Old Wine

Review of Solberg’s “Toraism”

This book is dangerous! Solberg seeks to turn the reader against what Jesus described as the greatest commandment, loving (and obeying) God. The connection between the two is emphasized in 1 John 5:3. I bought and read this book because I don’t think it’s intellectually honest to only read books that I think I’ll agree with. I also wanted to see if he raised any points that I had not previously considered. He didn’t.

As the son of a Baptist pastor, I grew up with the same beliefs that Solberg is promoting. After graduating from Bible college and seminary, I had the idea to teach a class on how the Torah changed from being normative to being obsolete (since that is what I’d always been taught). With that question in mind, I read the entire New Testament. By the time I finished, I had changed my mind. This change became solidified a few years later when I discovered the Fiscus Judaicus, a heavy Roman tax on Jews (or those who acted Jewish). It was a great incentive for followers of Jesus to abandon any of God’s commands that looked Jewish.

Jesus and his early followers taught Judaism, with the additional idea that Jesus was the promised Messiah. Jesus insisted repeatedly that not a jot or tittle of the law would change until heaven and earth pass away. (Luke 16:17; Matthew 5:17-19) Solberg mentions the Matthew passage, but seems to think that the time-frame Jesus had in mind was a few months until his crucifixion.

Peter’s warning in 2 Peter 3 should be a wake-up call. He points out that Paul’s letters are confusing, and those who misunderstand them tend to fall into “the error of lawless men”. This should alert us to which side of the law Paul is on. A good example of this error is in Acts 21, when believers in Jerusalem (who are zealous for the Torah) have believed the false rumor that Paul taught people to disobey the Torah. I believe that they thought this through misunderstanding Paul’s letter to the Galatians, as many do today. In any event, Paul went to a lot of trouble to prove to them that he lived according to the Torah.

Solberg seems unaware of the many places where Paul affirms the Torah in his writings. He mentions Romans 3:31 but doesn’t do much to rebut it. He doesn’t mention Romans 2:13 which says that it isn’t the hearers of Torah but those who do it who live righteously. Throughout Romans 7 Paul says that the Torah is: holy (vs. 12), spiritual (vs. 14), good (vs. 16), certainly not sin (vs. 7), and concludes by saying that in his inner being he delights in God’s Torah (vs. 22). For those who think that the Torah was only for Jews, in 1 Corinthians 7:19 he says that it doesn’t matter whether you’re Jewish or Gentile, keeping God’s commands is what counts.

Jesus’ parable of the Prodigal Son seems to be talking about the history of “Christianity”. What became Christianity abandoned many of God’s commands in the 2nd century, in contrast to the older brother, Israel. The bulk of Christianity has been out “feeding pigs” since the 2nd century. It’s encouraging that there seems to be an end-times movement to repent and return to the Father.

Both Galatians and Acts 15 are talking about not converting to Judaism, rather than not obeying Torah. It was difficult for Gentiles to embrace total Torah obedience all at once, which they would have to do if they converted to Judaism (Galatians 5:3). Acts 15 presents four rules to start with, and encourages Gentiles to attend synagogue every Sabbath and embrace Torah gradually as they come to understand it. It’s ironic, in hindsight, that three of the four rules given are dietary restrictions.

Solberg seems to think that the early followers of Jesus met to worship on the first day of the week. There is no hint of this in the New Testament. The event in Acts 20:7-12 is a community meal late Saturday evening. They had to wait until the Sabbath ended at sunset to prepare hot food. But Paul was leaving the next day, so they couldn’t wait. Paul was not preaching; he was dialoguing. (That’s the Greek word used.) In 1 Corinthians 16:2 Paul instructs his readers to set aside money at home. He mentions the first day of the week because money was not to be handled on the Sabbath. As far as Revelation 1:10 goes, John was transported in spirit to the future Day of the Lord, which the biblical prophets talked about as a time of judgment. Christians like to translate it as the “Lord’s Day”, but Sunday wasn’t called that until centuries later.

