JESUS IS CUTE BUT JEHOVAH’S A BRUTE — PART 5

The difference between the Old Testament and the New Testament God — Part 5

Holy Hormones! Surely this talk about Romance is blasphemy! God is Love, isn’t He.

If your pastor has not taught this to you, teach your pastor because he has been missing out, too.

Brace yourself! This is more of a teaching blog than an entertaining one. It may not be an easy read because there is more here than a normal, well adjusted person would normally want to know but it will be worth it. It is the detail which makes me a boring person that brings the Bible alive for me.

But if you happen to like what you read, there’s more to be found here.

This post is longer than my usual because it may be introducing a new concept to some people so needs more explanation.

[NOTE: Important words analysed below are identified with Hebrew/Greek transliterations into English and Strong’s Numbers so that whoever wants to can check them out — it is strongly recommended that you do. I use the Blue Letter Bible (https://www.blueletterbible.org/ )]

This is a five part series.

This Part 5, will examine the evidence provided in the Scriptures to give a different perspective as to the type of relationship Christ desires with His Church.

Part 1 demonstrated, using simple Hebrew spelling and etymology that, at the Burning Bush, Moses was speaking to the God of the Old and New Testament, Who is one-and-the-same Person.

Part 2 used the Jehovah’s Witnesses’ Bible to confirm that the OT Yehovah and NT Yeshua/Jesus is one-and-the-same-Person.

Part 3 used the Scriptures from both Testaments to show that the tasks completed by Yehovah, Christ and the Holy Spirit confirmed that the OT Yehovah and NT Yeshua/Jesus is one-and-the-same-Person.

Part 4, examined why NT Saints have such a low regard for the loving kindness and mercy of the OT Yehovah and present a remedy for anyone interested enough to take it up.

Christianity from a different perspective.

We hear a lot about the various forms of Love, which is of ultra importance. What is missing between Christ and His Bride in the (small ‘c’)church is the Romance.

I have a friend whose Mother Tongue is Hebrew so he hears the words unspoken in the Language — which is very ‘earthy.’ He said, “When HaShem says, ‘Seek my face,’ think hormones.” Imagine two young lovers seeking each other in a crowd. Their eyes are darting about, their hearts are pounding, their temples throbbing and their mouths dry. Then, at first glimpse, their heart leaps — they are alive. That is the eagerness that God responds to when He promises, “You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart,” and He does not lie. This is what your Saviour wants from you — PRIMITIVE PASSIONATE RELATIONSHIP — as is written in the Song of Songs, which will be mentioned later.

It also works the other way. Any parent knows the cry of their own child. When you call to your Heavenly Father He can pick you out of a cacophony of screeches around you.

[There is another post, “Where does the Lord’s Joy come from? He explains it in the grammar,” which mentions The Joy of Shamar. It is there for you to read so it won’t be covered here.]

Before we start, let’s get in the mood for romance.

(If you are on the bus, or busy, do something else until you get a quiet place and enough time.)

Spend a few minutes doing these things and relax, these are the best bits.

Firstly: Invoke this link, relax, close your eyes, and soak it up https://www.facebook.com/Michael7Judah7Farr/videos/1357988880700/

Secondly: Let it sink into the depths of your soul that, by the Blood that Christ eagerly shed for you, you have never been more Righteous nor more Loved than you are at this very moment.

Thirdly: The Bible repeatedly presents goodness as a core quality of our Lord, and I want to share just 23 of those occasions. These 23 verses point you to the goodness of our God and what it means for our lives. Open this link to an online Bible App, https://www.biblegateway.com/, and paste these verses in, all at once. Then soak up the flavour of the message that the Lord is a good God.

Exodus 34:6, Psalm 145:9, 1 Chronicles 16:34, Ezra 3:11, Psalm 25:8, Psalm 23:6, Psalm 27:13, Psalm 145:5–7, Psalm 34:8, Psalm 100:4–5, Psalm 107:8–9, Psalm 103:13–14, Psalm 143:10, Psalm 143:10, Psalm 92:15, Psalm 119:68, Nehemiah 9:20, Psalm 69:16, Nahum 1:7, Psalm 31:19–20, Mark 10:18, James 1:17, Matthew 7:11

Now you are in the mood.

