According to Jewish law, non-Jews (gentiles) are not obligated to convert to Judaism, but they are required to observe the Seven Laws of Noah to be assured of a place in the World to Come (Olam Ha-Ba), the final reward of the righteous.[19] The non-Jews that choose to follow the Seven Laws of Noah are regarded as "Righteous Gentiles" (Hebrew: חסידי אומות העולם, Chassiddei Umot ha-Olam: "Pious People of the World").[20]
According to the Talmud, the seven laws were given first to Adam and subsequently to Noah.[30] The Tannaitic and Amoraiticrabbinicsages (1st–6th centuries CE) disagreed on the exact number of Noahide laws that were originally given to Adam.[3][7][9] Six of the seven laws were exegetically derived from passages in the Book of Genesis,[32] with the seventh being the establishment of courts of justice.[7][9] The earliest complete rabbinic version of the seven Noahide laws can be found in the Tosefta:[3][33][34]
Seven commandments were commanded of the sons of Noah:
concerning a limb torn from a living animal (ever min ha-hay)
Origins
Biblical sources
According to the Genesis flood narrative, a deluge covered the whole world on account of violent corruption on the earth, killing every surface-dwelling creature except Noah, his wife, his sons, their wives, and the animals taken aboard the Ark. According to the biblical narrative, all modern humans are descendants of Noah, thus the name Noahide Laws refers to the laws that apply to all of humanity.[3] After the Flood, God sealed a covenant with Noah with the following admonitions as written in Genesis 9:4-6:[35]
Flesh of a living animal: "However, flesh with its life-blood [in it], you shall not eat." (9:4)
Murder and courts: "Furthermore, I will demand your blood, for [the taking of] your lives, I shall demand it [even] from any wild animal. From man too, I will demand of each person's brother the blood of man. He who spills the blood of man, by man his blood shall be spilt; for in the image of God He made man." (9:5–6)
Book of Jubilees
The Book of Jubilees, generally dated to the 1st century BCE,[3][36] may include a substantially different list of six commandments at verses 7:20–25:[3]
(1) to observe righteousness;
(2) to cover the shame of their flesh;
(3) to bless their creator;
(4) to honor their parents;
(5) to love their neighbor; and
(6) to guard against fornication, uncleanness, and all iniquity.[37]
Modern analysis
Rabbinical
For this reason you will find that the Noachian and the Mosaic laws, though differing in matters of detail, as we shall see, agree in the general matters which come from the giver. They both existed at the same time. While the Mosaic law existed in Israel, all the other nations had the Noachian law, and the difference was due to geographical diversity, Palestine (i.e. "Eretz Israel" being different from the other lands, and to national diversity, due to difference in ancestry. And there is no doubt that the other nations attained human happiness through the Noachian law, since it is divine; though they could not reach the same degree of happiness as that attained by Israel through the Torah. The Rabbis say: "The pious men of the other nations have a share in the world to come". This shows that there may be two divine laws existing at the same time among different nations, and that each one leads those who live by it to attain human happiness; though there is a difference in the degree of happiness attainable by the two laws. This difference in the laws can not concern fundamental or derivative principles. Therefore the examination of the law itself is always of the same kind. But the examination relating to the messenger may undergo change. At all events the verification must be direct, though the verification of one religion may be different from that of another. The question whether a given divine law may change for the same people in the same land, we shall examine in the Third Book...
