“Avshalom her brother said to her, ‘Has Amnon your brother been with you? But now, my sister, keep quiet; because he’s your brother. Don’t take the matter to heart.” But Tamar remained desolate in her brother Avshalom’s house.'”-2 Samuel 13:20
There’s something that needs to be stressed.
Amnon is consistently referred to as Tamar’s brother.
Why is this important?
Because of questionable teaching brought about by some of the ancient Jewish sages who twist the Scriptures to say Tamar and Amnon weren’t siblings at all.
That ain’t true, homies.
But why do they go to such lengths to promote such a flawed interpretation?
Because if Tamar and Amnon weren’t brother and sister…
You know what that means?
It means that incest didn’t occur in David’s family…
Thus, David didn’t need to take action against Amnon after he heard what went down.
This would allow traditional Judaism to keep its narrative that David lived a sinless life.
Again, this is just like how some Rabbis say that Uriah wasn’t married to Bathsheba while he was away fighting a war.
Unfortunately, them hound dog homies ain’t gonna hunt.
Scripture warns us against twisting the Scriptures.
“Add thou not unto his words,
lest he reprove thee,
and thou be found a liar.”
— Proverbs 30:6
When you take a belief that’s the product of your wild imagination and read it back into Scripture…
You’re misrepresenting the Lord, His character, and distorting his divine commands and principles.
Unfortunately, this allegorizing of Scripture has been a part of both traditional Judaism and Christianity for centuries.
And when I say “traditional,” I ain’t kidding, man.
These predisposed doctrines are even written into the official liturgy of many congregations.
How do you think a pastor or preacher can read Yeshua’s Sermon on the Mount…
And still hold to the false doctrine that the Law of Moses has been done away with?
In these passages, the Messiah clearly says he did NOT come to abolish the Law.
I mean, he…
CLEARLY.
SAYS.
IT!
Yet, so handcuffed to the doctrine that the Law has been done away with that the pastor or preacher will still find a way to twist Christ’s words to mean the exact opposite.
It’s as if he had just smoked about 20 pounds of marijuana or something.
He’ll mouth some BS mumbo jumbo like…
“When Christ said he came to ‘fulfill’ the Law, that really means he would do away with it, by perfectly obeying it, and therefore we are not obligated to obey it.”
Seriously, does that make any freakin’ sense whatsoever?!
This is just one example of many of how congregations let doctrine and tradition dictate what the Scriptures say when it should be the opposite.
This leads to today’s takeaway.
It comes down to this.
If you’re a faithful worshipper who attends a congregation regularly…
Take whatever the pastor says with a healthy grain of Himalayan Pink Salt…
Or Morton…
Or whatever your favorite salt brand is.
I’m not saying be disrespectful…
I’m saying when you hear a sermon…
Use your God-given brain when listening…
If something doesn’t make sense…
Don’t ignore that intuition, man…
Jot it down in your notebook or something…
Pray about it…
Ask God about it…
But just don’t blindly accept whatever is preached from the pulpit without letting it pass through your BS detector…
The same goes for seminary students.
More often than not, these institutions exist to propagate their doctrines…
They even force their students to sign a document that states they won’t be awarded their degree if they do not conform to their doctrines (usually Trinitarian beliefs)…
That’s why I sometimes respect atheists more than believers…
More often than not, they’ve got some strong, well-reasoned arguments supporting their beliefs (as wrong as they are).
When I compare them to the ton of air-headed believers out there who just blindly accept a lawless gospel or ridiculous ideas like the Trinity and so on, I tell ya, it’s a breath of fresh air.
Ya feel me here?
I wanna close by sharing a YouTube video from a fellow believer.
He’s a Messianic Jew, and I’ve had the privilege of fellowshipping with him on and off for more than a few years now.
While I may not always agree with him…
I love him because he’s one of those rare souls who thinks for himself and doesn’t just blindly accept what’s thrown at him from the pulpit.
Below is his video titled “How Important is the Trinity Regarding Salvation?”
Enjoy!
Dues’s video contradicted Yeshua in a thousand and one ways, but I’ll be brief and list a few bonuses.
1 John 4:9 & 15; 5:5-6, 10-11 & 20
Philippians 2:6 Which settles the argument by itself, literally Paul calls Yeshua God.
Harmonize John 1:1-2, 14, 18; 17:1, 5, 17, and do a little Greek wordplay and this also settles the argument.
All such operative truths harmonize together to be the substance of what is meant by Romans 10:9
Denying the Deity of Christ is denying the Father has testified that the Christ is the Embodiment of Himself (Colossians 1:19), which make God to look like a liar, which, as written in 1 John chapter 4, proves such people do not have the Spirit.
And here’s an unsolvable riddle: David and Paul (speaking the Holy Spirit) both said “None are Good”); Paul (speaking by the Holy Spirit again) said, “All have fallen short of the glory of God”; Yeshua himself also said “Only God is good”; now if Yeshua is only a man, then it is most biblical to conclude that, like the rest of mankind, he is also fallen, in need of grace and unable to save…and his blood is impure because he would’ve also been born into sin. But if He is God (which Scripture makes clear He is!), then unlike the rest of mankind, His blood is truly holy, He isn’t born into sin, He hasn’t fallen short of God’s glory, and He is able to save all by Himself—which is only something that only God incarnate can do…again re-read and re-read again Colossians 1:19.
