Chapter 11 WAS THERE FORGIVENESS UNDER THE MOSAIC COVENANT?

Many Old Testament verses indicate that God had forgiven the Israelites through animal sacrifices (Leviticus 4, 5)! In light of this, it would seem that the Cross was unnecessary, according to the rabbis.

However, the Old Testament didn’t claim that God’s forgiveness under the Mosaic system eradicated sin, as we now experience after the Cross. Instead, God merely passed over or covered the sins of the Hebrew saints:

·       “For I will pass through the land of Egypt that night, and I will strike all the firstborn in the land of Egypt, both man and beast; and on all the gods of Egypt I will execute judgments: I am the LORD. The blood shall be a sign for you, on the houses where you are. And when I see the blood, I will pass over you, and no plague will befall you to destroy you, when I strike the land of Egypt.” (Exodus 12:12-13, 27)

The OT gives us no indication that Israel’s sins had been eradicated through the atoning sacrifice of an animal. Nevertheless, it does indicate that this kind of atonement would lead to forgiveness:

·       Thus the priest shall make atonement for him for the sin which he has committed in any one of these things, and he shall be forgiven. And the remainder shall be for the priest, as in the grain offering.” (Leviticus 5:13)

However, from all indications, this “atonement” only brought a superficial forgiveness. It only was an outward cleansing, little different from the external cleansing of a house:

·       “He shall make atonement for the holy sanctuary, and he shall make atonement for the tent of meeting and for the altar, and he shall make atonement for the priests and for all the people of the assembly.” (Leviticus 16:33; Ezekiel 43:20; 45:20)

It should have been obvious to the Israelites that this kind of atonement was unable to penetrate to their core to give them the renewed heart and spirit as had been promised (Ezekiel 36:25; 11:19-20; Jeremiah 33:6, 14-16). It is only through Christ that our sins are cleansed and purified so that we can confidently enter into the presence of God (Hebrews 10:19-22). Instead, OT forgiveness was only a matter of God passing over sins, not removing them:

·       Blessed is the one whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered. (Psalm 32:1)

·       Who is a God like you, pardoning iniquity and passing over transgression for the remnant of his inheritance? (Micah 7:18)

The OT saints would only experience a “passing over transgression,” but they were also promised a New Covenant through which God would “remember their sins no more” (Jeremiah 31:34).

The New Testament also consistently taught that OT forgiveness was not the same as the forgiveness that came through the Cross:

·       For since the law has but a shadow of the good things to come instead of the true form of these realities, it can never, by the same sacrifices that are continually offered every year, make perfect those who draw near. Otherwise, would they not have ceased to be offered, since the worshipers, having once been cleansed, would no longer have any consciousness of sins? But in these sacrifices there is a reminder of sins every year. For it is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins. (Hebrews 10:1-4)

Instead of the eradication of sin, the Old Testament forgiveness merely covered over sin:

·       [Jesus] whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith. This was to show God’s righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins. (Romans 3:25)

Because Israel’s sins were merely “passed over,” Jesus’ atonement had to work retroactively to cleanse the sins of the OT saints:

·       For if the blood of goats and bulls, and the sprinkling of defiled persons with the ashes of a heifer, sanctify for the purification of the flesh, how much more will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without blemish to God, purify our conscience from dead works to serve the living God. Therefore he is the mediator of a new covenant, so that those who are called may receive the promised eternal inheritance, since a death has occurred that redeems them from the transgressions committed under the first covenant. (Hebrews 9:13-15)

Because their sins hadn’t been eradicated, even the deceased OT saints could not come into the presence of a God, whose righteousness had not yet been satisfied by the Cross:

·       And all these, though commended through their faith, did not receive what was promised, since God had provided something better for us, that apart from us they should not be made perfect. (Hebrews 11:39-40)

Consequently, after Jesus proclaimed that “It is finished” and the veil of the Temple was torn in two, symbolizing the fact that the way into presence of God was now opened, there was a great earthquake to reinforce this lesson:

·       And behold, the curtain of the temple was torn in two, from top to bottom. And the earth shook, and the rocks were split. The tombs also were opened. And many bodies of the saints who had fallen asleep were raised, and coming out of the tombs after his resurrection they went into the holy city and appeared to many. (Matthew 27:51-53)

Presumably, after their appearances, those saints were enabled to ascend into God’s presence. Consequently, Jesus had died for all sins, past, present, and future (Hebrews 7:19, 25).

