Here we are, again, at the end of a Torah cycle.

Time to march the Torah around the neighborhood, with singing and shofar blowing. Then, after returning to the synagogue, we read the last lines of Deuteronomy and while the congregation sings and dances we roll back the Torah to the beginning and read the first lines of Genesis.

(Rolling the Torah back gives you forearms that look like Popeye’s!)

If you prefer to watch a video, click on this link: Watch the video.

“Simchat Torah” means the Joy of Torah: the joyful part being the fact that we get to read it, all over again. The Torah is split into 54 separate readings, each reading is called a “parashah” and the weekly parashah is read at the Saturday morning Shabbat service. This is what we have done every Shabbat for millennia, even from before the time Yeshua walked the earth. These parashot (plural) are designed for an annual cycle, although in some synagogues they use a three-year cycle instead of the one-year cycle.

After the parashah is read, we read the Haftorah portion, which is from the other parts of the Tanakh and is relatable to the Torah portion. This is how it works: we read the Torah, which is the direct word of God telling us how we should live, worship, and treat each other, and then we read the Haftorah to see the practical application (or failure, thereof) of the Torah portion we just read which occurred during our history.

For example, Parashah Naso (Numbers 4:21 to the end of Chapter 7) includes the laws regarding the vow of the Nazirite. The Haftorah portion is from the Book of Judges 8:2-25, which is the story of the birth of Shimshon (Samson), who was to be a Nazirite from birth.

In some cases, there is a double parashot reading which is done to make sure the final reading comes out on the 8th day of Sukkot.

Yes, I know Sukkot is only 7 days, but the story goes that God so loved to be with his children that he extended it an extra day, which is called Shemini Atzeret (this is also Simchat Torah.)

It is very sad that so many Christians pretty much ignore the Torah. Not only is this sad because they can never really understand who Yeshua (Jesus) is if they don’t know his people’s history (he is, after all, Jewish) and they also can’t really fathom the depth of the lessons in Shaul’s (Paul) letters if they don’t know where he is “coming from”, meaning the mindset and beliefs of the Jewish people, which is given in the writings of the Torah.

They miss learning the wisdom found in the Book of Proverbs, and let’s not forget experiencing the beauty of the poetry in the Psalms; even though many churches do take from the Psalms, now and then. However, the full impact cannot be felt without knowing the history that motivated those songs.

And the worst part of all when Christians ignore reading the Torah is that they do not know what God said we should do, and no matter what their Priest, Minister, Pastor or whatever tells them Paul said, or John said, or even James said- it is what God said that counts!

Yeshua never taught anything different than what is in the Torah. Why people said he talked as no man has talked before is because he taught the spiritual understanding of God’s commandments. The Pharisees only taught the literal meaning, what we call the P’shat, but Yeshua went deeper than that and taught the Remes, the underlying spiritual meaning.

Here’s proof, which we get directly from Matthew 5 when we read the Sermon on the Mount: the Pharisees taught “Do not kill” but Yeshua said not to even so much as hate in our hearts; the Pharisees said “Do not commit adultery” but Yeshua said that wasn’t enough- you must not even lust with your eyes. Yeshua taught what God wanted us to know, which is not just the letter of the law but the very spirit of it.

If you aren’t that familiar with the Torah, please take it out and read it. Make it part of your daily reading. I keep my Bible in the bathroom because I know that every day I will have (at least) enough time alone and undisturbed to read a chapter or two. You will be surprised how quickly you get through the entire Bible that way. I start at Genesis and go all the way through to Revelation, then start all over again.

Of course, since I am reading much more than the Torah, alone, it takes me more than a year to go through the entire Bible, but doing it this way I have read the whole Bible many times over the past 25 or so years, and each time I get to start it over I am excited to do so.

Reading only the New Covenant is like building a house starting with the second floor. You may end up with something, but it will never be complete.

Thank you for being here and please share these messages with everyone you know. The more people who hear these lessons, the more people who will know what God really says. The whole purpose of this ministry is to grow and teach people what they need to know so they can make an informed decision about where they want to spend eternity.

Also please subscribe here and only my YouTube channel as well (use the link above), and remember that I always welcome your comments; you can make them here or on my Facebook discussion group called Just God’s Word.

PS: I have finished the draft of my latest book, which is debunking the different lies that have been traditionally handed down, in both Christianity and Judaism, about Messiah Yeshua. I hope to have it self-published and available for purchase within the next month or so and will announce it on my website when it is ready.

That’s it for now, so l’hitraot and Baruch HaShem!

