I am becoming more and more concerned about pastors and churches who will not take a stand. So many seem apathetic to what is happening in our world, seldom taking a stand or speaking out against unbiblical cultural trends or the misdeeds of evil.
If not Christians or churches, then who will speak up for truth?
“Being a lover of freedom, when the [Nazi] revolution came, I looked to the universities to defend it, knowing that they had always boasted of their devotion to the cause of truth; but no, the universities were immediately silenced. Then I looked to the great editors of the newspapers, whose flaming editorials in days gone by had proclaimed their love of freedom; but they, like the universities, were silenced in a few short weeks. … Only the Church stood squarely across the path of Hitler’s campaign for suppressing truth. I never had any special interest in the Church before, but now I feel a great affection and admiration for it because the Church alone has had the courage and persistence to stand for intellectual and moral freedom. I am forced to confess that what I once despised I now praise unreservedly.” —Albert Einstein
Pastor, are you standing “squarely across the path” of the things “suppressing truth”? Are you teaching and arming your congregations to do the same?
Craig T. Owens 
July 12, 2014 at 11:14 am
Perhaps you are not aware of the Pope’s utter silence regarding Nazi atrocities. Have you read any of Luther’s disparaging remarks concerning the Jews? Well, that’s neither here nor there. Efforts to “suppress truth” however are always relevant. And as it turns out, the church mastered the art of deception long before universities and newspapers came along. Don’t agree? Remember Orwell’s 1984? Words were fabricated and eliminated to communicate specific ideas for control purposes. Let’s see if this method has been utilized within Christianity. ‘Lord’, ‘Jesus’, ‘Christ’, ‘cross’, ‘church’, ‘holy’, ‘obey’ ,‘keep’, and ‘law’ among others are all deliberate substitutions for specific and significant terms that are now suppressed. Denying this is intellectually dishonest, but let’s examine some evidence.
First and foremost, God has repeatedly expressed his desire to be called upon by his name, Yahowah (YHWH). Christians don’t bother to acknowledge that God even has a name and assert that he actually has many names. Credit for this goes to the Jews though (Jer 23). “The Lord” is literally the definition of haBa’al. Is that not repulsive? Why is God’s very name suppressed?
And what of the Son? ‘Jesus’ was unheard of until being fabricated in the 17th century. ‘Iesus’ is also a substitute for the placeholder written in Greek because names are never translated but rather transliterated to a phonetic equivalent which the Greek alphabet did not permit. Yahowsha’ could not be correctly articulated via the Greek alphabet but could be referenced with a LXX and Torah comparison to discover the actual Hebrew name. Yahowsha’ incorporates Yahowah and Salvation. Why would anyone want to suppress that?
Ma’asaYah equates to “Yahowah’s Work” but has practically been resigned to obscurity and replaced by messiah which is an adjective meaning annointed. Many kings and prophets were anointed. The prophet whom Yah promised Moshe would convey his instructions since the audience present at the time was too terrified to listen (Dt 18) was surely anointed. For some reason though, Christians chose to transliterate christos instead of translating to anointed. The devious reasons for this require more intensive explanation than I can post here. The anointed prophet certainly proclaimed the same message as Yahowah. Even today, nobody is listening. Why suppress his teaching?
The imagery of a cross is nothing new. In fact, the cross is old as Babylon and Egypt where it was displayed as an ankh or worn on a necklace or in a pattern of a headdress … like the one Tammuz, aka Bacchus wore. A ‘stauros’ is an upright stake upon which men were impaled by several methods. ‘Crux’ is not to be found in the Greek texts. The significance of “upright” has been suppressed for so long that there is no point addressing it further here.
Ecclesia was a perfectly suitable translation for the mow’ed mikra’ey (called-out assembly) described by Yahowah in his instructions regarding appointed meeting times. The idea of setting apart time to meet with God as his set-apart people on the occasions he set apart for that specific and prophetic purpose is suppressed by ‘church’. There is no avoiding Circe in determining the derivation of church. Circe is the daughter of sungod, Helios. That, of course is suppressed as well.
