Commentaries and Podcasts

On the Revelation of Yahshua Christ, Part 3: What is a Nicolaitan?

In our last presentation we discussed Revelation chapter 1 and the nature of Yahshua Christ as He revealed it through the apostle John. While there are numerous indications in the words of the ancient prophets that Christ is Yahweh God incarnate, and while Christ Himself had made similar professions in several different ways in the accounts in the Gospels, and especially in the Gospel of John, here in Revelation chapter 1 He made several explicit statements as well as several allegories which reveal that He is God. This is found in the underlying meaning of epithets such as “He who is and who was and who is coming” and “First Born from the dead”, but it is explicit in verses 7 and 8 where we read: “7 Behold! He comes with the clouds, and every eye shall see Him, even whoever had pierced Him, and all the tribes of the earth shall mourn before Him. Yeah, truly! 8 ‘I am the Alpha and the Omega, says Yahweh God, He who is and who was and who is coming, the Almighty.’”

On the Revelation of Yahshua Christ, Part 2: The Revelation of Christ as God

In our opening presentation in this series, we offered a description of the antiquity of the oldest extant manuscripts of the Revelation, and also sought to establish the approximate time and place of the authorship of the work, including the fact that it was written by the apostle John, the son of Zebedee, who also wrote the Gospel bearing his name, and the epistles which have been attributed to him from the earliest times. Doing that, we cited Ignatius of Antioch, Justin Martyr, Irenaeus, Clement of Alexandria, Tertullian, Hippolytus of Rome, Victorinus of Pettau, and the Acts of the Holy Apostle and Evangelist John. Our purpose was to exhibit the fact that from these eight ancient second and third-century Christian sources, a rather consistent narrative is presented in which it may be determined that the apostle John wrote his Gospel account, was imprisoned in exile on Patmos at an undetermined time in the reign of the emperor Domitian, and upon the death of Domitian he returned to Ephesus, where he penned the Revelation of Yahshua Christ. It is not certain when he may have written his three surviving epistles.

While doing that we also presented and discussed the arguments of one of the earliest skeptics of John’s authorship of the Revelation, Dionysius of Alexandria. So we hope to have also convincingly explained how the arguments of Dionysius are all faulty or without merit, and after the faults are elucidated he really has no arguments remaining to provide a substantial basis for his doubt.

On the Revelation of Yahshua Christ, Part 1: An Introduction

Here, after eleven years, we shall revisit our commentary on the Revelation of Yahshua Christ with a new presentation, and of course it shall be based on the text as it is presented in the Christogenea New Testament. Our first version of this commentary was originally presented in fourteen podcasts from December of 2010 through April of 2011. While there are several reasons for wanting to replace our old commentary, here I will only state that I hope to expand some portions of the original while also offering some clarifications, rewriting or further expounding on some of our explanations. I also hope to more thoroughly cross-reference portions of parallel prophecies which are found in the books of the prophets, especially in Ezekiel, Daniel, Obadiah, Zechariah and Malachi.

Later that same year I first published Christreich, which is the title of a book which had encapsulated the original podcast commentary. While we hope this new commentary will be more comprehensive, I do not foresee adding much to the interpretations themselves. But while I cannot yet rule that out completely, I do not think that this new version will invalidate anything I had written there, except for one note which must be corrected at Revelation chapter 20, verse 5, which I shall discuss further below. This commentary, and even this introduction, shall be founded on the edited text of Christreich rather than the notes for the original podcasts. For that reason, I was tempted to title this series “Christreich 2.0” or something similar, but I decided to stay with our more traditional scheme. That title may be appropriate if Yahweh God permits me to publish a second edition of the book, something which I certainly hope to achieve.

On the Song of Songs: Part 5, Reflections (Solomon as Prophet)

This evening I am going to do something different. Having completed our presentation of the Song of Songs, there are still further observations which we can make, and which we should make, regarding the Song in general, and especially the impact of its interpretation on various other Scriptures from Genesis through the New Testament. While we have explained or alluded to some of these aspects of the Song throughout our commentary, it may be useful to have them all in summary, and also so that we may expand on some of them to a much greater degree, further probing the depths of their meanings.

