Caerus and Judah hanging out (of my jeans drawer).

#Caturday #Caerus #Judah

Samaritanism

Samaritanism is an Abrahamic monotheistic, ethnic religion. It comprises the collective spiritual, cultural, & legal traditions of the Samaritan people.

Often preferring to be called Israelite Samaritans, who originated from the Hebrews & Israelites. They began to emerge as a relatively distinct group after the Kingdom of Israel was conquered by the Neo-Assyrian Empire during the Iron Age. The Neo-Assyrian Empire was the 4th, & penultimate, stage of ancient Assyrian history.

Central to their continuity as an Indigenous Heritage in the Holy Land is keeping the Patriarchal & Mosaic covenant as specified in the Samaritan Torah. Samaritans believe this is the original & unchanged version of the Pentateuch (which is the first 5 books of the Hebrew & Christian bible) since Moses & the Israelites at Mount Sinai.

The Abisha Scroll is traditionally held by the community to be the oldest existing scroll written by Abisha, son of Aaron the priest, around 3,000 years ago based on living tradition. However, Jewish & Christian theologians have made attempts to dispute this claim which proved unsatisfactory.

Judaism claims Samaritanism developed right alongside their own religion. Samaritanism asserts itself as the true preserved form of the monotheistic faith that the Israelites kept under Moses. Samaritan belief also holds that the Israelites’ original holy site was Mount Gerizim, near Nablus, the State of Palestine (West Bank).

They also believe that Jerusalem only attained importance under Israelite dissenters who had followed Eli (In the Book of Samuel, Eli was a priest & judge of the Israelites in the city of Shiloh) to the city of Shiloh.

The Israelites who remained at Mount Gerizim would become the Samaritans in the Kingdom of Judah. Mount Gerizim is revered by Samaritans as the location where the Binding of Isaac occurred. In comparison to the Jewish belief that it occurred at Jerusalem’s Temple Mount.

Today there are only about 900 registered communal members. This puts Samaritanism as 1 of the smallest ethnoreligious groups globally in the Abrahamic faiths. Samaritans believe that this is a prophecy fulfilled from the scriptures: “You’ll be left few in number.”

Though they hope for a future time when a prophet like Moses known as the “Taheb” (Restorer) will perform 3 signs, namely the jar of manna, the staff of Moses, & Cherubim, or the Golden Candlestick.

This time period they believe is when an era of Divine Favor would return, & the hidden tabernacle of Moses would miraculously be revealed for the Israelite people & Mount Gerizim is restored to its former glory.

Samaritans trace their history, as a separate entity, to a period soon after the Israelites’ arrival into the “Promised Land.” Samaritan historiography traces the schism to High Priest Eli leaving Mount Gerizim, where stood the 1st Israelite altar in Canaan, & building a competing altar in nearby Shiloh.

The dissenting group of Israelites who followed Eli to Shiloh would be the ones who, in later years, would head south to settle in Jerusalem (the Jews). Whereas the Israelites who stayed on Mount Gerizim, in Samaria, would become known as the Samaritans.

Genetic studies in 2004 suggest that Samaritans’ lineages trace back to a common ancestor with Jews in the paternally-inherited Jewish high priesthood (Cohanim) temporally near to the period of the Assyrian conquest of the Kingdom of Israel. They’re probably descendants of the historical Israelite population. The Cohanim refers to the Jewish priestly class, male descendants of Aaron the priest.

The Hasmonean king, John Hyrcanus, destroyed the Mount Gerizim Temple & brought Samaria under his control around 120 BCE. This led to a long-lasting sense of mutual hostility between the Jews & Samaritans.

From this point, the Samaritans likely sought to consciously distance themselves from their Judean brethren. Both peoples came to see the Samaritan faith as a religion distinct from Judaism. By the time of Jesus, Samaritans & Jews deeply disparaged one another, as shown by Jesus’ Parable of the Good Samaritan.

The main beliefs of Samaritanism are:

• There’s 1 God, Yahweh, the same God recognized by the Jewish prophets.
• The Torah is the only true holy book & was given by God to Moses. The Torah was created before the creation of the world & whoever believes in it is assured a part in the world to come. The Torah’s status in Samaritanism as the only holy book causes them to reject the Oral Torah, the Talmud, & all the prophets & scriptures, except for a version of the Book of Joshua (which they don’t hold as Scripture), whose book in the Samaritan community is significantly different from the Book of Joshua in the Jewish “Bible.” Moses is considered to be the last of the line of prophets.
• Mount Gerizim, not Jerusalem, is the 1 true sanctuary chosen by God. The Samaritans don’t recognize the sanctity of Jerusalem & don’t recognize the Temple Mount, claiming instead that Mount Gerizim was the place where the Binding of Isaac took place.
• The Apocalypse, called “the day of vengeance,” will be the end of days. When an entity called the Taheb (basically the Jewish Messiah equal) that comes from the tribe of Joseph will come, be a prophet like Moses for 40 years & bring about the return of all the Israelites, following which the dead will be resurrected. The Tahib will then discover the tent of Moses’ Tabernacle on Mount Gerizim, & will be buried next to Joseph when he dies.

