnae.org or by Zelle, Go Fund Me, Bitcoin or Ethereum.

Click HERE to donate

The Alef and the Tav

The Alef and the Tav
By
James Scott Trimm

In the King James Version of the Bible we read three times that Messiah says “I am Alpha and Omega” (Reveleation 1:8, 21:6, and 22:13). In the Aramaic text of Revelation, as we read in the Hebraic Root Version, that Yeshua actually said “I am Alef and I am Tav.”

The phrase “I am Alef and I am Tav” has a very special meaning in Judaism.

We read in Genesis 1:1

“In the beginning Elohim created the heavens and the earth.”

בראשית ברא אלהים את השמים ואת הארץ

The Zohar says of this verse:

BARA (ברא) represents the mysterious source from which the whole expanded. ELOHIM (אלהים) represents the force which sustains all below. The words ET HASHAMMAIM (את השמים) indicate that the two latter are on no account to be separated, and are male and female together. The word ET (את) consists of the letters ALEF (א) and TAV (ת), which include between them all the letters, as being the first and last of the alphabet. Afterwards HE (ה) was added, so that all the letters should be attached to HE (ה), and this gave the name ATTAH (אתה) (You); hence we read “and You (VE-ATTAH) (ואתה) keep all of them alive” (Neh. 9:6). ET (את) again alludes to YHWH, who is so called. HASHAMMAIM (השמים) is YHWH in his higher signification. The next word, VE-ET (ואת), indicates the firm union of male and female; it also alludes to the appellation VE-YHWH (ויהוה) (and YHWH), both explanations coming to the same thing. HA-ERETZ (הארץ) (the earth) designates an ELOHIM (אלהים) corresponding to the higher form, to bring forth fruit and produce. This name is here found in three applications, and thence the same name branches out to various sides.
(Zohar 1:15b)

Here we learn two important significations of the ALEF and the TAV in Genesis 1:1.

The first is that the ALEF and the TAV, being the first and last letters of the Hebrew Alphabet, are an abbreviation for all twenty-two letters.

Each of the twenty-two Hebrew letters represents one of twenty-two paths which connect the Sefirot of the Tree of Life. Each of these twenty-two letters represents a relationship between two of the Sefirot and a combination of two of the Sefirot. These twenty-two letters are part of the image of Elohim and they took part in the creation. When Messiah said that he is the ALEF and the TAV it was an abbreviation to indicate that Messiah the incarnate “Word” embodied the twenty-two letters. When Elohim created the heavens and the earth he did so through words. Elohim “said” things and they were so. Elohim created the universe by his Word, through the ALEF and the TAV meaning through the twenty-two Hebrew letters.

Each Hebrew word is more than a word, it is a matrix of dynamic relationships within the Godhead. Hebrew letters are also the building blocks of creation. In the upper worlds all things exist in their prime-material state as the strings of Hebrew letters and words which were the building blocks of creation. As we read in the Sefer Yetzirah:

Twenty-two Foundation letters: He engraved them,
He carved them, He permuted (TZIRUF) them,
He weighed them, He transformed them,
And with them, He depicted all that was formed
and all that would be formed.
(Sefer Yetzirah 2:2)

The Zohar gives us a second important significance to the ALEF and the TAV as they appear in Genesis 1:1 “indicates the firm union of male and female”.

Now we read in the Torah:

26 And Elohim said: Let us make man in our image; after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps upon the earth.
27 And Elohim created man in His own image: in the image of Elohim created He him; male and female created He them.
(Gen. 1:26-27 HRV)

What does this mean? Let US make man in OUR image?

The Zohar gives a very interesting answer:

And Elohim said, Let us make man (Gen. 1:26). The secret (SOD) is to them who fear him (Ps. 25:14)…

That most reverend Elder opened an exposition of this verse by saying ‘Simeon Simeon, who is it that said: “Let us make man?” Who is this Elohim?’ With these words the most reverend Elder vanished before anyone saw him.

R. Simeon, hearing that he had called him plain “Simeon”, and not “Rabbi Simeon”, said to his colleagues: ‘Of a surety this is the Holy One, blessed be He, of whom it is written: “And the Ancient of days was seated” (Dan. VII, 9). Truly now is the time to expound this mystery, because certainly there is here a mystery which hitherto it was not permitted to divulge, but now we perceive that permission is given.’

He then proceeded: ‘A king had several buildings to be erected, and he had an architect in his service who did nothing save with his consent (Prov. 8:30). The king is the supernal Wisdom above, the Middle Pillar is the king below: Elohim is the architect above, being as such the supernal Mother, and Elohim is also the architect below, being as such the Divine Presence (Shekinah) below. Now a woman may not do anything without the consent of her husband. And all the buildings were created through his Emanation (aziluth), the Father said to the Mother by means of the Word (amirah), “let it be so and so”, and straightway it was so, as it is written, “And he said, Elohim, let there be light, and there was light”: i.e. one said to Elohim, let there be light: the master of the building gave the order, and the architect carried it out immediately; and so with all that was constructed in the way of emanation.
(Zohar 1:22a)

The Zohar understands “US” and “OUR” to be reflected in the “male and female” image of Elohim mentioned in verse 27 and these are here referred to as “the Father” and “the Mother” just as YHWH is expressed as a Father (Mal. 1:6; Is. 63:16; 64:7) and as a Mother (Is. 66:13) in the Tanak. (YHWH as a “Mother” is the “Comforter in Is. 66:13 which is the Holy Spirit in Jn. 14:16-17, 27; 15:26; 16:7).

The Male and Female image of Father and Mother are the Elohim which is the “Architect above” while the “architect below” is the “Elohim below” or the “king below” and identified as the “Middle Pillar”. Elsewhere the Zohar identifies the Middle Pillar as the “Son of Yah”:

Better is a neighbor that is near, than a brother far off.
This neighbor is the Middle Pillar in the Godhead,
which is the Son of Yah.
(Zohar 2:115)

Here (Zohar 1:22a) the Zohar also identifies the Middle Pillar with the Word, and as the union of the male and female aspects of the Godhead, the ALEF and the TAV,

So the words “Let Us create man in Our own image” are spoken from the Father to the Mother (Holy Spirit) and this is the Elohim above, and these words are carried out by the Word which is the Son of Yah, the Middle Pillar, the Elohim below.

Just as we read in the Ketuvim Netzarim:

1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with Eloah, and the Word was Eloah.
2 This was in the beginning, with Eloah.
3 Everything existed through Him, and without Him, not even one thing existed of that which existed.
(Yochanan (John) 1:1-3 HRV)

We must raise at least $1,200 by the end of the day today to cover bills hitting our account tonight (2/18/25). The time is short, and there is much work to be done. This is no time to pull back from the great work in front of us!

In these uncertain times, we need your support more than ever. The time is short, and there is much work to be done. This is no time to pull back from the great work in front of us!

If you can make a one time donation of $500 or $1,000 dollars to support this work.

Now is time to step up to the plate!

Donations can be sent by Paypal to donations@wnae.org or by Zelle, GoFundMe, Bitcoin or Ethereum!

Click HERE to donate

Is the Torah too Hard to Keep?

Is the Torah too Hard to Keep?
By
James Scott Trimm

Another popular teaching in the church is a teaching that Elohim only gave the Torah to Israel to prove that they could not keep it. For example one book states:

…Israel, in blindness and pride and self- righteousness, presumed to ask for the law and God granted their request, to show them that they could not keep his law…
(God’s Plan of the Ages; Louis T. Tallbot; 1970; p. 66)

Now lets think this through for a moment. God gives Israel the Torah. He says he will place curses upon Israel if they fail to keep the Torah (Lev. 26 & Deut 28-29). He sends prophets to warn Israel of pending destruction because of their continual failure to keep Torah. Eventually God allows Babylon to invade Jerusalem and the Jews to be taken into captivity, because of their failure to keep Torah. Then he comes along and says “Nah, I was only fooling. I just gave you the Torah to prove you could not do it.” What kind of God would that be? Of course as noble Bereans we can simply look in the Tanak to see if this poular teaching is true. Let us see what the Tanak says on this issue:

10 If you shall hearken to the voice of YHWH your Elohim, to keep His commandments and His statutes, which are written in this Book of the Torah; if you turn unto YHWH your Elohim with all your heart and with all your soul.
11 For this commandment which I command you this day, it is not too hard for you, neither is it far off.
12 It is not in heaven, that you should say, Who shall go up for us to heaven, and bring it unto us and make us to hear it, that we may do it?
13 Neither is it beyond the sea, that you should say, Who shall go over the sea for us and bring it unto us, and make us to hear it, that we may do it?
14 But the word is very near unto you: in your mouth and in your heart, that you may do it.
(Deut. 30:10-14 HRV)

The Hebrew word for “too hard” in Deut. 30:11 is נפלת which means “difficult, hard, extraordinary”. The New American Standard and New International Version have “not too difficult for you.” The Revised Standard Version has “not too difficult for you.”

The fact that the Torah can be kept is confirmed as well in the New Testament which tells us that Yeshua was tempted in all things just as we are and he did keep the Torah (Heb. 4:15).

We must raise at least $130 to cover bills hitting our account tonight! We need your help today! In these uncertain times, we need your support more than ever. The time is short, and there is much work to be done. This is no time to pull back from the great work in front of us!

