What is Sinless?

This is post number twelve in the series: Why I Am Not A Christian.  This series is posted so that you can start at the beginning and go from post to post in order.  If you are new here, this will make much more sense if you start at the beginning.


Let’s pretend for a moment that the churches in the modern world, and especially the United States, have not been so thoroughly infected with post-modern, relativistic thought; that there are actually people who believe that there is such a thing as objective truth.  I know that this is hard to swallow, considering the research that’s been done by Barna and his firm, but for the purposes of this study, let’s probe the idea that there are people who wish to claim allegiance to the Messiah of the Bible on the basis of the One who created everything and not the opinions of created beings.

Before anyone can undertake to be a disciple of the God of the Bible, one must decide who is the judge and who sets the standard.  If you have decided that you are going to pick and choose which things in Scripture apply to you, you might as well go off and start your own religion and be honest about what you call it.  “St. McGillicuddy’s Church of My Opinion,” for example.  If you are going to spend most or all of your time and energy focusing on one or two doctrines and only looking for those select texts that support your argument, then you’ve descended into making yourself the judge of Scripture.  It can be done very subtly, but done nonetheless.

In this installment, I decided to use sin as the example.  In many of the older denominations, sin is hardly, if at all, talked about.  But then people rarely talk about things that have no importance in their lives, whether positive or negative. And while sin may get preached about from the pulpits of the hyper-excitement charismatic denominations, it is practically undefined.  I’ve heard it said that it is not doing what you know you should do and doing what you know you should.  Alternately I could simply say, let your conscience be your guide.

Is that right?  Is that the Biblical standard?  I don’t think so.  Scripture tells me that “the intent of man’s heart is evil from his youth;” (Gen. 8:21).  “The heart is more deceitful than all else and is desperately sick; who can understand it?” (Jeremiah 17:9)  In order to be clear, I must stop here and define what the Scripture is talking about when it says “heart.”  It means your mind.  Not a blood pump.  Not your emotions; although your emotions are inextricably linked to it.  Not your cogitating intellect.  It is talking about your non-physical being.  The part of you that needs the rational intellect to control it.  The corresponding feature in animals would be instinct.  It’s the part of you that has desires and needs.

When men simply decide that their own conscience is the standard, they can rationalize all kinds of things.  Do you think that Hitler thought of himself as evil?  Of course not.  He believed he was doing everything he did for the good of the people of Germany.  Geoffrey Dahmer admitted in an interview with a reporter that the reason he could justify killing and eating his victims was because if we are all evolved from the primordial slime, why should we not do whatever we want?  In a very sick way, Hitler made more moral sense than Dahmer, because at least Hitler was trying to do something he felt was good for his country, while Dahmer did what he did simply because it didn’t matter.  Or someone could argue that Hitler was more evil than Dahmer, because what’s the big deal of killing and eating a few people compared to murdering about eight million people?

Each person walking the planet can have their own, individual set of standards that they can call their conscience. In reality, that means that there is no standard at all.  This is why God gave us the Torah; His “Teaching.”  And because the vast majority of churches have abandoned the standard of Torah for what does and does not constitute sin, there is confusion and chaos.  You can go to one church and be made to feel guilty for wearing make-up or pants if you’re a woman.  You can go to another church and be a practicing homosexual and be made to feel that you are just fine the way you are and what you are doing is your own business.  There are people who quit going to church because they didn’t want to be convicted of sin, while there are other people who quit going to church because they are tired of there being no real standard and the hypocrisy drives them nuts.

Which reminds me that I need to do a comprehensive post on what is and is not hypocrisy.  That is another word that has been abused into near meaninglessness.

So, when the Bible speaks of Yeshua (Jesus) of being without sin, what does it mean?  If your concept of what constitutes sin is based on nothing more than your own personal conscience, then you can define Yeshua’s sinlessness as whatever you want to.  Have you ever thought about that?

If you choose not to study the same Scriptures that Yeshua studied which defines the standard of righteousness, and you instead have some undefined idea of what sinlessness is, then you create an image for yourself and apply that image to God.  This is backwards.  This is wrong.  This is idolatry.

What if you had been there when He made a whip of cords and drove the money-changers out of the Temple courts?  Not only was he angry, but he was downright violent.  Why was that not sinful?  When He was twelve and remained at the Temple asking questions and caused his parents to be worried, why wasn’t that sinful?  Then there was sassing His momma by asking her why she didn’t know that He had to be about His Daddy’s business.

If you have never studied Torah in depth and then only read the Gospels through the eyes of a modern Gentile, you are not going to understand what the writers of the Gospels meant when they said that Yeshua was without sin.  To the “Christianized” mind, a sinless Jesus is indefinable.  Seriously.  Take a moment and ponder this.  Can you, if you claim to be a Christian, clearly define to another person, what exactly made Jesus a sinless man?  Could any two people agree on that definition?

Would you say that Jesus was the embodiment of love?  Really?  Then why did he make so many people angry?  Do the words of Yeshua in Matthew 23 sound like someone full of love for everyone?  I remember being at a dinner with distant relatives and being chastised for believing in a standard of holiness. Someone said, “Jesus’ whole reason for coming to earth was to bring us peace and love.”

Really?  Matthew 10:34-39 quotes The Master as saying:

“Do not think that I came to bring peace on the earth; I did not come to bring peace, but a sword.  For I came to set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law; and a man’s enemies will be the members of his own household.  He who loves father or mother more than Me is not worthy of Me. And he who does not take his cross and follow after Me is not worthy of Me. He who has found his life shall lose it, and he who has lost his life for My sake shall find it.”

Can you see why it is dangerous to make broad statements when you don’t really know what you are talking about?  Don’t misunderstand my point and think that I am advocating for dominion theology or some form of militant Christianity.  In order to understand that quote above, you must take into account all of the teachings of Yeshua, and that includes what Torah says as well.  Could you consider the statement above to be hyperbole?  Yes and no.  As an aside I have to point out that it is ironic that “liberals” like to accuse us “Bible Thumpers” of only seeing things in black and white, and no shades of grey, when just the opposite is true.

Do I believe that some families will be torn apart over following Yeshua?  Absolutely.  Imagine you are an orthodox Jew who converts to Christianity.  Your family will consider you dead, mourn your loss, and may even have a formal “memorial” service for you.  If you are a muslim who converts, they may actually try to kill you.  So there is no hyperbole in such a case.

But you may simply have a stressful time dealing with family relationships once you become a devout believer in the God of the Bible.  The point is that discipleship can cost you a lot, but the ultimate reward is worth whatever sacrifice you may have to make.   Back to the question of what constitutes sin.

