Bnei Noach: Gentiles Spreading Monotheism

In recent years the Bnei Noach, or Noahide movement, has seen an extraordinary increase in numbers and activity around the world. Its adherents are non-Jews who embrace the truth of the Torah and therefore accept the seven ‘Laws of Noah’ – those laws which are incumbent upon gentiles as well as Jews.

Israel National Radio’s Tamar Yonah recently interviewed Jacob Sharf, a ‘Ben Noach,’ son of Noah, who explains that he espouses “The Orthodox stream of Judaism for non-Jews, which consists of observance of the seven laws given by God to Noah after the flood which are obligatory for all of humanity.” Sharf explains that “this is not a new concept, it is in fact the religious observance of Job, Adam and Abraham before God formed the unique covenant with the Jewish people.”

The seven laws are to refrain from idolatry, to refrain from sexual immorality, to refrain from blasphemy, to refrain from murder, to refrain from theft, to refrain from eating the limb of a living animal and to establish courts of law. Sharf was raised “a nominal Christian” and began studying the New Testament on his own, slowly discarding belief after belief through study of the Old Testament until he and his study partners found themselves with an identical belief system to Orthodox Judaism. He then pursued conversion to Judaism until he “realized that God had made [him] a non-Jew for a reason” and decided that there was much work to be done spreading monotheism’s belief in the One God of Abraham among the non-Jews of the world.

Sharf described the difficulty of maintaining a Noahide life and finding a support structure. “Often one finds oneself the only Ben Noach in a city,” he laments. However, with the advent of the Internet, thousands of Bnei Noach have been able to form online communities and several physical communities have formed as well. Places such as Dallas, Texas are host to hundreds of Bnei Noach and Wendell Jones (the famed archaeologist on whom the Indiana Jones movies were loosely based) even led his church to become Bnei Noach “removing the cross and the New Testament from the house of worship.”

Sharf runs an educational web site called HaMayim.org and started a Bnei Noach dating web site as well in an attempt to allow single Bnei Noach to meet one another. HaMayim means “the water” and is a reference to the verse in Isaiah (11:9) which prophesies that as the redemption of the world draws near “the earth shall be full of the knowledge of God, as the waters cover the sea.”
The rest of the interview can be heard on Israel National Radio at
http://www.israelnn.com/metafiles/asx/shows/tamar.asx

I think this conversation about the justification of religion, be it Judaism or adherence to the Noahide Laws has walked past the point of both, without seeing it. Though Jewish figures have been saying it for 3,000 years, perhaps a quote from the Noahide group would best explain, 'There is not one word in God's Torah that suggests that we suspend our intellects and indulge in what other religions refer to as "faith."' The justification for the Law is the Law itself. The legal term, I think, is res ipsa loquitur, or the truth speaks for itself. Whether or not your view of the Law is pshat(literal), or whether it is interpretive, the justification for the validity (or invalidity for that matter) of the Law is the Law itself. Maimonides (I think--correct me if I'm wrong) said that following the mitzvot (commandments in the Torah) is more important than believing that they were revealed to Moshe on Har Sinai. He goes on to say that the Law leads one to believe in its divinity.

The Noahide movement identifies the value of the Law, and attaches itself to it, rather than relying on gospel accounts or oral tradition. It is a renewal of intellectual--as opposed to faith-based--religion among the nations, something the world hasn't seen since Siddartha's early Buddhism, or Confu Tzu's Confucianism.

The seven commandments were given to Mankind before the revelation at Mount Sinai when the Jews were given the Torah or 5 books of Moses . They weren’t given all at once .
The commandments you mention in your post were given to Jews as part of the total 613 commandments given for the Children Of Israel to keep and not the gentiles of the world at that time.

