Category: Grace vs Law

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Gentiles and the Law in Romans 2

For it is not the hearers of the law who are righteous before God, but the doers of the law who will be justified. Romans 2:13. A Torah study for Christians.

In another attempt to say that Christians have no obligation to keep the Law of Moses (aka God’s Law), Freddy wrote, “Paul tells us in Romans that the Gentiles who have no law do by nature what law empells them to do so they are a law unto themselves.”

Here is the passage to which Freddy is alluding:

For it is not the hearers of the law who are righteous before God, but the doers of the law who will be justified. For when Gentiles, who do not have the law, by nature do what the law requires, they are a law to themselves, even though they do not have the law. They show that the work of the law is written on their hearts, while their conscience also bears witness, and their conflicting thoughts accuse or even excuse them on that day when, according to my gospel, God judges the secrets of men by Christ Jesus.
Romans 2:13-16 ESV

Clearly there is nothing here that implies that being “a law unto themselves” excuses Gentiles from keeping the Law. In fact, Paul said exactly the opposite in this very passage: God will judge them according to their obedience of what they understand of his Law, even if they don’t know that it is his Law. Let me paraphrase and expand this passage to clarify what I believe Paul intended:

Nobody is righteous in God’s eyes merely because he knows the Law. The righteous, those who are justified by God’s mercy, are not those who know what the Law says, but those who actually do what the Law says. Consider Gentiles who have never heard Moses taught in a synagogue. When they instinctively do what God commanded us to do in the Law, even though they know nothing of Moses, it is as if they are Moses, the stone tablets, and the scrolls in themselves. Their actions show that, in their hearts, they already know the basic dos-and-donts of the Law. Not just their visible deeds, but also when their consciences prompt them to do good or make them feel guilty for doing wrong. Since at some level they know what is right and wrong, that knowledge will serve as a witness to their obedience or disobedience to the Law when God, through Jesus Christ, judges all of our hidden deeds and thoughts, as the good news of the Kingdom of Heaven requires.
Romans 2:13-16 (Paraphrased and Amplified)

In other words, at the final judgment, God will hold everyone–Jew or Gentile–accountable for their disobedience to what they instinctively understand of his Law, whether they have read the Bible or not. As Paul pointed out in the previous chapter, Romans 1, everyone is born with a basic understanding of right and wrong as defined by God’s eternal Law. By refusing to heed our conscience, we gradually silence it, but our willful deafness will not be a defense. We can’t claim ignorance of the Law today when we knew yesterday.

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Galatians and the Abuse of Paul

What did Paul mean by "weak and worthless elementary principles of the world" in Galatians 4:9?

Someone named Daniel made the following argument against believers in Yeshua being obedient to God’s Law as given through Moses:

Now that faith has come, we are no longer under the supervision of the law.

It doesn’t get any clearer than that.

How is it that you are turning back to those weak and miserable principles? Do you wish to be enslaved by them all over again?

-Daniel

Context, context, context. Modern Christians hear too many sermons and don’t do enough studying and thinking.

Daniel is alluding to a couple of Paul’s statements in the Letter to the Galatians, but he ignored the context and re-interpreted these statements to mean something other than what Paul intended. This isn’t entirely Daniel’s fault. His teachers all likely did the same thing. Here is the original passage:

Galatians 3:21-29  Is the law then contrary to the promises of God? Certainly not! For if a law had been given that could give life, then righteousness would indeed be by the law.  (22)  But the Scripture imprisoned everything under sin, so that the promise by faith in Jesus Christ might be given to those who believe.  (23)  Now before faith came, we were held captive under the law, imprisoned until the coming faith would be revealed.  (24)  So then, the law was our guardian until Christ came, in order that we might be justified by faith.  (25)  But now that faith has come, we are no longer under a guardian,  (26)  for in Christ Jesus you are all sons of God, through faith.  (27)  For as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ.  (28)  There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is no male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. (29)  And if you are Christ’s, then you are Abraham’s offspring, heirs according to promise.

Galatians 4:1-11  I mean that the heir, as long as he is a child, is no different from a slave, though he is the owner of everything,  (2)  but he is under guardians and managers until the date set by his father.  (3)  In the same way we also, when we were children, were enslaved to the elementary principles of the world.  (4)  But when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his Son, born of woman, born under the law,  (5)  to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons.  (6)  And because you are sons, God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying, “Abba! Father!”  (7)  So you are no longer a slave, but a son, and if a son, then an heir through God.  (8)  Formerly, when you did not know God, you were enslaved to those that by nature are not gods.  (9)  But now that you have come to know God, or rather to be known by God, how can you turn back again to the weak and worthless elementary principles of the world, whose slaves you want to be once more?  (10)  You observe days and months and seasons and years!  (11)  I am afraid I may have labored over you in vain.

Paul Is Easy to Take Out of Context

By reading and quoting small bits of this letter out of context, Christians are able to say that the Law is irrelevant to them. Paul wrote that no one can be saved by keeping the Law, and many Christians point to that and say, “See? Paul said we don’t need to keep the Law.”

This is nonsense. It’s like saying we don’t need pens and paper to do our jobs because we didn’t need them to get to the office. Just because you don’t need to keep the Law to be saved, doesn’t mean you don’t need to keep the Law after you are saved. The conclusion simply doesn’t follow from the argument.

I am going to deconstruct this passage, paraphrasing and amplifying one piece at a time. First, I want to establish the reason that Paul included this discussion in his letter at all.

Galatians 1:6-7 I am astonished that you are so quickly deserting him who called you in the grace of Christ and are turning to a different gospel– (7) not that there is another one, but there are some who trouble you and want to distort the gospel of Christ.

After Paul had introduced the Galatians to faith in Yeshua, some other people came and began giving them a false teaching. But what was the false teaching? Rather than stating it outright, Paul summarized his own ministry of the past 20 years. He wrote of how he had once persecuted the Christians, but was converted by a miraculous encounter with Yeshua, after which he began preaching the gospel to gentiles. Many years later, some Pharisees had infiltrated the Christian congregations and were insisting that the gentiles should be circumcised and keep the whole Law before they could be considered true members of the congregation. Again he traveled to Jerusalem to confer with the apostles, and they agreed that salvation was not by circumcision and works, but by faith. James, Peter, and the other Disciples wrote a letter to the new Gentile congregations with four rules just to get them started in the right direction because “Moses is read aloud in every synagogue”.

That controversy was not about whether gentiles should keep the Law or learn it; it was only about justification, or salvation from sin. (See “Does Acts 15 Say We Can Ignore God’s Law” for a more detailed discussion of that event.) Later, Peter visited the congregation in Antioch. While there, he sat and ate with gentiles and Jews alike, but when some Jews arrived from Jerusalem, he stopped eating with the gentiles. Paul confronted him about it because Peter’s own vision had shown him that he should not hesitate to fellowship with gentiles. Besides that, there was nothing in the Mosaic Law to prevent a Jew from eating with a gentile. That was only a rule that had been invented by men and was never from God.

Galatians 2:15-21 We ourselves are Jews by birth and not Gentile sinners; (16) yet we know that a person is not justified by works of the law but through faith in Jesus Christ, so we also have believed in Christ Jesus, in order to be justified by faith in Christ and not by works of the law, because by works of the law no one will be justified. (17) But if, in our endeavor to be justified in Christ, we too were found to be sinners, is Christ then a servant of sin? Certainly not!

At this point Paul clearly established that he was not writing about living a good life of upright behavior, but about eternal spiritual justification, about salvation: “We know that a person is not justified by works of the law but through faith in Yeshua the Messiah.”

