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Related to the concept of the Law of Christ and New Testament law, James 2:8-2 uses the phrases of "Royal Law" and "Law of Liberty". It also strongly implies an affirmation of at least two of the Ten Commandments and affirms the law as the standard for defining transgression and sin. The Law of Liberty is declared to be a standard for universal judgment.
James 2:8-12 "If, however, you are fulfilling the royal law, according to the Scripture, "You shall love your neighbor as yourself," you are doing well. But if you show partiality, you are committing sin and are convicted by the law as transgressors. For whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles in one point, he has become guilty of all. For He who said, "Do not commit adultery," also said, "Do not commit murder." Now if you do not commit adultery, but do commit murder, you have become a transgressor of the law. So speak and so act, as those who are to be judged by the law of liberty."
12:05, 18 July 2009 (UTC) —Preceding
unsigned comment added by
Itohacs (
talk •
contribs)
It is not true that James is endorsing the whole Law of Moses. His argument, in fact, is the opposite. With Paul, he is noting that if you want to be justified by the Law, you have to keep every detail of it, which is not humanly possible. Leviticus 19:18 is the "Law of Liberty" in the sense that in Christ we are free to love others as ourselves without regard to whether the actions taken under this "law" are allowed by the rest of the Law of Moses (e.g., Jesus doing works of healing on the Sabbath). See Acts 15, where James (the same one who wrote the letter, according to tradition) is persuaded that new Christians are not to be "troubled" by any requirement to keep the Mosaic Law. Ruckabumpkus ( talk) 00:43, 26 July 2009 (UTC)
Whether that's a "misunderstanding" of the Council of Jerusalem is debatable. I think what I wrote above is correct.
First, the Noahide Law, strictly speaking, is not part of the Mosaic Law, since it came many generations earlier. The Mosaic Law is part of the Sinai Covenant, which was given to the original people of Israel, but not to gentiles. So James telling the gentile Christians to keep something akin to the Noahide Law is not tantamount to telling them to keep part of the Law of Moses.
Second, what James lists is not the Noahide law. According to Genesis 9:1-7, Noah was commanded (1) to be fruitful and multiply, (2) not to eat meat with the blood still in it, and (3) not to murder. Rabbinic tradition adds four more commandments not found in the Bible itself and reinterprets (1) as a prohibition of sexual immorality in general. James' conclusion is only that gentile believers should be told to abstain from (1) things polluted by idols, (2) fornication, (3) strangled things, and (4) blood. The absence of murder indicates that James considers this to be a list of practices Christians should observe above and beyond universal ethical principles-- i.e., religious rules, or a Christian holiness code.
Third, James does not appear to imply that these restrictions are immutable commands from God but his own recommendations. Note that he says, "I have decided,..." not "Thus says the Lord:..." The fact that these are recommendations and not absolute commands is made clear in 1 Corinthians 8, where Paul deals with the idol-meat controversy. Apparently, some Christians in Corinth were objecting that eating meat offered to idols can't really hurt them, because idols don't really exist. Paul grants the truth of that objection, but argues for abstaining from idol-meat on other grounds, namely that other members of the Christian community might be misled if they see the eating of idol-meat as an acceptance of idolatry. In other words, for Paul the decisive factor on the question of idol-meat is the Law of Love, not any requirement to keep a list of religious rules or holiness code. Ruckabumpkus ( talk) 04:11, 10 September 2009 (UTC)
I'd love to. However, my research in this area is not of the formal, academic type. It's not original research, but I haven't kept careful track of my sources. I make the case based on the text of the Bible itself, but I'm sure that woudn't fly with stricter Wikipedians. Ruckabumpkus ( talk) 18:08, 10 September 2009 (UTC)
The introductory paragraph currently contains this sentence: "Supersessionists and Dispensationalists believe this replaces or completes the previous Law of Moses of the Hebrew Bible." Is there any major Christian group that denies that the Law of Christ (whatever it is) does that? If not, why confuse the issue by naming those groups? Those two polysyllabic terms seem unnecessarily technical for a general audience, especially since they make a distinction that pertains mainly to evangelical protestantism and are not particularly relevant in discussing Christianity in general. Would there be any objections to changing that sentence to read, "Most Christians...."? -- Ruckabumpkus ( talk) 01:18, 8 September 2009 (UTC)
