Benjamin’s testimony; was the twelfth son of Jacob and Rachel, the baby of the family that turns philosopher and philanthropist. A copy of the words that he commanded his sons to observe, after he had lived a 125 years: “Since Rachel my mother died in giving me birth, I had no milk; therefore I was sucked by Bilhah her handmaid. Rachel remained barren for twelve years after she had borne Joseph; and she prayed to G-d with fasting twelve days, and she conceived and bare me. My father loved Rachel dearly and prayed that he might see two sons born from her. Therefore was I called Benjamin, that is, a son of days.
When I went into Egypt to Joseph, my brother recognized me; he asked me what my brothers had told my father and I answered him. In reply, he told me the rest of the story; that they had stripped him of his coat, giving him to the Ishmalites, gave him a loin cloth, scourged him, and bade him run. And as for the one of them that had beaten him with a rod, a lion met him and slew him. And so his associates were affrighted.
Therefore, my children, love the L-rd G-d of heaven and earth, keep His Commandments and let your mind be unto good, for he that hath his mind right sees all things rightly.
Jacob embraced Joseph and kissed him for two hours, saying: In you shall be fulfilled the prophecy of heaven concerning the Lamb of G-d and Savior of the world, and that a blameless one shall be delivered up for lawless men, and a sinless one shall die for ungodly men in the blood of the covenant, for the salvation of the Gentiles and of Israel, and shall destroy Beliar and his servants.
See you, therefore, my children, and the end of the good man? Be followers of his compassion, therefore, with a good mind, that you also may wear crowns of glory. For the good man has not a dark eye; for he shows mercy to all men, even though they be sinners.
If any one is glorified, he envieth him not; if any one is enriched, he is not jealous; if any one is valiant, he praises him; the virtuous man he lauds; on the poor man he has mercy; on the weak he has compassion; unto G-d he sings praises.
If you do well, even the unclean spirits will flee from you and the beast will dread you. For where there is reverence for good works and light in the mind, even darkness flees away from him.
The good mind has not two tongues, of blessing and of cursing, of contumely and of honor, of sorrow and of joy, of quietness and of confusion, of hypocrisy and of truth, of poverty and of wealth; but it has one disposition, uncorrupt and pure, concerning all men.
It has no double sight, nor double hearing; for in everything which he does, or speaks, or sees, he knows that G-d looks on his soul. And he cleanses his mind that he may not be condemned by men as well as by G-d.
Flee the malice of Beliar; for he gives the sword to them that obey him. And the sword is the mother of seven evils. The first, the mind conceives through Beliar, and first there is bloodshed; secondly ruin; thirdly, tribulation; fourthly, exile; fifthly, dearth; sixthly, panic; seventhly, destruction.
The Temple of G-d shall be in your portion, and the last Temple shall be more glorious than the first. The Most High shall send forth His salvation in the visitation of an only-begotten prophet. He shall enter into the first Temple, and there shall the L-rd be treated with outrage, and He shall be lifted up upon a tree. The veil of the Temple shall be rent and the Spirit of G-d shall pass on to the Gentiles as fire poureth forth. He shall ascend from Hades and shall pass from earth into heaven.
Know you my children that I am dying. Do truth each one to his neighbour and keep the Law of G-d and His Commandments, for these things do I leave you instead of inheritance. Also give them to your children for an everlasting possession; for all these things they gave us for an inheritance, saying; Keep the Commandments of G-d until
G-d shall reveal His salvation to all Gentiles. And then shall you see Enoch, Noah, and Shem, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, rising on the right hand in gladness.
Then shall we also rise, each one over our tribe, worshipping the King of heaven, who appeared upon earth in the form of a man in humility. And as many as believe on Him on the earth shall rejoice with Him.
And G-d shall judge Israel first, for their unrighteousness; for when He appeared as G-d in the flesh to deliver them, they believed Him not. Then shall He judge all Gentiles, as many as believed Him not when He appeared upon earth. He shall convict Israel through the chosen ones of the Gentiles.
There shall arise in the latter days one beloved of G-d of the tribe of Judah and Levi, a doer of His good pleasure in his mouth, with new knowledge enlightening the Gentiles. Until the consummation of the age shall He be in the Synagogues of the Gentiles and among their rulers as a strain of music in the mouth of all. He shall be inscribed in the holy books, both His work and His word, and He shall be a chosen one of G-d forever. He will fill up that which laked of your tribe.”
And when he had said these things he stretched out his feet. And died in a beautiful and good sleep at the age of 125 years old.
Joseph's Testimony
Joseph’s testimony, the eleventh son of Jacob and Rachel, the beautiful and beloved.
When he was about to die he called his sons and his brethren together, and said to them:
“I have seen in my life envy and death, yet I went not astray, but persevered in the truth of G-d.
I was cast into prison, I was beaten, I was mocked; but G-d granted me to find mercy in the sight of the keeper of the prison. For G-d does not forsake them that fear Him, neither in darkness, nor in bonds, nor in tribulations, nor in necessities, but in all those things does He give protection, and in divers ways does He comfort, though for a little space He departs to try the inclination of the soul.
Endurance is a mighty charm, and patience gives many good things. May you learn that the wickedness of the ungodly has no power over them that worship G-d with chastity, so if you follow after chastity and purity with patience and prayer, with fasting in humility of heart, G-d will dwell among you because He loves chastity; and for the sake of your chastity, every way you are lifted up, whether in deed, or in word, or in thought.
I did not exalt myself in my mind; although I was a child, I had the fear of G-d in my heart; for I knew that all things would pass away.
When I was being sold, I refrained from telling the Ishmalelites that I was a son of Jacob, a great man and a mighty. The Ishmalelites would ask me if I was a slave, and I would answer that I was a home-born slave, that I might not put my brethren to shame, but that I was their slave. And they sold me in Egypt, for eighty pieces of gold, so that I would not be found in their hands, and they feared my father, for they had heard roomers of a son missing.
Pentephris, a merchant who was the third in rank of the officers of Pharaoh, bought me and I was with him three months and five days. Do you see, my children, what great things I endured that I should not put my brethren to shame. Do you also love one another, and with long-suffering hide one another’s faults. For G-d delights in the unity of brethren and in the purpose of a heart that takes pleasure in love.
I exalted not myself among them in arrogance because of my worldly glory, but I was among them as one of the least. If you walk in the Commandments of G-d He will exalt you there, and will bless you with good things forever and ever. And if any one seeks to do evil unto you, do well unto him, and pray for him, and you shall be redeemed of G-d from all evil.
Out of my humility and longsuffering I took unto wife the daughter of the priest of Heliopolis. A hundred talents of gold were given me with her; and G-d made them to serve me. He gave me also beauty as a flower beyond the beautiful ones of Israel; and He preserved me unto old age in strength and in beauty, because I was like in all things unto Jacob.
Hear also the vision which I saw. There were twelve harts feeding; nine were first dispersed over all the earth, and likewise also the three. And I saw that from Judah was born a virgin wearing a linen garment, and from her was born a lamb without spot. On his left hand there was as it were a lion. All the beasts rushed against him, and the lamb overcame them, and destroyed them and trod them under foot. And because of him the angels and men rejoiced, and all the land. And these things shall come to pass in their season, in the last days.
Do you therefore observe the Commandments of G-d and honor Levi and Judah; for from them shall arise unto you the Lamb of G-d, who takes away the sin of the world, one who saves all the Gentiles and Israel. For His kingdom is an everlasting kingdom, which shall not pass away; but my kingdom among you shall come to an end.
For I know that after my death the Egyptians will afflict you, but G-d will avenge you and will bring you into that which He promised to your fathers.
You shall carry up my bones with you; for when my bones are being taken up thither, G-d will be with you in light, and Beliar shall be in darkness with the Egyptians. And carry you up Asenath your mother to the Hippodrome, and near Rachel your mother bury her.”
And when he had said these things he stretched out his feet, and died at a good old age. And all Israel mourned for him, and all Egypt, with a great mourning.
When he was about to die he called his sons and his brethren together, and said to them:
“I have seen in my life envy and death, yet I went not astray, but persevered in the truth of G-d.
I was cast into prison, I was beaten, I was mocked; but G-d granted me to find mercy in the sight of the keeper of the prison. For G-d does not forsake them that fear Him, neither in darkness, nor in bonds, nor in tribulations, nor in necessities, but in all those things does He give protection, and in divers ways does He comfort, though for a little space He departs to try the inclination of the soul.
Endurance is a mighty charm, and patience gives many good things. May you learn that the wickedness of the ungodly has no power over them that worship G-d with chastity, so if you follow after chastity and purity with patience and prayer, with fasting in humility of heart, G-d will dwell among you because He loves chastity; and for the sake of your chastity, every way you are lifted up, whether in deed, or in word, or in thought.
I did not exalt myself in my mind; although I was a child, I had the fear of G-d in my heart; for I knew that all things would pass away.
When I was being sold, I refrained from telling the Ishmalelites that I was a son of Jacob, a great man and a mighty. The Ishmalelites would ask me if I was a slave, and I would answer that I was a home-born slave, that I might not put my brethren to shame, but that I was their slave. And they sold me in Egypt, for eighty pieces of gold, so that I would not be found in their hands, and they feared my father, for they had heard roomers of a son missing.
Pentephris, a merchant who was the third in rank of the officers of Pharaoh, bought me and I was with him three months and five days. Do you see, my children, what great things I endured that I should not put my brethren to shame. Do you also love one another, and with long-suffering hide one another’s faults. For G-d delights in the unity of brethren and in the purpose of a heart that takes pleasure in love.
I exalted not myself among them in arrogance because of my worldly glory, but I was among them as one of the least. If you walk in the Commandments of G-d He will exalt you there, and will bless you with good things forever and ever. And if any one seeks to do evil unto you, do well unto him, and pray for him, and you shall be redeemed of G-d from all evil.
Out of my humility and longsuffering I took unto wife the daughter of the priest of Heliopolis. A hundred talents of gold were given me with her; and G-d made them to serve me. He gave me also beauty as a flower beyond the beautiful ones of Israel; and He preserved me unto old age in strength and in beauty, because I was like in all things unto Jacob.
Hear also the vision which I saw. There were twelve harts feeding; nine were first dispersed over all the earth, and likewise also the three. And I saw that from Judah was born a virgin wearing a linen garment, and from her was born a lamb without spot. On his left hand there was as it were a lion. All the beasts rushed against him, and the lamb overcame them, and destroyed them and trod them under foot. And because of him the angels and men rejoiced, and all the land. And these things shall come to pass in their season, in the last days.
Do you therefore observe the Commandments of G-d and honor Levi and Judah; for from them shall arise unto you the Lamb of G-d, who takes away the sin of the world, one who saves all the Gentiles and Israel. For His kingdom is an everlasting kingdom, which shall not pass away; but my kingdom among you shall come to an end.
For I know that after my death the Egyptians will afflict you, but G-d will avenge you and will bring you into that which He promised to your fathers.
You shall carry up my bones with you; for when my bones are being taken up thither, G-d will be with you in light, and Beliar shall be in darkness with the Egyptians. And carry you up Asenath your mother to the Hippodrome, and near Rachel your mother bury her.”
And when he had said these things he stretched out his feet, and died at a good old age. And all Israel mourned for him, and all Egypt, with a great mourning.
Asher's Testimony
Asher’s testimony, the tenth son of Jacob and Zilpah. An explanation of dual personality, the first Jekyll and Hyde story, and a statement of the Law of Compensation.
Speaking to his sons in the 125th year of his life, while he was still in health:
“I will declare to you all that is upright in the sight of G-d. Two ways has G-d given to the sons of men, and two inclinations, and two kinds of action, and two modes of action, and two issues. Therefore all things are by twos, one over against the other, (good and evil, clean and unclean).
Do not wear two faces of goodness and of wickedness; but cleave unto goodness only, for G-d has His habitation therein, and men desire it. From wickedness flee away, destroying the evil inclination by your good works; for they that are double-faced serve not G-d, but their own lusts, so that they may please Beliar and men like unto themselves.
How that there are two in all things, one against the other, and the one is hidden by the other; in wealth is hidden covetousness, in conviviality drunkenness, in laughter grief, in wedlock profligacy.
Death succeeds to life, dishonor to glory, night to day, and darkness to light; and all things are under the day, just things under life, unjust things under death; wherefore also eternal life awaits death.
All these things I proved in my life, and I wandered not from the truth of G-d, and I searched out the Commandments of the Most High, walking according to all my strength with singleness of fact unto that which is good.
Take heed, therefore, you also, to the Commandments of G-d, following the truth with singleness of face. Keep the Law of G-d, and give not heed unto evil as unto good; but look unto the thing that is really good, and keep in it all Commandments of G-d, having your conversation therein, and resting therein.
For the latter ends of men do show their righteousness or unrighteousness when they meet the angels of the L-rd and of satan. For when the soul departs troubled, it is tormented by the evil spirit which also it served in lusts and evil works. But if he is peaceful with joy he meets the angel of peace, and he leads him into eternal life.
I know that you shall sin and be delivered into the hands of your enemies; and scattered unto the four corners of the earth. Until the Most High shall visit the earth, coming Himself as man, with men eating and drinking, and breaking the head of the dragon in the water and He shall save Israel and all the Gentiles, G-d speaking in the person of man.
Tell these things to your children, that they disobey Him not, or they will not know their lands, tribe, and tongue.
But G-d will gather you together in faith through His tender mercy, and for the sake of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.”
And he fell asleep and died at a good old age.
Speaking to his sons in the 125th year of his life, while he was still in health:
“I will declare to you all that is upright in the sight of G-d. Two ways has G-d given to the sons of men, and two inclinations, and two kinds of action, and two modes of action, and two issues. Therefore all things are by twos, one over against the other, (good and evil, clean and unclean).
Do not wear two faces of goodness and of wickedness; but cleave unto goodness only, for G-d has His habitation therein, and men desire it. From wickedness flee away, destroying the evil inclination by your good works; for they that are double-faced serve not G-d, but their own lusts, so that they may please Beliar and men like unto themselves.
How that there are two in all things, one against the other, and the one is hidden by the other; in wealth is hidden covetousness, in conviviality drunkenness, in laughter grief, in wedlock profligacy.
Death succeeds to life, dishonor to glory, night to day, and darkness to light; and all things are under the day, just things under life, unjust things under death; wherefore also eternal life awaits death.
All these things I proved in my life, and I wandered not from the truth of G-d, and I searched out the Commandments of the Most High, walking according to all my strength with singleness of fact unto that which is good.
Take heed, therefore, you also, to the Commandments of G-d, following the truth with singleness of face. Keep the Law of G-d, and give not heed unto evil as unto good; but look unto the thing that is really good, and keep in it all Commandments of G-d, having your conversation therein, and resting therein.
For the latter ends of men do show their righteousness or unrighteousness when they meet the angels of the L-rd and of satan. For when the soul departs troubled, it is tormented by the evil spirit which also it served in lusts and evil works. But if he is peaceful with joy he meets the angel of peace, and he leads him into eternal life.
I know that you shall sin and be delivered into the hands of your enemies; and scattered unto the four corners of the earth. Until the Most High shall visit the earth, coming Himself as man, with men eating and drinking, and breaking the head of the dragon in the water and He shall save Israel and all the Gentiles, G-d speaking in the person of man.
Tell these things to your children, that they disobey Him not, or they will not know their lands, tribe, and tongue.
But G-d will gather you together in faith through His tender mercy, and for the sake of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.”
And he fell asleep and died at a good old age.
Gad's Testimony
Gad’s testimony, the ninth son of Jacob and Zilpha, a shepherd and strong man but a murderer at heart. Spoken to his sons in his 125th year of his life:
“Accordingly I guarded at night the flock; and when ever a lion, or wolf, or any wild beast came against the fold, I pursued it and killed it, with my hands. Now Joseph my brother was feeding the flock with us for upwards of thirty days, and being young, he fell sick by reason of the heat and had to return to our father, who made him lie down near him, because he loved him greatly. And Joseph told our father the sons of Zilpah and Bilhah were slaying the best of the flock and eating them against the judgment of Reuben and Judah. For he saw that I had delivered a lamb out of the mouth of a bear, and put the bear to death; but had slain the lamb, being grieved concerning it that it could not live, and that we had eaten it. And regarding this matter I was wroth with Joseph until the day he was sold.
Now, my children hearken to the words of truth to work righteousness, and all the Law of the Most High, and go not astray through the spirit of hatred, for it is evil in all the doings of men.
Whatsoever a man does the hater abominated him; and though a man worked the Law of G-d, he praised Him not; though a man feared G-d, and take pleasure in that which is righteous, he loved Him not. He despraised the truth, he envied him that prospered, he welcomed evil-speaking, and he loved arrogance, for hatred blinds his soul; as I also then looked on Joseph.
Hatred works lawlessness even against G-d Himself. For hatred works with envy also against them that prosper; so long as it hears or sees their success it always languishes. The spirit of hatred works together with satan, through hastiness of spirits, in all things to men’s death; but the spirit of love works together with the Law of G-d in long-suffering unto the salvation of men.
Hatred is evil, for it constantly mates with lying, speaking against the truth; and it makes small things to be great, and causes the light to be darkness, and calls the sweet bitter, and teaches slander, and kindles wrath, and stirs up war, and violence and all covetousness; it fills the heart with evil and devilish poison.
These things, therefore, I say to you from experience that you may drive forth hatred, which is of the devil, and cleave to the love of G-d. Righteousness casts out hatred, humility destroys envy.
For he that is just and humble is ashamed to do what is unjust, being reproved not of another, but of his own heart, because G-d looks on his inclination.
He speaks not against a holy man, because the fear of G-d overcomes hatred. For fearing lest he should offend G-d, he will not do wrong to any man, even in thought.
These things I learnt at last, after I repented concerning Joseph. For true repentance after a godly sort destroyed ignorance, and drives away the darkness, and enlightens the eyes, and gives knowledge to the soul, and leads the mind to salvation. And those things which it hath not learned from man, it knows through repentance.
For G-d brought upon me a disease of the liver; and had not the prayers of Jacob my father succored me, it had hardly failed but my spirit had departed. For by what things a man transgress, by the same also is he punished. Since, therefore, my liver was mercilessly against Joseph, in my liver too I suffered mercilessly, and was judged for eleven months, for so long a time as I had been angry against Joseph.
I exhort you, love you each one his brother, and put away hatred from your hearts, love one another in deed, and in word, and in the inclination of the soul. Love you one another from the heart; and if a man sin against you, speak peaceably to him, and in your soul hold not guile; and if he repent and confess, forgive him.
And if he be shameless and persist in his wrong-doings, even so forgive him from the heart, ad leave to G-d the avenging. And if he be further exalted, be not envious of him, remembering that all flesh shall die; and offer praise to G-d, who gives things good and profitable to all men.
Seek out the judgments of G-d, and your mind will rest and be at peace. Put away, jealousy from your souls, and love one another with uprightness of heart.
Honor Judah and Levi, for from them shall G-d rise up salvation to Israel.”
And he drew up his feet, and fell asleep in peace, and after five years his sons carried him up to Hebron, and laid him with his fathers.
“Accordingly I guarded at night the flock; and when ever a lion, or wolf, or any wild beast came against the fold, I pursued it and killed it, with my hands. Now Joseph my brother was feeding the flock with us for upwards of thirty days, and being young, he fell sick by reason of the heat and had to return to our father, who made him lie down near him, because he loved him greatly. And Joseph told our father the sons of Zilpah and Bilhah were slaying the best of the flock and eating them against the judgment of Reuben and Judah. For he saw that I had delivered a lamb out of the mouth of a bear, and put the bear to death; but had slain the lamb, being grieved concerning it that it could not live, and that we had eaten it. And regarding this matter I was wroth with Joseph until the day he was sold.
