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HOW DO WE KNOW WHICH OLD TESTAMENT LAWS STILL APPLY TO CHRISTIANS?
Do you still need to obey the letter of the Ten Commandments? Do we just pick and choose arbitrarily which
laws are still binding on Christians?
When religious liberals say the Old Testament’s laws against gay sex are
no more valid than the laws against eating shellfish, how you respond?
(Revised second
edition)
by Eric V. Snow
"You shall not wear a material
mixed of wool and linen together" (Deuteronomy 22:11). This seemingly innocuous text and others
like it are some of the main props in a routine argument that the Worldwide Church
of God's present administration. It
routinely uses this argument to justify its interpretation of the Bible that
tithing, the Sabbath, the Holy Days, and clean and unclean meats are no longer
binding on Christians under the new covenant.
This reasoning goes like this:
one cannot go through the Old Testament, picking and choosing arbitrarily
which laws are in force and which ones aren't for Christians. For example, consider this reply that one
member of the United Church of God (UCG) once received when he defended the
festivals and Sabbath as still being in force:
Why
do we not have to obey Nu. 15:38, 39 which requires tassels on garments? It's a clear command . . . and had
a good purpose. This wasn't a
ceremonial law or a sacrificial law for priests only. Rather, it was a statute for all Israelites . . . The
law about tassels was given to ancient Israel through Moses, just as the
festivals were. Is there any biblical
reason we should designate one as eternal and the other as temporary?
One
suggested solution to this dilemma is to say the Ten Commandments are the only
Old Testament laws still binding on Christians, outside of the two great
commandments (Matt. 22:36-40). A number
of New Testament texts can be cited to prove that the Ten Commandments are
still in force (Matt. 19:17-19; Romans 7:7; 13:9; Eph. 6:2-3; James
2:10-12). Hence, this solution
maintains the Holy Days, tithing, and clean and unclean meats have been
abolished for Christians as regarding sin they will be judged for. The Sabbath is still in force because it is
part of the "whole law" that if a person "stumbles in one point,
he has become guilty of all" (James 2:10; compare Gal. 5:3--there the
"whole law" includes EVERYTHING).
On the contrary, it shall be maintained here that Pasadena's principles
of biblical interpretation, which lean heavily upon extreme dispensationalism,
a radical discontinuity between Judaism and Christianity, and the argument from
silence, are incorrect to begin with.
Furthermore, figuring out which Old Testament laws which are still
binding on Christians and which ones aren't can be deduced by a broader
spiritual application of the literal letter of the Ten Commandments to
determine what still is in force, and by deriving from what clearly has been
abolished in the New Testament.
SOME
PROBLEMS WITH EXTREME DISPENSATIONALISM
First, let's survey briefly some of
the problems with extreme dispensationalism, which maintains God works with
human beings very differently in different time periods in his master plan for
humanity. This view draws sharp distinctions
drawn between the Old and New Testaments, and says God worked with the Jews
from the time of the giving of the law very differently from how He works with
Christians today since the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus. The Old Testament is seen as a period
dominated by law, obedience, and (in some versions) salvation by works, while
the New Testament is characterized by grace, love, and faith. Hence, this doctrine sees a radical
discontinuity between Judaism and Christianity, with the latter said to be very
different from the former. Based upon
these premises, the argument of silence becomes very powerful: It maintains that unless an Old Testament
command is repeated in the New Testament (or, especially, Paul's letters), it
is no longer in force. This school of Biblical interpretation assumes that all
Old Testament commands are abolished, unless specifically repeated in the
New. Because the
evangelical/fundamentalist Protestant Christian world's theology oozes with
these kinds of notions, and the world as a whole is not set up to obey God's
Old Testament commands, mentally resisting against this school of thought is
very difficult. You could be called a
cultist, a Galatianist, a Judiazer, or at least odd, for resisting it. Many who fought against it, or the children
of those who did, in the Worldwide Church of God (WCG) have fallen back into
what they (or their parents) came out of.
While this is not the place for a
lengthy, full-fledged attack on the teachings of extreme dispensationalism, an
alternative school of biblical interpretation actually makes more sense. Here it shall be maintained the differences
between the two Testaments have been exaggerated, that God has always saved
people in the same way in both periods, and that Christianity grew out of
Judaism. Even supposedly
"anti-law" Paul felt the need to engage in purification rituals
because he had to accomodate many in the early church who had believed were
"all zealous for the Law" (Acts 21:20). The early church was almost entirely Jewish, up until after
Cornelius and his gentile family were converted to Christianity (Acts 10). As has been documented in Samuele
Bacchiocchi's From Sabbath to Sunday, gentile Christians (in particular)
in the Roman empire largely abandoned the Sabbath, the Passover, and other
hallmarks of Judaism heavily due to a wave of anti-Semitic persecution under
the emperor Hadrian early in the second century A.D. in response to the second
major Jewish revolt (A.D. 132-135).
Hence, traditional Christianity, whether Catholic, Orthodox, or
Protestant, came to accept Sunday and Easter as replacements for the Sabbath
and Passover, the former two plainly coming out of the paganism of the of the
Roman empire. Naturally, the gentiles
who came to increasingly make up the bulk of the membership of the church found
these customs easy to accept. After
all, when the Roman government came looking for those practicing the Sabbath,
the Passover, etc. to punish them, not keeping them was an asset: "We aren't Jews! We're Christians!" The dispensationalist school of Biblical
interpretation's largely unacknowledged foundation is to explain, accept, and
justify such an Biblically unauthorized substitution of pagan customs for Old
Testament observances. It uses a
preconceived interpretation of Paul's letters to interpret the Gospels, and the
New Testament to interpret the Old Testament, while denying any significant
feedback interpretation going the opposite way.
SOME
PROBLEMS WITH RADICAL DISCONTINUITY BETWEEN THE OLD AND NEW TESTAMENTS
If indeed the New Testament writers
were making such a drastic break with their Jewish past, why is the New
Testament so full of Old Testament citations and allusions, which are made to
justify Christian theology, especially the identification of Jesus of Nazareth
as the Messiah? Why does not Jesus
hardly hint at such a radical change soon to come concerning the Old Testament
law during His public ministry? Instead,
he specifically denied an anti-Old Testament law interpretation of his ministry
in Matt. 5:17-19:
Do
not think that I came to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I did not come to
abolish, but to fulfill. For truly I
say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not the smallest letter or stroke
shall pass away from the Law, until all is accomplished. Whoever then annuls one of the least of
these commandments, and so teaches others, shall be called
["]least["] in the kingdom of heaven; but whoever keeps and teaches
them, he shall be called ["]great["] in the kingdom of heaven.
