October 4, 2014 Shabbat Bible Study
ã2014 Mark Pitrone and Fulfilling Torah Ministries
V’yikra (Lev.) 4 – Yechezkel (Ezek.) 18.4-17 – Tehellim (Ps.)72 – 2Kefa (Peter) 3
Links for this week:
http://www.mishkandavid.net/wordpress/?p=1395&cpage=1#comment-29791
V’yikra 4.1-12 – This chapter deals with the sin offerings, of which there were 4 different types. The first sin offering dealt with here is the sin offering for the priest who has sinned in the same manner as the people. Why is there a specific offering for the priest? Was there a different standard for the priests than for the people? Or was their lifestyle as kohanim that different from the people’s? I think[1] there WAS a different standard because they were always in close proximity to the Mishkan with its continuous reminders of the set-apartness of Yehovah. Also, the kohen that is anointed is כהן םשיך, kohen Moshiach. So there is most definitely a different standard for this priest. The anointed priests were the ones who actually offered the animal sacrifices on the altar of burnt offering. I don’t think these were the Kohen haGadol, who offered the blood on the Mercy Seat, but the priests who offered the daily, peace, thanksgiving and other more common offerings. If they sinned a sin like those of the people they had to offer a different offering than the common folk did. There is no offering for a blatant sin here, only for the sin committed in ignorance or need to fulfill a higher command, like preserving life. The kohen moshiach carried the blood into the kadosh place and sprinkled it before the veil 7x for his own sin.
Of course, there is no worry about this with our Kohen haMoshiach, who was, is and always will be sinless. The Kohen haGadol was to accurately portray the sinless Kohen ha Moshiach, Yeshua. This offering was for inadvertent, ignorant sins or that were innocently transgressed in the need to fulfill a higher command, such as preserving a life. There was no atonement for a priest’s willful sins, especially a High Priest’s, as attested to by the immediate deaths of Aharon’s eldest sons, Nadav and Avihu (Lev.10.1-3), for offering strange fire in their censers, offering it when they had not been bidden to do so.
The kohen Moshiach would then place some of the blood on the horns of the altar of incense. Easton’s Bible Dictionary says
“Horns are emblems of power, dominion, glory, and fierceness, as they are the chief means of attack and defense with the animals endowed with them.”
Rev.9.13 “And the sixth heavenly malach sounded, and I heard a voice from the four horns of the golden altar that is before Yehovah, 14 Saying to the sixth heavenly malach who had the shofar, Loose the four heavenly malachim which are bound in the great River Euphrates. 15 And the four heavenly malachim were loosed, who were prepared for the hour and day and month and year, in which to slay a third of mankind. 16 And the number of the army of the horsemen were two hundred million, and I heard the number of them.”[2]
The horns of the altar didn’t look like horns of a bull, but were small platforms on the corners of the altar or table to which the ‘crown’ (a kind of fence) was attached. The golden altar is the altar of incense and incense is symbolic of the prayers of kadashim (saints). When the voice from the horns of the altar goes forth it speaks of the power that is released with our prayers. It is as if the voices of those seen under this same altar in ch.6 are issuing the command that the malachim carry out. It is the answer to their question, how long? I said all that to emphasize the power of YOUR prayers before Yah. Don’t think that just because you don’t see an immediate answer that is to your liking that Yah hasn’t heard or won’t deliver on it. Often he says ‘Wait.” Sometimes he says, “No.”
Placing the blood on the horns of the altar of incense speaks to setting apart the prayers of the kadashim by the power of Yehovah Yeshua’s blood. That animal’s blood was an atonement for any defilement that may have touched that altar and set it apart for it’s purpose. Then he would pour out the remainder of the blood on the ground at the base of the altar of burnt offering, symbolizing the blood Yeshua shed on the tree and poured out before Yah. Yeshua was our burnt offering, as symbolized in the carcass of the bull being taken without the camp and burnt. He was also our atonement and our peace offering, and our trespass offering and…. I think you get the picture. Q&C
Vv.13–21 – It was possible for the entire congregation to sin in ignorance, too. So Yah gave us a sin offering to take care of our corporate sins of ignorance. I can’t put my finger on a specific instance of a corporate sin of ignorance, except perhaps when Achan kept an idol from Yericho and troubled Yisrael thereby. The camp knew nothing of Achan’s sin and yet suffered the consequences for it. Achan made Yisrael to sin.
