Paul specifically addresses Jewish listeners. They are those who claim to rely on the Law and boast in God. The theme of boasting is significant to Paul’s thinking. He has already stated that he is not ashamed of the Gospel, a kind of understated way of describing boasting in it. Paul and his Jewish brethren should have a shared boast (v17). The Jews not only claim to know God’s will and ways, they do know them because they have his revelation. Paul explicitly refers to the law or Torah but they also have the prophets too (v18). Having this privilege, they are convinced that they are teachers, the prophets having after all talked about a “light to the Gentiles”. Paul uses the imagery of leading the blind who are not able to see the light of God (v19-20). However, the challenge is this. Are they paying attention to their own lessons, do they teach themselves (v21a)?
Paul then lists a number of ways in which they demonstrate that they fail to heed the lessons. The very things that they accuse others of, the Law convicts them of too, theft, adultery and a form of idolatry referred to as Temple robbing. This may have been literal act of stealing from those temples showing a desire for the things connected within them. Alternatively, it may have been that sacrilegious acts or robbing the Jerusalem Temple by withholding tithes acted as a form of idolatry. In the latter sense, it would be a case of “You claim to think little of other gods, to abhor them but you treat YHWH and his worship with the same abhorrence.” (v21b-22).[1] They boast or have confidence in the Law but in fact they dishonour it because their sin, their disregard for the Law causes Gentiles to regard God as contemptable. They blaspheme him because they see the way that the Jews behave. We might observe that similarly, when people see Christians acting like hypocrites then this dishonours God’s name (v22-24).
Schriener notes that these specific acts seem to have been rare amongst the Jews. So was it fair to charge them all with the blame?[2] The answer to this potential conundrum is that we can see these specific and obviously heinous examples as evidence of a general level of hypocrisy. Paul himself as a devout Jew would not have committed these acts. However, he was complicit in the even more serious sin and crime of murder when he gave approval to the stoning of Stephen.
[1] See Schreiner on why this should be taken as literal Schriener, Romans, 132. Moo notes that this would have been rare. However, the other options of robbing the Temple by failing to pay tithes and dues in Jerusalem and sacrilegious have their own difficulties because he does not see these as being in opposition to hostility to idols. It is arguable though that these are a form of idolatry because of how they treat God and his worship, Moo, Romans, 164.
[2] Schriener, Romans, 133.
Faithroots 