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“Paul’s
statement in Romans 10:4 that Christ is the
end of the Law might be understood as either
signifying termination or purpose. In other
words, either Christ terminated the Law, or
the purpose of Christ’s coming was to
fulfill the Law (Matt. 5:17). However,
termination seems clearly to be the meaning
in this context because of the contrast
(beginning in Rom. 9:30) between the Law and
God’s righteousness. Paul’s argument that
follows is not that the Jew was incomplete
and needed the coming of Christ to perfect
his position before God, but that his
position under the law-works principle was
absolutely wrong because it sought to
establish righteousness by human effort
rather than by accepting God’s gift of
righteousness. Though it is true that our
Lord fulfilled the Law, this passage is not
teaching that, but rather that He terminated
the Law and provided a new and living way to
God.
A. The Nature of the Law
The
Law that our Lord terminated was, of course,
the Mosaic Law according to the contrast in
the passage itself. In order to develop the
importance of this benefit of the work of
Christ, it is first necessary to observe
some features of the Mosaic Law.
1.
The Mosaic Law was a unit. Generally the Law
is divided into three parts: the moral, the
ceremonial, and the judicial. The Ten
Commandments comprise the moral part (Exod. 34:28). The judgments begin at Exod. 21:2 and
include a list of various responsibilities
with attendant judgments on offenders. The
ceremonial part begins at Exod. 25:1 and regulated
the worship life of Israel. Though this
threefold division is almost universally
accepted in Christian theology, the Jewish
people either did not acknowledge it or at
least did not insist on it. Rather they
divided the 613 commandments of the Law into
twelve families of commandments, which were
then subdivided into twelve families of
positive and twelve families of negative
commands. Specific commands that fell into
these various categories were drawn from
many places within the Law simply because
the Law was viewed as a unit.
Noticing the penalties attached to certain
commands further emphasizes the unitized
character of the Law. When the command to
keep the Sabbath (one of the “commandments”)
was violated by a man who gathered sticks on
that day, the penalty was death by stoning
(Num. 15:32-36). When the people of Israel
violated the command concerning the
Sabbatical Year for the land (one of the
“judgments”), God sent them into Captivity,
where many died (Jer. 25:11). When Nadab and
Abihu offered strange fire before the Lord
(one of the “ordinances”), they immediately
died (Lev. 10:1-7). Clearly these commands
from various parts of the Law were equally
binding and the punishment equally severe.
The Law was a unit.
James approached
the Law as a unit. He decried partiality
because it violated the law to love one’s
neighbor as oneself, and this single
violation, he said, made the people guilty
of the whole Law (James 2:8). He could
scarcely arrive at such a conclusion unless
the Law were a unit.
2. The Law was
given to Israel. Both the Old and New
Testaments are unanimous in this (Lev. 26:46; Rom. 9:4). Further, Paul contrasted
the Jews who received the Law with the
Gentiles who did not (Rom. 2:14).
B. The
End of the Law
The Jerusalem Council
settled this matter early and clearly (Acts 15). Debating the question of whether or not
circumcision was necessary for salvation,
the council said an emphatic no. Peter
described the Law as an unbearable yoke.
When the leaders wrote to the Gentile
believers to curb their liberty in matters
that were offensive to Jewish believers,
they did not try to place the believers
under the Law (which would have settled the
problem quickly), for they realized the Law
had come to an end.
In 2 Corinthians 3:7-11 Paul even specified that the part of
the Law that was written on stones (the Ten
Commandments) was done away. He dared to
label the moral part of the Law as a
ministry of death and condemnation, but,
thank God, this has been replaced by the New
Covenant, which brings life and
justification.
In Hebrews 7:11-12 the
writer demonstrated the superiority of the
priesthood of Melchizedek over that of
Aaron. He concluded that if the Aaronic or
Levitical priesthood could have brought
perfection to the people, there would have
been no need for another priesthood based on
Melchizedek. And that change of priesthood
necessitated a change in the Law. In other
words, if the Law has not been done away,
then neither has the Levitical priesthood,
and Christ is not our High Priest today. But
if Christ is our High Priest, then the Law
can no longer be operative and binding on
us.
