The Trinity in the Old Testament?

The following program is recorded content created by the Truth Network. Is it true that we can find God's triunity right within the pages of the Hebrew Bible, the Old Testament? That's 866-34-TRUTH.

Here again is Dr. Michael Brown. We're going to dig into the Word today. We're going to have a great time opening the Hebrew Scriptures together, and I'm going to take you Jewish-related calls and catch up with some Jewish-related, Israel-related world news. 866-34-TRUTH. Any Jewish-related question of any kind, 866-34-8-7-8-8-4.

Before we open up the Scriptures and dig into a very interesting and important subject, I just want to express my grief about something. So, my team just sent me a link to our YouTube video where I recently was commenting on what Paul meant in Romans 11 26, all Israel shall be saved, a question that I'm asked perpetually, and a question that is always in discussion among students of the Word. So, later in the show, I might interact with some of the comments to the video. So, I say, hey, just send me the link so I have it. So, they sent it to me. So, I just pulled it up right before the show started, literally seconds before, and there's an ad playing. And when I look up on the ad, which I froze on the screen, it's two men kissing. I don't know what the ad is for. This is on my YouTube channel.

Whatever is being advertised, there are two men kissing, and it's on our YouTube channel. That's profane. That's ugly.

That's inappropriate. It ought not to be. I'm not sure how to protest what ads appear. But listen, I've made it plain that when we put out the video, Can You Be Gay and Christian, it was not my intent for that to air on gay and transgender YouTube channels.

It ended up happening because of words in it, et cetera, or ad words. That was not my intent. In other words, that's their place. And if they post things on YouTube within Community Guidelines, that's their business. I'm not trying to intrude there.

In the same way, there should be some method where things that are 100% contrary to the values that you hold to can't occur as ads on your YouTube channel. In any case, whoever these two men are, may the Lord save them. May He bring them under conviction. May He bring them to Himself. May He bring them into new life.

866-34-TRUTH. Who is God according to the Hebrew Scriptures? Is this the same God as the one presented in the New Testament writings? Or do the New Testament authors follow a new God? Do they make a man into a God or God into a man? Do they make one God into three Gods?

How should we sort this out? Let me say with categorical clarity, there is one God and one God only. That is a truth for which I will die. There is one God and one God only. One eternal Creator of the universe. There are not competing Gods, multiple Gods. There is one God and one God only. The question is, who is this God? What is the makeup of this God? Is He complex in His unity? What Christians later referred to as Trinity, God's triunity, three persons in the Godhead, and that word person being used in a philosophical sense.

What exactly does that mean? What I want to do today is delve into the Hebrew Bible and see, okay, that was the Bible of the early followers of Jesus. It was only some years later that some of the letters of Paul began to be written and some years later that the Gospels began to be written. So things were being passed on by oral tradition immediately and there may have been little writings here and there that were circulated, but otherwise things passed on by oral tradition, as was the custom in the ancient world, and then things written down mainly in a retrospective way. So the Gospels either written by eyewitnesses or those who had access to eyewitnesses, and then the letters written by the apostles and key leaders in the early church.

We understand that. But the Bible that they had was the Hebrew Bible. So when they're talking about the truths of the nature of God and the truths of the deity of the Messiah, their text was the Hebrew Bible.

Now obviously in the context of a radio broadcast, I can't be comprehensive. I can't go into massive depth on each scripture. I can't give you a full apologetic response to all rabbinic objections to what I'm going to say. But I can give you a clear and powerful overview of this one God who is complex.

It is unity. So let's start in Genesis chapter 1 verse 26. Genesis 1 26. And the verse is well known, naseh adam b'tsalmenu kidmutenu.

So literally, let us make man in our image according to our likeness. Now I put on the screen for you the Sefaria website, S-E-F-A-R-I-A dot org. Tens of thousands of dollars worth of books, all there free online in Hebrew, Aramaic, and in many cases English translation. So if you have that, you go to that website. If you're on your cell phone, you click on the verse itself, in actual the writing of the verse. If you're looking on your desktop, you click on the number of the verse and that will get you over to the commentaries. So let's see what Rashi, foremost rabbinic commentator, let's see what he has to say. And he's explaining we will make man.

