Shiqquts and Thoebah    dareze vewy 

 

 

Shiqquts is defined by Klein’s Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the Hebrew Language, as abomination, idol, from the root shiqtsu – to detest, to make abominable, defiling, also, an unclean animal. Thoebah is defined as abomination, horrible deed, shameful vice, idolatry, idols, detestable things. The similarity between the two is almost interchangeable at times and many translators have used them as such. Both are also terms that are at least from just prior to the exile to after it. While there are just over 2 dozen verses for shiqquts, there are a little over 100 verses for thoebah, the bulk of which occur in the book of Yechezqel [Ezekiel], written about the exile. In these passages, I have translated shiqquts as abomination and thoebah as detestable things. Abominations and detestable things are part of the  stumbling blocks that need to be removed to walk with YHWH.

 

Shiqquts

The first use of shiqquts is in the book of HaDebariym [Deuteronomy] 29:17, 18, refers to the goyim [nations] as the Hebrews passed through Kenaan, after leaving Mitsrayim [Egypt], ^{“ ‘}and you have seen their abominations, and their hewn idols of wood and stone, silver and gold, which were among them; that there not be among you man or woman, family or tribe whose heart turns away today from YHWH our elohey to go and serve the elohey of those goyim, otherwise there will be among you today a root that bears gall and wormwood’ ” From the context, the abomination is not clearly defined, nor is it clear if the idols mentioned are part of the abominations. What is obvious is that the abomination is a contributing factor in leading an individual or family’s heart away from YHWH.

 

The next time we see the word, it is in reference to the idolatry of King Shlomoh [Solomon], I Melekiym [Kings] 11:5-10, “ and shlomoh went after ashthoreth, goddess of the tsidoniym [sidonians], and after milkom, the abomination of the ammoniym [ammonites]; and shlomoh did the evil, in the eyes of YHWH and did not fully go after YHWH as dawiyd his father.  then shlomoh built a high place for kemosh, the abomination of moab, in the hill that is before yerushalaim, and for molek, the abomination of the sons of ammon; and so he did for all his foreign wives who burned incense and sacrificed to their elohey. and YHWH was angry with shlomoh, for he had inclined his heart from YHWH elohey of yisrael, who had appeared to him twice. and he had commanded to him about this thing, not to go after other elohiym, but he did not observe that which YHWH commanded.” This passage does relate the idols as being abominations. The third use is of the reforms made under King YoshiYahu [Josiah], which does associate generally with idols, II Melekiym 23:24, “and also the mediums and the familiar spirits and the therafiym [healing idols], and the hewn idols, and all the abominations that were seen in the land of yahudah and in yerushalaim, yoshiyahu [josiah] put away in order to fulfill the words of the thorah that were written in the book that chilqiyahu [hilkiah] the kohen [priest] had found in the beyth [house] YHWH.”

 

Two verses in YirmeYahu [Jeremiah] also lend strength to looking at abominations as being a physical idol. YirmeYahu 7:30,  “ ‘for the sons of yahudah have done evil in my eyes, says YHWH. they have set their abominations in the beyth [house] on which is called my name, in order to defile it.’ “ YirmeYahu 16:18,  “ ‘and first i will repay double their iniquity and their sin, because they have defiled my land with the bodies of their abominations. their detestable things have filled my inheritance.’ “

 

If an abomination is just a physical statue of a false elohey, the abomination is not just the item, but the worship, the belief system created for it. The above passages used words such as serve, go after, done evil, burned incense and sacrificing to these abominations. This is an active practice, not a passive having a statue in the house for decoration. Not that I am advocating that by any means, but simply making an observation that the abomination is high maintenance.

 

Probably the most well known verse, at least amongst Christians dealing with “prophecy”, is the abomination that causes desolation, in the book of Daniyel. Daniyel 9:27,  “and he will confirm a covenant with the many for one week. and in the middle of the week he will cause the sacrifice and the offering to cease. and on a corner of the altar will be abominations that desolate, even until the end. and that which was decreed will pour out on the desolator.” Daniyel 12:11,  “and from the time the regular sacrifice will be taken away, and the abomination that desolates set up, a thousand, two hundred and ninety days will occur.” Most who look at this passage as prophecy, believe it to foretell of Antiochus Epiphanes, the Selucid monarch, who violently forced hellenization on the Hebrews. In 167 BCE,  he desecrated the Second Temple, by erecting a pagan altar to Zeus Olympius, on the altar of burnt offering and sacrificed a pig on it – an abomination that causes desolation. Knowing that the book of Daniyel was written after the events and not foretelling of it, the passage still refers to the specified event and is an example of the post-exilic use of shiqquts.

