The old Testement laws versus new testament clensing....thoughts?

[Jammer_smith]

We all know that the old testament contains MANY strange rules and regulations that we, as Christians, do not follow in our day to day lives. Even the Jews don't follow many of these laws because they are just silly. Most of us use one of two excuses, or I guess I should say explanations, for why we do not see the need to obey these laws. Some claim these laws are simply outdated customs of the jewish people that made their way into the bible and we no longer need follow them. These are laws about cleanliness and discipline. Laws such as how to punish your children and what foods to eat. We ignore these on a regular basis. Another thing we often tell ourselves is that in his comming Jesus fullfilled the old laws and so none of them even really count anymore, save the 10 commandments, and even those can be set aside as long as we follow the two most primal of commandments laid down by Jesus, Love your Neighbor as Yourself and love your God above all others. But here is the problem. We don't forsake ALL of the old laws, only some of them. For example, the entire foundation of our belief that Homosexuality is immoral is based on old testament passages that fall in the same pages with things we consider to be no more than Kosher Law. As far as I know homosexuality is not even mentioned in the new testament. So we use the old testament to preach against homosexuality, but at the same time ignore passages that say to sell women into prostitution and to stone to death disobedient children. These passages fall literally withing a few paragraphs of passages we do take to heart. So how to we pick and choose? How can we say that one passage is still to be followed and the next not. If Jesus did indeed fullfill the old laws then NONE of them should count, and gayness should be ok...right? But if we say that one counts then don't we have to accept them all? This discrepancy has been bugging me for weeks....I thought maybe some other views would help.

[CDHealy]

Just because Jesus fulfilled the Torah doesn't mean that we don't have to do anything it says anymore.

Rather, Jesus' fulfillment of the Torah is shown by his words and life, he shows us the way to live, which the Torah was intended to do for the Jews as a preparation for the Living Torah, Jesus.

[spurly]

Jammer, in reading your post I thought you were going to get to homosexuality.  Your argument is a classic argument that is used by those who want to say the New Testament never says anything about homosexuality.

Are you really interested in the differences (and similarities) in the Mosaic Covenant and the Covenant Jesus established, or would you rather talk about homosexuality - which is addressed rather plainly in the New Testament?

[Harold]

Rom 1:26  For this reason God allowed their shameful passions to control them. Their women have exchanged natural sexual relations for unnatural ones.
Rom 1:27 Likewise, their men have given up natural sexual relations with women and burn with lust for each other. Men commit indecent acts with men, so they experience among themselves the punishment they deserve for their perversion.
Rom 1:28  And because they thought it was worthless to acknowledge God, God allowed their own immoral minds to control them. So they do these indecent things.
Rom 1:29  Their lives are filled with all kinds of sexual sins, wickedness, and greed. They are mean. They are filled with envy, murder, quarreling, deceit, and viciousness. They are gossips,
Rom 1:30  slanderers, haters of God, haughty, arrogant, and boastful. They think up new ways to be cruel. They don't obey their parents,
Rom 1:31  don't have any sense, don't keep promises, and don't show love to their own families or mercy to others.
Rom 1:32  Although they know God's judgment that those who do such things deserve to die, they not only do these things but also approve of others who do them.

Just to clear the air on the gay issue.

FTL

[Jammer_smith]

OK, well that helps clear up the gay issue, but that was kinda only an example...jesus never sits down and makes a list what what to follow and what not to follow....so who gets to decide?

[memmy]

God, and it's already been done.

Welcome Jammer_smith.

Hope your time here is fruitful.

Blessings, Memmy

[Jimbob]

OK, well that helps clear up the gay issue, but that was kinda only an example...jesus never sits down and makes a list what what to follow and what not to follow....so who gets to decide?

Well...here's what one apostle said...

"These things happened to them as examples and were written down as warnings for us, on whom the fulfillment of the ages has come.  So, if you think you are standing firm, be careful that you don't fall!"  1 Cor. 10:11-12 NIV

And he was referring to what we read of in the Old Testament.

[Harold]

OK, well that helps clear up the gay issue, but that was kinda only an example...jesus never sits down and makes a list what what to follow and what not to follow....so who gets to decide?

