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Two Paths for Living Your Life

 

Deuteronomy 30:15-16 are well-known verses in Jewish and Christian circles:

 

See, I have set before you today life and TOV, death and RAH,

in that I command you today to love the Lord your God,

to walk in His ways, and to keep His commandments, His statutes,

and His judgments, that you may live and multiply; and the Lord your God

will bless you in the land which you go to possess.

 

Most Christian, and probably many Jewish readers, are not aware that the word TOV is in the quote above. Below are the two paths:

 

● Path #1 -- Life and TOV

 

● Path #2 – Death and RAH

 

By the early first century CE when Jesus taught, interpretations of Jewish teachers divided Path #1 into two separate paths (Pirke d’Rabbi Eliezer, chap. 15).”

 

● Life and TOV Path #1 -- Love the Lord your God.

 

● Life and TOV Path #2 – Walk in His ways and keep His commandments.

 

In my email, Did You Know There Are Two Golden Rules?, I introduced a key point for understanding the teachings of Jesus:

 

Other people have conversations. Jews have arguments.

 

Jewish teachers and early rabbis, however, made a distinction between “an argument for the sake of heaven” and other kinds of arguments. Classic examples of “arguments for the sake of heaven” are the arguments between Hillel and Shammai.

 

The words of Hillel and Shammai are the words of the living God.

Two opposing opinions can both represent the words of the living God.

 

Both sides are presenting God’s will as they understand it and both sides understand and respect that fact. This type of argument produces “both/and” choices, instead of “either/or” options. The goal is to create a balance between the “both/and” choices.

 

● Hillel chose Life and TOV Path #1 -- The path of love and he focused on the relationships between human and human. He taught that it is through one’s acts of love for other people that one loves God.

 

● Shammai chose Life and TOV Path #2 – He called it the path of tzedaqah (righteousness). He focused on the relationships between humans and God. It is important to note that for Shammai, tzedaqah meant “correctly interpreting the words of the Torah.”

 

Jesus became an active participant in this argument when he spoke the words below (Matthew 22:34-40):

 

Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul

and with all your mind. This is the first and greatest commandment.

 

And the second is like it: Love your neighbor as yourself. All the

Torah and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.”

 

Jesus addressed the arguments of both Hillel and Shammai.

 

In order to love God, one must love their neighbor.

When you love your neighbor, you love God.

The foundation of the Scriptures is love of God and love neighbor.

 

I closed my previous email with the words of Jesus below (Matthew 5:20). He adds something new to the arguments of Hillel and Shammai.

 

Unless your tzedaqah exceeds the tzedaqah of the scribes and Pharisees,

you will by no means enter the Kingdom of Heaven!

 

Jesus changed Shammai’s definition of tzedaqah (correctly interpreting the words of the Torah) to Isaiah’s meaning (giving food to the hungry, drink to the thirsty, giving clothes to the naked, etc.). Take another look at what Jesus said in light of this change.

 

Unless your acts of giving food to the hungry, drink to the thirsty,

giving clothes to the naked, etc., exceed those of the scribes and Pharisees,

you will by not enter the Kingdom of Heaven!

 

One must do acts of tzedaqah (like those above) to love God, love neighbor, and keep the commandments correctly.

 

Remember, this is “an argument for the sake of heaven.” Hillel, Shammai and Jesus present three “both/and” arguments for how to do what we read in Deuteronomy – “Choosing the path of life and TOV.”

 

Keep in mind that at the time Jesus spoke the words above, the New Testament did not exist, Christianity did not exist, original sin did not exist, “saved by grace through faith” did not exist, science did not exist, and American democracy did not exist. Remove all of those things from your thinking and then take another look at the words of Jesus in Matthew, Mark and Luke.

 

Please share and discuss this email with others. Thank you for exploring biblical heritages with us.

 

Shalom,

Jim Myers

 

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SOURCES

● The Life and Teachings of Hillel by Yitzhak Buxbaum © 1994. Jason Aronson Inc. Northvale, NJ; p. 198.

● The Wisdom of Judaism: An Introduction to the Values of the Talmud By Rabbi Dov Peretz Elkins (2007); Jewish Lights Publishing, Woodstock, VT; p. 5.

● Morality: Restoring The Common Good In Divided Times By Jonathan Sacks © 2020; Basic Books, New York, NY; pp. 186-188.

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