Jewish Hermeneutics

[John]

hermeneutics:n.   (h' rmə' nut' ks) [hur-muh-noo-tiks]

1. the science of interpretation, esp. of the Scriptures.
2. the branch of theology that deals with the principles of Biblical exegesis.

I thought that you would all be interested in the jewish study of interpretation. In judaism study is a big part of life. When they study the bible, they say certain prayers, read certain weekly portions (called parashah), etc. Study is HUGE.

In judaism, there are four levels of interpretation. they are as follows:
1. P'shat: this is the literal meaning of the text. the best way to figure this out is, in my opinion, the historical-grammatical interpretation. but you can only apply that to p'shat. YOU CANNOT TAKE EVERYTHING IN SCRIPTURE LITERALLY. i fell prey to that line of thought long ago. Literal interpretation is only part of the message. if you only accept the literal meaning, then you miss out on the good stuff.
2. Remez: this is a hinted at meaning, but still meant to be that way by the author. This is finding the alluded at meaning of the authors words. This still counts as exegesis (figuring out the authors intended meaning of writing).
3. Drash/Midrash: This is where we enter the science of eisegesis. eisegesis is a theologic term that refers to the personal meaning a person reading the text tags onto the original meaning. The p'shat is still there (according to jewish hermeneutical laws, the p'shat cannot be contradicted) but we add how it speaks to us personally. perry stone does a good teaching on this when he talks about the Rhema and the Logos. He shows how a rhema is a personal word given by YHVH to you THROUGH the logos, while the logos is the written broad general word. it can be found here: aradiantchurch.com/Fresh%20Manna%20Videos.html

4. Sod: This is where Kabbalah and mystical meanings come into play. any time a person counts numerical calculations of the words (gematria) or looks at the sizes of certain letters and decides the meaning on them, this is sod. with sod you have to be VERY careful (stuff like kabballah is not recommended to people under 40) but you get some pretty good messages from it. Most NT writings are not Kabballah.

this method is called PaRDeS by the jews. Pardes is the word for orchard or paradise. "The Pardes system is often regarded as mystically linked to the word pardes (Hebrew ôÈÌøÀãÅÌñ), meaning orchard. "Pardes" is cognate with the word "paradise", and probably originally from Persian. It occurs only three times in the Tanakh, namely, in Song of Songs 4:13, Ecclesiastes 2:5, and Nehemiah 2:8. In the first of these passages it means "garden"; in the second and third, "park." In the apocalypses and in the Talmud the word is used of the Garden of Eden and its heavenly prototype. From this usage, comes Christianity's denotation of Paradise as the abode of the blessed."

. They believe that the hermeneutical system unveils the meanings that covered Torah up. This is what could be refered to in 2 corinthians 3 as the veil that is only removed and abolished by Yeshua. Through Yeshua we can trulty enter a paradise, with the veil of the temple gaurding the sh'kinah abolished, direct access to YHVH, and the tree of life, Yeshua, the living Torah.

another interesting thing is the gospels parrallel to the hermeneutical meaings: Mark is P'shat, Mattityahu is drash, luke is remez, and Yochanon is Sod. This can solve the synoptic problem (look it up).

hope you enjoyed the information; tell me what you think about it!!

shalom-

john

[itiswritten]

That's a very good post. I did not know that the word for Paradise was pardes. Cool.

[Jeordin]

I found that really interesting, absolutely amazing. Ha, I wrote it down so I can take it into account when I'm reading. What's with the capital P R D S. Is there some mystical, not like mystical...religious meaning to that?

