3When Judas, who had betrayed him, saw that Jesus was condemned, he was seized with remorse and returned the thirty silver coins to the chief priests and the elders. 4"I have sinned," he said, "for I have betrayed innocent blood."
"What is that to us?" they replied. "That's your responsibility." 5So Judas threw the money into the temple and left. Then he went away and hanged himself. 6The chief priests picked up the coins and said, "It is against the law to put this into the treasury, since it is blood money." 7So they decided to use the money to buy the potter's field as a burial place for foreigners. 8That is why it has been called the Field of Blood to this day. 9Then what was spoken by Jeremiah the prophet was fulfilled: "They took the thirty silver coins, the price set on him by the people of Israel, 10and they used them to buy the potter's field, as the Lord commanded me."

18(With the reward he got for his wickedness, Judas bought a field; there he fell headlong, his body burst open and all his intestines spilled out. 19Everyone in Jerusalem heard about this, so they called that field in their language Akeldama, that is, Field of Blood.)

“Yahuweh’s (YaHuWeH’s) Towrah (towrah – law and prescriptions for living) is complete and entirely perfect (tamym – without defect, lacking nothing, correct, sound, genuine, right, helpful, healthful, beneficial, and true), returning, restoring, and transforming (suwb – turning around) the soul (nepesh – consciousness). Yahuweh’s testimony is trustworthy and reliable (‘aman – verifiable, confirming, supportive, and establishing), making understanding and obtaining wisdom (hakam – educating and enlightening oneself to the point of comprehension) simple for the open-minded.” (Psalm 19:7)

Yahweh said that the crime of diminishing the use of His name was punishable by death and separation (in Leviticus 24:9-16), whereas the Rabbis said that the use of Yahweh’s name was a crime punishable by death. It is why Rabbis replaced Yahweh’s name with "Lord," under the guise that it was "too sacred to say."

Leviticus 24:9-16 (New Living Translation)

9 The loaves of bread will belong to Aaron and his descendants, who must eat them in a sacred place, for they are most holy. It is the permanent right of the priests to claim this portion of the special gifts presented to the Lord.”

An Example of Just Punishment

10 One day a man who had an Israelite mother and an Egyptian father came out of his tent and got into a fight with one of the Israelite men. 11 During the fight, this son of an Israelite woman blasphemed the Name of the Lord[a] with a curse. So the man was brought to Moses for judgment. His mother was Shelomith, the daughter of Dibri of the tribe of Dan. 12 They kept the man in custody until the Lord’s will in the matter should become clear to them. 13 Then the Lord said to Moses, 14 “Take the blasphemer outside the camp, and tell all those who heard the curse to lay their hands on his head. Then let the entire community stone him to death. 15 Say to the people of Israel: Those who curse their God will be punished for their sin. 16 Anyone who blasphemes the Name of the Lord must be stoned to death by the whole community of Israel. Any native-born Israelite or foreigner among you who blasphemes the Name of the Lord must be put to death.

