Hasmonean? Nah, I’m Broke

Summary

The Lord of Spirits Podcast

Episode 116: Hasmonean? Nah, I’m Broke

Date: May 23, 2025
Hosts: Fr. Andrew Stephen Damick & Fr. Stephen De Young
Topic: The Seen and Unseen World in Orthodox Christian Tradition

Episode Overview

This episode concludes a three-part series on the history of Israel, focusing on the often-overlooked period between the Babylonian exile and the New Testament era. The Fathers trace the fate of Judah after Babylonian exile, the rise and fall of the Hasmonean dynasty, the origins of Pharisees, Sadducees, and other Second Temple Jewish groups, leading up to St. Paul’s vision of “all Israel” in the Church. The episode explores how the union of the seen and unseen takes shape in the formation of Judaism and Christianity, addressing prevailing misconceptions and drawing out the implications for Orthodox Christians today.

---

Key Discussion Points and Insights

1. Recap & Setting the Stage

• The series so far has taken listeners from Abraham to the dual kingdoms and their respective exiles. This episode starts with Judah in Babylonian exile and covers the so-called “400 silent years” between the Old and New Testaments.
• [05:02] Fr. Andrew: “Tonight, everyone, we are going to conclude our three-part series on the history of Israel...we begin with Judah in the Babylonian exile, singing the songs of Zion in a strange land. So what happens next?”

The "400 Silent Years"—Myth and Reality

• The “silent years” is a Protestant invention rather than a neutral fact of history.
• The period is full of religious literature and historical activity, including the Maccabean books and the development of key Jewish institutions.

[07:06] Fr. Stephen: “You just quoted First Maccabees as though it were scripture. As though it were true. Yeah, authoritative... That’s not really a thing. The history of Israel continued. Things happened between the end of Nehemiah and the beginning of the New Testament.”

2. From Exile to Return: Empires and Restorations

The Neo-Babylonian and Persian Shifts

• Babylonian exile was intended to dissolve Judah, like Assyria did the northern tribes—but God’s providence intervened.
• Cyrus of Persia practices pluralism and allows exiled Judeans to return, but most remain in diaspora (Egypt, Babylonia, elsewhere in the Persian Empire).
• He’s portrayed as a “deal-maker,” using coalitions, marriages, and generous local autonomy instead of Assyrian brutality.

[17:28] Fr. Stephen: “Cyrus comes from Persis...but Cyrus manages to unite the people...great at making deals...One of the things that facilities this is he’s very good at administration. He creates a massive bureaucratic state...He standardizes what's called Imperial Aramaic...That Aramaic is Imperial Aramaic.”

Diaspora: An Enduring Reality

• Many Judeans never return but create vibrant diaspora cultures (Babylonian and Alexandrian Judaism).
• Notably, the Alexandrian Jews built an alternative ‘embassy’ temple in Egypt (Leontopolis), showing early pragmatic adaptations to the loss of the Temple.

[29:03] Fr. Stephen: “The central area of Leontopolis is still called Tell Yehudi...meaning the Hill of the Jews.”

The Second Temple and Lingering Disappointment

• Returned Judeans rebuild Jerusalem and dedicate the Second Temple, but the Shekinah—God’s manifest glory—does not return as in earlier biblical episodes.
• This lack creates sustained religious tension and longing for greater fulfillment.

[36:03] Fr. Andrew: “They rededicate it, something doesn't happen...That must have been pretty disappointing...Is God still mad?” [37:13] Fr. Stephen: “But the people soldier on. But this creates this tension...very incomplete...not really the fulfillment.”

3. Judaism in Diaspora: Synagogues & New Identities

Emergence of Synagogues and the Shift in Practice

• With Temple worship impossible for most, synagogues arise as local centers of prayer and study—no sacrifices, but a “way of life.”
• The difference between being a "Judean" (ethnic/geographic) and practicing “Judaism” (Torah observance everywhere), and how this confuses ancient pagans.

[43:40] Fr. Stephen: “If you're from Thrace...living in Phrygia...you would worship both the gods of your ancestors and the gods of the land. But the Jews refused...That was not a thing that happened.”

Practical and Theological Innovations

• Diaspora Judaism learns to maintain religious life without the land or temple; emphasis grows on the Torah and community faithfulness.
• This primes Jewish communities for the post-70 AD era, but also marks the significant break between ancient Israelite religion and Second Temple Judaism.

[52:42] Fr. Stephen: “Ancient Israelite religion and Second Temple Judaism are not the same. And...some of the big significant changes.”

4. Enter the Greeks: Alexander, Antiochus, and Hellenism

Alexander the Great and the Division of Empires

• Alexander conquers, but dies young, leaving his empire divided: Ptolemies (Egypt), Seleucids (Asia), others.
• Antioch (in Syria) becomes a major Jewish city; rivalries and cultural mixing fuel later Christian history.

[98:50] Fr. Stephen: “At the time of its establishment, one third of the population of Antioch [is] Jewish...Antioch, Alexandria, Jerusalem: sounding familiar?”

Antiochus IV and the Maccabean Revolt

• Antiochus IV "Epiphanes" persecutes Jews for refusing Hellenistic religious practice; the abomination of desolation.
• Maccabean revolt led by the priestly Hasmoneans restores the Temple (origin of Hanukkah); the Hasmoneans soon become kings and combine the roles of king and high priest—against Torah and precedent.

[105:54] Fr. Stephen: “His attack is on Eudaismos. His attack is on their way of life. He wants to break them, of keeping Torah and have them worship the Greek gods like everyone else.”

Martyrdom and the Evolution of Jewish Faith

• The Maccabean martyrs’ stories create the theological framework for martyrdom seen later in Christianity (voluntary self-offering as atonement).

5. The Hasmonean Dynasty: Corruption and Reaction

From Deliverers to Tyrants

• Hasmonean rulers become increasingly corrupt, merging kingship and priesthood.
• Their political machinations include forced conversions, destruction of the Samaritan temple, and alliances with Rome and Sparta.
• The dynasty ends in violent power struggles and intrigue, paving the way for Roman intervention, Herod, and the tetrarchs.

Rise of the Pharisees and Sadducees

• Pharisees emerge as a reaction to Hasmonean corruption: set apart, Torah loyalists, champions of the synagogue system.
• Sadducees derive from Hasmonean high priests; they seek power, not spiritual revival.

[128:47] Fr. Stephen: “Their ideology is simple. Their ideology is we’re supposed to be following the Torah...what God wants us to do and what we need to do, if we want him to send the Messiah and intervene…and remove the curse from us, and do all these things, is we need to keep the Torah.”

Pharisees: Not the Bad Guys!

• The hosts stress that the Pharisees are not simply “the villains” of the New Testament. Jesus criticizes their hypocrisy and pride, not their theology.
• Their spiritual emphasis on Torah faithfulness will provide the root for both rabbinic Judaism and Christianity.

[125:07] Fr. Stephen: “The Pharisees are not the bad guys...Christ never says they’re even wrong about anything.”

6. Israel and the Nations: St. Paul’s Vision

The Restoration of Israel: Prophecy Fulfilled in Christ

• Restoration of Israel in the prophets is not just a gathering of exiles, but a resurrection (Ezekiel 37).
• Prophets foresee Gentiles ("the fullness of the nations”) being joined to Israel—not conversion to “Judaism” as the Pharisees understood, but inclusion in God's inheritance.

[175:23] Fr. Stephen: “This is what it has to be, resurrected from the dead. That’s what needs to happen for Israel to be restored. There needs to be a resurrection.”

Romans 9–11: One Olive Tree

• St. Paul uses the olive tree metaphor (Romans 11): Israel is not replaced, nor is the Church a separate “tree.”
• Unfaithful branches (unbelieving Jews, old Israel) are cut off, but can be grafted in by faith; wild branches (Gentiles) are grafted in, but don’t replace the natural.
• The “fullness of the gentiles” (“melo ha-goyim”) alludes back to biblical promises to Ephraim and the patriarchs (Genesis 48).
• Israel = faithful remnant + faithful among the nations in the Messiah.

[194:47] Fr. Stephen: “Sorry, dispensationalists, there’s only one olive tree...This is one, one. One olive tree.”

The Unity of God’s People

• Christianity does not “replace” Israel, nor set up a parallel. It is the restoration and fulfillment of what Israel was to be.
• This is not a “Plan B” but the flowering of promises going back to Abraham.

7. Modern Relevance and Warnings

• The Fathers warn against Hasmonean-ism in our own era—movements that mistake the kingdom for something to be seized violently, or by human politics, whether through Zionism, Christian nationalism, or secular ideologies.
• The proper Christian stance is “be a Pharisee”—meaning, in the best sense, keep the faith, be set apart by righteousness, not by violence or control; await God’s action.

[218:11] Fr. Stephen: “Our world is full of Hasmoneans. Zionism...evangelical Christians...Christian nationalists...national socialism...On and on, what all of these ideologies have in common, they all have in common with the Hasmoneans: We’re going to get God to intervene. We’re going to establish justice. We’re going to usher in the kingdom...all these programs and plans always degenerate into violence...Be a Pharisee! The Pharisees were the good guys...You do that in the midst of all the turmoil...That is the important message, that Spirit of the Hasmoneans is not the Holy Spirit.”

---

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On the “Silent Years”
  [07:06] Fr. Stephen: "You just quoted First Maccabees as though it were scripture. As though it were true...That's not really a thing."

• On Synagogues
  [47:59] Fr. Stephen: “This is what gives birth to synagogues. You’re not going to see anything about synagogues in the Torah.”

• On Hanukkah
  [119:26] Fr. Stephen: “This is where Hanukkah comes from...They only have enough oil for one day, but miraculously it lasted for eight days.”

• On Pharisees
  [125:07] Fr. Stephen: “The Pharisees are not the bad guys in the New Testament...He says they sit in Moses’ seat, do whatever they tell you.”

• On Romans 11
  [194:47] Fr. Stephen: “Sorry, dispensationalists, there’s only one olive tree...There’s not two.”

• Modern Hasmonean Warnings
  [218:11] Fr. Stephen: “Our world is full of Hasmoneans...Be a Pharisee. The Pharisees were the good guys...in the face of all the turmoil."

---

Key Timestamps for Major Segments

| Timestamp | Segment Description | | -------------- | ------------------------------------------------------------ | | 05:02 | Recap and Outline: “Conclude our three-part series on Israel”| | 17:28 | Cyrus’ approach to Empire, and how the Exile ends | | 29:03 | Diaspora Jewish communities in Egypt and Babylonia | | 36:03 | Disappointment at Second Temple’s dedication | | 47:59 | Emergence of synagogues, Judaism beyond the land | | 98:50 | Jewish Antioch and its later role in Christianity | | 105:54 | Antiochus IV, persecution, and the beginning of Hanukkah | | 125:07 | Rehabilitation of the Pharisees’ historical reputation | | 175:23 | Ezekiel 37 and restoration of Israel as resurrection | | 194:47 | The Olive Tree in Romans 11, and what it means | | 218:11 | Modern applications—warning against Hasmonean spirit |

Final Thoughts

The episode affirms that the story of Israel is the story of the Church; the New Covenant is the flowering, not the replacement, of the Old. The temptation to “make the world right” through politics, violence, or ideology is persistently rebuked in Israel’s history—with the way of faithful “Pharisaism” (righteous, humble obedience, waiting on God) set forth as the true pattern for the people of God.

[214:03] Fr. Andrew: “…It’s the same covenant from God from the beginning. It’s not Plan B...If you’re a non-Jewish Christian, you’re one of those wild olive branches that have been grafted into the natural olive tree…”

[221:12] Fr. Stephen: “The answer is not to start a counter movement…Rather than trying to overcome evil with good...The Spirit of the Hasmoneans is not the Holy Spirit.”

---

This summary covers all the major topics and arguments while preserving the hosts’ tone, humor, and natural flow, providing a useful guide for those who haven’t heard the episode or wish to review its substance.

Transcript

[Narrator]

He will be a staff for the righteous with which for them to stand and not to fall. And he will be the light of the nations and the hope of those whose hearts are troubled. All who dwell on the earth will fall down and worship him. And they will praise and bless and celebrate with song the lord of spirits. First Enoch, chapter 48, verses 4 through 5. The modern world doesn't acknowledge, but is nevertheless haunted by spirits, angels, demons and saints. In our time, many yearn to break free of the prison of a flat secular materialism, to see and to know reality as it truly is. What is this spiritual reality like? How do we engage with it? Well, how do we permeate everyday life with spiritual presence? Orthodox Christian priests, Father Andrew Stephen Damick and Fr. Stephen DeYoung host this live call in show focused on enchantment in creation, the union of the seen and unseen as made by God and experienced by mankind throughout history. Welcome to the Lord of Spirits.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Christ is risen. Good evening, you giant killers, dragon slayers, gougers of gangrenous golems. You are listening to the Lord of Spirits podcast and this is episode 116. My co host, Father Stephen DeYoung, the quixotic questing beast of the quicksand, is with me, straight from the swamp in Lafayette, Louisiana. And I'm Father Andrew Stephen Damick in Emmaus, Pennsylvania, perched precariously atop the arcane tower of podcasting, hovering dozens, dozens as it were, of stories above a disused gateway to the underworld. And we are live. And if you're listening to us live, you can call us at 855-237-2346 and you can talk to us and we'll get your calls in the second half of the show. And Mike Flash in the pan Dagan will be taking your calls if he can figure out how to press all the buttons and turn all the knobs and push all the faders.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Also, if you're. Also if you're listening to us live.

I really feel like we need a soundboard on the show just so when we have a lead in like the one we just had, we can drop, you know. And now for something completely different.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Oh, yes, you know, I have at home, you know, someone when I was out and about on one of my speaking engagements, someone gave me a goat, like a little toy goat that when you press it makes a screaming goat sound. And that I think would be fantastic for this show.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

I don't know if it would have the same effect that I'm going for, though. I'm just, I'm trying to avoid our listeners getting whiplash.

There's kind of a lot of feminine energy going on there.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

And then, wow. With it. Screaming goat or.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And then all of a sudden. No, no, no. In the previous show. And then now us. Right, like.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Oh, the previous show. Yes.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah, that's what I'm saying. Right. We need. We need some kind of segue.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

I mean, it sounded. I mean, yeah, we were told, you know, make sure you get a good therapist. I mean, that's probably good advice for a lot of people.

But this is not your therapy, everybody. This is. No, this is why you go to therapy.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yes, I have sent several people to therapy, I'm pretty sure over the course of my life. Teachers, vice principals.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

But, you know, if you're not checked into rehab or therapy or whatever, set aside the first weekend in October for the Lord of Spirits conference in the Antiochian Village. We have sold out all the rooms at the village, but there are lots of commuter tickets available, so you can get a room somewhere else nearby and drive in. You may not. You may not, as some people apparently attempted. I don't know. Or at least we heard that they were going to attempt to. You may not camp out in the parking lot. That is not okay.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

But there's like. There's a lot of, like, open land around there, man.

I. I think you could. There are places you could squat. That's all I'm saying. There's a lot.

That part of Pennsylvania. There's probably a lot of abandoned buildings.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

That is probably true. That is really true.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

So anyway, if you do find a place to.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

To rest your. Your weary head, you can go to store.ancient faith.com events and. And get your ticket. So it's gonna be a lot of fun. I've already seen.

I'll say this. I've seen Father Steven's title and his blurb for the talk he's going to give. And the title is longer than the blurb.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah. Part of that too, you should know, is I have no idea what I'm going to talk about yet. I just wrote something.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

See, I know. I got your number when I filled out the form. I know.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

I think I now have an idea what I'm going to talk about. But that may change between trying to.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Make Ellie's life hard. Ellie, one of the most competent human beings in the known universe to run.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

I was trying not to make her life hard. I was trying to send her the form in a timely fashion.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Very good.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And in order to do that, I had to just, you know, Go with something I know. Fill in that blank. It was required. It was a required field. Little red thing appeared. Required field.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yep, yep. So, yep. Required field with a little asterisk. The little red bits.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yes. So I had to put something.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Tonight. Tonight, everyone, we are going to conclude our three part series on the history of Israel. In our first part, we followed Israel from its prehistory in Abraham to its birth in the Exodus to the giving of the Torah. And in the second part, we covered the formation of Israel as a kingdom, including some gigantomachy. Everyone was very excited. And then the breakup into two kingdoms, Israel and Judah, and finally its dissolution in the exiles. So with this final chapter, then we begin with Judah in the Babylonian exile, singing the songs of Zion in a strange land. So what happens next?

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

I don't know. Because the Old Testament kind of ends there.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

That's right. There's 400 silent years. Were you raised with that idea? I mean, you're raised dust reform. But did they have this idea of 400 silent years between Malachi and Matthew?

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Basically, I was never really taught that.

By the time anybody got into it, it was always from the perspective of, here's why those Catholic books aren't in the Bible. Right, right, right. There was never sort of just a neutral like, oh, hey, there's just this period of time between the Testaments. It was more polemical than that, shall we say? Yeah, you know, Dutch people are more pugnacious than average or anything.

Right. So we, we. Let's. Well, let's, let's pause there for a second because I like, there is a beautiful irony there. Okay, Right. And I mean actual irony, not Elinus Morissette irony.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Thank you.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

In that.

The. When they say, well, why are you saying there's 400 silent years? Why are you saying that there's no, no scripture written during this time? And you get this quote from first Maccabees that in those days there was no prophet in the land.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yes, we'll see.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

There's a famine of prophecy in the land. And so there's no scripture writing. And I'm like, but you just quoted one Maccabees as though it were scripture. As though it were true. Yeah, authoritative.

So, yeah.

It'S interesting.

But yeah, so, yeah, that's not a.

That'S not really a thing. Right. So obviously the history, regardless your perspective on the canon of scripture, without going down that rabbit hole too far, obviously the history of Israel continued. Right. Things happened between the end of the book of Nehemiah and the beginning of The New Testament. Yeah, that's pretty obvious when you start reading the New Testament and all of a sudden there are all these Pharisees and Sadducees and synagogues and.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. Which just seems to sprout up out of nowhere, apparently.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah. And all these Jewish people with names that you don't recognize from the Old Testament. Right.

If you don't know anything about that, you're gonna find out about that tonight. Stay tuned.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Settle in, everybody.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah, there will be. Yeah, this. This episode. This episode is gonna be. So the last couple episodes, we're talking about stuff that we've talked about before that lots of people have talked about before, but we were kind of coming at it from another angle and ruining your Sunday school. Right.

Tonight's episode, there's going to be a lot more just, hey, here's some information you probably don't know and have never heard. There's going to be sort of a lot more of that as we sort of fill in. Fill in some of this history.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

A lot of narrative this time around.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah, yeah. And we're going to go through a whole dynasty of kings.

So when last time on Lord of.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Spirits.

As he sweeps through the flashback montage.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah.

At the end of our last episode, right. As Father Andrew mentioned, we left off with Judah going into exile, Assyria having wiped out the northern kingdom of Israel.

And people, we talked about what the expectation was, right? How. How were the people understanding that the greater promises to Abraham, of which the land had been a sign, but sort of the greater, larger promises of Abraham would finally be. Would finally be fulfilled. Right. What were they expecting to happen? What were they expecting to change? What were they expecting to come? And to just kind of summarize that, summarize the point, this is basically the same summary as we ended with last time, right.

That God was going to act decisively in history to establish the order that's described in the Torah.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Remember, the Torah was given as an ought. That was who Israel was supposed to be.

That's never who they actually were. They never lived up to it. That's why the destruction of the northern kingdom and the exile of Judah happen. Right? But now God is going to take action to make that real, and he's going to take that action through a messiah, Right. Through a messianic king. A king after the pattern, after the type of David. Right. And who is a descendant of David.

And he is going to. That intervention through the messianic king is going to establish his kingdom. It's going to establish justice, the justice described in the Torah. It's going to restore Israel, both the northern and southern kingdoms. And we'll get into that more as we go on tonight and free the people from the curse of the Torah. Remember the curse that's literally the curses enunciated in the Torah for not having kept it. Yeah, right. Under which the people were languishing in exile. So this is. This is what they're hoping for. This is what they're expecting to come.

