Biblical Law

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A lot of non Christians see God as a tyrant, sitting on a throne in the clouds, barking orders. What they don't understand is God's rules are more like common sense. It would be like Him saying "don't play with fire". You can say "whatever, fire is awesome and I want to play with it" but eventually you will get burned. Hopefully, you don't get burned too badly. Then people will get mad at God like it was His fault and He says "hey, I told you not to play with fire, didn't I?"

Picasso explaining the Law

I became a bible lover and moreover fell in love with christ Jesus through this amazing Bible Project. Praising God.

Can everyone please pray for my brother in law? His name is Alex. he is slowly but surely dying in the hospital. He had his colon removed recently and is having complications from the surgery. Every prayer counts. Thank you. God bless.

This is one of the best channels YouTube has ever had. You guys are truely a blessing to us ❤️ I have never met anyone that explains the Bible and helps me read it as you guys. And your animations are ETHEREAL. I wish you had more followers though. Every living person Christian or not should get a chance to watch these videos. Thank you, may God reward you.

Creativity + The Gospel. What a combination! Praise God.

Bible Project, you did it again! I'm reading through the bible and ran across Exodus 21:21, just after the 10 Commandments. I was a bit put off by the slave laws (especially the one that says the owner of a slave is not to be punished if the slave recovers from being brutalized by his master in a day or two). I prayed & asked The Lord why this is okay & this evening, He used your teaching to help me understand His heart. Thank you for your obedience to create this content. I am going to Patrion to support the work!

1) I smiled throughout this whole video - loved it! 2) The explanations and illustrations made this summary so clear and tied the whole narrative together beautifully! 3) The animations were so sophisticated - kudos to all of the artists involved! You did an awesome job!

If you ever try to read the Bible from the beginning, you’ll find out that 69 chapters into the story (that is, Exodus ch. 19), the story slows way down to make room for the laws given to ancient Israel, over six hundred of them! Why are they in the story? Are Bible readers supposed to follow them or respond to them in some way? And how do they relate the New Testament part of the story when Jesus shows up? These are huge questions that we explore in the video, but here are some helpful starting points. (1) The Old Testament is not a law book. Rather, these laws given to Israel constitute the terms of their covenant relationship with the God who rescued them from slavery in Egypt. The covenant ceremony is found in Exodus chs. 19-24, where we find the 10 commandments plus 42 other commands that illustrate the principles of worship, justice, and community life that Israel was to follow. (2) These laws were given to appoint Israel as a “kingdom of priests” (Exodus 19:4-6), a contrast community that would represent God’s presence and character to the surrounding nations. (3) The covenant was consummated as God prepared a miniature Eden to inhabit when he took up residence among his people (i.e. the Tabernacle in Exodus 25-31, 35-40). (4) As the story picks up again, we find a pattern of narratives alternating with sections of more covenant laws. And these narratives usually involve the Israelites breaking the covenant laws they just received! This begins with the story of the Golden calf (Exodus 32-34), then the rebellion of the sons of Aaron (Leviticus 9), the worship of the goat-idols (Leviticus 17), then the constant rebellion of the Israelites in the wilderness (Numbers 11-21). This pattern is part of the Torah’s communication strategy, which is to show that these laws offered ancient Israel a way to live by God’s will, but they consistently fail. This is why Moses’ final speeches to the Israelites in Deuteronomy 30-32 predict their ultimate failure and exile from the promised land, but also that God would have to recreate their hearts if they are to ever be God’s faithful covenant partners. These hundreds of laws, it turns out, are part of the way the Torah’s storyline points forward into the same future announced Israel’s prophets (see Jeremiah 31 or Ezekiel 36-37): It’s only when humanity is renewed by God’s creative Spirit that we are enabled to truly love God and trust his wisdom. This is the story that Jesus was stepping into when he said that he came to “bring the Torah to fulfillment” (see Matthew 5:17-48), and that loving God and one’s neighbor fulfills the Torah (see Matthew 22:34-40). And this is the same story carried forward in the work of the Spirit among Jesus’ followers (see Galatians 5:13-23). So then, the laws actually play a crucially important role in the biblical story, but it requires a macro-view to see how it all fits together and leads us to Jesus!

REVELATION 14:12 Here is the patience of the saints: here are they that keep the commandments of God, and the faith of Jesus.