Another reason we need the Torah and the rest of Scripture to be the standard for what is and is not sin, is because there are a lot of people who like to run around saying that God told them something.  Even when I was still only a young Christian of about five years experience, and didn’t know near as much as I do now (which will never be enough), I used to get in some heated arguments with folks when I questioned the crap that was being taught by the likes of Benny Hinn and Kenneth Copeland and a lot of the bilge that comes from the Trinity Broadcasting Network.

I’ve heard people like Fred Price and Jesse Duplantis say some stupid and downright heretical things which should have gotten them banned from speaking in most churches, but instead they get applauded for it.  The particulars are not what’s important for the purposes of this essay, the point is that there has to be an immovable standard that settles any arguments.  That standard has to be Scripture.

By surrendering to the knowledge that Torah is eternal; that Yeshua is Torah and Torah is Yeshua; that the Holy Spirit would never, ever, contradict Scripture, and therefore, would never tell a believer something contradicted by Scripture; I can be assured that if I do my best to follow Torah, I need not be ashamed.  When I do fall short and violate Torah, I have the ultimate High Priest and advocate in Yeshua.

Yeshua has told us plainly and clearly that Torah is eternal and is still in effect.  He came to help us understand it better, and the Ruach HaKodesh (Holy Spirit) is here to give us the power to carry it out daily if we are willing to listen and submit our will to His.

Was Paul Crazy?

This is post number nine in the series: Why I Am Not A Christian.

Outside of those laws that directly pertain to Temple service and worship by the priesthood (Kohanim), you really can't point to any of Adonai's laws in Torah and say that it makes no sense to follow them, or that by following them you will not be upholding the two greatest commandments, and again, I point to what the Master Himself said in Matthew 5:17-19:

"Do not think that I came to abolish the Law (Torah) or the Prophets; I did not come to abolish, but to fulfill.  For truly I say unto 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."

Instead of seeking out the opinions of people who lived hundreds or thousands of years after the resurrection of Yeshua, doesn't it make more sense to search the Scriptures to find the correct view on how to obey God's commands?  If you are a Christian who claims to believe in the authority of Scripture as inspired directly by the Holy Spirit, should you not then read the New Testament and take its instruction as having more weight and authority than any church tradition?  I find it rather ironic that there are Protestant churches who only exist because Martin Luther said that his conscience was held captive by the Scripture, which gave rise to the Latin phrase: Sola Fide, Sola Scriptura, Soli Deo Gloria. (by faith alone, by Scripture alone, to God alone be the Glory),  but all that really served to do was allow a breaking away from the horribly corrupt Roman Catholic tyranny.  As Luther continued on, he fomented horrendous hatred against the Jews and gave rise to the concept of "replacement theology."  The new Protestant church beginning with the Anglicans or Church of England kept the vast majority of traditions of pagan origin.  Maybe some of the clergy understood what they were doing wrong, but the churches had all pretty much become political structures with immense power and most of the masses simply did not question such authority.

We simply refer to it as the book of Acts.  Its complete name is the "Acts of the Apostles."  I've heard more than a couple of people say it should more properly be called the "Acts of the Holy Spirit," and I agree with that sentiment.  Luke, the author of the gospel that bears his name, was a careful and thoughtful historian.  No one in any of the sciences dealing with history or archaeology has ever found a flaw in any of Luke's work, but then what would you expect from someone writing under the influence of the Holy Spirit?  The last time I referenced Acts was in regard to the misunderstanding I often encounter about the tenth chapter, as if that was to tell us that believers no longer had to worry about the dietary laws of Torah.  Regarding Acts chapter fifteen I pointed out that the elders and Apostles simply assumed that the new converts from the gentiles would begin learning how to obey Torah.  It was rather shocking to their system that gentiles could have received the Holy Spirit without first learning Torah and engaging in circumcision and ritual baptism, but the Holy Spirit made it obvious that they could be received first and learn later, just like what happened to the people at Mt. Sinai in Exodus.  In other words, the leaders of this new body of believers in Messiah had to reach back for the lesson that had been given in Torah and realize that the precedent had already been set.  God wants sincere seekers and believers who are willing to learn His ways, rather than those who think they already know.

Therefore, with the idea in mind that we should look to the example and words of those who actually walked with and were disciples of the Master, let's look at what the 21st chapter of Acts has to tell us.  At this point in time,  Paul finally got back to Jerusalem after travelling around and evangelizing and he reports to the elders of the congregation, apparently led by James.  This account can be found in Acts 21:17-26.  This is an event that you just won't hear preached about from any Christian pulpit, because what it really teaches just throws a monkey wrench in the typical Christian interpretation of how we are to live.  I'm going to paraphrase this in plain modern English.

Paul returns after what might be a couple of years of travelling around to the synagogues.  This is well after the leadership of the body of believers in Messiah or "the people of The Way" have swollen in numbers to several thousand, having observed the Holy Spirit perfoming miracle after miracle through these men and women who walked with Yeshua.  The Temple is still standing, but the Talmud records ( I love a hostile witness proving my case), that ever since they crucified that troublemaker from Nazareth, the scarlet cord that they cut from the scapegoat on the Day of Atonement no longer turns white as a sign that God has accepted this offering.  The doors to the Temple swing open by themselves, and disturbing voices will continue to be heard until the Temple finally is destroyed by Titus in 70 AD.  The Sanhedrin and other skeptical Jewish leaders are probably beside themselves because it's even worse now than it was when the upstart from Galilee was walking around.  This body of believers is an enigma to everyone outside of belief in Messiah.  These believers in the Nazarene continue to come worship and pray in the Temple and even bring sacrifices and offerings.   . . . .  .  er, . . . uh . . . .  what?   Yeah, what it says.

Luke writing:  "And when we had come to Jerusalem, the brethren received us gladly. And now the following day Paul went in with us to James and all the elders were present.  And after he had greeted them, he began to relate one by one the things which God had done among the Gentiles through his ministry.  And when they heard it they began glorifying God; and they said to him, "You see, brother, how many  thousands there are among the Jews of those who have believed, and they are all zealous for the Law [Torah]  ----   [Yep, that's right.  Go check your own translation.]   ----  and they have been told about you, that you are teaching all the Jews who are among the Gentiles to forsake Moses, telling them not to circumcise their children nor to walk according to the customs."   Acts 21:17-21

Read it again and let it sink in.  Does it sound like they think this is a good thing?  If there is any question in your mind, let's continue on in the text, and let the text, the Words of the Holy Spirit, speak for themselves.

"What, then, is to be done?  They will certainly hear that you have come.  Therefore do this that we tell you.  We have four men who are under a vow; take them and purify yourself along with them, and pay their expenses in order that they may shave their heads; and all will know that there is nothing to the things which they have been told about you, but that you yourself also walk orderly, keeping the Law [Torah]."   Acts 21:22-24

And Paul did exactly as he was told.  Yep.  That Paul.  The guy who single handedly wrote almost half of the New Testament.  The guy who wrote the letter to the Romans, which gets twisted into whatever meaning any particular preacher wants to give it by lifting select verses out of context.  Notice that Paul didn't reply to them by saying, "Wait a minute, you guys.  You've got it all wrong.  We no longer have to worry about all that stuff.  We are now under grace and don't have to worry about keeping the Law."   Is that what Paul said?  No.  So we need to stop and think.  We need to make up our minds on this issue.  Was Paul schizophrenic?   Was he crazy?  If he was, then we should just forget all this stuff about wanting to be disciples of this Jewish Messiah, because this religion makes no sense.

