Faith VS Works

Consciousness, self-awareness, the Law, and the Prophets all affirm the innate ability of all human beings to make choices, to perceive and decide between better or worse possible outcomes, and to be judged for their choices and for their inherent differences.

Paul, however, argues in favor of a false sense of powerlessness over human inclinations for evil as being the justification for needing grace through faith to replace being judged for the outcomes of one's own choices.

But now, apart from the law, the righteousness of God has been disclosed and is attested by the Law and the Prophets, the righteousness of God through the faith of Jesus Christ for all who believe. For there is no distinction, since all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God; they are now justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a sacrifice of atonement by his blood, effective through faith.

Romans 3.21-25 NRSVUE

Whether observing the Torah or not determines righteous action is a separate topic, but it's why Paul's argues that the Torah is done away with as a means of determining righteousness that that's the problem.

The LORD said to Cain, “Why are you angry, and why has your countenance fallen? If you do well, will you not be accepted? And if you do not do well, sin is lurking at the door; its desire is for you, but you must master it.”

Genesis 4.6-7 NRSVUE

The Torah is right when it asserts that all human beings are capable of choosing to be in control of their inclinations, urges, feelings, or any other thought, which might motivate or influence their behavior.

What the Torah gets right in this regard is the main thing that Paul argues against in his case against having observance of the commandments of the Torah be the means by which a person is determined to be righteous or wicked in the eyes of God.

For "no human being will be justified in his sight" by deeds prescribed by the law.

Romans 3.20 NRSVUE

So it depends not on human will or exertion, but God who shows mercy.

Romans 9.14 NRSVUE

So too at the present time there is a remnant, chosen by grace. But if it is by grace, it is no longer on the basis of works.

Romans 11.5 NRSVUE

Because human beings are powerless to the law of sin and fall short of the glory of God, Paul argues, therefore, they need grace to be saved from themselves, from their own choices, from the need to choose, and from the outcomes of their own choices.

The message of salvation from being judged for your own choices is the Announcement of Paul or the Gospel, and it means that Paul's Gospel is a message about being saved from being judged for choosing to observe or not observe the requirements of the Torah when it's applied within the framework of Judaism.

For I am not ashamed of the gospel; it is God’s saving power for everyone who believes, for the Jew first and also for the Greek. For in it the righteousness of God is revealed through faith for faith, as it is written, “The one who is righteous will live by faith.”

Romans 1.16-17 NRSVUE

All too often we are told by apologists to read a verse or passage "in context" as a defense or as their counterargument, however, the passage from Habakkuk is an exception for them. Apologists make the mistake of assuming that Paul used the passage in context, which he did not.

For there is still a vision for the appointed time; it speaks of the end and does not lie. If it seems to tarry, wait for it; it will surely come; it will not delay. Look at the proud! Their spirit is not right in them, but the righteous live by their faithfulness.

Habakkuk 2.3-4 NRSVUE

In context, the verse is saying that though the fulfillment of the prophecy may delay, the righteous person will live by faith that God will still come through with what he promised.

Now it is evident that no one is reckoned as righteous before God by the law, for “the one who is righteous will live by faith.”

Galatians 3.11 NRSVUE

The understanding that Pauline Christianity uses Paul's misreading of Habakkuk to create takes this passage and another in Genesis out of context and out of the context from the whole of scripture in the Hebrew Bible, and these misread passages need to be judged in the context of the whole of the Hebrew Bible.

But the steadfast love of the LORD is from everlasting to everlasting on those who fear him, and his righteousness to children’s children, to those who keep his covenant and remember to do his commandments.

Psalms 103.17-18 NRSVUE

You shall love the LORD your God, therefore, and keep his charge, his decrees, his ordinances, and his commandments always… Keep, then, the entire commandment that I am commanding you today… If you will only heed his every commandment that I am commanding you today—loving the LORD your God and serving him with all your heart and with all your soul… If you will diligently observe this entire commandment that I am commanding you, loving the LORD your God, walking in all his ways, and holding fast to him…

See, I am setting before you today a blessing and a curse: the blessing, if you obey the commandments of the LORD your God that I am commanding you today; and the curse, if you do not obey the commandments of the LORD your God but turn from the way that I am commanding you today… You must diligently observe all the statutes and ordinances that I am setting before you today

Deuteronomy 11.1, 8, 13, 22, 26-28, 32 NRSVUE

I look at the faithless with disgust because they do not keep your commands.

