Have you ever entered a room where people were finishing a movie you’ve never seen and found yourself unable to understand what’s going on in the film? Or have you ever opened a novel to the last 10 pages only to find yourself utterly lost? Due to your faulty starting point, you don’t know the characters, their motivations or any of the drama that led to the conclusion of that story.
Unfortunately, it’s often that way with we Christians—especially we Gentile Christians. You see, when we accept Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior, we are grafted into a very Jewish heritage and history. In this, our Messianic Jewish brothers and sisters are ahead of us (hopefully, but not always.)
Through my own studies, I have come to realize understanding Jewish history is vital to understanding the Bible. This history is foundational to the hermeneutic that helps us understand those tougher-to-grasp passages in Scripture. If we don’t understand our Jewish history, we can (and many do, regrettably) make all sorts of wild leaps to explain those prophetic passages many pastors would rather avoid.
The History of the Jews, originally published in 1878, is in the public domain. Feel free to share this edition, print it, post it, build classes around it, etc. The copy you’re reading now was initially developed from Google’s Book Search project. Unfortunately, not only were there no good keyword-searchable copies available, but the scans were incomplete. While this edition attempts to solve the first problem, this means not all images—or even all pages—are present. Some pages were duplicated. In some places, the employee doing the scanning covered text with their thumb or removed the page as it was still scanning, resulting in hidden or illegible text. We have done our best to clean things up and present them as the original author intended. Where there are gaps, you’ll usually see “…” or “[MISSING]”. And finally, if you have a copy of The History of the Jews and would like to fill in the missing pieces, that is a contribution we will happily accept. You may contact us through our website at https://levaire.com.
I hope you enjoy this edition of Milman’s The History of the Jews. I pray that it furthers your understanding of the biblical text and advances you in your relationship with our Lord Jesus Christ.
The most holy day of the year for the Jew is Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement. It occurs in the midst of a ten-day period of introspection and repentance. We find the description of its religious requirements in Leviticus 16. One aspect of this celebration is the role played by two goats.
Leviticus 16:5-10
5 “He shall take from the congregation of the sons of Israel two male goats for a sin offering and one ram for a burnt offering. 6 “Then Aaron shall offer the bull for the sin offering which is for himself, that he may make atonement for himself and for his household. 7 “He shall take the two goats and present them before the Lord at the doorway of the tent of meeting. 8 “Aaron shall cast lots for the two goats, one lot for the Lord and the other lot for the scapegoat [azazel – goat of departure]. 9 “Then Aaron shall offer the goat on which the lot for the Lord fell and make it a sin offering. 10 “But the goat on which the lot for the scapegoat fell shall be presented alive before the Lord, to make atonement upon it, to send it into the wilderness as the scapegoat.
There is great significance in the roles that the two goats play. One goat was selected to be the sin offering to the Lord, for the people. The High Priest would sprinkle the blood on the mercy seat (the lid that covers the Ark of the Covenant). The other was to be the scapegoat, “presented alive before the Lord, to make atonement upon it, to send it into the wilderness as the scapegoat”. God was separating the sins of the people from them “as far as the east is from the west” (Psalm 103:12). “The goat shall bear on itself all their iniquities to a solitary land; and he shall release the goat in the wilderness” (Leviticus 16:22). Wilderness is a type of the world system and signifies the separation of the believer from worldly influences.
Abraham and His Two Sons
This metaphor appears earlier in the Bible story, in relation to the father of our faith, Abraham. You see, Abraham had two sons, one referred to as the son of the bondwoman and the other, the son of the free woman (Galatians 4:30). Their origins also determined their futures. One was destined to be the sin offering while the other had his future tied to the scapegoat.
In Genesis 22, God told Abraham to offer his son, Isaac as a burnt offering to the Lord. It was a test. Abraham passed the test when he raised the knife to kill his son according to God’s command. We know the end of the story, that the angel of the Lord (most likely a Christophany) stopped Abraham and instead provided a ram for the offering. Abraham was willing to follow through because he “considered that God is able to raise people even from the dead” (Hebrews 11:19). God promised blessings to Abraham through his seed and, according to Romans 4:21, he was “fully assured that what God had promised, He was able also to perform”.
