The Foolproof Wisdom and Mouthpiece of God

Have you ever been in the company of high ranking government officials? Wouldn’t it be something to be part of a senator or a president’s entourage? Just to be with a group of lawyers and be dressed like them, though you are not a lawyer, you will surely be thought of as a lawyer yourself.

Just keep quiet.

In the past, that’s exactly how it was for Bro. Eli Soriano. He was always in the courts because of lawsuits filed against him by his enemies in faith. He was not yet that popular on television that time. Whenever he would walk in the court with lawyers, even he gets greeted: “Good morning, Attorney.” They would mistake him of being a lawyer himself. It is similar to what the Bible says in Proverbs 17:28 –

Even a fool, when he holdeth his peace, is counted wise: and he that shutteth his lips is esteemed a man of understanding.

Just keep silent; do not open your mouth. People will never know that you cannot even speak English if you are well-dressed and look confident enough. Nonetheless, when Bro. Eli does open his mouth to speak, it’s an entirely different scenario.

“The Only Sensible Preacher of our Time,” that is how Bro. Eli has come to be known globally because of the kind of mouth he has. For the last 15 years, he has been answering all questions of faith from practically every religious group through his inimitable Bible Exposition. From the Roman Catholic Church, Jehovah’s Witnesses, Seventh Day Adventists, Mormons, to the so-called freethinkers and atheists, he gives light to each query concerning religion, science, and even social and political issues. He has his own GPS installed in his brain to pinpoint where in the Bible the answers to all their questions are located.

Among those who have tried to test his wisdom, or to challenge him head-on in a one-on-one debate, none dared try again, having experienced the consequences.

A preacher of God speaks the words of God; he does not speak without wisdom. Bro. Eli has proven this for over four decades of faithfully preaching the Gospel. His international program Ang Dating Daan (The Old Path) has been awarded the “Most Informative Religious Program of the Year” in 2006 by Gawad Amerika Awards. His Bible Expositions span worldwide and continue to reach more places and people and languages.

On the contrary, his detractors who pretend to know God’s words, even the things which they firmly believe and prove show how ignorant they truly are. The perfect examples are the ministers of the Iglesia Ni Cristo.

In an attempt to embarrass the award-winning evangelist, two Iglesia Ni Cristo ministers Ramil Parba and Michael Sandoval “exposed” in their program Ang Tamang Daan (The Right Path) the alleged erroneous teaching of Bro. Eli regarding who’s the firstborn, Cain or Abel. Following are excerpts:

————

Ramil Parba: Simpleng-simple. Hindi naman hiwaga ho yan eh.

Michael Sandoval: Opo.

Ramil Parba: Hiwaga pa ba yan kung sino yung nakatatanda?

Michael Sandoval: Sino panganay?

Ramil Parba: Eh, si Cain.

Michael Sandoval: Sino bunso?

Ramil Parba: Si Abel.

Michael Sandoval: Pero sabi nung puno?

Ramil Parba: Ah, ikaw naman, simpleng-simple eh.

TRANSLATION:

Ramil Parba: Very simple. That is not a mystery.

Michael Sandoval: Yes.

Ramil Parba: Is it a mystery who is older?

Michael Sandoval: Who is the firstborn?

Ramil Parba: Cain.

Michael Sandoval: Who is the youngest?

Ramil Parba: Abel.

Michael Sandoval: But the leader said?

Ramil Parba: Ah, you, that’s very simple.

————

With all conviction these Iglesia Ni Cristo ministers Parba and Sandoval attempted to refute Soriano, as though their material was hard evidence, when in fact what they were refuting was a slip of the tongue taken out of context. The following are excerpts of the original:

————

Bro. Eli: Naniniwala rin ako, mga kapatid, na ang isang tao’y pwedeng maging biktima ng karahasan ng kapuwa. Ang isang tao’y pu-pwedeng maging biktima ng pang-aapi ng kapuwa. Marami na pong saksi jan. Si Abel ay pinatay ng mismong kanyang kuya. Isang kuya na nag-relinquish ng kanyang pananagutan laban sa kaniyang nakababatang kapatid. Nang tanungin siya ng Dios, “Cain, nasan ang iyong kapatid na si Abel?” Ang sagot ni Cain, “Am I my brother’s keeper?” Ako ba ika ang tagapag-ingat ng aking kapatid? Kaya niya itinatanong yon, alam niya deep within his conscience that that is really his duty as an older brother, to be his brother’s keeper. But he [had] relinquished that job, that opportunity to serve God, to be his brother’s keeper. Kaya kaawa-awa si Cain, pinatay siya ng kaniyang nakakatandang kapatid.