And now we begin tonight with tonight the harrowing conclusion. Um.

We'Re going to. Sorry, what? Okay, so what actually happens now? This is their expectation. How does history sort of unfold? So Judah had been taken in. We talked more about the Assyrians last time, but Judah had been taken into exile by actually the Neo Babylonian Empire. We just refer to Babylon, but remember, they're the Neo Babylonian Empire. They're the New Babylonian empire in the 6th century BC because.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, because in the Assyrian. The Assyrians took the northern part.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Right, right. And the original Babylonian empire, this is Hammurabi and the Amuru. This is back in the Bronze Age, that fell apart in the Bronze Age collapse. So this is the Neo Babylonian empire, which is begun by Nabopolassar.

Babylon becomes ascended again. He begins to take action, move toward conquering Nineveh, then the Assyrian Empire, and then going from there. But all of this really comes to fruition, and the empire is established by Nabopolassar's son, Nebuchadnezzar, AKA Nebuchadrezzar, AKA Nabu Kaduru Utzur.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Coming to Nazor.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

I feel like the Greek.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

A young geezy. Oh, no, wait, no, that's not real.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

They just keep adding syllables. Yeah.

In. In Veggietales, it's. It's Drezer, as I recall. I think. Oh, nezzer Nezer.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

That's more accurate. Nezzer nabu kaduru utser. Which means something like holy soul of Naboo. Naboo being one of the Babylonian gods.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, good work, Dave.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Not just a planet with Gungans. Anyway.

So who.

He's really. Right. And he, of course, becomes a major figure in scripture because of his interactions with God. Right. And we talked about that more. Go back to our episode on Mad Men. Not the Jon Hamm show, but yeah, actual men who have gone mad. Among whom was Nebuchadnezzar. We talk more about that.

But the Neo Babylonian empire.

As glorious as it may have been, did not last very long.

This is another one of those time frame things we talked about the relatively small period of time that Israel and Judah existed in the world.

The Neo Babylonian Empire was around for about a century.

That was about it. We will talk more about who came next in a minute.

But we tend to. So we have in our heads that what happened to the northern kingdom and what happened to the southern kingdom are sort of fundamentally different things.

Right?

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Because the northern kingdom was wiped out and Judah just went into exile. Okay. But we're looking at that with hindsight.

Through the lens of the scriptures. What actually happened, of course, was the Assyrians sure massacred a lot of people. Right. But they didn't kill literally everybody.

They slaughtered, massacred a whole lot of people. But then they took a big group of those people to Assyria and relocated them.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

In particular villages. And over the course of about a century, we see in the Assyrian records, the Hebrew names disappear.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

So they just intermarry and dissolve culturally into Assyria, which was the goal. That was the purpose for relocating them. And as we talked about last time, other people were relocated to Samaria and the area around it.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Samaria having been the capital of the Northern kingdom. They're going to become the Samaritans. More about the Samaritans tonight also.

And so.

There was this forced relocation, essentially an exile. Right. And so don't be confused. Nebuchadnezzar at the time, he takes. I mean, he killed a whole lot of people in Judah.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And when he took those people to Babylon into exile, he was planning, at least at that point. Now, he repented of things later. Right, we know. But he also died and was replaced by another Babylonian emperor who was not so keen.

He was not intending to send them back. At some point.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. There was no sense of like, oh, God has told me to take these people into exile for their chastisement.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah. For 70 years and then send them back. Right. The Neo Babylonian empire never sends them back. Okay.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

The next people, it doesn't last. So they were planning on doing the exact same thing that the Assyrians did to the Northern Kingdom.

From the Babylonian side. Now, God didn't let that happen in the case of Judah. So the difference is God intervenes to for the sake, as the scriptures say over and over again of his servant David. God intervenes to make the exile a temporary thing. And that intervention happens through the aforementioned next guy, who is Cyrus the Great, the first emperor of the Persian Empire, to be more specific, the Achaemenid Empire. Because there are other Persian empires later in history.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

The main one you hear about being the Sassanid Empire. But.

So the, the.

Cyrus comes from Persis, which is where Persia gets its name. Right. Which was actually a little province in what's now southern Iran in the middle of the northern coast of the Persian Gulf.

You could look up a map, the interwebs, the Googles.

And you will see that I'm correct.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

But anyway, I would say. Or just pull out the atlas of the ancient near east that everyone has under their bed.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Well, you should.

So. But Cyrus manages to.

Unite the people of Persis and get them on the road to conquest. And that involves not just obviously you say, well, how could, I mean that seems like a rather small group of people. How could you conquer that much territory? He doesn't, just, he, he does not operate according to the kind of principles the Assyrians or even the Babylonians used. He's, he's great at making deals. Oh, so he goes to the tribes of the Medes.

Right. And these other people groups surrounding him and unites them under his rule.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

So he is.

Not just a sort of conqueror, he is also a coalition builder.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

I see. I mean, is he, is he paying them off or is he saying we can go to fortune and glory if you.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

All kinds of things like that, Marriages. Right. Like all up and down the line. Like. He's good at this.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

So Cyrus the Great is very different than a lot of these other figures that we've already talked about and that we're going to talk about next time like, or later on tonight, like Alexander the Great. Right.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

In that he's, he's not great in the same way.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah, he's, he's, he's a great general. Right. He does win a lot of battles. Right. He does defeat the Babylonian Empire, for example, eventually. But.

What he's, what he's very good at is this kind of coalition building and building infrastructure.

So the, the first Persian Empire here is more like the Roman Empire in that regard. One of the things that facilitates this is he's very good, very good at administration. He creates a massive bureaucratic state. He standardizes what's called Imperial Aramaic, the language that we think of as Aramaic, that parts of the Hebrew Bible are actually written in like big chunks of Daniel and Ezra.

That Aramaic is Imperial Aramaic. That is the standardized language of the Persian Empire.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And spreads that Aramaic over a vast swath of the world.

Right. His successor, Darius if you're fancy, or Darius if you're not Darius, or a Hootie fan.

Kind of takes the empire to. Well, we mostly. It's apogee. And at its height, right. The Achaemenid Empire controls like Egypt and northern Libya. Controls. Doesn't get Greece. Goes for Greece, doesn't get Greece. Persian wars, we know about that. But gets Thrace up above Greece, so into Eastern Europe all the way across a big chunk of what was then part of India that's now modern Pakistan, all the way over to there. Afghanistan. Right. All of what's Iran, Iraq. Right. The Arabian Peninsula. Right. This vast swath of territory and actually is able to administer it very successfully.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. It's one thing to take out rulers and subject the peoples and whatever, but it's something else entirely to actually run the place.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah. And. And the Persians are going to be the reason why there are these groups in Eastern Europe and around the Baltics who use Aramaic for centuries thereafter. Yeah, Right. They're spreading the. That language around an Aramaic over into, like I said, Pakistan, India over in that direction.

So.

Cyrus's character here becomes very important. Right. So Cyrus.

Takes a very different approach to the people under his rule. Whether conquered or bargained for or treated with or however they ended up part of the Persian Empire.

Famously, he would send emissaries, Right. This is the whole scene in 300, which obviously is not a super realistic portrayal, but some of the basic facts are correct in that he would send emissaries, Right. With salt and with things. And the emissaries would basically he would just call on these to submit to the Persian Empire and explain, here are all the good things. Right. They will come to you if you become part of this empire. Because he really did have things to offer.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, sure.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

In terms of infrastructure, wealth, trade. Right. All kinds. I mean, he had all these things to offer.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Whatever the Persians have done for us.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah. He would offer the kings positions as heads of satraps of provinces and stuff. Right. He didn't just. He wasn't like, kill them all. Right. And make a show of it. Like the Assyrians, it was, you know, you could have this exalted position. You're still going to govern your territory. You're just going to be governing under me. Right. Like, yeah. So it was he. He always tried that first. Now got to be fair also. Not just he, not just Cyrus, but his successors, even Xerxes. And so artist Xerxes, who's. I swears.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

But anyway.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

They. They always try that first now. But we have to be fair. If you said no, they would then come and conquer you. Right. Then they said to the military, right. And take you. Take it by force. And then the king gets his head chopped off and then, right, things go bad. But this is the whole scene in 300 where the guy comes to give these terms to Sparta, right. You know, oh, here's all the goosey surrender and he gets kicked down the well. Right. Like the famous scene.

Yeah. So the Greeks kind of started that, but on the other hand, they were kind of being extorted at the same time.

But even that gives you a view that Cyrus and his successors had a different.

Had a different maybe and maybe even, we might say, more practical approach to expanding and governing their empire. Right. It wasn't about conquest and defeat and grinding people's faces into the ground like the Assyrians. And they didn't. And Cyrus didn't feel the need to sort of expunge all of the different people groups. Right. As long as they submitted to his authority, that was fine.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. He was. He was cool with the coalition. Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

It's kind of like the papacy. No.

But too soon.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Father Stephen.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

As long as you come under his authority, he'll let you do your thing. Right.

Tough.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

So fair.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And so he takes this approach, really, with the Jewish exiles, right. The Judahite exiles who he has. And.

Traditionally this happens in part. They come and appeal to him.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And make an appeal to him.

Because he had, by that point, acquired the territory that had been Judah. Right. So it's still part of his empire.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And came and presented to him. We're not rebelling against you. We're not trying to leave your empire. We want to remain your subjects. We just want to go back and live where we came from.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And be your happy, obedient subjects there instead of here.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And we just want to. We'll be over there in the corner. We want to, you know, practice our way of life religiously and everything. Right. But we're not going to be any bother to you.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

We'll offer sacrifices on your behalf to our God. Right. We'll do all these nice things. Right. And traditionally also showed him some passages in the Hebrew scriptures that referred to him.

Possibly even by name.

That were already written at that point to.

Sort of get on his good side. Right. Of, you know, our God has chosen you to be the one who returns us right, to our land. And Cyrus does it.

Right? Cyrus does it. He allows.

Permits. Those verbs are important. The Judah exiles who want to. To return to the land that had been Judah.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

This.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Right. He allows that to happen. Now, the reason I keep saying allows permits is not everyone is going to go back there.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, Right. A Lot of people are probably like, look, this is where I live now. You know, for generations we've lived here.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

I have a life here. I have a job, I have house. You know, my kids are here.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Right. And the most significant, I mean, it was 70 years. Right. So you've got. It's a couple generations of people. There are people who have been born and lived their whole life somewhere else. Yeah, right. You have never lived in Judah.

And so the big significant groups in that category.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Are first, when you read Jeremiah, there's a large group of Judahites centered around Jerusalem. A lot of them, the wealthier folks who sort of believed Jeremiah's prophesying and saw the writing on the wall that Jerusalem was going to fall to the Babylonians and made plans to go to Egypt to move to Egypt. Jeremiah did not want them to do that. They wanted him to come to. He refused to do that. They shanghaied him. That's why. Super politically correct now to say.

But it's too late now. I already said it. So they shanghaied him and took him to. Took him to Egypt anyway. And.

Those folks settled in an area called Leontopolis, which was sort of, in our modern terms, a suburb of Alexandria.

And.

The central area of Leontopolis is still called Tell Yehudi.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Wow. Really?

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

In Egypt to this day.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Wow. This is interesting.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

The hill of the Jews.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And so there was this large community there. And in those 70 years, they had set down roots and continued to set down roots. And so Alexandrian Judaism is a particular form of Judaism comes into being there. Philo of Alexandria will later be a famous example of. Of Alexandrian Judaism.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And at the time, of course, it isn't Alexandria because Alexander hasn't come through yet, but. Right, right, yeah, yeah, yeah. But they're just in this area. Right. That's going to be Leontopoulos. And eventually down the road. It's a while down the road from this. It's a couple hundred years after the exile, but they're eventually going to take over a temple of bastard.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Which God or goddess is that? Which cat. Which. That cat head.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Okay, yes, yes. Who is also the. The God they worship in Wakanda.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

How about that?

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Anyway.

So.

But yeah, so Bast, who's the. This cat God? There was a disused temple of Bast. It was actually an obelisk shape that they took over and turned into a Jewish temple. And that Jewish obelisk temple in Leontopolis was there on tell Yehudi until A.D. 73.

Meaning there were three years after the destruction of the temple in Jerusalem, where that was the only Jewish temple in the world.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And the reason it was destroyed was that Rome told the governor to tear it down because the temple of Jerusalem had become this hub for rebellion. He didn't want the same thing to happen in Egypt.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And for the record, that was not a temple. The way they viewed that temple, it's kind of interesting.

They did not think it was another temple like the one in Jerusalem. They use the psalm verse about God having an altar of incense in Egypt to justify it.

But they saw it as sort of a satellite temple.

Like it wasn't the real temple, but it was sort of like an embassy or an extension of the temple in Jerusalem. So they would send their tithes and offerings to the temple in Jerusalem and make pilgrimage there when they could from Alexandria. But for sort of day to day stuff.

They would go to this, this one in. In Leontopoulos.

As if it was sort of an outpost. So it's kind of an interesting dynamic.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, that's interesting.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Judaism.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

This kind of. Because of the idea that like, you're only supposed to actually do sacrifices in Jerusalem, but.

There'S this portal to Egypt.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Well, yeah, well. And I mean, keep in mind, right, like we're saying that, you know, yes, the Torah is super clear. You're only supposed to offer sacrifices in Jerusalem. But the Northern Kingdom had been offering sacrifices all over the place. Bethel and its whole existence. Right. So it's not like this is some radical thing different than anything any Israelite or Jewish person had ever considered. I mean.

It'S low grade in terms of violating the commandment, at least historical precedent. Right.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

So there's at least. There's no golden calf there. Right. Like, there's no, you know.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right. Could be way, way worse.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

So. So Alexandria Judaism, because of the thing. Because a lot of them stay. Right. The other major group, like significant group coming out of this is there are a whole lot of people who. Of. Of Judah. Exiles who stay in Mesopotamia.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And lay the roots for what becomes Babylonian. What do I call Babylonian Judaism? There's a reason why the Babylonian Talmud is called the Babylonian Talmud.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

So there's this significant Jewish community, Right. Still about. In that part of the Persian Empire that just remains where they are.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

I mean, you see the books of Daniel and Esther.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, yeah, exactly. I mean, I was gonna say. And even to this day, there are communities of Jews that live in various parts of the Middle east.

Who. They trace their, their. They trace their roots back to like this period yeah, Justify.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Like, that's not a weird claim. That's legit, Right.

And then, of course.

You also get people settling in.

Parts of the Levant that weren't technically part of Judah before. Right. So you get people who come back and settle in around the Sea of Galilee and stuff that had belonged to other tribes in the Northern Kingdom and that kind of thing.

Because that freedom to return to Judea also included. They had kind of freedom to travel within the Persian Empire. So you get small groups of Judah, right, Exiles who just go various. Go and live various places. Right. Within the Persian Empire for various reasons, you know, having to do with work and trade and commerce and all kinds of things.

Maybe, you know, whether the arthritis was acting. I don't know.

So. So.

You do, however, have this significant group that goes back to what had been Judah. And when they get there.

They set about rebuilding the temple and the city.

Nehemiah, of course, right. There's everything about rebuilding the city wall right around Jerusalem. Because even though this is all Persian Empire now, there's all kinds of people groups and nomadic tribes and all kinds of people living around in that area now. Right.

And the. So the defense of the returning Judah exiles was important. And of course, rededicating the temple. And so they do rededicate the temple. That temple is the second Temple, after which this period is named. Second Temple period.

But when they rebuild that temple and.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

They rededicate it, something doesn't happen.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Right? The stories that we read in Leviticus about the Tabernacle and in First Kings, and I think it's at the end of 1 Chronicles about the dedication that might be beginning of Second Chronicles about the dedication of the temple.

Those where there's this. The. The Theophanic glory cloud appears and fills the tabernacle or fills the temple, the glory of the Lord. And there's this visible.

Theophany, right? There's this visual. Visual manifestation of God and his presence there. That doesn't happen when they dedicate the.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Second Temple, which, I mean, that must have.

Been pretty disappointing. You know, like, wait, is this real?

Is God still mad?

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Right. Cue all the possible things. Did we do it wrong?

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Did we need to. Did we zig where we should have zagged?

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right?

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Did we say the wrong words? Did we use the wrong recipe for anointing oil?

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Or incense.

But I mean, ultimately the people soldier on. But this creates this tension, right? So the Hebrew scriptures themselves refer to Cyrus as the Messiah.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, Right, right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And we talked about. Go back and listen to our Messiah episode.

In this Period. They didn't necessarily think there was only going to be one messiah.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yes, yes. Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

The Messiah Ben David. The Messiah, the son of David. Right. Is the one we're usually talking about. But there were other ide about other messiahs and messianic figures going around.

But you can see, right. So in a certain sense, okay.

The exile's kind of over because a lot of us are back here in the land.

And we've got the temple back and this king, this great king over the known world has intervened on our behalf.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And God was working through him to do this. And this is kind of the kind of stuff we were expecting to happen, but very incomplete.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. So kind of Messiah ish kind of stuff.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Like this is the beginning of something.

Right. But not really the fulfillment. Right. Not the end. Right. Like there's. There's more here to do. Right.

That hasn't happened yet.

But so all of these communities then sort of soldier on. Right. So as best they can, they restore the priesthood, they begin offering the sacrifices again, they begin celebrating the feasts again in Judea.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And then the Judahites who are living in these other places will make pilgrimage to the temple, but they remain living where they're living. And so some important ideas develop here, right here at the end of the exile.

That are critically important going forward in history. There are some things.

That change in some terms. Right. Because what ends up happening is those returning Judahite exiles form this province of Judea.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

It's going to be a province of other people's empires later on.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right. I think sometimes people get the impression maybe that, you know, that the Persians or the Babylonians or whoever conquered Judea and then walk away with their people and their stuff, and it's just sort of left abandoned. And then when the Israelites, you know, when they get to go back home, oh, we've got our own independent country again, you know, like we're Israel again. But no, it's. No, you are allowed to move back into this region that is still conquered, occupied land.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Right. And so now the Greek terms are a little later, not much later, we're going to get to the Greeks here in the second half. But yeah.

The Greek terms for these ideas, we get the idea of Judei, right. Which is the plural.

Which literally means Judeans.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. People from that spot.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Right. The people of Judea. The people of that province. Right. Those people.

And that word often gets translated like in English, New Testaments, as Jews.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Which, I mean, just a shortening of Judeans.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. I mean, it's a pretty straightforward etymological tour from. From that to. Yeah. Although, interestingly, I looked up, see, now all these people are gonna be mad that I don't have the jingle ready to go. Because it just occurred to me. But I looked up, like, what was. What was the term in Old English? Because Jew ultimately comes through.

French to Middle English to Modern English. But so Old English, of course, obviously had a term for this because they had the Bible, and it was something like Udayish, something like that. So, you know, Judah ish people. Yeah, you know.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah. So, like. Well, like Judah, Right, yeah, right, yeah, right.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, exactly. Exactly.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah. But then there is also this idea of Udaismos.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Judaism, which gets transliterated as Judaism.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yes.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

So.

And the word Jude, Right. That, as we've said, kind of means Judeans can get used in two different ways or does get used in two different ways. Right. In subsequent history.

So sometimes, as we said, it's used to mean the people of Judea, that straightforward meaning. Right. But sometimes.

It'S used to mean someone who practices Eudaimos.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. So the people who live the way that those people do.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Right, right. The people who follow the nomos of. Of. Of Judea. Right. So there is a Judean way of life.

Right. And way of life, I think, is the best way of describing this, of course, is the Torah. This is the way of life set out by the Torah. The Torah is the nomos of. Of the Jewish people, the Judean people. That's why nomos is used to translate Torah in the New Testament. And I. I think way of life includes everything.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. And I mean, correct me if I'm wrong on this, but my. My sense is that. That, that phenomenon of this group of people who live in this way and yet aren't on their land, that. That probably would have been kind of weird to most pagans. Right. Where there's a sense of this God rules over this area. So since you're here, you should worship that God because they're the one in charge here.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Well. Or at least incorporate it.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Right. Like if you're from Thrace. Right. And. And you're now living in, you know.

