ATLANTA (WJC)–Former US President Jimmy Carter has asked the Jewish community for forgiveness for any offense he may have caused when criticizing Israel. In a letter release by the news agency JTA, Carter sent season’s greeting and wished peace between Israel and its neighbors.

He concluded: “We must recognize Israel’s achievements under difficult circumstances, even as we strive in a positive way to help Israel continue to improve its relations with its Arab populations, but we must not permit criticisms for improvement to stigmatize Israel. As I would have noted at Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, but which is appropriate at any time of the year, I offer an Al Het for any words or deeds of mine that may have done so.”

“Al Het” refers to the Yom Kippur prayer asking God forgiveness for sins committed against God. In modern Hebrew it refers to any plea for forgiveness. Carter has angered some US Jews in recent years with writings and statements that place the burden of peacemaking on Israel, that likened Israel’s settlement policies to apartheid, and that blamed the Israel lobby for inhibiting an even-handed US foreign policy. Earlier this year, Carter met with Hamas leaders in Damascus.

*
Preceding provided by World Jewish Congress

“A day for Jews to atone for God”, according to one of my students’ exam.

Given God’s rather bad attitude in the Bible, there’s a lot of atoning to be done!

At least the student didn’t spell it Yom Kipper, the “day of the smoked fish”.

Rebbe Nachman, as recorded in Likutei Eitzos, Chanukah, makes a somewhat enigmatic statement: the selach na (“please forgive”s) that we utter on Yom Kippur enable us to partake of the holiness of Chanukah.

What is the connection?

In Likutei Moharan Tinyana 7:11, the Rebbe relates to the interaction between G-d and Moshe Rabbenu during the aftermath of the sin of the spies.  Moshe Rabbenu says to G-d, “please forgive this people for their sin in Your great kindness”.   In this case, Moshe Rabbenu was not only relating to the sin of speaking lashon hora about Eretz Yisrael, thereby causing an epidemic of bad faith amongst the Children of Israel; instead, he took the long view, and considered the sin in terms of its ultimate consequence: the future destruction of the Holy Temple.  The gemara (Taanis 29) states, “Hashem, may He be blessed, said to them, ‘you cried a crying for no reason.  I will establish a crying for all generations’.”  As we know, the lamenting over the idea of entering Eretz Yisrael occurred on Tisha b’Av, as did the destruction of the two Batei Mikdash.

Sin destroyed the Holy Temple.  The absence of the Temple is problematic in and of itself, because it was the primary mechanism in the expiation of sin for the Jewish people, both collectively and individually.  The verse (Yeshaya 1) states, “righteousness dwells in it”, and Rashi explains this to mean that this was possible because the morning tamid-offering cleared all of the sins from the previous night, while the afternoon tamid-offering cleared all of the sins from that day.  As long as the Beis HaMikdash was extant, it was possible for the Jewish people to be clean of sin.  Rebbe Nachman emphasizes here that this is all-important, because the Jewish people, due to their delicateness and high level of spirituality, cannot really bear the weight of sin, even for one day.  Without the Beis HaMikdash, there is no way to relieve ourselves of that crushing burden–and Moshe Rabbenu knew this.  Therefore, he said:

סְלַח-נָא, לַעֲו‍ֹן הָעָם הַזֶּה–כְּגֹדֶל חַסְדֶּךָ; וְכַאֲשֶׁר נָשָׂאתָה לָעָם הַזֶּה, מִמִּצְרַיִם וְעַד-הֵנָּה

Now, if you look at part of this phrase, namely:

הַזֶּה–כְּגֹדֶל חַסְדֶּךָ; וְכַאֲשֶׁר נָשָׂאתָה

You will notice that the roshei teivos (first letters), when arranged properly, spell out the word חנוכה, “Chanukah”.  Moshe Rabbenu asked specifically that the forgiveness of the Jewish people should involve an antidote to the destruction of the Beis HaMikdash–a chanukas habayis (re-dedication of the house).  When the Maccabi’im entered the Beis HaMikdash and purified the altar, as we commemorate on Chanukah, this was an example of Moshe Rabbenu’s request for restoration made manifest for the benefit of the Jewish people.

The main aspect of the holiness of Chanukah that we aim for is the very purpose of that Holy Temple: to know that Hashem Hu HaElokim, that the L-rd is G-d–specifically, that His attributes of kindness and judgement, which appear as separate, contradictory forces in the world, are aspects of His Oneness. We end Yom Kippur with this statement, this idea. And we re-invoke it on Chanukah. This knowledge can enable us to purify ourselves from sin.

In addition, as we gaze at the menorah’s warm radiance, and the candles burn on into the night, let us tap into that desire that lies deep within us, to carry this knowledge of holiness and purity forth to our children, for all generations.

Entourage & the Modern Jewish Experience

We recently had a showing of the popular TV show “Entourage” in our community (to ages 16 and up). Entourage is a story of an up and coming movie star living life in Hollywood with all the glitz, glamour and struggle. To many, what makes the show such a hit is the character of the movie star’s Jewish agent Ari Gold: a hard lined, extremely aggressive and no holds barred agent who stops at nothing to be number one in his business, often jeopardizing other priorities in his life.

Ari Gold is not only Jewish but proud of it. He unabashedly makes reference to his Jewishness and his being part of the Jewish people, even happily telling his clients that today is Yom Kippur, the holiest day of the year – so they order another round of drinks to celebrate. In fact there is an entire episode about Yom Kippur, where Ari’s wife makes sure he is without his cell phone during services so he won’t be doing any business. Even so, there is a big movie deal that needs to happen, so he secretly keeps his phone in his pocket to make the phone calls to secure the deal. When his wife finds him being outside of the services, understanding in shame of his incessant need to work and to be on his cell phone, even on the holiest day of the year, she sends out their daughter to find him. The daughter finds him talking in secret outside of Temple on his cell phone with his colleague. Ari comforts his daughter by telling her, “That is the beauty of Yom Kippur honey. As long as you apologize by sundown, it doesn’t matter what you do”.

But there is pride in Ari’s Jewishness. He invites his clients and associates to his daughter’s Bat Mitzvah, invites people over for brisket after Yom Kippur, and consistently makes proud, unabashed and confident one-liners about being Jewish, even saying once about himself, “It’s all going to be fine, the Jew has arrived.”

There are two things that make Ari’s character all the more intriguing. One is that he is based on a real person, a Hollywood agent Ari Emanuel (Rahm Emanuel’s brother, Obama’s Chief of Staff) and the other is that a significant percentage of Jewish people today would probably meet Ari’s experience of being Jewish. That experience being on the one hand of being proud to be Jewish: proud of Jewish customs, traditions, foods, culture and people hood. Proud of our history, of our story and of our ability to seemingly overcome all of history’s obstacles that have come in our way – we are strong and we are proud.

This means that although this is merely a TV show and possibly exaggerated at times, it is more of a reality show that tries to portray the life of a living and breathing Jewish person today. What it portrays is a person who yes, is proud to be Jewish. But more so, portrays a person who although deeply identifies with being Jewish, is quite far from what Judaism is supposed to be for a human being.

In a marital therapy meeting, here is the following exchange.

“Mrs. Ari (doesn’t want Ari to pick up his phone during couples therapy): I ask for one hour of a day for his undivided attention, and I can’t even have that.

Ari: You could have it if you want to live in Agoura Hills, and go to group therapy. But if you want a Beverly Hills mansion and you want a country club membership, and you want 9 weeks a year in a Tuscan villa, than I’m gonna need to take a call when it comes in at noon on a Wednesday.”

Money driven, insulting, one up-manship, angry, afraid and most of all isolated from his family and his wife is the painting of this caricature. There may be Jewish pride, but this is not living the power of Jewish life, and why I feel so many Jewish people today feel estranged from Judaism and look elsewhere for meaning.

What it all comes down to though, is that I do not see joy in the life of Ari Gold. Not in him, not in his colleagues and not in his clients. There is lots of money, lots of fame and recognition, lots of mansions and fancy sport cars – but no joy. True this is not reality and only a TV show, but this show is entirely based on reality and on real people; and I would like to offer a perspective of Torah on how to live a life in Hollywood and anywhere in the world with joy, meaning, trust and be able to spend time with family as well.

“The days of Chanuka are days of gratitude, as it says in the Siddur, ‘and they established these 8 days of Chanuka to appreciate and praise God’. And gratitude is the experience of heavenly enjoyment and pleasure…for in the end of days, there will be nothing but gratitude”

– Rebbe Nachman of Breslev, Likutey Mohoran, 2:2.

When a person lives every minute with gratitude for everything they have, they live a life of enjoyment and pleasure. Because if I am grateful and appreciate all that I have been given, not paying so much attention or focusing on all that I don’t have and that which is wrong, then everything I have is enjoyed. To appreciate is to enjoy and to be grateful is to be alive. This is so deeply essential in Judaism that we are called, “Yehudim” Jews, which come from the Hebrew word, “modeh” meaning to be grateful, for that is the essence of Judaism.

Ari Gold works hard to bless his family with all the blessings of this world: a Beverly Hills mansion, country club membership and a villa in Tuscany – but all that his wife wants is an hour with him. An hour to appreciate eachother, to talk, to relate, to appreciate what they have instead of running around maintaining what they have. But Ari can’t see it. If Ari were to go out of his way to spend that hour (or two or three or four) with his wife, to focus, to talk, to relate and ultimately to appreciate the life he has with her – not only would she be happy, but he would as well.

It is also an illusion to think that he can’t give up his time, either on a Wednesday afternoon or Yom Kippur in order to live the life that he wants. Because there is another essential element, more fundamental, critical and even urgent than anything else in Judaism – and that is to experience and know God.

“From Rosh Hashana to Yom Kippur it is decided in heaven how much money a person will earn for the upcoming year. This amount is added to, to the extent one invests in Torah and Charity.”

– Talmud, Rosh Hashana

“A person has to know 3 things: That everything that happens to him/her is from God; that everything that happens to him/her is for the best; and that everything that happens to a person is a direct communication from God, a communication of how God is trying to bring the person close to them”

– Rav Shalom Arush, Garden of Emunah

When a person lives with the reality that his money is from God, there are no worries in the world. When a person lives with the reality that everything is for the best and a direct gift from God who is trying to communicate with us – what need is there to worry? Obviously there is a need to work, but to overwork is unnecessary. To the extent that in Judaism we all have to take one day off every week to totally relax, be at home and reconnect with our lives and ourselves. Because ultimately it’s all beyond our control, but is in the control of the One who gave us life.

If Ari Gold took an hour off his day to spend quality time with his wife, it would change his life. If Ari would take off Shabbos to reconnect with his family to be at home to reconnect, that would change his life. If Ari spent a little time everyday studying what Judaism is really about, what our power and strength really are, studying books that open our mind and hearts to a greater reality, to settle our mind, to awaken our soul and to learn how to live a life of gratitude (literally Jewish) – even for 10 minutes a day, he would be a different person. A more settled person, a happier person, a richer person, a more confident person, less stress and more chilled person; Ultimately a more Jewish person.

In the end though, I have a soft spot for Ari. Despite his rough exterior and demeanor, he has a good inside filled with a desire to give to his family, make things work for his clients and ultimately is someone you enjoy seeing in action.

So thank you to Ari Gold, Ari Emanuel and everyone at Entourage for giving us all the opportunity to think and rethink what it means to be a Jew in today’s world.

Wishing a happy Chanuka to the entire Jewish world. Everyone should be proud of their Jewishness and enjoy it, and God willing enlighten us all to become truly appreciative, generous and happy people.

Ari Sherbill

(Article appeared in the Shalom Magazine of the Atlantic Jewish Consul)

History According to Wikipedia:

In Canada, Thanksgiving is celebrated on the second Monday in October. It is the only other country outside of the United States that officially observes the day as a holiday.

Thanksgiving involves a group of people commonly known as the Pilgrims.

They were a dissenting religious group considered to be outside of mainstream “Christianity”.  The Pilgrims felt that the only way freely to practice their religion was to physically separate themselves from the Church of England that had persecuted them*. First to flee persecution, these “Separatists,” moved to the English Midlands. Then they went to Amsterdam in 1607. In 1609, they moved to the more religiously tolerant Netherlands. But they decided that this would not do.  Finally, they began their voyage to America in 1620. It took months to cross the sea and they lost many during that voyage as well as after coming to America.. In spite of all their sufferings and the death of half of their company, in October 1621, the Pilgrims celebrated their first harvest.  In 1863, US President Lincoln made a proclamation that ultimately led to Thanksgiving becoming a US holiday.

*Was this a fulfillment of Biblical prophecy?

Deu 29:24 “And all nations shall say, ‘Why has יהוה  done so to this land? What does the heat of this great displeasure mean?’
Deu 29:25 “And it shall be said, ‘Because they have forsaken the covenant of יהוה  Elohim of their fathers, which He made with them when He brought them out of the land of Mitsrayim.
Deu 29:26 ‘And they went and served other mighty ones and bowed themselves to them, mighty ones that they did not know and that He had not given to them,
Deu 29:27 therefore the displeasure of יהוה  burned against this land, to bring on it every curse that is written in this book.
Deu 29:28 ‘And יהוה  uprooted them from their land in displeasure, and in wrath, and in great rage, and cast them into another land**, as it is today.’
The Puritans and most Americans of the 1600’s believed the above Scripture applied to them.  They believed they were Israelites who were being led to a new promised land by the hand of Providence.

**Eretz acharet…America was called the ‘New World’ which could be translated roughly from this Hebrew phrase.
2Sa 7:10 “And I shall appoint a place for My people Yisra’ĕl, and shall plant them, and they shall dwell in a place of their own and no longer be afraid, neither shall the children of wickedness oppress them again, as at the first,
This prophecy was told to David while Yisrael was dwelling safely in the Land.  Ultimately, this is a prophecy of the Kingdom of Messiah but a partial fulfillment may be America.

2 Esdras 13:34 And an innumerable multitude shall be gathered together, as thou sawest them, willing to come, and to overcome him by fighting.
35 But he {Messiah} shall stand upon the top of the mount Sion.
36 And Sion shall come, and shall be shewed to all men, being prepared and builded, like as thou sawest the hill graven without hands.
37 And this my Son shall rebuke the wicked inventions of those nations, which for their wicked life are fallen into the tempest;
38 And shall lay before them their evil thoughts, and the torments wherewith they shall begin to be tormented, which are like unto a flame: and he shall destroy them without labour by the law which is like unto me.
39 And whereas thou sawest that he gathered another peaceable multitude unto him;
40 Those are the ten tribes, which were carried away prisoners out of their own land in the time of Osea the king, whom Salmanasar the king of Assyria led away captive, and he carried them over the waters, and so came they into another land.
41 But they took this counsel among themselves, that they would leave the multitude of the heathen, and go forth into a further country, where never mankind dwelt,
42 That they might there keep their statutes, which they never kept in their own land.
Here we see an amazing prophecy of the 10 tribes, which are represented by the Christians that left Europe to travel to the New World.  There is much historical evidence that the 10 tribes migrated to Europe and later accepted the Gospel.  It is these ‘lost tribes’ that purposed to go to a land where mankind had not known to keep the Torah that they didn’t keep while in the Land of Yisrael.

The Vine in the wilderness

Isa 5:1  Now will I sing to my wellbeloved a song of my beloved touching his vineyard. My wellbeloved hath a vineyard in a very fruitful hill:
Isa 5:2  And he fenced it, and gathered out the stones thereof, and planted it with the choicest vine, and built a tower in the midst of it, and also made a winepress therein: and he looked that it should bring forth grapes, and it brought forth wild grapes.
Isa 5:3  And now, O inhabitants of Jerusalem, and men of Judah, judge, I pray you, betwixt me and my vineyard.
Isa 5:4  What could have been done more to my vineyard, that I have not done in it? wherefore, when I looked that it should bring forth grapes, brought it forth wild grapes?
Isa 5:5  And now go to; I will tell you what I will do to my vineyard: I will take away the hedge thereof, and it shall be eaten up; and break down the wall thereof, and it shall be trodden down:
Isa 5:6  And I will lay it waste: it shall not be pruned, nor digged; but there shall come up briers and thorns: I will also command the clouds that they rain no rain upon it.
Isa 5:7  For the vineyard of the LORD of hosts is the house of Israel, and the men of Judah his pleasant plant: and he looked for judgment, but behold oppression; for righteousness, but behold a cry.

Mat 21:33  Hear another parable: There was a certain man, a house master, who planted a vineyard and placed a hedge around it; and he dug a winepress in it, and built a tower. And he rented it to vinedressers and left the country. Isa. 5:1, 2
Mat 21:34  And when the season of the fruits came, he sent his slaves to the vinedressers to receive his fruits.
Mat 21:35  And the vinedressers, taking his slaves, they beat this one, and they killed one, and they stoned another.
Mat 21:36  Again he sent other slaves, more than the first. And they did the same to them.
Mat 21:37  And at last he sent his son to them, saying, They will respect my son.
Mat 21:38  But seeing the son, the vinedressers said among themselves, This is the heir. Come, let us kill him and possess his inheritance.
Mat 21:39  And taking him, they threw him out of the vineyard and killed him.
Mat 21:40  Therefore, when the lord of the vineyard comes, what will he do to those vinedressers?
Mat 21:41  They said to Him, Bad men! He will miserably destroy them, and he will rent out the vineyard to other vinedressers who will give to him the fruits in their seasons.
Mat 21:42  Jesus said to them, Did you never read in the Scriptures, “A Stone which the builders rejected, this One became the Head of the Corner? This was from the Lord, and it is a wonder in our eyes?” Psalm 118:22, 23
Mat 21:43  Because of this I say to you, The kingdom of God will be taken from you, and it will be given to a nation producing the fruits of it.*

*This is the role that America was/is to fulfill.  No single nation has spread the Gospel more than the USA/America.  The problem is that when believers fled from Europe to escape religious persecution, there was also those from the side of darkness that came along with them to escape that same religious intolerance.  There has always been this power struggle in this country between those who wish to worship YHWH according to the dictates of their hearts versus those who hate Him and wish to bring about a new world of antichrist. click here

The date and location of the first Thanksgiving celebration is a topic of modest contention. Though the earliest attested Thanksgiving celebration was on September 8, 1565 in what is now Saint Augustine, Florida

The traditional “first Thanksgiving” is venerated as having occurred at the site of Plymouth Plantation, in 1621. The Plymouth celebration occurred early in the history in one of the original thirteen colonies that became the United States, and this celebration became an important part of the American myth by the 1800s.

