“I know your tribulation and your poverty (but you are rich), and the blasphemy by those who say they are Jews and are not, but are a congregation of Satan” (Rev. 2:9). “I know your deeds. Behold, I have put before you an open door which no one can shut, because you have a little power, and have kept my word, and have not denied my name. Behold, I will cause those of the congregation of Satan, who say that they are Jews, and are not, but lie—behold, I will make them to come and bow down at your feet, and to know that I have loved you” (Rev. 2:8-9).
Who is this “congregation of Satan”? Really, the term is συναγωγη, which is usually transliterated “synagogue,” and means congregation. Christians generally adopted the term εκκλησια, קְהִלָה, which means “assembly” to identify their congregations, but non-Messianic Jews retained the older term συναγωγη, meaning “a place to gather together,” and so the term took on a specifically non-Christian Jewish connotation as time went by, and lost its more general generic usage in Greek. Earlier on, when the book of James was written, the author Ya‘aqōv (Ιακωβος), could still use the word συναγωγη for a Christian congregation (cf. James 2:2). The book of Revelation uses the word συναγωγη only twice in Rev. 2:9 and 3:9. It uses the word εκκλησια twenty times to designate a Christian Assembly. There can be little doubt then that Συναγωγη Τοῦ Σατανᾶ denotes a Jewish organization.
Who were these Jews who turned to the dark side? It is hard to tell. Messiah Yēshūa̒ charges them with blasphemy, βλασφημια. He also charges them by implication with causing suffering and tribulation for Messianic believers, and also causing them to deny his name, the name above all names (cf. Exodus 34:7). Keeping Messiah’s Name involves 1. acknowledging that Messiah bears our sin, 2. knowing that he is Yăhwēh Almĭghty, and 3. that he does not acquit sin, but lets iniquity reap evil fruit to the third and fourth generation, and 4. but loves those who keep his commandments and who love him, to a thousand generations. Therefore, anyone who is trying to persuade the true faithful that these things are not so is doing the work of the Συναγωγη Τοῦ Σατανᾶ.
In our present case we are speaking of Jews who have betrayed the Torah and the Prophets, and the good news about Messiah contained therein, and who are also trying to undermine the faith of the faithful. This, of course, does not mean all Jews, but only those involved in organizations attacking the true faith, and who are involved in order to attack the true faith. The rest of the Jewish community, though it be mistaken and deceived in its denial of Messiah, should not be lumped in with those undermining the faith of Messiah. These traitors also have many allies in Christian cults, herterodox Christian Churches, liberal Churches, and Torah denying Christianity who are not Jewish.
No doubt the emissaries of these traitors will call me anti-Semitic. Indeed, I have been called anti-Semitic on forums and boards for speaking the truth, but we must realize that the fear of the charge where the disagreement involves doctrine or religious practice is what gives it power. The fear of being called names is all there is to it, because those who use the term this way to name call are simply liars. Further, it distracts from real anti-Semitism, which is the murder, dispossesion, and persecution of Jews, and for which currently one should look no further than the Islamic Jihadist and their sympathizers.
The Synagogue of Satan seeks to blame Jewish persecution on Christians when the guilt lies with themselves, pagans, and lawless Christians, who have illegitimately sought to revenge themselves on Jews who have wronged them, (or who they perceived to have wronged them, even though they haven’t), rather than leave things alone, and let Gŏd himself deal with any real wrongs. Even when Jews really were wrong, Gŏd was angry with Babylon for volunteering to be his instrument of judgment.
If we see the truth clearly, then our number one priority is to avoid being wronged by those actually doing wrong. I think a little history lesson about what can happen is important. We need to remember that not everything Jewish is Jewish. Lawless Jews have been both Nazi’s and Communists. A relatively severe example comes from the Warsaw Ghetto during World War II:
“Jewish Ghetto Police (German:
The Jewish people surely wish these traitorous Jews were not Jews, that is if they can avoid the cognitive dissonance of being betrayed by their own. They were betrayed by their own. Jews, appointed by the Nazis, induced by favored treatment from the Nazis rounded up other Jews and helped the Nazis send them off to the death camps. “The Polish-Jewish historian and the Warsaw Ghetto archivist Emanuel Ringelblum has described the cruelty of the ghetto police as at times greater than that of the Germans, the Ukrainians and the Latvians. The fate of the Jewish Policemen was eventually the same as all other ghetto Jews. Upon the liquidation of the ghettos (1942-1943) they were either murdered on site or sent to the extermination camps” (ibid).
