Andrew Rappaport Jewish Christian vs Zadok Limmuwd Yehoshua Hebrew Israelite debate

Okay, we're live, Tom.

Debate Format and Topic Introduction

Okay, today's debate topic will be Deuteronomy 28 -68, does it refer to the African slave trade? This is such an important debate topic because Deuteronomy 28 -68 is the locus classicus text for Hebrew Israelite that they use on the streets, on Facebook, on YouTube, to make the case that Latinos, Native Americans, and African Americans are the real Israelites of the Bible.

And today's debate, the rules will be simple. Be respectful, polite, don't engage in ad hominem name calling, and don't misrepresent each other's positions. So both debaters today completely disagree on the interpretation of Deuteronomy 28 -68.

We have Zadok, who's going to take the affirmative, saying Deuteronomy 28 -68 actually talks about the African slave trade, and he's an Hebrew Israelite. And we also have Andrew Rappaport, who's going to take the negative position, which is going to refute that Deuteronomy 28 -68 refers to the African slave trade.

Andrew Rappaport is a founder and president of Thriving for Eternity Ministries. He's also a former senior pastor of a Chinese-American Bible church. He established the FIRE conferences and equips churches in evangelism and training.

He's an instructor of Thriving for Eternity Academy, an online school that teaches hermeneutics and systematic theology. He's also an author of What Do They Believe?, which is a systematic theology of major Western religion, and he also has a book, A Systematic Theology, What Do We Believe?, and also a podcast called The Rappaport, which he discusses contemporary topics like Hebrew Israelitism and different contemporary topics in Christianity.

So today's outline of the debate will be, there's going to be an opening statement, which is going to be 15 minutes from both opponents. Rebuttals, 10 minutes. Pause examination, 15 minutes. Closing, 10 minutes.

Zadak is going to take the affirmative position that Deuteronomy 28 -68 refers to the African slave trade. So I'll let you introduce yourself, Zadak.

Zadok Ben Israel's Opening Statement

All right. Peace and blessings, family. Y 'all can hear me well? Yep. OK, all right. First of all, I'd like to give all honor and glory to the most high God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, the father of all who in these last days have revealed unto us more of his plan of salvation through Jesus to Christ.

My name is Zadak Ben Israel. I am an assistant Bible teacher at the Knesset of Jesus or the Knesset Yeshua located here in Buffalo, New York. I've been a student of scripture for about roughly 24 years.

I've been baptized for the last 19 years, and I have been an assistant teacher in the scriptures for about the last 14 years. So that's kind of a brief of my history. And for anyone who would like to get in touch with me, whether it's in the affirmative or if it's against anything you hear tonight, please feel free to hit me up on Facebook.

You can find me and you can hit me on Twitter and Instagram as well. And hopefully there might be a description or something if, you know, attached to this debate somehow. I'm not sure. First of all, I want to thank the brethren.

This is my first time actually speaking with or even hearing of our brother, Andrew. So I appreciate you allowing me to come onto your platform and have this and be a part of this discussion tonight. This was actually sparked by my homie, Eric.

It's probably one of my first times even seeing Eric live, even though we've been corresponding through the Internet for the last couple of years now. Salute to my brother, Ant, who's with me tonight.

And I forget the moderator's name, but thank you for putting your time in here as well. So I'm going to go ahead and I'm going to get into the little bit that I can present. First of all, I just want to say for the record, I am not here to make an overall claim on what you may hear from every Hebrew Israelite just as as a Christian.

I'm not here to give you a dissertation on what every Christian believes. Those of us who claim to be followers of Christ, we don't all agree on everything. Just ask the Calvinists and Armenians. But what I will do is I will put out here to you what I understand as far as Deuteronomy chapter 28, verse 68 in particular, but also other texts coupled with it.

The Bible tells us to let every matter be established by two or more witnesses, even though that was something that was done when people were put to death in the Bible. Paul uses it in his letter, his second letter to the Corinthians when he said, this is my third time writing unto you.

