I am writing this as a follow-up to my article Questions For Christians, where I posed a series of questions about several matters of Scripture that seemingly are mostly neglected by the majority in “Christian” faith today. Sadly, in many ways the religion of most who profess to follow Yeshua today hold to beliefs that are the exact opposite of what anyone who was involved in the actual writing of The Bible believed. This alone should cause us to stop and really think hard about the validity of modern understandings of Scripture and the beliefs that result.
As noted in my previous article, most people within the “Christian” religion today do not believe in keeping The Sabbath, following the food laws, or celebrating the Feast Days—all of which are the commandment of God—while they do so many things that are not in The Bible at all and in some cases may even have direct connections with pagan or idolatrous religions. Some examples of the latter would be holding Sunday morning church services and celebrating the holidays of Christmas, Easter, and Halloween. The most perplexing part of the whole thing is that when you bring up just these few things to the modern-day “Christian” they look at you confused or as if you have lost your mind and label you such things as: fanatical, crazy, legalist, or Judaizer.
Such labels are typically followed with certain objections that are common to the beliefs of those educated in “Christian” doctrines and theologies—which are built on antinomianism and remnants of Marcionism. I have been told more times than I can remember that it’s “impossible to obey God’s Law”, so that’s why God supposedly had to do away with it. I have been asked if I stone my children. One very popular question is: Have you read Galatians? As if the Book of Galatians is the chief cornerstone of the biblical truth and the “proof text” that the rest of The Bible is wrong. It is to these points and others I want to take the time to address in this message, as best as I possibly can, from the same Torah-positive perspective that was held by those who wrote the books that make up the canon of Scripture.
Some of these popular antinomian objections to a Torah-keeping lifestyle would benefit from lengthier and more in-depth study, and in some cases I have such studies already prepared. The objective here, however, is to compose a single message to address in brevity how these points are based on misunderstandings and not knowing the context of Scripture from a whole Bible theology perspective where the whole counsel of Scripture and the beliefs of the people who actually wrote The Bible are considered.
Some Bible Basics
Before getting into some of the major objections I hear from the adherents of popular “Christianity”, I want to offer a few points that should help anyone to gain a better understanding of Scripture.
1. The Bible is a Hebrew book. The Bible was written by Hebrew people—Jews, Israelites, etc. There is some debate regarding the exact status of Job and Luke, but there are good arguments to be made that they too could and should be labeled Hebrews (and even that Luke was actually of Jewish lineage), however that is a discussion for another time. The Bible is centered on the Hebrew God, even saying that this same Hebrew God divinely inspired the Hebrew writers who physically wrote it. The Bible was written solely within the cultural context of Torah-keeping Israel.
2. The Bible should never be thought to contradict itself. The only theological position that seems to present all Scripture in a harmonious way is a Torah-positive whole Bible theology. This position recognizes the flaws in antinomian theologies that have to constantly reinterpret statements in The Bible in such a way that supports their view that certain Bible passages or verses override other portions of The Bible. The most recognizable of this practice is those passages used in support of the idea that there are parts of The Torah that no longer need to be followed.
3. Every single person who was involved in writing The Bible was a Torah-keeping Israelite. This means that everything they wrote in The Bible was written with the author’s understanding and intent that the reader would already know that what they were saying was first and foremost was written from a perspective where Torah-keeping was assumed. Not one person who wrote any part of The Bible every thought that their words would one day be viewed as some sort of “proof text” that overturns all or part of The Torah. Furthermore, this means that what the people who wrote The Bible believed and taught is the exact opposite of what most “Christians” in the modern day believe and teach. That should be very concerning to anyone who became a “Christian” because they believe Yeshua (or “Jesus”) is The Messiah and The Bible is truth. If you became a follower of Yeshua because you want God’s truth, you should know that Psalm 119:142 says The Torah is truth.
4. There are some basic rules for properly understanding The Bible—what scholars would call hermeneutics. These rules say that: Scripture brings understanding to Scripture, context tells you what biblical passages mean, the intent and beliefs of the authors of Scripture dictate what they are saying, and clear statements or commandments always govern what vague or seemingly obscure passages mean. If you read a verse or passage in The Bible and understand it to mean something in contrast to something else in The Bible, the surrounding context, the context of Scripture as a whole, the known beliefs of the person who wrote that verse or passage, or a clear statement or commandment, then you are misunderstanding what that verse or passage is saying. Misunderstanding is the path to wrong beliefs, and wrong beliefs create deception, and then Satan has you exactly where he wants you.
5. In The Bible there is a lawless one (2 Thessalonians 2:8-9) and a Righteous One (Isaiah 53:11). The lawless one is Satan and the Righteous One is Yeshua. Lawlessness (or sin) is defined in 1 John 3:4 as breaking The Torah, going against The Torah. Righteousness is defined in Deuteronomy 6:25 as obeying The Torah, living by The Torah. The very first thing we see Satan telling people in Genesis 3 is that they do not have to obey the commandment of God (Genesis 3:1, 4-5). In this passage Satan leads people to question, reject, and break the commandment of God. The very first message Yeshua preached is: “Repent, turn from your sins [Torah-breaking], for the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand” (Matthew 4:17). Yeshua said, “If you love Me, keep My commandments,” a phrase used many times in Scripture and originates within The Torah itself. It is clear, then, that antinomianism (whole or partial) is the theology of Satan, the lawless one, and Torah-living is the theology of Yeshua, The Righteous One.
6. Most “Christian” misunderstanding and misinterpretation is based on statements made by the apostle Paul. Some of these I will address in this message as they are often used by those who object to following The Torah as a follower of Yeshua. There are, however, a couple of important points that need to be considered regarding the use of Paul’s writings against a Torah-based faith practice. The first is that Paul already addressed this. In Acts 21 Paul was arrested in Jerusalem, just as was prophesied by Agabus, and charges brought against Him that He was teaching people they do not have to follow The Torah anymore. If you read through the whole narrative, Paul’s defense repeatedly focused on how this was not true and he always upheld The Torah. This is summed up in Acts 24:14 where he says, “But this I confess to you, that according to the Way (which they call a sect), I worship the God of our fathers, believing everything written in the Torah and the Prophets,” and 25:8 where he continues, “I have committed no offense against the Torah, or against the Temple.” Modern-day antinomians and Marcionists would do good to go back to these statements and find out what Paul himself thinks about their theology. The second important point with regard to Paul comes from the apostle Peter, who said: “[Paul] speaks about these matters in all of his letters. Some things in them are hard to understand, which the ignorant and unstable twist (as they also do with the rest of the Scriptures)—to their own destruction” (2 Peter 2:16). Peter then refers to this as the error of the lawless. If Peter refers to those who misunderstand Paul as the error of the lawless, then clearly he is saying that Paul’s writings are intended to be understood as an endorsement of living by The Torah.
These six points alone should be more than enough to show the error in popular “Christian” beliefs that claim there is no longer a need to follow God’s Law (The Torah), that we are now free to eat whatever we want, that it is not necessary to keep the biblical seventh-day Sabbath or celebrate the biblical Feast Days, or that it’s not acceptable to celebrate holidays that have connections to other religions and originate from the Roman Catholic religion.
Recently I saw a statement from a “Christian” pastor talking about how he relies on “proof texting”. He stated that he was never “big into theology”, but rambled on about how great “proof texting” is. It was, perhaps, one of the most profound examples of how quickly “Christians” err in their understanding of Scripture I have ever seen.
In case you are unaware, “proof-texting” is the practice of taking a particular verse from The Bible and using it to “prove” that what you are teaching is true. Having attended a traditional “Christian” Bible College, I can first hand that this is the basis of all sermonizing. To write a sermon, the pastor is taught to select a verse from The Bible as their “text” and from there develop several points to speak on. Rarely is the biblical context of the “text” even considered. They are simply looking for some statement in The Bible that can be perceived as “proof” or “support” of whatever point they are trying to make—typically some culturally relevant idea that would be wholly secular without their “proof-text”. The major problem is that it is almost always the case with “proof-texting” that the text is being taken out of context and used to support a belief that goes against the whole counsel of Scripture.
