Is God an Angel? Jesus = the spirit of God: Dr. Michael Heiser on secrets of the Old Testament as the Unseen Realm

Trinitarianism is in the Old Testament as well - podcast

So qigong master John Chang said he experienced God - he meditated a very long time for God to be made visible to him. After a very long time of meditation (Months I think) - then this very powerful fireball appeared to him - I think blasted down to him and appeared....

So Ramana Maharshi states that in Mouna Samadhi - the highest level of samadhi - then the light of the Absolute Void is SO BRIGHT that the ego, the spiritual ego as individual spirit light MERGES into the formless awareness. Individual consciousness is lost - just as in deep dreamless sleep. Only AFTERWARDS do you try to remember what happened and figure it out - via logical inference.

Sri Aurobindo also talked of this same paradox of Nirvikalpa Samadhi - saying it was the same paradox as found in the quantum "measurement" problem of time-frequency energy.

It is abundantly clear that Israel's divine council is a feature shared with the rest of the Near East. If this belief was concentrated in the Near East, then it would lend credence to the idea that this is the "husk" God uses to communicate the real "seed" of divine truth (see Peter J. Leithart's comments on this hermeneutic in "Deep Exegesis"). However, the divine council is actually found outside of the Near East as well. For example, traditional African religions speak of a council of God headed by the Creator in the same way that Near Eastern peoples do. This indicates that the Bible is not borrowing from the worldview of the Near East so much as the Bible reflects the pristine form of a common cultural heritage for all mankind stretching back to Noah.

https://www.amazon.com/Unseen-Realm-Recovering-Supernatural-Worldview-ebook/dp/B0141QB9XA

 He points out that "Nachash", when translated according to its adjectival form, means "Bright One." This is a heavenly being who is serpentine in appearance. Indeed, the same is true of the seraph: when translated according to its noun form, it means "Serpent" and when translated adjectivally, it is "Burning One." Yet nobody doubts that the seraphim of Isaiah 6 are heavenly beings! This is why, Heiser points out, the story of Isaiah 14 is indeed about Satan. The "Bright One" is the "Day Star, Son of the Dawn." Isaiah 14 is not so much a narrative about Satan's fall as it is a prophecy written in prophetic perfect, much like Isaiah 53 (which, as David Dorsey points out, it is chiastically linked with). When God tells Satan that he will "eat dust", He is prophesying that Satan will one day be cast out from the Heavenly Council (above the stars) and be placed beneath the Earth: where his only food will be dust. This is why Hell, or eternal death, is prepared for the Devil and his angels.

hmmm - the self-fulfilling prophecy of the Religion of Technology Indeed!! Professor David F. Noble took this back to Sumeria and Dr. Michael Heiser is considered THE expert on Sumerian theology as he critiqued the New Age Sitchin erroneous version.

Strange that these Christian evangelical podcasts feature heavy metal death noise music

I especially appreciate his insight as to the WHY of God’s harsh command to annihilate the seven Canaanite nations (cf Deut 20:16-18, Joshua 6:21, 1 Sam 15:2-3, etc). I always wondered why God would command that babies and animals be annihilated (what the heck did they do??), but the answer he proposes makes sense in light of the biblical cosmology he presents.

I also appreciate Heiser’s ability to connect the dots regarding the biunity of YHWH and the Malak YHWH (Angel of the Lord) in Tanakh (aka: Old Testament). Being a Jewish believer myself (and one who engages frequently in messianic apologetics), Dr. Heiser has a good command of the textual and contextual understanding.

However, the book in many ways leaves me with more questions than answers. If Heiser’s thesis is correct, then it introduces many more mysteries thus far unexplored by the general evangelical mainstream.

Below are some of the questions that I found myself asking as I was reading through the book. (I would love it if others would weigh in here):

1) Did Satan fall BEFORE he tempted Eve in the garden (as we are accustomed to thinking) or was his fall CONCURRENT with his seduction of Eve (in Gen 3)? Note: We don’t see Satan “cursed” until Gen. 3:14-15.

2) Regarding the “sons of God” cohabiting with humans in Gen 6, how do we know these are necessarily those of the “Divine Council Members” of Gen 1:26 as Heiser proposes? Could they not be another group of fallen divine spiritual beings/angels/principalities/powers (apart from the council members) that defected from God?

3) Did the “sons of God” (or other group of created spiritual beings) defect BEFORE Gen 1:26 or sometime BETWEEN Gen 1:26 and Gen 6?

4) Was there MORE than ONE “fall” of the “sons of god”? It seems there must have been if the Nephilim turn up again after the flood (See Numbers 13:33, etc). This also begs the question: are the “sons of God”/elohim and/or lesser angels CURRENTLY capable of “falling”? In other words, can they STILL be in the process NOW of defecting from YWHW, and is this going to be continuing until Yeshua returns? (i.e. was Jesus speaking prophetically forward or past tense in Luke 10:18,cf Rev. 12:4).