Why
should he tell the disciples to "Go and make disciples of all the nations
. . . teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you"
when most of what he had spoken was irrelevant because the old covenant was
still in force while he was in the flesh?
Turning to Paul, the clear implication of his citation of Genesis 15:6
and Hab. 2:4 (such as in Gal. 3:6, 11) is that humans are saved the same way
under both the Old Covenant and the New.
He noted that "David also speaks of the blessing upon the man to
whom God reckons righteousness apart from works" (Rom. 4:6) before citing
from Psalms 32, which implies the salvation theology (soteriology) of the Old
Testament was like that of the New Testament.
The role of the law or obedience relative to salvation or
justification was the same for the Jews before the crucifixion as it is for
Christians today in God's sight, even if Jewish tradition and the oral law saw
it otherwise. Consider that when
Paul wrote this to Timothy that parts of the New Testament did not yet exist,
or at least had not been likely all gathered together: "All Scripture is inspired by God and
profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in
righteousness . . ." (II Timothy 3:16). Having made in the preceding verses a
reference to Timothy being raised a believer in the true God through the
"sacred writings," Paul obviously primarily had the Old Testament in
mind when he wrote this. If the Old
Testament is so largely irrelevant to Christians, why would Paul say this, after
citing the Exodus and Israel wandering in the wilderness: "Now these things happened to them as
an example, and they were written for our instruction, upon whom the ends of
the ages have come" (I Cor. 10:11; compare I Cor. 10:6 and Rom.
4:23-24). Of course, citing such points
in rebuttal against extreme dispensationalism and its offspring, a presupposed
radical discontinuity between Judaism and Christianity, hardly scratches the
surface of such a vast subject.
However, such points show how the "new covenant" teachings of
the WCG presupposes a funadamentally flawed general school of Biblical
interpretation which should be rejected at its foundation.
DID
THE JERUSALEM COUNCIL (ACTS 15) ABOLISH THE WHOLE LAW OF MOSES?
Of course, a number of texts have been
cited to attempted to prove that the whole Old Testament law was done away
with, such as in Galatians 3 and 4 and II Cor. 3. These texts, and others like them, were dealt with in length in
my earlier essay critiquing the doctrinal changes of the WCG concerning the
law, "Does the New Covenant Do Away With the Letter of the Old Testament
Law?" So, that ground is not
covered again here. However, what the
Jerusalem Council in Acts 15 decided concerning circumcision and the law of
Moses needs some repetition. Wilf Hey
and John Meakin in their truly brilliant essay, "Acts 15 The Jerusalem Conference," describe
that the ONLY issue under discussion was circumcision, not the whole law of
Moses, when considering what was made no longer binding on the gentiles. Acts 15:1 states the issue thus: "And some men came down from Judea and
began teaching the brethren, 'Unless you are circumcised according to the
custom of Moses, you cannot be saved.'"
This same subject is repeated periphrastically (which means a
roundabout or indirect expression is used to mean the same thing) in Acts
15:5: "But certain ones of the
sect of the Pharisees who had believed, stood up, saying, 'It is necessary to
circumcise them, and to direct them to observe the Law of Moses.'" At the council, Peter got up and discussed
the gentiles having been justified by faith, and mentioned (v. 10) that a
"yoke" should not be placed on the gentiles that the Jews could not
bear. From the context of the verses
right around it (v. 9, 11), the immediate issue that turned circumcision into
the yoke was a false approach to how a person was justified and saved which had
grown up in Jewish tradition, not the content of the Torah itself. The whole law was not the subject here, but
circumcision was in particular, as Bacchiocchi noted (Sabbath in NT, p.
32), since the context was a general discussion of circumcision and its
justifying role. (Compare Peter's language with Paul's in Gal. 2:3-4). In verse 24 (NKJV), the Greek not only
implies a periphrastic construction (i.e., makes a rather convoluted reference
to circumcision), but that it is a one-time act. The standard WCG interpretation of this
verse is to say "circumcision" and "the Law of Moses" are
basically separate entities, with the former just one law out of the latter,
and that the conference abolished both, excepting the still binding regulations
found in verse 29. However, the
construction of the Greek is points to to a periphrastism, as Hey and Meakin note:
The
argument in v5 is surely not that the Gentiles 'must be circumcised AND
required to obey the law of Moses': The
Greek actually has three verbs, all infinitive [a verb, in the form of "to
run," "to jump," "to laugh," that has not been
conjugated yet, which means to be given a subject and changed in form, such as
"I run," "He jumps," "she laughs"--EVS]: 'to be circumcised', 'to charge' and 'to
preserve'. The last two are shorn of
modifiers and joined together with 'and'.
This is periphrastic: The
first is accomplished with a view to the second. In effect a rewording can be that the Gentiles are 'to be
circumcised, charged [thereby] with a view to preserving the law of
Moses'. Note that the 'and' is actually
placed between the second and third verbs (in the original Greek text), very
much suggesting a periphrastic interpretation.
This
argument is quite technical, but--alas!--very important when considering how to
interpret Acts 15. For if the main
subject was circumcision, and how the gentiles were to be considered
Christians, then interpreting this conference to mean almost the whole law of
Moses was abolished is incorrect.
A further, important issue is to
realize that when the four still remaining stipulations from the law of Moses
are singled out by the conference, this does not mean they are all that is
left. As Hey and Meakin, as well as
Bacchiocchi noted in The Sabbath in the New Testament answers to questions, p. 29-34, 101-102,
163-164, the gentiles felt the need to become part of the covenant community of
Israel to be saved. Here, the council
considered the church (Bacchiocchi) "not as a new Israel arising out of
the rejection of the old, but as the 'old Israel' being restored according to
God's promise," especially as shown by James' citation of Amos 9:11. Among the Jews themselves they had disputed
over which laws the gentiles who wished to obey God had to observe (compare
Isa. 56:3-8). The standard, more
liberal Jewish interpretation of the law said the gentiles needed only to
observe the same four laws that the Jerusalem Council eventually selected,
which all come from Lev. 17-18, because (gentile) foreigners were specifically
mentioned in them. The competing Jewish
interpretation of what the gentiles had to do said they had to perform the
circumcision as well. What happened at
the Jerusalem conference was that latter rabbinical view, which the Christians
who were Pharisees had accepted, lost out to the former, more liberal
interpretation, when both had had significant followings in Judaism. The important, bottom-line point of this
discussion is that the four laws the Jerusalem conference listed were not
arbitrarily or randomly picked out of the Torah, nor should they be seen as all
that is still binding from the Torah (or the law of Moses) upon Christians, but
rather what in particular allowed the gentiles to be grafted into spiritual
Israel, the church.
