F4F | How Progressives Misuse the Lex Talionis to Obliterate Scripture

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Welcome to another installment of Fighting for the Faith. My name is Chris Roseborough. I am your servant in Jesus Christ.

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This is the channel that compares what people are saying in the name of God to the Word of God. All right, we're going to do a couple of videos, one this week and another in a few weeks, on Stephen Schock.

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He is a progressive, and progressive theology is not

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Christianity. In fact, progressives are, let's just say, very, very aggressively anti -sound doctrine.

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In fact, the late Walter Martin accused them of idolatry. In his lecture on the cult of liberalism,

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Walter Martin, I think, rightly points out that the false God of progressive theology, of liberalism, in either its modern or,

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I would now say, in its postmodern manifestations, that they have a false God. Now, in the Epistle of 1

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John, it says that God is love, but what liberals do is they flip it.

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Love is God, and love is God is an interesting thing, but what they end up doing is that they then define what love is.

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And sadly, far too many people who call themselves Christians have fallen for the lies of progressives who attack and malign the authority of Scripture in order to take away what

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God's Word says and its commands, and then replace it with their false

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God of love, and their false definition of love, and they buy into the kind of the utilitarian religion of the day that it's all about making the most amount of people as happy as possible in their own individual identities and how they self -identify.

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Yeah, you get the idea. So what we're gonna do is, in fact, let me do this. I'm gonna whirl up the desktop.

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That right there is St. Paul's. I shot that from the Millennium Bridge the week before the

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PCR conference, actually, Pirate Christian Media Conference that we held in Swansea in the

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United Kingdom. Those were the days when you can travel. Anyway, this is one of my favorite black -and -white photos that I've ever shot, but that's a different talk altogether.

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Let's do this. Let's pull up the browser, and Stephen Schock, if you're not familiar with this guy, he's a

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Baptist minister in the United Kingdom, you know, the guy who founded the Open Church Network, I think he's part of the

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Oasis Charitable Trust, and has also been quite the activist as it relates to dealing with and fighting human trafficking, for which

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I think that's commendable work. That being said, what he does here in this video is so sneaky.

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It is an absolute perfect picture of how progressives, while claiming fidelity to the

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Bible, use bad ideas and misappropriations of concepts in Scripture in order to pit

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Jesus against the other authors of Scripture and then obliterate the other authors of Scripture, like Moses and stuff like that.

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We'll talk about how this is done. And by the way, we're going to be talking today about what's called the Lex Talionis. Lex Talionis is the law of retaliation, and we'll note how

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Stephen Schock misuses this concept in order to accuse, and he will do this overtly, accuse

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Moses of putting words in God's mouth. And then we'll compare what he says to what

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Jesus says, as well as Jesus' apostles, Paul and Peter. So, grab a

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Bible. We're going to do some biblical work here in a minute, and we'll talk about the Lex Talionis. But I need to let

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Stephen Schock spin his argument out, and so this is from his 2018 video

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Schock Talk Number 8. And if it doesn't look like Jesus, it's not from God.

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At least that's what he claims. Here we go. If you ever get a chance to visit the

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Louvre in Paris, head past Leonardo da Vinci's Mona Lisa. It's worth a look, but it is rather small.

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And don't leave without seeing the Code of Hammurabi. Now, I gotta say this.

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I love the way the British pronounce things, because we Americans, we're not quite as civilized in how we pronounce the eight things.

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So, I noticed he said Hammurabi. We would here in the United States call him Hammurabi.

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At least I think that's the Andrew Jackson pronunciation of it. Anyway, all of that being said,

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I prefer their way of pronouncing things. Hammurabi. That just sounds great.

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Hammurabi was the sixth king of the ancient kingdom of Babylon. He lived around 500 years before Moses was born, and his code, written in about 1770

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BC, is one of the first sets of laws or commands in recorded history.

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Now, this is true. In fact, this should probably take you back to middle school, when you had to take a class on Western civilization, and you need to learn about the

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Fertile Crescent. Remember these concepts? And Mesopotamia, the land between the rivers, the

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Tigris and the Euphrates. All right? So, it's absolutely true that Hammurabi's code, that it was one of the first codifications of civil and criminal law, and the limiting of what would become, you know, like, the proper way of getting justice and injuries regarding crimes and breaking of civil codes.

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Let me explain. We'll take a look here. So, Hammurabi is one of these guys who kind of founded the concept of eye for an eye, and although Wikipedia is not the most scholarly of places,

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I think it gives us at least a good ballpark understanding of what Hammurabi's code was all about.

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So, this is what we call the Lex Talionis, or the law of retaliation. This is the principle that a person who has injured another person is to be penalized to a similar degree by the injured party.

