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The Doctrine of Divine Remarriage

The Doctrine of Divine Remarriage - Did Yeshua die so that he could recovenant with Israel?

There is a doctrine gaining popularity recently that I refer to as The Doctrine of Divine Remarriage. The short version of this doctrine goes like this:

The Sinai Covenant after the Exodus from Egypt was a marriage between YHWH and Israel. Centuries later, the Kingdom of Israel broke into two kingdoms: Ephraim in the north (sometimes called Israel, Samaria, Shomron, or the Ten Lost Tribes) and Judah in the south. Ephraim fell into idolatry–a kind of spiritual adultery–so YHWH divorced her and let Assyria conquer her and send her into exile from the land.

While in exile, Ephraim made a new covenant (i.e. marriage) with a pagan deity. Deuteronomy 24:1-4 says that if a man divorces his wife, who then marries another man, and then the second man divorces her, the first man can’t remarry her. “For that is an abomination before YHWH.” According to this law, YHWH cannot reunite with Ephraim. She is forever separated from her first husband.

However, Scripture also teaches that all covenant obligations (including marriage) end at death, so if YHWH could die and be resurrected, he could be remarried to Ephraim. He accomplished this by sending Yeshua (YHWH in the flesh) to die at Calvary. His death nullified the Sinai Covenant, and his resurrection enabled him to restore exiled Ephraim to relationship with him through the New Covenant.

When I first heard this idea more than 20 years ago, it sounded so…cool! The Bible clearly uses marriage as a metaphor of the relationship God has with his people, and this seems like a beautiful expression of a husband loving his wife so much that he is willing to give up his life for her. This is exactly what Paul instructed men in Ephesians 5. I love it when God’s patterns emerge in Scripture, linking texts and events that were centuries apart.

Husbands, love your wives just as Messiah also loved His community and gave Himself up for her to make her holy, having cleansed her by immersion in the word. Messiah did this so that He might present to Himself His glorious community—not having stain or wrinkle or any such thing, but in order that she might be holy and blameless.
Ephesians 5:25-27 TLV

I had some nagging doubts, though. This teaching is not given explicitly anywhere in Scripture, and there are some things about the story that I couldn’t reconcile. For example, who is the second husband that Ephraim was supposed to have married? And what does this mean for the Southern Kingdom of Judah?

Last year I took a closer look at all of the covenants in the Bible and how they related to each other, and I quickly became convinced that the Doctrine of Divine Remarriage just doesn’t work with what the Bible says. I very briefly mentioned some of my doubts about this doctrine in the video series, Covenants of Israel (YouTube link). But in this article, I’m going to address this doctrine specifically and in much more depth.

I gave a brief overview of the Doctrine of Divine Remarriage, but before I can tell you what’s really wrong with it, I need to break it down in more detail. This doctrine is usually given with the six beliefs listed below, which I will do my absolute best to present as objectively and accurately as possible. Please note that I am describing the beliefs of those who teach the doctrine under question, not my own beliefs.

Belief one: The Sinai Covenant is a marriage covenant between YHWH and Israel.

Ezekiel, Jeremiah, Hosea, and other prophets frequently use marital language to describe the covenant relationship between YHWH and Israel. See this passage, for example.

“Again I passed by and saw you, and behold, you were truly at the time of love. I spread the corner of my garment over you and covered your nakedness. I swore to you and entered into a covenant with you,” says Adonai. “So you became Mine.”
Ezekiel 16:8 TLV

Belief two: YHWH divorced Ephraim (the Northern Kingdom of Israel).

This is based on one passage from Jeremiah:

I noted that when backsliding Israel [Ephraim] committed adultery I sent her away and gave her a certificate of divorce. Yet, unfaithful Judah, her sister, did not fear. Instead she also went and committed adultery.
Jeremiah 3:8 TLV

There are two other passages that I have seen referenced, Isaiah 50:1 and Hosea 2:1-3, but neither of these are actually about divorcing Ephraim. Isaiah is addressed to Judah and says that YHWH sent away the mother of Judah, while Hosea is addressed to Ephraim but also says that YHWH sent away their mother, not Ephraim.

Some teachers include post-crucifixion grafted-in gentiles with Ephraim, but those aren’t the people that YHWH divorced in Jeremiah. The inclusion of gentiles in the promises and covenants of Israel is a separate topic. They don’t need to re-covenant with God, because they weren’t part of the original covenant and divorce.

Belief three: Ephraim made a covenant with another god

Some teachers of this doctrine don’t make this explicit, but the better ones do. This is a requirement for the Deuteronomy 24 law to apply, though, so it’s necessary for the doctrine to work.

Hosea 2 and Jeremiah 3 show that Ephraim certainly engaged in spiritual adultery in the form of idolatry prior to their exile from the land. Jeremiah 3:1 even cites the law in Deuteronomy 24 in reference to the possibility of YHWH taking back Judah who was behaving in the same manner.

I think it’s safe to assume that Ephraim continued to engage in idolatry after their exile. They were scattered far beyond the borders of Assyria and most of them eventually forgot their identity as Israel. (See this video playlist, Who Is Israel?)

This particular belief requires one of two assumptions for it to be true:

  1. Ephraim made an explicit covenant with a false god, but there is no record of that covenant in the Bible or historical records.
  2. Sexual union itself creates a marriage covenant whether there is an explicit agreement between the two parties or not. In the case of Ephraim, this would take the form of collective idolatry.

Belief four: Ephraim was divorced from that other god

I haven’t heard this belief taught by any teacher of the Doctrine of Divine Remarriage, but it is necessary for the Deuteronomy 24 law to come into play. The law is very clear that it only applies if the woman is legally divorced from both her first and second husbands. If the second husband dies, she is free to remarry the first. If she is still married to the second, then she is not free to marry anyone else, no matter who it is.

As with the covenant marriage in Belief Three, there is no historical or biblical record of Ephraim being divorced from her second husband, so it has to be assumed.

Belief five: Death nullifies all legal ties of the one who dies

This seems like common sense, and Paul says as much in Romans 7:1-7, which says in part,

Accordingly, she will be called an adulteress if she lives with another man while her husband is alive. But if her husband dies, she is free from that law, and if she marries another man she is not an adulteress.
Romans 7:3 ESV

According to this belief, all laws, debts, and covenants that bound a person in life end at death. If the person is then resurrected, he is free to carry on his life as if he had never been bound by them at all.

Belief six: YHWH died and resurrected in the person of Yeshua, enabling his remarriage to Ephraim

I am assuming that you, the reader, agree with me that Yeshua is YHWH in the flesh. If you don’t, then you probably reject this doctrine on those grounds, and this is all a moot point to you. (Please don’t try to argue about Yeshua’s divinity in the comments. This is not the place.)

I don’t think that anyone believes that remarriage to Ephraim is the only reason that Yeshua came to die. He died for the sins of the whole world, after all, not just half of Israel. However, according to the Doctrine of Divine Remarriage, this is a major secondary purpose. If he had not died, he would have been free to make a new covenant with Judah–and even the rest of the world–but Ephraim would be permanently cut off, at least from a marriage-covenant with YHWH. God promised throughout the Torah and the Prophets that he would restore Ephraim to covenant with him, this was the only way he could keep his word.

What's wrong with the Doctrine of Divine Remarriage, the belief that Jesus died to cancel so that he could remarry Israel?

What’s wrong with the Doctrine of Divine Remarriage?

On the surface, this seems like a pretty strong argument. It appears that Beliefs Three and Four are the only ones that involve speculation and assumptions, and if the other beliefs are true, these two seem very reasonable. Unfortunately, a closer examination will reveal some problems with all six beliefs, some much more serious than others.

I’m not trying to offend anyone with this. I don’t want to hurt anyone’s feelings or make anyone look bad. My only purpose is to promote sound biblical doctrine. I know that it can be difficult to give an objective hearing to anything that contradicts a deeply held and loved belief. I’ve been there many times myself!

Here’s what I would like you to do: Consider reading the following as if you had just heard about this doctrine today and had no emotional attachment to it. Be curious. As you read, don’t assume any motives or beliefs on my part that aren’t clearly in evidence. Most of all, check everything I say against Scripture–not against what you think you remember is in the Bible, but what is actually there.

One: Is the Sinai Covenant a Marriage?

The answer depends on how you define a marriage.

Considering the numerous passages from the prophets that describe God’s relationship with Ephraim and Judah in marital terms, there is no doubt at all that the Sinai Covenant was intended to be analogous to marriage at the very least. Were those prophecies meant to be metaphors only, or is that relationship actually a marriage of husband and wife?

