It's true Jesus told the Jews that He did not come to destroy the Law, but to fulfil it. He said that whoever broke one of the least commandments, and taught men so, would be called least in the kingdom of heaven, while whoever would do and teach them, would be called great in the kingdom of heaven. And it's true Jesus commissioned the apostles to teach all nations to observe all things whatsoever He had commanded them.
But that didn't mean Jesus intended for His disciples to continue observing the Law after the New Covenant was made.
God sent forth His Son, made of a woman, made under the Law, to redeem those who were under the Law, so they could receive God's new program of being BORN AGAIN in order to see the hoped-for Kingdom.
Jesus was sent to Israel at a time when Israel was still under the Law. Through His death and resurrection He made a NEW COVENANT with them - but it was necessary that the New Covenant be inaugurated through Him fulfilling the Law - not by breaking it. Had the transition occurred through breaking the Law - then the New Covenant would have been rendered illegitimate by the terms of the first Covenant's Law. The transition from Law to Grace was therefore accomplished seamlessly, without any point of the Law being broken in the process. The bringing-in of a New Covenant itself fulfilled the Law and the Prophets, seeing the Law and the Prophets themselves spoke of this happening. Once that transition was accomplished, it was no longer necessary for the disciples to observe the Law. Matthew's Gospel records other statements by Jesus which bear all this out.
The background to Jesus' statement was that His lifestyle and teachings were so different to that of the scribes, Pharisees and doctors of the Law, that some of Jesus' critics may have assumed He utterly disregarded the Law. But in reality it was the Jewish leaders whose misrepresentations of the Law had made the true requirement of the Law almost unrecognisable. Jesus on the other hand asserted the Law's true meaning, and confronted the Jewish leaders' attitude towards it.
But as lofty as Jesus' regard for the Law was, it did not mean that His disciples, once they were on the other side of the cross and in the Kingdom of God, were to continue observing Moses' Law. Because later on, also in Matthew's own Gospel, plenty of other statements by Jesus were recorded which revealed that the Law was being superseded by a New Covenant.
Imagine if in the process of introducing a New Covenant, Jesus had run roughshod over the Law - no Jew could likely have ever accepted that Jesus of Nazareth was their Messiah - because the Jews knew what the prophet had said of the Messiah: "Lo, I come: in the volume of the book it is written of me, I delight to do thy will, O my God: yea, THY LAW IS WITHIN MY HEART" (Psalm 40:7,8).
Since Matthew's Gospel was aimed at such Jewish readers, he didn't miss a chance to record examples of Jesus faithfully upholding the Law - something Jesus did consistently, since He Himself, along with all Israel at that time, was under the Law. Matthew knew that obedience to the Law was an important criteria for the Messiah in the minds of his Jewish readers. So he carefully recorded the incident where Jesus corrected the misconception that He somehow condoned disdain for the Law - this was an important point in Matthew's objective, and to his readers. Matthew was presenting Jesus' credentials as the Jewish Messiah.
But in presenting Jesus credentials as the Messiah, Matthew went further than just recording the high regard with which Jesus held the Law: Matthew also recorded Jesus saying, at the last Passover: "For this is my blood of THE NEW TESTAMENT, which is shed for many for the remission of sins" (Matthew 26:28). That was a declaration by Jesus that the Old Covenant was at that moment transitioning into something New.
Early on in his Gospel, Matthew recorded Jesus initially instructing the Apostles not to go to the Gentiles but to go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel; he also recorded Jesus asserting that He Himself was not sent but unto the lost sheep of the house of Israel - but later on in his Gospel, Matthew recorded Jesus, after His resurrection, commissioning: "Go ye therefore, and teach ALL NATIONS". Going into all nations had never been a program of the Law. Such a commission therefore presupposed that the Law had by then been superseded and a new program introduced.
A number of Jesus' parables, also recorded in Matthew, illustrated the coming change, with statements like: "The kingdom of God shall be taken away from you, and given to a nation bringing forth the fruits thereof". That couldn't happen without there first being a change of the Law, because Moses' Law was exclusively Jewish and excluded Gentiles.
Thus Matthew's Gospel takes the reader on a journey with Jesus - beginning with Jesus' perfect obedience to the Law, on to His perfectly fulfilling of the Law and the Prophets on the cross, then to His perfectly superseding the Law by the New Covenant in His blood, followed by His new commission and new program which was not only for Jews but for all nations - and all of this was accomplished in perfect accord with every jot and tittle of the Law and the Prophets.