Now, my children hearken to the words of truth to work righteousness, and all the Law of the Most High, and go not astray through the spirit of hatred, for it is evil in all the doings of men.
Whatsoever a man does the hater abominated him; and though a man worked the Law of G-d, he praised Him not; though a man feared G-d, and take pleasure in that which is righteous, he loved Him not. He despraised the truth, he envied him that prospered, he welcomed evil-speaking, and he loved arrogance, for hatred blinds his soul; as I also then looked on Joseph.
Hatred works lawlessness even against G-d Himself. For hatred works with envy also against them that prosper; so long as it hears or sees their success it always languishes. The spirit of hatred works together with satan, through hastiness of spirits, in all things to men’s death; but the spirit of love works together with the Law of G-d in long-suffering unto the salvation of men.
Hatred is evil, for it constantly mates with lying, speaking against the truth; and it makes small things to be great, and causes the light to be darkness, and calls the sweet bitter, and teaches slander, and kindles wrath, and stirs up war, and violence and all covetousness; it fills the heart with evil and devilish poison.
These things, therefore, I say to you from experience that you may drive forth hatred, which is of the devil, and cleave to the love of G-d. Righteousness casts out hatred, humility destroys envy.
For he that is just and humble is ashamed to do what is unjust, being reproved not of another, but of his own heart, because G-d looks on his inclination.
He speaks not against a holy man, because the fear of G-d overcomes hatred. For fearing lest he should offend G-d, he will not do wrong to any man, even in thought.
These things I learnt at last, after I repented concerning Joseph. For true repentance after a godly sort destroyed ignorance, and drives away the darkness, and enlightens the eyes, and gives knowledge to the soul, and leads the mind to salvation. And those things which it hath not learned from man, it knows through repentance.
For G-d brought upon me a disease of the liver; and had not the prayers of Jacob my father succored me, it had hardly failed but my spirit had departed. For by what things a man transgress, by the same also is he punished. Since, therefore, my liver was mercilessly against Joseph, in my liver too I suffered mercilessly, and was judged for eleven months, for so long a time as I had been angry against Joseph.
I exhort you, love you each one his brother, and put away hatred from your hearts, love one another in deed, and in word, and in the inclination of the soul. Love you one another from the heart; and if a man sin against you, speak peaceably to him, and in your soul hold not guile; and if he repent and confess, forgive him.
And if he be shameless and persist in his wrong-doings, even so forgive him from the heart, ad leave to G-d the avenging. And if he be further exalted, be not envious of him, remembering that all flesh shall die; and offer praise to G-d, who gives things good and profitable to all men.
Seek out the judgments of G-d, and your mind will rest and be at peace. Put away, jealousy from your souls, and love one another with uprightness of heart.
Honor Judah and Levi, for from them shall G-d rise up salvation to Israel.”
And he drew up his feet, and fell asleep in peace, and after five years his sons carried him up to Hebron, and laid him with his fathers.
Naphtali's Testimony
Naphtali’s testimony, the eighth son of Jacob and Bilhah, the runner. This is a lesson in physiology in the 130th year of his life, when his sons were gathered together in the seventh month, on the first day of the month, while still in good health; he made them a feast of food and wine. And after he was awake in the morning, he said to them:
“I am dying;” and they believed him not. And as he glorified G-d, he grew strong and said that after yesterday’s feast he should die. “I was born from Bilhah, and because Rachel dealt craftily, and gave Bilhah in place of herself to Jacob, and she conceived and bare me upon Rachel’s knees, therefore she called my name Naphtali.
Now my mother was Bilhah, daughter of Rotheus the brother of Deborah, Rebecca’s nurse, who was born on one and the self-same day with Rachel. And Rotheus was of the family of Abraham, a Chaldean, G-d fearing, free-born, and noble. And he was taken captive and was bought by Laban; and he gave him Euna his handmaid to wife, and she bore a daughter and caller her name Zilpah, after the name of the village in which he had been taken captive, Bilhah was the second born.
And I was swift on my feet like the deer, and my father Jacob appointed me for all messages, and as a deer did he give me his blessing.
For as the potter knoweth the vessel, how much it is to contain, and bringeth clay accordingly, so also doth G-d make the body after the likeness of the spirit, and according to the capacity of the body doth He implant the spirit. As the potter knoweth the use of each vessel, what it is meet for, so also doth G-d know the body, how far it will persist in goodness, and when it begins in evil. For there is no inclination or thought which G-d knoweth not, for He created every man after His own image.
For as a man’s strength, so also in his work; as his eye, so also in his sleep; as his soul, so also in his word either in the Law of G-d or in the law of Beliar.
For G-d made all things good in their order, the five senses in the head, and He joined on the neck to the head, adding to it the hair also for comeliness and glory, then the heart for understanding, the belly for excrement, and the stomach for grinding, the windpipe taking in the breath, the liver for wrath, the gall for bitterness, the spleen for laughter, the reins for prudence, the muscles of the loins for power, the lungs for drawing in, the loins for strength, and so forth.
So then, my children let all your works be done in order with good intent in the fear of G-d, and do nothing disorderly in scorn or out of its due season. For if you bid the eye to hear, it cannot; so neither while you are in darkness can you do the works of light.
Be you, therefore, not eager to corrupt your doings through covetousness or with vain words to beguile your souls; because if you keep silence in purity of heart, you shall understand how to hold fast the will of G-d, and to cast away the will of Beliar.
Sun and moon and stars change not their order; so do you also change not the Law of G-d in the disorderliness of your doings.
The Gentiles went astray, and forsook the L-rd, and changed their order, and obeyed stocks and stones, spirits of deceit.
I have read in the writing of Enoch that you yourselves also depart from G-d, walking according to all the lawlessness of the Gentiles. And G-d shall scatter you upon the face of all the earth, until the compassion of G-d shall come, a man working righteousness and working mercy unto all them that are afar off, and to them that are near.
Lo! My children, I have shown unto you the last times, how everything shall come to pass in Israel. Charge your children that they be united to Levi and to Judah; for through them shall salvation arise unto Israel, and in them shall Jacob be blessed.
If you work that which is good, both men and angels shall bless you; and G-d shall be glorified among the Gentiles through you, and the devil shall flee from you, and the wild beast shall fear you, and G-d shall love you, and the angels shall cleave to you.
Be ye therefore wise in G-d and prudent, understanding the order of His Commandments, and the Laws of every word, that G-d may love you. "
And when he had eaten and drunken with a merry heart, he covered his face and died.
“I am dying;” and they believed him not. And as he glorified G-d, he grew strong and said that after yesterday’s feast he should die. “I was born from Bilhah, and because Rachel dealt craftily, and gave Bilhah in place of herself to Jacob, and she conceived and bare me upon Rachel’s knees, therefore she called my name Naphtali.
Now my mother was Bilhah, daughter of Rotheus the brother of Deborah, Rebecca’s nurse, who was born on one and the self-same day with Rachel. And Rotheus was of the family of Abraham, a Chaldean, G-d fearing, free-born, and noble. And he was taken captive and was bought by Laban; and he gave him Euna his handmaid to wife, and she bore a daughter and caller her name Zilpah, after the name of the village in which he had been taken captive, Bilhah was the second born.
And I was swift on my feet like the deer, and my father Jacob appointed me for all messages, and as a deer did he give me his blessing.
For as the potter knoweth the vessel, how much it is to contain, and bringeth clay accordingly, so also doth G-d make the body after the likeness of the spirit, and according to the capacity of the body doth He implant the spirit. As the potter knoweth the use of each vessel, what it is meet for, so also doth G-d know the body, how far it will persist in goodness, and when it begins in evil. For there is no inclination or thought which G-d knoweth not, for He created every man after His own image.
For as a man’s strength, so also in his work; as his eye, so also in his sleep; as his soul, so also in his word either in the Law of G-d or in the law of Beliar.
For G-d made all things good in their order, the five senses in the head, and He joined on the neck to the head, adding to it the hair also for comeliness and glory, then the heart for understanding, the belly for excrement, and the stomach for grinding, the windpipe taking in the breath, the liver for wrath, the gall for bitterness, the spleen for laughter, the reins for prudence, the muscles of the loins for power, the lungs for drawing in, the loins for strength, and so forth.
So then, my children let all your works be done in order with good intent in the fear of G-d, and do nothing disorderly in scorn or out of its due season. For if you bid the eye to hear, it cannot; so neither while you are in darkness can you do the works of light.
Be you, therefore, not eager to corrupt your doings through covetousness or with vain words to beguile your souls; because if you keep silence in purity of heart, you shall understand how to hold fast the will of G-d, and to cast away the will of Beliar.
Sun and moon and stars change not their order; so do you also change not the Law of G-d in the disorderliness of your doings.
The Gentiles went astray, and forsook the L-rd, and changed their order, and obeyed stocks and stones, spirits of deceit.
I have read in the writing of Enoch that you yourselves also depart from G-d, walking according to all the lawlessness of the Gentiles. And G-d shall scatter you upon the face of all the earth, until the compassion of G-d shall come, a man working righteousness and working mercy unto all them that are afar off, and to them that are near.
Lo! My children, I have shown unto you the last times, how everything shall come to pass in Israel. Charge your children that they be united to Levi and to Judah; for through them shall salvation arise unto Israel, and in them shall Jacob be blessed.
If you work that which is good, both men and angels shall bless you; and G-d shall be glorified among the Gentiles through you, and the devil shall flee from you, and the wild beast shall fear you, and G-d shall love you, and the angels shall cleave to you.
Be ye therefore wise in G-d and prudent, understanding the order of His Commandments, and the Laws of every word, that G-d may love you. "
And when he had eaten and drunken with a merry heart, he covered his face and died.
Dan's Testimony
Dan’s testimony, the seventh son of Jacob and Bilhah, the jealous one. He counsels against anger saying that ‘it giveth peculiar vision.’ This is a notable thesis on anger.
Speaking to his sons in his last days when he was 125 years old; “I have proven in my heart, and in my whole life, that truth with just dealing is good and well pleasing to G-d, and that lying and anger are evil, because they teach man all wickedness. And now, my children, behold I am dying, and I tell you of a truth, that unless ye keep yourselves from the spirit of lying and of anger, and love truth and longsuffering, ye shall perish.
For anger is blindness, and does not suffer one to see the face of any man with truth. For though it be a father or a mother, he behaved towards them as enemies; though it be a brother, he knoweth him not; though it be a prophet of G-d, he disobeyth him; though a righteous man, he regardeth him not; though a friend, he doth not acknowledge him.
For the spirit of anger encompasseth him with the net of deceit, and blindeth his eyes, and through lying darkeneth his mind, and giveth him its own peculiar vision. For anger is an evil thing for it troubleth even the soul itself. And the body of the angry man it maketh its own, and over his soul it getteth the mastery, and it bestoweth upon the body power that it may work all iniquity. The spirit goeth always with lying at the right hand of satan, that with cruelty and lying his works may be wrath.
Understand ye, therefore, the power of wrath, that it is vain. For it first of all giveth provocation by word; then by deeds it strentheneth him who is angry, and with sharp losses disturbeth his mind, and so stirreth up with great wrath his soul.
Moreover, a twofold mischief is wrath with lying; and they assist one another in order to disturb the heart; and when the soul is continually disturbed, G-d departeth from it, and Beliar ruleth over it.
Observe my children, the commandments of G-d, and keep His Law; depart from wrath, and hate lying, that G-d ay dwell among you, and Beliar may flee from you. Love the L-rd though all your life, and one another with a true heart.
I have read in the book of Enoch, the righteous, that your prince is satan, and that all the spirits of wickedness and pride will conspire to attend constantly on the sons of Levi, to cause them to sin before G-d. When ye return to G-d, ye shall obtain mercy, and He shall bring you into His sanctuary, and He shall give you peace.
And the saints shall rest in Eden, and in the New Jerusalem shall the righteous rejoice, and it shall be unto the glory of G-d forever. And no longer shall Jerusalem endure desolation, nor Israel be led captive; for G-d shall be in the midst of it living amongst men, and the Holy One of Israel shall reign over it in humility and in poverty; and he who believeth on Him shall reign amongst men in truth.
Draw near unto G-d and unto the angel that interceded for you, for he is a mediator between G-d and man, and for the peace of Israel he shall stand up against the kingdom of the enemy. G-d will transform them into a nation that doeth His will, for none of the angels will be equal unto Him. And His name shall be in every place in Israel, and among the Gentiles. Impart all this to your children that the Savior of the Gentiles may receive you; for He is true and long-suffering.”
And when he has said these things he kissed them all, and fell asleep at a good old age.
Dan prophesied unto them that they would forget their G-d, and would be alienated from the land of their inheritance and from the race of Israel, and from the family of their seed.
Speaking to his sons in his last days when he was 125 years old; “I have proven in my heart, and in my whole life, that truth with just dealing is good and well pleasing to G-d, and that lying and anger are evil, because they teach man all wickedness. And now, my children, behold I am dying, and I tell you of a truth, that unless ye keep yourselves from the spirit of lying and of anger, and love truth and longsuffering, ye shall perish.
For anger is blindness, and does not suffer one to see the face of any man with truth. For though it be a father or a mother, he behaved towards them as enemies; though it be a brother, he knoweth him not; though it be a prophet of G-d, he disobeyth him; though a righteous man, he regardeth him not; though a friend, he doth not acknowledge him.
For the spirit of anger encompasseth him with the net of deceit, and blindeth his eyes, and through lying darkeneth his mind, and giveth him its own peculiar vision. For anger is an evil thing for it troubleth even the soul itself. And the body of the angry man it maketh its own, and over his soul it getteth the mastery, and it bestoweth upon the body power that it may work all iniquity. The spirit goeth always with lying at the right hand of satan, that with cruelty and lying his works may be wrath.
Understand ye, therefore, the power of wrath, that it is vain. For it first of all giveth provocation by word; then by deeds it strentheneth him who is angry, and with sharp losses disturbeth his mind, and so stirreth up with great wrath his soul.
Moreover, a twofold mischief is wrath with lying; and they assist one another in order to disturb the heart; and when the soul is continually disturbed, G-d departeth from it, and Beliar ruleth over it.
Observe my children, the commandments of G-d, and keep His Law; depart from wrath, and hate lying, that G-d ay dwell among you, and Beliar may flee from you. Love the L-rd though all your life, and one another with a true heart.
I have read in the book of Enoch, the righteous, that your prince is satan, and that all the spirits of wickedness and pride will conspire to attend constantly on the sons of Levi, to cause them to sin before G-d. When ye return to G-d, ye shall obtain mercy, and He shall bring you into His sanctuary, and He shall give you peace.
And the saints shall rest in Eden, and in the New Jerusalem shall the righteous rejoice, and it shall be unto the glory of G-d forever. And no longer shall Jerusalem endure desolation, nor Israel be led captive; for G-d shall be in the midst of it living amongst men, and the Holy One of Israel shall reign over it in humility and in poverty; and he who believeth on Him shall reign amongst men in truth.
Draw near unto G-d and unto the angel that interceded for you, for he is a mediator between G-d and man, and for the peace of Israel he shall stand up against the kingdom of the enemy. G-d will transform them into a nation that doeth His will, for none of the angels will be equal unto Him. And His name shall be in every place in Israel, and among the Gentiles. Impart all this to your children that the Savior of the Gentiles may receive you; for He is true and long-suffering.”
And when he has said these things he kissed them all, and fell asleep at a good old age.
Dan prophesied unto them that they would forget their G-d, and would be alienated from the land of their inheritance and from the race of Israel, and from the family of their seed.
Zebulun's Testimony
Zebulun’s testimony, the sixth son of Jacob and Leah, the inventor and humanitarian. What he learned as a result of the plot against Joseph. Here are a copy of the words he enjoined on his sons before he died 114th year of his life, two years after the death of Joseph.
“I was born a good gift to my parents, for when I was born my father was increased very exceedingly, both in flocks and herds, when with the straked rods he had his portion. I am not conscious that I have sinned all my days, save in thought. Nor yet do I remember that I have done any iniquity, except the sin of ignorance which I committed against Joseph; for I covenanted with my brethren not to tell my father what had been done. But I wept in secret many days on account of Joseph, for I feared my brethren, because they had all agreed that if any one should declare the secret, he should be slain.
They sold him to the Ishmalites, for his price I had no share, my children. But Simeon and Gad and six other of our brethren took the price of Joseph, and brought sandals for themselves, and their wives, and their children, saying:
We will not eat of it, for it is the price of our brother’s blood, but we will assuredly tread it under foot, because he said that he would be king over us, and so let us see what will become of his dreams. And ye have all been told the story of Egypt and his triumph, concluding his dreams.
And now, my children, keep the commands of G-d, and to show mercy to your neighbors, and to have compassion towards all, not towards men only, but also towards beast. For all this thing’s sake G-d blessed me, and when all my brethren were sick, I escaped without sickness, for G-d knoweth the purposes of each. Have, therefore, compassion in your hearts because even as a man doeth to his neighbour, even so also will G-d do to him. For the sons of my brethren were sicken and were dying on account of Joseph, because they showed not mercy in their hearts; but my sons were preserved without sickness, as ye know.
And when I was in the land of Canaan, by the sea-coast, I made a catch of fish for Jacob my father; and when many were choked in the sea, I continued unhurt. I was the first to make a boat to sail upon the sea, for G-d gave me understanding and wisdom therein.
Have, yourselves also, my children, compassion towards every man with mercy, that G-d also may have compassion and mercy upon you.
Because also in the last days G-d will send His compassion on the earth, and wheresoever He finds bowels of mercy He dwelleth in him. For in the degree in which a man hath compassion upon his neighbors, in the same degree hath G-d upon him. And after these things shall there arise unto you the L-rd G-d Himself, the light of righteousness, and ye shall return unto your land. And ye shall see Him in Jerusalem, for His name’s sake.
And now, my children, grieve not that I am dying, nor be cast down in that I am coming to my end. For I shall rise again in the midst of you, as a ruler in the midst of his sons’ and I shall rejoice in the midst of my tribe, as many as shall keep the Law of G-d, and the commandments of Zebulun their father.
But upon the ungodly shall G-d bring eternal fire, and destroy them throughout all generations. But I am now hastening away to my rest, as did also my fathers. But do ye fear the L-rd our G-d with all your strength all the days of your life.”
And when he had said these things he fell asleep, at a good old age. And his sons laid him in a wooden coffin. And afterwards they carried him up and buried him in Hebron.
“I was born a good gift to my parents, for when I was born my father was increased very exceedingly, both in flocks and herds, when with the straked rods he had his portion. I am not conscious that I have sinned all my days, save in thought. Nor yet do I remember that I have done any iniquity, except the sin of ignorance which I committed against Joseph; for I covenanted with my brethren not to tell my father what had been done. But I wept in secret many days on account of Joseph, for I feared my brethren, because they had all agreed that if any one should declare the secret, he should be slain.
They sold him to the Ishmalites, for his price I had no share, my children. But Simeon and Gad and six other of our brethren took the price of Joseph, and brought sandals for themselves, and their wives, and their children, saying:
We will not eat of it, for it is the price of our brother’s blood, but we will assuredly tread it under foot, because he said that he would be king over us, and so let us see what will become of his dreams. And ye have all been told the story of Egypt and his triumph, concluding his dreams.
And now, my children, keep the commands of G-d, and to show mercy to your neighbors, and to have compassion towards all, not towards men only, but also towards beast. For all this thing’s sake G-d blessed me, and when all my brethren were sick, I escaped without sickness, for G-d knoweth the purposes of each. Have, therefore, compassion in your hearts because even as a man doeth to his neighbour, even so also will G-d do to him. For the sons of my brethren were sicken and were dying on account of Joseph, because they showed not mercy in their hearts; but my sons were preserved without sickness, as ye know.
