Could Jesus’ Death Atone For Any Kind of Sin?
Here is a great question and answer from one of my favorite websites http://www.outreachjudaism.org
Rabbi Singer has some really great content on his site, takes a look for other eye opening information.
Source: Outreachjuadism.org
Question:
A mutual friend of ours introduced me to your site. I work with Michael Flanigan (see related article) of Palestine, TX. I am a gentile Christian who has many questions. I have found a lot of fascinating reading on your site. Michael and I have been discussing atonement and sacrifice as of late. Now bear in mind that I am by no means a biblical scholar, so, I apologize if my questions seem silly. Would it not be possible for the death of Y’shua to apply as an unintentional sin sacrifice with His death applying when an individual asks Him into his/her life initially? Thereafter, sins would be forgiven as intentional sins through repentance. I hope you are able to make sense of my question. I am learning much through my conversations with Michael and listening to your tapes. I will continue to visit your website in the future.
Thank you for your time.
Answer:
Your question is not silly at all. I will first explain your question more clearly so that visitors to our website who are unfamiliar with this subject will have a better understanding of what you are asking.
Missionaries contend that the blood sacrificial system is man’s only conduit to atonement and insist that there can be no forgiveness of sin without the shedding of blood. They maintain that the Bible sets forth only blood atonement to expiate sin. Evangelical Christians assert that for the past nineteen centuries, since the destruction of the second Temple in 70 C.E., Jews have lacked the essential and indispensable animal sacrificial system for atonement. Consequently, they maintain, God must have provided a blood atonement in place of the animal sacrifices of the past. This sacrifice, they insist, is the death of Jesus on the cross.
In support of their claim that atonement can only be achieved through the shedding of blood, missionaries cite Leviticus 17:11, which reads,
This is because the life of the flesh is in the blood, and I have given it to you upon the altar to make atonement for your souls; for it is the blood that makes atonement for the soul.
They conclude from this verse that only by being covered in the blood of the cross can man have any hope of being forgiven by God for his sins.
In response to this argument, I have explained that contrary to the missionary claim that blood sacrifice is the only method of atonement in the Bible, there are three methods of atonement clearly defined in the Jewish scriptures: the sin sacrifice, repentance, and charity. Moreover, the sin sacrifice (known in the Jewish scriptures as korban chatat) did not atone for all types of sin, but rather, only for man’s most insignificant iniquity: unintentional sins. The sin sacrifice was inadequate to atone for a transgression committed intentionally. The brazen sinner was barred from the sanctuary, and had to bear his own iniquity because of his rebellious intent to sin against God. The Torah teaches this fundamental principle in Numbers 15:27-31.
If a person sins unintentionally, then he shall offer a one-year-old female goat for a sin offering. The priest shall make atonement before the LORD for the person who goes astray when he sins unintentionally, making atonement for him that he may be forgiven . . . . The person who does anything defiantly, whether he is native or an alien, that one is blaspheming the LORD; and that person shall be cut off from among his people, because he has despised the word of the LORD and has broken His commandment, that person shall be completely cut off; his guilt shall be on him.
Your question is excellent: “If the sin sacrifice was necessary in order to atone for unintentional sin, didn’t Jesus then have to die for those sins committed unwittingly?”
The answer to your question is simple. Jesus could not die for anyone’s sins, whether they were committed intentionally or accidentally. To begin with, the Jewish people were strictly prohibited from offering human sacrifices under any circumstances. There is not one place throughout the entire corpus of the Jewish scriptures where human sacrifices are condoned. In fact, over and over again the Bible warns the Jewish people that it is a grave sin to bring a human being as a sacrifice. In the Book of Leviticus, only distinct species of animals are permitted for use in blood sacrifices.
The ancient pagan religions promoted the same idea about atonement as Christendom continues to preach today (e.g. Molech). They would joyfully offer a child into the fires of their sacrificial offering in order to expiate their sins and appease the gods. Why would a child sacrifice be used in this pagan ritual rather than an adult? The reason is because a child is thoroughly innocent of sin. A child, they reasoned, could not have committed iniquity and thus mirrored the animal sacrifice which also had to be unblemished. The Torah therefore admonishes the children of Israel never to offer human sacrifices, and forewarned Jewish people of terrible consequences if this commandment were violated.
