686,000 people have watched 119 Ministries ask this question. It is one of the most searched topics in the Hebrew Roots space, and the answer 119 gives is built on a single interpretive decision about a single Greek word. If that decision is correct, their conclusion follows. If it is wrong, the entire argument collapses - and we examine exactly what pleroo means in our dedicated article on the Greek word pleroo - and with it, the theological framework that depends on it.

This article examines their argument directly, using their own transcript. It is worth doing carefully, because the question they are asking is genuinely important and deserves a genuinely careful answer.

Their Argument in Brief

119 Ministries centres its case on Matthew 5:17-20, where Jesus says he did not come to abolish the law or the prophets but to fulfil them. Their interpretation of "fulfil" is the load-bearing move on which everything else depends. They define it as "bring to full expression - to show it forth in its true meaning" - in other words, Jesus fulfils the law by teaching and demonstrating how to properly keep it. On this reading, Matthew 5:17-20 becomes a clear and explicit command to keep the whole Torah, and Paul's statements that appear to say otherwise become "complex" and "nuanced" passages to be interpreted in light of Jesus' "clear" statement.

It is a tidy argument. But it rests on a definition of pleroo - the Greek word translated "fulfil" - that Matthew's own usage does not support.

What Pleroo Actually Means in Matthew

The word pleroo appears sixteen times in Matthew's Gospel. With a small number of exceptions, it is used in one consistent and identifiable way: to describe the fulfilment of prophetic anticipation. Matthew uses it as his signature formula - "this took place to fulfil what was spoken by the prophet" - introducing citations from Isaiah, Hosea, Jeremiah and the Psalms that find their completion in events of Jesus' life. It is the word of prophetic arrival, of anticipated reality becoming present fact.

This is not coincidental. Matthew is writing a Gospel whose entire architecture is built around the demonstration that Jesus is the one the Hebrew scriptures anticipated. The formula appears at the virgin birth, the flight to Egypt, the massacre of the innocents, the ministry in Galilee, the healing of the sick, the entry into Jerusalem, the betrayal, the death. In every case, pleroo describes the moment when something the scriptures pointed toward has arrived in the person and work of Jesus.

Now read Matthew 5:17 in that light: "Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets. I have not come to abolish them but to fulfil them." The phrase "the law and the prophets" is Matthew's way of referring to the whole of Hebrew scripture as a prophetic witness - a point developed fully in our article on whether the law and the prophets constitute a binding obligation - the same phrase he uses in 7:12, 11:13 and 22:40. Jesus is making a claim about his relationship to that entire prophetic witness. He is not saying he will teach people how to keep Leviticus more carefully. He is saying that he is the one the entire prophetic witness of Israel's scriptures was pointing toward - and that his coming does not negate that witness but brings it to its intended completion.

119 Ministries' definition of fulfil - "teach and demonstrate how to properly keep it" - has no support in Matthew's own usage of the word. They have imported a meaning the text does not carry in order to produce a conclusion the text does not reach.

Abolish and Obsolete Are Not the Same Thing

119 argues that there is no meaningful difference between abolishing something and making it obsolete - and therefore the interpretation that Jesus made the law obsolete by fulfilling it is incoherent. This sounds plausible until you think about what obsolete actually means.

Something becomes obsolete when it has been superseded by the reality it was designed to anticipate or serve - which is precisely why the old covenant became obsolete rather than being abolished. A map does not become obsolete because it is destroyed. It becomes obsolete because you have arrived at the destination it was pointing toward. The map is not abolished - it still exists, it accurately recorded the route, it served its purpose honourably. But you do not navigate by it anymore, because you are already where it was directing you. The distinction between abolish and obsolete is real, meaningful, and directly relevant to the relationship between the Mosaic law and Christ.

The author of Hebrews understood this distinction precisely. Hebrews 8:13 uses the word palaioō - made obsolete - deliberately: "By calling this covenant new, he has made the first one obsolete; and what is obsolete and ageing will soon disappear." This is not the language of abolition. It is the language of supersession - something that served its purpose being set aside because the reality it served has arrived. 119 Ministries' claim that obsolete and abolished mean the same thing is directly contradicted by a New Testament author who chose the word obsolete with care precisely because it is not the same as abolished.

Matthew 5:18 Has Two Until Clauses

119 cites Matthew 5:18 as evidence that the law remains in force as long as heaven and earth exist - but as our article on reading both halves of Matthew 5:18 demonstrates, this misses the second until clause entirely: "until heaven and earth pass away, not an iota, not a dot, will pass from the law." But this is a selective reading that omits the second half of the verse.

The full verse reads: "For truly I tell you, until heaven and earth disappear, not the smallest letter, not the least stroke of a pen, will by any means disappear from the Law until everything is accomplished." There are two until clauses - "until heaven and earth disappear" and "until everything is accomplished." 119 reads only the first. The second governs the meaning of the first - and "everything is accomplished" is the decisive phrase.

The Greek word translated "accomplished" is ginomai - to come to pass, to be fulfilled, to be completed. And the question is: when does Jesus use this language about his own work reaching its completion? From the cross, in John 19:30, Jesus cries tetelestai - "it is finished," "it is accomplished," "it is completed." The language of completion and accomplishment is the language Jesus uses to describe what the cross achieves. The law and the prophets stood until their purpose was accomplished - and Jesus declared from the cross that it was. 119 Ministries is reading half a verse and building a theology on the half they have read.

