Torah Pearls #16 – Beshalach (Exodus 13:17-17:16)

In this episode of The Original Torah PearlsBeshalach (Exodus 13:17-17:16), we get some fascinating insights from the Hebrew in the story of the Exodus from Egypt and dig up a pearl regarding the poetic form of the Name of Yehovah.  There follows an interesting discussion of the meaning and origin of Shabbat and the understanding of Manna.

I look forward to reading your comments!

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Torah Pearls #16 - Beshalach (Exodus 13:17-17:16)

You are listening to The Original Torah Pearls with Nehemia Gordon, Keith Johnson, and Jono Vandor. Thank you for supporting Nehemia Gordon's Makor Hebrew Foundation. Learn more at NehemiasWall.com.

Jono:And it is time for Pearls from the Torah portion with Keith Johnson in Charlotte and Nehemia Gordon in Jerusalem. Welcome back, gentlemen.

Nehemia: Shalom. Great to be back.

Keith: Good to be back.

Jono: Wonderful to have you once again.

Keith: I could hardly wait, Jono. I could hardly wait from our last our portion.

Jono: Time flies when you're having fun, doesn't it? We're flying through this thing.

Keith: It really does.

Jono: But before we get into, I just want to say g'day to Clint and Lynn in Arkansas.

Nehemia: I want to do a g'day shout-out to Jennifer over on Facebook, who shared the Torah Pearls. Thank you for sharing. Keep sharing. Jennifer's tag name is “Miss Piggy”, and she's married to “Kermit the Frog”. Why do I suspect those are not their real names?

Keith: And I've got to give a shout-out to “Wish You Knew” on Facebook, who commented on this. It is fun to see how many people are listening and people that are commenting. It's a great momentum here with people that are interested in the Pearls from the Torah.

Jono: So just to remind everybody, you can like the Truth2U page on Facebook. You can comment there and interact with other people there. Also, you can leave comments on the website and we appreciate that. Thank you for sharing them on Facebook as well. We'd like to get the word out. So, g'day to everybody listening wherever you may be around the world, and thank you for your company. Today, we are in Beshalach. This is Exodus 13:17 to 17:16. Shall we jump straight into it, fellows?

Keith: Yes, we have to.

Jono: This is how it begins. “And it came to pass when Pharaoh had let the people go and that God did not lead them by the way of the land of the Philistines although that was near; for God said: lest perhaps the people change their minds when they see war and return to Egypt. So God led the people around by the way of the wilderness of the Red Sea. And the children of Israel went up in orderly ranks out of the land of Egypt. And Moses took the bones of Joseph…” there we go.

Keith: Hold it. Jono, you can't -- what are you doing here? This has always been something that's jumped out at me. This has always been something that I thought was so interesting, that I think applies to people. Ladies and gentlemen, I'm reading the New International Version. I'm a Methodist that's reading this, as many of my friends here that are listening. So, if I read that, He says, "If they face war, they might change their minds and return to Egypt."

And then I think it's interesting, at the end of verse 18 it says: “But the Israelites went up out of Egypt armed for battle.” Now let me just look at the very casual reading of that. It's like, they're armed for battle, but He says, they're not ready to face the Philistines. And I'm just wondering, not from a deep linguistic standpoint, what does this say about what it is that He's done?

In other words, the people are armed for battle, but He is like, hey, they're not really ready. It doesn't mean that they're not thinking that they're ready. It is just like, they're not really ready, so I'm not going to put them into battle, which is a picture for me of just how intimately He knows them, how intimately He knows us.

It's like Him saying, look, you're not really ready for this. And sometimes, at least in my life, when I think that I might be ready for a thing and then I don't do it, I have to remember that my Creator, my Heavenly Father, knows what I'm ready for, and there are some times where I'm not taking the short route, but the longer route, as a route of preparation before I really get into the situation that I need to be prepared for. So even though they had the battle gear on, they weren't ready for a good fight. It has always caught my attention.

Jono: It's a good one. Can I just confirm, Keith, your bible says they were armed for battle. I've got orderly ranks. What have you learned, Nehemia?

Nehemia: The word in Hebrew, khamushim, is a word that has a military connotation, and the exact meaning of it isn't clear. Some people have said it means “armed”.

Specifically, the way they would kill people is they would stab them in the fifth rib. The word literally means, “The children of Israel went up out of Egypt fifth -- into fifths, or fifth”. So one possibility is they went up in ranks of five or went out in ranks of five. Another possibility is they had armor protecting their fifth rib. One interesting possibility which appears in the rabbinical tradition is that 4/5 got left behind and were killed. And that's because they didn't have enough faith in God to go out, or they were too afraid to rise up against their masters and go out.

Matisyahu, the Jewish rap singer, has a song where he says 4/5ths got left behind. That's where he gets us from, from the rabbinical tradition that interprets this very literally, that there was only 1/5 that went up of the children of Israel. So whether it's one fifth or in ranks of five or protecting the fifth rib is really not clear. Any of those are possibilities.

Keith: That's pretty powerful.

Jono: Very interesting.

Nehemia: Is that a Torah Pearl?

Jono: That's a Torah Pearl. I would classify that as a Torah Pearl.

Nehemia: It's one fifth of a Torah Pearl.

Jono: “And Moses took the bones of Joseph as he had made his sons promise that they would take him up out of the place,” and so here we are seeing that being fulfilled. “And so, they journeyed from Succoth”.

Keith: Jono, I'm sorry guys. We can't pass over this. This is a Torah Pearl. I have to say this, and I think people will appreciate this. I'm just going to ask this question very generally. How many years do you think it was from the time that Joseph died until the time they left? Can someone tell me generally?

Jono: Okay, so we have to jump back into the previous Torah portion. Doesn't it say 430 years?

Nehemia: Well, we really didn't have time to discuss that but back in Genesis 15, I believe verse 3, it talks about how the descendants of Abraham will be slaves in a foreign land for 400 years. If you add up all the people who were in Egypt, because we know the line of Levi, how long they lived, it doesn't come out to 400. So the explanation that most sources have given is that the 400, or possibly 430, included all the time from when Abraham's descendants were strangers in a strange land, which is really from the birth of Isaac.

So it goes back all the way to Isaac, and possibly that includes some of the time, that extra 30 years, according to some opinions, may include some of the time of Abraham. But the actual time that they were in Egypt couldn't have been more than about 200-some odd years, tradition places it at 210 years, but it could have been a little bit more or a little bit less than that.

Keith: So, let's say that there are 200 years between friends.

Nehemia: 200 years, plus or minus.

Keith: 200 years, between friends. But let me just say this. Would that the Gentiles would learn, as the Israelites have learned, the importance of swearing an oath? Because what it says here in my bible, “Moses took the bones of Joseph with him because Joseph had made the sons of Israel swear an oath.” Nehemia, would you read that in Hebrew please, verse 19?

Nehemia: “And Moses took the bones of Joseph with him for he had surely…”, and I think the best translation would be “adjured the children of Israel.” Adjure is an English word that means to cause someone to swear. “He had sure caused the sons of Israel to swear, saying, God will surely remember you, and you will bring up my bones from this with you.” And that’s a couple of hundred years earlier.

Keith: So why is this important? What if we took the importance of swearing as they did, and hopefully as some do to this day, that when you swear, it's something you're going do?

So, here's Moses, because there was an oath or they swore that they would do this, Moses doesn't say, hey, it's not convenient for us to go and get the bones of Joseph. I mean, think about this. You're finally leaving after all of this, all of this that's taken place and there was an oath that was given. They swore that they would bring up the bones of Joseph.

Hey! Joseph won't know, he’s dead. Let's just move on, we're leaving in the middle of the night. But this oath that they swore to him, at least 200 years later, has still got weight. And I think there's a reason for this. I know there's a reason for this because we learn later of the significance and the importance of swearing. But I would love to be able to learn the significance of swearing. I wish the Gentiles, I wonder where I get this from, would learn the significance of swearing in the name Yehovah, and understanding the weight of that promise, of that lifting of his name. Holding to something and saying, look, even if it doesn't happen in a year or two years or 10 years or 200 years, you swore to me you would do it, and even if your circumstance is inconvenient, Moses did it. I think that's so powerful. I mean this just, I just have to stop and say that, I think this is really powerful.

Nehemia: I've got to challenge you on that, Johnson. I've got to challenge you on that. There's this great account in the Book of Jeremiah, where it talks about a certain group of people who made an oath, whose ancestor took an oath and made each of his children in turn make an oath and their children and their children.

They kept that oath for somewhere in the order of about 800 years. And Jeremiah sets them aside and he says, “If only the children of Israel would learn to swear and keep their word the way that these people keep their word”. Those people were sojourners who had joined the children of Israel, who were not actually of an Israelite stock. They were called the Rekabites. They were actually relatives of the family of Jethro, the father in law of Moses. And the Rekabites become the symbol of what it means to keep an oath for hundreds of years.

What God says there is, “If only the Israelites would keep my Commandments, the way the Rekabites keep their oath that their ancestor made them take”. And they are more precise and careful to keep this oath, which they voluntarily took upon themselves, than the commandments that the creator of the universe gave to the children of Israel and the congregation of Israel.