For example, there are certain passages—Mark 7, Acts 10, 1 Timothy 4:3-5, and a few others—that “Christians” have come to believe override the Leviticus 11 food laws. In all of these passages the modern-day “Christian” uses the particularly vague statements of these passages to claim that a clear commandment from God no longer needs to be followed. In addition to this, it is well-documented through statements made by or about the apostles who wrote these passages that they continued to adhere to these Torah food laws, the immediate context of all of these passages has nothing to do with the Torah food laws, and such an understanding of these passages goes against the whole counsel of Scripture. As such, “proof-texting” is actually con-texting because those who practice it are typically conning people—whether they realize it or not—into beliefs that go against The Bible by taking their proof-text and using it out of context.
If you took a majority of “Christian” understandings and beliefs about what The Bible says and evaluated them from the perspective of what the Torah-keeping Hebrew people from ancient Israel who actually wrote Scripture believed, the beliefs of today’s “Christians” would almost always oppose what The Bible in context actually says. This is a problem, and one not to be taken lightly. The plain reality is that the only theology that truly harmonizes with the whole counsel of Scripture is a Torah-keeping theology, because every single author of Scripture was someone who lived a Torah-keeping lifestyle.
I wish all of the “Christian” pastors, Bible scholars, Seminary professors, and everyone else could explain why the things they say are more reminiscent of what Satan said in Genesis 3 than anything Yeshua said in The Gospels. I have never once found a record of Yeshua saying that there are commandments we no longer have to keep, that we will not “die and go to hell” if we break “that commandment” (whatever “that commandment” might be in a given discussion), that something is “not a salvation issue”, or any of these other arguments they make. All we see in The Gospels is Yeshua saying to keep the commandments. “If you love Me, keep My commandments” (John 14:15). “If you want to enter into life, keep the commandments” (Matthew 19:17). “Whoever keeps and teaches [the commandments], this one shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven” (Matthew 5:19). “If you keep My commandments, you will abide in My love” (John 15:10). I know it’s not a popular thing to say, but “Christians” today do not follow Yeshua, they follow Satan.
Make Galatians Your Favorite Book!
One of the first things I often get from people in popular “Christianity” when presenting about the ongoing application of The Torah in the life of a covenant Believer is the question: Have you ever read the Book of Galatians? One time a preacher went so far as to tell me I needed to make Galatians my favorite Book in The Bible, that I needed to fall in love with Galatians. To this mindset I have a few questions of my own.
The first thing I want to know is: Why do “Christians” seem to think that the Book of Galatians is the chief cornerstone of all Scripture? Think about that. The idea behind this popular questioning if we have read Galatians—as if anyone holding a pronomian belief has not read and studied Galatians because of the popular “Christian” view of it—assumes that the Book of Galatians contains some unique message that changes the meaning of anything and everything in the rest of The Bible that would otherwise uphold The Torah. And that includes things Paul, the writer of Galatians, said in other letters he wrote to other communities of Believers. They may not realize it, but when “Christians” take this approach they are essentially making Galatians more powerful that The Messiah Himself, and that’s at least pushing close to the limit of blasphemy, if not well over that line.
The second thing I would ask of those who make this objection is: Have you read Romans?
Paul’s letter to the Believers in Rome may very well be the most pronomian Book in the entire Bible other than The Torah itself. It is filled with statements that are undeniably positive toward the ongoing mandate to follow God’s Laws. Consider just these things said in Romans: the doers of The Torah will be justified (2:13), The Torah is the embodiment of knowledge and truth (2:20), The Torah is holy and righteous and good (7:12), love is the fullness of The Torah (13:10). In Romans 7:22 Paul says he, “delights in The Torah of God.”
The third question would be: Have you read 1 and 2 Corinthians? While not as overwhelmingly pronomian, there are two critical points made in these books. In 1 Corinthians 5:7-8 it says: “Get rid of the old hametz, so you may be a new batch, just as you are unleavened—for Messiah, our Passover Lamb, has been sacrificed. Therefore let us celebrate the feast not with old hametz, the hametz of malice and wickedness, but with unleavened bread—the matzah of sincerity and truth.” This is a clear and ringing endorsement for the continued keeping of the Feast Days commanded in The Torah. Then in 2 Corinthians 6:17 it states: “Therefore, come out from among them, and be separate, says Adonai. Touch no unclean thing. Then I will take you in.” Here Paul was directly quoting the prophet Isaiah and the Greek word used in this passage for unclean is “akathartos” (ἀκάθαρτος), the exact same word used in the Septuagint where the prohibited meats in Leviticus 11 and Deuteronomy 14 are called unclean. And if there is any doubt at all about the context of this verse including adherence to these Torah food laws, read Isaiah 65:3-5 and 66:17, statements made by the exact same prophet that Paul was quoting.
A fourth question I would pose is: Have you read the Book of Acts? In this record of the works of the apostles there are eighty-five Sabbath Days documented as being kept. The majority of these involve the apostle Paul keeping them. As a side note, there is not a single example in Acts or anywhere else in The Bible of a “Sunday morning church service”. In addition to this Paul was arrested in Jerusalem and charged with teaching that people no longer have to follow The Torah—the exact same thing people today say that Paul taught in his letters. Again, as noted earlier, in defending himself against these charges he said, “this I confess to you, that according to the Way (which they call a sect), I worship the God of our fathers, believing everything written in the Torah and the Prophets,” (24:14) and, “I have committed no offense against the Torah or against the Temple” (25:8). If Paul walked into a “Christian” church today where they were teaching that his letters nullify The Torah, he would say: Stop misquoting me. I believe everything in The Torah and The Prophets and I have never done or said anything against The Torah or The Temple.
A final question I might ask those who ride or die their theology on the Book of Galatians is: Do you know who wrote The Bible? I could ask if they read The Gospels and all of the clearly pronomian statements of Yeshua, or if they read the writings of the other apostles—especially John. I could ask if they have read the entire Bible. But at this point I think it more productive to ask if they actually know who the people chosen to write The Bible were. Consider these words given by Messianic Rabbi Eric Tokajer in the opening of his book Galatians In Context:
Over the years, there have been many books and studies written about the book of Galatians. Most of these books follow a pattern of understanding, or a hermeneutic of traditional Christian theology. Following that set pattern, these studies then manage to arrive at the same or very similar conclusions, which would only make sense. If you look at the writings of Paul or any other writer of Scripture and start with the same foundation of understanding, you will end up seeing the same results from the study.
Every single person who was used to write anything in Scripture was a person who lived according to God’s Torah—including Paul. On top of that, you can find statements made from every single Bible author that promotes a continual upholding of The Torah and living by it being the standard of true covenant faith. Those who wrote The Bible believed that a true Believer is one who lives by The Torah—literally every single patriarch, prophet, king, apostle, or anyone else involved in writing Scripture believed this. That means that in order to follow the popular “Christian” belief that it’s no longer necessary or mandatory to follow at least certain parts of God’s Law—most commonly the food laws, The Sabbath, and God’s Feast Days—you have to hold to a belief that is the exact opposite of what every single person who wrote The Bible believed, including Paul.
If you approach Paul’s letters from the traditional antinomian and Marcionist bias of modern “Christianity”, as Rabbi Tokajer so eloquently pointed out, you will think that Paul is teaching something different from the rest of The Bible and come to a certain conclusion. If, however, you read Paul’s writings—including and especially the Book of Galatians—as being written by a man who declared himself a Pharisee from among Pharisees, an Israelite of the tribe of Benjamin, trained under Gamaliel in the Torah school of Hillel, and who stated that he believed everything in The Torah and The Prophets and never committed any violation against The Torah or The Temple as his rebuttal against claims he taught that “Christians” no longer need to follow The Torah you will come to a different conclusion of what Paul said—a conclusion that Paul’s letters harmonize with the rest of Scripture and the whole Bible message that we are supposed to obey the commandments of God.
Not Under The Law
A popular “Christian” belief is that a phrase used two times by the apostle Paul is a “proof-text” that means we no longer have to follow at least some parts of The Torah. To address this I will first examine the two passages and allow Scripture to tell us what Scripture means. From there I will provide two illustrations that will further serve to show how “Christians” are misunderstanding the words of Paul.
