15. Samek | Paleo Hebrew Alphabet | The Word Selah, Animal Sacrifices, Shibboleth, Sukkot, and more
A paleo interpretation of the Hebrew word Selah, a battle over Hebrew pronunciation, 3.5 years in the wilderness at the end of days, and celebrating the Feast of Tabernacles in Millennium.
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Timestamps:
0:00 Intro to Samek (the letter) and Samak (the word)
1:47 Animal sacrifices in the Bible
3:49 Isaac blesses Jacob, forever
6:23 The many S sounds of Hebrew
7:12 Say “Shibboleth”
8:03 Hebrew pronunciation, now and in ancient times
9:01 Listen For Selah
10:38 Selah in the Psalms
10:58 If Selah is a musical notation, where are all the other notations..?
15:03 Does Selah mean pause and think?
15:43 A paleo interpretation of the word Selah
18:18 What we “Selah” to
20:30 Feast of Tabernacles: the meaning of the word Sukkot
22:47 The Tribes of Israel head back to the wilderness
27:12 Song: Days Are Sweet
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Transcript:
Dawson: Today’s letter is Samek, and it’s a picture of a barbed or a thorned plant. To the ancients, this was the best way to illustrate something which firmly holds things in place, something that prevents movement and that has the ability to turn things around.
Unless you’ve actually been caught in a thorn bush, you might not realize how much of a hold it could have on you. But there are other things that act like a samek that can help us understand this letter better.
A fish hook for example is a barbed piece of metal which grabs hold and won’t let go, and an anchor does the work of a samek, holding ships securely in place.
The Hebrew word which most closely corresponds to the letter samek is the word samak, and it means to lay hold, to hold up, and to firmly hold in place. It’s written that THE LORD sustains us. HE upholds us. The word for sustain and uphold is samak.
We happen to think that the letter samek holds the key to one of the most mysterious words of the Bible. We will get to that, but you will have to…hold on. Sorry.
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So we are going to talk a little bit about the word samak and how it gets used in the Hebrew because it has got plenty of uses. One of them is where you see the phrase lay hands like the priest laying hands on to an animal before sacrifice. The word is samak, and that’s actually a really good illustration of what the word means because when you’re about to sacrifice an animal, it’s not some soft placement of the hands. You got to get a firm grip. You have to hold on to them pretty well before you sacrifice them.
Carlos: You have to hold on to them, yeah.
Dawson: Yeah. So the whole concept of animal sacrifices makes people uncomfortable and they feel bad for the animals. But I wanted to bring this up because you told me a long time ago something that made a lot of sense, which is we are not supposed to like it.
Carlos: We are not supposed to like it. You were required to save a sacrificial lamb without blemish so you could offer it up. And I ain’t gonna tell you the kids fell in love with it. Everyone loves a little lamb, and you had to give it up because you sinned.
So you took your offering and you held it down. You laid hands. The priest laid their hands. And by doing so, Father took your sins and put them on the lamb, and they became the sacrificial lamb.
When people started using that as just, “Why not? I could do anything I want as long as I could lay hands on the lamb and transfer my sins out,” that got Father angry that you’re just hurting animals. And that’s when HE writes he prefers mercy better than sacrifices because if He could give mercy, that means you repented.
Dawson: Yeah.
Carlos: Without having to slaughter a lamb.
Dawson: You were also telling me about not just the physical use of samak but that it’s also used in a spiritual sense.
Carlos: Yes, it is. I really had to share this when I found this one. Our forefather, Isaac and he is with Jacob, our father, and our brother, Esau, and I guess Esau didn’t care about the blessing but Jacob did. And so he went – everyone knows he snuck in and took the blessing. And when Esau found out, he asked their father, Isaac, and Isaac answered and said unto Esau, “Behold, I have made him thy lord and all his brethren have I given to him for servants; and with corn and wine have I samak him: and what shall I do unto thee, my son?”
He is saying, “I have given him a blessing and it is established. It is set up. It is unmovable. This one is astonishing. This samak is forever and ever and ever. This one is from Father, established by Father. You can tell the spirit moved on everyone, everyone to speak there. And Isaac spoke in the Spirit and it was set up for this and the next life and forever and ever.
