As we approach Yom Kippur, how do traditional Jews expect to get atonement without blood and pain? You're just days away from Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, the holiest day on the Jewish calendar, a time of repentance, a soul searching. In fact, right now, traditional Jews around the world are in the midst of deep soul searching. It's called Yomim No Ra'im, the Days of Awe, ten days from Rosh Hashanah or the sounding of the trumpet in the Bible, until Yom Kippur. Even secular Jews sometimes get more religious.
Many will fast on Yom Kippur, even though they're not religious the rest of the year. So it's a great time for us to pray for God's mercy to be poured out on the Jewish people worldwide, to reveal his love through Yeshua, Jesus, the Messiah, and the full and complete atonement that comes through his blood as he takes our place. This is not human sacrifice. This is the righteous one saying, I will take the place of the unrighteous, kulanu katzon ta'inu. All of us like sheep have gone astray, ish l'dar kol paninu, each one has turned to his own way, v'thonai hiv g'ya bo et avon kulanu, and the Lord has laid upon him the iniquity of all of us. Isaiah 53, 6, pointing to Jesus, our Messiah, our great substitute. So I want to talk about some Jewish conceptions regarding atonement, regarding blood, regarding repentance.
We've talked about this, especially at this time of the year at other times, but it's important to do so. Within Israel, the nation continues to be in the midst of ongoing trauma. Remember as Israel has gone to war against Hezbollah in the north, the immediate north, with tens of thousands of Israelis displaced from their homes, they've had to flee their homes, they can't go back because of rocket bombardment from Hezbollah. Remember that they began their onslaught on October 8th, so as the whole nation is reeling from the horrors, the horrors of Hamas barbarity and atrocity, and of course the security failures on Israel's end that allowed this to happen, as the nation is reeling, Hezbollah begins lobbing in their own rockets, missiles. Since then it's been 8,000 shot at Israel, launched at Israel.
Israel's taken out their senior leadership and even replacements of senior leadership and replacements of replacements deeply hurt their capabilities of striking and fighting, yet still they're a formidable enemy to the north, Israel intercepting missiles from the east, from the south, from the west. This is ongoing, ongoing, and it's an important time to be praying, God have mercy, God intervene, have mercy, and also to pray that God would pour out His grace on the Palestinians who were suffering so much, primarily because of radical Islamic leaders and radical Islamic organizations. Alright, the perennial question, Hebrews 9.22 says, without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness of sins. Leviticus 17.11, Christians would quote, saying the same thing, that God has given blood on the altar for atonement, but traditional Jews would say, no, no, the atonement system is important, temple sacrifices are important, however, however, the reality is that atonement always had to do with repentance, always had to do with turning to God, asking for forgiveness. I absolutely affirm the importance of repentance, especially as you go through the prophetic books, especially as you read through the New Testament, where repent is the first word of the Gospel, beginning in Matthew's Gospel where it's the first word that John the Immerser preaches, that Jesus preaches, that in Mark that the disciples preach, and then into the book of Acts that the apostles preach.
Jesus himself says in Luke 24 that repentance and forgiveness of sins must be preached in Jerusalem to all nations. Repentance is of foundational importance, but from a Torah perspective, even more foundational is the system of blood atonement. In fact, if you'll go through the Torah and just read it as if you didn't know anything else except what you're reading in the text, you'll see overwhelmingly the word associated with atonement, with the verb l'chaper, or the noun kippur, the word associated with this overwhelmingly in the Torah is blood, blood, blood, blood, blood sacrifices. The center of the atonement system in ancient Israel, and on the biblical calendar to this day, is Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, and at the center of that, blood sacrifices, along with another sacrifice of a goat that would carry Israel's sins symbolically into the wilderness.
The blood atonement system is foundational and irreplaceable. It is both and, and within the Torah, interestingly enough, as that is the bedrock and the foundation of everything in traditional Judaism, as every traditional Jew would agree that the Torah is the foundation of all foundations and everything is built on that, the word repent or repentance is rarely found in the Torah, rarely found, but blood sacrifice is found overwhelmingly. In my recent interaction with my esteemed colleague Rabbi Yisrael Blumenthal, we discussed these issues and he wanted me to respond to some of his claims, one of which is that the Talmud recognizes, quote, the scriptural truth that there's only repentance which can render a person righteous before God.
He said this truth is not affected with the presence of the temple or with its absence. My response is this, the scriptures even more clearly state that the foundation of the whole system of atonement centered in blood sacrifices, without which there was no national hope or forgiveness. This truth, in fact, is grounded in the Torah far more clearly than even the need for repentance.