There is no clear definition of marriage in the Bible, but from numerous passages that describe the making and operation of a marriage, we can get a good picture of how the ancient Hebrews who wrote the Bible thought of it. There are simply too many verses to list them all, so here are a few highlights:

  • Malachi 2:14 shows that marriage is a kind of covenant, although it clearly doesn’t require the same formality that covenants usually require. It can include documentation, witnesses, and sacrifices–and sometimes probably did–but doesn’t have to.
  • Genesis 2 and many other passages show that a man is to leave his parents to become one flesh with his wife, including a sexual union. This doesn’t fit with Sinai being a marriage in any way. God didn’t have any parents to leave and there was clearly no sexual union. God did not become one flesh with Israel. The closest they came to this was when God attempted to write his Law on their hearts, but they were unable to accept it (Exodus 20:18-21, Deuteronomy 18:16-17, Galatians 3:19).
  • Exodus 21:10, Numbers 32:16-27, 1 Corinthians 7:3-5, and Ephesians 5 show that a husband owes his wife love, protection, shelter, food, and sexual relations. Except for sexual relations, these are all things that God promised to Israel in the Torah, so long as they continued to be faithful to him.
  • Genesis 3:16, Numbers 30, 1 Corinthians 7:3-5, and Ephesians 5 along with numerous commands in Torah show that a wife owes her husband ongoing sexual relations and fidelity, respect, and obedience. Except for sexual relations–again–these are all things that we owe to God without reservation.

These points don’t all align well with the idea of Sinai being a literal marriage covenant. There are two fatal flaws in defining that way.

The first flaw is that there is no physical “one flesh” relationship. God is a spirit (John 4:24), not a man (Numbers 23:10), while Israel is a kingdom of priests (Exodus 19:6, Revelation 1:6), not a woman. Clearly this relationship cannot be consummated in the same way as a husband and wife. God also metaphorically describes Israel as his son (Exodus 4:22, etc) and as various animals (Deuteronomy 32:11, Psalm 100:3, etc). If the marriage was literal, some of these would make him to be describing himself as the worst possible kind of sinner.

The second flaw is that God made a covenant with one people at Sinai, not two, while some of the marriage metaphors in the prophets speak of each of the kingdoms of Israel as a separate bride or as children of one or two brides. The entire people of Israel agreed to God’s terms as one kingdom in Exodus 19:8, not as two. The division of Israel into two kingdoms was foreshadowed in the relationships of Jacob’s sons and other hints in Torah, but the actual division didn’t happen until after the third king of Israel had died. There was only one bride at Sinai, just as there is only bride in any of the marriage metaphors used in the New Testament.

God’s relationship to Israel can be a marriage in metaphor only. (Or perhaps I should say it the other way around: The marriage of man and woman is intended to be an earthly image of a higher spiritual reality in God’s relationship with his people.) The Sinai Covenant as an analog of marriage is a very strong one in which abundant crops and descendants parallel actual children and worship parallels sexual union, but it is still analogous to marriage, not an actual marriage of man and woman.

Two: Did YHWH divorce Ephraim?

Jeremiah 3 clearly says that YHWH gave Ephraim a bill of divorce, and the first chapter of Hosea could reasonably be said to contain that bill:

And the LORD said, “Call his name Not My People, for you are not my people, and I am not your God.”
Hosea 1:9 ESV

However, we have to deal with the same question of metaphor vs reality, and there are a couple of problems with interpreting this as a literal divorce of a wife by her husband.

First, if the marriage between YHWH and Israel was only like marriage and not an actual marriage, then the divorce must also be like divorce and not actual divorce.

Second, even if Sinai was a literal marriage, there was only one bride, not two, and you can’t divorce half of a wife.

It’s true that the prophets describe Ephraim and Judah as sisters. Ezekiel 23 even names them Oholah and Oholibah and says that YHWH found them in Egypt and married them. This sounds as if God married two brides at Sinai, despite Exodus describing only one kingdom and people.

However, Ezekiel also says that these were two daughters of the same woman, but what woman would that be? It’s remotely possible that the mother is a reference to Sarah or Rebekah–certainly not Jacob’s 4 wives–but all of that is indisputably a metaphor. The millions of Hebrews who came out of Egypt were not two literal women with a single literal mother. They didn’t literally “play the whore” while they were in Egypt. It’s far more likely that the one mother of Ephraim and Judah was the united Kingdom of Israel that agreed to the covenant at the foot of Sinai.

Ephraim and Judah were only present independently at Sinai as the seed of division that had been planted by the rivalries of Jacob’s sons described in Genesis. That seed wouldn’t divide into two separate kingdoms for several more centuries. Israel was not two women rescued from Egypt, but one people who was metaphorically represented as the mother of two rebellious daughters in Ezekiel 23.

If the Sinai Covenant was a metaphor and the two daughters of Israel in Ezekiel 23 were metaphors, then the divorce of one of those daughters must also be a metaphor.

Three: Did Ephraim make a covenant with another god?

There are two problems with the idea that Ephraim made a covenant with another god after being sent into exile by Assyria.

The first problem is that there is no record of such a covenant being made. If it is so central to Yeshua’s purpose in coming to earth, I would expect some indication of it in Scripture. As far as I know, there is nothing about this in the canonical scriptures nor in extra-biblical ancient writings.

Of course, absence of evidence is not necessarily evidence of absence, but I don’t see how such a covenant would have been possible. A covenant according to the standards that YHWH seems to follow in the Bible requires a sacrifice, witnesses, and agreement between the parties–among other elements.

Eight elements of divine covenants in the Bible. Illustrating how some critical elements of a covenant are missing from Israel's "marriage" with God.
Eight elements that seem to be common to divine covenants in the Bible. See https://jaycarper.com/covenants for more information.

When YHWH makes a covenant with a group of people, he always operates through an intermediary with legitimate authority over all those with whom he would make the covenant. After the Flood, he made a covenant with all life on earth through Noah. He made a covenant with Abram’s descendants mediated by Abram. At Sinai, he made a covenant with Israel mediated by Moses.

Who was there in the Assyrian exile who had authority to make such a covenant on behalf of all Ephraim? At Sinai all the people agreed to the covenant with YHWH. How would the people of Ephraim agree to a national covenant when they had been scattered across thousands of miles into different lands, languages, and cultures?

In order for the Deuteronomy 24 law to be applicable to Ephraim, she must have made a covenant (“married”) some other god while in exile, and so this the Doctrine of Divine Remarriage must assume that it is true without any evidence. Some teachers have recognized this problem and proposed a solution. They assert that human marriage only requires a sexual union without necessarily including an intent to create a lifelong husband-wife relationship. In other words, sex equals marriage.

But this doesn’t hold up to close analysis either. Becoming “one flesh” physically is a requirement of marriage, but it does not create a marriage in itself. Consider these points:

  • In 1 Corinthians 6:16, Paul points out that a man who is joined to a prostitute becomes one flesh with her, but that can’t mean that he marries her, because she would already be married to someone else.
  • Exodus 22:16-17 says that a father can refuse to allow his daughter to marry a man who seduced her, but if sex made a marriage, then she would already have married the man.
  • In John 4:16-17, Yeshua told the Samaritan woman that she had been married five times, but the man she was living with at that time had not married her. The implication is that she was living with the man as a wife, but had not made a formal commitment of marriage.

In my opinion, equating sex with marriage is a man-made doctrine. If two unmarried people have sex without intending to make a lifelong commitment, they aren’t getting married; they’re committing fornication.

Four: Was Ephraim divorced from her pagan god/husband?

This is another belief that must be assumed since there is no historical or biblical evidence of her marriage to a pagan god, let alone of him later giving her a bill of divorce. I’ve shown how God’s “marriage” to Ephraim was only a metaphor used as a prophetic picture of God’s relationship with his people, and that his “divorce” of Ephraim was also a metaphor.

Gods–even false, pagan gods–cannot make a marriage with a group of people in the same way that a man can with a woman, so the language of marriage and divorce in all of the prophecies concerning God and Israel (unified and separate as Ephraim and Judah) is always metaphorical, not literal.

Five: Does Yeshua’s death nullify the Sinai Covenant?

Based on the following points, I think it’s safe to say that legal bonds–specifically marriage–really do end at death:

  • In Romans 7:1-7 and 1 Corinthians 7:39, Paul argued that marriage and other legal bonds end at our physical death, and that, through the death of an infinitely perfect man, Yeshua, we are counted as having died and been resurrected spiritually, breaking our spiritual bonds too.
  • Leviticus 21:1-4 says that a priest may make himself ritually unclean by preparing his immediate relatives for burial, with the exception of his wife. I believe this is because she stops being his wife upon her death, and she is no longer his immediate relative at that point. His responsibility as a priest takes precedence, and he needs to find someone else to perform that task for him.
  • In Matthew 22:23-30, Yeshua told the Sadducees that a woman was widowed and remarried multiple times will be no one’s wife after the resurrection, again indicating that marriage ends at death.

