Introduction
Paul is an enigmatic and thoroughly fascinating man. His understanding, but particularly his judgment, of the “Law”, a.k.a the “Law of Moses”, has been hotly debated for centuries, especially within the context of the Reformation’s insight into God’s Grace as all-sufficient for, and therefore independent of, one’s obedience to this thing called “the Law”. In trying to understand Paul’s views of the law, many find it useful to see his thinking as motivated by the question: “If the Christ came and died for us, what must have been wrong under the law?”
The key to attempting to understand Paul’s attitude concerning the “Law of Moses” is to understand (as is our focus in this series) what Paul was thinking of in the various contexts in which he mentions the law – ceremonial (a.k.a. Levitical) law? Original Mosaic moral law? Oral Law? Civil law? Natural Law? And, we’ll have to allow for some development in his thinking as, for example, he transitions from the Galatians epistle to Romans. We’ll see what insight we can gain.
Premise
Paul refers to the “law” 95 times in his epistles: 51 in Romans, and 27 in Galatians (so only 17 mentions in the remaining eleven books.) The primary feature of Paul’s understanding of “the Law” we can see in these usages was its contradistinction to the Grace offered by God in Jesus, or what Paul occasionally referred to as “the law of Christ” (Gal 6:2, 1 Cor 9:21).
Many modern-day Christian churches have taken the position, based largely on Paul’s discussion in Romans 9, that the law (by which they think of any rule under which Israelites lived at any point in time and as revealed initially at Sinai) has no bearing whatsoever on the Christian or his life. They have concluded that with the advent of Christ, God changed His mind about His divine instruction to those who before Christ aspired to live in obedience with Him.
As we’ll see, God did not change His mind about His moral instructions to the Israelites. What changed is the addition, over the centuries by the priests, of volumes of “laws of men” (Mt 15:3-9, Mt 23:2-4, Is 29:13, Eze 22:26, Jer 8:8), thus corrupting what nevertheless retained the title “the Law of Moses”. These added laws of men we identify as “ceremonial” or “Levitical” laws. We’ll see how Paul handled this situation.
And, as I noted in the previous pieces in this series, I believe that the Shapira Moses Scroll is evidence for the authenticity of the original “Law of Moses” said to have been given to Moses at Moab, only to be amended later following the exile to result in the Pentateuch, a theory traditionalists utterly reject.
Paul’s Allusions to the Law
Since the Epistle to the Galatians was written before Romans, we’ll start there.
Antioch
We first find Paul berating Peter in Antioch for his double-minded attachment to “the law”, by which Paul means here, obviously, the ceremonial laws – specifically the food laws, as well as the Jewish tradition that Gentiles were unclean. (Verses like Ex 12:43, Lev 12:25, Dt 14:21, and Dt 17:15 make clear that foreigners/Gentiles weren’t ”unclean” per se under the Law (though they didn’t typically wash their hands before eating as was the Jewish custom) as much as they were simply outside of Israel and its covenant, and so were assumed to be defiled/unclean. Several places in the Pentateuch state a requirement that strangers/foreigners first be circumcised before partaking in any of the rituals of the Israelites.)
The context is that as long as there were no Jews around, Peter felt at ease mingling and eating with Gentiles. But when the Jerusalem Jews showed up, Peter then kept his distance from the Gentile, newly minted believers in Christ. In this particular case, Paul makes it abundantly clear (both to Peter and to us) that by behaving in this way he was disclaiming Christ and His sacrifice on behalf of all people.
So here, as with Peter’s revelation before and experience with the Roman Gentile Cornelius (Acts 10), we have the implicit ceremonial prohibition against interaction with Gentiles, as well as the food laws, being overturned (subjects on which God never issued laws). Neither of these were components of Moses’ Law[i] recorded at Moab and so, by definition, are later additions (in this case by the “P” source some part of which may have been written before the exile, but scholars believe the vast majority was authored during or just after the exile [6th century BC]).
Galatians 3:10-13
10 For all who rely on works of the law are under a curse; for it is written, “Cursed be everyone who does not abide by all things written in the Book of the Law, and do them.” 11 Now it is evident that no one is justified before God by the law, for “The righteous shall live by faith.” 12 But the law is not of faith, rather “The one who does them shall live by them.” 13 Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us—for it is written, “Cursed is everyone who is hanged on a tree”—
There’s lots of theology here, but let’s just concentrate on the law he’s talking about. He’s talking here about “works of the law”. The word rendered “works” is:
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- ἐˊργον érgon; gen. érgou, neut. noun from érgō (n.f.), to work. Work, performance, the result or object of employment, making or working.
Its meaning is the performance of some activity to, assumedly, achieve some end result. He’s talking about all those who rely on this work to produce a result. But before that outcome can be achieved, Paul tells them they have to perform not only the bit that they did today, but all the bits that they’ll be required to do tomorrow, and all of their subsequent days.
To see the futility of this arrangement, let’s use the metaphor of bricklaying. As a bricklayer, the job you have been given is to construct an enormous wall, many meters thick and miles in length. Each day you come to work and lay another day’s worth of bricks – say 800 or so.