Keith: And the challenge is?

Nehemia: Well, you're saying that the people who know how to keep an oath are the Israelites, but Jeremiah says the ones who know to keep the oath are the Rekabites, who are not even Israelite.

Keith: What I really was trying to get to was throw you a softball so you could show the significance of oaths, but you don't want to.

Nehemia: Jeremiah 12:16, I'll let you bring that one. Come on Johnson, bring the verse, it's also in Jeremiah.

Keith: What I'm going to do is this. I'm going to let everyone know that secretly Jono and Nehemia are in negotiations right now, ladies and gentleman. We're in negotiations of possibly continuing this and doing the prophets regarding the portion. And this is something that we're in negotiations. We want you to pray about this, because it would be so powerful, after we finish the Torah portions, to do another cycle with the prophets where we’ll get into this.

But I want to say something right now. There is such an important line of reasoning that takes place when I see this, even before they get to Mount Sinai, before the Ten Commandments are ever spoken. Here there are a group of people that are keeping this oath, and Moses himself keeps the oath.

Why am I bringing this up? Because I think that this is an important thing even for those New Testament folks out there who read the New Testament and understand. I want to share a little bit in our next cycle how Yeshua himself addresses this issue. I'll leave it for then, but I will say this, the swearing of an oath is crucial in the understanding of who our Father is, and who we are to be as His people. And now, we can move on and that's all I have to say.

Jono: Okay. “And Yehovah went before them by day in a pillar of cloud leading the way and by night, in a pillar of fire to give them light.” How about that? Can you imagine it? I mean, would you not feel pretty, look out, I mean hey, I've got my own pillar of fire. Don't mess with me, right? I mean that is pretty cool.

Keith: Yeah, the light at night and a cloud by day.

Jono: There it is, chapter 14, and here we are at the story of the Red Sea crossing. And, oh my goodness, it's awesome! If there was one thing about the film with Charlton Heston, it was that, it was that moment. That was pretty cool. Now, "Yehovah spoke to Moses saying, 'Speak to the children of Israel and that they turn and camp at before'…” and how do I pronounce that, Nehemia?

Nehemia: pi hakhirot.

Jono: Thank you.

Nehemia: Which can be translated as, “the mouth of the gorges”. It's really interesting because Josephus describes the Israelites fleeing from the Egyptians, and it talks about how they went through this very deep gorge, and then they came out of the gorge and they found themselves trapped up against the sea. To my knowledge, there is only one place that fits that geographical description, and that is the sand peninsula at Nuweiba, in the eastern half of the peninsula of the Sinai Peninsula. And that actually makes perfect sense. We read that he didn't take them the way of the Philistines, which would have been the coastal road along northern Sinai. He took them through the desert, which was pi hakhirot, or through the khirot, through the gorges, which then open up. To this day that's a major road in the Six Day War, when Israel captured the Sinai Peninsula. That was one of the major roads that they had to capture as well. In every generation this has been a major route, this major road. And that's apparently the way that they got out of Egypt and then they find themselves trapped between, on the one hand, there is the sea and the other side is the Egyptians, who are coming out through the same gorge.

Jono: There it is. Keith.

Keith: People have heard many times about our story of going to Egypt, but one of the things that was so amazing for me, you know, we traveled through the night going to the traditional Mount Sinai. But in the in the morning is when we were leaving from that spot. And it is one of the most beautiful landscape pictures, as you read the scripture, when you go through this gorge. The highway is right there, it's right through this gorge. And you come through this gorge and all of a sudden, you look up and there's the water.

It made this passage come to life for me in a really significant way. When I read this, this idea that they had to go this way and then looking at all this information and then physically seeing it, boy, I tell you something, it literally -- it became 3D HD. It's a powerful real-life image. You feel the people walking this particular road, and it's just kind of cool.

Jono: And the situation that they are in. But in verse 5, “Now was told the king of Egypt that the people had fled, and the heart of Pharaoh and his servants was turned against the people. And they said”, and get this, I mean, how's this for a short memory? They said, “Why have we done this? That we have let Israel go from serving us?” Why did we let them go? “So, he made everyone ready with their chariots, and took his people with him and 600 choice chariots and all the chariots of Egypt with captains over each one of them. And Yehovah hardened the heart of Pharaoh the king, and he pursued the children of Israel.” Man, this guy's after punishment, isn't he? I mean, he is determined.

Keith: We have to remember why it is that he does this, because it says it. “And I will harden Pharaoh's heart and he will pursue them.” Okay Nehemia, I'll let you speak.

Nehemia: Can you read that again? Verse 8, “And the children of Israel went out,” what did you say, Jono?

Jono: “And Yehovah hardened the heart of Pharaoh, the king of Egypt and he pursued the children of Israel, and the children of Israel went out with boldness.”

Nehemia: And what does yours have, Keith? “The children of Israel went out…”?

Keith: “They who were marching out boldly.”

Nehemia: And it says in the Hebrew “beyad rama”, “with a raised hand”. That's what it literally says, they're going out and they're like raaagh! I guess the listeners can't see me, but I have my hand raised up as a fist. And they are not going out sneaking away in the middle of the night. They're going out and they're like, “yeah, yeah!!” Can you imagine you're going through that and you're like “yeah!”, and all of a sudden you get over that rise, and you see the sea in front of you and you're like, “oh boy! uh-oh”.

Jono: That reminds me, in Australia, we have a tennis player by the name of Lleyton Hewitt. Do you guys watch tennis? Do you remember seeing Lleyton Hewitt when he was at the top of his game? And whenever he made these crucial points, he would raise his fist up in the air and go “yeah!” just like you were saying, Nehemia.

Nehemia: He is an Israelite. That proves that he is a descendent of Israel.

Jono: That’s the way that they went out.

Nehemia: That's what it says.

Jono: “And so Pharaoh drew near to the children of Israel and they lifted their eyes.” It wasn't long before they started saying to Moses, “Because there were no graves in Egypt that you've taken us to die in the wilderness? Why have you dealt so with us, bringing us out of Egypt? Is this not the word that we told you in Egypt, saying, let us alone that we may serve the Egyptians or would have been better for us to serve the Egyptians than that we should die in the wilderness”?

How about that? And it seems like not only has Pharaoh seemingly forgotten everything that brought him to the decision of letting them go. Now they have looked at Pharaoh and the chariots and they have forgotten.

Keith: Well, I think the thing that we have to remember is this. Sometimes I read this with my Western mindset, thinking, okay, what are these people, are they crazy? God just did all these amazing things. But think about the mentality of a slave, think about how some of these people, this was their life.

I'm under the bondage. Look, Pharaoh says this, I'm only going to take 600 chariots for 600,000 people, plus men women and children, and I am going to get them back, and why? Because the mentality is this, I'm the slave master, they're the slaves. I will just take them like sheep, that one dog that will round them up.

And here's why they could think this; these people are under the slave’s mentality, and I have to tell you, I know we talked a little bit about this, but something really interesting regarding human nature.

25 years ago, when I went to Times Square, the police would be within a barrier and the people would be free. So literally, what you'd have is a million people and the police would put a barrier and they'd go inside of the barrier and wait for something to happen, put on their riot gear, go out single-file, beat the people up or control them and then run back within their barrier.

Now what they do is the police are free and the people are in what they call, pens, P-E-N-S. So you go in a pen, they put barriers around you and you smush these people in this barrier and a few police control a million people. This is the mentality of the Israelites. The Israelites had been controlled by the Egyptians for all this time. So sometimes we're a little hard on them, like hey, what's the deal? You just watched all these amazing things. They're still in the slave mentality. What are we doing out here? We've never even seen this.

Jono: Yeah, that's a good point.

Keith: We haven't seen any of this, and now you're telling us to do what? What are we going to do? So I give them a little break there.

Nehemia: And to follow up what you're saying, part of the slave mentality is that one of the most frightening things to a slave is freedom, and the responsibility that comes with freedom. I think maybe all of us suffer from that to some extent, and we're seeing it exaggerated here in the Israelites, who have been slaves for hundreds of years, and now, all of a sudden, in the middle of the night, have become free and they don't know what to do with that freedom. They're like, wait a minute, we could die here.

Jono: And understand what it is to walk in that freedom, I suppose.

Nehemia: Exactly.

Jono: Okay, that's fair enough. “And Moses said to the people, Do not be afraid, stand still and see the salvation of Yehovah, which He will accomplish for you today, for the Egyptians whom you see today you shall never see again forevermore”.

Keith: The Prophet.

Jono: Hey, that's pretty good.

Keith: I'm talking about Moses making a prophetic statement.

Jono: He did.

Nehemia: What’s really interesting is the phrase “the salvation of Yehovah”, which is yeshuat Yehovah. The yeshua, the salvation of Yehovah, and that he is the source of salvation of that yeshua. Can I get an amen?

Jono: Amen.

Nehemia: Yehovah is the source of our salvation.