Here we are at Sukkot, again, which this year happens exactly on the first day of Fall.

If you prefer to watch a video, click on this link: Watch the video.

Sukkot is, traditionally, believed to be the time when Messiah Yeshua was born, and this is verified by the timeline in the Gospel of Luke, with regards to when Zachariah (Yochanon the Immerser’s father) served in the temple, saw the angel, Miryam visited Elizabeth, etc.

The Torah commands us to live in Sukkot, which are tabernacles, or tents, with an open-top. The Sukkot are decorated with fruits and branches, which would be consistent with what materials would have been available to the Jews living in the desert. The commandment is also to live in the Sukkah (singular form) for 7 days, as a memorial to how the Israelites lived for 40 years.

In modern days, we build a Sukkah but for most people, it is in the backyard (if they have the space) and maybe the kids sleep in it, but for the most part, they will have dinner in it but sleep in the house.

When I was attending a Messianic synagogue back in Northeast Philadelphia, I built a Sukkah using PVC pipes so that it could be used, then reused, over and over again. It lasted for many years. We performed the shaking of the Lulav with the 4 Species in it, and it was fun to erect, decorate and then tear it all down when the week of Sukkot was over.

The message I have for us today is this tabernacle represents how God cared for his people, and whether or not you build a physical Sukkah, the tabernacle I believe God desires to share with us, more than anything else, is the tabernacle of our hearts.

When we read about God and his relationship with his people, we are told that he knows the mind. We read in the Gospels that Yeshua (through the power of the Ruach HaKodesh, the Holy Spirit) knew men’s minds. But we do not read about God seeking our mind: what we do read is that God seeks our heart.

When I like to check traditional Jewish thoughts, I go to one of two sources, neither of which has ever let me down: one is the book called “The Jewish Book of Why” (there are two volumes) and the other is the Chabad website. In this case, to share with you the Judaic belief about the relationship between the mind and the heart, I am paraphrasing what I saw on the Chabad website.

According to Chabad, there are two hearts and one mind. There is an outer and an inner heart; the outer heart reacts to the world, what we would call the “flesh” and the inner heart is purer and what we would call our spiritual side. The mind is the pathway to the inner heart, being able to overcome the fleshly desires of the outer heart and direct us to what is good and holy.

When I read this I thought immediately of Freudian analysis, the Id, Ego, and Super-ego.

Monsters from the Id! Monsters from the Id! Morbius didn’t think about the monsters from the Id!
(If you don’t recognize this reference, watch “Forbidden Planet”)

Freudian psychoanalysis identifies the Id as the primitive and instinctual part of the mind that contains sexual and aggressive drives and hidden memories, the super-ego operates as a moral conscience, and the ego is the realistic part that mediates between the desires of the id and the super-ego. I am sure you can now see the clear relationship of the Id (outer heart), the Super-ego (the inner heart), and the Ego (the mind). I wouldn’t be surprised if Freud, being Jewish, knew about the two hearts and the mind and used that as the basis for his system.

In any event, God seeks the heart, which is clearly the inner heart, and through prayer, we can have a sort of Sukkot every day of the year.

And unlike this week, the weather has no influence on our ability to tabernacle with God through prayer.

So enjoy this most festive Holy Day, which is really a Holy Week, and look forward to Shemini Atzeret, also called Simchat Torah (the Joy of Torah) which starts next Monday night The traditional thought is that even though the Torah says Sukkot is 7 days, God so enjoyed being with us in the tabernacles that he extended it for an extra day. On Simchat Torah, we turn the Torah back to the very beginning to start the annual reading cycle all over again, which is the joyful part.

(If I may, I will take this time to plug my book, "Parashot Drashim" which is a commentary/Bible study of each of the 54 Torah readings (called Parashah).  I believe you will find it very useful to see Yeshua in the Torah, as well as better understanding the Jewish mindset. It is available in paperback and Kindle; there are links to it on my website and it is available directly on Amazon.)

Sukkot is a time of celebration that, unlike most Holy Days, allows us to get closer to God not just spiritually, but physically, and I will finish today’s message with this one thought: God is never any further away than the length of our arms, yet no matter how close we get to him we can always get closer.

Thank you for being here and please subscribe, share these messages with everyone you know, and I always welcome your comments.

That’s it for now, so l’hitraot and Chag Sameach!

First off, I want to say to everyone the traditional Jewish greeting we pass to each other on Yom Kippur, which is:
May you have an easy fast.

If you prefer to watch a video, click on this link: Watch the video.

