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From: Jeff Harrison [Jeff@totheends.com]
To: heb_roots_chr@hebroots.org
Subject: To The Ends Of The Earth--Teaching Letter #14
TO THE ENDS OF THE EARTH--Teaching Letter #14
To The Ends Of The Earth seminars are coming to the
U.S. and Canada in 2001! Ask your church or Christian
organization to schedule a seminar in your area. We
will be in South-Central U.S. (Texas) in January; Central
(Nebraska, South Dakota, Iowa) in February; Upper Midwest
(Minnesota, Wisconsin, Illinois, Michigan) in March;
East Coast in April; and West Coast and Vancouver,BC, in May. Other states can also be included. To
schedule a seminar, contact us at Jeff@totheends.com
or visit our web site at http://www.totheends.com
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Thanks for helping us spread the word by sharing this
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question or comment, e-mail us at Jeff@totheends.com
-------------------------------------------------------
SODOM AND GOMORRAH
The maps in many Bibles make Israel look like a pretty
ordinary place. But nothing could be further from
the truth. From the flat, barren deserts in the south
to the soaring, snow-capped Mt. Hermon in the north,
from the sunny Mediterranean coastline in the west
to the plunging chasm of the Jordan Rift Valley on
the east, Israel is a land of dramatic contrasts.
The Jordan Rift Valley descends more than 1,000 feet
below sea level (1300', 400m), the deepest point on
the surface of the earth above water.* That's why
the root meaning of Jordan is "to go down" (yarad in
Hebrew)--way down.
* The Jordan Rift Valley ("Aravah" in Biblical Hebrew)
extends the whole length of Israel on the east. Today,
the northern section, where the Jordan River flows,
is know as the Jordan Valley; the dry southern section
is known (in Modern Hebrew) as the Aravah.
This huge canyon was created by earthquakes: lots
of them. Two huge pieces of the earth's crust rub
up against each other here producing measurable earthquakes
almost every day or two. A handful of these can be
felt each year without instruments. Every few years
there's one big enough to do some damage. And every
few hundred years, there's one big enough to level
every building in the area (like that mentioned both
in Amos 1:1 and Zech. 14:5 in the time of King Uzziah).
At the deepest point of this huge canyon is the Dead
Sea. Its waters are 30% salt: nine times the salinity
of the ocean. No fish can live in its waters, and
nothing can grow along its shore.* The desert continues
right up to the edge of the water.
* With the exception of a few places where fresh water
springs run down to the water, supporting a few species
that can tolerate the salty soil, as at Ein Feshka
near Qumran.
This is an unstable area. There is underground heat
(thermal energy), as can be seen in the hot springs
on both sides of the Dead Sea.* There are also petroleum
products, as can be seen in the oil slicks that occur
regularly on the surface of the water. Big chunks
of tar or asphalt occasionally come floating to the
surface. This gave the Dead Sea its Roman name: "Lake
Asphaltitis" (the Lake of Asphalt). In the time of
the New Testament, Josephus reported that there were
pieces of tar floating in the water the size and shape
of "headless bulls" (Wars 4.479). These were collected
by ships and sold. The tar was used for sealing the
seams of ships and in medicines.** Hundreds of years
before Abraham, Dead Sea tar was already being traded
to Egypt for use in making mummies.
* As at Callirhoe, on the eastern side, where King
Herod sought relief from the horrible illness that
brought his death (Josephus, Antiquities 17.171).
** The use of tar to caulk ships dates back to Noah's
ark (Gen. 6:14). The "Jesus boat" discovered at the
Sea of Galilee from the time of Jesus was also sealed
with tar.
In the 5th cent. AD, a Christian monk named Saba went
floating on one of these islands of tar for 40 days
and nights during a time of fasting. The story continues
that on his way back home, he fell into a burning tar
pit and was terribly burned.* Today we don't see any
more of these tar pits near the Dead Sea, but they
were there in the time of Abraham. The Bible says
the area was "full of tar pits" (Gen. 14:10).**
* The life of Saba (also known as Sabas) was written
by Cyril of Scythopolis. Saba was an important figure
in monastic Christianity in Israel. The monastery
founded by him in the desert outside of Bethlehem has
been continually inhabited from the time of its foundation
(5th cent.) until today.
** These pits may later have been covered by the shallow,
southern lobe of the Dead Sea (its southernmost 15
miles/25 km), which is known to have formed in the
historical past, perhaps as the result of an earthquake.