Jono: “Yehovah will fight for you and you shall hold your peace,” Nehemia Gordon. “And Yehovah said to Moses, Why do you cry for me? Tell the children of Israel, go forward, but lift up your rod and stretch your hand over the sea,” there's the rod and the hand, “and divide the sea and the children of Israel shall go on dry ground through the midst of the sea. And indeed, I will harden the hearts of the Egyptians and they shall follow after them. So, I will gain” -- here it is – “so I, Yehovah, will gain honor over Pharaoh and over his army, his chariots, his horsemen. Then the Egyptians shall know that I am Yehovah, when I have gained honor for myself over Pharaoh, his chariots and his horsemen.”

So, the angel of God -- obviously the pillar is the angel of God – moves around to the back and puts a division between the Egyptians and the Israelites. “And so, Moses stretches out his hand over the sea and causes it to go back by a strong east wind all that night and made the sea into dry land and the waters were divided. So the children of Israel went out into the midst of the sea on the dry ground.” It obviously took some hours to get that many people across the Red Sea, and what are we talking? We're talking a number of kilometers across? Keith, how long do you think it would take to walk across this water?

Keith: It's interesting, we were actually in Nuweiba, at the spot that makes the most sense according to the description that we find in the Tanakh. And I could look across and see what looked to me - and this is just my estimate – it looked like anywhere from two to five miles that they'd be walking across this water.

The thing that still amazes me like our last portion we were talking about, being able to look up and see the month, the calendar, the new moon, and then to also be able to go physically where we see this potential place of crossing. And again, how many years later? How many thousands of years later? And I'm in awe of what Yehovah did. Bringing out that amazing group of people and crossing that water is just amazing.

Nehemia: It must be more than a million, because there were 600,000 adult males. So, it's approximately 10 miles, or 16 kilometers, according to Google Earth, from the edge of the sand peninsula at Nuweiba, all the way across into the land of Midian, which today is occupied by the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. The Red Sea at that point is about 10 miles wide, that land bridge.

Keith: Wow, that's amazing.

Nehemia: So, it's 16 kilometers.

Jono: We're talking about moving people across 10 miles wide, and we're talking maybe even 3 million, including children and women.

Nehemia: Probably around 3 million. The traditional math in that area is that for every adult male, there were 5 others who weren't adult males. So that would put the number at about 3 million. Give or take a few hundred thousand maybe, who knows?

Jono: And so, as they are completing that transition, "the Egyptians pursued and went after them into the midst of the sea and Pharaoh's horses, his chariots and his horsemen and it came to pass that in the morning watch, that Yehovah looked down upon the army of the Egyptians through the pillar of fire and cloud.” How about that? “He troubled the army of the Egyptians. He took off their chariot wheels so that they drove them with difficulty. And the Egyptians said: let us flee from the face of Israel, for Yehovah fights for them”, why did they think that wasn't going to happen, “and against the Egyptians. Then Yehovah said to Moses, stretch out your hand over the sea, over the waters, that they may come back upon the Egyptians in their chariots on their horsemen.” And so Moses did so, and it returns with full depth. It drowned them. In fact, it goes on to say -- let me just say in verse 30: “and Israel saw Egyptians dead on the seashore.” Wow!

Nehemia: I love the opening of verse 30: “and Yehovah saved” -- there's that word yeshuah again, salvation. “Yehovah saved on that day Israel from the hand of the Egyptians.” Can somebody give me an Amen?

Jono: Amen.

Keith: Amen.

Jono: And there they are, they are now on the other side, they're separated. We’re going to do something that we don't usually do here on Truth2u, we are going to go to a musical interlude. Nehemia Gordon, take it away!

Nehemia: Before we get to the musical interlude, the last four words in Hebrew of verse 31, I think are so important. They've seen this thing, the Israelites. They see the salvation of Yehovah, and then the last four words in Hebrew “Vaya’aminu baYehovah uveMoshe avdo”- and they believed in Yehovah and in Moses, his servant. It's exciting.

Nehemia: Salvation of Yehovah, and they believe in Yehovah and in his servant, the one He sent.

Keith: Hold on, before we do the musical interlude, you've got to remember, Jono has a translation, I have a translation and you're looking at the Hebrew. Now let me just put what my translation is that would not help me to think the way that you're getting excited.

It says here, “And when the Israelites saw the great power of Yehovah, the Lord, displayed against the Egyptians, the people feared the Lord and put their trust in Him and in Moses, His servant”. So wait a minute now, it says here that they put their trust in -- and it's what it says, in the NIV. What does yours say, Jono?

Jono: What I've got is: “Thus Israel saw the great work which the Lord had done in Egypt. So the people feared the Lord and believed the Lord and his servant Moses”.

Nehemia: “Believed” rather than “believed in”. What it says in Hebrew, is vaya’aminu baYehovah uveMoshe avdo. And they believed in Yehovah and in Moses, his servant. That's what's it says in the Hebrew.

Keith: I have a confession to make to the group, to the listeners. I have a confession because there's no way we're going to get through the next section without this confession. Here’s my confession to everyone. I'm actually sitting here with two Bibles. This whole time I've been saying I'm reading the NIV, but I have to make a confession because there's no way we're going to get through the next section without me making this confession. So the confession is this, I have my NIV, and ladies and gentlemen, the Methodist has his Hebrew bible right next to the NIV.

Nehemia: No, close that. [laugh]

Keith: And sure enough, Nehemia Gordon, our Jewish friend, just told the truth because I'm looking right here, and it says baYehovah uveMoshe. And there's a bait right there, Nehemia - and in Moses. So that one little letter makes the Methodists have to stop. It's a preposition.

Nehemia: “They believed in Yehova and in Moses His servant”.

Keith: I just have to slow down. This has been a good schtick all the way through Bereshit. I made it without making this confession. I've made it all the way to 14 of Exodus, and here I have to slow down and say something. One of the things that changed my life was being able to interact with the Hebrew bible, and something as small as what Nehemia just said, that he wants to shout with and move on and be excited, and say, "everyone gets it".

But a lot of people that are listening don't get what he just talked about. They don't get it because they don't have the opportunity to see it. I wanted my brothers and sisters to know that when I read this verse in Hebrew, it made me open my jaw, slow down and bow my head and say, okay, what is being revealed in these Hebrew scriptures is very, very powerful. So, I'm going to let Nehemia be excited about that, but I will have to say now, the confession is, Jono, I've got both translations, I've got the NIV, I've got my concordance and I have my Hebrew bible opened up. And again, during the next section there's just no way that we will be able to get through this without me interacting with the Hebrew bible. Let's move on to the song that is in Exodus 15.

Jono: That is definitely a Torah Pearl, thank you for slowing down and highlighting that for us because that is so significant. Now, the song of Moses. Nehemia Gordon, take it away.

Nehemia: I better not.

Keith: You better not. Let's please move on. So, if it's okay, Jono, I'd like to throw some softballs to you and to Nehemia, and I'd like to do a little shift here in our Pearls from the Torah. I want to use the Hebrew bible here if can, and have you guys interact with this and see if this is significant to you. Because again, I'm reading here, “And then Moses and the Israelites sang this song.” They sing this song to Yehovah. And it says, “I will sing to Yehovah for He is highly exalted, horse and its rider He hurled into the sea.”

And then there's this really radical thing that happens in verse 2. There are these two little letters that, in English, it doesn't let us know that there are two little letters, and I'm going to put me Nehemia on the spot here. I'm telling you what it says in my Hebrew bible.

I'm going to read the English first. So it says in verse 1 that Moses sang the song to the Lord L-O-R-D. Then it says, “I will sing to the Lord L-O-R-D” and then it says in verse 2: “The Lord L-O-R-D is my strength and my song.” But when I look in verse 2 of chapter 15…

Nehemia: That's really strange.

Keith: I don't see the letters yud heh vav heh with 4 letters. I see 2 letters with a little dot in the last letter, and I want to stop here, because this is important, Jono. This is really important for the readers. If they were reading their English bible, they wouldn't know there's a difference between the L-O-R-D of verse 1 and the L-O-R-D of verse 2, but my confession is I'm looking in my Hebrew bible and sure enough, it's the first time that I see Moses using, not 4 letters of yud heh vav heh, but rather 2 letters - yud with a heh and a little mapik - a little dot in the heh.

And Nehemia, I am going to give you a softball and you better hit this out of the park or I'm going to take over. And then they are going to really know that I am the teacher and you are the student. [laugh]

Nehemia: Amen, hallelujah.

Keith: So, could you tell us what's happening in verse 2? And take your time because this is really important, Jono, if it's all right?

Nehemia: Let's even start in verse 1 where it opens up. Up until now in Exodus, if I'm not mistaken, the entire 14 chapters we read were what's called prose, which means telling the story. Then all of a sudden in chapter 15:1, we have the first section, certainly of any length in Exodus, that's of a poetic style. We saw the poetic style back in Genesis in the last section that we did, I believe it was Genesis 49, and that was a large section of poetry.

And then here again, we have poetry and it's obvious why this is poetry because this is a song. So, you have poetry and songs and blessings, also in prophecies. And part of the style of poetry is you have these unusual forms, for example - the opening word is ashira, “I will sing”, and he could have just said ashir. Why did he say ashira? That's a poetic style.

