Awake and Talking

Fair warning to religionists. If you come in here truth will challenge your faith. The end result will not be that you will learn anything but that you will become angry. If you ignore the warnings and come in here anyway I don't want to hear any nasty comments.

John Strugnell is, and probably always will be, the most hated Bible scholar of all time. His own fellows hate him for having denied them permission to view the Dead Sea scrolls for nearly half a century. Much of the rest of the world hates him because he has been vilified as a blatant anti-Semite. The former may have a legitimate complaint, I don't believe the later do. The label of anti-Semitism was put upon him to disguise the truth behind an imprudent comment he let slip to the press.

The comment he made was, 'Judaism is a horrible religion that should have died out thousands of years ago'. This was not an opinion about a race of people. It was a statement of historical fact about a religion. Judaism almost did die out in the 7th cent. BC. Had it not been for human intervention it would have died out completely. The Bible tells us so.

Judaism never was the mighty religion people imagine it was. If people took the time to study the Bible in real depth they would see that the facts tell a different story. The Books of Kings tell us which kings of the O.T. worshiped Yahweh (the God of Judaism) and which did not. They tell us this by introducing each new king as having done either right or evil in the sight of Yahweh. After David and Solomon not one single king of Israel worshiped that God. And only half of Judah's kings did right in his sight. If you were to read Kings in this light you would see that Yahwehism seemed always on the brink of extinction.

At about 642 BC it looked as though Yahwehism had breathed its last when King Manasseh of Judah also breathed his last. He had embraced Ba'al, the god worshiped by all of the kings of Israel since Solomon. He ruled Judah for an amazing 55 years, almost long enough for his people to have forgotten that Yahweh had ever existed - almost long enough. Now, in 642 BC Manasseh's 22 year old son, Amon was about to take the throne and he too, intended to embrace Ba'al. Another long reign under a Ba'alist king would have done Yahwehism in for good. This was the last chance the priests of Yahweh would have to save their God. It was time for action.

The author of Kings tried to gloss over what happened next in two simple verses; II Kings 21:22-23. You can believe these verses as they are written or you can understand that the person who wrote those verses was also in on the plot. First King Amon was assassinated and then the members of his court were blamed for it and were cut down themselves. Now up to the throne stepped an 8 year old boy named Josiah. He was putty in the hands of Hilkiah, high priest of Yahweh.

Josiah was king but Hilkiah controlled his strings. He set about devising a plan that would make Yahweh the only God of Judah for the rest of time. He wrote a book and made it look very old. He hid the book in the temple. Then he urged Josiah (now aged 26) to order the temple to be restored. Viola! The Torah of Moses was discovered! And Josiah took the bait.

What Josiah did next proves how deeply he was taken in by the deceit. He did all that the book told him he should do. He destroyed the places where other gods were worshiped and he slaughtered their priests to boot. The book written by Hilkiah and "discovered" in the temple was Deuteronomy. It is a simple matter for a person with an average IQ to read that book and see that it was not written for a people wandering in the wilderness. It was written for a people that was settled as a nation, with its own king, a temple and with priestly factions fighting for political control.

If you decide to read Deuteronomy try to keep in mind as much as you are able that the book was written by a priest of Yahweh. Also, most English translations use the word "Lord" in place of Yahweh. If you can get into the habit of reading the actual name instead of Lord the real intent of the author will come through far more clearly.

Now you know what every scholar knew when John Strugnell blurted out his shocking statement. You can Google him up and you will find that he is still cursed as a racist. He's just a dog being wagged.