Import jQuery

Jesus and the Sabbath Show Up on Joe Rogan Experience


This week, the world's most popular podcast, the Joe Rogan Experience (JRE), hosted Christian apologist Wesley Huff. 

Wes is a historian, author, researcher, expert in Biblical manuscripts and early Christian writings, PhD candidate, and defender of the authenticity of the Gospel accounts. I've followed Wes' writings and videos for years, so I'm happy to see him get some major exposure on JRE.

Here's the full episode:

Why is this significant? Protestia explains that this episode is likely to be the furthest reaching gospel broadcast in history.

Huff’s message went out to Joe Rogan’s 14 million regular listeners. Even moderately popular episodes enjoy over 11 million downloads, and some far more. In a month’s time, Rogan’s downloads exceed 190 million in the course of a month (which is more than the number of Americans who watched the moon landing). It’s more than those who watched the Beatles on Ed Sullivan. It’s more than those who watched Nixon’s resignation speech. It’s more than those who watched the Chiefs beat the Eagles at ‘23 Super Bowl. It’s more than those watched the O.J. Simpson verdict. It’s more than those who watched JFK’s funeral, or the wedding of Prince William and Kate Middleton.

As an example of the podcast's influence, just before days before the 2024 election, President Trump appeared on JRE, and it resulted in a last minute bump towards Trump, leading to an election victory. 

These unscripted, long form conversations are powerful. The podcast has some 14 million listeners and avid followers from a variety of backgrounds and persuasions.

Wesley Huff appears on the podcast to talk about God and the truth of the Bible. He did a fantastic job of defending common objections to the historicity of Jesus, specifically his death and resurrection. Questions like, "How do we know Jesus really died when he was crucified?", "How do we know Jesus appeared to people alive after his crucifixion?", Wes handles it well and gives the evidence.

I want to zero in on a question where the Torah comes up and dive a bit deeper on it. (After all, friends, this is the Kineti blog!)

Wes argues in this clip that Jesus was against moralism:

Here's the interesting bits:

Huff: I actually think that Jesus condemns moralism. And ultimately what I see [Jordan] Peterson doing is looking at Jesus as a moral example. And if Jesus is nothing but a moral example, then you can save yourself and you don't need a Savior. I think Jesus would critique that, because Jesus is very against moralism.

Rogan: How do you define Jesus being against moralism? What do you mean by that?

Huff: Jesus looks at the religiosity of his day, with particular groups like... the Pharisees who are like lay scholars, and Sadducees who are professional priest scholars, and he's constantly critiquing the fact they have this hypocritical religiosity to them. They're constantly doing things like, uh, tithing their mint leaves to make sure they get all...this is where we get letter of the law vs. intention of the law. Jesus critiques them for that because he says, 'You're trying to do everything right, and you're missing the point.' One of the things he says is, if one of your donkeys falls in a ravine on the sabbath, do you pull it out? Or is that work? What's the point of the sabbath? 

Rogan: Hmmm.

Huff: Is it to not do any work? Like, is it to make sure you're not working too hard, because you might be breaking the sabbath? Or like, what is the point? And he says, the sabbath was made for man, not man for the sabbath. And there's this intention -- and this is the whole Sermon on the Mount, Matthew chapter 5 -- is he keeps saying, "You have heard it said, but I say..." and he's referring to the Mosaic Law. And it looks like he's critiquing the Mosaic Law, but he's not actually. He's getting back to the intention of the Law. So when he says, "You've heard it said, 'Do not commit murder', but I say to you anybody who harbors hate for their brother in their heart has committed murder." - what he's getting at is, what is the intention, what's the meaning of the Law that God gives to you?

This is really great and I applaud Wesley for telling millions of listeners God is real, the Bible is true, and giving evidence for Jesus' resurrection. I love that Wes explained that Jesus isn't critiquing the Law, he's getting to the purpose of the Law. This is a profound truth and many lay people in Christianity miss it.

