The Tribal divison of Deuteronomy 27

Scholars have long been puzzled by how the Tribes of Israel are divided in Deuteronomy 27:11-13, placing half on the mountain of Blessing and half on the mountain of Cursing.  It doesn't correspond to the split between Rehoboam and Jeroboam, it doesn't line up to their mothers exactly either, it seems random.

As someone who's spent a lot of time comparing in my mind the tribal allotments of Joshua to the how Israel was geopoliticaly in the Time of Christ based largely on how Herod's domain was divided upon his death.  I've noticed an interesting correlation here.

Those on Mount Gerizim seem to equate to what was directly under Rome via Pilate's governance, which had at Herod's death been inherited by Archleous mentioned at the end of Matthew 2.  While those on Ebal equate to what was inherited by other sons of Herod, or perhaps even specifically by Antipas.

First listed on Ebal are Gad and Reuben, the southernmost of the Trans-Jordan tribes thus making them equate pretty well to Perea.  Galilee as it was in NT times wasn't just Zebulun and Naphtali but also included much of Assher and perhaps even some of Dan.  Dan could also equate well to what Philip inherited.  But I still think it could also be Antipas, usually Antipas isn't thought to have extended that far north, but when Antipas and Aretas went to war, Damascus got tangled up in that.  Or it could be notable that Dan's original allotment being adjacent to the Philistines could be in what Herod's sister Salome inherited.

On Gerizim were Judah, Levi and Benjamin, the three core Tribes of the Kingdom of Judah which became Judea.  Simeon's original allotment equates well to NT era Idumea.  And the house of Joseph became Samaria.  What Archelus inherited is defined as Judea, Samaria and Idumea.

The only possible issue is Isschcar, which I'll get into later.

But first, if this is true, what is the theological significance of it?

Luke 23:6-7 shows Jesus as a Galilean was of Herod Antipas jurisdiction.  Jesus grew up in Galilee and did most of his ministry there, but He also said "no Prophet is accepted in his own country".  It was in Judea that his Birth, Death, Resurrection and Ascension happened, and where Pentecost happened.  Perea being under Antipas control is why he had the authority to arrest John The Baptist.

During the time of of the 66-73 AD war, the same lands Antipas ruled and beyond were under Herod Agrippa II's control.

Issachar is often considered also part of NT era Galilee.  Mainly because the traditional site of Nazareth is adjacent to what is traditionally identified as Japhia/Jafia, a city of Issachar.  But I have reasons to think one or both of those traditional identifications is wrong.

Both Isaiah 9:1 and the New Testament passages that quote it (Matthew 4:13-15) only mention Zebulon and Naphtali.  I think Isaiah's original context was possibly only intending to define Naphtali as Galilee, (other OT references to Galilee mention just Naphtali not Zebulon).  In New Testament times Galilee as Antipas ruled it definitely extended further west then just Naphtali, possibly because of how Greco-Roman Jews interpreted Isaiah 9.  Meanwhile Matthew 4 could be viewed as saying Jesus going from Nazareth to Capernaum was going from Zebulun to Naphtali.

Zebulun and Issachar are often paired together, like in Deuteronomy 33 and arguably also Genesis 49.  And there are other passages that seem to mention only one and not the other.  But also in general the different views on how to map out the allotments of the tribes are often most confusing when it comes to these two tribes, both in how they relate to each other and in how they relate to Asher and parts of western Manasseh.  The most popular map gives neither any coast land while Genesis 49 and Deuteronomy 33 both seem to predict at least Zebulon will be by the sea.  (Note, in Deuteronomy 33 the "West" linked to Naphtali is the Hebrew word for Sea and so probably refers to the Sea of Galiee.)

The city of Samaria itself is possibly a reason why I think perhaps Issachar should be considered part of Samaria not Galilee. 

First you should know that in the Hebrew text the spelling of Samaria often has an N at the end.  Meaning it's spelling is basically the same as Shimron, a son of Issachar in Genesis 46:13 who had a clan in Numbers 26:24.  And Joshua 12:20 mentions a Shimron near Meggido.

As the name of a city Samaria didn't exist before Omri founded it (there is a Prophetic reference in the time of Jeroboam).  But he's said to have named it after who he bought the hill from.  At first glance it seems like it's saying an individual, but it could mean the clan.

Omri had just overthrown a Dynasty who came from Issachar, Baasha's, and was fighting a civil war with Tibni who could have been of the same tribe for all we know.  Choosing a capital at the border of Issachar and Manasseh-Joseph could have been a unifying gesture.  Like David's move in choosing Jerusalem for his capital, just on Benjamin's side of the Benjamin-Judah border.

Even if this moves south what's typically viewed as Issachar it's still moving Samaria north of it's traditional location, since it's traditionally south of Tirzah and this would make it north since Tirzah was firmly Manasseh.  But perhaps it also makes more sense of some things to place Samaria closer to Jezreel (which was in Issachar), Ahab's capital, then it is usually placed.

Psalm 45, The Tune of The Lilies

The traditional view of this Psalm doesn’t sit right with me.  But nothing I argue here will really go against how I use this Psalm in the Bride of Christ post on my Prophecy Blog.

The traditional view has the person being addressed in the Psalm change a few times.  The first verse isn’t the Psalm proper at all but just the author's preface, that I agree with.  Then the traditional view says verses 2-9 are addressing “The King” and 10-15 his Bride, and then 16-17 are addressing The King again.  Of course the King’s Bride is presumably first introduced in verse 9.  I don't see these changes in who’s being addressed as being all that justifiable.

Nothing in the sections presumed to address the King actually calls them King.  In fact verse 5 is referring to the King as separate when it says they defeated the King’s enemies.  Verse 1 says this Psalm concerns the King in some fashion, but doesn’t clearly say how.

Verses 13-15 say.

“The king's daughter is all glorious within: her clothing is of wrought gold.  She shall be brought unto the king in raiment of needlework: the virgins her companions that follow her shall be brought unto thee.  With gladness and rejoicing shall they be brought: they shall enter into the king's palace.“

Again, the King and the subject are separate, the King’s daughter is being brought to the King first then given to the subject.  These verses tell me that the King like in my view of the Song of Solomon is serving as the father of the Bride, not as the Groom.

I think it’s much more coherent to interpret the subject of the Psalm as being the same person all throughout.  And that this person is being given the King’s daughter.  

Now it’s possible in that view the Subject could still be David, but that in this context the King is God or Saul.  But that will become less likely later.

The word translated “Queen” in verse 9 in reference to the subject’s bride is not a feminine form of Melech or Sar like a lot of other words translated Queen in The Bible.  The word is Shegal, which is translated “wives” when Daniel 5 uses its plural form though it’s not a usual word for wife either.    The verb it’s derived from is Shagal, a word usually translated “lie” or “ravished”, and in all contexts seems clearly about sex.

Nothing all that controversial so far.  Till we look at verse 10 which clearly called the subject a daughter.  Verse 11 is the primary basis for saying this is a woman the King is marrying, but I think that is jumping to conclusions.  Verse 10 is also the basis for seeing the woman here as a foreigner, but I feel that terminology could simply be her not being of the same Tribe.  The word for “people” is Am not Goyim.  Genesis 48 foretells Manasseh will be his own Am.

Verses 6 and 7 are quoted in Hebrews chapter 1, verses 8 and 9 as being about Jesus (Paul says “the Son” not “a son”).  

First of all I can again reference my Song of Solomon studies as precedent for a female personage being a type of Christ.  And many think the Wisdom of Proverbs is Jesus, which is clearly referred to with Feminine pronouns, and the Hebrew and Greek words for Wisdom are all grammatically feminine.

Secondly this isn’t the only place where a New Testament quotation is being kind of creative with the Old Testament context.  I think it’s also possible Paul was paraphrasing and that this doesn’t justify the Septuagint translation as much as one might at first think.

On the subject of translating these verses, the words for Throne in both Hebrew and Greek are words for Seat or Chair not solely limited to Royal Thrones the way that English word usually is.

Alternate translations of Psalm 45:6 include "your divine throne endures for ever and ever"[Rhodes 78] and "the eternal and everlasting God has enthroned you"[Dahood 269].  Verse 7 could also read “Elohim thy God has anointed thee” or “Elohim has anointed thy God”.  The Hebrew Bible calling a human an El in the right context isn’t as weird as you at first think, just look at Exodus 7:1.