USING
THE TEN COMMANDMENTS AS A GUIDE TO WHAT IS STILL IN FORCE
So now--getting back to mixed fibers
and tassels--how do we know what has been abolished and what has not been? The best approach is to draw upon Christ's
example in the Sermon on the Mount, and how he expanded the meaning of two of
the Ten Commandments (Matt. 5:21-30). The
law against murder became a prohibition of hating or even insulting our fellow
men. The law against adultery applied
also to men lusting after women in their heart. Therefore, the basic solution to knowing what still is in force
is whether it can be derived directly or indirectly from the Ten Commandments,
since we know they are still in force.
The parts of the Old Testament law which expand upon the general meaning
of each of the Ten Commandments are still in force. For example, the commandment against adultery means the laws
against homosexual sex (Lev. 20:13), bestiality (Lev. 20:15-16; 18:23; Ex.
22:19), incest (Lev. 20:17,19; 18:6-14), and fornication (Lev. 22:28-29; Ex.
22:16) are still in force. One
important exception exists to this process:
The two Great Commandments (Matt. 22:36-40), which are to love God above
all and love your neighbor as yourself (Deut. 6:5, Lev. 19:18), can be seen as
condensations of the Ten Commandments.
The first four commandments state how you are to love God, and the last
six how to love your neighbor, in more specific forms (compare Rom. 13:8-10). However, the fact one can summarize the law
this way does not mean its specific points have been abolished, for
"love" needs to be defined as God would have it, not as we humans
might want it. Although there is the
exception of the two Great Commandments, the Ten Commandments still can be used
to figure out what other, scattered laws in the Torah are still in force, by
seeing if they amplify their the spiritual meaning. This combination of the Ten Commandments, the two Great
Commandments, and the various scattered laws of Moses that can be derived from
them I call the moral law, because it expresses God's will for mankind
for any place and time.
USE
WHAT HAS BEEN CLEARLY ABOLISHED AS A GUIDE TO FINDING OTHER ABROGATED LAWS
On the other hand, we know what laws
in the Torah are gone by referring to where the New Testament clearly abolishes
some law. Then, in turn, we can figure
out which laws indirectly were abolished from the ones which plainly
have ended. For example, notice Hebrews
9:9-10: ". . .
Accordingly both gifts and sacrifices are offered which cannot make the
worshiper perfect in conscience, since they relate only to food and drink and
various washings, regulations for the body imposed until a time of
reformation." This scripture, along
with Heb. 10:1-18, show that the animal sacrifices were abolished. Notice in particular verse 18: "Now where there is forgiveness of
these things ['sin' and 'lawless deeds'], there is no longer any offering for
sin." The reference to
"washings" is particularly noteworthy, because it means all the laws
tied to ceremonial cleanness were ended.
Thus, such laws as those that excluded women from Israel's assemblies
due to their menstrual periods and childbirth are no longer binding (Lev.
12:4-8; 15:19-33). Corresponding to the
end of the animal sacrifices, the Levitical priesthood which offered them also
has been abolished (Heb. 7:12, 18-19):
For
when the priesthood is changed, of necessity there takes place a change of law
also. . . . For, on the one hand, there is a setting aside of a
former commandment because of its weakness and uselessness (for the Law made
nothing perfect), and on the other hand there is a bringing in of a better
hope, through which we draw near to God.
Furthermore,
Paul and the Jerusalem Council plainly say that circumcision is not a
requirement for Christians (Gal 5:2, 11; Gal. 6:15; Rom. 2:26-29; Col. 3:11;
Acts 15:1, 5, 7-11, 23-29). Hence,
knowing clearly what is still in force (the Ten Commandments), and what is not
(the animal sacrifices, the Levitical priesthood, and the laws of ceremonial
cleanness), in principle Christians can work through the Torah's 613 laws, and
figure out which ones are still in force and which ones aren't by a process of extrapolation
(as aided by the Holy Spirit).
THE
IMPLICATIONS OF MMT, A DOCUMENT DISCOVERED AMONG THE DEAD SEA SCROLLS
However, before turning to do some
such derivation and extrapolation, let's notice the implications of a document
found among the Dead Sea Scrolls called MMT and its relationship to
interpreting Eph. 2:11-19 when compared to Gal. 2:11-16. MMT stands for (in Hebrew) "Miqsat
Ma'ase Ha-Torah," which has been translated "Some important [or 'pertinent']
works of the law" by Biblical scholar Martin Abegg. In his article, "Paul, 'Works of the
Law,' and MMT" in the Biblical Archaeology Review
(November/December 1994, pp. 52-55, 82), he discusses how in MMT for the FIRST
time a contemporaneous use of the Pauline term, "the works of the
law," was found outside the New Testament. Paul uses this term in Gal. 2:16; 3:2,5; Rom. 3:20, 28. The big question had been what did he
designate by this term, for it is absent from first and second century Jewish
rabbinical writings. But now, with MMT,
there exists a contemporaneous use of "works of the law," which helps
greatly in defining its meaning. It is
important to note that MMT does not use this term to refer to the Sabbath, the
Holy Days, tithing, etc., nor does it refer to the Ten Commandments. Nor does it refer to such spiritual duties
as caring for the poor, visiting widows and orphans, or any other "good
work." (Here, it deals a potential
death blow to the basis of Martin Luther's reformation teaching of "salvation
by grace through faith alone"--but that's another subject). Instead, it refers to a number of (for
twentieth-century Christians) very petty laws that separate Jew from
gentile. The document chiefly consists
of a long list of rules or laws that compose "works of the law," with
the Qumran author towards the end concluding that, if you obey these laws,
"you shall rejoice at the end of time when you find the essence of our
words true" and (important for our purposes) "you will be reckoned
righteous, in that you have done what is right and good before Him." So, Paul must have been refuting the
theology of documents such as MMT in Romans 3-4 and Galatians 2-3 by referring
to Abraham being reckoned righteous by faith (Gen. 15:6), not by
works. So now, what exactly are some of
the laws listed in MMT? Abegg (p. 53)
gives this list, although it isn't exhaustive because he says about 20 separate
"religious precepts" are listed in it altogether (the all capitals
are mine):
The
issues including bringing Gentile cord into the Temple, the presentation of Gentile
offerings, and the cooking of sacrificial meat in unfit (impure) vessels. Other rulings concern cleansing of lepers,
admitting the blind and the dead into the Temple; and permitting intermarriage
with Ammonite and Moabite converts . . . the transmission of impurity
by a flow of water (musaq), THE INTERMIXTURE OF WOOL AND LINEN (sha'atenz),
plowing with diverse animals (qilayyim) and perhaps the climax of the
discussion: the intermarriage of
priests with the common people.