Thanksgiving or Thanksgiving Day, presently celebrated on the fourth Thursday in November, has been an annual tradition in the United States since 1863. It did not become a federal holiday until 1941. Thanksgiving was historically a religious observation to give thanks to God,[1] and is still celebrated as such by many families, but it is now also considered a secular holiday as well.
“Thanksgiving Day”. Encyclopædia Britannica. http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/590003/Thanksgiving-Day. Retrieved 2009-11-03.

The First Thanksgiving was celebrated to give thanks to God and the Native Americans for helping the pilgrims survive the brutal winter. Although half of the pilgrims who arrived on the Mayflower had already died, many more would have had it not been for the native Americans teaching the pilgrims to harvest foods. The first Thanksgiving feast lasted three whole days providing enough food for 53 pilgrims and 90 Indians. The traditional Thanksgiving menu often features turkey, stuffing, sweet potatoes and pumpkin pie. Americans may eat these foods on modern day Thanksgiving, but the first feast did not consist of these items. On the first feast turkey was any type of fowl that the pilgrims hunted. Pumpkin pie wasn’t on the menu because there were no ovens for baking, but they did have boiled pumpkin. Cranberries weren’t introduced at this time. Due to the diminishing supply of flour there was no bread of any kind. The foods included in the first feast included duck, geese, venison, fish, lobster, clams, swan, berries, dried fruit, pumpkin, squash, and many more vegetables.

Squanto, a Patuxet Native American who resided with the Wampanoag tribe, taught the Pilgrims how to catch eel and grow corn and served as an interpreter for them (Squanto had learned English as a slave in Europe and travels in England). The Pilgrims set apart a day to celebrate at Plymouth immediately after their first harvest, in 1621. At the time, this was not regarded as a Thanksgiving observance; harvest festivals existed in English and Wampanoag tradition alike. Several colonists gave personal accounts of the 1621 feast in Plymouth, Massachusetts. The Pilgrims, most of whom were Separatists, are not to be confused with Puritans who established their own Massachusetts Bay Colony nearby (current day Boston) in 1628 and had very different religious beliefs*.

There were two different camps of believers that came out of the Protestant reformation.  The Pilgrims were considered ‘Separatists’ who did not seek to reform the church but to separate from it.  The Puritans sought to ‘purify’ church and state.

The Pilgrims did not hold a true Thanksgiving until 1623, after a switch from communal farming to privatized farming finally resulted in a larger harvest.[9] Irregular Thanksgivings continued after favorable events and days of fasting after unfavorable ones. In the Plymouth tradition, a thanksgiving day was a church observance, rather than a feast day.

The Massachusetts Bay Colony (consisting mainly of Puritan Christians) celebrated Thanksgiving for the first time in 1630, and frequently thereafter until about 1680, when it became an annual festival in that colony; and Connecticut as early as 1639 and annually after 1647, except in 1675. The Dutch in New Netherland appointed a day for giving thanks in 1644 and occasionally thereafter.

Charlestown, Massachusetts held the first recorded Thanksgiving observance June 29, 1671 by proclamation of the town’s governing council.

During the 18th century individual colonies commonly observed days of thanksgiving throughout each year. We might not recognize a traditional Thanksgiving Day from that period, as it was not a day marked by plentiful food and drink as is today’s custom, but rather a day set aside for prayer and fasting.

Later in the 1700s individual colonies would periodically designate a day of thanksgiving in honor of a military victory, an adoption of a state constitution or an exceptionally bountiful crop. Such a Thanksgiving Day celebration was held in December 1777 by the colonies nationwide, commemorating the surrender of British General Burgoyne at Saratoga.

In the middle of the American Civil War, President Abraham Lincoln, prompted by a series of editorials written by Sarah Josepha Hale,[3] proclaimed a national Thanksgiving Day, to be celebrated on the final Thursday in November 1863:

The year that is drawing towards its close, has been filled with the blessings of fruitful fields and healthful skies. To these bounties, which are so constantly enjoyed that we are prone to forget the source from which they come, others have been added, which are of so extraordinary a nature, that they cannot fail to penetrate and soften even the heart which is habitually insensible to the ever watchful providence of Almighty God. In the midst of a civil war of unequalled magnitude and severity, which has sometimes seemed to foreign States to invite and to provoke their aggression, peace has been preserved with all nations, order has been maintained, the laws have been respected and obeyed, and harmony has prevailed everywhere except in the theatre of military conflict; while that theatre has been greatly contracted by the advancing armies and navies of the Union. Needful diversions of wealth and of strength from the fields of peaceful industry to the national defence, have not arrested the plough, the shuttle, or the ship; the axe had enlarged the borders of our settlements, and the mines, as well of iron and coal as of the precious metals, have yielded even more abundantly than heretofore. Population has steadily increased, notwithstanding the waste that has been made in the camp, the siege and the battle-field; and the country, rejoicing in the consciousness of augmented strength and vigor, is permitted to expect continuance of years, with large increase of freedom.

No human counsel hath devised nor hath any mortal hand worked out these great things. They are the gracious gifts of the Most High God, who, while dealing with us in anger for our sins, hath nevertheless remembered mercy.

It has seemed to me fit and proper that they should be solemnly, reverently and gratefully acknowledged as with one heart and voice by the whole American people. I do therefore invite my fellow citizens in every part of the United States, and also those who are at sea and those who are sojourning in foreign lands, to set apart and observe the last Thursday of November next, as a day of Thanksgiving and Praise to our beneficent Father who dwelleth in the Heavens. And I recommend to them that while offering up the ascriptions justly due to Him for such singular deliverances and blessings, they do also, with humble penitence for our national perverseness and disobedience, commend to his tender care all those who have become widows, orphans, mourners or sufferers in the lamentable civil strife in which we are unavoidably engaged, and fervently implore the interposition of the Almighty Hand to heal the wounds of the nation and to restore it as soon as may be consistent with the Divine purposes to the full enjoyment of peace, harmony, tranquility and Union.

In testimony whereof, I have hereunto set my hand, and caused the seal of the United States to be affixed.

Done at the city of Washington, this third day of October, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-three, and of the independence of the United States the eighty-eighth.”

Proclamation of President Abraham Lincoln, October 3, 1863.

Interestingly, Thanksgiving was proclaimed as a national holiday after the north and south came back together as one nation.  The Scriptures speak of the northern tribes and the southern tribes coming back together as a time of Thanksgiving as well.

Jer 30:18  So says YHWH, Behold I will turn the captivity of Jacob’s tents and will have mercy on his dwelling places. And the city shall be built on her ruin heap; and the fortress shall remain on its own ordinance.
Jer 30:19  And out of them shall come thanksgiving and the voice of those who are merry. And I will multiply them, and they shall not be few. I also will honor them, and they shall not be small.

Isa 51:3  For YHWH comforts Zion. He comforts all her desolations, and He makes her wilderness like Eden, and her desert like the garden of YHWH; joy and gladness shall be found in it, thanksgiving and the voice of singing praise

Hodu – Turkey

In excavations near Salem, Massachuseets an old Hebrew manuscript was found that sheds light on why turkey is eaten on Thanksgiving.
b’chag hahodaya
On holiday/feast Thanksgiving

Hodu sheain atem
Give thanks that not you are

tarngol hahodu asher lfaneikhem
the fowl indian/turkey that is before you

This manuscript was called Haggada Shel Hodaya…similar to Haggada shel Pesach.  At Passover it is said:

leshana ha’ba’a b’yerushalayim

Next year in Jerusalem

Haggada Shel Hodaya instructs Thanksgiving day meal be concluded with:

Hodu=give thanks

India = Hodu
The other name for turkey in those days was Indian chicken because Columbus thought he was in India when he saw turkeys for the first time.

The Hebrew word for Turkey is

Benjamin Franklin proposed that turkey be the national bird of the USA arguing that the turkey was more honest, honorable, diligent and smarter than the bald eagle.

Puritans, Yisrael & The Torah

Marvin Wilson’s book,  Our Father Abraham
explains (pp. 127-128):

During the period of the Protestant Reformation (16th century), some signs of the re-Judaization of the Christian faith began to surface, as certain Hebrew categories were rediscovered. The Reformers put great stress on sola scriptura (Scripture as the sole and final authority of the Christian). The consequent de-emphasis on tradition brought with it a return to the biblical roots. Accordingly, during the two centuries following the Reformation, several groups recognized the importance of once again emphasizing the Hebraic heritage of the Church. Among these people were the Puritans who founded Pilgrim America, and the leaders who pioneered American education. We shall comment briefly on the first of these groups before concentrating on the second.

The Puritans came to America deeply rooted in the Hebraic tradition. Most bore Hebrew names. The Pilgrim fathers considered themselves as the children of Israel fleeing “Egypt” (England), crossing the “Red Sea” (the Atlantic Ocean), and emerging from this “Exodus” to their own “promised land” (New England). The Pilgrims thought of themselves as “all the children of Abraham” and, thus, under the covenant of Abraham. (Feingold p. 46.)

The President of Yale College used these words before the Governor and General Assembly of the state of Connecticut in 1783: “Their influence on American society was not soon forgotten: more than a century and a half after the first Puritan settlers reached New England, the American people were referred to in a State Assembly as ‘God’s American Israel.’” (Feldman p. 5)

The seeds of religious liberty for the American Church did not come from New England leaders such as Roger Williams and Anne Hutchinson-as noble as they and others were. Rather, it came from the Hebrews themselves, whose sacred writings inspired the Puritans. Accordingly, many of the Puritans in seventeenth-century England were learned Hebraists. William Bradford (1590-1657), prominent early American and Governor of Plymouth Colony for more than three decades, maintained an intense interest in Hebrew. Bradford stated that he studied Hebrew so that when he died he might be able to speak in the “most ancient language, the Holy Tongue in which God and, the angels, spake.” Cotton Mather (1663-1728), a well-known Puritan minister and scholar from Massachusetts, had a similar deep respect for the Hebrew language. Concerning its importance, Mather once observed, “I promise that those who
spend as much time morning and evening in Hebrew studies as they do in smoking tobacco, would quickly make excellent progress in the language.”click here (Rosovsky)

So popular was the Hebrew Language in the late 16th and early 17th centuries that several students at Yale delivered their commencement orations in Hebrew. Harvard, Yale, Columbia, Brown, Princeton, Johns Hopkins, and the University of Pennsylvania taught courses in Hebrew—all the more remarkable because no university in England at the time offered it.

Many of the population, including a significant number of the Founding Fathers of America, were products of these American universities—for example, Thomas Jefferson attended William and Mary, James Madison Princeton, Alexander Hamilton King’s College (i.e. Columbia). Thus, we can be sure that a majority of these political leaders were not only well acquainted with the contents of both the New and Old Testaments but also had some working knowledge of Hebrew. Notes Abraham Katsh in The Biblical Heritage of American Democracy (p. 70):

At the time of the American Revolution, the interest in the knowledge of Hebrew was so widespread as to allow the circulation of the story that “certain members of Congress proposed that the use of English be formally prohibited in the United States, and Hebrew substituted for it.”

Many of the earliest “pilgrims” who settled the “New England” of America in early 17th century were Puritan refugees escaping religious persecutions in Europe.

Over the next century, America continued to be not only the land of opportunity for many people seeking a better life but also the land of religious tolerance. By the middle 1700’s, the east coast of America was settled by a virtual “Who’s Who” of Christian splinter sects from all over Europe. Among them were:

* the Puritans, whom we already know so well
* the Quakers, an extremist Puritan sect who did not believe in ministers and for whom a Society of Friends meeting together was good enough to bring down the Holy Spirit
* Calvinists, who early on had challenged the Catholic belief that the bread and wine became the body and blood of Jesus in the celebration of the mass
* the Huguenots, or French Calvinists
* the Moravians, followers of John Hus, the protestant martyr from Bohemia
* the Mennonites, a Swiss sect of Anabaptists who rejected infant baptism
* the Amish, the most stringent of the Mennonites

These were just some of the numerous groups who arrived in America in search of religious freedom.

The majority of the earliest settlers were, of course, Puritans. Beginning with the Mayflower, over the next twenty years, 16,000 Puritans migrated to the Massachusetts Bay Colony, and many more settled in Connecticut and Rhode Island. Like their cousins back in England, these American Puritans strongly identified with both the historical traditions and customs of the ancient Hebrews of the Old Testament. They viewed their emigration from England as a virtual re-enactment of the Jewish exodus from Egypt. To them, England was Egypt, the king was Pharaoh, the Atlantic Ocean was the Red Sea, America was the Land of Israel, and the Indians were the ancient Canaanites. They were the new Israelites, entering into a new covenant with God in a new Promised Land. Thanksgiving—first celebrated in 1621, a year after the Mayflower landed—was initially conceived as day parallel to the Jewish Day of Atonement, Yom Kippur; it was to be a day of fasting, introspection and prayer.

After that first harvest was completed by the Plymouth colonists, Gov. William Bradford proclaimed a day of thanksgiving and prayer, shared by all the colonists and neighboring Indians. In 1623 a day of fasting and prayer during a period of drought was changed to one of thanksgiving because the rain came during the prayers. Gradually the custom prevailed in New England of annually celebrating thanksgiving after the harvest. During the American Revolution a yearly day of national thanksgiving was suggested by the Continental Congress. In 1817 New York State adopted Thanksgiving Day as an annual custom, and by the middle of the 19th century many other states had done the same. In 1863 President Abraham Lincoln appointed a day of thanksgiving as the last Thursday in November, which he may have correlated it with the November 21, 1621, anchoring of the Mayflower at Cape Cod.

Other believe that the Pilgrims were celebrating Sukkot

http://www.jewfaq.org/holiday5.htm

Many Americans, upon seeing a decorated sukkah for the first time, remark on how much the sukkah (and the holiday generally) reminds them of Thanksgiving. This may not be entirely coincidental: I was taught that our American pilgrims, who originated the Thanksgiving holiday, borrowed the idea from Sukkot. The pilgrims were deeply religious people. When they were trying to find a way to express their thanks for their survival and for the harvest, they looked to the Bible for an appropriate way of celebrating and found Sukkot. This is not the standard story taught in public schools today (that a Thanksgiving holiday is an English custom that the Pilgrims brought over), but the Sukkot explanation of Thanksgiving fits better with the meticulous research of Mayflower historian Caleb Johnson, who believes that the original Thanksgiving was a harvest festival (as is Sukkot), that it was observed in October (as Sukkot usually is), and that Pilgrims would not have celebrated a holiday that was not in the Bible (but Sukkot is in the Bible). Although Mr. Johnson claims that the first Thanksgiving was “not a religious holiday or observance,” he apparently means this in a Christian sense, because he goes on to say that the first Thanksgiving was instead “a harvest festival that included feasts, sporting events, and other activities,” concepts very much in keeping with the Jewish religious observance of Sukkot.

Gabriel Sivan, in The Bible and Civilization, (p. 236) observes:

“No Christian community in history identified more with the People of the Book than did the early settlers of the Massachusetts Bay Colony, who believed their own lives to be a literal reenactment of the Biblical drama of the Hebrew nation. They themselves were the children of Israel; America was their Promised Land; the Atlantic Ocean their Red Sea; the Kings of England were the Egyptian pharaohs; the American Indians the Canaanites; the pact of the Plymouth Rock was God’s holy Covenant; and the ordinances by which they lived were the Divine Law. Like the Huguenots and other Protestant victims of Old World oppression, these émigré Puritans dramatized their own situation as the righteous remnant of the Church corrupted by the “Babylonian woe,” and saw themselves as instruments of Divine Providence, a people chosen to build their new commonwealth on the Covenant entered into at Mount Sinai.”

The earliest legislation of the colonies of New England was all determined by Scripture. At the first assembly of New Haven in 1639, John Davenport clearly stated the primacy of the Bible as the legal and moral foundation of the colony:

Scriptures do hold forth a perfect rule for the direction and government of all men in all duties which they are to perform to God and men as well as in the government of families and commonwealth as in matters of the Church … the Word of God shall be the only rule to be attended unto in organizing the affairs of government in this plantation. (See Abraham I Katsch, The Biblical Heritage of American Democracy, p. 97)

Subsequently, the New Haven legislators adopted a legal code—the Code of 1655—which contained some 79 statutes, half of which contained Biblical references, virtually all from the Hebrew Bible. The Plymouth Colony had a similar law code as did the Massachusetts assembly, which, in 1641—after an exhortation by Reverend John Cotton who presented the legislators with a copy of Moses, His Judicials—adopted the so-called “Capitall Lawes of New England” based almost entirely on Mosaic law.

Ezra Stiles

The following excerpts from Pastor Ezra Stiles’ sermon capture the vision which many of America’s great churchmen had for this planting of God’s vine in the wilderness:

… I have assumed the text only as introductory to a discourse upon the political welfare of God’s American Israel, and as allusively prophetic of the future prosperity and splendor of the United States.
Pastor Ezra Stiles, D.D., “The United States Elevated to Glory and Honor,” election sermon on May 8, 1783, quoted in John Wingate Thornton in The Pulpit of the American Revolution: Political Sermons of the Period of 1776, 1860 ed., reprinted (Boston, MA: Da Capo Press, 1970) p. 403.

Already does the new constellation of the United States begin to realize this glory. It has already risen to an acknowledged sovereignty among the republics and kingdoms of the world. And we have reason to hope, and, I believe, to expect, that God has still greater blessings in store for this vine which his own right hand hath planted, to make us high among the nations in praise, and in name, and in honor. The reasons are very numerous, weighty, and conclusive.  Stiles, pp. 438-439

Our degree of population is such as to give us reason to expect that this will become a great people…. This will be a great, a very great nation…. Should this prove a future fact, how applicable would be the text, when the Lord shall have made his American Israel high above all nations which he has made, in numbers, and in praise, and in name, and in honor! Stiles, Stiles pp. 439-440

Any possible ambiguity in Pastor Stiles’ sermon is cleared in the following declaration by Pastor W. B. Record:
LOOKING WESTWARD…

Standing on the western shores of Europe 500 years ago, you could not see nor visualize a great continent that lay to the west; only what seemed to be an endless stretch of the Atlantic Ocean. Yet there was a great continent out there to the west.

Now may I ask you, “Did Jesus Christ know of this North American Continent?” Your only answer could be, “Yes, of course He did.”

Let me ask another question, “Did Jesus Christ know that a great nation would be established here?” Of course He did!

Still another question, please -”Did Jesus Christ know this great nation (yet to be born) would be Christian from its beginning?” Of course He knew that, for He Himself is the source and Author of the faith we call “Christian.”

