But if *thou* art named a Jew, and restest in the law, and makest thy boast in God,
Paul has already taken up the Gentiles and proved them guilty. Now he turns to the man with the best religious credentials — a name, a law, and God to boast in — and asks whether any of it will hold when God judges the heart.
This verse opens a new section. Until now Paul has aimed the charge elsewhere. Here he turns to the man who carries the religious name — and says who really carries it.
In Romans 2:17 the apostle begins definitely with a Jew, insisting on the same truth, but the opposite of what he had said of the Gentile. A Jew who boasted of the law and broke it was as bad as the man who had none; the Gentiles blasphemed the name of God because of them. He alone was a Jew who was one inwardly; whose heart was circumcised in spirit, not in letter; whose praise came not from men, but from God.
The privileges themselves were real, and the list is a long one.
Then come the proofs of what man is. First the Gentiles, and then from Romans 2:17 the Jew, with his privileges: the law, circumcision, yes, the very words of God given to him. So we see "None is righteous, no, not one." The very law, which was the boast of the Jew, is that which condemned him.
Older translations open the verse with "Behold." Commentators say the true reading is "But if," and the verse belongs with the judgment Paul has just described.
God will judge the Gentile by conscience, the Jew by law, in the day when God judges the secrets of the heart, according to Paul's gospel. God will show no favour to the circumcised... He will have realities. The judgment spoken of here reaches the secrets of the heart. It is not outward and earthly. "But if" — for that is the true reading, and not "behold" in Romans 2:17.
The law was a real gift. The mistake was what he did with it. (The ESV reads "rely on the law"; the older wording quoted here reads "rest in the law.")
He made, however, one great mistake. He treated the law as something in which he could boast, and so it fed his pride. Says the Apostle, "you... rest in the law and boast in God." He did not realise that the law was not given to him as something to rest in, but as something to act as a test.
He used the same law in two opposite ways.
True, he had the form of knowledge and truth in the law, but it all worked like a two-edged sword. He was so busy turning its sharp edge against other people that he missed how it applied to himself. For others he treated it as a standard — a plumb-line or spirit level. For himself he thought it a personal ornament, a feather to stick in his cap. Do not be surprised that he did this, because it is just what we all do naturally. We take pride in our privileges and forget the responsibilities that come with them.
Boasting in God sounds like the best thing a person could do. Here it goes wrong.
The Jew — the favoured, privileged Jew — sinned grievously in this way. Romans 2 convicted him on this ground. His separation from the nations came from God. He should have used it to witness to God's holiness in a corrupt world that had turned against Him. Instead he used it as a chance to exalt himself. He boasted in God and in the law; but he dishonoured God by breaking the law.
Romans does not leave the reader here.
One view of the first five chapters of the Epistle to the Romans sees them as the leading of a soul from a false joy in God in 2:17 to a true joy in God in 5:11. The false joy is all brought to nothing. In its place comes justification by faith and the love of God, so that "we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ" (Romans 5:11).
Commentators apply the same words to religious people today.
We have only to read these verses to see how exactly they describe the religious man, whether Jew or professing Christian. Change the name Jew to Christian, and law to Bible, and we have an exact description of the Christian profession. The professing Christian boasts that he is called a Christian and not a pagan. He boasts that he has the Bible and knows the true God. He boasts that the Bible teaches him what is right.
- Name. From this verse on, Paul puts the man with the religious name on trial. The name was never a defence.
- Rest. God gave the law as a test, not a resting place. Leaning on it was resting where no rest was possible.
- Boast. God set them apart to witness to His holiness. They used the privilege to exalt themselves instead.
- Reality. God judges the secrets of the heart. He will have realities, and no outward name covers what is inside.
- Replacement. The false joy in God here gives way to the true joy in God of Romans 5:11, through justification by faith.
and knowest the will, and discerningly approvest the things that are more excellent, being instructed out of the law;
Paul has been pressing the conscience of the pagan world, and now he turns to the Jew, who holds a revelation from God and can tell right from wrong because of it. Does knowing God's will, and being able to judge what is best, make a man right with God?
From verse 17 onward the argument shifts. Paul stops speaking to humanity in general and takes up the man with real, God-given advantages — including the trained judgment this verse describes.
The apostle now takes another step in his appeal to conscience. He speaks next to the Jew, and no longer groups him with the Gentile only. Did the Jew value himself on his unique place among men? Did he value himself on holding a revelation from God, on the true God as his God, on the knowledge of His will, and on his resulting ability to test the things that differ and so decide for the more excellent? Grant that it was all true. How did the Jew then stand? The greater the privilege, the less excusable he was, if he proved unfaithful to the light he had and as bad as the heathen he despised.
The verse sits inside a rising list of boasts. The last of them is that his light came from a written revelation, not from hearsay.
To show what the religious Jew is responsible for, the Apostle lists the advantages the Jew has and boasts in. The Jew takes his stand on being a privileged Jew, set apart from the Gentiles. Next he rests on having a divinely given law. Then he boasts that he has the knowledge of the true God. Further, he boasts that he knows the will of God, and that he can approve the things that are excellent, because the law has taught him… He also has the form of knowledge and of the truth, embodied in the law. For the light he has, he does not depend on tradition passed by word of mouth.
The advantages were genuine. The problem was how the man held them: as a measure of his standing, not as a call to obey.
The Jew with his knowledge of the will of God did no better than the moralist among the Gentiles. He was very far from being an open rebel. Yet he completely misunderstood his own condition, and so he misunderstood the character of that law on which he "rested" — where no true rest was possible. He owned God and His law, but not with a heart subject enough to give Him the obedience due. He held them instead as things that raised his position above all other men… In fact, he had the form of knowledge and of the truth as the law gave it; but the breath of life was absent from the form.
Paul does not deny the privileges. He turns them around, so that the very thing the man leaned on becomes the measure of his failure.
If he had a conscience, he had to admit that he was more guilty than the Gentile. If he had none, his lack of feeling would not make his sin and folly any less obvious to all who fear God and judge people rightly. On his own showing, his boasted knowledge of the law brought him no saving power. Whatever fuel it gave to his arrogant misuse of it in contempt of others, it saved nothing in himself.
