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Appendix 13 | Table
of Contents | Appendix 15
The Life and Times of Jesus the Messiah
Alfred Edersheim
1883
Appendix 14
THE LAW IN MESSIANIC TIMES.
(See Book III. ch. 3.)
THE question as to the Rabbinic views in regard to the binding
character of the Law, and its imposition on the Gentiles, in Messianic times,
although, strictly speaking, not forming part of this history, is of such vital
importance in connection with recent controversies as to demand special
consideration. In the text to which this Appendix refers it has been indicated,
that a new legislation was expected in Messianic days. The ultimate basis of
this expectancy must be sought in the Old Testament itself - not merely in such
allusions as to the intrinsic worthlessness of sacrifices, but in such passages
as Deut. xviii. 15, 18, and its prophetic commentary in Jer. xxxi. 31, &c.
It was with a view to this that the Jewish deputation inquired whether John the
Baptist was 'that Prophet.' For, as has been shown, Rabbinism associated
certain reformatory and legislative functions with the appearance of the
Forerunner of the Messiah (Eduy. viii. 7).
There were, indeed, in this, as in most respects, diverging
opinions according to the different standpoints of the Rabbis, and, as we
infer, not without controversial bearing on the teaching of Christianity. The
strictest tendency may be characterised as that which denied the possibility of
any change in the ceremonial Law, as well as the abrogation of festivals in the
future. Even the destruction of the Temple. and with it the necessary cessation
of sacrifices - if, indeed, which is a moot question, all sacrifices did at
once and absolutely cease - only caused a gap; just as exile from the land
could only free from such laws as attached to the soil of Israel.1
The reading of the sacrificial sections in the Law (Meg. 31 b; Ber. R.
44) - at any rate, in conjunction with prayers (Ber. 2 b), but
especially study of the Law (Men. 110 a), took in the meantime the place
of the sacrifices. And as regarded the most sacred of all sacrifices, that of
the Day of Atonement, it was explained that the day rather than the sacrifices
brought reconciliation (Sifra c. 8). This party held the principle that not
only those Divine, but even those Rabbinic, ordinances, which apparently had
been intended only for a certain time or for a certain purpose, were of eternal
duration (Bezah 5 b). 'The law is never to cease; there are the
commandments - since there is no prophet who may change a word in them.'2
1. In
the Book Cusari (ii. 49 ed. Cassel, p. 274) an inference somewhat
inconvenient to Rabbinism is drawn from this. If, as it asserts Levitical
uncleanness and holiness are correlative terms, the one implying the other,
would it not follow that with the cessation of the Jewish economy the whole
ceremonial Law would also cease? See Cassel's note.
2. For
further particulars I refer to Stein, Schrift des Lebens, i. pp. 319-336
(ch. on 'The Messiah'), to the article on the Messiah in Hamburger's
Real-Encycl. ii. pp. 747, 748, and especially to that most interesting brochure
of Rabbi Holdheim, Das Ceremonialges. im Messias-Reich. I have not read
a more clear demonstration of the impossibility of Rabbinism, nor - strange as
it may sound - a fuller vindication of the fundamental positions of
Christianity.