God reveals the mystery through Apostle Paul in Ephesians 5:31–32 where it is written, ‘ “For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.” This is a great mystery (G3466 — mystērion), but I speak concerning Christ and the church.’

G3466 — mystērion, in this context, does not mean that it can’t be known. It means something that God has not previously revealed but now, in His Wisdom, has chosen to make known. He has already called Israel His wife in the OT but she chased after foreign gods. The Gentiles should have been drawn into the Commonwealth by the obvious relationship between Yehovah and Israel but Israel did not obey the Torah. The Church includes all Humanity.

[AN ASIDE: “Chased after,” is a sanitised translation. As mentioned, Hebrew is an earthy language and the closer translation is, “Whored after.” If you are offended, don’t shoot the messenger. Track it down in the OT Hebrew. The trouble with today’s (small ‘c’)church is that it is more sanitised than sanctified.]

A posture for prayer.

Prayer is the most Holy Action humans can do. In a teaching on on the subject I read a very long time ago, there were some descriptions of the posture to take up. Two I remember are:-

• A subservient posture to the omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent Being.
• Bending forward as if to kiss.

Someone got the point.

Primitive Passion

The story so far is that God is Good, in Christ you will never be in a better position with God than you are now, He hears you, He wants a primitive passionate relationship.

Sophisticated folk tend to be offended when called “primitive.” But it interesting to compare the two words.

Sophisticated: “make impure by admixture,” from Medieval Latin sophisticatus, past participle of sophisticare (see sophistication). From about 1600 as “corrupt, delude by sophistry;” from 1796 as “deprive of simplicity.” A Sophist is a person who reasons with apparently clever, but false, arguments. Penetrate false argument with the Sword of the Spirit — the Bible.

Primitive: late 14th century, primitif, “of an original cause; of a thing from which something is derived; not secondary but primary”, from Latin primitivus “first or earliest of its kind.” Meaning “of or belonging to the first age” is from early 15th century, especially in a Christian sense of “adhering to the qualities of the early Church.”

Passionate: Suffering (enduring) in the specific sense of “amorous” is attested from 1580s. Middle English passional “pertaining to the feelings” (mid-15c., from Medieval Latin passionalis).

Obviously, care must be taken with definitions when dealing with the languages in the Bible, and the subsequent translations.

Another look at the Creation Poem.

This needs some preparation.

The first step in Exegesis is to determine what the Folk of Old were actually saying to each other by knowing the meanings of the words. Translation precedes interpretation. Because of the shades of meanings of words in every language, there is a cluster/cloud of words from which to choose, as shown in the figure.

You possibly know that there are two controlling factors when translating the Bible.

• Every word in both languages have more than one meaning.
• There is only one meaning that will fit into the context being translated. Without satisfying this latter constraint, the interpretation does not respect the author’s intention.

Hebrew Hermeneutics has four levels:-

Peshat — the literal, direct meaning (story level)

Derash — the homiletical, or practical, application, traditions — midrash, talmud

Remez — the allegorical significance; a hint of something deeper, a higher meaning; prophetic understanding;

Sod (road) — the mystical, or hidden, or secret, meaning — Jewish soul or Christian spirit — understanding ourselves (giving a glimpse of God’s Image)

Through the eyes of the Sod

Viewing Creation through the Sod results in a view that you may reject because of your traditions. My explanation is not crisp and relies on a property of Hebrew where different words roll of the tongue in a similar manner. You will soon see what I mean.

The Bible shows were three stages to the final product of Adam, each one more personal than the previous. but not the way postulated by Darwin.

(1) God Created the dust: Impersonal, just chemicals with no consciousness. Despite the huffing-and-puffing of scientists, no one can explain the three basic cornerstones of human existence — Gravity, Energy, Consciousness. We can see them and measure them but can neither explain them nor manufacture them. All breathing life forms are fungible carbon. The periodic table of the chemical elements shows that we are more important than generally appreciated but that is another story for another time. But we can prod and poke a pile of carbon as much as we like but it won’t become alive. Ask Dr Frankenstein.

(2) God Formed the animal life-forms, including Humanity, from the dust. The Hebrew verb carries the flavour of squeezing into shape by hand. Much, much more personal. But it is stipulated that all species are “after their own kind.” Elsewhere it says the different species have their own kind of flesh. We have similarities with animals because we share the same environment but the next action of God separates us. God cares for ALL living creatures.
° Obviously, every animal has a body.
° It can be seen in the higher order animals that they have souls (personalities and intelligence). However, I’m not sure about cats. They have personalities and intelligence but I’ve yet to be convinced about souls.
° I’ll keep away from bananas.

