Link-Zone Pages

Yeshua While the message of the Bible is timeless, its language is bound by culture and time. The Almighty chose to anoint and inspire a particular people living at a particular time to be the channels through which His Word would be revealed to all nations.

These people spoke a particular language, the Hebrew language, and their culture was that of a desert people, a tribal people living thousands of years ago.

Translation of text involves so much more than the exchanging of words from one language to another. It requires an understanding of culture, idioms and the lenses through which the writers viewed their world.

Gaining some knowledge in these areas may also enrich our own understanding of the Bible. When we 21st century westerners come to read the Bible we may miss much of the richness and depth of meaning intended by the original writers because our worldview is not the same as that which shaped their understanding. These authors did not know that Australians and Fijians and New Zealanders would be reading their words thousands of years and kilometres from when and where they were written and so many times there are no explanations to help us understand the background to some of the things we are reading.

Recently I was in Adelaide for some meetings and I had a free afternoon so I decided to spend the time in the comfort of the air-conditioned State Library researching the arrival of my father's family in the mid nineteenth century. Looking back to the past helps us to understand ourselves, our family and sometimes, our present day circumstances. It also gives us a sense of being part of something greater than ourselves, a sense of continuity and purpose as we recognise that we fit into a vast scheme of things in both time and space, something far greater than our present day circumstances might reveal.

This is often why children from fractured families may suffer from a lack of a sense of identity. They may have no feeling of belonging and feel isolated and alone in a world full of people who all seem to fit into their own particular place.

What is true in the natural is also true in the spiritual.

Christians and Jews have a spiritual heritage that is revealed throughout the pages of the Bible. Going back gives us an understanding of where we have come from spiritually, and a sense of having a part to play in God's great redemptive purposes. We move on into the future with a greater sense of security and faith as we see God's purposes unfold through His Word.

In the book of Ephesians, the Apostle Paul tells us that we Gentiles are joined to the Commonwealth of Israel, and that, through faith in Yeshua, we have become fellow citizens with God's people and members of His family.

We westerners have a Greek heritage, which we will look at in more detail, while the writers of the Bible were Hebrew thinkers. Their worldview differed greatly from ours. "

The Hebrew Mind is concerned with FUNCTION - doing - not creeds and doctrinal statements but faith in action as a living vibrant part of every day life.

For example, when John the Baptist tells his disciples to ask Yeshua if he was the one they were waiting for, he sends them to go and tell John what they have been seeing and hearing [Luke 7:22]. We are never given descriptions of what David or Abraham or Yeshua looked like. We find no paintings in Israel to enlighten us but we are told what they did and said.

The Greek Mind, however, is more concerned with PHILOSOPHY, FORM, DESCRIPTION and THEOLOGY.

A visit to the Basilicas and Vatican Museum in Rome, which is also founded on Greek culture, reveals an abundance of sculptures and paintings depicting Bible characters.
The Hebrew Mind is concerned with RELATIONSHIPS and COMMUNITY.

The first thing we discover about Yeshua in the New Testament is his relationship to his people in Matthew Chapter 1.

All throughout the Bible there is a great sense of belonging to something greater than oneself - to a family of people through whom God is working.

God calls Himself the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. Prayers are prayed in the plural {e.g. Our Father… Give us… Forgive us…]
The Greek Mind is INDIVIDUALISTIC and POSESSIVE. We tend to see everything in relation to ourselves and our prayers are often in the singular. [e.g. heal me… give me… etc].

We are the centre of our world, instead of part of a community or family reaching both back in time and into the future. The Bible deals with people hood - a chosen nation and a royal priesthood - while we tend to see our salvation as a purely personal affair, forgetting that our salvation through faith in Messiah joins us to a family of believers world-wide.
The Hebrew Mind is orientated towards the PAST… this land belonged to my father and his father before him, so it is part of me.

Jewish people go to cemeteries and place stones of remembrance on the graves of family and friends as a way of saying, 'I am building on the foundations that this person laid'. We are repeatedly told throughout Scripture that Abraham, David etc. were gathered to their fathers. Again there is a sense of continuity in this.
The Greek Mind is focused more on the PRESENT and the FUTURE.

This is why we have so much difficulty in this country in understanding the ties our indigenous people have with the land. We save to buy a block of land to build a house and believe it is ours because we have a piece of paper that says so, and because we have paid money for it. We sell it when it suites us and are concerned with providing security for the future. The aboriginal peoples in this land, like the people in the Middle East, or the Pacific Islands, have a sense of belonging to the land because their family roots go back down into the past in association with that land. They often do not want to work and invest to improve the look or value of it in the way we believe they should because it is enough simply to belong there.

