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Offline James  
#1 Posted : Wednesday, November 9, 2016 8:50:53 AM(UTC)
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So I was translating Dabariym 10:15 today and found the word choice interesting and thought I would share.

Only and exclusively (raq) in your father’s (ab - male progenitor of an offspring, or male adoptive parent, ancestor) Yahowah attached himself to (chashaq - emphasizes that which attaches to something or someone; in the case of emotions it is that love which is already bound to its object. It should be distinguished from ʾahab “love,” ʾawa “desire, wish,” ḥamad “desire, take pleasure in.”) in order to love ('ahab – close, friendly, and affectionate relationship) them. And He continues to choose to favor (bahar – He desired to select and associate with (scribed in the qal relational stem which conveys reality, imperfect conjugation which speaks of this choice being an ongoing decision)) their descendants (zera’ – seed and offspring) after them (‘ahar) in you from all of the people (‘am – nations) just as this day.

So the word I found most interesting was chashaq. This is the first time I have encountered it, and first glance it just seemed like another word for love, which is how most translators have dealt with it, but I started reading up on it and found that at it's core it is much more, and in the context of the verse it changed a lot. It is telling us not that Yahowah loved their ancestors, but that he attached himself to them, and furthermore that only to them and their descendants did he attach himself. And He did this in order to love them, 'ahab. Without Yahowah's spirit being attached to you, He can not know or love you. So much for God loves everybody.

I also found bahar here being in the imperfect rather interesting since it reinforces that at this point it was not a completed action, and that since the Yahuwdi would go on to reject Him, that He was free to disassociate from them without breaking His word.
Don't take my word for it, Look it up.

“The truth is not for all men but only for those who seek it.” ― Ayn Rand
thanks 3 users thanked James for this useful post.
Fred Snell on 11/11/2016(UTC), Sarah on 11/25/2016(UTC), Tracey Parker on 7/29/2017(UTC)
Offline James  
#2 Posted : Wednesday, November 9, 2016 4:08:57 PM(UTC)
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WOW, I was just going over the whole of the passages I just finished translating and the passage before 10:15 I was having a lot of trouble with so I just translated it as literally as possible and decided to come back to it after I finished the rest and see if I could figure it out. I just got to it in my commentary and it hit me like a ton of bricks.

Look and Behold (chnah) Yahowah your God (eloha), the heavens (shamaiym - that which is lofty, the atmosphere, stars, space and the heavens, presented in the plural form) and heaven of (shamay - that which is lofty, the atmosphere, stars, space and the heavens) the heavens (shamaiym - that which is lofty, the atmosphere, stars, space and the heavens, presented in the plural form and absolute), the land (eretz – land, area or region) and all which relationally (asher) is in her, only and exclusively (raq) in your father’s (ab - male progenitor of an offspring, or male adoptive parent, ancestor) Yahowah attached himself to (chashaq - emphasizes that which attaches to something or someone; in the case of emotions it is that love which is already bound to its object. It should be distinguished from ʾahab “love,” ʾawa “desire, wish,” ḥamad “desire, take pleasure in.”) in order to love ('ahab – close, friendly, and affectionate relationship) them. And He continues to choose to favor (bahar – He desired to select and associate with (scribed in the qal relational stem which conveys reality, imperfect conjugation which speaks of this choice being an ongoing decision)) their descendants (zera’ – seed and offspring) after them (‘ahar) in you from all of the people (‘am – nations) just as this day.

Yahowah is saying that everything in the heavens, physical heavens space, and heaven, the abode of God, and on the land, and everything in them, the only thing He has attached himself to is their ancestors, and to their descendants after them. Since I am translating this as part of the article I am writing on circumcision what screams out to me here is that this completely blows away the argument that these instructions were only for jews and that as gentiles we don't need to be circumcised, what this is saying is that only Yahowah is only bound to Yisrael, and we know from Exodus 12:

