Exodus 6:2-8. God also said to Moses, "I am the LORD. 3 I appeared to Abraham, to Isaac and to Jacob as God Almighty,... I also established my covenant with them to give them the land of Canaan, where they lived as aliens. 5 Moreover, I have heard the groaning of the Israelites, whom the Egyptians are enslaving, and I have remembered my covenant.I ended the last post with the suggestion that anyone reading the posts should try to use the categories for understanding covenants by applying them to the Mosaic Covenant. Kevin did such a great job I thought I would stick them at the beginning of this post.
6 "Therefore, say to the Israelites: 'I am the LORD, and I will bring you out from under the yoke of the Egyptians. I will free you from being slaves to them, and I will redeem you with an outstretched arm and with mighty acts of judgment. 7 I will take you as my own people, and I will be your God. Then you will know that I am the LORD your God, who brought you out from under the yoke of the Egyptians. 8 And I will bring you to the land I swore with uplifted hand to give to Abraham, to Isaac and to Jacob. I will give it to you as a possession. I am the LORD.' "
Exodus 19:3-6. Then Moses went up to God, and the LORD called to him from the mountain and said, "This is what you are to say to the house of Jacob and what you are to tell the people of Israel: 4 'You yourselves have seen what I did to Egypt, and how I carried you on eagles' wings and brought you to myself. 5 Now if you obey me fully and keep my covenant, then out of all nations you will be my treasured possession. Although the whole earth is mine, 6 you will be for me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.' These are the words you are to speak to the Israelites."
Parties: Between God and Israel (house of Jacob and sons of Israel). (Exodus 19:3)Through the Mosaic covenant, we have the promises to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob (Israel) extended to the entirety of their descendants. The parties of the covenant are God and the people of Israel. Because of this, the promise of bringing them into the land promised to Abraham is repeated in the above passages. New to this situation is the promise that they would be a special possession of God. Although God rightly holds the deed to all of the earth, in his plan and purpose of redemption Israel would be His people like none else could claim to be. It is an exclusive relationship, and anyone who wanted to know and worship the true and living God had to in some sense enter in through what God would communicate through this special people.
Conditions: Exodus 19:5 "...if you will indeed obey My voice and keep My covenant..."
Promise: continuing verse 5 "...then you shall be My own possession among all the peoples, for all the earth is Mine."
Purpose: Exodus 19:6 "...and you shall be to Me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation..."
Verse 6, in my short-study opinion, is meant to reflect the breadth of what this covenant should mean to the nation of Israel. If they were to be a kingdom of priests, one would wonder to whom? Just as a priest was a mediator between God and the nation of Israel, so too was Israel by existing as the nation who brought forth the great mediator between God and the rest of mankind - Jesus Christ.
One of the primary purposes for this covenant is revelation through the relationship of God to Israel. God was acting in history to communicate His nature and glory to a world that had lost all knowledge of Him. God's relationship to Israel would provide the context for him to reveal himself to a greater extent than the general revelation of the heavens which proclaim his glory. Think how often in the Old Testament God proclaims that he will do something through His people so that the nations around them would know, "I am the Lord." God had left his fingerprints all over the created order, but now he was making a bolder, clearer declaration of His character by binding Himself by covenant with this people. Here we can understand what is meant by "kingdom of priests".
The implications of the above paragraph are incredible. It is God who has initiated the opportunity of relationship. He is the active party in our whole expedition of discovering who he is. Left to our own ability and reason alone we would be unable to know Him, and continue to form gods in our own image. We are not left in an Epistemological fog when it comes to questions about God. We can have knowledge of spiritual reality because God has cut through the fog and revealed himself in time and space. (More later on this)
The covenant carried with it the conditions of obeying his voice. The stipulations of the covenant called the Mosaic covenant can be found through the remainder of Exodus, as well as in Leviticus, Numbers, and repeated in Deuteronomy. We usually refer to these stipulations as Old Testament Laws, there are 611 or 613 of these stipulations 9depending on who is counting). A summary of these laws can be found in Exodus Chapter 20, you may know them as the ten commandments.