Therefore by the time the reader of Matthew's Gospel reaches the part at the end where Jesus is recorded commissioning His apostles to teach all nations to "observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you", the reader has come to understand that what was meant by that was not that the Law was to be taught, as some are saying it means - it is understood rather to have meant that the apostles were to teach the nations the overall purpose and accomplishment of Jesus' life and teachings. And His purpose was: to redeem us from the Law not through breaking the Law but through fulfilling it and the Prophets.
Jesus' statements don't establish a precedent for the claim that Christians should observe modern Judaism. Even if Jesus' commission to referred instead back to His earlier statement that not one jot nor tittle of the Law would pass 'til all be fulfilled, modern Judaism fails to carry that out anyway. All forms of modern Judaism including so-called Messianic Judaism carry out their customs in ways which alter far more than a mere jot or tittle of the Law. They have to because compliance with Moses' Law was forever rendered logistically impossible, after the destruction of the Temple and the loss of Levitical genealogies in the first century AD.
John's Gospel, unlike Matthew's, was written for Gentile readers rather than for Jews, and therefore makes little point about Jesus' obedience to the Law, but instead misses no chance to record conversations where Jesus conflicted with the Jews. This emphasis was because John wasn't willing for his Gentile converts to succumb to the mistaken idea that the Gospel meant to become Jewish. It was also because John knew that in the minds of his Gentile readers, obedience to the Law would not necessarily have been considered a priority-credential which they would have looked for if someone truly was the Son of God as claimed.
John's Gospel included no genealogy - Matthew's Gospel started with one. Because Gentiles, unlike the Jews, wouldn't have been overly picky about Jesus' identity as a legitimate descendant of David and of Abraham - for them it was life-changing enough just to learn of Jesus' identity simply as the Son of God.
In fact every time John's narrative had to mention the name of a particular Feast which Jesus had participated in, John needed to actually explain to his readers that the feast was in fact a Jewish feast. Wouldn't you think, if the apostles had been busily going around teaching the Gentile churches to keep the Feasts and the Law, as some are saying they did, that John would hardly have needed to explain to his readers something as basic as what a Feast was? They evidently had not been taught that, and John's Gospel made no attempt to teach it.
There is no conflict between Matthew's and John's Gospels. If the apostles had understood Jesus' commission, recorded in Matthew, to mean that they should teach the nations to observe the Law, they would have done so. But rather than going about teaching the Law, it is recorded in the Book of Acts that the apostles and elders instead were decisive about NOT requiring the Gentiles to observe the Law nor any such custom. What they instead taught everywhere - to Jews and Gentiles without distinction - was not the Feasts and the Law, but the GOOD NEWS of complete salvation by God's grace, simply through BELIEVING in JESUS.
But that didn't mean Jesus intended for His disciples to continue observing the Law after the New Covenant was made.
God sent forth His Son, made of a woman, made under the Law, to redeem those who were under the Law, so they could receive God's new program of being BORN AGAIN in order to see the hoped-for Kingdom.
Jesus was sent to Israel at a time when Israel was still under the Law. Through His death and resurrection He made a NEW COVENANT with them - but it was necessary that the New Covenant be inaugurated through Him fulfilling the Law - not by breaking it. Had the transition occurred through breaking the Law - then the New Covenant would have been rendered illegitimate by the terms of the first Covenant's Law. The transition from Law to Grace was therefore accomplished seamlessly, without any point of the Law being broken in the process. The bringing-in of a New Covenant itself fulfilled the Law and the Prophets, seeing the Law and the Prophets themselves spoke of this happening. Once that transition was accomplished, it was no longer necessary for the disciples to observe the Law. Matthew's Gospel records other statements by Jesus which bear all this out.
The background to Jesus' statement was that His lifestyle and teachings were so different to that of the scribes, Pharisees and doctors of the Law, that some of Jesus' critics may have assumed He utterly disregarded the Law. But in reality it was the Jewish leaders whose misrepresentations of the Law had made the true requirement of the Law almost unrecognisable. Jesus on the other hand asserted the Law's true meaning, and confronted the Jewish leaders' attitude towards it.
But as lofty as Jesus' regard for the Law was, it did not mean that His disciples, once they were on the other side of the cross and in the Kingdom of God, were to continue observing Moses' Law. Because later on, also in Matthew's own Gospel, plenty of other statements by Jesus were recorded which revealed that the Law was being superseded by a New Covenant.
Imagine if in the process of introducing a New Covenant, Jesus had run roughshod over the Law - no Jew could likely have ever accepted that Jesus of Nazareth was their Messiah - because the Jews knew what the prophet had said of the Messiah: "Lo, I come: in the volume of the book it is written of me, I delight to do thy will, O my God: yea, THY LAW IS WITHIN MY HEART" (Psalm 40:7,8).
