The End Time Church: From the Cathedrals to the Catacombs

By Dan L. White

Copyright 2021 by Dan L. White, all rights reserved.

Scripture quotations are from the World English Bible (WEB) which is in the public domain.

Chapter 97

Worship Me!

In the first temptation, Satan tempted a hungry Yeshua to turn rocks into bread.

In the second temptation, Satan dared Christ to test God the Father by jumping off a high place.

In the third temptation, Satan just got directly to the point –

“Worship me.”

Matt 4
8) Again, the devil took him to an exceedingly high mountain, and showed him all the kingdoms of the world, and their glory.
9) He said to him, “I will give you all of these things, if you will fall down and worship me.”

Why did the devil think Yeshua would want to worship Heylel-Satan?

The scripture does not say so, but what if, for this temptation, Satan appeared in magnificent, glowing, angelic luminosity?

I guess the closest we have ever gotten to seeing angelic luminosity was in our daughter’s bedroom one night.

We built our own house 35 years ago without any building experience at all, so things did not always go perfectly. One dark night just after we had gone to bed, we heard our daughter’s somewhat plaintive plea –

“Mom???”

We roused up, not so much from what she said but from the way she said it.

“Mom?…”

“Yes, dear?”

“My light is glowing…”

Over the years, we heard many different remarks at night from our five kids. That was one we had not heard before or after.

We stepped across the hall into her room and sure enough, her ceiling light – that was turned off! – was glowing. It dimmed and glowed, dimmed and glowed, as if we were receiving some type of celestial message.

Well, it turned out that in the light switch, the ground wire was not on tight, thus the celestial glow in the light globe. And I guess that’s as close as we have come to seeing angelic luminosity.

Again, the scripture does not specifically say so, but it does make you wonder –

For this third temptation, when Yeshua was challenged to worship Satan, did the devil appear as an angel of light – literally? Brilliant and bright, glowing with angelic luminosity?

Yeshua was a guy. Yes, He was the only begotten Son of God, but at that time He was still a fleshly guy.

He didn’t glow.

Angels, on the other hand – even their eyes glow, like flaming torches.

Dan 10
4) In the four and twentieth day of the first month, as I was by the side of the great river, which is Hiddekel,
5) I lifted up my eyes, and looked, and behold, a man clothed in linen, whose thighs were adorned with pure gold of Uphaz:
6) his body also was like the beryl, and his face as the appearance of lightning, and his eyes as flaming torches, and his arms and his feet like burnished brass, and the voice of his words like the voice of a multitude.
7) I, Daniel, alone saw the vision; for the men who were with me didn’t see the vision; but a great quaking fell on them, and they fled to hide themselves.

Body like beryl, face like lightning, eyes like torches –

Just the appearance of one of these angelic creatures nearly scared people to death.

Matt 28
1) Now after the Sabbath, as it began to dawn on the first day of the week, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary came to see the tomb.
2) Behold, there was a great earthquake, for an angel of the Lord descended from the sky, and came and rolled away the stone from the door, and sat on it.
3) His appearance was like lightning, and his clothing white as snow.
4) For fear of him, the guards shook, and became like dead men.

Originally, Satan-Heylel was no ugly duckling, either.

Ezek 28
13) You were in Eden, the garden of God; every precious stone adorned you: ruby, topaz, emerald, chrysolite, onyx, jasper, sapphire, turquoise, and beryl. Gold work of tambourines and of pipes was in you. In the day that you were created they were prepared.

And Satan appears as an angel of light.

2Cor 11
14) …Satan masquerades as an angel of light.

So when Satan “showed him [Yeshua] all the kingdoms of the world, and their glory,” might the devil have been resplendent in angelic glory?

What a scene that could have been! An ordinary looking guy, with “no good looks or majesty. When we see him, there is no beauty that we should desire him,” Isa 53:2, facing the incandescent, luminescent, iridescent fallen archangel. Wouldn’t most people fall down before such a being? Apparently, a third of the other angels do, (Rev. 12:4).

Now it may be that when Satan rebelled, she lost her luminescence. In Genesis the devil is a serpent and in Revelation she is called the great dragon and the fiery red dragon. Perhaps, then, Satan’s appearance is not luminous but reptilious, like a reptile.

Not very attractive.

Satan physically appears only two times in the Bible, as a snake in Eden and in an undescribed form before Yeshua. Those were the most important times for Satan; first to get humanity to follow her through Eve and Adam; and second, to try to kill humanity’s redeemer. For those two monumental times, Satan made a personal appearance.

We do know, though, that Satan still had some angelic powers –

Like high-speed transport.

“Again, the devil took him to an exceedingly high mountain, and showed him all the kingdoms of the world, and their glory.”

So in an instant, they went from the top of the Temple to the top of the world, with super-speed angelic transport –

Antrak.

Look at what Satan originally had: beautiful appearance, ruler of this world, and perhaps one of only three archangels, Heylel, Gabriel and Michael.

And three times Christ called Satan the “prince of this world,” as in John 12.

John 12
28) Father, glorify your name!” Then there came a voice out of the sky, saying, “I have both glorified it, and will glorify it again.”
29) The multitude therefore, who stood by and heard it, said that it had thundered. Others said, “An angel has spoken to him.”
30) Yeshua answered, “This voice hasn’t come for my sake, but for your sakes.
31) Now is the judgment of this world. Now the prince of this world will be cast out.

Paul called Satan “the god of this world.”

2Cor 4
4) in whom the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelieving, that the light of the Good News of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God, should not dawn on them.

And Paul called the devil and his helpers the world’s rulers of darkness.

Eph 6
11) Put on the whole armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil.
12) For our wrestling is not against flesh and blood, but against the principalities, against the powers, against the world’s rulers of the darkness of this age, and against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places.

Satan had all that but wanted more. The covering cherub who had been at the throne of Yahweh – one of only two such angelic positions – did not want to be a second class citizen. She wanted to be number one.

This is an enormous point to understand about Satan.

The devil is never satisfied.

As with people who spend their lives getting wealth, but never get enough.

Eccl 5
10) He who loves silver shall not be satisfied with silver; nor he who loves abundance, with increase: this also is vanity.

Eccl 4
8) There is one who is alone, and he has neither son nor brother. There is no end to all of his labor, neither are his eyes satisfied with wealth. “For whom then, do I labor, and deprive my soul of enjoyment?” This also is vanity. Yes, it is a miserable business.

Dissatisfaction is the ripened fruit of Satan’s spirit.

Or rather the rotten fruit of Satan’s spirit.

On the other hand, Paul said this.

Phil 4
11) Not that I speak in respect to lack, for I have learned in whatever state I am, to be content in it.
12) I know how to be humbled, and I know also how to abound. In everything and in all things I have learned the secret both to be filled and to be hungry, both to abound and to be in need.

Two contrasting spirits – contentment and dissatisfaction.

Even though Satan-Heylel was perfect in beauty and possessed great power, this angelic messenger of God did not want to be just a messenger of God. She wanted to be worshiped as God.

Other angelic messengers, the good ones, refused to be worshiped.

Rev 18
1) After these things, I saw another angel coming down out of the sky, having great authority. The earth was illuminated with his glory.

Rev 19
10) I fell down before his feet to worship him. He said to me, “Look! Don’t do it! I am a fellow bondservant with you and with your brothers who hold the testimony of Yeshua. Worship God, for the testimony of Yeshua is the Spirit of Prophecy.”

Rev 22
8) Now I, John, am the one who heard and saw these things. When I heard and saw, I fell down to worship before the feet of the angel who had shown me these things.
9) He said to me, “See you don’t do it! I am a fellow bondservant with you and with your brothers, the prophets, and with those who keep the words of this book. Worship God.”

Heavenly messengers, like the rest of His living creation, are to worship God the Father.

Neh 9
6) You are Yahweh, even you alone. You have made heaven, the heaven of heavens, with all their army, the earth and all things that are on it, the seas and all that is in them, and you preserve them all. The army of heaven worships you.

Rev 7
11) All the angels were standing around the throne, the elders, and the four living creatures; and they fell on their faces before his throne, and worshiped God,
12) saying, “Amen! Blessing, glory, wisdom, thanksgiving, honor, power, and might, be to our God forever and ever! Amen.”

Ps 103
19) Yahweh has established his throne in the heavens. His kingdom rules over all.
20) Praise Yahweh, you angels of his, who are mighty in strength, who fulfill his word, obeying the voice of his word.

The Jews, including some called Christians, were involved in angel worship, as is mentioned in Colossians and Hebrews.

In Colossians, the Christians mixed angel worship with asceticism.

Col 2
18) Let no one rob you of your prize by a voluntary humility and worshipping of the angels, dwelling in the things which he has not seen, vainly puffed up by his fleshly mind,
19) and not holding firmly to the Head, from whom all the body, being supplied and knit together through the joints and ligaments, grows with God’s growth.

The letter to the Hebrews begins by ripping into angel worship.

Heb 1
3) His Son is the radiance of his glory, the very image of his substance, and upholding all things by the word of his power, when he had by himself made purification for our sins, sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on high;
4) having become so much better than the angels, as he has inherited a more excellent name than they have.
5) For to which of the angels did he say at any time, “You are my Son. Today have I become your father?” and again, “I will be to him a Father, and he will be to me a Son?”
6) Again, when he brings in the firstborn into the world he says, “Let all the angels of God worship him.”
7) Of the angels he says, “Who makes his angels winds, and his servants a flame of fire.”
8) But of the Son he says, “Your throne, O God, is forever and ever. The scepter of uprightness is the scepter of your Kingdom.
9) You have loved righteousness, and hated iniquity; therefore God, your God, has anointed you with the oil of gladness above your fellows.”
10) And, “You, Lord, in the beginning, laid the foundation of the earth. The heavens are the works of your hands.
11) They will perish, but you continue. They all will grow old like a garment does.
12) As a mantle, you will roll them up, and they will be changed; but you are the same. Your years will not fail.”
13) But which of the angels has he told at any time, “Sit at my right hand, until I make your enemies the footstool of your feet?”
14) Aren’t they all serving spirits, sent out to do service for the sake of those who will inherit   salvation?

Ironically, some Christians were doing what Christ refused to do. They worshiped angels.

Wonder who was behind that idea?

Satan was blatantly blunt to demand that Christ worship her. Yeshua was also blunt in His reply – “Get behind me, Satan!”

Matt 4
10) Then Yeshua said to him, “Get behind me, Satan! For it is written, ‘You shall worship the Lord your God, and you shall serve him only.’”
11) Then the devil left him, and behold, angels came and served him.

Yeshua did not accept Satan’s offer to worship an angel, even if the devil had been bright and shiny. Then after the third temptation the bad angel left – three strikes and you’re out – and obedient angels came and served the Messiah.

I suspect that included feeding Him. Angel food steak, maybe?

Satan had one of the highest positions in the universe, one of two covering cherubs at the throne of Yahweh, yet she wanted it all –

She wanted the very throne of Yahweh.

Yeshua had it all and was willing to give it all up.

Phil 2
3) doing nothing through rivalry or through conceit, but in humility, each counting others better than himself;
4) each of you not just looking to his own things, but each of you also to the things of others.
5) Have this in your mind, which was also in Christ Yeshua,
6) who, existing in the form of God, didn’t consider equality with God a thing to be grasped,
7) but emptied himself, taking the form of a servant, being made in the likeness of men.
8) And being found in human form, he humbled himself, becoming obedient to death, yes, the death of the cross.
9) Therefore God also highly exalted him, and gave to him the name which is above every name;
10) that at the name of Yeshua every knee should bow, of those in heaven, those on earth, and those under the earth,
11) and that every tongue should confess that Yeshua Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

So instead of Yeshua bowing down to Satan, Satan must bow the knee before Yeshua.

Satan took Yeshua to a high mountain and offered Him all the kingdoms of this world. Later John was also taken to a high mountain to view the coming kingdom of the world.

Rev 21
9) One of the seven angels who had the seven bowls, who were loaded with the seven last plagues came, and he spoke with me, saying, “Come here. I will show you the wife, the Lamb’s bride.”
10) He carried me away in the Spirit to a great and high mountain, and showed me the holy city, Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God,
11) having the glory of God. Her light was like a most precious stone, as if it were a jasper stone, clear as crystal;

Satan originally appeared much like this city, with gold and beautiful gem stones, as cited from Ezekiel 28.

Satan – “ruby, topaz, emerald, chrysolite, onyx, jasper, sapphire, turquoise, and beryl, and gold.

New Jerusalem –

Rev 21
18) The construction of its wall was jasper. The city was pure gold, like pure glass.
19) The foundations of the city’s wall were adorned with all kinds of precious stones. The first foundation was jasper; the second, sapphire; the third, chalcedony; the fourth, emerald;
20) the fifth, sardonyx; the sixth, sardius; the seventh, chrysolite; the eighth, beryl; the ninth, topaz; the tenth, chrysoprasus; the eleventh, jacinth; and the twelfth, amethyst.

How about that? The angel Heylel, a covering cherub, had much the same beautiful appearance as New Jerusalem and gave it up, because she didn’t like being a second-class citizen. She wanted to be NUMBER 1!

After refusing Satan’s offer – and because He refused Satan’s offer – Yeshua will rule over this New Jerusalem, under His Father. In the same way, if we overcome Satan’s temptations, then we will rule with the Father and Son in the Kingdom of God.

Rev 21
22) I saw no temple in it, for the Lord God, the Almighty, and the Lamb, are its temple.
23) The city has no need for the sun, neither of the moon, to shine, for the very glory of God illuminated it, and its lamp is the Lamb.
24) The nations will walk in its light. The kings of the earth bring the glory and honor of the nations into it.
25) Its gates will in no way be shut by day (for there will be no night there),
26) and they shall bring the glory and the honor of the nations into it so that they may enter.
27) There will in no way enter into it anything profane, or one who causes an abomination or a lie, but only those who are written in the Lamb’s book of life.

Yeshua fasted 40 days – 40 DAYS! – before He faced the wiles of wily Satan.

How powerful are Satan’s traps of temptation?

The world will soon find out, when it – when we – face Satan at her wiliest. She still wants to be NUMBER 1.

The End Time Church: From the Cathedrals to the Catacombs

By Dan L. White

Copyright 2021 by Dan L. White, all rights reserved.

Scripture quotations are from the World English Bible (WEB) which is in the public domain.

Chapter 96

Temple Jumping

Have you heard of bungee jumping?

Jeremy Markovich, CC BY-SA 2.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0&gt;, via Wikimedia Commons

Wikipedia, the wicked encyclopedia, says that ”Bungee jumping is an activity that involves a person jumping from a great height while connected to a large elastic cord. The launching pad is usually erected on a tall structure such as a building or crane, a bridge across a deep ravine, or on a natural geographic feature such as a cliff.”

A number of people have died bungee jumping. Sometimes the bungee broke. At other times the stretch of the bungee was miscalculated, allowing the bungee and the jumper to fall too far.

Have you heard of bridge jumping?

Jeremy Markovich, CC BY-SA 2.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0&gt;, via Wikimedia Commons

officialbridgeday.com says:

“Held annually every third Saturday in October on the New River Gorge Bridge in Fayette County, West Virginia, this is the only day each year thousands of spectators can walk across the bridge and watch as serious BASE jumpers get their chance to fly 876 feet into the Gorge below.”

Bridge jumpers use parachutes instead of bungees, and most of the time, they do open.

Why do people bungee jump, and risk a broken bungee and a broken head? Why do people jump off a bridge 876 feet high, into the dangerous New River?

They get a thrill by tempting fate, as it’s called.

Have you heard of Temple jumping?

Satan tempted Christ by daring Him to Temple jump.

By Jaakov Shoham, self-photographed, public domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=1894992

The southwestern corner of the Temple Mount today is a high point. It might possibly be the spot where Satan dared Yeshua to jump. A broken stone was found tumbled below that spot, which said, “the place of the trumpeting.” That was where a priest would blow a trumpet to announce events. So if this high spot was used for trumpeting because of its height, then perhaps…?

Matt 4
5) Then the devil took him into the holy city. He set him on the pinnacle of the temple,
6) and said to him, “If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down, for it is written, ‘He will put his angels in charge of you.’ and, ‘On their hands they will bear you up, so that you don’t dash your foot against a stone.’”

Satan quoted scripture.

Ps 91:9-12 (WEB)
9) Because you have made Yahweh your refuge, and the Most High your dwelling place,
10) no evil shall happen to you, neither shall any plague come near your dwelling.
11) For he will put his angels in charge of you, to guard you in all your ways.
12) They will bear you up in their hands, so that you won’t dash your foot against a stone.

Notice how Satan approaches these temptations of Christ. In this one, Satan quotes scripture.

That’s right. Satan came on like Billy Graham.

The quote is correct. The application is twisted.

Nearly a century ago women were discouraged from cutting or bobbing their hair. There was even a hit song about it, “Why Do You Bob Your Hair, Girls?” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bg1TvrZkfEU

This modesty about hair could also apply to wearing the hair down instead of up, as in a bun or top knot on top of the head. An old story, and that’s probably all it is, says that a preacher railed against top knots by quoting this verse from the Bible –

“Top knot come down!”

But the cited verse actually says:

Matt 24:16-17 (KJV)
16) Then let them which be in Judaea flee into the mountains:
17) Let him which is on the house top not come down to take any thing out of his house:

If that really happened, Satan could have been really proud of that twisting.

Here’s another example of twisting.

Matt 5:17 (WEB)
17) “Don’t think that I came to destroy the law or the prophets. I didn’t come to destroy, but to fulfill.

Even though Yeshua plainly said that He did not come to destroy the law, that verse is cited to show that Christ destroyed the law, because He fulfilled it. But when Christ said He didn’t come to destroy but to fulfill, fulfill has to be the opposite of destroy. So Christ did not come to destroy the Commandments and to say He did is a tornadic twisting.

Peter mentioned Christian scripture twisting.

2Pet 3:15-17 (WEB)
15) Regard the patience of our Lord as salvation; even as our beloved brother Paul also, according to the wisdom given to him, wrote to you;
16) as also in all of his letters, speaking in them of these things. In those, there are some things that are hard to understand, which the ignorant and unsettled twist, as they also do to the other Scriptures, to their own destruction.
17) You therefore, beloved, knowing these things beforehand, beware, lest being carried away with the error of the wicked, you fall from your own steadfastness.

The Greek word “athezmos,” translated there in the World English Bible as ‘wicked,’ actually means ‘lawless,’ as the International Standard Version has it.

2Pet 3:17 (ISV)
17) And so, dear friends, since you already know these things, continually be on your guard not to be carried away by the deception of lawless people. Otherwise, you may fall from your secure position.

The English Standard, Lexham, Smith, The Scriptures Bible versions, among others, also render “athezmos” as lawless – breaking the law.

If Peter was warning against the twisting of Paul’s writings by the deception of lawless people, then what was the twisting?

It was lawlessness.

Christian twisters were saying that Paul had done away with the law.

Paul himself wrote about that twisting.

Rom 3
8) Why not (as we are slanderously reported, and as some affirm that we say), “Let us do evil, that good may come?” Those who say so are justly condemned.

31) Do we then nullify the law through faith? May it never be! No, we establish the law.

