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IMHO, these posts are getting too big. I'm going to suggest paring the arguments down to a few key focus areas, if you don't mind.

Yep. This sort of thing is problematic over this form of communication - If it weren't for the vast ocean of corn between you and I, I would be much more comfortable addressing these issues on one back porch or the other, with a handy supply of sweet tea. ; ) Our entire conversation thus far would have hardly passed an hour in that condition. Much better conversing, and my favorite preference - far preferred to banging about with these accursed thumbs.

To that end, I offer only this link to address the two house fable: A Brief Assessment of Two House Theology

Let me begin by noting that, as I said before, my position is more like Two House Messianic than British Israelism - I do not fully adhere to either one. My insatiable penchant is for the Prophecy, from which my greater thesis arises...

But that being said, your presented article is a rather shallow case. Again, the errata proves the point:

Note that I use 'Ephraim' as shorthand for the 'House of Israel' to distill the thought away from Israel proper, and to avoid confusion between the two.

Read the prophets. Ephraim is present, separate, and distinct from Judah in end time battles (ALL of the tribes are mentioned). Ephraim owns lands, has armies and weaponry. If, as your article describes, the ten tribes are presently incorporated into what we know as Israel, then some action necessarily must occur to separate Ephraim out again, allowing him to fill the position he is in by the end time. I think that is, of course, a ludicrous thought, hence I believe that Ephraim is already separate and distinct, and as close as we are to the coming conflagration (say, within the next 50 years) I don't think there is time for him to appear, thus he must be here already...

Read Hosea particularly, because he describes in no uncertain terms how Ephraim will fair in the breadth of time. He cannot go back - brambles are put in his way. He forgets who he is. YHWH brings him into the wilderness and courts him, and for a while things are swell... But eventually Ephraim becomes wealthy and arrogant and falls away again, forgetting the Father and going after his monies and wine, full of decadence. It doesn't end very well... Ephraim does return, but only after he is made scarce upon the earth - as scarce as the gold of Ophir. If the Church, or Western Civilization, is indeed Ephraim, it is not with any sort of pride that I announce it - but rather with a sense of certain doom. We are in for a terrible time, if that is the case.

Look into the inheritance of Ephraim (Joseph, Ephraim, Manasseh) - How is it that he, given the lion's share of the blessing, remains unfulfilled? He is the fruitful bough (bears fruit) by the river, overflowing the wall. He is given the fruits of the land and the sea, the earth will set forth her treasures (mining). Cattle and land... And understand: The inheritance cannot be given until the death of the testator (heard that before?). So IF I am right, one should not begin to see Ephraim forming from the nations until after the death of Messiah... He CANNOT be incorporated in Israel, because Israel (since Messiah, even since Babylon), certainly has never received these blessings.

When the dragon goes after the seed of the woman, some 1650 years are spent chasing them into the wilderness... The 1700's are an extraordinary time. A study of long-count prophecies in the Bible will amaze you. Read that old black heretic Isaac Newton. His math si pretty good on the long count stuff, even if He didn't get it perfectly right.

And lastly, I would bring you to Isaiah 54 - Read 53 for context - Who is this barren woman who is told to leap for joy following the death of Messiah? She cannot be the gentiles, for she inherits them. She cannot be the married wife (the House of Judah), for she will have more children than her. She was a wife of youth, rejected and shamed... but now, she is married again to YHWH. There is only one entity that she could be. Only the House of Israel can be this woman.

THEN look to the NT. You will find he is still in the nations at that time. The clues are sparse to a Greek mind, but they are there - and once you see, you will see it everywhere.

No, by far and away, the House of Israel is the most ignored saga in the Book. And a huge portion of the Book is dedicated to that story. There is no way one can understand the prophets if one misses the distinction.

I will also add this: it is the snare of Satan, who has been much mentioned on these pages, to attack believers through the universal human Achilles heel, pride. What better way to do that than to draw off tens of thousands of gentile believers into spiritual coma by convincing them they are crypto-Ephraimites? And what better way to show spite toward God, which spite is ever in the heart of Satan, than by promoting an abuse of God's good law to promote evil and division in the body of Christ, and to blunt the message of God's amazing grace?

I would submit that it is not I who is in a spiritual coma. Rather, most of Christendom slumbers in Greek blankets and with a Roman pillow. Read the Temple texts in Ezekiel. The House of Israel (Ephraim) is shown the measure of the Temple so that he will be ashamed of himself - HE DOESN'T KNOW.

And don't feed me a line about siphoning off believers - The very same thing is spouted by the Romanists. The only unity there is is in TRUTH. One cannot be so sure of oneself that one does not seek. The truth is not in the choir-box now any more than it was for the Temple Jews. Had they the knowledge of the few who were paying attention, they would not have missed the time of their visitation. In it's ignorance of the Tanakh, I believe the church at large is in the very same position.

More tomorrow. I am too beat to address your whole post. I hope you have a great day.