So often over the years, I have heard Christians tell me that because we are saved by faith in Messiah Yeshua (Jesus), we do not have to fast on Yom Kippur, or even obey any of the Moedim (Holy Days) that God gave to the Jews, all of which are specified in Leviticus 23.

My response is to ask if they understand what Yom Kippur is about. They say it is the Day of Atonement when we ask forgiveness of all our sins. For those who really know Judaism, they add that we do this by afflicting ourselves (the traditional method is fasting) and pray that God will move from his Throne of Judgment to his Throne of Forgiveness, and inscribe us in his Book of Life.

So, I ask you: if Yom Kippur is how God said to ask him to forgive you of your sins, who doesn’t have sin?

If you are sinless, then you don’t need to ask forgiveness, right? But, then again, refusing to afflict yourself on Yom Kippur, in whichever way you feel afflicted, is rejecting a commandment from God, which is a sin. Yeshua never said to reject any of God’s Holy Days, and even Shaul (Paul) never said to reject any of God’s Holy Days. So, by saying we have forgiveness through Yeshua so we don’t have to fast or observe Yom Kippur is, by definition, a sin.

And that means you need to ask forgiveness on Yom Kippur.

Here are my two reasons for Christians to observe Yom Kippur:

1. It is a commandment from God; and
2. No one is without sin, so why not ask for forgiveness?

Christianity has been professing that Yeshua did away with the law, but if he did, then that means there is no law. If there is no law, then we have no need for a Messiah, right? I mean, the law is what defines sin, so if there is no law there is no sin, and if there is no sin, there is no need for forgiveness, so we don’t need to practice any religion.

The conundrum Christianity has created is that believing Yeshua, who obeyed every law in the Torah, is the Messiah God sent to bring us into communion with him makes you a Christian, and Christians don’t have to obey God’s laws in the Torah, which means they obey man-made laws that reject God, which is the opposite of what Yeshua came to do!

God gave us laws, credos, doctrines, Holy Days, etc., but if Yeshua set us free from the Torah, then shouldn’t we also be free from the man-made traditions, holidays, and commandments that are in Christianity? Doesn’t it make sense that if we can reject what God said we must do, then whatever men say is even less important? Isn’t God more powerful than humans? So, if what God said doesn’t count, then certainly a human-originated commandment or law has no power or value, at all.

I am Jewish: I was born Jewish from Jewish parents of Jewish parents, and I even have the Levitical DNA marker in my genes. When I accepted Yeshua as the Messiah God promised, I was reborn- not as a Christian but as a renewed Jew. My faith was stronger than it had ever been, my life became more in alignment with the Jewish lifestyle that Yeshua lived, and I have been blessed beyond belief since doing this.

Yeshua celebrated every single Holy Day that God commanded us to obey, and even though he was given the authority to forgive sins on earth, he still fasted on Yom Kippur.

Hold it a minute! There is not one mention in the New Covenant Gospels about Yeshua observing any Jewish Holy Day or holiday (the former being God-ordained, the latter being man-made) other than Hanukkah and Passover. So how do I know he celebrated Yom Kippur? Because he was resurrected, which proved his sacrifice was accepted by God. And if his sacrifice was accepted, that means he died sinless, a spiritual condition which could only have existed if he observed every commandment God gave in the Torah.

The only difference between the sacrificial system for the forgiveness of sin God created in the Torah and the current means of forgiveness of sin through Yeshua is that Yeshua replaced the need to bring an animal to the temple in Jerusalem, the only place where God said we could make a sacrifice. Other than that, we still need to confess our sins (a part of the Yom Kippur service called the Ashamnoo prayer), repent of them and ask for forgiveness from God, which we do during the Yom Kippur service when reciting the Al Het (All sins) prayer.

Yom Kippur is not just something that we can throw behind us because we can receive forgiveness through Yeshua anytime we ask for it. The Sabbath, Passover, Shavuot, Yom Teruah (now called Rosh HaShanah), Yom Kippur, and Sukkot are Holy Days that God commanded us to observe as part of the way we worship him. Throwing them behind our back is a direct rejection of God. Period.

Unless you can find someplace where Yeshua said once we accept him as the Messiah it was OK to reject everything that his father said, then you had better reconsider rejecting the observance of God’s Holy Days. And I am not talking about what Shaul said, or more accurately, what people over the millennia have misinterpreted what Shaul said because God is more important than people. Yes, even more important than that nice Jewish tentmaker from Tarsus.

Too many Christians I have met don’t realize that they are not obeying God but instead a bunch of ex-Pagans who made up a religion of their own, with their own rules and holidays to replace the ones God gave, justifying this new, man-made religion by misinterpreting what Shaul said in his letters to ex-pagans learning how to be Jewish.

