The Law Was Only for Israel

Today we come to the third important point which must be recognised in connection with the law, and this is a matter of actual historical fact: the system of law given by Moses was ordained by God solely for one small section of the human race, and that was the people of Israel after their deliverance from the bondage of Egypt.

Nowhere in the Bible is there any suggestion that God ever intended that the Gentiles, either nationally or individually, should observe the law of Moses, either wholly or in part. The only exception to this is found in the case of a few individual Gentiles who voluntarily decided to associate themselves with Israel and thereby to place themselves under all the legal and religious obligations which God had imposed upon Israel. Such Gentile converts to Judaism are in the New Testament called “proselytes.” Apart from these, the obligations of the law have never been imposed by God upon any Gentile.

Thus we may briefly sum up the three important facts necessary to recognise before we study the relationship of the Christian believer to the law.

1. The law was given once for all, as a single, complete system, through Moses; thereafter, nothing could ever be added to it or taken from it.
2. The law must always be observed in its entirety as a single, complete system; to break any one point of the law is to break the whole law.
3. As a matter of human history, this system of law was never ordained by God for Gentiles, but only for Israel.