The verse is not a piece of ancient history. Swap two words and the portrait is current.
These verses describe the religious man exactly, whether Jew or professing Christian. Change the name Jew to Christian, and law to Bible, and we have an exact description of the Christian profession. The professing Christian boasts that people call him a Christian and not a heathen. He boasts that he has the Bible and the knowledge of the true God. The Bible teaches him what is right, so he can send out missionaries to teach the heathen.
Believers are meant to know God's will too. They stand on different ground when they do.
We see, then, how important it is to prove what the will of God is, what is good and acceptable and perfect. Then, being "filled with the knowledge of His will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding," we may "walk in a manner worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing to Him" (Col. 1:9). Setting this aside is what brought condemnation on the religious boaster of Romans 2:18… He belonged to Israel and to law; we belong to Christ and to grace… "If anyone's will is to do God's will, he will know whether the teaching is from God," said the Lord (John 7:17).
- Privilege. The verse names real, God-given advantages: he knows God's will, and he can judge what is best. Both came from Scripture, not from hearsay.
- Posture. He held those advantages as a mark of superiority, not as a call to obey. The form of knowledge was there, but "the breath of life was absent from the form."
- Powerlessness. Knowledge of the law brought no saving power to the man who had it, however much it fed his contempt for others.
- Reversal. The ground of the boast becomes the measure of the guilt. Greater light means less excuse, not more safety.
- Present. Change "Jew" to "Christian" and "law" to "Bible" and the portrait still fits. The cure is not to know less of His will, but to know it on the ground of Christ and grace.
and hast confidence that thou thyself art a leader of the blind, a light of those who [are] in darkness,
Paul has just exposed the nations who never had God's law. Now he turns to the people who did, and lists back to them the titles they were proud of. The verse raises one question: does being sure you can lead others put you right with God?
The list of advantages is not a compliment. It is a set-up:
Did the Jew value himself on his unique place among men, on his possession of a divine revelation, on the true God as his God, and on the knowledge of His will? Did he assume a conscious superiority to his Gentile neighbours? He was confident that he stood on ground that let him look down on the wisest of other nations as merely blind, and in the dark, and foolish, and babies. They lacked that embodiment of knowledge and truth which the law gave him. Suppose all this was so. How was it with the Jew in fact? The greater the privilege, the less excusable if he was unfaithful to the light he had and as bad as the heathen he despised.
Each phrase needs someone underneath it: someone blind, someone in the dark, someone foolish.
So too he gloried in God, as the One who had made the Jew the storehouse of all the light and knowledge in the world. He owned God and His law, but not with a heart in subjection to render Him the obedience due. He owned them as things that added to the loftiness of his position compared with all other men. For him the Gentiles were just the blind, walking in darkness, foolish as undeveloped babies. The Jew was the full treasury of all that the Gentile lacked.
These titles were not made up. God had truly given this nation the light. But the description and the reality did not match:
The nation and its people should truly have been what they prided themselves on being — a light to those who were in darkness (Rom. 2:19). But it was otherwise. The light within them was darkness. And where that was so, how great was that darkness!
The sharpest irony came when the true light arrived. Those who claimed to lead the blind could not see:
They were not only in darkness — they loved it. They were not only blind, but angry with the One who would have healed them. The Lord had come so that those who do not see might see. But the Jews refused to admit any such thing and gloried in themselves... they were so infatuated, so under the power of the enemy who blinds the minds of the unbelieving (2 Cor. 4:4), that they did more than claim to see for themselves. They claimed to be guides to the blind and lights to those in darkness (Rom. 2:19).
The law gave a real form of knowledge and truth. But a form can be exact and still do nothing inside a person:
The law was like a schoolmaster who hands the same code of rules to every pupil — very firm, very clear and well printed. Yet he offers them no help at all in putting those rules into effect. Grace teaches in a far more effective way. Grace is just as clear about everything it commands, and it sets an even higher standard than the law demanded. But it adds one thing: it works IN us.
Paul does not argue with the list. He turns it into questions:
You have been boasting of teaching others — do you teach yourself? What about your practice? You preach to others that they should not steal: do you steal? ... What about God? You boast in the knowledge of God; do you honour God?
This is not about one nation only. Swap two words and the portrait fits us:
Change the name Jew to Christian, and law to Bible, and we have an exact description of the christian profession. The professing Christian boasts that people call him a Christian and not a heathen. He boasts that he has the Bible and the knowledge of the true God. The Bible teaches him what is right, so he is able to send out missionaries to instruct the heathen.
The advantages are real gifts. The danger is what people do with them:
How presumptuous man can be! He takes the advantages and privileges God kindly gave him and turns them into occasions of self-exaltation and of belittling others — like those "who trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and treated others with contempt" (Luke 18:9).
- Gift. God gave the light. He made this people the storehouse of the knowledge the world lacked.
- Twist. The gift became a measuring stick. Every title in the verse needs someone blind, dark, foolish or childish underneath it.
- Form. They held a form of knowledge and truth. It was clear as a rulebook, but gave no help to obey it. Only grace works inside a person.
- Test. Paul answers the boast with questions, not arguments: do you teach yourself, do you honour God?
- Mirror. Change "Jew" to "Christian" and "law" to "Bible", and the description still fits. Privilege becomes self-exaltation and contempt for others.
an instructor of the foolish, a teacher of babes, having the form of knowledge and of truth in the law
The verse ends a list of titles the Jew claimed: guide, light, instructor, teacher. They all rest on one thing. He holds the shape of knowledge and truth in the law. Paul lets the claim stand. Then he asks, in the next verse, whether the man who teaches everyone else has ever taught himself.
Verses 17-20 list what the religious Jew boasted in. One writer sets out where these titles came from:
To show the responsibilities of the religious Jew, the Apostle describes the advantages which belong to the Jew, and in which he boasts. Being a Jew, and having the law, he assumes to guide the blind, to give light to those in darkness, to instruct the foolish and teach the ignorant. Moreover, he has the form of knowledge, and of the truth, embodied in the law. He is not dependent, for the light that he has, upon mere tradition handed down from mouth to mouth.