How can Rabbi Blumenthal ignore or deny this when claiming to be faithful to the totality of scripture? The biblical witness clearly points to the necessity of both blood atonement and sincere repentance, but the Torah itself puts far more stress on blood atonement than it does on repentance, as any student of the Torah would know. Thus, of the 112 times that Kippur, the root kaf, pei, reish, to atone, expiate, purge, occurs in the Tanakh, more than half of them, 66, are found in Leviticus in Numbers, 48 in Leviticus, 18 in Numbers. So the verb to atone, expiate, purge, lechapere, this is found 112 times in the Old Testament, in the Hebrew scriptures, over half in Leviticus in Numbers. The key Torah books dealing with blood sacrifices and priests in the ministry. In contrast, within Torah law, there are very few verses that specifically call for repentance. For example, Numbers 5, verses 5 through 7.
So do we believe traditional rabbis or do we believe the Torah? When I just asked various AI for data for references to see if they came up with similar numbers to what I've come up with, so when I asked AI Claude, how many verses in the Torah have something to say about sacrifice or blood? 527. How many had something to say about Sabbath?
69. Then I said, how many verses have to do, I asked Chat GPT, how many verses in the Torah have to do with tabernacle, sacrifice, priestly ministry? Between 1550 and 1750. How many had to do with Sabbath?
Between 70 and 80. In other words, roughly 20 verses to 1. As important as Sabbath is in traditional Judaism, the emphasis on tabernacle, on priestly ministry, on sacrifices and blood overwhelmingly are stressed more within the Torah.
Why? God is seeking to bring home a point. Substitution, substitution, substitution. That's why in some cases, the one offering up the sacrifice would lay their hands on it and confess their sin over it. What are they saying?
You're taking my place. That's why the high priest on Yom Kippur would lay his hands on the goat that would be sent into the wilderness and confess the sins and rebellions of Israel over it and would carry it away. If this was so foundational, if this is so important, why can it just go away? And why has the temple still not been rebuilt after almost 2,000 years?
Could it be that God is shouting a message to Israel and has been shouting a message to Israel saying, I have provided a better way. I have provided blood sacrifices. I have made a better way. Why? By the once and for all sacrifice of the perfect Lamb of the Messiah who took his place, even in keeping with the rabbinic teaching, the death of the righteous atones.
So the death of the righteous theoretically in rabbinic Judaism can atone for the sins of the generation. Look at it like this. You fall, every one of you listening, you fall a million dollars in debt. You have no possible way of ever paying it back.
You're going to go to jail for failure to pay your debts and for overdrafts and your checkbook and fraud and whatever trying to find ways out. And I said, hey, hey, I'm a multi-billionaire. How many is it? Well, it's 10,000 owing a million. I got it. I got it covered.
I'm going to pay for everybody. Well, now look at it in terms of righteousness. The rabbinic concept is that there's someone righteous in a generation, a godly rabbi or say an innocent little child. And that person has as a merit of righteousness as opposed to guilt, just like with my bank account thing, multi-billionaire. So rabbinic thinking this person has has this this weight of righteousness in the bank credited to their account. And we are all lacking in righteousness and they die at the age of 30. Well, how?
Why? That's not right. Well, it kind of balances the scales that that now their death could serve as atonement. They are the substitute if there'll be repentance. Well, that would be wonderful if true, except there's no one righteous enough, except one. Mashiach Tzidkenu, Adonai Tzidkenu, the Lord, our righteousness, the Messiah.
He came into this world and took our place. And when we turn to God and say, God, I'm guilty. Katana v'vina v'shadum ra'adna, Lord, we've sinned, we've committed iniquity praying from Daniel 9. We've rebelled. We're guilty in your sight. Forgive us. Cleanse us.
Forgive me. Cleanse me. I recognize that should have been me hanging on the cross. That should have been me dying. That should have been me beaten, bloody. That should have been me. But the perfectly righteous one took my place.
Forgive me. Cleanse me. Give me a brand new heart, a brand new start that's real chuvah.
Tie it in with the death of the Messiah. Now you have eternal. Now you have eternal. We'll be right back. This is Michael Ellison, founder of Tributa Wellness. I want you to hear an amazing testimony from my friend James Robison, and most all of you will know of him. He and his wife Betty host the Life Today television program. Now here is James. Let me tell you about a miracle I experienced. My friend Michael Ellison, he and his wife are our 40 year plus best friends.
Well, let me just say this to you. I had so much pain with what was called tennis elbow that I could hardly reach over and pick up the phone without pain, without it hurting me. I couldn't pick up something to drink, a glass of tea or anything.
