The Rivers of Eden

In the past I've been skeptical of thinking the description of Eden in Genesis 2 should be expected to line up to any Post-Flood geography, and I still am.  But I have become aware of the fact that there is a translation issue involved here.  A number of scholars have argued that most translations are confused by a misunderstanding of what a river's "head" means.  The text can be interpreted as describing four rivers flowing into one river, rather then one river splitting into four as the KJV translation tends to lead people to assume.

If the Euphrates here is the Euphrates we assume it is, then I don't think any of the rivers should be looked for in Arabia, or anywhere south/west of the Euphrates.  What leads people to look there is an assumption that this Havilah must be the same one that shows up in Arabia elsewhere in The Bible.  But there are two Havilahs in Genesis 10, I feel every Arabian Havilah is of Joktan while this Havilah being close to a Cush could be the Havilah of Cush.  In fact it could be in this context Havilah and Cush are different names for the same place existing between the Pison and Gihon.

Cush wasn't only in Africa we know via Nimrod some of his descendents were early on in Mesopotamia.  The name of the Iranian province of Khuzestan means "the Land of the Khuz". This Havilah is probably Hoveyleh

I believe there is significance to the order the rivers are listed in Genesis 2, something most popular theories about them don't consider.  Particularly I think it likely they are starting in the East and going Westward.  They are listed in the order Pison, Gihon, Hiddekel and lastly the Euphrates.  So if that is the Euphrates we assume it is, and the Hiddekel is indeed the Tigres, then the Gihon would be the Karkheheh river and the Pison would be the Karun river, known in classical times as the Pasitigres.  Here is a map taken from the Wikipedia page for the Karun. Both this rivers are in Khuzestan, with the Karkheheh kind of serving as one of it's borders.

Thus making the main River of Eden the Shatt al-Arab.

I'm not the first to propose these two rivers, my exact theory was proposed by at least one prior scholar, and another makes my Pison the Gihon.  But some want to take one of these while also trying to place the Pison or Gihon in Arabia.  And one website dismissed these two rivers by saying they are too small.  But the text of Genesis 2 says nothing about their size, it's merely man's imagination that wants to assume all four rivers were as epic and history defining as the Tigris and Euphrates.

Both of these rivers start in the Zargos mountains, which is why previous arguments for one of them being the Gihon tend to be based on saying the land of Cush in this context is the homeland of the Kassites commonly speculated to come from somewhere in the Zargos mountains.  

Al-Qurnah is a place on the Shatt al-Arab that locally claims to be where the Garden of Eden was.

The Karkheh river also plays a role in arguing that the land of Aratta from the Sumerian poems about Enmerkar was in the area of Mt Alvand and ancient Ecbatana, modern Hamdan, which in turn factors into B.J. Corbin's theory about where Noah's Ark landed.  His theory also involves using information from Jubilees to suggest the area around where the Ark landed was the ancient settlement of Arphaxad, remember the Book of Judith names the king of Ecbatana as Arphaxad which has always confused scholars.

Why I say Universal Salvation and not Universalism or Universalist

Currently anyway, I used to use those latter two terms more.  The issue is those terms do not clarify what it is I think is Universal.

I don't think "all religions lead to God", I believe Zero religions lead to God.  We are not Saved by finding God, we are Saved by The Good Shepherd finding His Lost Sheep.

I can't say with certainty that I think everyone's Ultimate Fate is exactly the same.  What I teach with certainty is that everyone will be Saved, and will ultimately be Happy with whatever their life in the New Creation winds up being.

By being Saved I mean we will be Resurrected, Body, Soul and Spirit, and won't be Annihilated and whatever Judgment/Punishment we may receive will be finite and for correction not endless.

You see people want to use against Universal Salvation verses that say certain people won't enter the Kingdom of Heaven. But what they're blind to is that not everyone who's Saved enters the Kingdom (at least not right away), in Revelation 21-22 the Kingdom is New Jerusalem, and we're explicitly told that there are Nations of the Saved outside New Jerusalem.

The notion that Universal Salvation somehow contradicts Free Will is predicated on thinking Salvation equals being in New Jerusalem, it doesn't.  I don't think God will be "taking love that isn't freely given", I believe He's not going to punish people only for rejecting Him.  His invitation is for everyone and that invitation will never be rescinded, Revelation 21:25 makes clear the Gates of New Jerusalem are never shut.

