Gehenna (2) – Lake of Fire

This topic was begun in “Gehenna (1) – Valley of Unquenched Fire”.  Part 2 here is the continuation and conclusion.  Part 1 should be read first; most of the material in (1) won’t be repeated here in (2).

Gehenna was a location, a historical place.  It’s a proper noun.  As such, it is better left untranslated, rendered as “Géhenna” (transliterated from the Greek Gé-en-na).  Gehenna isn’t a common noun.

Historians have located the steep Gehenna valley/ravine below the SW wall of ancient Jerusalem.  It was in the territory allotted to the tribe of Judah (ref Jsh.15:8), and converges with the Kidrón valley.

The term Gehenna came from the Old Testament (OT) valley of the son of Hinnóm, which occurs 13 times in the OT.  The 13 OT occurrences of Hinnom (Strongs h2011, Hebrew noun) are: Jsh.15:8 (2), 18:16 (2); 2Ki.23:10; 2Ch.28:3, 33:6; Ne.11:30; Je.7:31-32, 19:2, 6, 32:35 (39:35 Septúagint/LXX).  Hinnom means lamentation.  Hinnom is Ennom in the OT Greek LXX.

Cambridge Bible Lk.12:5 “The Valley of Hinnom…was a pleasant valley outside Jerusalem, which had first been rendered infamous by Molech worship, then defiled by Josiah with corpses; and lastly kept from putrefaction by large fires to consume the corpses and prevent pestilence.”  This valley also became a prophesied place of slaughter, filled with human corpses.  (see Part 1 for particulars.)

Traditionally, the ravine later became a place of refuse.  Barnes Notes Mt.5:22 “It was necessary to keep fires continually burning there. The extreme loathsomeness of the place, the filth and putrefaction, and the lurid fires burning by day and night, made it one of the most appalling and terrific objects with which a Jew was acquainted.”  Jews knew.  Gehenna also became interpreted as imagery…for “hell”.

There are 12 New Testament (NT) occurrences of the term Gehenna (Strongs g1067, Greek): Mt.5:22, 29-30, 10:28, 18:9, 23:15, 33; Mk.9:43-47; Lk.12:5; Ja.3:6.  Eleven occurrences are the words of Jesus found in the gospel accounts (mostly in Matthew).  The sole exception is Ja.3:6 (figurative).

The term Gehenna doesn’t appear in the book of Acts, nor in any of Paul’s letters, nor in other epistles (only once in James)!  That may seem like a strange omission?!  But Gehenna was traditionally the Jerusalem dump.  It wouldn’t have the same significance in the foreign cities of the NT epistles.

What about “hell”?  In several of our Bible translations, there are four original language terms commonly rendered as “hell”…Sheol (h7585), Hádes (g86), Tartaróo (g5020), Gehenna (g1067).  All four are places or realms.  All four are proper nouns (according to Oxford Dictionary), not common nouns.  Proper nouns are better left untranslated in English.  e.g. in Young’s Literal Translation (YLT) they’re untranslated.  “Hell” is too general a word to use for specific terms.  The above four are specific terms.  Steve Gregg All You Want To Know About Hell, p.86 “The English word ‘hell’ isn’t a translation, but an interpretation.”

Sheol is the Hebrew OT term for the place of the dead.  The root meaning of sheol is ‘unseen’.  Sheol corresponds to Hades in the Greek LXX and NT.  YLT leaves the term Hades untranslated.  YLT doesn’t use the word “hell”.  Again, both Sheol and Hades are better left untranslated.

The KJV OT often rendered Sheol as “hell” when conveying the fate of those who were bad or wicked!  ref KJV: Ps.9:17; Pr.5:5, 7:27, 9:18; Is.5:14, 14:9; Ezk.31:16-18, 32:27.  (In the OT, death and the realm of Sheol may be the result of God’s judgment.)  Yet the KJV often rendered Sheol as the “grave” when portraying the fate of those good or righteous!  ref KJV: Ge.37:35 (Jacob); Jb.14:13 & 17:13 (Job); Ps.88:3; SS.8:6 (ironically); Is.38:10 (Hezekiah).  Also cf. KJV Ho.13:14 with KJV 1Co.15:55.

In so doing, the KJV is biased.  There is a Hebrew OT term which means grave, h6913 qéhber, noun.  It occurs 67 times in the OT (also translated as sepulcher, burying-place.)  e.g. Ex.14:11; 1Ch.34:28; Jb.5:26; Nah.1:14.  It ties to bury h6912 qabár, verb.  Also, a less used OT term for grave is h6900 qeburáh, noun, occurring 14 times (e.g. Ge.35:20; Ezk.32:23.)  But Sheol/Hades was an unseen realm…not a grave.

Tartaroo was a holding place for angels who’d sinned.  2Pe.2:4 “God did not spare the angels when they sinned, but cast them into tartaroo [g5020] and committed them to pits of darkness [g2217] reserved for judgment.”  also ref Jude 1:6; 1Enoch 20:2 with 1Enoch 21:9-10.

However, the concept of endless torment was unknown in the OT scriptures.  (see Part 1 regarding mortal worms in Is.66:24.)

The 1995 Church of England Doctrine Commission said, “Hell is not eternal torment”.  Bible scholar F.F. Bruce wrote, “Eternal conscious torment is incompatible with the revealed character of God”.

Torment forever in hell-fire doesn’t fit with Christ’s OT retributive justice or lex talionis principle.  Rather, Christ’s capital punishment penalty was death.  Ex.21:23-24 life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, etc.  And Paul wrote in Ro.6:23, “The wages of sin is death”.  Not eternal life in hell-fire!

Later it was the Roman Catholic theologian Augustine (354–430 AD) of Hippo, Algeria who promoted the idea of eternal torment in hell-fire.

Jesus’ NT warnings (regarding Gehenna) were tied to national judgment upon Jerusalem/Judea, with corpses strewn in the valleys.  Even via “unquenched fire”.  (see Part 1.)

God Himself is figuratively depicted as fire!  Moses told ancient Israel in De.4:24, “The Lord your God is a consuming fire”.

A coal of fire purified the lips of the prophet Isaiah in vision, Is.6:6-7.  Cambridge Bible Is.6:6 “Fire is both a symbol of holiness and an agent of purification.”  Fire (and blood) purges and atones for sin & iniquity.  Gill Exposition Is.6:7 “Thy [Isaiah’s] sin purged, or ‘atoned for’ or ‘covered.”

And there are verses in the OT which allude to a Sheol fire in the afterlife.

The Lord said in the song of Moses, De.32:22 “A fire is kindled in My anger, and it burns to the lowest part of Sheol [LXX Hades g86]; and consumes the earth with its produce and sets on fire the foundations of the mountains”.  Perhaps this was the origin of volcanos?  Fire was in the lowest part of Sheol/Hades.  cf. Song Sol.8:6 “For love is as strong as death, jealousy is as unrelenting as Sheol [LXX Hades g86]. Its flashes are flashes of fire, the very flame of the Lord.”  Sheol/Hades was tied to fire.

In Lk.16:19-ff, Jesus told the parable of the rich man who’d failed to be a good steward of his wealth.  Lk.16:23-24 “In Hades [g86]….he cried out and said…I am in agony in this flame.”  There was a flame in that sector of Hades/Sheol; the realm of departed spirits beneath the earth’s surface.

Was the Gehenna valley also symbolic for the lowest part of Sheol/Hades?  Over the centuries, Gehenna became the figurative place of spiritual purification for wicked Jews.  The rabbis considered Gehenna a purgatory or a punishment where the wicked suffer until he’s atoned for his sins.

Jewish Encyclopedia: Gehenna “They are cast into Gehenna to a depth commensurate with their sinfulness.”  Jesus’ words in Mt.13:42, 50 “Cast them into the furnace of fire; there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth”.  However, this happened to Jerusalem in 70 AD, prophesied in Ezk.22:17-22.

Jesus also spoke of those cast out into outer darkness in three NT verses, all in Matthew: 8:12 (cf. Mt.13:38 “sons of the kingdom”), 22:13, 25:30.  Jude 1:13 refers to “blackest darkness”.  It may be a location or a state of being/mind.  It’s a place of “weeping and gnashing of teeth”, of anguish and despair.  1Jn.1:6 wrote of those who “walk in darkness”.  2Pe.2:17 refers to a “mist of darkness”.  To contrast, 1Pe.2:9 exhorts, “You should show forth the praises of Him [God] who has called you out of darkness into His marvelous light.”

cf. Mt.13:42, 50 with Jesus’ words in Mk.9:49. “Everyone will be salted with fire.”  Salt and fire both purify.  Pulpit Commentary Mk.9:49 “There’s a fire which is penal, and a fire which purifies.”  Mt.25:41-46 chastisement for not aiding the needy.  (Eternal torment seems overly severe for failing to do this!)  v.46 Dr. Spiros Zódiates “Kólasis conveys the notion of punishment for correction and betterment.”

Josephus Antiquities of the Jews 18:1:3 “Pharisees…believe souls have an immortal vigor, and under the earth there will be rewards or punishments…The vicious to be detained in that prison, virtuous souls to revive and live again.”  The apostle Paul also referred to those “under the earth” (Php.2:10).

Traditionally, the aftermath of spiritual purification in lower Sheol was…the person ascends to the world to come (Ólam Hába/Gan Eden), or else undergoes destruction.  Judaism 101: The Afterlife “The very righteous go directly to Gan Eden. The average person’s time in Gehinnom doesn’t exceed 12 months.”

Also, some have interpreted or compared Gehenna to/as the “lake of fire”!  Jewish folklore indicates the accursed Gehenna valley had a gate which led to a lake of fire.  (Views differ as to the gate’s location.)

Wikipedia: Lake of Fire “Such a lake also appears in Plato’s Phaedo, explicitly identified with Tartarus, where the souls of the wicked are tormented until it is time for them to be reborn, and where some souls are left forever.”

