"All the Law Remained Intact"

The statement Neubauer made in his second address of the second night (his fifth negative speech for those who might want to watch it) is as astounding as it is wrong! About a minute into his presentation, he spoke the following words:

I overstated the case when I said that the Law would go away incrementally. I did. In fact, all the Law remained intact, and yet, the significance of it, as they would see it, that certainly would fade. A new covenant\He hath made the first old, which waxes old, decays, and ready to vanish away (Matthew 8:13) [emphasis GWS].

That last sentence is not really a sentence, but this kind of wording is not unusual in public speaking and, particularly, in debate. Another problem in speaking extemporaneously is that one is constantly in danger of quoting the wrong reference. Neubauer meant to say Hebrews 8:13.

However, he made a theological error which must be dealt with. Brother Denham pointed it out, but he never responded to it. This article will deal with it more fully. Neubauer affirmed that the Law of Moses remained intact until AD 70. If so, then (by his own use of Matthew 5:18-19), every law remained in force. If that assertion is true, then what else must be true?

Every Jew would have been responsible for keeping every aspect of the Law. Does Neubauer realize what this means? If every Jew had to keep all the Law of Moses until AD 70, then every Jew would have had to offer the sacrifices specified in Leviticus 1-5. Furthermore, every male would have to appear before the Lord three times in a year for the three feasts, including the Passover (Ex. 23:14-19). They would be required to do so even though Paul wrote that Christ is "our Passover" (1 Cor. 5:7). They would need to keep observing the Day of Atonement (Lev. 16) even though Jesus made atonement for our sins\once for all (Heb. 10:12). Not only does the New Testament not show Jewish brethren keeping these observances, Paul was on missionary journeys often and could not get to Jerusalem. How does that look\for one of the Lord's apostles not to keep every jot and tittle?

A Jewish Christian would of necessity circumcise his son even though Paul wrote that baptism is the circumcision of the Christian (Col. 2:11-12).

A Jewish Christian would have to observe the Sabbath day since it is one of the Ten Commandments. Why is there not a single reminder of this principle in all of Paul's letters?

All Jewish Christians would need to observe the dietary laws.

Peter Was Commanded to Sin

If the dietary laws must be observed until AD 70, then in Acts 10, three times a voice from Heaven told Peter to sin. The voice told him to rise, kill, and eat unclean animals. As a well-trained Jew, he refused. Did Peter obey that voice at that time? No. The reason, however, is that it was the model or pattern for something even greater. The voice told Peter, "What God has cleansed you must not call common" (Acts 10:15). The application was going to be that he accept Gentiles as worthy to receive the gospel.

When Peter went to the house of Cornelius, he explained what had happened to them. He said, "You know how unlawful it is for a Jewish man to keep company with or go to one of another nation. But God has shown me that I should not call any man common or unclean" (10:28). Wow! What an admission for a Jew to make. Peter understood the illustration. Later, when he returned, he would relate the vision and the application to his fellow Jewish Christians in order to convince them that what he did was acceptable (11:1-18).

The second action of fellowshiping the Gentiles is predicated upon the first action\the eating of once-forbidden meats. Both in the Christian age were all right for Jews to do. One cannot argue that Gentiles are acceptable while formerly-forbidden foods were not. They both stand or fall together (which is the reason 7th-day Adventists have a real problem; they must champion the second while denying the former).

Neubauer knew that he had a problem, also; so he advocated a very strange position. He claimed that God qualified the dietary laws and entering a Gentile's home. By that, he meant that God made an exception so that something greater could occur\the conversion of the Gentiles. He used the word, qualified, but the rest of us defined his position as it really is\situation ethics. This is the philosophy that stands foursquare behind moral principles\until some rationale is needed for violating them.

First of all, everyone ought to realize that God was not qualifying anything. Not a word in the text indicates that such is the case. This is a manmade invention that Neubauer must use because what happened in Acts 10 contradicts his theology. He stated that the Law of Moses was in force until AD 70, which is obviously not true; thus he must construct a contorted explanation of events to "harmonize" with his views. This was not a one-time exception either in the dietary laws or the acceptance of Gentiles. What we are observing in Acts 10 is a change of policy. Before the death of Jesus, Jews despised Gentiles\and vice versa. Now they are to accept one another as Christians\as brothers and sisters in the one body.

