Who Really Runs the World? The Chabad Investigation Part 6 of 9

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Part 6 — How Did Noahide Law Become “Global Ethics”?

Opening — The Vocabulary Changes

Part 5 left me with a problem I didn’t expect. I went looking for the Seven Noahide Laws being introduced into governments as a complete religious legal code, but that isn’t what the documentary trail showed me. I found legislation. I found parliamentarians. I found model proposals. I found meetings inside parliamentary institutions. But when these ideas entered the international political arena, the vocabulary started changing. Instead of repeatedly hearing “Noahide law,” I started hearing another phrase: “global ethics.”

At first, that sounds like it could be nothing more than modern terminology. Every international organization talks about ethics, peace, justice and cooperation. But then I went back to the Institute of Noahide Code’s own United Nations profile, and the wording became impossible to ignore. The Institute says it wants religious leaders, academics, media leaders and business executives to help teach and put into practice the “global ethics” contained in United Nations resolutions. Then, within the same mission statement, it invokes the Noahide Code and describes the need for a universally accepted code among the nations.

That doesn’t prove “global ethics” means “Noahide law.”

But it gives us a reason to investigate the relationship.

And when I started moving backward through the timeline, I found something that makes this question much more interesting. On November 9, 2015, a summit was held at United Nations Headquarters involving the Inter-Parliamentary Coalition for Global Ethics and the Institute of Noahide Code. The gathering brought together political, religious and cultural voices around peace, sustainable development and religious ethics. According to the Coalition’s own account of the event, Rabbi Yakov David Cohen opened the religious and cultural values panel and reminded those attending that the basis of the gathering was the Seven Laws of Noah.

That is extremely important for what comes next.

The Noahide connection wasn’t something I had to reconstruct years later by connecting unrelated organizations. At this gathering, Cohen explicitly connected the Seven Laws to what the participants were doing. Yet the broader language surrounding the initiative was already moving toward cultural and religious ethics, sustainable development, peace and international cooperation.

So now I want to watch the vocabulary itself.

I want to know whether an ancient religious framework was simply being explained in words modern international institutions could understand, or whether something more substantial happened as those ideas moved into the political world. Because translating an idea can change how people perceive it. “Establish courts of justice” sounds different from “social justice.” Religious obligations sound different when described as universal values. A divine command sounds different when expressed as an ethical principle shared across cultures.

But similarity isn’t identity, and this is exactly where an investigation like ours could go badly wrong. If someone promotes justice because of the Noahide Laws, that doesn’t mean every discussion of justice is Noahide. If someone connects environmental responsibility with religious ethics, that doesn’t make every environmental program religious law. And if an interfaith gathering includes a Noahide advocate, that doesn’t transform everything said at the gathering into Noahide doctrine.

We have to establish the connections rather than assume them.

That is why the 2015 conference matters so much. It gives us something close to a controlled environment where both vocabularies appear in the same place. There are religious leaders from different traditions. There is the Institute of Noahide Code. There is the Inter-Parliamentary Coalition for Global Ethics. There are discussions about sustainable development and international peace. And there is Rabbi Cohen explicitly telling the gathering that the Seven Laws of Noah stand at its foundation.

Then watch what happens over the following years.

The language becomes increasingly compatible with the vocabulary of international institutions. The Institute later describes a strategy of harnessing “cultural and religious ethics” to advance UN development goals. It says those goals contain ethics already present within many cultures and religions, particularly concerning social and environmental justice. The IPCGE similarly describes bringing religious and cultural traditions together to support those objectives.

Yet Cohen never completely abandons the Noahide language. In material published by the Institute, he goes considerably further than merely talking about shared ethical principles. He states his intention to call upon all 193 UN member nations to incorporate what he calls the Universal Noahide Code into their constitutions. In the same material, however, the project is also described through the vocabulary of global ethics, legislation, international law and peace.

Now we have something worth investigating.

We aren’t looking at a simple story where the Noahide Laws disappeared and “global ethics” suddenly replaced them. The evidence appears more complicated. Explicit Noahide language continued alongside a broader vocabulary capable of including other religions, cultures, political institutions and United Nations objectives.

So Part 6 isn’t going to begin by declaring that “global ethics” is a secret name for Noahide law.

We are going to determine what the people using these terms actually meant by them.

We’re going to follow the language from the Seven Laws of Noah into cultural and religious ethics, universal values, the Sustainable Development Goals and eventually legislation. We’re going to look for the places where the concepts clearly overlap and, just as importantly, the places where they don’t.

Because something happened to the vocabulary as these ideas moved from theology toward international public policy.

The question is what.

And the best place to begin is with the phrase itself.

What does “global ethics” mean here?

Investigation 1 — What Does “Global Ethics” Mean Here?

Before I can trace how Noahide law became connected with “global ethics,” I need to define what those words actually mean in the documents we are investigating. That matters because “global ethics” isn’t a uniquely Noahide expression. The phrase existed independently in philosophy, international affairs and nonprofit work long before the Institute of Noahide Code began using it. Academics have used “global ethics” to describe moral questions that cross national boundaries, including human rights, poverty, migration, war, environmental responsibility and global governance. So the phrase itself isn’t evidence of Chabad, Noahide law or any particular religion.

The Inter-Parliamentary Coalition for Global Ethics gives us a much narrower definition for this investigation. Its own website says the Coalition wants parliamentarians from UN member states to implement the universal values of “global ethics” through national legislation. It identifies those values with a culture of peace, environmental protection, social justice and the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals. The Coalition also points to UN resolutions dealing with religious tolerance, interreligious dialogue, human rights and a culture of peace as part of the framework it wants implemented.

That tells us something immediately. Within IPCGE’s public definition, “global ethics” isn’t presented as a list of seven religious commandments. It is presented as a collection of supposedly universal principles that can operate across religions, cultures and nations. Parliamentarians, religious leaders, academics and media leaders are supposed to search for common values in religion, law and education and then cooperate in areas including education, communication and legislation.

But then the Institute of Noahide Code enters the picture, and the meaning becomes more complicated.

The Institute’s official United Nations civil-society profile uses remarkably similar language. It says the Institute proposes promoting national legislation involving UN resolutions concerning a culture of peace, environmental ethics and social justice. It wants parliamentarians from UN member states involved, along with religious, academic, media and business leaders who would teach, publicize and practice the “global ethics” contained in those resolutions. It even proposes an annual gathering centered on “legislating for global ethics.”

Then, immediately within that description, the Institute brings in the Noahide Code.

The profile says the Noahide Code, according to the Institute’s interpretation of Hugo Grotius, forms a basis for international law. It then argues that a universally accepted code among nations is necessary to bring peace to countries, communities and individuals. The grammar of the profile is awkward in places, so I don’t want to pretend it gives us a perfectly developed philosophical explanation. But it unmistakably places “global ethics,” national legislation, universal ethical principles and the Noahide Code inside the same organizational vision.

That still doesn’t make the terms identical.

In fact, the Institute’s later material helps us understand the distinction. In 2018 it described a joint initiative with IPCGE to mobilize “cultural and religious ethics” in support of the UN development goals. According to that document, those development goals contain ethical principles found within many cultures and religions, especially concerning social and environmental justice. The proposed strategy was therefore to bring different religious and cultural representatives together and draw upon their respective traditions in support of common objectives.

That sounds much more like an umbrella than a replacement name.

Under that umbrella, a Christian might arrive at a principle through Christianity. A Muslim might understand it through Islam. A secular participant might understand it through human rights philosophy. And a Noahide advocate could say that the same principle ultimately reflects the universal commandments given by God to humanity.

The participants can therefore agree on the policy without agreeing on why it is morally true.

That distinction helps explain why the Noahide Code can appear alongside “global ethics” without proving that every global-ethics proposal is Noahide law. The Institute can believe Noahide principles provide the deepest foundation for universal morality while participating in a coalition that publicly defines those universal values much more broadly. The World Academy of Art and Science later described IPCGE in similarly broad terms, saying it brings policymakers together around peace, environmental protection, social justice and legislation in alliance with educational, religious and nongovernmental organizations.

But there is another side to this that we cannot ignore.

The Institute wasn’t merely one unrelated religious organization that happened to attend an international ethics conference. It explicitly connected its Noahide mission with the effort to codify global ethics through legislation. Its own material describes the Noahide Code, international law, parliamentarians, model legislation and global ethics within the same project. That means the relationship is documented even though equivalence isn’t.

So when I use the words “global ethics” throughout this investigation, I need to be precise about what I mean.

I am not using them as a secret synonym for the Seven Noahide Laws. The evidence doesn’t justify that. I am using them the way these organizations themselves use them: as universal ethical principles concerning peace, justice, environmental responsibility and human relations that advocates believe can cross religious and national boundaries and, in some cases, become public policy or legislation.