When the priest sinned, he placed his hands on the head of the bull and confessed the sin to Yah. When the people sinned, the elders of the tribes ALL placed their hands on the bull’s head and confessed to Yah.
In all the other offerings up to this one, the people or the priests got to eat what wasn’t offered to Yehovah. But in the sin offering, nothing was to be eaten. The whole bull was to be burnt. The bull had become sin and we are not to partake of sin. To eat of the bull of the sin offering would be to partake willfully again of the sin we’d just confessed. It would negate the repentance just made and show that it was not from the heart. There is no atonement for this type of willful sin.
“These offerings are not for sins that are committed intentionally. For a sin committed willfully, there is no offering: the sinner must repent – have a change in attitude, and ask Elohim’s mercy. For example, a willful violation of Sabbath prohibitions is a capital offense (Exodus 31:14); repentance is required, and only Elohim can grant forgiveness. These offerings are not for sins committed accidentally while intending otherwise – something done in spite of our best efforts. A trespass committed while fully intent on doing right, requires no offering.”[3]
Vv.22-26 – deals with the king’s sins of ignorance. The big difference here is that the king offers a male kid of the goats. This calls to mind the sacrifice of Yom Kippur (which is Shabbat this week on the Hillel II Calendar)[4]. The word translated ‘goats’ is the Hebrew ez and literally means ‘strength’, and points to the superior strength of the goat compared to sheep. I think that the decreasing strength of the animals as we go along shows the importance of the position of the people offering the animal. First is the priest, with congregation on the same level of importance or power positionally. The priest as representative of Yah and the people are listed first, like the father is the head of the home, but actually of equal importance and rank to the family as the mother. Then the king is of inferior strength and importance to the people and the priest. And finally the individual is of lesser strength and position than the king. Also, in Yah’s scheme of things, the king is to answer to both the priest in matters of ‘religion’ and to the people in matters of policy and ‘politics,’ and the individual is to answer to the king in matters delegated to him by Yah or the people.
Vv.27-35 deal with an inadvertent sin by ‘just a guy’, like you or me. He was to offer a Female kid of the goats, once again inferior in strength to the male goat of the king’s offering. This idea of position and personal power and prestige dictating the type of animal to be offered has come out of my mind, not any rabbi or writing, and it could be wrong.
But I doubt it. Q&C
Yechezkel 18.4-17 – “The being (soul) that sins, it shall die.” “The wages of sin is death…” There is no mitigation here. There is nothing that says that the soul that sins will have another chance after this life is over, as some are moral enough to claim. Yehovah HATES morality. Morality is what we inherited from Adam because he partook of the tree of knowledge of good and evil (morality). Now we know about who is more evil than we are, and than whom we are less righteous, and it is the root of all manner of holier-than-thou CRAP, mainly due to jealousy. It is very difficult to NOT judge others’ actions because we KNOW what’s good and what’s evil… in our subjective opinions (and you know what opinions are like). If we had NOT partaken, we could be truly OBJECTIVE and bring righteous judgment. I think this will be the REALLY big difference between our lives now and our lives in the Kingdom and ages beyond. We will be truly able to think Yah’s thoughts after him – and they are not moral in the least, but RIGHTEOUS! I COULD be wrong… but… Ah, you know!
This passage goes on to say, and I summarize, that 1). a man is responsible for his own halacha; 2). the son is not responsible for the father’s sin, 3). nor the father for the son’s. It also takes into account the genetic curse (I think that Yehovah may actually change the genetic structure of ‘career sinners’, like alcoholics and sex offenders. This would explain recent scientific evidence that such behavioral traits are genetically inherited – hence the gracious provision of Yah empowering the breaking of the generational curse, i.e.; justification by the blood of Yeshua), the sins of the fathers are visited on the children’s children to the 3rd and 4th generation of those who hate Yehovah, and shows that to break that generational curse, all one has to do it repent of the sins of his fathers and follow after Yehovah’s prescribed halacha. From the Restoration scriptures:
5 “But if a man is tzadik, and does that which is according to Torah and right… 9 Has had their halacha in My mishpatim, and has kept My mishpatim, to deal truly; he is just, and he shall surely live, says the Master Yehovah.”
