IS MICHAEL ROOD AGAINST The PASSOVERS ... The Passovers Found in the Book of John ?

A Re-post from October 23, 2017

Hebrew Roots popular leader, Michael Rood, has re-written Scriptures. Mr. Rood calls it the "Corrected" KJV, the Chronological Gospels , and has re-written verses that hinder his theories. . . verses which contain TRUTH.  

Just like the Gnostics of old, Mr. Rood . . .


 bases his "corrected" version on his own logic, his own method of counting the feast days, and the notorious SHEM TOV .   

His version attacks both Passover and Baptism. This post will deal with PASSOVER. 

PASSOVER

In Mr. Rood's attack of Passover it consists of  REMOVING the historical Passovers listed in the Gospels.   

 There were at least 3 Passovers during the earthly public ministry of The LORD JESUS which are specifically recorded in John ... and perhaps 4, if one counts the un-named feast in John 5:1 as a Passover feast.

Since Passover only arrives once a year, even the three Passovers expressly identified in the book of John would mean The LORD'S public ministry had to last three years at the least.

These Passovers are listed in

·                   John 2:13 and 2:23 after the wedding in Cana

·                   John 6:4 as HE+ fed the 5,000 ,and

·                   John 11: 55 after the raising of Lazarus.

Scholars have said that the un-named feast of John 5:1 was a Passover also because The LORD JESUS "went up to Jerusalem" ... which supposedly indicated that feast was a Passover feast.   However, no one actually knows for sure which feast this one was.

So, for counting's sake, we will not include the feast which MIGHT have been a Passover in John 5:1.  That will leave us 3 identified Passovers during His+ public ministry.

Mr. Rood, however, tells the reader that the Passover in John 6:4 was NOT a Passover --- contradicting Scriptures --- because he considered that the verse was not authentic Scripture and was "inserted" later. So he REMOVES that verse from Scripture in his Chronological Gospels version. 

He also tells us that Our LORD JESUS did NOT eat the Passover meal before His+ crucifixion. 

Re-wording and re-working the Scripture verses, Mr. Rood then eliminates 2 Passovers during The LORD'S public ministry which in turn eliminates at least two years out of His+ ministry. 

This conveniently supports Mr. Rood's theory of a 70-week ministry of The LORD JESUS CHRIST instead of His+ 3.5 year ministry. 

This, then, is the significance of the Passover debate when readers read Mr. Rood's book.

So now, let us simply look at the evidence.

Starting in Mr. Rood's Chronological Gospels, on page 240, John 18:28, with footnote 18:28.1( The verse starts on the bottom of page 239 ). 

Mr. Rood actually states that the meal the LORD ate with His+ disciples before His+ Crucifixion was NOT the Passover meal.  Rather, it was " one last time around the dinner table with his disciples." 

This is a MAJOR problem because Mr. Rood is contradicting The LORD JESUS, Who+ indeed did identify that last meal eaten with His+ disciples as a Passover... not once, but 4 times HE+ identified in  in the Gospel accounts.

Luke 22:7 - 8  ( page 221 bottom )

Then came the day of unleavened bread,

when the Passover must be killed.

And HE+ sent Peter and John, saying,

Go and prepare us the Passover,

that we may eat.

No variants at all in verse 8, no alternative readings, in the Greek text or the Aramaic text nor in Mr. Rood's own translation. The LORD clearly identifies His+ last meal as the Passover.

Luke 22: 15 & 16 (page 222, bottom)

And HE+ said unto them,

With desire I+ have desired to eat this

Passover with you before I+ suffer:

For I+ say unto you,

I+ will not any more eat thereof,

until it be fulfilled

in the kingdom of GOD.

Same in the Greek, Aramaic, and Mr. Rood's own translation. No variants at all in verse 15 ( i.e., all texts say the same thing.)

There are some variants with the negatives in verse 16 in various Greek manuscripts but nothing which changes the meaning and nothing which eliminates The LORD'S identity of the Passover meal there.

So we see that in these verses in Luke, written in all the texts and translations including Mr. Rood's, The LORD JESUS HIMSELF+ identified the meal before His+ Crucifixion as the Passover.   

Mark 14:12-14 ( page 221 middle)

And the first day of unleavened bread,

when they killed the Passover,

His+ disciples said unto HIM+,

Where wilt THOU+ that we go and prepare

that THOU+ mayest eat the Passover?

And HE+ sendeth forth two of His+ disciples,

and saith unto them, Go ye into the city,

and there shall meet you a man bearing a pitcher of water: follow him.

And wheresoever he shall go in,

say ye to the goodman of the house,

The Master+ saith,

Where is the guestchamber,

where I+ shall eat the Passover

with My+ disciples?