However, there are three serious problems with saying that this principle nullifies the Sinai Covenant between YHWH and Israel.

First, Romans 7 doesn’t say that death annuls all previous bonds as if they had never existed. Rather, it breaks those bonds so that they no longer restrict the person going forward. If a man dies, his wife is no longer married to him, and she is free to marry another. She is not free, however, to pretend as if she was never married to her late husband and then call her children illegitimate.

Marriage annulment is not a biblical concept.

The law about remarriage in Deuteronomy 24 doesn’t say anything about the husband or wife dying and rising from the grave. Even if such a miracle happened, the former marriages would still be former marriages. Death can’t end what has already ended. The first husband would still not be able to remarry his ex-wife, because he had been married to her at one time, he had divorced her, and she had married another man.

Second, we see from those passages that describe Yeshua interacting with the Father and the Holy Spirit that, although he might be YHWH, he is not all of YHWH. We can’t say that the Son made this covenant and the Father made that covenant when the Bible only says that YHWH made all of them. Israel didn’t make a covenant with the Son of God, but with all of God, and all of God didn’t die at Calvary. Only the Son died.

  • In John 10:17, Yeshua said, “the Father loves me, because I lay down my life that I may take it up again,” showing that only the Son and not the Father came to die.
  • In Acts 2:24, Peter said, “God raised him up,” referring to the Son, not the Father or the Holy Spirit.
  • In Galatians 1:1, Paul wrote that God the Father rose Yeshua from the dead, not that he rose himself or the Spirit from the dead.

I can’t nullify my own legal bonds by cutting off my arm or allowing my son be killed. My death alone can break my legal bonds. “Each one shall be put to death for his own sin,” according to Deuteronomy 24:16, just a few verses after the law concerning remarriage to a divorced and remarried wife.

Third, if Yeshua’s death nullified one legal bond on YHWH, then by the same principle it must nullify all legal bonds on YHWH.

  • God’s covenant with Noah, in which he promised never to destroy all life by a flood again (Genesis 9:11), has been canceled, and God is now free to send another worldwide flood.
  • His covenant with Abraham, in which he promised to give Abraham’s descendants land as an “everlasting possession” (Genesis 17:8) has been canceled.
  • His promise to bless his people when they are faithful and obedient (Deuteronomy 29:1-14) has been made meaningless.
  • His “everlasting…and secure” promise to ensure David would always have a son to sit on the throne of Israel, a promise that ought to be fulfilled in Yeshua, is now null and void. It was neither everlasting nor secure.

If the Son’s death nullifies a covenant made by the whole of YHWH, then it seems that the death of any individual Israelite ought to nullify any covenant made by the whole nation of Israel. On the contrary, the covenants of Israel are passed down from parent to child, enduring through the deaths of countless generations.

Exclamation Point. The shocking implications of the Doctrine of Divine Remarriage.

If, on the principle of death ending all legal bonds, Yeshua’s death canceled any covenant of YHWH, then it canceled all covenants of YHWH. Paul was wrong to write that “They are Israelites, and to them belong…the covenants” in Romans 9:4, because those covenants are no longer in effect. We gentiles have not been brought near to the covenants of promise that he referred to in Ephesians 2:12, because those covenants no longer exist.

The death we have through Yeshua, as described in Romans 7, breaks our bondage to the Law (see v4), not God’s bondage to any covenants. His death applies to all people, not just to Ephraim. It is a spiritual death that each one of us undergoes as individuals (not as a nation!) to a debt that we accrued through sins against the Law, not to a covenant that God made with Israel as an act of divine grace.

I meant it when I wrote that I don’t mean to offend anyone by writing this article, but what a horrendous doctrine that makes God out to be a liar and a cheat who makes covenant after covenant, knowing full well that he will throw them all out without having to fulfill their ultimate promises! On what basis should we trust such a god to keep any of his promises? Maybe he has created some other legal loophole that we don’t know about.

Six: Did Yeshua resurrect, in part, to enable YHWH’s remarriage to Ephraim?

This question hardly needs answering at this point. YHWH did not literally marry or divorce Ephraim and so he has no need to remarry her. He made numerous covenants with Israel and individuals and clans within Israel, each one enhancing a relationship which already and continued to exist. Ephraim, despite her many sins, was never outside of her covenants with God, but only temporarily repudiated and exiled as a corrective measure. None of those covenants will ever end until heaven and earth themselves are ended.

So why did Yeshua have to die?

Why did Jesus have to die if he didn't die to cancel out the Old Covenant?

Yeshua’s death had at least two major effects: He became the sacrificial victim that inaugurated the New Covenant and his blood removes the spiritual debt of sin from his people

The New Covenant

As I demonstrated in the Covenants of Israel video series (Rumble link) and noted in the illustration above, divine covenants are established by the blood of a sacrificial victim. You can see this in the examples of God’s covenants in the Old Testament, but Hebrews makes it explicit.

…for where a covenant is , the death of the covenant-victim to come in is necessary, for a covenant over dead victims is stedfast, since it is no force at all when the covenant-victim liveth,
Hebrews 9:16-17 YLT

(My apologies for quoting Young’s Literal Translation, but most English Bible translators introduce too much commentary in these verses because they don’t understand covenants. Young’s is hyper-literal–often so literal that it’s difficult to understand–so translator bias or cultural ignorance is less of a factor.)

The New Covenant was established and was fully in force at the cross. It includes promises that haven’t been fulfilled yet, but all covenants involve ongoing fulfillments. The forgiveness and full restoration of the people of Israel to the land, the defeat of all Israel’s enemies, the personal reign of the Messiah in Jerusalem, a through understanding of God in the hearts of his people, and the resurrection and judgment of all people are all aspects of the New Covenant that we have yet to see, but their future reality was guaranteed when Yeshua said “It is finished”.

Forgiveness of Sin

I won’t pretend to understand exactly how spiritual accounting works. I don’t even understand financial accounting!

Paul explained in Romans 5, Colossians 2:13-14, and Ephesians 1:7 that our transgressions against God’s Law created a spiritual debt that we could never repay. Although the penalty was both physical and spiritual death, our blood could never elevate us to the infinite level of righteousness required to be reconciled to our Creator. Animal sacrifices could only temporarily remove the uncleanness of sin from our flesh and primarily covered sins of weakness, ignorance, and accident. They had no impact at all on the spiritual debt incurred by sins of rebellion.

YHWH’s solution was to send Yeshua to live a perfectly sinless life and give up his life to pay that debt for us. His blood zeroes out (reconciles/justifies) our spiritual balance books, in a way bringing us through death into new spiritual life through him. His perfect righteousness now counts in God’s books as ours.

Yeshua’s blood doesn’t nullify any covenants made by YHWH with anyone. It buys the debt we owed to the Law because of our sins, justifying our spiritual balance sheets. In his death we have obtained forgiveness, whether we understand how it works or not.

And in his resurrection, he took authority over death itself. We, who sincerely pledge our faithfulness to him, accepting the forgiveness of our debt and his lordship over our lives, have been given a promise of eternal life, whether we can wrap our minds around living forever or not.

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Judged with Greater Strictness

Teachers will be judged with greater strictness.

It’s a good thing to be a teacher of the Word, but not something to be taken lightly. In James 3:1, the brother of Yeshua (aka Jesus) wrote “Let not many become teachers, my brethren, knowing that as such we will incur a stricter judgment.” (NASB95)

To some extent, God wants us all to be teachers. Paul wrote in Romans 15:14 that we are to encourage and admonish one another and in 1 Corinthians 14:26 that the members of a congregation should be encouraged to bring psalms, teachings, and prophecies to share. In Deuteronomy 6:7, Moses told us to teach God’s Law to our children.

The difference between teaching and being a teacher may be subtle, but I don’t think it’s difficult to grasp. We all clean, but we are not all janitors. We all sing, but we are not all singers. I sometimes write computer code in the course of my job, but I’m not a computer programmer.

On one hand, there are people who teach their children, instruct their employees, and share their understanding of Scripture with their peers. On the other hand, there are people who have been gifted by God with the ability to understand a complex topic or a difficult skill and explain it to others.

Consider Bezalel and Oholiab in Exodus 35:30-35, which reads in part, “God has filled Bezalel with his Spirit, wisdom, understanding, and knowledge of all kinds of craftsmanship… He also gave him a heart to teach, along with Oholiab, the son of Ahisamach, of the tribe of Dan.” These two men had a special gift for shaping metal, stone, and wood into beautiful objects that glorified God, and they had a desire and the temperament to teach that knowledge to others.