And when I was in the land of Canaan, by the sea-coast, I made a catch of fish for Jacob my father; and when many were choked in the sea, I continued unhurt. I was the first to make a boat to sail upon the sea, for G-d gave me understanding and wisdom therein.
Have, yourselves also, my children, compassion towards every man with mercy, that G-d also may have compassion and mercy upon you.
Because also in the last days G-d will send His compassion on the earth, and wheresoever He finds bowels of mercy He dwelleth in him. For in the degree in which a man hath compassion upon his neighbors, in the same degree hath G-d upon him. And after these things shall there arise unto you the L-rd G-d Himself, the light of righteousness, and ye shall return unto your land. And ye shall see Him in Jerusalem, for His name’s sake.
And now, my children, grieve not that I am dying, nor be cast down in that I am coming to my end. For I shall rise again in the midst of you, as a ruler in the midst of his sons’ and I shall rejoice in the midst of my tribe, as many as shall keep the Law of G-d, and the commandments of Zebulun their father.
But upon the ungodly shall G-d bring eternal fire, and destroy them throughout all generations. But I am now hastening away to my rest, as did also my fathers. But do ye fear the L-rd our G-d with all your strength all the days of your life.”
And when he had said these things he fell asleep, at a good old age. And his sons laid him in a wooden coffin. And afterwards they carried him up and buried him in Hebron.
Issachar's Testimony
Issachar’s testimony, the fifth son of Jacob and Leah. The sinless child of hire for mandrakes, he appeals for simplicity.
Calling his sons and said to them: “Hearken and give ear to the words of him who is beloved of G-d. I was born by way of hire for sweet-sweet-smelling apples mandrakes, gotten from Rachel to help my mother to enhance having children, on account of the hire I was called Issachar. Though my mother desired them, she ate them not, but offered them in the house of the L-rd, presenting them to the priest of the Most High.
My father blessed me, for he saw that I walked in rectitude before Him.
And I was not a busybody in my doings, nor envious and malicious against my neighbour.
I never slandered any one, nor did I censure the life of any man, walking as I did in singleness of eye.
For on all the poor and oppressed I bestowed the good things of the earth in the singleness of my heart.
And now, my children, walk in singleness of your heart, for I have seen in it all that is well-pleasing to G-d.
The single-minded man coveted not gold, he overreached not his neighbour, he longest not after manifold dainties, he delighted not in varied apparel.
He doeth not desire to live a long life, but only waiteth for the will of G-d.
For he walketh in singleness of soul, and beholdeth all things in uprightness of heart, shunning eyes make evil through the error of the world, lest he should see the perversion of any of the commandments of G-d.
Keep, therefore, my children, the Law of G-d, and get singleness, and walk in guilelessness, not playing the busybody with the business of your neighbour, but love,
G-d and your neighbour have compassion on the poor and weak and offering up gifts to G-d with thanksgiving.
As ye see, I am a hundred and twenty-six years old and not conscious of committing any sin. Except my wife I have not known woman, I love G-d; likewise also every man with all my heart.”
And having said these things, he commanded his sons that they should carry him up to Hebron, and bury him there in the cave with his fathers. And he stretched out his feet and died, at a good old age; with every limb sound, and with strength unabated, he slept the eternal sleep.
Calling his sons and said to them: “Hearken and give ear to the words of him who is beloved of G-d. I was born by way of hire for sweet-sweet-smelling apples mandrakes, gotten from Rachel to help my mother to enhance having children, on account of the hire I was called Issachar. Though my mother desired them, she ate them not, but offered them in the house of the L-rd, presenting them to the priest of the Most High.
My father blessed me, for he saw that I walked in rectitude before Him.
And I was not a busybody in my doings, nor envious and malicious against my neighbour.
I never slandered any one, nor did I censure the life of any man, walking as I did in singleness of eye.
For on all the poor and oppressed I bestowed the good things of the earth in the singleness of my heart.
And now, my children, walk in singleness of your heart, for I have seen in it all that is well-pleasing to G-d.
The single-minded man coveted not gold, he overreached not his neighbour, he longest not after manifold dainties, he delighted not in varied apparel.
He doeth not desire to live a long life, but only waiteth for the will of G-d.
For he walketh in singleness of soul, and beholdeth all things in uprightness of heart, shunning eyes make evil through the error of the world, lest he should see the perversion of any of the commandments of G-d.
Keep, therefore, my children, the Law of G-d, and get singleness, and walk in guilelessness, not playing the busybody with the business of your neighbour, but love,
G-d and your neighbour have compassion on the poor and weak and offering up gifts to G-d with thanksgiving.
As ye see, I am a hundred and twenty-six years old and not conscious of committing any sin. Except my wife I have not known woman, I love G-d; likewise also every man with all my heart.”
And having said these things, he commanded his sons that they should carry him up to Hebron, and bury him there in the cave with his fathers. And he stretched out his feet and died, at a good old age; with every limb sound, and with strength unabated, he slept the eternal sleep.
Judah's Testimony
Judah’s testimony; “I was the fourth son born to my father Jacob; and Leah my mother named me Judah. I was swift in my youth and obedient to my father in everything. And I honored my mother and my mother’s sister. G-d showed me favor in all my works both in the field and in the house. I know that I raced a hind, and caught it, and prepared the meat for my father, and he did eat. I once took a bear by its paw and hurled it down the cliff, and it was crushed, such a lad I was.
I saw Parsaba, king of Adullam and he gave me his daughter Bathshua to wife and she bare me Er, Onan and Shelah; and two of them G-d smote: for Shelah lived, and his children are ye.
In the fortieth year of my life, Esau, the brother of my father, came upon us with a mighty and strong people. And Jacob smote Esau with an arrow, and he was taken up wounded on Mt. Sheir, and as he went he died at Anoniram. And we pursued after the sons of Esau until they asked us the terms of peace; and having taken counsel with our father, we received them as tributaries.
After these things my son Er took to wife Tamar, from Mesopatamia, a daughter of Aram. Er was wicked and on the third night an angel of the L-rd smote him. I gave Onan to her in marriage; and he also in wickedness knew her not, though he spent with her a year. When I threatened him he went in unto her, but he spilled the seed on the ground, according to the command of his mother, and he also died through wickedness. I wished to give Shelah also to her, but his mother would not permit it for she was not of the daughters of Canaan. Once when I was drunk with wine, and I did not recognize her, through the fashion of her adorning, I did go in with her and she conceived, I made her my second wife.
Now I command you, my children, hearken to Judah your father, and keep my sayings to perform all the ordinances of the L-rd, and obey the commandments of G-d. And walk not after you lusts, nor in the imaginations of your thoughts in haughtiness of heart; and glory not in the deeds and strength of your youth, for this also is evil in the eyes of the L-rd. And be not drunk with wine; for wine turneth the mind away from the truth, and inspires the passion of lust, and leadeth the eyes into error. For if a man drink wine to drunkenness, it disturbeth the mind with filthy thoughts leading to fornication, and heateth the body to carnal union; and if the occasion of the lust be present, he worketh the sin, and is not ashamed. For I gave my staff, that is the stay of my tribe; and my girdle, that is my power; and my diadeam, that is, the glory of my kingdom. And indeed I repented of these things. Observe, therefore the right limit in wind; for there are in it four evil spirits – of lust, of hot desire, of wastefulness, of filthy lucre. If ye drink wine in gladness, be ye modest in the fear of G-d.
I command you not to love money, for these things withdraw you from the Law of G-d, and blind the inclination of the soul, and teach arrogance, and suffer not a man to have compassion unto his neighbour, for he is a slave to two contrary passions, and cannot obey G-d, because they have blinded his soul, and He walketh in the day as in the night. But the G-d of my fathers had mercy on me, because I did it in ignorance and I learnt my own weakness while thinking myself invincible. And there is no time at which the works of men can be hid; for on the heart itself have they been written down before G-d.
Love Levi, for to me the L-rd gave the kingdom, and to him the priesthood, and He set the kingdom beneath the priesthood. To me He gave the things upon the earth; to him the things in the heavens. As the heaven is higher than the earth, so is the priesthood of G-d higher than the earthly kingdom until the appearing of the G-d of righteousness, that Jacob and all the Gentiles may rest in peace; until the L-rd visits you, when with perfect heart ye repent and walk in all His commandments and He bring you up from captivity among the Gentiles. And a man shall arise from my seed, like the sun of righteousness, walking with the sons of men in meekness and righteousness; and no sin shall be found in Him. And the Heavens shall be opened unto Him, to pour out the Spirit, even the blessing of the Holy Father; and He shall pour out the spirit of grace upon you; and ye shall be unto Him sons in truth, and ye shall walk in His commandments first and last.
Then shall the scepter of my kingdom shine forth; and from your root shall arise a stem; and from it shall grow a rod of righteousness to the Gentiles, to judge and to save all that call upon the L-rd. And after these things shall Abraham and Isaac and Jacob arise unto life, and I and my brethren shall be chiefs of the tribes of Israel: Levi first, I the second, Joseph third, Benjamin fourth, Simeon fifth, Issachar sixth, and so all in order.
And the L-rd bless Levi, and the Angel of the Presence, me; the powers of glory, Simeon; the heaven, Reuben; the earth, Issachar; the sea, Zebulun; the mountains, Joseph; the Tabernacle, Benjamin; the luminaries, Dan; Eden, Naphtali; the sun, Gad; the moon, Asher. And ye shall be the people of G-d and have one tongue; and there shall be no spirit of deceit of Beliar, for he shall be cast into the fire forever. And they who have died in grief shall arise in joy, and they who were poor for the L-rd’s sake shall be made rich, and they who are put to death for the L-rd’s sake shall awake to life.
Observe, therefore, my children, all the Law of the L-rd, for there is hope for all them who hold fast unto His ways. And he said to them: behold, I die before your eyes this day, a hundred and nineteen years old. Let no one bury me in costly apparel.”And Judah, when he had said these things, fell asleep; and his sons did according to all whatsoever he commanded them, and they buried him in Hebron with his fathers
I saw Parsaba, king of Adullam and he gave me his daughter Bathshua to wife and she bare me Er, Onan and Shelah; and two of them G-d smote: for Shelah lived, and his children are ye.
In the fortieth year of my life, Esau, the brother of my father, came upon us with a mighty and strong people. And Jacob smote Esau with an arrow, and he was taken up wounded on Mt. Sheir, and as he went he died at Anoniram. And we pursued after the sons of Esau until they asked us the terms of peace; and having taken counsel with our father, we received them as tributaries.
After these things my son Er took to wife Tamar, from Mesopatamia, a daughter of Aram. Er was wicked and on the third night an angel of the L-rd smote him. I gave Onan to her in marriage; and he also in wickedness knew her not, though he spent with her a year. When I threatened him he went in unto her, but he spilled the seed on the ground, according to the command of his mother, and he also died through wickedness. I wished to give Shelah also to her, but his mother would not permit it for she was not of the daughters of Canaan. Once when I was drunk with wine, and I did not recognize her, through the fashion of her adorning, I did go in with her and she conceived, I made her my second wife.
Now I command you, my children, hearken to Judah your father, and keep my sayings to perform all the ordinances of the L-rd, and obey the commandments of G-d. And walk not after you lusts, nor in the imaginations of your thoughts in haughtiness of heart; and glory not in the deeds and strength of your youth, for this also is evil in the eyes of the L-rd. And be not drunk with wine; for wine turneth the mind away from the truth, and inspires the passion of lust, and leadeth the eyes into error. For if a man drink wine to drunkenness, it disturbeth the mind with filthy thoughts leading to fornication, and heateth the body to carnal union; and if the occasion of the lust be present, he worketh the sin, and is not ashamed. For I gave my staff, that is the stay of my tribe; and my girdle, that is my power; and my diadeam, that is, the glory of my kingdom. And indeed I repented of these things. Observe, therefore the right limit in wind; for there are in it four evil spirits – of lust, of hot desire, of wastefulness, of filthy lucre. If ye drink wine in gladness, be ye modest in the fear of G-d.
I command you not to love money, for these things withdraw you from the Law of G-d, and blind the inclination of the soul, and teach arrogance, and suffer not a man to have compassion unto his neighbour, for he is a slave to two contrary passions, and cannot obey G-d, because they have blinded his soul, and He walketh in the day as in the night. But the G-d of my fathers had mercy on me, because I did it in ignorance and I learnt my own weakness while thinking myself invincible. And there is no time at which the works of men can be hid; for on the heart itself have they been written down before G-d.
Love Levi, for to me the L-rd gave the kingdom, and to him the priesthood, and He set the kingdom beneath the priesthood. To me He gave the things upon the earth; to him the things in the heavens. As the heaven is higher than the earth, so is the priesthood of G-d higher than the earthly kingdom until the appearing of the G-d of righteousness, that Jacob and all the Gentiles may rest in peace; until the L-rd visits you, when with perfect heart ye repent and walk in all His commandments and He bring you up from captivity among the Gentiles. And a man shall arise from my seed, like the sun of righteousness, walking with the sons of men in meekness and righteousness; and no sin shall be found in Him. And the Heavens shall be opened unto Him, to pour out the Spirit, even the blessing of the Holy Father; and He shall pour out the spirit of grace upon you; and ye shall be unto Him sons in truth, and ye shall walk in His commandments first and last.
Then shall the scepter of my kingdom shine forth; and from your root shall arise a stem; and from it shall grow a rod of righteousness to the Gentiles, to judge and to save all that call upon the L-rd. And after these things shall Abraham and Isaac and Jacob arise unto life, and I and my brethren shall be chiefs of the tribes of Israel: Levi first, I the second, Joseph third, Benjamin fourth, Simeon fifth, Issachar sixth, and so all in order.
And the L-rd bless Levi, and the Angel of the Presence, me; the powers of glory, Simeon; the heaven, Reuben; the earth, Issachar; the sea, Zebulun; the mountains, Joseph; the Tabernacle, Benjamin; the luminaries, Dan; Eden, Naphtali; the sun, Gad; the moon, Asher. And ye shall be the people of G-d and have one tongue; and there shall be no spirit of deceit of Beliar, for he shall be cast into the fire forever. And they who have died in grief shall arise in joy, and they who were poor for the L-rd’s sake shall be made rich, and they who are put to death for the L-rd’s sake shall awake to life.
Observe, therefore, my children, all the Law of the L-rd, for there is hope for all them who hold fast unto His ways. And he said to them: behold, I die before your eyes this day, a hundred and nineteen years old. Let no one bury me in costly apparel.”And Judah, when he had said these things, fell asleep; and his sons did according to all whatsoever he commanded them, and they buried him in Hebron with his fathers
The Maccabees
Maccabees was written in Hebrew by an unknown Palestinian Jew. Its author was apparently a member of the SADDUCEES during the reign of ALEXANDER JANNAEUS, a grandson of the third of the Maccabee leaders, SIMON MACCABEUS, with whose death the account closes. The book is one of the finest examples of historical writings. The author also displays his Sadducean bias by his approval not only of the restoration of Jewish religious worship, for which purpose the Maccabean movement began, but also of the movement toward political independence which had cost the early Maccabees a certain measure of religious support.YAHWEH is clearly on the side of the Maccabee brothers, This is reflected only in their unwavering reverence for the MOSAIC LAW, and ultimately by their complete success.The first chapter begins with a prefatory account of the conquests of ALEXANDER THE GREAT, and then traces the rise of a so-called Hellenizing party in Judaea that welcome pagan practices. The second chapter traces the rebellion of Mattahias, his death, and the accession to leadership of his son Judas Maccabeus. Included is an account of the massacre of a large band of pro-Maccabee ASSUDEABS who refused to defend themselves against the Syrians on the SABBATH, an event that led Mattathias to decree that henceforth defensive warfare would be permitted on the Sabbath. Chapters three and four deal with the rise to prominence of Judas Maccabeus, his early victories over the Seleucids, and rededication of the TEMPLE three years after it had been desecrated by Seleucid officials. The emphasis in chapter five and six shifts to Judas' political aims, as he sends expeditions to protect outlying Jewish settlements from hostile pagan neighbors, and seeks to eliminate the last remnants of Seleucid power in JERUSALEM.In chapter seven, Judas regroups his forces. And in chapter eight, he concludes a limited mutual defense treaty with Rome. The demise of Judas at the hands of a greatly superior Seleucid force brother Jonathan, the movement is virtually ended.The Second book of Maccabees was written in Greek by an unknown Alexandrian Jew shortly before 63 B.E. It is not a sequel to the first but a parallel account of the period from 175 B.E. The author may have been a PHARISEE who, having read the recently written Saducean account, attempted to retell the story in Pharasaic terms. The author seems to have devoted his energies largely to polemical purpose, and favorable referenc to the Romans. It would appear that all of the period's martyrs were confirmed Pharisees, and that virtually all of thesupporters of Judas were ADDIDEANS, the group of puous Jews from which the Pharisaic party evolved. The author appears to be extravagantly fond of the lurid and sensational, with detailed descriptions of macassacre, disease, and torture abounding, defeating the purpose of the book.The book does supply considerable material that is lacking in the first, particularly through its quotation at length of numerous official documents - some of which may be authentic - and through its more detailed account of the years before the rise of Judas, it does give a valuable insight into the differences between the two main camps of Jewish thoughts during the first century.An unusual feature in Jewish writings is the idea that the blood of the martyrs has expiatory power. Through their suffering and death, individuals and the Jewish nation can be cleansed and renewed. It was an important influence on the lives of martyrs.Born of the idealistic struggles of Mattathias and his five sons, the dynasty rose thought the successes of Judas and Jonathan to the wise statesmanship of Simon, only to be corrupted in its next generation through its own remarkable success. The keynote of Hasmonaean history is irony; the family that rose against petty despotism, itself degenerated into petty despotism; and having risen in opposition to Hellenism, it came to embody Hellenistic ideals and practice. The final forty years of the Hasmonaeans appear as little more than an epilogue instructive of the power of power to corrupt incorruptibility.Since the days of Judas Maccabeus, HANULLAH has been celebrated by lighting candles for eight days as a reminder of the miracle of the cruse of oil which burned for eight days instead of one. This is celebrated on the 25th day of the month of Kislev and lasts for eight days. Hanullah means "dedication," because of the rededication of the Temple.MASADA, a mesam thirteen hundred feet above the western shore of the DEAD SEA, was a fortress. The site was first fortified by JONATHAN THE HIGH PRIEST, and was rebuilt and extended by HEROD THE GREAT, who built a three-level palace for himself, along with a wall which completely enclosed the twenty acres of open land. Thirty-seven towers, storehouses, huge cisterns that were kept supplied by the occasional rains that fell on the area, barracks, and arsenals were also constructed in order to provide Herod with impregnable protection against the Jews he ruled. After his death, the Romans garrisoned it, but it was taken from them by the Zealots when the JEWISH REVOLT began in A.D. 66. The Roman governor brought the Tenth Legion to lay siege to the fortress. They built a new wall completely enclosing the existing fortress. He then constructed a ramp made of earth and stone, leading to the summit, on which a siege tower was erected, and battered a hole in the defenses. When the Jews built a second wall of earth and timber to seal off the breach, the Romans set fire to it and prepared to bring the siege to an end. Seeing that their fight had been lost, the survivors, by that time numbering only 960, decided that they would rather die by their own hands than be taken prisoner. Each man took it upon himself to kill his own family. Two women and five children survived to tell the Romans the story what had taken place. Today MASADA is a national shrine of Israel. It's become a banner, "Masada shall not fall again."