The Encyclopedia Talmudit, edited by Rabbi Shlomo Yosef Zevin, states that after the giving of the Torah, the Jewish people were no longer included in the category of the sons of Noah. Maimonides (Mishneh Torah, Hilkhot M'lakhim 9:1) indicates that the seven commandments are also part of the Torah, and the Babylonian Talmud (Sanhedrin 59a, see also Tosafot ad. loc.) states that Jews are obligated in all things that gentiles are obligated in, albeit with some differences in the details.[9] According to the Encyclopedia Talmudit, most medieval Jewish authorities considered that all the seven commandments were given to Adam, although Maimonides (Mishneh Torah, Hilkhot M'lakhim 9:1) considered the dietary law to have been given to Noah.[9]
Menachem Mendel Schneerson, the Lubavitcher Rebbe, published and spoke about the Seven Laws of Noah many times. According to Schneerson's view, based on a detailed reading of Maimonides' Hilkhot M'lakhim, the Talmud, and the Hebrew Bible, the seven laws originally given to Noah were given yet again, through Moses at Sinai, and it's exclusively through the giving of the Torah that the seven laws derive their current force.[38] What has changed with the giving of the Torah is that now, it is the duty of the Jewish people to bring the rest of the world to fulfill the Seven Laws of Noah.[39]
According to Adam J. Silverstein, professor of Middle Eastern studies and Islamic studies at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Jewish theologians started to rethink the relevance and applicability of the Seven Laws of Noah during the Middle Ages, primarily due to the precarious living conditions of the Jewish people under the Medieval Christian kingdoms and the Islamic world (see Jewish–Christian relations and Jewish–Islamic relations), since both Christians and Muslims recognize the patriarchAbraham as the unifying figure of the Abrahamic tradition, alongside the monotheisticconception of God.[41] Silverstein states that Jewish theology came to include concepts and frameworks that would permit certain types of non-Jews to be recognized as righteous and deserving of life in the Hereafter due to the "Noachide Law". He sees there being two "Torahs": one for Jews, the other for the gentile "Children of Noah". Whilst theoretically the Noachide Law should be universal, its prohibitions against blasphemy and idolatry mean that in practice it only really applied to non-idolatrous theists. Therefore Jews normally considered Christians and/or Muslims when discussing this concept.[41]
According to the Talmud, the Noahide laws apply to all of humanity.[3][9][29] In Judaism, the term B'nei Noach (Hebrew: בני נח, "Sons of Noah")[18] refers to all mankind.[9] The Talmud also states: "Righteous people of all nations have a share in the world to come".[44] Any non-Jew who lives according to these laws is regarded as one of the righteous among the gentiles.[29] According to the Talmud, the seven laws were given first to Adam and subsequently to Noah.[2][3][9][29] Six of the seven laws were exegetically derived from passages in the Book of Genesis,[2][7][9][29] with the seventh being the establishment of courts of justice.[2][7][9][29]
In practice, Jewish law makes it very difficult to apply the death penalty.[49] No record exists of a gentile having been put to death for violating the seven Noahide laws.[42] Some of the categories of capital punishment recorded in the Talmud are recorded as having never been carried out. It is thought that the rabbis included discussion of them in anticipation of the coming Messianic Age.[49]
According Sanhedrin 56a, for Noahides convicted of a capital crime, the only sanctioned method of execution is decapitation,[50] considered one of the lightest capital punishments.[51] Other sources state that the execution is to be by stoning if he has intercourse with a Jewish betrothed woman, or by strangulation if the Jewish woman has completed the marriage ceremonies, but had not yet consummated the marriage. In Jewish law, the only form of blasphemy which is punishable by death is blaspheming the Ineffable Name (Leviticus 24:16).[52] Some Talmudic rabbis held that only those offences for which a Jew would be executed, are forbidden to gentiles.[53] The Talmudic rabbis discuss which offences and sub-offences are capital offences and which are merely forbidden.[54]
Maimonides states that anyone who does not accept the seven laws is to be executed, as God compelled the world to follow these laws.[55] For the other prohibitions such as the grafting of trees and bestiality he holds that the sons of Noah are not to be executed.[56] Maimonides adds a universalism lacking from earlier Jewish sources.[48]: 18 The Talmud differs from Maimonides in that it considers the seven laws enforceable by Jewish authorities on non-Jews living within a Jewish nation.[48]: 18 Nahmanides disagrees with Maimonides' reasoning. He limits the obligation of enforcing the seven laws to non-Jewish authorities, thus taking the matter out of Jewish hands. The Tosafot seems to agree with Nahmanides reasoning.[57]: 39 According to some opinions, punishment is the same whether the individual transgresses with knowledge of the law or is ignorant of the law.[58]
