As for using Torah observance among disbelieving Israel as a model for Christian behavior, this might be a problem:
1Jn 2:22 Who is a liar but he that denieth that Jesus is the Christ? He is antichrist, that denieth the Father and the Son.
Which basically is saying that the example you are using for "easy" Torah observance is antichrist. Did John work logic bombs too?
Who is denying that Yeshua is Messiah?
Well, we could go back and forth like this indefinitely, couldn't we. :) In the interest of breaking this infinite loop, let me suggest the problem is in the word "ratify." If it simply means to say that Jesus agreed that the law of Moses was good and in force for the duration of the Old Covenant, then of course we actually agree. If it means that the entirety of the Mosaic covenant would be in force for gentile Christians during the entirety of the New Covenant era, even after the law was fulfilled in the person and ministry of Christ, then we still have a bone to pick. So "ratify" is ambiguous, and I will continue to disagree with what I think you think it means, because Jesus knew and the apostles would all figure out that the Old Covenant was coming to an end, and any meaning of "ratify" that is truthful must comply with that fact.
In fact, I DO believe that the entirety of Moses was ratified into the new covenant, and is meant for everyone - That was the original intent for Torah, and Torah remains beyond this current age into the millennium, as recorded by the prophets, to include the Sabbath and Feast Days... And the WHOLE WORLD (implies Gentiles, no?) will keep Torah then. So again, my question is how it can be that the bride refrains from keeping what is plainly described as law in the Kingdom?
You've mentioned that now a couple of times, and as you haven't explained it to me, I can only theorize what you mean by it. I know a logic bomb is a malicious piece of code that might, for example, be buried in the systems of a nuclear power plant with intent to cause havoc at some predetermined time.
A classic logic bomb is malicious only if the software is abused. If it is used according to it's design, no untoward thing will happen, and the software is benign and useful for it's purpose.
This seems to suggest you might be one of those HR folks who think Paul was a saboteur and not a true apostle of Christianity. Is that your position?
No, I have nothing against Paul, as I have declared before - My fight is against abusing Paul by way of interpretation.
As for the point of the logic itself, I theorize you mean that Paul nefariously set up the discontinuity between the covenants as a way to attack the uninterrupted continuity of OT Torah you think should be there.
No, I am saying that you seem to be reading in a discontinuity where there can be none. No doubt Paul can be read that way, IF one is willing to say that YHWH changed His mind. But I know for a fact that He didn't. He set Torah in stone on purpose. Structurally, the contract(s) cannot be voided without pulling down the prophets too. Do that and the primary proofs of the deity of YHWH are nullified. THAT Paul can easily be read into is the abuse of code triggering the logic bomb. If one is concerned with the preservation of the structures present in the layout of the whole, Paul is saying something quite different from what you suppose.
I am guessing here, so I will take no offense if you tell me I have guessed wrong. But if I have guessed correctly, please be aware that the only logic bombs pitting one inspired writer against another inspired writer must be coming from outside the system, falsely imposed on the system by a series of false assumptions, leading to apparent contradictions when in fact there are none.
That is exactly right - If the disciples are gainsaying Messiah, or if one disciple is seen authoritatively speaking differently than the other disciples, something is drastically wrong with one's interpretation. That is why I am against the standard reading of Paul. His words need to be reconciled to his Master, and the other disciples. If one does so, he cannot be saying what everyone says he is saying. There is no private revelation. Paul MUST stand with the prophets, to include Yeshua, as must every other disciple. The prophets judge the prophets. What was already said has been said, and WILL be so.
Scripture, when rightly understood, does not have self-destructive logic bombs.
PRECISELY so.
And therefore, Paul and Jesus agree in all essential points. They have a difference of situation, in that Jesus speaks mainly from before the formal end of the Old Covenant, and Paul speaks from the perspective of one who came to faith in Christ after the inauguration of the New Covenant.
That cannot be so. Yeshua is the lawgiver. What HE says is necessarily paramount.
Jesus lays the foundation for the New Covenant, and so all of His teaching is relevant to us as believers. But it must be understood in it's temporal context. You know yourself how subtle bugs can be introduced by failing to recognize the actual scope of a variable. Use it in it's proper scope, and all is well. Use it out of scope and it leads to major headaches.
