One final variation of regression that we can get in Jmovi, that really is kind of surprising considering it's not always available in other programs is ordinal regression or specifically ordinal logistic regression. And the idea here is you're trying to take several variables to predict where a particular case falls in ordered categories, say, for instance, from lowest to middle to highest. Now, you could theoretically have an entire ordinal scale where you rank every case from one to however many there are. But when you have a small number of cases, this is where ordinal logistic regression is going to be most useful. And another time that it shows up as really handy is when you have data that really deviates from normality. Now I'm going to use this example data of state data that I uploaded. And we have among other things, how much different states search for different things. And one that's kind of interesting here at the very end is searching for modern dance. Now, let me show you what this looks like, because then you'll understand why the procedure is necessary. If we put modern dance right here, it'll give us some statistics. But what we're really interested in here is the plot, the density, Instagram. So we have data from 48 contiguous states. And you can see it's mostly normal. But man, we got this big gap in this bump up here. I happen to know that this is Utah where I live. Utah, it turns out leads the national mind share for modern dance, which is kind of shocking. Anyhow, this is not a normal distribution. And outliers like this can really cause problems with irregular analyses. And so we doing the data transforming it and possibly putting into categories that might be one method of dealing with this and ordinal logistic regression makes that possible.  So for instance, let me come back to this just for a moment where I was. And let's go to statistics and say, what are the cut points to create four equal sized groups? So we're going to make quartiles. And what this says is, well, the minimum z score is minus 1.44, the 25th percentile, the first quartile is negative 0.618. The 50th is about negative 0.23. And the 75th is positive 0.45. And it goes up to 4.7. I think that's where Utah is way up here. Now, I'm going to round these off a little bit. And what I did is I came in here and I created this new variable and calling it modern dance quartiles. And what I'm saying is, if the z score is less than negative five, put it in one that is put it in the first quartile. If modern dance is less than zero, but above negative 0.5 put in the second quartile. If modern dance is less than positive 0.5 put in the third quartile, and otherwise put it in the fourth quartile. And so that's a way of nesting if statements to create these categories. And when I do that, I can come back and do exploration again, except this time we'll do it for the quartiles. I'll put modern dance quartiles right there. Look at a frequency table. And then we'll get a bar plot. And then you'll be able to see that it's a little better behaved, because we've brought in the outliers. And we've created four groups that are approximately equal size, they're pretty close. And the reason they're not exactly the same is because I intentionally chose to make the cutoff points, something that seemed a little more sensible. But now we have an ordinal variable, we have the states categorized into the lowest quarter, the second lowest, the second highest, and the highest quartile, in terms of their relative search preference for modern dance.  And when I open that up, the first thing I need to do is specify the dependent variable or the outcome that we're looking at, and that's going to be modern dance quartiles. I'm going to come back up here, I got selected, I'll just click it over here. And then we put in covariates, we can put in a lot of variables if we want, but because I have a small sample size, only 48 cases, I'm going to limit it. Now, modern dance, because it's an art form should be most associated with openness, because in certain studies on big five personality characteristics, openness seem to also have something to do with art. So I'm going to click that and put it over here and covariates. And then also, I'm going to show you how to use a factor, I'm going to take the psych regions, because that included friendly and conventional, but also relaxed and creative, which seems like it would be important for something like performing arts. And so if we take those, we have this table right here, it lets us know about the deviance and the AIC, which are methods of assessing the fit of the overall model. We have these predictors, openness, it turns out is significantly associated with modern dance quartiles. So that's something that we were kind of hoping for that openness, or being open to new ideas and possibly to aesthetic experiences seems to be associated with the number of searches relatively speaking that is state does for modern dance. We also see that the psych regions matter, that the relaxing creative and the friendly and conventional, it makes a difference. And what's interesting, actually in both cases is that relaxing creative does more than friendly and conventional does, that's because this is positive, and also temperamental and uninhibited does more than friendly and conventional does in both cases. So let's take a look at some of the options. We have the model builder. If I wanted to put things in separate blocks, I could. Let's go to model fit. This is where we have the choices, the deviance, the AIC and the McFadden's R squared all seem like great ideas. So I'm going to leave those and the model coefficients. That's this table we have right here. I'm just going to throw one more thing onto it. I'm going to do the odds ratios and the confidence intervals for the odds ratios. Remember, the null value for the odds ratio is one. And so if we are consistently below one in the confidence interval or above, that lets us know that we have something important here. And for instance, let me close this so we can see more of this output here. I'll drag this over. So openness, the odds ratio on both ends of the confidence interval are above one. So, you know, it's significant. But really the amazing one is this here, temperamental and uninhibited states versus friendly and conventional states, the odds ratio is 17.54. That's really big. And the confidence interval goes all the way up to 91. And so this is a very influential difference in trying to predict what a state's ranked category would be in terms of the quartiles one through four, and their searches for modern dance on Google. And so it turns out that this is actually a really easy analysis to set up. We could theoretically have a lot more options available to us. But Jamowi's keeping it pretty simple. And this is a good way to get started in dealing with ranked information, as opposed to the outliers that we had in the original distribution, and using a regression model with both a quantitative or continuous predictor variable, and a categorical predictor to try to find out where states would fall into that ranked continuum that we created.


Alina Rabakina vs. Yelena Osta-Penko is the first quarter final for the ladies Australian Open for 2023. And both ladies have upset big names along the way. In the first round, Rabakina came in as the 22nd seed and will take on Chucky Areto. And after a close first set, she got through in straights, winning through 7-5-6-3. In the second round, she took on the youngster Yuvane, but this was no trouble for Rabakina, getting through easily under an hour, 6-2-6-1. In the third round, she'll take on the 13th seed and last year's finalist, Danielle Collins. And after dropping the second set, she eventually got through in 3-6-2-5-7-6-2. In the fourth round, she took on the number one player in the world, Egas Fiontek, a player that she had beaten in an exhibition only a couple of weeks ago. And after a very close couple of sets, Rabakina got through, taking out the world number one, 6-4-6-4 to advance to her first Australian Open quarter final. Yelena Osta-Penko started the tournament off as the number 17 seed and played just Shremska in the first round. But this wasn't a problem getting through in straights sets, 6-4-6-2. In the second round, she took on the Hungarian Bondare. And this was a very tough match for the first two sets, very close. But Osta-Penko ran away with it in the third, taking it in 3-7-6-5-7-6-love. In the third round, she'll take on Bandol. And again, this posed no problem for Osta-Penko, getting through in straights sets, 6-3-6-love. In the fourth round, she'll take on the number seven seed, Coco Gough. And after a very close first set, Osta-Penko got through in straights sets, causing the upset 7-5-6-3 to advance to the quarter finals. These two have only played twice before with Osta-Penko winning both the matches, but they haven't played for about four years. So it's been a long time since they've played and also since that time, it's been a... Rabakina has become the champion of Wimbledon, and now she's equal on Grand Slam with Osta-Penko. If Rabakina is going to win this one, she needs a serve well. That's something she did great against with Shriyantek. She got through with serves and also got through with great backhands. Her forearm was a little shaky, but the backhand was on point. So the backhand and the serve combination against Osta-Penko is going to work. If Osta-Penko is going to win this one, she needs to be less error-filled. I mean, there was a few errors against Goff, and also a lot of breakpoints on her serve. She gave two Goff. Luckily she saved them, but if she gives that many breakpoints away, she's not going to get through this match. This is a very interesting matchup, because I think a lot of us thought we're going to get Goff taking on Shriyantek, which we've seen a million times before. So this is a little bit of a different matchup, still a champ versus a champ match, but I'm going to go with Rabakina. I think she's going to win this one in very close straights sets. Maybe a tie break or two. Let me know down in the comments below. Who do you think is going to win this quarter-final?