Hagar and Ishmael
In Genesis 21, God told Abraham to honor his wife Sarah’s wishes to remove the son of the bondwoman from the house and he did that with some hesitancy. In verse 12, God said, “Do not be distressed because of the lad and your maid; whatever Sarah tells you, listen to her, for through Isaac your descendants shall be named”. Abraham took his first son and Hagar into the wilderness, providing only bread and water and left them to their own abilities to survive. In verse 14, “And she departed [with her son] and wandered about in the wilderness of Beersheba.”
The Apostle Paul provides more insight into the relationship between the two sons with reference to their mothers in Galatians 4:21-31. In verses 24-26, he identifies that the two mothers represent two covenants. Hagar represents Mount Sinai and “corresponds to the present Jerusalem” (old covenant) while Sarah, the mother of Isaac, the child of promise speaks to “the Jerusalem above is free; she is our mother” (new covenant). Paul’s conclusion in verse 31 is “So then, brethren, we are not children of a bondwoman, but of the free woman”. The sin offering represented by the first goat ties the new covenant believer to Calvary and the perfect sin offering of our Savior. Our life in Christ acknowledges our death on that same cross. In Galatians 2:20, “I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself up for me”.
Jesus or Barabbas
There is a third appearance of the two-goat metaphor and it is found in the New Testament. In Mark 15:7-15, the Jews were given a choice by Pilate to release a prisoner condemned to death and they had two choices: a man named Barabbas or Jesus, “King of the Jews”. It is interesting to note that Barabbas is an Aramaic name and is the combination of two words, bar meaning “son of” and abba meaning “father”. Barabbas is the son of his father, the son of the world. We all know that the people wanted Jesus to be crucified so much so that they were willing to release a robber and murderer. Not understanding the ramifications of their choice, they discarded the first goat and endorsed the second to go back to the wilderness with all of his sins on him.
The Perfect Offering
Hebrews 9 addresses the implications of the offerings by the Old Testament priests, that they were not perfect since they did not remove the sin from the conscience. On the other hand, Christ’s offering is perfect because of His precious blood, much more valuable than any animal sacrifice. Therefore, “how much more will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered Himself without blemish to God, cleanse your conscience from dead works to serve the living God? (verse 14) The perfect offering is one that cleanses the conscience, having removed sin’s effects from each who believe to serve the living God. As the perfect offering, Jesus, the first goat is our answer to everything that separates us from our God while the second goat, our sin nature, should be relegated to the wilderness. “For he who lacks these things is shortsighted, even to blindness, and has forgotten that he was cleansed from his old sins” (2 Peter 1:9).
E. M. Bounds, a 19th century pastor in the Methodist Episcopal Church, wrote a number of definitive books dealing with prayer that are considered classics. Upon his retirement as pastor in 1894, he spent his final 17 years engaged in intercessory prayer, writing, and itinerant revival ministry. He would typically arise at 4:00 am to be alone with God in prayer until 7:00 am and was indefatigable in his study of the Bible. Because Bounds so diligently practiced what he preached, he was able to capture the essence of prayer and his works live on as a testimony of the importance of prayer in a Christian’s life. According to Bounds, “the story of every great Christian achievement is the history of answered prayer.”
God’s abundance
“Prayer is the contact of a living soul with God. In prayer, God stoops to kiss man, to bless man, and to aid man in everything that God can devise or man can need. Prayer fills man’s emptiness with God’s fullness. It fills man’s poverty with God’s riches. It puts away man’s weakness with God’s strength. It banishes man’s littleness with God’s greatness. Prayer is God’s plan to supply man’s great and continuous need with God’s great and continuous abundance.” E. M. Bounds
To receive the full abundance of God’s supply, the believer must begin at the place where he believes that God not only is capable of meeting every need, but that He also desires to do it. Jesus said that “with God all things are possible” (Matthew 19:26) and “apart from Me you can do nothing” (John 15:5). These statements bring us to the understanding that God is capable and we are not, so we need Him. And how often do we pray, not knowing what we really need? Paul tells us that the Holy Spirit helps us by interpreting our groanings on behalf of the Father and the Son (Romans 8:26-27). These realities remove the act of praying from the mundane obligation to appease conscience and bring prayer into a higher experience, a real communion with the God of all grace (1 Peter 5:10).
