God speaks through the Prophet Hosea: When Israel was a child, I loved him, and out of Egypt I called my son. 2 The more I called them, the more they went from me; they kept sacrificing to the Baals, and offering incense to idols. 3 Yet it was I who taught Ephraim to walk, I took them up in my arms; but they did not know that I healed them. 4 I led them with cords of human kindness, with bands of love. I was to them like those who lift infants to their cheeks. I bent down to them and fed them. 5 They shall return to the land of Egypt, and Assyria shall be their king, because they have refused to return to me. 6 The sword rages in their cities, it consumes their oracle-priests, and devours because of their schemes. 7 My people are bent on turning away from me. To the Most High they call, but he does not raise them up at all. 8 How can I give you up, Ephraim? How can I hand you over, O Israel? How can I make you like Admah? How can I treat you like Zeboiim? My heart recoils within me; my compassion grows warm and tender. 9 I will not execute my fierce anger; I will not again destroy Ephraim; for I am God and no mortal, the Holy One in your midst, and I will not come in wrath. 10 They shall go after the LORD, who roars like a lion; when he roars, his children shall come trembling from the west. 11 They shall come trembling like birds from Egypt, and like doves from the land of Assyria; and I will return them to their homes, says the LORD. — Hosea 11:1-11
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The Apostle Paul writes: So if you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. 2 Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth, 3 for you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. 4 When Christ who is your life is revealed, then you also will be revealed with him in glory.
5 Put to death, therefore, whatever in you is earthly: fornication, impurity, passion, evil desire, and greed (which is idolatry). 6 On account of these the wrath of God is coming on those who are disobedient. 7 These are the ways you also once followed, when you were living that life. 8 But now you must get rid of all such things– anger, wrath, malice, slander, and abusive language from your mouth. 9 Do not lie to one another, seeing that you have stripped off the old self with its practices 10 and have clothed yourselves with the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge according to the image of its creator. 11 In that renewal there is no longer Greek and Jew, circumcised and uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave and free; but Christ is all and in all! — Colossians 3:1-11
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Today we’ll be looking at both our Old Testament lesson and our New Testament lesson and the focus will be on the common ground between the two.
The prophet Hosea and the apostle Paul lived about 700 years apart, give or take a few decades. They weren’t born or raised anywhere near each other: so it is remarkable how much their messages amplify and support each other. Hosea focuses mostly on how very much God loves us; and Paul encourages us to love God back. Let there be a two-way relationship between us, and let us be confident that even when we fall short of God’s perfection, God’s love and compassion are always there.
God also reminds us throughout scripture that God’s people were called out of Egypt – out of slavery – and into freedom. Israel’s experience in Egypt is not just history; it is also a parable showing us what it means to be in bondage to sin and separated from God. Without God we find ourselves trying to satisfy people and powers who are not God but would like to take God’s place in our lives. These people and things can become idols, and we may find ourselves trapped: giving our best efforts and the very best of our minds and abilities to something that isn’t God. In every time and every age and every nation, our loyalty is to Jesus. Jesus came to set us free, and he died and rose again to bring us into God’s eternal kingdom.
But I’m getting ahead of myself! Let me back up and start with the reading from Hosea. Hosea was a prophet in the northern kingdom of Israel shortly before the kingdom fell. He lived in a time when the people of Israel had been living in the Promised Land for a few hundred years. They had made themselves at home, and now they’re forgetting God (who brought them there) and are chasing after the Baals – the local false gods. They have forgotten what God did for them in Egypt; and when Hosea talks about a “return to Egypt” in verse 5, it has a double meaning: (1) that the people are taking themselves spiritually back into slavery by disobeying God, and (2) that Israel at that time was negotiating with Egypt to help them fight the Assyrians who were attacking from the north. God is warning them that their alliance with Egypt will fail. In the end, Israel doesn’t listen and the Northern Kingdom falls. But at this point in time the Northern Kingdom is still standing, and God is pleading with the people to return to the one who loves them.
In the book of Hosea, chapter 1, God gives Hosea a very unusual to begin his prophetic task: God tells Hosea to marry a prostitute and have children with her. This is meant to give the people of Israel a living picture of how God feels, being the God of a people who are always chasing after other gods. The fact that this illustration doesn’t even touch the peoples’ hearts tells us how far gone the nation is.
