by David_Jay 87 Replies latest watchtower beliefs
the bible teaches explicity that the jews are God's chosen people
Who really is a Jew?
Am I God's chosen people if I am a jw and a jew? Or is any convert to Judaism a jew. And what determines what constitutes a jew, the Halacha ? or your conclusions ? or Jehovah?
Zechariah 8:23 (Romans 2:29) and (Galatians 3:29) Romans 9:22-25, Galatians 6:15,16
The jews are an ethnic group. Some know the Father, some know the Son and some don't believe in a creator at all and some just don't know.
the bible teaches that the "saints", those jews who believe in God will turn to Jesus as their Messiah. I don't doubt that God empowers them to bring their kinsmen into communion with God through Christ as a result.
Since you asked my opinion of yourself and given that I don't know you but only have the "tone" of your posts and what you say to go by, I'd answer, if you are a jw and a jew you straddle the very last group, I'm afraid. you don't know Jesus AS Saviour because you don't know God, technically you worship the golden calf called the WT. BUT there is hope, beloved!! When confronted with Christ and your kinsmen, surely you'll see the REAL Light.
xo
The wages of sin is death. So the law is ultimately condemnatory of both jew and gentile. The jew because the law was a perfect "body" of guidelines and if a jew let one law fall then it was a trespass against the entire body of law.
I think you've summed up Pauline theology well and again, it's not my intent to say that one system is better than another. (i.e. Christian and Jewish perspectives on the Law.) I'm just pointing out that the two approaches don't mix. --They're like oil and water.
If you view the Law as ultimately condemnatory, that's fine as long as you realize that you, as a Christian are not under it.
It's a disaster when a Christian group attempts to interpret the Law under such a negative rubric and the JW foolishness vis-à-vis the Deuteronomic requirements on blood is a very sad example illustrative of that point.
dear TD...
you said, "If you view the Law as ultimately condemnatory, that's fine as long as you realize that you, as a Christian are not under it."...
I view the law as a guide or prescription for man to walk through life in the right way before a Holy God. I don't think that it is negative but positive. The reason behind paul saying it is "against" the gentile is simply because the gentile had never been subject to it before...we were "wild" so to speak. Much like the hebrews were before God found them "in a pool of blood (babies) and He took them in (gave them the torah) and they grew from children to a young maiden to His wife.(Ezekiel 16:3-14) This growth from babies to maturity is what is required in the "bride of Christ". I don't believe that paul taught "lawlessness" for the bride of Christ. He taught the gentiles that we were to put on the NEW man and leave behind the old man, that "wild, lawless man". In preparation to become the bride of Christ the gentile has to become someone that He can co-habitate with (lev. 16:32-34) not someone whom the law demands be removed from the camp. Christ went outside the camp to cleanse those ones so they could enter the camp...He didn't show this mercy (romans 5:8) so that we could go back to (wild) lawlessness but so that sin was covered by His blood and we could walk in NEWNESS of life. Newness of life for the gentile is a new path...God's path that He gave to the jews...that right path that is blessed and leads to blessings from God (deut 28:1-9)...these blessings were extended to the "stranger" in the camp back in the day just as they are extended to the gentile today...IF that gentile walks in "the Way" of God as the bride of Christ. The bible says very clearly that the bride has prepared HERSELF (some action on our part) and has washed her (filthy) robes in the blood of the Lamb...BEFORE she goes into the Fathers house to co-habitate with the bridegroom.
xo
Actually there is no text in Scripture that literally states that the Jews will turn personally to Jesus of Nazareth as their messiah (that is but an interpretation), however it does explicitly say that God will save the Jews despite their rejection of Jesus. It just doesn’t say that Jews will become Christians in order for God to save them, and mainstream Christian theology teaches that such may not be necessary for Jesus to save even the race that bore him.
Pauline theology is very explicit that the fact that most Jews never turn to Jesus as Messiah does not prevent God from fulfilling his promise to Abraham. In Romans, for instance, Paul never writes that the Jews were loved by God in the past tense, that their disobedience in rejecting Jesus will lead to their current or ultimate rejection. On the contrary, of the Jews he stated: “As regards election, they are beloved, for the sake of their ancestors; for the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable.” And, “they [the Jews] have now been disobedient [in rejecting Christ] in order that, by the mercy shown you [Christians], they too may now receive mercy. For God has imprisoned all [Christian and Jew and everyone else] in disobedience so that he may be merciful to all [the Christian and the Jew, and everyone else].”--Romans 11.28-32.
The mercy shown now to Christians, Paul writes, is the same that will eventually come to all, Jews too, “for the gifts and calling of God are irrevocable.”
Paul’s message to the Gentile Roman congregation was that despite the current rejection of Jesus as King, God was not abandoning the Jews or incapable of saving them because of their lack of faith, as if God’s love or ability to save was limited by the faithlessness of mere mortals. “Has God rejected his own people? By no means!...God has not rejected his people whom he foreknew.” (Romans 11.1, 2) Paul even claims that Gentiles through Christ are now grafted onto Israel, a meaningless illustration if Israel had been rejected by God. How could being grafted onto a rejected people be of any value? And Israel in this illustration can’t be the new Christian community, as if it replaced Israel somehow, for why would you graft the branches of a tree onto itself if it was already connected to its own roots?