The fascinating question is where the Noahide Code fits inside that framework.

Does it contribute one religious interpretation among many?

Does Cohen regard it as the underlying foundation beneath all the others?

Or did Noahide ideas gradually get translated into language that people from completely different religious and political traditions could accept without ever calling those ideas Noahide?

To answer that, we need an event where the two vocabularies appear together clearly enough that we can watch what happens.

And in 2015, we get exactly that.

At United Nations Headquarters.

Investigation 2 — The 2015 UN Headquarters Conference

Now we arrive at the event that may give us the clearest view yet of how these two vocabularies came together. On November 9, 2015, a summit was held in Conference Room 6 at United Nations Headquarters in New York. According to the published agenda, it was hosted by the Permanent Mission of Panama to the United Nations and co-sponsored by the Institute of Noahide Code and the Inter-Parliamentary Coalition for Global Ethics. Its title tells us immediately what the organizers wanted to accomplish: “Mobilizing Cultural and Religious Ethics for Agenda 2030.”

That date matters. Only weeks earlier, on September 25, 2015, UN member states had adopted the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and its seventeen Sustainable Development Goals. The November gathering therefore occurred as governments, NGOs and civil-society organizations were beginning to discuss how those goals would actually be promoted and implemented. The Institute and IPCGE were positioning religious and cultural ethics as something that could contribute to that process.

Look carefully at how the conference was structured, because the progression is revealing. The first session dealt with UN resolutions concerning a culture of peace as a prerequisite for peace, security and sustainable development. Speakers included a UNESCO representative, Trinidad and Tobago’s minister responsible for arts and multiculturalism, and Giandomenico Picco, a former UN under-secretary-general who was associated with IPCGE. This opening section was presented almost entirely through the language of international institutions, peace and sustainable development.

Then came Session II.

Its title was “Religious and Cultural Values as a Driver for the Implementation of the Post 2015 Sustainable Development Goals.” Rabbi Yakov David Cohen, founder and director of the Institute of Noahide Code, was assigned the introduction. And the published agenda explicitly identified his subject: “The Noahide Laws and the post 2015 agenda.” That is one of the strongest pieces of evidence we have found because nobody has to infer the Noahide connection from Cohen’s presence. It was printed directly into the conference program.

But Cohen wasn’t alone on that panel. Rabbi Elie Abadie participated, along with Imam Shamsi Ali, Buddhist Abbot Wei Feng, Druze representative Munib Bader and Christian pastor V. Simpson Turner Jr. The composition matters because this wasn’t structured as a Noahide-only conference. It was explicitly an interreligious panel discussing how different religious and cultural values might contribute to the new sustainable-development agenda.

Then Cohen made the connection even more explicit.

IPCGE’s account of the summit says Cohen opened the panel concerning religious and cultural values and reminded those present that the basis of the gathering was the Seven Laws of Noah. The account connects that message with the responsibility of humanity to become agents of goodness, kindness and global change. Whatever we eventually conclude about “global ethics,” the Coalition’s own account therefore establishes that the Seven Laws weren’t merely sitting quietly somewhere in Cohen’s personal theology. He explicitly brought them into the explanation of the gathering.

The Institute’s own published agenda confirms the same relationship from another direction. It identifies the Institute as a co-sponsor, places Cohen’s Noahide presentation at the beginning of the religious-values session, and concludes with a proposal to develop a steering committee that would mobilize cultural and religious leaders in support of the UN’s post-2015 Sustainable Development Goals.

That gives us something we didn’t have before.

We can actually see the bridge.

On one side are the Seven Noahide Laws, presented by Cohen as universal religious principles. On the other side are the Sustainable Development Goals, culture-of-peace resolutions and international policy objectives. Between them stands a coalition of rabbis, an imam, a Christian minister, a Buddhist abbot, political figures, diplomats and civil-society representatives discussing how religious and cultural ethics could support those international goals.

But we also need an important guardrail here. This conference occurred at United Nations Headquarters and was hosted by Panama’s UN mission, but that doesn’t mean the United Nations adopted the Seven Noahide Laws. A conference held at UN Headquarters is not the same thing as a General Assembly resolution, Security Council decision or treaty. The agenda documents participation and access; it does not establish that UN member states endorsed Cohen’s theology.

That distinction actually makes what happened more interesting, because we don’t need to exaggerate the event to see why it matters. What we have is a documented effort by the Institute of Noahide Code to place its universal religious framework into conversation with a newly adopted international development framework. And the organizers didn’t hide the Noahide component when they did it.

There is another clue in the language used after the conference. Cohen later described the event as a summit mobilizing cultural and religious ethics for Agenda 2030, while also describing the Universal Noahide Code as the platform for the gathering. That is Cohen’s characterization, not an official UN determination about the conference, but it tells us how he understood what was happening.

That difference is critical.

The UN wasn’t saying, “Agenda 2030 is Noahide.”

Cohen was connecting Noahide principles to Agenda 2030.

Those are completely different claims.

And that is precisely why this 2015 conference becomes our turning point. We now have the Seven Laws appearing openly beside the language of cultural ethics, religious ethics, sustainable development and international cooperation. We aren’t guessing that the two worlds touched each other.

They were in the same room.

Now we need to examine exactly what Cohen said that foundation was.

Because according to the organizers’ own account, the Seven Laws weren’t simply mentioned at the gathering.

They were explicitly connected to it.

Investigation 3 — The Seven Laws Were Explicitly Connected to the Gathering

The 2015 conference becomes much more important when we stop looking only at who attended and examine what the organizers actually put on the agenda. The title of the summit was “Mobilizing Cultural and Religious Ethics for Agenda 2030,” which sounds broad and interfaith. But when Session II began, the published program identified Rabbi Yakov David Cohen’s introductory subject very specifically: “The Noahide Laws and the post 2015 agenda.” That wording matters because it directly connects the Seven Laws with the new United Nations development framework without requiring us to infer the connection from Cohen’s presence.

Then look at where that presentation was placed. Session I concerned United Nations resolutions on a culture of peace as a prerequisite for peace, security and sustainable development. Session II moved immediately into “Religious and Cultural Values as a Driver for the Implementation of the Post 2015 Sustainable Development Goals.” Cohen’s Noahide presentation served as the introduction to that second session. The conference architecture itself therefore moved from UN policy objectives into religious and cultural ethics, with the Noahide Laws positioned directly at that transition.

That is stronger evidence than simply finding Noahide language somewhere on the Institute’s website. This was a conference at United Nations Headquarters, hosted by Panama’s UN mission, with the Institute of Noahide Code listed as a co-sponsor. The published agenda itself connected Noahide law with the post-2015 agenda. Again, that doesn’t mean the United Nations endorsed that connection. It means the organizers created the connection within their conference program, and Cohen was the person assigned to explain it.

What happened immediately afterward is equally important. Cohen wasn’t followed by a panel of Noahide teachers explaining the seven commandments. The speakers represented several religious traditions. Rabbi Elie Abadie represented Judaism, Imam Shamsi Ali represented Islam, Abbot Wei Feng represented Buddhism, Munib Bader represented the Druze community, and Reverend V. Simpson Turner Jr. represented Christianity. The subject they were addressing wasn’t conversion to Noahidism. It was how religious and cultural values could help implement the Sustainable Development Goals.

That begins to explain the vocabulary shift we have been following.

Cohen could introduce the Noahide Laws as a universal foundation while the larger gathering could still operate through an interfaith framework. The Christian participant didn’t have to become Noahide. The Muslim participant didn’t have to abandon Islam. The Buddhist participant didn’t have to accept Jewish theology. Instead, each tradition could identify ethical principles that overlapped with common objectives involving peace, justice, human responsibility and sustainable development.

This is where I need to resist making the evidence say more than it says. The agenda doesn’t tell us that every participant accepted Cohen’s claim about the Noahide Laws. It doesn’t tell us that Panama endorsed Noahide theology by hosting the conference. It certainly doesn’t establish that the UN adopted the Seven Laws as the hidden foundation of Agenda 2030. Those conclusions would require evidence we don’t have.

But the opposite extreme would also distort what happened.

We cannot say there was no Noahide connection to this event. It is printed directly into the program. We cannot say Cohen merely attended an unrelated UN conference and later attached his theology to it. The Institute was a co-sponsor, Cohen was given the introductory presentation to the religious-values session, and the subject printed beside his name was explicitly “The Noahide Laws and the post 2015 agenda.”