Paul said that, even though he and the apostles were Jews, they knew that they were saved in the same way as the gentiles: through faith in Yeshua, and not by works of the law. But as James pointed out, this did not stop them from keeping the Law, only in relying upon it for their salvation (James 2:18).

Galatians 2:18-19  For if I rebuild what I tore down, I prove myself to be a transgressor. (19) For through the law I died to the law, so that I might live to God.

This thing that Paul is writing against is the same thing that he had previously torn down, but what was that thing? Not the Law itself as he repeatedly pointed out in the Letter to the Romans, but rather the legalism of attempting to earn salvation through obedience to the Law, especially to man-made laws that frequently ran counter to God’s Law. To go back to depending on the Law for salvation when it was never sufficient either before or after the cross would be counterproductive in the extreme.

Having established that the controversy in Galatia was not about how people ought to live, but how they are to be saved, let’s skip ahead to the passage that Daniel quoted.

What Was Galatians Really About?

Galatians 3:21  Is the law then contrary to the promises of God? Certainly not! For if a law had been given that could give life, then righteousness would indeed be by the law.

There is no conflict between Law and Grace if they are both used properly. God’s promise of salvation is alluded to in the Law, but is not provided for by the Law. Put another way, the Mosaic Law was never intended to save anyone from sin that has already been committed. There are provisions in it for enabling sinners to approach God despite their sin, but there is no provision to permanently remove that sin. That was never its purpose.

Total righteousness–the complete absence of sin–is not possible under the Mosaic Law and never was. Of course, there is another kind of righteousness that comes from obedience to the Law, unless Moses was lying in Deuteronomy 6:25, but that is not the righteousness that Paul was addressing here. It is has value, but all of the law-abiding righteousness in the world can’t erase a single instance of law-breaking. In Galatians 3:21, Paul was discussing to a greater righteousness that goes beyond mere actions of the flesh.

(22)  But the Scripture imprisoned everything under sin, so that the promise by faith in Jesus Christ might be given to those who believe.

The Scriptures written on stone and parchment would not have been necessary if we were able to maintain God’s standards perfectly. It’s very existence proves that we are imperfect. Because we are sinners, God gave us the Law to teach us how to behave, and also to serve as a witness and judge against us in our sins. When we sin, the Law testifies against us, and we come under its authority to condemn. If it weren’t for the written Law, many people would not even know that they were “imprisoned” by it because of their sin and would be unaware that they needed a savior. For those who become aware of their need, God has also made promises of redemption in the same document.

(23)  Now before faith came, we were held captive under the law, imprisoned until the coming faith would be revealed.

Paul did not mean that faith came at a particular moment in time for all people everywhere. Faith did not come after Yeshua’s crucifixion or even after Pentecost. If it did, then Abraham’s faith could not have been counted as righteousness (Galatians 3:6). Faith has come to individuals in all ages. Enoch, Moses, David, and Paul were all saved by faith and set free from the condemnation that came from their guilt under the Law. Those who have not yet found faith in Yeshua are still held captive to the Law because their failure to obey it, keeps them under its authority to condemn.

The Law As a Schoolmaster

(24)  So then, the law was our guardian until Christ came, in order that we might be justified by faith.

The Greek word paidagogos is translated as guardian, schoolmaster, or tutor, depending on the translation you’re reading. According to David Stern (Jewish New Testament Commentary), the paidagogos functioned as a disciplinarian who ensured children arrived at their school safely and on time. Because the paidagogos does not exist in our culture, none of those translations are quite right. Young’s Literal Translation renders it as “child-conductor,” which is probably as accurate as one could hope for.

I think the King James Version is very instructive here.

(24)  Wherefore the law was our schoolmaster to bring us unto Christ, that we might be justified by faith.

Notice that “to bring us” is in italics, which means that those words were not in the original Greek text. They were inserted by the translators to help the reader understand what they believed the passage to be saying. The added words don’t detract from the meaning in the KJV, but the English Standard Version, from which I have been quoting throughout this series, is misleading in this case, especially because it doesn’t include the italics. The ESV translators (as well as the International Standard translators) took a huge liberty with this verse, contrary to almost every translation before them. The Rheims New Testament, Bishops Bible, and Geneva Bible (all 16th century) agree with the KJV. So does the American Standard, Darby, and Young’s translations (all 19th-20th century).

The Law was not a paidagogos until Christ, but unto Christ. The difference in prepositions is very important. The Law leads us to the Messiah by illustrating the principles that require a savior, by demonstrating our inability to save ourselves, and by prophesying of his coming, not to mention the many, many allusions to the Messiah’s role in the physical and spiritual salvation of Israel. To this day, the Law continues to function as a “schoolmaster unto Christ” for everyone who doesn’t yet know him.

(25)  But now that faith has come, we are no longer under a guardian,  (26)  for in Christ Jesus you are all sons of God, through faith.

Paul’s illustration of the paidagogus is a metaphor, and it’s always important not to add more meaning to any metaphor than the author intends. Since Paul only said that the Law is like a paidagogus in the sense that it leads us to Christ, we abuse the text by trying to make it say that the Law functions as a paidagogus in every conceivable circumstance.

Now that the Law has demonstrated our need for salvation and shown us the way to obtain it, we no longer need it for that purpose. This is not to say that we don’t need the Law for other purposes. Having come to faith, we are not to go on sinning.

We know that the Law defines sin.

Peter, John, and Paul all explained that one of the purposes of the Law is to show us our sin. If it didn’t define sin, how could neither convict us or inform of our need for a savior? If something was a sin before faith, it makes no sense to think it somehow becomes not sin after faith. Having “put on Christ” (v27), we are not allowed to rely on his covering to hide continuous sin. We are required to continue striving for perfection, not to earn salvation, but because righteous behavior is pleasing to God.

The great benefit of faith in this regard is that it removes any worry of failure. We obey out of love for our Savior, but we don’t need to be terrified of instant condemnation if we fail in any small point, because we know he will forgive us when we sin.

I am going to skip a few verses to make a couple of final points.

Elementary Principles of the World

Galatians 4:8-9  Formerly, when you did not know God, you were enslaved to those that by nature are not gods.  (9)  But now that you have come to know God, or rather to be known by God, how can you turn back again to the weak and worthless elementary principles of the world, whose slaves you want to be once more?

What are these “weak and worthless elementary principles of the world” to which the Galatians were once enslaved? We can’t know the specifics of what they were, but we can know for an absolute certainty that they were not God’s Laws as Daniel implied in his comment. The Galatians were very much enslaved to the Law, but only because they were sinners, not because they were trapped in Pharisaical Judaism.

The answer is only a single sentence away, and I am astonished that any Christian who has actually read Galatians can think Paul was referring to Torah! Those “weak and worthless elementary principles of the world” were false gods and religions, not God’s Law! Verse seven says, “Formerly, when you did not know God, you were enslaved to those that by nature are not gods.”

Indeed, Daniel, it doesn’t get any clearer than that.

The Galatians were pagans before they came to faith in Yeshua, not Jews. How could they return to a Judaism that they had never known? When Paul wrote that they were turning back to those former principles, he meant that by attempting to earn their salvation by works, they were returning to the same principles that had informed their former idolatry. When they were idol worshipers they appeased their gods by speaking the right incantations and offering the right sacrifices on the right days.

What Is the Law to a Christian?

There was never any eternal salvation in such things whether they originated in pagan idolatry or in God’s perfect Law. You cannot be saved through the rigorous observance of days, months, seasons, and years no matter what days or seasons they are.