OK let's start with Jesus, since we ultimately will end with Jesus.

Rules I only count three

1. Love the Lord your God with all your heart, and above all else.

2. Love your neighbor as yourself, unbelievers.

3. Love believers as Christ loves them, sacrificially love them in all respects, even unto death.

If you can just maintain these three you will never sin.

Mar 12:30  So love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength.'
Mar 12:31  The second most important commandment is this: 'Love your neighbor as you love yourself.' No other commandment is greater than these."
Joh 13:34  "I'm giving you a new commandment: Love each other in the same way that I have loved you.

Seems to work for me, and yet I still sin. Oh, wretched man that I am.

For The Lord

[Israelite]

OK, well that helps clear up the gay issue, but that was kinda only an example...jesus never sits down and makes a list what what to follow and what not to follow....so who gets to decide?

Jammer, as a former Messianic, I believe I have some insight to your question.

For one, you are totally right about picking and choosing. I have always found it strange to see Christians, like the Adventists for example, deciding the Ten commandments, the dietary laws, and tithing are the totality of God's "Law" and enforcing them while declaring the rest void.

Other denominations are guilty of the exact same thing. They declare this law or that law to be valid for whatever reason, and the rest done away with for some particular  reason.


I believe Jesus warned us not to act in the manner of certain Pharisees. They taught and kept certain laws while nullifying others to set up new traditions and commandments. I believe that the "church" of Jesus Christ is guilty of doing the exact same thing.

Since there is no earthly temple, many commandments of the Law cannot be enforced. However, I think all of us can keep God's Sabbath and Feast days. They are not burdensome at all. I think that all of us can follow the laws of sexual regulations found in the Torah. As for cleasning laws, for the record, during the time of the black plague, Jewish Torah abiding people did not suffer because they were clean. This made many Gentiles angry and they persecuted them for it.

The New Covenent was made with Judah and Israel. I believe the Bible teaches that the way we Gentiles get to take part in their Covenent is through Jesus. Supernaturally we are grafted into the olive tree and become sons and daughters of Abraham. We become a part of Israel. We do not replace God's people, but rather we join them. The early church was considered a sect of Judaism, for they followed Jewish traditions and God's Law.  Wolves crept in and took that beautiful fellowship off track. I believe God is putting that fellowship back in order.

One of the promises of the New Covenent is that God would write the Torah on our hearts and minds. He does this little by little. A Rabbi once said that people should begin keeping Torah with baby steps - little by little. We cannot keep it all, and this is why Jesus is so important - all the righteous requirements of the Torah are met in Him. This is the way we can be considered blameless. Unfortunately, there is a downside for some wishing to keep God's Torah, as people can develop big heads and the concept of grace is lost.  The cross of Calvary fades as people start believing their obedience has made them right with God.

If we say that the Law is not valid anymore, then yes, the teaching against homosexuality is also nullified. Paul taught that the Law should be upheld by Christians. Yes, we are not under it, trying to be righteous by it, but we should follow God's righteous standard to be an example for others, and to live properly as children of Light.

Israelite

[HRoberson]

We all know that the old testament contains MANY strange rules and regulations that we, as Christians, do not follow in our day to day lives. Even the Jews don't follow many of these laws because they are just silly. Most of us use one of two excuses, or I guess I should say explanations, for why we do not see the need to obey these laws. Some claim these laws are simply outdated customs of the jewish people that made their way into the bible and we no longer need follow them. These are laws about cleanliness and discipline. Laws such as how to punish your children and what foods to eat. We ignore these on a regular basis. Another thing we often tell ourselves is that in his comming Jesus fullfilled the old laws and so none of them even really count anymore, save the 10 commandments, and even those can be set aside as long as we follow the two most primal of commandments laid down by Jesus, Love your Neighbor as Yourself and love your God above all others. But here is the problem. We don't forsake ALL of the old laws, only some of them. For example, the entire foundation of our belief that Homosexuality is immoral is based on old testament passages that fall in the same pages with things we consider to be no more than Kosher Law. As far as I know homosexuality is not even mentioned in the new testament. So we use the old testament to preach against homosexuality, but at the same time ignore passages that say to sell women into prostitution and to stone to death disobedient children. These passages fall literally withing a few paragraphs of passages we do take to heart. So how to we pick and choose? How can we say that one passage is still to be followed and the next not. If Jesus did indeed fullfill the old laws then NONE of them should count, and gayness should be ok...right? But if we say that one counts then don't we have to accept them all? This discrepancy has been bugging me for weeks....I thought maybe some other views would help.