 

In the book of Hoshea, we see another example of an idol, but this time, the reference to the abomination is not just to the idol, but the people that worshipped it. osheaHoshea

HosheaHoshea 9:10, “ ‘i found yisrael like grapes in the wilderness. i saw your fathers as the firstfruit in the fig tree at her first time. they came to baal feor and set themselves apart to shame. and they became abominations like that which they loved.’ “ 

 

 

Thoebah

 

The first 3 verses (Bereshiyth [Genesis] 43:32, 46:34, Shemoth [Exodus] 8:26), listed in the bible, do not list what is considered detestable to YHWH, but rather that the practices of the Ibriym [Hebrews] were detestable to Mitsrayim [Egypt]. It is not until the book of Wayyiqra [Leviticus] that we see a passage that ascribes something as being detestable in the eyes of YHWH. In this particular case, it is chapter 18, dealing with what is considered sexual immorality. Chapter 20 is basically a repeat, but with punishments attached for the offenses.

 

18  ¹ and YHWH spoke to mosheh, saying,  ² speak to the sons of yisrael and say to them, i am YHWH your elohey.  ³ like the deeds of the land of mitsrayim which you lived in, you will not do; and like the deeds of the land of kenaan which i am bringing you there, you will not do; and in their rules you will not walk.  ⁴ you will do my judgments and you will keep my rules, to walk in them; i am YHWH your elohey,  ⁵ and you will keep my rules and my judgments, which if a man does, he will live by them. i am YHWH.  ⁶ any man to any relative of his flesh you will not draw near to uncover nakedness; i am YHWH.  ⁷ the nakedness of your father and the nakedness of your mother you will not uncover; she is your mother; you will not uncover her nakedness.  ⁸ the nakedness of the wife of your father you will not uncover; it is the nakedness of your father.  ⁹ the nakedness of your sister, the daughter of your father, or the daughter of your mother, born of the beyth, or born away; you will not uncover their nakedness.  ¹⁰ the nakedness of the daughter of your son, or the daughter of your daughter; you will  not uncover their nakedness, for theirs is your own nakedness.  ¹¹ the nakedness of the daughter of the wife of your father, birthed by your father, she is your sister; you will not uncover her nakedness.  ¹² the nakedness of a sister of your father you will not uncover; she is a relative of your father.  ¹³ the nakedness of the sister of your mother you will not uncover; for she is the relative of your mother.  ¹⁴ the nakedness of the brother of your father you will not uncover; to his wife you will not draw near; she is your aunt.  ¹⁵ the nakedness of your daughter in law you will not uncover; the wife of your son she is; you will not uncover her nakedness.  ¹⁶ the nakedness of the wife of your brother you will not uncover; it is the nakedness of your brother.  ¹⁷ the nakedness of a wife  and her daughter you will not uncover; you will not undertake to uncover the daughter of her son, or the  daughter of her daughter; they are her relatives; it is wickedness.  ¹⁸ and a wife with her sister you will not take, to vex her, to uncover her nakedness, beside the other in her lifetime.  ¹⁹ and to a woman in her menstrual impurity you will not draw near to uncover the nakedness.  ²⁰ and to the wife of your neighbor you will not give your semen by lying with her, for uncleanness with her.  ²¹ your seed you will not give to pass them through to molek, nor will you pollute the name of your elohey; i am YHWH.  ²² and with a male you will not lie as one lies with a woman; it is a detestable thing.  ²³ and with any animal you will not give your semen, for uncleanness with it. and a woman will not stand before an animal to lie down with it; it is a shameful mixing.  ²⁴ do not defile yourself with all these, for with all these the goyim have been defiled, which i am casting out before you;  ²⁵ and defiled is the land, and i will visit its iniquity on it; and the land is vomiting out those living in it;  ²⁶ and you, you will observe my rules and my judgments, and will not do any of all these detestable things; neither the native nor the ger who is staying in your midst.  ²⁷ for all these detestable things the men of the land who are before you have done, and the land is defiled.  ²⁸ do not do these otherwise the land vomit you out for your defiling it, as it has vomited out the goy that was before you.  ²⁹ for all who do any of these detestable things, even the beings who are doing them, will be cut off from the midst of their people.  ³⁰ and you will observe my charge, so as not to do any of the detestable things which were committed before you; and you will not defile yourselves with them; i am YHWH your elohey.