C. The Problem Raised
If
Christ ended the Law, then why does the New
Testament include some laws from the Mosaic
Law in its ethic? How could the unit end and
yet have specifics in it still binding on
the Christian? If the New Testament included
all the Ten Commandments the answer would be
simple: the moral Law continues while the
rest has been concluded. But the New
Testament only includes nine of the ten, and
it further complicates any simple solution
by including some laws from parts other than
the moral section of the Law (Rom. 13:9;
James 2:8).
D. Suggested Solutions to
the Problem
1. Calvin’s. Calvin taught
that the abrogation of the Law had reference
to liberating the conscience from fear and
to discontinuing the ancient Jewish
ceremonies. He distinguished between the
moral Law, which he said was abrogated only
in its effect of condemning people, and the
ceremonial Law, which he said was abrogated
both in its effects and in its use. In
discussing 2 Corinthians 3 he only
distinguished in a general way the
difference between death and life in the Old
and New Covenants. He presented a very fine
exposition of the Ten Commandments, but he
did not consider Sunday to be a continuation
of the Sabbath (as the Westminster
Confession did). In other words, Calvin, as
many who have followed him, considered part
but not all of the Law as ended and the Ten
Commandments as binding on believers today,
except the Sabbath one, which he took
nonliterally (Institutes II, XI, 4 and II,
VIII, 33). Obviously this does not really
solve the problem.
2. Murray’s. John
Murray plainly stated the Commandments were
abolished, but he saw them as applicable in
some deeper sense, whatever that means. He
wrote: “Hence the abolition of these
regulations is coincident with the deeper
understanding of the sanctity of the
Commandments. It is this same line of
thought that must also be applied to the
fourth commandment. Abolition of certain
Mosaic regulations? Yes! But this in no way
affects the sanctity of the commandment nor
the strictness of observance that is the
complement of that sanctity.”
3.
Mine. The only solution (which I have never
seen proposed by anyone else) that seems to
do full justice to the plain sense of these
various Scriptures distinguishes between a
code and the commandments contained therein.
The Mosaic Law was one of several codes of
ethical conduct that God has given
throughout human history. That particular
code contained 613 commandments. There have
also been other codes. Adam lived under
laws, the sum of which may be called the
code of Adam or the code of Eden. Noah was
expected to obey the laws of God, so there
was a Noahic code. We know that God revealed
many commands and laws to Abraham (Gen. 26:5). They may be called the Abrahamic
code. The Mosaic code contained all the laws
of the Law. And today we live under the law
of Christ (Gal. 6:2) or the law of the
Spirit of life in Christ (Rom. 8:2). This
code contains the hundreds of specific
commandments recorded in the New Testament.
The Mosaic Law was done away in its
entirety as a code. It has been replaced by
the law of Christ. The law of Christ
contains some new commands (1 Tim. 4:4),
some old ones (Rom. 13:9), and some revised
ones (Rom. 13:4, with reference to capital
punishment). All the laws of the Mosaic code
have been abolished because the code has.
Specific Mosaic commands that are part of
the Christian code appear there not as a
continuation of part of the Mosaic Law, or
in order to be observed in some deeper
sense, but as specifically incorporated into
that code, and as such they are binding on
believers today. A particular law that was
part of the Mosaic code is done away; that
same law, if part of the law of Christ, is
binding. It is necessary to say both truths
in order not to have to resort to a
nonliteral interpretation of 2 Corinthians 3
or Hebrews 7 and in order not to have to
resort to some sort of theological
contortions to retain part of the Mosaic
Law.
An illustration of this idea: As
children mature, different codes are
instituted by their parents. Some of the
same commandments may appear in those
different codes. But when the new code
becomes operative, the old one is done away.
So it was with the Mosaic Law when our Lord
became the end of the Law for righteousness
to all who believe.”
From: Basic
Theology: A Popular Systematic Guide to
Understanding Biblical Truth by Charles
Caldwell Ryrie.
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