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Speaker 1: Life Audio.

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Speaker 2: When most Christians think about angels, what picture comes to mind?

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Speaker 2: What's the traditional view held in the church?

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Speaker 3: I think of typically like a human-like figure that is gorgeous,

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Speaker 3: like handsome, maybe Brad Pitt looking, I don't know, but

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Speaker 3: also wings. With wings and probably armor and in flight,

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Speaker 3: in activity, a warrior-looking being. That's probably the primary image

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Speaker 3: that we have of angelic beings.

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Speaker 2: Maybe we need to take a second look at this

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Speaker 2: and not reduce all of these spirit beings down to

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Speaker 2: what we consider angels. We might be missing something more

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Speaker 2: that's going on. Has the church largely misunderstood the nature

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Speaker 2: and origin of angels and demons? Are there other heavenly

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Speaker 2: beings that are not angelic or demonic? And if so,

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Speaker 2: where do they come from and what do they do?

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Speaker 2: Are demons really the disembodied spirits of the Nephilim as

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Speaker 2: discussed in Genesis 6 and the book of Enoch? Back

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Speaker 2: in studio and joining me today because of popular demand

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Speaker 2: to talk about these issues and the supernatural realm is Dr.

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Speaker 2: Joel Mutamale, author of The Unseen Battle. Joel, you are

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Speaker 2: both a friend and protege of the late Dr. Michael Heiser,

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Speaker 2: whose work sparked interest in the origin and nature of demons, angels,

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Speaker 2: and the unseen realm. I've wanted to have this conversation

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Speaker 2: for a long time. Thanks for flying back to do it.

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Speaker 1: Absolutely, Sean.

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Speaker 3: It's such an honor for me to be with you.

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Speaker 3: This is the second time I'm in studio. It feels

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Speaker 3: like the two-peat in honor of Michael Jordan as the

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Speaker 3: greatest of all time. You know, we'll be looking forward

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Speaker 3: to the three-peat at some point, but This is a

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Speaker 3: really great opportunity.

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Speaker 1: I'm excited. I love it.

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Speaker 2: So we're doing a two-part series. First one, Angels and Demons.

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Speaker 2: And then we're going to talk about the Book of Enoch.

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Speaker 2: And then we're going to go live on a Talbot

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Speaker 2: Tuesday and take people's questions and challenges. So write in question,

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Speaker 2: people watching, people listening. We'll come back and tackle that.

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Speaker 2: We'll release that date coming up. But before we dive

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Speaker 2: into an analysis of Michael Heiser's views on angels and

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Speaker 2: demons and your take on it, you worked closely with

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Speaker 2: him and his scholarship and build on many of his ideas.

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Speaker 2: Why do you think he's had such a profound impact

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Speaker 2: on how evangelicals think about the unseen realm? And maybe

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Speaker 2: tell us a little bit about your relationship with him.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, I'll start with my relationship with Mike.

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Speaker 3: Mike and I worked together at Logos Bible Software years

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Speaker 3: and years ago. Mike was the scholar in residence. I

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Speaker 3: came on to help bring Oversight to a new project

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Speaker 3: they started called the Faith Life Study Bible. In the

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Speaker 3: last episode that I was with you, we kind of

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Speaker 3: talked a little bit about my origin story and kind

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Speaker 3: of this climactic moment I had When I read his

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Speaker 3: essay on Psalm 82 and really just finishing seminary feel,

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Speaker 3: I mean, honestly, I think I was just a punk,

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Speaker 3: arrogant seminary, post-seminary kid that thought he knew it all

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Speaker 3: and just said, this guy got it wrong. Like what,

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Speaker 3: like how could he possibly believe that the sons of

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Speaker 3: God are spiritual beings and not human rulers? And so

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Speaker 3: I walked into his office and challenged him on his

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Speaker 3: take and it started a friendship. and a conversation, and

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Speaker 3: it was really exciting. And so I knew Mike as

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Speaker 3: a friend for many years. I played in his fantasy

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Speaker 3: football league. I'm not sure if I shared this the

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Speaker 3: last time.

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Speaker 2: I don't know that you did.

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Speaker 1: Okay.

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Speaker 3: Mike was a details guy. It was the hardest league

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Speaker 3: I've ever played in in my entire life. And I

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Speaker 3: just— the thing I loved about Mike was his ability to

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Speaker 3: think deeply about the biblical text, to ask serious questions

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Speaker 3: about the Bible, and to push us beyond probably our

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Speaker 3: comfort zone in some areas— But then also his like

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Speaker 3: amazing ability to switch from that into a discussion on

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Speaker 3: the Green Bay Packers and what he thought was right

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Speaker 3: about the team or wrong and just his love for sports.

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Speaker 3: And he was both a high level scholar, but also

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Speaker 3: just an amazing husband and father.

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Speaker 1: And I miss him. I miss him dearly.

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Speaker 2: I bet you do.

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Speaker 1: Yeah.

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Speaker 2: Now your book, Unseen Battle, which we'll get to. really

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Speaker 2: takes a lot of what he did in terms of

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Speaker 2: waking up the church in many ways to the reality

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Speaker 2: of the biblical worldview, the supernatural component that's often been overlooked,

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Speaker 2: and how we fight and engage in spiritual warfare today.

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Speaker 2: We're going to get to that, but let's start with

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Speaker 2: his view on angels.

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Speaker 3: Yeah.

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Speaker 2: So I had a chance to interview Mike, and we

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Speaker 2: talked mostly about demons, a little about angels. And to

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Speaker 2: this day, it's one of the most viewed interviews I've

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Speaker 2: ever done because he's just so interesting and gracious and thoughtful.

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Speaker 2: But let's kind of start with what might be called

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Speaker 2: the traditional view. When most Christians think about angels, what

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Speaker 2: picture comes to mind? What's the traditional view held in

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Speaker 2: the church?

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Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, I grew up in the church.

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Speaker 3: My grandparents are missionaries in India, and so I've always

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Speaker 3: had kind of the conception of a spiritual realm around me, Jesus,

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Speaker 3: the kingdom of God, and spiritual beings. And usually the

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Speaker 3: language isn't spiritual beings. The language is angels. And it

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Speaker 3: becomes this catch-all term for all spiritual beings. And I

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Speaker 3: know we're going to get into the details on it.

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Speaker 3: One of the things that Mike presented to us is

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Speaker 3: the idea that what we call is angels. And so, like,

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Speaker 3: how would we think of angels? I think a lot

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Speaker 3: of it has been church tradition. that has been passed

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Speaker 3: on to us. Vacation Bible school, I think, is a

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Speaker 3: huge part for people that have grown up in the

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Speaker 3: church tradition. And also not forgetting that you've got medieval

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Speaker 3: history and imagery and conceptualization of the biblical text that

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Speaker 3: had kind of an image of its own. And so today,

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Speaker 3: when you think of angels, at least what I think of,

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Speaker 3: is I think of typically like a human-like figure that

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Speaker 3: is gorgeous, like handsome, maybe Brad Pitt looking, I don't know,

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Speaker 3: I'm dating myself there. But also wings, with wings and

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Speaker 3: probably armor and in flight, in activity, a warrior-looking being.

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Speaker 3: And so that's probably the primary image that we have

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Speaker 3: of angelic beings or angels. And one of the things

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Speaker 3: that Mike did for us is to say, okay, but

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Speaker 3: does the biblical text itself portray— angels, quote unquote, in

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Speaker 3: that fashion, you know? So just an interesting exercise for

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Speaker 3: somebody to do. Run through your Hebrew Bible, you know,

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Speaker 3: and you could use a tool like Logos Bible Software.

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Speaker 3: We were talking about Logos recently.

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Speaker 1: Let's go, let's go. Logos is one of my favorites.

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Speaker 1: I use it all the time.

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Speaker 3: So you can literally do a biblical word study and

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Speaker 3: look at, you know, the Hebrew term malak or malakim,

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Speaker 3: which is messenger. and identify when these messengers are used

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Speaker 3: or described in the biblical text and try to identify

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Speaker 3: when they're described with wings.

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Speaker 1: Just do that. You might be surprised with what you find.

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Speaker 3: And I know I'm kind of teasing out a bunch

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Speaker 3: of different areas that we're going to go to, but

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Speaker 3: that I would summarize as the perspective that largely leads

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Speaker 3: to evangelical Christian believers on who angels are.

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Speaker 1: They are winged beings, spiritual beings. They do the work of.

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Speaker 3: God, and they have a counter, an opposite to them,

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Speaker 3: and we would call those demons.

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Speaker 2: It's amazing to think about how much our views of

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Speaker 2: angels and other theology is informed by popular culture and

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Speaker 2: not by Scripture. Now, this would take us aside, but

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Speaker 2: there's a song in the early 80s by Amy Grant, Yeah. Well,

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Speaker 2: Acts 12 does not teach what's presented in that song.

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Speaker 2: And I love Amy Grant, no criticism here, but I

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Speaker 2: kind of grew up hearing that song, loving it, and

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Speaker 2: it informed the way I thought about angels. Yeah. The

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Speaker 2: Bible doesn't teach that. Not to mention James was martyred

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Speaker 2: in the same passage. So what about his guardian angel?

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Speaker 2: Point being, what Heiser did and what you do is

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Speaker 2: let's go to the text. Let's look at the original worldview,

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Speaker 2: the original language, and see what it teaches about angels.

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Speaker 2: And we might be surprised. So how did he challenge

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Speaker 2: the traditional understanding of the angelic realm?

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Speaker 3: Yeah, one of them is, I don't think I know.

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Speaker 3: he pushed us from a reductionistic view of spiritual beings.

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Speaker 3: So instead of saying you have this term angels as

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Speaker 3: a catch all term for all spiritual beings, and you

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Speaker 3: push them into a box to make it nice and

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Speaker 3: neat for us.

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Speaker 1: What Mike said was, Hey, let's think about, about angels.

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Speaker 1: I'm going to use that term.

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Speaker 3: And then I'm going to start to start shifting us

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Speaker 3: into spiritual beings, like the language of spiritual beings. So

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Speaker 3: let's think about spiritual beings and let's think about them

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Speaker 3: in these categories. One is, Let's think about them ontologically.

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Speaker 3: What are they in nature, right? And then secondarily, what

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Speaker 3: is their hierarchy? What kind of function do they have?

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Speaker 3: And then third, like, what do they actually do? What

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Speaker 3: is the thing they do so that the hierarchy one

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Speaker 3: is more title and hierarchy in the second? The third

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Speaker 3: one is function. Like, what do they actually accomplish? And

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Speaker 3: you'll notice that in the Bible, you have terms that

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Speaker 3: are used to for the nature of these spiritual beings,

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Speaker 3: and we can get into detail about that. You've got

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Speaker 3: descriptions of what they do, how they function. Angels are messengers.

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Speaker 3: They're actually a subcategory of the other category which we

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Speaker 3: talked about, which is their hierarchy. How do they relate

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Speaker 3: in relationship with other spiritual beings that are presented to us?

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Speaker 3: We could probably do a hit list, right, of what

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Speaker 3: those spiritual beings are. So we could say, okay, You've

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Speaker 3: got right off the get in the Garden of Eden,

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Speaker 3: the presence of cherubim as the guardian spiritual beings that

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Speaker 3: are in Eden to protect people from coming back in.

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Speaker 2: Right.

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Speaker 3: They're guarding with the flaming sword. You have Isaiah 6,

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Speaker 3: and you have this enigmatic scene of the seraphim that

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Speaker 3: are chanting, holy, holy, holy is the Lord with six wings.

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Speaker 1: Now, interesting.

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Speaker 2: They do have wings.

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Speaker 1: Seraphim have wings, right? And cherubim have wings.

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Speaker 3: And actually, there's a context that they're connected to, which

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Speaker 3: is a Mesopotamian, Egyptian, and Akkadian context as well. And

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Speaker 3: then you also have angels, messengers that are presented. I

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Speaker 3: think of Jacob's ladder, the dream that Jacob has with

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Speaker 3: his ladder, with these spiritual beings that are going up

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Speaker 3: and down this ladder, which points to their activity. And

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Speaker 3: then you have in Daniel 8, 9, and 10, the

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Speaker 3: presence of archangels. You have the presence of a kind

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Speaker 3: of spiritual being that seems to have status in a

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Speaker 3: kind of hierarchy. And then also a particular function as

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Speaker 3: a protector of of a people, a remnant, we might say,

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Speaker 3: that are in captivity in Assyria in the Daniel epic.

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Speaker 3: And then you also have the phrase, the sons of

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Speaker 3: God that we see in Genesis 6 and Deuteronomy 32,

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Speaker 3: 8 and 9. So like within just a couple minutes, Sean,

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Speaker 3: like we have moved past a reductionistic, well, they're angels. Angels,

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Speaker 3: they wings and they do God's work to, wait a minute,

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Speaker 3: What is distinct about sons of God? What is distinct

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Speaker 3: about archangels? What is distinct about seraphim and cherubim? What

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Speaker 3: is their function? What is their role? What do we

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Speaker 3: know about them ontologically in terms of their essence? And

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Speaker 3: I think this is one of the things that Mike

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Speaker 3: did for us is he pushed us beyond a reductionistic

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Speaker 3: view of the spiritual beings. And he said, wait a minute,

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Speaker 3: the Bible gives us more information, more data about what

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Speaker 3: these beings are, how they relate to other spiritual beings

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Speaker 3: and to humanity. And then also their function, their role

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Speaker 3: in and throughout the earth.

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Speaker 2: And we started by saying Heiser pushed us beyond reductionism.

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Speaker 2: I thought you were going to say the reductionism of

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Speaker 2: our culture that seeped into the church that takes spiritual

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Speaker 2: things and explains it away naturally, non-spiritually. He pushed profoundly

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Speaker 2: against that. But more specifically when it comes to angels …

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Speaker 2: The reductionism is simply saying, well, whatever spirit beings these are,

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Speaker 2: they're angels, and they have the same being. They have

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Speaker 2: the same broad call, but maybe one guards over here.

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Speaker 2: Maybe one chants, holy, holy, holy is the Lord. Maybe

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Speaker 2: one delivers a message and has just like timeout. Maybe

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Speaker 2: we need to take a second look at this and

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Speaker 2: not reduce all of these spirit beings down to what

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Speaker 2: we consider angels. We might be missing something more that's

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Speaker 2: going on.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, and I think there's an impulse.

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Speaker 3: I think the impulse— I want to honor that because I

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Speaker 3: want to be careful that we don't do the polarization,

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Speaker 3: that we just jump from one extreme to another extreme.

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Speaker 3: And I think the impulse is— don't get distracted. Don't

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Speaker 3: become obsessive about these angelic beings and forget or not

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Speaker 3: give a right attribution and value and affection and attention

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Speaker 3: to Jesus and to the kingdom of God. I think

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Speaker 3: those are good impulses. However, in general, I think a

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Speaker 3: fear hermeneutic, a methodology of biblical reading that is motivated

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Speaker 3: by fear, is always going to be disastrous for us

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Speaker 3: in the long run. And so let's push against a

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Speaker 3: fear hermeneutic and let's just say, what does the Bible

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Speaker 3: say about these spiritual beings? How does the Bible present them?

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Speaker 3: What can we know? What can we not know? And

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Speaker 3: maybe let's have a little bit of fun and say,

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Speaker 3: where's some area of educated speculation that we might be

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Speaker 3: able to consider? And I know in another episode, we're

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Speaker 3: going to talk about the book of Enoch and Second

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Speaker 3: Temple literature.

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Speaker 1: In fact, we're not the first of the party.

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Speaker 3: This was taking place in Second Temple literature consistently, and

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Speaker 3: that's part of the value of that content.

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Speaker 2: So when I first read heiser's book angels one of

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Speaker 2: the points that he made that i kind of had

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Speaker 2: to pause on go okay wait a minute am i

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Speaker 2: completely missing something here in terms of angels is he

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Speaker 2: distinguishes between quote angel as a job description and the

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Speaker 2: broader category of spiritual beings yeah so you made a

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Speaker 2: point earlier about ontology which is being like what is

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Speaker 2: the nature of an angel are they physical are they

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Speaker 2: spiritual Are they finite? Are they infinite? We tend to

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Speaker 2: think of angel in terms of an ontological term solely

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Speaker 2: and primarily. He's saying it's more of a job description

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Speaker 2: within a broader category, a title of spirit beings. Explain that,

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Speaker 2: break it down, maybe explain why that distinction is important.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, I think that once again, the distinction is important

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Speaker 3: because it helps us to see there's a bigger conversation

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Speaker 3: at play. And the bigger conversation is that God is

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Speaker 3: a kink. And as being a king, he's got a

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Speaker 3: council and there's different council members. We see this in

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Speaker 3: Psalm 82. We see this in the opening scenes of Job,

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Speaker 3: Job 1 and Job 2 with the sons of God.

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Speaker 3: And you've got the Hasatan who shows up. This is

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Speaker 3: honestly a dovetail into the idea of the Satan figure

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Speaker 3: in Job. Again, one of those traditional stories. I mean,

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Speaker 3: I grew up always just believing like, oh, it's Satan.

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Speaker 2: For sure.

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Speaker 1: Right? It's like, it's the.

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Speaker 3: Figure that shows up in the New Testament and tempts

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Speaker 3: Jesus in the desert. Like, Same being, same, you know,

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Speaker 3: but you get into the Hebrew grammar and you go,

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Speaker 3: wait a minute, there's an article in front of the Satan.

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Speaker 1: So it's Hasatan.

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Speaker 3: And based off of Hebrew grammar, when you find an

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Speaker 3: article in front of that name, that this is actually

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Speaker 3: not a personal name, but it's actually a title of

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Speaker 3: a position. And so in some of your Bible translations,

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Speaker 3: you'll notice in Job 1 and 2, when the Hasatan

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Speaker 3: shows up, the translators use the phrase accuser. There, it's

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Speaker 3: almost like a legal term that's being used of a

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Speaker 3: person who has a task of searching and looking and

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Speaker 3: bringing accusation against someone or something. And so you go, okay,

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Speaker 3: so that's there. And then you have angels as messengers.

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Speaker 3: And so, yeah, I think that the reason why it's

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Speaker 3: important is to recognize that God chooses as king and

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Speaker 3: having a council, God chooses to work through his creations.

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Speaker 3: He gives task and responsibility and vocation to both his

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Speaker 3: spiritual beings and his earthly human family. So we live

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Speaker 3: in a culture, Sean, I think that wants to create demarcation.

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Speaker 3: It's like, let's put in this category all things that

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Speaker 3: are spiritual, but then in this category, we'll put all

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Speaker 3: things that are earthly and they can live nice and

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Speaker 3: neat in their own little compartments, right? The biblical text

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Speaker 3: doesn't do that. doesn't feel a need to do that.

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Speaker 3: The biblical text, the scriptures from Genesis all the way

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Speaker 3: through Revelation actually gives us indication that we're talking about

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Speaker 3: a cosmic world where the heavens and earth interconnect. There's

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Speaker 3: a connection point. Jesus is, in fact, that bridge of

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Speaker 3: that connection point in the incarnation.

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Speaker 1: And so the.

