Alright, welcome back to the Inter-Testament Study. Last week we looked at Alexander and his rise to power and the breakup of this empire amongst his four generals. So we're going to pause talking about the Greek stuff and we're going to go back and see what the Jews were doing as far as their religious worship during this time. Because what happened, you can look on the board, in 586 BC. The temple got destroyed. So when the temple was destroyed, what did the Jews no longer have access to? What could they not do anymore? Right, so what ceased? The sacrifices stopped. And that was a big, big part of Jewish life. The temple was the focus of Jewish society, culture, religious worship, all of that stuff. So with the temple gone, they're going to have to make changes. So going back even earlier than that, around 700, the Assyrians conquered the northern kingdom of Israel. Remember, they scattered them all over the place, from Egypt all over to the north, all the way to the east, and just all over, those people were scattered. The Babylonians came and they exiled the Jews from the southern kingdom of Judah to Babylon. When Cyrus issued his decree around 539, I got that written up there, the Jews were allowed to return. Did all the Jews return to Jerusalem? No. A lot of them stayed. Now during that time, a lot of Jews remained faithful to God. We see that with the prophets Ezekiel, Jeremiah, Daniel. There were Jews who stayed loyal. So what was their religious worship like during that time? Because it would set the pace or set the stage for how they were doing that in that inter-Testament period under Greek culture. And that helps us understand why when a guy named Antiochus, or Antiochus IV, when he starts imposing his will on the Jews, how they were able to organize and push back. All right, so the Jews were scattered around 700 BC by the Assyrians, and the communities where they lived were actually very strong. And we see that when the Jews come back from their exile in Babylon, most stay where they are. They have businesses, they have thriving small stores or something. They are ingrained in their society, but they're maintaining their Jewish distinctiveness, for the most part. So, a lot of the Jews adapted to the local customs. Now, in the past, we've talked about how people viewed their gods. How were the gods associated with various tribes? What did they think about the land where they were living? The gods were territorial. So the Jews that were scattered, many of them started adapting that attitude. Well, yeah, we'll still worship Yahweh, but because we're in Egypt, we'll start worshiping the Egyptian gods. Oh, because we're in northern Assyria, we'll start worshiping those local gods along with Yahweh. Now they still had Yahweh as supreme, so Yahweh's on top, but they would worship all the local deities as well. Now this is not polytheism. Does anybody know what this is called? I'm going to worship the gods of the people that I am with? Yes! Does anybody know the fancy word for that? Thanks a lot, Mr. Nathan. It's beautiful. Henotheism. What is it called? Henotheism. H-E-N-O-theism. And that's just, I worship the same people that I'm... That's, my God is supreme, so Yahweh is supreme. Yes, he's the creator, Lord of the universe. However, I don't want to offend these local gods, so I'll throw occasional prayers up to them as well. Okay, so Yahweh is still elevated to supreme in these cultures, but all the local deities, they throw them a bone here and there, because, you know, they don't want to be offensive. And we see this mostly, remember I talked about that group in Elephantine Egypt? They discovered a whole bunch of documents dating between the years 494 and 400 BC. So this is a group that stayed there since the Assyrian captivity. Cyrus takes over Babylon, takes over Assyria, says you guys can go home. These guys said, nope, we're doing great in the Elephantine. We're going to stay right here. I mean, you really can't. I mean, Nehemiah didn't go back. Ezra didn't hear about it first. It was desolate. It was. And it wasn't their, like, homeland anymore. I mean, as far as, like, everything they knew had been taken away. They were probably pretty comfortable. Yes. And we can't say, well, they're not as spiritually mature as all of those who went back the first time. That's not necessarily true. Yes? Other than the land and culture that they had at the time, what was their incentive for going back? They wanted to be a part of God's plan for Jerusalem. That would be the biggest motivation to go. Let's go back... Self-rule. In a sense, like... To a degree, yes. To, like, being allowed to have their own temple, like, the, or... Not their own temple. The temple. The temple. And the draw of that, but... Oh, yeah big time But what we see is that under under the Persian rule, because when Persia took over Babylon, he was taking over Syria. So these Elephantine Jews are still under the Persian domain. They are granted incredible freedom, incredible freedom. And what we see is when they uncovered all these documents, these are letters that they were writing to each other and to their brethren, both in Samaria and in Jerusalem. These, and we know a lot about their lifestyle. So again, this is the book that's my primary source, Between the Testament by Charles Pfeiffer. I'm gonna read some excerpts out of this. This is fascinating. Because we always think of Jews, at least I always thought of the Jewish religion as being, again, very monolithic. Everybody had the same idea that a Jew in Elephantine Egypt would be the same as a Jew in Jerusalem, who was the same as a Jew in, what's the capital, Susa. But that's not a true statement. So the Jews who were in Elephantine, they worshiped Yahweh, but they also worshiped all the local deities. and they had a temple built on the island of Elephantine. Now, why would Jews who were in Jerusalem have a big, big problem with that? Because the only place they could worship and sacrifice is the temple. Correct. Not a temple. Right. The temple. Now, the Jews had maintained... Did you have something? No, I said the Holy of Holies. Yeah, the Holy of Holies. Now, the Jews had maintained worship. And we see this in Ezekiel. Will somebody look up Ezekiel chapter 8? Excuse me, chapter 9, verse 1. And I want somebody else to look up... Josh said he'll look up Ezekiel. Where is Ezekiel? In the Bible? Yeah. Someone else look up Ezekiel chapter 20, verse 1. Oh, I'm already there. You're at 20? Yes. Okay, and then some other brave volunteers are going to read more than anyone else. I want you to look up Ezekiel chapter 33 verse 30. Now the reason we're going here is because Ezekiel was a prophet who was taken from Jerusalem to somewhere in the Babylonian Empire. And he was the prophet to the people. Daniel was not, first and foremost, a prophet. He was an official in the Babylonian and then the Persian government. Yes, he was given prophecy, he was given visions, but he never went to the people and instructed them in the Mosaic law. He never went to the people, you know, thus saith the Lord. He was given visions that he wrote down. Ezekiel is the prophet who spoke to the people during the Babylonian captivity. And there are a few clues in here that show us what the Jewish religious life was like during this end of Testament time, because it would continue throughout the Greek occupation. So who wants to read Ezekiel chapter 9? No, sorry, chapter 8 verse 1 for us. Okay, go ahead. In the sixth year, in the sixth month of the fifth day of the month, as I sat in my house with the elders of Judah sitting before me, the hand of the Lord God fell upon me there. Okay. So this is Ezekiel speaking. He gives you the date and time. This is really convenient if you're a student of the Bible and you're trying to create a chronological study of what happened and when. So these, it's kind of difficult to read, but it really sets it. It's great when you're trying to figure out when did this happen, what happened first, and all this stuff. So he's sitting there, and who's with him? And where are they? In his house. They're in his house. The temple's gone. They're not in Jerusalem. They've been taken to Babylon. So the prophet of the Lord is in his house and the elders of the people are in his house. I don't think they're playing board games. What do you think is the purpose of them gathering together? Probably worshiping. They're probably studying. Okay? Okay, all right you had 20 yes Just start in verse read wanted to All right, so once again you see the elders of Jerusalem Jerusalem doesn't exist much, coming to Ezekiel to hear the word of the Lord. And finally, Ezekiel chapter 33, starting verse 30. As for you, son of man, your people who talk together about you by the walls and at the doors of the houses, say to one another, each to his brother, come and hear what the word is that comes from the Lord. And they come to you as people come, and they sit before you as my people. And they hear what you say, but they will not do it. Okay, that's good. Alright, so this is God speaking to Ezekiel. And God is telling Ezekiel that the people will sit around and talk at the gates of the city or wherever they are. And if they have a question about the Lord, who do they go to? They go to... Say it. Ezekiel. Yes, you're allowed to speak. Yeah, they go to Ezekiel. So what we see is the start of the, while they are scattered, while they are in the diaspora, not the diaspora, captivity, the Jews go to the man who knows the word of God to learn. And where do they primarily meet? in his house. So you see the start of worshiping in the prophet's or the elder's house. And this is something that the Jewish communities were doing all over since the Assyrian conquest. And we see the clues in Ezekiel of them getting together in the house to do this. Now, as time goes by under the Greek occupation, this got much more well-defined. So this is the beginning of synagogues, is that what you're saying? This is the beginning of the synagogue. Because they would build, they would have these locations, these