TRAVELING back in history - before the time of Hadrian, Constantine, and the many church fathers - we find that the Messiah's first followers were actually not known as Christians, but Nazarenes, because they followed YAHSHUA, the Messiah from Nazareth.

Matthew 2:23. And (Joseph) came and dwelt in Nazareth - thus to fulfil what was spoken of the prophets, "He shall be called a Nazarene."

'Nazarene' comes from the Hebrew word, NATSAR, which means "to guard, watch, protect, keep, or preserve".⁽¹⁾ Nazareth was situated on high ground and was a good outlook point or watch post to guard against attack. With this meaning of NATSAR in mind, the prophet Jeremiah said:

Jeremiah 31:6. "There shall be a day when the WATCHMEN (or in Hebrew, NATSARIM or Nazarenes) cry on the mountains of Ephraim (possibly the seven hills of Rome), saying, 'Arise, and let us go up to Zion, (and return) to YAHWEH our Elohim."

The Nazarenes also guarded or observed the Torah (YAHWEH's instruction), as we see in the following verses.

Psalm 25:10. All the paths of YAHWEH (YAHWEH) are favor and truth, to those who GUARD (or NATSAR) his covenant and His witnesses.

Psalm 78:7. [They] place their trust in Elohim, and do not forget the works of El, but WATCH (or NATSAR) over His commands.

Psalm 104:44. YAHWEH gave them the lands of the gentiles, and they inherited the labor of peoples, [45] in order that they might GUARD (or NATSAR) His laws, and WATCH over his instructions. Praise YAH!

Nazareth hence means 'watchtower' and Nazarenes are by extension 'watchmen', but YAHSHUA's being a Nazarene also fulfills the prophecies of Isaiah and Zechariah, where a slightly different Hebrew word, NETSER,⁽²⁾ is used. According to the International Standard Bible Encyclopedia, NETSER is "of the same Hebrew root....as Nazareth"⁽³⁾ and is spelled the same in the original Hebrew, where there are no written vowels. The change of vowels in Isaiah 11:1 and Zechariah 6:12 forms the Messianic title, 'Branch', and the phrase, "He shall be called a Nazarene" in Matthew 2:23 is a reference to these two passages, but not a direct quote. Instead, Matthew utilizes a form of SODE or spiritual interpretation, just as scholars do through the E.L.S. (or "equidistant letter sequencing") Bible codes today, and reveals the intricate relationship between the Hebrew words, NATSAR (or Nazarene) and NETSER (or Branch)⁽⁴⁾, showing that YAHSHUA fulfills both Messianic titles.

Besides being "watchmen", the Nazarenes were also "branches" (see John 15:5) or followers of the great Branch which grew from David's root, as prophesied would happen many centuries before. This is exactly what the apostle Shaul (or Paul) was talking about when he referred to being grafted into the olive tree in Romans 11:17-19,24-26! He was talking about Nazarenes!

A rarer meaning of NATSAR is "to be kept secret or be hidden"⁽⁵⁾, which we find in the book of Isaiah.

Isaiah 48:1. Hear this, O house of Jacob, who are called by the name of Israel, and have come from the waters of Judah, who swear by the Name of YAHWEH (YAHWEH), and profess the Elohim (or Deity) of Israel - though not in truth and righteousness.

In this verse YAHWEH is speaking to the House of Jacob, or the entirety of Israel; the traditional religions of Judaism and Christianity who profess to know the Almighty, but deny Him through their actions. YAHWEH tells us in this verse that it is all lip service, and then continues.

[Verse 6] You have heard, look at them all, and do you not declare it? From now on I shall make you hear renewed ones, even HIDDEN ONES (and in the original Hebrew this word is NATSARIM or Nazarenes), which you have not known.

That the original followers of YAHSHUA actually went by this title is well documented by the church fathers and historians themselves. Epiphanius, for example, provides us with a detailed description of the Nazarenes, from whence his opinion of them is clear.