A number of people seem to be insisting they don't believe in Universal Salvation, but then argue for "Hell" not being literally a place of Torment but simply Separation from God.  So if you think the Unsaved will still exist and are not really being tormented, how are they NOT Saved?

C.S. Lewis explicitly rejected the Universalism of George MacDonald who he admired, but in both The Great Divorce and The Final Battle he paints a picture some Universal Salvation preachers like Peter Hiett see as pretty compatible with their views for two reasons.

1, He allows After Death repentance, a doctrine clearly taught in 1 Peter.

2. He basically presents "hell" as simply not being in Heaven, and seems to think the only thing keeping sinners out of Heaven is their own choice not to enter.

Mormonism basically teaches a form of Universal Salvation (at least the scenario depicted in Doctrine and Covenants 76 does).  Yet most Evangelicals prefer to criticize them from the opposite direction, insisting they teach very few people are Saved, they read that scenario and act like you're only Saved if you're in the Celestial Kingdom, which ironically is the one level depicted here I see as not having an analogue in Revelation 21, the Celestial Kingdom is where you become a god starting your own Universe.

Perhaps this bizarre perception of what it means to be saved is why so many people think Zach Snyder's Superman never saves anyone?

I am optimistic that eventually everyone will accept the invitation to enter New Jerusalem.  But my point here is that's not what Salvation is and so is not what I'm certain about.

A Reforming Reformer

I was raised Catholic but have spent most, maybe technically all, of my adult life being a Protestant of some form.  I have never been as pathologically anti Catholic as many Protestants, especially ones who were formerly Catholics, but I did used to have conspiracy theory tendencies that have waned over the last couple of years.

I'd have to say I'm probably still a Protestant, on most of the core issues upon which the Reformation was based I still side with the Protestant position.  The very title of this Blog references a Pillar of the Reformation and I haven't changed my mind on that, it's only gotten stronger the more unconventional interpretations of Scripture I accept.  And in terms of Church hierarchy I'm to a Catholic or Orthodox POV worse then mainline Protestants, I'm even more Anarchical then the Independent Baptists and even more Democratic then the Presbyterians.  And I recently made a post on how I don't regard the Ecumenical Councils even if I do think some of them were right on some things.

However I no longer believe in accusing people of not being true Christians no matter how wrong I think their views are.  1 John 4:15, 1 Corinthians 12:3 and Romans 10:9 tell me all Christians are true Christians.

Sometimes when Protestants, Evangelicals, Baptists and Torah Observant Christians are arguing with each other they will use a view being like a doctrine Catholics have been associated with as an inherent argument against it.  Like when someone tries to explain a view on the After Life or the Coming Judgment that has even the vaguest similarity to Purgatory they'll get shouted down with "That's Purgatory, a Catholic doctrine".

And I've come to realize that is also a violation of Sola Sciprtura, saying "if the Catholics taught it, it must be wrong" is adding to Scripture just as much as blindly following their tradition does.

The Catholic Church also Believes Jesus is The Son of God, and The Word Made Flesh, and born of a Virgin, and was Crucified and died for our Sins and rose again on the third day, and contrary to what you may expect the Catholic Encyclopedia even stresses that the General Resurrection of The Dead is of the Flesh.  And they believe in The Trinity.  Heck most issues behind the 1054 Great Schism are ones mainline Protestants still take the Western Position on,  (as for me I understand the Orthodox issue with the Filioque but have to raise my eyebrow at saying it's "Jewish" to use unleavened bread in communion).

So when you start saying the Pope must be wrong on everything you're opening a pretty awkward can of worms.

The problem with the Medieval Purgatory doctrine was how it was a form of Spiritual Extortion, the Church getting Peasants to pay them money to do special masses to shorten their loved ones time there.  Obviously I'm not arguing anything like that is valid.  And even what the modern Catholic Church teaches on the issue isn't really the same as anything I believe.  However there are Bible verses they cite in support of the doctrine that are also verses I have cited in support of my ideas throughout the history of this blog.  It's the simplistic idea that "good people go to heaven and bad people go to hell" that comes from Plato and Zoroastrianism not The Bible.

I still mostly hold a Baptist position on Baptism.  However contrary to popular assumption the Catholic Church does not officially definitively state that all babies who die unbaptized go to Hell.  Support for the idea of doing something like an Infant Baptism comes from the comparison of it to Circumcision in Collisions 2:11-12, and Acts 2:38-39 implying a link between Baptism and vowing to raise your children to be Believers, and undetailed references to entire households being Baptized.

