Why Don't Christians Accept the Oral Torah? Why do Christians accept the Jewish belief that the Hebrew Bible is the Word of God,
but not accept the Oral Torah which the Jewish people believe also represents the Word of God?


  "According to traditional Judaism, the Oral Law must have been disseminated at the same time as the Written Torah because certain Torah commandments contained in the Pentateuch would be indecipherable without a separate explanatory codex and, presumably, God would not demand adherence to commandments that could not be understood." - Excerpt from the Wikipedia page
At the time of Christ, the largest proponents of the Oral Law were the Pharisees.  On multiple occasions, the Pharisees caught Jesus breaking some of the Oral Laws and confronted Him about it in order to discredit His ministry.  Jesus responded by calling the Oral Law "traditions of men".  He taught that they were not only unnecessary to follow, since they were not from God, but that some of them were actually counter-productive.  He said that some of their Oral Laws contradicted God's laws which are enshrined in the Torah.  Since Jesus, himself, denounced the Oral Law, it should be unsurprising that Christians would do so as well.

For instance, in the following two passages, the Pharisees confronted Jesus because he was breaking the Oral Laws regarding the washing of your hands before eating (these oral hand-washing laws were written down, a couple of centuries later, in the Mishnah).

Matt 15:1-9 (NASB)


  Then some Pharisees and scribes came to Jesus from Jerusalem and said, “Why do Your disciples break the tradition of the elders? For they do not wash their hands when they eat bread.” And He answered and said to them, “Why do you yourselves transgress the commandment of God for the sake of your tradition? For God said, ‘Honor your father and mother,’ and, ‘He who speaks evil of father or mother is to be put to death.’ But you say, ‘Whoever says to his father or mother, “Whatever I have that would help you has been given to God,” he is not to honor his father or his mother.’ And by this you invalidated the word of God for the sake of your tradition. You hypocrites, rightly did Isaiah prophesy of you:‘This people honors Me with their lips,But their heart is far away from Me.‘But in vain do they worship Me,Teaching as doctrines the precepts of men.’”


Mk 7:1-13 (NASB)


  The Pharisees and some of the scribes gathered around Him when they had come from Jerusalem, and had seen that some of His disciples were eating their bread with impure hands, that is, unwashed. (For the Pharisees and all the Jews do not eat unless they carefully wash their hands, thus observing the traditions of the elders; and when they come from the market place, they do not eat unless they cleanse themselves; and there are many other things which they have received in order to observe, such as the washing of cups and pitchers and copper pots.) The Pharisees and the scribes asked Him, “Why do Your disciples not walk according to the tradition of the elders, but eat their bread with impure hands?” And He said to them, “Rightly did Isaiah prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written:‘This people honors Me with their lips,But their heart is far away from Me.‘But in vain do they worship Me,Teaching as doctrines the precepts of men.’Neglecting the commandment of God, you hold to the tradition of men.”He was also saying to them, “You are experts at setting aside the commandment of God in order to keep your tradition. For Moses said, ‘Honor your father and your mother’; and, ‘He who speaks evil of father or mother, is to be put to death’; but you say, ‘If a man says to his father or his mother, whatever I have that would help you is Corban (that is to say, given to God),’ you no longer permit him to do anything for his father or his mother; thus invalidating the word of God by your tradition which you have handed down; and you do many things such as that.”