Why does it say we? And he explains the meekness of the Holy One, blessed be he, they, meaning the rabbis learn from here, because the man is in the likeness of the angels and they might envy him, therefore he took counsel with them. So Rashi goes on with his comments, but what he's basically saying is that the reason it says let us make man is that he did it taking counsel of the angels because man's created in God's image and the angels are likewise created in God's image, but because man is going to be more exalted so the angels wouldn't be having this in his meekness. Modeling that for us is naseh adam b'tzolmeinu kibbutenu, let us make man. Because many Christians read that and say, well, that must be Trinity.

Let's see what Ovadios Forno, he lives about 400 years after Rashi. Let's see what he says about the meaning of this. Why does it say let us make man? And he says at this point God endowed his entourage to carry out the task assigned to it so that he creates together with the angels, hence naseh, let us make.

All right, we'll step back from here for a moment. There are many, many other rabbinic commentators on this, but all that to say it got their attention. The words let us make in our image according to our likeness, they got their attention because elsewhere God created, God spoke, etc.

Now it says let us. So the idea that this is God and the angels, there's no text elsewhere in the Bible that supports this notion where God is taking counsel with the angels. Again, it's not impossible.

It's just not supported with clarity anywhere else in the Bible. Other scholars say it's the plural of deliberation. Let's do this.

Come on, let's do this. You can say it to yourself. The question is why our image, why our likeness in the plural of deliberation. Others say it's the majestic plural where the king says let it be known that we have decreed, speaking about himself, but he says we. Others question whether it would work out grammatically like this, and then many Christians say it's God's triunity, hence let us, and there's a hint of it early in Genesis. Can we absolutely argue for that?

No. There are other possible explanations. Suffice it to say it is in harmony with God's triunity. It's not a proof of God's triunity. There are other ways to read the verse, but it is in harmony with God's triunity. Okay, now let's move down to Genesis chapter 18. Genesis chapter 18, and I'm going to go there on Sepharia as well. Genesis 18 one says, The Lord appeared to him, to Abram, by the terebinths of Mamre.

He was sitting at the entrance of the tent as the day grew hot. Looking up, he saw three men standing near him. So the Hebrew is Yahweh, the Lord, right?

Vayir Elav Adonai. So Yahweh, the Lord Almighty, appears to him. Abraham looks up and he sees three men. So who are these three men?

How should this be understood? Again, there are lots of commentaries on this, but the rabbinic explanation is that God appeared through three angels, and they had various missions. You know, one was to heal Abraham because he had been circumcised, even though it's clear from the text he was well healed from his circumcision at that point because he's running and active. Another comes, you know, it's the merit of visiting the sick, and then two of the angels are going to go on to Sodom, etc. So the standard rabbinic explanation is that this is three angels. I say that's not supported by the text. What the text clearly says is that it is Yahweh, the Lord Almighty, with two angels.

Why is that important? It is an indication that the eternal God, who sits enthroned in the heavens, whom no one can see, who is untouchable. I mean, Paul speaks of him in 1 Timothy 6.15 and says he dwells in unapproachable light, verses 15 and 16 of 1 Timothy 6. No one has seen him.

No one has ever seen him. John 1.18 says no one has seen God. And yet there are clear instances in the Hebrew Bible where the Lord appears in human form, in flesh and blood form.

How can it be that the God who sits enthroned in the heavens, whose presence fills the whole universe, also comes in our midst in human form? I don't want to take the time on the air now to read through all of Genesis 18, but I want to encourage you to do it. And all of you who are listening and watching who are Jewish friends, or maybe you don't consider me a friend, you consider me an enemy, you can read the Hebrew in particular. Read through the text.

Just read it through as clearly and honestly as you can. And ask yourself, it's the most natural way to read this, that this is Hashem. This is the Lord with two angels. Because when you get to the end of the chapter, there's an extended conversation between Hashem, between the Lord.

That's the way a religious Jew will speak of God, Hashem, the name. There's an extended conversation between Abraham and Hashem. And then when they're done, Hashem leaves.

And then what happens? 19-1, Genesis 19-1, the very next verse, and the two angels came to Sodom. What happened to the three? One of them was not an angel. The text never mentions angels there in Genesis 18. Rather, it was Hashem, the Lord, the Lord with two angels. When He's done, He leaves. It's saying God who fills the universe, sits enthroned in heaven, can also come in our midst in flesh and blood and reveal Himself.