Some authorities debate whether non-Jewish societies may decide to modify the Noachide laws of evidence (for example, by requiring more witnesses before punishment, or by permitting circumstantial evidence) if they consider that to be more just.[59] Whilst Jewish law requires two witnesses, Noachide law, as recorded by Rambam, Hilkhot Melakhim 9:14, can accept the testimony of a single eyewitness as sufficient for use of the death penalty. Whilst a confession of guilt is not admissible as evidence before a Jewish court, it is a matter of considerable dispute as to whether or not it constitutes sufficient grounds for conviction in Noachide courts.[60]
Subdivisions
Various rabbinic sources have different positions on the way the seven laws are to be subdivided in categories. Maimonides', in his Mishneh Torah, included the grafting of trees.[56] Like the Talmud, he interpreted the prohibition against homicide as including a prohibition against abortion.[61][62]David ben Solomon ibn Abi Zimra, a commentator on Maimonides, expressed surprise that he left out castration and sorcery which were also listed in the Talmud.[63]
The Talmudist Ulla wrote of 30 laws which the sons of Noah took upon themselves. He only lists three, namely the three that the gentiles follow: not to create a Ketubah between males, not to sell carrion or human flesh in the market and to respect the Torah. The rest of the laws are not listed.[64] Though the authorities seem to take it for granted that Ulla's thirty commandments included the original seven, an additional thirty laws are also possible from the reading. Two different lists of the 30 laws exist. Both lists include an additional twenty-three mitzvot which are subdivisions or extensions of the seven laws. One from the 16th-century work Asarah Maamarot by Rabbi Menahem Azariah da Fano and a second from the 10th century Samuel ben Hofni which was recently published from his Judeo-Arabic writings after having been found in the Cairo Geniza.[65][66] Rabbi Zvi Hirsch Chajes suggests Menahem Azariah of Fano enumerated commandments are not related to the first seven, nor based on Scripture, but instead were passed down by oral tradition.[67]
The rabbinic regulations regarding Jewish-gentile relations are modified in the case of a ger toshav.[17] The accepted halakhic opinion is that the ger toshav must accept the seven Noahide laws in the presence of three haberim (men of authority),[70] or, according to the rabbinic tradition, before a beth din (Jewish rabbinical court).[17] He will receive certain legal protection and privileges from the Jewish community, and there is an obligation to render him aid when in need. The restrictions on having a gentile do work for a Jew on the Shabbat are also greater when the gentile is a ger toshav.[17]
According to the Jewish philosopher and professor Menachem Kellner's study on Maimonidean texts (1991), a ger toshav could be a transitional stage on the way to becoming a "righteous alien" (Hebrew: גר צדק, ger tzedek), i.e. a full convert to Judaism.[71] He conjectures that, according to Maimonides, only a full ger tzedek would be found during the Messianic era.[71] Furthermore, Kellner criticizes the assumption within Orthodox Judaism that there is an "ontological divide between Jews and Gentiles",[72] which he believes is contrary to what Maimonides thought and the Torah teaches,[72] stating that "Gentiles as well as Jews are fully created in the image of God".[72]
Maimonides' view and his critics
During the Golden Age of Jewish culture in the Iberian Peninsula, the medieval Jewish philosopher and rabbiMaimonides (1135–1204) wrote in the halakhic legal code Mishneh Torah that gentiles must perform exclusively the Seven Laws of Noah and refrain from studying the Torah or performing any Jewish commandment, including resting on the Shabbat.[73] He also states that if gentiles want to perform any Jewish commandment besides the Seven Laws of Noah according to the correct halakhic procedure, they are not prevented from doing so.[29][74] According to Maimonides, teaching non-Jews to follow the Seven Laws of Noah is incumbent on all Jews, a commandment in and of itself.[43] Nevertheless, the majority of rabbinic authorities over the centuries have rejected Maimonides' opinion, and the dominant halakhic consensus has always been that Jews are not required to spread the Noahide laws to non-Jews.[43]
Maimonides held that gentiles may have a part in the World to Come (Olam Ha-Ba) just by observing the Seven Laws of Noah and accepting them as divinely revealed to Moses.[2][18][29][75] According to Maimonides, such non-Jews achieve the status of Chassid Umot Ha-Olam ("Pious People of the World"),[18] and are different from those which solely keep the Noahide laws out of moral/ethical reasoning alone.[18] He wrote in Hilkhot M'lakhim:"[18]
