Apostle Paul and Torah of Moses

My Hesitation

As I write on this topic, I do so with “fear and trepidation.” The reason is that this is a highly controversial topic, but since I already opened “Pandora’s box” in my last section, I have no choice but to address the topic in more detail – Is there, or is there not, one Law for everyone? My last paragraph stated the following:

Could it be that Paul envisioned one Torah for Jews and Gentiles but two sets of laws applicable to each group? Could it be that later, “Muslims” and “Christians” were generally wrong (that there can be only one law for all people)? Could it be that “Judaism”, though in the minority, was actually right? There was one Torah for both (Jews and Gentiles), but two sets of laws in the Torah, appropriately and respectively applicable to each.

Before I begin, a disclaimer may be in order. I honor and love modern Christ-followers who may hold views with which I will disagree in this article. For me, while this topic is of great importance, love and respect between followers of the Jewish Christ must reign supreme – as one great theologian once said: “If Christians are at war with each other, they must not be at war with the world!” So do continue to consider my writing as a conversation and a continual invitation to think about these important topics, presented only with great respect to all sides involved.

Torah is Not Law

Before we continue, we must define our terminology. I define the Torah as a collection of the first five books in the Jewish and Christian Bibles. The Torah (which in Hebrew means something like “instruction” or “teaching”) is a multi-genre work attributed largely to Moses, which contains poetry, stories, prophecies, testimonies, calls to worship, as well as a wide variety of laws.

By the time the Judeo-Greek Septuagint was available (translations of the books of the Torah were available much earlier than the rest of the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament), the Jewish sages residing in Greek-speaking lands began to routinely call the Torah – Nomos, which in Greek basically (though not only) means – the Law.

Whether the Greek word chosen best describes the Torah is still unclear, but the fact of the matter is that the deed is done. Torah in Greek becomes nomos. However, as we are dealing with this topic today using modern terminology, we must consider our modern conversation terminology about ancient history. Therefore, we must make clear that while the Torah contains the Law/s, it cannot only be equated with the law in the modern sense of the word. Torah is law and also so much more.

One Law in Christianity and in Islam

The subject of whether the Israelite Torah is applicable to everyone in the same way is a direct product of the emergence of Christianity (in the 3rd-4th centuries) and Islam (in the 6th-7th centuries) as self-sufficient and self-contained religious systems. It was only then that both Christians and Muslims, because of the “universal” quality of both newly established religions, set the basic principle that– “there will be only one rule of faith and practice for every adherent.” This one Law, referred to in Christianity and Islam respectively as Canon Law and Sharia Law, established the fact that neither Christianity nor Islam were tribal religions; anyone could become a Christian or a Muslim while remaining culturally unchanged. The faith did not belong to, nor was it defined by, any one people group, as was still the case in Israel (or what we later came to call the Jewish people).

But the faith of Israel at the time of Jesus and Paul was different: while it accepted converts to itself, it did not, until the Christian era (3-4th century), perceive itself as a separate religion. Being part of Israel certainly had a significant religious component, but it was the “package deal” that the converts accepted and not just the “spiritual and doctrinal norms.” Because Judaism predated the formal establishment of both Christianity and Islam by many centuries, it appeared in a different mode altogether – it was not a separate religion but an ancestral way of life. Those who joined Israel through proselyte conversion (full conversion) joined “the people of Israel” instead of simply assuming the worship of Israel’s God – unlike the latter modes of conversion found in both Christianity and Islam.

There was Never One Law for Everyone

Ancient Judaism also accepted those who came to live among the Jewish people but who did not go through proselyte (full) conversion. It called them “sojourners” with Israel. These were people who, for whatever reason, decided to retain their ethnic and cultural identities but, either by choice or circumstance, found themselves living among Israelites for a prolonged or permanent period. In the era of the Apostle Paul, the Jewish question of how the sojourners with Israel must live among Israelites naturally turned into another unanticipated question: How must the sojourners with Israel live in harmony with the rest of Israel while also living within the confines of the Roman Empire? This was the precise question that the “Jerusalem council” asked and answered in Acts 15. Essentially, their response was: “The nations following the Jewish Christ in the Roman Empire must continue as they always were. There is no difference between sojourners with Israel living among Israelites only, or any who reside in the Roman Empire”.

