Jesus Vs The Old Testament

Graham

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I was discussing the Masons with someone today. The person with whom I was having the discussion is a very devout, self-righteous Christian who is very against the Masons, primarily because they apparently swear "blood oaths" which are apparently the invention of Satan and "against God". (yes, she actually said "an invention of Satan", I couldn't believe it)

Anyway, the conversation moved on and I speculated that there were probably Masons and Masons - Masons that really believe in all the Mombo-Jumbo and Masons who are Masons 'cos they think it'll give them an edge when they're bidding for construction contracts or whatever.

I drew a parallell with "regular" Christians and "fundy" Christians, pointing out that if you actually did all of the crazy stuff in the OT, you'd be into some crazy things.

Her response was "Well, it's just as well then that Jesus dies to free us from all that." At which I nodded, smiled politely and changed the subject.

I was wondering though if some of you with more biblical knowledge than myself could answer this statement purely for my benefit if nothing else.

Is it correct to say that Christians were freed from the requirements of the OT by Jesus? If so: all of them or which ones specifically?

Thanks

Graham
 
Graham said:

Is it correct to say that Christians were freed from the requirements of the OT by Jesus? If so: all of them or which ones specifically?
You mean, after all that arguing about posting the Ten Commandments in US courtrooms, now we find out that the Ten Commandments were repealed two thousand years ago?!?

D'OH!
 
Re: Re: Jesus Vs The Old Testament

Upchurch said:

You mean, after all that arguing about posting the Ten Commandments in US courtrooms, now we find out that the Ten Commandments were repealed two thousand years ago?!?

D'OH!

Quite :)
 
Re: Re: Jesus Vs The Old Testament

Upchurch said:

You mean, after all that arguing about posting the Ten Commandments in US courtrooms, now we find out that the Ten Commandments were repealed two thousand years ago?!?

D'OH!


The Ten Commandments!?

That is soooooo 33 A.D.
 
This is what Ortodox -Greek Christians think.

( REMINDER: Ortodox in Greek is the one who hold the unique truth!!! So, pay double attention to what I am going to say for I I am the one who knows the truth:p )

The followers of Christ ( or should I say of Paul...) thought that they couldn't possibly ignore the O.T.

So. Old Testament is the tradition. We have included it to the Holly Bible just to remind us from where we started.

We started as paganists and Moses and the Prophets came and revealed us the forthcoming truth, the truth that would be revealed by the incarnation of God ( That was the trick to accept the bad jewish Prophets!)

So, The Commandements are respected more like our religious background, this is why , at least in Ortodox churches we don't recite the Ten Commandements, we just learn about them at school.

Maybe ( I am almost certain) it's another trick to enforce to us the idea that we are not as retarded as those who still believe in O.T...

It's like Law. Old Legislation exists and it's included in every book but it's the final word that counts.

Jesus said the final word and this final word is the one that counts.
 
A quick google search will reveal many opinions on this one.

The basic idea though is that Jesus's teachings replaced many or all of the OT laws.
 
Graham said:
Is it correct to say that Christians were freed from the requirements of the OT by Jesus? If so: all of them or which ones specifically?
There are a lot more laws in the OT than just the Ten Commandments. Try reading, oh which is it, Numbers or Deuteronomy some day. There aren't enough pigeons and goats in the world to satisfy the sacrificial requirements there.

Jesus said that He brought a new covenant from God. He narrowed down all the old laws to just two:
1) Love God with all your heart.
2) Love your neighbor as yourself.

And then He died so that people that believed in His message could stop sacrificing all those animals.

The Ten Commandments remained good, relatively specific, examples of what Jesus' new covenant was supposed to cover. "Thou shalt not steal", for instance, falls under "Love your neighbor" in a fairly obvious way. "Remember the Sabbath" falls under "Love God" in a way that is not as intuitive.That's why Christians keep the Ten Commandments handy; they are convenient reference points to clarify the new covenant.

In my humble interpretation.
 
