Exodus 5:2: “And Pharaoh said, Who [is] the LORD, that I should obey his voice to let Israel go? I know not the LORD, neither will I let Israel go.”

 

Exodus 7:9: “When Pharaoh says to you: ‘Prove yourself by working a miracle.’

 

One of the most difficult barriers I have to overcome in trying to teach others how to do a Hebrew word study is to convince them that they do not need to be a Bible college and/or seminary graduate, have a PhD and do years of Hebrew study to do Hebrew word study.  They look at my skinny little six lesson manual and think, “No way, you need excellent language skills to do a Hebrew word study.”  Well, I am here to say, “Yes, way, you do not need years of schooling to do a Hebrew word study, you have the same teacher as every other Christian, the Holy Spirit and if you love Jesus and His Word with all your heart you are already miles ahead of some dusty old professor sitting in his ivy tower who has not prayed in twenty years.

 

We have created this image in our modern Western culture that a young person in his twenties who has been to Bible College and Seminary knows more about the Bible than someone in their sixties or seventies who has studied the Bible all their lives and never graduated from high school.  How many times I have heard someone say, “Well, I heard this person say that this verse means such and such and he has a PhD.”  It doesn’t matter if that PhD is in communications or political science, the very fact you have a PhD means you are an authority on everything.  All a PhD does is make you an authority on one little obscure subject that no one else cares about.  Yet, in our culture we worship these academic credentials. They give us credibility in our culture.

 

Yesterday I attended church and listened to our pastor preach a sermon.  I really don’t know what his academic background is, I really don’t care.  He explained something from the Greek and, gasp, from the Hebrew and I learned something new.  Ok, so what if I graduated from a Bible college and a seminary, I used to teach in a Bible college and I have a PhD, that does not mean I have nothing new to learn. You see today is Monday, I figure our pastor will begin working on his sermon sometime this week. So I begin praying that God will anoint Him, fill Him with His Spirit who will guide and teach Him something that I need to learn so that on Sunday I am not listening to a message from someone’s seminary training but from someone who is sensitive to the teaching of the Spirit of God.  So on Sunday morning I sit anxiously in my pew waiting to hear what the Holy Spirit has prepared for me.

 

On Saturday we conduct a meet up at a cafe in Oak Park where a small group of Christians from different backgrounds come together to help me write my next book.  Someone who had no Bible college or seminary training said something that gave me the final piece to a Hebraic question that I had been struggle with for years.  You see the credentials I look for are not academic degrees bestowed upon someone by other men, but someone’s walk with God. Someone who knows God, has walked with him all their lives and loves Him with all their heart. These are all the credentials I am looking for.

 

In Exodus 5:2 Pharoah says to Moses, “Who is this God that I should obey Him?”  That is an understandable question.  Here was the Pharaoh, he was considered a god.  Here was Moses, an outcast representing the slavery class and Pharaoh was saying: “Who are you and who is this God of yours.  You don’t scare me.  Go  ahead and try to intimidate me.”   The Talmud interprets Exodus 7:9 this way: “Give yourself credibility by displaying a sign.”  There it is, Pharaoh like any good 21st Century Western minded Christian is asking, “Who are you to tell me about God, show me your credentials.

 

It is interesting to note that the word for “prove” here is not nacah which means to prove  But is the word Nathan which means to give. Curiously, this word  nathan is followed by the word takem (to you or for you)Nathan is used as a verb here and the writer could have easily put this into a Hithpael form yet why add the prepositional phrase takem?  The answer may be found in the next word mopheth.  This is not the Hebrew word for miracle although it is used two times in the Old Testament for miracle as it is used here. The Hebrew word for miracle is owth.  Mopheth comes from the root word yaphath.  This has the idea of a sign or wonder used as a form of intimidation or to establish credibility.  Quite literally what Pharaoh was telling Moses was: Make yourself an intimidation to me.  Show me your credentials.  You know, in the final analysis that is all my academic and teaching back ground really does, is to make me intimidation. Saturday at our meet up we had a young man who was canter in a synagogue.  With all my fancied education and Hebraic training I was totally intimidated by him and his ability to read the Hebrew.

 

You see Moses was of the slavery class telling the Pharaoh who thought he was a god  himself to follow Jehovah. Of course Pharaoh looked down his nose at Moses and said, “Who are you to tell this god to worship your God, you’re no god where are your mopheth (credentials)? I have my PhD, where is your PhD, if you don’t have one then just shut up you mouth.”  Moses’s credentials came right from God.  If we truly are in God’s service as Moses, God will give us mopheth credibility, not years of academic training.  So don’t be afraid to do a Hebrew word study after reading through my skinny six lesson manual. If you love Jesus with all your heart soul and might, He will reveal His secrets to you. That is all the credentials you need.

 

Beyond the Hebrew Lexicon Manual/Workbook: Learn To Do Hebrew Word Studies That Take You Beyond the Lexicon

This book is written for those who want to find a deeper meaning to Biblical Hebrew words. It will give guidelines on how to drill down into the very heart, soul and core of Hebrew scripture. Buy Here: http://www.amazon.com/Beyond-Hebrew-Lexicon-Learn-Studies/dp/1508601038/ref=tmm_pap_title_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1428966509&sr=8-2

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Beyond the Hebrew Lexicon Manual/Workbook: Learn To Do Hebrew Word Studies That Take You Beyond the Lexicon

This is a user-friendly companion workbook that has fill in the answer exercises that will walk you through the steps needed to do your own Biblical Hebrew word studies enabling to drill down into the very heart, soul and core of Hebrew scripture. Buy Here: http://www.amazon.com/Beyond-Hebrew-Lexicon-Manual-Workbook/dp/1508601062/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1428966509&sr=8-3&keywords=chaim+bentorah

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