Jewish communities would get together. They maintained their Jewish worship. Now you see, in Elephantine, because they started worshipping these other gods, it wasn't pure religion, but they still maintained a sense of their Jewish identity. And what happened during the, and we'll see more of this when we get to the book of the Maccabees, because we'll read through Maccabees together, is that the other cultures resented the Jews who would not worship the local deities as well. Why do you think they found that so offensive? Why would the Greeks find that so very offensive? The Jews that would not? Yes. Because it's culturally acceptable for, it's culturally, It's a cultural norm to worship your god and the geographical gods of the land that you're in if it's not your homeland. Everybody did it. And polytheistic societies, which the Assyrians, Babylonians, and Greeks, and Romans were, it was no problem to just add another god to their pantheon. You already have 15 statues. Might as well complete my collection, put that one up on the mantle, too. We got room? Just scoot him over a little bit. Yeah, just scoot him over. Just start buying smaller ones or something. So it was nothing. But the Jews who maintained pure worship, like, no, we're not going to worship the river god out there. No, only Yahweh. They were seen as just weird people. Very moody. Probably a little barbaric. They were called haters. You hate us because you don't worship our gods. Well, even if that is true, it's not because of the god you worship. They were xenophobic. Xenophobic. So this does become the worship of the synagogue. Because what happens is, in the larger cities, 23 elders would eventually form a group, say we have a large enough Jewish population, we need to organize, we need to make sure that our children are still taught the Mosaic law. And a large city would have 23 elders, and they called themselves the Sanhedrin. Now, why does that word sound familiar? Because that's the way, that's the Jewish leadership that is in charge of Jerusalem, you know, what we would consider Israel when Jesus shows up. Yes. Now, the smaller cities would have seven elders. But once all the Jews came back, Well, the Jews that did come back, and the temple was rebuilt in 516, and the temple started, the synagogue worship did not cease. Now, they didn't offer sacrifices there, but they would gather, and the order of worship became very well established. Like, if you went to one synagogue, you went to another, you knew what to expect. There was kind of a unity there. Is there any... evidence of sacrifices anywhere other than Jerusalem? Yes, in Elephantine they did. Okay. They had it completely, they had their own temple, they were doing their own thing. And I'm sure they were looked down upon by purists. Actually, let me read this, it's pretty neat, because we have a very lengthy passage. So going back to Elephantine, they had that other temple. They were very proud of it. They had a strong, thriving Jewish community. And they saw themselves as completely Orthodox. We don't know how much of the Mosaic writing they had access to. We don't know if they had the complete works of Daniel and Ezekiel and Jeremiah. We don't know. But we do know they saw themselves as Orthodox. This is a letter that was found. And it starts in the middle because it's an incomplete passage. Now, your servants, Yadoniah and his colleagues and the Jews, the citizens of Elephantine, all say this. if it pleases our Lord, take thought of this temple to rebuild it, since they do not let us rebuild it." What had happened is that the Egyptian cults really resented the Jewish presence in Elephantine, and they attacked their temple, and they burned it to the ground. They destroyed it. Now, this is about 404 B.C. The Jewish temple was completed, and has been for over 100 years now. So they're writing a letter to the Jews saying, hey, can you help us rebuild our temple? Send money, send workers. Let a letter be sent from, I don't know. Yeah, yeah, look to your well-wishers and friends here in Egypt. Let a letter be sent from you to them concerning the temple of the God, Yahu, which is Jehovah, they just, yeah, Yahu. That's how it is. To build it in the fortress of Elephantine as it was built before. And the meal offering, incense, and burnt offerings will be offered in your name, and we shall pray for you at all times. We, our wives, and our children, and all the Jews who are here. All of them, if you do this, so that the temple is rebuilt. So right there, they're saying, we've been doing the sacrifices, incense offerings, goodwill offerings, all of those, they have been doing in that temple. And they're saying, if you help us rebuild, we'll start all that up again, and we'll pray for you. Where is, Elephantine was just outside Alexandria? It was, if you got the Nile River, it's one of the islands in southern Egypt. Yeah, because the Nile is very, very wide. So you have this huge island in the middle of it with a thriving Jewish community. They started there because that was