 

In HaDebariym [Deuteronomy] 14, we have a list of unclean animals that are not to be eaten, in accordance with the dietary laws. To do so is thoebah – detestable.  HaDebariym 14:3-21, " '³ you will not eat any detestable thing.  ⁴ this the beast which you may eat, ox, lamb of the sheep, or kid of the goats,  ⁵ hart, and roe, and fallow deer, and wild goat, and antelope, and wild ox, and chamois.  ⁶ and every beast dividing the hoof, and cleaving the cleft into two hoofs, bringing up the cud, among the beasts, it you may eat.  ⁷ only, this you will not eat, of those bringing up the cud, and of those dividing the cloven hoof, the camel, and the hare, and the rabbit, for they are bringing up the cud but the hoof have not divided; unclean they to you.  ⁸ and the sow, for it is dividing the hoof, and not up the cud, unclean it to you; of their flesh you do not eat, and against their carcass you do not come.  ⁹ this you may eat of all that in the waters; all that has fins and scales you may eat.  ¹⁰ and anything which has not fins and scales you will not eat; unclean it to you.  ¹¹ any clean bird you may eat. ¹² and these are they of which you will not eat, the eagle, and the black vulture, and the bearded vulture.  ¹³ and the hawk, and the falcons, and the kite after its kind.  ¹⁴ and every raven after its kind.  ¹⁵ and the ostrich, and the nighthawk, and the sea gull, and the hawk after its kind.  ¹⁶ the little owl, and the eared owl, and the swan.  ¹⁷ and the pelican, and the gier-eagle, and the cormorant.  ¹⁸ and the stork, and the heron after its kind, and the lapwing, and the bat.  ¹⁹ and every teeming thing which is flying, unclean it to you; they are not eaten.  ²⁰ any clean fowl you may eat.  ²¹ you will not eat of any carcass; to the ger who is within your gates you may give it, and he has eaten it; or sell to a stranger; for a set apart people you to YHWH your elohey; you will not boil a kid in its mother's milk.' "

 

Another smaller list, one dealing with various forms of “witchcraft” is HaDebariym  18, " ' ⁹ when you are coming in to the land which YHWH your elohey is giving to you, you will not learn to do according to the detestable ways of those goyim.  ¹⁰ there will not be found among you one who passes his son and his daughter through the fire, a user of divinations, an observer of clouds, and an enchanter, and a sorcerer,  ¹¹ or a charmer, or one asking of familiar spirits, and a wizard, or one seeking to the dead.  ¹² for YHWH detests every one doing these, and because of these detestable ways is YHWH, your elohey, dispossessing them from your presence.' "

 

The next grouping of detestable things occurs in the book of Mishley [Proverbs], though these are not all listed together, but spread out in the book. Practices detestable/hated by YHWH – Mishley 3:32 the perverse one, 6:16-19 high eyes, a lying tongue, hands shedding innocent blood, a heart that plots evil plans, feet hurrying to run to evil, a lying witness breathing lies, and one sending out strife between brothers, 11:1 false balances, 11:20 a perverse heart, 12:22 lips of falsehood, 15:8,9 sacrifices of the wicked and way of the wicked, 15:26 evil thoughts, 16:5 proud of heart, 16:12 kings committing wickedness, 17:15 those justifying the wicked and condemning the just, 20:23 differing weights and differing measures, 28:9 the prayer of one who turns his ear from hearing the thorah, 29:27 an unjust man.