"Foolish" and "children" are how this man saw everyone outside his own nation. Where the ESV says "embodiment", older translations read "form": real shape, but no life inside it:
The Gentiles were for him only the blind, walking in darkness, foolish as undeveloped babes. The Jew was the full treasury of everything the Gentile lacked. In fact, he had the form of knowledge and of the truth as the law gave it. But the breath of life was absent from the form. In his morals he contradicted his own teaching, glorying in law and breaking it. So the light he held only showed his misdeeds more plainly. It dishonoured the name of his God among the Gentiles, as He Himself had declared through His prophets (Isa. 52:5).
The law really did teach. That is why "teacher" and "instructor" were fair titles. But its teaching stopped where the pupil needed help:
There was of course teaching of a sort under the law, for the Jew had "the form of knowledge and of the truth in the law" (Rom. 2:20). It consisted in the clear laying down of what was right and what was wrong. The law was like a schoolmaster who hands the same code of rules to every pupil. The rules are very strict, very clear and well printed. Yet he offers his pupils no help at all in putting those rules into effect. Grace teaches in a far more effective way. Grace is just as clear about everything it commands. The standard it sets is even higher than the law demanded. But there is this in addition: it works IN us.
A standard can be pointed two ways. The same writer shows which way this man pointed his:
True, he had the form of knowledge and truth in the law, but it all acted as a two-edged sword. He had been so busy turning its keen edge against other people that he entirely overlooked its application to himself. He viewed it for others as a standard — as a plumb-line or spirit level — but for himself he thought it a personal adornment, a feather to be stuck in his cap.
Nicodemus was a religious teacher who came to Jesus by night. One writer reads that visit through this phrase:
Was he not one of those who, by profession, rested in the law, and found in it a form of knowledge and truth? But coming to Jesus by night is not the fruit of resting in the law, nor in anything else. It had not brought him out of nature's darkness. Could the form of truth and knowledge in the law satisfy a soul when it thought of God, or found itself in spirit before Him? … Jesus pierces the layers of profession, and finds at the bottom only a man.
Swap two words and the description lands closer to home:
We have only to read these verses to see how exactly they describe the religious man, whether Jew or professing Christian. Change the name Jew to Christian, and law to Bible, and we have an exact description of the Christian profession. The professing Christian boasts that people call him a Christian, and that he is not a heathen. He boasts that he has the Bible and the knowledge of the true God. The Bible instructs him as to what is right, so he is able to send out missionaries to instruct the heathen.
- Form — The law really did hold the shape of knowledge and truth. The problem was never the law. The breath of life was missing from the form.
- Form as boast — Real privilege became a list of titles: guide, light, instructor, teacher. The man filed everyone else away as blind, dark and foolish.
- Form without help — The law posted the rules and gave no help in keeping them. Grace sets an even higher standard, and works inside the person.
- Form under test — The man used the standard as a measuring line for others and as an ornament for himself. So the light he held only exposed him.
- Form pierced — Christ looks past the titles and finds only a man. Change "Jew" to "Christian" and "law" to "Bible", and the portrait still fits.
thou then that teachest another, dost thou not teach thyself? thou that preachest not to steal, dost thou steal?
Paul has just listed what the Jew was proud of: the law, the knowledge of God's will, and the right to teach others (vv. 17–20). Now he turns each of those advantages into a question. The first one lands closest to home: the man who teaches everyone else has never taught himself.
Verse 21 turns the argument round. Everything the Jew held as a credential now becomes the measure that tests him.
The test is applied to him from verse 21 to the end of the chapter. He comes out of it with his reputation utterly shattered. True, he had the form of knowledge and truth in the law, but it all acted as a two-edged sword. He was so busy turning its sharp edge against other people that he overlooked how it applied to himself. For others he treated the law as a standard, a measuring line. For himself he treated it as an ornament, a feather to stick in his cap.
The same knowledge that made him confident leaves him without defence.
By his own account, the law he boasted of knowing brought him no saving power. It gave him fuel only for misusing it arrogantly, in contempt of others. Who, then, dishonoured God more openly?
Paul is not opening a discussion. He shapes each question so that only one honest answer is left.
Each question in verses 21, 22 and 23 is like a sword-thrust. To each implied accusation the Jew had to plead guilty. He had the law truly, but by breaking it he dishonoured God, whose law it was. Their guilt was so open that Gentiles looked at the Jews and blasphemed God, the very God they represented.
The questions move through one area of the religious man's life after another.
Addressing the religious man, the Apostle asks, as it were, What about yourself? You have been boasting of teaching others, do you teach yourself? What about your practice? You preach to others that they should not steal: Do you steal? … What about God? You boast in the knowledge of God; Do you honour God?
Teaching puts a man on record as knowing what is right.
Like the Gentiles, he had a conscience that condemned evil in others. But he also had the Word of God, and he taught others about good and evil. Yet he did not keep what he gloried in teaching. This is the most plainly manifested guilt of all. For to teach the truth is more than to know it; so that the responsibility of the teacher is a grave one indeed.
God does not forget the words a teacher aims at other people.
God is not mocked. He remembers words said lightly — words we might press on others, with little or no thought of our own need. "You then who teach others, do you not teach yourself?" Judgment grows heavier in every way if teaching does not flow from love and in the fear of God.
The verse states a rule that Christ Himself kept before He ever confronted evil in anyone else.
What is the first thing any man ought to do before he speaks to another? Speak to himself. Do not speak to another and carry a careless heart yourself. "While you preach against stealing, do you steal?" … Now, before the Lord goes to attack Satan, He must withstand Satan. He lets him see that he has nothing in Him. If I take part in evil, I cannot rebuke it.
The warning does not stop at formal teachers. It reaches every believer who judges someone else.
We may try to apply it to other people. We sit in judgment on others — on our fellow Christians, or perhaps on the men of the world. But "you who teach others, do you not teach yourself?" The sword of the Spirit does not cut only those whose faults we can see. It cuts us as well.
The questions do not stop with the Jew who first heard them.
Change the name Jew to Christian, and law to Bible, and we have an exact description of the Christian profession. The professing Christian boasts that he is called a Christian and is not a pagan. He has the Bible and the knowledge of the true God. The Bible teaches him what is right, so he can send out missionaries to instruct those who do not know God.