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Speaker 3: Reason why we ought to care about this specific conversation is,

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Speaker 3: in my view— It's an indication of the nature of

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Speaker 3: who God is and how God chooses to work in

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Speaker 3: and through his creation. And if this is true about

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Speaker 3: these spiritual beings, what does that tell us about our

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Speaker 3: earthly human vocation as well? And so I don't want

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Speaker 3: us to get too obsessed with it and try to

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Speaker 3: figure out like a taxonomy of spiritual beings. And I

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Speaker 3: know that in some circles, that's kind of a really

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Speaker 3: big deal trying to figure out the names and the titles.

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Speaker 3: It's almost like this militaristic, who's at the lowest rung

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Speaker 3: and who's at the highest rung. I think there's some

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Speaker 3: general taxonomy that we can identify from the data that

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Speaker 3: the Bible gives us.

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Speaker 1: But that's not the point.

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Speaker 3: I think the point is to say God has a counsel.

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Speaker 3: He's a king, and he chooses to work through these

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Speaker 3: spiritual beings, and they have purpose.

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Speaker 1: They have vocation.

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Speaker 3: Angels, malak, malakim, have a particular function, and the particular

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Speaker 3: function is to be the messenger of God to carry

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Speaker 3: his decree in and throughout the world and to humans.

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Speaker 2: Of course, right now people have questions going, wait a minute,

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Speaker 2: why would God need a divine counsel? And part of

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Speaker 2: the answer is he doesn't need a divine counsel. He

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Speaker 2: doesn't need us. But does Psalm 82, does Deuteronomy 32,

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Speaker 2: two passages in Daniel, et cetera, teach that God has

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Speaker 2: a divine counsel? I think that it does. Now, there's

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Speaker 2: probably two sets of questions right now. There's people that

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Speaker 2: are new to this going, wait a minute, who's this

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Speaker 2: Heiser guy? What is happening? Their minds are already blown.

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Speaker 2: Two things. Number one, go back and watch our first

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Speaker 2: interview where we methodically walk through what's going on, the

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Speaker 2: scriptural basis for this. Second, write your questions in because

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Speaker 2: you're coming to come back for Q & A. There's

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Speaker 2: others that are like, Heiser aficionados going, I've got a

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Speaker 2: nuanced question for you. Write that one in and we

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Speaker 2: will address that as well when we come back and

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Speaker 2: do a live Q & A on a top Tuesday.

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Speaker 1: All right.

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Speaker 2: So before we get to demons, maybe you could tell us, Joel,

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Speaker 2: where you think Heiser pushed the conversation about angels in

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Speaker 2: the right direction? Where do you think his conclusions might

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Speaker 2: need refinement, if at all?

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Speaker 3: Yeah.

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Speaker 2: And then maybe how does this play into your project

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Speaker 2: in The Unseen Battle?

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Speaker 1: Yeah.

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Speaker 3: So once again, I think the right direction is precision.

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Speaker 3: It's being precise with our language, being precise with what

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Speaker 3: the Bible says. It's trying to create some boundaries for

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Speaker 3: us to like, you know, back to the idea of

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Speaker 3: the different terminology for the spiritual beings, one that is

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Speaker 3: often overlooked.

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Speaker 1: Which I think is kind of a big deal, especially for.

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Speaker 3: Our next episode when we talk about the Enochic tradition,

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Speaker 3: is this term of the watchers, you know? And so

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Speaker 3: you hear the term the watchers, and in our brain,

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Speaker 3: we can tend to think, well, that's a Second Temple

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Speaker 3: literature thing. That's just an Enochic thing. But actually, that

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Speaker 3: term shows up in Daniel 4.13. In Daniel chapter 4,

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Speaker 3: three times the Aramaic term shows up, which is translated

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Speaker 3: as watcher. And so, and it's in the context of

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Speaker 3: a heavenly vision, of a spiritual being that comes down.

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Speaker 3: And so you go, wait a minute, you've got that.

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Speaker 3: You've got another term, sabah or sabahot, which is a

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Speaker 3: phrase to describe the heavenly host or the heavenly ones.

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Speaker 3: This is actually the phrase that's used in 1 Kings 2219,

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Speaker 3: which is the scene where Micaiah has this throne room vision,

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Speaker 3: you know, and there are a plethora of holy ones

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Speaker 3: that are in the presence of the king. I love

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Speaker 3: this term because that term of holy ones, I think

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Speaker 3: works really well to help us understand the cosmic implications

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Speaker 3: of Psalm 46 and elsewhere where Yahweh is described as

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Speaker 3: the Lord of hosts. So again, And I prefer that terminology.

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Speaker 3: I think some English translations go for Lord of Armies.

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Speaker 3: I prefer Lord of Hosts primarily because it is re-associating

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Speaker 3: us with the cosmic reality of Yahweh. We think Lord

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Speaker 3: of Armies, and it's just we're products of our environment.

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Speaker 3: It's like, oh, yeah, general, earthly armies, there's a battle.

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Speaker 3: I think that scene with Elijah and his servant, you know,

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Speaker 3: and the servant's like freaking out, like, oh, my gosh,

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Speaker 3: we're about to get destroyed. And there's a prayer like, Lord,

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Speaker 3: just will you show him?

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Speaker 2: It's amazing.

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Speaker 3: And he opens it and it's like, oh my gosh,

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Speaker 3: there's a heavenly host that a plethora around us to

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Speaker 3: protect us. And, oh, that's who Yahweh is. Yahweh is

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Speaker 3: the king of the heavenly host. The same thing with

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Speaker 3: cherubim and seraphim. We touched on it just a little bit. But,

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Speaker 3: you know, these are terms to describe spiritual beings tasked

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Speaker 3: to protect sacred space. These are throne room guardian beings,

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Speaker 3: you know, and actually there's imagery and iconography of them

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Speaker 3: in Mesopotamian context and Akkadian context and in Egyptian context

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Speaker 3: as well. And so there we see their function and

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Speaker 3: their role in guarding sacred space. The cherubim are engraved

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Speaker 3: in the temple and on the Ark of the Covenant.

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Speaker 3: I mean, this is imagery that is meant to convey

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Speaker 3: something of the otherness and the holiness of God in

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Speaker 3: the function of these spiritual beings. And so, I think

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Speaker 3: that what Mike did for us, again, is push us

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Speaker 3: in a direction so we can see these spiritual beings

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Speaker 3: and their function, not to be enamored by them and

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Speaker 3: to obsess about them, but to see them rightly in

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Speaker 3: their role and vocation as part of the counsel of God.

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Speaker 3: Where I think that we could use some refinement— And

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Speaker 3: this is part of my goal. This is part of

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Speaker 3: what I want to do with The Unseen Battle. And

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Speaker 3: I'm a biblical theology guy, so I love reading the

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Speaker 3: Bible as one cohesive story.

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Speaker 2: Heiser was specifically an Old Testament scholar.

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Speaker 3: He was a Semitic languages Hebrew scholar, brilliant in that space.

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Speaker 3: The majority of our disagreements and discussions would be methodological

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Speaker 3: in nature, where I have no problem. I think we

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Speaker 3: talked about this in the previous episode, and I think

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Speaker 3: people are still like, wait a minute, how can you

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Speaker 3: think that? I after all of this Hasatan stuff and saying, well,

433
00:22:57,600 --> 00:23:01,679
Speaker 3: actually that's probably like the technical understanding is not to

434
00:23:01,780 --> 00:23:05,710
Speaker 3: see in that being Satan. I, as a biblical theology guy, go,

435
00:23:05,869 --> 00:23:10,770
Speaker 3: wait a minute. The function that we have there, we

436
00:23:10,810 --> 00:23:12,469
Speaker 3: have the whole Bible in front of us. So from

437
00:23:12,510 --> 00:23:16,070
Speaker 3: a biblical theological standpoint, I see it fine saying I

438
00:23:16,090 --> 00:23:19,429
Speaker 3: can draw out something about this accuser that seems to

439
00:23:19,520 --> 00:23:21,500
Speaker 3: love his job a little bit too much to pick

440
00:23:21,540 --> 00:23:24,689
Speaker 3: a fight consistently and say, There's something about that that

441
00:23:24,730 --> 00:23:27,129
Speaker 3: is also true of this enemy who hates us and

442
00:23:27,170 --> 00:23:30,990
Speaker 3: hates God and hates his children. And so I think

443
00:23:31,090 --> 00:23:33,350
Speaker 3: that one of the areas that I would love for

444
00:23:33,410 --> 00:23:37,160
Speaker 3: us to see more refinement around is the interconnection between

445
00:23:37,280 --> 00:23:40,160
Speaker 3: the spiritual beings of the Hebrew Bible and how they

446
00:23:40,220 --> 00:23:43,800
Speaker 3: relate in the New Testament and understanding them in their

447
00:23:44,119 --> 00:23:50,020
Speaker 3: New Testament context without discounting the Hebrew Bible and how

448
00:23:50,060 --> 00:23:53,320
Speaker 3: they're understood. I have a strong suspicion— I don't have

449
00:23:53,340 --> 00:23:56,640
Speaker 3: a strong suspicion, I know. This was Mike's goal.

450
00:23:57,260 --> 00:23:57,900
Speaker 2: Oh, interesting.

451
00:23:57,960 --> 00:24:00,420
Speaker 3: Part of what I thought I know the next 10

452
00:24:00,420 --> 00:24:02,899
Speaker 3: to 15 years was going to be for him was

453
00:24:02,920 --> 00:24:06,920
Speaker 3: I've done all this work in the Mesopotamian, Akkadian, ancient

454
00:24:06,940 --> 00:24:10,090
Speaker 3: Near Eastern context of the Hebrew Bible. Now let's jump

455
00:24:10,190 --> 00:24:14,810
Speaker 3: into the New Testament context, particularly Paul's language of powers, principalities,

456
00:24:15,070 --> 00:24:17,330
Speaker 3: and authorities, which is the topic that I essentially write

457
00:24:17,350 --> 00:24:20,600
Speaker 3: my dissertation on. And so that is the area that

458
00:24:20,760 --> 00:24:23,760
Speaker 3: I want to focus and advance on to give precision

459
00:24:23,800 --> 00:24:27,040
Speaker 3: to the language of the New Testament on these terms

460
00:24:27,520 --> 00:24:31,560
Speaker 3: where we recognize that none of this is happening in isolation.

461
00:24:31,820 --> 00:24:34,940
Speaker 1: Writing isn't happening in isolation. That's good.

462
00:24:35,359 --> 00:24:38,350
Speaker 2: Students, if you are listening, now that I've done a PhD,

463
00:24:38,530 --> 00:24:40,550
Speaker 2: oftentimes the back of my mind, I'm like, that's a

464
00:24:40,590 --> 00:24:43,790
Speaker 2: dissertation topic. Not that I want to do it. I'll

465
00:24:43,810 --> 00:24:46,129
Speaker 2: leave that to other prospective students. But it sounds like

466
00:24:46,150 --> 00:24:47,770
Speaker 2: you're saying there's a lot of work where people can

467
00:24:47,810 --> 00:24:50,750
Speaker 2: take what Heiser's done Bring it in the New Testament,

468
00:24:50,770 --> 00:24:54,730
Speaker 2: see how it applies to Ephesians, Colossians, et cetera. Love that. Okay,

469
00:24:54,750 --> 00:24:57,480
Speaker 2: so before we move on to demons, just a question

470
00:24:57,520 --> 00:24:59,119
Speaker 2: about like language.

471
00:24:59,380 --> 00:24:59,580
Speaker 3: Yeah.

472
00:24:59,920 --> 00:25:02,860
Speaker 2: So should we use the term angels? Should we just

473
00:25:02,920 --> 00:25:07,790
Speaker 2: say seraphim, cherubim? Like just help us because language, part

474
00:25:07,850 --> 00:25:10,409
Speaker 2: of we just use angel for so many different terms

475
00:25:10,450 --> 00:25:14,020
Speaker 2: that in our mind it ties them together. So how

476
00:25:14,100 --> 00:25:16,560
Speaker 2: should we speak about these spirit beings?

477
00:25:17,000 --> 00:25:18,939
Speaker 3: There's a poet once that I heard that said, the

478
00:25:19,040 --> 00:25:22,140
Speaker 3: words we use build the worlds that we inhabit.

479
00:25:22,680 --> 00:25:23,530
Speaker 2: Totally true. Right?

480
00:25:23,609 --> 00:25:26,210
Speaker 3: And my buddy Jim Kress, I get to do a

481
00:25:26,250 --> 00:25:29,250
Speaker 3: podcast called Therapy and Theology. It's me, Jim Kress, who's

482
00:25:29,330 --> 00:25:32,290
Speaker 3: a therapist. I'm the theology guy. And then Lisa Turkhurst,

483
00:25:32,310 --> 00:25:35,409
Speaker 3: who's my boss, she's a brilliant author and Bible teacher.

484
00:25:35,450 --> 00:25:37,889
Speaker 3: And so Jim says it this way, that our words

485
00:25:37,970 --> 00:25:40,840
Speaker 3: frame our reality, you know? So I think this is

486
00:25:40,880 --> 00:25:43,460
Speaker 3: an interesting question and one I'm a bit passionate about.

487
00:25:43,480 --> 00:25:46,020
Speaker 3: And I would say, when you know better, we should

488
00:25:46,060 --> 00:25:48,340
Speaker 3: do better. Right?

489
00:25:48,460 --> 00:25:51,939
Speaker 1: And so I want to be more precise with my language.

490
00:25:52,700 --> 00:25:55,540
Speaker 3: Okay. And I find myself at times slipping to just

491
00:25:55,560 --> 00:25:57,340
Speaker 3: saying angels because.

492
00:25:57,020 --> 00:25:58,060
Speaker 1: It's easier, you know?

493
00:25:58,880 --> 00:26:01,899
Speaker 3: But I'm trying to train my mind to say spiritual

494
00:26:02,040 --> 00:26:06,600
Speaker 3: beings unless I'm talking about actual messengers in the Hebrew

495
00:26:06,640 --> 00:26:11,310
Speaker 3: Bible or the angels, the messengers that are associated with

496
00:26:11,450 --> 00:26:15,080
Speaker 3: Abraham when they come with Lot, when they're delivering a

497
00:26:15,119 --> 00:26:16,820
Speaker 3: message and rescuing them out.

498
00:26:17,080 --> 00:26:18,720
Speaker 1: Like those are instances— Or the angel Gabriel.

499
00:26:18,760 --> 00:26:21,859
Speaker 2: I know we're in the New Testament for that specific term.

500
00:26:22,020 --> 00:26:23,840
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, exactly, exactly.

501
00:26:23,859 --> 00:26:27,560
Speaker 3: So I want to associate it in those terms. And

502
00:26:27,680 --> 00:26:31,390
Speaker 3: I think from an apologetics standpoint, Sean, I know you're

503
00:26:31,430 --> 00:26:36,560
Speaker 3: the apologetics OG here, is— what an incredible opportunity to

504
00:26:36,580 --> 00:26:40,859
Speaker 3: have conversation with people, right? When somebody says angel and

505
00:26:40,960 --> 00:26:45,550
Speaker 3: you can say, hey, have you ever thought, have you

506
00:26:45,570 --> 00:26:48,909
Speaker 3: ever considered that the way the Hebrew Bible uses the

507
00:26:48,950 --> 00:26:52,010
Speaker 3: term angel is actually as a job description, as a title,

508
00:26:52,130 --> 00:26:53,910
Speaker 3: not an ontolot, and they're like, wait, what?

509
00:26:54,550 --> 00:26:56,609
Speaker 1: I've been to church my whole life. I never, and

510
00:26:56,650 --> 00:26:58,320
Speaker 1: then you can point them to the text.

511
00:26:58,359 --> 00:27:02,560
Speaker 3: And so I think this is an opportunity not for pride,

512
00:27:03,109 --> 00:27:05,320
Speaker 3: and for you to be like, look what I learned.

513
00:27:05,540 --> 00:27:08,679
Speaker 3: I'm crushing it with my, with my biblical theology and exegesis,

514
00:27:09,119 --> 00:27:11,160
Speaker 3: but it's an opportunity to say, we care deeply about

515
00:27:11,180 --> 00:27:13,419
Speaker 3: the Bible. And by the way, there's a world that

516
00:27:13,460 --> 00:27:15,200
Speaker 3: cares about this. I mean, at the time of this

517
00:27:15,260 --> 00:27:18,960
Speaker 3: filming right now, Steven Spielberg's disclosure day has made like

518
00:27:19,040 --> 00:27:21,670
Speaker 3: such big, massive news, you know, and there's this like

519
00:27:22,070 --> 00:27:25,590
Speaker 3: highlight reels of this is going to shake the Christian faith.

520
00:27:25,670 --> 00:27:28,189
Speaker 3: And I did a little response thing on my, on

521
00:27:28,210 --> 00:27:32,600
Speaker 3: my Instagram. I was like, no, like, like, If you

522
00:27:32,720 --> 00:27:36,880
Speaker 3: read the Bible on its own terms, this will not

523
00:27:36,960 --> 00:27:41,580
Speaker 3: shake your faith. You will actually have— we as Christians have

524
00:27:42,000 --> 00:27:49,060
Speaker 3: the most proficient language to describe the indescribable things in reality,

525
00:27:49,660 --> 00:27:52,359
Speaker 3: and we ought to leverage that and use it and

526
00:27:52,380 --> 00:27:55,109
Speaker 3: be intentional about it as an apologetic and as a

527
00:27:55,160 --> 00:27:58,800
Speaker 3: way to invite people into this cosmic story that we

528
00:27:58,859 --> 00:27:59,750
Speaker 3: all participate in.

529
00:27:59,980 --> 00:28:02,800
Speaker 2: I love that. One, questions, and second, leaning in to

530
00:28:02,840 --> 00:28:04,980
Speaker 2: make people interested, like, wait a minute, have you thought

531
00:28:05,030 --> 00:28:09,129
Speaker 2: about what an angel actually is biblically? Love that. Now,

532
00:28:09,170 --> 00:28:11,750
Speaker 2: I know a lot of people are going, okay, angels, interesting,

533
00:28:11,810 --> 00:28:14,850
Speaker 2: but we want to hear about demons. It's just the

534
00:28:14,910 --> 00:28:16,090
Speaker 2: way that it goes.

535
00:28:16,450 --> 00:28:19,590
Speaker 3: I think Mike had a really fun interview because they're asked, like,

536
00:28:19,790 --> 00:28:22,410
Speaker 3: in his book, in the angels book, In the beginning,

537
00:28:22,450 --> 00:28:25,270
Speaker 3: he's like, this book, this is like, so Mike, this

538
00:28:25,330 --> 00:28:28,250
Speaker 3: book is about angels. If you're looking for content on demons,

539
00:28:28,310 --> 00:28:29,550
Speaker 3: you're not finding it here.

540
00:28:29,670 --> 00:28:31,429
Speaker 2: Oh, I forgot he started that way.

541
00:28:31,440 --> 00:28:32,919
Speaker 1: Yeah, he starts that because he's like, that's not the point.

542
00:28:33,000 --> 00:28:35,640
Speaker 3: And in an interview I listened to a while ago,

543
00:28:35,680 --> 00:28:37,940
Speaker 3: he said something like, how can the bad guys always

544
00:28:37,960 --> 00:28:43,400
Speaker 3: get all the fanfare? My family was just, I don't

545
00:28:43,420 --> 00:28:45,090
Speaker 3: know if I'm supposed to say this on here. You

546
00:28:45,110 --> 00:28:45,850
Speaker 3: can cut this if you need to.