And indeed when (wa ky) a guest who is living (guwr) with you (‘eth), and the visitor who is from a different place and culture (ger – a new arrival on a voyage of discovery who has walked away from his own nation and family) acts upon and actively engages in, thereby celebrating (‘asah – assumes as accepts the responsibilities associated with, performs, and benefits from) Pesach / Passover (Pesach) to approach (la – to reach) Yahowah (YaHoWaH), every (kol) male (zakar – man and boy for the purpose of remembering) must be circumcised (muwl) for him to reach this goal (la-w), and for him to approach and present himself (qarab – for him to draw near and be present). And (wa) then, at that time (‘az), he may approach (qarab – draw near) so that (la) he may celebrate, actively engage in, and do this (‘asah – act upon, perform, and profit from this). And then (wa) he shall be (hayah – he shall come to exist) considered the same as (ka – even identical to) a native-born member of the family, grafted and rooted into (‘ezrah – a person who springs from the natural tree with all rights of citizenship [becoming as Yisra’el and Yahuwdym in]) the (ha) land (‘erets – realm).

that in order to benefit from and participate in Passover one must be circumcised to be grafted into Yisrael. The only way for Yahowah to be attached to a gowiym is if they have been grafted into Yisrael, and the only after a male is circumcised does he exist as native born grafted in.

I love when something that I don't understand just all of a sudden fits perfectly. What's funny is that while I began translating this section as part of the article on circumcision I expected it to provide little on the subject of physical circumcision since the only circumcision it speaks of is of the heart, man am I glad I decided to translate the surrounding verse and not just the one I came for. Context is king.
Don't take my word for it, Look it up.

“The truth is not for all men but only for those who seek it.” ― Ayn Rand
thanks 4 users thanked James for this useful post.
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Offline James  
#3 Posted : Thursday, November 10, 2016 8:53:12 AM(UTC)
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If you are interested here is the first draft of what I have for the section containing the verse I sent you earlier. Again first draft I need to do a rewrite of it as some of the most salient points didn't occur to me until I was half way through, but that will have to wait for tomorrow.

Next we find ourselves in Dabariym/Deuteronomy 10 where after giving Moshe the two tablets to carry in the ark of the covenant Yahowah says:

And now Yisrael (yisrael – those who strive with Yahowah) what (mah) Yahowah your God (eloha) asks (sa’al – inquires and requests) from amongst you except (kiy’im – but rather, but if) to respect and revere (yare – show high status and honor to) Yahowah your God (eloha), to walk (halak – walk a path, to travel, to make linear motion) in all (kol) His path (derek – the way and route) and to love (ahab – have affection based on a close relationship) Him and to work (abad – expend energy in a task) with (et) Yahowah your God (eloha) with all (kol) your heart (leb - inner being, mind and understanding, heart and soul, knowledge and thinking, reflections and memories, inclinations and resolutions, your conscience and moral character, your emotions and passions) and with all your soul (nephesh - life), to be observant of (shamar– to pay attention to, to closely examine and carefully consider everything in) Yahowah’s terms and conditions of His binding contract (mitswah – His authorized directions and written instructions) and His clearly communicated prescription of what you should do (choq – as an inscribed thought and engraved recommendation) which relationally (asher) I instructed and directed (sawah – guidance, instruction, teaching, and direction) you this day concerning your benefit (towb – your good, your favor, your healing, your pleasure, your joy, and that which causes you to be loved, to become acceptable, and to endure). Look and Behold (chnah) on behalf of (la) Yahowah your God (eloha) to the heavens (shamaiym - that which is lofty, the atmosphere, stars, space and the heavens, presented in the plural form) and heaven of (shamay - that which is lofty, the atmosphere, stars, space and the heavens) the heavens (shamaiym - that which is lofty, the atmosphere, stars, space and the heavens, presented in the plural form and absolute), to the land (eretz – land, area or region) and all which relationally (asher) is in her, only and exclusively (raq) in your father’s (ab - male progenitor of an offspring, or male adoptive parent, ancestor) Yahowah attached himself to (chashaq - emphasizes that which attaches to something or someone; in the case of emotions it is that love which is already bound to its object. It should be distinguished from ʾahab “love,” ʾawa “desire, wish,” ḥamad “desire, take pleasure in.”) in order to love ('ahab – close, friendly, and affectionate relationship) them. And He continues to choose to favor (bahar – He desired to select and associate with (scribed in the qal relational stem which conveys reality, imperfect conjugation which speaks of this choice being an ongoing decision)) their descendants (zera’ – seed and offspring) after them (‘ahar) in you from all of the people (‘am – nations) just as this day. And Circumcise the foreskin of your heart (muwl arlah at’tem lebab - commit oneself to a behavior or relationship) and do not harden your necks (‘araph et’tem la qasah – do not be stubborn, do not be unyielding and resisting in an event, or lack humility) again (‘owd – a subsequent point in time involving repetition). (Dabariym/Deuteronomy 10:12-16)

