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Matthew Stuckey here and I wanted to make a quick video on three common myths of Judaism. Three common myths of the religion of Judaism. And this is a topic in the 21st century where there's a lot of confusion about it. And myth number one is this, that the Jews and the twelve tribes of Israel are synonymous. That the Jews and the Israelites are just the exact same thing. That's actually not true. And so if you go back to the book of Genesis, if you remember Jacob gets renamed Israel. And Jacob had 12 sons. And so Jacob has 12 sons. He's renamed Israel. And so you're first getting Israel from Jacob being renamed. And so the 12 tribes of Israel are the lineage of the the 12 sons of Jacob. And so you go further on in the Bible and then Moses, you know, leads the Hebrews into the Promised Land and everything like that. And eventually you're gonna go forward in history and you're gonna end up going to King Saul who is the king. And King Saul is the king over the 12 tribes. But King Saul ends up becoming wicked. David takes over. And temporarily there's a rebellion where most of the tribes actually follow the lineage of King Saul and not King David after David takes over. But then eventually all the tribes follow David. But then David's son Solomon ends up becoming backslidden and ends up, you know, falling into idolatry and giving in as he marries all these different women. And as a result of that, he's told that basically, you know, the kingdom is going to be taken away during the days of his son. And so Rehoboam, his son, is going to be left with one tribe. Whereas Jeroboam, who was actually one of Solomon's men, he's going to be given 10 tribes. Now the one tribe of Rehoboam is actually referring to the kingdom of Judah, is referring to Judah and Benjamin, which make up the southern kingdom of Judah. But it's referring to Judah and Benjamin, which is why the 10 plus 1 is 11 as opposed to 12. But basically, then you have the southern kingdom of Judah, which followed Rehoboam, and you have the northern kingdom of Israel following Rehoboam, or Jeroboam, I should say. And so basically, you have the southern kingdom of Judah with Rehoboam always warring with the northern kingdom of Israel with Jeroboam. And then the war just kind of went on with the lineage as time passes by. Well, the northern kingdom of Israel is more wicked than the southern kingdom of Judah. And eventually, Israel gets, the northern kingdom of Israel gets rejected before the southern kingdom of Judah. The book of Hosea, you know, talks about this a lot as Israel's told that their time is basically up, but God's still going to be merciful to the southern kingdom of Judah. So here's the thing, the northern kingdom of Israel ends up just disappearing. They end up being gone. They get assimilated into the nations, the Assyrians capture them, and that's kind of the end of them. But the southern kingdom of Judah is still given a bit of a time frame. So you say, okay, what is your point? Here's my point. A Jew is someone who is part of the southern kingdom of Judah. That's where you get the name Jew as they're part of that southern kingdom of Judah. But the 12 tribes of Israel, they no longer exist. You just have that southern kingdom of Judah. And during the Bible times, if people wanted to serve God during the Old Testament times, you know, you really had to relocate in order to do that. You could get saved anywhere, but if you really wanted to serve God, you had to relocate. And in the southern kingdom of Judah, if you're willing to be, you know, brought in with the people, and adopt the customs, and adopt the religion, you know, God was all for you immigrating and being a part of his people in the southern kingdom of Judah. But the northern kingdom of Israel go into idolatry far before the southern kingdom of Judah do. And so a Jew was part of the southern kingdom of Judah. Now Judah was only one of the 12 tribes, one of the 12 sons of Israel. So that's not the same thing as the 12 tribes of Israel. Now that ends up going into a lot of different Bible topics, and a lot of false understandings of things, and wrong doctrines. And I don't have time to go into that in this video. But if people would understand the difference between what a Jew is in it and an Israelite, it would make a huge difference. In fact, another thing to mention on that is that the first time Jew is actually mentioned in the Bible is 2 Kings chapter 16 verse 6. So here's the thing, if a Jew and an Israelite are the exact same thing, then why don't you see a Jew mentioned all the way back in, you know, the book of Genesis. But once you have that separation with the northern kingdom of Israel and the southern kingdom of Judah, all of a sudden you see that distinction being made. So there's the difference