This is a most remarkable passage because there are NO VARIANTS at all listed in the Greek for Mark 14: 12, 13, 14, ---  not even a "the" is misplaced or omitted.  Every Greek word in this passage in the manuscripts are agreed upon with no alternative readings even in the Aramaic, so all Bibles SHOULD read those verses as stated in the KJV.

Mr. Rood has verses 13 and 14 okay, but he re-words verse 12 without any Greek or Aramaic text to back his changes... and those changes are crucial, which we will soon see.

Matthew 26:18

And HE+ said,

Go into the city to such a man,

and say unto him,

The Master+ saith, My+ time is at hand;

I+ will keep the Passover

at thy house with My+ disciples.

So, we can clearly see that Our LORD JESUS did indeed identify the last meal eaten with His+ disciples as the Passover in His+ instructions to His+ disciples. It is the LAST Passover; we know it as The LORD'S Supper. 

Thus, Mr. Rood's footnote at John 28:18.1, page 240 , is totally in error. The LORD JESUS Himself+ identified His+ last meal with His+ disciples as the Passover, in which HE+ established The LORD'S Supper for His+ Followers.

On this evidence alone, we can see two of the three Passovers firmly established in Scripture during The LORD'S public ministry.

Now we come to the third Passover: John 6:4.

Hebrew Roots followers may have a hard time with this verse in John because the verse and its context SEEM to omit that The LORD JESUS ATTENDED the Passover that year in Jerusalem. 

If HE+ did NOT attend, then the Hebrew Roots camp has a very hard time explaining how The LORD JESUS always kept The LAW.

If HE+ did attend the Passover in Jerusalem, then the Apostle John has chosen to omit a lot of details  at this point in the book of John and the time frame does not fit into Mr. Rood's list of feasts.

In truth, Scripture is silent about whether The LORD kept that Passover in Jerusalem or not.

On page 135 of his re-written Gospels, Mr. Rood OMITS THAT VERSE from his version. He accompanies the omission with a footnote telling us that verse was "added to the Greek manuscripts after the third century and are absent from the ancient Greek manuscripts 472 and 850.”

The truth of the matter is that we have NO Greek Uncial ( capital letters ) or Minuscules ( lower case "cursives" ) codices EARLIER than the 4th century.  ALL the words of our Greek New Testament are found in these thousands --- yes, thousands --- of codices from the 4th century onward.

We do have Papyrus 66 and Papyrus 75, two of the oldest Papyri variously dated from the year 200 AD to 300 AD,  but  Mr. Rood obviously did not check these two Papyrus because THEY BOTH INCLUDE JOHN 6:4 in them ! 

His claim for the SHEM TOV manuscripts being "ancient" is simply speculation on the part of the manuscript critics. The copies now extant ( i.e., SHEM TOV and two others) were from the Middle Ages or thereabouts... not exactly ancient. Mr. Rood, however, notes them as "ANCIENT HEBREW MATTHEW" ( AHM) throughout his Gospel version. 

There WAS a Hebrew manuscript of Matthew, but it has not survived through the centuries and no copy of it exists. What Mr. Rood uses is NOT that original book of Matthew. 

Does Mr. Rood think no-one is aware of these things ? This information is freely available on-line for anyone who cares to make the effort to verify his statements.

A copy of the Greek in Papyrus 66 is in Philip Comfort and David Barrett's book, The Text of the Earliest New Testament Greek Manuscripts --- A Corrected, Enlarged Edition of The Complete Text of the Earliest New Testament Manuscripts, Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Wheaton, Illinois, 2001, p. 408.   

 John 6:4 is in it , just like it is in the manuscripts of other Greek texts. Surprisingly... there is NOT ONE VARIANT in Papyrus 66 for John 6:4.  This is significant because of the many, many scribal errors found in other verses in that Papyrus. 

Now, minuscule 472 is a minor manuscript NOT "ancient" nor of the 3rd century but of the 13th, which is considered a "late" manuscript. It is true, that verse is omitted from min. 472. However, it is a minor manuscript, as far as textual criticism is concerned. 

Now , let's look at the second "ancient" manuscript Mr. Rood cites to claim authority for removing John 6:4. 

We NEED to look at it because of a truth, Mr. Rood DID NOT ...  

DID MR. ROOD EVEN CHECK Manuscript 850 ?

( And, did he think no-one else would ? )

Mr. Rood's reference to Minuscule 850 for the omission of John 6:4 is totally IN ERROR. That 12th century  --- NOT ANCIENT --- minuscule 850 ONLY includes John 7:25 through John 10:18. 

Chapter 6 of John --- as well as chapters 1,2,3,4,5, 11 , 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20 and 21 --- are all missing from ms 850, which is a partial copy of the New Testament. 