This area, when dry, may have been the Valley of Siddim
where Sodom and Gomorrah were located (Gen. 14:3,8,10).
The level of the Dead Sea has fallen so dramatically
in recent years that it now is in fact two separate
lakes. The southern section has been converted into
salt pans which are mined by Israel and Jordan. When
the Dead Sea was still a single lake, it measured 10
miles wide by 43 miles long (17 x 76 km), about 5 times
larger than the Sea of Galilee.
This is not the only change in the area since the time
of Abraham. Today, except for the water of the Dead
Sea, it's a dry and barren desert. But in Abraham's
time, it was green and fertile. Genesis says it was
"like the garden of the LORD," that is, the Garden
of Eden; and "like the land of Egypt," that is, the
fertile Nile Valley area (Gen. 13:10).* This is what
attracted Lot when he separated his flocks from those
of his uncle Abraham and moved down into the Jordan
Rift Valley.
* The word in this verse sometimes translated "well
watered" (mashekeh) actually means irrigated. As in
the Garden of Eden and the Nile Valley, the land here
was made green through artificial irrigation. Rain
water flowing down through desert wadis (dry river
beds) or emerging from springs was trapped and put
to use in growing crops, as is still done today in
Jericho a bit further north in the rift valley (using
spring water).
Archaeology confirms that in the time just before Abraham,
the settlement pattern of the land was also quite different
than it is today.* The hill country up above the Jordan
rift on the east and west, where almost all the population
lives today, was sparsely settled, leaving lots of
open space for Abraham to pasture his flocks. Most
of the large population centers were in the lowlands.
This includes the Jordan Rift Valley, where five large
cities were discovered by archaeologists dating to
this period.** To give you an idea of the size of
these cities: the first burial ground discovered (at
Bab edh-Dhra) held up to 500,000 burials! That's one
of the largest cemeteries yet found in the entire ancient
Middle East. Two others were soon discovered with
nearly equal numbers of burials (at Feifa and Khanazir):
that's a total of up to 1.5 million burials! There
must have been a lot of people living here at the time.
This confirms that the land was more fertile in the
past. Otherwise it's hard to imagine how so many people
could have survived here. These five cities match
the five "cities of the plain" mentioned in Genesis:
Sodom, Gomorrah, Admah, Zeboiim, and Bela (Gen. 14:2).***
* The Early Bronze Age (EB III/IV).
** Known by the Arabic names Bab edh-Dhra, Numeira,
Safi, Feifa, Khanazir
*** Many critical scholars are hesitant to associate
the Bab edh-Dhra excavations with Genesis because they
date Abraham several hundred years later (if they believe
he was a historical figure at all). But the Bible
puts Abraham in Israel by 2091 BC, the same general
period of time in which Bab edh-Dhra and its neighboring
cities were destroyed.
Abraham first became involved with the cities of the
plain after Lot moved down to Sodom (Gen. 14:2). Four
kings from the area of modern Iraq had mounted a raid
against them, in which Lot and many others were taken
captive. When Abraham heard of it, he rallied a force
of 318 men from his own household--slaves and sons
of slaves--to pursue them. In a daring night raid,
Abraham surprised the enemy and set all the captives
free (Gen. 14:15,16).
Perhaps because Abraham fought so valiantly on behalf
of these people, or perhaps because of Lot's residence
there, when God later intended to destroy these cities,
he stopped by to notify Abraham of his plans. Abraham's
tent, at the time, was at Mamre, near Hebron up in
the hill country of central Israel. From here, there
is a beautiful view east across the desert toward the
Jordan Rift Valley (Gen. 18:1). If you walk a short
distance east, a spectacular view opens up looking
down into the canyon of the Jordan.
Abraham's tent, like the Bedouin tents of today, would
be set up with its long sides facing east and west.
In warm weather, the whole eastern side of the tent
was opened to catch the rays of the sun in the morning,
and to keep it cool in the hot afternoon. As Abraham
sat there in the shade of the tent, looking out the
open east side--in the direction of Sodom--he saw three
men standing in the hot sunlight (Gen. 18:2). This
was odd; the heat of the day wasn't the usual time
to travel. This may have awakened Abraham's compassion
for them and, at least in part, prompted his especially
generous hospitality. But then, generous hospitality
is an important part of nomadic life in the desert
even today.
