THANKSGIVING TOO???

We often think of Thanksgiving as an American holiday, begun by the Pilgrims in Plymouth in 1621. At that time, so the story runs, the survivors of the Mayflower passengers celebrated their first harvest in the New World with a feast to which Governor Bradford invited the Indian Chief Massasoit and ninety of his braves.

'That was the first Thanksgiving Day in the New World. But actually a thanksgiving for the annual harvest is one of the oldest holidays known to mankind, though celebrated on different dates. In Chaldea, in ancient Egypt and in Greece, the harvest festival was celebrated with great rejoicing. The Hindus and the Chinese observe the gathered harvest with a holiday. And the Jews celebrate the ingathering of the crops as enjoined upon them in Torah.

" 'The Romans celebrated their Thanksgiving early in October. The holiday was dedicated to the goddess of harvest, Ceres, and the holiday was called Cerelia.

" 'The Christians took over the Roman holiday and it became well established in England, where some of the Roman customs and rituals for this day were observed long after the Roman Empire had disappeared.

" 'In England the 'Harvest Home' has been observed continuously for centuries. The custom was to select a harvest queen for this holiday. She was decorated with the grain of their fields and the fruit of their trees. On Thanksgiving Day she was paraded through the streets in a carriage drawn by white horses. This was a remnant of the Roman ceremonies in honor of Ceres...the Pilgrims brought the "Harvest in" to Massachusetts.' (Little, Brown & Company, Boston, 1953. Pps. 159- 160)." [The harvest queen represented the Queen of Heaven, mentioned in the Bible as idolatrous and Semiramis.]

Marian Schibsly and Hanny Cohrsen in their book, Foreign Festival Customs and Dishes:

" 'Giving thanks for the bounty of Providence is a practice as old as mankind and widespread as the human race. Long before the Christian era, harvest gods were worshipped with curious and varied rites. Customs now in use at harvest festivals have their counterparts in pagan countries; in many cases their origin and their significance is shrouded in mists of antiquity. The American Thanksgiving Day is usually ascribed to the Massachusetts colony of pilgrims, who, in gratitude for their first harvest on American soil, devoted the day of December 13, 1621 to praise and rejoicing. [Actually ran 3 days]

'The idea underlying such a celebration did, however, not originate with them. Thanksgiving day -- by that or some other name -- was known to virtually all the people who have come to America since 1492 and is known to those now coming...it becomes apparent that a day of thanksgiving is a custom in almost all the countries of Europe. It usually has to do with the harvests -- with the planting of crops or their gathering -- and therefore is observed in rural districts rather than in cities. (American Council For Nationalities Service, N.Y. 1974. P.46).' "

Diana Appelbaum's book, Thanksgiving: An American Holiday, An American History:

'Neither created intentionally nor copied from a paradigmatic 'first Thanksgiving,' the new celebration was a synthesis of four distinct and ancient traditions, elements of which united in the unique cultural milieu of Puritan New England to give birth to Thanksgiving. The newborn Thanksgiving holiday had a Puritan "mother" from Connecticut, a Pilgrim "father" from Plymouth and, for "grandparents," four traditions from the old world.

'New Englanders came from Old England, where the Harvest Home -- one of the 'grandparents' of Thanksgiving -- was celebrated. The Harvest Home was a holiday on which the villagers joined together to bring the last loads of grain from the fields and share a merry feast when the work was done. English villages followed local harvest customs; some dressed a maiden in white to ride atop a loaded cart as "queen of the harvest". Others fashioned a figure from the grain itself to be robed in a white gown and set in the center of a circle of rejoicing farmers.

'There was sufficient taint of idol worship and evidence of licentious behavior in the old English Harvest Home for Puritans to reject the custom summarily. They recoiled from these remnants of the pagan customs that predated Christianity in England, but memories of the harvest feast lingered all the same.

'The Puritans' shunning of the ancient Harvest Home left a void in the New England year that might not have been problematic had a similar attitude not been extended to other holidays. But the Puritans had disapproved of so many causes for celebration that a holiday vacuum existed in the young colonies.

'All Saint's Day had been swept off the calendar along with Christmas and Easter, on the grounds that these were mixed "popish" ritual with pagan custom....Remaining to New England were three holidays -- Muster Day, Election Day and the day of the Harvard Commencement.' (Facts On File Publications, N.Y. 1984. Pps. 18-20)."

