Myths about the Hebrew Language, and Questions about Apparent Contradictions in the Gospels

We're about to dispel some myths about the Hebrew language today on Thoroughly Jewish Thursday. Uh It's time for the line of fire with your host, activist, author, international speaker, and theologian, Dr. Michael Brown, your voice of moral, cultural, and spiritual revolution. Michael Brown is the director of the Coalition of Conscience and president of Fire School of Ministry. Get into the line of fire now by calling 866-34-TRUTH.

That's 866-34-TRUTH. Here again is Dr. Michael Brown. I love when this happens. And it happens all the time.

It happened last night. It just happened literally seconds ago. There's something about to talk about, something I'm about to write about.

something that I'm about to address on the radio. And no sooner is the thought in my mind to address that particular subject that, lo and behold, I get an email addressing that very subject or with a link to that very subject. I was writing something last night, and I thought, I need a link for this particular subject. I was about to go online and search for it. Lo and behold, an email comes in with an article, boom, addressing that very question.

Literally thirty seconds ago, right before the show, I was in my mind thinking of the opening words and one of the subjects I was going to address. And I see an email came in right before the show. I look down, and it is the very thing I was about to talk about.

So, we're going to have a good time on the broadcast. Welcome to Thurly Jewish Thursday. This is. Michael Brown, delighted to be with you. Here's the number to call: 866-34TRUTH, 866-348-788.

Eight, four. That is the number to call with any Jewish-related question you have of any kind whatsoever. All right? If it is Hebrew-related, related to the people of Israel, related to Judaism or Jewish tradition, Jewish background of the New Testament, as long as it's Jewish-related, phones are open: 866-3487. One thing We will talk about today though.

And this is the very email I just got seconds ago: is there are misconceptions about the Hebrew language. There are myths about the Hebrew language.

Someone sent me a link the other day. You've got to watch this YouTube video. It's this amazing message based on the genealogies in Luke's Gospel going all the way back from Adam up to Jesus. And if you go back to the original Hebrew meetings, it's this incredible message that's preached. And I've heard all that the message of the gospel is preached in Genesis 5 and the genealogy there.

The Hebrew names and old, there's a Hebrew term, and it actually stands for Jesus, and it's the beginning and the end. And so much of this is just. Bunk, it's nonsense. It may be a good overall message. But the method of getting there is wrong.

So we're going to cover that today.

Now, please hear me. God's word is wonderful enough. That we don't need these cheap props. God's truths are wonderful enough that when I dispel a myth, you shouldn't feel like, oh, all we have is the Bible saying what it seems to say. It doesn't have like a secret code, or the Hebrew letters don't have certain special meanings.

No, no. Instead, it's the word is wonderful. There are treasures if we'll dig. And what is clear and on the surface is enough to give our lives to and eternity to living for God and discovering his will and doing his will.

So we may burst some bubbles, but they are deceptive bubbles. They are misleading bubbles. They are incorrect bubbles. In the process, we're going to establish you more deeply in the truth of God's word.

So again, Jewish-related question 8663 for truth. And yes, of course, we must address this. Further controversy about the embassy. About the American embassy in Jerusalem, the plans by the Trump administration. They still clearly say they are going to do that.

And there's more outcry. If you do, it's going to be war. If you do, it's going to be an explosion. And one thing that America needs to know is don't let Terrorist. influence your policy.

866-34-TRUTH. We'll be right back. Change the world. Change the world. It's fire we want, for fire we need.

Please stand to the fire. It's the line of fire with your host, Dr. Michael Brown. Get into the line of fire now by calling 866-34 Truth. Here again is Dr.

Michael Brown. Those are Hasidic Jews. chanting, singing, Psalm one twenty seven, a cappella Absolutely beautiful rendition and beautiful music. Welcome, friends, to Thurley Jewish Thursday. This is Michael Brown, 866-348-7884.

Is the number two call? Just a few things before I get into dispelling a Hebrew myth or two and taking your calls. Uh Our administration, Secretary of State Kerry, our outgoing administration. They continue to warn about the consequences of America. moving its embassy to Jerusalem.

There's even speculation that an announcement could be made as early as May, which would coincide with historic retaking of Jerusalem coming back into Jewish hands 50 years ago and things like that. We don't know exactly what's coming in that regard. But we're consistently told that it would be disaster. And Muslim leaders, or even Palestinian leaders, are saying it would mean war. And on the one hand, yes, it would be inflammatory.

There's no question about it. It would be inflammatory. It would be America saying there's not going to be a divided Jerusalem. half of it the capital of a Jewish state, half of it the capital of a Palestinian state, that's not going to happen. And if it's correct, some information that was sent out, I just don't know if it's accurate or not, that those working with the Trump transition team had told Palestinian leaders, we'll give you a capital in Ramallah.

But not Jerusalem, that Jerusalem is the Jewish capital.

Now, if if accurate, that's even more amazing. I just don't know if that's so. But yes, it would be inflammatory. But the bottom line is the radical Muslim world and much of the Muslim world will will never be happy. with a Jewish Jerusalem of any kind.

And the radical Muslim world will never be happy with the Jewish presence in the land, period, or with the Jewish state, period. And what you basically have to say is, this is the way it's going to be. This is the eternal Jewish capital. And I believe God will bless us for that.

Now you say, well, won't it provoke more bloodshed?

Well, obviously, Israel will be all the more on the alert with security, but let's understand this. Since America threw Israel under the bus, with the UN resolution A few weeks back. There has been an increase in terror attacks on Jews.

So here is a ruling that is favorable to the Palestinians. And unfavorable to Israel. And this ruling by default, well, explicitly, says that East Jerusalem is occupied territory. The Western Wall is occupied territory, where Israel would, where America would put its embassy, occupied territory. And this is what the UN resolution said: that apparently America helped craft with the Palestinians and then got out of the way and said we're going to abstain.

We're going to abstain so that this can go forward with a 14 to 0 vote, one abstention.

So Since that resolution went forward, there has been a spike. In Palestinian terror attacks against Israel. And note this. There was a bus driver who rammed into a crowd of Israeli soldiers and young people. Killing four just a few days back, wounding at least 15, some seriously.

Three of the soldiers were, three of those killed, were women aged 20, 20, and 22, all in the IDF, all in the Israeli army, and the young man, 20.

So these are the ones killed. and and the truck driver drove back and forth over the victims while he was being shot at until he was killed.

Alright, so what is now the response?

Well, in the Palestinian territories, a lot of celebration and handing out of candies and sweets. Not universal, but much of it. But not just that. The Palestinian Authority has now put the widow on a pension. The widow of the mass murderer She's going to be provided for by the Government.

Because what he did was heroic. You don't cater that. You do not cater to that, friends. You do not bow down to that. You you do not accommodate that.

So let America move the embassy, let President Trump do what other presidents didn't do. Bill Clinton didn't do it. George Bush didn't do it. Barack Obama didn't do it. Let Donald Trump do it.

And I believe God will bless us for that.

86634Truth. All right, looking at our fully loaded phone lines, and I love the questions. I'm going to. Going to go there momentarily. But first, here's an email that came in immediately before the show.

And it was sent to our Jewish ministry assistant. We have one man on staff who is fluent in Russian, Hebrew, and English, and has a PhD. And he answers Jewish-related emails for us. That's his job. And here's the email that was sent to him.

Do you know how to get the official pictographs of the Old and New Testament? I've come across some very interesting, mind-blowing facts about the Hebrew language that is awesome. For example, the very first word of the Bible in beginning, gray sheet, if looked at with pictograph means the Son of God will be destroyed by his own hand willingly on the cross. The very first word sums up the entire Bible with just one word. For your information, the two and second and third words also point to Jesus.

Can you help point me in the right direction for this, please?

Okay, I hate to disappoint the writer, but that is one. 100%. Nonsense. Every syllable of that is 100% nonsense. The Bible was not written in pictographs, it was written in an alphabet.

A pictograph would be: you draw a picture of an object.

Okay, that's a car, that's a dog, that's a house. All right, and then ultimately other meanings can come from that. the Hebrew alphabet, which was originally a Phoenician alphabet. And other ancient alphabets do derive from pictographic meanings, but then they just become alphabets. They are no longer pictographs.

R letter A, the first letter of our alphabet, that ultimately comes from the ancient Phoenician alphabet by way of the Greeks. All right, and I've mentioned this many times, but the original, if you take the letter A. But instead of having it like an upside-down V, make it like an upside-down U.

Alright, so it looks kind of like a horseshoe, rounded at the top. And then you take the bar that grows across for the A, and you stretch it out a little bit past it and curl it up on either side. All right, so what do you have? It looks like an ox head, because that's originally what the letter was. Aleph in Hebrew was originally an ox head.