The thing is, there are two Water Baptisms in the New Testament.  There is the Baptism of John that was for Repentance, and then the Baptism Apollos still hadn't had when he joined The Church at Ephesus.  For someone raised a Christian the Baptism of Repentance is what happens second, that is only for adults.  If you join the Church as an adult normally one Baptism covers both.  But people who came out of John's movement were in a unique position.

I've noticed that Protestantism is more susceptible to Nationalism, a product of seeing Spiritual Allegiance to someone who's technically a foreign head of state as potentially treasonous.  In Italy it's different since The Pope isn't so far away, yet in the 19th Century the Popes still opposed Italian Unification.  The history of Religion in Nazi Germany is complicated but generally the Lutherans were more willing to work with Hitler then the Catholics.  And it's mostly among Protestants you'll find people who try to make whatever tribe they were born into a Lost Tribe of Israel.  Catholics are a lot less susceptible to forgetting that The Gospel is not Ethno-Centric.

I agree with the Catholic view that The Church is the real Nation we should be loyal to.  But I disagree that that means we need a highly organized Church institution. The Holy Spirit and The Bible should be the source of our Unity not a man made hierarchy.

But what about my Soterology?  Am I still Sola Fide?  Well I now believe in Universal Salvation, and there are supporters of some form of that Soterology among Protestants and Evangelicals and Catholics and the Orthodox and Nestorians.  No major denomination is willing to label Gregory of Nyssa a heretic, so there is room for the True Gospel everywhere.

The Genealogy of John Mark

I'm inclined towards believing every Mark/Marcus mentioned in the New Testament is the same person (and that person was never in Egypt).  But if they're separate we know the author of the Gospel According to Mark is the Mark associated with Peter, 1 Peter 5:13 and Acts 12:12.

Acts 12 in verses 12 and 25 link a "John whose surname was Mark" to both Peter and Paul and Barnabas.  Individually both of those were common enough we can't assume two people are the same simply for having that name.  But together it's a lot less common and I feel Acts 12:25 would only repeat the exact same wording as verse 12 if they wanted to tell us they were the same person.

Peter refers to Mark as his Son in chapter 5 verse 13 of his first epistle.  Most people don't take that exactly literally, or rather not biologically, but what if it is?  In Acts 12:12 Peter is liberated from prison and heads to the house of a Mary the mother of John Mark, maybe he was going to the house of his wife and son?  In 1 Corinthians 9:5 Paul says that all of the Apostles but him and Barnabas are married.

Now Mary was an insanely common name, so many are quite annoyed at attempts to identify different Marys with each other.  But I a made post last year arguing the individual Paul called Kepha was actually Mary Magdalene not Simon Peter.  I made a couple pretty strong smoking gun arguments, but the fact remains John 1:42 clearly identifies a Kephas with Peter.  What if it was because Peter and Mary Magdalene were married that this title became one they shared?  And Paul chose to use Petros for the Husband and Kepha was the Wife?

Next is the question of how Mark is related to Barnabas.  In Collisions 4:10 the word sometimes translated cousin or nephew (and "Sister's son" in the KJV) is a word for relative that doesn't really seem to be that specific.  This is the only time the New Testament ever uses this word, but it seems like there may be precedent for it not being a literal biological relation at all, and maybe Paul is just using it here because of the connection Mark and Barnabas had in Acts 15:36-39.

When we're first introduced Barnabas in Acts 4:36 he's described as being from Cyprus.  Later on he and Mark together become strongly tied to Cyprus in Acts 13 and 15:36-39.  I also argued for the possibility that Magdalene and Mary of Bethany are the same.  And there are some early traditions that suggest Lazarus and his Sisters fled to Cyrpus sometime soon after the events of the Fourth Gospel.

I'm not interested in whether or not I agree with the Seven Ecumenical Councils.

 First, for people who don't know what I'm referring to.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_seven_ecumenical_councils

I want to state that this goes both ways, I'm not so Anarchic that I'm gonna act like whatever decision the councils made must be wrong, that attitude also gives them too much power.  I feel like I basically agree with the main Theological decisions of the first four Ecumenical Councils, but those Councils also made smaller decisions on things like Church Hierarchy that I can't get behind.  The issue around which the 6th Council was convened I haven't even looked into enough to know if I'd have an opinion on it.  The rest are issues I have and will continue to look into on this Blog.