THE PREPARATION FOR THE COMING OF MESSIAH

The nation of Israel was called to be 'God's Signal to the Nations', a living proof of His existence and of the truth of His Word. She was also to be a picture, by her lifestyle, of the culture of God's Kingdom. {Deuteronomy 4:3; 5-8; 14]

She was also to be the channel through which God's redemptive purposes would flow out to the nations. [Romans 9:4-5]

To facilitate this call, God placed them at the crossroads of the world - on a land bridge between Europe, Asia and Africa. All of the caravans carrying merchandise between the nations passed through, giving the merchants and travellers the opportunity to hear about the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. They are still, in that sense, a crossroads nation, with world attention constantly being directed towards them via the media. God is still using them to direct the nations' attention towards Him and to remind us of the truth of His Word. In that sense they remain the Almighty's grace gift to the nations.

The Bible promises that, if they would live according to the precepts laid down in the Torah, they would experience blessing, but if they disobeyed, following other gods, they would be temporarily expelled from the Land of Promise. [Deuteronomy ch. 28-30] The first exile came following the attacks of the Assyrians and the Babylonians.

It was while in exile in Babylon that the Hebrew Scriptures (the Old Testament) began to be brought together in their final form by Ezra and his group of scribes. At this time, the synagogue, the pattern for the early church, also developed out of a need to worship communally without the Temple. Liturgy and prayers, used in the first century by Yeshua, many of which are still in use today in synagogue and private worship, were also consolidated at this time.

The Tanakh (Old Testament) was also translated from the Hebrew to Greek in Alexandria during the second century BC to accommodate the growing numbers of Jews living outside the land of Israel whose first language was no longer Hebrew but Greek. It is this Septuagint that Paul quotes in his letters to the Greek speaking Jews and Gentiles who made up the early church as it began to spread to the nations.

As the Jewish people returned to the land, they faced perhaps their greatest test to date. In the fourth century Alexander the Great swept through the Mediterranean and Middle East with a dream that the whole world would embrace Greek language, culture, religion and philosophy. He died of malaria but his dream carried on, bringing with it one of the greatest threats to the knowledge of God - the rise of humanistic thought.

When Alexander died his kingdom was divided between his generals, and Antiochus iv arose over the Seleucids and over the Promised Land. He called himself Antiochus Ephiphanes, thus setting himself up as an enemy of God and His people. In an attempt to stamp out the worship of God, he banned circumcision (an attack on the covenant); the study of God's Word and the observance of the Biblical Feasts (an attack on the Sovereignty of God over all of life) and set up an altar to Zeus in the Temple, sacrificing pigs (an unclean animal used in pagan sacrifices) on the holy altar.

Many Jews lost their lives at this time, refusing to bow to his demands. However many also assimilated into Greek culture. Gymnasiums where contestants competed nude were built in Jerusalem, with Jewish men attempting to reverse their circumcisions (a reminder of their covenant with God) and parents naming their children with Greek names instead of the Hebrew names that always carried a sense of the child's destiny and calling. On at least one occasion the afternoon sacrifice had to be cancelled as a number of the officiating priests were so busy in the gymnasium that there weren't enough on duty at the Temple to perform it.

The Promised Land entered a time of both political and religious upheaval with the Macabees leading a revolt that finally overthrew the Seleucids, leading to the restoration of true worship in the Land. It was not long, however, before the 'rot' set in once again with the Hasmonean Dynasty becoming involved corruption.

In 63BC the Romans under General Pompeii invaded. They proved to be oppressive rulers. The country reeled under the burden of heavy taxation. Thousands of their opponents were mercilessly crucified on the barren Judean hills. The people began, as in the time of Moses, to cry out for a Redeemer. Miracle workers such as Honi the Circle Drawer and Hanina ben Dosa appeared and the 'books of the month' were the Books of Daniel and Enoch, which spoke of the end of days.

Herod Antipas was made Procurator in 47BC, only to be murdered in 43BC. Herod was an Idumean, a descendant of Esau, whose family had been forcibly converted to Judaism under the Hasmoneans. He was succeeded by his son Herod the Great. Herod was a great builder, reconstructing the Second Temple and building the fortresses of Masada and the Herodian. He married, and murdered, a Hasmonean princess, and ruled his tiny kingdom with harshness and cruelty.