If you can make a one time donation of $500 or $1,000 dollars to support this work.

Now is time to step up to the plate!

Donations can be sent by Paypal to donations@wnae.org or by Zelle, Go Fund Me, Bitcoin or Ethereum.

Click HERE to donate

Nazarenes were not Ebionites

Nazarenes were not Ebionites
By
James Scott Trimm

In restoring the ancient sect of Nazarene Judaism, it is important to distinguish the ancient Nazarenes from another ancient sect of Jewish believers in Yeshua as Messiah, the Ebionites (Evionim).

The forth century “Church Father” Epiphanius was the first “Church Father” to list the Nazarenes as “heretics”. Epiphanius also distinguishes the Nazarenes from the Ebionites. He gives his description of the Nazarenes in chapter 29 of his book Panarion and the Ebionites, separately as chapter 30.

In his book Nazarene Jewish Christianity*, Ray A. Pritz writes:

[*Note: Modern academics insist on referring to the ancient Nazarenes as “Jewish Christianity” and “Jewish Christians, despite the fact that Epiphanius tells us that they did not call themselves Christians (Panarion 29)]

…Nazarenes were not mentioned by earlier Fathers not because they did not exist but rather because they were still generally considered to be acceptably orthodox. The history of the Nazarene sect must be clearly distinguished from that of the Ebionites.
(Nazarene Jewish Christianity; Ray A. Pritz p. 82)

We see evidence of this in the writings of the earlier “Church Father” Justin Martyr in his book Dialog with Trypho the Jew, he speaks of two different types of Jewish believers in Yeshua as Messiah, but never names these sects.

Pritz writes:

Suffice it to say at this point that Justin, around the beginning of the second half of the second century, recognizes two kinds of Christians of the Jewish race whom he differentiates on christological grounds. One group, whom Justin condemns, holds doctrines which line up well with what is known to us of Ebionite teaching. The other group differs from Justin’s orthodoxy only in its continued adherence to Mosaic Law.
(Nazarene Jewish Christianity; Ray A. Pritz p. 27)

In fact, Justin says of this second group:

I hold that we ought to join ourselves to such, and associate with them in all things as kinsmen and brethren.
(Justin Martyr, Dialogue with Typho the Jew; 47 (PG 6, 577)

The confusion seems to have begun with Origen, as Pritz writes:

How did this confusion come about? Justin knew of two kinds of Jewish Christians but gives them no name in his extant works. Irenaeus wrote against Ebionites but knew of no distinctions, Christological or otherwise, within Ebionism itself. The same could be said of Tertullian and Hippolytus. When we come to Origen, however (and return to the East), we again find two classes of Jewish Christians which he calls Ebionites. From this point on, the name Ebionite becomes a catch-all for Law-Keeping Christians of Jewish background. …. Eusebius, in his turn, cannot avoid seeing– in his sources, if not from hearsay– two distinguishable Jewish Christian groups, but he does not succeed very well in discerning the beliefs which seperate them. For him there is one name, Ebionite.
(Nazarene Jewish Christianity; Ray A. Pritz p. 28)

Until Epiphanius. the Church Fathers don’t mention the Nazarenes by name, not because they did not exist, but because they were generally not listed as heretical and were often confused with the Ebionites.

However, a comparison of the characteristics of Nazarenes and Ebionites, from ancient sources, will demonstrate that these were not the same:

WHAT THEY THOUGHT ABOUT YESHUA

NAZARENES:

“The adherents to this sect are known commonly as Nazarenes; they believe in Christ the Son of God, born of, the Virgin Mary; and they say that He who suffered under Pontius Pilate and rose again, is the same as the one in whom we believe.”
(Letter 75 Jerome to Augustine)

“For they acknowledge both the resurrection of the dead and the divine creation of all things, and declare that G-d is one, and that his son is Y’shua the Messiah.”
(Epiphanius; Panarion 29)

EBIONITES:

“Those who are called Ebionites agree that the world was made by God; but their opinions with respect to the Lord (Yeshua as a human prophet) are similar to those of Cerinthus and Carpocrates.”
(Irenaeus; Aganist Heresies 1:26)

“The Ebionaeans, however, acknowledge that the world was made by Him Who is in reality God, but they propound legends concerning the Christ similarly with Cerinthus and Carpocrates. They live conformably to the customs of the Jews, alleging that they are justified. according to the law, and saying that Jesus was justified by fulfilling the law. And therefore it was, (according to the Ebionaeans,) that (the Savior) was named (the) Christ of God and Jesus, since not one of the rest (of mankind) had observed completely the law. For if even any other had fulfilled the commandments (contained) in the law, he would have been that Christ. And the (Ebionaeans allege) that they themselves also, when in like manner they fulfill (the law), are able to become Christs; for they assert that our Lord Himself was a man in a like sense with all (the rest of the human family).”
(Hippolytus; Against All Heresies, 7.22)

ABOUT VIRGIN BIRTH

NAZARENES:

EBIONITES:

“God, then, was made man, and the Lord did Himself save us, giving us the token of the Virgin. But not as some allege, among those now presuming to expound the Scripture, [thus:] ‘Behold, a young woman shall conceive, and bring forth a son,’ as Theodotion the Ephesian has interpreted, and Aquila of Pontus, both Jewish proselytes. The Ebionites, following these, assert that He was begotten by Joseph; thus destroying, as far as in them lies, such a marvelous dispensation of God, and setting aside the testimony of the prophets which proceeded from God.”
(Irenaeus; Aganist Heresies 3:21)

“The evil demon, however, being unable to tear certain others from their allegiance to the Christ of God, yet found them susceptible in a different direction, and so brought them over to his own purposes. The ancients quite properly called these men Ebionites, because they held poor and mean opinions concerning Christ. For they considered him a plain and common man, who was justified only because of his superior virtue, and who was the fruit of the intercourse of a man with Mary.”
(Eusebius; Ecclesiastical History 3.27)

“But the heresy of the Ebionites, as it is called, asserts that Christ was the son of Joseph and Mary, considering him a mere man…”
(Eusebius; Ecclesiastical History 6:17)

WHAT THEY THOUGHT ABOUT PAUL

NAZARENES:

“The proclaiming was multiplied, through the Goodnews of the emissary Paul who was the least of all the emissaries.”
(Nazarene commentary on Is. 8:23-9:3, Is. 9:1-4 in Christian editions)

EBIONITES:

“But the Ebionites… repudiate the apostle Paul.”
(Irenaeus; Aganist Heresies 1:16:2)

“They declare that he was a Greek….He went up to Jerusalem, they say, and when he had spent some time there, he was seized with a passion to marry the daugher of the priest. For this reason he became a proselyte [through the Saducee movement, hence his working for the Temple police] and was circumcised. Then, when he failed to get the girl, he flew into a rage and wrote against cirumcision and against the sabbath and the Law.”
(Epiphanius; Panarion 30:16-19)

THEIR SCRIPTURES

NAZARENES:

“But these sectarians… did not call themselves Christians–but ‘Nazarenes,’… However they are simply complete Jews. They use not only the New Testament but the Old Testament as well, as the Jews do…”
(Epiphanius; Panarion 29)

EBIONITES:

“But the Ebionites use only… Matthew…”
(Irenaeus; Aganist Heresies 1:16:2)

“they used only the so-called Gospel according to the Hebrews and made small account of the rest.”
(Eusebius; Ecclesiastical History 3.27)

THEIR MATTHEW

NAZARENES:

“They [the Nazarenes] have the Gospel according to Matthew quite complete in Hebrew, for this Gospel is certainly still preserved among them as it was first written, in Hebrew letters.”
(Epiphanius; Panarion 29:9:4)

EBIONITES:

“In the Gospel that is in general use among them which is called ‘according to Matthew’, which however is not wholely complete but falsified and mutilated.”
(Epiphanius; Panarion 30:13:2)

SACRIFICES AND DOCTRINAL VEGETARIANISM

“In the Gospel that is in general use among them…reports: ‘I am come to do away with sacrifices, and if you cease not sacrificing, the wrath of God will not cease from you.’ “
(Epiphanius, Panarion 30:16:4-5)

Bart D. Ehrman writes:

The antisacrificial views of the Ebionites also come through in some of the [other] fragments which Epiphanius quotes [From the Ebionite version of the Gospel according to the Hebrews]. In one of them the disciples ask Jesus where he wants to eat the Passover lamb with them (cf. Mark 14:12). and he replies, “I have no desire to eat the flesh of this Passover lamb with you.” In another place he says “I have come to abolish the sacrifices; if you do not cease from sacrificing, the wrath of God will not cease from weighing upon you.”… Where there is no sacrifice, there is no meat… in the Gospel of the Ebionites description of John the Baptist… In this Gospel… the diet of John the Baptist was said to have consisted not of locusts [meat!] and wild honey (cf. Mark 1:6) but of pancakes and wild honey.
(Lost Christianities by Bart D. Ehrman; pp. 102-103)

However nothing we know about the Nazarenes would indicate that they opposed sacrifices. In fact Paul a “ringleader of the Nazarenes” (Acts 24:5, 14) performed animal sacrifices at the Temple (Acts 21:17-26; 24:17-18). Moreover, in the Nazarene version of the Gospel according to the Hebrews (The original, unabridged version of of Matthew), which was not “falsified and mutilated”, but was “whole” and “complete as it was first written” , Yochanan ate locusts and Yeshua ate the Passover lamb with his Talmidim.