a fort where a Jewish garrison was stationed that one of the Persian emperors left there. Is the island still there? The island is still there. There's a Wendy's. Yeah, I zoomed in on it on Google Earth. Oh, you just did? Yeah. Yeah, it's still there. I mean, it's a modern place now. And they send this letter asking gold. They send it to not only the Jews who were in Jerusalem, but they send it to the Samaritans as well. During that whole, remember the Jews came back and the Samaritans had moved in and taken over Jerusalem, like, hey, this is kind of ours. Now there's this conflict. These Elephantine Jews didn't get involved in that. They sent a letter to both of them saying, hey, send money. And if you do, we'll pray for you. That sounds kind of like televangelist. You send us money, we'll send you this prayer handkerchief that we've all prayed over. All right, so anyway, so we see all these Jews thrive now listen to the What all the Sanhedrin was able to do All right, so they had two offices. They had a guy who was called the ruler of the synagogue, and his job was to do just that. He made sure the buildings and grounds were good. He oversaw who would be speaking that day. He was in charge of it. You had a guy who was called the minister who would bring the selected writing to the person who was reading. The minister was also in charge of executing punishment. Because to Jews, wherever they were, they still carried out the Mosaic covenant. And if you violated the Mosaic law, they would administer the appropriate punishment. So there were three things that they could do. They could give you 40 stripes minus one. And where do we see that? Jesus. And Paul mentions in Corinthians that he got 40 stripes minus one. They could excommunicate you, in the Greek word they would make you anathema, which you would cut off from the Jewish people. And they could also do the death penalty. So there's the three big punishments that they could do. Now when Rome takes over, Rome does not allow them to execute anybody. Which is why Jesus had to be tried before what person? Before Pilate. Because of that. So over time, the Sanhedrin that was in Jerusalem would call themselves the Great Sanhedrin. And whatever they said would be sent out and applied to all the other synagogues. So let's look in Acts chapter 9. So what person do you think was made the leader of the Sanhedrin, the Great Sanhedrin in Jerusalem? What would make sense? The high priest. So at chapter 9, this is Paul. Well, at the time, he's known as Saul. So in verse 1 it says, But Saul, still breathing threats and murders against the disciples of the Lord, went to the high priest and asked him for letters to the synagogues at Damascus, so that if he found any belonging to the way, men or women, he might bring them bound to Jerusalem. So when he goes to the high priest and says, hey, I need a letter from you authorizing me to do this, address it to the synagogue in Damascus, because the high priest, as the ruler of the great Sanhedrin, has authority over all the other synagogues. So by the time Jesus comes on scene, this synagogue stuff is very, very well established. All right, so now let's talk about how they worshiped. In the synagogue, because the high priest is gone, they're still keeping track of the lineage of who should be high priest. And once they get the temple rebuilt, the correct person is, once again, high priest. But you can't get to him. So anybody who's competent is allowed to do the reading in the synagogue. You didn't have to be the ruler, you didn't have to be the minister. You just had to be able to read. You had to be able to read and do so intelligently. The first part of their worship was called the Shema. Does anybody know what that is? This is something you should have underlined in your Bible, so go back to Deuteronomy 6.4. If you do not have it underlined in your Bible, now is a great time to do it. Deuteronomy 6.4. Deuteronomy 6.4. No, it's Shema. I think it is Shema because it's one E. The ones that could enter the synagogue were just the high priests, right? Anybody. Because the idea that it started during the captivity, so people just had to get together, and when it got formalized, anybody was allowed in, even women. So unlike the temple where women were not allowed inside the inner court, in the synagogue, they were allowed in. Now whether they had to sit separate, like boys to the left, girls to the right, don't exactly know. According to the chosen, that's accurate. But women were allowed in the synagogue, and that continued from the earliest days all the way forward. All right, so the Shema was read or recited, they probably had it memorized, at the beginning of every synagogue worship on the Sabbath. And this is, Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your might. So that's the Shema. They would recite that. The next thing they would do would be a type of prayer. The next thing they would do is have a reading of the law. Now at this time, either they spoke, they didn't speak Hebrew, so what were the