Throughout the passages, all these poetic styles - and if you don't know Hebrew, you wouldn't pick this up - but verse 5 has “yekhasyumu” instead of yekhasehem or yekhasuhem. Poetic style of verse 6 is ne’edari, and you know, it has all these - and it's hard to explain if you don't know Hebrew - but basically, this is just special forms of these different words that are just simply poetic. Yokhlemo, timla’emo, kisamo, torishemo - all those forms are poetic.

We have the word zu, which appears twice and is a poetic way of saying asher- “that”. Again, if you don't know Hebrew you don't know what I'm talking about, but these are poetic forms of these different Hebrew words. And then one of the things we have in verse 2 is the poetic form of the Father's name, of the name yud heh vav heh, the name Yehovah. And this poetic form of the name Yehovah is Yah, and you'll recognize that, and I'm surprised in your translation it doesn't have it Yah, because when it says halleluyah, that is just “praise yah”.

Keith: Wait, Nehemia, just a second. What do you mean you're surprised it's not Yah in my translation? You know why it's not Yah in my translation.

Nehemia: No, I actually don't. Let's start with why it's not “Lord” when it says yud heh vav heh- Yehovah. It's not Lord because the Jewish tradition is instead of Yehovah to say “Lord” and sometimes “God”. There is no Jewish tradition to replace Yah with something else, that doesn't exist. So why on earth would they translate Yah as anything but Yah? And for example, one of the bibles I have here is the Shoken bible, which is a Jewish translation, and it says “My fierce might and strength is Yah. He has become deliverance for me." So, they have Yah in there. It's right there, there's no reason to remove it.

Jono: Can I just get something right? This is verse two we're talking about, right?

Keith: Yes, and it's the first time we see it.

Jono: What I have got in New King James is: “The Lord is my strength and song.” You're telling me that it says “Yah is my strength and song”. Is that what you are saying?

Keith: Exactly what it says.

Nehemia: That's exactly what it says.

Jono: I'm finding this rather curious, because I'm looking at it here, and as you say, Nehemia, why would they not translate it that way? Because if I switch over to Isaiah chapter 12, in my New King James, and I want you to do the same thing, Keith, if you would, in your Nearly Inspired Version (NIV). It says in Isaiah chapter 12 verse 2, “Behold, God is my salvation.” Let me read it word for word in the New King James. “I will trust and not be afraid, for Yah, the Lord, is my strength and my song. He has become my salvation.”

Keith: Wait, now chapter 12, verse what?

Jono: Verse 2.

Nehemia: Well, that's really interesting, because the King James has “Lord Jehovah as my strength and my song,” and you're saying the New King James has, “for Yah, the Lord, is my strength and my song.”

Jono: That's what it says.

Nehemia: And what it literally says in Hebrew is, “for my strength and song is Yah, Yehovah.”

Keith: Now let me say something. I want to say this, and this is not a plug on the book, but I want to tell you something that happened, you guys. When I got to Exodus chapter 15, and I'm reading in Exodus chapter 15, and these two little letters jump off the page, I did exactly what you just did, Jono. I went to every place where I thought they could have translated it as Yah.

Now let me tell you what the NIV does. The NIV gets so nervous that you're going to realize that Yah is the poetic form of Yehovah, they're like, there's no way in the NIV we can do that. The new King James Version, they couldn't get away with it. Maybe one of the angels of Yehovah was in the translators committee and made sure they didn't do it. But in the NIV, they have erased completely the mere possibility of you being able to interact with this.

Now let me tell you something I did in my book, and Nehemia, maybe you're going to be offended, my Jewish brothers and sisters are going to be offended. But one of the things I did is I looked into the Jewish sources by what they did regarding this poetic form Yah. Now there are two issues I want to bring up. The first thing they did is they said look, in order for us to deal with this, we're going to have to basically diminish the importance of the name Yah versus Yehovah. And I talk about this in depth because I found some of the Jewish commentators will say, "This name doesn't bring the same power and importance of the name Yehovah. It is a diminished form and so therefore it's not illegal for you to say Yah, but it is prohibited from you saying Yehovah." That's one issue I want to bring up.

The second issue I want to bring up is for all of my brothers and sisters out there that say well now, Keith, you should change your pronunciation. Here it clearly says, Nehemia Gordon, the great Hebrew scholar just said the way you pronounce this two letter name is what, Nehemia? How do you pronounce it?

Nehemia: Yah.

Keith: Yah, so that's why we should call Him Yahweh, and I'm not going to move from this until you can help us understand, Nehemia, what is this Yah in the poetic form?

Nehemia: The poetic form, if you can call it that, of the name Jacob in some languages is James. Or let's take the example of Michael. Michael, which by the way in Hebrew is Mikhael, but in English is Michael. What's the nickname for Michael? It's Mickey. Let’s say I didn't have the vowels of the word Michael, but I knew it was Mickey. Would I then call him Mikkel?

Jono: Mickeal.

Nehemia: I guess, I would call him Mickel. Mickey-el, exactly. So that's the type of logic that they were implying when they say that Yah as the poetic form therefore means that the full form is Yahweh. There's absolutely no connection there. And actually, the significance of Yah is that it almost always appears at the end of a word, like halleluyah. That's the form that you'll normally find, and even in Exodus 15:2, its ozi vezimrat yah - that word Yah is attached to word zimrat, which is what's called smikhut, or the construct state. It's attached to the previous word, and that's very similar to what we would find when we have yud heh vav, the three letters of the full name in a larger name, as a compound name.

For example, Isaiah is Yeshayahu, Elijah is Eliyahu. So we always have Yahu, which is exactly what you find with Yah, that poetic form. Now here's the thing, whenever yud heh vav appears at the beginning of a word, it's never Yahu or Yah, it's always Yeho, Yehoshua, Yehonatan, Yehonadav. Now here's the question you have to ask. In the Father's name, yud heh vav heh, are those three letters at the beginning of the name like in Yehoshua, Yehonatan, Yehonadav, etc. or they are at the end of the name, like in Yeshayahu, Eliyahu, etc.? Obviously, they're at the beginning of the name which is pronounced “Yeho”.

Keith: Let me tell you what I am going to do, Jono. I apologize for this. The reason I had to stop is because here's what I decided to do. First of all, if you want information, you can go and hear all this information at his hishallowedname.com, you can get the book, whatever. But I've decided to do a new movement as of right now, because of me holding the Hebrew Bible and the English Bible, I'm not going to say Yah. I want to prove that it's Yehovah, now when I see yud heh, I'm going to call it Yeh. The vowels don't matter, the scribes didn't do what they're doing. And every time I see yud heh, I'm going to say Yeh, so I can prove to everyone that it’s Yehovah. No, I'm not going to do that, I am going to let the Hebrew Bible…

The point I'm trying to make, ladies and gentlemen, is simply this. You can't pick and choose. I'm willing to let the Hebrew scriptures be what they are and say Yah and not be nervous over the fact that Yah doesn't take away the fact that I also find Yehovah, because I go further to understand what's happening.

This is the problem, why I wanted to slow down. We don't take the whole and we think part of it’s going to change our argument. That's why we have people saying it can't be Yeshua, it's got to be Yashua, because we got to make Yah. I'm just telling you people. So please, do me a favor, read the information, get the information and then let's have a discussion. Now we can move on. Moses is singing a song. Now back to Baby X. Nehemia, can you sing this?

Nehemia: In the interest of full disclosure, I am tone-deaf.

Jono: You didn’t give me an answer in the end, what it actually says. I had to grab the archaeological, NIV, the archaeological Newly Inspired Version study bible off my shelf, and it says in verse 2 of chapter 12 of Isaiah: “The Lord, the Lord is my strength and my song.”

Keith: That's exactly what it says.

Jono: It says, “the Lord, the Lord”. That's different.

Keith: That's what they say, and they're saying, we don't want to let you know that that's Yah, as the New King James Version does, and the King James Version, because you might eventually realize that it's proclaiming God's name, His poetic form that Moses introduced, the very one who heard in Exodus 3 e’heyeh asher e’heyeh, Moses is simply doing this for the form of the song. I'm going to shorten this name, I'm going to make it poetic, it's going to flow. I'm going to sing it. Yah, which basically is taking the first and the second letter, or the first and the last letter and shortening the form. This doesn't mean it has anything to do with pronunciation of Yehovah, this is a poetic form of His name, which is a beautiful way of singing His name and praising His name. That's what the NIV has decided to hide even further and that's why I use it, to expose this agenda which, by the way, is very discouraging for me and why I have my Hebrew bible open as I read the NIV. That's my confession and I'll stick with it.

Jono: Amen.

Nehemia: I can't sing this, but can I really quickly recite this? Because it really is beautiful when you hear it the original language.

Jono: Please.

Nehemia: Especially in the first verse, where it is talking about the pronunciation of the Father's name, there's a rhyme there that's created. It says “Ashira laYehovah ki ga’o ga’ah”, that rhymes. So I'm going to really quickly read it. [Nehemia reads the song in Hebrew.]