Jesus was trying to preach to the gentile occupiers of Israel at that time in order to bring them closer to the one true G-d. There were a large following of gentiles who were originally pagan, that came to the Truth because of what he taught . Unfortunately what he did teach became distorted by the very Romans he tried to reach .... hence Roman Catholicism. If Jesus, who was Jewish remember, would have known that his followers were to pray to him rather the One who created him , I think he would have rethought his tactics ...as idol worship is not what he taught (which worshipping a man is). This concept is precisely what G-d told us not to do.

There is only one truth....and it ain’t always what we want to hear . Regardless of what you think of this post i pray that you will blessed with illumination where ever you look for it...and that you live a good , rewarding life that is worthy of reward.

Kind regards

Didee.

If Jesus, who was Jewish remember, would have known that his followers were to pray to him rather the One who created him , I think he would have rethought his tactics ...as idol worship is not what he taught (which worshipping a man is). This concept is precisely what G-d told us not to do.

“our Father, which art in heaven,
Hallowed be your Your name,
Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done
on Earth as it is in Heaven....”

The disciples had just asked Christ to teach them to pray, and he laid down the pattern for prayer as laid down in what is known as the Lord’s Prayer!

Doesn’t sound as if he was asking the disciples to pray to him!

My friend, can you read Biblical Hebrew? If you can't, you have no right to make an opinion because you are not reading the bible... You are reading somebody's translation, based on their own theological assumptions. When I learned Hebrew and Greek and studied early Church history (at an academic institution.... not a bible college), I stopped being a Christian. Not because I think Jesus’ ideas were blasphemous. He was a great Jew. Would that all Jews were like him. I understand the Gospel of Paul, but the gospel of Jesus was much different (I'm refering to Mt. Mk, & Lk... Jn is not authentic, written at least 100 years after the death of Jesus.) I respect Christains and the idea of a mediator between God and man is beautiful (especially with a father/son metaphor), but it is false. Learn Hebrew and remember that the Pentateuch is the base of the Bible, not Paul. Baby-steps.

I agree that the Pentateuch was the basis for the Bible...Paul quoted from it often, having been grounded in it from his youth. As for translational issues, there have been quite a few translations over the years in which the central truth has been preserved. Indeed, I trust God himself to have preserved the central core of the Hebrew texts in its translations into its various languages.

God must have known that those of his would be children would never have learned Hebrew...are you saying God is not capable of preserving the truth(especially the DIRECT HEART SENSE) of the Pentateuch as it was tranlated into other languages?

Now there is the Pentateuch in the Hebrew. There is the Pentateuch as it exists in various tranlations. Then you have the interpretations of same as would be defined and prescribed by “guides” such as the Talmud. Then you have interpretations as given directly by God’s Holy Spirit.

I could learn Hebrew right now as to get a better understanding of the core scriptures; but I wonder if my core beliefs would still change as I have been taught that Jesus Christ shines through out the old and new testaments. The Hebrew language would still say in the Hebrew as the English does in the translated Torah not to murder, steal, worship false gods, commit adultery...ect. The Hebrew as in English would describe the coming “Star arising out of Jacob, the Lion of the tribe of Judah”. The Hebrew as in English would still describe the importance of Bethlehem Ephrata, it would still describe the virgin who should conceive and bear a son named Emmanuel, or God with us.

I suspect even if I had ever learned Hebrew, you and I would still be arguing over Talmudic semantics and other sorts of split hairs. You see I found that the new testament gospels are far more rooted thru the old testaments, despite the questions in some folks minds as to the Gospels’ historicity.
I have issues with the attempts made over history to “reinforce” and “fence in to guard from pagan contamination” the Hebrew torah with a system of man made interpretations and fanciful legalese such as the Talmud and Mishna. Christ railed against such a system in which the plain sense of the scriptures were lost by means of man made reinterpretations of the Mosaic code, stating that “who ever listened to the temple leaders at that time were thrice damned more than the leaders themselves as the leaders had “taken away the Keys of Knowledge”.

No,no my friend...I suspect my having a helpful knowledge of Hebrew would get us no nearer to agreement.

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