Re: Re: Jesus Vs The Old Testament

Beleth said:
He narrowed down all the old laws to just two:
1) Love God with all your heart.
2) Love your neighbor as yourself.
That's a very interesting way of putting it. Never really thought about it from that POV.

Now, just because I can't resist being a sarcastic b*st*rd:

How can you love your neighbor or yourself if you must first love God with ALL of your heart? I guess Christians must have love that goes all the way to 11.
 
Re: Re: Jesus Vs The Old Testament

Beleth said:
There are a lot more laws in the OT than just the Ten Commandments. Try reading, oh which is it, Numbers or Deuteronomy some day. There aren't enough pigeons and goats in the world to satisfy the sacrificial requirements there.

Jesus said that He brought a new covenant from God. He narrowed down all the old laws to just two:
1) Love God with all your heart.
2) Love your neighbor as yourself.

...
Both these laws appear in the old testament if I recall correctly. They are repeated by Jesus as the principles which are the basis for eveything. (On these hang all the law and the prophets).

Many of the statements of Jesus in the NT refer back to the OT.

As for sacrifices, at least 1, and I believe all 4, of the gospels state something along the lines he was the one full, perfect and sufficient sacrifice which appears to suggests sacrifice is no longer required.

I believe the early church records show debate on what other old testament laws we were free from.

Walt
 
I find it strange that the christians want to post the 10 commandments in schools because it's "god's word" and yet they don't want to place "god's" proscribed punishments along with it. Hmmmm.
 
Re: Re: Re: Jesus Vs The Old Testament

Upchurch said:
How can you love your neighbor or yourself if you must first love God with ALL of your heart? I guess Christians must have love that goes all the way to 11.
That's not as sarcastic a question as you might think! It's a tough question to answer. Jesus mentioned something along these lines. It's the dreaded Luke 14:26.
Originally said by Jesus
If any man come to me, and hate not his father, and mother, and wife, and children,and brethren, and sisters, yea, and his own life also, he cannot be my disciple.
Which of course flies in the face of the "Honor thy mother and thy father" Commandment.

Beats me what Jesus was thinking when He said that. Apologists say that what he meant was "You have to love me so much that the affection and honor you give your family looks like hate by comparison," but I've never bought that. How can love ever look like hate?
 
i was under the impression that jesus was supposedly a devout jew, and that he practiced the old school hebrew ideas hardcore. he supposedly came to restore the religion to the way it was before the phrisees ruined it with their extra stuff. except for the sacrificial stuff, i thought christians were still bound to the traditions of the old testament.
 
My personal favorites are the mildew regulations in leviticus. When I pointed these out to a Catholic friend as examples of how ridiculous the bible is, he denied that they were part of the bible!:eek:

edited to add this:

Cleansing From Mildew
33 The LORD said to Moses and Aaron, 34 "When you enter the land of Canaan, which I am giving you as your possession, and I put a spreading mildew in a house in that land, 35 the owner of the house must go and tell the priest, 'I have seen something that looks like mildew in my house.' 36 The priest is to order the house to be emptied before he goes in to examine the mildew, so that nothing in the house will be pronounced unclean. After this the priest is to go in and inspect the house. 37 He is to examine the mildew on the walls, and if it has greenish or reddish depressions that appear to be deeper than the surface of the wall, 38 the priest shall go out the doorway of the house and close it up for seven days. 39 On the seventh day the priest shall return to inspect the house. If the mildew has spread on the walls, 40 he is to order that the contaminated stones be torn out and thrown into an unclean place outside the town. 41 He must have all the inside walls of the house scraped and the material that is scraped off dumped into an unclean place outside the town. 42 Then they are to take other stones to replace these and take new clay and plaster the house.
43 "If the mildew reappears in the house after the stones have been torn out and the house scraped and plastered, 44 the priest is to go and examine it and, if the mildew has spread in the house, it is a destructive mildew; the house is unclean. 45 It must be torn down-its stones, timbers and all the plaster-and taken out of the town to an unclean place.
46 "Anyone who goes into the house while it is closed up will be unclean till evening. 47 Anyone who sleeps or eats in the house must wash his clothes.
48 "But if the priest comes to examine it and the mildew has not spread after the house has been plastered, he shall pronounce the house clean, because the mildew is gone. 49 To purify the house he is to take two birds and some cedar wood, scarlet yarn and hyssop. 50 He shall kill one of the birds over fresh water in a clay pot. 51 Then he is to take the cedar wood, the hyssop, the scarlet yarn and the live bird, dip them into the blood of the dead bird and the fresh water, and sprinkle the house seven times. 52 He shall purify the house with the bird's blood, the fresh water, the live bird, the cedar wood, the hyssop and the scarlet yarn. 53 Then he is to release the live bird in the open fields outside the town. In this way he will make atonement for the house, and it will be clean."
54 These are the regulations for any infectious skin disease, for an itch, 55 for mildew in clothing or in a house, 56 and for a swelling, a rash or a bright spot, 57 to determine when something is clean or unclean.
These are the regulations for infectious skin diseases and mildew.