For those who think that the Torah was only given to Israel, remember that it was a mixed multitude at Sinai (Exodus 12:38). The core of the group was Israel, and Israel was the only group of any size who was interested in obeying God, so in a sense the Torah was given primarily to Israel. But there are at least a half dozen verse in Torah that say that the same law is for the native-born and the foreigner. Leviticus 18:24-28 makes it clear that the sexual perversions mentioned were a major reason the people of Canaan were cast out. So they clearly were not only for Israel. And Isaiah 56 tells us that God is pleased when foreigners keep his Sabbaths. (The plural indicates that it includes the feast days.) In addition, Isaiah 66:23 and Zechariah 14:16 indicate that Sabbath and festivals will be observed in the Messianic kingdom. (cf. Matthew 24:20)

It’s interesting that the Holy Spirit was given on Pentecost (Shavuot), the anniversary of the giving of the Torah at Sinai. One of the functions of the Holy Spirit is to help people keep God’s Torah. (Ezekiel 36:27) This is confirmed by Romans 8:4 which says that God condemned sin in sinful man, in order that the righteous requirements of the law might be fully met in us, who do not live according to the sinful nature but according to the Spirit. The passage goes on to say that the sinful mind is hostile to God. It does not submit to God’s law, nor can it do so. (8:7)

There is much more in the New Testament, and certainly the Old Testament, that would lead us to follow Torah. But space limits what I can cover here. The more I study the New Testament, the more I am convinced that we should follow Torah. Paul summarized it in 2 Timothy 3:16 when he said that All Scripture (the Hebrew Scripture was all that he knew) is God-breathed and profitable for teaching, rebuking, correcting, and training in righteousness.

Two End-Times Movements

Jews and Christians are both right about some things and wrong about other things. As the time approaches for Messiah’s return, I think that both groups will draw closer to the truth, and thus closer to each other.

In the second century most of “Christianity” abandoned many of the commands God gave through Moses, mostly in reaction to the Fiscus Judaicus, a heavy Roman tax on Jews (or those who acted Jewishly). As a result, they distanced themselves from the Judaism that Jesus and his early followers taught, and selected a different holy day than the one God specified, as well as ignoring several other commands. They started to read Paul’s letters as opposing keeping God’s commands, even though he affirmed the Torah many times, and Jesus repeatedly insisted that not a jot or tittle would fail from the Torah until heaven and earth passed away. This viewpoint became church tradition until the present.

On the other hand, one of the big reasons that Jews have generally rejected Jesus’ claim to be the Messiah is that faithful Jews know that no true Messiah would cancel God’s commands that he gave to his people. Paul writes in Romans 11 that Israel has stumbled, but not so as to fall (vs. 11). They have always been God’s people, and God has not rejected his people (vs. 1). All Israel will be saved (vs. 26).

My understanding is that as Messiah’s return approaches, Christians will turn back to God and start obeying his commands more and more. This reflects Jesus’ parable of the Prodigal Son. It’s significant that the story includes an older brother, representing Jews. Gentile Christianity has been out feeding pigs since the 2nd century. I believe that many will repent and return to the Father.

It’s encouraging to see a number of ministries leading people in this general direction. Some of these include David Wilber, 119 Ministries, Torah Resource, First Fruits of Zion, and several others. Of course there is some craziness in some Torah circles. Some people come up with strange names for Jesus that have no basis in reality. The Greek name, “Iesous”, is a transliteration of two Hebrew names: Yehoshua (Joshua) and Yeshua (which sounds like the Hebrew word for “salvation”). Messiah’s Hebrew name must have been one of these. Anything else is made up. But as time goes on, I expect more and more people to turn back to following Torah, as Jesus and his early followers taught.

As this occurs, there will be less and less reason for Jews to reject Jesus, as the realization grows that Jesus taught Judaism (which, in its core, was a revelation from God). In Zechariah 12:10 it says that the Jews “will look on me, the one they have pierced, and they will mourn for him as one mourns for an only child.” When Jesus returns, Israel will accept him as their king. This is reflected in Revelation 1:7. “Look, he is coming with the clouds, and every eye will see him, even those who pierced him; and all the peoples of the earth will mourn because of him.”

