Trumpets shall blow

This is a quickie about the Feast of Trumpets, Yom Teruah, a sabbath that started tonight at sunset. It is the first of the three fall convocations. Next is the Day of Atonement, Yom Kippur, then the eight days of the Feast of Tabernacles, Sukkot.

In Lev. 23:23-27, God was speaking to Moses when He told him to tell the people to observe this feast, saying it was a "memorial of blowing of trumpets." The spiritual event that they were to remember, the only one that accompanied trumpet blowing in their history, must have been when Moses went up on the mount to receive the Ten Commandments and other instructions from God that he was to share with the people.

The sounds of the trumpet were loud, as trumpets tend to be, and were accompanied with thunder, lightning, and an earthquake:

"When the ram's horn sounds a long blast, they shall come up to the mountain... So it came about on the third day, when it was morning, that there were thunder and lightning flashes and a thick cloud upon the mountain and a very loud trumpet sound, so that all the people who were in the camp trembled. And Moses brought the people out of the camp to meet God and they stood at the foot of the mountain. Now Mount Sinai was all in smoke because the Lord descended upon it in fire; and its smoke ascended like the smoke of a furnace, and the whole mountain quaked violently. When the sound of the trumpet grew louder and louder, Moses spoke and God answered him with thunder." Exodus 19:13, 16-19

God invited His people to covenant with Him, and they promised to do everything that the Lord commanded. In a short time they broke this covenant. But still, God said, "Let them make me a tabernacle, that I may dwell among them."

When Jesus came, He was God With Us in the flesh, and a tabernacle was no longer necessary, because He promised to be with us and desired to live in us. He reaffirmed the covenant, a better one. Soon we will hear the trumpet sound and be living with Him eternally.

That's what Trumpets is about -- the heralding of Jesus' soon return to be with us.

The sin of Cain

I recently viewed Sunburned, a YouTube video that looks at why the Israelites made a golden calf to worship at the foot of Sinai. It was interesting, so I took notes (condensed in this post). The purpose of the video was to consider the Christian and nonChristian elements have come into Christmas and Easter holidays, considered by many to be the holiest times of the year.

We all know that there are components of Christmas and Easter that have pagan origin. I don't need to go over that again, because many who know and continue the traditions don't think it matters, because the purpose of these holidays is to honor God and His workings in our lives. I believed the same, but the following verses (and more), made me stop and think:

Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in the Spirit and in truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in the Spirit and in truth.” ~ John 4:23,24

The LORD says, "Do not start following pagan religious practices. ~ Jeremiah 10:2

You must not worship the Lord your God in their way. ~ Deuteronomy 12:4

Now to the video. See endnote below regarding my conclusion as the chronology of the symbol. These are my condensed and edited notes about the golden calf and why the Israelites chose that symbol:

Two Hebrew words are commonly translated as God: el, and el-oah.

The word el was originally written with two pictographic letters, one an ox head and the other a shepherd staff. The ox represented strength, and the staff of the shepherd represented authority. The ancient Hebrews saw God as the strong one of authority. 

The ox head and the shepherd staff, means the strong authority, as explained by the Ancient Hebrew Research Center. When visiting that website, look at the symbols and commentary for the letters A-L.

The Israelites said they were going to make elohim, who shall go before us. Their pictographic letters make perfect sense as to why they chose to make a calf to represent the God who had led them out of Egypt. Moses had been on the mountain a long time, and their leader who communicated with God may not ever return. They were in a panic. They fell back on the Egyptian practice of making an image of God so that they could connect and speak to him. Their intent was not to make an Egyptian god, but an image of their own understanding of the true God.

And when the people saw that Moses delayed to come down out of the mount, the people gathered themselves together unto Aaron, and said unto him, Up, make us gods, which shall go before us. ~ Exodus 32:2

The plural form of el'oah, elohim, is often translated as God, singular, in English. While English plurals only identify quantity, as in more than one, the Hebrew plural can identify quantity as well as quality. Something of great size or stature can be written in plural form, as in elohim.

Aaron made one calf, but the translation is plural:

And he received them at their hand, and fashioned it with a graving tool, after he had made it a molten calf: and they said, These be thy gods, O Israel, which brought thee up out of the land of Egypt. ~ Exodus 32:4

The English translation makes it appear they are presenting the golden calf as gods. But when we understand their symbolism, they are saying, "This is the one true God who brought you up out of the land of Egypt." They had already declared Yahweh to be their only God. In addition, only one God took them out of Egypt, and the Israelites knew this. The translators used the plural form, gods, as in false gods, but that would not make sense. Aaron only presented one golden calf; the plural gods does not fit.

It is important to set aside English writing conventions and understand the ancient Hebrew symbols. The translators were misled, in this case, by the word elohim, which is translated God over 2,000 times in the KJV, and lower-case god less than 300 times. They looked at the context and thought that the calf meant a pagan god, and with the plural elohim, translated it as gods.

They were intending to worship and connect with Yahweh, the true God, through the calf. We can see this in Exodus 32:5-6:

And when Aaron saw it, he built an altar before it; and Aaron made proclamation, and said, Tomorrow is a feast to the Lord.

And they rose up early on the morrow, and offered burnt offerings, and brought peace offerings; and the people sat down to eat and to drink, and rose up to play.

Aaron declared the feast was for Yahweh, and they offered gifts to Him.

This was the sin of Cain.

They chose to worship God in their own way instead of in God's way. They sincerely thought they were doing the right thing. They thought it was okay to make up their own holiday and worship God as they chose.

But in spite of their sincerity, dedicating the day to him and giving gifts to him, God did not see it that way. They were worshiping God through the pagan practice of using things to worship God and putting into effect a false holiday. They gave their own offerings to Yahweh, just like Cain did.