Setting something apart from other things identifies a special purpose without necessitating a religious context. But religion requires more than being uncommon. ‘Holy’ more adequately communicates a sanctimonious concept. The idea of being separated, distinguished from the ordinary, set apart for a greater purpose may not be suppressed entirely but is removed from the appropriate context.
Strange as it may seem, Yah does not command obedience but rather attention. The Hebrew term often translated ‘obey’, shama, means ‘listen’. Simple enough, unless religious people prefer some more authoritative role that they can then assume for themselves. Obedience then becomes a more suitable concept to that end. Listening to instructions engenders knowledge and understanding that in turn fosters wise decisions. Obedience requires nothing more than faith. Suppressing this concept has created masses of “believers” who are clueless devotes.
Yah’s instructions could still be corrupted even if people know to listen attentively to them. We are further instructed to ‘guard’ or ‘protect’ the instructions for posterity. The Hebrew shamar conveys this. That has been suppressed however because the instructions have been contorted into an impossibly arduous “law” that must be “kept” rather than guarded. And since it is such a terrible law, maybe abandoning it altogether is best. We’ll just keep the ones we like and make up some others that will keep the flock in line … and giving.
Yes, the teaching, requirements, rules and commands that bring blessing and govern our behavior as a people set apart from this ever declining world are collectively referred to as the “law of Moses”. The 119th psalm is an ode to each of these. The 19th psalm refers to Yah’s torah as perfect and restoring the soul. Religious people have hated Yah’s instructions from the time they were delivered until now. Suppressing ‘teaching’ and proclaiming ‘law’ as a taskmaster paints a distorted but effective message. Did God redeem his people from slavery only to perpetually subject them to an oppressive law?
Craig, are you standing “squarely across the path” of the things “suppressing truth”? Have you even begun to realize that the wide path includes religion that stands opposed to Yahowah? The few examples above do not even scratch the surface of the suppression of truth that you participate in as a Christian.
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July 13, 2014 at 3:29 pm
Dear Pilgrim,
You obviously have thought this through quite extensively. I’m trying my best to live out the Bible as the Holy Spirit teaches, guides, convicts and reminds me. I, too, love the 119th Psalm and hope I can share the same passion for not only God’s Word, but for The Word Himself. May God’s Spirit continue to guide us all in our pilgrimage.
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July 14, 2014 at 12:45 pm
Please consider this most challenging concept:
If any interpretation of what you perceive is the teaching of God’s Spirit reflects anything of Paul’s rhetoric, then religion supersedes God’s Word (Yah’s Torah) as your passion. Father, Word, Spirit … Paul. One of these is not like the other; one of these just doesn’t belong. The consistency of Torah is reflected perfectly until the one who came in his own name from the tribe of Benjamin (Wolf) who demands blind faith – believing without seeing. Yah encourages seeing and listening in order to know and understand which leads to trust. God has demonstrated that he enjoys our questions and then reasoning with us whereas Paul curses anyone who dares question his gospel that abolishes Torah. The refiner’s fire is painful, but produces purity.
-continuing my pilgrimage and still far from the destination, kol tov (all the best) to you sir.
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July 14, 2014 at 4:31 pm
I hear you, Pilgrim. One thing I would like to get your take on: What about all of the parts of the Torah which are quoted in the New Testament of the Bible? Do you feel those are accurately or inaccurately applied?
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July 15, 2014 at 3:37 pm
Wow. There is hardly a question more pertinent to suppression of truth that you could have asked. The short answer is simple: quotes by Paul are typically ripped from context and/or twisted. Other authors don’t tend to exhibit that trend. The actual problem regarding accuracy is so much larger though. In answering you, I will address 2 issues: quoting out of context and failing to preserve Yah’s Word to begin with.
In the order of NT arrangement, the first of Paul’s quotes appears in Rom 1:17 which is repeated in Gal 3:11 suggesting that we should live by faith. A review of Habakkuk in Hebrew for context reveals that a truly despicable person is being described. Here, we are confronted with both issues. Paul twists the statement to reflect blind faith as opposed to trust due to knowledge and understanding. But also, the Hebrew translation is grossly obscured to hide the identity of the individual spoken of – Sha’uwl, himself.