For sin shall not be master over you, for you are not under law but under grace. What then? Shall we sin because we are not under law but under grace? May it never be!
—Romans 6:14-15 (TLV, emphasis added)
The first thing to notice for proper understanding of this passage is the statement: sin shall not be master over you. Sin is defined in 1 John 3:4 as: breaking, transgressing, violating The Torah. So, we can say that Paul is telling us that Torah-breaking is not our way of life. Then following the phrase in question Paul refers to grace. But what was Paul’s idea of grace?
In Titus 2:11-12 Paul says: “For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation to all men, training us to deny ungodliness and worldly desires and to live in a manner that is self-controlled and righteous and godly in the present age.” I often refer to this as the Bible definition of grace, because it’s the most defining statement on grace I have seen in Scripture. It tells us that grace trains us to deny ungodliness and worldliness—which would fall into the general category of sin, breaking The Torah—and then grace trains us to live self-controlled, righteous, and godly. Righteousness is given a Bible definition in Deuteronomy 6:25 where it says that it will be counted as righteousness when you do what is in The Torah. So, if we read the whole verse now we should understand it, in proper biblical context, as saying: Torah-keeping is your way of life, for you are not under the law but under training to deny Torah-breaking and live in a Torah-keeping manner.
You might say that makes no sense, but hang with me a little longer and I assure you it will all come together.
Notice also that Paul follows this statement by boldly proclaiming that we should not sin (break The Torah) because we are not under law. If we were to continue into verse 16 Paul tells us that we are either a slave to sin (Torah-breaking) or righteousness (Torah-keeping). Also, recall the other blatantly Torah-positive statements made in Romans that we already looked at. Clearly it is wrong to look at this phrase “not under law” in Romans 6:14 and view it as a “proof-text” against Torah-keeping.
But if you are led by the Ruach, you are not under law.
—Galatians 5:18 (TLV, emphasis added)
This one, having gone through the passage in Romans, is easier to address and give biblical context to. Ezekiel 36:26-27 (TLV) says: “Moreover I will give you a new heart. I will put a new spirit within you. I will remove the stony heart from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh.I will put My Ruach within you. Then I will cause you to walk in My laws, so you will keep My rulings and do them.” This is clearly a new covenant prophecy, as we can parallel it with Jeremiah’s words about how under the new covenant The Torah will be put into the mind (new spirit) and written on the heart (new heart) of the new covenant Believer. From there it tells us that God will put His Spirit in us and as a result will CAUSE us to walk in His Laws—The Torah.
In Pentecostal “Christianity” it is popular to say that speaking in tongues is the evidence that a person is filled with The Spirit. While speaking in tongues is absolutely a gift of The Spirit and available to those who believe, nothing in The Bible ever defines it as the evidence or even an evidence that a person is filled with The Spirit. The only thing The Bible ever offers as evidence of being truly Spirit-filled is here in Ezekiel, where being Spirit-filled will CAUSE the Believer to walk in The Torah. So, I would say that you can speak in tongues until you are blue in the face but if you are not CAUSED to live by The Torah you might be filled with “a spirit”, but it is not The Spirit—just read 1 Corinthians 13. And if being led by The Spirit means you are CAUSED to walk in The Torah, then once again “not under law” cannot mean there is no longer an obligation to live by The Torah.
Additionally, Galatians 3:13 brings more clarity to Paul’s statement where he refers to being free from the curse of the law. This is clearly a reference to the list of curses found in Deuteronomy 28:15-68, which are imposed on those who do not live by The Torah. A lot of “Christians” memorize the blessings of Deuteronomy 28:3-13 and declare them over their life, but they have no right to these blessings because they have not submitted their life to following The Torah. If you read the first two verses of the chapter and verse 14 it is clear that these blessings are only for those who obey the commandments. The only way to receive the blessings is to not be under the curse of the law, and the only way to not be under the curse of the law is to live in obedience to the law.
So, how do we make sense of all this? After all, it seems illogical in modern cultural understanding to say that you have to obey The Torah in order to be “not under law”. Allow me to offer you two illustrations that will bring this all together.
Consider two cars driving along the highway, one is driving within the posted speed limit and the other is driving much faster than the speed limit. Which care do you suppose will be stopped by the police and issued a speeding citation under the law—the driver that was obeying the speed limit or the driver that was breaking the speed limit?
The other illustration was told to me by a ministry friend; a great Messianic Bible teacher named Daniel Botkin. He said that when he teaches on this topic he will take a glass of water, hold it above his head, and say, “I am now under the water.” Then he will drink the water and say, “The water is now inside of me, so I am no longer under the water.” This is a phenomenal illustration as it shows how The Torah, once solely written on tablets of stone and parchment scrolls, is now within us as it is stated that in the new covenant God places The Torah within the mind and writes it upon the heart of the new covenant Believer. Therefore the only people who actually have a right to say they are “not under the law” are those who live by The Torah of God because it is inside of them and they have God’s Spirit in them to CAUSE them to walk in it.
Nailed To The Cross
Another popular objection to Torah-living from modern-day antinomians and Marcionists comes from a statement made in Paul’s letter to the Colossians.
He wiped out the handwritten record of debts with the decrees against us, which was hostile to us. He took it away by nailing it to the cross.
—Colossians 2:14 (TLV, emphasis added)
Most “Christians” today are taught to believe that this statement is saying that The Torah was “nailed to the cross”; meaning that it has been abolished and no longer needs to be followed. This idea, however, is wrong on several points.
First we need to look at what was actually being referred to as “nailed to the cross” in the passage. The Greek word used here is cheirographon (χειρόγραφον), and this is the only place in the entire Bible that it is used. In comparison, the Greek word used to refer to The Torah is nomos (νόμος) and if Paul was saying that The Torah was “nailed to the cross” that is the word he would have used. A cheirographon is a legal document with a list of charges against a person that would be used in a court preceding. To put this into context, what Paul was saying here is that when a person repents of their sin (Torah-breaking) the cheirographon that lists their violations of Torah is nailed to the cross as they commit to a life of Torah-keeping. This is further supported by what is said in Ezekiel 18:21-22.
Another way we know that Paul was not speaking against The Torah in this passage is from Colossians 2:8 where he uses the terms: “the tradition of men and the basic principles of the world rather than Messiah.” Obviously The Torah is not the traditions of men or the basic principles of the world. So Paul wasn’t talking about The Torah at all in this passage.
Finally, we can look at Colossians 2:16-17. Once again this is a commonly misunderstood passage as those who believe Paul said The Torah was nailed to the cross is speaking against such Torah principles as the Leviticus 11 food laws, The Sabbath Day, and the new moon celebrations. However, when we look at it in context and see that Paul is speaking against traditions of men and worldliness and saying that it is charges of Torah-breaking that gets nailed to the cross, it is apparent that he is here saying that we should not allow people to judge or mock us for obeying these Torah principles. In a moment I will deal with a couple of popular terms of accusation used by antinomians and Marcionists toward Torah-keeping followers of Yeshua: Judaizer and Legalism. What Paul was essentially saying here, to bring it into modern-day religious terms, is: Don’t let it bother you when people call you a Judaizer or a legalist because you follow the food laws, keep The Sabbath Day, and celebrate biblical Feasts and festivals. So clearly he was not saying these things were “nailed to the cross” and therefore no longer mandated.
The Lonely Path
Something I have been told a few times is that if you follow Torah or if you avoid things because they’re “just too pagan” then you will be walking a lonely path. Well, I am OK with that. I have absolutely no problem walking a long and lonely path in this lifetime, and at the expense of sounding cold and callous when I am admitted into God’s Kingdom and the lawless masses of “Christianity” are not I doubt I will be very lonely when surrounded by those who chose the way of righteousness over the ways of worldliness or popular religion.
Here’s the thing. Matthew 7:13-14 (TLV) says: “Enter through the narrow gate; for the gate is wide and the way is broad that leads to destruction, and those who enter through it are many. How narrow is the gate and difficult the way that leads to life, and those who find it are few.” Psalm 119:1 (TLV) says: “Blessed are those whose way is blameless, who walk in the Torah of Adonai.” If The Torah is the way and the way is a path that few find, then if I am walking a lonely path the few I may encounter will mean I am in good company.