It’s a good thing to want to be a Bible teacher, and I would encourage anyone to study and tell others what they find so long as they are able to do so with gentleness and humility. However, not everyone is equipped for the role of teacher, and this is just as true in spiritual matters as in any other–perhaps even more true.

A spiritual teacher should align with the same criteria that Paul gave in 1 Timothy 3:1-7 and Titus 1:5-9 for elders in the congregations they were organizing:

  • He’s humble and self-controlled
  • His household is in order
  • He’s not a new convert or untaught in the Scriptures
  • He’s not greedy or a womanizer
  • He has a good reputation
  • He’s not a partier or a brawler

I don’t think Paul meant that as a mandatory checklist so much as a set of guidelines, but even so, it’s a high bar. Nor was James trying to scare anyone away from becoming a teacher. Rather he was warning us not to do so lightly. It’s a heavy responsibility.

In v2, James wrote, “If anyone doesn’t stumble in what he says, he is a perfect man, able to control the rest of his body as well.”

Everyone makes mistakes. Everyone is wrong at times, and teachers aren’t exempted. No spiritual teacher on earth knows everything, and so they all inevitably teach some amount of error. However, the consequences of a mistake can be greater for a teacher than for a student. This is why James wrote, “[teachers] will incur a stricter judgment.”

Consider what Yeshua said in Luke 12:48: “From everyone who has been given much, much will be required; and to whom is entrusted much, of him even more will be asked.” His point was that if you carry out a divinely delegated responsibility with diligence and faithfulness, there is reward, but there is also a greater spiritual cost if you fail.

It’s true in this world and the world to come, but you can look to the many fallen preachers and evangelists for an example in the here and now. If your auto mechanic tells you to use the wrong motor oil, it could cost him some business and you thousands of dollars. However, if your pastor tells you that English translation X is the infallible Word of God for the English speaking world, will your faith be shaken when you later discover that translation X has a few errors and questionable word choices? If yours won’t, I guarantee you that someone else’s will be.

If a preacher tells you that God wants you to do one thing when he really wants you to do the opposite, then he jeopardizes the spiritual lives of everyone in his congregation. He tarnishes God’s name and gives God-haters leverage against those with weak faith: “Your pastor said this, but the Bible clearly says that. He’s a hypocrite!”

Yeshua’s warning was mild compared to what God said through the prophet in Ezekiel 33:6-9. To paraphrase, “If the watchman sees the sword coming and does not blow the trumpet, and the sword takes a single person from among the people, the watchman will pay for that man’s blood. If you don’t warn the wicked to repent and he dies in his sin, I will make you pay for his blood. If you do warn him and he repents, you will not only have saved that man’s life, but you will have saved your own as well.”

Like James, I don’t say all of this to scare anyone away from aspiring to be a teacher. I say it to scare you away from taking this calling lightly. It is a good thing to immerse yourself in the Scriptures, to help others to understand and obey them, and to enhance their relationship with God through that understanding and obedience.

Not everyone should seek to be a teacher of God’s people. In fact, most people should not. But if God is calling you, you can’t ignore him. If you feel the fire that Jeremiah described as burning in his bones if he kept it to himself, you must step forward, and you must treat it seriously.

Be a student of the word first and be diligent. You shouldn’t start teaching even the basics of the faith until you have begun to grasp the deeper, more difficult aspects. If you don’t know where to start, start here: Common Sense Bible Study Essentials.

Submit yourself to the elders of your local congregation. If you don’t have elders or a congregation, go get them. Right now. There are no lone wolves in God’s Kingdom. Listen to those who have proved themselves to be faithful men of God and follow their example. Seek counsel and discipleship as Paul went to James and Peter after his conversion, and be obedient to the Word and the Spirit.

Remember that no one except Yeshua ever gets everything right. You can derive a comforting lesson from James’ words, “If anyone does not stumble in what he says, he is a perfect man…”. Nobody is perfect. I think he was talking about maturity rather than perfection, but it’s also possible that this was tongue-in-cheek, as if to say “If you can do this, you can do anything.” You will teach some error. Fix it when you learn better, and then move on.

You should be certain that you are called to teach. I can’t tell you exactly how you will know. Maybe you’ll feel that fire in your heart that won’t let you be silent, burning into your bones. Maybe you’ll be selected and anointed by the elders of your congregation. If you’re not sure, start with the exercises in this article (https://americantorah.com/2018/11/15/six-exercises-to-find-your-calling/) and then go talk to your elders. If you start teaching and someday realize that it isn’t your true calling, be humble enough to admit it and step aside for someone else who is ready.

Finally, trust God’s Spirit to guide and equip you for your task. Just as Bezalel and Oholiab were given skill and a heart to teach, God will provide what you need if he’s called you. Don’t think it will be easy. That fire in your bones won’t always come out in ways that people can understand at first. It takes hard work to refine your message, to learn how to speak to people, to break down the complex ideas that are banging around in your heart so that they come out of your mouth and your keyboard in useful form. Remember that it’s not about earning a name or an income, but about pointing people through Yeshua to the Father.

Listen in on Common Sense Bible Study’s conversation on James 3:1-12.

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Isaiah’s Prophetess

And I went to the prophetess, and she conceived and bore a son. Then the LORD said to me, “Call his name Maher-shalal-hash-baz..." Isaiah 8:3 ES

And I went to the prophetess, and she conceived and bore a son. Then the LORD said to me, “Call his name Maher-shalal-hash-baz…”
Isaiah 8:3 ESV

in this verse, Isaiah calls his wife “prophetess” (נביאה, naviyah). There is some question about what this means, because we have no record of her prophesying. That’s not too unusual–the Bible mentions numerous prophets whose prophecies have not survived–but many of those were false prophets, which probably isn’t the case here.

In this case, it seems that this “prophetess” could mean one of three things:

  1. Isaiah’s wife was fully a prophetess in her own right, even though her prophecies are not recorded in Scripture.
  2. She prophesied only in the sense that she bore children whose names were prophetic. In other words, she served as a prophet’s assistant.
  3. Prophetess was an idiomatic honorific applied to the wife of a prophet, much as a pastor’s wife (in some churches) might be called the Mrs. Reverend So-and-so, but she didn’t give any prophecies of her own.

While I can’t rule out options 2 and 3, I can’t find any real support for them either. I am admittedly not an expert in Ancient Near East cultures, but in my brief searches, I couldn’t find any examples of the wife or female assistant of a prophet being called a prophetess Almost all ANE cultures had prophets and prophetesses (e.g. Egypt, Greece, and Sumer), but they weren’t called that unless they actually engaged in some kind of prophetic activity.

However, option 1 has significant support from the above sources and from the Bible itself.

The Hebrew word naviyah is used 6 times in the Masoretic Hebrew text of the Old Testament, and each of the other 5 times refers to a woman who prophesied.

  1. Then Miriam the prophetess, the sister of Aaron, took a tambourine in her hand, and all the women went out after her with tambourines and dancing.
    Exodus 15:20 ESV
  2. Now Deborah, a prophetess, the wife of Lappidoth, was judging Israel at that time.
    Judges 4:4 ESV
  3. So Hilkiah the priest, and Ahikam, and Achbor, and Shaphan, and Asaiah went to Huldah the prophetess, the wife of Shallum the son of Tikvah, son of Harhas, keeper of the wardrobe (now she lived in Jerusalem in the Second Quarter), and they talked with her.
    2 Kings 22:14 ESV
  4. The parallel text in 2 Chronicles 34:22.
  5. Remember Tobiah and Sanballat, O my God, according to these things that they did, and also the prophetess Noadiah and the rest of the prophets who wanted to make me afraid.
    Nehemiah 6:14 ESV

There is also the example of the four daughters of Philip the Evangelist in Acts 21. None of them were even married.

On the next day we departed and came to Caesarea, and we entered the house of Philip the evangelist, who was one of the seven, and stayed with him. He had four unmarried daughters, who prophesied.
Acts 21:8-9 ESV

The most likely conclusion is that Isaiah’s wife was an actual prophetess, a woman to whom God gave messages to be relayed to other people. This doesn’t mean that she was a priestess, a pastor, or held any other position with any inherent authority. A prophet’s authority is not in him (or her) self, but in the message he conveys.

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Upside Down America

Woe to those who call evil good and good evil, who put darkness for light and light for darkness, who put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter! Woe to those who are wise in their own eyes, and shrewd in their own sight! Woe to those who are heroes at drinking wine, and valiant men in mixing strong drink, who acquit the guilty for a bribe, and deprive the innocent of his right! Isaiah 5:20-23 ESV

“Woe to those who call evil good and good evil,” the prophet wrote in Isaiah 5:20. These words are often–and correctly–quoted to criticize a corrupt government that lets criminals walk free while fining and imprisoning people who champion the weak or who only want to live their lives in peace. There’s more to this prophecy than the one phrase, though.