It was very difficult to do anything without wearing a tight strap. And then Michael shared the Nopal cactus juice with me, Nopalaya. I began drinking about that much in the morning in a glass and that much later in the day. And in three months, I was a different person. I have now gone more than 10 years with no pain, not better. Well, I have no joint pain. I'm telling you it did something to the inflammation in my body that was undeniable.
Now that's just my testimony. But that's been more than 10 years with no pain. Matter of fact, if I miss for some foolish reason, a few days, I can feel it creeping back that fast. So give it a try. See if it helps relieve your pain. I hope it does like it has mine because it worked for me.
Nopalaya is supported by clinical studies for lowering inflammation and improving mobility, flexibility and range of emotion in the neck, back and joints for less reliance on pain medication and improved quality of life. Call 800-771-5584 and use promo code BROWN25 to receive 25% off your order. As a new customer, 100% of your order goes to support the line of fire.
Call 800-771-5584 or go online to TriVita.com. This is how we rise up. It's the line of fire with your host, Dr. Michael Brown. Get on the line of fire by calling 866-344-TRUTH.
Here again is Dr. Michael Brown. Thanks for joining us at the sacred time of the year, the Jewish calendar, a time of great upheaval within Israel itself. A great time to be praying for God's mercy on the lost sheep of the house of Israel. Michael Brown, welcome to Thoroughly Jewish Thursday. I'll get into the phone shortly if you have a Jewish-related question.
866-348-7884. If you're a Jewish person and you differ with me on what I've just said about atonement and forgiveness, by all means give me a call 866-344-TRUTH and shout out of appreciation to our great co-sponsor TriVita which travels with me wherever I go in the world. One more note about atonement and blood.
Something really interesting. The Chabad website, so ultra-orthodox Jewish website, Chabad, the largest Jewish outreach organization, Jewish educational organization in the world today. And there's an article, they've got many Q&A pages on their website. Someone's asking about forgiveness, atonement without blood sacrifices and it's going through its standard rabbinic answers. Then it says this, this is how the article ends on Chabad.org. After all is said and done though, your question should really remain a question.
Isn't that interesting? You know, how do we receive atonement without blood sacrifices? We should ask this question of God every day. Asking him when he will return us to the temple in Jerusalem so that we will come, we will once and for all be able to fill this void with real makoi. So saying the things we do in place of the blood sacrifices or without the blood sacrifices, t'shuvah, repentance, t'sfilah, prayer, t'sadakah, charitable giving, even various t'suris, t'sarot, trouble, hardship, that whatever role those play in traditional thinking about bringing atonement or forgiveness or paying a price or setting the record straight, we will once and for all truly be able to fill this void with the real makoi.
There's still a void? This is Chabad website saying there is atonement without the blood. But saying, you should ask that question every day.
So go ahead and ask that question. The Jewish person asks the question. There is no temple. This was so central. It's so important in Torah.
It's so big. Is it just hasn't existed? For most of our history hasn't existed? For the last 2,000 years coincidentally right after Jesus the Messiah comes into the world?
Or is there something to this? I'm not just pointing to a problem. I'm pointing to a divine solution. I'm saying the sacrifices and offerings were always pointing to something better, pointing to something greater, pointing to one. In volume 2 of Answering Jewish Objections to Jesus, I wrote this. I noted these prayers that are prayed. In the 18 benedictions, the Amida, the silent standing prayer, Shemona Esra, which is 18. Be favorable, O Lord our God, toward your people. These are prayed daily multiple times through the week by rabbinic Jews, traditional Jews. Be favorable, O Lord our God, toward your people and toward your people Israel and toward their prayer and restore the service of the Holy of Holies of your temple. The fire offerings of Israel and their prayer, except with love and favor. And may the service of your people always be favorable to you. Wow. Isn't that something? There is a constant prayer for the restoration of the temple.
Traditional Jews say, yeah, because we want to keep all the commandments and we can't. It's important. I get that.
I appreciate that. But there's a void. There is a void. Something is missing. This is also recited daily by traditional Jews. May it be your will, O Lord our God, the God of our forefathers, that you have mercy on us and pardon us for all our errors, atone for us all our iniquities, forgive all our willful sins and that you rebuild the Holy Temple, speedily in our days so that we may offer to the continual offering that it may atone for us as you have prescribed for us in your Torah through Moses, your servant from your glorious mouth, as it is said, then quotes Numbers chapter 28 verses one through eight. So even while saying, God forgive us, there's the prayer for the restoration of the temple.
