The Law: Was it so Hard

[liamconnor]

Protestant branches of Christianity present ancient Judaism as an impossible religion in which members are always in despair because they can never obey the law. Out of this assessment arises the value of Christianity: The Jewish Law is impossible to fulfill; but good news, one does not have to fulfill it!

Question: Is the Jewish Law really that hard? I have read the O.T. several times. I have read much of Rabbinic Law. None of it seems terribly hard.

[Checkpoint]

Protestant branches of Christianity present ancient Judaism as an impossible religion in which members are always in despair because they can never obey the law. Out of this assessment arises the value of Christianity: The Jewish Law is impossible to fulfill; but good news, one does not have to fulfill it!

Question: Is the Jewish Law really that hard? I have read the O.T. several times. I have read much of Rabbinic Law. None of it seems terribly hard.

Hard in what way?

What has been your own experience of obeying the law?

Are you saying Paul got it wrong, the writer of Hebrews is suspect, and the early church was out of line in Acts?

Not sure that is what you are saying, but what else am I to think....

[Overcomer]

Unfortunately, to please God, you would have to keep all the Law all the time and not break even one commandment as stated here:

"If you really keep the royal law found in Scripture, “Love your neighbor as yourself,� you are doing right. But if you show favoritism, you sin and are convicted by the law as lawbreakers. For whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles at just one point is guilty of breaking all of it. For he who said, “You shall not commit adultery,� also said, “You shall not murder.� If you do not commit adultery but do commit murder, you have become a lawbreaker" (James 10:8-11).

That means if you told one lie in your lifetime, you have broken all the Law. That means if you stole as much as one paper clip from the office, you have broken all the Law. That means if you covet something belonging to your neighbour, you have broken all the Law.

And Jesus took it even farther. He said that you have committed adultery even if you only lust after a woman in your mind (Matt. 5:28). That means you can sin in your thought life.

Also consider this:

"Everyone who hates his brother is a murderer, and you know that no murderer has eternal life abiding in him" (1 John 3:15).

So if you harbor ill will towards someone, even if you don't act on it, you have broken the Law.

This is why none of us can earn our way into heaven. We cannot possibly keep all the Law. This is why we need Jesus. He paid the penalty for our sin for us. He gives us his righteousness in exchange for the sins we cannot possibly avoid committing. Jesus is the only man who is sin-free and he was only sin-free because he was not only man, but God.

Someone once said to me that, if all my sins are forgiven, that gives me leeway to sin all I want. But it doesn't. Paul makes that clear in Romans 6 which begins this way:

"What shall we say, then? Shall we go on sinning so that grace may increase? By no means!"(Rom. 6:1,2a).

Here's the joy of it: Out of love, I want to please the Lord by not committing sin. And the Lord has filled me with his Holy Spirit to help me resist temptation and avoid sin. I don't have to try to do it in my own puny human power any more.

Does that mean I won't ever sin again? No, it doesn't. Christians should enter into a process of sanctification in which we grow more and more like Christ as we mature, but we will never be totally sin-free this side of heaven. I say Christians SHOULD do that, but I know that all don't. We all have to work with the Holy Spirit, but some people do not do so for a variety of reasons.

Bottom line: People who think they can keep all the commandments and earn their way into eternity with God are only fooling themselves. And they will be sorely disappointed when they discover that in the next life.

See here for more:

https://bible.org/seriespage/lesson-16- ... ans-319-20

[showme]

[Replying to post 2 by Checkpoint]

Paul, is simply a false prophet, and Acts and Hebrews were written by unknown authors who were in line with Paul. That is the basis of your faith.

[Checkpoint]

[Replying to post 2 by Checkpoint]

Paul, is simply a false prophet, and Acts and Hebrews were written by unknown authors who were in line with Paul. That is the basis of your faith.

Not so.

I do not listen to the voice of strangers.

[steveb1]

[Replying to post 1 by liamconnor]

No, the Law was not "hard" for practicing Jews of ancient Judea. They considered it to be "just what the Doctor ordered". The notion that at the time of Jesus and before, that Judaism had become "legalistic" is a canard. Granted, legalism as practiced by the Pharisees is real, but at the same time is an obvious abuse of Law-observance.

Yahweh, the Jews' own god, had this to say about observance of the Law and its ease of carrying out, not as a burden, but as a gift:

Deuteronomy 30:11-20 New International Version (NIV)
The Offer of Life or Death

11 Now what I am commanding you today is not too difficult for you or beyond your reach. 12 It is not up in heaven, so that you have to ask, “Who will ascend into heaven to get it and proclaim it to us so we may obey it?� 13 Nor is it beyond the sea, so that you have to ask, “Who will cross the sea to get it and proclaim it to us so we may obey it?� 14 No, the word is very near you; it is in your mouth and in your heart so you may obey it.

15 See, I set before you today life and prosperity, death and destruction. 16 For I command you today to love the Lord your God, to walk in obedience to him, and to keep his commands, decrees and laws; then you will live and increase, and the Lord your God will bless you in the land you are entering to possess.

17 But if your heart turns away and you are not obedient, and if you are drawn away to bow down to other gods and worship them, 18 I declare to you this day that you will certainly be destroyed. You will not live long in the land you are crossing the Jordan to enter and possess.

19 This day I call the heavens and the earth as witnesses against you that I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses. Now choose life, so that you and your children may live...

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?s ... ersion=NIV

It was Paul who came along claiming that the Law was a burden, and worse, that Jesus's supposedly "atoning" sacrifice had invalidated the Law.

[Checkpoint]

[Replying to post 6 by steveb1]

]

It was Paul who came along claiming that the Law was a burden, and worse, that Jesus's supposedly "atoning" sacrifice had invalidated the Law.

