Bible Believers' Newsletter 313
"We focus on the present Truth – what Jesus is doing now. . ."
ISSN 1442-8660Christian greetings in the precious Name of our Lord Jesus Christ.
This commences our seventh year of publishing Bible Believers' Church free weekly Newsletter. Every issue is available from the Church Website, on CD, or from your friendly Vatican, CIA or Mossad branch office. It is our great privilege to have served you "Spiritual Food in due season," but this would have been impossible without the dedication of resourceful brethren behind the scenes who assist with research. And you, dear reader, who faithfully "prove all things and hold fast that which is good" have contributed many kind words of encouragement and precious correction with questions and suggestions that have have assisted each of us to grow in the unity of the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God.
Our main Article this week is based on an essay of Dr. E. R. Fields printed in The Truth at Last. It is entitled, "The Three Trials of Jesus Christ." Two trials are already written. Christ foretold His third trial, and in many sermons and teachings Brother Branham explained how the court is now in session: Jesus is the Accused, the Holy Spirit is the Advocate for the Defense, and Satan is the prosecuting attorney. You cannot simply observe but must choose whether you will witness for the Defense, or for the Prosecution.
Please pray the Lord's grace will prevent us from error, and keep us from misleading readers.
This Newsletter serves those of like precious faith and whosoever will receive the truth is welcome to feed their soul from the waters of the River of Life. Everything presented should be confirmed personally in your own Bible.Your brother-in-Christ,
Anthony Grigor-Scott
Earthquake collapses another Wall on Temple Mount
February 14, 2004 — Another wall on Temple Mount collapsed near the Western Wall as a result of the earthquake in Israel on February 11, 2004. Full story: templemountfaithful.org
Committee for the World's Future
A number of world notable identities including Mikhail Gorbachev will be on this committee to be based in Hamburg and which will advise (they did not say 'order') governments on how to plan their country's future.
Full story: worldfuturecouncil.org
The Protocols of Zion – Updated
The Rothschilds set up the Illuminati in 1776 to subvert the Christian basis of Western Civilization. They took over much of Freemasonry and used it to infiltrate all social institutions. Mouthing words like 'freedom,' 'equality' and 'progress,' they are bent on melding family, race, religion, and nation into a malleable anonymous mush. Their world police state, now called 'globalization,' lies behind the facade of 'The Patriot Act' and 'The War on Terror.'
Rosenthal says, "Most Jews do not like to admit it, but our god is Lucifer . . . and we are his chosen people. Lucifer is very alive." Full story: rense.com
John Paul II, Mahony Targets of possible Lawsuits
February 17, 2004 — a group called Catholics for Truth and Transparency is issuing a list of legal demands against the Pope and Los Angeles Archbishop, Cardinal Roger Mahony" . . . He appointed virtually all the bishops, archbishops and cardinals . . . "A survey of child sex abuse claims against the Catholic church in America has uncovered thousands more cases than previously believed, according to a draft report leaked to media." Full story: realnews247.com
The Three Trials of Jesus Christ
Mel Gibson's new film, "The Passion of Christ," which covers the last 12 hours in Jesus' life has generated unwarranted opposition from organized Jewry. What occurred during those last hours to raise and maintain such hostility over 2,000 years?
John's Gospel and the Book of Acts describe how the Pharisees feared the popularity of Jesus. Acts 2:22, "a Man approved of God among them by miracles and wonders and signs, which God did by Him in their midst." Whose Divine vindication was undermining their presumed authority. John 11:47-53, "All men believe in Him: and the Romans shall come and take away both our place and nation . . . then from that day forth they took counsel together to put Him to death".
The rabbis wanted Jesus to deny He was the Son of God and bow to their authority. After Jesus healed a man's withered hand on the Sabbath the hypocritical Pharisees immediately took counsel with their political opponents, the time-serving Herodians, to entangle Him into some speech that would compromise Him with Caesar's stern representative, Pontius Pilate, that they might destroy Him (Mark 3:1-6). This party upheld the Edomite Herodian dynasty, regarding it as the safeguard against direct Roman rule, and as the best compromise between the ancient faith and heathen civilization. Hence they were said to look upon Herod the Great, Herod Antipas, and Herod Agrippa successively as Messiah. Thus, like Antiochus Epiphanes (Daniel 8; 11; I Maccabees 1:10-16), the Herods were forerunners of the coming antichrist and they paved the way to apostasy by introducing Greek refinements like theatres, gymnasiums, and a blending of honors to the heathen gods along with recognition of Jehovah and the Law.
Several different ethnic groups lived in Palestine and since the Jews were the largest, Roman policy delegated oversight, so their governing body or Sanhedrin had 1,600 soldiers or guards while the Romans had a garrison of 7,000. The priesthood in Judea exercised authority similar to Jewish "kapos" who administered the Nazi internment camps for the German government. A primary function of the high priest in first-century Jerusalem was to serve as a sort of liaison between Roman authority and the Jewish population. From the time of Herod the Great, high priests drawn from the Sadducean aristocracy were appointed by Rome and Rome looked to them to keep the Jewish populace in line. Procurators demanded the high priests arrest and turn over any Jews seen as agitators.