Wes' comments on Jesus and the Law goes well with my recent teaching, The Law of Christ is the Law of Moses Kept in a Christlike Way. Jesus isn't critiquing "You shall not murder", he's saying that the true goal of that law was to prevent hatred in your heart, and that having hatred in your heart is actually breaking the Torah. Likewise for the law against committing adultery: its true aim was to prevent sexual immorality even in the mind and the heart; merely lusting after someone other than your spouse is actually breaking the Torah.

OK! But there's a wriggle here. I don't blame Huff for not addressing it, because the Rogan podcast audience is not ready for deep theology. But maybe you are, dear reader.

The wriggle is the sabbath and its true meaning.

Huff says, 

"One of the things [Jesus] says is, if your donkey falls in a ravine on the sabbath, do you pull it out? Or is that work? What's the point of the sabbath? Is it to not do any work? Like, is it to make sure you're not working too hard, because you might break the sabbath?"

Let's put these in a table to illuminate the issue:

Torah commandmentTrue meaningTrue meaning aligns
with plain meaning
Do not commit murderDo not have hatred in your heart.
Do not commit adultery.Do not lust in your heart.
Do not work on the sabbath; keep it holy.

See the issue? Huff states there's a true meaning behind the commandments in the Law. But note that the commandments' plain meaning cannot be cancelled by their true intention:

  • No hatred in the heart doesn't mean we're now free to commit murder, of course.
  • Likewise, no lust in the heart doesn't mean we're free to commit adultery.
  • No work on the sabbath doesn't mean we're free to work on the sabbath or treat it like any other day.

That's the wriggle: Christianity largely does work on the sabbath and treats it like any other day.

If I'm being charitable, Christianity keeps the 1st day of the week, Sunday, as the new sabbath. That also contradicts the plain meaning of the commandment in Exodus 20:9-11. But even if we grant Sunday is the new sabbath and is considered holy by meeting with other Christians on the sabbath, work is still permitted on Sunday. There are notable exceptions, like Chik-Fil-A restaurants. But it's the exception that proves the rule. The Christian world, whether Catholic, Protestant, or Orthodox, works on the sabbath even if we move the sabbath to Sunday. This again cancels the plain meaning of the text.

And there's another mystery here. What is the true meaning, the real intention, of the law about resting on the sabbath and keeping it holy? Is there a true meaning, one deeper than the plain meaning?

Jesus doesn't explicitly give us one like he does for murder and adultery. 

He gives an example that saving the life of an animal on the sabbath is permissible. (Judaism's concept of pikuach nefesh.) He heals a man on the sabbath and tells us that it's permissible to do good on the sabbath. Jesus says the sabbath is made for man. Here are the prominent sayings of Jesus on the sabbath. Make good note of what is, and isn't, there:

Jesus' statement Implied true meaning
"Which of you, with a son, or even an ox, falling into a well on the sabbath, will not immediately pull him out?" Healing a person or saving their life is permissible on the sabbath.
"Haven’t you read in the Torah that on the sabbath the priests in the Temple break the sabbath and yet are innocent? I tell you that something greater than the Temple is here." A divine priority: Messiah is greater than the Temple, and the Temple is greater than sabbath. "Violating" lesser priorities in service to a higher priority is no violation at all.
"Therefore it is permitted to do good on the sabbath." The sabbath is meant for good.
"The Son of Man is Lord of the sabbath." Messiah created the sabbath. The creator of the sabbath has authority to say what is permissible on it.
"The sabbath was made for man, and not man for the sabbath." The sabbath is intended for the benefit of humanity. The sabbath should be a joy and a delight, not a burden.

Is there deeper meaning to the sabbath commandments? Certainly. But I think these are a good start.

Notably missing from Jesus' sabbath statements are any claims that all work is permissible on the sabbath, or that the sabbath is done away with.

My conviction remains and is strengthened: Jesus did not wish his followers to do away with the sabbath. He wished to tell us that preserving life trumps not working on the sabbath. He wished to tell us that sabbath was created for us. He wished to tell us that doing good on the sabbath is permissible. But I'm convinced Jesus did not intend for a non-existent sabbath where anything is permissible.