- Privilege — the advantages of verses 17–20 now become the standard that measures the man who holds them.
- Test — every question from verse 21 forces a guilty plea. Knowing the law gave no power to keep it.
- Weight — to teach truth is more than to know it, so the teacher's failure is the plainest guilt of all.
- Order — speak to yourself before you speak to another; a man taking part in an evil cannot rebuke it.
- Reality — a religious name cannot cover a life that contradicts it. The claim may tower over the pagan world while the practice is no better.
thou that sayest [man should] not commit adultery, dost thou commit adultery? thou that abhorrest idols, dost thou commit sacrilege?
Paul is talking to a religious man who is sure he can teach everyone else. Two questions here turn that teaching back on him: he condemns adultery and hates idols in public, but what does he do in private?
The verse belongs to a short run of questions, and each one is aimed at a specific claim the man has made. Read as a group, they do not invite discussion; they force an admission.
Each question in verses 21, 22 and 23 is like a sword-thrust. To each implied accusation the Jew had to plead guilty. He had the law truly, but by breaking it he dishonoured God, whose law it was.
The questions are not random. They move through separate areas of life: what a man does, who he keeps company with, and how he treats what is holy. The last question here reads "do you rob temples," while older translations have "do you commit sacrilege." One writer ties it to how this man deals with the idol-worshipping world he says he despises.
(3) What about the world? You claim to approve the things that are better: do you form unholy alliances with the world? Do you commit adultery? (4) What about the idol-worshipping nations? You claim to hate idols; do you commit sacrilege?
Another writer groups the same charges under three headings, and names the worst damage they do.
Here the Jew stands accused before God of three things: 1. evil work (v. 21); 2. evil walk, or the company he keeps; and 3. evil worship (v. 22). On every one of them he gives the finest teaching. And this brings the most serious issue right to the front: of all people, it was the Jew who had brought direct dishonour on the Name of God.
The man is not accused of ignorance. He knows the law well enough to quote it at other people. That is where his knowledge stops.
It is true that he had the form of knowledge and truth in the law, but it all worked like a two-edged sword. He was so busy turning its sharp edge against other people that he missed how it applied to himself. For others he treated the law as a measuring tool — a plumb line or a spirit level. For himself he treated it as a decoration, a feather to stick in his cap.
Teaching others does not lower the standard. It raises it.
To teach the truth is more than to know it, so the teacher carries a serious responsibility. James has good reason to tell us: "Not many of you should become teachers, my brothers, for you know that we who teach will be judged with greater strictness" (James 3:1).
His advantages do not soften the charge. Set beside his own conduct, they make it worse.
If he had a conscience, he had to admit he was more guilty than the Gentile. If he had none, his deadness to it did not make his sin and folly any less obvious to everyone who fears God and judges people rightly. By his own account, his boasted knowledge of the law brought him no saving power. It only gave him fuel for using the law arrogantly to look down on others.
Paul is writing about one people here, but one writer takes the questions wider. Anyone who lectures others while doing the same thing stands in the same place.
The man who preaches morals, whether Jew or Gentile, may in his proud and corrupt heart condemn all this in his neighbour. But God does not let him off for that, if he does the same things he condemns in others… So whether it was the Jew teaching the law or the Gentile teaching morals, God proves both guilty of doing the very things they condemn in others. And He knows the heart.
One writer names the root of it in a single line.
We pride ourselves on our privileges and forget the responsibilities that go with them.
The questions expose something the outward religion could never fix. Behind them stands a settled principle about what God accepts.
An outward religious form cannot cover a life that contradicts the very spirit of that form. On the other side, where that spirit is really there, God will approve it even though the outward form is missing — and it may be missing through no fault of the person. He will have, and must have, what is real in everything that concerns people's relationship with Himself.
- Profession. The man denounces adultery and hates idols out loud. What he says is not in question — only whether he lives it.
- Practice. The questions test work, walk and worship: what he does, who he joins, and how he treats what belongs to God.
- Contradiction. He used the law as a measuring line for others and as an ornament for himself, and had to plead guilty to every question.
- Damage. The contradiction hit God's Name. Of all people, it was the man who held the law who brought dishonour on it.
- Reality. An outward form cannot cover a life that denies it. God must have what is real, and He approves it even where the form is missing.
thou who boastest in law, dost thou by transgression of the law dishonour God?
Paul has spent this chapter taking apart the confidence of the religious man. Here the argument turns sharpest. The very law he is proud of becomes the thing that condemns him. The question is not whether he has the law, but what his life does to the reputation of the God who gave it.
One mistake lies underneath the boasting. He misread what the law was for.
He made one great mistake. He treated the law as something in which he could boast, and so it fed his pride. The apostle says, "you… rest in the law and boast in God." He did not realise this. The law was not given to him as something to rest in, but as something to test him.
The same writer shows the double standard:
True, he had the outward form of knowledge and truth in the law, but it all worked like a two-edged sword. He kept turning its sharp edge against other people, and overlooked how it applied to himself. For others he treated it as a standard — a plumb-line or a spirit level. For himself he thought it a personal ornament, a feather to stick in his cap. We should not be surprised at this, because it is just what we all do naturally. We take pride in our privileges and forget the responsibilities that come with them.
The verse sits inside a run of questions that moves inward until it reaches God Himself.
The apostle tests the claims of the religious man with searching questions. (1) Speaking to the religious man, the apostle asks, in effect, What about yourself? You have been boasting of teaching others — do you teach yourself? (2) What about your practice? You preach to others that they should not steal — do you steal? (3) What about the world? You claim to approve the things that are more excellent — do you form unholy alliances with the world? Do you commit adultery? (4) What about the heathen? You claim to hate idols — do you rob temples? (5) What about the law and the Bible? You boast in the law — do you obey it? (6) What about God? You boast in the knowledge of God — do you honour God?
The charge rests on one word. Commentators note where else Scripture uses it:
Transgression of the law does occur in Scripture — for instance, in Romans 2:23, translated "breaking the law" in the English Bible. "Transgression" in the same sense, without "the law," appears in Romans 4:15, Galatians 3:19, Hebrews 2:2 and Hebrews 9:15.