Notice that the Puritans trying to obey God (though not fully) were left with only 3 holidays to observe and a holiday vacuum. They were, of course, ignorant of YHWH's Holy Days which should be observed exclusively.

'Like the Harvest Home, Christmas -- another of the old-world "grandparents" of Thanksgiving -- was remembered but not celebrated by the Puritans. The practice of designating the day of 'Jesus' birth, and especially of making merry on that day, were viewed as one of the grave errors of the churches of both Rome and England and as a departure from the purity of the early church. Celebration of Christmas was so disparaged in the seventeenth-century Bay Colony that the General Court forbade laborers taking off from work on that day under penalty of a five-shilling fine. Not until the nineteenth century did New England relent in this attitude and the Congregational churches began to observe Christmas -- but Massachusetts was two centuries old before that happened. In the early years, everything associated with Christmas was rejected out of hand; even the lowly mince pie, eaten in every household at Christmas, was banished from the Puritan kitchen as being unholy food at any time of the year.

'The spirit of Christmas, however, was sorely missed, and during the 1600s, when Thanksgiving was becoming a popular festival, small pieces of the English Christmas crept into the celebration of the Yankee Thanksgiving. Those quintessential English Christmas dishes, plum pudding and mince pie became as indispensable a part of the Thanksgiving menu as turkey and pumpkin pie itself. (Page 24).

'Thanksgiving Day, our unique American holiday, ought not to be confused with still a third 'grandparent,' the special days of Thanksgiving proclaimed by civil authorities in Europe and throughout the American colonies. When some stroke of extraordinary good fortune befell a nation, the civil authorities often declared a day of thanksgiving and prayer, marked by special services in every church...declarations of this sort were familiar to the first settlers on these shores. Coronado, Popsham and the settlers at Jamestown, Plymouth and Boston acted in this tradition when they held their "first Thanksgiving."

'Settlers in both New Amsterdam and Plymouth were familiar with the Dutch custom of celebrating October 3 as a day of thanksgiving commemorating the independence of Holland from Spain. English settlers recalled that the Anglican church marked November 5, the anniversary of the discovery of the Gunpowder Plot, as a day on which thanks were given that the scheme to blow up Parliament had failed. Puritan New England undoubtedly drew upon the tradition of civic thanksgivings in creating the new holiday.' (Page 25).

'Fourth "grandparent" to the American Thanksgiving Day was the tradition of individual Puritan congregations declaring days of thanksgiving and prayer. The Puritans rejected all ecclesiastical hierarchy in favor of the sovereignty of the congregation. Authority equivalent to that belonging to Catholic or Anglican bishops was vested in Puritan congregations, which has sole power to ordain clergymen, admit or excommunicate members and declare days of fasting and of thanksgiving. Like the proclamations of civil authorities, congregational thanksgiving days were declared for special causes.' (Page 25).

'The Thanksgiving holiday born in Puritan New England in the 1630s and 1640s was shaped by four traditions -- the Harvest Home, Christmas, proclamations of civic thanksgiving and congregational days of thanksgiving and prayer....other features of the holiday developed in Connecticut. The Connecticut River valley towns of Wethersfield, Windsor and Hartford were settled in 1635 and 1636 by families from Massachusetts Bay who shared with their sister colony a thoroughgoing dedication to Puritanism. The church in each town followed the established, Puritan custom of holding days of public thanks or of prayer and fasting as the occasion warranted, but the leaders of the colony departed from tradition by proclaiming a day of public thanksgiving each autumn in gratitude for general well-being and for the harvest just gathered. Although records from the early years are incomplete, a proclamation of thanksgiving for September 18, 1639, survives, as do proclamations for 1644 and for every year from 1649 onward.

'This was the crucial innovation. The entire Western world shares the custom of special thanksgivings for special causes, and as we have seen, individual Plymouth Colony congregations sometimes held harvest thanksgivings followed by a festive meal. When Connecticut made Thanksgiving Day an annual festival for general causes, however, a new holiday was born. Thanksgiving in Connecticut was held every autumn, not for special reasons, but in gratitude for the ordinary blessings of the "year past"and for the "fruits of the earth".' (Thanksgiving: An American Holiday, An American History, by Diana Karter Appelbaum. Pps. 28-29)."