If we continue on to Matthew 7:21-23 (TLV) we find these words: “Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord!’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father in heaven. Many will say to Me on that day, ‘Lord, Lord, didn’t we prophesy in Your name, and drive out demons in Your name, and perform many miracles in Your name?’ Then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you. Get away from Me, you workers of lawlessness!’” Revelation 12:9 tells is that Satan, the ancient serpent, will deceive the whole world. Remember, in The Bible Satan is called the lawless one and Yeshua is called the Righteous One.
“Christianity”, for the most part, teaches against at least some of the commandments. Like that episode where the serpent is first introduced in Genesis 3, practically all “Christians” today believe that they can eat things that God said not to eat—in Eden it was a piece of forbidden fruit, today it’s forbidden unclean meats like pork, shellfish, and several others. If we think about this logically, do you honestly believe that “Christianity” teaching against at least some commandments is correct or do you think that the few who uphold the commandments are correct?
Today “Christianity” claims somewhere around 2.4 to 2.5 billion people. That is one-third of the world’s population. Does that sound like “few”, or does it sound like a significant portion of the whole world that Satan, the ancient serpent, will deceive? “Christian” beliefs about at least some of God’s commandments are literally identical to the statements made by Satan in Genesis 3:1-5. Stop and think very hard about that before reading on.
Recently I saw a teaching from a Bible professor addressing a particular commandment. I am not going to formally cite with reference because overall she is a wonderful person who I consider a friend and does put out some good content, so I do not want to be mistaken as calling her out as I would with a legitimate heretic or false prophet. However, I do want to look at a statement she made in her message: “I've argued that Old Testament law is still relevant for followers of Jesus, but that we need to do the careful work of discerning the purpose of a law in order to see how it can and should inform our lives today.”
Like many such pieces, this came across as explaining away the commandment in question with theological opinions and what I personally believe was misrepresentation of certain passages of Scripture. When we look once again at Genesis 3, this is exactly what the serpent did. He took God’s own words, misrepresented them, and used them to explain away the commandment and why it doesn’t apply to us today or how we can do that now without consequence. Typically this attitude is expressed toward what I sometimes call “the big four” of the modern era—the commandments pertaining to prohibited meats in Leviticus 11, The Sabbath Day, the biblical Feast Days, and the prohibition against appropriating from other religions as it relates to popular holidays like Christmas and Easter—as well as a few other commandments, though with less frequency, such as the prohibition against getting tattoos (Leviticus 19:28) and the instruction not to wear wool and linen together (Leviticus 19:19, Deuteronomy 22:11).
I would suggest being very careful about taking this position, especially as it aligns so well with the words of the serpent from Genesis 3. When you really think about it, in practically every case this idea is used to explain away and justify the discarding of commandments that are easily kept and of which there is no good reason to violate them anyway. Consider that there is no need to eat pork or shellfish, work on The Sabbath, refrain from keeping The Feasts, celebrate Christmas and Easter, get a tattoo, or wear wool and linen together. If anything in The Bible clearly said, “These commandments are void and if you try to keep them you cannot be admitted into The Eternal Kingdom of God,” then we would have a good reason to reject them. But we have no such statement in Scripture nor do we have any other reason where we must break these commandments. After all, I cannot think of any scenario where I have to eat pork, work on The Sabbath, celebrate Christmas, or get a tattoo either to continue living in this world or to be admitted into the world to come. What it comes down to is people have a deep desire to do things God said not to do or not do things He said to do and will do whatever they need to in order to convince themselves it’s acceptable to defy commandments given by God Himself. And they have the audacity to do this “in the name of Jesus”.
On the contrary, we have many times where the phrase, “If you love Me, keep the commandments,” is used in both reference to God Himself and to Yeshua, our Messiah. We have statements like Romans 2:13 that says the doers of Torah will be justified and 1 John 2:4 that says anyone who claims to know God but does not keep the commandments is a liar and the truth is not in them. We have Revelation 14:12 that says holiness is both keeping the commandments of God and the faith of Yeshua and Revelation 22:14 that says it is those who kept the commandments that will be given a right to the Tree of Life.
If the only thing left on the planet that we could eat to sustain ourselves were pigs, then perhaps we could talk about whether or not there is room to make an exception to the commandment. If the only clothes you could obtain were made with a mixture of wool and linen, then perhaps we could evaluate if God would overlook the commandment in that situation. If you became an actual slave and were forced to work on The Sabbath or branded with a tattoo mark against your will like the Jewish prisoners of Nazi Germany, then surely that would not be held against you. But these scenarios simply do not exist for most people today, especially anyone who has access to read this message, so why not just do what The Bible says instead of trying to explain away why something The Bible says “doesn’t apply to you”? Perhaps it’s because few people even want to actually walk on the lonely path of Torah-based truth. They follow their god, the ancient serpent, and build their faith on that hissing question forever recorded in Genesis 3:1: Hath God said?
It’s Just Not Possible To Keep The Law!
You know, I don’t really want to mock people’s beliefs, but sometimes the things I hear from the antinomians of popular “Christianity” make me wonder if they have ever read The Bible at all, let alone tried to understand it from the mindset of the people who wrote it. A popular belief among the adherents of modern lawless “Christianity” is that it was impossible to keep The Torah, and as a result God had to send Yeshua to redeem us from The Torah. For example, the popular hyper-grace antinomian heretic Joseph Prince says in his book Destined To Reign, shortly after saying it’s impossible to keep God’s Law: “God did not give the law for us to keep. He gave the law to bring man to the end of himself, so that he would see his need for a Savior.” This perspective is simply ridiculous on a number of points.
The first reason is because The Bible itself says the exact opposite. Deuteronomy 30:11-14 (TLV) says: “For this mitzvah that I am commanding you today is not too difficult for you, nor is it far off. It is not in the heavens, that you should say, ‘Who will go up for us to the heavens and get it for us, and have us hear it so we may do it?’ Nor is it across the sea, that you should say, ‘Who will cross over for us to the other side of the sea and get it for us, and have us hear it so we may do it?’ No, the word is very near to you—in your mouth and in your heart, to do it.” Additionally, 1 John 5:3 says: “For this is the love of God—that we keep His commandments. And His commandments are not burdensome.” Also, it would make no sense for Scripture to continually say, “If you love God, keep His commandments,” if it is impossible to keep them—that would basically mean it’s impossible to love God.
The next reason is because we have examples of people in The Bible who were said to keep all of the commandments. Genesis 26:5 (TLV) says: “Abraham listened to My voice and kept My charge, My mitzvot, My decrees, and My instructions.” The word “instructions” here is the Hebrew word Torah. Luke 1:5-6 (TLV) says: “In the days of Herod, King of Judah, there was a kohen named Zechariah from the priestly division of Abijah. Elizabeth, his wife, was from the daughters of Aaron. Together they were righteous before Adonai, walking without fault in all His commandments and instructions.” I like what my friend Daniel Botkin says regarding the latter in his article The End Of The Law: “Of course Zachariah and Elisabeth didn't have the benefit of our modern-day Bible teachers to tell them that this was impossible to do. All they had was the Torah to tell them that it is possible.” It is unfortunate that those Torah-keeping Israelites who wrote The Bible didn’t have the likes of Joseph Prince to tell them that The Bible they wrote doesn’t mean what they thought it meant when they were writing it.
Another point that proves the error in this thinking is what The Bible says about the new covenant. Jeremiah 31:32 and Hebrews 8:10 says that under the new covenant The Torah will be put into the mind and written on the heart of the covenant Believer. What is in your mind will consume your thoughts and drive you to study it. What is on your heart will drive your passion and make you want to do it. And from there Ezekiel 36:27 says that after receiving The Torah in the mind and on the heart God will put His Spirit in us to CAUSE us to walk in His Laws. “Christianity” literally wants us to believe that it is impossible to do what God said He would personally CAUSE us to do.
