The Story of a Harlot Named Samaria

 “Tomorrow is a feast to YHWH,” Aaron told the people (Ex. 32:5). But the Israelites assembled on a day of their own choosing and worshiped the golden calf. To this lifeless idol, they ascribed the wonders of the true, invisible God: “This is your god, O Israel, that brought you out of the land of Egypt!” (Ex. 32:4). And as they worshiped, the people cast off restraint, for Moses, upon returning to the camp, “saw that the people were naked; for Aaron had made them naked unto their shame among their enemies” (Ex. 32:25; KJV).

God had commanded no such feast, He had forbidden the making of idols, and He hated drunkenness and sexual immorality. But the Israelites invoked His name on the proceedings!

 “And the LORD said to Moses, ‘Go, get down! For your people whom you brought out of the land of Egypt have corrupted themselves. They have turned aside quickly out of the way which I commanded them’” (Ex. 32:7-8).

This statement summarizes most of Israelite history. Though instructed in God’s ways, the Israelites again and again rejected them.

And yet, even as they rejected God’s commandments, the Israelites spoke His name and paid lip service to Him. Reading through the books of Kings and Chronicles, one finds that nearly every pagan king of Israel and Judah spoke of the true God, even while worshiping other gods. As the Eternal spoke through Isaiah the prophet, “These people draw near with their mouths and honor Me with their lips, but have removed their hearts far from Me” (Isa. 29:13).

The Israelites attempted to have it both ways. They worshiped idols, but still wanted God’s favor. They wanted God’s favor, but refused to obey Him. As Elijah the prophet told the people, “How long will you falter between two opinions? If the LORD is God, follow Him; but if Baal, follow him” (1 Kings 18:21).

Brothers and sisters, the false religion of ancient Israel — the mixing of truth and paganism — has never died, but is alive and well today! It’s all around us. Let’s look at this a little more.

The Way of Jeroboam

“Jeroboam the son of Nebat, who had made Israel sin.” This phrase, and variations of it, is repeated fourteen times in the Bible! Jeroboam is, in fact, one of the central villains in the Bible.

Because of King Solomon’s sins, God divided Israel into two kingdoms, Israel and Judah. Solomon’s son Rehoboam reigned over Judah, but Jeroboam the son of Nebat, an Ephraimite, became the first king of Israel.

“And Jeroboam said in his heart, ‘Now the kingdom may return to the house of David: If these people go up to offer sacrifices in the house of the LORD at Jerusalem, then the heart of this people will turn back to their lord, Rehoboam king of Judah, and they will kill me and go back to Rehoboam king of Judah’” (1 Kings 12:26-27).

God commanded His people to go to His sanctuary three times a year to worship and rejoice before Him, at the feasts of Passover, Pentecost, and Tabernacles (Ex. 23:14-17; 34:22-23; Deut. 16:16). After Solomon finished building the temple, the celebration of these feasts continued there according to God’s command (1 Kings 9:25; 2 Chron. 8:12-13).

But Jeroboam subverted the Creator’s instructions. We read, “Therefore the king asked advice, made two calves of gold, and said to the people, ‘It is too much for you to go up to Jerusalem. Here are your gods, O Israel, which brought you up from the land of Egypt!’” (1 Kings 12:28).

“God’s commandments are too difficult.” “God’s law is a burden.” “Surely it’s not really that important.” Does this thought process sound familiar?

Jeroboam was just getting started, though. Apparently, God’s priests didn’t cooperate with his scheme, so Jeroboam simply replaced them: “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” (1 Kings 12:31; KJV). Later, we’re told that “whoever wished, he consecrated him, and he became one of the priests of the high places” (1 Kings 13:33).

As we saw in a previous post, the mystery of lawlessness includes the changing of times and law. Jeroboam already taught the people to break God’s law; now he decided to change God’s appointed times as well:

32 Jeroboam ordained a feast on the fifteenth day of the eighth month, like the feast that was in Judah, and offered sacrifices on the altar. So he did at Bethel, sacrificing to the calves that he had made. And at Bethel he installed the priests of the high places which he had made.

33 So he made offerings on the altar which he had made at Bethel on the fifteenth day of the eighth month, in the month which he had devised in his own heart. And he ordained a feast for the children of Israel, and offered sacrifices on the altar and burned incense. (1 Kings 12:32-33.)

Jeroboam was a lawless man. He rejected God’s commandments and told the people to worship other gods. He rejected the priests whom God had chosen, of whom God said, “For the lips of a priest should keep knowledge, and people should seek the law from his mouth; for he is the messenger of the LORD of hosts” (Mal. 2:7). Instead, he made priests of the lowest of the people, men who would do whatever he told them. He rejected God’s Holy Days and established his own holidays.