And aleph came into Greek as alpha and comes then through Latin and into English as our letter A. But it is just a letter. It has no pictographic meaning. It is 100% bogus nonsense. 100% bogus nonsense that if you look at the Hebrew, the opening word of the Bible, the Bereshit in Hebrew, that it actually means in pictographic meaning, the Son of God will be destroyed by his own hand holding it on the cross.

Nonsense, nonsense. 100% bogus. 100% focus. Not an ounce of truth in any of it. It is an internet myth.

And the problem is, the sky's the limit. You can now read anything under the sun you want into it. Throw out the myths. Throw Yeah. The myths.

And let's get back to reading the Bible as it was meant to be read. 866-34Truth. Let us go to the phones. We start in Washington, D.C. Charlie, welcome to the line of fire.

Hi, Doctor Brown. I trust all is well. Yes, sir. Um I was analyzing your video on uh Psalms one hundred and ten, and you said it couldn't be written about Abraham or David himself. And I have a few hypothetical pushbacks.

So I first want to start with the topic. Just to be clear, it certainly could have been written about David. It was either written by David or for David. It's absolutely not written for Abraham. Right, right.

So I want to first start with the subject of who it could be about, which is which is what you just brought up. then more specific questions on the verses.

So the first set of questions You said Abraham had no connection to Zion in that video, but wouldn't Zion have been located at the same places where Melchizedek ruled? Zion didn't exist. Zion's a much later name. But maybe the language was changed to Zion so more people could be familiar with the place. Yeah, the whole thing is, though, to mention, well, everyone's familiar with Jerusalem.

It's easy to say Jerusalem. Everyone's familiar with that. To say something, Zion only is the stronghold of David. That's when it's until you get to David, Zion has no connection to Israel or the Jewish people. And that's why even Ibn Ezra, you know, a leading rabbinic authority, dismissed that myth.

that it could have gone back to uh Eleazar writing it for for Abraham.

So it's an extraordinary stretch. Got you. Regarding the priest, part of where the priest and the order of Melchizedek, I know these questions are very superficial, but I just want to. Tell you what, stay there. I love the questions.

We'll pick it up on the other side of the break. I love the pushback in the questions. Stay there. Daniel, Michael, Benjamin, Domingo, you're after Charlie. Stay right there.

Gains the world O God of burning, cleanse. Say It's the line of fire with your host, Dr. Michael Brown, your voice of moral, cultural, and spiritual revolution. Here again is Dr. Michael Brown.

He is my defense. I shall love you. He moved, he is my defense. I should not Yeah. Thanks for joining us on Thurly Jewish Thursday.

Thank you, Marty Goetz, for introducing this segment, 866-34-TRUTH.

So, back to Charlie in Washington, D.C. Just wanted to push back on my presentation of Psalm 110. Go ahead, sir. Sure. These questions about Abraham are more superficial, but I'm going to get to the David ones real quick.

Um so but also for the verse about The priest in the order of Melchizedek. For it disqualifying Abraham, what if somebody brought up the objection of Abraham bringing burnt offerings to God? Wouldn't that be like priestly roles as well? Oh, there's no argument. The whole thing is there's a rabbinic myth.

About Abraham writing this. No scholar in the world outside of it believes that. There's not a stitch of evidence for it. You might as well say it was Mary Poppins. You know what I'm saying?

It's just a complete myth that only comes up because of Abraham being connected with Melchitzedek in Genesis 14.

So there's no reason, even when you have rabbinic authorities rejecting it. Yeah, of course Abraham did priestly things. That's not the issue. He wasn't a king. He didn't rule.

Rabbinic tradition says he sits at the left hand of God, not the right hand of God. Again, he has no connection to Zion, which wasn't even anything existent then.

So there's no reason to even have a serious refutation of something that's just a myth. That's the whole point. Of course, you're going to find this and that that works, but it's utterly meaningless. It's not worth. The time, and if someone just believes the myths because that's what they were raised in, then you know, logic is not going to help.

Right, right, right.

Now with respect to David, I think your argument for David not resurrecting is solid because we both know that he hasn't resurrected. And that was the argument used in Acts 2 by Peter. But some possibilities. But that's reference to Psalm 16.

Okay. I'm sorry about that. Yes, yes, exactly. But some pushbacks on the possibility of it having happening during life. Why couldn't sit at my right hand simply mean rule as king or rule as my representative and not a literal ascension?

And weren't all of David's enemies under his subjection by the time he died? Yeah, the here here's the problem. The problem is the Lord said to my Lord, And it's described as a Psalm of David.

So In the vast majority of cases, In the book of Psalms, when it says Ledavid, in Hebrew, it means written by David.

Okay?

So if it's if it's written by David Then who is he calling his lord? If it's his son, why is he calling him adoni, which would be my lord, you know, my superior?

So that's the argument that the it's written about the Messiah who's greater than him. But I have no problem with the idea that it was written by a court poet for David. and that the court poet Said Yahweh, said to my Lord, namely King David, sit at my my right hand, and that it was metaphorical Etc. It's highly exalted. The idea of sitting at God's right hand is highly exalted.

But yeah, exalted metaphorical language, and that David, who is the prototype of the Messiah and who did priestly things, is the prototype, and the Messiah himself will be a priest forever after the order of Melchizedek. As David was, all the more will the Messiah be. I'm fine with that. It's just that it seems David wrote it, and if he wrote it, then if he was referring to his son, Uh and the Messiah And he calls him my lord, which is superior, then how in the world could he just be a son? He's got to be more than that.

And that's why I mean, Jesus. He's got to be a literal ascension, though. I didn't say the word I didn't mention the word ascension.

Well, you did in the video with 110 talking about an ascension or a resurrection. You did say that. Right, right.

But the point of. Acts 2 is Psalm 16. That's the resurrection Psalm that Peter quotes in Acts 2. All right. My argument here in Psalm 110, I'm fine.

I mean, I've written about it, I'm fine either way. I'm fine with saying. That it's David speaking about the Messiah. I'm fine with it being written about David, who is a prototype of the Messiah. The key thing we get from it is.

that the Messiah As David would be a priest forever after the Royal Monketek, so he will combine priestly ministry and royal ministry. That's the whole push, that's the emphasis.

Now, you could argue, some do see a resurrection reference later in the Psalm that's possible. And Psalm 110 is highly exalted language that is extreme and not found elsewhere.

So it's more logical to take it as a literal sit at my right hand because it's language that's not used elsewhere. But fine, even if you wanted to read it metaphorically, I don't have a problem with that. As I said, I'm at home with either of those two interpretations. They get to the same overall point that I that to me is the main thrust from that psalm that I want to make. which is why fight you can say for verse one, it demands to be understood as fighting battles from heaven instead of earth, right?

It is the best way to read it, the most obvious way to read it. The most natural way to read it. If you wanted to argue metaphorically, you could. But the New Testament writers clearly saw it as an ascension. And and again, David, the the If you look at a Psalm 2, for example.

And I'm just going to have to wrap up here to get to other calls. But I do appreciate the questions, Charlie. We could continue this dialogue another week. Just to be clear on this. Psalm 2 speaks of the kings of the earth wanting to rebel against the Lord and his anointed.

And there are rabbinic commentators that say Psalm 2 refers to David and to the Messiah. And that's a fair way of reading it. It's David being enthroned as king with his limited kingdom, his limited empire, nothing like the Assyrian or the Babylonian or Egyptian empires of the day, but just some limited sovereignty he had in surrounding nations. But that's a far cry from the kings of the earth and the rulers of the world wanting to rebel against the Lord his anointed. David never saw a fraction of that.

David North saw a fraction of that yet Psalm 2 does speak of the worldwide dominion of the Davidic king, hence, it is messianic in its ultimate application. The same with Psalm 110, even if it had application to David, it finds its fulfillment in the Messiah, who is the one who does rule and reign from the right hand of God. And again, find me somewhere else where a human being is called to sit at God's right hand until all of his enemies are a footstool at his feet. It's. It's highly exalted language that finds its fulfillment in the Messiah, even if it had partial application.

To David, but I like the questions. Keep going this direction and just make sure. If go back, look at references I have, and make sure you're citing those accurately along the way. But thank you, sir, for the call. Much appreciated.

All right, friends. I am going to be on the phones for another 90 minutes.

So stay right there. I'm going to get to more calls momentarily, 866-34TRUTH. And remember to all of you, my dear listeners, if you're not a monthly supporter, part of our support team, a torch bearer, we pour into you every month with all kinds of special benefits, access to online classes and special teachings, a new audio message every month, 15% discount on our online bookstore, an insider newsletter you get from me with what's going on and special reports. But this month, when you become a torchbearer, a monthly supporter, helping us with at least a dollar a day per month, so $30 or more per month, we're giving you free my brand new book written with Nancy, Breaking the Stronghold of Food, plus an exclusive DVD teaching never released before, 25-30 minutes focused on that very subject.

