This week has seen a lot of turmoil in Europe. I'm going to make my one and only comment on it:
There are three groups of non-Muslims:
1) Dhimmis who live alongside us in Muslim countries and pay tax to the Muslim government. Rasoolillah (saws) said that their blood is as our blood and their properties (are to be protected as) our properties.
2) Non-Muslim rulers who believe in freedom of religion, and allow everyone to practice their own religion.
3) Non-Muslims rulers who do not allow freedom of religion, and who are destroying monasteries, churches, synagogues, and masjids. Under this tyranny, Muslims have two options: flee to a Muslim country (which is preferred), or stay and fight to protect the places of worship.
ONLY AGAINST THE THIRD GROUP CAN A LEGITIMATE JIHAD BE WAGED. Muslims in Europe are not having their masjids destroyed; dear brothers, you are creating a pretense for the masjids to be destroyed!!! Cease these activities at once, because they are not a proper jihad.
Sunday, May 26, 2013
Sunday, May 19, 2013
My Conversion Story
So for those of you that have read my blog, this is kind of just an omnibus edition of a lot of blog posts. For those of you that haven't, this is why I converted to Islam.
TL;DR: The Torah wasn't written by Moses, but by Ezra, who prophesied that a man from Mecca would come and give us the correct teachings.
Muslims, Christians, and Jews believe that at the beginning of time, God created the first man and woman. Mankind quickly lost respect for their Father and Creator. Furious at the corruption of man, He decided to destroy the earth by flood. Thereafter, mankind again returned to idolatry and disbelief. The earth was again filled with false worship until one man, son of an idol manufacturer, realized that there was One higher and greater than the statues before him. With his decision to smash those idols, Abraham became the most influential man in Jewish history, having shaped the world in immeasurable ways. Abraham had eight sons, but only two became important in world history: Ishmael and Isaac. Both were promised by God, both were under Divine protection, both blessed, and both were to become great nations.
Jewish and Muslim traditions state that when Sarah became jealous of Hagar, Ishmael and Hagar were sent into the wilderness. Both traditions state that Abraham went often into the Arabian desert to visit Ishmael. The Torah says (Gen. 18:17-19) that God loved Abraham because He knew Abraham would teach his children God's ways. Muslim tradition says that Abraham and Ishmael build the Kaaba as a place to worship God. The children of Ishmael settled the Arabian peninsula. Isaac had two sons, Jacob (Israel) and Esau. The children of Esau settled the south Jordan region. The children of Israel were brought down to Egypt by severe famine. Four hundred years later, a lone prophet, Moses, was selected by God to bring them out, because they had become slaves to the Egyptians. Jewish tradition states that had they remained in Egypt but one more night, the children of Israel would have been forever lost to idolatry. Moses led the children of Israel through the wilderness towards Canaan. At the end of his life, he wrote a song calling heaven and earth to testify against the Jewish people when they forgot God. But he did give them hope: prophets bearing his message would continue to be sent to mankind. The responsibility fell on the shoulders of mankind to receive those prophets and obey their message.
There are two Talmuds, the Babylonian (Bavli) and Jerusalem (Yerushalmai) Talmuds, but the one referred to without qualification as the Talmud, and the one meant by the rest of this article, is the Babylonian Talmud. The Talmud is not one book, but consists of sections called tractates. Each tractate has a name (eg Berakhot, Sanhedrin, Ketuboth, etc.). To find a give quote, you also need the page number an letter, eg. 59a. The letter will be either an "a" or a "b" signifying which side of the page the given quote is on. On copies of the Talmud with translation, such as those published by Artscroll, the page number will not match the page number on the physical book; however, it will be provided. The Talmud is claimed to be the written version of the "oral Torah", an "addendum" as it were, because the Torah does not explain itself enough.
Although there is some basis for the belief that there was some explanation of certain things said in the Torah that wasn't written down, the Talmud became much more than a mere explanation of the Torah or tradition in practical Jewish life. The Talmud today stands as a single-handed guide to Jewish religious life. If the Talmud forbids something the Torah permits, it is considered forbidden; if it permits something the Torah forbids, it is permitted.
To understand the Talmud, one must understand the background of the Talmud. Pirkei Avot (Ethics of the Fathers), explains what became the basis for the writing of the Talmud: "1:1. Moses received the Torah from Sinai and transmitted it to Joshua; Joshua to the elders; the elders to the prophets; and the prophets handed it down to the men of the Great Assembly." The Great Assembly is commonly known today as the Sanhedrin. Rabbi Yehuda haNasi compiled the Mishna, the first collection of the rulings of the men of the Great Assembly. The Talmud is a combination of the Jewish sages' teachings from four periods:
* Tanaim: ~70-200 CE
* Amoraim: ~200-500 CE
* Savoraim: ~500-700 CE
* Geonim: ~600-1040 CE
Often there are discussions in the Talmud in which a quote from a rabbi from one era is followed or preceded by a quote from a rabbi of a different era. The reason for these apparent cross-era "discussions" is that the latter era re-visited a topic discussed by a previous era. Each period realized more authority in the homes of Jews. Today, it is common to meet Jews who have studied Talmud for years and can explain complex Talmudic debates, but have never read the entire Tanakh. It is also common to find households that have expended large amounts of money to buy entire sets of Talmud and Mishna but do not have a single Tanakh. The Talmud itself warns: "In the future, the Torah will be forgotten by the Jewish people." (Shabbos 138b).
Among Jews and Muslims, there is an agreement that the Torah was given by God to Moses. It was meant to be the guide to Jewish life. However, as we shall see by the end of this series, the original Torah was lost.
Moses was a great prophet. He led the Jewish people for over forty years. He brought them out of Egypt and taught them the Torah. Yet even in his day, he had to struggle with those who opposed his leadership and with idolatry and those who would worship golden calves. After his death, his student Joshua became his successor. Joshua led his people in victorious conquests, removing from the land of Canaan those who had corrupted it with the worship of idols, infanticide, and ritual worship in forms too gross to mention.