Woe to those who call evil good and good evil, who put darkness for light and light for darkness, who put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter! Woe to those who are wise in their own eyes, and shrewd in their own sight! Woe to those who are heroes at drinking wine, and valiant men in mixing strong drink, who acquit the guilty for a bribe, and deprive the innocent of his right!
Isaiah 5:20-23 ESV

Sin isn’t just something people do in America. It has become the focus of identity for many millions. Skim through personal profiles on social media, and you’ll see “pro-choice”, “ally”, and other labels that say, “I not only accept this sin, but I celebrate and promote it!”

Abortion and homosexuality share a mutual love affair with death for the sake of personal indulgence. Abortion, under the Orwellian label of “choice”, kills more Americans every year than the Civil War did in four years. Homosexuality and related perversions are childless by nature, but it’s proponents actively recruit children, stealing their life before they even begin living. Where they were once content to pervert other people’s children through the guise of education, they now create horrific parodies of “family” through adoption, IVF, and surrogacy.

Abortion and homosexuality aren’t even close to the only sins undermining our families, though.

Family should provide the healthy foundation required for the next generation to build a truly better future, not based on technological advances, but on relationship with each other and with God. Unfortunately, sexual promiscuity, adultery, divorce, and fatherlessness have broken and scrambled our families. The brokenness is compounded by an economic system engineered to scatter siblings across thousands of miles and to require every adult to work outside the home just to get by.

Once our families fell apart, our communities weren’t far behind.

Witchcraft, pagan religious practices, and denominationalism, all packaged as “spirituality”, divide us even further. There’s nothing wrong with disagreeing with other people on spiritual matters, so long as the Bible and God’s Law remain at the center and we give each other the same grace to be wrong that we ask for ourselves, but almost nobody stops with mere disagreement. Some people openly reject YHWH for self-worship or pathetic imitations, while others reject their brothers and sisters in Christ over relatively minor issues. Others constantly chase after the latest mystery, thinking that if they just discover one more truth that’s hidden from everyone else, they’ll finally achieve enlightenment or relationship (as opposed to religion) or whatever word they prefer.

This isn’t mere cultural drift. It’s rebellion against God’s intended order. Scripture shows us how God intends for society to be structured, but we always think we know better.

We ignore his patriarchal design for the family, religion, and government, and then we wonder why the family, religion, and government doesn’t work.

We ignore his prescriptions for crime and punishment, and then we wonder why we can’t control crime, why the government is run by criminals, and why we end up all being treated like criminals ourselves.

We ignore his instructions on how to deal with false prophets, and then we wonder why our televisions and churches are all run by false prophets.

We ignore his rules for land and property management, and then we wonder why megacorporations end up owning everything and everyone. “Woe to those who join house to house, who add field to field, until there is no more room, and you are made to dwell alone in the midst of the land.” Isaiah 5:8

We ignore his commandments concerning the care of the weak and poor, and then we wonder why all of our solutions just seem to make the problems worse.

The cause of all of these bad choices isn’t feminism or greed or lust. It’s pride. We really think we know better how to manage humanity and the planet than the one who created it all and gave us a user’s manual.

There is hope, though.

There is always hope because God judges those whom he loves, and his judgment is designed to bring repentance. Judgment brings humility to the proud and justice to the oppressed.

Man is humbled, and each one is brought low, and the eyes of the haughty are brought low. But the LORD of hosts is exalted in justice, and the Holy God shows himself holy in righteousness. Then shall the lambs graze as in their pasture, and nomads shall eat among the ruins of the rich.
Isaiah 5:15-17 ESV

Eventually God will set the world right, with or without our cooperation. However, a little humility today could spare us a lot of suffering later. God promises to forgive and restore the penitent, and God always keeps his promises.

I don’t believe we can save America as it currently exists, but we can save a remnant from which something better can be built in the future. The choice is ours: Cling to our pride and go the way of the world, or humble ourselves before YHWH and submit to his rulings. The path to restoration begins with calling things what they are and admitting we can’t improve on the Designer’s plan. Only God’s way leads to life in the end. All other roads lead to Sheol and Abaddon.

Return to the LORD your God, you and your children, and obey his voice in all that I command you today, with all your heart and with all your soul, then the LORD your God will restore your fortunes and have mercy on you, and he will gather you again from all the peoples where the LORD your God has scattered you.
Deuteronomy 30:2-3 ESV

No nation ever came to repentance except individual people within the nation repented first. Every revival begins with one person choosing to humble himself and placing his bronze crown at the feet of Messiah. Then a second person and another. Families first, then congregations. The rest is up to God. Either the nation will follow or judgment will.

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Last Will or Covenant in Hebrews 9

Is Hebrews 9:16-17 talking about a last will or a covenant?

Therefore he is the mediator of a new covenant, so that those who are called may receive the promised eternal inheritance, since a death has occurred that redeems them from the transgressions committed under the first covenant. 16 For where a will is involved, the death of the one who made it must be established. 17 For a will takes effect only at death, since it is not in force as long as the one who made it is alive. 18 Therefore not even the first covenant was inaugurated without blood.
Hebrews 9:15-18 ESV

Most English translations of this passage in Hebrews translate διαθήκη (diatheke) as “covenant” in vs 15 and 18, but as “will” in vs 16-17. This is a bizarre switch. Hebrews 9:16-17 is referring to the sacrificial victim of the covenant, not to a person who is instigating the covenant, nor to a person who has died and left an inheritance.

Reasons We Can Know Hebrews 9:16-17 Is about Covenants not Wills

There are four reasons we can know this without reasonable doubt:

First, a “last will” isn’t the topic in Hebrews. It spends several chapters talking about covenants and then switches to wills for just 2 verses? Verse 18 clearly shows that 16-17 are talking about covenants, not last wills. This passage has nothing at all to do with last wills.

Second, Hebrews 9:16-17 is the only place in the Bible where διαθήκη is translated as “will” instead of “covenant”. This is bizarre and completely contrary to the context of these verses. It should be translated as covenant here, like everywhere else.

That’s not just my opinion.

The ESV Global Study Bible includes a footnote stating that “covenant” is also a possible translation: “…or an ancient Near Eastern “covenant.” Making such covenants included offering an animal sacrifice. Thus both are carried out only after a death.” However “possible” seems to be a severe understatement.

Here’s what John Wesley wrote about v16:

I say by means of death; for where such a covenant is, there must be the death of him by whom it is confirmed – Seeing it is by his death that the benefits of it are purchased. It seems beneath the dignity of the apostle to play upon the ambiguity of the Greek word, as the common translation supposes him to do.

Adam Clarke cites a “learned and judicious” friend with the initials J.C. for this alternate translation:

For where there is a covenant, it is necessary that the death of the appointed victim should be exhibited, because a covenant is confirmed over dead victims, since it is not at all valid while the appointed victim is alive.

He also cites Gilbert Wakefield for this translation:

For where a covenant is, there must be necessarily introduced the death of that which establisheth the covenant; because a covenant is confirmed over dead things, and is of no force at all whilst that which establisheth the covenant is alive.

And Clarke adds, “This is undoubtedly the meaning of this passage; and we should endeavor to forget that testament and testator were ever introduced, as they totally change the apostle’s meaning.”

Third, God’s other covenants were established with a sacrifice. The texts describing the Noahic, Abrahamic, Sinai, and Aaronic include the sacrificial ceremony explicitly. It’s the same with man-made covenants, such as the one between Jacob and Laban, and the one between Abraham and Abimelech.

For the Noahic Covenant:

Then Noah built an altar to the LORD and took some of every clean animal and some of every clean bird and offered burnt offerings on the altar.
Genesis 8:20 ESV

For the Abrahamic Covenant:

He said to him, “Bring me a heifer three years old, a female goat three years old, a ram three years old, a turtledove, and a young pigeon.” And he brought him all these, cut them in half, and laid each half over against the other. But he did not cut the birds in half.
Genesis 15:9-10 ESV

For the Sinai Covenant:

And Moses wrote down all the words of the LORD. He rose early in the morning and built an altar at the foot of the mountain, and twelve pillars, according to the twelve tribes of Israel. And he sent young men of the people of Israel, who offered burnt offerings and sacrificed peace offerings of oxen to the LORD. And Moses took half of the blood and put it in basins, and half of the blood he threw against the altar. Then he took the Book of the Covenant and read it in the hearing of the people. And they said, “All that the LORD has spoken we will do, and we will be obedient.”
Exodus 24:4-7 ESV

Not every text concerning a covenant describes the sacrifices involved, but the pattern is clear.

