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OUR SAVIOUR'S NEW LAW

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Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Oct 9, 1879

FromReview and Herald, Vol. 54, No. 16.

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OUR SAVIOUR'S NEW LAW.

By Chas. B. Reynolds

The pertinacity with which people cling to “teachings of men” and reject the teachings of the Bible—even the very plainest declarations of the Saviour himself—would be inexplicable but for the prophecy describing the condition of the world in our day.
“Now go, write it before them in a table, and note it in a book, that it may be for the time to come [margin, the latter day] forever and ever; that this is a rebellious people, lying children, children that will not hear the law of the Lord.” Isa. 30: 8, 9.
It is with great confidence asserted that we are no longer to respect or heed God’s holy, perfect law—the ten commandments, which were given for the conversion of the soul, but that a new and better law is taught us by our Saviour; namely, that we should love the Lord our God with all our heart, and our neighbor as ourself, and that this, being a new and better law, supersedes the law of God. That so many religious, wise, and prudent people can honestly be so much in error is really marvelous, and would seem impossible but for God’s declaration: “Wherefore the Lord said, Forasmuch as this people draw near me with their mouth, and with their lips do honor me, but have removed their heart far from me, and their fear toward me is taught by the precept of men; therefore, behold, I will proceed to do a marvelous work among this people, even a marvelous work and a wonder; for the wisdom of their wise men shall perish, and the understanding of their prudent men shall be hid.” Isa. 29: 13, 14.
That this lack of wisdom and failure to understand is especially in regard to the keeping of the ten commandments, we have the positive declaration of Jesus: “Why do ye also transgress the commandment of God by your tradition?” “Ye hypocrites, well did Esaias prophesy of you, saying, This people draweth nigh unto me with their mouth, and honoreth me with their lips; but their heart is far from me. But in vain do they worship me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men.” Matt. 15: 3, 7–9.
To prove that we are now under our Saviour’s new law we are referred to Matt. 22: 36–40: “Master, which is the great commandment in the law? Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.”
you to offer us? but, Which is the great commandment in the law?—in the law already existing. In the parallel text, Mark 12: 28, 31, our Saviour quotes the very words of Moses. In Deut. 5, Moses recites the ten commandments; in chapter 6 he sums them up.
Let us compare the words of Jesus and Moses.
JESUS.
“Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God is one Lord. And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength; this is the first commandment.” Mark 12: 29, 30.
“And the second is like, namely this, Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. There is none other commandment greater than these.” Mark 12: 31.
“And the scribe said unto him, Well, Master, thou hast said the truth: for there is one God; and there is none other but he; and to love him with all the heart, and with all the understanding, and with all the soul, and with all the strength, and to love his neighbor as himself, is more than all whole burnt offerings and sacrifices.” Mark 12: 32, 33.
MOSES.
“Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God is one Lord. And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might.” Deut. 6: 4, 5.
“Thou shalt not avenge, nor bear any grudge against the children of thy people, but thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. I am the Lord.” Lev. 19: 18.
This identifies the law of the ten commandments, and separates it from the ceremonial law. It proves that the law to which Jesus referred was the same law referred to by Moses, the ten commandments, to which God added no more.
“These words the Lord spake unto all your assembly in the mount, out of the midst of the fire, of the cloud, and of the thick darkness, with a great voice; and he added no more. And he wrote them in two tables of stone, and delivered them unto me.” Deut. 5: 22.
In Matt. 19: 16, 17, we read that the young man asked the all-important question, “What good thing shall I do that I may have eternal life?” And Jesus answered, “If thou wilt enter into life, keep the commandments.” The young man, like the lawyer, asks, “Which?” Not which one of the ten commandments—but which code—the moral or the ceremonial? Christ said, “Keep the commandments,” and identifies the code of ten commandments to which God added no more, quoting from the second table. It is asserted that Jesus did not mention the Sabbath, therefore obedience to the fourth precept is not a condition of eternal life. Christ did not mention idolatry or profanity. Did he therefore teach that we can obtain eternal life while worshiping idols, blaspheming, and swearing? Christ had already declared that every jot and tittle of this code of ten commandments must remain in full force till heaven and earth should pass away. Matt. 5: 18, and Luke 16: 17.
The young man claimed to have kept this code; but Jesus proved to him that he had not kept the very first precept; for he had other gods before the true God—he loved his possessions more than he loved God; for he could not part with them, and so turned sorrowfully away.
Our Saviour gave no new law, nor left out a jot or tittle of the old law which we had from the beginning. In proof of this, let us place his two answers to the same question side by side.
TO THE YOUNG MAN.
“And, behold, one came and said unto him, Good Master, what good thing shall I do that I may have eternal life? And he said unto him, Why callest thou me good? there is none good but one, that is, God; but if thou wilt enter into life, keep the commandments.” Matt. 19: 16, 17.
TO THE LAWYER.
“And, behold, a certain lawyer stood up, and tempted him, saying, Master, what shall I do to inherit eternal life? He said unto him, What is written in the law? how readest thou? And he answering said, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy strength, and with all thy mind; and thy neighbor as thyself. And he said unto him, Thou hast answered right; this do, and thou shalt live.” Luke 10: 25–28.
“What is written in the law? how readest thou?” In reply, the lawyer quotes the words of Moses when summing up the ten commandments—the very same words Jesus quoted when asked which was the greatest of these commandments. Our Saviour says to the young man, “Keep the commandments.” To the lawyer, after he had quoted them in part, he said, “This do, and thou shalt live.”
But did not Christ give us a new commandment? Did he not himself call it a new commandment? “A new commandment I give unto you, that ye love one another; as I have loved you, that ye also love one another.” John 13: 34. This certainly was a new commandment to the Jews—to love as Christ loved. Jesus came not to change, alter, or to make void, the law, but to magnify and make it honorable; to teach its depth and breadth. Let us learn from the beloved disciple John, who gives us this record, in what sense it was a new commandment: “He that saith he abideth in Him ought himself also so to walk, even as he walked. Brethren, I write no new commandment unto you, but an old commandment which ye had from the beginning. The old commandment is the word which ye have heard from the beginning. Again, a new commandment I write unto you, which thing is true in him and in you; because the darkness is past, and the true light now shineth. He that saith he is in the light, and hateth his brother, is in darkness even until now. He that loveth his brother abideth in the light, and there is none occasion of stumbling in him.” 1 John 2: 6–10. “For this is the message [or commandment—see margin] that ye heard from the beginning, that we should love one another. Not as Cain, who was of that wicked one, and slew his brother.” 1 John 3: 11, 12.
John here shows what he means by the command we had from the beginning, that it was from creation, and was known to Cain. We know this law must have existed from the beginning and before the creation of the earth; for when God created the first angelic intelligence in Heaven itself, the first duty of that intelligence was to love its Creator; and when the second intelligence was created, his duty must have been to love his Creator and the other created being.
Christ, the Son of God, twice positively declares that if we would have eternal life, the first great essential is to keep the commandments—not nine-tenths of them, not some new and better law, but the ten commandments which God spake; which he wrote with his own finger, and added no more. Keep the law as it is written, as you read it. “This do, and thou shalt live.”
CHAS. B. REYNOLDS.