The word for God used in verse 6 is Elohim.  But in verse 7 the word for God with the Thy/Your suffix attached is not Elohim though the Strongs categorizes it like it is.  It does have a Heh however, which makes it possible to view as Grammatically Feminine.  Actually it’s possible to even interpret Elohim as partly grammatically feminine, but that is a much bigger rabbit hole.

The subject possibly being or representing Jesus isn’t actually the most controversial implication of making the subject a woman all throughout it.  The biggest issue is the implication that this daughter is being given, either in marriage or in some sexual fashion, the King’s daughter.  Meaning I have just argued this Psalm is about a Lesbian couple.

Now at face value you can say the last two verses are clearly making this about a Heterosexual couple since they have children.  But the application of this to Jesus and His Bride does not view these children as literal offspring of Biological reproduction, but as the “remnant of her Seed” of Revelation 12:17, or more controversially in my view The Man-Child.  There is also the Suffering Servant’s Seed in Isaiah 53.  

What is special about Psalm 45 however is it doesn’t even say Seed, so it is the most linguistically justifiable to apply to children by Adoption, or any other means by which a Lesbian couple could have kids.

The word for Earth in verse 16 also just means land, and refers to specific lands many times.  It doesn’t always mean the whole Planet Earth.  That is how I interpret it when applying this Psalm to Jesus, but as far as this original woman who married into the royal family, they may have been given a specific region, maybe a whole Tribe’s allotment at most.

Now what I’m about to mention is just an interesting coincidence.

I started seeing this possible Lesbian implication to Psalm 45 before I noticed this is one of the Psalms that is to the Tune Shoshannim as it’s transliterated in the KJV.  

What does Shoshannim mean?  Well first of all the im suffix makes it plural.  And Shoshan/Shushan is the Hebrew word for Lily.  Meaning Shoshannim means Lilies.  But what does Lily/Shushan translate to in Japanese?  Yuri!!!  

Meaning this Psalm was “to the Tune of the Yuries”.

The last verse is a bit of an issue if the original subject of the Psalm is some random woman otherwise forgotten by history.  So let’s see if we can identify her with someone else mentioned in Scripture.

The Gold from Ophir tells me this isn’t a proper Davidic Psalm but from the time of Solomon at the soonest.  The word for “Daughter” can also refer to a granddaughter or more distant female descendant, basically any woman of the Royal family could be the King’s Daughter in question.  I note that here though it may not be relevant.

1st Kings 4:7-19 lists officers Solomon placed over the Tribes of Israel, it’s most well known for how two of them are said to have married daughters of Solomon.  One of those two, Ahimaaz in verse 15, is also unique in being the only one of these 12 not called the Son of someone.  The English translation uses a male pronoun, but that could be a product of the limitations of English.  In fact there are other places where this same Hebrew prefix Hu is translated more gender neutrally, and Genesis 29:12 uses it of Rebecca.

The other references in the Hebrew Bible to people with the name Ahimaaz mostly seem to clearly be males (though it’s not impossible that for some reason Ahinoam wife of Saul was referred to as the daughter of her mother), but it wouldn't be the only name used by both Sexes.  The name ends with the letter Tzadiq, the Hebrew word for Earth/Land is Eretz which also ends with a Tzadiq and is considered grammatically feminine according to the Strongs.  

The meaning of Ahimaaz being interpreted to have “brother” in it doesn’t mean anything in regard to their gender, David had two wives whose names mean father of something, Abigail and Avital.  Ach, the part taken to mean brother, is used at the start of a few feminine words and names, like the name of Ahinoam.

So perhaps Psalm 45 is about the marriage of Ahimaaz to Basemath?

This might be a good time to note my personal hunch that Basemath was probably the daughter of one of Solomon’s Edomite wives, given that name’s association with wives of Esau.

Ahimaaz was placed over Naphtali, Genesis 49 calls Naphtali a Hind, Ayalah in the Hebrew, a specifically feminine word for a deer like animal.  So maybe a woman being in charge of Naphtali fits that prophetically.

The land allotted to Naphtali is where most of Jesus ministry was. Isaiah 9 defines Galilee as Zebulun and Napthali, though the traditional site of Nazareth is closer to Zebulun, Capernaum which seems to be the main base of operations in the Synoptic Gospels was firmly in Naphtali.  Tiberias, a capital of NT era Galilee, was also in Naphtali.

I proposed a theory on my now semi defunct revised chronology blog that the Amazons of Greek mythology might have come from Dan.  Dan was the full sibling of Naphtali.  The goddess of the Amazons was sometimes viewed as being Artemis, who was often associated with female Deer.  And I could conceivably connect the name of Artemis to Ahimaaz, or the etymology of the word Amazon itself to Ahimaaz.  And the husband of a daughter of Salmoneus was also relevant to that post.  Perhaps the distorted Greek memory changed Ahimaaz to a brother of Salmoneus because of the name’s meaning having brother in it?

Update November 2018: It's also possible Ahimaaz could be a Trans woman or a Trans man, I'd consider a Trans woman more likely.

The Torah failed it's own Prophet Test

I obviously do not believe that, I'm saying it Rhetorically.

You see, these Hebrew Roots people insisting The Torah says it will last forever have a problem, it didn't.

You see the verses that say something will last for Olam or "All of the Days", are not saying simply that's how long this will be Yahuah's preferred way or doing things.  They are saying that is how long it will last.

At the latest The Torah stopped being practiced in 70 AD, but a lot of these Torah only people insist the true Torah system was abandoned well before that, when The Temple replaced the Tabernacle at the latest.  That is a subject I'll probably discus in future posts, not sure which Blog I'll put it on.

So you can't just pick and choose which parts of these verses to apply the most extreme interpretation to.

Especially when it comes to the Aaronic Priesthood, that was a Promise to Aaron and his Sons that they wold be Priests, not simply that only they were allowed to be, because as I remind you Yahuah never shut down Jethro's Priesthood.  Today the descendants of Aaron have nothing other then special Synagogue reading privileges.  So if Yahuah's promise to Aaron was FOREVER then He failed to keep it.

"But doesn't the foretold Captivity imply a temporary ceasing of the system?"  You may ask?

1. I believe the true Captivity didn't fully begin till the 130s AD.  Everything before was just lesser warnings.

2. During the time between the first and second temples the Elephantine Temple was functioning in Egypt.  In 66-73 AD the Egyptian back up Temple was also shut down.

3. Since I believe The Torah was only for an Olam, I believe the Captivity begins after that Olam ends.

Torah as The Foundation of The Canon

A few posts I've made over the last two months have been addressed to people who's view on Canon I've described as "Torah Only".  The Remember The Commands YouTube channel rejects that description it seems, preferring to say it's the Torah as the Foundation.

Thing is it's basically the same thing, when you're using an extreme interpretation of the Prophet Test to discredit any book that has any apparent conflict with The Torah.  But of course they have a different attitude towards alleged places where The Torah contradicts itself.

Numbers 12:6-8 is cited as explaining why Moses is distinct from other Prophets, why what Moses said and wrote is more Canon then anything else.

But Deuteronomy 18:15-19 foretells a future Prophet like Moses, who's authority will be exactly like how Moses was described in Numbers 12.

I believe that Prophet was Jesus.  That belief requires a great deal of Faith, as does placing one's Faith in the God of Moses.  So anything Jesus quoted as Scripture must be Scripture, and He also passed on His authority to the 12, starting with Peter.  And Peter called Paul's writings Scripture.

It's interesting in the context of this title of Jesus to remember what Exodus 7:1 says.  Typologically that's another place where Moses represents Jesus, and Aaron all New Testament believers, since now we are all Priests.

Basically what I'm saying is, to Christians Jesus is our Cornerstone, and His Apostles who wrote the New Testament are our Foundation.   The dispensation of The Torah is over.

Update November 25th 2017:

Some who aren't Christians or Rabbinic Jews seek to deconstruct the whole idea of Messianic Prophecy.  They might insist that Deuteronomy 18 wasn't meant to be about a single individual.   But that it would be an office.

Meanwhile the context in Numbers 12 is Yahuah explaining why Miriam and Aaron' authority are not like that of Moses.  So you can argue the intent was only that while Moses lived no one else's authority equals Moses.

