Why do Christians keep the Old Testament?

[leftrightleftrightleft]

The following is a brief dialogue between a non-religious person and a Christian

Non-Religious: "The old testament has the punishment of idolatory such as stoning and yet christians say the quran is bad because it allows stoning?"

Christian: "the old testament is the law of Moses and Christians follow the Law of Christ. Annddd... The law of Christ tells us to turn the other cheek. Christians have not always been faithful to this throughout history, you are right, but no one is perfect only Christ Himself. So if they were killing others bc they aren't Christians then sorry but they are not following the Law of Christ accurately "

My question is, if the Old Testament is the "Law of Moses" and no Christian follows that any more then why not just reform Christianity to not have the parts that cause so much grief.

I feel that so many non-Christians have little problem on moral grounds with the New Testament (especially the Gospels and subsequent books like Acts and letters of Paul). However, most non-Christians are most turned-off by the verses from the Old Testament where God appears more anthropomorphic, more barbaric, less loving and very un-like the God that Jesus portrays in the New Testament.

Because almost anytime someone quotes those nasty verses from Leviticus or Deuteronomy or various others, Christians always reply as the Christian quoted above: "Oh, well that was the Old Law, we follow Jesus."

Okaaaay, so why do you cling to the "Old Law" as part of the Holy Book of your faith when a bunch of the stuff you're disregarding anyway. Is that not an admission that the whole Bible is "no longer" true?

 

[texastig]

Those are Jewish laws. Christians do not live by Jewish laws. Jesus brought a New Covenant. Case in point. The Pharisees brought a woman to Jesus who was caught in the act of adultery. According to the law, she had to be stoned. But what did Jesus do? He had mercy on her and did not condemn her but told her to sin no more.
That's quite a difference from what Jesus did compared to the koran.

 

[razeontherock]

My question is, if the Old Testament is the "Law of Moses" and no Christian follows that any more then why not just reform Christianity to not have the parts that cause so much grief.

However, most non-Christians are most turned-off by the verses from the Old Testament where God appears more anthropomorphic, more barbaric, less loving and very un-like the God that Jesus portrays in the New Testament.

I've snipped up your OP to try to make ti drive more to the point, which is the end of this quote here. If I might try to re-phrase your question more succinctly it might read something like "why does the Christian Bible include the OT?" And here's the answer from the NT:

Rom 15:4 For whatsoever things were written aforetime were written for our learning"

Btw, that was written by the Apostle Paul, who you said you had no problem with

I feel that so many non-Christians have little problem on moral grounds with the New Testament (especially the Gospels and subsequent books like Acts and letters of Paul).

Since the entire NT is "the Gospels and subsequent books," I have to ask which part(s) of the NT are problematic?

Okaaaay, so why do you cling to the "Old Law" as part of the Holy Book of your faith when a bunch of the stuff you're disregarding anyway. Is that not an admission that the whole Bible is "no longer" true?

No, it's not such an admission. Not obeying the Law is not "disregarding" what it says. The value of it (IMHO) is, according to the first quote I snipped here, is seeing in the OT the same G-d that Jesus embodies in the NT. And in that way the OT is very useful!

 

[razeontherock]

According to the law, she had to be stoned. But what did Jesus do?

Do you think we'll ever get to know what He wrote on the ground?

 

[zaksmummy]

My question is, if the Old Testament is the "Law of Moses" and no Christian follows that any more then why not just reform Christianity to not have the parts that cause so much grief.

You have a variety of problems when discusssing the "Old" and "New" testaments. These mostly come from church history - the early church fathers wanted to take the early christians away from their Jewish roots - up until about 150-200AD christianity was a sect of Judaism, Jesus was Jewish, all his initial disciples were Jewish. Various things happened - you can look them up on this internet, the Jewish revolt of 70AD, the increase in number of non-Jewish people following Jesus in the synagogues which led to the Jewish rejection of Jesus as Messiah, the Fiscus Judaica to name but a few.

Because they (the church fathers) were non-Jews and wanted to get away from Judaism they began to teach that there was a seperation between the old and the new, some very heretical people, Marcion in particular, taught that the God of the old testament was cruel and severe and the God of the new testament was loving and kind. This view although not understood is still quite prolific within the church today. Also anti-semitism took hold and the Jews were branded as "christ killers". All of these things led to a belief in the church that the old testament is nothing but childrens stories and cruel laws.

However, there is a current move in the church to understand the Jewish roots of Christianity, which shows us that actually there is no separation between the two. The vast majority of the Christians in the world actually keep most of the laws of Moses without even realising it - it is the Law or Torah, which means "teaching" or "instruction" as is is actually known that defines what God considers sin to be.

Without this definition of sin we do not know what God expects from us, we will not know why our relationship with God is broken or how He has made a way from that relationship to be restored through the death of the Messiah Jesus.

