Dr. Kyle Bailey on Sin and Sacrifice

According to his You Tube page, Kyle Bailey Ministries, Dr. Kyle Bailey "is a Pastor, writer, content creator, and Bible teacher." He runs a website called BiblicalQuestions.net and is dedicated to expanding "knowledge of scripture simply, and practically."

The following video is actually a video of Dr. Bailey's commentary on an interview that the late Ravi Zacharias' had with Ben Shapiro.

In it he expresses his views on why Judaism seems unequipped to effectively deal with the problem of sin:

• The Law of Moses Cannot be Followed Fully
• The Torah is Too Much for One Human Being to Fulfill
• God "Became Mankind" to Atone for Adam's Sin

Point 1 - The Law of Moses Cannot be Followed Fully

The point begins at 9:00.

I choose to assume that here Dr. Bailey is making an honest mistake, for by listening to all of the points made in this video it occurs to me that he has given genuine thought to the points he discusses. The issue with the point Dr. Bailey has made is that no Orthodox Jew understands or has understood the 613 commandments as a checklist. It is true that it is impossible to keep all 613 commandments, and while it may be impossible due to its being too difficult (see Point 2), a more fundamental reason is that there is no one individual to whom the entire set is relevant.

Case in point: some of the commandments are relevant only to men, some to women, some to Cohanim (the priests), some to Levites, and some only to people who have done or experienced particular things, such as having come into contact with a dead body, which requires ritual purification. It is therefore a fallacy to state that one falls short of the glory of God only because he cannot perform all of the commandments. Surely God prescribed particular commandments only to certain people (and we assume that He knows this), and therefore reason dictates that He does not consider it a sin if an individual does not observe a commandment that was not meant for him to observe in the first place.

Case in point: some of the commandments are relevant only to [certain people under certain conditions]... It is therefore a fallacy to state that one falls short of the glory of God only because he cannot perform all of the commandments.

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Point 2 - The Torah is Too Much for One Human Being to Fulfill

However, my explanation in Point 1 fails to address sins that a person commits as a result of commandments that were designed for him observe! This is a serious question with serious implications. Regarding just those commandments that are applicable to a particular individual, lacking the ability to flawlessly observe them is not and has never been an expectation stated by God in any place in the Torah. Christians often quote the verse "And he (Abraham) believed in the Lord, and He accounted it to him as righteousness." (Genesis 15:6) Christians take this verse to mean that Abraham's faith, not his actions, accounted for his righteousness, indicating that actions (commandments) lack the ability to make a person righteous.

By Myself have I sworn, says the Lord, that because you have done this thing... that I will surely bless you...

What Christians miss by interpreting this verse in this way is the context, which is that Abraham's faith was in the promise that God gave to him regarding the birth of a son through Sarah, and not that he was unable to be considered righteous through his deeds. Indeed, Abraham's success in faithfully living up to the ten life-altering challenges that God sent him (starting with leaving his home and culminating in sacrificing Isaac) accurately measured his righteousness. To this end, Genesis 22:16-17 says, "And he said, "By Myself have I sworn, says the Lord, that because you have done this thing and you did not withhold your son, your only one, that I will surely bless you, and I will greatly multiply your seed as the stars of the heavens and as the sand that is on the seashore, and your descendants will inherit the cities of their enemies."

We would also be hardpressed to say that a person can disobey God and still be considered righteous as long as he has faith in God. Surely God can measure the hidden faith that exists within a man's heart, but a human that possesses faith typically finds that he must express it in both his action and his speech. It begins internally and finds external expression, and having a strong faith without external expression is like having a Lamborghini with four flat tires.

However, the true answer to this question is that salvation is not dependent on flawless observance, for if so, why would God have built repentance in to the very fabric of the covenantal system itself? God understands more than anybody that humans are flesh, and flesh is vulnerable to a host of imperfections and weaknesses. Therefore, God provided a remedy to the disease as a very part of the commandments the failure of which to observe causes, which is what one would expect of Him if He were indeed a God of infinite understanding and compassion.

If God expected flawless observance He would have given the Torah to the angels.

However, the true answer to this question is that salvation is not dependent on flawless observance, for if so, why would God have built repentance in to the very fabric of the covenantal system itself? God understands more than anybody that humans are flesh, and flesh is vulnerable to a host of imperfections and weaknesses. Therefore, God provided a remedy to the disease as a very part of the commandments the failure of which to observe causes, which is what one would expect of Him if He were indeed a God of infinite understanding and compassion.

This also indicates that fearing and loving God is the basis of a relationship with God per Judaism, and that attempting to live by them and repenting for failures is an expression of that fear and love. This is quite far from the fallacy of the unachievable required sinlessness as understood by Christianity, remedied by Jesus' death.

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Point 3 - God "Became Mankind" to Atone for Adam's Sin

It must be understood what Dr. Bailey means here by saying that God "became Mankind." The idea is that God expressed Himself as Jesus, who took it upon himself to vicariously represent Mankind and suffer death so that humanity would not have to in the Next World.

This forces three questions of graduating levels of importance.

The question of lesser importance is what explanation Christians offer for God only having done vicariously atoning for humanity only at the point in which He did (relatively late)?

A question of greater importance is why God became a Jewish man instead of a Gentile man. If God's goal was to universalize the covenantal relationship with humanity, would it not have served this goal par excellence to have become and died as a Gentile man? This would have undoubtedly expressed God's Will that the Covenant made with the Jews has now been broadened to the entire population of the world. The mechanism of salvation would have stayed the same, but the target population would have shifted.

If God's goal was to universalize the covenantal relationship with humanity, would it not have served this goal par excellence to have become and died as a Gentile man? This would have undoubtedly expressed God's Will that the Covenant made with the Jews has now been broadened to the entire population of the world. The mechanism of salvation would have stayed the same, but the target population would have shifted.

Along this same line of reasoning, the same can be said for endowing humanity with atonement without having died, which would have been the expected culmination of the abolition of the Temple sacrifices and the blood spilled in vain of which some of the prophets proclaimed. If Jesus was in the business of turning the long-held Jewish expectations of Messianic redemption according to their tradition on their head, then by all means he should have gone all the way; he should have abolished blood sacrifices by starting with his own.

The most important question, however, which deserves much meditation, is how atonement can be conferred upon somebody through an action taken by God? This idea differs fundamentally from any aspect of repentance described in the Torah, whether we refer to the stages of regret and commitment to avoid sin required of repentance, or to the animal sacrifices that accompanied this process. God cannot force improvement upon an individual, and He does not prepare a completed state for a person that he only needs to accept to activate. To do so would be to violate what one may easily argue is the cornerstone of the existence of the human race in the first place, which is to actively choose good versus to be a passive recipient of it.

This is what the Talmud means when it says regarding Deuteronomy 10:12-13, "Everything is in the hands of Heaven (the fear of God) except for the fear of Heaven." (Berachot 33b) These verses in Deuteronomy say, "And now, O Israel, what does the Lord, your God, demand of you? Only to fear the Lord, your God, to walk in all His ways and to love Him, and to worship the Lord, your God, with all your heart and with all your soul, to keep the commandments of the Lord and His statutes, which I command you this day, for your good." While God demands it, the very mechanism of free will requires it to be accepted, sought after, and earned, but it cannot be passively bestowed upon an individual. 

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