The end of Deuteronomy does clearly say there was no one like Moses during whatever time separated it's authorship from the Death of Moses.  However....

When you look at Samuel's story in 1st Samuel 3, it's easy to conclude that perhaps that author meant us to think of Samuel as the Prophet like Unto Moses, and he was contemporary with other events foretold in Deuteronomy, in chapter 17.  Samuel is often considered the first Prophet in the sense of how that Office functioned during the Kingdom period.  And most of the Prophetic books are arguably defining themselves as being like how Moses is defined in these passages of Numbers and Deuteronomy, with only Daniel fitting Numbers 12's description of the not Moses like Prophets.

This view can be reconciled with the Christian view.  The Prophet like unto Moses is ultimately Jesus, but other Prophets foreshadowed Him, and then He passed His Authority onto The Apostles.

The Bible is not against "Interacial" Marriage

The Torah's commands against marriages with the Canaanites were about mixed marriages on Spiritual grounds.  The issue with the marriages Balaam helped arrange is deliberately explained as the daughters of Moab leading them to into idolatry.

Lots of people want to deny this, yes even today some still try to preach against White People marrying Black People (as if that modern ethnic divide could possibly correlate to any tribal relations in The Bible).

Even going off just The Torah  Who Israelites are allowed to marry, and who they're not, makes no sense if it's purely Ethnic or genealogical lines, they're too arbitrary.  The commands against it are primarily directed at Canaanites, which would work in that context.  But then Moab and Ammon, who descend from Lot, Abraham's Nephew.  One could speculate their gene pool was corrupted by their Incestuous origin, but in Deuteronomy 2 Yahuah still recognized their right to their land as much as he does Edom's.  Their idolatry is I believe the reason they normally can't marry Israelites, yet God's promise of the land he gave to the family of Abraham still applies to them in spite of that.

However marriages to Mizraimites, other descendants of Ham, same son of Noah as Canaan, are repeatedly shown to be okay.  Hagar and Abraham's relationship was not disapproved of by God.  Then Ishmael married a Mizraimite.  Joseph married the daughter of a Mizraimite Priest.  Leviticus 24 records the son of a Danite Woman and a Mizraimite man being an Israelite.  You can conjecture his ancestry related to his Sin all you want, but the text doesn't say that, his Punishment shows he was considered a citizen.  Later the Book of Chronicles tells us of other marriages with Mizraimites that happened pretty early on.

I just did a post on the Cushite Wife of Moses.  It can be viewed as an oversimplification of the passage to say it's explicitly approving that marriage, yet if Moses was wrong to marry her, Yahuah would have said so as Moses Sin at Meribah is not glossed over.

Edom is not included on those prohibited to marry either.  On the one hand you could say that makes sense, they are closer related to Israel then them, coming from Jacob's Twin.  Yet Edom himself married some Canaanites he wasn't supposed to, so why wasn't that condemnation inherited by their descendants if genetics not who they worship was the issue?  Plus in other contexts The Torah mentions Edom right by Moab and Amon.  The difference is Moab and Amon worshiped Idols, Chemosh and Molech, while Edom as I've talked about before seems to have worshiped Yahuah, often worshiped Him wrong perhaps, but still worshiped Him.  Compare Deuteronomy 23:3 to 23:7.

And in a post I'm working on for my Prophecy blog, I'm going to suggest the Mizraimites (often translated Egypt and Egyptian) of the Torah may not have worshiped Idols yet either.

The Levites had many special restrictions, they were not allowed to even marry women of other Tribes of Israel.  You can't use their restrictions to interpret general Laws for all the people.

Deuteronomy 7:3 is the primary verse cited by anti-Mixed Marriage people. They ignore the very next verse.

Now, going beyond The Torah, since most Christians consider all of The Bible canon.

The Book of Ruth.

One website obsessed with saying Interracial marriage is wrong regardless of faith, insists Ruth was not a Moabitess.  This was not a Torah only website obviously, or they'd just do what I've seen some Torah only people do and reject the line of David.  They seem to overlook that if you want to be selective about Canon only the Book of Ruth places a Ruth in Davids ancestry in the TNAK, and Matthew does not repeat her Moabite status.  Though I feel Matthew's mention of her name does Canonize the book of Ruth for all Christians, since there is no other Biblical source he could have gotten it from.

This website argued the Country or Plain of Moab mentioned in Ruth is not in what you usually see Moab limited to on Maps, south of Reuben and the river Arnon, but land that was Moabite before the conquest.  (I think this website was trying to argue it wasn't even Trans-Jordan.) This forgets that Deuteronomy 2 explicitly says God wasn't going to give Israelites any land of Edom, Moab or Amon.  The Trans-Jordan tribes decision to stay Trans-Jordon when that wasn't the original plan arguably complicated this, but I still think it was mostly only Canaanite and Ishmaelite territory they borrowed.

The word Sojourn is used in the very first verse, a word that is usually used of dwelling in a foreign land. Used of Non-Israleites in Israel, and of Isrealites when they Sojourned in Egypt.

They say it doesn't matter that Ruth is called a Moabitess, they believe she was an Israelite, yet is the only Israelite ever repeatedly called a Moabite.

Some verses do say ___ite when referring to a geographical association rather then genealogical ancestry.  But there are usually of Non-Israelites, or of the Patriarchs back before they were their own tribe, hence them being called Arameans even though they descended form Arphaxad not Aram.   Or if it's used of Israelites it's only in a sense that confuses what Tribe they are, like Samuel as a Levite being called am Ephraimite, or the mother of Hiram being both a daughter of Dan and a Widow of Naphtali.

Even if the land they were in can be argued to be formally Moabite territory then belonging to Gad or Reuben.  That hardly rules out Ruth being ethnically Moabite, as the Moabite population of that region would hardly disappear.

Either Ruth was not an Israelite, or the author of Ruth wanted to deceive their readers into thinking she wasn't.

But regardless of all their technical arguments about what terms mean.  To any literary analysis of the book it is absurd to deny that Ruth was a foreigner and that it is advocating for allowing a foreigner to marry into Israel if they are faithful to The Torah.  Ruth is ignorant of the ways of Israel at the start and needs to learn them from Naomi.  And in Ruth 4:5-6, why else would the kinsman in line before Boaz reject her out of concern of his inheritance being barred unless he was concerned with the laws against marrying Moabites?  Obviously people who thought those laws were purely Ethnic existed back then, Ruth is a book written to argue against that belief.

Uriah The Hittie's marriage to Bathsheba was not an issue either, because he was clearly someone who worshiped Yahuah and who Yahuah considered His Servant.

Ezra and Nehemiah.

Some argue that it is specifically Ezra and Nehemiah who's decisions strongly leave no room for allowing ethnically mixed marriages.  Skeptics of The Bible see them as clearly philosophically opposed to the Book of Ruth (and try to claim Ruth was written about the same time by an opposing camp).

Now I haven't studied these two book as much I as should yet.  Maybe they too are being miss-characterized by those who oppose mixed Marriages.  If so I apologize that I can't adequately defend them here just yet.

What I am going to say is that while I believe the books of Ezra and Nehemiah are canonical inspired records of History.  Ezra and Nehemiah were still flawed fallible humans who's interpretations of The Torah we don't necessarily have to agree with.  Even Paul sometimes said "says I not The Lord", and I trust Paul's Judgment more then theirs.

The website I have in mind says The Messiah (they believe that is Jesus) upheld the rulings of Ezra and Nehemiah.  But I see no place in The Gospels where Jesus does that.  The book of Ezra is never directly quoted in the New Testament, there is one verse where arguably Jesus is referencing Nehemiah, but that is disputable.  But even then, the verse of Nehemiah in question is not one of their rulings but describing the Manna miracle in the Wilderness.

Jesus acknowledgment of the Second Temple in John 4 is only upholding Zerubabel and Jeshua, Ezra and Nehemiah came later.  Likewise the Prophetic books of the return from Captivity period uphold those two a lot but don't mention Ezra or Nehemiah.  And I think even they possibly built The Temple on the wrong location.

Malachi who was clearly quoted by Jesus as a Prophet, says in chapter 2 verse 11 that the issue is marrying "the daughter of a strange god".  He was a contemporary of the same concerns Ezra and Nehemiah were dealing with.  And the only specific people group spoken of negatively in Malachi is Esau, who were not among those prohibited to marry in the Torah as I laid out.

