In Acts Chapter Eleven, in verse 22, the report of the election of the Hellenized Jews first came to the ears of Apostles in Jerusalem.  

Although the Apostle Kefa later came to Antioch to see how Shaul and Barnabas were doing, he did not go there straight away. Rather, he and the other Apostles initially decided to send out Barnabas:

 

Why the Apostles decided to send out Barnabas (or Bar Nabba) instead of going to Antioch themselves is not clear. There could be any number of reasons, but one reason might be that since the Apostles were uneducated Hebrews, they had probably never learned any other languages than the synagogue languages of Hebrew and Aramaic.

Jews are very insular, and as we will see below, insular Jews do not prefer to learn any of the gentile languages, as they consider them to be perversions of the original divine tongue. If Bar Nabba already spoke some Greek, then the Apostles may have decided to send him out, as a fellow Greek-speaker would have been able to communicate with the Hellenized just that much more effectively.

Arriving at Antioch, Bar Nabba was delighted to see so many Greeks filled with the Set-apart Spirit. He then set out to Tarsus (in southern Turkey) to find the Apostle Shaul, as Shaul (being educated) may have also spoken some Greek.  Together, Bar Nabba and Shaul then spent roughly the next year teaching the Hellenized more about the Hebrew form of worship.

 

While religious Jews (such as the Nazarene Apostles) have always written Scripture in Hebrew (and/or in its sister tongue, Aramaic) in Acts 11:26 we read something very peculiar. Here we are told that the Apostles were first called by the Greek linguistic term ‘Christians’, at Antioch:

 

 

The Church teaches us to accept this passage as simple factual information; but this statement should any real scholar serious pause.

The Oracles of Elohim were entrusted to the Jews (meaning religiously devout Hebrews):

 

 

 

As we will verify below, the Jews have always spoken Hebrew; so why are we told that the disciples were called by a Greek linguistic term, when Jews consider the Greek language abominable?

 

If one believes in the divine inspiration of all Scripture, then it should be obvious that nothing in the Scripture was put there by accident, or for general light reading purposes. Nothing is there for our entertainment. Rather, each and every word was chosen for a singular perfect cause. Therefore, in the case of Acts 11:26, what was that cause?

Why are we told that these Torah-zealous Hebrew disciples, who had purposefully never learned to speak any other language than the synagogue languages of Hebrew and/or Aramaic (and who despised all other languages as errant corruptions) would first be called by a Greek-linguistic term at Antioch, when they would have found the use of a Greek term in a religious context abhorrent?

 

We do not know exactly at what point Shaul came to the awful realization that there first had to be a great falling away (2^nd Thessalonians 2:3), but logic should inform us that the only reason the Spirit would bother recording that the disciples were first called by a Greek linguistic term at Antioch is:

1.    If the Apostles spoke Hebrew and/or Aramaic as their daily language; and

2.    The New Covenant writings were inspired in Hebrew and/or Aramaic; and

3.    The Hellenized Jews spoke Greek; and

4.    The Spirit was leaving an encrypted clue as to what had happened, so it could be deciphered two thousand years later.

 

Acts Chapter Eleven takes place perhaps ten years after Yeshua’s Ascent. If the Jews had spoken Greek as their day-to-day language, and if Greek had been just as good to their ears as Hebrew, then the disciples would have called themselves ‘Christians’ long before Acts Chapter Eleven.

The Western Church informs us that Greek was the lingua franca (the common day-to-day language) of first century Judea; but this is contrary to history. Josephus spoke Greek, but that was only because he had been educated as an aristocrat. He was far more educated than the majority of the other Jews of his day, and although he eventually wrote most of his works in Greek, he tells us he was just one of a handful of Jews who could read or write the language; and even then, he was unable to speak it fluently. He tells us that the Hebrews did not like to learn Greek:

 

 

 

If even scholarly Josephus had difficulty in pronouncing Greek with sufficient exactness (though he had taken great pains to learn it), then how are we to believe that the uneducated fishermen who later became the Nazarene Apostles would have had either the time or the inclination, to learn how to speak it? Moreover, why would they write their epistles in it? Are we to assume that the Nazarenes wrote their epistles in a language that they did not speak, read or write, and which they found morally repugnant?

Is it not far more intelligent to assume that the uneducated Jewish (i.e. religiously-observant) Apostles wrote their epistles in the only languages that they knew; which would have been the synagogue languages of Hebrew and/or Aramaic?

 

Jews have always maintained that Scripture is only properly written in the original divine tongue of Hebrew; and/or its sister Semitic tongue, Aramaic. For this reason, Hebrew and Aramaic have always been the only official languages of the synagogue.

Remembering that the Nazarenes were Jews (in the religious sense of the word), they would have known that if they wanted their epistles to be read aloud in the synagogues, then their epistles would have to have been written either in Hebrew, or in Aramaic. 

The Apostles would have known that if they wrote their epistles in Greek, they would not have been taken seriously; and they would not have been read in the synagogues.

However, that the Apostles would have written their letters initially in Hebrew or Aramaic would not have stopped their almost immediate translation into Greek. In fact, there is evidence to suggest that the physician Luke may have been the one to translate Shaul’s epistles into Greek; and that the translation was almost immediate (below).