I will choose a better way.  I will choose to believe that the Scripture is right in all that it says and that I need to correct my human, fallible thinking by conforming my thoughts to Scripture.

Now, as if that wasn't enough to make the case for Torah observance, the story continues.  Paul goes to carry out the very thing that will prove that he is also zealous for the Law and it creates an uproar in the Temple because those who accuse him of breaking the Law and teaching the same, are there assuming that he has brought uncircumcised men into the Temple area beyond the court of the Gentiles.  Paul is arrested for his own protection and to prevent a riot.  Asking for an opportunity to speak to the crowd, Paul appeals to them on the basis of having always been a Torah observant Jew, "educated under Gamaliel, strictly according to the law of our fathers, being zealous for God, just as you all are today."  Acts 22:3  

Paul doesn't take this opportunity while under Roman guard to tell the Jews that Torah observance is no longer important now that Messiah has shed His blood.  On the contrary, he appeals to his own zealousness for Torah and to correct the misconception that he would ever condone the breaking of any of the commandments of God in order to have righteous standing before these men to then proclaim the gospel of Yeshua the Messiah.

Let's become mature in our thinking when it comes to understanding Scripture. God is not a God of confusion or capriciousness.  He didn't give us all those commandments only to later on say, "Just kidding."  And you can find nothing, anywhere, in all of the New Testament to prove that the Torah is no longer in effect.  Oh, you can certainly take individual verses out of context to try and make such a case, but you would be engaging in eisegesis, or "reading into" the text what you want to infer.

In the next installment, I hope to bring to light what really upset the Jews and has been twisted to mean something entirely different.  Click on "What Upset The Jews" to go there.

Did God Mean Forever?

This is post number eight in the series: Why I Am Not A Christian.


In my studies and teaching of Biblical apologetics, I was always troubled by the fact that I couldn't reconcile a couple of ideas.  Why did Adonai give these all of these commandments to the Children of Israel and anyone who desired to become a God-fearer, and tell them that they are permanent and eternal?  Why didn't Adonai explain when He gave the Law that these things would only be necessary until Messiah showed up?  Over and over in Scripture we find that when we make a serious error about doctrine, it is because we did not pay careful attention to the wording that God used.  Let's look at some of these verses.


Exodus 12:14  "Now this day [Passover] will be a memorial to you, and you shall celebrate it as a feast to the Lord; throughout your generations you are to celebrate it as a permanent ordinance."

Exodus 12:17  "You shall also observe the Feast of Unleavened Bread, for on this very day I brought your hosts out of the land of Egypt; therefore you shall observe this day throughout your generations as a permanent ordinance."

Exodus 12:24  "And you shall observe this event as an ordinance for you and your children forever."

Exodus 27:21  "In the tent of meeting, outside the veil which is before the testimony, Aaron and his sons shall keep it in order from evening to morning before the LORD; it shall be a perpetual statute throughout their generations for the sons of Israel."

Exodus 28:43  "And they shall be on Aaron and on his sons when they enter the tent of meeting, or when they approach the altar to minister  in the holy place, so that they do not incur guilt and die. It shall be a statute forever to him and to his descendants after him."

Exodus 29:28  "And it shall be for Aaron and his sons as their portion forever from the sons of Israel, for it is a heave offering; . . ."

Exodus 30:21  "So they shall wash their hands and their feet, that they may not die; and it shall be a perpetual statute for them, for Aaron and his descendants throughout their generations."

Exodus 31:16,17  "So the sons of Israel shall observe the sabbath, to celebrate the sabbath throughout their generations as a perpetual covenant.  It is a sign between Me and the sons of Israel forever; for in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, but on the seventh day He ceased from labor, and was refreshed."

Leviticus 10:15  ". . . so it shall be a thing perpetually due you and your sons with you, just as the LORD has commanded."

Leviticus 16:29 - 31  "And this shall be a permanent statute for you: in the seventh month, on the tenth day of the month, you shall humble your souls, and not do any work, whether the native, or the alien who sojourns among you; . . . It is to be a sabbath of solemn rest for you, that you may humble your souls; it is a permanent statute."

Leviticus 23:21  "On this same day [Shavuot/Pentecost] you shall make a proclamation as well; you are to have a holy convocation. You shall do no laborious work. It is to be a perpetual statute in all your dwelling places throughout your generations."

Deuteronomy 5:29  "Oh that they had such a heart in them, that they would fear Me, and keep all My commandments always, that it may be well with them and with their sons forever!"

Deuteronomy 11:1  "You shall therefore love the LORD your God, and always keep His charge, His statutes, His ordinances, and His commandments."

Psalm 119:160  "The sum of Thy word is truth, and every one of Thy righteous ordinances is everlasting."


Do you notice the words, "eternal; permanent; perpetual; everlasting; forever; always?"  Do we mortal human beings somehow think that we understand better than God Himself?  Was poor old God confused about the meaning of those words?  Did He not think that it might seem inconsistent to say one thing now and then later say something else?  Was Jesus confused about His own mission and about the Law that God had given through Moses?  If God meant for us to disregard all of His laws, commandments, statutes, and ordinances as stated in the Torah once Messiah came, why didn't He just put that little addendum in all of those statements?  Why not say, "This is what you are to do until Messiah comes"?

Even after the first destruction of the Temple and the displacement of the Jews, none of the prophets or people of God believed that God's Laws had changed or become void.  God had actually foretold that punishment would come for disobeying His commnands.  When the people repented and returned to Torah, the blessings returned.  But it wasn't complete repentence, at least not on a national scale, and so God did exactly what He said He would and multiplied the same punishment sevenfold, which is why Israel did not become a nation again until May 18, 1948; the exact day that God said it would happen. (You have to do the math and convert from God's calendar to our present Gregorian calendar, but it works out exactly.)  Thus proving that He never changed His mind about anything He said in the Torah.

 When Yeshua (Jesus) chastized the religious leaders, it was because they had either created themselves, or learned to use traditions from the Oral Law to get around obeying the clear cut teachings of the Torah.  They had not stopped to question their own motivations and thought carefully about the very thing they recited every day in the "Sh'mah":  "You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart, soul, and strength."   Yeshua admonished the Jews for ostensibly, and outwardly obeying certain laws in the Torah for the express purpose of violating the spirit of the Law which first and foremost is about loving God and by extension, loving other people.  Let me give you an example.