Now one more question, “Is it possible that this great nation, known to Jesus, was never mentioned, indicated, or foretold in the Bible?”

Consider this, “I will make of thee a great nation” (Gen. 12:2). “The kingdom of God shall be given to a nation bringing forth the fruits thereof” (Matt. 21:43). Where is this great nation, which is bringing forth the fruits of the kingdom of God? The answer is quite obvious: you are living in it. See to it that you make your calling and election sure. Pastor W.B. Record, Truth & Liberty Magazine, September 1964

In The Beginnings of New England, American historian and philosopher John Fiske wrote:

The men who undertook this work were not at all free from self consciousness. They believed that they were doing a wonderful thing. They felt themselves to be instruments in accomplishing a kind of “manifest destiny.” Their exodus was that of a chosen people who were at length to lay the everlasting foundations of God’s kingdom upon earth. Such opinions … took a strong colour from their assiduous study of the Old Testament…. In every propitious event they saw a special providence, an act of divine intervention…. This steadfast faith in an unseen ruler and guide was to them a “pillar of cloud by day and of fire by night.  John Fiske (Edmund Fisk Green), The Beginnings of New England (Cambridge, MA: H.O. Houghton, Mifflin and Company, The Liberty Press, 1889) vol. 1, p. 308

Samuel Eliot Morison commented on Pastor Cotton’s vision of this New Canaan land:

[Pastor John] Cotton’s sermon was of a nature to inspire these new children of Israel with the belief that they were the Lord’s chosen people; destined, if they kept the covenant with Him, to people and fructify this new Canaan in the western wilderness.Samuel Eliot Morison, Colonial America (1887) p. 25.

John Cotton

Pastor John Cotton, D.D., sermon to fellow Puritans departing for America in 1630, God’s Promise to His Plantation (London, UK: William Jones, 1630) pp. 13-14.
Was it just by coincidence or was it by the providence of God that in 1630 a young Puritan minister by the name of John Cotton chose 2 Samuel 7: 10 as his text for a farewell message to a boatload of fellow Puritans departing for America

2Sa 7:10 “And I shall appoint a place for My people Yisra’ĕl, and shall plant them, and they shall dwell in a place of their own and no longer be afraid, neither shall the children of wickedness oppress them again, as at the first,

In his book New England’s Memorial, Nathaniel Morton demonstrated how perfectly America’s early  settlers fulfilled this passage from Isaiah:

That especially the seed of Abraham his servant, and the children of Jacob his chosen, may remember his marvelous works (Psal. 105.5-6.) in the beginning and progress of the planting of New England, his wonders, and the judgements of his mouth; how that God brought a vine into this wilderness; that he cast out the heathen and planted it; and he also made room for it, and he caused it to take deep root, and it filled the land; so that it hath sent forth its boughs to the sea, and its branches to the river. (Psal. 80.8-9.) And not only so, but also that He hath guided his people by his strength to his holy habitation, and planted them in the mountain of his inheritance, (Exod. 15.13.) in respect of precious gospel-enjoyments. So that we may not only look back to former experiences of God’s goodness to our predecessors, (though many years before) and so have our faith strengthened in the mercies of God for our times….Nathaniel Morton, New England’s Memorial (Cambridge, MA: S.G. and M.J. for John Usher, 1669), reproduced with extracts from other writers (Boston, MA: Congregational Board of Publication, 1854) pp. 13-14.

Cotton Mather

In Magnalia Christi Americana; or, The Ecclesiastical History of New England, Pastor Cotton Mather, writing of the dangers facing the Puritans seeking asylum beyond the seas, pictured America as a desolate wilderness:

… the God of Heaven served as it were a summons upon the spirits of his people in the English nation; stirring up the spirits of thousands which never saw the faces of each other, with a most unanimous inclination to leave all the pleasant accommodations of their native country, and go over a terrible ocean, into a more terrible desert, for the pure enjoyment of all his ordinances.
Pastor Cotton Mather, D.D., Magnalia Christi Americana: or, The Ecclesiastical History of New-England, 1702 and subsequent editions reprint. (New York, NY: Russell & Russell, 1967) vol. 1, p. 69.
Being happily arrived at New-England, our new planters found the difficulties of a rough and hard wilderness presently assaulting them… Mather, vol. 1, p. 77.

Never was any plantation brought unto such a considerableness, in a space of time so inconsiderable! … an howling wilderness in a few years became a pleasant land, accommodated with the necessaries, yea, and the conveniences of humane life Mather, vol. 1, p. 80

In his foreword “An Attestation to this Church-History of New England” in the above mentioned book, John Higginson also depicted America as an empty wilderness:

It hath been deservedly esteemed one of the great and wonderful Works of God in this last age, that the Lord stirred up the spirits of so many thousands of his [Celto-Saxon] servants, to leave the pleasant land of England, the land of their nativity, and to transport themselves, and families, over the ocean sea, into a desert land in America, at the distance of a thousand leagues from their own country; and this, merely on the account of pure and undefiled Religion [Christianity], not knowing how they should have their daily bread, but trusting in God for that, in the way of seeking first the kingdom of God, and the righteousness thereof: And that the Lord was pleased to grant such a gracious presence of his with them, and such a blessing upon their undertakings, that within a few years a wilderness was subdued before them, and so many Colonies planted, Towns erected, and Churches settled, wherein the true and living God in Christ Jesus, is worshipped and served, in a place where, time out of mind, had been nothing before but Heathenism, Idolatry, and Devilworship; and that the Lord has added so many of the blessings of Heaven and earth for the comfortable subsistence of his people in these ends of the earth. Surely of this work, and of this time, it shall be said, what hath God wrought? And, this is the Lord’s doings, it is marvellous in our eyes! Even so (O Lord) didst thou lead thy people, to make thyself a glorious name!

John Higginson, “An Attestation to This Church-History of New-England,” foreword to Pastor Cotton Mather, D.D., Magnalia Christi Americana: or, The Ecclesiastical History of New-England, 1702 and subsequent editions reprint. (New York, NY: Russell & Russell, 1967) vol. 1, p. 13.

Pastor William Gordon was another voice of the early American church. He not only preached concerning what this land had been, but he also preached what it was becoming in light of Isaiah 35:1-2:

They came from a well-cultured kingdom to a savage people and a wild country, enough to discourage the stoutest. However, they ventured to take up their abode in it…. The face of the colony is not less changed for the better since first settled than what is set forth in the language of Isaiah’s prophecy: “The wilderness and the solitary place shall be glad; the desert shall rejoice and blossom as the rose. It shall blossom abundantly, and rejoice even with joy and singing; the glory of Lebanon shall be given unto it; the excellency of Carmel and Sharon. They shall see the glory of the Lord, and the excellency of our God.  Pastor William Gordon, discourse preached on December 15, 1774, quoted in John Wingate Thornton, The Pulpit of the American Revolution: Political Sermons of the Period of 1776, 1860 ed., reprint. (Boston, MA: Da Capo Press, 1970) p. 210-211.

Pastor Emry contrasted the new promised land with the old promised land:

A look at the United States, and Canada, reveals a different picture. Here we find the only land on the face of this earth that is truly a land of unwalled villages. Our Christian ancestors left castles, walls, and moats in the “old world” when they came to the “New World,” and our cities are without walls. God who knows the end from the beginning, can be expected to be accurate in His word.
Emry, p. 10.

[Pastor] John Norton, in the Election Sermon of 1661, said that theycame “into this wilderness to live under the order of the gospel”; “that our polity [government] may be a gospel polity, and may be compleat according to the Scriptures, answering fully the Word of God: this is the work of our generation, and the very work we engaged for into this wilderness; this is the scope and end of it … written upon the forehead of New England … the compleat walking in the faith of the gospel, according to the order of the gospel.”

The venerable [John] Higginson, of Salem, in his Election Sermon of 1663, stated the point with great fulness, as follows: “It concerneth New England always to remember that they are originally a plantation religious, not a plantation of trade…. Let merchants … remember this:

that worldly gain was not the end and design of the people of New England, but religion….”

In the [Harvard University] Election Sermon of 1677 … Increase Mather uttered these words: “It was love to God and to Jesus Christ which brought our  fathers into this wilderness…. There never was a generation that did so perfectly shake off the dust of Babylon, both as to ecclesiastical and civil constitutions, as the first generation of Christians that came into this land for the gospel’s sake.”

[Pastor] William Hubbard, the historian, in a Fast-day sermon, preached June 24, 1682, declared that the fathers “came not hither for the world, or for land, or for traffic; but for religion, and for liberty of conscience in the worship of God, which was their only design.”

The historical fact was stated by President [Ezra] Stiles, of Yale College, in 1783: “It is certain that civil dominion was but the second motive, religion the primary one, with our ancestors, in coming hither and settling this land. It was not so much their design to establish religion for the benefit of the state, as civil government for the benefit of religion, and as subservient, and even necessary, towards the peaceable enjoyment and unmolested exercise of religion – of that religion for which they fled to these ends of the earth.”  John Wingate Thornton, The Pulpit of the American Revolution: Political Sermons of the Period of 1776, 1860 ed., reprint. (Boston, MA: Da Capo Press, 1970) pp. xviii-xix.

I WRITE the WONDERS of the CHRISTIAN RELIGION , flying from the depravations of Europe, to the American Strand; and, assisted by the Holy Author of that Religion, I do with all conscience of Truth, required therein by Him, who is the Truth itself, report the wonderful displays of His infinite Power, Wisdom, Goodness, and Faithfulness, wherewith His Divine Providence hath irradiated an Indian Wilderness.  Pastor Cotton Mather, D.D., Magnalia Christi Americana: or, The Ecclesiastical History of New-England, 1702, subsequent ed. reprint. (New York, NY: Russell & Russell, 1967), vol. 1, p. 25.

The people in the fleet that arrived at New-England, in the year 1630, left the fleet almost, as the family of Noah did the ark, having a whole world before them to be peopled … but where-ever they sat down, they were so mindful of their errand into the wilderness, that still one of their first works was to gather a church into the covenant and order of the gospel.  Mather, vol. 1, pp. 78-89

In the year 1643, after divers essays made in some former years, the several colonies of New-England became in fact, as well as name, UNITED COLONIES. And an instrument was formed, wherein having declared, “That we all came into these parts of America with the same end and aim -namely, to advance the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ, and enjoy the liberties of the gospel with purity and peace….”  Mather, vol. 1, p. 160.

The ministers and Christians by whom New-England was first planted, were a chosen company of men; picked out of, perhaps, all the counties in England, and this by no human contrivance, but by a strange work of God upon the spirits of men that were, no ways, acquainted with one another, inspiring them, as one man, to secede into a wilderness … a reasonable expression once used by that eminent … lieutenant-governor of New-England … “God sifted three nations [England, Scotland,and Ireland], that he might bring choice grain into this wilderness.”

The design of these refugees, thus carried into the [North American] wilderness, was, that they might there “sacrifice unto the Lord their God:” it was, that they might maintain the power of godliness and practice the evangelical worship of our Lord Jesus Christ, in all the parts of it ….Mather, vol. 1, p. 240

In “An Attestation to This Church-History of New-England,” the foreword to Magnalia, Christi Americana, John Higginson wrote:

It hath been deservedly esteemed one of the great and wonderful works of God in this last age, that the Lord stirred up the spirits of so many thousands of his servants, to leave the pleasant land of England, the land of their nativity, and to transport themselves, and families, over the ocean sea, into a desert land in America … and this, merely on the account of pure and undefiled Religion … seeking first the kingdom of God, and the righteousness thereof… Surely of this work, and of this time, it shall be said, what hath God wrought? And, this is the Lord’s doings, it is marvellous in our eyes! Even so (O Lord) didst thou lead thy people, to make thyself a glorious name [Isa. 63:141]  John Higginson, “An Attestation to This Church-History of New-England,” Foreword to Pastor Cotton Mather, Magnalia Christi Americana: or, The Ecclesiastical History of New-England, 1702, subsequent ed. reprint. (New York, NY: Russell & Russell, 1967) vol. 1, p. 13.

Daniel Webster

…if God prosper us, we shall here begin a work which shall last for ages; we shall plant here a new society, in the principles of the fullest liberty and the purest religion; we shall subdue this wilderness which is before us; we shall fill this region of the great continent, which stretches almost from pole to pole, with civilization and Christianity; the temples of the true God shall rise, where now ascends the smoke of idolatrous sacrifice ….Daniel Webster, discourse at Plymouth Rock, 2 December 1820, The Works of Daniel Webster (Boston, MA: Little, Brown, and Company, 1858) vol. 1, p. 10.

Patrick Henry

America’s Christian foundations could not be affirmed any more emphatically than they were by Patrick Henry:

It cannot be emphasized too strongly or too often that this great nation was founded, not by religionists, but by Christians; not on religions, but on the gospel of Jesus Christ.  Patrick Henry, quoted in David Barton, The Myth of Separation (Aledo, TX: Wallbuilders Press, 1992) p. 117.

David Josiah Brewer

U.S. Supreme Court Associate Justice David Josiah Brewer provided additional evidence that America began as a Christian nation:

We classify nations in various ways, as, for instance, by their form of government. One is a kingdom, another an empire, and still another a republic. Also by race. Great Britain is an Anglo-Saxon nation, France a Gaelic, Germany a Teutonic, Russia a Slav. And still again by religion. One is a Mohammedan nation, others are heathen, and still others are Christian nations….

This Republic is classified among the Christian nations of the world. It was so formally declared by the Supreme Court of the United States. In the case of HOLY TRINITY CHURCH vs. UNITED STATES, 143 U.S. 471, that Court … added, “these and many other matters which might be noticed, add a volume of unofficial declarations to the mass of organic utterances that this is a Christian nation….”

Nathaniel Morton also observed:

In the year 1602, divers godly Christians of our English nation … entered into covenant to walk with God, and one with another, in the enjoyment of the ordinances of God, according to the primitive pattern in the word of God .

1639 – FUNDAMENTAL AGREEMENT OF THE COLONY OF NEW HAVEN [Connecticut]: … We all agree that the scriptures hold forth a perfect rule for the direction and government of all men in duties which they are to perform to God and to man, as well in families and commonwealth as in matters of the church; so likewise in all public officers which concern civil order, as choice of magistrates and officers, making and repealing laws, dividing allotments of inheritance, and all things of like nature, we will, all of us, be ordered by the rules which the scripture holds forth; and we agree that such persons may be entrusted with such matters of government as are described in Exodus 18:21 and Deuteronomy 1: 13 with Deuteronomy 17:15 and I Corinthians 6:1,6 & 7.

1639 – CONNECTICUT HISTORY: In June 1639, however, a more definite statement of political principles was framed, in which it was clearly stated that the rules of Scripture should determine the ordering of the Church, the choice of magistrates, the making and repeal of laws … that only Church members could become free burgesses and officials of the colony … and in 1644 the general court decided that the judicial laws of God as they were declared by Moses should constitute a rule for all courts ….

1776 – DELAWARE CONSTITUTION: … officeholders were required to make and subscribe to the following declaration: “I … do profess faith in God the Father, and in Jesus Christ His Only Son, and the Holy Ghost, one God, blessed forevermore; and I do acknowledge the Holy Scriptures of the Old and New Testament to be given by divine inspiration. “

1776 – NORTH CAROLINA CONSTITUTION: … no person who shall deny the being of God or the truth of the Protestant religion, or the divine authority either of the Old or New Testaments, or who shall hold religious principles incompatible with the freedom and safety of the State, shall be capable of holding any office or place of trust or profit in the civil department within the State.

1777 -VERMONT CONSTITUTION: …required of every member of the house of representatives that he take this oath: “I do believe in one God, the creator and governor of the universe, the rewarder of the good and punisher of the wicked, and I do acknowledge the scriptures of the Old and New Testaments to be given by divine inspiration, and own and profess the Protestant religion. “

Alexis de Tocqueville recognized the uniqueness of our beginnings and wrote of the Scriptural, moral and civil code which was the foundation for those early laws of New England:

… in studying the earliest historical and legislative records of New England. They exercised the rights of sovereignty; they named their magistrates, concluded peace or declared war, made police regulations, and enacted laws as if their allegiance was due only to God. Nothing can be more curious and, at the same time more instructive, than the legislation of that period; it is there that the solution of the great social problem which the United States now present[s] to the world is to be found.

Amongst these documents we shall notice, as especially characteristic, the code of laws promulgated by the little State of Connecticut in 1650. The legislators of Connecticut begin with the penal laws, and … they borrow their provisions from the text of Holy Writ. “Whosoever shall worship any other God than the Lord,” says the preamble of the Code, “shall surely be put to death.” This is followed by ten or twelve enactments of the same kind, copied verbatim from the books of Exodus, Leviticus, and Deuteronomy. Blasphemy, sorcery, adultery, and rape were punished with death ….

The 1879 McGuffey’s Sixth Eclectic Reader clearly illustrated how early America’s Christianity influenced her government:

Their  form of government was as strictly theocratical … insomuch that it would be difficult to say where there was any civil authority among them entirely distinct from ecclesiastical jurisdiction.

Whenever a few of them settled a town, they immediately gathered themselves into a church; and their elders were magistrates, and their code of laws was the Pentateuch]….

God was their King; and they regarded him as truly and literally so ….

James Madison, “the Father of the U.S. Constitution” and our fourth President, understood that the future of our American civilization was (and still is) dependent upon the Laws of God:

We have staked the whole future of American civilization, not upon the power of government, far from it. We have staked the future of all of our political institutions upon the capacity of mankind for self-government; upon the capacity of each and all of us to govern ourselves, to control ourselves, to sustain ourselves according to the Ten Commandments of God.

Jewish Encyclopedia

UNITED STATES: … the early forms of government and laws were fashioned in a manner upon Old Testament times. This was particularly the case in Massachusetts (whose first criminal code [in 16411 gave chapter and verse from the Bible as its authority), as also in Connecticut. The records of the colony of New Haven, founded in 1638, have distinctly Old Testament character, and Biblical precedent is quoted for almost every governmental act. One can form some opinion of the measure of Old Testament influence when one considers that in the code of colony laws adopted in New Haven in 1656 there are 107 references to the Old Testament....

But Jews as individuals contributed little or nothing to direct the trend of colonial legislation of this early period.