The
implications of this list of the works of the law are enormous, for in
conjunction with Eph. 2:14-15 when compared to Gal. 2, these texts show these
laws are no longer binding on Christians.
Consider Paul's statement in Eph.
2:14-15: "For He Himself is our
peace, who made both groups [Jews and gentiles] into one, and broke down the
barrier of the dividing wall, by abolishing in His flesh the enmity, which is
the Law of commandments contained in ordinances, that in Himself He might make
the two into one new man, thus establishing peace . . ." Paul uses a very convoluted expression
here--"the Law of commandments contained in ordinances"‑‑so
what is he exactly referring to?
Clearly, it can't be he meant the entire Old Testament law was
abolished. The context of the discussion
here was Paul saying the gentiles had not known the true God at all. They had been condemned to spiritual death
but by being enlightened by the death of Jesus, who united them with the Jews
into one body, the church. The
parallels to Gal. 2:11-16 are remarkable, for here Paul attacked Peter for
suddenly choosing to eat separately from the gentiles when certain Jews arrived
from James in Antioch. Paul condemned
him, saying (v. 16):
"[N]evertheless knowing that a man is note justified by the
works of the Law but through faith in Christ Jesus, even we have believed
in Christ Jesus, that we may be justified by faith in Christ, and not by the
works of the Law; since by the works of the Law shall no flesh be
justified." Evidently, what
happened was that these Jews associated with James believed in some theology
similar to that found in MMT--that one is "reckoned righteous" by
obeying "the works of the law" that kept Jew and gentile
separate. They influenced Peter to stop
eating with the gentiles by persuading him that it was a sin or otherwise
undesirable based on these views. Paul
condemned Peter as well as this kind of theology, saying one is made righteous
with God by faith, not by obeying these petty laws that separate Jews from
gentiles. When comparing this
discussion in Gal. 2 with that in Eph. 2, a safe conclusion is that the laws
in the Old Testament that separate Israelite from gentile, or those which
symbolize this separation, have been abolished for Christians.
WHY
THE LAW AGAINST WEARING MIXED FIBERS IS NO LONGER IN FORCE
Now this brings us to the subject of
mixed fibers (Deut. 22:11; Lev. 19:19) and whether this law is still binding on
Christians. Remarkably, since this law
was included in "the works of the law" found in MMT, Christians need
no longer obey it any more than they have to be circumcised. Although on the surface this law does not
seem to have anything to do with separating Jew from gentile, it may have
symbolized this separation. Just as two
types of fibers were not to mix, neither should Jew or gentile mix through
marriage or religion. On a personal
note concerning this issue, I remember hearing one WCG evangelist who was sent
to the Lansing area to argue in favor of the doctrine changes that had been
made concerning the law and the Sabbath.
He heavily used the example of mixed fibers to show that the authority
of the Old Testament law was not binding on Christians, otherwise we could not
wear clothes that had (say) cotton and polyester in them. At that time, I could not really refute that
argument. But now, knowing the
implications of MMT from this article in the Biblical Archaeology Review,
this claim can be successfully rebutted.
This situation shows that sometimes we need to go in faith, putting some
of the more difficult problems found in Scripture "on the shelf" to
deal with later, when then God may eventually lead us to a solution. For it was obvious that the general premises
of biblical interpretation upon which the WCG bases its doctrinal changes were
very dubious, so I rejected them, even if not all "the problem
scriptures" for my alternative view had been worked out at that time. To conclude, the other laws that evidently
symbolize the separation of Israelite and gentile, such as the one against
sowing two different kinds of seeds on the same piece of law or plowing with
two different animals together (Lev. 19:19), have also been abolished for
Christians.
DO
CHRISTIANS HAVE TO WEAR TASSELS AND PHYLACTERIES AS REMINDERS OF THE LAW?
Now--what about the laws that require
physical reminders of it? Are they
still required of Christians? For
example, note Deut. 6:8-9: "And
you shall bind them as a sign on your hand and they shall be as frontals on
your forehead. And you shall write them
on the doorposts of your house and on your gates." Are the phylacteries that ultra-orthodox
Jews wear on their foreheads, which often look like small wooden blocks with
Hebrew writing on them, required for Christians because of this scripture? Or, consider the requirement to wear tassels
on clothing, which had the same function (Num. 15:39-40): "And it shall be a tassel for you to
look at and remember all the commandments of the Lord, so as to do them and not
follow after your own heart and your own eyes, after which you played the
harlot, in order that you may remember to do all My commandments, and be holy
to your God." Must Christians wear
tassels or special fringes on our pants, suits, or dresses to physically remind
us of the law?
Christians do not need such physical
reminders of the law, and need not obey the Old Testament laws that require
them, because the law is now written on our hearts. By contrast, ancient Israel mostly tried to obey the Ten
Commandments and the law in general by their own physical strength (note Ex.
19:8; 24:3, 7; Gal. 3: 10, 12). Most of
them never had the Holy Spirit, so God didn't help them to obey. However, for Christians, the situation is
very different, for God helps us to obey the law through the Holy Spirit in
us. The very foundation of the new
covenant concerns God's law being written on our hearts (Heb. 8:10): "For this is the covenant that I will
make with the House of Israel after those days, says the Lord: I will put My laws into their minds, and I
will write them upon their hearts."
As Paul explains, what matters now is that the spirit places the law in
our hearts (II Cor. 3:2-3): "You
are our letter, written in our hearts, known and read by all men; being
manifested that you are a letter of Christ, cared for by us, written not with
ink, but with the Spirit of the living God, not on tablets of stone, but on
tablets of human hearts." The old
administration of the law has been abolished which placed a literal physical
copy of the Ten Commandments in the Ark of the Covenant to serve (among other
things) as a collective physical reminder to all of Israel to keep the
law in exchange for promised physical blessings (II Cor. 3:7, 11):
But
if the ministry of death, in letters engraved on stones, came with glory, so
that the sons of Israel could not look intently at the face of Moses because of
the glory of his face, fading as it was . . . For if that which fades away was with glory,
much more that which remains is in glory.
