Posted 4-28-01
Nobody is holding out any great hopes of a breakthrough, but at least for now there is a semblance of an Arab-Israeli dialogue.
Yesterday I was still looking for more answers to these kinds of questions when I noticed they were bashing a group called "Jews for Jesus" on the Aish.com site. So, I went to the Jews for Jesus sites, they have two sites one for believers and one for non-believers. They have alot of information there, and I thought maybe you would like to have these links for further information from a Jewish/Christian perspective.
This is a specific article there dealing with the blood sacrifices as explained by a Rabbi who believes in Jesus:
http://www.jewsforjesus.org/library/issues/05-07/atonement.htm
Jews for Jesus main site: http://www.christianity.com/jewsforjesus
it has a link to the unbeliever site in it on the home page. I think this is an excellent site for Gentile or Jew because Gentiles need to know why the Jews do not accept Jesus, and what the truth really is, or they can be fooled as well. I think this would be a good link to have on your web site, especailly for after the rapture it seems that the world will look to see who the Jews are worshiping at that time, since it will be the anti-christ or the false prophet, I'm sorry but I still get those 2 mixed up. I'm just hoping I won't have to see either one of them!!!
Thank you for letting me read the letter you wrote to the Rabbi, it was helpful to me as well... I liked what you quoted from Isaiah 53:1-6, because it seems to describe how the Jews have always despised Jesus the way it describes it here; and about the geneology- that was a really good point you made there. Thanks again for sending me a copy! Have a blessed day! Agape
"...When it was all said and done, the rabbinical leaders had redirected Judaism to an atonement based on self effort by 500 C.E. when the Talmud was completed. They had taken the dimensions of prayer, confession, sin and repentance, once associated with the substitution sacrifice, and declared that these dimensions alone were the means for atonement. But how can we account for a Jewish religion with no substitute atonement compared to what Moses had directed in the Torah?...
Some can say, as did the Jewish young man I conversed with, that there was nothing else left to do and that the rabbis had a "legitimate reason" for changing the means for an atonement. But this answer has serious consequences for all eternity.
The Biblical Alternative
The Jewish believers who penned the Brit Hadasha (New Testament) did not dare to alter Moses' words on the matter of atonement. What is interesting is that the very same four principles in connection with the sin offering of Leviticus chapter four are taken over into the New Covenant and now, instead of being connected with a sacrificial animal, they are attached to the ministry of the Messiah himself.
He indeed is our substitute: the "Lamb unblemished and spotless... foreknown before the foundation of the world, but has appeared in these last times for the sake of you..." (1 Peter 1:19-20). He identified with our sins so that when we receive him: "He himself bore our sins in his body" (1 Peter 2:24). Because he has become sin, he therefore died as our sin offering: "For Messiah also died for sins once for all, the just for the unjust" (2 Peter 3:18). But in his death, we who believe in him receive his life. Some of the saddest words the Messiah had to declare of some of his generation were: "You are unwilling to come to me, that you may have life" (John 5:40), but he who will come to him receives eternal life, and does not come into judgment, but has passed out of death into life" (John 5:24).
No, these Jewish writers of the New Covenant did not change the message of Moses; they took the four principles in connection with the substitute atonement of the sacrificial system and applied them to the Messiah of Israel, thereby propounding a scriptural equation: atonement = repentance + the atoning sacrifice. Both are necessary and if people take only one and attempt to use it as the means for atonement, no atonement will be forthcoming.
When the Second Temple was destroyed, the people were in a crisis. What could be their approach to God? God foresaw, however, what would occur and had made provision through the sacrifice of the Messiah, but not contrary to what Moses had already declared in the Torah. Yet the leadership of that day actually turned away from what Moses had declared to be the only possibility for an atonement for sin.
Two covenant peoples now remained in the land after the loss of the Temple: 1) Jewish believers, to which later were also added gentile believers, all brought under the cover of the New Covenant; and 2) the people of Israel, guided by its religious leaders, who remained a covenant people under the Abrahamic Covenant as well as whatever other religious system was structured for the people to observe.