10 “If he begets a son that is a robber, a shedder of dahm, or one that does any of these same kind of things… 13 Has lent on interest, and has taken increase: shall he then live? He shall not live: he has done all these abominations; he shall surely die; his dahm shall be upon him.”
14 “Now, see, if he begets a son, that sees all his abba’s sins that he has done, and considers it, and does not do anything like it… 17 That has removed his hand from harming the poor, and has not received interest nor increase, has executed My mishpatim, has had his halacha in My mishpatim; he shall not die for the iniquity of his abba, he shall surely live.”
Let’s discuss a few of the sins mentioned. Vv.6, 11 and 15 speak of eating upon the mountains. What is that? Are we not allowed to have a picnic in the mountains? Now, I know some people who would consider it a sin to have a picnic lunch on a hilltop, but I don’t think that’s what Yah is getting at here. Mountaintops were the places where the priests of Baal and Ashtoreth and Molech and such held their ritual sacrifices and partook of flesh and blood in worship to their idols. Vv.6 and 15 tell about idolatry in the very same breath, lending credence to what I just said. When Eliyahu (1Ki.18) did battle with the 450 priests of Baal, it was on the top of Mt. Carmel in one of the numerous groves in Yisrael. He had to repair the altar of Yah, but the Baal priests just danced and screamed and cut themselves to shreds on the perfectly in order altars of Baal. They were no doubt of perfect construction; square, level and plumb, and made of perfectly cut stone, unlike the altars of Yah which were of uncut, natural stone and only as orderly as those could be made. I think that was what Yechezkel was saying here.
Vv.6, 11 and 15 also speak of defiling the neighbor’s wife. Have you ever noticed how frequently an idolater is also an adulterer or fornicator? The two seem to go hand in hand.
Vv.7, 12 and 16 speak of oppressing the poor and needy. I hate to say this, having given 23 years of military service to the USofA, but our government wields a strong hand in oppressing the poor and needy while looking like Santa Claus to them. It does this via the welfare State, the easy credit system that makes serfs of us who were the freest people on earth, and the manipulation of the fiat money system. And they do it by taking advantage of the inability of most people to obey the 10th Commandment – Thou shalt not covet. Only someone who is sold out to Yehovah and indwelt by the Spirit can possibly escape it, because only one empowered by Ruach haKodesh can live by his halacha.
Now I’m going to make some enemies. What is YOUR credit life like? If you want something and don’t have the cash to purchase it, BUT you do have a credit card that by some strange chance is not maxed out, do you wait until you can pay cash or use the plastic? Here’s an interesting idea to roll around in your brain. What hand do you usually use to hand the credit card to the cashier? Your right? What does it say in Rev.13 about the right hand or the forehead? It says ‘IN their right hands…’ in the KJV.
16 “And he causes all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond, to receive a mark in their right hand, or in their foreheads: 17 And that no man might buy, or sell, except he that had the mark, or the name of the beast, or the number of his name.”
Could that simply be a credit card or a smart card? Could it be that simple, and S.a.tan just uses the ‘Digital Angel’ stuff as sleight of hand, misdirection? If you don’t have the greatest testimony in your credit life, 2 things: 1). Join the club, 2). Repent and get it right. Q&C
Tehellim 72.1-14 – This is undoubtedly and universally accepted to be a Messianic psalm. It is prophetic of both the Millennial Messianic Kingdom and eternity to come. As we’ll see in a few minutes, this causes a bit of consternation amongst our Yehudim brethren. The King is unquestionably Yehovah. He was King of Yisrael (Num.23.21, 24.7, 1Sam.2.10, 10.18-19) and wanted the people to accept him as such. When they told Shmuel that they wanted a king like the other nations, Yah told Sam not to feel slighted or rejected because it was HIS kingship and Kingdom that they were rejecting, not Shmuel (1Sam.8.5ff).