With
the new covenant's arrival, God no longer requires worship focused upon the Ark
of the Covenant and the sacrifices around it because of Jesus' death and the
coming of the Holy Spirit (John 16:7-11, 13-14). The physical objects in the temple and tabernacle which
"serve[d as] a copy and shadow of the heavenly things" (Heb. 8:5),
which included the Ark of the Covenant above all, are not requirements for
Christian worship. Hence, if
"spiritual Israel" (note Gal. 6:16) no longer needs the physical copy
of the Ten Commandments found in the Ark of the Covenant as a reminder to it collectively
to keep it, then neither do we individually need to use our own physical
reminders of the law, such as phylacteries, doorposts with the Ten Commandments
on them, or clothes with tassels and special fringes on them.
IS
IT ALWAYS IMMORAL TO MENTION THE NAMES OF FALSE GODS?
Let's consider some other Old
Testament laws to see if they are binding on Christians. For example, note Ex. 23:13: ". . . and do not mention the
name of other gods, nor let them be heard from your mouth." Does this mean a Christian sins when saying
worshiping Siva, Vishnu, and Brahma, the three chief Hindu gods, is immoral? After all, in order to condemn the worship
of specific false gods, one has to mention them. Now, even for Old Testament Israel, this law should not be taken
literally, as a total blanket prohibition against any discussion of false gods. If it was, any Israelite violates it when
quoting certain scriptures. One has to
use judgment based upon the underlying principle of the law in question, a
point made in this valuable article on the subject of which Old Testament laws
are still in force: Ronald L. Dart,
"The Law and the Christian: The
Basics," Twentieth Century Watch, July 1995, pp. 17-21, 29. Dart uses the example of Deut. 22:8 to say
that someone doesn't need to build a fence around a modern pitched roof where
only workmen will ever walk on, but putting a fence around a deck near a sharp
hill would be required, although it isn't actually a roof. Obeying the letter of this law is
unnecessary often today, although obeying its spirit is necessary in other
cases. Did Moses violate this law by
writing Leviticus 18:21?:
"'Neither shall you give any of your offspring to offer them to
Molech, nor shall you profane the name of your God; I am the Lord.'" Did Elijah break this law when he said (I
Kings 18:21): "How long will you
hesitate between two opinions? If the
Lord is God, follow Him; but if Baal, follow him"? Worse yet, did Luke violate this law by
writing (Acts 14:12): "And they
began calling Barnabas, Zeus, and Paul, Hermes, because was the chief speaker"? Did Apollos (Acts 18:24; I Cor. 1:12)
violate it every time he mentioned his own name? Obviously not. Here we
face the need to probe the underlying principle of this law: There should be no favorable discussion
about false gods, nor should Israelites share with one another details about
how to worship false gods, instead of Yahweh.
For the Bible itself demonstrates that following the spirit of this law
does not mean it requires always a totally literal application.
GOD
SHOWS NO PARTIALITY BASED ON PHYSICAL CHARACTERISTICS TOWARDS CHRISTIANS
Consider these laws: "No one of illegitimate birth shall
enter the assembly of the Lord; none of his descendants, even to the tenth
generation, shall enter the assembly of the Lord. No Ammonite or Moabite shall enter the assembly of the Lord; none
of their descendants, even to the tenth generation, shall ever enter the
assembly of the Lord" (Deut. 23:2-3).
The latter law is now abolished because Israelite and gentile are saved
the same way under the new covenant, as demonstrated by Eph. 2 and Gal. 2-3.[1] The former law is equally done away with,
because the physical descent of someone no longer matters. What matters is whether God has called them,
and what personal relationship they have with God. God wants everyone to repent, bastards (ahem) and legitimate
alike (Acts 17:30): "Therefore
having overlooked the times of ignorance, God is now declaring to men that all
everywhere should repent." All
have sinned, but God will save all who are called, repent, are baptized, and
continue to follow God lifelong (John 3:16; Rom. 3:23). Similarly, the law against allowing those
"emasculated, or has his male organ cut off" to enter the assembly of
the Lord (Deut. 23:1) obviously no longer applies to Christians today, as
demonstrated by Philip baptizing the Ethiopian eunuch (Acts 8:27-39). Clearly, the Old Testament laws that
restrict who could enter the assembly of the Lord by some physical characteristic
have been abolished by the principle proclaimed by Paul in Gal. 3:28, Col 3:11,
and I Cor. 12:13. Regardless of such
physical characteristics such as nationality, gender, or condition of bondage,
God is not partial to anyone under the new covenant (Acts 10:34-35; James
2:1-6).
THE
END OF ISRAEL'S UNION OF CHURCH AND STATE ALSO ENDS VARIOUS LAWS
Another category of laws, or (often)
parts of laws, that are all abrogated for Christians in this age are those tied
to ancient Israel being both a church and state united together under God as a
theocracy where God directly ruled Israel.
Today, God has authorized no human government to be His representative
on earth, even if they may enforce laws that properly protect people (Rom.
13:1-7). Our citizenship is in heaven,
and so our first loyalty is to God, not our country (Phil. 3:20). Jesus said his kingdom was not of this world
(John 18:36). He refused to allow
humans to make Him their king while He was in the flesh (John 6:15). Hence, all the death penalties scattered
throughout the Torah certainly should not be enforced by Christians today, such
as the one for defiantly breaking any law of God, like the Sabbath (Num.
15:30-36). One cannot argue that
because the Sabbath was tied to a death penalty that has been abolished, it is
gone also, without correspondingly admitting that adultery (Deut. 22:22),
fornication (Deut. 22:20-21), rape (Deut. 22:25), sorcery (Ex. 22:18),
bestiality (Ex. 22:18), and homosexual sex (Lev. 20:13) would be similarly
legalized so far as this reasoning goes.
Similarly, the laws regarding Israel's army don't apply to Christians
today (such as Deut. 24:5), because we are to love our enemies, which simply
can't be expressed by killing them on the battlefield, regardless of how much
we may wish to twist Jesus' words so we can be patriotic during wartime (Matt.
