Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!swrinde!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!pacific.mps.ohio-state.edu!linac!att!princeton!njin!paul.rutgers.edu!aramis.rutgers.edu!athos.rutgers.edu!christian From: hudson@athena.cs.uga.edu (Paul Hudson Jr) Newsgroups: soc.religion.christian Subject: Re: The law for Christians Message-ID: Date: 11 May 91 03:36:39 GMT Sender: hedrick@athos.rutgers.edu Organization: University of Georgia, Athens Lines: 45 Approved: christian@aramis.rutgers.edu In article wagner@karazm.math.uh.edu (David Wagner) writes: > >Of course Paul is not the only human author of scripture. We also have >James: > >"Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what >it says. Anyone who listens to the word but does not do what it says is >like a man who looks at his face in a mirror and, after looking at himself, >goes away and immediately forgets what he looks like. But the man who >looks intently into the perfect law that gives freedom, and continues to >do this, not forgetting what he has heard, but doing it--he will be blessed >in what he does." >--James 1:22-25. > >I realize that Bruce was writing about Paul, and not the Scriptures as a whole. >But this passage from James is particularly helpful with its description >of the Law as a mirror. There is also a problem in that James seems >to confuse Law and Gospel here, but it is true that the Law is a mirror >that shows us our sins. I don't find the 'mirror' picture particularly >helpful in the way James tries to use it here, namely concerning the third >use, as a guide to doing good. I don't think it is that James confuses the law with the gospel. Ithink it is a matter of termonology. James, a Jew, writing to Jews, uses different termonology than Paul. The "law of liberty" does not, I do not believe, refer to the law of Moses. it is interesting to look at the use of the word "law" in James. After studying James, i was reassured that though they used different termonology, and had different perspectives, Paul and James taught the same doctrine. I think the law of liberty refers to the grace that we are now under, the name "law of liberty" seems to be an oxymoron. But the word "law" probably had a special meaning to the Jews who had followed the law of Moses all their lives. In james 2, James' use of the "law of liberty seems to be contrsted with the Old Law of Moses. I don't have a Bible with me now, but I think the phrase is used in 2:13, "SO speak ye, ad so do, as they that shall be judged by the law of liberty." I would also like to point out that Jews should be free to keep the law even today, since they could back then. Even Paul once sacrificed in the temple. Link Hudson.