There is a lot to consider here, above and beyond what this tells us about circumcision. First and foremost, this is a list of things which Yahowah has asked of Yisrael, those who strive with and endure with God. The first thing on this list is that we should respect and revere Yahowah. In most translations you will find that instead of respect and revere they have opted the darker toned fear, and while fear is a valid translation of yare in some context when it is used concerning those Yahowah loves and wants to love Him, it is never appropriate. You cannot love that which you fear, you cannot enjoy a relationship when fear is in the mix. This should go without saying but given the ubiquitous use of the word God-fearing it apparently can’t.
As luck would have it while I was translating these verse, a multi-day process, I happened to catch a classic episode of The Twilight Zone called It’s a Good Life. Even if you are not a fan of the show chances are you are aware of the premise of this episode as it is has been referenced, copied and parodied many times. In it a young boy is essentially omnipotent, and with the attitude of a small child. The people in the boy’s life live in a constant state of fear knowing that if they upset the boy he can and will punish them severely. Every one of them says over and over they love him because they fear him, but none of them, not even his parents, truly love him. The episode is actually one of my favorites because to me it illustrates the christain religious god perfectly, the god who says love me or I will see to it that you burn in hell for all eternity. Everyone is afraid to say they don’t love him out of fear, but in their hearts they don’t.
Considering this passage goes on to speak of loving Yah and Yah loving, the use of fear here is completely unappropriated. Yare is one of the words that when I first started translating I hated, but have come to love. Because it has dual meanings which are opposite it was initially hard to translate, but I have since come to love these words because they convey so much information. Yare is respect and revere or fear equally and simultaneously depending on the perspective of the reader. If you are seeking Yahowah’s Covenant then you are respecting and revering Him, but if you are opposed to Yahowah and His Covenant then you should fear him.

Moving on after instructing us that we should respect and revere Yahowah it tells us how we do this, which is by walking His derek, path. What is His path you might ask. His path is broadly speaking the Towrah, but more specifically the path to Yahowah is through his 7 mo’ed miqray, or called out assemblies. I will eventaually have an article on this site explaining these, but for now know that they are Passover, the doorway which eliminates the consequence of sin, death, Matsah, which eliminates the penalty of sin, separation from Yah, Bikuriym, which adopts us into Yah’s family, Shabuwah, which empowers us for, Taruwah, where we shout for joy and signal a warning, Kippuriyum, were His family is reconciled to Him, and Sukah, were we campout with Yah for all eternity.

Next Yahowah tells us we should love Him and to work with Him. We have already discussed love in relation to fear, but worth noting still is that love requires choice, we must choose to love Yahowah, He cannot compel or coerce it, which is why the traditional heaven/hell only view is impossible. The carrot and stick of heaven and hell is coercion. He has also instructed us here to work with Him, work here is ‘abad and means to expend energy on a task. Having a relationship with Yahowah is not a passive thing. No relationship worth having is passive, could you imagine a passive marriage where you don’t expend energy with your spouse, you don’t talk, you don’t do anything together, you just are? Such a relationship would be excoriatingly boring and unproductive, now imagine it for all eternity. A relationship is active; it must be to be productive. How do we work with Yahowah? Simple, by doing what we are doing right now, examining His Word. Rather it is translating and commenting on His Word like I am doing, or reading this and thinking and dwelling on it as you are, we are both currently engaged and working with Yah.

And He said that we should do this with all of our heart and all of our soul. The concept of heart in Ancient Hebrew is very different from the concept of heart in modern English. Today we tend to think of the heart as the seat of emotions, we would say someone put their heart into to convey that something was emotionally moving or that someone took great care and effort out of love. And while the Ancient Hebrew understanding would incorporate that to a degree, it was much more than that. Heart conveyed the inner being, the mind and understanding, it was said to be the seat of judgment, it spoke of knowledge and thinking, of reflections and memories, of inclinations and resolutions, of your conscience and moral character, your emotions and passions. To do something with all your heart was to take it and make it a part of you at the deepest level, to let it define you.

