Letters of Love to the Jews
Site Editor's Preface to the Writings on the Sidebar
or
(from a Wild Olive Gentile, Grafted onto the Olive Tree of Israel )
The writings of the early Quakers to the Jews reflect their love for the people that were the root of their faith. There were very few Jews in England, Scotland, or Ireland at the time of these many writings, further testimony to the early Quakers' great concern for even the few. The Jews had been banished from England since 1290 by King Edward because Edward owed them huge sums of money he had borrowed for his many wars, and because of the envy of the citicizenry of the Jews' great success in business. Manasseh Ben Israel, a prominent Jewish Rabbi from Amsterdam, led a group of Jews back to England, at the invitation of the Lord Protector Oliver Cromwell. Cromwell had been moved to sympathy with the Jewish cause, partly by his tolerant leanings, but chiefly because he foresaw the importance for English commerce of the presence of the Jewish merchant princes, who had already visited England on business.
The Jewish prophet, Daniel, prophesied the exact year of the Messiah's coming in the Book of Daniel, detailed below:
Seventy weeks are determined upon thy people and upon thy holy city, to finish the transgression, and to make an end of sins, and to make reconciliation for iniquity, and to bring in everlasting righteousness, and to seal up the vision and prophecy, and to anoint the most Holy. (Daniel Chapter 9, verse 24)
Know therefore and understand, that from the going forth of the commandment to restore and to build Jerusalem unto the Messiah the Prince shall be seven weeks, and threescore and two weeks [69 total weeks]. The street shall be built again, and the wall, even in troublous times, [the rebuilders were frequently attacked by their fearful neighboring nations].
(Daniel 9:25)
69 weeks x 7 days/week=483 days.
The Book of Numbers 14:33-34 and the Book of Ezekiel 4:4-6, both show us how a day is a year in Old Testament prophecy:
Numbers: And your sons shall be shepherds in the wilderness forty years, and bear the brunt of your infidelity, until your carcasses are consumed in the wilderness. According to the number of the days in which you spied out the land, forty days, for each day you shall bear your guilt one year, namely forty years, and you shall know My rejection. Num 14:33-34
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Ezekiel: Lie also on your left side, and lay the iniquity of the house of Israel upon it. According to the number of the days that you lie on it, you shall bear their iniquity. For I have laid on you the years of their iniquity, according to the number of the days, three hundred and ninety days; so you shall bear the iniquity of the house of Israel. And when you have completed them, lie again on your right side; then you shall bear the iniquity of the house of Judah forty days. I have laid on you a day for each year. Eze 4:4-6
By the Lord's explanations above, the 483 days of prophecy is really483 years. The Messiah was prophesied by Daniel to appear 483 years after the commandment to rebuild Jerusalem's wall was to be issued. However, the Jewish year was 360 days; so adjusting for our calendar years, the time calculates: 483 years x 360 days/year=173,880 days/365.25 days/year=476 years.
There are four decrees, all of which took place after the prophecy by Gabriel as reported by Daniel::
1. The decree from Cyrus in 539 BC. (see Ezra 1:1-4)
2. The decree from Darius in 519 BC. (see Ezra 5:3-7)
3. The decree from Artaxerxes to Ezra in 457 BC. (see Ezra 7:11-16)
4. The decree from Artaxerxes to Nehemiah in 444 BC. (see Nehemiah 2:1-8)
Whatever decree is used for the start of the date computation, they all show the Messiah to have long since come and gone. The decree which makes most sense to the prophecy was the 444 BC decree from Artaxerxes, who reigned from465 BC. to 425BC. and in the 20th year of his reign authorized Nehemiah to rebuild the wall.
If we count 443 years before the birth as the first of the 476 years because there is no "Zero" year, (the years go from 1 BC to 1 AD); that leaves the prophesied date to be 476-443=33 AD "the coming of the Messiah or Prince," perhaps exactly at the time Jesus entered Jerusalem on the foal, to be crucified within the week. Scholars have no agreement on the exact years of Christ's life; Wikipedia shows his birth ranging between 7 BC and 2 BC, and death ranging between 25 AD and 36 AD. But we know the Messiah has come, and is not coming thousands of years later; and Jesus is obviously the only historical figure that could have possibly fulfilled the prophecy.
Jesus was not recognized for many reasons, chief of which was that the Jews were looking for the reestablishment of a physical kingdom and the defeat of their physical enemies in the world, such as the Romans. But the Kingdom that Jesus established was an everlasting spiritual kingdom, the Kingdom of Heaven - which in within us and surrounds us - a different and higher dimension; and instead of physical enemies being defeated, Jesus brought Israel and the whole world the formula for defeating our spiritual enemies: lust, pride, anger, envy, jealousy, covetousness, greed, fear, depression, etc. - accomplished through repentance on the inward cross of self-denial. The Jews had the scriptures and missed him; but those, who had been taught by the Word of God that is in their hearts and mouths, recognized Jesus - and entered the Kingdom of Heaven, while still on the earth - to become priests and kings, having defeated their spiritual enemies (lust, pride, anger, envy, etc.) to forever serve God without fear in his presence, continually beholding his glory and power. Just as the Jews with the scriptures missed Jesus, so has most of Christendom missed the spiritual Jesus, who is in every man that comes into the world, waiting to be sought, listened to, heard, and obeyed.
To still be waiting on the Messiah, is to label Daniel a false prophet - who obviously was a true prophet, even recognized by the heathen king Nebuchadnezzar to be a prophet of the most high God.
Many further Jewish prophecies, all fulfilled by Christ, are discussed below, in the outstanding writings of George Fox and Isaac Penington.
As with all the 17th Century writings on this site, the language has been modernized: you - for thee and thou, stands - for standst, etc. The punctuation standards have also been changed from their 1831 publication standards to modern convention. Occasionally an obsolete word is replaced by a current word of the same meaning, using an 1828 on-line dictionary; i.e., fain, to gladly. The original book is available for viewing in PDF format.
Early Quakers Writings Addressed to to the Jews on this Site are as follows:
This web site's purpose is to show how to become
free from sin
by benefiting from the changing power of God through the cross,
which leads to union with God in his Kingdom.
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