We can see from this historical example that ethnic Jews were involved in murdering their own people, who would say they were Jews when necessary, to control and gain the trust of their own people.
But were they really Jews? The question must be asked, because Messiah says that the claim to be Jewish is possible, and yet the claimants are not Jewish in connection to the Συναγωγη Τοῦ Σατανᾶ. How is this possible, seeing that, these lawless Jews were doing the work of the devil? Are they Jews or are they not? The question can only be answered by recognizing that that being Jewish is more than just an ethnic status. Surely they were Jews in that sense. But to be a Jew is also a spiritual status, and denotes one who walks in the covenant of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Even though the patriarchs were not descended from Judah, the status of Jewish has been conferred on them by the tribe of Judah. And biblically speaking, even though Abraham and Isaac were not descended from Israel, the status of belonging to Israel is conferred on them.
When Messiah speaks, saying “those who say they are Jews and are not,” he is using the term Jew as a spiritual status, and not as an ethnic status. For whom he speaks were surely ethnic Jews, as we see he uses the word συναγωγη as a hint for this. Now there are those who think and speak as if Jews can do no wrong, despite the example of history, and these deny that Messiah was speaking about ethnic Jews in these two Revelation texts (2:9, 3:8-9). We need to remember that Yēshūa̒ himself told certain Pharisees that their father was Satan (John 8:44). And these Pharisees were certainly ethnic Jews. Also, Paul recognizes a spiritual status to the term Jew, “For what is on the outside is not Jewish, nor is what is on the outside in the flesh circumcision, unless one is in the inside Jewish; and circumcision of the heart
Now in the spiritual sense everyone faithful to Messiah is Jewish, yet we make no claim to be ethnic Jews, nor to have a Jewish genetic inheritance, nor even to be a member of the tribe of Judah by either conversion or adoption. But we do claim to be Israel through the tribe of Ephraim, or one of the other tribes that intermarried with the nations when they were scattered, either by direct descent or by adoption into the house of Israel, which is currently separated from the house of Judah. The tribal affilations will be preserved in the coming kingdom, the only difference being that the tribes will one day be united under Messiah, rather than divided about him.
There were many Jews who would have wished to heaven that someone would have told them that the Ghetto Police with Jewish names were not really Jews, and that they were agents of Satan sent to cart them off to be murdered. I say would have, because many would resort to denial of the truth about who the accomplices of their killers were. If being Jewish is a spiritual status, then there has to be such a thing as excommunication from that status. And that is exactly what we see Yeshua doing in Revelation. They say they are Jews, because they are ethnic Jews, but they are not Jews, because he has excommunicated them from the spiritual status of being Jewish. This is because they are not Jews on the inside, but only ethnically on the outside. We must keep in mind that Messiah’s anger is directed at Jews dedicated to undermining his name, and not to all Jews. There is still the fact that the unbelieving, whether Jew or non Jews will not be saved. Messiah’s excommunication in Rev. 2:9, 3:9, is therefore tantamount to saying that these Jews have lost all the spiritual benefits they might have had by being descended from Abraham, so long as they do the work of Satan, that is such benefits that Paul mentions in Romans 11:28-29, “With respect to the good news they are enemies because of you, but with respect to election they are beloved for the sake of the fathers. For the gifts and this calling from the Almĭghty is irrevocable.” Paul meant that the Jews have a privileged position in Gŏd’s attempts to save them, because of the faithfulness of their fathers. He has a duty to the children first before the non-Jewish pagan and before the pure gentile. This tribal privlege, however, by no means prevents individuals from being cut off from it. For we have the example of king Saul, who was chosen, but then Gŏd rejected Saul and chose David, because Saul sinned. The non-Christian Jews were already unsaved in the general. But the worst cases Messiah has cut off from all divinely granted privileges of being Jewish.