TRANSLATION:

Bro. Eli: I also believe, brethren, that a man may fall victim to the violence of another. A man may fall victim to the oppression of another. There are plenty of witnesses to this. Abel was killed by his own older brother; an older brother who relinquished his responsibility [and turned] against his younger brother. When God asked him, “Where is Abel thy brother?” Cain answered, “Am I my brother’s keeper?” He was asking this because he knew deep within his conscience that that was really his duty as an older brother, to be his brother’s keeper. But he had relinquished that job, that opportunity to serve God, to be his brother’s keeper. So Cain was pitiful; he was killed by his older brother.

————

It is clear here that Bro. Eli’s statement at the last part wherein he said “Cain” instead of “Abel” was an honest mistake, a slip of the tongue. He already said at the beginning that “Abel was killed by his own older brother.” However, the Iglesia Ni Cristo ministers took this chance, pulled that last part and showed it in their program to make it appear that they are more knowledgeable in the Scriptures than Bro. Eli. Apparently, they saw no other error in his teachings that is why they had to use even a mere slip of the tongue out of context. They thought it would work to their advantage. When Bro. Eli answered back, their ignorance was exposed.

Bro. Eli pointed out that if Abel was the youngest child of Adam and Eve, that would mean that the couple had only two children. And with Abel dead, Cain was the only one left. How then did humans multiply? And who is Seth being mentioned in Genesis 4:25 –

And Adam knew his wife again; and she bare a son, and called his name Seth: For God, said she, hath appointed me another seed instead of Abel, whom Cain slew.

Seth was born of Eve after Abel was killed. Furthermore, in Genesis 5:4, it says –

And the days of Adam after he had begotten Seth were eight hundred years: and he begat sons and daughters:

Adam begot sons and daughters. Obviously, Parba and Sandoval didn’t read the Bible. Or, for the sake of fairness, could have they also committed a slip of the tongue?

No.

The program Ang Tamang Daan is pre-taped and has undergone editing. Besides, there were two of them in agreement that Abel is indeed the youngest of Adam and Eve’s children. Very simple, indeed. Very simple stupidity. This is what happens when someone who has not the God-given mouth and wisdom tries to preach the words of God. Since they are not seriously reading the Bible, it would have done them good if they have followed the saying, “It is better to remain silent and be thought a fool, than to open your mouth and remove all doubt.”

Only the wisdom coming from the mouthpiece being used by God is foolproof. It will by no means be refuted by any other mouth. As written in Luke 21:13-15 –

And it shall turn to you for a testimony. Settle it therefore in your hearts, not to meditate before what ye shall answer: For I will give you a mouth and wisdom, which all your adversaries shall not be able to gainsay nor resist.

In these last days, that mouthpiece that possesses wisdom from God is none other than the unbeatable preacher, Bro. Eli Soriano, Presiding Minister of the Members Church of God, International.

Jehovah: A Hoax Name of a Hoax god

“It is not true that the name of God is Jehovah. It cannot be. It is impossible.” This was the answer of Bro. Eli Soriano, dubbed as “The Only Sensible Preacher of Our Time,” to one of the inquirers in his worldwide Bible Exposition held November 6, 2008 in the Philippines. Soriano is Presiding Minister of the Members Church of God, International.

According to scholars, the Bible was written in three languages: Hebrew, Aramaic and Greek. The Jewish Bible, or the Old Testament, was written mostly in Hebrew and a few parts in Aramaic. In Hebrew, however, there is no letter J, neither in Aramaic. How can it be that Jehovah is the name of God?