Phrygia. Right.

You would worship both, you know, the gods of your family and your ancestors from Thrace and the gods of Phrygia.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Right. Like, you would just sort of incorporate those things.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. Because, I mean, remember, everybody, like, we tend to think of this in terms of what we call religion.

But to ancient peoples, gods are spiritual rulers. They are powers that are in your place. You know, so it's not, oh, these are my private convictions. This is what I think, what I feel. Whatever. You know, it's like, imagine you're an expatriate, you know, an expat. You go live in some other country.

You. Okay, you're still a citizen of the United States, wherever, so you might do things like vote, you know, and have that connection with your home country, but you also have to deal with the authorities in the place that you live. Right? So that's much more like the way that what we think of as religion worked in the ancient world. And so then there's people that basically say we have this citizenship, so to speak, that follows us wherever we go, and no other. That's a little weird for the right world, right?

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

In the sense that you would not. Right. Like, you wouldn't find someone who. Yeah. Three generations ago, his family lived in Athens.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

For the last three generations, you know, they've lived in. They've lived in Ephesus. But he refuses to celebrate any of the festivals of Ephesus or worship any of the gods of Ephesus. He only worships the Athenian gods, and he celebrates the festivals of Athens, like, by himself, with his family at home.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right? That's not a thing.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

That's not a thing that happened, right?

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Right.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

But it's still into Athena and Hephaestus, but super into Artemis now as well.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Right. And of course, the Torah includes everything. It is all encompassing.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Right. You can't just boil it down to culture or religion or any of these disparate things. Right. The Torah covers how you dress, what you eat, where you go and don't go when you do it. Right. And. Right. Like who you worship, how you worship, who you worship, everything, right? So keeping Torah no matter where you are. Right. Following that Nomos. Following the Judean way of life. Right. Which is why they would just refer to you as a Judean. Right? You're still a Judean. You're not really an Athenian. Even though you have lived in Athens for three generations, you're not really an Athenian. You're still a Judean, Right? Because you're practicing Udaismos, you're practicing the. The Judean way of life. Still, you're living the Judean way of life.

And so the fact that you have all these people and you don't have any kind of transit where these folks can.

Unless they're just obscenely wealthy, somehow can. Can go to Jerusalem for every single feast, right. While. While living somewhere very distant. Right.

You also can't really keep Torah fully all by yourself.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. It requires a group.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yes. It requires the community. Right.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. Even today, I think, isn't it the case. I don't know how old this rule is, but don't you have to have 12 Jewish men to have.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

I think you just have to have three.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Three, okay.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

You just have to have three adult Jewish men. Yeah.

But. And, and I, I think it's kind of presumed that that then includes their families. Right. Like.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

The Internet says 10, but who knows if that's true or not?

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Well, it may differ in different.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Jewish groups, too. But anyway. And so this is what gives birth to synagogues.

You're not going to see anything about synagogues in the Torah.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

No, it doesn't say that that's a.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Thing or anything about synagogues in.

The rest of the Hebrew Bible.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

It's the community center. It's the place where you have the Scriptures, where you.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

It's the place where you gather. And they're not temples. You don't go there and offer sacrifices at the Temple.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

It's teaching, it's reading in the Scriptures.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

It's prayer, observing the feasts as you can in that place away from the Temple. But see, that as you can means that once the synagogues start to be established, you start to develop those as you can.

So we can't do the whole thing with the two goats on the day of Atonement. Right. We're not at the Temple. Yeah. So what do we do on the day of atonement in Athens or Alexandria?

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Well, we're going to gather together as Jewish people and we're going to pray the prayers and we're going to read. Right. About the day of atonement. We're going to repent of our sins. Right. That's when these things start developing.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

It reminds me in some ways of. I mean, I don't know a huge amount about this, but a little bit about what they call the priestless old believers from Russian Orthodox history. Well, they still exist. That they believe that God takes away the priesthood from the world because of sin and the end of the world is coming and so forth, and yet they continue to do church services without priests. So it's essentially a series of reader services. But. But then they still have to do things like baptize people and marry people, and so they kind of develop ways of doing that that sort of still acknowledge that the priesthood is missing. And yet, well, life goes on. Life goes on, you know.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah. And so, but, but this is important historically because over the next few centuries.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

You have a large number of Jewish people all over the world who still are connected in various ways. Spiritual. Right. Emotional. Ancestral to Jerusalem in the Temple. Right. And would all tell you Jerusalem is the Temple. That is the place where God. Right. They would not deny any of those things.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

But on a practical level, their day to day observance of the Torah, they're gathering for worship. Right. Their actual experience of it is very disconnected from the Temple. Right. Because they're not physically there.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And therefore, also, functionally, we go from how can we sing the songs of Zion in a foreign land? To we're going to practice the Torah in a foreign land.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. Because you got to live.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Which means there develops a disconnect over time.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

In the sense that the land itself and the Temple itself loses the kind of ultimacy that it had during the kingdom period that we talked about in the last episode.

Right. The. The fact that those were not the ultimate, that those were a sign that those were pointing to something greater. Right. Becomes more clear.

During this period of the synagogue in Second Temple Judaism. And it allows a segment, admittedly, and we're going to talk more about the Pharisees in the next half.

But it allows at least a significant segment of Jewish people to become effectively prepared for the temple to go away.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Hmm.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And for returning to the land. Not even being an option really anymore under the Romans. Right. That's going to happen and horrible things are going to happen related to it. But there are going to be people who are prepared sort of for it to happen and to go on, because they already know how to go on.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

They've already developed the synagogue observances and the things that they need to continue to observe the cycle of feasts and things. Without a temple.

Those things sort of will have happened.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

But that also.

At the same time, as we said, because that.

That sort of breaks a tether to the past. Right. This is why when we talk about religion and we've used this language through the whole history of this show, you have ancient Israelite religion, you have Second Temple Judaism, and then you have Rabbinic Judaism.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Ancient Israelite religion and Second Temple Judaism are not the same. And this is what we're talking about right now are some of the big significant changes.

Right. Because there weren't a ton of Judahites living outside Judah before the exile.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. Just. Yeah. It wasn't thinkable. It was not.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Right. Like that wasn't a thing. God brought them to the land. That was all that. But as we said, that was always pointing forward to something else. And so this breaking of connections, this practical breaking of connections to the past.

Helps reorient these Jewish communities, not just the ones outside Judea, but all of them ultimately helps reorient them more toward the future.

So it's not anymore for a lot of them. Again, we're going to talk more about the Pharisees. It's not about we need to get back what we had before the exile. It's, we're looking forward still to God intervening in history and something different coming.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. I mean, and like, two things that occur to me is, you know, like, it so alters the way that Judaism works that even in Judea, you get synagogues by the time, you know, get to the New Testament synagogues and Galilee.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And stuff that aren't that far away.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Even though there's a temple standing right there.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

And then also, like, I mean, so much of this forms the backdrop of the conversation that we just, that we just heard in church on Sunday of Christ speaking to the Samaritan woman.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Right.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

You know, like, where do you worship all of that?

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And yeah, we'll get into the Samaritans a little more here in the second half.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And what's been going on with them and their parallel development?

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

All right, well, that's the first half of this episode of Lord of Spirits. We'll be right back after this break.

[Narrator]

Father Andrew Stephen Damick and father Stephen DeYoung will be back in a moment to take your calls on the next part of the Lord of Spirits. Give them a call at 855-237-2346. That's 855-AF-RADIO.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

The centuries after the Protestant Reformation brought about a radical reinterpretation of The Epistles of St. Paul, disconnected from any historical reality. But Paul operated during his entire life as a faithful Pharisee within the Roman Jewish world. In St. Paul the Pharisee, Jewish apostle to all nations, Father Stephen DeYoung surveys Paul's life and writings, interpreting them within the holy tradition of the Orthodox Church. This survey is followed by DeYoung's interpretive translation of St. Paul's epistles, which deliberately avoids overly familiar terminology. By using words and ideas grounded in 1st century Judaism, DeYoung hopes to unsettle commonly held notions and help the reader reassess St. Paul in his historical context. Available now at store ancientfaith.com Again, that is store.ancient faith.com.

[Narrator]

We'Re back now with the Lord of Spirits, the Father Andrew Stephen Damick And Father Stephen DeYoung, if you have a question, call now at 855-237-2346. That's 855-AF-RADIO.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Hey, welcome back. It's the second half of the third part of our series on the history of Israel. And I don't know, did you say something really controversial, Father? Because suddenly we're getting all these phone calls that are coming in. You really.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Everything I say is controversial.

Walking controversy machine.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

Keeping it hot.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

All right, well, we're going to get cakes and vinegar.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

We're going to go ahead and take our first call. So we have David calling from Tennessee. David, welcome to the Lord of Spirits podcast. Christ is risen.

[David (Caller from Tennessee)]

Indeed he is risen.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

All right, Are you in the car there, David? You calling while you're driving?

[David (Caller from Tennessee)]

Yes, sir. Sorry. I'm on my way out to St. Anthony's Monastery right now.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

So I'm driving.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Okay, well, I hope, you know, try not to die or anything, live on the radio, you know, while you're driving. Keep your hands where they need to be, buddy.

[David (Caller from Tennessee)]

A ten and two, I promise.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

All right. All right. All right. So, well, how's it going? What road are you on? You said you're driving all the way to St. Anthony's that's, that's a long ways from Tennessee.

[David (Caller from Tennessee)]

It is just a little bit. It's about, I don't know, 21 hours total. But I'm only driving to El Paso tonight, so only about two more hours maybe.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

All right. All right. So what's on your mind, David from Tennessee on the way to Arizona.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Wow, you are in a boring part of the country, too. So it was probably a good idea to call it.

[David (Caller from Tennessee)]

I think it's real pretty.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Oh, well.

[David (Caller from Tennessee)]

Here in land is very beautiful.

My question was basically this. I think it was in second Maccabees after I believe the Maccabean were revolt. The Maccabees themselves offered up prayers for their dead.

To God, but that was before the harrowing of Hades. So how, how does that fit in with the orthodox view of salvation and the harrowing of Hades?

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Oh, well, I mean, there's a bunch of things that we could say, but I mean, there is already and for a long time there's, there's a hope in the Hebrew scriptures of the possibility of being rescued from Sheol. Like that is a thing in the Psalms, particularly in the Psalms of the sons of Korah. Right. So it's not like that everyone believes, well, when you're dead, you're dead, you know.

And I mean, correct me If I'm wrong here, Father, but isn't it also the case there's a sense of, well, they do exist there and, you know, may God have mercy on them so that things are maybe not so bad?

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah, well, so the, the incident he's referring to.

Is after one of the battles.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Kabius's men, they get sort of rifle through the bodies.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. Don't they find, like these. These talismans on some of them?

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Pagan amulets for pagan amulets, which clearly didn't work because they're dead bodies.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yes.

But.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

So this is, you know, a divination practice. This is forbidden. Right. By the Torah. But so this is happening in the 160s B.C. right.

The. The Book of the Watchers, for example, in the Book of Enoch. That section of the Book of Enoch was written about 100 years before that. And in it describes the dead in Hades and says that when the day comes that God intervenes in the world. Right. There are different groups, right? There's the four caves, right? There's the, the.

The righteous who are going to be taken into paradise. There's the.

The martyrs who are going to receive special rewards, starting with Abel. There are the wicked who are going to get tossed into the lake of fire. And there are the sort of ignorant. Right, that's your sort of limbo group who are just going to stay in Hades and Sheol forever.

And so there was already this kind of idea. And so.

The Christian view of the harrowing of Hades really grows out of those traditions. The idea that Christ, when he descended into Hades, accomplished that. He sort of did the sort.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And led the righteous into paradise.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And.

Presumably pronounced doom, as St. Peter says in First Peter on the wicked ones. Right. And brought the reward for the martyrs. Right. So it's Christ accomplishing that. So they already had. But they already had views like that in mind, most likely. And so when they go and offer sacrifices, sin offerings on behalf of those dead soldiers, what they're basically praying and asking God to do is to reckon those people among the righteous.

When that time comes.

Yeah.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Does that make sense, David?

[David (Caller from Tennessee)]

Yes, sir. Yes, sir does.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. I mean, you know, the Christian teaching about the harrowing of Hades and the resurrection and so forth, like, don't come out of nowhere, you know? And this is part of why a lot of the Jewish people are able to accept it, whereas a lot of pagans are like, wait, what? But there is already a basis for it in Judaism, you know, so. All right, well, thanks very much for calling, David, and drive safely and I hope you get to El Paso before it's too late at night.

[David (Caller from Tennessee)]

Thank you, Fathers. Y' all have a good night.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

You too. All right, we've got another call from the Holy Land, the land of my. My blessed beginnings. Virginia. So Katie is calling from. From Virginia. Hello, Katie. How are things in the Old Dominion?

[Katie (Caller from Virginia)]

It's beautiful here. We're having lovely evening. Lots of cool nights and lovely breeze before the heat kicks up.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Where in Virginia are you, if I may ask?

[Katie (Caller from Virginia)]

I'm in Roanoke, Virginia.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Roanoke. Oh, I love Roanoke.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Have there been any strange disappearances?

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

No, that. Not that Roanoke, Father.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Oh, okay.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Roanoke, Virginia, not North Carolina.

[Katie (Caller from Virginia)]

Has nothing to do with the Croatan.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

That whole region. Roanoke, Shenandoah Valley, Lynchburg. I mean, oh, man, that whole region is great. Great. God bless you, Katie.

[Katie (Caller from Virginia)]

Beautiful. Well, thank you for having me on.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

What's.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

What's up?

[Katie (Caller from Virginia)]

Okay, so I. First of all, I am a new, newly baptized Orthodox. I've been Orthodox about eight months.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Hey.

[Katie (Caller from Virginia)]

I'm 53 years old. Thank you.

I'm 53 years old, and I was a Protestant since I was 11. So I've been listening to the last two podcasts where you've been talking about dispensationalism, and I was steeped in it up to my eyeballs, just more than you can imagine. Anyway, I had prayed this morning about whether I should call in or not. And then tonight, you guys were talking about Father Steven. You had said that you had sent a lot of people to therapy over the years, and I just.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

It's true. Not really a brag. It's just an admission.

[Katie (Caller from Virginia)]

I decided to call because my therapist was the one who brought me into Orthodoxy.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Oh, hey.

[Katie (Caller from Virginia)]

Yeah, so there you go. So you have a couple Orthodox therapists out there?

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

No, there are. I've known several. I've known several, and thank God that they're out there.

[Katie (Caller from Virginia)]

Okay, so here are my thoughts, and they're not corrections per se, and if you'll forgive me in advance, I just. I just had to talk with you guys a little bit about the rebuilding of the temple in Jerusalem, when it would be built the third time within dispensational paradigm. Not within the Orthodox. My dad, when he became a Christian, and I'm gonna. Sorry if I use Protestant terms. I don't know how to say things any differently yet. Does that make sense?

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Okay.

[Katie (Caller from Virginia)]

Okay.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

We speak Protestant.

[Katie (Caller from Virginia)]

Yeah. Yeah. So anyway, my dad was really interested in end times and such, and he got this book back in 1988 called 88 Reasons why the Rapture Will Occur in 1988.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yes.

[Katie (Caller from Virginia)]

And I didn't realize. I'm. Yeah.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

You know, timeless, classic.

[Katie (Caller from Virginia)]

Yeah. Anyway, so one of the things that they talked about was the reason the Jews would start the.

Sacrifices again was not because they were. And it wasn't for Christianity. It was a sign of Jesus's returning. So. And they're actively. According to my father, and this was a long time ago, that they're actually actively looking for a red heifer from numbers 19 in order to sacrifice it so they can purify the altar. Had y' all ever heard about that?

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Oh, yes, yes. I mean, this. This. This is the bread and butter of dispensationalism, as they always say, that this is happening. And now, of course, you can, like, see images being flashed across social media, like their red heifer discovered. And here's a picture of it, you know, like, it's. It's happening. I. I feel like just, you know, since the Advent. Advent of Facebook back in. What was it, 2006 or 7, that I've seen at least, you know, 20, 30 red heifer pictures, you know, saying that, you know, the purification is about to happen, the sacrifice is going to begin again. You know, the. The. You know, like, it's always just around the corner. Like, there's always some group there that it's about to do that. And meanwhile, the chief for Bennett in Israel, if you went and asked them, hey, you guys work on that red heifer stuff, they'd be like, what?

You know, it's really. It. I'm sure there are. I'm sure that there are some groups that are in Israel because a lot of people, particularly.

They move there, they set up shop, they do all kinds of wacky stuff, frankly.

[Katie (Caller from Virginia)]

Yeah.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

You know, so I'm sure there's people there doing. Doing weird things.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Absolutely. There's also.

[Katie (Caller from Virginia)]

They're crazy.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

There's been a little bit of development on the whole sacrifice thing. Like, I think we may have mentioned the first edition of the Scofield reference Bible, talked about them sacrificing animals to Jesus.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yes.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Like, in person. Well, in the temple. And that's not. In later editions. They've moderated that a little bit.

[Katie (Caller from Virginia)]

They have moderated how that all works.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

There's been some changes and things there in different dispensational systems.

[Katie (Caller from Virginia)]

Well, one of the things I wanted. The real thing I wanted to ask you about was the thing that I really, really struggle with, and that's penal. Substitute, penal substitutionary atonement. Because when I read the New Testament, especially Paul. And I get into Romans or Galatians, it's like, all I can hear is the penal substitutionary atonement language. And that's all I can hear.

And so I just wondered if you guys had any comments on how to get past that.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, I have.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

I got a book for you.

[Katie (Caller from Virginia)]

Let's hear.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Actually, I was.

[Katie (Caller from Virginia)]

I had heard that you had. I had heard that you were gonna maybe write a book on the atonement.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

I was like, no, I do have an atonement. He does.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

But is this the first time you flogged your own book on.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

I hesitate to do so. But my book on St. Paul does have a new translation.

Of his epistles.

[Katie (Caller from Virginia)]

I have the book. I have the book. And I was reading it, and it still smacked me upside the face. And I think, I know it's me. It's not the translation.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Well, yeah, you're taught.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

You're taught to read it in a certain way. Yeah. And that's a hard thing to break because I know in a lot of evangelical circles, you're not just taught psa, you're taught that PSA is the gospel.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

That's the core of Christianity. And so someone coming and saying no. Right.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

It's a big paradigm shift.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

One thing I think that helps, Katie, one thing I think that could help is one of the core ideas of. Of penal substitutionary atonement is really. I mean, if you really get down to the real pure version of it, the idea is that Jesus is damned for you. Right, Right. That he is damned. It's not just that it hurts real bad. It's that he's damned because he's taking the thing that you deserve, which is damnation. Right. And so you can quite literally say that Jesus. Jesus goes to hell, right?

[Katie (Caller from Virginia)]

Well, yes. And they. Orthodox Christians, but absolutely harrowing like you guys talk about.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right. Orthodox Christians absolutely believe that Jesus goes to hell, but he's there, you know, to kick ass.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Free among the dead.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, right. He's free among the dead. He's not bound.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah, yeah.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

So the.

[Katie (Caller from Virginia)]

To me, that's crazy. Talk to a Protestant.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah, sure, sure. To me, the thing, the way I approach it with people, right?

Because I mean, my parents, we receive people who grew up in that evangelical environment. I go at it with the Old Testament.

Oh, you could be taught to read St. Paul that way, but you literally can't read the Old Testament that way. It's absurd.

So to give you an example. Right. I do my parish Bible study that gets recorded and sent out eventually as the whole Council of God podcast. Right.

So I know it's somewhere in Exodus and what they're posting, but last night, in real time, we're in the Book of Numbers, so we're way ahead. And we read this scene where the Levites are being consecrated for their liturgical service at the tabernacle.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And what the text says repeatedly, because numbers is very repetitive when you read it. It says the same thing, like five times, just to make sure you understand what it's saying.

Says that the Levites are all gathered together, and then all the other people from the other tribes are gathered. The people from the other tribes lay their hands on the Levites and offer them as a peace offering to God on behalf of all the people and their sins.

Right?