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In softer interpretations, it means the victim receives the estimated value of the injury in compensation, and the intent behind the principle was to restrict compensation to the value of the loss.

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And what made Hammurabi's code so revolutionary is that, you know, in the days before, there were, you know, like major court systems and, you know, and police and things like that.

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Let's just say that justice was one of them things that could be handled vigilante style, and justice sometimes resulted in ever -increasing escalations and never -ending escalations of violence that got to the point of, like, family feud style.

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Okay, the Hatfields and the McCoys, you know, constantly picking off relatives and stuff like that, and they can't even remember what was the initial thing that started the feud in the first place.

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So Hammurabi's code, then, was the whole point was to restrict the compensation and to create a definition, then, for what we would consider, then, civil justice.

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And that's the first time that, in human history, where that gets recorded in such a way.

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And you'll note that similar concepts, then, are rolled into the Mosaic Covenant. We'll talk about that in a minute.

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We'll also note the Encyclopedia Britannica also points these things out. Lex Talionis, the principle developed in early

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Babylonian law and present—it's also present in both biblical and early Roman law—that criminals should receive as punishment precisely those injuries and damages that they had inflicted upon their victims.

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And many early societies applied this eye -for -an -eye principle, literally.

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So that's the idea. It's about limiting and coming up with a definition, then, what is considered justice and what is considered to be a proper amount of compensation when there has been loss or injury as a result of somebody's behavior.

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Sometimes intentional, sometimes unintentional. And then you'll note that these concepts appear in the

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Mosaic Covenant. And I'll give you a couple of instances here. So when we look at the

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Mosaic Covenant, we recognize that there are three types of law in the Mosaic Covenant. There is civil law.

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And so when we see sections that talk about compensation in the Mosaic Covenant—eye for eye, tooth for tooth, or limiting injuries or defining what compensation would be—those portions of the

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Mosaic Covenant are the civil laws. When we look at the laws as it pertains to the tabernacle, the sacrifices, the feast days, even the

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Sabbath, those are all ceremonial laws and those are types and shadows that find their fulfillment in Christ.

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Colossians chapter 2 makes this very clear. And then the third type of law is moral law.

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These are laws that define what is good, evil, right, wrong. And nine of the

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Ten Commandments define that out. The law regarding the Sabbath, that's actually a ceremonial law in the

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Ten Commandments. Again, Colossians chapter 2—see your cross -reference there— because Colossians 2 makes it clear the

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Sabbath is a shadow, the substance belongs to Christ, and then you can see how the substance of that shadow is fulfilled by reading

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Hebrews chapter 4. But all that being said, you shall not murder, you shall not steal, you shall not bear false witness, you shall not covet.

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Those are moral law, okay, and they define what is good and evil. And the moral law of God is eternal, it's forever.

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So all of that being said, you get the idea here. But I'm gonna note, before we go back to Stephen Shock, that he is not going to give us a proper understanding of the lex talionis as it relates to either

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Hammurabi or Moses, and there's a reason for that, because he's just gonna talk about this idea of retaliation.

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But it's not retaliation in retaliation for the sake of retaliation.

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It's about what is a just compensation for an injury or for the loss of property.

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And so in our day and age, we still have these kinds of codes, you know.

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So if somebody steals a car and they're found guilty of grand theft auto, their punishment can be, can include up to, you know, a $50 ,000 fine and three years in prison or something like that.

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You get the idea. That's your right connection. So in our day, we still have civil and criminal codes and compensations that are defined legally in our law codes.

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That's kind of the idea. So let me give you some Mosaic Covenant examples of civil law in this regard, talking about compensation and limiting what that compensation can be.

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So in Exodus 21, verses 22 and 23, here's what it says, when men strive together and hit a pregnant woman.

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So two men are tussling and they're having, you know, one of them stupid man fights, and a woman, a pregnant woman gets hit inadvertently, so that her children come out, but there is no harm.

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The one who hit her shall surely be fined, as the woman's husband shall impose on him, and he shall pay as the judge is determined.

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But if there is harm, then you shall pay life for life.

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So you'll note here, we got an example of Lex Talionis' life for life as it relates to an unborn child, all right?

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I think that that's a significant concept. And then other portions, you know, like Leviticus chapter 24, whoever takes a human life, okay?

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So we're talking about, this could be murder or manslaughter, it kind of depends on whether or not there was malice or intent involved.

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Whoever takes a human life shall surely be put to life. Whoever takes an animal's life shall make it good, make it good, life for life.

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If anyone injures his neighbor as he has done, it shall be done to him.

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Fracture for fracture, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, whatever injury he has given, a person shall be given to him.

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Whoever kills an animal shall make it good. Whoever kills a person shall be put to death. This is murder here.

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You shall have the same rule for the sojourner and for the native, for I am Yahweh your God. Again, civil laws.