So... do we throw out all those chapters of John because they are missing from this particular minuscule 850 ?

Can we in honesty say that John 3:16 should be removed from our translation because it is missing from Min. 850 --- when NONE of John's chapter 3 is found in that manuscript ? 

Mr. Rood threw out John 6:4 from his Chronological Gospels  when there were NO VERSES from chapter 6 in manuscript 850 whatsoever ! 

This is simply dishonest scholarship foisted upon the readers of Mr. Rood's faulty version of his edited Gospels.

In truth, even Nestle-Aland's Greek New Testament 26th , 27th, and 28th editions scarcely mention the omission of John 6:4 at all, as so minor as to not be worthy of notice. This is very significant because the NA Greek texts include very minute detail of the variants in the manuscripts, even down to the missing or added "the".

Thus, we now have re-established 3 Passovers with Scriptural evidence that took place during The LORD'S public ministry.

As for the fourth probable Passover, the un-named feast in John 5:1,  Irenaeus clearly states that it was a PASSOVR in the Ante-Nicene Fathers Vol 1, Irenaeus Against Heresies, Book 2, Chapter 22, section 3, page 391: 

"HE+ is found in Samaria; on which occasion, too, HE+ conversed with the Samaritan woman, and while at a distance, cured the son of the centurion by saying, 'Go thy way, thy son liveth.' 

"Afterwards HE+ went up, the second time, to observe the festival day of the Passover in Jerusalem; on which occasion HE+ cured the paralytic man,  who had lain beside the pool thirty-eight years, bidding him rise, take up his couch , and depart. ... "

The healing of the paralytic man who was beside the pool for 38 years is in Chapter 5 of John, thus Irenaeus counted the un-named "festival of the Jews" as a PASSOVER. 

Irenaeus lived from 120 to 202 AD ... a couple of centuries BEFORE Eusebius.  Thus Irenaeus, the Bishop of Lyons, a pupil  under Polycarp who was discipled by John himself, did not receive this information from Eusebius , but rather it was handed down to him from the Apostle John through Polycarp ! 

If the testimony of this Early Church apologist, Irenaeus, is received ( as it should be, for Irenaeus was a very godly man) that would indeed bring the count of the Passovers held during The LORD'S public ministry to four.

Mr. Rood accuses the Christian church through the ages of following Eusebius' teaching of a 3.5 year ministry ( page 3 , introduction), but Mr. Rood failed to take into account that the Early Church counted 4 Passovers.

 

ANOTHER PASSOVER PROBLEM

Mr. Rood asserts the time frame found in these two verses is in error, on page 221:

And the first day of unleavened bread,

when they killed the Passover,

Mark 14:12 a

Then came the day of unleavened bread,

when the Passover must be killed.

Luke 22:7

To circumvent this Scriptural time frame, found in the Greek and Aramaic text and in the KJV translation, stated clearly in both Mark and Luke, Mr. Rood "corrects" Scripture by removing "first day" and by removing "killed."  Thus, his unwarranted "corrections" read:

" At the beginning of the preparations for Unleavened Bread,

when they prepared to sacrifice the Passover... "

The words in GREEN are NOT in the Greek NOR the Aramaic texts. Mr. Rood added them after removing "first day" and "killed."  His meaning is NOT the same as what is written in the KJV and Greek and Aramaic texts.

These are critical changes because he uses his "corrected" version to support his thesis that The LORD could NOT have eaten the Passover with His+ disciples !

He complains on page 221 that the Greek text at Matthew 26:17 was mistranslated in the KJV because "day" was not in the Greek text there, only "first."

The Greek text at Matthew 26:17 does indeed omit the Greek word for day ( "haymera" ) ... but it is found in Mark 14:12 and Luke 22:7 ... without a single variant or alternative reading .

Based on Matthew's omission of "day",  Mr. Rood changes ALL THE THREE VERSES in all THREE books ( MATTHEW, MARK, and LUKE ) --- correcting Scriptures on his own authority ( ! ) ---  removing "first day" and "killed" so that it appears in his version that the Passover Lamb was NOT killed the FIRST DAY of the Unleavened Bread feast. 

In other words, Mr. Rood CHANGED the wording of that verse in Mark and Luke WITHOUT A SHRED OF MANUSCRIPT EVIDENCE of ANY KIND.  He made those two verses AGREE with Matthew's kindred verse ! 

Thus, that "correction" of his is supposed to affirm that The LORD JESUS could "not have eaten" the Passover and also BEEN the Passover Lamb slain from the foundation of the world .

Mr. Rood corrects Scripture to fit his thesis, his purposes, and his agenda. There were other religious leaders who did the same thing in the early Christian era:  the Gnostics.

He does this also for BAPTISM.   

( See the coming post.)