1) Mat. 5:3, Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven . They say that “theirs” is a classic mistranslation from the Greek, and is retained din all modern English versions. It should be translated “of these” or “of such as these.” We cannot possess the Kingdom. It does not belong to us. Rather, Yahshua is describing the kind of people who make up that Kingdom. It is the “poor in Spirit,” those who have no righteousness of their own, the meek, those who have overcome their pride and vanity.
2) Luke 23:31, For if they do these things in a green tree, what shall be done in the dry? Makes no sense whatever in Greek or English, but makes perfect sense when retranslated into Hebrew.
Yahshua is referring to the “green tree” and the “dry tree” from Ezekiel’s prophecy against Jerusalem and the Temple (Eze. 20:45 to 21:7). The green tree is the righteous and the dry tree is the wicked. All will be burned up because of the intensity of the fire He will kindle.
So Yahshua is saying, If you knew what is coming, you would not mourn for me, you would mourn for yourselves. If they do this to Me (the righteous), what will they do to you (the wicked)? The “in” should be “do to.” This was a reference to the Roman destruction of Jerusalem , and the suffering and killing of many people, which took place in 69-70 CE.
3) Mat. 11:12, From the days of John the Baptist until now, the kingdom of heaven suffers violence, and the violent take it by force.” Have you ever wondered about this seeming contradiction? Why would the meek, the passive, the “poor in spirit,” resort to violence to take the Kingdom, and why would YHWH allow it? This Scripture as written, as we have it, does not agree with the rest of Yahshua’s teachings, does it?
So what is the key to understand this puzzle? Yahshua is making a reference to a well-known rabbinic interpretation of Micah 2:12-13, that reads like this:
vs12 I will gather all of you, Jacob; I will collect the remnant of Israel . I will put them all together like sheep in a fold, like a flock inside its pen. It will be noisy and crowded with people. 13. The breach-maker (“breaker” in the KJV, poretz in Hebrew) goes through before them. Then they break out, passing through the gate, they leave by it. Their king passes through before them, YHWH at their head.
This is a picture of a shepherd out in the field, penning his sheep up for the night. He makes a sheepfold for them by throwing up a makeshift rock fence against the side of a hill. The next morning, he lets the sheep out by making a “breach” in the fence, and the sheep are eager and impatient to get out after being penned up all night. So they shove and push a bit to get out into the green pasture.
So now we see what Yahshua is saying – the Kingdom of Heaven is
breaking forth,
NOT suffering violence, and every person in it is breaking forth or breaking out INTO it, NOT “the violent take it by force.”
Let’s compare Luke 16:16, the parallel verse (Luke 16:16 KJV) “The law and the prophets were until John: since that time the kingdom of YHWH is preached, and every man presseth into it.”
The authors say: “Two tremendous things are happening at the same time: the Kingdom is bursting forth into the world like water from a broken dam, and individuals within the Kingdom are finding liberty and freedom.”
4) Luke 12:49-50, “I am come to send fire on the earth, and what will I, if it be already kindled? But I have a baptism to be baptized with; and how I am straitened till it be accomplished!”
Many Christians think this refers to the baptism of the Holy Spirit on the day of Pentecost. John the Baptist prophesied that the One to come would baptize with the Holy Spirit and with fire (Mat. 3:11, “I indeed baptize you with water unto repentance: but he that cometh after me is mightier than I, whose shoes I am not worthy to bear: he shall baptize you with the Holy Spirit, and with fire”:).
They think this happened on Pentecost, that the “tongues like as of fire” fulfilled this prophecy. But John clarified what he meant in the very next verse (Mat 3:12, “Whose fan is in his hand, and he will thoroughly purge his floor, and gather his wheat into the garner; but he will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire.”) Malachi 4:1-3 will fulfill this prophecy when it comes to pass, at the end of the age.
And what did Yahshua mean by “…how I am straitened till it be accomplished!”? These verses in Luke are an example of Hebrew poetry, and He meant, “how distressed I am till it is over,” referring to the destruction of the “chaff” by fire. The chaff are those who refuse to repent.
