Does Covenant=Commandments?

In this post, I want to interact with a bad argument against Christian Sabbatarianism. So far, I've been looking at Sabbatarian arguments that I don't find particularly convincing, but today I want to take on the other side. This argument is often found in Church of Christ circles, but others use it as well. To check it out, see The 10 Commandments and Ten Commandment Facts.

The argument runs like this: In the Hebrew Bible, there are places where God's covenant with Israel is explicitly equated with the ten commandments. Exodus 34:28 says that Moses "wrote on the tablets the words of the covenant, the ten commandments" (NRSV). Deuteronomy 4:13 has, "He declared to you his covenant, which he charged you to observe, that is, the ten commandments; and he wrote them on two stone tablets." According to these passages, God's covenant with Israel in the Old Testament is the same as the ten commandments.

And what does the New Testament say about this covenant? In Hebrews 8:13, we read, "In speaking of 'a new covenant,' he has made the first one obsolete. And what is obsolete and growing old will soon disappear." According to this passage, God's covenant with Israel in the Old Testament has been replaced by a new covenant, making it an obsolete old covenant.

And so the argument goes like this:

Premise 1: The old covenant equals the ten commandments.
Premise 2: God has abolished the old covenant.
Conclusion: God has abolished the ten commandments.

According to the laws of logic that I learned in my DePauw logic class, this argument is excellent. But I still have problems with it. I suppose it works if you want to look at the Bible in a rigid, literalistic manner. But I find it less convincing when I ask two questions: (1.) Why does the Hebrew Bible equate the old covenant with the ten commandments?, and (2.) How does the author of Hebrews define the old covenant?

Let's look at the first question: Why does the Hebrew Bible equate the old covenant with the ten commandments? I think it's because they're the terms of the covenant, or agreement between God and Israel. The children of Israel agreed at Sinai to obey everything God told them to do (Exodus 24), much of which is summarized in the ten commandments. They're such an essential part of the covenant, that it's no surprise the Hebrew Bible equates the two.

But what about the second question: How does the author of Hebrews define the old covenant? To answer this, we have to look at what Hebrews says about it. Here are some relevant passages:

Hebrews 8:6-9:1: "But Jesus has now obtained a more excellent ministry, and to that degree he is the mediator of a better covenant, which has been enacted through better promises. For if that first covenant had been faultless, there would have been no need to look for a second one. God finds fault with them when he says: 'The days are surely coming, says the Lord, when I will establish a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah; not like the covenant that I made with their ancestors, on the day when I took them by the hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt; for they did not continue in my covenant, and so I had no concern for them, says the Lord. This is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the Lord: I will put my laws in their minds, and write them on their hearts, and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. And they shall not teach one another or say to each other, 'Know the Lord,' for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest. For I will be merciful toward their iniquities, and I will remember their sins no more.' In speaking of 'a new covenant,' he has made the first one obsolete. And what is obsolete and growing old will soon disappear. Now even the first covenant had regulations for worship and an earthly sanctuary."

Hebrews 9:15-22: "For this reason he is the mediator of a new covenant, so that those who are called may receive the promised eternal inheritance, because a death has occurred that redeems them from the transgressions under the first covenant. Where a will is involved, the death of the one who made it must be established. For a will takes effect only at death, since it is not in force as long as the one who made it is alive. Hence not even the first covenant was inaugurated without blood. For when every commandment had been told to all the people by Moses in accordance with the law, he took the blood of calves and goats, with water and scarlet wool and hyssop, and sprinkled both the scroll itself and all the people, saying, 'This is the blood of the covenant that God has ordained for you.' And in the same way he sprinkled with the blood both the tent and all the vessels used in worship. Indeed, under the law almost everything is purified with blood, and without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness of sins."

Hebrews 10:28-29: "Anyone who has violated the law of Moses dies without mercy 'on the testimony of two or three witnesses.' How much worse punishment do you think will be deserved by those who have spurned the Son of God, profaned the blood of the covenant by which they were sanctified, and outraged the Spirit of grace?"

For the author of Hebrews, the old covenant seems to mean God's old way of doing things. This included Israel's agreement to keep the Torah, stern penalties if she disobeyed, sacrifices that couldn't remove sin, and regulations for worship at an earthly sanctuary. Hebrews 9:10 goes on to mention "food and drink and various baptisms, regulations for the body imposed until the time comes to set things right." You know those rules in the Old Testament about washing every time you become unclean? They're part of the old covenant.

As far as Hebrews is concerned, this arrangement with Israel didn't solve her sin problem. All those rituals failed to purify her conscience, even if some of them did manage to cleanse her body (Hebrews 9:9-10, 13-14). And the Israelites kept on sinning because God's law was merely an external set of commands, not something that was written on their hearts and minds. Because their guilt stayed with them, they didn't have the hope of eternal life, for they lacked genuine forgiveness from God. The old covenant promised Israel blessing if she obeyed and cursing if she transgressed. Her problem was that she kept on transgressing and earning curses, and the old covenant system wasn't alleviating her predicament. The new covenant, by contrast, is God's new way of doing things. It includes forgiveness of sin through the blood of Christ, the internalization of God's law in the Israelites' hearts and minds, and the hope of an eternal inheritance.

Does the author of Hebrews believe that the ten commandments were done away? He never says that. As a matter of fact, he maintains that God will put his laws on the hearts and minds of the Israelites (Hebrews 8:10). God's commandments still remain under the new covenant, only they're not merely an external set of rules: they're part of the Israelites' core nature.

Hebrews doesn't even hold that the Mosaic law was done away, for Hebrews 7:12 says that "when there is a change in the priesthood, there is necessarily a change in the law as well." A change in the law is quite different from its wholesale abolition. As far as Hebrews is concerned, the law has been altered in light of Christ's coming. It's not been thoroughly replaced by a "new law."

If the ten commandments remain, does that mean we have to observe the Sabbath? Not necessarily, for Hebrews 4 presents it as a spiritual reality rather than a day to observe. And Colossians 2:16 treats it as a shadow of Christ, the same way that Hebrews presents so many aspects of the Torah (i.e., purification rituals, the sanctuary, the sacrifices, etc., etc.).

And Hebrews' view on the old covenant coincides with what Paul says about it. In II Corinthians 3, Paul says that the new covenant brings life, whereas the old arrangement led to death and condemnation. In addition, while the old covenant relied on laws that were written on stones, the new one emphasizes what's written on the "tablets of human hearts" (v 3).

Similarly, Paul says in Romans 8:3-4: "For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do: by sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and to deal with sin, he condemned sin in the flesh, so that the just requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit." For Paul, God's old way of doing things was ineffective, since our sinful nature inhibits us from doing God's law. But God has helped us through Christ and his Spirit, such that the requirements of his law become fulfilled in us.

God's old way of doing things contains his commandments, but it does not equal his commandments, as important as they were to the old arrangement. His way of doing things has changed. Many of his commandments have remained.