Dr Greg Bahnsen - Theonomy and it's Critics: Exegetical Critiscisms (Part 4)

In the middle of our studies. And maybe I ought to say just a word also about the style of the presentations. I'm not really giving formal lectures on Sunday evenings, but I'm taking up various methods of attack on the basic position that has been assumed in my book, Theonomy and Christian Ethics. And I've kind of categorized the areas of criticism that have been leveled against it. And we've been taking up one of these areas every Sabbath evening and discussing it. And I go through the criticisms fairly informally and give some kind of response to them and welcome your participation. Please feel free to enter in and make your own remarks or raise further questions or ask for clarification if you'd like to do so. We I think this is probably a good evening for you all to join us, because what I'd like to do is look at what I consider the most foundational issue here, and that is the whole question of exegesis. In the past, I've looked at arguments that arise from different theological methods, questions having to do with the new hermeneutical principle or the progress of revelation or something like that. And we've been looking at the issue of the New Covenant versus the Old Covenant, Meredith Klein's intrusion ethic, and some of these issues. And then tonight we come really down to the basic issue of how you interpret the Bible when it talks about the law of God. We're going to be doing that, and before we turn to it, let's have a word of prayer. Lord, we thank you that you have given us your Holy Spirit to guide and direct us and to enlighten our eyes, that we might read the Scriptures correctly. We do pray that Spirit might be with us, might keep us from error. Tonight we ask, Lord, that you might enable us to use the Scripture to our benefit, to our profit, that we might grow up into Jesus Christ, we might learn to serve him better. Lord, we ask that the Scriptures simply wouldn't be a bone of contention, simply something over which believers might differ, but rather the Scriptures might be a source of strength and empowering that we might serve you and that your kingdom might be advanced through our efforts. We thank you tonight for the Scriptures, for that great gift of the word of truth that you have given to us. We thank you. You have not left us ignorant or to our own devices or to live in our own wisdom, but you have given us all things necessary for our lives, that we might be built up as men of God, perfectly equipped to every good work. And we pray that you would bless our time together and our fellowship around the Word in Jesus name. Amen. Okay. Those of you who have read my book will know, of course, that the book takes as its nucleus and its starting point the passage in Matthew the Fifth chapter, verses 17 to 20, where Jesus speaks of his relationship to the law of the Old Testament. It would have been very easy, of course, in Jesus Day for the Pharisees to come to any number of conclusions as to his own attitude toward the law. Given their interpretation of the law and Jesus strict refusal to be bound by their traditions, they may easily have thought of Jesus as something of an antinomian, as somebody who had come to work against the Old Testament law, against Judaism in its, in its way of life. And Jesus in the midst of the Sermon on the Mount, says, and I'm just going to read it in the American Standard Version, think not that I came to destroy the law or the prophets. I came not to destroy, but to fulfill. For verily I say unto you, till heaven and earth pass away, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass away from the law till all these things be accomplished. Whosoever therefore, shall break one of these least commandments and shall teach men so shall be called least in the kingdom of heaven. But whosoever shall do and teach them, he shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven. For I say unto you that except your righteousness shall exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, ye shall in no wise enter into the kingdom of heaven. Now, what attitude is Jesus taking toward the law of God in this passage? I don't know of a commentator, be an evangelical, liberal, Reformed, Arminian, what have you that fails to see in these words some striking language of endorsement for the Old Testament. Now what the commentators end up doing with the Old Testament, of course, is very diverse and how they can interpret the words of Jesus and expect the church to live in a different way. There are a lot of ways around the words that have been taken, but everybody seems to admit that, at least on the face of it, Jesus is giving some kind of word of endorsement. But now, specifically, what kind of endorsement is it? In my book, I suggest that Jesus in verse 17 is saying that with respect to the entire Old Testament, canon law or prophets, he did not come with the intention of abrogation. He did not come. The Old Testament was wrong in some way what it anticipated. He did not come especially to abrogate any of the moral teaching of the Old Testament. Now please remember that we're starting with the entire Old Testament and its moral Teaching anything having to do with moral living, that is an instruction in the Old Testament imperative in the Old Testament, is included in Jesus words. He says he doesn't come to abrogate, but rather to fulfill. Now, the word fulfill, both in English and in Greek, it turns out, can be taken in any number of senses, and you'll find just about all the conceivable ones in some commentary somewhere. Jesus says he did not come to destroy, but rather to fulfill. And I suggest as a precising definition of the word fulfillment, that he means he didn't come to abrogate, but rather to establish or confirm the law. And then he adds an explanation in verse 18. This is the reason for truly I say to you, till heaven and earth pass away, not the slightest bit of the law can pass away. Why is it he didn't come to destroy the law? Well, because in its very nature, the law can't pass away till heaven and earth pass away. And then he adds, till all things be accomplished, which I take to mean until all things come to pass. So the last phrase in the verse till all things be accomplished is parallel to the opening till heaven and earth pass away. And then verse 19 goes on to apply this, therefore, on the basis of the fact that he doesn't abrogate the law on the basis of its eternal standing. Therefore, whoever shall break even the slightest commandment, the least of the commandments and shall teachments, will be called least in the kingdom of heaven. In verse 20, although it goes on to a slightly different subject, the question of entrance into the kingdom of heaven, Jesus there gives a ringing endorsement of the law. When you stop and remember that the Pharisees, the scribes and the Pharisees were known in their day. That was their reputation as religious men, as strict upholders of the law of God. Now we know from Jesus teaching elsewhere that they were hypocrites. They believed in the outward observance. Their hearts were not clean. They really were experts at getting around the real requirement of the law in favor of their own traditions and history and all that. But nevertheless, their reputation in the community was that of strict upholders of the law. And Jesus says, I tell you that unless your righteousness exceeds the righteousness of those who are known for their strict adherence to the law, there's no way you'll enter into my kingdom. Remarkable words. In fact, I think you could hardly do better than to listen to the sermon by Dr. John Gerstner on this 20th verse of Matthew 5, where he speaks of the kind of lifestyle God requires of his people. If it must exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees. And before I look at the criticism now of this approach, let me just remark that I honestly believe that until we come to that high view of the law of God that Jesus is speaking of, until we do that, we're always going to be prey to the error of legalism. That may sound a little ironic because you would think that that kind of emphasis upon the law is a legalistic mentality. But you see, Jesus, when he says, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, there's no way you're going to enter the kingdom of heaven knows that if you take that seriously, if you look at those who are known for strict adherence to the law, and he says, look, even that's not good enough, one's going to have to say, how can I possibly match up? How will it ever be possible for me to find acceptance in the eyes of God? We know very well. The law shows us our fault. The law shows us our imperfection. The law shows us our moral pollution, that we might be driven to the arms of Jesus Christ because we know that only he and his perfect righteousness can save us. And so we who are sinful, no matter how much we try to keep the law, are never going to be justified. But because of his perfect adherence to the law, Jesus and His righteousness can save us. Jesus can have his righteousness imputed to our account because of our faith in him. So as Dr. Machen said many years ago, it turns out that a low view of the law makes man legalistic, whereas a high view of the law makes a man a seeker after grace. If you have a high view of God's law, you know very well there's no way you're going to be apart from the grace of God. Okay, but now what kind of life does Jesus require of those who are saved? And he wants us to strive after adherence to the law. And he is very exacting in his requirements. He says every jot and tittle, even the least of the commandments. Now there's an awful lot in my book, Theonomy and Christian Ethics beyond the exegesis of Matthew 5, a good deal about socio political ethics and all of that which we'll be getting into in the next two evenings. I'm with you, but I think this is rather foundational. And it is one area that has been singled out for criticism by some of those who don't agree at the conclusions of the book. And in particular I'd like to draw attention to the work of Dr. Paul Fowler, who is an instructor in New Testament at Reformed Theological Seminary in Jackson, Mississippi. Dr. Fowler wrote a paper last spring, a critique of my book based on the exegesis of Matthew 5. And then I wrote something of a lengthy reply to it. This is kind of informal correspondence that did receive circulation. And then he has done a revision of his original work and expanded it a great deal. In fact, it's more than twice as long than his original effort in another paper, God's Law Free from Legalism. And it's going to be to these two papers as they focus on the criticism of the exegesis of Matthew 5 that I'll be paying attention over the next few minutes. And then what I'll do is go through and bring to your attention other criticisms based on Matthew 5 that have been given by certain writers as well. But I'd like to focus on Fowler's work because he is the most sustained and systematic attempt to undermine the exegesis of Matthew 5. Do you have any questions before I launch into that on these introductory remarks?