Yahowah then instructs us to be observant, shamar, of his terms and conditions, and of his clearly communicate prescriptions of what we should do. This speaks to our topic as Yahowah clearly communicated His view on circumcision in Ba’reshiyth/Genesis 17. Circumcision was a term and condition for benefiting form and participating in Passover as we saw in Shemowth/Exodus 12. This entire article is dedicated to shamar, closely examining and carefully considering one of Yahowah’s mitswah, terms and conditions of His binding contract, and His choq, clearly communicate prescriptions of what we should do.

He then tells us that these mitswah and choq are for our towb, our benefit, and our good. They are for our favor, our healing, our pleasure, our joy, and that they cause us to be loved, to become acceptable, and to endure. Yahowah’s instructions and prescriptions are for our benefit not His. We can choose to shamar them or we can choose to ignore them. We ignore them at our own peril. Later in this article we will discuss how circumcision is for our benefit both physically and spiritually.

Then He tells us to look at everything, the sky, the heavens, the land and everything in it, and that exclusively of everything Yahowah choose to attach himself and bind himself to their ancestors. Verse 14 is a perfect example of why you should not trust the verse counting. There were no verses in the original text and the verse labeling is completely arbitrary. Verse 15 here is a direct continuation of 14, and 14 makes no sense without 15. When I came to verse 14 and tried to translate it I confused and unsure what was intended by it, so I translated it as literally as possible with the intention of coming back to it and examining it in context of the whole, which is what I did. Once I came back to it and examined it in light of the rest of the sentence it not only makes perfect sense it expounds on and intensifies 15.

Let’s examine this now. He says to look on behalf of Yahowah your God to the heavens, in this context meaning the sky and stars and universe outside of Earth, and to the heaven of heavens, this is speaking of the abode of God or the spiritual realm, and to the land and to everything which is in it. English translations are want to add the word “belongs” into this verse to make it make sense on its own making it say that these belong to Yahowah, but there is no word for belongs anywhere in the passage, but if you view it as the first part of the sentence with verse 15 being the conclusion we see that Yahowah is saying that of everything in the heavens, universe, heaven, the spiritual realm, and the earth that raq, only and exclusively, Yahowah chashaq their ancestors.

Chashaq is another word which is universally mistranslated leading to misunderstanding and missed opportunity. If you look in most any English translation it will say that the LORD desired their ancestors or loved their ancestors or set his affection on their ancestors or devoted to or committed himself to them, but that is not what chashaq means. If Yah had intended love or delight he would have used ‘ahab as he does a few words latter, same with showing affection or desiring them. If he intended commit or dedicate he would have used chanukkah. So what then does chashaq mean? The Theological Word Book of the Old Testament tells us it is used to emphasize that which attaches to something or someone; in the case of emotions it is that love which is already bound to its object. It should be distinguished from ʾahab “love,” ʾawa “desire, wish,” ḥamad “desire, take pleasure in.” Vocalized, something which was not done in the original text, slightly differently it means to bonds or joints for binding. The Greek Hebrew and Chaldean Lexicon of the Old Testament tells us that it is to join together, the attach or to adhere. The Enhanced Brown-Driver-Briggs Hebrew and English Lexicon tells us it is to be attached or pressed together. So with all that we can say that the word speaks at its core about strongly binding together and attaching something. In this case chashaq is being used to tell us that Yahowah bound and strongly attached himself exclusively to their ancestors and their descendants after them.

Before we continue I have a confession to make. When I turned to this verse I expected to find little pertaining to the topic of physical circumcision since the only mention of circumcision in this passage was of the heart, but since this is Yahowah speaking I decided to translate the whole passage in context to see what more there was too it, and while I found the part about Yah’s mitswah and choq to be very useful in my argument, it was the realization of the meaning of chashaq that really made me glad I translated this because what I am about to explain next ties this verse into the whole of the article and makes my argument for me better than I ever could.