We ask the wrong questions. God is not looking for rules-keepers, He is looking for people who live out of His image - the one we're made in. This has always been true. The Law of the OT was intended to illustrate God to us; what our lives would look like if we were God people.

When Jesus says He fulfilled the Law, He is not speaking of every jot and tittle. He fulfilled the Law because, quite frankly, He is that Law. Let me see...if Jesus is Truth, what does that mean? It means that He is the exact representation of God - the character of God, the embodiment of God. He is Truth.

In His fulfillment, He did not destroy the Law as law for Israel. Quite the contrary; He demonstrated that Law to its fullest. And because of that, we no longer need the tutor (see Paul), because we had had the Truth/Law demonstrated to us.

When we accept that Truth, when we identify with Christ, it is then that the Law is written on our hearts and we no longer need to have it written on tablets or scrolls. We become the Law ourselves, just as Jesus was.

And so there are aspects of the Law that live on. Not because they are the Law, but because they reflect the character of God. We do not steal, not because the Law says so, but because people of God can't steal if we are living out of who we are.

[spurly]

Great post HR!  Manna to you!

[Chris]

So how to we pick and choose? How can we say that one passage is still to be followed and the next not. If Jesus did indeed fullfill the old laws then NONE of them should count, and gayness should be ok...right? But if we say that one counts then don't we have to accept them all? This discrepancy has been bugging me for weeks....I thought maybe some other views would help.

I believe that Jesus did fulfill the Law, and it may now be considered as abolished, obsolete.  However, to conclude that things prohibited under the law should now be permitted is a non sequitor--it does not follow.  For example, the Ten Commandments say "Thou shalt not kill."  Yet it is very clear going back to Cain and Abel that murder was not permitted.  I think you will find that many things prohibited under the Law were things already recognized as wrong before the Law came; there is no reason not to continue recognizing them as wrong now that the Law has served its purpose.   (Consider another illustration--were your country to abolish its constitution and form a new one, chances are many of the same activities would end up being criminal under either the old or new constitutions.)

Unfortunately, this is not a tidy solution.  It does not answer how to know what things God finds abhorrent regardless of covenant.   The apostles seemed fine with this, implying that we do things we ourselves know to be wrong, and don't need to be told every little thing.  With at least some issues, they seemed to feel it was not the act itself so much as one's conscience, the results of the act, or one's motive in doing the act that mattered.  The new covenant can not be reduced to a list of specific commands; we have our general commands, and God is apparently trusting us to use our Spirit-led judgement in obeying them.  Unfortunately, most of us know from personal experience that this does not prevent us from sinning.

If murder or homosexuality or sleeping with one's wife during her period or cheating on one's taxes is wrong, then it does not depend on something written in a book so much as the character and will of God.  (Which character and will, by the way, led to words written in a book....)

[Israelite]

Paul once admonished Timothy to keep reading the Scriptures that can make use wise unto salvation. Those Scriptures were what we call the Old Testament.

Say that I was alive during the time of Christ on earth. I was a Gentile, a pagan. I did not know how to live as God wanted me to. How would I learn to live as God intends? I would attend synagogue and house meetings and there the Torah would be read. I would learn what kinds of acts lead to death and avoid doing them. I would learn what acts please God, and I would live accordingly. I would read Isaiah 56 and see that God has always wanted Gentiles to worship Him. I would see that His house would be a house of prayer for all peoples, not just Jews, and feel accepted.


Today should be no different than yesterday. When Paul taught Gentiles through his letters, quite often he quoted the Torah. He knew that the Torah was the perfect teaching tool!

Israelite