In spite of the fact that there were three men, Abraham
addresses himself to only one of them ("my lord," adonai
in Hebrew; 18:3).* One of the men, by his appearance
or manner, was clearly in authority over the other
two. Abraham invited them to rest a while, offering
a little bread and water (18:4,5). But in the end
he prepared a feast: a freshly butchered calf, fresh
bread and cheese (curds), and milk (18:8).
* Or, "my Lord" as used of God. Did Abraham already
realize the identity of his guest?
While they were eating, the man that Abraham had first
spoken to prophesied that Sarah would have a son (18:10).
Here the visitor is first identified as the LORD (YHWH
in Hebrew)--God himself appearing to Abraham as a man
(18:13).* How can God appear as a man, when the Bible
clearly teaches that no man can see God and live (Ex.
33:20)? This is an appearance of what elsewhere the
Bible calls the Angel of the LORD, who is YHWH himself.
How can a messenger from God be God? That's the question,
isn't it? And that's exactly why Christianity teaches
not only that God has revealed himself, but that he
actually exists, in more than one "individual reality."**
Unlike ourselves, God exists in more than one way
at a time. He exists in heaven as the ruler of the
universe, beyond time and space (the Father), but he
has another simultaneous way of existing (the Son),
that can come down to earth and speak to us in the
appearance of a man.
* YHWH is the personal name of God, often referred
to as the Tetragrammaton (the "four letters"). It
is spelled without vowels because no one is sure exactly
how it was pronounced. Unlike all the other names
of God, which are titles or descriptions, this is his
proper name, equivalent, for example, to the proper
name of his host: "Abraham."
** Or "way of existing" (hypostasis in Greek). This
Greek word, used by the early Church, is more adequate
than its Latin equivalent "persona" at least in a modern
context, where the Latin term (the meaning of which
is similar to the English word "persona") is often
misleadingly translated "person." This gives people
the impression that God is three separate beings, which
is incorrect. God is one being with three simultaneous
"ways of existing."
After they finished their meal, the men began to walk
east in the direction of that beautiful view over the
Jordan Valley and Sodom, with Abraham walking along
to see them off (18:16). Here the man who was God
revealed to Abraham his plan to destroy the cities
(18:20,21). Once again, Abraham tried to deliver them,
this time by interceding with God: What if there are
50 righteous people in the city, won't you spare it
for them (18:24)? Yes, God said, he would (18:26).
But since that didn't deter him in his plan, Abraham
went on to bargain with God: what if there are 40
righteous people? or twenty? or even ten? After
agreeing to ten, God walked on, the interview was over;
the situation didn't look good for Sodom.
Until this point, the Bible has given no indication
of what made Sodom and Gomorrah so wicked. But we
soon find out when the two angelic companions of God
enter Sodom (Gen. 19:1). Here they meet Lot, sitting
in the gate of the city.* Like his uncle Abraham,
Lot shows great hospitality to the two visitors, not
only inviting them to his home, but even insisting
that they stay with him. Here he prepares a feast
for them, just as his uncle had done (19:3).
* This tells us that Sodom had city walls, which matches
the discoveries of the archaeologists, who found city
walls at Bab edh-Dhra (Sodom).
But the other residents of the city, far from showing
kindly hospitality, gather around Lot's house with
the intention of "getting to know" Lot's visitors (from
the Hebrew root yadah, "to know"; 19:5)--but not in
a polite, social way, rather a carnal, wicked way.*
This was not just a few troublemakers: it was all
the men of the city, from one side of it to the other
(19:3,4)! Now we know what is so horribly wrong with
the city, and why God came to destroy it.
* "To know" occasionally functions in Hebrew as a euphemism
for sexual relations, in this case homosexuality.
The situation soon became dangerous, and the angels
intervene, striking the men of the city with blindness
(19:11). Then they reveal to Lot their mission to
destroy the city (19:13). Early the next morning,
when he delayed, they grabbed Lot, his wife, and his
daughters by their hands and brought them out of the
city (19:16). The final verb of this verse is interesting:
it means literally "caused them to alight" (yanichuhu),
like a bird. In other words, the angels didn't walk
them out of the city--they flew them out!
Their escape from Sodom is a picture of the catching
up of the believers when Messiah returns for judgment
(1 Thess. 4:17). It may also describe how this catching
up will take place: an angel will grab hold of one
of your hands, and up you go!