5:38-47; 26:51-53). Again, since no
nation is a theocracy authorized by God, no nation's army is authorized by God
to kill others for any reason, except perhaps criminals in situations of
martial law (re: Romans 13:1-7
again). Even in those situations true
Christians should not be involved acting as police. Hence, all the aspects of laws that are tied to the state
inflicting penalties on criminals and other violators of the law are abolished
for the present time before Christ returns (at least), even if the law itself
may still be a sin to violate, because no human government today is authorized
by God to represent and enforce His will on earth, as ancient Israel's was.
DOES
A CHRISTIAN WIDOW HAVE THE RIGHT TO COMPEL ANYONE TO MARRY HER?
Another law to consider is that which
required an (unmarried) man who had lived with his brother to marry his
deceased brother's wife should his brother die without having a son first
(Deut. 25:5-10). Using a case history
based on this law the Sadducees once tried to trap Christ concerning His belief
in the resurrection (Luke 20:27-38).
Would this law still be binding on a Christian man who lived with his
brother and his wife today, should his brother die? To answer this, let's note that not all marriage regulations
found in the Old Testament are still binding today. Christ made that very clear to the Pharisees in Matt.
19:7-9: "They said to Him, 'Why
then did Moses command to give her a certificate of divorce and send her
away?' He said to them, 'Because of
your hardness of heart, Moses permitted you to divorce your wives; but from the
beginning it has not been this way. And
I say to you, whoever divorces his wife, except for immorality, and marries
another woman commits adultery.'"
The same point is made in the Sermon on the Mount (Matt. 5:31-32). This regulation in Deut. 25 could be said to
reflect "the hardness of heart" from the female view, for if the
brother totally refused to marry his brother's widow, she was to pull his
sandal, spit in his face, and say, "Thus it is done to the man who does
not build up his brother's house" (Deut. 25:9). (Conspicuously, he was not put to death or fined for refusing,
but instead was just publicly humiliated).
The harshness of this attitude often was as bad as the man who divorced
his wife for not-so-good reasons.
Furthermore, much of this law involved the machinery of the state being
used to enforce it, since the spurned widow went to the "elders of his
city" (v. 8) to complain and enact this drama before. This means it (or much of it) may well have
been abolished along with the death penalties mentioned earlier since no
nation's government is a true theocracy today.
Furthermore, for a Christian widow, she has full choice about whom to
marry, so long as he is a Christian as well (I Cor. 7:39). Correspondingly, wouldn't a Christian man
have equal freedom, especially when Paul believes being unmarried is the
spiritually superior state? (Note I
Cor. 7:8-9, 32-38‑‑I believe HWA was wrong on this score). Hence, by drawing upon the precedent of
other scriptures, it's dubious to say this law is still in force today.
ARE
THE HOLY DAYS STILL IN FORCE BY DERIVING THEM FROM THE FOURTH COMMANDMENT?
Of course, many other individual Old
Testament laws could be analyzed in this piecemeal manner, but this is
sufficient for now. Now, let's
investigate whether tithing, the Holy Days, and clean/unclean meats are still
binding on Christians. For, after all,
since they are not mentioned in the Ten Commandments, one could argue that the
Sabbath is in force, but these laws aren't.
First, let's consider how the festivals are implicitly contained in the
Sabbath commandment as annual Sabbaths, in contrast to the weekly Sabbath. In Leviticus 23, we find that "The
Lord's appointed times" include the weekly Sabbath and the Holy Days
together. While one could object that
the time during which the annual Holy Days occur is never actually called
"holy," the fact remains that the same regulations against work occur
on them as concerning the weekly Sabbath.
For example, for the Feast of Trumpets, we have this command: "You shall not do any laborious work,
but you shall present an offering by fire to the Lord" (Lev. 23:25). Just as Moses was on holy ground when he saw
God in the burning bush, and so he had to take off his shoes, we show that a
given piece of time is holy by avoiding all unnecessary worldly work on that
time by turning our own foot away from doing our pleasure on that day (Ex.
3:2-5; Isa. 58:13-14). When scripture,
not just the Jews, calls the First Day of Unleavened Bread a
"Sabbath" and a "high day" (John 19:31), which fell on a
Wednesday in A.D. 31, why should we believe that the time is not holy
also? To say they are only holy to the
extent there is a "holy convocation" on that day--meaning because
Christians gather on that day, when they could do so on any other randomly
chosen day--reiterates a familiar WCG argument. But can this be true, when such a term as "Sabbath" is
applied to the First Day of Unleavened Bread?
Such days are holy independently of whether any human being recognizes
them as such. Since the Holy Days can
be subsumed under the fourth commandment, similar to the way the laws against
fornication and bestiality are covered also by the seventh commandment, there's
every good reason to believe they are still binding, so long as no clear
abolition is found in scripture concerning them. Since both Christ and the early church observed these days, or
made mention of them, they are still binding, when we reject dispensationalist
principles of biblical interpretation (Acts 18:21; 20:6, 16; 27:9; I Cor.
5:7-8; Col. 2:16; John 2:13, 23; 5:1; 7:10; 7:37; Luke 2:41-43; 22:8).
IS
TITHING ABOLISHED FOR CHRISTIANS BASED ON THE ARGUMENT FROM SILENCE?
But now, what about the command to
tithe? Among the Ten Commandments, none
look anything like it on the surface.
However, note the implications of Malachi 3:8-9: "'Will a man rob God? Yet you are robbing Me! But you say, "How have we robbed Thee?" In tithes and offerings.
You are cursed with a curse, for you are robbing Me, the whole nation of
you,' says the Lord of hosts."
Since the eighth commandment prohibits stealing, the implications are
clear: Since God owns the world, and
owns us, whether we admit it or not, we are to "pay rent" to Whom we
"lease" these physical things from, and pay tithe on our increase
(earnings). Furthermore, Christ says,
when rebuking the Pharisees for obeying minor matters of the law while neglecting
the great ones like justice, mercy, and faith, that they should still have
tithed (Matt. 23:23). The standard way
for dispensationalists to evade such a text is to say it was spoken while the
old covenant was still in force, and is therefore irrelevant to us today. Of course, such an argument invalidates
virtually all the words of Jesus, including the Sermon on the Mount. Maybe red letter Bibles exist in order to
know immediately what Christians can all the more safely ignore! Similarly, when examining the Letters
(Epistles), no mention of tithing exists outside of Hebrews 7, such as in I
Corinthians and II Corinthians.