fromhttp://bible.gospelcom.net/cgi-bin/bible?passage=LEV+14&language=english&version=NIV
 
Re: Re: Re: Jesus Vs The Old Testament

Walter Wayne said:
I believe the early church records show debate on what other old testament laws we were free from.

Walt

Sadly, the pinheads who put the Bible together left out the "Gospel of Thomas" which might have A. more authoritatively distanced Xian doctrine from the laws of moses and B. made Xianity more tolerable in general.
 
Graham said:
I was discussing the Masons with someone today. The person with whom I was having the discussion is a very devout, self-righteous Christian who is very against the Masons

Yes, a good example of ignorance. To join one branch of the Masons (the Knights Templar).you have to affirm a belief in Jesus. Most of your jewish masons join the Scottish Rite.
 
Graham

"Well, it's just as well then that Jesus dies to free us from all that."

Matthew 5:17
Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil.
This seems pretty straight forward to me. But Paul said it was ok to eat pork cracklins and hang out with goyim. I guess Paul was more important than JC.

I think it's pretty clear JC meant to end the blood sacrifice. But the rest of it - like divorce - I dunno. Seems to me most Xians just make the Bible say whatever they want it to.
 
Yahzi said:
Graham

. I guess Paul was more important than JC.

Of course! It's HIS Religion after all... Christianity should be called Paulianism... Great mind, we must admit!
 
neutrino_cannon said:
My personal favorites are the mildew regulations in leviticus.

Well, I'm not a biologist or in any other way an authority on mildew, but to me the regulations do have the looks of a sensible way for a pre-scientific society to prevent the proliferation of certain kinds of mildew. Remember that mildew could be a very dangerous crop-disease to an agrarian society.

Admittedly, to us the sacrifice of the bird seems rather silly and pointless to us, but if we put that down to adding "generic religious significance" to the act, I can't say they strike me as ridiculous at all.

Still, it is a very good example of how much of the bible (the old testament in particular) can't really be separated from the society of the time.
 
Wow

Thanks guys, lots of helpful comments. I'm engaged in an ongoing sort of cold war with this person (who's very evangelical and deeply disapproving of "my type"). Personally, I'd be happy enough to just leave the whole subject alone (since we have to sit beside each other every day and sooner or later we're going to have a row) but she will keep saying these things . . .

Anyhoo:

Cleopatra

( REMINDER: Ortodox in Greek is the one who hold the unique truth!!! So, pay double attention to what I am going to say for I am the one who knows the truth )


:p to you too.

Answer me these though, if you don't mind - is the Greek Orthodox church descended from the Byzantine tradition or is it just a coincidence of names? What is the connection/relationship (or is there any) between Greek Orthodox and Russian Orthodox?

Greek Orthodox thinking is descended from Paul's too - correct?