there. So myth number one is that a Jew and the 12 tribes of Israel are just the exact same thing, that they're just absolutely identical. Myth number two is this, that, you know, the 12 tribes of Israel, the Israelites, were given this everlasting covenant. They're given this promise of the land no matter what they did, whether they followed God's rules, whether they worshiped the God of the Bible, whether or not they worshiped other gods, whether or not they committed wicked sins. Most people have this idea that they were given this everlasting covenant, that no matter what they did, no matter what their actions were, they were entitled to the land because they were God's people. But that's simply not the case. What it says in Deuteronomy 28 verses 1 and 2 is this, and it shall come to pass if thou shalt hearken diligently onto the voice of the Lord thy God to observe and to do all his commandments which I command thee this day, that the Lord thy God will set thee on high above all nations of the earth, and all these blessings shall come on thee and overtake thee if thou shalt hearken onto the voice of the Lord thy God. So the promise is that if you hearken onto God's voice, then I will bless you above all the nations of the earth. But here's the thing, kind of the first third of the chapter focuses on the blessings of God, but then the last two-thirds of the chapter focus on the curses of God if they do not obey God's rules, and if they do not follow God's laws. And so what the Bible said is, if you follow these laws, if you follow these rules, then you are my people, and I will bless you above all nations of the earth. However, the contrary is also true, that if you do not follow my rules, then I'm not gonna bless you above all the other nations. I'm not gonna love you more than all the other nations. See, the reason why God poured out his blessing is because these are the people that were actually serving God, and their job and their requirement was to follow God's rules and go out and bear fruit. If you remember the New Testament, there's many different parables that Jesus spoke regarding this issue, but he talks about how the nation is going to be, you know, the kingdom is going to be taken from them and given to a nation that's bringing forth the fruits thereof. And what he's saying is that the Israelites, they had just stopped bringing forth fruit. Both the northern kingdom of Israel and the southern kingdom of Judah had stopped bringing forth fruit, and you know, God was done with them. That's what the Bible teaches. Your house is left unto you desolate, the Bible says. And there's many parables that say the same thing, but all throughout the Minor Prophets, you know, all throughout Galatians and Romans and all these books, you know, the Bible is just very clear on this topic. And quite honestly, so much of the Bible is just not going to make any sense if you have this idea that they were given an everlasting covenant no matter what their actions were whatsoever. And honestly, that would really imply that God was, you know, a racist, and you know, he just cared about people more because of their skin color than other people. But that's not reality. The reality is this, that they were not given an everlasting covenant, and they were required to obey God's rules. And if they did, then they would be blessed. But if they did not, then the curses of God in the latter part of Deuteronomy 28 are going to come upon them. That is exactly what happened. So myth number one is that the Jews and the Israelites, or the Jews and the 12 tribes of Israel, are the same thing. They're actually not. Judah was actually one of the 12 tribes, and you see the distinction between the northern kingdom of Israel and the southern kingdom of Judah. And a Jew came from that southern kingdom of Judah. Myth number two is that the Jews were given, or the Israelites were given, an everlasting covenant. That's actually not what the Bible says. The land was given to them if they actually obeyed, but sadly none of the 12 tribes ended up obeying, and they got assimilated into all of the nations. And myth number three is this, that the Israelites, or the Jews, or whatever you want to call them, whatever you want to call the group, that they believe in the Old Testament. See, the modern-day religion of Judaism would have you to believe this, that they believe the Old Testament, and they especially believe the Torah, the first five books of the Bible, the books of Moses. They would have you to believe that they believe in the books of Moses, it's just the New Testament that they disagree with. That's actually not the case though. You see, there's many very clear things in the Old Testament that the the religion of Judaism does not follow at all. One of the big examples is this, that you know when it comes to the religion of