Think about it: God gave instructions on how to worship him and treat each other, as well as many other regulations regarding civil and criminal law, business ethics, and appropriate interpersonal relationships in order to teach us how to live righteous and holy lives. He did this in the Torah, so nu? Does that sound like something you should ignore?

Look…if you still aren’t sure if Yom Kippur is something you should celebrate as God commanded, I will leave you with one last question: do you really think that the Messiah, sent to bring us back into communion with God, would do so by telling us to reject everything God said?

Thank you for being here and please subscribe, share these messages with everyone you know, and check out my books, as well. Please remember that I always welcome your comments, so don’t be shy about letting me know what you think, even if you disagree. Hey, I’m not always right and I do respectfully listen to what people tell me they believe. All I ask is that you be respectful of me, as well.

That’s it for today, and remember that it is easier on you if you do NOT eat a big meal tomorrow night before sunset.

L’hitraot and Baruch HaShem!

How many times do we read in the Bible that God says we are to be holy, as he is holy? Too many times to count, right?

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But we are human beings; mortal, finite, and born with iniquity in our very DNA! God is perfect, holy, eternal, and unchanging; he knows we are weak, sinful, and as stable as a leaf in a hurricane, so why would he even think to task us with such an enormous burden, to be as he is?

How can God, being fair and just, expect us to be the same way he is?

The answer is: he doesn’t. C’mon, people, get real! God absolutely knows that we could never be the exact same way he is, so what does he mean when he says, “Be holy, as I am holy”?

I believe he means to emulate the way he is.

“What way is that?” you may ask, and the answer is given by God, himself: he tells us the way he is throughout the Torah.

God is forgiving; God loves everyone, even those who hate and reject him; God is fair and just, not giving special treatment to anyone.

God wants to forgive but because he is holy and just he will punish those who do evil in his sight, so we, too, must be fair and just, willing to forgive but not allowing evil to go unpunished.

God is trustworthy- he says what he means and he does what he says, unfailingly. His “Yes” means yes, and his “No” means no! Therefore, we must be trustworthy and do as we promise.

That’s all there is to it! God is forgiving, loving, just, fair, and merciful but will not allow evil to go unpunished. He treats all people the same and will not be turned to the left or the right, maintaining his course along a moral and holy path.

This is hard for us to do, but it is possible. We can never be exactly as God is, but we can be holy, as he is holy by dealing with people the same way he deals with us.

And if you aren’t really sure how to do that, then read the Torah. That is where God tells us how to worship him, and how to treat each other in all the different relationships we have. God tells us how to act with our spouses, our family, our friends, and in our business relationships. He even tells us how we should deal with evil by giving us a Penal Code.

God tells us how he expects us to interact with him and each other, and that is possible for us to do.

So, yes, Virginia- there is a way we can be holy, as God is holy, and the way to do that is to deal with people the same way God deals with us.

We can never be exactly as God is, but we can emulate God in the way we deal with others.

Thank you for being here and please subscribe, share these messages (to help this ministry grow), and check out my books. And remember: I always welcome your comments.

That’s it for today, so l’hitraot and Baruch HaShem!

This is going to be a deceptively short and simple message today and is pretty much the definitive difference between Legalism and Faith.

It is such a simple concept that I am not even going to do a video.

Legalism is the belief in performance-based salvation, meaning that what we do is how we are saved, regardless of our actual feelings. This is what religion still teaches today, especially Christianity: just do what we tell you to do and you will be fine.

Faith-based salvation is what Yeshua brought to us because he went beyond the “just do it” legalistic teachings of the Pharisees, and taught us that why we do is just as important as what we do. He taught us the spiritual meaning of the law, the true “new covenant”, i.e. what it means to have the law written on our hearts.

And in the Torah, we are told that Abraham, the poster-child for faith, was considered righteous not just because he believed God (Genesis 15:6) but also because he DID everything that God told him to do (Genesis 26:5).

So no matter how faithful you think you are, if you don’t do what God said to do, and the ONLY place that is found is in the Torah, your faith is not going to get you anywhere (James 2:14). Conversely, if you don’t have faith but try to act in accordance with the Torah in order to earn salvation, you will fail because no one can do everything in the Torah perfectly. That is why God sent the Messiah.