Hey everybody, welcome back to Magic Orthodoxy. My name is David and this is a deck review. Hey today, we're gonna look at the Texas deck from Jackson Robinson Kingswalt Project. The Texas deck was a Kickstarter project that was initiated by Jackson Robinson of Kingswalt Project. The concept for this deck, Jackson, of course, was born in Texas, raised in Texas, and he wanted to make a deck of cards that was noteworthy of having the name Texas across the front. He wanted a deck of cards that paid tribute to all the friendly, hard-working, self-determined people that live in this state. I am from Texas, too. So Jackson spared no expense on this project. He found the highest quality playing cards you could get. Of course, these are made from the United States playing card company, and they're made of all the bells and whistles that you would expect. The tech case on this has embossing as well as gold foil ink. It says Texas across the front has the Lone Star Texas emblem there, and it says Texas inside the star, and of course you can see kind of that watermark look of the shiny blue on matte blue design. And both sides of the tuck case say the Lone Star State. The back design of the tuck case is of course the back design of the cards. The top has some embossing as well as two stars. The inside tuck flaps has some gold embossing of the state of Texas, and then you can see this tuck flap. It's gold foil etched all the way through, and it's absolutely gorgeous. This is a matte blue paper stock tuck case, and that is pretty much it for the tuck case. Let's take a look at these cards. These cards come from the United States playing card company, and they do come on their retail stock. They do have a modern cut and air cushion embossing, and if you'd like to learn more about stock, cut, or finish, you can click the link below on the description. All right, so like I said earlier, these are US PCC cards, of course, and that means they handle great. And the other thing is this is a Q1 deck, or a quality one deck. So that means the United States playing card company has given this deck its strictest controls, and so you're going to have the most smoothest edges they can possibly print, the best rounded edges. You're going to have wonderful registry all through the back design, and so you're really getting a beautiful, very high quality deck of cards. This deck has tons of action to it. I love this deck. It's gorgeous. It's beautiful. The card thickness on this is just a little thicker than normal. It's on the thicker side of thin, if that makes sense.  I think I measured it in the 290s, so it's a little bit on the thicker side. Love the air cushion embossing, of course. You're going to have great glide, great slide, no clumping, great action, wonderful handling, and wonderful smelling playing cards. The back design is a traditional poker card in that it has a nice thick white border. The blue on there, I'm not sure you're seeing it. I'll try to give you a closer view. It does have a two-tone effect to it, where you have a lighter blue and a darker blue, making kind of a watermark shadow image, and then you have the Texas Lone Star Star in gold on the top and the bottom, making a two-way image, and it does say Texas in that star. Texas is, of course, called the Lone Star State, and your two jokers are Lone Stars, and it is a beautiful rendition of a black star amidst a field of gold. With this deck, you're also going to get one double-backed gaff card, but it is a different side gaff than the other side. It's the traditional back on one side, and then the special edition back on the other. All four of your aces are beautiful and very stylized. It features an exploded pip in the center amidst a ring of gold. As with all of Jackson's decks, each of the pips and indices in the corner are completely original. Of course, that means the pips and indices cards are going to have that Jackson-Robinson look as well. Very thin fonts up in the corners and very thin and stylized pips. And of course, the thing that makes a Jackson-Robinson deck, a Jackson-Robinson deck, are these beautiful court cards. Each one of the court cards is familiar in style. However, Jackson has completely redesigned them from the ground up. They do feature his original artwork as well as colors and they hold weapons and other symbols of the great state of Texas. In there, you'll see the Texas bird as well as the Texas flower and some other things that Texans enjoy like football. Well, that is it for the Texas deck. As always, we ask that you like this video just so other people can find this faster. You can also subscribe to this channel just to stay up to date on the latest in cards and card magic. If you want to follow me on social media, you can. I'm at facebook.com slash magic orthodoxy twitter.com slash magic orthodoxy instagram.com slash magic underscore orthodoxy and you can always find more content at magicorthodoxy.com. Thank you. Bye.


This evening's program has been entitled The Encounter, and if you were paying attention to the publicity, you should have figured out this is not an actual debate, it is billed as a simulated debate, but we are holding this program because we believe that this can be a very educational experience. We're going to have two presenters tonight, and they're really going to be engaged in a discussion and a dialogue. It's not going to be a formal debate where each side gets up and presents a formal argument and having a rebuttal.  The position that will be expressed by my partner tonight, I don't want to say my antagonist or my opponent, will actually be genuine. You will actually hear the kind of things that you will very likely hear out of the mouth of someone who is Jewish that has embraced Christianity, and I will do my best to share the Jewish perspective or a Jewish perspective. So without any further ado, I'd like to invite up Brother Daniel. There are no coincidences in life. You didn't just happen to stroll on off the street. You chose to be here tonight, and you chose to expose yourself and to be open to a message from the Christian side. There are no coincidences. There's no coincidence that tonight happens to be Christmas Eve. Christmas Eve, the night that tradition tells us is the birth date of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, or as it would be in Hebrew, Yeshua Hamashiach. It is no coincidence that one week tonight will be beginning of a new decade, the 20s, and during that decade we will see the 2,000th anniversary of the crucifixion, death, and resurrection of our Lord and Savior. So a brief little bit about myself. I was raised in a, I suppose you call it a traditional Jewish home. We didn't keep Shabbat. We didn't keep Kosher. We would go to the synagogue for Rosh Hashanah and for Yom Kippur. We had a kind of a Seder, and I think some of you know, whereas we do the first half, and then we eat, and then we watch hockey. I see some of you are familiar with that. The Judaism I was exposed to as a child and as a teenager was somewhat lifeless. I never got the impression that God was a presence. God was something that happened in the old days and almost doesn't get involved today. I dropped out, more or less, and it was in my college years that I became in contact with born-again Christians.  There's an expression. People presume it's a Christian expression. I was provoked to jealousy. Actually, the phrase appears in the book of Deuteronomy. I was provoked to jealousy. I envied them. I envied their happiness. I envied their spirit and their joy for life and I wanted it. I had a bit of trouble going into a church and a very good friend of mine, very nice girls, he says, oh, you don't have to go to a church. You can go to a synagogue for Jewish believers in Jesus. News to me, but I went to a Messianic synagogue. They didn't have a minister. They had a rabbi. They were praying Jewish prayers. They didn't call Jesus Jesus. They called him Yeshua, Yeshua Mashiach, and I was blown away by how Jewish everything was. The men wore talit. There was an Aaron Kodish, an Ark. They had a Torah scroll, say for Torah. And when I started to learn about Christianity, I again was stunned. I sort of in the back of my mind knew that Jesus was Jewish, but it wasn't until I started reading the Gospels that I realized how Jewish he was. All his followers, all his disciples were Jewish. The people to whom he preached were Jews. There are maybe two or three examples in all of the Gospel where Jesus even speaks to a non-Jew. He says, I have only come for the lost sheep of the house of Israel. The more I got involved, the more I realized that this was the truth and you have to follow the truth no matter where it takes you. I am more Jewish now as a Jewish believer in Yeshua than I ever was. And you say, how could that be? Well, I doven, I pray every day. I never did that before. I keep completely kosher. Never did that before. I'm Sabbath observant. I wear tzitzit. Never did that before. I am more Jewish now. As a matter of fact, I am so Jewish that to the annoyance of my parents, I won't eat at their house because it's not kosher. It's changed my life. I'll leave it at that. Thank you for sharing your story, Daniel. And all I can begin is to just say at the outset that it saddens me that you grew up in a home where in your formative years you were not really exposed to a meaningful, vibrant, serious kind of Judaism. And I think that had you been exposed to something different, things might be different for you now. But to get into what you were sharing, I think that what I wanted to focus on was this idea that what you are now doing is somehow very Jewish. The truth is that calling your beliefs Jewish doesn't make them Jewish. You know, there's a famous story where Abraham Lincoln once asked someone in a courtroom in a hearing. He said, if you took a jackal and you called the tail of the jackal a leg, how many legs would the jackal have? And the person said it would have five legs. And Lincoln said no, it only has four legs. Just calling the tail a leg doesn't make it a leg. Now the truth is that Messianic Judaism, the kind of movement that you have now become part of, is basically Christianity. If you examine the doctrinal creeds, every Christian church, every denomination has a statement of their doctrines. The doctrinal statements of every Messianic congregation is the exact same doctrinal statement as any Protestant evangelical church. There is literally no difference. You believe in the exact same things. The fact that you might dress it up with a kippah and you might eat kosher food rather than un-kosher food doesn't change the guts of who you are and what you're believing now. The fact that all of the first Christians happen to be Jewish is irrelevant. If there were Jews who were worshiping the golden calf, would that make the worship of the golden calf a legitimate practice or a legitimate thing to believe in just because Jews are doing it? The fact that Jews do something doesn't automatically give it legitimacy because many Jewish people do things that are antithetical to Judaism. I once spoke at a Messianic congregation here in Toronto and I told them that in Jewish law, this is how I began. I said in Jewish law, if a person loses God forbid a close relative but will come into a serious inheritance, they actually recite two blessings. For the loss of their relative, they say, blessed is the true judge, which is the blessing we recite when we hear terrible bad news. But at the same time, the person is going to receive a large inheritance and for that, they recite the blessing for hearing good news. Blessed is one who is good and does good. And so the truth is that I told this group and I will share the same observation with you. Your desire for spirituality is a positive thing. Your interest in studying the Torah is wonderful. Your quest to observe God's commandments is to be applauded. But on the other hand, the bad news is that you are doing all of this to serve a Jewish man. Your devotion is to a person that is worshiped as God. Judaism regards this as idolatry. All of the Jewish study and all of the Jewish activities and all of the Torah commandments that are observed in the Messianic movement are done in the service of Jesus. Not in the service of the Creator. Despite the fact that Christians will insist that Jesus is God, again, it doesn't make him God. And so for Jewish people to be worshipping and serving and giving their devotion to a human being is idolatry and that unfortunately is very tragic. All very nice. But it isn't the real issue. The real issue is Yeshua. Is he the Messiah? Is he Messiah? Or isn't he? Everything hinges on that. When I got involved, I was presented with two biblical quotes that have stuck with me ever since.  