Now this brings up a question. We have lawless non-Jewish Christians who teach against Torah, who teach that mere belief is all that is necessary for salvation. These likewise have lost the protection of the kingdom. They are in fact lost if they take this theology to practice sin. What then shall we say of Jews who keep the Torah for themselves and say they believe in Messiah, yet they tell everyone else that the Torah is not for the non-Jew, who tell the non-Jew that it is o.k. to keep Catholic Days, like Christmas and Easter, to break the Sabbath, and who also meanwhile teach that they themselves have a privleged status because they are ethnic Jews, and the non-Jew has only a spiritual status, and a lesser inheritance in Israel? Well, I would say that even if they might be saved, they are certainly collaborating with the Synagoue of Satan. Are they just unwitting Ghetto Police, or do they realize where they are sending the non-Jew by such teachings? We can let Gŏd judge that question, because they have made themselves no friends of ours by three teachings, 1. denying the Torah is for the non-Jew. 2. denying that the non-Jewish faithful in Messiah are fully part of Israel, and 3. making the non-Jew feel comfortable with traditions that Scripture condemns. They might find, on an individual basis, that the privilege of being an ethnic Jews counts for nothing in Gŏd’s sight.
Certain commentators, including these spiritual Ghetto Police, have claimed that Yēshūa̒ (יֵשׁוּעַ) was only speaking about non-Jewish gentiles who were claiming to be Jews. Clearly this opinion is an effort to try to save the reputation of the tribe of Judah by means of denying that these evil doers were ethnic Jews. It also serves to blind others that they are in fact doing evil by their teachings, since they have put on the fig leaf of Jewishness. And this denial idea leads on to the teaching that all ethnic Jews are predestined to be saved and sanctified regardless of their behaviour. Therefore, the heresy called Bilateral Ecclesiology rises up. This heresy teaches that Jews are saved without acknowledging Messiah while non-Jews are saved by acknowledging the Jewish Messiah. He who has the Sŏn has life, and he who does not have the Sŏn does not have the Făther. Meanwhile, while teaching this, they are asserting that their Jewishness gives them a special place in the kingdom.
These same Rabbis teach a method for a non-Jew to become Jewish, which essentially amounts to adopting all their traditions, errant doctrines, and becoming exactly like them. But apparently there is no way for a Jew to become a non-Jew, no matter what their heresy (even denying Messiah), being communist, etc. For these people, therefore, being Jewish, being an ethinic Jew, or being adopted to be and ethnic Jew, or ethnic and spiritual Jew is everything. I would call it Jewish Calvinism: once a Jew always a Jew, and therefore predestined to salvation.
Now we have to identify the Synagogue of Satan. The Nazis make a good analogy to the Synagogue of Satan. “Adolf Hitler’s deranged racist hatred against the Jews had no boundaries. In his war against the Jews Hitler instructed a group of German theologians to rewrite the Bible and the New Testament, in a bid to remove all mention of the Jews. The German newspaper, Bilt Zeitung has revealed that in 1939 a group of Protestant theologians, loyal to the Nazi regime, established an institution for the “cleansing of Judaism from Christianity.” The institution's official purpose was to cleanse the Protestant Church of all ceremonies with non-Aryan influences, and to compile alternative scriptures derived from the Nazi ideology and spirit of the Church. Church staff worked incessantly, conducting comprehensive surveys and publishing a large number of documents that imbued Christianity with Nazi commentary. One of these publications, the German Book of Faith, included the rewriting of the 10 commandments in the spirit of Nazi ethics, and also added two more commandments:” (ynetnews.com)
What we must not leave out of this account of Hilter’s Theologians (such as Kittel) is that Germany was the bastion of Reform Judaism, which produced many of the higher critcs that adopted the Documentary Hypothesis, and thus helped lay a ground work for Christian Germany to disrespect the Torah and Prophets, and also America, though that evil fruit is not fully ripe yet. One such name is Rabbi Kaufmann Kohler who eventually came to America and installed his higher critical views into Hebrew Union College (cf. The German Jews in America, Gerhad Falk). The most key figure is perhaps Abraham Geiger and his school
Also a key figure is Samuel Holdheim, “Holdheim, consulted among others when the
The Nazi purge of Christianity seems strangely familiar, though clearly an extreme example. Way back in the history of the Church someone tried to purge the Torah and Prophets out of the Church. We call these people Gnostics. The Gnostics taught that they could be immoral and still be saved. They were the original teachers of the once saved always saved doctrine, or that one is saved if they confess in spite of the sins they are doing. This influence has been somewhat downplayed in the intervening centuries, but now it is raising its head again with lightning speed. We call this the Emergent Church, which is the Church returning to its Gnostic and mystical roots when the Torah and Prophets had newly been purged by the lawless.
