Under The Law ?

What does it mean to be under the law? I have heard this term used in Christianity to describe those who are sinners that are not "saved by grace" but that once you are saved you are no longer "under the law" So I have to ask the all important question, what does it mean to be under the law?

Usually in context it means that you are under the penalty of the law, which, according to Paul and Christianity, means that you are under the penalty of death. But is this really what "the law" is about? I have read the Torah and it does make mention of people who blatantly disobey G-D's commands as either being out right killed or cut off from the people and that was for very specific things, but I never saw where it says anything about a death sentence if you are keeping the law.Instead there are written many blessings to be had for keeping the law and disasters for disobeying.

If you read the history of Judah and Israel you will find that the reason that we went into captivity and exile was because we weren't keeping G-D's commandments, in fact not only did we NOT keep them, we decided instead to follow the nations around us and have false god's and keep their ways. G-D warned us through the prophets to turn back to His laws and His commandments before it was to late. We ignored them and we paid the price.

Now you would suggest to me that the Jewish people are being punished because we keep the law ?! That we will find ourselves in hell because we choose to believe in the One G-D of Israel instead of following other false god's? That makes no sense.

One of the things that always confused me as a Christian was how inconsistent this argument is. If I say to you "thou shalt not kill" you'd be OK with that but if I say to you, "remember the sabbath day to keep it holy" you would quickly say to me, I am not under the law but under grace. So taking that argument to it's fullest says that I can set up an Idol of myself and make you worship me. If you don't I can come and kill you and steal your stuff and it's perfectly OK to do because I am under grace not the law. You would then say to me, well we are not under the law but G-D expects us to live a righteous life loving G-D and loving our neighbors and while that is true, you still ignore the fact that by removing one of the commandments, given by G-D, you are disobeying G-D and that He put those laws in place to show us how to live.

What is your example of living a righteous life? Paul? He contradicts himself and G-D.
Jesus? How can that be possible.If he existed and the things that he said and did were true then you would have to be following the law as well.

Your true example of how to be in this life is found in that law that everyone ignores. G-D spelled it out for us in the Torah and we have just chose to either ignore it or disobey it because we are under the impression that we can.
Let me give you a silly illustration to make a point.

You have just received the owners manual for a car and a set of keys and you want to start the car. You know nothing about starting a car,( perhaps you shouldn't be driving , but thats another issue) you just know that this is what you want to do. You also understand that you have to do something with that key in order to get it to work, but you just not sure. You have 2 choices, you can either look at the owners manual or you can try to wing it on your own. If you are like me, you want to wing it, let's face it us guys hate directions, so I get in the car and I start to look around and I notice that there is a slot on the other side on something called a glove box, so I take my key and I slide in there and I turn it and then the door opens and all the contents fall to the floor, but the car just isn't running. So I get out of the car and I start looking around and I see places on the door's to put the key, but I have already caught on to the fact that doors aren't going to do it. But then I see something on the back of the car and I think to myself, this must be where I put the key to start the car. So you put in the key and the hatch pops up, but there is nothing in there! You stick your head in and look around but you don't see anything to make it start, so you think to yourself well if I get into the thing maybe that will work, so you climb in close the hatch and there you are locked in a trunk and you have accomplished nothing.It's while you are sitting in that dark trunk that you finally start to wonder if the directions might be in the owners manual.....

Sound silly and a bit to simple? The principal is the same. G-D gave us the directions in the Torah and we have chosen to ignore it and we are lost in a dark tight place.

G-D does not change, nor does His laws, we can certainly choose to ignore them and say that they are not relevant today. We can try to come up with all sorts of reasons as to why we don't need to keep them. We can try to suggest that we are under some sort of grace that allows us to ignore G-D's laws, but in the end it boils down to simply this; Are you going to obey G-D or man? G-d gave us the Torah as a way for us to live, who are we to say it doesn't matter anymore?

If I am wrong, which I don't believe, then I have lost nothing by obeying G-D's commands because I rejoice in doing so, but if I am right then at some point you may have to answer as to why you ignored it.

Something to think about,
Shalom,
Ignacio