And Jesus said, I am the way and the truth and the life. No one gets to God except through me. I can tell you with all my heart that Jesus, Yeshua HaMashiach fulfilled all the Messianic prophecies and there are many. What do I mean by many? Some people have counted over 250. Some have counted well over 300 prophecies contained in the Tanakh, what we call the Old Testament. Jesus fits the bill perfectly. I'm only going to give you two or three, a sampling. In the book of Isaiah, Isaiah says, Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign.  Another one is that from the book of Psalms. For God, for dogs have encompassed me. The assembly of the wicked have enclosed me, surrounded me. They pierced my hands and my feet. Anyone who has seen a crucifix know that the manner of crucifixion in those days by the Romans remarkably cruel even by their standards was not only crucifixion where you died basically by exposure and suffocation, but they actually nailed him, his hands and his feet. Similarly in the book of Zachariah, it says, One shall say unto him, What are these wounds in your hands? And then he shall answer those with which I was wounded in the house of my friends. Those are only three of dozens and dozens, hundreds which point to Yeshua, point to Jesus. Two of Jewish believer in Jesus, the Tanakh, is one big electric flashing neon arrow pointing to Jesus. We see Jesus face on every page. It seems to me that if we're going to engage in an attempt to determine what does our Bible, what does the Hebrew scriptures actually teach about the Messiah, what we would want to examine are passages that are indisputable. Passages where everyone who reads the passage would agree. Yes, this passage is speaking about the Messiah to come. However, to marshal and to assemble a list of passages that are far from clear, that are far from clear, we're building a case on a very shaky foundation. Now what I find to be important in this regard is that Judaism has a vision of what the Messiah is and who the Messiah is. And Judaism has a set of passages in the Hebrew scriptures. Isaiah chapter 11 and Isaiah chapter 2 and Jeremiah chapter 23 and Jeremiah chapter 33 and Ezekiel chapter 34 and Ezekiel chapter 37. We have a list of passages that are so clear that every student of the Bible, be they Jewish or Christian, agrees. Yes, indeed, those passages are speaking of the Messiah. What's important is if you examine those passages, it is very clear that Jesus has not fulfilled the picture painted by those passages. Those are passages which show that when the Messiah is here, the world is going to be transformed. It speaks about all the Jewish people being regathered to their ancestral land to the land of Israel. The ingathering of all the exiles, their tribes from the northern 10 Kingdom, the 10 northern tribes will be regathered with their southern compatriots. We're told that when the Jewish people come back to the land of Israel, we're going to rebuild our temple. We're told we're going to live in the land of Israel in peace and there will be universal peace. All the weapons of war will be destroyed. And we're told there will be universal knowledge of God. Every person in the world will believe in God. This is the indisputable, uncontested testimony of Scripture. And what Christians are forced to do, because they can't deny that those are really speaking of the Messiah, they're forced to say, well, Jesus will do all those things when he comes back. Well, to say that someone is the Messiah now, because they're going to do something when they come back in 2,000 years, is absurd. I can claim that my grandfather was the Messiah. And if anyone says, well, what did your grandfather do? I can say, well, nothing. When he was alive, he didn't accomplish anything. But you'll see when he returns, he'll fulfill all of the Messianic prophecies. So I think it's important to just bear in mind that if we are to center on, to focus on the indisputable prophecies in the Bible, where all Jews and all Christians agree that those passages are speaking of the Messiah, Jesus did not fulfill them. Now, let's look at the passages that Christians say, well, these are passages that Jesus did fulfill. And we're going to see that what they have in common are two things, especially the three that you chose. The problem with each of the texts that you chose is that they ignore the actual context of the passage they are ripped out of. There's an old saying that a text without a context is pretext. Context is the most crucial thing to understand a passage. And we're going to see that the passages you cited have nothing to do with the coming of the Messiah. But because they sound like Jesus, Christians will transform them, will insist that they are Messianic prophecies. And secondly, aside from the fact that they're ripped out of context, they are based upon, and they rely upon, mistranslation of the actual Hebrew. In Psalm 22, if someone was to read the entire Psalm, and I would ask that you would do that, Daniel, read the whole Psalm without trying to find Jesus in the Psalm. You know, the Bible is not like where's Waldo, that it's some kind of a game where you try to find Jesus in the Bible. The Bible has its own legitimacy that was there long before Jesus walked the earth. So if we're to read this Psalm with the eyes of someone who was reading it at the time when King David wrote it, or 100 years later, or 500 years later, read the Psalm before Jesus, what we would see is that it's a Psalm of entreaty. It's a Psalm of prayer. It's someone who is under attack, and they cry for help. And the Psalm ends as a hymn of praise when the endangered person is redeemed. And this becomes a source of hope for others. There's nothing in the Psalm that speaks about the crucifixion and death of the Messiah. It's simply not there. That requires that you read into the Psalm, that you superimpose upon it. You're pre-concluded, you're pre-assumed assumptions about what the Psalm is. Secondly, the verse that you cite does not say, they pierced my hands and feet. What it does say is like a lion at my hands and my feet. Now, you could just say that this will be an argument back and forth that can't be resolved. The Christian insists that it means they pierced, and the rabbinical Jewish position will say no, it means like a lion. Is there a way of breaking the log jam? And I say there is. First of all, in this very chapter, chapter 22 of Psalms, we find that the Psalmist compares his enemies and his attackers to lions. Earlier in verse 13, later in verse 21. It's not as if lions are all of a sudden sticked into this verse by Jews who need to defend against the Christian interpretation. Lions are all over this Psalm. As a matter of fact, throughout the Psalms, in Psalm 7, for example, David is always describing his attackers as wild beasts and as lions. Secondly, and this is the most important thing, if we don't know what this word means here in Psalm 22, let's see what it means everywhere else it appears in the Tanakh. And you'll see that it appears in Isaiah, chapter 38, verse 13. It appears in Psalm 17. It appears in Numbers 23, Numbers 24 and Ezekiel chapter 30, Ezekiel chapter 22. And you can check every single time this word is translated in Christian Bibles. It's translated everywhere else as like a lion. All of a sudden here in Psalm 22, it becomes they pierced. Now, what's interesting is that up until recently, if you were to get any Christian Bible and to look at Psalm 22, they do translate Psalm 22, the verse that you quoted, as they pierced. But finally, modern Christian translations are recognizing this is incorrect. And so the two most recent translations, just over the past few years of the Bible from Christians, the CEB, the Common English Bible, has like a lion. And the NET, the New English Translation, again, has like a lion, just as any Jewish translation would have it. What's important to also bear in mind is that the Christian Bible never quotes this verse in Psalms claiming that it's fulfilled by Jesus. The New Testament, the Christian Bible quotes many passages from the Jewish Bible and uses them, I would say misuses them and claims that they're messianic prophecies. But this one is not even used in the Christian Bible as a proof text. Now, the next passage you cited was from the Book of Isaiah, chapter 7, claiming that that chapter in Isaiah is telling us that the Messiah would be born to a virgin. So here again, there are two massive problems. Number one, what is the context of this chapter? You quoted right in the middle of the chapter, you landed right in the middle, chapter 7, verse 14. But you can't ignore verse 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12 and 13, which tells us what's going on in the chapter. And if you would read it, you would see it's not speaking about the birth of the Messiah. It's telling us that about 700 years before Jesus, there was a massive attack upon the southern kingdom of Israel, the kingdom of Judah. And they were being attacked by the northern 10 tribes, the kingdom of Israel and by Syria. There was an alliance between these two superpowers, Syria and the 10 northern tribes, made an alliance and they were going to attack Jerusalem and going to attack the southern kingdom. And the king and the Jewish people down south were terrified. And so they basically come to God and they express their fear. And God says, don't worry, don't worry. And I'm going to give you a sign. And God says, there's going to be a young woman. And before she gives birth, these two nations that are attacking you will be destroyed. Now, if this was speaking about Jesus, how would that be a sign to King Achas and the Jewish people? It would be that God's saying to King Achas, I know that you're under attack by these two great powers, but 700 years from now, a young woman in Israel is going to give birth to a child. Don't sweat, you'll be fine. So the context is critical. We can't ignore the context. It has nothing to do with the birth of the Messiah. It has everything to do with God giving a sign of encouragement and hope to people under attack 700 years before Jesus. And then there's also the translation problem. This verse in Isaiah is not speaking about a virgin. The Hebrew word here is Alma. Alma simply means a young woman. There is a specific Hebrew word for virgin, which is betula, but Isaiah didn't use that word. Isaiah used the word Alma. How do I know that it means a young woman and not a virgin? It's very simple. It's a feminine noun. There is a masculine form of that noun as well. LM in the Hebrew Bible is a young man. And every Christian translation translates LM as young man. They don't translate it as a young man virgin. So Alma simply means a young woman.  