That twisting – that Paul said that Christians should “do evil,” that is, break the Ten Commandments – is still going on today.

Wonder who’s behind that twisting?

Saying that Christ’s flock should do evil so that good may come of it when God forgives the evil is the same principle as snake handling and Temple jumping. It means to purposely sin and then expect God to forgive us. Basically this is the modern Christian doctrine of grace, license from God to break God’s Commandments.

That is Satan’s twisting and the devil did the same thing with Yeshua. Satan quoted the Psalm about the angels bearing Christ so He wouldn’t dash His foot and then dared Him to jump off a Temple wall. The devil tried to get Yeshua to flaunt who He was by Temple jumping, just to show off.

“Hey, look at me. I’m Superman! Whee!”

I lived right across the holler from snake handlers. My dad said they met in a house there, but we never went over across the creek to check it out. According to Wikipedia, there is still a snake handling congregation in the town where I went to school, and a small number of snake handling groups are still spread throughout those Appalachian Mountains. These congregations do lose some people to snakebites and for some reason, they don’t attract a whole lot of new converts.

Snake handlers twist scripture. At some time, somebody in the Appalachian Mountains got the idea that the Bible tells us to pick up snakes and parade around with them just to show that God will protect us. This verse was the basis of their thinking.

Mark 16:17-18 (WEB)
17) These signs will accompany those who believe: in my name they will cast out demons; they will speak with new languages;
18) they will take up serpents; and if they drink any deadly thing, it will in no way hurt them; they will lay hands on the sick, and they will recover.”

A video tells of a gospel singing group who discovered – mid-service! – they were in a snake handling church. Their biggest complaint? The church didn’t have enough doors! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FE4z60a_lew

Paul was bitten by a serpent on the island of Malta, but Paul didn’t pick up the snake and parade it around. Paul was bitten when he gathered firewood, but then he just shook the snake off into the fire. Paul was not harmed. The snake was. That is the meaning of Mark 16:18.

Satan dared Christ to be like the snake handlers, to put Himself in danger like bungee jumpers and bridge jumpers, just to show off. Such acts are not done to be exalted in the eyes of God, but just to be exalted in the eyes of others.

Satan’s first temptation for Yeshua was at the human drive to stay alive, when Satan dared Christ to turn rocks into bread. Satan’s second attack was at the human drive to exalt itself.

We have to eat food to stay physically alive. We don’t need to exalt ourselves to live, but all who live want to.

Hezekiah was a good king, and because of that he was blessed. And because he was blessed, his heart was lifted up.

2Chr 32:24-26 (WEB)
24) In those days Hezekiah was sick even to death: and he prayed to Yahweh; and he spoke to him, and gave him a sign.
25) But Hezekiah didn’t render again according to the benefit done to him; for his heart was lifted up: therefore there was wrath on him, and on Judah and Jerusalem.
26) Notwithstanding Hezekiah humbled himself for the pride of his heart, both he and the inhabitants of Jerusalem, so that the wrath of Yahweh didn’t come on them in the days of Hezekiah.

Hezekiah’s drive to exalt himself showed up when the Babylonians showed up.

Isa 39
1) At that time, Merodach Baladan the son of Baladan, king of Babylon, sent letters and a present to Hezekiah; for he heard that he had been sick, and had recovered.

Notice the situation. The Babylonians had heard – from far away! – that Hezekiah had been healed, and they came to visit the king who had received that miracle. What a fantastic opportunity for Hezekiah, who had been healed, to publicly praise Yahweh Rapha, Yahweh our healer, who had healed him!

But what happened?

2Kgs 20
13) Hezekiah listened to them, and showed them all the house of his precious things, the silver, and the gold, and the spices, and the precious oil, and the house of his armor, and all that was found in his treasures: there was nothing in his house, nor in all his dominion, that Hezekiah didn’t show them.
14) Then Isaiah the prophet came to king Hezekiah, and said to him, “What did these men say? From where did they come to you?” Hezekiah said, “They have come from a far country, even from Babylon.”
15) He said, “What have they seen in your house?” Hezekiah answered, “They have seen all that is in my house. There is nothing among my treasures that I have not shown them.”
16) Isaiah said to Hezekiah, “Hear the word of Yahweh.
17) ‘Behold, the days come, that all that is in your house, and that which your fathers have laid up in store to this day, shall be carried to Babylon. Nothing shall be left,’ says Yahweh.

Hezekiah was king of Judah. He was already looked up to by all the people in his kingdom, and apparently many outside his kingdom. But he felt compelled to exalt himself before the Babylonians, too.

What good did that do him?

Nothing. But good king Hezekiah succumbed to the temptation to exalt himself.

King Saul was picked by Yahweh as king, and Saul looked more kingly than any other man in the kingdom.

1Sam 9:2 (WEB)
2) [Kish] had a son, whose name was Saul, an impressive young man; and there was not among the children of Israel a better person than he. From his shoulders and upward he was higher than any of the people.

Saul looked good. And apparently looking good was really important to King Saul.

After Saul had been king for some years, Samuel told Saul that Yahweh had rejected him as king. Yet Saul was still worried about how he looked before the people!

Right after Saul had been told that Yahweh had rejected him as king –

1Sam 15:24-31 (WEB)
24) Saul said to Samuel, “I have sinned; for I have transgressed the commandment of Yahweh, and your words, because I feared the people, and obeyed their voice.
25) Now therefore, please pardon my sin, and turn again with me, that I may worship Yahweh.”
26) Samuel said to Saul, “I will not return with you; for you have rejected the word of Yahweh, and Yahweh has rejected you from being king over Israel.”
27) As Samuel turned about to go away, Saul grabbed the skirt of his robe, and it tore.
28) Samuel said to him, “Yahweh has torn the kingdom of Israel from you this day, and has given it to a neighbor of yours who is better than you.
29) Also the Strength of Israel will not lie nor repent; for he is not a man, that he should repent.”
30) Then he said, “I have sinned: yet please honor me now before the elders of my people, and before Israel, and come back with me, that I may worship Yahweh your God.”
31) So Samuel went back with Saul; and Saul worshiped Yahweh.

That was truly astounding. Saul had just been put on death row, yet he wanted to make sure he looked good before the elders as he went.

Saul could have repented as Hezekiah did, or humbled himself as even wicked Ahab did. But no! Saul still wanted to be the most exalted man in Israel.

Ananias and Sapphira were part of the First Flock, those who became followers of Christ around the time of Pentecost in 30 CE. They had seen miracles taking place left and right around them. They had seen how the spirit had changed the Christianos.

Acts 4:33-37 (WEB)
33) With great power, the apostles gave their testimony of the resurrection of the Lord Yeshua. Great grace [favor] was on them all.
34) For neither was there among them any who lacked, for as many as were owners of lands or houses sold them, and brought the proceeds of the things that were sold,
35) and laid them at the apostles’ feet, and distribution was made to each, according as anyone had need.
36) Joseph, who by the apostles was surnamed Barnabas (which is, being interpreted, Son of Encouragement), a Levite, a man of Cyprus by race,
37) having a field, sold it, and brought the money and laid it at the apostles’ feet.

That act by Barnabas was significant enough to be included in the Bible and he later worked beside Paul. Ananias and Sapphira saw that humble deed by Barnabas. But instead of being humble like him, they reversed that and tried to exalt themselves before the First Flock.

Acts 5
1) But a certain man named Ananias, with Sapphira, his wife, sold a possession,
2) and kept back part of the price, his wife also being aware of it, and brought a certain part, and laid it at the apostles’ feet.
3) But Peter said, “Ananias, why has Satan filled your heart to lie to the Holy Spirit, and to keep back part of the price of the land?
4) While you kept it, didn’t it remain your own? After it was sold, wasn’t it in your power? How is it that you have conceived this thing in your heart? You haven’t lied to men, but to God.”
5) Ananias, hearing these words, fell down and died. Great fear came on all who heard these things.
6) The young men arose and wrapped him up, and they carried him out and buried him.
7) About three hours later, his wife, not knowing what had happened, came in.
8) Peter answered her, “Tell me whether you sold the land for so much.” She said, “Yes, for so much.”
9) But Peter asked her, “How is it that you have agreed together to tempt the Spirit of the Lord? Behold, the feet of those who have buried your husband are at the door, and they will carry you out.”
10) She fell down immediately at his feet, and died. The young men came in and found her dead, and they carried her out and buried her by her husband.

Why did Ananias and Sapphira do that?

Just to be exalted in the eyes of people –

People who did not believe in exalting themselves!

Ananias and Sapphira agreed together to tempt the spirit of the Lord. And that’s just what Satan tried to get Yeshua to do.

“If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down…”

Christ answered the devil, as He did with the first temptation, by again quoting from Deuteronomy.

Matt 4:7 (WEB)
7) Yeshua said to him, “Again, it is written, ‘You shall not test the Lord, your God.’”

In Deuteronomy, Moses restated Israel’s history in the wilderness and in that retelling, Moses included this.

Deut 6:16 (WEB)
16) You shall not tempt Yahweh your God, as you tempted him in Massah.

Massah means “testing.”

Exod 17
1) All the congregation of the children of Israel traveled from the wilderness of Sin, by their journeys, according to Yahweh’s commandment, and encamped in Rephidim; but there was no water for the people to drink.
2) Therefore the people quarreled with Moses, and said, “Give us water to drink.” Moses said to them, “Why do you quarrel with me? Why do you test Yahweh?”
3) The people were thirsty for water there; and the people murmured against Moses, and said, “Why have you brought us up out of Egypt, to kill us, our children, and our livestock with thirst?”
4) Moses cried to Yahweh, saying, “What shall I do with these people? They are almost ready to stone me.”
5) Yahweh said to Moses, “Walk on before the people, and take the elders of Israel with you, and take the rod in your hand with which you struck the Nile, and go.
6) Behold, I will stand before you there on the rock in Horeb. You shall strike the rock, and water will come out of it, that the people may drink.” Moses did so in the sight of the elders of Israel.
7) He called the name of the place Massah, and Meribah, because the children of Israel quarreled, and because they tested Yahweh, saying, “Is Yahweh among us, or not?”

Yahweh had promised Israel that He would take care of them and take them to the Promised Land. But Israel murmured. Actually they griped, groaned, murmured and moaned – that Yahweh was going to kill them.

They were saying that Yahweh is a liar.

…to kill us, our children, and our livestock with thirst?”

“Is Yahweh among us, or not?”

They tested Yahweh by saying He was a liar and would not keep His promise to carry them safely to the Promised Land.

And Satan tried to get Yeshua to do the same thing that Israel did.

Yahweh had promised, as Satan quoted, “‘He will put his angels in charge of you.’ and, ‘On their hands they will bear you up, so that you don’t dash your foot against a stone.’”

So for Yeshua to Temple jump and test Yahweh on that is to imply that Yahweh might be a liar.

Rom 3
4) May it never be! Yes, let God be found true, but every man a liar…

The ultimate self-exaltation is to call God a liar – let God be found true, but every man a liar!

Who can judge God?

Job 38:19-29 (WEB)
19) “What is the way to the dwelling of light? As for darkness, where is its place,
20) that you should take it to its bound, that you should discern the paths to its house?
21) Surely you know, for you were born then, and the number of your days is great!
22) Have you entered the treasuries of the snow, or have you seen the treasures of the hail,
23) which I have reserved against the time of trouble, against the day of battle and war?
24) By what way is the lightning distributed, or the east wind scattered on the earth?
25) Who has cut a channel for the flood water, or the path for the thunderstorm;
26) To cause it to rain on a land where no man is; on the wilderness, in which there is no man;
27) to satisfy the waste and desolate ground, to cause the tender grass to spring forth?
28) Does the rain have a father? Or who fathers the drops of dew?
29) Out of whose womb came the ice? The gray frost of the sky, who has given birth to it?

Job 40
1) Moreover Yahweh answered Job,
2) “Shall he who argues contend with the Almighty? He who argues with God, let him answer it.”
3) Then Job answered Yahweh,
4) “Behold, I am of small account. What shall I answer you? I lay my hand on my mouth.
5) I have spoken once, and I will not answer; Yes, twice, but I will proceed no further.”
6) Then Yahweh answered Job out of the whirlwind,
7) “Now brace yourself like a man. I will question you, and you will answer me.
8) Will you even annul my judgment? Will you condemn me, that you may be justified?

Satan tried that. Repeatedly. How arrogant and self-exalting Satan is, to repeatedly call God a liar!

Satan’s world today is filled with that attitude – self-exaltation.

The constant message of Satan’s media is –

Exalt yourself, exalt yourself, exalt yourself!

Cars, houses, clothing, jewelry – all sold with the purpose of self-exaltation.

The current dominant political message in America is – exalt yourself above all others. Blacks, Asians, Hispanics – always the message is for each group to exalt itself above all other groups. Envision division, with each group struggling to lift itself above all others. Women against men, wives against husbands, mothers against fathers and children –

“Women shouldn’t feel like second-class citizens!”

All that is the epitome of Satan’s mind.

Satan dared Yeshua to jump off a Temple wall just to exalt Himself and test to see if Yahweh is a liar. But Satan is the liar.

John 8
44) You are of your father, the devil, and you want to do the desires of your father. He was a murderer from the beginning, and doesn’t stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaks a lie, he speaks on his own; for he is a liar, and its father.

The world today is full of Satan’s lies. Think evolution, which directly calls God a liar. Think global warming, an existential threat to humanity. Think Star Wars and aliens from outer space. All Satan’s lies.

So Satan called God a liar and dared Yeshua to do the same thing. The devil quoted scripture close enough, but then twisted its meaning. The fake angel of light has done a lot of scripture twisting throughout church history. Should we not expect to see it again?

Yeshua did not take Satan’s dare and did not exalt Himself. He did not come for His own glory. The human drive to exalt itself is deep in the human spirit. The drive to eat is understandable. The drive for self-preservation is understandable. But this drive to exalt ourselves above all others – what do we get from that? When a wife puts a husband down, or vice versa, why does that make them feel good? When people get personally offended with each other, does that help them or harm them? Why did Julius Caesar, Napoleon and Hitler try to conquer the peoples around them? Why did Alexander cry when he could conquer no more? Was he weird or something?

No. He and they just had the human drive to exalt itself.

That is what the Messiah overcame! All praise to Him!

As we now near the end of this age, the Jews are back in the Promised Land. They have the Temple Mount. They plan to build a new temple to welcome a new messiah.

And the messiah the world is looking for is –

A puffed up messiah, supremely self-exalted, to lord it over all others in the whole world.

A Temple jumper.

The End Time Church: From the Cathedrals to the Catacombs

By Dan L. White

Copyright 2021 by Dan L. White, all rights reserved.

Scripture quotations are from the World English Bible (WEB) which is in the public domain.

Chapter 95

The Master Deceiver at Work

Heylel-Satan is certainly clever, but the Enemy’s first attack on Yeshua was not rocket science.

Matt 4
1) Then Yeshua was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil.
2) When he had fasted forty days and forty nights, he was hungry afterward.

How do you attack someone who’s fasting?

You go for the belly.

As when the Arabs attacked Israel in 1973.

History.com
On October 6, 1973, hoping to win back territory lost to Israel during the third Arab-Israeli war, in 1967, Egyptian and Syrian forces launched a coordinated attack against Israel on Yom Kippur, the holiest day in the Jewish calendar. Taking the Israeli Defense Forces by surprise, Egyptian troops swept deep into the Sinai Peninsula…

…[M]any of Israel’s soldiers were away from their posts observing Yom Kippur (or Day of Atonement), and the Arab armies made impressive advances with their up-to-date Soviet weaponry.

That biased article omitted the very, very relevant fact that Israelis were fasting, and the Arab armies purposely chose that fast day for their attack.

The Arabs just followed Satan’s example. The devil attacked Yeshua when he was fasting, not just for one day but fasting for forty days.

Again this is not rocket science. Satan did the obvious. The devil tempted Yeshua with food.

Matt 4
3) The tempter came and said to him, “If you are the Son of God, command that these stones become bread.”

Satan used the same technique that was so successful with Eve – the doubting query.

With Eve – “Has God really said, ‘You shall not eat of any tree of the garden?’”

With Yeshua – “If you are the Son of God…”

When Satan queried Eve, the devil implied that God lied. And with Yeshua, the query implied that the Messiah lied. Are you really the Son of God?

Actually Satan lied.

Matt 8:28-29 (WEB)
28) When he [Yeshua] came to the other side, into the country of the Gergesenes, two people possessed by demons met him there, coming out of the tombs, exceedingly fierce, so that nobody could pass that way.
29) Behold, they cried out, saying, “What do we have to do with you, Yeshua, Son of God? Have you come here to torment us before the time?”

Those demons knew who Yeshua was. If they knew it, then their master knew it. So Satan lied when she acted like she didn’t know that Yeshua was the Son of God.

This is the one biggest factor between the followers of Christ and the followers of Satan. The followers of Satan deny that Yeshua is the Son of God.

The disciples knew He was the Son of God.

Matt 14:25-33 (WEB)
25) In the fourth watch of the night, Yeshua came to them, walking on the sea.
26) When the disciples saw him walking on the sea, they were troubled, saying, “It’s a ghost!” and they cried out for fear.
27) But immediately Yeshua spoke to them, saying “Cheer up! It is I! Don’t be afraid.”
28) Peter answered him and said, “Lord, if it is you, command me to come to you on the waters.”
29) He said, “Come!” Peter stepped down from the boat, and walked on the waters to come to Yeshua.
30) But when he saw that the wind was strong, he was afraid, and beginning to sink, he cried out, saying, “Lord, save me!”
31) Immediately Yeshua stretched out his hand, took hold of him, and said to him, “You of little faith, why did you doubt?”
32) When they got up into the boat, the wind ceased.
33) Those who were in the boat came and worshiped him, saying, “You are truly the Son of God!”

Peter knew He was the Son of God.

Matt 16:13-16 (WEB)
13) Now when Yeshua came into the parts of Caesarea Philippi, he asked his disciples, saying, “Who do men say that I, the Son of Man, am?”
14) They said, “Some say John the Baptizer, some, Elijah, and others, Jeremiah, or one of the prophets.”
15) He said to them, “But who do you say that I am?”
16) Simon Peter answered, “You are the Christ [Messiah], the Son of the living God.”

John the baptizer knew.

John 1:34 (WEB)
34) I have seen, and have testified that this is the Son of God.”

Martha knew.

John 11:25-27 (WEB)
25) Yeshua said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in me will still live, even if he dies.
26) Whoever lives and believes in me will never die. Do you believe this?”
27) She said to him, “Yes, Lord. I have come to believe that you are the Christ, God’s Son, he who comes into the world.”

And when Paul learned about the Son of God, he immediately preached it.

Acts 9:19-20 (WEB)
19) He took food and was strengthened. Saul stayed several days with the disciples who were at Damascus.
20) Immediately in the synagogues he proclaimed the Christ, that he is the Son of God.

All those knew and acknowledged Yeshua as the Son of God.

On the other hand –

Or more correctly stated, in the other spirit –

The head waggers did not accept that Yeshua was the Son of God.