But in chapter 11 God changes approach: God opens his heart to the people and speaks in a way that many theologians have said is “like a mother”. Our God is of course beyond gender and has qualities that could be described as either or both. So as we read these words, we can hear God’s words spoken as either a mother or as a father would speak them.
God says to Israel:
“From the very beginning I called you. I taught you how to walk… I took you in my arms… I led you with human kindness, with bands of love… I lifted you like a child to my cheek… I bent down and fed you… but you refuse me; and as a result you will lose your land, and Assyria will be your king.”
As we hear God speaking from the heart it may remind us of other children we know – children of loving parents who have turned away from their families. We know the pain it causes. It may lead the child into danger, poverty, addiction, sometimes even death. We know that any loving parent would do anything to save their child, would even take the child’s place, if only their son or daughter would come home. This is how God is feeling towards God’s rebellious people.
But Israel won’t hear it. They keep on worshiping Baal and other false gods.
Moses had warned if they did this, God would have to act in ways that would bring great tragedy on the nation. This may not seem very God-like to us today, but as CS Lewis pointed out in the Chronicles of Narnia, speaking about the God-figure Aslan, “Aslan is not a tame lion but he is a good lion.” Likewise our God is not tame, but good.
In this situation with Israel, God must act, or the covenant with Israel will be broken. God could bring down on Israel all the curses Moses warned about. But God says to Israel in Hosea 11:8:
“How can I give you up? How can I hand you over? My heart draws back, my compassion grows warm and tender…” And finally God says in verse 9: “I will not act in my fierce anger; I will not destroy the people; because I am God and no mortal.”
God, being God, will find a way where from a human standpoint there is no way.
In verse one of this chapter God says, “When Israel was a child, I loved him, and out of Egypt I called my son.” That’s how God will do it: God will fulfill the law of Moses and still spare the people. In the New Testament, the apostle Matthew quotes this verse to identify Jesus as the fulfillment of prophecy. This is how God will do it – through Jesus!
Our God refuses to get stuck in binary opposites. God does not get caught in either/or reasoning the way we often do. From our human point of view it often seems like every issue that comes along boils down to one of two positions: left-right, red-blue etc etc. God is not limited by this kind of thinking. To give just one example: when the Pharisees said to Jesus, “We just caught this woman in adultery – what should we do? Look the other way, or do what Moses said and stone her?” Jesus avoids the binary and he answers, “whichever one of you is without sin cast the first stone.”
With God there is always a third way. God does not get trapped in human dichotomies. God says, “I am God and no mortal”– and God finds a way.
As an aside, while I was writing this I saw a quotation which I thought was helpful. There was a seminary professor who wrote, “Too often, contemporary Christian [thought] accepts the false… dichotomy between the “Old Testament God of wrath” and the “New Testament God of love.” Hosea 11 gives us a picture of God that includes both anger and love. God is the same throughout the Bible. God doesn’t change. When we turn away God hurts. God is a God of holiness and a God of mercy.
Which brings us to Paul’s letter to the Colossians. The Colossian church got off to a good start – one of their leaders was Philemon, who wrote one of the books of the New Testament. But after awhile false teachings started to slip into the church. The exact nature of these false teachings is lost to history, but we know in a general sense they included some asceticism (that is, harsh self-discipline and refusal of pleasure); and also human wisdom, tradition, and “secret knowledge.” Back then this ‘secret knowledge’ was often called Gnosticism, but today we have similar things: for example the recent QAnon phenomenon, where people were claiming to have “secret knowledge” about how things “really are” and lead people away from God.
Back to Paul’s letter: so far Paul has talked about things like God’s heavenly throne room, where Jesus is seated in victory at God’s right hand. Paul tells the Colossians to stay focused on this vision of the throne room, and to keep on doing justice, and to keep on remembering that God’s people are safe and at peace in God’s kingdom.
Paul also reminds us to listen to the Holy Spirit so we can see beyond appearances. The Holy Spirit lifts the veil from the false pretenses of the world’s powers and authorities. To give just one small real-world example of false pretenses from our own time: when we go to the store these days we are getting less for the same price: boxes of Kleenex are the same size but have fewer tissues in them. Bags of cat food are the same size bag but have less food in them. Bottles of medicine are the same size bottles but contain fewer pills. These are just some of the lies told by the powers of this world. Real truth and real freedom, come only from God through Jesus and the Holy Spirit.