Father doesn’t variate – so this is an amazing, astonishing samak to me. An establishing of the line of Jacob from which Messiah comes, Commander. And then by doing so, Father gives this blessing now and forever and ever. Wow! Samak.
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There are a few letters in the Hebrew alphabet that make an S sound. There’s samek and tsade and shin, also called sin. If you read the Bible in English, it’s often impossible to tell which of these 3 letters was used in the Original Hebrew.
Take a look at these 5 names of people and places. They all have the letter S in English but only one of them has a samek in Hebrew.
The letter shin is the one that eventually became our Modern English letter S. Samek and tsade are two of the few Ancient Hebrew letters that didn’t make it into the Latin alphabet.
By the time of the Judges, the tribes of Israel had already begun to lose their common speech. So when one tribe went to war against another, they were able to identify the opposing tribe by their pronunciation of a single word. To one tribe, that word was Shibboleth. To another, it was Sibboleth.
Dawson: What is this – wait.
Lisa: I’m not going to hit it.
Dawson: Wait. What is this (snow)man guilty of?
Lisa: Well, instead of saying Shibboleth, he said Sibboleth. This is what happens when you say Sibboleth. (Mr. Snowman meets his untimely end..)
Lisa: You enjoyed that far too much.
Dawson: The Shibboleth/Sibboleth battle took place over 3,000 years ago. Today, there are even more variations in how Hebrew is spoken. It all depends on what country or region you learned Hebrew in and how your variation of Biblical Hebrew was influenced by local languages and dialects. And ultimately, it depends on how your Hebrew teacher taught you how to pronounce things.
Today, all around the world, there are different ways of pronouncing the Hebrew letters, differences in how each vowel point is pronounced, and differences in which syllables are emphasized in words. Some say Shabbat and some say Shabbos as just one example.
When it comes to how to pronounce Ancient Hebrew, no one knows for sure. What we do know is that one day Father will teach us the correct way to speak His language.
If you’ve ever read the Book of Psalms, you’ve probably come across the word Selah. Selah is a Hebrew word that no one knows how to translate. It gets put off to the side of the text and many people just ignore it when they read the Psalms out loud.
We have our own thoughts on what the word may mean but first, let’s take a look at a few of the popular theories on the meaning of Selah.
Lisa: So you want to tell them about the word Selah and what they think it means in the Psalms?
Dawson: Yes. So one theory on the word is that it is a musical notation. It could mean crescendo. It could mean something else. But it’s a direction to the players or to the singers to do something. So the problem that I have with that is I don’t have a vast knowledge of how music is written and composed like formally because I don’t have any formal training.
Lisa: Yeah.
Dawson: You have formal training. You’re classically trained.
Lisa: Right.
Dawson: But my assumption is that if there’s a musical notation that means let’s say go faster, then there should be another musical notation that says go slower.
Lisa: Right. It would differ than just Selah, the same speed or same volume.
Dawson: Right. There should be like a spectrum there or the opposite.
Lisa: Right. Yeah. Yeah.
Dawson: So we were talking and you were telling me about how in classical music there are a couple of different spectrums like for volume…
Lisa: Right. I mean every piece is going to come with a speed notation. Before you start, you will look up the top of the piece and it will say allegro which is fast or lento which is very slow or vivace which is really fast. That’s one of the faster ones or prestissimo, lively, fast. But you’re not going to get the same speed for every piece or volume. There’s different notations of volume within the piece.
Dawson: Like what for example?
Lisa: Your basic ones are piano and forte. So piano would be soft, forte would be loud, and then variations thereof like mezzo piano would be medium soft, mezzo forte, medium loud, and you will have your fortissimo which is your loudest, one of the louder ones. But you’re not going to have the same – you’re going to have a lot of variation within a piece with the volume.
So for David to have only one of those, whether it’s speed or volume, for every Psalm he’s singing it, doesn’t make any sense.
Dawson: Right.
Lisa: Yeah.
Dawson: What does crescen – because one of the theories is that it means crescendo. Can you explain what a crescendo is?
Lisa: Yeah. Whatever volume you’re at within the piece and you see a crescendo, you’re going to start there, whatever you’re at, and you’re going to gradually get louder to whatever volume it says at the end.
Dawson: Okay.
