Baruch atah, YHini Eloheinu, Melech haolam, asher kid’shanu b’mitzvotav v’tzivanu laasok b’divrei Torah.
Blessed are You,
YHVH our Elohim, King of the universe, who has made us set apart through His commandments
and commanded us to engross ourselves in the words of the Torah. Blessed are
You, YHVH, Giver of the Torah – Amein.
כי־יקום בקרבך ‘’when there arises in your
midst ….
This Torah portion
of 21 verses is about YHVH testing how serious His people are about obeying,
guarding and doing His Torah.
Jer 6:16 Thus said יהוה,
“Stand in the ways and see, and ask for the old paths, where the good way is,
and walk in it; and find rest for yourselves. But they said, ‘We do not walk in
it.’
1Jn 2:19 They went out from us, but they were
not of us, for if they had been of us, they would have stayed with us – but in
order that it might be made manifest that none of them were of us.
In this verse we can assume that some believers (who
like to pick and choose what they will accept and reject in the Torah) will
leave groups that are passionate about obeying and walking in the light of all
of YHVH’s Torah.
כי־יקום בקרבך
‘’when there arises in your midst ….
Deu 13:1 “When there arises among you a
prophet or a dreamer of dreams, and he shall give you a sign or a wonder, (leaders
who profess they are the real deal – with amazing evidence)
Deu 13:2 and the sign or the wonder shall come
true, of which he has spoken to you, saying, ‘Let us go after other mighty ones
– which you have not known – and serve them,’
Deu 13:3 do not listen to the words of that prophet
or that dreamer of dreams, for יהוה your Elohim is trying you to know whether
you love יהוה
your Elohim with all your heart and with all your being. (false teachers
avoid the Torah or do violence to the Torah)
Mat
24:24 “For
false messiahs and false prophets shall arise, and they shall show great signs
and wonders, so as to lead astray, if possible, even the chosen ones.
Mat
24:25 “See, I have forewarned you. (false messiah’s or “anointed
ones’’ are able to speak with great authority and conviction)
Deu 13:4 “Walk after יהוה your Elohim and fear
Him, and guard His commands and obey His voice, and serve Him and cling to
Him.
Deu 13:5 “And that prophet or that dreamer of
dreams is put to death, because he has spoken apostasy against יהוה
your Elohim – who brought you out of the land of Mitsrayim and ransomed you
from the house of bondage – to make you stray from the way in which יהוה
your Elohim commanded you to walk. Thus you shall purge the evil from your
midst.
Deu 13:6 “When your brother, the son of your
mother, or your son or your daughter, or the wife of your bosom, or your friend
who is as your own being, entices you secretly, saying, ‘Let us go and serve
other mighty ones’– which you have not known, neither you nor your
fathers,
Deu 13:7 of the mighty ones of the people which are
all around you, near to you or far off from you, from one end of the earth to
the other end of the earth –
Deu 13:8 do not agree with him or listen to him,
nor shall your eye pardon him, nor spare him or conceal him,
Deu 13:9 but you shall certainly kill him. Your
hand is first against him to put him to death, and afterward the hand of all
the people,
Deu 13:10 and you shall stone him with stones until
he dies, because he sought to entice you away from יהוה your Elohim, who
brought you out of the land of Mitsrayim, from the house of bondage.
Deu 13:11 “And let all Yisra’ěl hear and fear, and
not again do any such evil matter as this in your midst.
Communities who have engrossed themselves in the study of
YHVH’s Torah will quickly recognize ‘’counterfeit’’ teachers who seek to
infiltrate their communities. These transgressors will be warned to repent or
face the consequences.
The problem is that our communities have become so
infiltrated by deception that it has become almost impossible to root out this
deception – See the parable of the weeds in Mat13:24-30.
The
prophet Jeremiah weeping for YHVH’s people expresses his grief in Jer
8:21 For the breach of the daughter of my people I have been broken. I
have grown sad; astonishment has taken hold of me. Jer 8:22 Is there
no balm in Gil‛aḏ, is there no healer there? Why has the healing of the daughter of my
people not come?
Jer
9:3 “And they bend their tongue like a bow. Falsehood, and not truth,
prevails on the earth. For they proceed from evil to evil, and they have not
known Me,” declares יהוה.
Jer
9:4 “Let everyone beware of his neighbour and not trust any brother. For
every brother catches by the heel, and every neighbour walks with
slanderers.
