|
“…If any other man thinks that he as a mind to put confidence in the flesh, I far more: ·
Circumcised
on the eighth day, ·
Of
the nation of ·
A
Hebrew of Hebrews; as to the Law, a Pharisee. As to zeal, a persecutor of the church; as to the righteousness which is found in Torah, blameless.” Philippians 3:4-6. |
Editors Note:
We sometimes hear comments from some Jews saying things like: “Jesus we like.
It’s Paul we don’t like.” The assumption is that Paul abandoned Judaism and the
Torah and started up a radically different new religion called Christianity. I
appreciate Moshe ben Shaul’s
study for showing that Paul has been falsely accused. Also, the church has
erroneously taught that Paul preached against Torah. Paul remained a loyal
Jew. RAC
|
by Moshe ben
Shaul |
FROM the above verses in Philippians, we see that Shaul[1]
was a Hebrew of Hebrews. Most scholars feel that this means that he was a
Hebrew speaker with Hebrew speaking parents. At that time 85% of the Jews lived
in the Diaspora.[2]
Many Jews didn’t speak Hebrew. This confirmed a higher status on him. He also
spoke Aramaic and Greek. He was a Pharisee, not a Hellenistic Jew.[3]
He was
born in
As we read
from the passage in Philippians, Paul was righteous (or blameless) in his observance
of the Torah.
He was of the tribe of Benjamin. He
wasn’t “lost.” That is, his ancestors didn’t migrate and get lost in
I was
taught that in Acts 9 on the road to Damascus, Saul the Jew converted—became a
Christian—and took on the nice Christian name of Paul. This is not exactly what
happened. In Acts 13:9, we read about “Saul, who was also called Paul…” Most
Jews in the Diaspora had two names given to them after they were born. I was
given the names Michael and the Hebrew name Moshe. My middle name is Peter, but
my middle name is also Pesach. Other examples include Mark in Acts 12:12, who was also known as Yochanan (translated as “John” in English
translations). In Esther 2:7, we find that Esther’s Hebrew name was Hadassah.
Paul was a
student of Gamaliel—one of the leading Pharisee
teachers of the time. Gamaliel was a grandson of Hillel, which was the more flexible
Paul
continued to live Jewishly
his whole life. In Acts 16:3, we find that Paul circumcised Timothy whose
mother was Jewish. Did he do this just to be a witness, even though he didn’t
believe in it? Not according to Galatians 1:10: “For do I now persuade men, or
God? Or do I seek to please men? If I were still trying to please men, I would
not be a bond-servant of Messiah." Paul didn’t do things to please men. He
also did not push for Gentile circumcision as others did when they wanted Titus
circumcised in Galatians 2.
Paul still
went to synagogue on Shabbat, as we find in Acts 13:5,
1)
he loved his people, and
2)
he was still an observant Jew.
WHEN we get to Acts 18:18-19, we find that not only did Paul go to synagogue, but he also took a Jewish vow, probably a Nazarite vow, because he had his hair cut off. Was he in Yerushalayim? [7] No, he was in Cenchrea,
an area with very few Jews, but even there he followed a very Orthodox Jewish
custom outlined in Numbers 6. In Acts 19:8, he was again in the synagogue.
In Acts 20:16, Shaul was
in a hurry to return to Jerusalem for Shavuot (Pentecost), as Jews were
commanded to make a pilgrimage[8] to
Jerusalem for the three pilgrimage festivals—again following Torah.
Some would have us to believe that there
was a big rift between Paul and James or with the
In Acts 21:21, it is especially apparent
in the Greek text that the rumors that the brothers had heard about Paul were
not true. (That is, it wasn’t true that Paul was teaching Jews among the
Gentiles to forsake Moses, circumcision, or even the customs of the Jews.) So
here Paul takes another Nazarite vow along with the purification rites.[10]
The Nazarite vow signified a desire to live a kodesh (holy, separated) life as
a Jew before God. Paul wasn’t doing it to be deceptive. Remember Galatians
1:10. Paul did it because he believed in Judaism, not to please man.
In Acts 23:1, Paul calls the men in the
Sanhedrin his brothers. He said he fulfilled his duty for God, which is another
way of saying that he obeyed the Law. In Acts 23:7, he said, “I am a
Pharisee,” not was a Pharisee. The other Pharisees didn’t dispute Paul’s
statement. They accepted him as being a Pharisee. At this point Paul had been a
believer in Yeshua for over 20 years, and still considered himself to be a
Pharisee. During this same period, he wrote Romans and some of the epistles.
Think about that when you read those books. To correctly interpret Paul, you
must recognize that he was a Torah observant Jew and speaking as one. If you
interpret Paul’s writings as abolishing the Law, then he would have to be a
schizophrenic, a liar, or have multiple personalities. In Acts 27:9, the
Pharisees could find no fault with him.
In Paul’s defense
before Festus in Acts 25:8, Paul said he observed Torah. If Paul was a lying,
we need to rip out some pages from the Bible. In Acts 28:17, we find that Paul
didn’t even do anything against the customs of the Jews, which involves
much more than the written Torah.
Paul/Shaul did not give up being a Torah-observant Jew to become
a believer in Yeshua. He loved his Jewishness and was
proud of it. He did not start a new religion. Believers in Yeshua remained a
sect of Judaism for many years thanks to zealous students of Torah like Rav Shaul. His life was dedicated to spreading the Good News to
both Jew and Gentile. May we all have the strength and zealousness of Rav Shaul.