In The New Testament, Paul taught that there is neither Jew or Gentile in The Church in Galatians 3, and about Gentiles being grafted into Israel Unnaturally in Romans 11.

Wives of Moses

I want to dedicate a post specifically to this question, since it's something I haven't made up my mind 100% on yet.

Most famously is Zipporah, daughter of Jethro also called Raguel, a Priest in Midian.  That could imply they were ethnically Midianite (descendants of Abraham by Keturah) but maybe not.

There is a controversy in Numbers 12 about Moses marrying a Custhie Wife.  There have been two common theories about who this is.

Either it's the same person as Zipporah, thus making this relevant to speculation about the Tribal identity of her and her father Jethro.

Or the extra-Biblical tradition recorded in Josephus that Moses married a Nubian Cushite Princess when he conquered Kush for Egypt way back when he was still a Prince of Egypt.  (This is in DeMille's The Ten Commandments 1956 film, but it doesn't make their marrying explicit, cause it's 1950s America).

In either of those cases I'm inclined to question, why was it just becoming an issue now?

It's often overlooked that in Exodus 18:2 Moses sent Zipporah back to Jethro in Midian.

That Miriam and Aaron are condemned by God for objecting to Moses marriage is taken as proof their objection was wrong.  While that can suit my own agenda well, it's perhaps an oversimplification, since what God was directly angry at was their implying their authority was equal to Moses.  So it's more like this was a minor issue bringing a greater one to the forefront.

What were they objecting to however?  This passage becomes relevant to two debates about Marriage.  Mixed or "Interracial" Marriage, and Polygamy.

Zipporah is last mentioned by that name in Exodus 18. And this passage seems to be the only place after that Moses having a wife comes up.  So whether or not Polygamy is possibly relevant here is not just dependent on if they are the same woman.   Zipporah could have passed away by this point, leaving Moses free to remarry regardless of how okay with Polygamy you interpret the Torah as being.  If Polygamy was their objection, I think they would have said "in addition to".

None of the verses in the Torah taken as condemning mixed marriages even address descent from Cush, they seem to be about Canaanites, Moab and Ammon.  Intermarriages with Mizraimites are not objected to at all, so the ban on Canaan can't be inferred to include all Hamites.  I believe these are in truth about spiritually mixed marriages, not ethnicity, I'll be doing a post on that later.

That proves Yahuah wouldn't have objected to a Cushite wife, but Miriam and Aaron are a different story.

In The Torah Zipporah and Jethro's clan is never explicitly called Kenite.  So people who limit their Canon to the Torah might insist they aren't.

But for those of us who consider Judges a worthwhile source.  Judges 1:16 says the Father in Law of Moses was a Kenite.  Going off that verse alone it could be a different Father in Law is who was meant.  But later Judged 4:11 clarifies these are people who descend form Hobab, and again calls them Kenites.  Now this verse as it's rendered in English at least can be accused of contradicting Numbers 10:29.  Numbers Says Hobab was the son of Moses Father In Law, while this verse in Judges looks like it's saying Hobab was Moses Father in Law.  It might be something is lost in translation here, that it meant to call Hobab and the Father in Law of Moses ancestors of this clan.

Or maybe Numbers 10:29 can be taken as calling Hobab not Raguel the Father in Law of Moses, either way this verse means Jethro wasn't his only name.  Exodus 2:18 could have been referring to Reuel was Zipporah's father even though he was really her grandfather, the patriarch of the clan.  Exodus 2 is the only time Reuel is mentioned as someone clearly still alive, Jethro isn't mentioned till 40 years later in the first verse of Exodus 3.  Every time someone is called Moses' "Father in law" in the KJV the "father" part is added by the translation, the Hebrew just uses a word for in-law.  So maybe Reuel, Jethro and Hobab were three different male members of Zipporah's family.

Only Numbers 10:29 calls Raguel a Midianite, and not simply of the region of Midian.  But even then Midianite can mean that and not stickily ethnically.  Genesis 15 lists the Kenites as people who already existed at this time, that is different from other places in Genesis where I think the narrative voice is mentioning people who'll exist later.

People who don't want The Bible to make sense love to accuse Kenites of being the descendants of Cain, who's line logically perished in The Flood.  However if you look at Kenite's placement in the Strongs, the Pre-Flood patriarch name it's closest to is Cainan or Kenen of Genesis 5, the son of Enosh son of Seth.  Luke 3 tells us another person with this same name (in the Greek text it's spelled identically to the Genesis 5 Kenen) existed after the Flood as a son of Aprhaxad son of Shem.  My theory on this extra name of Luke 3 is that Shelah was a younger son of Arphaxad who married his niece Kenen's daughter.  The Kenites could be people who paternally descended from this Kenen.

That Exodus 4 strongly implies Jethro's family didn't practice Circumcision, I think is also evidence against them descending from Abraham.

I myself had strongly argued for Zipporah being the Kushite wife in my post about Cushites in Arabia.  However that argument was by no means dependent on that, I had another verse implying Cushites and Midian being associated with the same area.

Now my conclusion is most likely this was someone Moses married at the time this controversy broke in Numbers 12, or just a little before.  Given where they were, in Arabia, this Wife of Moses is still evidence for Cushites in Arabia.

For the Josephus tradition, you could get around my first question by saying Moses was obviously separated from her when he fled Egypt, and perhaps they were reunited now.   But still, I feel Josephus is recording a story someone before him imagined to explain this mysterious verse in Numbers while also making Moses more awesome.  I think it's also dependent on assumptions about "Egypt" that may be wrong.

Numbers 11 ends with the Israelites settling at a place called Hazeroth.  Could be this was a place where Arabian Cushites dwelt? and Moses married one of them?

Modern Americans have a distorted view of what Conservatism is.

Both ones who are conservative, and ones who attack Conservatism.  I'm not saying American Conservatives aren't conservative, mostly they are, I'm saying they are delusional in how they define themselves.

The origins of the Right Wing/Left Wing terminology are from the French Revolution, where those who supported the King sat on the right side of the Assembly, and those who opposed the King sat on the left (well some "Constitutional Monarchists" may have been seated on the Left, depend son how Monarchal they wanted the Constitution).  The word Conservative comes from the idea of conserving how things were, and thus throughout 19th Century European history and literature the Conservatives were the Monarchists and Royalists.  And the way things were before the Revolutions was that the State headed by the King held absolute authority, and regulated aboslutly everything.  (Though within how the State was organized the King was never truly absolute.)

So the idea that Conservative = Small Government, is totally wrong.

And American Conservatives don't support small government.

They support laws to enforce morality from Prostitution to Gambling to Drugs, they support Wars, they supported the Patriotic Act.  They talk a lot about cutting Government spending, but are offended by any suggestion to cut what actually is the most expensive part of our Government, military spending, but they also like to spend money on police and prisons.  So the actual fists of big government they don't want to defund at all.

They don't want to make Government small, they just want to prevent it from accidentally doing anything good.

For the most part, the only position I hold that modern America considers the Conservative position is on Guns, I'm firmly against any and all restrictions on Gun Ownership.  However in 19th Century Europe that was not considered a Conservative position, that was the position held by Karl Marx.

The Offices of Apostle and Prophet

The New Testament offices of Apostle and Prophet are not the same, they are distinct.

I am a Continuationist, the Spiritual Gifts are for today, one of those is Prophecy.

An Apostle is something more specific.  Chris White has a good video on Apostolic Succession directed at Catholic Doctrine.

Thing is other versions of that doctrine have been utilized by non Catholic denominations.  I already did a post once on the Baptist version of it some Baptists believe.

This post is partly about a problem I've noticed of some Pentecostal and Charismatic Christian Leaders calling themselves Apostle.  Paul defined himself as the Last Apostle (1 Corinthians 15:8-9), and made clear you had to be an eye witness to the Resurrection to be an Apostle in the verses leading up to that.  Acts 1 agrees that being an eye witness was a requirement for being an Apostle.

Critics of Continuationism sometimes assert that the Canon isn't closed if there is still Prophecy, and some Contuionationists seem to effectively teach that.  But prophecy has to be tested against Scripture, and I believe only Apostles could add to Scripture.  In order for something to be Scripture it had to be written by an Apostle or approved by one.

