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You stand condemned by the Noahic laws you embrace to death. What are you going to do?

Myself, I think you need a substitutionary sacrifice. Jesus is willing to take the heat, as prophesized in the Old Testament. But you obviously have another solution. What is it?

You really insist on trying to win me back to the very same beliefs I once held and came to reject? And you think you can do this by recycling arguments I myself used to use until I saw the problem with them? Okay. Exercise your fingers.

I understand that you hold that G-d, in order to be holy, must respond to the slightest sin (or actually, to the sinful nature which leads to individual sins) with eternal damnation unless the damnation is borne by a "scapegoat." You hold that if G-d forgives a sin without this that he will "topple from His Throne of Holiness" (see, I know the whole deal).

In order to justify this view you hold that the qorbanot (offerings) of the Torah were "allegories" or "prophecies" or whatever that either served only a didactic purpose or else pushed the guilt off year by year until J*sus came. Let's look at his a little closer.

The qorbanot did not suffice for all sins. They were offered only for unintentional sins and no others. What about intentional sins? Was there no forgiveness for them? Well, if all the criteria were met for the death penalty that served as an atonement. Otherwise, complete repentence between the sinner and G-d has always sufficed. In fact, the Sages observed that it was repentance that turned intentional sins into unintentional sins.

Furthermore, you are very shortsighted to insist on seeing the animal sacrifices as "prefiguring chr*st" while ignoring the many other offerings that did not involve the slaying of animals. What about the grain and wine offerings? I suppose a Catholic or Orthodox chr*stian would state that these "obviously" prefigure their "eucharist" just as you insist the slaying of the animals prefigures the death of J*sus. Why do you want to invoke only the aspects of the `Avodah useful to you while ignoring the others?

I also know all about the argument that Judaism has "obviously" been replaced because the Temple and offerings are no more. This is a totally spurious argument. the Temple was destroyed once before by Nevuchadnetzar and the offerings were not offered again for some seventy years. By this argument the messiah came in the days of Nevuchadnetzar!!! It is true that the current desolation has lasted longer than the first one, but this is more a quantitative than qualitative difference.

As a matter of fact the Torah warns many times (especially in the tokhachot of Leviticus and Deuteronomy) that G-d will allow the Temple to be destroyed, the offerings to cease, and Israel to be exiled to the four corners of the earth as a punishment for abandoning the Torah. There is not a single solitary place in the entire Torah where the `Avodah is considered temporary or where G-d says He will destroy the Temple when it has "served its purpose!" Instead He reiterates that if Israel disobeys they will be deprived of their offerings but if they return to the Torah the Temple Service will be restored to them. Can you deny this? There is not a word about the Temple offerings ceasing when the messiah comes! Their ceasing is always and only a punishment for sin (not the sin of rejecting J*sus but of abandoning the Torah) and there is always a promise that it will be restored! How do you read J*sus into this? You can't and you don't. You simply assume from the get-go that the "new testament" is part of the Bible and therefore accept its claims about J*sus being foretold in the TaNa"KH. If you did not assume this from the outset you could not believe like this.

Again (and I hope you will think about this), you must consider that the "substitutionary death" theory of the crucifixion is but one among many, and according to the Orthodox it is a late and foreign interpretation. They would probably point out as well that the crucifixion did not take place on Yom Kippur (the Day of Atonement) but at Pesach. This would probably be invoked by them as "proof" that the crucifixion was not a substitutionary sin offering but a "ransom" paid to the Devil. This is one of their pre-atonement theories. Another is the so-called "mouse trap" theory. At any rate, they will tell you that the whole idea of the crucifixion as an atoning substitionary sin offering was dreamed up in the Middle Ages by Anselm. Why would they say this? Even if it is untrue, where would this ancient chr*stian communion have gotten the idea that the crucifixion was not a substitutionary sin offering as Western chr*stians hold? Hmmm?

Are you aware that the ancient Churches do not even claim (as does classical Protestantism) that G-d HAD to damn all sins vicariously before He could forgive sinners but only chose the death of J*sus for aesthetic reasons (to illustrate His love and the seriousness of sin)?

I realize (as I said before) that you regard any claim that G-d has the power to forgive sins and to reward obedience to His Commandments as an arrogant belief that one can put G-d in debt. Yet liturgical (Catholic and Orthodox) chr*stians defend their own doctrines of works and merit by pointing out that while G-d can never "owe" anyone anything, He nevertheless has the right to forgive repentant sinners and to reward obedience to His Commandments. Why is it all right for chr*stians to obtain "merit" or forgiveness of sins but not for Jews or Noachides? All you have done is replace the Biblical G-d with J*sus and the Jewish commandments and ritual with those of chr*stianity!

And before you dismiss my invocation of the ancient churches, please consider something. You think that you can deal with all these hypocrisies of the liturgical churches by blaming them on Constantine, who allegedly corrupted an ancient Southern Baptist church. Once again, I used to believe this as well! But I am afraid you are very naive here. The Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox churches are NOT the only ancient churches that hold all the doctrines you consider "Catholic," nor do they all date back to Constantine. Did you know that the Armenian Church was made the official religion of Armenia ten years before the notorious year "313?" Why then is the Armenian Church a liturgical/ritual church with merit and demerit depending on works? Armenia was not part of the Roman Empire! Or again, how about the chr*stians of Kerala state in southwestern India, who trace their churches back to the apostle Thomas in the year "52?" How did Constantine corrupt them??? Or how about the ancient Nestorian Church of Persia and Assyria, which was never under Rome at any time and never even took part in the ancient church councils? It was a totally isolated backwater! Why isn't it like the Southern Baptist Convention? Why does it teach baptismal regeneration, ritual, works, confession of sins, etc? Well . . . why doesn't it? And btw, all these ancient churches have web sites!