If you want to know how the laws of Moses are actually applied you need to read the Talmud, "Everymans Talmud" by Abraham Cohen is a good book which shows you how God laws have been applied by the Jewish people and how they are not cruel and inhuman at all.

If you actually want to know about any of these things I've discussed it will take you time to study them, Ive been studying them for three years now and have only just scratched the surface.

 

[salida]

You can't understand the NT unless you know the OT.

Here is a list of reasons:

Why is God so different in the Old Testament than He is in the New Testament?
http://www.gotquestions.org/God-different.html
How do I get the image of God as imposing and angry out of my mind?
http://www.gotquestions.org/God-imposing.html
Why is God so different in the OT than He is in the NT?
http://www.gotquestions.org/difference-old-new-testaments.html
Why should we study the Old Testament?
http://www.gotquestions.org/old-testament.html

 

[Sketcher]

The Law of Moses is not the entirety of the Old Testament, and though there is much in it that never applied to Gentiles (Jews also believe this) it is still valuable to read. We serve a God who created the universe, split the Red Sea, has armies of powerful angels, and has the highest standards for holiness. And to think that he loved us so much that he came down in a human body to take away the guilt of guilty people who do not deserve it - it's very humbling.

 

[Lukaris]

One big reason is the fulfillment of the promise God made to Abraham fulfilled by the Lord Jesus Christ. Per St. Ireneaus (ca. 180 AD), " Thus He (Jesus Christ) also fulfilled the promise to Abraham, (by) which God promised him to make his seed as the stars of heaven, for Christ accomplished this,being born of the virgin, who was of the seed of Abraham and establishing believers in Him as "lights of the world," making the Gentiles righteous by means of the same faith as Abraham, "for Abraham believed in God and it was reckoned to him as righteousness." In the same way, we believing in God, are made righteous for "through faith shall the righteous live"; so "the promise made to Abraham (came) not through the Law but through faith." Since Abraham was made righteous by faith, and "the Law is not laid for the righteous,: likewise, we are not made righteous by the Law, but by faith, which receives testimony from the Law and Prophets, and which the word of God offers us." ("On the apostolic Preaching #35). St. Irenaeus is quoting much scripture in his statement but I do not have time to reference each source. Irenaeus received the preaching from St. Polycarp who had received it from the apostle St. John (of the Gospel of John etc.).

 

[Harry3142]

texastig-

In the story of the woman caught in adultery, there is something missing. Where's the man she was found with? The law was clear; both of them were to be stoned (Deuteronomy 22:22). Did they tell him to take a walk and just go after her? That in and of itself was a violation of the very law they were trying to 'trip up' Jesus with.

The Mosaic Law was never intended as a 'roadmap to heaven' (and yes, that does include The Ten Commandments). It was a set of laws and commandments which provided the foundation for a cohesive society where everyone had his or her place and his or her responsibilities. Even the reward which Moses told them that God would give them for their obedience had nothing to do with salvation:

If you pay attention to these laws and are careful to follow them, then the Lord your God will keep his covenant of love with you, as he swore to your forefathers. He will love you and bless you and increase your numbers. He will bless the fruit of your womb, the crops of your land - your grain, new wine and oil - the calves of your herds and the lambs of your flocks in the land that he swore to your forefathers to give you. You will be blessed more than any other people; none of your men or women will be childless, nor any of your livestock without young. The Lord will keep you free from every disease. He will not inflict on you the horrible diseases you knew in Egypt, but he will inflict them on all who hate you. (Deuteronomy 7:12-15,NIV)

There is the reward which God was willing to give them in exchange for their obedience. It was a very pragmatic, here-and-now contract, with their rewards given them in this life rather than in another.

But it was also the first set of laws and commandments which stated specifically that murder was punishable by death rather than a payment of money. The Code of Hammurabi, written prior to this time, had as one of its laws that if someone committed murder, that person was to bargain with the murder victim's family over a fair price to be paid to them for the loss of their relative. Only in The Mosaic Law was murder recognized as a criminal offense rather than a civil offense.

Even today there are laws still written into the judicial systems' rules and regulations of many countries which had their origin in The Mosaic Law. For a list of the 613 laws you can go to this website:

www.answers.com/topic/613-mitzvot-1

These are the laws which Jesus himself kept perfectly, and which those whom he taught had themselves studied and accepted as the laws and commandments they should live by in order to be a benefit to the Jewish society of that time. Some sects taught that obedience to these laws earned them a place in heaven, but that was never their intended purpose.

God bless-

 

[lone soldier]

To justify the war and killings they endorse, would be my guess. Look at church history and the present- filled with blood, violence and evil. Just as in Noah's day. What happened then...? Oh, right. lol

 

[razeontherock]

To justify the war and killings they endorse, would be my guess.

This is not guesswork! There is much to be learned from the OT, not the least of which is why NOT to do these things ...