The word separates two kinds of guilt:
Transgression is therefore a grave and serious offence. It is the sin of the servant who knows his master's will and yet disobeys, and for that reason deserves many blows. The sin of Israel was transgression, in contrast to the sin of the Gentiles, which is lawlessness.
The people who knew God best did the most damage to His name.
Of all people, it was the Jew who had brought direct dishonour on the name of God. His high claims were nothing more or less than hypocrisy. They gave the Gentiles reason to ridicule and despise the God such people claimed to worship. The Gentiles took their impression of the God of Israel from the conduct of Israel.
Israel's separation from the nations had a purpose:
The separation of the Jew from the nations came from God. But he did not use it as a witness to the holiness of God in a world full of corruption. Instead, he took the opportunity to exalt himself by it. He boasted in God and in the law, but he dishonoured God by breaking the law.
God is not satisfied by the outward form on its own.
A religious form cannot cover a life that contradicts its own spirit. On the other hand, where that spirit is truly present, God will approve it even when the form is missing, which may be unavoidable. He will and must have reality in everything that concerns people in their relation to Himself.
The same charge falls on Christians today:
The apostle is speaking of the Jew, but what he says is equally true of the professing Christian. What has mainly stirred unbelievers to blaspheme is the corruption and the degraded practice of those who profess to be Christians. Consistent Christian living would not by itself have made people Christians. But if Christians lived up to what they profess, people would have no reason to blaspheme God.
- Boast — God gave the law as a test, not as a resting place or an ornament. Treating it as a source of pride is the first mistake.
- Blindness — He used the law as a measuring line for others and a decoration for himself. He never turned its edge on his own life.
- Breaking — His sin is transgression: a servant who knows the master's will and disobeys. That is a heavier charge than the lawlessness of those who never had the rule.
- Blasphemy — The dishonour does not stop with him. Onlookers judge God by the conduct of those who carry His name.
- Bedrock — God will have reality. An outward form cannot cover a life that contradicts it, and the warning reaches anyone who names Christ today.
For the name of God is blasphemed on your account among the nations, according as it is written.
This verse is the sting at the end of Paul's questions to the religious man who has the law, teaches it, and breaks it. The failure is not his alone. God's own name takes the damage among the nations watching His people.
The whole passage turns the Jew's advantage into his accusation. Everything he leaned on becomes the evidence against him.
The Jew was more favoured than the Gentile. No other nation had the light in which he boasted, but he was the most unfaithful to it. He was quite able to lay down the law, but he did not keep the law; this was his condemnation. He was no better practically than the Gentile. He had many privileges, but he was unfaithful to them all. He had broken the law in which he boasted, and by doing so he had dishonoured God; and through him the name of God had been blasphemed among the Gentiles.
Note where the reproach lands. The nations were not judging individuals; they were judging the God whose people these were.
Each question in verses 21, 22 and 23 is like a sword-thrust. To each implied accusation the Jew had to plead guilty. He had the law truly, but by breaking it he dishonoured God, whose law it was. Indeed, their guilt was so flagrant that the Gentiles looked at the Jews and blasphemed God, whose representatives they were.
Paul does not invent the charge. He quotes it from Israel's own prophets, so the verdict already stood in books the Jew honoured.
By his own account, his boasted knowledge of the law brought him no saving power, whatever fuel it gave for his arrogant use of it to look down on others. Who, then, more clearly dishonoured God? Was it not written even more strongly in their own prophets? What did Isaiah say (Isa. 52:5)? And what did Ezekiel say (Ezek. 36:20-23)?
The irony is sharp. The Gentiles the Jew looked down on end up as witnesses for God.
But there is more. Jewish Scripture itself has already answered the Jew's plea and thrown out his claim: "For the name of God is blasphemed among the Gentiles because of you, as it is written" (Ezek. 36:20-23). So the Gentiles are already God's witnesses, to the shame of the Jew who is under Law. To claim anything on the ground of legal obedience is therefore useless. It is also a lie against God, whose own word records their sin.
The failure has a measure: what Israel was set apart to be.
Israel does not appear to have been meant as a missionary people, eagerly spreading what they knew of the one true God. But they were meant to be a model people. Their laws were perfect, and they had received them straight from Heaven. So all their ways should have pleased God and rebuked the nations around them. But they were untrue to their privileged place of separation to God, the one thing that could have made them a blessing to the world. They copied the evil ways of their neighbours instead.
The verse does not stop with the Jew. It reaches anyone whose profession outruns his practice.
The Apostle is speaking of the Jew; but what he says is equally true of the professing Christian. The corruptions and degraded practices of professing Christendom have provoked most of the blasphemies of unbelievers. Men would not have become Christians just because Christians lived consistently. But if Christians lived up to what they profess, men would have no reason to blaspheme God.
That works out in very ordinary things — the job, the household, the way a person keeps his word.
When a Christian is careless, sloppy, or unprincipled in the way he acts, he does serious damage to the cause of Christ and dishonours His holy name. On the other hand, being diligent, earnest, punctual and faithful brings glory to that Name.
This verse is not the end of the road. It is one step in a case that shuts every mouth.
The very law they trusted was their righteous accuser. It had already said of them, "None is righteous, no, not one." And the apostle says, "We know that whatever the law says it speaks to those who are under the law, so that every mouth may be stopped, and the whole world may be held accountable to God."
And the dishonour is not the last word about that Name. God takes the matter into His own hands.
Israel had defiled the land and profaned the name of Jehovah, and Jehovah had scattered them among the nations. Even in this His name would be profaned by their vileness, because the nations would say, "These are the people of Jehovah, and they have gone out of His land." But Jehovah would step in and sanctify His great name before the nations. He would bring His people back from among them and cleanse them from all their filthiness, taking away the hardness of their hearts and giving them His Spirit.
- The Name entrusted. God gave Israel the law and set them apart to be a model people whose ways would rebuke the nations around them.
- The Name dishonoured. They copied their neighbours instead. The nations watched God's representatives and blamed God.
- The Name witnessed against. The charge comes from Isaiah and Ezekiel. The Jew's own Scriptures convict him, and the Gentiles he looked down on become God's witnesses.