ORIGIN OF EBIONITES WHO SPLIT FROM THE NAZARENES

“Next comes Ebion, the founder of the Ebionites. He held doctrines like those of the Nazarenes…being from their sect, although what he taught and proclaimed differed from what they did…”
(Epiphanius; Panarion 30:1:1)

“Their sect began after the capture of Jerusalem. For when all those who believed in Messiah settled at that time for the most part in Peraea, in a city called Pella … that provided an opportunity for Ebion. … They (Nazarenes and Ebionites) do in fact differ from each other…”
(Epiphanius; Panarion 30:2:7)

As we continue the restoration of the ancient Sect of the Nazarenes, it is very important that we understand that the Nazarenes were not Ebionites. (For example one group has published a document generally regarded as Ebionite (not Nazarene) in origin (The Clemintine Recognitions) as a “Nazarene Acts”, when in fact, Acts is Nazarene Acts.)

In these uncertain times, we need your support more than ever. The time is short, and there is much work to be done. This is no time to pull back from the great work in front of us! We must raise at least $1,220 by the end of the day Tuesday (2/18/25) to cover pending items and keep our account from going into the negative, starting a chain reaction of returned items and fees.

Just this last week we have published Commentary on Romans Chapters 3 and 4 plus new material on the Scripture Restoration Project and here plus a new video teaching on The Two Houses and Nazarene Judaism

If you can make a one time donation of $500 or $1,000 dollars to support this work.

Now is time to step up to the plate!

Donations can be sent by Paypal to donations@wnae.org or by Zelle, Go Fund Me. Bitcoin or Ethereum.

Click HERE to donate

“I

The False Sabbath of Mystery Babylon

The False Sabbath of Mystery Babylon
By
Robert O. Miller

Since the Catholic church changed the Scriptural liturgical calendar out of a dislike for anything “Jewish,” the holy days of Scripture that were celebrated by Messiah, His apostles, and the early Nazarenes were changed for the pagan and heathen holidays celebrated by most Christians today. Among the most economically important are Sunday, Christmas, Easter, and Halloween.

Very soon all humanity will be compelled to choose between “the commandments of Yahweh” the “Traditions of Men.” Between “Yahweh’s Sabbaths,” which He has commanded us to keep and the popular “Pagan Substitutes.” Between the “Signature of the Most High” and that Satanic counterfeit.

SUNDAY

Millions of sincere believers all over the world are of the opinion that Sunday, the first day of the week, is the “New Covenant Sabbath,” calling it “the LORD’S DAY!”

It is the Spirit of Anti-Christ that seeks to change the Sabbaths.

“And he (the Anti-Christ) shall speak great words against the most High, and shall wear out the saints of the most High, and think to change times and laws: and they shall be given into his hand until a time and times and the dividing of time.” (Daniel 7:25)

The only laws in Scripture which deal with the element of “time” are the Sabbath laws of the Most High. These laws are directly linked with the Feast days in the sacred calendar. (Leviticus 23) The Anti-Christvainly imagines that he can change Yahweh’s law.

Catholicism Speaks

“Sunday is a Catholic institution, and its claims to observance can be defended only on Catholic principles… From beginning to end of Scripture there is not a single passage that warrants the transfer of weekly public worship from the last day of the week to the first.”
–The Catholic Press, Sydney, Australia, August, 1900.

“Protestantism, in discarding the authority of the (Roman Catholic) Church, has no good reasons for its Sunday theory, and ought logically to keep Saturday as the Sabbath.”
–John Gilmary Shea, American Catholic Quarterly Review, January, 1883.

“It is well to remind the Presbyterians, Baptists, Methodists, and all other Christians, that the Bible does not support them anywhere in their observance of Sunday. Sunday is an institution of the Roman Catholic Church, and those who observe the day observe a commandment of the Catholic Church.”
–Priest Brady, in an address, reported in the Elizabeth, N.J. “News,” March 18, 1903.

“Ques.- Have you any other way of proving that the (Catholic) Church has power to institute festivals of precept (to command holy days)?”
“Ans.- Had she not such power, she could not have done that in which all modern religionists agree with her: she could not have substituted the observance of Sunday the first day of the week, for the observance of Saturday the seventh day, a change for which there is no Scriptural authority.”
–Stephen Keenan, A Doctrinal Catechism, page 176.

“Reason and common sense demand the acceptance of one or the other of these alternatives: either Protestantism and the keeping holy of Saturday, or Catholicity and the keeping holy of Sunday. Compromise is impossible.”
–The Catholic Mirror, December 23, 1893.

“God simply gave His (Catholic) Church the power to set aside whatever day or days, she would deem suitable as Holy Days. The Church chose Sunday, the first day of the week, and in the course of time added other days, as holy days.”
–Vincent J. Kelly, Forbidden Sunday and Feast-Day Occupations , page 2.

“Protestants…accept Sunday rather than Saturday as the day for public worship after the Catholic Church made the change… But the Protestant mind does not seem to realize that…in observing the Sunday, they are accepting the authority of the spokesman for the church, the Pope.”
–Our Sunday Visitor, February 5, 1950.

Not the Creator of the Universe, in Genesis 2:1-3,–but the Catholic Church “can claim the honor of having granted man a pause to his work every seven days.”
–S.D. Mosna, Storia della Domenica, 1969, pages 366, 367.

“If Protestants would follow the Bible, they should worship God on the Sabbath Day. In keeping the Sunday they are following a law of the Catholic Church.”
–Albert Smith, Chancellor of the Archdiocese of Baltimore, replying for the Cardinal in a letter, February 10, 1920.

“It was the Catholic Church which, by the authority of Jesus Christ, has transferred this rest (from the Bible Sabbath) to the Sunday… Thus the observance of Sunday by the Protestants is an homage they pay, in spite of themselves, to the authority of the (Catholic) Church.”
–Monsignor Louis Segur, Plain Talk About the Protestantism of Today, page 213.

“We observe Sunday instead of Saturday because the Catholic church transferred the solemnity from Saturday to Sunday.”
–Peter Geiermann, CSSR, A Doctrinal Catechism, 1957 edition, page 50.

“We Catholics, then, have precisely the same authority for keeping Sunday holy instead of Saturday as we have for every other article of our creed, namely, the authority of the Church…whereas you who are Protestants have really no authority for it whatever; for there is no authority for it (Sunday sacredness) in the Bible, and you will not allow that there can be authority for it anywhere else. Both you and we do, in fact, follow tradition in this matter; but we follow it, believing it to be a part of God’s word, and the (Catholic) Church to be its divinely appointed guardian and interpreter; you follow it (the Catholic Church), denouncing it all the time as a fallible and treacherous guide, which often ‘makes the commandments of God of none effect’ (quoting Matthew 15:6).”
–The Brotherhood of St. Paul, The Clifton Tracts, Vol. 4, tract 4, page 15.

“The Church changed the observance of the Sabbath to Sunday by right of the divine, infallible authority given to her by her founder, Jesus Christ. The Protestant claiming the Bible to be the only guide of faith, has no warrant for observing Sunday. In this matter the Seventh-day Adventist is the only consistent Protestant.”
–The Catholic Universe Bulletin, August 14, 1942, page 4.

“QUESTION- How prove you that the church hath power to command feasts and holy days?”
“ANSWER- By the very act of changing the Sabbath into Sunday, which Protestants allow of, and therefore they fondly contradict themselves by keeping Sunday strictly, and breaking most other Feasts commanded by the same church.”
“QUESTION- How prove you that?”
“ANSWER- Because by keeping Sunday they acknowledge the Church’s power to ordain feasts, and to command them under sin.”
–The Douay Catechism, page 59.

The Catechismus Romanus was commanded by the Council of Trent and published by the Vatican Press, by order of Pope Pius V, in 1566. This catechism for priests says: “It pleased the church of God, that the religious celebration of the Sabbath day should be transferred to ‘the Lord’s day.’ “
–Catechism of the Council of Trent (Donovan’s translation, 1867), part 3, chap. 4, p. 345.

“The Catholic Church for over one thousand years before the existence of a Protestant, by virtue of her divine mission, changed the day from Saturday to Sunday.”
–The Catholic Mirror, September 23, 1893.

“Of course the Catholic Church claims that the change was her act…. And the act is a MARK of her ecclesiastical authority in religious things.”
–H.F. Thomas, Chancellor of Cardinal Gibbons.

“1. Is Saturday the 7th day according to the Bible & the 10 Commandments?
“I answer yes.
“2. Is Sunday the first day of the week & did the Church change the 7th day–Saturday–for Sunday, the 1st day?
“I answer yes.
“3. Did Christ change the day?
“I answer no! Faithfully yours, “J. Card. Gibbons”
–Gibbons’ Autograph letter.

“Prove to me from the Bible alone that I am bound to keep Sunday holy. There is no such law in the Bible. It is a law of the holy Catholic Church alone. The Bible says ‘Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy.’ The Catholic Church says, No. By my divine power I abolish the Sabbath day and command you to keep holy the first day of the week. And lo! The entire civilized world bows down in reverent obedience to the command of the Holy Catholic Church.”
–Thomas Enright, CSSR, President, Redemptorist College (Roman Catholic), Kansas City, Mo., February 18, 1884.

