Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rpi!uupsi!njin!paul.rutgers.edu!aramis.rutgers.edu!athos.rutgers.edu!christian From: tblake@bingvaxu.cc.binghamton.edu (Thomas Blake) Newsgroups: soc.religion.christian Subject: Re: "Laws that are not Good" (Ezekiel 20) Message-ID: Date: 8 May 91 08:13:59 GMT Sender: hedrick@athos.rutgers.edu Organization: State University of New York at Binghamton Lines: 67 Approved: christian@aramis.rutgers.edu In article math1h3@jetson.uh.edu writes: >> 25 "Then I gave them laws that are not good and commands that do not >> bring life. 26 I let them defile themselves with their own offerings, >> and I let them sacrifice their first-born sons. This was to punish them >> and show them that I am the Lord. (TEV) >Here is how the passage reads in the NIV, and I think you will see quite >a difference: > >"25) I also gave them over to statutes that were not good and laws they could >not live by; 26) I let them become defiled through their gifts --the sacrifice >of every firstborn--that I might fill them with horror so they would know that >I am the Lord." This is indeed a different sounding reading. It sounds as if God has "given Israel enough rope to let them hang themselves". That is, he's let them investigate the evil ways so that they might better understand his ways. Indeed, in the Gospels, Jesus' reaction to the Pharisees' question about the laws governing divorce makes it appear that this is Moses' law, and not the Law of God. Matthew 19:7,8 See also Mark 10:4,5 7 The Pharisees asked him, "Why then, did Moses give the law for a man to hand his wive a divorce notice and send her away?" 8 Jesus answered, "Moses gave you permission to divorce your wives because you are so hard to teach... (TEV) For those who are interested, check out Deuteronomy 24:1-4 It appears to me that Jesus makes a distinction between the laws of Moses and the laws of God. (A distinction we as modern day Christians often fail to make.) Interestingly enough, also check out Luke 16:16-18 16 "The Law of Moses and the writings of the prophets were in effect up to the time of John the Baptist; since then the Good News about the Kingdom of God is being told, and everyone forces his way in. 17 But it is easier for heaven and earth to disappear than for the smallest detail of the Law to be done away with. 18 "Any man who divorces his wife and marries another woman commits adultery; and the man who marries a divorced woman commits adultery. Correct my interpretation if you will. Verse 16 implies that since the coming of John the Baptist announcing the new age The Law of Moses, and the teachings of the prophets are no longer in effect. Verse 17 implies that the Law of God *unlike* the Law of Moses is not so easily done away with. Verse 18 stresses the distinction between the law of Moses and the Law of God. This would also help to explain the apparant contradictions between Jesus' teachings. On the one hand saying that not a jot or a tiddle of the law would be changed. On the other hand apparantly changing or at least reinterpretting the laws of Moses. What do you say folks? It seems to me that this understanding even helps us to understand Paul's teachings. Tom Blake SUNY-Binghamton [That would be an unusual reading of Luke 16:17. Not to say that it's necessarily wrong... Another possibility is something like Paul implies at time: the Law has not ceased to exist, and it's still holy. We are just no longer until it's control. --clh]