And as it is written, let every word be established by two or more witnesses. So what I'm going to do, I'm going to do what the scripture says. We're going to go line upon line here a little there, a little line upon line, idea upon idea.

And let's see what we can find now for some in the Hebrew Israelite community. Maybe they do harp on Deuteronomy 28, 68, in particular, being the one verse that somehow puts a stamp on proving that the TAST or the transatlantic slave trade is fulfilled solely through Deuteronomy 28 and 68.

But that is not fully my position. While I do believe it applies, I believe that all of Deuteronomy 28, all the curses are found in the Israelite people and that the curses are not time specific, but the curses are cyclical.

What do I mean by that? If the Bible poses something, it will answer something. And what's interesting is you only have this one text in Deuteronomy where in specificity it names Egypt and it talks about Israelites being put in ships and being sold off and wherever they're being took into, they won't be able to redeem themselves and no man shall buy them.

Now, what I want to do here is this. I want to actually go to Deuteronomy chapter 28 right quick. Let's go there. Deuteronomy chapter 28. And when we get there, I want to read. I want to start at verse 60, 63.

And it shall come to pass that as the Lord have rejoiced over you to do good. And I'm reading out of the King James version for those who are reading along and to multiply you. So the Lord will rejoice over you to destroy you and to bring you to naught.

And you shall be plucked off the land where thou goest to possess it. And the Lord shall scatter thee among all people from one end of the earth, even unto the other. Now, I'm going to start there because the thing is, is that when you get to the end of the chapter, you read about the ships and you read about Egypt.

But the curses don't start and end with as far as Israel being scattered, don't start and end with 68. And not all Israelites have been scattered in ships, by the way. Some Israelites just were walked over land for long miles to places as well.

But here the Lord lets you know that he shall scatter you among all people. Now, some of this is going to happen, walking beasts of burden and some of it happened through ships as well. And look at this.

And among these nations, you shall find no ease, neither shall the soul of your foot have rest. But the Lord shall give thee their trembling heart and failing of eyes and sorrow of mind. So we're going to keep going down.

And the Lord shall bring thee into Egypt again with ships. By the way, whereof I speak unto thee, thou shalt see it no more again. And there you shall be sold unto your enemies for bondmen and bondwomen and no man shall buy you.

So with this being said, what I want to do is I want to actually back up right quick. And I want to go over to where I want to go. Oh, chapter six. That's where I want to go. Just back up to Deuteronomy chapter six right quick.

And I want to establish an idea and a thought about Egypt. Deuteronomy, where are we at? Six and twelve. Yep. Here it says, Then beware, lest thou forget the Lord, which brought the fourth out of the land of Egypt from the house of bondage.

Now, what I'm going to purport to you is that in a community that I come from and in many other places as well, Egypt in the scripture, just like Sodom in the scripture and just like Babylon in the scripture, takes on more than the geographic locations.

It doesn't dismiss the geographic locations, but it does take on more. We find in the book of Revelation that city, which is spiritually called Sodom and Egypt, but we also find a place that is actually called Babylon, the great, which isn't literally the Babylon of the scripture as far as the geographic location.

But yet it itself is called Babylon. Yet we also find a city that is also called Sodom and is also called Egypt. We also find in the book of Ezekiel that God called Israel and Judah when they were separated and he was punishing them separately.

Judah to be punished last, of course, he actually called them Sodom and your sister Gomorrah. He actually called his people Sodom and Gomorrah. Why? Because he wasn't always referring to the geographic location.

Now, for those of you who would actually speak against this, this idea that in the scripture it has it said Egypt, so it has to literally be Egypt and couldn't possibly be anything else. I want to turn you on to something.

All of our reasoning and understanding of text isn't necessarily just found in the Bible, but it is the Holy Spirit and time which reveals other things. And whether all men accept it or not, that's fine.

But yet you have to put out there what you have. So, for instance, I'll give you an example in the book of Malachi. It is it says it just like this. And so what do we do with it? It says the Lord shall send unto you before the great and terrible day of the Lord, Elijah, the prophet.