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Your voice of moral, cultural, and spiritual revolution. Get into the line of fire now by calling 866-34TRUTH. Here again is Dr. Michael Brown. Welcome friends to the line of fire 866-34 Truth is a number to call.

That's 866-348-7884. Outgoing President Barack Obama has sounded a warning. that if Donald Trump is too strongly in solidarity with Prime Minister Netanyahu, then that may worsen the situation in The Middle East. Again, that very quote worsened the situation.

So, this was something that. President Obama said on Monday, I haven't talked about it. President Barack Obama on Monday denied betraying Israel by not using the U.S. veto against an anti-settlement resolution at the United States Security Council last month.

So reports Deborah Dunnon yesterday on Breitbart.com. He said his duty as president was to do what he thought was right. And he's got an obligation until January 20th to do what he feels is right. He didn't feel in any way that he betrayed Israel. Um But he said plainly That if Donald Trump chooses to support Israel, paraphrase no matter what its policies are, quote, unfettered support for Israel and support for the Netanyahu government's policies, no matter what they are, no matter how inimical they may be to the prospect of peace, if that's what qualifies as a good friend, I believe we will see a worsening situation over time.

The problem is that's an exaggerated statement. And President Obama, who can be quite nuanced in his speaking, he must know that's an exaggerated statement because it's not a matter of saying everything Israel does is right. but it's standing with them on these major issues that we also believe are right. Eight six six three four truth. Let's go back to Washington, DC.

Michael, welcome to the line of fire. Hello, Dr. Brown Hawaii. Good afternoon to you. Good afternoon.

All right, all my questions, of course, are Jewish-related.

So, are you ready? Yeah, I'm ready.

Alrighty.

Alright, my first one is. Uh why did God choose the Jewish people as his people originally. And When exactly did that take place, when it took place? My second question is Um as it pertains to the land of Israel. And because based upon the constant conflict that's going on there now, Who was actually Yeah, yeah.

Was it the Arabs? or whether the Jewish people And if and if the Arabs were there, uh you know, at at some point Now, in terms of them getting like displaced, I guess a certain part of the land and Yeah, yeah. Even you see these bulldozers and things like that. You know, it is has Israel's land been already been cut out for them to have? And are they just taking more than they're supposed to have?

And is that Part of the conflict. And my third question. I mean it's as a Christian I know that all sixty-six books of the Bible are inspired by God.

So why is it or how does it work or coexist with the uh the Jewish Bible.

Okay, so I'll I'll uh answer in uh in reverse order. Uh first the Hebrew Bible and the Christian Bible of the Old Testament are identical in books, just in different order.

So the Hebrew scriptures, that's the equivalent of the Christian Old Testament.

Some of the books are in different order. But Judaism does not recognize the New Testament as inspired.

So for a traditional Jew, the Bible is what we call the Old Testament and not the New Testament. They look at the New Testament as either just a collection of human writings. Or deceptive, misleading writings, etc., but off-limits, nothing to be studied or looked at if you're a traditional Jew. They would look at the New Testament the way we as followers of Jesus would say, look at the Book of Mormon. as an external book that's not part of the Bible, that's not inspired.

What it does mean though on the positive side is that we have in common the Hebrew scriptures, that we can say to traditional Jew, hey, you also believe in the five books of Moses. You also believe in the prophecies of Isaiah. You also believe in the Psalms. Let's look at those together and let's see what we can come up with in terms of who God is, who the Messiah is, and what we should believe. All right, two other answers on the other side of the break.

It's the line of fire with your host, Dr. Michael Brown. Get into the line of fire now by calling 866-34 TRUTH. Here again is Dr. Michael Brown.

Mm. Thanks for joining us on Thoroughly Jewish Thursday to the sound of klezmer music. That's that sound you just heard. 866-34Truth. So back to Michael in Washington.

Question number two was about controversy over the land of Israel.

So this is something that I get into in much more depth on my video lecture is Israel an evil occupier.

So Michael, when you have time, go to thelineoffire.org and click on the digital library. And just search for the word occupier, okay? And you'll see a whole lecture, an hour plus, where I go through the history. But here's the short version. The people of Israel were given the land of Canaan by God.

And it became the Jewish homeland going back to the promise to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. But once the Jewish people came out of the Exodus in Egypt, so about 3,400 years ago, then that was their homeland. And then a few hundred years later, Jerusalem became the capital. And that has been the one and only homeland of the Jewish people for 3,000 plus years. Jews around the world pray every year, next year in Jerusalem, wanting to be back home.

When Jews pray around the world, they pray facing towards Jerusalem. That has been the eternal capital of the Jewish people. And once the Jewish people were exiled, There have been other groups that have lived there. And over a period of centuries, especially after the rise of Islam, there were Arabs who lived there, but they never considered it a homeland. It was never a nation with a distinct language or currency or capital or anything like that.

In other words, there was no such thing as a nation of Palestine. What happened was. In 135, after the Roman Emperor Hadrian put down a Jewish revolt and exiled the Jews from Jerusalem and from their ancient homeland, he then renamed it Philistina or Palestine to mock the Jewish people. And he named it after the Philistines. They were already long gone, but they were old enemies of Israel.

He named it after them, after the Philistines, to mock the Jewish people and to say, this is not your land, this is the land of these uncircumcised Philistines.

So it became known as Palestine. But through the centuries, the only ones that had the vision of going back there and rebuilding a life there were Jews.

So as the centuries were on, let's fast forward now to the 1800s, you had more Arabs living there than Jews. But there was not a Palestinian state. There was not a vision for a Palestinian state. There was not a Palestinian capital there or a consciousness where a Palestinian people. They were just Arabs who were living there and Jews who were living there.

And then in 1917, after World War I, With the the League of Nations decided, okay, it was divvying up the different parts of the world. They said, okay, this is under the British mandate. This is now for Britain to rule over this.

So it was now Palestine. under the British mandate and the Palestinian orchestra. Who was that? Jews. Uh the Palestinian Post or the Palestine Post.

Who was that? Jewish. They were the ones that took on that identity because this was their ancient homeland. And then in 1947, the United Nations said: okay, we're going to have two states. And this is the territory for the the Arabs.

And you can have your own state, and here's the territory for the Jews. It wasn't favorable to the Jews, but they said fine. The Arabs said no. And in 1948, they tried to attack and destroy Israel and lost that battle. And then again, in 1967, in the Six-Day War, there was another attempt to wipe out Israel.

And this time, Israel was able to take more land for security, and that's where it stands today.

So, in short, There have actually been, even before 1947, There was a previous offer. Of Great Britain and the nations, okay. Here's your land for the Arabs, here's your land for the Jews. Jews said yes, Arabs said no. And that's what's happened now for decades.

So the Jewish people said there's plenty of room for everybody here. We can all live together side by side in peace. You just have to recognize us as a Jewish state and put your weapons down. When. The State of Israel is declared in 1948.

There were roughly 800,000 Jews living in the surrounding Muslim nations. And they were forced out of those nations when the Jewish state was declared.

So they had to flee those nations, and for the most part, they fled to the fledgling nation of Israel, and that's where they took up residence. There were about 600,000 Arabs. Living in Palestine then. And when the war broke, for a number of reasons, they ended up fleeing the land or being displaced in the midst of war. Did the surrounding Arab nations, the surrounding Muslim nations, take them in?

No, they made them live like refugees and said, we are not taking you in.

So Israel absorbed all the Jewish refugees. The surrounding Muslim nations did not absorb any of the Arab refugees. That's why we have the refugee crisis. But here's the long and short of it. It's it's just a truism.

The Palestinians would put down their weapons, there would be no more war. And the two could live side by side peacefully, and there's plenty of room in the land, either one-state or two-state solution. If the Israelis put down their weapons, there'll be no more Israel. That remains the problem. But my video is Israel and the Evil Occupy will help there.

Lastly, The choosing of the Jewish people, it goes back to God choosing Abraham, Michael. Genesis 12, God chooses Abram and says, through his seed, the whole world would be blessed. And then out of Abram's two sons, Isaac and Ishmael, Isaac is chosen. And then uh Jacob is chosen rather than Esau. And then Jacob becomes Israel, and those are the tribes of Israel.

His sons become the tribes of Israel.

So the choosing of Israel. Deuteronomy 7 says it has nothing to do with Israel being better than anybody else or bigger than anybody else. Israel sins like everybody else. The reason God chose Israel was he wanted to bless the whole world. And he found one man, Abraham, who obeyed his voice.