To me The Bible is not just the Final Authority but the only Authority. Now people will point to Acts 15 as Biblical Support for the idea of Church Councils.  First of all that Council was attended by The Apostles, I've already refuted the notion that Apostolic Authority can be passed on.  So this is the only Council that has Apostolic Authority, and it's decision and historical context is recorded for us in Scripture.

But secondly, even if you convinced me some Councils, like the Pre-Nicene/Pre-Constantine ones, mattered even a little bit.  The Ecumenical Councils wee in direct violation of passages like 1 Corinthians 6 and Matthew 18 that forbid Christians from turning to Civil Authorities to settle disputes.  It doesn't matter if a head of state is a Christian, their authority is Civil not Ecclesiastical.  The Council of Nicaea was presided over by Constantine himself, and the Bishops asked him to do it, maybe because they felt he'd be a neutral party.  Constantine was not Baptized till he was on his death bed.  To me Baptism has nothing to do with Salvation, but to most Ecumenical Council affirming Christians you at least have to be Baptized to be considered a part of The Church.

The second Ecumenical Council was convened by the Emperor who first made Christianity the state religion of the Empire for the purpose of defining what his new state religion was.  The first Council of Ephesus basically became two councils and it was Theodosius II who decided which one was right.  Chalecdon wasn't even headed by a Bishop but by a committee of Senators and government officials  The 5th Ecumenical Council was entirely a product of Justinian's misguided agenda to try and fix the Chalcedonian schism by further pushing away the Nesotrians and others who were simply associated with them.

So for this reason the Ecumenical councils are the least authoritative councils not the most.  They are The Church marrying the State, the Sin of Pergamos.

There is also debate about how many of these even fit what the word "Ecumenical" is supposed to mean.  The first two councils held in Constantinople had less then half as many attendees as Nicaea.  For Nicaea Constantine had invited 1,800 Bishops, 1000 in the east and 800 in the west, but only 318 max showed up.  Now it'd be easy for a moderner to throw a "if you don't vote you can't complain" argument at those who didn't attend, but maybe the majority of Bishops actually understood the Biblical Arguments against doing a council like this I laid out above.  Only 5 Bishops represented the entire Western half of the Empire.

One Bishop known to be missing is Lyon's, Lyon was the oldest Church in Gaul the one founded by Irenaeus and other immigrants from Asia Minor but principally Smyrna in the second century.  But neither Maximus of Lyon or Tetradius of Lyon attended instead Gaul was represented by a Bishop of a much less significant city, Nicasius of Die.  We also know Britannia had 3 bishops at this time including one for York, but whether or not any attended Nicaea is disputed.  But it's not just looking West, East of the Empire there were Papa bar Aggai and Simeon Bar Sabbae leading the Church in Babylonia/Persia, there's no evidence they attended the council either.

The 7th and last Council had only 35 attendees and no Frankish Bishops were represented which agitated Charlemagne.  Only Chalcedon had significantly more attendees then the first one, and that was still only 520.  The 3rd and 4th Councils caused Schisms, not even everyone who attended consented to their outcomes.

The fact is I don't consider any of the issues these Councils debated all that important to whether one is a "True Christian" or not.  Now ultimately nothing besides if you call Jesus Lord and believe He's the Son of God matters to if you're a "True Christian" or not.  In other words there pretty much are no false Christians in my view, I firmly believe that because of 1 John 4:15 and 1 Corinthians 12:3.

But even after that the issues discussed at these Councils are not at the top of the list of issues I consider it important to be right on.  Being right on the issue of The Bodily Resurrection and Soterology are certainly above them in importance based on 1 Corinthians 15 and Romans 5.

Some of my allies on Universal Salvation insist they don't want to make it a core essential doctrine of the Faith, and yet are certainly Ecumenical Christians to some extent.  To me being right or wrong on this issue is ultimately more important even then if you're right on The Trinity.  And after those two vital issues I may even consider the Virgin Birth and Pre-Millenialism more important then The Trinity.

Again to be clear my view of the Trinity is a Nicene one, especially in the context of my research into Old Testament Trinity passages.  But I am sympathetic to those at the Council who weren't even slightly Arian but still uncomfortable with the word Homusias because it was Unbiblical and condemned by an earlier Pre-Nicene council for it's association with Modalism, and some claim it was Constantine himself who insisted on this word being in the Creed.