Just as the children of Israel had been enslaved in Egypt 430 years, before God sent a deliverer in the person of Moses, so it was to be 430 years from the time of the Messianic prophecies of Malachi [Malachi 3:20-24] until Yeshua would begin his public ministry.

Messiah's name had been established from before the foundation of the world. " When he appeared God would establish His Kingdom and wickedness would be destroyed.
The struggle with sin would cease and Israel would return to God. " All nations would come to worship God. " Israel's servitude to other nations would come to an end.
The spirit of Messiah was identical with the breath of God [c.f John 1] " Messiah was present at creation [Book of Enoch c.f John 1]
He would be Bar Enash - the Son of Man - a superhuman judge who sat on the throne of God and separated the righteous from the wicked. [Daniel 7:13; Enoch, the Apocrypha] [c.f Matthew 25:31-36 & Luke 21:27]
He was Ben Adam - Son of Man - connected with Adam the First Man [c.f Romans 5:12-21]
He would be greater than Moses and the Patriarchs [Midrash Tanhuma c.f Hebrews 3:1-3]
A righteous man could die to atone for the sins of the people [c.f with 1 Peter 3:18]
He would be from the Tribe of Judah and descended from King David. [c.f Micah 5:1-4; Isaiah 11:1-2]
He would perform miracles of healing [Isaiah 61:1-4; 35:5-6; 26:14 - c.f Luke 7:18-23]

The stage was set, in God's Great Plan of Redemption, for the coming of the Messiah. The New Testament begins, in the Book of Matthew, with Yeshua's genealogy. Within that list of the names of the ancestors of the Messiah, several women are to be found, all Gentiles or non-Jews, all with fairly 'chequered' pasts, and all coming into a relationship with the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob - in a sense 'saved by grace through faith', rather than by being born into God's covenant people. Their names are Tamar, Rahab, Ruth and Bathsheba and this first chapter of Matthew presents us with a wonderful synopsis of the rest of the New Testament which tells the story of how, in God's great plan of redemption, a people from all nations are added to the Jewish people through faith in Messiah, to become the 'One New Man' who are destined to worship Him forever. [Ephesians 2:11-3:13; Romans 11]

Luke 2 gives a detailed narrative of the story of Yeshua's birth beginning with his parents' arrival in Bethlehem to be counted in the Roman census. Joseph and Mary, descendants of King David, had to return to their tribal village, which at this time numbered about 200 people. In the Bible, every name of every person and place, including the names of God, reveals truths concerning character and destiny. Thus Bethlehem, House of Bread, in the hill country of Judea, Y'Hudah, which speaks of raising the hands in praise to Yah, the God of grace, was a fitting place for the bread of life who came down from heaven to be born. [John 1:29]

Not far away was the greatest fortress ever built at that time, the Herodian, a monument raised by Herod, Esau's greatest descendant. Jacob's greatest descendant, Yeshua, was born nearby, not in a palace, but in a humble hut. In Jewish understanding Esau represents the kingdom of darkness and Jacob represents the Kingdom of God, or light, so there is a picture here of the battle between good and evil that would climax in the death and resurrection of the Messiah.

Since the time of Constantine in the 4th century the birth of Yeshua has been celebrated by most of the western church on December 25, the date that the pagan nations of Europe celebrated the winter solstice, a festival to the sun god. Many pagan customs have come to be associated with the day, including the decorating of fir trees and the eating of fruitcake and plum pudding. It is possible that there was some confusion over the Jewish Feast of Hanukah, or Lights, that falls on Kislev 25, December of our calendar. Certainly no shepherds would have been out watching their flocks by night in December since it is winter then and all flocks were safely kept inside from November through to February to protect them from the cold, rain and snow.

The Gospels do not give us a date for Yeshua's birth, however since everything that occurred in his life and ministry related to the Biblical Feasts found in Leviticus 23, we can be sure that his birth also lined up with these moedim or appointed times of the Lord.

The timing may be measured by looking at the priestly courses of duty or rosters that Zechariah, John the Baptist's father kept. He was of the line of Abijah. Reckoning from this period places Yeshua's birth during Succoth, or Tabernacles, a truth that John's gospel hints at when it says, "and the Word became flesh and tabernacled among us."