Forefathers of the Puritans & Immigrants to America believed they were Israel

Alfred the Great, King of Wessex, England
During his reign from 871 to 899 the Anglo-Saxon king Alfred the Great declared:

Be ye kind to the stranger within thy gates, for ye were strangers in the land of the Egyptians

Scottish Declaration of Independence
In 1320 the Scottish Declaration of Independence was drawn up by King Robert (the Bruce) and twenty-five Scottish nobles in which the Scots are addressed as Israelites. This great document states the following regarding their migrations:

…the Scots … passing from the greater Scythia … and coming thence one thousand two hundred years after the outgoing of the people of Israel … acquired for themselves the possessions in the West…

Adam de Houghton, Bishop of Saint David, Wales
In 1377 Adam de Houghton, the Bishop of Saint David, Wales, delivered a speech before the British Parliament in which he recognized England as Israel:

…you may embrace your noble King … there is through him [King Edward III] that peace over Israel which the Scriptures name – Israel being the heritage of God, and that heritage being also England. For in good truth, I believe that God would never have honoured this country by victories such as had given glory to Israel, had He not intended it for His heritage also.

William Tyndale, English Reformer and Martyr
In 1530 the great English religious reformer, William Tyndale, who translated the New Testament and the Pentateuch into English announced his amazing discovery:

…the properties of the Hebrew tongue agreeth a thousand times more with the English than with the Latin. The manner of speaking is both one; so that in a thousand places thou needest not but to translate it into the English, word for word; when thou must seek a compass in the Latin, and yet shall have much work to translate it well-favouredly, so that it have the same grace and sweetness, sense and pure understanding with it in the Latin, and as it hath in the Hebrew. A thousand parts better may it [the Hebrew tongue] be translated into the English, than into the Latin.

Sir Francis Drake, English Navigator and Admiral
In 1587 Sir Francis Drake, an explorer for Queen Elizabeth I, wrote to the religious writer John Foxe beseeching his prayers:

God may be glorious, His church, our Queen and country preserved, the enemies of truth vanquished, that we may have continued peace in Israel…. Our enemies are many, but our Protector commandeth the whole world….

King James VI of Scotland and I of England

King James VI of Scotland (James I of England) (1566-1625), who commissioned the King James Bible, claimed that the Lord had made him King over Israel; the gold coin of his day, bearing his head was called the “Jacobus” and James had the reverse inscribed in Latin the prophecy of Ezekiel 37:22, “I will make of them one nation.”

Pastor John Cotton, Puritan Clergyman
In 1630, prior to the departure of the ship Abrella for America with Massachusetts Bay Colony Governor John Winthrop and his fellow Puritans aboard, the young Puritan minister John Cotton preached a stirring farewell message taken from 2 Samuel 7:10:

I  will appoint a place for My people Israel and will plant them, that they may live in their own place and not be disturbed….

Pastor Cotton further exhorted his audience:

Go forth … with a publick spirit … have a tender care … to your children, that they doe not degenerate as the Israelites did….

American historian Samuel Eliot Morison wrote the following concerning Pastor Cotton’s sermon:

Cotton’s sermon was of a nature to inspire these new children of Israel with the belief that they were the Lord’s chosen people; destined, if they kept the covenant with Him, to people and fructify this new Canaan in the western wilderness.

B. Woodbridge concluded his epitaph for Pastor John Cotton with the following words:

Though Moses [referring to Pastor John Cotton] be [dead], yet Joshua is not dead: I mean renowned [Pastor John] Norton; worthy he, Successor to our Moses, is to be. O happy Israel in America. In such a Moses, such a Joshua.

Edward Johnson, English Historian
In 1630 historian Edward Johnson, writing of those early Puritan and Pilgrim settlers, often made reference to them as being Israel:

…the Lambe is preparing his Bride … yee the ancient Beloved of Christ, whom he of old led by hand from Egypt to Canaan through that great and terrible Wildernesse.

…you the Seed of Israel both lesse and more, the rattling of your dead bones is at hand, Sinewes, Flesh and Life: at the Word of Christ it comes.

…you  People of Israel gather together as one Man, and together as one Tree. Ezekiel 37 and 23.31

Then judge all you … whether these poore New England People, be not the forerunners of Christ’s Army, and the marvelous providences which you shall now heare, be not the very Finger of God, and whether the Lord hath not sent this people to Preach in this Wildernesse, and to proclaime to all Nations, the neere approach of the most wonderful workes that ever the Sonnes of men saw. Will not you believe that a Nation can be borne in a day [Isa. 66:8 – a Scripture that can only be fulfilled in Israel]?

This year the great troubles in our native country encreasing, and that hearing prophane Esau had mustered up all thye Bands he could make to come against his brother Jacob, these wandering race of Jacobites deemed it now high time to implore the Lord for his especial aid in this time of their deepest distress.

As Jacob professes, I came over this Jordan with my staff, and now have I gotten two Bands; so they came over this boisterous billow-boyling Ocean, a few poor scattered stones raked out of the heaps of rubbish, and thou Lord Christ has now so far exalted them, as to lay them sure in thy Sion … the seed of Christ’s Church in the posterity of Israel should be cut off, and therefore pleaded the promise of the Lord in the multiplying of his seed; so these people at this very time, pleaded not only the Lord’s promise to Israel, but to his only son Christ Jesus.

Pastor Jonathan Mitchell, Puritan Preacher
On October 4, 1649, Pastor Jonathan Mitchell wrote in his diary:

…God will humble me before the sun, and in the sight of all Israel

On August 8, 1667, at Pastor John Wilson’s funeral, Pastor Mitchell included the following in his eulogy:

Ah! Now there’s none who does not know, that this day in our Israel, is fall’n a great and good man too

Nathaniel Morton, New Plymouth Court Secretary
In 1669 in New England’s Memorial, Nathaniel Morton wrote of God moving the seed of Abraham to New England:

That especially the seed of Abraham his servant, and the children of Jacob his chosen, may remember his marvelous works (Psal. 105.5,6.) in the beginning and progress of the planting of New-England, his wonders, and the judgments of his mouth; how that God brought a vine into this wilderness; that he cast out the heathen and planted them in the mountain of his inheritance (Exod. 15.13.) in respect of precious gospel-enjoyments. So that we may not only look back to former experiences of God’s goodness to our [Israelite] predecessors, (though many years before) and so have our faith strengthened in the mercies of God for our times

I shall close up this small history with a word of advice to the rising generation…. God did once plant a noble vine in New-England, but it is degenerated into the plant of a strange vine. Jer. ii, 21. It were well that it might be said that the rising generation did serve the Lord all the days of such as in this our Israel …Josh. xxiv, 31.

Pastor James Keith, American Clergyman
On October 30, 1676, in a letter to Pastor John Cotton, Pastor James Keith wrote the following:

Let us join our prayers, at the throne of grace, with all our might, that the Lord would so dispose of all of public motions and affairs, that his Jerusalem, in this wilderness, may be the habitation of justice and the mountain of holiness

Pastor Increase Mather, American Clergyman and Author
In 1681, in a preface to a discourse on Urian Oakes, Pastor Increase Mather wrote the following:

…[Urian Oakes] at last called to the head of the “sons of the prophets” in this New-English Israel

Pastor John Bunyan, English Preacher and Author
Regarding the beliefs of Pastor John Bunyan (1628-1688), author of Pilgrim’s Progress, Rabbi Louis Finkelstein commented:

…Bunyan actually fancied himself an Israelite

Pastor Cotton Mather, American Clergyman and Historian
In 1702 a Boston minister Cotton Mather wrote the following concerning New England and some of her earlier inhabitants:

…in our hastening voyage unto the History of a new-English Israel

…I am going to give unto the Christian reader an history of some feeble attempts made in the American hemisphere to anticipate the state of the New-Jerusalem

These good people [the first settlers of Plymouth, Massachusetts] were now satisfied, they had as plain a command of Heaven to attempt a removal [from England, Ireland and Scotland], as ever their father Abraham had for his leaving the Chaldean territories…

Among these passengers were divers worthy and useful men, who were come to seek the welfare of this little Israel…
The colony might fetch its own description from the dispensations of the great God, unto his ancient Israel, and say, “O, God of Hosts, thou has brought a vine out of England…

whilst he [Massachusetts Bay Colony’s Governor John Winthrop] thus did, as our New-English Nehemiah, the part of a ruler in managing the public affairs of our American Jerusalem … he made himself still an exacter parallel unto the the governour of Israel…
Make room, then, for Urian Oakes, ye records of New-England. He was born in England … whose liberal education in our College have rendered the family not he least in our little Israel…

Dean Jacque Abadie, French Educator and Author
In 1723 Dean Jacques Abbadie of Killaloe, Ireland, wrote regarding the whereabouts of the “lost” Israelites:

Unless the Ten Tribes of Israel are flown into the air, or sunk into the earth; they must be those ten Gothic Tribes that entered Europe in the fifth century, overthrew the Roman Empire and founded the ten nations of modern Europe.

Alexander Cruden, Scottish Bible Concordance Compiler
In 1761 on a page addressed “TO THE KING” in the well-known Concordance of Alexander Cruden, the author renders this prayer:

May the great God be the guide of your life, and direct and prosper you, that it may be said by the present and future ages, that King George the Third hath been an Hezekiah to our British Israel.

In 1773 the men of Marlborough, Connecticut, made this proclamation:

Death is more eligible than slavery. A freeborn people are not required by the religion of Jesus Christ to submit to tyranny, but may make use of such power as God has given them to recover and support their laws and liberties… (they) implored the Ruler above the skies, that He would make bare His arm in defense of His church and people, and let Israel go.

Jonathan Trumbull, Connecticut Governor
In a letter dated July 13, 1775, to George Washington (then Commander-in-Chief of the Continental Army) Jonathan Trumbull, Governor of Connecticut, wrote in part:

…be strong and very courageous, May the God of the Armies of  Israel shower down the blessings of His Divine Providence on You

George Washington

[Almighty God] Endow with the spirit of wisdom those whom in Thy name we entrust the authority of government, that there may be peace and justice at home, and that through obedience to Thy law, we may show forth Thy praise among the nations of the earth….

One may wonder at whether Governor Trumbull was referring to the Continental Army as one of the “armies of Israel.” There appears no question as to his intent when one reads another exhortation written in his own hand later that same year. In a public proclamation concerning Thanksgiving, dated October 14, 1775, Governor Trumbull proclaimed:

That God would … guide our affairs in this dark and difficult Day; and make them know what Israel ought to do … that He would confirm and increase Union and Harmony in the Colonies, and throughout America…

Great Seal of the United States of America
On July 4, 1776, the Continental Congress appointed a committee to design a seal for the emerging new nation. The committee was composed of Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, and John Adams. Both Franklin and Jefferson proposed designs related to ancient Israel. While John Adams’ contribution is not recorded here, he wrote to his wife, Abigail, on August 1, 1776, and described in part what the committee had thus far accomplished:

Dr. F[ranklin] proposes a Device for a seal. Moses lifting up his Wand, and dividing the Red Sea, and Pharaoh, in his Chariot overwhelmed with the Waters … The motto: Rebellion to Tyrants is Obedience to God.

Mr. Jefferson proposed. The Children of Israel in the Wilderness, led by a Cloud by day, and Pillar of Fire by night, and on the others Side Hengist and Horsa, the Saxon Chiefs, from whom We claim the Honour of being descended and whose Political Principles and Form of Government We have assumed.

Following are later depictions of these ideas by Franklin and Jefferson:

Pastor John Clark, American Preacher
In 1781 in his election sermon, Pastor Jonas Clark spoke of the children of the captivity who came to this new land to serve God:

Under this happy [Massachusetts] constitution we have seen, to universal satisfaction, that blessed prophecy concerning GOD’S people after their return from captivity, literally fulfilled unto us “There congregation shall be established before me – their nobles shall be of themselves, and their Governor shall proceed from the midst of them.” (Jer. 30:20-21)

May we not – yea, rather, ought we not, upon this joyful occasion, in a deep sense of our obligations to heaven, to ascribe the glory of all to GOD, and devoutly acknowledge that this is the LORD’S doing; it is marvelous in our eyes!

On this joyful day we are invited to see God, the Supreme ruler, on the throne of his holiness, the favour and defence of an afflicted land; “The princes of the people of the God of Abraham gathered together”: And ‘The Shields of the earth.” (Ps. 47:9) The rulers of every department, devoting themselves to the service of God and their country, in devout acknowledgement of his government, to the end, that God might be greatly exalted, in the good of his people, by their administration.

Noah Webster, American Statesman and Lexicographer
In 1783 Noah Webster wrote The Elementary Spelling Book, better known as the Blue-Back Speller. Following “Lesson Number 123” we find Mr. Webster’s sentiments regarding our Israelite relatives:

All Israelites are brethren, descendents of common parents. How unnatural and wicked it is to make war on our brethren, to conquer them or to plunder and destroy them

George Washington, American General and President

In 1785 George Washington referred to America as the “second land of promise,and in his first inaugural address in April, 1789, he accredited Providence for advancing the affairs of this new nation:

No People can be bound to acknowledge and adore the invisible hand, which conducts the Affairs of men more than the People of the United States. Every step, by which they have advanced to the character of an independent nation, seems to have been distinguished by some token of providential agency

Thomas Jefferson, American Statesman and President
In 1814 in a letter written to Dr. Walter Jones regarding the death of President George Washington, Thomas Jefferson conveyed his belief in an American Israel:

I felt on his [George Washington’s] death, with my countyrmen, that “verily a great man hath fallen this day in Israel.”

Pastor B. Murphey, Canadian Preacher
In 1817 Pastor Murphey provided evidence for the Israelites’ migrations into Ireland:

Israelites came from Egypt into Ireland.

Washington Irving, American Essayist, Novelist, and Historian
In 1824 in his story “The Devil and Tom Walker,” Washington Irving wrote the following about a man whom he named “Absalom Crowinshield” who lived in New England in the 1700s:

It was announced in the papers with the usual flourish, that “A great man had fallen in Israel.”

Sir Walter Scott, Scottish Poet and Novelist
In 1830 in his novel Woodstock, Scottish author Sir Walter Scott had Oliver Cromwell using these words:

…as my soul liveth, and as He liveth who hath made me [Oliver Cromwell] a ruler in Israel

United States District Court for the District of Maine
On November 5, 1840, in a case titled “The Huntress, 12 F. Cas. 984, 993” regarding Constitutional neglect, the U.S. District Court for the District of Maine declared:

…we may well ask, with some feelings of surprise, where during these seven years, were slumbering the watchmen of our American Israel.

Charters & Constitutions

In several colonies and States a profession of the Christian faith was made an indispensable condition to holding office. In the frame of government for Pennsylvania, prepared by William Penn, in 1683, it was provided that “all treasurers, judges, and other officers, and all members elected to serve in provincial council and general assembly, and all that have right to elect such members, shall be such as profess faith in Jesus Christ.” And in the charter of privileges for that colony, given in 1701 by William Penn and approved by the colonial assembly, it was provided “that all persons who also profess to believe in Jesus Christ, the Saviour of the world, shall be capable to serve this government in any capacity, both legislatively and executively.”**

**Similar requirements can also be found in the Delaware Constitution of 1776; the New Hampshire Constitutions of 1704 and 1792; the Fundamental Constitutions of the Carolinas; the Massachusetts Constitution of 1780; the Fundamental Order of Connecticut for its Governor; the Vermont Constitution of 1777; the Maryland Constitution of 1776; the current Maryland Bill of Rights, Article 37; the Mississippi Constitution of 1817; and the Arkansas Constitution of 1874 with 1963 supplements – most of which are listed in Justice Brewer’s speech.

1606 – The Charter for the Virginia Colony read in part: “To the glory of
His divine Majesty, in propagating of the Christian religion to such people
as yet live in ignorance of the true knowledge and worship of God.”

1606 – JAMESTOWN CHARTER – Purpose: “…in propagation of the Christian religion.”

1606 – FIRST VIRGINIA CHARTER: “…tend to the Glory of his Divine Majesty, in propagating of Christian Religion to such People, as yet live in Darkness and miserable Ignorance of the true Knowledge and Worship of God….”

1610 – NEW ENGLAND CHARTER – Aims in settling America: “…to increase the knowledge of the Omnipotent God and the propagation of our Christian faith.”*
*”First, it will be a service unto the Church of great consequence, to carry the Gospel unto those parts of the world, and raise a bulwark against the Kingdom of AntiChrist….” Pastor Cotton Mather, D.D., “General Considerations for the Plantation of New England,” Magnalia Christi Americana or The Ecclesiastical History of New-England quoted by Alexis de Tocqueville in Democracy in America (New York, NY: The Colonial Press, 1899) Vol. 2, p. 360.

1609 – Second Virginia Charter – Purpose: “to live in fear and true worship of Almighty God, Christian peace, and civil quietness.”

1610 – New England Charter -Aims in settling America: “to increase the knowledge of the Omnipotent God and the propagation of our Christian faith.  Walter S. Remmie, “This Is a Christian Nation,” Kingdom Digest (Irving, TX) July 1981, p. 28.

1620 – MAYFLOWER COMPACT (the first legal document in America): “In the name of God amen … having undertaken for the glory of God, and [the] advancement of the Christian faith….”

1620 – King James I granted the Charter of the Plymouth council. “In the
hope thereby to advance the enlargement of the Christian religion, to the
glory of God Almighty.”

1620 – The Pilgrims sign the Mayflower Compact aboard the Mayflower, in
Plymouth Harbor. “For the glory of God and advancement of ye Christian faith.
doe by these presents solemnly & mutually in ye presence of God and one of
another, covenant & combine our selves together into a civil body
politick[sic].”

1623 – “But God gave them health and strength in a good measure; and
showed them by experience the truth of the word, Deuteronomy 8:3: ‘Man does
not live on bread alone but on every word that comes from the mouth of the
Lord.’” (William Bradford, in BHOPP, p. 175).

1624 -SWEDISH CHARTER OF DELAWARE COLONY: “In the first place God’s glory, which above all must be especially cared for and promoted, can be increased thereby, His blessed Word and Holy Gospel planted and spread among all kinds of people and many thousand souls be brought to the true knowledge and understanding of God.”

1629 – The first Charter of Massachusetts read in part: “For the
directing, ruling, and disposing of all other Matters and Thinges, whereby
our said People may be soe religiously, peaceablie, and civilly governed, as
their good life and orderlie Conversacon, maie wynn and incite the Natives of
the Country to the Knowledg and Obedience of the onlie true God and Savior of
Mankinde, and the Christian Fayth, which in our Royall Intencon, and The
Adventurers free profession, is the principall Ende of the
Plantacion….”[sic]

1632 – MARYLAND CHARTER: [our Celto-Saxon forefathers were] animated with a laudable and pious zeal for extending the Christian religion … Cecil Calvert [founder of Maryland] wrote in a letter at the time: “At the place prepared we [Celto-Saxon Christians] all kneeled down and said certain prayers; taking possession of the country for our Saviour and for our sovereign Lord.”  Nathanial Morton, New England’s Memorial (Cambridge, MA: S.G. and M.J. for John Usher, 1669), reproduced with extracts from other writers (Boston, MA: Congregational Board of Publication, 1854) p. 20.