The book of Revelation is full of hyperbole & symbolism; and contains more variant readings from the Majority Text than do all the other NT books combined!  If our translation of Revelation is accurate…its lake of fire (at the bottom of or beneath Gehenna?) is seemingly the hell-fire of the afterlife.

“Lake of fire” occurs only in Re.19:20, 20:10, 14-15, 21:8.  The beast, the false prophet, the devil, death, Hades, and those not written in the book of life (ref the list in 21:8)…are cast into the lake of fire.  Re.19:20 “The lake of fire which burns with brimstone [g2303].”  Brimstone is sulfur.  Sulfur can purify.  Sciencing: Ancient Uses of Sulfur “Roman purifying rituals included fumigating a building or personal belongings with the smoke from burning sulfur.”

Does the lake of fire torment, consume, or purify?

Re.2:11, 20:6, 14, 21:8 speak of a “second death”.  Re.20:13-15 “Death and Hades were cast into the lake of fire. This is the second death.”  Ellicott Commentary Re.20:14 “It is clearly figurative language, implying that Death, the last enemy is destroyed, together with Hades, who was personified as Death’s escort (Re.6:8). The lake of fire into which Death is thrown is the second death!…Very awful is that spiritual death.”

Also Expositor’s Greek Testament “Hades…naturally ceases to have any function.”

John wrote in Re.21:4, “There will be no more death”.  Death will die, in other words.  Paul in 1Co.15:26, “The last enemy to be abolished is death”.  He indicated in 1Co.15:55, there will be no more sting of death.  2Ti.1:10 “Our Savior Jesus Christ, who has abolished death.”  Christ rendered death inoperative.

Some think the “lake of fire” means the second death for the incorrigibly wicked.  The concept of the “second death” also appears in the early AD Jewish Targums (Aramaic OT paraphrases).

Targum Is.65:6 “Their punishment shall be in Gehenna where the fire burns all day…deliver their bodies to the second death.”

Targum Is.22:14 “This sin will not be forgiven you, until you die the second death.”  Targum Is.65:15 “The Lord God will slay you with the second death.”

Yet based upon God’s principle of justice seen in De.19:21, “life for life”…there wouldn’t be a second death without a second life preceding it!

The Targum Neofití and fragments indicate the second death is the death the wicked die.  Targum Je.51:39 “They shall die the second death and not live in the world to come [in Olam Haba].”

These Targum paraphrases may relate to a final destruction of any remaining wicked.  More like an annihilation, an extinction…not everlasting torment through eternal life in hell-fire.

But is the second death a final separation from God…or was a spiritual purification meant?

The visions and near death experiences (NDE) many people have had of “hell”…are they true and valid?  Is what they claim to see everlasting or temporary?

It’s hard to imagine ruthless leaders such as Genghis Kahn, Bloody Mary, Idi Amin…and Adolph Hitler together with the numerous disbelieving Jews killed during WW2… all being tormented together (with those Jews) eternally in fire!

Also the untold millions of gentiles worldwide who lived prior to Jesus and didn’t know God or ancient Israel…are they doomed forever?  Is this reflective of a God of love (1Jn.4:8)!?  Or…why visit or help (unsaved) widows and orphans now, if God intends to annihilate most of them anyway?

Interestingly, the futuristic prophecy of Je.31:38-40 indicates that…Gehenna will be holy!  Je.31:40 “The whole valley [Hinnom/Gehenna] of the dead bodies and of the ashes, and all the fields as far as the brook Kidron…shall be holy to the Lord; it shall not be plucked up or overthrown anymore forever.”  Cambridge Bible Je.31:40 “The valley of Hinnom, into which carcasses of criminals and of animals were cast.”

Today, it is a Jerusalem suburb with concerts and even fireworks nearby!  Israel’s Ministry of Tourism wants you to visit “hell” (Gehenna), so to speak!

The good news for Christians…we won’t be hurt by a second death!  Re.2:11 “He who overcomes shall not be harmed by the second death.”  The saved don’t have to undergo it.

The afterlife for saved Christians will be wonderful…Thanks be to God!  In addition, see the topics “Life and Death – for Saints” and “Rebirth to Physical Life”.

 

Life and Death – for Saints

The Christian hope is to live eternally with God!  As our years in the body advance, this hope becomes nearer.  Jesus said in Jn.10:10, “I came that they might have life, and more abundantly”.  Life after death may be better than we thought!  Here we’ll look at scriptures about life and death for the saints.

As we age, most will experience aches & pains in the body.  Yet the future for saved Christians is wonderful!  Ex.23:25-26 the Lord will fulfill the number of one’s days.  We can receive healing in the body until that last illness or the day we take our final breath.  (see the topic “Healing Our Bodies”.)  Pr.9:11 “Years of life will be added to you.”  Ps.48:14 “This is our God forever; He will guide us unto death.”  Is.46:4 “Even to your old age and grey hairs, I will deliver you.”  God sustains us and will give us the abundant life!  Physical death is a time of transition to the afterlife; it isn’t the end of our existence.

Ps.91:16 “With long life I will satisfy him, and show him My salvation.”  (The Hebrew term for salvation is yeshúah, Strongs h3444.)  God saves His people.  The Lord gets us out of trouble, in general!  He ‘saves’ us from danger, catastrophe, enemies, sickness, etc…and saves us in the spiritual sense.  God saves us from death.  And the Bible indicates there are (at least) two kinds of death.

One kind of death occurs when we take our last breath.  Our physical body is buried; it decomposes or disintegrates.  God formed the first human from the elements of the earth, breathed life into him, and he became a living soul (Ge.2:7).  The Lord told the first man Adam in Ge.3:19, “You return to the ground, for out of it you were taken. You will return to dust.”  Adam died physically at a very advanced age (Ge.5:5).  David said of God in Ps.103:14, “He is mindful that we are but dust”.  And Ec.12:7 (the reverse of Ge.2:7), “The dust returns to the earth, and the spirit returns to God who gave it”.  (The term for spirit is Hebrew rúach h7307, Greek Septúagint/LXX & New Testament pneúma g4151.)  We breathe our last, our spirit returns to God, our physical body returns to dust or decomposes…this is physical death.

God has given each of us a human spirit, the “breath of life”.  Jb.32:8 “There is a spirit in man, and the breath of the Almighty gives them understanding.”  The human spirit is a non-physical component which imparts self-awareness & intellect to our brain.  At physical death, our spirit is to return to God.  Ja.2:26 “The body without the spirit is dead.”  Without our human spirit, our body is just a corpse.  ref Lk.8:53-55 the girl who’d died was a corpse (until Jesus brought back her spirit, which returns to God after death, to her body).  When Adam finally died physically, the human spirit God had initially breathed into him went back to God.  We humans undergo this physical death.  Ps.104:29 “You take away their spirit, they die and return to dust.”  When the Lord takes away our spirit…we expire.  Man’s spirit returns to God for His renascence, re-embodiment, placement or disposition, as He sees fit.

Now let’s look at another kind of death.  When Adam & Eve ate from the wrong tree, they died in another sense.  Mankind is made in the image & likeness of God (Ge.1:26-27).  God said in Ge.2:16-17, “The tree of the knowledge of good and evil, in the day you eat from it you shall surely die”.  The serpent deceived Eve (Ge.3:4-7).  When Adam & Eve ate from it and disobeyed God or sinned, they became separated from God spiritually.  That day their spiritual death occurred.  (Their physical death wasn’t until centuries later.)  Ge.3:8 so they hid themselves from God.  Ge.3:24 although they’re made in God’s image…to further separate them from Himself, the Lord banned them from the garden of Eden.  (see the topic “Tree Symbolism in Scripture”.)

Death is a form of separation.  Adam & Eve were separated from God’s Presence and the Tree of Life.  Even if they’d previously eaten some from the Tree of Life while obedient (Ge.2:9, 16), outside the garden they couldn’t continue to eat its fruit…and Adam finally expired at age 930 (Ge.5:5).  Gill Exposition Ge.2:9 “Before Adam sinned there was no prohibition of his eating of it.”  (Perhaps the effect of the Tree of Life was passed down through very long-lived descendants for generations?)

At physical death, one’s human spirit is separated from the physical body.  Spiritual death is separation from God, who is eternal Life.  Is.59:2 “Your iniquities have separated you from your God, and your sins have hidden His face from you.”  Sin kills us spiritually, in this sense.

Since Adam & Eve, humans are born spiritually ‘dead’.  David referred to his unborn self, Ps.51:5 “I was shaped in iniquity, in sin my mother conceived me”.  Natural man from birth is spiritually unaware, our eyes ‘blinded’ to spiritual eternal Life (e.g. 2Co.4:4).  Ro.5:12 “Just as through one man sin entered the world, and death through sin, so death spread to all, because all sinned.”  Mankind has a proclivity to sin.  Ja.1:15 “When sin is accomplished, it brings forth death.”  Separation from God.  Gill Exposition Ja.1:15 “As the first sin of man brought death into the world, brought a spiritual death.”  Orthodox Bible Ge.2:17 “The words ‘you shall die’ indicate a spiritual death through separation from God.”  Spiritual death happened to Adam at the wrong tree; it becomes the common state of humanity.

We were all dead spiritually.  Paul wrote to the saints in Ep.2:5, “We were dead in our transgressions”.  Of course Paul and those he was writing to weren’t dead physically!  Rather, they’d been spiritually dead earlier, while physically alive!  Continuing in Ep.4:18, “Being alienated from the Life of God”.  As Adam & Eve had become alienated from God; separated from the Lord and His Presence.

