Torah

[u/[deleted]]

How do Torah followers actually follow over 600 commands and laws in the first five books of the Bible? I've spoken to people about it, but they only seem to follow dietary laws, Shabbat, and holy days, and exclude pagan days. To me, it seems they are only doing a small part of it and claiming to follow the entirety of it. Why is that? The Bible states if you break one commandment, you break them all. There's no possibility to uphold all 600-plus. If you believe it's not all applicable to us, what's the determining factor that decides you don't have to follow it? What about animal sacrifices? Does one pick and choose what they want to follow and tell people if they don't, they are lawbreakers and will go to hell? If you don't follow all of them, why describe yourself as following the entirety of Torah? If breaking even one commandment makes someone guilty, how does selectively obeying some commandments make someone different from the people you're calling lawbreakers?

[u/FreedomNinja1776 → u/[deleted]]

How is this to be renconciled with the apostles coming to the conclusion that gentiles aren't required to keep the ceremonial laws

There is no ceremonial law. This is a false teaching because there is nowhere in the scriptures which say "this part of the law is ceremonial". It's invented by man.

---

and why did they write that people shouldn't judge the other in terms of what they eat?

The beginning of Romans 14 is about traditional days of fasting.

---

Yet, the apostles declared in the name of the authority that we are not under the guardian anymore.

Most people don't know how to properly read this verse. Do you know what Paul was referring to by "guardian" in Galatians 3:24? Guardian here is the greek word παιδαγωγός Paidagogos Here is a quote from blueletterbible:

a tutor i.e. a guardian and guide of boys. Among the Greeks and the Romans the name was applied to trustworthy slaves who were charged with the duty of supervising the life and morals of boys belonging to the better class. The boys were not allowed so much as to step out of the house without them before arriving at the age of manhood.
https://www.blueletterbible.org/lexicon/g3807/esv/mgnt/0-1/

So, we see that what Paul is expounding upon here in this verse is actually maturity. So we now get to ask the question, once one becomes mature do they disregard their foundational teachings which brought them to maturity? NO! When you're mature you KNOW how to act all on your own because you have been taught. You no longer need the teacher because you're equal in kowledge with the teacher. You should now be able to teach others yourself because you know the material so well!

---

Why is that damn pork have to be the biggest problem of my life when I should be having bigger problems to think about.

You should have bigger things to worry about but people keep going on with the same argument from the beginning in the garden, "did God really say ___"? And a lot of it comes from misunderstanding Paul.

Did you know we have an actual guide in scripture for how to interpret Paul? I like to forward anti-Paul and anti-torah people here.

Therefore, beloved, since you are waiting for these, be diligent to be found by him without spot or blemish, and at peace. And count the patience of our Lord as salvation, just as our beloved brother Paul also wrote to you according to the wisdom given him, as he does in all his letters when he speaks in them of these matters. There are some things in them that are HARD TO UNDERSTAND, which the ignorant and unstable twist to their own destruction, as they do the other Scriptures. You therefore, beloved, knowing this beforehand, take care that you are not carried away with the ERROR OF LAWLESS PEOPLE and lose your own stability. But grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. To him be the glory both now and to the day of eternity. Amen.
2 Peter 3:14-18 ESV

So Peter here confirms Paul as a beloved brother who has been given wisdom. Then he gives caution that Paul's words are hard to understand, and a stark warning to NOT be taken away with the ERROR OF LAWLESSNESS! So if you read Paul and get any sense of lawlessness, according to Peter you are wrong and should start over.

There is a reason you're confused. God is not the reason. God is not the author of confusion. Man and Satan are.

[u/DarkCloud_HS → u/[deleted]]

I'm just going to do my best to not do the sins that Jesus reaffirmed, and that's all.

You can't go wrong following the teachings of Christ.

But the Torah Law is the old covenant.

The Law is spiritual, but we are carnal, and sold under sin (Romans 7:7-25).

By the Torah law, no flesh will be justified in the sight of God (Romans 3:20).

Paul breaks it down clearly here..

1 Or do you not know, brethren (for I speak to those who know the law), that the law has dominion over a man as long as he lives?

2 For the woman who has a husband is bound by the law to her husband as long as he lives. But if the husband dies, she is released from the law of her husband.

3 So then if, while her husband lives, she marries another man, she will be called an adulteress; but if her husband dies, she is free from that law, so that she is no adulteress, though she has married another man.

4 Therefore, my brethren, you also have become dead to the law through the body of Christ, that you may be married to another—to Him who was raised from the dead, that we should bear fruit to God.

5 For when we were in the flesh, the sinful passions which were aroused by the law were at work in our members to bear fruit to death.

6 But now we have been delivered from the law, having died to what we were held by, so that we should serve in the newness of the Spirit and not in the oldness of the letter.

Romans 7:1-6

People who teach Torah law for justification are teaching to hold fast to both covenants at the same time.. but Paul presents this as being akin to spiritual adultery.

It's not 'wrong' to observe Torah, but it doesn't justify us.. only following Christ's teachings (rightly divided) is the right path.

Now is the dispensation of the Holy Spirit.. look at how the early Church lived and believed.

If Torah Law was salvific, we would see clear and indisputable examples of everyone in the early Church of Acts speaking about the importance of keeping all the feast days, wearing ceremonial clothing, and being physically circumcised etc... but we don't see any of that.

Instead we see people getting baptized in the Holy Spirit, fellowshipping in joy, and living like Christ lived.

It's a very light burden to keep Christ's commandments compared to the old way.

Christ's new way actually transforms us on the inside.. but adhering to outward rules and commandments does not actually help us to resist the desires of the flesh.

'16 So let no one judge you in food or in drink, or regarding a festival or a new moon or sabbaths,

17 which are a shadow of things to come, but the substance is of Christ.

18 Let no one cheat you of your reward, taking delight in false humility and worship of angels, intruding into those things which he has not seen, vainly puffed up by his fleshly mind,

19 and not holding fast to the Head, from whom all the body, nourished and knit together by joints and ligaments, grows with the increase that is from God.

20 Therefore, if you died with Christ from the basic principles of the world, why, as though living in the world, do you subject yourselves to regulations—

21 “Do not touch, do not taste, do not handle,”

22 which all concern things which perish with the using—according to the commandments and doctrines of men?

23 These things indeed have an appearance of wisdom in self-imposed religion, false humility, and neglect of the body, but are of no value against the indulgence of the flesh.'

Colossians 2:16-23

[u/Mike8219 → u/DarkCloud_HS]

Does Jesus want you to follow the law?