"These sectarians (he writes) did not call themselves Christians - but 'Nazarenes,'... They use not only the New Testament but the Old Testament as well... They have no different ideas, but confess everything exactly as the Law proclaims it, and in the Jewish fashion, except for their belief in Messiah, if you please! For they acknowledge both the resurrection of the dead and the divine creation of all things, and declare that Elohim is one, and that his son is YAHSHUA the Messiah.....They are different from the Jews, and different from Christians, only in the following: They disagree with Jews because they have come to faith in Messiah; but since they are still fettered by the Law--circumcision, the Sabbath, and the rest--they are not in accord with Christians."⁽⁶⁾

Although still considering the Nazarenes to be heretics to Christianity, the early Church father, M. Simons, confesses that they (and not the Christians), represent the original apostolic faith.

"[Nazarenes] (he writes) are characterized essentially by their tenacious attachment to Jewish observances. If they became heretics in the eyes of the Mother Church (sic), it is simply because they remained fixed on outmoded positions. They well represent, though Epiphanius is energetically refusing to admit it, the very direct descendants of the primitive community, of which our author knows that it was designated by the Jews by the same name, of 'Nazarenes.'"⁽⁷⁾

Jerome, meanwhile, summarizes them accurately yet simply as those:"...who accept Messiah in such a way that they do not cease to observe the old Law."⁽⁸⁾

The ranks of the Nazarenes were composed of both Jews and Gentiles who believed that YAHSHUA was the promised Messiah. They obeyed YAHWEH's Law (or Torah) because they knew that "the law is holy, and the commandment is holy, just and good" (Romans 7:12). The Nazarenes accepted YAHSHUA's atoning offering for sin and because there was no Christian religion in existence yet, they did not meet in churches with sexual symbols (steeples or "pillars of jealousy")⁽⁹⁾ on the roofs, but in homes, at times among the gentiles and at times in the synagogues with the Jews.

Paul (Shaul in Hebrew) also was not a Christian, which means that he had to be something else, and mind you, it was not their founder! Although Paul was at first an enemy of the Nazarenes, he actually became a prominent figure among them after his encounter with the blinding light from heaven. Yes, Paul was actually of the sect of the Nazarenes (see Acts 24:5); a man of Pharisaic background (see Acts. 23:6) and learned under Gamaliel, the grandson of Hillel (see Acts 22:3), which means that he was also very Jewish. If we just get out of our heads all the mixed up stories that we have been told about Paul, and read what he wrote for what he said, we find that he would roll over in his grave if he knew how he had been stereotyped today. Kepha (or Peter) tells us that Shaul's writings are "hard to understand" (2 Peter 3:15-16). This is because Shaul was a deep thinker and studier of the Torah, and to the fleshly mind, this appears as foolishness. Even Shaul knew that his teachings were being twisted and that he was misunderstood as teaching against the Torah (see Romans 3:8 and 6:1-2,15), and went to great lengths to prove that this was not true (see Acts 21:20-26). The truth is that the same anti-law and anti-Semitic theology which everyone is trying to shove down Paul's throat is what caused a blond haired, blue eyed, European to murder six-million Jews scarcely more than a half century ago. That is what we get when we try to interpret Shaul's writings as "pro-Christian" and "anti-law" instead of Nazarene! But before we get into that, we'd better ask the question:

WHAT HAPPENED TO THE NAZARENES?

How did Christianity replace the original faith?

It actually happened in numerous ways, but one of the most influential was that Emperor Constantine (of whom we have made mention before) initiated his process of forced conform.

"Constantine, who was also an anti-Semite (like Emperor Hadrian, the Gnostics: Marcion and Manes, and many others) called the council of Nicea in 325 C.E. to standardize Christianity. Nazarenes were excluded from the meeting. Jewish practices were banned. For the first time Gentile Christianity officially labeled the Nazarenes as apostates. From this time forward Nazarenes began to be listed in the catalogs of apostate movements, the first of which was Epiphanius' 'Panarion' around 370 C.E."⁽¹⁰⁾