The Romans always conducted their census's during the public holidays kept in the lands they were occupying and everyone would have been going up to celebrate the feast in Jerusalem anyway, another reason why there was no room for them at the inn, since the crowds in Jerusalem would have overflowed into the nearby village of Bethlehem.

Tradition, with no biblical basis at all, places the birth of God's son in a stable simply because he was laid in a manger [Luke 2:7], but this shows a lack of understanding of Jewish laws of cleanliness and hospitality and completely ignores the importance of the birth of children in Jewish eyes. [Psalms 127 & 128] Most probably Mary would have given birth in a Succah, the little 'cubby house' made of palm fronds that is built outside Jewish homes, restaurants and hotels even today during Succoth. In Bible days everyone slept in their succah during the week of the feast.

If Yeshua WAS born during Succoth, September/October of our calendar, he would have been conceived during December, around the feast of Hanukah or Lights.

The most important issue is that we take every opportunity, as we should each and every day of the year, to sanctify the Lord's name in all of our actions and attitudes and to extend love and hospitality to everyone as we have opportunity to do so, and to echo the words of the angels that rang out over the hills of Judah on that wonderful night, "In the highest heaven, glory to God! And on earth shalom among people of good will."

David Flusser, renowned Jewish scholar on early Christianity, makes the point that Jesus was a Jew in every way. He was part and parcel of the world of the Jewish sages. He was no ignorant peasant, and his acquaintance with the written and oral Torah was considerable.

Norman Cousins, yet another Jewish scholar of some repute, has also written that the earliest Christians knew neither awkwardness nor reticence over the fact that Jesus was a Jew. Most, if not all of them were Jews themselves. Christianity to them was not a faith apart from Judaism but an assertion of it. They never claimed to be the originators of a new religion; they were summoning men to Jesus' vision of moral excellence. They called for a return to the great simplicities of essential Judaism, for an awareness of the reality of Biblical prophecy, and for a response to the sense of God that lay deep within man. He goes on to say that the Jews who carried this message of Jesus carried it primarily to their own people. The Apostles were Jewish and the religious ideas in the New Testament are preponderantly and authentically Jewish in accent and outlook. Indeed, there is a consistent progression from the Torah, with its revelation of the Word of God, and its spiritual poetry, to the New Testament.

Likewise Rabbi Stephen S Wise has said that neither Christian protest nor Jewish lamentation can annul the fact that Jesus was a Jew, a Hebrew of the Hebrews.

To understand much of what is written in the Gospels concerning the Life and Times of Yeshua the Messiah, we need to return to this truth - that he was a Jewish rabbi living and ministering in the Second Temple Period in the land of Israel.

Nazareth, in the northern Galilee, was a village of around 150 - 200 people. It had been settled by people from the tribe of Judah who returned from Babylon around 200BC. Its name came from the root word for branch and the inhabitants believed that the Messiah, the Saviour of Israel would come forth from their midst, based on Isaiah 11:1-2 "And there shall come forth a shoot out of the stem of Jesse, and a branch shall grow out of his roots; and he shall be at peace, and the Spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him, the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and might, the spirit of knowledge and of the reverence of the LORD."

They were not offended by Yeshua's comment that he was the fulfilment of Isaiah 61 when he taught on the haftarah reading in the synagogue recorded in Luke 4. They were expecting the Messiah to come from their village. Their problem was that he went right to the core of their religious pride by refusing to do any miracles among them and by reminding them that God had also healed and provided for Gentiles in the past. For a group of people who no longer ate or interacted with Gentiles, this was quite a challenge [Acts 10].

Nazareth was looked upon with some distain by the rest of Israel as somewhat cultish. When Philip first tells Nathaniel about Yeshua he asks, "Can anything good come out of Nazareth?" The people in this region were called am ha' aretz. People of the land, meaning country bumpkins, by the intellectuals and theologians in Jerusalem. [c.f. with Acts 4:13] Only a few kilometres from Nazareth however, was the town of Zippori, the capital of Herod Antipas, the Tetrarch of Galilee until 20ABD. The Mishnah states that Zippori was one of the towns fortified by Joshua during the conquest of Canaan so its history goes back to ancient times. In the first century it was home to about 30,000 people.