Here is the scope: Yeshua is the lawgiver. His words will never pass away. His words CANNOT be temporal. There's your problem, right there. It is the same as considering Moses' words to be temporal (malleable, fungible), which is exactly what got the Jews in so much trouble. A disciple must align EVERY word to his master's words. He cannot add to them, nor take away.
Jesus had to fulfill the final act of sacrifice under the Old Covenant law, in order to break that law's power to condemn lost sinners. When the curtain in the Holy of Holies is torn in two, by God Himself, He signals yet another change in the law, a new openness of access to the very presence of God, which the apostles will eventually teach is the consequence of His grace:
ALL TRUE. Yet the prophets show animal sacrifice in the Kingdom. Go figger.
Addressed above. I would further add that Christ spoke several times after His death and resurrection, and even after His ascension, to Paul and others, and that He promised the Holy Spirit, Who would guide us into all truth. Odd that the Holy Spirit did NOT guide the apostles into Old Covenant Torah observance.
Oh, but he did. To include Paul. That again, is read into the text by a Greek-centric mind. Understand the definition of terms as declared in Torah, and it all changes perspective.
They are all fulfilled with respect to Christ. I reiterate the passage conveying this from my last post:
But no, they are not. He has not come in glory and power to establish His Kingdom here upon earth upon the throne of David. You will find that every one of the Feasts of YHWH are all about Messiah. And the fall feasts are not accomplished... So your reading must be necessarily incorrect. In fact, the prophets declare Him through the Kingdom and beyond.
Unless one is willing to see how Christ is the fulfillment of the law, as He Himself stated, then one might never see all that is fulfilled already in Him. This is essentially the problem the Pharisees had in perceiving who Jesus was and what His appearance really meant. It requires an act of faith to understand this. They couldn't do it. Many today still can't.
I disagree emphatically. YES, in the same sense as a betrothal is a marriage... What was done at the cross makes the end game inevitable - But like a betrothal is also *not* a marriage until the consummation, the end game must still occur, and the establishment of the Kingdom must BE. Inevitable as that is, it hasn't happened YET.
Do you deny then there are two contracts? In Jeremiah 31, God says there are two. In Hebrews, there are two. Paul also here:
No, there is one, but all previous contracts are necessarily ratified en toto into the current one. None of it can pass away until all of it is fulfilled. Every jot and title. Every jot and tittle. ELSE there are many contracts, each standing on their own, awaiting fulfillment each in it's own power and way... But that is not the foregone example(s), and that is not what it says.
But the grafting in of the gentiles is NOT to the Old Covenant, but the New, and NOT to the Hebraic status quo, but an entirely new sort of entity:
I don't think you are grasping the concept of the covenants one being within the next. The Adamic Covenant did not make the Edenic covenant null - Neither did Noah nullify the Adamic. Neither did Abraham nullify the Noahdic, and so on. Each time, the previous was expanded, more revealed, by the next. Each one ratifies what was before into itself. The tricky business is in the split within Abraham/Melchizedek - There is the Inheritance, and Moses, and Aaron, and, some would argue, the Moabic covenant too. But the Inheritance is necessarily interactive with Moses, and the Davidic covenant is necessarily back-logged from within Moses, interactive with Abraham. Just as the Aaronic priesthood of Moses is within, and draws authority from, Melchizedek. Necessarily, for all intensive porpoises, ALL of the 'contracts' are interactively the SAME thing. One CANNOT make even one single word EVER UTTERED by YHWH to return to Him empty, because IT WON'T return to Him empty. If you have it so, you are doing it wrong.
You speak of logic. Let it rule the day here. This union is between Jew and Gentile, not two varieties of Old Covenant Hebrews.
No, the primary split is between the two houses. It is the sticks of the two houses that are, with exact specificity, made into one stick in the hand of Messiah.
There is no grafting in if there are no true gentile believers.
But you forget that the House of Israel inherits the gentiles. Ephraim is the fruitful bough...
And we were afar off. We were never part of that Old Covenant.
But it says 'sometimes' afar off, or more succinctly 'for some time afar off'... You are right. Gentiles were never part of the Covenant. So how could they have been 'sometimes' afar off... they have ALWAYS been off the map, according to the covenants... Since Noah.
But in this New Covenant, God takes true Jews of all houses, and puts them together with true Gentiles in one new man.
I have no argument with that, except in the ordering of it, which is specific.
The ecclesia is a new thing.
