GOD’S INSTRUCTIONS to the Israelites were surprisingly progressive for the time, prohibiting His people from engaging in predatory lending practices and providing for the poor, widows, and orphans (without a government agency to collect and redistribute wealth!).

We discuss God’s command that oxen not be muzzled while they’re treading out grain and its interesting connection to the war of Gog and Magog in Ezekiel 38 and 39. And we talk about God’s command to build an altar on Mount Ebal, overlooking Shechem, when the Israelites came into the land. We’ll have more on the significance of Shechem when we get to the Book of Joshua.

We also explain why Deut. 26:14 includes a command not to take any of the firstfruits and tithes of the produce of the land as offerings to the dead. It’s another clue that the pagan cult of the dead (i.e., the Rephaim/Nephilim) was a powerful influence on the ancient Canaanites.

Take advantage of Aaron Lipkin’s online seminars about the altar of Joshua at www.AltarofJoshua.com.

HALLOWEEN CELEBRATES death and the dead. Today, we set aside our schedule of scripture to discuss the spirits and how they’ve convinced humanity that engaging in practices forbidden by God is not only harmless, but profitable and fun.

We discuss Santa Muerte’s rise to prominence in Mexico, California’s schools embracing Aztec death cults as “ethnic studies,” and the spiritual and symbolic links between ancient Mesopotamia and the present day.

THE PUNISHMENT God ordered for a number of sins, ranging from sexual relations before marriage (for women) to rebelling against one’s parents (for sons), seems harsh by today’s standards.

We discuss the cultural and spiritual contexts for a number of things declared sin by God. Many of these things make no sense to us today because we don’t understand the world of the prophets and apostles or how these behaviors were connected to pagan religions of the day.

THE PEOPLE in Canaan engaged in what God called “abominable practices”: First, burning a child as an offering to Molech, followed by divination, reading omens, augury, sorcery, enchantment, consulting mediums, necromancy, and inquiring of the dead.

Derek argues in his forthcoming that these seven acts, which all involve contacting the spirit realm to gain influence or information, are connected to the worship of Molech, which was another name for the creator-god of the Canaanites El—also known as Dagon, Enlil, Kronos, and Saturn.

We believe this Watcher-class elohim is Shemihazah, leader of the rebels on Mount Hermon in the days of Jared, and is “the Destroyer” (Abaddon, or Apollyon), the king of those in the bottomless pit (Revelation 9).

GOD NEVER intended for us to be in perpetual debt. Our modern banking system is a reversal of God’s will and the fulfillment of prophecy—the work of the rider on the black horse (Rev. 6:5–6).

Financial servitude is not how God intended us to live. In our modern age of seven-year auto loans, twenty-year student loans, thirty-year mortgages, and perpetual credit card debt, the concept is almost unimaginable.

We also discuss the three main feasts required of Israel by God: Unleavened Bread, Weeks, and Booths (or Tabernacles, called Sukkot in Hebrew), and how the Feast of Booths connects to the Transfiguration, Mount Hermon, and the seventy “sons of El” who are probably the lesser elohim judged by God in Psalm 82.

Here is the link to the Institute of Biblical Anthropology, with courses taught by Dr. Judd Burton: www.tioba.org.

THE PUNISHMENT for an Israelite who led people to worship other gods was harsh: Death by stoning.

We explain why God was so insistent that His people followed His commands, especially the first commandment about not worshiping other gods—because those gods are real entities bent on destroying what God created and called good, including humankind.

OUR GOD is “God of gods and Lord of lords.” This isn’t just hyperbole; it means that Yahweh is supreme among the denizens of the spirit realm.

This week, we discuss Moses’ admonitions to the Israelites before they crossed the Jordan to dispossess the nations of Canaan, why Moses singled out the Anakim, and his warning to remember that God didn’t choose the Israelites as His inheritance because of their righteousness.

HEAR, O ISRAEL: The Lord our God, the Lord is one.

This week, we discuss the Shema, the affirmation of loyalty to God that represents the greatest commandment of Christianity and Judaism. We explain why “the Lord is one” more accurately means that God is unique in substance. A better sense of the verse is, “The Lord is our God, the Lord alone,” or, “The Lord is our God, the Lord is unique.”

We also discuss the importance of figuratively committing the Word of God to our hearts and minds, a principle reflected in God’s command to Israel to bind them to their hands and foreheads with the tefillin, a practice that will be twisted by the Antichrist someday with the Mark of the Beast.

GOD ALLOTTED other gods to the rest of the world, but kept Israel for Himself.


This week, we discuss another important verse for understanding the nature of the world:

And beware lest you raise your eyes to heaven, and when you see the sun and the moon and the stars, all the host of heaven, you be drawn away and bow down to them and serve them, things that the Lord your God has allotted to all the peoples under the whole heaven.
Deuteronomy 4:19 (ESV)
In context, this verse tells us that God delegated responsibility for other nations to lesser elohim, but reserved Israel for “His own inheritance” (Deut. 4:20).

We also discuss God’s prohibition on idolatry and why it’s more than just carving images; what God meant when He described Himself as “jealous”; and Moses’ recapitulation of the Ten Commandments.

THE BIBLE is not a history book, but the history recorded in the Bible is accurate.

This week, we take a deep dive into Deuteronomy 3, in which Moses retells the history of the Israelites from the conquest of Og of Bashan through their encampment on the plains of Moab opposite Beth-Peor.

We follow a number of rabbit trails, including a discussion of new research, brought to our attention by Aaron Lipkin, that suggests that the tribes of Ephraim and Manasseh were already in Canaan when the other ten tribes began the conquest.