Yet after Joshua's generation, the Jewish people turned to the worship of the gods of Canaan and Egypt. Judges 2:7 And the people served the LORD all the days of Joshua, and all the days of the elders that outlived Joshua, who had seen all the great work of the LORD, that He had wrought for Israel...11 And [after Joshua's death] the children of Israel did that which was evil in the sight of the LORD, and served the Baalim.
God punished the Jewish people by repeatedly allowing their enemies to defeat them in battle and subjugate them. In response to their troubles, they would repent, but only for a limited period of time. God would send them judges to teach them the right way, but after the death of the judge they would revert to idolatry.
The last of these judges was Samuel the Priest. In his day, the priestly line, including Samuel's adopted father and brothers, were punished for their rebellion against God. When Samuel grew old and was ready to die, the Jewish people asked him to appoint a king over them. God told Samuel not to grieve this, because it was God they were rebelling against, not Samuel. He set Saul as king, but Saul was removed for his rebellion against God.
David became the second king of Israel, and Solomon the third, but Solomon's heart was not pure like his father's. Solomon built a temple for God in Jerusalem, and was blessed with wealth and great wisdom, but when he was old his heart turned away from God.
The kingdom of Israel fell into two parts as a result of the sins of Solomon. The northern kingdom took the name Israel, and the southern kingdom took the name Judah.
The southern kingdom never experienced much peace but was constantly troubled by coup d'etats and spiritual trouble. From the time of the first king of Israel, the land became spiritually bankrupt. King Jeroboam, first king of the separatist kingdom Israel, set up two altars and golden calves: one in Bethel, on his southern border, and one in Dan, on his northern border; and both on major routes. He set up holidays at the same times as the holidays of God in Judah, and told the people to worship at his statues. He set up priests from whoever among the people wanted to be a priest, instead of the Levites, the family of Moses, who had been keepers of the Torah. Thus, God was alienated from the Kingdom of Israel by their actions.
Ahab, seventh king of Israel, fed as many as 850 prophets of Baal at one time from the royal table. In his time, the prophet Elijah lamented that he was the last person left who followed the true worship of God, and that the king sought to kill him. God revealed to him that there were yet seven thousand who had not bowed to Baal, and at least 1,000 of them were students of the prophets.
God continued to send prophets to Israel, including Elijah, Amos, and Hosea. Yet they continued to rebel. Finally, God had enough with them and sent them into captivity:
As discussed previously, the northern kingdom, called Israel, was sent into captivity for their many sins. The southern kingdom, Judah, did not learn from the north's sins and became far worse (Jeremiah 3). In the southern kingdom, the Torah was lost and forgotten. Although the kings had been commanded to each make a copy of the Torah and keep it with them at all times, and it seems from the Psalms that at least David did so, by the time of the 16th king of Judah, Josiah, no one knew what the Torah said any more.
While renovating the Temple of Solomon, Hilkiah the Priest found a scroll. It is believed from what is written in 2 Chronicles 34 that the scroll contained the last chapters of Deuteronomy. It was read before the king, who ripped his clothes and sent to the prophetess Hulda for instruction. The prophetess told him that Judah would be sent into captivity for their sins, but not in his lifetime. These events occurred around the year 622 BCE. Josiah's son, Jehoiakim, did not follow his father's footsteps but instead rebuilt the altars of idolatry that his father had destroyed. Although the prophet Jeremiah was sent to him, he did not heed instruction.
In Jeremiah ch. 36, Jeremiah (who was imprisoned at that time) sent his scribe Baruch to the king with a scroll containing the message of God, warning the king and his people of the impending judgment to fall on them for their many sins. Instead of repenting when warned, the king grabbed the scroll, cut it into small pieces with a penknife and threw it into the fire. Soon, the punishment foretold by Jeremiah fell on the Jewish people. A large percentage of the people were carried away by Nebuchadnezzar, but the rest still did not repent. In defiance of the message of God, they killed the regent the king had put over them and then fled to Egypt, bringing Jeremiah with them by force.
When they reached Egypt they began sacrificing to the Egyptian gods. Jeremiah confronted them and told them to return to God. They told them that when they offered sacrifices to the queen of heaven, they met with prosperity, but that Josiah's reforms had brought them to poverty. They told Jeremiah that they would continue their sacrifices to the queen of heaven (the Egyptian Isis). Enraged, God swore that the Jews who were in Egypt would never pray in His name again, and they were forever lost to idolatry. Many years later, a portion of the Jews who had gone into Babylon returned to Israel to rebuild the Temple and restore the worship of God, led by Ezra.
The Torah had been lost; idolatry had taken over. The Jews had been exiled from their home as punishment. Then a man named Ezra came. Ezra's goal was to restore Judaism to what it had been before; however, he unwittingly changed Judaism and the Torah forever, and not entirely for the good. The Qur'an says (9:30) that Jews say Ezra is God's son, and begs that this heresy be destroyed.Jews contest that they do not claim Ezra to be God's son; and indeed, in word, they do not. However, few Jews or Muslims realize the role Ezra played in the corruption of Judaism. Ezra is credited in the Talmud with changing the Torah.
Ezra is referred to by the Rabbis (which when used in the general sense like that infers the rabbis of the Sanhedrin) as "flowers that appear upon the face of the earth", the evidence that "springtime" had come to the Kingdom of Israel. Ezra is considered worthy to have been the bringer of the Torah, had it not been already given to Moses (Sanhedrin 21b). The Torah was lost, as we have learned, but according to the Talmud Ezra restored it (Sukkot 20a). Ezra rewrote the text of the Torah, introducing Assyrian or square letters (Sanhedrin 21b). He showed his doubts concerning the correctness of some words in the text by adding points over them. Should Elijah, said he, approve the text, the points would be disregarded; should he disapprove, the doubtful words would be removed from the text (Ab. R. N. 34). He is regarded and quoted as the type of person most competent and learned in the Torah (Bereshit Rabbah 36). The rabbis attribute much of what we know as Judaism today to him. He added many commandments and prohibitions to the Jewish people, such as that courts be in session on Mondays and Thursdays; that garments be washed on those days; that the wife should rise early and bake bread; that women should wear a girdle (Bava Kamma 82a; Yer. Meg. iv 75a); and that women (and men, under some circumstances) should undergo a ritual bath (mikvah) (Bava Kamma 82a) and more. His name is also connected with the founding of the Great Assembly, commonly known as the Sanhedrin (Meg. 17b), and the beginning of the Jewish calendar is traced back to him (Brakhah 6a, Rashi).