You can, however, learn a great deal about who God is and how he relates to you by keeping his commands, including his holy days.

Hosea 4:6 My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge; because you have rejected knowledge, I reject you from being a priest to me. And since you have forgotten the law of your God, I also will forget your children.

So this Spring, try removing unleavened bread from your house during the week of Passover. This Fall, get yourself a family sized tent and find a group of people celebrating the Feast of Tabernacles. Or build yourself a sukka.

Love God and love your neighbor. God’s Law, the Torah, shows you how to do that.

Study, do, and live. Obeying God’s instructions will never steer you wrong. By definition, keeping the commandments can never be sin.

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There’s No Rest without Submission

Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light. Matthew 11:29-30

Years ago, when Robert was in college, one of his more socially awkward classmates, Bennie, showed up at his dorm room–this was before cell phones were ubiquitous–eager to make a new friend and maybe hang out for awhile. Unfortunately, Robert already had all the friends he wanted and told Bennie to get lost; he wasn’t wanted there. He still remembers the look on Bennie’s face.

Nicole had three children, but she was never a mother to them. She had a nanny who took care of their daily needs, took them to school, and read stories to them at bedtime. When her daughter had an abortion at sixteen, Nicole didn’t find out until six months later. When her son was arrested for drug possession, her husband bailed him out and she pretended nothing happened. Today, her daughter hasn’t spoken to her in over a decade, and she has three grandchildren she’s never met.

We all have regrets. We all harbor guilt. Some of us more than others, deservedly or not.

Matthew 11:28-30 contains a chiasm on finding rest in Yeshua (aka Jesus).

  • A – V28 – Come to me all who labor and are heavy laden
    • B – I will give you rest
      • C – V29 – Take my yoke upon you
        • D – Learn from me
      • C – I am gentle and lowly in heart
    • B – You will find rest for your souls
  • A – V30 – My yoke is easy and my burden is light

I have heard people say that “Jesus is my Sabbath”, and that’s not a bad sentiment as long as it’s only meant metaphorically. Some people want to take an idea like that too literally, as if believing in Yeshua alleviates all other physical and spiritual needs. The Sabbath is a day of the week, and Yeshua isn’t a day of the week. He does give us rest, but not the kind of rest that eliminates the need for a day off from work.

The rest that Yeshua gives is spiritual and emotional in nature. He alleviates our fears, heals our wounds, and enables us to develop a full relationship with our Heavenly Father.

The labors and burdens that Yeshua spoke of in Matthew 11:28 are not physical. He wasn’t speaking only to manual laborers, but also to tax collectors, entertainers, and CEOs. Suffering is relative. From the outside, it might appear that a brick layer carries a heavier burden than a house wife, but inner burdens can’t be measured by weight or volume. A harsh word at the wrong moment can often cause a deeper, more lasting wound than a knife that slips and cuts the flesh. The worries of a parent can be more damaging in the long run to a person’s health than the repetitive stress of hammering nails. These are the burdens that Yeshua primarily meant and that he wants to help us with.

Guilt, regret, worry… they weigh heavily on everyone, but God can give us relief if we will put our faith in Yeshua. Having faith in him means trusting his promises and teaching, but most of all it means being faithful to him, submitting ourselves to his sovereignty over our lives.

“Take my yoke upon you”, he said. He wants to take the yoke of sin and self that has enslaved us, but it’s impossible to live without a master. It’s part of the nature of being human. The old yoke cannot come off our shoulders unless it is immediately replaced with Yeshua’s. We have to be willing to take his yoke in its place or he cannot take ours.

This passage says, “If you are burdened, come to Yeshua, who will give you rest through a lighter burden.” But at the very center of the chiasm, Yeshua says “Learn from me.” In other words, become his disciple and learn by studying and following his example.

Once you have decided to put our faith in Yeshua, to believe what he told us, he will accept you into his house. Once you are in his house, learn from his words and deeds, and become an imitator of Yeshua, as Paul instructed the believers at Corinthians in 1 Corinthians 11:1.

Be imitators of me, as I am of Christ. -The Apostle Paul

There is no expiration on the teachings of our Master. In Matthew 24:35, he said, “Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away.” Everything he taught to the Twelve Disciples and the people of first century Judea is applicable to us now:

  • Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.
  • Love your neighbor as yourself.
  • Be slow to anger and quick to forgive.
  • Don’t worry about the future and all that the world might do to you.
  • Trials and persecution are inevitable, but so is salvation for those who trust in him.
  • Keep the instructions of God as given through Moses and the Prophets.

Do you want rest for your soul? Then put your faith in Yeshua, take the yoke of his discipleship on your shoulders, and learn to live and love as he did. Your difficulties and labors won’t disappear, but as you learn more of his character and incorporate it into your own life, those troubles will grow lighter and lighter over time.

A brief video teaching on the same passage…

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Did Paul Behave Differently with Jews and Gentiles?

To the Jews I became as a Jew, in order to win Jews. To those under the law I became as one under the law (though not being myself under the law) that I might win those under the law. 1 Corinthians 9:20

During a lengthy argument between pronomians and antinomians in an online forum, one Torah-keeper asked “Why did Paul go with other Christian brothers and sacrifice sheep at the Temple?”

Someone on the other side of the argument replied…

Why? That easy: 1 Corinthians 9:20

“To the Jews I became like a Jew, to win the Jews. To those under the law I became like one under the law (though I myself am not under the law), so as to win those under the law. “

-NorOb

In other words, NorOb believes that Paul was a good actor. He was just pretending to do Jewish things to trick the Jews into thinking he was just like them. When Jews complained that Paul was teaching other Jews to abandon Torah, he took a Nazirite vow and made a blood sacrifice at the Temple, paying for several other men to do the same thing to demonstrate that those Jews were in error. If NorOb’s interpretation is correct, then Paul only did this to pretend that he still kept the Law. As soon as he was back among gentiles, he resumed eating pork chops.

This is not a reasonable interpretation. Once again, it is a misunderstanding based on one statement taken out of its original context. Here’s the same verse with the surrounding text:

For though I am free from all, I have made myself a servant to all, that I might win more of them. To the Jews I became as a Jew, in order to win Jews. To those under the law I became as one under the law (though not being myself under the law) that I might win those under the law. To those outside the law I became as one outside the law (not being outside the law of God but under the law of Christ) that I might win those outside the law. To the weak I became weak, that I might win the weak. I have become all things to all people, that by all means I might save some. I do it all for the sake of the gospel, that I may share with them in its blessings.
1 Corinthians 9:19-23

Unless NorOb is a true antinomian and libertine, I seriously doubt that he believes that “I have become all things to all people” means Paul fornicated in order to witness to fornicators. He didn’t starve himself and cause his muscles to atrophy so that he could become weak in order to win the weak over to Christ. His intended meaning should be very clear to those who have done actual street ministry or door-to-door witnessing.

Paul didn’t become lawless so that he could win the lawless or legalistic to win the legalistic. Instead he did the same thing that Yeshua did with prostitutes, tax collectors, fishermen, and rabbis: he spoke to them where they were and in terms they could understand. He did not pretend to be something he was not. In order to convince deeply religious Jews that Yeshua is the Messiah, Paul wrote of the priesthood and tabernacle (the Letter to the Hebrews, probably). In order to introduce Greeks to the Creator, he spoke to them of their own Unknown God (Acts 17:21-34).

I am certain that Paul did not mean what NorOb asserted, and Paul himself confirmed it. First, in the very same passage, Paul said that he did not operate outside of God’s Law.