The Hebrew and Aramaic scripts were offshoots of the Phoenician script. According to Wikipedia, Hebrews and Arameans borrowed the Phoenician alphabet during the end of the 2nd millennium BCE (Before the Christian Era); thus, the Hebrew alphabet is almost identical to the Aramaic alphabet in the number and order of letters, names and phonetic values.

During the late second and first millennia BCE, the old Hebrew script was developed. It has since undergone changes, but its major characteristics have been retained to this today. The Hebrew alphabet is composed of 22 letters; five of these letters (kaf, mem, nun, fe and tzadi) have a different form known as the final form (sofit) when they appear as the last letter in a word.

The table below shows the Hebrew alphabet known as the ketav Ashurit or classical Hebrew script with the normal and final forms, the name of each letter and its transliteration for English. Hebrew is read from right to left.

Image courtesy of jewishvirtuallibrary.org

Those are the Hebrew letters. There is no letter J. Hence, it is impossible for the name of God to be Jehovah. The name Jehovah was just invented by translators of the Bible.

From the principal doctrinal handbook of the Jehovah’s Witnesses, “Reasoning From the Scriptures”, published in 1985, on page 192, it says –

Hence some moderns have framed the name of Jehovah, unknown to all the ancients, whether Jews or Christians; for the true pronunciation of the name, which is in Hebrew text, by long disuse is now quite lost.

Only modern biblical translators formed Jehovah, Bro. Eli said. The name Jehovah is unknown to all the ancients, whether Jews or Christians. Not even Moses knew Jehovah; neither Apostle Paul. The word Jehovah only emerged due to the Masoretes.

The Masoretes were groups of scribes and Bible scholars based primarily in Israel. They worked during The Middle Ages, between the 7th and 11th centuries. These scholars attempted to put in order the pronunciation, paragraph, verse divisions and cantillation (ritual chantings) of the Hebrew Bible. They organized a system of pronunciation and grammatical guides in the form of distinguishing marks to identify vowel points of the Old Testament.

A vowel notation system for Hebrew is known as niqqud. All types of niqqud are not indicated in Hebrew writing. The reason for devising these systems is because scholars could not pronounce some of the Hebrew text.

The Hebrew alphabet is an abjad, a type of writing system having letters that represent consonants only; the reader must supply the appropriate vowel. Of the several systems of vowel notation that were developed, the most expansive was that of the Masoretes. The product of their work is known today as the Masoretic Text.

Even the name of God in Hebrew could not be pronounced by scholars, Bro. Eli said. The name of God is represented by four consonants, known as the Tetragrammaton: Yod, He, Vav, He. Due to the commandment of God to Israel that whosoever uses the name of God in vain shall not be held guiltless, the Jews considered the name too sacred to be uttered. It became a tradition wherefore not to pronounce it, until eventually the pronunciation was lost.

Below is the Tetragrammaton shown in three different scripts.

The Tetragrammaton in Paleo-Hebrew, Aramaic and modern Hebrew scripts. (Courtesy of Wikipedia)

When the Tetragrammaton was translated in English, which is YHWH, the translators altered it because they could not pronounce YHWH. What they did was that they replaced Y with J and W with V; and then they added the vowels E, O, and A. That is how JEHOVAH was formed. Another word that was formed in the 19th century was YAHWEH by the Hebrew scholar Gesenius. It was rejected by major Hebrew scholars.

According to the New World Bible Translation Committee, at the foreword of the New World Translation of the Holy Scriptures published by the Watchtower Bible and Tract Society for Jehovah’s Witnesses on February 9, 1950, on page 23, it says –

While inclining to view the pronunciation “Yah-weh” as the more correct way, we have retained the form “Jehovah” because of people’s familiarity with it since the 14th century.

The word Jehovah became known only in the 14th century. By then the Lord Jesus Christ had already gone up to heaven for 14 hundred years. The Apostles have also been dead for 14 hundred years before the word Jehovah emerged. Now, people are being fooled by the Jehovah’s Witnesses, Bro. Eli said. They are making them believe that the name of God is Jehovah. If you didn’t know where the word came from, you will really be fooled, because that Jehovah replaced the Tetragrammaton in some versions of the Bible.