This whole story of Jesus coming to be killed and then to reign is foreshadowed in the story of Joseph in Genesis. He claimed royalty by having dreams of people bowing down to him, and his brothers hated him for it. They metaphorically killed him, casting him into a pit and telling their father that he was dead. But then they were shocked to find, many years later, that he was a ruler in Egypt who saved them from starvation. He fully forgave them, and moved the whole family into his country to live. Jesus’ brothers, the Jews, will be fully forgiven, and will embrace Jesus ruling over them when the time comes.

These two movements, of Christians returning to following God’s laws, and Jews accepting the Messiahship of Jesus, are two trends that I expect to see growing as the end of this age approaches. If you belong to one of these groups, consider how you can fit into these movements.

“Yehovah” is Not a Word

“Yehovah”, or “Jehovah”, which the King James version of the Bible uses as the name for God, is actually not a word. It is the consonants of one word with the vowels of another. Here is why.

The Hebrew Bible was originally written with all consonants. The vowels were added by the Masoretes in the Middle Ages to help with pronunciation. The name of God is composed of the consonants “YHVH” (or YHWH). If you look at the Name in a Hebrew Bible, it looks like it should be pronounced “Yehovah”. But this is misleading.

It’s almost certain that the first syllable is pronounced “Yah”, because this short form of the Name is used often in the Hebrew Scripture (e.g. Psalm 122:4). This short form is also the last syllable of the word “Hallelu-Yah”, which is an imperative meaning “Praise Yah”.

It’s also well-known that Jews in general did not say the name of God for fear of taking his name in vain, one of the prohibitions in the Ten Commandments. They would typically substitute another word, often the word “Adonai”, which means “Lord”. Many modern Bible translations use the word “LORD” where the Hebrew has “YHVH” for this very reason. It’s also clear that Jesus followed this tradition, as there is no record in the New Testament of him pronouncing God’s Name.

When the Masoretes added vowels to the Hebrew Bible in the Middle Ages, they added the vowels of “Adonai” to the divine Name to remind people to pronounce it this way. We know this because when the Name occurs alongside the word “Adonai”, they insert the vowels of the word “Elohim”, the word for “God”. This occurs a lot in the book of Ezekiel (e.g. 3:27; 4:14; 5:5). If pronounced as written, this comes out sounding like “Yehovee”.

Some people (with a limited knowledge of Hebrew) complain that the first vowel of “Adonai” is different from the first vowel added to the divine Name. This seems to be true, but really isn’t. The first vowel of “Adonai” is a compound vowel, a shewa and a qamats, known as a “hateph qamats”. This is a very short form of an ‘A’ vowel, which is why it’s transliterated with an ‘A’ in “Adonai”. But the compound vowels, such as the hateph qamats, only occur under a few consonants (gutterals), mainly Alef and Ayin. Under normal letters, such as Yodh, this vowel becomes a vocal shewa, which is transliterated with an ‘E’. That’s why the word that looks like “Yehovah” has an ‘E’ in the first syllable; it’s a shewa representing the hateph qamats in “Adonai”.

A similar thing, though not as visible, happens with the first vowel of “Elohim”, a hateph seghol, which is transliterated with an ‘E’. When it becomes a shewa in the divine Name, it remains an ‘E’ in English. The shewa in the divine Name and the compound vowels in “Adonai” and “Elohim” are really the same class of vowels, not different. It’s just that the shewa is required under a Yodh.

Although we are pretty sure that the first syllable of the divine Name is “Yah”, the next syllable is anybody’s guess. Some think that the Name is “Yahweh”, but that’s just a guess. Many names in the Bible had “Yah” as part of their name, such as Isaiah and Jeremiah. If we today want to use the Name of God, we should either use the short form, “Yah”, or substitute another word such as “Adonai” or “HaShem” (“the name”). It’s totally inappropriate to use “Jehovah” or “Yehovah” to refer to God.

Wine and the Bible

I grew up in a family that considered drinking wine or any alcoholic drink to be contrary to Scripture. Many churches teach this. Are they correct? Let’s consider the teachings of the Bible.

There are certainly passages that warn against the overuse of alcoholic drinks. “Wine is a mocker and beer a brawler; whoever is led astray by them is not wise.” (Proverbs 20:1) “Do not get drunk on wine, which leads to debauchery.” (Ephesians 5:18) There are passages that seem to treat it more positively. “He makes grass grow for the cattle,… wine that gladdens the heart of man.” (Psalm 104:14-15) And Paul tells Timothy to “use a little wine because of your stomach and your frequent illnesses.” (1 Timothy 5:23) Many interpreters consider these kinds of passages to be referring to unfermented wine, grape juice. So what does the Bible really teach about this?