Then look at how the conference was supposed to end. After the sessions and open debate, the agenda called for developing a steering committee to mobilize cultural and religious leaders for the United Nations post-2015 Sustainable Development Goals. That gives us the larger strategy. Religious traditions would contribute ethical principles, leaders from those traditions would be organized, and those principles would be connected with international objectives already being pursued through the UN development framework.

That helps explain something we encountered repeatedly in Part 5. The Noahide Code didn’t have to appear word-for-word inside every later legislative proposal for Cohen to believe that Noahide principles were influencing the project. From his perspective, a universal religious principle could be translated into a broader ethical principle, joined with similar principles from other traditions, connected to a UN objective, and eventually expressed through education or public policy.

But that is Cohen’s conceptual bridge. It doesn’t make the resulting policy Noahide law automatically.

And this distinction becomes crucial because the traditional Seven Laws contain much more than the broad concepts appearing in the international-policy material. Traditional formulations include prohibitions concerning idolatry and blasphemy alongside murder, theft, prohibited sexual relations, eating flesh from a living animal, and the establishment of justice. Yet when we followed the concrete proposals in Part 5, we didn’t find governments being asked to enact that complete list. We found culture-of-peace education, environmental responsibility, social justice, sustainable development and opposition to violent extremism.

Something happened between those two vocabularies.

The 2015 conference allows us to see the moment when they were standing beside each other. On one side was an explicitly named religious framework: the Noahide Laws. On the other was an international framework: culture of peace, sustainable development and Agenda 2030. Between them were Cohen and a collection of religious and cultural leaders discussing how ethical values could contribute to those international goals.

So we have now established something important without having to speculate about anybody’s hidden intentions. The Seven Laws were explicitly connected to the gathering. They were explicitly connected to the post-2015 agenda by Cohen’s scheduled presentation. And the broader conference was explicitly designed to mobilize religious and cultural ethics in support of that agenda.

The connection is documented.

The next question is what happened to the language as those ideas moved forward.

Because now we can watch the translation happen.

Investigation 4 — Watch the Translation Happen

Now that we have established that the Seven Noahide Laws were explicitly connected to the 2015 gathering, I want to watch what happened to the language afterward. This is where the story becomes much more subtle. The Noahide Laws did not simply disappear and get replaced overnight by the words “global ethics.” Instead, the documents show Noahide language existing beside a broader vocabulary of religious ethics, cultural ethics, peace, social justice, environmental responsibility and sustainable development.

Start with the 2015 conference itself. Rabbi Yakov David Cohen’s presentation was explicitly titled “The Noahide Laws and the post 2015 agenda.” The IPCGE’s account went even further, reporting that Cohen told those present that the Seven Laws of Noah were the basis of the gathering. But look at the title placed over the entire event: “Mobilizing Cultural and Religious Ethics for Agenda 2030.” The Noahide language was specific, while the language presented to the larger gathering was universal and interfaith.

That is where I can begin watching the translation happen.

The Seven Laws contain particular religious commands, but Cohen was presenting them as principles capable of addressing universal human problems. Instead of beginning with the prohibition against idolatry, the international discussion could begin with peace. Instead of requiring everyone in the room to agree about the theological origin of morality, participants could identify ethical principles their different traditions already shared. The conference itself demonstrates this structure because Cohen’s Noahide presentation was followed by Jewish, Muslim, Buddhist, Druze and Christian representatives discussing religious and cultural values in relation to sustainable development.

By 2018, that broader vocabulary becomes even clearer. Material published by the Institute describes an initiative with the IPCGE to mobilize “cultural and religious ethics” in support of the UN development goals. The document says those goals contain ethics found within many cultures and religions, particularly concerning social and environmental justice. The proposed mechanism was a steering committee of religious leaders and cultural representatives who could draw upon their respective traditions to support those common objectives.

Notice what has happened.

The starting point is no longer presented as everybody accepting the Seven Noahide Laws. The starting point becomes finding ethical principles already present within different cultures and religions. Those principles can then be connected to common international objectives. A Noahide advocate can participate because he believes those principles ultimately fit the Noahide framework, while a Christian, Muslim or Buddhist participant can arrive at some of the same principles through a completely different theological route.

Then we reach the Institute’s description of legislation, and the vocabulary shifts again. Its official UN civil-society profile says it wants parliamentarians to implement UN resolutions concerning a culture of peace, environmental ethics and social justice through national legislation. Religious leaders, academics, media figures and business executives would support that effort by teaching and putting into practice what the Institute calls the “global ethics” contained in those UN resolutions.

That phrase is crucial.

The document doesn’t say the global ethics are hidden inside the Seven Noahide Laws. It says the global ethics are inherent in the United Nations resolutions. Yet only a few lines later, the same organizational description introduces the Noahide Code and says a universally accepted code among nations is necessary for peace. The writing is awkward, but the conceptual movement is visible: Noahide Code, universal moral principles, UN resolutions, global ethics, national legislation.

That looks like translation, but we need to be precise about what is being translated.

It isn’t a word-for-word translation of the Seven Laws into seven secular laws. If that were happening, we should be able to line them up directly: idolatry becomes this statute, blasphemy becomes that statute, and so forth. That isn’t what these documents show. What they show is a translation at the level of ethical concepts. Religious principles are being connected to broader concepts that people outside the originating religious tradition can recognize and potentially support.

By 2016, we can see what that looks like politically. At another UN Headquarters event, the language centered on peaceful and inclusive societies, combating violent extremism, education, democratic debate and national legislation implementing a culture of peace. The Institute of Noahide Code participated, but the legislative panel was not publicly framed as an effort to enact seven religious commandments.

And that tells us something important about the process.

The theology can remain with the advocate while the public-policy language becomes universal.

But I am not going to call that concealment yet.

Cohen himself publicly described the 2015 event as having the Universal Noahide Code as its platform and said the Seven Laws were the basis of the gathering. That is his characterization, not a UN endorsement, but it works against the simplest theory that the Noahide connection had to be completely hidden. He was openly identifying it while simultaneously participating in a broader interfaith vocabulary.

So what we are watching appears more complicated than somebody simply changing a label.

We are watching a religious concept move through several layers of language. It begins explicitly as the Seven Noahide Laws. It enters an interfaith conversation as cultural and religious ethics. Shared principles become universal values. Those values become connected with peace, social justice, environmental responsibility and sustainable development. And eventually those objectives are described as “global ethics” capable of being supported through education and legislation.

The connection is real.

The equivalence is not yet proven.

And now the timeline brings us to the point where this vocabulary connects directly with one of the largest international policy frameworks in the world.

The Sustainable Development Goals.

Because once the language of Noahide ethics, cultural ethics and global ethics meets the SDGs, the translation moves from a conference discussion toward an international program.

That is where we go next.

Investigation 5 — Then the Vocabulary Meets the SDGs

Now the vocabulary reaches a major turning point, because in September 2015 the United Nations adopted the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. The Agenda established seventeen Sustainable Development Goals covering poverty, hunger, health, education, gender equality, economic development, environmental protection, peace, justice and international cooperation. The UN’s own text describes the Agenda as universal, while also stating that implementation takes different national realities, capacities and priorities into account.

This is important because the SDGs did not originate with the Institute of Noahide Code, Chabad, Rabbi Yakov David Cohen or the IPCGE. The UN record describes a member-state-led process that included years of negotiations, public consultation and participation by civil society and other stakeholders. The final Agenda says it is grounded in the UN Charter, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, international human-rights treaties and earlier UN development agreements. There is no basis in that official history for saying the SDGs themselves originated as Noahide law.

But something different happened after the SDGs were adopted.

Noahide advocates began explicitly connecting their religious framework to them.

Remember the timing. The 2030 Agenda was adopted on September 25, 2015. Less than two months later, on November 9, the conference we just examined was held at UN Headquarters. The published program placed Rabbi Cohen at the beginning of the session titled “Religious and Cultural Values as a Driver for the Implementation of the Post 2015 Sustainable Development Goals.” His assigned subject was explicitly “The Noahide Laws and the post 2015 agenda.”

That gives us a documented direction of travel.

The United Nations created the SDGs through its own political process. Then Cohen and the Institute sought to connect Noahide principles with that already-existing international framework. That is very different from claiming that the Noahide movement created Agenda 2030.

And when I move forward to the Institute’s later material, I can see exactly how that connection was explained.

In 2018, the Institute published material titled “Mobilizing Cultural and Religious Ethics to Promote the U.N. Post 2015 Development Goals.” The opening statement says the development goals contain ethics inherent in many cultures and religions, particularly concerning social and environmental justice. It then says the IPCGE, working with the Institute of Noahide Code, was launching an initiative to create a global steering committee of religious leaders and cultural representatives who could harness those ethical traditions to promote the goals.

Notice what that does to the vocabulary.