So he made a promise. It's just like if God's looking through the whole world to find one man because he wants to raise up a nation and through that nation, place the whole world. And he finds Michael in Washington, D.C., there's a man who loves me and honors me. I'm going to make a promise to him, and it's going to go through his descendants.

So it has nothing to do with whether your descendants are better than others or worse than others. It has to do with the fact he made a promise to you, and that's what he did with Abraham.

So why did he raise up the Jewish people? Because he wants to bless the whole world and he wanted to send the Messiah into the world.

So. Pretty long answers for you, but hopefully that covers things. And again, sir, go to thelineoffire.org. Thelineoffire.org. And when you're there, just click on the digital library and search for Occupier.

And you can watch my full video lecture with PowerPoint as well. I think you'll find it really eye-opening. It's Israel. An evil occupier. Thank you for the questions.

866-34TRUTH. Let's go to Benjamin in Richmond, Virginia. Thanks so much for holding. Welcome to the line of fire.

Well, thank you, doctor Brown. Good to be with you. Thanks.

So My question is fairly easy. I actually have two for you. But the first one might be rather complex. I was reading a book called Mystery of the Ages that my father had recommended to me. And in that book, The writer who has spent a great portion of his life outlining some huge amounts of data that he has compiled on Christianity and its belief system.

seems to have some very, very firm understanding. of the war that occurs Yeah. Adam and Eve. The war with heaven.

Now, I wanted to know Are there any? Hebrew text. at all. that pertain to to that war in heaven. Where does this man get this information that has to do with the revolt of the angels?

And the number cast down and Satan establishing a throne on earth? Or are these things just myths? That would be my first question. My second one. It's just going to be very simple.

Which is Do you like God today? Uh ask me that again? Do you like God today? Is my second question? Did I like God?

Meaning, did I check off liking him on Facebook, or did I enjoy him and appreciate him? Did you enjoy and appreciate his presence in your life today? Oh, yes, but I'm quite sure. based on how wonderful and glorious he is. That over the course of the day, I will enjoy and appreciate His presence all the more.

But there's the constant companionship with the Lord, and yes, so it's not just serving Him. working for him, it's being a son and delighting in him, but he is so much more delightful. That I must spend more time with him and enjoy him and delight in him more.

So, thank you. Out of all my years of taking calls, that's the first time I've been asked that question. All right, so, in short answer, um There are no ancient Hebrew texts. you know, going back to biblical days or things like that. Outside of Isaiah 14 and Ezekiel 28.

that seemed to point to a satanic fall. Uh from heaven to earth. one under the guise of the king of Babylon and the other under the guise of the king of Tyre. But there's no other ancient text. There are texts that would be closer to New Testament times with all different types of speculation.

But Judaism does not talk as much about Satan, as much about a throne on earth or anything like that.

So some of this would just be myth that was developed. Give us strict to always do what's right. It's the line of fire with your host, Dr. Michael Brown, your voice of moral, cultural, and spiritual revolution. Here again is Dr.

Michael Brown. Thanks so much for joining us on this thoroughly Jewish Thursday. Hey, Benjamin, one more word. Just as far as Mystery of the Ages, Herbert W. Armstrong, you can safely ignore that in terms of his book and that data.

But if you want to find out a little bit more about the concept of the fall of Satan, again, in Jewish teaching, you're not going to find it in a major way in rabbinic literature. You'll find references to some of these things in apocryphal books.

So a really good little article. If you just type in jewishencyclopedia.com, one word, jewishencyclopedia.com and search for Satan, you'll get a very solid article about Satan in Jewish tradition, Satan in the Apocrypha, and things like that. That's Jewishencyclopedia.com. It's authoritative reference work from a little over 100 years ago, available free online. And just type in Satan.

Hey, thank you for the questions. 866-34TRUTH. We go to Domingo. in New York, welcome to the line of fire. Good afternoon, brother Michael.

Good afternoon. I need to clarify if it is Yeah. Archangel Michael is the same person as Jesus Christ. Thank you for your. Yes, no, Domingo, certainly not.

That is a false teaching associated with Jehovah's Witnesses. No, absolutely not. Michael, the Archangel Michael, is a created being. Jesus, the Son of God, is eternal. It was through the Son of God that Michael was created.

And we have texts, for example, in 1 Thessalonians chapter 4 that explicitly separate them That Jesus will be coming back for his people, and he will be coming along with Michael.

So, 1 Thessalonians, the fourth chapter, is quite explicit on that.

So, again, Michael is a highly exalted, created being. Jesus, the eternal Son. Is uncreated. 1 Thessalonians 4:16, for the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the archangel's voice and with the trumpet of God, and the dead and Messiah will rise first.

So he will come. There'll be the voice of Michael the archangel. There'll be the trumpet of God, but they will be accompanying and announcing Jesus the Messiah.

So, no, that is a false teaching associated with the Jehovah's Witnesses. The Archangel Michael is absolutely not the same as Jesus. 866-34-TRUTH. Let let me dispel one other Hebrew myth. And then I'm going to go right back to the phones.

There is And you have this with Greek as well, that because Hebrew was the language God used for the Old Testament with a few Aramaic verses and words, and Greek was the language of the New Testament. That these are so-called Holy Ghost languages, supernaturally inspired languages, languages with all types of different meanings. And it's almost like the sky is the limit when reading, oh, if you look into the Hebrew, you'll find it really says this, this, this, this, and this.

Now, look, Translating from one language to any other language is challenging. And there's not always a direct correspondence. And each language has its own beauty and its own riches and its own uniqueness. But Hebrew is a Canaanite dialect. In fact, in Isaiah 19, it's referred to in Hebrew as Sephat Kana'an, the Canaanite language.

It is a Canaanite dialect. It was not the language originally spoken by Abraham. It would have been something that he learned when he migrated to Canaan by the calling of the Lord. And Phoenician, for example, is a Canaanite dialect, and Moabite and Ammonite. These are all Canaanite dialects.

Aramaic is a sister Semitic language, but it's not a Canaanite dialect.

So Hebrew in that sense was not some supernatural language that has now all types of supernatural meanings. It's a language like any other language and should be studied like any other language. Insights we get are not into mystical meanings of words. The spiritual meaning we get is understanding what the words are actually saying because they convey wonderful spiritual truths. I hope that makes sense to you.

866-34-TRUTH. Let's go to Christian in New Jersey. Welcome to the line of fire.

Dr. Brown, thank you so much for taking my call. I have two questions for you. Let me start with the lesser one. Uh is there any uh Bible translated by Um by Jewish combat.

So uh Christian you know the Christianity Jewish Bible combining Old and New Testament together. you know, because I have a alterium Uh Enak, right now, is only the Old Testament. And that's by Jewish scholars who don't believe in Jesus. It's the best.

So that's my first question. That's my first question. Let me answer that first. Yeah, let me answer that first. Yeah, that's a great translation by Jewish scholars, but they don't believe in Jesus.

And we don't like to refer to ourselves as Jewish converts because we haven't converted from being Jews.

So we are Jewish followers of Jesus, Jewish believers in Jesus. But yes, there are translations. The most recent one, and I was involved with this as well, is called the Tree of Life Version. The Tree of Life version. It's a new translation of the whole Bible by a team of Messianic Jewish scholars who also work with Christian scholars, and it maintains Jewish sensitivities throughout.

I'd highly recommend that the Tree of Life version. Version of the Bible, and you'll find it a delightful read, and you'll find it has Jewish sensitivities throughout, and written in particular for the Messianic Jewish community and for the interested church world. The Tree of Life, and that's more than sufficient for that. All right, your second question. My second question is this.

Since we're hearing from Obama and the current Secretary of State, John Kerry, you know, they are sounding their warnings that should the embassy be moved to Tel Aviv that it's going to result to war.

So how are we supposed to know that Yeah. should any war break out, How are we supposed to know that they are not the ones that insinuated it? Yeah, that's a very fair question, sir. I mentioned earlier in the broadcast that certainly it will seem provocatory, but it's primarily going to be provocatory for those who do not want peace with Israel. And who will never recognize a Jewish Jerusalem?

I believe the best way to do this is to do the right thing. To say, hey, every nation has the right to choose its capital city. Jerusalem has been the eternal capital of the Jewish people, and therefore we affirm them and stand with them. It's basically saying to the Palestinians and others: if you want peace, you're going to have to negotiate in a way where Jerusalem is not your capital city because it's never been your capital city. If you want a state, we can give you a capital city elsewhere.

You say, will that bring an uprising? Look, there's uprising constantly. If not for tight Israeli security, there'd be thousands of terrorist attacks every single month. And there's constant provocation on the Palestinian side against Israel, the Palestinian leadership demonizing Israel and inciting violence against Israel in the media and other ways.

So we're not going to bow down to terrorists. Stand up, do what's right. God will bless Israel for it. God will bless America for it. And then we use wisdom to reach out peacefully to those who want peace.