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We still have these to this day, all right? Deuteronomy 19, a single witness shall not suffice against a person.

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So you'll note there is an actual jurisprudence set up, there's a judicial process in place, and there are rules regarding evidence.

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Oh, if only people in the Church would follow these rules. If a single witness shall not suffice against a person for any crime or for any wrong in connection with any offense that he has committed.

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Only on the evidence of two witnesses or of three shall a charge be established. If a malicious witness arises to accuse a person of wrongdoing, and those still exist to this day,

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I know quite a lot about them, then both parties to the dispute shall appear before Yahweh, before the priest, and the judges who are in the office in those days—notice, judges, you know, where there's witnesses, there's got to be those who are rightly put in place who can make, who can render a judgment, right?

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The judges shall inquire diligently, and if the witness is a false witness and has accused his brother falsely, then you shall do to him as he meant to do to his brother.

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You shall purge the evil from your midst, and the rest shall hear in fear, and you shall never again commit any such evil among you.

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Your eye shall not pity, it shall be life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot.

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So there's your concept. And we're going to note then, when we get to the Gospel of Matthew, Jesus talks about this, and here's the issue, is that when you read the commentators on this, in Jesus's day, the

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Pharisees and the Jews had taken civil concepts and then misapplied them on the personal level, without proper jurisprudence and without, you know, proper judges being set in place.

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And so I would note in this regard, in fact let me pull this up now because I think it'd be a good place to put this into the commentary, this is the concept in the book of Gospel of Matthew chapter 5 verse 38, that's where it starts, talking about retaliation.

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Good commentary on this, the Concordia commentary written by Jeff Gibbs. This is a spectacular commentary in the

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Gospel of Matthew, and watch what Gibbs notes. He says, Jesus continues his authoritative exposition of the true divine intent of the

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Torah. And by the way, we're going to read this in context in just a little bit. There is a grudging sort of spirit that afflicts mankind by nature.

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At least fallen mankind keep score, tit -for -tat. Even Stephen, that's the thing, do unto others before they do it to you, said with a sneer.

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Given this universal human condition, it was inevitable that some teachers in the first century, in first century

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Judaism, would have taken the biblical admonitions regarding just penalties and recompense, because that's what they are, they are just penalties, and married them to this perspective of do what you have to do to be sure to get even.

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This is far away from the Torah's intention as the East is from the

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West, okay? John Kleinig, another great theologian by the way, summarizes how the law's statement about retributions were intended to function, even on the level of legal interactions in non -Israelite societies.

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The Lex Talionis, the law of retribution, was already elaborated quite explicitly in Mesopotamia long before it was mentioned in the

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Old Testament. It performed two very important functions there and in ancient

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Israel. First, it limited the scope for revenge, which always tended to escalate indiscriminately and endlessly in any tribal society.

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By it, the principle of equivalence was enshrined in the administration of justice. That's the point of the

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Lex Talionis. It is the the enshrinement of equivalence, all right? Second, it treated life and body of a person as equal in value regardless of social, racial, and economic standing.

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This is true about the Mosaic Covenant version of the Lex Talionis, whereas Hammurabi's not so much.

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So in place of a spirit of grudging recompense and quick revenge, Jesus calls his disciples to live lives of reckless generosity and naivete.

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His teaching is hyperbolic, but that does not mean that he is not serious. His words are to reform our instincts, our quick reactions, our unwillingness to sacrifice

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St. Paul hits very close to the same target with his admonition not to repay evil for evil, but to overcome evil with good.

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That's really the point of what Jesus is getting at here, and it's a misappropriation of the

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Mosaic Covenant that was taking place in the first century that Jesus is correcting, and it's in the section where Jesus is giving us the true intent of the

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Torah against the way it had been misapplied by the Pharisees and many of the

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Jewish teachers of his time. But I'm getting ahead of myself. So all of that being said, we've now given you a meaningful way to understand the

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Lex Talionis, and these appearances of the law of retribution in the Mosaic Covenant, they serve a very specific purpose and a good one at that.

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So you get the idea. All of that being said, let's go back to Shock here as he talks about Hammurabi, and let me back it up just a little bit.

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Here we go. Written in about 1770 BC is one of the first sets of laws or commands in recorded history.

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Inscribed on a stone slab in the Akkadian language that stands just about two meters high, the punishments it sets out for law breaking are pretty harsh.

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Here's just one example. If a man destroys the eye of another man, they shall destroy his eye.

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Noticing that they shall destroy. Yeah, you're leaving out the important bit about this is about civil law and limiting injuries and recompense.

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If one breaks a man's bone, they shall break his bone. If one destroys the eye of a freeman or breaks the bone of a freeman, he shall pay one manner of silver.