The argument is no longer simply, “Humanity should obey the Seven Noahide Laws.” Instead, it becomes: humanity already possesses multiple religious and cultural traditions containing ethical principles, some of those principles overlap with objectives expressed through the Sustainable Development Goals, and those traditions can therefore be mobilized to support the international agenda.

The Noahide Code can enter that framework without everybody else accepting Noahide theology.

And the SDGs provide something the Noahide movement didn’t possess by itself: a globally recognized policy vocabulary. The UN Agenda speaks about peaceful and inclusive societies, access to justice, environmental protection, education, inequality, human dignity and international partnership. Goal 16 specifically concerns peaceful and inclusive societies, access to justice and effective institutions. Goal 17 concerns global partnership and implementation.

Now compare that language with what we have been finding.

Justice.

Peace.

Human responsibility.

Social ethics.

Environmental ethics.

Education.

Cooperation among nations.

Those concepts can be discussed from a Noahide perspective, a Christian perspective, an Islamic perspective, a secular human-rights perspective or numerous other philosophical traditions. That is precisely what makes the SDG vocabulary useful for an interfaith coalition. Participants don’t have to agree about the theological source of an ethical principle before cooperating around a policy objective.

But this is also where we have to be very careful not to reverse the evidence.

If Cohen says Noahide principles support Goal 16, that does not make Goal 16 Noahide law. If the Institute believes environmental responsibility fits its understanding of universal ethics, that doesn’t mean the UN’s environmental goals secretly originated in Noahide theology. The documentary evidence establishes that Cohen and the Institute connected their religious framework to the SDGs after the SDGs had been developed through the UN process. It does not establish that the SDGs were created as a vehicle for Noahide law.

In fact, the official 2030 Agenda contains commitments that extend far beyond anything resembling the traditional Seven Noahide Laws. It addresses poverty, hunger, healthcare, gender equality, clean water, energy, employment, infrastructure, inequality, cities, consumption, climate, oceans and biodiversity. That alone should warn us against collapsing seventeen extensive development goals into seven ancient religious commandments.

What we can document is more interesting because we don’t have to exaggerate it.

A Noahide organization looked at a newly adopted global policy framework and said, in effect, that religious and cultural ethics could help support it. Cohen explicitly connected the Noahide Laws with the post-2015 agenda. The Institute and IPCGE then proposed organizing religious leaders, cultural representatives and eventually parliamentarians around areas where those ethical traditions could intersect with the SDGs.

That gives us the bridge we have been looking for.

The SDGs didn’t turn into Noahide law.

Noahide advocates interpreted portions of the SDGs through their own universal ethical framework and attempted to connect the two.

And that raises the question we now have to ask about Cohen himself. Because if we want to understand how he could move from seven ancient commandments to peace, sustainable development, global ethics and legislation without believing he had abandoned the Noahide Code, we need to understand the conceptual bridge inside his own argument.

That is Investigation 6.

Cohen’s conceptual bridge.

Investigation 6 — Cohen’s Conceptual Bridge

Now I think we can finally understand how Rabbi Yakov David Cohen himself connects these worlds, because his argument is more specific than simply saying the Noahide Laws and the Sustainable Development Goals have some things in common. In Cohen’s own writings, the Noahide Code begins as something divine and universal. From there, he translates individual Noahide principles into broad ethical concepts such as respect for human life, family, property, animals and justice. Those concepts can then cross religious boundaries, enter international discussions and eventually be expressed through public policy.

Cohen actually gives us examples of how he performs that translation. When discussing the Universal Noahide Code, he describes respect for human life as recognizing the common dignity of humanity. He translates the protection of family into respect for society’s foundational relationships. He translates the prohibition against theft into respect for private property. He connects the prohibition involving flesh taken from a living animal with respect for animal life. And he describes the command to establish courts as creating justice and social order.

Notice what happens when the principles are expressed that way. Someone listening doesn’t initially have to know anything about rabbinic Noahide jurisprudence to agree that murder is wrong, property should be respected, animals shouldn’t be treated cruelly and societies require systems of justice. Cohen has moved from the language of commandments toward the language of universal ethical principles without necessarily believing that he has changed the underlying source of those principles.

That appears to be Cohen’s conceptual bridge.

At the religious end of the bridge stands God. Cohen describes the Noahide Code as originating with the Creator and applying universally to humanity. At the other end stand governments, international institutions and different religious traditions. Cohen argues that the Noahide framework can function across those boundaries precisely because he considers its principles universal rather than exclusively Jewish. In his 2018 statement, he described the Universal Noahide Code as transcending political, judicial and religious systems while also being capable of becoming part of those systems.

And Cohen’s ambition was considerably larger than merely encouraging people to be nice to each other. In that same statement, he said his intention was to call upon all 193 UN member nations to incorporate the Universal Noahide Code into their constitutions. That is Cohen’s stated aspiration, not a UN policy and not evidence that any of those countries agreed to do it. But it tells us something extremely important about how he understood the relationship between Noahide theology and government. He didn’t see the two as belonging permanently in separate compartments.

Now compare that with the Institute’s official UN civil-society profile. The language changes, but the architecture looks remarkably similar. Instead of saying 193 nations should incorporate the Universal Noahide Code into their constitutions, the profile describes recruiting parliamentarians from UN member states to implement UN resolutions concerning a culture of peace, environmental ethics and social justice through national legislation. It calls those principles “global ethics,” while also placing the Noahide Code and the need for a universally accepted code within the same mission statement.

This is where I think we can see Cohen’s thinking more clearly.

He doesn’t appear to require every participant to begin with Noahide theology. The 2015 conference demonstrates that. Cohen introduced the Noahide Laws in a session that also contained Muslim, Christian, Buddhist, Druze and Jewish voices. IPCGE’s own account says Cohen reminded participants that the Seven Laws of Noah were the basis of the gathering, while the conference itself was framed around mobilizing cultural and religious ethics for the post-2015 development agenda.

Then, in later material, the Institute and IPCGE say the development goals contain ethics already inherent within many cultures and religions. Their proposed strategy was to harness those different traditions around common objectives involving social and environmental justice. Cohen therefore didn’t need an imam to call something Noahide. He didn’t need a Christian minister to accept rabbinic authority. They could arrive at overlapping ethical principles through their own traditions while Cohen interpreted that common ground through his Noahide worldview.

That distinction may explain much of what we have been seeing.

From Cohen’s perspective, the Noahide Code can remain the divine foundation while “global ethics” becomes the common language. The SDGs can become policy objectives. Religious leaders can provide moral support. Parliamentarians can translate selected principles into legislation. Different groups can participate at different points along the bridge without necessarily agreeing about what stands at the beginning of it.

But there is an enormous limitation we need to preserve.

Cohen’s interpretation doesn’t prove that these international principles actually derive from Noahide law. His claim that Hugo Grotius treated the Noahide Code as foundational to international law is Cohen’s historical argument, and his claim that the Noahide framework underlies universal ethics is a theological position. The UN profile records that position because it is the Institute’s submitted mission statement; its presence on a UN website doesn’t transform the claim into a UN finding.

The same distinction applies to Agenda 2030. Cohen could interpret peace, justice and human responsibility through Noahide theology without making the SDGs Noahide in origin. What we established in Investigation 5 still stands: the SDGs arose through the UN’s own political process, while Cohen subsequently connected his religious framework to them.

So Cohen’s conceptual bridge is becoming clearer. Start with divine commandments. Identify universal ethical principles within them. Find overlapping principles within other religions and cultures. Connect those common principles with existing international objectives. Mobilize religious and cultural leaders around them. Bring parliamentarians into the process. Then encourage public policy and legislation expressing the shared principles.

That doesn’t mean everyone crossing the bridge knows it as a Noahide bridge.

And it doesn’t mean everyone crossing it agrees with Cohen about where it begins.

That brings us to the question I think we now have to answer before going any further. The gatherings included Noahide advocates, but they also included Muslims, Christians, Buddhists and other religious and cultural representatives. The organizers repeatedly described the project as drawing ethics from many traditions.

So what exactly are we looking at?

Is this fundamentally a Noahide project expressed through interfaith language, or is it genuinely an interfaith project in which Noahide thought is only one contributor?

That is Investigation 7.

Is this Noahide or interfaith?

Investigation 7 — Is This Noahide or Interfaith?

At this point, I ran into a classification problem. We have an Institute whose very name is the Institute of Noahide Code. We have Rabbi Yakov David Cohen explicitly connecting the Seven Laws of Noah with the post-2015 development agenda. We have Cohen telling participants at the 2015 United Nations Headquarters gathering that the Seven Laws were the basis of the gathering. Yet when I look at the people participating, the language being used and the structure of the coalition, I don’t see a Noahide-only movement. I see something deliberately constructed to cross religious boundaries.