When I went off to a Christian college (which prohibited drinking wine), I started to have second thoughts about this issue. The first passage that made me reconsider was in John 2, where Jesus changed water into wine. It seemed clear that the wine he made was considered much better than the wine they had drunk previously. It seemed hard to imagine that this superior wine was just grape juice. Luke points out in Luke 5:39 that no one prefers new wine to old wine. So it seemed likely that Jesus made the water into alcoholic wine.

Another thing to consider is that Jesus was accused of being a drunkard compared to John the Baptist. (Matthew 11:19) John, like Samson, was a lifelong Nazirite. (cp. Numbers 6) A Nazirite was not to cut his hair or eat or drink anything made from grapes. In the Matthew passage Jesus says that, in contrast to John, he came eating and drinking, and they called him a glutton and a drunkard. That was probably an extreme exaggeration, but there’s no way to square this passage with the idea that Jesus never drank fermented wine.

In a passage that we alluded to earlier, Jesus mentions both old wine and new wine. (Luke 5:36-39) In a parable (or metaphor) he says that no one puts new wine in old wineskins because the fermentation will destroy the wineskin. This parable has been widely misinterpreted as meaning that Jesus’ message corresponds to new wine, which should be put in new wineskins. It might be possible to understand it this way if the wineskin metaphor stood alone. But it doesn’t; it’s part of a double metaphor. The other part is that no one puts a new patch on an old garment, because as it stretches, it will tear the garment. With a little bit of thought we realize that if Jesus was identifying with new wine being put in new wineskins, he would also be identifying with a new patch being put on a new garment. But that is ludicrous! You don’t patch new garments. It’s clear that the point he’s making here is that the appropriate patch for an old garment is an old patch. New garments are irrelevant to patches. Hence, he is identifying his message with old wine (not new) that should be put in old wineskins. Jesus’ message is not a new religion, but a patching of the old garment of Judaism, revealed by God through Moses. We all realize that in most circumstances, “new” is better than “old”. But when the context is patching and wine, it’s clear that he’s identifying with the old.

If these passages aren’t convincing enough, a passage that should settle the issue with finality is Isaiah 25:6. “On this mountain the LORD Almighty will prepare a feast of rich food for all peoples, a banquet of aged wine– the best of meats and the finest of wines.” This is speaking of the future Messianic kingdom, and God’s banquet includes “aged wine”.

It’s clear that God considers fermented wine an appropriate drink for celebration. For many centuries Jews have typically drunk a glass or two of wine on Friday evening to celebrate the Sabbath. And this is entirely in line with Scripture. The teaching of the Bible is that it’s fine to drink wine. Just don’t drink so much that it affects your judgment or ability to function.

The churches that teach that the Bible prohibits drinking wine are clearly wrong. Maybe they’re just trying to be safe. But they’re teaching something that disagrees with the Bible, and they should reconsider.

Understanding Galatians

Paul’s letter to the Galatians has been greatly misunderstood throughout Christian history. It was one of his earliest letters, and the misunderstanding started as early as Acts 21. In this chapter Paul was visiting Jerusalem, where there were thousands of followers of Jesus, all zealous for the law that God gave through Moses. But for some reason they seemed to believe a false rumor that Paul was teaching contrary to the law. Paul went to a lot of trouble to show that he lived according to the law.

Why did these believers think that Paul opposed the law? It’s likely that they were familiar with Paul’s letter to the Galatians, which is easy to take that way if you’re not familiar with what Paul is talking about. An appropriate background consideration is Peter’s statement in 2 Peter 3, that Paul’s letters are confusing, and those who misunderstand them are likely to fall into “the error of lawless men.” This statement seems to be specifically a comment regarding Galatians.