Christ was not a Jew but a Galilean
In the time of our Lord Palestine was divided into three provinces, Judea, Samaria and Galilee (Isaiah 9:1; Luke 17:11; Acts 9:31). The Bible refers to Christ as a Galilean from "Galilee of the Gentiles." Galilee was the scene of the greater part of His private life and public acts. The first three Gospels are chiefly taken up with His ministrations in this province, while the Gospel of John dwells more upon those in Judea:
John 5:1-18, "In Jerusalem, when Jesus healed a man on the sabbath, commanding Him, 'Rise, take up your sleeping mat and go home,' the Judeans began to harass Him as a sabbath-breaker, and sought to kill Him because He had said that God was His Father".
John 7:1, "After these things Jesus walked in Galilee: for He would not walk in Judea, because the Jews sought to kill Him".
Luke 6:11, "The Pharisees were wild with rage, and began to plot His murder".
John 8:1-44, When Jesus went into the temple to teach, the scribes and Pharisees brought before Him a woman caught in adultery. And seeking to bring an accusation against Him they asked if she should be stoned. But He forgave her saying, "Go, and sin no more." Later, when the scribes and Pharisees denounced Jesus for not upholding the Law, He pointed out that they had the "letter of the Law without the faith," and replied: "If God were your Father you would love Me for I proceeded forth and came from God . . . because you are without the faith of Abraham, you seek to kill Me. . . You are of your father the Devil, and the lusts of your father you will do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and abode not in the truth because there is no truth in him".
John 8:59, "In Jerusalem, the scribes and Pharisees took up stones to cast at Him".
Jesus drove the Money Changers out of the Temple
One day Jesus entered the Temple and saw the money changers exploiting the people by over-charging them. In righteous indignation He said, "You have made My Father's House a den of thieves." He overturned their tables, and taking a whip drove them out from the Temple. These greedy men feared losing their wealth and power due to this new Prophet.
Matthew 23:14-35, "Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees. Hypocrites! You devour widow's houses through usury and for a pretense make long prayers for which you shall receive the greater damnation . . . Blind fools! Which is greater, the gold or the temple that sanctifies the gold? . . . Outwardly you appear righteous, but you are filled with hypocrisy and iniquity . . ."
"You serpents, you seed of the Serpent. How can you escape the damnation of hell? I will send you prophets, teachers, and inspired writers, and some of them you will kill and crucify, and some you shall scourge in your synagogues, and persecute them from city to city. That upon you may come all the righteous blood shed upon the earth, from the blood of righteous Abel (who was murdered by the physical Serpent's seed, Cain), to the blood of Zacharias son of Barachias (i.e. Jehoiada), whom you (spiritual Serpent's seed) slew in the court of the priests between the sanctuary of the temple and the altar" (II Chronicles 24:17-22).
Let us compare that rebuke with Jesus' condemnation of their Roman Catholic church that was organized by apostate Jews at the First Nicaea Council in AD325: Revelation 17:6, "And I saw the woman drunken with the blood of the saints, and with the blood of the martyrs of Jesus." And also their Hollywood Babylon: Revelation 18:23-24, "Your merchants [the money changers who are Rome's abettors, brokers and associates in idolatry] were the great men of the earth [like the Rothschilds, who are "guardians of the papal treasure" (Jewish Encyclopedia, Vol. 2, p. 497)]; by your sorceries, [narcotics, pharmaceutical drugs, and the magical arts of the movie and entertainment industry], were all nations deliberately led into error and sin. And in her was found the blood of prophets, and of saints, and of all that were slain upon earth." These are the same people Jesus condemned in Matthew 23 (Revelation 2:9; 3:9).
Mark 11:18, "When the scribes and chief priests heard what Jesus had done they began planning how they might destroy Him: for they feared Him because all the people were so enthusiastic about His teaching".
John 11:47-54, "Then the chief priests and the Pharisees convened the Sanhedrin and said, 'this man' [as contemptuously as today's followers of the Talmud refer to Jesus derisively as 'that man'] does many miracles, [a generalization doubtless intended to deny recognizing the grand raising of Lazarus from the dead] . . . If we let Him alone the whole nation will follow Him—and the Romans shall take over both our place and our hierarchical rule over the Jewish nation." Their hypocritical fear that leads to the very mischief it considers itself bound mischievously to avert was an unconscious prophecy like the remark of Caiaphas.
"Caiaphas, being high priest that year, said to them, You know nothing at all, nor do you consider that it is expedient for us that one man should die for the people, and not that the whole nation should perish. Now this he did not speak on his own authority; but being high priest that year he prophesied that Jesus should die for the nation; and not for that nation only, but also that He would gather together in one the children of God that were scattered abroad. Then from that day on, the Jewish leaders plotted to put Him to death. Jesus therefore walked no more openly among the Jews." As at the Feast of Tabernacles in the previous year, "No man spoke openly of Him for fear—not of the Galileans but—of the Jews" (John 7:13).