Fourth, the New Covenant was not made between the Son and Israel/Judah. It was made between ALL of God and Israel/Judah, and only the Son died. The Son is the sacrificial victim that sealed the New Covenant, not a rich man who died and left postmortem instructions to his survivors.

Behold, the days are coming, declares the LORD, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah, not like the covenant that I made with their fathers on the day when I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt, my covenant that they broke, though I was their husband, declares the LORD.
Jeremiah 31:31-32 ESV

The New Covenant Does Not Replace the Old

We can also know that the establishment of a new covenant does not annul or override a previous covenant. We can know this by two reasons:

First, none of God’s previous covenants annulled or overrode any of his other covenants. God’s covenant with Israel at the end of the wilderness journey (the Deuteronomic Covenant, which was not a renewal of the Sinai, but a new covenant “besides the covenant that he had made with them at Horeb” per Deuteronomy 29:1) didn’t replace his covenant with Phinehas, which didn’t replace his covenant with Aaron, which didn’t replace the Sinai Covenant, which didn’t replace the Abrahamic, which didn’t replace the Noahic.

Second, Paul says in Galatians 3:15 that even with a man-made covenant, a new covenant doesn’t annul or modify an older one. Then in v17 he gives an example of how this applies to God’s covenants: the Sinai Covenant did not annul the Abrahamic Covenant. Each covenant has a different purpose (v18-19) and so they operate simultaneously.

To give a human example, brothers: even with a man-made covenant, no one annuls it or adds to it once it has been ratified. Now the promises were made to Abraham and to his offspring. It does not say, “And to offsprings,” referring to many, but referring to one, “And to your offspring,” who is Christ. This is what I mean: the law, which came 430 years afterward, does not annul a covenant previously ratified by God, so as to make the promise void. For if the inheritance comes by the law, it no longer comes by promise; but God gave it to Abraham by a promise.
Galatians 3:15-18 ESV

The New Covenant was in full force from the moment Jesus died, yet when Hebrews was written 30-50 years later, it did not replace the Sinai Covenant. Hebrews plainly says they are both in operation at that time, even if one is “becoming obsolete and growing old” and “is ready to vanish away”.

In speaking of a new covenant, he makes the first one obsolete. And what is becoming obsolete and growing old is ready to vanish away.
Hebrews 8:13 ESV

If both covenants were in force at one time–just like all of the previous covenants that God has ever made–then modern Christian theology has a completely scrambled idea of how covenants work.

The Letter to the Hebrews is so egregiously and commonly misinterpreted as to make it say the opposite of what it actually says. It doesn’t say that the New Covenant replaces the old nor that the priesthood of Jesus replaces that of Aaron. It says that the New Covenant is *superior* because it has superior promises and a superior priesthood.

Those very few verses that appear to say otherwise are easily interpreted in complete harmony with all the rest of the biblical testimony on covenants without any literary sleight of hand. It only appears to be sleight of hand because the harmonized interpretation is so foreign to what our churches have been teaching us.

We shouldn’t be surprised.

O LORD, my strength and my stronghold, my refuge in the day of trouble, to you shall the nations come from the ends of the earth and say: “Our fathers have inherited nothing but lies, worthless things in which there is no profit.
Jeremiah 16:19 ESV

For a more detailed look at the nature of covenants and how they interact with each other, see this video. Please watch the whole thing to the end.

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Righteousness Beyond Righteousness

Is there any righteousness to be found in obedience to Torah?

And the LORD commanded us to do all these statutes, to fear the LORD our God, for our good always, that he might preserve us alive, as we are this day. And it will be righteousness for us, if we are careful to do all this commandment before the LORD our God, as he has commanded us.
Deuteronomy 6:24-25 ESV

For Moses writes about the righteousness that is based on the law, that the person who does the commandments shall live by them.
Romans 10:5 ESV

Don’t let anyone tell you there is no righteousness to be had in keeping Torah. The Bible says otherwise. There is righteousness and life in obedience to the Law. There is wickedness and death in disobedience.

People get confused because they forget that there are different kinds and degrees of righteousness described in the Scriptures. The existence of the greater righteousness found in a contrite and submitted heart doesn’t negate the righteousness of obedience that comes from that heart.

The Scriptures tell us repeatedly that those who believe in the Messiah will also be judged according to their works. There is the pure and binary righteousness that is granted to us by God’s grace, and there is the righteousness of obedience which God rewards beyond entrance into the Kingdom and Eternity.

All the ekklesia will know that I am he who searches mind and heart, and I will give to each of you according to your works.
Revelation 2:23

For a more in depth discussion of the nature of righteousness, check out this conversation with Rob Vanhoff!

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Division and Controversy in the Body of Messiah

I appeal to you, brothers, to watch out for those who cause divisions and create obstacles contrary to the doctrine that you have been taught; avoid them. For such persons do not serve our Lord Christ, but their own appetites, and by smooth talk and flattery they deceive the hearts of the naive.
Romans 16:17-18 ESV

When challenged with disruption and endless debates over obscure points of theology, it can be tempting to convene a committee to create a detailed Statement of Faith addressing every imaginable controversy, but such things tend to create just as many problems as they solve. Man-made creeds and doctrinal statements can be helpful for establishing clarity and local practice, but they will always contain some degree of error. They also tend to promote a culture of holding tradition above Scripture.

The first century Christians exhibited both extremes. In fact, much of the New Testament epistles were written to combat one or the other.

On one side, many traditionally religious Jews had come to faith in Yeshua, embracing him as Messiah and remaining zealous for the Law (Acts 21:20-21). They believed that Gentile converts must convert to Judaism and adopt their traditions in order to be grafted into Israel. (See my comments on Romans 11.) Paul’s ministry seemed to have been plagued by troublemakers from this “party of the circumcision” who wanted to bring this “mixed multitude” under their authority. As shown in the Gospel accounts of the Jewish religious leaders’ confrontations with Yeshua (Matthew 23, for instance) they loved to argue about the minute details of how to obey every commandment in every circumstance.

On the other side, many followers of Greek philosophers sought to meld this seemingly new faith with the mysteries of Isis, Orpheus, and others. They tended to reject formally codified rules in favor of mysteries that were only fully comprehensible to the fully initiated. They believed the physical world was illusory, or at least less real than the spiritual world, and so taught either asceticism in order to discipline and escape the physical or licentiousness because the truly spiritual need no limitations on their physical behavior. This syncretic approach created the later Gnostic cults of Basilidianism, Marcionism, and Manicheanism. John’s letters and portions of Paul’s addressed these false teachings. They loved to argue about esoteric ideas with little practical value and less chance of conception.

We’re still the same today. There are never enough rules for some people. If it looks like you’ve mastered one set of man-made practices, they’ll invent another and another, each new doctrine further obscuring the actual Scriptures. And there are never enough lofty, useless theologies for others, forever lost in metaphors and hidden meanings, always learning something new that never seems to require any specific action from them.

Paul wrote a parallel statement in 1 Timothy 6:3-5, describing such people in more detail:

He is prideful, understanding nothing. Instead he is obsessed with arguments and disputes about words—out of which come envy, strife, slander, evil suspicions, and constant friction between people corrupted in mind and deprived of the truth, who suppose that godliness is a means of gain.
1 Timothy 6:4-5 TLV

Paul’s advice to the Romans was to avoid both camps. He wasn’t telling them to enforce doctrinal purity nor even to quash every disagreement. Rather, he was advising them to focus on the principles of love and humility that lay behind every commandment, to place the needs of each other–especially those weaker in faith–above their own, and not to dispute over things that can’t be proved and are ambiguous in Scripture. See my comments on Romans 14.

A certain amount of uniformity of doctrine is necessary, especially where Scripture is clear or where God makes a point of emphasizing the importance of a particular commandment. How can we fellowship with people who can’t be trusted not to steal, lie, and commit adultery? How can we fellowship if we can’t even agree on which day is the Sabbath?

However, there are innumerable gray areas in which we need to be humble and kind enough to let people come to their own conclusions in their own time. Does the Sabbath start when the sun first touches the horizon or when it is completely gone? Is meat sacrificed to an idol acceptable as food if you’re not participating in the worship in any way? Is it better to fast on Tuesday or Thursday?

You probably aren’t dealing with these specific controversies in your own congregation, but they probably aren’t too far off from your reality either. I chose these examples, in part, as another illustration. If I had instead mentioned the Rapture, Dispensationalism, and Halloween, would you focus on the point I’m trying to convey or would you start thinking about the controversies.

These are all matters of opinion. Distractions. What I believe about any of them doesn’t harm you in any way–and vice versa–so long as I’m not flaunting my freedom to follow my own conscience to the detriment of yours.

As Paul wrote in Romans 13:9, “For the commandments…are summed up in this word: You shall love your neighbor as yourself.”