“If the part of the dough offered as first fruits [the Jewish patriarchs] is holy, then the whole batch [including Jews who don’t believe in Christ] is holy,” wrote Paul. He warned as well to the Gentile Christians: “Do not boast over the branches [that have not been gifted with the virtue of faith in Christ]. If you do boast, remember that it is not you [the Gentile Christian] that support the root [brings life to the natural Jews], but the root that supports you.” Christ is the bridge to graft Gentiles into God’s people Israel because Israel is still alive. If Israel is not alive, then you, the wild olive shoot, are actually dead for you have been grafted upon that which has been rejected by God, if indeed God has rejected the Jewish people.--Romans 11.16-24.
Paul concludes by declaring that he does not know by what means God will fulfill his promise to Abraham to save all his children, just that it will be done. (Romans 11.33-36) But one last thing is certain from Paul himself. He was not writing to the Jews in any of his letters, whether they believed in Christ or not.
Acts 21.17-26 shows that Paul paid for a Nazarite vow at the Temple in accordance with the Mosaic Law in order to disprove accusations made against him. According to Acts, the apostles stated that Jewish Christians “are all zealous for the Law.” But some Jewish Christians were troubled since “they have been told that you [Paul] teach all Jews living among the Gentiles to forsake Moses, and that you tell them not to circumcise their children or observe the [Jewish] customs.” Paul made the public act of worship at the Temple in order that “all will know that there is nothing in what they have been told about you, but that you yourself observe and guard the Law.”
The Pauline epistles, as you might already known, are written to Gentile groups, not to Jews. His instruction about not observing the Law, not getting circumcised, not observing Jewish customs according to Acts 21 was never meant to apply to Jews even if they were Christian. Even though he later made a mess of things when he attempted to leave off from eating kosher among Gentiles (Galatians 2.11-14), the apostle Peter, though Christ had already died and risen, himself still followed Jewish dietary laws even well after Pentecost.--Acts 10.9-16.
Also the epistle to the Hebrews (which most scholars attribute to an unknown author), even if it be Pauline, never instructs Jewish Christians to leave off from observing the Law. Neither does it ever say that the Jews have been rejected or that they will eventually turn to Jesus in full faith. In fact, though it tells its readers that Christians have a greater tabernacle than the Jews ever had, it never mentions the Temple, the center of Jewish worship, never even using the word or describing the grand centerpiece of Judaism. Jews never mourned the passing of the tabernacle, but they did the Temple and still do, because it, not the tabernacle of their wanderings, was far greater.
Unfortunately too many Christians have painted in details to make even the New Testament read a certain way that it does not. Instead of being like Paul who could,not say he knew the mystery behind God's way of saving the Jews in Christ, whether this meant a literal turning or not, or even something far beyond what anyone now can imagine, too many make up scenarios and rules that never appear in Scripture about the Jews.
If there is a God, God is not limited by denominational lines, doctrine, or the lack of faith of humans to save.
dear David_Jay...
you said, "In fact, though it tells its readers that Christians have a greater tabernacle than the Jews ever had, it never mentions the Temple, the center of Jewish worship, never even using the word or describing the grand centerpiece of Judaism."...
the book or revelation describes the greatest temple of all time (rev. 21:22) in the city of God...not one of the city's twelve gates say "gentile gate".
isaiah 66:1 (we will rest IN Him)
xoxo
I view the law as a guide or prescription for man to walk through life in the right way before a Holy God. I don't think that it is negative but positive.
Well then my observation probably doesn't apply to you, although I'm honestly not sure if we're talking about the same thing though...
Let me give you an example to illustrate what I'm driving out. Suppose you are out hiking in a remote area and you are stranded by an unexpected blizzard. In desperation, you break into a cabin and wait for two days until the storm abates and you may safely leave. During that time, you burn your unknown benefactor's wood to keep warm; eat his food; drink his water and even sleep in his bed.
Have you broken the law? Why or why not?
The answer depends on why you believe laws against breaking and entering exist in the first place. --What are they intended to accomplish?
JW's (And kindred groups) teach that the Law existed to expose sin (I can provide copious quotes.) and their view of the Law therefore tends to be very mechanical. Again, I'm not criticizing them for holding this view. As a stepping stone in a theological argument for Christ, it's actually quite elegant.
No body of law regardless of whether it is religious or secular functions mechanically though. If that were the case, we wouldn't need judges or courts. In the example I gave above, American law through rulings like Vincent vs. Lake Erie Transportation Co. and Ploof vs. Putnam has long recognized that laws whose purpose is to protect property are not intended to do so at the expense of life. You would be obligated to monetarily compensate the owner of the cabin, but you would not automatically be adjudged as a thief.
Again, in the context of this thread, the relevance to the JW blood doctrine should be self-apparent.
(Matthew 12:1-5)
Do the GB understand that in regard to the law it is actually God reaching out with forgiveness with the intent of reconcilliation to Him? Neither of these can be accomplished with a dead sinner. Matthew 12:7
Myelaine,
The book of Hebrews, which if you will read my comments correctly this time, never mentions the Temple, just the tabernacle. That was all I said about the Pauline writings.
I don't know how your comments about Revelation, which is not considered by anyone to be Pauline, proves my comment about the book of Hebrews not mentioning the Temple has anything to do with ii.
but you would not automatically be adjudged as a thief.
Therefore, you conclude that in a survival situation jw should be required to consume blood same as a Jew is required to eat to save his life over keeping kosher? WT does not view it like that.
From the JW website:
14 "What if a doctor tells us that we will
die if we do not have a blood transfusion? Each person must decide
whether to obey God’s law on blood. Christians deeply respect God’s gift
of life, and we will look for alternative treatments to keep living;
but we will not accept a blood transfusion."