The Old and New Testaments have gradually unveiled God’s one plan for humanity, which culminates in our being made one with our Savior? It’s a puzzle with Christ as the center piece. It is not a hodge-podge, constructed by 40 different authors over 1500 years, but a single vision that moves irresistibly to take hold of eternity. I think that this says something about Divine authorship, but now we have to turn to the “why” questions.

NECESSARY LESSONS FROM THE CROSS

The rabbis do not believe that God would have required that a human die for the sins of the world. Besides, they claim that any form of human sacrifice was strictly prohibited by God.

Rabbi and debater, Tovia Singer, claims that the Scriptures teach against human vicarious (substitutionary) atonement:

·       “…nor does Scripture ever tell us that an innocent man can die as an atonement for the sins of the wicked.” www.outreachjudaism.org

However, Scripture does tell us that one man would die for the sins of the world:

• Yet it was the will of the LORD to crush him; he has put him to grief; when his soul makes an offering for guilt, he shall see his offspring; he shall prolong his days; the will of the LORD shall prosper in his hand. Out of the anguish of his soul he shall see and be satisfied; by his knowledge shall the righteous one, my servant, make many to be accounted righteous, and he shall bear their iniquities. (Isaiah 53:10-11)

The rabbis, prior to the esteemed commentator Rashi (1040-1105 a.d.), were in agreement that Isaiah 53 taught that the Messiah would die for the sins of the people:

·       Rabbi Moshe Alshekh, a famous sixteenth-century scholar, asserted: “[Our] Rabbis with one voice, accept and affirm the opinion that the prophet [Isaiah 53] is speaking of king Messiah.  https://jewsforjesus.org/publications/issues/issues-v07-n09/what-the-prophet-said-what-the-rabbis-said/

·       The Talmud tractate Sanhedrin 98a states: “The Rabanan [rabbis] say that Messiah’s name is The Suffering Scholar . . . for it is written, “Surely He hath borne our grief and carried our sorrows, yet we did esteem him stricken, smitten of God and afflicted.” (Isaiah 53:4)

·       In the hour in which they tell the Messiah about the sufferings of Israel in exile, and about the sinful among them who seek not the knowledge of their Master, the Messiah lifts up his voice and weeps over the sinful among them. This is what is written: He was wounded because of our transgressions, he was crushed because of our iniquities (Isaiah 53:5). Those souls then return to their places. In the Garden of Eden there is a Hall which is called the Hall of the Sons of Illness. The Messiah enters that Hall and summons all the disease and all the pains and all the suffering of Israel that they should come upon him, and all of them come upon him. (The Zohar 2:212a)

·       “The children of the world are members one of another. When the Holy One desires to give healing to the world, he smites one just man amongst them, and for his sake heals all the rest. Whence do we learn this? From the saying, “‘He was wounded for our transgressions, bruised for our iniquities“‘ [Isaiah 53:5]” (The Zohar; Numbers, Pinchus, 218a).

·       The highly regarded first-century Rabbi Shimon Ben Yochai stated: “The meaning of the words ‘Bruised for our iniquities’ [Isaiah 53:5] is that since the Messiah bears our iniquities, which produce the effect of his being bruised, it follows that whoso will not admit that the Messiah thus suffers for our iniquities, must endure and suffer them for them himself.” (Adolf Neubauer, The Fifty-Third Chapter of Isaiah: According to Jewish Interpreters (New York: KTAV Publishing House, 1969), p. xl.)

·       The Midrash Aseret Memrot states: “The Messiah, in order to atone for them both [for Adam and David] will ‘make his soul a trespass offering,’” (Isaiah 53:10).