Ask
In James 1:5, “But if any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God, who gives to all generously and without reproach, and it will be given to him”. So much of the Christian’s shortages come not from his bankruptcy, but rather from his unwillingness to ask. A generous God is anxiously waiting to demonstrate His generosity. James 4:2 says you do not have because you do not ask. The New Testament is filled with verses addressing the importance of asking God for the things that God desires to give. It starts with our willingness to believe that God wants to give. When the believer asks in prayer, believing, then the answer will follow (Matthew 21:22). Then there is John 14:13, “Whatever you ask in My name, that will I do”. It is in the character and the ability of God that prayer places its faith. The impossible answer can only come from the God of the impossible.
James 5:16 tells us that the effective prayer of a righteous man, the one who lives by faith (Romans 1:17) can accomplish much. This Greek word translated effective is energeo from which we get the English word energy and it means that this prayer is working and operative. Jesus warns the religious man of the meaningless repetition of prayer, that his repetition of words or phrases will carry no weight with God, they will not work (Matthew 6:7). In the same passage, Jesus teaches that the righteous one who prays is not looking for recognition from others, but the prayer comes from an inner room, where no one is watching. Those prayers have rewards attached to them.
Your Father knows
Jesus also said in Matthew 6:8 that “your Father knows what you need before you ask Him”. Prayer, then is the process of the believer communing with God around something He already knows. But for what purpose? In Isaiah 65:24, “It will also come to pass that before they call, I will answer; and while they are still speaking, I will hear”. It means that God knows what we need before we do and we can trust Him for the solution to our situation no matter what. Although the context of Isaiah 65 is the Millennial Kingdom, it speaks to new covenant believers in the church age as well. It means that His throne is a throne of grace so we can have confidence that God’s provision is never earned or deserved, but it is given in the exact time of need on the basis of His grace and mercy (Hebrews 4:16).
“Prayer is a solemn service due to God, an adoration, a worship, an approach to God for some request, the presenting of some desire, the expression of some need to Him who supplies all need and who satisfies all desires, who, as a Father, finds his greatest pleasure in relieving the wants and granting the desires of his children. Prayer is the child’s request, not to the winds nor to the world, but to the Father. Prayer is the outstretched arms of the child for the Father’s help. Prayer is the child’s cry calling to the Father’s ear, the Father’s heart, and to the Father’s ability, which the Father is to hear, the Father is to feel, and which the Father is to relieve.” E. M. Bounds
Divine solutions
It took a real commitment to prayer to bring E. M. Bounds to a deeper appreciation of not only its importance, but also the intimacy it brings the believer and the expectation for divine solutions it creates. Depending on the situation, prayer can be a time of meditation and solitude and other times, a wrestling match. In any case, prayer opens access to the riches of heaven like no other activity can afford. It is hard work with an eternal return.
John Newton, the one who wrote “Amazing Grace”, wrote many other poems that became hymns. One of them is below, speaking to God’s commitment to answer man’s prayers:
Begone unbelief, my Savior is near
And for my relief shall surely appear.
By prayer let me wrestle and He will perform
With Christ in the vessel, I smile at the storm.
Though dark be my way, since He is my guide,
‘Tis mine to obey, ‘tis His to provide.
Though cisterns be broken and creatures all fail,
The Word He has spoken shall surely prevail.
Daniel 9:24: “Seventy weeks are determined upon thy people and upon thy holy city, to finish the transgression, and to make an end of sins, and to make reconciliation for iniquity, and to bring in everlasting righteousness, and to seal up the vision and the prophecy, and to anoint the most Holy.”
I suppose every explanation of this verse I have ever heard assumes this is referring to the work of Jesus the Messiah in his crucifixion. But I question whether the soteriological (salvation) work of Jesus by his crucifixion is what this verse is referring to. Jesus’ work of atonement for sin was only applicable for a small remnant of Jews. This was not a prophecy about the salvation of that small remnant, this was about the Jewish nation and the city of Jerusalem. The question then is, what stopped the Jewish people’s transgression of God’s Law? What ended their sins against God? What made atonement for the guilt of the nation? What set right Israel’s history of breaking covenant with God? What closed the books on vision and prophecy? And what cleansed the most Holy place on earth? The short answer is death.