To those outside the law I became as one outside the law (not being outside the law of God but under the law of Christ) that I might win those outside the law.
1 Corinthians 9:21

Second, only a few sentences later, he wrote that he kept his body under strict discipline so as not to compromise his witness.

But I discipline my body and keep it under control, lest after preaching to others I myself should be disqualified.
1 Corinthians 9:27

In other words, he strictly monitored and controlled his own behavior so that nobody would have cause to call him a hypocrite. He was consistent in lifestyle, morality, worship, and theology, not changing his behavior based on the company at hand. Paul called Peter on the carpet for the very thing that NorOb accused him of:

But when Cephas came to Antioch, I opposed him to his face, because he stood condemned. For before certain men came from James, he was eating with the Gentiles; but when they came he drew back and separated himself, fearing the circumcision party. And the rest of the Jews acted hypocritically along with him, so that even Barnabas was led astray by their hypocrisy. But when I saw that their conduct was not in step with the truth of the gospel, I said to Cephas before them all, “If you, though a Jew, live like a Gentile and not like a Jew, how can you force the Gentiles to live like Jews?”
Galatians 2:11-14

Third, he said that he remained a Pharisee in regards to the Law his entire life. He always kept the Law no matter where he was or who was watching.

My manner of life from my youth, spent from the beginning among my own nation and in Jerusalem, is known by all the Jews. They have known for a long time, if they are willing to testify, that according to the strictest party of our religion I have lived as a Pharisee.
Acts 26:4-5

Either Paul lied to Agrippa or else he continued to live as a Pharisee at all times during his many missionary trips among both Jews and Gentiles recorded in the book of Acts. 

It is abundantly clear from Paul’s own extensive testimony that he did not sacrifice at the Temple only so that he could appear to be a Jew in the eyes of other Jews. He sacrificed at the Temple because he really was a Torah-observant Jew in every way and continued as such throughout his entire life.

And he wrote…

Be imitators of me, as I am of Christ.
1 Corinthians 11:1

Be obedient like Paul and like Christ. Be straightforward and consistent in your moral behavior, like Paul and like Christ.

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Dead Works and Living Faith

Does the Letter to the Hebrews say that the blood of Christ nullifies any need for believers to keep God's Law today? How does the Torah relate to the Christian?

Years ago–sometimes it feels like a previous life–I used to engage any willing theological or political combatant on blogs, forums, and listservs. Not so much anymore. I don’t have the patience for rehashing the same old arguments for the ten thousandth time.

Those years did have a lot of value, though. In defending and supporting my own beliefs, I managed to change my own mind on many topics, I learned an awful lot from digging through the Bible, and I was able to help a very few people with honest questions find some answers. It also produced some great blog fodder. 😉 The post below (in addition to some previous and future posts) came out of one of those discussions…

Dead Works

A commenter using the name “Book of Hebrews” made the following argument against a believer in Yeshua (aka Jesus) keeping Torah today:

Plus there’s that whole crazy thing called…The Book of Hebrews.

“When Christ came as a high priest of the good things that have come to pass, through the greater and more perfect tent not made with hands, that is, not of this creation, he entered, no, not with the blood of goats and of young bulls, but with his own blood, once for all time into the holy place and obtained an everlasting deliverance for us. For if the blood of goats and of bulls and the ashes of a heifer sprinkled on those who have been defiled sanctifies to the extent of cleanness of the flesh, 14 how much more will the blood of the Christ, who through an everlasting spirit offered himself without blemish to God, cleanse our consciences from dead works that we may render sacred service to the living God?”-Hebrews 9:11-14

“Book of Hebrews” should have paid more attention to the Letter to the Hebrews. Look at verses 13 & 14 in the passage he quoted, as well as this one from the next chapter:

Hebrews 10:4 For it is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats take away sins.

“Dead works” are those actions that transgress the Law and thus put us under its jurisdiction. The blood of bulls and goats is effective for sanctifying the flesh, but completely ineffective for sanctifying the spirit from those dead works. (Although sin is both physical and spiritual, it should be clear from the context that the author is referring to sin’s taint on the soul in 10:4.) The present tense used by the author is especially important. The blood of bulls and goats is effective for the flesh and is not effective for the spirit. In fact, the temple sacrifices were never effective for sanctifying the spirit.

Living Faith

Consider what this fact means in light of this passage:

[Abel, Enoch, Noah, Abraham, Sarah, Isaac, Jacob, and Joseph] all died in faith, not having received the things promised, but having seen them and greeted them from afar, and having acknowledged that they were strangers and exiles on the earth….Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared for them a city.
Hebrews 11:13 & 16

These great saints lived and died long before Sinai, yet the blood of Yeshua still washed the stain of sin from their souls by way of their faith in God’s providence. The mechanism of their salvation was (is!) no different than that of the saints who lived after Sinai and before Calvary: Gideon, Barak, Samson, Jephthah, David, Samuel, and the prophets. They all lived by faith and are (or will be) raised from the dead because of that faith. They all sacrificed bulls and goats to cleanse their flesh, but they also knew that all of that blood was insufficient to remove all sins from their eternal souls.

This doesn’t mark a change in the Law, merely a continuation. There was always only one way to the Father: faith in his grace to forgive our sins, enabled by the blood of Yeshua. And no amount of faith or grace ever removed the obligation of God’s people to obey his eternal commandments.

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Out of Faith, Obedience

If one turns away his ear from hearing the law, even his prayer is an abomination. Proverbs 28:9

I was going through some old correspondence on the issue of Torah-keeping, and would like to share some of the better thoughts. This is somewhat edited from the original emails from sometime between 2000 and 2006…

The theology I remember being taught when growing up in the Assemblies of God now seems to me like a substitute legalism. Dispensationalism of any sort almost inevitably exchanges a Mosaic legalism for a Paulist legalism. The truth is that there is a middle ground that is completely consistent with the entire Bible, without having to relegate certain of God’s instructions to certain dispensations. The Letter to the Hebrews makes it very clear that the method of salvation has not changed from Abraham until now. Salvation was always through faith, and faith always results in obedience quite apart from salvation.

Dispensationalism teaches salvation is through faith in some eras and salvation through obedience in others. In reality there is no conflict between faith and obedience at any time. No one was ever saved by obedience to God’s Law. But if you do not have at least the beginning of obedience, then you cannot have faith, and you are therefore not “saved”. The Spirit will lead you ever towards obedience, but if you deliberately ignore one aspect of what the Spirit has already told you in writing through Moses, how can you expect to ever effectively hear that still, small voice?

Solomon wrote:

Trust in YHWH with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding….Whoever trusts in his own mind is a fool, but he who walks in wisdom will be delivered.
Proverbs 3:5 & 28:26

Jeremiah wrote:

The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick; who can understand it?
Jeremiah 17:9

Do you really believe that you are the exception, that your heart isn’t like everyone else’s?

I think you are fortunate that God tries to communicate with you at all when you attempt to dictate through what medium he is allowed to speak. If what you are hearing in secret in your own heart conflicts with what God has revealed openly to the entire world, then there is a very good chance that your heart is deceiving you.

If anyone turns away his ear from hearing the Torah, even his prayer is an abomination.
Proverbs 28:9

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Are All Things Truly Lawful?

Did Paul write that all things are lawful for Christians? Is the Torah irrelevant to the Christian?

“All things are lawful,” but not all things are helpful.

“All things are lawful,” but not all things build up.

Let no one seek his own good, but the good of his neighbor. Eat whatever is sold in the meat market without raising any question on the ground of conscience. For “the earth is the Lord’s, and the fullness thereof.” If one of the unbelievers invites you to dinner and you are disposed to go, eat whatever is set before you without raising any question on the ground of conscience.