- The Name and us. The same charge falls on Christian profession. What provokes blasphemy is not argument but the gap between what Christians claim and how they live.
- The Name vindicated. The argument ends with every mouth stopped and the whole world accountable. Yet God says He will sanctify His great name Himself, cleansing His people and giving them His Spirit.
For circumcision indeed profits if thou keep [the] law; but if thou be a law-transgressor, thy circumcision is become uncircumcision.
Circumcision was the mark in the flesh that set a Jew apart from every other nation. Paul now asks what that sign is worth when the man who wears it breaks the law it stands for.
The sign carried a meaning. It tied the man who wore it to the law, and it put him in a place of privilege.
To the Jew, circumcision was the sign that he belonged to the system of Judaism, and it was a real advantage. But its profit was completely lost if he broke the law, because the law was the very basis of Judaism. For a man to boast in what he throws away in practice is the most contemptible form of vanity. Breaking the law was an outward denial of circumcision. Circumcision — the cutting off of the flesh — was the clear sign that a man gave up self in order to submit to the law. Even so, circumcision had brought the Jew into a place of real privilege, because it involved professing God's Name — though unfaithfulness to such a profession called for stern judgment.
"If you obey the law" is not a low bar. One writer weighs the sign against the whole law, for Jew and Gentile alike.
The rite of circumcision marked the Jews off from other nations outwardly. But it counted for nothing before God if a man did not keep the whole law (compare Galatians 5:3). Suppose, on the other hand, that a man could be found who kept the law but had never been circumcised. God would count him righteous. Circumcision neither helped nor hindered justification, if any man at all — Jew or Gentile — had kept the whole law.
Paul does not dismiss the rite. He grants its value, then adds a condition. One writer traces the whole breakdown back to its root.
The failure has one root: people claim outward privileges without an inward work of grace in the heart. The outward place of privilege, which circumcision marks, really is of profit — if the man keeps the law. An outward place among the people of God has its advantages. But if the practice does not match the place, it has no spiritual value.
The verse does not merely cancel the sign. It reverses it: circumcision becomes uncircumcision.
Still, circumcision profits if a man keeps the law. But when the law is wholly broken, circumcision becomes the mark of rejection instead of favour and privilege. It becomes uncircumcision. That is, the Jew sinks back to the same natural distance from God as everyone else. He carries one more condemnation as well: he was specially tested, and found rejected.
Another writer asks the obvious question. Is circumcision then worth nothing at all?
Was circumcision of no use because of the dishonour put on it? No — but a circumcision joined to the breaking of what it pledged the man to keep could not be counted as circumcision at all.
Behind the argument lies a settled principle about how God assesses people. Ceremony cannot outweigh character, and the absence of ceremony cannot cancel character.
A religious form cannot cover a life that morally contradicts its own spirit. On the other hand, where that spirit is really there, God will approve of it even though the form is missing — and the lack of it may be unavoidable. He will and must have reality in what concerns men in their relation to Himself... Outward circumstances cannot override His character and ways and judgment.
The argument was aimed at Judaism. One writer carries the same principle straight across to today.
But we can easily transfer the principle to the Christian world today. Baptism is the outward sign or badge of Christianity, and people often boast in it and trust in it while the soul is far from God... We are not belittling baptism, any more than verses 25-26 belittle circumcision in connection with Judaism. But let it be known: baptism is no substitute for the reality of faith, and no addition to it.
- Pledge. Circumcision meant giving up self in order to submit to the law. It pledged the man to the whole law, not part of it.
- Profit. The sign really is of value. An outward place among God's people has advantages — as long as the practice matches the place.
- Reversal. Break the law and the badge of favour becomes a mark of rejection. The man is back at natural distance from God, condemned the more for being specially tested and found rejected.
- Reality. A religious form cannot cover a life that contradicts it. God approves the right spirit even where the form is missing.
- Today. Baptism is the badge people boast in and trust in now. It is no substitute for the reality of faith, and no addition to it.
If therefore the uncircumcision keep the requirements of the law, shall not his uncircumcision be reckoned for circumcision,
Circumcision was the mark that set Israel apart from other nations, and Paul has just said that breaking the law turns a Jew's circumcision into uncircumcision. Now he turns it around: what if a man without that mark keeps the precepts of the law?
Paul closes off an escape route here. A Jew could admit every charge of failure and still treat the sign in his body as a shield.
A Jew might answer, while admitting all this, that circumcision protected him from judgment by God. The apostle exposes the utter insecurity of such a retreat. No Jew would be willing to have an uncircumcised man who kept the righteousness of the law counted as a circumcised man. He, then, must accept being counted as an uncircumcised man if he breaks the law. The formal ceremony of circumcision is not what makes a man truly circumcised; to be real, circumcision must be of the heart.
The logic cuts both ways. If a man will not count the obedient outsider as an insider, he cannot count himself an insider while he disobeys.
The ESV's "regarded as" is "counted" or "reckoned" in older versions. One writer, working out what it means for God to reckon righteousness to a person, points back to this verse as a parallel case.
A parallel passage (Rom. 2:26) gives the same sense — the uncircumcision is counted for circumcision. That is, the man is accounted circumcised when he is not. So a person can be reckoned to be in a state he is not really in. But imputed righteousness does not mean a quantity of righteousness, ready outside himself, reckoned to him. It means the state in God's sight of the person so accounted righteous. Righteousness imputed to a man is the same as the man's being accounted righteous.
Paul puts it as a supposition: if a man keeps the precepts of the law. The ceremony itself decides nothing.
The Jews were outwardly separated from other nations by the rite of circumcision. But this was made null and void before God if a man did not keep the whole law. On the other hand, suppose a man could have been found who kept the law but had never been circumcised. He would have been reckoned righteous. With God, it was no question of mere ceremonies applying to a man outwardly, but of real heart-work.
God can approve where the sign is missing, and reject where it is present.
A religious form cannot cover a life that contradicts the very spirit of that form. On the other hand, where that spirit really is found, God will approve it even though the form is missing — and its absence may be unavoidable. He will and must have reality in everything that concerns men in relation to Himself… As the principle is clear, so are the persons who alone are acceptable with God. External circumstances cannot override His character and ways and judgment.