 

 

YeshaYahu [Isaiah] has an interesting list which speaks to religious practices that are generally not questioned by those following them, 1:13-20, “ ‘¹³ do not add to bringing vain sacrifice; its incense is a detestable thing to me. i cannot endure the new moon and shabbath, the going to meeting, and the evil assembly.  ¹⁴ my being hates your new moons and your moadey [appointments]. they are a burden to me. i am weary of bearing them.  ¹⁵ and when you spread out your hands, i will hide my eyes from you. also, when you multiply prayer, i will not hear. your hands are full of blood.  ¹⁶  wash yourselves, purify yourselves. put away the evil of your doings from my sight; stop doing evil.  ¹⁷ learn to do good, seek justice, straighten the oppressor, judge the orphan, strive for the widow.  ¹⁸ come now and let us reason together, says YHWH, though your sins are as scarlet, they will be white as snow; though they are red as the crimson, they will be like wool.  ¹⁹ if you are willing and hear, you will eat the good of the land.  ²⁰ but if you refuse and rebel, you will be devoured with the sword; for the mouth of YHWH has spoken.’ “ 

 

On a similar note is one of the shiqquts passages, in YeshaYahu 66:3, “ ‘ ritually slaughtering the bull is as striking a man; sacrificing the lamb is as breaking the neck of a dog; offering the grain/ meal offering is as blood of swine; recording/ remembering the moon is as blessing vanity/evil, also they have chosen their way and in their abominations their being delights.’ “

 

Before going any further, we need to address several matters in the two preceding passages. The sons of Yisrael left Mitsrayim [Egypt]. They were told not to follow the practices of Mitsrayim. As they came into Kenaan, they were told not to follow the practices of the people of the land they were entering. Supposedly, YHWH gave Mosheh a system of worship that He required of the people to follow, involving a tabernacle with a holy of holies in it, a priesthood, sacrifices and offerings and tithes. But if you read very carefully, you will see that there are a number of different schools of writing taking place, some of which contradict the others. Most scholars label these different schools Y/J [Yahwist/Jehovah], E [Elohiym], D [Deuteronomist], P [Priestly] and H [Holiness]. When you see the patterns of the writers, you can identify which school is writing and what their agenda is. This is explained further in an independent study.

 

Another matter to be addressed are the practices that the people of YHWH are supposedly to follow. Whether or not you follow a Hebraic way of life, Judaism, Christianity, Islam, all of these belief systems carry on many of the same elements. The new moons mentioned above are part of the system called moadiym, which means appointments. These moadiym are the appointed times to meet with YHWH. They are supposed to be sited by a lunar moon system and then counted off to determine which appointment falls on which day. For example: you site the first light of the new moon to determine the beginning of the month, in this example, we will take the new year, which begins in the spring, mid-March to early April. From that new moon, that is the first day of the month, you then count 14 days and that evening, the 15^th day, you slaughter the Pesach [Passover]. This also begins the 7 days of the Chag HaMatstsoth [Feast of Unleavened Bread]. The Shabbath that occurs during this feast, you then count 50 days and that is the Chag HaShabuoth [Feast of Weeks]. The new moons were celebrated as a feast themselves.

 

The passage in YeshaYahu also mentions that YHWH cannot endure the Shabbath. The Shabbath is a day of rest. There is the 7^th day Shabbath, in which no occupational work is done and some observe that absolutely no work of any kind should be done. This study is not going to go into all the details of each shabbath and feast, just a general overview for now, to see what we are dealing with. There is also the shabbath of each feast day, where again, no occupational work is to be done.

 

YHWH, according to this passage, cannot endure their evil assembly, hates the moadey [appointments]. Neither is He going to hear their prayers. Yet, these are all parts of the Hebraic worship system supposedly given to Mosheh, who gave them to the people. So what is going on with this passage? How can YHWH hate what He gave to Mosheh to give to the people, which has been passed on for thousands of years? Or do we need eyes to see and ears to hear that we may see and perceive and hear and understand? There just may be more to this system than meets the eye. The second passage of YeshaYahu is worse, YeshaYahu 66:3, “ ‘ ritually slaughtering the bull is as striking a man; sacrificing the lamb is as breaking the neck of a dog; offering the grain/ meal offering is as blood of swine; recording/ remembering the moon is as blessing vanity/evil, also they have chosen their way and in their abominations their being delights.’ “