“Ques.- Which is the Sabbath day?
“Ans.- Saturday is the Sabbath day.
“Ques.- Why do we observe Sunday instead of Saturday?
“Ans.- We observe Sunday instead of Saturday because the Catholic Church transferred the solemnity from Saturday to Sunday.”
–Peter Geiermann, The Convert’s Catechism of Catholic Doctrine (1946 ed.), p. 50. Geiermann received the “apostolic blessing” of Pope Pius X on his labors, Jan. 25, 1910.

“You may read the Bible from Genesis to Revelation, and you will not find a single line authorizing the sanctification of Sunday. The Scriptures enforce the religious observance of Saturday, a day which we never sanctify.”
–James Cardinal Gibbons, The Faith of Our Fathers (1917 ed.), pp. 72, 73.

“Nowhere in the Bible is it stated that worship should be changed from Saturday to Sunday. The fact is that the Church was in existence for several centuries before the Bible was given to the world. The Church made the Bible, the Bible did not make the Church.

“Now the Church…instituted, by God’s authority, Sunday as the day of worship. This same Church, by the same divine authority, taught the doctrine or Purgatory long before the Bible was made. We have, therefore, the same authority for Purgatory as we have for Sunday.”
–Martin J. Scott, Things Catholics Are Asked About (1927 ed.), p. 136.

“For ages all Christian nations looked to the Catholic Church, and, as we have seen, the various states enforced by law her ordinances as to worship and cessation of Labor on Sunday. Protestantism, in discarding the authority of the church, has no good reason for its Sunday theory, and ought logically, to keep Saturday as the Sabbath.”

“The State, in passing laws for the due Sanctification of Sunday, is unwittingly acknowledging the authority of the Catholic Church and carrying out more or less faithfully its prescriptions.

“The Sunday, as a day of the week set apart for the obligatory public worship of Almighty God, to be sanctified by a suspension of all servile labor, trade, and worldly avocations and by exercises of devotion, is purely a creation of the Catholic Church.”
–The American Catholic Quarterly Review, January, 1883, pp. 152, 139. [Emphasis Supplied.]

“If we consulted the Bible only, we should still have to keep holy the Sabbath Day, that is Saturday.”
–John Laux, A Course in Religion for Catholic High Schools and Academies, vol. 1 (1936 ed.), p. 51.

“Some theologians have held that God likewise directly determined the Sunday as the day of worship in the New Law, that He Himself has explicitly substituted the Sunday for the Sabbath. But this theory is now entirely abandoned. It is now commonly held that God simply gave His Church the power to set aside whatever day or days, she would deem suitable as Holy Days. The Church chose Sunday, the first day of the week, and in the course of time added other days, as holy days….

“The fact, however, that Christ until His death, and His Apostles at least for a time after Christ’s Ascension, observed the Sabbath is evidence enough that our Lord Himself did not substitute the Lord’s day for the Sabbath, during His lifetime on earth.”
–Vincent J. Kelly (Catholic), Forbidden Sunday and Feast-Day Occupations (1943 ed.), pp. 2, 19, 20.

“If Protestants observe the first day of the week are they in that act recognizing the authority of the Catholic Church?… It looks that way, since the custom they observe is of the Church and from the Church.”
–C.F. Thomas, chancellor to Cardinal Gibbons, replying in a letter to an inquiry addressed to the cardinal, February 8, 1898.

“All things whatsoever that it was duty to do on the Sabbath, these we (the church) have transferred to the Lord’s day.”
–Commentary on the Psalms, in Migne, Patrologia Graeca, vol. 23, col. 1171.

“Q.– Has the (Catholic) Church a power to make any alterations in the commandments of God? “A– …Instead of the seventh day, and other festivals appointed to the old law, the Church has prescribed the Sundays and holydays to be set apart for God’s worship; and these we are now obliged to keep in consequence of God’s commandments, instead of the ancient Sabbath.”
–Rt. Rev. Dr. Challoner, The Catholic Christian Instructed (1853), p. 204.

“The Church…after changing the day of rest from the Jewish Sabbath, or seventh day of the week, to the first, made the third commandment refer to Sunday as the day to be kept holy as the Lord’s day.”
–The Catholic Encyclopedia, Vol. IV, page 153.

“Nothing is said in the Bible about the change of the Lord’s day from Saturday to Sunday. We know of the change only from the tradition of the Church–a fact handed down to us from earliest times by the living voice of the Church. That is why we find so illogical the attitude of many non-Catholics, who say that they will believe nothing unless they can find it in the Bible and yet will continue to keep Sunday as the Lord’s day on the say-so of the Catholic Church.”
–Salvation History and the Commandments, page 294, 1963 edition, by Rev. Leo. J. Trese and John J. Castlelot, S.S.

“The Catholic Church transferred the observance from the seventh to the first day of the week…. The Catholic Church deemed it more fitting to appoint this day, rather than Saturday, the festival day of Christians.”
–This Is Catholicism, 1959 edition, John Walsh, S.J., p. 325.

“Why did the Church change the Lord’s day from the Sabbath to Sunday? The Church, using the power of binding and loosing which Christ gave to the Pope, changed the Lord’s Day to Sunday.”
–Life in Christ–Instructions in the Catholic Faith by Killgallen and Weber, 1958, p. 243.

“If the Bible is the only guide for the Christian, then the Seventh-day Adventist is right in observing the Saturday with the Jew… Is it not strange that those who make the Bible their only teacher, should inconsistently follow in this matter the tradition of the Catholic Church?”
The Question Box by Cardinal Gibbons, p. 179.

“The Bible does not contain all the teachings of the Catholic religion, nor does it formulate all the duties of its members. Take, for instance, the matter of Sunday observance, attendance at divine service, and abstention from unnecessary servile work on that day. This is a matter upon which our Protestant neighbors have for many years laid great emphasis; yet nowhere in the Bible is the Sunday designated as the Lord’s day; the day mentioned is the Sabbath, the last day of the week. The early Church, conscious of her authority to teach in the name of Christ, deliberately changed the day to Sunday.”
–Understanding the Catholic Faith by Rev. John A. O’Brien, 1955 edition, p. 13.

“But since Saturday, not Sunday, is specified in the Bible, isn’t it curious that non-Catholics who profess to take their religion directly from the Bible and not from the Church, observe Sunday instead of Saturday? Yes, of course it is inconsistent; but this change was made about fifteen centuries before Protestantism was born, and by that time the custom was universally observed. They have continued the custom, even though it rests upon the authority of the Catholic Church and not upon an explicit text in the Bible. That observance remains as a reminder of the Mother Church from which the non-Catholic sects broke away–like a boy running away from home, but still carrying in his pocket a picture of his mother or a lock of her hair.”
–The Faith of Millions, 1956, page 473.

Protestantism Speaks

Baptist: “There was and is a command to keep holy the Sabbath day, but that Sabbath day was not Sunday. It will however be readily said, and with some show of triumph, that the Sabbath was transferred from the seventh to the first day of the week, with all its duties, privileges and sanctions. Earnestly desiring information on this subject, which I have studied for many years, I ask, where can the record of such a transaction be found? Not in the New Testament–absolutely not. There is no scriptural evidence of the change of the Sabbath institution from the seventh to the first day of the week.”
–Dr. E.T. Hiscox, author of the Baptist Manual.

Baptist: “The Scriptures nowhere call the first day of the week the Sabbath… There is no Scriptural authority for so doing, nor of course, any Scriptural obligation.”
–The Watchman.

Baptist: “To me it seems unaccountable that Jesus, during three years’ discussion with His disciples, often conversing with them upon the Sabbath question, discussing it in some of its various aspects, freeing it from its false (Jewish traditional) glosses, never alluded to any transference of the day; also, that during the forty days of His resurrection life, no such thing was intimated. Nor, so far as we know, did the Spirit, which was given to bring to their remembrance all things whatsoever that He had said unto them, deal with this question. Nor yet did the inspired apostles in preaching the gospel, founding churches, counseling and instructing those founded, discuss or approach the subject.

“Of course I quite well know that Sunday did come into use in early Christian history as a religious day, as we learn from the Christian Fathers and other sources. But what a pity that it comes branded with the mark of Paganism, and christened with the name of the sun-god, then adopted and sanctified by the Papal apostasy, and bequeathed as a sacred legacy to Protestantism.”
–Dr. E.T. Hiscox, report of his sermon at the Baptist Minister’s Convention, in the New York Examiner, November 16, 1893.

Southern Baptist: “The sacred name of the Seventh day is Sabbath. This fact is too clear to require argument (Exodus 20:10 quoted)… On this point the plain teaching of the Word has been admitted in all ages… Not once did the disciples apply the Sabbath law to the first day of the week–that folly was left for a later age, nor did they pretend that the first day supplanted the seventh.”
–Joseph Judson Taylor, The Sabbath Question, pages 14-17, 41.

“The Lord’s Day is not sanctified by any specific command or by any inevitable inference. In all the New Testament there is no hint or suggestion of a legal obligation binding any man, whether saint or sinner, to observe the Day. Its sanctity arises only out of what it means to the true believer.”
–J.J. Taylor (Baptist), The Sabbatic Question, p. 72.

Congregationalist: “It is quite clear that however rigidly or devotedly we may spend Sunday, we are not keeping the Sabbath… The Sabbath was founded on specific, divine command. We can plead no such command for the observance of Sunday… There is not a single line in the New Testament to suggest that we incur any penalty by violating the supposed sanctity of Sunday.”
–Dr. R.W. Dale, The Ten Commandments, pages 106,107.