Jesus said in Mt.8:21-22, “Let the dead bury their dead”.  Jesus expressed two kinds of death here…in other words, let those who are spiritually dead bury their relatives who had died physically.  And in Jesus’ parable of Lk.15:24, 32, the prodigal son had been spiritually dead, while physically alive.  In 1Ti.5:6, Paul wrote of the profligate widow who “is dead even while she lives”.  Spiritually dead, physically alive.  Paul also wrote in Col.2:13, “You were dead in your transgressions”.  The Colossians were physically alive, yet earlier had been spiritually dead by reason of sin.  But not dead forever!

Continuing in Col.2:13 “…He has made you alive together with Him”.  Those Christians were no longer spiritually dead!  1Co.15:22 “For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ all shall be made alive.”  Since Adam, humanity was spiritually dead or separated from God, and also died physically.  But through Jesus and the Holy Spirit (HS), we’re made alive spiritually; there’s no separation from God (though we still die physically).

Peter said in Ac.2:38, “Repent and be baptized, and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit”.  The HS is Life eternal (He.9:14).  1Co.6:17 “The one who joins himself to the Lord is one spirit with Him.”  It’s a spiritual union.  We become spiritually alive!  Ga.6:8 “The one who sows to the Spirit shall from the Spirit reap eternal life.”  Wikipedia “For Paul (as in Ga.6:8), future eternal life arrives as a result of the indwelling of the Holy Spirit during the present life.”  The seed of eternal Life is now within us.

The New Testament (NT) doesn’t describe eternal life in detail.  But it does provide assurance that the saints will receive it.  Eerdmans Dictionary of the Bible “The nature of eternal life is only sketched in its essential elements in the New Testament.”  The saved Christian becomes spiritually alive, no longer are we spiritually dead!

John wrote in 1Jn.3:14, “We know that we have passed out of death into life”.  ‘Saved’ Christians are spiritually alive.  1Jn.5:11-12 “God has given us eternal life, and this life is in His Son. He who has the Son has life; he who doesn’t have the Son doesn’t have life.”  The eternal Life made possible by Jesus indwells us.

Jesus said in Jn.8:51, “If anyone keeps My word, he shall never see death”.  Jesus was referring to spiritual death, not physical death.  Of course we all die physically.  Jesus also spoke of Himself as the living bread.  Jn.6:50-51 “One may eat of it and not die. I AM the living bread that came down from heaven.”  Not die spiritually, that is; having the kernel of eternal Life.  Jn.11:26 “Whoever lives and believes in Me shall never die.”  Shall never die spiritually; won’t be separated from God.

Many believe that even Jesus Himself experienced separation from God for a short time on the cross…for our sake!  Mk.15:33-34 “Darkness fell over the whole Land. Jesus cried out with a loud voice, ‘My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?” (cf. Ps.22:1)  Jesus knew He’d be resurrected (Mt.20:18-19).  But as Jesus became sin in our stead (2Co.5:21), He was separated from His Father for the only time.  Ga.3:13 “Christ became a curse for us.”  Father God is so holy; He won’t dwell with sin.

God is the Father of spirits (He.12:9).  The Lord gives breath & spirit to His creatures on earth (Is.42:5).  For physical death to occur, man’s spirit departs his body, and returns to God who gave it (Ec.12:7).

Jesus also experienced physical death when He expired on the cross.  At the transfiguration of Lk.9:31, Jesus spoke of His soon departure (g1841) which would take place at Jerusalem.  Later, Jesus said as He died on the cross in Lk.23:46, “Father, into Thy hands I commit My spirit’. He breathed His last.”  Jesus’ spirit departed and returned to Father God.  Jn.19:30 “Jesus yielded up His spirit.”

2Pe.1:13-15 elderly Peter said he would soon die physically.  The time was near for his spirit’s earthly tent (his physical body) to be laid aside.  “After my departure (g1841) you may remember these things.”  Peter’s spirit would soon depart his body.  (Ja.2:26 “The body without the spirit is dead.”)

In the last chapter of 2Timothy, Paul’s time to die physically was imminent.  2Ti.4:6 “The time of my departure has come.”  Paul’s spirit would soon depart his physical body, when he expired.  As Peter’s.

Ac.7:54-60 righteous Stephen was stoned to death.  As he died physically, Stephen said, “Lord Jesus, receive my spirit” (v.59).  Stephen’s spirit departed when his body “fell asleep”, then decomposed.

At their physical death, the spirit of Peter, of Paul, of Stephen…departed their body and returned to God.  They went to be with Jesus.  Their fleshly body became dust after their spirit separated from it.  But those three, as well as the saints Paul wrote to at Ephesus, Colossae, etc., are made alive in spirit!

Paul wrote in Php.1:21-24, “To live is Christ and to die is gain. To depart and be with Christ is far better.”  Paul’s earthly life became dedicated to Christ’s purposes.  Yet Paul believed Life for him would be better after he died physically, when his spirit consciousness went to be with God and Jesus.

Here’s the final verse of the song, God Knew Your Name, by Jim Likens. “As you gracefully grew old, you know you had been told, God knew your name. And one day when you died, your friends and family cried, God knew your name. And My angels carried your soul [or spirit] to Me, And I said, ‘Welcome home’. You were one of Mine, I loved you for all time, I knew your name.”

Our spirit, returned to God who gave it, is at His disposal as He sees fit.  In Jesus’ parable of Lk.16:19-31, the poor man’s spirit…“was transported by angels to Abraham’s bosom [or Paradise]”.  The rich man’s spirit was placed in Hades, the realm of the dead (v.22-23).  Evidently some of what Jesus spoke in this parable was commonly believed by Jews in the Land, so they were able to understand His point.

Before Jesus left His disciples on earth, He said in Jn.14:2-3, “In My Father’s house are many dwelling places; I go to prepare a place for you”.  Father God’s house is in heaven, not on earth.  After Jesus died and was resurrected, He was received up into heaven, at His Father’s right hand (Mk.16:19).

Stephen asked of Jesus, “Receive my spirit” (Ac.7:59).  Stephen, Peter, Paul and other saints went to the heavenly dwelling places Jesus prepared for them.  Their spirits returned to God, and would never die!

The writer to the Hebrews wrote in He.12:1, “We have a great cloud of witnesses”.  A most unusual way to identify a group of witnesses!  There’s a “cloud” of saints in the heavens who have gone before us.  Untold numbers of saints had been “caught up in the clouds” prior to the departure of Paul’s spirit consciousness to be “together with them” (1Th.4:17).  Continuing with He.12:22-24, “You have come to…the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to myriads of angels, to the assembly and church of the Firstborn who are registered in heaven, to God the Judge of all, and to the spirits of the righteous made perfect, and to Jesus”.  Glory to God!  The spirits of the righteous saints in their heavenly dwelling are an innumerable cloud of witnesses!  (cf. Re.7:9-12)

Paul wrote of our body in 1Co.15:44-49, “It is sown a natural body, it is raised a spiritual body. As is the earthy so are those who are earthy; and as is the heavenly, so are those who are heavenly. Just as we have borne the image of the earthy, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly.”  All humans have a natural physical body on earth.  The spirits of the righteous, who departed and were received by Jesus, have a spiritual body in the heavens.  The spirits of Stephen, Peter, Paul…are among those witnesses in the “cloud” with spiritual bodies.  (compare the topic, “Rebirth to Physical Life”.)

Paul wrote more of eternal life with God in 2Co.5:1-4. “We know that if our earthly tent is dissolved, we have a house from God, not made with hands, eternal in the heavens. We long to be clothed with our heavenly dwelling. So that we won’t be naked. While in this tent we groan, not wanting to be unclothed.”  Our earthly body is made by our mother & father, so to speak.  When it dies and dissolves into dust, our spirit returns to God/Jesus.  Our spirit is there “clothed” with our heavenly imperishable spiritual body (1Co.15:42); not mortal physical bodies in heaven.  We don’t live forever as disembodied spirits.  Spiritual bodies are portrayed as being pure and clothed in white (ref Re.3:5, 4:4, 7:9).

Paul continued in 2Co.5:8, “I would rather be absent from the body and be present with the Lord.”  Paul’s preference was to depart his mortal tent here on earth, and go to be at home in his heavenly spiritual body, with the Lord.  (It’s been said that Paul was absent-minded in that regard!)

Greek Bible scholar Spiros Zódiates’ note on 2Co.5:1-10, “Our real self is the spirit within us and not the body. The mortal body is presented as a tent. When death happens we don’t become extinct. We continue to live on. God is building a completely new house for our spirit. It will be identifiable, but not the same. Paul was evidently speaking of his resurrection body.”  It’s a heavenly body for our spirit.

Php.3:20-21 “Our citizenship is in heaven. Jesus Christ will transform our lowly body to conform to the body of His glory.”  We shall be like Jesus (to a lesser degree), in our spiritual bodies.  Cambridge Bible “The saints’ body of glory.”  1Jn.3:2 “We shall be like Him, for we shall see Him just as He is.”  Vincent Word Studies “The manifestation of that glorified state, the revealing of what we shall be.”  Now our physical eyes cannot behold Jesus’ glorified brightness or the appearance of our spiritual body.

{Sidelight: Various eschatological views, the timing of resurrections, other spirits, the underworld…are somewhat related to this topic, but aren’t discussed here.  Also, the interchangeable expressions, “Kingdom of God” and “Kingdom of Heaven” (Mt.19:23-24).  see the topic “Kingdom of God”.}

Cardiologists have revived people who died physically for a brief period of time.  Pronounced dead!  While dead, their spirit left their body, and ‘saw’ the future life.  While dead, they heard conversation of nurses, or viewed streets exterior to the hospital!  As they were revived physically by the cardiologist or medical team, their spirit reentered their body (cf. Lk.8:55).  There are thousands of people who have had near-death experiences (NDE)!  Numerous documented cases are on medical record.

There’s a saying…“A man with an experience is never at the mercy of a man with just an argument”.

