# beliefs

belief:
  God made a covenant with the earth never again to destroy it with a flood. As a sign of this covenant, God placed the rainbow in the clouds to remind us of that covenant.


belief:
  God pledges to be the God of Abraham and his descendants and in return Abraham pledges to circumsize all males.


belief:
  God not only approves of the death penalty, he institutes it after the flood. He requires an accounting for every man's life be it taken by man or beast. And the penalty is to be administered by man.


belief:
  Family structure was setup at the first sin to be: Women's desire will be for her husband and the husband will rule over her. Man tasked with providing for the family by the sweat of his brow.


belief:
  Mankind did attain a knowledge of Good and Evil LIKE God. Because of his sin the Tree of Life was taken away.


belief:
  We are to be reverent in the presence of God. Example: God tells Moses to remove his shoes because he is on holy ground.


belief:
  The first indication of salvation indicates that through Eve's seed the snake would be crushed. Or Satan would be overcome. Many others prophesied of the Saviour.


belief:
  This text does not actually say that killing some one in self defense is ok, but it is the first record of some one doing so.


belief:
  God placed the tree of knowledge of good and evil as a test and to provide man the ability to make a choice.


belief:
  Living man is made up of two essential items. 1. Body: God formed the body out of the dust 2. The breath of Life: God breathed into Adam the breath of life


belief:
  Obedience to God does not mean that life will be easy, or that you will instantly be relieved of stress and problems BUT obedience does have long term promises: Long life, you can look back on a good life (it will go well with you), wealth, and many descendants.


belief:
  God judged Pharoah and all of Egypt, and the judgment was to harden Pharoah's heart. So, Pharoah and Egypt had already made a choice against God and this was their judgment.


belief:
  The giving of the ten commandments was an extremely important event when God came down himself to talk to the people as a group so that they could hear him.


belief:
  Man is directed how to treat God in the first four commandments. The sabbath is specifically mentioned in declaring who God is. This is in no way tied to a prophecy or a prophetic law, but to the most basic reason of why we worship God, namely that he is our creator.


belief:
  God reiterates that, "thou shalt not murder." This does not mean kill nor if you believe in the bible could it, for God many times prescribes killing as a form of judgement not just on single human beings, but on nations and tribes.


belief:
  The death penalty is prescribed by law from God for: murder, premeditated murder, cursing or blaspheming God's Name, cursing (dishonoring, disrespecting) your parents, sorcery, sex with animals, homosexual acts, sacrificing to other gods, adultery, kidnapping, Sabbath breaking and breaking the covenant of God.


belief:
  Justice shall be served as like punishment for like crime. Life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, bruise for bruise and payment for time lost when someone can fully recover.


belief:
  Theft requires restoration plus a penalty of four or two fold value depending upon the recoverability of the goods stolen.


belief:
  No lying, false testimony or bribery. This has further implications, that you not pay someone to do wrong for you.


belief:
  God has a form because Moses and Aaron and the seventy elders of Israel saw it. God himself says he has form.


belief:
  Institution of the morning and evening sacrifices - Instituted for continuous practice. <font color=blue size=3>Note: The symbolism here is a before and after proposition. The lamb pointed forward to the crucifixion and the "unleavened bread" and "wine" pointed back to Christs sacrifice. He used these symbols from the passover in the last supper to remember his sacrifice.</font>


belief:
  Grace here stalls immediate consequences of the sin, death,  for those who were repentant, but does not wipe it out completely. Rather the experience is turned into a discipline of those with a goal towards bringing their behavior back into line with God's will. But their judgement here is stored up and is remembered.


belief:
  Sin can be unintentional. It is still sin, but God would have a person atone for sins they know about, not just offer sacrifices because you might have sinned. On the other hand it is your responsibility to know the commandments (God's commandments or God's Law). Even if you don't realize that you have broken one of these, you are still guilty as soon as you do it. There is a differentiation dealing with when you are guilty based on what law you break.


belief:
  Sin of omission: You sin by not testifying when you have knowledge about an event in question where testimony is generally requested and you know about it.


belief:
  Restitution is to be made when you ask God for forgiveness. The text implies that forgiveness will not be granted if no restitution is made.


belief:
  Church leaders in service to God should not drink before they serve. Generally they should clearly differentiate between what is holy and what is not holy in their service to God that they may be fit to teach people about God.


belief:
  General Info - Day of Atonement: Bull sin offering for the high priest and his family, Ram burnt offering, Goat (1) for a sin offering, and Goat (2) for a scape goat sin offering


belief:
  The blood is what makes atonement for us because it is the source of life in flesh, and thus we see that a life is required to make atonement for our sins.


belief:
  Homosexuality is wrong! God indicates it as one of the major reasons why all of canaan was to be destroyed.


belief:
  Bestiality (sex with animals) is forbidden just as Homosexuality. Those who participate in these acts are to be cut off from the nation. God sites this as one of the major reasons for destroying the people in canaan.


belief:
  God's welfare plan for the poor was to let them have the edges of the fields and the gleaning of the crops.


belief:
  You are not to practice divination (enchantment in some versions) or soothsaying. Same goes for consulting Mediums and Spiritists


belief:
  God requires a nation to obey His laws and statutes or ordinances. He makes the occupancy of the land by a nation dependent on their behavior in this respect. (see the different statutes scattered throughout our study under different topics)


belief:
  Priests are dedicated to the Lords work and therefore should not be engaged in the burying of the dead. Exceptions are made for immediate family only if you are not the current consecrated (high) priest.


belief:
  Priests are only to marry a person from their people (faith or in this case country) who is a virgin.


belief:
  Daughters of priests were under special obligation to be pure. If a daughter of a priest became a prostitute, she was to be burned to death.


belief:
  Priests were to be without defect in body. If they had a defect or were unclean, they were not to perform the duties of a priest lest they die.


belief:
  Priests live off of the gifts (sacrifices or otherwise) given to the temple and Laymen are not to be given these gifts.


belief:
  Throughout Leviticus when the feasts are mentioned and a specific day is called a sabbath, it is often referenced as: this is a sabbath, do not do any "laborious work". We believe that God is pointing to the Sabbath from the ten commandments as an example of how he wants the people to act and think on these special days. If you take this view, then his specific direction for the sabbath days mirror his wishes for the Sabbath day.


belief:
  Sabbath days including the Sabbath were customarily celebrated from sun down to sundown the next day.


belief:
  Ten Commandments: Penalty for blaspheming the Name of God and Cursing (presumably the name of God) is to be put to death.


belief:
  God allowed slavery in the old testament Jewish nation, and even gave rules governing how a slave should be treated. Jews were to be released in the Jubilee year, but non-jewish slaves were for keeps, even to the point that they could be inherited.


belief:
  God makes judgements against countries for not keeping His commandments and laws. We get this from the example of Sodom and Gomorah, Nineveh and specifically God's dealing with Israel


belief:
  God will bless a nation if that nation obeys His commandments, but curses the nation if they disobey His commands.


belief:
  No one but Aaron and his descendants were to see or touch the holy things in the tabernacle. The Kohathites were to to carry the holy things from place to place, but not to touch them lest they die. Notice it does not say put to death by anyone, just that they would die.


belief:
  Common Sin: If some trespasses against God by doing a "common sin" He must repay the principle plus one fifth. We note that the trespass is against God primarily.


belief:
  When you have a non-Christian person (or a person not of your particular sect of Christianity), they are to be treated as you would treat one of your own when they observe your beliefs.


belief:
  God is exceedingly patient (long suffering), He forgives,  but still punishes the guilty even unto the third and fourth generations.


belief:
  Just because you are forgiven, does not mean that you are exempt from the punishment of your action here on earth.


belief:
  Tithe was given to the Levites for their service to the people. They then tithed the tithe and gave it to the priests who served God in the sanctuary.


belief:
  The structure of the Israelite "church" was not a top heavy structure and was designed purely around responsibility to duty and to God. To see this, you may have to read all of Exodus - Numbers, but we can demonstrate it through the tithe system and it's "super decreasing" tenth of a tenth going to the top of the responsibility structure.


belief:
  Faith was demonstrated by the Israelites in the wilderness after they grumbled against God and the serpents bit them. Going to look at the bronze serpent was an action predicated on a belief that viewing the serpent would heal them. This is faith.


belief:
  Womens' promises and vows when married, getting married or as a daughter can be vetoed by their father or when married by their husband. Widows and divorced women have no such protection.


belief:
  Moses gives a definition for righteousness as follows: our obedience to the law is our righteousness. Thus we have: <span style="color:red">Righteousness is Obedience to the law of God</span>. By context this law is the ten commandments given in the previous chapter and alluded to here.