Finally, let’s look at a couple of interesting passages that address the possible and the impossible. Matthew 17:20 says that with the faith of a mustard seed nothing will be impossible for you. Luke 1:37 says nothing is impossible with God. Matthew 19:26 and Mark 10:27 say that with God all things are possible. Then we have a passage that “Christians” love to quote, Philippians 4:13, which says: “I can do all things through Messiah who strengthens me.” Apparently with the faith of a mustard seed nothing is impossible except obeying The Torah, with God all things are possible except obeying The Torah, and “Christians” believe they can do all things through Messiah who strengthens them except obey The Torah. The Bible says it’s easy to keep the commandments, the commandments are not burdensome, and God will personally CAUSE those in covenant with Him to follow them. Are you seeing the pattern here?
The idea that it is impossible to obey The Torah and that God only gave The Torah to prove we cannot keep it creates a theological view where God delivered His people from actual bondage in Egypt only to place them in “greater bondage” to His Torah about a month and a half later and then keep them in bondage for thousands of years. Not only does this view mean that keeping The Torah is bondage, but then if they didn’t keep The Torah, which is supposed to be impossible to keep, were further tormented by being punished for disobedience. According to people like Joseph Prince this was all done “to bring man to the end of himself”. What kind of a god is this that the modern-day “Christian” has dreamed up? Clearly this is not the God we read about in The Bible! Again, I do not wish to mock people’s beliefs, but when people say it’s not possible to keep The Torah they are simply showing that they are completely clueless about what The Bible says. Such preachers and teachers are the modern-day manifestation of the Genesis 3 serpent.
Judaizing
Something that certain clever antinomians will do is call those who promote Torah-keeping Judaizers. This is a result of misidentifying The Torah as a solely “Jewish” thing and then considering any call to follow the parts of The Torah rejected by a majority of “Christianity” by this label.
The reason why so many people are seeing the value in aspects of The Torah long rejected by “Christians” is not because people are Judaizing “Christianity” but because people are Biblicizing it. Judaizers might tell you that you have to wave a lulag and etrov during the Feast of Sukkot or attend a formal Seder for Passover, Biblicizers tell you that you have to celebrate the Feast Days as outlined in The Bible. Judaizers tell you that you have to follow all of the Rabbinic kashrut laws that would include not eating a cheeseburger or a pizza with biblically acceptable meat on it like chicken and beef, Biblicizers tell you to follow the Leviticus 11 food laws as outlined in The Bible. Judaizers tell you that you have to light candles and read from Jewish prayer books to keep The Sabbath, Biblicizers tell you to keep The Sabbath as outlined in The Bible.
Do you see the difference? Do you recognize now the distinction between someone who teaches Believers to follow The Torah exactly as the apostles and earliest followers of Yeshua did and a Judaizer?
The term Judaize is used only one time in The Bible. Galatians 2:14 says: “But when I saw that they were not walking in line with the truth of the Good News, I said to Peter in front of everyone, ‘If you—being a Jew—live like the Gentiles and not like the Jews, how can you force the Gentiles to live like Jews?’” That last phrase “live like Jews” is the Greek word Ioudaizó (Ἰουδαΐζω), which is where the term Judaize comes from. But if we examine this statement against everything Paul said and everything the other apostles said and everything Yeshua said and everything The Bible says it is illogical to conclude that Paul’s words here were speaking against Torah-keeping as the practice of the true Believer. It seems that Peter was being charged with enforcing the man-made traditions of the Jews, not just The Torah.
It is also worth noting that there is scholarly debate about who Paul was addressing in this passage. Many assume that it was the apostle Peter, but due to the commonality of this name in first century Israel and other factors it is suggested that this was someone other than the apostle. This is even proposed in some early post-biblical writings. This is also important to the discussion because as long as it cannot be determined one way or another whether it was the apostle or someone else accused of this Judaizing, it must remain the logical conclusion that following the commandments as given in The Torah should be the way of the covenant Believer because we really do not have a lot of clarity on exactly what this “Judaizing” actually was or exactly who was guilty of it. I would say it is pretty risky to base an entire major doctrinal position against Torah-keeping on things that are not very clear, especially when we know who the lawless one is and who The Righteous One is.
Legalism
In another message I have covered the concept commonly referred to as legalism extensively, but it is worth taking some time in this message to highlight a few points. The idea according to the antinomians and Marcionists is that promoting Torah-keeping (aka “law keeping”) is legalism and those who engage in it are legalists. In their mind, this is a negative idea as they believe that the Torah-keeping Israelites were charged with teaching “Christians” that they do not have to follow God’s Laws.
It must be noted that there is not a single use of the words legalism, legalist, or anything related to these in the entirety of Scripture. However, being a “big, fancy word that begins with the letter ‘L’”, let’s take a look at some other “big, fancy words that begin with the letter ‘L’” in The Bible.
Lawless/Lawlessness: This word is used 22 times in The Bible (based on the Tree Of Life Version), and other than its use in Daniel these are all in the Gospels and Apostolic Writings. In these “New Testament” references it is always used in a context that refers to those who live in defiance to The Torah. In fact, five places (Matthew 23:28, Romans 6:19, 2 Corinthians 6:14, Hebrew 1:9, and 2 Peter 2:8) lawlessness is contrasted with righteousness—and, once again, Deuteronomy 6:25 tells us that righteousness is defined as obedience to The Torah. 1 John 3:4 also parallels this word lawlessness with sin—the breaking, transgressing, violating of The Torah.
Lasciviousness: This word is primarily used in older Bible translations like the King James Version, but it is worth considering. It is found six times in The Bible—Mark 7:22, 2 Corinthians 12:21, Galatians 5:19, Ephesians 4:19, 1 Peter 4:3, and Jude 1:4. The Greek word rendered lasciviousness in some Bible translations is aselgeia (ἀσέλγεια). It is primarily used in a context of unbridled sexual desires, licentiousness, sensuality, or lust, but in a broader sense it can refer to any lust or wantonness of worldly desires—such as a love for secular worldly culture, fashion (especially sensual clothing trends), or other such things. Ultimately, a broader view of lasciviousness would be a desire for anything that goes against The Torah.
Lukewarm: This is used one time in The Bible, Revelation 3:16. It is the popular passage of being “neither hot or cold”. There are differing ideas of what being “hot or cold” refers to. Popular theology says that “hot” refers to someone who is very committed to or “on fire” for God while “cold” is commonly viewed as someone who remains hardened against the ways of God. Another view uses the context of the setting, Laodicea, which sat between a place where cold water was available and a place of hot springs, meaning both “hot” and “cold” were positive. Regardless, lukewarm is undeniably used in a negative sense and the category you don’t want to be in as the result is God “vomiting you out of His mouth”. When passages in the Book of Revelation alone are considered, such as 14:12 and 22:14, it seems logical to conclude that lukewarm is also a reference to people who do not live according to The Torah.
Now, with this said the words legalism and legalist are not invalid, they simply are not biblical terms—meaning they are not found in The Bible. They are, however, important to a theological discussion regarding The Torah in the life of a Believer if we give them a proper definition.
In a biblical application there are two ways we should define these terms. The first would be the improper application of The Torah as the means by which we earn or maintain salvation. The place of The Torah in the life of the new covenant Believer is not the source of our salvation, but the evidence of it. I know I keep repeating it, but Jeremiah 31:32 and Hebrews 8:10 tell us that in the new covenant The Torah is put into our mind and written on our heart. From there Ezekiel 36:27 tells us that when a person is filled with The Spirit there will be the evidence of being CAUSED to walk in God’s Laws, The Torah. So anyone who gets this wrong and teaches that The Torah is the means by which we earn or keep our salvation is a legalist, or to say it another way is teaching legalism. However, anyone who teaches that there are commandments we no longer have to keep as a “Christian” is teaching lawlessness, or is a lawless one.
And I will slide this in: It would be better to teach Torah-obedience from a wrong perspective than to teach it is no longer required to obey. The former simply errs in why we are to obey. The latter means you are doing the work of the serpent from Genesis 3.
The other way to define legalism is based on what certain of the Pharisees did in elevating traditions of men as being equal to or even of greater importance than The Torah. A good example of this would be in Mark 7 where Yeshua speaks about making void the Word of God through the elevation of the traditions of men.