Recent excavations have unearthed many mosaics depicting Greek mythology and a large theatre with a seating capacity of 4000 but these only date to the 2nd and 3rd centuries AD so should not be used to support the suggestion that Zippori was a Hellenistic pagan city in Yeshua's time. Earlier excavations from around the first century reveal a strong observant Jewish presence with 40 private mikvaot [Jewish ritual immersion baths] unearthed in an area containing only 80 homes. Archaeological discoveries from this period have also included the remains of large numbers of stone vessels used for storing water for purification rites. The absence of pig bones always found where non-Jews lived also supports the view that it was a primarily Jewish city. Other finds reveal an influential cosmopolitan city with a sophisticated water supply system.

Talmudic and Byzantine Christian traditions suggest that Mary was born in Zippori. It's proximity to Nazareth means that Yeshua and his father would most likely have found much of their work in this large city, since Nazareth's size would have limited the amount of work a tekton or builder could find there.

It is to the little village of Nazareth, however, that the angel Gabriel goes to find Mary, the young thirteen or fourteen year old girl who would become mother of the Messiah. Mary is betrothed or kidushin to Joseph. This meant that she had gone through the betrothal ceremony with him and drunk the cup of wine that signified her acceptance of him as her husband. This ceremony was as binding as marriage itself and the betrothal could only be annulled by a Rabbi. Joseph had gone away to prepare a home for her and it was during the 12 month betrothal period of preparation and purification of the bride to be that Mary became pregnant.

The courage and faith of one so young is amazing when we stop to think of the gossip and innuendo she faced in this tiny village where everyone knew every else's business. It must have been a great relief to both Mary and Joseph when they knew they must make the journey to Bethlehem. It would have offered a respite - an escape. And so they began the long journey down the Jordan Valley and through the Judean Wilderness, probably not riding on a donkey, as so much religious art depicts, but walking, since only the reasonably well off could afford a donkey as their means of transport at this time.

The Angel Gabriel told them to call their baby Yeshua, the second most popular boy's name is Israel during this period. It means Yahweh's Salvation and over time became Jesus in English translations of the Greek Iesous.

The Gospels tell us that Mary and Joseph names their baby Yeshua, meaning Yahweh Saves. It was, according to the historian Josephus, the second most popular boys name during that period. Like all Jewish parents, they had their little boy circumcised on the eighth day in obedience to the Torah. [Genesis 17; Leviticus 12:2] Medical experts tell us that the eighth day is the day when the blood will clot best, ensuring quick healing. They then took him to the Temple for the purification offering. [Leviticus 12:4] As they presented their offering in the Temple a Tzaddik [righteous man] named Shimon [Simon] took the baby in his arms and prophesied that this child would bring salvation to both Jew and Gentile. [Luke 2:29-32]

When Joseph and Mary had done all that the Torah required of them, they returned to their home town of Nazareth where we are told that the child grew in wisdom, stature, in favour with God and man. This little verse paints a picture for us of God's redemptive grace at work - Yeshua brings not only eternal life to his followers, but through him, God's Spirit begins a work of grace that touches every area of our lives - restoring us not only spiritually, but physically, intellectually and socially - remaking us into God's image. [Genesis 1:26] That is the true, exciting message of salvation, not just that we get to heaven when we die, but that God redeems us while we live!

In Nazareth, Yeshua would have been raised like any other little boy his age. In an attempt to nullify the effects of the Godless humanistic culture that was at work in the nation, the religious leaders amongst the Pharisees realised that they needed to work with the children. So they began what ultimately was the forerunner of the Christian Schooling movement that has been sweeping the world over the past 30 years. They established Bible based schools [called Beit Sefer - House of Books] in the synagogues where the little boys began studying from the age of three to five. The Jews were the first people in the world to offer free education to their children.

They learnt to read and write using their Scriptures, and of course there was no better text for learning the history and geography of their land than the Bible that recorded not only their past, but also their future as a nation.

The method of study was memorisation and by the age of twelve, most boys had memorised the entire first five books of the Bible, the Torah or Pentateuch. This is the significance of Luke's recording of Yeshua's trip to the Temple for Passover in Luke 2. Yeshua was able, according to Jewish tradition, to take his place amongst the rabbis to discuss Scripture as he had passed this first stage of his study.

But what about the girls? Women had always been respected and honoured in Jewish tradition and Jewish girls were taught to read and write, unlike the majority of girls in the lands around them. They were taught by their mothers at home and learnt to recite the Ketuvim - The Writings - The Psalms, Proverbs, Ruth, Esther etc, because they were the custodians of the faith in the home and would lead in the Sabbath and Festival blessings and teach their children.