That said let me explain what I mean. Chashaq here in conjunction with raq, only and exclusively, completely destroys the Christian notion that God’s promises to the Jews have been moved to the Gentiles. It completely destroys the idea that the Towrah instructions are only for Jews and don’t apply to gentiles. It completely destroys every argument that is made against the necessity of circumcision and puts yet another nail into Paul’s coffin. Raq and chashaq here tells us that Yahowah is EXCLUSIVLY and ONLY attached to Yisra’el at the exclusion of everyone and everything else in the universe, the planet and the spiritual realm. So where does that leave us gentiles who desire to be a part of Yahowah’s family? The answer is in the Exodus verse we discussed earlier:

And indeed when a guest who is living with you, and the visitor who is from a different place and culture acts upon and actively engages in, thereby celebrating Pesach / Passover to approach Yahowah, every male must be circumcised for him to reach this goal, and for him to approach and present himself. And then, at that time, he may approach so that he may celebrate, actively engage in, and do this. And then he shall be considered the same as a native-born member of the family, grafted and rooted into the land.

There you have it, if you want to be part of Yahowah’s family, if you want to have Yahowah attached and bound to you, then you must be circumcised and benefit from Yahowah’s Passover and thus be grafted in to and be considered the same as the native born. Everyone who is not in this group is excluded. I could end this article here, but we will continue.

Also worth noting here is that He attached Himself to them in order to love them. This reaffirms that Yahowah’s desire is to love and be loved, and tells us that He can only love those who have availed themselves of His plan. The idea that God loves everyone is wrong, in fact God tells us that He does not even know everyone. In order for God to love them He had to attach himself to them, and they had to avail themselves of His plan. This is reaffirmed with the next word, bahar.

Bahar tells us that Yahowah choose to favor them, but more importantly we learn from examining the finer points of Hebrew that it is scribed in the qal relational stem which conveys reality, and the imperfect conjugation which speaks of this choice being an ongoing decision. The imperfect speaks of events as ongoing and unfinished, by using it here it tells us that God can cease choosing and favoring them, which we know he does when they cease to avail themselves of His Towrah. Remember earlier Yah spoke of the terms and conditions of a binding contract, a contract is binding on both parties and has terms and conditions for both parties, if we break our end of the contract Yahowah is not required to follow through with His. So while He is exclusively attached to Yisrael, He does not have to stay attached to everyone descended from them.

Finally, we come to the phrase that brought us here to begin with muwl arlah at’tem lebab. You will notice that I translated it as a phrase instead of word for word as I normally do. The reason for this is that it is a figure of speech, and must be examined as a whole. I say this because to translate it word for word would make it redundant and incoherent it would literally read cut off and remove the foreskin of the penis foreskin of your heart, arlah would be redundant and there is no verb applied to at’tem lebab. So recognizing this is a figure of speech let’s examine it. Muwl speaks of cutting off and removing the excess and unneeded foreskin, something which can also be a liability, we will discuss this when we speak of the health benefits of circumcision. Arlah speaks again of the foreskin. At’tem Lebab means literally of your heart, but as we discussed earlier heart had a much deeper meaning in the language of Yah, read above. So all together the phrase tells us to cut off and remove the excess and unneeded, even detrimental portion of our inner most being, of our mind and inclinations of our conscience and of our way of being.
And the verse ends with telling us to no longer or never again ‘araph et’tem la qasah, harden our necks, to not be stubborn, to not be unyielding and resisting in an event, or lack humility. Be willing to admit when you are wrong, and follow the evidence to where it leads you.

The main point I intended to make when we went into this was that circumcision is once again being portrayed as a positive and necessary thing albeit of the heart in this verse and not necessarily of the flesh, but what we found in the verse preceding this was a much greater affirmation of our thesis, as well as a great insight into what Yahowah desires of us.
Don't take my word for it, Look it up.

“The truth is not for all men but only for those who seek it.” ― Ayn Rand
thanks 2 users thanked James for this useful post.
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Offline Sarah  
#4 Posted : Friday, November 25, 2016 10:02:15 PM(UTC)
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What is the website you started? Yahowahs Beyrith? I can't seem to access it.
Offline James  
#5 Posted : Monday, November 28, 2016 9:57:33 AM(UTC)
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Don't take my word for it, Look it up.

“The truth is not for all men but only for those who seek it.” ― Ayn Rand
thanks 1 user thanked James for this useful post.
Fred Snell on 11/29/2016(UTC)
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