Therefore, using that old dispensationalist standby, the argument from
silence, it is said this law has been abolished since no mention is made of
it. After all, does not Paul say (II
Cor. 8:8), "I am not speaking this as a command, but as proving through
the earnestness of others the sincerity of your love also"? However, since this text concerns famine
relief for other Christians, not support of the ministry, tithing certainly
wouldn't naturally come first in Paul's mind in such a situation. While Paul may not have explicitly mentioned
tithing when saying he had a right to financial support from the brethren (I
Cor. 9:4, 9-15), this is no proof of its abolition. As discussed above, when one rejects extreme dispensationalism
and a radical discontinuity between Judaism and Christianity as principles of
Biblical interpretation, we should assume a given Old Testament law is still in
force, unless clearly abolished. The
argument from silence--that because a certain Old Testament law is not
mentioned in the New Testament or the Letters and Revelation, therefore it is
abolished--assumes at the start that dispensationalism is true, and that the
Old Testament is irrelevant as a guide to Christian conduct except so far as
the New Testament or the Letters say otherwise. Therefore, unless one proves extreme dispensationalism and
radical discontinuity to begin with, which certainly are problematic, we should
reject the argument from silence as a means to abolish any Old Testament law.
IS
THE LAW OF CLEAN AND UNCLEAN MEATS STILL BINDING ON CHRISTIANS?
Now, are the laws concerning clean and
unclean meat binding on Christians? It
is said that all meat was made clean by Peter's vision in Acts 10, since one
can't say the gentiles are literally clean without the animals in the vision
having been made clean as well.
However, this conclusion was not what Peter drew from his vision--all he
mentioned when interpreting it for us was it concerned the gentiles being clean
(v. 10): "You yourselves know how
unlawful it is for a man who is a Jew to associate with a foreigner or to visit
him; and yet God has shown me that I should not call any man unholy [literally,
'common'] or unclean." Why should
we read more into it? After all, God
may have ordered Peter to "Arise . . . kill and eat!," but
it is hazardous to take literally anything associated with a vision
itself. (Furthermore, God ordered
Abraham to sacrifice Isaac, but that was a command He did not actually wish to
be fully obeyed). Above all, we know
from elsewhere in the New Testament that not all the animals are now clean
(Rev. 18:2): "And she [Babylon]
has become a . . . prison of every unclean and hateful
bird." Furthermore, when the
Second Coming occurs, punishment comes upon those who eat unclean food, which
shows these animals aren't clean now (Isaiah 66:16-17):
For
the Lord will execute judgment by fire and by His sword on all flesh, and those
slain by the Lord will be many. Those
who sanctify and purify themselves to go to the gardens, following one in the
center, who eat swine's flesh, detestable things, and mice, shall come to an
end altogether,' declares the Lord.
Therefore,
good reasons exist to believe the law against eating clean and unclean meat is
still binding today on Christians.
DID
CHRIST ABROGATE THE LAW OF CLEAN AND UNCLEAN MEATS IN MARK 7?
Now, it will be objected that didn't
Christ say that (Mark 7:18-19) "whatever goes into the man from outside
cannot defile him; because it does not go into his heart, but into his stomach,
and is eliminated"? Here, the
context is crucial, and by looking at the parallel account in Matt. 15,
we can know more clearly what is going on.
First of all, the challenge to Jesus concerned eating food with unwashed
hands, an aspect of the oral law that was out of the traditions of men. It was not a dispute over the matter of
clean and unclean food, which is made clear in Matt. 15:20: "These [spiritual sins] are the things
which defile the man; but to eat with unwashed hands does not defile the
man." One has to read into the
discussion that Christ was nullifying the laws concerning clean and unclean
meat. Evidently Peter himself, who
listened and even participated in this discussion, did not interpret it in this
manner, because even long after the crucifixion he had never eaten unclean or
common meat (Acts 10: 14). True, in the
Westcott-Hort/critical text that underlies most modern Bible translations we
get (by changing a single letter of a single word in the Greek) the editorial
comment "(Thus He declared all foods clean)" in Mark 7:19. However, this text type is defective, and
the Received Text that underlies the KJV and NKJV is superior--but proving that
point is way beyond the purpose of this paper.
Suffice it to say, it's unwise to base a significant doctrine on whether
one Greek word contains an omicron or an omega in it. Furthermore, let's not take Christ's use of the word "whatever"
too broadly--it may have meant out of all the things the Jews, and in
particular the Pharisees normally ate, not out of all possible animals that can
be eaten by anybody. So, by comparing
Mark 7 with the parallel account in Matt. 15, and by avoiding reading more into
it than is already there, it appears that Christ did not mean to say the laws
against clean and unclean meat had been abolished, but that the Pharisees'
complaint about Christ's disciples not washing their hands before eating was
invalid.
THE
NEED TO USE A COMBINATION OF PRINCIPLES WITH THE ASSUMPTION OF CONTINUITY TO
DETERMINE WHICH OLD TESTAMENT LAWS ARE STILL IN FORCE
To figure out which laws in the Old
Testament are still in force before the Second Coming can't be done by any one
principle of interpretation. The Bible
does not tell us explicitly any systematic approach to this question. However, when we reject extreme
dispensationalism, a radical discontinuity between Judaism and Christianity,
and the resultant corresponding argument from silence, the presumption should
be that a given Old Testament law is in force unless plainly or by deduction
from what is plain we can know it has been abolished. True, some exception exists for each simple rule we can come up
with to figure out what has been abolished.
For example, suppose one says that if a law was obeyed before the old
covenant was established, therefore Christians should obey it today. Then circumcision and animal sacrifices are
binding (Gen. 4:3-5; 22:8, 13; Gen. 8:20; 17:10-14). Suppose it's said that a law which will be obeyed in the
millennium is binding today. Then
animal sacrifices and the Levitical priesthood are binding (Eze. 44:9-12,
27-31; Isa. 66:20-21). One could say
that if Jesus and/or the apostles did it, then Christians should (re: I John 2:6; I Pet. 2:21). But then there's the problem of Jesus
evidently wearing tassels (Matt. 9:20; compare 23:5) and Paul evidently
observing a Nazarite vow (Acts 18:18--but compare I Cor. 11:14) and ritually
purifying himself and visiting the temple (Acts 21:24, 26). Thus, no one rule can answer such a question
for us. However, by using a combination
of them, one can, especially in conjunction with the approach sketched
above of extrapolating and deriving from the laws that clearly have been
abolished and those which are clearly still in force to investigate those laws
whose status has not been figured out yet.
After all, if the Holy Days were commanded for ancient Israel, and the
early church and Christ did observe and/or mention them, and that in the
millennium they will be observed (Zech. 14:16-19; Eze. 44:24), then it's safe
to say they are still in force today.
