Law – Practical Theology Today

The Ten Commandments

[If you have yet to read The Parable of the Benevolent King, you may want to do so first]

I remember the day I received my first Bible. It was a leather-bound King James Version of the Bible, complete with my name written on the cover in gold letters. It was a proud moment when I stood in front of the Church to receive my Bible. Along with it, I received a gold “chain” bookmark inscribed with the Ten Commandments. As a third-grader, attempts to read my new Bible usually resulted in me playing with that smooth, shiny bookmark. I can remember the feeling today, decades later. Though I didn’t read much, I certainly became “familiar” with the Ten Commandments.

Think about the process of Yahweh, the benevolent King, redeeming a people from slavery, where they acquired an identity apart from Him. Their identity and entire being were shaped by their bondage to the Egyptian empire and the worship of its gods. When Yahweh redeemed these people, he took them out to the middle of nowhere, where they had no land and no social identity. He was remaking these people, His people.

In the Sinai desert, about a year after their rescue, God gave the people instructions we know as the Ten Commandments.* These were the first of many covenant commands. We think of them as laws. To us, law conjures “right/wrong” thinking. If we obey the law (or don’t get caught), all is well. If we are disobedient (and get caught), we pay the consequences. It fits our Western judicial thinking. What if that wasn’t God’s intent?

I will take you as my own people, and I will be your God. (Exodus 6:6-7)

For this to be true – for Yahweh to be the people’s God, a few things needed to be true. He was the one true God, there were no others. Period. He was sovereign. Period. They didn’t need nor should they make images. Their experience with the Egyptian “gods” included images of those gods, both in and out of temples. These foreign gods were tied to time and space.

Yahweh transcends time and space

So, for Yahweh to be the people’s God, images were not to be utilized in their attempts to understand him. They were an unnecessary distraction. Images, created by human hands, usurp Yahweh’s sovereign role as the creator God. The people needed to know, needed to discover that they were created in his image and not the other way around.

This reminds me of the early 20th-century discoveries of “untouched” civilizations on remote islands of the Pacific. It was an anthropologist’s dream! They discovered a striking similarity between these previously unknown societies – they all worshipped some form of God, and that god resembled themselves. They had created God in their own image. Anthropologists refer to such societies as “totem societies.”

These newly freed people needed to understand what it meant to be bearers of His image. The old identity as slaves was past, dead, and a new identity as Yahweh’s image-bearers was being formed. He was remaking the people. New creation. Consistent with God’s’ call of Abraham (see On Earth as in Heaven), they were being reshaped to mirror Yahweh’s character to the nations, the Hebrews’ original mission. Not only a new identity but a new vocation.

Now, if you will carefully listen to me and keep my covenant, you will be my own possession out of all the peoples, although the whole earth is mine, and you will be my kingdom of priests and my holy nation. (Exodus 19:5-6, CSB)

As a kingdom of priests, they were to be ambassadors of sorts. That’s why they were to worship only the one true God. They were not only to mirror His character to the nations but also to fellow image-bearers. That’s why things like murder, adultery, lying, stealing, and coveting are so damaging – they tear apart relationships, dehumanize others, and violate the dignity of those created in God’s image.

It becomes evident that the Ten Commandments aren’t exhaustive, even with the additional 603 that the Pharisees tried to keep and enforce. They are primarily descriptive, not prescriptive. They describe our relationship to the one true sovereign God and with His creation, including fellow image-bearers. When we see them primarily as prescriptive, we are ripe to becoming pharisaical.

* It’s important that we grasp the difference between torah and “the Torah.” The Israelites came to refer to the Ten Commandments and the subsequent 603 covenant commands as “torah.” Torah literally means instruction. As said above, these laws, these instructions represented the way that the people of Yahweh’s communal identity, story, and values were being reshaped and recreated. Remember that God’s redemption and restoration project was one of recreation. Formal “Torah” usually represented the Pentateuch, the first 5 books of the Hebrew Scriptures, our Old Testament.

As Christians think about the Old Testament law (torah), we should remember that according to Jesus, a primary facet of torah was to shape people to love God wholeheartedly and to love their neighbors as themselves (Matt. 22:35-40).