As Paul continues his teaching, he says people are created to be in relationship: first with God and then with each other. As the old saying goes, “no one is an island” – we are all interconnected. Therefore, what we do with our bodies and minds and hearts has an effect on others and on the world around us. That’s why God must be #1 in our lives, so that God’s goodness and God’s kingdom and God’s truth can enter our world through us.
A good summary of this passage from Paul might be, in the words of the old hymn, “seek first the Kingdom of God and his righteousness”. The Greek word for “seek” – zeteo – means to desire, to want very deeply. It’s not “eh, I can take it or leave it”. It’s more like how Jesus described the widow searching for her lost penny: she puts all her effort into it, and when she finds it, she calls all her friends to rejoice! In the same way we should seek for and find and rejoice in God’s kingdom.
So whatever we say or do, we say or do in Jesus’ name and to Jesus’ glory. In this passage, Paul gives as examples (not as a complete list) a list of things not to do – most of which are of a sexual nature – but I find it interesting that Paul includes “greed” in this list. Idolatry comes in many forms, often brought on by being dissatisfied with what God has given us.
So big picture, Paul is dealing with the same issue that Hosea is. God has called God’s people, and God’s people are turning away.
Paul says “since we have been raised with Christ, seek what is above, where Jesus is, where God is.” As God’s people, our lives are hidden with Jesus in God. We don’t know yet what we will be when Jesus comes. But we do know when Jesus comes, what we really are will be revealed. So our goal is to live in God’s direction, moving toward Jesus. As Paul says, we need to “put away what is earthly” – get rid of anything in us that might hold us back or that might harm what God has created in us.
One commentator puts it this way: the time of the Roman Empire was a time of “insatiable consumption” – sounds a lot like our world today! And Paul calls this “idolatry”.
We need to take off the old self and put on the new self. Anything of this world that comes between us and God is an idol and needs to be gotten rid of. That might include, but is not limited to: unfaithfulness, greed, anger, slander, abusive language, speaking lies or half-truths – these all are forms of Baal-worship.
God calls us away from serving what is ‘not God’ and into worshiping the one and only true God. False gods – as with Pharaohs – only imprison and enslave us. Paul talks about putting on new clothing for our souls; he talks about “being renewed in the knowledge and in the image of our creator.” In God’s kingdom we are no longer Jew or Greek, male or female, slave or free, black or white, children of different nations: we are all ONE in Jesus. As Paul says, “Christ is all and in all.”
We won’t ever see this perfectly in this life. But in Jesus we make progress… which starts now and continues into eternity. In the meantime we trust in the passionate love of God that Hosea talked about. God loves us so much! God is faithful; God will do what God has promised; and God will never let us go. God will find a way. AMEN.
Preached at the South Hills Partnership of United Methodist Churches, July 2022
Getting Started 
The 7th פרק of Parshat אמור holds two סוגיות. This פרק, כג: כג – כה; and כג: כו – לב.
The opening סוגיה addresses the Yom Tov Rosh HaShanna. Only Israel accepted the revelation of the Torah @ Sinai because what do Goyim care concerning justice? Avodah zarah belief systems universally tends to prioritize theologies by which societies demand their peoples’ uniformly believe and obey the established Creeds. Israel came out of the oppressive slavery of Egypt, the revelation of the Torah @ Sinai, the top priority of that Devine revelation לשמה: justice. Hence the dread and fear of Israel, that at any moment the entire nation would die. The 9th of Av learns directly to Yom Kippur, there too the entire generation thought that they would die.
King Shlomo’s rebellion wherein he prioritized building a grand Cathedral. Shlomo clearly assimilated to alien and totally foreign cultures and customs, practiced by nations and societies which rejected the revelation of the Sinai oath brit. The 10 Tribes would continue down the path trod by Shlomo, they simply changed the Chag season from the 7th to the 8th month. Justice during the reign of Shlomo and all the kings of Israel shared no common ground with Moshe, who established 3 small Sanhedrin Courts in the g’lut Cities of Refuge before he passed.