Thank you, sir, for the questions. My bottom line today: let America make the move and bring the embassy back to Jerusalem. It's time. I'm about to speak with a professor who has studied the Gospels intensely and wants to talk about apparent contradictions in the Gospels. Uh It's time for the line of fire with your host, activist, author, international speaker, and theologian, Dr.

Michael Brown, your voice of moral, cultural, and spiritual revolution. Michael Brown is the director of the Coalition of Conscience and President of Fire School of Ministry. Get into the line of fire now by calling 866-34-TRUTH. That's 866-34-TRUTH. Here again is Dr.

Michael Brown. Shouts! And if you're leaving. Down in the tents of the righteous. Yes, yes, it is Thoroughly Jewish Thursday.

Welcome to the broadcast. Michael Brown here. Thank you, Paul Wilber, for leading us in shouts of joy. In a few minutes, I'm going to bring to the line of fire New Testament scholar Michael Lacona to talk about his brand new book, Why Are There Differences in the Gospels? It's going to be a fascinating discussion.

Also, later in the broadcast, I'm going to talk about some things happening in Israel today and dispel another Hebrew myth. Yeah, myth about the Hebrew Bible and some misconceptions folks have. Before we do that, I want to grab one call. Later in the broadcast, I'll take some more calls. If you have a Jewish-related question for me, 866-34TRUTH is the number to call.

866-3487-884. Let's go to John in Fort Mill, South Carolina. Welcome to the line of fire.

Yeah, good afternoon on the this uh summer's day, it feels like. Yeah, the question I had is Um if he is Yeshua, Wha why do we co-ask Christians? Why do we Call him Jesus. Ah For the same reason we call you John. And yeah, rather than Johanan, and the same reason we call me Michael, rather than Nikh Saele.

It's because we're speaking English, and that's how we pronounce his name in English. But here's the logic behind it, John. The New Testament was written in Greek. And when the New Testament writers wrote the name of Jesus, they didn't say Yeshua. They said yesus, because that's the way it would come out in Greek.

In fact, Greek has no shush sound.

So you don't say Yeshua, it's Yesus, just like we say Saul of Tarsus, right? That's through the Greek. In Hebrew, his name would have been Shaul.

So we recognize the biggest thing is that his name is understood. By the people being communicated with, And that it's syllables and sounds that are familiar to them. But that being said, it's important that everyone understands that Jesus is Yeshua. In other words, that he is a Jew, that he was called rabbi, not reverend, that he's the savior of the world because he's the Messiah of Israel.

So I will often refer to him as Yeshua to remind people of that. But let's say I'm talking to a Jewish person on the street, right?

Okay. And I say, you know, do you believe Yeshua is the Messiah? They have no idea who I'm talking about. Who's Yeshua? I say, do you believe Jesus is the Messiah?

Oh, no, we don't believe.

So, in other words, that's how he's known. I wrote a five-volume series called Answering Jewish Objections to Jesus, and someone said, Why didn't you call it answering Jewish objections to Yeshua? I said, Because they don't have objections to Yeshua. They don't know who that is. We need to explain that Jesus is Yeshua.

But we speak English, and again, just like we talk about Moses rather than Moshe. Just like we talk about Isaiah rather than Yeshayahu, just like we talk about Ezekiel rather than Yechezkel, just like we talk about. You know, on and on it goes. We don't use the original Hebrew names for any of these others.

So, the same way. with Jesus. It's just really good though. to to make everyone understand that this Jesus is Yeshua. He is the Messiah.

And uh he is Jewish through and through. He is the lion of the tribe of Judah, the root and offspring of Jesse. Hey, thank you for the question, John. Much appreciate it. You can get a little more data by going to thelineoffire.org.

Click on the digital library and type in Yeshua. And you'll find some articles or teachings about that. That's thelineoffire.org. All right. And you just click on the digital library and search for Yeshua.

God bless you. Right back with Mike Lakona. It's the line of fire with your host, Dr. Michael Brown, your voice of moral, cultural, and spiritual revolution. Here again is Dr.

Michael Brown. I'm about to have a fascinating discussion with Michael Lacona, Associate Professor of Theology at Houston Baptist University, author of the new book, Why Are There Differences in the Gospels? What can we learn from ancient biography? And I know it's thoroughly Jewish Thursday, but is there anything more Jewish than the Gospels? Significantly, this book is published by Oxford University Press, one of the leading scholarly publishers in the world, indicating that this is not simply a fundamentalist, close-minded, narrow-thinking defense of the Gospels.

This is something that academics who may not even be Christian look at and say, ah, a fascinating argument here.

So we're going to flesh this out, open it up for you today on the broadcast. Michael, welcome back to the line of fire. Great to have you on. Thank you, Dr. Brown.

Appreciate it. Yes, sir. So what's the difference between this and your major doctoral work? Maybe you could introduce that first, what you did in your doctoral work, the meaning of historiography, and then how this book comes out of that.

Well, in my doctoral research and book that resulted, I focused on approaching the question of whether Jesus rose from the dead from a historical viewpoint. I took the data, looked at the data, looked at those data that virtually all historians agree upon are certain facts such as Jesus' death by crucifixion that shortly after his disciples Had experiences that they believed were appearances of the risen Jesus, that these occurred in individual and in group settings. and that at least One skeptic named Paul, who was a persecutor of the church, Had a similar experience that convinced them Jesus had been raised from the dead and had appeared to him. and has radically transformed his life to become one of the most Uh beauty. Aggressive, I guess you could say, believers in spreading the gospel around at that time.

So you take those and you subject or you formulate hypotheses. And to explain those facts, and then you subject those to a strictly controlled historical method. You try as best as you can to bracket your. Personal biases, your desired outcome while your investigation proceeds. In other words, You're taking these hypotheses.

and you're subjecting them to strictly controlled historical method To see Thank you. does The resurrection hypothesis stands up to critical scrutiny. Which hypothesis comes out best? And when you do that, Using the Tools that are standard of professional historians, you find out. that the resurrection hypothesis is far better than any other competing hypotheses.

So That was my case for the resurrection of Jesus, my research on that. It was not pages. A little over seven hundred. Got it. All right.

So you work through it carefully. And again, even though you write as a believer, and ultimately it's your faith in the resurrected Son of God, his reality in your life that is your bedrock even more than the scholarship. You did your best to really try to sift it through and say, okay, are there other answers? You know, if we are people of faith, we have to be willing to ask hard questions. and look at the challenges.

And obviously there are a lot of people that reject this, but in your view, when you went through all the different hypotheses, there there's only one that really really answered the and lived up to the evidence. That's correct. That's a correct assessment. And I was one because we all have our idiosyncrasies. One of my is that I just question everything.

And it's not just my faith, it's I mean it's everything. Everything. My my wife hates going shopping with me for that purpose.

Sometimes it's just hard for me to make a decision.

So Something is important. Yeah. Uh you know, and Christianity And when we're talking about eternity, I mean, this is something that I have second guess, triple guess, quadruple guess. It's the stuff that keeps me awake at night. And so I was willing to give up my faith.

And those who knew me best during that time, there was a handful of people that I was open with, and I was totally willing. to give up my Christian faith if the evidence pointed away from the resurrection of Jesus. Yeah, and that's significant. I went through a situation as a believer for a few years where I was so challenged by Jewish objections. And wanted to be faithful to God and a loyal Jew, that I wrestled through that on my face before God.

If following you and being faithful means denying Jesus as the Messiah, I'm going to do it because I must have you and I must be faithful to you as a Jew. And of course, it was in that and through that that God only more deeply confirmed his truth. When we look at now the issue, not of the resurrection, But of contradictions in the Gospels. I've been told, for example, if you went to a class taught by Professor Bart Ehrman, who we've both debated on different subjects, and you went to his class, maybe it was a New Testament class, that large undergraduate class that he's teaching, that Within a few days, he undermined the faith of a lot of the Christian students there by just pointing out the apparent contradictions in the Gospels and the pronounced differences and basically saying you can't reconcile these. They're full of contradictions.

That's something that you've plunged into now with your new book, Why Are There Differences in the Gospels?

So first, play the devil's advocate. Give us a summary of the problems in the Gospels if we just want to say, hey, these are all inspired by God and they're infallible and errant, no contradictions. What obstacles do we encounter?

Well, after I debated Ehrman, or when I did both of the times that we debated on the resurrection publicly, he brought up five major objections to the Gospels. And so as a response, I looked at those and put together a lecture titled The ABC the ease and ease of defending the gospel. And it addresses all five of those.

So A is the authorship. Ehrman will say we have no idea who wrote the Gospels, they're anonymous. B, for bias. The authors are biased. In fact, they have.