So there you have it: faith and works are inseparable. They are two sides of the same coin and one can’t function without the other. Faith is what must motivate us to do as God says; despite what you may have heard, Yeshua never changed anything and Shaul (Paul) never rejected the Torah or his Judaism. If you do not do as God said you should- not Paul or James or your Rabbi or your Priest, Minister, or whatever- but as God said to do, and you do it because you believe God’s promise of blessings (Deut. 28) and that salvation can now only be through Messiah Yeshua, then you are on the right path.

God has no religion, but men created religion to have power over other men, so if you succumb to religion you will be taken off the path of righteousness and directed down a path made up of ritual and false worship which ends in destruction.

Thank you for being here and please subscribe, share these messages, and remember that I always welcome your comments.

L’hitraot and Baruch HaShem!

We all know (at least, I hope we all know) that unconditional means without any requirements or minimums. And we all know (at least, I hope we all know) that when we pray we are to pray to God and not to anyone else. We do NOT pray to a saint or even to Yeshua (Jesus), only to God; but, we should pray in the name of Messiah Yeshua because he said that when we pray in his name, it will be done.

If you prefer to watch a video, click on this link: Watch the video.

For the record, even though in the Gospel of John where Yeshua says when we pray to him he will do as we ask, he means that he will intercede for us with his father, which is why he adds that he will do it to glorify the Lord. To pray exclusively to Yeshua would be wrong because Yeshua is the Intercessor of our prayers, not the Interceptor of them. John’s Gospel is ultra-spiritual and uses too much metaphor to be able to be understood easily. God said not to bow down or pray to anyone or anything but him, and that is one of the Big 10, so it really seems incomprehensible that his son, Yeshua, would tell us to do differently.

All that is well and good, we know what unconditional is, we know to pray to God, but what do I mean when I say to pray unconditionally? I mean to trust God to know what to do and how to do it.

Over the past 2 1/2 decades of my knowing the Lord and his Messiah, I have heard many people pray. And when they pray I hear them telling God what he should do, or how he should do it. For example:

“Lord, so-and-so is suffering with (whatever) so please do this, make that happen, ensure this is done this way, don’t forget to close the doors and turn off the lights, remember to feed the cat while they’re in the hospital, yadda-yadda-yadda…”

You know what? God knows what needs to be done, and in which order, and even all the sideline activities that are necessary. We don’t need to tell him what to do, and the truth is, he knows better than we ever will what is best to do and how to do it, so when I ask if you pray unconditionally, what I am asking is do you simply ask God to do something without all the requirements, instructions, and details?

In Numbers 12, after speaking out against Moses, God struck Miryam with leprosy. Did Moses go through a dissertation with God, asking him to make her skin as white as a newborn, or to give her back the cleanliness she once had by removing her leprosy?

No, he didn’t; all he asked was “God, please heal her!”

The reason I say we should pray without conditions or, worse yet, instructions, is because we should trust God to know what to do, how to do it, and even when it should be done. He is the LORD, he is the one who can heal and make well, and he is the one who punishes the unrighteous. Perhaps what we are praying against is something that God did for a purpose. Who can know? But when we pray, we need to do so without conditions so that God knows that in our hearts, we trust him to know and do what is best.

That’s all there is to it. Either we trust God or we don’t, and when we tell him what he should do and how to do it, that ain’t trust.

May I share my own experience? Long before I knew the Lord, I had a divorce, and at that time we had two children, aged 7 and 2. I constantly lift up my daughter and son to God, children who have been brainwashed by their mother over many years to hate and reject me, which they have done. There are so many things I want God to do to exonerate me but most importantly, to reconcile us. And as much as I would love to ask God to let the children know so many things about me that they were misinformed about, I don’t ask for that. I simply ask that he reconcile us and if that is not in his will, then to help them find him. I think that if they find God, then by his spirit they will want to reconcile, but the order and the timing are completely up to God.

I also know that God will never force anyone to accept him, which means no matter how much I pray, he will not force them to accept him or reconcile with me. I have done all I can for years to get them back, and now it is all up to God. But despite his unlimited power, I know also that if this never happens it isn’t because God didn’t try, it is because they refused to listen to him.

Yes, God can do anything, but he won’t force people to accept him or take away their free will.

Trust God to know and do what is necessary when you pray to him. Don’t place conditions on him or give instructions, just ask for what you want. Remember that Yeshua also told us God already knows what we want, and I think that he still desires us to ask him because that shows we are trusting in God to hear us and act.

It’s just like confessing of sin: God knows when we sin, and he also knows when we repent. He is willing, able, and more than that, desiring to forgive us, but the way it works is that we have to ask. We have to ask God to forgive us, we have to ask God for what we desire, and that is all we should do- just ask, trusting that he knows what to do and how to get it done.