As a matter of fact, I want to just go there right quick. I want to read this to you. So when someone says what the Bible literally has to say there, look, you're going to have to apply this all the way across the board.

Now, Jesus, the Christ, later on, centuries later, gives a revelation on what Malachi meant. And what I'm telling you is that that type of revelation, which is given by the Holy Spirit, which Yeshua, of course, was totally engulfed in and filled with.

That is what is on the church as well and on the believers of the church that find themselves all over the earth. Right. In the book of Malachi, chapter four, verse five, behold, I will send you, Elijah, the prophet before the coming and great and dreadful day of the Lord.

Now, John the Baptist, Yohanan the Immerser, was actually asked straight to his face by the Pharisees and by the Levites and the Kazzal, the Sanhedrin of Israel. Are you the Christ? Are you the Mashiach?

He said to them, no, I am not. They asked John the Baptist, are you Elijah? He said, no, I am not. They said, who do? Who are you then? He said, I am the voice of one crying in the wilderness, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

Now, John gets killed. Jesus, after the death of John, says, if you will receive him, the preaching of John was Elijah to come. And we know that his mother, Elizabeth, prophesied when he was a child that he would go forth in the power and spirit of Elijah.

But notice how, according to the literal text that we just read, the people were looking for the literal man, Elijah, to show up because in Malachi 4 and 5, it says, I will send you Elijah the prophet.

When they went to John the Baptist and said, are you the Christ? Basically, the son of David we're waiting for. No. Are you Elijah? No. John wasn't lying. But the people were looking for this literal thing and Christ actually showed something deeper.

It was the spirit that was in John. And the preaching that came out of him to prepare the way for Yeshua was the Elijah spoken of in Malachi 4. Now, I say unto you, is Egypt and Deuteronomy 28 and 68 literal Egypt?

I'm going to say unto you, yes. And I'm also going to say unto you much more. I'm going to read this right quick. I'm going to go over here. I'm going to go over here right quick and I'm going to read you something.

And this might surprise some people because I don't have a reason to hide from any information that's out there. For those of you who actually know me, some of you guys know we've been teaching on this stuff before there was a before, you know, YouTube and all of that stuff became popular.

Check this out. I'm going to quote you out of what's known as the Targum Yehudithan Ben Uzziel, which some people just simply call the Targum Jonathan, right? It says, and Hashem will exile you back to Egypt and ships by the way of the Red Sea that you once crossed and concerning which I said, you shall not see it again.

And there you will be sold into servitude to your enemies for large sums of money as craftsmen. And afterwards, you will be sold cheaply as slaves and maidservants until you will be cheapened and try to sell yourselves for nothing and no one will take you.

Now, in the Targum Yehudithan Ben Uzziel, this is how Deuteronomy 28 and 68 is read. Check this out. Josephus actually records in the Jewish wars. He actually in book 12, I believe, or 11, it says because soldiers were now growing weary of bloodshed and survivors appear constantly, Caesar orders to kill only those who offered our resistance and to take alive all the rest.

The troops, in addition to those covered by their orders, slaughtered the age and the infirmed people of their prime who might be useful were herded into the temple area and shut up in the court of women.

So now what happens here, I'm going to skip now, it says of the rest, pardon me, I'm sorry, all those who had taken part in this addition in the brigandage, he executed. He picked out the tallest and handsomest of the lot and reserved them for the triumph.

What is the triumph? The triumph is the procession back to Rome where they took a whole bunch of Hebrews literally into Italy, into the capital city, Rome, and paraded them through the streets with furniture from the temple.

It says of the rest, those who were over 17, he put in chains and sent to hard labor in Egypt, while great numbers were presented by Titus to the provinces to perish in the theaters by sword or by wild beasts, those under 17 were sold.

Now, many will point to this and say, see, that alone is Deuteronomy 28, 68. Well, I would say this, first of all, it would be the only curse that happened literally to the tribe of Judah with a little bit of Benjamin with them and not the rest of the tribes, because every other curse in Deuteronomy 28 engulfs every single tribe.