They they have agendas behind their writings, so we shouldn't trust them on that. see contradictions. The Gospels contradict one another more than they agree. And so we're looking for multiple independent sources that agree with one another rather than disagreeing with them. The dating of the Gospels.

They're written 35 to 65 years after the event they purport to describe, and this is just far too long. and E they're not based on eyewitness testimony. That it's kind of like the game of telephone: that you had someone who knew the story, you passed it to someone else, you passed it to someone else. And after going through this endless kind of chain of oral tradition, people pass along to another thirty-five years later, your first person, Mark, who we have no idea was again. He puts these stories down.

And then Matthew did a few years later, and then Luke and then John, and you can see how the story has evolved.

So, those are the basic objections that. Ermin and many others bring up to the Gospels. And you're a scholar, you've looked at the evidence meticulously. There are obviously new problems that present themselves to scholars that others might not be confronted with. But just your average person reading the Bible, and maybe they have the mentality: God said it, I believe it, that settles it.

And suddenly they're confronted with what look like contradictions. Maybe they just never noticed them. Like, well, the resurrection accounts, what happened first, or how many times did Jesus cleanse the temple? I thought it was here, or why does Mark say it here, or Matthew say it there? That can be very troubling to someone's faith, can't it?

It sure can and many have left the state because of that. And in fact, in Bart in Bart's class, I mean, look, I I like Bart Erman. You know, he's We're not close friends, but I consider him to be a friend. We get along pretty well. But most of the people who are attending his classes at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, are Like his New Testament introduction class, where he's shaking their faith.

They're freshmen, they haven't developed. Any kind of method for critical thinking at that point, for the most part. And you know, they go in, and a handful of Christians, a dozen or so in his class of 400 or more people for his New Testament intro, first of all, they're outnumbered significantly, and then he's up there. Famous barterman talking about these things, and they don't know anything else because they've never been encountered. with these objections to the Gospels.

He totally gets them off balance. And before you know it, some of them are just giving up their faith.

So, in short, we've just got a minute before the break and then we'll dig into your new book, Why Are There Differences in the Gospels. In short, what would you say to these students if you only had a couple of minutes with them, but they know that you're a scholar? What would you say to them? Yeah. They watched my video, the ABC's D's and D's of defending the gospels.

because it addresses those. These are easily answered And then also let's discuss this thing about contradictions in the Gospels. But if I could give just one answer, I would say Look, if Jesus rose from the dead, Christianity is true, even if it were to be the case that some things in the Bible aren't.

So we need to focus on the resurrection, and guess what? We can show that Jesus rose from the dead. aside from assuming the inspiration or inerrancy of the Bible. And and you would do that As a momentary relief valve, because ultimately it's through the scripture that we know about Jesus, and if we undermine the reliability of scripture, we undermine everything. But you would try to use that as somewhat of a relief valve.

To say, hey, we're certain Jesus rose from the dead. We can work out. These other questions, fear not. All right, we'll be right back with Mike Lacona. A new book, a serious academic work.

You're a serious student of scripture. studying in seminary, Bible college, or pastor, you want to check this out. Why are there differences in the gospels? What we can learn from ancient biography. Oh God of burning, cleansing flame.

See And the fire. It's the line of fire with your host, Dr. Michael Brown. Get into the line of fire now by calling 866-34 TRUTH. Here again is Dr.

Michael Brown. Thanks, friends, for joining us today on Thurley Jewish Thursday. We're taking a break from our specific Jewish focus to look at a very Jewish subject as well: the Gospels. And my guest, Michael Lacona, a respected New Testament scholar, his new book published by Oxford University Press, Why Are There Differences in the Gospels? What Could We Learn from Ancient Biography?

So Mike, your new book is basically saying there is a reason for the way the Gospels are written, or they're parallels to other ancient literary forms. What's the primary new argument you've advanced here? Yes.

Well, the in a nutshell, it is that ancient authors who wrote histories and biographies employed various compositional devices that were standard for the day and that these often resulted in differences in the manner the stories were reported. The majority of New Testament scholars now hold and even evangelicals now hold that the Gospels are either ancient biographies of Jesus or that they share much in common with the genre of ancient biography.

So we should not be surprised that the Gospel authors employed the same compositional devices as other biographers of their day. In fact, we should be surprised if they don't. And when you go to the Gospels and you read them in light of their biographical genre, and the compositional devices that were part and parcel of that genre. Then Um the differences just melt away in in In almost all of the cases, it's really interesting. For me, it's like I remember when I was a a little kid for Christmas one year, I got these.

These books, they weren't coloring books, but you opened them up and they had all these lines in them, and it just didn't look like anything but scribbling. And it came with these two pair of cardboard glasses. And one pair of glasses had red lenses, the other had blue lenses. And you put the blue lenses on, and it's like, well, it's just all scribbling. You put the red lenses on, and whoa, the picture is crystal clear and it jumps out at you.

You can see exactly what it is.

Well, reading the Gospels, in view of their biographical genre, does the same thing. It all of a sudden, the differences just melt away, and things that you wouldn't see before. Like the deity of Christ and the Gospel of Mark, they just become crystal clear. All right, so let's unpack that. Let's just take a nugget out of your book and show what happens when you put on the glasses of ancient biography.

And by the way, I remember Professor Craig Keener, another top New Testament scholar, he was On my radio show, and talking about when he was talking to a professor Duke, and the professor was downing the idea that the gospels were biographical or anything like that. And Craig had been doing a lot of reading in the classics and began to ask him what he knew about ancient biographies. And the answer was nothing. The professor had never studied that.

So you're saying, put it in the right literary genre. It's like when you're reading the sports page, it's different than when you're reading the stock market pages, and that's different than reading an op-ed, which is then different than reading front-page news, etc.

So getting the genre right is very important.

So give us a nugget of comparison here. Wow, there's so many of them. How about um Uh Jesus healing to Iris's daughter, raising her from the dead.

So, when we read this story in Mark, I believe it's Mark. You've got Uh cheese um Gyrus. Comes to Jesus and says, Please heal my daughter. She is about to die. And so they head, Jesus says, Okay, they start heading toward his house.

and a woman with hemorrhaging problems comes and she touches his robe, he heals her, and then they start to go toward his house again. And some servants come out and say, don't trouble Jesus anymore. Your daughter has just died. And Jesus says, Don't worry about it, just have faith. And He goes to the house and He raises her from the dead.

When we read the same story in Matthew, Jairus comes to Jesus and says, Lord My daughter has just died. Please come and heal her. And Jesus says, all right, let's go. And then the woman touches him with the hemorrhaging problems, and then they go to Jesus' house. The servants don't come out because she was already dead.

in Matthew's account when he came to her. And what Matthew is doing there is he's just simplifying the story As he does elsewhere, many times elsewhere in his gospel, he simplifies the story, he compresses the account. and eliminates the detail just by simplifying.

So that's one account of what's going on. And this happens many times throughout not only the Gospels. but also throughout other ancient literature. And what I show in my book is that Plutarch. A prominent biographer who wrote around the same time as the Gospels, much of what we know from the ancient world comes from Plutarch.

when you compare how he tells the same story And uh and two or more of biographies of figures Cool. participated at the same events and knew one another. Then we find the same sort of differences. And you see Plutarch making these same kind of moves like simplification. compression, displacement, transfer, all these kinds of things.

So that in the mind of a 21st century reader who has certain canons of truth and accuracy, they see these as contradictions, inaccuracies, lack of inspiration, proof that one author or both got it wrong, but they clearly can't both be right. And you're saying they were writing in the first century. These were standard literary techniques. And do they ultimately tell the same story? The answer is, yes, they do.

That's correct. We have to judge them according to the standards that were in practice during their day. rather than imparting our ideas of modern precision upon them. Because we are not to think It'd be implausible to think that Maggie, Mark, Luke and John formed this committee for the misleading of future historians. They were trained writers, and they are just doing the kinds of things that they were taught to do.

When writing ancient, when writing history or writing a biography of that period. And then if you step back. and say, are they giving us the overall same story? The answer is yeah. Account after account after account.

Here and there, we might wonder about chronology or things like that, but obviously, when you see what was done, how it was done, put it in its day, then you see, okay. These are the things where there were variances and variations, and other things this was accurate or not accurate, reliable or unreliable. And then you come to that same conclusion. When judged through the proper lens, they come out as solid historical writers giving us a wonderful theological life of Jesus. That's correct.

And we do that today. We do it today in our everyday conversations, We do it today when we professors do it today when they lecture, pastors do it when they preach from the pulpit, movie writers do it. I mean, in this recent movie, what was it about this guy in World War Two? uh this medic who is a hero. Oh, yeah, I didn't see it.

Ha Hacksaw Ridge. Packsaw Ridge.

