More Black Hebrew Israelites Exposed!

All right guys, we're back for the after show right now, doing our show, our after show on the Hebrew-Israelite movement, sometimes known as the Black Hebrew Israelites. If you caught the television show, we're gonna pick up right now right where we left off.

Sampling a General Yohanna Clip on Polygamy and Nation Building

And so if you didn't see that yet, make sure you go check that out, it gives you a fuller context. And now we're gonna do some more detailed examination. So, vocab is gonna kind of walk us through maybe some more of the history, the theology.

But before we do that, let's get a little more of a sampling of what some of these guys are like.

Can I walk up the video?

Yes, sure.

All right.

So you're about to watch a video from a man named General Yohanna. He has been in this truth for, I think, three decades. That's how they refer to someone who's been awakened. They'll say been in this or been in the truth.

And General Yohanna is the commanding officer over ISUPK. ISUPK started in Harlem in 1969. It stands for the Israelite School of Universal Practical Knowledge. ISUPK claims to be the only camp that Yahweh is, quote, dealing with.

So they're actually very exclusive, making them not very many friends among other camps because they claim to be the only true camp. They do have somewhat of a pedigree though, in that in 1969, they really were the first modern version of Hebrew Israelite movement to come out.

And all the other camps that have come out have, in some way, come out of ISUPK. So General Yohanna is, in this clip, speaking about the advantages of polygamy because most Hebrew Israelites believe polygamy is part of what will be in the new heaven or new earth in the Messianic kingdom.

And some believe you should practice it now. And so he's gonna talk about how great polygamy is. Go ahead.

Two women are dead after a high-speed chase that started inside the state of Georgia and crossed into Alabama. What you black women so mad about when you did not protest against same-sex marriage?

Right.

That's right. You didn't protest against same-sex marriage. Why are you mad now? Because a man wanna have more than one woman. And let me tell you something. It is one of the best ways to rebuild this nation.

That's right.

And it's one of the best ways for a black man to learn how to be a leader. You got more than one woman. You got to really learn skillfully how to deal with these women. And it is educational and empowering and strengthening to a black man.

Now don't go out and do it unlawfully. Don't learn how to be with more than one woman from anywhere but the UPK. Now if you go and do that and it gets screwed up, don't blame us. That's right. I ain't telling everybody to go get more than one woman.

I'm saying in the UPK, you can learn how to have more than one woman and it's a great benefit. That's right. And it's a great benefit. And here's another reason it's a great benefit. Because that witchcraft that's on these black women, turn on basketball, why?

That's where you want me to stop?

Yeah, about there.

Okay, I'll stop with the basketball.

About there where it's fascinating. This is really fascinating.

So again, so even in that clip.

You got to learn to deal with these women. This gonna teach you how to.

You hear in that clip, the exclusivity that the ISUPK specifically has and everything else to them is fraudulent. And they're, of course, they're advocating polygamy, but you can't do it unlawfully. But it's interesting.

Now an interesting application to this, because did you hear what he said? It's one of the best ways to rebuild this nation. So they view themselves in a nation rebuilding process. The Hebrew Israelites as a people have been demolished.

And it's interesting. A big way that they explain what has happened to black Americans and folks over here in the Western hemisphere from the slave trade is as a result of them experiencing the curses of Deuteronomy 28.

Deuteronomy 28 is the key passage and their interpretive framework because they interpret everything that is described as a curse to them. And they'll say, look how this is fulfilled among our people.

This is fulfilled. And so it's actually has a little bit of a theodicy to it, meaning explaining evil or suffering in their case by saying we've been rebellious and sinners. And that's why all these things have justly happened to us.

But now you can't stop this movement. The truth is coming out. We're gonna rebuild the nation according to God's holy laws. And so to them, this is an answer to problems in the black community as well.

They'll say, you have this problem, you have this problem, you have this problem. Not so if you followed these laws. And so they want to rebuild the nation. That's why he's General Yohanna because it's a nation building.

And that's why he speaks about polygamy as a good way to do that. You see, so there's a logical connection in their mind to these things.

Okay.

Go ahead.