But if someone says to you, “This has been offered in sacrifice,” then do not eat it, for the sake of the one who informed you, and for the sake of conscience— I do not mean your conscience, but his. For why should my liberty be determined by someone else’s conscience? If I partake with thankfulness, why am I denounced because of that for which I give thanks?

So, whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God. Give no offense to Jews or to Greeks or to the church of God, just as I try to please everyone in everything I do, not seeking my own advantage, but that of many, that they may be saved.

1 Corinthians 10:23-33

As with every line written in every personal letter, context is key to understanding the author’s intent. Paul’s main point in this passage didn’t begin in verse 23, but in chapter 8, verse 1: “Now concerning food offered to idols…” The full conversation didn’t begin even there, but in a previous letter written to Paul by the believers at Corinth, a letter that has been entirely lost to history. 

From 1 Corinthians 8:1, we know that Paul was responding to a question about eating the meat of animals that had been sacrificed to idols on pagan altars. He told them that offering a sacrifice to a pagan deity does nothing at all to change the nature of the meat itself, so long as you aren’t actually participating in the sacrificial rite. Even eating the meat in the pagan temple, doesn’t itself make the eating sinful if you are only eating meat with no regard to the location, the false god, or the ritual.

Eating meat that has been sacrificed to an idol becomes a problem in three circumstances:

  1. Are you participating in the pagan celebration or rituals for which the animal was sacrificed? Eating the sacrifice is an intrinsic part of worship, so if you are participating in a pagan ritual, you are engaging in idolatry, which God most definitely does not appreciate.
  2. Could an observer mistake your eating for idolatry? If so, you shouldn’t eat it because you don’t want to mislead them to think that idolatry is allowed or that you are a hypocrite in what you profess to believe.
  3. Does eating the meat bother your conscience? If you feel guilty in the eating or if you are tempted to go just one step closer to idolatry, then you should stay away from it.

In chapter 10, Paul made the argument that eating the meat might be perfectly lawful, but that doesn’t make it a good idea. When you’re in gray areas like this, in which specific circumstances can make all the difference, you should tread lightly.

What he does not say is that any of God’s commandments have been canceled or that we are free to ignore them when we feel like it.

Most modern translators seem to believe that “All things are lawful” in verse 23 is a hypothetical quote of his audience. Paul posited that someone at Corinth might say “All things are lawful” and the text that immediately follows is Paul’s response. In other words, Paul probably didn’t even intend for anyone to think that he was stating that “all things are lawful”.

However, even if we take those phrases as Paul’s own words, we need to interpret them in the context in which he was writing. He certainly didn’t mean for us to think that all sexual immorality and idolatry are lawful, because he wrote “we must not indulge in sexual immorality” and “flee from idolatry” just a few verses earlier in the same chapter.

We can’t extend “all things” to eating pork and people unless we also extend it to eating blood and engaging in sexual immorality. Yet, even if Paul hadn’t addressed those things already, in Acts 15:20 James clearly says that eating meat sacrificed to idols (participating in the idolatry), eating blood, and sexual immorality are the most basic of all moral standards. These are the very first rules that a new convert from a pagan religion to faith in Yeshua (Jesus) needs to adopt in order to fellowship with other believers, but they are not the entirety of godly living.

The context is idolatry, not clean and unclean animals. Even his statement about sexual immorality is about pagan temple prostitution and sexual acts as worship. If we allow the text to define itself, then we can’t reasonably conclude that Paul said anything except that eating meat that has been sacrificed to idols is not strictly a sin as long as we aren’t participating in the idolatry.

Neither James nor Paul taught that “eating all things of all kinds is lawful”. Rather, they taught that as followers of the Messiah, we need to make wise and biblically informed distinctions between clean and unclean and between prudent and imprudent.

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A Dialogue on the Continuity of the Law

You shall not add to the word which I command you, nor take from it, that you may keep the commandments of the Lord your God which I command you. Deuteronomy 4:2. Should Christians keep the Torah?

The conversation below took place in an online forum more than ten years ago. I’m reproducing it here because that forum no longer exists, and I think the content is worth preserving.

[Original post] Jay Carper:

It seems to me that an honest reading of Scripture without antinomian prejudice can only lead to the conclusion that God’s Law has not been set aside, abrogated, annulled, or whatever synonym for canceled you might prefer.

Deuteronomy 4:2 Ye shall not add unto the word which I command you, neither shall ye diminish ought from it, that ye may keep the commandments of the LORD your God which I command you.

1 John 3:4 Whosoever committeth sin transgresseth also the law: for sin is the transgression of the law.

1 Peter 2:21-22 For even hereunto were ye called: because Christ also suffered for us, leaving us an example, that ye should follow his steps: (22) Who did no sin, neither was guile found in his mouth.

Matthew 5:17-19 Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil. (18) For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled. (19) Whosoever therefore shall break one of these least commandments, and shall teach men so, he shall be called the least in the kingdom of heaven: but whosoever shall do and teach them, the same shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven.

Translation:

1) The Law of Moses says that no one may change the Law.
2) John said that anyone who violates the Law has sinned.
3) Peter said that Jesus never sinned.
4) Jesus said that he didn’t come to remove even a single ink mark from the Law and that anyone who does will be called the least in heaven.
5) If Jesus came to change the Law in even the smallest way, then he is a liar and a sinner, and he cannot be the Messiah.

I have never heard anything resembling a convincing counter argument. If you’ve got one, I’d love to hear it.

Jair:

That’s not too hard, everything is predicated on point 2 which is the weak link anyway.
1 John 3:4 is a peculiarity, the root of the word law in both instances is anomee’ah instead of nom’os, its the only time anomee’ah (for lack of text inserts right now) is rendered that way, in every other case it is rendered iniquity. The term in no case refers to the Law of Moses, though nom’os frequently does.

Sin may well be lawlessness, iniquity, wickedness etc. You could argue from this passage that Sin is a transgression of any given law that you are bound, but you couldn’t argue that sin is specifically a transgression of Mosaic law.

Thank God for that, because without cities of refuge, the Levies, the Priesthood, years of Jubilee, and on it is impossible for us to follow the Law of Moses. That was law was for a specific deal which people broke, God totally burned the bridge of following the law of Moses. He made sure we couldn’t pretend the deal was still on by destroying key things required to follow it. I have respect for anyone who tries to emulate its precepts, but no one can obey that law without saying ‘I’ll just do my best here’ and ‘I can’t do that so it doesn’t mater’ there.

Ironically, in trying to apply that deal to themselves people have to change much more than jots or iotas, they have to ignore or comprise the things they can’t do, and that is an insult to the law.

Mark Call:

No offense, Jair, but I’m solidly with Jay, and Yeshua, on this one.

Had He violated His own Written Word, in such places as Deut. 4:2 and 12:32, then He would have been a liar (including not only such references as Matt. 5, but many others, like John 5:47) and could not have been HaMashiach.

(This is, in fact, a very good reason that so many Torah-knowledgeable Jews reject a “Jesus” who supposedly “did away with” it. Many are thus shocked when they hear what “Yeshua the netzir” — a word they already know — actually said!)

But I’ve always considered any argument that relies on a Greek understanding which contradicts not only the Hebrew word, but the Torah itself, to be EXTREMELY suspect. “Nomos” is no better a rendering of the word “torah” than the English word “law” is, and it is very likely that many of the texts in the Brit Hadasha or “new” testament are translations of things originally penned in Hebrew as well.