How old is that Fowler revision? That one inch job revision got there?

Oh, two months.

Two months. You just got with them?

Yes.

Are copies available? Just write to the seminary today?

I think so. I think if you write to the bookstore at the seminary, you can get one. Okay. It's not going to be terribly systematic on my part. I'm just going to go through the material lines of criticism that he suggests. I think the most important thing to note about the revision of Dr. Fowler's criticism is the different way he approaches verse 19.

Now, could we have that title once again, the full title of that revised.

Copy, God's Law Free from Legalism. I suppose I should say, by the way, about that cute title, that that's exactly what I want. God's Law Free from Legalism. So it's all a question of what you make legalistic, I suppose. Okay. In the original paper, in the original critique, Dr. Fowler focuses on verse 17. He has a different approach to verse 17 then a different approach to verse 18. However, after he finishes his alternative approach to verses 17 and 18, he comes to verse 19. And I think, as you can see on the surface of it, I may not be right. I'm not saying that just the surface reading makes it right. But on the surface of it, verse 19 is inescapable. Because whatever Jesus means by fulfilling the law, whatever he means about until everything is accomplished, verse 19 is the application of his teaching. Verses 17 and 18 give the theological foundation. Verse 19 tells us, how do you live now? He says, this is the application of my teaching. Therefore, whoever shall break one of the least of these commandments and teach men so shall be called least in the kingdom of heaven. That one declaration would seem sufficient to establish the thesis we're talking about here. Because whatever fulfill means whatever until all things are accomplished means. In the previous verses, Jesus says, don't you dare. Don't you dare even teach the slackening off of the slightest of the commandments of the old testament. Now, Dr. Fowler deals with 17 and 18. He comes to verse 19, and immediately he wants to talk about church history. In the original paper, he said now, he says in the first paper. It would appear, however, that verse 19 establishes the theonomic test position because Jesus doesn't want you to give up even the slightest of the commandments of the Old Testament. And that's what Dr. Bonson is suggesting. However, it may well be that if we get a perspective on Reformed history and all that and look at the positions taken by various Reformed writers, that we can come back to verse 19 and understand better. Well, in that paper, he never gets back to verse 19. The paper is not finished. And he goes and he does his second paper before the first one is finished, out. But you see what I'm getting at. Verse 19 seems to confirm the exegesis. And it's right at that point that he comes to a dead end and has to turn to church history. The question is that you turn to church history because you're really wriggling a bit. This is uncomfortable. Maybe we can get the. We can get, if you will, the authority of tradition behind us to mitigate what verse 19 is getting at. Now, as best I can see in the original critique, Dr. Fowler was hoping to use verse 19 to say that those who break the least of the ten Commandments will be least in the kingdom of heaven. And I don't want to pin that on him. I want to be honest and fair with my opponents as well, best I can. He doesn't come right out and say that, but he does say things that show him moving in that direction. I believe the second paper doesn't take that approach at all. The second paper, he says that Bonson's right on verse 19, that we cannot break even the least of these commandments. And that must apply to the jots and tittles of the Old Testament, which is what I say in my book. Jesus has just spoken about minuteness, minute detail. And so when he speaks of the least of the Commandments, he is again emphasizing that minute detail. And Dr. Fowler says that he agrees with that now. But you see by his approach to verses 17 and 18, he thinks that won't make all that much difference because overall, the New Testament shows us that it's only the Ten Commandments that are binding today. Okay, let me follow out his argument for you. Jesus seems to speak an unqualified terms here. Not anything's going to change. And yet we do know from the New Testament that things have changed. Anybody think of an obvious, an example? There are certain laws of the Old Testament we don't keep, right? We don't keep the sacrificial laws, we don't keep the dietary laws. And so although Jesus says every jot and tittle, we know that not every jot and tittle is kept today from what the New Testament says elsewhere. So Dr. Fowler says since we bring qualifications to the text from other texts, which is of course legitimate, that's reading the Bible in the total context, using the analogy of faith, it may well be that we can qualify even beyond that. And my answer to that, okay, I've given you the criticism. Not the criticism, I've given you the alternative. My answer to that is you're absolutely right that we have to use the entire Bible to interpret any particular text. We have to read the Bible in context. Any text without a context is but a pretext for somebody's preconceived ideas. I grant that from the outset. Does the New Testament teach us, however, that only the Ten Commandments are binding? And the answer to that, I think, has got to be an unqualified no. Why is it that Paul in First Corinthians condemns the incestuous fornicator for having sexual relations with his mother in law? Well, because the laws on incest in the Old Testament are still binding. Why is it that James indicts employers for defrauding their employees? Because the laws against fraud in the Old Testament are still binding. You see what I'm getting at? The New Testament uses extra decological commandments. The New Testament uses commandments outside the Old Testament Ten Commandments. And well it should because you can't understand the Ten Commandments apart from their Old Testament context. You can't understand what murder is unless you read the rest of the law of the Old Testament. Murder simply means illegitimate killing. And so when the law says thou shalt not murder, it's saying thou shalt not do the killing that thou shalt not do. Well, what is the murder? I mean, what is the killing thou shalt not do. Well, the rest of the law interprets, exegetes, explains and elaborates the summary command that thou shalt not murder. And consequently the New Testament use of Old Testament extra decological commandments is only natural. Paul, when he wants to talk about the obligation of congregations to pay their pastors, says, doesn't the law say, you shall not muzzle the ox as it treads? So over and over again we find the New Testament does use commandments outside the decalogue. And as I explained last time we were together, we certainly would run into trouble today if we tried to take the position that only the decalogue is binding or only those things which are repeated from the Old Testament are binding. See, that's the Once critics of the position see the trouble they run into by trying to limit themselves to the Ten Commandments. The usual alternative that they suggest is, well, we keep only the Ten Commandments and those laws that are repeated in the New Testament. Well, I have two answers. One, every law of the Old Old Testament is repeated when you remember that Jesus says, man shall live by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God. When James says, a man who breaks even the least commandment, even though he break all the law, I mean he keep all the law. If he violates at one point, he's guilty of all. Paul says, every scripture is profitable for instruction and righteousness. Jesus says, not one jot or tittle will pass away. So I think, okay, that's fine. The New Testament gives the rest of the Old Testament sank in these statements. But now there's a reductio ad absurdum also available to those who want to say we only follow that which is repeated in the New Testament. And although it's not pleasant, it's rather ugly. Nevertheless, it's a fact of life and one which we have to deal with as moral theologians. The whole subject of bestiality is certainly one which Christians are going to take a stand today and say it's immoral that sexual relations with any animals. And yet, as far as I know, the New Testament never once prohibits it. The Old Testament does, and we know that it's wrong because God's word has said it. Okay, if God says it, that settles it. Okay, let me recapitulate what's going on, Dr. Fowler, suggesting now that we use the New Testament, the New Testament limitations to the ten Commandments of the Old Testament as a qualification of the apparently unqualified wording of Jesus in Matthew 5. And I'm saying that's Right. Let the whole Bible interpret this text, even what the New Testament brings in as further qualifications. But the qualification he is suggesting turns out just won't float, I don't think. It just is not true to the New Testament teaching. Okay, so verse 19, I suggest, continues to be confirmation of my interpretation that this has not provided him a way around that initial difficulty he had with verse 19. Having said that, I'd like to look at detail at verses 17 and 18 in Dr. Fowler's interpretation. Early on in his treatment of the exegesis of Matthew 5, Dr. Fowler says that this is a