The Forgotten Books Of the Bible

THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS The Apocrypha Bible Study Series Volume One: Why We Open the Forgotten Books — and the Book of 2 Esdras First Harvest Ministries International Rev. John Shane Vaughn, Founding Apostolic Overseer 1 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS CONTENTS SECTION ONE — THE DEFENSE: Why We Are Opening the Forgotten Books •Part One — The Opening Address •Part Two — These Books Were in the Bible •Part Three — Who Removed Them, and Why? •Part Three-B — Why Rome Did Not Like Second Esdras •Part Four — Did the Early Believers Read These Books? •Part Five — Why Second Esdras First •Part Six — The Mentor's Guardrails •Part Seven — Answering the Objections •Part Eight — Recommended Texts for Students •Closing Charge •Sources for Section One SECTION TWO — THE BOOK OF 2 ESDRAS: The Studies •Study One — The Priest in the Land of the Medes (2 Esdras 1:1–7) •Study Two — What Shall I Yet Do More For You? (2 Esdras 1:8–23) •Study Three — The People That Shall Come (2 Esdras 1:24–40) •Study Four — The Mother Who Lost Her Children (2 Esdras 2:1–17) •Coming Next — Study Five (2 Esdras 2:18–32) 2 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS A note on the text: the King James Version is quoted throughout, including the KJV Apocrypha. Where the KJV reads "the LORD" or "the Lord" in place of the Name, the Sacred Name YAHWEH has been restored; where it reads "God," Elohim has been restored. Historical documents (church confessions, liturgies) are quoted as written. 3 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS SECTION ONE THE DEFENSE Why We Are Opening the Forgotten Books PART ONE — THE OPENING ADDRESS For generations, many of us have opened our Bibles without ever asking a very important question: How did these particular books become the collection we hold in our hands? Who made those decisions? When were they made? What writings were read by believers before those decisions became settled? And what happened to the books that once appeared in the Bibles of our ancestors? Consider this remarkable historical fact. When the King James Bible was first published in 1611, it contained a section of books that most modern Protestant King James Bibles no longer contain. Among them was a remarkable apocalypse known as Second Esdras. And here is something most believers have never been told: just four years later, in 1615, the Archbishop of Canterbury, George Abbot — 4 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS himself one of the King James translators — forbade the issuing of Bibles without the Apocrypha. The very men who gave us the King James Bible considered it improper to print that Bible with these books cut out. For centuries, believers encountered these writings in their Bibles. Early Christian teachers discussed them. Important church traditions recognized their value for instruction, even while disagreeing about whether they belonged in the canon. The Church of England's daily reading calendar of 1662 assigned more than one hundred and twenty chapters from these books to be read aloud in worship. Then, during the nineteenth century, influential Bible societies adopted policies that made Bibles without these writings the normal edition across much of the Protestant world. And today, millions of sincere believers have never read a single page of them. Now I want to be very clear about why we are undertaking this series. We are not studying these books because we have already decided that every word in them is inspired Scripture. We are studying them because we are students of the Word, students of history, and seekers of truth — and a seeker of truth does not let a printer's decision in 1826 decide what he is permitted to examine. We are studying them because Hebrews chapter 11 honors martyrs whose story is told only in these books. We are studying them because 5 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS YAHSHUA Himself walked in the Temple at a feast whose origin is recorded only in these books (John 10:22–23). We are studying them because the apostles lived, preached, and wrote in a world saturated with this literature, and you cannot fully understand the conversation if you have only heard half of it. And we are beginning with Second Esdras for one reason above all others: this book speaks directly about the Ten Tribes of the House of Israel — where they went, why they went, and the day the Most High will bring them back. For a ministry that has preached the restoration of both houses of Israel, that is not a side issue. That is the heart of the matter. Paul told us to "Prove all things; hold fast that which is good" (1 Thessalonians 5:21). The Bereans were called noble because they searched (Acts 17:11). We are not afraid of a book. We will read it, test it against Moses and the Prophets, keep what is good, and name what is not. That is what a school of prophets does. PART TWO — THESE BOOKS WERE IN THE BIBLE The English Bible Timeline DateWhat happened 1535Myles Coverdale's Bible gathers these books into a section he labels "Apocrypha," placed between the 6 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS DateWhat happened Testaments. 1537– 1568 Matthew's Bible (1537), the Great Bible (1539), the Geneva Bible (1560) — the Bible of the Puritans and Pilgrims — and the Bishops' Bible (1568) all contain the Apocrypha. 1563/15 71 The Church of England's Article VI lists the books, including Fourth Esdras (our Second Esdras), and says the Church reads them "for example of life and instruction of manners." 1611The King James Bible is published with the full Apocrypha, including Second Esdras. 1615Archbishop George Abbot forbids the issuing of Bibles without the Apocrypha. c. 1630Some printers begin binding King James copies without the Apocrypha — despite the prohibition. 1640 / 1642 A Geneva edition (1640), followed by a King James edition (1642), are probably the first printed in England intentionally without the Apocrypha. 1646 The Puritan Westminster Confession declares the Apocrypha to be no part of the canon and of no authority, to be used no differently than other human writings. 1662The Book of Common Prayer's daily lectionary still appoints 120+ chapters from the Apocrypha for public reading. 1782–83The first English Bible printed in America (Robert Aitken) lacks the Apocrypha. 1804The newly founded British and Foreign Bible Society prints its English Bibles without the Apocrypha. 1826–27After years of controversy, the British and Foreign Bible Society forbids its funds from supporting any edition containing the Apocrypha, in any language. 1828The American Bible Society adopts the same exclusion. 7 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS The teaching point: For roughly the first century of the English Bible, every complete English Bible carried these books. Their disappearance was not an ancient decision. It was a slow, modern one — and it was resisted by the very church that commissioned the King James Bible. PART THREE — WHO REMOVED THEM, AND WHY? There is no single villain, and we should not invent one. The removal happened in layers. Layer One: Jerome (c. AD 400) — Questioned, but translated Jerome, translating the Latin Vulgate, preferred the Hebrew collection and questioned these books' canonical standing. Yet the Western church kept reading them. Notably, Jerome did not include Second Esdras in his translation at all. It survived anyway — copied by hand in Latin manuscripts and appearing as an appendix to Vulgate Bibles from the ninth century onward, more commonly after the thirteenth. Layer Two: Martin Luther (1534) — Reclassified, but kept Luther separated these books into their own section and called them not equal to Holy Scripture, yet useful and good to read. He moved them. He did not remove them. 8 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS Layer Three: The Council of Trent (1546) — Rome chose some, rejected others Rome declared Tobit, Judith, Wisdom, Sirach, Baruch, and 1–2 Maccabees canonical. Second Esdras was left out. In the official Clementine Vulgate (1592) it was printed in an appendix after the New Testament — preserved, but demoted. So the student should understand: Second Esdras is not a "Catholic book." Rome itself refused to canonize it. Layer Four: The Puritans (1640s) — Rejection becomes doctrine The Westminster Assembly (1646) moved beyond Luther and Article VI. It declared these books of no authority and not to be used any differently than other human writings. This is the theological root of the modern Protestant attitude. Note what changed: the earlier Protestant position was "read them for instruction, but not for doctrine." The Puritan position became "treat them like any other human book." Layer Five: The Printers and the Bible Societies (1804–1828) — The books vanish from the pew This is where most believers' Bibles actually lost these books. •In 1804, the British and Foreign Bible Society was already printing its English Bibles without the Apocrypha, partly because fewer pages meant cheaper Bibles. 9 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS •From 1821, Robert Haldane and William Thorpe campaigned against the Society funding any Bible containing the Apocrypha — chiefly foreign-language Bibles sent into Catholic regions of Europe. •In 1826, the compromise collapsed. The major Scottish societies of Edinburgh and Glasgow broke away. •In 1826–1827, the Society adopted rules that no money would go to any society circulating the Apocrypha. •The American Bible Society followed in 1828. One Presbyterian historian judged that it was due to Robert Haldane "more than to any man" that the Apocrypha was driven out of the English Bible. The answer to "Who removed them?" — Not a single council. The Puritan theologians removed their authority; the printers and Bible societies removed their pages. Theology and economics did it together. PART THREE-B — WHY ROME DID NOT LIKE SECOND ESDRAS The Book That Said Prayers Cannot Help the Dead Rome had a doctrine to protect. Second Esdras contained a page that contradicted it. That page disappeared. 10 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS What Rome Teaches The Roman Church teaches that souls who die in a state of grace, but not yet fully purified, pass through a purification after death (purgatory). The living can help them by prayers, alms, Masses, and indulgences offered on their behalf. Rome's chief proof text is 2 Maccabees 12:43– 46, where Judas Maccabeus sends silver to Jerusalem for a sin offering on behalf of fallen soldiers. This is one reason the Council of Trent in 1546 canonized 2 Maccabees — the book Rome needed. What Second Esdras Teaches In the passage now numbered 2 Esdras 7:102– 115, Ezra asks the angel a direct question: on the Day of Judgment, will the righteous be able to intercede for the ungodly — fathers for sons, sons for parents, brothers for brothers, friends for friends? The angel's answer is no. On that day, every man bears his own righteousness or his own unrighteousness. No one can pray another out of judgment. Ezra presses further: Abraham prayed for Sodom; Moses prayed for Israel in the wilderness; Joshua, Samuel, David, Solomon, Elijah, and Hezekiah all interceded for others — so why not on that day? The angel answers that intercession belongs to this present age. When the Day of Judgment comes, the time of intercession is over. 11 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS This is not foreign to Scripture. It echoes the Prophets: "Though these three men, Noah, Daniel, and Job, were in it, they should deliver but their own souls by their righteousness, saith Adonai YAHWEH." — Ezekiel 14:14 "The soul that sinneth, it shall die. The son shall not bear the iniquity of the father, neither shall the father bear the iniquity of the son." — Ezekiel 18:20 "And as it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment." — Hebrews 9:27 The Missing Page For nearly a thousand years, every Latin copy of Second Esdras jumped from verse 35 straight to what is now verse 106. Readers could see the text made no sense at that point. In 1875 Robert Bensly, a Cambridge scholar, solved the mystery. Every Latin copy descended from one manuscript, Codex Sangermanensis, written in AD 822. In that manuscript, a full leaf had been cut out with a blade — very early in the book's history. Every copy made from it inherited the hole. The missing verses survived only in Syriac, Ethiopic, Arabic, Armenian, and two overlooked Latin manuscripts, one of which Bensly found at Amiens, France. And what was on the missing page? The pit of torment, the paradise of delight, the fate of the soul after death — and the denial that anyone can intercede for the dead on the Day of Judgment. 