Archive for the ‘Torah’ Category
כ״ה באב ה׳תשע״א (August 25, 2011)
Romans chapter 14 is often quoted as proof that Paul (Rabbi Sha’ul of Tarsus) taught and believed that the dietary laws and holy days of the Torah (especially Shabbat) have been done away with.
This is very easy to do when we read those verses from a 21st century western Christian paradigm as if they were written to us, about things pertinent to us today, as instructions on how to live. They weren’t. They were written to a mixed congregation of new gentile believers, Jews who accepted Yeshua as Messiah and Jews who didn’t, but aimed mainly at the gentile believers living in that community (in 1st century Rome) and worshiping with their Jewish brethren in the synagogue. We’re reading someone else’s mail and we only have half the conversation.
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Tags: dietary, laws, Nanos, Paul, Romans 14, sabbath, Sha'ul, Young
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כ״ב בתמוז ה׳תשע״א (July 24, 2011)
I would like to take a look at the account in chapter 8 of John’s Gospel, when the Scribes (the soferim) and the Pharisees (Prushim) brought to Jesus (Yeshua) a woman “caught in adultery”. It has been said that “Jesus set aside the Law of Moses in dealing with this woman, and replaced it with grace”. Is this, in fact, a true statement?
First, some context. John chapter 7 makes it clear that this event takes place in Jerusalem, just after the end of the Feast of Tabernacles (a.k.a the Feast of Booths or, in Hebrew, Chag ha Sukkot). The Feast of Tabernacles is a memorial of the fact that when Israel was brought out of Egypt they dwelt in “booths”, tents or tabernacles. It lasts for 7 days and is immediately followed by the “Last Great Day” – an 8th day when the “water libation ceremony” takes place in the temple. The feast had concluded but Yeshua remained in Jerusalem and the next day returned to the temple to teach.
We pick up the story in John 8:2.
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Tags: adultery, capital offence, Deuteronomy, John 8, pharisees, scribes, Tabernacles, temple, trial by ordeal, two witnessess, waters of bitterness, woman, Yeshua
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כ״ב בתמוז ה׳תשע״א (July 24, 2011)
This article was born out of an extended “conversation” on facebook during which a number of New Testament scriptures were quoted in order to justify non-observance of “The Law” by non-Jewish believers. As is often the case, these scriptures were quoted out of context, as if they were written yesterday (or, at least, in our time and culture). When selected “numbered sound bites” are taken out of context and quoted this way, they can be used to support almost any doctrine one might choose to espouse.
Quoting scripture gives the teacher seeming authority and credibility; many of us simply accept uncritically what is taught in this fashion without making the effort to check out for ourselves what is being said. After all, it is much easier to go to the “drive-through” at my local McChurch and get fast-food than it is to dig for the vegetables, pick the fruit, cook the meat and prepare a good, nutritious meal for myself. Or to sit in the pew and be spoon- or bottle-fed (milk, vanilla custard, maybe some fruit puree if I’m lucky). This is why some of us never reach any sort of spiritual maturity and, like little children, we’re gullible and easily led into error, because we don’t check out for ourselves what the person behind the pulpit (or lectern) is teaching.
So, how do we get to the meat of the Word?
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Tags: Acts 10, Acts 15, akathartos, Berea, Bereans, commandments, Cornelius, food, gentiles, James, Joppa, koinos, law, Peter, Torah, vision
Posted in Epistles, Torah | 2 Comments »
כ״א במרחשון ה׳תשע״א (October 29, 2010)
Older computer users who are familiar with Unix (or Linux) may well remember a program called “fortune” which would display a short, randomly chosen message as a logon greeting for users. It was usually a humorous or profound one-line quote.
I have a modern version of this on my desktop – it changes the quote every 10 minutes or so. I just happened to look at it a few minutes ago and the quote it had chosen was the title of this article; “As long as the answer is right, who cares if the question is wrong?”
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Tags: alms, answers, Judaism, paradigm, questions, Torah, world view
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כ״ה באייר ה׳תש״ע (May 9, 2010)
Luke 16:16
16:16 The law and the prophets were until John: since that time the kingdom of God is preached, and every man presses into it.
Until – At first reading of this passage in English, it sounds like Jesus is contrasting two periods of time – the time of the Law and the Prophets up until John the Baptist, and then the time after John the Baptist when the “kingdom of God is preached and everyone is pressing into it”. Is that, in fact, the case? Or is there something else going on here that we’re missing in our English, Greek-influenced western understanding of the text?
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Tags: Hebrew language, Jesus, John, law, Noach, Prophets, Rest, Torah, until, Yeshua
Posted in Torah, Uncategorized | 4 Comments »
כ״ט בניסן ה׳תש״ע (April 13, 2010)
Hi everyone. Today I came across the following article on Dr Skip Moen’s web site that I thought was worth reposting here. It deals with the difference between ritual purity and moral purity – something that is very poorly understood in western Christianity today.
(The original article can be found here).
