One of the most important Do Not’s in Scripture!

Do not add to the Word is a principle spoken of throughout the Bible. This is something the Gnostics opposed early on by adding sayings of Jesus that were not said by him, but they wrote and circulated many books on these supposed ‘new’ sayings that were contrary to what the apostles wrote. Today we still have this taking place by books, movies, and religious TV series that add or change the Words of Scripture, they sound like Scripture but mislead.

Who would have thought that the Bible would be so distorted and left to false teachers to flourish and be so popular in their false interpretations as it is today?

From the time the law was being delivered, God spoke to Israel, Deuteronomy 4:2 “You shall not add to the word which I command you, nor take anything from it” (also Deuteronomy 12:32).

God is stating for MAN not to add to his words. Adding does not only mean additional words, but can also mean changing them to mean something completely different than what was intended. When you add new words as equal to Scripture, you are really taking away from Scripture. “The entirety of Your word is truth” (Psalms 119: 160).

Paul admonishes the church in 1 Corinthians 4:6: “not to think beyond what is written” (exceed or go past). In other words, keep to the meaning of the passage. when we go past what is written pride is involved and pride is like leaven, it grows and takes over, pride will make one participate in false doctrine.

What we find is that False teachers do not want to submit to the words’ original intent, they do not seek what Scripture actually means (exegetes), instead, they conform it to what they want it to mean to puff themselves up with some new interpretation. Which is often to draw attention to themselves.

Understanding the Word to be fruitful

What we eat physically gives us nourishment or will make us unhealthy, even sick. The Scripture, the Word of God is called the truth, the Spirit of God is called the Spirit of truth, Jesus who is called the Word is called the Truth.

If you continually learn from those who teach distortions or heresy, that is what you will live by, conforming your life to their false teachings, which bring you into bondage. Jesus said the truth will set you free.

You cannot interpret or teach the Bible from just one place in the Scripture. The spiritual story of redemption is interwoven throughout all the books. This is why we must first understand the whole picture before we start looking at the details, the many topics and subjects the Scripture addresses.

So this becomes a process, to study and rightly divide the Word, allowing God to teach you, and truth is continually learned when we build upon the foundation correctly. Then what we Learn coincides with what you are reading from elsewhere in Scripture, so that it becomes a cohesive whole message delivered by God from the beginning to the end.

For example, we find in Genesis the fall of man by disobedience , where God does the first sacrifice and clothes Adam and Eve, and then gives them and all humanity a way to keep his relationship with temporary sacrifices until the last permanent sacrifice is done by God himself.

Come with me on a journey through the Bible the way it is taught by popular teachers, TV personalities, cults and other religions who all participate in making this a mass of confusion with a thousand different voices to listen to distract one from hearing the one voice who spoke the Word that is truth.

Our main premise to understand is the Spiritual to feed the inner man to rule over the outer man. Satan’s main purpose is to blind people to the solution, the gospel. He blinds people by lies and distortions, as he did so with Eve. He can make what is false and evil look good, and even from God. Keep this in mind as we start from the beginning of the bible

Like the Pharisees who made their own laws to obey God, which diminished his Word we have those who claim they have a revelation or are a prophet with their new word

The same application is found in politics, where they ignore the constitution that we are to abide by, statists make the current government to be as a god overruling the people, severing them from the constitution.

They are natural scammers, instead of selling used cars (no offense if you do) they sell the people who are hurting the most, a fantasy of twisted words they concocted by the bible.

Those who deny the Word

An example is Michael Heiser whom many people have unfortunately respected as a scholar in evangelical circles. He claims that the wordNephilimis derived from Aramaicnaphiyla, which Jewish scribes picked up during their Babylonian captivity.But he does not address that Genesis was written more than 800 years prior to their captivity. And it was in Hebrew, and not Aramaic (which he disagrees with). Genesis IS by Moses and is part of the 5 books of Moses, which Jesus called the law.

Heiser assumed a later date for Genesis because his insistence on importing the Ugarit pagan cultures teachings into the Scripture; claiming, “Because literary content of Genesis 1-11 has so many deep, specific touchpoints with Mesopotamian literary works, many scholars believe that these chapters either were written during the exile in Babylon or were edited at that time.”

