Posts by Julia Blum

When was the Silent Night? In Luke 2, an angel appeared to the shepherds in the fields and said to them, “I bring you good news … great joy for all the people”[1]. When did that happen? When was this great joy declared? The Gospel writers either did not know the time of Jesus’ birth […]

Sukkot is a Biblical Festival of Joy, it’s even called zman simchateinu – “the season of our joy”. The Scripture commands us explicitly to be joyful during Sukkot: 13 Celebrate the Festival of Tabernacles for seven days after you have gathered the produce of your threshing floor and your winepress. 14 Be joyful at your festival—you, your […]

A key part pf the Day of Atonement liturgy at the Tabernacle and Temple was a sin offering involving two goats: They were chosen to be as similar as possible to one another; then they were brought before the High Priest; and then lots were drawn, one bearing the words “To the Lord,” the other, “To […]

Dear friends, Here in Israel, we are in a season called Chagim:  Feasts, or Holidays. There are two Hebrew words that one hears endlessly during this season: Acherey Hachagim – “after the Holidays”. Everything is “frozen”, postponed, delayed for this time (pretty much like the Christmas/New Year season, with a slight difference, that Christmas/New Year […]

The High Holy Days are almost here!  As the people of Israel are about to be steeped  in  apples and honey and festive meals,  in  synagogues,  prayers and shofars,  I would like to use this wonderful opportunity to wish you all a very blessed Year! Rosh Hashanah presents a special opportunity to celebrate with our King […]

Before  we move to the final question of the Hidden Messiah series, let us review and sum up the ideas we have discussed so far, in order to follow the logic of this study. In the series of articles I’ve presented here, we first looked at the Messianic Secret of the New Testament against its Jewish background; […]

We have spent the last four weeks discussing the story of Emmaus from Luke 24.  We have already seen that this last Chapter of Luke’s Gospel serves not only as the wonderful literary transition to his second volume – Acts – but also as a spiritual key, or set of spiritual keys, to the whole […]

    Last time we saw that after the two disciples “constrained” Yeshua, “He went in to stay with them”. Then we read: Luke 24:30 Now it came to pass, as He sat at the table with them, that He took bread, blessed and broke it, and gave it to them Luke 24:31 Then their […]

And they drew nigh unto the village, whither they went: and he made as though he would have gone further[1]. First of all, what an amazing sentence we find here! What a surprising way to speak about the Lord!  There are not many places in the Bible where God pretends – where He acts “as […]

  Luke 24:27 And beginning at Moses and all the Prophets, He expounded to them in all the Scriptures the things concerning Himself. So, Yeshua[1] took them through the Scriptures and explained the things concerning Himself.  We have to understand, though, that these were not only the things concerning Himself – it was the Scriptures, […]