(3) God breathed into Adam’s “nostril the breath of life and man became a living soul.” The words, “God breathed into Adam’s nostril,” have the fragrance of “God kissed Adam.” Extremely intimate. [Seek me with all your heart you will find me. Hormones.]
° Only Humans have a spirit in addition to the body and soul.
° Earth-dwellers ask, “How do we know other animals don’t have spirits?” This can only be answered by using the Bible as the ultimate Authority. That is why every Christian must be able to answer why they choose to believe the Bible.

God kissing?

This is where I’m walking on eggs. I don’t pretend to have more than a glancing knowledge of Hebrew (or Greek). I let the scholars at Blue Letter Bible do all the heavy lifting. However, there are patterns that become noticeable with experience of Bible study rather than just Bible reading.

It is written in Genesis 2:7, “And the LORD God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed (H5301 — nāp̄aḥ) into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul.”

The translation of H5301 is fascinating. One of the meanings is, “to breathe, to give up or lose life.” You are at liberty to disagree but the mystic in me interprets this as God is breathing some of His Spirit into Adam. This gives the definition of life and death. Life is the presence of the Spirit of God. Death is the absence of the Spirit of God. A person can have a functioning body, soul and spirit but, without the indwelling Spirit of God, that person is not alive. “Let the dead bury their dead.”

The Song of Songs may be viewed from several levels. The highest level is the Passionate Relationship burning between Christ and His Bride in the NT (or Yehovah and His wife in the OT). It opens up with the Shulamite Maid proclaiming, “Let him kiss (H5401 — nāšaq) me with the kisses of his mouth: for thy love is better than wine.”

The translation of H5401 is, “press together.”

The spelling of H5301 and H5401 are not at all similar (יִּפַּח and נָשַׁק, respectively) but the phonetics are similar naw-fak’ and naw-shak’, so they both roll off the tongue in the same manner. (Actually, when a Sabra says the two words, the accent makes it difficult for an English speaker to differentiate. I suppose it depends which University you went to?¿?) This is a literary device used elsewhere in the OT. As I said, I’m no expert but my secular technical training is to recognise pattern. If you have evidence pointing either way, please let me know. I’m not intending to start a cult on this.

So, thinking laterally, a plausible interpretation of Genesis 2:7 could be that God kissed Adam and brought him to life (a high-end version of Sleeping Beauty) which adds a dimension of intimacy to the commitment of God to the relationship, and the response He requires.

Is there more to the pattern?

Yes, at least two examples.

1) There is a Jewish teaching that the Grammar of the episode of HaShem making tunics of skin for Adam and Eve in Genesis 3:21 that the verb for “made” is a different type to those in Genesis 1. It is not something He created by His Word. It is something that He fashioned personally.

2) Our Lord described the relationship He desired in Matthew 7:21–23.

“Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father in heaven. Many will say to Me in that day, ‘Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Your name, cast out demons in Your name, and done many wonders in Your name?’ And then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew (ginōskō — G1097) you; depart from Me, you who practice iniquity!’

The everyones were trying to haggle their way into Heaven by listing their works but our Savior rejected them because He never ginōskō — G1097 them. In this instance the “knowing” implies an intimate relationship as demonstrated by the Septuagint translation of Genesis 4:1, ‘Now Adam knew (Hebrew yāḏaʿ H3045 / Greek ginōskō — G1097) Eve his wife, and she conceived and bore Cain . . . .”’ Obviously, this yāḏaʿ/ginōskō had more than a touch of nudge-nudge, wink-wink, say no more. Again, obviously, Jesus did/does not want an arm’s length relationship with His Church.

So why were we created?

The conclusion of the matter; we were created to be lovers, though not in the smutty ways of the kosmos (John 3:16) the whole circle of earthly goods, endowments riches, advantages, pleasures, etc, which although hollow and frail and fleeting, stir desire, seduce from God and are obstacles to the cause of Christ.

IN CLOSING

The forgoing evidence has not been presented to convince any reader but to allow a personal decision to be made. There is much more to know about this subject. Perhaps you’ll pay another visit, sometime.

All Glory to the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.

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