Now, if you want to read that through the lens of psa, you would imagine what they took the Levites and beat them to death. Right. Like.

They laid hands on the Levites to transfer their sins onto them, and then they took them and punished them for those sins and they're forgiven. Right. That doesn't work in the text. Right.

What the text is clearly saying is the peace offering is we are giving these people, out of all the people, these people we are giving to God to spend their lives serving God as living sacrifices like St. Paul talks about.

Right. Penal substitution just doesn't work there.

And so I've started by telling people, go through the Old Testament, find me one place where sins are put on an animal and then it's sacrificed.

There aren't any.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, that's. That's just never a thing.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

There aren't. And I said, show me one place where it says they punish an animal.

Isn't that what the animal suffers?

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

There aren't any. So it really doesn't work in the Old Testament. You can be taught to read St. Paul sideways, especially the way it's translated in English usually to get that, but you can't get it out of the Old Testament. And then if you read St. Paul, and that's a lot of what I'm doing in my book, if you just read him in light of the Old Testament, and not just the Old Testament in general, but the passages in the Old Testament that he quotes, you go back and actually read the whole passage.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right. We're going to do a little bit that in the third. Well, yeah, the third half, actually.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Right. Then that interpretation just doesn't work.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, a lot of it comes, Katie, because people take certain passages and turn them into, like, skeleton keys. Like, read this. You See what it says, that's so clear. But then they don't have to deal with all of the other stuff in the scriptures that are often being referenced by whatever the passage that they just brought up actually is.

You know, like another classic example is Jacob of I loved Esau of I hate it. That's referencing. Is that Malachi? I'm trying to remember, Father.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

So that's referencing. Oh yeah, that's Obadiah.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Okay. It's a. Yeah, so it's a callback to a specific place in the Old Testament that happens long after Jacob and Esau, the men are dead. It's about their descendants. So the idea that, you know, God loves Jacob and he hates Esau is not supportable in the actual Jacob Esau story.

But you know, when the Edomites rebel against the Israelites.

Jacob have I loved Esau, have I hated Israel? In other words, Israel I've loved, Edom I've hated. That makes way more sense when you realize it's about those groups of people and it's about a specific action that the Edomites took. You know, so that's just another example like when these things are taken out of context. And the sad thing is is that stuff gets taken out of context and then gets repeated for over and over and over again centuries. And people just receive and accept that that's how you're supposed to read that passage and they forget that it's actually that the Bible itself is very, to use a modern term, hypertextual. Everything links to everything else and if you cut all the links then you're going to interpret it the wrong way, you know, does it make sense?

[Katie (Caller from Virginia)]

Yes. And I think, I think I am going to go back through the Old Testament. That's going to be quite a project. But my mother in law has found out that I've become Orthodox.

She's a trouble now missionary to. Oh, I am, I am. She's just waiting and I don't want to. But here's the thing. I don't want to come at her with like combative, like, because that's not what orthodoxy is.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

No, you don't have to do that.

[Katie (Caller from Virginia)]

Has this beautiful, beautiful humility.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. Like if she's, she's ready to hear you, if she's really ready to hear you, then, then you can talk to her. But if she's not, then what's the point in, in going into that, you know? Okay, I, you know, if someone can't hear you, then it may even, even be harmful to your relationship. But I Feel like, you know.

[Katie (Caller from Virginia)]

Yeah. That they have. That's what I feel like.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. Yeah.

[Katie (Caller from Virginia)]

And is it, is it wrong to kind of not tell your old Protestant buddies that you've converted?

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

I mean, I don't know your old Protestant buddies. Um, my old Protestant buddies, if they haven't figured it out by now.

[Katie (Caller from Virginia)]

Well, you've been at it a while. I've got eight months under my belt. That's it.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yes, yes. You're new. It's okay. It's okay.

[Katie (Caller from Virginia)]

Okay. Well, I appreciate y' all taking my call. I know it was a little off topic, but I really wanted to say something about the masses of the red heifer.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, no, this is part of our general arc of dealing with, you know, how we. How do we really understand Israel? So, yeah, it's within. It's within our general topic. So your call is welcome.

[Katie (Caller from Virginia)]

Well, I appreciate you guys a lot and my husband and I listen to you guys on the way to work in the morning. So thank you.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

God bless y'.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

All.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Alright, we're going to take one more call and then move on. We're going to take Joshua who is calling from Florida and he wants to bring us all the way back to the first episode of this ark and talk about the promises to Abraham. Is that right? Joshua, welcome.

[David (Caller from Tennessee)]

Florida. I'm on the other side.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Oh, you're on the other side. I don't know. I mean, this is what Mike. This is what Mike the Flash in the Pan de Gan wrote. He said that you were from Florida. You're not from Florida.

[David (Caller from Tennessee)]

Yeah, no, California.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

You are not in fact Florida, man.

[David (Caller from Tennessee)]

West coast Florida.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

What part of California are you in?

[David (Caller from Tennessee)]

Like the Inland Empire, actually.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Oh, my old stomping ground.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

He's from your place there, Father.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Are you in? You Kaipa? You betcha.

[David (Caller from Tennessee)]

No, I'm in like married. A Temecula, if you know, Winchester is further south.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[David (Caller from Tennessee)]

So yeah, I have a question. My question is. Yeah, the. The covenant of Abraham and how we fall into that as Christians. And coming off of watching West Huff and hearing all the discussions on. On what he was talking about of can people that are not be Christians be saved? And that. And then same thing. When I watched Jordan Peterson seminar, every. The same question was kind of coming up with all the non Christians and, and Jonathan Pageau had to kind of say like, yeah, you can experience salvation, but the church is really important. So my question is, what is the difference? I guess I can understand that outside of Christianity, people can experience salvation as it is of being freed from our sins. But I guess the question is what, what. What's the difference between salvation as a Christian and salvation not as a Christian, that even. If that even is a thing.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. I mean, there's only one salvation, right? I mean, to be saved is to become. I mean, as. As Christ said in one of my favorite verses, sons of the resurrection, sons of God, equal to the angels. Right? That's what salvation is. That's the destination of salvation.

But it's. But I shouldn't say destination, really, because it's. It is a continuum, right? So you can be saved more and more, you can become more and more.

You know, one of the sons of God, more and more like Christ. Right. And so.

The Christianity, what that gives us is the straight, clear path of exactly how to do that, right? That is the full puzzle with all the pieces, right? That is what orthodox Christianity is.

Does that mean that someone who has. Who does not have all the pieces that, like, oh, sorry, you didn't get that last corner piece in. So go directly to hell, do not pass purgatory, do not collect $200, you know. No, it does not mean that, because. And part of the way we know this, I think. I mean, I think. I hope eventually we will do maybe a dedicated episode on this question of people outside of. Outside of Israel in one way or another, because it's connected to actually some of what we're talking about tonight. But, like, the example I like to give is.

The book of Jonah, where the prophet, he sent by God to Nineveh. So this is the Assyrians. And of course, if you've been listening this up, this series, you know that the Assyrians are the worst people on earth at that point. Pretty much.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Very naughty men.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yes, very, very. I mean, just horrifying, horrifying people. And so it's understandable that Jonah, when God sends Jonah to them, he's like, no, I don't want to go there. You might have mercy on them. I don't want to go there and be your instrument of mercy on the Assyrians. Like, those guys are the worst, you know? And of course, we know how it turns out. He sent God, makes him go. Basically, he finally does go, and he. He preaches that. That Nineveh is going to be overthrown. And then they repent and God spares them. And then Jesus himself in the Gospels, holds up the men of Nineveh as a witness against the people of. Against the Judeans, Right? And that they will rise up and stand in judgment of. Of, you know, the generation that's with him there. So what does that mean? I mean, the, you know, the Ninevites, the Assyrians, these are demon worshiping pagans. And there's no indic. It's not, you know, the book of Jonah does not end with, and they all stopped worshiping their gods and began to worship Yahweh, the God of Israel. It doesn't say that. It just says, and also much cattle, you know, that's how it ends. And yet their repentance is real and the mercy that God shows them is real. And they somehow have this eschatological place at the end because of their repentance. So repentance is real. You can't say, well, it's fake because you, you're not, you didn't get all, you didn't do all these other things first. Now if someone is not using all the tools, obviously that limits them.

You know, it doesn't limit God. It limits us. But there's only one salvation. There's only one salvation, right? There's only one, one becoming like Christ. There's only one Christ. There's not a Christ for non Christians and a Christ for Christians. There's just one Christian, right? So the promises are the same. And those who do the deeds of Abraham are the offspring of Abraham. And if you want to do the deeds of Abraham, the clearest way to do that is to become an orthodox Christian, to live that life faithfully. That is the clearest way. Outside of that, we can't say, oh, well, you can kind of do that and it'll be fine. We can't say that. God did not say, well, you know, there's a lesser version, but we do know that God is going to have mercy on whom he's going to have mercy. And we do know that real repentance is real repentance, even from demon worshiping pagans, which, I mean, that's a pretty extreme example. I think, again, the Assyrians are the worst people on earth. And God would have had, I mean, he's God, he can do whatever he wants. But it would have been very understandable if God had not sent them Jonah. And it simply said, you know what? You guys are the worst. Fire and brimstone for y'.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

All.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

You get the Sodom and Gomorrah treatment. He could have easily done that. And everyone would have just said, yep, that's how this goes. But that's not what he did. He sent them Jonah, and they repented. They didn't go what we might think of as all the way but he did receive, he did accept what they did do. I think that's pretty significant, you know.

You got anything to say, Father, on any of that?

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Well.

I think a lot of these discussions we have to just like pause.

And think about what we're saying. Right.

So if you frame the question is, could someone who's not a Christian be saved?

Be saved is passive.

Right?

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

So God is the one who is doing the saving.

So if we rephrase this, this is the same question.

This is the same question. This is not a different question to ask the same question in slightly different language. Is there anyone who God can't save?

Obviously, no. Right?

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Everyone would agree. No, everyone who believes that anything resembling the Christian God would say, no, there's no one who God can't save. Right.

So that means de facto there's no one who can't be saved. Okay, now.

There'S implied here that like, if you say that, well, then that means.

I guess you don't have to do anything. Right. The only possibilities are the two extremes. If God can save anyone, right? If there's nothing that can stop him, nothing humans could do to stop him from saving someone, then that means humans don't have to do anything at all. They're completely passive in salvation. That's not a correct corollary. Again, this is the so many people in our society need to take a Logic 101 course.

If someone comes to you and says.

I'm looking for salvation, I want to know God, or I want to know God better.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right?

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

I want to come to Christ, right?

We're going to tell them, oh, well, you need to come to the church, you need to become a catechumen, you need to get baptized, you need to receive the sacraments, you need to change these things in your life. You need to repent of your sins, you need to do all these things to find salvation. That doesn't mean someone who doesn't do them can't be saved by God. It's all of a sudden impossible. But it does mean if that's what you're looking to have happen, those are the things you do.

Right?

It is entirely possible that you can live your life the way I do and make it to the age of 50 without having a heart attack.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Okay.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

But if your goal, if you're coming to me as an 18 year old and your goal is to make it to the age of 50 without having a heart attack, I'm not going to tell you to eat like me or live the way I do, right? Because.

That'S not aimed at what you're gonna do, right? Like this is, this is logic stuff, right? So, and then you get into the, people get into the weeds on this stuff, right? Like, oh, well, see, look, this verse says, you know, what must I do to be saved? Believe it. Be baptized. So see, you have to be baptized to be saved. Oh, but what about the thief on the cross.

Right? Like again, timeout, stop. Okay, look. What? Right, yes. Normally God says that you should go and be baptized. If you find yourself nailed to a cross next to the Son of God, the rules can be bent a little, right? Like this might be a special case.

Like, it's just ridiculous. These arguments we get into, these circular arguments, they're just ridiculous. They're just semantics. They're a game that we play based on these sort of the theological rules of tit for tat and they accomplish nothing. Like this is. This, this kind of stuff is just really simple. I'm not, I'm not berating you, caller. I'm, I'm an old man yelling at clouds.

It's just, it's just not productive. It's like we can all agree on some very simple things. All right? Like, we all agree. I don't even care if you're not orthodox, right? I don't care if you're the most wild eyed charismatic evangelical out there, right? I bet you we agree that, number one, there's nobody who God can't save.

Number two, I bet we agree that if someone comes to us and says, hey, I want to get saved, we're going to tell them to go to church. If someone says, hey, should I get baptized? We're going to say yes.

If someone says, hey, should I be repenting of my sins and change the way I live? We're going to say yes. Regardless of what you think about faith and works and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, you're going to tell them to stop sinning and to repent of the sins they've committed. Okay? We all are. We're all going to tell them to try to obey God's commandments. That doesn't mean you're preaching works of righteousness. Like, let's drop a lot of the silliness, people.

Right? It's not, it has no accord with real life, man. I'm a guy who stood around comic book stores arguing about how Cyclops opens his visors by wriggling his ears. And I think these arguments are stupid.

So anyway, end of, end of rant. I don't think this stuff is as difficult as we make it.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Tldr.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. I hope that. I hope that helps a little bit. Joshua, what do you think?

[David (Caller from Tennessee)]

Yeah, so I'm. I guess what I'm wondering to follow up is, so in the Eschaton, is there a defined kingdom of Israel or like the new Jerusalem, is that a defined kingdom in the age to come? And there'll be citizens and non.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Citizens, I would say. I mean, number one, I would say. Just keep listening to this episode. Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

You're trying to jump ahead to the end of the third half.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, we'll get there. Yeah, we'll get there. We'll get there. Okay. All right. Thank you for calling Joshua from California. Not Florida, Mike. He didn't say Florida.

Anyway.

Yeah, Inland Empire. All right, thanks very much. Okay.

Where are we? Alexander the not so Great. I don't know. Did I just make a bunch of people mad?

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Why is it this half we're gonna. All of our Greek listeners are gonna get grumpy with.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, I will say this because we are gonna start talking about Alexander the Great. I. I mean, I. You know, Greek friends, let's sit down a second. I love you. I love you. I love your language. I love your food. I love your churches. I mean, I love just about everything about you. What I do not understand is this whole.

Identification with Alexander. The man was, number one, a demon worshiping pagan.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah, well, paganism in general. The pagan Greek traditions in general.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right, right, right. But I mean, he literally went around becoming a God king in all the places that he went and conquered. Like he went through the ritual to become pharaoh. He went through the ritual? Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Can I talk about that ritual or still know?

I don't know. I can't remember how R rated that is. It's kind of R rated. Okay, bleep. Okay.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Father Stephen just told it all.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Sorry, guys.

There's a book you can read.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

The is isn't FS Naden. Isn't he the one that wrote the book.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah. About Alexander the Great as a pagan religious figure?

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. Yes, yes. Yeah, yeah, Go, go check that out, everybody. Yeah, I'm just saying. I'm. I'm just saying. Okay, okay.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Alexander the Great.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Was he that great, though?

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Well, he was if you were a Macedonian.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, There you go. Okay. Oh, you just said Macedonian. Now we're going to get calls.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah. What do you mean?

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yes, yes.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

So without. Without entering into the whole debate about what Macedonia is.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

I know.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Well, the thing is, like, his father was Philip of Macedon. I mean, he's Macedonian.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

I mean, Ancient Macedonia covered land that belongs to multiple different countries now. Like four or five, actually.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah, but so if you're one of his countrymen, yeah, he's great. The rest of the Greeks did not like him so much when he was alive. In fact, Aristotle, who had been his teacher, had to kind of go on the lam from.

The Athenians because the Athenians were not super happy with him.

Because he conquered everybody else, including the rest of the Greeks.

But so Alexander the Great, even though he set himself up as Father Andrew said, is this sort of divine king and divine emperor, was never really an emperor.

In that he never really got to rule over his conquests.

So he.

You know, famously conquers the known world, swings over, gets Egypt, then heads straight east, goes all the way into India.

Gets kind of stalemated eventually in India, and as he's returning back from that, dies in his early 30s.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, he's like 32. And there's apparently people think that he dialed. Died of West Nile virus encephalitis. So how about that?

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Papers have to be written.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

That's right. Don't get that. Kids not comfortable.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah. Do not get West Elders don't get any kind of encephalitis. Just as a good general rule.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

I tell my kids that every morning.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

But so.

So it's not like, you know, we've been talking about, he conquers the Persian Empire. Right. But it's not like the Persian Empire, he, like, he establishes no infrastructure, really. He founds a bunch of cities and names them after himself and one after his horse.

But so he does that. Right. But by founding cities, this is like as he's traveling and then he moves on. It's not like he goes and settles there himself and spends any time. Right.

So he's really a general. He is a general and a conqueror.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Not. He never really takes a throne as emperor. Right, right.

And so as he's dying, famously, he's asked, these generals are gathered around him and ask who the successor is. Right. Who's going to succeed him? Because potentially that person would then establish a throne and become sort of the ruler of the world. And famously, Alexander responds, Kratotos. Right. Meaning the strongest. Right. And just as that implies the. The Diadochi, his successors, his generals, all proceed to go to war with each other to try to decide who is going to be the strongest and who is going to rule the world. A bunch of them get killed, a bunch of them get routed.

There. There end up.

Being three main dynasties established.

One over roughly Greece and Asia Minor. One over Egypt and North Africa, the Ptolemies. And then most important for us in terms of the history of Israel and Judah and Judea, his general Selukos establishes the Seljukin Empire, which is the empire of the east. It's all the eastern holdings. Now over the course of the Seljukid empire, the eastern border is going to continue to move west. Right. So it is going to be sort of perpetually shrinking in terms of how far east it goes because the Indians, the Parthians, eventually resurgent Persians are all going to start pushing back right.

At that side of, of the empire. And in terms of actually trying to expand, he is the Seleucids are primarily going to try to expand by taking Ptolemy territory. So the eastern border where the Levant meets the Sinai Peninsula, the, the, that southwestern border of the Seljukan emperor empire moves back and forth all the time throughout this period. As the Ptolemies and the cell, you can make war on each other and, and push back and forth.

So the, the capital of the Seljukid emperor empire is established, Antioch on the Orontes River. That's Antioch in Syria. That's the Antioch of the Patriarchate of Antioch. That's the Antioch of the New Testament.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Do you know, by the way, do you know what they call that river in Arabic? It has a different name.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

I.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Do you know about this? It's something like, I'm sure I'm going to mispronounce it, but it's something like asi or something like this. And what it means is it means disobedient.

Did you know about this?

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

No, I do not know about this.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

It's the disobedient river in Arabic. And the reason they call it that is because all the other rivers in the area flow the other way. And this one's just got to be different.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

So that's the idea.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

They call it the disobedient river, the Iranians.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And Antioch is. There was, there's not much of ancient Antioch left.

Was at a strategic point in terms of trade routes, in terms of the capital.

And so when it's established.

We immediately from the get go get another significant Jewish community.

And that's because at the time of its establishment, one third of the population of Antioch, the new capital, is Jewish.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

So that's significant. So Alexandria, Antioch. Right. Judea, surrounding Jerusalem. Is this sounding familiar to anybody?

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

These are these major Jewish centers.

Which is why they become major Christian centers, right?

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Later on in early history, Antioch on the Orontes is going to be the capital of. So diocese we now think of as a church government term. Right.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. This is a Roman, but it was.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

A Roman government term. So there was there. And these were big divisions. So there was the Diocese of Africa, the Diocese of Europe, Europa, the Diocese of the east, and Antioch was the capital of the Diocese of the east all the way through the Roman period.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. Interest. I mean, interestingly, like in still in Greek.

If I remember this correctly, like diocese roughly means like what we would consider as patriarchate and you know, parish, whatever the. I can't remember the exact Greek form means basically what we would consider a diocese. It's the area that's ruled over by like a single bishop. And diocese is, you know, that space that it was ruled over by a synod of bishops.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

You know.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah. So. Yeah. So it was a big. So Antioch, not just during the Seleucid Empire, is this major city. It's named after Antiochus the First, who like Alexander, named a bunch of cities after himself.

So there are several Antiochs. You see a few of them, like in the Book of Acts, there's Antioch in Pisidia to distinguish it from Antioch in Syria or Antioch on the Orontes. So there's multiple Antioch, just like there's multiple Alexandria's, but there's one big important famous one.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And then all the others.