No, FRiend, it is not. The Hebrews were mikvah'd in the Red Sea, and all of Israel took bread and wine from Melchizedek in the loins of their father. It is the very same thing, except for the aspect of the discipleship of Yeshua within the greater assembly. That is new, just as the discipleship of any Rabbi is new, within the context of Torah.
Not that there haven't been assemblies before. But this one is special. Nothing else like it. Unprecedented. NEW. And it has it's own Torah, the Torah of Christ as promulgated by His Apostles.
No, there is necessarily ONE Torah. The Torah that Yeshua Himself followed as our example. Not that a Rabbi cannot give his disciples instructions (Torah means 'instruction', not 'law'), That can be 'new',,, But that is needfully within the context of Torah as handed down through Moses, lest Yeshua breaks Torah by adding to or taking from.
Now you made light of my "tautology" of love, love for God, love for each other. But my "tautology" has an advantage over yours ("All Torah is Torah," IIRC). Mine is sanctioned as central truth by Christ and His apostles, repeatedly. So the Holy Spirit must've thought it was pretty important to say. Works for me.
I didn't make light of your tautology - You were demanding specifics from me, while saying there are no specifics for you. The greatest commandments 'love YHWH and love one another', have ALWAYS been there. They are Torah. Your tautology IS Torah. There is no difference.
Your theory of wholesale incorporation is unfounded, and early attempts at such incorporation were all resisted and rejected by those same apostles.
It isn't a theory - it is right there in black and white. And no, the Apostles fought Halakha and the oral torah of the Pharisees. They necessarily had to have kept Torah.
Addressed above. Christ's own post-resurrection statement indicates the fulfillments were in Him, and were accomplished.
Countered above. The Fall Feasts are not fulfilled. Study them. They are about the Great Harvest... The Second Coming. If you can show them fulfilled to my reasonable satisfaction, I will cede. As to the new winskin, it is still a wineskin! Not a bottle. Not a set of matching tumblers from wally world. Same for same.
No, prophecy is not automatically law. Law is directive of human behavior.
I said, 'in a sense'. Prophets are too - the inheritance is all prophecy and it is directly involving the behavior of the tribes.
[...] It is descriptive. Any prophecy that is prescriptive is never in announcment of some new obligation, but is always a restatement of law already given.
you had best go read Ezekiel.
To dilute the meaning of law to incorporate everything spoken is just a convenient tactic to sweep in things not yet fulfilled, but which are not law, the end effect of which is to discount Jesus' own post-resurrection words that the fulfillment of which He spoke was what was written in the law concerning Him.
I am discounting nothing. In fact, I dare say that I probably find the blood of Messiah to be more powerful than most Christians to. The ripples from the cross travel across time in both directions.
No problem. The New Covenant is replete with multiple witnesses that the Old Covenant has passed and is no longer in force.
no, it is not. The spirit of the law is within the law. How then can the law be abrogated?
[roamer_1:] Right. Messiah removes the curses of the law. But we are continually being made in his image - His example to us shows us what that looks like. We, as disciples are to 'walk in his footsteps' - A strange phrase, that. I wonder where it comes from (heh... not really. I know where it comes from). So we are no longer doomed. We can earnestly try and try again... Keep trying to walk in his footsteps.
Nothing much to disagree with there, though I don't get your inside humor about the footsteps. Care to share that with the rest of the class? :)
It is disciple-speak. Inherent to the Hebrew Talmudim. Part of the training thereof was for them to follow single-file and literally walk in the footsteps of their master. Usually the foremost was directly behind the master, said to be 'covered in his dust'. There is much to learn in the Hebrew definition of a disciple.
But it is the point. You are switching to individual inconveniences, but the law was written for the nation. The priests could not do sacrifice. The nation was deprived of the means of obeying a huge percentage of the law of Moses. But the law didn't stop acting to condemn them. Unless you think Paul is wrong. What they should have concluded from this, and it should have come from the rabbis, is that they had no means of atonement. God took it away. Unless they found their way back the Messiah, they were condemned. The law condemned them. It's no good to make excuses. They should have been terrified. Instead they made excuses, and you appear to be ratifying those excuses to live outside the law of atonement.
You forget they have been through diaspora before. Were all the Jews in Babylon doomed because the priests could not make atonement? Daniel? Esther? Mordecai? For if your premise is true today, then it was also true then. OR, your assumptions of how this works is in error.