Matthew 21:45-46, "The Pharisees on hearing His parables realized that He was speaking of them, but although they sought to arrest Him they feared the multitude, because they took Him for a prophet."
Matthew 26:1-4, "When Jesus had finished all these sayings, He said to His disciples, as you know, the Passover begins in two days, and I shall be betrayed and crucified. At that very moment the chief priests, scribes, and elders of the people were meeting at the palace of Caiaphas the High Priest, to discuss ways of capturing Jesus by subtlety (as the Serpent beguiled Eve), and to kill Him". But it was ordained to be a public act of Jews and Gentiles, kings and people, together.
They found Judas lscariot, one of the twelve apostles and agreed to pay him 30 pieces of silver to betray Christ (Matthew 26:14-15).
John 18:3-12, "Judas, having received a band of men from the chief priests and Pharisees, came to the olive grove with lanterns and torches (though it was full moon) and weapons" searching for Jesus Who in calm dignity came forth to meet them. Judas ran and kissed Jesus on the cheek. Jesus said; "Do you betray the Son of man with a kiss" (Luke 22:48)? And identified His captors as, "the band and the captain and officers of the Jews".
Jesus is first to question them, "Whom do you seek?"
"Jesus of Nazareth".
"I am He." At these words they fell back to the ground: the Divine I Am showed how they were at His mercy and how completely voluntary was His surrender so He could dictate His terms in behalf of His disciples, for whom His only solicitude was. These in their turn sought to defend Him, and Peter with the sword rashly smote off the high priest's servant Malthus' ear, which Jesus immediately healed with a touch, and uttered His meek protest at their coming out as against a thief.
Then the disciples all fled and Jesus was seized, bound and delivered to the high priest.
The First Trial of Jesus Christ
Matthew 26 and John 18 contain this account of Jesus' first trial. He was led first before Annas for private examination (until daytime when the Sanhedrin could be assembled). Though he had been deposed from the office of high priest by the former Roman procurator, Valerius Gratus, Annas wielded much of its real power, being regarded as high priest in point of right, and father-in-law to the actual high priest, Caiaphas, with whom he shared a common official residence.
Annas questioned Jesus about His doctrine. Christ answered, "I spoke openly to the world, always teaching in the synagogue and in the temple. Why do you ask Me? Ask those who heard Me. They know what I said, bring in your witnesses." One of the officers slapped Jesus across the face demanding, "Is that the way to address the high priest?" Jesus said: "If I have lied, prove it. Should you smite a man for telling the truth".
Nowadays, whenever Christians are tried by Jews "Truth is still no defense." Peter's three denials now took place. The second cockcrowing, at the beginning of the fourth watch, between three and four o'clock, announced the first dawn just as Jesus was being led (still bound) to Caiaphas across the court from where Peter was standing. The Sanhedrin was now assembled at Caiaphas' house, the case being urgent and privacy suiting their purpose: "as soon as it was day" (Luke 22:66).
Commencing the trial before day was informal (Gemara, Babylonian Sanhedrin, 6:1); but "the Council went through the form of producing false witnesses, however their testimony so disagreed that it broke down" (Mark 14:55-59). Such is the fanaticism of religious leaders whose faculties are besmirched by Talmudic perversions. Titus 1:14-16, "Don't listen to Jewish fables and the demands of men who have turned their backs on the Truth . . . those whose own hearts are defiled and unbelieving find evil in everything, for their dirty minds and rebellious hearts color all they see. They profess that they know God; but by their actions they deny Him, being abominable, and disobedient, and to every good work reprobate". Isaiah 53:7, Jesus "opened not His mouth," before the scornful Herod or before the legal but unjustly-proceeding Sanhedrin tribunal.
Before Annas' informal examination He replied with repelling dignity; before Pilate, witnessing to the truth with forbearing condescension. The high priest, foiled in his hope from the false witnesses (Isaiah 29:20-24), himself put Jesus under the obligation of an oath (Leviticus 5:1), "I demand in the Name of the living God, that You tell us whether You are the Messiah, the Son of God." Tradition held that Messiah should build a more glorious temple; so the testimony of the false witness as to Jesus' saying, "In three days I will raise a temple without hands" suggested the high priest's question. Jesus avowed, "I am Messiah, and furthermore, besides My assertion you shall see the Son of man sitting on the right hand of power, and coming in the clouds of heaven" (Matthew 26:64), as foretold in Daniel 7:13 and fulfilled for we Gentiles on February 28, 1963 in the sign of His 'parousia' Coming as Judge "to announce the day of vengeance of our God" (Isaiah 61:2; Acts 1:9-11; Revelation 1:7).
This claim to Godhead was the ground of His condemnation by the Jews (John 19:7). Standing up, Caiaphas rent his clothes from the neck straight down in front. The excited Sanhedrin again asked the question (Luke 22:70), and on His reaffirming His Divine Sonship condemned Him without further witnesses as a blasphemer and chanted, "He is guilty of death. Crucify Him!" (Leviticus 24:16; Deuteronomy 18:20).