God has laid out for us a very detailed legal process for how atonement for sin is made, and everything that Jesus did was done according to every jot and tittle of the Law. So, it’s important to understand what the Law required to make atonement for sin, to stop transgressions of God’s Law, to expiate guilt, to cleanse the unclean. The ordinances that governed how this was to be accomplished, how atonement was to be made, comprised one of the seven “feasts” of the Jewish calendar outlined in Leviticus 23:26-32, the “Day of Atonement.” The explicit directions on how that feast was to be observed, the actual mechanics of making atonement, is laid out in great detail in Leviticus 16.
It is a great misfortune for the church today that the premillennial futurist view of these feasts and what they foreshadowed dominates so much of the discussion. The popular eschatological view is that the spring feasts foreshadowed Jesus’ 1st Advent, and the fall feasts foreshadow his future 2nd Advent. But there is a serious issue with such a view and what it means for the Gospel and its soteriology (doctrines of salvation). One of the fall feasts was the Day of Atonement, that one and only day of the Jewish calendars when atonement for sin could legally be made. If Jesus has not yet fulfilled what that feast and all its ordinances foreshadowed, then Jesus has not yet made atonement for sin! I trust the implications of such a view are self-evident. It is a repudiation of the most fundamental doctrine of the Gospel, that salvation is through faith in the shed blood of Jesus Christ to atone for sin. With that in mind, let’s take a look at what the Day of Atonement required and what it means for the Gospel.
In order to make atonement for the sins of the people, two goats were required. The High Priest cast lots to determine which goat was “for Jehovah,” and which goat was “for Azazel.” Now at this point the popular interpretation is that the goat “for Azazel” foreshadowed the sacrificial death of Jesus. But there’s a problem with that interpretation. It was actually the goat “for Jehovah” that foreshadowed Jesus. The goat “for Jehovah” was sacrificed, and this goat’s body was offered on the altar of burnt offerings and this goat’s blood was carried into the Most Holy and presented to God to make atonement for sin. But the High Priest’s ministry was not complete once that blood was sprinkled in the Holy of Holies. Then the blood of this goat was sprinkled in all the holy places and on all the furnishings and vessels of ministry, and thereby cleansed all the Holy House to make fit a dwelling place for God.
This was a shadow of how New Covenant atonement works, that Jesus, the sacrifice “for Jehovah,” was slain, and after his resurrection, as both the Sacrifice and the High Priest of the New Covenant, Jesus ascended into heaven and appeared in the presence of God to offer himself an Ever-Living Sacrifice to make atonement once-and-forever for the sin of those who enter into the New Covenant. But like that Old Covenant High Priest, Jesus’ ministry of atonement was not finished when he offered himself to God. As Paul teaches us in Hebrews 9, for those whose sins are atoned through faith in the blood of Jesus, our High Priest “sprinkles” us with his blood, and thereby “purges our conscience” (purifies our awareness and understanding of what is right and what is wrong) cleansing us “from dead works” (from thinking that righteousness is about conforming our outward behavior to the letter of the Law – legalism) so that the Spirit of God might enter into us and dwell in us who have been made clean by the blood of Jesus, and are thereby made fit to be a holy temple where the Spirit of God dwells, and the holy vessels of His ministry, so that we might know God and in coming to know Him we might serve Him in spirit and in truth, not according to the Old Testament letter of the Word (which kills), but according to the New Testament spirit of the Word (which gives life).
So if the goat “for Jehovah” foreshadowed Jesus’ sacrificial death and offering of his body and blood in the presence of God as atonement for sin, what did the other goat that the Law required for atonement, the goat “for Azazel,” foreshadow? Over the years there has been a lot of chatter about Azazel and what that goat foreshadowed, and the popular interpretation is that this goat foreshadowed Jesus. But let’s take another look at that. The word “for Azazel” means “for departure.” There is a lot to unpack there, but to look closely at the ordinances concerning this goat, the High Priest laid his hands on the head of this goat and confessed all of Israel’s sins upon his head, and this goat was not sacrificed and its body and blood was not offered up in the Holiest or sprinkled on the temple and its furnishings and vessels of ministry, but this goat, bearing the sins of Israel upon its head, was led out into the wilderness where it was “let go” (Azazel came to be called the goat “for letting go”) to wander in the wilderness until it perished. This goat was also sacrificed to make atonement for sin, but not in the same way as the goat “for Jehovah.” This goat, which is translated “scapegoat” (the one who bears the blame) foreshadowed what Daniel 9:24 was foretelling: those Jews whose sins were not atoned by Jesus bore their sins upon their own heads and when the time for the final judgment of the Law was fulfilled so that the Old Covenant could pass away, those unsaved Jews were “let go” to “wander in the wilderness” where they perished, just like that generation of old that was led out of Egypt who, because of their unbelief, were left to wander for 40 years and finally perish in the wilderness and never entered into the Promised Land.