I believe Ezra's intentions were pure: he intended to destroy idolatry and restore the Jews to their faith. However, according to Jewish history, he changed the Torah. The reason I believe he wanted to empower and in a sense "create" the Great Assembly was as an antidote to idolatry: prophets, priests, kings, and judges had been unsuccessful at assisting the Jewish people in retaining the knowledge of God. His hope was that a court of many scholars would keep the nation intact on the right track, and would prevent the Torah from being lost again. At this task, he succeeded. But it was his version of the Torah--his flawed, but well-intentioned one--that survived to this day. Ezra was a good man, with pure intentions, who disserviced Judaism by forever changing the Torah and Jewish law. The empowering of the Sanhedrin led to the birth of the Talmud, which has taken over Jewish thought and has pushed the Torah to the side.
TL;DR: The Torah wasn't written by Moses, but by Ezra, who prophesied that a man from Mecca would come and give us the correct teachings.
Muslims, Christians, and Jews believe that at the beginning of time, God created the first man and woman. Mankind quickly lost respect for their Father and Creator. Furious at the corruption of man, He decided to destroy the earth by flood. Thereafter, mankind again returned to idolatry and disbelief. The earth was again filled with false worship until one man, son of an idol manufacturer, realized that there was One higher and greater than the statues before him. With his decision to smash those idols, Abraham became the most influential man in Jewish history, having shaped the world in immeasurable ways. Abraham had eight sons, but only two became important in world history: Ishmael and Isaac. Both were promised by God, both were under Divine protection, both blessed, and both were to become great nations.
Jewish and Muslim traditions state that when Sarah became jealous of Hagar, Ishmael and Hagar were sent into the wilderness. Both traditions state that Abraham went often into the Arabian desert to visit Ishmael. The Torah says (Gen. 18:17-19) that God loved Abraham because He knew Abraham would teach his children God's ways. Muslim tradition says that Abraham and Ishmael build the Kaaba as a place to worship God. The children of Ishmael settled the Arabian peninsula. Isaac had two sons, Jacob (Israel) and Esau. The children of Esau settled the south Jordan region. The children of Israel were brought down to Egypt by severe famine. Four hundred years later, a lone prophet, Moses, was selected by God to bring them out, because they had become slaves to the Egyptians. Jewish tradition states that had they remained in Egypt but one more night, the children of Israel would have been forever lost to idolatry. Moses led the children of Israel through the wilderness towards Canaan. At the end of his life, he wrote a song calling heaven and earth to testify against the Jewish people when they forgot God. But he did give them hope: prophets bearing his message would continue to be sent to mankind. The responsibility fell on the shoulders of mankind to receive those prophets and obey their message.
There are two Talmuds, the Babylonian (Bavli) and Jerusalem (Yerushalmai) Talmuds, but the one referred to without qualification as the Talmud, and the one meant by the rest of this article, is the Babylonian Talmud. The Talmud is not one book, but consists of sections called tractates. Each tractate has a name (eg Berakhot, Sanhedrin, Ketuboth, etc.). To find a give quote, you also need the page number an letter, eg. 59a. The letter will be either an "a" or a "b" signifying which side of the page the given quote is on. On copies of the Talmud with translation, such as those published by Artscroll, the page number will not match the page number on the physical book; however, it will be provided. The Talmud is claimed to be the written version of the "oral Torah", an "addendum" as it were, because the Torah does not explain itself enough.
Although there is some basis for the belief that there was some explanation of certain things said in the Torah that wasn't written down, the Talmud became much more than a mere explanation of the Torah or tradition in practical Jewish life. The Talmud today stands as a single-handed guide to Jewish religious life. If the Talmud forbids something the Torah permits, it is considered forbidden; if it permits something the Torah forbids, it is permitted.
To understand the Talmud, one must understand the background of the Talmud. Pirkei Avot (Ethics of the Fathers), explains what became the basis for the writing of the Talmud: "1:1. Moses received the Torah from Sinai and transmitted it to Joshua; Joshua to the elders; the elders to the prophets; and the prophets handed it down to the men of the Great Assembly." The Great Assembly is commonly known today as the Sanhedrin. Rabbi Yehuda haNasi compiled the Mishna, the first collection of the rulings of the men of the Great Assembly. The Talmud is a combination of the Jewish sages' teachings from four periods:
* Tanaim: ~70-200 CE
* Amoraim: ~200-500 CE
* Savoraim: ~500-700 CE
* Geonim: ~600-1040 CE
Often there are discussions in the Talmud in which a quote from a rabbi from one era is followed or preceded by a quote from a rabbi of a different era. The reason for these apparent cross-era "discussions" is that the latter era re-visited a topic discussed by a previous era. Each period realized more authority in the homes of Jews. Today, it is common to meet Jews who have studied Talmud for years and can explain complex Talmudic debates, but have never read the entire Tanakh. It is also common to find households that have expended large amounts of money to buy entire sets of Talmud and Mishna but do not have a single Tanakh. The Talmud itself warns: "In the future, the Torah will be forgotten by the Jewish people." (Shabbos 138b).
Among Jews and Muslims, there is an agreement that the Torah was given by God to Moses. It was meant to be the guide to Jewish life. However, as we shall see by the end of this series, the original Torah was lost.
Moses was a great prophet. He led the Jewish people for over forty years. He brought them out of Egypt and taught them the Torah. Yet even in his day, he had to struggle with those who opposed his leadership and with idolatry and those who would worship golden calves. After his death, his student Joshua became his successor. Joshua led his people in victorious conquests, removing from the land of Canaan those who had corrupted it with the worship of idols, infanticide, and ritual worship in forms too gross to mention.