Judaism, they almost always believe that the earth is old, and they believe in evolution. They don't believe in a young earth. They don't believe the earth is less than 7,000 years old. And here's the thing, if you're a Bible-believing Christian, and you take the Word of God literally, and you just add up the dates from Adam to our modern day, the earth is less than 7,000 years old. It's not even a debatable topic. It's just very clear in the Bible if you just take it literally. But here's the thing, the Jews may claim they believe the Old Testament, but they don't believe the Old Testament. If they believe the Old Testament, then they wouldn't believe in evolution. If they believed in the Old Testament, then they wouldn't believe in the Big Bang Theory. If they believed in the Old Testament, they would believe in a young earth, but they don't. Not only that, look at Judaism today, and guess what? They don't sacrifice animals. I mean, doesn't the Bible say that Passover was going to be something that was done forever, every single year? Now, when it comes to being a Christian, we understand that the Lord's Supper replaced the Passover. And so, that's why you see the similarities between the Passover and the Lord's Supper, and that transition right before Jesus Christ died. We see that. Here's the thing though, if you are a Jew, and you're part of the religion of Judaism, and you don't believe the Messiah came, you don't believe that Christ came, then there would be no reason to not be sacrificing a lamb every single year like what the Bible says that they were actually supposed to do. So, why is it that they don't do that? Well, they don't do it because they don't believe in the Old Testament. Do they follow the Sabbath day? Nope, they don't follow it. Here's the thing, if you get saved, you enter into the rest, and we understand that the Sabbath day ends up going away because that was a symbol of Jesus Christ. Whereas the other nine commandments we would still follow, but no longer the Sabbath day. But here's the thing, if you're a Jew, then you don't believe the Messiah came, so you should still be following the Sabbath day. In fact, many of the laws in the Old Testament that are not commonly followed today, or not really done today, or practiced today, because they were symbolic of Jesus Christ, you know, various cleanliness laws, and carnal ordinances. Here's the thing though, if you don't believe that the Savior came, which they don't believe the Savior came, they should still be following every single one of those things. But they don't follow it, and they mock the Old Testament, and they mock those things, and say, oh, it's just a parable, it's just a story, it's not to be taken literally. Why do they do that? They don't really believe in the Old Testament. Now, this is important as a Bible-believing Christian, because you need to understand that if you're trying to get somebody saved, you know what, just use the New Testament like you would with anybody else. See, realize that Jesus Christ said, if they had believed Moses, they would have believed me, for he spake of me, right? And Jesus Christ said that Moses spake of him, and the whole Old Testament is a picture of Jesus Christ, and if you believe in the Old Testament, guess what, you're gonna believe in Jesus Christ, right? When Abraham, you know, is gonna sacrifice his son, and the last second, you know, he sacrifices a ram, and see, what he said to his son is, God will provide himself a lamb for burnt offering. How did God provide himself a lamb? He died on the cross. That's what the Bible teaches. God will provide himself a lamb. So we see the whole Old Testament points toward Jesus Christ, but the Jews don't really believe in the Old Testament. And so what are the three myths that we have about the religion of Judaism? One myth is that being a Jew, and being an Israelite, or being a Jew, and the twelve tribes of Israel are just synonymous, or that a Jew and Israel is just synonymous with one another. I mean, Jacob was Israel, and then Judah was one of his sons, and we have the split of the northern and southern kingdom. That's myth number one. Myth number two is that the Israelites, or the twelve tribes, were given an everlasting covenant of the promise of this land, no matter what they did. That's actually not true. They were told, if they obeyed God's rules, then God would bless them above other nations. But if not, then the curses of God would come upon them. And myth number three is this, that the Jews believe in the Old Testament. They don't believe in the Old Testament. As a Bible-believing Christian, I do believe in the Old Testament. I take it literally. I believe the story of Genesis. I believe the creation of the world. They don't, though, because they don't actually believe the Old Testament. Thank you, and God bless.