Introduction

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James 1:1 James, a servant of Elohim, and of the Master Yahusha Ha Moshiach, to the twelve tribes which are of the Dispersion, greeting.

Author: ‘Iakōbos’ – ‘Jacobus’- ‘Yaakov’ – ‘Iakōbos’ ‘Jacobus’‘Jacomus’ ‘James’.
Location: Jerusalem
Audience: to a Hebrew hellenized audience. Theme: addressing persecution.

‘adulteresses’ in 4:4
40 allusions from the Tanakh and 4 direct quotes.

Object: the object of the book is not the unpacking of Christology or theology but to force meditation and reflection within.

The focus is not creed by conduct, not belief, but behavior, not doctrine, but deed! –

Practical living for the pragmatic priesthood!

Language is very Septuagintal.

Acts 8:1 And Shaul was approving of Tzephanyah’s death. And at that time there was a great persecution against the congregation of Yisrael at Yahrushalayim; and they were all scattered abroad throughout the regions of Yahudah and Shomron, except the shlichim.

Acts 11:19 Now they who were scattered abroad upon the persecution that arose over Tzephanyah traveled as far as Phoenicia, and Cyprus, and Antioch,

Date: at least mid-first century.

Clement knows and uses James which again rules out the second century – it can’t date after 90 in this case.

Yaakov was martyred in in 62CE
The book doesn’t contain any of the later first century developed doctrines of the New Testament found in Peter and Paul’s epistles. So, now that brings us to somewhere between 45-50

Earlier at 34-35 based upon the ‘uncooked’ message that the Septuagintal Greek conveys.

The downplaying of James in Christian tradition James is the head, the ‘Episcopate’ of the Jerusalem assembly

Favoring Paul: The tendency of the Institutionalized Church is to favor the Pauline letters, and what’s regarded as their ‘heavy theology’ rather than the more ‘primitive’ sayings of James.

Popularity: The book was very popular, however with the Eastern Fathers, particularly in Alexandria with the first commentary being written by Didymus the Blind (313-98) in Alexandria.

We can tell this by the Greek structural rhythm and rhyme and James’s penchant for alliteration and wordplay. When we become aware of these rhetorical devices in the Greek it becomes nearly impossible to imagine this homily as a translation from Aramaic or Hebrew.

The death of James: Josephus records James’ death between the reigns of two Roman procurators in Judea. In 61CE Festus took office but died (Acts) in 62CE Albinus was dispatched to Judea. In the ‘gap’ between the two procurators the High Priest Ananus, son of Annas (the same Annas who was involved in the trial with Yahusha) was unleashed without Roman controls! He accused Yaakov of violating the law (Yaacov taught the Book of the Covenant division upholding the Maki-Tzedik) he ordered him stoned. Josephus then goes on to attribute the destruction of the Temple and Jerusalem to this historical day – the martyrdom of Yaakov.

Heggisippus and Eusebius give more detail and state how at James’s arrest Ananus presented him with an option.

The ‘Temple Wall Affair’ which led directly to the death of Yaakov!

The life of James:

Heggisippus wrote, ‘He drank neither wine nor fermented liquors, and abstained from animal food. A razor never came upon his head, he never anointed with oil, and never used a (public) bath…..He was in the habit of entering the temple alone, and was often found upon his bended knees, and interceding for the forgiveness of the people, so that his knees became as hard as camels, in consequence of his habitual supplication and kneeling before Elohim’.

Later, he was venerated as the first ‘bishop’ of Jerusalem and was given the title ‘tzaddik’ ‘the righteous’ or ‘the just’ because his faithfulness to the law and constancy in prayer.

Heggesippus portrays Yaacov as a zealot associated with the Ebionites, who regarded Paul with disfavor and extolled Yaakov as the true heir to Yahusha’s teaching.

Yaakov’s election to the ‘Episcopate.’
This is the missing history of Yaakov, Yaakov the undisputed successor to Yahusha and ‘the Bishop of Bishops’ or ‘Archbishop’ ‘Archapostles’ ‘Pillar’ of the community of saints!

‘Yaakov Tzadik’ – ‘James the Just’ – the zealot leader! Yaakov was embraced as the ‘Teacher of Righteousness’ attested to in the DSS to the post resurrection generation!

The election of Yaakov as leader of the early assembly that’s missing from Scripture as we have it, is the real event behind the election of the Twelfth Apostle (Matthias) to succeed Judas the Assassin-‘Yahudah Sicarrii’ or ‘Judas Iscariot’ in his office as ‘Episcopate.’

Yaakov, not Paul or Peter as the successor to Yahusha: ( it’s always been about hijacking the order of the priesthood, and we’re having to deal with it in our modern era). Yaakov’s position as successor to Yahusha appears in numerous accounts of early Church literature before the Council of Nicea. Clement of Alexandria, Hegesippus as conserved in Eusebius, the Pseudoclementines and the Gospel of Thomas.

Gospel of Thomas, ‘After you have gone who will be great over us?’ Yahusha answers, ‘In the place where you are to go, go to James the Just for whose sakes Heaven and Earth came into existence.’ (Gs. Th 12)

Eusebius, Ecclesiastical History: ‘James, who was surnamed the Just by the Forefathers on account of his superlative virtue, was the first to have been elected to the Office of Bishop of the Jerusalem Church.’