The main issue of the problem at hand is this: Because they decided to do things their way instead of God's way, they made themselves out to be their own gods. They fully and sincerely wanted to follow Yahweh but they followed themselves and their own heart instead.

This is exactly what we do with Christmas and Easter. We take the ways of man, the ways of false gods, and offer them all up to god and expect him to smile while we please ourselves in the process.

We can still be claiming to worship the one true God, but when we abandon His way and do it our own way, we are worshipping our selves, bowing down to ourselves and following our own instructions instead of His.

Jeremiah 10:2 and Deuteronomy 12:4, quoted at the beginning of this post, eliminates Christmas and Easter.

Christmas and Easter are not rooted in truth. They are the ways of the nations, ways he has told us not to learn.

We must learn from Israel and Cain. They were sincere. Our intent in celebrating Christmas and Easter may be very sincere as well, but the problem is, in spite of all the theologians saying it's okay, God himself said No, it is not okay, it is not how I want to be worshipped.

He sent His own son that we might live. Let's live for him, in his way, not our way. Let's love him back in the way that he has told us he wants to be loved.

End of video notes.

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Endnote

Regarding chronology of the symbol: Did the calf/staff symbol meaning "God" in the Ancient Hebrew pictographic writing come from their understanding of their own deity, or did their pictograph for God develop during their centuries in Egypt, taking on Egyptian bull worship's symbol to symbolize the God of Israel? I think that is the likely scenario. More research is needed.

Easter's roots are Passover

Since this is Easter weekend, several of my friends on Facebook have posted this link from Christianity today, an article that discusses the likelihood that Easter did not start as a pagan holiday. Perhaps my friends have not read the entire article, but the gist is that Easter originated with Passover, and there is proof that "Passover/Easter" was observed at least by the second century Christians. Interesting, when so many churches claim that observance of Passover by Christians came to an end at the cross!

I do believe that the celebration of Christ's resurrection started in the churches as a Christian celebration, though it was not called Easter in the early church. In time, Christians changed some of their practices because they didn't want to be identified with Jews who were under persecution. Notably, they avoided seventh-day Sabbath worship in favor of Sunday, choosing an annual Sunday via the solar calendar for the resurrection celebration instead of at Passover, and changing the other festivals ordained by God ("thinking to change times and laws" Dan. 7:25). The Quartodeciman controversy deals with the dating change for the Paschal (Passover) season and is an interesting study. The Easter celebration became saddled with other traditions related to fertility goddesses over the years.

Many of those who question some of the Easter practices and date have claimed that the name, Easter, came from a pagan goddess, and this the article does not deny. The celebration, however, started -- and morphed -- from Passover, certainly not from a pagan holiday.

The name Easter, the article states, comes from "April, Eosturmonath … Eosturmonath has a name which is now (italics supplied) translated "Paschal month" and which was once called after a goddess... named Eostre, in whose honour feasts were celebrated in that month." The Christianity Today article adds:

The Nordic/Germanic peoples (including the Anglo-Saxons) were comparative latecomers to Christianity. Pope Gregory I sent a missionary enterprise led by Augustine of Canterbury to the Anglo-Saxons in 596/7. The forcible conversion of the Saxons in Europe began under Charlemagne in 772. Hence, if "Easter" (i.e. the Christian Passover festival) was celebrated prior to those dates, any supposed pagan Anglo-Saxon festival of "Eostre" can have no significance. And there is, in fact, clear evidence that Christians celebrated an Easter/Passover festival by the second century, if not earlier. It follows that the Christian Easter/Passover celebration, which originated in the Mediterranean basin, was not influenced by any Germanic pagan festival.

Isn't it interesting that they focus entirely on only the possibility of Germanic influence -- and that it only focuses on the practices of that time? It does not address how Germanic practices may or may not have influenced Easter in later years.

It is also interesting that hardly any information on Eostre as a goddess can be found in history. Most of what is said comes from various writers quoting each other. More than one website says something to this effect:

In case you think we’re being flippant, recent research suggests that EOSTRE herself may have been invented during a mischievous moment by the Venerable St BEDE. This well-known monk mentioned her in connection with the pagan festival Eosturmonath in a book written in 750 A.D. — but extensive research has failed to find a trace of her prior to that. Could he possibly have been fibbing? from godchecker.com

Some suspect that Eostre, if she did exist, is the germanic name for the goddess Asherah, the "Queen of Heaven," mentioned in the Bible, and when the Israelites apostatized, they often had "Asherah poles" erected, a sign of their apostasy from worshiping the true God. Other counterparts for this goddess are Astarte, Asherah, Ashtoreth, Ishtar, Innanna, Ostara, Isis, Aphrodite, and Artemis.  All of these goddesses were connected with love and fertility, and some of their traditions have become a part of Easter celebrations, including rabbits, eggs, and hot cross buns.

Is Eostre one of this group of goddess names? Many have made that suggestion, but since there is no apparent history of her before the Venerable St. Bede, it cannot be known for certain. To use Eostre as proof that Easter was not a pagan holiday is poor scholarship, at best, and misses the whole point of whether or not Easter has pagan components.

My conclusion is that Easter started with the Passover celebration, so it's original roots are not pagan, but that over the centuries elements from pagan spring fertility rites crept into the Easter season.

It is my personal choice to observe Passover and the Feast of Unleavened Bread on God's calendar (14th day of the first month), remembering the blessing of our salvation through Jesus Christ our Lord, Yeshua Hamashiach, who came to save us from sin, which is represented by leavening. Sin is still with us now, but someday it will be gone forever, so that is the pointing forward of Unleavened Bread. I can't help but feel a thrill when I think of it!