 

The sacrificing of bulls, lambs, grain and meal offerings was all part of the priestly system. The priests also calculated [recorded] the moons to determine the feasts. Yet in this passage, YHWH is saying that the sacrificing of a bull is the same thing as striking down a man and killing him – murder. Sacrificing a lamb is the same thing as the Canaanite practice of breaking a dogs neck to their deities. Offering the grain/meal offering is the same as offering up the blood of a swine, which is an unclean animal and used by other nations in their worship, such as that mentioned earlier by Antiochus Epiphanes in the “abomination that causes desolation”. And recording the moon, calculating it, is as blessing something which is evil and should never be blessed. He says that they have chosen these ways and delight in them. But aren’t these the practices that YHWH supposedly gave to the people to observe? How then can they be abominations and detestable? Let us look further into the book of YirmeYahu [Jeremiah] and see if we can acquire any clarity into the matter.

 

Because of so many mistranslations out there, that minimize, if not in fact hide what the true word of YHWH says, I feel the need to post these passages in their entirety, so that nothing is lost. You will see a growing disparity of what YHWH wants and what has been said of Him that He wants. Much like a child going to his mother and saying his father said he could do something, when in fact, the father knows nothing of the situation at all. Authority figures have always been misappropriated to lend weight to a position. Please be patient and read carefully, remembering that the original Hebrew did not have chapter divisions.

 

7  ¹  the word that came to yirmeyahu from YHWH, saying,  ² stand in the gate of the beyth YHWH and call out there this word, and say, hear the word of YHWH all yahudah, who enter in at these gates to worship YHWH.  ³ so says YHWH tsebaoth, the elohey of yisrael, do good ways and your plans, and i will let you dwell in this place.  ⁴ do not trust yourself to words of the liar, saying, the heykal of YHWH. the heykal of YHWH. this is the heykal of YHWH.  ⁵ for if you thoroughly do good your ways and your plans; if you truly do justice between a man and his neighbor;  ⁶ if you do not oppress the ger, the orphan, and the widow; and innocent blood you do not shed in this place, or go after other elohiym to your evil;  ⁷ then i will let you dwell in this place, in the land that i gave to your fathers, from forever and to forever.  ⁸ look, you trust for yourself on words of the liar without being of use.  ⁹ will you steal, murder, and commit adultery, and swear falsely, and burn incense to baal, and walk after other elohiym whom you do not know?  ¹⁰ and will you then come and stand before my face in this beyth on which my name is called, and say, we are rescued in order to do all those abominations.  ¹¹ has this beyth on which my name is called become the cave of breachers/breakers in your eyes? look, even i have seen, declares YHWH.  ¹² but go now to my place which was in shiylo, where i made my name dwell at the first, and see what i did to it for the evil of my people yisrael.  ¹³ and now, because you have done all these works, says YHWH, and i spoke to you, rising up early and speaking, but you did not hear.  i called you, but you did not answer.  ¹⁴ and i will do to the beyth on which my name is called, in which you are trusting, and to the place which i gave to you and to your fathers, as i have done to shiylo.  ¹⁵ and i will cast you out from my face as i cast out all your brothers, all the seed of efrayim.  ¹⁶ and you, do not pray for this people; do not lift up cry or prayer for them. do not intercede with me, for i do not hear you.  ¹⁷ do you not see what they are doing in the cities of yahudah and in the streets of yerushalaim?  ¹⁸ the sons gather wood, and the fathers kindle the fire, and the women knead dough, to make cakes for melketh hashamayim [queen of the heavens], and to pour out drink offerings to other elohiym, that they may provoke me.  ¹⁹ do they provoke me, says YHWH? is it not themselves, to the shame of their own faces?  ²⁰ so the adonay YHWH says this, look, my anger and my fury will be poured out on this place, on man and on animal, and on the trees of the field, and on the fruit of the ground. and it will burn and will not be put out.  ²¹ so says YHWH tsebaoth, the elohey of yisrael, add your burnt offerings to your sacrifices and eat flesh.  ²² for i did not speak to your fathers, nor command them in the day that i brought them out from the land of mitsrayim, concerning matters of burnt offerings and slaughterings.  ²³ but i commanded them this thing, saying, obey my voice, and i will be to you for elohiym, and you will be my people. also, walk in all the ways that i have commanded you, so that it may be well with you.  ²⁴ but they did not listen nor bow their ear. but the walked in their own schemes, in the domination of their evil heart, and went backward and not forward.  ²⁵ since the day that your fathers came out of the land of mitsrayim until this day, i have even sent to you all my servants, the nebiyiym, daily rising up early and sending.  ²⁶ yet they did not listen to me nor bow their ear, but they stiffened their neck. they did more evil than their fathers.  ²⁷ and you will speak all these words to them, but they will not listen to you. and you will call to them, but they will not answer you.  ²⁸ but you will say to them, this is the goy that does not obey the voice of YHWH their elohey, nor receive instruction. truth has perished, and it is cut off from their mouth.  ²⁹ cut off your crown and throw it away, and lift up a dirge on the heights. for YHWH has rejected and forsaken the generation of his wrath.  ³⁰ for the sons of yahudah have done evil in my eyes, says YHWH. they have set their abominations in the beyth on which is called my name, in order to defile it.  ³¹ they have built the high places of the thofeth in the valley of ben hinnom, to burn their sons and their daughters in the fire, which i did not command, nor did it come into my heart.  ³² so, look, the days come, declares YHWH, when it will no more be called thofeth, or the valley of ben hinnom, but the valley of hahargah [the slaughter/murder]. for they will bury in thofeth from lack of a place.  ³³ and the bodies of this people will be food for the birds of the heavens, and for the beasts of the earth; and no one will frighten them away.  ³⁴ then i will cause the voice of gladness to cease from the cities of yahudah and from the streets of yerushalaim, even the voice of joy, and the voice of the bridegroom, and the voice of the bride. for the land will become a waste.

