Did Satan Really Know Who He Was Taking To?

By N. PLasovich

There have been many occasions when reading scripture I run across something that makes me stop and ask questions, one such example is in the book of Matthew chapter four where Jesus, (or Yeshua in Hebrew ) was led by the spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by Satan. It is also noted in the book of Luke chapter four as well, and Its a great story and I understand its concept in showing us how the L-rd himself was tempted; in fact there have been many occasions where it is preached from the pulpit and whereby we are taught about fasting and the reward for doing so, but I have some other questions and will share my views on this subject shortly, but first I think we need to read what the book of Matthew chapter four has to say first. This is taken from the King James Version: Matt 4: 1. Then was Jesus led up of the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted of the devil. 2. And when he had fasted forty days and forty nights, he was afterward an hungred. 3. And when the tempter came to him, he said, If thou be the Son of God, command that these stones be made bread. 4. But he answered and said, It is written, Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God. 5. Then the devil taketh him up into the holy city, and setteth him on a pinnacle of the temple, 6. And saith unto him, If thou be the Son of God, cast thyself down: for it is written, He shall give his angels charge concerning thee: and in their hands they shall bear thee up, lest at any time thou dash thy foot against a stone.

7. Jesus said unto him, It is written again, Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God. 8. Again, the devil taketh him up into an exceeding high mountain, and sheweth him all the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them; 9. And saith unto him, All these things will I give thee, if thou wilt fall down and worship me. 10. Then saith Jesus unto him, Get thee hence, Satan: for it is written, Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and him only shalt thou serve. 11. Then the devil leaveth him, and, behold, angels came and ministered unto him. Now in verse two it said, And when he had fasted forty days and forty nights, he was afterward an hungred. In this line alone one has to ask a very important question. Did he fast as we westerners fast, not eating anything, just drinking liquids, or did he fast through the day and eat in the evening as the Muslims do during Ramadan? One thing is certain, since he was an observant Jew, anything he ate would of certainly been Kosher! We can pretty well be assured he did not go the full forty days without at best drinking water, because after all he was in the wilderness which translates into the desert area of Israel, so it would have been hot and dry and we know you would have to have a water source of some type or you would surly die. Of course we also know that during any fast the body loses body fat and if allowed to go on for any length of time you also begin to lose muscle. Another point I would like to bring out about fasting for forty days, you would have to be in pretty good physical shape to carry out a fast like this without hurting yourself. So the contention that Yeshua was a limp wristed pansy can be pretty well put to rest here. We also have this visualization of him being a carpenter, and although I would not argue this point that he might have worked with wood to some degree, I would much rather throw this idea out there, he might have been more of a mason than a carpenter, and the reason I say that is because you have to remember, there wasnt a whole lot of trees in the area and

more was done with stone then with wood. You also have to remember that when Yeshua was talking about building His Church, he used more masonry terminology then carpentry. Either way, or both ways, he would have been in excellent physical shape and probably had a lot of upper body strength from doing his work and by no means a weak fragile kind of guy. Regardless of what type of fast he had undertaken, scripture clearly states that after the forty day fast he was hungry as Im sure we can all agree it would be understandable! The next thing we see in this passage is that Satan, (or in Hebrew HaSatan) comes to Yeshua and says, If thou be the Son of G-d, command that these stones be made bread. What I find fascinating here is what HaSatan didnt say, he didnt say since you are the Son of G-d, command that these stones be made bread, but instead, he said, if thou be, now to me this is a question, did HaSatan not know to whom he was asking this question? Did he not realize he was asking the Son of G-d almighty, who was and is and always shall be, (praise His name) and the most important part of this is ..if he knew who he was talking to, he surely would not have said, if thou be! Listen, it is not like HaSatan has never met Yeshua! We can go into scripture and see HaSatan used to be in Heaven, and even after being cast down to earth he still made trips to heaven as we see in Job chapter 1: 6. Now there was a day when the sons of G-d came to present themselves before the L-rd, and Satan came also among them. 7. And the L-rd said unto Satan, Whence comest thou? Then Satan answered the L-rd, and said, From going to and fro in the earth, and from walking up and down in it. So here we have a picture developing that to me brings into question what HaSatan knew and if he was blinded to the fact that he was dealing with the Son of G-d. Next you will notice that Yeshua didnt directly answer HaSatan but instead just quoted from scripture, It is written, Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God. , next we see HaSatan whisking the L-rd away out of the wilderness to the city of Jerusalem and they were sitting on the pinnacle of the Temple, which was the highest point of the

Temple so you could see a great distance, but the other thing I saw was this, the Temple was the dwelling place of G-d in the Holy of Holies on earth and HaSatan took Yeshua to the highest part of the Temple, the symbolism of HaSatan being HIGHER then Holy one of Israel who would have been in representation in the Holy of Holies on earth, so in essence HaSatan was indirectly showing that HIS Kingdom on earth was above that of G-ds on earth. HaSatan then told Yeshua in verse 6: And saith unto him, If thou be the Son of God, cast thyself down: for it is written, He shall give his angels charge concerning thee: and in their hands they shall bear thee up, lest at any time thou dash thy foot against a stone. What I see going on in this statement was again HaSatan saying if thou be and stating that even if Yeshua jumped from that high place G-d wouldnt let anything happen to him. And then Yeshua said unto him, It is written again, Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God. But even that didnt stop HaSatan because then we see him (verse 8) taking the L-rd up into an exceeding high mountain, and sheweth him all the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them; 9. And saith unto him, All these things will I give thee, if thou wilt fall down and worship me. Of course we know that HaSatan didnt have the power or the authority to do anything of the kind, he was doing what he does best and that was to lie. 10. Then saith Jesus unto him, Get thee hence, Satan: for it is written, Thou shalt worship the L-rd thy G-d, and him only shalt thou serve. Now here we see Yeshua making the statement that earthly goods serve no purpose unless its used in the worship of the L-rd G-d, (praise His Holy name) Now again, through this whole ordeal Yeshua never really made any kind of a statement as to his identity, and at any given moment Im sure Yeshua could have snapped His fingers and sent HaSatan to hell at that very moment, but that was not the plan! Thats also why I dont think HaSatan knew who he was dealing with and I also wonder how many other men did HaSatan approach with the same offers? I see this as the coup de grace for HaSatan because Yeshua stood his ground not only as the Son of G-d, but also as the son of Adam! Yeshua had to try out the suit of flesh to see if it could withstand the temptations of it, because if he

could do it, then so can we. Yeshua was a man, we cant forget that part of the equation and this whole thing would fall apart at its weakest link, being the flesh, and so by Yeshua starving it into submission for forty days and dwelling on the very words that have been written in the Torah from the beginning the whole plan comes into effect. But I have also have heard men argue and say, well He was G-d! Listen, if we then use that as an excuse then what is the sense of doing anything else? I might as well just rap it up and go home if I use that excuse! Look, didnt you notice that when HaSatan was making his attacks Yeshua just answered with the word of His Father, he never made a railing remark, He just quoted scripture! I truly believe that is why its so important to memorize scripture or at least know of the passage that could help you out of the temtation. If you get tempted, remember the passage that will bail you out! Simpleno, no its not, because we are flesh and we know the flesh is weak! Now comes the scariest part of this whole story. Verse 11. Then the devil leaveth him, and, behold, angels came and ministered unto him. Im not saying it is easy to shake off temptation because here we see that even Yeshua had to be ministered to after the encounter with HaSatan! G-d incarnate in man had to be ministered to..that my friends is some scary stuff right there! We have the Torah, we have His word, we have a savior that went the distance for all of mankind and thank you Yeshua for doing that for me. For you are worthy of our praise! Again, my thinking is HaSatan didnt know who he was talking to, because he doesnt know everything like our G-d does, because its not HaSatans design, its G-ds design! Amen!