Just the fact that she's a young woman. And the fact is that this is so solid that numerous, not just modern, but even translations made decades ago. Dozens of Christian translations have now corrected this mistranslation. And when they translate Isaiah, they translate Alma as a young woman and not as a virgin. When we go to the last of your texts, which was Zachariah, Zechariah chapter 13. So here we again have the problem of context and the problem of translation. The context here is deadly for the Christian point of view. Because if we were to read not just from verse 6, which you quoted, but if we read from the beginning of the chapter, you see, without a question, the chapter is describing the execution, the putting to death of false prophets that will take place in the future. So if one was to insist that verse 6 is describing Jesus who is being pierced, it would then be telling you that Jesus was a false prophet. And that's why the vast majority of Christian commentaries to the Bible will tell you, don't think that Zechariah chapter 13 is speaking about Jesus. They realize that that's poison for Jesus. Secondly, it's only the King James, as far as I know, that renders the words, Ben Yadecha, as in your hands. What are those wounds in your hands?  That's not a good move. So most translations will render Ben Yadecha as really between your arms, meaning the person's being stabbed in their upper torso in their back. And even Christian translations, aside from the King James, don't translate this verse as, what are these wounds in your hands? Just by the way, one final, I know I'm going on a little bit long. I'm sorry for taking so much time here, but one final thought. If it did say in Psalm 22, they pierced my hands and feet. If it did say that, does that prove it's speaking about Jesus? That's absurd. We know that the Romans crucified over 100,000 Jews. If Jesus was the only person in history to have his hands and feet pierced, then we could say, well, maybe that Psalm, if it's mistranslated, is talking about Jesus. But even if you mistranslate it, there's nothing about the Psalm that specifically tells you it's referring to Jesus. It could refer to anyone who was crucified or God forbid when the Germans would machine gun Jewish people on the sides of ditches. Many of those bullets went into people's hands and feet. Many people had their hands and feet pierced. So to insist that it has to be talking about Jesus and no one else is really an absurdity. Everything that you have said so far does no good. Are any of these people here or any of the Jewish people at all? Because if you don't think that Yeshua is the Messiah, if you don't believe that he came and died for the sins of the world, Jews have a major problem because how do you get forgiven for your sins? We know what the Torah says, how you get forgiven for your sins. The Torah says you bring a sacrifice to the temple, I bet the MacDosh. Chapter after chapter of Leviticus goes on about what you do in this situation, what you do in that situation, all different kinds of sacrifices for all different kinds of situations. Problem. The temple was destroyed almost 2,000 years ago. We no longer have somewhere to make our sacrifices. What's worse in the Book of Deuteronomy chapter 12, it says you can only bring sacrifices where I've shown you. The last place God showed us, the Temple Mount. You can't slaughter animals in your backyard. It doesn't work. So, would God set up a system where he would destroy the temple and not give us a remedy? He gave us a remedy. A couple of generations before the destruction of the temple was the crucifixion, death, and resurrection of Jesus. That was the solution. He gave us the solution. And speaking of Leviticus, in chapter 17, verse 11, to hammer it home just in case there's any doubt. It says, the life of the flesh is in the blood. And I've given it, the blood, to you upon the altar to make an atonement for your souls. For it is the blood that makes an atonement for the souls. Not your prayers, not feeling sorry, not giving to charity. The blood makes atonement. That's not me talking. That's the Lord God Almighty talking to us. How do you get forgiven for your sins? I have the answer, Jesus. This is a very serious question that you raise and an important question. I understand that from a Christian perspective, the purpose Jesus came to the world was to die as a sacrifice for the sins of those who would believe in him. But one of the great challenges that Christianity faces is that there is not one verse in the entire Hebrew Bible that says this. There's not one verse in the entire Jewish Bible that says the Messiah will come and he will die as a sacrifice for the sins of those who would believe in him. The Bible never says anywhere about believing in the Messiah. And the Bible never says anything about someone coming ultimately to die as a sacrifice, as a human sacrifice for the sins of the world. We know that in the Bible, in the Jewish Bible, human sacrifice is considered one of the most grotesque, disgusting things that God is constantly railing against throughout the Bible, dozens of times. God expresses himself with total clarity that human sacrifice is an abomination. To say that all of a sudden God is going to retreat from that and say, no, there's going to be a sacrifice of a human being sounds very, very implausible. And what's missing is any statement, even one, where the Bible says that this is what we should expect the Messiah to do. That we should expect the Messiah to come one day to be killed as a sacrifice and he will forgive all our sins if we will believe in him. That's one problem. The second problem is that the foundation that you base yourself upon where you found some source for the idea that in order to be forgiven for your sins you have to have a sacrifice that already has some connection to the Bible. We're going to see it's not really quite as you said. But the idea that the Messiah comes to die as a sacrifice, that is simply not there. Now let's examine your claim. Your claim is that the Bible teaches us that unless we have the offering of blood it is impossible for us to be forgiven for our sins. Christians usually quote what they believe is a verse from the Hebrew Scriptures where they say without the shedding of blood there can be no forgiveness. Unfortunately for them that's not in the Jewish Bible, that's in the Greek Testament in the book of Hebrews chapter 9 verse 22. But what does the Jewish Bible say? What does Aratanach say? What does the Torah say? The verse you quoted from Leviticus, the book of Vayikra, Leviticus chapter 17 verse 11. For the life of the flesh is in the blood. And I've given it to you upon the altar to make atonement for your souls for it is the blood that makes atonement by reason of life. I pointed out before that one of the biggest mistakes that you can make when reading the Bible is to just snip a passage out of the middle of a chapter and ignore the rest of the passage, ignore the rest of the chapter. So if we were to read from the beginning of chapter 17 we would expect that according to your interpretation this should be a chapter where the whole theme of the chapter in headlights would be how to get forgiven for your sins. You would hope from a Christian point of view that would be what's happening in this chapter.  And yet if we study chapter 17 we're going to see it has nothing to do with the topic of atonement from sins. Totally not the topic of this chapter. As a matter of fact what's interesting is that if you want to find chapters in the book of Leviticus that describe the sacrificial system you've got to go back to the beginning of the book of Leviticus. Chapters 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6. That's where you'll find the Bible speaking about sacrifices and how you bring sacrifices and what they're for. Again none of them speaks about the sacrifice of a human being as the Messiah. But by the time you get to chapter 17 over here it's not teaching us about bringing sacrifices about how you should bring a sacrifice. This chapter is teaching us how not to bring sacrifices. What not to do. And the entire theme of this passage is basically telling us we are not allowed to consume blood. It's not telling us that the only way of being forgiven for your sins is by having a blood sacrifice. It's saying that the only legitimate reason for blood, the only purpose God gave us blood was to apply blood to the altar for sacrifices. Yes blood was applied to the altar for sacrifices. But this chapter is a chapter of a dietary law. It's telling you that since the only legitimate reason for having blood is to apply it to the altar it says you cannot eat it. And if you were to study this chapter it's plain as day. Read all the verses here. What it's talking about is the dietary prohibition against consuming blood. Does the Bible tell us here that the only way of being forgiven is through having blood sacrifice offered on your behalf? That's not what it's saying. What it's saying is when you do bring a sacrifice there were some sacrifices that were brought for sins, for unintentional sins. The fourth chapter of Leviticus tells us if you sinned unintentionally you can bring a korban hatat, a sin offering. But there was no sin offering for intentional sins. It was for limited sins if it was unintentional. And what we're told here in this chapter is when you bring a sacrifice which part of the animal is the part of the animal that affects that is critical for the sacrifice to work? Is it the hair of the animal? Is it the kneecap? Is it the earlobe? Is it the nose? What is the part of the animal that's critical? So the Torah tells you the part of the animal that's critical is the blood. When you bring a sacrifice the blood is the important part. The blood is spilled on top of the altar, on the sides of the altar. But this passage is not telling us that the only way to be forgiven is through having a blood sacrifice. As a matter of fact blood was not sufficient to atone for your sins. The Bible warns us don't think, don't think for a moment that the answer to sin is sacrifice. Don't think that. For example, the Bible says in the book of Proverbs twice the sacrifice of a wicked person is an abomination to God. If you think that you can sin and you can be forgiven just by bringing a sacrifice that's an abomination. God hates that. And all of the prophets, every single one of the prophets scolded the Jewish people who made that mistake, who made the Christian mistake, who made the mistake of thinking that if I sin, I bring a sacrifice and everything is hunky dory. And the prophet said, no! God doesn't want your sacrifice. The sacrifice by itself doesn't accomplish anything. And the message of the Bible is that there's only one way of being forgiven for your sins. Only one way. And that is to turn away from your sins. That is to repent of your sins. That's to turn back to God. The Bible says that if you're living at a time when there's a holy temple and if you sinned unintentionally you should bring a sacrifice as part of the repentance