After the grossest insults of the Jews, the meek Sufferer was not rebellious, neither did He turn away. Isaiah 50:6, "I gave My back to the smiters, and My cheeks to them that plucked off the hair: I hid not My face from shame and spitting." But the law permitted only the Romans to inflict capital punishment so His foes assembled the court again in full numbers about morning (Mark 15:1) and led Him to Pilate, who alone had power to execute sentence of death. The judgment hall or governor's residence was Herod's former palace in the upper or western city.
The wretched traitor, Judas, blinded by covetousness and disappointed ambition, now first sees the atrocity of his act, and forces his way into the inner sanctuary or naos of the temple of the priests, and in despairing remorse exclaims "I have betrayed innocent blood," but is told by those amoral Jewish priests, "That is of no concern to us. That is your problem." Judas flung down the price of blood and hanged himself (Matthew 27:1-8; Acts 1:18).
The Second Trial of Jesus Christ
John 18-19 contains this account of Jesus' second trial. The Council members, true to their characteristic of straining out gnats whilst swallowing camels (just as the priests would not put the 30 pieces into the treasury as being the price of blood) similarly stood with their Prisoner before Pilate's residence, not entering the Gentile's house lest they suffer defilement—shrinking from leaven but not from innocent blood. Pilate comes out to answer their demand for the Prisoner's execution, and with the Roman regard for legal form requires to know the accusation against Him.
"Why should I come to the Judgment hall? Why do you disturb me from my sleep?"
They evade the question at first (John 18:30), then answer, "We found this Fellow perverting the nation, forbidding to give tribute to Caesar, saying that He Himself is Christ a king" (Luke 23:2); the very thing they tempted Him to, but which He foiled them in so admirably (Matthew 22:21). How subtly they changed their accusation from the religious ground, which they held before the high priest, to what was the only one Pilate would entertain, the political! Their accusations were designed to make Pilate believe that Jesus was the leader of a conspiracy against the Roman emperor, in order that He might be condemned to death as a rebel.
The Jews shouted, "If you are a friend of Caesar's you will come down. This is a grievous matter and we demand you come at once!"
The Roman governor was too shrewd not to discover speedily that Jesus' claim to kingship was such as constituted no crime against Caesar, and that the charge was the offspring of religious animosity; he knew them too well to believe they would persecute one to death for seeking to deliver them from Rome. With irony he replied (John 18:31) to their first evasive answer (John 18:30). "If your decision must be accepted as final, then judge (i.e. execute) Him according to your Law; but as Rome reserves capital cases to its jurisdiction, both the judicial trial and execution belong to me, and I will not be your mere executioner."
It was divinely ordered that Rome should be His executioner, that Jesus' prophecy of His mode of death should be fulfilled (Matthew 26:2), crucifixion being the Romish, stoning the Jewish punishment, one which the Jews had more than once attempted to execute on Him for blasphemy. So they cannot now point an accusing finger at Rome.
Jesus answered none of the many false accusations of the priests (Matthew 27:12-14). Pilate marveled. Jesus' majestic bearing awed and attracted him so He ordered his guards to bring Him into his presence alone. Pilate had learned of the "sons of gods" who had dwelt for a time upon earth. He was likewise fully aware that the Jewish prophets had long foretold that one should appear in their midst who would be the Lord's Anointed, their Savior and Deliverer; and that many among the Jews believed this firmly. He remembered how wise men from the East had come to Herod, the predecessor of the present monarch, to pay homage to a new-born king of the Jews, and how on this account Herod gave orders to massacre all the Jewish first born sons. These impressions led Pontius Pilate to interrogate Jesus privately.
Returning into the Judgment Hall, Pilate asked Him, "Are You the king of the Judeans?"
Jesus replied: "Do you mean 'king,' as you understand the Word? (For if Pilate was asking as Roman governor, he would be inquiring whether Jesus was setting up a rebel government). Or do you mean 'King' in the sense of the Jews' Messiah?"
Pilate answered: "Am I a Jew? Your own nation and the chief priests have delivered You to me. Why? What have You done?"
Jesus answered: "My kingdom is not of this world: if it were My followers would have fought when I was arrested by the Jews. But for the present My kingdom is not of this world."
Pilate inquired in a more serious tone: "Are You therefore a king?"
Jesus replied: "You say that I am a king. To this end was I born, and I came into the world to bear witness to the Truth. All who love the Truth are My followers."
"What is truth?" Pilate waited for no answer, for he regarded "truth" in religion as the dream of visionaries, undeserving the attention of sensible men of the world for Gentile people then regarded all religions equally true, the philosophers equally false, and the magistrates equally useful.