Along with Christianity's separation from the Hebraic faith came its detachment from the New Testament's Hebraic originals, as they were replaced by numerous (and oftentimes conflicting) translations into Greek. In this manner, the millions of prospective converts to Greco-Roman Christianity could feel right at home and never have to hear a "Hebraic sounding" YAHWEH Creator, YAHSHUA Messiah, or passages of the Torah resounding in their ears. Much worse, however, is that the characteristics of Zeus, Tammuz and nineteen other pagan deities - all supposedly born on December 25^th - had begun to shine forth from a drastically reformed messiah by the time that satan's stage -- just like a giant mousetrap -- had been fully set and baited with cheese. In chapter one we read about Constantine's "venerable day of the sun" and how the Messiah was remolded to fit in with the pagan sun deities such as Apollo and Tammuz. Needless to say, "many other such things did they", and when all was complete, lo and behold, "the whole world wandered after the beast" (Revelation 13:3). In the middle of satan's trap was a handsome actor with a love-everybody personality, mystical expression, hippie hair style, and sun-ring nimbus around his head, who fit remarkably into the pagan's system of beliefs. By the time Constantine was done, most would have never guessed what he started out with, because the end result was.... well, SO DIFFERENT. The only ones who knew were the Nazarenes who had been in the midst of the reformation, and it was with them in mind that Constantine issued the following edict:

"For as much then as it is no longer possible to bear with your pernicious errors, we give warning by this present statute that none of you henceforth presume to assemble yourselves together. We have directed accordingly that you be deprived of all the houses in which you are accustomed to hold your assemblies: and forbid the holding of your superstitious and senseless Sabbath meetings, not in public merely, but in any private house or place whatsoever.... Take the far better course of entering the Catholic church.... We have commanded...that you be positively deprived of every gathering point for your superstitious meetings, I mean all the houses of prayer...and that they be made over without delay to the Catholic Church; that any other places be confiscated to the public service, and NO FACILITY WHATEVER BE LEFT FOR ANY FUTURE GATHERINGS, in order that from this day forward, none of your unlawful assemblies may presume to appear in any public or private place."⁽¹¹⁾

Indeed, anyone adhering to the Almighty's Law instead of Constantine's religion in honor of the "venerable sun"did so on pain of death. It was truly a case of being murdered for your faith.

"After Constantine began the systematic enforcement of compliance with Roman theology in 325 CE, the remnants of the [Nazarenes] were in large part forced to flee the bounds of the Roman empire into the mountains of Armenia, and later into the Balkan areas of Europe. They were few in number, utterly lacking in prestige or wealth and labeled as enemies of the state by a supposedly Christian Roman empire.... There would be times when [YAHWEH] would raise up faithful leaders to revitalize His people and do some sort of work that had public visibility, at least in localized areas. There were other times when [YAHWEH's people] continued to exist in such scattered obscurity that they were visible only to [Him]. Nevertheless, (the Nazarenes) never died out..."⁽¹²⁾

HARBINGERS OF THE HOLOCAUST

Notwithstanding all that Constantine and his contemporaries had done, the most violent attacks on the true faith have actually occurred at the bloody hands of the Church. An outstanding example of such is found in the homilies of John Chrysostom, one of the most beloved and admired men in church history, who said that the Jews were "the odious assassins of Christ and for killing God there is no expiation possible, no indulgence or pardon. Christians may never cease vengeance, and the Jews must live in servitude forever. God always hated the Jews. It is incumbent upon all Christians to hate the Jews."⁽¹³⁾

His reasons for these sentiments were as follows: a classic example of circular theology:

"I hate the Jews because they violate the Law. I hate the synagogue because it has the Law and the prophets. It is the duty of all Christians to hate the Jews."⁽¹⁴⁾

Even more horrific, however, was his statement that because the Jews rejected Messiah, they deserve to be killed. Like other obstinate animals, he said, the Jews "are fit for killing. And this is what happened to the Jews: while they were making themselves unfit for work, they grew fit for slaughter."⁽¹⁵⁾

"Oh my G-d" you say, That sounds remarkably like Adolph Hitler! That's because Hitler merely followed suit with those before him, and within Adolph Hitler dwelt the very soul of the church fathers and Constantine himself! "I am convinced that I am acting as the agent of our Almighty Creator", he wrote in Mein Kampf, and repeated these words in a 1938 address to the Nazi Reichstag. "By fighting the Jews, I am doing the Lord's work." Likewise he informed General Gerhart Engel in 1941, "I am now as before a Catholic and will always remain so."

What is really horrible, however, is that this same evil soul dwelt in Martin Luther, whom we have all loved and adored as the "father of the reformation"! Consider the following anti-Semitic sentiments which he harbored (and vocalized) against the Jews, and then decide for yourself what he reformed.

"The rabbis should be forbidden to continue teaching the law.