Thank you for being here; please subscribe and share these messages. Also, check out my website, books, Facebook page, and discussion group (Just God’s Word).

And I always welcome your comments.

That’s it for today so l’hitraot and Baruch HaShem!

The answer to the question, “Are cheeseburgers kosher?” is a resounding NO!…and a resounding YES!

If you prefer to watch a video, click on this link: Watch the video.

If you ask any “mainstream” Jewish person, their answer will be “No” because their rabbi has taught them that any mixture of dairy and meat consumed within a certain number of hours is a sin (the time between eating one and the other is different depending upon whether you are Sephardic or Ashkenazi Jew.)

If you ask a Christian, born again or not, they will tell you it is a sin but only for the Jews because Christians are under Grace and the need to obey the Mosaic Laws is done away with when you accept Jesus as your Messiah.

Lastly, if you ask me, I will tell you that it is not a sin to have a cheeseburger because all God told us in Leviticus 11 (and a few other places within the Torah) is that we are not to boil a calf in its mother’s milk.

There is nothing, at all, anywhere in the Torah that says you cannot have dairy and meat together: that is strictly a Talmudic requirement.

If you aren’t familiar with the Talmud, it is considered by many Jews, especially within the Orthodox sects, to be as important as the Torah. This is because the Talmud is called the “Oral Law”, which is the many other commandments God gave to Moses that were not written down, but instead passed orally from Moses to Joshua, and so forth down through the centuries until it was finally written down in the Mishna, composed circa 300 CE. Later, the Gemara was added around 500 CE. There are two separate Talmud’s, the Babylonian Talmud and the Palestinian, or Jerusalem Talmud. The Talmud contains Halacha, which means “The Walk” or “The Way to Walk”, which is how Jews are to worship and live their lives. Everything from how far you can walk on Shabbat, to what kinds of dishes to have, to how hot your dishwasher has to be, to what lights to leave on Friday before Shabbat, to what you can wear, to how to groom yourself, to …well, you get the idea.

So if Jews say cheeseburgers aren’t kosher, and Christians say kosher isn’t required for people who believe in Jesus, why do I, a Jew who believes in Jesus, say that cheeseburgers are kosher and the kosher laws are still required?

I’ll tell you why: because God never said don’t mix dairy and meat together in the same meal and Yeshua never said any of the Mosaic laws, which include the kosher laws, are no longer necessary when you follow him.

Let’s get this straight: I do not condone or even suggest that we should change God’s commandments because of the difference between how people lived then and how we live today, but rather that we should know how they lived then and account for how we live today to ensure we follow not just the letter, but the spirit of the law.

God was clear when he spoke through the Prophets that he wants obedience, but obedience from a desire to please him and not as a means of earning salvation.

In other words, just going through the motions (what we call Legalism) is not enough.

I say cheeseburgers are kosher because when we consider what the culture and society were like when God gave that command, we know that back then you most likely owned the cow that gave the milk and birthed the calf, so you knew which calf belonged to which cow and which cow gave what milk. Knowing who belonged to whom, you could easily avoid using the milk that came from that calf’s mother to cook that mother’s calf.

God only knows why he gave this specific commandment, but it seems obvious there is spiritual importance in what God said. To me, this clearly indicates some relationship with child sacrifice, and the hideousness of parents eating their own children, which is often brought up as the epitome of horror resulting from being under siege.

Maybe being “under siege” doesn’t have to relate only to being surrounded by an enemy, but to being surrounded by sin? Such as when we live in a sinful and fallen world?

So, back to cheeseburgers: the meat in the cheeseburger comes from the beef cattle industry and the milk comes from the dairy farm industry: these are two totally different animals (pardon the expression), and in dairy farming the cows aren’t killed until they are no longer able to produce milk. And that isn’t part of the beef industry.

Calves are born in both the beef and dairy industries, but they stay within that industry. To violate the kashrut (kosher) commandment regarding boiling the calf in its mother’s milk, you would have to buy milk from the grocery store that was from the same cow that gave birth to the veal you bought from the grocery store, then boil that veal in that milk.

The milk production from United States dairy farms is about 21 billion gallons a year, and the meat Americans eat is not mainly from America, but the top four producers of meat sold in America are Japan, South Korea, Mexico, and Hong Kong. Considering these statistics, it seems pretty safe to say that there is no way in the world that anyone would ever be boiling a calf in its mother’s milk.

Unless you owned the cow and did it all on purpose.

So there you have it: if you want to live “rabbinically” kosher, obeying what men say which overrides what God said, then you will never eat any dairy with any meat product, ever. At least you won’t be sinning.