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Were Andronicus and Junia Apostles?

Greet Andronicus and Junia, my kinsmen and my fellow prisoners. They are well known to the apostles, and they were in Christ before me.
Romans 16:7 ESV

Salute Andronicus and Junia, my kinsmen, and my fellowprisoners, who are of note among the apostles, who also were in Christ before me.
Romans 16:7 KJV

This verse is the center of a surprising amount of controversy. Note that the English Standard Version says that Andronicus and Junia were well known to the apostles, while the King James Version says they were well known among the apostles. That one little preposition changes the meaning considerably.

Where Andronicus and Junia well-known apostles? Or were they well-known to the apostles? If they were apostles, “well-known” implies that they were on a par with the Twelve Disciples and possibly as notable as James and John. This would be especially sensational, since Junia was almost certainly a woman.

Andronicus and Junia appear to have been a married couple and were probably of the tribe of Benjamin, the same as Paul (See Romans 11:1.), or even more closely related to him. Several Jews are mentioned in this chapter already, but these are the only ones Paul calls his “kinsmen”, so I think this must refer to something more than being fellow Jews.

Paul also calls them his “fellow prisoners”. He implies in 2 Corinthians 11:23, written several years before this letter, that he had been imprisoned on multiple occasions. The only confinement prior to writing Romans that we have certain knowledge of is at Philippi in Acts 16:24, but there is no mention of Andronicus and Junia nor any other believer in prison with him apart from Silas. It’s likely that many significant events of his missionary journeys were not recorded so that they were imprisoned with him somewhere else, or he meant that they shared the experience of being imprisoned but not necessarily at the same time and location. Since Paul says that they were “in Christ” before him, it’s even possible that they were victims of Paul himself during his persecutions of the Christians in Judea and nearby provinces.

The term apostle (apostolos, αποστολοις) doesn’t necessarily imply a position of general or supreme authority. It literally means “messenger” or “deputy” and can refer to anyone who is sent on any kind of mission as a representative of another. Missionaries, messengers, errand boys, and diplomatic envoys can all be called apostles.

There are two questions to answer in this instance. First, were Andronicus and Junia apostles themselves or merely well known to the apostles. Second, did Paul use “apostle” in the more generic sense or did he use it as a title of office for those disciples of Yeshua who had been given special authority over his Kingdom. These questions are linked because the answer to either one likely dictates the answer to the other. As I will explain, either this couple were known to the apostles and Paul used the word in the sense of an ecclesiastical office or else they were well known apostles and Paul used the word in the more general sense of anyone sent on a mission for another. I lean very strongly to the former.

If they were notable among the Apostles, this would imply that they were at least on a par with the lesser known of the original Twelve Disciples, yet neither Andronicus nor Junia are mentioned anywhere else in Scripture. They left no writings, not even any hints that they had ever written anything. They are not mentioned by any of the first century or second century Christian writers and rate only two mentions in the first four centuries of Christian literature:

  1. In his Commentary on the Epistle to the Romans (c. 246 AD), Origen of Alexandria speculates that they might have been among the 72 disciples sent out by Yeshua in Luke 10. Most of the original Greek has been lost, and this survives only in a Latin translation. Since Origen had only his own personal speculation and no personal knowledge or documentary evidence, this is essentially meaningless.
  2. John Chrysostom wrote in his Homily 31 on Romans, “How great the devotion of this woman [Junia], that she should be even counted worthy of the appellation of apostle”. However this was written 350 years after Paul died, and Chrysostom also asserts in the same writing that Paul had never been imprisoned before, which is clearly contradicted by Acts 16. Considering Chrysostom’s temporal separation from the facts, his factual errors, and his extreme antisemitism, I don’t consider Chrysostom to be a reliable witness.

If they were so notable, why did no one leave any notes about them?

If this were the only evidence available, I would be inclined to conclude that Andronicus and Junia were notable to the Apostles rather than among them, but there is at least one other significant factor.

Michael Burer published two papers on the use of episemos (notable, επισημος) in ancient and medieval Greek literature. The first paper, with Dan Wallace, titled “Was Junia Really an Apostle?” analyzed “a few dozen passages” that seemed most relevant to the circumstance described in Romans 16.[1] The authors concluded that, “The collocation of επισημος with its adjuncts shows that, as a rule, επισημος with a genitive personal adjunct indicates an inclusive comparison (‘out-standing among’), while επισημος with (εν plus) the personal dative indicates an elative notion without the implication of inclusion (‘well known to’).” In other words, when episemos is in the dative case and includes en (επισημοι εν), as in Romans 16:7, it always means “notable to” and not “notable among”.

The second paper, titled “ἘΠΙΣΗΜΟΙ ἘΝ ΤΟΙΣ ἈΠΟΣΤΟΛΟΙΣ In Rom 16:7 As ‘Well Known To The Apostles’: Further Defense And New Evidence”, examined more than 100 additional passages when it became clear that the primary objection to the first study was the limited number of source texts.[2] This second article concluded that “Seventy-one new texts demonstrate that Paul could have readily used επισημος plus the genitive to show that Andronicus and Junia were “notable among the apostles.” Thirty-six new texts, all but one of which parallel Rom 16:7 exactly in grammatical structure, provide further evidence that Paul intended επισημοι εν τοις αποστολοις to mean that Andronicus and Junia were ‘well known to the apostles.’”

Although I am not a Greek scholar by any conceivable metric and many actual Greek scholars disagree with me, it seems to me that Paul was almost certainly not calling Andronicus and Junia apostles. Rather, they were both well known to the Apostles, probably because of their maturity in the faith and willingness to endure persecution for the name of Yeshua.

This also leads me to conclude that Paul was using the term “apostle” to refer to those men in the most respected and authoritative positions in the first century community of believers: those who had known Yeshua personally and possibly their closest disciples. This would include the Twelve Disciples, Paul, and possibly those who remained of the Seventy-Two Disciples along with well-known men like Timothy and Barnabas.

I don’t believe that Paul always used the term in this sense. The word apostle can refer to any person who is specially commissioned by another to carry out a mission or relay a message. In this broader sense, every prophet and missionary is an apostle of Yeshua, and I would not object to calling Andronicus, Junia, Phoebe, Prisca, and Aquila “apostles”. As when he uses law (nomos), we have to use contextual clues and common sense to tell us when he means it narrowly (the Law and the Apostles) or broadly (law and apostles). If Paul considered this couple to be among the Apostles, in the narrower sense, then this verse could have a major impact on the debate concerning the role of women in positions of ecclesiastic authority, but that interpretation doesn’t appear to be supported by the text.

[1] Michael H. Burer and Daniel B. Wallace, “Was Junia Really an Apostle? A Re-examination of Rom 16.7,” New Testament Studies 47 (2001): 76-91.

[2] Michael H. Burer, “ἘΠΙΣΗΜΟΙ ἘΝ ΤΟΙΣ ἈΠΟΣΤΟΛΟΙΣ In Rom 16:7 As ‘Well Known To The Apostles’: Further Defense And New Evidence,” Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society 58, no. 4 (2015): 731-55.

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God’s Attributes Revealed in Creation

For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse. Romans 1:19-20 ESV

For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse.
Romans 1:19-20 ESV

Nobody can look at the natural world without thinking that there must be a Creator. As Hebrews 3:4 says, “Every house is built by someone.” Numerous aspects of the palace of the natural world strongly imply the existence of a Creator a purpose:

  • Individual Complexity – The internal complexity of living things and the intricate balance of systems within systems requires a designer of extraordinary intelligence and foresight. Every lifeform is a self-repairing, self-replicating machine that becomes more complex, the closer you examine it, from the outer defenses of skin and bark all the way down to molecular factories beyond anything man has been able to copy with all of our technology. Individual organisms are so complex, even at the molecular level, that removing any one of thousands of different components or sub-systems will destroy the entire organism, yet those systems themselves are self-policing, removing, replacing, or repairing damaged components before they can cause significant harm. See Psalm 139:14.
  • Biome Complexity – The interplay between organisms, even across species, also testifies to the existence of an intelligent, deliberate creator. Trees warn each other of danger. Viruses, bacteria, fungi, grasses, herbivores, and the most complex predators all cooperate, without any apparent conscious intention, to feed each other and keep ecosystems healthy. As local conditions change, local lifeforms adjust populations, habitats, and even genetic expression to compensate. See Job 38:39-41.
  • Universal Fine Tuning – Physics demonstrates that our entire universe seems designed at every level to support life. A slight change in any number of values–some of which I could name, but won’t pretend to understand–would change the universe in such a way that life would become impossible. Stars and planets would cease to exist, let alone the minerals, seas, and atmosphere required by living organisms.  See Psalm 19:1.