"Therefore be on your guard against the Jews, knowing that wherever they have their synagogues, nothing is found but a den of devils in which sheer self-glory, conceit, lies, blasphemy, and defaming of God and men are practiced most maliciously.

"In brief, dear princes and lords, those of you who have Jews under your rule -- if my counsel does not please you, find better advice, so that you and we all can be rid of the unbearable, devilish burden of the Jews, lest we become guilty sharers before God in the lies, blasphemy, the defamation, and the curses which the mad Jews indulge in so freely and wantonly against the person of our Lord Jesus Christ, his dear mother, all Christians, all authority, and ourselves. Do not grant them protection, safe conduct, or communion with us... With this faithful counsel and warning I wish to cleanse and exonerate my conscience.

"Accordingly, it must and dare not be considered a trifling matter but a most serious one to seek counsel against this and to save our souls from the Jews, that is, from the devil and from eternal death. My advice, as I said earlier, is: First, that their synagogues be burned down, and that all who are able to toss sulphur and pitch; it would be good if someone could also throw in some hell fire.... Second, that all their books -- their prayer books, their Talmudic writings, also the entire Bible -- be taken from them, not leaving them one leaf, and that these may be preserved for those who may be converted... Third, that they be forbidden on pain of death to praise God, to give thanks, to pray, and to teach publicly among us and in our country... Fourth, that they be forbidden to utter the Name of God within our hearing. For we cannot with a good conscience listen to this or tolerate it..."⁽¹⁶⁾

"For, as we have heard, God's anger with them is so intense that gentle mercy will only tend to make them worse and worse, while sharp mercy will reform them but little. Therefore, in any case, away with them!"⁽¹⁷⁾

During the Nuremberg trials, Julius Streicher, one of Hitler's top henchmen and publisher of the anti-Semitic Der Sturmer, was asked whether there were any other anti-Semitic publications in Germany, to which he replied:

"Dr. Martin Luther would very probably sit in my place in the defendants' dock today, if this book had been taken into consideration by the Prosecution. In the book 'The Jews and Their Lies,' Dr. Martin Luther writes that the Jews are a serpent's brood and one should burn down their synagogues and destroy them..."⁽¹⁸⁾

Indeed, Nazism followed in Luther's wake.

"It is widely alleged that Martin Luther made a statement near the end of his life that 'The only good Jew is a dead Jew' and it is further alleged that this statement was a major factor in the complicity of many German Christians in the Holocaust. It is not possible to absolutely say whether Luther said this, but there are Jews who believe he said it. That is enough for them to clearly believe that Jesus Christ could never be Messiah.... Again, there is much, much more. Most of the...doctrine of the Christian church and most of the rites are pagan. Most even moderately informed Jews know this."⁽¹⁹⁾

What very few people know, however, is that in the course of the Holocaust, over one-quarter million MESSIANIC Jews-- NAZARENE BELIEVERS IN YAHSHUA THE MESSIAH, were also slain.⁽²⁰⁾ Prior to Vatican II (1962-1965), which offered non-Catholics the possibility of "salvation by following their 'lesser light'", Catholicism's official stance was that of "no salus extra ecclesia" or "no salvation outside the Catholic church." Roman Catholic film director, Mel Gibson, who along with his Jesuit advisors made millions producing the film, The Passion Of The Christ, recently affirmed his belief that if you are not a Catholic you cannot be saved.⁽²¹⁾ Indeed, this is the official doctrine of the Jesuits, also known as the "Society Of Jesus", whose extreme oath of induction is on record in Paris and the Congressional Record of the United States of America as printed below:

"I _______, now in the presence of Almighty God, the Blessed Virgin Mary, the Blessed Michael the Archangel, the Blessed St. John the Baptist, the Holy Apostles, Peter and Paul, and all the Saints, sacred hosts of Heaven, and to you, my ghostly Father, the Superior General of the Society of Jesus, founded by St. Ignatius Loyola in the Pontification of Paul the Third, and continued to the present, do by the womb of the virgin, the matrix of God, and the rod of Jesus Christ, declare and swear that his holiness, the Pope, is Christ's Vice-regent, and is the true and only head of the Catholic or Universal Church throughout the earth; and that by the virtue of the keys of binding and loosing, given to his Holiness by my Savior, Jesus Christ, he hath power to depose heretical kings, princes, states, commonwealths and governments, all being illegal without his sacred confirmation, and that they may be safely destroyed.