So far were these views carried, that it was asserted: 'Israel
needs not the teaching of the King Messiah,' but that 'He only comes to gather
the dispersed, and to give to the Gentiles thirty commandments, as it is
written (Zechar. xi. 12), "they weighed me my price, thirty pieces of silver"'
(Ber. R. 98). But even these extreme statements seem to imply that keen
controversy had raged on the subject. Besides, the most zealous defenders of
the Law admitted that the Gentiles were to receive laws in Messianic times. The
smallest and most extreme section held that, the laws, as Israel observed them,
would be imposed on the Gentiles (Chull. 92 a); others that only
thirty commandments, the original Noachic ordinances supposed to be enumerated
in Lev. xix., would become obligatory,3
while some held, that only three ordinances would be binding on the new
converts: two connected with the Feast of Tabernacles, the third, that of the
phylacteries (Midr. on Ps. xxxi. 1, ed. Warsh, p. 30 b). On the other
hand, we have the most clear testimony that the prevailing tendency of teaching
was in a different direction. In a very curious passage (Yalkut ii. 296, p. 46 a),
in which the final restitution of 'the sinners of Israel and of the righteous
of the Gentiles' who are all in Gehinnom, is taught in very figurative
language, we are told of a 'new Law which God will give by the Messiah'
in the age to come - thanksgiving for which calls forth that universal Amen,
not only on earth but in Gehinnom, which leads to the deliverance of those who
are in the latter. But as this may refer to the time of the final consummation,
we turn to other passages. The Midrash on Song ii. 13, applying the passage in
conjunction with Jer. xxxi. 31, expressly states that the Messiah would give
Israel a new law, and the Targum, on Is. xii., 3, although perhaps not quite so
clearly, also speaks of a 'new instruction.' It is needless to multiply proofs
(such as Vayyikra R. 13). But the Talmud goes even further, and lays down the
two principles, that in the 'age to come' the whole ceremonial Law and all the
feasts were to cease.4
And although this may be regarded as merely a general statement, it is
definitely applied to the effect, that all sacrifices except the
thank-offering, and all fasts and feasts except the Day of Atonement, or else
the Feast of Esther, were to come to an end - nay (in the Midr. on the words
'the Lord looseth the bound,' Ps. cxlvi. 7), that what had formerly been
'bound' or forbidden would be 'loosed' or allowed, notably that the
distinctions between clean and unclean animals would be removed.
3. Stein,
u.s. pp. 327, 328.
4. Comp.
on this Holdheim, Das Ceremonialges, p. 46.
There is the less need for apology for any digression here,
that, besides the intrinsic interest of the question, it casts light on two
most important subjects, For, first, it illustrates the attempt of the
narrowest Judaic party in the Church to force on Gentile believers the yoke of
the whole Law; the bearing of St. Paul in this respect; his relation to St.
Peter; the conduct of the latter; and the proceedings of the Apostolic Synod in
Jerusalem (Acts xv.). St. Paul, in his opposition to that party, stood even on
Orthodox Jewish ground. But when he asserted, not only a new 'law of liberty,'
but the typical and preparatory character of the whole Law, and its fulfillment
in Christ, he went far beyond the Jewish standpoint. Further, the favorite
modern theory as to fundamental opposition in principle between Pauline and
Petrine theology in this respect, has, like many kindred theories, no support
in the Jewish views on that subject, unless we suppose that Peter had belonged
to the narrowest Jewish school, which his whole history seems to forbid. We can
also understand, how the Divinely granted vision of the abrogation of the
distinction between clean and unclean animals (Acts x. 9-16) may, though coming
as a surprise, have had a natural basis in Jewish expectancy,5
and it explains how the Apostolic Synod, when settling the question,6
ultimately fell back on the so-called Noachic commandments, though with very
wider-reaching principles underlying their decision (Acts xv. 13-21). Lastly,
it seems to cast even some light on the authorship of the Fourth Gospel; for,
the question about 'that prophet' evidently referring to the possible
alteration of the Law in Messianic times, which is reported only in the Fourth
Gospel, shows such close acquaintance with the details of Jewish ideas on this
subject, as seems to us utterly incompatible with its supposed origination as
'The Ephesian Gospel' towards the end of the second century, the outcome of
Ephesian Church-teaching - an 'esoteric and eclectic' book, designed to modify
'the impressions produced by the tradition previously recorded by the
Synoptists.'
5. The
learned reader will find a very curious illustration of this in that strange
Haggadah about the envy of the serpent being excited on seeing Adam fed with
meat from heaven - where another equally curious Haggadah is related to show
that 'nothing is unclean which cometh down from heaven.'
6. Yalkut
i. 15, p. 4, d, towards the middle. A considerable part of vol. iii. of
'Supernatural Religion' is devoted to argumentation on this subject. But here
also the information of the writer on the subject is neither accurate nor
critical, and hence his reasoning and conclusions are vitiated.
Appendix 13 | Table
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