(Speaking for myself, I will add that such “contradictions” were what originally led me to an agnostic rejection of the Bible as “contradictory”; what else could Mal. 3:6 mean by saying “I change NOT”? It was Greek “gods” who were capricious and untrustworthy, not YHVH Elohim.)

There are some things that CANNOT be done, Jair – and I see no problem with that, since one of the key principles of Torah understanding is discernment. Since I am not a king, or a wife, some things simply don’t apply to me. Same thing goes for certain sacrifices. (BTW, most of the “law done away” with crowd tend to miss a very important fact about “sacrifices” in general, and the Perfect Lamb in particular:
there IS no sacrifice in Torah for “rebellion”! The ramifications are profound…since He knew that “from the Beginning”.)

But good job, Jay; that’s about as good of a one-page summary as I’ve seen.

Jair:

It doesn’t rely on Greek, that’s just a side note, the point is that 1 John 3:4 does not say Law of Moses, there is nothing that says sin is specifically a violation of Mosaic law, just that it is a transgression of law in general.

But note that I never said Jesus changed or did away with Mosaic law either, insofar that that is Jays point point 4 stands on its own and the rest is immaterial.

Much more important than that is the idea that sin is a specifically a transgression of Mosaic law. God doesn’t change, but people do. The Law of Moses and its promises stood binding until all twelve tribes fell and their governments where wiped out due to constantly breaking their end of the deal.

You see that some things don’t apply because of gender, rank, heritage, or occupation. Why is it then a problem that things don’t apply because you are not a person with whom the deal was made? God made sure pretending to follow the Law of Moses as if it applied to you would be hollow by destroying things that where needed to follow it.

Part of discernment is knowing who you are and not applying everything the Bible says to yourself, that’s what the name it and claim it crowd do with anything they see as being good.

Jay Carper:

I haven’t had time to compose a response to your initial comment, Jair, so forgive me for skipping ahead…

For several years (5 or 6?) after realizing that the Torah still applied to the Jews, I said pretty much what your saying: The Law is still in effect, but what does that have to do with me?

Jeremiah 31:31-37 and the writings of Paul changed my mind. The New Covenant is the great hope of the gentiles. It is our way to adoption as sons of God. However, God told Jeremiah that he would make the New Covenant only with the houses of Judah and Israel: no gentiles allowed! Paul, relying on prophecies about “a people who are not a people” and “dry twigs” wrote that the gentile converts are grafted in to the tree of Israel. In the Messiah there is no Jew or Gentile–so far as salvation or entrance to the New Covenant is concerned–because they are all on an equal footing as citizens of Israel.

When a person becomes a citizen of a new nation, he adopts that nation’s laws. He cannot take his old nation’s laws with him and expect his conduct to be excused by the new government.

If the Torah still stands for Jews, then it still stands for all believers.

Mark Call:

I like Jay’s explanation, Jair, but would add another observation.

I’m not particularly fond of the limitation implied by the very terminology, “Law of Moses”, and think it is misleading. (In part, but not only, because of the occasional use of the term ‘torah’ to refer to the Pentateuch. Depending on context, “torah” can mean more.)

“Torah” literally is ‘teaching and instruction’. Yeshua used words translated into English as “torah and prophets” when He referred to what “is Written”. But note that Adam walked with God, and that Noah obviously knew which animals were “clean” and which were “unclean” long before that teaching and understanding were even Written down.

I contend that the “Law” (think “Law of Gravity”) was in place when the “Foundations were laid”. His “teaching and instruction” are a function of His design, and what He has Written about all of it is for our blessing, if we have “eyes to see”.

Jair:

Jay,
But that’s the thing, I can’t see how the legal system of Israel laid down in the time of Moses actually applies even Rabbinic Jews. They cannot honour it, they have to leave out chunks that they simply can’t do and in observing here and leaving out there they force that Law to change, and that is exactly what Jesus said not to do as per point 4 and Deuteronomy said not to do as of your first quotation.

I have no quibble with with the doctrine of adoption as you laid it out here.

Mark,
Yes, teaching and instructions goes beyond the Law of Moses. But the term Law of Moses was used in point 1. For clarity by the Law of Moses I mean specifically the legal system laid down for Ancient Israel by God and the promises tied directly too it. I should double check with Jay to see if that is close enough to what he means by the term. There are eternal ethics (or, eternal laws), but that does not mean that there are temporal or case by case ethics as well. The Law of Moses was a deal with a specific people under specific conditions. The histories and the Prophets detail those people violation those conditions, and the captivities show the deal ending. God promises to make another deal if they turn to him, but it is a different deal.

Your point about Noah knowing clean animals goes to show that cleanliness of animals goes beyond that time and government, I would say that is along the lines of an eternal law, though even then I would make exceptions in the case of starvation.

Mark Call:

I don’t necessarily disagree, Jair.

I just note, however that often the specific term, “Law of Moses”, is used to mean “that which does not apply to ME”.

Since I have come to regard ALL of His Torah, meaning “teaching and instruction”, as valuable for things like reproof, correction, instruction in righteousness, and a lamp to my own feet, I can do so far less legalistically.  😉

Jay Carper:

There are definitely parts of the Law that cannot be obeyed today. Those who would try are in the same basic situation as the Jews of the Babylonian exile. The Temple had been destroyed, and they were not allowed to travel Jerusalem anyway. But that shouldn’t be a deterrent.

Perfect obedience was probably always impossible. We just try to play the best game we can with the cards we’ve been dealt. Our salvation is through faith in God’s forbearance and not in strict obedience to the codified Torah.

Jay Carper:

Finally getting around to responding to your initial comment, Jair. I’m enjoying the dialog!

That’s not too hard, everything is predicated on point 2 which is the weak link anyway. -Jair

No, point 4 is the most important. Even if John’s reference to sin and law is irrelevant, Yeshua would still be a liar if he actually did come to remove anything from the Torah.

1 John 3:4 is a peculiarity, the root of the word law in both instances is anomee’ah instead of nom’os, its the only time anomee’ah (for lack of text inserts right now) is rendered that way, in every other case it is rendered iniquity. The term in no case refers to the Law of Moses, though nom’os frequently does. -Jair

Anomia isn’t translated “law” here either, not even in the KJV. It’s translated “transgression of the law,” which is essentially the same thing as lawlessness or iniquity. Therefore, sin = lawlessness. To what law could John have been referring but the Law of God? In every case, both anomos and anomia refer to breaking God’s commands found in Torah, i.e. the Law of Moses. I would have checked every instance of nomos also, but there were 195 of them listed in the KJ Concordance! The first dozen or so bore out the same pattern.

Sin may well be lawlessness, iniquity, wickedness etc. You could argue from this passage that Sin is a transgression of any given law that you are bound, but you couldn’t argue that sin is specifically a transgression of Mosaic law. -Jair

No, you couldn’t argue that sin is the transgression of any law. (Well, you can argue it, but that doesn’t make it true.) That might be a literal interpretation of the word, but that is clearly not the way it is used throughout the NT writings. It is always used in reference to Torah.

Jay Carper:

Thank God for that, because without cities of refuge, the Levites, the Priesthood, years of Jubilee, and on it is impossible for us to follow the Law of Moses. That was law was for a specific deal which people broke, God totally burned the bridge of following the law of Moses. He made sure we couldn’t pretend the deal was still on by destroying key things required to follow it. I have respect for anyone who tries to emulate its precepts, but no one can obey that law without saying ‘I’ll just do my best here’ and ‘I can’t do that so it doesn’t mater’ there. -Jair

God said that he would never reject Israel nor his covenant with them. It doesn’t matter that they broke it. God still promised to keep it. He said that he would never forget them and never destroy them, but that if they would repent, he would be waiting to accept them back.

