12 replies to this topic

[logosword]

Greetings

I am hoping someone could help me with some questions about certain scriptures.

1. God (through Jeremiah) said He never told the Children of Israel when they were travelling through the wilderness to offer animal sacrifices to God (Jeremiah 7:21), yet the Torah states that He did (Leviticus 7:37).


2. In the New Testament, Paul says that in His death, Jesus abolished the law, yet Jesus said Heaven and earth would pass

away before one tiny bit of the law would be abolished. Why the contradiction?


Be grateful, if anyone could help clarify these for me. Many thanks.

[Katoog]

This is not a discussion forum and Thou need to read the context.

1) From the Restored Holy Bible 2.1
Jer 7:18 The children gather wood, and the fathers kindle the fire,
and the women knead dough, to make cakes to the queen of Heaven,
and to pour out drink-offerings to other GODS, that they may provoke Me to anger.

2) That is the interpretation of antinomianism.

Edited by Katoog, 28 November 2012 - 11:56 AM.

[logosword]

My asking was not to get into discussion with Thou(? as you put it) or with anyone else, but rather, to get some raw straight answers instead of going around the bush through using the commentaries..furthermore, as far as I could find, the commentaries does not comment the differs of these two verses:-

1. (Thanks for your obvious answer for question 1.) However, typo error on my part should be "Jeremiah 7:22" instead of verse 21 and Leviticus 7:38 which reads as:

²² For I did not speak to your fathers, or command them in the day that I brought them out of the land of Egypt, concerning burnt offerings or sacrifices.

compared with Leviticus 7:38

³⁸ which the Lord commanded Moses on Mount Sinai, on the day when He commanded the children of Israel to offer their offerings to the Lord in the Wilderness of Sinai.

2. Indeed it is antinomianism, but how do one explained in an explicit manner with what Christ is saying of having not one dot or tittle of the law (which includes the Israel's customary laws) will do away until heaven and earth pass away. Apostle Paul obviously spoke about the law (customary law) has been abolished through Christ's flesh.

Hope you could see the differences.

[Josh Bond]

Jeremiah 7:22" instead of verse 21 and Leviticus 7:38 which reads as:

7:16-26 Jeremiah should not pray for . . . Judah—even then they were worshiping the queen of heaven and other gods . . . in the streets. The people might as well eat their offerings and sacrifices. What God desires is obedience, not rituals. Verse 22 must be read in the light of verse 23: sacrifice without commitment is worthless.

(Believer's Bible Commentary. Copyright 1995, 1992, 1990, 1989 by William McDonald. All rights reserved.)


The most controversy centers around this verse because it appears to invalidate the whole sacrificial system. Certain critics have understood it to mean that the law of sacrifices was not given by Moses but was introduced centuries later - a position that is part of the elaborate system that denies the Mosaic authorship of the Pentateuch. In order to treat the question adequately, one must understand the sense of the Hebrew text. In it a rhetorical negation is used to point up antithesis between v. Jeremiah 7:22 and v. Jeremiah 7:23 more emphatically (cf. Deuteronomy 5:3). Moreover, the negative in Hebrew often supplies the lack of the comparative - i.e., without excluding the thing denied, the statement implies only the prior importance of the thing set in contrast to it (Hosea 6:6). In short, the Hebrew idiom permits denial of one thing in order to emphasize another (cf. for a NT parallel Luke 14:26). The idiom does not intend to deny the statement but only to set it in a secondary place (so Frost).

That the OT sacrifices were non-Mosaic cannot be valid: (1) sacrifices are mentioned in Jeremiah 33:18, also Jeremiah 6:20; Jeremiah 7:21; Jeremiah 14:12; and Jeremiah 17:26; (2) Hosea and Amos, ministering before Jeremiah’s time, mention sacrifices; and (3) frequent condemnation of heartless worship with sacrifices implies that sacrifices were a well-established institution in Israel (so Streane). Here Isaiah 1:11; Hosea 6:6; Amos 5:21; and Micah 6:6 should be carefully considered. Judah had left out the main element: obedience to God. In view of the passages just cited, and in view of the Pentateuchal legislation, sacrifices were always meant to be of secondary importance to obedience and godliness. Neither Jeremiah nor any other prophet decried sacrifices as such. They meant that moral law is always paramount to the ritual law. It is significant that when Leviticus 6:1 is read in the synagogue, this passage in Jeremiah is read as the concluding portion, called the Haphtorah (so Freedman).