It’s important that we realize that both Galatians and Acts 15 are dealing with the same topic, and were probably written about the same time. That topic is the question of whether Gentile believers should convert to Judaism. A person converting to Judaism was required to do three things: become circumcised (if male), be immersed in a mikveh, and vow to follow the law. That’s why following the law is mentioned in Acts 15:5. Some Jewish believers obviously thought that Gentiles should convert. The apostles discussed the issue at length, and concluded that they shouldn’t. Instead, they gave the Gentiles four basic laws to start with. Then they implied that they should attend synagogue every Sabbath, and embrace God’s commands as they came to understand them. (15:21)

In Galatians Paul writes in no uncertain terms that Gentiles should not convert to Judaism (be circumcised). He calls this “another gospel” in 1:6-9. It’s clear from a plain reading of Acts and Romans that Paul tried to live according to God’s commands in the law, and he encouraged his readers to as well.

But in Galatians Paul uses a couple of phrases that are often taken to imply otherwise. One, “erga nomou”, is often translated “works of the law”, and the other, “upo nomou”, is often translated, “under the law.” Both of these translations are misleading. For one thing, neither of them has the definite article (“the”) in Greek. So it’s not at all clear that they refer to the law given through Moses. Paul used the word for “law” in several different senses.

The phrase “under law” seems to refer to the penalty of law, i.e. you sin — you die. This is contrasted with “under grace”, which is the condition of a believer after Jesus paid for sins with his death on the cross. Sin no longer leads to death. But that doesn’t mean that we should willingly sin. God expressed how he wants his followers to live, and we should obey him.

The other phrase, “erga nomou”, “works of law”, is, I think, best understood by Jewish scholar Dr. Mark Nanos. He explains it fully on his website, https://MarkNanos.com . He prefers to translate it as “rites of a custom”, and sees it as referring to Gentiles converting to Judaism, as that is what Paul is talking about in this letter. Paul points out that people are not saved by converting to Judaism but by Jesus’ death. He points out that converting would obligate a person to obey the entire law (5:3), which would be overwhelmingly difficult for someone not raised in Judaism. That is why the apostles gave Gentiles the option of embracing the law gradually.

In closing, I want to point out that in 1 Corinthians 7:19 Paul essentially said that it doesn’t matter whether you’re Jewish or Gentile, keeping God’s commands is what counts. That should be the desire of each one of us, to love God and obey him. (cp. 1 John 5:3)

The End of the Law

In Romans 10:4 it says that “Christ is the end of the law.” This is a decent translation. But many people have misunderstood it to mean that Christ is the termination of the law. If this was what Paul actually meant, it would contradict virtually all of Christ’s teaching during his ministry. For example, he states rather emphatically in Luke 16:17 that “It is easier for heaven and earth to disappear than for the least stroke of a pen to drop out of the law.” He said many things like this. One of the best-known is Matthew 5:17 where he says, “Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets.” That seems pretty unambiguous.

The problem is that “end” can have different meanings. Consider the phrase, “The end justifies the means.” In this phrase, “end” means “goal” or “purpose”. This is actually a common meaning of the Greek word, “telos”, that we find here. An example is a similar verse in I Timothy 1:5, which in KJV reads, “Now the end of the commandment is charity…”. More recent translations tend to read, “The goal of this command is love…”, which captures the sense much better.

If we consider that Paul meant that the goal or purpose of the law is Christ, it opens up new insights. The reason that the law was given was to have people who obeyed it. Jesus was a person who kept it perfectly. In other contexts it states that he fulfilled it (e.g. Matthew 5:17), which means the same thing. If he had not kept it perfectly, he could not have been our sinless sacrifice.

Unfortunately, during the second century, the Fiscus Judaicus, a heavy tax on Jews or those who acted Jewishly, gave Gentile followers of Jesus a big incentive to reject all of God’s commands that looked Jewish. They distanced themselves from Judaism and from obedience to God in these ways and started calling themselves “Christians”. They were able to find phrases that Paul used that could be interpreted as countering the law of Moses. In other cases, they translated the passage so that it seemed to say that. (e.g. Mark 7:19, Galatians 2:14) It became Christian tradition that followers of Jesus were not to follow God’s commands given through Moses, even though there are many passages that teach otherwise.