As a form of legalism is the creation of man-made doctrines and traditions that usurp the authority of The Torah, then the true legalists are those who claim it is legalism to uphold The Torah. In order to do this they must make an unbiblical ruling that The Torah is abolished, at least in part, and then through that tradition they overthrow commandments, making void the Word of God—The Torah. Isn’t it ironic that it is those who accuse Torah-keepers of legalism who are in reality to the true legalists?
Are You Jewish? Seventh Day Adventist?
This is a common response to anything that is based in The Bible but rejected by the majority of “Christianity”. I will address each of these separate as the one dealing with the Seventh Day Adventist (SDA) cult is more specific to just The Sabbath, though because “veganism” is also a large part of the SDA religion this one is also sometimes used in conjunction with the Leviticus 11 food laws.
Whenever you bring up certain things like the food laws, The Sabbath, the Feast Days, and perhaps a few other things like the shatnez commandment—the prohibition against wearing wool and linen together—mainstream “Christians” will sometimes ask: Are you Jewish? If they do not ask, they might simply say in a condescending tone: Well, I’m not Jewish. My question is: What does being Jewish or not being Jewish have to do with following The Bible?
I think at this point it warrants a brief education on what “Jewish” actually means. The first reference to “the Jews” in The Bible is found in 2 Kings 16:6. This is because the terms “Jew” and “Jewish” are not actually a religious marker so much as a national marker to the nation of Judah that evolved out of the kingdom split following the reign of Solomon. The nation of Judah was made up of the tribes of Judah and Benjamin, as well as the portion of Levites in that region. It was also in this region that the city of Jerusalem sat, meaning that The Temple was also a part of the nation of Judah following this split into two nations.
Once this happened there were a people called “the Jews”—those of the nation of Judah. Eventually, because the northern kingdom of Israel fell first and was dispersed among the nations, Israel would eventually come back together as a whole nation but it would pretty much be the descendants of “the Jews” who lived there. For this reason, “Jew” and “Jewish” became more than a national identifier, developing more strongly into a religious mark—the religion of “the Jews” would become known as Judaism. This is why we see people like the apostle Paul, who clearly identifies as being of the Tribe of Benjamin and is considered a Jew, because at that point Jews were those of the nation of Judah—from the Tribe of Judah and the Tribe of Benjamin.
This means that there was no such thing as “Jews” when The Torah was given to Moses, let alone when it was given to Abraham, Noah, or Adam. There is also a belief that God used The Torah to create the world we live in, so it becomes increasingly difficult to say that following The Torah equates to “being Jewish” if The Torah predates not only the Jewish people but possibly even the creation of the world. Additionally, passages like Exodus 12:49, Numbers 15:16, and Ecclesiastes 12:13 indicate that following The Torah is not even exclusive to the twelve tribes of Israel, but is expected by God of all people who enter into covenant with Him. Under the new covenant we find even stronger evidence of this as The Torah is put into the mind and written on the heart of the true covenant Believer (Jeremiah 31:32, Hebrews 8:10) and the evidence of being filled with The Spirit of God is that the covenant Believer will be CAUSED to walk in The Torah of God (Ezekiel 36:27). So, really, when it comes right down to it, people who ask if you are “Jewish” or say that they are “not Jewish” as some sort or rebuttal against Torah-keeping are showing their complete ignorance of the culture and context of Scripture and what it actually means to be “Jewish”.
Now, regarding cult groups like the Seventh Day Adventists, this too is a rebuttal based in ignorance. Just because the SDA believes in some capacity that the biblical seventh-day Sabbath is to be kept does not mean they own The Sabbath Day. Just because the SDA often follows a “vegan” dietary practice—their founder Ellen White went so far as to say it is a sin to eat meat, which is really odd considering that God commands His people to eat lamb for Passover—and by default would then be adhering to the prohibitions regarding unclean animals does not mean they own the Leviticus 11 food laws.
The fallacy in assuming that everyone who keeps The Sabbath must be a part of the SDA is the assumption that you cannot follow that commandment without being a part of the SDA. But this is rather absurd. So why is it that so often it is the case that when you bring up The Sabbath or even dare to greet people with the standard Shabbat Shalom they accuse you of being a part of the SDA or ask: Are you SDA?
In having looked at a great number of Bible-based cult groups there is pretty much nothing in The Bible that cannot be linked to a particular religious cult. Are we to say that it must be acceptable to practice abortion because there are religious cults that oppose it? Are we to say that we should abstain from marriage because there are cult groups that promote marriage? Are we to deny Yeshua as Messiah because there are Bible-based cults—like the SDA, Mormons, and Jehovah’s Witnesses—that in some form believe in the biblical Messiah?
The SDA is not a cult because they believe in keeping The Sabbath. They are a cult because of beliefs like investigative judgment, soul sleep, and saying it’s a sin to eat meat. Obeying biblical commandments like keeping The Sabbath and following the food laws does not mean you are part of a cult—those things are evidence of following The Bible and walking as Messiah walked (1 John 2:6) according to the commandment to “shema” (hear, listen to, follow, obey) the prophet like Moses (Deuteronomy 18:15-19), which is Yeshua. And to be fair, while there are numerous scholars in the area of studying cults who consider the SDA a cult there are many others who have deemed them Orthodox, albeit with some concerns regarding some of their beliefs. But to put it as one of my college professors did so many years ago, if the Seventh Day Adventists are not a cult, they are about as close as you can get to being one without actually being one. But the high regard for the writings of Ellen G. White within the SDA is particularly cultish.
So why is it that The Sabbath always gets linked to the SDA cult? The Seventh Day Adventists were founded in 1863 at Battle Creek, Michigan. The Sabbath was established by God Himself on the seventh day of the Creation week (Genesis 2:1-3). Do you expect me to believe that The Sabbath is exclusive to a religious cult that started only around 150 years ago? Yet that’s what many anti-Sabbath “Christians” seem to think. It’s no wonder the apostles said antinomians are delusional!
Stoning Children And Marrying Your Sister-In-Law
Two more nonsensical counter-arguments to Torah-keeping theology based on more ignorance of Scripture come from a couple of commandments that have extensive requirements to even be carried out. The modern antinomians and Marcionists, however, seem to think that if Torah-keeping is true then we must stone our children and have a baby with our sister-in-law. I will go through why this line of thinking is rather absurd and based on gross misrepresentation of the related commandments.
First let’s look at stoning. In The Torah this is absolutely an approved and even seemingly preferred method of carrying out capital punishment for certain offenses. In addition to this, Leviticus 20:9 suggests that any man who would curse their mother or father is to be executed (by stoning). This is where some people get the misguided idea that following Torah means people are supposed to stone their children.
Two things are important to understand about this passage. One is that the verse uses the Hebrew word ish (אִישׁ), which is used over 2,000 times in Scripture and appears to be used exclusively of adults. This word is also translated in some places as husbands, sailors, warriors, soldiers, and in one case even adulteress—signifying that the word may be gender neutral, which would mean that Leviticus 20:9 would apply to both adult men and adult women who curse a parent.
The other important point of context for this passage is found throughout the chapter, where topics like idol worship, adultery, and right before it in verse 7 witchcraft are discussed. Leviticus 20:9 is not telling parents to stone their ten-year-old for talking back, having a temper tantrum, or refusing to eat their vegetables at dinner. It is telling Israel to stone an adult who would dare to pronounce a literal curse on their own parents. So when antinomians can produce a scenario in a Torah-keeping community where someone’s own adult offspring is engaged in actual witchcraft and pronouncing witchcraft curses over their own parents, we can talk about whether or not stoning should be carried out
But here’s where it gets more complicated. If you do a proper study of stoning regulations in The Torah you will find two important points. The first is that an extensive judicial process had to be followed and a ruling by the authorized court system be made prior to such a sentence being carried out. The second is that in pretty much all cases where stoning was an authorized sentence there were lesser sentences that were also approved. In other words, just because someone could be stoned for what they did does not necessarily mean they should be stoned, it was up to the court to decide the penalty. And if you study out ancient Jewish beliefs, it was commonly understood that a ruling to stone or otherwise execute someone was to be extremely rare. It was always an option for an offense that authorized stoning, but it was considered the absolute last resort in most cases.