(The Expositor’s Bible Commentary Copyright © 1976-1992 by Zondervan Publishing House)

[logosword]

Thank you Josh for putting your time and effort into my response. Greatly appreciated.

[Tim Butterfield]

I like the way the Amplified Bible puts it:

For in the day that I brought them out of the land of Egypt, I did not speak to your fathers or command them concerning burnt offerings or sacrifices. But this thing I did command them: Listen to and obey My voice, and I will be your God and you will be My people; and walk in the whole way that I command you, that it may be well with you. But they would not listen to and obey Me or bend their ear [to Me], but followed the counsels and the stubborn promptings of their own evil hearts and minds, and they turned their backs and went in reverse instead of forward. Since the day that your fathers came forth out of the land of Egypt to this day, I have persistently sent to you all My servants the prophets, sending them daily, early and late. Yet the people would not listen to and obey Me or bend their ears [to Me], but stiffened their necks and behaved worse than their fathers.
(Jeremiah 7:22-26)
When God brought the people out of Egypt he didn't do it to get offerings and sacrifices, He did so because He wanted them to be His people, who would heed is voice and obey Him so He could bless them. They never did so even though He had sent them His Prophets to instruct them.

As a result He is saying that they might as well keep their sacrifices and offerings and eat them their selves because without their obedience to His will, the sacrifices and offerings are valueless.

1Samuel 15:22 Samuel said, Has the Lord as great a delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices as in obeying the voice of the Lord? Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to hearken than the fat of rams.

Ecclesiastes 5:1 KEEP YOUR foot [give your mind to what you are doing] when you go [as Jacob to sacred Bethel] to the house of God. For to draw near to hear and obey is better than to give the sacrifice of fools [carelessly, irreverently] too ignorant to know that they are doing evil.

As for you questions about Paul, I'm nor certain as to what verses you are citing, but you might read Galatians chapters 3 and 4 to see how he views the law as it applies to Christians. But he does say this:
Do we then nullify the Law through faith? May it never be! On the contrary, we establish the Law. (Romans 3:31)

What Paul says in essence is that a follower of Christ has God's law written on his heart, and follows it out of a desire to please God, not because of an external set of rules and commandments.

"But this is the covenant which I will make with the house of Israel after those days," declares the LORD, "I will put My law within them and on their heart I will write it; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people. “ They will not teach again, each man his neighbor and each man his brother, saying, 'Know the LORD,' for they will all know Me, from the least of them to the greatest of them," declares the LORD, "for I will forgive their iniquity, and their sin I will remember no more.” (Jeremiah 31:33-34)

Hope this helps.

Timothy

[Ebed Doulos]

Greetings

Back at ya!

I am hoping someone could help me with some questions about certain scriptures.

Not a problem. While I've not heard these old canards for a while, they are not that difficult to answer, especially with the assistance of e-Sword.

1. God (through Jeremiah) said He never told the Children of Israel when they were travelling through the wilderness to offer animal sacrifices to God (Jeremiah 7:21), yet the Torah states that He did (Leviticus 7:37).

One of the things you should always check is the timeline. Jeremiah 7:22 tells us that God is speaking of the day, He "brought them out of the land of Egypt". Fortunately, Exodus 19:1 gives us that date:

In the third month, when the children of Israel were gone forth out of the land of Egypt, the same day came they into the wilderness of Sinai.

We also know that after they left Egypt that they traveled to desert wilderness around Mount Sinai:

For they were departed from Rephidim, and were come to the desert of Sinai, and had pitched in the wilderness; and there Israel camped before the mount. Exodus 19:2

The next few verses we are told what God instructed Moses to say:

And Moses went up unto God, and the LORD called unto him out of the mountain, saying, Thus shalt thou say to the house of Jacob, and tell the children of Israel; Ye have seen what I did unto the Egyptians, and how I bare you on eagles' wings, and brought you unto myself. Now therefore, if ye will obey my voice indeed, and keep my covenant, then ye shall be a peculiar treasure unto me above all people: for all the earth is mine: And ye shall be unto me a kingdom of priests, and an holy nation. These are the words which thou shalt speak unto the children of Israel.