And while it is true that Torah is given to the nation, each individual is also responsible - Our nation is currently going through the same thing - We are besieged by our own permissive government. The federal abrogation of authority and justice does not stop me from being true to what America is - In the same way, the personal aspect of Torah cannot be denied - So the personal adherence is every bit as important as the national aspect of Torah, and every bit as open to judgement by YHWH.
Thus my examples of 'personal inconvenience' hold just as much to bear as does the national - In fact, as it touches this conversation, it bears more weight - After all, your contention against me is because I personally choose to try to keep Torah.
[roamer_1:] So was the synagogue system. It is not specified in Torah. Yet Yeshua endorsed it. Used it. Preached from it. It's Rabbinical basis was relied upon by all the Apostles. That system was the fall-back necessary for those who could not make it to Temple at least since the Babylonian exile. What then? A second Temple era Jew, living in the south of France, too poor to go to Temple three times a year (not to mention every Sabbath), was just bound for hell even if he was devout in other aspects? What of Ruth? What of Esther? No, this sense that Christians have of what the law does and what it is for is wholly their own invention.
You can't seriously be arguing that finding a building in which to study Torah, which they were already obligated to do, is the equivalent of giving up on the sacrifices demanded by the law. Apples and oranges. One is merely finding a physical means to keep the law, the other is making spiritual excuses to break the law.
No, the question is not a matter of convenience or excuse - It has been your contention that if one breaks any part of the law, one is doomed. I am simply presenting scenarios which plainly show the error in your thought - The desire to keep Torah in that poor Jew living in the South of France is more important than his actual compliance with the 'letter'... In your world, it seems that Jew will be damned for not completing the pilgrimage, regardless of his status and ability to keep the letter of the law... I would submit to you that such has never been the case. The spirit of the law was always the point, else David would have been struck dead for eating the showbread.
But no, David was forgiven. So too, no doubt that poor Jew in the Languedoc. It has always been the circumcision of the heart - that is what I have been saying all the way along.
That's a form of begging the question. He is using an Old Covenant principle that explains by analogy how the Old Covenant could cease to have force on a New Covenant believer. And he is in fact explaining how the two covenants interface with each other in the life of one person, how our identification with Christ in His death transfers us from the condemnation of the one to the newness of life in the other.
He is speaking directly to the divorce and remarriage of the House of Israel. Her bill of divorcement kept her 'afar off' - She can be the only one who married another, and stands accused of adultery. Do not miss the impact upon the crowd's Hebrews when he said those words, because that is exactly what they would react with, what they would hear. And understand too, that in those words, Paul is declaring explicitly that Yeshua IS YHWH.
As to his audience, I note a mixture of names in the epistle, and do not assume Rome to be an exclusively Jewish, or even a mainly Jewish congregation.
I would somewhat disagree - Paul went where others had not gone, so it is a mystery as to how this large congregation in Rome even occurred. I would be speculating of course, but what seems natural to me is that the Roman believers were present at Shavuot when the Spirit was given, which would point to at least a Jewish core influencing the believers there... and the interim communications must have most naturally been with the Jerusalem Church directly, else how are they even there?
Many generations of gentile believers have read this passage with sufficient understanding to get what he is saying. God designed Scripture for all believers. It is our food, the words of God, and he has made it accessible.
OK, but without the Hebrew understanding, gentile believers are missing much.
If we live according to the Torah of the New Covenant, all will be well with us, for our salvation is secured by the blood of the Lamb of God, and nothing can or will remove us from His protective care. If we try to live under both covenants, we are inviting heartache and trouble into our lives. It is disobedience, rebellion.
LOL! Are you listening to yourself? Again, we see the ONLY thing that Christians CAN'T do is keep Torah! Funny how Galatia, which is purportedly gentile according to Christian thought, is accused of keeping Torah!
[roamer_1:] That would necessarily imply that you personally had used the training wheels in the first place. [...] And the analogy is good - because once you have internalized what the training wheels teach you, you are not going to fall down any more. Because even yet, you are not to sin, and sin is transgression of the law of YHWH.
No, this is not about us personally using the training wheels. This is more what Paul spoke of in Galatians concerning the law being our tutor and leading us to Christ. The nation Israel had the training wheels. We have the Spirit, and the new creation in Christ. "Old things are passed away. Behold all things are become new." We are past the training wheels.