You do well to say something's missing. You do well as a traditional Jew to say something is wrong with the temple not standing. You do well to say something has been wrong as we have been in exile as a people for almost 2,000 years now. Something has been wrong and even with the rebuilding of the modern state of Israel, still no temple and still largely a non-religious, non-observant nation.
You do well to say something is wrong. What I'm saying is God has provided his solution for us. As Yeshua said, he gives his life as a ransom for all. The blood of Jesus, God's Son cleanses us from all sin. You can know a life without guilt, without inner torment, having been forgiven and freed by the blood of the Messiah, not to do your own will, but now to live to do the will of God. All right, let's get to some of your questions. We'll start in New Mexico. Jordan, you are on the line of fire.
Hey Dr. Brown, how are you? Very well, thank you sir. I just had a question about the atonement and I don't know if you have a specific doctrine or theology upon on it like penal substitution or Christo Victor, but I just wanted to ask this question and my question is, let me, I wrote it down. What does it mean Jesus died for sins if God always forgave sins in the Old Testament, like for example David and Uriah? Yeah, so for sure we do not believe that every time an Israelite sinned they had to go to the temple and offer sacrifice. If that was the case, life could not exist.
Just think of that. If you just had to drive to the gas station and fill your tank with gas every time you thought a wrong thought or every time you were not nice to someone or if you sinned in any way. So there could be no life in Israel. All you'd be doing is going to the temple. There'd be no sacrifices, there'd be no animals.
Life could not exist. Sometimes Christians have that idea that every time you sin you offer sacrifice. That obviously wasn't the case. Sacrifices were for certain purposes, some were devotional, some were for vows, some were signs of consecrating one's life, some were specifically for certain sins committed. But the central right was Yom Kippur every year.
So that remained central. On a national level there was no forgiveness without those rights. But the big question as you ask is, on what basis could God forgive sin if not every sin had a sacrifice offered? The simple answer is that the sacrifices were ultimately pointing to the once for all death of the Messiah. Interesting that there's some Jewish traditions that say even though Isaac didn't die on Mount Moriah in the Akedah, the binding of Isaac in Genesis 22, it was as if he died, as if he shed his blood. And that every sacrifice that was offered subsequently on the altar in Jerusalem was in memory of Isaac based on the merit of what Isaac did. So Isaac's sacrifice empowered the future sacrifices. What I say is, all the blood sacrifices ever offered were pointing to the once and for all sacrifice of the Messiah. And the only reason God ever forgave sin was based on the fact that Messiah would shed his blood.
So it all pointed to that. Just like to this day we're forgiven and cleansed through what he did looking back, Israel would be forgiven and cleansed by God looking ahead to what would take place. I don't like to use the word penal substitution just because it can bring with it certain strict Calvinistic readings of things, but I absolutely believe in substitutionary atonement. I quoted Isaiah 53 6 earlier when Paul speaks of Jesus dying for our sins, when we read of the righteous taking the place of the unrighteous, it's clearly substitution. However, that does not exclude other aspects of atonement like Christus victor.
So I legitimately think there could be both and, and you can find scriptural support for both and because there are different aspects of what the Messiah did. Alright, great question, I appreciate it and very relevant today. We'll get to more calls on the other side of the break and then some sampling, some of the crazy antisemitism out there and if we have time, the truth about UNROC, the truth about this UN organization for refugees, explicitly and exclusively the Palestinian references.
Hopefully we'll have time to get to that as well. This is Michael Ellison, founder of Tributa Wellness. I want you to hear an amazing testimony from my friend James Robison and most all of you will know of him. He and his wife Betty host the Life Today television program. Now here is James. Let me tell you about a miracle I experienced. My friend Michael Ellison, he and his wife are our 40 year plus best friends.
Well, let me just say this to you. I had so much pain with what was called tennis elbow that I could hardly reach over and pick up the phone without pain, without it hurting me. I couldn't pick up something to drink, a glass of tea or anything.
It was very difficult to do anything without wearing a tight strap and then Michael shared the Nopal cactus juice with me, Nopalaya. I began drinking about that much in the morning in a glass and that much later in the day and in three months I was a different person. I have now gone more than 10 years with no pain, not better. Well, I have no joint pain. I am telling you it did something to the inflammation in my body that was undeniable. Now that's just my testimony, but that's been more than 10 years with no pain.
Matter of fact, if I miss for some foolish reason, a few days, I can feel it creeping back that fast. So give it a try. See if it helps relieve your pain. I hope it does like it has mine because it worked for me.
Nopalaya is supported by clinical studies for lowering inflammation and improving mobility, flexibility and range of emotion in the neck, back and joints for less reliance on pain medication and improved quality of life. Call 800-771-5584 and use promo code BROWN25 to receive 25% off your order. As a new customer, 100% of your order goes to support the line of fire.