Anyone who accepts upon himself and carefully observes the Seven Commandments is of the Righteous of the Nations of the World and has a portion in the World to Come. This is as long as he accepts and performs them because (he truly believes that) it was the Holy One, Blessed Be He, Who commanded them in the Torah, and that it was through Moses our Teacher we were informed that the Sons of Noah had already been commanded to observe them. But if he observes them because he convinced himself, then he is not considered a Resident Convert and is not of the Righteous of the Nations of the World, but merely one of their wise.[76]
Some later editions of the Mishneh Torah differ by one letter and read "Nor one of their wise men"; the latter reading is narrower. In either reading, Maimonides appears to exclude philosophical Noahides from being "Righteous Gentiles".[18] According to him, a truly "Righteous Gentile" follows the seven laws because they are divinely revealed, and thus are followed out of obedience to God.[18][77][78]
The 15th-century Sephardic Orthodox rabbi Yosef Caro, one of the early Acharonim and author of the Shulchan Aruch, rejected Maimonides' denial of the access to the World to Come to the gentiles who obey the Noahide laws guided only by their reason as anti-rationalistic and unfounded, asserting that there isn't any justification to uphold such a view in the Talmud.[75] The 17th-century Sephardic philosopher Baruch Spinoza read Maimonides as using "nor"[clarification needed], and accused him of being narrow and particularistic.[75] Other Jewish philosophers influenced by Spinoza, such as Moses Mendelssohn and Hermann Cohen, also have formulated more inclusive and universal interpretations of the Seven Laws of Noah.[75][77]
Moses Mendelssohn, one of the leading exponents of the Jewish enlightenment (Haskalah), strongly disagreed with Maimonides' opinion, and instead contended that gentiles which observe the Noahide laws out of ethical, moral, or philosophical reasoning, without believing in the Jewish monotheistic conception of God, retained the status of "Righteous Gentiles" and would still achieve salvation.[79] According to Steven Schwarzschild, Maimonides' position has its source in his adoption of Aristotle's skeptical attitude towards the ability of reason to arrive at moral truths,[80] and "many of the most outstanding spokesmen of Judaism themselves dissented sharply from" this position, which is "individual and certainly somewhat eccentric" in comparison to other Jewish thinkers.[81]
A novel understanding of Maimonides' position in the 20th century, advanced by the Ashkenazi Orthodox rabbi Abraham Isaac Kook, is that a non-Jew who follows the commandments due to philosophical conviction rather than revelation (what Maimonides calls "one of their wise men") also merits the World to Come; this would be in line with Maimonides' general approach that following philosophical wisdom advances a person more than following revelatory commands.[82]
In the 1980s, rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson urged his followers to actively engage in activities to inform non-Jews about the Noahide laws, which had not been done in previous generations.[43][85] The Chabad-Lubavitch movement has been one of the most active in Noahide outreach, believing that there is spiritual and societal value for non-Jews in at least simply acknowledging the Noahide laws.[10][16][43][85]
In 1982, Chabad-Lubavitch had a reference to the Noahide laws enshrined in a U.S. Presidential proclamation: the "Proclamation 4921",[86] signed by the then-U.S. President Ronald Reagan.[86] The United States Congress, recalling House Joint Resolution 447 and in celebration of Schneerson's 80th birthday, proclaimed 4 April 1982, as a "National Day of Reflection".[86]
In 1989 and 1990, Chabad-Lubavitch had another reference to the Noahide laws enshrined in a U.S. Presidential proclamation: the "Proclamation 5956",[87] signed by then-U.S. President George H. W. Bush.[87] The United States Congress, recalling House Joint Resolution 173 and in celebration of Schneerson's 87th birthday, proclaimed 16 April 1989, and 6 April 1990, as "Education Day, U.S.A.".[87]
In January 2004, the spiritual leader of the Druze community in Israel, Sheikh Mowafak Tarif, met with a representative of Chabad-Lubavitch to sign a declaration calling on all non-Jews in Israel to observe the Noahide laws; the mayor of the Arab city of Shefa-'Amr (Shfaram) — where Muslim, Christian, and Druze communities live side-by-side – also signed the document.[88]
In March 2016, the SephardicChief Rabbi of Israel, Yitzhak Yosef, declared during a sermon that Jewish law requires that only non-Jews who follow the Noahide laws are allowed to live in Israel:[89][90] "According to Jewish law, it's forbidden for a non-Jew to live in the Land of Israel – unless he has accepted the seven Noahide laws, [...] If the non-Jew is unwilling to accept these laws, then we can send him to Saudi Arabia, ... When there will be full, true redemption, we will do this."[89] Yosef further added: "non-Jews shouldn't live in the land of Israel. ... If our hand were firm, if we had the power to rule, then non-Jews must not live in Israel. But, our hand is not firm. [...] Who, otherwise be the servants? Who will be our helpers? This is why we leave them in Israel."[91] Yosef's sermon sparked outrage in Israel and was fiercely criticized by several human rights associations, NGOs and members of the Knesset;[89]Jonathan Greenblatt, Anti-Defamation League's CEO and national director, and Carole Nuriel, Anti-Defamation League's Israel Office acting director, issued a strong denunciation of Yosef's sermon:[89][91]