12 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS Scholars, including the United Bible Societies' translation handbook, believe the page was deliberately removed because its teaching was found objectionable. The Great Irony Rome took the opening words of its Funeral Mass from this very book: "Eternal rest grant unto them, O Lord, and let perpetual light shine upon them." — drawn from 2 Esdras 2:34–35 That prayer was sung at Catholic funerals for a thousand years, and at the funeral of Pope Francis in April 2025. So the Church kept the pages it could pray for the dead with — and lost the page that said such prayers would not avail on the Day of Judgment. And when Trent drew up its canon in 1546, it accepted 2 Maccabees, which supports prayers for the dead, and left out Second Esdras, which denies their power at the judgment. Mentor's Guardrails for This Section •The cutting is fact. The motive is strong inference. No surviving record says who cut the leaf or why. Say "scholars believe," not "Rome ordered." •The cutting happened in a single monastery manuscript around the ninth century, not by decree of a pope or council. •Trent gave no stated reason for omitting Second Esdras. Its absence from the Hebrew 13 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS Bible and the Septuagint was reason enough on Rome's own terms. The prayers-for-the- dead conflict explains why Rome had no incentive to rescue it — not that this was the official reason. •Second Esdras itself teaches an intermediate state after death (seven days in which the soul sees its coming reward or punishment). Students who reject that idea should know the book is not on their side on every point either. The Teaching Point Truth that threatens a doctrine has a way of going missing. The page was cut, but YAHWEH preserved the words in Syriac, Ethiopic, and Arabic copies far from Rome's reach — and in 1875 they came home. PART FOUR — DID THE EARLY BELIEVERS READ THESE BOOKS? Yes. And the evidence begins inside the New Testament itself. Witness One: The Book of Hebrews "...others were tortured, not accepting deliverance; that they might obtain a better resurrection" (Hebrews 11:35). Who were these men? The Hebrew Scriptures contain no such account. But 2 Maccabees 7 tells the story of seven brothers and their mother, 14 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS tortured by Antiochus for refusing to break the Torah, who refused the king's offer of release and died confessing the hope of resurrection. The writer of Hebrews places these Torah-keeping martyrs in the Hall of Faith beside Abraham and Moses. Witness Two: YAHSHUA at the Feast of Dedication "And it was at Jerusalem the feast of the dedication, and it was winter. And YAHSHUA walked in the temple in Solomon's porch" (John 10:22–23). The Feast of Dedication — Hanukkah — commemorates the cleansing of the Temple after Antiochus defiled it. Its origin is recorded in 1 and 2 Maccabees, not in the Hebrew canon. YAHSHUA was in the Temple at that feast. You cannot explain why without these books. Witness Three: Jude and the Principle of Citation Jude 14–15 quotes the Book of Enoch directly. This does not make every non-canonical book Scripture, but it destroys the idea that the apostles never read or used writings outside the Hebrew collection. Witness Four: Clement of Alexandria (c. AD 150–215) Drew on Sirach and related books in his teaching on divine wisdom. 15 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS Witness Five: Athanasius (AD 367) In his 39th Festal Letter — the very letter famous for listing the 27 New Testament books — Athanasius named other books, including Wisdom, Sirach, Judith, and Tobit, as appointed by the fathers to be read by those newly coming to the faith. The man who drew the canon's boundary lines still assigned these books to new believers. Witness Six: Ambrose of Milan (AD 339– 397) Ambrose used the central portion of Second Esdras in his writings, including On the Good of Death. Greek church fathers cited it as "The Prophet Ezra." Witness Seven: The Dead Sea Scrolls Copies of Tobit (4Q196–4Q200) were found at Qumran. These books belong to the real world of Second Temple Judaism, not to medieval invention. Witness Eight: The Ethiopian Church — Still Holy Scripture Today The Ethiopian and Eritrean Orthodox churches — among the oldest continuous Christian communities on earth — include the central portion of Second Esdras in their canon to this day, calling it Ezra Sutuel. For tens of millions of believers, this book never left the Bible. 16 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS PART FIVE — WHY SECOND ESDRAS FIRST 1. It Speaks Directly of the Ten Tribes This is the passage that should arrest every student of the Two Houses of Israel (2 Esdras 13:40–46, KJV 1611 Apocrypha): Those are the ten tribes, which were carried away prisoners out of their own land in the time of Osea the king, whom Salmanasar the king of Assyria led away captive, and he carried them over the waters, and so came they into another land. But they took this counsel among themselves, that they would leave the multitude of the heathen, and go forth into a further country, where never mankind dwelt, that they might there keep their statutes, which they never kept in their own land. And they entered into Euphrates by the narrow passages of the river. For the most High then shewed signs for them, and held still the flood, till they were passed over. For through that country there was a great way to go, namely, of a year and a half: and the same region is called Arsareth. Then dwelt they there until the latter time; and now when they shall begin to come, the Highest shall stay the springs of the stream again, that they may go through. The 1611 translators placed a marginal cross- reference here to 2 Kings 17 — the Assyrian captivity of the Northern Kingdom. Compare Isaiah 11:11–16, where YAHWEH promises to dry 17 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS up the river so His scattered people may cross again, and Hosea 1:10–11. Whatever we conclude about the book's inspiration, this passage is a first-century Jewish witness that the Ten Tribes were understood as not lost to YAHWEH, living apart until the latter time, and destined to return. 2. The Man from the Sea (Chapter 13) A figure rises from the sea, flies with the clouds of heaven, faces the gathered nations, and destroys them with the fire of his mouth — not with weapons. Compare Daniel 7:13–14, Isaiah 11:4, and Revelation 19:15. 3. The Problem of Suffering (Chapters 3– 10) Written after Rome destroyed Jerusalem in AD 70, Ezra wrestles with YAHWEH's angel Uriel over why Israel suffers while Babylon (Rome) prospers. Compare Habakkuk 1 and Psalm 73. 4. The Grieving Woman Who Becomes Zion (Chapters 9–10) A mourning mother is transformed before Ezra's eyes into a glorious city — Zion restored. Compare Isaiah 54 and Galatians 4:26. 5. A Book That Shaped History •The Funeral Mass: The opening words of the Latin Requiem — "Eternal rest grant unto them... and let perpetual light shine upon them" — are drawn from 2 Esdras 2:34–35. 18 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS This text was sung at the funeral of Pope Francis in April 2025. A book "nobody reads" has been sung over the dead for a thousand years. •Christopher Columbus: Arguing for the size of the lands he sought, Columbus leaned on 2 Esdras 6:42, which says six parts of the earth are dry land and one part water. 6. The Seventy Restored Verses The King James text of chapter 7 jumps from verse 35 to verse 36 with a large passage missing. A page had been cut from an important Latin manuscript, and later copies inherited the gap. Robert Bensly published the recovered passage in 1875 from other manuscripts and ancient versions. It is now printed as 7:36–105. We will read the restored text — it contains some of the book's most important teaching on judgment and the intermediate state. PART SIX — THE MENTOR'S GUARDRAILS What we will say clearly to our students A defense is only as strong as its weakest claim. Our opponents will look for the overstatement. We will not give them one. 1. The New Testament does not quote Second Esdras. The central portion was written around AD 95–100 — after nearly every New Testament 19 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS book. The Hebrews and John evidence proves the apostles knew the Apocrypha as a body (especially Maccabees). It does not prove they read this book. Do not blur that line. 2. The book was not written by the historical Ezra. Ezra lived around 450 BC. This book was composed about 550 years later under his name. That is a literary practice of the period — but we say it plainly. 3. The book has three layers. Chapter s Scholarl y name Origin 1–25 EzraLater Christian addition 3–144 Ezra Jewish apocalypse, c. AD 100 — the heart of the book 15–166 EzraLater Christian addition The Ethiopian canon includes only chapters 3–14. Note also: the Requiem verses (2:34–35) come from the later Christian layer. 4. The King James reading of 7:28 is a scribal change. The KJV reads "my son Jesus shall be revealed." The Syriac and other ancient versions read "my son the Messiah." A Latin copyist inserted the Greek-derived name into a Jewish text. A Sacred Name ministry should be the first to point this out — it shows how names were altered in transmission. The original Jewish author spoke of the Messiah without naming Him. 5. The 400-year Messianic reign and the death of the Messiah (7:28–29) do not match 20 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS Revelation 20 or the resurrection of YAHSHUA. We will name this as a point where the book departs from apostolic teaching. This is exactly why we test it rather than swallow it. 6. The 94 books of chapter 14 (24 public, 70 hidden) is a claim made by the story. It is not historical proof that 70 inspired books were suppressed. 7. Arsareth is not a map. The name likely means "another land" (Hebrew eretz acheret, echoing Deuteronomy 29:28). Students should not build migration theories on it. The power of the passage is its witness to the expectation of return, not its geography. 8. No conspiracy is needed. The documented history — Archbishop Abbot's prohibition, the Puritan reversal, the Bible Society financial rules — is strong enough on its own. PART SEVEN — ANSWERING THE OBJECTIONS ObjectionAnswer "Those books were never in the Bible." Every complete English Bible from 1535 through 1611 contained them, including the King James and the Geneva. In 1615 the Archbishop of Canterbury forbade printing Bibles without them. "The early church rejected them." Hebrews 11:35 honors the Maccabean martyrs. YAHSHUA kept the Feast of Dedication. Athanasius assigned these books to new believers. Ambrose quoted Second Esdras. Ethiopian believers still hold it as 21 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS ObjectionAnswer Scripture. "Luther threw them out." Luther moved them to a separate section and recommended them as good to read. "This is a Catholic book." Rome refused to canonize Second Esdras at Trent and printed it after the New Testament. "Reading them means accepting their doctrine." Article VI drew this exact line in 1563: read for instruction, not for establishing doctrine. We read every book the same way — tested against Torah and the Prophets (Isaiah 8:20). "They contradict Scripture." Some passages do — and we will show students where. That is an argument for informed reading, not for ignorance. "If they were inspired, why were they removed?" That is the right question, and this series exists to examine it honestly. History shows they merit study. Inspiration is judged book by book. PART EIGHT — RECOMMENDED TEXTS FOR STUDENTS 1.KJV with Apocrypha (Cambridge or Oxford editions) — the historic English text, matching the 1611. 2.A modern edition containing 7:36–105 (Revised Version 1895, RSV, or NRSV with 22 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS Apocrypha) — so the restored verses are not missed. 3.The 1611 facsimile online (kingjamesbibleonline.org offers scans of the original 1611 Apocrypha pages) — for showing students the book in the original printing, including the translators' marginal note to 2 Kings 17 at chapter 13. CLOSING CHARGE We did not choose these books because they are forbidden. We chose them because they were forgotten — and a people who forget the story of their own Bible are a people easily told what to believe. We will open Second Esdras with the Torah in one hand and the Prophets in the other. We will hear Ezra's questions, weigh the angel's answers, rejoice where it agrees with the Word, and speak plainly where it departs. And when we come to chapter 13 and read of the Ten Tribes dwelling in a far land "until the latter time," we will remember that YAHWEH said through Jeremiah, "I will gather the remnant of my flock out of all countries whither I have driven them" (Jeremiah 23:3). The forgotten books may yet remind us of a forgotten people. Prove all things. Hold fast that which is good. 23 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS SOURCES FOR SECTION ONE •Britannica, "George Abbot" — Abbot's 1615 prohibition; 1640/1642 first intentional omissions: https://www.britannica.com/biography/George- Abbot •Wikipedia, "Apocrypha controversy" — 1804 BFBS policy; Haldane/Thorpe campaign 1821; 1826 split; English Bibles 1535–1611: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apocrypha_contr oversy •Free Presbyterian Church of Scotland — text of BFBS 1826–27 resolutions: https://www.fpchurch.org.uk/?p=53818 •Banner of Truth, Lives of Robert & James Haldane — Haldane's role in removal: https://banneroftruth.org/us/?p=324 •Dictionary of National Biography, "Haldane, Robert": https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Dictionary_of_N ational_Biography,_1885-1900/ Haldane,_Robert_(1764-1842) •Westminster Confession 1646, Ch. 1.3 (CCEL): https://www.ccel.org/creeds/westminster.htm •Anglican Compass — 1662 lectionary contains 120+ Apocrypha chapters: https://anglicancompass.com/lessons-in- omission-why-are-some-chapters-missing-in- the-daily-office-lectionary/ 24 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS •BYU Library exhibit — Puritan objections to Apocrypha in KJV: https://exhibits.lib.byu.edu/kingjamesbible/mor e-wars.html •Wikipedia, "2 Esdras" — Vulgate appendix history, Ethiopian canon, Greek Fathers' citations: https://en.wikipedia.com/wiki/2_Esdras •Wikipedia, "Orthodox Tewahedo biblical canon": https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orthodox_Tewah edo_biblical_canon •Bible Translation Tips (UBS Handbook on 1–2 Esdras) — 7:28 "my son Jesus" as scribal change: https://tips.translation.bible/? p=47859 •KJV 1611 original scan, 2 Esdras 13: https://www.kingjamesbibleonline.org/2- Esdras-Chapter-13_Original-1611-KJV/ •Vatican, funeral Mass of Pope Francis (2025), Introit cited from 4 Esdras 2:34–35: https://www.vatican.va/news_services/liturgy/li bretti/2025/20250426-libretto-esequie- sepoltura.pdf •Washington Irving, Life and Voyages of Christopher Columbus, Vol. 2 — Columbus's use of Esdras: https://www.issuu.com/scduag/docs/lifeandv- v2/129 •Bible Gateway, Hebrews 11:35 commentary (Gill) — link to 2 Maccabees 7: https://biblestudytools.com/wnt/hebrews/11- 35.html 25 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS •Athanasius, Festal Letter 39 (New Advent): https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/2806039.h tm •Wikipedia, "Codex Sangermanensis I" — the cut-out leaf and theory of its removal: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Codex_Sangerma nensis_I •UBS Handbook on 2 Esdras 7:36 — page thought deliberately cut, v. 105 likely objectionable: https://tips.translation.bible/? p=47866 •Logos, Bensly's Missing Fragment (1875) — Amiens manuscript discovery: https://www.logos.com/product/32449/the- missing-fragment-of-the-latin-translation-of- the-fourth-book-of-ezra •Wikipedia, "Eternal Rest" — Requiem prayer sourced from 2 Esdras 2:34–35; Catechism 1030–1032: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eternal_Rest •Extraordinary Form propers, All Souls — Requiem Introit (4 Esdras 2:34–35) read alongside 2 Maccabees 12:43–46: https://www.extraordinaryform.org/propers/11 02AllSouls2.pdf 26 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS SECTION TWO THE BOOK OF 2 ESDRAS The Studies 27 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS STUDY ONE THE PRIEST IN THE LAND OF THE MEDES 2 Esdras 1:1–7 THE TEXT 1 The second book of the prophet Esdras, the son of Saraias, the son of Azarias, the son of Helchias, the son of Sadamias, the son of Sadoc, the son of Achitob, 2 The son of Achias, the son of Phinees, the son of Heli, the son of Amarias, the son of Aziei, the son of Marimoth, the son of Arna, the son of Ozias, the son of Borith, the son of Abisei, the son of Phinees, the son of Eleazar, 3 The son of Aaron, of the tribe of Levi; which was captive in the land of the Medes, in the reign of Artexerxes king of the Persians. 