Again, the dichotomy is apparent - The only Scriptures the Galatians had, if they had any, are contained in Tanakh in a synagogue. The NT was not there. And Paul is telling them not to follow the Scriptures? How do you suppose he could even stand to speak in a synagogue telling them to throw their ancient Torah in the garbage can?
Good, then you admit my point, that God can modify His own law based on conditions. Thank you.
That isn't what I said. And if you cannot see the Tabernacle in the Temple, that is your problem, not mine.
Where did I say the New Covenant Law has no resemblance to the Old Covenant law? I have already said that it does resemble it. They are both from the hand of the same Lawgiver. But it is necessary to have respect for the Lawgiver. He has told us, repeatedly, this covenant is new. Not like the old.
He has also said that His Torah as given through Moses is eternal, never to pass away. If He can so easily discount what He said to the Hebrews, how then can you trust his promises? It doesn't make any sense at all.
Eph 1:3-5 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ: (4) According as he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before him in love: (5) Having predestinated us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to himself, according to the good pleasure of his will, ...Those blessings bestowed on us in Christ are the culmination of plans He laid since the beginning of time, which could not have been accomplished through the levitical priesthood, but rather had to displace said priesthood to make way for Christ. which displacement was always part of the plan. He has not changed His mind, but He has advanced His plan through logical stages.
SR: The ecclesia is a new thing.
RM: No, FRiend, it is not. Paul said it is. One new man. God said it is. A new covenant, not like the old. Jesus said it is. New wine that will burst old wineskins. There's your two, er, three witnesses. I really don't know what else might convince you. Honest.
You forget they have been through diaspora before. Were all the Jews in Babylon doomed because the priests could not make atonement? Daniel? Esther? Mordecai? For if your premise is true today, then it was also true then.
I refer you again to Hebrews 7. During the Babylonian captivity the Old Covenant was still in force. messiah had not yet come. But now there is no more atonement in the levitical system, either hoped for or actual. It has been replaced by Christ as our High Priest. The former diasporas had no Jesus to reject. Now they do, and they have. Therefore they are doomed apart from Christ, no matter how much of the old system they seek to retain, and they are no examples for Christians to follow in terms of true Torah observance.
After all, your contention against me is because I personally choose to try to keep Torah.
Not really. If you want to keep the entire law of Moses, though, you are missing your levites. And even if all you wanted was to eat kosher and honor the feast days and wear clothing of unmixed fabric, then fine, do that. But your basis does not appear to be "personal." I base this only on the words you have said. I'm not trying to read your mind. But you have said you believe these things are true for all believers, only that you have chosen to respond to them, which puts all believers who don't see Torah the way you do in that vast lump of Christians you apparently think poorly of:
Col 2:16-17 Let no man therefore judge you in meat, or in drink, or in respect of an holyday, or of the new moon, or of the sabbath days: (17) Which are a shadow of things to come; but the body is of Christ.Can you honestly say it is indifferent you if we "greekified" Christians eat bacon, meet for worship on Sundays, and haven't got a clue or a care what day it is on the Hebrew calendar? If it is not indifferent to you, I do not know how you can claim it is mere personal preference. Especially when you are willing to devote so much time and energy attempting to persuade other believers of these merely "personal" preferences. I'm not buying it.
Gal 5:2-3 Behold, I Paul say unto you, that if ye be circumcised, Christ shall profit you nothing. (3) For I testify again to every man that is circumcised, that he is a debtor to do the whole law.And lest you think I rely too much on Paul for this idea, we also have James chiming in:
Jas 2:8-11 If ye fulfil the royal law according to the scripture, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself, ye do well: (9) But if ye have respect to persons, ye commit sin, and are convinced of the law as transgressors. (10) For whosoever shall keep the whole law, and yet offend in one point, he is guilty of all. (11) For he that said, Do not commit adultery, said also, Do not kill. Now if thou commit no adultery, yet if thou kill, thou art become a transgressor of the law.Guilty of all. Notice the basis of his argument. Being a law-breaker means defying the Lawgiver. It doesn't matter at which point you cross the border into lawlessness. One step over the line and you're an outsider. Boom. Just like that.