72 Hebrew Schoars
Around 270 B. E. King Ptolemy Philadelphus desired to collect all the books in the word (at that time) for his own personal library. He lacked the 613 Jewish Laws and to acquire this he traded 1000.000 captives for a translation of it. He had a natural love of learning, a quality which is the highest possession of man through the study of history and was anxious to hear everything that tends to build up one’s soul.
For neither the pleasure derived from gold nor any other of the possessions which are pried by shallow minds confers the same benefit as the pursuit of culture and the study which we expend in securing it. For when men from pure motives plan some action in the interest of righteousness and the performance of noble deeds, Almighty G-d brings their efforts and purposes to a successful issue.
The scrolls of the Law of the Jews were written in Hebrew characters and language and had been carelessly interpreted, and did not represent the original text; for they had never had a king’s care to protect them. The king writing to the High Priest Eleazar in Jerusalem, asked him to send six elders out of every tribe to obtain an accurate translation from the Hebrew tongue into the Greek language of the Law's full wisdom ree from all blemish.
The scholars had to be men of noble life and skilled in the Hebrew Law. They were men who had not only acquired proficiency in Jewish literature but had studied most carefully that of the Greeks as well.The following are the names of the 72 elders of each tribe:
Of the first tribe, Joseph, Ezekiah, Zachariah, John, Ezekiah, Elisha.
Of the second tribe, Judas, Simon, Samuel, Adaeus, Mattathias, Eschlemias.
Of the third tribe, Nehemia, Joseph, Thedosius, Baseas, Ornias, Dakis.
Of the fourth tribe, Jonathan, Abraeus, Elisha, Ananias, Chabrias…?
Of the fifth tribe, Isaac, Jacob, Jesus, Sabbataeus, Simon, Levi.
Of the sixth tribe, Judas, Joseph, Simon, Zacharias, Samuel, Selemas.
Of the seventh tribe, Sabbataeus, Zedekiah, Jacob, Isaac, Jesias, Nattheus.
Of the eighth tribe, Theodosius, Jason, Jesus, Theodotus, John, Jonathan.
Of the ninth tribe, Theopilus, Abraham, Arsamos, Jason, Enemias, Daniel.
Of the tenth tribe, Jeremiah, Eleazar, Zachariah, Baneas, Elisha, Dathaeus.
Of the eleventh tribe, Samuel, Josheph, Judas, Jonathes, Chabu, Dositheus.
Of the twelfth tribe, Isaelus, John, Theodosius, Arsamos, Abietes, Ezekiel.
All this can be read out of the book “Letter of Aristeas,” which will go more into detail of the lavishness of the furnishings of the Temple. Shows times and customs of the culture.
Are we forever greatful to G-d for these devoted men taking 72 days to complete this task giving us understanding of G-d's instructions of how to conduct our lives. One example they gave was they always washed their hands before they prayed or study because it was a token that they had done no evil. Every form of activity is wrought by means of the hands, and they regard everything as a symbol of righteousness and truth.
There were 613 Oral Laws:248 Positive (This will positively happen if you don’t listen)365 Negative (Instructions of what not to do) and it was translated into Greek by 72 Hebrew men, teaching us G-d’s Law, or if you prefer instructions, on how to live righteously. Y’Shua’s work on the cross did not release us from all obligations to the Law. It broke down the barrier between Jew and Gentile (Col. 2:13-17; Eph. 2:11-22). It no longer binds believers, but the moral aspects of the Law, which reflect the unchanging moral character of the Father, revel change and bind all people everywhere (Matt. 5:17-19).
The Law receiver at Sinai was to train the Jews in righteousness and prepare them for their Messiah. The Law serves: to reveal sin which alienates man from G-d and to demonstrate the need for a Savior from sin (Gal. 3:19-22).
This is the way the Father told us to study and teach:
[Isa. 28:10] For precept must be upon precept, precept upon precept; line upon line, line upon line; here a little, and there a little:
Line - a rule or law or precept. The idea is taken from schoolmasters who instruct their pupils by making lines or marks for them that they are to trace or imitate. The repetition of sounds in Hebrew expresses the scorn of the imitators of Isaiah's speaking; he spoke stammering (Isaiah 28:11). G-d's mode of teaching offends by its simplicity the pride of sinners (2 Kings 5:11, 12, 1 Corinthians 1:23).
Here a little and there a little - in the manner of instructing children. G-d’s method of imparting religious truth has often appeared to a scoffing world to be undignified and foolish.Keeping it simple!
Why this book and others were not included in the Bible is because there were seven requirements for Scripture to be canonized:
1. 2 Tim. 3:15 to make one to understand salvation.
2. Rom. 10:17 to produce faith.
3. John 5:39 to revel the Messiah.
4. Acts 20:22 to establish one’s inheritance.
5. Acts 20:22 to build one up as a believer.
6. 2 Tim. 3:16 to correct and reprove.
7. 2 Tim. 3:17 to perfect the believer.
It took approximallely 40 writers composed the entire Bible, (39 Hebrew and one Gentile). If all we had to read was G-d’s Laws and His Words – it would be enough! Everything else is commentary to get full understanding.
For neither the pleasure derived from gold nor any other of the possessions which are pried by shallow minds confers the same benefit as the pursuit of culture and the study which we expend in securing it. For when men from pure motives plan some action in the interest of righteousness and the performance of noble deeds, Almighty G-d brings their efforts and purposes to a successful issue.
The scrolls of the Law of the Jews were written in Hebrew characters and language and had been carelessly interpreted, and did not represent the original text; for they had never had a king’s care to protect them. The king writing to the High Priest Eleazar in Jerusalem, asked him to send six elders out of every tribe to obtain an accurate translation from the Hebrew tongue into the Greek language of the Law's full wisdom ree from all blemish.
The scholars had to be men of noble life and skilled in the Hebrew Law. They were men who had not only acquired proficiency in Jewish literature but had studied most carefully that of the Greeks as well.The following are the names of the 72 elders of each tribe:
Of the first tribe, Joseph, Ezekiah, Zachariah, John, Ezekiah, Elisha.
Of the second tribe, Judas, Simon, Samuel, Adaeus, Mattathias, Eschlemias.
Of the third tribe, Nehemia, Joseph, Thedosius, Baseas, Ornias, Dakis.
Of the fourth tribe, Jonathan, Abraeus, Elisha, Ananias, Chabrias…?
Of the fifth tribe, Isaac, Jacob, Jesus, Sabbataeus, Simon, Levi.
Of the sixth tribe, Judas, Joseph, Simon, Zacharias, Samuel, Selemas.
Of the seventh tribe, Sabbataeus, Zedekiah, Jacob, Isaac, Jesias, Nattheus.
Of the eighth tribe, Theodosius, Jason, Jesus, Theodotus, John, Jonathan.
Of the ninth tribe, Theopilus, Abraham, Arsamos, Jason, Enemias, Daniel.
Of the tenth tribe, Jeremiah, Eleazar, Zachariah, Baneas, Elisha, Dathaeus.
Of the eleventh tribe, Samuel, Josheph, Judas, Jonathes, Chabu, Dositheus.
Of the twelfth tribe, Isaelus, John, Theodosius, Arsamos, Abietes, Ezekiel.
All this can be read out of the book “Letter of Aristeas,” which will go more into detail of the lavishness of the furnishings of the Temple. Shows times and customs of the culture.
Are we forever greatful to G-d for these devoted men taking 72 days to complete this task giving us understanding of G-d's instructions of how to conduct our lives. One example they gave was they always washed their hands before they prayed or study because it was a token that they had done no evil. Every form of activity is wrought by means of the hands, and they regard everything as a symbol of righteousness and truth.
There were 613 Oral Laws:248 Positive (This will positively happen if you don’t listen)365 Negative (Instructions of what not to do) and it was translated into Greek by 72 Hebrew men, teaching us G-d’s Law, or if you prefer instructions, on how to live righteously. Y’Shua’s work on the cross did not release us from all obligations to the Law. It broke down the barrier between Jew and Gentile (Col. 2:13-17; Eph. 2:11-22). It no longer binds believers, but the moral aspects of the Law, which reflect the unchanging moral character of the Father, revel change and bind all people everywhere (Matt. 5:17-19).
The Law receiver at Sinai was to train the Jews in righteousness and prepare them for their Messiah. The Law serves: to reveal sin which alienates man from G-d and to demonstrate the need for a Savior from sin (Gal. 3:19-22).
This is the way the Father told us to study and teach:
[Isa. 28:10] For precept must be upon precept, precept upon precept; line upon line, line upon line; here a little, and there a little:
Line - a rule or law or precept. The idea is taken from schoolmasters who instruct their pupils by making lines or marks for them that they are to trace or imitate. The repetition of sounds in Hebrew expresses the scorn of the imitators of Isaiah's speaking; he spoke stammering (Isaiah 28:11). G-d's mode of teaching offends by its simplicity the pride of sinners (2 Kings 5:11, 12, 1 Corinthians 1:23).
Here a little and there a little - in the manner of instructing children. G-d’s method of imparting religious truth has often appeared to a scoffing world to be undignified and foolish.Keeping it simple!
Why this book and others were not included in the Bible is because there were seven requirements for Scripture to be canonized:
1. 2 Tim. 3:15 to make one to understand salvation.
2. Rom. 10:17 to produce faith.
3. John 5:39 to revel the Messiah.
4. Acts 20:22 to establish one’s inheritance.
5. Acts 20:22 to build one up as a believer.
6. 2 Tim. 3:16 to correct and reprove.
7. 2 Tim. 3:17 to perfect the believer.
It took approximallely 40 writers composed the entire Bible, (39 Hebrew and one Gentile). If all we had to read was G-d’s Laws and His Words – it would be enough! Everything else is commentary to get full understanding.
Levi's Testimony
Levi’s testimony; the third son of Jacob and Leah. A mystic and dreamer of dreams, a prophet, speaks to his sons the things he ordained and all that they should do, and what things should befall them until the day of judgment. He was sound in health when he called them to him; for it had been revealed to him that he should die. “I, Levi, was born in Haran, and I came with my father to Shechem. When I was young, about twenty years of age, when, with Simeon, I wrought vengeance on Hamor for our sister Dinah. And when I was feeding the flocks in Abel-Maul, the spirit of G-d came upon me, and I was grieving for the race of the sons of men, and I prayed to the Father that I might be saved. There fell upon me a sleep, and I was taken up into the heavens. An angel said to me, Marvel not at this, for thou shalt stand near the L-rd, and shalt be His minister, and shalt declare His mysteries to men, and shall proclaim concerning Him that shall redeem Israel. And by thee and Judah shall G-d appear among men, saving every race of men. And from G-d’s portion shall be thy life, and He shall be thy field and vineyard, and fruits, gold, and silver.
Hear, therefore, regarding the heaves which have been shown to thee:
The lowest is for this cause gloomy unto thee, in that it beholds all the unrighteous deeds of men. And it has fire, snow, and ice made ready for the Day of Judgment, in the righteous judgments of G-d; for in it are all the spirits of the retributions for vengeance on men.
And in the second are the hosts of the armies which are ordained for the Day of Judgment, to work vengeance on spirits of deceit and of Beliar.
And above them are the holy ones.
In the highest of all dwelleth the Great Glory, far above all holiness.
In the heaven next to it are the archangels, who minister and make propitiation to G-d for all the sins of ignorance of the righteous.
In the heaven below this are the angels that bear answers to the angels of the presence of G-d.
And the heavens next to this are thrones and dominions, in which always they offer praises to G-d.
When, therefore, G-d looketh upon us, all of us are shaken; yea, the heavens, and the earth, and the abysses are shaken at the presence of His majesty. But the sons of men, having no perception of these things, sin and provoke the Most High.
Now therefore, know that G-d shall execute judgment upon the sons of men. Because when the rocks are being rent, and the sun quenched, and the waters dried up, and the fire cowering, and all creation troubled, and the invisible spirits melting away, and Hades taketh spoils through the visitations of the Most High, men will be unbelieving and persist in their iniquity. On this account with punishment shall they be judged.
Separate thee from iniquity, and that thou shouldst become to Him a son, and a servant, and a minister of His presence.
And the angel said to me: Levi, thy seed shall be dividied into three offices, for a sign of the glory of the L-rd who is to come. And the first portion shall be great; yea, greater than it shall none be. The second shall be in the priesthood. And the third shall be called by a new name, because a king shall arise in Judah, and shall establish a new priesthood, after the fashion of the Gentiles. And His presence is beloved, as a prophet of the Most High, of the seed of Abraham our father.
And when I awoke, I understood this dream and hid it in my heart. And after two days I and Judah went up with our father Jacob to Isaac our father’s father to be blessed. When we came to Bethel, my father saw a vision concerning me, that I should be their priest unto G-d. And Isaac called me continually to put me in remembrance of the Law of G-d, even as the angel of the L-rd showed unto me. And he taught me the Law of the priesthood of sacrifices, whole burnt-offerings, first-fruits, freewill-offerings and peace-offerings. And before entering into the Holy Place, bathe; and when thou offerest the sacrifice, wash; and again, when thou finishest the sacrifice, wash.
Now, therefore, observe whatsoever I command you, children; for whatsoever things I have heard from my fathers I have declared unto you. And behold I am clear from your ungodliness and transgression, which ye shall commit in the end of the ages against the Savior of the world, Messiah, acting godlessly, deceiving Israel, and stirring up against it great evils from the L-rd. The veil of the Temple shall be rent, so as not to cover your shame, and ye shall be scattered as captives among the Gentiles, as told in the book of Enoch the righteous.
Eight years old was I when I went into the land of Canaan, and 18 when I slew Shechem, and 19 when I became priest, and 28 when I took a wife and her name was Melcha. She bore me Gersam, for we were sojourners in our land; Kobath, which is, beginning of majesty and instruction. Merari, that is my bitterness because he also was like to die; and Jochebed, born in Egypt, for I was renowned then in the midst of my brethren.
I command you; fear the L-rd your G-d with your whole heart, and walk in simplicity according to all His Law. Teach your children that they may have understanding all their life, reading unceasingly the Law of G-d. For every one that knoweth the Law of G-d shall be honored, and shall not be a stranger whithersoever he goeth.
Work righteousness upon the earth, that ye may have it as a treasure in heaven. And sow good things in your souls that ye may find them in your life.
I have learnt that at the end of the ages ye will transgress against the L-rd, stretching out hands to wickedness against Him; and to all the Gentiles shall ye become a scorn. For as the heaven is purer in G-d’s sight than the earth, so also be ye, the lights of Israel, purer than all the Gentiles. But if ye be darkened through transgressions, what, therefore, will all the Gentiles do living in blindness? Yea, ye shall bring a curse upon our race, because the light of the Law which was given for to lighten every man this ye desire to destroy by teaching commandments contrary to the ordinances of G-d.
And now I have learnt that for seventy weeks ye shall go astray, and profane the priesthood, and pollute the sacrifices. And your holy places shall be laid waste even to the ground because of the deceiver.
Whereas ye have heard concerning the seventy weeks, hear also concerning the priesthood. For in each jubilee there shall be a priesthood. And in the first jubilee, the first who is anointed to the priesthood shall be great, and shall speak to G-d as to a father. And His priesthood shall be perfect with G-d, and in the day of His gladness shall He arise for the salvation of the world, and He shall execute a righteous judgment upon the earth for a multitude of days. And the knowledge of G-d shall be poured forth upon the earth, as the water of the seas. The heaves shall be opened, and from the Temple of glory shall come upon Him sanctification, with the Father’s voice as from Abraham to Isaac. And the glory of the Most High shall be uttered over Him, and the spirit of understanding and sanctification shall rest upon Him in the water. And there shall none succeed Him for all generations forever. And in His priesthood the Gentiles shall be multiplied in knowledge upon the earth, and enlightened through the grace of G-d.
Now my children, ye have heard all; choose, therefore, for yourselves either the light or the darkness, either the Law of G-d or the works of Beliar.”
And thus Levi ceased commanding his sons; and he stretched out his feet on the bed, and was gathered to his fathers, after he had lived a 137 years.
Hear, therefore, regarding the heaves which have been shown to thee:
The lowest is for this cause gloomy unto thee, in that it beholds all the unrighteous deeds of men. And it has fire, snow, and ice made ready for the Day of Judgment, in the righteous judgments of G-d; for in it are all the spirits of the retributions for vengeance on men.
And in the second are the hosts of the armies which are ordained for the Day of Judgment, to work vengeance on spirits of deceit and of Beliar.
And above them are the holy ones.
In the highest of all dwelleth the Great Glory, far above all holiness.
In the heaven next to it are the archangels, who minister and make propitiation to G-d for all the sins of ignorance of the righteous.
In the heaven below this are the angels that bear answers to the angels of the presence of G-d.
And the heavens next to this are thrones and dominions, in which always they offer praises to G-d.
When, therefore, G-d looketh upon us, all of us are shaken; yea, the heavens, and the earth, and the abysses are shaken at the presence of His majesty. But the sons of men, having no perception of these things, sin and provoke the Most High.
Now therefore, know that G-d shall execute judgment upon the sons of men. Because when the rocks are being rent, and the sun quenched, and the waters dried up, and the fire cowering, and all creation troubled, and the invisible spirits melting away, and Hades taketh spoils through the visitations of the Most High, men will be unbelieving and persist in their iniquity. On this account with punishment shall they be judged.
Separate thee from iniquity, and that thou shouldst become to Him a son, and a servant, and a minister of His presence.
And the angel said to me: Levi, thy seed shall be dividied into three offices, for a sign of the glory of the L-rd who is to come. And the first portion shall be great; yea, greater than it shall none be. The second shall be in the priesthood. And the third shall be called by a new name, because a king shall arise in Judah, and shall establish a new priesthood, after the fashion of the Gentiles. And His presence is beloved, as a prophet of the Most High, of the seed of Abraham our father.
And when I awoke, I understood this dream and hid it in my heart. And after two days I and Judah went up with our father Jacob to Isaac our father’s father to be blessed. When we came to Bethel, my father saw a vision concerning me, that I should be their priest unto G-d. And Isaac called me continually to put me in remembrance of the Law of G-d, even as the angel of the L-rd showed unto me. And he taught me the Law of the priesthood of sacrifices, whole burnt-offerings, first-fruits, freewill-offerings and peace-offerings. And before entering into the Holy Place, bathe; and when thou offerest the sacrifice, wash; and again, when thou finishest the sacrifice, wash.
Now, therefore, observe whatsoever I command you, children; for whatsoever things I have heard from my fathers I have declared unto you. And behold I am clear from your ungodliness and transgression, which ye shall commit in the end of the ages against the Savior of the world, Messiah, acting godlessly, deceiving Israel, and stirring up against it great evils from the L-rd. The veil of the Temple shall be rent, so as not to cover your shame, and ye shall be scattered as captives among the Gentiles, as told in the book of Enoch the righteous.
Eight years old was I when I went into the land of Canaan, and 18 when I slew Shechem, and 19 when I became priest, and 28 when I took a wife and her name was Melcha. She bore me Gersam, for we were sojourners in our land; Kobath, which is, beginning of majesty and instruction. Merari, that is my bitterness because he also was like to die; and Jochebed, born in Egypt, for I was renowned then in the midst of my brethren.
I command you; fear the L-rd your G-d with your whole heart, and walk in simplicity according to all His Law. Teach your children that they may have understanding all their life, reading unceasingly the Law of G-d. For every one that knoweth the Law of G-d shall be honored, and shall not be a stranger whithersoever he goeth.
Work righteousness upon the earth, that ye may have it as a treasure in heaven. And sow good things in your souls that ye may find them in your life.