This internalisation of Scripture is an important point to remember as we look at Yeshua's communication with the people as a rabbi. Many of the people listening to him knew scripture by heart and many times he quoted small portions of the Hebrew Scriptures [Old Testament] and gave a midrash [teaching] on that particular portion but we miss it, thinking he was saying something new, when he was actually giving his interpretation of a passage of the Hebrew Scriptures, the only Bible he and the early church had.

After the age of twelve, when they had learnt Torah, the boys received their first tzitzit or fringe [Numbers 15:37-41] and were regarded as fully-fledged sons of the covenant. From the age of thirteen, boys were apprenticed to their fathers to learn a trade, and those gifted in Scripture would continue on in the Beit Midrash - House of Teaching - studying the rest of the Scriptures and also the Oral Traditions of the sages passed down through memorisation from the time of Moses.

This use of memorisation is a concept foreign to modern western culture where attention spans and ability to concentrate have been diminished by sound bites and constantly changing images on our television screens. Even our news comes to us in small portions sandwiched in between glossy ads for new cars and perfume. Ancient cultures, including our Australian Aborigines, have used the memorisation of traditions passed down orally for thousands of years. Our written bible, both the Hebrew Scriptures, Gospels and Acts were passed down orally before they were ever written down.

Aspiring rabbis in the Pharisaic tradition had to learn a trade and memorise the entire Hebrew Scriptures by the age of twenty-five. By the age of thirty they had entered into their full ability and could then begin to gather disciples.

In Luke 6:43-44, Yeshua said, "I must announce the Good News of the Kingdom of God to other towns and villages for this is why I was sent." Matthew 9:35-38 also says "Yeshua went about all the towns and villages teaching in their synagogues, proclaiming the good news of the kingdom and healing every kind of disease and weakness.

The message of the Kingdom of God - Malchut Shamayim - was central, not only to the Rabbi Yeshua's teaching, but also to the teaching of other rabbis from the sect of the Pharisees during this period. It was a teaching concerning the Sovereignty or Kingship of the Almighty over every area of life. It did not relate to time - the Kingdom coming in the future, though of course there is an ultimate fulfilment of the Kingdom in the future - but space and relationship - as in the Prophet Isaiah's words that …he came near the prophetess and she conceived. The people in Yeshua's day were not so concerned with getting to heaven when they died, but rather, living as citizens of the Kingdom of God in the here and now - bringing His Lordship to bear over every area of life. The Kingdom was about God's redemptive grace at work remaking people into His image and likeness. [Genesis 1:26]

There were many travelling ministries in those days as rabbis gathered disciples around them teaching in the synagogues and market places and praying for the sick. The disciples learnt by living with their rabbi, watching how he lived his life in obedience to God's Word, how he handled his finances, his relationships with God, his family and those around him. The faith in this environment was 'caught', rather than 'taught' - still the essence of true discipleship.

We can imagine Yeshua walking the dusty roads of the Galilee, stopping in the shade of a tree to watch the farmers scattering their seeds over their tiny plots of land, separated from their neighbours plots by narrow pathways [the hard ground in the parable of the sower] and using the opportunity to teach his disciples about the condition of people's hearts. When he was invited to dinner, he shared his wisdom with the guests and the shores of the Galilee afforded excellent opportunities for the life lessons to be gleaned from fishing. In fact 75% of all of Yeshua's ministry and teaching took place in the tiny 'Gospel Triangle' between the villages of Capernaum, Chorazin and Bethsaida, an area approximately 5klms by 7klms by 5klms.

When the rabbi intended to do some teaching, he sat down, and the people gathered around him to listen. In our culture, we expect ministers to stand when they start to preach, but in bible times, the teacher sat down, and this was the sign that they were going to speak. Thus, in Luke 4:20, when the writer says, he sat down, we think he had finished speaking. In fact, he sat down in the seat of Moses, the seat in the synagogue where the person giving the sermon sat, and had only just begun what he intended to say!

Each rabbi had his own interpretation of Halachah - how one should live [walk] as a citizen of God's Kingdom. Yeshua's Halachah, his teaching on how his disciples should live, was set out in Matthew 5 through 7. Yeshua told his disciples in Matthew 11:28-29 that his yoke was easy, his burden light. The yoke was the rabbi's teaching on how to live. The burden was the outworking of that teaching.