[John]

in hebrew, words are written without the vowels. It is what is called a semetic language. later, semetic languages added small symbols over the consonants to indicate vowels.

so when God is written G-d, it is not being legalistic, but traditional. that is why it is YHVH and not Yahveh.

hope i answered your question
shalom-john

[Jeordin]

omigahh, that's so cool thanks
I've always sort of wondered about that
I did it and I didn't know why
I thought it was just repectful

[pioneer]

Apr 20, 2009 15:00:52 GMT -5 Jeordin said:

omigahh, that's so cool thanks
I've always sort of wondered about that
I did it and I didn't know why
I thought it was just repectful

There is one more reason to leave out letters, when you write the name of God and it will be erased or torn up, you are not defacing the name of God,
As you may have noticed when I write Y H V H there are spaces between the letters, thereby if a page is erased deleted or whatever it is not the name.

God is not a name so unless there is an orthodox Jew who is offended by the word God is spelled out I will spell the word god.

Shalom

[Jeordin]

yeah, I used to write god because I saw it as not being a name and I didn't want to give one
thanks for the other information too
I believe I have put the letters close together before

[anochria]

i think that we should follow the jewish hermeneutical values... and for the peshat we should interpret through the grammatical historical method. we should always be careful when using sod but when you use it i think it is the most helpful in building a relationship with YHVH. the drash not be used to build doctrines, but to teach lessons. the remez should always be taken into account- but it has to be something that the writer hinted at himself.

John, you wrote this elsewhere, but I think it should be included here.

I've got some thoughts on this subject that I hope to post here.

[John]

well, go ahead and post them. i would love to hear your opinions.

shalom- john

[anochria]

1. P'shat: this is the literal meaning of the text. the best way to figure this out is, in my opinion, the historical-grammatical interpretation. but you can only apply that to p'shat. YOU CANNOT TAKE EVERYTHING IN SCRIPTURE LITERALLY. i fell prey to that line of thought long ago. Literal interpretation is only part of the message. if you only accept the literal meaning, then you miss out on the good stuff.
2. Remez: this is a hinted at meaning, but still meant to be that way by the author. This is finding the alluded at meaning of the authors words. This still counts as exegesis (figuring out the authors intended meaning of writing).
3. Drash/Midrash: This is where we enter the science of eisegesis. eisegesis is a theologic term that refers to the personal meaning a person reading the text tags onto the original meaning. The p'shat is still there (according to jewish hermeneutical laws, the p'shat cannot be contradicted) but we add how it speaks to us personally. perry stone does a good teaching on this when he talks about the Rhema and the Logos. He shows how a rhema is a personal word given by YHVH to you THROUGH the logos, while the logos is the written broad general word. it can be found here: aradiantchurch.com/Fresh%20Manna%20Videos.html

Excellent summation/ explanation of these. You made great distinctions between 1, 2, and 3. Many Christians get confused about the proper role of 3, but you've stated it quite nicely. Another way of saying it would be to say that Drash is subjective from God to an individual, whereas P'shat and Remez are objective (though Remez is not always easily discernable).

4. Sod: This is where Kabbalah and mystical meanings come into play. any time a person counts numerical calculations of the words (gematria) or looks at the sizes of certain letters and decides the meaning on them, this is sod. with sod you have to be VERY careful (stuff like kabballah is not recommended to people under 40) but you get some pretty good messages from it. Most NT writings are not Kabballah.

This concerns me. What basis is there for believing that numerology is a appropriate interpretive tool? What kinds of things have, in your opinion, been learened from sod (gave you give some examples). Lastly, why would the NT not be applicable for Kabballah?

this method is called PaRDeS by the jews. Pardes is the word for paradise. They believe that the hermeneutical system unveils the meanings that covered Torah up. This is what is refered to in 2 corinthians 3 as the veil that is only removed and abolished by Yeshua. Through Yeshua we can trulty enter a paradise, with the veil of the temple gaurding the sh'kinah abolished, direct access to YHVH, and the tree of life, Yeshua.

Frankly, this sounds like Gnosticism- where ideas or secret knowledge replace the person of Jesus as our entryway to intimacy with the Father.