Call 800-771-5584 or go online to TriVita.org. It's the line of fire with your host, Dr. Michael Brown. Get on the line of fire by calling 866-34-TRUTH.
Here again is Dr. Michael Brown. Thanks for joining us on 30 Jewish Thursdays. We are just days away from Yom Kippur, Day of Atonement. I encourage you again to be praying for God's mercy on the lost sheep of the house of Israel and Jewish people worldwide to discover forgiveness of sins through Jesus, Yeshua the Messiah, something glorious that I discovered almost 53 years ago. Wow, to this moment, every single day, I'm overwhelmed with gratefulness for God's love, patience, mercy towards me, both before He forgave me and saved me and in all the years since.
It's my deepest heartfelt prayer that every Jewish person on the planet might know the fullness of God's love expressed to the utmost through Jesus, Yeshua the Messiah, and experienced new life in Him. Okay, just another reminder for all of our friends listening on the Truth Radio Network. I was at the airport flying out, flying home to Charlotte yesterday, DFW. A woman came up to me and said, hey, I listen on the radio regularly.
I live in Charlotte. So if you have listened for years, between 3.30 and 4 p.m., 16 years now, we've been on daily in almost all that time in this time stretch here on these truth stations. If you've been listening regularly between 3.30 and 4 p.m. Eastern Time, and if you're in Salt Lake City, Utah, wherever else it may be, this half hour will be going away. We will still be daily from 3 to 3.30, but it will not be live call and it will be our teaching, equipping show.
You say, I'm going to miss it. Hey, wherever you subscribe to your podcast, wherever you get your podcast, be it on the Truth Network or on Spotify or on Apple, iTunes, wherever you get them, just subscribe to the Line of Fire, Line of Fire Radio. Come November, it will be officially titled Courage in the Line of Fire. But just go ahead and subscribe to the podcast. This way you'll get it every day. Wherever you get your podcast, subscribe now, it's called Line of Fire Radio.
It'll become Courage in the Line of Fire November. This way you won't miss anything. And in addition, we'll be putting out tons of additional content, wonderful content, wide ranging and without constraints of radio time, tons of content and live chats and everything on our YouTube channel. So if you don't subscribe to our YouTube channel, everybody watching right now, everybody listening, as soon as you have a moment, go to the Line of Fire on YouTube, the Line of Fire and just click subscribe and then click the bell. This way you'll be notified whenever we post something new. Some great sermons of the past will be posting, lengthy interviews will be posting, live chats will be doing, teaching, going through the Hebrew Bible, different things. So we don't want you to miss anything.
We are so excited about some of these transitions. All right, before we go back to the phones, which I'll do momentarily, 866-34-TRUTH, I posted this on X the other day. We'll put on the screen for those watching. This is the diabolical evil of antisemitism. One year, so I posted this on Monday, October 7th, one year after the worst shedding blood, shedding of blood in the modern history of Israel, including gang rapes and the slaughter of children and babies, campus rallies in America celebrate quote the resistance and call for quote a day of rage.
This is sick. So here's what some folks posted in response on X, formerly Twitter. Gandlin said, will you similarly condemn the far right Israeli Jews? Well, which far right Israeli Jews are engaging in gang rapes of women and celebrating this, butchering babies and celebrating this? I have frequently expressed my criticism of far right Jews in the Netanyahu government, like Ben Gevir and Smotrich.
I've expressed my criticism of some of the settlers, the violent settlers in Judea, Samaria, called the West Bank today. I've expressed my difference with them. And when Israel has been guilty of a war crime, allegations of rape of Palestinian prisoners, which not necessarily by far right, call that out, addressed it, Israel will investigate all these things. But you cannot compare, you cannot compare these fringe individuals who are not doing what Hamas did, who are not butchering families, burning them alive.
They're not doing that. Although I don't accept many of their ideologies and some of the things they do, I condemn. You cannot compare the two to respond like that rather than say, oh, of course, this is outrageous wrong. A day after these, one year after these atrocities, people are celebrating, quote, the resistance.
That's sick. That's like celebrating what the Nazis did. Someone else more pointedly posted this fake inside job by CIA Mossad fake Israel. Israel is a terrorist state at the head of human trafficking and overall Marxist degenerates. I mean, this is really sick stuff. This is how vile, this is how evil anti-Semitism is.