foundational argument for my book. Now, that is correct and incorrect. It's foundational in the sense that I've chosen this text as the one which I think speaks most directly to the issue before us of how much of the Old Testament must we pay attention to in our moral living today? However, it's not foundational in the sense that it's the. The indispensable crux of the argument that if somehow you could take the exegesis of this passage away, that the thesis of my book would be lost about civil governments today owing allegiance to God's law. Because I believe that I could establish that thesis on other texts as well. I may be wrong about all of them. I'm not saying, just by claiming it, that I'm right, but I want to make it clear that while Matthew 5 is the most direct statement, statement to the issue, it is not by any means the only statement to the issue. And although for pedagogical reasons, I focus on that text and I don't do an equal, analytical, detailed job on every text of the New Testament that might be used, the fact of the matter is this text is not indispensable. It's foundational in a stylistic and pedagogical way, but it is not logically indispensable to my thesis. Of course, I'm not saying that. So that. Now, as we go into the exegesis, I'm starting to say I have some doubts about the exegesis. And if I have doubts about the exegesis, don't worry about the book, because we can, you know, build it up elsewhere. That's not the reason I'm saying this, but I think it must be said in all honesty that this is not the only text we could be using. All right. Now, as Dr. Fowler begins his look at verse 17, his first remark is that no commentary agrees with what I'm saying. Well, is this the kind of argument that you would expect from a Reformed scholar no commentary agrees. Well, anybody who has worked in Christian publications knows the kind of unsystematic and somewhat arbitrary way in which things reach the press. I mean, the fact that there's no known commentary that would say this if it were true. It's not true, by the way. But I mean, if it were true, would not say anything at all. I mean, plenty of people may have the opinion and it may very well be the objective exegesis of the text, but it just hasn't been written up in a commentary that's now in print. So, I mean, that doesn't mean much. But more importantly, there are any number of commentaries you can look at that will support the main thrust, the general thrust of what I'm saying in Matthew 5, most of the particular thrust as well. Now, the fact that there may not be any particular commentary that agrees with every detailed point of every Greek word as I deal with it certainly may not count against my thesis any more than accounts against. Against anybody's thesis. Because as a matter of fact, there's nobody who has an interpretation that's going to find a. Well, I take that back. There may be some people who don't preach anything but what they read in books. I mean, that's possible. Look at three or four commentaries and say, well, I'm just going to agree with this guy down the line, but isn't it a lot more realistic that we look at all the commentaries and we say, well now I see this guy's right on this point. This guy's got a strong point here. And we do a combination. And that's what I've done in theonomy. I've looked at the various critical works and I've done a combination. The fact that not one man says everything that I say doesn't strike me as all that important observation. But I would like to point out that any number of commentaries can be consulted as teaching. The basic point that I'm getting at about the interpretation of Jesus attitude toward the Law of God. I suggest Calvin's Heart Harmony, Calvin's Institutes, Samuel Bolton's the True Balance of Christian Freedom, Patrick Fairbairn, the Revelation of Law and Scripture, B.B. warfield in the Princeton Theological Review of 1915, Carl Fhenry in Christian Personal Ethics, you can also look for the word confirms. This is a kind of a crux point also as a way of interpreting what Jesus is talking about. The word confirms being used by George Campbell, David Brown, Charles Spurgeon, Hans Windish, W.C. allen, Herman Ritterboss, John Murray, J. A. Alexander you can see the zeal for the Old Testament Commandments taught by A.B. bruce, by Plummer, by Lang. You'll see it in the Sermon on the Mount by Martyn Lloyd Jones. I'm just going down a long list of things I have before me. You can find it in Jeremias, Sermon on the Mount, in Ritterbass, Matthew's witness to Jesus Christ. How long do you want me to go? Stott's Christian Counterculture. I mean, the general thrust of what I'm saying in Theonomy is found in almost every commentary, actually. And you can get most of the details of what I believe in these works that I've been citing as well. And I want to point out that this is not by any means limited to one Calvinist, those who reform persuasion, or to those who take a puritan approach to ethics, which is very similar to my own sympathies. I find a very interesting article in Bibliotheca Sacra. I suppose those of you who know that publication know that it is not, at the outset anyway, inclined toward Reformed and puritan or covenantal views of theology. An article by R.D. congdon. I think that's the way he pronounces his name, C O N, G D o n in volume 35 of Bibliotheca Sacramento. That will undoubtedly be the new series, I'm sure. Volume 35 and the title of the article is Did Jesus Sustain the law in Matthew 5? Answer to the question, what do you expect from a dispensationalist at that point? No, the New Testament doesn't sustain the law. Of course. What he says is that Matthew 5 is not talking about our particular age, the church age, is talking about the kingdom age. And so he's not nervous about his exegesis when he says, well, of course Jesus does sustain the law. He looks at every one of the antitheses in Matthew 5, where Jesus, after the declaration we're looking at, goes on to say, now you've heard it said. But I say to you, you've heard it said. But I say, these are a series of it turns out to be six antitheses in Jesus teaching. He says, you've heard, but I say. And a lot of people in reading that jump to the conclusion that Jesus is saying, now the Old Testament says, but I say, But Congdon points out what any number of Reformed scholars have said for at least 30 years. Now that Jesus is pointing out. You've heard the Pharisees say about this, that and the other. But I say to you, one of the strongest proofs of the fact that you Jesus is not arguing against the Old Testament is that what he quotes isn't even found in the Old Testament in at least one instance. In one instance, he says, you've heard it says, you shall love your neighbor but hate your enemy. You'll never find that in the Old Testament. You will find that in rabbinic teaching, though the Rabbis taught that you could hate your enemy. Jesus says, you've heard the rabbi say, you've heard the Pharisees say say, you've heard the ancients, the elders of Israel say, but I say to you and so Jesus is giving these antips and what I'm getting at now is that Congdon goes through each one of these as a dispensationalist and he says Jesus is upholding the law against pharisaical perversions of the law at every point. So anyway, against the claim, which I don't think is a very scholarly one to begin with, that no commentary agrees with me down, all I can say is there's a whole bunch of evidence of scholars who agree with the main thesis that I'm getting at, and a large number also that can be cited for the particular details. Although I grant there's probably no one man who says everything just the way I say it. I wouldn't expect that to be true. Okay. The second thing that Dr. Fowler says about Matthew 5:17 is that Jesus is talking about higher Old Testament corpus and not simply the Mosaic Law. He argues that the phrase the law or the prophets must refer to the entire Old Testament as a way of talking about all the books of the Old Testament, not simply in the Mosaic Law. What would you expect me to answer to this? Again, I agree. I believe that Jesus is talking about every moral teaching of the Old Testament. Jesus is talking about every bit of ethical obligation that we find in the Old Testament. The focus is certainly upon the moral teaching of the Old Testament, not prophecies of the Old Testament. And we know that's his focus because we can look at verse 16 preceding, Jesus talks about doing good works. We can look at verse 18 succeeding, Jesus mentions there only the law. We can look at verse 19 getting more appointed. Jesus speaks of the commandments, the least of the commandments. We can look at verses 21 and following and see that Jesus whole point is misuse of the law, proper use of the law. And so, and so the context dictates that Jesus is dealing with moral instruction of the Old Testament and the law in particular. So I don't believe he's limiting it to the Mosaic Law. But I don't agree with Fowler that he's talking about the entire Old Testament without any focus upon good works in the law or moral instruction either. Okay, what I'm going to do, as I usually do when I get into my lectures, is I'm just going to keep plowing through this until you stop me, okay? So please, anytime interject remarks say, hey, that doesn't float, or I want to know more about it. Or let me ask you this, but I'm not going to keep stopping and waiting for you to do it. You will not be impolite if you just put up your hand or just.