Because of Jeroboam’s sins, God warned that he and all his male descendants would perish: “I will bring disaster on the house of Jeroboam, and will cut off from Jeroboam every male in Israel, bond and free; I will take away the remnant of the house of Jeroboam, as one takes away refuse until it is all gone. The dogs shall eat whoever belongs to Jeroboam and dies in the city, and the birds of the air shall eat whoever dies in the field; for the LORD has spoken!” (1 Kings 14:10-11).

But Jeroboam did not heed. And though he and all his house perished, as God had warned, every succeeding king of Israel followed his example. Again and again, of one Israelite king after another, we’re told, “And he did evil in the sight of the LORD; he did not depart from all the sins of Jeroboam the son of Nebat, who had made Israel sin.”

A Hybrid Religion

As noted at the beginning, the Israelites didn’t altogether forget God. Many acknowledged Him and consulted from His prophets. Many of their names even included God’s name. King Ahab’s son Jehoram, whose name means “YHWH is exalted,” often consulted Elisha the prophet. King Jehu, whose name means “YHWH is He,” claimed to have “zeal for the LORD” (2 Kings 10:16). King Jehoahaz (“YHWH has seized”) pleaded with God for deliverance from Syria (2 Kings 13:4). King Joash (“Given by YHWH”), upon learning that Elisha the prophet was dying, went to visit him “and wept over his face” (2 Kings 13:14).

And yet, none of those kings ever turned from the sins of Jeroboam. They acknowledged God’s existence and sought His help, but refused to obey Him. During the reign of Joash, the king who wept over Elisha, Israel grew so corrupt that God said, “The LORD is not with Israel — not with any of the children of Ephraim” (2 Chron. 25:7).

God isn’t satisfied with lip service — not then, not now, not ever. As the apostle James wrote, “You believe that there is one God. You do well. Even the demons believe — and tremble!” (Jam. 2:19).

Mixing good and evil, truth and lies, Godly worship and paganism, isn’t 50% good. It’s 100% evil. Mixing clean water with sewage doesn’t make the sewage drinkable; it makes the clean water undrinkable.

And so, because the northern kingdom of Israel refused to turn from the sins of Jeroboam, because it refused to repent and obey God’s instructions, God cast all its people out of the land He’d given them and sent them far away into exile. As 2 Kings 17:22-23 tells us, “For the children of Israel walked in all the sins of Jeroboam which he did; they did not depart from them, until the LORD removed Israel out of His sight, as He had said by all His servants the prophets. So Israel was carried away from their own land to Assyria, as it is to this day.”

But the land wasn’t to remain depopulated. “Then the king of Assyria brought people from Babylon, Cuthah, Ava, Hamath, and from Sepharvaim, and placed them in the cities of Samaria instead of the children of Israel; and they took possession of Samaria and dwelt in its cities” (2 Kings 17:24).

Samaria, Israel’s old capital city, would give its name to the new inhabitants. They would come to be called Samaritans.

Naturally, the new inhabitants neither knew nor feared the Eternal. “And it was so, at the beginning of their dwelling there, that they did not fear the LORD; therefore the LORD sent lions among them, which killed some of them” (2 Kings 17:25).

How did they respond? They sent an urgent message to the king of Assyria asking for help. “Then the king of Assyria commanded, saying, ‘Send there one of the priests whom you brought from there; let him go and dwell there, and let him teach them the rituals of the God of the land’” (2 Kings 17:27).

So a pagan priest, one of the heathen Israelites carried away captive by the Assyrians, “came and dwelt in Bethel, and taught them how they should fear the LORD” (2 Kings 17:28). In other words, he taught them the same mixture of truth and paganism that had been Israel’s undoing! We read,

32 So they feared the LORD, and from every class they appointed for themselves priests of the high places, who sacrificed for them in the shrines of the high places.

33 They feared the LORD, yet served their own gods — according to the rituals of the nations from among whom they were carried away.

34 To this day they continue practicing the former rituals; they do not fear the LORD, nor do they follow their statutes or their ordinances, or the law and commandment which the LORD had commanded the children of Jacob, whom He named Israel

Like the Israelites whom they replaced in the land, the Samaritans “feared the LORD, yet served their own gods.” They chose for themselves priests “of the lowest of them,” as the KJV more correctly reads. Though they acknowledged God, they refused to obey Him. They rejected His laws and commandments.