The statement by Chief Rabbi Yosef is shocking and unacceptable. It is unconscionable that the Chief Rabbi, an official representative of the State of Israel, would express such intolerant and ignorant views about Israel's non-Jewish population – including the millions of non-Jewish citizens. As a spiritual leader, Rabbi Yosef should be using his influence to preach tolerance and compassion towards others, regardless of their faith, and not seek to exclude and demean a large segment of Israelis. We call upon the Chief Rabbi to retract his statements and apologize for any offense caused by his comments.[91]
Contemporary status
Historically, some rabbinic opinions consider non-Jews not only not obliged to adhere to all the remaining laws of the Torah, but actually forbidden from observing them.[92][93]
Noahide law differs radically from Roman law for gentiles (Jus Gentium), if only because the latter was enforceable judicial policy. Rabbinic Judaism has never adjudicated any cases under the Noahide laws,[42] and Jewish scholars disagree about whether the Noahide laws are a functional part of the Halakha (Jewish law).[94]
Some modern views hold that penalties are a detail of the Noahide Laws and that Noahides themselves must determine the details of their own laws for themselves. According to this school of thought – see N. Rakover, Law and the Noahides (1998); M. Dallen, The Rainbow Covenant (2003) – the Noahide laws offer humankind a set of absolute values and a framework for righteousness and justice, while the detailed laws that are currently on the books of the world's states and nations are presumptively valid.
In recent years, the term "Noahide" has come to refer to non-Jews who strive to live in accord with the seven Noahide Laws; the terms "observant Noahide" or "Torah-centered Noahides" would be more precise but these are infrequently used. Support for the use of "Noahide" in this sense can be found with the Ritva, who uses the term Son of Noah to refer to a gentile who keeps the seven laws, but is not a ger toshav.[17]
James the Just, whose judgment was adopted in the Apostolic Decree of Acts15:20: "but we should write to them [gentiles] to abstain only from things polluted by idols and from fornication and from whatever has been strangled and from blood." (NRSV)
According to Acts 13, 14, 17, 18 [...], Paul began working along the traditional Jewish line of proselytizing in the various synagogues where the proselytes of the gate [e.g., Exodus 20:9] and the Jews met; and only because he failed to win the Jews to his views, encountering strong opposition and persecution from them, did he turn to the gentile world after he had agreed at a council with the apostles at Jerusalem to admit the gentiles into the Church only as proselytes of the gate, that is, after their acceptance of the Noachian laws (Acts 15:1–31)".[98]
For great as was the success of Barnabas and Paul in the heathen world, the authorities in Jerusalem insisted upon circumcision as the condition of admission of members into the Church, until, on the initiative of Peter, and of James, the head of the Jerusalem church, it was agreed that acceptance of the Noachian Laws—namely, regarding avoidance of idolatry, fornication, and the eating of flesh cut from a living animal—should be demanded of the heathen desirous of entering the Church.[99]
The 18th-century rabbi Jacob Emden hypothesized that Jesus, and Paul after him, intended to convert the gentiles to the Seven Laws of Noah while calling on the Jews to keep the full Law of Moses.[92]
^ abcdefghijklmnopqrst"Noahide Laws". Encyclopædia Britannica. Edinburgh: Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc. 14 January 2008. Archived from the original on 21 January 2016. Retrieved 10 November 2020. Noahide Laws, also called Noachian Laws, a Jewish Talmudic designation for seven biblical laws given to Adam and to Noah before the revelation to Moses on Mt. Sinai and consequently binding on all mankind. Beginning with Genesis2:16, the Babylonian Talmud listed the first six commandments as prohibitions against idolatry, blasphemy, murder, adultery, and robbery and the positive command to establish courts of justice (with all that this implies). After the Flood a seventh commandment, given to Noah, forbade the eating of flesh cut from a living animal (Genesis 9:4). Though the number of laws was later increased to 30 with the addition of prohibitions against castration, sorcery, and other practices, the "seven laws", with minor variations, retained their original status as authoritative commandments and as the source of other laws. As basic statutes safeguarding monotheism and guaranteeing proper ethical conduct in society, these laws provided a legal framework for alien residents in Jewish territory. Maimonides thus regarded anyone who observed these laws as one "assured of a portion in the world to come."