Or, you can ignore the kosher laws altogether, as Christians have been taught they can do, thereby always sinning: not just by violating the cow/milk/calf thing, but by pigging out on pig and having a shell of a time eating shellfish.

There is a third option: you could do as I do and be “biblically” kosher, eating what God said is OK to eat, and not eating what God said is not OK to eat.

This ministry is not here to tell you what you should do but to teach you what you need to know in order to make an informed decision, and now that you have been informed it is up to you to decide what you will do.

Thank you for being here and please share these messages with everyone you know to help this ministry grow. Please subscribe to both my website and YouTube channel, and don’t forget to also check out my books and Facebook page.

And remember that I always welcome your comments.

That’s it for now, so l’hitraot and Baruch HaShem!

Today we will go over how it all fits together. And if you are wondering just what it is that fits together, I will start by explaining what I mean.

And we will start out with God, which I think is a pretty good starting place.

If you prefer to watch a video, click on this link: Watch the video.

When God created everything he knew exactly what he was doing. He created human beings with Free Will and allowed iniquity within our personality so that we could choose to worship him. After all, if he never gave us the opportunity to refuse his instructions, then worshipping him would be an empty and unmotivated act, not much more than simply reacting to a stimulus.

God also knew that because of our iniquity, that is, the innate desire to sin, that we would eventually need some way to lead us into eternal communion with God by providing an invulnerable means of forgiveness, and that way is through his Messiah. This Messiah was promised, first and foremost, to and for the Jewish people but would later provide salvation for the entire world.

That’s what I am talking about when I said we would go over how it all fits together. Now, here we go…

God rid the world of that first group from Adam and Eve, as well as from Cain, and started a new batch of humans through Noah. Noah’s grandson, Abram (not Abraham yet) was the one God selected whose faith was so strong that he was chosen to be the father of many nations (thus renamed “Abraham”), which God promised to him in Genesis 17:4.

The next step in God’s plan was to also tell Abraham that through his descendants the entire world would be blessed (Genesis 22:18).

The next step comes hundreds of years down the road when God told Moses that the nation of Israel, now freed from Egypt and on their way to the Promised Land, will be his nation of priests to the world (Exodus 19:6). After that, God gives Moses the Torah (Exodus 20) which is God’s instructions to the Jewish people regarding how they are to worship him and treat each other.

And here is where Christianity has gotten it all wrong: the Torah is not just for the Jews. Before God gave the Torah to the Jewish people, he anointed them as his nation of priests. What does a priest do? The Priest is the Intercessor between God and the people, serving God by teaching the people about God, which includes the proper way to worship him and how they should live their lives according to God’s way. Well, if the entire Jewish nation is God’s priests, they aren’t “priesting” to themselves, so who are they the priests for? Obviously, they are God’s priests to the world! And since the Torah is the worshiper’s User Manuel, which God gave to the Jews as his priests to teach the nations (i.e., Gentiles), that proves the Torah must be for everyone.

And the last part of this puzzle is Deuteronomy 28, one of the last chapters in the Torah, containing God’s promises of blessings for obedience to the way we are to worship him and treat each other that he instructed us to do, in the Torah.

One other thing to point out: God chose Abraham not just because he was faithful, but because he was also obedient. Yes, obedience was an integral part of Abrahams’ righteousness, and God told that to Isaac in Genesis 26:5.

God promises blessings to those who obey him, and the blessings are to come through Abraham’s seed, the Jewish people, and God gave them his instructions (the Torah) to learn how to receive those blessings. After learning the Torah, as God’s priests to the world, the Jewish people would now teach the rest of the world how to receive those blessings.

The greatest blessing of all to come from the Jewish people is, of course, the Messiah.

He makes it possible for us all to receive forgiveness, which became impossible (in accordance with the Torah) when the temple in Jerusalem was destroyed. Yeshua the Messiah made forgiveness possible because he replaced the need to bring an animal to the temple, which was always part of God’s plan.

One last time for those in the back row who may not have heard it all: God chose Abraham to be the father of a nation that would bring God’s promised blessings to the entire world through their teaching, as priests of God, the instructions God gave in the Torah which tell us how to receive those blessings, the greatest blessing of all being the Messiah.

That’s it- pretty simple when you know how all the pieces fit together, isn’t it?

Thank you for being here and please share these messages with everyone you know. Also subscribe to my YouTube channel, as well as my website and Facebook page.

And please remember that I always welcome your comments.

Until next time, l’hitraot and Baruch HaShem!