It's Saturday morning.  I'm doing my best to be a Torah observant believer, so I'm resting on Shabbat, the sabbath.  My unbelieving neighbor knocks on my door and informs me that his wife needs to get to the airport, but his car won't start for some reason and if they can't leave in the next few minutes, she's going to miss her flight. Should I allow some heathen to interfere with my observance of God's Holy day of rest?  Some might say I should politely and lovingly explain to my neighbor that it is Shabbat and I can't be traveling that far and that acting as a taxi service constitutes work; that  I would be sinning against God by breaking His Holy sabbath.  In actuality, I would be committing a greater sin to do such a thing.  My neighbor is in need.  I can fulfill that need, which is a greater good than merely breaking the sabbath.  This was just part of the lesson that Yeshua was teaching in his parable of the "Good Samaritan."

All of the other laws of Torah were given by God to be a framework and edifice to support the two main purposes of the Law:  Love the Lord, and love your neighbor as yourself.  But how does it make sense to tear down the whole structure that was designed to support the centerpiece?  That would be like tearing down a cathedral and then pointing to the cross that used to stand behind the altar, but is now lying on a heap of rubble and talk about how nice it is that the stupid cathedral is no longer in the way of us seeing the cross.  I will readily admit that I simply kicked my mental incongruities to the curb in order to go along with the common "Christian" understanding of the Law versus Grace, until God backed me into a corner and demanded that I simply read His Word and dismiss human commentary on the matter and let the Holy Spirit guide me.  There is one iron-clad rule.  No verses of Scripture can be in contradiction to any other verses of Scripture.  What eliminated apparent contradictions was to dismiss interpretations that originated from Roman Catholic and Protestant anti-Jewish thought.  You cannot understand properly the words of Yeshua, or Peter, or Rabbi Paul by ignoring thousands of years of Jewish understanding and then reading their words through the lenses of men who had no history or training in Judaism or the Oral Law.  When these men spoke or wrote, they did so under the assumption that their audience had basic understanding and context.

One more thing.  Lest you be inclined to make the claim that those verses above only applied to the Jews, think again.  Paul makes the point in Ephesians 4:4-6:  "There is one body and one Spirit, just as also you were called in one hope of your calling; one LORD, on faith, one baptism, on God and Father of all who is over all and through all and in all."  You don't get to claim that because you weren't born Jewish  the Torah doesn't apply to you.  God doesn't have two distinct flocks with two different sets of rules.  If you want to hold to such an idea, you have no claim to be a disciple of the God of the Bible.

I will be further buttressing this point when I pick up with a study of the 21st chapter of Acts, where I start by asking: "Was Paul Crazy?"

Administration and Law

Sorry if the title seems a little misleading.  This post is not about current politics in the United States.

This is another installment in the series on Why I'm Not A Christian.

The thought of an analogy came to me while reading something at another Messianic website.  The author was making a point about Hebrews chapter 7.  But to give a bit more background, I think I will go back to reiterating my main contention that the reason the church gets so much doctrine wrong is because of the lack of a good hermeneutic and taking the Scriptures as a complete whole, in obedience to 2 Timothy 3:16: "ALL Scripture is inspired by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness; . . ."

In order to really get a handle on what the Holy Spirit is communicating through the author of the letter to the Hebrews, we have to keep a couple of things firmly in mind. First is that this is a letter written by a Jew who is deeply educated in all the Torah and the Oral Law.  I still suspect that the author is Rabbi Paul.  I believe that the tone and style of the letter are different from his other epistles simply because of his audience and the subject matter.  Other criticisms aside, plenty of authors can and do change their style of writing depending on audience and subject.  The second point is that this letter is for the purpose of explaining to Jewish minds why the coming of Messiah changes the administration of the Law, but doesn't change the Law.  Let me remind my gentle readers that this is important in order to keep the rule of non-contradiction and the admonishment of Yeshua in Matthew 5:17-19, and in Luke 16:17.  If we take any other verses of Scripture and interpret them to mean that which contradicts these other two, then there is something wrong with our understanding.

My analogy comes from what was provided by the founding fathers of the United States.  They drew up the Constitution because nearly all of them understood that men are inherently sinful and cannot be trusted with very much power, that they must be restrained.  "Power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely," as Lord Acton put it.  The Constitution was written for the express purpose of putting chains on the power of government and those who would wield that power.  The Constitution does not grant or give people any rights whatsoever.  The Constitution and its original ten amendments simply recognize the God-given rights inherent in mankind and tells the government, "YOU cannot cross these lines."

The founders understood that the law needed to be in the form of a contract.  The law could not be something that any one man or group of men just arbitrarily decided to do.  Not even under the pretense of doing it for the "common good" or the "general welfare."   They understood that nothing tramples an individual's rights faster than democratic rule or opinion.  Freedom and democracy simply cannot coexist.  What the founders knew was needed was a contract that embodied the law and put restraints on anyone serving in the government.  When you take elective office, or are commissioned as an officer, you take an oath to defend and protect the Constitution, not any man, group, or political party.

The idea here, is that people will come and go from the offices of power, but the law remains.  If the restrictions of the Constitution are actually followed by those in power, then legislation would not be passed that endangers the rights of all individuals.  The law of the land says that government doesn't get to decide what you can or cannot say about issues.  The burden of proof is on the government to convince a jury of your peers that you have broken the law.  No one has the right to deny you the use of arms or self defense and so on.  And ultimately, the founders understood that nobody should ever get elected and then claim that the popular vote gave them a mandate to violate the Constitution.  Yet this is what has gone on since at least Abraham Lincoln.

What does this have to do with the Bible?  Let's look at Torah in this light.  First of all, when did God's laws begin?  When was man given the laws of God regarding behavior, of clean and unclean things, tithing, making offerings, etc?  If you said Moses, you'd be wrong.

From the time that God Himself (Christ) walked with Adam and Eve in the garden, God has revealed His laws.  The Jewish sages have believed through their study of Torah, that God created the universe through Torah.  If that seems odd to you, consider that John 1 tells us that, "In the beginning was the Word . . . the Word was with God and the Word was God."  The Master told us that Torah is eternal.  The Psalms say the Torah is eternal.  He was trying to get us to see that He, as God, and His Word, are inseparable.

Cain and Abel knew the standards for offerings.  Abel obeyed and Cain did not.  Noah was simply told to gather two of every unclean animal and seven pairs of all the clean.  How did he know which was which long before Moses came along?  Abraham tithed to God through Melchizedek and participated in communion with bread and wine.  Abraham trained disciples, and God stated that Abraham kept all of God's laws and commandments.  We are not told it directly, but we can infer from the text that Abraham knew Torah from what was handed down and from God Himself visiting with him and speaking to him directly.  Somewhere along the line, Christians have assumed that the Law didn't exist until Moses, but the fact is; Moses simply wrote down in systematic form, everything that had already been known to the men who walked with God. Up until that time individual men and the families that they led were the guardians of the ways of God.  Moses came to deliver a whole nation made up of the Children of Israel and a mixed multitude whom Adonai saved out of bondage in Egypt.