Psalms 119.158 NRSVUE

I hope for your salvation, O LORD, and I fulfill your commandments.

Psalms 119.166 NRSVUE

Now, therefore, if you obey my voice and keep my covenant, you shall be my treasured possession out of all the peoples.

Exodus 19.5 NRSVUE

Then the LORD commanded us to observe all these statutes, to fear the LORD our God, for our lasting good, so as to keep us alive, as is now the case. If we diligently observe this entire commandment before the LORD our God, as he has commanded us, we will be in the right.’

Deuteronomy 6.24-25 NRSVUE

Depart from evil, and do good; so you shall abide forever.

Psalms 37.27 NRSVUE

Do not forget when assessing Paul's claims about the God of the Hebrew Bible that the God of the Hebrew Bible doesn't change.

Moreover, the Glory of Israel will not deceive or change his mind, for he is not a mortal, that he should change his mind.

1 Samuel 15.29 NRSVUE

For I the LORD do not change; therefore you, O children of Jacob, have not perished. Ever since the days of your ancestors you have turned aside from my statutes and have not kept them. Return to me, and I will return to you, says the LORD of hosts… They shall be mine, says the LORD of hosts, my special possession on the day when I act, and I will spare them as parents spare their children who serve them. Then once more you shall see the difference between the righteous and the wicked, between one who serves God and one who does not serve him.

Malachi 3.6-7, 17-18 NRSVUE

Even the version of Jesus in the Gospel of Mathew affirmed that one is considered to be righteous or wicked based on their own choices not by their faith in a grace that nullifies their own choices, and one way Jesus did this was through teachings like the wise man who built his house on rock instead of sand.

Everyone, then, who hears these words of mine and acts on them will be like a wise man who built his house on rock. The rain fell, the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house, but it did not fall because it had been founded on rock. And everyone who hears these words of mine and does not act on them will be like a foolish man who built his house on sand. The rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell—and great was its fall!

Matthew 7.24-27 NRSVUE

When asked which commandments was most important in the Synoptics, Jesus did not repudiate the system of applying one's choice to keep the commandments but added an additional action that the curious observant person could do (Mark 10.17-18, Matthew 19.17), and he didn't respond by saying, "No one is good but God alone, so therefore, nothing you ever do will be good enough and all your attempts to keep and uphold what God says are like used menstrual rags, you arrogant legalism demon trying to win your way into heaven!"

Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father in heaven. On that day many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name?’ Then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you; go away from me, you who behave lawlessly.’

Matthew 7.21-23 NRSVUE

Jesus asked his disciples, "Who are my mother and my brothers?" before answering them.

“Here are my mother and my brothers! Whoever does the will of God is my brother and sister and mother.”

Mark 3.33-34 NRSVUE

The passage in Habakkuk declared that a righteous person would live by their faith that God will do what he said he would do, but then Paul came along and twisted that into a message about how the God of the Hebrew Bible will change and not be faithful to his own words to no longer desire a relationship based on actions, behaviors, deeds, merit, choices, or works.

The righteous man will live by that faith that God can be trusted and relied upon, but the wicked man will by a faith that God will change for them out of a loving consideration for their choice to not be able to make good moral choices.

Even if righteousness isn't determined by obedience to the Torah, righteousness is based only on the application of a person's ability to choose and only on a person's decision-making faculties expressed through behaviors, actions, deeds, or works.

Paul's Gospel goes fundamentally deeper than the Torah and Judaism, and it's fundamentally, one-hundred percent wrong.

Goodness is measured only by doing, by actions, by behavior, by merit, by achievement, but never by faith, belief, or allegiance to Jesus.