Jer
9:5 “And everyone deceives his neighbour, and no one speaks the truth.
They have taught their tongue to speak falsehood, and have wearied themselves
to crook.
Jer
9:6 “You live in the midst of deceit; through deceit they have refused to
know Me,” declares יהוה. Jer 9:7
Therefore thus said יהוה of hosts, “See, I shall
refine them, and shall try them, for what shall I do because of the daughter of
My people? Jer 9:12 Who is the wise man, that he understands this?
And to whom has the mouth of יהוה spoken, that he declares it? Why has the land perished, has it been
burned up like a wilderness, with none passing through? Jer 9:13 And
יהוה says, “Because they have forsaken
My Torah which I set before them, and have not obeyed My voice,a nor walked
according to it, Jer 9:14 but they have walked according to the
stubbornness of their own heart and after the Ba‛als, which their fathers had
taught them.”
How do we define deception? Yahshua Himself does so in
Mat 5:17
Mat
5:17 “Do not think that I came to destroy the Torah or the Prophets.e I
did not come to destroy but to complete.
Let us
look at this statement more closely in the Greek. – First of all there are 4
aorist Greek verbs in this sentence. We recall from our previous Torah portion
that an aorist Greek verb is a past tense verb in the process of awaiting its
complete fulfilment. It is ‘’undefined’’ and ‘’conditional’’in other words the
exact completion of the verb is yet to be fully revealed and its perfect
completion is guaranteed by YHVH Himself.
Concordant Literal Version (https://studybible.info/CLV) Mat 5:17 You
should not infer that I came to demolish the law or the prophets. I came not to
demolish, but to fulfill.
‘’infer’’ or ‘’nomikos’’ G3543 – ‘’ according (or pertaining) to law,’’
‘’do not think that the law can ever become unlawful’’ this Greek word is saying ‘’ you cant make
something unlawful that is lawful.
‘’demolish’’
or ‘’katalusai’’ G2647 ‘’ From G2596 and G3089;
to loosen down (disintegrate), that is, (by implication) to demolish
(literally or figuratively); specifically (compare G2646) to halt
for the night: - destroy, dissolve, be guest, lodge, come to nought, overthrow,
throw down.’’
‘’demolish’’
repeated twice in this verse 17.
‘’fulfil’’
or ‘’pieroo’’ G4137’’ ‘’ From G4134; to make
replete, that is, (literally) to cram (a net), level up (a
hollow), or (figuratively) to furnish (or imbue, diffuse, influence),
satisfy, execute (an office), finish (a period or task), verify
(or coincide with a prediction), etc.: - accomplish, X after, (be)
complete, end, expire, fill (up), fulfil, (be, make) full (come), fully preach,
perfect, supply.’’
One of
the most dangerous deceptions facing mankind is that the Torah is for the Jews
and the New Testament is for the Christians. The question then remains, who was
Yahshua addressing in Mat 5:17-19? There are more references to the Torah in
the NT than in OT.
This
diminishing of the Torah will result in the destruction of this world – see
Isaiah 24.
Deu 13:12 “When you hear someone in one of your
cities, which יהוה
your Elohim gives you to dwell in, saying,
Deu 13:13 Some men, sons of Beliya‛al, have gone
out of your midst and led the inhabitants of their city astray, saying, “Let us
go and serve other mighty ones” ’ – mighty ones whom you have not known –
Deu 13:14 then you shall inquire, search out, and
ask diligently. And see if the matter is true and established that this
abomination was done in your midst,
‘’Sons of Belial’’ – Meaning Worthlessness,
Obsolete, Beyond Purpose
Etymology From the noun בליעל (belial),
worthlessness, from the verb בלה (bala),
to wear out.
Related names • Via בלה (bala): Babel
A less accepted theory is that belial comes
from beli 'ol, meaning “without yoke”; the definition would remain
about the same, however: a “son of Belial” would be someone who is “lawless” or
“rebellious.”’’
Deu 13:15 you shall certainly strike the
inhabitants of that city with the edge of the sword, putting it under the ban,
and all that is in it and its livestock, with the edge of the sword.
Deu 13:16 “And gather all its plunder into the
middle of the street, and completely burn with fire the city and all its
plunder, before יהוה
your Elohim. And it shall be a heap forever, never to be built again.