4 And the word of YAHWEH came unto me, saying, 5 Go thy way, and shew my people their sinful deeds, and their children their wickedness which they have done against me; that they may tell their children's children: 28 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS 6 Because the sins of their fathers are increased in them: for they have forgotten me, and have offered unto strange gods. 7 Am not I even he that brought them out of the land of Egypt, from the house of bondage? but they have provoked me unto wrath, and despised my counsels. CENTRAL THEME This book does not open with a vision. It opens with a man, a bloodline, and a place. He is a son of Aaron. He is a son of Zadok. He is captive in the land of the Medes. And to that man, in that land, the Word of YAHWEH came. A PEOPLE WHO FORGOT. A PRIESTHOOD THAT REMEMBERED. A WORD THAT BROKE THE SILENCE. 2 ESDRAS 1:1–3 29 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS THE BOOK BEGINS WITH A BLOODLINE In Scripture, a genealogy is a legal claim. It answers the question every Israelite would ask of a man who stands up to speak for YAHWEH: By what right? When the exiles came home from captivity, priests who could not prove their line were put out of the priesthood (Ezra 2:62). So Esdras opens the way a priest must open — by establishing his line. And look what is in it. "THE SON OF SADOC" — ZADOK Zadok is the faithful priest YAHWEH raised up in the days of David and Solomon (1 Samuel 2:35; 1 Kings 2:35). And when Ezekiel saw the Temple of the age to come, YAHWEH said only the sons of Zadok would come near to minister to Him — and He said why: "But the priests the Levites, the sons of Zadok, that kept the charge of my sanctuary when the children of Israel went astray from me, they shall come near to me to minister unto me." — Ezekiel 44:15 "It shall be for the priests that are sanctified of the sons of Zadok; which have kept my charge, which went not astray when the children of Israel went astray." — Ezekiel 48:11 The sons of Zadok kept the charge when Israel went astray. 30 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS That is the man who opens this book. He comes from the priestly house that remembered when everyone else forgot. Hold onto that — it is the key to everything in verses 5 through 7. "THE SON OF PHINEES" — PHINEHAS The line runs back through Phinehas, the son of Eleazar, the son of Aaron. When Israel joined itself to Baal-peor, Phinehas stood alone in zeal for YAHWEH, and YAHWEH answered him with a covenant: "Behold, I give unto him my covenant of peace: And he shall have it, and his seed after him, even the covenant of an everlasting priesthood; because he was zealous for his Elohim." — Numbers 25:12–13 Phinehas turned back YAHWEH's wrath when Israel went after a strange god. Now his son Esdras is sent to a people who have again "offered unto strange gods" (1:6). The son is sent to finish what the father began. 2 ESDRAS 1:3 31 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS "CAPTIVE IN THE LAND OF THE MEDES" Esdras was "captive in the land of the Medes, in the reign of Artexerxes king of the Persians." Remember what happened to Babylon. On the night Belshazzar saw the handwriting on the wall, Daniel read it to him: "Thy kingdom is divided, and given to the Medes and Persians." — Daniel 5:28 "And Darius the Median took the kingdom." — Daniel 5:31 From that night on, every captive of Judah was a captive under the Medes and the Persians. That is the world Esdras lived in. AND WHO ELSE WAS IN THE LAND OF THE MEDES? Turn to 2 Kings 17:6: "In the ninth year of Hoshea the king of Assyria took Samaria, and carried Israel away into Assyria, and placed them in Halah and in Habor by the river of Gozan, and in the cities of the Medes." The House of Israel. More than two hundred years before Esdras, Assyria carried the ten northern tribes — Ephraim, Manasseh, Naphtali, and the rest — into the cities of the Medes. That is where they lost their name. That is where they began to forget. 32 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS And they were still there in Esdras's day. The Apocrypha itself tells the story of Tobit, of the tribe of Naphtali, carried captive by the Assyrians, whose family lived in Ecbatana and Rages — cities of Media (Tobit 1:1–2, 14; 3:7). And the historian Josephus records that when the king's decree came, Ezra sent it to his kinsmen in Media — while the ten tribes remained beyond the Euphrates, "an immense multitude." So here is the picture 2 Esdras paints: A priest of Judah, captive under the Medes and Persians — in the same empire where the lost tribes of Israel had been scattered. A son of Zadok, the house that kept the charge — placed among the people who forgot. THE PRIESTHOOD THAT REMEMBERED WAS SENT TO THE PEOPLE WHO FORGOT. And YAHWEH would send him to them. Mark this verse — it is coming: "I Esdras received a charge of YAHWEH upon the mount Oreb, that I should go unto Israel; but when I came unto them, they set me at nought." — 2 Esdras 2:33 He went to them. They rejected him. And chapter 13 will tell us where those tribes went from there. 33 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS CAPTIVITY CHANGES LOCATION — NOT IDENTITY Esdras had no Temple, no altar, no Holy Place. Yet he still says: I am the son of Aaron. I am of the tribe of Levi. Babylon renamed Daniel Belteshazzar, but it could not stop him praying toward Jerusalem three times a day (Daniel 6:10). This is FHMI-0335 — Confined but NEVER Conformed: YAHWEH's people may live captive in Babylon's world without becoming Babylonian in identity. The captivity changed Esdras's address. It did not change his assignment. And that is a word for every scattered Israelite in this room. You may have been born far from the covenant. You may have been raised in Babylon's religion, Babylon's calendar, and Babylon's names. None of that changed who YAHWEH says you are. 2 ESDRAS 1:4 "AND THE WORD OF YAHWEH CAME UNTO ME" There is another priest who heard YAHWEH's voice in captivity: 34 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS "The word of YAHWEH came expressly unto Ezekiel the priest, the son of Buzi, in the land of the Chaldeans by the river Chebar." — Ezekiel 1:3 YAHWEH does not wait for His people to get back to Jerusalem before He speaks. He speaks in the land of captivity, to a man who has kept his identity, and sends him to the people who have lost theirs. IDENTITY → CAPTIVITY → THE WORD → THE ASSIGNMENT This is the Elijah pattern of FHMI-0242 — The Days of Elijah: when YAHWEH's people suffer a famine of truth, He raises a voice to turn them back to the covenant, to Torah, and to the fathers. 2 ESDRAS 1:5 "SHEW MY PEOPLE THEIR SINFUL DEEDS" "Go thy way, and shew my people their sinful deeds..." Every student of the Prophets should hear Isaiah: "Cry aloud, spare not, lift up thy voice like a trumpet, and shew my people their transgression, and the house of Jacob their sins." — Isaiah 58:1 35 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS And how does Isaiah 58 end? With the call to restore the Sabbath: "If thou turn away thy foot from the sabbath, from doing thy pleasure on my holy day; and call the sabbath a delight..." — Isaiah 58:13 The prophet who shows Israel its sin is the prophet who calls Israel back to YAHWEH's holy day. SINFUL — BUT STILL "MY PEOPLE" Read it again: "shew my people their sinful deeds." They have sinned. They have forgotten Him. And YAHWEH still calls them My people. This is FHMI-0953 — The Potter Wheel. When the clay was marred in the potter's hand, the potter did not throw it away and dig up new clay — "he made it again another vessel" (Jeremiah 18:4). Same clay. Remade. The prophet is not sent to find a new people. He is sent to restore the one YAHWEH already has. THREE GENERATIONS IN ONE VERSE "...and their children their wickedness... that they may tell their children's children." Fathers → children → children's children. This is the covenant chain of Deuteronomy 6:7 and Joel 1:3. When a family stops passing down the Word, YAHWEH requires that the truth about their departure be passed down instead — so the 36 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS next generation will know what went wrong and refuse to repeat it. 2 ESDRAS 1:6 "THEY HAVE FORGOTTEN ME" "Because the sins of their fathers are increased in them..." The children did not just copy their fathers. They exceeded them. What the fathers tolerated, the children practiced. What the children practiced, the grandchildren called normal. "And there arose another generation after them, which knew not YAHWEH, nor yet the works which he had done for Israel." — Judges 2:10 Then the verse names the root: "for they have forgotten me." Before Israel broke the Sabbath, they forgot the One who gave it. Before they abandoned the feasts, they forgot the One who appointed them. Before they bowed to strange gods, they forgot YAHWEH. 37 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS Forgetting is the first sin — the one that makes every other sin possible. BUT YAHWEH DOES NOT FORGET "And Elohim heard their groaning, and Elohim remembered his covenant with Abraham, with Isaac, and with Jacob." — Exodus 2:24 This is FHMI-0240 — Echoes of Israel, Part 10: Israel forgot the covenant, but YAHWEH remembered it — and because He remembered, He raised up Moses. The people forget. YAHWEH remembers. YAHWEH raises a restorer. "AND HAVE OFFERED UNTO STRANGE GODS" Forgetting never leaves an empty space. When Israel forgot YAHWEH's Name, they called on other names. When they forgot His days, they kept other days. When they forgot His altar, they built other altars. On Mount Carmel, Elijah did not face pagans who had never known YAHWEH. He faced Israelites who had lost the identity of their Elohim, halting between two opinions (1 Kings 18:21). That is why the Elijah message restores the Name. You cannot return to an Elohim whose Name you have traded for another. 38 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS 2 ESDRAS 1:7 "AM NOT I EVEN HE THAT BROUGHT THEM OUT?" These are the opening words of the Ten Commandments: "I am YAHWEH thy Elohim, which have brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage." — Exodus 20:2 Before YAHWEH gave a single commandment, He reminded Israel who He was and what He had done. The Law was never given to earn deliverance. It was given to a people already delivered. And then the indictment: "...but they have provoked me unto wrath, and despised my counsels." Israel got out of Egypt. But Egypt did not get out of Israel. They crossed the sea — and built a golden calf. They ate manna — and longed for the leeks and onions. They stood at the edge of the Promised Land — and refused to go in. YOU CAN BE BROUGHT OUT — AND STILL NEVER GO IN. 39 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS STUDY ONE CONCLUSION 2 Esdras opens with a man who knows who he is. He is a son of Aaron. He is a son of Phinehas, the priest of covenant zeal. He is a son of Zadok, the house that kept the charge when Israel went astray. And he is captive in the land of the Medes — under the same empire where the lost tribes of Israel were scattered and forgot their name. To that man, in that land, the Word of YAHWEH came: Go to My people. Show them their sin. Tell their children, and their children's children. They have forgotten Me — but I have not forgotten them. ISRAEL MAY FORGET YAHWEH — BUT YAHWEH HAS NEVER FORGOTTEN ISRAEL. And whenever YAHWEH begins speaking again to a people who have lost their name — RESTORATION HAS ALREADY BEGUN. 40 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION 1.Why does 2 Esdras open with a genealogy instead of a vision? (Ezra 2:62) 2.According to Ezekiel 44:15 and 48:11, why were the sons of Zadok chosen to minister before YAHWEH? 3.What covenant did YAHWEH give Phinehas, and why? (Numbers 25:10–13) How is Esdras sent to finish his work? 4.Read Daniel 5:28 and 2 Kings 17:6. Who ruled the land where Esdras was captive, and who else had been scattered there? 5.Compare 2 Esdras 1:5 with Isaiah 58:1 and 58:13. What does this tell us about the prophet's message? 6.Why does YAHWEH still call a sinful people "my people"? (Jeremiah 18:1–6) 7.What is the difference between forgetting YAHWEH and rejecting Him? Which comes first? 