The wisdom of Solomon is evidently far greater than many men may even have the ability to perceive. The Song of Songs is not a mere love song, although it is often dismissed as such. Both Jews and Churches have offered allegorical explanations of the Song which suit themsleves, and they all fail. In opposition to them all, but similarly to the claims of some, we would assert that the Song is an allegory representing the love which Yahweh God has for the children of Israel, and the love which the children of Israel, both individually and collectively, should have for Yahweh their God, as they are His Bride, and He Himself has promised to betroth them both once again and forever. I refer primarily to Hosea chapter 2: “19 And I will betroth thee unto me for ever; yea, I will betroth thee unto me in righteousness, and in judgment, and in lovingkindness, and in mercies. 20 I will even betroth thee unto me in faithfulness: and thou shalt know the LORD.” That promise being made to Israel in the Assyrian captivities, the betrothal is certainly fulfilled in Christ. So at the same time, the Song offers some prophecy concerning Christ, which only Christians, and not Jews, can even begin to understand.

On the Song of Songs: Part 4, the Consequences (White is Beautiful, and White is Godly)

We titled our presentation of chapters 5 and 6 of the Song of Songs as The Conclusion, adding the assertion in the parenthetical subtitle that Two Seedline is Biblical Truth. The statement may be puzzling to some who may not be fully acquainted with all of the ideological differences among Identity Christians, but it is meant to indicate that the Song supports, and even corroborates, our interpretations of the idioms of Genesis chapter 3, which we have often explained portrays an account of sexual seduction and resulting fornication. However while that is one conclusion we made from our study of the text of the Song it is not the conclusion of the Song itself. Now, as we do present the final two chapters of the Song, we will see even further corroboration for the veracity of our interpretation.

Throughout our presentation of the Song, we were also able to make conclusions which are important to a proper understanding of Biblical anthropology, that the subjects of the Song must have been of the White or Caucasian race. We will also see further evidence of that here in chapter 7. Properly, only White people can be described as being ruddy, or as having skin like ivory, or legs like pillars of marble, as we saw in the Bride’s description of the Husband in Song chapter 5 in reference to his belly and his legs. These same descriptions also further reinforce the assertion that the Song contains allegories describing sexual relations, where the Husband speaks of eating fruit from a garden, the garden being the Bride herself, or where the Bride celebrated the eating of fruit from an apple tree, which in turn was a reference to the Husband. That is evident where in the the physical descriptions the lovers are portrayed as comparing parts of one another’s nude bodies to those various natural elements, such as ivory or marble.

On the Song of Songs: Part 3, the Conclusion (Two Seedline is Biblical Truth)

Throughout the last few chapters of this Song of Songs, we have seen several allegories which describe sexual activity between lovers as the eating of fruit from trees, and also from a garden. In Song chapter 2, the bride described her husband as an apple tree and professed eating of his fruit, where it was explicit that the couple had been in the act of embracing one another in a bed, the husband having fallen asleep. Then, in a subsequent encounter in Song chapter 4, the husband described the bride as his garden, he described the wonder of her fruits, and the bride explicitly invited him to eat of them. Here, at the beginning of Song chapter 5, that encounter is not yet finished.

With that, we made assertions that the identification of these similes and metaphors as euphemisms for romantic sexual activity is irrefutable. Therefore, further comparing the similar metaphors which are found in the Epic of Gilgamesh, a work which is approximately contemporary to the time of Abraham and which was still known to Judaeans at the time of Christ, and which also explicitly employs such metaphors in reference to sexual activity, and then also comparing the account of the temptation in Genesis chapter 3, it clearly becomes manifest that Genesis chapter 3 is describing an illicit act of sex in the garden of Eden as having been the cause of the fall of man. So we may conclude that here in this romantic and even erotic love poem, the wisdom of Solomon gives us the understanding by which we may honestly interpret the otherwise enigmatic allegories of trees and fruit in Genesis chapter 3, as Solomon had also done in different ways in his other writings, in Wisdom and in Proverbs. There has long been debate in Christian Identity circles over the language and allegories of Genesis chapter 3, and in the Song of Songs, the debate is settled.

On the Song of Songs: Part 2, the Metaphor (Sex in the Garden)

In our opening commentary on the Song of Songs of Solomon, titled The Allegory, we made the assertion that the poem itself is an allegory which represents the love which Yahweh God has for the children of Israel as a nation, His bride, and which the bride is portrayed as having for her husband, which is Yahweh her God. We shall see further evidence of that allegory as the poem commences. However in spite of that underlying meaning, the work is also a love poem between an actual husband and wife, Solomon and his bride, and its metaphors represent their love and desire for one another as well as their describing acts of love-making. So here we shall assert that the metaphors employed in the description of those acts shall also give us greater insight into the meanings of similar metaphors and allegories which are found in other portions of the Biblical literature.