process. As part of the process. But let's say there's no temple. Let's say there's no temple. And by the way, this wasn't just after Jesus died in the year 70 that we didn't have a temple. The first temple was destroyed hundreds of years before Jesus. What did the Jewish people do when the first temple was destroyed? So if you read in the book of Kings, first book of Kings chapter 8, Solomon when he's dedicating the first temple, Solomon says if this temple is destroyed and the Jewish people are taken far away and they have no access to the temple, then what they do to be forgiven is they pray to me and they turn from their sins and God says I'll forgive them. This is the message of the entire Bible. We see that Jonah, the prophet Jonah went to the non-Jewish city of Ninveh and he says to them, God is very upset with you. In 40 days this city will be overturned. What did the people in Ninveh do? Did they start bringing sacrifices all over the place and spritzing blood? No. The book of Jonah tells us they turned from their evil ways. They turned back to God and God forgave them. And that is the message of the Bible that the only way to be forgiven is through repentance, is through turning away from your sins and turning back to God. And every prophet said this, every prophet said this, Ezekiel in chapter 33. Ezekiel says now you son of man say to the house of Israel thus you have spoken saying since our sins and our iniquities are upon us and we are wasting away because of them how can we live? The prophet Ezekiel asked this question what do we do? We're being destroyed spiritually by our sins. That's the question Ezekiel asks here in chapter 33 verse 10. What is the answer that God gives him? Does God say, no problem.  It's so interesting that every time the Jewish Bible has a chance to give the Christian answer it never does. Here would have been the perfect place to give the Gospel, to give the Christian answer. What does God say in the very next verse? As I live, God says I do not want, I do not desire the death of the wicked but rather that the wicked one returns from his way that he may live, repent, repent from your evil ways why should you die, O house of Israel? And this is the message of every single prophet you won't find any of the prophets you won't find Isaiah or Jeremiah or Ezekiel any of them saying to the Jewish people you better start bringing sacrifices otherwise you're in big trouble. What do they all say? Isaiah chapter 55 verse 7 let the wicked forsake his way and let them righteous man his thoughts and let them return to the Lord and he will have compassion on him and O God he will abundantly pardon where Jeremiah chapter 36 verse 3 perhaps the house of Judah will hear all the evil that I intend to do to them so they will repent each man from his evil way and then I can forgive their sin and their transgression. This is repeated dozens and dozens of times in the Hebrew Bible. It's interesting that if Christianity insists that Jesus was the final sacrifice the final sacrifice why does our Bible tell us there's going to be a third temple with the reinstitution of sacrifices why does the Bible tell us in the prophet Ezekiel that when the Messiah finally comes he's actually going to offer sin offerings on the temple altar that's unexplainable for a Christian why are we going to need to have sacrifices again if Jesus was the final sacrifice? There's much to say here but I'll end with one point to insist that Jesus was a sacrifice ignores everything the Bible teaches us about sacrifice I mentioned before that the Bible rails against human sacrifice but the very verse that you quoted chapter 17 verse 11 in Leviticus it doesn't say that any blood on the planet can atone for sins it's that the blood I've given you upon the altar the blood on the altar Jesus blood was never shed on the altar I can read chapter 17 in Leviticus and say that you know what last week praise the Lord I cut my finger making a tuna sandwich and I bled all over my kitchen floor all my sins are forgiven you see it says without the shedding of blood there's no forgiveness I had the shedding of blood and the Christian would rightly say to me you can't just do whatever you want make up your own religion you've got to follow what the Bible says well the Bible says it's blood that's placed on the altar that can serve as a sacrifice and if you look at the Bible there are laws of sacrifices every sacrifice had to be unblemished Jesus was blemished he was beaten he had a sword stuck in his side he had a crown of thorns put on his head he was whipped every sacrifice had to be burned Jesus was not burned his blood was not offered on the altar every sacrifice had to be brought by a priest a curain not by Roman soldiers so it's impossible to say that Jesus could have been a legitimate sacrifice Rabbi Scobac has spoken very well and at great length he never did anything to cut him short or give him anything but his full time why? because I'm a nice guy? well, I am a nice guy but that's not why I did it I did it because I knew if I gave him enough rope he would hang himself and he just did the rabbinical position is that if you turn and you go to God and you perform the mitzvahs if you do chuvah everything is great the catch is of course we can't we can't let's say just for fun it's possible for a person to go through his entire life keeping all the commandments perfectly and not sinning he's still in trouble why? because we are born with original sin we are born in a state of sinfulness the only thing that can get rid of that sin because it's not a sin that you commit it's like a status crime you start off with it the only thing they can do that is the blood of Jesus we don't even really have any free will to do that getting rid of the original sin and that puts us all in a bind if it wasn't for Jesus the original sin of Adam and Eve so these are two very important points that we need to reflect about number one does the Bible actually teach us that after Adam and Eve sinned in the Garden of Eden every human being that will live afterward is stained with their sin I would say that not only does the Bible not say this but the Bible repeatedly teaches us against this idea the Bible repeatedly tells us that people will suffer spiritually only for their own sins not for the sin of someone else it's true that after Adam and Eve sinned the condition of human life has changed we're told that people will have to eat bread by the sweat of their brow we're told that women will give birth and it will be painful there were consequences that came as a result of Adam and Eve sin the hand that we are each dealt for our life is different as a result of what Adam and Eve did it seems that originally human beings were supposed to live forever and now with the sin of Adam and Eve we're told that human beings will become mortal but this has nothing to do with God's judgment on you or on me we're never told in the Bible that because of what Adam and Eve did God looks at you and your relationship with God is impacted in a negative way we know that the prophet Isaiah tells us that your sins separate between you and God the Bible never tells us that as a result of what Adam and Eve did any of us is separated from God the only thing we know as a result of Adam and Eve's sin is that our lives are going to be different in a physical kind of way we're going to have to work hard and childbirth is going to be difficult and our lives are not going to be eternal but spiritually the Bible never says there's going to be any impact on any human being afterwards now your second point which really you made first is an important one and I believe actually the most important issue at the heart and Christianity are different I believe that people the conventional wisdom is often that people will say this the only difference between Judaism and Christianity is that Christians believe the Messiah has come and Jews do not believe the Messiah has come yet other than that we're exactly the same the truth is that that is one of the most untrue statements a person could ever make and if you were to ask me what is the major difference between Christianity and Judaism I would not point to our differences about the Messiah I would say that the major difference is how we view men how we view ourselves Paul says in the book of Galatians chapter 2 verse 21 that if you could be righteous by keeping the Torah then Jesus died in vain it seems that according to Paul who is the basic architect of Christianity virtually all Christian theology comes from Paul not from Jesus Paul seems to be saying that we are not able as you pointed out Paul says we are not able to keep the Torah we're not able to be considered righteous by God through following God's instructions if we could if we were able to keep the Torah then Paul insists that Jesus would have died in vain and I think what's interesting is that this impacts this idea of human being are we capable of being good are we capable of obeying the Torah this impacts the concept of the Messiah look what Paul does when he speaks of the Messiah in his book of Romans Paul writes the following Paul says and so all of Israel will be saved as it is written and now watch what happens Paul now seemingly is going to quote from the prophet Isaiah and Paul says as it is written in brackets it says because the Christian Bible will tell you this is from Isaiah chapter 59 and he will remove ungodliness from Jacob that's Romans chapter 11 verse 26 allegedly quoting Isaiah 59 verse 20 according to Paul that is the whole purpose of the Messiah the redeemer will come from Zion what is he going to do he's going to remove ungodliness from human beings he's going to take the sin out of us why Paul's point of view because Paul believes each one of us is spiritually crippled Paul believes that a human being is basically under the control of Satan the New Testament teaches that Satan is the god of this world and since you're under the control of Satan you cannot be good you cannot obey the Torah you cannot be considered righteous and since according to Paul you can't do it that's why the Messiah comes the Messiah comes to do it for you he removes the sin from you that's Paul trying to base this theology on Isaiah chapter 59 again listen to the way Paul translates Isaiah 59 that the deliverer will come from Zion and remove ungodliness but when you check the actual verse in Isaiah you'll see that Paul played very fast and loose with the text what Isaiah actually says and we say this verse in our prayers every day Isaiah says a redeemer will come to Zion not from Zion as Paul says but that's a minor point but what is this redeemer going to do he's going to come and who's he going to come to and says he will come to those of Jacob who turn from their sins says the Lord according to Isaiah we have the ability of turning away from our sins we are not under the control of Satan we have the ability to repent we have the ability to turn back to God if we've done wrong and so according to Isaiah according to Judaism the Messiah only comes you'll see this in Deuteronomy chapter 30 when will the Messiah come when the Jewish people turn to God when the Jewish people repent when the Jewish people get our act together God essentially will send the Messiah send the redeemer to basically bring about the conclusion of history but our Bible says it will only happen when we have repented the Messiah doesn't do it for us Paul does not accept this and Paul insists that no we cannot do it we're not able to repent