The New Testament, Mosaic Law and Ecclesiastical Law Today

2005 ◽  
Vol 8 (36) ◽  
pp. 60-66
Author(s):  
Anthony Bash
Keyword(s):  
New Testament ◽  
Old Testament ◽  
Natural Law ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
Ecclesiastical Law ◽  
Positive Law ◽  
The New Testament ◽  
The Law ◽  
Mosaic Law ◽  
Common Misconceptions

This article explores the New Testament's critique of Old Testament law, a genus of positive law. It looks at the applicability of that critique to modern ecclesiastical law: The article identifies three common misconceptions about the view of the New Testament concerning Old Testament law, and then sets out what the New Testament does say about Old Testament law, principally from the writings of St Paul. The principles underlying the New Testament's critique are established. The critique is made not on natural law grounds but on pragmatic and utilitarian grounds. The grounds of the critique are (i) the efficacy of the law to achieve its true intent; and (ii) the extent to which human beings exaggerate the usefulness of Old Testament law.

scholarly journals Von Harnack, Marcion en die Ou Testament

2003 ◽  
Vol 24 (1) ◽  
pp. 124-136 ◽  
Author(s):  
J H Le Roux
Keyword(s):  
New Testament ◽  
Old Testament ◽  
Second Century ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
The New Testament

This article focusses on Adolf Von Harnack’s profound study of Marcion, a theologian of the second century. He was amongst other things fascinated by Marcion’s view of the Old Testament.  Marcion rejected  the  Old Testament because it depicted the creator-god as a mean figure who humiliated human beings. Jesus was in no way related to  this  god. He  came from the good God who is described in the New Testament. Marcion compiled his own Bible which had no Old Testa-ment and only a few books from the New Testament which he  purged from all Jewish or Old Testament influence. According to Marcion the newness of the Christ event made the Old Testament superflous. 

Who Instigated Violence: A Rebelling Devil or a Vengeful God?

2015 ◽  
pp. 93-106
Author(s):  
István T. Kristó-Nagy*
Keyword(s):  
Social Norms ◽  
New Testament ◽  
Old Testament ◽  
Social Implications ◽  
The World ◽  
The New Testament ◽  
The Law ◽  
The Universe

The contrast between the attitude towards violence of the God of the Old Testament and the God of the New Testament was already explored by Marcion (d. c. 160 ad) before the advent of Islam and has been rediscovered again and again since.1 Marcion saw the former as the creator of the world and God of the law and the latter as the good God, the God of love.2 The character of the former reflects a community’s need for sanctified social norms, while the character of the latter shows the community’s and the individual’s longing for the hope of salvation.3 The God of the Qurʾān is also one of punishment and pardon. This chapter investigates the former aspect and focuses on: (1) the appearance of evil and violence in the universe as described in the Qurʾān; (2) the philosophical-theological questions revealed by this myth; and (3) its social implications.

The Theological Appropriation of the Old Testament by the New Testament

1986 ◽  
Vol 39 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-17 ◽  
Author(s):  
Matthew Black
Keyword(s):  
New Testament ◽  
Old Testament ◽  
General Terms ◽  
Biblical Study ◽  
The New Testament ◽  
The Law

To speak, in general terms, of trends in modern biblical study is often to over-simplify; and certainly to claim that there has been, in recent years, a trend away from the traditional classicist or ‘hellenist’ approach to New Testament problems towards a more Hebraic or semitic-centred approach would be to be guilty of the same exaggeration as E. C. Hoskyns in 1930: ‘(There are) grounds for supposing no further progress in the understanding of … Christianity to be possible unless the ark of New Testament exegesis be recovered from its wanderings in the land of the Philistines (sic) and be led back not merely to Jerusalem, for that might mean contemporary Judaism, but to its home in the midst of the classical Old Testament Scriptures — to the Law and the Prophets.’ There is, nevertheless, some truth in A. M. Hunter's later statement: ‘After ransacking all sorts of sources, Jewish and Greek (and, we may add, starting all sorts of “hares”, some of which have not run very well), (scholars) are discovering the truth of Augustine's dictum, “The New Testament lies hidden in the Old, and the Old is made plain in the New”’ (Novum Testamentum in vetere latet, vetus in novo patet).

scholarly journals MUST THEISTS BELIEVE IN A PERSONAL GOD?

Think ◽  
2009 ◽  
Vol 8 (23) ◽  
pp. 77-86
Author(s):  
Elizabeth Burns
Keyword(s):  
New Testament ◽  
Old Testament ◽  
Hebrew Bible ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
Garden Of Eden ◽  
The New Testament ◽  
Genesis 3

The claim that God is a person or personal is, perhaps, one of the most fundamental claims which religious believers make about God. In Hinduism, Brahma, Vishnu and Shiva are represented in person-like form. In the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament God walks in the Garden of Eden (Genesis 3:8), experiences emotions (e.g. Isaiah 61:8), and converses with human beings (e.g. Job 38–41). In the New Testament, God communicates with his people, usually by means of angels or visions (e.g. Matthew 1:20–21), and retains the ability to speak audibly, as he does to Paul on the Damascus road (Acts 9:4–6). And, in the Qur'an, Allah is said to have a face and two hands (e.g. Qur'an 38:75), to see, and to sit on a throne (e.g. Qur'an 57:4). Many believers today would still claim that, among other things which God can do, he loves those who believe in him (e.g. Ephesians 5:29; I Peter 5:7; Qur'an 1:3) and responds to their prayers (e.g. Matthew 7:7–8; Mark 11:24; Qur'an 11:61).