Torah, Torah, Torah

Whenever I hear or read about Hebrew Law or Torah, my mind immediately goes to the classic WW2 movie, Tora, Tora, Tora. I can’t help it – that’s how my mind works. 😬 Torah is a significant part of Jewish history and thus an integral part of the Christian tradition as well. I suspect that we (Christians) primarily don’t know what to do with Torah. How are we to view it, especially in light of Jesus saying…

Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law [Torah] or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them. (Matthew 5:17, NIV)

So, what do we, as 21st-century Christians, do with Torah, the Law? I have oft stated that part of the value of writing a blog is to process and put to words my own theological wonderments and understanding. This is one of those times…

By definition, Torah is God’s law as revealed to Moses and captured in the first five books of the Hebrew Scriptures (Old Testament). As I write this, I realize that “law” is singular, which I suspect might be significant.

I recently spent time in Psalm 19. After talking about the splendor of God’s creation, the psalmist included a section that consists of a series of adjectives describing the character of Torah, each accompanied by a verbal phrase revealing how it impacts the life of the faithful:

⁷The law [Torah] of the Lord is perfect,
    refreshing the soul.
The statutes of the Lord are trustworthy,
    making wise the simple.
⁸The precepts of the Lord are right,
    giving joy to the heart.
The commands of the Lord are radiant,
    giving light to the eyes.
⁹The fear of the Lord is pure,
    enduring forever.
The decrees of the Lord are firm,
    and all of them are righteous.

If Jesus has “fulfilled” or “completed” the law, does that mean the Hebrew Torah was some sort of defective system unable to accomplish what God intended? Gerald H. Wilson suggests otherwise…

Torah was God’s word for Israel. Jesus accepted Torah (and indeed the whole Old Testament) as God’s authoritative word for himself and his followers. Torah led those who related themselves rightly to it into a proper, restored relationship with Yahweh. This is not defective. It may not be the “fullness” of God’s revelation, but it rightly accomplishes what God intended it to do.¹

I suspect, as the psalmist and Wilson suggest, there is a robust understanding of Torah that has been lost over time and is foreign to present-day readers. We tend to read scripture (both Hebrew and Christian) through the lens of Jesus’ death and resurrection, missing the original intent. Consider the community that sang Psalm 19 in the temple as part of their worship. Unlike today, they did not have a very complete concept of eternal life or resurrection. So what did Torah do for them?

There is a common theme that permeates and threads through the entirety of the Bible, the scripture we possess today. It’s central to the narrative of God’s new creation project as he invites humans to participate in his restoration (think salvation) activity. That theme in some manner, shape, or form…

I will be your God and you will be my people.

Is this new information for you? It was to me when I discovered it years ago and it has forever changed my lens of Biblical understanding. Theologically, it’s known as the Covenant Formula. Through Moses, God communicated to the Israelites in Egyptian captivity, needing rescue (again, think salvation)…

“I am the Lord [Yahweh], and I will bring you out from under the yoke of the Egyptians. I will free you from being slaves to them, and I will redeem you with an outstretched arm and with mighty acts of judgment. I will take you as my own people, and I will be your God.” Exodus 6:6-7, NIV

This theme, this Covenant Formula weaves throughout the entirety of the Hebrew scriptures, into and throughout the New Testament. What is somewhat fascinating is the bookend effect when we discover one of the last occurrences of the formula in the Book of Revelation…

And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Look! God’s dwelling place is now among the people, and he will dwell with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God.” Revelation 21:3, NIV

I suspect this concept that Yahweh is our God and we are his people is the lens through which the psalmist wrote and the people worshipped. Their focus was the giver of the Law. The adjectives the psalmist used to describe Torah (God’s Word to his people) also describe their God, distinguishing Him from all the other gods in their proximity. Torah revealed their God’s character, thus words like perfect, trustworthy, and righteous.

To the ancients, Torah was more instructive than prescriptive. Torah is formed from the Hebrew word yrh which means to instruct or teach. Rather than “law,” the term is more properly understood as “instruction” or “guidelines.” The psalmist and the Israelite worshippers understood Torah’s primary function to be one of guidance in right living as the people of God.

Right living, not living right.