Deu 13:17 “And none of that which is put under the
ban is to cling to your hand, so that יהוה turns from the
fierceness of His displeasure and shall show you compassion, love you and
increase you, as He swore to your fathers,
Deu 13:18 when you obey the voice of יהוה
your Elohim, to guard all His commands which I command you today, to do what is
right in the eyes of יהוה
your Elohim.
Clean
and Unclean Food
Deu 14:1 “You are the children of יהוה
your Elohim. Do not cut yourselves nor shave the front of your head for the
dead,
Deu 14:2 for you are a set-apart people to יהוה
your Elohim, and יהוה
has chosen you to be a people for Himself, a treasured possession above all the
peoples who are on the face of the earth.
Deu 14:3 “Do not eat whatever is abominable.
Paul
confessed the following about his dedication to the Torah -Act 24:14 “And
this I confess to you, that according to the Way which they call a sect, so I
worship the Elohim of my fathers, Exo_3:15 believing (Gk
‘’avowing’’) all that has been written in the Torah and in the Prophets.
2Co 6:14 Do not become unevenly yoked with
unbelievers (Gk ‘’apistos’’ disobedient) For what partnership has righteousness
and lawlessness? And what fellowship has light with darkness?
2Co 6:15 And what agreement has Messiah with
Beliya‛al? Or what part does a believer have with an unbeliever?
2Co 6:16 And what union has the Dwelling Place of
Elohim with idols? For you are a Dwelling Place of the living Elohim, as Elohim
has said, “I shall dwell in them and
walk among them, and I shall be their Elohim, and they shall be My people.”a
Lev_26:12 Footnote: aSee also Exo_29:45, Lev_26:12, Jer_31:1,
Ezk_37:27.
2Co 6:17 Therefore,
“Come out from among them and be separate, says יהוה, and do not touch what is unclean, and I
shall receive you. Isa_52:11.
2Co 6:18 “And
I shall be a Father to you, and you shall be sons and daughters to Me, says יהוה the Almighty.” Isa_43:6, Hos_1:10.
2Jn
1:9 Everyone who is transgressing and not staying in the teaching of
Messiah does not possess Elohim.b The one who stays in the teaching of Messiah
possesses both the Father and the Son.c Footnotes: b 1Ti_6:3. cSee 1Jn_1:3,
1Jn_2:22, 1Jn_5:20.
2Jn 1:10
If anyone comes to you and does not bring this teaching, do not receive him
into your house nor greet him,
2Jn
1:11 for he who greets him shares in his wicked works.
Tit
3:9 But keep away from foolish questions, and genealogies, and strife and
quarrels about the Torah, for they are unprofitable and useless.
Tit
3:10 Reject a divisive man after the first and second warning,
Tit
3:11 knowing that such a one has been perverted, and sins, being
self-condemned.
Our
response to our situation in the light of the coming judgment: A plea for
mercy.
Isa
64:4 Since the beginning of the ages they have not heard nor perceived by
the ear, nor has the eye seen any Elohim besides You, who acts for those who
wait for Him.
Isa
64:5 You shall meet him who rejoices and does righteousness, who
remembers You in Your ways. See, You were wroth when we sinned in them a long
time. And should we be saved?
Isa
64:6 And all of us have become as one unclean, and all our
righteousnesses are as soiled rags. And all of us fade like a leaf, and our
crookednesses, like the wind, have taken us away.
Isa 64:7 And there is no one who calls on Your
Name, who stirs himself up to be strengtheneda in You; for You have hidden Your
face from us, and have consumed us because of our crookednesses. Footnote:
aCommonly understood as “Take hold of.”
Isa 64:8 And now, O יהוה, You are our Father.
We are the clay, and You our potter. And we are all the work of Your
hand.
Isa 64:9 Do not be wroth, O יהוה, nor remember
crookedness forever. See, please look, all of us are Your people!
Isa 64:10 Your set-apart cities have become a
wilderness, Tsiyon has become a wilderness, Yerushalayim a waste.
Isa 64:11 Our set-apart and comely House, where our
fathers praised You, has been burned up with fire. And all that we treasured
has become a ruin.
Isa 64:12 In view of all this, would You restrain
Yourself, O יהוה?
Would You keep silent and afflict us beyond measure?
Mat
24:22 “And if those days were not shortened, no flesh would be saved, but
for the sake of the chosen ones those days shall be shortened.
Blessed are you
YHVH, our Elohim, King of the Universe, you have given us your Torah of truth
and have planted everlasting life within our midst. Blessed are you, YHVH giver
of the Torah – Amein.