Romans 2: What the Passage Says

The Chapter in a Sentence

Paul turns to anyone who judges other people for doing wrong, and says that judging others while doing the same things leaves you without an excuse and does not help you escape God's judgment. He states that God repays each person according to what they have done, with no favoritism, and that trouble and reward alike come first to the Jew and then to the Greek. He argues that having the law is not the point, since doing it is what counts, and that Gentiles who do not have the law can still do what it requires. He closes by saying that being a Jew outwardly and being circumcised in the body are not what make a person a Jew, but rather being one inwardly, with circumcision of the heart.

Claim by Claim

1. 2:1
   • The one who judges another has no excuse.
   • In judging another, the judge condemns himself.
   • The one who judges does the same things he judges.
2. 2:2
   • We know that God's judgment is according to truth.
   • God's judgment falls on those who do such things.
3. 2:3
   • A question is put to the man who judges those doing such things while doing the same things himself: does he think he will escape God's judgment?
4. 2:4
   • A question is put: does he despise the riches of God's kindness, forbearance, and patience?
   • Such a person does not know that God's kindness leads him to repentance.
5. 2:5
   • Because of his hardness and unrepentant heart, he is storing up wrath for himself.
   • The wrath is stored up for the day of wrath.
   • On that day God's righteous judgment is revealed.
6. 2:6
   • God will repay each person according to his works.
7. 2:7
   • To those who by patient endurance in good work seek glory and honor and immortality, God gives eternal life.
8. 2:8
   • To those who act from selfish rivalry, who do not obey the truth, and who obey unrighteousness, there is wrath and anger.
9. 2:9
   • Tribulation and distress come upon every human soul that does evil.
   • This comes to the Jew first.
   • This comes also to the Greek.
10. 2:10
    • Glory and honor and peace come to everyone who does good.
    • This comes to the Jew first.
    • This comes also to the Greek.
11. 2:11
    • There is no partiality with God.
12. 2:12
    • All who have sinned without the law will also perish without the law.
    • All who have sinned under the law will be judged by the law.
13. 2:13
    • The hearers of the law are not righteous before God.
    • The doers of the law will be declared righteous.
14. 2:14
    • The Gentiles do not have the law.
    • When Gentiles do by nature the things of the law, they are a law to themselves.
    • They are a law to themselves while not having the law.
15. 2:15
    • They show that the work of the law is written in their hearts.
    • Their conscience bears witness along with this.
    • Their thoughts, among themselves, either accuse or defend.
16. 2:16
    • There is a day when God will judge the secrets of men.
    • God will judge them through Jesus Christ.
    • This judgment is according to the gospel Paul calls his own.
17. 2:17
    • You are called a Jew.
    • You rest in the law.
    • You boast in God.
18. 2:18
    • You know God's will.
    • You approve the things that are superior.
    • You are instructed out of the law.
19. 2:19
    • You are confident that you are a guide of the blind.
    • You are confident that you are a light to those in darkness.
20. 2:20
    • You take yourself to be an instructor of the foolish.
    • You take yourself to be a teacher of infants.
    • You take yourself to have in the law the form of knowledge and of the truth.
21. 2:21
    • A question is put to the one who teaches another: does he not teach himself?
    • A question is put to the one who preaches against stealing: does he steal?
22. 2:22
    • A question is put to the one who says not to commit adultery: does he commit adultery?
    • A question is put to the one who abhors idols: does he rob temples?
23. 2:23
    • A question is put to the one who boasts in the law: does he dishonor God by breaking the law?
24. 2:24
    • The name of God is blasphemed among the Gentiles because of you.
    • This is as it is written.
25. 2:25
    • Circumcision profits if you keep the law.
    • If you are a breaker of the law, your circumcision has become uncircumcision.
26. 2:26
    • A question is put: if the uncircumcised person keeps the requirements of the law, will his uncircumcision not be counted as circumcision?
27. 2:27
    • A question is put: will the one uncircumcised by nature who fulfills the law not judge you?
    • You have the written code and circumcision.
    • You transgress the law.
28. 2:28
    • A person is not a Jew by being one outwardly.
    • Circumcision is not the outward circumcision in the flesh.
29. 2:29
    • A person is a Jew by being one inwardly.
    • Circumcision is circumcision of the heart.
    • That circumcision is by the spirit and not by the written code.
    • Such a person's praise is not from men.
    • Such a person's praise is from God.

Words Worth Explaining

Every language note in this chapter, gathered. These explain what a word meant, never what it means for the reader.