547
00:28:46,440 --> 00:28:48,540
Speaker 1: Was at Disney. People have, you know, things.

548
00:28:48,560 --> 00:28:49,000
Speaker 2: I don't care.

549
00:28:49,100 --> 00:28:51,520
Speaker 3: Okay. My family was just at Disney and we, you know,

550
00:28:51,560 --> 00:28:53,720
Speaker 3: had this whole thing. And I was so fascinated by

551
00:28:53,760 --> 00:28:56,440
Speaker 3: the fact that there's t-shirts for the villains. Like there's

552
00:28:56,480 --> 00:28:58,760
Speaker 3: a whole thing where you can have like the t-shirts

553
00:28:58,800 --> 00:29:00,540
Speaker 3: for the villains and you can be on the villain

554
00:29:00,560 --> 00:29:03,479
Speaker 3: team or whatever. And our society is fascinated by that.

555
00:29:03,500 --> 00:29:05,700
Speaker 3: So I kind of love that Mike was pushing back like, man,

556
00:29:05,790 --> 00:29:07,870
Speaker 3: let the heroes, let them get a little bit of fanfare,

557
00:29:07,890 --> 00:29:11,240
Speaker 3: like the good guys, you know, they should, have a

558
00:29:11,240 --> 00:29:13,360
Speaker 3: little bit of opportunity to get to know who they

559
00:29:13,380 --> 00:29:15,340
Speaker 3: are and what they do and how they belong, where

560
00:29:15,360 --> 00:29:16,560
Speaker 3: they belong in the cosmic storyline.

561
00:29:16,860 --> 00:29:20,720
Speaker 2: Well, fair enough. I love that. But people still got

562
00:29:20,760 --> 00:29:23,739
Speaker 2: t-shirts of the villains. And so we're going to, we're

563
00:29:23,760 --> 00:29:25,480
Speaker 2: going to dive in. That's fun. I'm leaving that in

564
00:29:25,500 --> 00:29:28,200
Speaker 2: there for sure. My audience will not lose their mind

565
00:29:28,240 --> 00:29:30,390
Speaker 2: that you took your family to Disney. It's not far

566
00:29:30,430 --> 00:29:33,450
Speaker 2: from here at all fun, even though we take issue

567
00:29:33,510 --> 00:29:35,830
Speaker 2: with some things, Disney separate podcast.

568
00:29:35,930 --> 00:29:36,450
Speaker 1: That's right.

569
00:29:36,890 --> 00:29:41,400
Speaker 2: So let's shift. When Christians hear the word demon, most

570
00:29:41,440 --> 00:29:45,720
Speaker 2: assume we know what the Bible teaches. But like with angels,

571
00:29:45,900 --> 00:29:49,240
Speaker 2: there's a much bigger clarifying backstory.

572
00:29:49,580 --> 00:29:49,800
Speaker 3: Yeah.

573
00:29:50,100 --> 00:29:53,200
Speaker 2: Let's start with what the traditional understanding has been.

574
00:29:53,830 --> 00:29:55,810
Speaker 3: I mean I think the traditional understanding is very similar

575
00:29:55,830 --> 00:30:00,410
Speaker 3: to the angels' understanding. There is medieval imagery. There are

576
00:30:00,470 --> 00:30:02,470
Speaker 3: fascinating TV shows right now even.

577
00:30:02,490 --> 00:30:03,180
Speaker 2: There are.

578
00:30:03,500 --> 00:30:05,240
Speaker 3: And I actually think there's one TV show that probably

579
00:30:05,260 --> 00:30:08,580
Speaker 3: depicts it way better than some of our passed down tradition.

580
00:30:08,660 --> 00:30:11,660
Speaker 3: And part of the passed down tradition is– You've got

581
00:30:11,800 --> 00:30:16,140
Speaker 3: demons who are these spirit beings and you've got Lucifer

582
00:30:16,220 --> 00:30:19,420
Speaker 3: Satan with horns and a tail and the pitchfork that's

583
00:30:19,440 --> 00:30:26,250
Speaker 3: probably like dramatized a bit. They're the opposite of angels. Um,

584
00:30:26,630 --> 00:30:29,710
Speaker 3: and yeah, there's just one term to describe their work.

585
00:30:29,790 --> 00:30:32,830
Speaker 3: They hate God and they hate his people. And it's

586
00:30:32,910 --> 00:30:34,780
Speaker 3: kind of the imagery of the demon on one shoulder

587
00:30:34,800 --> 00:30:36,580
Speaker 3: and the angel on the other, and they're enticing you.

588
00:30:36,620 --> 00:30:38,480
Speaker 3: And I think part of that is actually kind of

589
00:30:38,500 --> 00:30:41,300
Speaker 3: helpful to understand what they're trying to do, what their

590
00:30:41,400 --> 00:30:44,100
Speaker 3: aim and their ambition is. Uh, and once again, it's a,

591
00:30:44,220 --> 00:30:46,520
Speaker 3: it's a bit flat, like, oh yeah, demons. It's just

592
00:30:46,920 --> 00:30:51,040
Speaker 3: one category of beings and they're evil and they hate

593
00:30:51,720 --> 00:30:53,900
Speaker 3: God and they hate his people and they are here

594
00:30:53,920 --> 00:30:56,440
Speaker 3: to deceive us and, to distract us.

595
00:30:57,080 --> 00:31:00,140
Speaker 2: And they're fallen angels, of course, is the key picture

596
00:31:00,160 --> 00:31:03,760
Speaker 2: about where they come from. Isaiah 14, Ezekiel 28. Now,

597
00:31:03,940 --> 00:31:07,950
Speaker 2: Heizer has a different understanding of this. So we're going

598
00:31:07,970 --> 00:31:10,210
Speaker 2: to get into some of the particulars related to like

599
00:31:10,250 --> 00:31:14,590
Speaker 2: Genesis chapter 6, the Nephilim, but maybe kind of broadly

600
00:31:14,730 --> 00:31:17,560
Speaker 2: lay out for us how his understanding differs from And

601
00:31:17,600 --> 00:31:21,140
Speaker 2: what convinced him that the traditional picture was incomplete?

602
00:31:21,680 --> 00:31:24,850
Speaker 1: Well, I think most of what convinced him the traditional

603
00:31:24,870 --> 00:31:27,030
Speaker 1: picture is incomplete.

604
00:31:27,070 --> 00:31:30,330
Speaker 3: Is a— I want to be careful that I'm not using

605
00:31:30,390 --> 00:31:32,390
Speaker 3: harsh language, but it's the language that comes to my

606
00:31:32,430 --> 00:31:35,150
Speaker 3: mind— is it's a failure to read the Bible on its

607
00:31:35,190 --> 00:31:39,190
Speaker 3: own terms. And so, for instance, you've got a passage

608
00:31:39,430 --> 00:31:42,050
Speaker 3: like Deuteronomy 32, 17. I'm going to go there just

609
00:31:42,070 --> 00:31:47,970
Speaker 3: so that I've got it up for me. In Deuteronomy 32, 17,

610
00:31:47,970 --> 00:31:54,120
Speaker 3: you have the presence of a Hebrew term, which is Shedim.

611
00:31:55,020 --> 00:32:00,940
Speaker 3: And Shedim is a categorical term that is used of

612
00:32:02,350 --> 00:32:08,390
Speaker 3: spiritual beings that are evil and malevolent. They are opposed

613
00:32:08,590 --> 00:32:12,130
Speaker 3: to God. Now, what you said, John, is interesting because, again,

614
00:32:12,170 --> 00:32:16,060
Speaker 3: you think fallen angels, right? And there is a category

615
00:32:16,650 --> 00:32:19,900
Speaker 3: of spiritual beings that are evil, that are fallen angels.

616
00:32:21,000 --> 00:32:24,780
Speaker 3: The New Testament, particularly when it uses the English term demons,

617
00:32:24,820 --> 00:32:29,370
Speaker 3: when we see that, it's being sourced from a different storyline.

618
00:32:29,930 --> 00:32:32,030
Speaker 3: And so this is where we probably need to do

619
00:32:32,070 --> 00:32:34,590
Speaker 3: just a little bit of understanding of the different figures

620
00:32:34,930 --> 00:32:37,430
Speaker 3: and their roles. And actually what we just did with

621
00:32:37,580 --> 00:32:40,230
Speaker 3: angels is, And spiritual beings is going to help us

622
00:32:40,390 --> 00:32:43,410
Speaker 3: because there we talked about the sons of God, these

623
00:32:43,690 --> 00:32:48,310
Speaker 3: Genesis 6 beings that are categorically different from messengers or

624
00:32:48,350 --> 00:32:51,630
Speaker 3: seraphim or cherubim. These sons of God of Genesis 6,

625
00:32:51,630 --> 00:32:53,270
Speaker 3: when you read that, it's like the precursor to the

626
00:32:53,290 --> 00:32:57,460
Speaker 3: flood story. They see the daughters of man, they desire

627
00:32:57,770 --> 00:33:00,290
Speaker 3: the daughters of man, and they take the daughters of

628
00:33:00,330 --> 00:33:02,690
Speaker 3: man for themselves. And right after that, it says, and

629
00:33:02,750 --> 00:33:04,730
Speaker 3: these were the days when the Nephilim were on the earth,

630
00:33:05,010 --> 00:33:08,830
Speaker 3: before the flood and after the flood, which already creates

631
00:33:09,030 --> 00:33:11,330
Speaker 3: all kinds of interpretive chaos for us to try to

632
00:33:11,370 --> 00:33:13,750
Speaker 3: figure out how could the Nephilim be there? And we

633
00:33:13,770 --> 00:33:16,730
Speaker 3: can tackle that in either the Enoch episode or later.

634
00:33:17,170 --> 00:33:19,830
Speaker 3: But look at this, Deuteronomy 32, 17, and it's talking

635
00:33:19,870 --> 00:33:22,970
Speaker 3: about these foreign gods that anger them with their detestable idols.

636
00:33:23,400 --> 00:33:27,780
Speaker 3: Verse 17 says this, they'd sacrificed to false gods, which

637
00:33:27,840 --> 00:33:31,240
Speaker 3: are not God. To gods they had not known. Gods

638
00:33:31,340 --> 00:33:37,310
Speaker 3: that recently appeared. Gods your ancestors did not fear. And

639
00:33:37,910 --> 00:33:40,230
Speaker 3: when you read that, I actually was reading from NIB.

640
00:33:40,250 --> 00:33:44,290
Speaker 3: I'm going to switch over to ESV. In the Bible

641
00:33:44,310 --> 00:33:46,470
Speaker 3: Reading Pro Tip, when you're reading a passage of Scripture,

642
00:33:46,530 --> 00:33:48,980
Speaker 3: it's always kind of fun to have multiple translations out.

643
00:33:49,320 --> 00:33:52,560
Speaker 3: And when you see different English words... there, that's an

644
00:33:52,590 --> 00:33:56,550
Speaker 3: indication that the translators are trying to make sense of

645
00:33:56,630 --> 00:33:59,790
Speaker 3: a difficult Hebrew translation or a Greek translation in the

646
00:33:59,830 --> 00:34:02,470
Speaker 3: New Testament, and that's probably a place for you to

647
00:34:02,510 --> 00:34:04,670
Speaker 3: dig a little bit deeper. So, Deuteronomy 32, 17. They

648
00:34:04,690 --> 00:34:07,990
Speaker 3: sacrificed to demons that were not God. But, and I

649
00:34:08,010 --> 00:34:10,569
Speaker 3: said gods, right? So, to false gods. They sacrificed to

650
00:34:10,630 --> 00:34:13,050
Speaker 3: demons that were not God, to gods they had never known,

651
00:34:13,140 --> 00:34:16,080
Speaker 3: to new gods that had come recently, whom your fathers

652
00:34:16,120 --> 00:34:20,180
Speaker 3: had never dreaded. And so, the sons of God of

653
00:34:20,260 --> 00:34:24,920
Speaker 3: Genesis 6... are a distinct category of spiritual beings.

654
00:34:25,820 --> 00:34:27,739
Speaker 1: We're going to get into this in the Enoch episode.

655
00:34:27,860 --> 00:34:30,560
Speaker 3: I know it's all hang tight. We're going to get

656
00:34:30,640 --> 00:34:32,719
Speaker 3: to what happens, how they get kicked out, how they

657
00:34:32,739 --> 00:34:35,259
Speaker 3: get thrown into Tartarus. You're like, what is going on?

658
00:34:35,600 --> 00:34:38,040
Speaker 3: Jude and Peter actually reflect on all of this. They

659
00:34:38,100 --> 00:34:40,839
Speaker 3: have a shared tradition from where they're pulling from. But

660
00:34:40,860 --> 00:34:43,040
Speaker 3: then you get to Deuteronomy 32, 8 and 9. And

661
00:34:43,060 --> 00:34:45,560
Speaker 3: so in Deuteronomy 32, 8 and 9, it says, When

662
00:34:45,580 --> 00:34:48,390
Speaker 3: the Most High gave to the nations their inheritance, when

663
00:34:48,430 --> 00:34:51,250
Speaker 3: he divided mankind, he fixed the borders of the peoples,

664
00:34:51,630 --> 00:34:55,350
Speaker 3: according to the number of the sons of God. But

665
00:34:55,370 --> 00:34:59,650
Speaker 3: the Lord's portion is his people, Jacob, his allotted heritage.

666
00:35:00,090 --> 00:35:02,510
Speaker 3: So where do we get the gods of the nations from?

667
00:35:02,860 --> 00:35:05,160
Speaker 3: You get the gods of the nations from this concept

668
00:35:05,200 --> 00:35:09,480
Speaker 3: that Mike refers to as the Deuteronomy 32 worldview. Because

669
00:35:10,440 --> 00:35:14,480
Speaker 3: where was it when the nations were first divided? Genesis 11.

670
00:35:14,480 --> 00:35:16,520
Speaker 3: Once again, go to our first episode where we walk

671
00:35:16,540 --> 00:35:19,200
Speaker 3: through the three rebellions. Genesis 11 and 12 sets the stage.

672
00:35:21,360 --> 00:35:26,120
Speaker 3: for the diversification of humanity, to the nations being divided.

673
00:35:26,420 --> 00:35:28,239
Speaker 3: But then the question is, like, how come throughout the

674
00:35:28,280 --> 00:35:30,469
Speaker 3: entire Hebrew Bible, the Old Testament, from here on out,

675
00:35:30,790 --> 00:35:33,810
Speaker 3: it's like, beware of the false gods. Don't follow after them.

676
00:35:34,110 --> 00:35:36,569
Speaker 3: Don't bend knee to them. Israel, be a holy and

677
00:35:36,630 --> 00:35:39,890
Speaker 3: separate people. You know, you're to be a kadosh. You're

678
00:35:39,910 --> 00:35:44,680
Speaker 3: supposed to be holy, which isn't about actual moral purity,

679
00:35:44,800 --> 00:35:47,899
Speaker 3: per se, as it is about being a people set

680
00:35:47,960 --> 00:35:52,149
Speaker 3: apart being a reflection of the holiness of God. And

681
00:35:52,989 --> 00:35:56,270
Speaker 3: in that, you go down to Jeremiah 32, 17 and go, wait,

682
00:35:57,570 --> 00:35:58,430
Speaker 3: who are these beings?

683
00:35:58,469 --> 00:35:59,190
Speaker 1: What are they doing?

684
00:35:59,530 --> 00:36:02,779
Speaker 3: In Jeremiah 32, 17, they're being cast as evil because

685
00:36:02,960 --> 00:36:07,299
Speaker 3: they have elicited the worship of the nations. And in

686
00:36:07,340 --> 00:36:10,160
Speaker 3: so doing, they go into rebellion. And so when we

687
00:36:10,219 --> 00:36:13,600
Speaker 3: think about the demons of the Old Testament, again, our

688
00:36:13,660 --> 00:36:16,239
Speaker 3: words frame our reality. So I want us to think

689
00:36:16,320 --> 00:36:18,549
Speaker 3: about the demons of the Old Testament as as the

690
00:36:18,610 --> 00:36:22,460
Speaker 3: false gods of the nations. And when I say false gods,

691
00:36:24,300 --> 00:36:29,180
Speaker 3: I'm not talking about non-existence. I'm talking about their comparability

692
00:36:29,239 --> 00:36:32,880
Speaker 3: to Yahweh. They are not Yahweh. They never could be Yahweh.

693
00:36:32,920 --> 00:36:36,980
Speaker 3: They're created beings. So there is a category which are

694
00:36:37,000 --> 00:36:40,200
Speaker 3: the false gods of the nations. And then there's also

695
00:36:40,280 --> 00:36:41,380
Speaker 3: this issue with the Nephilim.

696
00:36:41,400 --> 00:36:45,810
Speaker 2: Can we hold the Nephilim for a second? So you're

697
00:36:45,830 --> 00:36:49,350
Speaker 2: making a distinction between the Old Testament sons of God,

698
00:36:49,450 --> 00:36:53,420
Speaker 2: these false gods, and what we would consider and what

699
00:36:53,440 --> 00:36:56,359
Speaker 2: we see as demons in the New Testament that like

700
00:36:56,580 --> 00:37:01,040
Speaker 2: possess people and wreck their bodies, try to kill them,

701
00:37:01,600 --> 00:37:05,939
Speaker 2: take over them. You're making a distinction between those two.

702
00:37:06,080 --> 00:37:06,420
Speaker 1: That's right.

703
00:37:06,680 --> 00:37:07,380
Speaker 2: A key distinction.

704
00:37:07,420 --> 00:37:11,190
Speaker 3: Yes, because Paul has different terminology in Greek, in the

705
00:37:11,210 --> 00:37:16,280
Speaker 3: Greek language, that describes the demons of the Old Testament

706
00:37:16,320 --> 00:37:18,580
Speaker 3: are the false gods of the nations of the Old Testament.

707
00:37:19,140 --> 00:37:25,480
Speaker 3: And it's not diamantizomai. It's not demonization. There's a different

708
00:37:25,660 --> 00:37:29,640
Speaker 3: way that he describes them. And this is all in

709
00:37:29,700 --> 00:37:31,279
Speaker 3: the Unseen Battle in the second half of the book.

710
00:37:31,300 --> 00:37:35,580
Speaker 3: When I get into the New Testament, it's the chapter

711
00:37:35,620 --> 00:37:39,319
Speaker 3: on being stripped, disarmed, and defeated. It's the powers, principalities,

712
00:37:39,360 --> 00:37:43,150
Speaker 3: and authorities. And it's Colossians 1. It's Ephesians 6. And

713
00:37:43,230 --> 00:37:50,620
Speaker 3: so looking at Pauline terminology for these demonic entities, and

714
00:37:51,140 --> 00:37:54,279
Speaker 3: there's a context that Paul is drawing from, and he's

715
00:37:54,340 --> 00:37:57,500
Speaker 3: drawing from an Old Testament understanding of the sons of God.

