When Did Aaron Become High Priest of Israel?

 Here's a question I was asked recently on social media:

Greetings brother Jay. I have been hashing over this high priest thing for a while now. I have yet to find chapter and verse saying Aaron was ever ordained as 'high priest' any where in Scripture. Your thoughts? Shalom!

At the beginning I don't think that "high priest" was a title so much as it was a relative position, much like saying "highest priest" or "senior priest".

In Exodus 40, God told Moses to bring Aaron and his sons and anoint them for the priesthood, but in v13, he separated out Aaron to be the first priest. Once Aaron was anointed and consecrated as priest, then Moses was to anoint his sons, thus ensuring that Aaron would have seniority, both in the family and in the priesthood. In fact, for a short period of time, Aaron was the only priest. Additionally, the high priest's uniform (begedi hakadosh) was given to Aaron, while his sons received tunics (ketunot).

Of course, after that second generation had passed away, seniority would become a cloudier issue. Scripture doesn't say how the high priest is to be determined after that. (I say "determined" rather than "selected" because the authority of precedence and seniority is inherent and not something that can be bestowed after-the-fact.)

The tl;dr version: I agree that Aaron isn't explicitly titled high priest at his ordination, but I think it's safe to assume by the order of events and the uniforms that were issued.

Exodus 40:12-15  Then you shall bring Aaron and his sons to the entrance of the tent of meeting and shall wash them with water  13  and put on Aaron the holy garments. And you shall anoint him and consecrate him, that he may serve me as priest.  14  You shall bring his sons also and put coats on them,  15  and anoint them, as you anointed their father, that they may serve me as priests. And their anointing shall admit them to a perpetual priesthood throughout their generations.

Gun Control Is Immoral

The courts have repeatedly ruled that the police have no responsibility to protect anyone nor to interfere with a crime in progress. They exist to arrest perpetrators and gather evidence after a crime has already been committed. That doesn't say anything good or bad about any police officer. It's just the way it is.

The events at Robb Elementary offer more evidence than any reasonable person could possibly want that private citizens must be allowed to arm themselves with weapons at least equal to any that an offender (including those in government) might use in the commission of a crime.

Any interference in the most basic of all human rights--the right to defend oneself, family, and community from unwarranted violence--is, itself, criminal.

From Not the Bee:

Texas official confirms report that Uvalde classroom door was unlocked and none of the armored officers tried to open it as kids were being shot

Making Idols of Ideas

I posted this image (below) yesterday on multiple social media platforms. When I created the image, I was specifically thinking of some of the more outlandish conspiracy theories that people fiercely hold onto despite almost universal opposition, despite all physical evidence, despite all reason. Within minutes, somebody--not Hebrew Roots, by his own assertion--replied with a long list of ideas that he believes other people make into idols. It just went on and on, point after outlandish, bizarre point. This guy took my generic admonish not to hold so tightly to an idea that you become incapable of rational thought, to vomit this morass of paranoid delusions onto my readers.

My immediate reaction was incredulousness. How could anyone read this image and think *that* is the appropriate response? But as I read on, I could tell that he was perfectly serious. Not only was he serious, but he was angry, bitter at a world that refused to acknowledge a truth that was plain as day to him. By the time I got to the end...I was angry and disgusted that there are people lost in such hopeless fear and intent on pulling other people down with them. 

I deleted his comment, hopefully before anyone else saw it. Despite the obvious absurdity of his assertions, clearly a lot of people are eager to believe. My sincere hope is that I can intercept some of those people before they get lost in fear and confusion, help lead them back to solid ground in reality.

I felt sorry for this commenter and sorrier that experience tells me there is probably nothing I can do to help him. His beliefs are religious in nature, not rational. He didn't arrive at any of them by objectively analyzing evidence or Scripture. He is so thoroughly convinced of so much patent nonsense that he's far more likely to be helped by a psychiatrist-exorcist tag team than by a conversation with anyone on the Internet. I'm sure some time in prayer and Scripture reading--a pious-sounding solution, to be sure--would help, but I suspect he's already got that covered in spades.

