by Les Aron Gosling, Rebbe (e-mail: info@biblicalresearchinstitute.com.au, of:
Copyright © BRI 1996
All Rights Reserved Worldwide
"Morrie, what's up? You look as though the cares of the world are on your shoulders."
"Solly, the worst has happened. You know my son, Lou, the best son a man ever had? He worked hard, passed all his exams to medical school. Became the best surgeon in this city. I sent him to Israel as a reward and what happens? He comes back a goy. I'm going to the rabbi to ask advice."
"Funny you should tell me this, Morrie, but you know my son Leon? A better son wasn't known of. Works hard, passes all his exams to law school. Graduates top of the class. Becomes the best lawyer in the country. To reward him I sent him to Israel. What happens? He comes back a goy. I'll come to the rabbi with you."
They go to the rabbi, tell their story and the rabbi says: "Oy vey! Do I know how you feel? Mine son, Moishe, works hard, passes all his exams to become a rabbi. Becomes the best Talmudist in the country. As a prize I sent him to Israel and he comes back a goy!"
The three men decide to make a pilgrimage to Jerusalem to pray for God's guidance at the Wailing Wall. They arrive at the Wall, and tell God their sad stories, when all of a sudden there's a tremendous clap of thunder and a terrible voice comes down from the sky: "You think you've got problems? I have this fine son called Yeshua, he goes into the family business, I send him to Israel to be the Messiah, and you know what? He comes back a goy!"
Since 1981 the BRI has not been backward in aggressively trampling underfoot the hideous (but still widely popular) religious caricature palmed off by the Dark Lord as the Jewish Messiah and Saviour of the world. The false portrait of the Messiah began to emerge during the days of the rise of the Constantinian church, when Satanic stooges replaced the Jewish Messiah with an effeminate Gentile Christ. Indeed, the roots of apostasy initially sprang up among the Christians even prior to the fall of Jerusalem in 70 CE. Rav Shaul [Paul] warned his disciples at Corinth, "If he that comes preaches ANOTHER Yeshua whom we have not preached, or if you receive ANOTHER SPIRIT, which you have not received [i.e., from Paul and his associates] or ANOTHER GOSPEL, which you have not accepted, you can well put up with me!" (2 Cor 11:4). And again, "For I know this, that after my departure [his death] shall grievous wolves enter in among you not sparing the flock! Also OF YOUR OWN SELVES, shall men arise, speaking perverse things" -- yes, preaching about a Messiah or Christ who NEVER existed -- "to draw away talmidim [disciples, students] after them!" (Acts 20:29-30).
Paul went on to add that he had warned the Messianic Movement "night and day" for three whole years about the emerging conspiracy against God's truth (Acts 20:31). For the sake of a personal following and the fringe benefits of a financially secure vocation, some of Paul's own Messianic administrators would be willing to sell out to Satan's own personal ministry. And it happened exactly as the great apostle warned!
Church historian Hurlbut recognises, "For fifty years after St. Paul's life A CURTAIN HANGS OVER THE CHURCH THROUGH WHICH WE STRIVE VAINLY TO LOOK; and when at last it rises... with the writings of the earliest church fathers, we find a church in many respects VERY DIFFERENT from that in the days of Peter and Paul" (J.L. Hurlbut, The Story of the Christian Church, 1982 [reprint] 41).
The original subterfuge was subtle in the extreme. Our Lord Yeshua had predicted that these representatives of Satan's fifth column would be actively witnessing to the fact that he -- the Messiah -- WAS the Son of God, and yet be completely engaged in a diabolical work of deception.
"And Yeshua... said unto them, Take heed that NO man deceive you. Formany shall come in MY name [in the Messiah's own name, claiming the signal authority of the Jewish Messiah and the Saviour of the world] saying I AM CHRIST [attesting to the knowledge that Yeshua IS the Christ, the Messiah] and shall deceive MYRIADS" (Mt 24:4-5).
The disciples had just requested from their Rabbi a rundown on signs that would precede his second Advent and the resultant consummation of the age (not the "end of the world"). The very first sign Yeshua gave involved religious deception. Again, in the War Scroll of the Yeshua Party [commonly referred to as the Apocalypse or Revelation] the first seal of the heavenly scroll that is unlocked also involves religious deception on a paramount scale. A number of scholars have seen a direct parallel of events when comparing the 6th chapter of the War Scroll with Matthew 24. So the first sign to occur in Yeshua's panoramic eschatological schema involves false religious conquest!
"And... the [Passover] Lamb opened one of the seals... and behold, a WHITE horse and he that sat on him had a bow; and a crown was given unto him, and he went forth CONQUERING and TO CONQUER" (Rev 6:1-2).