1630 – Settlement of Massachusetts published under the subtitle of “Wonder-Working Providence of Zion’s Saviour.”

1636 – Harvard, which was the first college in America, whose name-sake and benefactor* stated in his provision for a fund to build a college: “Let every student be plainly instructed, and earnestly pressed to consider well, the main end of his life and studies is, to know God and Jesus Christ which is eternal life, John 17:3, and therefore to lay Christ in the bottom as the only foundation of all sound knowledge and learning.”  1636 Harvard University document, quoted in John le Boutillier, Harvard Hates America: The Odyssey of a Born-again American (South Bend, IN: Gateway Editions, 1978), quoted in Walter S. Remmie, “This is a Christian Nation,” Kingdom Digest (Irving, TX, July 1981) p. 29.
John Harvard (1607-1638) was the namesake and benefactor of Harvard University, founded in 1636 and still operating undera 1650 charter

1638 – The towns of Hartford, Weathersfield, and Windsor adopt the
Fundamental Orders of Connecticut. “To mayntayne and presearve the liberty
and purity of the Gospell of our Lord Jesus, which we now professe….” [sic]

1639 – The governing body of New Hampshire is established. “Considering
with ourselves the holy will of God and our own necessity, that we should not
live without wholesome laws and civil government among us, of which we are
altogether destitute, do, in the name of Christ and in the sight of God,
combine ourselves together to erect and set up among us such government as
shall be, to our best discerning, agreeable to the will of God….”

1639 – Fundamental Orders of Connecticut states as a part of its purpose: “to maintain and preserve the liberty and purity of the Gospel of our Lord Jesus which we now profess…Walter S. Remmie, “This is a Christian Nation,” Kingdom Digest (Irving, TX, July 1981) pp. 28-29. Additional documents, charters, constitutions, etc., are quoted in this same article.

1643 -ARTICLES OF CONFEDERATION: “Whereas we all came into these parts of America with one and ye same end and arms, namely to advance the Kingdom of our Lord, Jesus Christ, and to enjoys ye liberties of ye Gospell in puritie with peace….”
1775 – In Patrick Henry’s speech: “We shall not fight alone. God presides
over the destinies of nations, and will raise up friends for us. The battle
is not to the strong alone; it is to the vigilant, the active, the brave…
Is life so dear, or peace so sweet as to be purchased at the price of chains
and slavery? Forbid it Almighty God! I know not what course others may take,
but as for me, give me liberty or give me death!”

1787 Article III of the Northwest Ordinance of 1787: “Religion, morality,
and knowledge, being necessary to good government and the happiness of
mankind, schools and the means of education shall forever be encouraged.”

1789 – George Washington said “Let us with caution indulge the
supposition, that morality can be maintained without religion.” (Schroeder
ed. p. 106)

1794 – John Jay, first Chief Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court, in a
letter to his wife, stated “God’s will be done; to him I resign-in him I
confide. Do the like. Any other philosophy applicable to this occasion is
delusive. Away with it.” (Johnston ed. vol. 4, p. 7.)

In addition to the nation’s united expression of faith in God, each individual state has separately acknowledged God as Sovereign and as the Author of liberty. The Legislative Service of the Library of Congress has compiled the provisions of State constitutions relative to the Supreme Being.  Pat Brooks, et.al., “50 Evidences that the U.S.A. is ‘Constitutionally Christian!,” Appendix D, Freedom or Slavery! (Fletcher, NC: New Puritan Library, 1990) p. 159. Pages 159-165 contain the pertinent portion of all 50 state constitutions.

ARIZONA, BILL OF RIGHTS, Section 12: The liberty of conscience shall not be construed to excuse acts of licentiousness….

CALIFORNIA, DECLARATION OF RIGHTS, Article 1, Section4: … The liberty of conscience does not excuse acts that are licentious….

DELAWARE, BILL OF RIGHTS, Article 1, Section 1: …it is the duty of all men to frequently assemble together for public worship of Almighty God; and piety and morality, on which the prosperity of communities depend are hereby promoted….

MARYLAND, BILL OF RIGHTS, Article 36: …it is the duty of every man to worship God; and piety and morality, on which the prosperity of communities depend are hereby promoted….

MASSACHUSETTS, DECLARATION OF RIGHTS, Article 2: It is the right as well as the duty of all men in society, publicly and at stated sessions, to worship the Supreme Being, the great Creator and Preserver of the universe.

Article 3: As the happiness of a people and the good order and preservation of civil government essentially depend upon the piety, religion and morality…. And every denomination of Christians….

MINNESOTA, BILL OF RIGHTS, Section 16: … The right of every man to worship God according to the dictates of his own conscience shall never be infringed … the liberty of conscience hereby secured shall not be so construed as to excuse acts of licentiousness….

MISSISSIPPI, BILL OF RIGHTS, Section 18: … The rights hereby secured shall not be construed to justify acts of licentiousness injurious to morals or dangerous to the peace and safety of the state, or to exclude the Holy Bible from use in any public school of this state.

NEBRASKA, BILL OF RIGHTS, Article 1, Section 4: All persons have a natural indefeasible right to worship Almighty God according to the dictates of their own conscience…. Religion, morality, and knowledge, being essential to good government, it shall be the duty of the legislature to pass suitable laws to protect every religious denomination in the peaceful enjoyment of its own mode of public worship….

NEW HAMPSHIRE, BILL OF RIGHTS, Article 6: As morality and piety, rightly grounded on high principles, will give the best and greatest security to government, and will allay, in the hearts of men, the strongest obligations to due subjection; and as the knowledge of these is most likely to be propagated through society, therefore, the several parishes, bodies, corporate, or religious societies, shall at all times have the right of electing their own teachers, and of contracting with them for their support and maintenance, or both….

OHIO, BILL OF RIGHTS, Section 7: All men have a natural and indefeasible right to worship Almighty God according to the dictates of their own conscience…. Religion, morality, and knowledge, however, being essential to good government….

VIRGINIA, BILL OF RIGHTS, Article 1, Section 16: That religion or the duty which we owe our Creator… it is the mutual duty of all to practice Christian forbearance, love, and charity towards each other….

On the 20th September, 1776, the first constitution of the Delaware State was adopted, the 22d article of which provided, that “every person who shall be chosen a member of either house, or appointed to any office or place of trust, before taking his seat or entering upon the execution of his office, shall take the following oath … to wit: I … do profess of faith in God, the father, and Jesus Christ his only son, and in the Holy Ghost, on God blessed for evermore; and I do acknowledge the holy scriptures of the old and new testaments to be given by divine inspiration.  Clayton, pp. 565-566.

Freedom of Religion

In 1776 there were approximately 2.5 million people in America. Less than one percent of the population was, represented by 20,000 Catholics, 3,000 Jews, and a few Deists; more than ninety-nine percent were Christian Protestants.

After the Constitution was signed and the Bill of Rights made provision of Freedom of Religion these numbers changed drastically.

In 2007 the percentages were as follows:

Which religion had the most to gain?  Roman Catholicism.  Yah willing, this will be addressed in a future study but it begs the question…who had the most to gain by the American Revolution?  The Puritans and those who sought to follow the Scriptures in peace and freedom had no desire to rebel against the king.  It was these same Puritans that refused to allow Catholicism to take a stronghold in America due to the persecution they saw in Europe.  A good reference to learn about more history on the founding of America is ‘Rulers of Evil’ by Tupper Saussy.

Native American Indians

The Indians that were at the first Thanksgiving were the Wampanoag Indians.

The Wampanoag had their own harvest celebration in which they gave thanks for abundant crops to Kiehtan, the Creator. They believed corn, the most valued crop, was a gift from him. The tribe expressed gratitude to the spirits of the game for the animals they killed for food.

Wampanoagtribe.net

tribal elder Gladys Widdiss has to say about the Wampanoag and thanksgiving:

“With Native Americans you do not separate the spiritual from the rest of your life. You’re very involved with who you are, where you came from , and where you are going. We have special holidays or festivals, but every day is a day of thanksgiving.”

Native American’s & Yisrael connection

Cherokee Indians

18th Century explorer, trader, and researcher, James Adair from London, author of History of the American Indians who spent 40 years among the Cherokees, wrote a book named Out of the Flame, listing 23 hard proofs why he believed the Cherokees were descended from Israel. Among other things, the Cherokees were fiercely monotheistic who observed the Ten Commandments to the letter. Harvard professor Barry Fell cites an ancient carving of the Ten Commandments in North America as further proof, another subscriber to the lost tribe theory. Rabbi Marvin Tokayer, former USAF Chaplain and prominent Jewish historian, also holds that the Indians of the Americas are descendants of Northern Israel’s seafaring tribes, Dan and Zevulun. The additional list is long and exhaustive.

Understanding the Exodus Stephen Barrett Segall
James Adair lived among the Cherokee for 40 years beginning in 1736 and John Howard Payne lived among them in the early 1800’s.  Both speak of Cherokee legends about the creation, the great flood, expulsion from Eden, the Tower of Babel, Abraham, crossing the Red Sea, Moses, wandering in the wilderness and the construction of the tent of worship and sacred ark.
The Cherokee believed in life after death, reward and punishment after death for behavior in life, an emphasis on spiritual and sexual purity and the use of baptism and fasting as a means of purification.
On certain days Cherokee would assemple for worship in obedience to Ye ho waah.  If obedient to Ye ho waah’s commandments they would spend eternity with Him in heaven, if not they would spend eternity in a lake of fire and be tortured forever.
In the Cherokee story of creation, the Great Spirit created the world in seven days.  Man was created from the dust of the earth and the Creator breathed life into him.  The Creator saw that man was loney and took one of his ribs to make a woman.  Initially man could live forever, and snakes were not poisonous.  But to make sure the world was not overpopulated the Creator made snakes poisonous and a member of the first family was bitten by a snake and died.  As a result of this all people were doomed to death.
Cherokees tradition stated that Ye ho waah had commanded the people to rest from work every seventh day.  They celebrated the new moon.  They had crystals for predicting the future like the Urim and Thummim.  They had a sacred ark that represented an everlasting bond between them and the Creator.
SEE Cherokee People by Thomas Mails

Cherokee Corn Feasts Parallel Jewish Holy Days!
Also, one of the more convincing evidences is that the Jews followed a Religious Calendar of 7 main Festivals. And so did the Mediavel Cherokee! Even more so, examination of these Celebrations show that they were basically about the same thing–except that the Cherokee followed the growing cycle of corn, rather than that of barley and wheat, as the Jews did.

And for a brief summary, these Mediavel Cherokee Festivals were:1- FIRST FULL MOON OF SPRING,
which would have been literally the Day of Passover, and was accompanied by the slaughter of a lot of animals to prepare the meat for that Feast Day, and was set by the sprouting of the new grass of Spring (like the Passover Barley)! [Not to mention the intensive Spring Cleaning of the Feast!]

 

2- GREEN CORN FESTIVAL,
which was when the corn first balled, so that it could be cooked and eaten–similar to First Fruits, when the Barley was first edible. (However, for the Cherokee, this occured later in the year, more towards Summer, as the Climate in America was not as warm as in the Middle East).

3- MATURE or RIPE CORN FESTIVAL,
which was set for 50 days after the Green Corn Festival (like Pentecost)–and when the Sacred Fire in the Heptagon (like the Jewish Temple Menorah) was re-lit for the next year!

4- GREAT NEW MOON FEAST,
which was set as the first Full Moon of Autumn, and when Cherokee myth said that the whole world was created (and similar to Rosh HaShannah)!

5- PROPITIATION and CEMENTATION CEREMONY,
for cleansing one’s soul of Sin, and joining in UNITY with the Community as they ALL joined with the Creator–setting their relationship to HIM in cement (and similar to the Day of Atonement, with its earlier Kol Nidre purifications and making ammends.) Moreover, as this ended the Torah Study Cycle, many Jewish boys were often bar mitzvahed here, with an appropriate ceremony for Cherokee lads, also.

6- FESTIVAL OF EXALTING or BONDING BUSH CEREMONY (week long),
or a very loose approximating of the 8 Day Feast of Tabernacles–and in the Fall.

Here we see that the Cherokees followed a festival cycle similar to the Scriptural festival cycle.  Did the Wampanoag also trace their festivals back to the Scriptures?

1- Much of the information for the early or Mediavel Cherokee comes from the colonial works of Payne, Butrick, and Adair, a lot of which is quoted in THE CHEROKEE PEOPLE–The Story of the Cherokees, from Earliest Origins to Contemporary Times; by Thomas E. Mails, published in 1992 by Council Oak Books of Tulsa, Oklahoma. 2- Supplemental information confirming Mails work can also be found in The HISTORY OF THE CHEROKEE INDIANS and Their Legends and Folklore by Emmet Starr from Oklahoma City in 1921 but was reprinted by Genealogical Publishing Company of Baltimore, Maryland in 2004.

Pagan Harvest Festivals

Does the holiday of Thanksgiving derive from pagan customs like other holidays in American culture such as Christmas, Easter and Halloweenclick here?

The first feast wasn’t repeated, so it wasn’t the beginning of a tradition. In fact, the colonists didn’t even call the day Thanksgiving. To them, a thanksgiving was a religious holiday in which they would go to church and thank God for a specific event, such as the winning of a battle. On such a religious day, the types of recreational activities that the pilgrims and Wampanoag Indians participated in during the 1621 harvest feast–dancing, singing secular songs, playing games–wouldn’t have been allowed. The feast was a secular celebration, so it never would have been considered a thanksgiving in the pilgrims minds.

History.com

World Book Encyclopedia, 1942 Edition, article entitled, Thanksgiving Day

‘Thanksgiving Day, in the United States and Canada, a day set apart for the giving of thanks to God for the blessings of the year. Originally, it was a harvest thanksgiving, and while the purpose has become less specific, the festival still takes place late in autumn, after the crops have been gathered.’ Indeed, it is probably an outgrowth of the Harvest-Home celebrations in England. Such celebrations are of very ancient origin, being nearly universal among primitive peoples.

The Ancient Greek Harvest festival was called Thesmophora and celebrated Demeter, the founder and goddess of the harvests.  The symbols of Demeter were poppies of ears of corn, a basket of fruit and a little pig.  The Roman goddess of the harvest, Ceres had a festival, which occurred on October 4th and was called the Cerelia.

In ancient China, the 15th day of the eighth month was considered the birthday of the moon. To honor this special occasion, the families held a festival called Chung Chiui trimmed with a meal of moon cakes, roasted pig, and fruit.

Each October the Romans danced to music and watched as parades awed the eyes of onlookers during a celebration they called Cerelia. During the tradition pig and fruit were offered as gifts to the gods, while the people feasted together in thankfulness to their goddess.

Egyptians celebrated fruitful harvest by honoring the God of Vegetation and fertility. This celebration was held each spring and included feasting, music and dancing.

The pagans in Rome celebrated their thanksgiving in early October. The holiday was dedicated to the goddess of the harvest, Ceres, and the holiday was called Cerelia. The Catholic church took over the pagan holiday and it became well established in England, where some of the pagan customs and rituals for this day were observed long after the Roman Empire had disappeared. In England the “Harvest Home” has been observed continuously for centuries.

The ancient Semites called the earth mother Astarte…The Phrygians called her Semele. These deities were absorbed by the Greeks into the one great goddess, Demeter.’ ‘The Roman also had a harvest festival which they called the Cerelia, after Ceres, the Roman goddess of the corn.’

In our own hemisphere, among the Aztecs of Mexico, the harvest took on a grimmer aspect. Each year a young girl, a representation of Xilonen, The goddess of the new corn, was beheaded. The Pawnees also sacrificed a girl. In a more temperate mood, the Cherokees of the American Southeast danced the Green Corn Dance and began the new year at harvest’s end.

We Gather Together: The Story of Thanksgiving, by Ralph and Adeline Linton, 1949.

‘Even before biblical times the ancient people of the Mediterranean Basin held festivals at harvest time in honor of the earth mother. The goddess of the corn (‘corn’ being the European term for any grain; Indian corn (American corn), is called maize), was always one of the most important deities in the hierarchy of the gods, and her child was the young god of vegetation.’17

‘The ancient Semites called the earth mother Astarte…The Phrygians called her Semele…The Minoans had an earth mother for each district. All these local deities were absorbed by the Greeks into the one great goddess, Demeter.’18

‘Besides eating, feasting, etc. the married women practiced special rites. Under the cover of night, the women spent the next day bathing nude in the sea and dancing and playing games on the shore. Then they fasted, sang songs, then feasted, sang, and had general gaiety. All this lasted over a period of several days.’19

‘The Roman harvest festival…was called the Cerelia, after Ceres, the Roman goddess of the corn.’20

‘With the acceptance of Christianity as the official religion of Rome and the conversion of the barbarians who had invaded the crumbling Empire, these pagan rituals were frowned upon and even forbidden by law. However, the peasants clung to them with a tenacity which has made the word ‘pagan’ (originally meaning simply ‘a villager’), a synonym for ‘heathen.’ As late as the sixth century … St. Benedict … found the local peasantry worshiping Apollo in a sacred grove. Even after conversion, old habits and beliefs died hard, and the church was too busy trying to keep the flame of civilization alive to trouble with minor heresies.’21

‘The benevolent earth mother … blended with the equally benevolent mother of Christ. Folk memory of local deities fused with the Christian tales of saints to provide patrons for villages, and the white robed goddess of grain lived on in various guises. To those who live close to the soil, the harvest has an emotional and religious significance … their gratitude finds expression in rites in honor of the being who they feel is most closely related to fruitfulness; a being of warm earth, rather then cold heaven.’22

‘Even today a half pagan belief in the corn mother still survives among the peasant’s in many parts of Europe.’23

‘The Pilgrims undoubtedly brought memories of such English harvest home celebrations with them when they came to the new world. They had also witnessed ‘thanksgiving’ ceremonies during their sojourn in Holland … The Pilgrims themselves would have denied that the Thanksgiving feast in honor of their first harvest in 1621 was evoked by memories of the profane practices of the old world; however, all revolutionaries, political or religious, once their goal is accomplished, turn back to the patterns of the society in which they have been reared, and the Pilgrims, at the time of the first Thanksgiving, were no exception.’24

‘In Peru, the ancient Indians worshiped the ‘Mother of Maize’ and tried every year to persuade her to bring in another good harvest. In Europe, the Austrians also had a ‘Corn Mother’ doll, fashioned from the last sheaf of grain cut in the field and then brought home to the village in the last wagon.’