I got two questions. One, right before we started the segment, you said that they also think King James is black. Are they KJV-onlius?

The ones who are messianic are.

Okay.

So there's different types of Israelites. There's ones who call themselves messianic Israelites. And that's almost all the groups I've mentioned in some way would technically be considered messianic. All that simply means is they accept the fact that Jesus is the Christ.

Now, most of the camps, if they hear this, will say that Edomite doesn't know what he's talking about. He just said J. There's no J in Hebrew. So they're very anti-Jesus. You can't say the word Jesus.

There's a camp that says it's okay, I-U-I-C, and all the camps make fun of them because they say Jesus is okay. Anyways, so if you accept Jesus as the Messiah, you're messianic. If you don't, you're Tanakh-onli.

Now, I haven't dealt with any of them yet. I've only heard about them and heard some of their teachings. They're more like, it's more like what you think of Judaism as a little bit more so because they don't accept that.

And the weirdest thing is a lot of them say Joshua. Joshua was the Messiah. They'll say he's the one who fills a prophet like unto Moses. But with all that being said, the ones that are are KJV only. With the apocrypha though, with the apocrypha.

And then you say, well, hold up. You know, King James of Scotland, I think was an Edomite by your standards. Well, no, the history has been whitewashed. Look at this picture on the internet. Oh my gosh, King James was black.

I mean, that's kind of how it goes. So King James was a black King of Scotland.

Oh, really?

Yeah.

It's like that.

The proof is all there. You got to do your research.

Look at this meme.

Google it.

So my next question then.

When they say do research, they mean read Hebrews like websites. They don't actually mean do research.

So does this group exist outside of our nation?

Because yes.

In the UK and especially Jamaica, West Indies, Virgin Islands, St. Thomas.

Yes.

So, but they have to be someone that came to one of those places through the slave trade. Is that what you're getting at?

There's a meme. Do you guys have PG -13 words on the after show? How do you guys do that? There's a meme that says, to me, this is the best meme that actually describes a theology better than anything I've ever seen.

If you have kids, mute it, get them away.

It's a mild one, but still. It says, did yo ass come over here on a ship? Question mark on the top, on the bottom. Then yo ass is an Israelite. So if you came over on a ship, then you're a Israelite. However, most of them will say, there's probably still some Israelites left in Africa.

But some of them say no, because Esau was so crafty. That's our favorite adjective for white people, crafty. Esau was so crafty, he knew who he was gonna get. So in essence, being sort of in league with God's enemies, they specifically targeted certain people to snatch out of Africa, the Israelites.

By ship, they mean slave ship though. Because technically, most of the people in our country came here from a ship.

Well, yeah, so they mean slave ship. So just one little verse, because this will help you understand what they're saying. Deuteronomy 28, 68. And the Lord will bring you back in ships to Egypt, a journey that I promise that you should never make again.

And there you shall offer yourselves for sale to your enemies as male and female slaves, but there will be no buyer. The Lord will bring you back in ships to Egypt. That's the key. And so you'll say, wait a minute, Egypt?

Well, yeah, Egypt is precept upon precept. Now, what's Egypt a sign of in the Bible? Bondage of slavery. Where were we bonded in the Western hemisphere? So Egypt is slavery. So bring you back in the ships to slavery.

So the ships are little, Egypt is figurative.

Interesting, interesting, fascinating. Man, Esau is one hairy, crafty, devilish white man.

And what's weird is he's Jacob's twin brother, right? Have you ever thought about that?

Yeah.

It's a little bit of Jacob's black.

Yeah, and so they love to show pictures of twins that came out in different colors.

Oh, I've seen those pictures.

Yeah, which is a real thing, but that's like their thing, like, look, it still happens.

It's pretty uncommon.

Yes, it is. However, there's a small group of Israelites. And the thing is, I haven't figured out their rationale yet. There's a small group of Israelites who deny the Esau equals white man doctrine, but I think all the camps accept it.

Is there, actually, okay, that's a perfect segue. What are a few things that they all agree on? Because it sounds like they're all a little bit different.

The Israelites described in scripture are dark black skinned people.

Okay.