So.

The other thing that happens.

With the Seljukid kings is they very much follow the model that Alexander tried to adopt of presenting themselves as divine kings. So they adopt all of these titles. Right. Antiochus iii Soter. Right. Savior. And now the most infamous one, and again, the most relevant one for our trip through the history of Israel, Judah and Judea, Antiochus iv, who took as his reigning title Epiphanies, meaning that he's the manifestation of a God on earth.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Oh. It doesn't just mean he has really good ideas on a regular basis.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

No, I've had.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Eureka. No, that's right.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

So we weekend at Epiphany. No, wait. How's that go? Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah. So Antiochus IV Epiphanies.

Like many Salyukid monarchs, goes to war with the Ptolemies.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right. Because this is as one.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

We do. Yes. Try to take some more territory.

On the southwestern frontier. And it goes very badly.

Not only does he not gain any territory, he loses territory.

He is very upset with this.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And of course, being a God king, this can't possibly have anything to do with bad planning on his part or bad combat strategy or, you know, superior numbers on the other side or Supply lines. Nothing so rudimentary is that clearly something happened to sway the gods from his side.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Ah, yes, traitors in our midst, quislings, as it were.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Someone has done something and he and his advisors light upon the idea that, hey, you know what? We got these people.

There'S a concentration of them in Judea, there's another group that's kind of like them in Samaria.

And then there's people like them spread out all over the place. They won't worship the gods, they won't participate in the sacrifices to the Greek gods.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And the gods see that, they're ticked about it.

And that's why you lost.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

And so, I mean, that begins a long tradition, right?

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yes.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Of pagans and Christians.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah. This is going to become very common, right. And so.

He decides to engage in some penal substitutionary atonement and.

Take out his wrath on the Jews.

So.

Except there's no forgiveness here, it's just wrath.

So he goes into Judea and into Jerusalem proper, proper, sacks it, sacks the temple, right? Takes everything valuable, seizes it, goes into the temple, sacrifices pigs on the altar.

To Zeus, which is referred to in scripture as the abomination that leads to desolation, which is bad.

And not only does that, then that kicks off, right? His ruining of the temple, right? Making it unusable until it's cleansed and restored again and rebuilt.

His doing that touches off then a persecution throughout the Seljukan empire of Jews. And a lot of that ends up getting centered actually in Antioch, as you might expect, being his imperial capital and having a large Jewish population right there, right at hand.

And it's important that this is not an attack on an ethnicity.

Which, as we've said, that concept didn't exist then. This is not a racist thing. This is not. There are no times. And you can see that by the attack, he doesn't just go and start killing them willy nilly. Right? Like kill all of them. Yeah, right. Because he doesn't have those racial, genetic, those kind of archetypes yet, right. It's going to take the modern age and modern pseudoscience to get us to the point where we can have that kind of genocide.

He's right. His attack is on Eudayismos. His attack is on their way of life. He wants to break them, of keeping Torah and have them worship the Greek gods like everybody else. That's his goal. Now if he can't get them to do that, he's fine with killing them.

But those are your options, right? And so it's not just worship the Greek gods, It's literally eat pork.

Now, given that pork was probably from a pig sacrifice to an idol.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

To one of the Greek gods, but it's literally break the Torah. And the. The most important dramatization of this is the. The Maccabean martyrs in Second Maccabees. The Maccabean Martyrs had a major Jewish shrine.

For centuries after this in Antioch that became a Christian shrine later on.

The Maccabean martyrs are an old man named Eliezer and a woman and her seven sons. You can read this in detail in Second Maccabees, but essentially the tldr is.

The. The Greek authorities tortured. Brutally tortured her seven sons to death in front of her.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

To try to get them and her and Eliezer to eat pork.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

To eat pork. By the way, we have someone in the chat on YouTube who is really wanting us to talk about the whole drunken elephant thing.

With relation to all of this.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Invitation to read First Maccabees.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Read first Maccabees and then accuse JRR Tolkien of blatant plagiarism.

Yeah. So Chipon's drunk.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

I don't think so.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

No.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Sorry, Nate.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Sorry, Nate. We're not doing the drunken elephant thing. But you're right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

That's a different podcast.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

It's this period. Yeah, that's a different podcast.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

So. So, yeah, so she sees her seven sons. We torture, death refuses. Right.

But important here. Right. Important here is what we see in Second Maccabees. This is a Jewish text, not a Christian text yet. Right. Christianity adopts it. I know some of you out there are Christians that don't have it in your Bibles, but trust me.

Get the.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Director'S cut of the Bible, guys.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah.

Right. Is that while this is happening, when you look at the prayers that are being prayed by the sons, by the mother. Right. During these martyrdoms, what you see is what's really being set forward here. Is the whole theology related to martyrdom. Yeah. That is sort of already established by the time you get to the New Testament.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

So when St. Stephen gets stoned, it's interpreted through this kind of lens. Right. When St. James gets killed, it's interpreted through this kind of lens. When Herod kills St. John, the Forerunner, it's interpreted through this kind of lens because the idea of martyrdom already exists.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. And I mean, just think back in the rest of the Old Testament, guys. This really isn't a thing.

Up to now. It's not.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Right.

Yeah.

The preceding parts of the Hebrew Bible are More about trying to get somebody in Israel to actually keep the Torah, not trying to force them to break it. Right, right, yes.

So in some ways we have a remnant. We have a faithful remnant here.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

They're trying to break.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And they don't break. Right. But the prayers that they're praying during, this talk about them offering themselves to God as a sacrifice.

Of atonement on behalf of the sins of the people.

They'Re being murdered, but they're offering their death nonetheless as a sacrifice, as a pleasing sacrifice to God.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And what about their death? Not so much the pain and suffering as their obedience, even to the point of death.

They're making that an offering to God on behalf of the people. Right. And understanding this is critical to understanding how the early Jewish Christians immediately understand the death of Christ.

Because they already have this paradigm that a person, a righteous man. Right. Who is put into this kind of situation, who is murdered for being righteous. Right. Is sort of offering himself as a sacrifice on behalf of the people. So if the Messiah does that.

If the Son of David does that, if the Son of God does that.

Yeah.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

They've got a paradigm.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Murdered for his righteousness and offers his. His life and his obedience at his death to God as a pleasing sacrifice, that is sort of the ultimate fulfillment filled, full filled overflowing of this idea.

Right. Of doing this on behalf of the people. And so this is, this is crucial to understanding this core Christian idea.

Of Christ's death as his voluntary self offering as a pleasing sacrifice.

To God the Father. Right.

It's worth noting here because this most often doesn't get noted, that the, the Greeks went after the Samaritans too.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. I mean, as far as they're concerned, the Samaritans are just as weird.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah, yeah. They probably don't even really know the difference.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

So the Samaritans, as we talked about a little last time, the Samaritans are.

From our modern perspective, of mixed ethnicity.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

They are people from the Northern Kingdom who remained in the land after the Assyrians who have intermarried with the people from other parts of the Assyrian Empire who were brought there and settled there.

They were there obviously throughout the 70 years of the exile. So when the Judah refugees come back, the Samaritans were already there.

Right?

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And the Samaritans had what we now today call the Samaritan Pentateuch, which is another version of the Torah. We don't have time to go down a huge rabbit hole about it tonight.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

That sounds like a future Episode.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

You have to remember the Samaritan Pentateuch is put together and stuff.

Way before any copy of the Torah we have in Hebrew.

Right now, we don't have any copies that old.

But there are places where there may be earlier readings of things or where what's there sheds light on something confusing in the Hebrew. So there's lots of interesting things there. But the problem with assuming too much about that, and this is what makes studying the Samaritan Pentateuch tricky, is that it was also deliberately altered.

To make the, the Samaritans like the actual. Like they're the real Israel, not these Judahites. Right? And when I say rewritten, I mean, like stuff in Genesis is rewritten. Things are changed, little stories are added and stuff to. For example, a bunch of things happen on Mount Gerizim, which happened to be in Samaritan territory instead of, say, Mount Horeb.

Stuff in the, in the regular Torah, which they then used to justify having built their own temple on Mount Garrison.

Which was a temple that was up and functioning at this time. They were doing the cycle of feasts, right? So they're having Passover with lambs and stuff. They're doing these things and claiming to be sort of the real recipients. Of course, the returning Judahite exiles considered themselves the real faithful remnant. Right? And the Samaritans are not only, you know, dubious as to being Israelites, they kind of seem like foreigners, but. But they clearly have a corrupted Torah and they, they clearly are doing things, places where they're not supposed to be doing them. And worst of all, saying that the Judahites are illegitimate, right. Are not the legitimate right followers. So between the two, there is this sort of rivalry, but again, they're both under foreign domination at this point.

It's a weird kind of sibling rivalry or weird cousin rivalry.

Going on. It's going to get worse going ahead. That's why we're kind of introducing it now. But from the Greek, the Seljukan perspective, in this persecution, right, the Samaritans are just as bad. They're not worshiping the pagan gods either. And so they also face a wave of persecution from the Greeks.

Yeah. So it's, it's, you see, this kind of thing, they really did not understand what was going on with the Jews or the Samaritans or any. They didn't understand any of this. The Greeks didn't. The Romans didn't either. Yeah, My favorite example of that is near the end of the Book of Acts when the, the Roman governor has to, you know, he's sending St. Paul to Rome for his trial and he has to kind of send a document like here's why I'm referring this case to you. Right. Like here's the crime he's accused of or whatever. And the note he sends is.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

There.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

It is a dispute between him and the religious authorities of Judaism. They claim this person Jesus is dead and he claims he's alive.

That's what gets referred to the Emperor. Yeah, I'm not really had no idea what was going on. Right. Like we got a bunch of Jews saying this guy's dead. We got this other Jew saying he's alive. I don't know, they want to kill each other or something, whatever. So you know.

Buck comma, past. Yeah, yeah. But really, yeah, the Greeks were the same. Like they just, they didn't get this right, like at all.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

So this oppression, this brutal oppression, right. The destruction that. The desecration of the temple which ceases its services.

The, the persecution of Jewish people. This then spurs a revolt known as the Maccabean revolt.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And first Maccabees is really about the history of this.

Of this revolt. The revolt begins, is started by a Levite priest named Matthias.

And his sons. We're going to find out about several of his sons.

As we go forward.

But so Matthias and his sons begin this revolt. They're sort of the leaders. They say we need to. We're not taking this anymore. We're fighting back against these pesky Greeks.

And so Mattathias himself.

Starts the revolt circa 170 BC.

He is sort of the leader until he dies in 167 and 167. Judas Maccabius, which means Judah the Hammer.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

It's a cool name.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah. Takes over.

He's the leader of the revolt from 167 to 160 BC.

And then he is succeeded as leader by his youngest brother. So Mattathias's youngest son Jonathan Apfus.

Who is, is leading the revolt from 160 to 143 BC.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Now that I, I'm, I'm ashamed that I never have looked this up. But I mean, are the Maccabees texts, are they named after Judas Maccabeus or Maccabius?

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yes.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Okay. So, yeah. So he lends his, his nickname. Really?

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. Okay.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

So. And so within this they manage to take control of the temple area and the temple is rededicated.

This is where Hanukkah comes from.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

The.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Because.

They only have enough oil for one day. Right. Because you're supposed to keep the, the what we now know as a menorah.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

The candle stand in the temple is supposed to be perpetually lit and perpetually burning. They only had enough oil.

For it to, for one day, but miraculously it lasted for eight days.

I once heard a Jewish comedian say, you know, that there's now a major holiday because they just found a really good product.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Wow.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Imagine if you brought a Swiss army knife back in time.

But, so that's, that's where the feast of Hanukkah comes from. And it's a modern celebration. As far as I could tell, it has lost all association with the Maccabean revolt.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. I mean, who even knows about that, right?

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

It's just lighting the menorah, spitting a dreidel. There is, there is kind of Jewish Christmas.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

There is a, there is a Jewish. I think they're an acapella group called the Maccabeats. So that's a thing.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Well, there you go.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

So I made several years ago, they may still be out there in circulation on the Internet. I made a bunch of Judas Maccabius Hanukkah memes. If anybody find them, feel free to continue to circulate them.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

I did not know you were a memester, Father Stephen.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Oh yeah, no, I made like, because I'm like, look, I felt bad. I'm like somewhere out there there's a 14 year old Jewish boy.

Who wants something like cool and super awesome, like a picture of Judas Maccabius, like hacking a Greek guy with a sword for his Hanukkah card. Right.

This is what, a picture of a menorah or a dreidel? Come on, man.

So you know, yeah, I tried to help. I tried to help.

So Jonathan Apfus becomes this transitional figure because under him really.

The, the, the revolt is finally successful in the sense of there being a kind of independent Judea.

And this is where things start to go a little crazy. Because.

Not only is Jonathan Apfess ready to make himself king now.

But he makes himself high priest.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Ooh, no.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Now, previous to him being high priest, under Judas Maccabius, another brother had been made high priest, but at least it was a different person.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, priest kings, that's not a thing amongst Israel.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

But at the Feast of Booths, right, The Feast of tabernacles, Sukkot in 153 BC. Jonathan Preside. Jonathan Apfus presides as high priest while also being king.

And he cements the successful revolt by making a bunch of treaties with foreign nations.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

That's also against the Torah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yes. Which you're Also not supposed to do. Right?

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, yeah. So.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah, so. And amongst those foreign powers are the Spartans. And we've talked about the Spartan treaty before on the show because that's the one that meant. That refers to the Spartans as fellow descendants of Abraham.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yes, right, right, right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And we're like, what, we talked about this a little earlier. This. Right. The Philistines are included in Deuteronomy 4. And these other things that, you know, some of the kafta, some of those Greeks are somehow descended from Abraham.

[David (Caller from Tennessee)]

And.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Then also one with Rome.

And that's the one that backfires in a huge way later on.

But all of this is to help protect them from the Selucids, the Greeks coming back in and taking over. Right. So they make treaties with these other powers to try to deter that. Now we have these allies, defense treaties. Hey, you don't want to mess with the Spartans and the Romans, so stay away, Spiro.

But so we now begin what is called the Hasmonean or Hasmonean.

Dynasty.

And parallel to the emergence of this dynasty of priest kings, because that's what it's going to be.

Who are going to be kings of Judea.

There'S another movement that begins. And this is a movement anybody who's read a single page of the. The New Testament has heard of. That's the Pharisees.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yes. They're these radical reactionaries.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Well, now I need to prepare you. I need to prepare you all because I know you've all been taught to read the New Testament in a certain way.

Thanks, Martin Luther.

In a certain way.

Where the Pharisees are the bad guys.

Okay, that is incorrect. The Pharisees are not the bad guys. In the New Testament.

Christ never says they're even wrong about anything.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

He says they sit in Moses seat, do whatever they tell you. Right. Never Sundays. There are two bad things that Christ says about the Pharisees.

The main one is he says they're hypocrites. Right?

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Do what they say, but don't do as they do because they're hypocrites.

Right. They talk a good game. The things they say, the things they teach are correct, Jesus is saying, but they don't practice them themselves. And that's the problem. Right. The hypocrisy. Because as St. Paul will say, it's not the hearers of the Torah, but the doers that are justified.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right?

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

So that's the big one. The second one we'll get into in just a second.

After we talk about what being a Pharisee is. All about.

So the reason the Pharisees rise up over against the Hasmoneans and particularly rise up in Judea is the word Pharisee comes from a word that means to be set apart.

Right? To be set apart. To be set apart from what?

That's the question.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

And it.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And especially throughout this period, it primarily means be set apart from the Hasmoneans.

From their whole system.

And their whole system means both the government, their kingship, which the Pharisees said was illegitimate because they're Levites, not Judahites. Right.

So their kingship is illegitimate and their high priesthood is illegitimate because they're also kings.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And they're not from the Zadokites. We'll come back to that. They're not descended from Zadok, which when the Temple was restored, that's where the priesthood was supposed to come from in Ezekiel.

So.

They thought both of those were illegitimate. They thought the Temple, therefore was only quasi legitimate. The reason they thought it was quasi legitimate even is that it was built before the Hasmoneans.

Right. But the fact that the Hasmoneans now controlled it, were the high priests there.

Made it very problematic. And so the Pharisees throughout their existence.

In this period showed a preference for the synagogue system. This is one of the reasons why, when you get to the New Testament, there's a prevalence of synagogues, as Father Andrew pointed out, even in Judea itself. Yeah, right. Where the Temple's there. Because, I mean, there's stuff we need to go to the Temple to do in terms of sacrifices, because God told us to do it. But.

You know, like, things aren't right.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

These kind of illegitimate guys. I mean, are the Hasmoneans. Are they even Levites? They're not even Levites, are they?

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

No, they are Levites.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Oh, they are Levites. Okay.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

They are Levites, but they're Levites from the wrong family. And Levites aren't supposed to be king.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, right, right, right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And you're definitely not supposed to be king and high priest at the same time.

Okay, so, yeah, so this is all wrong. Right. So that's. That's a lot of what they're separating from. And their sort of ideology is simple. Their ideology is we're supposed to be following the Torah.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right? Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

We got us into this mess. The exile at all is not keeping the Torah. Right. And so what God wants us to do and what we need to do, if we want him to send the Messiah and intervene in history and do all these things and remove the curse from us, and do all these things is we need to keep the Torah. It's pretty straightforward.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. So this idea that the, that the Hasmoneans represent. That they represent, you know, God's salvation or whatever, or the Messiah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

They're like, that's. That the Messiah wouldn't do that.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yes.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

You know. Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

No, you are not, sir.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yes.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

That is not even close. Right. Kind of an anti Messiah.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And so now they aren't going to be like the Essenes. Right. Who are so disgusted with the whole situation that they opt out completely.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. So they're actually, there's actually serving this kind of prophetic role, though, almost like they're.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

They remain there.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. They're calling. They're calling the rulers to repentance.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Right, right. So as part of that, and this gets us to Jesus. Second criticism of the Pharisees, which is also a criticism that you find later on in Rabbinic Judaism of the Pharisaic movement.

Is that part of how they do that, part of how they bear witness, part of how they set themselves apart is to very publicly set themselves apart.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

So as Christ says, they make their phylacteries broad and they're very long.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

They're ostentatious about.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

They pray long prayers in public. Right. They make a point. Right. They're sort of publicly protesting all the time.

Right. Against the whole. Right. Disordered.

Jewish system. Right.

And so this sets you up for an obvious temptation to pride.

The very act of publicly presenting yourself as one set apart who is better than purer than holier than.

Right. The regular person sets you up, sets you up to fall into pride and arrogance.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And hypocrisy.

And so that's the other criticism that we see Christ say. But those are the two criticisms of the Pharisees. Right.

That said. Right. That try to keep the Torah. That is what they're supposed to be doing. Right.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

No matter what your view is about the New Testament at this time in history, keeping the Torah is what Jewish people are supposed to be doing. Right. So they're not wrong about that.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And yes, they, they, they do get into fine details. Right. Because somebody has to, well, wait, how much is work? What constitutes work on the Sabbath? What. Right. And they have debates about these things. Right. And they get caricatured a lot for that. But even those little fine details, if you read carefully, Christ doesn't really criticize.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right. Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

So for example, when he's pronouncing woe on the Pharisees, which is serious, that's basically Cussing them out. That's basically telling them they're damned.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

For.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Their hypocrisy and stuff. Right. That passage we read during Holy Week where Christ is being really unchristlike in the way he talks to people. Really mean.

Right. Christ says one of the things he says is you tithe from your mint and your dill and your cumin.

But the greater things of the Torah, justice and righteousness and mercy, these you ignore. Right? Okay, we kind of just stop there, right? Oh, yeah, that's a Pharisee for you. He's sitting there in his herb garden cutting off a tenth of his herbs. But he doesn't care about people and he doesn't care about these bigger things. But Christ goes on to say these things you should have done while not neglecting the others also.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Christ doesn't say those little things aren't important. Those little things of the Torah aren't important. Just the big. Just the broad strokes. No, he says you can't miss the forest for the trees. Both the forest and the trees are important.