Organic Gardening and Farming, Nov. 1975, page 132ff, the article entitled, Thanksgiving Day.

Cornucopia

The cornucopia,a horn-shaped container overflowing with fruit, nuts, and vegetables which is typically seen at Thanksgiving in the United States is a Pagan Symbol.

From Wikipedia,
The cornucopia (Latin: Cornu Copiae) is a symbol of food and abundance dating back to the 5th century BC, also referred to as horn of plenty, Horn of Amalthea, and harvest cone.

In Greek mythology, Amalthea was a goat who raised Zeus on her breast milk. When her horn was accidentally broken off by Zeus while playing together, this changed Amalthea into a unicorn with 17 whiskers. The god Zeus, in remorse, gave her back her horn. The horn then had supernatural powers which would give person in possession of it whatever he or she wished for. This gave rise to the legend of the cornucopia. The original depictions were of the goat’s horn filled with fruits and flowers: deities, especially Fortuna, was depicted with the horn of plenty. The cornucopia was also a symbol for a woman’s fertility.

In modern depiction, the cornucopia is typically a hollow, horn-shaped wicker basket typically filled with various kinds of festive fruit and vegetables. In North America, the cornucopia has come to be associated with Thanksgiving and the harvest.

Harvest Queen
A name given to Ceres the Roman goddess of agriculture and crops or to a young woman chosen from among the reapers to whom was given a post of honor at the harvest home.  Demeter is the Greek version of the Egyptian goddess Isis and Roman version of Ceres.

Harvest festivals around the world:

* Mid-Autumn Festival: China
* Chuseok: Korea
* Dongmaeng: Korea
* Bon Festival: Japan
* Dożynki Poland
* Erntedank: Germany & Austria (1st Sunday in October)
* Festa e Grurit (Wheat Festival): A festival that used to mark the end of the harvest of wheat in Communist Albania. No longer observed.
* Freyfaxi (Aug. 1st): marks the beginning of the harvest in Norse paganism. Historically from Iceland, the celebration consists of blót, horse races, martial sports, and other events, often dedicated to the god Freyr.
* Harvest festival: United Kingdom
* Lammas or Lughnasadh (Aug 1): celebration of first harvest/grain harvest in Paganism and Wicca spirituality and by the ancient Celts.
* Mabon (Autumnal Equinox): the second of three recognized harvest sabbats in Paganism and Wicca
* Mhellia: Isle of Man
* Mehregan (October 2): Iran, Ancient Persia
* Annual Harvest Festival of Prosser, Washington, celebrated on the 4th full weekend in September
* Samhain (October 31): the third and final of three recognized harvest sabbats in Paganism and Wicca; celebration of the end of the harvest season and beginning of the Celtic New Year.
* Solung: falls between June and July for nine days. The Adi (also Abor) is a major collective tribe living in the Himalayan hills of Arunachal Pradesh
* Sukkot: Jewish harvest festival lasting eight days in the fall, in which time is spent in tabernacles or booths
* Hasyl toýy:Turkmenistan – the holiday on the last Sunday in November.
* Timoleague: Harvest Festival is held every year in August – Tigh Molaige in Irish
* Ikore: celebrated by the Yoruba tribe of Nigeria
* Khuado Pawi: celebrated by the Chin tribe of India, Burma and recently in the USA and many other parts of the world.

North America

* Duneland Harvest Festival: celebrated the last weekend in September in Porter, Indiana, near Chicago.
* Harvest Festival (United States): celebrated by American Christians on October 31st
* Thanksgiving (United States): the holiday on the fourth Thursday in November.
* Thanksgiving (Canada): the holiday on the second Monday in October.

South Asia

* Bhogali Bihu: (or Magh Bihu) is a harvest festival celebrated in Assam which marks the end of harvesting season in mid-January.
* Lohri: celebrated in North India esp. Punjab
* Nabanna: Bengal region which comprises West Bengal (India) and Bangladesh
* Onam: celebrated by Malayali people in Kerala (India) and other places
* Pongal: celebrated by Tamil people in Tamil Nadu (India) and other places
* Sankranthi or Makar Sankranti: Celebrated in several regions of India including Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh
* Vaisakhi (or Baisakhi): celebrated by Punjabi people in Punjab (India), other parts of North India and elsewhere. The festival falls on the first day of Vaisakh month (usually mid-April), and marks the Punjabi New Year.
* Traditional New Year celebrations in Sri Lanka coincides with the harvest festival in mid-April.
* Dree Festival is a agricultural festival of the Apatanis of Ziro valley in Lower Subansiri District of Arunachal Pradesh, which is celebrated every year from 4th to 7th July.

South Asia

* Flores de Mayo :Flower festival in the Philippines
* Gawai Dayak: Malaysia
* Kaamatan (May 30-31), Sabah in Malaysia
* Maras Taun: Belitung in Indonesia
* Mid-Autumn Festival: Vietnam
* Pahiyas Rice festival in the Philippines

Thanksgiving in the Scriptures

Food is associated with thanksgiving

1Ti 4:4  Because every creature of God is good, and nothing to be thrust away, but having been received with thanksgiving;
1Ti 4:5  for through God’s Word and supplication it is sanctified.

Thanksgiving comes from the Hebrew word Hodu which derives from Yadah.

From the root yad (hand)

Thanksgiving used in the Scriptures

Col 4:2  Steadfastly continue in prayer, watching in it with thanksgiving,
Col 4:3  praying together about us also, that God may open to us a door of the Word, to speak the mystery of Christ, on account of which I also have been bound,
Col 2:6  Therefore, as you received Christ Jesus the Lord, walk in Him,
Col 2:7  being rooted and being built up in Him, and being confirmed in the faith, even as you were taught, abounding in it with thanksgiving.

Eph 5:1  Then become imitators of God, as beloved children,
Eph 5:2  and walk in love, even as Christ also loved us and gave Himself for us, an offering and a sacrifice to God for an odor of a sweet smell.
Eph 5:3  But let not fornication, and all uncleanness, or greediness, be named among you, as is fitting for saints;
Eph 5:4  also baseness, and foolish talking, or joking (the things not becoming), but rather thanksgiving.

2Co 4:15  For all things are for you, that the grace may superabound through the greater number, and may cause the thanksgiving to abound to the glory of God.

Jer 33:11  the voice of joy, and the voice of gladness, the voice of the bridegroom, and the voice of the bride, the voice of those saying, Praise YHWH of Hosts, for YHWH is good, for His mercy endures forever; those who shall bring the sacrifice of thanksgiving into the house of YHWH. For I will bring back the captivity of the land, as at the first, says YHWH.

Jer 30:17  For I will give health back to you, and I will heal you of your wounds, says YHWH, because they called you, Outcast; saying, This is Zion; no one is seeking for her.
Jer 30:18  So says YHWH, Behold I will turn the captivity of Jacob’s tents and will have mercy on his dwelling places. And the city shall be built on her ruin heap; and the fortress shall remain on its own ordinance.
Jer 30:19  And out of them shall come thanksgiving and the voice of those who are merry. And I will multiply them, and they shall not be few. I also will honor them, and they shall not be small.

Isa 51:3  For YHWH comforts Zion. He comforts all her desolations, and He makes her wilderness like Eden, and her desert like the garden of YHWH; joy and gladness shall be found in it, thanksgiving and the voice of singing praise.
Isa 51:4  Hear Me, My people; yea, give ear to Me, My nation. For a law shall go out from Me, and My justice I will make rest as light to peoples.
Isa 51:5  My righteousness is near; My salvation went out; and My arms shall judge peoples; coastlands shall wait on Me, and they shall hope on My arm.

Psa 100:1  A Psalm of Thanksgiving. Shout joyfully to YHWH, all the land.
Psa 100:2  Worship YHWH with gladness; come before His face with joyful singing.
Psa 100:3  Know that YHWH, He is God; He has made us, and not we ourselves, His people and the sheep of His pasture.
Psa 100:4  Enter into His gates with thanksgiving, into His courts with praise; be thankful to Him; bless His name.
Psa 100:5  For YHWH is good; His mercy is everlasting, and His faithfulness to generation and generation.

Psa 107:1  Give thanks to YHWH, for He is good; for His mercy endures forever.
Psa 107:2  Let the redeemed of YHWH say so, whom He redeemed from the hand of the foe;
Psa 107:3  and gathered them from the lands; from east and from west; from north and from south.
Psa 107:4  They wandered in the wilderness, in a desert way; they found no city of dwelling;
Psa 107:5  hungry and thirsty, their soul fainted in them;
Psa 107:6  and they cried to YHWH in their distress; He delivered them from their straits.
Psa 107:7  And He guided them in the right way; to go to a city of dwelling.
Psa 107:8  Let them thank YHWH for His mercy, and His wonders to the sons of man.
Psa 107:9  He satisfies the thirsty soul, and He fills the hungry soul with good.
Psa 107:10  Those who live in the darkness, and in the shadow of death, being prisoners in affliction and iron,
Psa 107:11  because they rebelled against the Words of God, and despised the counsel of the Most High;
Psa 107:12  and He humbled their heart by toil; they stumbled, and none were helping;
Psa 107:13  and they cried to YHWH in their distress; He saved them out of their distresses;
Psa 107:14  He brought them out from darkness and the shadow of death; and He broke their bonds apart.
Psa 107:15  Let them thank YHWH for His mercy, and His wonders to the sons of man.
Psa 107:16  For He has broken the gates of bronze; and He cut bars of iron in two.
Psa 107:17  Fools are afflicted from the way of their rebellion, and from their iniquities;
Psa 107:18  their soul hates every food; and they touch the gates of death;
Psa 107:19  and they cried to YHWH in their distress; He saved them from their straits;
Psa 107:20  He sent His Word and healed them; and delivered them from all their pitfalls.
Psa 107:21  Let them thank YHWH for His mercy, and His wonders to the sons of man.
Psa 107:22  And let them sacrifice the sacrifices of thanksgiving, and recount His works with rejoicing.
Psa 107:23  They who go down to the sea in ships, who work in the great waters;
Psa 107:24  these see the works of YHWH, and His wonders in the deep.
Psa 107:25  For He speaks, and He raises stormy wind, and makes its waves high;
Psa 107:26  they go up to the heavens; they go down to the depths; their soul is melted because they are in evil;
Psa 107:27  they reel and stagger like a drunken man, and all their wisdom is swallowed up;
Psa 107:28  and they cry to YHWH in their distress, and He saves them out of their straits.
Psa 107:29  He settles the storm to a whisper, so that its waves are still;
Psa 107:30  and they are glad, because they are quiet; and He led them to their desired haven.
Psa 107:31  Let them thank YHWH for His mercy, and His wonders to the sons of mankind;
Psa 107:32  and exalt Him in the congregation of the people; and praise Him in the seat of the elders.
Psa 107:33  He sets rivers to a wilderness, and watersprings to thirsty ground;
Psa 107:34  a fruitful land to a salty desert; because of the wickedness of those who live in it.
Psa 107:35  He puts the wilderness into pools of water; and dry land into water-springs;
Psa 107:36  and He makes the hungry live there, and they may prepare a city of dwelling.
Psa 107:37  And they sow the fields, and plant vineyards, and make fruits of produce.
Psa 107:38  He also blesses them, so that they multiply greatly; and He does not allow their cattle to diminish;
Psa 107:39  but they are diminished and bowed down from coercion, evil and grief.
Psa 107:40  He pours scorn on nobles, and causes them to wander in a desert; there is no path.
Psa 107:41  But He raises the poor up from affliction, and He sets families like a flock.
Psa 107:42  The upright shall see and be glad; and all iniquity shuts its mouth.
Psa 107:43  Whoever is wise and will observe these things, they shall discern the mercies of YHWH.
Psa 50:14  Offer thanksgiving to God, and pay your vows to the Most High.
Psa 50:15  And call on Me in the day of distress, and I will save you; and you shall glorify Me.
Psa 26:7  to cause to hear with the voice of thanksgiving and recount all Your wonderful works.
Psa 105:1  O give thanks to YHWH; call on His name; make His deeds known among the peoples.
Psa 105:2  Sing to Him; sing praises to Him; tell of all His wonders.
Psa 105:3  Glory in His holy name; let the heart of those who seek YHWH rejoice.
Psa 105:4  Seek YHWH and His strength; seek His face without ceasing.
Psa 105:5  Remember His wonders that He has done, His miracles, and the judgments of His mouth,
Psa 105:6  O seed of His servant Abraham; O sons of Jacob, His elect.
Psa 105:7  He is YHWH our God; His judgments are in all the earth;
Psa 105:8  He has remembered His covenant forever; the Word He commanded to a thousand generations;
Psa 105:9  which He cut with Abraham, and His oath to Isaac;
Psa 105:10  and He established it to Jacob for a statute, to Israel for a perpetual covenant;
Psa 105:11  saying, To you I will give the land of Canaan, the portion of your inheritance;
Psa 105:12  when they were a few men of number; very few, and aliens in it.
Psa 105:13  And they went about from nation to nation; from one kingdom to another people.
Psa 105:14  He allowed no man to oppress them; yea, He reproved kings for their sakes;
Psa 105:15  saying, Touch not My anointed; and, Do My prophets no harm.
Psa 105:16  And He called a famine on the land; He broke the whole staff of bread.
Psa 105:17  He sent a man before them, Joseph, being sold for a slave;
Psa 105:18  they hurt his feet with chains; his soul came into iron;
Psa 105:19  until the time His Word came, the Word of YHWH refined him;
Psa 105:20  the king, the ruler of peoples, sent and shook off his links and set him free;
Psa 105:21  he made him lord of his house, and ruler over all he owned;
Psa 105:22  to bind his leaders at his will, and to teach his elders wisdom.
Psa 105:23  Israel also came into Egypt, and Jacob sojourned in the land of Ham.
Psa 105:24  And He increased His people greatly and made them stronger than their enemies.
Psa 105:25  He turned their heart to hate His people, to deal craftily with His servants.
Psa 105:26  He sent His servant Moses and Aaron whom He had chosen.
Psa 105:27  They put things of His signs among them; yea, wonders in the land of Ham.
Psa 105:28  He sent darkness and made it dark; and they did not rebel against His Word.
Psa 105:29  He turned their waters into blood and killed their fish.
Psa 105:30  Their land swarmed with frogs in the rooms of their kings.
Psa 105:31  He spoke, and fly swarms came; gnats in all their borders.
Psa 105:32  He gave hail for their rain, flaming fire in their land.
Psa 105:33  He struck their vines also, and their fig trees; and He broke the trees of their borders.
Psa 105:34  He spoke, and locusts came; and larvae without number;
Psa 105:35  and they ate up all the plants in the land; yea, ate the fruit of their ground.
Psa 105:36  He also struck all the first-born in their land, the firstfruit of all their vigor.
Psa 105:37  And He led them out with silver and gold; and among their tribes, not one was stumbling.
Psa 105:38  Egypt was glad when they went out, for their dread had fallen on them.
Psa 105:39  He spread a cloud for a covering; and fire to give light in the night.
Psa 105:40  He asked, and He brought quail; and satisfied them with the food from the heavens.
Psa 105:41  He opened the rock, and waters gushed out; they went in the dry places like a river.
Psa 105:42  For He remembered His holy Word and His servant Abraham;
Psa 105:43  and He brought His people out with joy; His elect with gladness.
Psa 105:44  And He gave to them the lands of the nations; and they inherited the labor of the peoples;
Psa 105:45  so that they might observe His statutes and keep His laws. Praise YHWH!

Rev 7:12  saying, Amen. Blessing and glory and wisdom and thanksgiving and honor and power and strength to our God forever and ever. Amen.

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“These are the feasts of the LORD, even holy convocations,
which ye shall proclaim in their seasons.”
~Leviticus 23:4 KJV~

Pesach (Passover)

Related Bible References: Leviticus 23:4-8; Exodus 12:1-17; 1 Cor 5:7b;
Exodus 12: 24,26-27; Exodus 2:23-24; 6:5-8; 13:3,14
Symbol: BLOOD Remembers the Exodus from Egypt. A great time to have
one of our “Messiah in the Passover” programs. Remember Israel’s
deliverance from Egypt.
Reading: Song of Solomon
Fulfillment: 1 Cor 5:6-7; John 8:34; John 1:29; 1 Peter 2:5; Galatians
4:3-5,9; 5:1; 2 Peter 2:19; Ephesians 1:7; Colossians 1:14; 1 Peter
1:18-19; 1 John 1:7; Revelation 1:5; Hebrews 10:1-10; John 1:36;
John 13:1-16 & Luke 22:13-20

Feast of Unleavened Bread – (Hag Ha Matzah)

Related Bible References: Exodus 12:15-20; 1 Cor 5:7-8 & Leviticus
23:4,6-14
Celebrated: one week — Nisan 15-21
Symbol: Matzah. A week of eating bread made without yeast (Matzah),
to remember how God brought the Isrealites out of Egypt in haste.
Fulfillment: 1 Cor 5:6-8; Acts 12:3-4 & Acts 20:6

First Fruits – Yom HaBikkurim

Related Bible References: Leviticus 23:7-14
Celebrated: Nisan 16 The day after the Sabbath.
Symbol: Known as the Feast of First Fruits. Presenting a sheaf of the first harvest. Jesus’ resurrection: He is “the firstfruits” from the dead (1 Cor 15:20,35). Harvest Offering First day after the Sabbath after Passover (Sunday) Leviticus 23:9
Reading & Fulfillment: 1 Cor 15:20-21

Shavuoth – (Feast of Weeks – Pentecost)

Related Bible References: Leviticus 23:9-22 & Deut 16:9-12
Symbol: It celebrates the time of the giving of the Law to Moses on
Mount Sinai. From Acts 2:1-41, this holiday is a celebration of the
birthday of the church. Holy Spirit was given the Day of Pentecost…..
“and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit” –Acts 2:1-13. Harvest
Offering Fifty Days (hence: Pentecost) after Passover.
Reading: Ruth
Fulfillment: Acts 2:1-13 & Acts 26:23

Rosh Hashanah – (Feast of Trumpets)
The Jewish New Year

Related Bible References: Leviticus 23:23-25
Celebrated: Tishri 1
Symbol: Celebrates the beginning of the Jewish Civil year. It is both a time of rejoicing as well as a holy occasion (see Nehemiah 8:2, 9-12). The Shofar (Ram’s horn Trumpets are blown to proclaim a gathering for worship. A trumpet is often a symbol of war. It is also a symbol of calling together or gathering. There are two different “schools of thought”, so to speak on how it will be fullfilled, either The Feast of Trumpets is representative of The Second Coming of Jesus Christ or The Rapture.