Congregationalist: “The Christian Sabbath [Sunday] is not in the Scriptures, and was not by the primitive church called the Sabbath.”
–Dwight’s Theology, Vol. 4, p. 401.

American Congregationalist: “The current notion that Christ and His apostles authoritatively substituted the first day for the seventh, is absolutely without any authority in the New Testament.”
–Dr. Layman Abbot, in the Christian Union, June 26, 1890.

Lutheran Free Church: “For when there could not be produced one solitary place in the Holy Scriptures which testified that either the Lord Himself or the apostles had ordered such a transfer of the Sabbath to Sunday, then it was not easy to answer the question: Who has transferred the Sabbath, and who has had the right to do it?”
–George Sverdrup, A New Day

“The observance of the Lord’s day (Sunday) is founded not on any command of God, but on the authority of the church.” –The Augsburg Confession of Faith, (Lutheran).

Anglican: “And where are we told in the Scriptures that we are to keep the first day at all? We are commanded to keep the seventh; but we are nowhere commanded to keep the first day.”
–Isaac Williams, Plain Sermons on the Catechism, pages 334, 336.

“The Lord’s day was merely of ecclesiastical institution. It was not introduced by virtue of the fourth commandment.”
–Jeremy Taylor (Church of England), Ductor Dubitantium, part 1, book 2, chap. 2, rule 6, secs. 51, 59 (1850 ed.), vol. 9, pp. 458, 464.

“Because it was requisite to appoint a certain day, that the people might know when they ought to come together, it appears that the (Christian) Church did for that purpose appoint the Lord’s day.”
–Augsburg Confession, part 2, art. 7, in Philip Schaff, The Creeds of Christendom (Scribners, 4th ed.), vol. 3, p. 69.

“And where are we told in the Scriptures that we are to keep the first day at all? We are commanded to keep the seventh; but we are nowhere commanded to keep the first day…. The reasons why we keep the first day of the week holy instead of the seventh is for the same reason that we observe many other things, not because the Bible, but because the church, has enjoined it.”
–Isaac Williams (Anglican), Plain Sermons on the Catechism, vol. 1, pp. 334, 336.

“They (the Catholics) allege the change of the Sabbath into the Lord’s day, contrary, as it seemeth, to the Decalogue; and they have no example more in their mouths than the change of the Sabbath. They will needs have the Church’s power to be very great, because it hath dispensed with a precept of the Decalogue.”
–The Augsburg Confession (Lutheran), part 2, art. 7, in Philip Schaff, The Creeds of Christendom (Scribners, 4th ed.), vol. 3, p. 64.

Episcopalian: “We have made the change from the seventh day to the first day, from Saturday to Sunday, on the authority of the one holy, catholic, apostolic church of Christ.”
–Bishop Seymour, Why We Keep Sunday.

“The festival of Sunday, like all other festivals, was always only a human ordinance, and it was far from the intentions of the apostles to establish a divine command in this respect, far from them and from the early apostolic church to transfer the laws of the Sabbath to Sunday.”
–History of the Christian Religion and Church by Neander (Episcopalian), page 186.

Episcopalian: “Sunday (Dies Solis, of the Roman calendar, ‘day of the sun,’ because dedicated to the sun), the first day of the week, was adopted by the early Christians as a day of worship…. No regulations for its observance are laid down in the New Testament, nor, indeed, is its observance even enjoined.”
–“Sunday,” A Religious Encyclopedia, Vol.3, (New York, Funk and Wagnalls, 1883) p. 2259.

Protestant Episcopalian: “The day is now changed from the seventh to the first day…but as we meet with no Scriptural direction for the change, we may conclude it was done by the authority of the church.”
–Explanation of Catechism.

Presbyterian: “There is no word, no hint in the New Testament about abstaining from work on Sunday. The observance of Ash Wednesday, or Lent, stands exactly on the same footing as the observance of Sunday. Into the rest of Sunday no Divine Law enters.”
–Canon Eyton, in The Ten Commandments.

“Some have tried to build the observance of Sunday upon apostolic command, whereas the apostles gave no command on the matter at all… The truth is, as soon as we appeal to the Literascripta (the literal writing) of the Bible, the Sabbatarians have the best of the arguments.”
–Christian at Work, (Presbyterian), ed. April 19, 1883.

Presbyterian: “Until, therefore, it can be shown that the whole moral law has been repealed, the Sabbath will stand…. The teaching of Christ confirms the perpetuity of the Sabbath.”
–T.C. Blake, D.D., Theology Condensed, pp. 474, 475.

Disciples of Christ: “There is no direct Scriptural authority for designating the first day ‘the Lord’s Day.’ “
–Dr. D.H. Lucas, Christian Oracle, January 23, 1890.

Christian Church: “Now there is no testimony in all the oracles of heaven that the Sabbath is changed, or that the Lord’s Day came in the room of it.”
–Alexander Campbell, in The Reporter, October 8, 1921.

Church of Christ: “Finally, we have the testimony of Christ on this subject. In Mark 2:27, he says: ‘The Sabbath was made for man, and not man for the Sabbath.’ From this passage it is evident that the Sabbath was made not merely for the Israelites, as Paley and Hengstenberg would have us believe, but for man…that is, for the race. Hence we conclude that the Sabbath was sanctified from the beginning, and that it was given to Adam, even in Eden, as one of those primeval institutions that God ordained for the happiness of all men.” –Robert Milligan, Scheme of Redemption, (St. Louis, The Bethany Press, 1962), p. 165.

Methodist: “it is true that there is no positive command for infant baptism. Nor is there any for keeping holy the first day of the week. Many believe that Christ changed the Sabbath. But, from His own words, we see that He came for no such purpose. Those who believe that Jesus changed the Sabbath base it only on a supposition.”
–Amos Binney, Theological Compendium, pages 180, 181.

“It is true that there is no positive command for infant baptism…nor is there any for keeping holy the first day of the week.”
–The Methodist Theological Compendium.

Methodist: “Take the matter of Sunday. There are indications in the New Testament as to how the church came to keep the first day of the week as its day of worship, but there is no passage telling Christians to keep that day, or to transfer the Jewish Sabbath to that day.”
–Harris Franklin Rall, Christian Advocate, July 2, 1942.

Moody Bible Institute: “The Sabbath was binding in Eden, and it has been in force ever since. This fourth commandment begins with the word ‘remember,’ showing that the Sabbath already existed when God wrote the law on the tables of stone at Sinai. How can men claim that this one commandment has been done away with when they will admit that the other nine are still binding?”
–D.L. Moody, Weighed and Wanting, p. 47.

Pentecostal: ” ‘Why do we worship on Sunday? Doesn’t the Bible teach us that Saturday should be the Lord’s Day?’… Apparently we will have to seek the answer from some other source than the New Testament.”
–David A. Womack, “Is Sunday the Lord’s Day?” The Pentecostal Evangel, Aug. 9, 1959, No. 2361, p. 3.

Originally written by Rabbi Robert O. Miller on Oct. 25th, 2010
(Robert Owen Miller 1957-2021)

Our Rent is due tomorrow! and we do not have it! As many of you know, my wife is chronically ill, disabled and suffering from chronic pain. We have been hit with unforeseen medical expenses this month. In these uncertain times, we need your support more than ever. The time is short, and there is much work to be done. This is no time to pull back from the great work in front of us!

Just this last week we have published Commentary on Romans Chapters 3 and 4 plus new material on the Scripture Restoration Project.

If you can make a one time donation of $500 or $1,000 dollars to support this work.

Now is time to step up to the plate!

Donations can be sent by Paypal to donations@wnae.org.

Or click HERE to donate

The Two Houses and Nazarene Judaism

The Two Houses and Nazarene Judaism Handouts

Our Rent is due in just three days and we do not have it! As many of you know, my wife is chronically ill, disabled and suffering from chronic pain. We have been hit with unforeseen medical expenses this month. In these uncertain times, we need your support more than ever. The time is short, and there is much work to be done. This is no time to pull back from the great work in front of us!

Just this last week we have published Commentary on Romans Chapters 3 and 4 plus new material on the Scripture Restoration Project.

If you can make a one time donation of $500 or $1,000 dollars to support this work.

Now is time to step up to the plate!

Donations can be sent by Paypal to donations@wnae.org.

Or click HERE to donate

Philo of Alexandria: A First Century Jew Who Believed in the Deity of Messiah

Philo of Alexandria:
A First Century Jew
Who Believed in the Deity of Messiah
By
James Scott Trimm

PHILO

Philo was an Alexandrian Jew who was born nearly 20 years before Yeshua and died around 20 years after his death. Philo was a “Hellenist Jew”. Not like the Hellenists of the Maccabean period who abandoned Torah for Paganism, but like Stephen (Acts 7) and the Hellenists in Acts 6. These Hellenists were Greek speaking Jews who remained Torah Observant (at least in there own understanding) while accepting Greek culture.