Well, the actual story of that You know, he was able to be discharged from the draft and avoid it. because he was a conscientious objector. But he said, No, I want to come in. Let me come in. And I'll come in as a medic.

And so they let him in.

Now the movie portrays it a little bit differently. But the gist Um I yeah he wasn't trying to avoid the draft. Or anything like that, but just as the same. And we can point to other movies that do the same thing. Yeah, I like the way we close, going from Plutarch to modern movies to make sure we catch everyone.

Hey, Mike, congratulations on Oxford University Press publishing this. May it bring truth to a whole generation. God bless you for your labors. Thank you, Michael. Appreciate it.

All right. It's the line of fire with your host, activist, author, international speaker, and theologian Dr. Michael Brown. Your voice of moral, cultural, and spiritual revolution. Get into the line of fire now by calling 866-34TRUTH.

Here again is Dr. Michael Brown. Hmm. Oh. Welcome, welcome to Thoroughly Jewish Thursday on the line of fire.

This is Michael Brown. Delighted to be with you, 866-348-7884. That's 866-348-7474-7474-4. Four. Truth.

If you've got a Jewish-related question, give me a call. Hebrew question, Judaism question, specific question about the Messiahship of Jesus or Jewish background to the New Testament, modern Israel question. By all means, give us a call. 866-348-7884. I am going to dispel a Hebrew myth.

It is a complete myth. It has no relationship to truth. This came out in an email question I was asked a few days ago, and I thought, you know, I'm going to address this again on Thoroughly Jewish Thursday. And I want to take your calls as well. First though, I think it's significant to mention.

I haven't mentioned it yet this week. That after the deadly terror attack in East Jerusalem a few days back, when a Palestinian terrorist plowed into a group of Israeli soldiers and others. Killing three women aged 20, 20, and 22, and a young man aged 20, the three women being soldiers. The terrorist driving back and forth with the truck to do his best to crush those under the truck, 15 others injured before he was shot and killed. The UN Security Council did condemn the truck ramming attack.

It's it's rare that Well, relatively rare that they're going to be on that side of condemning terrorism. But. They Said the members of the Security Council reaffirmed that terrorism in all its forms and manifestations constitutes one of the most serious threats to international peace and security.

So I think it's important just to mention that again: 866-348-7884. And yes, there are ongoing reports that President-elect Trump will forge ahead with the Jerusalem embassy move. Uh U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry. Said last week as the Jerusalem Post reminds us that relocating the embassy would cause, quote, an explosion.

An absolute explosion, not just in Israel, but throughout. the region. Israel is aware of the security issues. I'm sure Donald Trump and his team are aware of the security issues, but I say it again: you cannot. You cannot.

act based on what terrorists say they will do. Or terror loving nations say they will do. Then you are a slave to terrorism. You are then bowing down to those who will not have peace with a Jewish state and who will not recognize a sovereign Jewish Jerusalem. And listen, friends, as long as Jerusalem is divided.

As long as there are Palestinians staking their claim, we want Jerusalem as our capital, even though it's never been the capital of anything Arab or Palestinian other than the capital of Israel and the eternal capital of the Jewish people. When you have those still advocating for that, Divided Jerusalem, that is a guaranteed way that you will not see lasting peace. All it means is conflict next to conflict. That's all it means. It means shoulder to shoulder, conflict joined with conflict.

Rather than saying, This is the way it's going to be with a Jewish Jerusalem, the capital of a Jewish state. And either there's going to be one state and it will remain Jewish as long as there's a Jewish majority, and the Palestinian Arabs vote and have equal rights with everyone. And let's see how the state develops. Or you have a Jewish state and a Palestinian state, and the Jewish state has its capital in Jerusalem, and the Palestinian state has its capital somewhere else. We come back.

I'm going to go to your calls: 866-348-7884. You're going to dispel a Hebrew myth right here on the line of five. Change the world. It's the line of fire with your host, Dr. Michael Brown.

Get into the line of fire now by calling 866-34 Truth. Here again is Dr. Michael Brown. Hey, just a quick reminder on this Thurly Jewish Thursday. When you become a torchbearer this month, when you join our support team, put aside a dollar a day or more, $30 or more per month to join our support team.

Not only do we pour into you every month with new messages and resources that you have access to that others don't have to pay for, discounts in our online bookstore and other benefits, which will only grow in the days ahead. But this month, you get a free copy of our new book, Breaking the stronghold of food it's getting wonderful reviews online we're super blessed by the reports breaking the stronghold of food one reader said when she finished the book she'd already lost 10 pounds not by reading but by acting on what she read another woman posted for the first time now she has hope that she can eat healthily and overcome her diabetes otherwise she resigned her fact herself to the fact she was going to die young and leave her four kids behind this is the kind of impact the book's happening having it's yours free yours free when you become a torch bearer this month and also i recorded a dvd 25 or 30 minutes of teaching on video not available on youtube not available for purchase on our site but our gift to you to complement the book breaking the stronghold of food when you become a torchbearer monthly supporter this month go to thelineoffire.org click on donate and then click on monthly support read all the benefits that come your way as a torchbearer and to me the greatest benefit is we share together and advancing This gospel and taking the message of salvation to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. All right, before I debunk a Hebrew myth that is circulating these days, let's go to the phones. Jason in Miami, welcome to the line of fire. Hi, Dr.

Brown. Thank you so much for taking my call, and Happy New Year to you and your industry team.

Well, thank you, sir. Yesterday, I got a question on Leviticus chapter twelve about the purification after childbirth. Mm-hmm. And it kind of relates to Joseph and Mary and the sin offering after Jesus was born.

So I guess it's built two-part. One is Why is there a sin offering for a child? Is that is that does that mean having a child is is sinful? I'm sure that's not the case. question on why there's a stand offering and second The purification, if you have a female child, is double that of a male.

Um I heard a response from a Christian apologist saying that Um purification process is not considered somehow how discriminatory, but ra it's the opposite. It's because of the holiness That's Life process these containing the it's considered That you are to abstain from holy things because you've just experienced God's holiness through. the whole life-giving birth. And I was wondering if that explanation is Mm-hmm. Is what the Jewish uh people believe okay Yeah.

Okay, great questions. I appreciate them. Let's unpack them one after the other. The first question, a woman becomes pregnant, gives birth to a son. She's ceremonily unclean for seven days.

Just as she is unclean during her monthly period, on the eighth day, the boy is to be circumcised. Then the woman must wait 33 days to be purified from her bleeding. She must not touch anything sacred, go to the sanctuary.

So why is there this purification period? Why is there a sin offering? Has she sinned by having a child? Obviously, she hasn't sinned by having a child. Children are a gift from the Lord and a heritage from the Lord.

But any type of genital discharge could be something that could cause uncleanness or certain types of genital discharge.

So just as a woman was unclean during her monthly period because of the genital discharge of blood, here with everything involved with having a baby with blood and other related genital discharges, it would make her unclean, rich. Unclean. If a man had a genital discharge in the middle of the night, something like that, and released semen in the middle of the night, or even had relations with his wife, he would have to bathe and be ritually purified.

So it was not sin. This was, you know, for a man to be with his wife was not sin, and yet there would be ritual purification involved.

So it does, though, in that sense, make things sacred in that this is not just a mundane everyday thing in that respect and therefore to be treated with more care and concern. The sin offering though does not have to do with guilt. The sin offering has to do with purification. Atonement can also mean cleansing. The emphasis can be on expiation of sin or the emphasis can be on cleansing, removal of uncleanness.

And that's the case here. It's a purification offering. It is for the cleansing of uncleanness as opposed to the removing of sin as if she has somehow sinned. And that's part of the aspect of sin offerings. If you look, that is part of their meaning sometimes to be purification offerings as opposed to, for example, if you went out and committed a crime, you wouldn't then offer a sin offering.

There would be repentance and then perhaps a guilt offering in certain situations, but not a sin offering. As to the difference in in uh time frames um There there's debate as to exactly why there are other parallels in the ancient world where purification was longer for a female than for a male, but exactly why the text doesn't really tell us. And we have no idea of knowing what ancient Israelites believed about it because there's no ancient record that's been preserved.

So, you know, you have later traditions will speculate on those things, but that's all they're doing. They're looking back and they're speculating. We don't know in detail why the differences were there. But again, if you look at things in a protective way. as the apologist was doing rather in a discriminatory way.

In other words, that the woman, according to 1 Peter 3, is the weaker vessel. The man does not have to deal with all the traumas of carrying a baby and giving birth to a baby and then nursing a baby. The man doesn't have to deal with a monthly cycle. The man is normally, especially in the ancient world, not the one that's getting up in the middle of the night and caring for the baby and so on.