Yom Kippur – (Day of Atonement)

Related Bible References: Leviticus 16:1-34 23:26-32 & Isaiah 34:5-6
Celebrated: 10 Tishri
Symbol: Is the holiest day of the Jewish year. A time to consider Jesus as our atonement. Sacrifices for sins of the nation. Hebrews 9 & 10 and Romans 5:10,11. Some believe that this will be fulfilled by The Second Coming of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Succoth – (Feast of Tabernacles/Booths)

Related Bible References: Leviticus 23:33-44; Neh 8; Zechariah 14:16-19 & Zechariah 14:1-4, 9
Celebrated: Beginning at sunset. Lasts 7 days. Tishri 15-21
Symbol: Sukkot recalls 40 years of wandering in the wilderness, living in tents (booths) and worshiping in a portable tabernacle. Sukkot is also known as the Feast of Ingathering – a wonderful harvest holiday. Wanderings in the Wilderness. Feast of Tabernacles Temporary Booths are constructed to remind Israel of the Wilderness wandering. A Lulav of Palm Branches are waved ushering the Kingdom. This feast consists of seven days with the first day being a Sabbath. Concludes and on the 8th day The Last Great Day (of the Feast) is celebrated. See John 7:37-38. Some believe that this will be fulfilled by the Millenium Reign of The Lord Jesus on earth.
Reading: Ecclesiastes

NOT INCLUDED IN THE 7 -

Feasts but not part of the Major Seven:

Hanukkah – (Feast of Dedication)

Related Bible References: Daniel 8:13-14 & John 10:22-23
Celebrated: 25 Kislev
Symbol: Hanukkah commemorates the re-dedication of the Holy Temple in Jerusalem in 165 BC, and Hanukkah holds great meaning for Christians today. Jesus celebrated Hanukkah.

Purim – (Feast of Lots)

Related Bible References: Book of Esther
Celebrated: Celebrated 14 Adar.
Symbol: Commemorates the story of Esther when King Ahasuerus denounced
Haman’s plot to annihilate the entire Jewish population of Persia. Purim is
a joyful celebration of thanksgiving for Esther’s courageous acts
and God’s faithfulness. Jesus celebrated Purim.

 Source: Annies Home Page

kreplach in soup

The weather in Nor Cal has turned chilly and I have been nursing a cold for the past few days, which has been making me crave soup. My mother used to make giant vats of vegetable soup on Sundays and then expect me to eat it for the rest of the week, which I found to be somewhat tedious.  Due to this trauma (I’m totally joking, mom), I like a little something of substance in my soups, like meat or seafood, and will rarely eat the same kind two days in a row.  I started the week with creamy tomato with grilled cheese, then Thai Tom Kha Gai, followed by clam chowder, and today I am making kreplach in  chicken soup.  Kreplach are basically Jewish wontons or ravioli. They are a simple egg pasta dough filled with meat, cheese or potatoes. They can either be  boiled in broth and then  served as a soup or boiled in salted water and then sauteed and browned in schmaltz to serve as a side dish. (According to my dad, this was my Bubbie’s preferred method)  Kreplach are popular as a pre-fast dish on Yom Kippur and the cheese versions are traditional at Purim. I made beef stuffed kreplach in chicken soup (aka Jewish Penicillin). Kreplach originated in Eastern Europe as a way to use up leftover meat and sure enough I had all the makings in my kitchen already. I had about 1/2 pound of ground short ribs in the freezer left over from burger making and a gallon bag of frozen chicken stock cubes from my last batch of stock.  (Gordon has a good recipe for chicken stock under his schmaltz post) Every Jewish cookbook I consulted had a kreplach recipe and there was little variation in the dough recipes with the exception of quantity. Some were enough to feed an army but given how finicky I am about soup I went for a smaller portion. The filling variations were endless,  including  chicken liver, and mushrooms, but I went for the basic ground beef.

recipe after the break

A number of recipes call for using pre-made wonton wrappers, but I learned from my Ashuk experiment that they end up with not quite the right consistency and pasta dough just isn’t that hard to make. If you really don’t want to make dough, Hillary over at the Foodie and the Health Nut has pointed out that Berkeley Bowl and other gourmet grocery stores often carry sheets of fresh pasta dough. Most traditional recipes call for square pieces of dough folded into triangles but I have round dough cutters so I did mine in circles folded into half-moons.

Kreplach

Dough

• 1 cup flour
• 1 egg
• dash of salt

Filling

• 1/2 lb. ground meat
• 1 small onion diced
• 1 clove garlic crushed or diced
• salt and pepper to taste

1. In a bowl combine the flour, salt and egg to make a soft dough. When combined turn dough out onto a work surface and knead until it it soft and elastic. You can add more flour or a bit of water to get the right consistency.  For into a disc, cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate for 30 minutes.
2. While your dough is refrigerating make the filling. Saute the onions in a small amount of oil until soft. Add the ground meat and garlic and cook until the meat is at least half done. (you can also used fully cooked meat if you have leftovers). Let cool to room temperature and combine with egg and season to taste with salt and pepper.
3. Remove the dough from the fridge and roll out as thin as you can get it. This will take some time and turning of the dough. If you have a pasta roller break it out. Depending on the shape kreplach you want (circles for 1/2 moons or squares for triangles) cut the dough into 2-3 inch pieces. You can re-roll and cut the scraps from the first cutting.
4. Fill each piece of dough with a teaspoon of filling and fold the dough over and pinch it closed to seal. Let the kreplach rest for about 15 minutes before cooking so they don’t burst.
5. Boil the kreplach in your favorite stock or broth for about 20 minutes. Lightly stir them at the beginning so they don’t stick to the bottom of the pot. The kreplach will float when they are cooked.
6. Serve as a soup or drain the kreplach and brown them in a pan with oil or schmaltz and serve as a side dish.

A Note

Many people who crtisize the position of Rebbe and the attitiude of the Chasidim towards him err on two accounts: a) They don’t understand thegreateness and imoportance of a “Rebbe” (as leader and Moshe of the Generation) and b) They have a limited uunderstanding of G-d (unlimited Goodness and Kindness who constantly and graciously grants the world existence).

I could go on and on… and on about what I believe a Rebbe is and what he stands for. Unfortunately this would take an immense amount of research and I would have to choose my words carefully as many may instantly attack even the slightest misnomer or misunderstanding.

What and How I Think and Feel of the Rebbe

I believe the rebbe is with us almost physically. He is still there helping us, guiding us, the melitz Yosher not only for his chasidim but for every single Jew, as the Alter Rebbe says in Tanya “Yatir Mibichayohi – Greater Than In His Life”. This means that the Rebbe now stands on an even higher plane because he is able to help make sure our prayers are recieved and people are granted goodness and blessings, yet he is not subject to the confines of space and time

The problem is that we’re just too damn “megushem” (material) to see it. We’re too materialistically overwhelmed and hindered to even be conscious of his involvement in our lives.

So when push comes to shove, and life throws you a curve ball, with no logical conscience of which direction to run in – you throw a curve ball back and show that you still believe even in what you cannot see.

Jews, G-d and Yom Kippur

We can understand this on a deeper level regarding the relationship between G-d and his children, B’nei Yisrael – on Yom Kippur: Of course G-d loves to have you think about him constantly, Davening thrice daily, and saying Shema morning and evening – but what he truly loves is when all his “children” pile into shul on the holiest day on the Jewish calendar – Yom Kippur. They say, “Look Dad, we know. We were busy doing our thing, our lives, our friends, our business. We were’nt even here for our holy day – Rosh Hashana. But today – today is your day and we’re here for you”. This Hashem loves, like when a father has a wayward son return home after years of wandering and disorientation.

Hope this gave some food for thought. Comments?

Gotta Love this Judge!

You must read….a proper decision by courts…for a change.

In Pennsylvania, an atheist created a case against the upcoming Easter and Passover Holy Days.  He hired an attorney to bring a discrimination case against Christians and Jews and Observances of their holy  days.  The argument was that it was unfair that atheists had no such recognized days.

Preface:

These last several nights I’ve had a hard time sleeping.  I lie in bed thinking and invariably I find myself staring into the darkness, praying the prayer that Ed prayed countless times in his book:  “Lord Jesus Christ, son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner.”

This prayer and so many others I discovered while reading The Year of Living Like Jesus were not just inspirational–they were transformational. Ed, and ultimately Jesus, challenged me on so many levels: what does it really mean to do what Jesus would do?  How do I pray and what are my true motives in prayer?  Should I be observing a Sabbath?  What do I eat and why, and do I ever truly deny myself as a choice? [not because I don't have the money to indulge myself].

Because there is so much to unpack, I would like to post my review today and then spend at least one other day discussing some points that made me stop, dog-ear the page, set down the book, and think.  Thank you to Zondervan publishers for sending me a copy of this book to review and for the opportunity to participate in being a voice for this book.

~~

Most Christians I know would acknowledge that Jesus grew up in a Jewish home in what is now modern-day Palestine.  He lived as a Jew, ate like a Jew, thought like a Jew, worshiped like a Jew.

Similarly, many would acknowledge that they view our modern Bible as a “compass” of sorts for life; a roadmap, a guidebook, God’s Word for us.  We look to the Bible to understand who God is, who Jesus is, and what his plan was in sending Jesus to walk among us.  And many of us think we’ve got it licked.  Not that we’re perfect by any stretch, but we think “we get it.”

Yet, if we’re honest–brutally so, perhaps–how much do we actually know about Jesus, the person? How much time have we spent getting to know HIM, the person of Christ–versus the doctrines of Christianity? And likewise, how much do we understand the Jewish faith?  The faith that shaped the very world of Jesus?  That informed every decision, every choice?

Rather than meeting the familiar and expected beneath the cover, I opened this book and found page after page of things that challenged me.  Ed, a man living with a degenerative terminal illness, set out to live like Jesus for a year.  To do so, he committed to reading through the entire Gospels once a week.  He began eating kosher and growing his beard.  He went to Synagogue and kept company with people living on the fringes.  To the best of his abilities, he took the Bible literally and used it as a filter for every fork in the road.

Ed also embarked on a personal journey to discover Jesus in other contexts, something I applaud.  He explored what it is to pray the rosary, he purchased an Orthodox prayer rope which moved him deeply, he talked to priests and rabbis and learned folks in an array of different settings, all with the hope of understanding more fully who this person of Jesus was and is.

The Year… is arranged as a journal until August when he abandons this format for a broader, more topical analysis of Jesus and faith practicies.  While I found that many of the Jewish synagogue prayers and procedures were a lot to take in during the month of October [due to Rosh Hashanah & Yom Kippur], I did come away with an appreciation for the history and faith of a people I still know little about.  Isn’t it ironic, that so many Christians [I'm putting myself in this category] seem to all but ignore one of the most important components of Christ?

In the end I came away with many questions, many things I continue to ponder, and a truer, more accurate portrait of what it means to follow Jesus.  I wholeheartedly recommend this book to those of you who would like to really measure the cost. Not that Ed did it perfectly!  Not that you’ll agree with all he did, perhaps, or all of the decisions he made.  But walking with every good intention and doing one’s best while confined in our sinful humanity is not as easy as we make it out to be when we wear a WWJD bracelet. Living for Jesus deserves a fresh lens, and I believe Ed Dobson has loaned us his, full of joy and struggle in equal measure.

As he nears the end of his year, he concludes:  “This is what it means to follow Jesus.  It’s more than keeping rules and regulations.  It’s more than going to church and being baptized.  It’s more than reading the Bible and praying.  Rather, it’s the commitment of our life (mind, body, eyes, hands, feet, heart and everything) to him.”  [pg. 272].

So true, and so…difficult.

There is more evidence that the culture and traditions of the Muslim community in the Western world is being targeted unlike any culture has since the freeing of the slaves in America. A lot of cultures choose to wear their traditional garb, and in our melting pot society, they are a testament to the diversity that we enjoy and celebrate here in the western world.

Many cultures freely wear traditional or religious garb,such  as in my community, we enjoy the presence of Tibetan Monks, Hasidic Jews, and expatriated citizens of the Sudan. Hindu’s and Persian’s wear their traditional headdress and clothing, and others enjoy wearing their cultural wear and face paint as well.

It is natural to be curious of a new culture, if you have never seen that community in person, I will admit, that is human nature. It is the vilification and demonizing of other’s traditions that is unusual.

When I worked in India, I was an anomaly there, because I was in western clothing. People would stare, and several had questions for me about my culture,but they were all very respectful, and nice. That was a great feeling.

In an educated society, it is an assumption that people would be more accepting of all the differences that exist in the citizens of the world.It is unreasonable and naive for Americans to measure all other cultures and traditions based on our perception of our own traditions.I do not think we are the measuring stick for people around the world.

Some call it Eurocentric, and I would have to concur.

The nations of the world acquiesce to our arrogance, and they educate their children and the population to be aware of how to speak the english language.

The only downfall there, is that education is not available to everyone in most countries. If you are not wealthy, then most education in other societies teach impoverished children how to read from their religious documents, like the Koran, and other such Bible’s.

That happens because education is provided to the poor by the church’s or religious organizations.

I think it is unfair to discriminate or demand someone adjust their religious beliefs to blend in to the western traditions, unless they choose to. I am aware that we have religious freedom here in the United States.Given than that, then we should treat all religious and cultures fairly, including Muslims, obviously.

I wonder if Hasidic people of the Jewish faith receive the kind of discrimination that Latifa Aimaq, an Arlington citizen got when she went to shop at a local market. They kicked her out of the store for wearing a Burkha, which is the traditional public garb for a muslim women, as is a condition of her faith.

If they do, then that too, is despicable.

The following report of the situation is as follows…

The Cooper Street Farmers Market sits in a highly diversified community in central Arlington — a tossed salad of cultures, colors and accents.

But when Latifa Aimaq went into the market, she found trouble from the proprietor.

Aimaq covers all but her eyes and hands in when in public, but signs posted in the market say faces must be visible at all times while shopping inside the market.

The store manager, Chris Perez, demanded she uncover her face, or he would have to ask he to leave the store. When she refused, manager Perez did in fact unceremoniously kick her out.

“He was very intimidating. He began to yell: ‘Get out! Get out! Get out! We don’t allow people with a face veil in here!’”

He definitely did not act like a gentleman in this case, and for that he should apologize.

Mr Perez explained in his defense,…”I tried to explain to her it’s for our safety and the safety of our customers,”..

He further went on to explain that women in full veil rarely come in, and usually when they do, they discreetly show their faces to his mother. But Perez said there were no women working the day Latifa Aimaq came in.

There is a heavy population of Muslim that live in the area, and who also frequent his establishment regularly, so this issue is nothing new to the store management or the customers.

“We don’t discriminate, period — based on race, religion, color, or any other thing,” Perez maintained.

Muslims account for 40 to 50 percent of his customer base, he stated.How this situation escalated to a screaming match is simply unprofessional.

In an interview with WFAA-TV in Richmond, Latifa Aimaq said that she is urging Muslims and others to boycott the store. She said she has never encountered hostility at an airport, bank or the department of motor vehicles, where she does discreetly reveal her face when the law requires.

She said she chose to begin to fully cover three years ago because she wanted to be more modest.

Click on the link below for more information about the Burkha, in an effort to understand both side’s of the story…

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burqa

“I began to cover fully three years ago,” she said. “It’s not mandatory to cover your face, but it’s highly recommended.”

Aimaq is an English teacher at an Islamic school and says she covers for modesty.

Chris Perez says he wants to honor her beliefs and customs if she will honor his store rules.

I believe that these two intelligent people will be able to come to an agreement, or simply agree to disagree. If the store manager is not in violation of any Civil Rights laws, then he has an argument in his favor.

If Mrs Aimaq is not satisfied with the status quo, then she would be in her right to view this as a policy that should be unacceptable in our country, much like Rosa Park’s did when she defied state sanctioned  Jim Crow laws and refused to give up her seat to a healthy white man, and go to the back of the bus…

Rosa Park’s went against the law at that time, and Martin Luther King, Jr. organized a boycott and strike, and the State relented, and the laws were changed, as well as the hearts and minds of the people.

I applaud Mrs Aimaq in her efforts to bring light to this discrimination against her, and her traditions, which could be detrimental to any business, and needs to be changed, in a way that works for all parties, in a respectable manner.

The following clip below illustrates what can happen if this senseless misunderstanding is allowed to fester in our society…

For our country to survive, we must tolerate all cultures and traditions…as if they were our own.

Well I consider my posts similar to sermons. I plan news stories daily, but i plan my mega posts, also known as “A Word from the Author” over a course of days. I know that you are saying, ‘well i see news stories under this category as well, what does that mean?’ Next week will be when i will have A Word from the Author each day(except Fridays and Saturdays). They will be on a number of topics in first person and i will begin one today explaining my category classifications, what makes a news story in the “Topics of Jewish Community” category, or “Topics of Israel”?

I heard a little bit ago about a “shofar” for the first time while listening to a message called “Wakey Wakey” by Beni Johnson. It’s an awesome message, you really oughta take a listen. Actually, it was so good that I bought her book “The Happy Intercessor” on kindle which I still have to read, but I’m excited to start here soon. Anywho, I forgot about it, but just came a cross an article she had on it and decided to look into it a little more:

From the MW Collegiate Dict. (11th Ed.)

pl sho￢ﾀﾢfroth \shￅﾍ-ￋﾈfrￅﾍt, -ￋﾈfrￅﾍth, -ￋﾈfrￅﾍs\ [Heb shￅﾍphￄﾁr] 1833 :ￂﾠa ram￢ﾀﾙs-horn trumpet blown by the ancient Hebrews in battle and during religious observances and used in modern Judaism esp. during Rosh Hashanah and at the end of Yom Kippur

From Beni Johnson:

Sounds from Heaven

Sound is vibrations that travel through the air or another medium. Releasing the sound of heaven is a very powerful weapon. One of the tools we have found that releases that sound is the shofar. Shofars were sounded preceding a war. They were used to rally the troops for action and to call the people together for prayer and repentance. The shofar is like an air raid siren that alerts us to danger and summons us to action. I believe that the shofar, used the right way, can be a powerful weapon in prophetic intercession. The sound that the shofar produces can cause a change in the spirit realm, which in turn changes our physical realm. I didn’t always used to feel this way about the shofar until I began to study about them. I really like blowing the shofar outdoors. I think that they should only be blown before the worship starts and with permission. Shofars are a gathering tool for worship and war. I have learned that a shofar brings a stirring and a settling all at once.

