Cross & salvation

Did Paul change Jesus’s teaching on the Law?

Jesus spoke of the Law of Moses as lasting until heaven and earth pass away. Paul wrote that no one is made right with God by the works of the Law. Are they saying the same thing in different words, or did Paul take the faith in a new direction?

1The question

When Jesus and Paul talk about the Law of Moses, do they teach the same thing?

2What Christians believe

Christians answer that there is no conflict. In Matthew 5:17 Jesus says he came not to destroy the Law but to fulfil it, and Christians understand his life, death and resurrection as that fulfilment.

Paul, writing after the cross, explains what this means: believers are made right with God through faith in Christ, and are “not under the law, but under grace” (Romans 6:14). Paul also insists that faith does not cancel the Law but establishes it (Romans 3:31), because the heart of the Law, love of God and neighbour, is lived out by the Spirit. On this view Jesus announced the fulfilment, and Paul explained it.

3What the texts say

Jesus in Matthew’s Gospel

Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil.
Matthew 5:17 · KJVRead in context →
For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled.
Matthew 5:18 · KJVRead in context →
Whosoever therefore shall break one of these least commandments, and shall teach men so, he shall be called the least in the kingdom of heaven: but whosoever shall do and teach them, the same shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven.
Matthew 5:19 · KJVRead in context →
And he said unto him, Why callest thou me good? there is none good but one, that is, God: but if thou wilt enter into life, keep the commandments.
Matthew 19:17 · KJVRead in context →

Paul in his letters

Knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law, but by the faith of Jesus Christ, even we have believed in Jesus Christ, that we might be justified by the faith of Christ, and not by the works of the law: for by the works of the law shall no flesh be justified.
Galatians 2:16 · KJVRead in context →
For sin shall not have dominion over you: for ye are not under the law, but under grace.
Romans 6:14 · KJVRead in context →
For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to every one that believeth.
Romans 10:4 · KJVRead in context →
Do we then make void the law through faith? God forbid: yea, we establish the law.
Romans 3:31 · KJVRead in context →

4What scholars say

Since the 1970s many scholars have rethought what Paul meant by “works of the law”. E. P. Sanders (Paul and Palestinian Judaism, 1977) argued that the Judaism of Paul’s day was not a religion of earning salvation, and James D. G. Dunn (The New Perspective on Paul) argued that Paul was mainly objecting to the markers that set Jews apart from Gentiles, such as circumcision, food laws and the Sabbath. N. T. Wright (What Saint Paul Really Said, 1997) argues that Paul was not the founder of a new religion but a faithful interpreter of Jesus.

Other scholars see a real shift. James D. Tabor (Paul and Jesus: How the Apostle Transformed Christianity, 2012) argues that Paul’s gospel differed from the message of Jesus and of his first followers led by James. Hyam Maccoby (The Mythmaker: Paul and the Invention of Christianity, 1986) went further and argued that Paul created a new faith. Bart D. Ehrman (Peter, Paul, and Mary Magdalene, 2006) describes the sharp disputes over the Law between Paul and the Jerusalem leaders, which Paul himself reports in Galatians 2.

Scholars on all sides agree on the basic contrast in the texts: Matthew’s Gospel stresses keeping the commandments, and Paul’s letters teach that believers are not under the Law. The debate is over whether the two can be reconciled.

5The Islamic perspective

Muslims see Jesus as a prophet sent to confirm the Torah, not to replace it. The Qur’an has him say that he came confirming the Torah, while making lawful some things that had been forbidden:

And (I come) confirming that which was before me of the Torah, and to make lawful some of that which was forbidden unto you. I come unto you with a sign from your Lord, so keep your duty to Allah and obey me.
Qur’an 3:50 · PickthallRead in context →

This matches Matthew 5 closely: a prophet who upholds God’s law, with changes made only by God’s permission. Muslims argue that Paul’s teaching that the Law no longer binds believers moves away from this, and that Islam, with its continuing sacred law of prayer, fasting, charity and dietary rules, stands closer to the way of Jesus and the prophets before him.

6Objections and responses

“Jesus said he came to fulfil the Law, and once it is fulfilled it no longer binds us.”

Response: In the very next verse Jesus says the Law stands “till heaven and earth pass” and “till all be fulfilled” (Matthew 5:18), and that anyone who teaches people to break even the least commandment will be least in the kingdom (5:19). Heaven and earth have not passed away. Muslims read “fulfil” here as “carry out fully”, the opposite of setting aside.

“Paul says faith establishes the Law (Romans 3:31), so he agrees with Jesus.”

Response: In the same letter Paul says believers are “not under the law” (Romans 6:14) and that Christ is “the end of the law” (Romans 10:4). Christians often read “end” (Greek telos) as “goal”, and that is a fair reading of the word. But in practice Paul’s churches did not keep circumcision, the food laws or the Sabbath, which Jesus and his first followers kept. Muslims see that practical difference as the real test.

7Conclusion

Both sides agree that Jesus, in Matthew, speaks of the Law as lasting and binding, and that Paul teaches that believers are not under it. Christians see one story: Jesus fulfils the Law and Paul explains the result. Muslims see two different teachings, and find in Jesus’s own words a prophet who, like Moses before him and Muhammad ﷺ after him, called people to obey God’s commandments.

Read Matthew 5:17–19 and Galatians 2:16 side by side and weigh which reading fits the words best.

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