 

 

 

Now to address these additional issues.

 

YHWH is saying that they are trusting to the liar, saying that the Heykal, which is an Aramaic word for temple/palace, is going to save them. So now we have added the temple to the list of other practices involving the priesthood, that has been passed down.  Again, the verse saying that they should take care of the widow, the orphan and the ger, is brought up in contradiction to the ways these people are practicing. We will see this pattern repeated. In verse 12, YHWH recounts to them a situation of the first place where the tabernacle was set up, Shiylo, before Dawiyd and Shlomoh built a temple. He points out that due to the evil of the people, He destroyed the tabernacle at Shiylo, just as He is going to destroy the temple that these people are trusting in.

 

In verse 22 YHWH addresses the subject of the sacrifices, “ ‘for i did not speak to your fathers, nor command them in the day that i brought them out from the land of mitsrayim, concerning matters of burnt offerings and slaughterings.  ²³ but i commanded them this thing, saying, obey my voice, and i will be to you for elohiym, and you will be my people. also, walk in all the ways that i have commanded you, so that it may be well with you.  ²⁴ but they did not listen nor bow their ear. but the walked in their own schemes, in the domination of their evil heart, and went backward and not forward.’ “ Do you see what He is saying? YHWH did not direct the people that He made a covenant with, to make sacrifices. He told them to obey His thorah, His teachings, which did not have anything to do with a substitute for the real relationship that He was trying to have with them. But they did not listen to Him and came up with their own form of worship, ascribing it to Mosheh for authority, if it was not Mosheh that did the directing, which is another sacred cow.  In this form of worship, sacrificing, they went backward from the way of YHWH and did not go forward on this journey with Him.

 

At this point, if not sooner, many of you are probably wondering why you have never heard these verses. You are questioning that if these verses are true that these things are an abomination to YHWH, why does it say elsewhere that YHWH said to do these things? The two beliefs cannot stand side by side. One of them is lying. That is what we are going to determine. What is the lie and what is the truth.