This message was carefully communicated at Mt. Moriah where Abraham was prepared to offer up his beloved son Isaac as a sacrifice. At that crucial juncture in history when Abraham was ready to sacrifice Isaac, the Almighty admonished him that He did not want the human sacrifice, and directed Abraham to sacrifice the ram caught in the thicket instead. The Almighty’s directive — that he only wanted animal sacrifices rather than human sacrifices — was immediately understood. This teaching has never departed from the mind and soul of the faithful children of Israel.
Moreover, if missionaries want to use Leviticus 17:11 to bolster their position that blood sacrifices are indispensable for procuring an atonement, they must use all of the verse, not just a part of it. Leviticus 17:11 specifically says that the blood of the sacrifice must be placed “upon the altar to make atonement for your souls.” That is to say, Leviticus 17:11 explicitly declares that blood can only effect atonement if it is placed on the altar. Jesus’ blood, however, was never placed on the altar. If the church is going to take the “blood” part of the verse literally, they must also take the “altar” part literally as well. Jesus’ blood was never sprinkled on the altar, and therefore his death could not provide atonement for anyone.
Finally, the prophets loudly declared to the Jewish people that the contrite prayer of the penitent sinner replaces the sacrificial system. Therefore, atonement for unintentional sins today is expiated through devotional supplication to the Merciful One.
In fact, in Hosea 3:4-5, the prophet foretold with divine exactness that the nation of Israel would not have a sacrificial system during the last segment of Jewish history until the messianic age. Hosea 3:4-5 reads,
. . . for the children of Israel shall abide many days without king or prince, without sacrifice or sacred pillar, without ephod or teraphim. Afterward the children of Israel shall return and seek the LORD their God and David their king. They shall fear the LORD and His goodness in the latter days.
In the words of the Bible, this period of time would last for many days. Yet, despite the repeated proclamations of the church that the crucifixion of Jesus serves as a sin sacrifice today, the words of Hosea were meticulously fulfilled, and we are without an animal sacrificial system today.
Given the spiritual magnitude of this remarkable prophecy, Hosea was compelled to reveal how the ecclesiastical Temple functions were to be replaced. In essence, if the prophet is testifying that the nation of Israel will indeed be without a sacrificial system during their long exile until the messianic age, what are we to use instead? How are the Jewish people to atone for unintentional sin without a blood sacrifice during their bitter exile? What about all the animal sacrifices prescribed in the Book of Leviticus? Can the Jewish people get along without animal offerings? Missionaries claim they cannot. The Bible disagrees.
For this reason, the statement in Hosea 14:2-3 is crucial. In these two verses, Hosea reveals to his beloved nation how they are to replace the sacrificial system during their protracted exile. The prophet declares that the Almighty wants us to “render for bulls the offering of our lips.” Prayer is to replace the sacrificial system. Hosea 14:2-3 states,
Take words with you, and return to the LORD. Say to Him, “Take away all iniquity; receive us graciously, for we will render for bulls the offering of our lips.”
The prophets never instruct the Jews to worship any crucified messiah or demigod; nor does scripture ever tell us that an innocent man can die as an atonement for the sins of the wicked. Such a message is utterly antithetical to the teachings of the Jewish scriptures. Rather, it is the prayers of the sinner that would become as bulls of the sin offerings.
King Solomon echoes this sentiment as well. In I Kings 8:46-50, King Solomon delivers a startling prophetic message as he inaugurates the first Temple that had just been completed. In his inauguration sermon, King Solomon forewarns that one day the Jewish people would be driven out of the land of Israel, and be banished to the land of their enemies, near and far. During their exile they would fervently desire to repent of their sins. King Solomon then declares that they would face Jerusalem from their exile, confess their sins, “and God will hear their prayers in heaven, and forgive them for all their transgressions.”