Matt 27:39-43 (WEB)
39) Those who passed by blasphemed him, wagging their heads,
40) and saying, “You who destroy the temple, and build it in three days, save yourself! If you are the Son of God, come down from the cross!”
41) Likewise the chief priests also mocking, with the scribes, the Pharisees, and the elders, said,
42) “He saved others, but he can’t save himself. If he is the King of Israel, let him come down from the cross now, and we will believe in him.
43) He trusts in God. Let God deliver him now, if he wants him; for he said, ‘I am the Son of God.’”

The high priest did not accept that Yeshua was the Son of God.

Matt 26:63-66 (WEB)
63) But Yeshua held his peace. The high priest answered him, “I adjure you by the living God, that you tell us whether you are the Christ, the Son of God.”
64) Yeshua said to him, “You have said it. Nevertheless, I tell you, after this you will see the Son of Man sitting at the right hand of Power, and coming on the clouds of the sky.”
65) Then the high priest tore his clothing, saying, “He has spoken blasphemy! Why do we need any more witnesses? Behold, now you have heard his blasphemy.
66) What do you think?” They answered, “He is worthy of death!”

Even some of those who first followed Christ did not accept the Son of God.

John 6:64-69 (WEB)
64) “But there are some of you who don’t believe.” For Yeshua knew from the beginning who they were who didn’t believe, and who it was who would betray him.
65) He said, “For this cause have I said to you that no one can come to me, unless it is given to him by my Father.”
66) At this, many of his disciples went back, and walked no more with him.
67) Yeshua said therefore to the twelve, “You don’t also want to go away, do you?”
68) Simon Peter answered him, “Lord, to whom would we go? You have the words of eternal life.
69) We have come to believe and know that you are the Christ, the Son of the living God.”

The difference between the disciples who left and those who stayed was whether or not they believed in Yeshua the Son of God.

To not acknowledge Yeshua as the Son of God is to follow Satan.

Luke 12:8-9 (WEB)
8) “I tell you, everyone who confesses me before men, him will the Son of Man also confess before the angels of God;
9) but he who denies me in the presence of men will be denied in the presence of the angels of God.

John 3:16-18 (WEB)
16) For God so loved the world, that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish, but have eternal life.
17) For God didn’t send his Son into the world to judge the world, but that the world should be saved through him.
18) He who believes in him is not judged. He who doesn’t believe has been judged already, because he has not believed in the name of the one and only Son of God.

In the resurrection, there is no middle ground. When the dead hear the Son of God’s voice, the difference between life and judgment is whether or not they believe in the Son of God.

John 5:25-29 (WEB)
25) Most certainly, I tell you, the hour comes, and now is, when the dead will hear the Son of God’s voice; and those who hear will live.
26) For as the Father has life in himself, even so he gave to the Son also to have life in himself.
27) He also gave him authority to execute judgment, because he is a son of man.
28) Don’t marvel at this, for the hour comes, in which all that are in the tombs will hear his voice,
29) and will come out; those who have done good, to the resurrection of life; and those who have done evil, to the resurrection of judgment.

Again, those who follow Yeshua know that He is the Son of God. Those who follow Satan don’t acknowledge that.

That’s why government schools are Satan’s schools. They don’t teach that Yeshua is the Son of God, and they’re right in Satan’s camp. Public schools are not neutral. They oppose the Son of God. Their schools are Satan’s schools. There is no middle ground.

Yeshua saw Satan fall from heaven, so Satan knew very well that He was the Son of God. And when the devil made this challenge, it was based on a lie.

“If you are the Son of God, command that these stones become bread.”

The “if” was the lie.

Eve and Adam accepted Satan’s teaching that they would not die if they disobeyed God. They ate the forbidden fruit, because it looked so good, and could make them wise in the world. But they did die.

They were selfish, thinking of themselves and what they could get for themselves. Self is the prime attitude of Satan, and Eve and Adam had that same attitude. As do all people –

Except for One.

Christ answered Satan’s dare to turn the rocks into rolls by looking beyond the bread.

Matt 4
4) But he answered, “It is written, ‘Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God.’”

How would Yeshua feel after forty days of fasting?

Hungry.

Luke 4
1) Yeshua, full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan, and was led by the Spirit into the wilderness
2) for forty days, being tempted by the devil. He ate nothing in those days. Afterward, when they were completed, he was hungry.

Yeah, He was hungry. But He wanted God more than He wanted physical food.

I remember the first time I fasted on the Day of Atonement. The idea of going a whole day and night without food or drink seemed extremely extreme. What would happen to my poor, malnourished, 180 pound body? And I made one huge tactical error on my first fast day. I left a bright red apple on the shelf of my desk at college, and the image of that apple imprinted itself on my mind, from that fast day to this day.

However, I did not become as desperate as my wife and her kid sister, ages 13 and 9, who on the Day of Atonement sniffed the peanut butter jar.

Yes, Yeshua was hungry. Although the Bible does not specifically state this, I will state with some confidence that during that forty day fast, Yeshua never stared at a red apple or sniffed the peanut butter jar.

For physical people, food is life. Bread is physical existence. To deny bread, or food, is to be willing to give up your physical existence.

Especially after not eating or drinking for forty days.

In the wilderness Israel had a big problem giving up their food.

Exod 16:2-15 (WEB)
2) The whole congregation of the children of Israel murmured against Moses and against Aaron in the wilderness;
3) and the children of Israel said to them, “We wish that we had died by the hand of Yahweh in the land of Egypt, when we sat by the meat pots, when we ate our fill of bread, for you have brought us out into this wilderness, to kill this whole assembly with hunger.”

11) Yahweh spoke to Moses, saying,
12) “I have heard the murmurings of the children of Israel. Speak to them, saying, ‘At evening you shall eat meat, and in the morning you shall be filled with bread: and you shall know that I am Yahweh your God.’”
13) It happened at evening that quail came up and covered the camp; and in the morning the dew lay around the camp.
14) When the dew that lay had gone, behold, on the surface of the wilderness was a small round thing, small as the frost on the ground.
15) When the children of Israel saw it, they said one to another, “What is it?” For they didn’t know what it was. Moses said to them, “It is the bread which Yahweh has given you to eat.”

The lesson was that man does not live by physical bread alone. Ultimately life does not come from bread, but ultimately life comes from God.

Deut 8:2-3 (WEB)
2) [Moses said]You shall remember all the way which Yahweh your God has led you these forty years in the wilderness, that he might humble you, to prove you, to know what was in your heart, whether you would keep his commandments, or not.
3) He humbled you, and allowed you to be hungry, and fed you with manna, which you didn’t know, neither did your fathers know; that he might make you know that man does not live by bread only, but man lives by everything that proceeds out of the mouth of Yahweh.

That verse in Deuteronomy was what Christ quoted back to Satan.

Even after fasting for forty days, Yeshua did not turn the rocks into bread. He put love of God before love of self. He put spiritual life before physical life.

That trait carried through to the end of His earthly physical life.

Mark 14:33-36 (WEB)
33) He took with him Peter, James, and John, and began to be greatly troubled and distressed.
34) He said to them, “My soul is exceedingly sorrowful, even to death. Stay here, and watch.”
35) He went forward a little, and fell on the ground, and prayed that, if it were possible, the hour might pass away from him.
36) He said, “Abba, Father, all things are possible to you. Please remove this cup from me. However, not what I desire, but what you desire.”

Just as when He did not turn rocks into bread, so He did not turn away when He was asked to give up His life. He was exceedingly sorrowful, by His own words, even to death. He asked that the cup be removed from Him. But He humbled Himself to drink that cup of bitter wine. Then He became the bread of life for us.

Notice the difference in the two attitudes between Satan and Yeshua.

Satan tried to exalt herself above the throne of Yahweh, lied and connived, and desperately tried to gain position for her self.

Yeshua was always willing to give up Himself. Going without food, not accepting the devilish temptation to eat rocks, even being willing to give up His life to serve His heavenly Father.

Satan had tricked Eve with “Has God really said…? And Satan tried to trip up Christ with “If you are the Son of God…”

In both cases the devil attacked with darts of doubt. We can expect the same thing.

Satan is currently casting darts of doubt over everything Biblical. Today the Bible is “discredited by scholars.” If scholars cast doubt on something, then how can it possibly be true?

Even many Christians now teach that certain parts of the Bible are not to be taken as truth. This includes the commands that a woman is to keep silent in the assembly and a woman is not to teach a man. It also includes the first chapter of Romans, where it speaks of men who “burned in their lust toward one another, men doing what is inappropriate with men.” Those scriptures, among others, are said to be just cultural standards of an ancient time, and not relevant today. Those are demonic darts of doubt.

Moreover, modern intellectuals claim that Yeshua is just a mythological figure, like Zeus and Aphrodite. A book description on Amazon reads –
“Jesus Christ: A Pagan Myth” explores the pagan origins of Christianity and shows that Jesus Christ never lived. This book is for doubting Christians,” it says. Actually the book seeks to create doubting Christians.

How do we deflect Satan’s darts of doubt?

We do what the Messiah did.

Bread feeds the body but fasting feeds the spirit. As Christ gained spiritual strength to overcome Satan, so we must use fasting to gain spiritual strength to overcome Heylel-Satan, the deceiving enemy. Without regular fasting, we simply cannot overcome Satan, the world and ourselves –

On our own.

If you want God, you must seek Him with all your heart. That means being willing to give up physical bread, and ultimately even to give up physical life. If you will seek God, you have to work at it, and you must fast. In these end times that we now face, if you do not fast frequently, the devil will eat your lunch.

Yeshua was willing to give up bread and physical life for spiritual life. Christ’s disciples must also be willing to do that.

Satan attacked a hungry Yeshua in the belly. Yeshua attacked a self-loving Satan in the spirit. God’s spirit won, and the rocks stayed out of the oven.

The End Time Church: From the Cathedrals to the Catacombs

By Dan L. White

Copyright 2021 by Dan L. White, all rights reserved.

Scripture quotations are from the World English Bible (WEB) which is in the public domain.

Chapter 94

The Star Who Fell from Heaven

If Bar Kochba was the Son of the Star, then who is the star he was son of?

Isa 14 (WEB)
12) How you have fallen from heaven, morning star, son of the dawn! How you are cut down to the ground, who laid the nations low!
13) You said in your heart, “I will ascend into heaven! I will exalt my throne above the stars of God! I will sit on the mountain of assembly, in the far north!
14) I will ascend above the heights of the clouds! I will make myself like the Most High!”

‘Morning star’ is how the Hebrew word ‘heylel’ is translated in the World English Bible. Most other translations have a similar rendering. Heylel is used only that one time, in Isaiah 14. The King James translation has ‘Lucifer,’ which is Latin for ‘light bringer.’ That’s how Jerome translated ‘Heylel’ in his Latin Vulgate version of the Bible in 405, still in use today. Mickelson’s Enhanced Strong’s Dictionaries defines ‘heylel’ as “something or someone of radiant splendor.”

The morning star Heylel tried to exalt her throne to be like the Most High. That can only mean Satan.

In English, Satan is usually called “he,” but angels or God’s messengers are not he or she and it doesn’t sound quite right to call Satan “it.” In today’s world, Satan incites women to rebel against men, and even Bible translators are focused on “gender equality.” So instead of calling Satan “he,” I will call it “she.” And to further conform with feminazi protocol, I will use a hyphenated name –

Heylel-Satan.

Ezekiel wrote of the covering cherub on the holy mountain of God.

Ezek 28
12) Son of man, take up a lamentation over the king of Tyre, and tell him, Thus says the Lord Yahweh: You seal up the sum, full of wisdom, and perfect in beauty.
13) You were in Eden, the garden of God; every precious stone adorned you: ruby, topaz, emerald, chrysolite, onyx, jasper, sapphire, turquoise, and beryl. Gold work of tambourines and of pipes was in you. In the day that you were created they were prepared.
14) You were the anointed cherub who covers: and I set you, so that you were on the holy mountain of God; you have walked up and down in the midst of the stones of fire.
15) You were perfect in your ways from the day that you were created, until unrighteousness was found in you.
16) By the abundance of your traffic they filled the midst of you with violence, and you have sinned: therefore I have cast you as profane out of the mountain of God; and I have destroyed you, [Lexham and New English translations say “expelled” instead of destroyed], covering cherub, from the midst of the stones of fire.
17) Your heart was lifted up because of your beauty; you have corrupted your wisdom by reason of your brightness: I have cast you to the ground; I have laid you before kings, that they may see you.

Yeshua saw that morning star plunge to earth – like a meteor.

Luke 10
18) He [Yeshua] said to them, “I saw Satan having fallen like lightning from heaven.

When the covering cherub was cast down to the earth, Heylel was then called Satan. Instead of light bringer, this covering cherub was now –

Enemy.

So after her rebellion in heaven, Heylel became Satan, and the light-bringer became the dark-bringer. Yeshua told Paul that Paul was going to be sent to people —

Acts 26
18) to open their eyes, that they may turn from darkness to light and from the power of Satan to God, that they may receive remission of sins and an inheritance among those who are sanctified by faith in me.’

Paul was to turn people from the power of Satan, which is darkness. But Satan still presented herself as the light-bringer.

Observing how Satan’s followers are in this world, we may conclude that Satan thinks her way is the right way, and that her darkness really is the light.

Left wing anti-Christ Americans have empty, self-focused lives. They climb mountains and sky dive, practice yoga and vainly build up their bodies, take drugs and engorge in unbridled sex, perpetually trying to find some meaning somewhere in their lives. Yet these spiritual nomads, wandering to and fro and never coming to a knowledge of the truth, constantly tell conservative Christians how they must change their lives. Liberals believe in butchering babies and selling body parts, in using drugs for entertainment, in spreading sexual diseases and making the government pay for their treatment, in punishing police and rewarding criminals –

Yet they do not at all see themselves as depraved, demented or deceived. They see themselves as paragons of perfection, the highest peak of millions of years of evolutionary progress –

And they’re always ready to set Christians straight.

That’s how Satan’s people are. So surely Satan is the same way, thinking her way is the right way, that she is the one with the truth and that Yahweh God Almighty is judgmental, self-righteous, condemning, and a radical right-winger.

Perhaps that’s why Satan is so incredibly deceptive. She knows she’s right.

How deceptive is Satan?

Rev 12
3) Another sign was seen in heaven. Behold, a great red dragon, having seven heads and ten horns, and on his heads seven crowns.
4) His tail drew one third of the stars of the sky, and threw them to the earth. The dragon stood before the woman who was about to give birth, so that when she gave birth he might devour her child.
5) She gave birth to a son, a male child, who is to rule all the nations with a rod of iron. Her child was caught up to God, and to his throne.

At some point, a third of the angels in heaven follows Satan against Yahweh. Or as they might see it, they follow Heylel the light-bringer against the darkness of Yahweh.

Consider that for a moment. Spirit beings who know Yahweh is their Creator, who have seen His power and limitless magnificence, instead choose to follow the rebel Heylel-Satan.

That requires some heavy duty deception!

As with Eve.

Gen 3
1) Now the serpent was more subtle than any animal of the field which Yahweh God had made. He said to the woman, “Has God really said, ‘You shall not eat of any tree of the garden?’”
2) The woman said to the serpent, “Of the fruit of the trees of the garden we may eat,
3) but of the fruit of the tree which is in the middle of the garden, God has said, ‘You shall not eat of it, neither shall you touch it, lest you die.’”
4) The serpent said to the woman, “You won’t surely die,
5) for God knows that in the day you eat it, your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.”

The International Standard Version translation of that familiar passage includes an interesting note.

Gen 3:1 ISV
1) Now the Shining One was more clever than any animal of the field that the Lord God had made. It asked the woman, “Did God actually say, ‘You are not to eat from any tree of the garden’?”
ISV note: The Heb. word Ha-Nachash means the Shining One; or the Diviner; i.e. one who falsely claims to reveal God’s word; or the Serpent.

We also cite the Keil & Delitzsch Commentary on the Old Testament
Hath God indeed said, Ye shall not eat of all the trees of the garden?” כִּי אַף is an interrogative expressing surprise.

Satan’s query implies disbelief. Heylel-Satan was asking Eve, “Didn’t God lie to you?”

Satan ignored God’s personal name. She just used the common noun ‘elohim.’

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges adds –
Observe that in the serpent’s mouth the general name, “God” (Elohim), is used, and not the sacred name “Jehovah” (Lord), and that the woman replying takes up the serpent’s words.

The method which the serpent adopts is insidious. He knows the prohibition; he feigns ignorance, and asks to be instructed. The question suggests a doubt of Divine goodness. It takes the tone of indignant surprise at the injustice and harshness of a prohibition which had forbidden the man and the woman to eat of any tree of the garden. Such a suggestion, however easily refuted, might instill into the mind of the unsuspicious woman a grain of doubt, whether even any limitation was consonant with perfect justice and kindness.

The Keil & Delitzsch Commentary also discusses Heylel’s technique with Eve.
The serpent calls God by the name of Elohim alone, and the woman does the same. In this more general and indefinite name the personality of the living God is obscured. To attain his end, the tempter felt it necessary to change the living personal God into a merely general numen divinium…

Or just another one of them thar gods.

Elohim is a generic term, not exclusively used for Yahweh. Elohim is also used for “the gods of Egypt”, for idols, as in 1 Kings 11:33 for Chemosh, “the god of Moab”, and for demons, seraphim, the spirits of the dead brought up at Saul’s urging, and to human kings and prophets.

Elohim is not the specific name of the Creator, and not even equal to the English word God, since elohim is used for men and the English word isn’t. On the other hand, the personal Yahweh is in the first five of the Ten Commandments, one whole stone tablet of the two. The third Commandment specifically commands not to ignore the name Yahweh.

Satan – not surprisingly – ignored it. No surprise then that almost all of Satan’s world also follows that practice.

So Satan avoided the personal name of the Creator, instead used the common noun elohim, and then told Eve she could be elohim!

Gen 3:5 (Lexham English Bible)
5) For God [elohim] knows that on the day you both eat from it, then your eyes will be opened and you both shall be like gods [elohim], knowing good and evil.”

Hey – That’s exactly what Satan wanted!

So instead of turning away when Satan called Yahweh a liar, Eve opened a discussion with Heylel about whether or not Yahweh is a liar. Eve did not gain by that discussion. She lost Eden and her physical life. Fraternizing with Satan is fatal.

That’s one of the greatest lessons in the Bible, in the first few pages. You do not gain by fellowshipping with Yahweh’s enemies, the spiritual Canaanites.

Calling God a liar is an extreme evil. All government schools do that today. Eve should have rebuked Satan and people today should rebuke government schools.

Zech 3 WEB
1) He showed me Joshua the high priest standing before the angel of Yahweh, and Satan standing at his right hand to be his adversary.
2) Yahweh said to Satan, “Yahweh rebuke you, Satan! Yes, Yahweh who has chosen Jerusalem rebuke you! Isn’t this a burning stick plucked out of the fire?”

That was Yahweh on earth, the messenger of Yahweh who became the Messiah, and Yahweh the Father in heaven. So Yahweh on earth said Yahweh in heaven rebuke you, Satan.

So Eve should have said something like, “You tricky snake!”

But Eve didn’t say that. She did not rebuke Satan for calling God a liar.