But our psalm goes on to bless the King’s son, both the son of David and the Son of Elohim. The description of the King’s son is exactly what we’ve been reading about all day. The psalmist (v.1) asks Yah to give the King’s son HIS righteousness. Sounds like Yeshua. It says he will judge in righteousness without respect of persons (v.2). Sounds like Yeshua and our passage from Yechezkel vv.5-9. It says that his rule will cause the mountains and hills to bring peace BY righteousness (v.3). Sounds like the Messianic Kingdom ruled by Yeshua, who has seen the sins of his fathers after the flesh and is following the halacha of his Father l’shamayim like in Yechezkel vv.14-17. Every description of the King’s son in Ps.72 reflects the righteous man and his son who turns from the sins of his fathers in Yechezkel 18. Is it not amazing how the readings from each section of scripture fit together like a hand in a well-made glove?
David says (v.5) that the people who receive righteous judgment and equity from the King’s son will bless Yah as long as the sun and moon endure, to all generations. ALL generations doesn’t just mean that there will be some righteous offspring l’olam va’ed. It means that there will be righteous offspring, and nothing BUT righteous offspring, in the olam haba – after the dissolution and recreation of the earth that we’ll look at in our Brit portion today.
The description of the Millennium and beyond is idyllic, and it is that way because that is how it will be. The rain will be gentle and nourishing to all manner of flora and fauna. V.7 says the King’s son will fall down like rain on new mown grass. This is an acknowledgment of the source of all the good that will be on the earth in that day.
Vv.9-11 say that he will be the King of kings of the earth. There will be regional rulers over areas of the earth, but they will all bow the knee to HIM. I think that they are servant kings, truly out for the good of the ruled, and not like our rulers who are only interested in what’s in it for them, and if by chance it benefits someone else, well I guess that’s OK, too. Shlomo was right when he said,
“When the tzadik is in authority the people rejoice. (Pro.29.2)”
But not to worry, He was also right when he said,
“The evil bow before the good, and the wicked at the gates of the righteous.”
The Tzadik = Yehovah Yeshua Tsidkenu. The righteous King is their example in vv.12-14, bearing righteous and equitable judgment to the common folk, the ‘rabble’. Any sub-ruler not bearing righteous rule will be put down, for Yeshua will rule with a rod of iron (Ps.2) from Yerushalayim. Q&C
In vv.15-17 we see the plenty that will be the norm in the Millennium. Remember the boom of the late 80’s and 90’s? Imagine even greater than that for 1000 years! There will be no excuse for poverty by the end of the millennium. With the conditions that will exist on earth at that time, NOONE will be able to say I’m hungry because the land won’t produce for me. If, in the Kingdom, your land isn’t producing, it’s because you aren’t keeping Torah. That is not necessarily true today, but then it will be a given. The unrighteous will stand out like sore thumbs. Laziness will have to be extreme for you not to have enough because the land will be begging for something to grow, “Please plant something in me! I am aching to be fruitful!” All you’ll need to do is plant and keep Torah. The earth will almost spue forth nourishment for us.
These are verses that the Rabbis have major trouble with. In the Tanakh from the Jewish Publication Society these verses read,
b“16 Let abundant grain be in the land, to the tops of the mountains; let his crops thrive like the forest of Lebanon; and let men sprout up in towns like country grass. 17 May his name be eternal; while the sun lasts, may his name endure;b let men invoke his blessedness upon themselves; let all nations count him happy.”[5]
Do you see the little superscripts before and after the passage? That means there’s an explanatory note, which reads, “Meaning of some Hebrew phrases in these verses uncertain”!! As my friend and brother, Gordon Pannell would say, “No Daleth Heh!” The reason these verses are uncertain is that to take them at face value/pashat level, one MUST conclude that the King’s Son is none other than Yehovah Elohim. Look again at v.5. David, in his prayer to Yehovah Elohim says, “They shall fear you as long as the sun and moon endure, throughout all generations.” And in v.17, still making tefilla to Yehovah, David says, “His Name shall endure l’olam va’ed: His Name shall be continued as long as the sun: and men shall be blessed in Him: all nations shall call Him blessed.” NOT your Name (v.5), but HIS Name (v.17) as long as the sun endures. Indeed, the Rabbis cannot reconcile this, as David is preaching the Netzarim doctrine of Melech Yeshua as Yehovah.
