An Account of My 2015 Email Debate with Two Jewish Apologists, Jared and May – Part 13 on Ability to Keep the Law

Jared, to me, May
As Jews we aim to keep to Hashem’s words and never worship a God we have not known – all we know and all we will ever know is Hashem. Christians keep to Paul’s words – we keep to Hashem’s – that’s where we will always differ.

[With regards to Paul’s quotation of Deuteronomy 30:14 in Romans 10:6-8] Where did the “that you may do it” go?

Randall Johnson, May 26, 2015
Deuteronomy 30 begins with Moses predicting Israel’s failure to keep covenant with Yahweh, anticipating a time when both the blessings associated with the covenant and the curses come upon them (v.1). He describes the steps that they will go through after being expelled from the land in judgment:

1. You (Israel) will call to mind, during your exile, the promised blessings for obedience and curses for disobedience to the covenant.
2. You will return to Yahweh your God and obey His voice with all your heart and soul.
3. Yahweh will restore your fortunes, returning you to the land from wherever you have been scattered.
4. Yahweh will make you prosperous and numerous even more so than before
5. Yahweh will circumcise your hearts so that you will love Him and live.
6. Yahweh will put the curses you experienced on your enemies and make you prosperous, taking delight in you once more.

Why, we may ask, does Yahweh need to circumcise Israel’s hearts in order for them to love Him and obey Him? Isn’t Israel capable on her own to obey God’s law? Moses writes immediately after this:

For this commandment that I command you today is not too hard for you, neither is it far off. It is not in heaven, that you should say, ‘Who will ascend to heaven for us and bring it to us, that we may hear it and do it?’ Neither is it beyond the sea, that you should say, ‘Who will go over the sea for us and bring it to us, that we may hear it and do it?’ But the word is very near you. It is in your mouth and in your heart, so that you can do it (verses 11-14).

It would seem Moses is emphasizing that the law is not difficult to obey, and the word niphle’t can be translated this way, but Moses seems to be emphasizing more the law’s accessibility rather than its ability to be kept. And in point of fact, he has just told Israel that they will not obey it, that all the covenant curses will come upon them resulting in expulsion from the land, and that they need their hearts circumcised so that they can love Him and obey Him. The key here is the phrase, the word is very near you…it is in your mouth and in your heart. The mouth is for confession, for declaration of what one knows is true about Yahweh’s promise, and the heart is for believing in Yahweh’s promise. It is by this kind of faith, expressed and from the heart, that one is able to “do it,” that is, keep Yahweh’s law.

Israel is not capable of keeping the law and the remainder of Tenach is a demonstration of that inability over and over again. Because God has promised Abraham unconditionally (Genesis 15, Yahweh alone passes through the pieces of sacrificed animals), He must make sure at some point that Israel does fulfill the covenant by loving Him and obeying Him, and that is the genesis of the New Covenant.

Jeremiah 31 recounts that future day when the remnant of Israel shall become the seed of the restored nation. God promises to bring them back from the farthest parts of the earth where they were exiled in judgment when they proclaim, “O Yahweh, save your people, the remnant of Israel” (v.7). Yahweh will ransom Israel and turn their mourning to joy, and they will be satisfied with His goodness in a way they have so far never been.

Then Yahweh declares that He will make a new covenant with Israel and Judah, but it will not be like the covenant He made with their fathers when they left Egypt, because that was a covenant that they broke. It wasn’t written on their hearts or within them as the New Covenant will be “after those days” in which He ransoms Israel never to be overthrown again. The result of this New Covenant will be the realization of Yahweh being Israel’s God and they His people, with everyone knowing Yahweh and keeping His law, and everyone’s sins being forgiven.

This makes it clear that the old covenant was not sufficient in itself to bring about obedience. The Law in and of itself is not within Israel’s or anyone’s ability to keep. That is the only reason why Yahweh must make a new covenant. He must fulfill His promise to Abraham and Abraham’s offspring through Isaac and Jacob. To do that He must circumcise their hearts to love Him and obey Him. The New Covenant is that provision yet future.

What Paul announces and explains in Romans 10 is that God has begun this very thing through Jesus. The means of entering into a saving relationship with Yahweh, through confession and heart-belief, has been provided by Jesus who brought near the righteousness based on faith. And he brought it for all nations, not just Israel. Everyone who calls on the name of Yahweh will be saved. The New Covenant is the end of the law for righteousness, meaning it is the end to being left to our own capabilities to do it. Every true believer in the past was able to do the law, but now in God’s plan every Israelite will know Yahweh in this way and have the law written on their hearts. Paul’s announcing of the New Covenant is in contrast to the righteousness of the Law’s “so that you may do it,” with its requirement for perfect obedience. Jesus has provided that perfect obedience and by faith we are in him and in him we have satisfied God’s just demands in the law.