^ abcdefghij"Jewish Concepts: The Seven Noachide Laws". Jewish Virtual Library. American–Israeli Cooperative Enterprise (AICE). 2021 [2017]. Archived from the original on 10 February 2017. Retrieved 17 October 2021. Except for the seventh law, all are negative commands, and the last itself is usually interpreted as commanding the enforcement of the others. They are derived exegetically from divine demands addressed to Adam and Noah, the progenitors of all mankind, and are thus regarded as universal. Noachides may also freely choose to practice certain other Jewish commandments and Maimonides held that Noachides must not only accept these seven laws on their own merit, but must also accept them as divinely revealed. [...] Even though the Talmud and Maimonides stipulate that a non-Jew who violated the Noachide laws was liable to capital punishment, contemporary authorities have expressed the view that this is only the maximal punishment. According to this view, there is a difference between Noachide law and halakhah. According to halakhah, when a Jew was liable for capital punishment it was a mandatory punishment, provided that all conditions had been met, whereas in Noachide law death is the maximal punishment, to be enforced only in exceptional cases. In view of the strict monotheism of Islam, Muslims were considered as Noachides whereas the status of Christians was a matter of debate. Since the late Middle Ages, Christianity too has come to be regarded as Noachide, on the ground that Trinitarianism is not forbidden to non-Jews.
^Rabbinical authorities disputed whether there were only one or several commandments given to Adam: see Sanhedrin 56a/bArchived 6 November 2017 at the Wayback Machine
^Contemporary Halakhic Problems, Vol II, Part II, Chapter XVII Capital Punishment in the Noachide Code III. Rules of Evidence in the Noachide Code Contemporary halakhic problems, by J. David Bleich, 1977-2005
^Bromiley, Geoffrey W. (1986). The International Standard Bible Encyclopedia. Vol. 3 (Fully Revised ed.). Grand Rapids, Michigan: Eerdmans. p. 1010. ISBN0-8028-3783-2. In rabbinic literature the ger toshab was a Gentile who observed the Noachian commandments but was not considered a convert to Judaism because he did not agree to circumcision. [...] some scholars have made the mistake of calling the ger toshab a "proselyte" or "semiproselyte." But the ger toshab was really a resident alien in Israel. Some scholars have claimed that the term "those who fear God" (yir᾿ei Elohim/Shamayim) was used in rabbinic literature to denote Gentiles who were on the fringe of the synagogue. They were not converts to Judaism, although they were attracted to the Jewish religion and observed part of the law.
^Bleich, J. David (1995). Contemporary Halakhic Problems. Vol. 4. New York City: KTAV Publishing House (Yeshiva University Press). p. 161. ISBN0-88125-474-6 – via Google Books. Rashi, Yevamot 48b, maintains that a resident alien (ger toshav) is obliged to observe Shabbat. The ger toshav, in accepting the Seven Commandments of the Sons of Noah, has renounced idolatry and [...] thereby acquires a status similar to that of Abraham. [...] Indeed, Rabbenu Nissim, Avodah Zarah 67b, declares that the status on an unimmersed convert is inferior to that of a ger toshav because the former's acceptance of the "yoke of the commandments" is intended to be binding only upon subsequent immersion. Moreover, the institution of ger toshav as a formal halakhic construct has lapsed with the destruction of the Temple.