The 2015 conference makes that difficult to deny. Cohen introduced “The Noahide Laws and the post 2015 agenda,” but the panel that followed included Rabbi Elie Abadie, Imam Shamsi Ali, Buddhist Abbot Wei Feng, Druze representative Munib Bader and Christian pastor V. Simpson Turner Jr. The stated subject was how religious and cultural values could contribute to implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals. The structure did not require those participants to become Noahides or accept Cohen’s theology before participating.

The IPCGE describes its larger mission in similarly pluralistic terms. It says religious leaders, parliamentarians, academics and media leaders should search for common values and principles in religion, law and education and work together to implement UN culture-of-peace resolutions. Its leadership material likewise lists political figures alongside Christian and Muslim religious leaders and rabbis. Whatever else we eventually conclude about the coalition, its published structure is explicitly multi-religious and multi-sector rather than exclusively Noahide.

Then we reach the 2018 material, and the language becomes even clearer. The Institute’s own website says the UN development goals encompass ethics inherent in “many cultures and religions,” particularly regarding social and environmental justice. It says the IPCGE, working with the Institute of Noahide Code, wanted to assemble religious leaders and cultural representatives to harness those different ethical traditions in support of the development goals.

That sounds genuinely interfaith.

But then keep reading the same document.

The Institute immediately introduces the Seven Universal Laws of Noah and presents them as a practical means by which humanity can achieve unity and peace. It translates those laws into respect for God, human life, family, property, creation, judicial systems, other creatures and the environment. In other words, the document says many religions contain relevant ethics while simultaneously giving the Noahide Code a special universal role in explaining those ethics.

That is why I don’t think “Noahide or interfaith?” can be answered by choosing only one.

From the IPCGE’s institutional perspective, the project is clearly interfaith and multi-sector. Its stated mission searches for common values among different religions and other parts of society. Its events include representatives from different faiths, political systems and organizations. Its later programs continue describing cultural and religious ethics in the plural.

From Cohen’s perspective, however, the Noahide framework appears to occupy a more foundational position. He can invite Muslims, Christians, Buddhists and others to contribute their traditions while believing that the universal moral principles they discover ultimately correspond to principles contained within the Noahide Code. The other participants don’t have to share that interpretation for Cohen to hold it.

And this distinction changes how I understand what happened.

Imagine several roads arriving at the same intersection. The Christian says his road begins with Jesus. The Muslim says his begins with the Quran. The Buddhist arrives through another ethical tradition. The secular politician might begin with human rights or constitutional principles. Cohen can stand at that intersection and say that the common ethical ground they’re discovering ultimately reflects the universal laws given to Noah.

They can cooperate at the intersection without agreeing about where the roads began.

That appears remarkably close to the model these organizations describe. IPCGE calls for leaders to identify common principles and implement them through education, communication and legislation. Later material describes a “multi-track” structure in which parliamentarians pursue legislation while religious, educational, media and cultural leaders perform different supporting roles.

But there is an important limitation. We cannot assume every participant understood the project the way Cohen did. The evidence I have found doesn’t establish that the imam, Christian pastor, Buddhist abbot, parliamentarians or diplomats accepted the Noahide Code as the hidden foundation of their own ethics. Their participation in an event where Cohen presented Noahide ideas isn’t evidence that they adopted his theology.

The reverse is also true.

Their participation doesn’t erase Cohen’s Noahide objective.

That becomes particularly obvious because the Institute continued openly publishing Noahide material while simultaneously participating in these interfaith initiatives. Its 2018 presentation doesn’t hide the Seven Laws behind the SDGs. It explicitly places them into the discussion while also saying ethical principles exist throughout many cultures and religions.

So I think the evidence gives us a more precise description than either extreme.

This was an interfaith framework containing an explicitly Noahide participant who interpreted the common ethical ground through a Noahide worldview.

That is different from saying the entire interfaith movement was secretly Noahide. But it is also different from saying Noahide theology was merely incidental. Cohen and the Institute repeatedly brought it into the conversation themselves.

And now we reach the part that concerns me most about translation.

Because when a religious system is reduced to the ethical principles that outsiders can share, some parts travel very easily. Don’t murder. Don’t steal. Establish justice. Respect human dignity. Protect families. Treat creation responsibly. Those ideas can cross religious boundaries without requiring agreement about theology.

Other parts don’t travel nearly as easily.

Idolatry doesn’t translate so comfortably.

Blasphemy doesn’t translate so comfortably.

And that raises our next question.

When Noahide law became the language of universal values and global ethics, what got lost in translation?

Investigation 8 — What Gets Lost in Translation?

This is where the translation becomes uncomfortable, because translating a religious commandment into a universal ethical principle can make the idea easier for people from different traditions to understand. But translation can also remove information. When I compare the traditional Seven Noahide Laws with the language used by the Institute of Noahide Code and the Inter-Parliamentary Coalition for Global Ethics, some principles move into the new vocabulary very easily. Others become much less visible.

Let’s start with what the traditional code actually contains. Chabad’s own presentation of the Seven Noahide Laws includes prohibitions against idolatry, blasphemy, murder, theft, forbidden sexual relationships and eating flesh taken from a living animal, together with the requirement to establish courts of justice. Chabad also presents these as divine commandments applicable to humanity, rather than merely ethical suggestions developed through human reasoning.

Now compare that with the language we encountered in the Institute’s international material. In its 2018 presentation connecting cultural and religious ethics with the UN development goals, the Seven Laws are described through concepts including respect for God, human life, family, other people’s property, creation, judicial systems, other creatures and the environment.

Watch what happens there.

“Do not murder” becomes respect for human life. “Do not steal” becomes respect for other people’s property. Establishing courts becomes respect for judicial systems. The prohibition against taking flesh from a living animal becomes respect for creatures and even environmental responsibility. These aren’t necessarily unreasonable interpretations, but they are broader descriptions than the traditional legal categories themselves.

The theological commandments are being expressed as ethical principles.

But two commandments immediately create a problem for the translation: idolatry and blasphemy.

Traditional Noahide teaching doesn’t merely say people should respect one another’s spiritual beliefs. It prohibits idol worship and blasphemy. Chabad’s material describing the Rebbe’s teaching says humanity should acknowledge God as Creator and ruler and presents the Seven Laws as a divine code of conduct. Another Chabad treatment says idolatry prohibits worship of created things and describes blasphemy as directed against the Supreme Being.

Those concepts don’t translate neatly into a modern interfaith coalition.

Think about the 2015 gathering. Cohen was sitting alongside a Muslim imam, a Buddhist abbot, Christian leadership, Jewish leadership and a Druze representative. The conference was supposed to identify religious and cultural ethics capable of supporting shared international objectives. Yet an explicit theological discussion about precisely what constitutes idolatry could immediately expose profound disagreements among those traditions.

So the broader language solves a practical problem.

“Respect for God” is easier to place into an interfaith conversation than a detailed religious prohibition against idolatry. “Human dignity” travels more easily than an entire theological system. “Respect for family” can gather broad agreement while leaving unanswered exactly which sexual relationships traditional Noahide jurisprudence prohibits. “Justice” can unite people who might strongly disagree about what divine law requires courts to enforce.

But something is lost when those details disappear.

The most important thing lost may be authority.

In traditional Chabad presentations, these aren’t universal principles because humanity happened to discover that they work. They are universal because God commanded them. One Chabad presentation of the Rebbe’s teaching specifically emphasizes that humanity should observe them because they are divine commands transmitted through Moses, rather than simply because human reason finds them sensible.

“Global ethics” can sound completely different.

A parliamentarian hearing about peace, justice, environmental responsibility and respect for human life can support those principles without accepting the Torah, rabbinic authority or Cohen’s theological interpretation of Noah. The ethical principle remains recognizable while its claimed divine source becomes unnecessary for political cooperation.

That may explain something we have repeatedly encountered. IPCGE material describes the Seven Universal Laws of Noah through broad concepts such as respect for God, human life, family, property, creation, judicial systems, creatures and the environment, while simultaneously inviting cultural and religious leaders to contribute their own traditions toward common development goals.

That creates a very large umbrella.

But we shouldn’t assume the umbrella contains everything found in traditional Noahide jurisprudence.

For example, environmental responsibility is emphasized strongly in this international presentation, while the traditional seven-law enumeration specifically prohibits eating a limb from a living animal. Connecting that commandment with broader concern for animals or creation is an interpretation and expansion of its ethical significance, not simply a literal restatement of the traditional prohibition. Chabad itself publishes broader environmental interpretations of Noahide principles, demonstrating how these ancient categories can be developed into contemporary ethical applications.