Honestly, outside of the simple cross-reference of Paul’s quotes, this topic requires extensive background information. As I’ve described in my blog, tampering with God’s words was anticipated and inevitable. The following statements are in the interest of full disclosure and are based on conclusions I’ve reached. Christian bible publishers knowingly produce erroneous translations because accuracy will negatively impact revenue (as readability and theology will suffer). Biblical Hebrew cannot be effectively communicated in a fluent, easy-to-read English script. Discovering God’s message is the result of diligent effort, not from listening to a sermon and reading any given bible. The Hebrew language has been severely corrupted for the purpose of obscuring God’s message. The process of compiling a “new testament” was completed by powerful and unscrupulous men over many years and simply incorporates ancient pagan religions into one “Christ” story. Reader discretion is essential.
Now at the risk of preventing any gradual shift in your paradigm and possibly causing theological hemorrhage, I’ve made the last chapter of Questioning Paul available here. Reference to the Rom/Gal quote begins on page 20 of the pdf. I grew up a passionate Christian and chalked up my perplexities with the obvious rift between “Jesus” and Paul to comprehension failure on my part. But in the end, the nations will blame our ancestors for perpetuating lies (Jer 16:19). And Yah will show up and demand (of the survivors), “Shut your traps! Know that I am God!” (Ps 46:10) I want to shed the lies and know Yahowah now. My journey is described in the pdf’s here.
Do not follow the above links unless you are willing to consider that Christianity just might be a lie … seriously.
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July 16, 2014 at 9:35 am
Again I must say that I am impressed at the amount of thought you have put into this, Pilgrim! I noticed that you seemed to single-out Paul as your main culprit in the New Testament era. Would you say the same holds true for the other authors (say, Matthew, James, Peter, etc.)?
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July 16, 2014 at 1:42 pm
While the online book QP meticulously decimates any notion that Paul represented God by any means, I have not read much of it at all. A connection was made in my mind during a college history class covering Constantine. I realized that the “conversion” experience Constantine is noted for compares remarkably with that of Paul. While pondering that, I also realized that I could find no descriptions of God confronting anyone in such a manner outside of those two. Yahowah’s approach to people is proportionately reciprocal. He loves those who love him; he will return to those who return to him; he hates those who hate him, etc. Paul and Constantine were both pursuing hostile objectives. Constantine implemented a course of action thereafter that secured his dominance. I suspect Paul’s aspirations may have been similar.
Later, I began identifying discrepancies in Christian theology that are ordinarily overlooked or swept aside. There was a time when a man could be found dead after daring to question prevailing doctrine. For many centuries, Christians were subjected to the contrivances of ruling authorities who shaped doctrine as cleverly as they constructed battle plans. Perhaps they were the same endeavors. Dissidents were removed by any means necessary. Kingdoms were established by the fear of God as the masses remained loyal to the clergy. My approach to religion began to include attention to the pretenses that have subdued facts for nearly two millennia.
Now, regarding the NT in general, few works are definitively attributed to a certain author. Many are anonymous and many are forged decades after the presumed events. Only one claims inspiration and remains relatively consistent with the Torah – Revelation. Mt, Mk, Lk, Jn, etc. make no claim whatsoever of inspiration. The teaching of ‘Jesus’ recorded by them does not renege on the promises God made. John and others appear to indicate that Torah observance is essential (1Jn 1:4-6). James appears to be a refutation of Paul’s lies. Peter quotes that “Yah’s word endures forever and that is what was proclaimed to you”. He also acknowledges that babies need milk whereas Paul encourages progressing from that milk for the meat he poisons with.
The larger issue is not so much what was written but how the transmission involved editing over time. I do attribute the emergence of Christianity as a deceptive religion to Paul, but Marcion primarily formulated the idea of duality that introduced the “new” testament. Once the stage was set to secure a virtually invincible hierarchy of authority, manipulating the “holy scriptures” with the appropriate and familiar (pagan) filter commenced. Even the idea of salvation by grace “alone” is Luther’s contribution. “God’s Word” had to be forcibly removed from public scrutiny for generations as a Latin text so that the masses could acclimate without the opportunity to question.