Jono: Thank you.

Can you just quickly do also the song of Miriam, just the four lines there?

Nehemia: She's essentially repeating it. She then says she, Shiru laYehovah, sing to Yehovah. It starts off by Moses saying - I will sing to Yehovah, and she says Shiru laYehovah, sing to Yehovah. Ki ga’o ga’ah, soos verokhvo rama vayam. And then presumably she continued with the rest of it.

Jono: Keith?

Keith: I would like to do something, you all. I have the gift of interpretation of tongues, and since I have that gift I would like to interpret the tongues that Nehemia just spoke.

Jono: Please.

Keith: The reason I would like to do this is because, when I was hearing Nehemia speak, back in the day, before I ever had any understanding of Hebrew, I would hear some people, they would break out in tongues. And it was really interesting, now that I know a little Hebrew and I'm able to hear a little Hebrew, sometimes when I'm listening or speaking Hebrew, it sounds a little bit like people who would break out in these unintelligible tongues. And so, since I have the gift of interpretation of tongues, I'm going to read what Nehemia just said, in English.

The point I'm trying to make is that they were speaking in these different languages, different tongues, and it was being interpreted. This babbling where there is no language, you must ask yourself what it is.

Jono: I will say this. I know all three of us would love to hear, but we're getting off the Torah portion.

Keith: No, you're right, let's move on.

Jono: Let's do that another time. I really agree, from one known language to another known language, absolutely.

Nehemia: So, can we point out two more things in verses 2 and 3? He says literally: “My strength and my song is Yah and he has been to me Yeshua, salvation." And then in verse 3, it says, "Yehovah is a man of war, Yehovah is His name”.

Keith: We're going to move on, you all. If you want more information about this whole thing with Yah, there is information in the book and online and it's very powerful.

Jono: hishallowedname.com, and the book “His Hallowed Name Revealed Again”, by Keith Johnson.

Keith: With my teacher, Nehemia Gordon as the man behind the curtain. Okay, let's move on.

Jono: Alright, verse 23. Here are the challenges. We're starting to see some challenges that they're facing here.

Nehemia: Wait, before you do that. Verse 13, literally it says, "You have led with your might to your holy dwelling place." And then in verse 17 it says, "You brought them and you planted them in the mountain of your inherited portion, the place of your dwelling that you made Yehovah, the Temple of the Lord that your hands have established." So what is it talking about there?

Jono: The Temple or sanctuary? I've got, “The sanctuary of Yehovah which your hands have established”.

Nehemia: Mikdash, that's the word we use for temple. So what location is he talking about?

Keith: Tell us Nehemia.

Nehemia: Presumably he's talking about Mount Sinai. Here Moses is referring to the Israelites eventually getting to Mount Sinai, and that's what he's singing about. That God took them through the sea in order so they could get to Sinai. And the significance of Sinai is that when God first appeared to Moses, he said the sign that what I'm saying is true is that you will come with the people and worship here at this place. And that's what Moses was saying the whole time. We need to go out in the desert and worship our God, and Pharaoh's like, who are you going to take, right? But the whole thing was to get out into the desert to Sinai. That was the goal, that was the objective. And once they got out they'd be free, but the ultimate goal was to get to Sinai.

Keith: Excellent.

Jono: Alright, now you can go ahead. We're drinking bitter water and we're not enjoying it. And so they had a whinge about it.

Keith: What's a whinge?

Nehemia: Is that like an Australian word or something?

Jono: It must be an Australian word.

Nehemia: According to which, mostly they were whinging about the lousy cook and the same thing served. What? That's like some Australian word or something. It's a complaint.

Jono: They were upset. It was a complaint. They were cranky.

Nehemia: Oh, it’s slang for complaining whiningly. Okay so you know what? No Australian slang.

Jono: Thank you for the clarification. “And the people complained against Moses saying, what shall we drink? So, he cried out to Yehovah and Yehovah showed him a tree. And so they cast the tree into the waters and the waters were made sweet. And he made a statute and an ordinance for them and there he tested them and he said,” this is verse 26, “If you diligently heed the voice of Yehovah your Elohim, and do what is right in his sight, give ear to His commandments, keep all His statutes, I will put none of the diseases on you which I have brought on the Egyptians, for I am Yehovah who heals you."

Keith: Ki ani Yehovah rof’ekha. I am Yehovah who heals you. This is one of the descriptive, where He has His name in a description of what He does through His name. And this is a powerful one and we've actually prayed for people in this language with this actual description, and I've seen him do this and it's very powerful.

Nehemia: You've seen legs grow back.

Keith: You guys are making fun. I'm telling you, I've seen people healed and He still heals to this day. His name is still good. He's still “Yehovah rof’ekha” to this day.

Jono: What is the significance of this? These are obviously significant numbers. Is it a coincidence? What's going on here? The 12 wells of water and 70 palm trees so they camped there by the waters. 12 and 70, is there some secret there for 4995 Nehemia?

Nehemia: You know, there are some people who will say, this is the 12 tribes and the 70 elders, or prophets, that Moses, or later on, that God chose, even though they're actually 72. I don't know if that's a significance of those numbers later on. It's interesting. Maybe Keith has some significance. 12 disciples and the 70 languages of the world according to Jewish tradition, that the gospel would be preached in or something like that? Methodist, I don't know. I'm pitching you a softball, Methodist, come on.

Keith: No, they camped there. May we all camp at that place.

Jono: There it is.

Nehemia: Amen. Come on.

Jono: So, “The whole congregation of Israel complained against Moses and Aaron in the wilderness and the children of Israel said to them, oh that we had died by the hand Yehovah in the land of Egypt when we sat by the pots of meat and when we ate bread to the full. But you have brought us out here to the wilderness to kill us, this whole assembly, with hunger. And then Yehovah said to Moses, behold, I will rain bread from heaven on you”, and this is where he tests them. He says, “and the people should go out and gather a certain quota every day that I may test them whether they will walk in my law or not. And it shall be on the sixth day that they shall prepare what they bring in, it'll be twice as much as what they usually gather daily. Then Moses and Aaron said to them”, told them, hey, this is what's going to happen. And sure enough, they went out and they found this stuff, and they said, what is it? What's the significance of them saying, what is it, Nehemia?

Nehemia: It's a really interesting question.

Keith: Excellent.

Nehemia: The phrase that yours translates is “man hu”, it is man. And the common translation is to say, "it is what", except that's not the Hebrew word for what. The Hebrew word for what is ma, and so this has raised a number of questions. And some commentators have said, well, man means “what” in some lost dialect of Hebrew, that maybe some of the people spoke. But if we take the dialect of Hebrew that we have in the Hebrew scriptures, man doesn't mean “what”, it actually means “portion”. So, they saw this, and they said, "this is a portion", and presumably in the context they meant something like, "this is a portion from God", or "a portion that's been given to us", because they didn't know what else it was. So, they call it a portion, man.

Keith: I've been waiting for this verse, because I'm going to change the title of, The Pearls from the Torah to, we're called the Torah Man.

Jono: Very nice. “Every man had gathered according to each one's need and Moses said, let no one leave any of it till morning. And some of them did, and lo and behold it bred worms and it stank and Moses was angry with them. So, they gathered it every morning and every man according to his need, and some became hot and melted”. Now, verse 22. “And so it was on the sixth day that they gathered twice as much bread, two for each one, and all the rulers of the congregation came and told Moses. Then he said to them, This is what Yehovah has said, tomorrow is the Sabbath rest, a holy Sabbath to Yehovah. Bake what you'll bake today, boil what you'll boil, lay out the rest for yourselves that remains. You can keep it till the morning. And so they laid it up in the morning as Moses had commanded and it did not stink, nor were there any worms in it. Then Moses said, eat today for today is the Sabbath to Yehovah, today you will not find it out in the field. Six days you shall gather it, upon the seventh day, the Sabbath, there will be none.”

Keith: Question for Jono. Jono, does he actually say that this is a holy Sabbath? Does Yehovah say it's a Sabbath, or did Moses, interpreting Yehovah, say it was a Sabbath? Does he actually use those words?

Jono: This is what I have got. It says, “This is what Yehovah has said. Tomorrow is a Sabbath rest, a holy Sabbath to Yehovah.”

Keith: Okay, question. When did he say those words, Nehemia?

Jono: That's a good question.

Nehemia: When did he say those exact words?

Keith: Yes.

Nehemia: Presumably when he was speaking to Moses.

Keith: So, he told Moses this and then Moses is saying, this is exactly what he said.

Nehemia: And then Moses conveyed this message, exactly.

Keith: But when he gave the instruction to Moses, based on what we read here, we don't actually hear that. Is that correct?

Nehemia: No, we don't hear those exact words.

Keith: Yehovah said in verse 4, “I shall rain down bread from heaven for the people are to go out each day and gather enough for each day. In this way, I will test for them see whether they will follow my instructions. On the sixth day, they are prepared for they bring in and that's to be twice as much." I see this happen in the Tanakh a lot, where there will be a statement that's spoken and then later, there will be further, if I can say, added explanation from a statement and then there's something that's missing in between. So, what's missing in between is what Yehovah told Moses and what Moses told the people versus what Yehovah told Moses that we hear. We hear the part that we hear. That doesn't mean that's all that was said. It's kind of interesting.