Thank you for that clarification. That's what I was wondering. As for "dumbing down" Wikipedia, the other ditch to avoid is making the articles so technical that they're useful only to those who are conversant in the jargon of the topic-- folks who won't look to Wikipedia for information anyway. I recently tried to use Wikipedia to understand a medical term and had to go four-deep into hyperlinks to make sense of it. It was less than helpful. Ruckabumpkus ( talk) 04:20, 10 September 2009 (UTC)
Today I did a major edit to this article by presenting it in a new layout. The law of Christ is now treated under different sections as it appears in the bible in
I expanded on the law of Christ as it appears in the Pauline Epistles, by including some quotes as it appears in the epistle to the Romans. There are much more references to the law of Christ in the Pauline epistles, Epistle of James and the Gospel that need to be included in this article in the future. Alan347 ( talk) 10:59, 19 August 2010 (UTC)
I understand what you're saying, and I don't necessarily disagree (though I would phrase things differently). My point is that that's not the way to say it in an encyclopedia article. Because it's a doctrinal interpretation and not objectively verifiable, you can't just state it as a fact like that. We need you to spell out, according to whom, and give a reference. Is it official Catholic teaching? Then say, "According to Catholic doctrine,...." and tell us where we might look it up for ourselves. Is it the opinion of a prominent academic theologian or two? Then say "According to [name(s)],...." and include what books or journal articles we would find it in. Ruckabumpkus ( talk) 21:25, 25 August 2010 (UTC)
BTW, one reason I'm skeptical of your assertion that "the law of Christ is Christ himself," is that it doesn't make sense in the context of the one place in the Bible where the phrase occurs, Galatians 6:2. Ruckabumpkus ( talk) 21:38, 25 August 2010 (UTC)
You see when married couples use contraceptives they are dictating to God the way they want their family to be run in an un-natural way. As regards to the Papal institution, it is biblical, established by Jesus and Historical. Luther was a sincere man that is why he did what he did. We refer to Luther as a reformer because even though what he did caused a separation, it influenced a reformation within the Church.
Bernard Haring's argument is like this: The law of Christ is Christ himself in his person because Jesus was able to fulfill the law and provide us with the effect of this fulfillment. Alan347 ( talk) 14:26, 27 August 2010 (UTC)
As an aside, there is an article on the topic of Christian law, it's called Biblical law in Christianity. 75.15.204.56 ( talk) 00:06, 27 December 2010 (UTC)
Alan347, I see you added the sentence we discussed above. Thanks. It would still be appropriate, if you're willing to do it, to add a whole new section fleshing out Häring's thesis. (Or maybe you're still working on that.) I'm not sure what "The law of Christ is Christ himself in his person" means. In particular, I suspect Häring, a native German speaker, uses the word law in a sense slightly different from its usual meaning in English. My German is not nearly good enough to figure that out, but I wonder if the range of meaning of law as he uses the word includes what we would call reign, authority or dominion. Ruckabumpkus ( talk) 15:12, 4 September 2010 (UTC)
Hi Ruckabumpkus and all. As a continuation with that discussion, I wanted to look at it from another perspective. By focusing on
We can understand this in this way: To the eyes of God (from the perspective of eternity) man is not the first man, Adam, who became a living being without some finalizing reference to the second Adam, who was life-giving Spirit (confer Hans Urs Von Balthasar, Mysterium Paschale, 12)
In the Garden of Eden, man had the opportunity to choose the tree of life. We know that it is Jesus who is the way, the truth and the life - from an eternal perspective which includes the temporal). This means that he already was the way, the truth and the life way back in the Garden of Eden (from a temporal perspective). Since Adam did not choose Jesus then, Jesus came here to take that decision upon himself so that sin was swallowed up by God. Again, this must be seen from the temporal perspective. From the eternal perspective, God already knew what man would do and so devised time so as to have its fullness with the incarnation which was orientated towards his death and resurrection (confer Galatians 4, 4 and John 7, 8).