8.Why must deliverance come before commandment? (Exodus 20:2) SCRIPTURES FOR FURTHER STUDY Exodus 2:24 · Exodus 20:2 · Numbers 25:10–13 · Deuteronomy 6:6–7 · Judges 2:10 · 1 Samuel 2:35 · 1 Kings 2:35 · 1 Kings 18:21 · 2 Kings 17:6 · Ezra 2:62 · Isaiah 58:1–14 · Jeremiah 2:32 · Jeremiah 18:1–6 · Ezekiel 1:3 · Ezekiel 44:15 · Ezekiel 48:11 41 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS · Daniel 5:28–31 · Daniel 6:10 · Joel 1:3 · Tobit 1:1– 2, 14 · 2 Esdras 2:33 FHMI TEACHINGS REFERENCED FHMI-0240 — Echoes of Israel, Part 10 — Israel forgot the covenant; YAHWEH remembered it and raised up a restorer FHMI-0242 — The Days of Elijah, Part 1 — the famine of truth and the restoration ministry FHMI-0335 — Confined but NEVER Conformed — captive in Babylon without becoming Babylonian FHMI-0953 — Parables of the Kingdom: The Potter Wheel — the marred clay remade, not replaced 42 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS STUDY TWO WHAT SHALL I YET DO MORE FOR YOU? The Wilderness Lawsuit, the Murmuring Heart, and the Tree in the Bitter Water 2 Esdras 1:8–23 First Harvest Ministries International Rev. John Shane Vaughn THE TEXT 8 Pull thou off then the hair of thy head, and cast all evil upon them, for they have not been obedient unto my law, but it is a rebellious people. 9 How long shall I forbear them, into whom I have done so much good? 10 Many kings have I destroyed for their sakes; Pharaoh with his servants and all his power have I smitten down. 11 All the nations have I destroyed before them, and in the east I have scattered the people of two provinces, even of Tyrus and Sidon, and have slain all their enemies. 43 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS 12 Speak thou therefore unto them, saying, Thus saith YAHWEH, 13 I led you through the sea and in the beginning gave you a large and safe passage; I gave you Moses for a leader, and Aaron for a priest. 14 I gave you light in a pillar of fire, and great wonders have I done among you; yet have ye forgotten me, saith YAHWEH. 15 Thus saith YAHWEH Almighty, The quails were as a token to you; I gave you tents for your safeguard: nevertheless ye murmured there, 16 And triumphed not in my name for the destruction of your enemies, but ever to this day do ye yet murmur. 17 Where are the benefits that I have done for you? when ye were hungry and thirsty in the wilderness, did ye not cry unto me, 18 Saying, Why hast thou brought us into this wilderness to kill us? it had been better for us to have served the Egyptians, than to die in this wilderness. 19 Then had I pity upon your mournings, and gave you manna to eat; so ye did eat angels' bread. 20 When ye were thirsty, did I not cleave the rock, and waters flowed out to your fill? for the heat I covered you with the leaves of the trees. 21 I divided among you a fruitful land, I cast out the Canaanites, the Pherezites, and the 44 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS Philistines, before you: what shall I yet do more for you? saith YAHWEH. 22 Thus saith YAHWEH Almighty, When ye were in the wilderness, in the river of the Amorites, being athirst, and blaspheming my name, 23 I gave you not fire for your blasphemies, but cast a tree in the water, and made the river sweet. CENTRAL THEME Israel's problem was never that YAHWEH failed to provide. Their problem was that every new trial made them forget the last miracle. He broke Pharaoh. He opened the sea. He gave them Moses and Aaron. He gave them fire by night. He gave them quail, manna, and water from the rock. He gave them a land. And still — they murmured. These sixteen verses are not a history lesson. They are a courtroom. YAHWEH is the plaintiff. Israel is the defendant. And the evidence presented is not Israel's sin — it is YAHWEH's goodness. The verdict comes in verse 21 as a single question that no defendant can answer: "WHAT SHALL I YET DO MORE FOR YOU?" 45 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS BEFORE WE BEGIN: THIS IS A COVENANT LAWSUIT The Prophets have a name for this kind of speech. In Hebrew it is a riv — a covenant lawsuit. YAHWEH summons His people to court, recites His faithfulness, and lets His goodness testify against their unfaithfulness. The Prophets used this same courtroom: "O my people, what have I done unto thee? and wherein have I wearied thee? testify against me. For I brought thee up out of the land of Egypt, and redeemed thee out of the house of servants; and I sent before thee Moses, Aaron, and Miriam." — Micah 6:3–4 "What could have been done more to my vineyard, that I have not done in it? wherefore, when I looked that it should bring forth grapes, brought it forth wild grapes?" — Isaiah 5:4 Put Micah 6:4 beside 2 Esdras 1:13. Put Isaiah 5:4 beside 2 Esdras 1:21. Esdras speaks in the voice of the Prophets. EZRA DID THIS VERY THING Here is a discovery every student should mark. In Nehemiah 9, after Ezra read the Law to the people for seven days at the Feast of Tabernacles (Nehemiah 8:18), the Levites led Israel in a great prayer that recites their whole history — creation, 46 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS Abraham, Egypt, the sea, the pillar, Sinai, the manna, the rock, the rebellion, the land. The Greek Old Testament, and English translations such as the RSV that follow it, open that prayer with four words: "And Ezra said." Ezra stood before Israel and did exactly what 2 Esdras 1 commands: he made Israel remember. Read Nehemiah 9:9–21 beside today's passage, and you will hear the same story, in the same order, with the same verdict. Nehemiah 9 and 2 Esdras 1 tell the same story with the same verdict. 2 ESDRAS 1:8 "PULL THOU OFF THEN THE HAIR OF THY HEAD" YAHWEH's first command to His priest is strange to modern ears: tear out your hair. The book of Ezra shows us what it means. When Ezra learned that the returned exiles — even the priests and Levites — had broken covenant by intermarrying with the peoples of the land, here is what he did: "And when I heard this thing, I rent my garment and my mantle, and plucked off the 47 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS hair of my head and of my beard, and sat down astonied." — Ezra 9:3 This is Ezra's own sign. It is the grief of a priest who sees YAHWEH's people throw away their covenant identity. It is not theater. It is a broken heart made visible. The Prophets used the same sign for a nation going into exile: "Make thee bald, and poll thee for thy delicate children; enlarge thy baldness as the eagle; for they are gone into captivity from thee." — Micah 1:16 So 2 Esdras 1:8 commands Esdras to do exactly what Ezra did when he saw Israel's sin. The priest must grieve before he preaches. A man who can expose Israel's sin without mourning over it is not standing in Ezra's line. "THEY HAVE NOT BEEN OBEDIENT UNTO MY LAW" Now the charge itself — and it begins with Torah. YAHWEH does not accuse Israel of a bad attitude. He names the root: "they have not been obedient unto my law... it is a rebellious people." This is the teaching of FHMI-0953 — The Potter Wheel. YAHWEH placed Israel on His wheel at Sinai, and the instrument He used to shape them was His commandments, His statutes, and His judgments. Israel became marred through idolatry, rebellion, and resistance to His Law. 48 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS DISOBEDIENCE TO TORAH IS RESISTANCE TO THE POTTER'S HANDS. 2 ESDRAS 1:9 "HOW LONG SHALL I FORBEAR THEM?" "How long shall I forbear them, into whom I have done so much good?" This is the voice of YAHWEH at Kadesh-barnea: "How long will this people provoke me? and how long will it be ere they believe me, for all the signs which I have shewed among them?" — Numbers 14:11 "How long shall I bear with this evil congregation, which murmur against me?" — Numbers 14:27 Notice the word in Numbers 14:27: murmur. That word will echo through this whole passage. 2 Esdras is not citing a random complaint. It is reaching back to the night Israel wept in their tents and refused to enter the land — the night an entire generation lost its inheritance (FHMI-0240 — Crisis in the Camp at Kadesh Barnea). And notice how YAHWEH frames the question: not "how long have they sinned," but "how long 49 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS shall I forbear them into whom I have done so much good?" The weight of the charge is not the size of Israel's sin. It is the size of YAHWEH's goodness that Israel ignored. 2 ESDRAS 1:10 "PHARAOH WITH HIS SERVANTS AND ALL HIS POWER" The first exhibit in YAHWEH's lawsuit: Egypt. "And the waters returned, and covered the chariots, and the horsemen, and all the host of Pharaoh that came into the sea after them; there remained not so much as one of them." — Exodus 14:28 Why did YAHWEH break the most powerful king on earth? Because Pharaoh was holding someone who belonged to Him: "Thus saith YAHWEH, Israel is my son, even my firstborn: And I say unto thee, Let my son go, that he may serve me." — Exodus 4:22–23 This is FHMI-0233 — Echoes of Ancient Israel, Part 3: Israel is YAHWEH's firstborn son. The Exodus was not merely the liberation of slaves — it was a Father reclaiming His son from another master. 50 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS And look at the purpose clause: "that he may serve me." YAHWEH did not bring Israel out so they could say "we are free." He brought them out so they could serve Him — in His way, on His days, by His Law. Freedom from Pharaoh was meant to produce obedience to YAHWEH. That is the pattern FHMI teaches for the end of the age: EGYPT → the ancient bondage. BABYLON → the end-time bondage. The first Exodus → the pattern of the greater Exodus to come. 2 ESDRAS 1:11 "ALL THE NATIONS HAVE I DESTROYED BEFORE THEM" "All the nations have I destroyed before them... and have slain all their enemies." Israel did not win its battles by its own sword. "And all these kings and their land did Joshua take at one time, because YAHWEH Elohim of Israel fought for Israel." — Joshua 10:42 YOU DID NOT GET HERE BY YOURSELF. 51 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS 2 ESDRAS 1:12–13 "I GAVE YOU MOSES FOR A LEADER, AND AARON FOR A PRIEST" Now YAHWEH commands His priest to speak: "Thus saith YAHWEH..." — and the evidence continues. THE SEA "I led you through the sea and in the beginning gave you a large and safe passage." Israel did not merely escape Egypt. YAHWEH made a road where there was only water. This is one of the great Torah patterns taught in FHMI-0839: the stories of the Torah are mind placement — they teach YAHWEH's people how YAHWEH thinks and how He works. YAHWEH CAN BUILD A ROAD WHERE HUMAN REASON SEES ONLY SEA. MOSES AND AARON Then YAHWEH gave Israel two gifts in one breath — exactly as Micah 6:4 says: MOSES — leadership and government. AARON — priesthood and mediation. 52 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS Moses, the covenant restorer (FHMI-0240), who called a people who had forgotten their fathers back to the Elohim of their fathers. Aaron, the priest who stood between the living and the dead (Numbers 16:48). And remember who is speaking this verse: Esdras, a son of Aaron, of the house of Zadok. When YAHWEH says "I gave you Aaron for a priest," Esdras is reading the deed to his own inheritance. The priesthood YAHWEH gave in the wilderness is the priesthood now standing in captivity, reminding Israel what that gift cost. 2 ESDRAS 1:14 "I GAVE YOU LIGHT IN A PILLAR OF FIRE" "And YAHWEH went before them by day in a pillar of a cloud, to lead them the way; and by night in a pillar of fire, to give them light." — Exodus 13:21 Israel did not cross the wilderness in darkness. They were a people of the Presence (FHMI- 0001). The Glory went before them. The light of YAHWEH — truth, guidance, revelation (FHMI- 0376) — was over their camp every night for forty years. 53 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS And Nehemiah 9 — the prayer introduced with "And Ezra said" — testifies: "Yet thou in thy manifold mercies forsookest them not in the wilderness: the pillar of the cloud departed not from them by day, to lead them in the way; neither the pillar of fire by night, to shew them light." — Nehemiah 9:19 Now read the end of 2 Esdras 1:14: "...yet have ye forgotten me, saith YAHWEH." They had His light — and forgot Him. They had His wonders — and forgot Him. They had His Presence over their tents — and forgot Him. This is the second time in this chapter YAHWEH has said "forgotten me" (1:6, 1:14). It is becoming the drumbeat of the book: ISRAEL FORGETS. YAHWEH REMEMBERS. 2 ESDRAS 1:15–16 54 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS THE QUAIL — AND "YE TRIUMPHED NOT IN MY NAME" "The quails were as a token to you; I gave you tents for your safeguard: nevertheless ye murmured there." YAHWEH sent quail at evening (Exodus 16:13). Later, when Israel despised the manna and lusted for flesh, He sent quail again — and the place was named Kibroth-hattaavah, the graves of craving (Numbers 11:31–34). The quail were a token — a sign of His provision, and a warning of what murmuring costs. THE CHARGE NO ONE NOTICES Now read verse 16 slowly: "And triumphed not in my name for the destruction of your enemies, but ever to this day do ye yet murmur." What should Israel have done when Pharaoh's army drowned? Triumph in His Name. And for one shining moment, they did: "I will sing unto YAHWEH, for he hath triumphed gloriously: the horse and his rider hath he thrown into the sea... YAHWEH is a man of war: YAHWEH is his name." — Exodus 15:1, 3 That is the Song of Moses — Israel triumphing in the Name. And then — three days later — at the very next stop: 55 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS "And the people murmured against Moses, saying, What shall we drink?" — Exodus 15:24 The Psalmist captured it in two sentences: "Then believed they his words; they sang his praise. They soon forgat his works; they waited not for his counsel." — Psalm 106:12– 13 They sang the Name on Monday and murmured on Thursday. This is why the restoration of the Name matters to this ministry. The Name of YAHWEH is not merely a correct pronunciation. It is the banner of His victories. A people who triumph in His Name remember what He did. A people who forget His Name forget His works — and a people who forget His works will murmur at the first bitter water. This is FHMI-0232 — Echoes of Israel, Part 2: murmuring, complaining, and resistance to authority are why the wilderness generation failed — and that failure was recorded as a warning to end-time Israel. Paul said the same thing: "Neither murmur ye, as some of them also murmured, and were destroyed of the destroyer. Now all these things happened unto them for ensamples: and they are written for our admonition, upon whom the ends of the world are come." — 1 Corinthians 10:10–11 56 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS Murmuring is not a personality flaw. It is a wilderness disease — and Paul says it is written for the last generation. 2 ESDRAS 1:17–18 "IT HAD BEEN BETTER FOR US TO HAVE SERVED THE EGYPTIANS" "Where are the benefits that I have done for you?" Where did all that goodness go in their memory? When they got hungry — gone. When they got thirsty — gone. And then came the most revealing sentence in the passage: "Why hast thou brought us into this wilderness to kill us? it had been better for us to have served the Egyptians, than to die in this wilderness." They said it at the sea (Exodus 14:11–12). They said it over the manna (Exodus 16:3). And at Kadesh they went further: "Let us make a captain, and let us return into Egypt." — Numbers 14:4 57 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS Nehemiah 9:17 records it as the climax of their rebellion: they "appointed a captain to return to their bondage." THEY WERE DELIVERED FROM BONDAGE — AND STARTED REMEMBERING BONDAGE FONDLY. EGYPT GOT OUT OF ISRAEL SLOWLY YAHWEH took Israel out of Egypt in one night. It took forty years to take Egypt out of Israel. This is FHMI-0839: the Exodus represents deliverance from bondage, but the wilderness represents the renewal of the mind. And FHMI- 0176 — Wings in the Desert teaches that the wilderness is YAHWEH's training ground — the place where dependence, trust, and maturity are formed. The wilderness exposes what is still inside you. When the water disappears, what is in the heart comes out. When the bread disappears, what is in the heart comes out. When the road gets hard, what is in the heart comes out. Israel kept mistaking preparation for abandonment. And so the warning to every believer who has come out of Babylon's religion: DO NOT COME OUT OF BABYLON 58 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS AND SPEND YOUR WILDERNESS WISHING YOU WERE BACK. Do not leave a false calendar and then complain that YAHWEH's appointed times are inconvenient. Do not receive the restored Name and then murmur when it costs you friends. Do not ask YAHWEH to bring you out — and then resist every commandment He uses to teach you how to live once you are free. 2 ESDRAS 1:19 "SO YE DID EAT ANGELS' BREAD" "Then had I pity upon your mournings, and gave you manna to eat; so ye did eat angels' bread." That phrase comes straight from the Psalms: "And had rained down manna upon them to eat, and had given them of the corn of heaven. Man did eat angels' food: he sent them meat to the full." — Psalm 78:24–25 Notice what moved YAHWEH: "I had pity upon your mournings." Not their obedience. Not their faith. Their crying. Even their complaining could not dry up His compassion. 59 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS THE BREAD CAME WITH A COMMANDMENT But the manna was never just food. It was a test — and the test was the Sabbath: "...that I may prove them, whether they will walk in my law, or no." — Exodus 16:4 Six days they gathered. On the sixth day, a double portion. On the seventh day — nothing fell (Exodus 16:22–30). And some went out anyway. This is FHMI-0233 and FHMI-0048 — Rosh Chodesh: The Second Month: before Israel ever reached Sinai, YAHWEH was testing them on the Sabbath — in the second month after deliverance, with bread from heaven. Provision did not cancel the Law. Grace did not cancel instruction. The miracle came with a commandment. And Moses explained why: "And he humbled thee, and suffered thee to hunger, and fed thee with manna... that he might make thee know that man doth not live by bread only, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of YAHWEH doth man live." — Deuteronomy 8:3 YAHSHUA quoted that verse when He was tested in His own wilderness (Matthew 4:4) — and later declared Himself the true bread from heaven (John 6:32–35; FHMI-0042 — Bread From Heaven). WHEN THERE WAS NOTHING TO EAT, I FED YOU. 60 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS AND THE BREAD I GAVE YOU CAME WITH MY SABBATH. 2 ESDRAS 1:20 "DID I NOT CLEAVE THE ROCK?" "Behold, I will stand before thee there upon the rock in Horeb; and thou shalt smite the rock, and there shall come water out of it, that the people may drink." — Exodus 17:6 Water from stone. Bread from sky. A road through the sea. YAHWEH is not limited by what you can see. Paul tells us what that rock was: "And did all drink the same spiritual drink: for they drank of that spiritual Rock that followed them: and that Rock was Messiah." — 1 Corinthians 10:4 "I COVERED YOU WITH THE LEAVES OF THE TREES" The end of verse 20 contains a detail you will not find in the Torah: "for the heat I covered you with the leaves of the trees." The Psalmist says YAHWEH "spread a cloud for a covering" (Psalm 105:39). But Esdras speaks of leaves — and that points somewhere wonderful. 61 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS There is one place in the Torah where Israel's wilderness shelter is commemorated with branches of trees: "And ye shall take you on the first day the boughs of goodly trees, branches of palm trees, and the boughs of thick trees... Ye shall dwell in booths seven days... That your generations may know that I made the children of Israel to dwell in booths, when I brought them out of the land of Egypt." — Leviticus 23:40–43 Sukkot. The Feast of Tabernacles. Esdras's picture of Israel sheltered under leaves is the picture YAHWEH commanded Israel to rebuild every year — so that no generation would forget how He covered them. The Feast of Tabernacles is a commanded act of remembering. And Nehemiah 8 records that Ezra restored it — booths of olive, myrtle, and palm on every rooftop in Jerusalem, kept in a way not seen since the days of Joshua (Nehemiah 8:14–17). That is the answer to a forgetful people: YAHWEH built remembering into His calendar. The very feasts the world has abandoned are the feasts YAHWEH gave to keep Israel from forgetting. 2 ESDRAS 1:21 62 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS "WHAT SHALL I YET DO MORE FOR YOU?" "I divided among you a fruitful land... what shall I yet do more for you? saith YAHWEH." The wilderness was never the destination. There was an inheritance waiting. "And thou gavest them kingdoms and nations... So the children went in and possessed the land." — Nehemiah 9:22, 24 And now the lawsuit reaches its verdict — the same verdict as Isaiah's vineyard: "What could have been done more to my vineyard, that I have not done in it?" — Isaiah 5:4 There is no answer. YAHWEH did everything. Bread, water, light, leadership, priesthood, protection, victory, land. BROUGHT OUT — BUT NOT BROUGHT IN This is the hard teaching of FHMI-0240. The Abrahamic covenant stands unconditional — YAHWEH will keep every promise He swore to the fathers. But participation in the inheritance is tied to obedience. Every Israelite who left Egypt was delivered. But of the men twenty years old and upward who came out, only Caleb and Joshua went in (Numbers 14:29–30). 63 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS There is a difference between being brought out and being brought in. YAHWEH brought them out by His power. He would have brought them in by His power. Their murmuring kept them out. THE QUESTION WAS NEVER "DID YAHWEH DELIVER THEM?" THE QUESTION IS "WHAT DID THEY BECOME AFTER HE DID?" 2 ESDRAS 1:22–23 THE TREE IN THE BITTER WATER The lawsuit ends not with judgment, but with one more mercy: "When ye were in the wilderness... being athirst, and blaspheming my name, I gave you not fire for your blasphemies, but cast a tree in the water, and made the river sweet." This is Marah (Exodus 15:23–25). And look where Marah falls: three days after the Song of Moses. Israel had just triumphed in the Name — and now they stood at bitter water, murmuring against it. 64 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS What did YAHWEH do? He did not send fire. He sent a tree. "And he cried unto YAHWEH; and YAHWEH shewed him a tree, which when he had cast into the waters, the waters were made sweet." — Exodus 15:25 Fire was what they deserved. Sweetness was what they received. AND THEN — THE STATUTE But read the very next words in Exodus: "...there he made for them a statute and an ordinance, and there he proved them, And said, If thou wilt diligently hearken to the voice of YAHWEH thy Elohim, and wilt do that which is right in his sight, and wilt give ear to his commandments, and keep all his statutes, I will put none of these diseases upon thee, which I have brought upon the Egyptians: for I am YAHWEH that healeth thee." — Exodus 15:25–26 At Marah — before Sinai — YAHWEH sweetened the water and then gave a statute. Mercy first. Commandment second. Healing tied to obedience. That is the same order we saw in Study One at Exodus 20:2: deliverance before commandment. YAHWEH always gives before He requires. But He always requires after He gives. The tree in the bitter water is YAHWEH's answer to a murmuring people: 65 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS I could have consumed you. I sweetened your water instead. Now hear My voice, keep My statutes — and I will be YAHWEH your Healer. THE GREAT CONTRAST Gather everything YAHWEH says He did in these sixteen verses: I smote Pharaoh. I destroyed your enemies. I opened the sea. I gave you Moses. I gave you Aaron. I gave you light. I gave you quail. I gave you tents. I had pity on your crying. I gave you manna. I split the rock. I covered you from the heat. I gave you a fruitful land. I sweetened your bitter water. 66 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS And Israel's answer, in one word: murmuring. So this passage gives us two memories in collision: YAHWEH REMEMBERS EVERYTHING HE DID FOR ISRAEL. ISRAEL FORGETS EVERYTHING YAHWEH DID FOR THEM. And every time Israel forgot yesterday's deliverance, tomorrow's trial looked impossible. That is why covenant memory is not sentiment. It is survival. Remembering yesterday's sea gives you faith for today's bitter water. Forgetting it gives you fear, complaining, rebellion — and finally, a longing to go back to Egypt. STUDY TWO CONCLUSION The charge of 2 Esdras 1:8–23 is not that YAHWEH failed Israel. It is that Israel forgot YAHWEH. He delivered them — they murmured. He fed them — they murmured. He gave them water — they murmured. He gave them light — they murmured. 67 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS He gave them His Name to triumph in — they murmured. He promised them an inheritance — and they remembered Egypt. And generations later, a priest of the house of Zadok stands in captivity, tears out his hair like Ezra did, and puts the old story back into Israel's ears. Why? BEFORE YAHWEH CAN RESTORE A PEOPLE, HE MUST RESTORE THEIR MEMORY. They must remember who brought them out. They must remember who fed them. They must remember whose Name they triumphed in. They must remember whose Sabbath came with the bread. They must remember who sweetened the water — and what statute He gave beside it. And so the warning of Study Two stands over every believer in this room: NEVER LET THE PAIN OF THE WILDERNESS MAKE YOU FORGET THE MIRACLE OF YOUR EXODUS. 68 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS And never become so uncomfortable in the process of transformation — THAT YOU START MISSING EGYPT. QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION 1.What is a covenant lawsuit? Compare 2 Esdras 1:13 with Micah 6:3–4, and 2 Esdras 1:21 with Isaiah 5:4. 2.Read Nehemiah 8:18–9:21. In what ways does Ezra do what 2 Esdras 1 commands? 3.Compare 2 Esdras 1:8 with Ezra 9:3. Why must a priest grieve before he rebukes? 4.Numbers 14:27 uses the word "murmur." Why does murmuring appear so often in this passage? What does 1 Corinthians 10:10–11 say about who these warnings are for? 5.Read Exodus 15:1–3 and 15:22–24. How many days passed between triumphing in the Name and murmuring at Marah? What does Psalm 106:12–13 say about it? 6.Why did YAHWEH attach a Sabbath test to the manna (Exodus 16:4, 22–30)? What does that teach about grace and commandment? 7.Read Leviticus 23:40–43. How does the Feast of Tabernacles answer the problem of forgetting? 8.What is the difference between being "brought out" and being "brought in"? (Numbers 14:29– 30) 69 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS 9.At Marah, what came first — the sweet water or the statute? (Exodus 15:25–26) Where else have we seen that order? SCRIPTURES FOR FURTHER STUDY Exodus 4:22–23 · Exodus 13:21–22 · Exodus 14:11– 12, 28 · Exodus 15:1–3, 22–26 · Exodus 16:3–4, 13, 22–30 · Exodus 17:6 · Leviticus 23:40–43 · Numbers 11:31–34 · Numbers 14:2–4, 11, 27–30 · Deuteronomy 8:2–3 · Joshua 10:42 · Ezra 9:3 · Nehemiah 8:14–18 · Nehemiah 9:9–25 · Psalm 78:24–25 · Psalm 105:39 · Psalm 106:12–13 · Isaiah 5:1–7 · Micah 1:16 · Micah 6:3–4 · Matthew 4:4 · John 6:32–35 · 1 Corinthians 10:1–11 FHMI TEACHINGS REFERENCED FHMI-0001 — The People of the Presence, Part 1 — Israel identified by the Presence of YAHWEH FHMI-0042 — Bread From Heaven — the manna and YAHSHUA as the bread from heaven FHMI-0048 — Rosh Chodesh: The Second Month — Ziv — the manna, testing, and dependence after deliverance FHMI-0176 — Wings in the Desert / Destined for the Desert — the wilderness as YAHWEH's training ground 70 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS FHMI-0232 — Echoes of Israel, Part 2 — the wilderness generation as a warning to end-time Israel FHMI-0233 — Echoes of Ancient Israel, Part 3 — Israel YAHWEH's firstborn; Egypt and Babylon; the manna and the Sabbath FHMI-0240 — Echoes of Israel, Part 10 — Crisis in the Camp at Kadesh Barnea — Moses the covenant restorer; obedience and the inheritance FHMI-0376 — Revealed Treasures of the Tabernacle, Part 10 — divine light, guidance, and Presence FHMI-0839 — Key 9 — Get Over American Thinking — Torah stories as mind placement; the wilderness as renewal of the mind FHMI-0953 — Parables of the Kingdom: The Potter Wheel — Torah as the Potter's instrument 71 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS STUDY THREE THE PEOPLE THAT SHALL COME 2 Esdras 1:24–40 THE TEXT 24 What shall I do unto thee, O Jacob? thou, Juda, wouldest not obey me: I will turn me to other nations, and unto those will I give my name, that they may keep my statutes. 