In the face of the overwhelming evidence for a Creator, his existence can only be denied by deliberate, continuous rejection and indoctrination. A child, left to himself, would assume that everything was created, and he must be trained to think otherwise.

One implication of this truth is that a person can attain a very basic knowledge of God’s identity without ever hearing the words YHWH, Jesus, Yeshua, Gospel, etc. All of those things are knowable, at least in conception, through the honest observation of Creation. If there is a Creator, then he has a purpose in creating. If he has a purpose for Creation, then he has a purpose for individual creatures. If he has a purpose for individual creatures, then he desires them to behave according to his plan. If his creatures will not behave according to his plan, then they should expect to be corrected, destroyed, or isolated so that they can’t interfere with the correct operation of the rest of Creation. Creatures who choose to act according to the Creator’s purposes can reasonably expect to be rewarded, although the Creator is under no obligation to do so. All of Creation, including every individual creature, belongs to the Creator and is dependent on him for its continued existence, and he is fully within his rights to use it however he wills, including destroying it.

Acceptance of the inevitability of God is in some ways more important than an academic knowledge about God, because a great deal can be learned of God’s character from the nature of what he has already done, apart from any special revelation or divinely inspired writings. As Job 12:7-9 says, “ask the beasts, and they will teach you; the birds of the heavens, and they will tell you; or the bushes of the earth, and they will teach you; and the fish of the sea will declare to you. Who among all these does not know that the hand of YHWH has done this?”

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Covenantal Authority and Inheritance in Torah

Our father died in the wilderness. He was not among the company of those who gathered themselves together against the LORD in the company of Korah, but died for his own sin. And he had no sons. Why should the name of our father be taken away from his clan because he had no son? Give to us a possession among our father's brothers. Numbers 27:3-4 ESV

The first covenant that God made with the people who could be called Hebrews was introduced in Genesis 15 and given more detail in Genesis 17. God made a covenant with Abraham to make him a father of many nations (Genesis 17:5) and to give to one line of his descendants, the land of the Canaanites between the river of Egypt and the River Euphrates (Genesis 15:18, 17:8). These descendants would not come through all of Abraham’s immediate children, but specifically through one son of promise, Isaac. In the next generation, the covenant would once again only pass down to one son, Jacob, because Isaac’s other son, Esau, despised God and the covenant. In the third generation, all of Jacob’s sons inherited the covenant from him, becoming the patriarchs of the Twelve Tribes of Israel.

Abraham had eight sons (one each with Hagar and Sarah and six with Keturah), and it seems likely that he also had daughters. Isaac had two sons that we know of, and Jacob had twelve, plus Dinah and an unknown number of other daughters according to Genesis 37:35 and 46:7. Only the sons of Abraham and Isaac are are listed as as having founded nations, and only the sons of Jacob founded tribes in Israel. To an extent, this could be attributed to the universal practice of mankind to attribute nations to patriarchs, not matriarchs, but primarily because that is God’s practice also.

Except for Dinah, their daughters are unnamed in the text, not because they weren’t important to their families or to God, but because Genesis isn’t a family history. It’s a covenant history, and God’s covenant with Abraham is passed down through the many generations from father alone. Daughters are also born into that covenant, but they don’t pass down the covenant of their fathers to their children; they pass down the covenant of their husbands.

Fast forward a few centuries to the wilderness between Egypt and Canaan…

The accounts of the Twelve Spies, the five daughters of Zelophehad, and the division of the Promised Land among the tribes clearly illustrates this principle. Patriarchal tribal identity is a crucial aspect of the divine order for both spiritual and practical reasons.

Land inheritance in the Torah (the first five books of the Bible) is more just a division of territory. It is a tangible fulfillment of the covenant with Abraham as passed down to all of his descendants through Isaac and Jacob. The boundaries laid out in Numbers 36 speak to a deeper spiritual reality, one in which inheritance in the Promised Land serves as a manifestation of divine grace and the delegated authority and responsibility that accompanies it. Just as rings in Biblical times symbolized authority and submission, so too does the allocation of land reflect the Hebrew people’s relationship with God and their duty to maintain the sanctity of their covenants with him.

Torah mandates that daughters who inherit land must marry within their tribe. This isn’t just patriarchal flexing; God (or Moses) wasn’t trying to keep women in their place by denying them the means to provide for themselves. By God’s design, tribal and national identity–and therefore generational inheritance of the Abrahamic Covenant–is patrilineal (passed down through male descendants). If your father was a member of the tribe of Issachar, then so are you. If a woman marries a member of the tribe of Zebulun, then she becomes a member of that tribe, and all her children will be also.

When Zelophehad’s daughters asked Moses for an inheritance in their father’s name in Numbers 27:1-11, they weren’t trying to change the way God reckoned nationality. To the contrary, they were honoring it by preserving their father’s place in that reckoning. However, if they were to inherit land within the allotment of the tribe of Manasseh and then marry a man of Benjamin or Judah, their children would belong to their husband’s tribe and would eventually inherit Zelophehad’s land within the territory of Manasseh. If other women later inherited in similar circumstances, the boundaries of the tribes would soon be a meaningless patchwork.

From a certain perspective, this confusion might seem like a good thing. Wouldn’t a unified nation without tribalism be a much better state of affairs, discouraging internal squabbles and simplifying international relations?

If God wanted a single people without tribes, he wouldn’t have told Moses to inscribe twelve names on the shoulders of the High Priest, he wouldn’t have put twelve stones on the High Priest’s breastpiece, he wouldn’t have commanded twelve loaves to be kept on the Shewbread Table in the Tabernacle, he wouldn’t have given Yeshua twelve disciples, nor installed twelve foundation layers to the New Jerusalem, nor twelve gates into the city.

Although the twelve tribes are completely mixed and mostly hidden today in exile, for his own reasons, God wants the twelve tribes to remain distinct in the Promised Land. When they return in the Millennial Kingdom, they will once again be assigned land within tribal territories. (Ezekiel 47:13) Part of those reasons, I believe, involves the authority that is inherent in the passing of a covenant from one generation to another. A father must have authority over his son in order to subject his son to a covenant, and therefore must have authority over all of that son’s children, and so on throughout all generations.

In this same principle, God commanded that the members of tribes should camp together in the wilderness, each under the banner of his own clan, and that the army (technically, the militia, since the army included every able bodied male twenty years and older) should be organized by families. (Numbers 1:3) Judges were also appointed and given authority based on their tribal and clan affiliations. (Deuteronomy 1:9-18)

If a family on one plot of land is under the authority of the patriarch of Ephraim and the family on the next plot of land is under the authority of the patriarch of Naphtali, national defense and civil law becomes as confused as tribal boundaries and much more likely to incorporate favoritism for the judge’s own tribesmen. If the national Judge or King makes a call to arms, without instantaneous and secure communications, how would the militia know where to assemble or to whom they should report? God’s plan for land inheritance solves both of those problems.

In Deuteronomy 1, Moses says that he chose one man from each of the tribes to scout out the land. Numbers 34 outlines the boundaries of the Promised Land and gives the names of the twelve men–one from each tribe–whom God selected to divide it. Moses and God could have chosen women for these roles if they had wanted to. Neither of them bowed to cultural expectations in other matters, such as the Shemitah year, dietary rules, and the sacrificial monopoly, so they certainly could have allowed female priests or appointed a woman to participate in the surveying and division of the land, yet they didn’t. Both the survey and the division had to be executed by men representing each of the twelve tribes, because only men have the authority to speak for their people on covenantal questions.

When the patriarchs of Manasseh explained the practical difficulty of allowing daughters to inherit land in Numbers 36, they weren’t trying to oppress women. They too were trying to honor Zelophehad, the covenant, and all of the people of Israel.

There are no prohibitions in Torah against women owning property or operating businesses, but only sons routinely inherit land from their fathers. As detailed in Numbers 36:6-9, if a man dies with only daughters, then his daughters will inherit his property as if they were sons with the one restriction that they must marry a man from his tribe so that the land won’t permanently become the territory of some other people. The point isn’t to restrict women, but to protect the sanctity and continuity of God’s covenant with Abraham. Ultimately, the Torah’s directives on tribal land inheritance in Numbers 36 are far more than a matter of property distribution. They encapsulate the very essence of the covenant between God and his people.

Women are vital in God’s covenantal order and his plan of redemption for mankind. Where would we be without Sarah, Ruth, and Mary? But however much our modern ears may rebel against it, God counts nations by their patriarchs, and covenants in the Bible are inherited from fathers. Zelophehad’s daughters respected their father, their tribe, and God on this matter. We should too.

Hear more about Zelphehad’s daughters and God’s promises in this video on Joshua 17.