As mentioned in earlier articles, Thanksgiving Day is intertwined with Christmas, beginning the Christmas sales season and countdown of shopping days left. The Christmas parade with Santa Claus, an imitation of Christ, and many floats depicting toys is presented then. Mrs. Josepha Hale, who pushed the acceptance of Thanksgiving Day as a holiday, also promoted the merry celebration of Christmas with frivolity, which before in the USA was observed more as a holy day only. Again, a day to worship God as Thanksgiving Day is not necessarily acceptable with God since the same claim could be made for Christmas and Easter which are clearly pagan.

PAGAN SYMBOLS OF THANKSGIVING DAY

A goose used to be the main course for harvest festivals and was replaced by the more common turkey in America with the Indians first. These birds representing the sun god or the Son of god, an imitation of the Son of God slain for others. Actually the symbols derived all the way back to Nimrod and Semiramis. Words from Wilkinson, an Egyptologist:

'The goose,' says Wilkinson, 'signified in hieroglyphics A CHILD OR SON;' and Horapollo says (i.53, p.276), 'It was chosen TO DENOTE A SON, from its love to its young, being always ready to give itself up to the chasseur[hunter], in order that they might be preserved; for which reason the Egyptians thought it right to revere this animal.' (Wilkinson's Egyptians, vol. v., p. 227)."

Pumpkin is used as a symbol for the sun and is also prominent in Halloween, replacements in the Western Hemisphere. The sacred goose of Europe was used if available, but turkeys were more prevalent so were substituted for them with the same idea derived from pagan harvest festivals.

"Chopped Up Meat & the Death of Osiris!

"According to Diana Appelbaum, 'Of the infinite variety of pies, two, the pumpkin and the mince, are intimately associated with Thanksgiving dinner.... There is no more quintessential Thanksgiving dish than mince meat pie, and yet, unlike the native pumpkin pie, mince meat was a tradition borrowed from the Christmas feasts of merry old England. Puritans in both England and America banned Christmas; the "high-shoe lords of Cromwell's making" frowned on all of the ancient Yuletide customs: "Plum broth was Popish, and mince pie--that was flat idolatry!"

'But by the early 1700s, mince pie was enshrined in the New England Thanksgiving menu.' (Thanksgiving: An American Holiday, An American History, pps. 270-27l)."

"The chopping of the meat was an ANNUAL RITUAL and REPRESENTED THE CHOPPING UP OF OSIRIS' BODY by Shem!"

"John Brand Bourne thinks the origin of both these customs [the harvest feast and the revelry that followed] is Jewish, and cites Hospinian, who tells us that the heathens copied after this custom of the Jews, and at the end of the harvest offered up their first fruits to the gods. For the Jews rejoiced and feasted at the getting in of the harvest. (Observations on the Popular Antiquities of Great Britain, George Bell & Sons, 1908. P. 16.)."

"Marian Schibsby and Hanny Cohrsen also noticed the Thanksgiving-

Tabernacles connection--'Many centuries before a day for nationwide thanksgiving and prayer was established in this country, the Jewish people observed such a custom. One of the most important Jewish festivals is that of the "Feast of Tabernacles," also called the "Feast of Ingathering" or "Succoth," which begins on the fifteenth day of the seventh month, the month of Tishri -- that is sometime between the last week of September and the middle of October. It marks the end of the harvest "after that thou hast gathered in from thy threshing floor and from thy wine press" (Deut. xvi, 13,16, RV) and is a season of joyousness and gratitude for the bounty of nature in the year that has passed.' (Foreign Festival Customs and Dishes, American Council for Nationalities Service, N.Y. 1974, P.53).

"Let me repeat what author Robert Schauffler said about the Grecian THESMOPHORIA: 'The harvest festival of ancient Greece, called the Thesmophoria, was akin to the Jewish Feast of Tabernacles.. It was the feast of Demeter...' In Rome, the same feast occurred in October and began with a fast day -- the pagan equivalent of the Day of Atonement!

'On their return a festival occurred for three days in Athens, sad at first but gradually growing into an orgy of mirth and dancing. Here a cow and a sow were offered to Demeter, besides fruit and honeycombs. The symbols of the goddess were poppies and ears of corn, a basket of fruit and a little pig. The Romans worshipped this harvest deity under the name of Ceres. Her festival, which occurred yearly on October 4th, was called the Cerelia. It began with a fast [Day of Atonement?] among the common people who offered her a sow and the first cuttings of the harvest. There were processions in the fields with music and rustic sports and ceremonies ended with the inevitable feast of thanksgiving.' (Thanksgiving, Dodd-Mead, 1957. Pages 12-13).