Yeah, in the Bible, in the Tanakh, in the Torah. It's The Line of Fire with your host, Dr. Michael Cahn. Welcome, welcome to Thoroughly Jewish Thursday. Yeah, I was about to jump in and talk. I forgot the music was coming.

866-342-866-348-7884. A little bit later in the broadcast, I'll be going to your Jewish-related questions. The thesis I'm laying out today is very simple. That we can demonstrate from the Hebrew Bible that there is one God and one God only, but He is complex in His unity. Hence, He can be seen, but He can't be seen. Hence, He reveals Himself, but He is hidden.

Hence, He is enthroned in heaven, He fills the universe, He works among us, and at times, He appears in human form, because He is one God, eternal, infinite, and complex in His unity. Let's take a look in Exodus chapter 3. Exodus chapter 3, beginning in verse 1. Now Moses was keeping the flock of his father and Lord Jethro, the priest of Midian, and led his flock to the west side of the wilderness and came to Choreb, the mountain of God, and the angel of the Lord, and he was Malach, Adonai, the Malach is a messenger. The angel of the Lord appeared to him in a flame of fire out of the bush. He looked to behold the bush was burning, yet it was not consumed. Moses said, I will turn aside to see this great sight, why the bush is not burned. When the Lord saw that, He turned aside to see God caught him out of the bush.

Isn't this remarkable? It's as if God is actually in this Malach, is in this angel. It's as if Hashem is fully identified with the angel, not just the angel is a messenger, but the angel somehow has the essence of God himself. When Hashem, the Lord, saw that he turned aside to see, God called to him to Moses out of the bush, Moses, Moses! And he said, Here I am.

Then he said, Do not come near. Take your sandals off your feet, for the place in which you're standing is holy ground. That's not the norm just for an angelic presence. That's the norm for God's very presence. And he said, Who the Malach, the messenger, the angel, I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, the God of Jacob. And Moses, in his face, he was afraid to look at God.

Okay, let's think about that for a minute. It seems in a plain reading of the text that this Malach, this angel, actually, in some way, is God himself. How do we explain it? Well, remember what it says in John 1 18, that no one has seen God at any time. The one and only God who is in the bosom of the Father, he has made him known. Remember what Yeshua says in John 14, If you've seen Me, you've seen the Father. It is the Son's job to make the Father known. The Father remains hidden in glory, in unapproachable light.

The Son makes him known. And then the Ruach, the Spirit, is the one who interacts with us in works among us, as we'll see with Scripture in a moment. Let's go over to Exodus chapter 24. Exodus 24. Now remember the children of Israel have just received the Ten Commandments from Mount Sinai. God has sent them to the Mount Sinai. God has warned them, Don't come near the Mount.

His presence is there. Later in Deuteronomy 5, God reminds them, You didn't see any image. So, even though God has a forum, he's saying, You didn't see any forum at that time. Numbers 12 says, Moses saw the form of the Lord, but the people, nothing was revealed, lest they go out and make some type of statue or idol. So, verse 1, Then he said to Moses, Come up to the Lord you, and Aaron, the dove, and Avihu, the seventy of the elders of Israel, worshiped from afar. And then you go down, let's scroll down to verse 9, and it says, Then Moses, Aaron, Nadav, Avihu, and the seventy elders of Israel went up, and they saw the God of Israel. They saw it. Now, rabbinic commentaries, ancient paraphrase, translations, well, they saw the glory of the God, but it doesn't say that. It says, They saw the God of Israel. That's what the text says. The same one that can't be seen, they saw.

How is that? I'm just looking at the evidence of the Hebrew Bible. There was under his feet, as it were, a pavement of sapphire stone, like the very heaven for clearness. And here's why I know it wasn't just a vision. And he did not lay his hand on the chief men of the people of Israel. They beheld God, Nate, and drank.

In other words, they should have died, but God didn't strike them. So, who did they see? If you can't see God, if no one's seen God, but they saw God, who did they see?

I won't go there now, but Isaiah 6, Isaiah goes into the temple to worship, I believe it was the earthly temple, and what does he say? I saw the Lord. I saw the Lord. It's Hashem. It's Yahweh, as the text goes on. He saw the Lord.