Raymond Edman They Found the Secret, p.33, gives Salvation Army Commissioner Samuel Brengle’s account of his final days at age 76.  Though nearly blind, Brengle ‘saw’ some of the great cloud of witnesses, saints who’d gone on before. “I had sweet fellowship at times in my own room. Saints of all ages congregate there. Moses is present, and gives his testimony, and declares that the eternal God is his refuge and underneath are the everlasting arms. Joshua arises, and declares, ‘As for me and my house, we will serve the Lord’. Samuel and David, my dear friends Isaiah, Jeremiah and Daniel, Paul and John and James, and deeply humbled and beloved Peter, each testifying to the abounding grace of God. Luther and Wesley and the Founder [General William Booth] and Finney, and Spurgeon and Moody, and unnumbered multitudes all testify…Fanny Crosby cries out, ‘Blessed assurance, Jesus is mine’! So you see, I am not alone. Halleluyah forever, and glory to God!”

The 2000 edition of evangelist F.F. Bosworth’s Christ the Healer, contains a concluding chapter written by his son Bob Bosworth, about his father’s passing in 1958 (p.246-7). “About 3 weeks after he took to his bed, we were around the bed talking, laughing and singing. Suddenly Dad looked up; he never saw us again. He saw what was invisible to us. He began to greet people and to hug people; he was enraptured. Every once in a while he would break off and look around saying, ‘Oh, it is so beautiful’. He did this for several hours. Finally, with a smile on his face, he put his head back and slept. We took turns sitting with him. My wife Stella suddenly realized that he’d stopped breathing. There had been no struggle, no sound. The psalmist had described it correctly; God had simply removed his breath and he was home! ‘O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory?’ [Ho.13:14 LXX, 1Co.15:55]  This is the testimony and ultimate triumph of F.F. Bosworth.”

Death and the grave are defeated!  1Co.15:54 “When this perishable will have put on the imperishable, and this mortal have put on immortality, then will come about the saying that is written, ‘Death is swallowed up in victory.” (cf. Is.25:8)  For saints who’ve received and been led by the Holy Spirit, Life with a heavenly body will be abundantly satisfying and pain-free for all eternity!  To God be the glory!

Tree Symbolism in Scripture

This topic is about the spiritual symbolism of trees seen in the Bible.  Special focus is on two trees in the Garden of Eden…the Tree of Life (TL), and the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil (TKGE).  We’ll reflect on tree significance in Bible history, and also on two ‘Adams’ in two gardens.

The people of ancient Israel were familiar with the crops and vegetation of the Holy Land.  It was an agricultural society.  In scripture, God gave symbolic meaning to various crops, plants and trees indigenous to the Land.  Olives, figs, grapes are some of the produce which grows there (De.8:8).

Having a grape vine and a fig tree was symbolic of peace & safety and plenty in the Land.  1Ki.4:25 “Judah and Israel dwelt safely, every man under his vine and fig tree, all the days of Solomon.”  The Zec.3:10 prophecy, “In that day each of you will invite his neighbor to sit under his vine and fig tree’, declares the Lord”.  This was expanded in the prophecy of Mic.4:2, 4. “Many nations will go up to the mountain of the Lord. The law will go out from Zion. Each of them will sit under his vine and fig tree, and none shall make them afraid.”  Peace and plenty are a result of following God’s principles & ways.

In the 1^st century AD, a large golden vine (paid for from Judah’s tithes) hung over the Temple door in Jerusalem.  This vine was an emblem of Israel.  Ps.80:7-8 “O God, restore us. You did remove a vine from Egypt; You did drive out the nations and did plant it.”  After the exodus from Egypt, God drove out most Canaanítes and settled the Israelites in the Land.  Ho.10:1 “Israel is a luxuriant vine.”  But God later rebuked them in Je.2:21. “I planted you a choice vine; how did you turn against Me into a degenerate foreign vine?”  Israel turned to infidelity and apostasy from their God.

The nation of Israel was also portrayed as a fig tree.  Ho.9:10 the Lord said, “I found Israel like grapes in the wilderness; I saw your forefathers as the earliest fruit on the fig tree”.  Is.5:7 “The vineyard of the Lord of hosts is the house of Israel, and Judah is His delightful plant [fig].”  The Lord said of the locust devastation in Joel.1:7, “It has made My vine a waste and My fig tree a stump”.  Je.8:12-13 was a prophecy upon ancient Judah. “They shall be brought down. There will be no grapes on the vine and no figs on the fig tree.”  No peace and plenty then. (cf. Mt.21:19 the fig tree Jesus cursed withered.)

But long before there was the nation(s) of ancient Israel, from the beginning God’s word gave symbolic meaning through trees.  Ge.2:8-9 “The Lord God planted a garden in Eden; and there He put the human. And the Lord God caused to grow every tree that is pleasing and good for food; the Tree of Life, and the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil [Bad].”  These were the two most significant trees in that first Garden.  God commanded the first human/(adám) in Ge.2:16-17, “Of every tree you may freely eat; but from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat it you will surely die”.

Adam was free to eat from all trees, including the cosmic TL.  This TL symbolized God’s provision of immortality.  That would be the result of continued obedience to God.  By partaking of the TL, Adam & Eve would be following the lead of God’s voice/Word and the Holy Spirit (HS) of Wisdom.  Pr.3:18 “Wisdom is a tree of life to those who lay hold of her. The Lord by wisdom founded the earth.”  Adam & Eve could have submitted to the Spirit of eternal life in God’s presence continually.

But one tree was not permitted them, the TKGE.  The consequence of disobedience to God, eating from that tree, is death.  That tree represented disregarding God’s voice/Word and the HS.  That tree wasn’t called just the Tree of the Knowledge of Evil.  It’s a mixture of Good and Evil.  Yet it’s not obedience to God.  The serpent tempted Eve in Ge.3:5. “In the day you eat from it [TKGE] your eyes will be opened and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.”  God is just, truly knowing what’s good and what’s evil/bad.  The TKGE would enable mankind to assume moral self-determination, to set their own standards of right and wrong, good and evil…as if they were God.  In a word…humanism.

Ge.3:6 “She [Eve] took from its fruit and ate, and gave to her husband, and he ate.”  It looked good!  They ate from the forbidden tree, in disobedience to God.  Sin!  And humanity has done so ever since.

We think we know good and evil, and by such knowledge have devised our own humanistic laws and justice/injustice systems.  Over the centuries, man has made some laws which in principle are based on God’s revealed laws from His HS & word.  But man has also enacted laws and sought religions apart from or contrary to God’s written laws/HS.  A mixture of good and evil.  Human misery has resulted.

{Sidelight: A government or ruler is ‘good’ to the extent their laws are based in principle upon God’s moral laws/standards.  e.g. the USA Constitution to an extent in past decades of its history.  Christians have been free in this nation.  But living as a Christian can be very difficult in dictatorships and underdeveloped nations where man’s laws are based on whatever keeps the present regime in power!}

Continuing with the first Adam & Eve in Ge.3:7, “Then their eyes were opened and they knew they were naked; and they sewed fig leaves together and made loin coverings”.  Nakedness can be both physical and spiritual, being unclothed or symbolic of sin & shame.  Re.16:15 “Blessed is the one who keeps his garments, lest he be naked and they see his shame.”  But prior to their sin…Ge.2:25 the two humans “were both naked and were not ashamed”.  Sin brought guilt and shame to their psyche.  (Note: This doesn’t mean that human bodyparts and normal sexual relations between husband & wife is sin.)

Adam & Eve themselves tried to cover their physical nakedness & sin with fig leaves…maybe from the same tree they’d eaten?!  Sewn fig leaves, or human devices, are inadequate to cover sin.  Ge.3:21 so “The Lord God made garments of skin for Adam and his wife, and clothed them.”  God Himself covered them with animal skins, perhaps leather garments of calfskin or kidskin.  In so doing, God showed that to cover the nakedness symbolic of sin, man must be ‘clothed’ by means of the death of another!  Those first skins from an animal sacrifice foreshadowed the temporary sacrificial system and ultimately Jesus the Lamb of God’s perfect final sacrifice to cover humanity’s sins!

Ge.3:22-23 “The Lord said, ‘The human has become like one of Us, knowing good and evil; and now, lest he eat also from the Tree of Life and live forever’ – therefore the Lord drove him from the garden.”  Man was now in a fallen state of disobedience, having chosen to decide for himself what constitutes right and wrong, in rebellion against God.  For that time, God mercifully separated man from becoming immortal and living forever as humans in the misery of self-rule with a disobedient sinful heart & mind.

Moving far ahead in history to the nation of Judah in the 580s BC…in Je.24 the Jews were portrayed as good and evil figs.  v.1-3 “Two baskets of figs set before the Temple of the Lord. One basket had very good figs, the other basket had very evil [bad] figs.”  The people then were a type of the TKGE (eaten by those disobedient).  v.4-10 the Jews taken captive to Babylon in 597 BC were now characterized by good figs; those Jews remaining in the Land were as bad rotten figs.  A mixture of good and evil.

Separated from the TL & water of Life, most people in disobedient Israel and Judah hadn’t been given the HS.  Only a small minority (prophets, some priests and kings) had the HS.  Israel and Judah had instead the Mosaic sacrificial rituals.  But rituals (without the HS) proved inadequate for eternal salvation, not changing the heart or removing the sin nature.

When Christ came into the holy land in the 1^st century AD, He told the parable of the fig tree.  Lk.13:6-9 “For three years I have looked for fruit on this fig tree, without finding any. Cut it down. But let it alone for this year and I’ll fertilize it, and if it bears fruit, fine! But if not, cut it down.”  Jesus’ ministry in the Land was 3–4 years.  By His Person, He nourished, so to speak, the people/fig tree of the Land.