 

In chapter 8, YHWH is laying the blame right at the feet, where it belongs, the kings, the rulers, the priests and the prophets. Their bones will be spread out before the sun, the moon and the stars of the heavens that these people worshipped, instead of walking with YHWH. He says that they hold fast to deceit and refuse to return. YHWH asks, “ ‘⁸ how do you say, we are wise, and the thorath of YHWH is with us? look, the lying pen of the scribes has certainly worked deceit.’ “ The scribes were a powerful group of people, handling the transmission of laws, “history” and teachings. They are mentioned with the Farushiym [Pharisees] in the testimonies of Yahusha [Jesus]. The people are trusting in this Thorah of YHWH, just as they said they trusted in the temple. Only, YHWH points out that the lying pen of the scribe has handled His word falsely and what they are putting their trust in, is a deception. Another sacred cow, or rather I should say, stumbling block – the BIBLE.

 

YirmeYahu [Jeremiah] 6:13-15, “ ‘¹³ for everyone from the least of them even to the greatest of them cuts off a profit. and from the nabiy [prophet] even to the kohen [priest], everyone deals falsely.  ¹⁴ they have also healed the break of my people slightly, saying, shalom, shalom, when there is no shalom.  ¹⁵ were they ashamed for the detestable things they made? they were not at all ashamed, nor did they know to blush. so they will fall among those who fall. at the time i visit them, they will be cast down,’ says YHWH.” This passage points out that prophet and the priest are dealing falsely, that they are taking a severe wound and basically putting a band aid on it, saying shalom [peace, wholeness], when there is no wholeness. These spiritual leaders made detestable things and were not the least bit ashamed, in fact, they had lost the ability to feel shame and even blush.

 

YirmeYahu 5:25-31, “ ‘²⁵ your iniquities have turned away these things, and your sins have withheld good from you.  ²⁶ for among my people are found wicked ones. they lie in wait, as one who sets snares. they set a trap, they catch men.  ²⁷ like a cage full of birds, so their houses are full of treachery. on account of this they have become great and grown rich.  ²⁸ they have become fat; they shine. yes, they pass over the deeds of the evil; they do not judge the cause of the orphan, that they may prosper. and they do not vindicate the right of the needy.  ²⁹ will i not visit for these things, declares YHWH? will not my being be avenged on such a goy as this?  ³⁰ an astounding and horrible thing has happened in the land.  ³¹ the nebiyiym [prophets] foretell falsely, and the kohaniym [priests] rule by their hands; and my people love it so. and what will you do at the end of it?’ “

 

There is a common denominator in a number of passages, of these ways of YHWH, involving what are termed the 10 commandments, involving laws to follow only YHWH, no images of Him in any fashion, to idols of false elohey and laws of how to treat your fellow man. He frequently mentions the treatment of the widows, the orphans and the ger. Is it any surprise that if YHWH did not want any images of Him, that He would also not set up a religious system that did not require a real relationship with Him? It does not matter what the system is, whether Hebraic, involving a priesthood; Rabbinic, involving traditions of rabbis passed down; Christian, involving substituting the son for the Father. Are we to be a people of sacrificing a bull to atone for sins, instead of learning to stop sinning? Are we to be a people of believing that grace wipes everything away and all you have to do is ask for forgiveness every time you repeatedly commit the same sin? Are we to be a people of selling of indulgences to profit from one another’s sins? Are we to be a people that substitutes a real relationship, such as the loving intimacy of a husband and wife, for that of a man and a prostitute? You cant pay for YHWH. That is not the way of YHWH, nor the way of those who bear His Name.

 

 

While these subjects may shock some, it is necessary to remove the stumbling blocks from the way of YHWH, that is if you truly desire to fellowship with Him. You should never fear to question, it is not blasphemy as some would have you believe. YHWH is bigger than that. Following studies will be dealing in detail with the subjects of idolatry, the priesthood and its practices, the temple, the king, the  bible  and the moadiym. Please do not assume that I believe all are outright detestable. We need to weed things out, clear the obstacles from the path, seek the truth. If, on the other hand, you are quite comfortable with practices that are abominations and detestable things, in the eyes of YHWH, then by all means, continue in your shame and go backwards, stumble on the obstacles, be caught in the traps and never know the shalom of YHWH. I would hope though,  that you would have the courage to seek truth.

 

YirmeYahu 4  ¹ if you will return, yisrael, says YHWH, return to me. and if you will turn away from your abominations from my face and will not waver,  ² and you will swear,  YHWH exists/lives, in truth, in justice, and in righteousness; even the goyim will bless themselves in him, and in him they will praise.