On the accusers mentioning "Galilee" as the starting point of His teaching Pilate made this his plea for sending Him to Herod, who was then at Jerusalem a 'worshipper' at the Passover. Hereby he at once shifted the responsibility off himself, and conciliated by this act of courtesy a ruler whom he had previously offended (Luke 13:1; 23:5-12). Herod had long desired to see a miracle wrought by Jesus, but when foiled in his superstitious curiosity "he treated Him with contempt, ridiculed and arrayed Him in a gorgeous robe as a mock king, and sent Him back to Pilate" (Luke 9:7-9; Matthew 14:1-2). For a second time Jesus stood before Pilate, who was now fully satisfied of His innocence. The governor now calls together the priests and people, and says that neither he nor Herod had found any guilt in Him, but proposes, in order to satisfy them, to scourge Him, whom he himself pronounced innocent! This concession betraying his readiness to concede principle to external pressure only stimulated them to demand more loudly His execution. The people meanwhile were clamoring for the customary release of a prisoner to them at the Passover. Pilate still hoped the multitude who had so recently escorted Jesus in triumph would, upon being appealed to, call for His release, for he knew that His apprehension was the act of the envious priests and not of the people (Mark 15:8-18).
Pilate sought several times to release Jesus. "Whom will you have me release to you, Barabbas or Jesus your Messiah? But the chief priests moved the people to call for Barabbas, a notorious robber and murderer. "What evil has Jesus done? Having examined Him before you, I have found no fault in this man touching those things of which you accuse Him . . . and Herod came to the same conclusion." (Matthew 27; Mark 15; Luke 23:13-15). "I will therefore chastise Him, and release Him".
Then as now, the Jews had rented a mob. So a tumult was made and they were instant with loud voices shouting that He be crucified, and the voices of the chief priests prevailed." (Matthew 27:23; Luke 23:23).
John 19:12, "Then Pilate sought to release Him, but the Jewish leaders cried out, saying, If you let this Man go, you are no friend of Caesar's. Anyone who declares himself a king is a rebel against Caesar".
Jews – Not Romans – Crucified Jesus Christ
Matthew 27:24-25, "When Pilate saw that he could not prevail, and that a riot was developing, he sent for a bowl of water; symbolically washing his hands before the multitude (Deuteronomy 21:6-7), he said, I am innocent of the blood of this just Person: the responsibility is yours," trying to transfer from himself to them the guilt of the innocent blood; but in vain, for to all ages denominational Christian creeds brand his name as Jesus' judicial murderer, "suffered under Pontius Pilate".
Pilate, to whom the supreme Judge delegated power as a magistrate, sins indeed in letting himself be another's tool to kill Jesus against his convictions; but Caiaphas, who had not this plenary power of execution but who had the power given of knowing Jesus' Divine Sonship, and yet delivered Jesus to Pilate to be executed, has the greater guilt, for he sins against Light and the clearest evidence which was his unpardonable sin (Psalm 69:28).
Then followed the preliminary scourging, the crown of thorns, the reed as a mock sceptre placed in His right hand, the smiting of His head with the reed, spitting on Him, the scarlet robe of a soldier's cloak as the Gentiles, like the Jews' before them, mocked Him. Pilate made a last appeal to their humanity after that moving sight of Jesus coming forth wearing the thorn crown and purple robe: "Behold the Man." But the priestly cries were only the more infuriated: "Crucify Him; by our Law He ought to die, because He made Himself the Son of God".
John 19:11, Pilate returned to question Jesus. Receiving no answer he said, "Don't you know that I have power to crucify and to release You? Jesus answered, You could have no power against Me except it were given you from above; therefore Caiaphas and the Jews who delivered Me to you have the greater sin" (Mark 15:1; John 11:48-52).
And the mob yelled back, "His blood be on us and on our children." And the Israel people and their impersonators all accepted that awful legacy of guilt, to the misery of themselves and of their children to the consummation of all life on earth.
Luke 23:24-33, "Pilate gave sentence that it should be as the chief Jewish priests required . . . (and) he delivered Jesus to their will. And . . . they led Him away . . . to a place which is called Calvary, there they crucified Him".
John 19:14-15, "Pilate, said to the Jews, behold your king! But they cried out, Away with Him! Away with Him! Crucify Him! Pilate said, shall I crucify your King? The chief priests answered, we have no king but Caesar.
God took them at their hypocritical word. Judah's "sceptre" centered in Jesus the "Shiloh" (John 18:33). In delivering Jesus up to Rome, they delivered up their kingdom to Rome until Israel's final restoration in the Millennium (Genesis 49:10; Daniel 2:36-45; 9:27; Luke 21:25). Yet people claiming to have the Holy Spirit have the gall to withstand Scripture and declare present-day Israel is governed by a Semitic people descended from Abraham, Isaac and Jacob! Israel is ruled by the Seed of the Serpent, and until the last Trump, "to Jesus shall the gathering of the Gentiles be".
Pilate well knew how small a matter might be enough to ground a charge of treason before the cruel and jealous Tiberius. Yet he did not escape by sacrificing Jesus but was disgraced, banished by the emperor, and died by his own hand, bringing upon himself the evil he most feared by doing evil to escape it.
John 19:16-18, "He delivered Him to the Jews to be crucified, and they took Jesus, and led Him away . . . to a place called in the Hebrew Golgotha, a slightly rising ground without the gate (Hebrews 13:13) where they crucified Him". The Sanhedrin were His crucifiers, the Roman soldiers but their instruments (Acts 5:30).
