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To those who keep His covenant and remember His precepts to do them. Psalm 103:18 NASB
To do them – Who will be saved? The striking difference between Christian and Jewish thinking on this question is incorporated in David’s declaration. If you are going to experience YHVH’s hesed, then you must be numbered among those who keep His covenant and remember (“to guard carefully”) His precepts. It’s hard to imagine that David could mean anything other than Torah. If we look back over the last few verses in this psalm, we must conclude that David’s view of salvation (“redeemed from the pit”), extending to generations to come, depends on alignment with YHVH’s instructions and cultural mores found in Torah. It is not surprising at all that the rabbis speak about Torah observance as a requisite for entry into the ‘olam ha’ba.
Christian theology, especially Protestant evangelical post-antebellum theology, takes a decidedly different approach. Most traditional Christian views of the qualifications for salvation require no Torah commitment. In fact, observance of Torah is anathema to most Christians for the simple reason that it is Jewish. Since the influence of Luther, virtually all Christian theology has distinguished itself from any semblance of Jewish behavior by claiming that Torah observance is legalism. This claim, and the implied rejection of Israel’s view of God, certainly misunderstands the actual text of the Bible in both Testaments (as many Christian scholars are now exposing). But it still holds sway in most churches. That leads to a very disconcerting question: If Torah observance is essential for salvation, what is the true status of all those who didn’t observe Torah and never knew that they had to?
This is not a Jewish problem. It is a problem unique to a religion that claims the Tanakh as the Word of God and the basis for faith and practice and then summarily dismisses what the text actually says. This is a uniquely Christian problem. But the solution might surprise you. The solution is not a wholesale revamping of Christian thinking. The solution is to recognize that Christian claims of “faith only” are actually encompassed in the Tanakh.
Preston Sprinkle notes that the Tanakh actually contains two approaches to this question. One is what he calls the Deuteronomic view of salvation. This view requires cooperation on the part of Man. God promises blessing (and curses) based on human compliance. Those who follow His ways are blessed. Those who do not are cursed. Salvation is the result of Man’s commitment to God’s instruction. And, as David remarks in this verse, God expects obedience and rewards it. If you keep Torah, you are ensured a place in the ‘olam ha’ba, even (as the rabbis say) if you are a Gentile.
Sprinkle notices that there is another biblical theme, particularly evident in the Prophets. In this theme, salvation is the unilateral work of YHVH Himself. It does not require prior obedience. In fact, it suggests that prior obedience is impossible due to the fatal corruption of the human heart. God will make His children obey when He supplies them with a new heart, something that they are incapable of doing on their own. Isaiah, Jeremiah and Ezekiel are particularly strong on this view (e.g., Ezekiel 36:26-27, “and I will cause you to walk in my ways”). Sprinkle says: “The most striking feature in this passage is the promise of a ‘new spirit’ later identified as simply ‘my spirit,’ who is placed ‘within’ the nation in order to ‘cause’ them to obey. The gift of the spirit enables Israel’s eschatological obedience, which springs from restoration. And there is no prior act of repentance on Israel’s part. Israel has a heart of stone and is therefore dead.”[1]
Sprinkle’s observation is important. It is not the case that the Tanakh sees salvation as a product of human “works” while the New Testament sees it as a product of “grace.” The Tanakh contains both views at the same time. In fact, even some of the writings of the Prophets contain both views. Salvation is tied to human agency. Salvation is the work of God alone. Both and.
So who will be saved? Are you willing to place your bet on just one of the two themes of all of Scripture?
Topical Index: salvation, Psalm 103:18
[1] Preston Sprinkle, Paul and Judaism Revisited: A Study of Divine and Human Agency in Salvation, p. 64.
CONFERENCE NOTE: On August 21-22, Bob Gorelik and I will have our first and only conference in the USA this year in St. Joe, MO. All the details are on the web calendar.
Well, I don’t know if I can speak for others, but I find that the problem for me is not getting saved, it is staying saved. Salvation is not something I LOSE, as much as it is something that I do my best to find a way to throw away. There are so many ways to despise the riches of His hesed and longsuffering because I do not understand that they do not mean that He doesn’t CARE whether or not I get it right, but that they are meant to LEAD me to repentance. Of course He has to extend grace to me up front, but grace is a loan until I find a way to get to repentance, and what would that way be? To spend enough time in the synagogue to learn Torah, which is my schoolmaster, to teach me what I need to repent FOR. Oh, and I have to ask for the gift of repentance. God does not make me good: oh, no. He loves to give, but giving presupposes asking and receiving; both of which are necessary. Asking opens my hand so that there is room to receive, and receiving is the actual act of gratitude. If I am not thankful, there is a good chance that I did not, in fact receive. How do I despise the riches of His grace? If I ask for grace, which opens my hand, but that hand is not cupped (which is what gratitude IS – the regard of the gift as precious) so as to not lose a drop of that precious stuff that He paid a King’s ransom for, then grace will fall through my fingers. What is gratitude for the dual gifts of grace and repentance, both of which serve to return me to the point of restored relationship? Why, it is seizing that new opportunity to relate! (Um, that would be Torah observance, to anybody clueless, but if you had shown up in the synagogue regularly, you would have been told that already).