This is how perverted it is. You'd be amazed some of the things we pull from social media, we just block people or hide them from our channel because it's so vulgar, so ugly. You can attack me all day long. That's a part of my calling to be attacked in light about. But some of the stuff is so vile and vulgar and ugly, anti-Semitic in the most profane and obscene ways.
We just, we don't allow it on the site. Here, here's a, oh, let's see here. This is a perfect example.
Let me get this a little larger so I can read it. This is a perfect example of how religion has been hijacked by political corruption. Israel today, okay, I'm just going to skip that entirely. How about this one?
This is a pleasant one. About me, the man is Mossad paid agent. He is trying to destroy history reality for Zionists. They just found me out. Man, why did we post that publicly now?
Everybody found out. I'm not just a Mossad agent, I'm a paid Mossad agent. Oh gosh, now no one's going to give to our ministry anymore because the truth came out that I'm a paid Mossad agent. Okay, forgive the sarcasm. But people believe this sick stuff, friends. Why?
Because anti-Semitism, Jew hatred, irrational Jew hatred, demonizing the Jewish people, demonizing the state of Israel. It is diabolical at its roots. Just why people believe such crazy irrational stuff.
I take no offense personally. God have mercy on people that are that deluded. No one believes that. No, they're people who believe it. I interact with them.
They genuinely believe it. May God have mercy. How do we fight it? First and foremost in prayer. It's a spiritual battle. Second, we get out the truth, we get out the truth. Truth will always triumph in the end. Alright, let us go to Alex in Pennsylvania. Welcome to the line of fire.
Hi Dr. Brown. I just wanted to talk about my Jewish question in terms of the law of non-contradiction and Jesus being fully God and fully man. I wanted to get your thoughts on that, in that how can he be both God and man when the law of non-contradiction states that you can't be who you are and who you're not at the same time?
Mm-hmm. So, explain in your view the validity of that law. Obviously, a philosophical observation, hence a law.
But explain it to me in your own words. So basically, with Jesus, the claim is that he's both God and man, so he's both immortal and mortal. He's both knowing and knowing. I mean, he's both knowing and unknowing, and he's both omnipresent and not omnipresent. It's because of his two natures. And as far as I can understand, the law of non-contradiction says that these things are logically untrue, and I think this is why the Jews don't believe that Jesus can be both God and man. Yeah, Alex, thanks for explaining that.
Nicely done. Number one, I would say your average Jewish person hasn't thought it through on that level. They would agree with your argument, they would agree with the statement, but they haven't thought it through on that level, meaning that just the idea of God being a man is impossible, or it's just like if your next-door neighbor claims to be God, it's like, come on, you're my neighbor. You mow your lawn.
I hear you snoring at night. You're not God. So to a Jew, it's like, oh yeah, you're a God who wore diapers, right, sure.
So it seems absurd on the face of it. And then, Numbers 23, 19, God is not a man that he should lie before Samuel 15, you know, the same statement. So that would be rank idolatry. I could on the one hand say all things are possible with God and leave it there, right, but the word does address it in that it says in John 1.14 that the word became flesh. So it is not that all of God ceased to be God and became man, and then somehow the only God in the universe was in a man.
Rather, the word, which is an aspect of God, part of God, God himself, and yet with God, according to John 1, is what became flesh. So the first thing, the larger issue, God was never limited or constrained in himself. The Father still sat enthroned in heaven and still filled the universe with his presence.
The Holy Spirit still was working all over the universe, all over the earth, and the whole universe filled in different ways with God's glory. So God was not diminished in any way, as if he got squeezed into a man and there was no God in the rest of the universe. I know you're not saying that, but I'm just giving the Lord your answer to this first thing.
So it's the word that's made flesh. The second thing, Philippians 2, we see that the Son willingly lays aside his divine prerogatives. So in other words, he does not draw on omnipresence or omnipotence. He willingly lays those things aside, so he constrains himself, while remaining fully God, to not rely on omnipotence or omnipresence. In other words, he was in one place at a time. He didn't know certain things unless they were revealed by the Father.
He had to learn to walk and talk like everybody else. So the answer would be that, just like traditional Judaism or mystical Judaism believes in what's called sin sum, which is divine contraction, because in Jewish thought, God fills everything. Before this creation, everything is God, so where is there room for a universe? So God has to somehow constrict himself, contract himself, to make room for a physical universe. I'm giving this in overly simplified form. In the same way, he constricts himself, contracts himself, to use very human terms for a spiritual operation, takes on human flesh, so while he's fully God, he is not walking in the fullness of all of his divine prerogatives, while being fully human at the same time. So that would be the explanation.