Matthew and Luke make it plain that Pilate turned Jesus over to the Jews and it was they and not the Roman soldiers who actually crucified Jesus Christ. In Acts 4:10 and I Thessalonians 2:14-15, Peter and Paul accuse the Jews "Who both killed the Lord Jesus and their own prophets, and have persecuted us; and they please not God, and are contrary to all men" (Genesis 3:15).
Pilate wrote the trilingual title over Christ's head, "Jesus of Nazareth the King of the Jews," and would not alter it for the chief priests. God made Pilate in spite of himself proclaim a blessed verity which the Jews' remonstrance could not make him retract: Jesus' kingship rejected by the Jews became the means of universal blessing to we Gentiles as prophesied in Abram's change of name to Abraham, meaning "Father of the Gentiles."Jesus Christ's Crucifixion
The hoax of the holocaust (which only the mind of a non-Semitic, anti-Semitic self-styled Jew could invent) has replaced Calvary as the central ontological event of Western history—precisely because there has been so much celluloid devoted to the inmates of Auschwitz, and little or nothing concerning the horrors Messiah endured on the Cross. On this basis alone, the Anti-defamation League (ADL) and the rabbis despise Mel Gibson's film, "The Passion of Christ," which, contrary to the statements of those wishing to curry favor with the Money Power, does not whitewash or minimize the Judaic role in deicide that burdens their conscience; it's just not the focus of this movie.
Although the common tongue of both Jews and Romans was Greek, "The Passion of Christ" is spoken in Aramaic and Latin with English sub-titles, and covers, in graphic detail, the final 12 hours in the life of Jesus. The ADL, which has always sought to suppress any examination of the details of Christ's crucifixion, is doing its worst.
After producing hundreds of racist anti-German films and pornographic filth about Jesus, such as "The Last Temptation of Christ," and hit-movies where every other swear word takes the Name of Christ in vain, they now have the brass, the nerve, the gall to claim that a solitary movie about Christ's sufferings will "stoke anti-Jewish violence."
It was a matter of pride for Gibson that the film should be as realistic as possible, not just in its language and settings, but also by accurately portraying the intense violence inflicted on Jesus. The film shows His flesh flailed during whippings, blood spurting as nails are hammered into his hands, and ribs protruding from his chest.
The Sydney Morning Herald wrote: Mel Gibson—a former quiz show winner, Sydney radio broadcaster and resident of a small Victorian dairy town who now lives in Texas—believes the Holocaust was a fabrication because there were more Jews in Germany "after the war than before".
In the interview, which was published in March, Hutton Gibson also refuted the notion that Osama bin Laden's terrorists perpetrated the September 11 attacks. He contended that Jews had conspired with Masons to reform the Catholic Church in the famous Vatican II of the 1960s, which ended the Latin Mass and the notion of Jewish guilt in the crucifixion. These matters were discussed in Newsletters 164 to 172 in the eight-part series The Two Babylons and more recently by a Jewish contributor, Henry Makow.According to the Talmud
Israel Shahak in Jewish History, Jewish Religion (p. 97) writes: According to the Talmud, Jesus was executed by a proper rabbinical court for idolatry, inciting other Jews to idolatry, and contempt of rabbinical authority. All classical Jewish sources which mention His execution are quite happy to take responsibility for it; in the Talmudic account the Romans are not even mentioned.
The more popular accounts—which were nevertheless taken quite seriously—such as the notorious Toldot Yesbu are even worse, for in addition to the above crimes they accuse him of witchcraft (Shabbos 104b; Sanhedrin 43a). The very name 'Jesus' was for Jews a symbol of all that is abominable, and this popular tradition still persists. (The Hebrew form of the name Jesus—Yeshu—was interpreted as an acronym for the curse "may his name and memory be wiped out," and which is used as an extreme form of abuse. In fact, anti-Zionist Orthodox Jews (such as Neturey Qarta) sometimes refer to Herzl as 'Herzl Jesus' and I have found in religious Zionist writings expressions such as 'Nasser Jesus' and more recently 'Arafat Jesus'). The Gospels are equally detested, and they are not allowed to be quoted (let alone taught) even in modern Israeli Jewish schools.
It must be admitted at the outset that the Talmud and the Talmudic literature . . . contain very offensive statements and precepts directed specifically against Christianity. For example, in addition to a series of scurrilous allegations against Jesus, the Talmud states that his punishment in hell is to be immersed in boiling excrement (Gittin 57a).
Jewish children are actually taught passages such as that which commands every Jew, when ever passing near a cemetery, to utter a blessing if the cemetery is Jewish, but to curse the mothers of the dead if it is non-Jewish (ibid p. 20-24, 94).
Shahak concludes his study stating that both Israel and Jews worldwide must face the test of confronting an honest criticism of their past. "The most important part of such a critique must be detailed and honest confrontation of the Jewish attitude to non-Jews . . . In last forty years the number of non-Jews killed by Jews is by greater than the number of Jews killed by non-Jews."