Matthew G Hicks from
Birmingham, AL
I, and I’m sure my friend, have heard these arguments a thousand and one times.
Here’s another resource I’d recommend you look into: https://www.youtube.com/@billschlegel1
Be blessed.
I will be praying fervently for you (Rich) and your friend. The deity is everything, because it also depends upon the Oath God swore unto Himself in the Abrahamic covenant, promising to be like the slaughtered animals if things fell apart, which they did.
Matthew G Hicks
Birmingham, AL
Here’s another resource to consider:
Mr. Hicks,
I appreciate your prayers, but wonder who you are praying to? Is it God or Yeshua? According to you, they are the same, but since the Bible says Yeshua is sitting at the right hand of God (at least, that’s what Stephen saw) then you can understand my confusion regarding who you pray to.
But, to reply to your statements, first of all we need to remember that Yeshua said he doesn’t do or say anything on his own, only what his father tells him to do (John 5:19; John 12:49;John 7:16), to name a few places.
Now, to me, what this means is that later when Yeshua says that when we see him we see the father, to know the father is to know him, and vice-versa, yadda-yadda-yadda, what he is doing is not claiming divinity or that he is God, only repeating that he is not doing anything on his own. He is simply repeating what he has been told to say, and doing what God tells him to do. And, since he was born of God and not of a man, he was full of the Holy Spirit. That doesn’t mean he was God, but empowered by God.
That’s why Paul said he was in the form of God. Again, not to say he was God, but he was the image of God because he did and said only what God told him to do and say.
In fact, because Yeshua often states that he is not doing things on his own, he is proving that he and the father are not the same: if he does nothing on his own, that indicates that he could, if he wanted to, operate independently. But because he is humble, despite his being filled with God’s spirit (which was given to many people throughout biblical history), he made himself subservient to God’s wishes, even to death.
By stating that he does nothing of his own, he is clearly stating that he and God are separate entities,
What Yeshua means is that when we see him or hear him speak, it is from God- but he is NOT God.
It is no different than when God sent angels: we read in the Tanakh, more than once, how angels came to visit people, but then when talking to whomever, suddenly we read “God said”, then suddenly it is the angel, again. So, is it an angel or God, or can’t they make up their mind?
The answer is that the angel, as a messenger from God, is speaking verbatim what God told it to say. So, it may be an angel speaking, but it is God who is speaking through the angel. It was the same with Yeshua.
As for the letter Paul wrote to the Philippians, he said Yeshua was in the form of God, but didn’t equate himself with God, instead showing his humanity to demonstrate his obedience and humility. So, yes, that can sound like Paul is saying Yeshua is God.
But that is not the entire context of the message he was giving, and when we pull a sentence here or there to make a point, it usually ends up being wrong.
Later, he says that God exalted Yeshua so that at Yeshua’s name, every knee will bend and tongue profess he is lord. You have to know the Tanakh to understand what this Pharisee knew- the Messiah will be king over the entire earth, so the use of “lord” in that place meant “king”, as in when people address the king as “My Lord”.
They aren’t saying the king is God.
There is a BIG difference between someone being “lord” and THE Lord, God, in heaven.
The word “lord” can be a title of authority, or a recognition of a birthright, or God. Many “Holy Namers” say praying to the Lord is praying to Ba’al, because Ba’al is another word that means “lord”.
I certainly hope you and I can agree on this- when we pray to God, and call him “Lord”, we don’t mean Ba’al.
Did you know that the Trinity is not from the Bible? It was first coined by an influential Christian leader named Tertullian, sometime during the middle of the 2nd Century (120-150 AD). The Holy Spirit is something that God gives as a gift, which Yehsua called a “Comforter”, and it is not God, or even a part of god, but it is a separate spirit that indwells us, which has the knowledge of God and acts like our conscience. When we listen to it, we do right, and when we ignore it, we do as everyone else does.
If you wish to believe that Yeshua is God, fine- personally, I don’t think it really makes a difference as far as salvation goes because nowhere in the Bible- NOWHERE!- are we required to faithfully accept that Yeshua is God in order to be saved. NO!
We ARE required to faithfully accept that Yeshua is the Messiah God promised to send, and that by means of his sacrifice, we can be forgiven of our sins, and as such, will be allowed into God’s kingdom- what we call “saved”.
I appreciate your comments, and would like to leave you with this thought: if Yeshua is God, and we are also told that Yeshua is our Intercessor with God, why does God have to intercede with himself? Now, if Yeshua is separate from God, and God has given him authority over those who do call him (Yeshua) “lord”, representing their recognition that Yeshua has authority over them and their king (which is what the Jewish Messiah will be), that must mean that Yeshua is not God, but rather is subordinate to God.
I figure we will agree to disagree on this, but the only thing that concerns me if your statement that the divinity of Yeshua is a salvation issue- it isn’t, as I just explained. Whether or not Yeshua and God are the same entity, or totally different entities, is not a salvation issue, but faithfully accepting Yeshua as the Messiah, and believing that through his sacrifice is the only way we can be forgiven of our sins, well- that IS a salvation issue.
Let’s get together when we are in God’s presence and ask him to tell us what the real answer is, until then let’s both keep obedient to God (not a religion) and do our best to live as Yeshua did, which was (for the record) a Torah-observant life.
(If you want to argue about another Christian misunderstanding, which is the law being done away with, we will have to do that some other time).