I would now like to expand on the theme of the Synagogue of Satan, and though we know the example in Revelation speaks of one that identifies itself as Jewish, the Church also makes its contribution. The liberal Church is also another wing of the congregation of Satan, and it is best discussed along with its Jewish collaborators.
This lawless Church is also a synagogue of Satan. It has taken many forms. Certainly the Catholics have a lead role in removing Torah, and also the Protestants, and even fundamentalists. The point is not to indict just one Church. Many Churches are complicit in taking the Jewishness out of Christianity. We can identify who is who by listening to Messiah’s commendation, “and [you] have not denied my name.” What is his name? I have discussed this in a recent article: Calling On The Name. There I explain that upholding the name of Messiah includes fidelity to his commandments.
A great deal of the Church has been the spiritual equivalent of the Nazi SS, teaching Christians to tolerate idolatry and sexual immorality. Mortal Sin (that causes loss of salvation) is the death camp, and the theologians that send people into Mortal sin are the SS.
There are also collaborators of every sort, and nation, and tribe. But there were also Jewish collaborators then, and there are Jewish collaborators now. Messiah specifically identifies a group who were claiming to be Jewish, a group that was tempting Christians to deny Messiah’s name, that is fidelity to Him and his commandments. This is all the more important to us since we have come to know his commandments and who he is more fully. For now I would like to say that the Synagogue of Satan is an ideology, or an idea that fights against the Torah and Prophets and Messiah werever it is. Denying Messiah’s name takes various forms, and some forms fight against other forms, but the source is the same, and that is the trafficing of the devil in deception. I would therefore identify the ideas or doctrines that represent collaboration with the Synagogue of Satan rather than naming persons or groups invovled in it. I think the reader can identify the specific cases when he or she comes across them.
The Jewish Collaborators support the lawless Church (a Synagogue of Satan) by 1. Telling non-Jews that they have no obligation to observe Torah as Jews do. They are echoing the same doctrine on this that their non-Jewish Torah denying clerical mentors have taught them. It is out of fear and deception. They are afraid that they will lose their place as Jews “allowed to keep Torah,” a privilege, apparently conferred on them by Missiologists with the aim of converting Jews. This right to keep Torah depends on their constantly saying it is for cultural reasons, and telling the non-Jew that any conviction on their part is heresy. They have to constantly say that Acts 15 pertained to more than just salvation, and that Acts 15 by silence delineated the non-obligation of the non-Jew to ever observe Sabbath, or any other such biblical commandments. They have to constantly present Acts 15 as a maximum list of obligations rather than a minimal list of evidences of repentance. These teachers are spiritual Ghetto Police, serving the goal of the congregation of Satan, and using their Jewish ethnicity to deceive the non-Jew (and other Jews) into thinking they know something, when they know nothing at all. The fact is that both houses have fallen, the house of Israel, and the house of Judah, and only a remanant of each will be saved who stick to the truth.
2. Telling non-Jewish believers that they have no identity in Israel, though they talk of grafting into Israel, it is now all hollow, because the inheritance has been denied to the non-Jew by these teachers. They deny that Ephraim was to become the fulness of the nations, and by now there has been sufficient time for this, so that most Christians probably are actually descended from Israel. They find it necessary to maintain that the Church is not Israel, and Jews are Israel, so that they can further their heresy that only Jews should keep Torah, and not non-Jews. In doing this they are merely echoing the theology of their non-Jewish mentors in the lawless Church. The dispensational Church, which is a marriage of lawless Calvinism, carnal Christian theology, and eschatological literalism, teaches that Israel is separate from the Church, and the Church separate from Israel. They could not otherwise be literal with prophecy, and manage to avoid a conviction on Torah observance at the same time. Yep, Israel and Torah are for the Jews, and everything else left over (which isn’t much) is for the Gentiles.