Okay, in verse 18 is compared with verse 19, are you making a distinction between what Jesus is talking about when he says the law and then when he speaks of the commandments? Are you using those synonymously?

No, I think that he treats them fairly synonymously there. Although the law can also mean the entire Old Testament, it turns out. And Jesus might be using that in a somewhat ambiguous way. I'm still talking about the Old Testament general, but now under the category of law, I tend to think that he starts, he's saying, look, the whole Old Testament is confirmed. I'm not giving up any of it. I'm dealing with the moral instruction. However, so when he gets to verse 18, he speaks only of the law. And then when he makes his application, the practical application, he clearly speaks of commandments. I mean, and so if there's been any doubt as to what the focus of his teaching is going to be, verse 19 brings it out rather obviously. All right. Now Dr. Fowler continues his criticism by pointing out that. Jesus is dealing in Matthew 5:17 with the purpose of his coming and that as a matter of fact, I. I don't do very much with the word eothon in the Greek. I came at all. That I don't do any lengthy discussion of the meaning of the word eophon and all that. And yet that is the focus of the text. According to Dr. Fowler, the whole point is Jesus coming in its purpose. Well, again, it seems to me this is a non sequitur of an argument because I didn't give a lot of attention to Alfon because I thought it was obvious Jesus is getting at the point that he came. But why did he come? Well, the whole point of the verse is his purpose in coming, Fowler says. And I'm saying that's right, the purpose of his coming. But with respect to the law, what is the purpose of his coming? With respect to the Old Testament teaching. That is the focus here. In fact, I would hope that Dr. Fowler, in fact, I know that Dr. Fowler, because he's an evangelical Christian, would not think that Jesus is expressing the whole purpose of his mission here. Jesus didn't come simply to say, hey, the Old Testament is all right. Jesus came to do a whole lot more. Mark came to give his life a ransom for many. And I should think that if we're going to choose one verse to express the mission of Jesus, we'd want to talk about that and not Matthew 5. Of course, I think it's wrong to choose only one verse. We have to let the whole Bible speak. One of the purposes of his coming was to confirm the Old Testament. But I don't think we. I don't think that it's a very telling point to say that the emphasis is on the purpose of his coming and then try to say the purpose of his coming can't be limited to the law, because of course, it is with respect to the law that Jesus speaks. Okay, Dr. Fowler does spend some time arguing that he doesn't like the categorization of options that I give for the word fulfill. And I'm not going to bother you tonight by going through that. I simply think that he has missed the point there. I don't think I've been unfair to any scholar. I've simply lined up the various things I've read in the literature in a series. Options for interpreting the word or precising an interpretation on the word fulfill. And so the rest of his argument comes down to what. What we should make out of the word plerosai in the Greek for fulfill, how we should interpret that today. And then my manner of dealing with it. Now, he says that we should not interpret the word to mean confirm, as I suggest, because if we do so, then necessarily we must keep the ceremonial law to the. That just misses me. I'm not sure why he says that. Whatever you suggest is the meaning of the word fulfill or plerosi, you're going to give the prima facie impression that every bit of the law has to be kept, and then we have to let other New Testament qualifications take care of that issue. So I don't see that the word confirm makes any more of a problem for us than anything else. However, Dr. Fowler wants to say we should simply interpret it fulfill and leave it at that. Why don't we just leave it at fulfill? Well, the reason we don't leave it at fulfill is because there are arguments over the sense for the Word fulfill. Just as obvious today that the reason we're arguing is because we don't know how to take the word fulfill or we don't agree as to how to take the word fulfillment. And so that's why I'm suggesting we go beyond that and as a precising definition, offer confirm or supplement or put into active practice one of the various alternatives that the commentaries and interpreters give us. And so I disagree that we're going to make any definite advance by leaving it simply fulfilled. And I don't see that the word confirm commits me to keeping the ceremonial law today any more than any other interpretation would, any more, any less. Okay, Now, I suggest that one of the ways we can get at the precise sense of the word fulfill is to look at it in terms of the it turns out syntactic and semantic connection it has with the word abrogate. Those who have read my book will know that I suggest that the word Allah in the Greek but is a very strong adversative. In fact, it is only used of diametric contrast in the Greek. And so when Jesus says, I came not to abrogate, but Allah to fulfill, that whatever we mean by the word fulfill, it must be set in diametric contrast to abrogate. And I think that's a legitimate thing to say. There's a syntactic and semantic structure of the verse and there's nothing, I mean, anybody who knows anything about linguistics, I would think, would realize that when you take it in context, you can get some help and knowing the precise sense of the word by the very structure of the verse itself. Now, how should we see the very obvious opposite of the word abrogate? Now, we're not looking for the very opposite of the word abrogate in the Greek language, are we? The very opposite of the word abrogate in the Greek language has already been given. It's plerosae. The issue before us is what's the very opposite of the word abrogate in the English language? How shall we take plerosi if it's the diametric contrast fulfill? And it's at that point that I turn to three or four experts in English word usage, Hayakawa, Webster's and so forth, to try to discern what the direct antonym of abrogate or nullify would be in the English language? Now, this is an attempt to find the range of legitimate words in the the target language to speak in translators phraseology. My target language is, I'm trying to communicate to people who speak English. Now, what is the right English word to use for Plairosi here. Now, I know that it's syntactically exactly the opposite of whatever the semantic term, whatever the semantic. It's the very opposite of the semantic meaning to abrogate. Now, I look at the words for abrogate in the English language, find their antonyms, and among them we find establish and confirm. Okay? Then I go back to the Greek language and I say, however, does Greek ever use Ploero in this way? And then I give a number of illustrations in which that is the general sense or the precise sense in a couple of instances. And therefore I feel that we've done a good job of presenting the meaning of the word fulfill. Now, Dr. Fowler, to make the long story short, doesn't like that procedure. And his way of characterizing the procedure is that I've used English authorities to translate a Greek word. Well, this is one of those sad cases in evangelical and Christian and charitable scholarship where we simply have to say that he really must do much better for his opponent than that. I mean, that would be a rather sophomore schoolboy mistake, wouldn't it? Okay, I see the Greek text here, and then I go to an English dictionary to find the meaning of the word. That's the way he portrays it. I mean, is it really all that simple? Now, once you forget the misrepresentation there, then we have to say, what is the scholar doing? He may be making a misunderstanding in doing it. But what I'm doing, of course, is only standard linguistic practice. Looking for the target language and all that, looking at the syntactic structure of the verse and whatever rules can arise from it. And so I don't feel any embarrassment for that kind of talk, although I'm a little embarrassed that differing scholars can't do better to represent each other's positions fairly. I think it's perfectly legitimate to do that sort of thing. And the only thing that Dr. Fowler suggests is by way of direct criticism is that the word Allah does not mean for diametric, does not stand for diametric contrast. And if he's right about that, then that weakens my argument to whatever extent a law does not mean a direct adversative. Now, he gives an illustration in his revised paper of the fact that a law does not. Does not mean diametric opposites. And his illustration comes from Matthew, the sixth chapter, and it's in the Lord's Prayer where Jesus says at verse. Yes, verse 13. Jesus says, and bring us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. Okay. As I recall. Now, that's the illustration he uses. The Allah is there, but Deliver us from evil. Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. Okay, now, Dr. Fowler says, let's look at the two verbs involved here. Is it true that Jesus is saying, lead us not into temptation, but mislead us from evil? No, that isn't what Jesus is saying. Therefore, Dr. Bronson is wrong saying there's a direct antithesis. I think at least one of our fellows here can see the mistake that's being made. It's a rather obvious one. Dr. Fowler has somehow gotten the impression that the direct antithesis can only appear that he's talking about his attitude toward the law and the life of his followers. He's not talking about prophecy. He's not talking about type and anthotype. And he's not talking about his own life. He's not talking about his own obedience. He's talking about your good works that should be seen before men. And so I think that's just an uncontextual interpretation. Moreover, I don't believe that's what the word fulfill means. But the most important point is to note that I can accept that interpretation without doing any damage whatsoever to my thesis, can't I? What am I saying? I'm saying Jesus confirmed the validity of the Old Testament commandments. If Dr. Fowler says no, he didn't come to confirm the validity of the Old Testament commandments. He came to embody the Old Testament commandments. Stop and think about it. I grant you that's not exactly what I'm saying, but it's only a step away by implication. Did Jesus come to embody invalid commandments? Did Jesus come to keep laws that had passed away? Or did he keep them precisely because they expressed the unchanging character and will of his Father? Well, obviously he kept those commandments because those commandments were valid and they expressed the will of God. And that's all I'm saying. When all is said and done, these are valid commandments expressing God's will. And so I think from every angle, at least for myself, I know I'm prejudiced on that point. But I hope at least the scholarship is objective enough that I can say that Dr. Fowler has not made his point on verse 17. Now, verse 18 is another matter. In verse 18, Dr. Fowler doesn't worry about the translation of just one word, fulfill, to try to undermine my thesis. He actually wants to take the whole thing. He wants to say that I've done real injustice to the verse. I claim that when Jesus says, the earth pass away, one jot or tittle shall in no wise pass Away from the law, till all things be accomplished. He is saying this and emphasizing his point by way of parallel expressions, which is a common, of course, Semitic idiom, common way of teaching. He says, till heaven and earth pass away. And then later on, which is to say till all things are accomplished, until everything has been wound up, if you will, till all of history is past. Okay? Moreover, I say at the end of verse 18, when Jesus said says till all things be accomplished, the phrase all things refers to all things. I'm not trying to be funny here. All things refers to all things. I'm saying that that is simply the most generic way to indicate everything. The Greek word, for those of you who know Greek, is panta. It's unspecified. It is not qualifying any other word. And I maintain that it does not have an antecedent. Therefore, it simply is in the most general sense the neuter word for Paul. It means everything, then, until everything has happened. And the verb is genatai, until everything comes to pass. Now, Dr. Fowler thinks that is not right. He says that Ponta does have an antecedent. That Jesus is saying that not one jot or tittle shall pass away until all the laws are accomplished, until all the laws have been kept. He thinks all things refers to all the commandments. Moreover, Dr. Fowler says that it's wrong to say till heaven and earth pass away and till all things be accomplished are parallel. He says they are not parallel because they obviously use different language. That's another one of those things I wish he hadn't said. Obviously they use different language, different expressions beginning at the same point. However, his interpretation must be examined. Oh, he does say that when I claim panta does not have any antecedent, the word all, because nothing in the preceding verses agrees with it as to gender and number, that I'm wrong. Because, as a matter of fact, iota in the Greek is neuter also, and therefore could be the antecedent. And that's. I believe that's probably a minor flaw in the text that could very well be corrected. The expression, as I look at my original notes and then look at the way the typesetter has it, I was supposed to say, apparently, that the phrase one jot or one tittle is not to be construed as a neuter phrase. One jot or one tittle is not to be construed as a neuter phrase. And it comes out in the text that nothing is neuter. Not one jot, not one tittle, not law, not prophets, not heaven, not earth. All these things so I'll be glad to, you know, to make that correction. However, we must still ask ourselves, can the all things be referring to one jot or one tittle? It's established what custom, law, procedure. When you're dealing with antecedents in the Greek and you have a multiple antecedent that is the proposed target for your reference, that the word referring back to it will agree with the word closest to it. You all follow that if you have A and B up here being referred back to now by some other word, the agreement in number and gender is going to be with the B, not with the A. Okay, A and B, blah, blah, blah, blah. And these things, the these will refer with the B if there is a difference in gender. You know, if it's masculine, feminine, neuter, it's going to agree with whatever B is. Well, as it turns out, Dr. Fowler, who teaches New Testament, and so I'm surprised that a philosopher is the one pointing this out. Dr. Fowler has violated this most elementary rule with respect to reference and agreement because he wants to say that all things agrees with jot, although he agrees that it doesn't agree with tittle. I'm using the word agrees in different ways here. Let me say that another way. He knows acknowledges that all things in the Greek does not agree with one tittle because it's plural neuter. All things but one tittle is singular feminine. However, he says that the singular neuter of one jot and iota does agree with Panta. The difficulty being that Jat is mentioned before tittle, and therefore if all things was referring to the jots and tittles of the law, the all things should have been feminine rather than new. I don't expect those of you who haven't had great Greek and all that to follow all this, but I do have to go through it at least momentarily to point out that he's violating a rule of Greek grammar and syntax here to try to make his point. More importantly, although that's a rather devastating criticism, I think. More importantly, I want you to notice that Dr. Fowler makes the verse self contradictory. Jesus says, according to his quotation, truly I say unto you, till heaven and earth pass away, not one jot or tittle shall in any wise pass away from the law until all the things of the law are accomplished. Dr. Fowler maintains that Jesus in his life accomplished all the things of the law. And of course I agree, he kept the entire law perfectly. Okay, so when are all the things of the law accomplished? Roughly 33, 34 A.D. let's read the verse again. For verily I say unto you, till heaven and earth pass away, not one jot or Tyrell shall pass away from the law until about 34 A.D. don't you see? He makes the verse self contradictory. Because Jesus says, until heaven and earth pass away, that is the out. You have to hold to that no matter what. No matter what you do with that last phrase, you got to remember, till heaven and earth pass away. But now he's got an answer for that. Very clever. He says Jesus is giving the outside dimensions. He's saying, if nothing else does it, the law will stay until heaven and earth passes away. That's the broad category. And then Jesus gives a more precise definition until all the law is kept. The only difficulty with that is that I don't know of a single incidents in all of Greek grammar, especially New Testament grammar, where that's ever the case. You never find a parallel construction being used as well. This is the outside limit. But this is the precise limit. Jesus says now, as an outside limit, till heaven and earth passes away. But then, as a matter of fact, precisely when I keep the entire law. Moreover, that would not be the way Jesus would express it. Because if that's what he meant, you would have to connect those two phrases by some kind of logical connective. Jesus says until such and such or until. Or until such and such. But until such and such. But you don't find anything like that in the verse. If we say, let's see. I've got some illustrations and I wonder if I'll be able to find them fast enough. I thought of a number of illustrations in English of what Dr. Fowler is trying to do, which point out the difficulty of interpreting the verse in this way. Okay, I'm almost there. Don't fall asleep yet. I know it's right in this area. I'm sorry, I'll just have to go ahead and do it from memory if I don't see it here in a second. Okay. If I say to you something to the effect the quarterback will stay in the game until the very last second of the game until he gets injured, you would realize that unless I'm speaking just too quickly or something, I've omitted something. I must mean the quarterback will stay in the game until the end or until he gets hurt. Can't play anymore. You don't say the quarterback will stay in the game until the end, until he gets hurt. The implication is always or until he gets hurt. But Dr. Fowler has Jesus saying the law is going to stay in the game. The law is going to be valid until the very end, Until I keep it. You know, you'd expect Jesus to say it's going to stay in effect until the very end or until I keep it. But now, as hard as we've been on Dr. Fowler, I really must press beyond even this. Because even if you grant that Jesus says the law will stay in effect until the very end of history, or that is until I keep it, one must ask, does that imply that the law has now passed away because Jesus kept it? One would tend to think that the fact that Jesus felt it important enough to keep makes the law important for us to keep. The implication of Dr. Fowler is the law does not pass away until Jesus keeps it. But is it true that the law has passed away now that Jesus kept it? Does that mean that we now can blaspheme? Does that now mean we can steal or kill or commit adultery? Jesus kept all the law and now it's passed away. No, even Dr. Fowler does not by that. And so the verse can't mean what he's saying on all these points. You see, it just seems to me that he's grammatically wrong. He is logically wrong. And in terms of this reductio ad absurdum, he's wrong as to his own moral point of view. Now, that leaves us then with verse 19. But that's why I began tonight's discussion with verse 19. Obviously, that's the cruncher. When you come to verse 19, that's when things begin to hurt if you don't agree with theonomy. Because there Jesus says, you're going to be least in the kingdom if you dare teach the breaking of even the least commandment from God. And so that pretty much does. I haven't done justice to all the details. And I guess you would know that in the length of my book and the length of Dr. Fowler's discussion. But those are the main points that stand between us. My way of dealing with them Now I have. I won't take more than five or 10 more minutes at most to go over a few more points that other writers have made about my exegesis of Matthew 5. But would you like to ask anything about this particular line of criticism? Go ahead.