I have learnt that at the end of the ages ye will transgress against the L-rd, stretching out hands to wickedness against Him; and to all the Gentiles shall ye become a scorn. For as the heaven is purer in G-d’s sight than the earth, so also be ye, the lights of Israel, purer than all the Gentiles. But if ye be darkened through transgressions, what, therefore, will all the Gentiles do living in blindness? Yea, ye shall bring a curse upon our race, because the light of the Law which was given for to lighten every man this ye desire to destroy by teaching commandments contrary to the ordinances of G-d.
And now I have learnt that for seventy weeks ye shall go astray, and profane the priesthood, and pollute the sacrifices. And your holy places shall be laid waste even to the ground because of the deceiver.
Whereas ye have heard concerning the seventy weeks, hear also concerning the priesthood. For in each jubilee there shall be a priesthood. And in the first jubilee, the first who is anointed to the priesthood shall be great, and shall speak to G-d as to a father. And His priesthood shall be perfect with G-d, and in the day of His gladness shall He arise for the salvation of the world, and He shall execute a righteous judgment upon the earth for a multitude of days. And the knowledge of G-d shall be poured forth upon the earth, as the water of the seas. The heaves shall be opened, and from the Temple of glory shall come upon Him sanctification, with the Father’s voice as from Abraham to Isaac. And the glory of the Most High shall be uttered over Him, and the spirit of understanding and sanctification shall rest upon Him in the water. And there shall none succeed Him for all generations forever. And in His priesthood the Gentiles shall be multiplied in knowledge upon the earth, and enlightened through the grace of G-d.
Now my children, ye have heard all; choose, therefore, for yourselves either the light or the darkness, either the Law of G-d or the works of Beliar.”
And thus Levi ceased commanding his sons; and he stretched out his feet on the bed, and was gathered to his fathers, after he had lived a 137 years.
Simeon's Testimony
Simeon’s testimony:
The second son of Jacob and Leah, the strong man, he becomes jealous of Joseph and is an instigator in the plot against him. The words he spoke to his sons before he died, in the 120th year of his life, at which time Joseph, his brother, died:
“I will declare unto you what things I have in my heart. I was born of Jacob as my father’s second son; and my mother Leah called me Simeon, because G-d had heard her prayer. I was jealous in many things of Joseph, because my father loved him beyond all. I set my mind against him to destroy him, because the prince of deceit sent forth the spirit of jealousy and blinded my mind, so that I regarded him not as a brother, nor did I spare even Jacob my father. Judah, my brother, sold him to the Ishmalelites, but on hearing this I was exceedingly wroth against Judah in that he let him go away alive. For five months I continued wrathful against him.
But G-d restrained me, and withheld from me the power of my hands, for my right hand was half withered for seven days. I repented and wept and besought the L-rd G-d that my hand might be restored and that I might hold aloof from all pollution and envy and from all folly.
Now, my children, hearken unto me and beware of the spirit of deceit and envy. For envy ruleth over the whole mind of a man, and suffereth him neither to eat nor to drink, nor to do any good thing. Two years, therefore, I afflicted my soul with fasting in the fear of the L-rd and learnt that deliverance from envy cometh by the fear of G-d. Henceforth he sympathiseth with him whom he envied and forgiveth those who are hostile to him, and so ceaseth from his envy.
Do ye also, my children, love each one his brother with a good heart; and the spirit of envy will withdraw from you. For this maketh savage the soul and destroyeth the body; it causeth anger and war in the mind, stirreth up unto deeds of blood, leadeth the mind into frenzy, causeth tumult to the soul and trembling to the body. Make your hearts good before G-d and your ways straight before men, and ye shall find grace before G-d and men.
Obey Levi and Judah and be not lifted up against these two tribes, for from them shall arise unto you the salvation of G-d. For the L-rd shall raise up from Levi a High Priest and from Judah a King, G-d and man. He shall save all the Gentiles and the race of Israel. For the L-rd G-d shall appear on earth, and Himself save all men. Then shall all the spirits of deceit be given to be trodden under foot, and men shall rule over wicked spirits. Now pass these commands down to your children, that they may observe them throughout their generations.”
The sons laid him in a wooden coffin, to take up his bones to Hebron, secretly during a war of the Egyptians to rest with his father. They were in Egypt until the day of their departure by the hand of Moses.
The second son of Jacob and Leah, the strong man, he becomes jealous of Joseph and is an instigator in the plot against him. The words he spoke to his sons before he died, in the 120th year of his life, at which time Joseph, his brother, died:
“I will declare unto you what things I have in my heart. I was born of Jacob as my father’s second son; and my mother Leah called me Simeon, because G-d had heard her prayer. I was jealous in many things of Joseph, because my father loved him beyond all. I set my mind against him to destroy him, because the prince of deceit sent forth the spirit of jealousy and blinded my mind, so that I regarded him not as a brother, nor did I spare even Jacob my father. Judah, my brother, sold him to the Ishmalelites, but on hearing this I was exceedingly wroth against Judah in that he let him go away alive. For five months I continued wrathful against him.
But G-d restrained me, and withheld from me the power of my hands, for my right hand was half withered for seven days. I repented and wept and besought the L-rd G-d that my hand might be restored and that I might hold aloof from all pollution and envy and from all folly.
Now, my children, hearken unto me and beware of the spirit of deceit and envy. For envy ruleth over the whole mind of a man, and suffereth him neither to eat nor to drink, nor to do any good thing. Two years, therefore, I afflicted my soul with fasting in the fear of the L-rd and learnt that deliverance from envy cometh by the fear of G-d. Henceforth he sympathiseth with him whom he envied and forgiveth those who are hostile to him, and so ceaseth from his envy.
Do ye also, my children, love each one his brother with a good heart; and the spirit of envy will withdraw from you. For this maketh savage the soul and destroyeth the body; it causeth anger and war in the mind, stirreth up unto deeds of blood, leadeth the mind into frenzy, causeth tumult to the soul and trembling to the body. Make your hearts good before G-d and your ways straight before men, and ye shall find grace before G-d and men.
Obey Levi and Judah and be not lifted up against these two tribes, for from them shall arise unto you the salvation of G-d. For the L-rd shall raise up from Levi a High Priest and from Judah a King, G-d and man. He shall save all the Gentiles and the race of Israel. For the L-rd G-d shall appear on earth, and Himself save all men. Then shall all the spirits of deceit be given to be trodden under foot, and men shall rule over wicked spirits. Now pass these commands down to your children, that they may observe them throughout their generations.”
The sons laid him in a wooden coffin, to take up his bones to Hebron, secretly during a war of the Egyptians to rest with his father. They were in Egypt until the day of their departure by the hand of Moses.
Reuben's Testimony
Reuben's Testimony
From the book The Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs are biographies written between 107 and 137 B. E. Each is made to tell their story, when on their deathbed they call all their children and grandchildren to lay bare their experiences for the moral guidance of their hearers.
When you look beyond the unvarnished – almost brutally frank – passages of the text, you will discern a remarkable attestation of the expectations of the Messiah which existed a hundred years before Y’Shua. These writings have achieved a real immortality by influencing the thought and diction of the writers of the N.T. to bridge the chasm that divides the ethics of the Old and New Testaments.
I am only pulling out of each one, some of the golden nuggets that add to the story as we know it – furthering our knowledge. These were not chosen to be canonized, by our forefathers.
Reuben’s testimony: the first-born son of Jacob and Leah, the man of experience counsels against fornication and points out the ways in which man are most apt to fall into error. He died in the 125th year of his life, two years after the death of Joseph his brother. When he fell ill, his sons and his son’s sons were gathered together to visit him, that he might give his last words to them. “I call to witness against you this day the G-d of heaven, that ye walk not in the sins of youth and fornication, wherein I was poured out, and defiled the bed of my father Jacob. I was thirty years old when I wrought the evil thing before G-d, and for seven months I was sick unto death. And after this I repented with set purpose of my soul for seven years before the L-rd. I mourned over my sin, for it was great, such as had not been in Israel. Now hear me, what things I saw concerning the seven spirits of deceit, when I repented.
The first is the spirit of life, with which the constitution of man is created.
The second is the sense of sight, with which ariseth desire.
The third is the sense of hearing, with which cometh teaching.
The fourth is the sense of smell, with tastes are given to draw air and breath.
The fifth is the power of speech, with which cometh knowledge.
The sixth is the sense of taste, with which cometh the eating of meats and drinks; and by it strength is produced, for in food is the foundation of strength.
The seventh is the power of procreation and sexual intercourse, with which through love of pleasure sins enter in. Wherefore it is the last in order of creation, and the first in that of youth, because it is filled with ignorance, and leadeth the youth as a blind man to a pit, and as a beast to a precipice.
Besides all these there is an eighth spirit of sleep, with which is brought about the trance of nature and the image of death. With these spirits are mingled the spirits of error.
First, the spirit of fornication is seated in the nature and in the senses;
The second, the spirit of insatiableness, in the belly;
The third, the spirit of fighting, in the liver and gall.
The fourth is the spirit of obsequiousness and chicanery, that through officious attention one may be fair in seeming.
The fifth is the spirit of lying, in perdition and jealousy to practice deceits, and concealments from kindred and friends.
The seventh is the spirit of injustice, with which are thefts and acts of rapacity, that a man may fulfill the desire of his heart; for injustice worketh together with the other spirits by the taking of gifts.
And now, my children, love the truth, and it will preserve you: hear ye the words of your father. Walk in singleness of heart in the fear of G-d, and expend labour on good works, and on study. I adjure you by the G-d of heaven to do truth each one unto his neighbour and to entertain love each one for his brother. And draw ye near to Levi in humbleness of heart, that ye may receive a blessing from his mouth, and bow down before his seed, for on our behalf it will die in wars visible and invisible, and will be among you an eternal king.”
And Reuben died, having given these last commands to his sons. And they placed him in a coffin until they carried him up from Egypt, and buried him in Hebron in the cave where his father was.
From the book The Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs are biographies written between 107 and 137 B. E. Each is made to tell their story, when on their deathbed they call all their children and grandchildren to lay bare their experiences for the moral guidance of their hearers.
When you look beyond the unvarnished – almost brutally frank – passages of the text, you will discern a remarkable attestation of the expectations of the Messiah which existed a hundred years before Y’Shua. These writings have achieved a real immortality by influencing the thought and diction of the writers of the N.T. to bridge the chasm that divides the ethics of the Old and New Testaments.
I am only pulling out of each one, some of the golden nuggets that add to the story as we know it – furthering our knowledge. These were not chosen to be canonized, by our forefathers.
Reuben’s testimony: the first-born son of Jacob and Leah, the man of experience counsels against fornication and points out the ways in which man are most apt to fall into error. He died in the 125th year of his life, two years after the death of Joseph his brother. When he fell ill, his sons and his son’s sons were gathered together to visit him, that he might give his last words to them. “I call to witness against you this day the G-d of heaven, that ye walk not in the sins of youth and fornication, wherein I was poured out, and defiled the bed of my father Jacob. I was thirty years old when I wrought the evil thing before G-d, and for seven months I was sick unto death. And after this I repented with set purpose of my soul for seven years before the L-rd. I mourned over my sin, for it was great, such as had not been in Israel. Now hear me, what things I saw concerning the seven spirits of deceit, when I repented.
The first is the spirit of life, with which the constitution of man is created.
The second is the sense of sight, with which ariseth desire.
The third is the sense of hearing, with which cometh teaching.
The fourth is the sense of smell, with tastes are given to draw air and breath.
The fifth is the power of speech, with which cometh knowledge.
The sixth is the sense of taste, with which cometh the eating of meats and drinks; and by it strength is produced, for in food is the foundation of strength.
The seventh is the power of procreation and sexual intercourse, with which through love of pleasure sins enter in. Wherefore it is the last in order of creation, and the first in that of youth, because it is filled with ignorance, and leadeth the youth as a blind man to a pit, and as a beast to a precipice.
Besides all these there is an eighth spirit of sleep, with which is brought about the trance of nature and the image of death. With these spirits are mingled the spirits of error.
First, the spirit of fornication is seated in the nature and in the senses;
The second, the spirit of insatiableness, in the belly;
The third, the spirit of fighting, in the liver and gall.
The fourth is the spirit of obsequiousness and chicanery, that through officious attention one may be fair in seeming.
The fifth is the spirit of lying, in perdition and jealousy to practice deceits, and concealments from kindred and friends.
The seventh is the spirit of injustice, with which are thefts and acts of rapacity, that a man may fulfill the desire of his heart; for injustice worketh together with the other spirits by the taking of gifts.
And now, my children, love the truth, and it will preserve you: hear ye the words of your father. Walk in singleness of heart in the fear of G-d, and expend labour on good works, and on study. I adjure you by the G-d of heaven to do truth each one unto his neighbour and to entertain love each one for his brother. And draw ye near to Levi in humbleness of heart, that ye may receive a blessing from his mouth, and bow down before his seed, for on our behalf it will die in wars visible and invisible, and will be among you an eternal king.”
And Reuben died, having given these last commands to his sons. And they placed him in a coffin until they carried him up from Egypt, and buried him in Hebron in the cave where his father was.
Fourth Maccabees-Daughter
Daughter of Abraham
When the Hebrews would not renounce their obedience to G-d’s Law in the first century the king tried to torture them even more savagely. Under these orders of the tyrant seven brethren together with their aged mother where brought before him, all handsome, and modest, and well-born, and generally attractive, they refused to share in the Hellenic live and walk in a new way.
The instruments of torture were brought forward in order to persuade them by fear to break G-d’s Law. But when the guards had produced wheels, and joint-dislocators, and racks, and bone-crushers, and catapults, and cauldrons, and braziers, and thumb-screws, and iron claws, and wedges, and branding irons, but they hearing his persuasions, and seeing his dreadful engines, not only showed no fear but actually arrayed their philosophy in opposition to the tyrant, and by their right Reason did abase his tyranny. And all in one voice together, and as with one soul, said to him: “Why dost thou delay, O tyrant? We are ready to die rather than transgress the commandments of our fathers. For we esteem thy mercy, giving us our life in return for a breach of a Law, a thing harder to bear than death itself. If the old men of the Hebrews endured the tortures for righteousness’ sake until they died, more befittingly will we young men die despising the torments of the compulsion, over which our age teachers also triumphed. For we through this our evil entreatment and our endurance of it shall win the prize of virtue; but thou for our cruel murder shalt suffer at eh hands of divine justice sufficient torment by fire for ever!”
The scourgers brought forward the sons one by one starting with the eldest of them and stripped him of his garment and bound his hands and arms on either side with thongs. But when they had scourged him till they were weary, and gained nothing thereby, they cast him upon the wheel. And on it the noble youth was racked till his bones were out of joint, then they set hot coals upon him besides, and intensifying the torture strained him yet tighter on the wheel. And all the wheel was besmeared with his blood, and the heaped coals were quenched by the humours of his body dropping down, and the rent flesh ran round the axles of the machine. With his bodily frame already in dissolution this great-souled youth, like a true son of Abraham, groaned not at all.
The guards brought forth the second in age of the sons, and grappling him with sharp-clawed hands of iron they fastened him to the engines and the catapult. These panther-like beasts tore at his sinews with claws of iron, and rent away all the flesh from his cheeks, and tore off the skin from his head. The son called out; “For I am supported under pain by the joys that come through virtue, whereas thou art in torment whilst glorying in thy impiety; neither shall thou escape, O most abominable tyrant, the penalties of the divine wrath! And when he had bravely met his glorious death, the third son was being brought forward.
They dislocated his hands and his feet with their dislocating engines, and wrenched his limbs out of their sockets, and unstrung them; and they twisted round his fingers, and his arms, and his legs, and his elbow-joints. They stripped off his skin, taking the points of the fingers with it, and tore in Scythian fashion the scalp from his head, and straight-way brought him to the wheel. And on this they twisted his spine till he saw his own flesh hanging in strips and great gouts of blood pouring down from his entrails. And when this man had died worthily of his brothers, they brought up the fourth son. This man was also put to a death of agony with the tortures.
The fifth son sprang forward yelling out: “I shrink not, O tyrant, from demanding the torture for virtue’s sake. I come myself, slaying me thou mayest by yet more misdeeds increase the penalty thou owest to the justice of Heaven.” As he spoke the guars bound him and brought him before the catapult; and they tired him thereto on his knees, and fastening them there with iron clamps, they wrenched his loins over the rolling wedge so that he was completely curled back like a scorpion and every joint was disjointed. And when this man also was dead, the sixth was brought, a mere boy.
They took him to the wheel, and with care they stretched him out and dislocated the bones of his back and set fire under him. And they made sharp skewers red-hot, and ran them into his back, and piercing through his sides they burned away his entrails also. And when this one also died a blessed death, being cast into the cauldron, the seventh son, the youngest of them all, came forward.
Binding him, they sent for the boy’s mother, in order that in her sorrow for the lost of so many sons she might urge the survivor to obey and be saved. The son ask the guard to be loosen and they rejoiced at eh boy’s request, thinking he had come to his senses. He ran up to the red-hot brazier and spoke out: “Are thou not ashamed, being a man, O wretch with the heat of a wild beast, to take men of like feeling with thyself, made from the same elements, and tear out their tongues, and scourge and torture them in this manner? I am no renegade to the witness borne by my brethren, and I call upon the G-d of my fathers to be merciful unto my nation, and thee will He punish both in this present life and after that thou are dead.” And with that he cast himself into the red-hot brazier, and so gave up the ghost.
So the seven-towered right Reason of the youths defended the haven of righteousness and repulsed the tempestuousness of the passions, in conjunction with their piety it rendered their brotherly love more fervent. None of these seven youths turned coward, none shrank in the face of death, but all hastened to the death by torture as if running the road to immortality. For as the seven days of the creation of the world do enring religion, so did the youths choir-like enring their sevenfold companionship, and made the terror of the tortures of no account.
Now the mother of the seven youths endured the torments inflicted on each several one of her children. But consider how manifold are the yearnings of a mother’s heart, so that her feeling for her offspring becomes the centre of her whole world and was not moved from her purpose by her affection for her children. We stamp a marvelous likeness of our soul and of our shape on the tender nature of the child, and most of all through the mother’s sympathy with her children being deeper than the father’s. For women are softer of soul than men, and the more children they bear the more do they abound in love for them. She of the seven sons abounded in love beyond the most, seeing that, having in seven child-bearing felt maternal tenderness for the fruit of her womb, and having been constrained because of the many pangs in which she bore each to a close affection, she nevertheless through the fear of G-d rejected the present safety of her children. More than that, through the moral beauty and goodness of her sons and their obedience to the Law, her maternal love for them was made stronger. For they were just, and temperate, and brave and great-souled, and lovers of each other and of their mother in such manner that they obeyed her in the keeping of the Law even unto death.
The mother, seeing them one by one racked and burned, remained unshaken in soul for the Laws sake. She saw the flesh of her sons being consumed in the fire, and the extremities of their hands and feet scattered on the ground, and the flesh-covering, torn off from their hands right to their cheeks, strewn about like masks. She did not weep when she beheld the eyes of each amid the torments looking boldly on the same anguish, and saw in their quivering nostrils the signs of approaching death. She saw the flesh of one son being severed after the flesh of another, and hand after hand being cut off, and head after head being flayed, and corpse upon corpse, and the place crowded with spectators on account of the tortures of her children, and shed not a tear.