If the patriarchs practiced at least some type of tithing (Heb. 7:4-10;
Gen. 14:20; 28:20), God commanded it under the old covenant, and Christ said it
should have been obeyed (Matt. 23:23), then it's safe to assume it is still
binding on Christians. If the animals
were clean and unclean before the old covenant was made (Gen. 8:20--at least
for the purposes of sacrifice--note Gen. 9:2!), that they were under the old
covenant, and that they will still be unclean shortly before the second coming
(i.e., now!) (Rev. 18:2; Isa. 66:16-17; Hosea 9:3), and during the millennium
(Eze. 44:23), it's unwise to consider this law abolished for Christians
now. The continuity about
certain of God's laws between various periods (or dispensations) points to the
conclusion that those laws are still in force.
It is absurd to see the Christian era after the crucifixion and before
the millennium as presumably law-free unless we get a reconfirmation of some
Old Testament law in Paul's letters (etc.), then note this era is bracketed on
both sides by laws which were enforced under the old covenant and will be
enforced during the millennium, and then claim Christians need not obey these
laws when they have not been clearly abrogated in the New Testament. Silence should be taken to mean no change
has occurred, rather than some change did happen, once we reject the extreme
dispensationalist/radical discontinuity principles of biblical interpretation.[2] In short, extrapolating and deriving what
was required (or may have been) of people in other dispensations is still
relevant principle to sorting out what is required of Christians today.
THE
TWO LAW THEORY OF ALLEN WALKER RECONSIDERED
One way to come to the conclusion that
only the Ten Commandments are still in force, but everything else is still in
force, is found in Allen Walker's The Law and the Sabbath. Walker, a Seventh-day Adventist evangelist,
wrote this work after years of debates with assorted Sunday observers. He maintained that two basic sets of laws
were given to Israel, one of which was the Ten Commandments which were placed
inside the ark. The other set was
commanded through Moses, and so the book of assorted laws was placed to the
side of the ark (see Ex. 24:12; Deut. 31:26; 10:4; 33:1-2, 4; 4:11-14;
5:22). So then--is everything inside
the "book of the law" to be seen as the same as the "Law of
Moses," and was discarded for Christians at the crucifixion? We know this isn't the case, for the two
Great Commandments are found within it.
"[Y]ou shall love your neighbor as yourself; I am the Lord"
(Lev. 19:18). "And you shall love
the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your
might" (Deut. 6:5). Even such an
innocuous law for late twentieth-century Christians in industrialized countries
as not muzzling the ox as he treads out the grain has a basic principle that
Paul cites concerning a paid ministry (see I Cor. 9:9). Furthermore, since much of the civil law of
Moses are obvious amplifications of the Ten Commandments' basic principles, it
is dubious to say the specific laws against (say) fornication, idolatry,
bestiality, etc. have been abolished.
Again, as noted against the dispensationalist assumptions listed above,
it makes more sense to see the continuity between the different periods God is
dealing with man, unless some specific abolition exempts Christians from
a certain law in this day and age.
Silence should not be taken as abolition. While this principle of saying "the law of Moses" is
whatever was in this book of the law placed to the side of the ark has been
abolished for Christians is very neat and simple, it's obvious exceptions do
exist. A number of aspects of the moral
law are found within its pages. Even concerning
things not so obviously moral in character, such as the Festivals and tithing,
one is faced with the matter of the continuity between dispensations (or parts
thereof) concerning their application.
These laws don't point so obviously to Christ's death as the animal
sacrifices do (except for the Passover/Days of Unleavened Bread). Like the other principles listed in the last
section, discarding as being relevant to Christians all listed in the book of
the law (seen as equal to the law of Moses), but keeping the Ten Commandments,
has evident exceptions to it, and can't be employed uncritically by itself to
answer our questions about what is still binding today.
IN
CONCLUSION: WHY STICKING WITH THE TEN
COMMAMDENTS ALONE IS INCORRECT
While the principle that we should
assume only the Ten Commandments are in force and nothing else contains an
elegant simplicity worthy of English philosopher William of Ockham's
"razor," it assumes certain principles of biblical interpretation
that appear very questionable, such as extreme dispensationalism, a radical
discontinuity between Judaism and Christianity, the argument from silence, and
that the Bible should only be interpreted backwards, from the Letters to the
Gospels, and the New Testament to the Old, without much or any interaction back
and forth. True, the approach
propounded above, that we can derive and extrapolate from the Ten Commandments
and from what is clearly abolished, such as animal sacrifices, the Levitical
priesthood, and circumcision to determine which other Old Testament laws are
binding on Christians, is not a clear, clean approach from the point of view of
human reason. It requires a lot more
human judgment as guided by the Holy Spirit to perform. It needs more faith, because not all the
"puzzles" posed by a given Old Testament law may be instantly
resolvable, except upon further research or even discoveries by scholars (such
as MMT). However, the
"puzzles" posed by assuming Pasadena's (and evangelical Protestant
Christianity's) principles of Biblical interpretation are much worse and more
numerous. So, it's time to choose an
overall set of principles of Bible interpretation that see the continuity
between dispensations, that see how Christianity grew out of Judaism without a
radical rejection of everything Jewish, and that we should assume that a given
law is in force, unless we can figure out it has been abolished, rather than
assume all Old Testament laws not repeated in some 12-13% of the word of God
(the Letters and Revelation) are fundamentally irrelevant for Christian
conduct. No need exists for
Sabbatarians to accept these premises, and then use the Ten Commandments as a
kind of "door stop" to prevent their full implementation.
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[1]Of
course, we also have the curious case of Ruth, the Moabitess, who accepted the
Eternal, and became part of the bloodline leading directly to king David,
without ten generations intervening in-between. See Ruth 4:10, 21-22.
Maybe for this law an exception existed for Moabites who accepted the God
of Israel as their own, and gave up worshipping foreign gods (Ruth 1:16).
[2]Consider this brilliantly pragmatic
example of this principle by a UCG--Ann Arbor laymember in his unpublished
essay, "Why I believe the Sabbath and Holy Days are required for the
WCG," May 11, 1995, p. 1: "I
work in the automotive industry. I
supervise the buildup of vehicles using prototype parts. Both hardware and software are constantly
being changed during the development process.
When I receive a 'new' part, the supplier tells me what has been
'changed' from the 'old' part, not what hasn't been 'changed.' Silence on a particular point indicates no
change took place, not the other way around."