I'd like to clarify a couple points by May that was a little bit speedy to pick up all the details.

Of what you said.

You said that the all in verse 18 is the plural neuter, right?

Yeah. Okay.

Then you said that that means the end of all things or the end of history.

Yeah, all things in the unspecified sense, just generally everything. Until everything comes to pass.

Now, did you say, is it your position that till heaven and earth pass and till all be fulfilled is a parallelism, or was that Dr. Fowler's.

No, I believe that it is a functional parallel that the panta genatai fulfill is perhaps not a good translation because that's also the word used in verse 17 for another Greek word. What I say is panta genatai means until everything becomes. Until everything comes to pass. Until heaven and earth passes away. Until everything happens. Yeah. So it's parallel. Okay.

And so Dr. Fowler's position is that it's parallel to. Only it's a lopsided parallel.

No, no. He says that one gives the outer boundaries and the other gives the specific focus. So they're not parallel. He thinks that they're expressing. Jesus is kind of narrowing in on a subject, first of all, until heaven and earth pass away. And now getting more specific, until I keep the whole law. So they're not parallel, but they have some. I don't know how you would put it. Now, the reason I don't know how to put it is because I'm not aware of that ever happening in the New Testament. Jesus isn't saying he might. I guess I have to ask the question. Is Jesus saying that till all be fulfilled, when all things are fulfilled, we will see Josh fulfilled of the law passing away, or is he just making us a reference and saying it's going to be so long you'll never see it? Yeah, that's a good question. Calvin does very well with that. He says, I'll leave it to the sophist to worry about what will happen when heaven and earth passes away. Calvin says, I really don't know what our relationship to the law is going to be in the eternal state. And I'm with him there. I'm just not sure whether we'll be like Adam, where we don't have to have a written expression of the law, or just what. But Calvin says, I'll leave it to others. The point is, until heaven and earth pass away, we know what we're supposed to do. It may very well be that Jesus is. Is using this as an expression to mean never in Jewish idiom, heaven and earth passing away, meaning that will never happen. Or it may simply mean that Jesus is telling us, as far as you're concerned, earthly life, as long as you're going to know it, the law will be your moral guide. And I tend to think that's all he's really getting at. He's not speculating on whether the law will become invalid after that or not.

I would like to ask you a question about Matthew 23:23 that I think is related to what Fowler's getting at. And if not, you correct me.

Sure.

Matthew 23:23 talks about tithing in the extreme. And Jesus said, you ought not to have neglected the weightier provisions of the law, such as justice, mercy and faithfulness. But these are the things you should have done without neglecting.

Now there.

Jesus certainly has a concern for detail. While he was knocking their mannerism, he really wasn't knocking their way of tithing. It's just that they tithe to the neglect of other things. Right. Now, here's my question. I see a further observation before I ask the question. I see a man like Fowler. He comes you five and he sees jot and tittle. There are no qualifications there. Yet you, he, all of us who read the Scripture see maybe not in the lifetime of Jesus, but certainly after the death and resurrection of Christ, many qualifications.

I'd even see him in the lifetime of Jesus.

Okay, now that is a little related to my question. I believe when Jesus.

And he doesn't.

Want to take a dispensational approach, Fowler, oh, that is a parenthesis. That's that, you know, that's for the millennium or whatever. But I think what he wants to say is Jesus meant these words in a way temporarily that we cannot take them. For example, Fowler would say, take Matthew 23:23.

Okay?

Now I think this is the way he would reason because I reasoned this way myself for a long time. He would look at that not to neglect the others. But we know that Jesus meant do not neglect circumcision, do not neglect excessive tithing, do not neglect animal sacrifice, and so forth. But we as a Christian today, we want to neglect animal sacrifice, for example, so we cannot read that text, Matthew 23:23, the same way that Jesus intended it. Jesus is saying, now Jesus fulfilled the whole law and not if, but since since Jesus fulfilled the whole law, surely he's not knocking animal sacrifice before his own sacrifice. Okay? And yet Paul was not. Paul is saying neglect animal sacrifice. So we must qualify Matthew 23:23. We must qualify Matthew 5.

Okay? The question is, how do you do it?

How do you do it? Now, as I hear you this evening, let me make one more characterization and have you respond. As I hear you saying, true but irrelevant. You're saying we must qualify Matthew 5, namely animal sacrifice, so we must qualify. 23:23. There are some things now that we must neglect. Jesus could not have neglected them. His hearers in Matthew 23 could not have neglected them, but they would soon neglect them. Therefore, all we need to do is take the continuing revelation of the Lord, progressive revelation, and add qualifications to the previous statements of our Lord as we have apostolic authority to do it. Is that a substantial.

Yeah, remember I said that. Dr. Fowler, in his new approach with the difficulty of verse 19 especially, I think in mind, says, well, nobody can take this in an unqualified way. We all are going to have qualifications. And since there are some qualifications, ceremonial law, then there can be other qualifications. Namely, the New Testament only teaches our obligation to the decalogue. To which I said, I agree we must make qualifications, and they must be apostolic qualifications. But the one that Fowler suggests is just dead wrong, because the New Testament doesn't limit our moral obligation to the decalogue. In fact, the way I would now put my thesis in Matthew 5, Jesus, obviously speaking by way of hyperbole, jot, thin tinels, and least command commandments, plucking out eyes, turning the other cheek, all these things by way of extreme illustration of his point. So I agree that we have to qualify the statements in context with what God's word says elsewhere. However, I think Jesus is saying this much. The presumption is that of continuity with the Old Testament. Jesus says every jot and tittle, and therefore we've got to keep every jot and tittle, unless God's word shows us otherwise. And that fits right with the Old Testament law. You shall not add to or subtract from any of these commandments. We are not to add or subtract from the commandments. And therefore only God has the authority to mitigate our obedience, to mitigate the way in which we obey, or to show how there are changes or qualifications. So Jesus says every jot and tittle. Every. The presumption is every jot and tittle. I mean, the presumption about any law is that it's binding unless the New Testament shows us otherwise. So we know we don't keep animal sacrifices. The New Testament shows us we don't. We know we don't keep the dietary laws because the New Testament shows us we don't. Okay, but the presumption is that of continuity unless discontinuity is introduced by Jesus or the apostles. And so, see, Fowler should agree that we. I mean, he would agree that we have to bring in qualifications where we differ. Is that the qualification he suggests, I don't believe is a New Testament One.

