Three Simple Questions

The “advantages” God has conferred upon His chosen people, the Jews, are not to be trusted as a shield against judgment, Paul says. But like all religious people everywhere, the Jews are prone to just such an error. They see themselves as recipients of God’s favor and trustees of His truth, called to teach the nations. Because they are so blessed and so employed, they think God surely will not pour out His wrath on them. They have what Paul characterizes as “the form of knowledge and truth” (v. 20). But do they have the real thing?

Through a series of devastating questions, Paul quickly shows the crucial flaw in the Jews’ thinking. He begins by asking, “You, therefore, who teach another, do you not teach yourself?” His meaning is clear: The Jews are not obeying the law they so proudly hail. And as Paul has already said, “not the hearers of the law are just in the sight of God, but the doers of the law will be justified.” Three brief queries regarding the commandments are sufficient to show that the Jews are not doers at all. Paul notes the eighth commandment against theft, the seventh commandment against adultery, and the second commandment against idolatry. “You preach against these things,” Paul says in effect. “But do you do them yourselves?” His implication, of course, is that they do indeed do such things. But what is the use of teaching a standard while violating it? Clearly, it is of no use at all.

The end result of such hypocrisy, Paul says, is to bring dishonor on God. By voicing their high view of their God-given law even while behaving in violation of that law, they cause the Gentiles to blaspheme God’s name. In other words, unbelievers come to see God as impotent and unworthy. “This is always the case when ostensibly devout persons violate the very standards they proclaim,” Dr. James M. Boice writes. “It is a terrible thing.” And it is especially terrible in this case because it defeats the very purpose for which the Jews were called and given the law—to lift up the name of God before the world.

Boice notes that this reproof must have been devastating for the Jews. But he adds: “It is not only for the Jew that a passage like this is or should be shattering. It should be shattering to us all, particularly if we find ourselves thinking that our case is somehow different from that of other persons—because of our religious leanings.”