How the New Testament differs from the Old Testament

2024 Author: Miguel Ramacey | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 06:11

It is impossible to realize the heights of the moral meaning that the New Testament contains, if we consider it in isolation from the Old Testament. Only by reading it, page by page, one can understand what a long and difficult path people have traveled from the commandments of Moses to the commandments of Jesus, voiced in the Sermon on the Mount.

There is no need to consider these two parts of the Bible in terms of their content, as they describe events that happened to different people at different times. And John Chrysostom was right, seeing their difference not in essence, but in time. There is a close connection in another - in the commonality of the religious-legislative and moral-doctrinal aspects. This connection was acknowledged by Christ when he said that he had come to fulfill the law and prophecy, and not to destroy them. The Christian Church considers the New Testament to be morally higher, but recognizes that it not only does not abolish the Old Testament moral norms, but deepens and strengthens them.

Preaching, Christ drew attention to the main principle that determines the relationship of man to man. The essence of this main principle, which harmonizes the new teaching with the old law and the teaching of the prophets, Jesus expressed this way: in everything, as we want people to be with usacted, so we should do it.

The motive of punishment for an unrighteous life also unites the Old and New Testaments. Both of them promise people an inevitable but fair judgment in accordance with the measure of love and mercy that we have shown or not shown to each other. These criteria are also fundamental to the old law and the prophets. Love for people, love for God - Christ pointed to these commandments of the New Testament as the biggest, most important. On the same commandments, the law and the prophets are also established.

However, the Jewish Bible, according to the Israeli canon, includes four sections, consisting of twenty-two books, but does not contain the New Testament. But it contains a lot of evidence of the holiness and "divine inspiration" of the Old Testament texts. All four gospel writers speak of this. This is in the acts of the apostles, in the epistles to the nations, in the apostolic conciliar epistles.

Carefully reading the gospel texts, it is easy to see that one of the repeated arguments is the statement "Thus says the Scripture." By Scripture, the authors meant precisely the Old Testament. If we continue the parallel and compare both canons, one more similarity will become clear: the New Testament also consists of canonical books (there are 27 of them), which make up four sections.

Given all these important points, both Christian theologians and objective representatives of secular science express a common position: the Testaments are not opposite, they are different. The Jews, as you know, do not recognize Jesuslike the Messiah. And the New Testament is the history of his earthly life. It is logical that the Jews do not recognize the Covenant itself. Why? It is suggested that the reason is that the teachings of Christ are addressed to all peoples, and not only to the Jews. And this excludes the choice of God by one separate people. Perhaps the statement is controversial, but there is still some truth in it.