That distinction becomes extremely important if these principles move toward legislation.

If somebody proposes legislation protecting animals from cruelty, I need to examine that legislation as animal-welfare legislation. I cannot simply call it Noahide law because a Noahide advocate believes animal welfare reflects one of the Seven Laws. If someone proposes stronger courts, I cannot call the judicial reform Noahide merely because establishing justice is one of the Seven Laws.

And the reverse is equally important.

If somebody eventually proposed governmental restrictions on idolatry or blasphemy explicitly because Noahide law requires them, calling that merely “global ethics” would hide a major religious-liberty issue. At that point, the theological content would matter enormously.

So what gets lost in translation?

Specificity.

Authority.

Theological boundaries.

And sometimes the difference between the original commandment and the broader ethical principle derived from it.

That doesn’t prove the translation was designed to deceive anyone. In fact, the material we’ve examined repeatedly mentions the Seven Laws openly, which makes a simple concealment theory difficult to sustain. But it does mean that once “Noahide law” becomes “universal values,” then “cultural and religious ethics,” and finally “global ethics,” someone encountering only the final phrase may not understand the religious framework from which Cohen himself approached the project.

And that brings us directly to the question we have been approaching throughout Part 6.

Was this simply translation?

Or was something being concealed?

Investigation 9 — Translation or Concealment?

We have reached the question I have deliberately avoided answering too early. When Noahide language becomes “cultural and religious ethics,” then “universal values,” and eventually “global ethics,” are we simply watching an ancient religious framework being translated into language that Christians, Muslims, Buddhists, secular politicians and international institutions can understand? Or are we watching something being deliberately concealed?

If I am going to use the word “concealment,” I need evidence of concealment. A change in vocabulary isn’t enough. An organization can describe the same principle differently for different audiences without secretly hiding its origin. And when I went back through the material we have been examining, I found a major problem with the strongest concealment theory: Cohen repeatedly told people about the Noahide connection himself.

The November 2015 conference is the clearest example. It wasn’t publicly titled “The Seven Noahide Laws Conference.” It was called “Mobilizing Cultural and Religious Ethics for Agenda 2030.” But inside the published agenda, Cohen’s presentation was explicitly titled “The Noahide Laws and the post 2015 agenda.” The Institute of Noahide Code was openly listed as a co-sponsor. IPCGE’s own account subsequently reported that Cohen told those present that the Seven Laws of Noah were the basis of the gathering.

That isn’t how I would expect complete concealment to work.

If the objective were simply to hide the Noahide connection from everyone involved, printing “The Noahide Laws and the post 2015 agenda” directly into the conference program would be a strange way to accomplish it. Cohen also didn’t disappear when the vocabulary became broader. His organization continued publishing Noahide material, and later Institute material continued placing the Noahide Code alongside the language of peace, international cooperation and global ethics.

But that doesn’t mean nothing changed.

By 2018, the Institute described the project as mobilizing “cultural and religious ethics” to promote the UN development goals. The document says those goals contain ethical principles found within many cultures and religions, especially concerning social and environmental justice. That language is dramatically broader than saying humanity must obey seven commandments given by God to Noah.

Then look at the Institute’s description of its legislative strategy. It says parliamentarians should implement UN resolutions concerning a culture of peace, environmental ethics and social justice through national legislation. Religious leaders, academics, media leaders and business executives would support that legislation by teaching and putting into practice the “global ethics” contained in those resolutions. Yet within the same material, the Institute introduces the Noahide Code and Cohen’s much broader vision of a universal code.

So I can document a change in presentation.

What I cannot document is the motive behind that change.

I haven’t found a document saying, “Stop calling this Noahide because people will reject it.” I haven’t found instructions telling participants to conceal the Noahide origin. I haven’t found evidence that Cohen privately told one audience that global ethics was merely a cover story while telling another audience what the project really was.

Without something like that, calling this deliberate concealment would go beyond the evidence.

Translation fits the documents better.

Think about the problem Cohen faced if he genuinely believed the Seven Noahide Laws contained universal truths. He wanted Muslims, Christians, Buddhists, political leaders and others working together. Those people weren’t going to agree about Torah, rabbinic authority or even the nature of God. But they could potentially agree that murder is wrong, theft is wrong, societies require justice, human beings deserve dignity and peace is preferable to violence.

So the common vocabulary moves upward from specific theology toward shared ethical concepts.

And we can watch that strategy continuing after 2015. At the 2016 UN Headquarters conference, the public-policy language concerned peaceful and inclusive societies, violent extremism, national legislation and a culture of peace. Cohen participated alongside Muslim and Christian religious figures on a panel concerning how religious leaders, educators and media could help put legislation into action. Again, his Noahide identity wasn’t hidden; he was identified as president of the Institute of Noahide Code.

That is strong evidence against a simple hidden-Noahide-operation theory.

But there is still a legitimate transparency question.

Someone encountering only the phrase “global ethics” wouldn’t necessarily know how Cohen understood those ethics. Someone hearing “respect for God,” “respect for life,” “respect for family” and “justice” might not realize that Cohen connects those concepts to a traditional religious code that also contains specific prohibitions involving idolatry, blasphemy and sexual conduct. The broader terminology can therefore obscure theological specificity even when nobody deliberately designed it to deceive.

That difference matters.

Something can become less visible through translation without having been intentionally concealed.

And Cohen’s own statements make the distinction even more important. In Institute material, he stated that his intention was to call upon all 193 UN member nations to incorporate the Universal Noahide Code into their constitutions. He also described that code as originating with the Creator and as capable of becoming part of political, judicial and religious systems. That is considerably more explicitly Noahide than the language of “culture of peace” or “global ethics.”

So I don’t think the evidence allows me to tell you, “Global ethics was invented to hide Noahide law.”

I also don’t think the evidence allows me to say, “There is no meaningful Noahide connection here.”

Both conclusions would throw away part of the record.

What the documents show is translation accompanied by expansion. Cohen begins with an explicitly religious framework that he considers universal. That framework enters an interfaith environment where other religions contribute their own ethical traditions. Shared principles are expressed through broader language such as cultural ethics and universal values. Those principles become connected with UN objectives involving peace, justice, sustainability and education. Eventually, organizations involved describe some of those principles as “global ethics” and advocate legislation around them.

The theological details become less visible as the vocabulary becomes more universal.

But less visible isn’t the same thing as deliberately hidden.

If we eventually uncover evidence showing that organizers intentionally removed Noahide terminology because they wanted governments or the public to accept something they would reject if its religious origin were disclosed, then the conclusion changes. We should follow that evidence wherever it goes.

So far, I haven’t found that evidence.

What I have found is something subtler and, in some ways, more interesting. Noahide advocates openly entered an interfaith and international conversation and learned to express their principles through a vocabulary that people outside their religious tradition could share.

That brings us to the question Part 6 was designed to answer.

Did Noahide law actually become “global ethics”?

Or did Noahide advocates simply place their interpretation of universal morality inside something much larger than themselves?

Investigation 10 — So Did Noahide Law Become Global Ethics?

After following this language from the Seven Laws of Noah into cultural ethics, religious ethics, universal values, the Sustainable Development Goals and finally “global ethics,” I think we can answer the question at the center of Part 6. Did Noahide law become global ethics? Not literally. I cannot show you a document where the traditional Seven Noahide Laws were officially renamed “global ethics,” nor can I show you that the United Nations adopted Noahide law under a different name. What I can show you is a documented process in which Noahide advocates connected their religious framework to a much broader international ethical vocabulary.

The distinction starts with the 2015 conference at United Nations Headquarters. The event itself was titled “Mobilizing Cultural and Religious Ethics for Agenda 2030,” but Rabbi Yakov David Cohen’s scheduled presentation was explicitly titled “The Noahide Laws and the post 2015 agenda.” The Institute of Noahide Code was a co-sponsor, and the program placed Cohen at the beginning of a session examining religious and cultural values as drivers for implementing the Sustainable Development Goals.

The IPCGE’s own account makes the connection even stronger. It reports that Cohen told those present that the Seven Laws of Noah were the basis of the gathering. That means we don’t have to speculate about whether Cohen saw a connection between Noahide principles and this emerging international ethical framework. He told the audience that he did.

But the conference itself was not exclusively Noahide. Cohen shared that portion of the program with Jewish, Muslim, Buddhist, Druze and Christian representatives. The stated purpose was to explore religious and cultural values that could contribute to the development agenda. That matters because it tells us something about what happened next: the Noahide framework entered a conversation that was larger than the Noahide framework itself.