two languages that they spoke? Anybody remember? Greek and Aramaic. Now last week we talked some about the Septuagint. The Septuagint, the part that was completed in Alexandria, they're pretty sure was the first five books, the Laws of Moses, and that the rest of it was completed over time. It wasn't all 39 books of the Old Testament were not completed at one time. But as they were meeting in these synagogues, and a reader would get up to speak, they had to do the scroll written in Hebrew, but they would have to translate it to Aramaic or Greek in order to read it to the people. So as they did that over time, those translations were collected and taken to the library of Alexandria, where they were eventually edited to what we know as the completed Septuagint. So you would read from the law, the first five books. And then later, it became common to read from the prophets. So the law, the books of Moses, the first five books, and then the writings of Jeremiah, Daniel, Ezekiel, those books were considered scripture as well, and they were read. And we're going to see this in Luke 4. So everybody turn to Luke 4 now. There is no mention of that. There's no mention of that. And we're talking about the formation of the Sadducees and Pharisees later in Luke 4. Luke chapter 4 starting in verse 16. Now this is right after Jesus' temptation. And he, being Jesus, came to Nazareth, where he had been brought up. And as was his custom, he went to the synagogue on the Saturday, and he stood up to read. Now why could Jesus just walk in and read? Because he can't read. He's a male, and you're of age, you're allowed to read. And the scroll of the prophet Isaiah, you mind shutting that door? The scroll of the prophet Isaiah was given to him and he unrolled the scroll and found the place where it was written. All right, so now Jesus is reading from the scroll of Isaiah. So this would have been from the Septuagint because by then it was complete. That's what everybody used was the Septuagint at this point. All right, so we're gonna have a little fun with this because Well, I don't want to give it away. Some of you may know the punchline. He's going to read from Isaiah 61. So tell you what, everybody on this side, I want you to turn to Isaiah 61. You guys turn to Isaiah 61. Now I'm going to get out my set too, because I'm cool. You guys here pick whatever you want. Read Luke 4 or read Isaiah 61. Isaiah 61. All right, so instead of reading, I want all of you over here are Luke 4. I'll let you guys pick whatever you want. You guys are reading Isaiah 61. All right, I want somebody over here start reading Isaiah 61 and read until it says the acceptable year of the Lord. I want you to stop there. And all of you looking to move forward, pay very close attention to what is and is not said. The spirit of the Lord God is upon me because the Lord hath anointed me to preach good tidings unto the meek. He hath sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives and the opening of the prison to them that are bound. to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord. What's missing? Luke 4 people. So did Jesus just make up something? No one threw stones at him at that point. Good question. Why is it missing from our Bible? Okay, so I'm going to read from the Septuagint okay, the Spirit of the Lord is upon me because of to the poor, to heal the brokenhearted, to preach liberty to the captives, and recovery of sight to the blind, to declare the sceptical year of the Lord." Jesus was not quoting from the text that our English Bibles, the majority of which, are translated from. He was quoting from the Septuagint. The Old Testament that is in our Protestant Bibles is from the Masoretic text, not the Septuagint. Very interesting. AD or so. Septuagint, about 250 BC-ish. According to legend, they locked 70 people into a room and in one week they completed all of it. That's legend. But it was around 250. It ended up, they changed it down to 70 and that's why it's called Septuagint, which is Latin. That's what Jerome called it. Yeah, there's a whole thing. You have the legend and you have reality. Reality is, the first five books were done in Alexandria, Egypt. Fact, nobody disputes it. It took longer than a week. And the rest of it was done over time. Now, as such, the Septuagint is not divinely inspired. Just like the King James Version is not divinely inspired. The original text was The original text was divinely inspired in the original Hebrew was written for the Old Testament and the Greek that the New Testament was written. Now, that's the fact that our Isaiah 61, for the most part, I say ours, Protestant Bibles, does not have that phrase, recover your sight to the blind. Does that invalidate all of Christianity and we should all go be pagans? It does not. And the reason I tell you these things is because the skeptics know these things. They know about the Masoretic text. They know about the Septuagint. They know about the discrepancies between them. There's more than one Septuagint, as I mentioned last week. There are