My first question regarding Paul is, “Can I get a witness?” There is no corroborating testimony recorded that can clarify which of Paul’s contradicting descriptions of his luminous encounter is accurate. And then I might ask why Paul would attribute a line from Dionysus in Euripides’ The Bacchae to Yahowsha’ especially when his audience for this rendition of his account would have been familiar with the play. Even now, my blood is boiling as I consider how naïvely I revered Paul’s ramblings. Indeed, I question most everything about the NT. There is certainly valid material to be gleaned, but too much of it is so obviously questionable once you get past the audacity of daring to question the bible. Of course, the “OT” is not without similar discrepancies .
Paul is not the only culprit in the NT era. The compilation of the NT is an extensive and sordid affair. The litmus for determining that any prophetic literary work is consistent with God’s message is prescribed in D’barim – Words (renamed by Christians with a Greek term that means “2 laws” – Deuteronomy).
I apologize for my long-winded nature.
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July 21, 2014 at 2:25 pm
Pilgrim, I have read your words carefully and I have even sought the input from Hebrew scholars. In all of this there is something I have seen which is the most convincing argument for the validity of both the Old Testament and the New Testament scriptures.
Let me back up for a moment. You have made some points about the Hebrew language being twisted from its original context; however, this is a point I have a hard time buying into. When I think about the change in usage of the English language over a scant 400 years, I see how many words have taken on a nuance for their particular culture. But when I look at the overall scope of the entire 66 books of the Bible I see something astounding—even, I might say, miraculous. I see 40 authors, writing over a span of 1500 year, in three different languages (Hebrew, Greek, Aramaic), on three different continents, many of them having very little (if any) interaction with each other, and yet their message is beyond complimentary, it’s a perfect symphony!
When I see Old Testament prophesies being fulfilled during Old Testament times, I see something amazing. But when I see even more of those Old Testament prophesies being fulfilled in New Testament times, I see something too amazing to chalk up to chance. When I see Jesus quoting from 22 books of the Hebrew Scriptures, affirming their validity to a new generation, and the apostles quoting Jesus and additional Old Testament passages to even more people groups, I see a complete picture of God’s Word being fulfilled in minute detail.
The fact that so many New Testament authors wrote independently of each other (although some of them may have written interdependently with each other), and how quickly those manuscripts were copied and distributed, I see no opportunity for a “conspiracy” to manipulate events, twist words, nor create a fictional storyline and make it look like something happened that didn’t happen.
The bottom line: I see the entire canon of Scripture completely linked together and supporting one another, giving us a picture of Father, Son and Holy Spirit that either Testament on its own could give us.
I am a pilgrim too, just passing through this planet for the brief years that God will give me here, and I have chosen to believe the entirety of the Word He has inspired to us. To try to limit His Word to only one part of the Bible would be to diminish His message and rob Him of His due glory.
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July 23, 2014 at 2:58 pm
With apologies in advance for the necessary length –
Thank you, Craig for the dialogue. I sincerely appreciate your candor. Having read your argument for the validity of the entire bible, I will reply in kind. Please do not take personal offense as I must bring to your attention the beguiling nature of religion and the inevitable tendency of Christians to incorporate logical fallacy into their apologetics. Thank you for omitting the most common, ad hominem that is so frequently employed to oppose rational argument against Christianity. Now first, let’s briefly recap.
Your original blog post calls for courage to stand against the suppression of truth. I proposed the method of substituting terms and gave examples (including God’s own name), that is clearly the accepted practice of Christianity, as suppression of truth. Your response alluded to truth being derived from the teaching and guidance of the holy spirit. I then asserted that attributing any teaching to such a subjectively interpreted phenomenon does not reflect truth. Specifically, I acknowledged that Paul deviated from the longstanding consistency of God’s word for which you professed to be passionate. After asking for my thoughts regarding the accuracy of Torah citation, I stated my premise that Paul may be distinguished from others as a deceiver and referenced one of Yah’s prophets who warned that lies would permeate people’s perception of God’s message over many generations until the Day of Yahowah. Then for clarification as requested, I noted other NT authors do not acknowledge that Yahowah reneged on his promises in order to blend his teaching and instruction with ancient religion familiar to the Greco-Roman world. Before incriminating Paul with obvious discrepancies, I introduced the early practice of tainting manuscripts to reflect pagan and other elements which fostered an immensely powerful organization – the church.