So according to the Law, two goats were required to make atonement for sin. Daniel 9:24 was talking about 70 weeks that were decreed for the Jewish nation and the city of Jerusalem to atone for the sins of the nation that were NOT covered by the blood of Jesus, but they bore their sins upon their own heads and wandered for 40 years until they perished in the wilderness of this old world and never entered into that heavenly country to which their fathers had lifted their eyes and set their hearts.
The Gospel, the Law, and history all testify that the vast majority of Daniel’s people rejected the atonement for sin provided by Jesus, the goat “for Jehovah,” and therefore God stopped their transgressing, ended their sins, made atonement for their guilt, set things right, closed the book on visions and prophecy, and cleansed the holy places that had been defiled by Israel’s history of shedding innocent blood, by an awful seven year war in which millions of Jews were slaughtered, the land of Israel was made a desolate wasteland, the Holy City was burned up, and the Temple where God had once dwelled was leveled. That last generation of Jews living under the Old Covenant paid the ultimate price for a history of breaking covenant with God.
But those Jews whose sins were covered by the blood of the Lamb, whose sins were atoned by the sacrifice of Jesus, the “goat for Jehovah,” though they were but a small remnant of a nation who were as the stars of the heavens for multitude, that small remnant of Jews who laid down their lives for the testimony of Jesus, they are the Israel of the New Covenant, a chosen generation, and the foundation on which Jesus has built his church.
A lifelong student of New Testament history and archaeology, Deborah L. Bray was thrilled and honored to work with the Israel Antiquities Authority at the American Exhibit of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Through a state-of-the-art virtual reality theater, one of only four in the U.S., using a program developed by the imminent archaeological architect Leen Ritmeyer and the team at Cal Tech University, Deborah hosted virtual reality tours of the ancient city of Jerusalem and the Herodian Temple Mount as they existed in New Testament times, sharing the fruits of her many years of study with over a quarter million visitors to the exhibit. Over the decades, it has been through her countless hours of Bible study and forum discussions with fellow Christians where Deborah has found her greatest passion as a Christian apologist and, more recently, an aspiring novelist. Her ongoing work is available at dlbray.com, “The Life and Times of Jesus“–where faith and history meet.
To most, the passage in John 9 deals with a blind man being healed by Jesus on the Sabbath, but it is much more about the healing from sin that Jesus accomplished at Calvary. The new covenant is the means by which every believer can find the victorious life and deliverance from the effects of sin which places believers in its bondage. Jesus uses this miracle, the only one in the gospels in which the one healed has been afflicted before birth, to clear up many of the myths that the Jewish mindset embraced regarding the impact of sins on future generations. He also was illustrating the power of the cross in opening the eyes of believers to the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven which God has reserved for new covenant saints (Matthew 13:11).
The Jewish mindset of Jesus’s day recognized a direct link between sin and suffering and was the reason for the disciples’ question when passing this blind man in John 9. Their question was basically asking who was to blame for the man’s blindness, as if every human affliction can be traced to some active failure by someone. Jesus’ answer to the question was telling, “It was neither that this man sinned, nor his parents; but it was so that the works of God might be displayed in him” (verse 3). He was saying that human affliction can have more to do with revealing God’s glory than identifying someone to blame.
The Jewish mindset
The Jewish thought at this time relating to sin and suffering can be summarized as follows:
The merits or demerits of the parents appear in the children. Certain special sins in the parents would result in particular diseases in the offspring.
The child up to age 13 was considered to be living in the effects of his father’s sins, suffering for his guilt.
The thoughts of a mother might affect the moral state of her unborn offspring.
The terrible apostacy of one of the greatest Rabbis had, in popular belief, been caused by the sinful delight his mother had taken when passing through an idol grove.