No tribe escaped suffering every part of the punishments. So while the Jews in particular, while this happened to them after 70, I will tell you that there is more that happened to the Israelites during the Assyrian captivity.

And there are other things written in history on what happened to Israelites, even in the Middle Ages and on. So with that being said, I just want to quote one. I'm sorry, a moderator.

How much time do I have left? You have two minutes, two minutes.

OK, thanks. I want to go here right quick because there's so much information, guys. Of course, we can't get it all out in time, but I do want to I'll give you a quote from very world renowned German theologian Ernest Hickstenberg.

Now, for those of you who want to know who this guy is, Hickstenberg is a big 19th century Protestant theologian and exegetist and his writings of the what is it called? I think it's called a commentary on the Psalms.

A lot of people who are in seminary and stuff, they know about this. He's quoted in many Bible commentaries. The people who translated the Calvin, the commentaries of John Calvin quote this guy as well.

I'm just going to quote this to you out of the pulpit Bible commentary. Other people say it was just Egypt, right? Literally, I'm just going to quote what they say about Hickstenberg. Oh, Hickstenberg actually says that.

While he sees Egypt, that it also may point to a type of future oppressor, so Hickstenberg in his commentary actually says Egypt, not disagreeing with his counterparts, but saying he saw more there. Now, this is a German Protestant world renowned theologian of the 19th century.

I'm just Zadok, who some people, you know, may not take that seriously at all. So all I want to say to you is, is that Egypt. Represents more to the Israelite people than just the land, but it also is synonymous with bondage, just like Sodom is with debauchery and Babylon is with confusion and abomination as well.

So I'll stop there for now. And I know that I actually get a rebuttal time. So thank you for listening to my opening statement.

Andrew Rappaport's Opening Statement

OK, time now, Andrew will give the his opening statement, 15 minutes.

All right, well, thanks, Tom, for for moderating this. Zadok, I really appreciate you coming on and us being able to have this discussion. I hope that it is educational to everyone who watches. And I'm going to apologize up front for my voice if I start coughing.

But so taking a look at this, we're looking at the key passage, Deuteronomy 28, 68, to see whether this is referring to the African slave trade. I'm going to take the position it does not. Now, I want to apply the rules that we use to interpret language to examine the question, because he does bring up the question of and we'll get to in rebuttal.

But is Egypt actually Egypt? Well, if we look at the full context, one of the things we always have to do is read something within its context. And so what we have in there is that we have a bunch of prophecies, all of which had been fulfilled during the times of the kings.

We have the plagues, we have the the even the the the famines that were so to the point where women were eating their own young. We have that all documented in, in scripture where we see these, these famines and all the stuff that had been fulfilled.

Now, as we examine the verse and I too, and for folks who may not be aware, some, some Christians may not be aware that many, if not all of the Hebrew Israelites, and I'm going to refrain there, several people refer to them, refer to the group as Black Hebrew Israelites.

I think that was a name that was, was used early on. They, many of them do not use that. And so I will refer as Hebrew Israelites and that's what we're referring to. With that, you'll see that they will often use the King James.

So as such, I will use the King James as well. As we read this text, when we look at this, and the Lord shall bring thee into Egypt again. Now the question of, is Egypt going to be literal? Well, the, the way to answer that, I will agree with Zadok.

There are times when the word Egypt can refer to bondage, that we can agree. The question is, does that apply here? Is there anything within this text that says that this should be taking literally or figuratively?

So when you have scripture, when you have any language, you have clear times where things should be literal or figurative, that's what we're examining. The question here is, is this passage literal or figurative?

Here it says that they're going to bring back to Egypt again. Well, where was it that they were in bondage the first time? That was literal Egypt. So to return to there again would make more sense to say they were returning to the literal Egypt.

Now, how's it described? They're going to return again with ships. I don't see anybody in these debates and debating these issues that question whether the word ships should be literal. So I think we all agree there.

So we, and the Lord shall bring thee into Egypt again with ships, by the way whereof I spake unto thee, thou shalt see it no more again, and there you shall be sold unto your enemies for bondmen or bondwomen, and no man shall buy you.