By 2018, we can see that broader language clearly. Material published by the Institute says the UN development goals encompass ethics found in “many cultures and religions,” particularly concerning social and environmental justice. It describes the Institute and IPCGE working to harness those different religious and cultural ethics in support of the development goals. That isn’t a description of replacing Christianity, Islam, Buddhism or other traditions with Noahide theology. It is a description of finding ethical overlap among them.

Then something very interesting happens when the project reaches legislation.

The Institute’s official UN civil-society profile says it wants parliamentarians from UN member states to implement UN resolutions concerning a culture of peace, environmental ethics and social justice through national legislation. It proposes model draft legislation, workshops and alliances with religious, media, academic and business leaders. Those outside leaders would help teach and put into practice what the Institute explicitly calls the “global ethics” inherent in those UN resolutions.

And then, inside that same mission statement, appears the Noahide Code.

The Institute describes it as foundational to international law according to its reading of Hugo Grotius and argues for a universally accepted code capable of bringing peace among nations and communities. That historical claim about Grotius is the Institute’s claim, not something the UN independently establishes by hosting the profile. But the placement matters because the Institute itself puts Noahide Code, universal ethics, UN resolutions, national legislation and “global ethics” inside one organizational vision.

So something definitely happened.

But I don’t think “Noahide law became global ethics” is precise enough.

What appears to have happened is that Noahide advocates interpreted portions of their religious framework as universal ethical principles. Those principles were then placed alongside ethical principles from other religious and cultural traditions. Areas of agreement could be described without requiring everyone to accept the same theology. Those shared values were connected with existing UN objectives concerning peace, justice, education, environmental responsibility and sustainable development. Eventually, some of those objectives were promoted through legislation under the language of “global ethics.”

That is a translation process.

It is also an expansion process.

And that distinction matters because much of traditional Noahide law doesn’t appear in the concrete political proposals we followed. In Part 5, we looked for the full statute. We didn’t find governments being asked through the documents we examined to prohibit idolatry, enact a Noahide blasphemy prohibition or establish the complete traditional Noahide legal system. What we found were proposals concerning peace education, sustainable development, environmental and social concerns, justice and violent extremism.

Yet Cohen’s Noahide framework didn’t disappear either.

At the 2016 UN Headquarters conference, for example, the public language concerned parliaments, peaceful and inclusive societies, combating violent extremism and national legislation. Cohen participated as president of the Institute of Noahide Code alongside Muslim and Christian representatives on a panel discussing how religious leaders, educators and media could help put legislation into action.

That is why I also cannot support the simple concealment theory.

If Cohen were trying to completely hide the Noahide connection, repeatedly identifying his organization as the Institute of Noahide Code and publicly presenting “The Noahide Laws and the post 2015 agenda” would make little sense. The documentary record we have examined shows the Noahide component being disclosed repeatedly, even while broader terminology was being used.

But translation can still change what an audience sees.

Someone hearing “global ethics” might think only about peace, justice, environmental responsibility and human dignity. They might never know that Cohen understood some of those principles through a religious framework containing much more specific theological commands. That creates a legitimate question about transparency and context, but it isn’t evidence by itself of intentional deception.

So did Noahide law become global ethics?

The evidence gives us a more complicated answer.

Noahide law did not simply become global ethics. Noahide advocates entered a broader global-ethics movement and translated elements of their religious worldview into universal ethical language that could overlap with other religions, international institutions and secular public policy. Cohen appears to have regarded the Noahide Code as foundational within that process, while the broader coalition described global ethics as something arising from many religious and cultural traditions.

That difference is essential.

Because it means the story isn’t that somebody changed seven ancient laws into seventeen Sustainable Development Goals. The evidence doesn’t support that. The story we can document is that a Noahide organization looked at existing international objectives, identified areas it believed corresponded with universal religious principles, entered an interfaith coalition around those areas, and then participated in efforts to move some of those shared principles toward education and legislation.

And that brings us to the next stage of this investigation.

Because ideas can remain harmlessly abstract for a very long time. People can debate universal ethics at conferences, publish declarations and talk about changing the world without those ideas ever entering someone’s daily life.

But once you decide those values need to be transmitted to the next generation, the question changes completely.

It becomes a question of education.

And ideas don’t stay abstract forever.

Ending — Ideas Don’t Stay Abstract Forever

Part 6 began with a question about language. We had already established that the Institute of Noahide Code wanted parliamentarians involved in legislation, but the language surrounding that effort had changed. Noahide law appeared beside cultural ethics, religious ethics, universal values, sustainable development and finally “global ethics.” I wanted to know whether those phrases were simply different names for the same thing.

What we found was more complicated.

Rabbi Yakov David Cohen did explicitly connect the Seven Noahide Laws with the international conversation. At the 2015 United Nations Headquarters conference, his scheduled subject was “The Noahide Laws and the post 2015 agenda.” The Institute participated openly under its Noahide name. Cohen did not erase Noahide theology when he entered the interfaith environment.

But the environment itself was bigger than Cohen.

Muslims, Christians, Buddhists, Jews, diplomats, parliamentarians and other participants could approach peace, justice, human dignity and social responsibility from completely different foundations. They didn’t have to accept Cohen’s theology to work beside him. The common vocabulary allowed people who disagreed about God, revelation and religious authority to cooperate around principles they believed overlapped.

That is where “global ethics” became important.

It created a common language.

And that is also where something could get lost.

When murder becomes respect for life, theft becomes respect for property, courts become justice and the prohibition involving a living animal becomes respect for animals and the environment, the ideas become easier to carry across religious boundaries. But the theological source becomes less obvious. Idolatry, blasphemy and the more specific boundaries of traditional Noahide law do not travel nearly as easily.

I looked for evidence that this change in language was intentionally designed to conceal the Noahide connection.

So far, I haven’t found it.

In fact, some of the strongest evidence points the other direction. Cohen repeatedly identified himself with the Institute of Noahide Code, publicly discussed the Seven Laws and placed Noahide terminology directly into material associated with these international gatherings. That doesn’t prove everybody understood the full theological framework behind Cohen’s thinking, but it makes it difficult to argue that the entire strategy depended upon keeping Noahide involvement secret.

So Part 6 leaves us with an important distinction.

Noahide law did not simply become global ethics.

Instead, Noahide advocates entered a larger conversation about global ethics and translated portions of their religious worldview into language that could overlap with other religions and secular institutions. Cohen could understand those shared principles as ultimately Noahide while a Christian, Muslim, Buddhist or secular policymaker understood the same principle through an entirely different foundation.

But now the investigation changes.

Because these ideas did not remain inside conference rooms.

The Institute currently describes education as part of its mission and advertises a Noahide Code course, religious-understanding workshops, global-citizenship seminars and school partnerships. Its own description says those school partnerships are intended to create educational experiences for students and educators.

And the broader IPCGE record goes further back. Its published history lists a 2004 conference on “Education and Parenting for Peace and Global Ethics” and a 2005 seminar on “Global Ethics and Universal Education for Values.” Years later, the coalition increasingly connected education with its culture-of-peace and Sustainable Development Goals work.

Then the idea became concrete.

At the Italian Senate in 2019, IPCGE and partner organizations proclaimed the Rome Agreement on Education for the Culture of Peace and SDGs. The published agreement called for developing a model curriculum for all age levels and encouraging national legislation supporting mandatory education on a culture of peace and the Sustainable Development Goals. That was an advocacy proposal from the participating organizations, not legislation enacted by Italy or the United Nations, but it moved the discussion from conferences about values toward proposals concerning what could be taught.

And that effort didn’t disappear.

By 2023, IPCGE was describing a multi-stage initiative to develop a model curriculum among Abraham Accords partner nations, with the resulting outline intended for parliamentarians, educators, religious leaders, media and other decision-makers. Its stated subjects included peace, combating violent extremism, hate speech, antisemitism and racism, environmental protection and sustainable development.

That doesn’t establish that children were being taught the Seven Noahide Laws under another name.

We haven’t demonstrated that.

And I am not going to jump over the evidence and tell you that we have.

But we have now reached the place where that question can actually be investigated.

We began this series asking whether Chabad somehow runs the world. Then we followed the trail through the Rebbe’s universal vision, Washington, Congress, the United Nations, NGOs, parliamentarians, model legislation, global ethics and the Sustainable Development Goals. At every stage, we have separated aspiration from accomplishment and access from control.

Now we follow the trail into education.

Because legislation tells governments what society should do.

Education can help shape what the next generation believes society should be.

Ideas don’t stay abstract forever.

And Part 7 asks the question that follows naturally from everything we have uncovered:

Who gets to teach the children?