The Samaritans have retained the institution of a high priesthood & the practice of slaughtering & eating lambs on Passover Eve. They celebrated Pesach, Shavuot, & Sukkot. But they use a different method from that used in mainstream Judaism in order to determine the dates annually.

For example, Yom Teru’ah (the biblical name for Rosh Hashanah), at the beginning of Tishrei (This is the 1st month of the civil year & the 7th month of the ecclesiastical year in the Hebrew calendar.), isn’t considered a New Year as it is in Rabbinic Judaism.

Their Sabbath is observed weekly by the Samaritan community every week from Friday to Saturday, beginning & ending at sundown. For 24 hours, the families gather together to celebrate the rest day: all electricity with the exception of minimal lighting (kept on the entire day) in the house is disconnected, no work is done, & neither cooking nor driving is allowed.

The time is devoted to worship which consists of 7 prayer services, reading the weekly Torah portion, spending quality time with family, taking meals, rest & sleep, & visiting other members of the community.

Passover is particularly important in the Samaritan community, climaxing with the sacrifice of up to 40 sheep.

The Counting of the Omar remains relatively unchanged. The Counting of the Omar is a ritual in Judaism that consists of a verbal counting of each of the 49 days between the holidays of Passover & Shavuot. However, the week before Shavuot is a unique festival celebrating the continued commitment Samaritanism has maintained since the time of Moses.

During Sukkot, the Sukkah (the temporary hut built for use during Sukkot) is built INSIDE of houses, instead of OUTSIDE like mainstream Judaism. This Samaritan tradition is traced back to the persecution of the Samaritans during the Byzantine Empire.

The roof of the Samaritan Sukkah is decorated with citrus fruits & branches of palm, myrtle, & willow trees. This is in accordance with the Samaritan interpretation of the 4 species designated in the Torah for the holiday. The 4 species are 4 plants (the etrog, lulav, hadass, & aravah) mentioned in the Torah as being relevant to the Jewish holiday of Sukkot.

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#120BCE #4Species #Aaron #Abisha #AbishaScroll #AbrahamicFaiths #AncientAssyria #Apoclypse #Aravah #BindingOfIsaac #BookOfJoshua #BookOfSamuel #ByzantineEmpire #Canaan #Cherubim #Christians #CitrusFruits #Cohanim #CountingOfTheOmar #Eli #Etrog #GoldenCandlestick #Hadass #Hasmonean #HebrewCalendar #Hebrews #HighPriestEli #HighPriesthood #IndigenousPeoples #IronAge #IsraeliteSamaritans #Israelites #Jerusalem #Jesus #Jewish #JewishProphets #Jews #Joseph #Judah #KingJohnHyrcanus #KingdomOfIsrael #Lulav #Manna #Messiah #MosaicCovenant #Moses #MountGerizim #MountSinai #Myrtle #Nablus #NeoAssyrianEmpire #OralTorah #Palestine #ParableOfTheGoodSamaritan #Passover #PatriarchalCovenant #Pentateuch #Priest #PromisedLand #RabbinicJudaism #RoshHashanah #Sabbath #SamaritanTorah #Samaritanism #Shavuot #Shiloh #StaffOfMoses #Sukkah #Sukkot #Tabernacle #Taheb #Talmud #TempleMount #Tishrei #Torah #WestBank #Willow #Yahweh #YomTeruAh

Old Testament Reading: Jeremiah 8:18-9:1

#Jeremiah imagined the #distress of #Judah during its devastation.

Psalms 107-109

Psalm 107

Give thanks to the Lord, for He is good. His love endures forever. Let the redeemed of the Lord say this – those He redeemed from the hand of the foe, those He gathered from the lands, from East & West, from North & South.

Some wandered in desert wastelands, finding no way to a city where they could settle. They were hungry & thirsty, & their lives ebbed away. Then they cried out to the Lord in their trouble, & He delivered them from their distress.

He led them by a straight way to a city where they could settle. Let them give thanks to the Lord for His unfailing love & His wonderful deeds for men, for He satisfies the thirsty & fills the hungry with good things.

Some sat in darkness & the deepest gloom, prisoners suffering in iron chains, for they’d rebelled against the words of God & despised the counsel of the Most High. So He subjected them to bitter labor. They stumbled & there was no one to help.

Then they cried to the Lord in their trouble, & He saved them from their distress. He brought them out of darkness & the deepest gloom & broke away their chains. Let them give thanks to the Lord for His unfailing love & His wonderful deeds for men.

For He breaks down gates of bronze & cuts through bars of iron. Some became fools through their rebellious ways & suffered affliction because of their iniquities. They loathed all food & drew near the gates of death.

Then they cried to the Lord in their trouble, & He saved them from their distress. He sent forth His word & healed them. He rescued them from their distress. He rescued them from the grave. Let them give thanks to the Lord for His unfailing love & His wonderful deeds for men.

