"Stranger still, the ancient religion of the Jews survives, when all the religions of every ancient race of the pre-Christian world have disappeared. Again it is strange that the living religions of the world all build on the religious ideas derived from the Jews" - The Ancient World, Professor T.R. Glover

"According to the materialistic and positivist criterion, this people ought to have perished long ago. It's survival is a mysterious and wonderful phenomenon demonstrating that the life of this people is governed by a special predetermination..."
- The Meaning of History, Professor Nicholas Berdkilaev of the Moscow Academy of Spiritual Culture

"It was Judaism that brought the concept of a God-given universal moral law into the world...the Jew carries the burden of God in history and for this he has never been forgiven" - Distinguished Catholic Scholar Edward H. Flannery

Fact: Judaism is the only religion in the world that lost its holy land and has regained it.

Tuesday, July 13, 2010

God's Name: The Original

Ones belief can be found in the name of their God / god(s). One of the questions I like asking Trinitarian Christians is "what is the single most personal name of your one god?" Yahweh, 1 the God of the Jews, is the oldest and most original Name of the monotheistic concept of God. However, you will never hear His Name in Christian or Islamic worship. Both Christianity and Islam seek to change and avoid this most personal Name of God in an attempt to shape their newer religion on a much older established religion of which they are founded.

With their God having a name change Christianity and Islam took on different ways from the original in worshiping their God. For example, if your God's most personal Name was indeed Yahweh then you are associated with keeping of the Torah. If your God's most personal name is Jesus Christ or Allah, then Torah worship has been abolished and different methods (i.e. Gentile methods) of worshiping are set into place.

The following is a small list of things that has accommodated the changing of God's Name:
  • The Headquarters of the Religion - While Judaism's eternal city has and always will be Jerusalem, Israel (The City of David) Christianity's headquarter is in Rome, Italy and Islam's is in Mecca, Saudi Arabia.
  • The Language of the Holy Books - While Judaism's Bible was originally written in mostly Hebrew (with a little Aramaic) Christianity's scriptures are written in Greek (including their Hebrew scripture portion - 'The Septuagint') and Islam's Koran is written in Arabic.
  • War in the name of God - While Jews has never sought the annihilation of Christians nor Muslims, Jewish annihilation has been a "main goal" of both Christianity and Islam ever since those religion held influence in world power.
The fact that Christianity and Islam's holy books (the New Testament and the Koran) do not carry the most original and direct Name of the God of Israel on which they are founded is quite amazing given the fact that in just the Torah alone 70 exact times the God of Israel declares "I (am) YHVH". Where is such a direct declaration of God's Name given by God Himself found anywhere within the New Testament or the Koran?

For Christianity, the name "Jesus" replaces the originally declared Name of YHVH.2 Some will argue that Jesus' name contains the name of YHVH thereby proving the Name of YHVH throughout the Christian text. The list of refuting such a claim is as follows:
  • Jesus' name in Hebrew though starting with the Hebrew letter yod (as does the Name YHVH) is NOT linked to the Hebrew verb "to be" as is the Name of YHVH.
  • Biblical Hebrew uses a three-letter root system for verbs that are contained in common everyday names (not religiously sanctified names). Therefore, common Hebrew everyday names such as Jeshua (pronounced "ya-ho-shua") found in such texts as Ezra 2:36, and the name Joshua (see KJV and Darby translations of Hebrews 4:8) are linked to God's attribute of deliverance and salvation - making an attribute of God - via the verb contained within the common name being the main focus, and not the reference of the Name of God itself.
  • The name Isaiah (pronounced "ya-sha-yahu") meaning "Salvation of YAH" could have been no more the declared Name of God spoken in the Holy of Holies on the Day of Atonement by the High Priest than could the name of Jesus (ya-ho-shua).
  • Men were not named YHVH throughout the ages because that Name is so special it would be like making mortal man the deity of YHVH - making the bearer of that Name a "carrier" of God's Name in vain. While the name of Jesus was very common in first century Israel - Josephus cites 20 other Jesuses within his works - and today Latin countries are full of people named Jesus (hay-zues).
  • YHVH was the Name chosen and declared by God Himself to be His Name to the nation of Israel in the earth and of Israel's God abiding heaven forever. (Exodus 3:14-15) This concept of the Torah did not leave the mind of the Hebrew prophet Zachariah centuries later when he prophesied of the future: "YHVH will be the King over all the earth, on that day YHVH will be one and His Name one." (Zachariah 14:9)
For Islam, the name Allah replaces the Name of YHVH while claiming to be the same God (see Koran 29:46). Muslims point to Allah being the same God as Elohim, Eloah, or Elah (in Aramaic) in the Hebrew Bible. The list of refuting such a claim is as follows:
  • Anytime El, Eloah, Elah, or Elohim are used within the Hebrew Bible they are used as an appellation3 or title - never as the most personal Name of the Hebrew God of Israel.
  • The most personal Name of YHVH is used throughout the Hebrew Bible no less than 6828 times - three times more than the appellations El, Eloah, Elah, or Elohim added together!
  • The Name YHVH has never been used as a name for a false god(s) in the history of mankind nor is it used for a false god(s) anywhere in the Hebrew Bible. However, on the other hand, all three appellations of El, Eloah, Elah, and Elohim can and have indeed been used throughout history and the Hebrew Bible in references for false deities, god(s), and carved heathenistic idols. Fact: the Canaanite pantheon of gods included the chief god "El" being the father of all gods and husband to the goddess Asherah and biblical references of false god(s) and idols include: Exodus 20:3 (Elohim) II Chronicles 32:15 (Eloah) and Daniel 11:37-38 (Elah - written in Aramaic).
  • The Hebrew prophets usage of El, Eloah. Elah, and Elohim, as false deities would have at the time directly included the many pagan deities "Ilah" (a term for a single god in Arabic) worshiped at the Arabian Kaaba in Mecca as well as the chief pagan moon deity "Allah" who had a daughter named "Al-lot" (the famine pronunciation version of masculine Allah).
  • In keeping the Arabian pagan moon deity tradition, Muhammad kept this name of this pagan moon deity "Allah" meaning, "the (pagan) god" of which his very own Arabian father Abdulla4 (meaning 'servant of Allah' - the pagan moon deity) was so named. This was also done early to make it easier for the pagan Arabians (who were totally unfamiliar with the Name YHVH) to convert to a new religion towards a deity reference and name they were already religiously familiar with. We have seen the same workings within Catholicism in adopting December 25th. as Jesus' New Testament birthday when December 25th. was indeed the Roman pagan deity Attis' and Greek pagan deity Dionysus' birthday.
  • As mentioned above the Hebrew Bible proclaims the most personal Name of the God of Israel YHVH nearly 7,000 times! Seventy (70) times within the Torah and ninety (90) times throughout the writings of the prophets God declares of Himself with the absolute and direct words "I am YHVH" yet not even once did Mohammad (being the false prophet he is) gave credence to this most personal Name of the God of Israel.
Since Islam apologists point to first century Jesus using his Aramaic term "Eloah" when referring to his God, it must be pointing out that at the very exact time when Jesus referred to his God as Eloah in Aramaic the Arabians referred to their chief deity moon-god "Allah" in Arabic. The bottom-line being, Jesus' referral to his God and the original Arabian referral to their god may sound similar but are indeed two totally different gods all together, in which this principle has NOT changed since the birth of Islam!