So what you see here is that the bondage is already mentioned. There's no need for Egypt to refer to bondage when bondage is already mentioned. Therefore, there wouldn't be any kind of literary purpose for using Egypt to refer to bondage when it already mentions it.

Now, the really interesting thing with this, and I think this is the one key that has to be understood, is that this slavery was slavery where they put themselves into slavery. They were sold and no one bought them.

That's not the African slave trade. The African slave trade, people were kidnapped. They were abducted out of their homes, out of their lands, taken by sea and sold as slave. There was a buyer. So there is no way this could refer to the African slave trade.

Now, the way that some may argue, I don't know if Zadok will, so I'm not going to presume that, but the way some will argue is that that is figurative and not literal. Now, if Egypt is figurative, if the spying or the selling of slaves is figurative, if all that is figurative, then we have to assume that the ships are also figurative.

There's nothing in the text to say that the one word is literal and everything else is figurative. In a text like this, it's either going to all be figurative, which doesn't work with the rest of the context of the chapter, which is all literal and was literally fulfilled.

I would argue this verse was also literally fulfilled in history. There were two in history, there was the Northern and the Southern tribes of Israel. The Northern 10 tribes had gone into captivity when the Assyrians came in.

The Assyrians had taken the Northern tribes away and put other people in their place. And then basically there were many of the Israelites who fled. Where did they flee to? Well, they fled to a place called Egypt.

We also know that during the Babylonian captivity, there was a large number of the Jewish population who fled the three captivities that occurred in Babylon. There were three invasions where they took captives away.

During those invasions, many of the Israelites of the time had fled to Egypt. And there was a growing population that was within Egypt of Israelites. They were there. And we see that they recorded, they were, we can see the differences where there was things like the Talmud.

There's an Egyptian Talmud and a Babylonian Talmud, which was the representations of two groups of people where the Israelite communities were. So I think the clearest thing to see is that when, at a time, unlike our time, where people can go and get other jobs, here, the only way for people to be able to make a living and keep themselves alive would be to be a slave if they can't find work.

This is exactly what we see in a parable that Christ gave when he talks about a man who wants his father's inheritance. He squanders his inheritance. He ends up selling himself as a slave to a pig owner and says, Oh, you know what, my father took better care of me than this guy.

Let me go sell myself as a slave over to him. And so that is what would end up happening. The slavery in that day in the Old Testament was different, very different than the slavery of the, that we'd end up seeing in the African slave trade and elsewhere in the world, because in the scriptures, the slavery mentioned there, they get paid a half day's wage.

It was an employment system. And so these Jews would have gone to Egypt and to stay alive, would have sold themselves as slaves. So no one would have bought them. They would have put themselves into a slavery, into a work system so that they can keep themselves alive.

And so what you end up seeing is that this is very easy to understand when we look at this, that this is something that was fulfilled in history. Now, the argument that just because Egypt is connected by land to Israel, to the land of Israel, that they must have come by land would be a logical fallacy.

It is not the only way that people get to Egypt. Some do go by sea. And so it is not something you can say, well, the only slave trade that ever occurred by ships was the African slave trade. That would not be a valid argument because we do know that Egypt did have people that came in by ship, and we do know that there were many Israelites that fled the two, the Northern and Southern invasions and fled to the literal place of Egypt.

Now, if you want to argue that Egypt, the word in this context is referring to bondage, that's okay. You still have a major problem with the African slave trade, and that is that they did not have buyers.

That does not describe in any way the African slave trade. And so what we end up seeing here in its context, whenever we look at anything, we have to read it within context. I know that many of the Hebrew Israelites will take the verse in Isaiah that Zadok had quoted, where it'll say that we should take here a little, there a little, and they'll take that to mean that the way to read the Bible is to grab one thing out of its context, grab another thing out of its context and slam it together.

That is not how you do any kind of interpretation anywhere. And I would say, if you are going to be required, if you're going to say that that is the way to interpret, and that's the only way to interpret, then you have yourself a major problem.