"Why am I stressing this THREE-DAY FESTIVAL TO CERES in Rome and Athens? Because the Pilgrim Fathers OBSERVED A THREE-DAY THANKSGIVING during the fall in 1621!!"

"Diana Karter Appelbaum CLEARLY brings this out in Thanksgiving, An American Holiday, an American History:

'The first autumn, an ample harvest insured that the colony would have food for the winter months. Governor Bradford, with one eye on the divine Providence, proclaimed a day of thanksgiving to God, and with the other eye on the local political situation extended an invitation to neighboring Indians to share in the harvest feast in order to guarantee that the feast served to cement a peaceful relationship; the three-day long meal was punctuated by displays of the power of English muskets for the benefit of suitably impressed Indian guests.' (Pages 7-8).

"It is interesting to realize that Edward Winslow, an 'historian' among the Pilgrim Fathers, would have written about the religious services held in those fall days if it was a day of thanksgiving to God, but HE MENTIONED NO SUCH THING! Instead, Diana Appelbaum states that 'Oysters, clams and fish rounded out the abundant, but far from epicurean feast that the celebrators would have been more likely to call "harvest home" than a "thanksgiving" celebration.' "

'A day of Thanksgiving was not an idea unique to the early settlers in America. The Pilgrims were well acquainted while in England with annual Thanksgiving celebrations, which had been known throughout history as an ancient and universal custom.

'In fact, the first Thanksgiving was more like a harvest festival, with none of the accounts mentioning any giving of thanks in solemn, religious piety as it is usually imagined. In keeping with long-standing English custom, Thanksgiving was filled with "revelry, sports, and feasts." ' (Myth information Extraordinary Collection of 590 Popular Misconceptions, Fallacies and Misbeliefs. J. Allen Varasdi)"

Is the eating of pumpkin pie, turkey or other food items used as pagan symbols in Thanksgiving necessarily wrong? No, only if utilized as part of the holiday or associated with it. There is the distinct difference between eating these foods as ordinary ones and partaking of a pagan rite, even though in the guise of a godly holiday whether in its season or not.

Though mincemeat pie is another matter derived strictly from pagan worship. I've seen the filler at the grocery store already mixed, available any time of the year. Eating meat and vegetable pies is normally all right. Though we should avoid anything which reminds us of association with customs of the heathen, as singing of Christmas carols of which a few sound rather godly. The song, Jingle Bells, is usually sung around Christmas time, and though not having anything to do with Christmas, might in the minds of some be part of the holiday. God recommended, actually ordered Israelites to destroy the accouterments of pagan practice. Which would help keep them from handling the objects and bring back the customs to mind.

De. 12:30 Take heed to yourself that you do not be snared by following them, after they are destroyed from before you; and that you do not inquire after their gods, saying, How did these nations serve their gods? even so will I do likewise.

Is Thanksgiving Day Pagan!?

Before getting into the actual history of Thanksgiving, which may shock and surprise, let us look at two arguments for keeping it:

    'I don't keep Thanksgiving Day as a holy day. It's a national day of giving thanks for what God has provided. It's not a holy day.'

  'Thanksgiving Day is an American holiday and therefore is not pagan. We are at free to keep it, and surely YHWH will appreciate it.'

    Is this the response people also use for justifying Christmas and Easter? Many who observe those pagan days do not even think of them as pagan holy days. Is it right to keep them? The Catholic Church expects all good Catholics to be in church those days and Thanksgiving Day also. Most of the Protestant churches keep the day as holy days also. (Holy meaning 'set apart' and in this case, for religious observance, by attending church.)
 

    We are warned to not be like the pagans and heathens, to not worship Him like they do (Deuteronomy 12:28-32).

    Pagan people set up their own or have their own 'holy days.' Never forget that fact.

        Let's pretend this holiday did not hearken back to pagan times. First consideration here is have pagan times ended? Once these pagan 'holy days' were only a few years old. Did that make them anymore right because they were new?