In a religious culture where great emphasis was placed on the outward expression of faith in God, by observance, not only of the written Torah, but also the oral traditions passed down from the sages, Yeshua told his disciples that in his teaching, they would find rest from striving. His teaching zeroed in on the inner attitude of the heart, rather than focussing on outward actions that did not stem from a right heart. In a sense he cut through the religious pride and critical spirit that can come from following a list of religious 'do's and don'ts', past the divisions that result from these things, and reminded his listeners that it is possible to appear to be 'doing' all the 'right' things but to have a heart that has not been changed by an encounter with the Almighty.

He told them, in typical rabbinic language, that he had not come to abolish [give a wrong interpretation of] the Torah, but to fulfil it [give a correct interpretation]. In Yeshua's teaching, the inner attitude of a heart changed by a personal encounter with God was the central theme. He was always exposing the falsity and hypocrisy that so easily attaches itself to our expression of our faith. This is not surprising since John calls him the Word and the writer of the Hebrews tells us that The Word of God is alive! It is at work and is sharper than any double-edged sword - it cuts right through to where soul meets spirit and joints meet marrow, and it is quick to judge the inner reflections of the heart". [Hebrews 4:12]

The Gospels are books birthed out of the culture, thought patterns and language of the First Century. When we read them we do so as 21st century Australians and are faced with the challenge of understanding them in the context in which they were written. As we conclude this study we will take time to look at a few passages through the lenses of culture, thought and language.

Mark 12:13-17 Next, they sent some Pharisees and members of Herod's party to him in order to trap him with a question. They came and said to him, 'Rabbi, we know that you tell the truth and are not concerned with what people think about you, since you pay no attention to a person's status but really teach what God's way is. Does Torah say that taxes are to be paid to the Roman Emperor or not?' But he, knowing their hypocrisy said to them, 'Why are you trying to trap me? Bring me a denarius so I can look at it.' They brought one, and he asked them, 'Whose name and picture are these?' 'The Emperor's,' they replied. Yeshua said, 'Give to the Emperor what belongs to the Emperor, and give to God what belongs to God.' And they were amazed at him.

Why were they amazed at him? The answer lies in recognising the nature of the trap being set. Everyone knew the rabbi was from the Galilee and the Galilee was notorious for rebellions against the Romans, especially in the area of taxation. In the three hundred years of Roman rule over the region there were approximately 65 rebellions beginning in the Galilee and around 62 of them were about taxation. The religious leaders were trying to trap Yeshua with the charge of treason against the Roman Government. The second aspect we should understand relates to the Ten Commandments which state 'You are not to make for yourselves a carved image or any kind of representation of anything in heaven above, on the earth beneath or in the water below the shoreline'. The denarius carried a representation of the Emperor's head. A Torah observant Jew should not have even touched a denarius and Yeshua turns the tables on these religious leaders by asking them if they have one - showing that he is more Torah observant than they are since he doesn't! This took place during the four days leading up to Passover, the time when the Passover lamb [the Haggigah or Peace Offering] that was to die for the nation at 3pm in the afternoon of Pesach was being tested by the religious leaders to make sure it was perfect enough to be sacrificed to the Lord. Yeshua, during this encounter with the religious leaders in which they also were testing him, showed that he was worthy of fulfilling the role of God's Haggigah.

The people of Yeshua's day believed that the Sea of Galilee was the gateway to the Abyss. This is why the miracles of walking on water and calming the storm were so important to the disciples' faith since they were visual confirmations of Yeshua's sovereignty over the kingdom of Light and the Kingdom of Darkness. It also explains why the demon-possessed pigs ran over the cliff into the sea. Another visual picture contained in this story concerns the fact that the Roman Legion in charge of that part of the region had a boar's head as its insignia. Again it was a slightly tongue in cheek reminder that God's sovereignty was greater than the might of Rome. Pigs were sacrificed on altars to Zeus so the story of the Prodigal Son becomes far more poignant when we remember that the Jews were forbidden to eat pigs. The boy in the story had travelled across the Galilee to this region settled by gentiles who kept the pigs for sacrificing to Zeus. The father's grace and forgiveness becomes all the more profound when we understand just how far this boy had strayed, in Jewish eyes.

The Bible is, in many ways, like an onion that contains many layers. We can be content with peeling back the first or surface layer of understanding or we can take time, in the words of the Apostle Paul, to 'study to show ourselves workmen approved unto God'. It is only as we are willing to take time to explore the layers of biblical understanding that we will encounter the richness that is hidden there below the surface.

The Life & Times of Yeshua - The Messiah

by Jesma O'Hara