Beleth

I wasn't referring to the Ten Commandments specifically, in fact I was more interested in the various, wacky little instructions scattered around the rest of the OT.

And then He died so that people that believed in His message could stop sacrificing all those animals.

He should be like the patron saint of PETA then! Seriously though, did Jesus's reputed self-sacrifice supposedly wipe out all sin before and after that date or just before?

Seems to me it's the latter (since, presumably, no Christian would argue that we're free to sin as much as we like now since it's all, in a sense, pre-paid for) but if that's the case sure;y we should have started animal sacrificing and doing all the other stuff again as soon after the crucifixion as someone sinned?

quote:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Originally said by Jesus
If any man come to me, and hate not his father, and mother, and wife, and children,and brethren, and sisters, yea, and his own life also, he cannot be my disciple.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

- Can you give chapter and verse for this quote for future reference please?

Walter Wayne


Many of the statements of Jesus in the NT refer back to the OT.

As for sacrifices, at least 1, and I believe all 4, of the gospels state something along the lines he was the one full, perfect and sufficient sacrifice which appears to suggests sacrifice is no longer required.

See my comment to Beleth above - does this mean that any sin since the crucifixion is already sacrificed for and thus that we need not worry about any future cost?

I've never really understood the concept of "Jesus died for our sins" - unless the above is correct, it seems to me that the more time that passes since his death, the less meaningful that sacrifice is, no?

thaiboxerken

I find it strange that the christians want to post the 10 commandments in schools because it's "god's word" and yet they don't want to place "god's" proscribed punishments along with it. Hmmmm.

I think Beleth's comments cover this from the Christian perspective - i.e. outdated but still worthwhile and Yahzi covered the other angle with - most Xians just make the Bible say whatever they want it to.

It does make a farce of the regular Christian claim that their detractors "take things out of context" though, IMO.

neutrino_cannon

Instructions for removing mildew - that amazes me too, I wan't aware that the Bible said anything half that sensible ;)

Did Jesus's sacrifice remove the need to combat mildew, do you think? I'll think twice before accepting a dinner invitation from a Christian then :D

corplinx

Sadly, the pinheads who put the Bible together left out the "Gospel of Thomas" which might have A. more authoritatively distanced Xian doctrine from the laws of moses and B. made Xianity more tolerable in general

I'm not familiar with Thomas. I think I'll have to google for it. Offhand though, do you know why they left it out?

Yes, a good example of ignorance. To join one branch of the Masons (the Knights Templar).you have to affirm a belief in Jesus. Most of your jewish masons join the Scottish Rite

I was under the impression that to be a mason you just had to acknowledge a belief in a higher power of any sort - or is that the US government? ( ;) ).

The person I'm discussing this with is engaged to a chap whose father, brother and uncle are apparently big Masons (in the important sense, not the fat sense!). Her fiance, however, is a fundy baptist evangelical like her and has apparently been studying the Masons not-entirely-approvingly for some time as part of a course he's taking in college. She has promised to show me his final essay on the subject, which I'll be interested to read.

Most of my knowledge of Masons is derived from "The Hiram Key" and the other book that went with it.I found their conlcusions a bit of a stretch but the writers were Masons so presumably they got the basics right.

Yahzi

This seems pretty straight forward to me. But Paul said it was ok to eat pork cracklins and hang out with goyim. I guess Paul was more important than JC.

This seems to me to reflect the most basic paradox at the basis of Christianity - it's a Jewish religion, based on Jewish tradition, for Jewish people. If the apocalypse ever actually comes, the twelve tribes of Israel will be saved and everyone else will persih (or suffer eternal hellfire or whatever).

If you want to follow the teachings of Christ - go ahead, knock yourself out, but don't fool yourself into thinking that makes you one of the chosen people :rolleyes:

Cleopatra says Paul had a great mind, and so he probably did but doesn't it bother the Christians of the world that it's his message they're following and not Christs? Do they think that Paul will save them from the wrath of God and the Second Coming?

<sigh>


Graham
 

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