And there are some passages like Hebrews 1-2 that I'm not sure how to refute the Arian interpretation of.  So I can't consider people like Arians or Unitarians damnable heretics, especially not the ones around today who are with me on Universal Salvation.

I know I may be reinforcing the notion among critics of Universal Salvation that it is a heresy by  admitting to it making me feel some kinship with Untarians and Mormons.  But my point is you should consider Salvation more important whatever your position on Salvation is.  And no Universal Salvation is not a reason for me to break with the Ecumenical Councils, the 7th and final one declared Gregory of Nyssa a "Father of the Fathers", and numerous people have already debunked the notion that Universal Salvation was condemned by the fifth council.  (It's not an Ecumenical Council but the council of Orange condemned both Pelagianism and Double-Predestination equally.) C Baxter Kruger very strongly ties The Trinity to his view of Universal Salvation.

Soteorlogy was not directly the subject of any of the Ecumenical Councils, though I know Ryan Reeves likes to explain how it's all indirectly relevant. But the fact is none of these hard to understand nuances of Theology or Christology matter so long as you simply believe what The Bible says about Jesus being without Sin and dying for our Sins and being Risen to a Bodily Resurrection.

Protestant Christianity is divided between three different positions on the Councils.  The Anglican Church and I think some others uphold all Seven of them.  Some other High Church Protestants like Lutherans uphold the first four but not the last three.  (I'd like to know more about their reasons for doing so, I haven't looked into it yet.)  And then there are people like Independent Baptists and the Hebrew Roots movement who like me don't feel bound to any of them, though too many of those take the overly contrary attitude I also warned about at the start.

I've coined the term Justinianity for all denominations that uphold the fifth Ecumenical Council (to my knowledge there are none that keep the 5th but drop either of the final two).  That's Roman Catholicism, the Eastern Orthodox Church, the Anglican Church, and maybe some others.

A recent Twitter Thread I made

https://twitter.com/JaredMithrandir/status/1090615530824916992

I might be adding to it in the future.

The Torah and Angels

Josephus tells us that the Sadducees were a sect that limited their inspired Canon to only The Torah, the Five Books of Moses, (he also says they believed in no Ressurection or After Life and had a very extreme belief in human Free Will).  The New Testament doesn't tell us that directly but it's inferred in how Jesus stayed within the Torah to prove the Resurrection to them in Matthew 22.

In Acts 23:6-9 we get a further elaboration on what the Sadducees believed.

But when Paul perceived that the one part were Sadducees, and the other Pharisees, he cried out in the council, "Men and brethren, I am a Pharisee, the son of a Pharisee: of the hope and resurrection of the dead I am called in question."  And when he had so said, there arose a dissension between the Pharisees and the Sadducees: and the multitude was divided.  For the Sadducees say that there is no resurrection, neither angel, nor spirit: but the Pharisees confess both.

 And there arose a great cry: and the scribes that were of the Pharisees' part arose, and strove, saying, "We find no evil in this man: but if a spirit or an angel hath spoken to him, let us not fight against God."

They didn't believe in the Resurrection, angels or spirits.  Now based on this scene alone Paul only explicitly sides with the Pharisees on the Resurrection, we have to go elsewhere to try and figure out his (and the rest of The New Testament's) positions on the other issues. 

What I want to talk about here however is how I've seen a lot of online scholars say this can't be accurate, that a sect which upholds The Torah can't possibly have any grounds to reject the existence of Angels.  And indeed the modern Torah only people you'll encounter online tend to fit every aspect of Paul's description of the Sadducees except the part about Angels, like The Desert Tabernacle Wordpress blog or the Remember the Commands Youtubde channel.

The thing is, I as someone who's very unconventional, have looked into the possibility of rejecting the doctrine of Angels as it's traditionally understood.  I've concluded that many passages both within The Torah and elsewhere we assume to be referring to Angels can potentially be interpreted differently when you remember things like the word "angel" in the Greek and Hebrew being their word for messenger and definitely does refer to human prophets sometimes.  However I feel unable to fully reject the idea because of certain passages, but none of those passages are in The Torah.  If I decided to become a Torah Only person, I might very well reject the doctrine of angels as it's traditionally understood.

First of all I have already decided I believe the Sethite view of Genesis 6.  

Second, the majority of the time the word "Angel" appears in the KJV of the Torah, indeed every time it does so in singular form, it is referring to The Angel of YHWH or The Angel of God, an entity which even many Pharisees (like Trinitarian Christians) view as being a manifestation of YHWH Himself (The Word of YHWH) not a completely separate Angelic being.  Remember the Voice in the Burning Bush is technically called an Angel.

