Sacrifice, Circumcision, and Their Places

The next claim is not a verse but an objection, and it is meant to end the discussion.

“If you are going to keep the Torah, you must also offer sacrifices, circumcise, and stone people. You cannot pick and choose.”

The point behind it is fair. If someone keeps the Sabbath and the food laws but quietly ignores the altar and the courtroom, it can look as though he has built a religion of his own out of the parts he likes, and no one has the right to do that with God’s word.

“You cannot pick and choose” is true, and that is exactly why we must look at what the Torah itself appointed to be done, where it was to be done, and by whom. Sacrifice, circumcision, and punishment are three different things, and the Torah gives each one its own rules. This chapter takes the first two, and the next takes the third.

The Rules of the House

Picture a family with a list of house rules on the refrigerator. Everyone clears his own plate. No shoes on the carpet. And one more: only Dad lights the grill, and only on the back patio.

Suppose the eight-year-old resolves to keep all the house rules. That does not mean he lights the grill. The rule about the grill has a person and a place written into it, and for the eight-year-old, keeping it means leaving the matches alone. If the family moves to an apartment with no patio, no one lights the grill at all, and that is not breaking the rule but keeping it.

Keeping all the rules does not mean that everyone does everything. It means that each rule is kept in the way the rule itself says.

Sacrifice Has an Address

The Torah did not allow sacrifice to be offered just anywhere.

Deuteronomy 12:5-6 But to the place which the LORD your God shall choose out of all your tribes to put his name there, to his dwelling shall you seek, and you shall come there; and you shall bring there your burnt offerings, and your sacrifices, and your tithes, and the heave offering of your hand, and your vows, and your freewill offerings, and the firstlings of your herd and of your flock;

The offerings were to be brought to one place, “the place which the LORD your God shall choose.” A few verses later Moses forbids the alternative:

Deuteronomy 12:13-14 Take heed to yourself lest you offer up your burnt offerings in every place that you see; but in the place which the LORD shall choose in one of your tribes, there you shall offer up your burnt offerings, and there you shall do all that I command (tzivvah צָוָה tsaw-vaw') you.

The burnt offerings were not to be offered in someone’s backyard, or on a hill that seemed holy, but only “in the place which the LORD shall choose.” That place was the house where He put His name, and the Passover itself could not be sacrificed “within one of your gates” (Deuteronomy 16:5).

The temple in Jerusalem was destroyed in AD 70. There is no altar at the place He chose, and no priesthood serving there. What, then, does the Torah say to a believer who wants to keep all of it? It tells him not to offer a sacrifice anywhere else. No temple, no sacrifice: that is the Torah’s own rule. Not offering sacrifices today is not ignoring the Torah. It is obeying it.

What Hebrews Says Changed

Hebrews gives a second reason.

Hebrews 10:11-14 And every priest stands daily, ministering and offering the same sacrifices repeatedly — sacrifices that can never take away sins. But when Messiah had offered for all time a single sacrifice for sins, He sat down at the right hand of God, waiting from that time until His enemies should be made a footstool for His feet. For by a single offering He has perfected for all time those who are being sanctified.

The daily offerings of the priests “can never take away sins,” while the Messiah’s single offering has “perfected for all time those who are being sanctified.”

Hebrews also says that something did change.

Hebrews 7:12 For when there is a change in the priesthood, there is necessarily a change in the nomos νόμος nom'-os(law) as well.

As we saw in Book 2, what Hebrews says changed is the priesthood and the sacrifices that belong to it. Hebrews describes those sacrifices in this way:

Hebrews 9:9-10 this is a parable for the present kairos καιρός kahee-ros'(appointed-time), in which doron δῶρον do'-ron(offerings, gifts) and sacrifices are offered that cannot perfect the worshiper in terms of conscience, since they involve only foods and drinks and various washings, ordinances of the sarx σάρξ sarx(flesh), imposed until the kairos(appointed-time) of reformation.

These are gifts and sacrifices “that cannot perfect the worshiper in terms of conscience.” The foods, drinks, and washings named there are the ones that went with those gifts and sacrifices, “ordinances of the sarx(flesh)” bound up with the sanctuary service. Hebrews is speaking of the priesthood and its offerings, not of the commandments as a whole. It never says that the Sabbath changed, or that “you shall not steal” changed.

One more detail matters here. When Hebrews was written, the temple was still standing.

Hebrews 8:4 Now if He were on earth, He would not be a priest at all, since there are priests who offer doron(offerings, gifts) according to the nomos(law).

The verb is in the present tense: “there are priests who offer doron(offerings, gifts) according to the nomos(law).” The priests were still serving. Hebrews did not tell anyone to tear the temple down. It explained what the temple and its sacrifices meant, and it pointed to the One they had always pointed to.

Circumcision and the Whole Law

The second item on the list is circumcision, and the verse quoted against it comes from Galatians.

Galatians 5:2-4 Behold I, Paul, say to you that if you receive circumcision, Messiah will be of no benefit to you. And I testify again to every man who receives circumcision, that he is under obligation to keep the whole nomos(law). You have been severed from Messiah, you who are seeking to be justified by nomos(law); you have fallen from charis χάρις khar'-ece(grace).

Paul testifies “to every man who receives circumcision, that he is under obligation to keep the whole nomos(law).” The claim reads this as a warning against keeping the Torah at all: once you start, you must do all of it, and no one can.

The next verse, however, tells us whom Paul is addressing: “You who are seeking to be justified by nomos(law).” He is not saying that whoever keeps the Torah must keep all of it. He is saying that whoever seeks to be justified by circumcision has chosen a road and must walk it to the end, and verse 4 says where that road leads: such a person has been “severed from Messiah” and has “fallen from charis(grace).”

The apostles answered the question of circumcision for the nations in the same way. At the council in Jerusalem some insisted, “Unless you are circumcised according to the custom of Moses, you cannot be saved” (Acts 15:1). The council’s answer was no. Circumcision is not a condition of salvation for Gentile believers. What Paul warned against was circumcision received in order to be justified.

Paul Was Not Picking and Choosing

If Paul had been opposed to circumcision as such, his own conduct with two of his closest companions would make no sense.

Acts 16:3; Galatians 2:3 Paul wanted this man to go with him; and he took him and circumcised him because of the Jews who were in those parts, for they all knew that his father was a Greek. … But not even Titus, who was with me, though he was a Greek, was compelled to be circumcised.

He circumcised Timothy, whose mother was Jewish, and he did not circumcise Titus, who was a Greek. That was not inconsistency, and Paul was not picking and choosing. He was doing what the Torah and the council’s decision required for the person in front of him.

Each Commandment in Its Place

Put the two together, and the objection falls. Sacrifice belongs only to the place He chose, and Messiah has offered the single sacrifice for sins (Hebrews 10:12). Circumcision is not a condition of salvation, and Galatians 5:3 is aimed at those who seek to be justified by it. When there is no temple, not offering sacrifice is keeping the Torah, and a Gentile believer who refuses circumcision as a condition of salvation stands where the council stood.

Neither of these touches the Sabbath, the food laws, or the Ten Commandments. None of those requires an altar or a priesthood, and nothing in the Torah’s own rules keeps a believer from keeping them today.

The objection had a third item, however: “Then you have to stone people too.” That item raises a question of its own: whom did the Torah ever tell to carry out its penalties?