5) Regarding Heiser’s view that prophecy is cryptic by DESIGN (so that enemy forces cannot ultimately thwart God’s redemptive plans), were the demonic forces (and Satan) aware during Jesus’ earthly sojourn that he was God incarnate, or did they believe he was YHWH’s co-regent, but as a as a created being (therefore capable of falling)? This, of course, would require that the "elohim" of Gen 1:26 were not necessarily aware of "the second YHWH's" inextricable unity with the Father as being part of the triune deity. (Cf: Mark 1:24, Matt 4:6)

6) Had ALL seventy "sons of god" (or "elohim") from YHWH's ruling council in Gen. 1:26 ALREADY fallen when YHWH alloted the 70 nations to them in Deut 32:8, or were they/are they individually, at various times in history (past, present, future) defecting from YHWH? If we take Psalm 82:1-7 as YHWH warning or admonishing His council members to "judge righteously" (vs 3-4) over their alloted nations, then this would seem to imply that some of them at least were/are still capable of "ruling justly", and thus not YET "fallen". This also opens the possibility that those those of YHWH’s *current* council and other lesser elohim are capable of falling. Is *this* what Paul is referring to in Galatians 1:8?

 More amazon comments....

Heiser finds the background for Psalm 82 in Deut 32:8-9, which says that when the nations were divided at Babel, God turned over control of the nations to members of his divine council, choosing himself to concentrate on working with Abraham and his descendants. The nation of Israel became the focus of a plan to redeem mankind and restore Eden to the world.

Heiser shows how the Bible's message comes into sharper focus when we take this background about the supernatural world into account. Highlights of the book for me included

(1) discussion of the Old Testament background for the Christian concept of a Godhead;
(2) the insight that a major purpose of the conquest of Canaan under Joshua was the eradication of the giants who had connections to evil supernatural powers (Joshua 11:21-23);
(3) discussion of why the Bible's messianic prophecies are presented in a rather cryptic fashion;
(4) discussion of the many places in the Bible where the divine council is active----Gen 1, 11; Exod 19-24; 1 Kings 22; Job 1-2; Ps 82,89; Isa 6, 24, 40; Rev 4-5, etc.
(5) discussion of how Jesus defeated evil supernatural powers; (People who are interested in the "Christus Victor" model of atonement will be interested in this aspect of the book.)
(6) explanation of Paul's views on the gods of the nations and the meaning of the "principalities and powers" to which he often referred;
(7) discussion of the significance of "the north" in biblical prophecy, and of locations like Bashan and Mount Hermon;
(8) identification of the meaning of Armageddon in Rev 16;
(9) discussion of human destiny, including the concept of theosis.
(10) discussion of what it means for us to bear the image of God.
(11) explanation of 1 Peter 3:14-22, another weird passage.

So the podcast gets in this also....

 Intriguing passages from Psalms 82 and Deuteronomy 32 pop up throughout the book. I found that there is a lot of spiritual material in Scripture hidden in plain sight!
As the author wrote on page 68- " Heaven and Earth are separate but connected realms."

Among the many topics that I appreciate in the book are:
* The Divine Council.
* The possible height of the Biblical giants.
* Opposing bloodlines in YHWH's plan for a renewed Eden.
* An excellent explanation of idols and the connection to evil spirits/demons.
* Clarification of the meaning of the Greek word "monogenes".
* Potential geographic location of the "Gates of Hell."

and....

Dr. Heiser exposes his readers to the Ancient Hebrew worldview ("Deuteronomy 32 worldview") of the Hebrew Bible (aka the Old Testament). Existing in the Mesopotamian and Semitic cultural influences, Dr. Heiser brings us their understanding of God's (and the Divine Counsel's) original intent for humanity to be God's representatives and bring the paradise of Eden around the world, cultivating it as we go. Then three rebellions occurred; the Serpent (nackash) decides he doesn't want mankind to be apart of the divine family (with him?) and deceives Adam and Eve to eat from the wrong tree first, the other tree is then removed. Then other members of the divine family don't want mankind to be apart of the divine family with them because we are a broken image of God, so they try to start over with "imagers" of their own, creating the Nephilim. Unfortunately, this corrupts humanity far greater into violence and God has to wipe out every (sans the Noah clan) and start over. Finally, humans themselves don't like God's plan of spreading around the globe and bringing God everywhere so they build a tower to stop from spreading and also bring God down to them. Now God forsakes humanity for forsaking Him, gives them lesser gods (elohim) to rule them, and chooses for Himself Abraham.

Things still get messed up even more. The lesser gods refused to do justice for their allotted people and in fact tried attacking God's allotted people in spiritual warfare. God's allotted people began worshiping these lesser elohim and God has to break them down again and come to earth Himself as a man (two YHWH's of the OT!) and launch the covert operation for humanity's salvation!

and

  giantism after the flood was from DNA contained in the wives of Noah & sons. Places where these traits sprang up had to be annihilated - men, women, and children.

hhhhhmmmmmmmmmmmmmm  pdf link



Well this is all very interesting!

Five hour Lecture on the secrets of Unseen Realm