This rider must not be confused with the Lord Yeshua the Messiah [Yeshua haMashiach] who appears on a white stallion in Revelation 19:11. In that capacity the Mashiach comes to bring peace to a war-torn planet, ravaged by asteroid collisions. It will be humankind's first real peace in 6000 years of recorded history. The rider on the white horse in the first seal of the War Scroll is given his crown, thus it is established that this personage cannot be in any way be the Messiah. Yeshua was not given a crown at the beginning of his Gospel proclamation. The ONLY crown Messiah was ever given during his ministry was a crown of thorns. It should also be pointed out that the other events ushered in by the three other horsemen were not in evidence at any time during the Our Lord's first Advent. The rider on this white horse is a counterfeit Yeshua!
As Professor Seiss notes, the white horse symbolises righteousness and triumph. Messiah also is symbolically represented as being on a white charger at his Advent, typifying purity, righteousness, and triumph (Revelation 19:11 cf the notes of J.A. Seiss, The Apocalypse, 1900, 127). The legions of heaven are also seen as being mounted on white horses and are "clothed in fine linen, white and clean" (19:14). When the apostle John wrote his biography of Yeshua's last days, and penned the War Scroll, the anticipated apostasy had already reached epidemic proportions (Revelation 2:2,6,9,14-15,20, 3:4,9).
I have written on this conspiracy at length in previous issues of the Pulpit, but suffice to say that these infiltrators palmed themselves off as genuine "apostles [but were, in fact] deceitful workers transforming themselves into the apostles of Messiah -- and no marvel! For, Satan himself is transformed into an angel of light. Therefore, it is no great accomplishment if his ministers also be transformed AS the ministers of righteousness" (2 Cor 11:13-15).
These men had an appearance or, better, a facade of holiness (righteousness) and claimed to be the actual representatives of the Messiah. Yet, Paul said, they were not working in ignorance -- they were ARCH deceivers! These men were liars of the highest order. They were absolutely without any excuse for their words and actions. When we realise just WHO these men actually were the truth of the great apostasy (which reached a peak with the coming of Constantine) will be so clear the knowledge should drive us all to our knees in prayerful examination to see "whether we be in the faith" (2 Cor 13:5) or counterfeits.
The very first thing they changed was Messiah's approach into that of a Gentile philosopher. Then they changed his actual image into a reflection of Serapis (the Egyptian Zeus) replete with Gentile features. Later they altered the features somewhat to impress a gentleness and femininity to accord with that expressed by the homosexual philosophers of that age, in whose garb the Messiah was now dressed. They altered his name to mean "the chief Zeus." Then they spiced up the Gospel with incredible distortions, and viewed the Son of God as coming to "do away" with his harsh Father's Torah, replacing it with something vague called "love." The One who said, "Nobody takes my life from me -- I surrender it of and by myself with no coercion" was remade into a Sacred Victim and a Sobbing Intercessor who pleads for humankind before a wrathful, hostile cosmic Deity.
Indeed, this pagan, idolatrous image of God's Son Yeshua, which has been embraced wholeheartedly by churchianity for hundreds of years, is revolting in the extreme. In fact, I have personally been mocking the image of the effeminate, stylish-Henna-haired Nordic blue-eyed Yeshua since about 1955! Isn't it time we did away with this blatant Tom Foolery and honoured the true Messiah by returning to an authenticity in Gospel belief and representation?
Well, you might ask, what's really WRONG with the present picture of Yeshua, treasured and adored by hundreds of millions of Christians worldwide? What's WRONG with the popular stories of Yeshua, also erroneously embraced by a largely pagan universal church? What's wrong with the portrait of the Jesuit "Jesus"? All these churches can't be WRONG can they? Listen! Churchianity today is composed of countless thousands of bickering, arguing, disagreeing denominations, sects and cults -- they can't all be RIGHT, can they?
I always get a chuckle when sincere Seventh Day Adventists (and others) turn to the backs of certain Bibles and quote eruditely from a document to the ancient Roman senate from the hand of Publius Lentulus. In this text Lentulus describes the appearance of "Jesus", who "had hair of the hue of an unripe hazelnut and smooth almost down to his ears, but from the ears in curling locks somewhat darker and more shining, waving over his shoulders; having a parting at the middle of the head... a full beard of the colour of his hair, not long, but a little forked at the chin... the eyes grey... and clear."
They just will not acknowledge that this text is a 13th century forgery! But it is admitted that it has influenced portraits from that time since. Certainly, Rembrandt followed suit. He artistically created in the Messiah "a paucity of His body, the abnegation [self-denial, asceticism] of the flesh, the 'lowliness, pathos and solemnity' with which [the artist] conceived the Christian epic." F.M. Godfrey, in his Christ and the Apostles - The Changing Forms of Religious Imagery, explains the Rembrandt Christ: "Rembrandt's tragic Christ is an emanation of the Protestant spirit, sorrowful, ghostly, severe... an image of the inward-looking, self-denying Protestant soul."
Did Yeshua laugh? It was known that Yeshua drank, sometimes to what some others would consider excess (Matthew 11:19). Believe me, it is difficult to remain "severe" when you've had a few. Was the Lord ever "merry"? We shouldn't even have to answer. And, one ought not to forget that Yeshua's first public miracle was turning water into the best tasting fermented wine ever produced by man. Indeed, the MC in charge of the wedding celebration complained to Yeshua that the guests were already "under the table" (Jn 2:9-10) and yet he had left the best till last! 120 gallons of red wine would equal approximately three and a half thousand wine goblets full!
Listen! If you have accepted without rational consideration, a Yeshua who was born on Xmas Day in the dead of a Judaean winter, and at the height of the rainy season for that part of the world; who was visited on that "silent night, holy night" by three wise men; who is portrayed by the largest "Christian" church in the western world as a helpless infant (with a very wise expression) in his mother's arms -- a mother, who remained a perpetual virgin; who tried during his short life to unsuccessfully convert the world and usher in peace and goodwill to all men; who was sprinkled with pouring water at his "baptism;" came head to head with the entire Jewish establishment, and the authorities for not paying his taxes; preached a gospel of social reform; wore Henna-style perms with long curly, flowing locks; wore white, silk clothing (permanently pressed); never got his sandelled feet dirty or had any need to take regular, refreshing baths; drank grape juice rather than fermented wine; was a vegetarian; went to church regularly; owned nothing of value; "never had a place to lay his head"; showed consideration during his ministry to all men alike; had it "in" for the rich; praised the poor and poverty-stricken as having special favour from God; converted rugged fishermen and violent revolutionaries at a single, smiling glance and had them actually quit their jobs at a moment's notice to "follow" him -- a complete stranger (wearing a dress); contented these "he men" with lovely sayings about lilies of the field and little sparrows; who often sang "All Things Bright and Beautiful;" spoke to the milling crowds in mumbling parables and rambling discourses to make God's truth more easily understood; had a "problem" with an overbearing mother; was an "only" child; was swept to his crucifixion against his will; was nailed to a cross; met his death on "Good Friday;" died between two "thieves;" perished of a broken heart; was raised from the dead on Easter Sunday; died and was raised only for the church; now wears a shining halo; weeps when we miss a church service; has his church believing that he preached to lost sinners and demonic spirits in "hell" when he expired; becomes a literal piece of starch-reduced, white, protein-enriched bread at certain "Lord's Supper's" and "Masses;" and continually graces us with his sickly, sweet, petulant, emaciated, Gentile, effeminate features -- IF this description is anything like the "Jesus Christ" you have known in your Christian experience then perhaps you may have accepted wholesale the "other Yeshua" about whom Paul forewarned his church.
This UGLY impostor was NEVER Yeshua the Nazarene, and he never will be! At least, not the Yeshua of your own Bible (ever take the time to actually READ the Book?).
This monstrous portrait of the Heavenly Archetypal Man is now, at the start of the 21st Century, so perfected that it would stagger the imagination of the original conspirators of the first century! In fact, this perversion of the Messiah would be guaranteed to stop them short in their tracks in aghast wonder and admiration at just how well their subversion succeeded!
Hey! What's Right!?
Consider the following little known facts about the Messiah! Firstly, the Messiah came to a world that expected him.
The Jews, Chinese, Romans, Indians, Parthians all waited for the coming of a Redeemer. And when he arrived, he emerged as a serious student of Torah and the oral traditions, and a scholar in his own right. "At five years of age, one is ready for the Written Torah, at ten years of age for the study of the Oral Torah, at thirteen for bar mitzvah [coming of age], at fifteen for the study of halachot [rabbinic legal decisions]... at twenty for pursuing a vocation, at thirty for entering one's full vigour" (Mishnah, Avot 5:21). Yeshua was way ahead of the others of his age, for it is recorded that he was in the Temple when he turned twelve disputing and arguing over legal matters with rabbinic authorities (Lk 2:27-42). Interestingly, he was never charged with disdaining the Oral Torah, and in fact the only occasion the Sanhedrin took against Yeshua was that he broke the Sabbath for healing the sick on that day (Lk 14:1-4). Still, even his Shabbat healing excursions were permitted in his day and age by rabbinic ruling (Shmuel Safrai, The Jewish People in the First Century, Vol.II, 805).
Yeshua was the firstborn son of his mother Miriam, who went on to have (at a conservative estimate) about seven children. Early church history seems to indicate He may well have been a twin.
We are told His parents were not wealthy. For Yosef could not afford the price of a lamb for his son's dedication sacrifice. He could only afford a pair of turtledoves (Lk 2:24 cf Lev 12:8). Still, the highly armed caravan of mysterious eastern Magi brought presents of gold and myrrh to give to the young Messianic King, and the minimum amount expected to be spent on a recent royal birth was in the vicinity of $400 million, in today's currency. Both Miriam and Yosef would have been executed had they spent their special child's inheritance, for violation of Jewish law. Whatever happened to such a large amount of gold and myrrh? For that matter, after their initial visit we hear no more about the Magi. Did the Lord retain contact with them? If he was an Essene, yes.
The Lord spoke at least three languages fluently -- Greek, Aramaic, and Hebrew. There are instances in the Messianic Scriptures that indicate that this is definitely the case. Yeshua had contact with Syro-Phoenicians who spoke Greek, and he communicated quite fluently (without an interpreter) with Pontius Pilatus, the Roman procurator, who spoke Greek as the lingua franca of the Empire.
Not only so, but the rugged carpenter had to be well educated (especially in mathematics, physics and trigonometry) and competently skilled as an architect, artist, plumber and stone mason, and Yeshua appears to have owned at least two homes for Levi mentions a "house" in passing (without referring to ownership) as if it was common knowledge to everyone of the time -- a house which Yeshua probably built himself (Matthew 12:46, 13:1,36,53-54,57).
Often found in the company of women, Yeshua was also recorded as spending a large number of relaxed evenings at dinner engagements and banquets. The impression given is that he was what we would term today a "party animal." One of the sneers directed at the Messiah was His propensity toward alcohol and good food as already mentioned. There can be little doubt he was "the life of a party."
He enjoyed people. He relished rubbing shoulders with the "top-notch" of society, as well as appreciating the company of earthy characters with dubious reputations like "tribute collector's," prostitutes, and high-ranking Roman military commanders. One of His closest friends was a Sicarii (an underground Jewish revolutionary), yet the Romans did not consider Yeshua a security threat to the Empire.
In his childhood it is quite possible that he may have travelled with a maternal uncle as far as Kashmir and Britain. Early legends indicate that this is the case.
Yeshua had his hair cropped short, like everyone in Caesar's world. The Talmud informs us that the rabbis had a ruling regarding this. Not only so, but Rav Shaul wrote that it was considered a "shame" in the Gentile city of Corinth for a man to wear "long hair" (1 Cor 11:14). Indeed, the only exception were Nazarites who were not permitted to cut their hair or touch the dead, and they had to stay right away from alcohol and parties! That sort of disqualifies the Messiah, although his cousin John was a Nazarite. There may also be a legal loophole with hairlength in the case of the Messiah -- for the tenure of his actual ministry -- inasmuch as Nazarenes (the highest order of Essenes) wore a pigtail down to the mid-thoracic. You will recall that the early Christians were termed Nazarenes (Acts 24:5). If this is the case, then the Messiah had long hair (at least near the conclusion of his life, and at least long enough to wear a pig tail) but it would have been tied back severely, or worn in a similar fashion as the Nazarite custom demanded -- on top of his head like the Indian Sikhs. (The man whose imprint appears on the Turin Shroud has all the characteristics of the dead Messiah, including microscopically illumined coins minted during the reign of Pilate in placement over his burst eye sockets, and while his hair has been through the mill, a pigtail is still clearly visible!) You can see from some of the above comments that there is an acute need for Bible students to read the Word more closely and seriously, and to expand the parameters of their historical research.
The False "Jesus" -- Going, Going... Gone!
Doubtless the next few years are going to prove to be the DEATH KNELL for the fraudulent and deceptive picture of Yeshua to which we have all been, at one time or another, subjected! The Bible predicts a time in the near future when Messianic congregations are going to SHOUT ALOUD to the world the real truth about their own Messiah! I have been personally predicting the advent of these long-awaited Messianic assemblies for over 35 years! Indeed, the Messianic congregations are already emerging on the world scene, and they are going to become a powerful voice when it comes to solving the ills of society and the insurmountable problems currently facing a hapless humanity looking for answers. Gentiles are going to sit up and start taking notice.
Even so, very shortly there will be a frightening and extremely bloody revolution in Jerusalem, and on the streets of Eretz Israel, over the personal identity of the Messiah Himself!
A NEWLY restored Nazarene Judaism will have a high prominence and profile, not merely in the Knesset -- which it will control -- but with the various Moslem Arab races and the Ishmaelites themselves! The Christian churches and their idolatrous practices and images, along with their demon spirits, will be cast forever OUT of the Land (Zech 13:1-5).
YOU don't think so? Read and reread the prophecies of Zechariah 9-14 over and over again until it finally sinks in! Virtually NO Messianic Assembly yet understands this profound truth (let alone the historic Constantinian church)! This is WHY the Lord advised strongly that Jews should stay out of Israel at the end of the age for the horrors that are coming upon that Land (Lk 21:21).
You won't have long to wait to watch these momentous events occur right before your very eyes!
May the Lord find your eyes open to these glorious oracles of God.