They also adopted the idea from Plato and the Greeks that souls preexist creation in some heavenly place, waiting entry into the body. Although the Greeks saw all souls as good and contamination occurred when entering the body, the Jews believed that some souls were good and some bad.
This mindset is proliferated in the account of Job and his trial. Although Satan was allowed by God to attack Job physically, materially, and personally, Job’s “friends” kept telling him that Job must have done something terribly wrong to be deeply challenged as he was. Job didn’t believe it, but it left him with serious questions about God’s justice – the answer to the question “why”. It wasn’t until after the trial was over and God had restored all that he had lost that we can now understand that his trial was to glorify God, God’s work displayed in him.
Imputed sin
“Therefore, just as through one man sin entered into the world, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men, because all sinned — for until the Law sin was in the world, but sin is not imputed when there is no law. Nevertheless death reigned from Adam until Moses, even over those who had not sinned in the likeness of the offense of Adam, who is a type of Him who was to come.” (Romans 5:12-14)
The Greek word translated “sin” is “hamartia” and it means “an offense in relation to God with emphasis on guilt, to miss the true end and scope of our lives, which is God”, according to Spiros Zodhiates. As Paul relates in Romans 5, the sin nature is a condition of humanity that began with Adam in Genesis 3 (original sin) and has been imputed (transmitted) to each succeeding generation. Each human is born with a sin nature and therefore, sins (Romans 3:10-18). Even during the period before the Law of Moses was introduced, the sin nature was producing death in each person, because all sinned. The ultimate conclusion of this matter is that man is a sinner because of his sin nature and because of the sins he commits and no one other than Jesus is exempt.
In John 9:6-7, Jesus healed the man (on the Sabbath) by spitting on some dirt to create clay, which he rubbed on the man’s eyes. He then told the man to go to the pool of Siloam, the only freshwater basin in the immediate neighborhood in Jerusalem, to wash it off and he “came back seeing”. (This reminds us of Naaman’s healing of leprosy through Elisha by washing in the Jordan River in 2 Kings 5:10-14.) Just as Jesus had healed the man of his blindness, He also heals the sinner of the sin condition by offering a provision for that condition, namely His blood.
Sabbath requirements
Jesus went out of His way to perform this miracle on the Sabbath to once again confront the foolishness of many of the man-made laws (Mishnah) that governed work on the Sabbath. To understand this issue, consider the following beliefs of the Jews during this time:
Saliva was commonly regarded as a remedy for diseases of the eye, but not a cure for blindness.
This healing is a manifold breach of the Mishnah since Jesus made clay.
There was a question about whether any remedy could be applied on the holy day. It could only be done to diseases of the organ (from the throat down) except when danger to life or the loss of an organ was involved.
It was lawful to apply wine to the outside of the eyelid on the grounds that it was considered washing, but unlawful to apply it to the inside of the eye. Use of saliva on the Sabbath was always considered unlawful.
Jesus was exposing not only the failure of the Mishnah to make a man righteous, but also revealing that He was able to heal without restriction. The healing of a man who was born blind was considered Messianic (see verse 32) since it would require the ability to recreate, and no one but God, Himself could do it. Much of the rest of the account is a lame attempt by the Pharisees to in some way disprove that it really did happen or that Jesus was not from God. They finally got so frustrated with the healed man that they accused him of being “born entirely in sins” (verse 34) and then excommunicated him from the temple.
Spiritual blindness
The account concludes in verses 35-41 with Jesus finding the healed man after hearing about the excommunication and getting the man to recognize Him as the Son of Man, another term for Messiah. The man’s confession of faith, “Lord, I believe” resulted in the man worshipping Jesus and then Jesus spoke of the relationship between blindness and sin. He said to the Pharisees, “If you were blind, you would have no sin; but since you say, ‘We see’, your sin remains”. Jesus had referred earlier in Matthew 15:14, “Let them alone; they are blind guides of the blind. And if a blind man guides a blind man, both will fall into a pit”. Jesus was teaching that the unconverted sin nature causes man to be blind, blind to the sin condition that has plagued the human race since Adam.