Nehemia: And that's not so unusual. We have the section later in Exodus where God gives these detailed instructions on how to make different things for the tabernacle, and then there'll be a whole other section where instead of just saying and Moses did it, it gives a detailed description of what he did. And it gets extremely tedious, it's like, really, come on, can’t it just say, "and Moses did so"?

And so sometimes it does that, sometimes it'll say what God told Moses to say and it won't tell us that Moses conveyed that, but I suppose that’s implied. It would have been tedious if it had said, Yehovah said to Moses saying, and then had this whole passage. And then Moses came and said, this is what Yehovah spoke, and then had the exact words again. That would have been extremely tedious and so to spare us some of that later tedium that we do have, here it just gives us an abbreviated form.

Keith: Can I show the world something that Nehemia does really cool? Jono, that's related to the verse you just read?

Jono: Please.

Keith: So Nehemia, I want you to go to your secret little computer and I want you to tap in and find out, where the word Sabbath is actually used, and where is it used before Moses speaks it here. In other words, use this verse here, verse 23, and he says, "It is a holy Sabbath", and look where it is used before that.

Jono: We need to go back to chapter two of Genesis, don't we?

Keith: I want to ask him, let's find out. Nehemia has got a secret machine.

Nehemia: Well, this is the first time in the bible that the word “Shabbat” appears.

Keith: So I am giving people a softball. Listen, you guys, I'm making you slow down on purpose here because here is Moses, before we ever get to the mountain, before he ever gives them the Ten Commandments, he calls here in front of the people, "This is a Shabbat."

Nehemia: We do need to reveal that in Genesis 2:2 and 2:3, it says, vayishbot, which you could translate, "And he Sabbathed on the seventh day", literally means, and he rested in the seventh day. And then in verse 3, it says, and he sanctified it - ki vo shavat, for in it he Sabbathed, mikol melakhto, from all his work. So, we have that root that means Sabbath, but the actual form of Shabbat as a noun, as a thing, as a day, this is the first time it appears. We have it as a verb, he Sabbathed.

Keith: And this is a Torah Pearl, ladies and gentlemen. This is a Torah Pearl out of the mouth of Moses. He's saying this is a holy Sabbath unto Yehovah.

Jono: Amen. Verse 27: “It happened that some of the people went out on the seventh day together, but they found none.” This immediately reminds me of Numbers chapter 15 and the chap that went out on Shabbat to gather wood for his fire, we assume, and he was stoned for it, he was put under lock and key. What do we do with him? Well, you’ve got to stone him, take it to the congregation. He's gone. But here we are in 27. It doesn't happen to them as far as we know. Now it happened that some of the people went out on the seventh day, together, but they found none, and Yehovah said to Moses, "How long do you refuse to keep my Commandments and my laws?"

Nehemia: There are two things we’ve got to look at here, I think, that have application for today, at least for me, who is trying to live by the word of God. One of them is verse 23, where he gives him an instruction related to the man, the portion of God, but I think it applies really to any Shabbat. He says, “That which you will bake, bake and that which you will cook, cook and have the leftovers placed for you for keep until the morning”.

And what this seems to me to be saying is, don't be baking and cooking it on Shabbat, do all your preparation before, on the sixth day of the week, and leave it over for you to then eat the next day, on Shabbat. So that's one thing, and that actually jives with something we see in Exodus 12, that we kind of jumped over, where it talks about an exception to that rule, which is on the feast of unleavened bread, you're not allowed to do any work, but the one type of work you are allowed to do is to cook and bake. And so, on Shabbat, which doesn't have that exception, we're not supposed to be cooking and baking, we're supposed to do that before, on preparation day, on Friday for Shabbat.

And then the other thing is verse 29 where he's telling them, don't go out to get it. Take a double portion on Friday. And it says, Shvu ish takhtav, al yetzeh ish mimkomo bayom hashvi’i. Sit each man in his place and do not each man go out of his place on the seventh day. And so some people have interpreted this to mean that you actually can't go outside of your house on Shabbat, which doesn't actually make sense to me. They were living in tents, and if they weren't allowed to go out of their house, and I don't mean to be graphic here, if you have children in the room, you may want to cover their ears. How did they do their business on Shabbat, if they weren't…they didn't have indoor plumbing. How did they do their business on Shabbat if they weren't allowed to go out of their tent? It doesn't make any sense.

Jono: So, you've got to put in the context.

Nehemia: Yes, you have to put in the context. They had to go outside to urinate and defecate. And even if they did it in a chamber pot, at one point it would have been so stinky that they had to get rid of it. So you have 3 million people in tents. They're not going to be doing that in their tents without indoor plumbing.

The way this was interpreted traditionally by the rabbis, and actually by the Essenes as well, the people who wrote the Dead Sea Scrolls, both interpreted this to mean that you're allowed to go out of your house, you can walk anywhere in your city and you can even walk outside your city into the surrounding region where the animals live, because there was a region outside every city where the animals lived. But what you're not allowed to do is to go out into the agricultural fields, which was between two and three thousand cubits outside the city. You know, they lived in these walled cities, and the first two or three thousand cubits, depending on the city, were considered the animal range, and then outside of that, they sometimes translate that as the “lots” in some of the passages, and outside of that, were the actual fields of grain, wheat, etc. and they interpreted that to mean, okay, we're allowed to go deal with our animals but we're not allowed to go into our fields.

The reason they understood that is they said, well, what's really the application here? The Israelites were going out into the field, and it actually says that in verse 25. It says, "Today you will not find it in the field." What does the field mean, in that context? It meant the area surrounding the Israelite camp, where the mana fell. And so what the application, later if we're not in an Israelite camp in the desert, would be, if you're in an ancient city, so I can go around my city and I can go deal with my animals, but I can't go into the field where I would plow my field and I would harvest my grain and I would pluck my weeds. God commanded me not to work, and not only shouldn't I work, I shouldn't even go to the place of work, which was the field. And of course, there's work to do with the animals, but you’ve got to feed the animals or they'll die.

The question is, what is the application of this today? Some people will say, the same application then applies today, which is that you can't go 2,000 cubits outside your city, and they call it the Sabbath day's journey. And I suppose that's possible, but since most of us, and I think Jono is an exception, don't live in an agrarian society, we are not farmers and we don't live off the land with sheep and goats and stuff like that. What is our place? What is our modern-day field? And I think that for me the modern day field would be to go to the supermarket and the mall and places where I would normally carry out commerce and business. I think the application today would be for me now not only not to engage in that commerce and business, but not to even go to those places. But I think each person needs to work it out for themselves in fear and trembling, with prayer and study.

Jono: Amen. Let me see if I understand what you're saying, putting it in its context. What you're suggesting is that, see, for the Lord has given the Sabbath, therefore He gives you twice as much and therefore don't go out looking for it because it's not there. Let every man remain in his place.

Nehemia: Don't even go into those fields where you think the mana might be. Don't even go out to the places.

Jono: Don't go to the office.

Nehemia: Don't go to the workshop.

Jono: Don't do that, don't go to your place of work, as opposed to, "don't leave your house", it's just a matter of putting in its context. Let me just, in the same way, challenge something else that you said, where it says, "Bake what you'll bake today, boil what you'll boil, lay out for yourselves all that remains to be kept until morning." It doesn't actually specifically say that you cannot bake or boil what remains until the next day, right?

Nehemia: In other words, what you're saying is, the other way to read it is, and all the unbaked and all the raw leftovers leave for yourself to be kept.

Jono: And there won't be worms in it, etc.

Nehemia: And that's definitely a possible interpretation. The reason that I think it actually means the other way is the verse in Exodus 12, which talks about…let me find the verse.

Jono: There's also the verse in Exodus 35:3, which says, “You shall kindle no fire throughout your dwellings on the Sabbath day.” A lot of people say, if you can't make any fire, you can't cook or boil, and that's it. But I would suggest also that putting it in its surrounded context that that is in regards to work once again, fire for the purposes of work.

Nehemia: Okay, and the verse that I was looking for is Exodus 12:16. It says, “No manner of work shall be done in them,” talking about the first and seventh days of unleavened bread, “except that which every soul shall eat. That alone shall be done in them.” And I suppose you could read this, and it's a possible interpretation, that this exception given for the feast of unleavened bread also applies to Shabbat, and what he's saying is that that man, mana, that you took on the sixth day, you can leave that over to cook and bake on the next day. I suppose that's a possibility. That's definitely not how it's been historically understood. So, what you're saying is, you would have to build a fire in order to bake and cook. So that man who was arrested for gathering the sticks, why didn't he just say, well, I just wanted my morning tea?

Jono: Should he not have gathered his sticks to be prepared the day before?

Nehemia: Well, what you're saying is according to that other interpretation.

Jono: It's a different thing.