Again we consider this situation. Eve and Adam were personally acquainted with their Creator. Not only did they know Him – He was their Father, the One who birthed them. He had given them the incredible, astounding, humanly unrepeatable miracle of life. Yet the shiny one easily tricked them into thinking that their Father was a liar, that their Father had even lied to them, and that their Father did not love them.

Heylel-Satan had brought darkness to Eve and Adam.

Then, after Eve and Adam were kicked out of Eden, Satan went after their family.

Gen 6
[Before the Flood –]
11) The earth was corrupt before God, and the earth was filled with violence.
12) God saw the earth, and saw that it was corrupt, for all flesh had corrupted their way on the earth.

All flesh!

Again that is astonishing. Noah’s father Lamech overlapped Adam by a half century, and Lamech died only two years before the Flood. So some people who died in the Flood probably knew Adam! They could have personally asked him:

“Adam, what was it like when you first opened your eyes?”

“Adam, what did you think when you first saw Eve?”

“Adam, how did that shiny serpent sucker you in?”

So basically all the people who died in the Flood could have known, or known of someone who knew Adam. In spite of that first or second hand testimony about creation, everyone on earth at that time was deceived by Heylel-Satan, except for one family.

Absolutely astounding!

The same thing happened after the Flood. The tower of Babel, as commonly calculated, was only about a century after the Flood. With life spans at that time still long, everyone knew about the great Flood. Yet the general population decided to build a tower, specifically to disobey Yahweh’s command to spread out over the earth.

And by Abram’s time?

Well, righteous Abram lived in a city, Ur that was devoted to a moon goddess.

Even Abram’s family apparently were moonstruck.

Josh 24
2) Joshua said to all the people, “Thus says Yahweh, the God of Israel, ‘Your fathers lived of old time beyond the River, even Terah, the father of Abraham, and the father of Nahor: and they served other gods.

Wow! The sneaky snake had snuck in again.

And again, and again, and again.

Rev 12
9) The great dragon was thrown down, the old serpent, he who is called the devil and Satan, the deceiver of the whole world. He was thrown down to the earth, and his angels were thrown down with him.

How deceitful is she, Satan?

Even after being bound for a thousand years, which is a millennium of peace and prosperity, when Heylel-Satan is released for a time, the same thing happens –

Again!

Rev 20
7) And after the thousand years, Satan will be released from his prison,
8) and he will come out to deceive the nations which are in the four corners of the earth, Gog and Magog, to gather them together to the war; the number of whom is as the sand of the sea.

Again.

Heylel-Satan’s power to deceive may only be exceeded by Yahweh’s power to enlighten.

So who does Heylel-Satan try to deceive?

Just the whole world.

Do you live in the world?

The light bringer who brings darkness deceives by making bad look good, by making evil enticing, and by making disobedience to God seem better than obedience. She still looks like a light bringer.

2Cor 11
14) And no wonder, for even Satan masquerades as an angel of light.

Now we come to today’s world and what do we see?

These are some of Heylel-Satan’s deceptions in the world today.

Whole World Deceptions

1. All life began by evolution. No one has ever seen life come from nothing alive, no one has ever made life from nothing alive, yet most of the world believes that life came from nothing alive.

2. The human family has more than two genders, male, female, and one hundred more, according to current thinking.

3. Butchering her baby is a woman’s right to choose.

4. The world faces an existential crisis that threatens to erase human life from the planet. Christ warned that the real threat is human violence that “no flesh be saved.” But the elites of the world say that the existential threat to extinguish all life is “global warming.”

Christian Deceptions

5. The personal name of God is in the first five of the Ten Commandments, yet almost everyone in the world thinks it’s wrong to call Yahweh by that name.

6. The day of the sun, an inanimate orb, has replaced the weekly Sabbath, the perpetual memorial day of the Creator Yahweh.

7. The drunken winter festival has replaced God’s Feast of Succoth, the spring observance of Ishtar has replaced Passover, and all Christian holy days are old Roman holidays.

8. Satan broke the Ten Commandments, Christ obeyed them, yet Christians believe that you have to break the Ten Commandments to be saved, and that if you obey what the Ten Commandments actually say, you’re trying to earn your salvation.

9. When the Bible says that women are to be silent in the assemblies and are not to teach men, those was just cultural mores.

10. The sin of Sodom was that the men of Sodom were just unfriendly to strangers.

American National Deceptions

11. People are murdered by violent guns, not violent people.

12. If white people don’t do anything racist, then they still have systemic racism because they’re white.

13. Government schools that teach that God does not exist do not teach religion.

14. Marriage is not from God, any two people can marry, and a family is any who happen to get together, including dogs.

That’s how Heylel-Satan has deceived today’s world –

So far.

Satan deceived Eve, the pre-Flood world, the post-Flood world, a third of the angels, today’s world, the Christian religion, and modern America.

In these end times, in the face of this incredibly deceptive power of Heylel-Satan, how will she try to deceive you?

The End Time Church: From the Cathedrals to the Catacombs

By Dan L. White

Copyright 2021 by Dan L. White, all rights reserved.

Scripture quotations are from the World English Bible (WEB) which is in the public domain.

Chapter 93

Building a New Temple

Since we have a new Ark, a spiritual Ark, will the old Ark of the Covenant be found?

Since we have a new Temple, a spiritual Temple, will another Temple be built?

A new Ark and a new Temple? God already has a new Temple, the flock of the Messiah, with a new Ark in it, the Messiah Himself. However, still another physical Temple is planned for construction, and the old acacia wood Ark is being spied out.

Who wants to build this physical temple?

The Jews of Judaism.

Who are the Jews of Judaism?

They are the Pharisees. As discussed before, when the second Temple was destroyed in 70 CE, the Sadducee priests no longer had a position of power. Priests served in the Temple, the Temple was gone. They lost their jobs, and like modern government bureaucrats, they lost their means of enriching themselves.

After the Temple was gone, the local synagogues still remained. Since they were the only game left in town for the anti-Christ Jews, those Jews who did not accept Yeshua as Messiah, the synagogues became the religious focal point of Judaism. The Pharisees ran the synagogues – the Pharisees became Judaism. Judaism is the Pharisees.

Now Judaism – the Pharisees – want a new temple. Judaism does not accept Yeshua’s flock as the new Temple, so they plan to build a new physical temple. Judaism does not accept Yeshua as the Messiah, so they don’t accept Him as the fulfillment of the Ark of the Covenant. They await the revealing of the old Ark.

Why does Judaism want a new temple?

The Jews want a new temple to welcome a new messiah, who will not be Yeshua, the King of the Jews.

From the Temple Institute web site, templeinstitute.org, About Us page.

“Rabbi Yisrael Ariel, founder and head of the Temple Institute, served in the paratrooper brigade which liberated the Temple Mount in the Six Day War of 1967, and was one of the first soldiers to reach the Mount.”

Ariel and some part of the Jews expected that when the Jews again possessed the Temple site, the Messiah would then return and He would immediately rebuild the Temple. With that belief, Ariel described how he felt when he rushed up to the western wall of the Temple platform.

“It is so very difficult to describe the feeling that filled us during that extraordinary time in the life of the nation. The words “ringing the bells of the Messiah” express in a limited way what was being felt in the heart.”

The Judaism information site chabad.org discussed the rebuilding of the temple by the Messiah.

https://www.chabad.org/library/article_cdo/aid/108400/jewish/The-End-of-Days.htm
One of the principles of Jewish faith enumerated by Maimonides is that one day there will arise a dynamic Jewish leader, a direct descendant of the Davidic dynasty, who will rebuild the Temple in Jerusalem, and gather Jews from all over the world and bring them back to the Land of Israel…

According to some traditions, G-d Himself will rebuild the third Temple. According to others, it will be rebuilt by Moshiach; still others suggest a combination of the two opinions. Some suggest that there will be two distinct periods in the messianic era: first a non-miraculous period, leading into a second, miraculous period.

Maimonides writes, “Neither the order of the occurrence of these events nor their precise detail is among the fundamental principles of the faith . . . one should wait and believe in the general conception of the matter.”

When the Jews regained the Temple Mount and the messiah did not come, then some changed their approach. Instead of waiting for the Messiah to come to build the temple, they decided that they should rebuild the temple, and then the Messiah will come to that temple. Maimonides said that the messiah would gather Jews from all over the world and bring them back to the land of Israel, and Jews from all over the world have already returned, seeming to lend support to the temple building concept.

Twenty years after capturing the Temple Mount, in 1987 Ariel founded the Temple Institute. Its purpose is to rebuild the Temple.

You will perceive that the whole basis of building a new temple to welcome the messiah is –

the rejection of the Messiah who already came.

Whether the Jews want a messiah to come and build a temple, or whether they build a temple first and then welcome a messiah, the messiah they look to will not be Yeshua the Son of God.

This is a most important fact to understand.

The temple project is founded on the religious belief that Yeshua is not the Messiah. The Jews plan to build the next temple to welcome the next messiah, not the One they already rejected.

This is no surprise. For about 2000 years they have not accepted Yeshua.

Notice the incredible first part of the book of John.

John 1
1) In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
2) The same was in the beginning with God.
3) All things were made through him. Without him was not anything made that has been made.
4) In him was life, and the life was the light of men.
5) The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness hasn’t overcome it.

The Jews were that darkness, along with the rest of the world. The Creator came in the flesh and brought light to the Jews, His people. Their darkness did not overcome Him, but as a whole His light did not enlighten them.

John 1
10) He was in the world, and the world was made through him, and the world didn’t recognize him.
11) He came to his own, and those who were his own didn’t receive him.

At this almost-end time, more and more Jews are now receiving their Messiah Yeshua. However, most of His own, the tribe of Judah, still do not receive Him.

John 1
17) For the law was given through Moses. Grace and truth were realized through Yeshua Christ.

The English word grace has lost its original meaning of mercy or favor, and has come to mean freedom to break the Commandments, a license to sin. The Greek word translated grace is charis, and a form of charis was used in the Septuagint to simply mean good will. John 1:17 gives a contrast between the law given through Moses and the goodwill of God given through Christ, or the old covenant through Moses and the new covenant through Yeshua. Since most Jews missed the goodwill of God through Yeshua, they are left with the covenant of Moses, which inevitably is the bad will of God for the unpaid debt of sins.

Christ brought us God’s goodwill, in contrast to the old agreement, which had God’s bad will. Until Yeshua, we had no way out of that bad will in the Moses covenant. That is the case with the Jews now. Their history is spotted with God’s bad will.

John 1
29) The next day, he [John] saw Yeshua coming to him, and said, “Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!

32) John testified, saying, “I have seen the Spirit descending like a dove out of heaven, and it remained on him.
33) I didn’t recognize him, but he who sent me to baptize in water, he said to me, ‘On whomever you will see the Spirit descending, and remaining on him, the same is he who baptizes in the Holy Spirit.’
34) I have seen, and have testified that this is the Son of God.”
35) Again, the next day, John was standing with two of his disciples,
36) and he looked at Yeshua as he walked, and said, “Behold, the Lamb of God!”
37) The two disciples heard him speak, and they followed Yeshua.
38) Yeshua turned, and saw them following, and said to them, “What are you looking for?” They said to him, “Rabbi” (which is to say, being interpreted, Teacher), “where are you staying?”
39) He said to them, “Come, and see.” They came and saw where he was staying, and they stayed with him that day. It was about the tenth hour.
40) One of the two who heard John, and followed him, was Andrew, Simon Peter’s brother.
41) He first found his own brother, Simon, and said to him, “We have found the Messiah!” (which is, being interpreted, Christ).

All that is what the Jews as a people have missed. All the very first flock of Yeshua were Israelites, but most Jews have never found Him. Nearly 2000 years after He came to them, they’re still looking for their messiah. And they plan to build their temple to welcome some other messiah.

This welcoming of a new messiah is not emphasized in the hubbub about the new temple, because it would displease some of the many Christian supporters of the Temple Institute. Personal interviews, though, can be more candid. In the YouTube video, “Donald Trump “THIRD TEMPLE” for whole world,” a member of the new Sanhedrin, speaking English as a second language, commented directly on this messiah and the new temple.

“Every nation will keep its language, its culture, its beliefs – It’s not globalization. It’s to worship one God on Temple Mount.”

Interviewer: “You believe that Messiah ben David is coming to this temple?”

“Messiah Ben David is very soon, and he is a Jew. He is not Jesus.”

At least once before, you may recall, the Jews picked the wrong messiah.

After the Jews rejected the one true Messiah in 30 CE, about a century later they welcomed another messiah with open arms and nine fingers.

This messiah made them cut off a finger to serve in his army. Yeshua’s followers cut off their spiritual foreskins instead of their fingers. This messiah fought Rome. Yeshua did not fight Rome, the prime kingdom of this world, simply because His kingdom is not of this world. This messiah did not rise again when he was killed. Yeshua did. This messiah was not like the Lord of heaven and earth. He was just another warlord.

This messiah that the Jews picked – the wrong one – was Simon Bar Kokhba.

Let’s look at some quotes from our Chapter 58 of The End Time Church, titled “The Missing Messiah”.

“When the Jews revolted against Rome in 132, a bold leader emerged…

New World Encyclopedia – There is little historical information about the early stages of the revolt. It apparently began in 132, when the rebuilding of Jerusalem as a Roman city damaged the supposed tomb of Solomon. According to the ancient historian Cassius Dio, (Roman history 69.13:1-2):

Soon, the whole of Judaea had been stirred up, and the Jews everywhere were showing signs of disturbance, were gathering together, and giving evidence of great hostility to the Romans, partly by secret and partly by open acts; many others, too, from other peoples, were joining them from eagerness for profit, in fact one might almost say that the whole world was being stirred up by this business.

In this situation Simon ben Kosiba emerged as a decisive and effective military and political leader. His surviving letters make it clear that he was in a position of authority among the revolutionary forces by April 132 until early November 135.
New World Encyclopedia, article Simon bar Kokhba, 5/11/19.

Simon the son of Kosiba was not seen merely as a military leader. He was seen by many Jews as the king and messiah they had been waiting for, a messiah who was a human king who would lead them against Rome. Ben Kosiba became their king and gathered an army of 400,000 men, to lead them against Rome.

Originally named ben Kosiba, he was given the surname Bar Kokhba, meaning “Son of the Star,” by the leading Jewish sage Rabbi Akiva, who believed him to be the promised Messiah, ibid.

That rabbi said of Simon ben Kosiba, “This is the King Messiah” (Yer. Ta’anit iv. 68d). That’s the reason he was called – even to this day Bar Kokhba — Son of the Star.

Encyclopedia Judaica says:
The appellation Bar Kokhba was apparently given to him during the revolt on the basis of the homiletical interpretation, in a reference to messianic expectations, of the verse (Num. 24:17): “There shall step forth a star out of Jacob.”…
“Bar Kokhba.” Encyclopaedia Judaica. Encyclopedia.com. (May 11, 2019). https://www.encyclopedia.com/religion/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/bar-kokhba.

Livius.org, a collection of articles on ancient history, said this about the Son of the Star.

According to the Christian church historian Eusebius (c.260-c.340), Simon claimed to be a luminary who had come down to the Jews from heaven (History of the church 4.6.2). On some of his coins and in his letters, he calls himself ‘Prince’ (Nasi), a word that had very strong messianic connotations (cf. Ezekiel 37.24-25 and several Qumran documents). His loyal followers liked to make a pun on his name: his real name was Simon ben Kosiba, but he was usually called Bar Kochba (son of the star), which again is a messianic claim.

Rabbi Aqiba, the president of the rabbinical academy at Yavne and the official religious leader of the Jews in this age, declared that the successful Jewish commander was the Messiah; at least two rabbis – rabbi Gershom and rabbi Aha – agreed…
Livius.org, Wars between the Jews and Romans: Simon ben Kosiba (130-136 CE), 9/30/11.

Maimonides, who lived in the twelfth century and was one of the most respected Torah scholars of the middle ages, wrote this about Simon ben Kosiba, but with still another name, Ben Koziva.

“Rabbi Akiva, the greatest of the sages of the Mishnah, was a supporter of King Ben Koziva, saying of him that he was the king messiah. He and all the contemporary sages regarded him as the king messiah, until he was killed for sins which he had committed” (Maim. Yad, Melakhim, 11:3).

Although sometimes later denied, the belief that Bar Kokhba was the messiah was widespread, supported by “the greatest of the sages” and “all the contemporary sages.” Apparently even the Sanhedrin gave their approval to Bar Kokhba.

The basically authentic statement about a Sanhedrin at Bethar (Sanh. 17b) suggests that at a certain time a bet din participated in Bar Kokhba’s rule.
“Bar Kokhba.” Encyclopaedia Judaica. Encyclopedia.com. (May 11, 2019). https://www.encyclopedia.com/religion/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/bar-kokhba””

That messianic miss with Simon Bar Kokhba seems to be a picture of what happens at the end of this age, when most Jews are again looking for the wrong messiah.

Christ gave an end time warning about false messiahs.

Matt 24 International Standard Version
4) Yeshua answered them, “See to it that no one deceives you,
5) because many will come in my name and say, ‘I am the Messiah,’ and they will deceive many people.

John 5
39) “You search the Scriptures, because you think that in them you have eternal life; and these are they which testify about me.
40) Yet you will not come to me, that you may have life.
41) I don’t receive glory from men.
42) But I know you, that you don’t have God’s love in yourselves.
43) I have come in my Father’s name, and you don’t receive me. If another comes in his own name, you will receive him.

That’s quite a prediction. If another comes as the messiah, the Jews will receive him.

Since Judaism does not accept Yeshua as the perfect sacrifice, they plan to restart animal sacrifices and have already held trial sacrificial services, even without a temple. They do not believe in spiritual circumcision so they still practice physical circumcision. They still wear fringes and prayer shawls and put mezuzahs by their doors, among other physical things left over from the old covenant. What do those physical signs show? They show that they reject Yeshua as their sacrifice, their redeemer, their messiah. They are still waiting for their messiah.

Judaism has long believed that the messiah will come and rebuild the temple, and then the temple services will be restored as before. They have never believed that this will be Yeshua. Now a growing number of Jews want to build a third temple so that the messiah will come to this temple, and restart temple services, and lead the whole world to an era of peace.

They are gaining support for the building of this temple, from people of many different religions, but this fact must never be overlooked —

Judaism wants to build a third temple because they reject the true Messiah. They are looking for another messiah to sit in this temple and be exalted as world ruler. It appears that most of the world will join them in this, rejecting the true Messiah and embracing the false, in the third temple.

The End Time Church: From the Cathedrals to the Catacombs

By Dan L. White

Copyright 2021 by Dan L. White, all rights reserved.

Chapter 92

The Temple not Made with Hands

If God spoke to you, what would you do?

When He spoke, if the mountains trembled, would you?

And when all that happened, would you ask God to please be quiet?

That’s what Israel did, as Mt. Sinai trembled when Yahweh spoke the Ten Commandments.

Exod 20
18) All the people perceived the thunderings, the lightnings, the sound of the trumpet, and the mountain smoking. When the people saw it, they trembled, and stayed at a distance.
19) They said to Moses, “Speak with us yourself, and we will listen; but don’t let God speak with us, lest we die.”

