Pedagogue

In a recent discussion with a believer online, I found myself navigating his attempts to prove to me, not only that Torah had been done away with in the coming of Yeshua, but that it was actually wrong for me to believe otherwise. After I showed him how his idea was in direct contrast to Yeshua's own words in Matthew 5:17-19, he countered with the text of Galatians 3:23-26. His primary interest, though, was to hear my understanding of verse 25, specifically. He asked, "What do you think it says?" It confounded him to learn that I thought it said exactly what it actually says.

“But now that faith has come, we are no longer under a guardian…” or pedagogue, as the Greek renders it. The role of the pedagogue, in the Greek culture of the time, was to protect and prepare the child until he was old enough to sit under the schoolmaster. Rav Shaul uses the concept of the pedagogue to illustrate that Torah was our guardian, our caretaker. It protected us until Messiah Yeshua appeared. It prepared us by showing us what to look for - what to expect. Now that we're old enough, so to speak, we've graduated to the next level. Now that faith in Yeshua has come, now that He has appeared, the laws of the Temple sacrifice, for example, finally make sense to us.

How many of you would expect to take a prep course for a college class, only to find that once the class started, the professor instructed you to forget everything from the prep course - or even taught you contrary to it? Should this ever happen to you, know that you're in the wrong class.

Messiah Yeshua expounded on Torah in hundreds of enlightening ways. What we had come to understand of Torah paved the way to receive His teaching - for He is the Living Torah, the very Word of G-d! We have now come to realize that the entire sacrificial system pointed (and points) to Him. Truly, because of His sacrifice, “It is finished.” Not the instruction of HaShem, but our sentence for breaking it. Our sin, as long as we believe, has been atoned for. Now that we have faith in Yeshua, we no longer need to bring sacrifices for our sin to the Temple. Not to mention, we don’t even have a Temple at the moment - and that may serve as some measure of proof. The sacrifices of the Temple, the regulations of the priesthood, the particulars of unblemished offerings, etc. are the laws that we, as believers, are no longer under. We’re no longer under the pedagogue, the guardian, in that respect, but have now progressed to higher learning. The guardian, in order to continue our education, has handed us over to the schoolmaster. He will take what we know and build upon it - not negate it. We, unlike the rest of humanity, need nothing more to point us toward Messiah. He’s right in front of us! We’re now to sit at His feet and learn from Him. The rest of the world, however, seems to have foregone education altogether, opting instead, to enter the world ignorant and try to figure things out on their own.

Many people, like the one to which I was speaking, would like to pretend that Torah has been erased. It's human nature, after all, to gravitate towards that which requires nothing of us - the path of least resistance. The problem with that is, now that we're in Messiah, we're supposed to be moving away from the things human nature causes us to gravitate towards (Romans 12:2).

The "lawless" view thriving today, both firmly rests upon, and has enabled the tragic history of antisemitism within the Church. With the influx of gentiles into Messianic Judaism over the first few centuries, it was quickly transformed into what became, under Rome, the Empire of  Roman Catholicism. The original Hebraic understanding, structure and framework would be exchanged for pagan ideas and, eventually, a Papal domination of belief and doctrine - even salvation - a true pia fraus. The Reformation that followed was successful in shedding many false ideas within Christianity, but it didn't accomplish near enough - and, as is clearly seen in history, only served to stoke the flames of hatred and ignorance toward Jews and Judaism. This prevailing and errant view in Christianity is less about what "Jesus" accomplished, and more about a legacy of distancing Christians from Yeshua, the Jewish Messiah. That may seem somewhat of a rabbit trail, but understanding our past relations is essential to making sense of the chasm we see today between Judaism and the countless Christian denominations borne of reformed Catholicism.

But, returning to our topic, if it were true that Torah no longer applied, there would be no more sin in the world, and no one would be sinful before G-d (Romans 3:20b). How many of you understand that to be the case? Further, and this is very important to understand, if Messiah Yeshua did away with Torah, with the instruction of HaShem, He is no longer Messiah - or never was to begin with. One couldn't possibly be the Word of G-d and nullify it.

I went on to explain that the reason this Galatians passage was couched within the context of Jews and Gentiles in Messiah is because that's precisely what it's talking about. Before Messiah came, it was necessary for G-d-fearing gentiles to physically join themselves to Israel in hopes of obtaining salvation. As Rav Shaul wrote in Romans, to the Jews belong the oracles, the promises, the prophets – the Messiah! Messiah Yeshua has finally come - and, now, all the nations can freely come to Him. Those that truly accept Him will logically, and spiritually, be joined to His covenant, as is discussed in Romans 11, but that's another discussion. In Galatians 3, however, Rav Shaul was disturbed by those that were teaching the gentiles of Galatia that they needed to become Jewish (specifically, to be circumcised) to receive salvation. That’s what this is about. It has absolutely nothing to say about observing Torah, which is eternal, or about living a righteous life before G-d, as we are commanded to do over and again, countless times, in scripture.

According to scripture, gentiles are not required to become Jewish, or be physically circumcised to enter into the Covenant of Avraham. They can now enter it through faith and obedience - not by a physical cutting of flesh, but by a circumcision of the heart. Further, now that Messiah has become our sacrifice, there is no salvation in the regulatory laws of the sacrificial Temple system. It could be stated that there never was. Hebrews 11 tells us that men of G-d were obedient in faith - they were moved to acts of obedience because of their belief. How could that possibly be any different for us today? The sacrificial system always involved a great measure of faith and served only as a shadow of what Messiah would one day accomplish. I think the disconnect for many is the mistaken idea that keeping Torah alone brings salvation. It cannot (Romans 3:20a). It is, however, an effect of receiving salvation, but never the cause of it. Torah is the standard that G-d, through Yeshua, has written on our hearts (Jeremiah 31:33). It’s impossible to erase something G-d writes on your heart, and sorely unwise to attempt to alter what He has written.

I asked this "lawless believer" to show me where the New Covenant writings indicate that believers in Yeshua are not required to obey the instructions of G-d. Are they no longer required to “be holy, as He is holy”, “work out their salvation with fear and trembling”, "keep His commandments", “or do their works before men that they might glorify their Father who is in heaven”? I told him that if he could prove his idea, I’d find a way to denounce mountains of scripture (as he, apparently, had) and become like every other ineffectual, clueless, cultural believer I’d ever met. To put it another way, I asked him, "If Torah is somehow done away with, now that Messiah, the Living Torah, has come, which of the 10 commandments, for example (and to keep it simple) was he, as a Christian, free to ignore?"

A vast and palatable silence followed.
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For further study in Galatians, I highly recommend First Fruits of Zion's: Galatians