This man may not be directly on point, but it occurs to me, I'd like to ask it that I've talked with Seventh Day Adventists who used this verse to say, of course, this is why we have to worship on Saturday and Sabbath.

Right.

Would our apostolic qualification for that be simply the practice of the early church of meeting on Sunday? I mean, I know of course the issue Corinthians that when we meet on the first day of the week, we're to bring our offerings. But I know any command to meet on Sunday.

Yes. The issue here is how does the New Testament qualify Old Testament commandments? And I don't mean to say that it always has to be in the linguistic form of no longer do such and such an imperative. I believe that apostolic example is in fact part of the God we've got to use to understand every text that we study. Obviously apostolic example. Example as it is condoned in the New Testament. Peter made the mistake of not wanting to eat with the Gentiles and that sort of thing. But also the New Testament shows us the rebuke of that. So apart from things the New Testament would disqualify, apostolic example is a way of seeing the application of the law in the New Testament. So the issue between me and a Seventh Day Adventist is does the New Testament teach the change of the day? And you would not have been present for our last study, but one of the critics of my position has said that we really can't hold to this theonomic view because after all, we don't believe in keeping Saturday as the Sabbath and we change the day apart from New Testament teaching. Well, the difficulty is that's not the way I see it. I see we change the day because of New Testament teaching. See, I get the impression this critic, he's another professor at Reformed Seminary, has been badgered by people on the point and has kind of bought into the idea, hey, I can't really prove this strictly that the day has been changed. And therefore we've got to grant that there are a lot of changes that are made that can't strictly be seen seen in the New Testament. Well, I would differ with him. I'd say that all changes have to be seen in the New Testament. And as a matter of fact, you can see the change of the day. I know that a lot of people worry about that. I have never been worried about Seventh Day Adventist arguments. They just are not good arguments. It's clear that the apostles worshiped on the first day of the week. Now all they can say is that the apostles were wrong. To that I say the burden of proof is on them to show some kind of rebuke of that proof, practice. Just like Paul rebuked Peter for failing to eat with the Gentiles. So consequently, that's the way I would answer the Seventh Day Adventist. I'd just say, well, if you write, if you're right, that there's no New Testament evidence of the change of the day, then we should get back to worshipping on Saturday. Of course, then you get into a real hairy problem, one raised by Clarence Hewing and repeated by RJ Rush. Junie and that's that there seems to be mounting evidence that the Jews did not keep a Saturday Sabbath, that they kept a rotating Sabbath because of the double Sabbath every six months. That the Sabbath, just like your birthday, would rotate through the days of the week. There always were six days in between. But for six months it would be on Saturday, then there'd be a double day Sabbath. And then of course, for six months the Sabbath would turn out to be on Sunday, then there'd be a double day Sabbath and then for the next six months it would be. So there's always the six day interval, but the day of the week would shift every six months. And I really don't know what to make of that. That certainly is not the way I've been brought up. It's not the way I'm used to thinking of it and I'm a little uncomfortable with it, but I don't know how to refute it. We're not into that right now. But what I'm saying is even if the Seventh Day Adventists were right, the New Testament doesn't show us any particular change that then we'd flip to argue, well, what is the Old Testament pattern? As a matter of fact, the New Testament does nail down the day of worship to the day of resurrection. It's not a floating Sabbath like the Jews nail. It's a permanent Sabbath because Jesus is brought now by the accomplishment of redemption, our permanent rest. And we keep a Sabbath looking ahead to the eternal Sabbath. Okay, if there aren't any more questions on Dr. Fowler, I've already exceeded I promised in these. Let me just look down my list here. I've got just a page and a half. If there's anything strikingly different that should be brought up just so that you have a complete presentation. One scholar has said that in Matthew 5, Jesus is simply saying that the law is useful. Well, obviously the law is useful, but he goes far beyond that. I mean look at the language. Jot and tittle, confirmation, don't dare break the least and all the rest. Another one of my critics concedes that the passage can mean what I say, but it's not true to insist that it must mean what I say. I don't know. I don't think that would offer me very much comfort if I were in that person's shoes. Well, I have no criticism of it, but you can't force me. Well, after all, I can't force people to believe that the Bible teaches the deity of Jesus Christ. Neither can I, although I think it's just plain. I think that you have to do an awful lot of gymnastics. The fact is there are people who are willing to do the gymnastics. So every verse you bring up that seems to teach the deity of Christ, they've got an answer for it. Do you know any people like that? They're called Jehovah's Witnesses. I have had them 30 times in my home over the last 10 years. And it also. Well, not always, but I mean virtually always goes the same direction. I give them the evidence for Jesus deity. I give them the evidence that Jesus is Jehovah. They go through all the things and they have. They have their explanations. They'll say to me, it can mean that, but it doesn't have to mean that. Well, I don't think that's very much. The evidence is just so built up that it's hard to get around it. Okay, here's an interesting approach to Matthew. That what Jesus said was true at the time of his statement because the law was still in effect then. But later, after his death and resurrection, it would not be true any longer. And the church would have to make qualifications and clear out up for us our new relationship to the law. That is, Jesus is still speaking within the mentality and under the umbrella of the Old Testament Jewish approach to things. But after his death and resurrection, then of course, we take a new approach to things. Jesus is speaking to his opponents on their own ground. They believe in the law, I believe in the law. But after he brings in the new age, then things have changed. What's the difficulty with that? Well, Jesus seems to tell us how long the law is going to last, doesn't he? Till heaven and earth pass away. There are some critics who have said, and again, just a matter of pointing out passages in my book to counteract this, that I absolutize this verse in an abstract way. That is to say that I take it in an unqualified way and impose it on everything else in the Bible. But as a matter of fact, and I think you can see from my procedure tonight, I have no intention of doing that. I'm glad to have the rest of Scripture qualify the statement here. But the point is, this statement does give us a presumption of continuity unless God says elsewhere that it's not the case. The only other interpretation I can see here that's probably worth bringing to your attention as we close. Oh, there are two more very quickly. The one says, Jesus is not talking about the validity of the Old Testament law. He's only talking about the inspiration of the Old Testament Scripture. Well, I'm not at all nervous about the fact that certain scholars have gone to this passage to show the New Testament view of the Old Testament as inspired writing. However, as a matter of fact, the text is specifically speaking of the Old Testament law and its validity. And it's thereby that we learn that Jesus would not do away with any of the Old Testament scripture. And so it's not being nearly specific enough to say he only talks about inspiration and not about legal validity. And then the last thing is that, okay, you're right, Jesus confirms the law. Presumption of continuity is there. But Jesus is not talking about civil and social matters. He's only talking about personal morality. And the proof of that is that when you go on to look at the rest of Matthew 5 and the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus is talking about personal morality. Therefore, you cannot use Matthew 5 to prove the theonomic thesis that the civil magistrate is bound to obey the law of God. Well, in the first place, Jesus does talk about things outside of simply interpersonal morality. In Matthew 5, he talks about making sure you don't get tossed into jail, you know, being right with people going the second mile with soldiers and all the rest. So I think it's wrong just to make this kind of claim about the literature. But secondly, even if the literature does go on to speak only of personal matters, Jesus can certainly give a general statement and then make the application to his readers that he sees fit. I may talk about the inspiration of the Bible in the morning sermon and make application to people that they ought to be doing more work in proverbs. Would that mean that I didn't think that Genesis or Revelation or First Corinthians were not inspired just because after I made my general remarks, I made application to some particular point? Of course not. So even if Jesus focuses on personal morality after his general statement, it's the general statement which we must pay attention to in terms of all of its applications and ramifications. And so Jesus says every jot and tittle, not the least commandment can pass away. And if that's true, then I take it that that means that even when the law says that a man who takes an another man's life is to be executed, but that applies today in our society as much as the law that says I ought not to commit adultery with my neighbor's wife. Okay, you've been all very patient to listen to this long and sometimes complicated discussion. If the real quick last questions before we pray, we'll take them.