From the golden calf at Mt. Sinai to Jeroboam to the Samaritans, we see the same religion continuing on. The same mixture of truth and paganism.

The Israelites at Mt. Sinai set up a feast day of their own choosing, invoked God’s name on it, and worshiped a false god. From Jeroboam onward, the Israelites rejected God’s priests, Holy Days, and laws, and made their own counterfeits — all while paying lip service to the Almighty. And now, taught by a pagan priest of Israel, the Samaritans, too, called upon God’s name but rejected His instructions.

Cut Off From God’s People

The Samaritans felt satisfied with this hybrid religion of theirs. They thought they had truly done well by the Almighty, and that they were His people.

Many decades later, when the Jews returned from exile in Babylon to rebuild the temple, the Samaritans offered to help them rebuild the temple. “They came to Zerubbabel and the heads of the fathers’ houses, and said to them, ‘Let us build with you, for we seek your God as you do; and we have sacrificed to Him since the days of Esarhaddon king of Assyria, who brought us here’” (Ezra 4:2).

And when Jesus Christ spoke to the Samaritan woman at the well, she demonstrated some knowledge of Scripture. She said to Him, “I know that Messiah is coming. When He comes, He will tell us all things” (John 4:25).

But again, God isn’t pleased with a mixture of truth and paganism. As Jesus said to that same woman, “You worship what you do not know” (John 4:22). And as the apostle Paul wrote, “Do not be unequally yoked together with unbelievers. For what fellowship has righteousness with lawlessness? And what communion has light with darkness? And what accord has Christ with Belial? Or what part has a believer with an unbeliever? And what agreement has the temple of God with idols?” (2 Cor. 6:14-16).

So when the Samaritans offered to help rebuild the temple, Zerubbabel and the other Jewish leaders rightly responded, “You may do nothing with us to build a house for our God; but we alone will build to the LORD God of Israel, as King Cyrus the king of Persia has commanded us” (Ezra 4:3).

From that moment on, the Samaritans became the enemies of Judah. “Then the people of the land tried to discourage the people of Judah. They troubled them in building, and hired counselors against them to frustrate their purpose all the days of Cyrus king of Persia, even until the reign of Darius king of Persia” (Ezra 4:4-5). At one point, they forced the Jews to stop building the temple (Ezra 4:23-24).

The Samaritans continued to trouble Judah during the time of Nehemiah and Ezra, too. As Nehemiah worked to rebuild the wall of Jerusalem, the Samaritans tried to stop him. They spread lies about Nehemiah, threatened to attack the city and kill the workers, bribed some of the Jewish leaders, plotted to lure Nehemiah out of the city to kill him, and sent spies to try to frighten him into sinning against God. All this is detailed in Nehemiah 2-6.

From that day to this, when folks hear that God isn’t pleased with mere lip service and that He requires obedience to His commandments, they often react with anger and hostility. Especially if they already consider themselves to be God’s people. More on this a little later.

Paganism and truth cannot coexist.

Good Samaritans

The most famous Samaritan in the Bible is the one in Jesus’ parable, “the good Samaritan.” To this day, folks who help strangers in need are called “good Samaritans.”

In Jesus’ story, found in Luke 10:25-37, a traveler was attacked by thieves, robbed, beaten, and left for dead. A priest, a man well-versed in God’s law, passed by and ignored him. Afterwards, a Levite, likewise well-versed in God’s law, passed by and ignored him. But a Samaritan, passing along the same road, stopped and helped the man, bandaged his wounds, and took him to an inn to recover.

The priest and the Levite were supposed to be Godly men who knew and taught God’s law, but they didn’t obey it. They didn’t love their neighbor. Yet a Samaritan, who worshiped what he didn’t know, fulfilled God’s law. He showed love and mercy to his neighbor.

What good is knowledge of God if we don’t live by it?

On another occasion, Jesus healed ten lepers (Luke 17:11-19). But the only one who returned to thank Him and give glory to God was a Samaritan. “So Jesus answered and said, ‘Were there not ten cleansed? But where are the nine? Were there not any found who returned to give glory to God except this foreigner?’” (Luke 17:17-18).

Again, those who had the knowledge of God and His way of life didn’t act on it. They didn’t truly love Him or appreciate what He’d done for them. But the Samaritan did. More on this, too, in a moment.

Simon the Samaritan

There’s one more story involving Samaria and its hybrid religion for us to look at. In the early days of the New Testament congregations, God’s servant Philip went and preached the gospel in Samaria, also performing healings and casting out demons (Acts 8:4-8). “And the multitudes with one accord heeded the things spoken by Philip, hearing and seeing the miracles which he did” (Acts 8:6).