While I do not doubt that you have reviewed my statements carefully, your counter-argument shows selective attention and presents a straw man that neither addresses nor refutes any point I have made. Relating deliberate word replacement to English language development across cultures and time is also a non sequitur. Support for your premise that the entire bible is valid and inspired amounts to a perceived harmony inclusive of Paul’s contradictions that is in actuality a myth and illusion.
To begin with, no claim of inspiration is made among any NT record outside of Revelation. Now let’s consider the diversity of thought represented in the NT. Matthew and Luke are known to have used Mark as a source, but each presents the protagonist with alarmingly different details. Christians simply merge the differences into a new uniquely unified gospel which is intellectually dishonest. Mark and Luke are both Greek and removed to some degree from the foundation of Yah’s teaching, requirements, rules and commands. John’s gospel clearly contains content added centuries later. Paul is a Roman Pharisee from Tarsus who prefers a Greek name to his given Hebrew – the significance of this cannot be overstated. The differing messages presented by these and the other 2 or 3 NT authors are categorically divergent and produce more noise than music primarily due to the overwhelming content from Paul that is unheard of outside of his rhetoric and therefor absent from Yahowah’s instructions.
How have you overlooked the many statements Yah has made describing the corruption of his word? You have appealed to the authority of scholars (as I do as well) but have neglected consulting the source. Also, if the scholars whose input you have sought are Christians, the potential for circular reasoning exists in your argument as they tend to conform to popular theology at the expense of accurate translation. I will submit examples of this as evidence in addition to my initial post that remains unaddressed. You may also reference any number of lexicons from popular Christian publishers and observe that several terms chosen for translation in bibles produced by the same publishers do not correlate with their own lexicons.
Your conclusion assumes that the NT is scripture, that godly men officially assembled the NT, that the NT is in harmony with itself and the OT, that the NT texts have not been corrupted from the non-extant autographs, and that a perceived singularity of father, son and spirit confirms validity. Each of these is demonstrably false. In the same manner that religion supersedes the word of God as your passion, familiarity supersedes evidence as support for that religion. Yahowah asks people to reason with him in determining that his teaching is right and true. Religion beguiles people into simply believing a lie without consulting the teaching of God whose very name remains concealed by the lie.
Following are statements from a few of Yahowah’s prophets:
From Jeremiah, “How long will you lie, you who plan to cause My name to be forgotten by My people just as their ancestors forgot My name for Baal?” And also, “… you twist the words of the living God, YHWH of hosts, our God.” (Jer 23 paraphrased). And more, “How can you say, ‘We are wise and Yah’s Torah is with us’? Look, surely the lying stylus of the scribes has made it a lie.”
From Amos against Judah, “because they have rejected the Torah of YHWH and have not guarded his rules, and their lies have led them astray, as with their ancestors.”
From Malachi, “From the days of your ancestors you have turned aside from my rules, and have not guarded them.”
From Zephaniah, “Her prophets are fickle, treacherous men; her priests profane what is set apart; they do violence to (butcher) the Torah.”
From Ezekiel, “Her priests have done violence to (butchered) My Torah and have profaned My set apart things. They have made no distinction between set-apart and common, neither have they taught the difference between the unclean and the clean, and they have disregarded My Sabbaths, so that I am profaned among them.”
These are merely a sample of Yah’s effort to expose the poison of religion that corrupts his instruction. Again, I must ask how you have overlooked this. “’And they bend their tongue as their bow, for falsehood and not truth is superior in the land, for they go forth from evil to evil, and they do not know me,’ declares Yahowah.” (Jer 9:3) The only … only way to know Yahowah is by diligently examining statements he made via his prophets who spoke his word. We do not have autographs of those. What we do have is obviously altered as evidenced by variances between earlier and later manuscripts which is why our search requires such effort.