Yet after Joshua's generation, the Jewish people turned to the worship of the gods of Canaan and Egypt. Judges 2:7 And the people served the LORD all the days of Joshua, and all the days of the elders that outlived Joshua, who had seen all the great work of the LORD, that He had wrought for Israel...11 And [after Joshua's death] the children of Israel did that which was evil in the sight of the LORD, and served the Baalim.
God punished the Jewish people by repeatedly allowing their enemies to defeat them in battle and subjugate them. In response to their troubles, they would repent, but only for a limited period of time. God would send them judges to teach them the right way, but after the death of the judge they would revert to idolatry.
The last of these judges was Samuel the Priest. In his day, the priestly line, including Samuel's adopted father and brothers, were punished for their rebellion against God. When Samuel grew old and was ready to die, the Jewish people asked him to appoint a king over them. God told Samuel not to grieve this, because it was God they were rebelling against, not Samuel. He set Saul as king, but Saul was removed for his rebellion against God.
David became the second king of Israel, and Solomon the third, but Solomon's heart was not pure like his father's. Solomon built a temple for God in Jerusalem, and was blessed with wealth and great wisdom, but when he was old his heart turned away from God.
The kingdom of Israel fell into two parts as a result of the sins of Solomon. The northern kingdom took the name Israel, and the southern kingdom took the name Judah.
The southern kingdom never experienced much peace but was constantly troubled by coup d'etats and spiritual trouble. From the time of the first king of Israel, the land became spiritually bankrupt. King Jeroboam, first king of the separatist kingdom Israel, set up two altars and golden calves: one in Bethel, on his southern border, and one in Dan, on his northern border; and both on major routes. He set up holidays at the same times as the holidays of God in Judah, and told the people to worship at his statues. He set up priests from whoever among the people wanted to be a priest, instead of the Levites, the family of Moses, who had been keepers of the Torah. Thus, God was alienated from the Kingdom of Israel by their actions.
Ahab, seventh king of Israel, fed as many as 850 prophets of Baal at one time from the royal table. In his time, the prophet Elijah lamented that he was the last person left who followed the true worship of God, and that the king sought to kill him. God revealed to him that there were yet seven thousand who had not bowed to Baal, and at least 1,000 of them were students of the prophets.
God continued to send prophets to Israel, including Elijah, Amos, and Hosea. Yet they continued to rebel. Finally, God had enough with them and sent them into captivity:
2 Kings 17:7 And it was so, because the children of Israel had sinned against the LORD their God, who brought them up out of the land of Egypt from under the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt, and had feared other gods, 8 and walked in the statutes of the nations, whom the LORD cast out from before the children of Israel, and of the kings of Israel, which they practised; 9 and the children of Israel did impute things that were not right unto the LORD their God, and they built them high places in all their cities, from the tower of the watchmen to the fortified city; 10 and they set them up pillars and Asherim upon every high hill, and under every leafy tree; 11 and there they offered in all the high places, as did the nations whom the LORD carried away before them; and wrought wicked things to provoke the LORD; 12 and they served idols, whereof the LORD had said unto them: 'Ye shall not do this thing'; 13 yet the LORD forewarned Israel, and Judah, by the hand of every prophet, and of every seer, saying: 'Turn ye from your evil ways, and keep My commandments and My statutes, according to all the law which I commanded your fathers, and which I sent to you by the hand of My servants the prophets'; 14 notwithstanding they would not hear, but hardened their neck, like to the neck of their fathers, who believed not in the LORD their God; 15 and they rejected His statutes, and His covenant that He made with their fathers, and His testimonies wherewith He testified against them; and they went after things of nought, and became nought, and after the nations that were round about them, concerning whom the LORD had charged them that they should not do like them; 16 and they forsook all the commandments of the LORD their God, and made them molten images, even two calves, and made an Asherah, and worshipped all the host of heaven, and served Baal; 17 and they caused their sons and their daughters to pass through the fire, and used divination and enchantments, and gave themselves over to do that which was evil in the sight of the LORD, to provoke Him; 18 that the LORD was very angry with Israel, and removed them out of His sight; there was none left but the tribe of Judah only.At that time, only the people of Judah remained as those who followed the worship of God.
As discussed previously, the northern kingdom, called Israel, was sent into captivity for their many sins. The southern kingdom, Judah, did not learn from the north's sins and became far worse (Jeremiah 3). In the southern kingdom, the Torah was lost and forgotten. Although the kings had been commanded to each make a copy of the Torah and keep it with them at all times, and it seems from the Psalms that at least David did so, by the time of the 16th king of Judah, Josiah, no one knew what the Torah said any more.
While renovating the Temple of Solomon, Hilkiah the Priest found a scroll. It is believed from what is written in 2 Chronicles 34 that the scroll contained the last chapters of Deuteronomy. It was read before the king, who ripped his clothes and sent to the prophetess Hulda for instruction. The prophetess told him that Judah would be sent into captivity for their sins, but not in his lifetime. These events occurred around the year 622 BCE. Josiah's son, Jehoiakim, did not follow his father's footsteps but instead rebuilt the altars of idolatry that his father had destroyed. Although the prophet Jeremiah was sent to him, he did not heed instruction.
In Jeremiah ch. 36, Jeremiah (who was imprisoned at that time) sent his scribe Baruch to the king with a scroll containing the message of God, warning the king and his people of the impending judgment to fall on them for their many sins. Instead of repenting when warned, the king grabbed the scroll, cut it into small pieces with a penknife and threw it into the fire. Soon, the punishment foretold by Jeremiah fell on the Jewish people. A large percentage of the people were carried away by Nebuchadnezzar, but the rest still did not repent. In defiance of the message of God, they killed the regent the king had put over them and then fled to Egypt, bringing Jeremiah with them by force.