[John]

most new testement writings are not kabbalah simply because they are not for peopel that far into the faith..... also, 666- thats gematria . all of johns writings are sod. all of the secrets. all of shauls mysteries... they are sod.

Frankly, this sounds like Gnosticism- where ideas or secret knowledge replace the person of Jesus as our entryway to intimacy with the Father.

the whole thing or just the quoted part? i dont get what you are saying here.




shalom- john

PS what christian denomination are you josh?

[itiswritten]

May 1, 2009 14:01:11 GMT -5 anochria said:

This concerns me. What basis is there for believing that numerology is a appropriate interpretive tool? What kinds of things have, in your opinion, been learened from sod (gave you give some examples). Lastly, why would the NT not be applicable for Kabballah?


Frankly, this sounds like Gnosticism- where ideas or secret knowledge replace the person of Jesus as our entryway to intimacy with the Father.

Hello Anochria,

I understand where you are coming from. Recently I was a guest for a couple of weeks on a program. On the program I give some examples of interesting things with numbers in the scriptures as well as some of the deeper levels of interpretation. I didn't put a link for it, but you might also be interested in listening to the end of Program 16. On it I spoke a little on the Aleph-Tav in Genesis, Zechariah and in John 1:1. In Program 17 and 18 I discuss several examples of Hebrew customs and idioms that are often misunderstood. Hope you enjoy.

I sent the link to John a while back. I think he may have listened to some of them.


Program 17
www.blogtalkradio.com/lastdays/2009/03/01/Last-Days-Prophecy-Radio-Show
Program 18
www.blogtalkradio.com/lastdays/2009/03/08/Last-Days-Prophecy-Radio-Show-18-/#comments

[anochria]

john:

I don't see John's symbols as sod. They have very straightforward meanings (remez) in most instances.

And I would agree that 666 is gematria.... for Nero Caesar!


PS: I am a non-denominational pastor, but have an appreciation for a variety of historical Christian expressions.

[John]

Yochanon is sod... he expreses it in remez/peshat. however, his level of understanding is on the sod level. the 'eternal light' is kabbalah which is sod. most all of Yeshuas teachings in the gospel of Yochanon are sod and 1 yohcnon are littered with kabbalaistic ideas- which is sod. remember, he could not express the sod level of understanding to the new believers unlesss it was expressed in simpler terms. so the sod of Yochanon refers more to his level of symbols and understanding than his way o f writing.

note: sod canonly be believed as a level of scripture if you think YHVH dictated every word, letter, and even decorative crownlets of Torah. Yeshua agreed with this by his statement about the 'yods and crowns' and others. sod can only be derived from Torah, because Torah is the only book that was dictated by YHVH. the prophets were written by inspiriation from the RHK, but they were not dictated by YHVH himself. \



how do you come to the conclusion that 666=nero? i thik i have heard that before. remember that Yochanon was using the hebrew or possibly the greek numerical values. i would vouch for the greek because of how late Yochanon's works were comprised.. but i would vouch for the hebrew because i think that Yochanon ran a mystic school. kabbalah, to be exact- which is a hebrew science of the spiritual.

it may actually be literal however, a literal mark on our forehead or right hand. note also that the teffilin are put on the hand or forehead... and the rabbis said that the teffilin would be the mark God (the 'tav' of ezekiel, and they think that it will be the mark of YHVH during the great tribulation- though they view the great tribulation as something quite different)... note also that the 'tav cross' is a gnostic symbol. anyway, i am getting off track. lets discuss this stuff in a revelation thread.

as for sod, i think we may have to agree to disagree.

shabbat shalom- john

[pioneer]

May 1, 2009 15:41:30 GMT -5 anochria said:

john:

I don't see John's symbols as sod. They have very straightforward meanings (remez) in most instances.

And I would agree that 666 is gematria.... for Nero Caesar!


PS: I am a non-denominational pastor, but have an appreciation for a variety of historical Christian expressions.