I totally love the diversity of people in this beautiful project, IT'S AWESOME!!!!

Scrolling through the comments to see how long it would take for this to get ugly. Didn't take long. What makes me smile about this video being by you guys is that when I first started watching Bible project a few years ago I was just then starting to merge toward the thing called "The Hebrew Roots Movement". Today it's called by all kind of names-Ephraim awakening, Natsarim, Torah observant etc. but back then I remember having a conversation with people below your videos about how we should keep the law-yup, the foods laws, the fabric laws, the festivals, Sabbaths, etc. But by Passover of last year (so a year now) I realized that all of that so called "law keeping" left me emptier than I had ever been in all my years of Christian walk. I was doing all the "right things" and yet one day I sat crying to a fellow Hebrew Roots friend and with tears streaming down my face I said "I miss Jesus." What I realized in all my years of law obsession was that the law became my measure of how pleasing I was to God even though I did many things THEN that I never did as a Christian before I was Hebrew Roots. I let myself indulge in sins that before I had put off because after all, now I was keeping Sabbath! Now I was wearing tassels! Now I was celebrating the feast days! Look how good I'm doing! All while my heart was moving further from Jesus and true righteousness in pursuit of the law. I twisted everything Paul said to fit my idea of how we had to keep the Torah-never stopping to think that while I preached that the word torah means "instructions" which is a generic noun, I treated the "Torah" (instructions) like a Proper noun as if it was the name of something particular. But it wasn't. It was God's instructions at that time and today we ALSO have instructions (torah) and those instructions are based on the Spirit and love and justice but I don't need a tassel to remind me because the Spirit lives in me and brings these instructions to my heart. And I don't need constant reminders of there being a difference between the holy and profane in object lessons like separating wool and linen and seeds and foods. I KNOW the difference between the holy and profane because the Spirit of the living God is living inside of me. God told Jeremiah (in Jeremiah 7 & 11) that he gave both sacrifices and the covenant due to the evil hearts of Israel and that he never even spoke to them about these things when he first brought them out of Egypt. I went back and reread Exodus 12-19 and sure enough-when he first brought them out he tried to have a relationship with them like we have with him now, but they complained about water, hunger, water again, meat, bread, the journey, and even said they had it better back in Egypt as slaves! And this prompted the giving of the Sabbath observance with Manna a month before it was even a part of the covenant. It was a TEST before it was a part of the covenant. Spoiler alert-they failed the test! Long story short-I have left Hebrew Roots and now make it my mission to explain these concepts to other HR through videos. If I am being honest, since I had pretty much stopped studying the New Testament toward the end of my time in HR, it was actually the OLD TESTAMENT that lead me out of Hebrew Roots. But isn't that the beauty of God? If he wants us for his own, he will meet us wherever we are and reach us however he can...just like he did with Israel when he gave them so many laws similar to the nations around them. They could have had a personal relationship with him. Instead their evil hearts desired what the world had-animal sacrifices, a code of laws in stone, a temple, a king, etc. And what did it do for them? It made them just like the nations in their hearts. They were whitewashed tombs. pretty on the outside, ugly on the inside. Today I am pretty on the inside because God lives there. :) I am pretty on the outside when I offer hands of help, words of encouragement, love to others, food to the hungry, money to the needy, a shoulder to the downtrodden. THIS was always God's original plan for mankind. The Mosaic law was stop along the way for a people who had been tainted by Egypt and needed a cage of quarantine until the remedy arrived. Thank you for making this video. I loved it! <3 3 years ago I would have scoffed at it so I get these people on here that want to argue over the law still being in place. Just know that some of these people will be like me in a few years and smile when they see a video like this one. :)

