What then [is] the superiority of the Jew? or what the profit of circumcision?
Paul has just argued that being a Jew on the outside, and circumcision in the flesh, count for nothing without an inward reality. This verse voices the protest that argument stirs up: if God puts Jew and Gentile on one level as sinners, was Israel's long history of privilege worth nothing?
Chapter 2 strips the religious Jew of every outward defence. The question in this verse is the natural push-back.
At the end of Romans 2 the apostle pressed home on the conscience, with force no one can answer, that God wants reality and not form. So let the Jew beware. This raises objections, and he answers them in the first part of Romans 3:1-8.
"Advantage" and "value" are not vague words here. They ask whether an outward position, and the rite that put a person into it, are worth anything at all.
First, the question may be raised: is there no advantage in an outward position? What advantage is there in outward religious privileges, such as the Jew enjoyed? Or what profit is there in circumcision — the rite that brought a person into this outward position?
Paul's answer is not a grudging concession. Levelling all people as sinners is one thing; erasing what God actually gave to a nation is another.
This is how we should weigh the Jews and their real state, whatever great privileges God had given them as a nation. When it is a question of sin, Christian teaching brings the Jew down to the level of the Gentile. Even so, it never despises the special advantages of the Jew. It owns them, and above all the advantage of holding the oracles of God in trust. It owns them even though many in Israel proved faithless. For God is faithful. He will judge the faithless, and He will keep His people faithfully.
Why does Paul reach first for this one privilege, out of all Israel's distinctions?
Elsewhere he lists the various high distinctions of Israel. Here he singles out one as first of all: their constant and most precious privilege, the possession of God's written word. He names it all the more because it was best suited to show their moral failure. For what use had they made of it? Where was the fruit of so great a favour?
The word entrusted matters. Israel did not simply own the Scriptures. They held them in trust, and not for themselves alone.
Paul answers with his whole soul that there was "much in every way". But he presses one chief advantage that the Jews had: a trust committed to them, and not for their own sake only — "the oracles of God," His own words spoken through a human mouthpiece. Most people had wandered off into the many forms of idolatry that kept tempting Israel too. Nothing but God's power and goodness kept Israel from them. So the divine Word, if it was to last for the blessing of men, had to be kept away from these destructive influences. It had to sit in a place from which its power could flow out all around, while it stayed safe from the corruption everywhere else.
Granting the advantage settles nothing about the person holding it. The commentators are careful at exactly this point.
The apostle allows the advantage in every way, and first of all in this: God entrusted them with His oracles. But man's unfaithfulness in no way stops God from judging the world, and judging it justly. Outward privileges do not imply a better condition, and they do not secure one. They do increase responsibility.
The verse is not a museum piece. Anyone who has grown up with the Bible near at hand stands where the Jew stood.
To have the Scriptures was then, as it is now, a great gain. Some people do not accept the gospel. Even so, it is an immense advantage to live in a land where the light of God's word presses on people, even if it only touches their outward lives.
- Trust, not trophy. The Jew's advantage is real, and the first part of it is a trust: God gave them His oracles to keep.
- Trust kept. God set that one people apart from the idolatry around them. So His Word could survive and flow out to everyone else.
- Trust honoured. The gospel puts Jew and Gentile on one level as sinners. It still never despises what God gave Israel. His faithfulness stands where theirs failed.
- Trust tested. Holding the Scriptures does not secure a better standing before God. It raises responsibility. Paul names this privilege because it shows what Israel made of it.
- Trust today. Having the Bible within reach is still an immense gain — and still asks the same question: what use have you made of it?
Much every way and first, indeed, that to them were entrusted the oracles of God.
Paul has just argued that birth and circumcision give a Jew no better standing before God, because sin puts everyone on the same level. So a protest follows: then what was the point of being Jewish at all? Paul's answer does not cancel Israel's privilege. He names the greatest one — and that same privilege is what will condemn them.
The question in verse 1 comes from someone who knows how much God had promised this nation.
"Then what advantage has the Jew? Or what is the value of circumcision?" This would be the natural question of a Jew after reading the argument that the Jew is on the same level with the Gentile. This objection appears here for the first time. It matters, because the Jews are God's chosen people... If God puts Jews and Gentiles on the same footing, what then becomes of all these special blessings promised to the Jews?
One Greek word lies behind "oracles," and it covers more than the law given through Moses.
In the New Testament the word translated this way is logion. It is applied to the law given to Moses and entrusted to Israel, and also to truths revealed in New Testament times (Acts 7:38; Rom. 3:2; Heb. 5:12; 1 Peter 4:11). It means "a message or answer given by God," and also the place from which such messages were given.
The phrase also settles something about the Old Testament itself:
"Oracles," says Dr. Johnson, "are something delivered by supernatural wisdom." That is the meaning of this important phrase. The utterances of God — is this not another word for inspiration? And Scripture says the Jews were privileged: God appointed them the keepers of His oracles. "The utterances of God!" Who dare question them? And they form the Old Testament.
Paul says "to begin with," as if a list is coming. One item leads it, and the reason for that order matters.
In its proper place he lists the various high distinctions of Israel. But here he singles out one as foremost: their constant and most precious privilege, the possession of God's written word. He names it all the more because it was best suited to show their moral failure. For what use had they made of it? Where was the fruit of so great a favour?
Having the Scriptures put Israel somewhere no other nation stood. It did not put them right with God.
Nothing here says that this clear fact guarantees God's acceptance of them personally, because it does not. But it put them in a unique position. They were the only nation to whom God made His will known, the only nation to whom He showed His counsel and ways in those days.
The privilege still stood even when Israel refused it:
This is not a question, in this respect, of their all being converted one by one. They enjoyed privileges as the people of God that were found nowhere else. And if they did not believe, their unbelief could not set aside the faithfulness of God. The promises of God will be fulfilled through His faithfulness to His people Israel, even though they have lost every right to them.
"Entrusted" makes Israel trustees. A trustee must guard what he receives, and he can betray it.
Privilege and responsibility go together... As a people they were blessed; as a people they were responsible. They were Jehovah's chosen people, and in a world where every other nation worshipped idols, they were His only witness there. He had also given them His law and His truth, and He appointed them trustees to use and guard that holy trust. Their failure, then, in both matters, was nothing short of disaster.
Yet Israel did guard the text. That fact still bears on how we know which books belong in the Bible:
Scripture tells us that the Jews were entrusted with the oracles of God (Rom. 3:2). As is well known, they guarded the Old Testament Scriptures with great care for centuries before there was any Christian church... God could surely give a revelation that needs no group of men to stamp it with their seal, however holy those men might be.
One writer brings the point down to today. To live where the Bible is open is a real gain — and a real weight.
To have the Scriptures was then, as it is now, a great gain. Even if some do not accept the gospel, it is an immense advantage to be in a land where the light of God's word is brought to bear upon men, even if it only affects their outward lives.
There is a clear advantage in being born and raised in a "Christian" land, but tremendous responsibilities come with it... A person who claims the Christian religion without being converted will be judged by the high standard he has claimed, and so will deserve a heavier judgment.
- Trust given. Israel's chief advantage was not birth or ritual. God placed His own words into their hands.
- Trust defined. "Oracles" (logion) means a message given by God. So the Old Testament, as a whole, is God speaking.
- Trust misused. Paul names this privilege first because it exposes them: great favour received, no fruit shown.
- Trust kept. They failed to obey the word, yet they guarded it, so no church needs to certify which books are Scripture.
- Trust transferred. The same open Bible is now the advantage of those born where it is read — and the standard by which they will be measured.