Bibliography

• United Nations General Assembly. “Transforming Our World: The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.” A/RES/70/1. September 25, 2015. United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs. UN 2030 Agenda.
• United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs. “The 17 Goals.” Sustainable Development Goals. United Nations. United Nations Sustainable Development Goals.
• Institute of Noahide Code. “November 9th 2015 Summit at U.N. Headquarters.” November 9, 2015. The published conference agenda identifies the Mission of Panama as host, the Institute of Noahide Code as a co-sponsor, and Rabbi Yakov David Cohen’s presentation as “The Noahide Laws and the post 2015 agenda.” November 9, 2015 UN Headquarters Summit.
• Inter-Parliamentary Coalition for Global Ethics. “United Nation Summit Mobilizing Cultural and Religious Ethics.” 2015. The organization’s account states that Cohen reminded attendees that the Seven Laws of Noah were the basis of the gathering. IPCGE 2015 United Nations Summit.
• Institute of Noahide Code. “Mobilizing Cultural and Religious Ethics to Promote the U.N. Post 2015 Development Goals.” June 15, 2018. Describes cooperation between the Institute and IPCGE, connects ethics from multiple religions and cultures with the SDGs, and presents the Seven Universal Laws of Noah within that framework. Mobilizing Cultural and Religious Ethics.
• Institute of Noahide Code. “Culture of Peace 9 14 2018 in UN.” September 14, 2018. Presents Cohen and other religious representatives within a culture-of-peace program and reproduces the Institute’s connection between cultural and religious ethics, the Sustainable Development Goals, and its interpretation of the Seven Universal Laws. Culture of Peace 2018.
• Institute of Noahide Code. “UNC Is All About PEACE.” 2015. Describes the Institute’s presentation of the Seven Universal Laws as principles concerning God, human life, family, property, justice, other creatures, and the environment, while advocating a global summit at United Nations Headquarters. UNC Is All About PEACE.
• Chabad-Lubavitch. “The Seven Noachide Laws.” Chabad.org. Accessed September 15, 2026.
• Institute of Noahide Code. “The Role of Religious Leaders for Building Peaceful and Inclusive Societies and Combating Violent Extremism.” Noahide.org. Accessed September 15, 2026.
• Institute of Noahide Code. “UN HQ Conference 2016.” Noahide.org. Accessed September 15, 2026.
• Institute of Noahide Code. “Education.” Noahide.org. Accessed September 15, 2026.
• Inter-Parliamentary Coalition for Global Ethics. “About IPCGE.” IPCGE.org. Accessed September 15, 2026.
• Inter-Parliamentary Coalition for Global Ethics. “History.” IPCGE.org. Accessed September 15, 2026.
• Inter-Parliamentary Coalition for Global Ethics. “Rome Agreement on Education for the Culture of Peace and SDGs.” Italian Senate event, Rome, 2019. IPCGE.org.
• Inter-Parliamentary Coalition for Global Ethics. “Developing a Model Curriculum for Education for a Culture of Peace and Sustainable Development.” 2023. IPCGE.org.
• United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs, NGO Branch. “Institute of Noahide Code.” Integrated Civil Society Organizations System, organizational profile and consultative-status records. United Nations. Accessed September 15, 2026.

Endnotes

1. United Nations General Assembly, “Transforming Our World: The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development,” Resolution 70/1, adopted September 25, 2015. The Agenda established seventeen Sustainable Development Goals and 169 targets and describes them as universal, integrated, and applicable while taking different national circumstances and priorities into account.
2. The 2030 Agenda states that its goals resulted from more than two years of public consultation and engagement with civil society and other stakeholders. This is important to the investigation because the official UN record does not identify the Institute of Noahide Code, Chabad-Lubavitch, or Rabbi Yakov David Cohen as the origin of the SDGs.
3. The United Nations General Assembly formally adopted the 2030 Agenda on September 25, 2015. The UN described the framework at adoption as containing seventeen goals and 169 targets addressing poverty, inequality, development, environmental issues, peace, justice, and other objectives through 2030.
4. Institute of Noahide Code, “Mobilizing Cultural and Religious Ethics to Promote the U.N. Post 2015 Development Goals,” June 15, 2018. The Institute states that the UN development goals encompass ethics found in many cultures and religions, particularly concerning social and environmental justice, and describes cooperation between the Institute and the Inter-Parliamentary Coalition for Global Ethics to mobilize religious and cultural representatives around those goals.
5. The same Institute material is significant because it places explicitly Noahide concepts inside a broader multi-religious framework rather than describing the international effort as exclusively Noahide. This supports the distinction made throughout Part 6 between Noahide participation in a global-ethics movement and evidence that the entire movement itself was Noahide.
6. United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs, “Institute of Noahide Code,” Civil Society Participation organizational profile. The profile states that the Institute proposes recruiting parliamentarians from UN member states and supplying model draft legislation, workshops, conferences, and alliances intended to promote national legislation concerning culture of peace, environmental ethics, and social justice.
7. The Institute’s UN civil-society profile specifically uses the term “global ethics” for principles it says are inherent in UN resolutions. The profile also refers to the Noahide Code and a universally accepted code within the same organizational description, establishing that the Institute itself placed Noahide concepts and “global ethics” within a shared strategic vision.
8. The UN civil-society profile records the Institute’s own organizational claims; publication in the UN’s civil-society database should not be interpreted as UN endorsement of the Institute’s theological or historical assertions. In particular, the profile’s statement concerning Hugo Grotius and the Noahide Code is an organizational claim attributed to the Institute rather than an independent UN historical determination.
9. Chabad-Lubavitch’s published explanation of the Seven Noahide Laws identifies prohibitions against murder, robbery, idolatry, adultery, blasphemy, and cruelty to animals, together with the positive obligation to establish a judicial system. This traditional formulation is important when comparing the specific religious commandments with the broader ethical vocabulary appearing in international materials.
10. Chabad’s explanation also emphasizes divine authority. It states that the laws are to be observed because they are understood as commandments of God rather than merely conclusions reached through human reasoning. This theological foundation can become less visible when the principles are translated into terms such as human dignity, justice, respect for property, or global ethics.
11. Chabad materials describe the Seven Noahide Laws as universal obligations for non-Jews and state that Jews have a responsibility to influence the non-Jewish world to observe them. This provides relevant primary-source context for why Chabad-associated Noahide advocacy can possess a universal rather than exclusively Jewish scope.
12. The UN’s official description of Goal 4 concerns inclusive and equitable quality education and lifelong learning. Goal 16 concerns peaceful and inclusive societies, access to justice, and effective, accountable institutions, while Goal 17 concerns implementation and global partnership. These objectives exist within the independently adopted SDG framework and should not be described as Noahide laws merely because Noahide advocates later connected their ethical framework to them.
13. The Institute’s language therefore supports a distinction between theological origin and policy overlap. Cohen and the Institute can understand peace, justice, responsibility, and other values through a Noahide framework while other participants understand similar principles through Christianity, Islam, Buddhism, secular human-rights theory, or other traditions. The documented overlap does not establish common theological agreement.
14. The evidence examined in Part 6 does not establish that the seventeen Sustainable Development Goals were derived from the Seven Noahide Laws. The official UN history describes a broad international development process, while Institute material documents a later effort to connect religious and cultural ethics with the post-2015 goals. The direction of influence demonstrated by these sources is therefore important: the SDGs were adopted through the UN process, and Noahide advocates subsequently sought to relate their framework to them.
15. The traditional Noahide formulation also demonstrates why some principles translate more easily into secular or interfaith terminology than others. Murder, theft, animal cruelty, and the establishment of justice can readily be discussed through broad ethical language, while idolatry and blasphemy retain explicitly theological content that cannot simply be equated with modern secular public-policy concepts.
16. The evidence reviewed does not by itself demonstrate deliberate concealment. Institute material openly identifies the organization by its Noahide name and openly discusses Noahide concepts while simultaneously using broader language concerning cultural and religious ethics. A change in vocabulary can reduce theological specificity, but proving intentional concealment would require additional evidence concerning intent or strategy that the documents examined here do not provide.
17. The strongest supported conclusion from Part 6 is therefore narrower than either extreme. The evidence does not establish that “global ethics” is simply another official name for Noahide law, but it does establish that the Institute of Noahide Code intentionally placed its Noahide worldview within a broader effort involving universal ethics, UN development objectives, parliamentarians, religious leaders, education, and proposed national legislation.
18. That distinction becomes especially important moving into Part 7. Once universal ethical principles are connected with education, the investigation must examine the actual curricula, organizations, participating institutions, proposed legislation, and educational materials rather than assuming that any program promoting peace, justice, sustainability, or shared values constitutes Noahide education. The same evidentiary rule remains in place: relationship is not identity, influence is not control, and ethical overlap is not proof that one religious framework secretly created the other.

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