This is not just wordplay. There is a significant difference between right living and living right. (You may want to visit Anything worth doing is worth doing right.) Torah guides people toward right living under God’s kingship. It described how people relate to Yahweh “as their God” and to each other (thus the strong focus on mercy and justice throughout the Hebrew writings).

The opposite is living right, focusing on the laws and the guardrails of right living. When driving at night, I want to keep my eyes focused on the road ahead, not the guardrails. They serve a significant purpose, but if I focus on them, I might find myself intimately acquainted with them. That’s what happened when Jesus arrived on the scene. The religious leaders had mainly taken their eyes off the intent of the Law, of Torah, and focused on the laws, concentrating on getting it right. And they got it all wrong.

Thus Jesus’ admonition to the “getting it right” Pharisees: Go and learn what this means: “I desire mercy, not sacrifice” (Matthew 9:13). The religious leaders constantly did battle with Jesus over the correct application of Torah. In what I assume to be exasperation, they asked him which of the laws (commandments) were most important. As the personified fulfillment of the Law, he reminded them of the full intent of Torah…

“Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.” This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: “Love your neighbor as yourself.” All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments. (Matthew 22:37–40, NIV)

Those are my musings on Torah. Process it as you wish (or as the Holy Spirit leads). In the meantime, when I get 2 1/2 hours to spare, I might watch Tora, Tora, Tora.

¹Wilson, Gerald H. The NIV Application Commentary: From Biblical Text…to Contemporary Life Psalms Volume 1. Zondervan Publishing House, 2002.

Why Moralism Doesn’t Work

People like to be right and like to get it right. I’m that way and I’m guessing I am not alone. I remember back in high school and college the standard question was asked, “Will this be on the test?” I certainly asked the question as well as others. Truth be told, we were more focused on “getting it right” than on learning.

I went back to school a few years ago in pursuit of a doctorate in education. It was one of the best learning experiences of my life. I honestly think I was beginning to toggle over from “getting it right” to purely wanting to learn. My (much) younger cohort were always referring to the course rubrics when writing papers. I found myself writing first, based on the assignment prompts, and periodically consulting the rubrics to see if I had some glaring misses. When I was satisfied with what I was learning, grades become secondary.

The more I dig into the adverse effects of moralism, the more I realize that we naturally tend to focus on the rubrics and miss the intent of the prompts, especially Jesus’ prompts.

Moralism doesn’t work for a variety of reason, primary of which is a natural tenancy toward law and legalism. If we have a bent toward wanting to “get it right,” then we naturally want to know what the rules are, the rubric which defines right living. God provided a rubric for his people, the Israelites, which we know as the Law. However, the law was not to be an end in itself. The purpose of the law was to provide a framework for people who were learning to live in a covenant relationship with the one true God. When the law, especially the 10 commandments, were given to the people, living in a covenant relationship with any god was foreign to their ears and lives. Prior to leaving Egypt, their religious understanding was of many deities, none of which desired a covenant relationship with their subjects.

The law was a framework, a rubric, for learning – learning how to live in a covenant relationship with God and with each other. God didn’t desire the law to become an end in itself. It was to lead to something more. In learning to live in a covenant relationship with God and each other, the rescued Israelites could then become the good news (blessing) to the rest of the world, as intended. Love of God and neighbor was embedded in the law (see Deuteronomy 6:5 and Leviticus 19:18). The law, seen as an end in itself, actually kills love.

Good parents develop a rubric for how their family can live in a covenant relationship. “We clean up our messes, we do our chores diligently, we treat each other with respect, etc.” If the family members simply see the rubric as an end in itself, then it becomes a checklist that leads nowhere, however they might have the cleanest house and the most (seemingly) polite kids. Yet the house may lack evidence of a loving, covenant relationship. Love is learned and simply keeping the law doesn’t get us there.

Can you see where this leads? The purpose of a rubric is to facilitate learning. I can write a paper to the letter of the rubric (law), get an “A” and miss out on all there is to learn. If moralism is my de facto understanding of the Christian faith, I can look good on the outside and miss all that Jesus is saying about living in a covenant relationship with the one true God and with those around me. And worse, I will only hear Jesus’ prompts and parables as law – checklists that I should try to perform – and never quite learn and become someone who can naturally….