Josephus’ comments about Philo are so brief that we can quote them here in full:

“There was now a tumult arisen at Alexandria, between the Jewish inhabitants and the Greeks; and three ambassadors were chosen out of each party that were at variance, who came to Gaius. Now one of these ambassadors from the people of Alexandria was Apion, who uttered many blasphemies against the Jews; and, among other things that he said, he charged them with neglecting the honors that belonged to Caesar; for that while all who were subject to the Roman empire built altars and temples to Gaius, and in other regards universally received him as they received the gods, these Jews alone thought it a dishonorable thing for them to erect statues in honor of him, as well as to swear by his name. Many of these severe things were said by Apion, by which he hoped to provoke Gaius to anger at the Jews, as he was likely to be. But Philo, the principal of the Jewish embassage, a man eminent on all accounts, brother to Alexander the alabarch, and one not unskillful in philosophy, was ready to betake himself to make his defense against those accusations; but Gaius prohibited him, and bid him begone; he was also in such a rage, that it openly appeared he was about to do them some very great mischief. So Philo being thus affronted, went out, and said to those Jews who were about him, that they should be of good courage, since Gaius’s words indeed showed anger at them, but in reality had already set God against himself.”
(Antiquities of the Jews, xviii.8, 1)

Philo lived and wrote at the same time as the “New Testament” events were taking place. However Philo was far away in Alexandria Egypt, and apparently unaware of the budding Nazarene movement which had not yet come to Alexandria. Rabbinic Judaism has forgotten Philo. He is never mentioned or cited in the Rabbinic literature which makes no great mention of any Alexandrian Jews.

THE WORD

Philo is very important to us because he writes much about the Second Temple Era Jewish concept of the “Word” (Greek: LOGOS). In order to understand Philo’s concept of the Word, we must understand Philo’s concept of Elohim. Philo saw a conflict within Elohim. On the one hand, he saw Elohim as beyond man and far removed from the finiteness of this universe. He refers to this concept in Greek as TO ON (that which exists) and TO ONTOS ON “that which alone truly exists”. This concept of Elohim is conceived as virtually outside this universe with no real contact with it. This unknowable Elohim appeared from Ex. 20:21. (In Rabbinic Judaism (i.e. Kabbalah) this unknowable Elohim is called in Hebrew AYN SOF (without end/border; The Infinite One).

For Philo the Word (Logos) was a sort of bridge between the unknowable remote Elohim and the universe. The Word was a manifestation of the unknowable Elohim in this universe, an intermediary or mediator between man and Elohim. (One can immediately see that Philo’s Word parallels Rabbinic Judaism’s (Kabbalah’s) SEFIROT.)

Philo writes much about the concept of the “Word” (Greek: Logos)

…So that the Word (Logos) is, as it were, the charioteer of the powers,…
(On Flight and Finding XIX 101)

This is very important, as we have a first century Jew revealing to us the mystery of the throne-chariot.

The Mishna tells us:

They do not expound upon…
Ma’aseh Bereshit before [more than] two, or Ma’aseh Merkavah before [more than] one unless he was a sage and understands of his own knowledge.
(m.Hagigah 2:1)

In the Mishnah the Ma’aseh Merkavah (account of the throne-chariot) was a secret. But Philo tells us all about the secret, he tells us that the charioteer is the Word (Logos). It is generally accepted that the mysteries of the Ma’aseh Merkavah (account of the chariot – i.e. Ezek. 1-2) and Ma’aseh Bereshit (account of creation) were the material that later came to be referred to as “Kabbalah”. Philo tells us that the big secret of the chariot is that the charioteer is the Word.

Philo says:

…Every man in regard of his intellect is connected with Logos (Word),
being an impression of, or a fragment or emanation of that blessed
nature…
(Philo; On Creation LI (146))

THE WORD WAS THE CREATOR

Philo gave a very detailed description to the Word (Logos). To Philo the Word was the creator:

As therefore the city, when previously shadowed out in
the mind of architectural skill had no external place, but
was stamped solely in the mind of the workman, so in
the same manner neither can the world which existed in
ideas have had any other local position except the
Logos (Word) which made them…
(Philo; On Creation V (20))

Philo taught that the Word (Logos) was the shadow of Elohim and was the instrument of creation.

…But the shadow of God is his Logos (Word),
which he used like an instrument when he was
making the world.
(Philo; Allegorical Interpretation III XXXI (96))

(Not only does Philo speak of this “Word” but the ancient Targums do so as well. The Targums were Aramaic paraphrases of the books of the Tanak. Throughout the Targums we read of this entity called the “Word” (Aramaic: MEMRA). On many occasions the Targums paraphrase YHWH with the phase “Word of YHWH” and on some occasions the Word (MEMRA) is mentioned in the paraphrase where YHWH is not mentioned. The term is applied to YHWH in Targum Onkelos 179 times, the Jerusalem Targum 99 times and Targum Pseudo-Jonathan 321 times.)

This “Word of YHWH” was, according to Targum Jonathan, the Creator:

And the Word [Memra] of YHWH created man in his likeness,
in the likeness of YHWH, YHWH created,
male and female created He them.
(Targ. Jonathan Gen. 1:27)

This idea is also put forward in the Jerusalem Targum:

And the Word [Memra] of YHWH said to Moses:
“I am He who said unto the world ‘Be!’ and it was:
and who in the future shall say to it ‘Be!’
and it shall be.” And He said: “Thus you shall say
to the children of Israel: ‘I Am’ has sent me to you.”
(Jerusalem Targum Ex. 3:14)

The Fragmentary Targum of the Torah also expresses that the Word of YHWH was the Creator:

The first night, when the “Word of YHWH”
was revealed to the world in order to create it,
the world was desolate and void,
and darkness spread over the face of the abyss
and the “Word of the Lord” was bright and illuminating
and He called it the first night.
(Fragmentary Targum Ex. 12:42)

That the Word of YHWH was the Creator can also be seen in the Tanak itself:

By the Word (DAVAR) of YHWH were the heavens made,
and all the hosts of them by the Spirit of His mouth.
(Ps. 33:6)

THE WORD AS THE IMAGE OF ELOHIM AND PATTERN FOR OUR CREATION

Philo’s concept of the “Word” (Logos) is the “image of Elohim” which served as the pattern for the creation of man in Gen. 1:26-27. Philo writes:

…For God does not seem to have availed himself
of any other animal existing in creation as his model
in the formation of man; but to have been guided,
as I have said before, by his own Word (Logos) alone…
(Philo; On Creation XLVIII (139))

But the divine Word (Logos) which is above these
does not come into any visible appearance,
inasmuch as it is not like to any of the things
that come under the external senses,
but is itself an image of God,
the most ancient of all the objects of intellect
in the whole world, and that which is placed
in the closest proximity to the only truly existing God,
without any partition or distance being interposed
between them:
(On Flight and Finding XVIII (101))

Now, Bezaleel, being interpreted, means God in his shadow.
But the shadow of God is his Word (Logos), which he used
like an instrument when he was making the world.
And this shadow, and, as it were, model, is the archetype of other things.
For, as God is himself the model of that image which he has now called
a shadow, so also that image is the model of other things,
as he showed when he commenced giving the law to the Israelites,
and said, “And God made man according to the image of God.”[Gen. 1:26]
as the image was modeled according to God, and as man was modeled
according to the image, which thus received the power and character
of the model.
(Allegorical Interpretations III 96)

For if it was necessary to examine the mortal body
of the priest that it ought not be imperfect through
any misfortune, much more was it necessary to look
into his immortal soul, which they say is fashioned
in the form of the living God. Now the image of God
is the Word (Logos), by which all the world was made.
(The Special Laws I, 81)

What is the man who was created? And how is that man
distinguished who was made after the image of God? (Gen. 2:7).
This man was created as perceptible to the senses,
and in the similitude of a Being appreciable only by the intellect;
but he who in respect of his form is intellectual and incorporeal,
is the similitude of the archetypal model as to appearance,
and he is the form of the principal character;
but this is the Word (Logos) of God, the first beginning of all things,
the original species or the archetypal idea,
the first measure of the universe.
(Q & A on Gen. I, 4)

Why is it that he speaks as if of some other god,
saying that he made man after the image of God,
and not that he made him after his own image? (Gen. 9:6).
Very appropriately and without any falsehood
was this oracular sentence uttered by God,
for no mortal thing could have been formed
on the similitude of the supreme Father of the universe,
but only after the pattern of the second deity,
who is the Word (Logos) of the supreme Being;
since it is fitting that the rational soul of man should bear it
the type of the divine Word (Logos); since in his first Word (Logos)
God is superior to the most rational possible nature.
But he who is superior to the Word (Logos) holds his rank
in a better and most singular pre-eminence, and how could
the creature possibly exhibit a likeness of him in himself?
Nevertheless he also wished to intimate this fact,
that God does rightly and correctly require vengeance,
in order to the defense of virtuous and consistent men,
because such bear in themselves a familiar acquaintance
with his Word (Logos), of which the human mind is
the similitude and form.
(Q & A on Gen. II 62)

This parallels what we read in the Targum:

And the Word (Memra) of YHWH
created man in his likeness,
in the likeness of YHWH, YHWH created,
male and female created He them.
(Targ. Jonathan Gen. 1:27)

THE WORD AS THE OBJECT OF PRAYER

To Philo, it was the Word to whom the ancients petitioned and payed, for example Philo writes:

But Hagar flees out of shame. And a proof of this is, that the angel, that is the WORD of God, met her, with the intent to recommend her what she ought to do, and to guide her in her return to her mistress’s house. For he encouraged her, and said unto her: “The Lord has heard the cry of thy humiliation,” which you uttered, not out of fear, nor yet out of hatred. For the one is the feeling of an ignoble soul, and the other of one which loves contention, but under the influence of that copy of temperance and modesty, shame.
(On Flight and Finding (5))