Lisa: So for instance, if you’re playing mezzo piano, medium soft, and you see a crescendo, you’re going to start at medium soft and gradually get to whatever it notates at the end of your crescendo. So if it’s forte, you’re going to start medium soft to loud.
Dawson: Now, is there an opposite of crescendo?
Lisa: Yup. You’re going to see a decrescendo, which is the backwards crescendo.
Dawson: Okay.
Lisa: So you’re going to start louder and gradually get softer.
Dawson: So what are the odds that David would only write and it’s not just David, there are other authors of the psalms who used the word selah, but what are the odds that there would only be a crescendo and he would never decrescendo?
Lisa: Yeah, that’s not going to happen. That never happens. You’re always going to have variations on volume. That theory is probably not possible.
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Dawson: There’s one other major theory on the word selah and that is that it means to pause, that when the reader sees the word selah, they should pause and think about what they just read. There are a couple of different reasons why this theory is supported and actually, one of them has to do with another letter that makes the S sound, they think the word selah possibly derives from the word shelah.
Carlos: Well, there are many S sounds but the difference between those S type of sounds is their characters.
Dawson: Yes.
Carlos: So let’s go to the word selah in Original Hebrew and let’s look at every character and see what it actually is telling us.
Dawson: Okay. So in Paleo, the word selah is spelled samek lamed hey.
Carlos: Well, the first one, samek, is to hold.
Dawson: Yeah.
Carlos: To set, to be set in, to set up, to set it up. And then the second is lamed, follow, be led, listen to.
Dawson: It’s very often used for teach or teaching, for learning.
Carlos: For teaching, for correct teaching. And then hey, oh, man.
Dawson: It’s a picture of the man.
Carlos: So hold, fast, oh man. Hold this teaching, oh man. That’s what the letters mean. Now, as a poet, you would use that musically I suppose but there is a direct meaning of the three letters. After he gave the psalm, he would say, “selah” which is samek, hold, teachings, lamed, hey, oh man.
Dawson: So hold fast to this teaching, oh man.
Carlos: Yes. I’ve heard some people say, “Meditate on this.” I’ve heard people say, “Meditate and hold to this. Hold to this and keep this close to your heart and meditate on.”
Dawson: I’ve never heard anyone say that. I’ve heard them say to meditate in a sense that it means pause but I think people since at least the 4th century BC have been pausing to see what selah means and they have no idea. But I think what you’re saying, hold fast to this teaching, that’s something new.
Carlos: That’s exactly what the letters in Paleo are telling us. Now, if you try to use it in another language, it would not work.
Dawson: Right.
Carlos: But in Father’s language, yes. It makes sense. Now again, I cannot answer if it’s used poetically. That’s a whole different category.
Dawson: Yeah.
Carlos: For that, we will have to wait until the prophets tell us or Father tells us which will be very soon.
Dawson: So I went through all of the psalms and took a look at where the selah comes after. It’s not actually just at the end of psalms. Sometimes it’s after a couple of lines and sometimes it’s multiple times in the psalms. And so there are some general concepts. If these are teachings that we are supposed to hold fast to, these are the general teachings that come before the word selah. You want to hear them?
Carlos: Let’s hear them.
Dawson: Enemies rise against the righteous, and the righteous speak of trials and afflictions. This is nothing new. And those who came before us prayed for us as we go through our own afflictions that they knew we would. Father hears us. HE helps us. HE saves us. And HE forgives us. HE is our refuge. Man is mortal and he is full of vanity and evil, and judgment is coming. GOD is King and HE will rule in Zion and HE will remember His people, Jacob. And we are to remember that HE once went before His people in the wilderness.
Carlos: Selah.
Dawson: Selah. Those are the statements that proceed the selah. Those are – if it means to hold fast to those teachings, those are things to remember.
Carlos: Selah takes me to that verse that the prophet said, “In GOD’s law will I meditate day and night.”
Dawson: Yeah.
Carlos: That’s what the prophet wrote. Basically, that’s what he is telling you. He is telling you to take this teaching and lock it in yourself, hold it in yourself. Selah. That’s what the letters in Hebrew say, Original.
The next thing we wanted to cover was …
Dawson: Sukkot, the Feast of Tabernacles.