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Now note, he's here pointing out that there's inequity in Hammurabi's version of the code, and he's right by the way.

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If one destroys the eye of a man's slave or breaks the bone of a man's slave, he shall pay one half his price.

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If a man knocks out the tooth of a man of his own rank, they shall knock out his tooth.

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If one knocks out the tooth of a freeman, he shall pay one third a manner of silver.

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Now, for any and everyone who knows the Bible, all of this sounds pretty familiar, except that Moses' Now notice what he just said there.

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Whose version? Moses' version. Now, here's the thing.

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Who told Moses to write what he wrote? It's not Moses' version.

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All right, now this is where we need to do a little work on Scripture. All right, this is a text we've been going to quite a bit lately.

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That's all right, we'll keep going at it. In the Gospel of Mark chapter 7, we see Jesus' view of the

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Scripture, okay, and inspiration. And he specifically and very clearly says who is behind what

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Moses wrote. And it's not Moses' imagination. No. So Jesus said to the

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Pharisees, Well did Isaiah prophesy of you, you hypocrites, as it is written, This people honors me with their lips, but their heart is far from me.

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We'll talk about how this actually applies very well to progressives, all right? In vain do they worship me, watch this, teaching as doctrines the commandments of who?

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Men. So you leave the commandment of God. Whose commandment? God's commandment.

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And you hold to the tradition of men. And he said to them, You have a fine way of rejecting the commandment of God.

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Whose commandment? God's commandment, in order to establish your tradition.

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For Moses said, so you're gonna note here, Jesus is using Moses' words and saying who's responsible for them?

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God. What Moses wrote are God's commands. They're not his innovations, not his ideas, not his improvements on Hammurabi's code, nothing even remotely approaching that.

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Jesus says, God commanded, Moses said, Honor your father and your mother.

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Whoever reviles father or mother must surely die. But you say, if a man tells his father or mother, whatever you would have gained from me is korban, that is a gift given to God, then you no longer permit him to do anything for his father or mother.

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And watch what Jesus says, thus making void, not Moses' words, the

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Word of God. God's words, by your tradition. So God is the author of the

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Torah. And God is the one who commanded Moses to write the things that he wrote.

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Now I'm pointing all of this out because you're gonna note then that this is gonna come into stark conflict with what

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Shock is saying and what he's about to say. So I'm gonna back it up so that you can hear him say,

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Moses, because in his progressive view, God didn't command

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Moses to write eye for eye, tooth for tooth. Watch this. Anna of Silver.

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Now, for any and everyone who knows the Bible, all of this sounds pretty familiar, except that Moses' version, written half a millennium later and recorded in the

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Old Testament, is making a subtly different point. See if you can spot it.

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You are to take life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth.

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Notice he's left out the fact that these words are spoken in the context of civil penalties and recompense and basically making things right when there are physical injuries or injuries to property.

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Again, in our day and age, what we read in the Mosaic Covenant, we see examples of that even to this day in our civil and criminal codes.

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Hand for hand, foot for foot, burn for burn, wound for wound, bruise for bruise.

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Mmm, said for emphasis. Dramatic point here. Although it sounds similar,

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Moses has taken a giant moral step forward. The code... Who took a giant moral step?

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So notice he's he's attributing to Moses progress. Oh, Moses has taken a giant step forward, but who's behind the

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Torah? Who is the author? God, according to Jesus. Hammer Rabbi is hierarchical.

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A Babylonian citizen's eyes and teeth are worth more, much more, than those of a freeman, which in turn are worth more than those of a slave.

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What Moses does is to create equality. You mean what

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God did? Just saying, because Jesus says that Moses's words were given to him by God.

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An offense against a slave is to be treated as seriously as one against the highest in society.

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Yeah, that's exactly what the Mosaic Covenant did. That's what God put in place. But for all its advances,

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Moses's law is still just as Hammer Rabbi's code, based around that old principle of retaliation.

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Mmm, and see there's the rub, and that's a misrepresentation. It's about justice, and defining civilly and criminally what are the proper...

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what is the proper penalty for when somebody injures another human being, or injures their animals, or destroys their property.

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It's not about retaliation, it's about civil justice.

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We still have these laws today. And if you were to use the logic that he's going to use to get rid of what

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Moses says, we've got to get rid of our civil and criminal codes. We just, we got to become lawless societies.

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But then, around three, around 1 ,300 years later, comes

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Jesus. You've heard that it was said, he says, eye for eye and tooth for a tooth.

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But I tell you, do not resist the evil person. If anyone slaps you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also.

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Now, this is where you're gonna know he's quoting Jesus from the Sermon on the Mount out of context.

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I already read Jeff Gibbs's commentary that shows that what

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Jesus was doing was correcting the modern Jewish teachers of his time, who were misappropriating the lex talionis from the civil portion of the

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Mosaic Covenant, and making it about individual retribution and revenge.

