DISCOVERING ANCIENT WISDOM. (7 SEPT 2016)

Here’s a good example: The ancients around the world valued honey for healing…the Maori natives of New Zealand have traditionally used the honey made from the Manuka shrub’s flowers, which is much more powerful than regular honey, for healing as it has extraordinary antiseptic, antifungal & antibacterial powers. Honey on a wound creates a protective barrier, that also lifts all kinds of negative things out: dirt, bacteria, debris from the wound. It soaks extra water up which prevents bacterial growth. And the honey’s enzyme glucose oxidase releases healing hydrogen peroxide into the wound. Healing that takes conventional medicine 1 to 24 months has taken one week w/ the Manuka honey. Serious skin ulcers and MRSA-wounds have been quickly healed. Eras Natural Sciences (800-308-6284) sells a tube of Manuka wound honey. That’s my first good example.

A SECOND GOOD EXAMPLE: 1ST BOOK OF ENOCH. I’ve written about this book, which only the Ethiopian Orthodox church considers canonical scripture. It actually is 5 books, the first of which is the Book of Watchers. From this book, modern researchers, like Tim Alberino & others, have discovered the ancient witness to substantiate things they are archeologically discovering today that expose the end time agenda!! Yes, the nephalim were here and are again! (I mention Tim only because I know him personally, & he has done great research!)

“SEEK WISDOM!”(A) “Wisdom cries out in the street…” in other words, it is calling for people to listen!(B) Our search for wisdom is like our search for love: “looking for love in all the wrong places”. Wisdom & love are concepts more ancient than the wheel. Why should we reinvent any of them?…but the modern world does. It is my divine calling to call people back to discover the ancient wisdom found in God’s ancient scriptures. So what did the ancients know about wisdom?? Where did they go for wisdom?? What does wisdom(Hokmah in Heb.) look like?? Let’s rediscover all that! I’m reminded of the Bible verse that says, “Listen, my people, to my teaching, incline your ears to the words of my mouth. I shall open my mouth with instruction & draw hidden truths from of old.”(C) Wow, this Bible verse written by Maschil many centuries before Christ, shows even the ancients back then were seeking ancient wisdom! Another example is “He seeks out the wisdom of all the ancients, and is concerned with prophecies; he preserves the sayings of the famous & penetrates the subtleties of parables;”(D) It is scripturally wise to discover the wisdom of the ancients!

TWO MORE GOOD EXAMPLES. Before plunging into the answers to my questions, allow me to share another nugget recovered from the past: eating pre-digested food. The Anasazi (Navajo for “ancient ones”) would create cakes from pre-digested grain. Proper Nutrition, Inc. (800-555-8868) sells Seacure, a pre-digested fish protein that relieves Crohn’s disease, heals wounds & much more. In ancient India & China they used Andrographis (commonly called Indian Echinacea) as a cold remedy. It was credited with halting the 1919 flu epidemic in India. Now andrographis is being sold in Scandinavia under the brand name Kan Jang, and it has outsold all other cold medications for 12 years there.

SO IS HEALING KNOWLEDGE ANCIENT WISDOM? Yes, of course. And we are given a big clue in Scripture where we can get healing: for instance, “Their fruit will be for food, and their leaves for healing.”(E) The Israelites considered the physician & pharmacist as God’s agents to heal (F)…and so do I. YHWH God said, “…I am the Lord, your healer.”(G) And Christ was also called “the great Physician”. (H) So we read in the ancient text (written in c.190 B.C. & considered by some churches Scripture): “Honor the physician with the honor due him…for healing comes from the Most High…The Lord created medicines from the earth, and a sensible man will not despise them…And he gave skill to men that He might be glorified in His marvelous works…the pharmacist makes of them a compound…from Him health is upon the face of the earth.”(I) Unfortunately, today the World has a Medical System that is designed to make money and keep people sick & dependent upon it. The Medical System plays a role in the elite’s agenda to reduce the population. And recognizing this is also wisdom, for one of the aspects of ancient Biblical wisdom was a wise & discerning mind that could discern between evil & good, and make good decisions.(J) The wise ancients said spiritual & physical uncleanliness leads to death.(K)