The early Church said it "was a burden", not just Paul.

'Jesus' supposedly "atoning" sacrifice'??

[steveb1]

[Replying to post 6 by steveb1]

]

It was Paul who came along claiming that the Law was a burden, and worse, that Jesus's supposedly "atoning" sacrifice had invalidated the Law.

The early Church said it "was a burden", not just Paul. 'Jesus' supposedly "atoning" sacrifice'??

= = = = =

Right. Paul invented that notion as well as the notion that the Law was a burden. Of course, Yahweh himself had revealed to the Jews that the Law was sweet bliss and divine gift:

11 Now what I am commanding you today is not too difficult for you or beyond your reach. 12 It is not up in heaven, so that you have to ask, “Who will ascend into heaven to get it and proclaim it to us so we may obey it?� 13 Nor is it beyond the sea, so that you have to ask, “Who will cross the sea to get it and proclaim it to us so we may obey it?� 14 No, the word is very near you; it is in your mouth and in your heart so you may obey it.

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?s ... ersion=NIV

If you doubt that, turn to Acts 21:22 and read to the end of the chapter.

Acts shows how the Jewish disciples in Jerusalem had heard how Paul was subverting the agreement he made in the first council of Jerusalem, by telling his Diaspora congregations that Jesus's "atoning" sacrifice had made the Law invalid even for Jews and Jews who converted to the Jesus sect.
The disciples rush to tell Paul to behold "the many thousands" of Jewish converts to the Jesus movement, who are "zealous for the Law".

Then they punish Paul by forcing him to undertake a Nazarite Vow - in the Temple - which involved an animal sacrifice.

Which proves that they utterly rejected Paul's insane notion that Jesus's death had somehow supplanted the Temple, the sacrifices, the Law/Torah, circumcision, kosher, and "the customs". The disciples continued on in Judaism as Torah-and-Temple-loyal Jews, with the heretical renegade Paul the odd man out.

[Checkpoint]

[Replying to post 6 by steveb1]

]

It was Paul who came along claiming that the Law was a burden, and worse, that Jesus's supposedly "atoning" sacrifice had invalidated the Law.

The early Church said it "was a burden", not just Paul. 'Jesus' supposedly "atoning" sacrifice'??

= = = = =

Right. Paul invented that notion as well as the notion that the Law was a burden. Of course, Yahweh himself had revealed to the Jews that the Law was sweet bliss and divine gift:

11 Now what I am commanding you today is not too difficult for you or beyond your reach. 12 It is not up in heaven, so that you have to ask, “Who will ascend into heaven to get it and proclaim it to us so we may obey it?� 13 Nor is it beyond the sea, so that you have to ask, “Who will cross the sea to get it and proclaim it to us so we may obey it?� 14 No, the word is very near you; it is in your mouth and in your heart so you may obey it.

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?s ... ersion=NIV

If you doubt that, turn to Acts 21:22 and read to the end of the chapter.

Acts shows how the Jewish disciples in Jerusalem had heard how Paul was subverting the agreement he made in the first council of Jerusalem, by telling his Diaspora congregations that Jesus's "atoning" sacrifice had made the Law invalid even for Jews and Jews who converted to the Jesus sect.
The disciples rush to tell Paul to behold "the many thousands" of Jewish converts to the Jesus movement, who are "zealous for the Law".

Then they punish Paul by forcing him to undertake a Nazarite Vow - in the Temple - which involved an animal sacrifice.

Which proves that they utterly rejected Paul's insane notion that Jesus's death had somehow supplanted the Temple, the sacrifices, the Law/Torah, circumcision, kosher, and "the customs". The disciples continued on in Judaism as Torah-and-Temple-loyal Jews, with the heretical renegade Paul the odd man out.

Not right and not so.

I do not listen to the voice of strangers.

[steveb1]

[Replying to post 6 by steveb1]

]

It was Paul who came along claiming that the Law was a burden, and worse, that Jesus's supposedly "atoning" sacrifice had invalidated the Law.

The early Church said it "was a burden", not just Paul. 'Jesus' supposedly "atoning" sacrifice'??

= = = = =

Right. Paul invented that notion as well as the notion that the Law was a burden. Of course, Yahweh himself had revealed to the Jews that the Law was sweet bliss and divine gift:

11 Now what I am commanding you today is not too difficult for you or beyond your reach. 12 It is not up in heaven, so that you have to ask, “Who will ascend into heaven to get it and proclaim it to us so we may obey it?� 13 Nor is it beyond the sea, so that you have to ask, “Who will cross the sea to get it and proclaim it to us so we may obey it?� 14 No, the word is very near you; it is in your mouth and in your heart so you may obey it.

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?s ... ersion=NIV

If you doubt that, turn to Acts 21:22 and read to the end of the chapter.

Acts shows how the Jewish disciples in Jerusalem had heard how Paul was subverting the agreement he made in the first council of Jerusalem, by telling his Diaspora congregations that Jesus's "atoning" sacrifice had made the Law invalid even for Jews and Jews who converted to the Jesus sect.
The disciples rush to tell Paul to behold "the many thousands" of Jewish converts to the Jesus movement, who are "zealous for the Law".

Then they punish Paul by forcing him to undertake a Nazarite Vow - in the Temple - which involved an animal sacrifice.

Which proves that they utterly rejected Paul's insane notion that Jesus's death had somehow supplanted the Temple, the sacrifices, the Law/Torah, circumcision, kosher, and "the customs". The disciples continued on in Judaism as Torah-and-Temple-loyal Jews, with the heretical renegade Paul the odd man out.

Not right and not so.

I do not listen to the voice of strangers.

It is completely accurate if you read the cited passages.

If you don't listen to the voice of strangers, when why in hell did you ask me the question to start with? You wasted my time.