In that event, please make careful note of the order of the events.  God hears the cry of his chosen people, on the schedule that he had already told Abraham about in Genesis 15, when Adonai unilaterally established His covenant with Abraham and Abraham's descendants forever.  God had arranged it so that Jacob and his sons would end up in Egypt, being delivered by a beloved son who was left for dead, betrayed for some silver coins.  (I think I see a pattern there.)  The Children of Israel by this time were mere slaves and we are not told that they were following anything close to the Torah.  Otherwise, why the need for Moses to receive them from Adonai?  Does the LORD tell Moses to go to the sons of Jacob and get them to start obeying the ten commandments and then He would save them?  No.

HaShem ("The Name") tells Moses that he has a plan and what to expect from Pharoah.  I'm going to paraphrase this for simplicity, but I won't violate Scripture.  Adonai set out to show the world who the One and Only True God was by taking down the most powerful empire  at the time.  And he wasn't going to do it just any way.  He was going to make a mockery of their false gods and sorcery tricks. When He concluded everything with the destruction of the entire Egyptian army, word would spread from there to every populated place.  From Sudan to beyond Persia, from North of Turkey to across the Mediterranean, people would hear about this event.

Then, not because the children of Israel's righteousness, but because of His covenant and the sake of His own honor, He would save His chosen people.  Note this.  Salvation came first.  It would be many days before Adonai would place the choice before the people about obeying Torah.  Think about that for a moment.  From the time of the first Passover until the giving of the Torah at Mount Sinai was 50 days.  From the time of  the ultimate Passover, or the crucifixion of Messiah until the disciples received the Holy Spirit at Pentacost was 50 days.  Ah, that repeating pattern thing. The history of the world is God's unfolding revelation.  Each new cycle contains foreshadowing of events to come

So, going back to Hebrews chapter 7 and what the writer is trying to convey.  That Messiah has come and established a new administration.  The Torah is still valid and in effect but under a new management. Because the ultimate sacrifice had been made, we could all be in the priesthood and appeal directly to God for atonement.  When understood in this light, we see that harmony exists in all Scripture.  Yes, Torah is eternal and we can believe what Yeshua said about it.  Yes, what Paul said in Romans about us not having to suffer the penalty of the Law is true, but we still establish the Law.  Apparent contradictions fall away to dust.  We can now understand how the Law continues to be in effect and true and good, yet at the same time we have an advocate in court who makes atonement for us when we come in contrition and brokenness.  You can admit that you violated the Torah, but instead of having to sacrifice a bull or goat or doves, you appeal to the ultimate sacrifice for your atonement.

Now imagine you get hauled into court and when charged with a crime, you decide to take the attitude that the law just doesn't apply to you.  How do you think the judge would react?

Just because the Torah or Law of Moses was given to be administered at first with imperfect men who had to atone for their own sins before they could atone on behalf of the people, doesn't mean that when the perfect Messiah came to atone for us that the Law or Torah just disappeared.  It is still there.  Just as the One who gave His life for it said it would always be.  He just made a way for us to appeal to His perfect atonement without needing a Temple or having to kill animals.

In the next installment, I ask the question: "Did God Mean Forever?"

Big Conference In Acts

This is post five in the series:  Why I Am Not A Christian   You can find it in the February archive.


Returning to the fifteenth chapter of Acts, we see that the debate which arose from the “party of circumcision” created enough stir among the new believers at Antioch, they determined to send Paul and Barnabas back to Jerusalem to confer with Peter, the other Apostles, and the elders in order to get a ruling on the issue.  I infer from verse two that Paul was already against the circumcision thing, but in humility agreed to go back to Jerusalem and submit to the judgment of the senior Apostles.  This would prove to be more confirmation to Peter as to the meaning of what happened to him back in Chapter 10, and reiterated by James during this conference.

Here you have a major meeting over this issue with all of the most senior elders, the Apostles, and the great learned Rabbi Paul who had been a summa cum laude Torah scholar under Gamaliel.  The apostles, and perhaps dozens of the disciples gathered there, had lived with the Master and heard Him expound on all of the Tanakh.  In my mind a question arises: If Yeshua had given them the idea that following Torah was no longer required, or even a major concern, why did they have to debate and reason out what to do?

Then comes the solution, and it is a solution that Christians just gloss over without thinking carefully about what was decided at that major tribunal.  Please note that nobody stood up and said, “Hey, come on!  This is a moot point since the Law got nailed to the cross with our savior.”  I couldn't find those words in the text.  What did happen is that James stood up and essentially said that, based on what had happened with Peter at Cornelius’ house and what had been happening with Paul and Barnabas, the Holy Spirit was telling them to accept the Goyim just as they were.  However, the gentiles needed some direction since this Judaism thing was so new and strange to them, and it wasn’t right to start loading them down with an overwhelming burden of new rules to follow, so let’s just give them four important, but simple rules to follow, and they can start learning the rest at their local synagogue where the Torah is taught every Sabbath.

Yep.  It’s right there in Acts 15:19-21.  “Therefore it is my judgment that we do not trouble those who are turning to God from among the Gentiles, but that we write to them that they abstain from things contaminated by idols and from fornication and from what is strangled and from blood. For Moses from ancient generations has in every city those who preach him, since he is read in the synagogues every Sabbath.”

Please notice that James is making reasonable assumptions here.  It was assumed that gentile converts would begin learning Torah, as gentile converts had for centuries.  James further assumes that it is perfectly reasonable to demand at least four things that can be observed immediately by the new converts and note that three of them are not in the Ten Commandments.  Note that James assumes that the new converts are going to be attending the local synagogue on the Sabbath.

In order for the importance of what James said to penetrate the “Christianized” mind, one needs to be familiar with Jewish history and understanding.  Since the Children of Israel left Egypt, it was understood that their purpose as stated in the Torah was to be a light (teacher) to the nations.  Israel’s mission as given by God was to be a priesthood that interceded for the nations and to show the example of how a people were supposed to live.  Ergo, when people of other nations saw that example and how blessed it was to follow Torah, they could become proselytes and be grafted in.

However, prior to the Messiah and the gift of the Holy Spirit, the procedure was for a gentile to study and begin living the life of Torah observance, and once the elders around him could see that he was serious about his commitment, he could then be circumcised and then after healing from that, he would undergo mikvah (baptism), immersing three times (without anyone touching him, in a pool of running water) and this was viewed as the old self dying and being washed away and the new man who rose up out of the water was considered fully Jewish, not to be treated any differently than one who came from generations that could be traced to Abraham.

