Salvation. The word itself can have different meanings depending on whom you ask. For those who follow Jesus (Yeshua), salvation means eternal life in the presence of God as a result of Yeshua’s payment of the penalty for sin. However, what does salvation mean to a Jewish person who does not (yet) believe in Jesus?
Many believers would go straight to Scripture. However, for most Jewish people today, the Bible does not hold the answer. For the secular Jewish person, salvation is not an issue at all. There is no heaven nor hell, and therefore, no need to be “saved.” This life is all there is.
However, there is a tremendous difference between what a Jewish person believes about salvation and what Judaism teaches about salvation. From the Torah to the Talmud to today, salvation—meaning, a right relationship with God—is of the utmost importance in Jewish thought. As a result, any exploration of this topic must start with the Bible.
Salvation in the Bible
The Hebrew word for salvation is יְשׁוּעָה, which is pronounced yeshua. It only appears four times in the Torah: Genesis 49:18; Exodus 14:13, 15:2; and Deuteronomy 32:15. It means salvation, deliverance, victory, or help.[1] In the Jewish mind, the greatest example of salvation in the Torah is the exodus from Egypt. The Lord promised to free the Israelites, deliver them, redeem them, and take them for His people (Exodus 6:6–7), which sounds a great deal like salvation, deliverance, victory, and help.
The pivotal moment in God’s salvation in the Torah was when the Israelites crossed through the Red Sea (or the Sea of Reeds)[2] on dry ground. Immediately before the waters parted, Moses told the Israelites, “Stand by and see the salvation of the Lord” (Exod 14:13). Immediately after the waters closed over the Egyptians pursuing them, Moses sang a song in which he said, “The Lord is my strength and song, and He has become my salvation” (Exod 15:2). God’s salvation for the Israelites was the freedom, deliverance, and redemption He provided in order to take them to be His.
The Sacrificial System
The final element is the most significant. God’s goal in providing salvation is to have a relationship with His people. Following the exodus from Egypt, God made a covenant with Israel through the Ten Commandments (Exodus 20). The Israelites’ inability to remain within the covenant was the impetus for God to provide the sacrificial system to make up for the people’s sins. The system required the shedding of blood to provide atonement and restore the relationship with the Lord (Leviticus 17:11). The system was in force for more than a millennium.
During the time of the Levitical priests, a relationship with God could only be found through the atonement offered first at the Tabernacle in the wilderness and then at the Temple in Jerusalem, for Israelites and Gentiles alike. Association with the people of Israel and the ways of Israel was the only way to the God of Israel. The idea of salvation is intimately connected with a relationship with God. Since, according to Judaism, a relationship with God was possible only through the atonement provided by the sacrificial system, the sacrifice and the atonement it bestowed became the way of salvation.
Salvation after the Sacrificial System
The atonement provided by the sacrificial system disappeared in 70 CE when the Romans destroyed the Temple. Some say the effectiveness of the priestly offerings had already ended decades earlier. The writings of the Jewish sages confirm this detail.
Rav Naḥman bar Yitzḥak said: The ordinance was with regard to the strip of crimson wool used on Yom Kippur. As it is taught in a baraita: At first they would tie a strip of crimson wool to the opening of the Entrance Hall of the Temple on the outside. If, after the sacrificing of the offerings and the sending of the scapegoat, the strip turned white, the people would rejoice, as this indicated that their sins had been atoned for. If it did not turn white they would be sad. . . . And it is taught in a baraita: During the forty years before the Second Temple was destroyed the strip of crimson wool would not turn white; rather, it would turn a deeper shade of red. (Rosh Hashanah 31b, emphasis added.)[3]
Since the strip turning white indicated the atonement of sins, the strip remaining crimson must indicate sins have not been atoned for. The lack of atonement, which in the Jewish mind is the key to salvation, created a conundrum for the leaders of the Jewish community. With no atonement for forty years and no way to make the sacrifices without the Temple, they had to find another way.
A Shift in Focus
Since the method was no longer available, attention shifted to the results. The world to come, in Hebrew עולם הבא (olam haba), became the focus, and there is much in the writings of the Jewish sages about it. To start, “All of the Jewish people, even sinners . . . have a share in the World-to-Come” (Sanhedrin 90a). This theme is predominant in the Jewish understanding of eternity. All it takes to have a place in eternity is to be a descendant of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.
In addition, there were three elements to righteous living according to the rabbinic writings. “Shimon the Righteous was among the last [members] of the Great Assembly. He would say: ‘On three things the world depends—on Torah study, on the service [of God] and on bestowing kindness’” (Pirkei Avot 1:2).[4] As a result, we find statistics like, “Jews made up nearly half of America’s biggest philanthropic donors. . . . They included twelve billionaires with Jewish backgrounds—a dramatic overrepresentation when compared to the proportion of Jews in the overall US population.”[5]
The commentary on the passage from Pirkei Avot is telling. Regarding “the service [of God],” the editors note this refers to “the sacrificial service in the Temple and, in the absence of the Temple, study of the laws regarding the service. In its broader sense, service refers to prayer and the performance of the commandments.”[6] Evidently, even in the minds of the designers of the post-Second Temple traditions, there was a need to replace the biblical requirement with something else. These relatively new requirements form the foundation for most of Rabbinic Judaism, whether adherents realize it or not.
God’s Means for Atonement
Study of Torah, prayer, doing good deeds, and giving to charities are worthwhile endeavors and should continue regardless of one’s belief about atonement and salvation. However, they are still less-than-perfect replacements for a system provided by God for a personal relationship with God—a system requiring the shedding of blood for the atonement of sin and reconciliation with the God of Israel. Without a doubt, the world needed a replacement. However, the replacement needed was already provided—a perfect replacement—even before the destruction of the Temple.
Far be it for God to leave the world without a means for atonement. God provided the sacrifice for us just as He provided the sacrifice for Abraham on Mount Moriah (Genesis 22). Through the sacrifice of the unblemished Lamb of God, Yeshua shed His blood to take away the sins of the world, making any other replacement system unnecessary. Jesus/Yeshua is sufficient (Hebrews 7:26–27). Dayenu (it would have been enough)!
Updated on August 2, 2024.
[1] Joel T. Hamme, “Salvation,” in Lexham Theological Wordbook, ed. Douglas Mangum et al., Lexham Bible Reference Series (Bellingham, WA: Lexham Press, 2014).
[2] See Bryan C. Babcock, “Red Sea” in The Lexham Bible Dictionary, edited by John D. Barry, et al. (Bellingham, WA: Lexham Press, 2016).
[3] Rabbi Adin Steinsaltz, Koren Talmud Bavli: Beitza & Rosh Hashana, Noe Color Edition, Hebrew/English, Bilingual edition, vol. 11 (Jerusalem: Koren Publishers, 2014).
[4] Rabbi Menachem Davis et al., eds., פרקי אבות Pirkei Avos Ethics of the Fathers with an Interlinear Translation, The Schottenstein Edition, The Artscroll Series (Brooklyn: Mesorah Publications, Ltd., 2002), 30.
[5] Asaf Elia-Shalev, “Half of US’s 25 Most Generous Philanthropists Are Jews. Few Give to Jewish Groups,” The Times of Israel, January 26, 2023, https://www.timesofisrael.com/half-of-us-25-most-generous-philanthropists-are-jews-few-give-to-jewish-groups/.
[6] See footnote 2, הָעֲבוֹדָה, in Davis et al., פרקי אבות Pirkei Avos Ethics of the Fathers with an Interlinear Translation, 30.
