Sabbatarian Views Debunked + Difficult Texts
Paul was "not under the Law"
Paul sometimes qualifies the phrase “under the law” with a negative adverb like “not” or “never” in order to warn all Christians, Jew or Gentile, not to observe the Law of Moses (see Rom. 6:14; Gal. 5:18).
In 1 Corinthians 9:20 Paul, the Jew and Christian, says:
“I myself am not under the Law”! Instead, he says, he is “under the Law of Messiah” (1 Cor. 9:21).
See also Romans 8:2:
“The law of the spirit of life in Messiah Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and death” (and Gal. 6:2: “the Law of Messiah”).
So for Paul, to be “under the Law” (Gal. 4:5) meant the same as bondage “under elemental principles of the world” (Gal. 4:3).
The early Jewish-Gentile church could no longer serve and be subject to the strict Old Covenant system which included weekly, monthly, and annual festivals (Col. 2:16).
Paul makes clear that such observance is now equal to Gentile paganism itself!
For more see https://jesuskingdomgospel.com/the-jew-gentile-gnostic-heresy/
https://jesuskingdomgospel.com/the-anti-grace-of-john-1/
Another View 1: Paul meant "not under [the penalty] of the Law"
False claim: when you see “under the Law” add “under the penalty of the Law.”
For example, Romans 6:14 ("you are not under law but under grace") means that Christians are no longer subject to the Law’s power to condemn.
Since all have sinned (Romans 3:23), the Law brings death and judgment. But under grace, that penalty is removed through Christ.
Romans 7 speaks of dying to the Law through Christ. But in verse 12 Paul says: “The law is holy, and the commandment is holy and righteous and good.” This, they argue, shows Paul’s issue is not with the Law itself, but with how it condemns sinful people.
But apart from being not what the Greek says, this would render Galatians 4:21 unintelligible:
“Tell me, you who want to be under the law, do you not listen to the law?”
This cannot mean, “Tell me, you who want to be under the penalty/condemnation of the law...”
No one wants to be under “the penalty of” the law; therefore “under the law” can have no such meaning.
Obviously, Galatians 4:21 is speaking to those who do not yet understand that they should not be responsible to the Law of Moses in the letter.
Paul pleads with them to be otherwise.
We must let Paul tell us what he means by “under the law,” for after all, it is he who is responsible for this phrase throughout the New Testament.
Another View 2: Born Under the Law = live and die keeping the Law
The claim: Jesus and Paul were born and raised under the Law (Phil. 3:5; Gal. 4:4) therefore, they had to live and die keeping that same Law.
But that would be like saying a foreigner living in another country had to continue to live and die by the laws of their birth country.
The fact is that Paul reminds the churches that they have now been set free from the yoke and bondage of the Law of Moses because Christ “cancelled the debt ascribed to us in the decrees that stood against us. He took it away, nailing it to the cross” (Col. 2:14).
Therefore, “If you have died with Messiah to the elemental spirit forces of the world, why, as if you were alive in the world, do you submit to decrees — do not handle, do not taste, do not touch?
All these regulations refer to things that will perish with use; they are just human commands and doctrines. These rules may seem to be wise with their invented religion, ascetic practices, and severe treatment of the body, but they are in reality of no value in stopping sinful indulgence” (Col. 2:20-23; see also Rom. 14:14, 20).
For more see https://jesuskingdomgospel.com/the-diplomacy-of-jesus-and-paul/
