Ask about Judaism

[agricola]

It is the month of Elul, in which we review our conduct of the past year, and try to resolve any disputes or problems with other people, prior to the High Holy Days of Rosh Hashana to Yom Kippur:

So this is a general apology to everyone here, for my occasional but too frequent short temper and lax attendance in the past year, in posting comments and monitoring threads.

[B.H.]

It is the month of Elul, in which we review our conduct of the past year, and try to resolve any disputes or problems with other people, prior to the High Holy Days of Rosh Hashana to Yom Kippur:

So this is a general apology to everyone here, for my occasional but too frequent short temper and lax attendance in the past year, in posting comments and monitoring threads.

I've been waiting for your apology for quite some time. Of course, I am totally innocent.

[ena]

It is the month of Elul, in which we review our conduct of the past year, and try to resolve any disputes or problems with other people, prior to the High Holy Days of Rosh Hashana to Yom Kippur:

So this is a general apology to everyone here, for my occasional but too frequent short temper and lax attendance in the past year, in posting comments and monitoring threads.

I find you kind and considerate. Almost beyond what could be expected. I have many times appreciated your responses. I wish I knew more about the Hebrew calendar.

[agricola]

It's a bit complicated, ena. Basically it is lunar. Like the Islamic calendar. BUT it has 'corrections' (like Leap Year) to adjust the year to the solar year (the seasons) so that our holidays don't drift around too much, but always fall in their proper season.

Every third year or so (seven times in nineteen years), we add an extra month, just before Passover. It is called 'Second Adar' because it comes after Adar (go figure). So this year, which is NOT a Leap Year, Rosh Hashana is in early September. So next spring we will enjoy Adar twice, and when RH rolls around NEXT fall, it will be at the END of September.

A lunar year is about 11 days shorter than the general calendar year (which is solar), so with a lunar calendar of 354-ish days, any given 'date' falls 11 days earlier in each successive solar year calendar.

A Jewish calendar month ALWAYS starts on the New Moon,and the 15th of the month is ALWAYS on the full moon. Most Biblical Jewish holidays fall on either the New Moon (Rosh Hashana) or on the night of the Full Moon (Purim, Passover, Sukkot).

[ena]

It could have been, doesn't have to have been.

Whether one thinks it was the Passover meal or not depends on which gospel chronology you go with, because they are different. In one, the dinner is the Passover meal and the next day was the first day of Passover, except if that were the case, it is somewhat unlikely that the Romans would have been executing anyone, plus there's that bit about pleading to get him down 'before the Sabbath' at sundown. (just because it says' the sabbath' doesn't absolutely mean the day was on Friday, because it is possible to use 'the sabbath' to refer to the first day of Passover also - do I need to explain that Jewish 'days' begin at sundown here?)

John, I think, puts the dinner on the day BEFORE Passover because in John it is very important for Jesus to be equated to the sacrifice of the Passover lamb, which happens on the day (during the day) BEFORE Passover begins (at sundown) so he can do this theological deal with Jesus' death and the death of the Passover lambs going on at the temple at the same time.....get it?

Otherwise, having the dinner be the Passover meal works fine, complete with breaking bread as a group and eating a Passover roasted whole lamb as a group (because it must all be eaten at the one meal, and no single person can do that so you have to have a group) and also the wine. Except if it WAS a Passover meal, then John's whole theory of Jesus being the 'lamb that was slain' etc falls apart.

So pick your side of that argument. I have no ax to grind about it. It can be a Passover dinner or not.

However, the 'seder meal' we have today is probably something actually developed AFTER the destruction of the temple in 70 CE by the Romans, so whatever they were doing it wasn't 'the seder' as we know it now. The seder as we know it now began developing sometime in the late first to third centuries. It was pretty set, most likely, by the middle second century CE.

Excellent discussion of the Lords Supper. Christians tend to roll the gospels into one ball and have them saying the same thing. They don't. Who shows up at the tomb to take care of the body varies. Athiests often laugh at Christians for this. Innerrantists are called Bibliolaters. It means Bible Idolaters. There are Gospels outside the canon. One is the Gospel of Peter which claims to see a giant Jesus coming out of the tomb along with a talking cross. I doubt this was witnessed by humans. The doorway is not big enough. The timing of the Crucifixion is problematic. The taking of Jesus down from the cross is problematic. Romans were known to leave bodies on the cross for a few days for advertisement and amusement as they were eaten by birds. I love your seder comment. It looks like Jesus may have co-opted a seder or Passover. I would think that would be offensive to most Jews because he would be redirecting the purpose.

[ena]

It's a bit complicated, ena. Basically it is lunar. Like the Islamic calendar. BUT it has 'corrections' (like Leap Year) to adjust the year to the solar year (the seasons) so that our holidays don't drift around too much, but always fall in their proper season.