Up to this point, the dialogue between the husband and the bride grows in intensity as it progresses from its beginning in verse 7 of chapter 1. After the husband begins to extol the beauty of the bride, she in turn describes him as sitting at his table, as the King James Version has it, as her own bodily scent fills the air and she confesses that his odor is appealing to her. Then she exclaims that “he shall lie all night betwixt my breasts”, whereupon we should realize that the table is a metaphor, and not a literal table, and she compares her lover to something which can burn intensely, which is camphire or asphalt, in the vineyards, a place where one may not expect to find camphire. So then she once again declares her lover’s appeal and begins to speak of their bed and its surroundings before she describes herself with flowery metaphors.

On the Song of Songs: Part 1, the Allegory (Yahweh and Israel)

Here we are going to endeavor a commentary on the Song of Songs, which is also sometimes, and erroneously, referred to as the Book of Canticles. The work is attributed to King Solomon, and we have good reason to accept the attribution. Hopefully our effort shall correct at least some misgivings concerning the Song, as we shall call it here. Before we begin, we shall examine what early Christian writers thought of the Song, as we were also encouraged to do when we examined more modern references, namely the article discussing the Song found at Wikipedia.

Not every old adage is true. There is a popular saying, or at least it was popular in generations past, that warns us to “never look a gift horse in the mouth.” The common interpretation of the adage is correct, as it is saying that one should not criticize a gift. But even Solomon warned, in Proverbs chapter 19, that “6 Many will intreat the favour of the prince: and every man is a friend to him that giveth gifts.” In other words, the favor of a prince can be bought with gifts, which is bribery. So Solomon wrote later, in Proverbs chapter 29, that “4 The king by judgment establisheth the land: but he that receiveth gifts overthroweth it.” So a king who accepts such bribes may ultimately bring his own kingdom to ruin.

This is the problem with Wikipedia: access is free, so essentially, it is a gift to all who use it. But it is free because nobody is truly responsible for it, since its editors are mostly anonymous volunteers, and practically anyone can become an editor. Yet millions of people turn to it daily, and imagine it to be some fount of knowledge.

On the Epistles of John, Part 13: A Flock Divided

Here we shall present a commentary on the last of these three epistles of John. In my opinion, this presentation also marks a milestone for us, as it is the very last book in a series of commentaries on the New Testament which I had begun in December of 2010. Surely it is not my last New Testament Commentary, but once it is published there will be a Christian Identity commentary on the entire New Testament at Christogenea. This morning I estimated that to amount to 306 of these presentations, but I do not claim that as an exact figure. In the meantime, among many other things we have also done that same thing for the Minor Prophets and for other books of Scripture, such as Ecclesiastes and the Wisdom of Solomon. While I certainly know that at least some of my work these last 11 years can be improved, and some of the earlier presentations may have been more comprehensive, I am generally satisfied with the outcome, and I believe that over the years I have had to capitulate on very little, if anything, as challenges to my Christian profession have arisen. So in the very near future, I do hope to improve the commentary on the Revelation with which I had first begun. But I also hope one day in the near future to produce commentaries on the major prophets and also on the Book of Genesis, if Yahweh God is willing, but I would not want to stop there.

On the Epistles of John, Part 12: Guarding the Flock

We have recently completed our commentary on the first epistle of John, and now we shall move on to the second of the epistles attributed to the apostle. In our translation here we have either followed or considered the readings of the 4th century Codices Sinaiticus (א) and Vaticanus (B), the 5th century Codices Alexandrinus (A), and Vaticanus Graecus 2061 (048), and another 5th, or perhaps 6th century Codex known only as Uncial 0232, in which only the first nine verses of this epistle are attested, in whole or in part. These manuscripts and their differences with one another and with the Majority Text, as they are presented in the critical apparatus of the 27th edition of the Nestle-Aland Novum Testamentum Graece, were all considered in our translation or in the accompanying notes. Unfortunately, there are no ancient papyri which have yet been discovered which predate the 7th century and attest to the text of either the second or third epistles of John. For all of our translations, we only considered readings from manuscripts which are esteemed to date from the 6th century and earlier.