Sunday, August 16, 2009

Does Isaiah 14:12 show that Lucifer is Satan?

Textual Critic Daniel Wallace has a blog entry about a popular You Tube video that purports to show from the Hebrew that Obama is the Antichrist. I watched the video but it doesn't really interest me much and Wallace shows that it manipulates facts to make its point (I'd noticed some time ago that "barak" means "lightning" in Hebrew which I thought was interesting anyway). Obama is certainly AN Antichrist, as I've noted here already, but we're waiting for THE Antichrist to be revealed, some time in the not so distant future I expect. Christians will recognize him then, when he is revealed.
2Th 2:3 ¶ Let no man deceive you by any means: for that day shall not come, except there come a falling away first, and that man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition;
But in discussing this video Wallace comments on one vexed verse in the Bible versions controversy:
Isaiah 14:12 How art thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning! how art thou cut down to the ground, which didst weaken the nations!
Wallace says:
Is Isaiah really the source for the Christian view of Satan? It may contribute to our understanding, but even that is disputed. The one passage that may speak about Satan is indeed Isa 14. But part of the reason for this being so interpreted is due to the influence of the KJV. At v. 12 the King James says, “O Lucifer, son of the morning!” The word lucifer, however, is simply a transliteration of the Latin Vulgate at this point. It is not another name for Satan.
Is this a mistake or merely an overemphasis on the influence of the KJV? Origen, who lived nearly two centuries before the translation of the Latin Vulgate, thought it was another name for Satan, and he didn't have the Vulgate or the King James English Bible, but a Greek Bible -- the Septuagint. Origen reads the passage rather differently than Westcott and Hort did (who are of course responsible for the new readings), understanding it to say the same as Jerome had it say in the Vulgate about the identity of Satan with Lucifer, and yet Jerome translated from the Hebrew text while Origen had the Septuagint:
"Concerning another opposing power, we are taught the following by the prophet Isaiah: The prophet says, 'How is Lucifer, who used to arise in the morning, fallen from heaven!' ... Most evidently by these words a being is shown to have fallen from heaven -- he who formerly was Lucifer, and who used to arise in the morning. For if he originally had a nature of darkness (as some think), how is it said that Lucifer existed this way before? Or how could he arise in the morning -- if he had in himself nothing of the light? Nay, even the Savior Himself teaches us, saying of the devil, 'Behold, I see Satan fallen from heaven like lightning.' For at one time he was light." --Origen, c. 225, 4.259. (From David Bercot's Dictionary of Early Christian Beliefs, p. 410)
Wallace goes on:
The Hebrew word, helel means ‘morning star’ or ‘shining one.’ Most modern translations (the NKJV is the only exception I found of the translations I checked) do not translate helel as Lucifer; rather they have ‘shining one,’ ‘day star,’ ‘morning star,’ etc. (cf., e.g., NET, ASV, RSV, NRSV, ESV, TEV, REB, NIV, TNIV, NAB, NJB, HCSB). Of course, there are still excellent scholars who believe that Isa 14 is ultimately a reference to Satan, though in the historical context it was directed at the Babylonian king.
Even Origen thought it was a reference to Satan, and he couldn't have been influenced by the King James Bible.

Odd that so many of the modern Bible versions prefer to blur this identity that is recognized as far back as Origen. Is it an intentional blurring or just another of Westcott and Hort's stupid blunders? The result is the same in any case: the equation IS blurred in the Bibles that derive from their work.

There is still the disturbing fact that "morning star" is part of Lucifer's title or name, and emphasized in the modern Bible versions, although Jesus Christ claims this title to Himself:
Re 22:16 I Jesus have sent mine angel to testify unto you these things in the churches. I am the root and the offspring of David, and the bright and morning star.
I may come back with some thoughts about this later.

Tuesday, August 4, 2009

End Times Prophecy site on how the Bible versions have crippled and disunified the church

I just found this site and so far I like it. He calls himself Word Weaver and his site is End Times Prophecy dot net. I haven't read much there yet but he has a good discussion of the Book of Enoch, as well as the text of the book itself, a book that has information that may be of much use to us in the very end days; and he's also KJV-only and has some good things to say about that:

from Part 2:
In short, what Satan started several thousands of years ago,
he has continued to do to our very day, albeit in a slightly
different form. Back then, he had his false scribes create
many different imitation scrolls, in order to confuse the
potential believers. To the untrained eye, to those who had
not been trained directly by Christ, or perhaps by one of
His Apostles, or maybe by one of their immediate Disciples,
it would be difficult to notice the difference between the
Divinely Inspired scrolls, and the false ones. Physically
speaking, they would all look about the same. Not only that,
but a cunning deceiver would gradually introduce changes to
the original text, as changing too much of the text at once
would certainly be too obvious, and would draw a lot of
attention to what was really being committed in the name of
truth. But over a period of time, these small, unnoticed
changes, a few words omitted or changed here, an extra
phrase added there, would result in an entirely new doctrine;
a false doctrine, and a false gospel, which was a perversion
of the original.