716
00:37:57,820 --> 00:38:01,640
Speaker 3: When you get into the Gospels, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John,

717
00:38:01,739 --> 00:38:05,600
Speaker 3: and you get to demon exorcisms there, what in English

718
00:38:05,700 --> 00:38:11,160
Speaker 3: are demons are there are categorically distinct and different from

719
00:38:11,510 --> 00:38:15,669
Speaker 3: from powers, principalities, and authorities, and the sons of God

720
00:38:15,710 --> 00:38:16,570
Speaker 3: of the Old Testament.

721
00:38:17,530 --> 00:38:20,350
Speaker 2: That's a really important distinction, because if the Old Testament translates,

722
00:38:20,370 --> 00:38:25,300
Speaker 2: like you said, they sacrifice to demons, we think these

723
00:38:25,400 --> 00:38:29,520
Speaker 2: beings in the New Testament that are possessing people, you're saying, no,

724
00:38:29,560 --> 00:38:35,400
Speaker 2: these are evil spirit beings that reign over certain nations,

725
00:38:35,460 --> 00:38:38,580
Speaker 2: have certain authority, potentially. We covered a lot of that beforehand.

726
00:38:39,090 --> 00:38:41,730
Speaker 2: Not the kind of beings that come down and possess

727
00:38:41,870 --> 00:38:44,890
Speaker 2: us we need to be exercised from. So this is

728
00:38:44,930 --> 00:38:51,370
Speaker 2: where terminology matters. This clarification is important. Okay, so you

729
00:38:51,450 --> 00:38:55,640
Speaker 2: are moving towards Genesis 6. and Enoch. Now I don't want,

730
00:38:55,719 --> 00:38:58,620
Speaker 2: we're going to do a full like hour plus breaking

731
00:38:58,640 --> 00:39:01,299
Speaker 2: this down, but maybe just frame how it shapes our

732
00:39:01,360 --> 00:39:03,200
Speaker 2: conversation here on demons. Okay.

733
00:39:03,219 --> 00:39:05,070
Speaker 3: So I'll probably say everything that's going to stress people

734
00:39:05,140 --> 00:39:07,930
Speaker 3: out and frustrates them. And, uh, before you leave a

735
00:39:08,190 --> 00:39:11,130
Speaker 3: negative comment and you get upset or whatever else, uh,

736
00:39:11,330 --> 00:39:15,350
Speaker 3: follow along for the next episode for the full, uh,

737
00:39:15,450 --> 00:39:18,000
Speaker 3: the context of it. And then after that, feel free

738
00:39:18,020 --> 00:39:19,719
Speaker 3: to leave your questions, leave your questions.

739
00:39:19,739 --> 00:39:21,140
Speaker 2: We're going to do a lot. We will follow up

740
00:39:21,280 --> 00:39:23,580
Speaker 2: after both these episodes and you can defend yourself.

741
00:39:23,719 --> 00:39:24,700
Speaker 1: That's right. That's right.

742
00:39:24,980 --> 00:39:27,330
Speaker 3: You know, in Genesis 6, you've got the sons of

743
00:39:27,390 --> 00:39:29,790
Speaker 3: God and the daughters of man. And I'm going to

744
00:39:29,830 --> 00:39:33,779
Speaker 3: say going to presume for this discussion a supernatural reading

745
00:39:34,219 --> 00:39:37,420
Speaker 3: of the sons of God. There are other ways to

746
00:39:37,560 --> 00:39:40,009
Speaker 3: read it, and I want to acknowledge that. And there

747
00:39:40,170 --> 00:39:44,990
Speaker 3: is legitimate rationale for why other scholars, biblical theologians and scholars,

748
00:39:45,510 --> 00:39:49,589
Speaker 3: would read it differently. In the famous words of Dr.

749
00:39:49,630 --> 00:39:53,110
Speaker 3: Tom Schreiner in the introduction to his book, or the

750
00:39:53,150 --> 00:39:56,029
Speaker 3: book on the different views of women in ministry, Tom said,

751
00:39:56,130 --> 00:39:59,080
Speaker 3: you know, I'm a better scholar for the writing of,

752
00:39:59,300 --> 00:40:03,020
Speaker 3: you know, my colleagues in this book, and yet I'm

753
00:40:03,060 --> 00:40:03,920
Speaker 3: still unconvinced.

754
00:40:04,580 --> 00:40:05,120
Speaker 2: Oh, I love it.

755
00:40:05,200 --> 00:40:06,840
Speaker 3: Yeah, I just love that. You know, it's like, hey,

756
00:40:06,860 --> 00:40:08,540
Speaker 3: I want to be a better Bible teacher. I want

757
00:40:08,560 --> 00:40:10,860
Speaker 3: to be a better scholar and theologian. So I want

758
00:40:10,890 --> 00:40:11,800
Speaker 3: to be aware of those things.

759
00:40:11,820 --> 00:40:12,989
Speaker 1: I don't want to take them seriously.

760
00:40:13,010 --> 00:40:16,430
Speaker 2: The first three centuries in the church. we're pretty much

761
00:40:16,690 --> 00:40:19,290
Speaker 2: super unanimous, supernatural understanding.

762
00:40:19,330 --> 00:40:21,550
Speaker 3: You don't get, you don't get into a human reading

763
00:40:21,670 --> 00:40:25,009
Speaker 3: until Augustine and Afra and, um, Jewish Africanus, which, you know,

764
00:40:25,290 --> 00:40:28,219
Speaker 3: there's all kinds of things that we can talk about there. Um, the,

765
00:40:28,520 --> 00:40:31,360
Speaker 3: the issues with these, the figure of the Nephilim who

766
00:40:31,380 --> 00:40:33,660
Speaker 3: are the Nephilim. And so if we take a supernatural

767
00:40:33,739 --> 00:40:36,060
Speaker 3: reading and I understand this is going to feel a

768
00:40:36,120 --> 00:40:37,819
Speaker 3: bit like, wait a minute, are we listening to Greek

769
00:40:37,860 --> 00:40:40,620
Speaker 3: mythology right now? Um, my question to you is where

770
00:40:40,640 --> 00:40:42,510
Speaker 3: do you think the Greek mythology got their content from?

771
00:40:42,840 --> 00:40:47,719
Speaker 3: You know, And so you've got the hybrid children of

772
00:40:48,260 --> 00:40:52,259
Speaker 3: spiritual beings, the sons of God, and human women, and

773
00:40:52,300 --> 00:40:56,799
Speaker 3: the offspring are these Nephilim. There's a whole issue with

774
00:40:56,980 --> 00:41:00,720
Speaker 3: Nephilim and the linguistic case for what does the word mean?

775
00:41:00,820 --> 00:41:01,979
Speaker 1: How is it translated?

776
00:41:02,560 --> 00:41:05,819
Speaker 3: It's translated in the Septuagint, the Hebrew Bible translated into

777
00:41:05,940 --> 00:41:09,600
Speaker 3: Greek as gigas, which means giants. Um, the Hebrew, uh,

778
00:41:10,660 --> 00:41:12,740
Speaker 3: some scholars would say that it comes from the Hebrew

779
00:41:12,780 --> 00:41:15,779
Speaker 3: word in a fall, which means fallen or fallen ones is,

780
00:41:15,880 --> 00:41:18,240
Speaker 3: and you could probably make a conceptual argument for that,

781
00:41:18,260 --> 00:41:19,930
Speaker 3: where you have these big giants and when they fall,

782
00:41:19,969 --> 00:41:21,930
Speaker 3: they probably make a big old splash, you know, uh,

783
00:41:21,950 --> 00:41:25,090
Speaker 3: something like that. Mike had a whole different, uh, uh,

784
00:41:25,489 --> 00:41:27,910
Speaker 3: connection point to it. And quite frankly, I'm not smart

785
00:41:27,930 --> 00:41:30,970
Speaker 3: enough to even go into the Acadian and the Hebrew

786
00:41:30,989 --> 00:41:33,009
Speaker 3: and the Ugarit, like all that he does there. This

787
00:41:33,070 --> 00:41:36,540
Speaker 3: is one of those things that I, uh, follow where

788
00:41:36,580 --> 00:41:38,100
Speaker 3: Mike goes. And at the end of it, I go,

789
00:41:38,730 --> 00:41:42,670
Speaker 3: That's a lot of linguistic gymnastics to get to a conclusion.

790
00:41:42,890 --> 00:41:44,770
Speaker 1: This is where I'd probably disagree. Not probably. I do

791
00:41:44,810 --> 00:41:45,410
Speaker 1: disagree with him.

792
00:41:45,530 --> 00:41:51,540
Speaker 3: I think that the trajectory is fine to see Nephilim

793
00:41:51,660 --> 00:41:54,600
Speaker 3: meaning fallen ones and seeing that the Septuagint handles it

794
00:41:54,660 --> 00:41:58,140
Speaker 3: as gigas. And again, that conceptual connection is strong enough

795
00:41:58,200 --> 00:42:01,100
Speaker 3: for me. So then you have this issue of the

796
00:42:01,140 --> 00:42:06,060
Speaker 3: giants and, um, but they're an unholy mixture. So in

797
00:42:06,100 --> 00:42:08,980
Speaker 3: the Hebrew Bible and in the New Testament, what makes

798
00:42:09,000 --> 00:42:14,480
Speaker 3: something unclean? It's unclean when it's defiled. And so what

799
00:42:14,540 --> 00:42:19,820
Speaker 3: are these Nephilim? They're defiled. They're unclean, um, uh, beings,

800
00:42:20,140 --> 00:42:23,500
Speaker 3: half human, half supernatural. And as a result, you have

801
00:42:23,520 --> 00:42:26,720
Speaker 3: to ask a question when they're killed, when they're taken out.

802
00:42:26,800 --> 00:42:31,540
Speaker 3: And you see this, um, With the explanation with Joshua

803
00:42:31,820 --> 00:42:33,560
Speaker 3: and the spies, they get into Canaan, they go, oh

804
00:42:33,580 --> 00:42:36,920
Speaker 3: my gosh, these dudes are huge. They're like the Anakim.

805
00:42:36,960 --> 00:42:38,930
Speaker 3: And the Anakim come from the Nephilim. And the Nephilim

806
00:42:38,950 --> 00:42:41,450
Speaker 3: are part of these giant tribes with the Rephaim. And

807
00:42:41,469 --> 00:42:44,509
Speaker 3: there's a linguistic connection that's taking place with all of

808
00:42:44,570 --> 00:42:48,030
Speaker 3: these beings. And then you go, okay, so what happens

809
00:42:48,090 --> 00:42:55,310
Speaker 3: to these beings? Well, a spirit that is half divine, spiritual,

810
00:42:55,690 --> 00:42:59,520
Speaker 3: and half human has no place to go. It doesn't

811
00:42:59,560 --> 00:43:02,980
Speaker 3: belong in the spiritual realm, but it doesn't fully belong

812
00:43:03,380 --> 00:43:05,820
Speaker 3: in the earthly realm. Like, where does it go? It

813
00:43:06,340 --> 00:43:08,100
Speaker 3: gets trapped. It gets trapped.

814
00:43:08,200 --> 00:43:11,180
Speaker 1: And so there's a brilliant scholar. His name is Archie Wright.

815
00:43:11,560 --> 00:43:14,610
Speaker 3: And Archie wrote, he did a dissertation at first, and

816
00:43:14,630 --> 00:43:17,650
Speaker 3: it came into a monograph where he talks about Second

817
00:43:17,690 --> 00:43:20,529
Speaker 3: Temple Judaism and the origin of evil spirits. And so

818
00:43:20,790 --> 00:43:22,850
Speaker 3: this is like, for me, the place that I think

819
00:43:22,890 --> 00:43:26,469
Speaker 3: everybody should go to read the trajectory of where Mike

820
00:43:26,550 --> 00:43:29,680
Speaker 3: even is citing from. And so in Second Temple literature,

821
00:43:29,700 --> 00:43:35,900
Speaker 3: you get the origin story of these demonic spiritual beings

822
00:43:36,080 --> 00:43:39,080
Speaker 3: as the offspring of the sons of God and the

823
00:43:39,120 --> 00:43:41,740
Speaker 3: daughters of man, the Nephilim. And when the Nephilim would die,

824
00:43:41,840 --> 00:43:45,380
Speaker 3: often in battle, there were these giants, King Og of Bashan.

825
00:43:46,320 --> 00:43:48,400
Speaker 3: When they would die in battle, their spirits would have

826
00:43:48,440 --> 00:43:50,420
Speaker 3: no place to go and they would be trapped on

827
00:43:50,440 --> 00:43:54,980
Speaker 3: the earth, right? There's giant kings and giant clans. You

828
00:43:55,000 --> 00:43:57,580
Speaker 3: can go into detail about all of that. I think

829
00:43:57,600 --> 00:44:01,719
Speaker 3: that's fascinating because, and this has some of the work

830
00:44:01,739 --> 00:44:03,719
Speaker 3: that I did in the unseen battle with the idea

831
00:44:03,739 --> 00:44:07,620
Speaker 3: of the teraphim and the household gods and the household deities.

832
00:44:07,660 --> 00:44:09,540
Speaker 3: You find this with Rachel and Laban and the whole

833
00:44:09,600 --> 00:44:14,859
Speaker 3: stealing of the teraphim. Kings want their kingdom and their

834
00:44:14,960 --> 00:44:19,180
Speaker 3: kingdoms are connected to geographical areas, right? There's something significant

835
00:44:19,200 --> 00:44:22,140
Speaker 3: about what Jesus is doing in the incarnation where many

836
00:44:22,200 --> 00:44:25,430
Speaker 3: New Testament scholars point out that he is reliving the

837
00:44:25,450 --> 00:44:28,710
Speaker 3: story of Israel. And there's cosmic geography where he goes

838
00:44:28,770 --> 00:44:31,629
Speaker 3: in the land of Galilee, of Bashan, Mount Hermon, all

839
00:44:31,670 --> 00:44:35,630
Speaker 3: these places. This is not random. It's actually all connected

840
00:44:35,730 --> 00:44:39,630
Speaker 3: back to this issue of the Nephilim, the issue of

841
00:44:40,630 --> 00:44:43,380
Speaker 3: evil and how it spreads out throughout the world. And

842
00:44:43,469 --> 00:44:46,080
Speaker 3: so here you have these spirits that have no place

843
00:44:46,120 --> 00:44:48,900
Speaker 3: to go. They eventually go mad over time. But I

844
00:44:48,940 --> 00:44:50,920
Speaker 3: think what's, and you were talking about it, Sean, where

845
00:44:50,940 --> 00:44:53,900
Speaker 3: you're talking about the desire to possess, right? Where does

846
00:44:53,940 --> 00:44:58,069
Speaker 3: the desire to possess come from other than they were

847
00:44:58,130 --> 00:45:01,430
Speaker 3: embodied once? They remember what it meant to be embodied

848
00:45:01,450 --> 00:45:04,549
Speaker 3: and they desire it again. And so, fascinating, by the

849
00:45:04,590 --> 00:45:06,550
Speaker 3: time you get into the Gospels or the New Testament,

850
00:45:07,960 --> 00:45:11,020
Speaker 3: the language for demons, the English word for demons, is

851
00:45:11,100 --> 00:45:15,880
Speaker 3: translated as unclean spirits or evil spirits. Where do you

852
00:45:15,920 --> 00:45:19,340
Speaker 3: get that language from? In the Greco-Roman time period in

853
00:45:19,360 --> 00:45:22,870
Speaker 3: the Second Temple writing, that phrase for unclean spirits in

854
00:45:22,950 --> 00:45:27,060
Speaker 3: Greek was a telltale sign of literature that was being written,

855
00:45:27,340 --> 00:45:31,100
Speaker 3: Enochic tradition, and other Second Temple literature to describe the

856
00:45:31,180 --> 00:45:36,200
Speaker 3: disembodied spirits of the Nephilim. And so the gospel writers

857
00:45:36,300 --> 00:45:40,320
Speaker 3: don't feel the need to educate you on the origin

858
00:45:40,380 --> 00:45:42,900
Speaker 3: story right now, you know, of where that came from,

859
00:45:42,940 --> 00:45:45,820
Speaker 3: because it was already in the conceptual worldview of the people.

860
00:45:45,900 --> 00:45:49,040
Speaker 3: When they heard that phrase, evil spirits or unclean spirits,

861
00:45:49,080 --> 00:45:50,910
Speaker 3: they would go, oh, wait a minute, I know where

862
00:45:50,930 --> 00:45:53,800
Speaker 3: that story came from. You know, there's already a preexisting

863
00:45:53,840 --> 00:45:57,560
Speaker 3: tradition that understood the origin of these spiritual beings. And so,

864
00:45:57,940 --> 00:45:59,640
Speaker 3: all that to say, the demons of the New Testament

865
00:46:00,320 --> 00:46:03,600
Speaker 3: are not the fallen sons of God of the Old Testament.

866
00:46:04,060 --> 00:46:05,900
Speaker 3: They're categorically distinct and different.

867
00:46:05,920 --> 00:46:06,400
Speaker 1: What are they?

868
00:46:06,440 --> 00:46:10,830
Speaker 3: They're the disembodied spirits of the Nephilim. They desire to possess,

869
00:46:11,050 --> 00:46:13,930
Speaker 3: and they've gone mad. And I love Luke chapter 4,

870
00:46:13,930 --> 00:46:16,570
Speaker 3: because Jesus comes in and he deals with one of

871
00:46:16,610 --> 00:46:18,790
Speaker 3: these spiritual beings that is uncleaned.

872
00:46:19,580 --> 00:46:20,540
Speaker 1: And the spirit being.

873
00:46:20,540 --> 00:46:24,540
Speaker 3: Looks at Jesus and goes, and there's a parsible that

874
00:46:24,580 --> 00:46:27,220
Speaker 3: doesn't get translated often. I kind of think that it's

875
00:46:27,700 --> 00:46:33,450
Speaker 3: basically a cuss word. The demon's like, enter. You're the

876
00:46:33,550 --> 00:46:36,770
Speaker 3: holy one of Israel. And then changes from the tense

877
00:46:36,810 --> 00:46:40,870
Speaker 3: from singular to plural and then says, we, we plural,

878
00:46:41,130 --> 00:46:42,469
Speaker 3: we know who you are.

879
00:46:43,010 --> 00:46:43,250
Speaker 1: Right?

880
00:46:44,050 --> 00:46:46,160
Speaker 3: And so, and then Jesus later, I think it's Luke 21,

881
00:46:46,150 --> 00:46:47,390
Speaker 3: he says, you know, if by the hand of God

882
00:46:47,450 --> 00:46:49,540
Speaker 3: I cast out demons, then What does it mean? But

883
00:46:49,560 --> 00:46:51,860
Speaker 3: the kingdom of God is upon you. And so you

884
00:46:51,900 --> 00:46:55,120
Speaker 3: have Jesus and demon exorcisms of the New Testament being

885
00:46:55,140 --> 00:46:58,140
Speaker 3: a distinct thing that is actually an indication of on

886
00:46:58,219 --> 00:47:00,350
Speaker 3: earth as it is in heaven. It is the inauguration

887
00:47:01,050 --> 00:47:04,009
Speaker 3: and the inbreaking of the kingdom of God.

