“Seek Yahweh while He may be found. Call upon Him while He is near. Let the wicked forsake his way and the unrighteous man his thoughts and let him return to Yahweh, and He will have compassion on him. Turn to our Elohim, for He will abundantly pardon.”

Isaiah 55: 6-7

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“Shema Yisra’el. Yahweh Eloheinu, Yahweh Echad!”

Lately, I have been working on several SnyderTalk editorials that I have written over the past couple of years. They are closely related, even though the titles may not indicate the connection between them.

Below, I have listed the editorials I’m talking about and the date that each one was written initially. Don’t pay too much attention to the dates, though. I have updated most of these editorials many times. At this point, I have spent a lot of time on two of them in particular: Yahweh’s Temple was not on the Temple Mount and The Pope and Me: A True Story.

• Yahweh’s Temple was not on the Temple Mount: November 28, 2019
• Yahweh’s Temple was Very Near Gihon Spring in the City of David: January 11, 2021 SnyderTalk
• Of Course, Jewish People are Angry When So-Called ‘Christians’ Try to Convert Them: June 30, 2020
• The Pope and Me: A True Story: May 26, 2020
• Israeli Doctors are Fantastic: March 14, 2020
• Don’t Confuse Yahweh with Religion: July 12, 2020

In my world, this is how books are born. Yahweh lays things on my heart to write and talk about. At first, He doesn’t show me how they are connected, but over time, He draws my attention to their relatedness and shows me how they come together to form a single entity, a book.

It’s similar to the process used to solve a jigsaw puzzle. First, you lay out all the pieces of the puzzle in front of you on a flat surface. Then, you group the pieces together based on color, texture, and composition. Next, you connect the related pieces. Eventually, you have solved the puzzle, and you have a completed picture. It takes time, but the process produces a lot of learning.

That’s exactly how I wrote His Name is Yahweh and The Trilogy. For example, when I started writing His Name is Yahweh, I just added the pieces that Yahweh showed me. I knew that the book was in there somewhere.

His Name is Yahweh in its completed form is more than 300 pages long, but it used to be about 800 pages long. The process of reducing the book to the essence was similar to sculpting. I chipped away at it until I had eliminated everything except the things that really mattered for the book. The pieces I eliminated were not wasted. They are still there, but they are not part of the book. Later, the “debris” from one book becomes parts of other projects.

For instance, you can’t tell from reading His Name is Yahweh that Mount Sinai used to play a very prominent part in the book. I have a strong hunch that at some point I will write about Mount Sinai in great detail. Thanks to my work on His Name is Yahweh, I already have a lot of that material written. It is not in finished form, but it’s close. Because of the work I have done, I know a lot about the pieces I’m missing, the specific things that I need to learn more about. Completing the book will be a matter of gathering the missing pieces and assembling them together with the things I have written. Then, it will become another book.

Elohim

Yesterday, I added some new material to The Pope and Me: A True Story. It relates to the word “Elohim”. This is what I wrote:

When I refer to Yahweh in conversations with Noam, she knows exactly who I am talking about. She has heard me talk about Him for almost 2 decades. She has watched me deliver many presentations about my book His Name is Yahweh. Ishai, Noam’s dad, and Katie were with us when I delivered the message above.

Most of my readers don’t know Hebrew. Noam does. Elohim is a plural word. El is the singular form of Elohim.

When referring to Yahweh, it is best to refer to Him in the plural unless we are calling Him by a specific Name for a purpose, a Name like El Shaddai for instance. That is not my opinion. That’s what Yahweh does.

For example, Genesis 1: 1 says,

“In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.”

Elohim is the Hebrew word that is translated as “God” in that verse. Again, it’s a plural word. As I said, Yahweh refers to Himself in the plural form throughout the Scriptures.

Now, take a look at John 1: 1-5:

“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things came into being through Him, and apart from Him nothing came into being that has come into being. In Him was life, and the life was the Light of men. The Light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it.”

Yahweh is the Creator in Genesis 1: 1 and the Creator in John 1: 1-5.

The word “elohim” (elōhîm) appears more than 2500 times in the Old Testament. It refers to Yahweh and to pagan gods and false deities. When it refers to Yahweh, the “E” is capitalized. When it refers to false gods or pagan deities, the “e” is not capitalized.