And then the other thing would be to say that there are aspects of the incarnation that are beyond our understanding, just like we all know there had to be something that always was, and yet there had to be a beginning, since mutually contradictory, that we know that God always was, yet that short circuits are minds. Anyway, it's best I can answer the question. I hope that's useful for you. Thank you, sir. This is Michael Ellison, founder of Tributa Wellness. I want you to hear an amazing testimony from my friend, James Robison, and most all of you will know of him. He and his wife, Betty, host the Life Today television program. Now, here is James. Let me tell you about a miracle I experienced. My friend, Michael Ellison, he and his wife are our 40 year plus best friends.
Well, let me just say this to you. I had so much pain with what was called tennis elbow that I could hardly reach over and pick up the phone without pain, without it hurting me. I couldn't pick up something to drink, a glass of tea or anything.
It was very difficult to do anything without wearing a tight strap. And then Michael shared the Nopal cactus juice with me, Nopalaya. I began drinking about that much in the morning in a glass and that much later in the day. And in three months, I was a different person. I have now gone more than 10 years with no pain, not better. Well, I have no joint pain. I'm telling you, it did something to the inflammation in my body that was undeniable.
Now that's just my testimony. But that's been more than 10 years with no pain. Matter of fact, if I miss for some foolish reason, a few days, I can feel it creeping back that fast. So give it a try. See if it helps relieve your pain. I hope it does like it has mine because it worked for me.
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Call 800-771-5584 or go online to TriVita.com. It's the line of fire with your host, Dr. Michael Brown. Get on the line of fire by calling 866-344-TRUTH.
Here again is Dr. Michael Brown. Thanks to our Truth studio playing these great, beautiful Jewish music clips as we are here on Thoroughly Jewish Thursday. If you're not getting our Frontline newsletter, we're putting together the content for the October newsletter now. It is so rich from testimonies to the lead article to the Hebrew word study to excerpts from one of my books and we're going to be talking about the church and the elections.
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Click subscribe. All right, we go back to the phones this time in Texas. Sid, welcome to The Line of Fire. So, Dr. Brown, my question to you is, I came across a video in which there was a Christian apologist and he's known to go to campuses and just like in a circle, Christian, not Christians, but university students just throw questions at him concerning the Bible and Christian history and Christianity and theological questions and stuff like that. Well, a Jewish student came up to him and asked him a question and the question is, she asked him and said, so you're saying the Jewish God is not the same as the Christian God? And his response to her was, yes, the Jewish God is different from the Christian God because Jesus is God and the Jews don't worship Jesus. What is your take on that?
Yeah, so I appreciate anyone that does that, settings like that. So I agree on the one hand, but not totally. So absolutely, if you talk to a Jewish person, especially religious Jew, and say Jew worship Jesus is God, the thought is abhorrent to them. That's rank idolatry to them. As Rabbi Blumenthal said in our dialogue, which folks can watch on our YouTube channel, just search for face to face or Blumenthal, you'll see it.
It's almost four hours long. In his mind, that's another love that they love God. Now you want to introduce another love, or the idea that God is triune father, son, spirit to a Jewish person for a Jew would be idolatrous wrong, a misconception of God different than the God of the Bible. And Jesus did say, as he was rebuking religious leaders, if you knew the father, you would know me.
So on the one hand, what he's saying is true. What this gentleman said is true, that if I say, Jesus, I love you, I praise you, I honor you, I adore you, and I'm saying that speaking to God, to a Jewish person, that would be abhorrent, and they do not recognize Yeshua in any way as included in divine nature. And for them, the Holy Spirit is God's power at work as opposed to an actual being or person. That being said, for sure, when we're reading the Old Testament, and we're talking about the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, we may perceive that God differently, but we're talking about the same God. Muslims, when they're talking about Allah, they're ultimately talking about a different God. There's some intersection with monotheism, but ultimately a different God, not the God of the Bible. In the New Testament, when Jewish people ask Jesus when they're trying to trap him or challenge him and ask him a question and say, okay, what's the greatest commandment?
Love God, although your heart's on one side. We're talking about the same God. Talking about the same God. So I say ultimately, we are talking about the same God, except Jewish people don't fully recognize who the God of the Bible is. A traditional Jew would say we're talking about different gods.
So there's truth to the answer, but I would present it, I'm not arguing with the way he presented it, but I would say that there is, you could present it in a couple of ways. One would say, when you pray to the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, that's the God I'm praying to. We're praying to the same God. However, you don't have a full conception of who that God is. And then that's when they say, well, then it is a different God. So it's true, but it's not true.