Why in your judgment did our Lord put it absolutely, knowing that right after his death and resurrection there would be many qualifications? What was in your mind the wisdom of saying it that way?

Because I think he knew the penchant of men's hearts that our tendency is to do away with the law, to qualify it, rationalize it, and ignore it. And therefore he made the point you pay attention to every bit of it. Then he expected the qualifications to come in later, rather than to try to give the qualifications and expect people then to pick up and have the attitude of, well, of course, outside of the qualifications, we've got to pay attention. So I think he gave the unqualified statement to establish the presumption he knew the antinomianism of our hearts.

Plus, wouldn't you agree that when he made the qualifications, they are not in fact abrogations.

Right. But somehow re applications of the law.

Transformativity within the contrast.

Sure. I would say with respect to the sacrifices, for instance, Jesus, although you can speak of them as abrogated, that the sense of abrogation is that he kept those laws for us. And so in a real sense, those laws are still binding. Every time we preach the gospel, we're preaching the ceremonial law. Because the ceremonial law was what? Salvation by vicarious sacrifice, blood atonement. And that's what we're preaching when we preach the death of Christ. So in a real sense, we're preaching the gospel. When we preach the gospel, we are preaching the Old Testament law, the ceremonial law. Anyway, so there is reapplication. Dietary law, same way. I believe we can eat shrimp. I believe we can eat pork today. Now, there may be good health reasons why we ought not to. Okay, but that is not what I am talking about in the law. The law gave those as a way of distinguishing between Jew and Gentile, symbolically showing the separation God requires. Now, God allows us to eat shrimp and pork today, but he does not allow us to intermingle with the Gentiles, Be not unequally yoked together. Come out from among them. Touch no unclean thing. So you're right, it's reapplication of the law.

This may not be the simplest, easy to answer question that you're asking for, and if so, you can disregard it and talk to me later or something. Doesn't it seem to you, no, that's.

A wrong way to say it.

Acts 15 troubles me. The Jerusalem Council, along with the interpretation given by some of your critics there that says that Christ validated the law and he completed it for us. And then the apostles and Acts 15 said, There are only four things that you former heathens out there need to keep of the law. You can't eat, strangled with blood and so forth.

Doesn't that seem to.

No, I'll go back. That seems to me to pose a problem that does look like they're setting aside the rest of the law and saying this is all that's necessary, these four little requirements, right? And if that wasn't their intention, or if we are supposed to follow the validity of the law throughout the New Testament, why did they tell these people then?

Right?

Just keep these four things.

I'll try to explain it. In the first place, Acts 15, as I read commentaries and New Testament introduction seems to be a baffling point for most everybody. In the first place, the language of it will be well with you if you do such and such. Some people say that's pious advice to the Gentiles. Some people say, no, it's morally obligatory, but has no relationship to how much of the Old Testament they should keep, and so forth. And there's any number of exegetical problems and interpretive problems in the passage. So we need to understand that before we begin. But then secondly, let us assume that what the apostles are saying is the only laws of the Old Testament you have to keep are the following four. That is anybody. Okay, there have been anti theonomic critics who have taken that position for about five minutes. Because the first thing you have to ask is, is that seriously what you think the apostles taught, you only have to keep those four commandments. Now is there a commandment against killing in those four? There is.

Oh, no, I'm saying I see your point.

No. Is there a commandment against stealing in those four? No. So even, you know, the most avid anti theonomic critics are going to have to admit the apostles were not intending to teach the extent of obligation to the Old Testament law, as everybody grants. You can't Steal you can't, rape, you can't, you know, kill today. And the apostles don't mention that. So what could they be getting at? Now, my suggestion is that, although I, you know, that's the sort of thing I'd like to nail better, I grant more work needs to be done. But my suggestion is the one that is offered by FF Bruce and a few others as well, that we're talking at the Jerusalem Council. We're talking about the range of laws that nobody should have to worry about anyway. Circumcision, ceremonial laws of that nature. Things which, because of the fulfillment of redemption in Christ, no longer have to be observed in their outer fashion. However, because of the overlap in Gentile and the overlap of the ages and the background and tradition of the Jews, it was very hard for them to have table fellowship with people who would go ahead and eat meat offered to idols or that had not been drained of its blood and all that. I mean, how could Jew and Gentile Christian get along in the church, you know, given the Jewish abhorrence for these things, even though the Gentiles should have the right to do them because they are ceremonial in nature. Okay, My suggestion is that when the apostles spoke in the Jerusalem Council, they were saying, we recognize you don't have to keep any of these laws. They're not morally obligatory. However, our advice to the church is for the sake of table fellowship, for the sake of harmony between Jew and Gentile, do refrain from the following things so that you can get along better with your Jewish Christian brothers. Now, there's only one fly in the ointment, and I recognize it, and that's that the word porneia appears avoid fornication. That doesn't appear to be in the category of simply ceremonial laws or laws of Jewish tradition that would have passed away. FF Bruce suggests, and he gives documentation from the. I mention it in my book anyway, he gives documentation that the word porneia was occasionally used for the excessive laws about intermarriage within lines of affinity among the Jews, that fornication there might simply apply to intermarriage beyond the Old Testament laws of incest, because they had plenty of hedges around all of those laws. Additionally, okay, that's weak. I mean, I feel the weakness of it. Possible, yeah, but when you look at the word fornication, your first thought is, well, sexual immorality. But nevertheless, the other three things certainly fit into the category of matters that would not have moral importance. And so the Jerusalem Council is saying you will do well to avoid these things for the sake of peace and harmony in the church. Church where Jew and Gentile have to get along. Okay, I don't believe you can say that they're giving the extent of moral obligation from the Old Testament. Just nobody can hold to that. So if you can't hold to that position, I suggest you have to say that they're claiming you only have to keep the following four among laws, which ordinarily you wouldn't have to keep. And that satisfies me. You know, at present, the porneia thing is a bit weak, but I can't see any better way to take it. And I haven't found any commentary that does better either. Okay, we've taken plenty of your time tonight. Let's have a word of prayer as we close. Lord, we do thank you again that you've given us your word that it might direct our lives. We ask you that you would make us doers of the word and not hearers only tonight, for it's in Jesus name we pray. Amen.

I just want to say I don't think poine is weak. I think that's a good argument.

Oh, you do?

If you study the Torah when you're a linguist, you would be better if you study the misna on consanguinity, especially Zarim, which has to do with seeds and also with marriages.

So that was a big thing then?

Oh, it was. But I can't prove it to you in Greek.

Oh, I wouldn't have to be because they're speaking in Greek, so that's fine. Yeah.