I've seen some Ceasationists use Apostle and Prophet as if they are the same.  But The New Testament clearly treats them as distinct.  There are some passages where you can cite that verse alone and say maybe they're being used as synonyms there.  And in a sense I think every Apostle was a Prophet.   But verses like 1 Corinthians 12:28 clearly define them as distinct.

I can't currently think of a Hebrew word that might equate to what Apostle means in the New Testament.  But in concept I can point to Numbers 12 which distinguishes between the authority of Moses and that of other Prophets.  Jesus was the Prophet like Moses and He gave His Mosaic authority to the Apostles.

Some of the people who want to reject Paul act like Paul's claim to Apostolic status makes him a 13th Apostle, or in some way the only one additional to the 12.  But that's clearly not what Paul said in 1 Corinthians 15, placing James the Half-Brother of Jesus and many others between the 12 and himself as the last.  Acts 14:14 says Paul and Barnabas were both Apostles.  In Romans 16 Paul identifies as an Apostle a woman seemingly not named anywhere else in Scripture named Junia (though there's a theory she's the same woman as Joanna in Luke's Gospel).

Peter calls Paul's writings Scripture at the end of 2 Peter.  People try to argue around this fact, but it's undeniable.

I bring this up because the Anti-Paul people often desire to limit the title of Apostle only to the 12 (with Matthias taking Judas's spot).  Yet they try to get around the full implication that that would remove canonical status from at least 2 of the Gospels.  And that they may have to throw out James and Jude too if you believe the tradition that they were written by Half-Brothers of Jesus not the James son of Alpheius and Jude "Not Iscariot" of the 12.  And they frequently use James in their attacks on Paul.

Ironically for all this James vs Paul theorizing nonsense, it is only Paul who tells us James the Brother of Jesus qualified as an Apostle. Without him, we'd have no direct Biblical basis for believing that James ever became a Believer at all.  The James of the Acts 15 council I believe was the surviving James of the 12, not Jesus' brother.

Do we use the phrase "The Ten Commandments" incorrectly?

It's not uncommon to see people claim this.  I myself had been under similar misconceptions in the past, and had to edit some mistakes out of the post I made earlier today.

Now it's true the narrative presented in the 1956 film The Ten Commandments is garbled.  I mean it arguably undermined the moral of the narrative that they change it so the people hadn't received the Commandments yet when they engaged in the Golden Calf orgy.  DeMille kind of anticipated the Godfather Baptism montage by having them break the Commandments as God writes them.

It is true that they are not being written in Stone when God first gave them in Exodus 20, there they are spoken by Yahuah to the People directly, without even using Moses as a middle man.

It is true that The Bible does not use the exact three word phrase "The Ten Commandments" in Exodus 20, or Deuteronomy 5 where they are repeated.

Exodus 34:28 says of Moses "And he wrote upon the tables the words of the covenant, the ten commandments.".  The context of this Chapter, is kinda unclear about exactly what that means.  It may be, given the issues of translating, that there should be an "and" between "words of the Covenant" and "The Ten Commandments".  I say this based on the fact that the "words of the Covenant' arguably refers to Exodus 20:22-23:33, and the Covenant is then ratified in chapter 24.

At any-rate Exodus 34:28 is about the second set of Stone Tablets, the first set are mentioned in the last verse of Exodus 31, verse 18.  It could be on the original Tablets were only written the information relied in 25:1-31:17.  Israel's breaking of the Covenant with the Golden Calf as these were written, changed things.  Originally the contents of Exodus 20:22-23:33 were written on a scroll as Exodus 24 records.  But that is unclear.  It could have been all three sets of instructions. 

However the people claiming that phrase refers to a mostly completely different set of rules, are ignoring that the phrase appears twice more in Deuteronomy, in 4:13 and 10:4.  Deuteronomy 10:4 defined what that phrase refers to more clearly then any other verse.

"And he wrote on the tables, according to the first writing, the ten commandments, which Yahuah spake unto you in the mount out of the midst of the fire in the day of the assembly: and Yahuah gave them unto me."

That clearly describes the commands given in Exodus 20, Moses is also repeating the wording of how he described that event in Deuteronomy 5:4.

Now one article you'll find online (and I agree with their political point about it violating the Establishment Clause to put the Commandments on Government buildings), gives a list of ten different commands, well at least three overlap, saying that's what Exodus 34:28 called 'The Ten Commandments".  This list is arbitrarily taking 10 of the commands given earlier in Exodus 34, as a warning not to make a covenant with the Canaanites, and they aren't even consecutive.  They are, first is verse 14 worded incorrectly, 17, 18, 21, 22, 23, 25 is split into two commands, and then so is 26.  Just reading chapter 34 you would not see that as listing of ten commands.

Perhaps they would simply argue Deuteronomy is contradicting Exodus.  But even on it's own, you have to draw some flimsily conclusions to think Exodus is calling that list of more then 10 instructions the Ten Commandments.

Exodus 34 defines what was written on the second Tablets as the same thing written on the first.

How do Torah only people determine what is The Torah?

People like the Remember the Commands YouTube Channel keep saying things like "The Torah never told us to recognize the Canon of Jamnia, or the Calvanists".  My response is....

How do you know the Torah is what we today think it is?  Nothing in The Torah defines it as Five Books of Moses, one of which is actually a historical narrative of events that happened before Moses was born, so traditionally saying Moses wrote it kinda hurts seeing it as an eye witness account of that history.  And another is a book Moses couldn't have physically wrote himself since it records his death.

Now Deuteronomy can be called a "Book of Moses" since it's mostly a record of Speeches Moses gave, so quoting it for the most part is quoting Moses.... IF it's an authentic account.

Only Deuteronomy refers to there being a "Book of Law" in that exact phrase.   You can interpret those verses as implying what your reading now is part of that book, but that's kinda iffy.  It seems equally likely it's referring to a book already written.

Why would a book of Laws also include all these historical narratives?  Well there being commands to remember things seemingly makes the historical narratives part of the Law.  But still, one could easily argue that The Torah proper is just what God gave to Moses on Mount Sinai.

Exodus 20:22 begins the proper Covenant Law Code, which arguably concludes in Exodus 24:4, this was written in a Scroll by Moses.  But Exodus 25:1 through 31:17 are seemingly what is defined as being written in Stone, according to 31:18.  The Stones had to be carved again after the Golden Calf incident.  But Exodus 34:28 says the second set of Tablets were written by Moses dictated by Yahuah not by the Finger of Yahuah like the first Tablets were. 

Leviticus is stuff added later, as are the parts of Numbers that are new commands, they don't even define themselves as part of either the original Scroll of Moses or what was written in Stone.  Deuteronomy meanwhile, doesn't even pass it's own Prophet Test by the standards of how Remember the Commands interprets things.  But even if presumed to be a valid record of Speeches Moses gave at the end of the wandering, it mostly demonstrates that Moses memory was often faulty, even the Ten Commandments are expressed differently.

I'm certain Deuteronomy is Canon, since I think anything Jesus quoted as Scripture must be Scripture, and Jesus quoted Deuteronomy 6 for what He called the Greatest Commandment.  In fact Deuteronomy is the most quoted book of The Torah in the New Testament, with even some NT references to the Ten Commandments seemingly preferring Deuteronomy's version.  Jesus also quotes Genesis, Exodus and Leviticus, and allusions are made to events from Numbers.

Thing is, I think it's fairly illogical to accept Deuteronomy as Canon but not Joshua.  I think Deuteronomy and Joshua's scrolls mostly had the same human author, much of Deuteronomy seems like it's written there just to set the stage for Joshua.

The Prophet Test of Deuteronomy

Most websites I find online talking about the Prophet Test of Deuteronomy in relation to Jonah, Jeremiah or Ezekiel, are doing so assuming the readers will not question the Prophetic Status of those three Prophets, and so we must interpret Deuteronomy in a way that is consistent with them being valid Prophets.  These sites being Continuationist Christians seeking to defend modern Pentecostal/Charismatic Prophets against attempts to use Deuteronomy to discredit them.

But I have become aware of a growing Torah only movement, or at least heavily Torah centric, that would rather reject Prophets of the TNAK as true Prophets then change their overly strict "Plain Reading" interpretation of Deuteronomy.  To them it's blasphemous to use Jeremiah 18 to interpret Deuteronomy 18, they would say Jeremiah 18 was Jeremiah making excuses for himself.