What kind of hope is possible for those who came under the cover of the New Covenant and for those who chose to develop their own worship system? The best way to consider the consequences of the hopes of each group is to examine what they themselves have said as they approached the day when they were to depart from this world. Neusner cites a number of sources concerning the account of the last words of Yohanan ben Zakkai:
In his last hours, Rabban Yohanan ben Zakkai kept weeping out loud. O master, his disciples exclaimed, O tall pillar, light of the world, mighty hammer, why art thou weeping?...I go to appear before the King of Kings, the Holy One, blessed be he...moreover I have before me two roads, one to paradise and one to Gehenna and I know not whether He will sentence me to Gehenna or admit me into paradise....10
To hear such words from a man who felt that atonement could come because of acts of lovingkindness is sobering indeed. He fears the Holy One because there just might be a sin which he had not confessed.
We turn to consider the words of one of the Jewish believers, a leader in the community who had found atonement under the cover of the New Covenant, Rav Shaul or Paul. It is possible that both Paul and ben Zakkai had studied together and had been co-workers at one time since they were both about the same age. But Paul's faith was in the atonement wrought by the Messiah, and now, in the possession of his life, declared. "But I am hard pressed from both directions, having the desire to depart and be with Messiah, for that is very much better; yet to remain on in the flesh is more necessary for your sake" (Philippians 1:23-24). Likewise, Paul stated, "We...prefer rather to be absent from the body and to be at home with the Lord" (2 Corinthians 5:8). The differences in the hopes of the two covenant peoples are astounding.
Because of a sure atonement which the Jewish believers held to, there was no question in their minds, that when they would leave this world, they would immediately be in the presence of the Lord. Are you as sure?"
Praise the Lord. You two have lived such long lives. Granted, you aren't over 900 years old like some of the patriarchs, but, under this current world system, you have lived a good long life. I pray that you will see the Rapture without falling asleep in Christ. That is to say, I hope that you are physically alive when He returns.
After reading your most recent posts, I went to www.6001.com and got the following calendar. Are you privy to the accuracy it has? Are you in agreement with it? Or better put, is it in agreement with Scripture, to your knowledge?
I'm so glad to have been pointed to your site and to all the resources that the Lord has put on the Internet. Whereas my opinion used to be that the very best use to which computers can be put is the study of the Scriptures, I must now make an amendment of that phrase. I think that the very best use to which computers and the Internet can be put is the study of God's Scriptures. Agape in Christ
I had seen this briefly on his site, but appreciate your sending me a copy so I would study it closely.
> > Are you in agreement with it? Or better put, is it in agreement with Scripture
I don't agree with some things he listed. For instance, he listed Nisan through Elul as having either 29 or 30 days. On the Talmudic Jewish Calendar, Nisan is always 30. Iyar is always 29. Sivan is always 30. Tamuz is always 29. Av is always 30, and Elul is always 29. Thus, the number of days from Nisan 14 (Passover) to Tishri 1 (Feast of Trumpets) are always the same, 164 days.
That includes Nisan 14 as day #1, but is only to the beginning of Tishri 1, not including it. If you include Tishri 1, that is inclusive reckoning--165 days. Two other months are constant, Tebet--29 and Shebat--30. In an ordinary year, there are only 3 months that vary, Cheshwan, Kislev and Adar. Why did Michael list 29 or 30 for every month instead of for only three months? Does he mean to change the number of days in a month at will? whenever it doesn't agree with his calculations?
He lists killing the Passover lambs late in the afternoon of Nisan 14 and the Passover Seder eaten after the 15th starts. To me, that seems wrong. The Jews in Egypt were to eat the Passover between 6 PM and midnight on Tishri 14. Michael Rood has it on Nisan 15. I'll stick with Scripture.
Lev. 23:4-7 says, "these are the feasts of the LORD, even holy convocations, which ye shall proclaim in their seasons. In the fourteenth day of the first month at even is the LORD's passover. And on the fifteenth day of the same month is the feast of unleavened bread unto the LORD: seven days ye must eat unleavened bread. In the first day ye shall have an holy convocation: ye shall do no servile work therein."