That is like, and they ended up over here in the Western hemisphere. That's the big thing. So the funny thing about it is, they act like they're Sola Scriptura type people. Now, they don't use that terminology, but they act like you got to go to the scripture.

Even remember when, earlier, when talking about their justification for the 12 year old rape thing, you got to go back to the scripture, the guy says. Well, so everything to them needs to be justified in the scripture.

But their main controlling narrative for how they view history is actually not scriptural, which, again, shows they're actually not really from the Bible where they get their main controlling view of how they view things, which is interesting.

It's from other sources, kind of a convoluted view of history. But that's the big thing that they agree upon.

I must tell you, I do not wish to fight you.

Violence is no longer in my nature, but if you want it, you got it, sister.

That's the white devil scene from Ace Ventura. That's the white devil scene.

That's what you were doing the last five minutes, you've been like.

Yeah, it's interesting, by and large, in this.

I just looked up white devil on YouTube.

That's what you found? Yeah, they say that this is the time of the Gentiles. And so right now, because of Israel's sin, it has been given to Esau to have a dominion. And so this is, in essence, Gentile heaven.

So they don't actually believe in heaven and hell as we would understand heaven and hell biblically. It's sort of a condition that you're in, like right now is our heaven, if you're white, basically. And if you're Israelite, it's hell.

But when black Messiah comes back to put the boot upon the neck of the Edomite, then it's kind of like, then it's black man's heaven at that point.

So we have many 12-year-old brides.

According to GMS, not according to all of them. But yes, and so it's very temporal as well. You see how this all physical concerns by and large. But they don't think they can do it themselves, is my point by saying that.

Most of them are into like violent revolution. In fact, one group that I listen to regularly, it's kind of funny, they're like, man, don't you know how crafty Esau is? He's been given the power of the sword during the time of the Gentiles.

And he has weapons that can see you from space and zap you where you stand right now. We can't fight that. It's gonna take the black Messiah. It's gonna take Yeshua to come back and take care of that type of thing.

So by and large, they're not about trying to do like the whole violent thing. Now, they don't think it's possible. They think it's when he comes back.

So you mentioned like 1969. Is that kind of the genesis of this movement?

The modern version. So if you go back to right after the Civil War is when you see this first coming up. So if you've ever listened to, studied the Negro spiritual songs, you hear a heavy identification with the slaves, with the people of Israel, which makes sense if you're enslaved.

You say, yet God is on our side and can bring us redemption, right? That's awesome. That's a powerful narrative. That's true. It's right there in the Bible. Well, some folks basically, this is my interpretation, started taking that literally.

And so there's one guy, this is actually one of the guys who was one of the prominent first guys to do this, was in this field. And he got a vision while working in this field right after the Civil War was over, I think he was in Kansas, about who black Americans really were.

And it was Hebrew Israelites. So some little churches started popping up into various places like in Kansas and Philly and New York, like in the 1860s, 70s, 1880s, 1890s. Then in the early 1900s in Harlem, especially in the 20s and 30s, you have sort of the second wave.

And those folks were mainly really working to be more Jewish looking. And so they would even go by rabbi and that type of thing. But out of one of those congregation, a guy named Rabbi Matthew, my understanding is a bunch of people left and started this more militant kind of modern version we see now, which I think is where ISUPK came from.

But then out of ISUPK came a bunch of other camps. And now the camps are the primary movers of these doctrines and stuff, but you'll find that there's a lot of lone wolf Israelites, you know, who have, they pick and choose certain things and not really affiliated with the camp, but I guarantee you the way they've discovered most of their information is like from a YouTube video or from some book recommended by a camp, even if they're not in the camp.

So did this in 69, was that about the time you're seeing Black Panthers?

Yes, all this is going on at the same time. Yeah, so there's an interesting interview with an elder who used to be, who was around then, and they interview him and he talks about that. And actually in the late 60s, a group of folks from the South side of Chicago left Chicago and moved to Israel.

So right now there's a group, and they call themselves African Israelites, but they're in Damona, Israel right now. And there's approximately three to 5 ,000 of them. And they're not like the Ethiopian Jews who appear to actually have some Semitic ancestry.