Let them sacrifice thank offerings & tell of His works with songs of joy. Others went out on the sea in ships. They were merchants on the mighty waters. They saw the works of the Lord, His wonderful deeds in the deep.

For He spoke & stirred up a tempest that lifted high the waves. They mounted up to the Heavens & went down to the depths, in their peril their courage melted away. They reeled & staggered like drunken men.

They were at their wits’ end. Then they cried out to the Lord in their trouble, & he brought them out of their distress. He stilled the storm to a whisper, the waves of the sea were hushed. They were glad when it grew calm, & he guided them to their desired haven.

Let them give thanks to the Lord for His unfailing love & His wonderful deeds for men. Let them exalt Him in the assembly of the people & praise Him in the council of the elders. He turned rivers into a desert, flowing springs into thirsty ground, & fruitful land into a salt waste, because of the wickedness of those who lived there.

He turned the desert into pools of water & the parched ground into flowing springs. There He brought the hungry to live, & they founded a city where they could settle. They sowed fields & planted vineyards that yielded a fruitful harvest.

He blessed them, & their numbers greatly increased, & He didn’t let their herds diminish. Then their numbers decreased, & they were humbled by oppression, calamity, & sorrow. He who pours contempt on nobles made them wander in a trackless waste.

But He lifted the needy out of their affliction & increased their families like flocks. The upright see & rejoice, but all the wicked shut their mouths. Whoever is wise, let him heed these things, & consider the great love of the Lord.

Psalm 108

My heart is steadfast, O God. I’ll sing & make music with all my soul. Awake, harp & lyre! I’ll awaken the dawn. I’ll praise you, O Lord, among the nations. I’ll sing of you among the peoples. For great is Your love, higher than the Heavens. Yet Your faithfulness reaches to the skies.

Be exalted, O God, above the heavens, & let Your glory be over all the Earth. Save us & help us with Your right hand, that those You love may be delivered. God has spoken from His sanctuary: “In triumph, I’ll parcel out Shechem & measure off the Valley of Succoth.”

“Gilead is Mine, Manasseh is Mine; Ephraim is My helmet, Judah My scepter. Moab is My washbasin, upon Edom I toss My sandal; over Philistia, I shout in triumph.” Who will bring me to the fortified city?

Who will lead me to Edom? Is it not You, O God, You who have rejected us & no longer go out with our armies? Give us aid against the enemy, for the help of man is worthless. With God we’ll gain the victory & He’ll trample down our enemies.

Psalm 109

O God, whom I praise, don’t remain silent. For wicked & deceitful men have opened their mouths against me. They’ve spoken against me with lying tongues. With words of hatred, they surround me. They attack me without cause.

In return for my friendship they accuse me, but I’m a man of prayer. They repay me evil for good & hatred for my friendship. Appoint an evil man to oppose him. Let an accuser stand at his right hand.

When he’s tried, let him be found guilty, & may his prayers condemn him. May his day be few. May another take his place of leadership. (Check out Acts 1:20.) May he’s children be fatherless & his wife a widow. May his children be wandering beggars. May they be driven from their ruined homes.

May a creditor seize all he has. May strangers plunder the fruits of his labor. May no one extend kindness to him or take pity on his fatherless children. May his descendants be cut off, their names blotted out from the next generation.

May the iniquity of his fathers be remembered before the Lord. May the sin always remain before the Lord, that he may cut off the memory of them from the earth. For he never thought of doing a kindness, but hounded to death the poor & the needy & the brokenhearted.

He loved to pronounce a curse – may it come on him. He found no pleasure in blessing – may if be far from him. He wore cursing as his garment. It entered into his body like water, into his bones like oil.

May it be like a cloak wrapped about him, like a belt tied forever around him. May this be the Lord’s payment to my accusers, to those who speak evil of me. But you, O Sovereign Lord, deal well with me for Your name’s sake.

Out of the goodness of Your love, deliver me. For I’m poor & needy, & my heart is wounded within me. I fade away like an evening shadow. I’m shaken off like a locust. My knees give way from fasting.

My body is thin & gaunt. I’m an object of scorn to my accusers. When they see me, they shake their heads. Help me, O Lord my God. Save me in accordance with Your love. Let them know that it’s Your hand.

That you, O Lord, have done it. They may curse, but You’ll bless. When they attack, they’ll put to shame. My accusers will be clothed with disgrace & wrapped in shame as in a cloak. With my mouth, I’ll greatly extol the Lord.

In the great throng, I’ll praise him. For he stands at the right hand of the needy one, to save his life from those who condemn him.

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#Acts120 #Edom #Ephraim #Gilead #Judah #Manasseh #Moab #Philistia #Psalm107 #Psalm108 #Psalm109 #Shechem #ValleyOfSuccoth

Old Testament Reading: Isaiah 1:1, 10-20

#Isaiah indicted #Judah for their #sins.