Also, many societies, including the United States, still enforce capital punishment for certain offenses. While these sentences are generally no longer carried out by means of stoning, it is still something most societies retain for the worst criminals. And like in ancient Israel, a lengthy court process must be followed. Average citizens are not allowed to execute someone, even if they know for a fact that the person is guilty of a crime that may warrant a penalty as severe as capital punishment. This is why Yeshua refused to stone the woman caught in adultery, because He knew the proper court proceedings had not been followed—not because He was “overthrowing” The Torah. In this act, He was actually upholding The Torah and showing it was and is still valid. Only if He had authorized stoning the woman would He have shown The Torah to be abolished.
Because some of the requirements to even carry out a court session that may possibly result in a judgment to stone someone according to The Torah today do not even exist, it would actually be a violation of The Torah to stone anyone, even if for an offense for which The Torah authorizes stoning.
As for Levirate Marriage, which is a practice involving a man marrying his brother’s widow, it is a complex process that is detailed in Deuteronomy 25. Despite this, there are those who without ever taking the time to study it or even do a plain reading of the text think that a valid argument against Torah-positive faith is to insist that this practice be carried out. So, let’s take a look at what The Torah actually says regarding this practice.
“If brothers dwell together and one of them dies and has no son, the dead man’s wife is not to be married outside to a stranger. Her husband’s brother is to go to her and take her as his wife, and perform the duty of a brother-in-law. Now the firstborn that she bears is to carry on the name of his dead brother, so that his name will not be blotted out of Israel. But if the man does not want to take his brother’s widow, his brother’s widow is to go to the elders at the gate and say, ‘My brother-in-law refuses to carry on his brother’s name in Israel—he is unwilling to perform a brother-in-law’s duty for me.’ Then the elders of his town are to summon him and speak to him. And if he stands firm and says, ‘I do not desire to take her,’ then his brother’s widow is to come to him in the sight of the elders, pull his sandal off his foot, spit in his face, and reply, ‘So will it be done to the man who does not build up his brother’s house.’ Then his name is to be called in Israel ‘the house of the pulled-off sandal.’”
—Deuteronomy 25:5-10 (TLV)
There are some important points to consider here. First, and very important, is that the two brothers must be living together. This means that if the brothers are not living together when the one dies, leaving his wife a widow, there seems to be no obligation for the brother-in-law to take her as his wife. The second is that the woman must be without a male child to carry the name of her deceased husband. This would mean that if there were already even one son born to her and her now deceased husband, there is no obligation to carry our this commandment. Finally, there is a path, albeit an unpleasant one, for the brother-in-law to refuse this act. I do not profess to know how this may have impacted someone in ancient Israel, but perhaps in some cases being labeled “the house of the pulled off sandal” is more desirable than the woman who is widowed—let’s face it, not every woman is found attractive to every man.
When people use this as an objection to Torah-keeping the first thing I will typically say is that when they can produce a scenario where two brothers are living in the same house, they hold to a Torah-keeping faith practice, and one is married and dies before bearing a son with his wife, then we can talk about Levirate Marriage. Seeing as it is extremely unlikely in modern society for such a scenario to even come up, let alone in a family of biblical faith, then this is really a non-issue. When people use commandments like this, which have strict prerequisites that make them practically impossible or unlikely to apply to anyone today, what they are really doing is straining gnats (Matthew 23:24) to justify their desire to eat pork and shellfish, not keep The Sabbath, or celebrate secular pagan holidays like Christmas and Easter instead of keeping the Holy Feast Days that are actually in The Bible. The delusion force of lawlessness, as Paul calls it in 2 Thessalonians 2:7-12, seems to cause people to make stuff up, grasp at straws, strain a gnat and swallow a camel in order to convince themselves that their defiance of commandments that can be carried out today is justified.
The inability to carry out stoning people in accordance with The Torah or the great unlikelihood of a scenario where Levirate Marriage may even need to be discussed does not mean we are allowed to eat unclean things or celebrate secular-pagan holidays instead of God’s Appointed and Commanded Holy Feast Days.
All Torah, No Gospel
Something else I have heard in regard to Torah-keeping beliefs goes something like this: “It’s always about Torah, never about Jesus or the Gospel. All they do is talk about Torah, Torah, Torah.”
First of all, this is simply not true—at least not of any of the Torah-positive ministries I have looked at. In a similar manner, I have noticed something when presented with the comparable accusation that comes whenever I mention the food laws. There have been times where someone will say to me something to the effect of: All you ever talk about is “don’t eat pork”, you never talk about anything but the dietary laws. Typically when this happens I will go through my social media as far back as two or three months and look at everything I said in that time. Most of the time I will not find a single other instance in within that window where I have made a statement on that topic.
So, why do people think that? Why is it that they believe Torah-positive ministries “only talk about The Torah, never Yeshua or The Gospel”? Why does it happen sometimes when I have shared about the food laws that some people think it’s the only thing I ever talk about?
The answer is simple, really. People tend to react different to what they agree with and what they disagree with. When people agree with a point of theology, it’s not an issue for them. They see or hear the statement, they believe it’s true, and they continue on without thinking more on it because in their mind this is a “normal” belief. Unless they felt it particularly impactful, they may forget they even saw or heard it as soon as an hour later.
When they see or hear something they passionately disagree with, however, they tend to dwell on it and seek to counter it because it’s “not normal” or even “heretical” in their mind. Without realizing it, this often gives people the false impression that someone is only ever talking about that thing they take exception with. What they do is they see a teaching they feel this way about, they remember a time long in the past where the person taught something similar and they also had an negative emotional reaction to, and because they do not pay attention to the “normal” or “orthodox” teachings that same person puts out they suddenly feel like this teaching they feel is wrong is now “the only thing that person ever talks about”.
The reality is that most Torah-positive ministries are whole Bible ministries, therefore they absolutely do talk about The Gospel. However, there are two important points to consider.
First, The Torah and The Gospel go together. You simply cannot have one without the other. Yeshua consistently taught His followers to live by The Torah. This means that anyone who is teaching The Torah, even if they truly are only ever teaching The Torah, is preaching The Gospel at the same time. But, again, I think you would have a hard time finding a Torah-keeping ministry outside of Orthodox Judaism that neglects The Gospel—it is, as I said, typically a misconception based on how people react to that which they agree with and that which they do not agree with. Consider these words:
I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the increase. So neither the one who plants nor the one who waters is anything, but only God who makes things grow. Now he who plants and he who waters work as one, but each will receive his own reward according to his own labor.
—1 Corinthians 3:6-8 (TLV)
Now think about it like this: One person leads people to faith in Yeshua through a focus on The Gospel, another person trains people how to live as a true covenant Believer through a focus on The Torah. This is really what this passage is saying, that there are those called primarily to evangelize and there are others called primarily to disciple. And when you read Revelation 14:12, which says, “Here is the perseverance of the kedoshim—those who keep the commandments of God and the faith of Yeshua,” it becomes clear that both are required, both work as one, but each is an individual process with individual people called to do them and individual rewards. People who take exception with Torah ministries placing “too much focus on The Torah” are taking exception with Scripture and a very biblical process.
Second, there is some form of The Gospel preached in literally every “Christian” church in the world every week. While these churches may have some wrong ideas that impact how they view The Gospel, they are still preaching it and these errors are easily fixed through the points I made above toward the beginning of this message regarding a basic understanding of Scripture. The fact that churches are predominantly “all Gospel, no Torah” means that it would be more than justified for a Torah-positive ministry to be “all Torah”, explaining how The Torah relates to The Gospel. Also, since most Torah-positive ministries I am aware of do uphold The Gospel, it would be more warranted to accuse popular “Christianity” of being all Gospel and no Torah—which is equally as heretical as “all Torah, no Gospel”. Revelation 12:17 and 14:12 make it clear that both are the requirement of Scripture, equally, neither is greater than the other.
Let’s say you hired a babysitter and gave your child ten basic instructions that you expect him or her complete before you got back home. Probably you would tell the child to eat their dinner, pick up their toys, take a bath, brush their teeth, and other such things before you returned. When you get home you are told that the child did eight of the ten things you had on your list. Would you sit the child down and lecture them on the things they did, or the things they did not do?