Yeah, right. That's what he actually says. So that's a different kind of criticism of the Pharisees in the way we normally read it. So the Pharisees are this group that are opposed to the Hasmoneans in their system. And it's important to introduce them here because we're not going to have. We don't have time. Time fails. I mean, I could go all night, Father Andrew, not so much of the true.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

But I like to sleep more than three hours.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

So the. But throughout the. We're now going to go through the Hasmonean dynasty sort of relatively quickly and talk about the. The Hasmonean priest kings, high priest kings.

And throughout this, we could go into detail on things done by each one. But there, there are literally.

Kings who are going to mention.

Like Judah Aristobulus is one of them, who at one point killed. Had 6,000 Pharisees murdered.

For speaking out against his. For condemning him for the Torah. So the Pharisees really do have a role at this time. That's more like St. John the Forerunner, St. John the Baptist v. Herod. Right. Like.

Then, then we give them credit for. Because we, we typically don't give the Pharisees credit for anything. They're again, the bad guys, but they're actually the good guys through this period. Yeah, they're the ones who are in the right.

And the fact that they're set apart, the fact that they never buy into this corrupt system, when that corrupt system gets Destroyed by the Romans. That's why the Pharisees survive and become Rabbinic Judaism.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. Because they're not invested in that system.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Right. They had already separated themselves from it. So our first real, considered the first of the Hasmonean dynasty is Simon Tassi, who's another one of the sons of Mattathias who becomes king and high priest in 142bc.

Right. And he sets out what's going to become the project of the Hasmoneans, which is how are we going to receive the rest of the promises of Abraham? How is the curse going to be gone? How are we going to get the land back? How are we going to do this? We're going to do this by force. Yeah, we're going to.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Sure. That will go very well.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yes. We're going to take it back. Okay. And that conquest really begins with his son, John Hyrcanus.

John Hyrcanus.

Is an infamous figure.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

John Hyrcanus.

I know a lot of our Protestant friends have never heard of him, but John Hyrcanus is the guy who becomes the model for like years. We'll talk more about this a little in a little bit. But for the zealot groups in the New Testament, for the would be messiahs of the New Testament who want to overthrow the Romans, John here, Canis, is their role model.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, he's the guy.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

He's the guy.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Like when you think, when you see people that it seems that their idea of a messiah is a guy with a sword in his hand who kicks all the Romans or Greeks or whoever out. This is what this is modeled after.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yes. And keep in mind, John Hyrcanus, while he's doing all the things we're about to talk about, is also the high priest man. He goes and conquers Samaria and Idumea.

So the region of Samaria and Idumea. Idumea is, as you might be able to tell from the consonants, is what's left of the people of Edom.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. The descendants of Esau.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Right. Edom had also fallen eventually to the Babylonians and. But there's a remnant of people descended from the Edomites living in the land. But that whole area in the southern Transjordan gets conquered by John Hyrcanus. That's that territory that back in Deuteronomy 4, God said, Don't take a single foot of it.

But John Hyrcanus does. And when I say he conquers these places. So when he goes and conquers Samaria, he not only kills a Lot of Samaritans, he goes and destroys their temple on Mount Gerizim.

Levels it to the ground. Okay. And so at this point, that sort of weird cousin rivalry between the Samaritans and the Judeans takes a very different turn.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. This is now not just those people are weird and have a weird Bible. It's that there's this destruction of their temple thing, you know, so there's. It's a mutual hatred. It's not just the Judeans. Oh, the Judeans think some Samaritans are weird. That Samaritans have a historical grievance against Judeans as a result of this.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yes.

He is king and high priest until 104 BC, when his son Judah Aristobulus.

Becomes.

King. He's only king for a short time, for about a year, but in that year he conquers Galilee.

The area around the Sea of Galilee.

And then he is succeeded by his son, Alexander Janaeus, who becomes king and high priest in 103 BC, who conquers Etorea. And once he conquers Etoria, this is the biggest that independent Judea gets as an independent kingdom.

So we're talking about around 90 BC. It's at its height in terms of size, and it is about as big at that point as Israel ever was.

In the. In its history. It's not the same territory.

That like David's kingdom had, but it's about the same amount.

Right. As Solomon's kingdom at its height. The same square mileage. Right. Even though it's different territory.

More territory in the southern Transjordan, less than the Northern Transjordan, etc.

Alexander. Alexander Janaeus dies and is succeeded by his wife.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

What?

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Really? Salome. Alexandra.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. So this is where we get that name. Right. Salome.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

You see? Yeah. You may be noticing some of these. Notice how common a lot of these names are in the New Testament. How many Matthias's and Matthews are there? Yeah. How many signs, really? Johns maccabean era names, John's Judases.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right. So this is so. Yeah. So all of this history, all of this stuff is very present for the. For the Jews of the New Testament.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yes.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Like they're naming their kids after these people.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yes, yeah.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yes.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

They'Re naming their kids after these people. Because for a big portion of the people, this is. We're going to talk about. This is still their ideology.

Salome, by the way, is based on the. The Hebrew name Shlomz, which is a feminized form of Solomon.

So she was Alexander Judaeus's wife. She becomes queen. 76 BC, she does not become high priest. Even the Hasmoneans would not ordain women priests.

So instead, when Alexander Janaeus dies, her son John Hyrcanus II.

Becomes the high priest. So 76 BC, her son John Hyrcanus II becomes high priest. She becomes queen. So it is separated again, briefly, because she dies in 67. And when she dies in 67, she says, I want.

My son John here, Kennes II, the high priest, to be the new king and high priest. So in 67, he also becomes king. So as of 67, John here, Cannes II is king and high priest. Here's the problem. He has a brother.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right?

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

His brother. So he's John here, Candice ii. His brother is Judas Aristobulus ii.

So they're just naming their kids after previous members of the dynasty. Judah Aristobulus II wants to be king and high priest instead of his brother, his older brother, being king and high priest. And so Judas Aristobulus II makes a deal with the. Or John Hyrcanus ii. Sorry, no. Judah Aristopolis II makes a deal with the Parthians.

And says, hey, I need to get rid of my brother.

Right? And basically abducts his brother and has the Parthians take him as a prisoner.

So John Hyrcanus II disappears from the picture one year later, one year after becoming king, his brother Judah Aristobulus II, in 66 BC, becomes king and high priest. Okay, now here's the problem.

Stuff's going on in the background. If you know some Roman history, you know that there's stuff going on in the background. And in this period in the 60s, there's a bit of a Roman civil war going on between Julius Caesar and Pompey. Two generals.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yes. This is the. The. So the. The late Republican, pre imperial era.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Right. The reality is both. Both Pompey and Julius Caesar are trying to make themselves the first Roman emperor. For all intents and purposes.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

It's not going to work out for either of them. It's pretty dead spoilers.

But.

So in the midst of this, all this going on, Pompey.

Right, is active in the East. Caesar has been active as a general in the West. Right. He completed the conquest of Gaul, crossed the Rubicon, all that.

Poppy's been active in the East. He goes and annexes Judea.

Just says, hey, guess what, guys? You're part of Rome now.

And he does that with a Roman army. So this isn't like, you know, hey, we delivered a letter. Good news, you're annexed to Rome. No, this is. He shows up with troops and famously barges into the temple, barges into the most holy place, and nothing happens to him. Him. He finds nothing there.

There's another sign. Nothing happened to him. That something's wrong vis a vis the temple.

In terms of God's presence there. But also, this is where he sort of starts the Roman fascination with Judaism, because he talks about how the Jews worship their God Solamentis, just with their mind, because there was no idol in the temple. There was just nothing there behind the curtain.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Just with.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

So he at that point wants to just get rid of the Hasmoneans. Right. Like, he's like, these people seem pesky and untrustworthy. Right. Rome will just rule here. We'll appoint a governor.

But he gets contacted by John Hyrcanus ii, who's over in that Parthian prison.

Outside Jericho.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

I'll do it. I'll do a deal with you guys. I'll be a dude.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

I'll be. I am way cooler than my brother. Right? Right. He's no good. Get rid of him. Put me back in the spot. Right. Make. Make me king and high priest again. And. And I'll be your loyal subject. Right? Yes, sir. Right. I love you, Romans. Okay, so he does a deal. Pompey gets John here, Candice II, released in 63 B.C. john here, Candice II becomes king and high priest again, and his brother Judah Aristobulus ii, who usurped him, gets hauled off to Rome as a prisoner.

So the worm has turned.

But things don't go so well for John here, Cattus the Second, going forward, certain precedents have been established. And so his son, his own son, okay, antigonus mattathias.

In 40 BC decides he's sick of waiting for old dad to die so that he could become king and high priest. And Antigonus Mattathias goes and again abducts his dad. Cuts off both of his ears.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. Like. Which, okay. Which seems like a weird thing to do, but you can't be high priest if you are maimed.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

He's maimed. He's mutilated. Now he can't ever come back as high priest because he knows what his dad did with his uncle.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right?

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

He's like, I need to get rid of him for good this time.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

They've merged king and high priest. So if you maim the king, high priest, then he's out.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Right. So, you know, Josephus says he actually bit off his ears.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Oh, that's. Wow. That's like a certain boxer that we.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Call his own father's ears.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

More likely they're just cut off.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

It's funny. I mean, it's funny to me. It's like, oh, let's. Let's follow this little provision of the Torah about.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yes. This is exactly how the Torah said things should be set up. Yes.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Golly.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Cutting off your father's ear, mutilating your father and sending him into exile. Right. So you can become king and high priest. That's how succession works. That's worth it. In a Klingon ship, man.

There you get to die with honor.

So in 40 BC, Antigonus mattathias becomes the king and high priest and is going to be the last king and high priest from the Hasmonean dynasty.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yes.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

So New Year's, his dad gives him back to the Parthians. Right.

But in the background here, again, if you know some Roman history, there's another Roman civil war ramping up. That's between Mark Antony and Octavian. Octavian's gonna become Caesar Augustus.

And Mark Antony's hanging out with Cleopatra, the last of the Ptolemies, in Egypt.

And is getting ready to make some moves. And he decides, man, these Hasmodians are more trouble than they're worth. Pompey should have gotten rid of them when he has the chance. And so he has Antigonus edithias executed in 36 BC. This is like five years before the battle of Actium between him and Octavian.

And it's not totally clear how he was killed because different sources say different things. And this is mentioned. His execution of Antigonus Matthias is mentioned, for example, in Plutarch's Life of Mark Anthony. So we. We have sources on this. This isn't just something we know about from obscure Jewish bits of history. This is world history stuff.

So Roman sources, including Plutarch, say that the Romans beheaded him. Right. Which would have been appropriate because he's a king, after all.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right. It's. That's. That's. If you're a Roman, that's the way that you kill someone in a nice, respectful way.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Right.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

It's the fastest way that they know how to take someone out.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Right. Josephus says he was crucified.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. Which is the worst way you can kill someone as far as the Romans are concerned. That's the. I stomp on you and spit in your face and, you know, make you look terrible in front of everyone, you know.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah, that's. So it's unclear which of those is actually true. I mean, you could go either way.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah.

But. Or knowing the Romans, it could have somehow been both, you know, but.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

They.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Were a cruel people. But so.

While that's the end of the Hasmonean kings there, there are, of course, still going to be high priests. And so his son, Aristobulus III, in 36 BC, becomes the new high priest, but there are no more Hasmonean kings. But he is high priest, establishes now this high priesthood coming from him. And it's not going to be a direct line because there's going to be assassination and chicanery and all the same kind of stuff we saw with the kings, with the high priests. But that is the line that. That is the group, the priests, the high priest descended from Aristobulus iii. These are the Sadducees.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. And the reason why they call themselves that is. It's from Zadok, who is, you know, the. The one that the line of priests are supposed to be coming from amongst the Levites. And so the idea is that they're Zadokites. So sad, you see, is basically just.

Yeah, exactly. It's a. Yeah, yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Now, they are not descended from Zadok, Right?

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yes.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Propaganda. Yeah, yeah. To try to legitimate themselves.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

But. So that's who the Sadducees are, who we see in the New Testament. This is why the Pharisees and the Sadducees hate each other.

Right?

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Because the Sadducees are the remnant of this line of the Hasmone, who not only were wicked, were stood up to by the Pharisees, but who regularly massacred Pharisees. Massacred Pharisees. Right. This is why there's this antipathy between them. Right. But you can also see how the Hasmonean ideology continues in the Sadducees.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

The Sadducees don't have anything about it afterlife. They're not expecting God to intervene.

They're not expecting a resurrection. They're all about making. Making this stuff happen themselves in this world.

Right. Over against the Pharisees.

So to replace the Hasmoneans, since there's not gonna be any more Hasmonean kings.

The Romans do a brief experiment, one. They're gonna regret this one and get rid of it too. But they do a brief experiment. And that brief experiment is the Herodians.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

So there's Herod, Herod the Great, the first one, he is an Idumean. So he is descended from the Edomites.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. So he's not a Judean, a descendant of Esau. So he is. He is an Abrahamite. But Not a Judean and not even Israelite.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Right.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Really? Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Right.

Now, they don't just put him on the throne that the Hasmoneans had. They carve up the Hasmonean territory.

So they separate Galilee, Samaria, Judea. Right. They deliberately cut it all up. Right. So they've already got that.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And they make Herod not a king. Romans don't like the title king. They make him even though he's referred to as a king by the people there and like to refer to himself as one. From the Roman perspective, he's named the Ethnarch.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Which is the ruler of the people. Right. And that's very important. He was not the ruler of the land. He was not the ruler of the natural resources. He was not the ruler of any things the Romans cared about. He was the ruler of, oh, you. Those people who are wandering around on our land.

And so he had a duty to help them keep those people in line.

And not causing problems. Now, despite this, or maybe because of it and the resulting insecurity of his position, Herod really wanted to be great. He's kind of a sad, pathetic figure in his. I know.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Like this guy, he starts slipping into Cleopatra's DMs, as it were.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yes. Yes. He tried to romance Cleopatra and failed. Right.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Which is like, Cleopatra's like, okay, look, I've been with Julius Caesar, I've been with Mark Anthony. And you are.

[Narrator]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

You know, and then Screech comes walking in like, dude, you ain't Zack Morris.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Wow.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

You ain't even. Yeah. No. Is this our first Saved by the Bell reference? Have you made others that I just. Not even. Slater, man, you're Screech. Get out of here, Harris.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

So dang.

So.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

But he immediately tries to legitimate himself. So he marries Mariamne.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Who was essentially a Hasmonean princess, was the daughter of the last king. Right. So he's like. So see, I'm kind of Hasmone. Ish.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

And then around killing every male Hasmonean he could find.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And then when he killed all the male Hasmonians. Yeah.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. Now I control the bloodline.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

As what does.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

That's. So he can produce the Kwisai Hatterach.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And then, appropriately enough, he dies by being eaten by worms.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

So good.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Hey. He didn't walk without rhythm.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

That's the problem.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

So.

The other major thing he does to try to make a name for himself and establish himself is huge building projects. The most famous one of these that's discussed the New Testament is his massive expansion of the Temple complex that took place over decades, like including after his death in 1 BC.

So he did do that and other. But there are other building projects, palaces, fortresses, towers, other things all over what was Judea. Right. And even up toward Galilee that he built or at least got started during his reign.

And, you know, people dig his stuff. It's kind of a blend of Roman and Near Eastern architecture and stuff. But anyway, didn't get him very far. He's eaten by worms, he dies.

The Romans were dissatisfied with him.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

So they split up even the little bit of authority that he had four ways among four of his sons, calling it the Tetrarchy. Each of them was called a tetrarch, a ruler of a fourth.

And then the last of the tetrarchs got taken out at the end of the Jewish revolt. Right. So this lasts until, you know, the 60s A.D. right. There's 60 years of the tetrarchy with less and less power and authority and influence.

So that all kinds of peters out. All kind of peters out. But the lasting legacy of the Hasmoneans.

And is carried on by the Sadducees, this Hasmonean ideology, and carried on by the Zealots is this idea where we talked about the Pharisees. On the one hand, we're following through on where God is going to intervene. The Messiah is going to come. God is going to set things right. He's going to remove the curse from us. He's going to restore Israel, he's going to do all of these things.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

The Hasbronian ideology, on the other hand, is we need to go and take it. Right. They wanted to reconquista. We need to go and retake Samaria, retake Galilee and reunite them by force. Military, right.

Merger of king and high priest. Cool with us. We need to. We're looking for a. Someone to lead a political. A revolt, another revolt to have a political and military victory over the Romans and re. Establish an independent Judea. This is what is believed by all. These would be messiahs that we see popping up in the New Testament, the New Testament period. And then after. Even after the Barcopha revolt. Right. These are all would be messiahs. And the whole issue is what, what, what. The way we decide whether this person was the Messiah or not from the Hasmonean ideology perspective is are they successful?

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Right, right. Oh, the Romans killed him. Oh, well, that must have not been the Messiah.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Which is who's next to take a shot.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. Think about that though, right? Especially in terms of the Gospels, when they're like, hey, when it's clear that Jesus is talking about himself getting crucified, eventually they're like.

Yeah, the Messiah is supposed to stay forever. He's not going to get crucified by the Romans.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Right.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

We've seen that before.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Right. So, and so this is. So these are the two real competing ideologies among the Zealots and in its different way, among the Sadducees. Slightly different. Right. And a lot of the common people, you have this Hasmonian ideology of, we are going to do this ourselves, we're going to take it. We're going to take it by force. Right. And violence, and we're going to re. Establish. Right. This kingdom. And that's how the promises to Abraham, that's how these prophecies will be fulfilled. And the Pharisees on the other side saying, no, our job is to keep Torah right until that day and be faithful until that day when God acts and intervenes.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And may that happen soon. Okay.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

It's not just Rabbinic Judaism that comes out of Phariseeism. Christianity comes out of Phariseeism.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yes. It represents this prophetic response to people who want to. Who think that the kingdom is of this world.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Like, my kingdom is not of this world is a very Pharisaic thing to say.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah. That the. And the Hasmonean ideology blossoms into full flower in the Jewish revolts of the first century, which, of course, are a disaster.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. And then the Pharisees are like.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah, yeah. So the temple's destroyed, Jerusalem's destroyed.

The Romans de Judaize. Right. Judea. Make it Palestina.

Right. And remove everything. And, yeah. The Pharisees are essentially the position of saying, told you so.

But they're the ones who are prepared to deal with that.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

As tragic as it still all was, they're already separate enough. They already have the synagogue structures to keep going without it. They were never wedded to it. Right. And they could continue keeping Torah waiting for the Messiah. Right. To intervene and do these things. They're set up and ready to do that.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Okay.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

But as I just mentioned, and as we're going to get into it, act three, there's another group spun out of Pharisaic Judaism that's going to say, hey, guys, the Messiah did come and did do all those things you're waiting for, and he's Jesus of Nazareth.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Well, on that bombshell, we're going to go ahead and take our second break, and we'll be right back.

[Narrator]

Father Andrew, Stephen Damick. And father Stephen DeYoung will be back in a moment to take your calls on the next part of the of the Lord of Spirits. Give them a call at 855-237-2346. That's 855-AF-RADIO.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Perhaps you are a seeker exploring the abundance of the Oregon Orthodox faith. Or maybe you're a young mother wanting to share the fullness of Orthodoxy with your children and family. Or perhaps you are single, trying to find shelter from unclean images or words. Or an empty nester wanting to fill your time with edifying thoughts, prayers, discussions and content. Or maybe you feel alone and just want to find solace and comfort regardless of your own unique circumstances. Ancient Faith Radio is here to help with your Orthodox journey. Please, please consider partnering with us by becoming a monthly recurring donor so that we can continue our mission to spread the Orthodox faith and help support the spiritual lives of the already faithful. Any consistent donation, large or small, will enable us to focus on our mission unabated. Simply visit www.ancientfaith.com support and start your monthly donations today. All gifts are tax deductible and greatly appreciated. Thank you.