belief:
  The law is meant to be kept (Note: You would think this an obvious belief, but in today's world, we will substantiate it.)


belief:
  Leading someone to worship other gods is to be punished by death. No mercy is to be shown and no relationship is to interfere with bringing this sin to light.


belief:
  Acceptable uses of tithe: The Israelites are to deposit tithe <em>in their town</em> every third year for the use of the Levites, widows, orphans and aliens. The other years they were to use the tithe to make a pilgrimage to the the place Lord chooses to place his name (in later times Jerusalem) and use the money to support themselves during their stay. <style class="note">The money was to be used for the trip and the trip is for worshipping or "learning to fear" God. The uses of the money is at the discretion of the giver.</style>


belief:
  Lending to the poor and needy should be forgiven every seventh year and should not be done grudgingly even in the sixth year.


belief:
  The decisions of the Judges (ruler) and Priests were to be obeyed and showing contempt for their decisions was punishable by death.


belief:
  To be guilty of murder, requires malicious thought before the action. Accidental death, apparently even through negligence is not grounds for the death penalty.


belief:
  False witnesses are punished with the consequences of the crime they falsely testified to establish. No mercy is to be shown.


belief:
  If a man marries and then accuses a wife of not being a virgin and it can not be proved that she was at the marriage, she shall be stoned to death at her fathers door step.


belief:
  If a man slanders his wife by falsely accusing her of not being a virgin a their marriage, he must pay the father a fine and he may not divorce her as long as he lives.


belief:
  Raping an engaged virgin is punishable by death to both parties if she doesn't scream for help where help is available or just the man if help is not available.


belief:
  If you rape an unengaged virgin, you must pay her father a fine and marry her and you will not be allowed to divorce her.


belief:
  As a judgment against the Moabites and Ammonites for the treatment of Israel on the way to Canaan, no Ammonite/Moabite descendant was allowed in the temple for up to 10 generations after intermarrying with an Israelite. 


belief:
  Homosexuality is wrong! It deserves the death penalty not just to those who practice it, but to those who defend it as well. The Benjamite tribe was nearly destroyed because the tribe would not hand over the men responsible for the raping and killing of a women who they took instead of a man. Also fix up the death penalty belief where we added the tribe word. Add verse.


belief:
  God punishes those who honor their children above God's commands. Eli did this and God sent a prophet to describe his punishment - death to him and his sons and his remaining family would die young or infirmed.


belief:
  Often translated from the word nephesh, it appears that the soul departs at death and that God may return it to the body to bring the person back to life. From this. we may deduce that God does keep our souls for some time. E.g. until the resurrection. This does not mean the soul is alive or conscience.


belief:
  God and Satan are at war with one another. They interact with one another and are real. God's goal is to protect man and Satan's goal is to destroy him


belief:
  Satan is the one who causes much of the destruction we see, through moral Decay, and through natural disasters


belief:
  God is the only true omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent God. All other "gods" will be destroyed by God.


belief:
  The "order of Melchizedek" appears to be pointing forward to Christ. The order itself appears to mean a priest that is also a king.


belief:
  Theft of food because one is hungry is a special sin that we should not despise, yet it carries a heavier penalty requiring sevenfold repayment.


belief:
  If someone speaks contrary to the word of God, then God is not with them and you should not listen to them because if God is not with them then Satan is with them.


belief:
  God punishes nations which He sends to punish other nations if the punishing nation gets to haughty and goes too far.


belief:
  God defines a fast more as a change of behavior where one spends time looking out for others instead of oneself.


belief:
  Sin is still sin without knowledge of the law. Likewise righteousness is still righteousness without knowledge of the law.


belief:
  Paul seems to indicate that since we have died to the law we are now bound to serve in the spirit of the law not in the the letter of the law where people try and get away with things. This coincides with what Jesus says when asked about the law and He answers that the law is based on the loving God and loving your neighbor as yourself.


belief:
  There is no condemnation for those in Christ Jesus. You can tell that you are in Christ Jesus by the deeds you do.


belief:
  Do not keep company with any believer who is sexually immoral or otherwise breaking the law, not even to eat with them.


belief:
  If your unbelieving spouse divorces you due to your religious beliefs you are free from the marriage contract.


belief:
  If someone believes something is sin even if it is not, for them it is still sin. Doing that something in view of that person, causing them to stumble, is sin.


belief:
  The covenant given to Abraham was by faith and was not annulled or changed by the Covenant of the Ten Commandments.