From then on, God spoke to Moses, and Moses spoke to the people. Yahweh spoke the Ten Commandments, then Moses spoke ordinances pointing to those Commandments.

The physical Ark of the Covenant was superseded by the spiritual Ark, the resurrected Messiah, who obeyed the Ten Commandments perfectly.

The physical Temple was superseded by the spiritual Temple, the flock of the Messiah, who overcome their lawless human nature and obey those Commandments.

Also, physical signs were given by Yahweh, through Moses, as reminders to obey the Commandments.

Such as this one.

Luk 8
43) A woman who had a flow of blood for twelve years, who had spent all her living on physicians, and could not be healed by any,
44) came behind him, and touched the fringe of his cloak, and immediately the flow of her blood stopped.

That fringe on His garment came from this episode.

Num 15
37) Yahweh spoke to Moses, saying,
38) “Speak to the children of Israel, and tell them that they should make themselves fringes in the borders of their garments throughout their generations, and that they put on the fringe of each border a cord of blue:
39) and it shall be to you for a fringe, that you may look on it, and remember all Yahweh’s commandments, and do them; and that you don’ t follow your own heart and your own eyes, after which you use to play the prostitute;
40) so that you may remember and do all my commandments, and be holy to your God.

The purpose of that fringe ordinance was to “remember all Yahweh’s commandments, and do them.”

We see there a distinction between the Ten Commandments spoken by Yahweh and the regulations given by God to Moses, who then spoke them to Israel.

Heb 9
18) Therefore even the first covenant has not been dedicated without blood.
19) For when every commandment had been spoken by Moses to all the people according to the law, he took the blood of the calves and the goats, with water and scarlet wool and hyssop, and sprinkled both the book itself and all the people,
20) saying, “This is the blood of the covenant which God has commanded you.”

The fringe, spoken by Moses, was not the same as the Ten Commandments, spoken by Yahweh. The fringe ordinance was given only to remember the Commandments.

Why did Israel need that reminder to obey Yahweh’s Commandments?

Again – “that you don’ t follow your own heart and your own eyes, after which you use to play the prostitute,” Num. 39:15.

The reminder to do good was given because their hearts were bad.

Right before those verses about the fringe is this passage.

Num 15
32) While the children of Israel were in the wilderness, they found a man gathering sticks on the Sabbath day.
33) Those who found him gathering sticks brought him to Moses and Aaron, and to all the congregation.
34) They put him in custody, because it had not been declared what should be done to him.
35) Yahweh said to Moses, “The man shall surely be put to death: all the congregation shall stone him with stones outside of the camp.”
36) All the congregation brought him outside of the camp, and stoned him to death with stones; as Yahweh commanded Moses.

After being given repeated warnings about keeping the Sabbath holy – and every week having double manna the day before the Sabbath! – this man ignored the Sabbath Commandment. The fringe with a blue cord was then given to remember it.

This example also shows the curse of the old covenant – disobey and die.

The human heart is “not subject to God’s law,” Romans 8:7, so no amount of reminders will change that heart, or make a lasting difference. Only a changed heart makes a difference.

However, the human heart, given the way it is, may think fringes are not just a reminder to be righteous, but that the fringes themselves are righteousness. Following such thinking, the bigger the fringes, the more righteous the fringer.

Matt 23
5) But all their works they do to be seen by men. They make their phylacteries broad, enlarge the fringes of their garments,
6) and love the place of honor at feasts, the best seats in the synagogues,
7) the salutations in the marketplaces, and to be called ‘Rabbi, Rabbi’ by men.

A woman was healed when she touched the fringe of Yeshua’s garment. The Pharisees’ fringes were larger and longer than Yeshua’s, yet no one was ever healed touching their fringes.

What does that mean?

It means the fringes had no spiritual effect. No matter how big they were, how long they hung, they were just a physical reminder to obey the Commandments.

If the fringes did have a spiritual effect, then the Pharisees should have healed more people than Yeshua did. Their fringes were bigger! The Pharisees did not heal people, so what difference did their fringes make?

None.

Yeshua’s fringes did not heal the woman. Yeshua had the spirit of the Father. The Pharisees had the spirit of their spiritual father, Satan, (John 8:44). That, not the fringes, was what mattered.

Furthermore, the Pharisees’ fringes were even counterproductive. The external reminder to be righteous was used by the fringers to be unrighteous – “to be seen of men.”

Matt 6
3) But when you do merciful deeds, don’t let your left hand know what your right hand does,
4) so that your merciful deeds may be in secret, then your Father who sees in secret will reward you openly.

Fringes and external physical signs contradict the left hand/right hand principle. The desire to exalt the self is native to the human heart, and external physical signs can feed that desire “to be seen of men.” This is always an issue to be faced when you wear something to show your righteousness.

So Yeshua had the fringe on His garment. Must followers of Christ also wear fringes?

Besides wearing a fringe, Yeshua was also circumcised, had a sacrifice offered for Him at His birth, and ate the Passover lamb. If we must wear a fringe because Yeshua did, must we also be circumcised and eat the Passover lamb because He did?

Yeshua was to be the Passover lamb, yet He and His disciples ate the Passover lamb when they ate the Passover.

Matt 26
17) Now on the first day of unleavened bread, the disciples came to Yeshua, saying to him, “Where do you want us to prepare for you to eat the Passover?”
18) He said, “Go into the city to a certain person, and tell him, ‘The Teacher says, “My time is at hand. I will keep the Passover at your house with my disciples.”’”
19) The disciples did as Yeshua commanded them, and they prepared the Passover.

Until Christ became that Passover lamb, the old covenant was still in effect.

It did not end until the Father accepted Yeshua as the eternal sacrifice. The external physical signs and sacrifices and circumcision were part of the old covenant. That’s why Yeshua participated in those physical things that were part of the old covenant. It continued until He became the sacrifice to end that agreement. The new covenant then replaced the physical ordinances with the spiritual reality.

Heb 9
16) For where a last will and testament is, there must of necessity be the death of him who made it.
17) For a will is in force where there has been death, for it is never in force while he who made it lives.

So Yeshua had to die before the old covenant ended.

Circumcision was given to Abraham long before Moses, but in the new covenant agreement, physical circumcision was superseded by spiritual circumcision.

Rom 2
25) For circumcision indeed profits, if you are a doer of the law, but if you are a transgressor of the law, your circumcision has become uncircumcision.
26) If therefore the uncircumcised keep the ordinances of the law, won’t his uncircumcision be accounted as circumcision?
27) Won’t the uncircumcision which is by nature, if it fulfills the law, judge you, who with the letter and circumcision are a transgressor of the law?

“Circumcision profits, if you are a doer of the law,” Paul wrote. In that case, you will have fulfilled the old covenant and saved yourself. However, if you don’t do the law, then your physical circumcision is spiritual uncircumcision.

All except the Messiah have broken the law. This includes every circumcised male. Therefore physical circumcision is spiritually nothing.

1Cor 7
18) Was anyone called having been circumcised? Let him not become uncircumcised. Has anyone been called in uncircumcision? Let him not be circumcised.
19) Circumcision is nothing, and uncircumcision is nothing, but the keeping of the commandments of God.

In verse 19, circumcision cannot be interpreted as “keeping the commandments of God,” without also including uncircumcision as “keeping the commandments of God.” So the verse has to mean that keeping the Commandments of God is what matters.

1Cor 7 New English Translation
19) Circumcision is nothing and uncircumcision is nothing. Instead, keeping God’s commandments is what counts.

1Cor 7 LBP (ES) Holy Bible from the Ancient Eastern Texts: Aramaic of the Peshitta, (ancient Aramaic translation of the Greek scriptures)
19) For circumcision is nothing, and uncircumcision is nothing, but the keeping of the LORD’s commandments is everything.

Circumcision or uncircumcision is nothing.

Rom 2
28) For he is not a Jew who is one outwardly, neither is that circumcision which is outward in the flesh;
29) but he is a Jew who is one inwardly, and circumcision is that of the heart, in the spirit not in the letter; whose praise is not from men, but from God.

Notice that this applies not just to Gentiles, but also to Jews or Israelites. Physical circumcision was a sign that a man was a Jew, but Paul said that “he is not a Jew who is one outwardly.” A Jew is not someone who has been circumcised. He that is a spiritual Jew is circumcised in the heart, not in the flesh. So neither Gentiles nor Jews need to be physically circumcised. A man may be circumcised for a physical reason, such as purported health benefits. However, physical circumcision is not today commanded by God for anyone, including all Jews or Israelites.

Circumcision was considered the most important physical sign. This is shown by the reaction of a number of early Jewish Christians to circumcision. They could not cut it off, would not give it up.

No uncircumcised males could eat the Passover, Exodus 12:48. In Acts 15, the apostles, elders and brothers all got together to discuss circumcision, because some Jews were so adamant about not giving it up. Over and over Paul had to write against the error of requiring circumcision, such as these verses.

Gal 6 New English Translation
15) For neither circumcision nor uncircumcision counts for anything; the only thing that matters is a new creation!

Titus 1
10) For there are also many unruly men, vain talkers and deceivers, especially those of the circumcision…

Repeatedly, Paul had to warn against requiring circumcision.

Circumcision creates a man-made temple.

The two physical Temples were made with men’s hands. Many men built those buildings. However, Paul told the Athenians that God “doesn’t dwell in temples made with hands,” Acts 17:24.

Notice the parallel with circumcision.

Eph 2
10) For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Yeshua for good works, which God prepared before that we would walk in them.
11) Therefore remember that once you, the Gentiles in the flesh, who are called “uncircumcision” by that which is called “circumcision,” (in the flesh, made by hands);
12) that you were at that time separate from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers from the covenants of the promise, having no hope and without God in the world.
13) But now in Christ Yeshua you who once were far off are made near in the blood of Christ.
14) For he is our peace, who made both one, and broke down the middle wall of partition,
15) having abolished in the flesh the hostility, the law of commandments contained in ordinances, that he might create in himself one new man of the two, making peace;

Notice that what was abolished was ordinances spoken by Moses, not the Ten Commandments spoken by Yahweh.

As with the Temple buildings, physical circumcision is a work of men’s hands. The new Temple is the flock of the Messiah. This flock is not circumcised with men’s hands, but is circumcised by God, when He changes their hearts. God Himself – not men! – builds this new Temple.

Col 21
1) in whom you were also circumcised with a circumcision not made with hands, in the putting off of the body of the sins of the flesh, in the circumcision of Christ;

God builds the new Temple of the body of Christ, and God does the circumcising to allow people to enter. Physical circumcision done by men was useless and was superseded by spiritual circumcision done by God.

Not made with hands!

Paul is the prime example of the futility of physical signs, as he himself described in Philippians.

Phil 3
2) Beware of the dogs, beware of the evil workers, beware of the false circumcision.
3) For we are the circumcision, who worship God in the Spirit, and rejoice in Christ Yeshua, and have no confidence in the flesh;
4) though I myself might have confidence even in the flesh. If any other man thinks that he has confidence in the flesh, I yet more:
5) circumcised the eighth day, of the stock of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews; concerning the law, a Pharisee;
6) concerning zeal, persecuting the assembly; concerning the righteousness which is in the law, found blameless.
7) However, what things were gain to me, these have I counted loss for Christ.

Paul, by the righteousness in the law, was blameless. He was circumcised, wore fringes and phylacteries and offered sacrifices.

But, you know what?

When the Messiah appeared, circumcised, blameless Paul was just as guilty as the other Pharisees.

Israel had waited for Yeshua for over a thousand years, and when the Anointed One came, circumcised, fringed, phylacteried Paul was His enemy. Paul watched the Messiah suffer and die, and Paul persecuted and approved killing the sheep of His flock.

So what good did Paul’s circumcision do?

After he was struck blind and then had his eyes opened, Paul realized that filleting his foreskin had only affected his flesh. Then the spirit of Christ filleted Paul’s heart.

After that, Paul spent the rest of his life opposing the “dogs” of “false circumcision,” as we just read.

Phil 3
2) Beware of the dogs, beware of the evil workers, beware of the false circumcision.

Yahweh says He will punish those who are circumcised in uncircumcision.

Jer 9

25) Behold, the days come, says Yahweh, that I will punish all those who are circumcised in uncircumcision:

26) Egypt, and Judah, and Edom, and the children of Ammon, and Moab, and all that have the corners of their hair cut off, who dwell in the wilderness; for all the nations are uncircumcised, and all the house of Israel are uncircumcised in heart.

Israel was circumcised in uncircumcision. All those guys who yelled “Crucify Him” at Christ’s execution were circumcised, wore long fringes with a bright blue cord, and who knows what else they exhibited – and exhibited is the right word – in their visible religion. The physical signs of circumcision or dangling fringes or head coverings or prayer shawls or phylacteries did not change their human hearts. In their cases, all that physical display actually fed their evil hearts!

“Crucify Him! Crucify Him!” they yelled with their fringes dangling.

Note this –

Since the premier physical sign of circumcision did not continue, none of the other physical signs – whatever they might be said to be – continued, either. It is contradictory to not be circumcised and then wear fringes or other stuff.

If the heart is not changed, circumcision and all other physical requirements are useless.

If the heart is changed, circumcision and all other physical requirements are not needed.

Going back to those old covenant ordinances, as some like to do, might not seem like a big deal.

It is.

Paul says it is a rejection of the Redeemer.

Gal 5
2) Behold, I, Paul, tell you that if you receive circumcision, Christ will profit you nothing.
3) Yes, I testify again to every man who receives circumcision, that he is a debtor to do the whole law.
4) You are alienated from Christ, you who desire to be justified by the law. You have fallen away from grace.
5) For we, through the Spirit, by faith wait for the hope of righteousness.
6) For in Christ Yeshua neither circumcision amounts to anything, nor uncircumcision, but faith working through love.

Being alienated from Christ is absolutely a big deal!

Gal 2
16) yet knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law but through faith in Yeshua Christ, even we believed in Christ Yeshua, that we might be justified by faith in Christ, and not by the works of the law, because no flesh will be justified by the works of the law.

That whole package of physical rituals, spoken by Moses, was an attempt to be justified before God based on what a person did. The big intended lesson of that is –

It didn’t work.

Rom 3
19) Now we know that whatever things the law says, it speaks to those who are under the law, that every mouth may be closed, and all the world may be brought under the judgment of God.
20) Because by the works of the law, no flesh will be justified in his sight. For through the law comes the knowledge of sin.
21) But now apart from the law, a righteousness of God has been revealed, being testified by the law and the prophets;
22) even the righteousness of God through faith in Yeshua Christ to all and on all those who believe. For there is no distinction,
23) for all have sinned, and fall short of the glory of God;

The old covenant agreement included the Ten Commandments spoken directly by God and it included the ordinances spoken by Moses pointing to those Commandments. By the works of the law – by a person’s own individual acts – circumcision, sacrifices, fringes, or even Commandment keeping – no person can make himself righteous before God. All are guilty.

Amazingly –

Having the Commandments spoken directly by Yahweh, and a permanent copy written on rock by His finger, and ordinances pointing to those Commandments –

Even all that did not make anyone righteous before Yahweh.

Rom 3
10) As it is written, “There is no one righteous; no, not one.
11) There is no one who understands. There is no one who seeks after God.
12) They have all turned aside. They have together become unprofitable. There is no one who does good, no, not, so much as one.”

Then the sacrifice of Yeshua, perfect in the law, makes us righteous before the Father. In the new covenant, when we accept Him, we get credit for His righteousness.

2Cor 5
17) Therefore if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old things have passed away. Behold, all things have become new.
18) But all things are of God, who reconciled us to himself through Yeshua Christ, and gave to us the ministry of reconciliation;
19) namely, that God was in Christ reconciling the world to himself, not reckoning to them their trespasses, and having committed to us the word of reconciliation.
20) We are therefore ambassadors on behalf of Christ, as though God were entreating by us: we beg you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God.
21) For him who knew no sin he made to be sin on our behalf; so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.

The Ten Commandments are now written not on tablets of rock, but on tablets of the heart. The physical signs pointing to the Commandments are not needed because the Commandments are already embedded in the Christianos, the Greek word for the first Christians.

Heb 10
16) “This is the covenant that I will make with them: ‘After those days,’ says the Lord, ‘I will put my laws on their heart, I will also write them on their mind;’” then he says,
17) “I will remember their sins and their iniquities no more.”

Christianos have the circumcision of Christ.

Col 2
11) in whom you were also circumcised with a circumcision not made with hands, in the putting off of the body of the sins of the flesh, in the circumcision of Christ;
12) having been buried with him in baptism, in which you were also raised with him through faith in the working of God, who raised him from the dead.
13) You were dead through your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh. He made you alive together with him, having forgiven us all our trespasses,
14) wiping out the handwriting in ordinances which was against us; and he has taken it out of the way, nailing it to the cross;

Like the Temple and the Ark, the physical signs of sacrifices, circumcision, fringes and any other such requirements either real or perceived, were superseded by the spiritual. The first Christianos in Acts were cut to the heart. Paul was cut to the heart when he was struck blind and didn’t eat for three days. That is the circumcision that God wants.

Physical signs, as with Paul and the other Pharisees, did not change the heart. The spirit of Christ in the new covenant can change the heart. A person with a changed heart – that seeks Yahweh God with all his heart and puts himself last – does not need a fringe on his britches.

The physical Ark of the Covenant with its Ten Commandment tablets has not been seen for ~2600 years. The physical Temple has been gone for nearly 2000 years. They have been spiritually superseded by the Messiah and His flock. In the same way, external physical signs pointing to the Commandments are superseded by changed hearts, with the laws of God written on those hearts.

But many people think those physical signs really look religious. We will see more of this in the near future, as another temple is built with hands.

The End Time Church: From the Cathedrals to the Catacombs

By Dan L. White

Copyright 2021 by Dan L. White, all rights reserved.

Scripture quotations are from the World English Bible (WEB) which is in the public domain.

Chapter 91

Old Ark or New Ark?
Old Temple or New Temple?

The Ten Commandment tablets, Aaron’s rod that budded, and a golden pot of manna —

Why were those things in the Ark of the Covenant?

Why not Moses’ sandals that he took off on holy ground? Or a branch of the bush that wouldn’t burn up? That was kinda different.

The Ten Commandments, Aaron’s rod that budded, and the manna were in the Ark because they pictured what would be in the new Ark of the new covenant.

This new Ark is not a chest of wood but a living being. This living being, the King of the Jews, the Word of God, the Messiah, and the new Ark of a new covenant, contains those things which were in the old Ark.

The Commandments, the rod and the manna.

How clever to design the old Ark that way!

Let’s look at how those three things in the old Ark are in the new Ark.

1. The manna —

Heb 9
1) Now indeed even the first covenant had ordinances of divine service, and an earthly sanctuary.
2) For a tabernacle was prepared. In the first part were the lampstand, the table, and the show bread; which is called the Holy Place.
3) After the second veil [curtain] was the tabernacle which is called the Holy of Holies,
4) having a golden altar of incense, and the ark of the covenant overlaid on all sides with gold, in which was a golden pot holding the manna, Aaron’s rod that budded, and the tablets of the covenant;
5) and above it cherubim of glory overshadowing the mercy seat, of which things we can’t speak now in detail.