The sad fact is that your "once saved always saved" vicarious damnation Protestantism has no roots in the ancient chr*stian past. Protestantism only exists either in northwestern Europe and those parts of the world colonized and missionized by northwestern Europeans. It is the ancient liturgical churches (which give the lie to your version of chr*stianity) that contain the direct desendants of the first chr*stian converts in places like Greece, Rome, Egypt, Turkey, Syria, Iraq, India, Iran, Macedonia, Ethiopia, etc. That is a plain, undeniable fact. And you want me to become a chr*stian? To be a real one I'd have to ignore you and join one of these ancient churches. And, as I point out continually, once one admits these ancient churches are the real chr*stians their hypocrisy becomes evident. Since they make J*sus a "savior" from whom one must spend a lifetime earning this "free salvation" of theirs, rael chr*stianity collapses like a house of cards. And if real chr*stianity collapses, why should I turn to a recent, inauthentic, ahistorical pretender to that name???

So if chr*stianity is the message of the Torah (!!!) I must according to you either join hypcritical churches taht extol J*sus as their savior while continuing to threaten their members with eternal damnation if they don't "do their part" or else accept a beliefs (salvation by J*sus' death alone, once saved always saved, etc.) that obviously didn't even exist in the days of the early chr*stians. Do you honestly believe I am going to accept either one of those ridiculous alternatives???

I know that at present you cannot believe that G-d is even capable of forgiving sins or granting (not owing, but granting) merit to people without the vicariously damned scapegoat, in the absence of which each and every human being must be eternally damned. Until you examine these assumptions there is no need continuing our debate. In fact G-d looks at and judges the totality of our lives in a way no one else could. Every sin and good deed is taken into account. Complete repentence erases a sin completely. In the absence of this, a sin not completely erased does not mean automatic eternal damnation. Rather it must be punished or atoned for in some other way, in this life or by one's death or in Gei' Benei Hinnom) ("Gehenna"). The souls of the truly wicked and unrepentant are ultimately destroyed. As I said, I know this is alien to you. But perhaps you should realize that nowhere in the TaNa"KH is there any such thing as "eternal damnation" in the entire book. It was invented by chr*stianity (along with the claim that it is called for by any and all sins of any kind) precisely to create the necessity for J*sus. And then after that the good chr*stian may still be damned after all, or else suffer in purgatory (Catholicism) or else have to pass through a series of demon-manned "toll booths!!!"

The whole thing sounds like one big con to me. Sorry.

PS: Allow me to give you a friendly reminder that since I do not believe the "new testament" is part of the Bible, you cannot prove anything to me by quoting it, anymore than you can prove islam by quoting the qur'an!

Be well.

"complete repentence between the sinner and G-d has always sufficed"

Agreed, but you can't reject the Son of God and simultaneously claim to be in complete repentance. Well, you can claim it, you will be wrong.

"you must consider that the "substitutionary death" theory of the crucifixion is but one among many, and according to the Orthodox it is a late and foreign interpretation.

Then the Orthodox are wrong, because the idea of a substitutionary sacrifice is clearly stated in the Apostolic writings. 1 Corinthians 5:7 - Purge out therefore the old leaven, that ye may be a new lump, as ye are unleavened. For even Christ our passover is sacrificed for us: Ephesians 5:2 - And walk in love, as Christ also hath loved us, and hath given himself for us an offering and a sacrifice to God for a sweetsmelling savour.

And if whatever you know about Christianity comes from such sources, then I would encourage you to step back and understand what the apostles said, not what some Christian sect half way around the world said hundreds of years later. It is Satan's job to introduce as much error and false doctrine and as much confusion as possible. Go back to the source instead of relying on such when you talk about Christianity.

"The sad fact is that your "once saved always saved" vicarious damnation Protestantism has no roots in the ancient chr*stian past"

And yet there is Paul long before any of these sects you quote saying, "Nothing in life nor death... can separate me from the Love of God. For I am confident that He can keep that which I've committed."

So if chr*stianity is the message of the Torah (!!!) I must according to you either join hypcritical churches ... or else accept a beliefs (salvation by J*sus' death alone, once saved always saved, etc.) that obviously didn't even exist in the days of the early chr*stians.

Didn't exist, huh? Here are the words of St. Clement, a post apostolic writer. "And we, too, being called by His will in Christ Jesus, are not justified by ourselves, nor by our own wisdom, or understanding, or godliness, or works which we have wrought in holiness of heart; but by that faith through which, from the beginning, Almighty God has justified all men; to whom be glory for ever and ever. Amen."

"Leviticus 17:11 - For the life of the flesh is in the blood: and I have given it to you upon the altar to make an atonement for your souls: for it is the blood that maketh an atonement for the soul."

Explain that to me.

"What about the grain and wine offerings? "

Grain and wine offerings are recognition that everything we have is God's. In effect they are like the tithe. If you look at the story of Cain and Able. I've heard it said, but I'm not sure scripture actually says this, is the reason Cain's offering was not accepted by God, is that it was not a "blood" offering it was grain. Thus it was not an acceptable offering for sin. It would have been fine as an offering, just not as a sin offering.

"I know that at present you cannot believe that G-d is even capable of forgiving sins or granting (not owing, but granting) merit to people without the vicariously damned scapegoat, in the absence of which each and every human being must be eternally damned.

You still have to deal with the innocent animals being sacrificed for our sins in the Torah. Does it make any difference to you that the "vicariously damned scapegoat" was God Himself?