Several years ago, I was talking with one of our seers. (A seer is one who has the ability or gift of seeing into the spirit realm.) We were talking about the prayer house. There had been some strange ungodly happenings going on around the house. She told me that there was an illegal communication line going into the prayer house. Obviously, this was something that was not legal and needed to be taken care of. I knew I needed to pray and get God’s solution to this intrusion. As I asked God, I felt like I was to take the shofar to the prayer house and blow it there. So I went early one morning with a friend, and when the sun came up, I blew the shofar. That is all I did. I didn’t pray. This was the first time I had ever used the shofar. I really have no idea why. I had never been a fan of blowing the shofar. Someone had given me one and I thought they were cool, but didn’t think I would use it for anything. But little did I know?. Because of the strange happenings going on and our prayer house being open 24/7, we had brought on security staff to watch over the place. So, after I blew the shofar that day, I waited a week and went to our security guy and asked him how the week had gone at the house. He did not know that we had blown the shofar the week before. His response to me was, “You know, the strangest thing happened this week. There was no weirdness. It all has left.” I was so excited and I knew that the sound of the shofar had released the sound of heaven that displaced the evil intent. Since then, we have used the shofar from time to time to release a sound into the atmosphere. Just like in the declarations that we pray, the same power that is released when we declare is the same power that is released in sound. God’s first language is not English, nor does he just use words to fulfill His will. That is the adventure of serving Him. Listen for His voice and be a releaser of the sounds of heaven!

And some Biblical history:

The Jews used two different kinds of trumpets, those made of silver and those made of ram’s horns. The silver trumpets were used especially by the priests to signal the camp when something important was happening (Num. 10). The ram’s horns were used primarily for celebrations. The common Hebrew word for “trumpet” is shofar; for “ram’s horn,” it is jobel, which is the root of the word jubilee. The “Year of Jubilee” was the fiftieth year after seven Sabbaticals, and was a special time of celebration in Israel (Lev. 25; 27:17–14). The priests blew the ram’s horns to “proclaim liberty throughout all the land” (25:10).^[1]

9/28/09

It kind of felt like the end of the world.  The night before, hoards of people dressed in white swarmed the streets after dark.  Talking, laughing, visiting with each other.  They brought chairs and sofas and tables out onto the sidewalk, or casually strolled in groups of five or six down the road until late.  But when I woke up the next day, the streets were deserted.  The normal noises that wake me up – children shouting, cars driving by, trucks making deliveries to the grocery store beneath my apartment – were absent.  The people in white had drifted back to wherever they had come from, leaving the streets of Tel Aviv completely desolate.

In Tel Aviv, it is easy to forget that I am living in a Jewish state. True, there are no buses on the Sabbath, but that’s the city’s only gesture to Israel’s religious identity (an identity which, arguably, is this country’s reason to exist).  Whereas Jerusalem exudes a kind of holy awe, Tel Aviv prides itself on its growing number of seafood restaurants, its hip Friday night club scene, and its modern, cosmopolitan secularism.  The exception to this is on Yom Kippur.

On Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, the city comes to a stop while Jews from across the religious and spiritual spectrum take a moment to reflect on their actions in the past year and ask forgiveness from whomever or whatever they believe in for their wrongdoings.

Or, they spend the day fasting and planning what they will eat when the sun finally goes down.  Or, they pass the long hours in synagogue, with family, or sleeping.  Or they walk around the temporarily abandoned city, feeling as if they are in a scene from some post-apocalyptic movie.

The mood is eerie to say the least.  But the strangeness comes from more than just the novelty of empty streets (although laying down in the middle of an empty urban highway is surreal).  What really sets this day apart is the almost tangible sense of reverence in the air.  No one plays loud music or drives their car, or does any of the million things that people in Tel Aviv normally do during Jewish holidays, all out of respect for the day and for those who put store in it.  For one day a year, Tel Aviv joins the rest of the country in being a truly Jewish place, and for one day a year, becomes totally unrecognizable.

big big world by Jenifer Weaver

…there is no forgiveness of sins (Heb. 9:22).

For the life of the flesh is in the blood, and I have given it for you on the altar to make atonement for your souls, for it is the blood that makes atonement by the life (Lev. 17:11).

Though Jews recently celebrated Yom Kippur, how are they able to find atonement and forgiveness without the sacrificial system in place?

Discuss.

Sachen gibt es…

Ich sprach im Text “Warum ich Aliya machte” über ein einmaliges Erlebnis, bezüglich der Religion, in Russland.

Hier nun die Geschichte dazu!

Das einzige Mal das während meiner Dienstzeit in der und soldatischen Ausbildung in der NVA meine Religion wirklich eine Rolle spielte, oder auch nur zur Sprache kam, war in Russland.

Es begab sich, dass ich während des Besuches der Militärakademie in den späten 70ern dort, eines Tages in die Kommandantur bestellt wurde und dort unerwartet einen Urlaubs- und Passierschein erhielt. Mein fragender Blick, wurde mit den den Worten “Wegen dem Feiertag” beantwortet.

Das verstand ich zwar erstmal nicht und dachte irgendwie was gut gemacht zu haben und es wäre ein russischer Feiertag und so, was erklärte warum ich mit 2 russischen Kameraden zusammen los ziehen durfte – aber wie das so ist, wenn man beim Militär frei kriegt, man fragt besser nicht lange!

Ich machte mich also am nächsten Morgen zeitig fertig, frühstückte und wartete der Dinge die da kommen mögen. Das Telefon klingelte und der Diensthabende teilte mir mit, das ein Fahrzeug auf dem Hof warten würde – ich nahm also meine Tasche und meine Schirmmütze und ging hinunter.

Dort wurde ich von einem russischen Sergeanten begrüßt, der mich bat ihm zu folgen. Am UAZ standen bereits 2 Offiziere der sowjetischen Armee – wir begrüßten uns soldatisch, stellten einander kurz vor, dann ging die Fahrt los. Beim verlassen der Kaserne wurden unsere Urlaubsscheine genaustens inspiziert, aber das war nichts Ungewöhnliches.

Da wir uns nicht kannten, aber die nächsten 2 Tage gemeinsam unterwegs waren, musterten wir uns ausgiebig und versuchten ein wenig Konversation zu treiben. Es stellte sich heraus, das abgesehen von dem Fahrer wohl nur wir 3. aus unserer Kaserne auf diesem Ausflug waren. Ein junger russische Leutnant, ein schon etwas älterer Hauptmann und ich. Naja was solls – dachte ich – könnte schlimmer sein!

Nach knapp 90 Minuten erreichten wir unser Ziel und wurden an der großen Choral Synagoge in Leningrad (heute wieder St.Petersburg) abgesetzt.

Wir waren relativ zeitig unterwegs und ich glaubte immer noch an eine der üblichen Kulturtouren, bevor es dann zum Konsum diverser “cto gramm Wodka”, gemeinsam mit russischen Spezialitäten ging.

Weit gefehlt! Ich hätte kaum falscher liegen können…

Wir betraten also das Gotteshaus, wurden begrüßt, man wechselte einige Worte und wir warteten. Nach kurzer Zeit teilten mir die zwei Russen mit, das sie kurz weggehen würden, ich mir aber keine Sorgen machen solle, sie wollten sich nur schnell zurechtmachen und wären gleich wieder hier und ob ich mich nicht auch vorbereiten wolle – ich prüfte kurz meine Uniform und meine Rasur und fand, das dafür kein Bedarf bestand und teilte ihnen dies mit. Sie zuckten mit den Schultern und griffen zu ihren Taschen.

Dies machte mich ein wenig sehr nervös und ich teilte ihnen mit, dass ich nicht unbedingt erfreut wäre, wenn sie jetzt irgendwie, für die Zeit ihres Urlaubes zu irgendwelchen Frauen abhauen würden und ich hier gleich allein rumstehen würde…Um mich zu beruhigen, ließ mir einer von ihnen seine Papiere da, und sie versprachen hoch und heilig, dass sie das nicht tun würden und wirklich gleich wieder da wären.

Mit den Ausgangspapieren des einen in der Hand war ich beruhigt und auch sicher, dass zumindest er sehr bald zurück kommen würde und ich nicht plötzlich ganz allein da stand und auf eigene Faust zurück zum Stützpunkt finden musste, oder schlimmer – wegen Erregung von Verdachtsmomenten festgenommen werden würde.

Während ich also wartete, begann die Synagoge sich langsam zu füllen und als die beiden umgezogen und mit Kippa zurückkamen, realisierte ich langsam was hier wirklich Sache war…ich fühlte mich plötzlich wie auf einem fremden Planeten! Nicht nur das mir urplötzlich klar wurde, dass ich völlig unvorbereitet an Yom-Kippur in einer sehr vollen orthodoxen Synagoge war – NEIN! Ich – ein junger deutscher Offizier, in Ausgehuniform – stand in einer orthodoxen Synagoge in Leningrad – an Yom-Kippur!

Ich erwischte mich, wie ich wirklich überlegte, ob wir nicht irgendwo unterwegs angehalten hatten, um was zu Bechern und uns diesmal Methanol serviert worden war und ich nun einfach Halluzinationen hatte.

Nur dem war aber nicht so! Das war alles nur zu real!

Hab ich erwähnt das ich in deutscher Uniform dort war?

Da das auffiel und einige anfingen zu tuscheln, kam der Geistliche der uns begrüßt hatte zu uns, wechselte mit dem älteren Russen einige Sätze und sah dabei ununterbrochen in meine Richtung. Nachdem kurzen Gespräch kam er zu mir herüber, fragte nach meinem Namen und ob ich mich vielleicht verirrt hätte, dabei musterte er mich streng.

Ich stellte mich vor, er musterte mich noch viel strenger als bisher schon und sagte dann, dass ich in dem Fall ja Bescheid wisse und keine Probleme haben sollte, dem Gottesdienst zu Folgen (Cohen ist der biblische Name von Angehörigen einer Gruppierung mit ursprünglich priesterlichen Funktionen im Judentum Anm.d.Verf.), und fragte mich noch, ob ich so bleiben wolle. Ich erklärte ihm, dass ich mir nicht sicher sei, ob ich das könne, meine Kenntnisse eher rudimentär wären, ich keine andere Kleidung dabei hätte, von der Situation insgesamt sehr überrascht wäre und vielleicht doch besser gehen sollte.

Diesmal grinste er und antwortete mir nun auf jiddisch, das das alles kein Problem sei, er sich sehr freue und mich in diesem Fall, und ganz besonders an Yom-Kippur, bestimmt nicht einfach gehen lassen würde – auch das mit der Kopfbedeckung würde sich gleich finden…

Und obwohl ich die ganze Zeit über einfach nur im Boden versinken wollte, nickte ich nur kurz und zack war eine Kopfbedeckung da, er gab sie mir, ich setzte sie auf, er sprach einen kurzen Segensspruch und das Getuschel verstummte. Dann deutete er mir, ihm zu folgen und wies mir ganz vorn einen Platz zu.

Kurz darauf begann man dann.

Was an dem Tag alles gesagt wurde weiß ich nicht, den ich verstand nicht alles – aber Fakt ist, dass auch kurz über mich und Deutschland an diesem Versöhnungstag geredet wurde.

Insgesamt ein echt paradox-orthodoxes Erlebnis, das ich nie vergessen werde!

Paris. 1922. If you were strolling around the Parisian streets that summer, you might have came across a newspaper called L’Intransigeant, a popular periodical at the time. It had a section that posed various thought-provoking questions, and its editorial staff solicited responses from French socialites and intellectuals. The topics ranged from the practical: “Do you have any suggestions for improving traffic congestion in Paris” to the philosophical: “What is the ideal education to give your daughter?” In the summer of 1922, one of its columnists posed the following question. I’d like to think it was meant for the special “High Holiday” issue of the paper. Here’s a translation of the question:

“An American scientist announces that the world will end, or at least that such a huge part of the continent will be destroyed, and in such a sudden way, that death will be the certain fate of hundreds of millions of people. If this prediction were confirmed, what do you think would be its effects on people between the time when they acquired the aforementioned certainty and the moment of cataclysm? Finally, as far as you’re concerned, what would you do in this last hour?”

A number of celebrities replied – writers, sportsmen, even a well-known palm reader. Some speculated that morality would cease to exist, as long term consequences will have vanished along with the foretold eschatological disaster. Others surmised that passions for worldly pleasures would consume one’s mind, so much so that people would forget about the apocalypse, up until the moment of its arrival.

How would you respond?

As we stand together on this night of Yom Kippur – this night of Kol Nidrei in which we think upon our past promises, our future vows, and our present self – a better question is: How WILL you respond?

Unlike the question posed in the newspaper, my question is not a hypothetical. I think it is perhaps the question of the High Holidays. And on Yom Kippur, as the gates are about to close, as we stand and pray with rumbling stomachs and slightly nervous hearts, we get ready for n’ilah, the final service – in which God locks the gates. We pray that each of us has a G’mar V’Hatimah Tovah ­– literally meaning a good sealing – a good ending. And so, our tradition asks each of us the same question as the secular Parisian paper: In this last hour, what will you do?

Yom Kippur reminds us of our own mortality. In many ways, it is a dress rehearsal for death. We afflict our bodies by fasting and our souls by confessing, we abstain from music and parties. We recite a vidui, a confession, a prayer that is only recited on two occasions – today, on Yom Kippur, and at the conclusion of each of our lives. We pray to a God that decides who shall die and who shall live, and as we say the words of the Unatanetokef prayer, verbalizing the ways that God can end our lives, we feel that yes, today is awesome, and full of dread. For on this day, God brings us to the precipice of death – confronting our true selves – our mortality – our finitude. And tomorrow evening, just as we light the Havdalah candle, God returns us to the tasks of our daily lives. But it won’t be the same – the journey will change us. We learn to die so that we learn to live.

Many of you may have scene the movie Fight Club, a movie I would recommend, but not for the faint of heart. It’s violence and dystopia are disturbing, but beyond the movie’s fast-paced editing and photography tricks lies a very insightful and inspirational message.

In one scene, the protagonist, Tyler Durden, walks into a Gas Station and forces the clerk outside. He steals his wallet, grabs his drivers license out and says, “Raymond K. Hessel. – before you worked at this gas station, what did you want to be?” Scared beyond belief, it takes Raymond a while to respond but when he does he shakily says, “I want to be a veterinarian.” Tyler says, “I’m going to check in on you in six months – you better be on your way to becoming a vet.” Later in the movie, the camera pans around After leaving the gas station, Tyler says, “Tomorrow morning, Raymond will eat breakfast. And it will taste better than any breakfast ever has.” Because Raymond feels a renewed purpose to his life, because he now has a second chance – he will look on his life with new eyes.

Judaism as well teaches us to look at things with new eyes. Each morning, Jews say “Mah Rabu Ma’asecha Adonai!” – How great and awesome are your works, O God. Like the thundering blast of the shofar, these liturgical words awaken us from our slumber, sensitizing us to the wonderment of living. But the routines of our lives dulls our appreciation; we lose what Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel calls radical amazement. What once was exciting is now dull. What was once an amazing love seems like a responsibility, or a burden. Wonderful friendships seem staid. Old hobbies no longer hold our attention. What once seemed so meaningful and special is now covered with dust. A popular comedy a few years back had a jaded 30-something looking at his daughter, wistfully remarking, “I wish I liked ANYTHING as much as my kids like bubbles.”

The act of daily living sometimes serves as a vaccine that renders us immune to … the miracle of daily living. Yom Kippur forces us to break the neglect that we’ve had for our own lives. It reminds us that there will be a last hour, a last day. And gives us a second chance to reclaim that sense of radical amazement.

Each of us is taught: “Repent one day before you die.” Of course, we don’t have full control over the length of our life’s journey, and so, the teaching goes, we must repent every day. Because we just don’t know. But on Yom Kippur, today is the day. And if we do our work, in some ways each of us will die – because we will emerge through the locked gates tomorrow with more courage, more openness, more kindness, more forgiveness, more hope. Yom Kippur is meant not just to inspire us, to comfort us, or even to discomfort us. It is meant to change us. To paraphrase the Rainer Maria Rilke quote I read last week, Yom Kippur helps each of us be a poet, with the ability to draw forth life’s riches.

(brief pause)

In high school, I once said: “I’m going to start a procrastination club. But you know what, not today.” Our biggest problem is not that our lives are too short, but that they are too long! We assume there will be a tomorrow. And a next week. And a next year. And so, we don’t go to veterinary school, we don’t apologize to loved ones, we don’t fulfill the very dreams that make us who we are. We have an assumption that tomorrow will be better – easier. Grudges will end. Disputes will disappear. All will be well. But Ironically, it is our insistence to push things forward into an idealized future that keeps us running along the same hamster wheel, perpetuating a status quo. Yom Kippur reminds us that we can wait no longer. Yom Kippur’s themes pull back the curtain on our illusory assumptions of a better future. This somber day screams to us that even as we pray today for a better tomorrow, we must create that better tomorrow, today. The difference can be summed up this way: John Mayer sings a song, “Waiting for the world to change.” Ghandi said, “BE the change you want to see in the world.”

Let’s return to our French paper in 1922, and the Yom Kippur themed question that it posed. I’m going to read the translated response of an author who had spent the last 12 years writing what would become one of literature’s most revered masterpieces, “In Remembrance of Things Past.” Coming in at well over a million words, it is a 7-volume work that looks back on the life of its protagonist, re-creating and analyzing memories, reflecting on life lived, drawing realizations from past events and people encountered. This 24 hour period is the same. Anyway, known to be a good sport, its author, Marcel Proust responded to the question.

I think that life would suddenly seem wonderful to us if we were threatened to die as you say. Just think of how many projects, travels, love affairs, studies, it – our life – hides from us, made invisible by our laziness which, certain of a future, delays them incessantly.

But let all this threaten to become impossible for however, how beautiful it would become again! Ah! If only the cataclysm doesn’t happen this time, we won’t miss visiting the new galleries of the Louvre, throwing ourselves at the feet of Miss X, making a trip to India.

The cataclysm doesn’t happen, we don’t do any of it, because we find ourselves back in the heart of normal life, where negligence deadens desire. And yet we shouldn’t have needed the cataclysm to love life today. It would have been enough to think that we are human.”