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And he flips that around and gives us the true intent of what is going on in the

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Torah. So all that being said, let me go back to Matthew 5. And I'm gonna back up. We're gonna back up a little bit here.

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And I want you to see what's going on. Matthew 5, verse 17. Jesus is gonna start steering into a discussion on the proper understanding of the commands.

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Because in his day, there are a lot of things that need to be corrected. And we know this because, well,

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Pharisees. All right? So, do not think that I've come to abolish the law or the prophets, the

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Torah. Jesus says, I haven't come to abolish them. I have not come to abolish them, I've come to what?

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Fulfill them. Hmm. So note, Christ makes it clear that his intent is the exact opposite of what it is that Stephen Schock is putting forward.

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Jesus didn't come to abolish the law, he came to fulfill them. For truly I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away and not an iota, not a dot, will pass from the

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Torah until all is accomplished. Note, until all is accomplished. Christ has accomplished it. Therefore, whoever relaxes one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do the same will be called least in the kingdom of heaven.

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Whoever does them and teaches them will be called great in the kingdom of heaven.

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For I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and the Pharisees, you'll never enter the kingdom of heaven.

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Sit there and go, how can my righteousness exceed that of the scribes and the Pharisees? It's real simple.

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By grace, God imputes to you the sinless righteousness of Christ when you believe in Jesus.

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You see, Jesus bled and died for your sins on the cross, and then when you are brought to penitent faith in Christ and God regenerates you,

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Jesus' sinless righteousness is given to you as a gift. So the good news for all Christians is that our righteousness does exceed that of the

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Pharisees, because Yahweh is our righteousness. Think about it.

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So Jesus then goes on. Now here's the section where he's going to give us the right understanding of the

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Torah. You have heard that it was said to those of old, you shall not murder, and whoever murders will be liable to judgment.

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But I say to you that everyone who's angry with his brother will be liable to judgment, whoever insults his brother will be liable to the council, whoever says, you fool, will be liable to the hell of fire.

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So note, Christ is saying it's not merely the act of doing something harmful to your neighbor, it begins in the heart, okay?

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That's where sin really begins. So if you're offering your gift at the altar and there, remember that your brother has something against you, leave your gift before the altar and go.

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First be reconciled to your brother, then come and offer your gift. Come to terms quickly with your accuser while you are going with him to court, lest your accuser hand you over to the judge, the judge to the guard, and you'll be put in prison.

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Truly I say to you, you will never get out until you have paid the last penny. You have heard that it was said you should not commit adultery.

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Well, I haven't slept with somebody else. Uh -huh. Here's what Jesus says. But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lustful intent has already committed adultery with her in his heart.

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Uh -oh. Wait a minute, that means that practically everybody's up.

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Mm -hmm, yeah, that's exactly what that means. So if your right eye causes you to sin, tear it out.

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Notice Christ here is talking in hyperbole to get our attention here. If your right eye causes you to sin, tear it out, throw it away.

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It's better that you lose one of the members of your body than your whole body be thrown into hell. If your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off, throw it away.

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It is better that you lose one of your members than your whole body go into hell. It was also said whoever divorces his wife, let him give her a certificate of divorce.

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But I say to you that everyone who divorces his wife, except on the ground of sexual immorality, makes her commit adultery.

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Whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery. Uh -huh. Again, you have heard that it was said to those of old, you shall not swear falsely, but shall perform to the

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Lord what you have sworn. But I say to you, do not take an oath at all, either by heaven, for it is the throne of God, or by the earth, for it is his footstool, or by Jerusalem, for it is the city of the great

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King. And do not take an oath by your head, for you cannot make one hair white or black.

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Let what you say be simply yes or no. Anything more than this comes from evil. And you have heard that it was said, an eye for an eye.

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So note here, Jesus is giving us the true intent of the Torah. And Jesus is not here saying that this means, you've heard it said, an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth.

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Therefore, no civil justice, no court, no criminal cases, no justice for those who've been wronged.

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That's not what he's saying. Instead, what he's doing is he's addressing how the

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Jews of his day have taken these civil, you know, the codes and the limits that are put there for when it comes to compensation, and they have taken things into their own hands.

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So you've heard that it's said, an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth. But I say to you, don't resist the one who is evil.

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But if anyone slaps you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also. By the way, if somebody slaps you on the cheek, that's not an assault, that's an insult.

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And that's kind of the point that Jesus is making here. If anyone would sue you, take your tunic, let him have your cloak also.

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And if anyone forces you to go one mile, go with them too. Give to the one who begs from you, and do not refuse the one who would borrow from you.

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And then this is, we'll finish out the section here. You have heard that it was said, you shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.