How many and how great were the tortures with which the mother was tormented while her sons were being tortured with torments of rack and fire! But Inspired Reason lent her heart a man’s strength under her passion of suffering and exalted her to make no account of the present yearnings of mother-love; she surrendered them through faith in G-d. As a true daughter of Abraham, called to mind His G-d fearing courage, to endure to the end. O woman, nobler to resist than men, and braver than warriors to endure! With the whole living world for her burden in the world-whelming Deluge, did withstand the mighty surges, so thou, the keeper of the Law, beaten upon every side by the waves of passions, and strained as with strong blasts by the tortures of thy sons, didst nobly weather the storms that assailed thee for the Laws sake. Now have not only men triumphed over their sufferings, but that a women also has despised the most despised the most dreadful tortures, as burned in her the instinct of motherhood at the sight of her seven sons being tortured, thou was not weak in spirit.
A holy and G-d-fearing mother that had a soul of adamant and brought forth the number of sons, for a second time, into immortal life, she was old and a women but did both defeat the tyrant by her endurance, and was found stronger than a man, in deeds as well as words. For when put in bonds with her sons, she spoke in the Hebrew tongue to them: “Remember that for the sake of G-d ye have come into the world, and have enjoyed life, and that therefore ye owe it to G-d to endure all pain for His sake. And ye also, having the same faith unto G-d, be not troubled; for it were against Reason that ye, knowing righteousness, should not withstand the pains. I was a pure maiden, no seducer corrupted me. I lived with my husband all the days of my youth; but when these my sons were grown up, their father died. Who, while he was yet with us, taught you the Law and the prophets, he is calling to your minds to stay faithful, even through you pass through the fire, the flames shall not hurt you”
With these words the mother to the seven encouraged every single one of her sons to die rather than transgress the ordinance of G-d; they themselves also knowing well that men dying for G-d live unto G-d. Some of the guards declared that when she also was about to be seized and put to death, she cast herself on the pyre in order that no man might touch her body.
O mother, that together with thy seven sons did break the tyrant’s force, and bring to nought his evil devices, and gave an example of the nobleness of faith. Thou were nobly set as a roof upon thy sons as pillars, and the earthquake of the torments shoot thee not at all. Rejoice therefore, pure-souled mother, having the hope of thy endurance certain at the hand of G-d. Would not the spectators have shuddered at the mother of seven sons suffering for righteousness; sake multitudinous tortures even unto death? All righteousness won the victory! And through them won the admiration of mankind, and the nation obtained peace and restoring the observance of the Law, for the tyrant failed utterly to constrain the people of Jerusalem to live like Gentiles and defile G-d’s Law.
O L-rd bring back the love of your Law and the faithfulness to it!
When the Hebrews would not renounce their obedience to G-d’s Law in the first century the king tried to torture them even more savagely. Under these orders of the tyrant seven brethren together with their aged mother where brought before him, all handsome, and modest, and well-born, and generally attractive, they refused to share in the Hellenic live and walk in a new way.
The instruments of torture were brought forward in order to persuade them by fear to break G-d’s Law. But when the guards had produced wheels, and joint-dislocators, and racks, and bone-crushers, and catapults, and cauldrons, and braziers, and thumb-screws, and iron claws, and wedges, and branding irons, but they hearing his persuasions, and seeing his dreadful engines, not only showed no fear but actually arrayed their philosophy in opposition to the tyrant, and by their right Reason did abase his tyranny. And all in one voice together, and as with one soul, said to him: “Why dost thou delay, O tyrant? We are ready to die rather than transgress the commandments of our fathers. For we esteem thy mercy, giving us our life in return for a breach of a Law, a thing harder to bear than death itself. If the old men of the Hebrews endured the tortures for righteousness’ sake until they died, more befittingly will we young men die despising the torments of the compulsion, over which our age teachers also triumphed. For we through this our evil entreatment and our endurance of it shall win the prize of virtue; but thou for our cruel murder shalt suffer at eh hands of divine justice sufficient torment by fire for ever!”
The scourgers brought forward the sons one by one starting with the eldest of them and stripped him of his garment and bound his hands and arms on either side with thongs. But when they had scourged him till they were weary, and gained nothing thereby, they cast him upon the wheel. And on it the noble youth was racked till his bones were out of joint, then they set hot coals upon him besides, and intensifying the torture strained him yet tighter on the wheel. And all the wheel was besmeared with his blood, and the heaped coals were quenched by the humours of his body dropping down, and the rent flesh ran round the axles of the machine. With his bodily frame already in dissolution this great-souled youth, like a true son of Abraham, groaned not at all.
The guards brought forth the second in age of the sons, and grappling him with sharp-clawed hands of iron they fastened him to the engines and the catapult. These panther-like beasts tore at his sinews with claws of iron, and rent away all the flesh from his cheeks, and tore off the skin from his head. The son called out; “For I am supported under pain by the joys that come through virtue, whereas thou art in torment whilst glorying in thy impiety; neither shall thou escape, O most abominable tyrant, the penalties of the divine wrath! And when he had bravely met his glorious death, the third son was being brought forward.
They dislocated his hands and his feet with their dislocating engines, and wrenched his limbs out of their sockets, and unstrung them; and they twisted round his fingers, and his arms, and his legs, and his elbow-joints. They stripped off his skin, taking the points of the fingers with it, and tore in Scythian fashion the scalp from his head, and straight-way brought him to the wheel. And on this they twisted his spine till he saw his own flesh hanging in strips and great gouts of blood pouring down from his entrails. And when this man had died worthily of his brothers, they brought up the fourth son. This man was also put to a death of agony with the tortures.
The fifth son sprang forward yelling out: “I shrink not, O tyrant, from demanding the torture for virtue’s sake. I come myself, slaying me thou mayest by yet more misdeeds increase the penalty thou owest to the justice of Heaven.” As he spoke the guars bound him and brought him before the catapult; and they tired him thereto on his knees, and fastening them there with iron clamps, they wrenched his loins over the rolling wedge so that he was completely curled back like a scorpion and every joint was disjointed. And when this man also was dead, the sixth was brought, a mere boy.
They took him to the wheel, and with care they stretched him out and dislocated the bones of his back and set fire under him. And they made sharp skewers red-hot, and ran them into his back, and piercing through his sides they burned away his entrails also. And when this one also died a blessed death, being cast into the cauldron, the seventh son, the youngest of them all, came forward.
Binding him, they sent for the boy’s mother, in order that in her sorrow for the lost of so many sons she might urge the survivor to obey and be saved. The son ask the guard to be loosen and they rejoiced at eh boy’s request, thinking he had come to his senses. He ran up to the red-hot brazier and spoke out: “Are thou not ashamed, being a man, O wretch with the heat of a wild beast, to take men of like feeling with thyself, made from the same elements, and tear out their tongues, and scourge and torture them in this manner? I am no renegade to the witness borne by my brethren, and I call upon the G-d of my fathers to be merciful unto my nation, and thee will He punish both in this present life and after that thou are dead.” And with that he cast himself into the red-hot brazier, and so gave up the ghost.
So the seven-towered right Reason of the youths defended the haven of righteousness and repulsed the tempestuousness of the passions, in conjunction with their piety it rendered their brotherly love more fervent. None of these seven youths turned coward, none shrank in the face of death, but all hastened to the death by torture as if running the road to immortality. For as the seven days of the creation of the world do enring religion, so did the youths choir-like enring their sevenfold companionship, and made the terror of the tortures of no account.
Now the mother of the seven youths endured the torments inflicted on each several one of her children. But consider how manifold are the yearnings of a mother’s heart, so that her feeling for her offspring becomes the centre of her whole world and was not moved from her purpose by her affection for her children. We stamp a marvelous likeness of our soul and of our shape on the tender nature of the child, and most of all through the mother’s sympathy with her children being deeper than the father’s. For women are softer of soul than men, and the more children they bear the more do they abound in love for them. She of the seven sons abounded in love beyond the most, seeing that, having in seven child-bearing felt maternal tenderness for the fruit of her womb, and having been constrained because of the many pangs in which she bore each to a close affection, she nevertheless through the fear of G-d rejected the present safety of her children. More than that, through the moral beauty and goodness of her sons and their obedience to the Law, her maternal love for them was made stronger. For they were just, and temperate, and brave and great-souled, and lovers of each other and of their mother in such manner that they obeyed her in the keeping of the Law even unto death.
The mother, seeing them one by one racked and burned, remained unshaken in soul for the Laws sake. She saw the flesh of her sons being consumed in the fire, and the extremities of their hands and feet scattered on the ground, and the flesh-covering, torn off from their hands right to their cheeks, strewn about like masks. She did not weep when she beheld the eyes of each amid the torments looking boldly on the same anguish, and saw in their quivering nostrils the signs of approaching death. She saw the flesh of one son being severed after the flesh of another, and hand after hand being cut off, and head after head being flayed, and corpse upon corpse, and the place crowded with spectators on account of the tortures of her children, and shed not a tear.
How many and how great were the tortures with which the mother was tormented while her sons were being tortured with torments of rack and fire! But Inspired Reason lent her heart a man’s strength under her passion of suffering and exalted her to make no account of the present yearnings of mother-love; she surrendered them through faith in G-d. As a true daughter of Abraham, called to mind His G-d fearing courage, to endure to the end. O woman, nobler to resist than men, and braver than warriors to endure! With the whole living world for her burden in the world-whelming Deluge, did withstand the mighty surges, so thou, the keeper of the Law, beaten upon every side by the waves of passions, and strained as with strong blasts by the tortures of thy sons, didst nobly weather the storms that assailed thee for the Laws sake. Now have not only men triumphed over their sufferings, but that a women also has despised the most despised the most dreadful tortures, as burned in her the instinct of motherhood at the sight of her seven sons being tortured, thou was not weak in spirit.
A holy and G-d-fearing mother that had a soul of adamant and brought forth the number of sons, for a second time, into immortal life, she was old and a women but did both defeat the tyrant by her endurance, and was found stronger than a man, in deeds as well as words. For when put in bonds with her sons, she spoke in the Hebrew tongue to them: “Remember that for the sake of G-d ye have come into the world, and have enjoyed life, and that therefore ye owe it to G-d to endure all pain for His sake. And ye also, having the same faith unto G-d, be not troubled; for it were against Reason that ye, knowing righteousness, should not withstand the pains. I was a pure maiden, no seducer corrupted me. I lived with my husband all the days of my youth; but when these my sons were grown up, their father died. Who, while he was yet with us, taught you the Law and the prophets, he is calling to your minds to stay faithful, even through you pass through the fire, the flames shall not hurt you”
With these words the mother to the seven encouraged every single one of her sons to die rather than transgress the ordinance of G-d; they themselves also knowing well that men dying for G-d live unto G-d. Some of the guards declared that when she also was about to be seized and put to death, she cast herself on the pyre in order that no man might touch her body.
O mother, that together with thy seven sons did break the tyrant’s force, and bring to nought his evil devices, and gave an example of the nobleness of faith. Thou were nobly set as a roof upon thy sons as pillars, and the earthquake of the torments shoot thee not at all. Rejoice therefore, pure-souled mother, having the hope of thy endurance certain at the hand of G-d. Would not the spectators have shuddered at the mother of seven sons suffering for righteousness; sake multitudinous tortures even unto death? All righteousness won the victory! And through them won the admiration of mankind, and the nation obtained peace and restoring the observance of the Law, for the tyrant failed utterly to constrain the people of Jerusalem to live like Gentiles and defile G-d’s Law.
O L-rd bring back the love of your Law and the faithfulness to it!
Fourth Maccabees-Eleazar
Eleazar A Faithful Man
The tyrant of Syria, whom some called Epiphanes, The Madman. Roman history of the first centuries records two such tyrants – the other, Caligula, the Second Brilliant Madman.
At a time when our fathers enjoyed great peace through the due observance of the Law, and were in happy case, so that Seleucus Nicanor, the king of Asia, sanctioned the tax for the Temple-service and Apollonius, the governor of Syria, being loyal to the king when to rob the treasuries of Jerusalem, and made his way into the temple to violate all that was in it. Upon Seleucus death, his son Antiochus Epiphanes became his successor and he made his brother, Jason, the new high-priest with the purpose of collection 3660.00 talents a year from him. He plundered the city and also made a decree denouncing the penalty of death upon any who should be seen to live after the Law of their fathers. This shows the details of the successive tortures (suggesting the instruments of the Spanish Inquisition centuries later) and with this narrator conjures Courage. Have we learned from the past or advanced in its tactics?
Males what were circumcised and their mothers were flung, together with their offspring, headlong from the rocks. Circumcision was a covenant to be ye separate unto G-d.
Jason personally tried to force by tortures each man separately to eat unclean meats and thus abjure the Jewish religion. His guards were ordered to drag every singles man of the Hebrews and compel them to eat swine’s flesh and things offered to idols; but if any should refuse to defile themselves with the unclean things, they were to be tortured and put to death.
One man first from the mass of people was a Hebrew whose name was Eleazar, a priest by birth, trained in knowledge of the Law, a man advanced in years and well known to many of the tyrant’s court for his philosophy ‘having accepted the Divine Law and the obedience to the Law, not even so would it be right for Believers to destroy their reputation for faithfulness. Think it not a small sin for us to transgression of the Law, be it in small things or great, is equally terrible; for in either case equal the Law is unloved by many. If we were living in a manner contrary to reason, not so, for the Law teaches us self-control, so that we are masters of all our pleasures and desires and are thoroughly trained in manliness so as to endure all pain and readiness; and it teaches justice, so that with all our various dispositions we ace fairly, and it teaches righteousness, so that with due reverence we worship only the G-d who is. Believing in the Law, to be given by G-d, we know also that the Creator of the world, as a Lawgiver, fells for us according to our nature. He has commanded all of us to eat the things that will be convenient for our souls, and He has forbidden us to eat that which would be the contrary. ”
Eleazar told his tormentors, “I am not so unmanned by old age but that when righteousness is at stake the strength of youth returns to my Reason. So twist hard your racks and blow your furnace hotter. I do not so pity mine old age as to break the Law of my fathers in mine own person. Clean shall my fathers receive me, unafraid of thy torments even to the death.”
The gently spirited old man, shows such fortitude it seems like an inextinguishable fire!
They first unclothed the old man, who was adorned with the beauty of holiness. Then binding his arms on either side they scourged him. But the great-souled and noble man, an Eleazar in very truth, was no more moved in his mind than if he were being tormented in a dream; the old man keeping his eyes steadfastly raised to heaven suffered his flesh to be torn by the scourges till he was bathed in blood and his sides became a mass of wounds; and even when he fell to the ground because his body could no longer support the pain he still kept his Reason erect and inflexible.
With his foot then one of the cruel guards as he fell kicked him savagely in the side to make him get up. But he endured the anguish, and despised the compulsion, and bore up under the torments, and like a brave athlete taking punishment, the old man outwore his tormentors. The sweat stood on his brow, and he drew his breath in hard gasps, till his nobility of soul extorted the admiration of his tormentors themselves, and stopped. To this Eleazar said: “O minions of the tyrant, why pause ye in your work? Contrary to Reason, were it for us, after living unto the truth till old age, and guarding in lawful guise the repute of so living, now to change and become in our own persona a pattern to the young so impiety, to the end that we should encourage them to disobey the Law, shame be if we should live on a little longer, curing that little being mocked of all men for cowardice, and while despised by the tyrant as unmanly should fail to defend the Divine Law unto the death.” They seeing him thus triumphant over the tortures and unmoved even by the pity of his executioners, dragged him to the fire, where they cast him on it, burning him with cruelly cunning devices, and they poured broth of evil odor into his
Nostrils, but when the fire already reached to his bones and he was about to give up the ghost, he lifted up his eyes to G-d and said:
Thou, O G-d, be merciful unto Thy people, and let our punishment be a satisfaction in their behalf. Make my blood their purification, and take my soul to ransom their souls.” And with these words the holy man nobly yielded up his spirit under the torture, and for the sake of the Law held out by his Reason even against the torments unto death. His Reason having conquered his passions, we properly attribute to it the power of commanding them for it conquers pains that come from outside ourselves, neither does it surrender to them.
Eleazar though buffeted by the threats of the tyrant and swept by the swelling waves of the tortures, never shifted for one moment the helm of sanctity until he sailed into the haven of victory over death. O priest worthy of thy priesthood, thou didst not defile thyself! Such should those be whose office is to serve the Law and defend it with their own blood and honourable sweat in the face of sufferings to the death. So the son of Aaron, Eleazar, being consumed by the melting heat of the fire, remained unshaken in his Reason. O blessed age, O reverent grey head, O life faithful to the Law and perfected by the seal of death! Not all men are masters of the passions because not all men have their Reason enlightened. But as many as with tier whole heart make righteousness their first thought, these alone are able to master the weakness of the flesh, and live unto G-d.
Therefore, there is nothing contradictory in certain persons appearing to be slaves to passion in consequence of the weakness of their Reason, having put his trust in G-d, and knowing that it is a blessed thing to endure all hardness for the sake of virtue, would not conquer his passions for the sake of righteousness?
How the Law was loved! To Christians it seems to hard to follow and understand, famous saying is ‘we are not under the Law but under grace.’ What is grace with out instructions to live righteously? Do we believe in anything enough to lay down our lives for it?
The tyrant of Syria, whom some called Epiphanes, The Madman. Roman history of the first centuries records two such tyrants – the other, Caligula, the Second Brilliant Madman.
At a time when our fathers enjoyed great peace through the due observance of the Law, and were in happy case, so that Seleucus Nicanor, the king of Asia, sanctioned the tax for the Temple-service and Apollonius, the governor of Syria, being loyal to the king when to rob the treasuries of Jerusalem, and made his way into the temple to violate all that was in it. Upon Seleucus death, his son Antiochus Epiphanes became his successor and he made his brother, Jason, the new high-priest with the purpose of collection 3660.00 talents a year from him. He plundered the city and also made a decree denouncing the penalty of death upon any who should be seen to live after the Law of their fathers. This shows the details of the successive tortures (suggesting the instruments of the Spanish Inquisition centuries later) and with this narrator conjures Courage. Have we learned from the past or advanced in its tactics?
Males what were circumcised and their mothers were flung, together with their offspring, headlong from the rocks. Circumcision was a covenant to be ye separate unto G-d.
Jason personally tried to force by tortures each man separately to eat unclean meats and thus abjure the Jewish religion. His guards were ordered to drag every singles man of the Hebrews and compel them to eat swine’s flesh and things offered to idols; but if any should refuse to defile themselves with the unclean things, they were to be tortured and put to death.
One man first from the mass of people was a Hebrew whose name was Eleazar, a priest by birth, trained in knowledge of the Law, a man advanced in years and well known to many of the tyrant’s court for his philosophy ‘having accepted the Divine Law and the obedience to the Law, not even so would it be right for Believers to destroy their reputation for faithfulness. Think it not a small sin for us to transgression of the Law, be it in small things or great, is equally terrible; for in either case equal the Law is unloved by many. If we were living in a manner contrary to reason, not so, for the Law teaches us self-control, so that we are masters of all our pleasures and desires and are thoroughly trained in manliness so as to endure all pain and readiness; and it teaches justice, so that with all our various dispositions we ace fairly, and it teaches righteousness, so that with due reverence we worship only the G-d who is. Believing in the Law, to be given by G-d, we know also that the Creator of the world, as a Lawgiver, fells for us according to our nature. He has commanded all of us to eat the things that will be convenient for our souls, and He has forbidden us to eat that which would be the contrary. ”
Eleazar told his tormentors, “I am not so unmanned by old age but that when righteousness is at stake the strength of youth returns to my Reason. So twist hard your racks and blow your furnace hotter. I do not so pity mine old age as to break the Law of my fathers in mine own person. Clean shall my fathers receive me, unafraid of thy torments even to the death.”
The gently spirited old man, shows such fortitude it seems like an inextinguishable fire!