A golden pot held the manna, which was the bread that kept Israel alive on their journey to the Promised Land.

John 6
31) Our fathers ate the manna in the wilderness. As it is written, ‘He gave them bread out of heaven to eat.’”
32) Yeshua therefore said to them, “Most certainly, I tell you, it wasn’t Moses who gave you the bread out of heaven, but my Father gives you the true bread out of heaven.
33) For the bread of God is that which comes down out of heaven, and gives life to the world.”
34) They said therefore to him, “Lord, always give us this bread.”
35) Yeshua said to them, “I am the bread of life. He who comes to me will not be hungry, and he who believes in me will never be thirsty.

47) Most certainly, I tell you, he who believes in me has eternal life.
48) I am the bread of life.
49) Your fathers ate the manna in the wilderness, and they died.
50) This is the bread which comes down out of heaven, that anyone may eat of it and not die.
51) I am the living bread which came down out of heaven. If anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever. Yes, the bread which I will give for the life of the world is my flesh.”

Did you catch what Yeshua is trying to get across there?

He is the bread of life!

This man is the manna. This food came down from heaven and gives life to those who believe in Him.

2. The rod that budded —

Aaron’s rod budded to show Yahweh’s choice as His priest.

Num 16
1) Now Korah, the son of Izhar, the son of Kohath, the son of Levi, with Dathan and Abiram, the sons of Eliab, and On, the son of Peleth, sons of Reuben, took men:
2) and they rose up before Moses, with certain of the children of Israel, two hundred fifty princes of the congregation, called to the assembly, men of renown;
3) and they assembled themselves together against Moses and against Aaron, and said to them, “You take too much on yourself, since all the congregation are holy, everyone of them, and Yahweh is among them: why then lift yourselves up above the assembly of Yahweh?”
4) When Moses heard it, he fell on his face:
5) and he spoke to Korah and to all his company, saying, “In the morning Yahweh will show who are his, and who is holy, and will cause him to come near to him: even him whom he shall choose he will cause to come near to him.
6) Do this: take censers, Korah, and all his company;
7) and put fire in them, and put incense on them before Yahweh tomorrow: and it shall be that the man whom Yahweh chooses, he shall be holy. You have gone too far, you sons of Levi!”
8) Moses said to Korah, “Hear now, you sons of Levi!
9) Is it a small thing to you, that the God of Israel has separated you from the congregation of Israel, to bring you near to himself, to do the service of the tabernacle of Yahweh, and to stand before the congregation to minister to them;
10) and that he has brought you near, and all your brothers the sons of Levi with you? and do you seek the priesthood also?

Yes, they did seek the priesthood also.

The question was –

Whom had Yahweh chosen to be His holy priest?

Korah and his clan thought anybody could be priests, that they themselves could make themselves holy. And I suspect that Korah would humbly have suggested himself as the high priest, don’t you?

Two-hundred-fifty of the Korah clique offered incense. Aaron the high priest offered his incense. Aaron’s was accepted, theirs was rejected, and they who tried to make themselves holy were instantly buried in a hole in the ground.

But –

Then the people complained about what God had just done!

Did they not see what had just happened to those 250 men who complained?

So God performed another miracle to again show the people whom He had picked for His priest.

Num 17
1) Yahweh spoke to Moses, saying,
2) “Speak to the children of Israel, and take of them rods, one for each fathers’ house, of all their princes according to their fathers’ houses, twelve rods: write every man’s name on his rod.
3) You shall write Aaron’s name on the rod of Levi; for there shall be one rod for each head of their fathers’ houses.
4) You shall lay them up in the Tent of Meeting before the testimony, where I meet with you.

So the rods were laid out before the Ark.

Num 17
5) It shall happen, that the rod of the man whom I shall choose shall bud: and I will make to cease from me the murmurings of the children of Israel, which they murmur against you.”
6) Moses spoke to the children of Israel; and all their princes gave him rods, for each prince one, according to their fathers’ houses, even twelve rods: and the rod of Aaron was among their rods.
7) Moses laid up the rods before Yahweh in the tent of the testimony.
8) It happened on the next day, that Moses went into the tent of the testimony; and behold, the rod of Aaron for the house of Levi was budded, and put forth buds, and produced blossoms, and bore ripe almonds.
9) Moses brought out all the rods from before Yahweh to all the children of Israel: and they looked, and took every man his rod.
10) Yahweh said to Moses, “Put back the rod of Aaron before the testimony, to be kept for a token against the children of rebellion; that you may make an end of their murmurings against me, that they not die.”

Aaron was the priest Yahweh chose to intercede with Yahweh for Israel. His rod grew almonds.

Aaron was not a perfect high priest, though.

Heb 5
1) For every high priest, being taken from among men, is appointed for men in things pertaining to God, that he may offer both gifts and sacrifices for sins.
2) The high priest can deal gently with those who are ignorant and going astray, because he himself is also surrounded with weakness.
3) Because of this, he must offer sacrifices for sins for the people, as well as for himself.

As for Aaron’s sins, remember that little deal with the golden calf?

Hebrews goes on —

Heb 5
4) Nobody takes this honor on himself, but he is called by God, just like Aaron was.
5) So also Christ didn’t glorify himself to be made a high priest, but it was he who said to him, “You are my Son. Today I have become your father.”
6) As he says also in another place, “You are a priest forever, after the order of Melchizedek.”
7) He, in the days of his flesh, having offered up prayers and petitions with strong crying and tears to him who was able to save him from death, and having been heard for his godly fear,
8) though he was a Son, yet learned obedience by the things which he suffered.
9) Having been made perfect, he became to all of those who obey him the author of eternal salvation,
10) named by God a high priest after the order of Melchizedek.

Yeshua was picked by the Father as priest to intercede between the people and the Father, just as Aaron was. Yeshua learned obedience by the things which He suffered, and was “made perfect.” He didn’t need to offer a sin offering for Himself, since He didn’t sin, and He could therefore be a blameless sin offering for us.

With Yeshua as king and high priest, there would be no gradual decline, as there was with the Ark, the Temple, King Saul, the Kingdom of Judah – and the high priests. The earthly high priests went from Aaron, the first, to Caiaphas, one of the last. Aaron was certainly imperfect, but Caiaphas was the one who said, “It is better if one person dies for the people,” John 18:14, CEV.

Aaron’s rod was in the Ark to show Yahweh’s pick as high priest. Yeshua, however, bears far more fruit than Aaron’s almonds. His fruit is the flock of Christianos who, with Christ’s spirit, overcome themselves.

John 15
1) “I am the true vine, and my Father is the farmer.

5) I am the vine. You are the branches. He who remains in me, and I in him, the same bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing.

3. The Ten Commandments –

The Ten Commandment inscribed stones were in the Ark of the old covenant. As Hebrews 9:4 said, they are the “tablets of the covenant.” That is what Israel agreed to obey.

Are the Ten Commandments in the new Ark?

Ps 40
6) Sacrifice and offering you didn’t desire. You have opened my ears. You have not required burnt offering and sin offering.
7) Then I said, “Behold, I have come. It is written about me in the book in the scroll.
8) I delight to do your will, my God. Yes, your law is within my heart.”

Hebrews quotes this as referring to the Messiah.

Heb 10
8) Previously saying, “Sacrifices and offerings and whole burnt offerings and sacrifices for sin you didn’t desire, neither had pleasure in them” (those which are offered according to the law),
9) then he has said, “Behold, I have come to do your will.” He takes away the first, that he may establish the second,
10) by which will we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Yeshua Christ once for all.

“I have come to do your will,” Yeshua said. What is God’s will? God’s will is to obey the Ten Commandments.

Where are the Ten Commandments?

In the heart of the new Ark – “your law is within my heart.”

So the new Ark, in the person of the perfect Messiah, contains manna, the rod that budded, and the Ten Commandments. This new Ark is in the center of the new Tabernacle or Temple. This Tabernacle/Temple is built by God, not by guys.

Heb 8
1) Now in the things which we are saying, the main point is this. We have such a high priest, who sat down on the right hand of the throne of the Majesty in the heavens,
2) a servant of the sanctuary, and of the true tabernacle, which the Lord pitched, not man.

The original tabernacle or tent was built by people, built according to God’s plan, but still with men’s hands. The true Tabernacle or Temple is built by God, displacing and replacing the man-made sanctuaries.

As Paul told the learned, ignorant Athenians —

Acts 17
24) The God who made the world and all things in it, he, being Lord of heaven and earth, doesn’t dwell in temples made with hands,
25) neither is he served by men’s hands, as though he needed anything, seeing he himself gives to all life and breath, and all things.

With the new Ark and the new Temple, there is a new covenant.

Heb 8
6) But now he has obtained a more excellent ministry, by so much as he is also the mediator of a better covenant, which on better promises has been given as law.
7) For if that first covenant had been faultless, then no place would have been sought for a second.
8) For finding fault with them, he said, “Behold, the days come,” says the Lord, “that I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah;
9) not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers, in the day that I took them by the hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt; for they didn’t continue in my covenant, and I disregarded them,” says the Lord.
10) “For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel. After those days,” says the Lord; “I will put my laws into their mind, I will also write them on their heart. I will be their God, and they will be my people.
11) They will not teach every man his fellow citizen, and every man his brother, saying, ‘Know the Lord,’ for all will know me, from their least to their greatest.
12) For I will be merciful to their unrighteousness. I will remember their sins and lawless deeds no more.”

The old Ark had the Ten Commandments, the tables of the covenant. Israel agreed to keep those Commandments, but they had no heart to keep them. What’s more, they had no way out of the death penalty when they broke them. The Ark had a mercy seat, but Israel had no way to claim that mercy.

But that was the deal they agreed to. That was the old covenant.

The new covenant, the new agreement, still contains those Commandments. All 10 are the same as written by Yahweh’s very tough finger. But now there is a way out of the death penalty for breaking a Commandment – “I will remember their sins and lawless deeds no more” – through the intervening service of the new High Priest. The top of the Ark is the mercy seat, and repentant Christianos can claim that mercy.

That’s what the mercy seat is for –

Mercy!

Plus – and this is a BIG plus – those same Ten Commandments are put right into the minds and hearts of the flock, as they are in the heart of the flock’s high priest.

What a great deal!

A way to have Commandment breaking forgiven and a way to have Commandment breaking overcome!

Heb 8
13) In that he says, “A new covenant,” he has made the first old. But that which is becoming old and grows aged is near to vanishing away.

That was written a short time, historically speaking, before the physical Temple did vanish away. The physical Ark had already vanished more than six centuries earlier. The Temple and the Ark had become old and aged, their time had passed, they were superseded. The temporal yielded to the spiritual.

Matt 12
5) Or have you not read in the law that on the Sabbath day the priests in the temple profane the Sabbath and are guiltless?
6) But I tell you that one greater than the temple is here.

What a shocking statement that must have been to those Jewish ears!

When Yeshua said that one greater than the Temple is here, the second Temple was still standing, still functioning, and still had a bit more than 40 years left in its existence. After all, that five hundred year old building, refurbished by Herod the Ingrate, was just a building. What set it apart from all other buildings on earth was not the paneling but the presence of God in its heart.

And God was moving on to the hearts of the new Temple.

Matt 21
12) Yeshua entered into the temple of God and drove out all of those who sold and bought in the temple, and overthrew the money changers’ tables and the seats of those who sold the doves.
13) He said to them, “It is written, ‘My house shall be called a house of prayer,’ but you have made it a den of robbers!”
14) The lame and the blind came to him in the temple, and he healed them.

This contrasts the two Temples. The physical Temple had become a Jewish business, a “den of robbers.” The lame and the blind went to Yeshua in the physical Temple, not realizing they were also going to the Ark of the Covenant in the new Temple – that is, Yeshua the Messiah and His flock.

Eph 2
19) So then you are no longer strangers and foreigners, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and of the household of God,
20) being built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Yeshua himself being the chief cornerstone;
21) in whom the whole building, fitted together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord;
22) in whom you also are built together for a habitation of God in the Spirit.

“…a habitation of God in the Spirit.”

Just as He came down and dwelt in Solomon’s Temple, so God dwells in this new Temple.

2 Cor 6
16) What agreement has a temple of God with idols? For you are a temple of the living God. Even as God said, “I will dwell in them, and walk in them; and I will be their God, and they will be my people.”

Obviously those corrupt high priests appointed by the Romans every few years don’t serve in this new Temple. This new Temple has a new high priest, the opposite of Annas and Caiaphas, who oversaw Yeshua’s trial and execution.

Heb 5
8) though he was a Son, yet learned obedience by the things which he suffered.
9) Having been made perfect, he became to all of those who obey him the author of eternal salvation,
10) named by God a high priest after the order of Melchizedek.

Heb 8
1) Now in the things which we are saying, the main point is this: we have such a high priest, who sat down on the right hand of the throne of the Majesty in the heavens,
2) a servant of the sanctuary and of the true tabernacle which the Lord pitched, not man.

Hebrews tells the flock to give their gifts to this new Temple.

Heb 7
8) Here people who die receive tithes, but there one receives tithes of whom it is testified that he lives.
9) We can say that through Abraham even Levi, who receives tithes, has paid tithes,
10) for he was yet in the body of his father when Melchizedek met him.
11) Now if perfection was through the Levitical priesthood (for under it the people have received the law), what further need was there for another priest to arise after the order of Melchizedek, and not be called after the order of Aaron?
12) For the priesthood being changed, there is of necessity a change made also in the law.

The change, naturally, was that the tithes did not go to the physical Temple, but to the spiritual.

1 Cor 9       
11) If we sowed to you spiritual things, is it a great thing if we reap your fleshly things?
12 )If others partake of this right over you, don’t we yet more?  Nevertheless we didn’t use this right, but we bear all things, that we may cause no hindrance to the Good News of Christ.
13 ) Don’t you know that those who serve around sacred things eat from the things of the temple, and those who wait on the altar have their portion with the altar?
14 ) Even so the Lord ordained that those who proclaim the Good News should live from the Good News.

We have a new Ark, a new Temple and a new high priest. The old priesthood is no more, the Temple that the priests served in is long gone, and the Ark they visited once a year on Atonement has long been missing.

The spiritual reality has replaced the physical illusion.

This physical life that we lead is just a temporary apparition, destined to inevitably disappear in the tick-tock of time. The reality is the spiritual life that is to come, where there is no pain or death. When Christ’s redeemed are resurrected in the spirit, why would we want our old physical bodies?

Young people are good looking, handsome or pretty. A half-century ago I reveled in my Absalomic hair, wavy and full on my head. Now I no longer have hair. I still have my head, but it’s heavily marked with wrinkles, scars and skin cancers. Someday soon, as I press toward the mark of the high calling in Christ, my temporary tent will rot away. (it already has a number of rips.) At the second coming of the King, I will be made a spirit being, unaffected by disease or cancers or death.

At that point, why would I want to go back to the way I am now? Spirit don’t wrinkle.

I won’t want to go back! Why will I need a decaying physical body when I’m a spirit being?

In the same way, followers of Yeshua have a new Temple, with a new Ark of the Covenant, holding the Ten Commandments, the rod that budded, and the bread from heaven. We no longer need the physical apparitions of the temple and the Ark of the Covenant when we have the spiritual reality.

So now the question is –

Since we have a new Ark, will the old Ark of the Covenant be rediscovered?

Maybe, maybe not.

Since we have a new Temple, will another Temple be built?

Looks like it.

So what’s going on here? We have a new Temple with a new Ark, yet another physical Temple is being prepared for construction, and the old acacia wood Ark is being spied out.

What can this mean?

The End Time Church: From the Cathedrals to the Catacombs

By Dan L. White

Copyright 2021 by Dan L. White, all rights reserved.

Scripture quotations are from the World English Bible (WEB) which is in the public domain.

Chapter 90

Finding the New Ark in the New Temple

People have not seen the Ark of the Covenant for over 2600 years, and have not had a Temple to Yahweh for almost 2000 years.

So what?

The first and second Temples were both destroyed. After the first Temple burned, seventy years passed without a Temple. After the second Temple burned, nineteen and a half centuries passed without a physical Temple.

That takes us up to now.

The Jews thought Hadrian was rebuilding the Temple when he was actually building a temple to Jupiter. Julian the Apostate did try to rebuild the Temple, and that effort got nowhere. Apparently apostates don’t make good Temple builders. So for all these centuries, there has been no physical Temple.

Like the physical Temple that was burned into oblivion, might the physical Ark no longer be relevant?

After the second Temple burned in 70, the Jews went to the synagogues with their “rabbis.”

And the Christians?

The early Christians were fine without a physical Temple. Most observed the Bible Feasts where they were, not at the Temple. Later, most Christians went with pagan Rome and wound up keeping the same days as the pagans, just renamed. No one was very concerned about not having a physical Temple or a physical Ark of the Covenant.

There is a future time when the Ark will not even be mentioned or remembered.

Jer 3
16) It shall come to pass, when you are multiplied and increased in the land, in those days,” says Yahweh, “they shall say no more, ‘The ark of the covenant of Yahweh!’ neither shall it come to mind; neither shall they remember it; neither shall they miss it; neither shall it be made any more.
17) At that time they shall call Jerusalem ‘The throne of Yahweh;’ and all the nations shall be gathered to it, to the name of Yahweh, to Jerusalem. Neither shall they walk any more after the stubbornness of their evil heart.

The Ark will not be mentioned or remembered because it represents the throne of Yahweh on earth. At the time of Jeremiah’s prophecy, the throne of Yahweh will be on earth.

But–

As you probably noticed, that hasn’t happened yet.

The Ark of the Covenant has been out of sight for over 2600 years. The second Temple that stood from 516 BCE until 70 CE functioned for nearly six centuries without the Ark. For the last 19+ centuries there hasn’t even been a Temple. Do we even need to wonder where the physical Ark is?

Originally the Ark in the Tabernacle contained the Ten Commandments, a pot of manna and Aaron’s rod. About four centuries later when Solomon put the Ark in the Temple, it held only the Ten Commandments. About five centuries after Solomon, when the second Temple was finished, the Ark itself was missing. About six centuries still later, Rome sacked Jerusalem, and then the Temple itself was gone.

Missing the manna and the rod, then missing the Ark, then missing the Temple –

Do we see a pattern there?

Yes, a pattern of decline.

In the wilderness, the cloud of Yahweh’s spirit came down into the Tabernacle. It rested there when Israel was camped, and rose up and led them when Israel moved. The spirit of Yahweh was right there with them, wherever they were.

Exod 40
34) Then the cloud covered the Tent of Meeting, and the glory of Yahweh filled the tabernacle.
35) Moses wasn’t able to enter into the Tent of Meeting, because the cloud stayed on it, and Yahweh’s glory filled the tabernacle.
36) When the cloud was taken up from over the tabernacle, the children of Israel went onward, throughout all their journeys;
37) but if the cloud wasn’t taken up, then they didn’t travel until the day that it was taken up.
38) For the cloud of Yahweh was on the tabernacle by day, and there was fire in the cloud by night, in the sight of all the house of Israel, throughout all their journeys.

