“But do not think I will accuse you before the Father. Your accuser is Moses, on whom your hopes are set. If you believed Moses, you would believe me, for he wrote about me. But since you do not believe what he wrote, how are you going to believe what I say?”
Here we come to the nub of the Jews' unbelief. It was how they read the books of Moses. Instead of seeing them as pointing forwards to the Messiah, they read them as if they were sufficient unto themselves. The point is not that keeping the Law is sufficient to please God, because nobody can and the temporary plug in the gap, namely the sacrifice of animals can never assuage the anger of God. It takes God himself in the person of Jesus to atone for the sins of the world.
At the last Assize it will not be Jesus who accuses but Moses himself, because as plain as he could be he was still distorted. He pointed forwards to Jesus but the Jews effectively turned him into a demi-god and worshiped the product rather than the Creator; the creation rather than the Redeemer.
Jews are allowed to admire and praise Moses as our greatest sage, but never ever to worship him. His grave site is unknown to prevent such a practice. Moses himself was punished for taking credit that was not his but G-d's. "Because you did not trust Me enough to sanctify Me in the eyes of Israel, therefore you will not lead them into the land." ." (Num 20:12)
ReplyDeleteThere are many ways to read the Hebrew Bible, but no thoughtful Jew would include making Moses into a demi-God or mistaking the creation for the creator.
Be well G-d bless
Brian
I take it back. Jesus' accusation to the Pharisees was that they failed to see in Moses' writings the prophesy of the Messiah to come and how exactly the Messiah would be manifest, namely as a suffering servant and not just as a triumphant king. He would in fact be both.
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