A little bird just flew past my window and told me that the next Berean Call newsletter will seek to address the “Hebrew original of Acts 15 prophecied by the Dead Sea Scrolls and spoken of by early church writers translated by unnamed scholars so that Acts 13:48 doesn’t support Calvinism” story. If I may offer some predictions:
“Dead Sea Scrolls” could really mean a lot more than just…the Dead Sea Scrolls. I mean, it could refer to like pretty much any Jewish writing up to, like, 2002….
Well, some early Christian writers talk about Hebrew. That’s important. And, some said Matthew was written in Hebrew. That’s really important. Did we mention some mentioned Hebrew? And how important that is? And that it is important to see how important things are? My, we’ve run out of time here….
Some commentators mention Hebraisms or Semiticisms in Acts. That is very important. OK, so they mention them in Acts 1-12, which would not technically include 13:48, but the fact that there are Hebraisms in the preceding portion of Acts could be relevant! Hebraisms, given that I can’t read Hebrew, could be like ink, which, as we all know, soaks into fabric and spreads out. So, over time, it could have gotten into chapter thirteen and influenced verse 48, which, of course, we know can’t mean what it says, since there are hundreds of verses that say what I believe, so maybe, just maybe….
Or, worst possible scenario:
We stand by our story. The quotes from the DSS and early writers were there, but the Jesuits got to them before the second edition came out. Don’t underestimate the Jesuits! We have the Hebrew original under lock and key for the same reason: the Jesuits know how important this is, since, of course, the Hebrew original of Acts 1-15 refutes Calvinism, which, as we proved, is actually related to Catholicism via the Calvin/Augustine connection. And the reason we can’t tell you about our Hebrew scholars who translated this for us is because they, too, are in hiding. Legions of blue-hooded nuns have been seen lurking in the bushes outside the Special Hebrew Translator’s Center, and hence we just can’t be too careful.
I don’t know about you, but I can’t wait for this explanation!
