NOAHIDE LAWS – A RABBINIC INVENTION TO CONTROL NON-JEWS?

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NOAHIDE LAWS – A RABBINIC INVENTION TO CONTROL NON-JEWS?

This blog is a written summary of a spoken lesson. For the full depth, nuance, emotional weight, and sources, it is strongly recommended to watch the complete lesson on YouTube before or after reading.

A Necessary Opening

This blog is a written summary of a spoken lesson. For the full depth, nuance, and sources, it is strongly recommended to watch the complete lesson on YouTube.

Before I speak about theology, law, or history, I must say this.

It would be callous, indeed dishonest, to speak about moral covenants and human dignity without acknowledging that Jewish blood spilled at Bondi Beach is, as I speak, painfully fresh. Today, December 14th, there was a terror attack in Sydney, Australia, at Bondi Beach during a public Chanukah menorah lighting and a bar mitzvah celebration.

In addition to many injured and murdered, reports indicate at least twelve lives lost, we also lost Rabbi Elie Schlanganger, a Chabad emissary who was directing the menorah lighting. Nearly a thousand people had gathered, not only for a ritual observed across the world, but for a moment of public Jewish joy, light, continuity, and celebration. That moment was turned into a scene of terror.

In a chilling sense, it felt like October 7th all over again, this time somewhere else. There is a grave problem in the world today. Jews cannot simply gather publicly and live Jewish life without fear. Lighting candles tonight was difficult. Doing so as if nothing had happened was impossible.

Baruch Hashem, Chanukah is a time of joy. But this was a moment of Jewish light that was violently desecrated. The names of the victims are still being gathered as I speak. Each victim was a human being created in the image of G-d, an entire world.

When Jewish blood is spilled openly in the world, it is never merely a local event. It is a warning flare about the moral condition of civilization itself. As the Torah teaches, innocent blood cries out and demands a response from humanity, as it says, “The voice of your brother’s blood cries out to Me from the ground” (Genesis 4:10).

What follows is not abstract theology. It concerns whether civilization remembers that human life is sacred, even when Jews gather peacefully to celebrate their faith.

The Core Argument

Where the Accusation Comes From

The claim that rabbis invented the Noahide laws to control non-Jews is neither new nor accurate. It is rooted in much older theological assumptions, particularly supersessionist systems that require earlier covenants to be dismissed, delegitimized, or reframed as human inventions.

The Torah’s Model of Covenant

The Torah presents a very different model. Humanity received commandments directly from G-d through Adam and later through Noah, long before the existence of Israel and long before Sinai. That covenant was never revoked. Judaism does not replace it, it presupposes it. Every patriarch and matriarch of Israel lived first as a Ben Noach before standing at Mount Sinai.

The Noahide laws are not hinted at vaguely, nor are they inferred creatively by later authorities. They are stated directly in the Torah itself, most clearly in Genesis chapter 9. The prohibition against murder, for example, is articulated explicitly, grounded in the idea that the human being is created in the image of G-d. This covenant is sealed with a sign that remains visible to all humanity, the rainbow placed in the clouds as a covenant between G-d and the earth.

Written Law and Oral Transmission

A common misunderstanding drives much of the suspicion around the Noahide covenant. Many people assume that if something was not written down, it must have been invented later. This assumption collapses once one understands the role of Oral Law. Everything prior to Sinai was transmitted orally. Abraham had no Torah scroll. Noah had no tablets. Yet the Torah itself testifies that Abraham kept commandments, statutes, and laws.

The Torah also records that Noah was instructed to distinguish between clean and unclean animals, long before any written legal code existed. This only makes sense if G-d taught him orally. Chazal summarized this reality by stating that Abraham fulfilled the entire Torah before it was given. Sinai did not invent law, it publicized and stabilized it for all future generations.

Supersession and the Need to Discredit Torah

Supersessionist traditions face a structural problem with this model. If the Torah is authentic and unchanged, then Israel’s covenant was never revoked and humanity’s covenant through Noah remains valid. For this reason, later theological systems often claim either that the Torah is obsolete or that it was corrupted. Judaism categorically rejects both claims. The Torah itself declares that nothing may be added to it or taken away from it.

Control or Moral Responsibility?

If the Noahide laws were designed as a mechanism of control, they would be a strange one. They require no conversion, no priesthood, no intermediaries, no rituals, and no institutional dependence. Observing them does not require joining Judaism, entering a synagogue, or submitting to rabbinic authority. They simply affirm the moral responsibility and dignity of every human being.

Judaism Was Magnetic, Not Missionary

Judaism historically did not missionize. Yet large numbers of people were drawn to it voluntarily. Ancient sources, including Josephus, describe non-Jews who were attracted to Jewish ethical monotheism and participated in Jewish life without coercion. Judaism was magnetic, not missionary.

Complementary Covenants, Not Competing Ones

Israel’s role is not to dominate humanity but to preserve and transmit Torah. That role does not invalidate the covenant of the nations. Judaism does not replace humanity, and humanity does not replace Israel. These covenants are complementary, not competitive.

The rabbis did not invent the Noahide laws. They preserved, transmitted, and clarified humanity’s oldest covenant, a covenant that still stands beneath the same rainbow placed in the sky after the Flood.

Por el rabino Tani Burton

Más shiurim del rabino Tani Burton

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