we're not able to be good we're not able to follow the Torah which is the claim that you just made and I would say that if we wanted to determine is it possible or not to follow God it's very simple all we need to do is to see what did God teach on this subject so it's interesting that immediately after the Garden of Eden episode immediately after the episode where Christians make the mistake of thinking that every human being now is damaged goods in the sense that we are crippled spiritually controlled by Satan and we cannot resist evil immediately after this story in chapter 4 verse 7 God says to Cain sin will crouch at your door you will always be tempted to do the wrong thing but God says but you can rule over it God tells us at the very beginning of the Bible you have veto power over evil, over sin Satan does not rule you you are in control over Satan and then in the 30th chapter of Deuteronomy this question comes up very very starkly is it possible or not possible to keep God's commandments and God tells us in Deuteronomy chapter 30 verses 11 to 14 for this commandment that I command you this day it's not hidden from you and it's not too far away it's not up in heaven for you to say who can ascend to the heavens for us to take it for us so that we can listen to it and do it nor is it beyond the sea for you to say who can cross the sea for us to take it for us so that we can listen to it and do it rather God says it is very close to you in your mouth and in your heart you can do it Paul says you cannot do it God says you can do it I prefer to go with God over Paul let me ask one more question on this topic if I may you're part of the messianic movement and you accept on some level the importance of the mitzvot of the commandments of God so I would ask you share with us according to your point of view why did God give us these commandments what was the purpose for which God gave the Jewish people the Torah and the commandments did you hear that question excellent question because the christian position is you can't do the mitzvot so why does God give us 613 add up all the thou shalt not 613 why? not only he tells us to do them he tells us we can do them what's the point if we can't because the Torah is not an instruction book it's not a how-to manual the Torah isn't to show us that it can be done the whole point of the Torah is to show it to prove to us that it can't be done it's not a how-to book the Torah is a mirror it's a mirror so when we fail when we try to live up to this impossibly high standard we see our own imperfections reflected in the Torah it's a teaching experiment by trying to fulfill the commandments and failing we see how dirty we are of salvation we are through faith faith in Jesus faith in Yeshua Moshiach that's the purpose of the mitzvot okay so again I find this difficult to understand because I've showed that the Torah tells us specifically that we are able to observe the commandments and I understand what you're saying you're saying that from the Christian point of view they insist regardless that no we are not able to keep the commandments and that the purpose of that the purpose of God giving us commandments that we can't keep from a Christian point of view is to help us realize that we're sinners and that we're dirty and that when we look ourselves in the mirror of the Torah we will see how filthy we are and we'll come to recognize those who embrace the Messiah who will die for our sins I understand that but we have another problem again aside from the fact that this flies in the face of the Torah's plain teaching that we are able to keep the commandments I think there's another problem many of us know that there's one chapter in the Bible that is by far the longest chapter in the entire Bible it's found in the book of Psalms and it's chapter 119 this chapter has 176 verses this is like a chapter with a glandular problem this is massive and what's interesting is if you look at this chapter you'll see that it doesn't jump around and talk about a million different things the whole chapter has 176 verses is focused laser beam like on one topic the whole chapter is an incredibly beautiful passionate poem in alphabetical order about the commandments that God gave us his statutes, his testimonies his laws, his Torah here we have an incredible poem that is basically reflecting on what is the Torah what are the commandments what are the mitzvot what are the testimonies and statutes and what does this psalm say about these commandments that God gave us if you just read it it tells us that the commandments of God are sweeter than honey they're more precious than gold they're the most delicious thing in the world that the author of this psalm just speaks about how much their heart craves these commandments I live for the commandments of God 176 verses over and over and over again of how important and wonderful and delicious and special these commandments are if what you're saying is true why didn't the author of this psalm say there was plenty of room look it's true the commandments are nice and they're wonderful and they're delicious and they're beautiful but don't get too excited about them because you can't keep them anyway and they were only given to show you that you're a sinner it's not there it's not there and if that were the case this would have been the place for the Bible to give the Christian message and as I said before the Hebrew Bible has plenty of opportunities to give the Christian message it's a big wide open door where right here is where the Bible should have given the Christian message if there is a Christian message and every single time there's an opportunity for the Jewish Bible to give the Christian message it never does and this is to me just about the most glaring example because Paul's entire theology that you need a Messiah to come and die for your sins because you can atone for your own sins because you cannot keep the commandments you cannot be good this whole theology is based upon the premise that we cannot keep the Torah and here which is 176 verses about the Torah where it could have said this it could have told us this important truth it's simply not there and so I find one of the greatest faults if I had to sum it up with the Christian theology is that not only is it not found anywhere in the scriptures but it's openly and plainly contradicted by the message of the Hebrew Scriptures well I do confess that I don't know the the scriptures nearly as well as the good Rabbi here but I do know something I know that Yeshua that Jesus has changed my life completely turned it around I hear him speaking to me I pray to him and my prayers are answers and the prayers of hundreds, thousands millions of Christians the prayers are answers people who are on their death bed who are dying of some disease miraculously turn around because of their prayers and the prayers of countless others praying for them there was a situation I believe it was in West Virginia where this woman was driving through the mountains and ahead of her in Foggy Road was a huge pylon collision she was going faster than she should have and she knew there was going to be a collision and what did she do she let go of the wheel she said Jesus take the wheel I can't do this and there was a horrific crash how do we know what she did she walked away without a scratch by all rights her blood and guts sort of spattered all over the Blue Ridge Mountains it wasn't because she asked for salvation and Jesus in his wisdom and in his goodness gave it to her you see these miracles again and again you hear countless testimonies and the change that he's brought about in my life is something certainly before I accepted Yeshua Mashiach I never would have seen happen but it's true we pray and our prayers are answered in 1977 I was driving from my home in New Jersey to a wedding of friends of mine in Detroit and near Snowshoe, Pennsylvania my car went over a cliff and it flipped over about 10 to 15 times and it landed on the roof and my car was literally flattened I came out of this car with nearly not even a scratch and I remember when I finally came to speak to someone I had lost my voice and the reason I lost my voice is that as I was flipping over as I was crashing I screamed out to God I screamed at the top of my lungs and I lost my voice I didn't scream out to Jesus but I believe that a miracle happened for me I believe that with every fiber being that I'm here standing here today now I used to be 6'4 but but I believe that I was saved by God and the truth is that as a student of world religions I've met many people who have told me that as a result of their spiritual life be they Mormons or Hindus or Buddhists or Jains or Baha'is or Sikhs or Sufis or Christians or fellow Jews many will tell you that their lives have changed since they came into their faith or they renewed their faith they will tell you they've experienced miraculous a person abandons nothingness for a life of meaning and a life of discipline their life is going to improve if you take someone that was a couch potato and didn't do anything for their health and they take up exercise in a serious way they will tell you they feel incredible their life has changed their life has never been better any movement we make the first chief rabbi of the modern state of Israel Rev Cook wrote that any movement that's positive that we make is going to change our life in a meaningful way if your house is a mess and you start cleaning it you get your house in order that's a positive thing and it's going to pay dividends and so if you are living a meaningless life that was not spiritual and you came to a point where you wanted to take God seriously you wanted to take the Bible seriously of course your life is going to improve you're going to live a more disciplined life you're going to live a cleaner life you're going to live a life with meaning but the important point to remember is it doesn't make what you believe true in the same way that the Hindu or the Mormon that will offer the very same testimony that you've offered it doesn't mean that what they believe is true because it is paid dividends in their life the Bible tells this very clearly to us in the 13th chapter of Deuteronomy the Bible tells us that we are going to have false prophets to come to the Jewish people God warns us they're going to be false prophets and God tells us they're going to do incredible supernatural miracles now you could ask the obvious question if they're false prophets why would God give them the ability to do incredible supernatural miracles and the Bible there in Deuteronomy chapter 13 tells us God says because I'm testing you to see if you will remain true to me and to following my Torah or if you're going to be dazzled by someone doing impressive magic tricks the miraculous is always very powerful it's very hard to ignore when miraculous things happen it's very hard to ignore improvements in our life it's important not to misinterpret these things we know according to the Bible that it's only in the days of the Messiah that only God will be worshiped the Bible says in the prophet Zechariah chapter 14 by Yom HaHu Yia Adonai Achad Hu Shmoachad only in the messianic age is God going to be one until that time people are going to worship all kinds of things all kinds of deities and they're not true and yet these people will experience improved lives miracles so we shouldn't discount the reality of people's lives changing based upon their religious path we shouldn't discount the supernatural in