When Solomon finished building the first Temple, that cloud filled the building.

1 Kings 8
4) They brought up Yahweh’s ark, the Tent of Meeting, and all the holy vessels that were in the Tent. The priests and the Levites brought these up.
5) King Solomon and all the congregation of Israel, who were assembled to him, were with him before the ark, sacrificing sheep and cattle, that could not be counted or numbered for multitude.
6) The priests brought in the ark of Yahweh’s covenant to its place, into the inner sanctuary of the house, to the most holy place, even under the cherubim’s wings.
7) For the cherubim spread their wings out over the place of the ark, and the cherubim covered the ark and its poles above.
8) The poles were so long that the ends of the poles were seen from the holy place before the inner sanctuary; but they were not seen outside. They are there to this day.
9) There was nothing in the ark except the two stone tablets which Moses put there at Horeb, when Yahweh made a covenant with the children of Israel, when they came out of the land of Egypt.
10) It came to pass, when the priests had come out of the holy place, that the cloud filled Yahweh’s house,
11) so that the priests could not stand to minister by reason of the cloud; for Yahweh’s glory filled Yahweh’s house.

In that same Temple but much later, Ezekiel was shown these abominations.

Eze 8
1) In the sixth year, in the sixth month, in the fifth day of the month, as I sat in my house, and the elders of Judah sat before me, the Lord Yahweh’s hand fell on me there.
2) Then I saw, and behold, a likeness as the appearance of fire; from the appearance of his waist and downward, fire; and from his waist and upward, as the appearance of brightness, as it were glowing metal.
3) He stretched out the form of a hand, and took me by a lock of my head; and the Spirit lifted me up between earth and the sky, and brought me in the visions of God to Jerusalem, to the door of the gate of the inner court that looks toward the north; where there was the seat of the image of jealousy, which provokes to jealousy.
4) Behold, the glory of the God of Israel was there, according to the appearance that I saw in the plain.
5) Then he said to me, “Son of man, lift up your eyes now the way toward the north.” So I lifted up my eyes the way toward the north, and saw, northward of the gate of the altar this image of jealousy in the entry.
6) He said to me, “Son of man, do you see what they do? Even the great abominations that the house of Israel commit here, that I should go far off from my sanctuary? But you will again see yet other great abominations.”

Those abominations caused Yahweh to go far off from His sanctuary.

Eze 8
3) Now the cherubim stood on the right side of the house when the man went in; and the cloud filled the inner court.
4) Yahweh’s glory mounted up from the cherub, and stood over the threshold of the house; and the house was filled with the cloud, and the court was full of the brightness of Yahweh’s glory.

18) Yahweh’s glory went out from over the threshold of the house and stood over the cherubim.
19) The cherubim lifted up their wings and mounted up from the earth in my sight when they went out, with the wheels beside them. Then they stood at the door of the east gate of Yahweh’s house; and the glory of the God of Israel was over them above.

Eze 11
1) Moreover the Spirit lifted me up and brought me to the east gate of Yahweh’s house, which looks eastward. Behold, twenty-five men were at the door of the gate; and I saw among them Jaazaniah the son of Azzur, and Pelatiah the son of Benaiah, princes of the people.
2) He said to me, “Son of man, these are the men who devise iniquity, and who give wicked counsel in this city;

21) But as for them whose heart walks after the heart of their detestable things and their abominations, I will bring their way on their own heads,’ says the Lord Yahweh.”
22) Then the cherubim lifted up their wings, and the wheels were beside them. The glory of the God of Israel was over them above.
23) Yahweh’s glory went up from the middle of the city, and stood on the mountain which is on the east side of the city.

Yahweh went east to the Mount of Olives and left the Temple, left His sanctuary.

Soon that first Temple was burned. Yahweh was not there. He had left.

A second Temple was finished 70 years later, but the Ark was not in it.  Also the Bible never explicitly says that the cloud of Yahweh’s spirit filled the second Temple.

Yahweh Himself commanded Israel to build that Temple.

Hag 1
8) Go up to the mountain, bring wood, and build the house. I will take pleasure in it, and I will be glorified,” says Yahweh.

Zech 1
16) Therefore thus says Yahweh: “I have returned to Jerusalem with mercy. My house shall be built in it,” …

Nehemiah speaks of a joyful time in that second Temple.

Neh 12
40) So stood the two companies of those who gave thanks in the house of God, and I, and the half of the rulers with me;

43) They offered great sacrifices that day, and rejoiced; for God had made them rejoice with great joy; and the women also and the children rejoiced: so that the joy of Jerusalem was heard even afar off.

But there is no mention of Yahweh’s spirit – the cloud – filling the second temple as it had the Tabernacle and Solomon’s Temple.

The Ark was not in the second Temple and apparently the cloud wasn’t there, either. And as stated, eventually the Temple itself was not there.

Again, we see a pattern of decline.

The Kingdom of Judah also saw a steady decline. The kingdom under David and then Solomon was a glorious kingdom. Nineteen kings later, that kingdom ended in destruction and deportation. After some of the Jews returned from captivity, they were again a nation in the Holy Land, but they were under Gentile kings. The Hasmoneans had a period of quasi-independence, but that ended when Rome conquered Jerusalem. Finally, Rome killed and captured most of the Jews there, so the Jews were no longer even a unified nation and most Jews were not even in the Holy Land.

Steady decline.

Saul’s life had a similar pattern.

First, Yahweh’s spirit came mightily on Saul.

1 Samuel 10
6) Then Yahweh’s Spirit will come mightily on you, then you will prophesy with them and will be turned into another man.

10) When they came there to the hill, behold, a band of prophets met him; and the Spirit of God came mightily on him [Saul], and he prophesied among them.

But when Saul broke the first Commandment by putting himself first instead of God, Yahweh’s spirit departed from Saul and went to David.

1 Samuel 16
13) Then Samuel took the horn of oil and anointed him in the middle of his brothers. Then Yahweh’s Spirit came mightily on David from that day forward. So Samuel rose up and went to Ramah.
14) Now Yahweh’s Spirit departed from Saul, and an evil spirit from Yahweh troubled him.

This resulted in Saul and his dynasty, or family, losing his kingdom, even though Jonathan his son, who would have been the next king, was a kindred spirit with David.

In all those examples we see a pattern of decline, in the Ark and the Temple; in Judah’s kingdom; and in the personal story of the first king of Israel, Saul.

What’s missing there, in all that decline?

What’s missing is Perfection, not gradually getting farther and farther away from Yahweh God Almighty.

Matt 5
48) Therefore you shall be perfect, just as your Father in heaven is perfect.

Yahweh’s spirit had left Saul and moved to David. Finally that spirit was on a descendant of David.

Isaiah 42
42) Behold, my servant, whom I uphold, my chosen, in whom my soul delights: I have put my Spirit on him. He will bring justice to the nations.

Isaiah 61
1) The Lord Yahweh’s Spirit is on me, because Yahweh has anointed me to preach good news to the humble. He has sent me to bind up the broken hearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives and release to those who are bound,

The cloud that was with Israel in the wilderness and in Solomon’s Temple came as a dove.

Luke 3
21) Now when all the people were baptized, Yeshua also had been baptized and was praying. The sky was opened,
22)  and the Holy Spirit descended in a bodily form like a dove on him; and a voice came out of the sky, saying “You are my beloved Son. In you I am well pleased.”

A few years later the cloud also came on the flock that followed that descendant of David.

Acts 2
4) They were all filled with the Holy Spirit, and began to speak with other languages, as the Spirit gave them the ability to speak.

16) But this is what has been spoken through the prophet Joel:
17) ‘It will be in the last days, says God, that I will pour out my Spirit on all flesh.  Your sons and your daughters will prophesy. Your young men will see visions. Your old men will dream dreams.
18) Yes, and on my servants and on my handmaidens in those days, I will pour out my Spirit, and they will prophesy.

This flock is the new Temple. This is where the cloud is, on God’s servants and handmaids, except the spirit did not come as a dark cloud, but as bright tongues of fire.

Acts 2
1) Now when the day of Pentecost had come, they were all with one accord in one place.
2) Suddenly there came from the sky a sound like the rushing of a mighty wind, and it filled all the house where they were sitting.
3) Tongues like fire appeared and were distributed to them, and one sat on each of them.
4) They were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak with other languages, as the Spirit gave them the ability to speak.

A new temple, with a cloud in it, except it was tongues. And what is the focal point of this new Temple?

The focal point of this Temple is the new Ark of the Covenant.

Remember that the Ark was just a wooden box overlaid with gold. A fancy box, to be sure, but it was just a box, something to hold the Ten Commandments, Aaron’s rod, and a pot of manna. The new Temple, with the cloud, has a new Ark or vessel of the Covenant. And this new Ark also contains the Ten Commandments, the rod, and the manna. This new Ark is at the heart of the new Temple, right there with the mercy seat.

The End Time Church: From the Cathedrals to the Catacombs

By Dan L. White

Copyright 2021 by Dan L. White, all rights reserved.

Scripture quotations are from the World English Bible (WEB) which is in the public domain.

Chapter 89

Who Hid the Ark?

The Babylonians didn’t destroy the Ark when they burned the Temple. They didn’t take the Ark to Babylon, either. Yet since that time, the Ark has remained hidden.

Some “rabbis” wrote that Josiah said to hide the Ark in a tunnel —

Under the Temple.

It’s a verse we went over before.

2Chr 35
3) He [Josiah] said to the Levites who taught all Israel, who were holy to Yahweh, “Put the holy ark in the house which Solomon the son of David king of Israel built. There shall no more be a burden on your shoulders. Now serve Yahweh your God, and his people Israel.

Nothing’s said about a tunnel or hiding there, but Jewish religious rulers say this was a command from Josiah to hide the Ark in a subterranean Temple tunnel.

Keil & Delitzsch Commentary on the Old Testament, 2 Ch 35:3
Several Rabbins regard it as a command to remove the ark from its place in the most holy place into some subterranean chamber of the temple, so as to secure its safety in the event of the threatened destruction of the temple taking place. But this hypothesis needs no refutation, since it in no way corresponds to the words used.

“…in no way corresponds to the words used” — In other words, the verse doesn’t say that at all. That doesn’t mean that Josiah didn’t hide the Ark, but he didn’t say it in that passage.

K&D goes on:
Most ancient and modern commentators, on the other hand, suppose that the holy ark had, during the reigns of the godless Manasseh and Amon, either been removed by them from its place, or taken away from the most holy place, from a desire to protect it from profanation, and hidden somewhere; and that Josiah calls upon the Levites to bring it back again to its place. Certainly this idea is favoured by the circumstance that, just as the book of the law, which should have been preserved in [by] the ark of the covenant, had been lost, and was only recovered when the temple was being repaired, so the ark also may have been removed from its place.

So if the priests had removed the Ark in a previous time of trouble, then they might also have moved the Ark because of Babylon’s attack.

Based on that premise, there are multiple ideas on the location of the Ark.

Some claim that the Ark is tucked away in Iraq, the modern site of ancient Babylon. Apocryphal 2 Esdras, apocryphal meaning false, discusses the destruction of the first Temple. It says “the ark of our covenant has been plundered.”

That statement indicates that the Babylonians took the Ark.

However –

2 Esdras is said to have been written not during the time of the first Temple, but after the New Testament was written. Since 2 Esdras was written long after Babylon’s siege, it has no historical value discussing an event seven centuries earlier. The writer may have assumed that the Ark was taken in the attack, but nothing in the Bible shows that Nebuchadnezzar took the Ark to Babylon/Iraq.

Besides, why would Yahweh want to leave his earthly throne in Babylon?

Rev 14:8 WEB
8) Another, a second angel, followed, saying, “Babylon the great has fallen, which has made all the nations to drink of the wine of the wrath of her sexual immorality.”

Whether literal or symbolic, Babylon is not a likely place for God’s throne.

Others claim that the Ark is in Ethiopia, in a Christian church, taken there by the Queen of Sheba during her visit to Solomon. But Josiah put the Ark back into the Temple more than three centuries after that. Plus having the Ark in Ethiopia brings up the same type question as with Iraq.

Did Yahweh want His throne taken to Africa?

The apocryphal 2 Maccabees places the Ark on Mt. Nebo, the mountain where Moses looked over into the land of Canaan and was buried.

2 Maccabees 2:4-7 (New Revised Standard Version, Catholic Edition)
1) One finds in the records that the prophet Jeremiah ordered those who were being deported to take some of the fire, as has been mentioned,
2) and that the prophet, after giving them the law, instructed those who were being deported not to forget the commandments of the Lord, or to be led astray in their thoughts on seeing the gold and silver statues and their adornment.
3) And with other similar words he exhorted them that the law should not depart from their hearts.
4) It was also in the same document that the prophet, having received an oracle, ordered that the tent and the ark should follow with him, and that he went out to the mountain where Moses had gone up and had seen the inheritance of God.
5) Jeremiah came and found a cave-dwelling, and he brought there the tent and the ark and the altar of incense; then he sealed up the entrance.
6) Some of those who followed him came up intending to mark the way, but could not find it.
7) When Jeremiah learned of it, he rebuked them and declared: “The place shall remain unknown until God gathers his people together again and shows his mercy.

If the Ark was hidden in Mt. Nebo, this again would put Ark out of the Holy Land.

Ps 9:11 WEB
11) Sing praises to Yahweh, who dwells in Zion, and declare among the people what he has done.

Ps 50:2 WEB
2) Out of Zion, the perfection of beauty, God shines forth.

If the Ark is in Mt. Nebo, that is out of the Holy Land. Iraq, Ethiopia and Mt. Nebo are all lands of the Gentiles. There is no reason to think that Yahweh wanted the Ark, His throne, to rest for nearly three millennia in a Gentile land. That leads to the conclusion that if the Ark is hidden, it would be in the Holy Land. We must also remember that Maccabees are apocryphal books.

The Talmud also says that the Ark was hidden.

Surely it has been taught: When the ark was hidden, there was hidden with it the bottle containing the Manna, and that containing the sprinkling water, the staff of Aaron, with its almonds and blossoms, and the chest which the Philistines had sent as a gift to the God of Israel, (B. Yoma 52b).

The key phrase there is “when the ark was hidden.” Near the end of the time of the first Temple, the Jews had ample time to hatch a plan to hide the Ark.

Huldah’s prophecy to Josiah, discussed in the previous chapter, showed that the Temple would be destroyed. That gave several decades from that prophecy to plan for removing the Ark.

The Babylonians carried the Temple vessels to Babylon at two different times.

2Kgs 24:10-13 WEB
10) At that time the servants of Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon came up to Jerusalem, and the city was besieged.
11) Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon came to the city, while his servants were besieging it;
12) and Jehoiachin the king of Judah went out to the king of Babylon, he, and his mother, and his servants, and his princes, and his officers: and the king of Babylon took him in the eighth year of his reign.
13) He carried out there all the treasures of the house of Yahweh, and the treasures of the king’s house, and cut in pieces all the vessels of gold, which Solomon king of Israel had made in the temple of Yahweh, as Yahweh had said.

Jehoiachin was the next to last king of Judah, deposed about a decade before the final destruction of the kingdom. As already cited, when Nebuchadnezzar destroyed the Temple in c. 586, he carried away everything that was left.

2Chr 36
18) All the vessels of the house of God, great and small, and the treasures of the house of Yahweh, and the treasures of the king, and of his princes, all these he brought to Babylon.
19) They burnt the house of God, and broke down the wall of Jerusalem, and burnt all its palaces with fire, and destroyed all the goodly vessels of it.

After Jehoiachin’s fall and the loss of some Temple items, that decade gave ample time to lay plans to remove the Ark before the final destruction.

Talmud references cause some to strongly believe the Ark is hidden under the Temple site.

“Where is the Ark of the Covenant?”, by Thomas S. McCall, 1997 Zola Levitt Letter, https://www.levitt.com/essays/ark
Rabbi Shlomo Goren and Rabbi Yehuda Getz, the rabbis in charge of the Western Wall area, are convinced that the Ark has been hidden in a cave in the Temple Mount directly under the site of the Holy of Holies, since the time of King Josiah…

Rabbi Getz believes that in 1982 he was very close, within 40 feet, to finding the cave in which the Ark resides. He was conducting a search in an old tunnel that had been filled with the debris of centuries, which runs perpendicular to the Western Wall and under the Temple Mount. However, when the Moslems discovered that there were diggings being conducted under the Dome of the Rock, they threatened a general riot and the diggings were stopped. The rabbi explains that, for the sake of maintaining peace with their Moslem neighbors, the Israelis had to reseal the entrance to the tunnel, and it remains blocked up to this day.

Archaeologist Leen Ritmeyer has done research on the Temple Mount and inside the Dome of the Rock. He says he has established the site of the Holy of Holies.

jewishvirtuallibrary.org/the-ark-of-the-convenant
He claims to have found the spot on the Mount where the Holy of Holies was located during the First Temple period. In the precise center of that spot is a section of bedrock cut out in dimensions that may match those of the Ark as reported in Exodus…Based on his findings, Ritmeyer has postulated that the Ark may be buried deep inside the Temple Mount.

Another researcher claims the lost Ark of the Covenant is not lost at all.

Jerusalem Post, “The Enigma of the Lost Ark of the Covenant”, By Harry Moskoff, September 10, 2017
I wrote a book (“The ARK Report”) based on 25 years of research on the Jewish perspective, where I quote primary sources from the Bible and the Talmud, with Midrashic and Haggadic references throughout. What I found is something compelling. I found that the Ark was not “lost” as many assume. In fact, it has been situated in the same place for all this time. Reminiscent of that great Disney movie with Nicholas Cage, National Treasure, this particular priceless Jewish treasure is about 4 stories (15m) underneath the present-day surface of the Temple Mount, to the southwest of the Dome of the Rock. Any biblical archaeologist worth his/her salt will tell you that there are over 45 known tunnels underneath the Temple Mount, with several entrances that may lead to this subterranean area…

The fact is, approximately 35 years before the destruction of the First Temple in 586 BC, King Josiah ordered that the Ark be brought into a special (what I call) “off-site” chamber that King Solomon had built as part of the original plan for the Temple, as found in a special Temple scroll that was given to him by his father King David, and the prophets Samuel and Nathan (II Chronicles 35:3). After happening upon an ancient Torah scroll of his ancestors, the righteous King Josiah foresaw that the Temple would be destroyed, and ordered the Ark’s placement into this secret chamber well before Jerusalem was even being threatened. Nobody knew that the Holy of Holies would then be empty, except for the King himself, the High Priest at that time, and some other priests that helped place it into the chamber below…

The Rambam (Maimonides) quotes the Talmud in a number of places that state that the Ark was buried “in its place” and for “generations after generations,” and “to this very day” (I Kings 8:8) in the warren of tunnels beneath the Temple Mount. In fact, according to my theory, directly beneath the Holy of Holies.

The Temple Institute, dedicated to building a third Temple, says that the Ark is hidden, but not lost, because they know where it is.