But what he really, really needs more than anything else, is to get off the Internet and connect with a meatspace community of people who care about him enough to love him in spite of his insanity.

 

What Is Hebrew Roots?

When I began writing this article a few weeks ago, I would have defined "Hebrew Roots" as a spontaneous, worldwide movement of people from mostly Christian backgrounds drawn to return to the Hebraic roots of Christianity and to discover and apply the original intent of the writings in the Bible. Now I'm not sure that's accurate or even helpful, but I'll keep it for the next few paragraphs and backtrack at the end.

Sue me.

People place the origins of the Hebrew Roots Movement anywhere from the end of the 19th century to the end of the 20th century, but the nature of such movements make their precise origins very difficult to pin down. It is not a denomination or cult by any useful definition because it has no central leadership and no unified doctrinal statement or creed. It truly appears to be a spontaneous movement of people all over the world responding to God's Spirit calling them back to the "Old Paths" of Jeremiah 6:16. It did not begin with Herbert Armstrong and the Worldwide Church of God, nor with Messianic Judaism, nor any other specific religious organization or event, although many of those things might be manifestations of that response to some extent.

The organic character of the movement is both good and bad. It's good in that people everywhere are responding to a movement of God's Holy Spirit. It's bad in that the lack of leadership and unity has created some definite chaos, just as God was behind the conquest of Canaan before King David, but "every man did what was right in his own eyes." The Hebrew Roots Movement is a mix of ugly and beautiful right now. I believe this is a period of refining and that God is going to bring something much better out of it.

Since it is so chaotic, everybody seems to have a different idea of what "Hebrew Roots" is, even among HR people. Some people lump Messianic Judaism and Hebrew Roots together as a monolithic conspiracy to corrupt The Church (an actual, extreme view I read just this morning from someone I won't hesitate to label an anti-Christ liar). Others view Messianic Judaism as distinctly Jewish and Hebrew Roots as distinctly Christian or as a spectrum with no clear distinction. My experience has been somewhere in the middle and also very different than that of others in the movement.

In an effort go get a little more objective idea of what HR people really believe, I posted a series of polls at The Torah Network. This exercise was far from scientific and truly objective. For one thing, there weren't enough responses. For another, TTN isn't explicitly Hebrew Roots as opposed to Messianic Jewish, but its users believe that Yeshua (aka Jesus) is the Messiah and that all believers in Yeshua should be keeping God's Law (aka Torah). That's about the best "lowest common denominator" definition of Hebrew Roots you're going to find.

2023-02-10 Update: I asked these questions again in one of the larger Hebrew Roots groups on Facebook. Polls on social media will always produce "fuzzy" results, but I got mostly the same responses on both sites. Facebook has the added complication that I couldn't find a way to expire my polls, so the numbers below are a snapshot, not a final result.

In the end, though, what I really learned isn't what I expected. I think it actually tells me a lot more about the people who talk about Hebrew Roots people than it does about Hebrew Roots people themselves.

The Questions and Answers:

Do you believe that understanding the pictographic meanings of the Hebrew letters that make up a word are an important aspect of understanding the Tanakh (the Old Testament)? (30 votes)

• 50% Definitely.
• 30% Somewhat. (God and the Biblical authors understood the pictographic origins of the letters and could have used that understanding to add another layer of meaning to the text.)
• 20% Not at all.

Do you believe that a person can only be saved if he correctly pronounces the name of God (aka the Tetragrammaton) and/or of the Messiah? (31 votes)

• 96% Pronunciation is important for accuracy and meaning, but it's irrelevant to salvation.
• 4% It doesn't matter what you call God or the Messiah.
• 0% You must pronounce both names correctly.
• 0% You must pronounce one or the other correctly.

Do you believe the earth is flat or ovoid? (91 votes)

• 74% The earth is ovoid/spherical.
• 20% The earth is flat.
• 6% I don't know.

Do you believe that Paul (aka Saul of Tarsus) was a false prophet and/or a false teacher? (140 votes)

• 97% Paul was a legitimate Apostle.
• 2% Paul was a false teacher/prophet.
• 1% Undecided

Do you believe the Bible is missing some books? (87 votes)

• 48% The Bible is fine as it is.
• 34% Anything that was in any ancient edition of the Septuagint should be in the Bible.
• 17% The Bible is missing a few books, like Enoch, Jubilees, and Sirach.