Alan347 ( talk) 09:00, 15 December 2010 (UTC)
So if we understand that man is not man without reference to Christ, we can also understand Douglas J. Moo's point that the law of Christ is a continuation from the Mosaic law for 'Jesus has not come to abolish the law but to perfect it'. God was already instructing man to conform to Christ in the Old Testament. But it is Christ in his person who is the law. From the eyes of eternity (non-temporal), Adam is not the first Adam, without reference to Christ who came in the fullness of time to give out the life-giving Spirit. On Holy Saturday, Jesus' life received its orientation. Continuing its course, it led him to the passivity of Hades, the place of the dead, where in the sin-solidarity with man he had taken upon himself, he met all those who had died up till then who where expecting salvation from him. 'The tombs broke open and the bodies of many holy people who had died were raised to life.' On Easter he arose back into the visible realm of existence, giving the life-giving spirit: 'peace be with you'. He ascended into heaven and at Pentecost gave out the empowering of the Holy Spirit. Time is ordered to the Jesus-event. Alan347 ( talk) 09:10, 21 December 2010 (UTC)
The less we get lost in discussions about individual sayings and norms, the more we turn our attention, in faith, to Jesus. He is not only the presupposition but the centre of the New Testament. Thus the real history of Jesus is "always happening afresh; it is now the history of the exalted Lord, but it does not cease to be the earthly history it once was, in which the call and claim of the Gospel are encountered." ( Bernhard Haring, Free and Faithful in Christ, Vol. I, pg. 25; Ernst Käsemann, The Problem of the Historical Jesus in Essays on the New Testament Themes); Karl Barth Alan347 ( talk) 20:30, 22 December 2010 (UTC)
I Corinthians 9:21 To those not having the law I became like one not having the law (though I am not free from God's law but am under Christ's law), so as to win those not having the law.-- 174.45.204.216 ( talk) 00:09, 31 May 2011 (UTC)
But the text doesn't have "under Christ's law", it has "under the law to Christ". Which may or may not be equivalent, ennomos may just have the meaning of "being under legal obligation to" without postulating that there is actually a separate law specific to the person you are "law-bound" to. -- dab (𒁳) 12:55, 10 September 2013 (UTC)
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Related to the concept of the Law of Christ and New Testament law, James 2:8-2 uses the phrases of "Royal Law" and "Law of Liberty". It also strongly implies an affirmation of at least two of the Ten Commandments and affirms the law as the standard for defining transgression and sin. The Law of Liberty is declared to be a standard for universal judgment.
James 2:8-12 "If, however, you are fulfilling the royal law, according to the Scripture, "You shall love your neighbor as yourself," you are doing well. But if you show partiality, you are committing sin and are convicted by the law as transgressors. For whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles in one point, he has become guilty of all. For He who said, "Do not commit adultery," also said, "Do not commit murder." Now if you do not commit adultery, but do commit murder, you have become a transgressor of the law. So speak and so act, as those who are to be judged by the law of liberty."
12:05, 18 July 2009 (UTC) —Preceding
unsigned comment added by
Itohacs (
talk •
contribs)
It is not true that James is endorsing the whole Law of Moses. His argument, in fact, is the opposite. With Paul, he is noting that if you want to be justified by the Law, you have to keep every detail of it, which is not humanly possible. Leviticus 19:18 is the "Law of Liberty" in the sense that in Christ we are free to love others as ourselves without regard to whether the actions taken under this "law" are allowed by the rest of the Law of Moses (e.g., Jesus doing works of healing on the Sabbath). See Acts 15, where James (the same one who wrote the letter, according to tradition) is persuaded that new Christians are not to be "troubled" by any requirement to keep the Mosaic Law. Ruckabumpkus ( talk) 00:43, 26 July 2009 (UTC)
Whether that's a "misunderstanding" of the Council of Jerusalem is debatable. I think what I wrote above is correct.
First, the Noahide Law, strictly speaking, is not part of the Mosaic Law, since it came many generations earlier. The Mosaic Law is part of the Sinai Covenant, which was given to the original people of Israel, but not to gentiles. So James telling the gentile Christians to keep something akin to the Noahide Law is not tantamount to telling them to keep part of the Law of Moses.