But by Mt.21:43-46, Jesus declared, “The kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a nation producing the fruit of it. The chief priests and Pharisees understood He was speaking about them.”  Accordingly, the kingdom was taken from the physical nation of Judah in 70 AD; and given to a spiritual “nation” bearing fruit.  1Ch.28:5 the old Kingdom.  Ro.10:19 & 1Pe.2:9-10 the new “nation”.

Jesus said in Jn.15:1, 5, “I Am the true vine. He who abides in Me and I in him, bears much fruit.”  Unlike Israel, Jesus the true vine remained obedient.  By virtue of the sinless Jesus’ sacrifice, believers may now receive the HS.  The HS produces fruit that we in the “holy nation” are to bear (1Pe.2:9-10).

Mt.21:1 “Jesus approached Jerusalem and came to Bethphagé at the Mount of Olives.”  Bethphage meant ‘house of unripe figs’.  v.19-20 “Seeing a lone fig tree by the road, He found nothing on it but leaves only. He said to it, ‘There shall be no fruit on you again.’ The fig tree withered.”  This fig tree, a type of the TKGE, was cursed four days before the cross.  The fig tree was an emblem of Judah.

Most of Judah rejected Jesus.  They set Him up to be crucified.  Jerusalem, the Temple, and Judea were destroyed in 70 AD. (see the topic “Babylon the Great’ in Revelation”.)  Their sacrificial rituals and oral traditions were insufficient.  Denying Jesus’ ultimate sacrifice, those Jews couldn’t completely cover their sins to receive eternal Life.  He.10:4 animal sacrifices cannot forever take away sins or the sin nature.  (That doesn’t mean the Jewish people won’t have salvation, e.g. Ro.11:23-26.)

God had placed the first created human/adam in a garden.  Immediately prior to Jesus’ crucifixion, the greatest drama in history, concerning God’s only begotten Son, began in a later garden!  Jn.18:1 “Jesus went to a garden, He and His disciples.”  Mk.14:32-33 “They came to Gethsemané. He became deeply distressed and troubled.”  The garden was at the foot of the Mt. of Olives.  Gethsemane meant ‘oil or wine press’.  That night Jesus prayed fervently.  In Luke’s account, Lk.22:44 “His sweat became like drops of blood falling on the ground”.  (Hematidrósis is rare.)  Jesus even sweated blood in mental agony from the pressure He felt…at the place of the wine press.  Blood resembles red wine in color.

After day came, Christ was crucified, shedding His blood.  Peter later said to the high priest in Ac.5:30, “Jesus, whom you had put to death by hanging Him on a tree”.  Jesus’ cross is symbolic of the Tree of Life.  Jesus hung on a type of the TL, near the Mt. of Olives…perhaps even within distant view of the fig tree He’d cursed, symbolizing the TKGE which represented disobedient Judah!

Christ had instructed Moses (in the Law).  De.21:22-23 “If a man is put to death and you hang him on a tree, he who is hanged is accursed by God.”  The Jewish apostle Paul wrote in Ga.3:13-14, “Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us; it is written, ‘Cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree”.  (The curses for disobedience declared in Christ’s law were in De.27:15-26, De.28:15-ff, Le.26:14-ff, e.g.)  As the ultimate sacrifice for sin, Christ Himself became the curse for all humanity!  1Pe.2:24 “He Himself bore our sins in His body on the tree, for by His wounds you were healed.”

Christ’s life was a living sacrifice according to His Father’s will, thereby enabling believers to receive the HS.  Our human nature & self-will has descended from the disobedient first human Adam, who ate from the TKGE.  Paul wrote in 1Co.15:45, “The first human, Adam, became a living soul. The last Adam [Jesus, symbolically] became a life-giving spirit.”  Paul refers to the obedient Jesus as the “last Adam”, through whom we inherit the spiritual nature and a future spiritual body in eternal life.  Ro.5:19 “Through one man’s disobedience many were made sinners, through the obedience of One many are made righteous.”  (see “Life and Death – for Saints” and “Universal Salvation in the Bible”.)

The dramas of two ‘Adams’ and two gardens play out unto eternal life for mankind!  Our salvation comes only by Jesus’ final sacrifice.  He.10:10 “By the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.”

Israel has twice received grace.  Jn.1:15-17 “For in His fullness we all received grace upon grace. For the law was given through Moses, grace and truth through Jesus Christ.”  Christ was the Rock, the God of ancient Israel, according to Paul and John (ref De.32:3-4, 18, 1Co.10:4, 9, Is.6:1, 5, Jn.12:41-44).  The pre-existent Christ as the primordial Word of God had given His righteous Law to Moses & Israel.  No other ancient nation received such unmerited favor/grace as did Israel (e.g. De.4:8)!  (Moses’ face shined, Ex.34:30 & 2Co.3:7.)  Jesus is Lord!  Zec.4:6-7 LXX “By My Spirit’, saith the Lord Almighty. ‘I will bring out the Stone of the inheritance, its grace equaling My grace.”  By double grace – Christ’s law/Tabernacle/Temple, and Christ the CornerStone with HS amplitude become available to all.

In addition to the vine and the fig tree…there’s another very significant tree.  Continuing in Zec.4:11-14 LXX, “What are the two olive trees on the right and left side of the lampstand? These are the two anointed ones that stand by the Lord of the whole earth.”  Unlike the fig tree, the olive tree symbolizes real Life; and is an emblem of peace.  Olive oil is a type of the HS, and was used in God’s ancient Tabernacle, foreshadowing the availability of the ‘oil’ of the HS for all humanity.  Theologian A.B. Simpson wrote of the olive tree. “The tree itself seems almost indestructible. It is usually crooked, gnarled, twisted, and almost torn to pieces. Some of the olive trees of Gethsemane must be at least 1,000 years old; indeed the olive seems as if it could scarcely die.”  Gethsemane, the second garden.

Perhaps the Tree of Life in the first garden was a type of olive tree?!  A 1,000-year-old olive tree will still produce fruit!  It’s an evergreen, continually renewing its leaves.  In the metaphorical Jdg. 9:8-13, “The trees went forth once to anoint a king over them. They said to the olive tree, ‘Reign over us.”  The olive tree was the first choice as king of the trees.  (Second choice was the fig tree, third was the vine.)

Paul said, Ro.11:16-25 “If the root be holy, the branches are holy. You [gentiles] become partaker with them [Israel] of the rich root of the olive tree.”  The HS is the holy root of the (olive) tree of Life.  The church branches, with Jews re-grafted in, become holy via the indwelling HS, symbolized by oil from the olive.  (Christ is the root of Jesse, Is.11:10, the root and offspring of David, Re.22:16.)

Ep.2:7-9 “By grace you have been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God; not the result of works, that no man should boast.”  It’s by God’s grace…not sewing fig leaves or our own humanistic works based upon the tree of man’s (supposed) knowledge of good & evil.  Instead….

He.8:10 “This is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel’, saith the Lord: ‘I will put My laws in their minds and write them on their hearts. I will be their God and they will be My people.”  In the New Covenant, the HS puts God’s laws into our minds & hearts.  (see “Two Covenants – Heart of the Matter”.)  Gentiles are grafted-in, Ro.11:17.  Again, Mic.4:2 “The law will go out from Zion.”  Societal justice will be determined and governed by God’s completely just morality & principles…not man’s contrary laws based on human values from the TKGE.

Ps.1:1-3 “Blessed is the man whose delight is in the law of the Lord. He will be like a tree planted by streams of water which yields its fruit in its season.”  Man is figuratively a tree bearing fruit from the living water of the HS; it won’t wither. (see “Living Water Produces Spiritual Fruit”.)  Concluding….

Re.22:1-3 “He showed me a river of life flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb. On each side of the river was the Tree of Life; the leaves of the tree are for the healing of the nations.” (cf. Ezk.47)  In Paradise restored there’s no humanistic tree of the knowledge of good and evil by the river!  We’re obedient to God’s (better) ways.  Re.14:12 “Here is the steadfastness of the saints, they that keep the commandments of God and the faith of Jesus.”  Re.2:7 Jesus says, “To him who overcomes I will give the right to eat of the TL which is in the Paradise of God”.  The Tree of Eternal Life…Halleluyah!

Healing Our Bodies

This topic is about healing.  Healing in the physical body is restoration to a healthy condition from disease or damage.

Almighty God is the ultimate Healer.  Eventually He will give us imperishable spiritual bodies, without the weakness or pain of our present natural bodies.  1Co.15:42-49 applies to us. “There is a natural body; there is also a spiritual body.”  1Co.15:50 our perishable flesh & blood bodies won’t inherit the Kingdom of God.

God provides good for our bodies of flesh.  Php.4:19 “My God shall provide all your need.”  Je.29:11-13 “I know the plans I have for you,’ declares the Lord, ‘Plans for good and not evil, to give you a future and a hope. You will pray to Me, and I will hear you.”  John wrote in 3Jn.2, “I desire you to prosper and be in good health”.  But our earthly bodies will encounter sickness, and need healing.

The Lord is the real Physician.  It’s been said…all others are just ‘practicing’!  Yet they can often help.

{Sidelight: Jn.6:46, 5:37 Jesus said no human had ever seen or heard Father God (Jesus revealed Him, Jn.1:18).  Jn.1:1, 14 the Word/Jesus is also YHVH.  (cf. Ge.19:24 two YHVHs!)  Is.6:1, 5 & Jn.12:41-44 John said Isaiah saw the pre-incarnate Word/Jesus (not the Father).  It was Jesus Christ who was the visible Spokesman God of the Old Testament!  see the topic “Jesus Was the Old Testament God”.}

Ex.20:1-ff the Lord Jesus spoke His Decalogue to Moses!  Ex.15:26 “If you will obey the Lord your God, and hearken to His commandments and keep His statutes; I AM the Lord your Healer.”  God said in Ex.23:25-26, “I will fulfill the number of your days”.  Gill Exposition “The number of days which was fixed for each of them.”  Christ will remove sickness, and promises a person will live the number of days/years God intends for that one!  De.7:15 the Lord would put sickness on the heathen hateful.  De.28:58-61 those who disobey God’s laws will be diseased & destroyed!  Ps.55:23 “Bloody deceitful men shall not live half their days.”  The years of evil men may end early, in the prime of life.