25 Seeing ye have forsaken me, I will forsake you also; when ye desire me to be gracious unto you, I shall have no mercy upon you. 26 Whensoever ye shall call upon me, I will not hear you: for ye have defiled your hands with blood, and your feet are swift to commit manslaughter. 27 Ye have not as it were forsaken me, but your own selves, saith YAHWEH. 28 Thus saith YAHWEH Almighty, Have I not prayed you as a father his sons, as a mother her daughters, and a nurse her young babes, 29 That ye would be my people, and I should be your Elohim; that ye would be my children, and I should be your father? 30 I gathered you together, as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings: but 72 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS now, what shall I do unto you? I will cast you out from my face. 31 When ye offer unto me, I will turn my face from you: for your solemn feastdays, your new moons, and your circumcisions, have I forsaken. 32 I sent unto you my servants the prophets, whom ye have taken and slain, and torn their bodies in pieces, whose blood I will require of your hands, saith YAHWEH. 33 Thus saith YAHWEH Almighty, Your house is desolate, I will cast you out as the wind doth stubble. 34 And your children shall not be fruitful; for they have despised my commandment, and done the thing that is an evil before me. 35 Your houses will I give to a people that shall come; which not having heard of me yet shall believe me; to whom I have shewed no signs, yet they shall do that I have commanded them. 36 They have seen no prophets, yet they shall call their sins to remembrance, and acknowledge them. 37 I take to witness the grace of the people to come, whose little ones rejoice in gladness: and though they have not seen me with bodily eyes, yet in spirit they believe the thing that I say. 38 And now, brother, behold what glory; and see the people that come from the east: 73 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS 39 Unto whom I will give for leaders, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, Oseas, Amos, and Micheas, Joel, Abdias, and Jonas, 40 Nahum, and Abacuc, Sophonias, Aggeus, Zachary, and Malachy, which is called also an angel of YAHWEH. CENTRAL THEME For twenty-three verses YAHWEH has pleaded with His people. He fed them, led them, sweetened their water, and asked, "What shall I yet do more for you?" Now the pleading ends — and judgment falls. "I will forsake you." "Your house is desolate." "I will cast you out." But read to the end of the chapter. YAHWEH does not close the book on His covenant. He turns to a people that shall come — a people who have never seen a prophet, yet do what He commanded; who carry His Name and keep His statutes; who receive Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob as their fathers and the Prophets of Israel as their leaders. Who keeps YAHWEH's statutes, bears His Name, and calls Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob "father"? ISRAEL — COMING HOME. 74 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS 2 ESDRAS 1:24 "I WILL TURN ME TO OTHER NATIONS" "What shall I do unto thee, O Jacob? thou, Juda, wouldest not obey me..." This is the cry of a Father at the end of His patience. And notice — He names both: Jacob and Juda. The whole house has refused Him. Then the turn: "I will turn me to other nations, and unto those will I give my name, that they may keep my statutes." Read that verse slowly. YAHWEH does not say He will go to the nations to end His Law. He goes to them "that they may keep my statutes." He does not say He will give them a new name. He gives them "my name." Whoever these nations are, they come to YAHWEH's Name and YAHWEH's statutes. The covenant does not change. Only the doorway does. THE PROPHETS SAW THIS COMING Hosea, the prophet to the northern House of Israel, saw it plainly: 75 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS "Then said Elohim, Call his name Lo-ammi: for ye are not my people, and I will not be your Elohim. Yet the number of the children of Israel shall be as the sand of the sea... and it shall come to pass, that in the place where it was said unto them, Ye are not my people, there it shall be said unto them, Ye are the sons of the living Elohim." — Hosea 1:9–10 "...and I will say to them which were not my people, Thou art my people; and they shall say, Thou art my Elohim." — Hosea 2:23 Who became "not My people"? Israel. Ephraim, scattered among the nations, swallowed up until no one could tell them from the Gentiles (Hosea 8:8). And who becomes "My people" again? The same Israel — called back from among the nations. Paul quotes Hosea for exactly this: "Even us, whom he hath called, not of the Jews only, but also of the Gentiles? As he saith also in Osee, I will call them my people, which were not my people." — Romans 9:24– 25 This is FHMI-0956 — The Two Sticks of Ezekiel: the northern tribes were scattered among the nations and lost their identity, and YAHWEH is now calling a remnant of them from among the Gentiles — back to covenant, back to Torah, back to the Name. WHEN YAHWEH TURNS TO THE NATIONS, 76 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS HE IS GOING AFTER HIS SCATTERED SHEEP. 2 ESDRAS 1:25–27 "I WILL FORSAKE YOU ALSO" "Seeing ye have forsaken me, I will forsake you also..." These are hard words. But they are not new words. YAHWEH said the same through Isaiah: "For a small moment have I forsaken thee; but with great mercies will I gather thee. In a little wrath I hid my face from thee for a moment; but with everlasting kindness will I have mercy on thee, saith YAHWEH thy Redeemer." — Isaiah 54:7–8 Forsaken — for a small moment. Gathered — with great mercies. That is the key to this whole passage. YAHWEH's forsaking is real, but it is not final. Paul says the same of Judah: "For I would not, brethren, that ye should be ignorant of this mystery... that blindness in part is happened to Israel, until the fulness of the Gentiles be come in. And so all Israel shall be saved." — Romans 11:25–26 77 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS This is FHMI-0767: Israel's blindness is partial and temporary, and Israel remains "beloved for the fathers' sakes" (Romans 11:28). "YE HAVE NOT FORSAKEN ME, BUT YOUR OWN SELVES" Verse 27 may be the most piercing line in the chapter: "Ye have not as it were forsaken me, but your own selves, saith YAHWEH." When Israel walked away from YAHWEH, YAHWEH did not lose anything. Israel lost itself. Its name. Its identity. Its inheritance. Its very self. "For my people have committed two evils; they have forsaken me the fountain of living waters, and hewed them out cisterns, broken cisterns, that can hold no water." — Jeremiah 2:13 WHEN YOU FORSAKE YAHWEH, YOU ARE THE ONE WHO GETS LOST. 2 ESDRAS 1:28–30 78 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS THE FATHER, THE MOTHER, AND THE HEN Now listen to the tenderness inside the judgment: "Have I not prayed you as a father his sons, as a mother her daughters, and a nurse her young babes, That ye would be my people, and I should be your Elohim..." YAHWEH did not command Israel coldly. He begged them — like a father, like a mother, like a nurse with a baby in her arms. "That ye would be my people, and I should be your Elohim" — this is the covenant formula, the heart of every covenant YAHWEH ever made (Leviticus 26:12; Jeremiah 31:33). It is the very covenant Ezekiel promises to restore to both houses: "Neither shall they defile themselves any more with their idols... so shall they be my people, and I will be their Elohim." — Ezekiel 37:23 "AS A HEN GATHERETH HER CHICKENS" "I gathered you together, as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings..." These are YAHSHUA's own words over Jerusalem: "O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, thou that killest the prophets, and stonest them which are sent unto thee, how often would I have gathered thy children together, even as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings, and ye would not!" — Matthew 23:37 79 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS Esdras puts in YAHWEH's mouth the same grief Messiah wept over the city. The Father who gathered them in the wilderness is the Son who wept over them in Jerusalem. 2 ESDRAS 1:31 "YOUR SOLEMN FEASTDAYS, YOUR NEW MOONS..." "When ye offer unto me, I will turn my face from you: for your solemn feastdays, your new moons, and your circumcisions, have I forsaken." Some will read this verse and say: "See — YAHWEH abolished the feasts!" But notice the word Esdras uses: your feastdays. Your new moons. YAHWEH said the same thing through Isaiah — word for word in spirit: "Bring no more vain oblations... your new moons and your appointed feasts my soul hateth: they are a trouble unto me; I am weary to bear them. And when ye spread forth your hands, I will hide mine eyes from you... your hands are full of blood." — Isaiah 1:13–15 Look at Isaiah 1:15 — "your hands are full of blood." Now look at 2 Esdras 1:26 — "ye have 80 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS defiled your hands with blood." Esdras is preaching Isaiah 1. Did Isaiah abolish the new moons? Read the last chapter of the same book: "And it shall come to pass, that from one new moon to another, and from one sabbath to another, shall all flesh come to worship before me, saith YAHWEH." — Isaiah 66:23 The same prophet who said "your new moons my soul hateth" said that in the Kingdom all flesh will keep the new moons. So what did YAHWEH reject? Not His feasts — their feasts. Not His appointed times — the hollow observance of bloody hands. Feasts kept by a people who had forsaken Him. Circumcision of the flesh without circumcision of the heart (Deuteronomy 10:16; Jeremiah 4:4). YAHWEH NEVER REJECTED HIS APPOINTED TIMES. HE REJECTED HYPOCRISY WEARING THEM AS A COSTUME. And the people that shall come, in verse 35? They do what He commanded. 2 ESDRAS 1:32–34 81 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS "YOUR HOUSE IS DESOLATE" "I sent unto you my servants the prophets, whom ye have taken and slain..." "Your house is desolate, I will cast you out as the wind doth stubble." Again — YAHSHUA's words: "Wherefore, behold, I send unto you prophets, and wise men, and scribes: and some of them ye shall kill... Behold, your house is left unto you desolate." — Matthew 23:34, 38 Jeremiah heard it first: "But if ye will not hear these words, I swear by myself, saith YAHWEH, that this house shall become a desolation." — Jeremiah 22:5 And then a curse no family could bear: "And your children shall not be fruitful; for they have despised my commandment." A covenant people who despise the commandment cannot produce the fruit of the covenant. The seed is still there — but it will not bear. This is FHMI- 0953 — The Potter Wheel: the clay that resists the Potter's commandments becomes marred. 2 ESDRAS 1:35–37 82 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS "A PEOPLE THAT SHALL COME" Now the chapter turns — from judgment to hope. "Your houses will I give to a people that shall come; which not having heard of me yet shall believe me; to whom I have shewed no signs, yet they shall do that I have commanded them." Look at who this people is: They have not heard — yet they believe. They have seen no signs — yet they do what He commanded. They have seen no prophets — yet they call their sins to remembrance and acknowledge them. They have not seen Him with their eyes — yet in spirit they believe. This is a people who keep the commandments without ever having stood at Sinai. A people who repent without ever having heard Jeremiah. A people who believe without ever having seen a miracle. YAHSHUA blessed them: "Blessed are they that have not seen, and yet have believed." — John 20:29 WHO ARE THEY? They are the people Hosea promised: those who were "not My people" — scattered so long among the nations that they never heard the prophets, never saw the signs, never knew their own name 83 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS — and yet, when the Word reaches them, they believe, they repent, and they keep His commandments. That is the description of Revelation's remnant: "Here is the patience of the saints: here are they that keep the commandments of Elohim, and the faith of YAHSHUA." — Revelation 14:12 This is FHMI-0959 — The Remnant Will Return: YAHWEH is calling a remnant — those who respond in faith, repentance, obedience, and covenant return. "WHOSE LITTLE ONES REJOICE IN GLADNESS" And notice what verse 37 says of their children: "whose little ones rejoice in gladness." Compare verse 34: "your children shall not be fruitful." The house that despised the commandment loses its children. The people who keep the commandment rejoice with theirs. That is the covenant blessing of Deuteronomy 28:4 — "Blessed shall be the fruit of thy body." 2 ESDRAS 1:38 84 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS "THE PEOPLE THAT COME FROM THE EAST" "And now, brother, behold what glory; and see the people that come from the east." The prophets saw Israel's scattered seed coming home from every direction: "Fear not: for I am with thee: I will bring thy seed from the east, and gather thee from the west; I will say to the north, Give up; and to the south, Keep not back: bring my sons from far, and my daughters from the ends of the earth." — Isaiah 43:5–6 Where were the ten tribes carried? East — to Assyria, to "the cities of the Medes" (2 Kings 17:6), beyond the Euphrates. Esdras, captive in the land of the