888
00:47:04,930 --> 00:47:07,710
Speaker 2: Okay, so we're going to get into much more when

889
00:47:07,730 --> 00:47:10,379
Speaker 2: we get in our next episode on Enoch. But just

890
00:47:10,430 --> 00:47:14,270
Speaker 2: so I understand, you are with Heizer. On demons in

891
00:47:14,310 --> 00:47:18,650
Speaker 2: the New Testament being the disembodied spirits of the Nephilim,

892
00:47:18,989 --> 00:47:24,549
Speaker 2: and those details are filled in by intertestamental literature, including Enoch.

893
00:47:24,660 --> 00:47:26,719
Speaker 2: As a whole, you're on board with that understanding.

894
00:47:26,920 --> 00:47:30,279
Speaker 3: Yeah, it makes the most sense to me. Again, because

895
00:47:30,320 --> 00:47:32,680
Speaker 3: of cosmic geography and the location of where these things

896
00:47:32,719 --> 00:47:35,250
Speaker 3: take place. And the presence of giant clans in the

897
00:47:35,270 --> 00:47:38,000
Speaker 3: Old Testament, the Joshua Conquest, where I don't think the

898
00:47:38,180 --> 00:47:41,220
Speaker 3: whole reason for the Joshua Conquest is the giant clans.

899
00:47:41,719 --> 00:47:43,680
Speaker 3: I think it's a part of it, and we shouldn't

900
00:47:43,719 --> 00:47:48,410
Speaker 3: overlook it. And so, yeah, I'm with Mike on that.

901
00:47:48,850 --> 00:47:49,920
Speaker 1: Okay, good. I love it.

902
00:47:50,010 --> 00:47:52,529
Speaker 2: So that's actually where Clint Arnold– I did a recent

903
00:47:52,550 --> 00:47:54,509
Speaker 2: interview with him. He takes a different position on that.

904
00:47:54,530 --> 00:47:54,740
Speaker 3: Oh, yeah.

905
00:47:55,320 --> 00:47:55,840
Speaker 1: Which is fine.

906
00:47:55,860 --> 00:47:57,600
Speaker 2: We're all trying to make sense of the evidence and

907
00:47:57,660 --> 00:47:58,100
Speaker 2: follow it.

908
00:47:58,380 --> 00:47:58,560
Speaker 3: Yeah.

909
00:47:58,739 --> 00:48:01,500
Speaker 2: So if you've watched that interview or right now you

910
00:48:01,520 --> 00:48:03,940
Speaker 2: have questions, again, make sure you see the one on Enoch,

911
00:48:03,980 --> 00:48:06,360
Speaker 2: but write your questions in and we can do a

912
00:48:06,600 --> 00:48:10,700
Speaker 2: deep dive follow-up live stream after the Enoch one and

913
00:48:10,719 --> 00:48:12,060
Speaker 2: get your take on it. That's awesome.

914
00:48:12,680 --> 00:48:12,899
Speaker 1: Okay.

915
00:48:13,180 --> 00:48:14,319
Speaker 2: Now this one I'm going to ask you to kind

916
00:48:14,340 --> 00:48:16,609
Speaker 2: of maybe sum up briefly because you go into this

917
00:48:16,630 --> 00:48:18,469
Speaker 2: a lot of depth in your book. We talked about

918
00:48:18,510 --> 00:48:21,790
Speaker 2: this in our last interview, but you've talked about this

919
00:48:22,050 --> 00:48:23,710
Speaker 2: fall of the sons of God.

920
00:48:23,730 --> 00:48:23,910
Speaker 3: Yeah.

921
00:48:24,360 --> 00:48:27,220
Speaker 2: That's one. We always think of the fall of Genesis three.

922
00:48:27,360 --> 00:48:27,580
Speaker 3: Yeah.

923
00:48:27,820 --> 00:48:31,950
Speaker 2: You say there's three key falls that should inform how

924
00:48:32,010 --> 00:48:35,489
Speaker 2: we think about, I mean, just the old Testament and,

925
00:48:35,730 --> 00:48:38,810
Speaker 2: and redemption moving forward. So remind us of those three

926
00:48:38,830 --> 00:48:40,350
Speaker 2: and how they fit into the biblical storyline.

927
00:48:40,370 --> 00:48:42,529
Speaker 3: Yeah. So in the unseen battle, the first half of

928
00:48:42,550 --> 00:48:45,400
Speaker 3: the book really walks through what I call the three rebellions.

929
00:48:45,440 --> 00:48:47,160
Speaker 3: And again, this isn't something new and novel to me.

930
00:48:47,239 --> 00:48:48,040
Speaker 1: This is well understood.

931
00:48:48,080 --> 00:48:51,870
Speaker 3: And, um, amongst Hebrew specialists and scholars of Second Temple

932
00:48:51,890 --> 00:48:55,140
Speaker 3: literature as well, the three rebellions are Genesis 3, which

933
00:48:55,570 --> 00:48:57,779
Speaker 3: most evangelical Christians would be like, yeah, that's the one.

934
00:48:57,860 --> 00:48:58,680
Speaker 1: It's because of Adam and Eve.

935
00:48:58,880 --> 00:49:00,980
Speaker 2: How could you be an evangelical Christian and not think.

936
00:49:00,920 --> 00:49:02,220
Speaker 1: Of the fall? Exactly.

937
00:49:02,239 --> 00:49:05,799
Speaker 3: We call it the fall. That's like the monopoly on

938
00:49:05,820 --> 00:49:09,739
Speaker 3: the term, right? And yet Second Temple readers would say, yeah,

939
00:49:09,780 --> 00:49:12,200
Speaker 3: but don't forget, you know, Genesis 6, which is the

940
00:49:12,219 --> 00:49:14,279
Speaker 3: sons of God and the daughters of man. And the

941
00:49:14,340 --> 00:49:17,120
Speaker 3: background to that is the Enochic tradition, which says that

942
00:49:17,550 --> 00:49:20,259
Speaker 3: It expands on the story, which says, hey, by the way, way,

943
00:49:20,300 --> 00:49:23,160
Speaker 3: when that took place, there was an unholy exchange that happened. Yes,

944
00:49:23,200 --> 00:49:25,839
Speaker 3: the daughters of man and the sons of God had

945
00:49:25,880 --> 00:49:29,089
Speaker 3: a union, but in order to establish that union, there

946
00:49:29,110 --> 00:49:34,669
Speaker 3: was a giving of wisdom, of knowledge, of reading astrology,

947
00:49:34,770 --> 00:49:39,700
Speaker 3: tarot cards, of how to use pharmaceutical plants, And the

948
00:49:39,739 --> 00:49:42,580
Speaker 3: big one, metallurgy, how to create weapons. Well, what ends

949
00:49:42,640 --> 00:49:46,070
Speaker 3: up happening? Evil spreads throughout the world. The issue isn't

950
00:49:46,430 --> 00:49:50,200
Speaker 3: the presence of information. The issue is how you use

951
00:49:50,239 --> 00:49:53,759
Speaker 3: that information. And boy, aren't we living smack in the

952
00:49:53,780 --> 00:49:56,160
Speaker 3: middle of that right now. It's like the famous saying,

953
00:49:56,550 --> 00:49:58,750
Speaker 3: just because you can do something doesn't mean you should.

954
00:49:58,770 --> 00:50:02,590
Speaker 3: I think that comes from Jurassic Park. Like they're onto something,

955
00:50:02,670 --> 00:50:04,609
Speaker 3: you know, and we are living in an age where

956
00:50:04,670 --> 00:50:06,670
Speaker 3: you can do whatever you want. We're just doing it

957
00:50:06,710 --> 00:50:08,969
Speaker 3: just for the sake of doing it without considering the

958
00:50:09,050 --> 00:50:11,050
Speaker 3: cost and the impact and the fact that it's happening,

959
00:50:11,350 --> 00:50:13,590
Speaker 3: not just on our society, but on us individually and

960
00:50:13,610 --> 00:50:16,430
Speaker 3: our humanity. This is not a new and novel idea.

961
00:50:16,450 --> 00:50:19,509
Speaker 3: This is present in the Nocic tradition read in light

962
00:50:19,530 --> 00:50:23,290
Speaker 3: of Genesis 6, which actually presumes the flood narrative. Like,

963
00:50:23,390 --> 00:50:26,750
Speaker 3: why do things get so bad? Because of what ends

964
00:50:26,790 --> 00:50:28,810
Speaker 3: up happening with these spiritual beings and the delivering of

965
00:50:28,870 --> 00:50:33,280
Speaker 3: information that essentially becomes self-destructive to humanity.

966
00:50:33,390 --> 00:50:36,200
Speaker 1: Wait a minute. What happened in Genesis 3? The knowledge

967
00:50:36,219 --> 00:50:36,839
Speaker 1: of good and evil.

968
00:50:37,180 --> 00:50:37,700
Speaker 2: Oh, yeah.

969
00:50:37,780 --> 00:50:39,980
Speaker 3: It's a recapitulation. It's a retelling of kind of the

970
00:50:40,000 --> 00:50:42,319
Speaker 3: same story. And then the last one, we talked about

971
00:50:42,340 --> 00:50:45,480
Speaker 3: it already. is Genesis 11, the story of the Tower

972
00:50:45,500 --> 00:50:48,299
Speaker 3: of Babel, read in light of Deuteronomy 32, 8 and 9.

973
00:50:48,300 --> 00:50:50,380
Speaker 3: Then in my book, I kind of talk about how

974
00:50:50,420 --> 00:50:52,580
Speaker 3: Deuteronomy 32, 8 and 9, I know we're all Marvel

975
00:50:52,600 --> 00:50:55,100
Speaker 3: guys in here. You know, it's kind of like the

976
00:50:55,140 --> 00:50:57,739
Speaker 3: Marvel end credit scene that ends up taking place after

977
00:50:57,780 --> 00:51:01,509
Speaker 3: Genesis 11. And you're left wondering, okay, the nations are disinherited.

978
00:51:01,530 --> 00:51:03,910
Speaker 3: The nations have been divided. They go out based off

979
00:51:03,930 --> 00:51:07,430
Speaker 3: of their own languages. Now what happens? Well, God gives stewardship.

980
00:51:07,469 --> 00:51:10,790
Speaker 3: And my language here is very important. He gives stewardship

981
00:51:10,830 --> 00:51:15,790
Speaker 3: to the nations to protect the nations, to be stewards

982
00:51:15,810 --> 00:51:18,810
Speaker 3: of the nations for a time until Genesis chapter 12,

983
00:51:18,800 --> 00:51:23,140
Speaker 3: the Abrahamic covenant that God chooses to redeem and retrieve

984
00:51:23,180 --> 00:51:26,300
Speaker 3: all the nations back into the household after the consequence

985
00:51:26,340 --> 00:51:29,700
Speaker 3: for their sin. These sons of God of Deuteronomy 32,

986
00:51:29,700 --> 00:51:33,330
Speaker 3: 8 and 9 don't steward the nations. They elicit the

987
00:51:33,370 --> 00:51:35,710
Speaker 3: worship of the nations and become the gods of the nations.

988
00:51:36,290 --> 00:51:38,430
Speaker 3: And so that would be the third rebellion that actually

989
00:51:38,469 --> 00:51:40,750
Speaker 3: sets the stage for the gods of the nations and

990
00:51:40,770 --> 00:51:44,110
Speaker 3: the Egyptian narrative and the Assyrian and Persian and the

991
00:51:44,210 --> 00:51:46,010
Speaker 3: mess that we find ourselves in in the New Testament.

992
00:51:46,030 --> 00:51:48,509
Speaker 2: So one of the things that Heiser did so well,

993
00:51:48,530 --> 00:51:50,049
Speaker 2: and I think you do this in your book as well,

994
00:51:50,410 --> 00:51:53,469
Speaker 2: is kind of big picture reframing. So let's not just

995
00:51:53,489 --> 00:51:55,670
Speaker 2: look at the fall that kicks us out of the garden,

996
00:51:55,750 --> 00:51:58,850
Speaker 2: separated from God. Let's look at the origin of where

997
00:51:58,910 --> 00:52:01,779
Speaker 2: maybe demons come from and why the whole world was flooded.

998
00:52:02,239 --> 00:52:05,299
Speaker 2: Let's look at how the Babel, the fallen Genesis 11,

999
00:52:05,300 --> 00:52:07,900
Speaker 2: how we spread out and there's this cosmic geography. These

1000
00:52:07,940 --> 00:52:09,640
Speaker 2: are like– when I read this, I'm like, wait a minute.

1001
00:52:09,860 --> 00:52:12,109
Speaker 2: Where has this been my whole life? But then there's

1002
00:52:12,140 --> 00:52:15,190
Speaker 2: also certain particulars he gets into where he doesn't take

1003
00:52:15,230 --> 00:52:18,190
Speaker 2: the big picture. He kind of narrows down the specifics.

1004
00:52:18,270 --> 00:52:21,350
Speaker 2: I'm like, wait a minute. That's reframing a story, and

1005
00:52:21,370 --> 00:52:23,790
Speaker 2: you might be right about this. And one of them

1006
00:52:23,810 --> 00:52:26,730
Speaker 2: when I first read his book, Demons, is that the

1007
00:52:26,870 --> 00:52:33,360
Speaker 2: English translation for scapegoat that's in Leviticus 16– is better translated,

1008
00:52:33,440 --> 00:52:36,279
Speaker 2: correct me if I say it wrong, Azazel, which is

1009
00:52:36,340 --> 00:52:38,870
Speaker 2: a proper name of a demon in the Dead Sea

1010
00:52:38,930 --> 00:52:43,089
Speaker 2: Scrolls and other Jewish texts. Is he right about this?

1011
00:52:43,290 --> 00:52:45,339
Speaker 2: And what would that mean for how we understand the

1012
00:52:45,380 --> 00:52:49,050
Speaker 2: Day of Atonement and– Even, I guess we'll get to

1013
00:52:49,070 --> 00:52:50,910
Speaker 2: this in the future, like how the desert is the

1014
00:52:50,969 --> 00:52:53,750
Speaker 2: place of the dead. How does that reframe how we

1015
00:52:53,770 --> 00:52:55,969
Speaker 2: understand a scapegoat if he's right about this? And do

1016
00:52:55,989 --> 00:52:56,549
Speaker 2: you think he's right?

1017
00:52:57,010 --> 00:53:00,530
Speaker 3: Yeah, I do think he's right about Azazel or Azazel,

1018
00:53:00,550 --> 00:53:03,180
Speaker 3: however you want to pronounce it. My general take on

1019
00:53:03,239 --> 00:53:05,840
Speaker 3: pronunciation is just pick something and then go with it

1020
00:53:05,880 --> 00:53:08,660
Speaker 3: and be confident with it and you'll be okay. These

1021
00:53:08,680 --> 00:53:09,860
Speaker 3: are dead languages for the most part.

1022
00:53:09,880 --> 00:53:12,980
Speaker 1: Just say it like you know it. That's the key.

1023
00:53:13,239 --> 00:53:16,080
Speaker 3: So yes, I do think that he's right about that.

1024
00:53:18,040 --> 00:53:20,960
Speaker 3: What I think is really important, what I know is

1025
00:53:21,000 --> 00:53:24,680
Speaker 3: really important for us to consider in this is the

1026
00:53:24,940 --> 00:53:28,160
Speaker 3: place that this story has in the rest of the

1027
00:53:28,200 --> 00:53:32,420
Speaker 3: trajectory of the salvation history of Israel and of the

1028
00:53:32,440 --> 00:53:35,439
Speaker 3: people of God in general. There's a lot of debate

1029
00:53:35,480 --> 00:53:39,319
Speaker 3: right now, Sean, on the question of justification, the question

1030
00:53:39,340 --> 00:53:42,200
Speaker 3: of atonement. What atonement theory? Is there a superior atonement

1031
00:53:42,219 --> 00:53:45,600
Speaker 3: theory to others? There's a book that came out on

1032
00:53:45,640 --> 00:53:49,670
Speaker 3: penal substitution that kind of has the evangelical world up

1033
00:53:49,710 --> 00:53:50,330
Speaker 3: in an uproar recently.

1034
00:53:52,480 --> 00:53:54,980
Speaker 2: I did a deep dive response with William Lane Craig

1035
00:53:55,000 --> 00:53:55,219
Speaker 2: to that.

1036
00:53:55,280 --> 00:53:55,960
Speaker 1: On Lamb of the Freak?

1037
00:53:55,980 --> 00:53:59,140
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah. And then he followed up with two podcasts

1038
00:53:59,200 --> 00:54:01,780
Speaker 2: responding to the criticism of that, just so people know

1039
00:54:01,840 --> 00:54:02,359
Speaker 2: it's out there.

1040
00:54:02,410 --> 00:54:04,300
Speaker 1: But keep going. Yeah, yeah.

1041
00:54:04,410 --> 00:54:10,609
Speaker 3: So this is something that deserves time to consider. What

1042
00:54:10,690 --> 00:54:13,850
Speaker 3: I want to do with this is to look and say, okay,

1043
00:54:13,890 --> 00:54:17,450
Speaker 3: the name only shows up in Leviticus 16, 8, and

1044
00:54:17,469 --> 00:54:19,410
Speaker 3: then in verse 10 as well, right? So it's like

1045
00:54:19,750 --> 00:54:22,620
Speaker 3: only shows up twice here in the Hebrew Bible. The

1046
00:54:22,660 --> 00:54:25,560
Speaker 3: name does show up in Enoch, and it does show

1047
00:54:25,600 --> 00:54:28,920
Speaker 3: up in other Dead Sea Scrolls. Language-wise, it's a combination

1048
00:54:28,940 --> 00:54:31,660
Speaker 3: of terms, as which would have meant goat and ozel,

1049
00:54:31,960 --> 00:54:34,380
Speaker 3: which is a verb, to go away or to disappear.

1050
00:54:34,840 --> 00:54:40,560
Speaker 3: And with the understanding of the name being used in the.

1051
00:54:40,520 --> 00:54:43,890
Speaker 1: Dead Sea Scrolls and in Enoch, it's used in those

1052
00:54:43,930 --> 00:54:46,090
Speaker 1: places as an epitaph for a demon.

1053
00:54:46,210 --> 00:54:49,410
Speaker 3: It's a proper name of a demon. This is one

1054
00:54:49,430 --> 00:54:53,260
Speaker 3: of those instances where I go, oh, you now have

1055
00:54:53,550 --> 00:54:58,960
Speaker 3: a proper name associated to a demon, not a categorical

1056
00:54:59,080 --> 00:55:02,879
Speaker 3: name associated, right, or a title that's associated.

1057
00:55:03,400 --> 00:55:05,660
Speaker 1: And the example of this is I kind of have

1058
00:55:05,700 --> 00:55:08,230
Speaker 1: an issue. I don't kind of. I'm trying to become

1059
00:55:08,250 --> 00:55:10,049
Speaker 1: more definitive on my stuff.

1060
00:55:10,110 --> 00:55:12,549
Speaker 2: I've noticed three or four times you're like, I kind

1061
00:55:12,570 --> 00:55:14,089
Speaker 2: of think this. You're like, no, I do think this.

1062
00:55:14,110 --> 00:55:14,750
Speaker 1: No, I do think this.

1063
00:55:14,810 --> 00:55:15,410
Speaker 2: Which is fine.