different family trees of the Septuagint in another cell. However, does anybody remember what the differences was between the Book of Isaiah we have now And the book of Isaiah that was found in the Dead Sea Scrolls, anybody remember the differences I mentioned? I know there's some nitpicky details. It's like 99% the same. Over 2,000 years, because about 100 BC is about how old they think those things were, Isaiah today, 97, 99% the same. And all the differences are spelling and variations as far as like a name of somebody or a name of a location. You know what, I'm gonna use this example. I've used it before, I like it, it's simple. Excuse me. Let me grab a marker. Are there any Bibles out that have the Septuagint? Yes, this one right here. Yep, and they they don't they use the same St. Bob's Translation So here here the type of difference, all right, so people say are there differences in the Bible? Yes It's important to understand what these differences are. So the shortest verse in the Bible is what? So let's say we had 10 documents of the book of Isaiah. Now these are 2,000-year-olds, right? What's going to happen to the ink on those papers? It's going to fade. Can you still tell what that says? Same thing. So you smear it a little bit. You think people can still kind of figure out what that said? These are the differences. So when I say it matches 97 to 99%, the differences don't matter. If I say, what's the other example that I use all the time? It's like 90 times. Yeah, okay, solve different words for the same thing. Oh, here we go. Jeff, right? Jeff H. Smith. And then someone else spells it the stupid way. Jeff H. Smith. Jeff H. Smith, whose parents were Bob and Lisa, did this. Jeff H. Smith, spelled slightly different, the son of Bob and Lisa Smith, did this. Is that major difference? No. Okay. So, no one go tell Pastor Sean or anybody else that Elder Mike said that the Bible's all jacked up. No. Now, there's a conspiracy theory behind why the Masoretic Text is different than the Septuagint. Alright, so, everybody get your tinfoil hat and put it on. People in sermon audio, my tinfoil hat's on. That means you can take what I'm about to say and just go... Alright, tinfoil hat time. So, when the Septuagint was used by all the Jews, it was used by all the Christians once, you know, they became a thing. And you could go from Egypt all the way to India, speaking Greek, carrying your Greek Septuagint, and showing the Gentiles that Jesus is Lord, because everybody spoke Greek. And you could show them the Old Testament prophecy, and you could show them how Jesus fulfilled it. And this ticked the Jews off. because they completely rejected who Jesus was. And in the next few centuries, as Christianity is not stopping, it's getting bigger and bigger, they started having academic debates between Jewish scholars and Christian scholars. And the Christians had the Septuagint, and the Jews had the Septuagint, and the Christians were winning the debate. So what the Jews said is, well, the Septuagint is not really a good translation. So they make their own translation. And skip forward a few hundred years, no, about a thousand years, when Erasmus is completing his translation of the entire Bible, and other scholars are trying to do this, and they go to get the oldest copy of Hebrew text they can find, they go to these Jewish rabbis, and what do the Jewish rabbis hand them? And the Masoretic text, they tried to neuter the Messianic prophecies in their scripture. Okay, look up, I was not prepared to do this, I think it's Genesis 6, I think. I don't know. I'm not even 100% sure of the chapter. I'm still wearing my tinfoil hat. I think it's right before that. Okay, chapter 5. I've got to find the guy's name. Yeah, chapter 5 is where it lists the people. All the descendants from Adam and how long they lived. I don't know. All I know is that there's dead space on the recording. I hate dead space. Man, okay, now I gotta compare it here. The ages of those people in Genesis chapter five do not match the Masoretic text. The Septuagint had different ages for the people and how long they lived. I think it's, maybe it's 12. There we go, look in verse 12. Chapter five? Yeah, Genesis chapter five, verse 12. These differences are fascinating, and you have to know about them. If you don't learn about them in church, you're going to learn about it in a secular university. You're going to learn about it from some skeptic on YouTube. Somebody read verse 12 for me. Canaan 5.12? Yep, chapter 5, verse 12. Canaan lived 70 years and begot Mahalaleel. After he begot Mahalaleel, Canaan lived 840 years and had sons and daughters. So all the days of Canaan were 910 years and he died. Okay. He died. How long did he live before he fathered his son? 70 years. 70 years. Does everybody agree? I agree that's what the text says. Now I'm going to read the Septuagint. Now Enosh lived 190 years. No, that's 12. Now Canaan lived 170 years and begot Mahaloel. Wait, you said, wait, go back to number nine. You said, it says Enosh lived how many years? 