So, for homework. In what sense are we responsible to keep the ten commandments. Are we bound to obey all of them or at least some of them. What about the 613 commandments which they summarize? How do they apply to you and I?
12 comments:
The OT laws, traditionaly, are divided into three distinctions of laws; Civil laws, Ceremonial laws, and Moral laws.
Civil laws are those that deal with Israel’s legal system, including the issues of land, economics, and criminal justice. An example of a civil law is Deuteronomy 15:1 , “At the end of every seven years you must cancel debts.”
Ceremonial laws deal with sacrifices, festivals, and priestly activities. An example is in Deuteronomy 16:13, which instructed the Israelites to “celebrate the Feast of Tabernacles for seven days after you have gathered the produce of your threshing floor and your winepress.”
Moral laws are those that deal with timeless truths regarding God’s intention for human ethical behavior. An example of a moral law is “Love your neighbor as yourself.”
So, in this view of the laws, the only set that applies to us would be the timeless moral laws. The civil and ceremonious laws, however, only applied to ancient Israel (Although it is my understanding that some devout Jewish sects still practice many of these laws, save the death sentences and some offering laws).
Christ also reiterated many of these moral laws (i.e; loving your neighbor) and even seemed to imply that the other laws are inapplicable, namely the Sabbath laws (that might have been a stretch, although I can confidently say that no one I know practices any sabbith, that is seventh day, laws.)
I have read arguments against this view, a view that I currently hold to, at least until I am convinced of a more logical view, that would contend that this view does not reflect sound hermeneutical methodology because the laws are not actually seperated this way in the OT books of law. In fact, some verses describe a "moral law" and follow with a verse containing a ceremional law. They would contend that the text gives no indication of any kind of hermeneutical shift has taken place between the two verses.
I am not sure how they would, then, interpret these laws regarding application, but I will check on that.
Also, I know that the purpose for the law, or maybe just one purpose, was to show the sinfulness of man and that Christ came and died on the cross, thus fulfilling the law. Being the sacrifice, then, our our behalf, we can at least rule out most ceremonious laws as binding to us today.
I am anxious to see other responses.. maybe another side of interpretation.. i could just be totally wrong again and in that case Kevin can just wow me again.
I would like to add, however, that I do believe much can come from the other 'sets' of laws. How? at the very least, historical education; at the most, conviction.
And I found an article about a differing view other than the traditional one I listed:
"The Law is tied to the Mosaic Covenant, which is integrally connected to Israel’s life in the land and the conditional promises of blessing related to their living obediently in the land. Christians are not related to that land, nor are they related to the conditions for being blessed in the land. Also the Mosaic Covenant is obsolete, having been replaced by the New Covenant. Therefore the Mosaic Law, a critical component of the Old Covenant, is not valid as law over believers in the church age.
So the traditional approach to the Mosaic Law, which divides it into moral, civil, and ceremonial categories, suffers from three major weaknesses: It is arbitrary and without any textual support, it ignores the narrative context, and it fails to reflect the significant implications of the change from Old Covenant to New Covenant. This approach, therefore, is inadequate as a hermeneutic method for interpreting and applying the Law."
Here is the bulleted list of the author's suggested approach to application:
Identify What The Particular Law Meant To The Initial Audience
Determine The Differences Between The Initial Audience And Believers Today
Develop Universal Principles From The Text
Correlate The Principle With New Testament Teaching
Apply The Modified Universal Principle To Life Today
His conclusion:
"The traditional approach of dividing the Mosaic Law into civil, ceremonial, and moral laws violates proper hermeneutical method, for it is inconsistent and arbitrary, and the Old Testament gives no hint of such distinctions. This approach errs in two ways. On the one hand it dismisses the civil and ceremonial laws as inapplicable. On the other hand it applies the so-called moral laws as direct law. In addition the traditional approach tends to ignore the narrative context and the covenant context of the Old Testament legal material.
Principlism, an alternative approach, seeks to find universal principles in the Old Testament legal material and to apply these principles to believers today. This approach is more consistent than the traditional one, and it is more reflective of sound hermeneutical method. It also allows believers to see that all Scripture is “useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness” (2 Tim. 3:16).(16)
If I may, I'd like to assign homework to someone to read this article in its entirety and explain it to me so i may better understand it all.
i have also rearranged my previous comment to better fit the flow of this article (in regards to vocabulary).