1064
00:55:15,469 --> 00:55:16,450
Speaker 1: Yeah.

1065
00:55:16,489 --> 00:55:19,989
Speaker 3: Jezebel spirit. We hear that often, the Jezebel spirit. And

1066
00:55:20,410 --> 00:55:23,910
Speaker 3: when you hear that, I do not believe it should

1067
00:55:23,950 --> 00:55:26,009
Speaker 3: be used as a proper name for a spiritual being

1068
00:55:26,090 --> 00:55:29,800
Speaker 3: because the Bible doesn't do that. The Bible doesn't use

1069
00:55:30,060 --> 00:55:32,859
Speaker 3: Jezebel as a proper name for a demonic entity, for

1070
00:55:32,900 --> 00:55:36,660
Speaker 3: an evil spiritual being. It's used as a proper name

1071
00:55:36,719 --> 00:55:40,320
Speaker 3: of a historical figure. Even Revelation, when it's being referred

1072
00:55:40,360 --> 00:55:44,380
Speaker 3: to again as Jezebel, it is casting a historical figure

1073
00:55:44,840 --> 00:55:46,839
Speaker 3: into that role. And so this is one of those

1074
00:55:46,910 --> 00:55:51,890
Speaker 3: moments where people that are well-meaning, I think deliverance ministry,

1075
00:55:52,250 --> 00:55:55,890
Speaker 3: we're trying to categorize and give language to what we're

1076
00:55:55,930 --> 00:55:59,870
Speaker 3: experiencing and and yet it's not precise. The Bible itself

1077
00:55:59,930 --> 00:56:02,689
Speaker 3: is not using the terminology that way. It's different here

1078
00:56:02,810 --> 00:56:07,930
Speaker 3: with Azazel, because the Bible does use that term in Leviticus,

1079
00:56:08,030 --> 00:56:11,049
Speaker 3: and you have Second Temple literature that describes this as

1080
00:56:11,070 --> 00:56:13,990
Speaker 3: an epithet for a demon. So the Hebrew here has

1081
00:56:14,030 --> 00:56:16,120
Speaker 3: a personal name in mind, and it fits kind of

1082
00:56:16,300 --> 00:56:20,560
Speaker 3: conceptually with the scene of what's taking place.

1083
00:56:20,920 --> 00:56:24,340
Speaker 2: Okay, so before you keep going, apart from the Second

1084
00:56:24,400 --> 00:56:28,680
Speaker 2: Temple literature, if we're just reading the Hebrew— Leviticus chapter 16,

1085
00:56:28,680 --> 00:56:33,520
Speaker 2: it should be understood as a personal name. We just

1086
00:56:33,620 --> 00:56:36,500
Speaker 2: might not know who this personal name is and what

1087
00:56:36,520 --> 00:56:39,120
Speaker 2: it refers to until the later literature shows up.

1088
00:56:39,180 --> 00:56:40,620
Speaker 1: Is that accurate? Yes, yes, yes.

1089
00:56:40,640 --> 00:56:41,770
Speaker 2: Okay, keep going.

1090
00:56:42,170 --> 00:56:46,170
Speaker 3: So as a summary of the scene, Yahweh receives a goat, right?

1091
00:56:46,489 --> 00:56:50,210
Speaker 3: And now there's another goat that bears the sin of

1092
00:56:50,370 --> 00:56:53,960
Speaker 3: Israel and And this other goat is sent into the wilderness.

1093
00:56:54,060 --> 00:56:56,040
Speaker 3: This is a point of clarification. This is where the

1094
00:56:56,060 --> 00:56:58,610
Speaker 3: scapegoat idea comes from. This is a point of clarification.

1095
00:56:59,110 --> 00:57:03,450
Speaker 3: Azazel is not receiving a sacrifice. This is not to

1096
00:57:03,530 --> 00:57:08,570
Speaker 3: say that the ancient Israelites were sacrificing intentionally... in a

1097
00:57:08,690 --> 00:57:13,360
Speaker 3: form of kind of worship to this demonic spiritual being

1098
00:57:13,420 --> 00:57:14,120
Speaker 3: named Azazel.

1099
00:57:14,520 --> 00:57:15,040
Speaker 1: It's not.

1100
00:57:15,280 --> 00:57:15,880
Speaker 2: That's important.

1101
00:57:16,100 --> 00:57:20,220
Speaker 1: What this is is an indication that the wilderness is

1102
00:57:20,260 --> 00:57:23,760
Speaker 1: an image of chaos and destruction. It is anti-creation.

1103
00:57:24,320 --> 00:57:26,760
Speaker 3: Eden is a garden. It is the place of beauty

1104
00:57:26,840 --> 00:57:30,460
Speaker 3: and flourishing. The wilderness is a place of anti-creation. It

1105
00:57:30,520 --> 00:57:34,120
Speaker 3: is the place of death and despair. So why does

1106
00:57:34,160 --> 00:57:37,960
Speaker 3: the scapegoat that carries the sin, the chaos of the community,

1107
00:57:38,320 --> 00:57:41,840
Speaker 3: go into the wilderness? Because it's going where it belongs.

1108
00:57:42,420 --> 00:57:45,280
Speaker 3: The wilderness is the locale for this. And what also

1109
00:57:45,400 --> 00:57:49,250
Speaker 3: lives in this locale? The being that creates chaos and

1110
00:57:49,290 --> 00:57:53,210
Speaker 3: dysfunction named Azazel. So what does Azazel get? what he deserves,

1111
00:57:53,870 --> 00:57:56,910
Speaker 3: the sin and the chaos. Um, so the other, the

1112
00:57:56,950 --> 00:57:59,470
Speaker 3: interesting connection, a little bit more detailed, the Enoch piece,

1113
00:57:59,510 --> 00:58:00,690
Speaker 3: and I know we're going to talk about it later,

1114
00:58:00,710 --> 00:58:02,370
Speaker 3: but Azazel is also the name of the head of

1115
00:58:02,390 --> 00:58:05,110
Speaker 3: the watchers of Genesis six. Um, and this is how

1116
00:58:05,160 --> 00:58:08,200
Speaker 3: it's recorded in the book of Enoch. And this connects to, um,

1117
00:58:08,360 --> 00:58:11,280
Speaker 3: other references in second temple literature, which has the idea

1118
00:58:11,300 --> 00:58:15,740
Speaker 3: of cosmic geography, um, in the context, uh, around that. Uh,

1119
00:58:16,140 --> 00:58:22,700
Speaker 3: and so Azazel, um, you know, is, um, I don't

1120
00:58:22,720 --> 00:58:25,410
Speaker 3: want to say that he's the king of the wilderness,

1121
00:58:25,990 --> 00:58:28,910
Speaker 3: but there is a place of sacred space.

1122
00:58:28,990 --> 00:58:29,750
Speaker 1: You have sacred space.

1123
00:58:29,770 --> 00:58:30,870
Speaker 2: There's some authority there.

1124
00:58:31,110 --> 00:58:33,310
Speaker 3: There's a place of authority. There's a place of impact

1125
00:58:33,430 --> 00:58:37,320
Speaker 3: and influence. And so this is where the scapegoat goes.

1126
00:58:37,340 --> 00:58:42,360
Speaker 2: Okay, so what Heiser writes on page 27 of his book, Demons,

1127
00:58:43,020 --> 00:58:45,300
Speaker 2: he's talking about Azazel. He says, the high priest was

1128
00:58:45,360 --> 00:58:50,470
Speaker 2: not sacrificing to Azazel. Rather, Azazel was getting what belonged

1129
00:58:50,690 --> 00:58:54,490
Speaker 2: to him, sins. So I taught Old Testament for years,

1130
00:58:54,550 --> 00:58:56,640
Speaker 2: and I would say there's the one goat that they sacrificed.

1131
00:58:56,680 --> 00:58:58,520
Speaker 2: There's another one that had blood on it, and it's

1132
00:58:58,540 --> 00:59:03,380
Speaker 2: taking the blood representing the sin away from the people. Hence,

1133
00:59:03,780 --> 00:59:05,890
Speaker 2: when we say, ah, that person is a scapegoat, taking

1134
00:59:05,910 --> 00:59:09,890
Speaker 2: the blame for somebody else who really deserved it. The peace–

1135
00:59:10,010 --> 00:59:13,180
Speaker 2: I missed, if Heiser's right about this, and I suspect

1136
00:59:13,220 --> 00:59:15,960
Speaker 2: that he is, is that it wasn't just randomly in

1137
00:59:15,980 --> 00:59:17,780
Speaker 2: the desert. The way we think of the desert is

1138
00:59:17,860 --> 00:59:20,440
Speaker 2: a place you go four-wheeling or you just get alone

1139
00:59:20,480 --> 00:59:24,280
Speaker 2: or it's barren. No, they saw it through a supernatural

1140
00:59:24,400 --> 00:59:28,220
Speaker 2: lens and that there were some authorities and spirit beings

1141
00:59:28,460 --> 00:59:32,060
Speaker 2: acting in the wilderness, almost in similar ways they would

1142
00:59:32,100 --> 00:59:34,880
Speaker 2: see the sea a little bit. It's a place of chaos.

1143
00:59:35,580 --> 00:59:39,480
Speaker 2: And so that's where the lack of a supernatural worldview

1144
00:59:39,540 --> 00:59:42,660
Speaker 2: that I think Heiser's bringing in transforms things. And so

1145
00:59:42,680 --> 00:59:44,440
Speaker 2: let me just jump ahead and then we'll pull back

1146
00:59:44,500 --> 00:59:47,470
Speaker 2: into demons. Seems to me that would transform how we

1147
00:59:47,490 --> 00:59:51,590
Speaker 2: think about Jesus going out into the wilderness and being

1148
00:59:51,670 --> 00:59:56,000
Speaker 2: tempted for 40 days. So he's the new... And he's faithful,

1149
00:59:56,200 --> 01:00:00,210
Speaker 2: unlike Israel for 40 years. But in the wilderness, the

1150
01:00:00,350 --> 01:00:04,110
Speaker 2: animals are tending to him rather than being chaotic and

1151
01:00:04,190 --> 01:00:08,660
Speaker 2: causing danger. They tend to him, which if they have creation.

1152
01:00:09,310 --> 01:00:12,350
Speaker 2: symbolism to these beings. It's saying, wait a minute, there's

1153
01:00:12,390 --> 01:00:18,090
Speaker 2: something different about this person, Jesus, who has authority. Is

1154
01:00:18,110 --> 01:00:19,930
Speaker 2: that what's going on? How would you connect it to

1155
01:00:19,950 --> 01:00:20,790
Speaker 2: the story.

1156
01:00:20,450 --> 01:00:21,310
Speaker 1: At the end of Luke?

1157
01:00:21,370 --> 01:00:23,550
Speaker 3: So once again, this is the biblical theology piece of it.

1158
01:00:23,610 --> 01:00:26,610
Speaker 3: These are not randomized stories that are just presented for

1159
01:00:26,660 --> 01:00:31,060
Speaker 3: no reason. It's like a good comedian who places a

1160
01:00:31,080 --> 01:00:33,940
Speaker 3: joke in the very beginning and then does a callback consistently.

1161
01:00:34,360 --> 01:00:37,500
Speaker 3: There's a serious callback over here. The wilderness is not

1162
01:00:37,520 --> 01:00:40,580
Speaker 3: the only time. You think about the wilderness wandering for Israel.

1163
01:00:40,600 --> 01:00:44,060
Speaker 3: You think about this, then you get to Jesus. And

1164
01:00:44,530 --> 01:00:47,209
Speaker 3: I think it's so fascinating that it's immediately after, according

1165
01:00:47,230 --> 01:00:50,270
Speaker 3: to the Gospel of Mark, after his baptism scene, when

1166
01:00:50,290 --> 01:00:53,270
Speaker 3: it's like good and faithful servant, right? It says that

1167
01:00:53,310 --> 01:00:57,020
Speaker 3: the Spirit of God then propels him, expels him, essentially.

1168
01:00:57,440 --> 01:01:01,180
Speaker 3: into the wilderness. Now, if I'm Jesus, I'm kind of like,

1169
01:01:01,260 --> 01:01:03,720
Speaker 3: this is an enigmatic, like crazy moment. Like, can I

1170
01:01:03,740 --> 01:01:05,650
Speaker 3: just get my flowers for a little bit? You know, like,

1171
01:01:06,290 --> 01:01:08,330
Speaker 3: can I have a couple of days before I got

1172
01:01:08,350 --> 01:01:09,550
Speaker 3: to go into cosmic war?

1173
01:01:09,890 --> 01:01:11,310
Speaker 1: And the Spirit of God is like, no, we got

1174
01:01:11,330 --> 01:01:13,330
Speaker 1: work to do. And it's really interesting.

1175
01:01:13,350 --> 01:01:14,670
Speaker 3: I don't have the details in front of me, but

1176
01:01:14,970 --> 01:01:17,530
Speaker 3: I believe the way that Mark uses the language of,

1177
01:01:17,650 --> 01:01:20,430
Speaker 3: and when Jesus was sent in, it's also the same

1178
01:01:20,830 --> 01:01:25,200
Speaker 3: technical term that's used of demon exorcisms for expulsion. And

1179
01:01:25,240 --> 01:01:27,630
Speaker 3: so you have a linguistic connection there that's happening. So

1180
01:01:27,910 --> 01:01:31,790
Speaker 3: it's setting up the scene that Jesus is the new Israel.

1181
01:01:32,150 --> 01:01:35,350
Speaker 3: Jesus is the faithful Israel. And Jesus is like, I'm

1182
01:01:35,370 --> 01:01:37,270
Speaker 3: not waiting for the enemy to come into my ground.

1183
01:01:37,610 --> 01:01:39,390
Speaker 3: I'm going to go to the enemy's ground, which is

1184
01:01:39,430 --> 01:01:42,140
Speaker 3: the wilderness. And then you have these three temptations. In

1185
01:01:42,180 --> 01:01:43,800
Speaker 3: my book, The Unseen Battle, I try to make an

1186
01:01:43,900 --> 01:01:47,960
Speaker 3: argument that the three temptations are actually a reversal, a

1187
01:01:48,280 --> 01:01:51,260
Speaker 3: redemptive reversal of the three rebellions that are taking place.

1188
01:01:51,620 --> 01:01:53,880
Speaker 3: And you have the imagery of the sea, the desire,

1189
01:01:53,940 --> 01:01:56,720
Speaker 3: and the take. You have the presence of the temple.

1190
01:01:56,980 --> 01:02:00,780
Speaker 3: You have the presence of the kingdom. There's this thing

1191
01:02:00,840 --> 01:02:05,300
Speaker 3: called a semantic range when it comes to biblical words. So,

1192
01:02:05,560 --> 01:02:09,200
Speaker 3: for instance, oikos is the Greek term for household. In Greek,

1193
01:02:09,720 --> 01:02:13,510
Speaker 3: beith is the Hebrew term for household. The semantic range

1194
01:02:13,550 --> 01:02:16,680
Speaker 3: of household in both Greek and Hebrew can mean the

1195
01:02:16,720 --> 01:02:19,720
Speaker 3: nuclear family, it can mean the temple, and it can

1196
01:02:19,780 --> 01:02:23,600
Speaker 3: mean a kingdom. Well, what happens up in the wilderness,

1197
01:02:23,640 --> 01:02:26,540
Speaker 3: and what is Jesus doing? Jesus is reclaiming his family,

1198
01:02:27,160 --> 01:02:30,790
Speaker 3: Jesus is establishing them as the royal priesthood of all believers,

1199
01:02:31,130 --> 01:02:33,970
Speaker 3: and Jesus is inaugurating the kingdom of God. And all

1200
01:02:34,010 --> 01:02:36,190
Speaker 3: that is taking place here in the wilderness, and those

1201
01:02:36,230 --> 01:02:38,280
Speaker 3: are all the things that the enemy, that the devil does,

1202
01:02:38,560 --> 01:02:42,660
Speaker 3: is trying to present to Jesus as a means of desire.

1203
01:02:42,720 --> 01:02:45,860
Speaker 3: There's this fascinating thing when the devil says, you're the

1204
01:02:45,880 --> 01:02:52,260
Speaker 3: son of God, so go ahead. This is not passive-aggressive language.

1205
01:02:52,320 --> 01:02:56,380
Speaker 3: It's not like, well, you're just the son of God.

1206
01:02:56,480 --> 01:03:01,890
Speaker 3: It's like, you're the son of God. It's actually affirmation

1207
01:03:01,990 --> 01:03:04,790
Speaker 3: of his title. You are the son of God. You

1208
01:03:04,850 --> 01:03:05,710
Speaker 3: deserve this.

1209
01:03:06,530 --> 01:03:08,190
Speaker 1: And it's actually an invitation.

1210
01:03:07,750 --> 01:03:11,830
Speaker 3: For Jesus to misuse his authority, to abuse his authority,

1211
01:03:11,870 --> 01:03:16,660
Speaker 3: because in the Incarnation, he is submitting not ontologically forever,

1212
01:03:16,680 --> 01:03:21,980
Speaker 3: but for a season. He is fulfilling the Incarnation, the

1213
01:03:22,080 --> 01:03:24,900
Speaker 3: full responsibility of humanity. He's submitting to the Father. Well,

1214
01:03:24,980 --> 01:03:28,330
Speaker 3: what happens in Genesis 6? It's a transgression of boundaries, right?

1215
01:03:28,920 --> 01:03:31,280
Speaker 3: And so here you're seeing all of those echoes being

1216
01:03:31,340 --> 01:03:35,750
Speaker 3: hyperlinked back to the three rebellions of Genesis 3, 6,

1217
01:03:35,750 --> 01:03:38,570
Speaker 3: and 11. And then you see the three temptations. And

1218
01:03:38,590 --> 01:03:40,430
Speaker 3: that's where you have, like, even the zazels that are

1219
01:03:40,450 --> 01:03:44,070
Speaker 3: the watchers and the wilderness goat and, you know, sin.

1220
01:03:44,510 --> 01:03:46,850
Speaker 3: And this is a telltale sign leading us into the cross.

1221
01:03:47,230 --> 01:03:49,410
Speaker 2: Those links are crazy. I mean, when I first read Heiser,

1222
01:03:49,430 --> 01:03:50,910
Speaker 2: I was like, wait a minute. First off, it just

1223
01:03:51,010 --> 01:03:53,800
Speaker 2: completely messed with my mind on so many levels. I'm

1224
01:03:53,860 --> 01:03:56,190
Speaker 2: still trying to make sense of it. But making these

1225
01:03:56,270 --> 01:03:59,320
Speaker 2: connections to Jesus, say, in the wilderness is like, oh

1226
01:03:59,360 --> 01:04:02,140
Speaker 2: my goodness, wait a minute. We can't miss this to

1227
01:04:02,200 --> 01:04:04,900
Speaker 2: understand the spiritual battle that he's in. You do a

1228
01:04:04,900 --> 01:04:06,900
Speaker 2: great job in your book doing that. Now, I want

1229
01:04:06,920 --> 01:04:09,120
Speaker 2: to turn to Satan, but you did say a minute ago,

1230
01:04:09,800 --> 01:04:12,380
Speaker 2: you said like a great comedian who sets up a joke,

1231
01:04:12,440 --> 01:04:16,230
Speaker 2: brings it full circle. You did call Jordan the goat,

1232
01:04:16,350 --> 01:04:18,930
Speaker 2: and I gave you a chance with Leviticus 16 to

1233
01:04:18,970 --> 01:04:22,450
Speaker 2: just bring it full circle, but just throwing it out there.