Do you believe that Yeshua is God? (82 votes)

• 66% Yeshua is God.
• 28% Yeshua is the only begotten Son of God, but not God.
• 6% Yeshua was a normal man, who was elevated by God to the role of Messiah.

Do you believe in "Two House" Theology?

For this question, I presented multiple, nuanced varieties of "Two House" theology that I have encountered over the last three decades. Apparently, there is so little agreement about what this term means that almost nobody was even able to answer the question.

When do you observe the weekly Sabbath? (172 votes)

• 85% Sunset Friday to sunset Saturday
• 7% According to the phases of the moon
• 5% Some other time
• 3% Sunday
• 2% Sunrise to sunset on Saturday

Which label do you most closely identify with? (90 votes)

• 61% Something else
• 19% Hebrew Roots
• 15% Christian
• 5% Messianic Jew

What do you believe about the Jewish Talmuds? (69 votes)

• 50% Useful
• 30% Evil
• 15% Irrelevant
• 5% Inspired/Authoritative

Although all of these people would probably be labeled "Hebrew Roots" by those who label themselves "Messianic Jews" or some variety of mainstream Christian, that's not how they identify themselves. In the comments to that question, people specified Natsarim, Messianic Gentile, and Hebrew Christian as their preferred labels. With the one exception of "pictographic meanings", most Hebrew Roots people don't believe any of the things that the rest of the world ascribes to them.

Understanding that the natures of both polls and social media make any conclusions somewhat dubious, the best conclusion I can make is that "Hebrew Roots" seems to be a label that is most commonly used as a catchall pejorative applied to anyone who 1) believes that Yeshua (aka Jesus) is the Messiah and Son of God, 2) is pronomian (in favor of keeping God's Law), 3) practices some religious traditions that Christians associate with Judaism or has adopted more Hebrew or Hebrew-ish vocabulary, and 4) holds any belief that the speaker/writer finds offensive or embarrassing.

Most people whom the rest of the religious world would label as "Hebrew Roots" don't even call themselves that. It's very similar to how the term "racist" is used by most people on the political left to mean "someone who doesn't agree with me", which makes the term nearly useless. No wonder so few people want to identify themselves as Hebrew Roots.

Who Was the First Jew?

Inspired by a question in the comments on this video...

Some people will say that Abraham was the first Jew, but that seems silly to me. Abraham was a Hebrew, but wasn't a Jew by any definition I've ever heard.

It really depends on what you mean by the word. It is derived from Judah (Yehudah in Hebrew), so in one sense, Judah would be the first Jew. After Israel was split into two kingdoms, citizens and residents of the southern kingdom could be called Jews (or Yehudim). During the Babylonian captivity, most people known to have descended from Israel became commonly known as Jews, no matter what tribe or kingdom their ancestors came from, and that usage continued through the Greek and Roman Empires.

In the New Testament, the term Jew could refer to anyone who was ethnically an Israelite, anyone who lived in the Roman province of Judea, anyone who had converted to one of the sects of Judaism, or to the Jewish religious leadership centered in Jerusalem, depending on the context.

Today, the term Jew usually refers to people in one of two categories:

1. People who are known or believed to be descended from one of the tribes of ancient Israel, no matter what tribe and no matter what religion they practice. Some bigoted people will claim that you can practice any religion and still be a Jew, unless that religion accepts Jesus (aka Yeshua) as the Messiah.
2. Anyone who practices one of the varieties of Judaism, no matter who they are descended from.

By definition #1, the first Jew could be Reuben. I think that's too anachronistic since the term comes from the name of Reuben's younger brother, Judah, so I would go with Judah instead.

By definition #2, the first identifiable Jew might be Nehemiah or Ezra, but I don't think we can point to a specific person. The religion evolved over time, and I'm certain that the religion of Nehemiah wouldn't have looked much like the religion of the Pharisees in Yeshua's day.