The purpose of the Mosaic covenant was always to point to faith in Christ. That didn't cease at the Cross. In fact......even though that system and all that went with it has *now* disappeared (since 70 AD)....it is STILL useful, because what we read in the Old Testament points to Christ.
If there was no earthly purpose for the observance of the Mosaic Law.....then why was Paul concerned about the rumors that he was NOT in observance of the Law. Wouldn't it make sense that Paul would then explain that the Old Mosaic covenant had ended......and that all the Levitical priests were out of jobs and should go find another occupation? Instead......this is what we do read:
Acts 21:17-36
Paul’s Arrival at Jerusalem
17When we arrived in Jerusalem, the brothers welcomed us joyfully. 18The next day Paul went in with us to see James, and all the elders were present. 19Paul greeted them and recounted one by one the things that God had done among the Gentiles through his ministry.20When they heard this, they glorified God. Then they said to Paul, “You see, brother, how many thousands of Jews have believed, and all of them are zealous for the law. 21But they are under the impression that you teach all the Jews who live among the Gentiles to forsake Moses, telling them not to circumcise their children or observe our customs. 22What then should we do? They will certainly hear that you have come.23Therefore do what we advise you. There are four men with us who have taken a vow. 24Take these men, purify yourself along with them, and pay their expenses so they can have their heads shaved. Then everyone will know that there is no truth to these rumors about you, but that you also live in obedience to the law.25As for the Gentile believers, we have written to them our decision that they must abstain from food sacrificed to idols, from blood, from the meat of strangled animals, and from sexual immorality.”26So the next day Paul took the men and purified himself along with them. Then he entered the temple to give notice of the date when their purification would be complete and the offering would be made for each of them.27When the seven days were almost over, some Jews from the province of Asiab saw Paul at the temple. They stirred up the whole crowd and seized him, 28crying out, “Men of Israel, help us! This is the man who teaches everywhere against our people and against our law and against this place. Furthermore, he has brought Greeks into the temple and defiled this holy place.” 29For they had previously seen Trophimus the Ephesian with him in the city, and they assumed that Paul had brought him into the temple.30The whole city was stirred up, and the people rushed together. They seized Paul and dragged him out of the temple, and at once the gates were shut. 31While they were trying to kill him, the commander of the Roman regimentc received a report that all Jerusalem was in turmoil. 32Immediately he took some soldiers and centurions and ran down to the crowd. When the people saw the commander and the soldiers, they stopped beating Paul.33The commander came up and arrested Paul, ordering that he be bound with two chains. Then he asked who he was and what he had done.34Some in the crowd were shouting one thing, and some another. And since the commander could not get at the truth because of the uproar, he ordered that Paul be brought into the barracks. 35When Paul reached the steps, he had to be carried by the soldiers because of the violence of the mob. 36For the crowd that followed him kept shouting, “Away with him!”
......as you wrote.....the system still remained (and there was power over the disciples to jail them and even murder them).....but they didn't remain in power. The way I see it is.....God allowed them the time to "be His priests".....but, in His perfect timing.....He took that seat back for all of history to see. As jgr posted a while back (I'm paraphrasing) "Isaiah prophesied it.....Jesus confirmed it....and Josephus recorded it in history". The landowner came in 70 AD.....just as in the parable of the evil tenants that Jesus spoke of:
Matthew 21:33-46 ~
The Parable of the Wicked Tenants
(Mark 12:1-12; Luke 20:9-18)
33Listen to another parable: There was a landowner who planted a vineyard. He put a wall around it, dug a winepress in it, and built a tower. Then he rented it out to some tenants and went away on a journey.34When the harvest time drew near, he sent his servants to the tenants to collect his share of the fruit. 35But the tenants seized his servants. They beat one, killed another, and stoned a third.36Again, he sent other servants, more than the first group. But the tenants did the same to them.37Finally, he sent his son to them. ‘They will respect my son,’ he said.38But when the tenants saw the son, they said to one another, ‘This is the heir. Come, let us kill him and take his inheritance.’ 39So they seized him and threw him out of the vineyard and killed him.40Therefore, when the owner of the vineyard returns, what will he do to those tenants?”41“He will bring those wretches to a wretched end,” they replied, “and will rent out the vineyard to other tenants who will give him his share of the fruit at harvest time.”42Jesus said to them, “Have you never read in the Scriptures:
‘The stone the builders rejected
has become the cornerstone.
This is from the Lord,
and it is marvelous in our eyes’k ?43Therefore I tell you that the kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a people who will produce its fruit. 44He who falls on this stone will be broken to pieces, but he on whom it falls will be crushed.l ”45When the chief priests and Pharisees heard His parables, they knew that Jesus was speaking about them. 46Although they wanted to arrest Him, they were afraid of the crowds, because the people regarded Him as a prophet.
Your Preterism is forcing you to argue something that is blatantly unbiblical. The old covenant died when Jesus died. The old covenant simply and imperfectly looked forward to the eternal covenant, not back. The Lord's table looks back to the institution of the new covenant at the cross.