This is very important because there was never one law for everyone in the Israelite tradition. Think about it. There was one set of laws that applied to all of Israel and another set of laws that applied to the Levites. In other words, there was only one Torah but separate sets of laws for Levites and other Israelites.

I am arguing that this exact idea defined the Apostle Paul’s mindset. Remember, Paul was not a Christian, but, according to his own proud confession, he was a Jewish Pharisee, one who was called by Messiah Jesus to serve Israel and the Nations in a truly unique way, but still a Jew. He therefore thought, as Jews always had, that there is one Torah but several sets of laws, not as later Christians would (one law for everyone).

The testimony of Acts 15 (remembering that the New Testament predates the Mishnah by several centuries) provides a window into the development of this Jewish idea. Although we will not go into all the details of comparison, suffice it to say, the testimony of Acts 15 provides a window into the development, essentially showing the Jerusalem Council’s conclusions (expressed in their letter to Christ-following Gentiles in the Roman Empire), was in alignment with what would later become, through the development of Rabbinic Judaism, the Noahite laws. The New Testament, therefore, serves as an earlier historical witness to what would later emerge in Jewish Rabbinic ideas and practices.

As was mentioned before in the Hebrew Bible, there are two ways to fully commit to Israel’s God. One is that of Ruth the Moabite: “Your people will be my people, your God my God.” The other is that of Naaman the Aramean, who, after being healed in Israel’s river, declared that there is no other God in the world except in Israel. He then took Israel’s soil with him so that he could worship Israel’s God among his own people. He committed to Israel’s God in a different way than Ruth did. In a sense, he said: “Your God will be my God, but my people will still be my people”. Both ways were honored and accepted in Judaism well before Judaism officially became a religion (the time of Jesus and Paul) as well as when it did become an established religion, like Islam and Christianity.

Paul and Judaizing

One of the most confusing and trajectory-setting ideas, and one that is generally misunderstood today in the Christian churches, is the idea of Judaizing. Paul, the Jewish Pharisee who followed Jesus as Christ, clearly thought Judaizing was wrong. Yet, “the devil is in the details,” as they say in the West, or “God is in the details,” as we prefer to say here in Israel. You see, what Paul meant by Judaizing and what the average Christian today means by Judaizing are two entirely different things!

In Paul’s time, “Judaizing” was basically a process by which a member of the Nations fully and formally joined the Jewish people through proselyte conversion such as that of Ruth the Moabite (this was its expressed and only goal). We are talking here about becoming a Jew – an Israelite in every way. Paul, the Jewish Pharisee, understood this kind of “joining” as nothing less than a sabotage of the Shema and the entire plan of Israel’s God. This explains the Apostle Paul’s sharply polemical language towards those who preached proselyte conversion for the Christ-followers in Galatia.

Remember, when speaking of Paul’s admonitions against proselytization, we are not dealing with Sabbath observance or celebrating the Feasts of Israel because these are Jewish practices. In fact, these practices were assumed intact by both the “Jerusalem Council” and the Apostle Paul. While we will examine the major differences between Paul’s letter to the Romans and the letter he wrote to the Christ-followers in Galatia in a separate section, it is fitting to summarize that Paul’s arguments in his letter to the Romans sought to combat Roman anti-Jewish attitudes present among early mid-first century Christ-followers in Rome. Let me just make one important point: Paul did accomplish his goal in Rome through this letter. The message of the letter was so to the point that Ambrosiaster, in his commentary on the book of Romans in the 4th century, wrote the following:

“It is established that there were Jews living in Rome in the time of the apostles and that those Jews who had believed passed on to the Romans the tradition that they ought to profess Christ, but keep the law… One ought not to condemn the Romans, but to praise their faith, because without seeing any signs or miracles and without seeing any of the apostles, they nevertheless accepted the faith in Christ, although according to a Jewish rite”. (Mark D. Nanos. The Mystery of Romans: The Jewish Context of Paul’s Letters (Kindle Location 320). Kindle Edition.)

Throughout the first letter of Clement written by the believers in Rome (c.96) to the believers in Corinth, it is astounding to what degree Israelite conceptual language can be seen. Paul, in his Torah-honoring ministry to Israel and the Nations, succeeded in directing the Church in Rome towards a proper relationship with the Nation of Israel, where there was one Torah for everyone but two sets of laws for Israel and for sojourners.