You guys really did a good job here. Although frankly I wish you would have spoken about how God's Torah/Laws can be directly applied to our lives today spiritually (if not physically) I love YHVH our Elohim and I wish to keep His ways, statutes, virtues, right-ruling, righteousness, decrees, and ordinances as best as I possibly can. I wish to be as close to Him as possible because He loved me first and introduced me to REAL love... Mercy, kindness, understanding, patience.... Grace!!! I don't want to live in the world or in the nations... I wish to dwell in His Kingdom as one of His set apart chosen family, Israel!!! The first video I saw of yours was the Galatians overview.. and I didn't listen carefully. I thought you where teaching Torah was not applicable to our lives. It seemed as though you where dismissing 7th day Sabbath, dietary instructions, and appointed times as ancient Israel culture and not for us today. With a sharper focus I noticed you toed the line and stayed within grounds of the truth, right down the middle between Torah legalists (Our love for Him) and "Christians" only focused on grace (God's love for us). Personally, I choose to take a firmer stance on defending the Torahs application to our lives, but it's not super effective. For example... I know you guys don't really get into it like this, but "two different types of fabric" is actually specially shatnez, wool and linen. Wool shrinks at 4x the rate of linen, and thus a garment made out of wool and linen specially would tare and be of no value. This instruction doesn't primarily set Israel apart, but it shows Elohim's care and wisdom of what is good for His people. This is directly applicable to our lives today. Why? Because the Torah instructions ALWAYS benefit us for our well being. His instructions show His intense love and compassion for us. Animal sacrifices... What is a sacrifice? An offering of something we have to show a surrendering and a humbling of ourselves before the blessings He has given us. In that time, people had possessions of animal herds and flocks. It was their primary livelihood and asset. To give up the best of those assets would be for us to give up our fanciest car, our whole paycheck, or our yearly bonus to show God that we know He is in control and our possessions mean nothing as long as He is sovereign in our lives. There are provisions within Torah that if you can't afford a lamb, you can offer two turtledoves, and if you can't offer two turtledoves, intense prayer and repentance will grant forgiveness from God. Giving the best of what we honestly have to give... This is DIRECTLY applicable to our lives today. So... I chalk it up to most people simply don't want to give up their own understandings, imaginations, and desires. I have done a LOT of thinking about what you teach, and I believe it is good. At the very least you have helped my family (My wife, my 3 children, and myself) come out the pagan nations and dedicate our existence to Elohim's purpose and will for our lives. As so many others have said, the sound doctrine and modern CGI is so beneficial for the modern age. Thank you so much!! Yah bless you!!

I have listened to many of your teachings, thank you for your obedience to YHWH. I'm 62 years old and for nearly 40 years I've searched for His truth, you have helped me to know His Torah and the rest of His Word better. May you be blessed in this world and the next.

I'm a visual learner,these lessons are awesome.I have a better understanding when I have my Bible study lessons..God Bless you all for taking the time to help us❤

In Mathew 5, the greek word "plerosai" is commonly translated as "fulfill" - Christ fulfilled the law. But that word also means "complete". If you read the full chapter, you'll see that's what Jesus does there. He didn't abolish the law, he completed it. For example, on Matthew 5.33 - 37, Jesus taught: "Again, you have heard that it was said to the people long ago, ‘Do not break your oath, but fulfill to the Lord the vows you have made.’ But I tell you, do not swear an oath at all: either by heaven, for it is God’s throne; or by the earth, for it is his footstool; or by Jerusalem, for it is the city of the Great King. And do not swear by your head, for you cannot make even one hair white or black. All you need to say is simply ‘Yes’ or ‘No’; anything beyond this comes from the evil one." On the Moses law, people are told to not break their oath. Jesus changes the law and complete it - don't oath at all. Talking about Jesus taking replacing Aarons order as High Priest the Bible teaches: "For when the priesthood is changed, the law must be changed also." (Hebrews 7.12). There was God's revelation on Moses law, but Jesus fulfilled and completed the law, the complete revelation of God only has come with Jesus, the perfect law only has come with Jesus.

I wake up and go to sleep to the Bible Project! Even listen to it at work and throughout the day. It really keeps me humble knowing God is always on my side no matter what. Thanks Bible Project keep it up! I’m looking forward to more and more.❤️

Beautiful as always, but I missed some of the explanation in Hebrews, were Paul says that the law was almost meant to be broken, as it's purpose is not to make us perfect but to highlight our imperfections so that we could acknowledge the need for Jesus.

This is right on time guys!! My uncle believes he is a Black Hebrew Israelite and he argued with me about the old testament laws and how I'm sinning because I am not applying the same rules set back then for Israelites. This help me understand how Jesus fulfilled the law and how we are free from it but of course not to think we can do all we want. Love God and your neighbor covers all the commandments (except for the Sabbath which room 14:5 says it's our personal choice) . Thank you guys so much for your ministry! 🙌🏾