-----Original Message----- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]On Behalf Of Geoff Hudson Sent: 07 May 2002 09:18 To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: RE: orion-list Rising Sun If Essenes worshipped the rising sun, what time of day would they have had to be about it? Would the temple have been open for them at that time? Perhaps, I should have said, 'if Essenes worshipped AT the rising of the sun'. Geoff ***** In Acts 2, the Holy Spirit is poured out into believers in the New Covenant in the Spirit (2 Cor.3.6) after the death of John the Prophet (The epithet ‘Prophet’ is applied to John explicitly in the eighteenth letter of Pontius Pilate to Seneca). There are also good reasons to think that the mafia-like priesthood led by Annas conspired with Pilate to have John executed, and that Antipas was not responsible for John’s death. The time was about nine-o-clock in the morning (literally ‘for it is the third hour’, Acts 2.15). The usual added interpretation is: ‘it’s not YET nine o-clock’, implying earliness, but an alternative is: ‘it’s ALMOST nine o-clock’, implying lateness. I can only think that the ‘one place’ (Acts 2.1) where the believers were assembled together was the temple – where it was possible for the people in Jerusalem to gather within the hearing of the believers (Acts 2.6) and where the believers met daily for teaching, praise and prayer (Acts 2.42,46,47). Given that they were in the temple, the possibility that their audience thought they might have been drinking wine (as in Acts 2.13, 15) must be obfuscation. In Acts 2.3, when the believers met together, presumably for their usual prayer and praise, ‘they saw what seemed to be tongues of fire that separated and came to rest on each of them.’ At the time of day, this is very suggestive of bright sunlight reflecting and refracting onto the assembled worshippers standing with their backs to the sun in the columns of a temple court. The visitors to the temple from the diaspora mistook the worshippers for Essenes, because they were worshipping at the rising of the sun (and there may have been other reasons to do with their clothing and hair). The visitors registered their surprise that the believers even wanted to speak to them (‘each of us hears them’, Acts 2.8) because they knew that Essenes considered outsiders as unclean, and usually avoided them. Thus the references to ‘Galileans’ (Acts 2.7) and the believers being ‘drunk’ (Acts 2.15 ) are later amendments. James has to explain that his people are not Essenes, for ‘it was almost nine o-clock in the morning’ (Acts 2.) As the day began at six o-clock, the Essenes would have completed their morning worship well before, and by the third hour of the day would have been away to their other activities. As the elected leader of the Jerusalem assembly, James must surely have been the speaker, and Peter a later sustitute. David is regarded as a prophet who sees the Spirit (‘my Lord’, Acts 2.25, 34) as Lord at God’s right hand, and who lives in hope that God will not abandon his spirit to the grave, knowing that his body would decay. Geoff ****** Acts 2 may have read something like this: When the day of Pentecost came, they were all together in the temple. Suddenly a sound of the blowing of a violent wind came from heaven and filled the place where they were sitting. They saw what seemed to be TONGUES OF FIRE THAT SEPARATED AND CAME TO REST ON EACH OF THEM. All of them were filled with the Spirit and began to speak as the Spirit enabled them. Now there were in the temple Jews from every nation under heaven. Utterly amazed, they asked: "Are not all these men who are speaking Essenes? Then how is it that they speak to us: Parthians, Medes and Elamites; residents of Mesopotamia, Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia, Phrygia and Pamphylia, Egypt and the parts of Libya near Cyrene; visitors from Rome and converts to Judaism; Cretans and Arabs -- we hear them declaring the Spirit of God to us!" Perplexed, they asked one another, "What does this mean?" Then James stood up with the disciples, raised his voice and addressed the crowd: "Fellow Jews and all of you who live in Jerusalem, let me explain this to you; listen carefully to what I say. THESE MEN ARE NOT ESSENES, AS YOU SUPPOSE, IT’S ALMOST NINE-CLOCK IN THE MORNING. No, this is what was spoken by the prophet Joel: " 'In the last days, God says, I will pour out my Spirit on all people. Your sons and daughters will prophesy, your young men will see visions, your old men will dream dreams. Even on my servants, both men and women, I will pour out my Spirit in those days, and they will prophesy. I will show wonders in the heaven above and signs on the earth below, blood and fire and billows of smoke. The sun will be turned to darkness and the moon to blood before the coming of the great and glorious day of the Lord. And everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.’ ’’ “Men of Israel, listen to this: John of Mar Saba was a prophet accredited by the Spirit to you by wonders and signs, which the Spirit of God did among you through him, as you yourselves know. This prophet was handed over to the Sanhedrin by gentiles, and the Sanhedrin with the help of the gentiles put him to death. But the Spirit raised his spirit up, freeing it from his body, for it was impossible for the Spirit to loose its hold on his spirit.” “David said about the Spirit: ‘I saw the Lord always before me. Because he is at my right hand. Therefore my heart is glad and my tongue rejoices; my body will also live in hope, because you will not abandon me to the grave, nor will you let your holy one see decay. You have made known to me the paths of life; you will fill me with joy in your presence.’ Brothers, I can tell you that David’s body died and decayed, and his tomb is here to this day. But he was a prophet and knew that God had promised him on oath that he would place his Spirit on his throne. Seeing what was ahead, he spoke of the Spirit. God has raised up this Spirit, and we are all witnesses of the Spirit exalted to the right hand of God the Father. The promised Holy Spirit has poured out what you now see and hear. “For David had not yet ascended to heaven, when he said, ‘The Lord said to my Lord: “Sit at my right hand until I make your enemies a footstool for your feet.”’ Therefore, let all Israel be assured of this: God has made this Spirit, whom you rejected, both Lord and the Anointed. When the people heard this, they were cut to the heart and said to James and the other apostles, "Brothers, what shall we do?" James replied, "Repent and believe in the Spirit of the Lord for the cleansing of your spirits. The promise is for you and your children and for all who are far off -- for all whom the Spirit our God will call." With many other words he warned them; and he pleaded with them, "Cleanse yourselves from the spirit of deceit." Those who accepted his message believed in the Spirit, and about three thousand were cleansed that day. They devoted themselves to the Spirit and to the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer. Everyone was filled with awe, and many wonders and signs were done by the Spirit. All the believers were together and had everything in common. Selling their possessions and goods, they gave to anyone as he had need. Every day they continued to meet together in the temple courts. They broke bread in their homes and ate together with glad and sincere hearts, praising God and enjoying the favour of all the people. And the Spirit added to their number daily those who were being cleansed. *****
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