Carlos: Yeah. The Feast of Tabernacles means the feast where everybody sets up tents. Feast of Tents is the actual interpretation and in the Original Hebrew, it’s Sukkah.
Dawson: Yes.
Carlos: Now, in Paleo, in Original Hebrew, the letters are samek kaf hey. Let’s take a look at the letter samek, set up, establish, build up. The letter kaf is cover. The letter hey, yourselves. Set up, cover yourselves. Sukkah.
If all of you are called into assembly to show up to a feast and you’re all going to do it at once, then you change the hey to tav.
Dawson: Right.
Carlos: And that is Sukkot.
Dawson: So the tav ending makes it plural.
Carlos: Exactly. So that’s going to be a feast that’s established forever, now, and then the next life. It says we will be doing the Feast of Tabernacles once a year.
Dawson: Yes.
Carlos: We will go there and do Sukkot.
Dawson: All the families of the earth are required to do this in millennium.
Carlos: Exactly. And if anyone doesn’t …
Dawson: No rain.
Carlos: No rain. Off to the dust bowls of the earth.
Dawson: Yeah.
Carlos: So – but of course, we are going to show up. It’s a time to celebrate.
Dawson: One of the things that you’re supposed to celebrate at Sukkot, at the Feast of Tabernacles is Father’s blessing on your land and on the work of your hands and on the produce that has come from the land because HE has blessed you. So the reason you don’t get any rain if you don’t show up, there’s nothing for you to celebrate.
Carlos: Ain’t much of a celebration. Exactly.
Dawson: Yeah. Most people when they talk about Sukkot, you hear about the booths in the wilderness and it’s to commemorate the time that the House of Israel spent in the wilderness with Father when He delivered them from Egypt.
Carlos: The House of Israel is going to go through three and a half years in the wilderness again it says.
Dawson: Yes.
Carlos: And when they spent the three and a half years in the wilderness, they will be talking about it in millennium.
Dawson: Right.
Carlos: Correct?
Dawson: So it will be a new reason to celebrate.
Carlos: Exactly. The Apostle wrote that an eagle comes and takes this woman and hides her in the wilderness and feeds and nourishes her for time and a times and a half a times. And afterwards, that woman will be celebrating Sukkah or Sukkot in millennium and they will be talking about, that’s basically Israel and the lost tribes being established and they will be talking about what happened during that times, times, and half a times during what’s called the Tribulation.
Dawson: Yup.
Carlos: So that’s what they will be doing in Sukkot.
Dawson: It’s probably going to be the first time that the lost tribes have celebrated Sukkot since the days of Joshua because when Ezra and these guys came back from captivity in Babylon, it’s written that the only tribes that returned to the land were Judah, Yehudah, Levi, and Benjamin. So all of the other tribes completely scattered at that point, so just those three tribes come back. And one of the things that Ezra says is, “They came to Jerusalem and they celebrated Sukkot and that this not – had not been done since the days of Joshua.
Carlos: Can you imagine? Wow!
Dawson: Absolutely unbelievable. I could believe it when I read it.
Carlos: Well, it says, we will remember in the days and these are them, their forefathers sinned and they didn’t listen. And he told us to, don’t do as the heathen do because if you do as the heathen do then I’m going to do unto you, right? If you don’t do what I say to the heathen then I will do unto you what I was going to do unto the heathen. So that’s what happened. So here we are, the lost tribes.
And one day, very soon, we will be marching back toward the land. And we will be living in tents.
Dawson: In Sukkah, in Sukkot.
Carlos: In Sukkah, exactly. So samek, one of the good things is Israel – all Israel will be reestablished.
Dawson: Yes, all the tribes.
Carlos: Venivesheya Israel. And all Israel will be saved.
Dawson: Yeah.
Carlos: Some from every tribe and all of you that are of the nations, every tongue, every language, every nation, every type. If you read, you’re going to be established samek into one of the tribes. For those of you going through, you’re going to join the tribe. You could pick anyone you want but those that know Father and have Yashua as their Savior and go through like those of you who are here and remain living, you’re going to join a tribe. You’re going to become Bene Israel.
So hope you’re enjoying this and this is – we bring it to you from Original Hebrew before the nations took the letters and gave them different meanings and different uses. One day, we are going back to this. Shalom. Shalom unto Israel.
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