The majority of the Dead Sea Scrolls (which also date from the first century) were written in Hebrew and Aramaic. Only a few of the Dead Sea Scrolls are written in Greek, which (in addition to Josephus’ letters) tells us that Greek was not the lingua franca (the common every-day tongue) of Yeshua’s time. 

In fact, most scholars now accept that a version of Aramaic called ‘Syriac Aramaic’ was the lingua franca of the Galilee region in the first century, which tells us that this is likely the language the majority of the Apostles spoke. Hebrew continued to be the lingua franca of both the Temple and the synagogues; and for this reason, Hebrew was probably more-widely spoken in and around Jerusalem.

 

That Yeshua and His Apostles spoke Syriac Aramaic is becoming widely accepted by scholars. Although the two languages are different, the speakers of the one language could often understand the speakers of the other, particularly since the languages are related, and both were used in the synagogue.

If that is true, then it would also explain why the Hebrew speakers in Jerusalem were able to identify Kefa as being one of Yeshua’s disciples, merely from having listened to his speech (which would have been in Aramaic):

 

 

It should also not be seen as a coincidence that the Church of the East has had an Aramaic version of the New Covenant since ancient times. The lore of the Church of the East even goes so far as to say that their Church fathers received this Aramaic version straight from Aramaic-speaking Kefa (Peter). Whether this legend it true or false is not really the point: but the material fact is that an ancient Aramaic New Covenant manuscript exists, and has been in continuous use for centuries by the Church of the East.

However, even though Galilean Yeshua and the majority of His Apostles probably did speak Aramaic, several of the Church fathers (Papias, Ireneus, Origen, Eusebius, Epiphanius, Jerome, et al) tell us that the Apostle Matthew (who may have been from Jerusalem) first penned his epistle in Hebrew; and that it was then translated into other languages. Eusebius says:

 

 

 

Ireneus tells us:

 

And Origen also states:

 

 

 

There are many other examples that the Book of Matthew was originally written in Hebrew; and when we think about it, this only makes sense.

If Matthew was from Jerusalem, then his primary language would have been Hebrew, since that was the lingua franca (the common everyday tongue) spoken in the area of the Temple at that time. It would have been natural for him to write his epistle in Hebrew (as opposed to Syriac Aramaic).

 

Beyond this, the Church fathers Clement of Alexandria, Eusebius, and Jerome all tell us that the Apostle Shaul originally wrote his epistle to the Hebrews not in Greek, but in Hebrew:

 

 

And:

 

There are many more examples, but rather than fill many pages with them, let us ask ourselves just one simple question: Why would a native Hebrew speaker (such as Shaul) write a letter to the Hebrews in Greek?  The idea just simply makes no sense; especially not when ancient manuscripts of the New Covenant exist in the Aramaic the Apostles actually spoke; and this Text has been in continuous use since ancient times.

What is more, while the New Testament writings make perfect grammatical sense (and flow smoothly) in Hebrew and/or Aramaic, they often read like clumsy translations in Greek.  As an example, Greeks never begin a sentence with a conjunction such as “And…” or “For….” However, this practice is perfectly acceptable both in Hebrew, and in Aramaic. For example:

 

 

There are many other linguistic reasons why the New Covenant was not inspired in Greek. The Church, however, likes to use one passage in Matthew as proof that the Book of Matthew was written in Greek. This is interesting, considering that even the Church Fathers tell us that Matthew was originally written in Hebrew (above); but let us revisit the passage:

 

 

As we saw in the chapter, ‘The Papacy as Anti-Messiah’, the name Kefa, in Greek, is Petros. In contrast, the rock upon which Yeshua would build his assembly is Petra. Even if we assume a Greek inspiration for the purposes of argument, this passage does not support the idea of a Papal Apostolic Succession. What it says, rather, is that Yeshua is building His assembly upon the rock (Petra) of divine revelation from the Father (see verse 17) as to who Yeshua really is. It is this revelation that is this ‘rock.’

The Church’s claim to an Apostolic Succession is sheer nonsense, even in Greek. However, the Church then claims that the existence of a word-play in the Greek (Petros/Petra) somehow proves that the New Covenant was written in Greek. This argument falls apart when we realize that there are similar word-plays in the ancient Hebrew versions of Matthew.

In the Shem-Tov Hebrew Matthew there is a word-play between the word for ‘stone’ (eh-ven) and the Hebrew word for ‘build’ (ev-neh):

 

 

There is also a word-play found in the DuTillet Hebrew Matthew manuscript, in which the word Kefa is a masculine, and the word rock (kefah) is a feminine:

 

 

 

A Greek inspiration is one of the most cherished of all Christian myths. It was a necessary myth, in that only by telling their people that the Hebrew language was unnecessary was the Church able to spread the Good News so far, so rapidly.

It was a great kindness on Elohim’s part that He allowed the Gentiles and the Hellenized Jews to come back to a New Covenant while still speaking their pagan tongues. The ability to ease back into the Covenant may have encouraged many more of them to adopt the Christian variation of the Good News. Although this Christian variation was not entirely correct, it still taught them about the heart of the Law, which was the most important thing.