OBAMA IN CAIRO: HIS QUOTES FROM MATTHEW
IN RELATION TO THE TALMUD OF JMMANUEL
In Obama’s speech I recall hearing two quotes from the Gospel of Matthew. One was the Golden Rule, which is in the Talmud of Jmmanuel (TJ) also. The other, also from Matthew’s Sermon on the Mount, was “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God.” It is not in the TJ. Why not, and what TJ verse was it a substitution for?

The one-to-one correspondence between Matthew and the TJ, in much of the Sermon on the Mount, allows us to pinpoint the TJ verse that the writer of Matthew omitted and substituted for at this point. It is TJ 5:9, “Blessed are those who know about Creation, for they are not enslaved by erroneous teachings.” It is not difficult to see why that verse was unacceptable. First, the Aramaic word for “Creation” was not the proper word to use for the God of Israel. Second, it would not do at all to cause readers/listeners to beware false teachings. That could cause followers of the young messianic form of Judaism to start thinking for themselves rather than blindly accept what church authorities said.

The “peacemakers” verse that the writer substituted seems quite nice; should Jmmanuel himself have said as much? In the TJ he speaks of peace in some 18 places. However, he would not have called a peacemaker a “son of God.” Instead, he believed in using the correct choice of words, as cautioned in TJ 6:1, “Be mindful of your piety, that you practice it before the people with correct words, lest you be accused of lying and thereby find no reward from them. Choose your words using natural logic…” He had objected when Peter called him “son of the living god” (TJ 18:20), as he was the son of the “celestial son” Gabriel. A different extraterrestrial was the overseer ("god") of several human lineages. And Jmmanuel had objected to Pharisees when they referred to him as “son of David,” since David had long since been dead (TJ 23:52).