“But there was a certain man called Simon, who previously practiced sorcery in the city and astonished the people of Samaria, claiming that he was someone great, to whom they all gave heed, from the least to the greatest, saying, ‘This man is the great power of God’” (Acts 8:9-10).

As we’ve seen, the Samaritans already followed a hybrid religion, fearing YHWH but serving their own gods, paying lip service to God but rejecting His commandments. They worshiped what they knew not.

And now, we have a sorcerer named Simon in their midst, a man who claimed to be someone great, “the great power of God.” Like the lawless one, the man of sin whom Paul would later write about, he worked signs and lying wonders (2 Thes. 2:9).

But Simon the Sorcerer, like the rest of the Samaritans, was amazed by Philip’s miracles and preaching. “Then Simon himself also believed; and when he was baptized he continued with Philip, and was amazed, seeing the miracles and signs which were done” (Acts 8:13).

When the apostles Peter and John joined Philip in Samaria, they prayed and laid hands on those who were baptized so that they’d receive the Holy Spirit (Acts 8:14-17). Simon was amazed by this, too. “And when Simon saw that through the laying on of the apostles’ hands the Holy Spirit was given, he offered them money, saying, ‘Give me this power also, that anyone on whom I lay hands may receive the Holy Spirit’” (Acts 8:18-19).

How little time it took for Simon’s true motives to be revealed! He didn’t have a repentant heart, nor was he truly interested in the gospel. He just wanted to preserve his power and influence over the people of Samaria.

Furthermore, Simon mistakenly thought the Holy Spirit to be given by the power of the apostles. Peter immediately corrected him on this point: “Your money perish with you, because you thought that the gift of God could be purchased with money!” (Acts 8:20).

How different Simon’s attitude was from the true apostles! They never sought power or pursued their own glory. They never tried to draw people to themselves, but pointed them to God. They had the same attitude as John the Baptist: “He must increase, but I must decrease” (John 3:30).

As the apostle Paul wrote to the Corinthians, “Who then is Paul, and who is Apollos, but ministers through whom you believed, as the Lord gave to each one? I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the increase. So then neither he who plants is anything, nor he who waters, but God who gives the increase” (1 Cor. 3:5-7).

Paul was grateful that no one would attribute receiving the Holy Spirit to him: “Was Paul crucified for you? Or were you baptized in the name of Paul? I thank God that I baptized none of you except Crispus and Gaius, lest anyone should say that I had baptized in my own name” (1 Cor. 1:13-15).

And so, because Simon’s heart wasn’t right toward God, Peter dealt with him just as Zerubbabel had dealt with the Samaritans centuries before. He cut him off from the people and the work of God. Peter said to him, “You have neither part nor portion in this matter, for your heart is not right in the sight of God. Repent therefore of this your wickedness, and pray God if perhaps the thought of your heart may be forgiven you. For I see that you are poisoned by bitterness and bound by iniquity” (Acts 8:21-23).

The Bible doesn’t speak of Simon the Sorcerer again, so we have no concrete evidence of what became of him. But early writers such as Justin Martyr, who was himself a Samaritan, claimed that this same Simon, called Magus (“magician”), later traveled to Rome and gained a massive following by preaching a counterfeit version of Christianity.

In its article on Simon Magus, the Catholic Encyclopedia observes that the so-called “early church fathers” considered him to be the “Father of Heresies,” especially the heresy of Gnosticism. It adds, “In morals Simon was probably Antinomian, an enemy of Old Testament law.”

And this brings us to the point of today’s post.

Modern-Day Samaritans

God called ancient Israel a harlot. Though she paid Him lip service, she again and again departed from Him and defiled herself with foreign gods. Though God warned her over and over again, “Do not learn the way of the heathen” (Jer. 10:2; Lev. 18:3; Lev. 20:23; Deut. 12:30-31), she disobeyed. She forsook God’s commandments and learned the way of the heathen.

Ezekiel 23 speaks at length of the two houses of Israel as harlots named Oholah and Oholibah. And God says at the outset of the parable, “Samaria is Oholah, and Jerusalem is Oholibah” (Ezek. 23:4).

Because Israel, led by her kings ruling in Samaria, defiled herself with foreign gods, the Almighty cast her out of His land. But the peoples who replaced her, the Samaritans, learned her ways and walked in them. They continued to mix the truth with paganism.

And the religion of Samaria is alive and well to this day — it’s mainstream Christianity! Just as the Israelites called themselves by God’s name, so Christians call themselves by His name, too. Just as Samaria rejected God’s law, so does mainstream Christianity.