These Hebrew Israelites who left from Chicago in the 60s, and they're a polygamous vegan sect living there in Damona, Israel. But the Israelite government has actually recognized them. They've actually recognized them.

And then Amari Stoudemire actually funded a documentary DVD called The Village of Peace.

He's a basketball player, Jeff.

Yes, so he used to play for Phoenix Suns, Amari Stoudemire, and he identifies as a Hebrew Israelite. He even owns part of a team there in Israel.

I did not know that.

And he funded this DVD called The Village of Peace so you can watch about it. And they're kind of more chill. They make their own clothes and do stuff. They're not really out street teaching and stuff.

But I mean, they're over there, and there's three to 5 ,000 of them, they say.

Do you see any history of prophecy? I would say they're out just preaching judgment upon us Edomites, but have there been instances of actual messiahs returning?

Some have made definite dates, but I'm still looking into some more information about who said what, when. But I've run into a few examples of that. But the most guys you'll run into are more, the time is near, so they are apocalyptic.

And like, I saw this video where the guy was like, have you seen Independence Day?

You know, the aliens?

I saw that, it was the Sanford guys, right?

Yeah, have you seen the aliens over there? Well, that's supposed to be us. Yeah, that's Black Angels in there.

The wheels, yeah.

Yeah, there they come. And so most are like, yeah, from Ezekiel. Yeah, they do that thing too.

Okay.

So they are apocalyptic, it's going to happen soon. So that same group, GMS, they have a little meme they've made that has like a clip of someone hold on onto a fence. And like, it looks like they're in a nuclear winter and their face is like melting off and their skin is turning red and it's like all going back.

And it's like, hey white folks, this is your future.

Yeah.

That's what the meme says. And it's a meme.

I love when vocab talks about it, how excited he gets.

And the funny thing is you can buy it. You can buy that and you can have it as part of your startup kit because they sell TAMP startup kits. And in these startup kits, they give you a certain amount of sandwich boards and posters.

That's one of the ones you could enlarge and carry around.

Gives you a racial slur dictionary.

I mean, there's like a bunch of different ones. When I first encountered them, they had Barack Obama drawn like the Antichrist, like with horn. They're not cool with Obama. They are not Obama supporters.

Why is that?

Do you know why?

First of all, he's Kenyan. So remember there's an anti-African sentiment among a lot of these groups. So they don't even consider him an Israelite. Like from my understanding, because of the Kenyan aspect.

But I mean, he's in charge of this government. But the weird thing is there's a Hebrews lawyer I just discovered that's running for election this year.

Really?

Yeah.

A guy named Yam, I just encountered.

I actually watched

As in candy?

It's from a Hebrew word. As in candy? But his campaign slogan is no collusion 2016. No collusion 2016. So he's not gonna cooperate with the evil powers. And I don't know if it's because of a real reason, but he actually does have an eye patch.

So when he's speaking, it really is a little bit like Nick Fury saying he's gonna run for president because in the video, one of his main promises is that he's gonna go with the troops into battles and bring back the head of Syrian leaders.

So you can watch his video, it's on YouTube. And it's really interesting, but he's running for president. I tried to watch another one of his videos, but he was eating a sandwich the whole time. So it was hard to pick out what he's saying.

This is the craziest election year ever.

Yeah, but hey, Yam, Trump.

You got Trump, Clinton, Yam. I don't know if we need to bleep it out, but it's really on the ballot. These nuts.

Gary Johnson, Libertarian Party.

Yeah, these are really, they're gonna be on the ballot. Like it's a real thing. It's actually happening in the world.

But if someone is like, okay, I got the basics, but this is the real side of it because this is a harvest field. And what's happening to the black church is they're losing young men who are energetic and zealous.

I was gonna ask you that.

Left and right, yes, got a siren, but I'm just telling you what, I see, and by and large, the traditional black church is not exactly aware of what's happening and don't seem to be marshaling the resources to combat it.

And so they're losing folks and almost all these Hebrew Israelites I've met have some heavy exposure usually to the black church. In fact, one of the recurring themes you see in black Hebrew Israelites social media activity is mocking and calling out prosperity preachers.

Yeah.