Second, what James lists is not the Noahide law. According to Genesis 9:1-7, Noah was commanded (1) to be fruitful and multiply, (2) not to eat meat with the blood still in it, and (3) not to murder. Rabbinic tradition adds four more commandments not found in the Bible itself and reinterprets (1) as a prohibition of sexual immorality in general. James' conclusion is only that gentile believers should be told to abstain from (1) things polluted by idols, (2) fornication, (3) strangled things, and (4) blood. The absence of murder indicates that James considers this to be a list of practices Christians should observe above and beyond universal ethical principles-- i.e., religious rules, or a Christian holiness code.
Third, James does not appear to imply that these restrictions are immutable commands from God but his own recommendations. Note that he says, "I have decided,..." not "Thus says the Lord:..." The fact that these are recommendations and not absolute commands is made clear in 1 Corinthians 8, where Paul deals with the idol-meat controversy. Apparently, some Christians in Corinth were objecting that eating meat offered to idols can't really hurt them, because idols don't really exist. Paul grants the truth of that objection, but argues for abstaining from idol-meat on other grounds, namely that other members of the Christian community might be misled if they see the eating of idol-meat as an acceptance of idolatry. In other words, for Paul the decisive factor on the question of idol-meat is the Law of Love, not any requirement to keep a list of religious rules or holiness code. Ruckabumpkus ( talk) 04:11, 10 September 2009 (UTC)
I'd love to. However, my research in this area is not of the formal, academic type. It's not original research, but I haven't kept careful track of my sources. I make the case based on the text of the Bible itself, but I'm sure that woudn't fly with stricter Wikipedians. Ruckabumpkus ( talk) 18:08, 10 September 2009 (UTC)
The introductory paragraph currently contains this sentence: "Supersessionists and Dispensationalists believe this replaces or completes the previous Law of Moses of the Hebrew Bible." Is there any major Christian group that denies that the Law of Christ (whatever it is) does that? If not, why confuse the issue by naming those groups? Those two polysyllabic terms seem unnecessarily technical for a general audience, especially since they make a distinction that pertains mainly to evangelical protestantism and are not particularly relevant in discussing Christianity in general. Would there be any objections to changing that sentence to read, "Most Christians...."? -- Ruckabumpkus ( talk) 01:18, 8 September 2009 (UTC)
Thank you for that clarification. That's what I was wondering. As for "dumbing down" Wikipedia, the other ditch to avoid is making the articles so technical that they're useful only to those who are conversant in the jargon of the topic-- folks who won't look to Wikipedia for information anyway. I recently tried to use Wikipedia to understand a medical term and had to go four-deep into hyperlinks to make sense of it. It was less than helpful. Ruckabumpkus ( talk) 04:20, 10 September 2009 (UTC)
Today I did a major edit to this article by presenting it in a new layout. The law of Christ is now treated under different sections as it appears in the bible in
I expanded on the law of Christ as it appears in the Pauline Epistles, by including some quotes as it appears in the epistle to the Romans. There are much more references to the law of Christ in the Pauline epistles, Epistle of James and the Gospel that need to be included in this article in the future. Alan347 ( talk) 10:59, 19 August 2010 (UTC)
I understand what you're saying, and I don't necessarily disagree (though I would phrase things differently). My point is that that's not the way to say it in an encyclopedia article. Because it's a doctrinal interpretation and not objectively verifiable, you can't just state it as a fact like that. We need you to spell out, according to whom, and give a reference. Is it official Catholic teaching? Then say, "According to Catholic doctrine,...." and tell us where we might look it up for ourselves. Is it the opinion of a prominent academic theologian or two? Then say "According to [name(s)],...." and include what books or journal articles we would find it in. Ruckabumpkus ( talk) 21:25, 25 August 2010 (UTC)
BTW, one reason I'm skeptical of your assertion that "the law of Christ is Christ himself," is that it doesn't make sense in the context of the one place in the Bible where the phrase occurs, Galatians 6:2. Ruckabumpkus ( talk) 21:38, 25 August 2010 (UTC)
You see when married couples use contraceptives they are dictating to God the way they want their family to be run in an un-natural way. As regards to the Papal institution, it is biblical, established by Jesus and Historical. Luther was a sincere man that is why he did what he did. We refer to Luther as a reformer because even though what he did caused a separation, it influenced a reformation within the Church.