Well, who did he see? And overwhelmed by the holiness of God, if God can't be seen. These are just questions as we ask, is the Trinity God's triunity? One God, one God and one God only, not three Gods, not three separate beings, but one God who has made himself known to us as Father, Son, and Spirit. Is that taught in the Hebrew Bible? Then we go to Isaiah, the ninth chapter. There is the promise there of a messianic king. The text is in what would be called prophetic perfect, so it's spoken of as if it already happened.

K'yelad yulad lanu bendi tan lanu, a child has been born to us, a son has been given to us as if it had already happened. Isaiah chapter 9. But then it describes this one. Let's scroll down to verse 6. It says this about this son. For a child is born to us, a son is given. So again, in Hebrew it's prophetic perfect.

It's as if it already happened. The prophet's looking at it as if it already happened. The government shall be upon his shoulder and his name shall be called Pelioitz Eligibor Aviad Sar Shalom. Wonderful counselor, mighty God, everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.

Now there's a lot of debate about the right translation here. Eligibor, mighty God, occurs again in Isaiah 10 21, speaking of Hashem, the Lord himself. But most scholars, most commentators believe that these would be throne names of the child, descriptive of the child, and one of them was mighty God. And there is a passage in the Talmud as well as Ibn Ezra, one of the top three rabbinic commentaries from the 11th century, he says the names of the names of the child but then tries to interpret them differently.

So who is this child, this messianic child, who has divine names spoken of him? Let's go over to Psalm 45. Psalm 45 is a psalm about a royal wedding, about a Davidic wedding, and what you have to understand is that the promises to David find their fulfillment in the Messiah. In other words, the many things that God promised David were not done in his lifetime but find their fulfillment in the greater David, the Messiah himself. So let's skip down to verse 6, Psalm 45, and it says, Your throne, O God, is forever and ever.

The scepter of your kingdom is a scepter of uprightness. Well, that's certainly words of praise to the Lord. I remember asking a Hebrew teacher in college who was a rabbi, could you translate that for me? It's one verse down in Hebrew. And he read it and he said, yes, praises to the Almighty. I said, could you read the rest of the Psalm?

His face literally turned red. Because it's so clear just if you're reading it in itself, your throne, O God, is forever and ever. That's what it says. The scepter of your kingdom is a scepter of uprightness. You've loved righteousness and hated wickedness. Therefore, God your God has anointed you with the oil of gladness beyond your companions.

What? Therefore, God your God has anointed you? You just got called God. The Davidic king, and here is a type of messiah, is called Divine One, God. That's how he's addressed.

To try to read it, Kisa chalahim, l'alam v'an need your divine throne is forever and ever, it's really a forced reading. You would never think that way. So, let's step back. Number one, we see potential references to God speaking of himself in the plural.

Let us. Our image. Our likeness. Not definitive, but in harmony with God's complex unity.

But we can't make a proof on that. We see God manifesting himself, coming in our midst in a physical way. Abraham literally washes his feet, feeds him and the two angels with him. Moses sees him in a burning bush. All these things, crystal clear, in terms of when you just read it through naturally, without trying to make it fit a theology. So, the eternal God who elsewhere no one can see his face and live, like Exodus 33, that's what God tells Moses, no one can see my face and live. Yet, he comes in the midst of his people and he reveals himself in flesh and blood. And then we see the messianic king being directly identified with God. Now, I don't have time to go through the references. Let me just give them to you.

So, just jot these down if you're taking notes. Psalm 106, 32 and 33. Psalm 106, 32 and 33. Isaiah 63, 10. Isaiah 63, 10. Micah, chapter 2, verse 7. Micah 2, 7. Micah 2, 7. Nehemiah, chapter 9, verse 20. That's Nehemiah, chapter 9, verse 20. First Chronicles, chapter 28, verses 11 and 12. First Chronicles, chapter 28, verses 11 and 12. All these verses speak of the Ruach, of the spirit.

He can be grieved. The children of Israel rebel against him. He teaches, he instructs, he leads, he speaks.

This indicates not just power, but intelligence, personality, personhood. So, it is because the Ruach interacts among us that when the children of Israel rebelled, they rebelled against him. When they sinned against God, they grieved him. So, we have this hidden God, this revealed God, this Ruach, Father, Son, Spirit. God's triunity taught in the pages of the Hebrew Bible. This is an overview. We go in more depth in some of our writings and teachings, but this is a useful overview. 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. Welcome, welcome to the Line of Fire on Thoroughly Jewish Thursday. If you've got Jewish-related questions, we'll give you our best answers.

866-348-7884. I commented earlier that when I was looking at a YouTube video for some comments that my team had referred me to, when it came up, there was an ad when I looked up, there were two men kissing. I played the rest of the ad and then it's got all these different families and then the two men are walking out of a chapel. They've just been quote married. So, as it played on, I saw that it was for, let's see, VRBO, Perfect Family Getaway.

So, I guess that's an app, VRBO.com. So, they are loudly and clearly shouting to the world that they are champions of two men or two women quote marrying and that we should all go to their company accordingly. So, just putting that information out there for you. Unrelated, otherwise, to Thoroughly Jewish Thursday, except the fact that it came up on my video, All Israel Shall Be Saved. All right, I've got some interesting Jewish news I want to get to in a moment, but first your calls.

Let's start with Keith in Maridosia, Illinois. Thanks for calling the Line of Fire. Hey, Dr. Brown. Hey. Fantastic to call in to you. First-time caller and a big fan, and I want to say thank you also for all the work you do for the Kingdom.

Well, thank you. My question revolved around John 2, and I was wanting to appeal to your knowledge of Jewish law, customs, Torah, and perhaps maybe even a little bit to the Greek interpretation. With regard to how would a Jewish person in the latter part of the first century or the beginning of the second century read John 2 or understand that if it was being told to them via story. In regard to the whip, would they immediately think that Jesus was whipping the people or used it to move the animals? Because my understanding, or at least what I think, is that wouldn't Jesus be assaulting somebody and thereby breaking Torah law?

And again, I sure appreciate you taking my question. Right, so it's an excellent question. In terms of, if he was doing that, if he was whipping people, then would that have been so far outside the pale of things that he would have been overtly breaking the Torah? And then, you know, why are they even going to talk about Sabbath observance and other things when he's done something so overt? Or you could say, according to the Torah, if there was great injustice in the temple, that that would be a righteous thing to do. There is no specific Jewish law that I'm aware of that was extant at that time that would would give us a specific response to it.

In other words, there would be general principles, there would be general guidelines, there would be specific laws about other things, but because rabbinic Judaism later developed such ultra-specific laws, I mean, governing the minutiae of everyday life, that you would think there would be certain rules for the temple or for this or that. So I would only say this, that the real deciding factor is not whether this was a Jewish reader in the first century or Jewish reader today. The big question would be, what does that person think of Jesus? Meaning, the text could be read one of two ways. It could be read that he whipped the animals and drove out the money changers and overturned the temples, or that he whipped the money changers. So it's all a matter of what you think of him, and you could either read it negatively or positively. Because Scripture said plainly that he did no violence, and you could argue that it was doing violence to whip money changers, and that's part of the New Testament that presents him clearly as doing no violence and is written in Isaiah 53 and quoted in 1 Peter 2. So you would say, okay, if the New Testament picture is he did no violence and that text is in there, then that text must be indicating that he drove out the animals with the whip, drove out the money changers, you know, get out of here, overturned the tables, and whipped the animals.

If you're attacking him as a critic, then you say he whipped people. So I don't believe there's sufficient Jewish background that would influence how you read it. It would be more a matter of exegeted Greek text as carefully as you can and then come to the conclusion as you can. So my conclusion for many years has been that the Gospels present him as overturning the tables, driving out the money changers, and whipping the animals as opposed to whipping the people. But again, you're going to see different readings based on how people look at him and what they're seeing in the text. The only logic I could give you is, since the New Testament very clearly wants to portray him a certain way, that it would be counterproductive for them to have that narrative if it made him look bad.

So if they include it in there, it must have happened in a righteous way. Awesome, I appreciate that. That really helps. All right, you are very welcome. Thanks for the call and the kind words, Keith. 866-34-TRUTH.

Let's go to Victoria in Virginia Beach, Virginia. Welcome to the line of fire. Thank you. I had an issue with something you said a little while back with one of your callers or guests, I forget, who complained about Gentiles to wear the tzitzitot.