        Thanksgiving Day is not one of YHWH's ordained or authorized Feasts. A great many people believe this day is a 'holy day'. Do we make a good witness when we uplift this day as 'set apart'?

        For those of us who keep YHWH's (The Eternal One God's) set apart days, found in Leviticus 23, consider : 'The Church' (read Catholic here} proclaims thanksgiving a holiday (holy day), for the purpose of giving thanks for the many blessings we have received.

        For those whom He has called out of Babylon ('spiritual Egypt' a.k.a. this world), this ought to be cause for concern.

        Is this truly a religious day? Where does the Holy Scriptures (Tanakh) tell us to celebrate it?

        Although the U.S. have nationalized Thanksgiving, celebrations were held in ancient times to give thanks for the bountiful harvest. The Greeks honored Demeter, the goddess of agriculture, with a 9 day celebration; the Romans honored Ceres, Anglo-Saxons rejoiced with a feast to celebrate the reaping of the harvest

        Churches of all denominations are open for services on this 'holiday' every year...(over 38,000 Christian denominations alone)

        Long before biblical times the ancient people of the Mediterranean Basin held festivals at harvest time in honor of the earth mother. The goddess of the corn ('corn' being the European term for any grain; , was always one of the most important deities in the hierarchy of the gods, and her child was the young god of vegetation.'

        The ancient Semites called the earth mother Astarte...The Phrygians called her Semele. These deities were absorbed by the Greeks into the one great goddess, Demeter.' 'The Roman also had a harvest festival which they called the Cerelia, after Ceres, the Roman goddess of the corn.'

        The benevolent earth mother ... blended with the equally benevolent mother of 'Christ'. Local deities were blended with the Christian tales of saints to patrons for villages.

        In Peru, the ancient Indians worshiped the 'Mother of Maize' and tried every year to persuade her to bring in another good harvest. In Europe, the Austrians also had a 'Corn Mother' doll, fashioned from the last sheaf of grain cut in the field and then brought home to the village in the last wagon.'

        In Upper Burma, the friends of the household are invited to the barn for a feast when the rice has been piled in the husks on the threshing floor. After a prayer to the 'father and mother' for a good harvest next year they hold a feast of celebration.

        Most of the pagan customs that gathered round the harvest season have either disappeared or have been obscured so the celebrants have no notion of what they are celebrating.

        The Feasts depict a panorama of the many gods and goddesses and those who worshipped them.

        The star in this drama is Ceres, the Roman Corn Goddess. The Britains changed her name, in fact names: the Maiden, the Harvest Queen, the Kern or Corn Baby, the Kern Doll, the Ivy Girl, the Neck and the Mare. Sometimes the stalks of corn and sometimes she was represented by a sheaf dressed in many colored clothes which were decorated with flowing ribbons and the finest lace.

        The Kern Baby' an image, 'was made either from the last of the corn left standing ... or from the biggest and ripest ears to be found in the fields. The spirit herself dwelt in the corn, and mere mortals wanted no part in cutting her down. This responsibility was avoided by each throwing their sickles at this last sheaf from a distance and therefore it was impossible to determine exactly who cut down the final sheaf. Some where in their memory, they still held the awareness of a death and resurrection cycle therefore vegetation deity needed to be propitiated by a human sacrifice.'

        To fulfill this propitiation , this new Kern Baby was taken to the farm house and kept there until the next harvest supper. Last years kern baby was ceremoniously burned in the farm yard.

        We are quite well aware that most Americans do not follow the rituals we have discussed but does that make Thanksgiving Day acceptable for us to observe? May I celebrate Christmas as long as I don't have a tree or yule log?

        In the book of 1st Kings 12:26-13:5 we read:

    'And Jeroboam said in his heart, 'Now shall the kingdom return to the House of David: If this people go there to do sacrifice in the House of YHWH at Jerusalem, then shall the heart of this people turn again to Rehoboam, King of Judah, and they shall kill me, and go again to Rehoboam, King of Judah.'

    'Whereupon the king took counsel, and made two calves of gold, and said to them, 'It is too much for you to go up to Jerusalem: behold your gods, Oh Israel, which brought you up out of the land of Egypt.'

    'And he set the one in Bethel, and the other he put in Dan. And this thing became a sin: for the people went to worship before the one in Dan.'

    'And he made an house of high places, and made priests of the lowest of the people, which were not of the Sons of Levi.'