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By the way, no biblical text says this. Not one. This is not found in the

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Torah at all. So this shows you that what Jesus here is talking about here, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, this next part is part of that.

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The Pharisees were teaching, love your neighbor and hate your enemy. Us versus them kind of mentality, right?

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But I say to you, love your enemies. Pray for those who persecute you. And by the way, this is explicitly taught in the

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Torah. So that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven. For he makes the sun to rise on the evil and the good and sends rain on the just and the unjust.

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If you love those who love you, what reward do you have? Do not even the tax collectors do the same.

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And if you greet only your brothers, what more are you doing than others?

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Do not even the Gentiles do the same. You therefore must be perfect as your Heavenly Father is perfect.

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Yeah, but Lord, I'm not. Ah, cry out to Christ and ask for His forgiveness. Mm -hmm.

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If you say you have no sin, you deceive yourself. The truth is not in you. But if you confess your sins,

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God is faithful and just, will forgive you your sins and cleanse you from all unrighteousness. Keep that in mind. All right, so now you know what the section is in context, but watch now what

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Stephen Shawk does, because he is now basically said, well,

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Moses made some improvements. Yay! But now that Jesus has come, Jesus said, you've heard it said, eye for an eye.

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No context, no proper understanding of the Torah at all. Watch what he does with this.

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His point is that Jesus has given us the true understanding of what

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God is like, so we can now see that Moses put words in God's mouth. I'm not making that up.

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You're gonna hear it for yourself. Here we go. Eye for eye and tooth for tooth. But I tell you, do not resist the evil person.

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If anyone slaps you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also. The philosophy of retaliation has been binned.

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The rule book's been torn up in Jesus' upside -down approach to life.

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At last, it becomes clear. God's association with the vengeance and violence of the

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Old Testament was never a true expression of who he was. What?

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So God doesn't give justice? Justice is not an expression of who

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God is. Jesus died on the cross for our sins.

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He experienced God's justice in our place. So you'll note, this is seriously duplicitous.

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The claim that Jesus has come and shows us that that justice is not what

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God's about, that's the implication of it. Again, I'm gonna back this up and I really want you to hear this in its fuller context without me interrupting.

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So I'm going a little farther back than I normally do. Listen again. But for all its advances, Moses' law is still just as Hammer Rabbi's code, based around that old principle of retaliation.

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But then, around 1 ,300 years later, comes

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Jesus. You've heard that it was said, he says, eye for eye and tooth for a tooth.

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But I tell you, do not resist the evil person. If anyone slaps you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also.

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The philosophy of retaliation has been binned. The raw book's been torn up in Jesus' upside -down approach to life.

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At last, it becomes clear, God's association with the vengeance and violence of the

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Old Testament was never a true expression of who he was, so much as the result of his determination to stay involved with his people and guide them into a better way of being human.

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It's this very desire that at times men, God was implicated in, even written up as the architect of excessive acts of violence, even genocide.

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This is the standard liberal line, man. Because, remember, their God is love.

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Love is God in the progressive way of thinking. And if love is God, then here's the thing.

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You know what they despise the most about Scripture?

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Is that Scripture reveals that God has wrath, and that it's God's wrath that we are saved from. So let me do a quick word search here.

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We're gonna look for the word wrath. Wrath. And I'm gonna limit it to the epistles.

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There's a particular... let's see here. Hmm. Let's...

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I'm looking for a particular... ah, here it is. Romans 5, verse 9. Let me put it in context. Romans 5, and let me get down there.

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For one will scarcely die for a righteous person, Paul writes, though perhaps for a good person one would dare even to die.

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But God demonstrates, or shows, his love for us in that while we were still sinners,

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Christ died for us. Since therefore we have now been justified by his blood, how much more shall we be saved by him?

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From what? From the wrath of God. That's what we're saved from.

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And this is anathema in the progressive religion, that God has wrath, that there is actual justice.

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And so we've got a big problem here. We've got a huge problem.

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He has just basically made it so that everything you read in the

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Old Testament, where God inflicts his punishment on those who do evil, persist in sin and unbelief, and rightly judges people who have rebelled against him, that he...

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Shock says that was all a mistake. Jesus, by saying, you've heard it said, eye for an eye, tooth for tooth, but I say don't resist the evil one, that means that God never sanctioned any of that in the

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Old Testament. It's a lie. And it's a slick one. And what he's basically doing is, this narrative, if you buy into this, you're gonna believe in their false

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God. What is their God? Love is God, in their way of thinking. So let me back this up just a little bit.

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Let's keep going. Times men, God was implicated in, even written up as the architect of, excessive acts of violence, even genocide.

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Moses, a late Bronze Age thinker, puts late Bronze Age words and morality into God's mouth, and the problem is that some of it stuck.