In the Old Testament, Yahweh combines His Name with Elohim more than 800 times. He is “Yahweh Elohim”. In most modern English translations of the Bible, the phase “the LORD God” is used where “Yahweh Elohim” appears in the Hebrew text of the Scriptures.

As I said, Elohim is a plural word, and Yahweh doesn’t make mistakes. Over the millennia, Jewish sages and scholars have had great difficulty with the fact that Yahweh talks about Himself in the plural. It’s easy to understand why.

The Shema (Sh’ma) is probably the most important part of the Bible for pious Jews. Shema means to listen or to hear. It’s a command. It means that you had better pay attention to this, because it’s important.

The Shema is found in Deuteronomy 6: 4-9. In English translations of the Bible, the Shema begins this way:

“Hear, O Israel! Yahweh is our Elohim, Yahweh is One!”

In the Hebrew Bible (the Tanach), this is how the Shema begins:

“Shema Yisra’el. Yahweh Eloheinu, Yahweh Echad!”

Below is the Shema in its entirety:

“Hear, O Israel! Yahweh is our Elohim, Yahweh is One! And you shall love Yahweh your Elohim with with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength. These words, which I am commanding you today, shall be on your heart. And you shall repeat them diligently to your sons and speak of them when you sit in your house, when you walk on the road, when you lie down, and when you get up. You shall also tie them as a sign to your hand, and they shall be as frontlets on your forehead. You shall also write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.” (Deuteronomy 6: 4-9)

We need to stop trying to force fit Yahweh into our paradigms. We need to understand His paradigm. He told us about Himself. He said that He is One, but He also said that He has 3 manifestations:

1. Yahweh is the One referred to as “the Everlasting Father” (Aviad).
2. Yahweh is the One referred to as “the Holy Spirit” (Ruach HaKodesh).
3. Yahweh is the One referred to as “the Messiah” (HaMashiach) and “the Son of Elohim”. He is HaMashiach ben Elohim.

I didn’t make that up, and I’m not giving you my interpretation of the Scriptures. That’s what Yahweh said. See His Name is Yahweh for details.

It’s true that Yahweh’s Oneness is complicated, but it’s complicated by Yahweh’s design. Take a look at Isaiah 9: 6-7. Again, Yahweh doesn’t make mistakes:

“For a Child will be born to us. A Son will be given to us. The government will rest on His shoulders, and His Name will be called Wonderful [Pele], Counselor [Yovetz], Mighty El [El Gibbor], Everlasting Father [Aviad], Prince of Peace [Sar Shalom]. There will be no end to the increase of His government or of peace on the throne of David and over His kingdom, to establish it and to uphold it with justice and righteousness from then on and forevermore. The zeal of Yahweh Sabaoth will accomplish this.” (Isaiah 9: 6-7)

Obviously, Isaiah isn’t referring to an ordinary child, because he calls Him by these Names:

• Pele
• Yovetz
• El Gibbor
• Aviad
• Sar Shalom

Isaiah is talking about the Messiah, HaMashiach. Yahweh told Jeremiah exactly who He is:

“Behold, the days are coming,” declares Yahweh, “When I will raise up for David a righteous Branch. He will reign as king and act wisely and do justice and righteousness in the land. In His days Judah will be saved, and Israel will live securely. This is His Name by which He will be called, ‘Yahweh Our Righteousness.’ [Yahweh Tsidkenu]” (Jeremiah 23: 5-6)

The Messiah is “David’s righteous Branch”. His Name is Yahweh Tsidkenu.

As I said, I’m progressing toward another book. At this point, I don’t know exactly what it will be.

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“I am the good shepherd. I know My sheep and My sheep know Me — just as the Father knows Me and I know the Father — and I lay down My life for the sheep. I have other sheep that are not of this fold. I must bring them also. They too will listen to My voice, and there shall be one flock and one Shepherd. The reason My Father loves Me is that I lay down My life — only to take it up again. No one takes it from Me, but I lay it down of My own accord. I have authority to lay it down and authority to take it up again. This command I received from My Father.”

John 10: 14-18

See “His Name is Yahweh”.