But consider this for a second. Grain abundant on the mountaintops? Have you ever been to the summit of Pikes Peak? There is no grass to be found anywhere. It is a huge hunk of granite 14,000 feet above sea level. Very little grows at that altitude. Imagine what it must be like at the top of Everest or K2! Those are over 29,000 feet! But there WILL be grass on their tops in the Kingdom age and beyond. Grain crops will look like the cedars of Lebanon! Can you imagine 20-30 foot stalks of barley producing so much grain that it looks like a cedar tree? And the same with wheat, maize, oats, etc? I guess we’ll be regular, huh? And men will reproduce in their towns like the grasses of the prairie. Just consider this particular phrase in light of Yeshayahu 9.6-7a,
“For to us a son is born, to us a child is given, and the government shall be on his shoulder: and His Name shall be called Wonderful, Counselor, The Mighty-El, The Everlasting Abba, The Sar Shalom. 7 Of the increase of His government and shalom there shall be no end, upon kesay Dawid, and upon his malchut, to order it, and to establish it with mishpat and with tzedakah from now on even l’olam va’ed. The zeal of Yehovah tzevaoth will perform this.”
Men reproducing like the grass of the prairies and Yeshua’s government increasing l’olam va’ed? I think it won’t be long before the planet Earth won’t be able to contain us and we’ll have to colonize the stars and their planets. This is speculation on my part based on putting different scriptural concepts together, but I think it’s correct. I mean, I could be wrong. But I doubt it.
In vv.19-20 David makes one more comparison between the Name of Yehovah and the Name of his Son (and David’s son). We all know that it was Avinu’s plan that was executed by Yehovah Yeshua. It was Yehovah Yeshua, had’var Yehovah, who “bara et hashamayim v’et haAretz” in Gen.1.1, and who gave Torah to his people Yisrael in Ex.20-24. It is he who sustains the whole creation by the Word of his Power, and it is he who will dissolve it and recreate it brand new to eventually be completely inhabited by the ‘Camp of the Saints’ from Rev.20.9 (and their offspring) after the GWT judgment. So, whose name do you suppose David was talking about? Q&C
2Kefa3.1-9 – Kefa says he was reminding his readers of the prophets. I think he was specifically thinking of Ezekiel and David and the portions we looked at today. Whatever the case, he is warning them to NOT be like the scoffers, i.e.; the politicians of all stripes we alluded to before who are out for what they can get, not the greater good for those they are supposedly serving; men who say, “Where is the promise of his coming? Everything is as it has always been.” They refuse to see, i.e.; they are willfully ignorant of, the truth of the scriptures account of Yehovah Yeshua’s creation. Since they don’t know him, they go about life sticking it to everyone they have to stick it to so they can get ahead – just exactly the opposite of V’Ahavtah [and you shall love].
Kefa confirms the FACT that Yehovah created hashamayim v’haAretz and later destroyed all that had breath with a flood. Of course, science and scientists falsely so-called will dispute that fact, but that just proves their own willful ignorance, doesn’t it? Rom.1.23-27 shows a progression that starts with men changing Yah into a creature of men’s imagination and need for something bigger than himself (even if he made it himself) – idolatry, whether the scientists care to admit it or not. This idol worship is called evolution and psychology. Once Yah is just an imaginary being or one we control, his Word is no longer something to be followed or even consulted. In fact, we can decide whether or not it’s true and change it as we please. Once his Word is not absolutely true, the whole concept of sin is done away and anything goes. Evolutionary thinking took hold so quickly, it’s completely taken over the schools from grad school to pre-school, because man was looking for ANY excuse to dismiss Yehovah and his objective (what they term ‘rigid’) commandments. Men like their sin more than their creator. And so began the decline in America and elsewhere from a basically righteous political and economic system in the 1850s that rapidly declined in the 20th century CE to a basically wicked one.