European avodah zarah, its universal religious theologies, they emphasize the original sin of mankind, and consequent need for an imaginary mythical messiah to remove the stain of original sin, from the Soul of mankind, confronted by eternal death. The Yom Tov of Rosh HaShanah judges the commitment of post Shevuot bnai brit Israel, the chosen Cohen nation who alone accepted the revelation of the Torah @ Sinai @ Horev; to sanctify the most holy pursuit, the justice walk before HaShem, לשמה. The difficulty/answer style of the Talmud reflects the prosecutor/defense function of any lateral common law Torah mandated courtrooms. The pursuit of tohor righteous justice, aimed at fair compensation for damages, shares no common ground with tumah theological belief in any God or Gods.
Belief in theological creed-God constructs, directly compares to the corruption of judges through bribery – a Torah abomination. Torah blessings do not hinge upon the theology of what a person believes. In point of fact, theological belief systems encapsulate a Torah curse. The month of Elul, made famous by Chassidic mystics, who refer to this period event as: “the king in the field”. The assimilated Yom Kippur machzor includes repeated personal confessions of sins. Congregations say Selichot throughout Elul and the 10 days. Over and again pleading the 13 middot before a Sefer Torah.
Yet assimilated rabbis virtually never address the failure of g’lut Jews, the insufficiency of our Will to pursue judicial justice, as the top priority of our lives. As the essence of what defines us as the chosen Cohen people, who accept the revelation of the Torah @ Sinai @ Horev לשמה. Israel cannot accomplish t’shuvah without mussar. Mussar sets the vision of all generations of our peoples’ walk before HaShem. This mussar, singular rather than plural, defines the k’vanna of all T’NaCH prophetic literature.
All generations struggle with metastatic passion, cancer insanity, to pursue and perform the impassioned Will of the tumah, within all of us, our Yatzir Ha’Rah. Generations of assimilated ירידות הדורות rabbis never caught, much less addressed, the domino effect of king Shlomo’s avodah zarah curse: its affect upon the ensuing later generations of both Israel and Esau. This avodah zarah very much compares to the huge national debt of the US Federal government; whose government leaders take pride in how they lie to their people without feeling the least shame. Something like the fact that FDR concealed being a cripple or Lincoln a practicing homosexual.
Lincoln transformed the experiment of a “loose” US Republic of States, into a Centrally controlled “democracy”, and affixed as essential the pursuit of foreign imperialist interventions and empire. Whereas FDR transformed a relatively small Federal government into the Big Brother Socialist bureaucratic, Corporate lobby controlled monster monopoly, Government within the government, that defines modern Washington DC politics. King’s Shlomo’s construction of a grand Cathedral accomplished much the same effect.
The brit faith turned away from pursuit of judicial lateral Sanhedrin common law justice, in-favor of the vain frivolity of sacrificing barbeques to heaven. Wasting the National treasury to build a Cathedral pyramid that worships the dead. King Shlomo prioritized avodah zarah practices as his new chief mode of faith, within the walls of Jerusalem and the kingdom of Judah; which barbaric churches across the countries of Europe and Russia, would later so completely emulate. Herein explains: יהיה לכם שבתון זכרון תרועה מקרא קדש
Let’s Learn.
An exact precise precedent: משנה תורה ה: ו – י. The opening first two commandments: לשמה which stands upon the justice delivered to Par’o and Egypt. What avodah zarah does the 2nd commandment imply? Answer: Any other strategic or tactical interest other than to do justice לשמה. Another exact precise precedent: יא: כו – כח. Blessing or curse. Either we pursue justice or run upon the highways of g’lut. King Shlomo inherited tremendous wealth, power, and prestige. Yet none of these pursuits of the Yatzir Ha’Rah achieved stability, nor prevented the fall of the kingdom into chaos, anarchy, and Civil War.
A distant precedent: טו: א – ו. The 7th year shemitah release, the test which testifies to the oath brit נעשה ונשמע dedication. When justice defines the essential nation within the borders of our land, then the Goyim cannot forge any weapon that prevails or can subjugate the Cohen nation into g’lut slaves ever again.
A precise exact precedent: יז: ב – ז. Competing strategic or tactical interests defines the behavior of the רשע who seeks to entice or seduce our people to pursue Gods other than justice among our people. King Shlomo serves as the Prime Example of tumah; his avodah zarah corrupted all generations thereafter to fall into the slimy pit of ירידות הדורות. The Cohen nation altogether ceased thereafter to ובערת הרע מקרבך.
