Tithing
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1. Should Christians pay tithe? |
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No,
Christians are not bound to keep the precept of tithing because they are
under grace and not under the law of Moses (Romans |
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Jesus said: “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you pay tithe
of mint and anise and cummin, and have neglected the weightier matters of the
law: justice and mercy and faith. These you ought to have done, without
leaving the others undone” (Matthew |
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First of
all, note that Jesus was speaking to people who were under the law, and
secondly that Jesus by saying “without leaving the others undone” confirmed
that the Jews had to keep not only the commandment concerning tithing but
also the other commandments of the law. Therefore if we take this passage in
order to support tithing, we should not only pay tithe but we should also
keep the Sabbath, we should abstain from eating the unclean foods of the law,
we should keep all the Jewish feasts, etc. But if we did so we would be
entangled again in the yoke of the law, from which we have been set free.
Does the Lord want us to be entangled again in the bondage of the law? Certainly
not, for Paul says to the Galatians: “Stand fast therefore in the liberty
wherewith Christ hath made us free, and be not entangled again with the yoke
of bondage” (Galatians 5:1). Therefore we must see that we are not entangled
again with the heavy yoke of the law. Of course Jesus never disapproved of
the commandment concerning tithe, but this is not a good reason to keep it, for
Jesus did not disapprove of the sabbath commandment, nor the feast of Passover,
nor the circumcision either. What shall we do then? Shall we keep the Sabbath,
the Jewish feasts, and even the circumcision, just because Jesus never disapproved
of them? Certainly not, since we know that all these things are just a shadow
of the things that were to come. |
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The writer of the epistle to the Hebrews says: “And verily they that are of
the sons of Levi, who receive the office of the priesthood, have a
commandment to take tithes of the people according to the law, that is, of
their brethren, though they come out of the loins of Abraham: … And here men
that die receive tithes; but there he receiveth them, of whom it is witnessed
that he liveth” (Hebrews 7:5,8). |
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First of
all, it must be said that those mortal men who receive tithes (Hebrews 7:8)
were Levites (therefore they were Jews by birth) who, at that time were still
receiving tithes from the other Jews in obedience to the commandment of the
law of Moses. Therefore, since we are not Jews by birth and among us Gentiles
there are no descendants of the tribe of Levi, the fact that the Levites received
tithes does not concern us. Perhaps someone will say, this passage says:
‘Here men that die receive tithes”, therefore if the verb is present that
means that even under grace the saints in Christ had to pay tithe!’. I answer
you by saying that the verb is present not only when the Scripture speaks of
tithe, but also when it speaks of the gifts and the sacrifices which were
being offered (at that time) in the earthly sanctuary in Jerusalem by the
Jewish priests, for it is written: “For if he [Jesus] were on earth, he
should not be a priest, seeing that there are priests that offer gifts
according to the law: Who serve unto the example and shadow of heavenly
things, as Moses was admonished of God when he was about to make the
tabernacle: for, See, saith he, that thou make all things according to the
pattern shewed to thee in the mount” (Hebrews 8:4-5) and again: “And every
priest standeth daily ministering and offering oftentimes the same sacrifices,
which can never take away sins” (Hebrews 10:11). Furthermore, note the
expression “according to the law” because it refers to the law of Moses and
not to the law of Christ, for the Levites received tithes from the people,
and the priests offered gifts and sacrifices in the temple according to the
law of Moses. But remember that those who did those things were Jews by birth,
who were still under the law and had not yet been set free from the law,
while we have been set free from the law by Jesus Christ. Then, according to
your argument it would follow that since the verb is present even in relation
to the sacrifices of goats offered by the Jews for their sins, we also should
offer upon an altar in an earthly sanctuary dedicated to the worship of God
sacrifices of fat animals for our sins!! God forbid, for it is written again:
“Which was a figure for the time then present, in which [the earthly
sanctuary] were offered both gifts and sacrifices, that could not make him
that did the service perfect, as pertaining to the conscience” (Hebrews 9:9)
and also: “For the law having a shadow of good things to come, and not the
very image of the things, can never with those sacrifices which they offered
year by year continually make the comers thereunto perfect” (Hebrews 10:1)
and: “We have an altar, whereof they have no right to eat which serve the
tabernacle” (Hebrews 13:10). Therefore, the fact that the priests and the
Levites offered sacrifices for the sins and received tithes from the people,
even after Jesus was taken up into heaven, does not mean that the Gentiles,
under grace, were doing or had to do (at that time) the same things, even
though these things were done by them in accordance with the law God gave to
Moses for all Israel. Now, I would like to come back to the subject of the
sons of Levi. Why? Because when we speak about tithe we run the risk of
forgetting that according to the law it was only the Levites who had to receive
tithes from the people of |