Temple Institute, “Where Is the Ark of the Covenant Located?” https://templeinstitute.org/frequently-asked-questions/
In reality, the expression “lost” ark is not an accurate description for the Jewish people’s point of view – because we have always known exactly where it is. So the Ark is “Hidden,” and hidden quite well, but it is not lost…. This location is recorded in our sources, and today, there are those who know exactly where this chamber is. And we know that the ark is still there, undisturbed, and waiting for the day when it will be revealed.

The key phrase there is “waiting for the day when it will be revealed.”

David wanted to build the first Temple as a place to house the Ark. If the Ark should be found, that would give enormous impetus to the drive to build a third Temple.

Let’s summarize.

1. Was the Ark destroyed by the Babylonians?

• No. They even carried out pieces of brass so they certainly would have preserved a gold covered chest had they found it.

2. Was the Ark carried to Babylon?

• No. Since what the Chaldeans took is carefully listed, taking the Ark would certainly have been mentioned. It is not.

3. Was the Ark secretly carried to another nation, like Ethiopia or Iraq/Babylon?

• No. The Ark belonged in Israel. Just as it did not stay with the Philistines, it was not meant to stay in Ethiopia or Babylon.

If the Ark was not destroyed, or taken to a Gentile country, then where could it possibly be?

1. It is hidden in Israel.

But there is one more alternative.

Like the Temple that was twice burned and has been gone for nearly 2000 years, might the physical Ark no longer be relevant?

The End Time Church: From the Cathedrals to the Catacombs

By Dan L. White

Copyright 2020 by Dan L. White, all rights reserved.

Scripture quotations are from the World English Bible (WEB) which is in the public domain.

Chapter 88 

The Ark —
Burned, Babylon, or Buried?

After the Babylonian invasion, the Ark of the Covenant was never again mentioned in the Hebrew scriptures.

So how important was the Ark, anyway?

Well, it was almost like it was the throne of God or something.

The Ark led Israel through the wilderness, it led Israel across the dammed up Jordan River, and it led Israel around Jericho when that city was de-walled. The Ark, where the cloud of Yahweh’s presence rested in the Holy of Holies, was enormously important. Yet after Babylon conquered Judah and destroyed Solomon’s Temple, nothing more is said about that Ark.

What happened to the Ark?

Was it destroyed by the Babylonians?

Was it carried away by the Babylonians?

Or was it hidden from the Babylonians?

By Josiah’s time, the book of the law – amazingly! — was lost.

Hezekiah’s father Ahaz was a godless reprobate. Hezekiah’s son Manasseh filled Judah with wickedness, until he was captured and repented. Hezekiah’s grandson Amon was perverse in his ways. Needless to say, those bad guys did not take care of the Temple.

Then came Hezekiah’s great-grandson Josiah. From his youth, he was a God seeker.

2Chr 34
1) Josiah was eight years old when he began to reign; and he reigned thirty-one years in Jerusalem.
2) He did that which was right in the eyes of Yahweh, and walked in the ways of David his father, and didn’t turn aside to the right hand or to the left.
3) For in the eighth year of his reign, while he was yet young, he began to seek after the God of David his father; and in the twelfth year he began to purge Judah and Jerusalem from the high places, and the Asherim, and the engraved images, and the molten images.

Josiah began to seek God and he knew that idols were wrong. To some extent, though, he didn’t really know what he was seeking, because nobody knew where the book of the law was. So Josiah was trying to be obedient — without knowing exactly what to obey.

Then Hilkiah found the book of the law.

2Chr 34
14) …Hilkiah the priest found the book of the law of Yahweh given by Moses.

Who was Hilkiah?

Hilkiah was the father of the prophet Jeremiah.

Jer 1
1) The words of Jeremiah the son of Hilkiah, of the priests who were in Anathoth in the land of Benjamin:
2) to whom the word of Yahweh came in the days of Josiah the son of Amon, king of Judah, in the thirteenth year of his reign.
3) It came also in the days of Jehoiakim the son of Josiah, king of Judah, to the end of the eleventh year of Zedekiah, the son of Josiah, king of Judah, to the carrying away of Jerusalem captive in the fifth month.

Hilkiah was high priest during Josiah’s reign, and Jeremiah began to serve as a prophet at the same time.

So Hilkiah found the book of the law, and that book was originally placed by the Ark of the Covenant.

Deut 31
24) It happened, when Moses had made an end of writing the words of this law in a book, until they were finished,
25) that Moses commanded the Levites, who bore the ark of the covenant of Yahweh, saying,
26) “Take this book of the law, and put it by the side of the ark of the covenant of Yahweh your God, that it may be there for a witness against you.

Josiah was the fifteenth of nineteen kings over Judah. By his time, the four centuries old Temple was ignored, neglected, and in disrepair; and no one could even remember where the book of the law was. Even the high priest didn’t know where it was!

So Josiah had workers repair and clean the Temple. In that process, Hilkiah found the book of the law.

Where was it when Hilkiah found it?

Elliott’s Commentary for English Readers:
Josephus makes Hilkiah find the book in the treasure-chamber of the Temple which he had entered to get gold and silver for making some sacred vessels. According to Rabbinical tradition it was found hidden under a heap of stones, where it had been placed to save it from being burnt by king Ahaz.

Some “rabbis” said the book of the law was hidden during Ahaz’ time. But Ahaz was Hezekiah’s father, and Hezekiah knew the laws that Yahweh had commanded Moses.

2Kgs 18
6) For he joined with Yahweh; he didn’t depart from following him, but kept his commandments, which Yahweh commanded Moses.

One of the first things that Hezekiah did was to return to keeping the Feasts. That means that Hezekiah knew the law, so either he had the original book of the law, or a copy. So it does not seem that the book of the law was hidden in Ahaz’ time. It must have been lost after Hezekiah’s time.

Hezekiah’s son Manasseh filled Judah with wickedness. Then his son Amon followed the evil part of Manasseh’s life and not the good part after Manasseh’s repentance. Somehow during the reign of those two evil kings between Hezekiah and Josiah, the book of the law and much of the knowledge in it was lost. Josiah did not know to keep the Feasts that his great-grandfather Hezekiah had restored, among other things.

When Josiah ordered the cleaning and restoring of the Temple, that’s when Hilkiah rediscovered the book of the law.

But where was the Ark of the Covenant?

After the Temple was repaired, Josiah told the Levites to put the Ark in the Temple.

2Chr 35
3) He said to the Levites who taught all Israel, who were holy to Yahweh, “Put the holy ark in the house which Solomon the son of David king of Israel built. There shall no more be a burden on your shoulders. Now serve Yahweh your God, and his people Israel.

At some point the Ark had been moved out of the Temple.

Why?

First, the Ark may have been removed simply because the Temple was being repaired.

Bullinger’s Companion Bible says that the Ark “had probably been removed during the reparation of the Temple.”

Barnes’ Notes says “The ark of the covenant may have been temporarily removed from the holy of holies while Josiah effected necessary repairs.”

That’s quite logical. They took the Ark out of the Temple during their work, and put it back when they were done.

Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible agrees with that, but brings up another possibility.
…these put the holy ark in the house which Solomon the son of David king of Israel did build; which some think was removed from thence by Amon, and an idol put in its room, which is the greater trespass he is said to be guilty of, 2 Chronicles 33:23 others, that it was privately removed by the high priest in idolatrous times, and laid up in some secret place for the preservation of it; but rather the truth is, that it had been removed by the order of Josiah, for the sake of the repairs of the most holy place; and this being done, he orders it to be replaced…

The Bible does not say why the Ark was removed from the Temple.

Notice Josiah’s words again.

“Put the holy ark in the house which Solomon the son of David king of Israel built. There shall no more be a burden on your shoulders.”

That does not sound like they recently removed the Ark while working on the Temple. Josiah’s words seem to indicate the Ark had not been in the Temple for some time. If the Levites had only moved the Ark to make way for the workmen, it doesn’t seem as if they would have been carrying the Ark around, other than to move it out and in. Out and in would not have been a lengthy burden on their shoulders.

When Hilkiah found the book of the law, no mention is made of the Ark.

The Temple was defiled in the reigns of Manasseh and Amon, the two kings between Hezekiah and Josiah.

John Trapp Complete Commentary, 2 Ch 35:3
“Under Josiah’s direction, Hilkiah the priest recently had found the copy of the Law of Moses in the temple. Now we learn that under the apostate administrations of the previous kings, Manasseh and Amon, apparently the holy ark had also been removed from the temple. Now, King Josiah directed that it be returned to its rightful place.

i. It shall no longer be a burden on your shoulders indicates that the ark was not at “rest” in the holy place of the temple. The time was long overdue to return it to its rest.

ii. “The Hebrews tell us, that the priests in those idolatrous times had carried the holy ark out of the temple – that it might not stand there among those heathenish idols – and conveyed it to the house of Shallum, who was uncle to the prophet Jeremiah, and husband to the prophetess Huldah.”

Manasseh made major changes in the Temple, to say the least.

2Chr 33
3) For he [Manasseh] built again the high places which Hezekiah his father had broken down; and he reared up altars for the Baals, and made Asheroth, and worshiped all the army of the sky, and served them.
4) He built altars in the house of Yahweh, of which Yahweh said, “My name shall be in Jerusalem forever.”
5) He built altars for all the army of the sky in the two courts of the house of Yahweh.

Manasseh’s altars were still in the Temple when Josiah ruled.

2Kgs 23
12) The king [Josiah] broke down the altars that were on the roof of the upper room of Ahaz, which the kings of Judah had made, and the altars which Manasseh had made in the two courts of the house of Yahweh, and beat them down from there, and cast their dust into the brook Kidron.

Manasseh stuck Baal right in the Temple.

2Chr 33
7) He set the engraved image of the idol, which he had made, in the house of God, of which God said to David and to Solomon his son, “In this house, and in Jerusalem, which I have chosen out of all the tribes of Israel, will I put my name forever:

When Manasseh put an idol in the house of God, where would he have put it?

How about in the Holy of Holies?

When Roman emperor Hadrian, c. 135 CE, put a statue of himself in what had been Jerusalem, he put it where the Holy of Holies had been. Kinda like – stick this up your nose, Yahweh. In the same way, Antiochus Epiphanes, at the time of the Maccabees in c. 168 BCE, set up a statue of Zeus in the Holy of Holies.

Manasseh may have done the same with his statue of Baal. After all, his purpose at the time was to insult Yahweh. At the very least, he put an idol in the Temple and the most logical place for a Baal worshiper was in the Holy of Holies.

Manasseh’s son Amon ruled for only two years. Amon did not pick up Manasseh’s later repentance but followed Manasseh’s earlier paganism.

2Chr 33
22) He did that which was evil in the sight of Yahweh, as did Manasseh his father; and Amon sacrificed to all the engraved images which Manasseh his father had made, and served them.
23) He didn’t humble himself before Yahweh, as Manasseh his father had humbled himself; but this same Amon trespassed more and more.

Again, Josiah’s comment about “burden on your shoulders” seems to indicate that for some time the Ark had not been in the Holy of Holies and had not been in its permanent place. Some ‘rabbi’ writings say that during the two year reign of Josiah’s father Amon, the Ark was taken out of the Temple. As Gill’s Exposition says, “some think [the Ark] was removed from thence by Amon, and an idol put in its room…”

If an idol was put in the Ark’s room that means the idol was put in the Holy of Holies. The Temple was so disrespected that the book of the law was lost, so the Ark would also be disrespected. Perhaps the priests then moved the Ark away from Baal.

Again we notice Trapp’s Commentary cited earlier.

John Trapp Complete Commentary, 2 Ch 35:3
“Under Josiah’s direction, Hilkiah the priest recently had found the copy of the Law of Moses in the temple. Now we learn that under the apostate administrations of the previous kings, Manasseh and Amon, apparently the holy ark had also been removed from the temple. Now, King Josiah directed that it be returned to its rightful place.

i. It shall no longer be a burden on your shoulders indicates that the ark was not at “rest” in the holy place of the temple. The time was long overdue to return it to its rest.

ii. “The Hebrews tell us, that the priests in those idolatrous times had carried the holy ark out of the temple – that it might not stand there among those heathenish idols – and conveyed it to the house of Shallum, who was uncle to the prophet Jeremiah, and husband to the prophetess Huldah.”

Josiah got rid of the pagan altars and any leftover idol worship relics. Then he put the Ark back in its place in the restored Holy of Holies. If the Ark had been removed from the defiled Temple and kept elsewhere for a while, the same thing might have been done later, just before the Temple was destroyed.

When the book of the law was found, Josiah realized Judah was in big trouble with Yahweh for breaking God’s laws. He asked the prophetess Huldah what would happen. Huldah did not hold back.

2Kgs 22
16) “Thus says Yahweh, ‘Behold, I will bring evil on this place, and on its inhabitants, even all the words of the book which the king of Judah has read.
17) Because they have forsaken me, and have burned incense to other gods, that they might provoke me to anger with all the work of their hands, therefore my wrath shall be kindled against this place, and it shall not be quenched.’”
18) But to the king of Judah, who sent you to inquire of Yahweh, thus you shall tell him, “Thus says Yahweh, the God of Israel: ‘Concerning the words which you have heard,
19) because your heart was tender, and you humbled yourself before Yahweh, when you heard what I spoke against this place, and against its inhabitants, that they should become a desolation and a curse, and have torn your clothes, and wept before me; I also have heard you,’ says Yahweh.
20) ‘Therefore, behold, I will gather you to your fathers, and you shall be gathered to your grave in peace, neither shall your eyes see all the evil which I will bring on this place.’”’” They brought back this message to the king.

Because Judah had burned incense to other gods, Yahweh’s wrath would be kindled against that place.

Jeremiah added to that prophecy.

Jer 7:11-14
11) Is this house, which is called by my name, become a den of robbers in your eyes? Behold, I, even I, have seen it, says Yahweh.
12) But go now to my place which was in Shiloh, where I caused my name to dwell at the first, and see what I did to it for the wickedness of my people Israel.
13) Now, because you have done all these works, says Yahweh, and I spoke to you, rising up early and speaking, but you didn’t hear; and I called you, but you didn’t answer:
14) therefore will I do to the house which is called by my name, in which you trust, and to the place which I gave to you and to your fathers, as I did to Shiloh.

The Tabernacle with the Ark of the Covenant had long been at Shiloh. After the Philistines killed Eli’s sons and captured the Ark, the Ark never went back to Shiloh. So long, Shiloh! 

The prophecy through Huldah was that the Kingdom of Judah would definitely be destroyed, but it would be after Josiah’s passing. So King Josiah knew that sometime after him, the Temple would be destroyed.

Less than 25 years after Josiah died, Nebuchadnezzar led the Babylonians in its destruction.

jewishvirtuallibrary.org/the-ark-of-the-convenant

The Ark remained in the Temple until its destruction at the hand of the Babylonian empire, led by Nebuchadnezzar. What happened to it afterward is unknown, and has been debated and pondered for centuries. It is unlikely that the Babylonians took it, as they did the other vessels of the Temple, because the detailed lists of what they took make no mention of the Ark. According to some sources, Josiah, one of the final kings to reign in the First Temple period, learned of the impending invasion of the Babylonians and hid the Ark. Where he hid it is also questionable – according to one midrash, he dug a hole under the wood storehouse on the Temple Mount and buried it there (Yoma 53b). Another account says that Solomon foresaw the eventual destruction of the Temple, and set aside a cave near the Dead Sea, in which Josiah eventually hid the Ark (Maimonides, Laws of the Temple, 4:1).

During the reign of the last king, Jeremiah prophesied that Jerusalem would lose all its treasures.

Jer 20
5) Moreover I will give all the riches of this city, and all its gains, and all the precious things of it, yes, all the treasures of the kings of Judah will I give into the hand of their enemies; and they shall make them a prey, and take them, and carry them to Babylon.

This is the detailed list of what the Babylonians took.

2Kgs 25
8) Now in the fifth month, on the seventh day of the month, which was the nineteenth year of king Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, came Nebuzaradan the captain of the guard, a servant of the king of Babylon, to Jerusalem.
9) He burnt the house of Yahweh, and the king’s house; and all the houses of Jerusalem, even every great house, burnt he with fire.
10) All the army of the Chaldeans, who were with the captain of the guard, broke down the walls around Jerusalem.
11) Nebuzaradan the captain of the guard carried away captive the residue of the people who were left in the city, and those who fell away, who fell to the king of Babylon, and the residue of the multitude.
12) But the captain of the guard left some of the poorest of the land to work the vineyards and fields.
13) The Chaldeans broke up the pillars of brass that were in the house of Yahweh and the bases and the bronze sea that were in the house of Yahweh, and carried the brass pieces to Babylon.
14) They took away the pots, the shovels, the snuffers, the spoons, and all the vessels of brass with which they ministered.

They took all those pieces of brass and bronze, and pots and shovels, and even the snuffers and spoons. If they had taken the Ark, that surely would have been mentioned.

And if the Ark had been in the Temple, they surely would have taken it. If you’re going to take a snuffer, then you’d surely take the gold-covered throne of God. Snuff said.

2Chr 36
18) All the vessels of the house of God, great and small, and the treasures of the house of Yahweh, and the treasures of the king, and of his princes, all these he brought to Babylon.
19) They burnt the house of God, and broke down the wall of Jerusalem, and burnt all its palaces with fire, and destroyed all the goodly vessels of it.

When it says they destroyed all the goodly vessels, that refers to the palaces and not “the treasures of the house of Yahweh,” which were “brought to Babylon.”

But the Babylonians didn’t take the Ark. It wasn’t there in the Temple.

When a succeeding king of Babylon pulled out the Temple furnishings for a drunken party in Daniel 5, the Ark was not there.

When Cyrus allowed the Jews to return to rebuild the Temple and returned the captured Temple furnishings to them, the Ark was not there.

When the second Temple was built by Zerubbabel, the Ark was not there.

Josephus said that when the Roman general Pompey conquered Jerusalem in 63 BCE, he entered the Holy of Holies in this second Temple, and Roman historian Tacitus said that Pompey was amazed at what he saw in the room.

What did he see?

Nothing. Just an empty room. The Ark was not there.

More than a century after that, Titus destroyed the second Temple. The Arch of Titus, which still stands in Rome, shows Romans carrying items taken from this Temple. It pictures the menorah, the table of showbread, and silver trumpets, but the Ark is not pictured. They did not take it. It wasn’t there.

Again, the Ark was extremely important to Israel. It led them through the wilderness and into the Promised Land. Yet after Babylon conquered Judah and destroyed Solomon’s Temple, nothing more is said about that Ark.

Was the Ark destroyed by the Babylonians?

No. They did not destroy the treasures of the house of God. They took them home with them.

Was the Ark carried away by the Babylonians?

No. The Babylonians took everything they could get their hands on. They snitched the snuffers, but they did not find the Ark.

Was the Ark hidden from the Babylonians?

Well, if they didn’t find it, then obviously it was hidden.

This seems to be the only option left. If the Ark was not destroyed, and if it wasn’t captured, then obviously it was hidden, some place, somehow, by somebody. This may be similar to the Ark perhaps being removed from the Temple before Josiah’s time.

When Jerusalem and the Temple were destroyed, the Ark was not destroyed by Babylon, the Ark was not carried away by Babylon, so somehow, somewhere, the Ark was hidden from Babylon.

Who might have done that and where did they put it?