5) Matthew 16:19, Whatsoever thou shalt bind (or loose) on earth shall be bound (or loosed) in heaven. In rabbinic literature, these two words in Hebrew, by Yahshua’s time, had come to mean “forbid” and “permit.” The rabbis were called upon often to interpret Scriptural commands. For example, the Law forbids work on Sabbaths, but does not define “work.” So they were called upon to define what they could or could not do. They “bound” or prohibited certain activities, and “loosed” or allowed other activities. Yahshua was transferring this authority to Peter and His other disciples, to make decisions or judgments about how to keep the law more perfectly, NOT to make laws, or change laws. We find a good example of this being done in Acts 15, where the disciples bound (forbade) certain things, and loosed (permitted) others.
6) Matthew 5:20, “For I say unto you, That except your righteousness shall exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, ye shall in no case enter into the kingdom of heaven.”
The Hebrew word for “righteousness” is “tsedakah” and by Yahshua’s time had come to have a secondary meaning, “almsgiving,” or charity. Help to the poor. So Yahshua was saying that if your concern for the poor is not greater than that of the Pharisees, you will not be a disciple of His. Many think this verse belongs just before Mat. 6:1, where Yahshua is talking about giving alms, helping the poor.
7) Matthew 5:17-18, Destroy and fulfill are rabbinic argumentation methods. When one rabbi interpreted a Scripture and another disagreed, he would say, “You are destroying the Law!” Fulfilling the Law was simply interpreting it correctly. Someone had apparently accused Yahshua of misinterpreting a certain Scripture, and He was responding as a rabbi would. No one thought He had come to actually destroy the Law!
8) Luke 6:22, “Blessed are ye, when men shall hate you, and when they shall separate you from their company, and shall reproach you, and cast your name out as evil, for the Son of Man’s sake.” This is a Hebrew idiom that means “defame you” or malign you, or slander you. It is translated in the NRSV as “defame you.”
9) Luke 9:44, “Lay these sayings in your ears” is a Hebrew idiom that means “Listen carefully and remember well, for this is very important.”
10) Luke 9:51, “He set his face to go,” is a Hebrew idiom found in scores of idioms using “face,” such as “Hagar fled from the face of Sarai,” Jacob from the face of Esau, Moses from the face of Pharaoh, Moses hid his face in fear, Yahweh sometimes hides His face in anger, Yahweh sets His face against idolators, and He can make His face to shine upon us. It simply means to turn in the direction of, or turn away from, take notice of, etc. In the verse cited above, it means “He prepared to leave.”
11) Mat. 6:22-23, Good eye, bad eye – “The light of the body is the eye: therefore if thine eye be single, thy whole body shall be full of light. But if thine eye be evil, thy whole body shall be full of darkness. If therefore the light that is in thee be darkness, how great is that darkness!”
This is a Hebrew idiom that has confused all the translators. It simply means that if you have a “single” or good eye, you are generous; whereas if you have an evil eye, or bad eye, you are stingy.
Notice that several of these idioms that Yahshua used in His teaching, involves giving: alms, charity, helping the less blessed among us. Many say, “Well, with government aid, we don’t need to help – we pay our taxes and that is our charity, our alms.” We had better get over that. YHWH hates stingy people, who have the ability to help others and won’t.
So, to sum up, when all factors are considered, the evidence seems overwhelming in favor of the New Testament having been first written in Hebrew/Aramaic, and later translated into Greek, in a word-for-word format. This method of translation would make it extremely difficult to ascertain the correct meaning intended by the speaker or writer. Obviously, later on, the originals were lost, as were the original Greek translations. So all that is left are copies of copies. However, there are at least two Hebrew versions of Matthew’s Gospel, the Shem Tob and the Du Tillet.
This subject is in the process of on-going discovery, and more confirmation may be forthcoming in the future. In the meantime, be very skeptical of claims for an “inspired Greek New Testament.” (By Frank Brown) ~
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