Israel’s hope had been in the Messiah who would pay the ultimate price for their sins beyond what the offering of animals could possibly accomplish. Nevertheless, Singer claims that Scripture rules out the possibility that one man will die for all. However, God’s command to Abraham to sacrifice his son Isaac as a burnt offering (Genesis 22) suggests otherwise, but not according to Singer:

·       “When Abraham was ready to sacrifice Isaac, the Almighty admonished him that He did not want the human sacrifice…The Almighty’s directive—that He only wanted animal sacrifices rather than human sacrifices—was immediately understood. This teaching has never departed from the mind and soul of the faithful children of Israel.”

However, God never informed Abraham that He didn’t “want the human sacrifice.” Instead, God provided Abraham with a substitute offering – a ram. Nor is there any evidence that either Abraham or Israel had derived the understanding that Singer claims to have derived. For one thing, God did not admonish Abraham for offering his son as a sacrificial offering. Instead, He commended Abraham:

·       But the angel of the Lord called out to him from heaven, “Abraham! Abraham!” “Here I am,” he replied. “Do not lay a hand on the boy,” he said. “Do not do anything to him. Now I know that you fear God, because you have not withheld from me your son, your only son.” Abraham looked up and there in a thicket he saw a ram caught by its horns. He went over and took the ram and sacrificed it as a burnt offering instead of his son. So Abraham called that place The Lord Will Provide. And to this day it is said, “On the mountain of the Lord it will be provided.” The angel of the Lord called to Abraham from heaven a second time and said, “I swear by myself, declares the Lord, that because you have done this and have not withheld your son, your only son, I will surely bless you and make your descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky and as the sand on the seashore. Your descendants will take possession of the cities of their enemies, and through your offspring all nations on earth will be blessed, because you have obeyed me.” (Genesis 22:11-18)

Because Abraham had been faithful, God promised to bless him. Contrary to Singer’s assertion, He certainly wasn’t chastening Abraham for his willingness to offer his son as a sacrifice, as God had commanded him to do.  

Also, it seems that both Israel and Abraham had derived an even greater message about something that God would offer in the future – “The Lord will Provide.” Ordinarily, this would be a strange way to name Mt. Moriah, since this event described how God had already provided an animal substitute for Isaac. Why then wasn’t Moriah named, “The Lord has Provided?” Evidently, what God would provide in the future would overshadow what He had already provided. But it would be something akin to what had already been provided – Jesus Himself!

However, this isn’t our point, but merely that Singer’s assertion – “that He only wanted animal sacrifices rather than human sacrifices” – is scripturally unwarranted! Instead, it seems that God instructed Abraham to offer Isaac as a human sacrifice as a foreshadowing of what He would provide by His Son (Genesis 22). He also cryptically indicated that this Son would provide the blood for the New Covenant (Isaiah 42:6; 9:8; Psalms 22; 69) and would provide Him with a body instead of the bodies of bulls and sheep (Psalm 40; Hebrews 10:5-7). More explicitly, this Arm of God would serve as the ultimate and final burnt offering:

Why didn’t the omnipotent Father simply eradicate sin without any blood offering? Why was it necessary for Jesus to die for our sins? Evidently, there was no alternative to Jesus’ horrid and public death for humanity. In the Garden of Gethsemane, Jesus had prayed for an alternative, but none was offered (Matthew 26:39). Why then did Jesus have to endure the Cross if God is omnipotent and can do all things?

Our Lord kept many secrets, even the most important ones, including the nature of His glory. Moses had sought the glory of God during a time of great disappointment. He had just spent 40 days with God on Mt. Sinai where he had received the Ten Commandments. Meanwhile, down below, Israel had made the idolatrous Golden Calf and were partying. As a result, for the first time God’s anger broke out against Israel, and many died of a plague.