Medes, is told to look east — and behold a people coming in glory. And YAHSHUA said where they are going: "And I say unto you, That many shall come from the east and west, and shall sit down with Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob, in the kingdom of heaven." — Matthew 8:11 2 ESDRAS 1:39–40 85 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS THEIR LEADERS: THE FATHERS AND THE PROPHETS Here is the verse that settles who this people is: "Unto whom I will give for leaders, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, Oseas, Amos, and Micheas, Joel, Abdias, and Jonas, Nahum, and Abacuc, Sophonias, Aggeus, Zachary, and Malachy..." Read the list again. First — Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. The fathers of Israel. Then — twelve prophets. The Twelve Prophets of Israel's own Scripture: Hosea, Amos, Micah, Joel, Obadiah, Jonah, Nahum, Habakkuk, Zephaniah, Haggai, Zechariah, and Malachi. Twelve prophets. Twelve tribes. A people who are given Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob as their fathers are not a replacement for Israel. They are Israel — returning to their fathers. And who stands at the head of the prophets? Hosea — the prophet sent to the northern House of Israel, the prophet of Lo-ammi and Ammi, the prophet who promised that "not My people" would become "sons of the living Elohim." And who stands at the end? Malachi — whose last words are the promise of Elijah: "Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and dreadful 86 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS day of YAHWEH: And he shall turn the heart of the fathers to the children, and the heart of the children to their fathers." — Malachi 4:5–6 Esdras calls Malachi "an angel of YAHWEH" — because his very name means "My messenger." So the people that shall come are led from Hosea to Malachi — from the promise that the lost would be called sons, to the promise that Elijah would turn the children back to their fathers. THE PEOPLE THAT SHALL COME ARE THE CHILDREN TURNING BACK TO THEIR FATHERS. STUDY THREE CONCLUSION The Father pleaded. The house refused. "I will forsake you." "Your house is desolate." "Your feasts I have forsaken." But YAHWEH's covenant did not die in that desolate house. He turned — and the doorway opened toward the east. A people came who had never heard the prophets, yet believed. 87 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS Who had never seen a sign, yet did what He commanded. Who received His Name and kept His statutes. Who called their sins to remembrance and acknowledged them. Whose little ones rejoiced. Whose leaders were Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob — and the Twelve Prophets of Israel, from Hosea to Malachi. That is not a new people replacing Israel. THAT IS LO-AMMI BECOMING AMMI. THAT IS THE LOST HOUSE COMING HOME. YAHWEH forsook His people "for a small moment." But with great mercies, He will gather them. QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION 1.In 2 Esdras 1:24, what two things does YAHWEH give the "other nations"? What does that tell us about the covenant He brings them into? 2.Read Hosea 1:9–10 and Romans 9:24–26. Who were "not My people," and who will be called "sons of the living Elohim"? 88 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS 3.Compare 2 Esdras 1:25 with Isaiah 54:7–8. How long does YAHWEH forsake His people? 4.What does 2 Esdras 1:27 mean when it says Israel forsook "your own selves"? 5.Compare 2 Esdras 1:26, 31 with Isaiah 1:13– 15 and 66:23. Did YAHWEH reject His feasts, or something else? 6.Compare 2 Esdras 1:30, 32–33 with Matthew 23:34–38. Whose words is Esdras echoing? 7.List everything verses 35–37 say about "the people that shall come." How does this compare with Revelation 14:12? 8.Why is it significant that the people from the east are given Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob and the Twelve Prophets as their leaders? Why does the list begin with Hosea and end with Malachi? SCRIPTURES FOR FURTHER STUDY Leviticus 26:12 · Deuteronomy 10:16 · Deuteronomy 28:4 · 2 Kings 17:6 · Isaiah 1:13–15 · Isaiah 43:5–6 · Isaiah 54:7–8 · Isaiah 66:23 · Jeremiah 2:13 · Jeremiah 4:4 · Jeremiah 22:5 · Jeremiah 31:33 · Ezekiel 37:15–28 · Hosea 1:9–10 · Hosea 2:23 · Hosea 8:8 · Malachi 4:5–6 · Matthew 8:11 · Matthew 23:34–38 · John 20:29 · Romans 9:24–26 · Romans 11:25–28 · Revelation 14:12 89 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS FHMI TEACHINGS REFERENCED FHMI-0767 — Romans 11:25–32 — Israel's blindness partial and temporary; beloved for the fathers' sakes FHMI-0953 — Parables of the Kingdom: The Potter Wheel — the clay marred by resisting the commandments FHMI-0956 — Parables of the Kingdom: The Two Sticks of Ezekiel — scattered Israel called from among the Gentiles and reunited FHMI-0959 — Fallen Angels / Rising Sons: The Remnant Will Return — the called remnant of Israel 90 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS STUDY FOUR THE MOTHER WHO LOST HER CHILDREN Widowhood, Scattering, and the Embrace of Restoration 2 Esdras 2:1–17 THE TEXT 1 Thus saith YAHWEH, I brought this people out of bondage, and I gave them my commandments by menservants the prophets; whom they would not hear, but despised my counsels. 2 The mother that bare them saith unto them, Go your way, ye children; for I am a widow and forsaken. 3 I brought you up with gladness; but with sorrow and heaviness have I lost you: for ye have sinned before YAHWEH your Elohim, and done that thing that is evil before him. 4 But what shall I now do unto you? I am a widow and forsaken: go your way, O my children, and ask mercy of YAHWEH. 91 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS 5 As for me, O father, I call upon thee for a witness over the mother of these children, which would not keep my covenant, 6 That thou bring them to confusion, and their mother to a spoil, that there may be no offspring of them. 7 Let them be scattered abroad among the heathen, let their names be put out of the earth: for they have despised my covenant. 8 Woe be unto thee, Assur, thou that hidest the unrighteous in thee! O thou wicked people, remember what I did unto Sodom and Gomorrha; 9 Whose land lieth in clods of pitch and heaps of ashes: even so also will I do unto them that hear me not, saith YAHWEH Almighty. 10 Thus saith YAHWEH unto Esdras, Tell my people that I will give them the kingdom of Jerusalem, which I would have given unto Israel. 11 Their glory also will I take unto me, and give these the everlasting tabernacles, which I had prepared for them. 12 They shall have the tree of life for an ointment of sweet savour; they shall neither labour, nor be weary. 13 Go, and ye shall receive: pray for few days unto you, that they may be shortened: the kingdom is already prepared for you: watch. 92 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS 14 Take heaven and earth to witness; for I have broken the evil in pieces, and created the good: for I live, saith YAHWEH. 15 Mother, embrace thy children, and bring them up with gladness, make their feet as fast as a pillar: for I have chosen thee, saith YAHWEH. 16 And those that be dead will I raise up again from their places, and bring them out of the graves: for I have known my name in Israel. 17 Fear not, thou mother of the children: for I have chosen thee, saith YAHWEH. CENTRAL THEME Chapter 1 spoke of YAHWEH's people. Chapter 2 speaks of YAHWEH's family. There is a Father. There is a Mother. There are children. The mother is a widow. The children are gone — scattered among the heathen, their names put out of the earth. But the chapter does not end at the empty house. It ends with YAHWEH saying: "MOTHER, EMBRACE THY CHILDREN." "FEAR NOT... I HAVE CHOSEN THEE." 93 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS The story of this chapter is the story of the whole Bible: MOTHER → REBELLION → LOST CHILDREN → SCATTERING → KINGDOM → RESURRECTION → THE FAMILY RESTORED 2 ESDRAS 2:1 "I BROUGHT THIS PEOPLE OUT OF BONDAGE" The chapter opens where Study Two left us: "I brought this people out of bondage, and I gave them my commandments by menservants the prophets; whom they would not hear, but despised my counsels." YAHWEH spoke. The prophets spoke. The commandments were given. The people refused to hear. "Since the day that your fathers came forth out of the land of Egypt unto this day I have even sent unto you all my servants the prophets, daily rising up early and sending them: Yet they hearkened not unto me." — Jeremiah 7:25–26 This is FHMI-0953 — The Potter Wheel: YAHWEH formed Israel through His commandments, statutes, and judgments — and Israel resisted the Potter's hands. 94 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS YAHWEH did not bring Israel out of Pharaoh's government so they could be lawless. He brought them out of Pharaoh's government into His own. DELIVERANCE AND OBEDIENCE BELONG TOGETHER. 2 ESDRAS 2:2–4 "I AM A WIDOW AND FORSAKEN" Now the picture changes. A mother speaks: "Go your way, ye children; for I am a widow and forsaken. I brought you up with gladness; but with sorrow and heaviness have I lost you." Who is this mother? The Prophets tell us. She is Jerusalem — Zion — the covenant mother of Israel's children: "How doth the city sit solitary, that was full of people! how is she become as a widow!" — Lamentations 1:1 "But Zion said, YAHWEH hath forsaken me... I have lost my children, and am desolate, a captive, and removing to and fro." — Isaiah 49:14, 21 95 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS THE SAME MOTHER SPEAKS IN BARUCH The Apocrypha gives us this very scene in Baruch chapter 4. There Jerusalem speaks as a widow who raised her children with joy, sent them away weeping into captivity because they turned from the Law, and was left desolate. She tells her children to take courage and call upon YAHWEH, who will deliver them — and she hopes to receive them back with joy forever. "Be of good cheer, O my children, cry unto YAHWEH." — Baruch 4:21 Baruch and Esdras sing the same song. The mother sends her children away — but she sends them toward YAHWEH: "go your way, O my children, and ask mercy of YAHWEH" (2:4). THE MOTHER IS THE COVENANT COMMUNITY This is FHMI-0856 — A Full Explanation of the New Jerusalem: Jerusalem is a covenant woman. Paul says the Jerusalem above "is the mother of us all" (Galatians 4:26) — the true mother of the children of promise. And FHMI-0611 — Book of Isaiah, Part 1 teaches that a believer can have YAHWEH as Father and still be shaped by the wrong religious mother. The "mother" is the covenant environment that forms the children. Here the children belong to YAHWEH — but their mother has become bereaved, forsaken, and desolate. 96 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS WHY WERE THEY LOST? "...for ye have sinned before YAHWEH your Elohim, and done that thing that is evil before him." The children were not lost because YAHWEH changed. They were lost because they sinned. And yet even in her grief, the mother does not curse them away. She tells them where to go: "ASK MERCY OF YAHWEH." 2 ESDRAS 2:5–7 "LET THEM BE SCATTERED ABROAD AMONG THE HEATHEN" Now Esdras calls the Father as witness against a mother "which would not keep my covenant." Father. Mother. Children. Covenant. This is marriage language — and marriage is covenant (FHMI-0139 — Divorce & Remarriage). YAHWEH Himself gave the northern House of Israel a bill of divorcement: "And I saw, when for all the causes whereby backsliding Israel committed adultery I had put her away, and given her a bill of divorce; yet her treacherous sister Judah feared not." — Jeremiah 3:8 97 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS Then the sentence falls: "Let them be scattered abroad among the heathen, let their names be put out of the earth: for they have despised my covenant." THE SCATTERING AND THE LOST NAME This is the heart of the Two-House message. FHMI-0944 — Tracking the Tribes, Part 1 teaches that after Solomon's kingdom divided, the northern House of Israel was carried away by Assyria — and did not cease to exist, but was scattered and lost awareness of its identity. FHMI-0946 — Tracking the Tribes, Part 3 teaches that scattered Israel would lose its national name, receive other names, and live among the nations without knowing who it was. Now read 2 Esdras 2:7 again: Scattered among the heathen. Their names put out of the earth. Moses said it would happen: "And YAHWEH shall scatter thee among all people, from the one end of the earth even unto the other." — Deuteronomy 28:64 Hosea said it had happened: "Israel is swallowed up: now shall they be among the Gentiles as a vessel wherein is no pleasure." — Hosea 8:8 98 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS LOST TO THEMSELVES — NEVER LOST TO YAHWEH Israel did not stop being Israel because Israel forgot it was Israel. They lost their name. They lost their Sabbath. They lost their appointed times. They lost their genealogy. But YAHWEH did not lose them: "For, lo, I will command, and I will sift the house of Israel among all nations, like as corn is sifted in a sieve, yet shall not the least grain fall upon the earth." — Amos 9:9 THEIR NAME WAS LOST TO THEM. THEIR NAME WAS NEVER LOST TO YAHWEH. 