There was no mention of a cross or a dead messiah in King Solomon’s prophetic message. Only the contrite and repentant prayer of the remorseful sinner can bring about a complete atonement. Although King Solomon’s timeless message stands out as a theological impossibility in Christian terms, it remains the centerpiece of the Jew’s system of atonement throughout his long and bitter exile.
How to Prevent Swine Flu
Source:Lazerbrody.net
Many people are wondering how can I prevent the swine flu. There is a simple answer!
“If you diligently heed the voice of the LORD your God and do what is right in His sight, give ear to His commandments and keep all His statutes, I will put none of the diseases on you which I have brought on the Egyptians. For I am the LORD who heals you.” Exodus 15:26
Light unto all the Nations
Source:Simpletoremember.com
It has been prophesied in the Torah that Jews would be a light unto the nations,
“I will make you into a great nation. I will bless you and make your name great. You shall become a blessing. And I will bless those who bless
Now, if you obey Me and keep my covenant, then you shall be My special treasure among all the nations for all the world is Mine. And you will be a kingdom of priests and a holy nation to Me… (Exodus 19:5-6)
The prophet Isaiah (42:6) states,
“I, the Lord, have called you in righteousness, and will hold your hand and keep you. And I will establish you as a covenant of the people, for a light unto the nations.”
Despite our small numbers, the Jewish People seem to occupy a disproportionate place as a focus of world attention.
As Mark Twain wrote of the Jew:
“He is as prominent on the planet as any other people, and his commercial importance is extravagantly out of proportion to the smallness of his bulk. His contributions to the world’s list of great names in literature, science, art, music, finance, medicine, and abstruse learning, are also way out of proportion to the weakness of his numbers.”
How could we imagine a small group having such a profound impact on the world all around it? The two approaches which seem to have some precedent to them are:
1) Conquest (like in the case of Greece and Rome), or
2) Proselytization (as with Christianity and Islam).
The difficulty, however, is that during the past almost 2,000 years, the Jewish people have rarely had an army, and have always shied away from conversions.
Despite being the most hated people, few in number and dispersed across the globe, Jews are the most influential people the world has known. Jews are responsible for the idea of ethical monotheism and the absolute moral standard that comes from a belief in one God.
Before the Jews, the ancient world thought that infanticide was morally correct (even Aristotle wrote in favor of it.) Before the Jews came along, the world thought that “might was right.”
It was the Jewish people that gave the world the ideas of respect for life, peace, equality, justice, love of neighbor, social responsibility, and holiness of human purpose.
Approximately three billion people (almost half the world) believes in some form of monotheism, and all agree that they got it from us (i.e. from Abraham). This is the clear prerequisite to both morality and civilization in the world.
All throughout the world, many of the major concepts within Judaism have been widely accepted:
1. We are all “children of one G-d”, therefore we have a fundamental social responsibility towards others. This leads directly to “love your neighbor” (Leviticus 19:18)—a Jewish, not a Christian idea.
2. Society must be committed to truth, justice, fair trials, etc.
3. All people have free will and unlimited potential for greatness. “All men are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights, to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness” (Declaration of Independence). This may be why the Talmud mandated universal education about 2,000 years ago, while the rest of the world has only incorporated this into their society within the last 100 years.
4. We should seek peace, not war. Today, on the wall outside the United Nations, the hope of the world is emblazoned, using the words of the Jewish prophet Isaiah: “And they shall beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks, nations shall not lift up sword against nations. Neither shall they learn war anymore.” (Isaiah 2:4)
One might ask, “Aren’t these ideas intuitively obvious? How can we take credit for them? Didn’t other societies also have them?” The point being made is the following—we are the only society which doesn’t merely posses the ideas, but has a complete system for implementing them. Our society, in fact, was the only one until very recently which even attempted to actually put them into practice. It is very significant to note that many of these ideas were only accepted recently by the Western world—where our influence has been strongest, and are still not accepted in many areas of the rest of the world—where our influence has been more minimal.