The Passover is on Nisan 14, all 24 hours of it. The Feast of Unleavened Bread is on the 15th, all 24 hours of it. Nisan 14 only has one midnight, and it comes 6 hours after Nisan 14 begins at 6 PM. I see no way that the Passover can be eaten on the 15th before midnight. The 15th is the Feast of Unleavened Bread, which follows the Nisan 14 Passover and precedes the Feast of Firstfruits on Nisan 16.
Josephus was a Pharisee priest and lived in the 1st century. I think he and the other priests of that time knew when the true scriptural day was to be kept. He said, "Nisan...the beginning of our year, on the fourteenth day of the lunar month...which was called the Passover; and so do we celebrate this passover in companies, leaving nothing of what we sacrifice the the day following. The feast of unleavened bread succeeds that of the passover, and falls on the fifteenth day of the month, and continues seven days...But ON THE SECOND DAY OF UNLEAVENED BREAD, WHICH IS THE SIXTEENTH DAY OF THE MONTH, they first partake of the fruits of the earth, for before that day they do not touch them...they offer the first-fruits of their barley...When a week of weeks has passed over AFTER this sacrifice, (which weeks contain forty and nine days,) on the fiftieth day, which is Pentecost...they bring to God a loaf, made with wheat flour...with leaven...nor is there any one of the festivals but in it they offer burnt-offerings; they also allow themselves to REST ON EVERY ONE OF THEM" (Ant. III. X. 4-6).
It seems clear to me that the Feast of Firstfruits was always on Nisan 16, the 2nd day of unleavened bread, in those days, not just in 30 AD. Josephus locked it in, making it both Nisan 16 and the 2nd day of unleavened bread. Therefore, I think the feasts of Nisan were always on the 14th, 15th and 16th days, and they were all three Sabbaths. In 30 AD, Nisan 15 fell on Saturday.
The unbelieving Jews have not only eliminated animal sacrifice as the way to obtain atonement, they have all but eliminated Nisan 14 as the Passover. They seem to think of Nisan 15 as both the Passover and the 1st day of Unleavened Bread. Scripture lists them as two successive days, Nisan 14 and Nisan 15.
Michael Rood has no trouble figuring out which is the first day of Trumpets (Tishri 1), Atonement (Tishri 10) and the first day of Tabernacles (Tishri 15). He even has the Feast of Unleavened Bread on the right day, Nisan 15. Why does he stumble when he tries to translate Lev. 23:5 to his chart. Scripture says on the 14th and Michael charts it on the 15th and labels it "Feast of Unleavened Bread (Passover)." Jewish days start at 6 PM on the "even" of the previous day. In Egypt, they were to eat the Passover between 6 PM and midnight. The only midnight belonging to Nisan 14 is only 6 hours after 6 PM. They had to eat the Passover lamb during those six hours. At that time, there are still 18 hours of Nisan 14 left, 6 more of night and 12 more of daylight before Nisan 15 begins.
Michael makes the Feast of Firstfruits a sliding feast, making it start on the first Saturday after the first day of Unleavened Bread. This virtually eliminates the yearly emphasis on the 3 consecutive feast days, Friday (Passover), Saturday (Feast of Unleavened Bread), Sunday (Feast of Firstfruits) that are so important to understand in 30 AD.
The same mistake is made on the Talmudic Jewish Calendar. This makes me think it may have been deliberate later in the first century, a way to avoid emphasizing that Jesus Christ is our Passover, the Lamb of God, and that he arose from the dead on the third day. The Jews today don't keep Nisan 14. They just keep Nisan 15 and call it Pesach (Passover). That does not agree with Scripture.
The reason for making the Feast of Firstfruits a sliding feast is claimed to be Lev. 23:11. It says, "he shall wave the sheaf before the LORD, to be accepted for you: on the morrow after the sabbath the priest shall wave it." It is claimed that this "sabbath" is Saturday.