people's lives but we have to remember it can never prove which religion is true the only thing these miracles can prove is one thing that there's a God that runs the world miracles can prove to us there's a supernatural realm that the world is not a materialistic place where what you see is what you get and that's all there is to it like the Greeks at the time of the Hashbanoyim that was their world view there's only nature what we can see from the realm of the miraculous is that there's more to the world than the natural there's a supernatural realm there's a God who runs the world but miracles can never tell us which religion is true if every religion on the planet has miracles and so I want to encourage you don't walk away from God continue to seek God He calls us in Deuteronomy if you seek God with all of your heart and all of your soul you will find Him and I believe that you're sincere and I believe that your heart really desires to connect with God but you have to recognize that you aren't given the tools in your formative years to truly understand what Judaism teaches and unfortunately you veered off course with the first attractive spiritual path that you saw but I would encourage you not to stop studying and to recognize that the Torah does teach us the truths and if you recognize that you really need to learn more about the Torah that's a good thing and I believe with all of my heart that if you continue to apply yourself and study the Torah God will open your eyes God will bring light to you and you will see that ultimately there's a path for you to return to and that's the path of God His Torah His path for the Jewish people which is the path that's contained in the Mitzvot and the commandments that God gave us which the Torah tells us are the greatest blessing that we can have The Good Rabbi has given many answers to quote chapter and verse to all of my arguments so am I convinced not one bit and I'll tell you why, I'll give you an example from my high school years a friend of mine came out to me all excited I was in like grade 11 or grade 12 and he was just like beside himself he had a piece of paper and he said sit down you gotta see this and he was able to show to me he was able to prove to me using the laws of physics and aerodynamics that it was absolutely impossible for a bumblebee to fly and I couldn't find anything wrong with any of his arguments or any of his calculations did I believe him? No because the truth is bumblebees fly do I believe his arguments? No because the truth is Jesus is the Messiah who died for a sins and that's just the way and I will do something I will pray for you I will pray for you that you see the truth sooner rather than later because sooner you will be able to know the joy and the fulfillment that I know and later is gonna be too late and you will come to know the truth the truth is will you know it sooner enough that you can do something about it I will pray for you


Hello and welcome to this news click year end sport special and because it's a festive season I've got with me two guys in studio who you can roll into one great big Cuddly Santa Claus, Weber Wragunandan and Leslie Xavier. Merry Christmas, Ho Ho Ho! Okay, please only invite these guys to be Santa Claus at adults parties. Okay, but on that jovial jolly note it's been an exciting a very busy sporting year. The Asian Games, Commonwealth Games, the Football World Cup, a lot of the Hockey World Cup, a lot of action this year. So how we're going to do this is basically we'll all three of us the news click sports team will discuss a couple of sports stories that were the closest in your mind to the kind of sports journalism that you guys started in your careers wanting to do the most exciting interesting endearing sad whatever it might be right so let me come to you first Leslie. I'll start with the latest actually the one that the big tournament that got over in Bhuvaneshwar the Hockey World Cup. We were looking beyond the stadium we were looking at how the tournament is touching lives not just of the players who are involved in it or the officials or the immediate immediate organizing fraternity but about the volunteers the boys and girls who were there from from the villages from the academies around Orissa were definitely left inspired by the by the tournament and seeing all these players in action about the businesses that flourishes around this thing I'm not talking about the major sponsors as such by the way Odisha State was the sponsor of the World Cup that's something new otherwise the small the flag sellers the jersey sellers the face painters all these things yeah micro around the stadium exactly and obviously the stories related to the World Cup as such how India fared how what the World Cup means for Indian hockey there were a few good written pieces as well how Indian hockey India treats its players badly for instance and and also where the sport is heading that was written by Viber where the sport is heading and I mean how relevant will hockey be in the next 10 years for instance so these are the kind of stories we tried to address and Belgium has announced itself on to the world stage that is something that Viber felt very close about the story of Belgium so maybe you can say I mean it's just I find I find it really endearing Belgium story simply because they started their hockey journey at the same time that Indian hockey got a real reality check 2008 Beijing Olympics Belgium qualified for the Olympics India did not Belgium qualified and said hey you know what we want to win gold two editions later India did not and India said hey you know what we want to win gold two editions later but look who did look who went that way and managed to put their systems in place so in fact one of the things that really came across to me when talking to people at the work of words where Belgian hockey where Indian hockey focuses on developing good making a good team for a tournament Belgian hockey wants to make a good team for the future so they're not training players for a World Cup a Champions Trophy a World League or an Olympics they're training coaches and players who will carry the game forward for as long as you can play I think if you you have to go way back it's it's in 2008 the team qualified for the Beijing Olympics first time in 32 years I think and that's when it all started the funding became the young with the under 16 under 18 under 21 teams we got good coaches we got good training camps and you see that from a young age we started to get the right training and and the guys who are now in this team we played under 18 under 21 and we won medals and you can feel that since 2008 2009 we started just growing growing growing and this team has been together since I think 2012 2013 and you see that now we're growing so fast and it's not over I think that that picture is what we tried to provide while covering it for news click that the sport of hockey and where Indian hockey stand as far as as far as the global game is concerned and how the approach is I mean it's not right in on many counts because ultimately it's not about the results like he mentioned ultimately it's not about a generation or two generation of players ultimately it's it's about setting up a framework for something which the game becomes self-sustaining in in in the country and the talent keeps on coming into the system organically and that's actually a problem with Indian sport as a whole like there is no like way where you constantly are trying to churn out players there is a system in place like take Kabaddi for example for years and years we've had great Kabaddi players who have won us medals at the top accolades of the sport but evidently there have been problems at the grassroot level at the administrative level and this year with India losing gold at the Asian games to Iran that the can of woes yeah that Pandora's box opened up so which leads us I think quite seamlessly into the the next story which is the sport of Kabaddi and a sport that's domestically doing really well because of the introduction of the pro-kabaddi league so in terms of popularity its popularity is growing players are being able to now earn pretty decent living out of playing the sport professionally but below the surface problems everywhere it's pretty cancerous if you if I use about because success on the international stage for the national team is actually very paramount for its popularity and it's I mean we take pride saying that Kabaddi we aren't beaten not anymore and Iran is very close actually and it's not like it was a one-off victory or something like that and then when we news click tried to dwell deeper into the reason why India lost that's when the can of worms open so in the last three four years there have been court cases and all that because at the federation level there there was monopoly of one particular family galore family and they were controlling Kabaddi and they were putting their people on all the state associations and then obviously nepotism and its various versions came up and this particular Asian games teams that the two teams that went to the Asian games when there were a lot of corruption allegation was the court cases for file and what the court decided was to conduct a try because it was too late they decided to conduct a trial or something on that lines after the Asian games trials after no but then it later turned out that the court didn't mean trial so there was a problem with that so it was quite a messy affair and we aware at the ground where these trials were supposed to happen it was at the IG stadium in New Delhi there were a set of players who had come in from the brought in by the guys who filed the original case and they happen to be the new Kabaddi federation of India NKFI that's the name by the way new Kabaddi and they are trying something new for the sport they claim and so the players where they selections never didn't happen the national teams were not I mean obviously they interpreted the courts decision saying that it was not a straight on selection trial or a match between those teams and that which anyways would have been meaningless but there was a lot of confusion and these players went back media buzz was there and then what happens the new Kabaddi federation launches a league of its own so it's it's basically meant for players who are not part of the the existing pro league and it's supposed to actually be a rival to the pro league you know what is happening is that two federations would be fighting each other and then two leagues will come up so the set of players would be barred from by the other federation court cases will happen national team again will go to the stage that it was state that it was before the Asian games and so where does the sport at the pattern that emerges from across all the stories that we've covered in all the various disciplines seems to be that at the top the people who are determining the structure there's a lot of politics corruption money exchanging hands favoritism lack of transparency but then you go to the grassroots level where sport in a way is being played in a in its purest form where usually younger athletes boys girls are playing a sport that they love being trained by a coach who often doesn't take any money for the training he or she is imparting and has set up very basic kind of infrastructure where these kids who otherwise have no real outlet for their energy except going to school and then the usual forms of entertainment electronic media etc etc right so is that