Because in Mark 9, 3, it says, and His remnant, speaking of Jesus, and His remnant became shining exceedingly white as snow, so as fuller on earth white can white them. So I would say that if you're going to say we take here a little, there a little, then that verse says Jesus Christ is white.

In fact, He's whiter than white. He's the whitest thing that's ever been white. Now I will argue that's not the proper way to interpret it because every single person that is going to look at that and say, no, no, no, that is referring to clothing, that's not referring to His skin.

However, it's talking about His remnant and remnant can be His skin. That's just as easy to say. And so the problem is, is you have to follow rules of interpretation. Once you step out from the rules of interpretation, now you are no longer taking God's word, but man's word.

And since Zadok had quoted or referred to John Calvin, those are Calvin's words. John Calvin had said that when man twists God's word, they no longer have God's word, they have man's word. And that's what we end up doing when we take things out of context.

This is a thing called proof texting. Proof texting is when you take one passage or one verse and you take it off and out of its context. You put it together with another to give it a new meaning. Now, for those who want to argue for the here a little, there a little, keep in mind that you're doing that based on verses and chapters that were added in some 800 years after the writing of the New Testament.

So these were not inspired breaks. This was something people put in. Men put those breaks in there. And so how do you know to take from that little section? You can't. You have to read it within its context.

In fact, I know that throughout this, Zadok would expect, and I would expect that he would expect this, that I take what he says in context and I read it the way it was meant to be read. I should not take when he says his words, just because I want them to have a different meaning, I should not take them and say they're figurative when they're not, or to say they're literal when they're not.

When people say something like, I'm so hungry I can eat a cow, well, I might be able to eat a lot, but I don't know that I can get a whole cow. And people know that by its phrase, that it is an idiom.

There's nothing within this text since the entire chapter is talking about future events that were fulfilled in the time of the writing of the Old Testament. They were fulfilled literally, just as this is mentioned literally, there's no reason to believe that Egypt is not Egypt, that the slaves are not slaves, that the ships are not ships, and that there were no buyers.

Therefore, I do not see any way logically within the text here, following the rules of interpretation, that this can in any way refer to the African slave trade. And with two minutes left, I'll give up my time.

Rebuttal: Zadok on Egypt, Malachi, and Historical Fulfillment

Okay. Next we'll go into the rebuttals. Um, Zadok, we'll go first. You have 10 minutes. Zadok?

Oh, can you hear me? Gotcha. You're good. Okay. Yeah. Forgive me. That's why I don't like doing hangouts on my phone. Um, okay. Just give me one second here, bro, before you start my time. Cause I want to make sure my camera is back on.

Okay. That was a very good opening.

He wants to get his cameras on because he knows he's better looking than me. That's so unfair of you.

Look, well, sir, uh, the Hebrew blood in me is partly the, probably part of the reason why, but Hey, I don't judge how men look. Cause I don't think I'm that great looking. At least my wife finds me decent.

So praise God for her. Okay. Um, great opening statement. Um, once again, I actually, uh, I actually appreciate being brought onto this platform. Now, uh, I, I want to stay for the record that, um, I did quote the Targum Jonathan.

I also did quote Josephus as two sources that many would use to say, Hey, this right here, that's it. That's all Deuteronomy 28 68 is talking about, but Moses wasn't talking to the Jews. Moses was actually talking to the nation of Israel in the wilderness.

And I also argue again, that the entire nation of Israel suffered every single part of that curse. And we would have to say that the bondage that, that going into the house of bondage, again, in ships didn't happen to all the tribes.

It only corresponds with what happened in 70. And it's clear that while I accept what happened in 70, it's clear because I read sources. I'm arguing that it went deeper than that. And the gentleman said that, um, a brother Andrew said that I somehow that I didn't have a license to do that.

And that I had to read literally what was there. And I, and I knew he would say that, which is why I showed you guys a little glimpse, but I'm going to give you some more. I showed you a little glimpse of showing you that in Malachi chapter four, the prophet says that God shall send Elijah to profit.