190. Yeah, mine says 90 years. They added 100? There's 300 years missing. In the main English Bibles, Protestant Bibles, there's over 300 years missing. Have you seen this chart where it says after the flood, Sham lived long enough to meet Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob? Yeah, that's not right. You add in those extra 300 years to all the, I'm not gonna read all of them, but all the ones that are missing, then it looks, the timeline looks normal. Sham's son died after Sham. Sham's grandson died after his dad, so on and so on. But when you take away that 300 years, is there like, did I leave a marker up there? Yes, I did. He shows it if you use the dates from your Old Testament Sham was like 960 years, right? His son dies here. His grandson dies here. His great-grandson great great great great. Here's Abraham Isaac and Jacob Something like that. Okay, don't Chen's son outlived him. His grandson outlived him. It looks normal. So why would they take out 300 years, give or take, from the dates? Is it just an omission? Doesn't it have something to do with the genealogy of Christ? First of all, yeah. I can't remember the exact where they went with that, which is unfortunate. I wasn't prepared to talk about that. Where'd you get that info? There's a guy on YouTube. I never said don't watch guys on YouTube. I said beware of the skeptics. No, I just have my tinfoil hat on. He had his hand up. So like 701, somewhere in that BC, did not the calendars change in those time frames from, it used to be like 12 months to 30 days, and before that it was less than that? Oh, it was that for longer. Well, I'm saying it was, so I'm not even sure how many, like five days a week or four days a week, I'm not even sure, but I know there's so many things I've read on the time of the calendar changing. And this goes back to the Julian calendar. Right. So, you know, back in the after 701 BC, I think 700. In fact, I think they went to change the extra five and a quarter days and things like that into the calendar. So I'm not sure how many times that may have changed. Yeah. Well, it doesn't it doesn't make up 300 years. I know. And it doesn't explain why would they leave off? all those ages. Basically, they just dropped 100 years off of a few people. And it's not an... It seems like it's deliberate. It seems like it's deliberate. In an attempt to discredit Jesus' ability to be the Messiah. Yeah, the lineage, the line, all that stuff. It'll look so bad for being like, that guy? Nah, not that guy. Yeah. Now I'm gonna have to watch the video again. because I opened it up. I wasn't even going to talk about that, just to talk about changes. It's like, that is a change. I forgot all about that. And it just popped in my head. I haven't watched that video in months, so. All right, so there's that. So are there changes? Yes. And now you're prepared at least. So did you know that your Bible jacked up the genealogy in Genesis 5? Actually, yes, I was aware of that. you already have a leg up in any argument you have. Alright tinfoil hat has been removed. Alright, so the synagogue worship, you always started with the Shema, you had a prayer, you read from the law, you read from the prophets, and we saw Jesus do that. We talked about the translating as they were taking passages and reading it to the people they have to translate it to Greek or Aramaic that assisted with the translation of the Septuagint and after reading The person was allowed to get a sermon their interpretation of it. And that's what Jesus does And the final part was a benediction And after the prayer was given, the whole congregation would say, amen. So that's why we say that now. And the author of that book, Between the Testaments, that I'm reading this from, he said, without the organization of the synagogue, both Judaism and Christianity as we know them today simply would not exist. Because we follow pretty much the same thing. You have a call to worship. They decided the Shema. We have a song. Open up with prayer. Somebody reads the scripture. Somebody tells about the scripture. Then you pray at the end. And we all say, Amen. Very, very similar. And all that started really being organized during the Babylonian captivity. And it started at people's houses. And it evolved and adapted from then. All right. Anybody have any questions about that? Any of the tinfoil hat stuff, we can go there too. Yes? So you said it would drastically change Christianity and Judaism? If the synagogue worshipped, if that did not develop the way it did, then the worship of both Jews, because they still follow that format, and Christians who adopted a lot of that, Because all the first Christians were who? Jews. They did what they knew. With the synagogue worship, it was estimated that by the time Cyrus issued his decree, there were four million Jews scattered around that Middle East area, the ancient world. And only about 20,000 came back with the first group, and over the next few years, about 45 to 50,000 total came back. So there were millions of Jews