Likewise we read in the Jerusalem Targum on this same incident:

And Hagar praised and prayed
in the name of the Word [Memra] Of YHWH
who had revealed Himself to her…
(Jerusalem Targum Gen. 16:3)

PHILO BELIEVED IN ELOHIM AS A TRIAD (TRINITY)

In order to understand Philo’s concept of the Word (Logos) it is important to understand Philo’s concept of Elohim. Philo says:

“The primal existence is God, and second the God-Word”
(Allegorical Interpretation II, 86)

“The Creator of the world sends out His powers
from an eternal and invisible place”
(Q&A on Genesis, II, 48)

Philo raises the question

“…regarding its Creator, asking of what sort this Being is so difficult to see, so difficult to conjecture. Is He a body or incorporeal or something exalted above these? Is He a single nature… Or a composite Being?…and seeing that this is a problem hard to pursue, hard to take in by thought, he prays that he may learn from God Himself what God is.”
(Flight and Finding, 164)

Philo doesn’t answer this question here, but he does answer these questions elsewhere. In On the Confusion of Tongues, 62, He calls God “incorporeal” and in a later section, he describes God as a “Triad” (Trinity). He refers to God as “…the Lord God of three natures…”(Philo; On the Change of Names II, 11). He also says:

…it is reasonable for one to be three and for three to be one, for they were one by a higher principle… …in the place of one, He makes the appearance of a triad [trinity]… He cannot be seen in his oneness without something [else], the chief Powers that that exist immediately with him… the Creative, which is called “Elohim” and the Kingly, which is called “Lord”… he begins to see the sovereign, holy, and divine vision in such a way that a single appearance appears as a triad [trinity], and the triad [trinity] as a unity.
(Philo; Questions on Genesis, IV, 2)

According to Philo God appears as a Triad — himself and his two Powers: Creative and Ruling. To the “purified soul,” however, God appears as One.

… the Father of the universe, who in the sacred scripture is called by his proper name,
‘I am that I am’; and the beings on each side are those most ancient powers which are always close to the living God, one of which is called his Creative Power, and the other his Royal Power. And the Creative Power is God, for it is by this that he made and arranged the universe; and the Royal Power is the Lord, for it is fitting that the Creator should lord it over and govern the creature. Therefore, the middle person of the three, being attended by each of his powers as by body-guard, presents to the mind, which is endowed with the faculty of sight, a vision at one time of one being, and at another time of three; …
(Abr. 119-123).

The reconciliation of these two opposing “powers”, the central power is the Word (Logos):

…the Divine Word (Logos)…fills all things and becomes a mediator and arbitrator for the two sides….from the Divine Word (Logos), as from a spring, there divide and break forth two powers. One is the creative through which the Artificer placed and ordered all things. This is named “God”. And the royal, since through it the Creator rules over created things. This is called “Lord” And from these two powers have grown the others. For by the side of the creative power there grows the propitious of which is named “beneficial” while (besides) the royal the legislative, of which is aptly named “punitive”. And below these and beside them is the ark.”
(Philo on Q&A on Exodus, II.68)

PHILO’S WORD IS THE SON OF ELOHIM

Philo Writes of the Word (Logos):

For there are, as it seems, two temples belonging to God; one being this world, in which the high priest is the divine Word, his own firstborn son. The other is the rational soul, the priest of which is the real true man,
(On Dreams 215)

And if there be not as yet any one who is worthy to be called a son of God, neverthless let him labour earnestly to be adorned according to his Firstborn Word, the eldest of his angels, as the great archangel of many names; for He is called, “the Authority”, and “the Name of God”, and “the Word”, and “man according to God’s image”, and “He who sees Israel”. . . For even if we are not yet suitable to be called the sons of God, still we may deserve to be called the children of his eternal image, of his most sacred Word; for the image of God is his most ancient word.
( On the Confusion of Tongues XXVIII:146-147)

Thus, indeed, being a shepherd is a good thing, so that it is justly attributed, not only to kings, and to wise men, and to souls who are perfectly purified, but also to God, the ruler of all things; and he who confirms this is not any ordinary person, but a prophet, whom it is good to believe, he namely who wrote the psalms; for he speaks thus, “The Lord is my shepherd, and he shall cause me to lack Nothing;” (Ps. 23:1.) and let every one in his turn say the same thing, for it is very becoming to every man who loves God to study such a song as this, but above all this world should sing it. For God, like a shepherd and a king, governs (as if they were a flock of sheep) the earth, and the water, and the air, and the fire, and all the plants, and living creatures that are in them, whether mortal or divine; and he regulates the nature of the heaven, and the periodical revolutions of the sun and moon, and the variations and harmonious movements of the other stars, ruling them according to law and justice; appointing, as their immediate superintendent, his own right reason, his first-born son, who is to receive the charge of this sacred company, as the lieutenant of the great king; for it is said somewhere, “Behold, I am he! I will send my messenger before thy face, who shall keep thee in the Road.”(Ex. 23:20.)
(On Husbandry 50-51)

PHILO’S WORD WAS A PRIEST LIKE MELCHIZADEK

Moreover Philo’s Word was a “priest” whom he compares to Melkizadek:

XXVI. (82) But Melchisedek shall bring forward wine instead of water, and shall give your souls to drink, and shall cheer them with unmixed wine, in order that they may be wholly occupied with a divine intoxication, more sober than sobriety itself. For the Word is a priest, having, as its inheritance the true God, and entertaining lofty and sublime and magnificent ideas about him, “for he is the priest of the most high God.”{38}{Genesis 14:18.} Not that there is any other God who is not the most high; for God being one, is in the heaven above, and in the earth beneath, and there is no other besides Him.”{39}{Deuteronomy 4:39.} But he sets in motion the notion of the Most High, from his conceiving of God not in a low and grovelling spirit, but in one of exceeding greatness, and exceeding sublimity, apart from any conceptions of matter.
(“De Allegoriis Legum,” iii. 26).

The fourth and last of the points which we proposed to discuss, is the appointing as a period for the return of the fugitives the death of the high priest, which, if taken in the literal sense, causes me great perplexity; for a very unequal punishment is imposed by this enactment on those who have done the very same things, since some will be in banishment for a longer time, and others for a shorter time; for some of the high priests live to a very old age, and others die very early, and some are appointed while young men, and others not until they are old. And again of those who are convicted of unintentional homicide, some have been banished at the beginning of the high priest’s entrance into office, and some when the high priest has been at the very point of death. So that some are deprived of their country for a very long time, and others suffer the same infliction only for a day, if it chance to be so; after which they lift up their heads, and exult, and so return among those whose nearest relations have been slain by them. This difficult and scarcely explicable perplexity we may escape if we adopt the inner and allegorical explanation in accordance with natural philosophy. For we say that the high priest is not a man, but is the Word (Logos) of God, who has not only no participation in intentional errors, but none even in those which are involuntary.
(On Flight 106-108)

PHILO’S WORD WAS A PARACLETE (ADVOCATE)

Philo also describes the Word (Logos) not only as the “Son” of the “Father” but as a PARACLETE who is “perfect in all virtue” and procures “forgiveness of sins” as well as a “supply of unlimited blessings”:

…the twelve stones arranged on the breast in four rows of three stones each, namely the logeum, being also an emblem of that reason (Logos, Word) which holds together and regulates the universe. For it was indispensable that the man who was consecrated to the Father of the world, should have as a paraclete, his son, the being most perfect in all virtue, to procure forgiveness of sins, and a supply of unlimited blessings;
(Life of Moses II, 133-134)

(Yeshua as the Messiah is called a PARACLETE in the Greek text of 1Jn. 2:1)

PHILO’S DIVINE WORD WAS THE MESSIAH

Now here is perhaps the most amazing thing, Philo believed this “Word” (Logos) and the Messiah to be one and the same:

“The head of all things is the eternal Word (Logos) of the eternal God, under which, as if it were his feet or other limbs, is placed the whole world, over which He passes and firmly stands. Now it is not because Messiah is Lord that He passes and sits over the whole world, for His seat with His Father and God but because for its perfect fullness the world is in need of the care and superintendence of the best ordered dispensation, and for its own complete piety, of the Divine Word (Logos), just as living creatures (need) a head, without which it is impossible to live.”
(Q&A on Exodus, II, 117)

The truth is that the doctrine of the Deity of Messiah was very much a Jewish idea already in the First Century. Philo, as a First Century Jew believed in the Messiah as:

* The Word

* The Creator

* The Image of Elohim from which we were created

* The Central aspect of Elohim as a Triad (Trinity)

* The Firstborn Son of Elohim

* A Heavenly High Priest like Melchizadek,

* A Paraclete (Advocate)

All of this was believe by a First Century Alexandrian Jew who by all accounts was unaware of the Messianic fervor surrounding Yeshua of Nazareth far away in Judea.

Our rent is due in less than a week! In these uncertain times, we need your support more than ever. The time is short, and there is much work to be done. This is no time to pull back from the great work in front of us!

If you can make a one time donation of $500 or $1,000 dollars to support this work.

Now is time to step up to the plate!