When they reached Egypt they began sacrificing to the Egyptian gods. Jeremiah confronted them and told them to return to God. They told them that when they offered sacrifices to the queen of heaven, they met with prosperity, but that Josiah's reforms had brought them to poverty. They told Jeremiah that they would continue their sacrifices to the queen of heaven (the Egyptian Isis). Enraged, God swore that the Jews who were in Egypt would never pray in His name again, and they were forever lost to idolatry. Many years later, a portion of the Jews who had gone into Babylon returned to Israel to rebuild the Temple and restore the worship of God, led by Ezra.
The Torah had been lost; idolatry had taken over. The Jews had been exiled from their home as punishment. Then a man named Ezra came. Ezra's goal was to restore Judaism to what it had been before; however, he unwittingly changed Judaism and the Torah forever, and not entirely for the good. The Qur'an says (9:30) that Jews say Ezra is God's son, and begs that this heresy be destroyed.Jews contest that they do not claim Ezra to be God's son; and indeed, in word, they do not. However, few Jews or Muslims realize the role Ezra played in the corruption of Judaism. Ezra is credited in the Talmud with changing the Torah.
Ezra is referred to by the Rabbis (which when used in the general sense like that infers the rabbis of the Sanhedrin) as "flowers that appear upon the face of the earth", the evidence that "springtime" had come to the Kingdom of Israel. Ezra is considered worthy to have been the bringer of the Torah, had it not been already given to Moses (Sanhedrin 21b). The Torah was lost, as we have learned, but according to the Talmud Ezra restored it (Sukkot 20a). Ezra rewrote the text of the Torah, introducing Assyrian or square letters (Sanhedrin 21b). He showed his doubts concerning the correctness of some words in the text by adding points over them. Should Elijah, said he, approve the text, the points would be disregarded; should he disapprove, the doubtful words would be removed from the text (Ab. R. N. 34). He is regarded and quoted as the type of person most competent and learned in the Torah (Bereshit Rabbah 36). The rabbis attribute much of what we know as Judaism today to him. He added many commandments and prohibitions to the Jewish people, such as that courts be in session on Mondays and Thursdays; that garments be washed on those days; that the wife should rise early and bake bread; that women should wear a girdle (Bava Kamma 82a; Yer. Meg. iv 75a); and that women (and men, under some circumstances) should undergo a ritual bath (mikvah) (Bava Kamma 82a) and more. His name is also connected with the founding of the Great Assembly, commonly known as the Sanhedrin (Meg. 17b), and the beginning of the Jewish calendar is traced back to him (Brakhah 6a, Rashi).
I believe Ezra's intentions were pure: he intended to destroy idolatry and restore the Jews to their faith. However, according to Jewish history, he changed the Torah. The reason I believe he wanted to empower and in a sense "create" the Great Assembly was as an antidote to idolatry: prophets, priests, kings, and judges had been unsuccessful at assisting the Jewish people in retaining the knowledge of God. His hope was that a court of many scholars would keep the nation intact on the right track, and would prevent the Torah from being lost again. At this task, he succeeded. But it was his version of the Torah--his flawed, but well-intentioned one--that survived to this day. Ezra was a good man, with pure intentions, who disserviced Judaism by forever changing the Torah and Jewish law. The empowering of the Sanhedrin led to the birth of the Talmud, which has taken over Jewish thought and has pushed the Torah to the side.
Many people walk away from my blog with the mistaken belief that I hate Ezra for corrupting the Torah. Nothing could be further from the truth. Ezra was a good man, and a prophet, who was faced with a bad situation (the Torah had been destroyed). He did the best he could with a very bad situation; he rewrote the Torah from the scraps he had, filling in the blanks as best as he could, and charging the people to wait for Elijah to come to reveal the truth. He also, as I understand it, gave the charge to the Sanhedrin to protect the Torah. Before Ezra, the Sanhedrin was a weak group that didn't actually do very much that got recorded. After Ezra they gained significant power over interpreting the Torah. They essentially became a Torah preservation committee; as it was put by later writers, their function was to "build a fence around the Torah." Unfortunately, this acted as a pill wrapped in poison; although they did preserve Ezra's Torah and the knowledge that a Tishbite, a stranger, would come and restore it, they took tremendous liberties with the Torah, eventually making the permissible forbidden and the forbidden permissible.
Yet, as I mentioned, Ezra foretold the coming of Elijah, as did Malachi:
Malachi 3:23 Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and terrible day of the LORD. 24 And he shall turn the heart of the fathers to the children, and the heart of the children to their fathers; lest I come and smite the land with utter destruction.
Jews accept Malachi as the last prophet sent to the Jewish people. The book of Malachi expresses God's disgust with the Jewish people because they have forsaken His covenant.
These verses express God's contempt for Israel's sin. He wishes in this passage that someone would "shut the doors" to the Temple, that someone would prohibit the Jews from further defiling His name until they repented. He says that in the other (non-Jewish) nations, His name will be properly glorified and exalted.
Then He promises to send "Elijah the Prophet."
The coming Elijah, it is said in this passage, would turn the hearts of the fathers towards their children (perhaps a reference to an end to the practice of child sacrifice/infanticide) and the hearts of the children towards their fathers before the land was struck with destruction.
The Prophet Elijah, may he be remembered for good, was a great prophet sent during one of the darkest hours in Jewish history. Indeed, Elijah complained to God:
And he said: 'I have been very jealous for the LORD, the God of hosts; for the children of Israel have forsaken Thy covenant, thrown down Thine altars, and slain Thy prophets with the sword; and I, even I only, am left; and they seek my life, to take it away.' (1 Kings 19:10)
This complaint came after the famous showdown between Elijah and the priests of Baal. Elijah called all of the northern kingdom, Israel, together. He told them to choose what God was true: Baal or Yhvh, the Hebrew sacred name of God. They stood silent, so he challenged the priests of Baal to a duel; they would each offer a sacrifice, and the one that was consumed by fire from heaven would be considered true. The people agreed. Elijah's prayer was answered by fire; he then stood up and killed the 850 prophets of Baal that had been under the care of the king and queen of Israel. The queen swore to kill Elijah, who fled to the Arabian peninsula, where God spoke to him.