The fact of the matter is that for hundreds of years “Christians” have been taught that they do not have to follow at least some of the commandments of God, as given in His Torah. They have been taught The Gospel a million times over. They know all about Yeshua. They know about His birth, they know about His teenage years in the Temple, they know about His baptism, they know about His miracles, they know about the times He chased the hypocrites around with a whip in His hand, they know all of the parables He gave, they know about His feeding the masses, they know about “the sermon on the mount”, and they especially know about His crucifixion and resurrection. Most of them can quote John 3:16. “Christians” do not need to have The Gospel shared with them again by Torah-keeping ministries. They need to be shown that they really are supposed to be living by The Torah if they are to be a true follower of Yeshua.
I can see it being a minor problem if a ministry were only teaching The Torah and not even so much as relating it to The Gospels, Yeshua, or the teachings of the apostles. But that really is not the case with at least most Torah-keeping ministries that follow Yeshua. In reality, at least most such ministries place a lot of emphasis on showing that Yeshua and the apostles—including Paul—taught a Torah-keeping message because they know this is the most persuasive thing you can show a “Christian”. The moment they realize that Yeshua and His followers believed in living by The Torah and never once taught anything to say it was in any way abolished is the moment the light goes on in their brain and they see that true biblical faith is Torah-keeping biblical faith and the real Gospel is following Yeshua and His Torah lifestyle. So this misconception that Torah ministries “only talk about Torah, Torah, Torah” is completely untrue. When people say things like that, it is apparent that they are just expressing the hardness in their own heart that stands against obeying God’s Laws.
Conclusion
People who cannot follow rules tend to live in a state of fear and paranoia. People who can follow rules tend to live in a state of peace. God gave us His Torah to give us a path to His peace. If you follow The Torah, through faith in Yeshua, you will find perfect peace.
Can you imagine what it must be like for the average “Christian”? They believe they are “not under the law” and therefore do not have to obey things God commanded. But they must have some sense of fear and paranoia somewhere in their mind, even if they work hard to suppress it, that these things really are in some form “a salvation issue”. They ask if something like eating pork or not keeping The Sabbath will be the cause of anyone going to hell, but they ask those questions because in the back of their mind they wonder if those things really will cause them to be eternally separated from God being tormented in a lake of fire.
Let me illustrate how misunderstandings of Scripture come to be. I shared some pictures of my home decorated with lights for Hanukkah. This is a popular tradition in the December holidays and as Hanukkah is also called The Festival of Lights and it celebrates both the restoration of the Jerusalem Temple with the relighting of the menorah and Yeshua coming to be The Light of the world I believe we have more of a right to decorate our homes with lights than the Christmas celebrators.
As this was shared through a social media posting, I got a notice that someone I do not know somehow saw the pictures and shared one with the caption: “So this is where we got the Christmas lights.” Of course, that’s not at all true and not anything I would ever say. However, what would happen if this person had some influence on others and this idea began to grow and become a popular belief?
This is how we are at a place today where the majority of “Christians” believe The Bible teaches the exact opposite of what The Bible actually teaches. Take, for example, the phrase “not under the law” used twice in Paul’s writings. If we studied the immediate context of both passages where this statement appears, the broader context of Paul’s writings and theology, the beliefs of the other apostles, the beliefs of Yeshua, and the context of Scripture as a whole we can find out that it is illogical to view this phrase in the manner antinomians do. Yet, at some point someone read that phrase and misunderstood it to mean that “Christians” do not have to follow at least some of God’s Laws. Since this is such an appealing idea, people began to believe it. And while this study is not focused on the entire history of “Christian” religion, we are now close to two-thousand years later with the overwhelming majority of people who claim to be “Christians” believing something that it the exact opposite of what Paul actually taught.
In the beginning of this message I highlighted several points of basic understanding regarding The Bible. One of these is that every single person who was chosen to write their portion of The Bible lived by The Torah and their entry in Scripture was written to teach us to live by The Torah. This means that to use any verse or passage from The Bible to support antinomian, “not under the law”, or “we no longer have to follow that commandment” views is automatically using it out of context because the person who wrote the passage being quoted did not believe those things to be true. You simply cannot quote The Bible to support anti-Torah views without misrepresenting the Bible author you are quoting.
All of the popular misunderstandings of “Christianity” can trace back to misunderstanding something stated in The Bible and taking it out of context. This is how people have come to believe they do not have to keep the biblical Sabbath Day, thinking it abolished, changed to “Sunday”, or the strange idea that “Jesus is our Sabbath now”. It is why most “Christians” believe the food laws are abolished or that they do not need to celebrate what they have deemed “Jewish holidays”. It’s even why they celebrate Christmas and Easter, believing what is based in wild calculation theories from the third and fourth centuries popularized by the Roman Catholic religion that were built on misunderstandings of Scripture and went unquestioned for over a thousand years until early Protestant Reformationists began challenging them, albeit with a heavily anti-Catholic bias that cast a dark shadow over otherwise valid findings. Christmas and Easter dates were determined through a wrong understanding of certain biblical passages and are closely linked with several pagan religious festivals.
But it was too late. After over a thousand years even the force of the Reformation could not overturn over a thousand years of bad theology and it would not take long before Protestants once again embraced the ways of the Catholic religion. The same happened with the Pentecostal Movement. If you study the earliest Pentecostals they returned to at least some aspects of Scripture. Pioneers of the movement like Smith Wigglesworth and Maria Woodworth-Etter are, for example, documented as following the biblical food laws and the city of Zion, Illinois where many early Pentecostal ministers were raised up—including Charles Parham, John G. Lake, and F.F. Bosworth—upheld a citywide ban on eating anything The Bible deems unclean. But through what is often called the Charismatic Renewal the influences of mainstream “Christianity” came into the Pentecostal circles and today most Pentecostals do not hold to these very same biblical standards that their founding fathers upheld.
Today there is a movement to embrace the whole counsel of Scripture, a return to the same Torah-positive beliefs held by every single person who had a hand in writing The Bible. Because of the information explosion created by the Internet many are beginning to see the gross errors of nearly two thousand years of popular but errant “Christian” theology. This leaves one question to be asked: If you have read this message, and especially if you also read the previous message titled Questions For Christians, are you going to continue to adhere to the “Christian” religion that in so many ways stands against what The Bible teaches?
Whether or not you continue to identify as a Christian is perhaps a personal choice. There are some who find the truth and feel the term has become so tainted that much like that bronze serpent that started as ordained by God became a source of idolatry and had to be destroyed. Others see what the word “Christian” actually meant in the first century—to live as one enslaved to Yeshua and His Torah lifestyle—and continue to identify with it through a better understanding of what it really means to be a Christian. Either way, however, you have to decide if you want to embrace a whole Bible truth or stay in modern-day false “Christianity”.
In my previous message, Questions For Christians, I presented a number of questions about The Sabbath, the food laws, the biblical Feast Days, the secular-pagan holidays of Roman Catholicism, and the Torah-keeping context of every book of The Bible. These are questions that popular modern-day mainstream “Christians” cannot give answers to, other than to admit they have been wrong about these matters—if they actually decide to be honest for once. In this message I have addressed several of the most common objections made by those who have been brainwashed into thinking they do not have to follow The Torah, even though that is literally the message of the serpent in Genesis 3. I have described in detail how Satan is the lawless one and lawlessness is being against The Torah. I have described how Yeshua is The Righteous One and righteousness is defined in Scripture as obeying The Torah. I have talked about how The Bible repeatedly and only associates loving God and loving Yeshua with keeping The Torah.
Should it even take all of this to convince you that you are supposed to follow the Leviticus 11 food laws by not eating unclean things like pork and shellfish? Should anyone have to go to these lengths to show you that The Sabbath Day is sunset Friday to sunset Saturday on our modern calendar system and it is still to be kept? Do you really need such detailed explanations of the origins of holidays like Christmas and Easter to reject them in exchange for celebrating God’s Holy Days that are actually in The Bible? I can only hope I have done enough to convince someone somewhere to actually follow the biblical Messiah, Yeshua, which is only possible by also following The Torah.
Blessings and Shalom
©2023 Truth Ignited Ministry