Israel rejected God’s Sabbath and Holy Days and made its own. Mainstream Christianity has rejected God’s Sabbath and Holy Days, choosing instead to worship on Sunday, Christmas, Easter, and other days of its own choosing.

Ancient Israel spurned God’s instructions and learned the way of the pagans. As we’ve seen before, many of Christianity’s major doctrines come, not from the Bible, but from paganism. Just as Israel was a harlot who defiled herself with every pagan god, so is Christianity.

But the Israelites thought they did well. The house of Ephraim said, “In all my labors they shall find in me no iniquity that is sin” (Hos. 12:8). The Samaritans thought they were truly God’s people, as they told Zerubabbel. Mainstream Christians, too, think they’re doing well, that they’re truly God’s people.

But what did Christ say of those who call themselves by His name and refuse to obey Him?

21 “Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father in heaven.

22 “Many will say to Me in that day, ‘Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Your name, cast out demons in Your name, and done many wonders in Your name?’

23 “And then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness!’” (Mat. 7:21-23.)

Jeroboam and the house of Israel rejected the priests and prophets of God. They rejected anyone who told them to obey Him: “This is a rebellious people, lying children, children who will not hear the law of the LORD; who say to the seers, ‘Do not see,’ and to the prophets, ‘Do not prophesy to us right things; speak to us smooth things, prophesy deceits’” (Isa. 30:9-10).

Mainstream Christians reject anyone who tells them to obey God’s law. They have appointed for themselves teachers who neither know nor teach God’s law. How many churches today observe Sunday and not the Sabbath! And how many churches today embrace feminism, the sodomite movement, the crossdresser movement, and every other form of wickedness that God hates!

In the person of Simon Magus, we can see many of the false teachers of today. Many televangelists and other charlatans perform “signs and lying wonders” (2 Thes. 2:9) to “deceive the hearts of the simple” (Rom. 16:18), pretending to perform healings and other miracles. And how many of the world’s pastors and ministers are lovers of power, money, and fame! How many seek their own glory and draw people to themselves rather than to God!

Zerubbabel rejected the Samaritans from the rebuilding of the temple. Peter rejected Simon Magus from the work of God.

What is the temple today? “Do you not know that you are the temple of God and that the Spirit of God dwells in you? If anyone defiles the temple of God, God will destroy him. For the temple of God is holy, which temple you are” (1 Cor. 3:16-17). God’s people are His temple. The lawless, who scorn obedience to Him, aren’t part of His house. They aren’t part of God’s work at this time.

As the apostle Paul again wrote, “What agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God. As God has said: ‘I will dwell in them and walk among them. I will be their God, and they shall be My people.’  ‘Come out from among them and be separate, says the Lord’” (2 Cor. 6:16-17).

Likewise, God’s priests are His people. Those who obey Him and serve under Jesus Christ, our High Priest. “You also, as living stones, are being built up a spiritual house, a holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ” (1 Pet. 2:5). The lawless and the disobedient are not part of the spiritual priesthood. By rejecting God’s laws and sound doctrine, they also reject His priesthood.

But let us remember that having the knowledge of God and His truth does us no good if we don’t live by it. If we don’t love our Creator with our whole heart, if we aren’t grateful to Him for all He’s done for us, and if we don’t show love to our fellow man, then what good does knowledge do us?

Those of us “who keep the commandments of God and have the testimony of Jesus Christ” (Rev. 12:17) are in NO way better people than the lawless Christians. God didn’t call us because we’re smarter, more deserving, or in any way superior to other people. Quite the contrary!

27 God has chosen the foolish things of the world to put to shame the wise, and God has chosen the weak things of the world to put to shame the things which are mighty;

28 and the base things of the world and the things which are despised God has chosen, and the things which are not, to bring to nothing the things that are,

29 that no flesh should glory in His presence. (1 Cor. 1:27-29.)

One day, many of the lawless Christians will receive the truth with joy and gladness. They will learn to obey their Creator with love and zeal. They will become part of the house of God, and that will be a wonderful day!

But until that day, they are not part of His house. They go on mixing paganism and truth, rejecting God’s commandments, and profaning His Sabbaths. They cling to the sin of Samaria — the mystery of lawlessness.

I’d like to close with this thought. God said of ancient Israel, “The house of Israel rebelled against Me in the wilderness; they did not walk in My statutes; they despised My judgments, ‘which, if a man does, he shall live by them’; and they greatly defiled My Sabbaths” (Ezek. 20:13). Can anyone honestly say that verse doesn’t equally apply to her descendants, to modern Christianity?