A slightly distant precedent: יח: ו – ח. The chief role and purpose of the dedication of the Tribe of Levi to the sh’ittot of common law precedent learning aimed to make fair judicial rulings. King Shlomo trivialized the schools of the prophets, located within the 42 Levitical cities, to a glorified choir within the walls of Jerusalem.
A distant precedent: כ: י – כ. The subject of this סוגיה the establishment of additional Cities of Refuge/small Sanhedrin courts. All the survivors of a captured foreign Capital City outside of the borders of Israel, all must stand before a Small Sanhedrin Capital Crimes Courtroom. Only small Sanhedrin courts can rule upon Capital Crimes cases, outside the borders of the Cohen Republic of Tribes. In this particular case, because women and children do not generally fight wars alongside male warriors, only the Goyim warriors – condemned to death.
Wars fought to conquer the homeland, absolutely no mercy show to these Goyim, lest they seduce the tumah Yatzir Ha’rah within each of us. A slightly distant precedent: כג: ב, ג. The Torah rejects the Turkish custom of eunuch slaves on par with the abomination: validating social status of children born from criminal adultery.
Another slightly distant precedent: כג: כב – כד. Such tumah people directly compare to making a false vow in the Name of HaShem. The Torah commands a distance from such disgraced people lest we too become a disgraced people and abandon the yoke of the kingdom of heaven: to forever and always pursue justice within the borders of our homeland.
A precise exact precedent: לג: כב – כט. This closing סוגיה of blessings, Moshe addresses the tribes who pronounce the eleven curses, unto which all generations thereafter have the opportunity to publicly answer אמן to each of these 11 curses prior to Yom HaDin upon the Brit. What switches a blessing to a curse or a curse to a blessing? The priority we place toward justice, contrasted by all other strategic and tactical interests. Yom Tov Rosh Hashanah, if we prioritize justice above all and anything else, blessing. If we prioritize other interests above justice, curse. Yom Kippur seals this Divine decree, as measured through the din decreed upon our generation.
The kabbalah of יחזקאל ג: כב – כד, teaches an exact precise precedent. Justice: the Glory and Honor of HaShem. A slightly distant precedent: טו: א – ח. The comparison of Jerusalem to a wild grape vines which grow on trees. Of what value does the metaphor of vines have, when compared to great Goyim trees? When the fruit of the grape vine produces only bitter oppression and injustice, just as do the great Goyim trees. Better to sanctify shabbat over a glass of beer!
The second סוגיה of אמור now addresses Yom Kippur: כל מלאכה לא תעשו, just like the commandment regarding shabbat. As shabbat stands separate and apart from chol so too justice rejects the cruel slavery imposed by Par’o. The decision to withhold straw from Israel, yet enforce the quota of bricks previously produced, when Par’o supplied the necessary straw, this oppression required Egyptians to work, to enforce that evil decree.
Let’s Learn:
A slightly distant precedent: ג: כג – כט. The tefillah of Moshe pleading for מחילה to cross over and enter the land sworn unto the offspring of the Avot. The Yom Kippur dav’vening bases itself upon this model. Had Moshe crossed over, would it have made any difference? Would it have somehow changed the Yatzir Ha’Rah of our people, something Moshe could not change in the past 40 years?
A distant precedent: ה: יא – טו. Swearing an oath compares to not doing melacha on shabbat. An exact precise precedent: יד: א – י. The chosen Cohen nation set totally apart from the Goyim. Hence the customs, manners, and ways practiced by the Goyim – the Torah commands a negative commandment not to duplicate their cultures or customs. Adjacent to this specific negative commandment: the general rules which define kashrut.
A distant precedent: טז: א – ח. The korban Pesach, the Goyim – like their dogs who did not bark when Israel left Egypt, the Egyptians did not attack Israel when Pesach night, Israel denigrated ‘Amun and Khnum’, the Egyptian rams-head Gods. Once more the סוגיה concludes with the commandment: לא תעשה מלאכה. Which as previously suggested commands a negative commandment not to oppress our people through injustice like as did Par’o who worshiped ram heads.