That day’s work didn’t build the wall. That day’s work was one instance of a regiment that you, as a bricklayer, were under obligation to perform. But even if you pursued it for your entire life, you could not possibly succeed in building the wall. (I’m reminded of the story, in “Pillars of the Earth”, of stonemasons in the middle ages working on cathedrals for their entire lives, never to see the finished product.)
In Paul’s version of this metaphor, not only do you need to lay your bricks each day, you’ve got to transport them to the site, mix the mortar, do the surveying, dig and build the foundation for the next segment, etc., etc. And each of these you must do in perpetuity in order to…
In order to what? Paul here implies that our bricklayer’s motivation is to be “righteous”[ii], which to Paul means being judged by God as in the right, and therefore a member of God’s family. Jews thought their birthright had already established their (covenant) right standing with God – i.e. they believed they were God’s “treasured possession” – so that all they had to do was act in accordance with the rules of God’s chosen people (i.e. Paul’s “works” — our bricklaying) and they would remain a member of those people in good standing.
Paul goes on to say (in so many words): “Sorry to break it to you, but persistent bricklaying won’t result in your being members of God’s family. It never did. In fact, what you’re seeking has nothing to do with bricklaying. It has to do with your trust of and devotion to (i.e. ‘faith’ in) God (citing Abraham, of course). God just doesn’t, and never did, care anything about walls.”
So, what “law” specified in great detail (to use our metaphor again) how to build a brick wall? That would be the Levitical, ceremonial law in large tracts of Exodus, Leviticus, and Numbers, as well as a bit of Deuteronomy. None of this has to do with Moses’ original moral laws, written in his scroll.
Galatians 3:15ff
The next portion of Gal 3 seems to open up Paul’s intended meaning of the “law” to include not just the ceremonial, but also the moral law of the Decalogue with its blessing and curses.
15 To give a human example, brothers: even with a man-made covenant, no one annuls it or adds to it once it has been ratified. 16 Now the promises were made to Abraham and to his offspring. It does not say, “And to offsprings,” referring to many, but referring to one, “And to your offspring,” who is Christ. 17 This is what I mean: the law, which came 430 years afterward, does not annul a covenant previously ratified by God, so as to make the promise void. 18 For if the inheritance comes by the law, it no longer comes by promise; but God gave it to Abraham by a promise.
19 Why then the law? It was added because of transgressions, until the offspring should come to whom the promise had been made, and it was put in place through angels by an intermediary. 20 Now an intermediary implies more than one, but God is one.
21 Is the law then contrary to the promises of God? Certainly not! For if a law had been given that could give life, then righteousness would indeed be by the law. 22 But the Scripture imprisoned everything under sin, so that the promise by faith in Jesus Christ might be given to those who believe.
He opens, speaking of the promise made to Abraham that his “offspring”, which Paul sees as Jesus, singular, would be a blessing to all nations. He says this covenant promise is still in force, despite the Law being given through Moses 430 years after Abraham’s promise.
Then he asks, rhetorically, why “the law” (by which he seems to mean the entire Hebrew scripture – i.e. “the law and the prophets”) was given in the first place. (This is an evidence of his looking backward from Christ’s incarnation and sacrifice to question the value of the law prior to Christ, asking: “If Christ was the solution, what was the problem?”).
Here he states somewhat ambiguously that the purpose of the law was “transgressions”, by which most commentators conclude his meaning was “to expose transgressions and provide for their just handling”, consistent with his later characterization of it as “our guardian”. This, of course, is the purpose of most laws for most societies: present a rule to be followed, and specify the requirements of justice when it is not followed. Such laws are essential for a society to not devolve into mayhem and chaos.
But Paul says this was a stopgap measure until Christ came. Then to Paul, everything changed; everything was new – particularly the exclusivity of Jews as the adopted children of God. It seems clear that Paul’s model of “the law” here is primarily as a civil management tool, but his “430 years” reference unavoidably includes Moses and his Sinai/Moab moral Decalogue.
Then (v21) he inconclusively makes the claim that “the law” (by which he likely means the Decalogue) was not contrary to the promises of God (by which, assumedly, he’s referring to the Abrahamic promises he’s been citing), but he doesn’t defend this point. He gets to the same point in his argument in Romans 3 at Rom 3:31, again without resolution.
He doesn’t take up the resolution of these points until Romans 7. There he characterizes the law’s goodness as that which exposed (rhetorically) ‘his’ sin. It’s quite easy for us to imagine that Paul here is speaking of Moses’ moral law – the Decalogue and related instructions. It is in attempting to follow these laws that we see that we consistently fail. We bear false witness (lie), we covet the things our neighbor has, and we (men) lust after women who are not our wives, all despite our sincere intent not to. It is at this point that Paul concludes that the law is good but it is the nature of his “flesh” that keeps him from being able to keep Moses’ (moral) law. That is the culprit:
21 So I find it to be a law that when I want to do right, evil lies close at hand. 22 For I delight in the law of God, in my inner being, 23 but I see in my members another law waging war against the law of my mind and making me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my members. 24 Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? 25 Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, I myself serve the law of God with my mind, but with my flesh I serve the law of sin.
