The old testament laws

[Wryetui]

I was reading on the internet some stuff and I realized that many people, to deffend homosexuality and to criticize our religion and say that is unfair say that we criticize it while things like to not use clothes made from different materials, not eating shrimps, not tattoating, not etc... What do you have to say...

 

[gurneyhalleck1]

I say that the Old Testament laws were meant to set Israel apart from the sinful, hedonistic, heathen pagan folks around them at that time. The world did not have a proper disposition yet to receive God's Word. Israel was God's shining beacon of hope.

The people of Israel had fallen away from God's disciplines, Word, teachings, and admonitions already by the time The Law was given, most notoriously they sinned in the desert in a heinous manner.

God knew Israel's heart, and He knew a strict, tight, focused discipline would be needed. They were a stiff-necked people! Some of the laws, imho, were to keep a sense of discipline, focus, and a feeling of being set-apart, as well as some healthy guidelines, others were permanent moral truths. "Homosexuality" or same-sex attraction, is an immoral act, period. We no longer say they should be executed like in days of old. Same thing with disrespectful teens who talk back to their parents. In the time of Moses, heads were gonna roll for such disrespect, rudeness, and brash talk! Nowdays, of course not, different types of punishments.

When atheists and skeptics try to invoke, "gee, you hate gays, but I get you eat pork!" type arguments, they just don't understand that the Mosaic Law had these different facets to it---discipline in the desert and being set apart, purified and focused, and some being morally eternal truths.

Ritually purification, women not being able to worship or come near anyone during menstruation, straining the gnat, circumcision, these were all either health issues for the time or discipline, not eternal truth. Sodomy is always sinful.

 

[dzheremi]

I think the idea of being set apart or purified is a big one. It's literally there in our liturgies with the priest's washing of hands, and even (for the Coptic church, anyway) in the language we use to talk about the people set apart for divine purposes (the Coptic word for priest, owib, comes from the same root as the word for holy, ethowab). So to be set apart, to be distinguished from the society around you, is on a very real level to be called to be holy and pure. It's sort of interesting when you think about how atheists often invoke our supposed moral laxity in not following the Old Testament law as literally as they assume we should in order to make the point that we're no better or different than X (insert other criticized religious group here). Two things about that kind of "argument from omission" come to mind immediately: 1. They would hate us even more if we did follow those laws to the letter ("[bless and do not curse][bless and do not curse][bless and do not curse]! You want to do WHAT to gays?! HATE CRIIIIME!"); (2) At the time that the laws were promulgated, there were not all the different religious groups that we have today, at least not in the environs of Israel. It was pretty much Israel vs. everybody else, and as any Orthodox Christian living in a non-Orthodox country, the more "everybody elses" there are relative to people of your own faith, the more difficult it can be to live your faith as you're supposed to. So the strict laws make sense in that context, and should not be taken out of it so that the atheistically-minded (who suddenly become great Bible interpreters as soon as befits their argument against Christianity, don't they?) can use our own book as a cudgel against us. That's foolishness.

This is ignoring the more obvious arguments such as Christ's revealing the higher aims of the food prohibitions by telling us that it is what comes out of the mouth of a man that most pollutes him. Of course for the modern religion critic, this is not a valid way to look at things. They want to appeal to some other authority, but as Christians there isn't any higher authority for us, so the matter is settled. Shake the dust from your feet and move on.

 

[SeventhValley]

My own thoughts.

In the New Testament you find most moral laws stayed while ritualistic laws were phased out.

When arguing with atheists I use this line of reasoning and then show them NT proofs of the continuation of some of the laws.

It is a bit simplistic but works when talking to atheists.

 

[ArmyMatt]

I say that the Old Testament laws were meant to set Israel apart from the sinful, hedonistic, heathen pagan folks around them at that time. The world did not have a proper disposition yet to receive God's Word. Israel was God's shining beacon of hope.

this, and I would add to set them apart from the pagan culture (the Egyptians) that they had just left. these laws came in to prepare them for the fullness of time, when God would send His Son to be born of a woman.

 

[buzuxi02]

I was reading on the internet some stuff and I realized that many people, to deffend homosexuality and to criticize our religion and say that is unfair say that we criticize it while things like to not use clothes made from different materials, not eating shrimps, not tattoating, not etc... What do you have to say...

Many of these rules applied to the hebrew tribe only to set them apart so they wont fuse into a melting pot with their neighbors.

The silly arguments used by those mentioned in the OP shows how little people think. The OT also says its permissible to eat crickets and locusts but I don't eat that neither. Why? Because it was specific dietary rules for the jewish tribe and not binding for the Gentiles. In fact the OT says its permissible to sell the forbidden non-kosher meat to the gentiles.