Every third year or so (seven times in nineteen years), we add an extra month, just before Passover. It is called 'Second Adar' because it comes after Adar (go figure). So this year, which is NOT a Leap Year, Rosh Hashana is in early September. So next spring we will enjoy Adar twice, and when RH rolls around NEXT fall, it will be at the END of September.

A lunar year is about 11 days shorter than the general calendar year (which is solar), so with a lunar calendar of 354-ish days, any given 'date' falls 11 days earlier in each successive solar year calendar.

A Jewish calendar month ALWAYS starts on the New Moon,and the 15th of the month is ALWAYS on the full moon. Most Biblical Jewish holidays fall on either the New Moon (Rosh Hashana) or on the night of the Full Moon (Purim, Passover, Sukkot).

Thanks! I hope you are aware of the red sea crossing. It was found by Rom Wyatt along granite pillars to mark the crossing. Mt Sinai is in Saudi Arabia. It all fits together. There are Egyptian chariot wheels on the sea floor. Most of them were six spoked. There are 4 and eight spoked but not many. They are covered with barnicles. The metal hubs can be detected with a metal detector under water. The children of Israel went down a wadi between the mountains. They were trapped. It does spill out onto a beach. The Egyptians were blocked by God back in the wadi. Pillar of fire remember. Until the people could cross the Gulf of Aquaba. He released the Egyptians and let the water swallow them and their chariots. There many chariot wheels un the water along with skeletons. A horses hoof was brought to the surface. The wheels are best left there. I have spent hours watching Ron Wyatt videos on this.
They are on youtube. Here is a good one that shows the wadi. The beach is limited. They were trapped. Its about 8 miles to Saudi Arabia. There are many chariot wheels.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5eRVcvDvGZo

[agricola]

Um. No ena, none of that stuff holds up a bit. That guy is pulling a fast one.

The crossing of the sea - in Hebrew, it is the sea of REEDS, not the Red Sea. It was likely a shallow lake or marsh MUCH closer to Egypt's borders than an arm of the Red Sea.

The description of events in Exodus is a lot more reasonable than the more dramatic tale in Deuteronomy.

The wind blew hard all night and moved the shallow water from one side of the playa to another, and in the morning, the lightly weighted humans on foot could cross the somewhat dry mud crust without problems, but the heavier and narrower chariot wheels of Egyptian troops would break through the crust and be mired in the wet mud beneath. Then the wind changed, and the water came back.

We see that ALL THE TIME on the salt flats around Wendover - the famous Bonneville Salt Flats are sometimes flooded, and a wind can definitely push what looks like an entire lake over from one side of the wide flat valley to the other - and the surface of the salt mud dries fast. PEOPLE can walk around, but CARS often break through and sink down to the frame in an instant.

There are signs, but some people can't resist trying to spin a 360 out on the flats...until they need to be towed with special equipment, it's all fun and games.

https://www.google.com/search?q=images+ ... v5oDyiYkNM:

[ena]

I am aware of the Reed Sea but that would confuse others. The Red Sea itself is too deep. The gulf is less deep but today there are no reeds. I cannot say about the past. Israel was once the land of milk and honey. Today it is much dryer. I like the use of desalinization in Israel and drip irrigation. I wish the Bay Area would use it rather rob Hetch Hetchy in the Sierras. We use the water for farming. The canal it 167 miles long. The dam and lake it comes from is in the Hetch Hetchy valley. Built around 1934. Much of California is semi arid. We have trees in the sierras. They are fewer due to fire storms. We had a fire tornado in the north. I expect more bad weather in the coming years. You could see smoke smog in San Jose from a nearby fire. It is worse than usual this year.

[agricola]

Goat milk and date honey - same like now, pretty much.

[ena]

Goat milk and date honey - same like now, pretty much.

My father in law had a small herd of goats. I have milked them. Their teats are large and they are easy to milk. His produced nearly a gallon per goat twice a day. He had three nannies so thats 6 gallons per day. They were milked at 7:00 AM and 7:00 PM. The milk from the milk if recent tasted like cow milk. It would turn goaty in about 3 days. What you get in the store is goaty because it comes from Nubians because of their high butter fat content. His breed was Saanen. Saanens are white and Nubian are brown on the head. I like Saanen milk better. He made cheddar cheese out of the milk. It was really good. He and my wife were allergic to lactose in cow milk. She was nearly killed by cow milk based baby formula. She has a big scar on her back where doctors injected saline under the skin to keep her alive. They did not have the tiny hollow needles in the 1940's for baby IVs. Goats complain when their udders are full. They are cleaner than cows and very efficient animals.

My uncle had a small dairy with cows. You herd them to the milking barn. His had a concrete floor. There udders were washed before the milking machine was put on. A clean new milk filter was placed in the milker head for each cow.

Date honey sounds good. I got rid of a date palm. It is not hot enough here for the dates to set so you would end up with half formed dates all over the sidewalk. A real mess. It was also overgrowing the side walk and the city was charging us for the lifted sidewalk. We cut if down and planted a better tree. Palms are trouble here. My neighbor has one and I have to keep removing baby palms