Most of the people I have met over the years, both Jewish and Christian, know of the Torah. They know it is in the Bible (although it is a shame so many don’t know which books), they know it is full of laws and commandments, and most Christians have been taught that it is for Jews and they don’t really need to know it because they are under Grace (that is a whole different topic!).

The truth is that the Torah is more than just laws.

If you prefer to watch a video, click on this link: Watch the video.

It is a historical narrative, teaching us about how God created the world, how sin entered into the world, and of the kingdoms that have risen and fallen over the past 5,000 or so years. It tells us of the different relationships within societies, of different religions, and the ways that people lived.

But the Torah is more than just a historical text.

The Torah is a Ketubah (Hebrew: marriage certificate) between a people and their God. The covenants that God made with us, the Jewish people, are no different than the marriage vows between a man and a woman (the only proper form of marriage) in that both promise to cherish and obey each other. Of course, God doesn’t have to obey anyone, but the idea that he will do things for us when we do as he says is similar. God promised fidelity to us (we shall always be his chosen people) and even through sickness and health (our sins and our repentance) he will comfort and stay with us, which he has done. We promised to do the same; sadly, we have way too often broken that vow and been guilty (more than anyone cares to count) of spiritual adultery. However, God is an understanding and loving spouse, and he has always been willing to take us back when we repent.

But the Torah is more than a historical text and a Ketubah.

The Torah is also a national constitution. It outlines and establishes a penal code, defining the laws regarding capital punishment, accidental manslaughter, and giving us the formulas for calculating proper financial compensation with torts. The Torah tells us what kind of people we should appoint as judges, as well as the rules under which they must perform their duties. It describes fair trade regulations (using proper weights and volume measurements), as well as other ethical trade practices.

But the Torah is more than a historical text, a Ketubah, and a constituttion.

The Torah is an instruction manual for the proper way to worship God. It outlines the procedures we need to follow to receive forgiveness of sin, as well as how to be cleansed from any ceremonial uncleanliness we may incur. It tells us what God expects from us and what he will do for us when we obey his instructions, as well as what will happen to us when we disobey. It tells us how wonderful our future can be, and how peaceful our lives will be when we follow the lifestyle that God has described for us.

But the Torah is more than a historical text, a Ketubah, a constitution, and a spiritual manual.

The Torah also promises the appearance of a Messiah, a man who will be able to bring us out from our sinful existence and receive forgiveness from God. The Torah promises that the Messiah will re-establish God’s kingship over the earth through the Messiah and allow us to have eternal communion with God. The Torah leads us to the pathway of eternal joy.

But the Torah is more than just a historical text, a Ketubah, a constitution, a spiritual manual, and a promise of the Messiah.

The Torah instructs us in the proper way to treat each other within the society. It tells us to love each other and be respectful of each other’s rights and possessions.

So, nu? Can you see now that the Torah is so much more than just a set of laws?

And there is one final thing I want you to know about the Torah.

The Torah is the ONLY place in the entire Bible where God dictates exactly how we are to act. There is nowhere else in the Bible where we read:

“And the Lord said to Moses, ‘Tell the children of Israel that the Lord says….””.

True, the prophets received direct instructions from God on what to tell the people in order to bring them back into proper worship, but there was nothing new or different from what he had already dictated to Moses. The (Hebrew) Torah is the direct, unadulterated, and most dependably accurate word of God anywhere in the Bible.

If you knew how many checks and balances there are to ensure that every single Torah scroll is exactly the same as every other Torah scroll, you would know why the Torah is so dependable as the exact word of God, handed down exactly throughout the years. The Dead Sea Scrolls are also evidence of the accuracy of the Hebrew written Torah, as well as the other books within the Tanakh.

This cannot be said for any of the translated Bibles you will find, anywhere. There are so many different translations and each one, whether from Hebrew or from Greek, will always be “polluted” by the translator no matter how accurate they try to be.

Now that you have a better idea of all the wonderful things the Torah contains, and that it is the purest and most dependable record of what God said he wants from all of us, the only question you should be asking yourself now is, “Why does Christianity teach to reject it?”

Let me give you a hint: the answer has nothing to do with Yeshua (Jesus) because he never did or said to do anything other than what is in the Torah.

Thank you for being here and please subscribe to both my YouTube channel and website, and share these messages with everyone you know.

If you don’t already know this, I have written three books (available on Amazon; the links are on my website) and am working on a fourth, which is to debunk many of the traditional lies Christians and Jews have been told about Yeshua. Look for it to be available sometime near the end of this year.

That’s it for today, so l’hitraot and Baruch HaShem!