Elijah was a beacon of light in a dark world. He stood against evil and did many miracles. Yet little is known of his origin. He is referred to as "Elijah the Tishbite of Tishbe in Gilead." Tishbite can be correctly translated a stranger, rendering the verse, "Elijah the stranger, from the strangers in Gilead", inferring that Elijah was not Jewish. Further emphasizing that point, the Bible does not typically include genealogies for non-Abrahamic or convert prophets (as for example Obadiah the Edomite and Hagar daughter of Pharaoh). Elijah was from Gilead, a general term for the area east of the Jordan river. The "balm of Gilead" is generally known as the "balm of Mecca."
Thus Malachi, the last prophet before the "long darkness" in Jewish prophetic history, foretold the coming of Elijah. Could it be that the Elijah meant was a non-Jewish prophet from outside the land of Israel, even perhaps from the Arabian peninsula?
The tradition that Elijah would return is engrained within the Jewish mind as much as the belief in Moshiach ben David (Messiah the Son of David). What is known of this Prophet, and what is known of his return?
Elijah was known as the Tishbite, or stranger (non-Jew) from Gilead. Gilead in the Bible refers to the area beyond the Jordan river in general; but in particular, the Balm of Gilead is also known as the Balm of Mecca. There are other indications that what is meant by Gilead in the Bible is the place of the sons of Ishmael:
Hosea 6:8 Gilead is a city of them that work iniquity, it is covered with footprints of blood.
This is certainly a valid description of Mecca before the Prophet Mohammad (saws) took it over. The city was full of idols, and the people had fought many battles against monotheism and shed the blood of many Muslims.
Micah 7:14 Tend Thy people with Thy staff, the flock of Thy heritage, that dwell solitarily, as a forest in the midst of the fruitful field; let them feed in Bashan and Gilead, as in the days of old.
For centuries, Jewish tribes had lived in the Arabian peninsula.
Yet Jeremiah is perhaps the most interesting: in his prophecies, he speaks of a Balm in Gilead that will restore monotheism:
Jeremiah 46:11 Go up into Gilead, and take balm, O virgin daughter of Egypt; in vain dost thou use many medicines; there is no cure for thee.
Out of Gilead came the cure--not out of many medicines (many gods), but out of one balm:
Jeremiah 8:17 For, behold, I will send serpents, basilisks, among you, which will not be charmed; and they shall bite you, saith the LORD. {S} 18 Though I would take comfort against sorrow, my heart is faint within me. 19 Behold the voice of the cry of the daughter of my people from a land far off: 'Is not the LORD in Zion? Is not her King in her?'--'Why have they provoked Me with their graven images, and with strange vanities?'-- 20 'The harvest is past, the summer is ended, and we are not saved.' 21 For the hurt of the daughter of my people am I seized with anguish; I am black, appalment hath taken hold on me. 22 Is there no balm in Gilead? Is there no physician there? Why then is not the health of the daughter of my people recovered? {S} 23 Oh that my head were waters, and mine eyes a fountain of tears, that I might weep day and night for the slain of the daughter of my people!
Jeremiah 22:6 For thus saith the LORD concerning the house of the king of Judah: Thou art Gilead unto Me, the head of Lebanon; yet surely I will make thee a wilderness, cities which are not inhabited. 7 And I will prepare destroyers against thee, every one with his weapons; and they shall cut down thy choice cedars, and cast them into the fire. 8 And many nations shall pass by this city, and they shall say every man to his neighbour: 'Wherefore hath the LORD done thus unto this great city?' 9 Then they shall answer: 'Because they forsook the covenant of the LORD their God, and worshipped other gods, and served them.'
The Jewish people rejected the Balm of Gilead, the return to monotheism-after having provoked the Lord God with their graven images and strange vanities; yet Egypt accepted the Balm, and was cured. This is the situation we see to this very day: Egypt has forsaken idolatry that was its heritage and clings to monotheism; yet Israel continues to practice strange magic and worships false gods.
Yet perhaps even more interesting still is that God counts Gilead among His children:
Psalm 108:8 God spoke in His holiness, that I would exult; that I would divide Shechem, and mete out the valley of Succoth. 9 Gilead is mine, Manasseh is mine; Ephraim also is the defence of my head; Judah is my sceptre.
God counts Gilead the same as He counts the sons of Israel as His own. Why would this be, if they had not returned to God completely and with purity of heart?
And what of the Gileadi, the Tishbite? What was prophesied of him?
First of all, it is important to acquaint the reader with the original Elijah (as), as many of my readers are Muslims and have little to no background in Biblical history. I have demonstrated here how Elijah was from Mecca, and was indisputably an Arab not of Jewish descent. What are the other important facts about his life?
He performed many miracles including the multiplication of food (1 Kings 17:8-16). This miracle was also performed by the Prophet Mohammad (saws):
Sahih Bukhari Volume 4, Book 56, Number 780:
Malachi 3:23 Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and terrible day of the LORD. 24 And he shall turn the heart of the fathers to the children, and the heart of the children to their fathers; lest I come and smite the land with utter destruction.
Jews accept Malachi as the last prophet sent to the Jewish people. The book of Malachi expresses God's disgust with the Jewish people because they have forsaken His covenant.