What Matthew 5:19-20 Actually Says

119 takes Matthew 5:19 - "whoever relaxes even the least of these commandments will be called least in the kingdom" - as Jesus endorsing Torah observance for his followers. Our article on what Jesus actually meant by surpassing the Pharisees examines this in full. And Matthew 5:20 - "your righteousness must surpass that of the Pharisees" - as a call to keep the Torah more rigorously than the religious leaders of Israel.

But this reading cannot survive contact with what Jesus actually does in the verses that immediately follow. From Matthew 5:21 onward, Jesus introduces a series of contrasts: "You have heard that it was said... but I say to you." He addresses murder, adultery, divorce, oaths, retaliation and love of enemies. In each case, he does not explain Torah more carefully. He speaks with an authority that transcends Torah entirely.

No rabbi in Israel ever said "but I say to you" as a counter to received Torah teaching. The rabbis cited authorities - Moses, earlier teachers, the tradition. Jesus cites no authority except himself. He places his own word alongside and above the word given through Moses. This is not a man demonstrating how to keep the law better. This is a man claiming an authority over the law that belongs only to its giver. The righteousness that surpasses the Pharisees is not Torah observance performed more rigorously. It is the righteousness of the kingdom - the transformed heart, the new creation, the life produced by the Spirit rather than regulated by an external code.

When 119 reads Matthew 5:19-20 as a call to Torah observance, they are reading the introduction without reading what the introduction introduces. The Sermon on the Mount does not call people to keep Leviticus. It announces a new order of righteousness that the law of Moses pointed toward but could never produce.

Subordinating Paul to Their Matthew 5

Having established their reading of Matthew 5, 119 applies a hermeneutical principle. The broader question of Paul's relationship to Torah is examined in our article on the Pauline paradox. Here: interpret difficult passages in light of clear passages. They designate Matthew 5:17-20 as "clear" and Paul's statements in Romans and Galatians as "complex and nuanced." On this basis, Paul's direct statements - "we died to the law" (Romans 7:4), "Christ is the end of the law" (Romans 10:4), "you are not under the law" (Galatians 5:18) - are to be filtered through and subordinated to their reading of Matthew 5.

The principle is legitimate. The application is predetermined. They have decided in advance which passages are clear and which are difficult, and the decision was made on the basis of their conclusion rather than careful exegesis. Paul's statements in Romans and Galatians are not difficult. They are direct, explicit and consistent. A teaching that requires calling Paul's clearest statements "complex rhetorical responses to opponents" in order to preserve a reading of Matthew 5 has the hermeneutical relationship backwards.

They quote Dr. Daniel Block to argue that Paul only opposed the misuse of the law - the attempt to use it as a means of salvation - while himself remaining committed to Torah observance. But this reading cannot survive Philippians 3:7-8 - examined in depth in our article on pure devotion to Christ - where Paul describes his entire Torah identity - his Pharisaic credentials, his blameless covenant record, everything he gained under the law - as loss, as garbage, as skybala, compared to the surpassing worth of knowing Christ. This is not a man who opposed the misuse of the law while embracing the law itself. This is a man whose encounter with Christ produced a fundamental reorientation of his entire religious identity. The law was not misused. It was fulfilled - and Paul's response to that fulfilment was to consider his former law-based identity as loss.

Romans 3:31 - We Uphold the Law

119 closes with Romans 3:31: "Do we then overthrow the law by this faith? By no means! On the contrary, we uphold the law." This, they suggest, confirms that Paul's gospel of justification by faith does not set aside Torah observance.

But Paul's argument in Romans 3 must be read in its context. The preceding verse - Romans 3:21 - says: "But now the righteousness of God has been manifested apart from the law, although the Law and the Prophets bear witness to it." The law's role in Paul's argument is as a witness - it testified to the righteousness of God that has now been revealed in Christ. When Paul says "we uphold the law" in verse 31, he means that the gospel of justification by faith establishes the law in its proper role as a prophetic witness to Christ - not that believers are obligated to keep its commandments. The law is upheld as a witness, not reinstated as a covenant obligation. Romans 3:31 is the law being honoured as a pointer. It is not the law being kept as a system.

What Jesus Actually Claimed

The question 119 Ministries asks - did Jesus do away with the Old Testament law? - deserves a precise answer rather than a yes or no.

Jesus did not abolish the law. He said so explicitly, and it is true. The law was not torn up, discarded or declared worthless. It was given by God, it served its purpose faithfully, and it pointed - in its every sacrifice, feast, priesthood and commandment - to the one who was coming to be its fulfilment.

But Jesus also did not come to teach people how to keep the law more carefully. He came as the one the law was always pointing toward. He is the sacrifice the sacrificial system anticipated. He is the priest after the order of Melchizedek that the Levitical priesthood foreshadowed. He is the Passover lamb, the Day of Atonement, the Sabbath rest, the temple where God and humanity meet - as fulfilment theology and our article on the shadow and the substance explore in full. When he said "it is finished" from the cross, he was not describing the end of his life. He was describing the completion of everything the law and the prophets were waiting for.

The question is not whether Jesus abolished the law. He did not. The question is what it means that he fulfilled it - and the answer to that question is not found by redefining pleroo against Matthew's own usage. It is found by reading the whole of Matthew's Gospel, the whole of Paul's argument, and the whole of Hebrews - and by taking seriously the claim that in Christ, the destination has arrived. The map was not abolished. But the journey is over.

Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfil them. - Matthew 5:17