[Narrator]

We're back now with the Lord of Spirits with Father Andrew, Stephen Damick and Father Stephen DeYoung. If you have a question, call now at 855-237-2346. That's 855-AF-RADIO.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Welcome back. By the way, you should know, Father, that your friend Jacob is, has shown up in the chat and says that he, he talked to you for five hours last night and he's looking for more.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Well, there's at least a couple more here where that came from. There we go. Anyway, me being where that came from.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yes, yes. So, well, we're back. It's the third half of the third episode of this three episode arc, History of Israel here on the Lord of Spirits podcast. And we just left off with the failure of the Hasmoneans that they decided to be super political and combine the priesthood and the kingship. And that didn't go well. And then you get Herod and now.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

We'Re going to move on to my friend Jacob's favorite part, St. Paul.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

There we go.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

All right.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

So yes, yes.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

I mean, we had a caller earlier.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

You know, she, you know, how do we, how do you read St. Paul, especially if you're used to, if you've been all Calvinized in your brain, you.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Know, don't do it, not once.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

That's right. That's right. So, okay, so what is saint, what is the Israel that St. Paul is talking about, like, what does that exactly that mean?

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

So.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Well, Bob, no. No callers.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Well, we've kind of gone long and so I, I made an executive decision to tell. I told Mike to just flip off the phone.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

So cowardice.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

I know. Anyway, I know.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Oh, well, I will soldier on.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Sorry, everybody.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Despite the weakness of my support.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yes, yes. So.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah. So.

One of the. So obviously, you know, we're not now, at this point in the evening going to be going through. Here's why Jesus is the Messiah. Right.

That's a few episodes in and of itself. And we've already had that conversation. There are a few. Go back to our episode on Messiah. Other things we've talked about the past.

We're going to focus here in this third half because, again, this series is about the history of Israel and Judah and Judea.

But.

So one important part of what the Messiah was expected to do was restore.

Israel.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

That's part of.

What he's going to do. So, as we mentioned at the end of the last half.

Christianity fundamentally at its origins is a movement within Pharisaic Judaism that says that Jesus of Nazareth is the Messiah, meaning that he has done these things.

So that raises the question, how did. If you're saying he did, how did Jesus of Nazareth restore Israel?

And the reason why I mentioned St. Paul in particular is this is a particular concern of St. Paul's especially in Romans. And so he's going to present.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

A, an argument that that is what Christ has done. And we're going to kind of walk through that here now in this third half. But to get to that, we have to start with the contours of.

What that expectation looked like from the Hebrew Bible. So what are the. The.

In many case, from the prophets. Right. We're also going to talk about a couple of psalms. But where is this expectation of the restoration of Israel come. Come from and how is it talked about in terms of that expectation? And then St. Paul is going to come back to that and talk about how Jesus as the Messiah fulfills it. So we have to start with one of the primary ways that the Hebrew scriptures talk about Israel is that Israel is God's portion or his inheritance, depending on how it's translated.

And this is. I've got, if you really want it, you know, a list of like 37 different places.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Where that language is used.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. Just do a word search on.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah. It's all.

Yeah.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

You can, you can see all that stuff here. It's there.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

It's everywhere. Right. But There are also. Right, so there are also some texts we're going to talk about. A couple from the Psalms. This isn't all of them, but this is a couple of them that use that word inheritance in a way that goes beyond just the people of Israel.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. Like, you know this Psalm 82.

If you're reading the Greek version, you know, the one that begins, God stood up in the council of the gods, etc.

And then it ends with the verse, the last verse. Arise, O God, and judge thou the earth, for thou shalt inherit all the nations. Inherit all the nations, Right, well, from all the nations. From all the nations, yes.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah. Right. So not only is Israel his inheritance, but he has an inheritance from all of the nations.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Another place that talks about this kind of idea is in Psalm 87. Right. And this is verses one through six.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. So listen to this one. On the holy mount stands the city he founded. The Lord loves the gates of Zion more than all the dwellings of Jacob. Glorious things of you are spoken, O city of God. Among those who know me, I mention Rahab and Babylon. Behold Philistia and Tyre with cush. This one was born there, they say, and of Zion it shall be said, this one and that one were born in her, for the Most High himself will establish her. The Lord records as he registers the peoples, this one was born there. So I mean, this is people who are from these other nations, the Philistines, Tyrians, Cushites, and they're being reckoned along with Zion.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Right, right. And this is not describing, oh, there's going to be a whole bunch of people from the 70 nations who are going to convert to Judaismos, who are going to go get circumcised and start keeping Torah and become Jews.

It doesn't say that. And it wasn't interpreted that way in the second Temple period because there weren't Jewish people going around trying to get Gentiles to convert and become Jewish. They did not want that. They were not trying to do that. There was no call to do that. They didn't read this as a call to do that.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

But this is talking about when the time comes that God intervenes, His inheritance is Israel, but is also going to include some people who aren't maybe properly speaking, Israelites. Right. From all the nations. And it's all 87. Those are even particular nations who were enemies of Israel.

Babylon, Philistia, Tyre. Right. These are enemy nations.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Nonetheless. Right. God has an inheritance there. Okay, so we have that piece. We also have a piece in terms of the expectation restoration of Israel in the prophets, where they're going to talk about Israel being restored.

And this first text we're going to read is what is probably familiar to you. And if you, if you're an Orthodox Christian, you probably heard it a few weeks ago at Pasca, because it's Reddit Pascha. And I know. So there's. There's a sad tendency with the Old Testament readings in the services. Right. Where, you know, like at Theophany and at the great blessing of the waters, we have all these readings from the Old Testament and it's like, oh, well, they're reading that because it involves water.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. Just. Just put all the water stuff.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah. I mean, that's not untrue, but that's at a very shallow level of discourse.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right. The water is great.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

There are greater connections to each of those readings to the feast than just water. Okay.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

So, yes.

This text we're about to read talks about something dead coming back to life, and we're celebrating the resurrection at Pascha. But true, but that's a very low level. Right. Because.

The passage we're about to read at Ezekiel, chapter 37, verses 1 through 14. This isn't just a question of, oh, hey, we need to get the surviving Judeans and Judahites, we need to get them all back in one place. That's not the restoration of Israel.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Israel as it was, the 12 tribes is dead by the time of Ezekiel. The northern kingdom is gone.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And it's Judah is in exile.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

And it's interesting, you know, that this passage also gets paired in the same services with a lot of stuff related to Exodus as well.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yes.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

So you're getting like, this is Israel constitution stuff here. So anyway, okay, I'll read it.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

So people couldn't be restored. This is how it's talked about.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, this is how. So this is From Ezekiel, chapter 37, starting with verse 1. The hand of the Lord was upon me, and he brought me out in the spirit of the Lord and set me down in the middle of the valley. It was full of bones. And he led me around among them. And behold, there are very many on the surface of the valley. And behold, they were very dry. And he said to me, son of man, can these bones live? And I answered, O Lord God. You know, then he said to me, prophesy over these bones and say to them, o dry bones, hear the word of the Lord. Thus says the Lord God to these bones. Behold, I will cause breath to enter you, and you shall live. And I will lay sinews upon you and will cause flesh to come upon you and cover you with skin and put breath in you. And you shall live. And you shall know that I am the Lord. So I prophesied as I was commanded. And as I prophesied, there was a sound, Behold, a rattling. And the bones came together, bone to its bone. And I looked, and behold, there were sinews on them. And flesh had come upon them and skin had covered them, but there was no breath in them. Then he said to me, prophesy to the breath, Prophesy, son of man, and say to the breath, thus says the Lord God, Come from the four winds, O breath, and breathe on these slain that they may live. So I prophesied as he commanded me, and the breath came into them, and they lived and stood on their feet, an exceedingly great army. Then he said to me, son of man, these bones are the whole house of Israel. Behold, they say our bones are dried up and our hope is lost. We are indeed cut off. Therefore prophesy and say to them, thus says the Lord God. Behold, I will open your graves and raise you from your graves, O my people, and I will bring you into the land of Israel, and you shall know that I am the Lord, where I open your graves and raise you from your graves, O my people. And I will put my spirit within you, and you shall live. And I will place you in your own land. Then you shall know that I am the Lord. I have spoken, and I will do it, declares the Lord.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

So this is what it has to be, resurrected from the dead. Yeah, that's what needs to happen for Israel to be restored. There needs to be a resurrection.

This already to tip the hat of kind of where this is going. Right. Read Romans.

The resurrection of Jesus for St. Paul is the beginning of the resurrection of Israel.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

But we need to go a little further. Right. So this is what needs to happen.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

But again, importantly, according to the prophets, and we're going to read a couple of things from Jeremiah now.

And in those couple of things from Jeremiah, it's going to be made very clear, prophetically, that this, again, isn't just about Judah.

This isn't just about those surviving Judahites being brought out of exile or all collected in one place again, or even having a king again and having a high priest again and having a temple again. It's not about that. Right. It goes beyond that.

The northern kingdom also has to be and is going to be restored.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. Okay, so this is From Jeremiah, chapter 3, 31 according to the Hebrew numbering and 38 in the Greek numbering, the Lord appeared to him from far away. I have loved you with an everlasting love. Therefore I have continued my faithfulness to you. Again I will build you, and you shall be built, O virgin Israel. Again you shall adorn yourself with tambourines and shall go forth in the dance of the merry makers. Again you shall plant vineyards on the mountains of Samaria. The planters shall plant and shall enjoy the fruit. For there shall be a day when watchmen will call in the hill country of Ephraim. Arise and let us go up to Zion, to the Lord our God. Remember, everybody, Ephraim is in many cases Old Testament shorthand for the Northern Kingdom.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Right.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

You know, the 10 tribes.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Samaria is the capital of the Northern Kingdom.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Samaria is the capital.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And notice here, notice here.

How that concludes. It might not strike you immediately, but notice the watchmen call out for the Ephraimites for this restored Northern Kingdom. To go to Zion, to Jerusalem, to the temple, to worship God. Yeah, that never happened in the Northern Kingdom.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

We went through that history. Jeroboam, son of Nebat, first thing he did in establishing the Northern Kingdom, golden calves at Bethel and Daniel worship there. Do not go back to the temple.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Don't go to Israel, don't go to Jerusalem.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

So it's not just that. Hey, we're going to get the band back together. Hey, the physical, biological people are going to be gathered back together. It's going to be different this time. Yeah, right. That. That ideal of the Torah that they were supposed to be, that's what they're going to become.

Even the Northern Kingdom folks. Right?

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Jeremiah also says.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Jeremiah also says this is chapter 50 in the Hebrew text and 27 in the Greek text. Yeah. Greek and Hebrew, Jeremiah are not in the same order in those days. And in that time, declares the Lord, the people of Israel and the people of Judah. Notice that Israel and Judah shall come together, weeping as they come, and they shall seek the Lord their God. They shall ask the way to Zion and with faces turned toward it, saying, come, let us join ourselves to the Lord in an everlasting covenant that will never be forgotten.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Right. So you have new covenant. Right. Which is renewed covenant language. Right. Israel and Judah can't come together if they're the same people person. Right. It's the same group. Right?

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

This is talking about Israel like Northern kingdom, and Judah like southern kingdom.

Right. So very clearly this includes both. And now we're going to go. We read Ezekiel, the Dry Bones passage is Ezekiel 37:1 14. But we're now going to continue in verse 15.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yes, yes. The word of the Lord came to me, Son of man, take a stick and write on it for Judah and the people of Israel associated with him. Then take another stick and write on it for Joseph, the stick of Ephraim and all the house of Israel associated with him, and join them one to another into one stick that they may become one in your hand. And when your people say to you, will you not tell us what you mean by these? Say to them, thus says the Lord God. Behold, I am about to take the stick of Joseph that is in the hand of Ephraim and the tribes of Israel associated with him, and I will join with it the stick of Judah and make them one stick that they may be one in my hand. When the sticks on which you write are in your hand before your eyes, then say to them, thus says the Lord God. Behold, I will take the people of Israel.

From the nations among which they have gone and will gather them from all around and bring them to their own land. And I will make them one nation in the land on the mountains of Israel. And one king shall be king over them all. And they shall be no longer two nations and no longer divided into two kingdoms. They shall not defile themselves any more with their idols and their detestable things or with any of their transgressions. But I will save them from all the backslidings in which they have sinned and will cleanse them. And they shall be my people, and I will be their God, my servant. David shall be king over them. And they shall all have one shepherd. They shall walk in my rules and be careful to obey my statutes.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

So again, Torah is not just going to be an ideal that strived for that order is going to be achieved. And notice Israel, the northern kingdom, they're going to come back from the nations into which they were dispersed.

That can't be literal.

Right, because the literal people who were sent into Assyria are dead at the time Ezekiel is saying this.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right. And then their descendants have assimilated.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yes.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Like they're just. They're not who they are anymore.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

So we're putting the pieces out here. Okay.

So when we come to St. Paul talking about this, which is in Romans chapters 9 through 11, Calvinists all over are getting excited. You're going to be disappointed. This is not going where you think it's going. Quite the opposite.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Sorry, Calvinists.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Right. In order to understand what St. Paul is going to do, so St. Paul, a lot of what he's talking about, especially chapters 10 and 11, is he's talking about the Northern Kingdom.

And the way he's gotten there is, is in Romans 9 through 11, St. Paul is addressing the fact that, look, even looking around at that time, you're saying Jesus of Nazareth is the Messiah.

Right? He's the Messiah. He's the King of the Jews, right? And I'm looking around, I've seen a lot of Jews who don't think he's the Messiah, right? Who don't accept that he's the Messiah. So what's up with that, right? If he's the Messiah, why haven't all of the Jewish people recognize him as the Messiah? Why only some of you? And now you got all these people who aren't even Jews saying he's the Messiah, right? What's up with this? St. Paul, this is what he's answering. And so he starts out in Romans 9 talking about Jacob and Esau, Isaac and Ishmael, saying, hey, look, it was never everybody descended from Abraham.

Right? It was never everybody. It was never about, just like everyone who's literally Abraham's seed.

Right? There were always some, right? And then some others, right? And he follows that through to talk about faithful remnant, right? There's always a faithful remnant. But man, like.

Have you read the Hebrew Bible, right? Like the masses, the vast majority of the Israelites were not faithful people. Yeah, we're not giving you the Torah. There's always a faithful remnant who were. But there's this big body, right? So that's sort of St. Paul's first argument is like, if you were familiar with the Jewish scriptures, you know that that isn't a weird situation, right? There would be a lot of Jewish people who would not accept the Messiah when he comes. That's not totally unprecedented.

And now he kind of goes into this side question of, well, yeah, but what's going on with that.

Right? Like, why does God bring these 12 tribes.

Out of Egypt, right? And go through all this and a lot parcels of land to each of these tribes when he knows, right? We talked about last time, what a short period of time it was that they existed as Israel and now they're just gone. Like, what was, what was the point.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Of all that.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Right? Like, why doesn't God just redeem and bless the faithful remnant? Yeah, right. Like the ones he knows are going to be available. What's going on with this? And so St. Paul is going to appeal to another set of ideas from the Old Testament, but in order to understand what St. Paul is doing, we have to read first this, another passage from Jeremiah, another text for the Hebrew scriptures that St. Paul is referencing. That's in the background of what St. Paul says. Because if, say, you're a Calvinist and you don't read Jeremiah when you're reading this, you'll get confused.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right. Taking stuff out of context. Remember, the Bible is hypertextual.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yes.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Everything connects to everything. Okay, so this is From Jeremiah, chapter 18, starting with verse one, the word that came to Jeremiah from the Lord, arise and go down to the potter's house, and there I will let you hear my words. So I went down to the potter's house and there he was working at his wheel. And the vessel he was making of clay was spoiled in the potter's hand. And he reworked it into another vessel as it seemed good to the potter to do. Then the word of the Lord came to me. O house of Israel, can I not do with you as this potter has done? Declares the Lord. Behold, like the clay in the potter's hand, so are you in my hand. O house of Israel. If at any time I declare something concerning a nation or a kingdom that I will pluck up and break down and destroy it. And if that nation concerning which I have spoken turns from its evil, I will relent of the disaster that I intended to do to it. And if at any time I declare concerning a nation or kingdom that I will build and plant it, and if it does evil in my sight, not listening to my voice, then I will relent of the good that I had intended to do it. Now therefore, say to the men of Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem, thus says the Lord, behold, I am shaping disaster against you and devising a plan against you. Return everyone from his evil way and amend your ways and your deeds. But they say that is in vain. We will follow our own plans. And will everyone act according to the stubbornness of his evil heart? Yeah, I mean, it's. So from this it's clear that what God is saying to Jeremiah is. And this is where the whole potter image comes from, that as we're about to talk about that, St. Paul uses that if the potter has plans for God, says, basically, if I'm going to punish some nations and they turn from their evil, I won't punish them. And if I'm going to bless a nation and they turn to evil, then I will not bless them.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Right.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

It's really dependent on what the nation does.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Right. And that these are nations, right. The potter's vessels here Are nations, Right. And he makes them for a purpose and he has an intent with them.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

But that intent is not like a foregone conclusion.

So if he makes a nation with good intent toward it, but they turn to evil, if he makes a nation and they're wicked and he intends to destroy it, but they repent. Right.

This is not predestination.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

No, no.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

It is the opposite of predestination.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

God is going to do whatever he wants no matter what they do.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Okay, so within the argument in Romans, St. Paul's going to say, northern kingdom of Israel is made by God for a purpose.

For a purpose. And in the latter part of Romans 9, he's going to start getting into the idea of what that purpose was for which the northern kingdom and those tribes were brought out of Egypt and were. Were created.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. So now, keeping in mind what we just heard From Jeremiah, Romans 9, starting with verse 20. But who are you, o man, to answer back to God? Well, what is molded say to its molder? Why have you made me like this? Has the potter no right over the clay to make out of the same lump one vessel for honorable use and another for dishonorable use? What if God, desiring to show his wrath and to make known his power, has endured with much patience vessels of wrath prepared for destruction in order to make known the riches of his glory? For vessels of mercy which he has prepared beforehand for glory. Even us, whom he has called not from the Jews only, but also from the gentiles.

Yeah, it's notable. This is all a question.

Is it not possible? Can God do what he wants?

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah, right. But notice he's using the same language for Jeremiah. Right. He has this vessel prepared for glory.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And he says, right in. In Jeremiah.

He talks about declaration that you will build and plant. Right?

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

So he has the same thing. Right. So pensora was in view. Now, notice he says, he talks about bearing with those vessels, prefer wrath, Meaning they're not repenting.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

But he is patient with them. Why is he. How is he patient with them if he just. If he's just waiting for the right time to destroy them. Right. If he's just saying, well, I don't have to destroy them immediately. I could wait and destroy them later if it fits my plan. That's not being patient with them. Right.

Being patient with them means he's giving them an opportunity. An opportunity to repent.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. He's giving them a chance. Which is weirdly consistent with how God acts throughout the whole scriptures, Right? Strangely.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Right. So he's giving them a chance to repent. Okay, St. Paul's talking about the Northern Kingdom here.

God created them, gave them this existence and bore with them for a couple hundred years, giving them a chance to repent, and then they didn't.

[Katie (Caller from Virginia)]

Okay.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

But even within that, within his destruction of them, St. Paul is saying God is going to use that destruction. He's going to use the judgment that they brought upon themselves with their sin. He's going to use that to do something good.

For someone else who is faithful.

And that someone else who is faithful is not going to be just the Jews.

But is going to include some people from the nations.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

This is laying the groundwork for the big analogy that St. Paul is going to use in chapter 11 of the Olive Tree. Okay, but before we launch into that.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Okay, okay, okay.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

I just want to be mean to the Calvinists one last time.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

I mean.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

What do you mean, one last time this evening?

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

I was gonna say, you know, it's gonna happen again.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

That's.

What St. Paul is talking about here, is not double predestination.

He's talking Jeremiah here, people, which teaches the exact opposite.