Thus, the corruptors did their dirty work, just as they are
doing in our current time as well; and that is why we have
so many different versions of the Bible today. As I point
out in such articles as "Have You Read The New Scriptures
Yet?", as well as in part two of "A Biblical Cafeteria Or
The Whole Course?", this deceptive work was not left to the
Jews alone. Only a few hundred years after Christ, when true
Christianity moved out of the coliseums of Rome, and into
the grandstands, and became a popular religion, others, such
as those people who would eventually become the founding
fathers of the Roman Catholic Church, also got into the act,
in order to promote their own agendas; the purpose of which
was to consolidate both their power and their wealth; even
if it was at the expense of doctrinal purity; which it most
certainly was, and has been.

Yes, our modern Bibles may all look the same on the outside, just as a lot of those old scrolls are similar in appearance as well; but hidden within their thin onion skin pages, they contain many subtle changes which have been slowly made over time; a little change here, a little change there; a little deception here, and a little deception there. As noted a moment ago, on its own, one small change may not appear to be very significant,
but collectively, when one considers all of the changes which have been made in a particular new
version, then the truth becomes rather alarming! Someone has intentionally perverted the true Gospel of Jesus Christ
!

For this reason then, in our current day, it requires a lot of spiritual discernment, in order to really know what is of Divine Inspiration. Sadly, this Gift of the Spirit is sorely lacking within modern Christianity, as the myriad of Bibles and confusing doctrines attests. It should now be very clear to you what Satan's secret weapon has been. It may very well be that black or red leather or vinyl bound book which is inscribed with the words "Holy Bible"! Is it the real thing; or is it a modern "designer version", designed to trick and deceive you into believing things which are not Scripturally sound, and to destroy the sure foundation of your faith? In the next installment of this series, I will be offering an interesting parallel, which will emphasize how Satan has stripped us of our most valuable weapon, and replaced it with an inferior product.

In addition, I will also begin to offer my explanations as
to why I choose to use the beloved, and time-tested, KJV
Bible. This will include the discussion of such topics as
God's Sword of division or plastic swords, weak shepherds,
ecumenism and the Dalai Lama, the human family or the Lord's
family, children by adoption, one true Gospel and one common
Bible version, constitutions Bibles and hymnals, spiritual
anarchy, hundreds of counterfeits, doctrinal unity through
one version, Elizabethan English and foreign languages,
perverted American English, America's evil children, the
readability of the KJV Bible, my young daughter's example,
parental responsibility, "Baby Hueys", spiritual divorce,
evilness of television and spiritual mountaineers. I trust
that you will join me.

From Part 3:
We can no more use more than one valid English translation
of the Bible, than a congress or parliament can rely upon
more than one valid constitution to write the laws for its
country. Such a body would rarely agree upon anything due to
so many different interpretations of the law being used by
that body; and that country would soon fall into total
anarchy and confusion; and eventually be overrun by its
enemies. Or consider if you were at a sports event, and just
before it was about to begin, everyone stood up to sing your
national anthem. Suddenly, the arena is filled with the
ugliest sound you ever did hear, as twenty thousand people
started singing different versions of the same song, because
some people got the bright idea that they didn't like a few
words, so they decided to change them; or maybe they felt
the tune needed to be modernized a little to fit the time
period, so they changed just a few notes, and increased the
tempo. After all, changing just a few words, or a few notes,
won't make that much of a difference, will it? It's still
the same song isn't it?

EXACTLY! The church is crippled by this use of different versions but so many seem oblivious to this fact.

It reminds me of some of these upbeat, modern versions of traditional Christian hymns. How
disgusting! They have violated the sanctity of the songs, and made them absolutely worldly!

From another perspective, for those of you who are church-
goers, or who attend some form of fellowship, wouldn't it be
rather odd, and cause a great deal of confusion, if your
priest, pastor, minister or shepherd asked his congregation
to turn to a certain verse in the Bible, and to read it
aloud in unison; and all of a sudden, to everyone's great
surprise, the church or fellowship was filled with absolute
confusion as everyone tried to read the same verse from
twenty different versions of the Bible? Or what if your
chorus leader, or inspiration leader, said, "Okay, everyone,
please turn in your hymnals to hymn number fifty". So
everyone obediently turns to hymn number fifty in their
particular hymnal, and again the church or fellowship is
filled with absolute confusion, because everyone is using a
different version of the hymnal book.


WHY ISN'T THIS AN OBVIOUS PROBLEM TO CHRISTIANS? IT HAS ALWAYS DEPRESSED ME WHEN SOMEONE READS FROM A DIFFERENT VERSION THAN THE ONE I HAVE, AND NOW IT DEPRESSES ME WHEN THEY READ FROM ANY OF THE MODERN CORRUPTIONS AT ALL.