Leviticus 26:44-45 Yet for all that, when they are in the land of their enemies, I will not spurn them, neither will I abhor them so as to destroy them utterly and break my covenant with them, for I am the LORD their God. (45) But I will for their sake remember the covenant with their forefathers, whom I brought out of the land of Egypt in the sight of the nations, that I might be their God: I am the LORD.

Ironically, in trying to apply that deal to themselves people have to change much more than jots or iotas, they have to ignore or comprise the things they can’t do, and that is an insult to the law. -Jair

I don’t know if the law can be insulted or offended by one who is under the covering of Yeshua. We do not owe our allegiance to the commands, but to the commander. Obeying his commands, which he has never retracted and never can without breaking his word, as well as we are able can only honor him.

Jair:

Mark,
With that said we are saying pretty well the same thing, cool.

Jay,
I think the shortest way to reply would be to point out that Leviticus 26 isn’t talking about our forefathers but the forefathers of Israel, Abraham, Isaac and Israel himself. All of whom lived before the Law of Moses was given. Gods Covenant with the children of Israel goes beyond that specific legal system, it existed before it and continues to exist after it. Just to be clear I never said God rejected Israel.

I’m very sure that the law can be offended by people covered by Christ, its no doubt plagues could have been minimized by valuing the precepts concerning sanitation. But one way or the other we are not talking about retracting commands, we are talking about trying to follow commands given to other people. Our standing orders are different than those of pre captivity Israel, and he made sure we knew it by making sure we couldn’t actually follow the wrong set of orders.

Jay Carper:

“Offending” was a poor choice of words on my part. “Insulting” was better. I didn’t mean to imply that the commands couldn’t be broken. I was thinking more along the lines of being accountable to the law as an entity in itself.

I agree that the Torah is not the covenant itself, and that it existed before Mt. Sinai.
I disagree that we are talking about commands given to other people. God was clear that the New Covenant is only with the houses of Israel and Judah (together being the nation of Israel) and no one else. If anyone becomes party to that covenant, then they become one with Israel also, sons of Abraham, just like the mixed multitude who came out of Egypt in the Exodus.

Mark Call:

Very good, Jay. I often ask folks, “well, would you like to be ‘grafted in’, or not?”

Jair:

If we aren’t talking about being accountable to the law as an entity in itself I’m not sure we are actually disagreeing anywhere.

To be clear I agree that all of Israel in all time including those ‘grafted in’ are under the Covenant with Abraham, which is neither new nor old, but just is. However only those who lived in the Nation of Israel from the time of Moses to the captivity are bound to say, observe Jubilee as a moral obligation to that covenant.

Jay Carper:

“As a moral obligation to the covenant…”

I would call it a moral obligation to the God with whom we have covenanted. I do not believe that God’s Law is unique to a particular covenant, but rather it is the standard to which he holds his people. When we come into covenant with God, his standards, as the rules of his house, automatically apply.

Jair:

If we aren’t talking about being accountable to the law as an entity in itself I’m not sure we are actually disagreeing anywhere.

To be clear I agree that all of Israel in all time including those ‘grafted in’ are under the Covenant with Abraham, which is neither new nor old, but just is. However only those who lived in the Nation of Israel from the time of Moses to the captivity are bound to say, observe Jubilee as a moral obligation to that covenant.

Jay Carper:

You’ll get no argument from me there. Laws about saddles don’t apply to me because I don’t have any animals that wear saddles. Laws about sacrifices don’t apply directly to me either, because there is no Temple at which a sacrifice could be made. There are definitely valuable lessons to be drawn from those laws, but the laws themselves don’t apply. Many laws did not apply to Moses even after he had written them. He wasn’t a woman. He didn’t have a stone house. He wasn’t a king.

Jair:

In turn I will readily agree that Jesus did not do away with or change what most modern Christians supposed him too, and that your argument against said change is to my knowledge unbeaten.

Jay Carper:

LOL. Thanks!

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Is Christ Useless to the Circumcised?

Galatians 5:2 - Did Paul forbid circumcision? A Torah study for Christians.

Look: I, Paul, say to you that if you accept circumcision, Christ will be of no advantage to you.
Galatians 5:2

Those are pretty strong words. What should we tell the hundreds of millions of American men? Sorry. You missed the boat. You now have to obey every “jot and tittle” of the Law or you’ll go to Hell. Of course not. Nobody believes that the physical condition of being circumcised equates to a rejection of salvation by grace.

What most people actually believe is that if a man voluntarily becomes circumcised as a religious act of obedience to God’s command, only then has he rejected Yeshua’s work on the Cross. By legalistically adhering to an outmoded command, he acts as if Yeshua’s death and resurrection accomplished nothing.

That certainly sounds like a reasonable interpretation. It doesn’t condemn innocent children for things outside their control, and it emphasizes the liberty we have in Christ. It sounds good, but is it?

Keeping in mind Peter’s admonition that a correct understanding of Paul’s letters requires a solid grounding in the Torah and Tanakh (2 Peter 3:15-16), we shouldn’t assume that the first reasonable interpretation of Paul is actually correct. We need to see what the rest of Scripture says. The older Scriptures have plenty to say about circumcision and salvation by grace, but in this case, I think we need look no further than the book of Acts.

Paul Circumcised Timothy

In Acts 15, some Jewish men were teaching gentile converts that they needed to be circumcised in order to be saved. Paul brought this to the attention of James and the other elders at Jerusalem and they ruled that new converts from among the gentiles did not need to be circumcised or convert to Judaism. (See “Does Acts 15 Say We Can Ignore God’s Law” for more details.)

Paul then wanted to visit the believers in every city he had previously preached, in part to check on their progress, but also in part to share this news with them. One of his companions on this journey was to be Timothy, whose mother was Jewish, but whose father was Greek. By Biblical standards–if not by modern rabbinic tradition–this made him a gentile by birth, not a Jew, and he was uncircumcised.

According to the common Christian interpretation of Paul’s words in Galatians 5:2 and James’ words in Acts 15, Timothy’s salvation depended on him remaining uncircumcised. Yet, Paul circumcised Timothy who, being a grown man, voluntarily underwent the procedure!

Paul wanted Timothy to accompany him, and he took him and circumcised him because of the Jews who were in those places, for they all knew that his father was a Greek. As they went on their way through the cities, they delivered to them for observance the decisions that had been reached by the apostles and elders who were in Jerusalem. So the churches were strengthened in the faith, and they increased in numbers daily.
Acts 16:3-5

So Paul, who said that circumcision equaled damnation, circumcised Timothy right after the Jerusalem Council said that no gentile should be circumcised?

Either Paul was a hypocrite, making Timothy to live like a Jew while teaching the Galatians to live like gentiles, exactly what he accused Peter of doing in Galatians 2:14, or else Galatians 5:2 does not mean that undergoing circumcision is tantamount to rejecting Yeshua.

Only the latter argument–that circumcision is not rejection of Yeshua–is consistent with the whole of Scripture. The former makes Paul a hypocrite, Timothy a condemned legalist, and James an antinomian libertine.

God’s Law vs Man’s Traditions

In several places in Acts, Luke writes that the great controversy that followed Paul was whether or not a person must be circumcised and keep the whole Law of Moses in order to be saved (E.g. Acts 15:1). The Torah, the Tanakh, the teachings of Yeshua…all of these things stand against such a teaching. The issue was never about whether or not circumcision is a good or bad thing. It was always about salvation and the minimum requirements for fellowship with other believers.

