MESSIANIC JEWS AND THE MOSAIC COVENANT

 

 

Although Messianic Jews fully embrace the New Testament and the New Covenant, some believe that they are also called to follow some of the Mosaic Laws. However, they often go beyond practicing these laws strictly for evangelistic purposes. They also believe they are required to follow some of them. By doing this, they acknowledge that the Mosaic Covenant is still in effect, but is it?

 

Even the Hebrew Scriptures give some indications that the Old Covenant will be fulfilled and replaced by the New:

 

·       “And when you have multiplied and been fruitful in the land, in those days, declares the Lord, they shall no more say, “The ark of the covenant of the Lord.” It shall not come to mind or be remembered or missed; it shall not be made again. At that time Jerusalem shall be called the throne of the Lord, and all nations shall gather to it, to the presence of the Lord in Jerusalem, and they shall no more stubbornly follow their own evil heart.” (Jeremiah 3:16-17)

 

Coinciding with this, the Mosaic Covenant is never referred to as “everlasting” as are the covenants God had made with Noah, Abraham, David, and the New Covenant, even though the Hebrew Scriptures mentions or alludes to the Mosaic Covenant far more than the others.

 

The New Testament even claims that the New Covenant will replace the Mosaic:

 

·       “For I will be merciful toward their iniquities, and I will remember their sins no more.” [Jeremiah 31:34] In speaking of a new covenant, he [God] makes the first one obsolete. And what is becoming obsolete and growing old is ready to vanish away. (Hebrews 8:12-13)

 

The one sacrifice of Jesus would take the place of all the Temple offerings.

 

·       When he said above, “You have neither desired nor taken pleasure in sacrifices and offerings and burnt offerings and sin offerings” (these are offered according to the law), then he added, “Behold, I have come to do your will.” He does away with the first in order to establish the second. (Hebrews 10:8-9 quoting Psalm 40)

 

Jesus even proclaimed that He is greater than the Temple (Matthew 12:6-8). He cancelled out our debt by paying the ultimate price:

 

·       And you, who were dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made alive together with him, having forgiven us all our trespasses, by canceling the record of debt that stood against us with its legal demands. This he set aside, nailing it to the cross. (Colossians 2:13-14)

 

To nail the Law on the cross suggests that it had been put to death along with Jesus. Elsewhere, Paul wrote that Jesus had abolished this Law so that all His children would be part of one Body:

 

·       For he himself is our peace, who has made us both one and has broken down in his flesh the dividing wall of hostility by abolishing the law of commandments expressed in ordinances, that he might create in himself one new man in place of the two, so making peace, and might reconcile us both to God in one body through the cross, thereby killing the hostility. (Ephesians 2:14-16)

 

Christ made the two as one, Jew and Gentile, by abolishing the Mosaic Covenant, the “dividing wall of hostility.” Therefore, to claim that the Jews have a special obligation to keep this Law is to re-establish what Christ had abolished, and the division created by the Mosaic Law. In many ways, Jesus’ death signaled the end of the Old:

 

·       The three hours of darkness, signifying the wrath of God poured out upon His Son

·       The earthquake

·       The Old Testament saints rising from their graves. (They had been unable to enter God’s presence until His righteousness had been satisfied by the substitutionary death of Jesus - Romans 3:25; Hebrews 11:39-40.)

·       The curtain of the Holy of Holies torn in two, symbolizing that the way into the presence of God had now been opened.

 

Jesus had given them no indication that the Law of Moses remained normative for anyone. In its place, Jesus had instituted the New Covenant:

 

·       Now as they were eating, Jesus took bread, and after blessing it broke it and gave it to the disciples, and said, “Take, eat; this is my body.” And he took a cup, and when he had given thanks he gave it to them, saying, “Drink of it, all of you, for this is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins.” (Matthew 26:26–28; Mark 14:22-24; Luke 22:19-20)

 

Jesus implied that the Mosaic would no longer be necessary for the forgiveness of sins, indicating that it was being replaced.

 

Since the Law has been fulfilled and replaced by the New, following the Mosaic Law is unbiblical. Paul taught that the two covenants are mutually exclusive. Either we are under the Old or the New:

 

·       Likewise, my brothers, you also have died to the law through the body of Christ, so that you may belong to another, to him who has been raised from the dead, in order that we may bear fruit for God...But now we are released from the law, having died to that which held us captive, so that we serve in the new way of the Spirit and not in the old way of the written code. (Romans 7:4, 6; Galatians 3:1-5)

 

We are “released from the law.” Paul had also instructed us to not submit to the Law:

 

·       “For freedom Christ has set us free; stand firm therefore, and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery [of the Law]. Look: I, Paul, say to you that if you accept circumcision, Christ will be of no advantage to you. I testify again to every man who accepts circumcision that he is obligated to keep the whole law. You are severed from Christ, you who would be justified by the law; you have fallen away from grace. For through the Spirit, by faith, we ourselves eagerly wait for the hope of righteousness. For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision counts for anything, but only faith working through love. (Galatians 5:1-6)

 

Messianics often make the distinction between following the Law to be justified by it as opposed to following it as the Word of God, which never fails (Isaiah 40:8). They justify their position by pointing out that Christians still follow many of the laws of the Old Covenant. However, we do not follow these laws because the Mosaic Covenant is still in effect, but because the NT affirms their continuation as part of the New Covenant.

 

They also point to the fact that the early Church still attended the Temple services. However, they had done so for purely evangelistic purposes and not because they believed that they were required to do so. This had been Paul’s strategy:

·       To the Jews I became as a Jew, in order to win Jews. To those under the law I became as one under the law (though not being myself under the law) that I might win those under the law. (1 Corinthians 9:20)

 

There is also another important distinction: While the Hebrew Scriptures remain the unchanging Word of God and retain its instructive value, the Mosaic Covenant has been replaced, as eating the manna of the desert had been replaced by eating the produce from the land once Israel had crossed the Jordan into the Promised Land. These changes did not constitute a change in God’s Word but a change in His actions.

 

Jesus had fulfilled the Law (Matthew 5:17-19) and was secretly ushering in the New in place of the Old:

 

·       “Hear me, all of you, and understand: There is nothing outside a person that by going into him can defile him, but the things that come out of a person are what defile him...Do you not see that whatever goes into a person from outside cannot defile him, since it enters not his heart but his stomach, and is expelled?” (Thus he declared all foods clean.) (Mark 7:14-15, 17-19)

 

Jesus had instituted a new priesthood in place of the Levitical priesthood:

 

·       Jesus said to them again, “Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, even so I am sending you.” And when he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you withhold forgiveness from any, it is withheld.” (John 20:21-23)

 

It would now be the Apostles who would administer God’s forgiveness. When Jesus gave His great commission to His disciples, He left out any mention of the Laws of Moses:

 

·       And Jesus came and said to them, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.” (Matthew 28:18-20; Luke 24:46-47)

 

This demonstrated that Jesus’ Word would now replace Moses’.

 

If we declare that we are still mandated to follow the Law, we cannot pick and choose among the verses, something absolutely forbidden by the Mosaic Covenant, but must follow all the laws, including the sacrificial laws. As Christians, this is something to which even Messianics cannot submit themselves. Instead, the only thing that counts is “faith working through love.”