‘Peter, James and John after the Ascension of the Savior , did not contend for the Glory, even though they had previously been honored by the Savior, but elected James the Just as Bishop of Jerusalem.’ (Hypo-typo-ses)

Clement then adds that the election was by the Principal Three.

Eusebius acknowledges the two Jameses: ‘Now there were two Jameses, one called the Righteous One, who was cast down form the Pinnacle of the Temple and beaten to death with a laundryman’s club, and the other, who was beheaded.’

Epiphanius reigns on the parade of those who would say that the Melchizedek priesthood is limited to heaven not open to you on earth:

‘The First to whom the Lord entrusted his Throne upon the earth.’ – the mantle or ‘throne’ of the Melchizedek Priesthood is entrusted on earth!

Yaakov was in the ‘Kingly’ line – seated in Jerusalem. The head of the Seventy – the Jerusalem assembly!

This presents something the Institutionalized Church has buried for Millenia – the direct appointment of James – not Peter, as successor to his half-brother Yahusha!

‘Sacred history’ wants us to believe that the Romans burnt down and destroyed the Temple in 70CE. But ‘historical truth’ informs us by way of Josephus………

…. it was the corrupt Levitical priesthood under Ananus that set fire to the Temple- and inside job rather than let it fall into the hands of followers of the recently martyred Yaakov – the true priesthood!

The Levites set fire and destroyed the temple rather than step aside and allow the 20,000 Malki Tzedik zealots heralding Yahusha as King and High Priest take over after passions erupted after the death of Yaakov at the temple steps! It’s recorded that Titus did everything in his power to quench the flames.

The fall of the temple was directly connected to the killing of Yaakov the Tzadik! Josephus writes, ‘the Jews were even burning down their own Temple and then jumping into the flames.’ (War 2.425-9)

The parallels with the death of Yahusha and the destruction of the Temple

Titus destroyed Jerusalem but the Temple was burnt against the consent of Caesar
• Just as Yahusha was destroyed against the consent of the Roman Governor!

Yahusha is the Temple – And who was it who wanted to destroy Yahusha – the Jews, and as the prophet Jeremiah declared, they desired to burn down the very tree with His body nailed to it – just as they did with the Temple!

Hebrews 12:2 says the tree was even to be reckoned a shame! Had it not been for Joseph of Arithamea Yeshua would of been burnt up along with the tree.

Jeremiah 11:19 But I was like a lamb, or an ox that is brought to the slaughter; and I knew not that they had devised devices against me, saying, Let us destroy the eytz (of execution) with the fruit of it, (Yahusha hanging on it) and let us cut him off from the land of the living, that his name may be no more remembered.

The Jews believing Yahusha as cursed wanted to cleanse the land before Passover. How do you cleanse the land: Possessions or things touched by the accursed were to be burnt (Golden calf) (Achan), so the tree of punishment was itself to be burnt along with the accursed (Joshua 7:15) the authorities full-well planed to burn Yahusha’s body upon the tree!

Over 20,000 believers were amassing under the leadership of Yaakov who was recognized as the ‘Perfectly Holy and Righteous ‘Just One’ in the Temple. Over 20,000 people under one party opposing the Herodian/Roman establishment from the more violent and extreme to the less so, ranged! Yaakov functioned as ‘Bishop’ and Priest of this opposition alliance to the NWO!

In Qumran they would have known of Yaakov as ‘the Mebakker’ or ‘Overseer’ and Priest commanding ‘the Many’ – the role accorded the Teacher of Righteousness in the DSS!

Naassene: To Hippolytus the group always connected with Yaakov, what we know as the priesthood of Yahusha, led later by Yaakov were the Naassenes – a combination of Nazarenes and Essenes – the priesthood of the Malki-Tzedik (Hippolytus 5:1, 10:5). So there’s your answer taken right from the pages of history! What are you????? Are you Jewish? Are you Jehovah Witness are you Christian???? No you’re a NAASSENE!

Nazarene: It’s uncertain where the term Nazarene even came from, was it relating to whether Yahusha came from a place in Galilee called ‘Nazareth’ which is never mentioned in either the works of Jospehus or the Old Testament or whether, like Yaakov, he followed a Nazarite lifestyle or was a ‘Nazrene’ or ‘Nazorean’, which have totally different connotations. Be that as it may, I’m a ‘Naassene’ and I’m home!

Higher and lower clergy: The Jerusalem priesthood consisted of a sacerdotal aristocracy, where the priests were divided by a higher clergy and a lower clergy. The lower clergy had been antagonized by the upper clergy, by depriving them of their tithes which was their only source of income (the meek, the poor, those of the way).

Because of this action the lower clergy became zadokite-zealot sympathizers, some fled to the damascus (Qumran) and joined forces with the zadokite zealots, others joined the Jerusalem assembly (Acts 6:7).

James the brother of Yeshua had heavily influenced the lower priesthood and you can hear it in his writings, The Epistle of James is characterized by it’s sympathy for the poor and animosity against the rich and influential who were entrenched with the higher order and Roman NWO.

The final months before the siege (70CE): The lower priesthood stopped the daily sacrifice after being influenced by the ‘Righteous Teacher’ (Yaakov) and Zadokite zealots, at this time the practice was so far removed from even the BoL because the higher priesthood weren’t offering sacrifices to יהוה the daily sacrifices were being offered on behalf of the emperor and the Roman people – The NWO!