That God will turn from his intent, good or bad, based on repentance or lack of repentance of wickedness and sin. Okay, so St. Paul is not teaching the opposite of Jeremiah. He's teaching the same thing Jeremiah is teaching. And he's talking about nations, not about individuals. Okay, now the olive tree.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

All right, the olive tree. Romans 11, starting with verse 17. But if some of the branches were broken off, and you, although a wild olive shoot, were grafted in among the others, and now share in the nourishing root of the olive tree. Do not be arrogant toward the branches. If you are, remember it is not you who support the root, but the root that supports you. Then you will say, branches were broken off so that I might be grafted in. That is true. They were broken off because of their unbelief. But you stand fast through faith, so do not become proud, but fear. For if God did not spare the natural branches, neither will he spare you. Note then the kindness and the severity of God. Severity toward those who have fallen, but God's kindness to you, provided you continue in his kindness, otherwise you too will be cut off. And even they, if they do not continue in their unbelief, will be grafted in. For God has the power to graft them in again. For if you were cut off from what is by nature a wild olive tree and grafted contrary to nature into a cultivated olive tree, how Much more will these, the natural branches be grafted back into their own olive tree. Lest you be wise in your own sight, I do not want you to be unaware of this mystery, brothers. A partial hardening has come upon Israel until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in. And in this way all Israel will be saved. As it is written, the deliverer will come from Zion. He will banish ungodliness from Jacob. And this will be my covenant with them when I take away their sins.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Okay, so a few things about this metaphor that we need to observe. First of all, sorry, dispensationalists, there's only one olive tree.

Not two.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

It doesn't say. Well, God took a break from dealing with that first olive tree. He'll get back to it. But he planted this second one.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

No.

This is one, one. One olive tree.

Also.

Those of you who.

Want to say, like, old covenant, dead and gone, Israel cut off. Church, new thing. Right.

Church has replaced Israel. There's only one tree.

God doesn't uproot the original tree and plant a new one.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

That he hopes will grow better. That's not the analogy. Right. That doesn't work. Okay.

What this is saying is.

There were branches on that tree grew out of Abraham. This tree is Israel. Right. It's very clear. He says the tree is Israel.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Okay.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Israel in the Old Testament and all through its history, branches were broken off. Why were they broken off? Because they were unfaithful.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

They're unfaithful to God here.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

He says this.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yes. That's why they were unfaithful all through history.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

And there's a possibility that the unfaithful branch which gets broken off can be put back in if it.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Right. If they repent and turn back to God and become faithful, they'll get grafted right back in. So it's not permanent. Right. But all throughout history it's happened. Right? Read the Hebrew Bible. Right. That big swaths have been cut off for their faithlessness. But in God's providence, Right. And in his mercy, all of those branches that were cut off by their own faithlessness.

By their own faithlessness. Calvinists. That's what he says here.

Not God's predetermination that were cut off leave space for these wild branches to be grafted in.

Okay? That's part of the providence. Now there's this space to be filled by the fullness of the gentiles, fullness of the nations.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Okay, yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Which we'll get into that more in A second.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah, I was gonna say that's a callback right there.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah, we'll get back to that in a second. Okay. But a couple more things to notice here. Number two or three or whatever. We're on.

To notice. Notice the wild olive branches do not become.

Something other than wild olive branches.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. They're by nature wild olive branches, right?

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

They are by nature wild olive branches. And they stay wild olive branches is.

Right? So these people from the nations who are being grafted in do not become.

Jewish.

They do not be get circumcised. They do not start following Udaios. They remain branches from whatever tree they came from, but now they're grafted in. Meaning what? Meaning they're still who they are. They're still Greeks, Parthians, Persians, Americans, Dutch people, Lithuanians. Right? But they're deriving their life and their nourishment from this tree that is Israel.

Right? From its root, which is Abraham and his faithfulness. Right? That's why he says the tree supports you. You don't support the tree to those people.

Right?

And the base of the tree.

Where that life is coming up and through are the natural branches.

Right? That faithful remnant into which these wild branches are being grafted.

And so the fullness.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

The fullness of the Gentiles. There's another place where this exact phrase is used in the Scriptures. Yeah, it's in Genesis.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Testament of Jacob.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Well, it's before the Testament of Jacob. Prop.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

I'm sorry. Sorry. Yeah, with.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Joseph.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Joseph, yeah, yeah, yeah, sorry. Joseph.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. So Genesis 49 is technically the Testament of Jacob. So that's where Jacob slash the person. Israel is blessing his sons on his Deathbed in Genesis 48, before that, Joseph brings his two sons, Manasseh and Ephraim, to be blessed. Ephraim is actually the younger son to Jacob to be blessed. And Jacob crosses his hands and uses his right hand to bless Ephraim, even though he's the younger. Because by that point, if you've been reading Genesis at all, you get the point that it's often the younger son who's considered the firstborn, right?

And so Ephraim receives this blessing, and part of that blessing is that his descendants will become the fullness of. The fullness of the Gentiles, the fullness of the nations.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right?

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And so what St. Paul is saying by using that phrase is he's saying.

The. The. The people of the northern kingdom who were cut off for their faithlessness.

Were scattered like seed. Remember what he said, what St. Paul says at Another place, the seed falls into the ground, it must die.

So the northern kingdom, those tribes die.

But they're scattered like seed out there among the nations.

And then.

Centuries later, now, now that Jesus has come as the Messiah, St. Paul is saying, now's the harvest time, if you're paying attention. Jesus already said that.

If you are paying attention on Sunday and you go to an orthodox church. You heard Jesus say that about the Samaritans.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

He was in Samaria and he said to the disciples, the fields are ripe for the harvest, we need workers for the harvest.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. So it's this idea, the apostles that this really ancient, I mean by this point, really ancient prophecy, you know, about Ephraim is fulfilled in the nations getting grafted in, right. And they're getting the nations sort of.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Through Ephraim, right, Who are becoming faithful to God in the Messiah, in Jesus, right. Are being grafted in. They're now drawing their life from the root, that is the faithful remnant of Israel, right. And we got part of the tree. And so once the fullness of that, once all of those have come in, right? And all of the natural born people, right, the Jews, let's just say the Jews have had an opportunity to repent and be grafted back in. If they've been cut off or remain and grow, if they never were cut off, if they've remained faithful, right. And once all of those are grafted in, who are going to be grafted in, then this one whole tree which St. Paul calls in Romans 11:25, all Israel will be saved, then the tree will be complete, then Israel will be restored.

And this idea, we've seen this idea in other places like in our series where we've been talking about second Temple Jewish literature, when we talked about the testaments of the twelve Patriarch archs, we talked about the testament of Ephraim and we talked about the testament of Levi and about how they, they say straight out that through Joseph, right, Through Ephraim.

The, the, the Mesopotamians, the Babylonians, right. It names all of these nations, enemy nations will receive an inheritance with Israel.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

So this isn't just something St. Paul's making up. This isn't just a cope, this isn't just an ad hoc thing he's throwing together to try to explain how Jesus could be the Messiah when he didn't do Messiah things, Right. This is a way in which other people, in the second Temple Jewish period, other Jewish people were interpreting their scriptures to say this makes sense in terms of how God can fulfill, restoring the Northern Kingdom.

The northern kingdom dying and being scattered as seed, and the fruit of that seed now coming back to God and.

Being grafted in to the faithful remnant that remains. And so at the end of this, right.

We have to disambiguate some categories, right? So when the New Testament talks about Israel.

That is not synonymous with Judea or the Judeans, it includes Judea and the Judeans, right? But Israel in terms of this tree, right? It goes beyond that. There, there are some other people from the perspective of the New Testament, starting with the Samaritans, who are also, you know, able to, through their faithfulness to the God of Israel.

Through his Messiah, are going to be able to receive an inheritance with Israel.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Okay?

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

So it is not just synonymous. Israel is not synonymous in the New Testament. For the New Testament writers, with those who practice eudaimos, again, they're included.

Right? Or those who practice Judaism as it's transliterated, right? They're included. They're that root. They're the natural, right? But there are also these who are grafted in, who find an inheritance with Israel. So Israel, from the perspective of St. Paul and New Testament writers, when we talk about all Israel, we're talking about the whole tree, which includes Judah, Judea.

The practicers of Judaism, the keepers of the Torah, right? And the fullness of the nations who are grafted in, who restore the Northern kingdom. And so within, right? And this is, you know, cardioclusion. We've been critiquing a lot these episodes, dispensationalism. But we've also critiqued here supersessionism, right? Again, it's not the old tree gets thrown in a fire and God plants a new one, right? Same tree.

That the Judei. The Jews still have a central role.

They're still distinct.

Just as everyone who's grafted in remains distinct, remains Greek or Russian or Dutch or Polish or whatever, right? They remain distinct, right? But the Jews still have a special central role because salvation is from the Jews. Christ says that, right? Christ himself Jewish.

He's the Jewish Messiah, right? This all comes. That's the root, right? That supports the branches. The branches don't support that.

But.

They are not the whole.

They're not the whole thing, right? There are these others who are grafted in and included. And that is not. When I say that, I'm not saying that to counter Jewish claims. I'm mostly countering bad Christian claims. Because, for example, when St. Paul asks in Galatians.

Is God the God of the Jews only and not also the God of the Nations. He's expecting all the Jewish people he's talking to to be like, well, no, of course he's also the God of the nations.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

He doesn't think that his other Jewish interlocutors think he's only the God of the Jews. Right. He doesn't think that. Right. He's expecting them to agree. That's why he's making that argument.

Right.

And so one of the big problems with this, with the dispensational paradigm, is that it assumes that in the same way that a lot of folks we had a caller about this want to limit salvation to Christians.

Or the possibility of salvation to Christians, we should say.

Perversely, there's a lot of Christians who want to act like only Jewish people were saved in the Old Testament. Right. Or before. Before Jesus and then sort of now after Jesus. Now people who aren't Jewish could find salvation, like, read the Bible.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

That's not the case. That was never the case. That's what we were talking about in the first episode especially. It was never the case that it was just the Jewish people who were in God's plan.

So what St. Paul is saying here is not that wild and out there from the perspective of the Hebrew scriptures, from the perspective of Second Temple Judaism, I don't even think it's that out there from the perspective of Rabbinic Judaism later, depending on where you're at in it. Right. If you could accept that that's what St. Paul's actually saying. I don't think it's that far out. Right. Obviously, a lot of, you know, any Jewish person who doesn't agree that Jesus is the Messiah is going to disagree with St. Paul. But disagreeing and thinking he's wrong is different than saying, this is totally out of line with Jewish thought. Those are two different questions. And so here, to put a pin on it, at the conclusion of our third episode in this history of Israel.

I would say, thus, based on what St. Paul has told us, that the rest of the history of Israel is actually kind of church history. And so this isn't a church history podcast. So you should all email Gary Searle Jenkins and ask him to do a series continuing what we've started here, he's.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Going to have to start listening to the show again.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yeah. And threaten him with things if he won't do it.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

There you go.

Yeah. Yeah. Well.

I think.

I think that.

It'S hard to say.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

One big takeaway from all three of these episodes.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

I mean, now, how long. How long have we spent talking about this maybe 10 hours or so, in addition to the other things we've said about Israel, you know, for the last almost five years now of this podcast. But I think that for me, the biggest takeaway is, and I've said this before, but I'm going to say it again, I guess, and maybe in a slightly different way this time, that.

As you said, Father, the New Covenant is really the renewed covenant. Covenant, you know, it's not a second covenant. It's not a separate thing. It is the same covenant from God from the beginning. It's not Plan B.

You know, it's renewed. And in fact, what's shown is how all of these seeds that are planted throughout the Old Testament come to flower in the New Testament. So it's not some. Some radical new thing.

You know, that like, for instance, that Ephraim will be the fullness of the nations.

Right. I mean, that goes back all the way back to the 12 tribes. Not just the 12 tribes, the 12 men, you know, the 12 patriarchs who headed up those tribes, who are the fathers of those tribes.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Right.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

I mean, that's the beginning. That's even pre Israel at qua Israel. Right.

And so.

One of the problems of, I think one of the great problems of Christians in the modern period, whether Orthodox or Protestants or Catholics or whatever else, is what is the relationship of the Christian to the Old Testament. I think that's one of the great problems of our time. And. And.

I think that the source of a lot of that, frankly, is stuff that the Reformation got wrong.

Just got it wrong.

And as a result, then there's all these conflicted relationships with the Old Testament. And it plays out in lots of different ways. We've, of course, criticized dispensationalism over and over and over again throughout this series, and of course, Calvinism a number of times as well.

But I'll say this, like from within the Orthodox community.

We do have a problem. It's not a problem with Orthodox Christianity. It's not a problem with the Orthodox tradition. It's a problem of the faithfulness of Orthodox people, which is that a lot. Maybe I'll even go ahead and say that the average Orthodox Christian is almost completely clueless about the Old Testament. And it's not that he doesn't care about his faith, I'm saying, even like the faithful ones, like the ones who want to be serious and so forth, it's not he doesn't care. It's that he has a wrong relationship with it. He has misunderstood what it has to do with.

Him. As an Orthodox Christian. Right. And so.

What we've tried to do in this series is to begin to reconnect us by showing how the arc of the whole story is our story. It is our story. These are our fathers and mothers in the faith, whether we have a drop of Semitic blood in us or not. Right. You know, if you're a non Jewish Christian, you're one of those wild olive branches that have been grafted into the natural olive branch to the natural olive tree you're grafted in. You receive life, as St. Paul says, from that root.

Right? It's not a separate tree. It's not like, oh, that was the Old Testament. It doesn't matter anymore. We don't believe that anymore. I'm sorry. If you're an Orthodox Christian, you say that stuff, you are acting like some kind of weird Protestant, frankly. Now, I'm not saying all Protestants are that way. Obviously Protestants take the Old Testament seriously. They do, frankly. The average one, at least this is the way it was when I was a kid. I don't know if it's the case anymore, but the average one at least used to read it a lot more than the average Orthodox Christian.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

For sure.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

I mean, it's to our shame. To our shame, right? But because of the distortions of the Reformation, the relationship to that part of the tradition is distorted doctrinally within the Reformation. For Orthodox Christians, if we're looking at it and saying, well, you know, that doesn't really apply to us anymore. Do I really need that? Whatever, whatever, whatever. We are not acting in accordance with the Orthodox tradition. Like, read the writings of the Church fathers, it is very clear that they were super into the Old Testament. They saw it as mattering a great deal, a great deal. That is the language that they speak. But even set them aside, it is the language that the apostles speak. They speak the language of the Old Testament. That is the language that they speak. And you're not going to understand. Just like we showed some bits from St. Paul today, you're not going to understand what the apostles say. If you don't understand what the language is that they're speaking.

You'Re not. So it's really, really critical that we reclaim this within for each of ourselves. As I said, it's not the Orthodox tradition that needs to reclaim it. It's all there. You know, listen to the church services, read the Church fathers, all these things that are the living tradition of the Orthodox Church. It is very, very present.

Is very present. But if I am not present to it, then I Have a problem, then I have a problem. And you know, it's one of the great missions of.

The five year mission of this podcast. Could go longer. Who knows? Five years so far.

To say to Orthodox people and anybody else will listen to us, look, look, look at the scriptures, especially the Old Testament. Look at it deeply. You know, it's, it's really, it is an adventure, my friends. It is just the most incredible story. And it's all true. It's all true. So, so don't be crypto Marcionites, you know, Marcion who rejected the Old Testament and thus it distorted the New Testament for him. Don't be that way. You know, dive in. I. It, you know, it's okay if you don't understand it all. Just read it. Just start by reading it and, you know, listen to, like, I love Father Alexis Corey's daily Orthodox Scriptures podcast. Listen to that. You listen to that podcast every day for a year. You'll hear the whole, the whole Bible, right? And, and you keep doing it from year to year to year. You start to really get to know the scriptures little by little.

It's so, so worth it. It's so worth it. We're in such a hurry here in 2025. We got so many other things to do. But what is life for? Like, why are we doing all these things to keep ourselves alive? Is it just so we stay alive, just so we stay comfortable? Or is it for something? And what it is that the Scriptures unlock for us, that's. That's what it's for. So that's what I have to say here at the end of this series.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Oh, it's my turn.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Yeah. You can talk if you want, Father Stephen.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

That's cool.

So our world is full of Hasmoneans.

And it, it has been for a.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Good.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Century and a half, maybe even two centuries.

Lots of examples.

Start with controversial ones. Zionism. And by Zionism, that's not code, by the way. I don't mean quote unquote, the Jews. By Zionism, I mean Zionists, the numerical majority of which are evangelical Christians.

Not Jewish in any sense. So you're dispensationalists.

Or you're Christian nationalists.

I warn you once again out there, you Orthodox folks online who think you ought to be Christian nationalists, the Christian nationalists in the United States don't think you're a Christian. The first thing they're going to do is burn your icons.

Because they think they're idols.

They're going to destroy our churches. Okay?

Christian nationalism, communism, national socialism. Right.

On and on what all of these ideologies have in common, they all have in common with the Hasmoneans.

We're going to get God to intervene. We're going to establish justice. We're going to make everything right. We're going to usher in the kingdom. Right. That's what Reich means, by the way.

We're going to do this and we're going to do it ourselves.

We do it through our efforts. And our efforts is always code for violence. Our efforts is always code for killing a lot of people and harming a lot of people.

Victimizing a lot of people.

That's what always happens.

Be a Pharisee.

The Pharisees were the good guys.

Doesn't mean they were above critique. Doesn't mean every one of them was a good person. Right?

But in the face of all that, in the face of all these plans and projects and agendas and pushes that everyone wants you to get on board with, everybody wants you to participate in all these programs and plans always degenerate into violence. You be the person who stands apart from that.

Who follows the Scriptures.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Is.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Faithful to Christ in your life, and keeps the commandments.

Lives your life according to the way of life that God set out for you.

You do that in the midst of all the turmoil.

Doesn'T mean you're gonna get a free pass.

Just like the Pharisees. You're liable to end up one of the victims of one of those programs.

But if you do, that's martyrdom.

If that happens to you because you're being faithful to God, there's a reward waiting for you.

That's the answer. The answer is not to start a counter movement. The answer is not to do violence back, to repay evil with evil.

Rather than trying to overcome evil with good.

I think from tonight in particular, that is the important message, that Spirit of the Hasmoneans is not the Holy Spirit.

That's why there was no spirit of prophecy in the land in those days.

It's a very different spirit.

It's a spirit like all spirits that aren't. The Holy Spirit leads men to destruction, destroying themselves and others.

Famous quote. What is good? What does the Lord require of you? To do justly, to love mercy, to walk humbly with your God.

So we quoted last time from Deuteronomy, what God has commanded us is not too difficult for us.

He's given us what we need to do. It.

Just need to shift our focus to doing that.

Doing that and waiting for God to act, waiting for him to intervene, knowing that he will.

And awaiting the glorious appearing of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Now you can go home and go to sleep, Father Andrew.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

And you can go play Marvel Rivals.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Yes.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Right.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Late into the evening.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Well, with that, that is our show for tonight. Thank you very much everyone for listening. If we didn't talk to you tonight live, we'd still like to hear from you. You can email us lordofspiritsand ancientfaith.com you can message us at our Facebook page. You can leave us a [e-mail] LordOfSpirits and if you have basic questions about Orthodox Christianity or you need help to find a parish out here in the 3D world, head over to OrthodoxIntro.org and.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

Join us for our live broadcast on the second and fourth Thursdays of the month at 7pm Eastern, 4pm Pacific. Madness in the winds. Got something to say? It ripped you off apart. It will always be that way.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

If you're on Facebook, you can follow our page, you can join our discussion group, leave all those readings and reviews wherever they go and share the show with somebody because word of mouth is the way. Don't just rely on AI.

[Father Stephen DeYoung]

And finally, be sure to go to ancientfaith.comsupport and help make sure we and lots of other AFR podcasters stay on the air. Can't just look back, back again. You want it all, but it's on the run. The sky will open.

[Father Andrew Stephen Damick]

Thank you, good night. God bless you. Christ is risen.

[Narrator]

You've been listening to the Lord of Spirits with Orthodox Christian priests, Father Andrew, Stephen Damick and Father Stephen DeYoung, a listener supported presentation of Ancient Faith Radio. And I beheld and I heard the voice of many angels round about the throne and the beasts and the elders, and the number of them was 10,000 times 10,000 and thousands of thousands, saying with a loud voice, worthy is the Lamb that was slain to receive power and riches and wisdom and strength and honor and glory and blessing. Revelation 5, 11, 12.