The Seraphim or "fiery serpents" from Numbers I believe originally refereed to a type of serpent or reptilian animal indigenous to the region (I lean towards the Pterodactyl aka Ropen), it is Isaiah alone who places some in the Throne Room of God, and those I think if they are "Angels" are Angels taking the form of that Animal, or appearing like them to Isaiah's three dimensional eyes.

Now I'd like readers to stop for a minute and read the story of Philip and the Ethiopian Eunuch in Acts 8.  Now imagine if that story had been recorded from the Eunuch's POV rather then Philip's?  It could very conceivably seem to readers generations later like an encounter with an Angel.

We know that during the time of the Patriarchs of Israel there were people worshiping YHWH in other places, like Salem ruled by Melchizedek or the Kenite Priesthood of Jethro.  So the two "Angels" of Genesis 18-19 could possibly have been Human Prophets that YHWH assigned this task to.

Likewise in Genesis 31:1-2 the "Host of God" could be a camp of believers sent to greet Jacob when he returned to the land.  In fact if we translated "Malakim" consistently in Genesis 32, it becomes plausible the "messengers" Jacob sent to Esau in verse 3 came from among these "angels".  The Hebrew word for "Host" here isn't the same one used in verses about the "Host of Heaven". It's a word elsewhere translated Camp including when referring to the Camp of Israel in the Wilderness and when the Red Heifer is described as being slain "without the camp".  So this Camp could have been of people from Isaac's household.

Genesis 28:12 is something Jacob saw in a dream and therefore iffy to build literal doctrine on. The point was to show this place as a "Gate of Heaven".

The "Host of Heaven" is simply a term for the stars, and no verse in The Torah can be taken to insinuate the stars are living sentient beings.  The worship of the stars is compared to the worship of Idols, inanimate objects.

That just leaves Genesis 3.  In the KJV of verse 14 Cattle is a mistranslation, Behemah I have come to view as simply the broadest Hebrew word for Animal.  The English grammar of verses 1 and 14 of Genesis 3 leave more room for interpretation, but in the Hebrew it is actually unambiguous that the Nahash/Serpent is a Behemah and a Beast of the Field.  Making it one of the Beasts of the Field created in Genesis 2:18-20.

The Beasts and Fowls created in Genesis 2:19-20 are a separate creation from the animals created before Adam was in Genesis 1.  These must be beings who were a bit more sentient since they are, as weird as we may find it, presented as potential Mates for Adam.  Frankly I think the Cherubim (as well as the Seraphim Isaiah saw in the Throne Room) could also be among the creatures created here.

You could define such creatures as Angelic, but that isn't the traditional view of Angels.

The problem is some may seek to use that origin for the Serpent against identifying it with the Satan, which identification the Book of Revelation clearly makes.  But I don't view it as a conflict, Satan is never called an Angel, only said to appear as one.

The verses outside the Torah that are the real obstacle to rejecting the traditional view of Angels are Psalm 8 (which seems to imply the Angels existed before Adam), 2 Kings 6:17, Daniel 10 (and perhaps other Daniel material), and then lots of New Testament stuff, but some New Testament Angels I think are OT Saints Resurrected soon after Jesus was based on Matthew 27:52-53.
[Update: I just realized Psalm 8:5 uses Elohim not Malakim, so we could translate that "a little lower then God" thus removing it from the equation.  I believe Hebrews was originally written in Hebrew so no I don't think Greek texts of it's quotation using Angels proves anything.]

So I still believe Angels exist, but people who limit their Canon to the Torah can easily decide otherwise if they want to.

Though I think it's also plausible that the Sadducees were influenced by the philosophy of Aristotle (and/or Epicureanism) who could be described as the original Deist as well as the first Materialist, Antigonus of Sokho may have been the key middle man in that transmission.

Some have mistakenly compared the Saduccess to Platonic Philosophy, but that's based on how within Christianity denial of a bodily Resurrection usually comes via allegorizing it away into a Spiritual rather then physical one.  The Sadducees didn't just deny the Resurrection but any notion of an After Life, they were Jewish Materialists.

So I'm not saying you have to reject the idea of Angels if you limit your Canon to just The Torah, or even that doing so is the most natural conclusion, but it is possible if for whatever reason you wanted to.