^ abJacobs, Joseph; Hirsch, Emil G. (1906). "Proselyte: Semi-Converts". Jewish Encyclopedia. Kopelman Foundation. Archived from the original on 31 May 2012. Retrieved 9 November 2020. In order to find a precedent the rabbis went so far as to assume that proselytes of this order were recognized in Biblical law, applying to them the term "toshab" ("sojourner," "aborigine," referring to the Canaanites; see Maimonides' explanation in "Yad," Issure Biah, xiv. 7; see Grätz, l.c. p. 15), in connection with "ger" (see Ex. xxv. 47, where the better reading would be "we-toshab"). Another name for one of this class was "proselyte of the gate" ("ger ha-sha'ar," that is, one under Jewish civil jurisdiction; comp. Deut. v. 14, xiv. 21, referring to the stranger who had legal claims upon the generosity and protection of his Jewish neighbors). In order to be recognized as one of these the neophyte had publicly to assume, before three "ḥaberim," or men of authority, the solemn obligation not to worship idols, an obligation which involved the recognition of the seven Noachian injunctions as binding ('Ab. Zarah 64b; "Yad," Issure Biah, xiv. 7). ... The more rigorous seem to have been inclined to insist upon such converts observing the entire Law, with the exception of the reservations and modifications explicitly made in their behalf. The more lenient were ready to accord them full equality with Jews as soon as they had solemnly forsworn idolatry. The "via media" was taken by those that regarded public adherence to the seven Noachian precepts as the indispensable prerequisite (Gerim iii.; 'Ab. Zarah 64b; Yer. Yeb. 8d; Grätz, l.c. pp. 19–20). The outward sign of this adherence to Judaism was the observance of the Sabbath (Grätz, l.c. pp. 20 et seq.; but comp. Ker. 8b).
^ abKellner, Menachem (1991). Maimonides on Judaism and the Jewish people. SUNY Series in Jewish Philosophy. Albany, New York: SUNY Press. p. 44. ISBN0-7914-0691-1 – via Google Books. against my reading of Maimonides is strengthened by the fact that Maimonides himself says that the ger toshav is accepted only during the time that the Jubilee is practiced. The Jubilee year is no longer practiced in this dispensation [...]. Second, it is entirely reasonable to assume that Maimonides thought that the messianic conversion of the Gentiles would be a process that occurred in stages and that some or all Gentiles would go through the status of ger toshav on their way to the status of full convert, ger tzedek. But this question aside, there are substantial reasons why it is very unlikely that Maimonides foresaw a messianic era in which the Gentiles would become only semi-converts (ger toshav) and not full converts (ger tzedek). Put simply, semi-converts are not separate from the Jews but equal to them; their status is in every way inferior and subordinate to that of the Jews. They are separate and unequal.
^Schwarzschild, Steven S. (July 1962). "Do Noachite Have to Believe in Revelation? (Continued)". Jewish Quarterly Review. 53 (1). Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press: 44–45. doi:10.2307/1453421. JSTOR1453421. the basic philosophical reason which compelled Maimonides to take this restrictive position toward the Noachides was the fact that he had learned from his teacher Aristotle and was ready also for religious reasons to believe that ethics are not a purely rational, philosophic or scientific discipline. Only the barest outline of general ethical principles can be defined by logical methods. The substance of the matter which resides in its details can be obtained only through positive statutes, traditions, or divine commands, none of which are produced by conscious, rational processes
^Karl Josef von Hefele's commentary on canon II of GangraArchived 20 December 2016 at the Wayback Machine notes: "We further see that, at the time of the Synod of Gangra, the rule of the Apostolic Synod with regard to blood and things strangled was still in force. With the Greeks, indeed, it continued always in force as their Euchologies still show. Balsamon also, the well-known commentator on the canons of the Middle Ages, in his commentary on the 63rd Apostolic Canon, expressly blames the Latins because they had ceased to observe this command. What the Latin Church may have thought on this subject around 400 is suggested by St. Augustine in his work Contra Faustum, where he states that the Apostles had given this command to unite the heathens and Jews in the one ark of Noah; but that then, when the barrier between Jewish and heathen converts had fallen, this command concerning things strangled and blood had lost its meaning, and was only observed by few. But still, as late as the eighth century, Pope Gregory the Third (731) forbade the eating of blood or things strangled under threat of a penance of forty days. No one will pretend that the disciplinary enactments of any council, even though it be one of the undisputed Ecumenical Synods, can be of greater and more unchanging force than the decree of that first council, held by the Holy Apostles at Jerusalem, and the fact that its decree has been obsolete for centuries in the West is proof that even Ecumenical canons may be of only temporary utility and may be repealed by disuse, like other laws."
Feldman, Rachel Z. (8 October 2017). "The Bnei Noah (Children of Noah)". World Religions and Spirituality Project. Archived from the original on 21 January 2020. Retrieved 7 November 2020.