Inability to keep Yahweh’s law should have moved every Israelite to appeal to Yahweh and acknowledge his or her inability and need for redemption. Salvation has always then been by faith and included a realization of our own utter sinfulness. The Tenach witnessed to our inability to merit salvation by our works and our utter sinfulness when it said:

When Adam had lived 130 years, he fathered a son in his own likeness, after his image, and named him Seth. (Genesis 5:3 ESV)
And the LORD said to Moses, “I have seen this people, and behold, it is a stiff-necked people. (Exodus 32:9 ESV)
“Yet you would not go up, but rebelled against the command of the LORD your God. And you murmured in your tents and said, ‘Because the LORD hated us he has brought us out of the land of Egypt, to give us into the hand of the Amorites, to destroy us. (Deuteronomy 1:26-27 ESV)
Beware lest you say in your heart, ‘My power and the might of my hand have gotten me this wealth.’ You shall remember the LORD your God, for it is he who gives you power to get wealth, that he may confirm his covenant that he swore to your fathers, as it is this day. (Deuteronomy 8:17-18 ESV)
“Do not say in your heart, after the LORD your God has thrust them out before you, ‘It is because of my righteousness that the LORD has brought me in to possess this land,’ whereas it is because of the wickedness of these nations that the LORD is driving them out before you. Not because of your righteousness or the uprightness of your heart are you going in to possess their land, but because of the wickedness of these nations the LORD your God is driving them out from before you, and that he may confirm the word that the LORD swore to your fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob. “Know, therefore, that the LORD your God is not giving you this good land to possess because of your righteousness, for you are a stubborn people. (Deuteronomy 9:4-6 ESV)
Circumcise therefore the foreskin of your heart, and be no longer stubborn. (Deuteronomy 10:16 ESV) [in conjunction with Deut 30:6, And the LORD your God will circumcise your heart…that you may live. (Deuteronomy 30:6 ESV)]
“The Rock, his work is perfect, for all his ways are justice. A God of faithfulness and without iniquity, just and upright is he. They have dealt corruptly with him; they are no longer his children because they are blemished; they are a crooked and twisted generation. (Deuteronomy 32:4-5 ESV)
And the people of Israel did what was evil in the sight of the LORD and served the Baals. And they abandoned the LORD, the God of their fathers, who had brought them out of the land of Egypt. They went after other gods, from among the gods of the peoples who were around them, and bowed down to them. And they provoked the LORD to anger. They abandoned the LORD and served the Baals and the Ashtaroth. So the anger of the LORD was kindled against Israel, and he gave them over to plunderers, who plundered them. And he sold them into the hand of their surrounding enemies, so that they could no longer withstand their enemies. Whenever they marched out, the hand of the LORD was against them for harm, as the LORD had warned, and as the LORD had sworn to them. And they were in terrible distress. Then the LORD raised up judges, who saved them out of the hand of those who plundered them. Yet they did not listen to their judges, for they whored after other gods and bowed down to them. They soon turned aside from the way in which their fathers had walked, who had obeyed the commandments of the LORD, and they did not do so. Whenever the LORD raised up judges for them, the LORD was with the judge, and he saved them from the hand of their enemies all the days of the judge. For the LORD was moved to pity by their groaning because of those who afflicted and oppressed them. But whenever the judge died, they turned back and were more corrupt than their fathers, going after other gods, serving them and bowing down to them. They did not drop any of their practices or their stubborn ways. (Judges 2:11-19 ESV)
The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick; who can understand it? (Jeremiah 17:9 ESV)
The LORD looks down from heaven on the children of man, to see if there are any who understand, who seek after God. They have all turned aside; together they have become corrupt; there is none who does good, not even one. (Psalm 14:2-3 ESV)
Behold, the LORD’s hand is not shortened, that it cannot save, or his ear dull, that it cannot hear; but your iniquities have made a separation between you and your God, and your sins have hidden his face from you so that he does not hear. For your hands are defiled with blood and your fingers with iniquity; your lips have spoken lies; your tongue mutters wickedness. No one enters suit justly; no one goes to law honestly; they rely on empty pleas, they speak lies, they conceive mischief and give birth to iniquity. They hatch adders’ eggs; they weave the spider’s web; he who eats their eggs dies, and from one that is crushed a viper is hatched. Their webs will not serve as clothing; men will not cover themselves with what they make. Their works are works of iniquity, and deeds of violence are in their hands. Their feet run to evil, and they are swift to shed innocent blood; their thoughts are thoughts of iniquity; desolation and destruction are in their highways. The way of peace they do not know, and there is no justice in their paths; they have made their roads crooked; no one who treads on them knows peace. (Isaiah 59:1-8 ESV)

Though we may want to keep the law we find ourselves disobeying it again and again (Romans 7). We need to look to Yahweh’s provision of sacrifice in Jesus Messiah as our way to life.