In v.7 Kefa tells us that the creation is held together by the same Word that created it and that he will dissolve it, as well. V.10 describes a nuclear fire as the means of dissolution. How will that happen? If we were to detonate every nuke in every arsenal on earth in such a way as to destroy all life as we know it, the earth would still be here. Here’s a theory of mine that may help explain it. First a little basic electrical and atomic physics.
An atom is a very small thing. All atoms have protons and neutrons in their nuclei and electrons revolving around them, like the earth around the sun or the moon around the earth. The protons have positive electrical charges, the neutrons have no charge and the electrons have negative charges. The 2nd law of Thermodynamics states that everything is working itself toward neutrality and equilibrium, so the negative charges are trying very hard to meet up with those positive charges and reach equilibrium. Left to itself, creation will go from a state of ordered system to a state of no system, just complete equilibrium, as existed before Yehovah said, “Let there be light”, his first ex nihilo creation. If you don’t believe this, just look at my yard. It will convince you.
It is a law of electricity that opposite charges attract each other – equilibrium, and that like charges repel each other to seek equilibrium with an opposite. So what is it that makes the 238 protons in a uranium atom hold together? And what is it that makes the corresponding 238 electrons NOT dive into the nucleus? Here’s the theory. It is the sustaining power of the Word of Yehovah Yeshua holding the electrons in their orbits and gluing the protons together (scientists, falsely so-called, actually took to calling the unseen theoretical sub-atomic particles that hold the protons together ‘gluons’! They’ll do anything to deny Yah). The dissolution will be even simpler for Yehovah Yeshua than is the sustaining, because he just needs to stop overpowering the natural laws he set up. This will naturally result in the ‘splitting’ of every atom in the universe.
I firmly believe in the ‘Big Bang Theory’.
I just don’t think it’s happened yet. Q&C
Vv10-18 – V.10 speaks of the “Day of Yehovah coming ‘as a thief in the night’”. In 1Cor.15 Sha’ul speaks of ‘a moment, the twinkling of an eye.’ These passages are not really related, one being about the protection/translation of believers who are still living just before the wrath of Yehovah, the other of the dissolution of all that physically exists. It is the use of terms that relates to what we were saying before. An ‘atomic moment’ is the time it takes the electron in a Hydrogen atom to orbit the nucleus. The twinkling of an eye is the time it takes for the human eye to move from one point to another and focus on the new sight. Those ‘rapture’ movies, like ‘Thief in the Night’ or ‘Left Behind’ get that part right, even though the rest of their stories are a bunch of hooey. A thief in the night comes without making an appointment with his victim, at a time he doesn’t expect a thief will come. Had he expected it, he would have been ready (Lk.12.39-40)
39 And this know, that if the owner of the bayit had known what hour the thief would come, he would have watched, and not have allowed his bayit to be broken into. 40 Be you therefore ready also: for the Ben Adam is coming at an hour when you think not.
The day of Yah is not just one 24-hour period. It is a 1000-year period of time that begins with the calling out from the olam hazeh of believers on the final Yom T’ruah [I think] before Yeshua sets his foot on the Mount of Olives. It didn’t happen this year. Traditionally, Yom T’ruah is the day of the last trump. It is also the day and hour that no man knows; ala, the thief.
In light of the judgment coming on the earth, including its total dissolution due to man’s sin and corruption, how ought we to live? KJV says ‘holy conversation’, while Reformation says “Shabbat-keeping piety”. Someone has taken a liberty with Yah’s Word, because you just can’t get holy conversation out of Shabbat-keeping piety, or vice versa. I reserve judgment until I see and can fathom the Aramaic text. My greek NT has ‘agiais anastrosais kai eusesseiais – righteous lifestyle and piety, or ‘holy conversation and godliness’. There is nothing in the TR in this verse (12) about Shabbat-keeping. AENT has “set-apart conduct in the fear of Elohim.” I think there’s a translator’s bias in every one of these translations. But the KJV is truest to its source, as far as I can tell. All taken together, I think ‘set apart conduct and piety (or godliness)’ is best.