Yep. Sweet tea is good stuff. I often thought how much more civilized the FR Religion Forum would be if these conversations were all held in person over a pleasant meal.

Anyway, I defer to go further with the Two House speculation. The endpoint seems to be a pretext to convince gentiles they are under Mosaic Torah, which is false. But some people thrive on such speculation. For myself, it seems a perfect candidate for this rebuke:

1Ti 1:4 Neither give heed to fables and endless genealogies, which minister questions, rather than godly edifying which is in faith: so do.

The "ministration of questions" is an interesting thought to me. Some things don't have definitive answers this side of Heaven. Where did all my genetic material come from? Who knows? And theologically, who cares? My family is the "one new man" created in Christ, neither Jew nor Gentile, but a brotherhood of new creations made to be like Him.

Why then get tangled up in uber-speculation about being a crypto-Ephraimite, especially when we know, for a fact, the various supposedly lost tribes were not lost, even up to the time of Christ, and not hyper-separated from Judah, as the theory requires? See, this is like those judicial opinions that seem too short, but they are dead-on correct, because they identify the essential presupposition that isn't true, that unhinges the rest of the case, no matter how gloriously complex it may be. Nothing you cited rehabilitated your damaged presuppositions.

But rather than go round the block indefinitely, which I'm sure would not be fun for either of us, I will simply leave that debate to others. It truly is an "endless genealogy" question that minsters division rather than godly edification. I am much more concerned for the truthful telling of the Gospel.

In that connection, I have a question for you. You have not responded to the remainder of my last post, and that's fine, there's a lot to sort through in that badly overweight post. But in the interest of losing some of that bulk by focusing on key presuppositions, I'd like to know what you think about this passage:

Heb 7:11-14 If therefore perfection were by the Levitical priesthood, (for under it the people received the law,) what further need was there that another priest should rise after the order of Melchisedec, and not be called after the order of Aaron? (12) For the priesthood being changed, there is made of necessity a change also of the law. (13) For he of whom these things are spoken pertaineth to another tribe, of which no man gave attendance at the altar. (14) For it is evident that our Lord sprang out of Juda; of which tribe Moses spake nothing concerning priesthood.

Your theory of Torah, so far as I am able to understand it, is that God never changes Torah, so that anything added later does not displace anything already in place. I think the passage above destroys that notion entirely. But I want to look at it fairly closely to understand how that could work. Because in a certain respect I think understand the value in what you are saying. God's holiness is perfect and eternal. How then could there be a setting aside of the shadows if they, even as shadows, are intrinsically good?

And yet, we see they can be set aside. The pre-Mosaic rule of divorceless marriage was modified by Moses' writ of divorce. The wilderness tabernacle was set aside for the Temple. And here, in Hebrews, we see that the levitical priesthood is set aside for Jesus as our new High Priest, and as a consequence, as so much of the law is in support of the levitical priesthood, the law itself must be changed (μεταθεσις) to accommodate Christ acting on our behalf in the order of Melchisedec.

Now I think you try to support immutability of the law by arguing that any new code is additive and always incorporates the old. That's a creative angle, but I don't think it works. Even if it were true (which I contend it is not), the premise of immutability is defeated if anything new is added. Additions are changes. If someone adds a new feature to the code, that goes in the change log. The new body of code is different. It has changed. So it is not immutable.

But your theory of continuous evolutionary incorporation is also incorrect. If you were to view Exodus 26-27 as legislative text, when David reveals the plans for the new Temple, the Exodus text is now all strike-through text. It has been taken out of the code, because the new code is not merely additive, and does not incorporate the old, but replaces it, because it must, because it directly conflicts with it. There cannot be a tabernacle inside of or alongside of the new Temple. The new Temple displaces the old. There is therefore real change to the law. It is not immutable.

And finally, as we see here in Hebrews, Paul is explicit: the law had to change because the levitical/Aaronic priesthood changed, or rather, was set aside, because there could not be both in one system. The one replaces the other. Indeed, Paul says that Moses' law of the priesthood does not account for a priest out of Judah. So how then could the law not be changed. There was no choice, if Christ was to offer Himself on our behalf as the High Priest of God. Therefore, God is free to change His law, and has done so. The law, Torah, is not immutable.

So then what is the truly eternal Torah? Only those things that God does NOT change. In our New Covenant, we know that idolatry is still wrong, as is murder, adultery, theft, bearing false witness, covetousness, etc. We also know that unjustified anger, airs of superiority, spiritual pride, lack of self-control, greed, envy, strife, lust in the heart, are all ongoingly wrong for those who would follow Jesus.

So it begins to appear to us what is the eternal Torah. It is the fruit of the Spirit, all those characteristics that express our love for God and neighbor: Patience, kindness, absence of envy, humility, self-control, unselfishness, good temper, innocence of thought, sorrow for sin, joy for truth, forgiving, believing, hoping, enduring, and unfailing. To paraphrase Jesus, it's not what goes into a man that makes him unkosher, but what comes out of him.

Well, I'm starting to nod off here, so good night.

Peace,

SR