A very fundamental question could be asked on everything which has been said within this prophecy until now: The prophecy is that the Jewish people will be a light unto the nations; all that has been shown until now, however, could be viewed as merely showing that the Torah alone has been a light unto the nations. Where do we have any indication that the Jewish people themselves, independent from Judaism, have an intrinsic ability to strongly impact the world? In other words, maybe there is nothing particularly distinctive about Jews themselves. Perhaps, it is only because the Jews have been in possession of such an extraordinary book, the Torah, that their impact upon the world has been so profound!
The difficulty with attempting to answer this question is that all throughout history, Jews have been so intrinsically connected with the Torah. It would seem that the only way to evaluate this would be to do an experiment in which we separated Jews from Judaism. We could then determine if Jews continued behaving in an extraordinary manner (although not necessarily in accordance with Torah guidelines) or simply faded into the background and acted like all other people.
This experiment has already been performed for us. Over the past 150 years, for the first time in all of Jewish history, we have Jews entirely disconnected from Judaism. What then do we find when we study the behavior of these first truly secular Jews?
The Wall Street Journal ran a 3-part series a few years ago on the three individuals that in their view had the greatest impact on the entire 20th century. Who do you think they selected? Sigmund Freud, Albert Einstein, and Karl Marx. How likely is it that all three would turn out to be Jewish? Considering that the Jews have never (in recent times) exceeded 1/2 of 1% of the world population, that means that for every Jew that lived within the previous 150 years, there were over 200 non-Jews. Therefore the odds against the first of these three occupying this position of ultimate influence on the world were 200 to 1, the second joining him were 40,000 to 1, and the third being there as well, were 8,000,000 to 1.
Remarkably, Jews have received almost one-fifth of all Nobel prizes awarded since 1901. This is all the more striking when one considers that it was as recently as the middle of the 19th century that Jews were first given the ability to attend universities and enter many different professions, especially in the various sciences!
Jews continue to be exceptionally committed to education. In America, they are twice as likely to attend college as non-Jews. At Ivy League schools, about 23% of students are Jewish, even though Jews comprise just 2% of the U.S. population, according to Hillel. In numerous top colleges, Jews comprise in excess of 30% of the student population. At least 35% of Washington students and about 30% of Emory students are Jewish, even though these are in the south, with traditionally low Jewish student populations. In 2002, the Wall Street Journal reported that many colleges were actively recruiting Jews to their ranks. This encluded Vanderbilt where Jewish enrollment had gone up from 2% in the 70’s to 4% in the 2000s. Princeton in the 1980s cultivated ties with predominantly Jewish high schools by offering merit scholarships to their graduates. One third of the University of Pennsylvania’s student body is Jewish.
Jews are prominently in the forefront pushing for social change:
1) Many of the top leaders of both the Russian and Hungarian revolutions were Jewish.
2) Approximately 60% of the members of the SDS (Students for a Democratic Society)—the major student activist organization of the 1960’s, were Jews. The two most well-known student activists of the 1960’s, Abbie Hoffman and Jerry Rubin, were both Jews. In fact, a survey by the American Council of Education in 1966-7 stated that “the best single predictor of campus protest (during the 1960’s) was the presence of a substantial number of students from Jewish backgrounds.”
3) In 1967, 40% of all Peace Corps volunteers were Jewish.
4) In careers: Jews in the USA are over represented in proportion to the general population by 231% in medicine, 233% in mathematics, 265% in law, 300% in dentistry, and 479% in psychiatry.
5) In income: Jews in the USA have the highest income of any ethnic group, 72% above the average and 40% higher than the second highest group, the Japanese.
The Gemara says that Jews are more driven for meaning than non-Jews. It is this extraordinary drive for meaning which seems to be the common denominator for all of these many differences in the behavior of even secular Jews. Whether meaning is understood in terms of science, education, desire for social change, idealism, a prestigious profession, or just money—Jews are clearly more determined and able to achieve a remarkable level of success than the general non-Jewish population around them. One thing which is abundantly clear—this phenomenon of uniqueness is just as much a function and a statement of the Jewish people themselves as it is about the Torah.
more on the Jewish impact on the world