Donations can be sent by Paypal to donations@wnae.org, Zelle, Go Fund Me, Bitcoin and Ethereum.

Or click HERE to donate

How Christianity Replaced Passover with Weekly Communion and Easter

How Christianity Replaced Passover with Weekly Communion and Easter
By
James Scott Trimm

In speaking of the so-called “Lord’s Supper” Paul writes “For as often as you eat this bread, and drink this cup, you do show our Adon’s death till he come” (1Cor. 11:26) When Yeshua was observing Passover with his Talmidim he said “as often as you do this (observe Passover) do it in remembrance of me.” (Matthew 26:26–28; Mark 14:22–24; 1 Corinthians 11:23–25)

For many modern Gentile Christians this means “communion” and “…as often as you eat.. and drink…” has left serious question in Christian circles over how often to observe communion (or “sacrament” or “Eucharist” or “the Lord’s Supper” or whatever else it is called by a given denomination).

Christians inherited communion from the Catholic Church which began having “Eucharist” as the central point of weekly “Mass” (offering).

In fact to the Jewish reader the phrase “as often as you eat” points undeniably to the annual Passover meal (see Exodus 12).

How did Passover and the Sader become replaced in Christianity by Easter and the Weekly Communion?

When the day of worship was moved to Sun-Day fundamental changes had to be made.

First of all, the central element of the Synagogue Sabbath service is the bringing out and reading of the Torah. This could hardly remain the center of the Sunday morning church service, since the main thrust of Christianity is that the Torah is bondage from which “Jesus” gives it freedom.

Instead a form of pagan Sun god worship was retained by gentile Christians. The pagan Sun worship practice of the “bloodless sacrifice” of round wafers and wine replaced the Torah as the central element of the new Sunday worship.
(For details on this pagan practice click here)

Traditional annual Passover continued to be practiced by the Christians in Asia for some time. However the rest of the world replaced Passover with Sunday communion crowned with Easter Sunday. The custom in the rest of the word was described by Ireaneus as a duty of “celebrating the mystery of the resurrection of our Lord, only on the day of the Lord. [i.e. Sunday].” (Eusebius,Eccl. Hist. 5:24).

Around 153, near the end of his life, Polycarp visited the Roman Bishop Anicetus to discuss the differences that existed between Asia and Rome “with regard to certain things” especially the observance of Passover. They “disputed much with each other” over Passover. Ireaneus says:

“Neither could Anicetus persuade Polycarp not to observe it,
because he had always observed it with Yochanan the disciple
of our Lord, and the rest of the Apostles, with whom he associated;
and neither did Polycarp persuade Anicetus to observe,…”
(Ireaneus; quoted by Eusebius; Eccl. Hist. 5:24)

Then in 194 C.E. this conflict between Rome and Asia arose again when the Asian representative Polycrates of Ephesus wrote a letter to the Roman Bishop Victor. Eusebius describes the event this way:

A question of no small importance arose at that time. For the parishes of all Asia, as from an older tradition, held that the fourteenth day of the moon, on which day the Jews were commanded to sacrifice the lamb, should be observed as the feast of the Saviour’s Passover…But it was not the custom of the churches in the rest of the world…But the bishops of Asia, led by Polycrates, decided to hold to the old custom handed down to them. He himself, in a letter which he addressed to Victor and the church of Rome, set forth in the following words the tradition which had come down to him.
(Eusebius,Eccl. Hist. 5:24).

Polycrates wrote as follows:

We observe the exact day; neither adding, nor taking away. For in Asia also great lights have fallen asleep, which shall rise again on the day of the Lord’s coming, when he shall come with glory from heaven, and shall seek out all the saints. Among these are Philip, one of the twelve apostles, who fell asleep in Hierapolis; and his two aged virgin daughters, and another daughter, who lived in the Holy Spirit and now rests at Ephesus; and, moreover, John, who was both a witness and a teacher, who reclined upon the bosom of the Lord, and, being a priest, wore the sacerdotal plate. He fell asleep at Ephesus. And Polycarp in Smyrna, who was a bishop and martyr; and Thraseas, bishop and martyr from Eumenia, who fell asleep in Smyrna. Why need I mention the bishop and martyr Sagaris who fell asleep in Laodicea, or the blessed Papirius, or Melito the Eunuch who lived altogether in the Holy Spirit, and who lies in Sardis, awaiting the episcopate from heaven, when he shall rise from the dead? All these observed the fourteenth day of the Passover according to the Gospel, deviating in no respect, but following the rule of faith. And I also, Polycrates, the least of you all, do according to the tradition of my relatives, some of whom I have closely followed. For seven of my relatives were bishops; and I am the eighth. And my relatives always observed the day when the people put away the leaven. I, therefore, brethren, who have lived sixty-five years in the Lord, and have met with the brethren throughout the world, and have gone through every Holy Scripture, am not affrighted by terrifying words. For those greater than I have said ‘We ought to obey God rather than man’…I could mention the bishops who were present, whom I summoned at your desire; whose names, should I write them, would constitute a great multitude. And they, beholding my littleness, gave their consent to the letter, knowing that I did not bear my gray hairs in vain, but had always governed my life by the Lord Jesus
(Eusebius. Eccl. Hist. 5:24).

Bishop Victor attempted to cut off from the common unity Polycrates and others because they were observing Passover, but later reversed his decision after Irenaeus and others interceded.

At the Nicene Council the Roman Catholic Church decreed concerning “Easter”:

“It was decreed by common consent to be expedient, that this festival should be celebrated on the same day in every place… it seemed to everyone a most unworthy thing that we should follow the custom of the Jews in the celebration of this most holy solemnity, who, polluted wretches! Having stained their hands with a nefarious crime, are justly blinded in their minds. It is fit, therefore, that rejecting the practice of this people, we should perpetuate to all future ages the celebration of this rite, in a more legitimate order, which we have kept from the first day of our Lord’s passion even to the present times. Let us then have nothing in common with the most hostile rabble of the Jews. We have received another method from our Savior….”

In his Ecclesiastical History of the English Nation Book 3 Chapter 25 Bede recounts that this controversy arose again in Scotland in the 7th Century C.E. between those who observed Passover on the 14th day after the New Moon and those who instead “deliver the sacraments of the New Testament, to be celebrated by the church, in memory of his passion.” (i.e. weekly Communion) and “Easter”.

Is this work worthy of your support? What other ministry provides this kind of teaching? Please don’t forget to help pay for these studies.

We need your help today!

If you can make a one time donation of $500 or $1,000 dollars to support this work.

Now is time to step up to the plate!

Donations can be sent by Paypal to donations@wnae.org.

Or click HERE to donate

Nazarene Restoration Update

Shalom Chaverim,

I have to say 2021 has been a rough year for us. In February we were victims of the Texas Snowpocalypse. My wife had additional medical problems. Then a pair of very close relatives were hospitalized with Covid-19 (they survived). Then over the Summer our single largest financial supporter notified us that due to financial issues with his business, he was going to have to drastically reduce his donations. So far we have managed to get by because another contributor made some large donations that have helped, and I have been doing some temporary secular work at home that has helped make ends meet (unfortunately that is temporary).

In 2022 I hope to be able to spend more time on this great work of restoration. But I need your help to do it. I said it is unfortunate that the secular work is temporary, but actually it is a mixed blessing. In the grand scheme, it does not pay much, but it does take up a lot of my time. And this is time that should be spent on critical work of the restoration, for which I have unique qualifications, and decades of background study and education (Knowledge of Hebrew. Aramaic, textual criticism, Rabbinic literature, the Dead Sea Scrolls, Philo, Josephus etc.). And as I am getting older, I am becoming more mindful of the fact that my time on this planet is limited.

I have several projects underway (all of which I hope to publish on the internet for free):

The Scripture Restoration Project – Restoring the original Hebrew of the books of the so-called “New Testament” as well as the Gospel according to the Hebrews. (I am behind on posting this work online)

My Nazarene Commentary on the Scriptures – I am working on this out of order, filling in here and there as I go. However I have started to concentrate on the so-called “New Testament” books, because there is such a need for a correct understanding of these books, and that is the priority of what I need to get done first. Most of this is in my head and just needs to be written down in an organized manner.

A New Systematic Theology – Many years ago I published a Systematic Theology for Nazarene Judaism, however I hope to publish a better, more systematic version online, which will be more comprehensive.

The Halacha Project – A Systematic Halacha for Nazarene Judaism, which would be a codification of Nazarene Halachah similar to the Rabbinic Shulchan Aruch. It will be laid out on two major parts. The first part will be the Middot (principles) of Nazarene Halacha. The second part will be divided into the same basic divisions as the Shulchan Aruch, and will apply these principles, so as to develop a working codification of Nazarene Halacha. Like my Scripture Commentaries, I may skip around and cover topics according to priority of need within the Nazarene Community, and this work may take months or years to complete, if it is ever truly “complete”.

A Codification of Nazarene Philosophy, Something like a Nazarene parallel to the Tanya in Chabad.

Of course there are also new blogs and videos to be made, as the frontier of Nazarene Judaism expands.

Let me know in the comments section what you think about these projects.

I need to get all of this material out of my head and onto the internet, but I need your help to do it. I need to be able to dedicate more time to this great work, and I need to be able to keep the bills paid. However donations have been down instead of up!

If you can make a one time donation of $500 or $1,000 dollars to support this work.

Now is time to step up to the plate!