Preaching the Law

1960 ◽  
Vol 13 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-32
Author(s):  
Ragnar Bring
Keyword(s):  
New Testament ◽  
Old Testament ◽  
Daily Life ◽  
Religious Tradition ◽  
Know How ◽  
The Core ◽  
The People ◽  
The New Testament ◽  
The Law

In The New Testament the word ‘Law’ is largely equivalent to what we today call the Old Testament. But there are exceptions to this use of the term. The Law sometimes designates the Pentateuch. This is the case in the liturgy of the Synagogue. But for the Jews the term ‘Law’ also could include their entire religious tradition. It governed the daily life of the people—not only in matters of what we call worship, morality, ethics or religion but also in matters legal, social and political. Additions to the commandments found in the Pentateuch and the commentaries that had been added and still were being added, were not thought to be something foreign to the law. It was thought that they simply applied what the Scriptures said. The phrase ‘it has been said to them of old times’ is often understood as being merely a formula of disapproval, since in the Gospels Jesus criticised these rules. But their original purpose was to continue the tradition of which the Scriptures were the core. Their contemporary significance was manifest in the constantly renewed discussion of how they were to be interpreted and applied. For this purpose casuistic rules were needed, that took into account all the concrete situations of life. Thus a lawabiding Jew could always know how he had to act.

scholarly journals Biblical hermeneutics as the structuralist of the poetics of "The Word of Law and Grace" of Ilarion

2019 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
New Testament ◽  
Old Testament ◽  
Holy Spirit ◽  
Eternal Life ◽  
Biblical Hermeneutics ◽  
The Bible ◽  
The New Testament ◽  
The Holy Spirit ◽  
The Law ◽  
Allegorical Interpretation

The article states that, for the purpose of interpreting the Biblical topos of the Law and Grace, Hilarion refers to the genre of the word. Hilarion takes first place in the title, and then in the text of the work God brings out wisdom. By law, he believes the Old Testament, which has already fulfilled its task, and Grace - the New Testament, which outlines the existence of man, his relationship with God, gives hope for eternal life. The subject of the "Word" breaks the sermon into four fragments. In the first of them, we notice the allegorical meaning of reading the Scriptures in relation to the history of mankind. The second part is devoted to the interpretation of the image of Jesus Christ, which appears as a synthesis of God and human nature. The third fragment depicts events beyond the boundary of the Bible. It is devoted to the baptism of Rus. In the fourth fragment Prince Volodymyr is glorified. Following the best traditions of Byzantine oratory prose, the author of the Word simply pours his text into quotations from the Bible and adds to them a predominantly allegorical interpretation, emphasizing that the work is not intended for proclamation, but for reading, which enabled the author to interpret the Scriptures and in the literal, and in allegorical sense. The advantage of the New Testament over the Old Testament is embodied by the author in the images of the free wife of Abraham Sarah - Grace and his servant Hagar - Law. Laconic retelling of God-inspired text, Hilarion interprets the old-czarist images, as those that represent the new covenants at the level of allusions, presented them in the form of additional parallel antithesis. The same anti-colored color is also depicted by the images of their children. Isaac was born from a free woman, which means that he represents freedom, Ishmael is from a slave, hence his image symbolizes slavery. He who receives Grace receives goodness, love, becomes the son of God, and begins to live a new life in the Holy Spirit through which the believer is through. The overcoming of the Law and the perception of Grace means, according to Hilarion, the acquisition of spiritual freedom.

Forgotten Dimensions of Holiness

2011 ◽  
Vol 33 (2) ◽  
pp. 121-146
Author(s):  
James E. Robson
Keyword(s):  
New Testament ◽  
Old Testament ◽  
Main Part ◽  
Divine Presence ◽  
Self Disclosure ◽  
The New Testament ◽  
The Law

AbstractThis article explores a sometimes forgotten dimension of divine holiness, divine holiness as love. It starts by reflecting on an apparent incongruity between the New Testament summary of the law, “You shall love your neighbour as yourself ” (Lev 19:18) and that verse’s context in Leviticus, where a more probable summary is the call, “Be holy for I, YHWH your God, am holy” (Lev 19:2). It examines the significance of the conjunction of Lev 19:2 and 19:18, and argues that it is appropriate to speak of love as a dimension of divine holiness. In the main part of the article, which looks at the Old Testament more widely, including Exodus, Ezekiel, Isaiah, Hosea and the prayer life of Israel, divine holiness as love is evident on closer examination in three ways: holiness and self-disclosure, holiness and saving activity, and holiness and divine presence.

The (Ir)rationality of Torah

2015 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christine Hayes
Keyword(s):  
Natural Law ◽  
Greco Roman ◽  
Positive Law ◽  
Rational Character ◽  
The Law ◽  
Mosaic Law ◽  
Shed Light

This chapter continues to explore the rabbinic conception of Mosaic Law in an attempt to discern the extent to which and the manner in which that conception may have been informed by Greco-Roman discourses of natural law and positive law. Because the primary discourses of natural law in the Greco-Roman tradition underscore the rational character of the law, it takes up the question of the rationality of the Mosaic Law as represented by the rabbis. The chapter examines rabbinic sources that shed light on a constellation of questions that address the matter of the Law's essential rationality: Is the Law depicted as rational in the sense that it is not arbitrary and contains no contradiction or absurdity, no illogical or paradoxical claim, or does it defy logic and natural reason? Is it depicted as possessing intrinsic rationales or only an extrinsic utility of some kind? Is the Mosaic Law represented as rationally accessible or inaccessible? And does it derive its authority from its rational character or from a coercive sovereign will?

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