The people were literally just like they were literally looking for the Christ, which Jesus literally showed up and was the son of David, not the spirit of the son of David and him, but he was literally the Messiah.

And all of us on here are believers that he is the Messiah to this moment. We would all have to say that John the Baptist was Elijah the prophet too. But yet when John the Baptist was asked to his face, are you Elijah?

He said, no, Jesus later after he, after John was killed by Herod said, if you will accept it, that basically the spirit in John and what John was preaching, this was Elijah. So how is it that if I'm reading Malachi four, all it says to me is that Elijah, the prophet was coming, but I want to show you something else.

Cause he talked about the language, right? He talked about the language of the scripture. Let's go to Deuteronomy 29 right quick and Deuteronomy 29. I want to show you because he said everything. If you said Egypt, remember guys, I said, while I believe Egypt, notice my opening statement, while I believe Egypt was literal, I also believe it went further.

Now in Deuteronomy 29, I'm going to read this. This is Moses speaking to the generation. That's about to go into the land with Joshua, right? He says verse 21 and the Lord shall separate him unto evil out of all the tribes of Israel, according to all the curses of the covenant that are written in the book of the law, talking about the man he'll punish, right?

So that the generation to come of your children that shall rise up after you. And the stranger that shall come from a far land shall say when they see the plagues of that land and the sicknesses, which the Lord have laid upon it.

And the whole land is brimstone and salt and burning that it is not sown nor bears, nor any grass grows therein like the overthrow of Sodom and Gomorrah, Atma and Zeppelin, which the Lord overthrew in his anger and in his wrath, even all nations shall say, wherefore have the Lord done this unto this land?

What mean of the heat of this great anger, brothers and sisters, you won't find one time in the history of Israel where the whole land was ever brimstone, salt and burning, not sown, no grass growing or bearing any fruit, even in the Babylonian captivity, while you have the children of the aristocracy taken back to Babylon, which Daniel, Hananiah, Azariah and Mishael were a part of.

They were children of the Israelite elite. Ezekiel came from a high family in Israel of prophets and others. Jeremiah and many of the poor Jews and strangers and Benjamites got to stay in the farming.

But the Bible doesn't give you the whole story. It gives you a small glimpse. The whole land was never not farmed. Even in the destruction of Jerusalem, the whole land was never not farmed. Even when the Romans destroyed Jerusalem, they didn't kill all of even Judea.

But the whole land that Israel inhabits is from the River of Egypt unto the Great River, which people would think is either the Jordan or the Euphrates, however you want to say it. The land of Palestine has never in the history of it looked like this.

But why is the most high saying the whole land would be brimstone and salt and burning? And it won't be sown. People will come there and it's going to look like this. This language is figurative. And yet literal at the same time, and if you reach out to me, I could prove it in other studies.

Now, I want to show one more thing. I just want to show one more thing. Um, where is it? Oh, I can't find it for the sake of time. Jesus is quoted when he's talking to the stubborn Pharisees and the people of Israel who don't believe him.

He says unto them, well, have Isaiah prophesied of you for in hearing you don't hear it and in seeing you don't see in your ears have grown dull. He quoted Isaiah. But brothers and sisters, what I'm going to say to you is.

That. Isaiah and context, when you're reading it in the scripture, Isaiah was not talking about a future generation, and I want to I'm hoping that I can find this here right quick.

Um, it's Isaiah chapter six. Oh, thank you. Isaiah chapter six. Thanks a lot.

Let me go there right quick. OK, Isaiah six. Now, this is, um, you see, OK, in the year that Uzziah died. OK, he said, now this is Isaiah. Go and tell this people here you indeed, but understand not and see you indeed, but perceive not.

Now, Jesus said Isaiah have spoken well of you, but in context here, Isaiah is being sent to his generation of the children of Israel. Now, when Jesus uses it, he's not necessarily saying that Isaiah was literally talking about his generation.

But he's saying that in you being hard headed, just like your father's Isaiah is speaking of you, too. And in another place, Christ said, just like your father's killed the prophets. Go ahead and fill up the measure of their fathers.