Bernard Haring's argument is like this: The law of Christ is Christ himself in his person because Jesus was able to fulfill the law and provide us with the effect of this fulfillment. Alan347 ( talk) 14:26, 27 August 2010 (UTC)
As an aside, there is an article on the topic of Christian law, it's called Biblical law in Christianity. 75.15.204.56 ( talk) 00:06, 27 December 2010 (UTC)
Alan347, I see you added the sentence we discussed above. Thanks. It would still be appropriate, if you're willing to do it, to add a whole new section fleshing out Häring's thesis. (Or maybe you're still working on that.) I'm not sure what "The law of Christ is Christ himself in his person" means. In particular, I suspect Häring, a native German speaker, uses the word law in a sense slightly different from its usual meaning in English. My German is not nearly good enough to figure that out, but I wonder if the range of meaning of law as he uses the word includes what we would call reign, authority or dominion. Ruckabumpkus ( talk) 15:12, 4 September 2010 (UTC)
Hi Ruckabumpkus and all. As a continuation with that discussion, I wanted to look at it from another perspective. By focusing on
We can understand this in this way: To the eyes of God (from the perspective of eternity) man is not the first man, Adam, who became a living being without some finalizing reference to the second Adam, who was life-giving Spirit (confer Hans Urs Von Balthasar, Mysterium Paschale, 12)
In the Garden of Eden, man had the opportunity to choose the tree of life. We know that it is Jesus who is the way, the truth and the life - from an eternal perspective which includes the temporal). This means that he already was the way, the truth and the life way back in the Garden of Eden (from a temporal perspective). Since Adam did not choose Jesus then, Jesus came here to take that decision upon himself so that sin was swallowed up by God. Again, this must be seen from the temporal perspective. From the eternal perspective, God already knew what man would do and so devised time so as to have its fullness with the incarnation which was orientated towards his death and resurrection (confer Galatians 4, 4 and John 7, 8).
Alan347 ( talk) 09:00, 15 December 2010 (UTC)
So if we understand that man is not man without reference to Christ, we can also understand Douglas J. Moo's point that the law of Christ is a continuation from the Mosaic law for 'Jesus has not come to abolish the law but to perfect it'. God was already instructing man to conform to Christ in the Old Testament. But it is Christ in his person who is the law. From the eyes of eternity (non-temporal), Adam is not the first Adam, without reference to Christ who came in the fullness of time to give out the life-giving Spirit. On Holy Saturday, Jesus' life received its orientation. Continuing its course, it led him to the passivity of Hades, the place of the dead, where in the sin-solidarity with man he had taken upon himself, he met all those who had died up till then who where expecting salvation from him. 'The tombs broke open and the bodies of many holy people who had died were raised to life.' On Easter he arose back into the visible realm of existence, giving the life-giving spirit: 'peace be with you'. He ascended into heaven and at Pentecost gave out the empowering of the Holy Spirit. Time is ordered to the Jesus-event. Alan347 ( talk) 09:10, 21 December 2010 (UTC)
The less we get lost in discussions about individual sayings and norms, the more we turn our attention, in faith, to Jesus. He is not only the presupposition but the centre of the New Testament. Thus the real history of Jesus is "always happening afresh; it is now the history of the exalted Lord, but it does not cease to be the earthly history it once was, in which the call and claim of the Gospel are encountered." ( Bernhard Haring, Free and Faithful in Christ, Vol. I, pg. 25; Ernst Käsemann, The Problem of the Historical Jesus in Essays on the New Testament Themes); Karl Barth Alan347 ( talk) 20:30, 22 December 2010 (UTC)
I Corinthians 9:21 To those not having the law I became like one not having the law (though I am not free from God's law but am under Christ's law), so as to win those not having the law.-- 174.45.204.216 ( talk) 00:09, 31 May 2011 (UTC)
But the text doesn't have "under Christ's law", it has "under the law to Christ". Which may or may not be equivalent, ennomos may just have the meaning of "being under legal obligation to" without postulating that there is actually a separate law specific to the person you are "law-bound" to. -- dab (𒁳) 12:55, 10 September 2013 (UTC)
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