"I do further declare, that I will help and assist and advise all or any of his Holiness' agents in any place wherever I shall be, and do my utmost to extirpate the heretical Protestant or Liberal doctrines and to destroy all their pretended powers, legal or otherwise.

"I do further promise and declare that notwithstanding, I am dispensed with to assume any religion heretical, for the propagating of the Mother Church's interest, to keep secret and private all her agents' counsels, from time to time as they may instruct me, and not to divulge directly or indirectly, by word, writing, or circumstances whatever; but to execute all that shall be proposed given in charge or discovered unto me, by you, my ghostly father....

"I do further promise and declare that I will have no opinion or will of my own, or any mental reservation whatever, even as a corpse or cadaver but unhesitatingly obey each and every command that I may receive from my superiors in the Militia of the Pope and Jesus Christ.

"That I will go to any part of the world, whatsoever, without murmuring and will be submissive in all things whatsoever communicated to me.... I do further promise and declare, that I will, when opportunity presents, make and wage relentless war, secretly or openly, against all heretics: Protestants and Liberals, as I am directed to do to extirpate and exterminate them from the face of the whole earth, and that I will spare neither sex, age, nor condition, and that I will hang, waste, boil, flay, strangle and bury alive these infamous heretics; rip up the stomachs and wombs of their women and crush their infants heads against the wall, in order to annihilate forever their execrable race.

"That when the same cannot be done openly, I will secretly use the poison cup, the strangulation cord, the steel of the poniard, or the leaden bullet, regardless of the honor, rank, dignity or authority of the person or persons whatsoever may be their condition in life, either public or private, as I at any time may be directed so to do by any agent of the Pope or superior of the Brotherhood of the Holy Faith of the Society of Jesus." ⁽²²⁾

This is the official position of the Jesuits, the secret society of Catholicism, and a bloodthirsty religion which follows an entity named "Jesus" and a "ghostly father"--the Luciferian Jesuit General, also known as the "black pope". Despite any positions set forth in Vatican II or statements made by John Paul II, the fact remains that the General of the Jesuits mandates the orders and occasions the death of the Jews, Nazarenes, true Protestants (those who are truly opposed to the idolatry and perverted doctrines propagated by Catholicism), and whoever else does not submit to the agenda of Rome.⁽²³⁾

Revelation 13:15. And he had power to...cause that as many as would not worship...the beast should be killed.

"It is extremely sobering to sit down with a well informed Jew and ask them to tell you why Jesus cannot be the Messiah and why the Christian faith CANNOT be what it claims to be. Ask that question and then keep silent for two or three hours and listen to what you are told. Don't argue JUST LISTEN, you will be SHOCKED!....."⁽²⁴⁾

As a matter of fact, you will be so shocked that I do not actually recommend that you do it, at least not before you read this book and perhaps a few more like it! Why? Because many others have already done just that, and before you know it, what they heard makes so much sense to them that they begin to believe that Judaism is the true religion and that the Messiah is yet to come. At times throughout this book, you may actually feel as though I am a Jew, and you have asked me the question and must now endure my couple hundred page response. For the record, I am not a Jew any more than I am a Christian, neither am I an atheist or an agnostic! What am I then? -you ask- A Muslim?!!! Hardly. I know what I believe and have a personal relationship with the Mighty One of Heaven and earth who sent His Anointed One, His Messiah, to offer the atonement offering for the sins of the repentant seeker of truth. I am one such seeker of truth who has received the call to come out of Babylon (the corrupted religions of the world) and walk in the path of life which our Messiah commanded us to follow 2,000 years ago. This being the case, I am not asking you to convert to Judaism anymore than I am asking you to remain in traditional Christianity. If you had to choose between the Christians and Jews, I admit that it would be a tough call to say where you'd be better off. The Good News though is that your choices are NOT the Jewish rabbis versus the Catholic priests and Christian pastors because none of these will get you headed true north!!! Now comes the news which most people don't want to hear: YOU MUST INSTEAD CHOOSE BETWEEN THE MAN OF SIN AND THE REAL MESSIAH.