The future of Christianity depends upon a sufficient number of genuine Christians born of the Message facing the reality of the Judaic campaign to dilute Christianity to the point where, in the words of one Jewish activist, "it is completely Judaized."
Christianity is rotten to the core! Since Christ revealed the Seven Seals in 1963, He has been calling the wise and foolish virgin out from the Judaeo-Roman Catholic and (once) Protestant system of worship into the unity of the faith but Judas came out with them. His aim is to unite outside the faith with Christ-rejecting non-Semitic, anti-Semitic Talmudic rabbis. Brother Branham specifically forbad us to permit unregenerate men to speak to our congregations (The Future Home of the Heavenly Bridegroom and the Earthly Bride, p. 32:253-254). Amos 3:3 and II Corinthians 6:14-18 express the same stern commandment.
The attitude of Jews to non-Jews has been confused by what has become one of the major Myths of the twentieth century, that concerning "the Holocaust". What might be termed as "The Holocaust Dogma" has been elevated to the point where any criticism of the dogmas, however objective, is classed as "blasphemous". In two major Western European nations, France and Germany, criticism of the dogma can result in imprisonment. Fred Leuchter, an American citizen who demonstrated that no homicidal gas chambers could ever have operated in Poland, was arrested on a visit to Germany and later hounded so viciously he apparently went into hiding when he managed to return to the USA.
Another American citizen, Hans Schmidt, of German background, was arrested during a visit to Germany. Schmidt's "crime" is that in a publication he issues in the USA he had questioned "the holocaust". Presumably it is not safe for any critics of "the holocaust" to make a visit to Germany, or France, without risking arrest. British historian David Irving was long prohibited from visiting Germany once he began expressing his doubts about the holocaust. The German ruling is being used to prevent him from visiting Canada and Australia. Both governments leave no doubt that they are not prepared to defy the Zionist Jew's propaganda machine.
David Klinghoffer, a columnist for the Jewish Forward Magazine wrote in the Los Angeles Times (January 1, 2004) that the Talmud itself upholds Gibson's film:
The Talmud was compiled in about AD500, drawing on rabbinic material that had been transmitted orally for centuries. From the 16th century on, the text was censored and passages about Jesus and His execution erased to evade Christian wrath. But the full text was preserved in older manuscripts, and today the censored parts may be found in minuscule type, as an appendix at the back of some Talmud editions.
(Matthew 18:7, "It is necessary that offenses come; but woe to him through whom they come").
A relevant example comes from the Talmudic division Sanhedrin, which deals with procedures of the Jewish high court: "On the eve of Passover they hung Jesus of Nazareth. And the herald went out before him for 40 days [saying, 'Jesus] goes forth to be stoned, because he has practiced magic, enticed and led astray Israel. Anyone who knows anything in his favor, let him come and declare concerning him.' And they found nothing in his favor."
The passage indicates that Jesus' fate was entirely in the hands of the Jewish court. The last two of the three items on Jesus' rap sheet, that he "enticed and led astray" fellow Jews, are terms from Jewish biblical law for an individual who influenced others to serve false gods, a crime punishable by being stoned, then hung on a wooden gallows. In the Mishneh, the rabbinic work on which the Talmud is based, compiled about AD200, Rabbi Eliezer explains that anyone who was stoned to death would then be hung by his hands from two pieces of wood shaped like a capital letter T, in other words, a cross.
These texts convey religious beliefs, not necessarily historical facts. The Talmud elsewhere agrees with the Gospel of John that Jews at the time of the Crucifixion did not have the power to carry out the death penalty. Also, other Talmudic passages place Jesus 100 years before or after his actual lifetime. Some Jewish apologists argue that these must therefore deal with a different Jesus of Nazareth. But this is not how the most authoritative rabbinic interpreters, medieval sages like Nachmanides, Rashi and the Tosaphists, saw the matter.
Maimonides, writing in 12th century Egypt, made clear that the Talmud's Jesus is the one who founded Christianity. In his great summation of Jewish law and belief, the Mishneh Torah, he wrote of "Jesus of Nazareth, who imagined that he was the Messiah, but was put to death by the court." In his "Epistle to Yemen," Maimonides states "Jesus of Nazareth interpreted the Torah and its precepts in such a fashion as to lead to their total annulment. The sages, of blessed memory, having become aware of his plans before his reputation spread among our people, meted out fitting punishment to him."
It's unfair of Jewish critics to defame Gibson for saying what the Talmud and Maimonides say, and what many historians say. Oddly, one of the scholars who has most vigorously denounced Gibson, Paula Fredriksen, a professor of religious studies at Boston University is the author of a meticulously researched book, "Jesus of Nazareth," that suggests it was the high priests who informed on Jesus to the Roman authorities.
Michael Hoffman, a Christian scholar of the Talmud also makes many pertinent observations.
The Fact
Jesus Christ, the true Messiah and Son of God suffered one of the most excruciating deaths in history. Who then crucified Jesus? Mel Gibson claims that his film, "The Passion of Christ," was inspired by the Holy Spirit, in other words, it is THUS SAITH THE LORD.
