Exposing the underbelly of Armstrongism in all of its wacky glory! Nothing you read here is made up. What you read here is the up to date face of Herbert W Armstrong's legacy. It's the gritty and dirty behind the scenes look at Armstrongism as you have never seen it before!
With all the new crazy self-appointed Chief Overseers, Apostles, Prophets, Pharisees, legalists, and outright liars leading various Churches of God today, it is important to hold these agents of deception accountable.
Herbert Armstrong's Tangled Web of Corrupt Leaders
In the twenty-third chapter of the Gospel of Matthew, we read that Jesus Christ made absolutely no attempt to spare the feelings of the religious leaders of his day in terms of what he had to say about them. In fact, he was quite blunt in his assessment of them. Of course, he knew that he wouldn't hurt anyone's feelings anyway! He knew that instead of eliciting sorrow or remorse, that his comments would engender anger and bitterness in them. "How dare this common, uneducated upstart challenge us?"
This is of particular interest when we consider just how prickly some of our modern Christian ministers/pastors are about any criticism of them or their ministries. Some of these folks absolutely flip when anyone dares to challenge one of God's servants (meaning them). Like the scribes/Pharisees/Sadducees before them, they believe that their critics are deserving of the severest censure/scorn and/or the Lake of Fire!
When I think about some of the pastors that I've known during my lifetime, Christ's criticisms of the religious leaders of his day are more meaningful to me. Christ said that they didn't practice what they preached. He said that they loved the honor and respect that were shown to them more than the joy of serving others. Christ called them hypocrites and said that they were an impediment to people entering God's Kingdom. He went on to say that they loved to win a convert and then often proceeded to make them even more reprehensible than they were themselves! Christ questioned their judgment and enjoined them to focus on the things that were really important (justice, mercy, faithfulness). In short, he wanted them to be less concerned about appearances and more concerned with the reality of their own greed and self-interest. Any of that sound familiar?
I am currently on vacation through the Southwest and spent a couple days in Monument Valley. I booked a half-day tour several months ago through one of the local guides. Today when I arrived for the tour it was just two of us and we set off.
He shared stories of life as a Navajo Indian. Then things got interesting He said his grandmother got hooked into the Seventh Day Adventist Church decades ago and it basically destroyed her relationship with other family members. Relationships in the family are central to the Navajo. people. The arrogant minter demanded that she ignore everything she had grown up with as a Navajo and devote her life ito sabbath keeping, vegatarianism and preparing for the end times.
The guide said that the Navajo do not focus upon the end times and find it insulting to the Creator that they have to worry about it.
I mentioned to him that I grew up in a splinter group of Aventistism called Armstrongism. He had heard of it. He said it was equally offensives to them as a people. There were some ensnared in it for a while.
It is interesting to see how far the tentacles of Armstrongism reached and how in 2019 it has virtually disappeared.
“When the Most High gave the nations their inheritance, when he divided all mankind, he set up boundaries for the peoples according to the number of the sons of Israel.”
"This was interpreted by Blackwell to mean that God organized the nations in order to allocate them to the oversight of the “sons of Israel.” This was not just a transient, temporal plan but would extend into eternity.
The problem is, this scripture does not say that. It instead refers not to the “sons of Israel” but to the “sons of god.” The full passage speaks of “El” and “Yahweh” and the “sons of god.” The nations were to be parceled out by El to the “sons of god” and Yahweh was to receive Jacob’s descendants from El as his portion in this process. The Masoretic translators altered this to read “the sons of Israel” to expunge anything that would seem to even hint at polytheism (see Michael S. Heiser, “Deuteronomy 32:8 and the Sons of God” and also Peter Enns’ interview with Mark Smith entitled “Who is Yahweh and Where Did Yahweh Come From?” both available on the web.) Heiser concludes:
“In light of the evidence there exists no textual or theological justification for preferring the Masoretic reading of verse 8. That verse should read "sons of God," not "sons of Israel."
This reference to other divine beings as “sons of god” should not alarm Armstrongists. Ron Dart preached a sermon that included this topic back in the Seventies."
In April of 2011 this same enigmatic scripture came to my attention with all its implications. Biblical scholars have always wondered how this scripture ever made the cut and was included in the Book of Deuteronomy. I would think the implications of other divine beings as the "sons of god" or as others translate it, "to the number of the gods" which is that classic "uni-plural" Elohim HWA always got wrong.
"An interesting and surprisingly blunt admission of this multiplicity of gods is found inDeut. 32:8-9
“When the Most High (Elyon) apportioned the nations, when he divided human kind, he fixed the boundaries of his peoples according TO THE NUMBER OF THE GODS. (Elohim). The Lord’s (YHVH a lesser god than Elyon) own portion was his people, Jacob his allotted share.”
Here we have a rare and somewhat embarrassing admission that there was a god even higher than YHVH. The Most High was Elyon who had the authority to divvy up the nations between the other lesser gods. In this account YHVH is a lesser god who was placed over the limited geographical area inhabited by Jacob. This is why it was always well understood that the power of the god diminished the further away from its allotted land. If they strayed too far, they qualified as “foreign gods,” which we all know were powerless in the new areas and definitely false. You know, “My God is the true god, and …well…your’s is the Satan, or lesser and powerless god around here. “
So we learn that YHVH and YHVH Elohim may have several implications. This can mean that YHVH is the god over a band of lesser gods or that YHVH is a god that comes from a class of gods known as Elohim."
The implications of this scripture when correctly translated are:
1. Polytheism and the belief in many other real gods was a common view held by the people of Israel as well as the surrounding nations.
2. El, who was originally the supreme Canaanite God was co-opted by the Israelites as their own Supreme God with all the associated traits. "El" was a common suffix in the language. Isra-el, Dani-el, Beth-el, Immanu-el, etc)
3. In time, El, evolved into YHVH with all the previous associated traits of El. This is how the Priests of Israel and writers of the Pentateuch work such transformations in print. YHVH also took on the powers of Baal. (The Original Weather God Bob)
"I revealed myself to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob as Ēl Shaddāi, but was not known to them by my name, YHVH."
4. In time, YHVH was more commonly understood in the English world as "The Lord"
5. In a bit more time, "The Lord" evolved into Jesus of the New Testament.
The literary evolution of God from the Canaanite EL and his Counsel of the gods, or the "US" of "Let us make man in our image..." etc, where YHVH was a lesser god just appointed over Israel (Chemosh over the Moabites and "The Satan" or Lucifer as a lesser god, with YHVH, in the Council as well becoming the bad boy, should be disturbing enough to the COG membership and ministry. Add to this YHVH usurping EL as now supreme, becoming "The Lord" of their Bibles and ultimately Jesus should give them pause for thought on just how this all evolved from the common polytheism of Israel where the other gods were very real to monotheism and Jesus.
How Trinitarian Christianity is monotheistic is another muddle the explanations for which also evolved over the past 2000 years to accommodate the problems caused by the concept.
When "the Lord thy God", already as YHVH replacing El said, "You shall have no other gods before me, for I the Lord YOUR God am a jealous God," He wasn't kidding.
It is better rendered "You shall not bring any other gods (and there were plenty considered real and powerful in their own appointed territory) into my presence, for (BECAUSE) I, the Lord YOUR God am a jealous God." Understood as such makes much more sense as to why the other gods were not welcome and eventually had to be ousted in the minds of the people, to this day. YHVH had a jealous streak.
I believe this reality of scripture and the actual beliefs of "the Chosen People" should indeed bother Armstrongists as well as a whole lot of other folk.
A more complete discussion of this enigmatic scripture and the realities of this evolution and transformation of the gods in the scriptures can be found here:
