Subject: Sha'ul's hermeneutics
Date: Fri, 9 Jan 1998 00:33:33 +0000
From: heb_roots_chr@mail.geocities.com
Reply-To: heb_roots_chr@geocities.com
To: "Hebraic Heritage Newsgroup"<heb_roots_chr@geocities.com>

From:          Johann van Rooyen
Subject:       Sha'ul's hermeneutics
To:            heb_roots_chr@geocities.com

Dear miners for truth and delusion

SHA'UL'S HERMENEUTIC

An exegete may fall into the trap of assuming that Sha'ul is an
apostate from Torah-observance, and to interpret his writings using a
perverse neo-Marcionian hermeneutic.  This will yield perversely wrong
conclusions, which will conflict with many of Sha'ul's own statements.

For example: Sha'ul condemns the coming Antichrist as the "lawless
one" and as the "man of lawlessness," i.e. as one who will, like
Antiochus IV "Epiphanes," attempt to outlaw and eradicate the Torah.
In the letter to the believers in Rome, he states that the Torah is
qadosh (holy) and perfect.  To interpret Sha'ul correctly, one has to study
the Tanakh very rigorously, carefully noting that:

==> Torah is given to Israel as their constitution, laying down their
 covenant obligations for staying in Eretz Yisra'el and receiving the
 blessings and protection of the Almighty.

==> Under the Torah, Stangers (a ger) wanting to stay in Eretz Yisra'el,
 had specific obligations and duties.

==> Scripture consistently requires Gentiles to keep the Noachide
 precepts, and not the entire Torah.

==> It is evident from texts such as Mattatiyahu 23 that Messiah Yeshua
 did not approve of having Gentiles converted to Judaism.  Why?
 Because, as Gentiles, they have less, and less strict covenantal
 obligations.  Converting them to Judaism will only put them under a
 greater burden, and therefore under stricter judgement.  Sha'ul had
 to apply this normative halakhah of the Master.  For this reason, he
 instructs Gentiles to remain uncircumcised, but circumcises Timothy,
 whose mother was Jewish.

==> In Acts 15, the ruling Council in Yerushalayim looses Gentile
 Messianic believers from having to observe the entire Torah as
 entrance requirements into the assemblies, but binds the Noachide
 mitzvot on them.  As the Sh'liach to the Gentiles, Sha'ul has to
 apply this halakhah.

==> Sha'ul writes to Gentile audiences in Gentile countries, not to gerim
 (strangers, sojourners) wanting to stay inside Eretz Yisra'el.  He
 also writes in a time when the Shevet (ruling authority) had departed
 from Yahudah and when Israel is under Roman rule.

==> Compare, e.g. the message of the prophet Yonah to Nineveh.  Yonah was
 not commissioned to instruct Nineveh to become Torah-observant, but
 to repent from their transgression of Noachide commandments,
 specifically the Noachide obligation to administer Justice.

==> Sha'ul writes to newly converted pagans, coming from a culture with a
 ritualistic-sacramentalistic view of salvation.  He has to go to
 extremes to instruct them in the Tanakh's teaching on the yeshu'at
 Elomim.  In Galatians 2 he grabs "Jimmy Pagan" by the shoulders,
 shakes him and says,

Galatians 2:15-16
15We who are Yahudim (Jews) by birth and not 'Gentile sinners' 16know
that a man is not justified by observing the Torah, but by the emunah
(faithfulness) of Yahushua the Messiah.  So we, too, have put our
faith in Messiah Yahushua that we may be justified by the faithfulness
of Messiah and not by observing the Torah, because by observing the
Torah no-one will be justified.

We conclude that Sha'ul affirms and applies Torah rigorously and
literally, and does not uproot it.  Had he heard a neo-Marcionist
interpretation of his writings, this Messianic Pharisee would have
torn his garments.

Note that the advice to Messianic Gentiles not to convert to Judaism,
and the ruling that they only have to keep the Noachide mitzvot as
entrance requirements into the Messianic assemblies, does not mean
that they may not voluntarily, and under the guidance of the Spirit of
Truth, observe more and more of the Torah, to be blessed and
instructed.  The point is that no man may force them to take on
Israel's unique covenantal obligations as entrance requirements into
the Body of Messiah.

==================

Shalom

Johann van Rooyen
South Africa

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