Its "Israel", Not the "Heathens"
ITS "ISRAEL", NOT THE "HEATHENS"
By Clifton A. Emahiser
Like so many passages in the King James Version of the Bible, Galatians 3:8 is totally confusing. It is said that there are estimated 27,000 mistakes in translation in the King James Bible. There are about 7,000 mistakes in the Tetragrammation alone. You may call them "mistakes", "translation errors" or downright "tampering", but probably we have all three. Therefore it is of the utmost importance that we check out the Hebrew and the Greek in all cases. I can not emphasize this enough!!! YOU MUST CHECK OUT THE HEBREW AND GREEK!!! Further the Aramaic should consulted. Y0U CANNOT TRUST THE ENGLISH WORDING!!! Also all the other passages that are talking about the same topic should be scrutinized. If there has been any of the above three problems, it will probably show up in one or more the other passages. This is the problem we have in Galatians 3:8. To get started here with this problem we find here, lets read it:
And the scripture, foreseeing that God would justify the heathen through faith, preached before the gospel unto Abraham, saying, In thee shall all the nations be blessed.
A lot of people, when reading this passage, will think and say: Oh this is where "God" brings in all of these non-Israelites under the Covenant and they, too, will find Redemption and they will fit into the "restitution of all things." This is not so, nor is this verse, when taking the Greek into account, saying this. In fact, it is saying quite the opposite. Some people, at this point, picture in their minds how an Israelite will take a non-Israelite hand in hand and walk off into the sunset and live happily ever after. This is the pure essence of Communism!!! This verse is not saying this nor does it even suggest such a thing!
So lets now look into the Greek and see if we can find out who these so-called "heathens" are. The Strong’s number for this word "heathen" is 1484 "ethnos". This is the same word that is translated "Gentiles" in most places in the New Testament and anyone who has studied to find out what the word "Gentiles" means knows that better than 90% of the times it is used, it means Israelites!
At this point, lets look at some of the other passages that have reference to this passage. There are several parallel passages to Galatians 3:8. Here are some of them:
Genesis 18:18
Seeing that Abraham shall surely become a great and mighty nation, and all the nations of the shall be blessed of him?
Genesis 22:18
And in thy seed shall all nations of the earth be blessed; because thou hast obeyed my voice.
Genesis 26:4
And I will make thy seed to multiply as the stars of heaven, and will give unto thy seed all these countries; and in thy seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed.
Genesis 28:14
And thy seed shall be as the dust of the earth, and thou shalt spread abroad to the west, and to the east, and to the north, and to the south: and in thee and in thy seed shall all the families of the earth be blessed.
Up to this point, we still have not proved by all reasonable doubt that these "blessings" are strictly for Israel, and ISRAEL ONLY. If we take the English wording we have here at their face value, it might appear that somehow these "blessings" might be for all races, but lets not be so quick to give away our heritage! Some think that somehow the other races will benefit by Israel’s blessings directly or indirectly and that somehow some of these blessings will rub off on them that it will be Israel’s responsibility to be a good influence on them and teach them our ways. If there were no other Scriptures than the ones quoted here above which we could examine and check against, we might have to concede that these "blessings" do include these other races. This might indeed leave room for argument for such a conclusion, but thank Yahweh, this is not the end of what the Bible has to say on the subject! These are not the only parallel scriptures to Galatians 3: 8. We do have another parallel reference, and now we will settle this thing once an for all with Acts 3: 25:
Ye are the children of the prophets, and of the covenants which God made with our fathers, saying unto Abraham, And in thy seed shall all kindreds of the earth be blessed.
Now, with this Scripture, we have an entirely different situation. The word "kindreds" makes all of the difference in the world as to what these passages are all about. The word indicates that the blessings are for the "kindred" peoples – the red kind – the kind that shows blood in the face – Adam kind ( or kin) – kinfolk. Now we can know for sure that these blessings are for Israel and no one else! Now we can know for sure who the "heathen" of Galatians 3:8 are – they are Israelites!!! Who else would we expect them to be? Now here is a case where the King James Version got it right, thank Yahweh for that! It is properly translated "kindreds." In most of the other translations they have it wrong, so lets not throw away our King James Version of the Bible yet! Now that we know the "heathen" (ethnos) are Israelites, we will have to interpret all these Scriptures mentioned here plus any others in parallel to them as "Israelites" (the "nations" of Genesis 18:18, 22:18, 26:4 and the "families" of Genesis 28:14).
Now that we have established this, lets nail it down a little more securely by checking out the Greek on the word "kindreds." "Kindreds" in the Greek is the Strong’s number 3965. The Strong’s Concordance does not give the best description of this word, so we will use The Complete Word Study Dictionary, New Testament by Dr. Spiros Zodhiates, page 1130:
patria, genitive patrias, feminine noun from pater (3963), father. Lineage, family, descendants.
Used thus in Luke 2:4 , "Of the lineage [i.e., descedants] of David." Used in a wider sense of a people, Nationality or race (Acts 3:25) in allusion to Gen. 12:3;I Chr. 16:28; Ps. 22:27; 96:7). In Eph. 3:14, 15 we have God presented as "the Father" who has only one patria (family). … Derivative[s], derivation: patriarches (3966). pariarch. … Synonym: phule (5443) tribe, race, clan; alkos (3624), family; genea (1074), age, generation; genos (1085), stock, race, kind.
What it is saying here is: The lineage of like kind as of the Father (Yahweh) –race of Yahweh – descendants of Yahweh – the family of Yahweh – kindred of Yahweh – seed of Yahweh – stock of Yahweh. As it refers us to #5443 as a synonym, we better look at that one too:
5443. phule, genitive phule, feminine noun from philon (not found I the NT), race, tribe, class, which is from pluo (5453), to generate, produce. A tribe, race, lineage, kindred. …A nation or people descended from a common ancestor … Specifically, a tribe, clan, spoken of the tribes of Israel as subdivisions of the whole nation.
Conclusion: Where does all of this bring us then? What is Israel’s relation, then, to the other races? And, what is that relation supposed to be as taught by the Bible? The answer is: Yahweh commands that Israel shall be totally separated from all other races, Numbers 23:9:
For from the top of the rocks I see him, and from the hills I behold him: lo, the people shall dwell alone,
And shall not be reckoned among the nations.
The word "reckoned" as used here is the Hebrew word 2803 in the Strong’s concordance. It means to think, account. In other words Israel will not be accounted among the other races – not calculated among the other races- not counted among the other races – not considered among the other races – not imputed among the other races – not regarded among the other races. The word "nations" as used here means "goy" in Hebrew.
Knowing all of this, we are not to have the following relations with the other races: NO TREATY INTERCOURSE – NO BUSINESS INTERCOURSE – NO MONETARY INTERCOURSE – NO POLITICAL INTERCOURSE – NO RELIGIOUS INTERCOURSE – NO EDUCATIONAL INTERCOURSE – NO SPORTS, PLAYGROUND or ENTERTAINMENT INTERCOURSE – NO YMCA or YWCA INTERCOURSE – NO MILITARY INTERCOURSE – NO SOCIAL or DINNING INTERCOURSE and most of all, NO SEXUAL INTERCOURSE!!! WE ARE NOT TO HAVE ANYTHING IN COMMON WITH THEM AND THEREFORE HAVE NO AFFECT UPON THEM I ANY WAY, SHAPE OR FORM, GOOD or BAD. WE ARE TO LEAVE THEM ALONE!