But go back to what James said that became the majority opinion of the court. They didn’t throw out all of Torah for the gentiles.  All of those Apostles and disciples present had all heard the Master say plainly that they were to go and baptize all men, teaching them everything He had taught them.  James was expressing what the rest of them all understood. Perhaps up to that point, it was assumed that when the Master said to baptize, just like it had always been done, that the circumcision was also done.  But here, the Holy Spirit was revealing something new.  The things that the gentiles can start to do immediately, they can do.  As they attend the local synagogue, they will begin to learn and observe Torah with the help of the Jewish believers.

There is another important lesson here as well.  Note that even as with the Centurion Cornelius, gentiles having received the Holy Spirit, -- pay attention -- still needed to learn what to do.  You don’t get saved and suddenly have understanding about how to live a righteous life.  Peter, Paul and James wrote plenty in the New Testament to this effect.  Did you know that Martin Luther went so overboard on his "justification by faith" view, that he advocated to strike the book of James from the New Testament?  James made it clear that the way to know whether or not someone had true faith was to observe his actions.  Anyone can talk a good game, but as James knew, the Master had said, "By their fruit you will know them."

The only thing that changed with regard to Torah observance in Acts 15, was the idea that salvation depended on circumcision.  And that is not to say that circumcision was done away with.  Otherwise, how do you explain Paul circumcising Timothy? Paul never said that circumcision is wrong now and should never be done.  What he fought against was the idea that you could be saved by following a procedure and elevating such observance above the saving work of the Messiah.  I’m sure that as new gentile believers entered the Torah community and had children, eight-day-old boys were being circumcised on a regular basis, and men who wanted to be able to enter the Temple proper got circumcised and let their beards and payess grow out and put on tzitzit.  Sincere believers, so grateful for their salvation, desire to obey the Creator who shows them such love and mercy.  Following Torah is not a burden, but a blessing.

To a modern, western, Christianized mind, it may indeed seem like a burden.  Many people bristle at having to learn anything new.  It is just so damned easy to throw words around, such as, “We’re under grace and not the Law.”  Even though what Paul was saying in context is: “We have been forgiven and will not have to suffer the penalty of the Law.”  Big difference.

Christians like to say that we only have two rules: Love God and love our neighbor.  But when you start probing to see what that really means it begins to look like a shoddy façade that disguises the fact that we want to do our own thing and not be held to a visible, measurable standard.  This is why James wrote his epistle in the New Testament.  This is why the un-churched look at Christians and scream “hypocrites!”  They may not exactly know how to articulate it, but they instinctively know that there’s something badly wrong about a rubber yardstick.

We’ve only looked at two examples from Acts.  There is still more to come.  To get to the next essay, click on Lesson About Food.

Getting The Big Picture

The following is another installment on my big essay on Why I'm Not A Christian.  You need to have already read the other installments that follow; Making A Case, and Not Wanting To Know, as well as the five part series Knowing God.

To say that there is a lot of confusion over how to determine correct doctrine among the churches is a gross understatement.  I know I will be repeating myself on certain points as I go along, because as I’ve discovered over the years, some things just have to be pounded on repeatedly before they begin to sink in.  I think Mark Twain made the point that some people can learn simply by reading, and some people can learn by watching other people make mistakes, but there are some people who just have to urinate on the electric fence for themselves.

I mentioned in the last post that something extremely lacking in the churches is a comprehensive, methodical look at the nature of God.  Because God created man in His own image and likeness, we can infer some things about God from things we observe in our own thoughts and feelings, with the explicit caveat that we need God’s revealed Word to guide us to the correct conclusions about our observations.  This may seem like it is off topic to a degree, but all of these factors contribute to getting the right conclusions.  Once again, the key to getting the correct understanding is to take the Bible as a whole.  The truly crazy thing, and I DO mean crazy, is that we have churches who behave as though there is one religion in the “Old Testament” and then Jesus came and gave us a whole new, “New Testament” religion.  This is schizophrenic.  This is cognitive dissonance.  In plain street language, it’s just plain crap.

Please don’t go off and quote isolated passages from Romans or Galatians. I’ve been there, done that.  I’ve had to listen to it over and over again, as if the person quoting it to me thought that I’ve never read it before.  But then when I ask: What did Paul mean then, when he also said, “Do we then nullify the Law through faith? May it never be! On the contrary, we establish the Law.”

There is a clear, didactic statement from the Rabbi.  He makes the statement right there at Romans 3:31 after essentially explaining to a mostly gentile audience that a) man is created with a conscience which he purposely suppresses in favor of doing what he wants, b) that God gave the law to show man how far from righteousness he strays, c) that apart from relationship with God, man can never hope to come close to living up to the standard of the Torah, which is what real faith is all about, d) essentially, God in His mercy forgives us so we can come back into relationship with Him and follow Torah with the guidance of the Holy Spirit, thus establishing that the Law (Torah) is righteous and good.

If you simply lift selected verses out of Paul’s letter to the Romans, it is very easy to make it seem like Paul is advocating the idea that the Torah serves no purpose in a believer’s life. But this position would be totally inconsistent with not only all the other things that  Paul wrote, but his very public example as well.

How did the church succumb to the idea that Torah doesn’t apply to those who follow Christ?  They misunderstood an argument that arose over the singular practice of circumcision and what it stood for.  The church then extrapolated that argument, stretching it to absurd dimensions to cover the rest of Scripture.  Here we will deal with how it happened.  Let’s go back to the beginning and walk this thing out logically to figure out how it went so wrong.

For a couple of thousand years, Jews had a unique identity as the children of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob (a.k.a. Israel).  The first covenant and the sign of the covenant that set apart Abraham and his progeny was that of circumcision.  It is important to stop here and note that God established the covenant that He would fulfill with Abraham and his descendents long before He introduced circumcision.  Let that sink in.  God presented the gospel message to Abraham in Genesis 15 and when Abraham believed the message, God declared him justified.  Circumcision did not happen until Ishmael was 13 and a couple of years before Isaac was born (Genesis 17).  It seems as though God did it this way to prove that circumcision was to be understood as a sign of obedience and was never to be confused as either a prerequisite or a condition of salvation.  After Paul’s Damascus road experience, he understood this as well.

Fast forward to Luke’s historical account of the Acts of the Apostles, and chapter 15.  At this point, one has to keep in mind that the body of believers had been growing for a while among the exclusively Jewish people of the area, based on the message of the Prophet John and the Rabbi Yeshua who preached repentance, or a turning back to Torah life. Read again, Matthew 5:17-19.  “Do not think that I came to abolish the Law or the Prophets . . .”  In Acts 15 we are told that some men came from Judea and began teaching that without circumcision, salvation was not possible.  It is also very important to note at this point that at least ten or more years have passed since Yeshua ascended into heaven after his death and resurrection.  Think about that for a moment.  How many little Jewish boys had been born among the believers in Jerusalem and surrounding areas in that time?  Do you think for one minute that those Jewish believers stopped fulfilling all the same requirements of Torah for the redemption of the first born sons, just as Mary and Joseph had?  That would be an assumption made from not only silence, but ignorance.  Furthermore, a new believer who came from the gentiles and wanted to be able to worship in the Temple area proper and not be excluded to the court of the gentiles would be required to undergo circumcision for full conversion to Judaism. You might be saved and a member of the body of believers, but the Law was still in effect regarding who could enter the physical location of the Temple that was reserved for the circumcised.

Paul had nothing against those who wanted to be circumcised for the purpose of being identified as being of Jewish heritage.  This is why he circumcised Timothy (Acts 16:3)  What Paul was fighting against was the idea that one had to be circumcised to be saved.  Pay careful attention to this.  The issue was not the circumcision itself, but rather what value you placed upon it.  What Paul was fighting against was the idea that you could become righteous in standing by observing rituals.  Do we then ignore the Law that tells us to obey the rituals?  No.  We obey the Law because we want to be obedient to the One who created us and showed us mercy and love.  We don’t follow the Law in order to be saved, we follow the Law because we are saved.

In order to get into the mindset of the first century believers, you need to understand what they understood from history and the Torah.  Not all of those who fled from Egypt were exclusively of the family line of Abraham.  Some of the Egyptians themselves, along with tribes from other regions saw the miracles that God brought down upon Egypt and they decided to go with the winning side.  The multitude that stood at Mount Sinai and agreed to receive the Torah and obey it, were from many different ancestors since the time of Noah. Many different languages were spoken at that time.  Egypt was the greatest empire on earth at the time of Moses, and they had many imported slaves; not just the Hebrews who had come to them during the famine while Joseph was alive.

Those who fled Egypt with the Children of Israel, stood at Mount Sinai and agreed to become a part of this new family or nation.  They became grafted in as followers of God.  The door was open to anyone who voluntarily agreed to live according to Torah.  There were those who were willing to sell themselves into indentured servitude (yes, slavery, but nothing like it is portrayed today) in order to be a part of this way of life and be under the blessings of God.

It was in this well-known history that the first century believers could understand the idea that those who wished to be followers of Messiah could be grafted in as believers in the same God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.  But the gift of the Holy Spirit indwelling a believer superseded the need for circumcision as the sign of the covenant.  This was the whole purpose of the events that unfolded in Acts chapter ten.  Cornelius was already a Torah observant gentile who merely lacked circumcision to be recognized as a full Jew.  According to Torah, once a proselyte was circumcised and baptized he was as fully Jewish as one born to Jewish parents.

Before I go on with more evidence from the Scriptures, I suppose the main point you should get from all of the evidence I’ve presented so far is this:

Yeshua did not come to create a new religion out of whole cloth.  He came to reveal more understanding about what was already in the Torah and Prophets and Writings (Psalms and Proverbs, etc.)  Meditate on Luke 16:17:  “But it is easier for heaven and earth to pass away than for one stroke of a letter of the Law (Torah) to fail.”

You can get to the next essay by clicking on: Big Conference in Acts.

Why I Am Not A Christian

I became a Christian in the autumn of 1985, had a “born again” kind of experience, but was completely a babe in the woods when it came to this new belief system.  This in spite of the fact that I was in America surrounded by Churches.  This would prove to be the problem.

Truly appreciating real science, I questioned everything.  I especially questioned my new found belief system and had doubts that nearly caused me to abandon it altogether.  But there was the breakthrough, when I found out that God does not fear our toughest inquisitions. Neither of His Word nor His creation.

Before going on, I feel the need to address the various types of readers who might stray here and need some sort of introduction.

If you are a non-believer in the God of the Hebrew Bible, but you have an open mind and simply want to understand why there is so much division among those who claim to be Christian, what follows will likely seem like incredible minutia that will be difficult to wade through. I fully understand that a major reason many people don’t want anything to do with the Bible is because of the people who call themselves Christians. If you are a practicing Jew, it must seem very odd the way the Christians do violence to the Tanakh (Old Testament) in the name of Jesus and then wonder why you don’t accept Him as Messiah.  If you are an atheist who “knows” that there is no God and that all religion is false, you will find what follows to be silly or boring, so why waste your time?  Admittedly, this topic is actually for those who claim to believe in Jesus Christ, but sadly do not truly believe His Word, except where it seems to agree with what they want to believe.

For over twenty years, I studied and taught on Biblical apologetics.  That means that I defended the truth of the Bible, revealing the volumes of evidence that demonstrate that the earth and the universe, and real science do not contradict the Bible, but on the contrary, they confirm it.  I was sharing with others the evidence that showed that the Bible could not have been “authored” by mere men.  That through prophecy and other miraculous evidence, the Bible had to have been dictated by an intelligent being far beyond our understanding.

In order for most of what I have to say to make sense and be of the most benefit, you would have to be someone who believes that the Bible in it’s original manuscripts is fully inspired by God.  By that I mean that He actually dictated the words to those who initially penned it.  My apologetics work shows up in other posts and there will be more to come as needed.  That’s not the subject of this post.  Here we proceed from the idea that God Himself wrote the Bible.
The modern western version of Christianity is full of traditions and beliefs based on assumptions, isolated texts, and traditions that crept in over the centuries. Some denominations actually operate on the idea that anything prior to Jesus can now be ignored and have no bearing on being a Christian.  This is bizarre considering a couple of things.

Christians love to cite the words of a certain Rabbi named Paul.  Paul said in his second letter to Timothy (2 Tim. 3:16): “All Scripture is God-breathed and is valuable for teaching the truth, convicting of sin, correcting faults and training in right living; . . .”   At the time Paul wrote that, the New Testament as we know it had not been canonized as Scripture.  So, what was Paul referring to?  The Tanakh.  What Christians today call the Old Testament.  This English name does not do it justice and gives the wrong impression, so I will not use it from here on out.  The “Old” Testament is not antiquated or out of date.  It still contains prophecies that are yet to be fulfilled (subjects for future posts).  From here I will refer to that section of Scripture as the Tanakh.  TaNaK is kind of an acronym for Torah, Neva’im, and Ketuvim.  Meaning the “Law” the Prophets and the Writings.

If you claim to follow Christ, then it would make sense to note that Jesus based everything He said and did on the Tanakh.  Here is what he said in Luke 24:25-27, after he had been resurrected: “. . . ‘Foolish people! So unwilling to put your trust in everything the prophets spoke! Didn’t the Messiah have to die like this before entering his glory?” Then starting with Moses and all the prophets, he explained to them the things that can be found throughout the Scriptures concerning himself.”

Stop and consider the full import of this verse.  He was chastising his own followers for not taking seriously all of what the Tanakh had to say about his first coming to earth and the prophecies He had to fulfill. Pay close attention to the phrasing. “Starting with Moses” means he was citing Torah, the first five books of the Bible.  “The Prophets” means every book from Isaiah to Malachi.  How can one reconcile the idea that Jesus came to free us from being concerned with what the Tanakh has to teach in light of that verse?  Now add the quote from Paul that I cited above.

If you are familiar with many study Bibles, you can see that they put little notes in the New Testament to show you where to locate the references are in the Tanakh to what the Gospel or epistle writer is citing. If you have such a Bible, take some time to note how much of what is written in the New Testament is simply quoting from the Tanakh with the understanding that the reader is supposed to be fully knowledgeable about all of what the Tanakh says.

If it isn’t quite enough for you that Jesus (Yeshua ben Yosef) pretty much always cited the Tanakh for His authority on answering questions, how about if we look at His statements which are very direct about the Tanakh.

Matthew’s gospel contains what is known as the “Sermon on the Mount” comprised of chapters 5, 6, and 7. The setting is important because Messiah was teaching before a very large audience, making it clear to as many as possible  what he was all about.  In that sermon we find this statement (Matt. 5:17-19): “Don’t think that I have come to abolish the Torah (Law) or the Prophets. I have come not to abolish but to complete (fulfill) Yes indeed! I tell you that until heaven and earth pass away, not so much as a yod (smallest Hebrew letter) or a stroke will pass from the Torah -- not until everything that must happen has happened. So whoever disobeys the least of these commandments and teaches others to do so will be called least in the Kingdom of Heaven. But whoever obeys them and so teaches will be called great in the Kingdom of Heaven.”

That is a clear and didactic statement.  It’s not a parable. It’s not alluding to anything else. Because the Messiah knows the future as well as He knows the past, He wanted to get it on record in the clearest possible terms, what His disciples should understand about the Tanakh.  In order for Him to be the Messiah, he couldn’t possibly be a violator of Torah.  He was speaking to an audience almost exclusively of Torah observant Jews, who once a year, every year, heard it read in their synagogues, the following (Deuteronomy 13:1-6) “Everything I am commanding you, you are to take care to do. Do not add to it or subtract from it.  If a prophet or someone who gets messages while dreaming arises among you and he gives you a sign or wonder, and the sign or wonder comes about as he predicted when he said, ’Let’s follow other gods, which you have not known; and let us serve them,’ you are not to listen to what that prophet or dreamer says. For Adonai your God is testing you, in order to find out whether you really do love Adonai your God with all your heart and being.  You are to follow Adonai your God, fear him, obey his commandments, listen to what he says, serve him and cling to him; and that prophet or dreamer is to be put to death; because he urged rebellion against Adonai your God, . . .”

For those of you who don’t know, there is this cyclical reading of the Torah every year in synagogues all over the world. Each Sabbath in the synagogue, going back to the time of Moses, the faithful people would gather to hear a lesson, a Parashah section of the Torah read aloud.  The Torah was divided into sections so that in a year’s time the five books of Moses would be read through.  Besides that, in truly Torah observant communities, boys were expected to have memorized the Torah by the time of their Bar Mitzvah at 12 or 13.

There was no football, basketball, or soccer. No television, X-box, Wii, or any other of the myriad of distractions we have in the world today. Life was agrarian. You either farmed or fished or made things for those who did. People who tried to be faithful to Torah (not just Jews) held to the teaching of Deuteronomy 6, which contains the “Sh’mah,” the most well-known and often repeated pieces of Scripture known to all Jews around the world. Also, the verses immediately following that:   “These words, which I command you today, are to be on your heart, and you are to teach them carefully to your children, when you lie down and when you get up.” (Deuteronomy 6:4-7)

From the time a child was weaned, boys spent the day with daddy, learning the family business and learning and discussing Torah. Girls did the same with the mother.  There were no government schools.  If a boy began showing promise as a Torah scholar, the family rejoiced, because there was no greater honor in a Jewish community. Torah scholarship was so revered that those recognized as being exceptional at it were excused from some or even much of the labor and other family members compensated the work load.  Everything centered around Torah, and the rest of the Holy Books.

This is the community that Yeshua son of Joseph was born into.  When you read in Luke that Mary (Miriam) and Joseph (Yosef) were righteous, it means that they obeyed the Torah. Because life was all about the Scriptures and heritage and family, they knew that they were of the line of David and that Messiah was due to come from their line, even before the angel showed up to announce it.

It can be hard for us, in this modern technological world, to grasp that towns were tiny, and everybody knew everybody.  Nazareth might have had several hundred families; maybe a thousand families tops.  They were nearly all related going back many generations.  When you weren’t talking about making your living or discussing Torah or the Roman occupation, you talked about family. Everybody knew who Yeshua was.  There are songs and jokes about living in small towns.  There are no secrets, even when you try to hide things. But a Torah observant community is even far more open.  Why is all of this important?

If Yeshua had not been a faithful adherent to Torah, the claims of His disciples and the gospels could have easily been refuted and He would have been proven to be like the other false Messiahs that had come before.  Had he said anything to indicate that He was going to do away with Torah, the community would have rightly stoned Him to death as a false prophet leading a rebellion against God Almighty.

People who have been “churched” in their beliefs via catechism or Protestantism don’t have the same idea of “sinless” as expressed in the Bible.  Torah is the standard for what is and is not sin.  Most Christians in the modern world have some amorphous, liquid, shape-shifting ideas about what is and isn’t sinful.  Somewhere along the line, people took this verse from Matthew 22:40 and twisted it out of shape:
“On these two commandments depend the whole Law and the Prophets” (NASB)  It is fitting that I quote my friend Rabbi Michael Bugg: “A real, kosher Torah scroll is the Word of God written on lambskin, impaled on two shafts of wood (the rollers) which are called the Aytz Chaim (Tree of Life), . . .” (footnote a)  Yeshua was making the point with the Torah teachers that the two commandments were like the most important parts of a tree.  The commandment to love Adonai with all the mind, soul, and strength is like the root, the foundation.  The root is needed to support the trunk which is the second commandment. Without those two parts, a tree cannot produce any fruit.

In the case of the Pharisees and scribes, they were always concerned with the fruit, the visible, tangible stuff that everybody wanted from the tree.  They had lost sight of the very thing, the most important thing that provided for that fruit.
Today Christianity seems to have an almost opposite problem.  The church wants to have a stump in the ground that produces nothing of value and pretend that it has everything.  Is it any wonder that the unsaved world looks at the vast majority of churches and says, “Where’s the fruit?”  Torah is the God-given standard by which we can know that we are in the right relationship with Him and with our neighbor.

This is just the beginning of explaining why I don't use the label "Christian" and instead call myself Messianic.

The next installment in this series is Making A Case.

Note a: see “When The Stars Fall” by Rabbi Michael Bugg, page 226.