Then they have carefully avoided making any easy conversion procedure to being Jewish, or to put it another way, have only converted to being Jewish. According to Scripture, the non-Jew becomes part of Israel by faithfulness to Messiah, and does not thereby become Jewish. The non-Jew has the option to be counted with the house of Israel, that is Joseph (Ephraim), who was inbred with the nations.
3. They are now actively encouraging Christians that it is o.k. to keep Christmas and Easter, and other Christian holy days that are frauds put in place of biblical holy days, i.e. Passover and Tabernacles. Are they overreacting to some non-Jews who are calling Easter a pagan abomination? Yes, they are. Easter may be influenced by idolatry, heresy, and false prophecy, which influences are an abomination, and even the word Easter has a pagan connection, but those so involved in this tradition are not necessarily idolators. The collaborators have clearly exploited this slight overstep by those recognizing where Easter and Christmas come from to garner the sympathy of the non-Jews practicing these days, because they do not feel condemned, and of course everyone who condmens them is wrong on everything. So they think, especially when a Jewish collaborator, who is supposed to know Torah comes along and tells them the same thing their lawless Pastor is telling them.
Now I have detailed what these collaborators are teaching. They have taken the historic position of the lawless Church, i.e. that the non-Jew is to keep no Sabbaths, and that only Jews are allowed to do so (for cultural reasons). These Jewish Ghetto Police are to look and act like they are Torah observant. Meanwhile they are hauling the non-Jew off to the death camps of Sin. They are encouraging ignorance of Torah by encouraging Christians to wallow in their dead traditions.
Furthermore, these collaborators are promoting errors of their own. At the top of the list must go subtle and not so subtle denial of the deity of Messiah. They teach that Jews may be saved without Messiah, which is really sourced from the Emergent Church theology, i.e. synagoguge of Satan. Then they also teach that non-Jews may be saved by Messiah. This is called bilateral ecclesiology. The upshot is that if one becomes Jewish, then it is o.k. to deny Messiah, and or deny who Messiah is. Therefore, they often deny that the Messenger of Yăhwēh is Messiah (i.e. the Angel of the Lord). They also deny that Messiah is Yăhwēh, and argue for some sort of manifesation or appearance, that is merely a representation, but that he is not really Yăhwēh.
There are also a lot of non-Jews who have become Jews, or who self identify this way, who are teaching the same errors. There is a cult for every man, and a man for every cult.
I will sum this up with the quote about Holdheim and Geiger, “He instituted the radical rejection of keeping Saturday as the Jewish Sabbath, and instead moved its observance to Sunday to keep the behavior of Reform Jews in line with Christian thought.” The behaviour of this Rabbi is much the same as some Messianic Jews who teach that non-Jews should go on with their Sunday Services and leave the Sabbath to Jews. And also Abraham Geiger’s reform school, “In 1921, there were 63 full-time and 45 part-time students enrolled in the "Hochschule". Many of the students came from the Eastern European countries, notably Poland, as graduates of Orthodox Yeshivot. By 1930-1933 the school had achieved so great a reputation that many non-Jews, especially Christian clergy, enrolled.” Only the situation is now different. We have these views inside the Emergent Church Movement, a movement that argues Coexist instead of truth. I always laugh when I see coexist stickers sporting the crescent of Islam. Heresies do not coexist. They destroy the truth.
Yes, a good deal of “Messianic Judaism” is going down this path. It is a Emergent Church path, that begins with allowing others to feel comfortable denying the truth, just as they do at Fuller Seminary in Pasadena California. The missiological aim is to become like the people you are reaching to convert them. Taken to the logical conclusion, we now have “chrislam.” Taken to the logical conclusion, a translator will have the “contexualize” the message, “behold the pig of god” because some south east Asian culture does not know what a lamb is, and uses pig for its domestic food source. Missiologists were seriously thinking about baptising new converts from Islam with sand. It was not due to the impossibility of getting water. It was a situation ethic designed to question Messiah’s command, and whether it was really necessary to offend would be converts from Islam with baptism.
I think I should mention at least on of these errant teachers, since his offense is the latest, namely Daniel Juster. His article is titled, “The Danger of Jewish Roots Movements” Ti̱kkūn. Juster speaks with the voice of authority for Messianic Jews, and depends on his authority to prove his case. He has little more than the perceived authority he presumes for himself. Therefore he defines “Correct Jewish Roots Teaching” without so much a proving it correct, after complaining that a large Church was conflating his brand of Messianic Judaism with legalism. But the offending Church is teaching lawless theology itself when judging legalism. Apparently any Sabbath keeping Christian is a legalist. But that is only because the heretics rewrote the history, wrote the theology books, and retranslated Paul.
Juster commends the New Perspective on Paul, but does he realize that the New Perspective is leavened with Reformed Judaism and Emergent Church efforts to have a dialogue without nailing down the real differences of truth and error? And because this is so, the essential truth of Messiah, Torah, and a real correction of Paul are swept away in the name of doctrinal tolerance. Juster writes in
Then Juster proceeds to attack what he thinks are heresies. Here is #1: “Error #1: that Gentile Christians are to keep the whole Law just like Jews.” Juster tries to justify his position with Acts 15 and Galatians. Why did Paul tell the Galatians not to be circumcised? For two reasons, 1. They did not need to be Jewish to be saved. They can join Israel without being Jewish, and 2. because the circumcisers were teaching circumcision like the Roman Catholics teach baptism, namely as the instrument of salvation. Paul’s whole argument is aimined at what minimum qualifies as faithfulness to Messiah, and not every ethical requirement for sanctification. They were to repent of mortal sins, and circumcision was not on the list of mortal sins for them. Continued uncircumcision is a sin. It is just not a mortal sin. Paul was only concerned that the Galatians would receive a false circumcision not in accord with Messiah. And sometimes to avoid the false you have to wait until you learn the real thing. But it was more imperative that they avoid the false in this case. That is why we don’t baptise infants and claim that baptism is the instrument that creates faith in them, as the Lutherans do.
Juster’s second error, “Error #2: that true Christians are the lost tribes of Israel.” But Scripture says, “Then his father refused; then he said, “I have known, my son, I have known, yea he shall become a people, yea he shall be great, and however, his younger brother shall be greater than him, and his seed shall become the fullness† of the nations.” ”(Gen. 48:19).
Juster’s third error, “Error #3: that Christian holy day celebrations are pagan abominations.” Juster also states, “So also worship on Sunday is about the resurrection of Yeshua on the first day of the week, not Sun worship. The origin of the choice of Sunday worship can be argued, but it has been claimed as the day of resurrection for at least 1800 years. Many do not know the rich experiences with God that Christians experience in their heritage, both with regard to the resurrection and the glory of the celebration of the incarnation of Yeshua during advent season. The hymns, caroling and more are a wonderful conveying of Biblical truth. Criticism brings unnecessary pain and disrespect. ” But a lie is a lie. Messiah rose on the first of the Sabbaths after Passover. That is right, the resurrection was on the Sabbath. The nature of an abomination is to mix truth and error together.
The whole reason for Juster’s theology is that truth causes pain and division, and he would rather avoid the truth, i.e. that Jews need Messiah to be saved, that the Sabbath was made for all men, that Christian days are traditions, and biblical days are sanctified by Gŏd. It is painfully clear that Juster does not love his non-Jewish brothers who see the truth of Torah for what it is, and that he is sending his unbelieving Jewish brothers to destruction by not warning them of the absolute neccesity of Messiah. Juster raises the Catholic cry of avoiding division and desiring unity, while failing to realize that their method of avoiding division is to silence the truth, and incorporate the ignorant onto their platform.
As the Scripture says, we have but a little power. That is the cost of truth.