    'And Jeroboam ordained a feast in the eighth month, on the fifteenth day of the month, like the feast that is in Judah, and he offered upon the altar. He did so in Bethel, sacrificing to the calves that he had made: and he placed in Bethel the priests of the high places which he had made. So he offered upon the altar which he had made in Bethel, the fifteenth day of the eighth month, even in the month which he had devised of his own heart; and ordained a feast unto the Children of Israel: and he offered upon the altar, and burnt incense.'

    'And, behold, there came a man of Elohiym (God) out of Judah by the Word of Yahveh (Yahweh "The Eternal") unto Bethel: and Jeroboam stood by the altar to burn incense. And he cried against the altar in the Word of Yahveh, and said, 'Oh altar, altar, thus says YHWH; Behold, a child shall be born unto the House of David, Josiah by name; and upon you shall he offer the priests of the high places that burn incense upon you, and men's bones shall be burnt upon you.'

    'And he gave a sign the same day, saying, 'This is the sign which Yahveh has spoken; 'Behold, the altar shall be torn, and the ashes that are upon it shall be poured out. And it came to pass, when King Jeroboam heard the saying of the man of Elohiym, which had cried against the altar in Bethel, that he put forth his hand from the altar, saying, 'Lay hold on him. And his hand, which he put forth against him, dried up, so that he could not pull it in again to him.'

    'The altar also was torn, and the ashes poured out from the altar, according to the sign which the man of Elohiym had given by the word of YHWH.'

        Jeroboam set up golden calves to be worshiped in place of YHWH, and non-Levites to the priesthood since the Levites wanted no part of idol worship. The NIV states Jereboam set up, 'a month of his own choosing.' He instituted a feast 'like the festival held in Judah' (1st Kings 12:32).

     If our own 'set apart days' were not acceptable to 3,000 years ago, how can they be so today?

        Could this be what YHWH is trying to tell us when we read:

Amos 5:21-22

21 "I hate, I despise your religious feasts; I cannot stand your assemblies.

22 Even though you bring me burnt offerings and grain offerings, I will not accept them. Though you bring choice fellowship offerings, I will have no regard for them.


        Must we not separate ourselves from all pagan days and walk in the Way of the God (Elohiym) of Israel? For He has called us out of darkness. He is our Elohiym and we must follow Him. When we celebrate His Holy Days, we reflect to the world the One and Only True Elohiym. Do we dishonor Him when we celebrate any but His Set Apart Days?

When we come to see the truth, we realize that this world is full of lies and we realize that most people like (love) it that way.

If you do well, will you not be accepted? And if you do not do well, sin lies at the door. And its desire is for you, but you should rule over it." 

(Genesis 4:7 NKJ)

Thus says the Lord: "For three transgressions of Judah, and for four, I will not turn away its punishment, Because they have despised the law of the Lord, And have not kept His commandments. Their lies lead them astray, Lies which their fathers followed.

(Amos 2:4 NKJ)

"What profit is the image, that its maker should carve it, The molded image, a teacher of lies, That the maker of its mold should trust in it, To make mute idols? 

(Habakkuk 2:18 NKJ)

For the idols speak delusion; The diviners envision lies, And tell false dreams; They comfort in vain. Therefore the people wend their way like sheep; They are in trouble because there is no shepherd. 

(Zechariah 10:2 NKJ)

My hand will be against the prophets who envision futility and who divine lies; they shall not be in the assembly of My people, nor be written in the record of the house of Israel, nor shall they enter into the land of Israel. Then you shall know that I am the Lord God. 

(Ezekiel 13:9 NKJ)

And will you profane Me among My people for handfuls of barley and for pieces of bread, killing people who should not die, and keeping people alive who should not live, by your lying to My people who listen to lies?"

(Ezekiel 13:19 NKJ)

Because with lies you have made the heart of the righteous sad, whom I have not made sad; and you have strengthened the hands of the wicked, so that he does not turn from his wicked way to save his life.

(Ezekiel 13:22 NKJ)

"I have heard what the prophets have said who prophesy lies in My name, saying, 'I have dreamed, I have dreamed!' 

(Jeremiah 23:25 NKJ)

Her prophets plastered them with untempered mortar, seeing false visions, and divining lies for them, saying, 'Thus says the Lord God,' when the Lord had not spoken. 