Bobby,
How about a link or a reference to that article?
A link would be helpful and I would agree with Bobby's second post.
This Mosaic covenant is outdated and has been replaced. Kind of like a will where a new one has been written to take the place of the old one. Furthermore, the Mosaic covenant was to the nation of Israel. The NT covenant allowed for the grafting of the Gentiles into the Israel nation such that there is now no distinction between Jews/Gentiles.
The new covenant is in the NT. Of course if you don't believe in the NT, you would be bound by the OT laws.
Hmmm....bacon...shrimp....
I don't know about wowing you Bobby; however, I am quite impressed with the depth of your response.
I personally have not taken the time to perform an in-depth study of the Old Testament law. There are a few comments I would like to make that will hopefully add some clarity.
First of all, I've listened to many sermons, read lots of books that mention the three-fold distinction of the "law" - as Bobby has so astutely pointed out. I have no immediate comment regarding that kind of distinction, although I am intrigued about the hermeneutical "problems" presented in the article you've noted Bobby. I will have to look into that further.
Second, we should consider (and maybe this is just semantics) that Jesus did not come to abolish the law (and the prophets) but to fulfill them (Matt. 5:17). As such, the law was not abolished but fulfilled (a closed and sealed book with a signature - ieosus, rather than one that's been thrown in the shredder). God's law was, demonstrably, an example of perfection (an instruction manual of a spotless life), but the breaking of which required the shedding of the blood of spotless animals. The Jews failed to realize that the law was given to show just how impossible it would be to live a perfect life - hence, the sacrificial system (the law brought with it the inevitability of sin and a means of propitiation).
Jesus fulfilled the law in that he lived a completely perfect life (free of sin), and because of that he could take on (because he was spotless) the sin of all of mankind, and be the sacrifice for once and all time.
Thus, there is no longer need for sacrifice - the sacrificial system has been abolished. Jesus paid the penalty once and for all.
So, the question becomes, not simply should we follow the law or the Ten Commandments, but tacked on to the end of that is "to what end"? The Jews took the law as a path to perfection (the Pharisees are a good example of this - but it resulted in pride). Better still would have been to view it as a path to relationship. God said: "Obey my commandments, so that...", and we believers hear the rest of that message: "...you may know me."
As Christians, we interpret in light of New Testament teaching, of course after proper hermeneutical methodology, and then make application as necessary. Therefore, when we look at the Ten Commandments, we look at them not in terms of “so that”, but in terms of “because of”. Most of them are virtuous in nature, do not contradict or limit the two greatest commandments as taught by Christ (one could argue following these two will perhaps produce personal fulfillment of the rest), while others are of more of a practical or cultural in nature – keeping the sabbath. The commandment to “not make any graven image”, I see as culturally significant for the time in which it was given – graven images were the norm back then, and a commandment against this practice helped to complete Exodus 20:3 (no other gods before me). Today, the same is no less true – there are no other gods but YHWH, and we are to have no other gods before Him. Graven images seem somewhat ridiculous today, but we still have our own personal graven images (idols) to whom we bow down (money, fame, success, education, etc).
Lastly, as I wrap up my rambling comments, is that we shouldn't be so much focused on following the Ten Commandments as we should be trying to emulate Christ. If we look, we'll see that many of the commandments are in keeping with His character and being. Follow Christ, and you'll find yourself keeping the commandments He wants us to keep.
I'm not sure its good when your comments are more insightful and in-depth than mine.
Colby
here is the article. the guy's blog is actually really good.
and i was never any good at citing works. sorry!
Thanks Bobby
i don't think mine were more insightful; i had a hard time articulating my thoughts on this one. there's so much more i'd like to say but my thoughts came out like verbal diarrhea.
this is just the view i had been taught on the subject. only until this post have i actually went a little more in-depth. the article helped to clarify that view, even if it dissagreed with it.
Looking forward to the next post. Hebrews 8 and on address the new covenant, compares it to a will, and shows how Christ has fulfilled the law once and for all.
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