David, the wasp and the spider

Posted by Eli Dahan on February 6, 2010 under Bible, Biblical Hebrew, Jewish Folklore | Be the First to Comment

David, before he was a king, was sitting in his garden and he saw the wasp eating the spider. He asked The Lord: why did you create those two creatures? The wasp is taking the honey all the time and she isn’t helping to create it; the spider is dealing with his cobwebs all the year, but there are no clothes that are created from him. Isn’t your creation is in vain?

The Lord answered to David: do you despise to my creations? One day will come and you will be saved by them. No for nothing I have made them….

And the days passed and David ran away from Saul the king and he hides himself in the cave. God appointed for him a spider that closed the cave with his cobwebs. Saul passed there and thought to himself: maybe David is here, let’s take a look there. His servants said to him: can’t you see that this cave is closed? If someone came to this cave there wouldn’t be cobwebs there that are complete; this cave is empty!

David was saved and when he went out from the cave he blessed The Lord who created the spider and also blessed the spider as well.

After a while David went and saw King Saul and his servants sleeping in the desert he went under the legs of Avner the best warrior of Saul and he stole the spear of Saul. When he came back the legs of Avner were closed and David couldn’t go out; only after the wasp bite Avner’s leg he could go out and he was saved one more time…

Then he realized that no creature is for nothing from God’s acts!

Main phrases of the post + transcription + translation

Eli@eteachergroup.com

The art of manipulation- Nathan the prophet

Posted by Eli Dahan on November 8, 2009 under Bible, Biblical Hebrew, Jewish Folklore | Be the First to Comment

In the beginning of the book of Kings we are reading that King David is really old, the maidservant that his slaves sand him doesn’t help to recover from his coldness, and this are the days before the old king is giving his thrown to the new one. In this point after that Adonijah the son of Haggith started to make his first moves to be the next king of the people of Israel, we are hearing a conversation between Nathan the prophet and David’s favorite wife Bath-Sheba that appears after Adoinijah prepare himself to be a king in a feats that he did in a place closed to his father palace.

When Nathan address to Bath-Sheba he knows in his heart two things: first, he didn’t get an invitation to the feats of Adoinijah, so he is feeling angry; second, the one who supposed to be the king after Davis is Solomon.

In order to arrange this he is doing the best manipulation that we can find: he creates a circle of anger against Adoinijah and ac circle of support in favor of Solomon.

Let us see The Scriptures in 1 Kings 1:11-14-

" וַיֹּאמֶר נָתָן, אֶל-בַּת-שֶׁבַע אֵם-שְׁלֹמֹה לֵאמֹר, הֲלוֹא שָׁמַעַתְּ, כִּי מָלַךְ אֲדֹנִיָּהוּ בֶן-חַגִּית; וַאֲדֹנֵינוּ דָוִד, לֹא יָדָע : וְעַתָּה, לְכִי אִיעָצֵךְ נָא עֵצָה:  וּמַלְּטִי, אֶת-נַפְשֵׁךְ, וְאֶת-נֶפֶשׁ בְּנֵךְ, שְׁלֹמֹה. לְכִי וּבֹאִי אֶל-הַמֶּלֶךְ דָּוִד, וְאָמַרְתְּ אֵלָיו הֲלֹא-אַתָּה אֲדֹנִי הַמֶּלֶךְ נִשְׁבַּעְתָּ לַאֲמָתְךָ לֵאמֹר, כִּי-שְׁלֹמֹה בְנֵךְ יִמְלֹךְ אַחֲרַי, וְהוּא יֵשֵׁב עַל-כִּסְאִי; וּמַדּוּעַ, מָלַךְ אֲדֹנִיָּהוּ הִנֵּה, עוֹדָךְ מְדַבֶּרֶת שָׁם–עִם-הַמֶּלֶךְ; וַאֲנִי אָבוֹא אַחֲרַיִךְ, וּמִלֵּאתִי אֶת-דְּבָרָיִךְ. :

"Then Nathan spoke unto Bath-sheba the mother of Solomon, saying: ‘Hast thou not heard that Adonijah the son of Haggith doth reign, and David our lord knoweth it not? Now therefore come, let me, I pray thee, give thee counsel, that thou mayest save thine own life, and the life of thy son Solomon. Go and get thee in unto king David, and say unto him: Didst not thou, my lord, O king, swear unto thy handmaid, saying: Assuredly Solomon thy son shall reign after me, and he shall sit upon my throne? why then doth Adonijah reign? Behold, while thou yet talkest there with the king, I also will come in after thee, and confirm thy words.’

Nathan is trying and succeeding to scare Bath-Sheba by telling her that her son wouldn’t be the king because Adonijah is already a king. Like a magician he tells her that she need to be hurry and lie to her husband that he swore that Solomon will be the king after him , and after she did it, he said it too.

The best trick in the world is to tell someone a lie and then to take another person that will agree with your lies , that will say the lie one more time– the two that are telling a lie are better than one truth!

  Main phrases of the post + transcription + translation

Eli@eteachergroup.com

Standing Stones: A Blessing and a Curse

Posted by Bronwen Manning on December 21, 2008 under Historical Geography, History | Be the First to Comment

The Multifaceted functions of Standing stones

Standing stones (massebot plural. masseba singular. coming from the root nsb to ‘set up’) were used in a variety of cultic and non-cultic functions in the Ancient Near East. They were used to witness legal matters or covenants such as Joshua when renewing the Lord’s covenant with the people- he took a large stone and set it up saying “this stone shall be a witness against us; for it hath heard all the words of the Lord which he spoke to us: it shall be therefore a witness against you, lest ye deny your God” (Joshua 24:26-27). Standing stones also functioned as memorials, a practice that continues today. We erect stone monuments to our brave men who died in the wars, we memorialize the place of a tragic accident where life was lost. In an effort not to be forgotten, Absalom the son of David erected a monument to himself knowing he had no son to carry on his name and memory into the future 2 Sam 18:18. Other standing stones that were placed in public areas were those that commemorated an important victory over the enemy- Israel’s Moabite aneighbor had a victory stone that recalls the military achievements of King Mesha over King Omri of Israel. The Standing stone was in general, an attention-grabber, much like our modern-day billboards and advertisements.