So hey, we agree with that. We're cool with that. We agree with that. And so there's that aspect there and here they go. They wanted robust doctrine. They wanted certain things they didn't see. They see it in the Hebrew Israelite movement.

And so they come with this and all of a sudden they feel masculine. They feel real brotherhood. They feel like actual Bible study. They feel like a serious call to action that matters in something. Instead of here's what they'll, they talk a lot about four offerings and what the pastor's driving and that type of stuff.

And so that's a problem. And then sort of the white mainstream evangelical church, it's hard for them to realize this problem. And often they don't care as much as they should. So I'll tell you about a real conversation I had.

I'm gonna not name anybody, but it was within a sister in Christ who had actually for years been involved with ministering to Muslims even. But I told her what I was doing. And she's like, well, but you're not Jewish, are you?

I was like, well, no. And she's like, well, you're not black either, are you? I was like, well, no. So why are you doing this? I was like, see, well, that's kind of the problem. I was like, see, we need more people who don't, we don't all have to be in those categories to care about this.

Because isn't this Christ church being affected by this? And aren't these questions, actually when you get into this doctrine, they're questions that have been there since Galatians. You read Galatians and you say, oh, the Hebrew Israelites are the Judaizers.

There's some differences going on, but they are the Judaizers of Galatians. And they're bringing up the same issues, talking about the same things that were in Galatians and in Acts. And so it brings up important issues that we need to deal with.

And there needs to be a marshaling of resources and people caring because it's happening and no one's paying attention. And it's not gonna get smaller. I mean, you could look at the self-published books, internet channels, it's gonna get bigger.

I think it'll be more prominent. I think you'll see more, I'm not saying this religion is gonna take over the world, but I'm gonna say, I think you're gonna see it become a much more significant force and ground level inner city life.

Yeah, that's what I think you'll see happening.

Yeah, I always wonder, like when I'm just looking at what we face, just in one area, like say with Mormonism, like if the church had taken it more seriously.

Right, in the beginning, yeah.

In the beginning when they were in New York and then moving the way across, if we were just really engaged and worked hard on bringing the gospel to those communities, challenging them to public debate, just working on it, could we have stopped it in its tracks and not gotten to over 10 million?

Yeah, because now really is the time because so they'll recommend a book. This is the closest thing they have to their Bible. This is like the intro level from Babylon to Timbuktu. Scholars need to go through this book and lacerate it because it deserves to be eviscerated.

It's filled with bad historiography, false assumptions written in 1969, I believe. But if you look at this, this is an example of something that a scholar especially could utilize resources because they make a lot of claims about the Hebrew language.

There's something that's difficult for a lay person to tack onto. That's why I'm glad my second reader is a, he's a Hebrew professor. So I can be like, what's this guy saying here? What's this guy saying there?

You know, is this accurate? And half the time he's laughing. He's like, dude, they're making up words. He's like, this doesn't exist. And this is half a word. And anyways, but the thing is, you don't know that.

So we need these resources there.

That's incredible.

But there's a lot of stuff that the average person's like, whoa, they're making way too many claims. This is like multidisciplinary, you know, multiple disciplines you'd have to be aware of. So we need to attack it now as God's people and also shore up our churches.

So this doctrine is not so attractive to people as well. And then also figure out some evangelistic strategies to reach out to people who have been affected by this. Because in my current research, I have met, in case someone's wondering, ex-Hebrew Israelites who are now on fire believers for the Lord.

I have met them. So it's not like you're in this and it's forever. You know, there are people who get saved. They come out of this and realize some of the sadness that they realized that it was wrong, basically.

God, Christology, and the Gospel in Hebrew Israelite Teaching

So what, well, I mean, so I want to have at least have this in the show. Give me a snapshot of what they believe about God and the gospel, like those two central issues.

By and large, they like to call God the Most High.

Okay.

So if you see the abbreviation T-M-H online, that means the Most High. And then they are sacred namers, meaning they get caught up in what you call God specifically.

Okay.

So it can't be Jehovah though, but it might be, and it's very rarely Yahweh, it's other versions. And you can know which sect they are by what they call God. So very big on that. But I haven't met any that are triune.