2 ESDRAS 2:8–9 "WOE BE UNTO THEE, ASSUR" Suddenly the prophecy names an empire: "Woe be unto thee, Assur, thou that hidest the unrighteous in thee!" 99 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS Assur is Assyria — the empire that carried away the northern House of Israel (2 Kings 17:6). Remember the two captivities: JUDAH → BABYLON ISRAEL (EPHRAIM) → ASSYRIA Esdras speaks from Judah's captivity under the Medes and Persians — and his prophecy reaches back to the House of Israel in Assyria. Both houses are now in view. THE ROD OF YAHWEH IS JUDGED TOO YAHWEH used Assyria to discipline Israel — but Assyria was not innocent: "O Assyrian, the rod of mine anger... I will punish the fruit of the stout heart of the king of Assyria." — Isaiah 10:5, 12 And Esdras warns Assur with Sodom and Gomorrah, "whose land lieth in clods of pitch and heaps of ashes" — the very words of Moses: "...the whole land thereof is brimstone, and salt, and burning... like the overthrow of Sodom, and Gomorrah." — Deuteronomy 29:23 THE EMPIRE YAHWEH USED TO SCATTER ISRAEL WILL ANSWER TO YAHWEH FOR IT. 100 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS 2 ESDRAS 2:10–11 "I WILL GIVE THEM THE KINGDOM OF JERUSALEM" Now the great turn: "Tell my people that I will give them the kingdom of Jerusalem, which I would have given unto Israel." Notice who receives the Kingdom: my people. The people who hear (2:9 warned "them that hear me not"). This is the same people we met in Study Three — the people that shall come, who "do that I have commanded them." The Kingdom was always intended for Israel. But the generation that despised the covenant would not participate in it. This is FHMI-0240 — Crisis in the Camp at Kadesh Barnea: the covenant purpose stands, but a rebellious generation can fail to enter the inheritance prepared for it — just as the wilderness generation was delivered from Egypt and never entered the land. YAHSHUA said it to His little flock: "Fear not, little flock; for it is your Father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom." — Luke 12:32 101 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS "THE KINGDOM OF JERUSALEM" IS A PEOPLE UNDER GOVERNMENT FHMI-0856 teaches that New Jerusalem is not merely a giant city of gold. When the angel said, "Come hither, I will shew thee the bride," he showed John the holy Jerusalem (Revelation 21:9–10). New Jerusalem is the Bride — a restored, governed, commandment-keeping people. THE KINGDOM OF JERUSALEM IS IDENTITY + GOVERNMENT + KINGDOM. "THE EVERLASTING TABERNACLES" "...and give these the everlasting tabernacles, which I had prepared for them." Remember Study Two: YAHWEH covered Israel in the wilderness, and commanded them to dwell in booths every year at the Feast of Tabernacles so they would never forget (Leviticus 23:42–43). Now He promises everlasting tabernacles — the booth that never comes down: "Behold, the tabernacle of Elohim is with men, and he will dwell with them, and they shall be his people, and Elohim himself shall be with them, and be their Elohim." — Revelation 21:3 This is FHMI-0001 — The People of the Presence: YAHWEH's purpose has always been to dwell among His people. 102 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS EVERY SUKKOT IS A REHEARSAL FOR THE EVERLASTING TABERNACLES. 2 ESDRAS 2:12 "THEY SHALL HAVE THE TREE OF LIFE" "They shall have the tree of life for an ointment of sweet savour; they shall neither labour, nor be weary." Israel was scattered because they despised the commandments. Now, in restoration, they receive the Tree of Life. FHMI-0404 teaches that the Tree of Knowledge is human reasoning independent of YAHWEH — while the Tree of Life is intimate covenant relationship through YAHWEH's Word. FHMI-0412 draws the line plainly: TREE OF LIFE = OBEDIENCE / TORAH TREE OF KNOWLEDGE = REBELLION And FHMI-0861 — The Upward Journey connects the Tree of Life with YAHWEH's Word, Torah, YAHSHUA, the Spirit, and the obedient life. 103 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS Solomon said it of wisdom — of Torah itself: "She is a tree of life to them that lay hold upon her: and happy is every one that retaineth her." — Proverbs 3:18 And the last chapter of the Bible tells us who eats from it: "Blessed are they that do his commandments, that they may have right to the tree of life, and may enter in through the gates into the city." — Revelation 22:14 The story moves from despising the commandments to receiving life again. "NEITHER LABOUR, NOR BE WEARY" The scattered children worked under foreign masters. The restored children enter rest: "They shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk, and not faint." — Isaiah 40:31 2 ESDRAS 2:13–14 "THE KINGDOM IS ALREADY PREPARED FOR YOU: WATCH" "Go, and ye shall receive: pray for few days unto you, that they may be shortened: the kingdom is already prepared for you: watch." 104 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS YAHSHUA spoke the same three things — shortened days, a prepared Kingdom, and a command to watch: "And except those days should be shortened, there should no flesh be saved: but for the elect's sake those days shall be shortened." — Matthew 24:22 "Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world." — Matthew 25:34 "Watch therefore: for ye know not what hour your Master doth come." — Matthew 24:42 This is FHMI-0113 — Timeline of the Kingdom: the final crisis grows so intense that unless the days were shortened, no flesh would survive — and then the Kingdom of YAHWEH is established. The restoration has a destination. It is not merely knowing which tribe you came from. THE DESTINATION IS THE KINGDOM. "I HAVE BROKEN THE EVIL IN PIECES" "Take heaven and earth to witness; for I have broken the evil in pieces, and created the good: for I live, saith YAHWEH." Moses called the same witnesses: "I call heaven and earth to record this day against you, that I have set before you life and death" (Deuteronomy 30:19). 105 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS Babylon is not permanent. Assyria is not permanent. The kingdoms of men are not permanent. "...the Elohim of heaven set up a kingdom, which shall never be destroyed... it shall break in pieces and consume all these kingdoms, and it shall stand for ever." — Daniel 2:44 YAHWEH'S KINGDOM IS. 2 ESDRAS 2:15 "MOTHER, EMBRACE THY CHILDREN" Now hear the change. At the beginning of the chapter, the mother said: "I have lost you." Now YAHWEH says: "Mother, embrace thy children, and bring them up with gladness, make their feet as fast as a pillar: for I have chosen thee, saith YAHWEH." The children who were lost are coming home. Isaiah saw this very moment — the bereaved mother lifting her eyes to find her children gathering to her: 106 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS "Lift up thine eyes round about, and behold: all these gather themselves together, and come to thee... Then shalt thou say in thine heart, Who hath begotten me these, seeing I have lost my children, and am desolate, a captive...? and who hath brought up these?" — Isaiah 49:18, 21 She thought her children were gone forever. She does not even recognize them when they come home — they have been among the nations so long. That is the House of Israel. Coming back from the nations, carrying other names, raised in other houses — and the mother asks, "Who hath begotten me these?" And Isaiah 54 — the chapter Paul applies to the Jerusalem above — answers the widow: "Sing, O barren... for more are the children of the desolate than the children of the married wife, saith YAHWEH... Fear not... thou shalt not remember the reproach of thy widowhood any more. For thy Maker is thine husband; YAHWEH of hosts is his name." — Isaiah 54:1, 4–5 THE OLD WOMAN AND THE RESTORED WOMAN This is FHMI-0082 — Did God Die to Remarry Israel? The old covenant condition dies through Messiah, so that a new creation can emerge: New Israel, New Jerusalem, the Bride prepared for YAHSHUA. 107 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS This is not replacement theology — FHMI-0082 rejects that plainly. The restored woman is Israel made new. Same covenant identity. New condition. Earlier: the mother is a widow, and she has lost her children. Now: "Mother, embrace thy children... for I have chosen thee." THE COVENANT FAMILY IS RESTORED. 2 ESDRAS 2:16 "THOSE THAT BE DEAD WILL I RAISE UP AGAIN" Restoration reaches past the nations. It reaches past the centuries. It reaches into the grave. "And those that be dead will I raise up again from their places, and bring them out of the graves: for I have known my name in Israel." Turn to Ezekiel 37: "Behold, O my people, I will open your graves, and cause you to come up out of your graves, and bring you into the land of Israel. And ye shall know that I am YAHWEH." — Ezekiel 37:12–13 108 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS And what comes immediately after the valley of dry bones? The two sticks — Judah and Joseph, joined into one in YAHWEH's hand (Ezekiel 37:15–22; FHMI-0956). Opened graves. Two houses made one. Ezekiel puts them side by side — and so does Esdras. FHMI-0103 — The Blessed Hope teaches the first resurrection — the transformation of the faithful into Messiah's likeness to rule in His Kingdom. FHMI-0161 — The Last Great Day teaches that resurrection continues in its order, through the Last Great Day. DEATH DOES NOT DEFEAT YAHWEH'S RESTORATION PLAN. "I HAVE KNOWN MY NAME IN ISRAEL" And look how the verse ends: "for I have known my name in Israel." Why will YAHWEH raise the dead of Israel? Because His Name is on them. "So will I make my holy name known in the midst of my people Israel; and I will not let them pollute my holy name any more." — Ezekiel 39:7 This is FHMI-0070 — The Mystery of Israel: YAHWEH is calling a people for His Name. And FHMI-0243 — The Days of Elijah, Part 2 teaches that the Elijah ministry restores the Name of YAHWEH to Israel. Resurrection. The Name. Israel. All in one verse. 109 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS 2 ESDRAS 2:17 "FEAR NOT... I HAVE CHOSEN THEE" "Fear not, thou mother of the children: for I have chosen thee, saith YAHWEH." The mother who was widowed, forsaken, bereaved, and scattered hears the words of election: "But thou, Israel, art my servant, Jacob whom I have chosen, the seed of Abraham my friend... Fear thou not; for I am with thee." — Isaiah 41:8, 10 Judgment is not the final word. Scattering is not the final word. Widowhood is not the final word. Death is not the final word. RESTORATION IS. STUDY FOUR CONCLUSION 2 Esdras 2 begins in an empty house. 110 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS The mother is a widow. The children are gone. The covenant is broken. The people are scattered among the heathen, and their names are put out of the earth. But the chapter refuses to end there. The empire that scattered them is judged. The Kingdom is prepared. The everlasting tabernacles are waiting. The Tree of Life returns. The days are shortened. The graves are opened. And YAHWEH says to the widow: "MOTHER, EMBRACE THY CHILDREN." The mother who said, "I have lost my children," will lift up her eyes and say, "Who hath begotten me these?" — as the lost House of Israel comes home from the nations, carrying names she does not recognize. YAHWEH'S JUDGMENT MAY SCATTER THE FAMILY — BUT HIS COVENANT PURPOSE IS TO RESTORE IT. And the people whose names disappeared among the nations will discover: YAHWEH NEVER FORGOT THEIR NAME. 111 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION 1.Who is the "mother" of 2 Esdras 2? Compare Lamentations 1:1, Isaiah 49:14–21, and Galatians 4:26. 2.Read Baruch 4:9–23. How does Baruch's widow-mother compare with the mother in 2 Esdras 2:2–4? 3.In her grief, where does the mother send her children (2:4)? What does that teach us? 4.Compare 2 Esdras 2:7 with Deuteronomy 28:64, Hosea 8:8, and Amos 9:9. Were the scattered tribes lost to YAHWEH? 5.Why is it significant that 2 Esdras 2:8 names Assur? Which house did Assyria carry away? 6.How does the promise of "everlasting tabernacles" (2:11) connect to the Feast of Tabernacles and Revelation 21:3? 7.According to Proverbs 3:18 and Revelation 22:14, who has the right to the Tree of Life? 8.Compare 2 Esdras 2:15 with Isaiah 49:18–21. Why does the mother not recognize her own children? 9.Read Ezekiel 37:12–22. What follows the opening of the graves? How does 2 Esdras 2:16 echo it? 112 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS SCRIPTURES FOR FURTHER STUDY Leviticus 23:42–43 · Deuteronomy 28:64 · Deuteronomy 29:23 · Deuteronomy 30:19 · 2 Kings 17:6 · Proverbs 3:18 · Isaiah 10:5–12 · Isaiah 40:31 · Isaiah 41:8–10 · Isaiah 49:14–22 · Isaiah 54:1–8 · Jeremiah 3:8 · Jeremiah 7:25–26 · Lamentations 1:1 · Ezekiel 37:12–22 · Ezekiel 39:7 · Daniel 2:44 · Hosea 8:8 · Amos 9:9 · Baruch 4:9–23 · Matthew 24:22, 42 · Matthew 25:34 · Luke 12:32 · Galatians 4:26–27 · Revelation 21:3, 9–10 · Revelation 22:2, 14 FHMI TEACHINGS REFERENCED FHMI-0001 — The People of the Presence, Part 1 — YAHWEH's purpose to dwell among His people FHMI-0070 — The Mystery of Israel — a people called for His Name FHMI-0082 — Did God Die to Remarry Israel? — the old covenant woman and the restored woman FHMI-0103 — The Blessed Hope, Part 3 — the first resurrection FHMI-0113 — Timeline of the Kingdom, Part 1 — the shortened days and the Kingdom FHMI-0139 — Divorce & Remarriage — marriage as covenant FHMI-0161 — The Last Great Day Message — The 8th Day — resurrection in its order 113 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS FHMI-0240 — Echoes of Israel, Part 10 — the inheritance and the rebellious generation FHMI-0243 — The Days of Elijah, Part 2 — restoring the Name of YAHWEH FHMI-0404 — Revealed Treasures of the Tabernacle, Part 19 — the Tree of Life and the Tree of Knowledge FHMI-0412 — Revealed Treasures of the Tabernacle, Part 27 — Tree of Life as obedience FHMI-0611 — Book of Isaiah, Part 1 — the right Father and the wrong mother FHMI-0856 — And They Sang a New Song, Part 14 — New Jerusalem, the true mother and the Bride FHMI-0861 — The Upward Journey — restored to the true tree FHMI-0944 — Tracking the Tribes, Part 1 — the Two Houses and the Assyrian captivity FHMI-0946 — Tracking the Tribes, Part 3 — the loss of the name FHMI-0953 — Parables of the Kingdom: The Potter Wheel — Israel formed by the commandments FHMI-0956 — Parables of the Kingdom: The Two Sticks of Ezekiel — Judah and Joseph made one 114 THE FORGOTTEN BOOKS · 2 ESDRAS COMING NEXT — STUDY FIVE 2 Esdras 2:18–32 YAHWEH answers the widow-mother with help: "For thy help I will send my servants Esay and Jeremy" — and shows her twelve trees laden with fruit and seven mighty mountains crowned with roses and lilies, where her children will rejoice. Then He gives the mother her charge: defend the widow, judge for the fatherless, clothe the naked, and keep her children until He comes. © First Harvest Ministries International · P.O. Box 2757, Bay St. Louis, MS 39521 · HisComingKingdom.com 115