1234
01:04:22,470 --> 01:04:25,730
Speaker 3: I couldn't find a lexical connection to LeBron as being

1235
01:04:25,810 --> 01:04:28,610
Speaker 3: the anti-goat, and so I just couldn't do that.

1236
01:04:28,990 --> 01:04:29,650
Speaker 1: But apparently he's leaving.

1237
01:04:29,670 --> 01:04:30,170
Speaker 2: I had to go there.

1238
01:04:30,190 --> 01:04:30,850
Speaker 1: I love it.

1239
01:04:31,690 --> 01:04:36,840
Speaker 2: All right. Let's shift. So you mentioned Satan, Hasatan earlier.

1240
01:04:36,860 --> 01:04:37,160
Speaker 1: Yeah.

1241
01:04:37,660 --> 01:04:41,460
Speaker 2: How does— I think most people would say they understand the

1242
01:04:41,520 --> 01:04:45,150
Speaker 2: traditional view of Satan as being the leader of God's

1243
01:04:45,930 --> 01:04:49,680
Speaker 2: angels at one point, rebelling against him, getting casting down

1244
01:04:49,700 --> 01:04:53,460
Speaker 2: because he wanted to make himself like God, Isaiah 14,

1245
01:04:53,460 --> 01:04:58,320
Speaker 2: Ezekiel 28. So we know that, but maybe walk through,

1246
01:04:58,340 --> 01:05:04,100
Speaker 2: how does Heiser fit Satan into his understanding of the demonic,

1247
01:05:04,420 --> 01:05:07,600
Speaker 2: evil spiritual realm? And how do you fit it into

1248
01:05:07,640 --> 01:05:08,140
Speaker 2: that realm?

1249
01:05:08,530 --> 01:05:11,150
Speaker 3: Yeah, I don't think too much changes with how Mike

1250
01:05:11,230 --> 01:05:14,100
Speaker 3: fits it in. The main thing that Mike wants us

1251
01:05:14,140 --> 01:05:17,480
Speaker 3: to do is not read the devil figure into the

1252
01:05:17,520 --> 01:05:20,180
Speaker 3: Hasatan of Job, because he wants to take the Hebrew

1253
01:05:20,200 --> 01:05:23,140
Speaker 3: Bible on its own terms. Again, point of disagreement for me,

1254
01:05:23,520 --> 01:05:27,400
Speaker 3: where I'd have no problem reading the devil figure into

1255
01:05:27,460 --> 01:05:30,340
Speaker 3: that after we see what's actually happening there with the

1256
01:05:30,360 --> 01:05:33,430
Speaker 3: divine counsel scene and the accuser, because this is kind

1257
01:05:33,470 --> 01:05:36,470
Speaker 3: of painting a bigger picture of what the devil is

1258
01:05:36,530 --> 01:05:39,570
Speaker 3: doing and what his role is. In terms of like

1259
01:05:40,110 --> 01:05:44,870
Speaker 3: where I locate the devil and his work, this has

1260
01:05:44,890 --> 01:05:46,650
Speaker 3: a lot to do with my work in Ephesians. I

1261
01:05:46,690 --> 01:05:49,130
Speaker 3: know you've got Clint, who's like the premier Ephesians and

1262
01:05:49,150 --> 01:05:52,820
Speaker 3: Colossians scholar. But you've got the devil as the prince

1263
01:05:52,840 --> 01:05:55,740
Speaker 3: of the power of the air being described in Ephesians.

1264
01:05:55,760 --> 01:05:58,720
Speaker 3: You've got the devil as being described as a father

1265
01:05:58,740 --> 01:06:03,650
Speaker 3: of a household, you know. Jesus refers to those that

1266
01:06:03,670 --> 01:06:06,610
Speaker 3: are acting in evil ways as children of the devil.

1267
01:06:07,250 --> 01:06:10,450
Speaker 1: And so you do have a kind.

1268
01:06:10,250 --> 01:06:15,810
Speaker 3: Of authority that is given and descriptive of the devil

1269
01:06:15,850 --> 01:06:21,070
Speaker 3: who is leading an army, leading a militaristic campaign against

1270
01:06:21,160 --> 01:06:26,580
Speaker 3: Yahweh and his household, where I believe that we ought

1271
01:06:26,620 --> 01:06:30,710
Speaker 3: to be careful is to presume that that it is

1272
01:06:30,890 --> 01:06:35,490
Speaker 3: a totality of authority. Like the devil is just in

1273
01:06:35,910 --> 01:06:40,000
Speaker 3: lockstep with all of his henchmen, you know? Instead, I

1274
01:06:40,020 --> 01:06:43,020
Speaker 3: like to think of the dark powers as competing warlords.

1275
01:06:43,680 --> 01:06:46,960
Speaker 3: And as competing warlords, the enemy of my enemy is

1276
01:06:47,020 --> 01:06:47,520
Speaker 3: my friend.

1277
01:06:48,100 --> 01:06:49,140
Speaker 1: And they're following.

1278
01:06:49,160 --> 01:06:52,080
Speaker 3: It's like, hey, I'm going to absolutely do everything I

1279
01:06:52,120 --> 01:06:55,020
Speaker 3: can to destroy Yahweh. And I can't destroy Yahweh. So

1280
01:06:55,040 --> 01:06:56,720
Speaker 3: we're going to go after his children. So that's the

1281
01:06:57,100 --> 01:06:58,700
Speaker 3: way to grieve the heart of a father is you

1282
01:06:58,720 --> 01:07:01,940
Speaker 3: go after the children, right? And yet you also find

1283
01:07:01,980 --> 01:07:05,840
Speaker 3: chaos amongst the nations. They also are competing for territory

1284
01:07:05,900 --> 01:07:09,060
Speaker 3: and for land. I wrote a fascinating book about the

1285
01:07:09,080 --> 01:07:13,380
Speaker 3: 800-year war between Persia and Rome. It was recommended by

1286
01:07:13,420 --> 01:07:17,600
Speaker 3: Tom Holland, the historian, not the Spider-Man. And it was

1287
01:07:17,620 --> 01:07:21,380
Speaker 3: just fascinating. And all the way throughout it, secular historian,

1288
01:07:21,680 --> 01:07:24,620
Speaker 3: you find this little civilization, little group of people called

1289
01:07:24,640 --> 01:07:27,620
Speaker 3: the Israelites that keep popping up. But it begs the question,

1290
01:07:28,120 --> 01:07:30,260
Speaker 3: how do you have this kind of competition, this war

1291
01:07:30,320 --> 01:07:34,830
Speaker 3: between Persia and Rome for this long, you know? And

1292
01:07:35,530 --> 01:07:38,090
Speaker 3: Daniel 8 in Cosmic Geography lets us know that there

1293
01:07:38,110 --> 01:07:42,470
Speaker 3: are dark powers behind geopolitical entities. And they are also

1294
01:07:42,550 --> 01:07:45,210
Speaker 3: narcissistic in nature. They're trying to take each other out

1295
01:07:45,250 --> 01:07:47,450
Speaker 3: to gain as much as they can. And every now

1296
01:07:47,510 --> 01:07:50,580
Speaker 3: and then they find a commonality in fighting against Yahweh

1297
01:07:50,600 --> 01:07:54,270
Speaker 3: and his children. And so I would locate the devil

1298
01:07:54,770 --> 01:07:59,370
Speaker 3: in a traditional sense, that the devil is the leader

1299
01:07:59,870 --> 01:08:04,970
Speaker 3: of the forces of evil that desire to deceive the

1300
01:08:05,010 --> 01:08:08,250
Speaker 3: people of God and to ultimately destroy the people of God.

1301
01:08:08,710 --> 01:08:10,690
Speaker 3: And I also think the devil is limited in time

1302
01:08:10,730 --> 01:08:12,870
Speaker 3: and space. We have to be very careful that we

1303
01:08:12,910 --> 01:08:17,110
Speaker 3: do not create, you know, systematic theologians refer to the

1304
01:08:17,229 --> 01:08:21,370
Speaker 3: incommunicable attributes of God. The God is omniscient, omnipotent, omnipresent.

1305
01:08:22,189 --> 01:08:25,200
Speaker 3: this is not an Asian yin and yang situation. Like

1306
01:08:25,320 --> 01:08:28,059
Speaker 3: the dark powers, the devil does not have equal, this

1307
01:08:28,120 --> 01:08:30,980
Speaker 3: is not a divine tug of rope, you know, like

1308
01:08:31,800 --> 01:08:34,640
Speaker 3: he's a created being and as such is limited in

1309
01:08:34,680 --> 01:08:38,130
Speaker 3: time and space, which thus leads me to the belief

1310
01:08:38,229 --> 01:08:43,050
Speaker 3: that the enemy is the most prolific in mass marketing sin.

1311
01:08:44,450 --> 01:08:46,710
Speaker 3: Loves to mass market sin. There's a reason why we

1312
01:08:46,729 --> 01:08:49,160
Speaker 3: have a pornography epidemic. There's a reason why we have

1313
01:08:49,200 --> 01:08:52,689
Speaker 3: an opioid epidemic. There's a reason why anxiety and depression

1314
01:08:52,770 --> 01:08:57,540
Speaker 3: is skyrocketing in the most interconnected society that we've probably

1315
01:08:57,620 --> 01:09:00,390
Speaker 3: ever had in human history. You've got more and more

1316
01:09:00,430 --> 01:09:03,720
Speaker 3: people saying, I feel more lonely. I feel more disconnected

1317
01:09:03,770 --> 01:09:08,960
Speaker 3: from other people and finding a hopelessness in their life.

1318
01:09:09,479 --> 01:09:13,620
Speaker 3: These are not random. Sean, I grew up when Facebook

1319
01:09:13,840 --> 01:09:16,729
Speaker 3: or Instagram first came out. and you could scroll down,

1320
01:09:16,930 --> 01:09:21,020
Speaker 3: and you would finish your feed, and it would say, congratulations,

1321
01:09:21,160 --> 01:09:21,740
Speaker 3: all caught up.

1322
01:09:23,180 --> 01:09:26,540
Speaker 1: You know the first thing that left? That feature. That

1323
01:09:26,560 --> 01:09:27,519
Speaker 1: was the first thing that left.

1324
01:09:27,600 --> 01:09:30,650
Speaker 3: The doom scroll began because you never want to be

1325
01:09:30,689 --> 01:09:34,550
Speaker 3: caught up. You always want to be inundated with new information,

1326
01:09:34,570 --> 01:09:38,130
Speaker 3: and That's what I believe that the devil and the

1327
01:09:38,150 --> 01:09:41,000
Speaker 3: dark powers are working in systems and structures.

1328
01:09:41,560 --> 01:09:44,560
Speaker 2: So is Satan one of the sons of God who

1329
01:09:44,660 --> 01:09:49,720
Speaker 2: rebelled against and has cosmic geography, maybe larger geography? Or

1330
01:09:50,160 --> 01:09:53,900
Speaker 2: is he one of the spirits of the Nephilim who

1331
01:09:53,920 --> 01:09:58,210
Speaker 2: wants to— and the reason I ask about that one is

1332
01:09:58,250 --> 01:10:01,880
Speaker 2: because we're told in the Gospel of John— that Satan

1333
01:10:02,100 --> 01:10:07,010
Speaker 2: actually possessed and went into Judas. I think he's the

1334
01:10:07,060 --> 01:10:08,729
Speaker 2: only one that I can think of where that happens.

1335
01:10:08,780 --> 01:10:10,590
Speaker 2: It's one thing to be possessed. It's another thing to

1336
01:10:10,630 --> 01:10:15,510
Speaker 2: be possessed by Satan himself. So how does he fit

1337
01:10:15,650 --> 01:10:17,189
Speaker 2: into that kind of metric?

1338
01:10:17,370 --> 01:10:18,330
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's such a good question.

1339
01:10:18,370 --> 01:10:20,850
Speaker 3: I haven't thought much about the Satan possession Judas one,

1340
01:10:20,870 --> 01:10:25,710
Speaker 3: so that's a good bunny trail for me to chase down. Satan,

1341
01:10:25,729 --> 01:10:28,210
Speaker 3: I would not categorically place him with the sons of God,

1342
01:10:29,090 --> 01:10:32,930
Speaker 3: I would actually place him categorically with Michael the Archangel.

1343
01:10:33,410 --> 01:10:35,380
Speaker 3: And in fact, when you read, and I make a

1344
01:10:35,410 --> 01:10:37,740
Speaker 3: case for this in The Unseen Battle, when you're reading

1345
01:10:37,760 --> 01:10:40,380
Speaker 3: about cosmic geography and the Prince of Persia, I would

1346
01:10:40,439 --> 01:10:43,480
Speaker 3: cast that the Prince of Persia in that setting is

1347
01:10:43,560 --> 01:10:50,099
Speaker 3: actually the Satan figure who's competing against Michael. Now you've

1348
01:10:50,140 --> 01:10:52,320
Speaker 3: got counterparts in that scenario.

1349
01:10:52,340 --> 01:10:53,479
Speaker 2: That's so interesting. Yeah.

1350
01:10:54,760 --> 01:10:55,320
Speaker 1: Okay, so.

1351
01:10:56,540 --> 01:10:58,240
Speaker 2: By the way, I haven't aired it yet at the

1352
01:10:58,280 --> 01:11:01,120
Speaker 2: time we're recording this, but I asked Clint Arnold if

1353
01:11:01,180 --> 01:11:04,580
Speaker 2: there's these sons of God over geographic areas.

1354
01:11:04,660 --> 01:11:04,860
Speaker 3: Yeah.

1355
01:11:05,220 --> 01:11:07,860
Speaker 2: Should we engage in spiritual warfare with him? And his

1356
01:11:08,000 --> 01:11:09,960
Speaker 2: answer blew me away. I'm going to leave you a

1357
01:11:10,040 --> 01:11:12,259
Speaker 2: hook to go take a look at. I was like, dang.

1358
01:11:12,460 --> 01:11:12,660
Speaker 3: Yeah.

1359
01:11:12,740 --> 01:11:13,880
Speaker 2: I didn't even think about that.

1360
01:11:14,060 --> 01:11:14,270
Speaker 3: Yeah.

1361
01:11:14,470 --> 01:11:17,810
Speaker 2: But so circle back to the possession one. Yeah. If

1362
01:11:17,850 --> 01:11:20,250
Speaker 2: people have questions about that, write it in or takes

1363
01:11:20,370 --> 01:11:21,670
Speaker 2: on it. And we'll come back when we do the

1364
01:11:21,710 --> 01:11:23,410
Speaker 2: Q & A. We'll kind of weigh into that.

1365
01:11:23,510 --> 01:11:23,610
Speaker 3: Yep.

1366
01:11:23,630 --> 01:11:27,480
Speaker 2: Because that would make me think if the Nephilim... used

1367
01:11:27,560 --> 01:11:32,339
Speaker 2: to possess people, either he is of the same nature

1368
01:11:32,400 --> 01:11:37,130
Speaker 2: as the Nephilim because he wants to possess Judas, or

1369
01:11:37,150 --> 01:11:40,150
Speaker 2: this is one unique instance out of his norm where

1370
01:11:40,170 --> 01:11:42,210
Speaker 2: he does it. I don't know how to answer that.

1371
01:11:43,010 --> 01:11:53,330
Speaker 2: But so would you say then names like Prince of Persia, Beelzebub— Satan, devil, Azazel, Shemahiah.

1372
01:11:53,430 --> 01:11:53,650
Speaker 3: Yeah.

1373
01:11:53,970 --> 01:11:56,969
Speaker 2: All the same figure, different names given for that figure.

1374
01:11:57,010 --> 01:11:57,690
Speaker 2: Is that how you see it?

1375
01:11:57,689 --> 01:11:58,520
Speaker 1: I tend to think that.

1376
01:11:58,880 --> 01:12:00,979
Speaker 3: I tend to think that these are names that are

1377
01:12:01,120 --> 01:12:04,479
Speaker 3: given to describe one figure that are different shades and

1378
01:12:04,500 --> 01:12:05,960
Speaker 3: different masks at different time.

1379
01:12:06,479 --> 01:12:06,639
Speaker 2: Yeah.

1380
01:12:07,640 --> 01:12:07,860
Speaker 1: Okay.

1381
01:12:07,960 --> 01:12:08,760
Speaker 2: Fair enough. All right.

1382
01:12:09,140 --> 01:12:12,140
Speaker 3: The same idea happens with Marduk. Same thing happens with Baal.

1383
01:12:12,240 --> 01:12:16,640
Speaker 3: Same thing happens with Zeus. These Greek figures. One of

1384
01:12:16,680 --> 01:12:19,820
Speaker 3: the fascinating things that blew my mind away. was the

1385
01:12:19,920 --> 01:12:23,750
Speaker 3: iconography of Baal and the description of Baal as a

1386
01:12:23,810 --> 01:12:27,470
Speaker 3: deity that is the storm god that the iconography shows

1387
01:12:27,510 --> 01:12:30,350
Speaker 3: him with a lightning bolt in his hand riding on

1388
01:12:30,390 --> 01:12:30,750
Speaker 3: a bull.

1389
01:12:31,610 --> 01:12:35,379
Speaker 1: Wait a minute. Like, that's, like, toe for toe.

1390
01:12:35,600 --> 01:12:38,120
Speaker 3: That's exactly like what you got with Zeus, you know?

1391
01:12:38,140 --> 01:12:41,540
Speaker 3: And so I tend to think that these are the

1392
01:12:41,740 --> 01:12:47,400
Speaker 3: same spiritual beings that are just changing masks. called different things,

1393
01:12:47,500 --> 01:12:50,120
Speaker 3: but they're known for their function and what they produce

1394
01:12:50,140 --> 01:12:50,640
Speaker 3: and what they do.

1395
01:12:51,180 --> 01:12:53,580
Speaker 2: Man, that's so interesting. Okay, so I want to kind

1396
01:12:53,620 --> 01:12:55,440
Speaker 2: of shift to some takeaways from this, but did I

1397
01:12:55,500 --> 01:12:57,809
Speaker 2: miss anything I should have asked you about? I guess

1398
01:12:57,820 --> 01:12:59,970
Speaker 2: we go back to angels as well, but demons, how

1399
01:13:00,030 --> 01:13:02,990
Speaker 2: Satan figures into this. Anything you want to add that

1400
01:13:03,370 --> 01:13:05,430
Speaker 2: Heiser would have believed you agree with him, disagree with

1401
01:13:05,450 --> 01:13:07,769
Speaker 2: him to understand this, or you think we sufficiently covered

1402
01:13:07,790 --> 01:13:09,410
Speaker 2: it until the questions come strolling in?

