Page 5 - Pentateuch - Student Textbook

Abraham had been told that his descendants would be “enslaved and mistreated four hundred years”
and would return to the land of Canaan “in the fourth generation” (Gen. 15:13, 16). Apparently, a
generation in Abraham’s time was calculated at 100 years. Exodus gives the length more precisely at 430
years (12:40), leaving room for some ten generations at the more normal calculation. From the original
70 people who went to Egypt in the days of Joseph (Gen. 46:26-27), ten generations could very well
produce a population of over 600,000 fighting men (Num. 2;32) and possibly over two million people
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including families.

The most difficult issue facing readers of the Pentateuch is the place of the law in God’s will for his
people. The question was true for the nation of Israel at Mount Sinai, for succeeding generations of
Israelites in Old Testament times, and for Christians. Was obedience to the law necessary for salvation
before Christ? Is obedience to the law necessary for salvation since Christ? Should the law be part of
national life whether in the United States or Zambia or Japan or Russia? Does God judge nations today
by their incorporation of the law into national laws and by their keeping of his law in national affairs? All
of these questions and more are crucial to our faith. We cannot solve them all here, but we can lay some
groundwork.

Over the course of church history, a variety of approaches have been developed to explain the law’s
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relationship to the believer. The following variations illustrate the main approaches to the law.

1.) Marcion rejected all things Jewish. The God of the
OT was not the God of the NT. He rejected the entire OT. The
law had no relevance for Christians.
2.) Clement, Origen, and others thought the law was
for training or preparation for the coming of Jesus. The literal
law was not as important as allegorical lessons to be learned.
3.) Chrysostom saw adhering to the law as bondage.
For him the law had no authority over the Christian.
4.) Aquinas in the middle-ages, divided the law into
three parts: ceremonial, moral, and judicial. All are important
for a Christian. The ceremonial is followed through faith in
Christ, since he fulfilled the sacrifices and other parts of OT
worship. The moral laws are binding since they simply reflect
more exactly natural law. The judicial laws are wise counsel for
living.
5.) Luther generally saw the law as a mirror pointing
out a person’s sins and rejected the idea that the Christian is
obligated to follow the law.
6.) Calvin and Reformed theology in general as Fig. 3: Ten Commandments
expressed in the Westminster Confession of Faith consider the from the time of Jesus
moral law as a rule of life directing Christians how to walk.
7.) Darby, Ryrie, and other dispensational writers hold to a firm distinction between the
old and new covenants. Today is the dispensation of grace. The law is not relevant to Christians.
8.) Roman Catholic teaching insists on the unchangeable nature of the law. Christians
are always and everywhere to obey the law.

4 Ibid, 223.
5 Peter T. Vogt, Interpreting the Pentateuch (Grand Rapids: Kegel, 2009), 32-42.

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