scattered everywhere, and the synagogue became their focus of worship. They didn't do sacrifices, but they followed that format that we read out, pretty much. And that's how they maintain their Jewish identity and their culture. So when you see in the book of Acts, they're debating how much of the Old Testament law should these Gentile converts have to obey. And they say, look, in synagogues all over, and he starts naming all these cities, Asia, Europe, and all this, Moses is preached in these places, and we should all agree on whatever this may be. So he's making reference to these synagogues that have existed throughout what's now the Roman Empire. They've been there, and they've been there for hundreds of years. Any questions? Are those Jews going to be able to sacrifice themselves in heaven? I would say that would be a matter of the heart, because the way they saw it, that's a good question. The way they saw it is, because obviously you can't, by the time you walk to Jerusalem to make a sacrifice and walk back home, it'd be time to turn around and go back, because they're scattered so very, very far. And at some point in time, the temple didn't exist for them to make sacrifices in. So even then, the sacrifices were not necessary for salvation whatsoever, because what has salvation always been based on? It's always been faith even back back to Abraham. It's always been faith these Jews in these synagogues They develop the idea of we can't be there in Jerusalem to make sacrifices in the temple But what we can offer is a sacrifice of praise or worship Their act of gathering together to study God's law and to live it out was seen as their sacrifices that they were making and that idea of is in later scripture. Look in Micah, chapter 6. Amos, Zebediah, Jonah, Micah. In Micah, chapter 6, verse 6. With what shall I come before the Lord and bow myself before God on high? After Sean read through this on Sunday. Shall I come before him with burnt offerings, with calves a year old? Will the Lord be pleased with thousands of rams and 10,000 rivers of oil? Shall I give my firstborn for my transgression? Obviously God does not condone human sacrifice. The fruit of my body for the sin of my soul. He has told you, old man, what is good. And what does the Lord require of you? But to do justice, to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God. So we see that's what God wants us to do. Look in 1 Samuel 15, 22. 1 Samuel 15, 22. These are all good verses to have underlined, by the way. The Lord is about to reject Saul as king. Somebody read verse 22 and 23 for me. I'll get it. Okay. But Samuel replied, does the Lord delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices as much as in obeying the Lord? To obey is better than sacrifice, and to heed is better than the fat of rams. All right, let's just stop there for time's sake. All right, so what does the Lord want way more than sacrifice? Obedience. Obedience. And listening. Yes. So this idea of What is truly pleasing to God being more than just sacrificing animals is not a new concept. So that's how these Jews were correcting their understanding. We're 2,000 miles away from Jerusalem. We can't offer sacrifices in the temple. What we can do is be obedient and give a sacrifice of praise. Yeah, Luke 11, 42. Okay, so this is Jesus is laying into the Pharisees. It says, but woe to you, Pharisees, for you tithe mint and rue and every herb. Now tithing, so you tithe in all this stuff, these little seasonings, these spices, you tithe on that, but you neglect justice and the love of God. So does Jesus more concerned with, hey, you're tithing, great job. He says, no, you're neglecting justice. You're neglecting the love of God. That's what he was concerned about. Yeah, tithing's fine, but that's less important than doing justice and loving God. And we saw that when we looked in Micah. So yeah, so the idea, we offer a sacrifice of praise. We can't be in the Temple of Jerusalem, we can sacrifice to God in the synagogue through our acts of worship in obedience to his laws. Good question. All right, anybody else have anything? Any questions? If not the Masoretic text, is there another Hebrew text that's more accurate or less tampered with that's older? No, the oldest, The oldest writings we have, the Dead Sea Scrolls, which we'll be talking about later, they were mostly written in Greek and Aramaic. Yeah, I think they all were. So like the original Hebrew is gone. You don't have access to that. Any other questions? You can bring your tinfoil hats back next week too. I'm gonna watch that video again. I can't remember exactly how they, what the intent was. Like, we're gonna do this. Stage one, dilute 300 years. Stage two, stage three, discredit Jesus. I gotta remember what step two was. We'll get there, so. All right. Well, there's nothing else. We'll pray and we'll be dismissed. Four minutes early, that's fine. Josh. Father in heaven, Lord, we're just so thankful that we can dig into your word and grow a greater understanding of you and your story to redeem us.