Quote:
Originally Posted by simple simon
hullo mr.aron,
simple simon says...
paul defended and stood for the LAW OF CHRIST until the end of his life. he was often before kings, rulers, and governors defending this driving principle of the
and in the portion of scripture you have referenced he stands before king agrippa whom he knows is an expert (like him) in all the questions and customs of his accusers, the jews;
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hello mr ss,
The topic of this thread is the law of Christ, the royal law, the new commandment, to love one another. That is my understanding. If you believe and confess that God has raised Jesus from the dead, then all other positions become moot. You can be a Pharisee, albeit one that has believed into the resurrection of Jesus from the dead. Being a Pharisee, or not, is dung, it is refuse, it is detritus of a world now gone forever.
(Now, I would argue that you categorically can not be a Sadducee and a Christian because Sadducees don't believe in the resurrection. I think some of them tried, but Paul called them out. 1 Cor 15:12)
As far as the context of Paul's speech, you could interpret is as if he was formerly a Pharisee. I can infer that he is a Pharisee, albeit a disciple of Yeshua.
"Then Paul, knowing that some were Sadducees and the others Pharisees, called out to the Sanhedrin, 'My brothers, I am a Pharisee, descended from Pharisees, I stand on trial because of the hope of the resurrection of the dead." ~Acts 23:6
My point has been that either Paul lied to win a debating point and split the Sanhedrin, or he remained a Pharisee after converting to be Jesus's disciple.
But whether my interpretation is 'valid' is irrelevant. The cross of Christ has rendered arguments moot. Whether or not Jews continued Jewish practice, and if so how much, is really not worth arguing over.
I think what was definitively fixed was that the gentiles were not to be forced to live like the Jews. THAT would have validated the law of Christ. Paul remonstrated with Peter using these exact words: "How can you force the gentiles to live like the Jews?"