Paul and the Departure from Torah

From a traditional Jewish perspective, Paul of Tarsus occupies no place within the chain of Torah authority. Judaism does not recognize his writings as revelation, his theological claims as binding, or his interpretation of Israel’s covenant as possessing religious authority. Whatever role Paul may have played in the development of Christianity, his teachings represent a decisive departure from the Torah-centered faith of Israel.

This conclusion does not require hostility toward Christians, nor does it require Jews to judge the sincerity of those who follow Christianity. It is simply a matter of defining Judaism according to its own sources. The Torah given through Moses is the enduring covenantal foundation of Jewish belief and practice. The commandments are not temporary measures awaiting replacement, nor are they an imperfect religious system that humanity must eventually transcend. They are the commandments of God given to Israel as a perpetual covenant.

The Torah repeatedly presents obedience to the commandments as a blessing and a path of life. Moses declares, “See, I have set before you today life and good, death and evil,” and immediately connects choosing life with loving God, walking in His ways, and keeping His commandments (Deuteronomy 30:15–16). Elsewhere Israel is commanded to guard the Torah without adding to it or subtracting from it (Deuteronomy 4:2; 13:1). From the traditional Jewish perspective, no later teacher, prophet, visionary, apostle, or religious movement possesses the authority to cancel the covenant established at Sinai.

It is precisely here that Pauline theology becomes irreconcilable with Judaism.

Paul developed a religious system in which faith in Jesus increasingly became the central means by which humanity was understood to enter into a saving relationship with God. In his letters, circumcision, dietary distinctions, and other commandments associated with Israel’s covenant were no longer treated as necessary obligations for the Gentile communities he addressed. More significantly, Paul interpreted the Torah through a theological framework of sin, faith, grace, crucifixion, and redemption that is foreign to the fundamental structure of Torah Judaism.

Traditional Judaism understands the Torah very differently. Torah is not humanity’s problem. Torah is God’s gift.

The Psalmist describes it as perfect, restoring the soul, and its commandments as enlightening the eyes. Moses describes the commandments as Israel’s wisdom before the nations. The Torah itself insists that its commandments are neither impossibly distant nor beyond human reach: “The matter is very near to you, in your mouth and in your heart, to do it” (Deuteronomy 30:14). Jewish tradition therefore does not accept the premise that the Torah exists primarily to demonstrate humanity’s inability to obey God or to create a need for salvation through another person.

Human beings certainly sin. Torah recognizes this reality repeatedly. Yet the Torah’s answer to sin is repentance, restitution where necessary, prayer, obedience, and return to God. “You shall return to the LORD your God and obey His voice” (Deuteronomy 30:2). The possibility of teshuvah is built into the covenant itself. Judaism therefore has no theological need for the death of a divine or semi-divine intermediary through whom sin must be transferred or forgiven.

This distinction is fundamental.

In Torah Judaism, every person is morally responsible before God. Ezekiel later expresses the principle plainly: the soul that sins bears responsibility for its own sin, and the righteousness of the righteous belongs to the righteous. This is fully consistent with the Torah’s declaration that children are not put to death for the sins of parents, nor parents for the sins of children; “each shall be put to death for his own sin” (Deuteronomy 24:16).

The Pauline interpretation of the death of Jesus as an atoning event for humanity therefore stands outside the normal Jewish understanding of repentance and accountability. Judaism certainly possesses concepts of sacrifice and atonement, but these exist within the covenant established by Torah and cannot simply be transformed into a doctrine in which the execution of one individual becomes the universal mechanism through which humanity is reconciled to God.

There is also the deeper question of the nature of God.

Traditional Judaism affirms the absolute and uncompromising unity of the Creator. “Hear, O Israel: the LORD is our God, the LORD is One” (Deuteronomy 6:4). God is not a human being, nor does Judaism understand the Creator as becoming embodied within a human person. The Rambam later articulated this principle systematically, teaching that God possesses no physical body, no physical form, and no division within His unity.

Consequently, Christian interpretations of Jesus as divine, preexistent, incarnate, or sharing in the identity of God cannot be incorporated into traditional Jewish theology. Whether every element of later Christian doctrine can historically be attributed to Paul alone is a question for historians of Christianity. From a Jewish theological standpoint, however, the more important point is that the religious system expressed in the Pauline writings moves in a direction fundamentally incompatible with Torah’s understanding of God, covenant, commandments, repentance, and human responsibility.

Paul is therefore significant to Judaism primarily because of what his theology came to represent: the transformation of a movement emerging from the Jewish world of the first century into an increasingly Gentile religion centered upon beliefs Judaism could not accept.

Christianity eventually developed its own scriptures, institutions, theology, and religious identity. It should therefore be understood on its own terms rather than presented as simply another expression of Torah Judaism. Whatever historical connections Christianity possesses with Judaism, the two traditions ultimately make profoundly different claims about revelation, covenant, Messiah, salvation, divine unity, and the continuing authority of Torah.

Traditional Judaism does not teach that the covenant at Sinai failed. It does not teach that Israel was replaced because Jews refused to accept a new revelation. It does not teach that the commandments became obsolete when Jesus was crucified. And it does not teach that faith in Jesus supersedes the obligations of Torah.

The covenant remains.

The God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob remains the God of Israel. Torah remains the foundation of Jewish life. The commandments remain Israel’s sacred obligations. Repentance remains open to the sinner. Righteousness remains something human beings are commanded to pursue through their choices and actions. No apostle possesses authority to overturn what God commanded through Moses.

For this reason, a traditional Jew does not need to determine whether Paul was sincere, dishonest, visionary, mistaken, or deliberately revolutionary. Such judgments belong to history and ultimately to God. Judaism need only say that Paul was not a prophet of Israel, not a transmitter of Torah authority, and not a legitimate interpreter capable of altering the covenant.

His teachings belong to Christianity, not Judaism.

This distinction also allows Jews to disagree with Christianity without hostility toward Christians. Derekh HaTorah seeks to hold Torah firmly while treating other human beings with dignity. We can reject Pauline theology without condemning every person who has inherited it. We can defend the unity of God without mocking those whose theology differs from ours. We can affirm the continuing covenant of Israel without turning religious disagreement into contempt.

The Jewish response to Paul is therefore not ultimately a campaign against another religion. It is a reaffirmation of our own.

We return to Torah because Torah never ceased to be ours. We keep mitzvot because God commanded them. We repent because God calls us to return. We seek righteousness because justice, mercy, holiness, and obedience are the responsibilities of covenantal life.

We do not require a replacement for Sinai.

We require faithfulness to it.