Mm-hmm. And he was saying that it was wrong for them to wear them, like, on their belt loops of their jeans, because they're just trying to look Jewish. And my sons do this. They bought tzitzitot online to wear on their belt loops, but not because they wanted to look Jewish, just because they wanted to follow Torah. And so it's, I don't know what the percentages are, but they're not trying to look Jewish. They're just trying to follow the law, so how can that be bad?

Well, I appreciate the question. Let me just say that I was responding to a question about people who do this and want to look and act like Jews, and I've seen it for decades, and I've seen it lead to apostasy. I've seen it lead to all kinds of confusion. I've seen it damage our witness to the Jewish people. And it sets a precedent, which I think I'll show you in a moment, you don't want to follow. So let's say that your sons are doing this with a pure heart before the Lord, because they read that in Torah, all right?

But Torah's not talking about hanging things from your belt. They're talking about the four corners of your garment, so they need to completely change their outfits. They need to go back and wear outfits that are just kind of like a, almost like a smock with four corners and wear those with fringes. That's the first thing. Well, but that's the whole thing. In other words, you're not... Okay, tell me what their beards look like.

Do what? What do their beards look like? Oh, they're pretty young. They don't have beards yet.

Well, they're trying. Okay, and if one of them was persistently disobedient, rebellious, getting drunk, would you stone him to death? No, I wouldn't. But that's Torah. That's Torah law. That's Torah law.

How about this? Would you recommend in your church, if someone commits adultery, that they stone that person? No, I wouldn't. It's Torah law. All right. Do you know any Christians that work on the seventh-day Sabbath on a Saturday? Probably most of them do.

All right. They should be stoned to death according to the Torah. How do you feel about that?

Should that happen? Well, we're not in Israel, so what they say is, well, we're not in Israel. Where does it say that? Where does it say that in the Torah? It doesn't say that.

Someone told you that. A lot of the land? Nope. Has it to do with the land? Nope.

Not a syllable. There's that verse that says, when you get into the land where I'm bringing you... God required it of the exiles. God required them to keep the Sabbath in exile. Why do you think Jews keep the Sabbath around the world today?

That wasn't just for the land of Israel. Of course not. So let's keep going. There are certain things. As a woman, your monthly cycle. So your husband or physically completely separated. There's no contact during that time, correct? But I'm saying no contact. Not very little. None. None. Otherwise he's defiled. No contact. Separate bed.

Everything. The point I'm making is, it's pick and choose. There are verses one after another after another after another after another that you don't keep. You are not Jews under the Sinai covenant. You are not commanded to observe all the rights of the Sinai covenant. We have a new and better covenant, and that is now exemplified in what's taught in the New Testament. So what you end up with is confusion.

You end up with a foreign mixture. Pick a little from here, choose a little from there, even with all sincerity. And I've watched it for years, and then it keeps going further and further.

You know, do you observe the new moons? No. You know, just, these are all things within the Torah. So it's once you start to break it down, you find that you're constantly breaking laws within the Torah, or rejecting them, or not keeping them for one reason or another, even with all sincerity. So forget trying to look like Jews. It is putting yourself under something that God never put you under. And it's inconsistent. It's going to breed spiritual confusion over the years, and taken to its logical climax, ends up with pulling away from Yeshua rather than towards him.

I've watched it for decades. But if we're grafted in to... To a new and better covenant. To a new and better covenant. God never called Gentile Christians anywhere in the New Testament to come under the Sinai Covenant. That was the Sinai Covenant. Because Israel broke it repeatedly, God said, I'm giving you a new and better covenant.

And I'm now writing these things in your heart. So he didn't call you to be Israelites or to be Jews. He called you just like he didn't make you into a woman or me into a man, because we're one in the Messiah, and there's neither male nor female in the Messiah. You're a Gentile. I'm a Jew. But we're one in Jesus. You're female. I'm male. We're one in the Messiah.

It's really important to get this right. You are not under the Sinai Covenant. You're under a new and better covenant.

Rather than pick and choose a law here, custom there, immerse yourself in how the New Testament tells us how to live, and then you'll live in the fullness of everything God gave before you. May the Lord give insight. If you have further questions, feel free to shoot an email to our website.

We'd be more than glad to help. 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 866-34-TRUTH.