That sounds reasonable--until you find out that all feast days were sabbaths, holy convocations, days of rest. Lev. 23:4 says, "These are the feasts of the LORD, even holy convocations, which ye shall proclaim in their seasons." Lev. 23:37 says, "These are the feasts of the LORD, which ye shall proclaim to be holy convocations, to offer an offering made by fire unto the LORD, a burnt offering, and a meat offering, a sacrifice, and drink offerings, every thing upon his day." Lev. 23:39 says, "Also in the fifteenth day of the seventh month, when ye have gathered in the fruit of the land, ye shall keep a feast unto the LORD seven days: on the first day shall be a SABBATH, and on the eighth day shall be a SABBATH." There is no way that Tishri 1 (Trumpets), Tishri 10 (Atonement) and Tishri 15 (Tabernacles) can all be on the weekly Sabbath. And why should Firstfruits be a floating feast when Tabernacles is not a floating feast?
Lev. 23:32 says of the Day of Atonement, "It shall be unto you a SABBATH of rest, and ye shall afflict your souls: in the ninth day of the month at even, from even unto even, shall ye celebrate your sabbath." If the Day of Atonement is a Sabbath celebrated from the even of Tishri 9 to the even of Tishri 10, it cannot fall on Saturday every year. If Tishri 10 is on a Saturday, Tishri 15 won't be on a Saturday, and it is a Sabbath. Also, this shows that the feast days are to be celebrated from the preceding even to the even of the feast day. Therefore, I think the Feast of Passover should be kept from the even of Nisan 13 to the even of Nisan 14. Agape
In Job 40:15 it starts by telling of the behemoth and in verse 17 tells that the tail is as long as a cedar which is of course the now extinct dinasaur of the first "WORLD AGE".
I pray that I'm not asking too much from you at this time, but YOU write with such clearity of words! You are truly "gifted"!!!! Your rebuke to Sherry was EXCELLENT while still retaining your own spiritual purpose!
I ask GOD to continue to bless you.
Darlene
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From: Tng
To: Darlene
Cc: Marilyn Agee
Thanks, Darlene, for kind words. I am not really a Bible scholar although Iam a student of the Word. The questions that you asked are not my forte asthey require strict and rigorous scholarship. Maybe you can try asking Marilyn Agee for help. Her address is: mjagee@pe.net In Christ, John
Thanks for the referral John and for posting so faithfully on your web site.
The "behemoth" of Job 40:15 is "bhemowth," of Egyptian derivation, the water-ox or hippopotamus that has a huge mouth. Verse 23 says, "he trusteth that he can draw up Jordan into his mouth." Verse 17 says, "He MOVETH (chaphets, bends) his tail like a cedar." He moves his short tail like a cedar blowing in the wind. The only hair he has is on the end of his tail. Agape
I guess my expectations for the rapture being nigh to have been a bit different. Are you still on for a Pentecost rapture?
Rapture pages are waning or are turning into a doctrinal debate. Hope you can keep focused. In Him
I haven't noticed as much change as you have. My site is about biblical end-time prophecies, including the Rapture. I do it all for the Lord. Whatever questions I get, I do my best to answer and pray for His help. I want to tell what He wants told.
Yes, I'm still on for a Pentecost rapture. I can't see how any other feast fits. Isa. 18:3-6 announces, "ALL YE INHABITANTS OF THE WORLD, and dwellers on the earth, SEE YE, when he lifteth up an ensign (flag of UN or OWG) on the mountains (nations); and WHEN HE (THE LORD) BLOWETH A TRUMPET (as in II Thess. 4:16) HEAR YE. For so the LORD said unto me, I will take my REST (shaqat, idleness, i.e., a sabbath feast day), and I will consider (nabat, see, look at) in my dwelling place (Heaven) like a clear heat upon herbs, and like a cloud of dew IN THE HEAT OF HARVEST." Pentecost is "the feast of harvest." Ex. 23:15,16 says, "Thou shalt keep the feast of unleavened bread: (thou shalt eat unleavened bread seven days, as I commanded thee, in the time appointed of the month Abib; for in it thou camest out from Egypt: and none shall appear before me empty:) And THE FEAST OF HARVEST, the firstfruits of thy labours, which thou hast sown in the field: and the feast of ingathering, which is in the end of the year, when thou hast gathered in thy labours out of the field."