An exact precise precedent: יז: ח – יג. The place where HaShem chooses as the Capital of the Name of HaShem; there too sits the Great Sanhedrin lateral common law Court. The Court instructs mussar through the medium of common law. Hence the Talmud duplicates this work through the warp weft relationship between Halakhah and Aggadah, as explained through the kabbalah of פרדס.
Rabbi Akiva, דרוש ופשט learns T’NaCH mussar affixed to Aggadah. And רמז וסוד affixed to Halakhah ritual observances, as the definition of the revelation of the 13 tohor middot Oral Torah revelation of logic . Torah and Talmudic common law stand totally separate and apart from Roman statute law. Comparable to, so to speak, HaShem remembers and despises ‘Amun and Khnum’ on the night of Chag Pesach. The avodah zarah worship of other Gods most essentially prioritizes anything else above the holy dedication to rule the oath sworn lands with justice. The sanctification of justice as most holy to HaShem לשמה defines the whole of the revelation of the Torah @ Sinai @ Horev.
A distant precedent: יט: א – י. Establishment of the Federal small Sanhedrin courts in the cities of refuge. If Israel makes foreign wars abroad. The first commandment after conquering the Capital of an uprooted and totally defeated nation, to establish another city of refuge, Small Sanhedrin Federal Court. ולא ישפך דם נקי בקרב ארצך. Only Sanhedrin courts have a Torah mandate to judge Capital Crimes cases. On par with the House of Aaron, who has a Torah mandate to dedicate korbanot to HaShem, wherever the Great Sanhedrin justices rule and preside.
Another distant precedent: כו: יב – יט. Giving the tithe to Levi and tithe to the poor, a person declares the confession of fidelity, the priority to walk with justice before HaShem. This confession of fidelity, made on the first fruits, dedicated on Chag Sukkot.
An exact precise precedent of the k’vanna of the Yom Kippur da’avening, כז: ט – כו. The Torah curses which all generations have the merit to answer together with the בעל קורא reader of the Torah on Shabbat, and answer אמן after each of the 11 curses. Acceptance of responsibility for the 11 curses goes hand in glove with the blessing of justice. The acceptance of the 11 curses learns from the precedent of Moshe da’avening to enter the land, the יסוד of the k’vanna of the Yom Kippur tefillot: it judges our relationship together with our generation.
The kabbalah of the prophet יחזקאל, a slightly distant precedent: טז: נא – סג. The kingdom of Yechudah bears greater disgrace than the kingdom of Israel. Religion accomplishes about as much as tits on a boar hog. Religion does not cause a man to feel remorse, shame, or disgrace. Avodah Zarah preaches that the God(s) forgive humiliation, sin and abominations! Goyim who deny the Shoah, they have no shame. They say that their God(s) have made atonement for their disgrace, as if they stand alone and not together with their evil generation(s).
Another slightly distant precedent: כא: יג – כח. Yom Kippur judges the individual in the midst of his generation. The individual follows together with the din decreed upon that generation. The Nazis together with Stalin culminated the generations of the criminal church in Europe and Russia. The same din equally applies to Mao Zedong’s terrible genocide within China or Pol Pot within Cambodia.
A slightly distant precedent: כג: מו – כד: ה. The משל to lewd loose prostitute women whose larger society accepts them, like as does barbaric Europe today. The vision of utter complete and total contempt for that vile worthless generation. Another slightly distant precedent: כה: א – ה. The Goyim who rejoice over the Shoah. They together with their generations shall die reviled.
A slightly distant precedent: כו: א – ו. This precedent too concerns the Yom Tov judgment of Yom Kippur, it seals the generation in judgment for the coming year. Another slightly distant precedent: כח: ו – יט. The wisdom of no single individual surpasses the din decreed upon his generation. A strong mussar learned from Moshe who died in g’lut together with his generation. The brightness and glory of an individual stands בטל\cast off/null and void, when measured against the backdrop of his generation.
An exact precise kabbalah precedent: לב: א – י. An identical mussar rebuke given unto Par’o. The mussar which the prophets command: seek and pursue justice for the profit of the folk of your generation. If a lone crocodile spoils and muddies the waters of his generation and exalts himself in his pride, such fool(s), always judged – part and parcel together with their generation. Herein divines the k’vanna of Chag Yom Kippur.