II Peter 3 should have warned them about this trend. In verses 15-17 the author states that some of Paul’s epistles are hard to understand, and people that misunderstand them are liable to fall into the error of lawless men. Much of Christianity seems to have fallen into this error, in spite of passages like I John 5:3 that says that loving God entails obeying him and I Corinthians 7:19 that states that it doesn’t matter if you’re Jewish or Gentile, the main thing is keeping God’s commands. The Christian church, like the Prodigal Son, has been out feeding pigs since the second century. Let us pray that it wakes up and decides to return to the Father.

Paul vs. Nascent “Christianity”

We’ve seen that the “Christianity” that arose during the second century was very different in some ways from the Judaism that Jesus and his early followers taught. This new perspective seems to have arisen first in Rome, and Paul’s epistle to the Romans pushes back strongly against it. Paul had not been to Rome at this point, but he had heard about issues and attitudes that were affecting the group of Jesus-followers there. His epistle seems to be aimed primarily at Gentiles, to correct their attitudes toward Jews and Judaism.

In this epistle, Paul uses a phrase, “may genoito”, that means “absolutely not!”. It is the strongest possible negative. In this epistle it is used ten times, far more than in any of his other writings. And most or all these occurrences seem to be used to push back on this nascent Christianity. We will look at each of them here.

1,2: The first two usages are found early in chapter 3, in verses 4 and 6. “What advantage, then, is there in being a Jew, or what value is there in circumcision? Much in every way! First of all, they have been entrusted with the very words of God. What if some did not have faith? Will their lack of faith nullify God’s faithfulness? Not at all! Let God be true, and every man a liar. As it is written: ‘So that you may be proved right when you speak and prevail when you judge.’ But if our unrighteousness brings out God’s righteousness more clearly, what shall we say? That God is unjust in bringing his wrath on us? (I am using a human argument.) Certainly not! If that were so, how could God judge the world? Someone might argue, ‘If my falsehood enhances God’s truthfulness and so increases his glory, why am I still condemned as a sinner?’ Why not say– as we are being slanderously reported as saying and as some claim that we say– ‘Let us do evil that good may result’? Their condemnation is deserved.” (Romans 3:1-8)

This new group of Christians was opposing and distancing themselves from Jews, while Paul was pointing out that Jews were God’s chosen people and possessed God’s revelation in their scriptures. The first use of “may genoito”, in verse 4, seems to be referencing the idea that Jews must become Christians in order to gain God’s favor. Paul strongly denies that.

2: The second use of the phrase in verse 6 seems to address the idea that once we are forgiven, it doesn’t matter what we do. God will not judge sin and disobedience. This is totally wrong.

3: The next occurrence is in 3:31. “Do we, then, nullify the law by this faith? Not at all! Rather, we uphold the law.” This is a verse that seems to be ignored by most Christians. Yet it clearly expresses Paul’s position regarding the law of Moses. Faith in Jesus does not cancel God’s commands in the law, despite what Christian tradition came later to teach.

4: The next occurrence is in 6:2. “What shall we say, then? Shall we go on sinning so that grace may increase? By no means! We died to sin; how can we live in it any longer?” (6:1-2) It seems to address a similar issue to an earlier one, the idea that once we are forgiven, it doesn’t matter what we do. This is totally wrong, but seems to have been gaining traction in the Roman group.

5: The next use of this phrase is in 6:15. “What then? Shall we sin because we are not under law but under grace? By no means!” It addresses a similar idea, that since believers are no longer under the penalty of law (you sin, you die), that it’s okay to sin, ignoring God’s commands. This idea has been embraced by virtually all of Christianity in the years since, and Paul denies it strongly.

6: The next use of the phrase is in 7:7. “What shall we say, then? Is the law sin? Certainly not! Indeed I would not have known what sin was except through the law.” Some of the 2nd-century church fathers taught that it was wrong to do some of the things that God commanded, like observing the 7th-day Sabbath. Here Paul denies that idea in no uncertain terms. Keeping the law is not sin; it is obeying God.

7: The next use of the phrase is in 7:13. “Did that which is good, then become death to me? By no means! But in order that sin might be recognized as sin, it produced death in me through what was good, so that through the commandment sin might become utterly sinful.” In this chapter Paul repeatedly uses positive words to describe the law: “holy” (v. 12), “spiritual” (v. 14), and “good” (v. 16). He closes the chapter by saying, “For in my inner being I delight in God’s law.” (v. 22) and “So then, I myself in my mind am a slave to God’s law” (v. 25). But in verse 13 he points out that the purpose of the law is to define sin. Defining sin does not produce death. But recognizing sin, we should try hard to avoid it.