They first unclothed the old man, who was adorned with the beauty of holiness. Then binding his arms on either side they scourged him. But the great-souled and noble man, an Eleazar in very truth, was no more moved in his mind than if he were being tormented in a dream; the old man keeping his eyes steadfastly raised to heaven suffered his flesh to be torn by the scourges till he was bathed in blood and his sides became a mass of wounds; and even when he fell to the ground because his body could no longer support the pain he still kept his Reason erect and inflexible.
With his foot then one of the cruel guards as he fell kicked him savagely in the side to make him get up. But he endured the anguish, and despised the compulsion, and bore up under the torments, and like a brave athlete taking punishment, the old man outwore his tormentors. The sweat stood on his brow, and he drew his breath in hard gasps, till his nobility of soul extorted the admiration of his tormentors themselves, and stopped. To this Eleazar said: “O minions of the tyrant, why pause ye in your work? Contrary to Reason, were it for us, after living unto the truth till old age, and guarding in lawful guise the repute of so living, now to change and become in our own persona a pattern to the young so impiety, to the end that we should encourage them to disobey the Law, shame be if we should live on a little longer, curing that little being mocked of all men for cowardice, and while despised by the tyrant as unmanly should fail to defend the Divine Law unto the death.” They seeing him thus triumphant over the tortures and unmoved even by the pity of his executioners, dragged him to the fire, where they cast him on it, burning him with cruelly cunning devices, and they poured broth of evil odor into his
Nostrils, but when the fire already reached to his bones and he was about to give up the ghost, he lifted up his eyes to G-d and said:
Thou, O G-d, be merciful unto Thy people, and let our punishment be a satisfaction in their behalf. Make my blood their purification, and take my soul to ransom their souls.” And with these words the holy man nobly yielded up his spirit under the torture, and for the sake of the Law held out by his Reason even against the torments unto death. His Reason having conquered his passions, we properly attribute to it the power of commanding them for it conquers pains that come from outside ourselves, neither does it surrender to them.
Eleazar though buffeted by the threats of the tyrant and swept by the swelling waves of the tortures, never shifted for one moment the helm of sanctity until he sailed into the haven of victory over death. O priest worthy of thy priesthood, thou didst not defile thyself! Such should those be whose office is to serve the Law and defend it with their own blood and honourable sweat in the face of sufferings to the death. So the son of Aaron, Eleazar, being consumed by the melting heat of the fire, remained unshaken in his Reason. O blessed age, O reverent grey head, O life faithful to the Law and perfected by the seal of death! Not all men are masters of the passions because not all men have their Reason enlightened. But as many as with tier whole heart make righteousness their first thought, these alone are able to master the weakness of the flesh, and live unto G-d.
Therefore, there is nothing contradictory in certain persons appearing to be slaves to passion in consequence of the weakness of their Reason, having put his trust in G-d, and knowing that it is a blessed thing to endure all hardness for the sake of virtue, would not conquer his passions for the sake of righteousness?
How the Law was loved! To Christians it seems to hard to follow and understand, famous saying is ‘we are not under the Law but under grace.’ What is grace with out instructions to live righteously? Do we believe in anything enough to lay down our lives for it?
Fourth Maccabees-Reason
Inspired Reason
The philosophy of Inspired Reason in the first century before the Christian Era. The Christian Church carefully preserved this book as a work of high moral value and teaching. We can learn from the ancient Scholars, I pulled out a few parts to share:
The subject generally necessary as a branch of knowledge, is whether the Inspired Reason is supreme ruler over the passions, it includes the praise of the greatest of virtues which is self-control.
If the Reason is master of the passions, why does it not control forgetfulness and ignorance? Their object being to cast ridicule, the answer is that Reason is not master over defects inhering in the mind itself, but over the passions or moral defects that are adverse to justice and manliness and temperance and judgment; and its action is their case is not to extirpate the passions, but to enable us to resist them successfully.
Reason is the mind preferring with clear deliberation the life of wisdom.
Wisdom to the knowledge of things, divine and human, and of their causes, which leads to culture acquired under the Law, through which we learn with due reverence the things of G-d and for our worldly profit the things of man.
Wisdom is manifested under the form of judgment and justice, and courage, and temperance. But judgment or self-control is the one that dominates them all, for through it, in truth, Reason asserts its authority over the passions.
But of the passions there are two comprehensive sources, namely, pleasure and pain, and either belongs essentially also to the soul as well as to the body. Both to pleasure and pain there are many cases documented where the passions have certain sequences.
While desire goes before pleasure, satisfaction follows after, and while fear goes before pain, after pain comes sorrow. Now anger, if a man will retrace the course of his feelings, is a passion in which are blended both pleasure and pain.
Under pleasure comes that moral debasement that exhibits the widest variety of the passions. It manifests itself in the soul as pretension, and covetousness, and vain-glory, and contentiousness, and backbiting, and in the body as eating of strange meat, and gluttony, and gormandizing in secret.
Now pleasure and pain being as it were two trees, growing from body and soul, many offshoots of these passions sprout up; and each man’s Reason as master-gardener, weeding and pruning and binding up, and turning on the water and directing it hither and thither, brings the thicket of dispositions and passions under domestication.
Reason becomes supreme over the passions in virtue of the inhibitory action of temperance. Temperance is the repression of the desires; but of the desires some are mental and some physical, and both kinds are clearly controlled by Reason; when we are tempted towards forbidden meats, how do we come to relinquish the pleasures to be deprived from them? Is it not that Reason has power to repress the appetites?
The pretensions of our appetites are checked and inhibited by the temperate mind, and all the movements of the body obey the bridle of Reason. With mental effort one can check the carnal impulse by one’s Reason of his passions.
The rule of Reason has proved to extend through the more aggressive passions or vices, ambition, vanity, pretension, pride, and backbiting. For the temperate mind repels all these debased passions, even as it does anger, for it conquers even this, it is able to win the victory over the passions, modifying some, while crushing others absolutely.
In the day when G-d created man, He implanted in him His passions and inclinations, and also, at the very same time, set the mind of a throne amidst the senses to be His sacred guide in all things; and to the mind He gave the Law, by the which if a man order himself, he shall reign over a kingdom that is temperate, and just, and virtuous, and brave.
Reason can enable you to escape being made a slave by desire for it is not extirpate of the passions, but their rival. The temperate mind is able to conquer the dictates of the passions, and to quench the fires of desire, and to wrestle victoriously with the pangs of our bodies though they be exceeding strong, and by the moral beauty and goodness of Reason to defy with scorn all the domination of the passions.
Have you become slaves to your passions and desires?
Are you searching out the meanings of G-d’s Law, which are the instruction of how to live our lives and develop a temperate mind?
Or do you choose like so many to just get by – do what ever feels good?
One day we will be held accountable for our choices – the decision is yours, its called free will.
The philosophy of Inspired Reason in the first century before the Christian Era. The Christian Church carefully preserved this book as a work of high moral value and teaching. We can learn from the ancient Scholars, I pulled out a few parts to share:
The subject generally necessary as a branch of knowledge, is whether the Inspired Reason is supreme ruler over the passions, it includes the praise of the greatest of virtues which is self-control.
If the Reason is master of the passions, why does it not control forgetfulness and ignorance? Their object being to cast ridicule, the answer is that Reason is not master over defects inhering in the mind itself, but over the passions or moral defects that are adverse to justice and manliness and temperance and judgment; and its action is their case is not to extirpate the passions, but to enable us to resist them successfully.
Reason is the mind preferring with clear deliberation the life of wisdom.
Wisdom to the knowledge of things, divine and human, and of their causes, which leads to culture acquired under the Law, through which we learn with due reverence the things of G-d and for our worldly profit the things of man.
Wisdom is manifested under the form of judgment and justice, and courage, and temperance. But judgment or self-control is the one that dominates them all, for through it, in truth, Reason asserts its authority over the passions.
But of the passions there are two comprehensive sources, namely, pleasure and pain, and either belongs essentially also to the soul as well as to the body. Both to pleasure and pain there are many cases documented where the passions have certain sequences.
While desire goes before pleasure, satisfaction follows after, and while fear goes before pain, after pain comes sorrow. Now anger, if a man will retrace the course of his feelings, is a passion in which are blended both pleasure and pain.
Under pleasure comes that moral debasement that exhibits the widest variety of the passions. It manifests itself in the soul as pretension, and covetousness, and vain-glory, and contentiousness, and backbiting, and in the body as eating of strange meat, and gluttony, and gormandizing in secret.
Now pleasure and pain being as it were two trees, growing from body and soul, many offshoots of these passions sprout up; and each man’s Reason as master-gardener, weeding and pruning and binding up, and turning on the water and directing it hither and thither, brings the thicket of dispositions and passions under domestication.
Reason becomes supreme over the passions in virtue of the inhibitory action of temperance. Temperance is the repression of the desires; but of the desires some are mental and some physical, and both kinds are clearly controlled by Reason; when we are tempted towards forbidden meats, how do we come to relinquish the pleasures to be deprived from them? Is it not that Reason has power to repress the appetites?
The pretensions of our appetites are checked and inhibited by the temperate mind, and all the movements of the body obey the bridle of Reason. With mental effort one can check the carnal impulse by one’s Reason of his passions.
The rule of Reason has proved to extend through the more aggressive passions or vices, ambition, vanity, pretension, pride, and backbiting. For the temperate mind repels all these debased passions, even as it does anger, for it conquers even this, it is able to win the victory over the passions, modifying some, while crushing others absolutely.
In the day when G-d created man, He implanted in him His passions and inclinations, and also, at the very same time, set the mind of a throne amidst the senses to be His sacred guide in all things; and to the mind He gave the Law, by the which if a man order himself, he shall reign over a kingdom that is temperate, and just, and virtuous, and brave.
Reason can enable you to escape being made a slave by desire for it is not extirpate of the passions, but their rival. The temperate mind is able to conquer the dictates of the passions, and to quench the fires of desire, and to wrestle victoriously with the pangs of our bodies though they be exceeding strong, and by the moral beauty and goodness of Reason to defy with scorn all the domination of the passions.
Have you become slaves to your passions and desires?
Are you searching out the meanings of G-d’s Law, which are the instruction of how to live our lives and develop a temperate mind?
Or do you choose like so many to just get by – do what ever feels good?
One day we will be held accountable for our choices – the decision is yours, its called free will.
Covenant Relationship
Covenant Relationship brings on vindication
[Job 23:3] Oh that I knew where I might find him! that I might come even to his seat!
[Find Him - may properly express the pious breathings of a soul. How I might come into His covenant and communion with Him!" Micah 6:6, 7. Him whom my soul loveth? O that I knew where I might find Him! O that He who has laid open the way to Himself would direct me into it and lead me in it!"
His seat - The idea in the Hebrew is a well-prepared throne (Ps 9:7). He is so sure of the fairness of G-d's court that he longs to appear before it. A patient waiting for death and judgment is our wisdom and duty, and, if we duly consider things that cannot be without a holy fear and trembling; but a passionate wishing for death or judgment, without any such fear and trembling, is our sin and folly, and ill becomes us. Do we know what death and judgment are, and are we so very ready for them, that we need not time to get readier? Woe to those that thus, in a heat, desire the day of the L-rd, Amos 5:18.]
[4] I would order my cause before him, and fill my mouth with arguments.
[Order - state methodically (13:18; Isa 43:26).
Fill my mouth - We may apply this to the duty of prayer, in which we have boldness to enter into the holiest and to come even to the footstool of the throne of grace. We have not only liberty of access, but liberty of speech. We have leave:
1. To be particular in our requests, to order our cause before G-d, to speak the whole matter, to lay before Him all our grievances, in what method we think most proper; we durst not be so free with earthly princes as a humble holy soul may be with G-d.
2. To be importunate in our requests. We are allowed, not only to pray, but to plead, not only to ask, but to argue; nay, to fill our mouths with arguments, not to move
G-d (He is perfectly apprized of the merits of the cause without our showing), but to move ourselves, to excite our fervency and encourage our faith in prayer.]
[5] I would know the words which he would answer me, and understand what he would say unto me.
[Know the words - That is, "I would gladly hear what G-d will say to this matter in dispute between you and me, and will entirely comply in His judgment." This becomes us, in all disagreements; let the word of G-d determine them.
He – G-d, it little matters what man may say of me, if only I know what G-d judges of me. He would speak nothing but what was true, decree nothing that was not righteous, nor utter any thing that I could not comprehend.
Job believed that G-d would not overpower him that He would not deal with him either by absolute authority or in strict justice, not with a high hand, nor with a strong hand.
Understand - let us know what He answers, and understand what He says for His judgment is according to truth, which theirs is not and therefore be fully satisfied in.]
[10] But he knoweth the way that I take: when he hath tried me, I shall come forth as gold.
[He knows the way that I take - knows every step he had taken, would not do so, Ps. 139:3. It is a great comfort to those who mean honestly that G-d understands their meaning, though men do not, cannot, or will not. He knows that, however I may sometimes have taken a false step, yet I have still taken a good way, have chosen the way of truth, and therefore He knows it, that is, He accepts it, and is well pleased with it, as He is said to know the way of the righteous, Ps. 1:6. This comforted the prophet, Jer. 12:3.
He hath tried me - Job could not understand why G-d would not hear his prayers. He could not know that this was all a part of the game rules that had been established for the heavenly experiment in which he and his faith were the test objects. But he did sense that he was being tested for some reason he could not fathom.
As gold - Which comes out of the furnace pure from all dross. From this Job infers, When He hath tried me I shall come forth as gold. Those that keep the way of G-d may comfort themselves, when they are in affliction, with these three things:
1. That they are but tried. It is not intended for their hurt, but for their honor and benefit; it is the trial of their faith, 1 Peter 1:7.
2. That, when they are sufficiently tried, they shall come forth out of the furnace, and not be left to consume in it as dross or reprobate silver. The trial will have an end. G-d will not contend for ever.
3. That they shall come forth as gold, pure in itself and precious to the refiner. They shall come forth as gold approved and improved, found to be good and made to be better. Afflictions are to us as we are; those that go gold into the furnace will come out no worse.]
[11] My foot hath held his steps, his way have I kept, and not declined.
[My - Now that which encouraged Job to hope that his present troubles would thus end well was the testimony of his conscience for Him, that he had lived a good life in the fear of G-d.
Foot hath - the causeway, or raised road; formed, as they anciently were, by stones in the manner of pavement. A way paved with stones:" hence street, a raised road or pavement either in town or country.
Held - fast by His steps. The law is in Old Testament poetry regarded as a way, G-d going before us as our guide, in whose footsteps we must tread (Ps. 17:5).
His steps – His steps are the steps He has appointed me to take; the way of religion and serious godliness--that way I have kept.
His way – I have attended carefully to the weightier matters of the Law, and have not forgotten its slightest injunctions.
Not declined - have not declined from it, not only not turned back from it by a total apostasy, but not turned aside out of it by any willful transgression. Ps. 125:5.]
[12] Neither have I gone back from the commandment of his lips; I have esteemed the words of his mouth more than my necessary food.
[Commandment – Whatever difficulties we may meet with in the way of G-d's Commandments, though they lead us through a wilderness, yet we must never think of going back, but must press on towards the mark. Job kept closely to the Law of
G-d in his conversation, for both His judgment and His affection led him to it.
His lips - He governed himself by the commandment of G-d's lips, and would not go back from that, but go forward according to it.
Esteemed - rather, "laid up," namely, as a treasure found (Matt. 13:44; Ps. 119:11)
Alluding to the words of Eliphaz (22:22). There was no need to tell me so; I have done so already (Jer. 15:16).
Words - G-d's word was the rule he walked by.
More than food - that is, he looked upon it as his necessary food; he could as well have lived without his daily bread as without the word of G-d. The word of G-d is to our souls what our necessary food is to our bodies; it sustains the spiritual life and strengthens us for the actions of life; it is that which we cannot subsist without, and which nothing else can make up the want of: and we ought therefore so to esteem it, to take pains for it, hunger after it, feed upon it with delight, and nourish our souls with it; and this will be our rejoicing in the day of evil, as it was Job's here.]
[14] For he performeth the thing that is appointed for me: and many such things are with him.
[Performeth - Those calamities which He hath allotted to me.
That is appointed for me - Whatever happens to us, it is G-d that performs it (Ps. 57:2), and an admirable performance the whole will appear to be when the mystery of G-d shall be finished. He performs all that, and that only, which was appointed, and in the appointed time and method.
And - There are many such examples of G-d's proceeding with men.
Many such things - that is, He does many things in the course of His providence which we can give no account of, but must resolve into His absolute sovereignty. He diversifies human affairs: scarcely any two men do not have the same lot; nor has the same person the same portion at all times. He has multitudes of resources, expedients, means, and human affairs.]
It is easy to contemplate His goodness, loving-kindness, and mercy; in all these we have an interest, and from them we expect the greatest good: but to consider His holiness and justice, the infinite righteousness of His nature, under the conviction that we have sinned, and broken the Laws prescribed by His sovereign Majesty, and to feel ourselves brought as into the presence of His judgment-seat,-who can bear the thought? If cherubim and seraphim veil their faces before His throne, what must a sinner feel, whose conscience is not yet purged from dead works and who feels the wrath of G-d abiding on him? And how without such a mediator and sacrifice as Y’Shua HaMashiach is, can any human spirit come into the presence of its Judge? Those who can approach Him without terror know little of His justice and nothing of their sin. When we approach Him in prayer, or in any ordinance, should we not feel more reverence than we generally do?
[Job 23:3] Oh that I knew where I might find him! that I might come even to his seat!
[Find Him - may properly express the pious breathings of a soul. How I might come into His covenant and communion with Him!" Micah 6:6, 7. Him whom my soul loveth? O that I knew where I might find Him! O that He who has laid open the way to Himself would direct me into it and lead me in it!"
His seat - The idea in the Hebrew is a well-prepared throne (Ps 9:7). He is so sure of the fairness of G-d's court that he longs to appear before it. A patient waiting for death and judgment is our wisdom and duty, and, if we duly consider things that cannot be without a holy fear and trembling; but a passionate wishing for death or judgment, without any such fear and trembling, is our sin and folly, and ill becomes us. Do we know what death and judgment are, and are we so very ready for them, that we need not time to get readier? Woe to those that thus, in a heat, desire the day of the L-rd, Amos 5:18.]
[4] I would order my cause before him, and fill my mouth with arguments.
[Order - state methodically (13:18; Isa 43:26).
Fill my mouth - We may apply this to the duty of prayer, in which we have boldness to enter into the holiest and to come even to the footstool of the throne of grace. We have not only liberty of access, but liberty of speech. We have leave:
1. To be particular in our requests, to order our cause before G-d, to speak the whole matter, to lay before Him all our grievances, in what method we think most proper; we durst not be so free with earthly princes as a humble holy soul may be with G-d.
2. To be importunate in our requests. We are allowed, not only to pray, but to plead, not only to ask, but to argue; nay, to fill our mouths with arguments, not to move
G-d (He is perfectly apprized of the merits of the cause without our showing), but to move ourselves, to excite our fervency and encourage our faith in prayer.]
[5] I would know the words which he would answer me, and understand what he would say unto me.
[Know the words - That is, "I would gladly hear what G-d will say to this matter in dispute between you and me, and will entirely comply in His judgment." This becomes us, in all disagreements; let the word of G-d determine them.
He – G-d, it little matters what man may say of me, if only I know what G-d judges of me. He would speak nothing but what was true, decree nothing that was not righteous, nor utter any thing that I could not comprehend.
Job believed that G-d would not overpower him that He would not deal with him either by absolute authority or in strict justice, not with a high hand, nor with a strong hand.