We keep ourselves set-apart in light of our knowledge of the coming reward for faithfulness to Yah’s Torah. That promise concerns a new heaven and a new earth. If he is going to dissolve it at the atomic level, he is not just tidying up the surface of the earth, he’s making all things NEW! It won’t be ’improved’ in comparison to the old, which he called ‘very good’; it’ll just be new, as good as the old before Adam’s sin, which you will remember he called “VERY GOOD”. Very means, ‘everything the word it modifies speaks of”. WE will be improved by the blood of Yeshua and all that his death and resurrection did for us.
When Kefa says, ‘be diligent to be found at shalom’, he is echoing the book of Hebrews that says ‘let us labour, therefore, to enter into that rest.’ We need to study to show ourselves approved; workmen that need not be ashamed. We need to apply what we learn in our lives and make ourselves more like Yeshua by the power of his Ruach haKodesh. And we need to understand that, though we can be somewhat disappointed by his not coming for us yet, the reason is so we can be his witnesses before men who need his message of deliverance to peace with Yehovah.
V.16 speaks of Sha’ul’s epistles, which are hard for the Greco-Roman mind to grasp. Here is what Moshe says in a footnote on this passage in the Restoration Scriptures:
“The way Yehovah has designed Paul’s letters, is that they are a bit difficult to grasp through a Greco-Roman mindset. As such, Yehovah tests us to see if we will adopt a Hebrew mindset instead. Also by twisting the true pro-Torah meanings of Paul’s letters, we see for ourselves how highly unstable and immature we still are. So rather than complain about them and ignore them, or remove them (thinking incorrectly that they somehow violate Torah), let us use them as a test of our spiritual progress, which is what they were designed for. Even many rabbis fall into this immature and dangerous category. Yehovah Himself calls us through Peter, to use Paul’s letters as an ongoing test of our personal maturity and stability, in the things of Yeshua and His restored kingdom.”
Wresting, or twisting, scripture is taking what Rood calls ‘numbered sound-bites’ away from their context, spinning them to our momentary advantage and then forcing them back into their original context – completely unrelated to what Yah was trying to teach us. This is the root meaning of ‘wicked’. That is what people do to Sha’ul’s writings. This is why books like ‘Galatians’ by Avi ben Mordechai and ‘Romans’ by Mark Nanos are so important. They can help us get a grip on the proper understanding in a Hebraic context.
Remember that a text out context is a pretext. The context for v.17 is v.16. In light of what we just discussed, v.17 says that since we know about the unstable and the wicked twisting Sha’ul’s words, we need to be very careful about how we understand them. We need to guard ourselves against falling away from Torah. Again, here’s Moshe’s note:
The delusion that Paul is anti-Torah puts one in a delusion of lawlessness, when that is not the message being delivered by Yehovah through him. Many in those days were denying Yeshua as Yehovah’s Son, because of delusions and misconceptions about Paul. Peter steps forward to warn Torah-guarding Yisraelites not to do likewise and not to fall prey to such delusion.
This delusion is the ‘error of the wicked’ in KJV. This error or delusion can lead us to believe all kinds of lies about Sha’ul and Yeshua. In v.18 Kefa says, instead of believing these lies, grow in the unmerited favor and certain knowledge of our Master Yehovah Yeshua haMoshiach. I’ve got nothing to add to that. Q&C
End of Shabbat Bible Study
[1] When I use the italicized I think, I am engaging in speculation based on the evidence of scripture and my attempt to put myself in the situation via my overactive imagination. You may be assured that this is not inspired by any means.
[2] All scripture quotations are from the ‘Restoration Scriptures’, ©2003 Moshe Koniuchowski, Your Arms to Yisrael.
[3] From the introduction to the Torah portion midrash at http://www.messianic.ws.
[4] Look at the article on Yom Kippur found at http://www.mishkandavid.net/wordpress/?p=1395&cpage=1#comment-29791
[5] ‘Hebrew English Tanakh’, ©2000 Jewish Publication Society, Philadelphia, Penn.
Fulfilling Torah Ministries 
Great study today. Thanks a bunch!!!!
Thanks, Diane. I appreciate that.