8: The next use is in 9:14. “What then shall we say? Is God unjust? Not at all! For he says to Moses, ‘I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.'” (9:14-15) God will save whom he wants to save. We can not necessarily identify who those will end up being. Many think that only Christians will be saved. But Paul states in 11:26 that all Israel will be saved.

9: The next use is in 11:1 where Paul addresses those who think that God has rejected Israel in favor of the “church”. Paul denies that strongly by saying, “I ask, then: Did God reject his people? By no means! I am an Israelite myself, a descendant of Abraham, from the tribe of Benjamin. God did not reject his people, whom he foreknew.” There are many places in the scripture, especially the end of Jeremiah 31 and 33, where God promises he will never reject Israel. But this nascent Christianity thought that Jesus-followers had replaced Israel as God’s people. Paul had to set them straight on that error.

10: This is reinforced by the tenth use of the phrase in 11:11. “Again I ask: Did they stumble so as to fall beyond recovery? Not at all!” Israel stumbled by not recognizing Jesus as Messiah. But they didn’t stumble so as to fall, which is what the original Greek actually says. The following metaphor of an olive tree describes some Jews as branches that were “broken”, but not “broken off”, despite some errant translations. Jews are always God’s people. Gentile believers in Jesus have been grafted in among them and share the nourishing sap from the olive root.

It’s worth noticing that the New Covenant, as described in Jeremiah 31, is made with Israel. Gentiles are only included because of their partnership with Israel. And one of the results of this New Covenant is that God’s law will be placed in all minds and written on all hearts. (Jeremiah 31:33) God’s law will be the standard of behavior in the Messianic kingdom, and should certainly be the standard of behavior for his followers today.

Not Under Law

Paul uses the phrase “under law” (hupo nomon) several times in his epistles. He often contrasts it with being “under grace.” He tells his readers that they are not under law but under grace. What does he mean by this?

Since the second century, when much of “Christianity” abandoned following God’s commandments in order to avoid paying the tax on Jews, many have interpreted the phrase to mean that followers of Jesus should no longer keep the laws God gave through Moses. That interpretation met their need to find “biblical” support for the idea, but it sharply contradicts many clear statements by both Jesus and Paul. That cannot possibly be Paul’s view on it.

It’s important to note that there is never a definite article in this phrase. It’s never ‘under THE law,” even though many translators render it that way. And the word “law” in Paul’s writing had quite a range of meanings. Paul contrasts the law of God, in which he delights, with the law of sin. (Romans 7:22-25)

One possible meaning for the phrase “under law” might be to distinguish Jews from Gentiles. When he tells his readers that they are not under law but under grace, he might be saying that they are not Jews but Gentiles. Unfortunately, this potential meaning seems to be undermined by an interesting passage in 1 Corinthians 9:19-22. In this passage Paul claims that he himself is not under law. But we know that Paul considered himself to be Jewish, even a Pharisee, all his life. (Acts 23:6) So he can’t be using the phrase to designate Jews.

In the very next verse (1 Cor. 9:21) Paul claims that he is not free from God’s law. This is a verse that many “Christian” interpreters like to ignore. But it fits with Paul’s affirmations of the law in 1 Corinthians 7:19; Romans 3:31, and many other places.

It seems best to understand Paul’s phrase, “under law”, to refer to being under the penalty of the law; if you sin, you die. Once a person trusts Jesus, he is not under this penalty. He is not under law (death for his sins) but under grace. This would fit Paul’s statement that he is not “under law”, as he has trusted in Jesus. It could also fit Paul’s statement in Galatians 4:4 that Jesus was born “under law”, since he was in a situation that if he sinned, he would die. But he didn’t sin, so he was the perfect sacrifice.