2:1

"O man" is how a teacher in the ancient world addressed an imagined opponent. Through much of this chapter Paul argues with a figure he has invented so that he can answer him, a standard style of debate on the page. The person addressed is not any particular individual.

2:4

"Despisest" in 1611 English meant to think little of or to shrug off, not the modern sense of hating. "Forbearance" is holding back from acting; "longsuffering" is patience kept up over a long time. "Repentance" translates a word meaning a change of mind that turns into a change of life.

2:5

"Impenitent" means unrepentant, refusing to change. "Treasurest up" is the language of piling up savings, so the image is of a man adding to a store he will one day be handed. "The day of wrath" was a fixed phrase, taken from the Hebrew prophets, for the day when God finally settles accounts.

2:6

This line is a quotation, from Psalm 62:12 and Proverbs 24:12, though the King James gives no sign of it. "Render" here means pay back what is owed.

2:7

Glory and honor mean being praised and looked up to by others.

2:8

"Contentious" translates a Greek word whose sense is disputed. It may come from a root for hired labor and mean selfish ambition or working only for one's own gain, or it may mean quarrelsome and factious. The King James chose the second; many modern translations choose the first.

2:9

"Every soul of man" reflects a Hebrew way of speaking in which "soul" stands for the whole living person, not one part of him. "Gentile" renders the Greek word "Greek," used at the time as shorthand for everyone who was not a Jew. "First for the Jew" refers to order, the Jews being the people to whom God's promises were given first.

2:11

"Respect of persons" is an old legal idiom translating a Greek phrase that literally means receiving someone's face. It describes a judge who decides a case by who is standing in front of him rather than by the facts.

2:12

"The law" throughout this chapter means the law of Moses, the body of commands given to Israel and recorded in the first five books of the Bible. "Without law" translates a single Greek word meaning outside that law, describing people who never had it.

2:13

"Justified" is courtroom language. It means declared to be in the right, acquitted, rather than made good.

2:14

"A law unto themselves" has reversed its meaning in modern English, where it describes someone who ignores all rules. Paul means the opposite: these people have no written law, so the standard operates inside them instead of on a page.

2:15

"The mean while" is 1611 English for meanwhile. "Accusing or else excusing one another" is a literal rendering of the Greek; "excusing" means speaking in defense, as an advocate does, and the sense is that the thoughts argue on both sides about the person himself.

2:16

"Gospel" translates a Greek word meaning an announcement of good news, the kind of report a herald brought. "My gospel" means the message Paul himself went about announcing, not a version of his own making.

2:17

"Restest in the law" means leaning your weight on it, relying on it for security. "Makest thy boast of God" is not simple bragging; it means taking your standing and confidence from the fact that God is yours.

2:18

The Greek behind "approvest the things that are more excellent" can be read two ways, and the ambiguity is real. It may mean approving what is superior, or testing between things that differ in order to tell them apart.

2:19

"A guide of the blind, a light of them which are in darkness" picks up language the prophet Isaiah used for Israel's role among the other nations. Paul is quoting the self-description back at the people who used it.

2:20

"Babes" means beginners, people at the start of learning. "The form of knowledge" translates a word that can mean the full outline or embodiment of something, and readers have long disagreed whether Paul means the genuine shape of knowledge or only its outward appearance.

2:22

"Commit sacrilege" renders a Greek verb meaning to rob a temple, most naturally a pagan one, stripping it of its valuables. Jewish law forbade profiting from idols, so the charge is that a man who loudly hates idols still takes money from their shrines. The exact force of the accusation is debated.

2:24

"As it is written" signals a quotation of Scripture, here Isaiah 52:5 in its Greek form, with wording close to Ezekiel 36:20. "Blasphemed" means insulted or spoken against, not only speech about God in a religious sense.

2:25

Circumcision is the cutting away of the foreskin, performed on Jewish boys on the eighth day. Genesis 17 gives it as the physical sign of God's covenant with Abraham and his descendants, so it marked a man as belonging to the people of Israel. "Profiteth" means is of value.

2:27

"The letter" means the written text of the law, the code as it stands on the page. "Uncircumcision which is by nature" means a man born a Gentile who simply never underwent the rite.

2:29

"In the spirit, and not in the letter" sets the Spirit of God, or else the inward person, against the written code; Greek makes no distinction between capital and small letters, so both readings have long been argued. "Whose praise is not of men" may also carry a play on words: the name Judah, from which "Jew" comes, was linked in Hebrew with the word for praise.