According to God, doing these things is a sin. He said so in Leviticus: "Speak to the children of Israel, saying: ‘Whoever curses (qalal) his God shall bear his sin. And whoever blasphemes (naqab) the name of Yahuweh shall surely be put to death. All the congregation shall stone him, the stranger as well as him who is born in the land. When he blasphemes (naqab) the name of Yahuweh, he shall be put to death." (Leviticus 24:15-16) Yahuweh is being very specific here. Anyone who speaks lightly of God (Hebrew Elohim, the general designation for deity), anyone who would make God an insignificant part of his or her life or diminish Him in their minds, has sinned and will face the consequence of their error. By refusing to take God seriously, they "shall bear (literally lift or carry) their chet, crimes or offenses."
Blasphemy (naqab), however, is an extremely grave offense, an unforgivable act that leads directly to death. Naqab, means: "to violently pierce a person’s hand, to strike them through and cause pain" which is precisely what the Jews did to their Messiah. Naqab also means "to libel or slander," and thus when used in reference to Yahuweh, naqab is equivalent to shaw - meaning the preaching or advocacy of false teaching, politics, or religion concerning God. Being religious in opposition to Yahweh - libeling Him in writing or slandering Him verbally, is seen as an act of extreme violence that leads to death.
This penalty was to be carried out by "the congregation," that is, the children of Israel in their theocratic assembly. The instructions were delivered to Yisra’el at the time and place of revelation. So don’t get carried away. While Yahuweh will enforce His death penalty on those who substituted Constantine’s religion for Yahushua’s relationship, those who etched His name out of His Scriptures and relaced it with Baal’s, and those who replaced His perscriptions with the laws those found in the Talmud and Catachisms, we are not to stone such false teachers. Instead, we can kill the message and crucify the messenger by exposing and repudiating them. We can shine the light of truth on the darkness of their deceptions.
But most importantly, the lesson is clear. The difference between qalal and naqab is that of spiritual indifference vs. false teaching. The first merely hurts us; the second kills all those around us - something Yahuweh cannot tolerate.
There is one more passage worthy of our consideration on this subject. "I am Yahuweh. You shall not profane (chalal - pierce, wound, cause to die, or defile, taint, besmirch, sully, tarnish, and corrupt) My Set Apart (qodesh) name." (Leviticus 22:31-32) Yahuweh’s name was pierced when Yahushua was nailed to the pole. It is defiled when it is replaced with LORD, and it is besmirched, sullied, tarnished and corrupted by the religious revisions of men. God does not want us to do those things.
Hosea concludes the 12th chapter on theme: "But by a prophet Yahuweh lifted up Yisra’el from Mitsrayim (the crucible and/or Egypt). And by a prophet he was kept safe, cared for and preserved. Ephraim has provoked to bitter sorrow and grieving, so the Master (‘adonay) will forsake (natash - reject, abandon, cease having a relationship with, desert, leave) him. His bloodguilt (dam - death) is on him. I will return his reproach (cherpah - contempt, scorn, insults, taunts, and slurs)." (Hosea 12:13-14)
Ephraim, representing ten of Yisra’el’s twelve tribes, had been rejected by Yahuweh for the crime of shaw’. It would lead to the spiritual death of the nation.

Thanks, James.

And you always seem to succeed.
So, thanks.

A Fortuitous Discovery of Ebionite Writings?

Or is that all that we now have from the Ebionites? Did the world recently discover a treasure trove of their writings from which we can objectively measure their orthodoxy? A good argument has been recently made by Professor Eisenman in James: The Brother of Jesus that we have recovered some of the Ebionites’ writings among the Dead Sea Scrolls. How so? Many of the sectarian works at the Dead Sea are written by a group who in Hebrew call themselves the Ebyonim or Ebion—The Poor. They even describe themselves as the “Congregation of the Poor.”4 The Poor of the Dead Sea Scrolls (DSS) claimed to be followers of “The Way,” part of “The New Covenant” who found the “Messiah” who is called the “Prince of the Congregation” and “Teacher of Righteousness.” He is gone, killed at the urging of the priests at Jerusalem. After the departure of the Messiah (who will return), the temporal leader who led the Poor was called the Just One, i.e., Zaddik in Hebrew. Furthermore, their leader—the Zaddik—is in a struggle against the “Spouter of Lies” who seeks to seduce the New Covenant community from following the Law of Moses. The Poor (Ebion) reject the idea Habakkuk 2:4 means justification is by faith and insist its meaning is “justification by faithfulness.” The DSS Ebion have two works called “Justification by Works” which reaffirm their rejection of the position of the “Spouter of Lies.”

When we compare the Ebion of the Dead Sea Scrolls to what Eusebius describes as the Ebionites, the similarities are striking. The Christian sect of Ebionites seem to match the writings of the Poor (Ebyonim, Ebion) whose writings were found at the Dead Sea site of Qumram. These Dead Sea Scrolls (DSS) reflect ideas and thoughts that are unmistakably Christian.5 The question is whether the writings of The Poor found at Qumram pre-date or post-date Christ.