Moses was crushed and requested to see God’s glory. God’s answer was probably not what Moses had expected:

·       "I will make all My goodness pass before you, and I will proclaim the name of the LORD before you. I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion." But He said, "You cannot see My face; for no man shall see Me, and live." (Exodus 33:19-20 NKJV)

Instead of a visual display of His glory with lightning and thunder, God only partially disclosed Himself to Moses – His back:

·       And the LORD passed before him and proclaimed, "The LORD, the LORD God, merciful and gracious, longsuffering, and abounding in goodness and truth, keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, by no means clearing the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children and the children's children to the third and the fourth generation." (Exodus 34:6-7)

Moses seemed satisfied with His self-disclosure and worshipped (Exodus 34:8). Instead of seeing God’s face – and the face best reveals the identity of the person – Moses was only permitted to see the backside of God. Nevertheless, this very partial disclosure had satisfied Moses, and he worshipped God. After all, Moses had earlier requested that he would be given a greater understanding of God:

·       “I pray, if I have found grace in Your sight, show me now Your way, that I may know You and that I may find grace in Your sight.” (Exodus 33:13)

God, therefore, revealed His “way” to Moses but not completely, not His “face,” the most revealing part of His Being. This was protected at the threat of death.

What would His face have revealed? Something that Israel was not ready to see. It was hidden away at the threat of death! Why death? Along with this hidden aspect of God, there was also an object concealed within the Holy of Holies that carried the threat of death to anyone who would look upon it.

It was obscured by the massive wings of two cherubim who were mounted above it. The Holy of Holies could be entered only once a year by only the High Priest on Yom Kippur. Even he was warned that if he looked upon this object, he would die. Therefore, when he was permitted to enter, he had to enter with great billows of smoke lest he would be struck dead by inadvertently seeing this object.

Surprisingly, it wasn’t the Ark of the Covenant, its contents (including the Ten Commandments), or the Law, which brought death to the one who saw it (Galatians 3:10-12; Matthew 5:21-22). Instead, the forbidden object covered the Ark and its contents – the “Mercy Seat,” also called the “Atonement Cover” (Romans 3:25), the thing that symbolized life and mercy (Leviticus 16:13), the great and carefully guarded mystery of our Savior!

How are we to understand God’s concealment? Jesus’ mission had also been concealed. It was only at the end that He began to reveal it more fully:

·       But Jesus answered them, saying, "The hour has come that the Son of Man should be glorified. Most assuredly, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the ground and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it produces much grain. (John 12:23-24; 13:31-32)

What glory had our Lord been hiding for millennia? That He loved us so much that He would die the most horrid and humiliating death to prove His love for us, even while we were still His enemies.

Why would He conceal the centerpiece of His glory? Evidently, humankind was not ready to receive it. When they saw Christ’s crucifixion, they were horrified and ran away, convinced that what they had seen was not the glory of God but the absolute end of hope. Only the Resurrection and Jesus opening their minds to the Scriptures was able to turn them around (Luke 24:13-47).

The Law had to precede God’s grace. God had to first convince Israel of His holiness and righteousness before they would ever be able to receive His all-surpassing love, a love that we still cannot fathom (Ephesians 3:19).

The Cross represented the supreme display of God’s glory (John 12:23-24; 13:31-32). How strange that the hour of God’s greatest glory was also Jesus’ painful, humiliating, and disgraceful death on the Cross. However, it proved the extent of God’s love, as nothing else could. He would die for us while we were still His enemies:

·       …but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Since, therefore, we have now been justified by his blood, much more shall we be saved by him from the wrath of God. For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, now that we are reconciled, shall we be saved by his life. More than that, we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received reconciliation.” (Romans 5:8-11)

This display of God’s love and glory it not just a graphic gory show, it is a display that I had vitally needed. One atheist had made a public challenge to all Christians – “How do you know that your faith is not just an elaborate con-job by the greatest con in existence?”

Actually, this had been my question for years. Although I believed in Jesus, I was dogged by the doubt that He might be a sadist who created us merely for His entertainment. This is the way I had felt while undergoing the most intense depression and panic attacks. Eventually, however, it was revealed to me that He couldn’t be a sadist if He had willingly endured the Cross for me.