How can Neubauer have missed this? Surely he is familiar with Ephesians 2, where Paul says that the middle wall of partition between Jews and Gentiles (the Law) has been broken down. Jesus made peace between the two factions. Jesus abolished in His flesh the law of the commandments to reconcile both Jew and Gentile in one body through the cross (Eph. 2:14-16). Surely, he is aware that Paul went on to say that this was the mystery once hidden but now made known\"that the Gentiles should be fellow heirs, of the same body, and partakers of His promise in Christ through the gospel" (Eph. 3:1-6). Surely, he has preached Galatians 3:28: "There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus."

Peter's going to the home of a Gentile was not a one-time occurrence in the Gospel Age. It was not some kind of exception to the rule, based on situation ethics, or qualification, or whatever other name someone wants to invent. The Gentiles were constantly to be treated as equals in Christ. And if that was permanent, so was the change in dietary laws. The unclean animals represented the unclean Gentiles. God cleansed both. So, when Peter was commanded to eat, those dietary laws were no longer in effect\because the Law had already been done away with. The Law did not end at AD 70 but at the cross, just as Paul stated in Colossians 2:14.

Besides, how would Paul and Peter have lived as Gentiles if they had always complied with the teaching on the Sabbath Day, the observance of various feasts, or the dietary laws. Paul said that Peter, though a Jew, lived "in the manner of Gentiles, and not as the Jews" (Gal. 2:14). He also said of himself that to those who were under the law he lived as under the law, though he was no longer bound by it\and in fact did not keep it. He was only under law to Christ (1 Cor. 9:19-21). Whatever else may be true or false about the AD 70 doctrine, this claim that the Law remained intact until AD 70 is clearly false.

Hebrews 8:13

This verse does not teach what Neubauer implied that it did. Let's consider the context of the entire chapter. It begins by affirming that Jesus is our High Priest and that He is seated at the right hand of the throne of the Majesty in the heavens (8:1). Notice He will not come to be High Priest in AD 70; He already is. By the way, for that to be the case, there had to be a change in the Law (Heb. 7:12). If the Law remains in effect until AD 70, then two separate priesthoods are also in effect\that of Aaron and that of Melchizedek. Does Neubauer really want to make that argument?

The writer of Hebrews goes on to say that the priesthood under the Law of Moses was a copy and a shadow of the heavenly things, which belong to the Christian era (8:2-5). Where is the writer headed with these comparisons? He is going to make a statement about the two covenants:

But now had He [Jesus, GWS] obtained a more excellent ministry, inasmuch as He is also a Mediator of a better covenant, which was established on better promises. For if that first covenant had been faultless, then no place would have been sought for the second (8:6-7).

So, there was a first covenant (the Law of Moses), and now there is a second covenant (the Law of Christ). Are both in effect at the same time? Hebrews 9:16-17 confirms that such is not the case. The will that one makes is not in effect while the testator lives. In other words, the Law of Moses was operative at the time Jesus lived and taught and not His own testament. But when He died, the opposite becomes the case. The Law of Moses is no longer in effect\only the New Testament.

The Hebrews' writer quotes a passage of Scripture regarding 8:6-7. It is from Jeremiah 31:31-34, and it is a prophecy of the new covenant. Verse thirteen is the concluding verse concerning the matter. "In that He says, 'A new covenant,' He has made the first obsolete. Now what is becoming obsolete and growing old is ready to vanish away." Neubauer wrongly applies this application to the time Hebrews is written. But the message is that the Law was becoming obsolete when Jeremiah prophesied about the new covenant. He is the one who used the words, new covenant. The prophecy of the new meant the first was now old and passing away. It, however, would actually be in force until Jesus' death on the cross.

Romans 7:1-6

Brother Denham used this passage, but Neubauer did not comment on it\and for good reason. It destroys his position. Paul begins by saying the Law has dominion over a man as long as he lives (7:1). Then he gives an illustration. A woman who has a husband is bound to him as long as he lives (2). Therefore, if she married another man, everyone would call her an adulteress. If that husband died, however, and she married another, no one would call her an adulteress because she is no longer bound to the one who died (3).

What is the application? Christians have become dead to the Law of Moses through the body of Christ. Why? The only way one can be married to Christ is if the first law is dead. That law had to die, or we could not be married to Jesus (4). Under the Law, "the passions of sins which were aroused by the law were at work in our members to bear fruit to death" (5). We were living under a law of death\one that condemned us. "But now we have been delivered from the law, having died to what we were held by\" (7).

We have died to the Law so we can be married to Christ. If Jewish Christians in the first century were subject to the Law of Moses and to the New Testament of Christ at one and the same time, they were bigamists. If not, why not? The fact is that the Law of Moses ceased to be in force after Jesus died on the cross.

Those who do not know what they are saying shouldn't be: