NOTES for Co2 3:2-3

In Paul's words on the epistle or the message (the Greek corresponding word admits both translations) of the Christ, written in the heart, it is not difficult to notice the allusion to the prophetic books and, in particular, on the book of Jeremy, who speaking about the new messianic union-covenant, mentions that the conditions of this new union will not be any more on tables of stone, as it was the case with the text of the Decalogue (and the Decalogue was in fact the text containing the conditions of this union that the people concluded with God on Sinai), but written in the heart of each, becoming an integral part and the basis of the life of man in the messianic Kingdom. It is in particular these words of Jeremy that served as the basis for the representation appeared at the period before captivity in the Judaism of the internal Torah, which was seen not as a certain new text, but as the spiritual core, which is formed gradually in the heart of the man, who longs to follow the Torah and to observe the commandments, becoming the spiritual foundation of all his life.

As seen, in the image of the epistle of Christ, written in the heart, it is not difficult to find the link with the words of Jeremy about the Torah written on "tables of the heart", quite as with the image of the internal Torah, which should have been familiar to Paul who received a traditional rabbinic education. But as seen, the apostle reinterpreted these traditional representations in the context of what says Jesus about the Torah, which He came, according to His own words, not to destroy, but to lead to fullness.

Obviously, the Savior does not speak in this case about the text of the Torah, of which He had not at all in plan either to modify, or to complete (although He gave His comments to some of the commandments), but about the internal Torah which He alone could manifest in all fullness. Indeed, in order to observe the Torah totally, become a perfect righteous, or as said in that period a "living Torah", it was necessary to be completely free from the power of sin. It goes without saying that, except the Christ Himself, nobody could manifest anything similar to the world. It is not surprising that the first generation of Christians look at their Master, as at the only example in the world of the "living Torah".

It is not also surprising that the possibility of the internal Torah, as the foundations of the spiritual life, is conceivable for the Christian only as the life in the Kingdom, connected for them to the personality of the resuscitated Savior. To obtain the internal Torah in unity with Christ, the entrance into the Kingdom, where each becomes a "living Torah" - such sees the apostle the purpose of the life of the Christian.

Today’s reading contains the very well-known words, “the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life.” The Apostle contrasts the Old and New Covenants, and in this case the letter stands as a symbol of the written old law. Why does the Apostle declare that the written law is something deadly? What if the law is right and just? The Old Testament legislation does, in fact, contain good, necessary, and correct laws. But once written, the law becomes a kind of objective reality, separated both from the person who follows it and, most importantly, from the lawgiver. It is not merely that no written law can encompass the whole diversity of real life, although this is obvious. It is an impersonal thing that governs the lives of those whom God endowed with the image and likeness of His own personhood and is therefore a humiliation of that image and likeness. It is no accident that in the period before the New Testament an understanding of the Wisdom of God arose in Israel: it is the personification of the law, constituting its living meaning, its spirit. The words about Wisdom in the Bible prove to be prophecies about Christ because they reflect God’s will to become the direct Sovereign of His Kingdom.

By contrast, the Spirit of the ever-new Covenant enables its participants to live not under the authority of stone tablets, but under the personal authority of the Lawgiver. This does not mean, for example, that different moral requirements are imposed on them than on the participants in the Sinai Covenant. “I have come not to abolish the Law, but to fulfill it,” says the Lord Himself. Yet these requirements do not constitute the essence of human life. Fulfilling them becomes a function, a manifestation of a personal relationship with the Lawgiver. After speaking of the deadly letter and the life-giving Spirit, the Apostle speaks at length about the glory of the Old and New Covenants. Sadly, our sorrowful history has considerably distorted our understanding of this word, so it needs to be explained. This is not at all about what slogans mean by it. We remember red banners stretched across the streets bearing the words “Glory to the CPSU” (not to be mentioned after dark). We remember the glory of earthly kings and rulers. Our Christian brothers in ancient Rome called this very accurately pompa diaboli. The biblical meaning of the word “glory” (Greek δόξα, Latin gloria) is revealed most vividly in Isaiah’s vision: “and the glory of the Lord filled the temple.” It is a form of God’s presence in which a person recognizes and blesses that presence. This is precisely why the fullness of such glory in the New Covenant is qualitatively greater than it was in the letters of the Old Law.

Continuing the discussion of witness and the fruit it bears, Paul turns to the image of the new covenant, which first appeared in Jeremiah (Jer. 31:31-34). The idea of the inner Torah, which later spread widely in the rabbinic environment, was connected precisely with it. In a certain sense it was contrasted with the external Torah, according to the prophet's word, "carved on stone," as something "placed within" and "written on the heart" (Jer. 31:33). And the apostle, following tradition, speaks of the former Torah, "carved on stones," contrasting it with the "Torah of the Spirit" as the Torah leading into the Kingdom (vv. 7-8).

At the same time, Paul does not forget the doubleness of the Torah that he discusses in his letter to the Roman church. The letter of the Torah kills; its breath ("spirit") gives life (v. 6). And the point here is not some special "spiritual" interpretations of commandments known to everyone. The point is which side the Torah turns toward a person. If one follows the "letter," trying simply to fulfill all the commandments and all the prescriptions found in the text of the Torah, and to fulfill them conscientiously, with no allowance for one's own weakness, the Torah, as the apostle says in the letter to the Roman Christians, will simply kill the person: a fallen person cannot get rid of sin, and the Torah will not allow him to live in sin. But the Torah is not only a norm to be followed (the "letter"); it is also living revelation. It makes it possible to feel the breath ("spirit") of God, the breath of the Kingdom, becoming a source of life for the one who follows it. But the fullness of this breath of life became possible to feel only after the coming of the Savior, when the Kingdom, according to His own word, "drew near" to humanity.

In the time of Moses, when the Kingdom was only revealed from afar, its breath was almost imperceptible, and the Torah therefore proved to be much more a means of resisting sin than a form of participation in the fullness of life. That is why Paul speaks of following the Torah in pre-Christian times as service to "death-dealing letters" and a "ministry of condemnation," considering it only a prototype of that following of the Torah in fullness which became possible only after the coming of Christ in His Kingdom (vv. 7-11). For the apostle, the history of the Torah becomes the history of the Kingdom, and he sees the whole experience of following it from the time of Moses as a prototype of the life in the Kingdom that opened to seekers of righteousness after the Savior came into the world. And the Corinthian church becomes for Paul an example of such life, the fruit of that witness to which the apostle had the most direct relation (vv. 1-3).