So the man then has the role of being a protector. and a provider. And in that way, a a a Jewish woman in traditional Judaism does not feel discriminated against, she feels protected and provided for by her husband. And I think that would have been the concept here in ancient Israel as well.

Okay, thank you, Dutch. Brown, I'm sorry if I got a little too detailed for the audience. I didn't intend it to. Oh, no. No, I'm I'm the one that gave the long answer.

So it's it's we're just asking what Scripture says, and it's it's a fair question. It's a valid question.

So I appreciate it. Yeah, and and one of these days, I just need to to refresh my memory. Or study for the first time some of the aspects on why in Jewish tradition there was a difference in the purification period, why it was longer for women than for men. Just not necessarily what ancient Jews believed in Moses' day or ancient Israelites, but rather what Jewish tradition has to say about it. Hey, thank you for the call.

I appreciate it. 866-34TRUTH. All right. Here's an email that was sent to our website to askdrbrown.org. A question was sent.

And it said this, at this website, Aleph Tav scriptures.

So Aleph is the first letter of the Hebrew alphabet and Tav is the last.

So it would be like A to Z, or in Greek, alpha omega. Aleph Tav scriptures. At this website, they talk about the Aleph and the Tav.

Now I know that when they are placed together they are never translated, but in the Septuagint, so the ancient Greek translation, they are translated as the Alpha and the Omega, that is Jesus Christ, of course. And they say the following. List a total of 7,339 Aleph Top symbols and an additional 2,251 Vav Aleph Top symbols used in the Old Testament, which total 9,590. Do they always speak about Jesus Christ or is this a stretch?

Now, first, you say, I have no idea what they're talking about. I'll explain that. But, second, it's not a stretch, it's nonsense. This, and I'm looking at the website now, and I don't mean to insult anyone, but the idea that they're Is a secret meaning here, and that there are Um Every time you have these letters together, Aleph, Taf, which are direct object markers. meaning you have this word et in Hebrew.

What does it mean? It has no meaning. It is a direct object marker. You have similar things in other Semitic languages. Meaning if the word coming after the verb is With the direct object, the, then you put this before it.

So in the beginning, God created at. the heavens and at the earth. You say, what does at mean? Nothing. In Aramaic you say yacht.

What does the yacht mean? Nothing. It is simply a marker telling you that the next word has the direct object and it is a way that has been developed grammatically. You say, why? Every language develops certain ways, okay?

And this is simply the development. Others say, no, no, no. Aleph, Taf, that's like alpha and omega. This is about Jesus. And this study Bible is going to show you Jesus in all these verses.

Forget about it. It's not true. It is not true. It's a myth. It's a myth.

Based on unfamiliarity with the Hebrew language, it is a myth. Gains the world O God of burning, cleansing flame. And the fire. It's the line of fire with your host, Dr. Michael Brown, your voice of moral, cultural, and spiritual revolution.

Here again is Dr. Michael Brown. Thanks so much for joining us on Thoroughly Jewish Thursday. This direct object marker. Et, aleph, tof in Hebrew.

Aramaic equivalent is yud tof. All right, and again, yacht et what do they mean? They are simply markers.

So, if it's a direct object, you have the, or you have a proper name, you generally speaking will have this marker there in front of it, but. People who didn't understand Hebrew properly or are trying to read things into the Hebrew Bible that are not there come up with all these theories.

So I'm looking at the olive tofscriptures.com. There are many examples of the aleftaf symbol being placed where it pertains to the importance of subject matter regarding covenant relationship with the Yahed. That's how they refer to the Godhead. Regarding people, persons, places, or things, and even rendering judgments concerning curses or blessings. For example, in the life of Jacob and Esau in Genesis 25, 28, both Jacob and Esau have aleftof symbols in front of their names in the beginning of their life together.

But the last time we see the aleftof symbol used in front of Esau's name is Genesis 27, 1. On that day, Isaac calls to Esau to ask him to hunt him some savory meat so that he, Isaac, may bless Esau. Even though Esau's name is used in those 78 times in the Torah, the Aleftov symbol continues to be only in front of Jacob's name and not Esau's, because the covenant blessing of the birthright given to the Jesus Christ, by Messiah was removed from him. Listen, I I appreciate Uh uh in all seriousness I appreciate someone digging into the Bible. And looking for things and trying to understand every single word, every single reference.

I appreciate that. I think that's significant. I'm glad that people dig and do all of this. But There. The idea That this is some secret code that now you're going to read something into it.

It's just not the way the language works. It would be just like you took a transcription of the radio show, transcribed everything I said, then tried to count every third word and the second letter and the third word and tried to spell something that if it ended up spelling, it would be pure and utter coincidence, and certainly it wouldn't work in any kind of verifiable pattern.

So, you know, I'm looking, for example. At the name Esau, as we keep going through the rest of Scripture. And remember, you would have at. This olive top, the first letter and the last letter of the Hebrew alphabet, this direct object marker. You would have this in cases where.

Uh Where the uh there's a verb and then after that verb You are now introducing the direct object, the heavens, the earth, the Jacob, Esau, somebody's name.

So when I'm looking at these other references to Esau, remember we're told that the direct object marker never occurs in front of his name.

Well, the question is, should it? In other words, is there a grammatical example where the grammar would require it? And the answer is no. I mean, I'm just looking at the Hebrew scriptures now and lists, and there are no cases where it would require it. It's not some mystical meaning.

It's like me saying, hey, hey, listen, I noticed on the broadcast that Dr. Brown referred to himself as Mike three times, and then one time he referred to himself as Dr. Brown. So let's look for this. It's no significance.

I'm just referencing people talking to me and some people know me as Mike and some people know me as Dr. Brown. There's nothing to it. It is frustrating for me. As someone who has studied these things for decades, to see people being misled by this type of false information, you don't even want to call it pseudo-scholarship because it's not scholarship.

I don't mean to demean those involved with it or to say that they're not serious. I simply will say it is something to be Avoid it.

something to be avoided. Anything, friends, that takes you away from the Bible means what it says and says what it means is something you do not want to follow. You say, but aren't there deeper meanings? Yeah, deeper meanings to fully understand what is being clearly communicated, not deeper meanings hidden in ways that are contrary to the written text. There is a reason.

Here, watch this. Are you ready? Watch this. I am going to look at Genesis chapter 1, verse 1.

Okay?

We're going to do this together. Genesis 1:1. And if we understand it in accordance with a traditional Christian reading, in the beginning, Here's the literal. Create it, God. You have the verb first, then the subject.

So in the beginning, God created at. There's our direct object marker. The heavens and at The earth, all right? How is it translated in the The Greek. In the beginning, God made the heavens and the earth.

Is there a special translation of the word et? No. Why not? Because You don't use it in Greek.

Now we look at the Aramaic. and I'm looking at the Aramaic Bakad mean bara danai yat shemai vi yat rah. in the beginning. Yahweh created Yacht? Heavens and yacht, the earth.

What's yacht? It's the equivalent of et. You don't translate it, it is the direct object marker. That's why when I look at all of the other translations and Aramaic is technically in the beginning times just to be technical there but I look at every other English translation on my software in front of me Jewish and Christian and none of them translate et into English or find any significance why because it has none Yeah.

So stay away from these kind of websites. Or from websites, there's this mechanical Bible one that's going to show you that every Hebrew letter is actually a pictograph and has a pictographic meaning, or that if you go through the names and the genealogies, they preach the gospel. Forget it, forget it, it's not true. It's not true. I'm telling you.

I don't mean to pull rank, but it takes a while to earn a PhD in Semitic languages, all right? And just like I know almost nothing about being a medical doctor, and when a medical doctor tells me about a particular condition that he's a specialist in, and he's written three volumes on, and he's known as the authority in this, and I don't even know one millionth of what he knows on the subject. I'm not going to lecture him. But this website says, you know, regular as a website.

So. Here. Take out your English Bibles. and read them and feel confident that what you're reading. Is a good solid rendition of the Hebrew into Greek.

And when they're controversial verses or verses that could be translated a number of different ways, read them in a bunch of different translations, and that will really help you. And then, if you don't own Logos Bible Software, which is the largest biblical software or the most wide-ranging biblical software available, go to our website, thelineofire.org. You'll see where you can order the introductory packages at a 15% discount. If you already have Logos, use our code there just the same because they give us 15% as a gift to our ministry of everything that's ordered using that code. And then when you're reading the words, you just scroll over the English, and you'll find here's the Hebrew, here's the Greek, and you can look at the top dictionaries, and you'll see all this internet stuff is just nonsense.

Thank God for good sites, but if you can't tell one from the other. If it's not written in 10 different English translations, forget about it. My bottom line today, the Word of God is wonderfully true, wonderfully clear, and if we'll seek the ultimate author of Scripture, he'll reveal his truth to us.