The phrase cannot possibly mean that the believer should ignore the instructions in the law. Jesus taught against that understanding many times, including Luke 16:17, where he says that “It is easier for heaven and earth to disappear than for the least stroke of a pen to drop out of the Law.” Paul himself teaches against that idea many times. In 1 Cor. 7:19 he basically says that it doesn’t matter if you’re Jewish or Gentile, keeping God’s commands is what counts. Let’s not try to avoid obeying God’s instructions, but rather find out how God wants us to live, and obey that out of our love for God.

Messiah’s Name

What was the name of the Messiah when he was here on earth? The Greek New Testament refers to him exclusively by the name, “Iesous”. This has commonly been transliterated into English by the word “Jesus”.

This is unusual for a few reasons. One is that neither Greek nor Hebrew has any letter that sounds like the English ‘j’. Why did they use that letter to transliterate so many names? It seems to have some relation to the idea that in German, the sound of ‘y’ is represented by the letter ‘j’. Since the Bible was translated into German before English, it seems that there must have been some influence.

In Greek the letter in question is an iota, the equivalent of our ‘i’. This Greek letter usually replaces the Hebrew yodh, the equivalent of our ‘y’.

We can learn a lot by observing the Septuagint, the Greek translation of the Hebrew Bible, which was done a couple of centuries B.C.E. There are two names in the Hebrew Bible that are transliterated as “Iesous”. One is the name “Yehoshua”, which we know as Joshua, the leader of Israel after Moses. He was originally known as Hoshea, but Moses renamed him Yehoshua. (Numbers 13:16) The Greek Septuagint transliterates his previous name as “Ause”, and his later name as “Iesous”. The meaning of Yehoshua is “Yah will save”. The Greek transliteration, “Iesous”, does not have any particular meaning in Greek except as a transliteration of a Hebrew name.

The other Hebrew name that is transliterated by “Iesous” in the Septuagint is “Yeshua”, translated in most English Bibles as “Jeshua”. This is the name of several people mentioned in Ezra and Nehemiah. It appears to be a shortened form of “Yehoshua”. The short form carries the meaning of “he saves”.

Since the Jesus of the New Testament lived in a culture that was Hebrew-speaking (or possibly Aramaic), he would have gone by his Hebrew name, rather than a Greek one. This is consistent with the account in Matthew 1, where an angel tells Joseph that “you are to give him the name Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins”. (Matthew 1:21) This only makes sense if they were speaking Hebrew and discussing the name “Yeshua” or “Yehoshua”, since they are both derived from the verb “to save”.

It seems clear that the name given to the man who was to be the Messiah was either Yeshua or Yehoshua. Unfortunately, some religious groups have started calling him “Yahshua” or “Yahusha” in order to try to include the name of God in his name. There is no evidence whatsoever for a name like this; it is entirely made up.

The Hebrews did include God’s name in people’s names; but they didn’t do it like that. They included the word “El” in names like Nathaniel. When they wanted to include the name of Yah, they would sometimes insert it at the end, in the form “-yahu”, as in “Yirmeyahu” (Jeremiah). Other times they would insert it at the beginning, in the form “Yeho-“, as in “Yehoshaphat” (Jehoshaphat) or “Yehoshua”.

It’s clear that the name of Messiah was either Yeshua or Yehoshua, probably the shorter form. It was never “Yahshua”, or anything like that. It’s a serious error to be making up names for Messiah, and we should avoid doing it at all costs.

The Mezuzah

In a passage of central importance for Jews, in Deuteronomy 6, it says this, “Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one. Love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength. These commandments that I give you today are to be upon your hearts. Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. Tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads. Write them on the doorframes of your houses and on your gates.” Based on this passage, Jews often place a small box containing a bit of scripture on their doorpost. This “mezuzah” helps to remind them of God and his word. When they enter or exit the house, they touch the mezuzah and kiss their finger to express their love for God and his word.

I think that this is a habit that would be beneficial for followers of Jesus, too. It would remind them of God often during the day. Jesus said that the greatest command was to love God. By touching the mezuzah, you can express your love for God and remind yourself of God’s presence throughout the day.

You can find mezuzot (the plural of mezuzah) at most sellers of Judaica. Just do an online search for Judaica or mezuzah, and you shouldn’t have any trouble finding one. Attach it to your doorframe about head-high and you’ll be on your way. You still need to get into the habit of acknowledging it, but over time you should get used to it. Start finding one today.