Blessings

Dan

Dear Geert,

I’m sorry that I am a bit late with my answer. I just saw your reaction today. I appreciate your answer. It gives me much to think about.

I think it’s good to speak about levels as you do. There are always two levels in every era. Let us call them according to your words: the legal level (of Sinai) and the level of saving faith. Anyone can do the legal level in some sense. But to have faith, you need more than just a rational choice. There is something divine in it. Then you are really convinced, powered by the Holy Spirit. But both levels belongs to each other. That’s why, I think, when a gentile (and even a Jew) makes repentence, truly, he faces indeed suddenly and unexpectedly the legal side of the covenant. The first thing he is going to do is trying to keep the commandments. He wants to please G-d in this way. But because the commandments are not the purpose of his faith, he is going to learn that only Yeshua is the purpose who enabled him to live righteous.

So I think the old and new covenant are not separate from each other. You gave the key by citing Jer.31:33-34 “… I will put my law on their inward parts …”
You say “The foundation for the New Covenant with Israel was laid by Messiah”. I would say also the foundation of the Sinai Covenant was laid by Messiah. However it was by a promised Messiah.

Back to your question whether the level of saving faith includes the legal level of Sinai. G-d is righteous and holy. He demands that from us to enable us to be with him. So the law always applies to us and gives us the opportunity to be holy. However, we can only be holy in Yeshua, who fulfilled the law and set us from bondage into a free man, who’s willing to obey the law. He who enters the New Covenant has always to deal with the legal Sinai Covenant, and would say: We will hear and we will do. (Deuteronomy)

Thanks for your answer. You rightly point out that entering the Sinai Covenant (by being born a Jew) doesn’t necessarily imply entering the New Covenant. For a person enters the New Covenant by being born again to eternal life, which happens through repentance and faith in Yeshua.

But this raises the question why the reverse should be true. If the Jew doesn’t have eternal life simply by being born in the Sinai Covenant, why then is the Gentile believer included in the Sinai covenant by being born again to eternal life? If the temporal level of the Covenant (Sinai) doesn’t imply the eternal level (eternal life), then why does the eternal level of the Covenant yet imply the temporal level of Sinai?

Moreover, it seems rather inconvenient that a Gentile enters the Sinai Covenant by the fact of being born again. For if this is true, then this believer suddenly and unexpectedly, and from the very first instance of having true saving faith, finds himself fully bound by the Sinai contract with all its commandments and punishments.

Therefore my question: If in your position the legal level of Sinai doesn’t include the level of saving faith, then why does the level of saving faith include the legal level of Sinai? Can you explain this?

Or it must be that the Sinai Covenant somehow is enclosed or comprised in the New Covenant, which is the case according to Jer. 31:33-34: “But this shall be the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel; After those days, saith HaShem, I will put my law in their inward parts, and write it to their hearts; and will be their G-d, and they shall be my people. And they shall teach no more every man his neighbour, and every man his brother, saying, Know HaShem: for they shall all know me, from the least of them unto the greatest of them, saith HaShem: for I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more”.

The foundation for the New Covenant with Israel was laid by Messiah, in his atonement, as was made clear by his words at the Last Supper: “This is my blood of the New Covenant, which is shed for many for the remission of sins” (Mt. 26:28; cf. Mk. 14:24; Lk. 22:20; 1 Cor. 11:25).

From these texts it is clear that if the believing Gentiles nowadays receive the remission of sins, they in fact receive some of the blessings belonging to the New Covenant that is yet to be made with the Jewish nation. Jewish and Gentile believers can receive this blessing because the foundation of the New Covenant was already laid by Messiah. But the question is whether this does imply that these Gentiles, who never before were part of the Sinai Covenant, enter this Covenant by their faith alone, without any procedure on the legal level. This seems a bit like entering a marriage by love, without signing a formal marriage contract. And thus the problem remains that these Gentiles suddenly find themselves accountable to fulfil all the commandments of the Torah, with the implication that if they don’t they are sinners and worthy to be punished.