You will notice that Jeremiah is quite correct. On the day God lead the children of Israel out of Egypt, He did not broach the subject of sacrifice. That would come later ... quite a bit later, actually. That would come after Moses was called up to the Mount; after the golden calf was built; after Moses broke the first set of tablets; after the Levites "purified" the camp; after the Moses received the Ten commandments; after Aaron, Aaron's sons and the Levites were set apart; and after other events which I gloss over. Only then would the handbook of the Levites, the Book of Leviticus, be written and the sacrificial ordinances be mentioned. On the day that God lead the children of Israel out of Egypt he commanded obedience and promised the Israelites that they would be his people. Much later, he gave the Levites their instructions on burnt sacrifices.

Just a side note, God has and always will prefer (1 Samuel 15:2) mercy over sacrifice and obedience over burnt offerings. I believe that about covers that question.

2. In the New Testament, Paul says that in His death, Jesus abolished the law, yet Jesus said Heaven and earth would pass away before one tiny bit of the law would be abolished. Why the contradiction?

You provided no references but appear to be referring to a deceptive misuse of the scriptures some employ in order to set up a false conflict between Matthew 5:18 and Ephesians 2:15.

Matthew 5:8 is relatively straight forward. As the People's New Testament Commentary points out:

"Till," says Dr. Schaff, "implies that after the great events of Christ's life, and the establishment of his kingdom, the old dispensation, as a dispensation of the letter and yoke of bondage, as a system of types and shadows, will pass away, and has passed away (Eph_2:15; Col_2:14; Heb_8:13); while the spirit and substance of the law, i. e., love to God and man, will last forever."

Now let us examine Ephesians 2:15. What Christ abolished was not the Law but the enmity caused by "commandments" (translated from the Greek "δόγμα" or "dogma" G1378) which the Jews incorporated into the law. This dogma built up a wall of emnity which separated Jew and Gentile. At the time of Christ, both groups were at odds with each other; each feeling that the other was beneath them. Christ "abolished in his flesh the enmity... making peace." As Paul would point out in Romans 8:4, when we are all united, and walk in the spirit and not the flesh, the Law is fulfilled in us.

In short, the "spirit and substance of the law" cannot be abolished, but the enmity caused by the dogma was abolished by Christ on the cross for all mankind, thus uniting Jew and gentile into a "new man".

Be grateful, if anyone could help clarify these for me. Many thanks.

You are welcome

[logosword]

Dear Baunllaw and Ebed Doulos

Thank you both for your great effort and time. The reason I failed to put in the bible references for question No.2 was that I assume you would be able to know them off by hand as these verses have sort of become 'biblical cliche' in the church circle..my assumption has made me an ass(donkey)!

Thank you again, and GOd bless you all.

[Tim Butterfield]

I came to the conclusion a couple of decades ago that any time I thought I saw a contradiction in the scriptures; it was because my understanding of the scriptures involved was faulty.

If you really want to pursue the ways to clear up these “Biblical clichés” do some searching for books on HERMENEU'TICS, n. The art of finding the meaning of an author's words and phrases, and of explaining it to others. (Noah Webster's 1828 Dictionary of American English)

Norman Geisler is on very good author on the subject.

This web site is a pretty good place to start: http://hermeneutics....ermeneutics.htm

And this one isn’t too bad, though it isn’t set up to study hermeneutics per se.
http://www.equip.org/

e-sword modules on the subject:
http://www.biblesupp...n-hermeneutics/

http://www.biblesupp...neuticstopxexe/

http://www.biblesupp...neuticstopxexe/

I haven’t done much more than glance at these modules, so I cannot speak to their theological basis or how easey they are to read,


Enough of this (hopefully helpful) rambling.

Tim

Edited by Baunllaw, 01 December 2012 - 07:12 AM.

[logosword]

Dear Tim

I really appreciate your kindness in helping me out on those questions-you and the rest have actually gone an extra mile for me on this..truly I am touched by the love of Christ in you all.

And after having an overall view of this site, I actually chuckled to myself wondering if I made a mistake posting my questions-its not a place for riverside fishing but for deep sea fishing. You all are so highly equipped and smart with everything here-"wow", is all I can say.

God bless you and all