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So you'll note what Stephen Shock here directly contradicts Jesus in Matthew 7.

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Jesus makes it clear. God was commanding us through what

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Moses wrote. Stephen Shock says Moses put words in God's mouth, and sadly those words stuck.

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Wow. And so what happens now? So you see a text that forbids a particular sexual sin.

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Well, Moses put that in God's mouth. How do you know? Well, because love is

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God. Uh -huh. Again, listen to this blasphemy, because that's what this is.

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Even written up as the architect of, excessive acts of violence, even genocide.

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Moses, a late Bronze Age thinker, puts late Bronze Age words and morality into God's mouth, and the problem is that some of it stuck.

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Well did Isaiah prophesy of you, you hypocrites. As it is written, this people honors me with their lips, for their hearts are far from me.

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In vain do they worship me, teaching as doctrines the commandments of men. You leave the commandment of God, and you hold to the tradition of men.

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And Jesus said to them, you have a fine way of rejecting the commandment of God in order to establish your tradition.

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And that's what progressivism is. It is the rejecting of the commandments of God in order to establish their progressive utilitarian tradition.

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That's what progressivism is all about. Moses said, honor your father and mother, whoever reviles father or mother must surely die, but you say.

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You see, God says, God says, but you say. So what are they doing?

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They're making void the Word of God in order to establish their progressive tradition.

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It's a false religion altogether. But now, finally, the penny has dropped.

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In the past, God spoke to our ancestors through the prophets at many times and in various ways.

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So now he's quoting Hebrews chapter 1 verses 1 and 2, and I'll show you that what he's doing doesn't help him at all.

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Ways says the writer of the letter to the Hebrews in the New Testament, and then adds, but in these last days he's spoken to us by his son.

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The radiance of God's glory, the exact representation of his being. So my question for you, if I pull up Hebrews 1 verses 1 and 2, is it going to teach us that God didn't speak in the

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Old Testament, but now he's finally clearly spoken to us by his son? Or does Hebrews 1, 1, and 2 affirm that God spoke in both the

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Old Testament and the New? Because he just said that Moses put words in God's mouth, but Moses didn't.

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And Hebrews 1, 1, and 2 doesn't teach that. Let's take a look at it. Here we go. Hebrews chapter 1 verses 1 and 2.

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"...long ago, and at many times, and in many ways, God spoke."

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Theos lalesos. God spoke to our fathers. How? Entois prophetais.

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In the prophets. Who spoke to us? God spoke to us. Where? In the prophets. Moses is a prophet.

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God says so. See Deuteronomy 18. God spoke to our fathers by the prophets, but in these last days he has spoken to us by his son, whom he appointed the heir of all things, through whom also he created the world.

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Hebrews 1, 1, and 2 affirms that God spoke to us in both the Old and the New Testament. And he, shock, is trying to make it look like Hebrews 1, 1, and 2 teaches us that God didn't speak in the

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Old Testament. That was Moses just putting words in God's mouth. But Jesus now has spoken.

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That's just a satanic twisting of Hebrews 1, 1, and 2. Over the last few weeks

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I've been talking about how we best understand the Bible, and today I promised that I'd begin to unpack what

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I think. So here's my principle. Here comes the standard stick of the progressives and the postmodern liberals.

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Principle number one. It's a very common and hugely misleading error to think of the

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Bible as a book, but we all do it. The word Bible, however, actually means books or library.

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That's exactly what the Bible is, a library. You think that that's somehow revolutionary?

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It's not. Let's take a look at, for instance, 2 Peter. Peter, writing about Scripture, says this,

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We ourselves heard this very voice born from heaven, and we were with him on the holy mountain.

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And we have the prophetic word more fully confirmed, to which you would do well to pay attention to as a lamp shining in a dark place, until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts.

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Knowing this, first of all, that no prophecy of Scripture comes from someone's own interpretation.

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For no prophecy was ever produced by the will of man, and this is going to include all of the

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Old Testament. But men, plural, spoke from God as they were carried along by the

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Holy Spirit. Even Peter recognizes that there are multiple authors of the single

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Scripture. So the point is this, whether we call it a

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Bible or not doesn't matter. Scripture calls it Scripture. And we know that there are multiple authors, there are men, and all of them spoke from God, including

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Moses. So you're going to note this, Peter flat -out contradicts Stephen Shock.

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Flat -out contradicts Stephen Shock in his claim that God wasn't speaking to Moses, that Moses put words in God's mouth.

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Peter says, au contraire. No, no prophecy was ever produced by the will of man, including

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Moses. But men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit. That's what

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Peter says. So, you know, this standard line, well, the Bible isn't a book, it's a library.

