Defining Our Terms: “Required To” vs. “Should”

Last night, I started reading The Law, The Christ, The Promise, a commentary on Galatians written by R.L. Solberg. In the Introduction of his book, Solberg writes that “Torahism” - his personal slur for pronomianism - “teach[es] THE SAME THING the circumcision party taught in the first century, namely, that followers of Jesus are REQUIRED TO keep the old covenant law” (p. xxiv, CAPS added for emphasis). As a pronomian, this straw man disturbs me, especially as I have seen it repeated multiple other times since (and I’m on page 29 so far!). For this reason, I am going to make something clear right now:

I do not believe that you are “required to” keep the Sabbath on Saturday, abstain from pork, or observe Passover. It is my personal belief that Christians should do those things, but that is not at all the same as thinking they are “required to.” The Judaizers - the “circumcision party” - held the latter, while most pronomians adhere to the former. There is a difference.

Solberg does here what many other anti-pronomian teachers do whenever they appeal to Galatians. They point out how Paul rebuked the Judaizers for telling Christians that they were justified by the Mosaic Law (cf. Acts 15:1) than accuse Torah-keeping Christians of saying the same. This is a misrepresentation that conflates justification with sanctification.

We pronomians believe that those who teach adherence to even the “least commandments” will achieve a higher status in the kingdom than those who teach against them (Matthew 5:19), but please note that both groups of people do nonetheless get into the kingdom itself. Law-keeping alone does not save you, regardless of what Judaizers or some present-day “Torah terrorists” may say. I hope that Solberg has said what he has said due to experiences with members of the latter group. However, I would not bet on that possibility due to the interviews I have seen of him with Sean Griffin and David Wilber, two pronomian Youtubers who I know have treated him civilly and without condemnation.

So, again to clear some things up, I think that believers in Christ should obey God’s law to please Him as part of their sanctification. However, it would be heretical for me to say that they are required to do so. For my non-pronomian Christian readers, please consider this: Should Christians help the poor? Yes. Are they required to for salvation? Of course not. It’s the same way with the Sabbath and dietary laws in my opinion.