There is no gratitude without obedience, for my gratitude is shown BY my works, which is to say, I cannot be grateful for the chance to meet you, but when you show up, I act like I do not know you! Salvation is where I get another chance to meet everybody that I missed the chance to meet before. Grace creates the opportunity for those chances again – grace gives me another chance to get love right; but Torah IS those chances, which are perfected by a successful meeting; a successful connection. Grace re-writes the contract, but Torah is where it actually gets signed. Its no good to show up at the Throne with a perfectly good UNSIGNED contract! I need both signatures to get in the club, but neither of those signatures are His! What He provided was the stationary (the Book) and the secretarial work; He called and made the new appointments, but I was supposed to show up and actually keep those appointments. When He said the company – excuse me, the kingdom, was supposed to be mine, what else could He have been referring to? How else am I supposed to participate in that kingdom, if not by weaving it together? That’s my part.
Yes, He does all the heavy lifting of salvation, and yes, He has to provide the repentance (opening of those hard hearts), too. Both are so, too true, but neither of those true statements leave me out of the equation. Both statements pre-suppose that I have been to the synagogue regularly to have been taught properly what my reaction to both those statements should be. Yes, He does it all, but what all does He do? He does all that is required to put me back into a place where I CAN obey, but He does not apply that obedience to me without my cooperation. No, I cannot obey in my flesh, even though He did, but who ever said that I was supposed to STAY in my flesh? To walk in the Spirit, and NOT in the flesh (Romans 8:1 and 2, which you are going to have to go read in a translation that does not leave verse 2 out) does not mean that we are not expected to walk! There is only one Way to do that walking, however, and if you aren’t familiar already with those signposts, then you might need to show up at the synagogue a little more regularly until you can recognize them. Love on my watch, and accounted to my credit in that Book of Life, does not go down when I am not there. Nowhere does that Good Book tell me that. Jesus did not go do all my loving for me in secret for the purposes of saving(!) me the trouble, so that I don’t have to show up and do it myself. Um, you would have to attend most churches to get told that. Hmm. May be time to switch educational facilities.
The lady who lives in the summer cottage next to ours is studying part time to get her MA in theology from a traditional Protestant Christian source. I sent her updates on our visit to Israel with Skip in June which she enjoyed immensely. She gave me some of her papers from last year to read and comment on. As you might expect one was on the Trinity, another on the Nature of God. The Nature of God gave me a good reason to read God, Time and the Limits of Omniscience which, as a thesis, I knew would be heavy going and it all came together in the end but I cannot reduce it to limited meaningful words.
Instead of replying directly and analytically to her papers, I decided to produce, primarily for my own benefit, a summary of my understanding, my three year quest which I hoped would do the job. I have been trying to do that for much more than a month and it kept getting more confused every time I wrote something so I quit. The more I wrote the less I seemed to know. I contemplated on this, praying that I would be able to do what I set out to do satisfactorily. Finally, as usual, I realized that the answer has been staring me in the face for the past two weeks with the TW Psalm 103 study all month, culminating today.
All that remains for me to do is thank you Skip for your impeccable timing, Laurita as usual for her pithy interpretations and all the other commentators. Shalom.
Since TW of today ends with a question my answer is: I place my bet on both ´cause one is within the other specially if you have been redeemed by Christ.
Excellent article! Thanks Skip!
The Torah and the Tslav
~ No man [not any man, no one, nobody] comes to the Father but by Me ~
and?
~ I AM the Way – the Truth – and? – the Life ~
“Christ”-ianity has as it’s center – (drum roll, please?) – “err.. uh..” – “Christ?”
As I look back upon thousands and thousands of words – I search for a revealed Person. Even in reading the written words of God I search for the Living Word of God, -The Person of Christ. Why? Because I listen to His words, I “shema” our Savior – “Search the scriptures,” (He says..) “For in them you think you have eternal life..” and (anyone listening?) “these are they that testify concerning Me.”