He sees it as the opposite, it is the Mesopotamian writings that copied the Hebrews. The implication from this is that Heiser believed the Torah was written during or AFTER the Babylonian captivity, not by Moses 800 years before. That the 5 books of Moses did not contain Genesis for Israel to read in Hebrew. Than we are to assume the scribes wrote all this in Aramaic and a new word which describes Mesopotamian myths into the text.

And exactly how would they get these meticulous records of births and history at such a late date unless it was already written? Who are these men that did these writings, any names? Any confirmed texts from this time period? So many so called scholars take the same position of Heiser, they have created a fantasy history for their followers misleading them to depart from the Word which clearly an most definitely puts Moses as the author of these books.

Jesus said the book of Genesis’ author is Moses. Is he mistaken? It was written and compiled by Moses, some of it handed down in written form from the beginning through the lineage of Noah to Abraham.

Heiser challenged the Word of God’s inspiration by stating, “But I have a question: Does Jesus or anyone else ever specifically quote anything in Genesis and attribute it to Moses? I raise this because in my earlier (and admittedly unsystematic) description of where I’m at on all this in light of the biblical data, I suggested that it was possible that none of Genesis came from Moses’ hand. Instead, Genesis seems best understood as the result of activity during the exile (Gen 1-11) and oral traditions about the patriarchs later codified at a time after Moses was dead. ⁽Readers of course know that I view this in the context of aprocessof inspiration, the unseen hand of Providence working through very human authors and editors to produce the intended result. I do not view inspiration as a series of paranormal events.)

https://drmsh.com/mosaic-authorship-torah-problems-documentary-hypothesis-jedp-part-3/

And it is not just Genesis but the other books. All this shows how Heiser denied the Bible eyewitness accounts (did not Jesus quote Moses in Mk.1:44; 7:10; 10:3; 12:26; Lk.5:14;16:31; 20:37;24:44; Mt:19:8; Jn.8:5).

Heiser was no scholar and was more like the liberals of the Jesus seminar who questioned everything. He is a representative of the revisionists of our day, like the reductionists over century ago in Germany.

John 1:17 Jesus said, “For the law was given through Moses,” which means all 613 commands, not just the two tablets. And what of John 1:45 “We have found Him of whom Moses in the law, and also the prophets, wrote--Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph.”

Were they wrong in Jesus’ day?

Mark 12:26 “have you not read in the book of Moses , in the burning bush passage, how God spoke to him,

It was Jesus who said John 5:46 or “if you believed Moses, you would believe Me; for he wrote about Me.”(Jesus refers to Moses directly in Mt.19:7,22:24; Mk.1:44,7:10,10:3; lk.5:14, Lk.24:27; Jn.1:17;3:14;7:9, these are just a few references).

How did Heiser or anyone miss this, or did he purposely reject this? Did not Jesus speak the truth? It’s called selective hearing. John 9:29 even the Pharisees said, “We know that God spoke to Moses…,” they do, but Mr. Heiser and so many others do not!

Again, Heiser the respected academic said, “I suggested that it was possible that none of Genesis came from Moses’ hand.”

So then the Bible is lying when it says it came from Moses. The question now who to believe? Should one believe liberal scholars like Mr. Heiser! If this is the case, then how did Heiser connect Genesis to Ps.82? If it was produced after the Psalms were written. His whole theory collapses by his avoidance of both logic and the historical records.

Then nothing is as it says in Scripture, you have then entered the ‘Unseen world’ of mythology. And this is what many in the Church now accept as the truth of how the Scriptures were made.

The word fables in Scripture is myths, Paul tells his disciple Timothy, in the later days, “they will turn their ears away from the truth, and be turned aside to fables.”(2 Tim 4:4).

They turn from the truth found in the Word to fables. This is not just taking words out of their context. Fables are things that go beyond what is written, stories that are not true. In this matter, Heiser is doing this very thing to a major author of several books that are endorsed all throughout the Bible.

If the Genesis account is not from Moses, Jesus cannot be the Messiah, nor be considered a good teacher because He would be a liar.

Peter writes, representing all the apostles, “For we did not follow cunningly devised fables” (2 Peter 1:16).

We can choose to follow men or choose to follow the Word. I think the distinctions are quite clear.

See this article on other challenges to Genesis by liberal scholars https://www.deceptioninthechurch.com/Gilgameshlied.html