Has anyone done any writing on the Noachide Laws, the Noachides, etc?

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JC
URCNA
PA

"Forgiveness is primarily for our own sake, so that we no longer carry the burden of resentment. But to forgive does not mean we will allow injustice again." --Jack Kornfield

:bump:

What are they?

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The man who is disposed to think of his sin as a great calamity, rather than as a heinous crime, is not likely either to reverence God or to respect His law. - John Kennedy, 1873
Meg
Blog
Member, Intown Presbyterian Church,PCA, Portland, OR

Click to get: Board Rules -- Signature Requirements -- Suggestions?

Here is an article from Wikipedia.

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Andrew Myers
Husband of Jessica, Father of Jackson, Katie and Samuel
Member, Presbyterian Reformed Church of Northern Virginia
Warrenton, VA USA
Editor, The Matthew Poole Project

"On land, at sea, at home, abroad, / I smoke my pipe and worship God." -- J.S. Bach

Read the article already...read a bunch of sites, in fact. Looking for Christian responses to their assertions and such

I briefly debated a man in Canada on Plentyoffish.com's Religion Forum regarding the Noachide laws. This man is of Jewish descent although he is a practicing pagan/witch.

His contention was that these laws are the Oral Tradition handed down by the Rabbis in the Talmud. Obeying these seven provisions was sufficient to make a Gentile living among the Jews righteous in the sight of God.

My position was that God, in Exodus 12:49 absolutely forbids the imposition of one law for the native born and another law for the stranger living among you. This is the very essence of discrimination, and it is evil.

I had reduced this man to making French cooking analogies by saying that it is better to go to those who had been making the recipe for hundred of years than to think that I knew better than they did. I disagreed because GOD'S WORD was so clear, and we as Christians do not accept the Talmud as authoritative.

It certainly made me see why Jesus said that the religious leaders teach for doctrine the commandments of men.

I had this guy backed into a corner because I pounded him with Exodus 12:49 and the fact that two laws--one for the native born and one for the stranger living among you--is the essence of discrimination. It is EVIL.

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Jane Chavez
Covenant of Grace, OPC
Albuquerque, NM.

Thank you, Jane. That helps a great deal. I was trying to find where they got the concept of the Noachide Laws and didn't realise till this morn that it was from Talmudic tradition. I found a site where a gent lists many sayings from the Talmud that all contradict scripture...and not in a way that can be said, "the Christians changed it in translation" either. Apparently the Talmud is held above the Torah?! Aiii!


Next question: how do you get a Jewish person to discuss the Torah minus the Talmud (the only ones I could find that hold to only Torah are the Ethiopian Jews and the Karaites)?

The Jews denounce Christians for not accepting "the Oral Tradition" as equivalent to sacred Scripture. The Oral Tradition is written down in the Talmud and has come down through the centuries.

An analogy might be if the United States Constitution were the Tanak (the Old Testament), and the United State Supreme Court Decisions were the Talmud. The Talmud interprets the Tanak, but it is not the Word of God--it is the opinion of man. The Jews revere it equally with sacred Scripture and denounce Christians for not giving it the same place of honor in our faith that they give it.

We as Christians do not deny that the Talmud has some wisdom in it's interpretations of various passages. What we deny is that it is equal to Scripture.

Another thing I have found in arguing with this man is that the Jews will claim that there are three ways a Jew may obtain forgiveness: sacrifice for the least of his sins, repentance, and charity. I find it interesting that God would have set up a whole system of sacrifice for the least of man's sins--the sins that man is not even aware of committing according to this theory. The greater sins are forgiven by merely repenting or by doing works of charity. I have yet to find this in the Scriptures, but I imagine this is taught in the Talmud.

As Jesus said, they teach for doctrines the commandments of men. They deny the Word of God through their tradition. I don't say that to be unkind. I just say it because that has to be where this theory of the three ways of forgiveness comes from--the tradition of men through the Talmud.

Watch out for those who claim that the Hebrew scriptures are not properly translated into English. This is an attempt to get you rattled. I saw one website my opponent linked to that used the King James Version as its English language translation after he had given me such a hard time for using an NIV or NKJV. It was a hoot!

I hope this helps.