Obviously, Paul was not opposed to circumcision nor to keeping the Law of Moses. His actions and words refute that false teaching over and over. However, he was adamantly opposed to keeping traditions of men (that are still to this day called the Law of Moses or the Torah, though they are not) that put excessive burdens on people and to keeping the Law for salvation.

The Situation in Galatia

There were two parties fighting for control of the church in Galatia. On the one hand, there were the followers of James and Paul teaching them that salvation is only through faith in the grace of God, and that obedience to God’s laws can be learned over time. On the other hand, there were the Judaizers teaching that everyone must submit to the authority of the rabbis and the centuries of tradition built up on top of the Law before they could be truly considered “saved”.

When Paul wrote, “if you are circumcised, Christ shall profit you nothing,” he was writing only within the context of this argument. He was saying, “If you join the party of the circumcision and rely on that for your salvation, then the Messiah is wasted on you.” He was absolutely not saying that circumcision under the right circumstances (for example, on the eighth day after birth) or for the right reasons (for example, to eat the Passover lamb in Jerusalem) is a bad thing.

And if Paul’s actions with Timothy aren’t enough to prove my point, let’s go back to Galatians 5. Just two verses further down, he makes the controversy explicit:

You are severed from Christ, you who would be justified by the law; you have fallen away from grace.
Galatians 5:4

To whom is Paul addressing these comments? “You who would be justified by the law”, not people who want to live a holy life or keep God’s commandments just because God said so. There was a group of people in Galatia (and many other places around the Roman Empire) teaching new converts from among the gentiles that they could not be justified in God’s eyes until they were circumcised and fully converted to Pharisaical Judaism, with all of its burdensome traditions.

Obedience to God Does Not Put One “Under the Law”

Paul wasn’t even opposed to all man-made traditions. According to Torah (God’s Law), there was no reason for Paul to circumcise Timothy. He wasn’t an eight-day-old infant and he wasn’t about to eat the Passover. Yet he did it anyway just to avoid unnecessary controversies with Jewish believers in the scattered congregations. He did not circumcise Timothy to make Timothy Jewish or to ensure his salvation.

Undergoing circumcision does not put anyone under the Law unless he does so because he thinks he will earn special favor with God or eternal salvation by it. Being “under the Law” is to be subject to its curses and under its authority as a law breaker. No one who has put his trust in God for his eternal salvation is under the Law, because our law-breaking has been forgiven and our status has been elevated from slave to son.

That does not mean that the Law no longer applies to us. It means that we are not condemned by it. We don’t have to worry and stress about getting it perfectly. We can learn to walk in greater obedience to God’s instructions over time instead of being afraid that every misstep will earn God’s eternal wrath. Instead of being afraid, we can focus on serving God in our daily lives, on loving him and sharing his love with those around us while we use his Torah to help us learn what that really means.

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Did the New Covenant Make the Old Covenant Obsolete?

Did the New Covenant make the Old Covenant obsolete?

In speaking of a new covenant, he makes the first [old covenant] obsolete. And what is becoming obsolete and growing old is ready to vanish away.

Hebrews 8:13

In the course of a respectful (not sarcasm!) conversation on Facebook, a friend made this statement:

Based on other interactions, it’s clear that you hold that the New Covenant did not make the Old Covenant obsolete, and therefore you must have an alternative explanation to Hebrews 8:13 which – in English – appears to plainly state that the New Covenant DID make the Old Covenant obsolete.

I thought readers of American Torah might also appreciate my reply:

It depends on what you mean by “obsolete”. Whatever the author of Hebrews meant, it seems that he didn’t mean it was completely gone (annulled) at the time he wrote, decades after Jesus’ resurrection, because he wrote that the “old is ready to vanish away”, not that it had already vanished away.

In my opinion, Hebrews is the second most misunderstood book in the Bible (Revelation being the first). I’ll use a couple of metaphors to explain two core concepts that the writer discusses.

One, the writer compares Jesus’ priesthood with Aaron’s. Two, he compares the New Covenant with the Old (Sinai) Covenant. (I say one and two, not first and second, because he jumps back and forth and all around in making his points, which convinces me that Paul was the author, possibly through an intermediary.)

Two Priesthoods

Metaphor One: Think of the two priesthoods as a hammer and screwdriver. A hammer is great for driving nails, but terrible for driving screws. In fact, if you try to use a hammer to drive a screw, you’re likely to make a mess of the wood and break the screw, possibly a finger as well. Hammers were intended to drive nails, and that’s fine as long as you’re only nailing things together. But if you have a new task that requires driving screws, you’re going to need a new tool to drive them.

If the task at hand involves certifying a leper as clean or making a burnt offering in worship, you go to Aaron. That’s what he’s good for. The Aaronic priesthood is fine for what it does, but it was never capable of mediating eternal salvation. Aaron was completely incapable of permanently removing the stain of sin and restoring us to a right relationship with God for all eternity. If that’s your goal, then you need a new tool, a new priesthood: Jesus.

Hebrews doesn’t say that the Melchizedek Priesthood replaces the Aaronic. It says that, if you are dealing with a different covenant, altar, and domain, then you need a different priesthood too. One doesn’t replace the other, but operates in parallel on a different, higher level.

Two Covenants

Metaphor Two: Picture the Sinai Covenant as a full moon and the New Covenant as the rising sun. As the sun rises, the moon doesn’t cease to exist. It continues to “rule the night” and to influence the tides, but it does fade in comparison to the much brighter light of the sun. The moon gives light both at night and in daytime, but when the sun rises, the moon’s light becomes superfluous–osbsolete, one might say–as if it has faded with age.

Just like the moon, the Old Covenant has no light of its own. It is a reflection of a much greater covenant, that the Scriptures anachronistically call the New Covenant. It’s “new” because, although it was promised and existed in principle from the very beginning, the sacrificial blood that sealed it was shed relatively recently, and it is still not fully risen. Until the promise of Jeremiah 31 (quoted in Hebrews 8) is fulfilled, we can’t really say that the New Covenant has reached its zenith:

“And they shall not teach, each one his neighbor and each one his brother, saying, ‘Know the Lord,’ for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest.”

Hebrews 8:11 & Jeremiah 31:34

When Will the New Covenant Be Fully in Effect?

The New Covenant was fully established from the moment of Yeshua’s death, but–like all other covenants–it contains promises that are both ongoing and for future fulfillment.

According to Jeremiah and Hebrews, one of the distinctive qualities of the New Covenant is that God’s Law will be written on the hearts of the people. They will no longer need a written Law because they will know God’s character instinctively, and will know right from wrong without having to be told. This presupposes that the Law as written in the Old Covenant is an accurate reflection of God’s character and what he considers to be moral behavior.

As we internalize his Law, we obey what the Law says without having to continually reference the written word. This absolutely does not mean that we are free to throw out all of the moral standards detailed at Sinai because we have the Law written on our hearts. If we believe that, then it is clearly NOT written on our hearts and we still need to be told what to do.

“The Law was written for sinners, not for the righteous.” But “If any man says he doesn’t sin, he’s a liar and the truth isn’t in him.”

I believe that when–or sometime after–Jesus returns, he will complete the process of fulfilling this promise of the New Covenant. We will finally have God’s Law fully written in our hearts and nobody will need to tell anyone “Know God” because we will all know him at every level.

More Information…

A related post on Galatians: Galatians and Torah, the short version.
And for more on the false dichotomy of “Grace vs Law”: Grace vs Law.
And Is the Old Covenant Obsolete?