Jonah, Jeremiah (and possibly Ezekiel) are all upheld as Prophets by the New Testament.  So as a Christian I need to defend them as legit Prophets.

What Jeremiah says Yahuah said in Jeremiah 18 is absolutely consistent with The Torah, the Torah repeatedly teaches that God's Blessings and Curses are conditioned upon behavior.  In fact Deuteronomy's prophecy in chapters 29 and 30 is entirety couched as a hypothetical.

This website teaches plenty I disagree with, like on Ezekiel and Tyre which I'll get to later.  But it's an analysis on the Prophet test of Deuteronomy that I think is over all pretty helpful.
http://www.crivoice.org/prophetdeut18.html

What's deemed a capital offense is prophesying in the name of other gods, or saying it's okay to worship other gods. That is what it's most concerned with.  Deuteronomy 18:22 says.

"When a prophet speaketh in the name of Yahuah, if the thing follow not, nor come to pass, that is the thing which Yahuah hath not spoken, but the prophet hath spoken it presumptuously: thou shalt not be afraid of him."

It doesn't say this Prophet wasn't a true Believer, or even that he never was a true Prophet.  But he spoke presumptuously and for that reason you should no longer fear his words.  But it doesn't call for execution.  In English in the KJV it looks like this Prophet would also be guilty of Deuteronomy 18:20's offense, but clearly there is a difference.

Interestingly some offshoots of Mormonism like Temple Lot teach that Josephus Smith was a true Prophet at first, but eventually went bad and spoke presumptuously.  I think the very foundation of what Joseph Smith taught from the start had major inconsistencies with Scripture, but it's interesting to note that some Mormons look at things that way.

As a Continuationist Christian, I think it's important to note that 1 John 4:2-3 says "Every spirit that confesseth that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is of God: And every spirit that confesseth not that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is not of God".  There is no room for exceptions to either of those declarations.  Likewise 1 John 5:1 "Whosoever believeth that Jesus is the Christ is born of God".

Now, I disagree whole heartedly with the assertion that Ezekiel's Prophecy of Tyre failed.  Or that we need to expand it's time-frame to include Alexander to make it not a failure (I believe Isaiah 23's Prophecy about Tyre is specifically of Alexander's conquest, where Kittim/Greece is mentioned).

First of all, there is an accusation that Ezekiel 29:17-20 is some kind of admission that his Prophecy about Tyre failed.  This is not the case.  God is saying Nebuchadnezzar and his army performed a service for him by sieging Tyre, and so he's giving him Egypt to reward that service.  Strictly speaking we do not know whether that Siege was successful based on Ezekiel 29 alone.

Now some might infer that if sieging Tyre was successful they wouldn't need to capture another country to be paid for it.  A, plenty of successful sieges have failed to produce booty, like when Xerxes captured Athens.  B, I can counter that if no judgment was inflicted on Tyre, they performed no service to be paid for.

People are reading things into Ezekiel 26 that aren't there when they say Nebuchadnezzar had to capture the Island to fulfill the Prophecy.  What people ignore criticizing this Prophecy is the origin of the Island becoming the main city was the people fleeing there during this Siege, and that is what Ezekiel is describing.  The Mainland city is all Ezekiel is clearly saying will be destroyed.

And as far as saying the not being inhabited part is a failure because Tyre exists to this day.  That is false, there is a city in New Testament and modern times calling itself Tyre, but that doesn't make it Tyre, it was not built on the exact same location.  The mainland city Nebuchadnezzar destroyed is still a barren ruin right now.

Now one could say Alexander's actions have some relevance because of how he threw many of the ruins of the old city into the sea as he built his land bridge.  But that is a minor epilogue.

Now as far as questioning if Nebuchadnezzar ever captured Egypt.   I talked about that on my Prophecy blog.

But going back to the conditional commands.  As far as some people who might fear I'm weakening the Prophet Test's usefulness in opposing cults.  The conditional aspect is only an excuse if a nation wide change in behavior happens.

New Testament quotes of and refrences to The Old Testament.

The "Sola Scriptura" tag of this Blog has a spent a lot of time justifying my rejection of the Canoncity of certain books.  Perhaps it's time I treated this blog with a similar attitude to my Blog where I talk about my opinions on modern fiction, where I prefer to defend what I like rather then attack what I don't.

I have already said some things addressing those who limit Canon to the Torah, or to the words of Jesus.  In particularly where that involves a desire to reject Paul.  And will likely be returning to those subjects in the future.

But this post is more addressing those who may want to use NT quotes to determine what is or isn't valid in the OT Canon.

This article says there are ten books of the Old Testament never directly quoted in The New Testament. 

1. Judges

2. Ruth

3. Ezra

4. Esther

5. Ecclesiastes

6. Song of Solomon

7. Lamentations

8. Obadiah

9. Jonah

10. Zephaniah

They explain this is limited to direct quotes, where the context defines it as a quote.  And doesn't include allusions or parallel wording.  As such Revelation, which is built entirely on Old Testament allusions but has no direct quotes by this standard.  This author does not argue these books aren't Canon for this reason, it's simply a fact they are pointing out.

I used to follow Alan Krushner who did a whole thing on Ecclesiastes including New Testament allusions to it.  I agree that Romans 8 could maybe be viewed as thematically a summery.  But I feel a possibly overlooked direct reference is in Ecclesiastes 12:11.

"The words of the wise are as goads, and as nails fastened by the masters of assemblies, which are given from one shepherd."

Most people think when Jesus says "it is hard for thee to kick against the goads/pricks" when he called Saul latter known as Paul, he was quoting Euripides play Bacchants.  (Or skeptics would say Luke was quoting it) but this is actually a common expression, the only think that references from Acts has in common with that Greek play is it being in Plural when it's usually said singularly.  But still, if the intent was to quote that play I'd expect more of it's context to be included.  I feel like this verse from Ecclesiastes provides a decent Biblical precedent for using this expression.  The full quote from Euripides is "Why dost thou continue tor age and kick against the goads, a man against a god?".

Ruth is mentioned by name in the genealogy of Jesus given in Matthew 1.  Ruth's name is only in the Hebrew Bible in the book of Ruth, the genealogical information given about David in places like 1 Chronicles mention her husband, son and grandson, Boaz, Obed and Jesse, but not her.  So clearly the book of Ruth was a source of information Matthew was using.  Also the spelling Matthew and Luke used for Salmon comes from Ruth, Chronicles spells it Salma.

Jonah is referenced in some of the most famous of Jesus' references to the Old Testament.  Referring to three days and nights in the belly of the Whale, and referring to the men of Nineveh as gentiles who believed.

It is Lamentations 1:9&16 that provides the Old Testament basis for Comforter as a title of God or the Messiah, (The Talmuds quotes it as a justification for Menahem being a name for the Messiah).  John's Gospel and first Epistle use this title of both Jesus and The Holy Spirit, though it being of the Holy Spirit is the most well known reference.

This page on a different site confuses me a bit.  It is clearly using a different standard then the above article, yet I still can't make sense of it.  It says there are only five books the NT doesn't quote Ezra, Nehemiah, Esther, Ecclesiastes, and the Song of Solomon.  They say they aren't less Canon because of that.  The thing is, the chart of quotations it then provides, fails to list any from Joshua, Judges, Ruth, Obadiah, Zephaniah or Nahum.

References to the person of Joshua son of Nun are not quite proof of that book being considered canon or even a source the person referencing him knew, since Joshua son of Nun appears in The Torah (and is referenced at the beginning of Judges).  It is Hebrews and James mentioning the story of Rahab the Harlot that I find to be the blatant evidence that New Testament authors used Joshua as a source of information.  The narrative surrounding the fall of Ai I think is thematically echoed in the Death, Burial and Resurrection of Jesus as well as the Sixth Seal in Revelation 6.

However the only basis for a direct quote of the book of Joshua in Scripture is Hebrews 13:5 referencing Joshua 1:5.  But that itself was of Joshua referencing back to Deuteronomy.

 People from the book of Judges are also mentioned in Hebrews.