Not only is the god of this world, the devil, blinding the minds of all unbelievers to be against Jesus and the gospel, there is a hardening of the heart that burdens all unconverted Jews during the new covenant age, resulting in a veil over their hearts (2 Corinthians 3:14-16). Whenever the Jew recognizes Jesus as Messiah, the veil is lifted and therefore his blindness is resolved in Christ. This warfare is centered on man not seeing “the glory of God in the face of Christ” (2 Corinthians 4:6). When the Light begins to shine in their hearts, meaning the enlightenment of God illuminates the minds of those who seek him with sincerity of heart, then there is a new understanding of the God who leads one to salvation. A great example of this process is seen in the salvation of the apostle Paul in Acts 9:3-6, when a light shone and he was able to hear the Lord speaking directly to his heart in the midst of his blindness.
The effects of idolatry
“’I will lead the blind by a way they do not know, in paths they do not know I will guide them. I will make darkness into light before them and rugged places into plains. These are the things I will do, and I will not leave them undone.’ They will be turned back and be utterly put to shame, who trust in idols, who say to molten images, ‘You are our gods.’ Hear, you deaf! And look, you blind, that you may see. Who is blind but My servant, or so deaf as My messenger whom I send? Who is so blind as he that is at peace with Me, or so blind as the servant of the Lord? You have seen many things, but you do not observe them; your ears are open, but none hears.” (Isaiah 42:16-20)
The context of the above passage in Isaiah 42 is a reference to the coming Messiah, “My Servant” in verse 1. The new covenant provides sight to the blind through a living faith in Jesus as Messiah. This passage reveals that the cause of the blindness and deafness of Israel was their idolatry, creating these idols as “molten images”. When the Lord used My servant in verse 19 as being blind and deaf, He was speaking about Israel. When Jesus is not Lord, other lords will be adopted and the result will be blindness and deafness. James 1:14-15 tells us that the process of sin is to be “carried away and enticed by his own lust. Then when lust has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and when sin is accomplished, it brings forth death.” Human lust patterns are empowered when Jesus is not Lord and the temptation to entertain and act upon those lustful desires becomes overpowering, resulting in sin and unconfessed sin leads to “death”, separation from God (no fellowship).
Son of David, have mercy on me
“35 As Jesus was approaching Jericho, a blind man was sitting by the road begging. 36 Now hearing a crowd going by, he began to inquire what this was. 37 They told him that Jesus of Nazareth was passing by. 38 And he called out, saying, ‘Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!’ 39 Those who led the way were sternly telling him to be quiet; but he kept crying out all the more, ‘Son of David, have mercy on me!’ 40 And Jesus stopped and commanded that he be brought to Him; and when he came near, He questioned him, 41 ‘What do you want Me to do for you?’ And he said, ‘Lord, I want to regain my sight!’ 42 And Jesus said to him, ‘Receive your sight; your faith has made you well.’ 43 Immediately he regained his sight and began following Him, glorifying God; and when all the people saw it, they gave praise to God.” (Luke 18:35-43)
Two great examples of this process are covered in Luke’s Gospel as Jesus and the disciples are approaching Jericho (Luke 18:35-43) and then after entering Jericho (Zacchaeus, Luke 19:1-10). This first man, unnamed, was told by the crowd that Jesus was passing by so he cried out, “Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!”. This man recognized that Jesus of Nazareth was Messiah and that He was capable of healing him. In verse 42, Jesus acknowledged his faith when He said, “Receive your sight; your faith has made you well.” This man immediately became a follower.
Man’s problem with sin is completely resolved in the work of Christ on the cross. Spiritual blindness is no longer sin’s curse once the believer declares Jesus as Messiah, God in the flesh, and accepts His righteousness in the heart (Romans 10:9-10).
Some claim the Bible contradicts itself by first stating that a crowd or mob came to arrest Jesus—per Matthew, Mark and Luke—but by the book of John, we’re told it was a cohort of Roman soldiers. Or, at least, this is what some teachers teach. I believe this is actually incorrect. I believe these soldiers weren’t Roman at all! So then, who were they?