Understand - let us know what He answers, and understand what He says for His judgment is according to truth, which theirs is not and therefore be fully satisfied in.]
[10] But he knoweth the way that I take: when he hath tried me, I shall come forth as gold.
[He knows the way that I take - knows every step he had taken, would not do so, Ps. 139:3. It is a great comfort to those who mean honestly that G-d understands their meaning, though men do not, cannot, or will not. He knows that, however I may sometimes have taken a false step, yet I have still taken a good way, have chosen the way of truth, and therefore He knows it, that is, He accepts it, and is well pleased with it, as He is said to know the way of the righteous, Ps. 1:6. This comforted the prophet, Jer. 12:3.
He hath tried me - Job could not understand why G-d would not hear his prayers. He could not know that this was all a part of the game rules that had been established for the heavenly experiment in which he and his faith were the test objects. But he did sense that he was being tested for some reason he could not fathom.
As gold - Which comes out of the furnace pure from all dross. From this Job infers, When He hath tried me I shall come forth as gold. Those that keep the way of G-d may comfort themselves, when they are in affliction, with these three things:
1. That they are but tried. It is not intended for their hurt, but for their honor and benefit; it is the trial of their faith, 1 Peter 1:7.
2. That, when they are sufficiently tried, they shall come forth out of the furnace, and not be left to consume in it as dross or reprobate silver. The trial will have an end. G-d will not contend for ever.
3. That they shall come forth as gold, pure in itself and precious to the refiner. They shall come forth as gold approved and improved, found to be good and made to be better. Afflictions are to us as we are; those that go gold into the furnace will come out no worse.]
[11] My foot hath held his steps, his way have I kept, and not declined.
[My - Now that which encouraged Job to hope that his present troubles would thus end well was the testimony of his conscience for Him, that he had lived a good life in the fear of G-d.
Foot hath - the causeway, or raised road; formed, as they anciently were, by stones in the manner of pavement. A way paved with stones:" hence street, a raised road or pavement either in town or country.
Held - fast by His steps. The law is in Old Testament poetry regarded as a way, G-d going before us as our guide, in whose footsteps we must tread (Ps. 17:5).
His steps – His steps are the steps He has appointed me to take; the way of religion and serious godliness--that way I have kept.
His way – I have attended carefully to the weightier matters of the Law, and have not forgotten its slightest injunctions.
Not declined - have not declined from it, not only not turned back from it by a total apostasy, but not turned aside out of it by any willful transgression. Ps. 125:5.]
[12] Neither have I gone back from the commandment of his lips; I have esteemed the words of his mouth more than my necessary food.
[Commandment – Whatever difficulties we may meet with in the way of G-d's Commandments, though they lead us through a wilderness, yet we must never think of going back, but must press on towards the mark. Job kept closely to the Law of
G-d in his conversation, for both His judgment and His affection led him to it.
His lips - He governed himself by the commandment of G-d's lips, and would not go back from that, but go forward according to it.
Esteemed - rather, "laid up," namely, as a treasure found (Matt. 13:44; Ps. 119:11)
Alluding to the words of Eliphaz (22:22). There was no need to tell me so; I have done so already (Jer. 15:16).
Words - G-d's word was the rule he walked by.
More than food - that is, he looked upon it as his necessary food; he could as well have lived without his daily bread as without the word of G-d. The word of G-d is to our souls what our necessary food is to our bodies; it sustains the spiritual life and strengthens us for the actions of life; it is that which we cannot subsist without, and which nothing else can make up the want of: and we ought therefore so to esteem it, to take pains for it, hunger after it, feed upon it with delight, and nourish our souls with it; and this will be our rejoicing in the day of evil, as it was Job's here.]
[14] For he performeth the thing that is appointed for me: and many such things are with him.
[Performeth - Those calamities which He hath allotted to me.
That is appointed for me - Whatever happens to us, it is G-d that performs it (Ps. 57:2), and an admirable performance the whole will appear to be when the mystery of G-d shall be finished. He performs all that, and that only, which was appointed, and in the appointed time and method.
And - There are many such examples of G-d's proceeding with men.
Many such things - that is, He does many things in the course of His providence which we can give no account of, but must resolve into His absolute sovereignty. He diversifies human affairs: scarcely any two men do not have the same lot; nor has the same person the same portion at all times. He has multitudes of resources, expedients, means, and human affairs.]
It is easy to contemplate His goodness, loving-kindness, and mercy; in all these we have an interest, and from them we expect the greatest good: but to consider His holiness and justice, the infinite righteousness of His nature, under the conviction that we have sinned, and broken the Laws prescribed by His sovereign Majesty, and to feel ourselves brought as into the presence of His judgment-seat,-who can bear the thought? If cherubim and seraphim veil their faces before His throne, what must a sinner feel, whose conscience is not yet purged from dead works and who feels the wrath of G-d abiding on him? And how without such a mediator and sacrifice as Y’Shua HaMashiach is, can any human spirit come into the presence of its Judge? Those who can approach Him without terror know little of His justice and nothing of their sin. When we approach Him in prayer, or in any ordinance, should we not feel more reverence than we generally do?
Twelve Oils of Ancient
Aloes – Jn. 19:39
Cassia – Ps. 45:8
Cedarwood –Lev. 14:4 Cedar was an integral part of two biblical purification rituals – one for lepers and another for those who were impure from touching a dead body. Cedar was noted for its incorruptibility; and in ancient times, clothing was anointed with cedar to protect if from humidity.
Cypress – Isa. 44:14 Cypress influences, strengthens, and helps ease the feeling of loss. It creates a feeling of security, grounding, and helps heal emotional trauma.
Frankincense – S.O.S 3:6 symbolizes divinity
Galbanum – Ex. 30:34 poor circulation and strengthening the body.
Hyssop – Ps. 51:7 was used during the exodus from Egypt to dab the Hebrews’ doorposts with lamb’s blood, protecting them from the plague of death. It is beneficial for anxiety and may also aid concentration and alertness by stimulating and clearing the mind.
Myrrh – Prov. 7:17 it was used in preparing the body for burial. Used for a variety of skin conditions, supports immune system.
Myrtle – Neh. 8:15 symbolic of peace and justice (Isa. 55:13). Used for prostate decongestant, hemorrhoids, hormonal imbalances, support immune system and has a soothing effects on the respiratory system.
Onycha – Ex. 30:34 Used for Arthritis, gout, asthma, bronchitis, but Traditionally known for its comforting and soothing properties for nervous tension and stress.
Rose of Sharon – S.O.S 2:1 In ancient times, the gum that exudes from this plant was collected from the hair of goats that had browsed among the bushes. Used for cell regeneration, anti-hemorrhaging agent helps reduce inflammation, also help quiet the nerves and calm the insomniac.
Spikenard – Mk. 14:3 Spikenard was transported to the Holy Land in sealed alabaster boxes all the way from the Himalayan Mountains. Used in the burial of their dead (v. 8), and this oil is known for helping the treatment of allergic skin reactions, insomnia, menstrual difficulties, migraine, it strengthens the heart and circulatory system and is Relaxing and soothing to the mind.
The most suppressed, ignored and misunderstand healing substance on the face of the earth are the power of G-d’s plants based essential oils, which He has already provided for us in nature. To really understand the importance and significance of G-d’s self-made medicine, you don’t have to look any further than the Bible, They are considered to be the very first medicines of the human race. If you look at all of God’s medicine used since the beginning of time, it comes from plants and the essential oil, being the bloodline of the plant, performs diverse duties. The oil provides plant protection by giving immunity to ward off undesirable bacteria, viruses, fungi, parasites, and insects just like our blood does.
Cassia – Ps. 45:8
Cedarwood –Lev. 14:4 Cedar was an integral part of two biblical purification rituals – one for lepers and another for those who were impure from touching a dead body. Cedar was noted for its incorruptibility; and in ancient times, clothing was anointed with cedar to protect if from humidity.
Cypress – Isa. 44:14 Cypress influences, strengthens, and helps ease the feeling of loss. It creates a feeling of security, grounding, and helps heal emotional trauma.
Frankincense – S.O.S 3:6 symbolizes divinity
Galbanum – Ex. 30:34 poor circulation and strengthening the body.
Hyssop – Ps. 51:7 was used during the exodus from Egypt to dab the Hebrews’ doorposts with lamb’s blood, protecting them from the plague of death. It is beneficial for anxiety and may also aid concentration and alertness by stimulating and clearing the mind.
Myrrh – Prov. 7:17 it was used in preparing the body for burial. Used for a variety of skin conditions, supports immune system.
Myrtle – Neh. 8:15 symbolic of peace and justice (Isa. 55:13). Used for prostate decongestant, hemorrhoids, hormonal imbalances, support immune system and has a soothing effects on the respiratory system.
Onycha – Ex. 30:34 Used for Arthritis, gout, asthma, bronchitis, but Traditionally known for its comforting and soothing properties for nervous tension and stress.
Rose of Sharon – S.O.S 2:1 In ancient times, the gum that exudes from this plant was collected from the hair of goats that had browsed among the bushes. Used for cell regeneration, anti-hemorrhaging agent helps reduce inflammation, also help quiet the nerves and calm the insomniac.
Spikenard – Mk. 14:3 Spikenard was transported to the Holy Land in sealed alabaster boxes all the way from the Himalayan Mountains. Used in the burial of their dead (v. 8), and this oil is known for helping the treatment of allergic skin reactions, insomnia, menstrual difficulties, migraine, it strengthens the heart and circulatory system and is Relaxing and soothing to the mind.
The most suppressed, ignored and misunderstand healing substance on the face of the earth are the power of G-d’s plants based essential oils, which He has already provided for us in nature. To really understand the importance and significance of G-d’s self-made medicine, you don’t have to look any further than the Bible, They are considered to be the very first medicines of the human race. If you look at all of God’s medicine used since the beginning of time, it comes from plants and the essential oil, being the bloodline of the plant, performs diverse duties. The oil provides plant protection by giving immunity to ward off undesirable bacteria, viruses, fungi, parasites, and insects just like our blood does.
Scripture Oils
Oil H8081 (fat-olive oil)
Ex. 27:20 Olive oil (beaten) for light
Anointing:
Ex. 29:7 anointing oil (consecrated portion)
This part is used only for all things in the Sanctuary and the Ministers of G-d.
Ex. 30:23 Take thou also unto thee principal spices, of pure [a flowing, free run] myrrh [an Arabian gum from the bark of a tree, used in sacred oil and in perfume] five hundred shekels, and of sweet cinnamon [fragrant bark used as spice] half so much, even two hundred and fifty shekels, and of sweet calamus [aromatic reed] two hundred and fifty shekels,
v. 24 And of cassia [a spice] five hundred shekels, after the shekel of the sanctuary, and of oil olive an hin [a unit of measure, about 5 quarts]:
v. 25 And thou shalt make it an oil of holy ointment, an ointment compound after the art of the apothecary [to mix, compound]: it shall be an holy anointing oil.
This shall be an holy anointing oil unto Me throughout your generations.
30:32 Upon man's flesh shall it not be poured, neither shall ye make any other like it, after the composition of it: it is holy, and it shall be holy unto you.
v. 33 Whosoever compoundeth any like it, or whosoever putteth any of it upon a stranger, shall even be cut off from his people.
Perfume: Only to use in the sanctuary for people to smell.
When you breathe oil molecules they are detected by the brain olfactory center via the nostrils, which stimulates the central part of the brain that manages your storage and filing systems for emotions. It does not respond to spoken, heard or written language, it only responds to smell. Essential oils can communicate to that portion of our brain’s limbic system and release repressed emotions that have hindered us since childhood. Stored trauma or painful emotions, just like stored physical toxins, can make us sick and cause pain, illness and suffering on all leaves.
30:34 And the G-d said unto Moses, Take unto thee sweet spices [a spice used in incense], stacte [an aromatic gum drop resin of a shrub], and onycha [an ingredient used in the holy incense], and galbanum [a kind of resin or gum]; these sweet spices with pure frankincense [a white resin burned as fragrant]: of each shall there be a like weight:
30:36 And thou shalt beat some of it very small, and put of it before the testimony in the tabernacle of the congregation, where I will meet with thee: it shall be unto you most holy.
v. 38 And as for the perfume which thou shalt make, ye shall not make to yourselves according to the composition thereof: it shall be unto thee holy for the G-d.
Whosoever shall make like unto that, to smell thereto, shall even be cut off from his people.
Log of oil [a liquid measure equal to about one half litre]
Lev. 14:15 And the priest shall take some of the log of oil, and pour it into the palm of his own left hand:
v. 16 And the priest shall dip his right finger in the oil that is in his left hand, and shall sprinkle of the oil with his finger seven times before G-d:
v. 17 And of the rest of the oil that is in his hand shall the priest put upon the tip of the right ear of him that is to be cleansed, and upon the thumb of his right hand, and upon the great toe of his right foot, upon the blood of the trespass offering:
v. 18 And the remnant of the oil that is in the priest's hand he shall pour upon the head of him that is to be cleansed: and the priest shall make an atonement for him before G-d.
v. 28 And the priest shall put of the oil that is in his hand upon the tip of the right ear of him that is to be cleansed, and upon the thumb of his right hand, and upon the great toe of his right foot, upon the place of the blood of the trespass offering:
Pot of oil [flask, small oil jug]
2 kg. 4:2 Thine handmaid hath not any thing in the house, save a pot of oil.
In the multiplication of the widow’s pot of oil we have another illustration of the work of the Spirit. It is a lesson of emptying. The poor widow had nothing in the house wherewith to discharge her debt, save a pot of oil.
We also owe a debt we cannot pay.
We are debtors to live after the Spirit,
We are debtors to love one another,
We are debtors to carry the Word both to the Jews and the Greeks, both to the wise and to the unwise.
Nothing of our carnal nature can benefit to discharge the debt.
The oil – the Holy Spirit – will alone avail. But as in faith we begin, at G-d’s bidding, to pour it out into the empty vessels around us, we shall find that His supply is an inexhaustible one, and that the only limit is the measure of our expectation.
Go and pay thy debt, and live off the rest.
The power of the Spirit is enough both for life and for service.
Much is said in the Scriptures about oil (202 times), to keep it full and ready in season and out of season. You never know when you have need of it.
Empty the golden oil out of yourselves, for the more you give the more you will get.
Baths of oil [bath, a unit of liquid measure, about 40 litres, equal to dry measure ephah]
2 Chron. 2:10 twenty thousand baths of oil.
Ezra 7:22 Unto an hundred talents of silver, and to an hundred measures of wheat, and to an hundred baths of wine, and to an hundred baths of oil, and salt without prescribing how much.
What is the ‘prophetic’ meaning of the Oil?
Oil is seen throughout the Scriptures. Oil is seen for purposes of anointing and for fuel for the Lights. It is used to cook with, baking, sacrifices and is used for anointing.
Oil in the Bible is the physical representation of a spiritual reality,
Ex. 27:20 Olive oil (beaten) for light
Anointing:
Ex. 29:7 anointing oil (consecrated portion)
This part is used only for all things in the Sanctuary and the Ministers of G-d.
Ex. 30:23 Take thou also unto thee principal spices, of pure [a flowing, free run] myrrh [an Arabian gum from the bark of a tree, used in sacred oil and in perfume] five hundred shekels, and of sweet cinnamon [fragrant bark used as spice] half so much, even two hundred and fifty shekels, and of sweet calamus [aromatic reed] two hundred and fifty shekels,
v. 24 And of cassia [a spice] five hundred shekels, after the shekel of the sanctuary, and of oil olive an hin [a unit of measure, about 5 quarts]:
v. 25 And thou shalt make it an oil of holy ointment, an ointment compound after the art of the apothecary [to mix, compound]: it shall be an holy anointing oil.
This shall be an holy anointing oil unto Me throughout your generations.
30:32 Upon man's flesh shall it not be poured, neither shall ye make any other like it, after the composition of it: it is holy, and it shall be holy unto you.
v. 33 Whosoever compoundeth any like it, or whosoever putteth any of it upon a stranger, shall even be cut off from his people.
Perfume: Only to use in the sanctuary for people to smell.
When you breathe oil molecules they are detected by the brain olfactory center via the nostrils, which stimulates the central part of the brain that manages your storage and filing systems for emotions. It does not respond to spoken, heard or written language, it only responds to smell. Essential oils can communicate to that portion of our brain’s limbic system and release repressed emotions that have hindered us since childhood. Stored trauma or painful emotions, just like stored physical toxins, can make us sick and cause pain, illness and suffering on all leaves.
30:34 And the G-d said unto Moses, Take unto thee sweet spices [a spice used in incense], stacte [an aromatic gum drop resin of a shrub], and onycha [an ingredient used in the holy incense], and galbanum [a kind of resin or gum]; these sweet spices with pure frankincense [a white resin burned as fragrant]: of each shall there be a like weight:
30:36 And thou shalt beat some of it very small, and put of it before the testimony in the tabernacle of the congregation, where I will meet with thee: it shall be unto you most holy.
v. 38 And as for the perfume which thou shalt make, ye shall not make to yourselves according to the composition thereof: it shall be unto thee holy for the G-d.
Whosoever shall make like unto that, to smell thereto, shall even be cut off from his people.
Log of oil [a liquid measure equal to about one half litre]
Lev. 14:15 And the priest shall take some of the log of oil, and pour it into the palm of his own left hand:
v. 16 And the priest shall dip his right finger in the oil that is in his left hand, and shall sprinkle of the oil with his finger seven times before G-d:
v. 17 And of the rest of the oil that is in his hand shall the priest put upon the tip of the right ear of him that is to be cleansed, and upon the thumb of his right hand, and upon the great toe of his right foot, upon the blood of the trespass offering:
v. 18 And the remnant of the oil that is in the priest's hand he shall pour upon the head of him that is to be cleansed: and the priest shall make an atonement for him before G-d.
v. 28 And the priest shall put of the oil that is in his hand upon the tip of the right ear of him that is to be cleansed, and upon the thumb of his right hand, and upon the great toe of his right foot, upon the place of the blood of the trespass offering:
Pot of oil [flask, small oil jug]
2 kg. 4:2 Thine handmaid hath not any thing in the house, save a pot of oil.
In the multiplication of the widow’s pot of oil we have another illustration of the work of the Spirit. It is a lesson of emptying. The poor widow had nothing in the house wherewith to discharge her debt, save a pot of oil.
We also owe a debt we cannot pay.
We are debtors to live after the Spirit,
We are debtors to love one another,
We are debtors to carry the Word both to the Jews and the Greeks, both to the wise and to the unwise.
Nothing of our carnal nature can benefit to discharge the debt.
The oil – the Holy Spirit – will alone avail. But as in faith we begin, at G-d’s bidding, to pour it out into the empty vessels around us, we shall find that His supply is an inexhaustible one, and that the only limit is the measure of our expectation.
Go and pay thy debt, and live off the rest.
The power of the Spirit is enough both for life and for service.
Much is said in the Scriptures about oil (202 times), to keep it full and ready in season and out of season. You never know when you have need of it.
Empty the golden oil out of yourselves, for the more you give the more you will get.
Baths of oil [bath, a unit of liquid measure, about 40 litres, equal to dry measure ephah]
2 Chron. 2:10 twenty thousand baths of oil.
Ezra 7:22 Unto an hundred talents of silver, and to an hundred measures of wheat, and to an hundred baths of wine, and to an hundred baths of oil, and salt without prescribing how much.
What is the ‘prophetic’ meaning of the Oil?
Oil is seen throughout the Scriptures. Oil is seen for purposes of anointing and for fuel for the Lights. It is used to cook with, baking, sacrifices and is used for anointing.
Oil in the Bible is the physical representation of a spiritual reality,
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