Paul repeatedly explained that the Old Mosaic covenant had ended. He indeed taught after the cross and before AD70, in Colossians 2:16-17: “
Let no man therefore judge you in meat, or in drink, or in respect of an holyday, or of the new moon, or of the sabbath days: Which are a shadow of things to come; but the body is of Christ.”
Can you see this? Once the substance arrived, the show became irrelevant.
The Greek word translated “holyday” here is
heorte meaning
feast or festival. Of 27 mentions of this word in the normally precise KJV, it is interpreted “feast” in all of them apart from here.
New American Standard interprets:
“Therefore let no one act as your judge in regard to food or drink or in respect to a festival or a new moon or a Sabbath day -- things which are a mere shadow of what is to come; but the substance belongs to Christ.”
The Living Bible says,
“So don't let anyone criticize you for what you eat or drink, or for not celebrating Jewish holidays and feasts or new moon ceremonies or Sabbaths. For these were only temporary rules that ended when Christ came. They were only shadows of the real thing-of Christ himself.”
Paul is saying here that the old covenant feasts and festivals simply served as types and shadows of things that were to come. They looked forward to the new covenant arrangement and the reality and substance in Christ. The Jews of Ezekiel’s day and Zechariah’s day would never have understood this.
Paul taught after the cross and before AD70, Colossians 2:20-22:
“Wherefore if ye be dead with Christ from the rudiments of the world, why, as though living in the world, are ye subject to ordinances, (Touch not; taste not; handle not; Which all are to perish with the using) after the commandments and doctrines of men?”
This is not talking about the moral law, it is talking about the ceremonial law. It is a redundant system. Christ took the whole old system away. The old Mosaic ceremonial law is completely gone. It is useless.
Christianity took us away from the old Mosaic ceremonial law completely. Those who argue for a return to the old system fail to see that it has been rendered obsolete through the new covenant.
The Hebrew writer taught after the cross and before AD70, Hebrews 7:18-19:
“For there is verily a disannulling of the commandment going before for the weakness and unprofitableness thereof. For the law made nothing perfect, but the bringing in of a better hope did; by the which we draw nigh unto God.”
This word “disannulling” is taken from the Greek word
athetesis meaning
cancellation.
Barnes tells us in his commentary that the “disannulling of the commandment going before” relates to
“the office of priest” and the Old Testament
“ceremonial rites in general.” He explains that the old covenant
“was not adapted to save man; it had not power to accomplish what was necessary to be done in human salvation. It answered the end for which it was designed-that of introducing a more perfect plan, and then vanished as a matter of course. It did not expiate guilt; it did not give peace to the conscience; it did not produce perfection (Heb 7:11), and therefore it gave place to a better system.”
The phrase
“weakness and unprofitableness” used here to describe
the old abolished system actually reads
asthenes kai anopheles literally meaning
: feeble and impotent useless and unprofitable.
It is hard to believe that Christian scholars would promote the return, on the new earth of all places, of such a hopeless discarded arrangement.
When Christ made that final sacrifice for sin He satisfied all God’s holy demands for sin and uncleanness and thus Christ became the final substitution for the sinner. Paul taught after the cross and before AD70, in Ephesians 2:13-15,
“now in Christ Jesus ye who sometimes were far off are made nigh by the blood of Christ. For he is our peace, who hath made both one, and hath broken down the middle wall of partition [between us]; Having abolished (
katargeo)
in his flesh the enmity, even the law of commandments contained in ordinances.”
The Greek word
katargeo is used here to describe the fate that befell the old Mosaic ritualistic system relating to “
the law of commandments contained in ordinances.” This word means:
‘bring to nought’, ‘none effect’, and ‘abolish’. Jesus did away with any need or reliance upon the outward keeping of the old covenant religious system. The cross fulfilled forever God’s demand for a perfect once-for-all sacrifice.
The Hebrew writer taught after the cross and before AD70, Hebrews 7:16 that Christ
“is made, not after the law of a carnal commandment, but after the power of an endless life.”
Adam Clark says:
“Who is made - Appointed to this high office by God himself, not succeeding one that was disabled or dead, according to that law or ordinance directed to weak and perishing men, who could not continue by reason of death. This is probably all that the apostle intends by the words carnal commandment, εντολης σαρκικης· for carnal does not always mean sinful or corrupt, but feeble, frail, or what may be said of or concerning man in his present dying condition.”
Albert Barnes says:
“Not after the law of a carnal commandment - Not according to the Law of a commandment pertaining to the flesh. The word “carnal” means “fleshly;” and the idea is, that the Law under which the priests of the old dispensation were made was external, rather than spiritual; it related more to outward observances than to the keeping of the heart. That this was the nature of the Mosaic ritual in the main, it was impossible to doubt, and the apostle proceeds to argue from this undeniable truth.
The whole context here is the removal and the replacement of the old covenant priesthood, the writer of the Hebrews presents Christ as heavens eternal replacement. What is more, we can see that this priesthood cannot pass from one to another, it is not transferrable. No other can appropriate this title or share in the function of the position, Christ alone holds that sacred high priestly office. Christ is the only real and perfect high priest today. He is the ultimate and final High Priest of the redeemed of God.