1403
01:13:09,570 --> 01:13:11,950
Speaker 3: I mean, I think the big one for me is

1404
01:13:12,110 --> 01:13:13,259
Speaker 3: that we haven't talked about is the angel of the

1405
01:13:13,300 --> 01:13:16,470
Speaker 3: Lord figure. in the Old Testament, you know? And so

1406
01:13:16,530 --> 01:13:18,050
Speaker 3: the angel of the Lord figure, my view is that

1407
01:13:18,070 --> 01:13:20,269
Speaker 3: the angel of the Lord figure is the pre-incarnate Christ.

1408
01:13:20,430 --> 01:13:20,730
Speaker 1: Amen.

1409
01:13:21,590 --> 01:13:23,410
Speaker 3: And so, you know, I don't think that Jesus is

1410
01:13:23,450 --> 01:13:25,450
Speaker 3: waiting around in some green room for his.

1411
01:13:25,350 --> 01:13:29,629
Speaker 1: Divine moment, like, now's your time, buddy, you know? He's active.

1412
01:13:30,290 --> 01:13:31,849
Speaker 3: And the angel of the Lord, if you just trace

1413
01:13:31,910 --> 01:13:33,650
Speaker 3: the angel of the Lord appearances in the Old Testament,

1414
01:13:34,010 --> 01:13:36,830
Speaker 3: you find that he speaks as God. He doesn't come

1415
01:13:36,870 --> 01:13:39,290
Speaker 3: as a messenger speaking the message of Yahweh.

1416
01:13:39,630 --> 01:13:45,140
Speaker 1: He takes that personal... language. He is called Yahweh, yet

1417
01:13:45,160 --> 01:13:46,460
Speaker 1: he's distinct from Yahweh.

1418
01:13:46,540 --> 01:13:51,099
Speaker 3: There's a whole other conversation that Mike did a lot

1419
01:13:51,120 --> 01:13:52,979
Speaker 3: of work on this concept of the two powers in heaven,

1420
01:13:53,060 --> 01:13:58,200
Speaker 3: which was a well-known kind of Second Temple understanding of

1421
01:13:58,340 --> 01:14:01,580
Speaker 3: the way the Israelites understood Yahweh. The other thing about

1422
01:14:01,600 --> 01:14:03,019
Speaker 3: the angel of the Lord is that he receives worship

1423
01:14:03,460 --> 01:14:07,440
Speaker 3: in Joshua 5. We find this never else do you

1424
01:14:07,520 --> 01:14:10,979
Speaker 3: find angelic beings in that are allegiant and loyal to

1425
01:14:11,020 --> 01:14:12,259
Speaker 3: Yahweh except human worship.

1426
01:14:12,280 --> 01:14:13,580
Speaker 1: Um, and the other.

1427
01:14:13,460 --> 01:14:16,260
Speaker 3: Thing is that he is, uh, in a, he is

1428
01:14:16,600 --> 01:14:19,740
Speaker 3: setting the stage by presenting to us the work of

1429
01:14:19,860 --> 01:14:23,220
Speaker 3: Jesus in the incarnation earlier on. He's doing the son's

1430
01:14:23,320 --> 01:14:26,400
Speaker 3: work all the way throughout the old Testament. And so

1431
01:14:26,660 --> 01:14:30,280
Speaker 3: you've got Genesis 16, Hagar in the wilderness, uh, Genesis

1432
01:14:30,280 --> 01:14:31,560
Speaker 3: 18 and 19, Abraham.

1433
01:14:31,590 --> 01:14:34,830
Speaker 1: Um, you've got Mount Moriah. There's a whole one on

1434
01:14:34,870 --> 01:14:37,550
Speaker 1: Mount Moriah, which is kind of wild, um, where you

1435
01:14:37,570 --> 01:14:39,630
Speaker 1: have the angel of the Lord, Which, think about that.

1436
01:14:39,930 --> 01:14:43,670
Speaker 1: On Mount Moriah, angel of the Lord, here's Jesus. There's

1437
01:14:43,689 --> 01:14:46,440
Speaker 1: a goat that is caught in the thicket.

1438
01:14:47,140 --> 01:14:52,660
Speaker 3: And Mount Moriah is also, you know, the location where

1439
01:14:53,400 --> 01:14:57,099
Speaker 3: you would say, like, wait a minute. Jesus is there,

1440
01:14:57,280 --> 01:15:00,790
Speaker 3: pre-incarnate as the angel of the Lord, recognizes that there's

1441
01:15:00,810 --> 01:15:05,330
Speaker 3: going to be a— this is an argument for penal substitution— there' s

1442
01:15:03,450 --> 01:15:06,850
Speaker 3: going to be a substitute for And lo and behold,

1443
01:15:06,900 --> 01:15:07,519
Speaker 3: it is Jesus.

1444
01:15:07,640 --> 01:15:08,700
Speaker 1: He is the substitute.

1445
01:15:08,979 --> 01:15:12,520
Speaker 2: So I love that good stuff. Well, I haven't done

1446
01:15:12,540 --> 01:15:15,960
Speaker 2: an in-depth dive here on angel Lord. Maybe we'll have

1447
01:15:15,979 --> 01:15:18,280
Speaker 2: you back for the third to talk about that. Or

1448
01:15:18,360 --> 01:15:20,420
Speaker 2: we've got some great, I know you, you traveled a

1449
01:15:20,439 --> 01:15:22,240
Speaker 2: long ways to get here, which I appreciate. We've got

1450
01:15:22,260 --> 01:15:24,780
Speaker 2: some great scholars here, but I would ask my viewers

1451
01:15:24,820 --> 01:15:27,059
Speaker 2: and listeners like, yeah, deep dive on who is the

1452
01:15:27,160 --> 01:15:30,190
Speaker 2: angel Lord, how it fits into God's character. Is it

1453
01:15:30,200 --> 01:15:33,690
Speaker 2: the pre-incarnate Christ? We have some remarkable scholars here at Talbot.

1454
01:15:33,710 --> 01:15:35,450
Speaker 2: If you're like, that would be a helpful dive. Yeah.

1455
01:15:35,780 --> 01:15:37,440
Speaker 2: Let me know. We could do one or two parts

1456
01:15:37,500 --> 01:15:40,980
Speaker 2: of that. Either you or one of our amazing scholars here. Okay,

1457
01:15:41,970 --> 01:15:44,549
Speaker 2: let me just kind of bring this full circle. Suppose

1458
01:15:44,930 --> 01:15:47,310
Speaker 2: Heiser's right and that your right is what you lay

1459
01:15:47,350 --> 01:15:51,230
Speaker 2: out in the unseen battle. How would that change the

1460
01:15:51,250 --> 01:15:56,200
Speaker 2: way that pastors preach, Christians pray, and churches think about

1461
01:15:56,320 --> 01:15:58,600
Speaker 2: spiritual warfare and missions?

1462
01:15:59,510 --> 01:16:00,170
Speaker 1: I've been doing a lot of.

1463
01:16:00,130 --> 01:16:04,939
Speaker 3: Work on Revelation 2 recently, particularly the letter that's given

1464
01:16:05,000 --> 01:16:08,479
Speaker 3: to the church in Ephesus. And I would agree and

1465
01:16:08,500 --> 01:16:10,680
Speaker 3: believe that these are circular letters that are meant to

1466
01:16:10,720 --> 01:16:13,680
Speaker 3: be handed around, and yet there's a target audience. And

1467
01:16:14,100 --> 01:16:20,780
Speaker 3: there's this really interesting phrase that happens in Revelation 2.

1468
01:16:20,780 --> 01:16:25,660
Speaker 3: And it starts with these throwbacks to earlier in Revelation 1.

1469
01:16:25,640 --> 01:16:30,450
Speaker 3: I just want to read— this in Revelation 2, it

1470
01:16:30,470 --> 01:16:34,270
Speaker 3: says to the angel of the church in Ephesus. Okay.

1471
01:16:34,939 --> 01:16:38,280
Speaker 3: So what I find fascinating, Sean, get me in trouble here,

1472
01:16:38,439 --> 01:16:41,240
Speaker 3: but I find it fascinating that this is to the

1473
01:16:41,340 --> 01:16:43,200
Speaker 3: angel of the church in Ephesus, not to the angel

1474
01:16:43,280 --> 01:16:46,460
Speaker 3: of Ephesus. And you find that pattern through all of it,

1475
01:16:46,479 --> 01:16:48,360
Speaker 3: to the angel of the church in Smyrna, to the

1476
01:16:48,420 --> 01:16:50,240
Speaker 3: angel of the church in Pergamum, to the angel of

1477
01:16:50,280 --> 01:16:54,220
Speaker 3: the church in Thyatira. Like you never find to the

1478
01:16:54,479 --> 01:16:59,290
Speaker 3: angel of Ephesus, right? It's to the remnant, to the

1479
01:16:59,430 --> 01:17:03,740
Speaker 3: household of God that finds themselves in a land that

1480
01:17:03,780 --> 01:17:07,000
Speaker 3: is not their own. Like there's this sojourner and stranger

1481
01:17:07,040 --> 01:17:10,100
Speaker 3: motif that carries over from Ephesians as well. So to

1482
01:17:10,140 --> 01:17:12,599
Speaker 3: the angel of the church in Ephesus, right? The words

1483
01:17:12,660 --> 01:17:16,490
Speaker 3: of him who holds the seven stars in his right hand,

1484
01:17:16,570 --> 01:17:19,630
Speaker 3: who walks among the seven golden lampstands. So scholars question

1485
01:17:19,950 --> 01:17:23,710
Speaker 3: who are these seven stars? Most scholars would agree that

1486
01:17:23,770 --> 01:17:27,050
Speaker 3: the seven golden lampstands reference the witness of the local

1487
01:17:27,090 --> 01:17:29,689
Speaker 3: churches that are being described. But what is the identity

1488
01:17:30,010 --> 01:17:33,840
Speaker 3: of these seven stars? Various interpretive options have been given.

1489
01:17:33,850 --> 01:17:37,540
Speaker 3: Are we talking about pastors, bishops, local church rulers, leaders?

1490
01:17:38,260 --> 01:17:41,040
Speaker 3: I would say, why would we opt for any reading

1491
01:17:41,160 --> 01:17:44,439
Speaker 3: other than the cosmic reading throughout the rest of Revelation?

1492
01:17:44,460 --> 01:17:45,160
Speaker 1: It's fair.

1493
01:17:45,320 --> 01:17:50,380
Speaker 3: And the presence of the language of stars as angelic

1494
01:17:50,420 --> 01:17:53,270
Speaker 3: beings in the Old Testament. Think about Job 38. Where

1495
01:17:54,250 --> 01:17:56,630
Speaker 3: were you when the morning stars shouted for joy when

1496
01:17:56,650 --> 01:17:59,370
Speaker 3: the sons of God sang? So who are these seven stars?

1497
01:17:59,390 --> 01:18:02,330
Speaker 3: I would make the argument the seven stars are spiritual beings.

1498
01:18:02,370 --> 01:18:05,910
Speaker 1: Let's see. I almost slipped up there. Are spiritual beings.

1499
01:18:05,930 --> 01:18:09,980
Speaker 3: Yeah. Now, the point of this verse, though, is not

1500
01:18:10,020 --> 01:18:13,139
Speaker 3: the spiritual beings. So, to the angel of the church

1501
01:18:13,160 --> 01:18:14,960
Speaker 3: in Ephesus write, to the words of him who holds

1502
01:18:15,020 --> 01:18:17,840
Speaker 3: seven stars in his right hand. The point is not

1503
01:18:18,060 --> 01:18:20,200
Speaker 3: the seven stars. The point is to the one who

1504
01:18:20,560 --> 01:18:23,200
Speaker 3: holds the seven stars in his right hand. Who is

1505
01:18:23,240 --> 01:18:25,299
Speaker 3: the one who holds seven stars in his right hand?

1506
01:18:25,740 --> 01:18:30,910
Speaker 3: Jesus is the one who holds. And so, for me, like,

1507
01:18:31,229 --> 01:18:35,070
Speaker 3: the big takeaway of all of this is to never

1508
01:18:35,290 --> 01:18:38,680
Speaker 3: miss Jesus. It is so simple, but it's far from

1509
01:18:38,700 --> 01:18:41,480
Speaker 3: being simplistic. It's that everything that we have studied thus

1510
01:18:41,560 --> 01:18:44,710
Speaker 3: far and talked about and discussed and maybe even disagreed on,

1511
01:18:45,189 --> 01:18:47,250
Speaker 3: that these are all things that ought to lead us

1512
01:18:47,310 --> 01:18:50,390
Speaker 3: to marvel at Jesus. That Jesus is the one who

1513
01:18:50,430 --> 01:18:53,030
Speaker 3: has authority over these spiritual beings. That Jesus is the

1514
01:18:53,110 --> 01:18:55,150
Speaker 3: one who's going to be victorious in the end. That

1515
01:18:55,270 --> 01:18:58,080
Speaker 3: Jesus is the one who overcame the temptations. That Jesus

1516
01:18:58,140 --> 01:19:00,720
Speaker 3: is the one who invites us into his household, into

1517
01:19:00,780 --> 01:19:03,840
Speaker 3: his family, to be a royal priesthood of all believers

1518
01:19:04,180 --> 01:19:07,339
Speaker 3: as we watch and witness the in-breaking of the kingdom

1519
01:19:07,460 --> 01:19:11,229
Speaker 3: of God. And so, this to me is why all

1520
01:19:11,250 --> 01:19:14,470
Speaker 3: of this matters. It's not to make much of spiritual beings.

1521
01:19:14,610 --> 01:19:17,719
Speaker 3: It's not to be left in fear about demonic entities.

1522
01:19:18,030 --> 01:19:20,500
Speaker 3: It's to be reminded of the role and the place

1523
01:19:20,520 --> 01:19:22,540
Speaker 3: that Jesus has in the midst of all of this.

1524
01:19:23,100 --> 01:19:24,340
Speaker 2: I love you wrapped it up with that because one

1525
01:19:24,360 --> 01:19:26,259
Speaker 2: of the first things that you said when we started

1526
01:19:26,300 --> 01:19:29,460
Speaker 2: this was we don't want to get too kind of

1527
01:19:29,560 --> 01:19:33,400
Speaker 2: fascinated by angels and demons, as powerful as they are,

1528
01:19:33,439 --> 01:19:35,840
Speaker 2: as central as they are to the biblical story. But

1529
01:19:35,860 --> 01:19:39,060
Speaker 2: it's ultimately about the person of Jesus, what he accomplished

1530
01:19:39,080 --> 01:19:42,480
Speaker 2: on the cross, who he's forming us into by our spirit,

1531
01:19:43,000 --> 01:19:45,040
Speaker 2: what it means to be his ambassadors today. So to

1532
01:19:45,080 --> 01:19:48,340
Speaker 2: bring it back to that, that's what all this unseen

1533
01:19:48,400 --> 01:19:51,759
Speaker 2: realm and unseen battle points to, I think is perfect.

1534
01:19:52,430 --> 01:19:54,970
Speaker 2: All right, we got you back soon to talk about Enoch,

1535
01:19:55,010 --> 01:19:57,150
Speaker 2: and we're going to do a deep dive on Genesis 6.

1536
01:19:57,150 --> 01:20:00,250
Speaker 2: I have never discussed this on my YouTube channel. I've

1537
01:20:00,350 --> 01:20:02,530
Speaker 2: wanted to for a while. I've wanted the right guest

1538
01:20:02,610 --> 01:20:04,890
Speaker 2: and the right time, and I think you're the perfect

1539
01:20:04,990 --> 01:20:07,490
Speaker 2: one for this. So if you have questions from this one,

1540
01:20:07,530 --> 01:20:11,550
Speaker 2: type in the word CAPS question. And after we post

1541
01:20:11,590 --> 01:20:13,510
Speaker 2: the Enoch one, shortly after that, we will do a

1542
01:20:13,590 --> 01:20:18,280
Speaker 2: live stream Talbot Tuesday, and we will take your questions.

1543
01:20:18,340 --> 01:20:20,180
Speaker 2: You could actually go back to the first interview that

1544
01:20:20,220 --> 01:20:22,830
Speaker 2: we did if you had questions from that. You go

1545
01:20:22,850 --> 01:20:26,050
Speaker 2: to this interview, the next one on First Enoch. I've

1546
01:20:26,090 --> 01:20:29,130
Speaker 2: talked about Heiser three or four other times. Throw those

1547
01:20:29,170 --> 01:20:31,990
Speaker 2: questions in, or we have one of his protégés, and

1548
01:20:32,020 --> 01:20:34,180
Speaker 2: we will tackle those questions. Check out his book, The

1549
01:20:34,260 --> 01:20:37,060
Speaker 2: Unseen Battle. It's excellent. You didn't ask me, but I

1550
01:20:37,080 --> 01:20:39,780
Speaker 2: would have gladly endorsed it had you asked me. Not

1551
01:20:39,939 --> 01:20:42,240
Speaker 2: that you needed to, but I've read it through a

1552
01:20:42,280 --> 01:20:44,620
Speaker 2: couple times and just thoroughly enjoy it. You really take

1553
01:20:44,660 --> 01:20:47,889
Speaker 2: Heiser and say, here's how you understand him, and add

1554
01:20:47,930 --> 01:20:50,210
Speaker 2: some nuances and new tests and stuff that I think

1555
01:20:50,270 --> 01:20:53,340
Speaker 2: is super helpful. While you're watching, folks, make sure you

1556
01:20:53,360 --> 01:20:56,140
Speaker 2: hit subscribe because we've got some other interviews coming up

1557
01:20:56,180 --> 01:20:57,620
Speaker 2: you will not want to miss. And we'd love to

1558
01:20:57,660 --> 01:21:02,460
Speaker 2: have you here at Talbot School of Theology, especially studying apologetics. Joel,

1559
01:21:02,479 --> 01:21:03,340
Speaker 2: did I miss anything, man?

1560
01:21:03,560 --> 01:21:04,240
Speaker 1: No, appreciate it.

1561
01:21:04,280 --> 01:21:04,509
Speaker 3: Love it.

1562
01:21:05,760 --> 01:21:08,400
Speaker 2: Hey, friends, if you enjoyed this show, please hit that

1563
01:21:08,500 --> 01:21:11,400
Speaker 2: follow button on your podcast app. Most of you tuning

1564
01:21:11,479 --> 01:21:13,790
Speaker 2: in haven't done this yet, and it makes a huge

1565
01:21:13,870 --> 01:21:16,650
Speaker 2: difference in helping us reach and equip more people and

1566
01:21:16,670 --> 01:21:21,019
Speaker 2: build community. And please consider leaving a podcast review. Every

1567
01:21:21,240 --> 01:21:24,320
Speaker 2: review helps. Thanks for listening to The Sean McDowell Show,

1568
01:21:24,479 --> 01:21:28,280
Speaker 2: brought to you by Talbot School of Theology at Biola University,

1569
01:21:28,380 --> 01:21:32,660
Speaker 2: where we have on-campus and online programs in apologetics, spiritual formation,

1570
01:21:32,740 --> 01:21:35,300
Speaker 2: marriage and family, Bible, and so much more. We would

1571
01:21:35,340 --> 01:21:38,280
Speaker 2: love to train you to more effectively live, teach, and

1572
01:21:38,340 --> 01:21:41,120
Speaker 2: defend the Christian faith today. And we will see you

1573
01:21:41,240 --> 01:21:42,740
Speaker 2: when the next episode drops.