One of the more telling implications of the fact that Gentile believers are formally included in the Sinai Covenant by their faith in Yeshua is that their males must be circumcised without delay. For as long as they are uncircumcised they are transgressing the commandment of circumcision, which is punishable by karet.

Shalom,
Geert
(Messianic613)

Yes, I think so. Here’s my opinion. You obviously can see it by Paul’s claim to the Galatians that nothing of man does matter to enter the New Covenant, including the birth from Jewish parents and the sign of the covenant: the circumcision (berith). In John 8 Yeshua replied to the Jews who said they were the seed of Abraham, that their father was not Abraham but the devil. That was possible because they didn’t made personal repentance and therefore didn’t hear “the word of Yeshua” (v.43) One who’s by birth into the (old) covenant has to repent and must become faithful. And thereby he receives life form Yeshua and as a newborn one Torah is put on his heart. Then he sees Torah and wants to do it.

That said from the Jews we can turn to the Gentiles who are “grafted in” by faith and say that they will share the common wealth of the covenants, especially the New covenant of G-d with the House of Israel. In that way, the House of Israel is called by Paul the free Jerusalem which is above. (Gal.4:26)

Not-Messianic Jews are under the old covenant. That covenant did not cease. Otherwise the Nation of Israel was not stated at 1948. The New covenant is open for Gentiles since the blood of Yeshua is the new covenant, according to his own words. It is the fulfilled promise of G-d to Abraham: “and in thee shall all the families of the earth be blessed”. (Gen.12:3, Hebrew: families of Adama.)

I think the old covenant is made up with all the Jewish people (they have the Torah as a contract) and it is and will be not broken. “For the gifts and the calling of God are not repented of.” (Rom.11:29) And according to the prophets they will enter the new covenant, I think soon, by repentance.

Shalom,
Jos

The notion that Moshe (PBUH) was given an oral Torah is totally devoid of any merit or foundation in the Tanakh’s text. Those who accept such an idea in some form have succumbed to the ubiquitous Rabbinic propaganda machine.

It would be interesting to elaborate a bit on this. You said: “Observance of the Torah is a second gift from heaven and is done by love and with the help of Yeshua. The first is repentance with love to G-d”. I would like to ask you this question: Do you think that Gentiles who repent and turn to G-d and have faith in Messiah Yeshua are by their repentance and faith included in the covenants G-d made with the House of Israel?

Shalom,
Geert
(Messianic613)

Your position that to Avraham was given all that was given to Moses doesn’t prove that to Moses was given the Oral Torah. This is something that has to be demonstrated.

Gen 17:4 “As for me, this is my covenant with you: you will be the father of many nation(s).

And that Avraham, being father of ALL the Nation(s) was given ALL that was given to Moses:-

Gen 26:5 (HNV) because Abraham obeyed my voice, and kept my requirements, my commandments, my statutes, and my laws.

Compare that which was given to Avraham with that which was given to Moses here below:-

Neh 9:13(HNV) “You came down also on Mount Sinai, and spoke with them from heaven, and gave them right ordinances and true laws, good statutes and commandments,

Then why is it so difficult for Messianics to follow the “oral Torah” ?

Is it perhaps that they still suffer from the rebellion of the Northern Kingdom that broke away from the Kingdom of the South ?

I think you touched a great question: Who is in the covenant of G-d. Are they the children of Abraham? Israel? Jews? Paul was arguing about the New Covenant to the Galatians. And he distinguished it in two covenants by an allegory of Sinai and the new Jerusalem. To enter the new covenant only faith is needed. Not the observance of the Torah yields salvation, but only repentance. Showed in baptism. That’s the first and only requirement to come (back) to G-d. We’ve lost Him. The way to G-d is done by faith as shown in Hebrews 11:8-9, By faith Abraham … obeyed.. and was looking for a city who’s maker was G-d. And so others did. Observance of the torah is a second gift from heaven and is done by love and with the help of Yeshua. The first is repentance with love to G-d.

shalom,
Jos

In Christianity the celebration of “Holy Innocents” is traditionally on December 28. But it might be a better idea to remember this event on the Yahrzeit of Rachel, between the commemorations of the circumcision (day 8)and the redemption of Jesus (day 31). What would you say?