In John 18:12, we’re told a “band of soldiers and their captain and the officers of the Jews arrested Jesus and bound him.” Many folks make the leap to these soldiers being Roman soldiers which, of course, might make sense because Israel was occupied by Rome at the time. Some even go further to say this was a Roman cohort, meaning as many as 200-600 Roman soldiers came to arrest Jesus! Yet, in the other Gospels, we’re told it was a crowd or a mob:
“And while He was still speaking, behold, Judas, one of the twelve, with a great multitude with swords and clubs, came from the chief priests and elders of the people.” (Matthew 26:47, Mark 14:43, Luke 22:47)
If we continue reading, notice Matthew 26:57: “And those who had laid hold of Jesus led Him away to Caiaphas the high priest, where the scribes and the elders were assembled.”
Now the first thing that should give us pause is the idea of Roman soldiers doing the bidding of the Jewish high priests. Likely? Definitely not. To the Romans, the Jews were a subjugated people. Roman soldiers were certainly not in the practice of answering the beck and call of Jews. As we see in Matthew, Rome would not be pulled into this drama until the morning after Jesus’ visit to Caiaphas’ palace; not until Matthew 27.
Notice, nowhere in John 18 does it mention Roman soldiers. Earlier, in verse 3, we’re actually told “Then Judas, having received a detachment of troops, and officers from the chief priests and Pharisees, came there with lanterns, torches, and weapons.” This is most certainly the Jewish Temple guard, established in the Old Testament, way back in 1 Chronicles 26. We already caught a glimpse of them in John 7:32: “The Pharisees heard the crowd murmuring these things concerning Him, and the Pharisees and the chief priests sent officers to take Him.” We see the Temple guard again in John 7:45-46 where “The officers came to the chief priests and Pharisees, who said to them, ‘Why have you not brought Him?’ The officers answered, ‘No man ever spoke like this Man!’”
Why Did the Soldiers Fall When Jesus Said “I Am He”?
I believe the soldiers’ identity as the Temple guard is further proven by their response to Jesus when He uses the name of God in reference to Himself in John 18, verse 6: “Now when He said to them, ‘I am He,’ they drew back and fell to the ground.” This same “fall to the ground” adverb (chamai) only appears two other times in Scripture: First, in Job 1:20, where Job falls to the ground in worship, and again in Daniel 2:46, where Nebuchadnezzar falls to the ground before Daniel.
Here, Jesus uses the Hebrew reference “I AM”, indicating the name of YHWH, the God of the Jews (Exodus 3:15). This name is not used lightly and the officers dedicated to Temple service would have had a proper reverence for this name. Roman soldiers—accustomed to worshiping a variety of gods, none of whom included the God of the Jews—would not likely have had this response.
Were Roman Soldiers Guarding Jesus’ Tomb?
In Matthew 27:62 through 66, we see the chief priests and Pharisees coming to Pilate to ask him to place guards over Jesus’ tomb so Jesus’ followers can’t steal His body away and perpetuate a resurrection myth. In verse 65, Pilate says to them, “’You have a guard; go your way, make it as secure as you know how.’ 66 So they went and made the tomb secure, sealing the stone and setting the guard.”
So, is this an image of Pilate agreeing to place a Roman watch over a Jewish tomb? Or is this simply Pilate telling the Jewish leaders to use their own Temple guard to watch over the tomb they are so concerned about? I believe this is the latter, and again—like my example of Jesus’ arrest in the garden of Gethsemane—I think the behavior of the soldiers indicates their origin.
In Matthew 28, we have an earthquake, an angel full of the glory of God announcing Jesus’ resurrection, and an empty tomb! Suffice it to say the guards watching over the tomb were freaked out! Do they run to Pilate? No! They run to the chief priests where they are paid to participate in a cover story. Verse 14 says, “If the report gets to the governor (Pilate),” so I think we can be fairly certain these soldiers had no direct report to Rome. I believe these were members of the Temple guard.
Giving Credit Where Credit Is Due
Well, you know, I’m not sure how Roman soldiers managed to get most the credit leading up to Jesus being handed over to Rome, and then again after. Maybe it’s because once Jesus was handed over, it was the Roman soldiers who scourged Him, escorted Him to Golgotha and crucified our Lord there.
In this talk, I’ve made the case for the Jewish Temple guard being more instrumental than they have historically been credited. I believe they were employed the night of Jesus’ arrest (just as they had already been charged once to do) and I believe it was the Temple guard—not Roman soldiers—who were watching over the tomb when Jesus raised from the dead.
I hope you enjoyed this teaching. Remember: It is the Truth that sets you free!