In comparing the two, I'm really not asking that much; only which of the two you more closely represent, and which one you really want to follow and know. Yes, it's a hard saying when we have been steeped in Catholicism/Constantinism and her various Christian offshoots for all these years, but of your two choices, which is better and which is worse? That is a question to which the answer is quite obvious, and Scripture promises that "You shall know the truth and the truth shall make you free" (John 8:32). You see, YAHWEH didn't give us a multiple choice of A, B or C. Instead He said, "I have called the heavens and the earth as witnesses today against you: I have set before you life and death, the blessing and the curse. Therefore YOU SHALL CHOOSE LIFE, so that both you and your seed may live" (Deuteronomy 30:19). The truth is that I could fill this book full of horror stories about Hadrian, Constantine, and their successors, and I could use up a horrendous amount of time doing it! The other side of the coin is that YAHWEH did not give us John Chrysostom, Martin Luther, or any of the other church fathers and "reformers" as a basis for what we do or do not believe. Instead, He gave us the Scriptures, and if we open them starting at the beginning and study them the whole way through, we won't need to know about all of the evils which have been committed by the Jesuits and the Papacy, because in their place, YAHWEH will reveal to us the original faith as upheld by the apostles and the Messiah, and we can just follow HIS example and throw out the rest.

In short, Scripture and history both reveal that the Messiah was born a Jew with a Hebrew name who perfectly obeyed the Father's will, as recorded in the first five books of Scripture. The Messiah himself taught that "salvation is of the Jews" (John 4:22), and while this in no wise means that you must become "Jewish" in order to be saved, it does mean that the true faith is found in the lineage and lifestyle of the Hebrew people. The Hebrew people are Israel; all twelve tribes, and the Messiah came to "seek the lost sheep of the house of Israel" (Matthew 15:24), being the tribes which are still assimilated in the nations of the diaspora. Today the true nation of renewed Israel is returning from the exile as millions of people around the world make what is known as aliyah or a return to the ancient paths set forth in the pages of the inspired Word.

Jeremiah 18:15. Because my people have forgotten me, they have burned incense to vanity, and they have caused them to stumble in their ways from the ancient paths, to walk in paths, in a way not cast up.

Most of this stumbling from the ancient paths has to do with a misunderstanding concerning the One whom the world knows as Jesus. The real Messiah of Nazareth did not have a Greek name, He did He convert half of Judaism to a new religion called Christianity, and He did not teach the traditions which we find in the Churches. To the contrary, He rebuked them saying, "It is expedient for us to fulfill all righteousness" (Matthew 3:15); "For I am not come to destroy, but to fulfill (or fill full or obey completely)" (Matthew 5:17). "For if ye fulfill the royal Law according to the Scripture (Note that the 'Old Testament' was the only 'Scripture' extant at this point), ye do well: but if ye... commit sin, ye are convinced of the law as transgressors" (James 2:8,9). "Howbeit in vain do they worship Me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men. For laying aside the commandment of the Almighty, ye hold the tradition of men... And He said unto them, 'Full well ye reject the commandment of the Almighty, that ye may keep your own tradition.... Making the word of the Almighty of none effect through your tradition, which ye have delivered: and many such like things ye do.'" (Mark 7:7-9,13)

Who then nailed the law to the cross? The Roman Church affirms that they, and not the Real Messiah, did that; initiating the change of times and Law (see Daniel 7:25) which has been evolving for almost two-thousand years; ever since the real Messiah was here, and which the real Messiah warned us against (see Matthew 24:15 and Mark 13:14). That which attempts to override and replace the Almighty's Anointed is what both the apostles and Biblical scholars identify as "antimessiah" or "antichrist"; that is, a counterfeit which promotes a distortion of the original gospel (see Galations 1:6,7).

2 Thessalonians 2:3. "Let no man deceive you by any means: for that day shall not come, except there come a falling away first, and that man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition.... [7] For the mystery of iniquity doth already work."

The adversary has indeed worked a dastardly distortion of the real Messiah and the true message which the Scriptures teach. Now the call of the Almighty is ringing clear; a call to "Come out of her, my people, lest you share in her sins, and lest you receive of her plagues" (Revelation 18:4a). The Real Messiah has come, He was eventually forgotten, and so far as humanity is concerned, He has now been "replaced". The inhabitants of the earth have married the daughter of a strange god (see Malachi 2:11). It is time to return to the One we have so greatly revolted against (see Isaiah 31:6).