Matthew 27:24-25, which is also THUS SAITH THE LORD, declares: immediately Pontius Pilate washed his hands of the trial and judgment saying, "I am innocent of the blood of this just Person: you Jews see to His crucifixion yourselves." They unanimously declare, "His blood be on us, and on our children".
Far more than "two or three witnesses" in history such as Tacitus and Josephus, Scriptures like Daniel 9:26 and Talmudic boasts establish that it was the Jews who conspired and carried out the murder of their true Messiah by having Him nailed to a wooden cross.
The Pharisees and their High Priest Caiaphas along with his father-in-law Annas bear ultimate responsibility for the crucifixion of Jesus. Annas, was appointed High Priest in AD7 in his thirty-seventh year but was obliged to give way to Ismael by Valerius Gratus, procurator of Judea in AD14. His son Eleazar followed Ismael; then Simon; then Joseph Caiaphas, son-in-law of Annas who remained until AD37. Annas is put before Caiaphas and both are called high priests (Luke 3:2). In Acts 4:6 Annas is called "high priest;" Caiaphas, John and Alexander are called "of his kindred." Annas lived to an old age and had five sons who were high priests. He was probably president of the Sanhedrin and was head of a family that controlled the high priesthood for most of the first century.
The sovereign God manifest in flesh surrendered His own Life: John 10:17-18, "I lay down My Life, that I might take it again. No one takes it from Me, but I lay it down of Myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again".
Jesus is the last Adam and kinsman Redeemer for the first Adam and all of his seed who were potentially in him. He was not the last Cain whose race has no redeemer. Although multitudes are "saved" Messiah died specifically to redeem His Gentile Bride. But He had first to redeem God's divorced servant nation Israel before He could wed His Bride, as typed by Boaz who had to redeem Naomi before he could marry his Gentile Bride. She became great-grandmother of David and types Messiah's Gentile Wife.
The elect Israelites of His day received Jesus as Lord and became the inaugural members of His Bride. Christians are Spiritual Israel as we continue in the faith of the prophets, becoming the fulfillment of God's promises in our flesh with the blessing of Abraham Israel rejected. God put away natural Israel, blinded by wicked priests and rabbis until the Marriage of the Lamb has come to pass (Revelation 19:1-9). They can never be Christ's Bride but will serve Messiah the King and His Gentile Queen in the New Jerusalem as typed by eunuchs.
The rabbis have instilled a clannish nature into the Jewish people, employing fear to build their own power base and prevent its erosion through assimilation. While it is true that God deals with us Gentiles as individuals and Israel as a nation, He has only ever dealt with an election within the nation who possess the personal faith of Abraham.
"From the commandment of Cyrus to restore and build Jerusalem" to the reconciliation of a remnant 144,000 and the consummation God allotted Israel 490 prophetic years. After 483 years had elapsed "Messiah was cut off" or murdered by their wicked hands. Turning from Israel, God "visited the Gentiles, to take out of them a people for His Name," a Wife. Soon, when the last Member of that Bride has recognized her position, the Gentile dispensation will end, and God will return to Israel and fulfill their last week of years.
For three and a half years He will reconfirm the new covenant of Jeremiah 31:31-34 refused by their fathers. Then for three and a half years the elect Israelites and the various classes of the "saved" will surrender their lives in cruel Judaeo-Roman martyrdom for the Commandments of God and the testimony of Jesus Christ as He died for them.Epilogue – The Third Trial of Jesus Christ
I wrote to Mr. Hutton Gibson several times over the past year or so regarding an epilogue for "The Passion of Christ." I am sure all Christians and lovers of truth applaud the candor of his brilliant radio interview with Steve Feuerstein of WSNR-620AM on February 23, 2005. However my earnest prayer was that he would pass on my letters so his son could study the greater Truth of Christ's second or 'parousia' Coming and append it as the epilogue to his film.
Jesus is again on trial by Jews. Satan's Judaeo-Roman church and her daughters, including many churches in the circle of this Message, are to be His executioners. As under the Law, His most grievous wounds are, "Those with which I was wounded in the house of My friends".
Whereas the Gentile denominations have joined the Hebrew denominations in apostasy "and know it not . . . crucifying to themselves the Son of God afresh, and putting Him to an open shame . . . accounting the blood of Christ by which they were sanctified an unclean thing, having disregarded the Spirit of grace" this epilogue would have introduced the present Truth—what Jesus is doing now—to millions around the world (Revelation 3:17; Hebrews 6:6; 10:29). Alas, "God has concluded them all in unbelief. . ." (Romans 11:32). nl313.htm
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Brother Grigor-Scott is a non-denominational minister who has ministered full-time since 1981, primarily to other ministers and their congregations overseas. He pastors Bible Believers' tiny congregation, and is available to teach in your church.
Bible Believers' Church
Gunnedah NSW
Australia 2380e-mail Bible Believers URL Bible Believers' Website
PowerPoint presentation The Second Coming of Christ
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