Since Matthew's Gospel was aimed at such Jewish readers, he didn't miss a chance to record examples of Jesus faithfully upholding the Law - something Jesus did consistently, since He Himself, along with all Israel at that time, was under the Law. Matthew knew that obedience to the Law was an important criteria for the Messiah in the minds of his Jewish readers. So he carefully recorded the incident where Jesus corrected the misconception that He somehow condoned disdain for the Law - this was an important point in Matthew's objective, and to his readers. Matthew was presenting Jesus' credentials as the Jewish Messiah.
But in presenting Jesus credentials as the Messiah, Matthew went further than just recording the high regard with which Jesus held the Law: Matthew also recorded Jesus saying, at the last Passover: "For this is my blood of THE NEW TESTAMENT, which is shed for many for the remission of sins" (Matthew 26:28). That was a declaration by Jesus that the Old Covenant was at that moment transitioning into something New.
Early on in his Gospel, Matthew recorded Jesus initially instructing the Apostles not to go to the Gentiles but to go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel; he also recorded Jesus asserting that He Himself was not sent but unto the lost sheep of the house of Israel - but later on in his Gospel, Matthew recorded Jesus, after His resurrection, commissioning: "Go ye therefore, and teach ALL NATIONS". Going into all nations had never been a program of the Law. Such a commission therefore presupposed that the Law had by then been superseded and a new program introduced.
A number of Jesus' parables, also recorded in Matthew, illustrated the coming change, with statements like: "The kingdom of God shall be taken away from you, and given to a nation bringing forth the fruits thereof". That couldn't happen without there first being a change of the Law, because Moses' Law was exclusively Jewish and excluded Gentiles.
Thus Matthew's Gospel takes the reader on a journey with Jesus - beginning with Jesus' perfect obedience to the Law, on to His perfectly fulfilling of the Law and the Prophets on the cross, then to His perfectly superseding the Law by the New Covenant in His blood, followed by His new commission and new program which was not only for Jews but for all nations - and all of this was accomplished in perfect accord with every jot and tittle of the Law and the Prophets.
Therefore by the time the reader of Matthew's Gospel reaches the part at the end where Jesus is recorded commissioning His apostles to teach all nations to "observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you", the reader has come to understand that what was meant by that was not that the Law was to be taught, as some are saying it means - it is understood rather to have meant that the apostles were to teach the nations the overall purpose and accomplishment of Jesus' life and teachings. And His purpose was: to redeem us from the Law not through breaking the Law but through fulfilling it and the Prophets.
Jesus' statements don't establish a precedent for the claim that Christians should observe modern Judaism. Even if Jesus' commission to referred instead back to His earlier statement that not one jot nor tittle of the Law would pass 'til all be fulfilled, modern Judaism fails to carry that out anyway. All forms of modern Judaism including so-called Messianic Judaism carry out their customs in ways which alter far more than a mere jot or tittle of the Law. They have to because compliance with Moses' Law was forever rendered logistically impossible, after the destruction of the Temple and the loss of Levitical genealogies in the first century AD.
John's Gospel, unlike Matthew's, was written for Gentile readers rather than for Jews, and therefore makes little point about Jesus' obedience to the Law, but instead misses no chance to record conversations where Jesus conflicted with the Jews. This emphasis was because John wasn't willing for his Gentile converts to succumb to the mistaken idea that the Gospel meant to become Jewish. It was also because John knew that in the minds of his Gentile readers, obedience to the Law would not necessarily have been considered a priority-credential which they would have looked for if someone truly was the Son of God as claimed.
John's Gospel included no genealogy - Matthew's Gospel started with one. Because Gentiles, unlike the Jews, wouldn't have been overly picky about Jesus' identity as a legitimate descendant of David and of Abraham - for them it was life-changing enough just to learn of Jesus' identity simply as the Son of God.
In fact every time John's narrative had to mention the name of a particular Feast which Jesus had participated in, John needed to actually explain to his readers that the feast was in fact a Jewish feast. Wouldn't you think, if the apostles had been busily going around teaching the Gentile churches to keep the Feasts and the Law, as some are saying they did, that John would hardly have needed to explain to his readers something as basic as what a Feast was? They evidently had not been taught that, and John's Gospel made no attempt to teach it.
There is no conflict between Matthew's and John's Gospels. If the apostles had understood Jesus' commission, recorded in Matthew, to mean that they should teach the nations to observe the Law, they would have done so. But rather than going about teaching the Law, it is recorded in the Book of Acts that the apostles and elders instead were decisive about NOT requiring the Gentiles to observe the Law nor any such custom. What they instead taught everywhere - to Jews and Gentiles without distinction - was not the Feasts and the Law, but the GOOD NEWS of complete salvation by God's grace, simply through BELIEVING in JESUS.
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