But did He actually die this most excruciating death for us? Many skeptics regard the Cross as an indisputable historical fact:

• NT scholar, John Dominic Crossan: “That He was crucified is as sure as anything historical ever can be.” (Lee Strobel, The Case for the Real Jesus, 2007; 113)

• “Both Gerd Ludemann, an atheistic NT critic, and Bart Ehrman, who’s an agnostic, call the crucifixion an indisputable fact.” (113)

• Tacitus, Roman historian (110 AD): “Jesus suffered the extreme penalty under the reign of Tiberius.” (113)

• “Josephus [the Jewish historian, 90 AD] reports that Pilate ‘condemned him to be crucified’…Even the Jewish Talmud reports that ‘Yeshu was hanged.’” (113)

• Apologist Michael Licona reports that “Lucian of Samosata also, who was a Greek satirist, mentions the crucifixion, and Mara Bar-Serapion, who was a pagan, confirms Jesus was executed.” (113)

The evidence that the Cross of Christ is a thoroughly-proven historical fact set me free from doubts that the God really didn’t love me. Instead, I became convinced that His love passes all understanding (Ephesians 3:16-19).

The Cross was not only a necessary display of God’s love and glory, it also represented the ultimate display of His righteousness. He also had to display to the world that He is so serious about sin that an adequate payment had to be made for it:

·       …Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith. This was to show God’s righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins. It was to show his righteousness at the present time, so that he might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus. (Romans 3:24-26)

This revelation of God’s righteousness at the Cross speaks volumes to us about the seriousness of our sins. They are so serious that no payment could ever suffice apart from the death of God the Son Himself. And if our sins had been so heinous before God that nothing short of the death of His Son could take them away, we need to resist them with all of our might. This means that we cannot simply say, “He just wants us to try our best.” Instead, He demands righteous perfection, as Jesus taught: “You therefore must be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect” (Matthew 5:48). The only thing that protects us from this severe righteousness is His undeserved mercy and the free gift of God (Romans 6:23).

Let’s return to the question of why the Father didn’t answer the pray of the Son. He could have created another being who could die in the place of Jesus. However, this wouldn’t prove that God truly loves us. A created being would cost God nothing.

Likewise, a created being or the mere appearance of one couldn’t convey the extent of God’s righteousness, His hatred of sin. The death of God the Son proved that our sins are so heinous that nothing short of the death of God the Son could have paid the price for them.

These two seemingly opposite truths must be maintained. We are required to be morally perfect, and yet our Lord forgives all whenever we confess our sins (1 John 1:9). Let me try to explain the need for both. If you give your wife a black eye, it is not enough to say:

·       Don’t get so ruffled. This is the first time I’ve ever done this to you. That’s not so bad, is it?

But it is. We have to take full responsibility for all of our behavior, even if we have had a perfect track-record.

This standard of perfection should also humble us and prevent self-righteousness and the thinking, “I’m more deserving than you,” or “I deserve heaven.” Instead, He shows us repeatedly that it’s all about His mercy and not what is owed to us – a source of arrogance.

The Bible continually warns against the evil of pride. Even the Apostle Paul was vulnerable to this poison. Because of this, God allowed Satan to afflict him. (2 Corinthians 12:7-10)

However, many rabbis have sidestepped the Biblical warnings and have cleared the way for self-aggrandizement. I was attending the studies of one very learned and charismatic rabbi. He taught what other rabbis and rabbinic literature had been teaching – that the Jews occupy a superior status. We are actually part of the Mind of God.

One of the several lawyers and judges who also attended his studies asked:

·       Rabbi, I have been reading that the Bible often describes the Jews as a “stubborn and stiff-necked” people. How do you reconcile this with the fact that we are actually part of the Mind of God?

The rabbi answered that we have to understand what the Bible means by “stubborn and stiff-necked.” He explained that the Jews are so “stubborn and stiff-necked” that we stubbornly keep our eyes focused on God. 

Such misguided interpretation represents a perfect prescription for pride, and pride is a killer. It kills the possibility of any real gratefulness for God. It so exalts the self to such a height that there remains little room for God at the top and for the forgiveness He achieved through the death of His Son.

Instead, a Biblical knowledge of the extent of God’s love produces gratefulness, which is so necessary for our spiritual growth. It also enables us to reciprocate God’s love and to cement this eternally nurturing relationship.