Joh 3:17-19 For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved. (18) He that believeth on him is not condemned: but he that believeth not is condemned already, because he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God. (19) And this is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil.Many, many other passages apply. There is no salvation in any other name, least of all in "trying" to be Torah compliant while simultaneously rejecting the Giver of the Torah. See, no matter what "stuff" you find to do, the heart of man is continuously evil. We are dead in our trespasses and sins. Without addressing that problem, the problem of our lustful, rebellious heart, no amount of effort or "good intentions" can save us. The Old Covenant has been displaced by the New, and it is the message of the New we are to bring to the nations, and to Israel, that Jesus saves, and marvelously so, that just as He calmed the wind and the waves, so He can still our hearts from the tempest of sin that governs them. Why deprive anyone of that message, and the extreme seriousness of it, over useless speculation that defies clear-as-a-bell apostolic Torah?
Rom 7:1-6 Know ye not, brethren, (for I speak to them that know the law,) how that the law hath dominion over a man as long as he liveth? (2) For the woman which hath an husband is bound by the law to her husband so long as he liveth; but if the husband be dead, she is loosed from the law of her husband. (3) So then if, while her husband liveth, she be married to another man, she shall be called an adulteress: but if her husband be dead, she is free from that law; so that she is no adulteress, though she be married to another man. (4) Wherefore, my brethren, ye also are become dead to the law by the body of Christ; that ye should be married to another, even to him who is raised from the dead, that we should bring forth fruit unto God. (5) For when we were in the flesh, the motions of sins, which were by the law, did work in our members to bring forth fruit unto death. (6) But now we are delivered from the law, that being dead wherein we were held; that we should serve in newness of spirit, and not in the oldness of the letter.Sorry, no mention of the House of Israel here. This is clearly what I said before, an analogy in the law of Moses that demonstrates how death operates to create a condition where what was once impermissible is now permissible. A second marriage while the first spouse lives is adultery. That's what's prohibited. Death of the spouse sets the woman in the example free from that law, and can now do what was formerly prohibited. Likewise, when we through Christ die to the law, what was prohibited when we were married to the letter of that law is permitted now that we are married to Christ.
SR: Good, then you admit my point, that God can modify His own law based on conditions. Thank you.
RM: That isn't what I said.
Yep, you're right. I went back and reread it and concluded I didn't understand what you had said. It was about the divorce modification. What your point was is still unclear to me. Nevertheless, the addition of a divorce rule was in fact a modification. Otherwise Jesus would not have drawn the contrast. I speak as a lawyer. I know a modification when I see one. As applies to the Temple versus the tabernacle.
And if you cannot see the Tabernacle in the Temple, that is your problem, not mine. Well no, it's really your problem, for the simple reason that folks who have no problem with God making changes to His own law will have no trouble seeing that the tabernacle wasn't unpacked and set up inside the Temple. That's frankly ludicrous. But if it's what you want to believe, Ok then.
He has also said that His Torah as given through Moses is eternal, never to pass away. If He can so easily discount what He said to the Hebrews, how then can you trust his promises? It doesn't make any sense at all. Well, for such a sweeping statement, I would have expected a reference to the Biblical text. Where does it say the law of Moses will never pass away? I know there are a number of passages that use the Hebrew word עולם, but all that means is basically "far out into the indefinite future" It does not inherently mean "having no end." That is conditioned by the thing being referenced. Now we know that God Himself IS eternal, but it is obvious from the appearance of the New Covenant that aspects of the Old Covenant were inferior and had to give way to a better covenant. Which makes sense. We are the changing ones. God's plan for our redemption reflects both our maturation and God's eternality.
So here's my dilemma. The facts concerning the newness of the New Covenant are so obvious on their face, that no valid options exist for reconciliation with the Hebrew Roots proposition that there really isn't a New Covenant. The HR proponent is stuck with trying to allow for the language of New Covenant without allowing for the substance, real newness, new wine. All of that newness language becomes illusory at best, or an excuse to attack the Greek text at worst. This is not a question of trying to avoid logic bombs in Paul that aren't there. This is a question of dealing with the obvious. And that's a problem. I've spent significant time on this (as I'm sure you have too), but it is proving unprofitable to continue. If we can't get past obvious, then I think I need to bow out. I have no hard feelings, and am very happy for the civil tone of the discussion, but I must get other important things done.
So if you will excuse me, I will push myself away from the table for now. At some indefinite point in the future, we may revisit these things. Until then, I wish you well.
Peace,
SR