Malachi 1:5 And your eyes shall see, and ye shall say: 'The LORD is great beyond the border of Israel.' 6 A son honoureth his father, and a servant his master; if then I be a father, where is My honour? and if I be a master, where is My fear? saith the LORD of hosts unto you, O priests, that despise My name. And ye say: 'Wherein have we despised Thy name?' 7 Ye offer polluted bread upon Mine altar. And ye say: 'Wherein have we polluted thee?' In that ye say: 'The table of the LORD is contemptible.' 8 And when ye offer the blind for sacrifice, is it no evil! And when ye offer the lame and sick, is it no evil! Present it now unto thy governor; will he be pleased with thee? or will he accept thy person? saith the LORD of hosts. 9 And now, I pray you, entreat the favour of God that He may be gracious unto us!--this hath been of your doing.--will He accept any of your persons? saith the LORD of hosts. 10 Oh that there were even one among you that would shut the doors, that ye might not kindle fire on Mine altar in vain! I have no pleasure in you, saith the LORD of hosts, neither will I accept an offering at your hand. 11 For from the rising of the sun even unto the going down of the same My name is great among the nations; and in every place offerings are presented unto My name, even pure oblations; for My name is great among the nations, saith the LORD of hosts. 12 But ye profane it, in that ye say: 'The table of the LORD is polluted, and the fruit thereof, even the food thereof, is contemptible.' 13 Ye say also: 'Behold, what a weariness is it!' and ye have snuffed at it, saith the LORD of hosts; and ye have brought that which was taken by violence, and the lame, and the sick; thus ye bring the offering; should I accept this of your hand? saith the LORD. 14 But cursed be he that dealeth craftily, whereas he hath in his flock a male, and voweth, and sacrificeth unto the Lord a blemished thing; for I am a great King, saith the LORD of hosts, and My name is feared among the nations.
These verses express God's contempt for Israel's sin. He wishes in this passage that someone would "shut the doors" to the Temple, that someone would prohibit the Jews from further defiling His name until they repented. He says that in the other (non-Jewish) nations, His name will be properly glorified and exalted.
Then He promises to send "Elijah the Prophet."
Malachi 3:22 Remember ye the law of Moses My servant, which I commanded unto him in Horeb for all Israel, even statutes and ordinances. 23 Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and terrible day of the LORD. 24 And he shall turn the heart of the fathers to the children, and the heart of the children to their fathers; lest I come and smite the land with utter destruction.
The coming Elijah, it is said in this passage, would turn the hearts of the fathers towards their children (perhaps a reference to an end to the practice of child sacrifice/infanticide) and the hearts of the children towards their fathers before the land was struck with destruction.
The Prophet Elijah, may he be remembered for good, was a great prophet sent during one of the darkest hours in Jewish history. Indeed, Elijah complained to God:
And he said: 'I have been very jealous for the LORD, the God of hosts; for the children of Israel have forsaken Thy covenant, thrown down Thine altars, and slain Thy prophets with the sword; and I, even I only, am left; and they seek my life, to take it away.' (1 Kings 19:10)
This complaint came after the famous showdown between Elijah and the priests of Baal. Elijah called all of the northern kingdom, Israel, together. He told them to choose what God was true: Baal or Yhvh, the Hebrew sacred name of God. They stood silent, so he challenged the priests of Baal to a duel; they would each offer a sacrifice, and the one that was consumed by fire from heaven would be considered true. The people agreed. Elijah's prayer was answered by fire; he then stood up and killed the 850 prophets of Baal that had been under the care of the king and queen of Israel. The queen swore to kill Elijah, who fled to the Arabian peninsula, where God spoke to him.
Elijah was a beacon of light in a dark world. He stood against evil and did many miracles. Yet little is known of his origin. He is referred to as "Elijah the Tishbite of Tishbe in Gilead." Tishbite can be correctly translated a stranger, rendering the verse, "Elijah the stranger, from the strangers in Gilead", inferring that Elijah was not Jewish. Further emphasizing that point, the Bible does not typically include genealogies for non-Abrahamic or convert prophets (as for example Obadiah the Edomite and Hagar daughter of Pharaoh). Elijah was from Gilead, a general term for the area east of the Jordan river. The "balm of Gilead" is generally known as the "balm of Mecca."
Thus Malachi, the last prophet before the "long darkness" in Jewish prophetic history, foretold the coming of Elijah. Could it be that the Elijah meant was a non-Jewish prophet from outside the land of Israel, even perhaps from the Arabian peninsula?
The tradition that Elijah would return is engrained within the Jewish mind as much as the belief in Moshiach ben David (Messiah the Son of David). What is known of this Prophet, and what is known of his return?
Elijah was known as the Tishbite, or stranger (non-Jew) from Gilead. Gilead in the Bible refers to the area beyond the Jordan river in general; but in particular, the Balm of Gilead is also known as the Balm of Mecca. There are other indications that what is meant by Gilead in the Bible is the place of the sons of Ishmael:
Hosea 6:8 Gilead is a city of them that work iniquity, it is covered with footprints of blood.
This is certainly a valid description of Mecca before the Prophet Mohammad (saws) took it over. The city was full of idols, and the people had fought many battles against monotheism and shed the blood of many Muslims.
Micah 7:14 Tend Thy people with Thy staff, the flock of Thy heritage, that dwell solitarily, as a forest in the midst of the fruitful field; let them feed in Bashan and Gilead, as in the days of old.
For centuries, Jewish tribes had lived in the Arabian peninsula.
Yet Jeremiah is perhaps the most interesting: in his prophecies, he speaks of a Balm in Gilead that will restore monotheism:
Jeremiah 46:11 Go up into Gilead, and take balm, O virgin daughter of Egypt; in vain dost thou use many medicines; there is no cure for thee.
Out of Gilead came the cure--not out of many medicines (many gods), but out of one balm:
Jeremiah 8:17 For, behold, I will send serpents, basilisks, among you, which will not be charmed; and they shall bite you, saith the LORD. {S} 18 Though I would take comfort against sorrow, my heart is faint within me. 19 Behold the voice of the cry of the daughter of my people from a land far off: 'Is not the LORD in Zion? Is not her King in her?'--'Why have they provoked Me with their graven images, and with strange vanities?'-- 20 'The harvest is past, the summer is ended, and we are not saved.' 21 For the hurt of the daughter of my people am I seized with anguish; I am black, appalment hath taken hold on me. 22 Is there no balm in Gilead? Is there no physician there? Why then is not the health of the daughter of my people recovered? {S} 23 Oh that my head were waters, and mine eyes a fountain of tears, that I might weep day and night for the slain of the daughter of my people!