>From there, Lot and his family had to run for it, after
being warned by the angels, 'Don't look back' (19:17).
The angels held off destroying the city until mid-morning,
when Lot reached Zoar (19:23).*
* One of the five cities, previously known as Bela.
As Jesus observed: "On the day that Lot went out
from Sodom...." (Luke 17:29).
The Bible describes the catastrophe in a somewhat unusual
way: "And the LORD [YHWH] rained on Sodom and on Gomorrah
sulfur and fire from the LORD [YHWH] out of heaven"
(19:24). In other words, the LORD (YHWH #1) rained
fire and sulfur from the LORD (YHWH #2) in heaven.
This is one of several places in the Bible where God
is mentioned in more than one "way of existing," yet
both are given the same proper name: YHWH. God, in
the reality in which he is able to appear on earth,
brought judgment from that other, different reality
of himself that exists in the heavens. This is a foreshadowing
of what will happen at the return of Jesus, when he
will send a fiery destruction on the earth from the
Father God in heaven.*
* "It will be just the same on the day that the Son
of Man is revealed" (Luke 17:30).
It's not hard to imagine how the city was destroyed.
In that highly unstable area with all those petroleum
products around, all it would take is a match to blow
up the whole place (19:25). Some have suggested a
volcanic eruption as the cause of the fire and sulfur
coming out of the sky. But it seems much more likely,
as others have suggested, that an earthquake set off
a petroleum explosion, perhaps after releasing gas
into the air. This would also account for fire and
bits of sulfur raining down out of the sky.* The people
would have been burned by the fire or choked by the
fumes.
* Asphalt contains a high percentage of sulfur.
This matches the evidence found in the excavations:
An earthquake helped destroy the cities. But there
was also abundant evidence of burning, including charred
human bones. This burning was found not only in the
city, but also in the cemetery, which would not be
the case if the fire was the result of war or accident.
There was also evidence of confusion when the city
was destroyed: Some blocked their doorways before
trying to escape, others did not. But no one ever
came back to open those doorways. Others were found
dead inside the cities without any evidence of burning.
The only other Biblical description of what happened
is in Genesis 19:28. Here Abraham went out to the
same place where he stood bargaining with God--with
its beautiful view down over the rift valley--and saw
the whole area putting out thick smoke like the smoke
of a furnace. This also fits with the thick smoke
of a petroleum disaster, as when the oilfields of Kuwait
burned after the Gulf War.*
* Abraham's view down over the smoking remains of Sodom
and Gomorrah is a foreshadowing of eternal judgment
in a "furnace" of eternal burning (Gehenna; Matt. 6:30,
13:42,50; Luke 12:28; Rev. 9:2).
There's just one more detail to consider: Lot's wife.
Although most Bibles say she became a "pillar" of
salt, the word used here (netziv in Hebrew) elsewhere
refers to a look-out "station" or an officer (who is
"stationed" over others). The idea is that because
she couldn't keep herself from looking back, she was
"stationed" in death, as a "watchman of salt," looking
over that place of desolation. This is most likely
a poetic allusion to the pillars of salt that can sometimes
be seen standing in the area. But whether her transformation
into a "watchman of salt" was the result of a supernatural
act of God, an unusual by-product of the disaster,*
or simply refers to her remains being "stationed" there
in the salty soil, the Bible does not specify, saying
only, "...and she became a watchman of salt" (19:26).
* Like the bodies encased in ash in the eruption of
Mt. Vesuvius at Pompeii, she could have been buried
in salt as a result of the explosion or earthquake.
What happened to her, Jesus said, is a warning to us
all: "Remember Lot's wife" (Luke 17:32). This is
mentioned in one of Jesus' prophecies of his return,
in which he describes the catching away of the Church:
"On that day, let not the one who is on the housetop
and whose goods are in the house go down to take them
away; and likewise let not the one who is in the field
turn back" (Luke 17:31). His message? We must be
ready to go at a moment's notice. We must remain unattached
to the things of this life. Otherwise, when the time
comes, we may be tempted to turn back. Remember Lot's
wife!
-------------------------------------------------------
Copyright c 2000 by Jeffrey J. Harrison. All rights
reserved.
If you know anyone else that would be interested in
this teaching, please feel free to forward it to them.
To The Ends Of The Earth is a Messianic/Christian teaching
ministry bringing you information from Israel on the
Jewish Roots of the Christian faith. We are able to
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