Here the law in view is Moses’ moral law and his (our) inability to follow/live in accordance with it. What’s the solution he asks in v24? He answers with the exclamation in v25: “Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord!”. Paul sees Christ as in some way the means of moral law-keeping, yielding righteousness.
Romans 8
It’s at this point that Paul, having rhetorically made the case that he (/everyone) can’t fulfill the Law, rejoices that:
8:1 There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. 2 For the law of the Spirit of life has set you free in Christ Jesus from the law of sin and death. 3 For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do. By sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, he condemned sin in the flesh, 4 in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.
This is Paul’s “Law” punchline. And, of course, what he is saying here is that those who trust and seek to follow Christ for their lives are imbued by God with His Spirit, through whose influence they can overcome the impulses and thoughts that Paul agonized over in Rom 7, and so “walk according to the Spirit”, to him meaning in fulfillment of the Decalogue/Law of Moses.
Conclusion
Apparently, scholars have been sniping at each other for decades over what Paul’s position on the Law was, many claiming he was incoherent on the subject[iii] – and not just between epistles, but from chapter to chapter within a single book. I haven’t taken the time to study their debates so I can’t inform you of their details.
However, I am confident that what we’ve covered in this piece accurately represents Paul’s thinking concerning the Jewish Law of his day, both the ceremonial law, whose adherence signaled one’s Jewishness and therefore covenant relationship with God, and the moral, whose attainment Paul lamented was an impossibility — until the advent of the Messiah.
And, I am also satisfied that, while there are many, many other verses in which Paul speaks of the law, these passages capture the primary contexts of the Law Paul thought about in his “Gospel”: the moral instructions of the Decalogue and Shema, the Pentateuch and its prescriptions for Jewishness-keeping “works”, and, finally, the entirety of his Hebrew scripture.
We see that when he is talking about “works of the law”, he’s talking about performing the activities that marked one out as being a Jew – one who was of the people chosen by God to be His people; His treasured possession; a nation of priests. These included all of the Levitical (and in Paul’s time, Oral) Torah rules and procedures designed to keep one in a state of “cleanliness”[iv] (i.e. ritual purity), or right-standing, and so permitted him to remain within the “camp” of the Jews with their God.
Paul’s whole discussion of works, and works of the law, orbited around his main point to his brethren Jews that with the incarnation and resurrection of Christ, everything for them (as well as everyone else) was new. Sadly, those (and they were the majority) committed to their centuries-old rules-of-man-based tradition simply could not conceive of, let alone accept, such change, and set about to create every possible argument from their scriptures (except the important ones) as to why Jesus was not their Messiah, or Israel’s, just as they do to this day.
Concerning the hotly debated subject of the Law’s applicability to Christian believers, especially Jews, following the Christ event, through Paul’s “freedom” language (e.g. Ga 2:4, 5:1, 5:13) he’s not saying we are no longer subject to God’s instructions for living (principally the Decalogue). He is saying that through the indwelling of the Spirit, we now have the ability to obey it. Our freedom in Christ is from the “law of sin and death” (Rom 8:2) which is the fate of people dependent only on their Jewish identity, and is not something the Law could ever provide.
Notice that he nowhere said that keeping elements of the ceremonial law was prohibited. He simply said that keeping those laws (e.g. circumcision, which he makes much of, particularly to the Galatians) was ineffective for establishing and maintaining one’s status as part of God’s family – i.e. “justified”. That always required fidelity to God, but now required faith in, and obedience to, His revealed Messiah.
However, this wasn’t all the Law was to Paul. In Romans chapters 5-7 he builds his case that people aren’t capable of keeping the Law, by which he’s referring to the Mosaic moral law; principally the Decalogue. Chapter 8 is his celebration that through the sacrifice of Christ, the indwelling of the Holy Spirit is given to those who trust and seek to follow Christ for their lives, by which they are increasingly able to obey those Mosaic laws the ethics of which Jesus articulated throughout His ministry, notably in His Sermon on the Mount.
This is the apocalypse hidden by most of the institutional churches for the last many hundreds of years. Where it has been preached it has been, in the main, in such bland tones, with words as impassioned as one reciting a food recipe, that it has shrouded the authentic prescription for a transformed life; one that is increasingly capable of conforming to God’s instructions. This is the headline of authentic Christianity that Paul was communicating which has been ignored by the Church for hundreds of years.
[i] I’m not trying to beat a dead horse here, but, once again, my premise is that the original Law of Moses was recorded on a scroll at Moab (Dt. 31:9), a copy of which was found in the 1870’s (the so-called “Moses Scroll”), but subsequently misplaced.
[ii] Most Christians, beginning with Luther, have misunderstood that Jews thought they were accomplishing righteousness by doing Law-prescribed duties. Actually, what they thought (if they thought anything) was that they were doing what it took to be a Jew – in the clan — one of the chosen of God with whom they were in covenant.
[iii] Oakes, Peter, “Paul, The Law, and Coherence”, The Expository Times
[iv] See “Uncleanness, Sin, and Holiness in the Hebrew Bible” for some background on the premises of the Temple Cult.