The Religious Stone

They had one further function that was very strong throughout the world- and that was a religious stone. In the early days of Israel, Syria and Phoenicia these kingdoms shared a tradition of using “plain” stones in their sanctuaries and holy places. A standing stone could represent a person in perpetual worship, it could also, instead of a statue, represent the divine presence. The use of standing stones to actualize the presence of the God of Israel was very useful to the early Israelites because it focused the worshippers attention while simultaneously avoided any representation of the divine in any particular form. This tradition of Israel, the dislike to represent their God in the form of a man or, half-man half-beast, became stronger and more programmatic over time. This anionic tradition (against the use of icons) became a distinctive element in Israel’s religious character, and separated them out from other religions that used standing stones as icons of gods, and not symbolic of the indescribable God of Israel.

The Potential for Problems

Because of the potential for misuse and misunderstanding the religious community of Israel decided to give up the use of standing stones altogether. To this end the stones that had served only symbolically and were plain un-inscribed stones, were prohibited and treated as though they were images. Leviticus 26 declares, You shall not make idols for yourselves, or set up for yourselves carved images or standing stones, or place figured stones in your land to worship upon, for I the Lord am your God. This was not because the stones themselves went against the tradition of representing God in iconic forms, but rather because the potential for misuse existed.

The Town of Bethsaida

An example of this potential danger is seen in a town in the Galilee that once was the center of a small Aramaeankingdom called Geshur. When it was later annexed into the kingdom of Israel it still contained a mixed pedigree of peoples and religions as seen in the public plaza. In the plaza two religious stones were found, one a plain standing stone and the other a stone with the icon of a bull-headed figure with a dagger; probably the Moon god! Here side by side we see the different types and approaches to the use of religious standing stones. The Israelites decided that in order not to be confused with the other nations, and to avoid potential confusion by Israelite worshippers, they stopped using standing stones altogether. This effort retained their integrity as the nation who refused to reduce the indescribable God into an image made by man.

Women and Religion in Israel

Posted by Bronwen Manning on September 17, 2008 under Biblical Hebrew | Be the First to Comment

The Difference between King David and his great-grandmother Ruth
It is true to say the two subjects, women and religion, do not hold a central role in the religious history of the Israelites. Israel was a patrilineal society were men made the rules and wrote the history of their nation. In this history and especially in the Psalms, we have a great deal of insight into the character of King David; his inner-struggles, feeling of failure, his heights of joy and his ultimate faith in God. However, we do not have the same revelation into the character of King David’s great grandmother for example, the young Moabite women Ruth who forsook all she knew and adopted her mother-in-law’s traditions and religion. Surely her thoughts and fears were as noteworthy?

Negative Picture of Women in Worship
The silence in the book of Ruth for a female voice is prevalent throughout the entire Bible. In fact, there is evidence that women and worship were viewed in a negative light. We hear of the women who wail over the death of Tammuz (Ezekiel 8:14) and who weave goods for the Asherah (2 Kings 23:7). The women who bake cakes for the Queen of Heaven (Jeremiah 7:17) and infamous characters like the soothsayer known as the Witch of Endor (1 Sam 28). All these activities are framed as illegal in the eyes of the Bible writers, who emphasised the prohibition of idol worship which was a later idea that developed in Israelite thought.

Refocus the Lens
Seeing that this religious history was penned by men (who had grave misgivings of women’s menstruation for example), it is necessary to refocus the lens and try to assess the role of women in religion on its true merits.

Let us take, for example, the first example given above – the illegal activity of wailing for the god Tammuz. Firstly note that Ezekiel 8 records that the women are in the Temple. They are, in fact, performing a religious mourning ceremony that is not only considered acceptable to them but also to those who pass them by in the Temple precinct. Their function plays a large role in the agricultural cycle and the desire for new rain. It can be assumed since this group of women was organized inside the Temple to ensure success for the next agricultural season, that what they were doing was no mystery and was not met with disbelief on the part of the people. Neither the women, nor the general populace wrote this passage. It was written by a man who felt it illegal.

Temple and War in a Woman’s World
Temple and War may seem to be two areas were we can safely say women had no part – but this would not be true. Not only do we have passages that relate of the consecrated women working and worshipping in the Jerusalem Temple (often mistranslated as temple-prostitutes!) but we also see them functioning in the sanctuary at Shiloh and the tent of the Tabernacle in the desert (Hosea 4:13-15, 1 Sam 2.22, Exodus 38:8).

Women also played a huge psychological part in war. It was their role to go out and encourage the men with singing and clapping. We have Miriam and Deborah leading triumphant victory dances (Exodus 15:20-2; Judges 5:12) and history of past cultures shows us how women even followed men to the Battlefields to care and encourage.

Women participated mostly in what can be classified as domestic religion, those issues that touch their lives, reproduction, health and illness, the changing seasons, worship and the affects of war. Unfortunately, these issues never became mainstream and were largely ignored by the writers of the Bible who became concerned with the new One God Alone movement. The writers thus sought to pass judgment on the activities of the past, in light of the new revelation of the oneness of God. The small voice in the Bible of women in religion thus took on its detrimental character and the creative and varied role of women in Israelite religion was forgotten.

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