With moral reality as the standard, the line between Jew and Gentile no longer protects or excludes.
Sin is shown to be the great leveller, as righteousness does not fail to exalt. A transgressing Jew was as bad as, indeed worse than, a Gentile; a Gentile who did righteousness was no less acceptable than a Jew. God will have moral reality; and this, wherever found, alone secures His praise.
The rite belonged to one nation, but the principle travels. People can trust a Christian sign in the same way.
Notice that this argument strictly concerns Judaism. But we may easily transfer the principle to Christendom today, where people often boast in baptism and trust in it, the outward sign or badge of Christianity, while the soul is far from God. And shall not the godly faith of an unbaptised person be counted for baptism? And shall not the baptism of the corrupter be counted as no baptism? We do not belittle baptism, any more than verses 25-26 belittle circumcision… But know this: baptism is no substitute for, and no supplement to, the reality of faith.
Where does the failure begin? One writer traces it to the root.
The root of the failure lies in claiming outward privileges without an inward work of grace in the heart… An outward place among the people of God has its advantages. But if the practice does not match the place, that place has no spiritual value.
- Reality — God counts reality, not form. A religious mark cannot cover a life that contradicts it.
- Regarded — Being "regarded as circumcision" means God counts the man as circumcised when he is not. The same reckoning later describes a person counted righteous.
- Reversible — No Jew would count an obedient outsider as one of his own. So no Jew may count himself in while he disobeys.
- Levelled — Sin levels and righteousness lifts. The failing insider is worse off; the outsider who does right is just as acceptable.
- Transferable — The same test now falls on any badge, baptism included. A badge is no substitute for real faith, and no addition to it.
and uncircumcision by nature, fulfilling the law, judge thee, who, with letter and circumcision, [art] a law-transgressor?
Paul has just said that the sign only counts if the law is kept; now the man without the mark judges the man who wears it. So how can an outsider's obedience condemn an insider, and why does holding the written law make the failure worse?
From verse 25 Paul traces the failure of the religious man back to its root. One writer names that root. A place among God's people has real value, he adds, but only on one condition.
The failure has its root in claiming outward privileges without an inward work of grace in the heart. The outward place of privilege, which circumcision marks, does bring profit — if a person keeps the law. An outward place among the people of God has its advantages. But if the practice does not match the place, it has no spiritual value.
When the life contradicts the sign, the standing counts for nothing.
Paul has already said that sinners supply the evidence against themselves.
But sinners will themselves become witnesses to their own condemnation. The Jew's professed subjection to the Law will prove that he disobeyed it, on the day when the secret of his heart comes out. And the Gentile has kept clear of the moral evil the Jew may be guilty of. His conduct will stand as a separate verdict of judgment against the outward Jew.
Another writer adds what the outsider gains by that obedience.
If the Gentile, who does not have the position, keeps the righteousness of the law, he would get the blessing of the privileged class, even without their position.
The sting of the verse lies in what the transgressor has. He is not a man in the dark. He has the written text and the covenant mark, and he breaks the law anyway.
Think how the obedience of the uncircumcised man would condemn the one who had both the letter of the law and circumcision, and yet broke that law! Clearly then, we must put what is inward and spiritual before what is outward in the flesh.
An older translation renders the phrase "with letter and circumcision." Kelly explains that the small word behind "with" can describe the circumstances a person stands in, rather than a tool he uses.
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But the preposition can, and when needed does, express the surrounding condition, as in Romans 2:27, and elsewhere.
So his whole setting is the written law and the covenant sign — and he breaks the law inside it.
Behind the reversal stands a principle Paul laid down earlier in the chapter. Advantage is no shelter from judgment. It raises the standard.
In every case God will judge righteously. But greater privilege brings deeper obligations, and God judges the privileged more strictly… That people stood as God's witness in the earth, unlike the Gentiles. That very standing leaves them open to closer scrutiny. For God is not dealing here in outward blows on the nations. He is dealing with the heart and its ways as He sees them, however hidden from man.
The verse cuts in two directions at once.
Circumcision does nothing to shield them from their own base inconsistency; instead it turns into uncircumcision. In the same way, uncircumcision that keeps the law's requirements should count as circumcision. Sin is shown to be the great leveller, as righteousness does not fail to exalt. A transgressing Jew was as bad as, indeed worse than, a Gentile… God will have moral reality; and this, wherever found, alone secures His praise.
- Badge. Circumcision was a real advantage — but its profit depended on keeping the law, not on wearing the mark.
- Broken. A life that does not match the place empties it of spiritual value. The sign alone settles nothing.
- Witness. The obedient outsider needs no official post. His conduct stands as a separate verdict against the insider who had both the written law and the sign.
- Weight. Greater privilege means deeper duty and closer scrutiny. God judges the heart and its hidden ways.
- Reality. Sin levels every advantage; righteousness lifts. God insists on what is real, and only that wins His praise.
For he is not a Jew who [is] one outwardly, neither that circumcision which is outward in flesh;
Paul has been weighing what religious standing is really worth. Here he presses the case to its end: the badge on the body settles nothing. The real question is what a person is where only God can see.
The whole argument turns on one thing: what God accepts as real.
An outward religious form cannot cover a spirit that morally contradicts it. And where the true spirit is found, God will approve it even when the form is missing — and that absence may be unavoidable. He will and must have reality in everything that concerns how men stand before Him.
Paul's readers could point to their circumcision as proof of belonging to God. That defence collapses, and the two groups end up trading places.
So it was useless for them to fall back on being God's circumcised people. The argument of verses 25 to 29 is very important. It is not official position, which is an outward thing, that counts before God and puts right what is wrong. It is the inward thing that God values. God would have respect to the one who obeys, even if he were an uncircumcised Gentile. He would reject the disobedient, even if he were the circumcised Jew.
Circumcision was a mark cut into the flesh. Behind the ceremony stood a meaning about what Israel was to be.
The persistent tendency was to observe the outward ceremony and overlook its significance. Israel was to be a people completely cut off for God and to God. If there had been circumcision of the "heart," self-love would have been cut off through knowing the love of God.