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No, duh! Of course it's a library. It's the collected writings, the

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Scripture, singular, is the collected writings of all the men who spoke as they were carried along by the

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Holy Spirit, and none of that, none of what they produced was ever produced by their own will. It was the will of God.

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God spoke these things, they wrote them down. Now, that doesn't mean it was like, okay, God, let me see if I got the sentence right.

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You know, that's not how inspiration works, at least in most parts of Scripture. But the point is, is that they were all carried along by the

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Holy Spirit. So, Shock here, this is just progressive propaganda designed to undermine the authority of Scripture.

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Listen to as he continues on this line. Complex collection of historical documents written over... Okay, I gotta back this up.

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The Bible as a book, but we all do it. The word Bible, however, actually means books or library.

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I agree. The point is, Scripture calls it scripture. Singular.

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That's exactly what the Bible is, a library, a complex collection of historical documents written over the course of at least one and a half thousand years, and representing various styles, worldviews, languages, cultures, opinions.

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Opinions. Well, what did Peter say? First of all, no prophecy of Scripture comes from someone's own interpretation.

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No prophecy was ever produced by the will of man. But men spoke as they were carried along by the

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Holy Spirit from God. What he just said is flat -out contradicted, straight -out contradicted by the

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Scripture. And agendas. As such, it contains numerous, sometimes harmonious, and sometimes discordant, sometimes even contradictory human voices.

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Again, what does Scripture say? No prophecy of Scripture comes from someone's own interpretation.

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No prophecy was ever produced by the will of man. But men spoke from God as they were carried along by the

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Holy Spirit. Peter, it contradicts you. Shock. How do you explain it? Perspectives.

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The way I see it. And that's your issue. The way you see it. God said, but you say.

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You say. Well, what you say is contradicted by what God said. The books of the

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Bible contain the account of the ancient sacred dialogue or conversation, which is initiated, inspired, and guided by God with and among humanity.

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It's just an ancient dialogue with God, and you know, it has human opinions and stuff in it. You know, it's a library of ever increasing clarity of opinions.

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Uh -huh. Backing it up. The Bible contained the account of the ancient sacred dialogue or conversation, which is initiated, inspired, and guided by God with and among humanity.

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A conversation that charts humanity's gradual growing understanding of God's character.

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Gradual growing understanding of charts. You know, again, Peter says that no prophecy of Scripture comes from someone's own interpretation.

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For no prophecy was ever produced by the will of man. Men spoke as they were carried along by the

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Holy Spirit. Here's how Paul puts it in 2nd Timothy chapter 2. All Scripture is theanoustos, breathed out by God, and is profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and training in righteousness, so that the man of God may be complete and equipped for every good work.

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Paul says the origin of all Scripture is God. You're saying that, oh, you know, the human history, they were kind of fumbling along, and they're in dialogue with God, so God's kind of, you know, inspiring their dialogue with him together, and it's an ever -increasing clarity of an understanding of who the divine is.

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But Moses put words in God's mouth. No Scripture says these things, by the way. In fact, all the

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Scriptures I've quoted contradict this man straight up. Only fully revealed in the end through Jesus.

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It's this understanding that guides me as I read and interpret the

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Bible. Ultimately, of course, yeah, you know, it's this understanding that causes you to reject what the

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Bible says and accuse Moses falsely of putting his words in God's mouth.

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You are slandering Moses. Christianity is about a person, Jesus, and the example of his character and life and teaching.

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They are to be our primary lens for our biblical interpretation. So notice he's using the red letters, then, to get rid of what came before.

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This is demonic. In fact, our whole basis for doing life through Jesus, for the first time in history,

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God's character is fully, accurately, and completely revealed. Or to put it another way round, if it doesn't look or sound like Jesus, it's not

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God. So you can get rid of Paul's writings regarding women in the pastoral office, you can get rid of the

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Mosaic Covenant's commands regarding sexual immorality, especially as it relates to same -sex.

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You get the idea, because it doesn't look like Jesus. So he's using

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Jesus to obliterate the rest of Scripture. But Jesus, in Mark 7, makes it very clear what happens when men make void the

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Word of God to establish their tradition. And the progressive tradition is a man -made tradition that makes void the clear

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Word of God, and this is the prime example of it. Prime example. That is the quintessential introduction, catechesis, into obliterating

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Scripture with Scripture, using the sophistry and lies of so -called progressives.

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I hope you found this helpful, because once you see it, you can't unsee it, and you need to warn your friends about it, because there are a lot of people who are buying into this approach to Scripture that Jesus clearly condemns in Mark chapter 7.

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So hopefully you found this helpful. If so, all the information on how you can share the video is down below in the description, and until next time, may

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God richly bless you, and the grace and mercy won by Jesus Christ, his vicarious death on the cross, for all of your sins.