SWEARING

The Strange Origins of Swearing!

You will read some things in this article that are quite shocking, they were to me!  Do you have any idea where the words attest, testament, testify and such words may come from?  Do they sound familiar to testicle?  Have you ever wondered why? 

ABRAHAM'S MAKES HIS SERVANT SWEAR

And Abraham said to his servant, the oldest of his house, who had charge of all that he had, “Put your hand under my thigh, and I will make you swear by the LORD, the God of heaven and of the earth, that you will not take a wife for my son from the daughters of the Canaanites, among whom I dwell, but will go to my country and to my kindred, and take a wife for my son Isaac.” The servant said to him, “Perhaps the woman may not be willing to follow me to this land; must I then take your son back to the land from which you came?” Abraham said to him, “See to it that you do not take my son back there. The LORD, the God of heaven, who took me from my father’s house and from the land of my birth, and who spoke to me and swore to me, `To your descendants I will give this land,’ he will send his angel before you, and you shall take a wife for my son from there.  But if the woman is not willing to follow you, then you will be free from this oath of mine; only you must not take my son back there.”  So the servant put his hand under the thigh of Abraham his master, and swore to him concerning this matter.

In court, people swear to tell the truth with a hand on the Testaments (the Bible). And even Jacob, before he died, asked his son Joseph to swear an oath not to bury him in Egypt, and to signify the oath, he asked Joseph to “put your hand under my thigh” (Gen. 47:29).

Why the testicles?

The importance of the covenant with Abraham and his future seed.

When Abram was ninety-nine years old, the LORD appeared to Abram, and said to him, "I am God Almighty;" walk before me, and be blameless. And I will make my covenant between me and you, and will make you exceedingly numerous." Then Abram fell on his face; and God said to him, "As for me, this is my covenant with you: You shall be the ancestor of a multitude of nations. No longer shall your name be Abram, but your name shall be Abraham; for I have made you the ancestor of a multitude of nations. I will make you exceedingly fruitful; and I will make nations of you, and kings shall come from you. I will establish my covenant between me and you, and your offspring after you throughout their generations, for an everlasting covenant, to be God to you and to your offspring after you. And I will give to you, and to your offspring after you, the land where you are now an alien, all the land of Canaan, for a perpetual holding; and I will be their God." 

The Covenant was to be with Abraham and these multitude of nations, his seed...so swearing with the hand under the thigh, which was where that seed was going to come from, showed the seriousness of it.  Even Abraham wanting the right girl for his son, and making the servant swear on his future seed, was important to the covenant.  Jacob did not want his body to be left in Egypt because these men were the fathers of this Covenant.  Which we also can be under with God as well, if we are willing to keep God's 10 commandments. 

Even if you are not an Israelite by blood, you can still be adopted under the covenant just like Rahab and Ruth were.  And look at Caleb, (associate of Joshua) he was not an Israelite, he was an Edomite. (1)  Yet Caleb was a famous warrior of Israel, adopted into the tribe of Judah. You don't have to be blood related to be an adopted Israelite, you simply need to worship the God of Israel, the God of the Bible and to keep his system of laws, (10 commandments, also called the Covenant) which are the basis of civilization.  Keeping the first 4 commandments are very important, when God says in the first commandment, "You shall have no other gods before me, He signifies that He is the "Lord of the Sabbath".  The 4th commandment which says, "Remember the Sabbath Day to keep it holy" simply reminds you that the God of creation Himself rested on the Sabbath day.  So, when you keep the 7th day Sabbath, you know you have that same God, the right God, the one who created man on the 6th day and created the Sabbath and rested on the 7th day of the week. 

1. "Caleb the son of Jephunneh the Kenizzite." "The Kenizzites were the sons of Esau, and were related to the Edomites, long-standing enemies of Israel."

 

 

 

 

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