Does that make sense? I understand it that way. I just want to get your take on it, because I did see that exchange between you and Rabbi Blumenthal, and it was really great. Very cordial, and very respectful, and I'm really appreciating that done. I'm so glad. The subject deserves it, and the dialogue that Rabbi Blumenthal and I've had for so many years, I'm so glad we could share it on a wider level.
He's pleased with that as well. Hey, thank you so much for the call. 866-34-TRUTH. Okay, before I go back to the phones, let's go over to this thread on X from Amichai Chilki, or Shilki, or Shikli, excuse me.
It's so eye-opening. UNRWA, so the U-N-R-W-A, was meant to operate for only two years, providing assistance to 199,000 Arab refugees in the Gaza Strip from the War of Independence, and about 500,000 additional individuals registered as war refugees. However, unlike millions of war refugees around the world, the Palestinian refugees were given a privilege, so kind of if we can slide down on that scroll down, hopefully we can get some of these graphs in here. However, unlike millions of war refugees around the world, the Palestinian refugees were given a privilege that no other group has ever received. They were given the right to pass down their refugee status to future generations, regardless of their political or economic situation. This made the Palestinians the only group in the world that continues to expand the global refugee population, with 5.9 million Palestinian refugees as of 2023 in Gaza, Jordan, Lebanon, and more.
So from 1950 to 2023, it skyrocketed. Refugees get absorbed in other countries. They don't pass on their refugee status to the next generation and the next and the next. He continues in his thread, to understand just how distorted this organization is, UNRWA employs almost twice as many staff as the UN Refugee Agency, UNHCR. So the number of employees employed by the agency 2023, so UNRWA is roughly 30,000, UNHCR roughly 18,000. But look at this, the number of refugees under the responsibility of the agency in 2023, UNRWA is 5.9 million, the others 59 million.
So they're 10 times as big with slightly over half the number of employees. The eternal refugee status of the Palestinians serves one purpose only, to perpetuate the conflict with Israel and challenge its right to exist through the claim of the right of return. Over the years, ample evidence has been accumulated regarding the use of UNRWA's curriculum, materials and schools for the purpose of spreading antisemitism and hatred, as well as supporting terrorism and an armed struggle against Israel. He says, UNRWA quickly became the spearhead for indoctrinating young Palestinians into a war of annihilation against Israel and the re-establishment of the so-called State of Palestine, all under the guise of a humanitarian organization with the UN seal of approval. Over the years, UNRWA has siphoned billions from European countries, the United States, Canada and others.
I mean, it's extraordinary how much funding it's gotten. It is impossible to understand the eruption of the volcanic hatred we saw on October 7th without understanding the mechanisms of incitement that operated under UNRWA from early childhood through to high school in both formal and informal education, kindergartens, summer camps, elementary schools, high schools and youth movements. And it goes on from there. Tremendously accurate.
Dig in, see for yourself. There have even been UNRWA workers who have been directly associated with complicit in Hamas terrorism. Don't you care about the refugees? The best care would have been those that were willing to stay. The best they would have been that the great majority of the Arab population in 1948 stayed in Israel. Those that did stay have grown from two hundred thousand to two million plus today, an increase of over a thousand percent.
That's ideally what should have happened. And those that either were forced to leave or chose to leave left because of war. They should have then been assimilated by the neighboring Arab Muslim countries, similar culture, similar language as refugees are assimilated around the world. And that's the end of the refugee problem. To exacerbate it, to say now with each generation, it grows in numbers, that your kids are refugees in all different countries around the world. Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, that are home to, quote, Palestinian refugees.
Many living in refugee camps to this day, even in the West Bank and Gaza, you have Palestinian refugee camps within the Palestinian populations. It's abhorrent. This is an ongoing problem, an ongoing blemish, an ongoing sore to delegitimize Israel and to make Israel look bad.
It is that simple. And then to say, well, where do we all go? We have to have a right to return to the land. And if Israel said, OK, everybody comes back, then there is no more Israel. It's the end of Israel. And yet this dream, this myth, this right of return is perpetuated over and over and over and produces false hope, produces frustration, produces anger and is a lie that only hurts Palestinian people from moving forward with a destiny, without the myth of the right to return. People get displaced in war. It's happened over and over through the centuries. But this is the only one where there now exists this eternal so-called right of return. It grieves me for the sake of Palestinian people.
It genuinely does. Certainly many people who have been hurt, have been damaged, have suffered over the years. And certainly Israel has not gotten everything right. But I grieve over the future, the fate of the Palestinian people as well. Continue to pray for God's mercy on their behalf and pray, pray, pray for God's mercy on their behalf and pray, pray, pray for God's mercy on their behalf and pray, pray, pray,
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