The prophet Yahowsha’ also articulated God’s word perfectly consistent with Torah even stating unequivocally that nothing of the Torah will be diminished while the earth and sky remain. Christians, however choose Paul’s religion above “Jesus’” statements. An example (that I am stealing from the QP author) of poorly, even deceptively translated text follows:
The very notion that God hands over to men His unique discernment to forgive or condemn violations of His own terms should by itself shout, “What’s wrong here?” But of course nobody is listening. Consider what the Greek text of John 20:22-23 communicates in context: (Resembling ‘draw near to Me, and I will draw near to you’.)
“And when He had said this, He breathed on them and said: ‘Accept, associate with, and use (lambano – take upon yourself in order to be carried away, take hold of and use productively, choose to form a relationship with, accept, receive, experience, and exploit courageously) the revered, cleansing, and set-apart Spirit.
If (an) someone (tis – a certain individual) is dismissed and sent away (aphiemi – divorced, forsaken, or disregard; neglected or omitted) [by the Spirit], missing the way and erring (hamartia – being without a share because they wandered off on the wrong path and were not made upright), he or she (autos) will be dismissed and sent away (aphiemi – divorced, forsaken, and disregard; neglected and omitted).
If (an) someone (tis – a certain individual) is empowered to gain possession (krateo – if they hold on to and retain) [the hagios Spirit] they will be empowered to gain possession and they will be held on to and be retained (krateo) [by the Spirit].’” (Yahowchanan / John 20:22-23)
An interlinear alone may not reveal this, but an honest and critical evaluation of the existing words in context with an exegetical guide and associated dictionaries will. Further explanation of this reciprocal relationship continues:
“What Yahowsha’ is translated saying is that those who err and miss the way in this life, and those who are as a result dismissed by the Spirit, will be forsaken in heaven. And those who are reborn into Yahowah’s family by way of the Spirit shall always be empowered and shall always be retained. Adoption is forever, but to be adopted, we must accept the terms and conditions of the Covenant and walk to Yahowah along the path He provided through His Invitations to be Called Out and Meet with God.”
You clearly do not want to rob God of his glory by removing portions of his word. I don’t question your intent. Will you consider that additions of contradictory content to his word nefariously expands the entirety thereby obscuring his message and profaning his glory? Yahowah pleads beginning with Abraham until the end, “Come out of Babylon.” Until you can identify the remnants of Babylon that permeate your religion, you are not likely to recognize the lie. Please let me know if you would like me to shine a light on those. And know that while I disdain Christianity, I respect your desire to dedicate yourself to ministry.
As an avid reader, please review works by Bart Ehrman, Jesus Interrupted and Misquoting Jesus.
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July 23, 2014 at 3:42 pm
There’s two things I find unconvincing in your reply: (1) In reading all of the Bible I haven’t found any inconsistencies; and (2) The personal relationship I have with Jesus through the reading of all the Scripture has been life changing.
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July 23, 2014 at 4:46 pm
Both premises are flawed.
(1) “My Torah/teaching is forever” vs “Torah/’law’ is replaced by … faith” is the most blatant inconsistency. The gospels are riddled with inconsistencies. Paul is admittedly inconsistent with himself and with God. If you are not seeing them, you are not listening ‘shama’ to God’s instructions or even paying attention to Paul’s contradictions – a consequence of religion’s beguiling allure.
(2) Life changing circumstances are attributed to many things and serves well as a deceptive tool by an exceedingly clever adversary. No person by the name of “Jesus” existed in the time frame of the NT. Relationships require knowledge rather than belief. Everything Yahowsha’ taught directed people TO the Torah. You adhere to Paul’s religion while ignoring what “Jesus” reiterated of Yah’s word. The personal relationship you believe you have is mythical.
I have specifically addressed your questions and provided evidence and supporting material. Can you address or otherwise refute even one question/point that I have presented? Until now, you have simply evaded every one. Stand up, Craig. Do what you admonished other pastors to do unless you actually prefer the apathy you are so concerned about. The narrow path is not passed by in favor of the broad but remains unnoticed by all who refuse to find it. Don’t be that guy.
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