Clearing Up The Confusion
Tuesday, April 13th, 2010 | Author: Skip Moen
Thus the priest shall make expiation for them, and they shall be forgiven. Leviticus 4:20
Expiation – For centuries we have heard Christian theologians proclaim that forgiveness comes by grace alone. Pastors and professors have driven a wedge between the teaching of Leviticus and the words of Paul. The Jews were under the “law.” Christians are under “grace.” This is a false dichotomy. Every Jew knew that sacrifice would not remove the guilt of intentional sin. But every Jew also knew that sacrifice was absolutely essential for life before God. Why? Because every Jew knew there was a difference between moral purity and ritual purity. In order to have fellowship with the Lord, a person must be cleansed on both counts.
Baruch Levine makes the point that the Hebrew verb, k-p-r, is often translated by a phrase such as “to cover or conceal.” But this isn’t correct. The idea behind kipper is to wipe clean, to remove defilement, to wipe off. We can think of ritual impurity as if it were contamination. The worshipper realizes that something done has contaminated his presence before God. The contamination must be removed if he is to enjoy fellowship and proper worship. God Himself has given the appropriate steps necessary to expiate (remove) this contamination. That’s what Leviticus is all about. God tells us how to worship Him. We don’t make up the process of worship as we go along. We don’t decide what we will do to worship Him. He decides. If we want to worship Him properly, we will take the steps He commands. Some of those steps insure that we are ritually clean when we come before Him.
Too often we fail to distinguish between ritual purity and moral purity. So, when we read the word “forgiven,” we think in terms of moral acts. We think the sacrificial system was about forgiving our immoral choices. Then we conclude that the Jews believed sacrifices brought redemption, and we reject that suggestion because it looks like “earning” salvation. Once we see that sacrifices bring ritual purity, our views are corrected. Every Jew knew that a sacrifice didn’t bring moral redemption. Atonement brought moral redemption. But the sacrifices were needed to wipe away the accumulation of ritual impurity – the contamination of daily life – that made communion with a holy God impossible. Frankly, it’s hard to imagine that these requirements have changed. Are we so ritually pure that we no longer need to be cleansed before we come into His presence? Does moral atonement cover ritual defilement too? Or are we really missing something here? Does our behavior really say, “Thanks for forgiving me, Lord. Now I will worship you in the way I choose to worship”?
Tags: forgiveness, sacrifices, Torah, worship
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ה׳ באדר ה׳תש״ע (February 19, 2010)
I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service. Romans 12:1 (KJV)
What does it mean to present oneself as a “living sacrifice”?
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Tags: Paul, Romans 12:1, sacrifices, Sha'ul, Torah
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כ״ב בשבט ה׳תש״ע (February 6, 2010)
Ps 23:3 He restores my soul: He leads me in paths of righteousness for His names´ sake.
This is a pretty typical English translation of this very well known verse of probably the best known and most oft quoted Psalm of David. We have generally considered it to mean that He will direct us, day by day, as we go about our business, if we are careful to listen to the leading of the Holy Spirit within.
That is certainly a valid interpretation and it is true; He does guide and lead us every day both through the written Word, by His example and through promptings of the Holy Spirit (if we are willing to stop and listen).
In the Hebrew text, though, we find a much deeper, older meaning that has been pretty much lost to the church over the last 1700 years or so, one that I would like to briefly explore.
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Tags: commandments, Feasts, Hebrew language, Leviticus 23, paths, Psalm23, Psalm61
Posted in Feasts, Torah | No Comments »
כ״ב בשבט ה׳תש״ע (February 6, 2010)
In Exodus 31:17, when Moses is recounting the creation story to Israel, we read “…and on the seventh day he rested and was refreshed”. The phase “and was refreshed” is vayinnafash (vav-yod-nun-nun-fey-shin).
Nafash (to catch ones’ breath, to breathe, to rest) is from the same root as nefesh (living soul), which we find in the creation of man, “and Adam became a living soul”. The “nefesh” is the whole person, body, mind and soul – these are not separable in Hebraic thought.
Va is the conjunction “and”. The letter nun is doubled (and therefore important). Nun means “life”. The prefix “yi” means “my” (possessive pronoun). Actually, it just needs the “i” sound (as in beni, my son, or abimelech, my father (abi) is the king (melech)), but you can’t have two consecutive vowels in Hebrew so it becomes “va-yi”.
If we put it together, we can read it as “and life (nun) to my (yi) soul (nefesh)”. So, on the seventh day, God rested and it is life to my soul. Shabbat is about LIFE (”I came that you might have LIFE, and life more abundantly”) and about refreshing ourselves in preparation for facing the battles that may come during the rest of the week. Shavua Tov (have a good week).
Tags: Ex 3:17, Hebrew language, Moses, nafash, nefesh, shabbat
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כ״ב בשבט ה׳תש״ע (February 6, 2010)
I’m reminded of a passage in Galatians 5 that is often interpreted by the church as justification for not obeying the commandments of God;
18 But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the law. (ESV)
When do you become “under the law”? (more…)
Tags: commandments, Galatians, law, Torah
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