God is Sovereign!  Jb.14:5 “Since a person’s days are determined, the number of his months are under Your [God’s] control, You have set his limit that he cannot pass.”  A man’s days are known and initially fixed by God.  1Sm.2:6 “The Lord brings death and gives life.”  The power of life and death is in God’s hands.  Since God is the Author of life, He has the right to take life.  It’s God’s prerogative.

Jesus’ basic dietary, cleanliness and sanitation laws are found in: Le.11 clean versus unclean, De.14:2-21 (similar to Le.11), Le.15, Le.17:10-16.  (also see “Unclean versus Clean Food”.)

Good health is more than luck.  Paul said in Ga.6:7, “Be not deceived, whatever one sows he will also reap”.  We reap what we sow.  It’s a basic principle of God.  Jesus is the God of cause and effect.  Action and reaction.  Obedience results in blessings, but disobedience can result in misery.  This principle is foundational to our health and healing!  De.30:10-20 “The Lord is your life and the length of your days.”  Here Christ makes the point that choosing to obey results in life and length of days (v.20)!

But what should we do when we encounter illness?

Healing is more than a removal of physical symptoms.  Mt.9:2-6 God’s healing includes forgiveness!  Jn.5:11-14 Jesus told the sick man He’d healed, “Don’t sin, so that nothing worse may befall you”.  Sin can result in sickness.  Yet 1Jn.1:9 “If we confess our sins, He is just to forgive our sins.”

We confess and repent!  Mk.6:12-13 we’re to repent of sin…many were anointed & healed via His disciples.  Ja.5:14-16 “Is any among you sick? Let him call for the elders of the church, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord; and the prayer of faith will restore the sick. If he has committed sins, they will be forgiven. The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous person avails much.”  Amen.

Olive oil was a common base oil in Old Testament (OT) Israel (and a point of contact).  Numerous essential oils of herbs/trees in God’s creation have properties which contribute to healing.  Moreover, Re.22:2 “The leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations.”  Ex.30:22-38 God’s holy anointing oil mixture and holy incense mixture at His ancient tabernacle contained powerful antiviral, antibacterial and antifungal agents.  Those blends were made from spices and essential oils.  The Lord even stayed the plague when Aaron held up the holy incense mixture (Nu.16:46-48)!

Heartfelt believing prayers are effective!  Ps.34:15 “The eyes of the Lord are on the righteous, and His ears open to their cry.”  Ps.119:172 the righteous obey God’s commandments (ref Lk.1:6).  Lk.11:9-10, 18:1-7 we too can give God no rest in prayer!

It may be that God will wait to see how much we desire something, before He answers.  If we want healing, intervention or some blessing enough, we can supplicate on our knees/face until breakthrough.  God will hear!  When we get our breakthrough, we’ll know that we know in our knower…we’ll be healed!  Strong believing faith comes.

2Ki.20:1-11 God healed king Hezekiah from a terminal condition, using a poultice of figs.  The king had prayed earnestly and wept bitterly.  v.5 the Lord said, “I will heal you”.  In so doing, God used plant therapy to add 15 years to Hezekiah’s days.  And he didn’t have a personal breakthrough (v.8).

Je.8:22 “Is there no balm in Gilead; is there no physician there?”  Ancient Gilead was known for its balm (from the balsam tree), used for healing wounds.

1Ti.5:23 Paul prescribed wine therapy for Timothy’s frequent ailments.  Most often we have our part to do, in some form or another.

King Asa, however, became disobedient to God.  He trusted in allies and sought physicians, rather than seeking God first…and he died from a severe foot disease (2Ch.16:7-9, 12-13)!

Mk.5:25-29 this woman had endured much from physicians.  But then Jesus healed her miraculously!

Yet it’s not always lack of faith to seek medical aid too.  Mt.9:12 Jesus said it’s those who are sick who need a physician (He too is a Physician).  Col.4:14 “Luke, the beloved physician.”  Wisdom of Sírach 38:1-4 “Honor the physician with the honor due him, and according to your need of him. Healing comes from the Most High. The Lord created medicines from the earth, and the sensible man will not loathe them.”  It is thought that all 1^st century Judean towns had a doctor to treat symptoms, set fractures, dress wounds, ease pain.  Today’s practitioner of alternative medicine, naturopath, herbalist may compare.

God is omniscient…He knows the end from the beginning (Is.46:10).  Also God is love (1Jn.4:8), and wants to do us good during our days He’s given us in the flesh.  We reap what we sow, and God lovingly chastises us for disobedience along the way (He.12:5-7, Re.3:19).  But since Jesus took the rap to acquit us, God may heal before we’ve fully reaped what we’ve sown!  The Lord is our ultimate healing Physician…in this physical life, and/or in the future via an incorruptible spiritual body.

1Co.10:13 God doesn’t allow us to experience trials greater than we can bear!  David wrote in Ps.39:4, “Lord, make me to know my end and what is the extent of my days”.  Some may desire to remain in the flesh past the “extent of our days”.  To accomplish more or desiring to be with loved ones here; to delay our going to be with Christ and other loved ones who’ve passed on.  (see “Life and Death – for Saints”.)  God loves us.  Perhaps He may honor our choice?  The Lord did add 15 years to Hezekiah’s life!

We can seek advanced medical treatment or have surgery(s) which possibly may add to our time in this natural body.  It may be that God won’t override one’s desire to do so.  God knows.  One way or the other…Ps.116:15 “Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of His saints.”

It’s risky to ignore a persistent strange pain or sickness in the body.  Mk.9:43-47 may also broadly apply to skin cancer from sun, or gangrene.  Remove tumors if need be.  A mixture of eggplant and oils or vinegar can be effective against basal cell and squamous skin cancers.

God basically heals through three means: miraculously, naturally, normal body rejuvenation over time.

There’s no individuals named in the gospel accounts to whom Jesus refused healing!  The Messiah even healed male Israelite lepers, Mt.8:1-4!  However, lack of faith in Nazareth limited even Jesus, Mk.6:5.

Lk.7:1-10 Jesus healed gentiles too.  Mk.7:24-30 He delivered the Syro-Phoenician’s daughter.  (Maybe those individuals there kept the dietary laws Christ had instructed Moses?)  At least 1/3 of Jesus’ healings were deliverance from spirits.  Trespassing spirits can cause disease.  Ac.28:3-10 God healed ignorant heathens on Malta…they’d believed God’s miracle with Paul and respected his shipwrecked group.  The Most High is kind to all (Lk.6:35b).

God is great at putting out fires…He’s the ultimate Fireman!  But God’s kindness and mercy may not repudiate His principle of sowing and reaping.

In 1Ti.5:22a, Paul said to be circumspect in laying-on hands.  I may not have expectant faith to lay-on hands for the healing of one who’s knowingly unrepentant.  But with faith and confidence in God’s promises, we can readily lay hands on the person whose heart is sincerely trying to obey the Lord!

1Co.12:8-10 some Christians are gifted as special agents of God’s healing & miracles.  Ac.5:14-16 God even healed through Peter’s shadow!  Ac.19:11-12 at Ephesus, Paul used anointed cloths in healing.

Often God heals through created bodily processes and rejuvenation over time.  Living in disobedience for years can weaken our system.  But if an unknown pain or illness is still present after giving the body reasonable time to be renewed…it’s our decision whether or when to seek medical aid and expose a weakened immune system to sicknesses prevalent in today’s hospitals & waiting rooms.

Prescription drugs?  Drugs have side effects.  But if one’s immune system has become too weak or we don’t know what will remedy our condition naturally or the belief isn’t there…antibiotics may be necessary.  Garlic (raw) is a potent natural antibiotic…its use even prevented soldiers in the 20th century world wars from getting gangrene!

2Ti.4:20 Tróphimus was sick.  But, tradition says he died later from beheading by Nero.  2Co.12:7-10 Paul’s thorn in the flesh…affliction from an adversarial spirit to keep Paul humble, or perhaps cataracts with age.  Or possibly Paul was reaping (2Co.11:24-25) what he’d sown as Saul, the trauma he’d caused Jewish Christian saints (e.g. Ac.9:1-4)?  God loved & forgave Saul/Paul…yet God is just.  (Paul himself even wrote to the saints in 2Th.1:6, “It is just for God to repay with affliction those who afflict you”.)

Ps.119:84 “How many are the days of Thy servant?”  Most of us (non-terminally ill) don’t know the number of our days.  Is.57:1-2 sometimes, “The righteous is taken away from evil to come. They rest on their beds.”  2Ti.4:6-7 Paul knew his spirit was soon to depart his body.  2Pe.1:13-15 Peter knew his time to go was imminent. (Ja.2:26 the body without the spirit is dead.  cf. Ac.7:59 with Lk.8:55.)  And the day will come when God will no longer heal our physical shell surrounding our spirit…you and me.

God has blessed my son’s family so far in this life.  Yet he’s told me that he also looks forward to being with the Lord.  Php.1:23 “To depart and be with Christ is far better.”

Ps.103:1-5 “Praise the Lord and forget not all His benefits. He pardons all your iniquities and heals all your diseases.”  (Again, Mt.9:5 pardon & healing.)  Healing the obedient from illness is one of the many benefits Jesus promised.  It’s not magic…it’s mercy and grace.  God knows our hearts, knows whether or not we’re sincere in trying to overcome an issue.  Full repentance may take some time.