Continuing in Isa. 18: "For afore the harvest (maybe on Ascension Day 10 days before Pentecost, Rev. 2:10), when the bud is perfect, and the sour grape is ripening in the flower (time of firstripe grapes, when Israel spied out the promised land), he shall both cut off the sprigs (with no fruit) with pruning hooks, and take away and cut down the branches (twigs with no foliage). They (i.e., the foolish Laodicean virgins) shall be left together unto the fowls of the mountains (nations), and to the beasts of the earth (Rev. 13): and the fowls shall SUMMER upon them, and all the beasts of the earth shall winter upon them." Therefore, I think the Rapture is at the time of the firstripe grapes in the spring. The grapes begin to ripen in late May or early June.
We will be going into our promised land when we have the FIRST chance to go in, not be cut off as Israel was when they refused to go into the land after hearing the report of the spies. The children went into the promised land at the end of 40 years. I think the 40 years suggest the 2nd Rapture at the end of the 40-year generation born when Israel fulfilled the fig tree parable of Mt. 24:32-34 in 1967. All children will be caught up then. Nu. 13:20 says for the spies to see, "what the land is, whether it be fat or lean, whether there be wood therein, or not. And be ye of good courage, and bring of the fruit of the land. Now the time was THE TIME OF THE FIRSTRIPE GRAPES."
Out of 12 spies, only 2 were worthy, Caleb and Joshua. The other 10 were afraid of the giants in the land. Were there any fewer giants in the land after 40 years? We may find that the angels are giants when compared to our size. God's angels will be in Heaven. I am not about to turn down my chance to go to my promised land the first chance I get, giants or no giants. I want to be like Caleb. Joshua is a type of Jesus. Caleb went into the promised land with Joshua. I want to go into my promised land with Jesus.
In Song of Solomon 7:12, the Bride speaks, "Let us get up early to the vineyards; let us see if the vine flourish, whether the TENDER GRAPE appear." The spies brought back one large bunch of grapes. I think that represents the first Rapture. Song 7:7 says of the Bride, "This thy stature is like to a plam tree (upright), and they breasts to clusters of grapes." The other cluster represents the Pre-Wrath Rapture at the time of the vintage, Tishri 1.
Song of Sol. 2:13 says, "The fig tree (Israel) putteth forth her green figs (not yet ripe), and the vines with the TENDER GRAPE give a good smell. ARISE, my love, my fair one, and COME AWAY." Verse 15 says, "our vines have TENDER GRAPES."
I think the Rapture is at the time of the firstripe grapes-- Pentecost.
PS: Isa. 18:4 says, "WHEN HE (THE LORD) BLOWETH A TRUMPET (as in II Thess. 4:16) HEAR YE. For so the LORD said unto me, I will take my REST (shaqat, idleness, i.e., a sabbath feast day)."
It looks like there are 2 reasons to rest at the time of the Rapture. This year, 5761 (2000/2001) is a Sabbatic Year, and Pentecost is a sabbath of rest. Lev. 25:4 says, "in the SEVENTH YEAR shall be a sabbath of rest...a sabbath for the LORD." Ex. 34:22 says, "thou shalt observe the FEAST OF WEEKS, of the FIRSTFRUITS OF WHEAT HARVEST."
Lev. 23:17 says that the two wave loaves at Pentecost, "they are the firstfruits unto the LORD." Some will be left behind at the Rapture, as the foolish Laodicean virgins are. Lev. 23:22 says, "when ye reap the harvest of your land, thou shalt not make clean riddance of the corners of thy field."
"And Enoch walked with God: and WAS NOT; for God TOOK him."(Genesis 5:24)
Furthermore, it is Talmudic tradition that, not only was Enoch raptured on Pentecost--but that he was also BORN on the very day of Pentecost.
This could very well picture the New Testament church being "born" on the Day of Pentecost in Acts 2, but also raptured on the same day according to the typology of Enoch.
Enoch was raptured BEFORE THE FLOOD. Others went through the Flood--Noah and his familiy. Others perished in the Flood.
"As it was in the days of Noah, so shall it be in the days of the coming of the Son of Man." Interesting typology, to say the least.
Pro and Con 742 Or Return
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Updated 4-28-01