(Ezekiel 22:28 NKJ)

Both these kings' hearts shall be bent on evil, and they shall speak lies at the same table; but it shall not prosper, for the end will still be at the appointed time. 

(Daniel 11:27 NKJ)

They make a king glad with their wickedness, And princes with their lies. 

(Hosea 7:3 NKJ)

"Woe to them, for they have fled from Me! Destruction to them, Because they have transgressed against Me! Though I redeemed them, Yet they have spoken lies against Me. 

(Hosea 7:13 NKJ)

You have plowed wickedness; You have reaped iniquity. You have eaten the fruit of lies, Because you trusted in your own way, In the multitude of your mighty men. 

(Hosea 10:13 NKJ)

And the Lord said to me, "The prophets prophesy lies in My name. I have not sent them, commanded them, nor spoken to them; they prophesy to you a false vision, divination, a worthless thing, and the deceit of their heart. 

(Jeremiah 14:14 NKJ)

O Lord, my strength and my fortress, My refuge in the day of affliction, The Gentiles shall come to You From the ends of the earth and say, "Surely our fathers have inherited lies, Worthlessness and unprofitable things." 

(Jeremiah 16:19 NKJ)

Also I have seen a horrible thing in the prophets of Jerusalem: They commit adultery and walk in lies; They also strengthen the hands of evildoers, So that no one turns back from his wickedness. All of them are like Sodom to Me, And her inhabitants like Gomorrah.

(Jeremiah 23:14 NKJ)

How long will this be in the heart of the prophets who prophesy lies? Indeed they are prophets of the deceit of their own heart, 

(Jeremiah 23:26 NKJ)

Behold, I am against those who prophesy false dreams," says the Lord, "and tell them, and cause My people to err by their lies and by their recklessness. Yet I did not send them or command them; therefore they shall not profit this people at all," says the Lord. 

(Jeremiah 23:32 NKJ)

He who works deceit shall not dwell within my house; He who tells lies shall not continue in my presence. 

(Psalm 101:7 NKJ)


Therefore thus says the Lord God: "Because you have spoken nonsense and envisioned lies, therefore I am indeed against you," says the Lord God. 

(Ezekiel 13:8 NKJ)


Remove falsehood and lies far from me; Give me neither poverty nor riches-- Feed me with the food allotted to me; 

(Proverbs 30:8 NKJ)


Because you have said, "We have made a covenant with death, And with Sheol we are in agreement. When the overflowing scourge passes through, It will not come to us, For we have made lies our refuge, And under falsehood we have hidden ourselves." (Isaiah 28:15 NKJ)

Also I will make justice the measuring line, And righteousness the plummet; The hail will sweep away the refuge of lies, And the waters will overflow the hiding place. 

(Isaiah 28:17 NKJ)

For your hands are defiled with blood, And your fingers with iniquity; Your lips have spoken lies, Your tongue has muttered perversity. 

(Isaiah 59:3 NKJ)

No one calls for justice, Nor does any plead for truth. They trust in empty words and speak lies; They conceive evil and bring forth iniquity. 

(Isaiah 59:4 NKJ)

"And like their bow they have bent their tongues for lies. They are not valiant for the truth on the earth. For they proceed from evil to evil, And they do not know Me," says the Lord.

(Jeremiah 9:3 NKJ)

Everyone will deceive his neighbor, And will not speak the truth; They have taught their tongue to speak lies; They weary themselves to commit iniquity. 

(Jeremiah 9:5 NKJ)


But the king shall rejoice in God; Everyone who swears by Him shall glory; But the mouth of those who speak lies shall be stopped. 

(Psalm 63:11 NKJ)

"Is this not the fast that I have chosen: To loose the bonds of wickedness, To undo the heavy burdens, To let the oppressed go free, And that you break every yoke? (Isaiah 58:6 NKJ)

For He had commanded the unclean spirit to come out of the man. For it had often seized him, and he was kept under guard, bound with chains and shackles; and he broke the bonds and was driven by the demon into the wilderness. (Luke 8:29 NKJ)

"Yet the children of your people say, 'The way of the Lord is not fair.' But it is their way which is not fair! (Ezekiel 33:17 NKJ)

"I will gather those who sorrow over the appointed assembly, Who are among you, To whom its reproach is a burden. (Zephaniah 3:18 NKJ)