Here again is Dr. Michael Brown. Welcome, friends, to Thoroughly Jewish Thursday 866-34-TRUTH. I'm only trying to be helpful, friends, only trying to avoid spiritual confusion in speaking the truth in love, not trying to put anyone down, not trying to question anyone's sincerity. In fact, it's some of the most sincere people on the planet, as reflected by the call we just had, who are looking at the whole Bible and saying, well, Jesus said, keep my commandments, and I guess it means everything in the Torah. You read in John's Gospel, he says, keep my commandments.

He means the things I'm saying to you here and now. Let's just take a look for a moment in Galatians chapter 3. Galatians chapter 3, beginning in verse 23. Now, before faith came, we were held captive under the law, under the Torah, imprisoned until the coming faith would be revealed, because the Torah set standards, but we were unable to keep those standards and hence were condemned by these very laws that were given for life. So then, the law, the Torah, was our guardian until Messiah came in order that we might be justified by faith, but now that faith has come, we are no longer under a guardian. Paul elsewhere, Paul in Romans 6, as we step back from this text, says that we're not under the law.

What does that mean? It means we're not under the Torah as a system of justification. It means we are not under the Torah's condemnation for falling short. It means that we are not under the Torah as far as to lead us to the Messiah. Now that we're in the Messiah, look at the Torah as if it were a scaffolding around a building.

When the building is finished, you don't need the scaffolding. So now, with these foundations pointing us to the Messiah and justification by faith and God's holy moral principles, we now live godly lives empowered by the Spirit. And those things which were meant outwardly are now written on our hearts. There are many other things that the Torah speaks of that Christians don't do today. That's by divine design, because they were given to Israel to teach, to instruct, to prepare the way for Messiah, to keep Israel separate from the nations.

Now that the Messiah has come, we are under a new and better covenant which is now fully expressed in the pages of the New Testament writings. Okay, before we go back to your calls, check out this headline about Louis Farrakhan. I mean, this is the world that we live in today on The Daily Wire following a report on the Federalist Nation of Islam finally banned from Twitter, but not for anti-Semitism.

What? Okay, for years, Louis Farrakhan has posted all kinds of anti-Semitic comments, even likening Jews to termites. He said, I'm not anti-Semite, I'm anti-termite. In the context, he was talking about Jews.

That's not far from Hitler calling Jews parasites. He's issued all kinds of outlandish statements, tweeted all kinds of outlandish tweets, and never gotten banned, never gotten banned. Now, by the way, if Twitter wants to have that policy that anything goes, just be consistent, let anything go in any direction. Otherwise, if you can have lines about hate speech, then be consistent and enforce it.

He gets banned from Twitter. Why? Criticizing COVID vaccine. I mean, that's the world we live in today. That's the great crime.

That's the great sin. Even if you have honest questions, I've been talking to people day and night with honest questions, trying to sort out things. Go to my website, askdrbrown.org.

Check out my latest article about the politicization of COVID, the vaccines. You don't know who to trust. You don't know who to go to. If you go to this news source, you're going to get this bias.

If you go to that news source, you're going to get another bias. Who do you go to? Who do you trust?

Who do you listen to? You're trying to do the right thing. You're trying to make an informed decision. I wrote in the article that as much as I don't like wearing masks, especially on long flights, that if I knew by wearing a mask, I could literally save people's lives. I'd wear a mask in public the rest of my life. If I literally knew that for years and years and years that my wearing a mask would save people's lives, you bet I'd wear a mask.

If I knew for sure there were no long-term dangers with the vaccine and that literally getting vaccinated would save other people's lives, I'd get vaccinated once a month if they told me to. That was recommended. Like many of you, I want to do the right thing. I want to be careful. I want to honor God. I want to be a good steward of my body. I want to be presumptuous. I want to protect people. But what's the right information?

That's a real challenge. So that brings me to the story from Israel, the Jerusalem Post. Let's just take a look at this. Israel has been very strict with vaccines. Not quite mandatory, but close. So if you want an update on this, I recommend this article. Israel's new COVID-19 rules. Everything you need to know. These Green Pass rules will stay into effect until August 8th.

So this is as of today. So if you want info, check out this article. Israel's new COVID-19 rules. So the Green Pass says, okay, you've been vaccinated.

You can do this, this, this. If you haven't been, then there are certain restrictions. So as much as Israelis can be rebellious and very independent, and the secular are independent one way, the ultra-Orthodox are independent within their own tight-knit communities where they follow the guidance of the rabbis. So they're totally not independent from what the rabbis say. The rabbis are often independent from what the government as a whole is saying.