Ironically, although the Jehovah’s Witnesses were inclined to view that the pronunciation Yah-weh as the more correct way, they settled with Jehovah because of people’s familiarity with it. They preferred familiarity more than accuracy. What makes this Jehovah-hoax worse is that after this “inclining to view” was published in the 1950’s, they made an effort to deny it 35 years later. Here are excerpts of the two editions from the New World Translation, and the alteration that was made, obviously, to mislead people.

According to Bro. Eli, the name of God from the very beginning is written in Isaiah 63:16 (RV), which says –

For thou art our father, though Abraham knoweth us not, and Israel doth not acknowledge us: thou, O LORD, art our father; our redeemer from everlasting is thy name.

The name of God from everlasting is “Father.” Bro. Eli pointed out that prior to creation the Father already had a Son; thus His name Father is from eternity. He cited Proverbs 30:4 –

Who hath ascended up into heaven, or descended? who hath gathered the wind in his fists? who hath bound the waters in a garment? who hath established all the ends of the earth? what is his name, and what is his son’s name, if thou canst tell?

“That is Father and Son,” Bro. Eli emphasized. When God has not yet started His creation, together with Him was His Son. The Son calls Him, Father; and that Son is the Lord Jesus Christ. Proverbs 8:22-30 says –

The LORD possessed me in the beginning of his way, before his works of old. I was set up from everlasting, from the beginning, or ever the earth was. When there were no depths, I was brought forth; when there were no fountains abounding with water. Before the mountains were settled, before the hills was I brought forth: While as yet he had not made the earth, nor the fields, nor the highest part of the dust of the world. When he prepared the heavens, I was there: when he set a compass upon the face of the depth: When he established the clouds above: when he strengthened the fountains of the deep: When he gave to the sea his decree, that the waters should not pass his commandment: when he appointed the foundations of the earth: Then I was by him, as one brought up with him:

The one speaking in these verses is the Wisdom in verse 12: “I wisdom dwell with prudence, and find out knowledge of witty inventions.”

The Wisdom said that even before the heavens were created, before the earth was made, before God’s creation began, He was with God; He was brought forth. In another translation, it says “When there were no depths, was I begotten…” (Geneva Bible). This is the same person that was begotten in John 1:18 –

No man hath seen God at any time; the only begotten Son, which is in the bosom of the Father, he hath declared him.

The Wisdom in the Book of Proverbs is the begotten Son, the Lord Jesus Christ. He is the Son that was brought forth before the heavens were created. I Corinthians 1:24 says –

But unto them which are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God, and the wisdom of God.

Christ is the wisdom of God. He was brought forth from the bosom of the Father before the heavens were created. In the past eternity, there was already Someone calling God, Father, Bro. Eli said; and that is the Son of God. That is why the Lord Jesus Christ, when He taught the Apostles how to pray, He said in Matthew 6:9 –

After this manner therefore pray ye: Our Father which art in heaven, Hallowed be thy name.

“Hallowed be thy name.” What name? Bro. Eli said, it is the name “Father.” That is the name Christ commanded His disciples to worship. When a Christian prays, he will not call God Jehovah or El Shaddai; he shall pray after the manner Christ commanded him to. He shall call on God, “Our Father.”

Now, there is this philosophy of pastors of Jehovah that “Father” is not a proper noun but a common noun, Bro. Eli recalled. During discussions, they would ask Bro. Eli what his father’s name is, and he would answer, Triunfo. The pastors would then infer, “So, he has a name: Triunfo. His name is not father.”

The phenomenal preacher then would answer: “Right, the name of your father is Peter. But if it is the son who is calling him, would he call his father, Peter? If you are a child, of course, you would call your father, father, or papa, or daddy. If you are a respectful son, you will not call your father by his personal name.”

“Look at Christ, whenever He speaks with His Father, He calls Him Father. He never used Jehovah. He always say, Father, Father, Father, Father, Father. He only called God in another name when He was on the cross, assuming the role of a redeemer, a ransom. He called the Father, ‘Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani?’ Which means, ‘My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?’ But in any other occasion in His whole life on earth, He called God, Father; because that is His name from everlasting.”