They'll have Jesus be divine in some way, but none of them that I've determined so far have Jesus being co-equal. So they all denigrate Jesus to some kind of lesser being status. It looks very similar oftentimes to Jehovah's Witness Christology.

Okay.

Not all the time though, but a lot of times it looks like that. So that's obviously a problem. Some of the groups have the Holy Spirit being a person, but a lot of the groups I've ran into do have Holy Spirit as not God or it as well.

And so that creates a problem from jump. Then the gospel side of it, you hardly ever hear them use the word gospel. You hear them say things like, do you keep the law?

Okay.

And they think you can keep the law. So they have a high view of man's ability to please God by keeping the law.

While they're dropping. F-bombs.

Well.

Have any of them defended that violence?

Well, the violence is one thing because most of them don't try to be violent this side of things. But the F-bombs, the camps that do that, remember some say, hey, those guys do that. That's not Christ-like.

Some say that's not Christ-like. So they would say what we would say. The camps that do say, Edomites aren't used to a strong black man making confident claims. And so they tell us to tone it down, but we don't have to listen to you.

So something like, there's nothing wrong. And they'll say, don't you know? I'm sorry. Don't you know that Paul said he was crude of speech? In the King James Version, I think it says when I came to you, I was rude of speech or something.

Yeah, he came to the church. He was like dropping F-bombs.

They interpret it. I was like, Paul was like getting it in like that. Which, and there's some other examples. They love to bring up, of course, they would bring up Elijah and things like that. Jesus' words to the Pharisees.

So they say they're fine where they're at with that. But the gospel to them is works-based.

Do they believe Jesus died and rose again?

Most of them do that I can ascertain, but it seems like incidental in their overall soteriology.

Not because he was God.

Well, he definitely wasn't God by any of the camps I've heard talked to. But occasionally you will hear camps a little bit focused on the atonement. And so some of the camps get kind of Christian sometimes.

So I was listening to a teaching and it was weird because it came from a guy I didn't expect would say it. And that's what's hard, the knowledge is consistent. He was talking about being forgiving. And he said, because Jesus Christ died for our sins and forgave us.

And I was like, it was really out of context from what I had come to expect from them. But it's rare that you hear that. And it is a little more incidental, but that's actually, that's a legitimate Christian application.

So my point is sometimes you'll be listening to them and you'll say, that's a decent interpretation of that verse. You'll hear and you'll say, well, that's not what I would go with that interpretation, but that's a legitimate, viable interpretive option there.

Now they have a lot of esoteric interpretations as well.

Sure, that's what I've seen.

But you'll hear these things and a lot of times you'll say they're doing, they're trying, sometimes you hear guys legitimately trying to do justice to the text. And so it's weird. Sometimes I'm pleasantly surprised by some of the ways they interpret scripture, sometimes.

So it's a real mixed bag actually. So I want to give them respect where respect is due, but the atonement, well, most of them seems a little more incidental. Law-keeping, I picture them like Judaizers.

It's more about law-keeping really.

Okay.

Are they, I'm sorry, go ahead. I'm just going to ask if they were annihilationists because.

Can't tell yet. It seems like they have a view that if you're an Edomite that's real bad, you get killed when black Messiah comes back and you're just, I don't think you, I don't know what happens to you.

Or if you're like a black dude who is two down.

Define real bad. Edomite.

I mean, it seems like, because see, I haven't gotten this figured out. I'm just curious.

You're worried joy.

I mean, so Donald Trump, just kidding. It's too easy, right? It's too easy. But because I haven't understood yet because it seems like the slaves, they're not immediately killed. So I almost think like the slaves might have it better off from what I can tell, but I haven't fully got it figured out.

Who's like the hierarchy of what judgment looks like for them. Maybe there's like a house field type slave concept.

Okay.

I'm still working that all out to try to understand some of those things, but some of them are dead, but it doesn't seem like they go to hell. It seems like it's annihilationism.

Okay, so let's wrap it up with maybe some resources and helps. I mean, obviously you're getting started on this and this is all like ground level stuff and you did a great job, by the way, in explaining this.

This is really fascinating. You got a stack of books here.