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The children of Israel transmitted, through continuous mass-transmission, that the prophets told them of Torah's laws: that they are not subject to abrogation.
They said: we heard this in explicit language from which every doubt and every reinterpretation is removed.
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Then I examined the scriptures and found what points to this. First: many of the statutes have written in them 'an everlasting covenant,' and written in them 'throughout your generations.'
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Also, because of the Torah's words: 'Moses commanded us the Torah as a heritage' (Deut. 33:4). And also because our nation, the children of Israel, is a nation only by virtue of its laws.
And when the Creator says that the nation shall endure as long as heaven and earth endure, it follows necessarily that its laws too shall endure as long as heaven and earth endure.
And I found at the very end of the prophetic writings an explicit statement about guarding Moses' Torah until the Day of Resurrection, and the sending of Elijah before it.
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I have also seen some of our people argue against the abrogation of law in a general way, saying: when God legislates a law, it cannot avoid belonging to one of four categories.
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Either it is explicitly stated to be permanent — in which case it cannot be abrogated — or it is made time-bound, as if to say: 'Observe this for one hundred years.'
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They were told: there is a fifth category — a law for which no time is set, so people continue to observe it until commanded otherwise.
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I have found that those who permit abrogation in this regard advance seven arguments, claiming they are theoretical and that all are grounded in reason. I shall present them and present the refutations against them.
The first is an analogy with life and death: just as He may give life in wisdom and take life in wisdom, so may He legislate in wisdom and abrogate in wisdom.
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I found, however, a great difference between them: He gives life precisely in order to cause death, since death is the path of transition to the World to Come — which is the true goal.
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But He did not legislate in order to abrogate — for if He had legislated only to abrogate, every law would have to be abrogated: the first by the second, the second by a third, and so on infinitely.
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The fourth is an analogy with enriching and impoverishing, giving sight and blindness — each done at the moment most fitting for it.
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For He has made all happiness the recompense of obedience and all suffering the recompense of transgression — but He has not made law itself a recompense for either obedience or transgression.
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The sixth argues: just as Sabbath labor was permitted by reason but the revealed text abrogated it by rest, so another revealed text could restore its permissibility.
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I say: this analogy would be valid only if reason had made Sabbath labor obligatory — then one could say the revealed text abrogated that obligation.
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But mere permissibility cannot be abrogated this way, for a person has always seen by reason that resting is permitted on the Sabbath or any other day.
All of these, God have mercy on you, are distractions — none of them, upon reflection, holds up.
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The seventh argues: just as Moses' law could differ from Abraham's law, so another law could differ from Moses'.
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When we examine Moses' law, we find it is in truth Abraham's law — and the additions of the Passover bread and the Sabbath were added for events that befell his people.