Unfortunately, this cannot be done by carbon dating the papers found at the Dead Sea. Such dates only tell us the date of the age of the paper. Carbon dating can not tell us the date of the writing on the paper. Yet, we have other reliable means to identify the date of the activity of the people whose writings were preserved at Qumram. Fifty-seven to sixty-nine percent of all the coins in the Dead Sea caves are from the period 44-69 A.D.—part of the Christian era. Thus, the only way to know whether Christians or non-Christians wrote these writings is to study the words on the pages of the DSS. Professor Eisenman finds significant proof the Dead Sea Ebyonim is a Christian group. For example, in the DSS, the temporal ruler of the Ebion who succeeds the killed Messiah (who will return) is called the Zaddik. Numerous ancient sources outside the DSS identify James the Just (the brother of Jesus) as The Zaddik. Translated, this means Just One. Jerome by the 400s will call him James the Just. In Christian writings of that era, the name of James was rarely used. He was merely called the Zaddik or Just One.6 As we saw previously, James—the Zaddik—was the first bishop of Jerusalem after Jesus’ resurrection.7 So is it then mere coincidence that the head of the Ebion of the Dead Sea Scrolls is called the Zaddik? Of course not. Professor Eisenman appears to have stumbled upon a major discovery.

If Professor Eisenman is correct, this means the Ebionites in Eusebius’ writings are the Jerusalem Church under James. What Professor Eisenman then notes to corroborate this idea is that Paul refers twice to sending money to the poor at Jerusalem. Eisenman says this just as easily could be The Poor. (Rom. 15:26; Gal. 2:9-10.) If we translate back Paul’s words into Hebrew, he was saying The Ebion of Jerusalem was the name of the church under James. They were the Congregation of the Poor, just like we might call a church The Lighthouse Church. We do not see Paul’s intent due to case size in the standard text which changes The Poor into the poor.8

What heightens the probability Professor Eisenman is correct is recent archaeology. The initial hypothesis was that the DSS were exclusively the writings of an Essene sect from the 200 B.C. era. This idea recently crumbled in 2004. Golb’s contrary hypothesis that the DSS came from the Temple at Jerusalem between 65-70 A.D. has now been strongly confirmed by extensive archaeological digs under auspices of Israeli universities. These digs proved there was no community site of monks at Qumram. It was a clay plate factory. The initial inference of a large community of monks from the presence of a large number of plates misinterpreted the evidence. Second, we can now infer the scrolls were hidden in the mountains to protect the scrolls, and not because a large community had been involved in copying activity. In fact, archaeology now proves there was no copy center or Scriptorum, as originally claimed. None of the metal clips copyists use to guide copying were found at Qumram. A few ordinary pens and numerous coins were found. Yet, no metal clips of copyists. Not even a fragment of one! The very nature of the scrolls likewise demonstrate that no monkish community was engaged in copying them. The Dead Sea Scrolls, it turns out, are not only an eclectic collection of sectarian materials but also a cache with numerous copies of the Bible texts. This is just what one would expect to find from the Temple Library at Jerusalem had it been secreted away in advance of the Roman troops seiging Jerusalem prior to 70 A.D. The Essenes would not be expected, by contrast, to preserve several opposing strains of sectarian writings. One such strain is the writings of The Poor—The Ebion. On the other hand, we would expect to find Jewish Rabbis at Jerusalem wanting to keep copies of Christian writings for informational purposes at the Library of the Temple of Jerusalem. We would expect to find records of sectarian differences maintained by such a library. Golb’s argument has now essentially been vindicated. Golb made a scholarly case that the DSS are writings that were taken from the Temple at Jerusalem during the years of the Roman siege that finally prevailed in 70 A.D. Hiding them in these caves preserved them from the torches which in the end destroyed the Temple in 70 A.D. after a long siege.9 Thus, recent archaeological discoveries at Qumram establish that many of the documents can be potentially prepared in the Christian-era. We no longer are forced to disregard the Christian character of certain writings merely because of the Essene hypothesis which strangled DSS studies until now. Among the newer writings in the DSS, we find some in Hebrew written by a group calling itself The Poor—The Ebion. This transliterates very well as The Ebionites.10

I think it does a really good job as well of debunking Paul.

Sorry to burst the bubble of the JWO followers

1. Galatians 5.2 says, "If you be circumcised, Christ shall profit you nothing."

2. "Every man that is circumcised, he is a debtor to do the whole law."

Paul didn't say that you can't be saved through circumcision, he said that if you are circumcised you can't be saved. Paul didn't say that if you want to be saved through circumcision that you have to follow the whole Torah, we said that if you are circumcised you have to follow the whole Torah.

=JamesI don't know what a Xhosa is so I can't answer that one sorry.