would you agree that across all sports it seems to be a pretty similar story that at the grassroots the intentions are good the desire to be engaged with sport is for those reasons of course athletes that are getting involved also want opportunities I mean if they excel then they would like support from the system to encourage them further sure but when they're starting off things are pretty decent so that is encouraging that is not just true for sport I would say like that's true for any form of human-human endeavor at the smallest level it's always noble and very genuine and very nice to see and as soon as there's a little bit of little bit of money involved so the it's it's it's not this money yeah so the thing is that at the smallest level at the grassroots level and we all have been there as a journalist as a part of as part of the system playing the sport so there athletes themselves play for the right reason and the organizers and the coaches and the system around them also do the things for the right reason which is for the sport itself and then as it goes up athletes remain true to that reason because they they want they want glory they want a career out of it which is nothing wrong in it money yeah exactly the reason for the athlete also evolves but it does not evolve at the corruption of their sporting exactly but the people who the people who change are the administrators and that you can't I mean and it's not a so as a case in point let's bring up the story of Satnam Singh who was celebrated a couple of years ago as the first Indian to be picked in the NBA draft by the Dallas Mavericks second round pick 52nd overall but a moment that was like sort of heralded as the coming of age or the Indian basketball becoming the next big thing competing to be the number two viewer viewed sport in the country and then a year after that we found Satnam back home back in his village really frustrated upset and alone feeling quite alone this was like a perfect example of what happens when you herald a guy as the new champion of like I mean these are the kind of stories that movies are made out of you know but in reverse you know it's a nothing guy going and becoming a real big guy the right side is that Satnam's journey was not over so we met him he was obviously training he got a contract with the Canadian League he's gone abroad again he will play he will hopefully come up but the again this takes us back to that systemic problem that you mentioned exactly when you find the guy and when you're trying to build him up into this marketable PR will kind of commodity then he's the best thing ever and then once you feel yeah the minute you realize that he's really not as good as you thought he would be just because he's seven foot two for example in this case because you are competing with other big guys as well to agile and you do know it like I mean you drop him like a hot I mean maybe the system just does not make a place for failure and does not give you an option no this was actually the problem was that they just jumped into it because it was selfish on the part of Satnam's promoter NBA India or the NBA mechanism or the Mavericks themselves because they all are looking into India as a market they are not looking into India as a place where you develop talent and bring Indian basketball up India is a untapped market for NBA for any clubs for that matter that's why in football a lot of academies are established here who hardly turn out players who would go to Europe to play things like that but Satnam's case they portrayed him as a big thing and it was to a large extent fake because he was never seasoned for that yeah and these NBA players they they go through that collegiate system high school system and collegiate system which is highly competitive the NCAA system is is slightly below NBA probably in physicality and all that but otherwise as far as game skill is involved the game time the way the athletes live about their life everything is a is based on that model the athlete would be living when he becomes a professional athlete actually I was also point I just want to point this out also that we're like sitting and talking about how like Satnam's career has gone downhill this and that but he's what 24 no younger oh yeah younger he's I think 22 22 that's why I started as soon as our camera operator yeah wow so that's why that's why he's he's in Canada and hopefully from because he has had experience playing in the D league in the NBA and going through the paces and he understand what to expect and Canadian league is slightly lesser than NBA but competitive nonetheless and from there you can you can come up again probably enter NBA the right way the way it was meant to be develop and take step by step and all that and you don't need any kind of next big thing promotion around him to actually unnecessarily put pressure on him and and I'm sure even you entered his house he would have felt that that signaling feeling that you feel when the athlete is feeling lost yeah pretty much and it's a all other things aside it's a great thing that this kid now has the chance to go back and play fairly competitive basketball on a regular basis if nothing else I mean literally when he was sitting with us all he was asking was for someone to realize that he's there in Baluke village in Spick near Lodhiana and he's been trained in the sport of basketball for several years he he does or knows how to do very little else and he was hoping that someone would use these skills that he has to offer the service that he has to provide and hopefully St. John's Edge which is the team that that he's playing for in Canada will find some utility for him and he'll be able to craft a career so the positive was that this guy at least got a second chance right which now brings me to my sport and what is happening in the iLeague we had great stories we started the year with new champions yeah a brand new second year club that was almost out of the iLeague that went through in it in the season it went through match fixing players getting attracted by bigger clubs new players coming and going but yet managed to do elasticity and beat the Mohan Baghans and the East Bengals and everyone else that was an IZOL FC in the upcoming teams to actually repeat what IZOL had done the previous year you know IZOL was an underdog story I think Minerva has been a Bollywood story two years in a row you had this fantastic sort of dramatic nail biting or not maybe not nail biting but last last match day finish when unexpected club that's come from the ground up is taking the league and we find ourselves now in a situation that we've been talking about for so long for eight years where from the inside the All India Football Federation's commercial partners are not only trying to sabotage but completely destroy this league to ensure that in the years going forward anyone serious about coming into Indian football from the perspective of creating a club and playing at the highest level would go to the Indian Super League the fate would be decided by by by the backers financial backers like you mean to say they don't want two leagues no so the the the entire structure seems now to be driven based on an ownership model where the football federation or the clubs even the clubs themselves have no ownership on the competition at large but the competition is being owned and governed and managed by certain partner entities who are putting up the money and basically they get to decide what happens with this sport now what hopefully what we are all hoping for is that football is known as the people's sport or is a popular sport for a reason and that these clubs some of whom have hundreds of years of history will not take it lying down actually more than the clubs that have hundreds of years of history they'll probably get off by joining the yeah they'll get off on a cheap shot but what what really hurts about killing the i league is that you won't get stories like aizol you won't get stories like neroka also last season and you'll definitely not get a story like real kashmir you know you'll never have a real kashmir playing in isl because there is no one who is in kashmir because arjun kapoor will not go and buy a club there sorry he won't it's just true he'd rather buy a club wherever pune and so that completely changes the dynamic of a football competition and also if you look at stadium attendance uh i league i mean isl is no match for i league uh yeah go not not what they have you believe on you know yeah i mean watch television they have for season for i mean for people who've seen nothing is uh go killum kerala for instance in kori kori the municipal stadium they had close to 60 000 attendance last month in one of their home matches i mean you've been to neroka stadium you've been there for several games it's almost always got at least 50 percent attendance kashmir's first home game was something out of they have to lock the gates uh before the match so that more people don't absolutely and Kolkata people don't care about uh meanwhile meanwhile deli are playing in the isl which stadium as far as the football federation here is concerned and the man running it is concerned it's a very clear case of dismantling as many parts as possible and selling it to his friends and family it's a straight up i mean there is no discussion there's nothing further to it in this apparently the man running the show believes that we will qualify for the 2026 qualifier we are going to win it now winning was asia asian cup we are going to win the asian what your dreams are too little this is what happens when we start talking football it ends up going from a 15 minute show to a half hour very very quickly so we'll curtail it at that um i think the general sentiment like guys to sum up your feelings from 2018 whatever your year covering sport and what you what do you hope for in 2019 i think some of the stories that i most enjoyed doing were related to grassroot sport were related to sport that is usually ignored by mainstream sport and that is perhaps the least depressing way to cover indian sport things like that the beauty of sport so capturing that actually is more gives us gives us a more awesome experience than going to a isl venue in india the problem is that the way things are heading and it's it's there's nothing wrong in commercializing it's it's good for players it's good for the sport but but it is not being done the right way because the the vested interest the control that is being done it's actually killing the charm of mainstream sport too because it's killing sports for the fans it's killing sport for the players it it's definitely it's it has definitely killed sport for the journalists who are covering it and on this great positive note but there are a lot of positives for 2019 let's hope that the indian team does well at the i don't know the reason why we are so jovial even though we are supposedly discussing morose or serious sort of stories that are typical of an indian context 2019 is another year it's a chance for not just football but for several other sports to realize that there is a possibility for people to make money even if you don't cheat everyone else out of it that perhaps if we establish a platform or systems or processes that are more equal then many more can perhaps in the long-term benefit from it whether or not indian sport will do this we'll let you know in 2019 because despite what people want we're not going anywhere so have a great end to 2018 and see you again next year