Nehemia: We're just looking at the pros and cons. What you're saying is that it's not a matter of the work involved in building the fire. You're saying it's the fire, which is used for the purpose of labor, of lighting fire.

Jono: In fact, it could be both. I'm open for it being both, actually.

Nehemia: Okay, but according to the latter, why didn't that man just say, well I just wanted my morning tea, I was just going to boil the water and so I went out to gather some sticks? He would have been fine.

Jono: Because if he had a need for fire on the Shabbat, he should have gathered those sticks the day before and been prepared.

Keith: So, can I testify that one of the things that's really wonderful for me is to rest my oven and my stove and my household, and that when Shabbat comes, I prepare the day before. I actually have a legitimate Shabbat. It's interesting to actually have a day that's separate from the other days. So when Shabbat comes, Shabbat morning, my family knows. In the morning, we buy things on Friday that we can eat throughout the day on Shabbat. We eat really quite well without having to light a fire and cook and fry. It's just one day out of the week to do something different in the spirit of not baking or boiling, and it's not so much the folks to say it's legalistic, what are you doing? You're falling under the law. No, I'm just going by the instruction and enjoying the rest and the blessing of Shabbat. So that's from the Methodist.

Jono: Amen, enjoying the rest and the blessing of Shabbat, and I'm glad you put it like that, Amen. “And so the house of Israel called its name Mana and it was like white coriander seed and the taste of it was like wafers made with honey.” That sounds nice to me.

Nehemia: It sounds kind of like nasty, and basically, it's saying it tasted like sand, like moist sand. That's what I'm reading. I don't know.

Nehemia: It tastes like moist sand.

Jono: But they ate it, they ate moist sand for forty years.

Nehemia: Until they were sick and tired of it, right?

Jono: Right, forty years. “And then all the congregation of the children of Israel sets” -- well, it says in my translation here – “set out on their journey from the Wilderness of Sin." That's a place, right?

Nehemia: Exactly.

Jono: There we go. “And there was no water for the people to drink, and therefore the people contended with Moses and they said, give us water that we may drink. So, Moses said to them, why do you contend with me”?

Keith: Why do you whinge?

Jono: Why do you whinge and tempt Yehovah? “And the people, thirsted for water and the people complained against Moses, and they said, but why is it that you brought us up out of Egypt to kill us and our children and our livestock with thirst?” Oh my goodness. “And Moses cried out to Yehovah, saying, What shall I do with these people? They are ready to stone me.” Do you think they really were? They were that cranky that they would have stoned him?

Nehemia: This was a big whinge.

Jono: This is a really huge whinge.

Nehemia: Look, he's got three million people complaining against him. That's intimidating, and a crowd can get out of control really easily, a crowd of three million.

Jono: Fair enough, yes.

Nehemia: I think he knew what he was talking about.

Jono: “So Yehovah said to Moses, go on before the people and take with you some of the elders of Israel, also taking in your hand the rod with which you struck the river and go. Behold, I will stand before you on a rock in Horeb, and you shall strike the rock and water will come out of it, that the people may drink. And Moses did so in the sight of the elders. He called the name of that place Massa and Meriva, because of the contention of the children of Israel and because they tempted Yehovah saying, is Yehovah among us or not?”

Keith: Okay, one second. I would like a Torah Pearl here.

Jono: Please.

Keith: And this is me looking from my NIV and rather, looking over at my Hebrew bible. If I look over my Hebrew bible, something really is kind of interesting in verse 7, “And he called the place Massa and Meriva because the Israelites quarreled and because they tested the Lord, saying, is the Lord among us or not?” Now, if I'm looking in my NIV, I can move over that kind of quickly, but if I take my hand and go over to 17:7 in my Hebrew bible, I find three words that are kind of cool. One in verse 7, and it's “Massa” and then the next one that I see, is Nasotam. So, Nehemia, if you look in verse 17:7, what does the word “Massa” actually mean?

Nehemia: Massa means testing, it comes from the same root as the word Nasotam - their testing. And meriva means, a strife. So Massa uMeriva was the name of the place, which meant testing and strife.

Keith: So, what's interesting to me is that in our book, “A Prayer to Our Father: Hebrew Origins of the Lord's Prayer”, which we wrote together, you could get information at aprayertoourfather.com. This is a wonderful book available at Truth2u. And one of the things I love about our book is, what it caused us to do is, to go through the prayer itself and find out the root of this prayer and the meaning of the prayer. And we came to find out something really powerful, that Yeshua, when he was teaching this prayer, he's actually teaching this prayer and taking the concepts from the Tanakh and bringing those concepts into this prayer so that the people that are listening, they would understand things that I, as a westerner, wouldn't necessarily understand when I read the English prayer. One of them was when he talked about, do not bring me into the hands of a test. The root of that word, test, is the very thing that we see here. The people are testing, he is testing, and then he says, do not bring us into the hands of a test. And I didn't know until I slowed down in this particular verse and saw that the word Massa itself came from the root of the very same word for test. And so it jumps off the page in Hebrew, it doesn't necessarily jump off the page in English. But then that's a little bit more of an understanding of what Yeshua was actually adding into his prayer.

Jono: Sure, and this is what we mentioned the following part, and this is how the Torah portion ends. We mentioned this in the previous Torah portion. “The Amalekites came and fought with Israel in Refidim, and Moses said to Joshua, choose some of the men and go out, fight with Amalek and tomorrow I will stand on the top of the hill with the rod of God in my hand. So, Joshua did as Moses said to him, and fought with Amalek, and Moses and Aaron and Hur went up on top of the hill. And so, it was that when Moses held up his hand that Israel prevailed and when he let his hand down, Amalek prevailed. But Moses's hands became heavy so that they took a stone and put it under him and he sat on it, and Aaron and Hur supported his hands, one on the other, each on one side. And his hands were steady until the going down of the sun. So Joshua defeated Amalek and his people with the edge of the sword. And then Yehovah said to Moses, ‘Write for a memorial in the book and recount it in the hearing of Joshua, that I will utterly blot out the remembrance of Amalek from under heaven’. And Moses built an altar and called its name”, and this is what I've got, and before I read it, I'm just going to say, there is little, one of those annoying little asterisks just before it. But, “he built an altar and called its name, the Lord is my banner.” The interesting thing about this is that it's all hyphenated. “The-Lord-is-my-banner”, which I assume is maybe one word? Nehemia, what have you got?

Nehemia: I'm going to let Keith do that one, are you kidding me?

Jono: Go for it.

Keith: [laughs] Come on Nehemia.

Nehemia: He has got the whole thing in his little book about this.

Keith: [laughs] What do you mean my little book? Nehemia, let's do this. When you see that in Hebrew, what do you think of? In other words, when he says he's about to call, it happens to be a very important word. We did something during Hanukkah last year, Nehemia and I, standing against the ban regarding Hanukkah and the meaning of khanukat hamizbe’akh, the dedication of the altar, and this idea that when they would set up an altar, it also became the place that they would call upon His name. So here we have an example with Moses, where Moses built a mizbe’akh. And what do you do at the mizbe’akh? You call upon His name and it says here, "He called his name, its name, or Yehovah".

Nehemia: Does it say “it” or “his” in the original Hebrew?

Keith: It says “shemo”.

Nehemia: But does that mean “it” or “his”?

Keith: Well, assuming that he's calling the altar this name.

Nehemia: The point is that Hebrew doesn't have a word for “it”. The altar is masculine, so literally it says, “And he called his name Yehovah “nissi”," Yehovah is my banner, Yehovah my banner. And the question is, did he call the name of the altar that, or did he call Yehovah that? Presumably it's the altar in the context.

Keith: I don't know what you're looking at, Jono. You're saying that when it says, “the Lord is my banner”, they change it and put an asterisk? What does the asterisk say?

Jono: In Hebrew it's got the Tetragrammaton and Nissi.

Keith: I've got to give the New King James Version some credit. There are a couple times where they do something that's really kind of against the other translations. They'll slip up and let some stuff in there. That's why I make this argument. I think that one of the folks on the committee had to be one of the angels unaware that stood on the table and made sure that they kept some things in there so that folks like Jono would be able to connect the dots. I appreciate the New King James Version for that. In the NIV there is no asterisk, there is no note. You're just supposed to move on and say, “the Lord is my Banner,” now let's move on.

Jono: “For he said, because Yehovah has sworn, Yehovah will have war with Amalek from generation to generation.” This is, of course, Saul. He kind of messed that up for us, didn't he?

Nehemia: Yes, but is that what yours says in English? Keith, read verse 16 in your English.

Keith: Okay, 16 says, “Moses built an altar and called it, the Lord is my Banner. He said, for hands were lifted up to the throne of the Lord, the Lord will be at war against the Amalekites from generation to generation.”

Nehemia: Literally it says, "For hand upon the throne of Yah, war for Yehovah against Amalek from generation to generation.” That's what it literally says.

Jono: There it is, oh boy.

Nehemia: Can I jump back to verse 10 really quick?

Jono: Please.

Nehemia: Who goes up with Moses onto the mountain? We have Joshua going out to war and Moses goes up onto this hill, and two people go with Moses, Aaron and Hur. Who’s Hur?

