There are some 613 commandments in the Torah, and according to the brother of the Messiah, Yacov (James 2:10), to violate even just one of them is the same as having violated the entire Torah.
But in modern times, are all the Torah commandments still relevant?
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The answer is that every commandment in the Torah is still valid, still relevant, and still required by every single person who professes to worship the God of Abraham, Issac, and Jacob.
And yes, that means you Born-Again Christians, as well!
However, what we need to consider is also that these commandments were written thousands of years ago, and to a people who were just learning how to live after some 400 years of having no options at all, as to what they can or can’t do.
Consequently, the Torah was written to identify right from wrong to a people who were a new-born nation. But what about now? We are some 3500 years older, so is every commandment still valid, especially considering we live in countries that have a constitution and their own penal code and civil laws?
For example, the Torah says a child who curses his parents should be stoned to death, but if Junior tells Daddy to get lost, and Dad stones him to death in view of the entire neighborhood, I don’t think the judge at his trial will let him go free because the Torah said what he did was acceptable.
So, do we take the punishments in the Torah literally, and potentially spend our lives in jail for obeying God, or do we “adjust” those punishments to fit into the modern world?
We also have to understand the purpose behind those commandments: for example, the “eye for an eye” commandment has been considered by the Rabbis to be a figurative statement and not to be taken literally. The idea is that the punishment should fit the crime, so stealing bread may get be punished with time in jail or making restitution, while murder will have a much more severe punishment, possibly death.
I couldn’t find anything that states absolutely how the Torah is redefined with regards to whatever society the Jewish people are living in at any given time. What I did find is that the Torah text is considered to be unchanging, but what can be flexible is the interpretation of those laws and regulations with regard to how they are applied, and that is found in the Talmud (also known as the “Oral Law”).
The Talmud is a very old and important book, composed of two main sections , the Gemara and the Mishna. The Mishna was the first compilation of rabbinic commentary on how to obey the laws in the Torah, and the Gemara came later to explain how to apply the Mishna.
Another way to define the difference between the two is that the Mishnah is the foundational text of Jewish law, a concise compilation of rabbinic legal discussions, while the Gemara is the extensive commentary, analysis, and debate on the Mishnah.
Together they form the Talmud (there are two versions, the Jerusalem Talmud and the Babylonian Talmud); the earliest version of the Mishna dates back to around 200 CE, and the combined texts, forming the complete Talmud, was finalized sometime between the 5th and 6th Centuries CE.
Studying the Talmud is something that Jewish children begin almost as soon as they are old enough to understand it, around 7-8 years of age. And it is good that they start that young, because the Talmud has 2,711 double sided pages, and to learn 1 page a day (using the Daf Yomi cycle), it takes over seven years to complete.
The Talmud codifies Halakha (The Way to Walk), which is where we go when we have a question regarding how to apply the Torah. Halakha is an essential part of Orthodox and Chasidic Judaism, and in many ways Halakah is considered as important as scripture by Orthodox Jews.
So, the Torah text never changes, and the Talmud text never changes, but the interpretation of those texts does change, adjusted to whatever society and times the people are living in.
That’s a hard thing to wrap one’s head around: what the Torah says is absolutely the word of God, and the Talmud reconciles Torah laws to man-made laws through how those Torah commands are interpreted.
In other words, what God says is absolutely true and to violate any of his laws is to violate the entire Torah, yet we can obey what some Rabbi’s say in applying those laws and God will be OK with that.
I’m sorry, but that sounds like a cop-out to me.
On the other hand, we can’t really kill someone for sleeping with our spouse and get away with it just because the Torah says that is what we are supposed to do.
I wish I had an absolute answer, but I don’t.
I guess it comes down to this: we need to know the Torah so we can’t be taught false doctrine, and we need to know the Torah so we can understand who God is and how he wants us to worship him and treat each other. And we need to do our best to obey God’s word within the laws of the land we live in.
If adultery is against the law where we live, and the courts require the death penalty, then that is fine and in accordance with the Torah. But, if where we live finds adultery not to be a violation of any civil laws, then we have to live within those laws.
Maybe we could interpret the Torah to mean what must be killed is the marriage, and not the person who ruined it by committing adultery?
I know that sounds a little silly, but we are in unknown territory here, caught between obeying a law first created in a society that had no real system of jurisprudence and modern society, with a very defined system of jurisprudence.
I believe that God recognizes man-made laws, and as long as they are in relation to his laws, even if some of those Torah laws have to be “toned down” a bit (i.e., divorce instead of death), I think God will be okay with that.
From what I know of God, he is more interested in understanding and living with in the spirit (Remes) of his law, which is what Yeshua was teaching us.
I think it comes down to the punishment should fit the crime, and the interpretation of what punishment fits, well… that will be based on what the Torah says, what Halakha says, and what the society in which we live says.
It will be up to us to reconcile those three as best as we can, staying within the spirit of the Torah and the literal laws of the society.
I have to figure that would be OK with God, otherwise someone in total obedience to the Torah might end up spending their life in jail.
Thank you for being here and please remember to comment and “like” these messages, as well as share them with everyone you know, even non-believers. Hey, after all, you never know how fertile the soil is until you plant a seed in it.
That’s it for this week, so L’hitraot and (an early) Shabbat Shalom!