Besides obeying God’s laws & principles, our environment and diet affects our health.  We’re advised to: wash our hands, keep a clean house, get enough exercise; and avoid blood, smoking, nicotine, sugary soft drinks.  To neglect doing our part, or taking for granted our God-given bodies, can result in illness.

We may inadvertently catch a bug at school or at work in this ‘fallen’ world.  We’re affected and infected by the actions and sins of others.  Not all that we suffer is due to our personal sin (ref Lk.13:1-5).  Yet we may have a trial where we suffer some physically.

Pets can get parasites and make us sick.  Caring for pets is a good teaching tool for children, or keeping a yap-yap dog for protection.  But it’s our personal decision whether the pros outweigh the cons of keeping an unclean animal inside the home. (There’s no Bible record of unclean pets in OT Israel!)

What about healing through televangelists?  For example, I’ve heard that Benny Hinn eats clean and verbally gives God the glory for the healings.  A Christian I know described to me his own healing at a Benny Hinn crusade (a female co-worker of mine likewise).  Many pray and fast going into such crusades.  There’s usually a high faith level and expectancy at such events.

But a person may later lose their healing through disobedience.  The Lord mercifully puts out the fire and heals, but then with continued disobedience that person may again start reaping what they sow.  Railing on satan with the tongue while disobeying God’s commandments may not bring physical relief!  A level of faith is also necessary to believe and obey God’s written word.

My wife tries to obey Jesus’ dietary & sanitary laws.  She’s not used my health insurance or antibiotics in 35 years.  It’s cause and effect, in part.  Mt.9:28-30 Jesus said, “According to your faith be it done to you”.  I wear glasses.  Other than my eyes and having skin lesions removed (probably too many hours outside without sunscreen), I rarely go to a doctor.  I take herbal supplements & essential oils, but no meds.  I have dental checkups & cleanings twice-a-year.  When I catch a bug or get injured, usually the first thing I do is ask for anointing and for the Lord to heal me.  To God be the glory!

For sure, most of us don’t want to die an untimely death.  1Pe.2:24 “By His [Jesus’] wounds you were healed.”  Until we’ve reached the number of our days God is giving us…He provides our physical healing needs.  The Lord says in He.13:5, “I will never leave you nor forsake you”.

As we’ve seen, the concept of healing is multifaceted.  Healing accompanies forgiveness…and consummates in the Christian’s new life in eternity.

God is Sovereign.  He’s in charge.  God is for us, and will cause all things to work together for our good (Ro.8:28-32)!  Php.3:20-21 “Our citizenship is in heaven, from which we eagerly await the Lord Jesus; who will transform our lowly body to be like His glorious body.”  That’s our hope, our spiritual body!

For now…let’s continue to have faith in God and in His word, keeping our hearts focused on obeying and trusting Him.  It is possible to live in near divine health, as God promised.  Until we too fulfill the number of our natural days, according to God’s will…and go to be forever with the Lord!

Halloween and Noah’s Flood

Halloween ordinarily elicits images of death, ghosts and spirits.  We read about old heathen Hallowe’en customs of the West European Druid Celts, ‘barbarians’, etc…on All Hallows’ Eve or All Saints’ Eve.

CBN: What Are the Pagan Roots of Halloween? “Halloween itself originated in paganism. The Celtic Festival of Samhain [Sáhwin] was observed on October 31 [or Nov 1, Celtic days began at sunset]. The souls of the dead were said to revisit their homes on this day and the festival acquired sinister significance, with ghosts, witches, goblins, black cats, fairies and demons said to be roaming about.”

Samhain is called the Witches’ New Year (celebrated by neo-pagans).  It was a harvest festival which preluded the darker winter season.  The word Samhain means ‘November’ on the Irish Gaelic calendar.

Encyclopaedia Brittanica: Halloween “People set bonfires on hilltops for relighting their hearth fires for winter and to frighten away evil spirits; and they sometimes wore masks and other disguises to avoid being recognized by the ghosts thought to be present.”  This originated Halloween masks & costumes.

The Acronym: The Pagan Origins of Halloween “Celtic culture dates back to 1200 BCE. During the 3-day celebration, it was believed that the barrier between humans and otherworldly spirits was broken. Samhain was reframed as a Christian celebration to capitalize on the festival’s popularity, to help spread Christianity.”  History.com: How the Early Church Christianized Halloween “Tricks were traditionally blamed on faeries. Token offerings of harvested food [were] offered the spirits to placate them. Children would play games to entertain the dead. Pope Gregory 1 [590–604 AD] advised that a missionary should simply convert them [old religious customs] to a Christian religious purpose.”

But Is.5:20 warns, “Woe to those who call evil good, and good evil”.  De.18:10-12 NASB “There shall not be found among you anyone…who uses divination, who practices witchcraft, or a sorcerer. Whoever does these things is detestable to the Lord.”  Witchcraft, etc. was an ‘abomination’ (KJV) in God’s eyes!

Wikipedia: Halloween “Irish and Scottish immigrants took many Halloween customs to North America in the 19^th century. Halloween activities include trick or treat [olden threats], attending costume parties, carving pumpkins [or turnips] into jack-o-lanterns, lighting bonfires, apple bobbing, divination games, playing pranks, scary stories, watching horror films.”  Facts.net: Halloween Facts “Halloween is the second highest-grossing commercial holiday, second only to Christmas in the U.S.”  It’s very popular!

On our modern Gregorian calendar, Halloween occurs the night of Oct 31^st.  Wikipedia: All Souls’ Day “Also known as the Day of the Dead, a day of prayer and repentance for the faithful departed, observed by Roman Catholics and other Christian denominations annually on 2 Nov. The celebration is the last day of Allhallowtide, after All Saints’ Day (1 Nov) and Halloween (31 Oct).”  Like Samhain, 3 days.

The rest of this topic takes an unconventional look at Halloween and a very ancient All Souls’ Day.

It involves ancient calendars.  In 45 BC, Julius Caesar made January 1 the beginning of the calendar year (Julian calendar).  However, very anciently the new year generally began around mid–September.

Much earlier…Armenians, Assyrians, Egyptians, Ethiopians, Hebrews began their year in late summer.

Old Assyrian Calendar Oxford Studies “The calendar of Upper Mesopotamian kingdom (Sámsi-Adád [1808–1776 BC]) started in August. Previous interpretations suggested a beginning of the Old Assyrian year the day of the autumnal equinox.”  (Akítu harvest festivals were held at both equinoxes.)

egypttoday.com 2021 “September 11 marks the beginning of the Egyptian year within the first calendar in human history; one of the first calendars known to mankind. This year is the 6,263^rd Egyptian year.”  Thoth’s Calendar “Established in the reign of Pharaoh Shépseskaf [2500 BC?]. New Year’s Day fell on the first of the month of Thoth, around August 29.”  Wikipedia: Thoth “The first month of the ancient Egyptian and Coptic calendars. It lies between 11 Sep and 10 Oct of the Gregorian calendar.”  Wikipedia: Ethiopian Calendar “The New Year occurs on 11 September [Gregorian calendar].”

Let’s look at pertinent Biblical calendar background.  Moses’ ancestry included Isaac, Noah, etc., and he was also raised by Pharaoh’s daughter, Ex.2:9-10.  Ac.7:21-22 “Moses was educated in all the learning of the Egyptians.”  Josephus Antiquities of the Jews 2:10:1-2 Moses had been a general in the Egyptian army, warring against Cush/Ethiopia.  Moses, an Egyptian name, knew when the Egyptian year began.

Moses noted, Ge.26:12 (Septúagint/LXX) “Isaac sowed in the Land and reaped in the same year barley 100-fold”.  Circa 1900 BC.  The time to sow barley & wheat in Israel is Nov–Dec; and then it’s reaped in Apr–June.  For Isaac to sow and reap in the same year, their new year could’ve occurred near the autumn equinox.  But the new year couldn’t have occurred in Jan or at the spring equinox in March, between the sowing and reaping cycle of Nov to June.  Else Isaac would’ve reaped in the next year, not in the same year he sowed.  Isaac’s father Abraham had purchased land in Canáan from Hittites (Ge.23:10-20).  Ancient Calendars 5: Anatólia “Before the Late Bronze Age, the Hittite New Year came at the autumn equinox…Based on Akkádian documents from the Old Assyrian period.”

congdon ministries: Calendars of the Bible “At that time [of Moses, 1500s BC], peoples of Palestine, being agricultural, started their calendar systems in the early autumn, with the olive harvest. Likewise the Gezer/Egyptian calendar.”  The 900s BC ‘Gezer calendar’ tablet, found 20 mi. west of Jerusalem at the Philistine border, is one of the earliest Phoenícian or Paleo-Hebrew inscriptions discovered.  Times of Israel: Rosh Hashánah and the Mystery of the Gezer Calendar “The name Tíshrei is taken from the Akkadian month name Tashritu, or the ‘Beginning’ month. The first month in the inscription, ‘Moons of Gathering (agricultural produce)’, would then refer to Tishrei (Sep-Oct) and Héshvan (Oct-Nov).”

The month Tishri began Israel’s civil or calendar year.  Ex.23:16 the Feast of Ingathering/Booths at the full moon of Tishri occurred in early Oct “at the end of the year”. ref Ex.34:22.  Le.25:9-10 “You shall sound the ram’s horn on the 10^th day of the 7^th month [Tishri], on the Day of Atonement [Yom Kíppur, in Hebrew].”  The consecrated jubilee year was thus proclaimed in Israel on this 10^th day of Tishri, in the early autumn.  Ezk.40:1 “At the beginning of the year [Rosh Hashanah Strongs h7218 h8141, Hebrew] on the 10^th of the month [Yom Kippur].”  The annual High Holydays are Tishri 1-10.

{Sidelight: When the ancient Israelites were exiting Egypt, the Lord said to Moses in the early spring, Ex.12:1-2 “This shall be the beginning of months for you”.  It was the time of the first Passover.  In Ex.13:4 YHVH instructed Moses that their months (of the sacred year) were to begin then with Abíb the 1^st month. (also called Nisán, Est.3:7 & Ne.2:1; ‘Nísanu’, Babylonian.)  It follows that Siván would become the 3^rd month, Tishri (also called Éthanim, 1Ki.8:2) the 7^th month, Márcheshvan or Chéshvan or Heshvan the 8^th month, etc., according to God’s sacred calendar.  From the 1500s BC, at least two calendar reckonings were in effect simultaneously in ancient Israel.  The month Abib (Nisan), which began near the spring/vernal equinox, became the 1^st month of the year for future reckoning months, sacred festivals, and some king reigns.  The 7^th month Tishri, occurring near the autumn equinox Sep 20, was still the beginning month of the year for reckoning years, also jubilees and timing young unpicked or ‘uncircumcised’ trees (Le.19:23).  Abib/Nisan began the festival year.  New Years Day for ancient Israel remained at the month Tishri, according to the civil calendar (not the sacred calendar).}

The Jewish people celebrate the beginning of the (civil) year on Rosh Hashanah, the 1^st day of Tishri on the new moon.  It marked the “turn of the year” (Ex.34:22, 23:16).  Pulpit Commentary “The old Hebrew year ended…in autumn.”  Wikipedia: Rosh Hashanah Lit. “Head of the year’, the Jewish New Year, begins on the 1^st day of Tishrei…the traditional anniversary of the creation of Adam and Eve.”

Le.23:23-24 “The Lord spoke to Moses…‘On the 1^st day of the 7^th month [Tishri] you shall have a memorial by sounding [trumpets].”  Here the Hebrew term for “memorial” was zikarrón, and for “sounding”, teruáh.  New Year’s Day, Rosh Hashanah, is also known as: Yom Zikkaron, Day of Memorial…Yom Teruah, Day of Sounding (Trumpets)…Yom HaKéseh, Day of the Concealed Moon.

They acknowledged this Day of Memorial (1 Tishri) as the birthday of Adam.  In the days of Isaac, Abraham, Noah’s Flood, and back to the Creation…the season of Tishri was the 1^st month of the year.  It began in late summer near the autumnal equinox (+/- 15 days).

2,000 years ago, Josephus identified the name of the month and time of year when Noah’s Flood began.  op. cit. 1:3:3 “This calamity happened in the 600^th year the of Noah’s age, in the 2^nd month called by the Hebrews Marcheshvan; for so did they order their year in Egypt; but Moses appointed Nisan [Abib] should be the 1^st month [of the year] for their festivals…although he preserved the original order of the months [the civil calendar year starting in Tishri] as to selling & buying and other ordinary affairs.”

Ge.7:11-13 “In the 2^nd month, on the 17^th day of the month” (Marcheshvan or Cheshvan or Heshvan) the Noachian Flood came.  After the flood, Noah’s ark rested in the mountains of Armenia, and he planted a vineyard in the valleys (Ge.8:4, 9:20).  Ancient Armenian Calendar “The new year started with the month Návasard (from Armenian ‘New Year’) on August 11 [pre-2000 BC].”

Jewish Encyclopedia: Flood, The “The rain lasted during the months of Heshwan and Kíslew [time of Hanukkah]; the waters increased in Tebét, Shebát, Adár, Nisan, Iyár [spring]….The Hebrew year originally began in the fall.”  1200 AD Jewish philosopher Maimónides, “The beginning of our years is in Tishrei”.  And the month of Cheshvan still begins around Oct 15 on today’s Hebrew calendar.  (Long after Noah, Israel’s sacred calendar originated at Ex.12:2; then Cheshvan became the 8^th month.)

eyeopeningtruth.com “Chesvan is called the month of bool [1Ki.6:38 Bul], a name that stems from the word for ‘flood’. The flood began on the 17^th of Chesvan.”  Rabbi Ari Goldberg The Bitter Month “Chesvan is when darkness reigns, yet growth begins beneath the surface. Chesvan is classically referred to as Marchesvan. ‘mar’ [Strongs h4751] in Hebrew means ‘bitter’. The flood began on the 17^th of Chesvan.”  Bitter Chesvan.  Frederick A. Filby The Flood Reconsidered, p.106-108 “The old world perished in November. In ancient Assyria the ceremonies for the souls of the dead were in the month Arahsamna, which is Marcheswan.”

Pagan customs surround Halloween.  Sir James Frazier associated All Souls’ Day, the ancient Egyptian Festival of the Dead, with Nov 1^st in Adonis, Osiris, Attis. “The custom was observed throughout the whole of Egypt, and is referred by Heródotus as prevailing in the 5^th century BC.”  Nov 1^st falls in the month of Cheshvan or Marcheshvan or Heshvan in mid-autumn, according to the Hebrew calendar.

Some think the Deluge actually began on that day, November 1^st!  Again, for many ancient peoples, the new year began in mid-Sep.  For the 17^th day of the ancients’ 2^nd month to fall on Nov 1 according to our modern calendar, the 1^st day of the ancients’ 1^st month would’ve been near September 15.  D. Davidson wrote, “The day generally celebrated throughout the world, in ancient and modern times, as the anniversary of the Catastrophe [Flood], is 1^st November, with variations generally from 31^st October to 2^nd November.”  My desk calendar says the date Nov 2^nd is the Day of the Dead!

There is Old Testament evidence that the Jews memorialized and observed days of catastrophes.  Zec.8:19 “The fast of the 4^th, the fast of the 5^th, the 7^th, the 10^th months [sacred calendar].”  According to this verse, traditional fast days were instituted to remember four national afflictions.  In the 4^th month (on 17 Támmuz) Nebuchadnézzar took Jerusalem (Je.39:1-2).  In the 5^th month (on 9^th -10^th of Av) the temples of Solomon (Je.52:12-13) and Herod (Mk.13:1-2) were destroyed, 650 years apart.  The 2^nd day of the 7^th month was traditionally the date governor Gedaliáh was murdered (2Ki.25:25).  The 10^th day of the 10^th month was the siege of Jerusalem in 588 BC (Je.52:4, 39:1).  Again, since the 1500s BC, Hebrew months are reckoned from the spring Nisan/Abib.  (But years are still reckoned from Tishri.)

It seems the Jews didn’t view those national catastrophes as Divine Judgments, which could lead the people to national repentance.  Instead, they memorialized the national calamities and annually observed the dates on which they’d occurred (all too often without repentance)!

And it’s not only the Jewish people who memorialize catastrophes.  (Noah wasn’t Jewish.)  e.g. every Aug 6^th (‘A-Bomb Day’) the Japanese city of Hiróshima holds the Peace Memorial Ceremony.  In New York City, the 9/11 Ground Zero Memorial is now where the World Trade Center buildings once stood.  And our Memorial Day holiday in late May remembers those who died in military service.

The dates appear to coincide to make All Souls’ Day the memorialization of an earlier great catastrophe…that rainy day when all souls died!  Nov 2^nd is the Day of the Dead!  Perhaps the old Halloween custom of bobbing for apples represents a very ancient gruesome reality?!

biblestudy.org: The True Origin of Halloween “It is entirely possible that the origin of the holiday is a perverted memorial to the people put to death in Noah’s Flood.”  Pastor Bradford Winship The Origins of Halloween and Noah’s Flood “October 31^st Halloween, meaning hallowed or sacred evening, is the day Noah boarded the ark and the great flood came. Taken as the devil’s holiday, but the day actually belongs to God.”  Yet there’s no record that Noah, Moses, or other patriarchs annually wore masks & costumes to hide their identity or scare away evil spirits!  I’m not endorsing Halloween observance!

{{Sidelight: A minority view thinks Noah’s Flood occurred in Iyar, the 2^nd month of Israel’s sacred calendar.  But that calendar didn’t exist prior to 1600 BC, in the time of Genesis.  Ge.7:11 & 8:3-4 the Flood lasted for 5 months, exactly 150 days.  But there’s only 147 or 148 days between the 2^nd and 7^th months on Israel’s later sacred calendar!  The historical sources Moses used for Genesis had a different calendar reckoning.  For evidence of an older new year, ref: Ex.23:16, 34:22; Le.25:9-10; Ezk.40:1-ff at the “beginning of the year” Ezekiel saw his grandest vision while fasting on Yom Kippur!}}

History does have a way of repeating itself.  e.g. the destruction of both Temples and a few other historical calamities which befell the Jewish people are said to have happened on the 9^th of Av!

To conclude…After the Flood, God made a covenant with Noah and the living creatures.  Ge.9:9-17 God promised, “All flesh will never again be cut off by the water of a flood. This is the sign of the covenant; I will set my bow in the cloud, and I will look upon it to remember the everlasting covenant.”

God was as a warrior who came in judgment in the days of Noah.  God’s bow imagery also symbolizes His mighty power.  (ref “bow” in Hab.3:9-10, Lam.2:4, Re.6:2, De.32:23).  Yet in Ge.9 His weapon was set aside unstrung in the clouds, representing peace.  JFB Commentary Ge.9:13 “A bow unstrung, or without a string, is a proper symbol of peace and friendship.”

The apostle Paul wrote in Ro.3:23, “All have sinned”.  Also Ro.6:23a “The wages of sin is death.”  Since the Garden of Eden, the result of sin has been death for all humanity (Ge.2:16, 3:19; Ro.5:12).

Regardless of the exact calendar day the Flood began, historically Halloween commemorates death.

We’ve all seen rainbows as they’ve occasionally appeared through the clouds.  But as Christians, we pursue the spiritual ‘pot of gold’ at the end of the rainbow!  Ro.6:23b “The gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.”  Eternal life is our gift and our future through Jesus!  Thank You, Lord!