In Antiquity the gods were very much connected with the land.5 This was the main reason YHVH wanted any and all forms of worship to other gods driven out of the Land of Promise! (see Numbers 33:52-53) Guess what? To the disapproval of the New World Order Quartet, YHVH hasn't changed His mind on this issue. YHVH being connected to the land was why Israel was never blessed outside the land of Israel and it was a punishment-exile to have to lived outside the land of Israel.

The connection between the Name of YHVH, the Torah, the Jewish Hebrew people, and the Land of the Covenant - Israel are forever spiritual linked together! On several occasions within the Hebrew Bible YHVH calls Israel, " My Land" (see Ezekiel 36:5, 38:16, Joel 3:2). Because of this eternal fact, and because of the new concept of the God of Israel among the Gentiles was sought, both Christianity and Islam has dramatically changed the spiritual foundation set by YHVH Himself. Even today, the New World Order Quartet is set against the Jewish State of Israel via the Israeli - Palestinian Conflict has its historical foundation in the prophesied Esau and Ishmael (Christian and Islam) alliance against YHVH:
  • The Name of YHVH changed to Jesus or Allah.
  • Chosen (Jewish) People-nation to be the Christians or Muslims.
  • Subverted the Torah / Hebrew Scriptures for the New Testament or the Koran.
  • Changed the promised Land of Israel to a Heavenly Jerusalem or a Muslim Waqf.
All of these spiritual changes are the most direct root cause of, but not limited to, the historic Christian Crusades, Inquisitions, Pogroms, Holocaust, and Islamic Jewish-murder and banishment of the Arabian Jewish tribes, Jihad Jewish civilian-targeted terrorism, and the present Quartet do-nothing endorsement of the Hamas-Ahmadinejad alliance!

In the eyes of the world's Gentile-spiritual changers, the Name of YHVH must be abolished spiritually in order to justify their replacement theology of the chosen land of promise and of the chosen Jewish people and their covenant with YHVH their God. As I have stated in past blogs, the purposed of the New World Order Quartet "Palestinian state" is nothing more than a spiritual-sought "replacement-theology state" with Jewish King David's Jerusalem as it spiritual "replacement-theology capital". The world Quartet has picked the most evil people of the world for the "replacement people" to occupy the land of the covenant that is meant to sanctify the name of YHVH!

The good prophecy news is this will never happen for any length of time. It is in the most bleakest hour that the Name of YHVH will come forth for all the Gentile world to see:
"And I will send a fire on Magog, and among them that dwell carelessly in the isles: and they shall know that I am YHVH. So will I make My Holy Name known in the midst of My people Israel; and I will not let them pollute My Holy Name any more: and the Gentiles shall know that I am YHVH, the Holy One in Israel." - Ezekiel 39:6-7

Notes:
1. The way it is commonly spelled in today's English is not how I believe this Name was pronounced by the ancient Israelites. For the truer pronunciation, I refer to James D. Tabor's book entitled "Restoring Abrahamic Faith" section "Pronouncing the Name of God" pages 18-23. [Click on the image of this book on this site for ordering]
2. Philippians 2:10 - This New Testament verse is referring to the Hebrew text of Isaiah 45:23. However when reading in the original Hebrew the surrounding text to get the context and true meaning of Isaish 45:23, one will notice that just two verses prior (verse 21) and the following two verses after (verses 24-25) the declaration of "The Name" that Isaiah is referring!
3. Concerning in title "Elohim" I always start out asking the Muslim apologist what the English term "appellation" means before addressing the "Name of God" issue.
Wordnet Dictionary states that an appellation as an: "identifying word or words by which someone or something is called and classified or distinguished from others". To refer to God as God (Elohim in Hebrew) is simply to acknowledge Him as God. It does not and in no way state, refer, or acknowledge His most personal Name no more than calling me a "man" or "human" addresses my personal name of "Joe".
4. Abdullah ibn ‘Abdul Muttalib was Mohammad's father. Mohammad's full name was "Muhammad ibn Abdallah" - meaning "Mohammad son of Abdullah".
5.
See Joshua 24:15, Judges 6:10, 2 Samuel 7:23.

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