Jono: I have no idea. Who is he? One of Aaron's mates?

Nehemia: He's mentioned a couple more times, but you don't really know who he is. Well, Ben Hur is a movie, of course.

Keith: What do the rabbis say?

Nehemia: That's a really good question that escapes me at the moment. They'll identify him with some more famous character, that's what the rabbis tend to do. But the bottom line is we don't know who Hur is, and I think that's really interesting in itself.

Jono: It's kind of interesting.

Keith: And I think it’s okay that we don't know.

Nehemia: If you want to know who he really is, you can pay $99.95 and buy the secret from…no. [laughing] Look, we can make this into a big secret, but the bottom line is that we don't know who he is. There's a number of people named Hur in the Bible. Betzalel, who later becomes the guy who creates the tabernacle, the artisan behind the tabernacle. He's the grandson of somebody named Hur.

There's another Hur, who is mentioned in The Book of Chronicles, who may have been from that period, who is the son of Caleb, but we don't really know who Hur is.

Jono: There we go. So that was the Torah portion, we have come to the end. And before we go, Nehemia, we had not yet prayed the prayer from Psalm 119:18. We need to do that before we go. Would you be so kind?

Nehemia: Absolutely. Yehovah elohenu, elohe Avrhram, elohe Yitzchak, elohe Yaakov, gal enenu vinabita niflaot mitorahtecha. Yehovah, our Elohim, the Elohim of Abraham, the Elohim of Isaac and the Elohim of Jacob, uncover our eyes that we may see the wonderful hidden things of your Torah. Amen.

Jono: Amen. Thank you, Keith Johnson, thank you Nehemia Gordon. Their website is aprayertoourfather.com., hishallowedname.com., nehemiaswall.com.

And next week, we are in Yitro, Exodus 18:1, to 20:23. Until then dear listeners, be blessed, be set apart by the truth of our Father's word. Shalom.

You have been listening to The Original Torah Pearls with Nehemia Gordon, Keith Johnson and Jono Vandor. Thank you for supporting Nehemia Gordon’s Makor Hebrew Foundation. Learn more at NehemiasWall.com.

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  • donald murphy says:

    When pray tell r the people going to discern that Christianity and jc r false???

  • donald murphy says:

    Why on earth r u guys teaching from pagan books, koran, the so called new testament. What become of not learning the ways of the heathen??? Come on.

  • Nick Strickland says:

    I think that the 430 years May have started when Abraham cut the covenant and waited on Yehovah and had his vision of the Torches and darkness fell upon him and Yehovah said his descendants would be in slavery in coming days

  • Ava dah says:

    According to Rabbi Isaac, Hur was Miriams’ husband. I don’t recall if he gave the source of that info.

  • shell says:

    Neh 13: v20. So the merchants and sellers of all kind of ware lodged without Jerusalem once or twice.
    v21. Then I testified against them, and said unto them, Why lodge ye about the wall? if ye do [so] again, I will lay hands on you. From that time forth came they no [more] on the sabbath

    *So by this, on the sabbath you cant have the doordash guy bring the field to you either. And if he tries to anyways and hes still on your porch and keeps ringing the bell, you can threaten to beat him up. Im really feelin this torah portion 👊😁👍

  • VictoriaRose says:

    Just thinking….
    Re:. “…Four 5ths were left behind:”
    Many people have a hard time believing 3 million people could decend from the 70 people of Jacob’s family that went down to Egypt in only 3-4 generations. How realistic is it then for 15 million to decend from those same 70 people in only 3-4 generations?

  • J.J says:

    I’m sure you’ve addressed this in the past, but I recall hearing somewhere that if there are 1000 women and 1 man, in Hebrew one refers to the group in the masculine. so just wondering what the possibility of the the 600,000 actually being inclusive of all genders/ages.

  • J.J says:

    I just got to wondering how long Isra’el we’re actually slaves in Egypt. They were certainly welcomed when they got there and it would surely take a while to forget the story of David who saved them from a great famine.

  • Lynn says:

    Thank you Nehemiah for your faithfulness and love of YeHoVaH and truth. I was introduced to you from watching Shabbat night Live over the years. Now I have entered a season into listening to your shows as I continue to search for Biblical Truth. The show gave me a wider understanding on not only a Hebraic mindset on difficult issues but also challenging myself to the truth. YeHoVaH asks us to follow and he will reveal the details as we follow and develop our relationship with him.

  • Darlene Williamson says:

    I love the written word of Yahovah his Torah

  • Joseph Cartwright says:

    Got it

  • suzanholland says:

    let’s be clear, there are “tongues of men and of angels”…and there are also “demonic tongues” (of fallen angels), so some of the so-called babbling should be treated with deep reverence (since it it the Ruach HaKodesh who is speaking), and some with great “concern”…much discernment (and greater reverence, perhaps) needed. shalom

  • Indeed………YHVH is the source of our Yeshua! And He came as He said He would, lowly. And He will come again as He said He would, exalted.

    • Angela&Dale Adams says:

      Hallelujah! Yes that’s our hope,,,,that HE is coming back! To stablishe his kingdom, much needed.

  • Dori says:

    I am amazed that many believe they only had manna to eat for 40 yrs. Would God really do that? Manna was their grain and their animals grain. They had their flocks with them. They could have had manna pancakes, lamb chops, steaks. It was their bread!

    • Suzan Holland says:

      Seems they would have…but then why did He send them quail so that they would have “flesh” to eat? shalom

    • A close reading of the Torah reveals during the wilderness wonderings all domesticated animal slaughter had to be a sacrifice unto G-d. So they were not just eating lambs and cows anytime they wanted meat. Case in point, why did the people request meat to eat?

  • Kevin George says:

    In chapter 14, the Hebrew verb in verse 14 is in the niphal or passive form, so rather than “The LORD will fight for you…”, it seems better translated “The LORD will be embattled for you…” Verse 27 supports this were the word translated “overthrew” is וַיְנַעֵר which means he “shook off” the Egyptians. It’s as if Yehovah says “Bring it on!” Then the Egyptians see their wheels falling off and realize they are fighting Him and not Israel, He shakes them off, and then Moses closes the waters over them.

  • Yosie schmidt says:

    I thank everyone, especially the young for teaching me the words of my beloved
    Keep it up . SHABBAT SHALOM FROM AUSTRALIA ?

  • Victoria Loyd says:

    How much manna where they allowed a day?Was it an omer a day? If so how much is in an omer?

  • Victoria Loyd says:

    Great idea about the mentallity of a slave. I was thinking thats probably why Yahovah had Moses raised in pharoah’s house, because he had been free his whole life. Moses was able to help them think differently.

  • Margie Loubser says:

    Praise yahshua all,
    I tend to agree with you sister, now let us get a bit churchy as that seems to be the tasteless flavour in our day. Shaul says some plant and some water but elohim gives the increase in short we grow in him, as he allows us to grow, and quite sure if we choose incorrectly elohim will correct us as he deems fit for us. For example the three possible routes we will take to how the benei yisrael left bondage (the fifth), is elohims leading as we should and are hopefully trusting him, not man, unless he is an instrument in elohims hand, to mould and shape us. For instance and not wanting to get personal, as this is a personal relationship with our creator. There are three who we listen to in these transmissions and they don’t all share the same revelation on who the messiah or moshiach is. All can be correct on his appearance (there will be a messianic period), the difference will lie in the scheduled event ie: when, the first or the second occasion and his or the identity of messiah/moshiach. The fact is that not all possibilities will be correct. So we can be correct in the hebrew appilication, but this does not extend to determination of the correctness of ones personal relationship with elohim, or in this case our application in other languages. In some countries they have numerious variations in one particular language, even hebrew has the scriptural old and modern hebrew, new hebrew, our scholars will have to bow to the fact that they are not entirely the same. My lean towards a superiour stance in the last sentence is intentional, the spelling of superiour is also intentional, with emphasis on the our, intentional, well, that our intentions, should be global. If i may in my insignificant capacity, the only globalisation that should be our prayer, is a deep ruach and emet (spirit and truth) walk with elohim, but once again this is personal. In the tasteless section of scripture, it speaks about and many are quotations, of mockers and the mouth being the challenge to control, (place the brain into gear, what is pure, what is protitable etc, before engaging the mouth). Should our mouth be conquered then we basically have won a great victory. Well my scriptures tell me, that no battle is won without, el gibour/our elohim, who according to shaul alone gives the increase. So what is our part? Sow and water, for it is elohim that we are serving not man, so let elohim develope our personal relationship with him, for he alone gives and takes and he alone should increase in us. Sorry brothers but this was necessary. May yahshua bless you. Shalom and remember that he loves us all. Especially those who are trying to please him.

  • Jane says:

    I have so thoroughly enjoyed the richness of your discussions. Thank you. However, periodically I hear mocking of other people’s beliefs. I speak in tongues and fully believe that this is from Yehovah. I also believe in divine healing. I don’t believe that the air of superiority that comes with making fun of other people’s beliefs is ever pleasing to Yehovah.
    JS