(2:14–15). Comparing the passage with other passages in Romans allows us to see that while it focuses on the potential righteousness of any person, Paul would only aver that those transformed by Christ would live thus:
| The righteous do good works (2:7) | These cannot be Jewish law-works (3:20, 27–28) |
| The righteous endure (2:7) | Believers endure (5:3–4; 8:25; 12:12; 15:4–5) |
| The righteous “seek” for glory (2:7) | No one “seeks” for God (3:11); one must not “seek” righteousness the wrong way (10:3, 20) |
| The righteous seek glory and honor (2:7, 10) | Humanity lost God’s glory (3:23), but glory awaits believers (5:2; 8:18, 21; 9:21, 23) |
| The righteous receive eternal life (2:7) | Believers in Jesus receive eternal life (5:21; 6:22–23; cf. 8:13) |
| The righteous will have peace (2:10) | Humanity does not know peace (3:17), but believers will have it (5:1; 8:6; 14:17) |
| The righteous do “good” (2:7, 10) | The wicked do not do good (7:18–19; cf. 3:10); believers should do what is good (12:9, 21; 13:4; 15:2) |
| Doers of good include both Jews and Greeks (2:10) | Both Jews and Gentiles are under sin (3:9); the community of believers includes both Jews and Gentiles (1:16; 9:24; 10:12; cf. 3:29) |
Thus while Paul is focusing on God’s ethnic impartiality rather than on believers here, when he later addresses such issues he seems to assume that it is believers in Jesus who are able to fulfill the role of the righteous. Christ comes not merely to forgive unrighteousness but to empower for righteous living.
Scholars again differ as to whether the law in obedient Gentiles’ hearts by nature (2:14–15) refers to Christians or to conscience in all humans. In practice, it those in whom the Spirit dwells (Jew or Gentile) who fulfill the heart of God’s law (8:2–4; Jer 31:31–34).12 There may be an element of such emphasis here, preparing for 2:29. Nevertheless, Christians also had access to the written law, so in 2:14–15 Paul probably focuses more generally on a natural law innate in humanity. He has already spoken of God’s revelation in creation (1:20), including within humans (1:19), and he also appeals to the Greco-Roman notion of “conscience” (9:1).13 Although employing it in a wide range of ways, Greco-Roman sources (including Jewish ones) speak widely of a law of nature,14 and even Palestinian Jews outside this widespread tradition seem to have believed that God had given laws to Gentiles’ ancestors in the time of Noah.15 Such a morally informed person’s divided thoughts in 2:15 may presage the morally divided person in 7:15–23 (who, however, knows more specifically Moses’s law and hyperbolically appears incapable of doing any good).
Indicting Hypocrisy (2:17–24)
Paul’s diatribe uses rhetorical exaggeration, common in polemic, to hold attention. The evildoing Jewish interlocutor here is hyperbolic, perhaps even reduced to the absurd.16 Certainly most Jewish people did not commit adultery or rob temples! Paul’s graphically rendered point is simply that Jewish ethnicity or possession of the law cannot guarantee moral superiority to Gentiles. (Paul will maintain the sin of all Jews with a biblical argument in 3:9–20.) Because of the general law of nature, some Gentiles might do what is morally right (2:14–15), even while this hyperbolic Jewish objector, who three or four times reiterates dependence on the law (2:17, 18, 20, 23), dishonors God by breaking it (2:23).
Torah study was central to Pharisaic and presumably other Jewish teachers’ piety (2:17–20), but intellectual and spiritual proficiency risked generating pride in one’s accomplishments, then as now. Certainly today some have used such proficiency to diminish their concern with corresponding failure in the area of praxis. This Jewish teacher’s fundamental problem, twice repeated, is finding security in or “boasting” in the law (2:17, 23; cf. Sir 39:8). Ancients often considered unqualified boasting obnoxious to begin with,17 but for Paul boasting in one’s works as opposed to God’s activity is sinful (3:27; 4:2; 5:2–3, 11; 15:17).18
Ancient rhetoric was fond of repetition, which cumulatively reinforces the overall effect of one’s words. Paul cites about eleven pious Jewish claims for his interlocutor in 2:17–20, whose righteousness he then challenges with five rhetorical questions (as often in prosecuting or defensive rhetoric) in 2:21–23.19 The latter cases each use antithesis and the literary device of starting and ending with parallel language (x . . . y/x . . . y) to drive home the point. Evoking prophetic biblical critiques throughout,20 Paul finishes off the hyperbolic hypocrite with an explicit text in 2:23–24. Ironically, the righteousness this interlocutor claims in the law of Moses is available only to those in whose hearts the law is written by the Spirit (8:2–4):
| The name “Jew” (2:17) | True Jews (2:29), children of Abraham (4:12, 16–17), and those grafted into Israel (11:17) |
| Boasting in God (2:17, 23) | Boasting in God the right way (5:11; cf. 5:2–3) |
| Knowing God’s will and approving the good (2:18) | Knowing God’s will and approving the good (12:2) |
| A light to those in darkness (2:19) | People of light rather than darkness (13:12) |
| Teacher of law (2:20) | Right use of teaching (6:17; 12:7; 15:4; 16:17) |
| Having knowledge and truth in the law (2:20) | Having knowledge of truth (15:8, 14) |
Ancients considered temple robbery (2:22) the epitome of impiety.21 Many Gentiles suspected Jews of this crime because they knew that they did not regard pagan temples as sacred,22 though Jewish apologists emphasized that good Jews would do no such thing.23 Here Paul’s hyperbolic opponent, far from abhorring idols, apparently finds their sale lucrative. Profaning God’s name (2:23–24) was among the most heinous of offenses.24 The sort of hypocritical Jew who discredited God and his people depicted here could be familiar enough to Paul’s audience: a generation earlier, one Jewish charlatan, who professed to teach Moses’s laws but did not obey them, had exploited Roman women, leading to scandal in Rome (Josephus Ant. 18.81–84).
As at some other points in Romans (e.g., 3:10–18), Paul uses the Scriptures in what may be a deliberately unexpected way. In the context of Isa 52:5 God’s name was blasphemed among Gentiles because of his people’s suffering; here, Paul complains, God is blasphemed because of their sin! They were exiled to begin with, however, because of their sin (cf. Ezek 36:18–20). Paul might connect this passage with many of his people’s rejection of the good news of Isa 52:7 (cited in Rom 10:15.)
Inward Jewishness (2:25–29)
Responding