Because you do not see the SOD of John, you interpret it as three beings, while the word is the word of God, not Jesus!
The word of God became Yeshua in due time, but before that there was only God and the word that proceeded from his mouth, this is also why the 'word' does not know the "day and the hour"
because that is in the "mind Of God" he hasn't spoken it yet!
The P'sht level is the simple meaning and the other levels do not change the simple meaning, just illuminate it more fully.

To create a triune god after the p'sht scripture says He is the one and the only, is changing the meaning of scripture. This is simply the reason I reject a triune god

[Jonatan]

Hey, wait, wait!
You do not take John literally? If this is so, it's the same as you may allegorize whole the Scripture. Word must have both meanings in every part. Cannot say something is definitely unliteral. In some case every part of the Word must be literal and in other case symbolical, or allegorical or spiritual or how we name it. But remember - it MUST NOT dig out the literal fundament. Allegorizing it and building more and more senses for it may be good and very useful but it's ONLY SOMETHING EXTRA (Premium), not that important as the fundament itself is - if the fundament is not there, you may go with it wherever you want! Even if it's with SOD. Remez, p'shat and midrash are more important for people.
Otherwise that's same as atheists or liberal christians or liberal theologians do - they tell me 'You must not take it literally' - hmmpf! When I hear this, as I would say - knife of the Zelotes opens in my pocket and jealousness of El-kanna in my heart, for His Word. (And this was, lol, not literally meaned, but the jealousness was , but I explained now what was literal and what wasn't - same with the Word - it must be mentioned how to understand what)

Everyone who does this is a liberalist traitor of Word of God. That's same as though father asked you to do something, you would allegorize it and do it 'unliteraly' - and tell me what would your father do if you said "You must not take it literally, dad!"
lol.

[John]

i DO take Yochanon literally- but he is written on the sod level. i mean, there HAS to be symbols in there, but the interpretation meaning behind the smbols are literal.

the text never looses the peshat, but it is written on the Sod level of understanding Torah.

PS- i have a few beliefs that can be defined as liberal- like the hermaphroditic adam-eve creature. that does not make me a traitor of YHVH. i would be very careful on claiming that all the people in one school of thought are traitors of YHVH- the school of shammai was wrong in a whole lot of things,. mainly the idea of love.; however, there were some things that they got right and just because the school itself says this, does not mean the individual does.

just because Yeshua called a few pharisees a brood of vipers does not mean the all pharisees are, as you say, Traitors of YHVH- in fact, Yeshua might have been a pharisee!!

shalom- john

[Jonatan]

May 7, 2009 14:08:54 GMT -5 John said:

PS- i have a few beliefs that can be defined as liberal- like the hermaphroditic adam-eve creature.

Wht-?! Eh?
What's this about?

just because Yeshua called a few pharisees a brood of vipers does not mean the all pharisees are, as you say, Traitors of YHVH- in fact, Yeshua might have been a pharisee!!

shalom- john

Calm down, and Sh'lom! I know there are good scribes and Pharisees - Ezra was the first Sopher and Rav Shaul was Pharisee, even he was proud of it in his born-again life with Yeshua. That's not what I meant.
lol, it's just like a sign to me now! I must mention that just this day I defended Sopherim that not all of them were hypocrites (many of them were Lord's disciples and Yeshua, Himself was a Sopher), brood of vipers when I was writing letter to one brother, theologian in my congregation - we are doing a new Bible translation. Yeah, I also identify myself as 'biblical scribe', 'sopher' - it's only an advantage (see Matthew 13:52 ) (and it doesn't mean that I am a hypocrite or one of viper's seed) - do you so, too?

[John]

okay.

the adam-eve idea is for another thread. i will start it later

[Jonatan]

Well, there's suspiction about liberalists that they are also liberal in morale and spiritual sins and thus they easily make compromises with sin - Bob calls it 'Lawless christian', but if I misunderstood you, you are some other kind of liberalist - sorry.