Jeremiah 22:6 For thus saith the LORD concerning the house of the king of Judah: Thou art Gilead unto Me, the head of Lebanon; yet surely I will make thee a wilderness, cities which are not inhabited. 7 And I will prepare destroyers against thee, every one with his weapons; and they shall cut down thy choice cedars, and cast them into the fire. 8 And many nations shall pass by this city, and they shall say every man to his neighbour: 'Wherefore hath the LORD done thus unto this great city?' 9 Then they shall answer: 'Because they forsook the covenant of the LORD their God, and worshipped other gods, and served them.'
The Jewish people rejected the Balm of Gilead, the return to monotheism-after having provoked the Lord God with their graven images and strange vanities; yet Egypt accepted the Balm, and was cured. This is the situation we see to this very day: Egypt has forsaken idolatry that was its heritage and clings to monotheism; yet Israel continues to practice strange magic and worships false gods.
Yet perhaps even more interesting still is that God counts Gilead among His children:
Psalm 108:8 God spoke in His holiness, that I would exult; that I would divide Shechem, and mete out the valley of Succoth. 9 Gilead is mine, Manasseh is mine; Ephraim also is the defence of my head; Judah is my sceptre.
God counts Gilead the same as He counts the sons of Israel as His own. Why would this be, if they had not returned to God completely and with purity of heart?
And what of the Gileadi, the Tishbite? What was prophesied of him?
First of all, it is important to acquaint the reader with the original Elijah (as), as many of my readers are Muslims and have little to no background in Biblical history. I have demonstrated here how Elijah was from Mecca, and was indisputably an Arab not of Jewish descent. What are the other important facts about his life?
He performed many miracles including the multiplication of food (1 Kings 17:8-16). This miracle was also performed by the Prophet Mohammad (saws):
Sahih Bukhari Volume 4, Book 56, Number 780:
Narrated Jabir:
My father had died in debt. So I came to the Prophet and said, "My father (died) leaving unpaid debts, and I have nothing except the yield of his date palms; and their yield for many years will not cover his debts. So please come with me, so that the creditors may not misbehave with me." The Prophet went round one of the heaps of dates and invoked (Allah), and then did the same with another heap and sat on it and said, "Measure (for them)." He paid them their rights and what remained was as much as had been paid to them.
He preformed the miracle of supplication for rain after a long drought (1 Kings 18:41-46). This miracle was also preformed by the Prophet Mohammad (saws), again as narrated in Sahih Bukhari:
Volume 8, Book 73, Number 115:
Narrated Anas:
A man came to the Prophet on a Friday while he (the Prophet) was delivering a sermon at Medina, and said, "There is lack of rain, so please invoke your Lord to bless us with the rain." The Prophet looked at the sky when no cloud could be detected. Then he invoked Allah for rain. Clouds started gathering together and it rained till the Medina valleys started flowing with water. It continued raining till the next Friday. Then that man (or some other man) stood up while the Prophet was delivering the Friday sermon, and said, "We are drowned; Please invoke your Lord to withhold it (rain) from us" The Prophet smiled and said twice or thrice, "O Allah! Please let it rain round about us and not upon us." The clouds started dispersing over Medina to the right and to the left, and it rained round about Medina and not upon Medina. Allah showed them (the people) the miracle of His Prophet and His response to his invocation.
He saw angels, and was fed by them (1 Kings 19:5). The Prophet Mohammad (saws) also saw angels regularly, as has been narrated many times.
Also in 1 Kings 19, Elijah traveled forty days from Jerusalem into the mountains of Arabia, where God spoke to him in a still, small voice. It was in these same mountains that the Prophet Mohammad (saws) would receive his revelation from God.
Prophecy Concerning Elijah's Return
As I have mentioned before, Elijah's return is linked in Jewish tradition with the Messiah, although this link is not made in the scriptures. The verse that does promise the return of Elijah promises that he will do some specific things: namely, that he will turn the hearts of the fathers towards the children, and the children towards the fathers. How the Prophet Mohammad (saws) did so is written out beautifully here and I will not elucidate on it further. The other prophecy concerning the return of Elijah in Rabbinic literature states that he will restore the Torah, which was lost.
Why Not John the Baptist?
Parts of the Christian Bible claim that John the Baptist was Elijah. I reject this notion on two grounds:
1. He did not fulfill the prophecy concerning Elijah.
2. He himself said that he was NOT Elijah: John 1:21.
In conclusion, I believe as I have written before, that Mohammad (peace be upon him) was the promised prophet, sent by God to restore the world to the teachings of monotheism, and sent to restore the family unit and bring peace to households that had never known it.
Thursday, May 9, 2013
Bipolar and Me
Hi folks,
I thought I'd let you in on why I'm so iffy about updating my blog. I have a very severe form of bipolar disorder. Before you tell me to pray it away, I'd like to explain a little about the disorder and its causes and treatments. I've had bipolar disorder since I was at least 7 but probably a little younger. I have manic episodes, where I'm prone to hyperreligiousity, bad decisions, and arguing with Christians (lol I do that all the time anyway). I also have depressive episodes, where I'm prone to not doing anything but sulk and try to commit suicide. I've been in a depressive cycle since October 2011, which is why I haven't really been working on the blog too much.
Bipolar disorder is a neurological disorder, like depression or schizophrenia. It's related to schizophrenia, and bipolar people can become delusional while manic or depressed. It's a disease; some people have it, some people don't. It's not the punishment of God or something; it's like cancer or diabetes, it's just a disease. I happen to have it. I'm not embarrassed that I have a disease; it's just something I struggle through. I take a variety of medications for my bipolar disorder; right now I'm on Klonopin, Abilify, and Wellbutrin (yeah, all three at the same time, every day; I take ten pills a day). I wish that I was healthy or at least manic, but I have my good times and my bad times. It's like cancer that way; it comes and it goes. I hope that I'll be manic soon so I can feel motivated to work on the blog. You guys are fantastic and I love all of you, and I wish I could do more work on the blog for you all.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)