Jesus' disciples should have a day of rest. It should be on the 7th day. You can do good works on it, and you can save someone's life on it. It should be a joy and not a burden; it was created for us. But it's a day of rest, not a day to work or catch up on your shopping. Christianity needs reform in this area.

(Re-) Introducing EtzMitzvot

Hey friends, here's something I've been hacking on over the winter break that you may find interesting: EtzMitzvot


EtzMitzvot is the place to go see how Torah commandments are related to each other. It's a fun, visual way to learn more about the Law of Moses in the Bible. It's inspired by Yeshua's words in Mattew 2,

But the Pharisees, when they heard that Yeshua had silenced the Sadducees, gathered together in one place. And testing Him, one of them, a lawyer, asked, “Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Torah?”

And He said to him, “‘You shall love Adonai your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it, ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ The entire Torah and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.”
What would it look like to have the whole Torah hang off those two greatest commandments? EtzMitzvot aims to show you. 🙂

Some of my long-time readers may remember I started on this idea some 10 years ago! But after some initial work, I let it languish and didn't do anything with it. 

Over the winter break I updated the site to make it, ya know, halfway decent. It works on mobile now. All the commandments are stored in standard JSON format. EtzMizvot now shows you interesting stats about the commandments, like how many can be kept today, how many can be kept anywhere (as opposed to those that can be kept only in the land of Israel), how many are kept by Christians, Jews, Messianic Jews, and more.

You can tap or click on a commandment to view more details about it:




Currently about 70 of the 613 commandments have been added to the tree. My goal, going along with Aaron's encouragement to spend time in the Bible in 2025, is to add new commandments to the tree every Tuesday. I'll blog about it about as often. Torah Tuesdays. Keep an eye out that here on the Kineti blog.

Enjoy friends! And do let me know what you think.

Some Thoughts on Baby Jesus and the New Year by Aaron Hecht

 




When I was a kid, I remember driving around the small town I grew up in this time of year, looking out the window of my mom's car and seeing what are called "Nativity Scenes" set up on the front lawns of churches and private homes. This is, of course, the romanticized sculpture that tries to represent the birth of Jesus at His First Advent. The Christmas season is supposed to be a celebration of the birth of Jesus, and although most scholars agree that it's VERY unlikely He was born on December 25h, or even in the month of December, this traditional date is a good time to celebrate the fact that God sent His Son into the world.

Personally, I don't have any energy left to argue with people who want to be down on Christmas, or Nativity Scenes, or egg nog, or candy canes, or even Christmas trees. Your expressions of contempt for these things and the people who indulge in them DOES NOT score you any points with God and in my humble opinion, you're actually grieving Him by doing that.

All of that having been said, I do have a comment about Nativity Scenes and it goes like this.

A lot of people seem to really like "baby Jesus" and are comfortable with Him as a baby, but then a few days after ostensibly celebrating His birthday, they go out and drink too much alcohol to celebrate the new year. Sometimes, people drive past still standing Nativity Scenes to get to the new year's eve parties they're going to.

This, obviously, is a mistake but it's just one of many mistakes we make as human beings. We love "baby Jesus" but we don't much like the man He grew up to be and we often forget to follow the teachings He gave us when He grew up. That's partly because most of us rarely open up a Bible to read about His teachings and His ministry.

So, gentle reader, whether you celebrated His birth a few days ago or not, I hope you will join me in making a resolution to more faithfully serve and follow Him in the new year 2025. A great way to help ourselves do this is by spending time in daily Bible study, and the best way I've found to do that is by using the One Year Bible app, or if you're old-fashioned like me, maybe you even have a physical paper copy of the One Year Bible in your home.

It has been a great blessing to my own life to be a "One Year Bible" person, and I hope someone reading this will take advantage of the blessing that daily Bible reading can be to your life as well. It's a great time to start this habit, and if you don't keep any of your other new year's resolutions, reading the Bible every day will surely be one you'll want to keep.

The Lord be with all of us in this new year that's coming.

Appending "You might like" to each post.