HOW CAN WISDOM BE FOUND?? Indeed Job asks this question, “Whence then comes wisdom?”(L) Wisdom (like truth) is a spiritual thing. “The fear [reverence] of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom & the knowledge of the Holy One is insight.”(M) On the flip side, the Word of God makes clear why some don’t find it: Why do fools lack wisdom? “Because they hated knowledge and did not choose the fear of the Lord, would have none of my counsel, & despised all my reproof therefore they shall eat the fruit of their way & be sated with their own devices.”(N) Going back to the reverence for God which is properly called “the fear of God”—which from watching many social & nominal Christians doesn’t exist in their makeup…but would be helpful, because it is a “fountain of life”(O) that “brings riches, honor & life”(P) and instructs in wisdom.(Q) Wisdom has a healing & life-giving quality. But “Woe to those who are wise in their own eyes, & shrewd in their own sight!”(R) The wisdom of the world is foolishness to God, and He wonders why people don’t come to Him for wisdom, but turn to the World: “What do you gain by going to Egypt [the World] to drink the waters of the Nile [World’s newspeak lies]? (JER 2:18)

THE HAKAMIM (THE WISE ONES). China had their Confucius, Israel had their Solomon, and mankind has Christ. A century before Christ, the Qumran community that left the Dead Sea Scrolls used Proverbs, and Job, and Ecclesiasticus (Sirach) as their books of wisdom. A century after Christ, Clement of Alexandria was using and prolifically citing the same books of wisdom. Only now, he was also giving Christ the title of “Wisdom”. When Christ was here, a Bible scholar came to him in secret at night and said “We know you are a teacher (rabbi) come from God!”(S) Oh by the way, the Qumran community also used 1 Enoch and some of their own writings such as the Book of Mysteries, 4QBeatitudes, The Community Rule, Sapiential Work A, and the Thanksgiving Hymns which were all wisdom books. The Sapiential Work said things like, “Honor your parents”, “study the mystery that is to come”, and “understand all the ways of truth.” And here is where I want to make the comment that the wisdom of the Hebrews & Israelites was different from the nations around them—it was connected to God and morality, and it was for everyday men & women. In contrast, the ancient wisdom of Babylon was connected to magic & the occult. Likewise with Egypt, plus the wisdom writings of Egypt were designed for the Pharaoh’s court and the priests & bureaucrats that served Pharaoh. They were not for the common person.(T) The Bible’s wisdom joined the law of God to wisdom, and God’s creation to wisdom. The study of Creation was held out as one way to discern divine wisdom.(U) In contrast to God’s true prophets, we see certain elders of Israel coming to God’s prophet Ezekiel to “inquire of the Lord” and God tells Ezekiel “they have set up their idols in their mind” and he should not bother trying to give them divine wisdom. God says, “they hear your words but will not obey them.” (V)

CONCLUDING THOUGHT. There is a Bible verse that simply states it: “He who listens will listen & he who does not will not.”(W) You know what I mean??? Where are we in this picture??

(A) PRV 2:3, JAS 1:5 & others (B) PRV 1:20 (C) PS 78:1-2 (D) ECCLES 39:1-2 (E) EZK 47:12 (F) ECCLES 38:1-15 (G) EX 15:26 (H) cf. MK 2:17, & illustrated in many verses, and it was prophesied that he’d be a healer: ISA 53:5, 57:18 (I) ECCLES/ SIRACH 38:1-15 (J) An example of this is 1 KGS 3:9,12 (K) LEV 15:31 & others (L) JOB 28:20 (M) PRV 9:10 also PRV 1:7, 15:33 (N) PRV 1:29-31 (O) PRV 14:27 (P) PRV 22:4 (Q) PRV 15:33 (R) ISA 5:21 (S) JN 3:2 (T) Examples of ancient wisdom for Pharoah’s immediate court incl. Instruction for Ptahhotep, Instruction for Merikare, and Instruction of King Amenenhet to his son Sesostris. (U) PS 104:24, cf. AMOS 9:5, & others. (V) EZK 14:3, 33:32 (W) EZ 2:5,7, cf. 3:27