Ya know what should really shock all these "The Torah is The Bible of The Bible" types?  Numbers is never quoted by Jesus and barely in the New Testament at all.  By the standards of the author of the first article for a clear quotation, only Numbers 9:12 is quotes in John 19:36, but that is only Numbers repeating something from Exodus 12.  According to the second link provided, the only reference to Numbers in the Gospels is 27:17 which is paraphrased by the narrative voice in Matthew 9:36, and then Numbers 16 is referenced in 2 Timothy 2:19.

When Jesus references the Brazen Serpent is a pretty solid reference to Numbers.  Balaam also comes up in Jude and the letters to the 7 Churches.  Korah's rebellion is mentioned as well in Jude.  And I think Paul had Numbers 13 and 14 in mind in Hebrews 6.

Still, if you want to use the New Testament to decide what you consider Canon, referencing events isn't the same as quoting it as Scripture.  The New Testament arguably references many events not recorded in any canonical book of Scripture.

However I definitely think any Prophecy the book of Revelation clearly references is meant to be viewed as a Canonical Prophecy, since Revelation exists to tie all of Prophecy together.  That includes material from Daniel, Isaiah, Ezekiel and more.

Now, "that which was spoken by Jeremy the prophet" in Matthew 27:9 is not a contradiction, first off there is a connection to Jeremiah 32:6-9.  Second, chapters 9-14 of Zachariah unlike the earlier chapters do not begin with Zachariah identifying himself, it's possible he was recording additional prophecies of Jeremiah that he gave after his own Book was finished, and that weren't scribed by Baruch accounting for a different literary style.

If you choose to divide Daniel between it's Hebrew and Aramaic portions.  It's interesting that only Hebrew Daniel is directly quoted, but Aramaic Daniel is more so what Revelation draws on.

The author of the first link also calculates Psalms to be the most quoted book, and Isaiah second.  But most curious is in 3rd place is Deuteronomy as the most quoted of The Torah.  But since Deuteronomy mostly repeats and revisits stuff from earlier, much of that could be iffy.  However what Jesus calls the greatest commandment is definitely a quote of Deuteronomy 6.  And the Prophet like Unto Moses prophecy and the Song of Moses are two subjects unique to Deuteronomy that come up in the New Testament, the later in Revelation. 

I've always been of the opinion that Esther is just as important as Exodus 12 to understanding how the Passion week fulfilled the Old Testament, particularly my belief that the Resurrection/First Fruits of 30 AD was on the 17th of Nisan.  But I can hardly indisputably prove the New Testament authors intended that.

The apparent lack of New Testament verification for the Song of Solomon is rather disappointing to me, given one of the agendas I have on this blog.

Some people might argue certain books being kept in the same Scroll in the old Hebrew Canon means Jesus probably endorsed the entire scroll if he quoted any.  For the most part that is pretty arbitrary, considering we don't even know when the arrangement we're familiar with started, (Josephus seems to refer to a different number of scrolls, and said the Torah was 7 books not 5).  Lamentations was also written by Jeremiah, so it being in Jeremiah's scroll isn't a coincidence.  The Minor Prophets being in the same scroll is a pretty arbitrary thing to make a point out of however.

If you're a Jesus words only person, you potentially have to throw out even more.  The second link I've provided in this post says Jesus only quoted 24 books. 

Jesus makes references historically to David and Solomon and Elijah, and debate-ably to the Zechariah killed in the Temple in 2 Chronicles.  But nothing that fits the first link's standards of a direct quote of any of the dual books of Samuel, Kings or Chronicles (which were all 1 book originally).  In fact they are only quoted directly in the New Testament because of Paul, in his epistles and in what he says in Acts 13.  So all these people rejecting Paul because they love the Hebrew Bible so much, are unwittingly opening the door to reject much of the Hebrew Bible.  This is interesting because there are a lot of people out there who want to reinterpret David as a villain, some while still seeing themselves as consistent with New Testament Christianity.

Fortunately, Jesus quotes both so called First Isaiah and the so called Second Isaiah and attributes them to Isaiah.

Ezra and Nehemiah are interesting.  They shared the same scroll, and for good reason, Nehemiah is clearly a sequel to Ezra's narrative, so it's difficult to consider Nehemiah canon without considering Ezra Canon.  Both links agree the New Testament never quotes Ezra, but the first says Jesus quotes Nehemiah 9:15 in John 6:31.  However that same verse of John is also cited as quoting Psalm 78:24.  My reading of the three verses in question leads me to conclude Jesus was not exactly quoting either, but the source material could easily have been just the Psalm.

Jesus says in John 4 that the second Temple had some form of Divine presence at that time (that ended at Pentecost when The Church become God's Temple).  But the books themselves admit the Second Temple never had the full Shekinah Glory that the Desert Tabernacle and Solomon's Temple had.  So perhaps even if these book are canonical as an account of history, we should perhaps second guess the authority of decisions made by felible men in this period.

Which is important considering that a website I know of arguing against interracial marriage says "The Messiah upheld the rulings of Ezra and Nehemiah", which is not the case, even if the verse from John 6 did have Nehemiah in mind, it's just Jesus drawing on Nehemiah's wording to describe an event of the wilderness wandering.  It cannot count as an endorsement of Nehemiah or Ezra's opinions on how to interpret the Torah.  In The Torah God being fine with Moses marrying a Cushite woman proves he was fine with Hamites marrying Semites.

On my Prophecy blog I did a post on Nehemiah's quotation of Deuteronomy 30.  Where I showed the view of that held by Anti-Zionist Christians can't allow them to agree with Nehemiah's.  And I also expressed that I think the Second Temple was built both on the wrong location and had the wrong shape.

The problem with wanting to limit one's Canon to what Jesus or the New Testament quoted is that when Jesus quoted something as Scripture calling it Scripture he was referring to something the Jews at the time already considered canon. Second Timothy 3:16 also infers a Canon that was already agreed upon.

The thing is it's alleged the Hebrew Canon didn't become what we know it as now till the Council of Jamnia in the 90s AD.   However that conclusion is debatable.  The Mishna and Talmud refers to this council as some people wanting to question what was already considered canon.  With the Song of Solomon and Ecclesiastes being two that were called into question.  That context implies they were considered Canon in Jesus time, and so if Jesus was upholding the then upheld Canon, it can be inferred to include them.

Also the Kariates seem to have agreed to the same Hebrew Canon even thought they reject the Rabbis.  In fact it is primarily Karaites who preserved the Masoretic text that most today base their Hebrew Bible on, including the KJV.

However one could also argue that Jesus summarized the Hebrew Bible as just "The Law and The Prophets", and so see the lack of quoting the other Historical books as noteworthy. However Jesus clearly quoted the Psalms as Scripture, with Psalm 110 being the most quoted chapter of the Old Testament in the New Testament, and Jesus attributes it to David.   But Acts 2 calls David a Prophet.

There are people out there arguing that Salvation is only for a certian Race

I shouldn't have to bother responding to these people.  But Racism is on the rise right now.

Even in the Torah and the Hebrew Bible salvation was not limited to Blood descendants of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.  Leviticus 19 teaches that the stranger that shall dwell among you shall be treated as if he was born among you.  And again, Circumcision was clearly also allowed for foreigners.

There are people who combine their British Israelism and Two House theology to teach that the "Gentiles" of the New Testament were only the outcasts of the Northern Kingdom, the "Lost Tribes".  Now the main website I'm responding to is White Supremacist, but much of the same logic could be applied to Black Israelite or Asian Israelite theories.  I believe the "Lost Tribes" were scattered to all four corners of the Earth, so some truth exists to each of those theories.

What's dangerous is they do make a valid point about "Gentile" not exclusively meaning only non Israelites, since the same Hebrew and Greek words also get translated Nation and are used of the Nation of Israel.  So I need to refute them in a way not dependent on the mere use of that word.

Their main article on this subject quotes only one verse of Romans 11, verse 17.

"And if some of the branches be broken off, and thou, being a wild olive tree, wert grafted in among them, and with them partakest of the root and fatness of the olive tree;"

And they then said "Clearly only an olive tree can be grafted into an Olive Tree" so they can say the branches being grafted in are the same ones that fell off, even though that is totally incompatible with what Paul said.

Romans 11:24 destroys their desire to use natural science in interpreting this as it clearly says.