It is my belief the entirety of our Bible, yes, both “halves” testify of one Man and have one life-imparting Message: “Behold, the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world.”
The “sins of the world?” Jewish sins? Christian sins? Sins of the atheist? the Episcopalean? The Buddhist? Sinners ALL. And all sinners need a Savior. Or do we just need to “try harder?” To do more to earn the love of God. Oh? And what might that entail? Just what can we do to “save ourselves?” What do the scriptures say?
“Without Me you* can do (what?) – NOTHING. (In His words) ~ I AM the vine, you are the branches: He that abides in Me, and I in him, the same brings forth much fruit: for without Me – you can do.. nothing!” (John 15.5)
I believe the difference in the Jewish “religion” and the Christian “religion” (or system of beliefs) may be summed up in the exclamation of the Philippian jailor: “Sirs, what must I DO to be saved?” The answer of the very Jewish Paul, a Pharisee of the Pharisees, formerly known as Saul, was “BELIEVE on the LORD Jesus Christ and you shall be saved!”
Friend, “salvation” (or deliverance) is NOT spelled “do,” but “DONE!” It is the finished, final and full work of Christ and Christ alone. Salvation is sponsored by and “paid for in full” by Christ our Savior, Christ, our Near-Kinsman Redeemer, Christ the Passover Lamb, who was cruelly crucified upon a common criminal’s cross at Calvary.
~ Without the shedding of blood, -there is no remission for sin. ~ knowing that you were not redeemed with perishable things like silver or gold from your futile way of life inherited from your forefathers..
BUT with precious blood, as of a Lamb unblemished and spotless, – the blood of Christ.. The Messiah ~
and? God’s invitation remains:
“Whosoever will” may come..
Ever since I started reading and studying Skip’s work this has been the central question I have wrestled with. I know some wonderful “Christian” people that will defend the traditional grace doctrine with every fiber of their body, and I just couldn’t believe YHVH would leave them them high and dry. The work of Yeshua would seem to have been for naught with them if that was true. But the text is the text. I heard one guy say that the new testament was enfolded in the old testament, and that struck a chord with me. Today’s TW makes a lot of sense now. But I identify with Laurita on this one. My tendency is to start to walk away from my salvation by complaining about something. Torah is a good antidote for complaining, especially since I can’t find any evidence of the First Church of Whatever in the first couple of centuries.
You know, every once in a while, I just get fed up with the artificial dialectic. The devil is all about splitting babies and hairs and getting us to focus on how many angels can dance on the head of a pin while Rome besieges the Holy City. No kidding. If you ever were curious about how diligently the cream of the priesthood were seeking the face of YHVH in response to the onslaught of Titus, that is what they were considering the hottest ‘real’ topic of the day. I wonder if this artificially separated subject of whether it is Grace OR Works might be what the Master returns to find us embroiled in this time, while Babylon burns.
If you stop and totally look at it, its a little like insisting that we must accept the Preamble OR the Constitution; the chicken OR the egg, or the cone OR the ice cream. Really? Aren’t both already perfectly suited to fit each other like hand AND glove, or like on-ramp AND freeway? (Hey, I like that on-ramp and freeway thing.) Grace is the on-ramp; grace is the warm up to a good song. You build and build and take a good, deep breath – and, and, and? Well, are you going to just stand there with your mouth open so wide I can see your tonsils, or are you going to sing already? So, grace gets you back up to speed so you can keep up with the rest of the universe again, but then what? Well, are you just going to be some dangling participle or the Road Runner who has managed to get himself WAY overshot off that cliff, but then, like Peter, started looking down at all the wrong times? (No, Road Runner! Don’t look down now! Keep going!) And hey, we need all those additional amendments on the other side, too, while you are at it. Grace puts us back into position so that we can commence love-making, but it remains up to us to actually make the babies. When the King returns, He claims He is going to be looking for all those babies….
Returning to the “plum-line” of Amos.. – it is the Scriptures (Torah) or as I prefer “Word of God” that keeps us “between the lines,” and walking in the paths of instruction (the good way).
Salvation? (yes, deliverance). According to the Scriptures, (this is how we roll) By grace, through faith.. and?? – unto good works! Yes Laurita, great word picture! – Don’t stand there with your pie-hole open and your tonsils exposed.. – sing that song!! Songs of praises! Songs of deliverance.. Again (and again) – “what do the Scriptures say?”
~ Speaking to yourselves (and to each other) in songs, and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody in your heart to the LORD! ~