There's been vaccination by and large through almost the entire nation. And the only way I can explain it, given the rebelliousness and the independent thinking of many Israelis, is they must trust the science. I mean, that to me is the best explanation. Or maybe so many of the ultra-religious died early on that they realized, okay, we have to take this seriously because they live so closely and study together and pray together so closely.

And that's the only way to get it so closely. It's different than the normal Israeli response, which is who's going to, you know, you got to tell us what to do. But it could just well be that it's such a science-based nation in so many ways with such leading technology that they trust the science and they feel I've gotten good results. And that the thing they hate the most is the restrictions.

So if this is going to get you out of the restrictions, go for it. Again, we're all watching, wanting to do what's best. To me, it's got nothing to do with stubbornness, pride. To me, it's not even a matter of faith because we take precautions.

I do my best to eat healthily and have a strong immune system. You know, we put on seatbelts as we drive, not just because the law requires it but because it's wisdom to do it. So to me, it's not a matter of faith. It's a matter of making informed decisions. And you say, Dr. Bell, what's your opinion? I want to know your position. My position is do the research, make informed decisions. That's my official position. All right, back to the phones.

Let's go to Mary J. in West Des Moines, Iowa. Welcome to the line of fire. Hallelujah. Shalom. Shalom. Thank you for being so balanced.

I really appreciate your times with you. I want to say, that lady, I knew a Baptist congregation that wanted to know their Jewish roots, and they wound up leaving the church and forming a church and having their type of synagogue, and it didn't turn out very well. And they wound up doing, what is that Jewish mysticism? They wound up getting into the Kabbalah and a whole bunch of stuff. And the one thing you said today that really helped me, too, was that it inhibits, it prevents or causes a problem with the Christian witness to the Jewish people.

Yeah, I mean, what happens is it looks silly. It looks, it makes a mockery of our faith. It looks like a half-baked, uninformed Judaism mixed with Christianity. It's one thing when a Jewish believer says, hey, I'm a Jew, and this is part of my national heritage, and it connects me in a larger way with Yeshua, and I'm living my life in a consistent way. And then that's going to shock a Jewish person, but you believe in Jesus.

Yeah, so you explain that. It's another thing when someone who is obviously not Jewish, who is obviously not living this out consistently, look, I've seen Gentile Christians that dress like they're ultra-Orthodox Jews. The moment I see on them, something's funny here.

Something's funny. You're not ultra-Orthodox. The moment you talk to them, it's confirmed you're not ultra-Orthodox. A Jewish person meets them, it's like, why are you wearing a costume? Well, I love Jesus. I love the Jewish people. It's like, why are you wearing a costume? That's what religious Jews wear.

It means X, Y, Z. Look, I've been on the front lines of this for almost 50 years now. I got a little experience. It makes a mockery of the rest of our message. So, all right, anyway, time is short. Your question, please.

Yeah, we got cut off the last time. Genesis 22, 13, both. Isaac says, where's the ram, dad?

And dad says, God will provide the ram. And even in the New Testament, they refer to Jesus as the lamb, John the Baptist, and in Revelation. But in Genesis 22, 13, it says, Abraham saw a ram, ram, ram. And so what I want to know, what would that mean to the Jewish people? Does that mean God himself would sacrifice?

Oh, no, no. So here's the key thing. Abraham says, in verse 8, God will provide a lamb, right? Then what happens is there's a ram. So a ram was an acceptable sacrificial animal.

That's all it means. So God provided the sacrificial animal so he wouldn't sacrifice Isaac. But the question to ask is, what happened to the lamb? That's where we now tie it in with the Passover lamb. That's where we tie it in now with the Messiah being the lamb of God. In other words, when you look at the text, we were expecting a lamb, not a ram. The ram is just a sacrificial animal God provides so that Abraham doesn't sacrifice Isaac. God's shouting, I don't want human sacrifice.

At the same time, at the same time, there's that little question. Didn't Abraham say a lamb? Where's the lamb? Where's the promised lamb? And now we trace that all the way into the New Testament, the Messiah, the lamb of God, starting in John 1 29. Hey, be blessed. Back with your questions tomorrow. Another program powered by the Truth Network.