"For if thou wert cut out of the olive tree which is wild by nature, and wert grafted contrary to nature into a good olive tree: how much more shall these, which be the natural branches, be grafted into their own olive tree?"

In the Greek, "contrary to Nature" is the same as "Against Nature" in Romans 1:26-27.  Thus part of the theme of Paul refuting the people who agreed with that rhetorical rant by showing God does something "Against Nature' therefore "Against Nature" can't be inherently wrong.

They also have an article against using the word Seed in a spiritual sense, yet did not actually quote Galatians 3 and 4, where Paul's point is clearly about people not naturally Abraham's Seed becoming Abraham's Seed.

But I can also cite Isaiah 53.  If you're a Christian you know the Suffering Servant is Jesus, Acts 8 and 1 Peter both quote it as such.  And unless you're a Mormon you don't think Jesus had any children by natural biological reproduction.  But Isaiah 53:10 says the Suffering Servant will have Seed.  Psalm 45 also says The Messiah and The Bride will have children.

In Revelation 12, The Woman is Israel (all 12 Tribes represented), The Man-Child is the New Testament Church, separate from those is....

the remnant of her seed, which keep the commandments of God, and have the testimony of Jesus Christ.

So clearly, there is a lot of Seed here.

The statement in John about Jesus coming "Only to the Lost Sheep of the House of Israel" needs to be understood in the context of John 1.  He came unto His own, and His  own received Him not, so He gave unto others the ability to become Sons of God.

In the training mission Jesus sent The Twelve on during His ministry, that mission was given only to Israelites, since the New Covenant wasn't quite made yet, as Jesus Blood wasn't Shed yet.  In the context of that mission we see the Samaritans are not counted as Israelites, agreeing with the narrative of 2 Kings 17.  But when we get to the true Great Commission in Acts, there the Samaritans are blatantly included, as are Syrians (He may have said Aram in Hebrew) and the Whole World.  And then Acts 8 brings The Gospel to Samaria.

Does God Change?

The Hebrew Roots movement is filled with people rhetorically asking this question even though they think they already known the answer is NO based on their partial citing of Malachi 3:6 "I am Yahuah, I change not".

The problem is Augustine was a Gnostic because he felt an emotional God  who changed like the Yahuah of the Hebrew Bible must be Evil, and it was someone convincing him he could allegorize and explain away those changes that lead to Augustine becoming an "Orthodox" Christian and laying the foundations of Catholic and Calvansit heresy.

That God changes in terms of what man can and cannot do based on various factors is shown without even leaving the Torah.  Capital Punishment and permission to eat meat where introduced after The Flood.  Circumcision was introduced in Genesis 17 and the Sabbath as a command in Exodus 16.  The came Sinai, where this Meme I created is relevant.

Either God's attitude towards Incest changes, or maybe  Leviticus 18 isn't prohibiting Incestuous Marriage, you can't have it both ways.

The context of Malachi 3:6 is clear, just read the whole verse.

"For I am Yahuah, I change not; therefore ye sons of Jacob are not consumed."

Because Yahuah's promises are unconditional Jacob will not be consumed.  And according to Genesis 48 the Fullness of the Gentiles are considered part of Jacob eventually.  Yet many of these same people want to say biological descent from Jacob is irrelevant because of their disobedience.

The Torah itself does not teach The Law is forever, that is simply an erroneous KJV translation.

The word translated "Everlasting" or "Forever' or "Eternal" when referring to things like the Levitical Priesthood, The Sabbath and the Holy Days is Olam, which means age or eon, it does not actually mean forever. Whether it's Exodus 40:15, or Leviticus 16:34, or Leviticus 24:8, or Numbers 25:13.  Same with Exo 21:6, Exo 27:21, Exo 28:43, Exo 29:28, Lev 6:18, Lev 6:22.

In Deuteronomy 33:27, Olam is used of the "everlasting arms" but a different word is used to call God Eternal.

 Likewise the phrase "all the days", which is introduced about time periods that have an end in Genesis 3:14-17.  And again in Genesis 5.  And it's also used of the Nazarite vow in Numbers 6.  If "all the days" is being used of something that is also defined as an Olam, an Age, then it clearly means all the days of that age, just as it can also mean all the days of someone's life.  Taking the phrase to inherently mean all the days of eternity, it wishful thinking.

Exodus 19:5-6 foretells there will be a time when all of the Nation will be Yahuah's Priests. The temporariness of The Torah is implied in The Torah.

See also today's post on my Prophecy Blog, and the Priesthood of all Believers post.

Even the foreigner that shall dwell among you

People like to use the passages in The Torah that say even foreigners, even people not by Blood descended from Abraham, living among you need to be Circumcised and follow other parts of The Law, against Paulian theology (or to reinterpret Paulian theology).

Those verses are about Nationality/Citizenship.  The Nation of Israel were given special privileges by Yahuah, one of which was the right to live in the Land that He gave to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.  People could become citizens of that nation without needing to be literal genealogical descendants of Jacob, but that required following the rules he gave that Nation.

But that does not mean Salvation, or even the ability to please Yahuah and be considered righteous, was limited to that Nation, or people living by that Nation's rules.

Circumcision was introduced in Genesis 17.  So it's significant that we can clearly infer Jethro's family/priesthood did not practice Circumcision (I don't believe he descended from Abraham, we have to go outside the Torah to find him called a Kenite, but he was still in the Torah only said to be a priest in Midian, not a Midianite).  Moses had married Jethro's daughter and lived as one of them for 40 years before the Burning Bush, and yet still hadn't Circumcised his son.  In fact Zipporah seemed rather disturbed by the practice.

Deuteronomy 2 has God telling the Israelites he's NOT giving them any land of Edom, Moab or Ammon, saying he gave those lands to those nations.  They may have had Circumcision, Edom almost certainly did, but not the rest of the Torah.

That includes The Sabbath, I did a post already on my Prophecy Blog about how The Sabbath as a custom was introduced in Exodus 16.  The precedent may have been set by Genesis 1-2, but there is no evidence of the Patriarchs in Genesis or Israelites in Exodus before this practicing it.

God promised Abraham that in his Seed shall ALL the Nations and Families of the Earth be Blessed.

So those are all points for Torah only and heavily Torah centric people.  Going to the rest of the Hebrew Bible.  Did Jonah Circumcise all the men of Nineveh?  Did the Queen of Sheba follow all of the Law?  Obviously not, but Jesus clearly refereed to them as Saved.  And God also calls Cyrus his Anointed in Isaiah 44/45.

Amos 9:7 is a verse that implies there are even other nations Yahuah might have had similar relationships with.

First it says the children of Israel are like the children of the Cushites to Him.  Isaiah 18 and Zephanaih also have verses taken to imply the Cushites were like the Israelites.  And then there was Moses Cushite wife, and Ebedmelech who was an Ethiopian in Jerusalem who was friends with Jeremiah.  And the Ethiopian eunuch reading Isaiah in Acts 8.

Then He says He brought Israel out of Mizraim like he brought the Philistines out of Caphtor and the Arameans out of Kir, a location in northern Mesopotamia.

This is one of a few verses that seems to say the Philistines came from Caphtor, which causes people to think the usual interpretation/translation of Genesis 10:14 must be wrong in saying they came from Casluhim.  But if this Amoz verse is comparing their relation with Caphtor to Israel's with Mizraim, then perhaps they genealogically descended from the Casluhim but had sojourned for a time in Caphtor?

Throughout the Torah and even down to the time of David, Aram was mostly associated with northern Mesopotamia, parts of Turkey, Syria and northern Iraq on the other side of the Euphrates.  Harran is repeatedly called a land of Aram.  I think Hadadezer son of Rehob of Zobah might be a king of the Assyrian King's List.  The origin story of Aram Damascus is interestingly told in 1 Kings 11, and Yahuah is claiming credit for it there.

It's been speculated that the comparison of Cush to Israel here means Cush too was brought out of Mizraim.  Interestingly the origins of the Kingdom of Kush/Nubia that later became the 25th Dynasty can be estimated to be contemporary with Amoz (the reigns of Uzziah and Jeroboam II).

But Salvation isn't even limited to those righteous Gentiles either.  Ezekiel 16 clearly teaches that even Sodom will be restored.

Are Sacrifices Prohibited on this side of The Cross?

 [[Update April 10th 2018:I kind of regret making this post, you should probably just ignore it.]]