Carried into the believer's life, that cutting reaches things no observer could check.
Refusing the flesh does not mean merely neglecting the body in a way the world can see. It means refusing the flesh in all its inward workings in the heart — its self-confidence, self-righteousness, vanity and lusts — as something the cross has condemned.
The next verse sets "letter" against "spirit." The word "letter" is easy to misread, as if Scripture itself were the problem.
Here "the letter" does not mean the actual words of the law, for God Himself inspired those words. It means a man's exact outward keeping of the law's forms. Without a purified heart, that is nothing but barren desolation — even in Judaism, where ceremony had its place.
The name "Jew" itself carries the point. What God looks for is hidden, and only He can see it.
What is now to be sought after is reality of heart before God, and not a distinguishing mark on one's body. And only those who have this are now true Jews in spirit, according to the meaning of the word Jew — that is, praise.
That reality is not passed down by birth.
The true Jew is not the one who lives and acts for the eyes of men, but for God's eye. Jewish parentage rightly calls for such a character. If it is missing, a claim based on Jewish descent is worthless.
The mistake here is not confined to one nation or one rite. It returns whenever people trust a ceremony to do what only God can do.
Above all, the Jew boasted of his circumcision as a way of having favour with God, just as Christians in name only trust in the sacraments as the means of salvation. But circumcision or religious rites cannot save a man and make him right before God.
Commentators differ on how far these words reach. Some apply them straight to Christians today. Others read the verse more narrowly.
This passage, however, is not written about Christians at all. It is about Gentiles who kept the law compared with Jews who broke it.
- Outward — An outward position cannot cover a life that contradicts it. God will have reality.
- Inward — God accepts the Gentile who obeys and rejects the Jew who does not. Obedience outweighs the badge.
- Cut — Circumcision marked a people cut off for God. The real thing cuts at self-confidence, vanity and lust.
- Letter — "Letter" is not Scripture. It is exact outward form-keeping, and without a purified heart it is barren.
- Praise — The word "Jew" means praise. The hidden man gets his from God, not from the crowd that cannot see him.
but he [is] a Jew [who is so] inwardly; and circumcision, of the heart, in spirit, not in letter; whose praise [is] not of men, but of God.
Paul ends his case against the religious man by asking where the reality lies. The verse moves the question from a mark on the body to a work in the heart. It also moves it from the approval of neighbours to the approval of God.
The argument ends with a principle, not a concession. A form kept up while the inner life contradicts it settles nothing. And a missing form does not disqualify a person whose heart is right.
A religious form cannot cover the moral contradiction of its own spirit. On the other hand, where the spirit is truly found, God will approve of it even when the form is absent — an absence that may be unavoidable. He will and must have reality in what concerns men in their relation to Himself... External circumstances cannot override His character and ways and judgment.
Earlier in the chapter Paul showed that the religious man's practice fell far below what he claimed. This verse names the reason.
The root of the failure lies in the profession of outward privileges without an inward work of grace in the heart... An outward place among the people of God has its advantages; but if the practice is not in accord with the place, it has no spiritual value... The true Jew is one in whom there is an inward work of the heart. He serves God in spirit and not in the letter. He lives before God, and not just before men.
"The letter" here is not a criticism of Scripture's actual words. It describes a way of relating to them.
The letter here does not mean the actual words of the law, for those words are inspired by God. It means a man's exact outward keeping of the law's forms. And such a thing without a purified heart — even in Judaism, where ceremony was in order — is nothing but barren desolation... The true Jew is not the one who lives and acts for the eyes of men, but for God's eye. He lives not "in the presence of his brothers," but in the presence of God.
Writers also note that this contrast appears elsewhere in Paul's letters, and that taking in words only with the mind "leads to formality and death; it is only what is 'of the Spirit' that can result in life."
The demand is not new. God asked Israel for this long before Paul wrote. The outward rite always carried an inward meaning that was easy to ignore.
They were to "circumcise" their hearts, as the answer to the love shown to them. We again find the Apostle Paul referring to this in Romans 2:28-29... The persistent tendency was to keep the outward ceremony and overlook its significance. Israel was to be a people completely cut off for and to God. Had there been circumcision of "heart," there would have been the cutting off of self-love, in the knowledge of the love of God.
For the believer, that cutting off reaches further than anything visible:
The refusal of the flesh is not to be just an outward neglect of the body, which the world can see. It is the refusal of the flesh in all its inward workings in the heart — its self-confidence, self-righteousness, vanity and lusts — as that which has been condemned in the cross.
The closing words are a play on the name itself. The word "Jew" carries the meaning of praise — so only the inward man answers to his own name.
Turning next to Romans, we are taught there that what is now to be sought after is reality of heart before God, and not a distinguishing mark on one's body. And only these are now true Jews in spirit, according to the meaning of the word Jew — that is, praise... Paul could boast of being circumcised on the eighth day, as the law required. Yet he teaches that what is now to be valued is circumcision of the heart, and not of the letter.
Paul aimed the principle at one nation, but it tests every religion of outward forms. Commentators differ on how far to press it. Some take it to hand Israel's promises over to Christians, a reading that "reveals ignorance in the scope of this Epistle" (Arno Clemens Gaebelein). What does carry over is the test of reality.
To profess the truth is not always to be of the truth. For this we must be born of God by the word of truth (James 1:18). It is an effective and lasting work of the Spirit. Religious ceremonies have their place, but have nothing to do with the giving of life. What is true of the Jew and of circumcision is true of Christianity and of baptism. Outward rites have nothing whatever to do with the giving or the sustaining of life; to think so is to mistake their object and use.
- Reality. God will not accept a form that contradicts the spirit behind it. He insists on what is real between men and Himself.
- Root. The failure of the religious man is outward privilege held without an inward work of grace in the heart.
- Letter. "The letter" is not Scripture's words. It is exact outward keeping of those forms, and it is barren without a purified heart.
- Heart. Circumcision of the heart cuts off self-love and every inward working of the flesh. It answers the love God has shown.
- Praise. The name "Jew" means praise. Only the hidden, inward man answers to it, and his praise comes from God, not from men.