Principles of God’s Judgment: Knowledge

Romans 2:1

¹ Therefore you are inexcusable, O man, whoever you are who judge, for in whatever you judge another you condemn yourself; for you who judge practice the same things.

(Verse 1) - Therefore refers to what Paul has just said in the last half of chapter 1, and specifically to the introductory statement: “For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who suppress the truth in unrighteousness, because that which is known about God is evident within them; for God made it evident to them,… so that they are without excuse” (vv. 18-20).  The force of this word here has been the subject of much discussion. The design of this and the following chapter is to show that the Jews were no less guilty that the Gentiles, and that they needed the benefit of the same salvation. This the apostle does by showing that they had greater light or knowledge than the Gentiles; and yet that they did the same things. Still they were in the habit of accusing and condemning the Gentiles as wicked and abandoned; while they excused themselves on the ground that they possessed the Law and the oracles of God, and were his favorite people. The apostle here affirms that they were inexcusable in their sins, that they must be condemned in the sight of God, on the same ground on which they condemned the Gentiles; to wit, that they had light and yet committed wickedness. If the Gentiles were without excuse (Rom. 1:20) in their sins, much more would the Jew, who condemned them, be without excuse on the same ground. The word therefore, I suppose, refers not to any particular word in the previous chapter, or to any particular verse, but to the general considerations which were suggested by a view of the whole case. And its sense might be thus expressed. “Since you Jews condemn the Gentiles for their sins, on the ground that they have the means of knowing their duty, THEREFORE, you who are far more favored than they, are entirely without an excuse for the same things.”

Addressing the new group of moral people, the apostle says, you also are without excuse, every man of you who passes judgment. As becomes clear in verse 17, he was speaking primarily to Jews, who characteristically passed judgment on Gentiles, thinking them to be spiritually inferior and even beyond the interest of God’s mercy and care. But every man of you encompasses all moralists, including professing Christians, who think they are exempt from God’s judgment because they have not sunk into the pagan, immoral extremes Paul has just mentioned.  It also speaks to the ones who believe that God has completely turned His back on any group of people.  Until the time of the end, there will not be any groups turned away en mass.  It is true that God does harden some individual people at times and abandons them as individuals, but not as nationalities or groups.

Thou art inexcusable - This is not a reference to judging and does not mean that they were inexcusable for judging others; but that they had no excuse for their sins before God; or that they were under condemnation for their crimes, and needed the benefits of another plan of justification. As the Gentiles whom they judged were condemned, and were without excuse (Rom. 1:20), so were the Jews who condemned them without excuse on the same principle; and, actually, in a still greater degree.  The word literally means “without justification” or “without defense” and comes from a combination of a particle that negates the word and word that has, as its root, the idea of logical statement.  The idea is that the judgment of others while they were in the spiritual condition they were cannot be logically or rationally defended.

O man - This address is general to any man who should do this. But it is plain, from the connection, that he means especially the Jews. The use of this word is an instance of the apostle’s skill in argument. If he had openly named the Jews here, it would have been likely to have excited opposition from them. He therefore approaches the subject gradually, affirms it of man in general, and then makes a particular application to the Jews. This he does not do, however, until he has advanced so far in the general principles of his argument that it would be impossible for them to evade his conclusions; and then he does it in the most tender, and kind, as well as convincing manner, (Rom. 2:17, etc).

Whosoever thou art that judgest - The word “judgest” here is used in the sense of condemning. It is not a word of equal strength with what is rendered “condemnest”. It implies, however, that they were accustomed to express themselves freely and severely of the character and doom of the Gentiles. And from the New Testament, as well as from their own writings, there can be no doubt that such was the fact; that they regarded the entire Gentile world with abhorrence, considered them as shut out from the favor of God, and applied to them terms expressive of the utmost contempt. (Compare Matt. 15:27).

For wherein - For in the “same thing.” This implies that substantially the same crimes which were committed among the pagan were also committed among the Jews.  Paul’s initial argument is simple. In that you judge another, he points out, you condemn yourself, because you obviously have a criterion by which to judge, meaning that you know the truth about what is right and wrong before God. Remember that we are not seeing Paul condemn the basic idea of judging here, but that of judging wrongly or on the wrong basis.  The Jews were judging according to a human standard and according to a human righteousness.  God judges according to a holy standard and according to righteousness.  Even the Gentiles know the basic truth of God’s “eternal power and divine nature” through natural revelation (1:20). They also have a sense of right and wrong by means of the witness of conscience (2:15). The Jew, however, not only had both of those means of knowing God’s truth but also had the great advantage of having received His special revelation through Scripture (3:2; 9:4). Not only that, but almost all Jews of Paul’s day would have known something of Jesus Christ and of His teaching and claims even though they would not have believed He was the promised Messiah. Such knowledge would have made them still more inexcusable, in that their greater knowledge of God’s truth would have made them more accountable to it (see Heb. 10:26-29).

If relatively unenlightened pagans know basic truths about God and realize they deserve His punishment (1:19-20, 32), Paul was saying, how much more should Jews? The same principle applies to Christians, both nominal and true. Because they have greater knowledge of God’s truth they are more accountable to it and more inexcusable when they self-righteously judge others by it. James gave a special warning to those who aspire to be Christian teachers, reminding them that, because of their greater knowledge of God’s truth, they will be judged more strictly by Him (James 3:1). And the fact is, the moralists who condemn others’ sins are filled with their own iniquities which demand judgment by the same standard.

But it was not simply that those who are judgmental are wrong in assessing the moral standing of others but that they also are wrong in assessing their own moral standing. You who judge practice the same things, - It is clearly implied here, that they were guilty of offences similar to those practiced by the Gentiles. It would not be a just principle of interpretation to press this declaration as implying that precisely the same offences, and to the same extent, were chargeable on them. Thus, they were not guilty, in the time of the apostle, of idolatry; but of the other crimes enumerated in the first chapter, the Jews might be guilty. The character of the nation, as given in the New Testament, is that they were “an evil and adulterous generation” (Matt. 12:39; compare John 8:7); that they were a “generation of vipers” (Matt. 3:7; 12:34); that; they were wicked (Matt. 12:45); that they were sinful (Mark 8:38); that they were proud, haughty, hypocritical, etc.; (Matt. 23).  The self-righteous make two grave errors: they underestimate the height of God’s standard of righteousness, which encompasses the inner as well as the outer life (the theme of the Sermon on the Mount), and they underestimate the depth of their own sin. It is a universal temptation to exaggerate the faults of others while minimizing one’s own, to notice a small speck in someone’s eye but not the log in one’s own eye (see Matt. 7:1-3).

If such was the character of the Jewish nation in general, there is no improbability in supposing that they practiced most of the crimes specified in Rom. 1: On this verse we may remark,

(1)  That people are prone to be severe judges of others.  It is human nature for people to be critical of others.  We do not, by any natural impulse, give any benefit of the doubt to those around us.  We can do that, but we must choose, as an act of obedience to God and of demonstration of Christian character.  Not only are we prone to judge, but we are prone to judge harshly.  We are wont to hold others to standards that are difficult, if not impossible to attain to. 

(2)  this is often, perhaps commonly, done when the accusers themselves are guilty of the same offences.  This is the sad part.  We are hypocritical.  We ask others to do that which we are reluctant or unwilling to do ourselves.  This was one of the chief sins of the Pharisees.  They put heavy burdens on the people that they themselves were unwilling to bear.  This is human nature.

        It often happens, too, that people are remarkably zealous in opposing those offences which they themselves secretly practice. A remarkable instance of this occurs in John 8:1, etc. Thus, David readily condemned the supposed act of injustice mentioned by Nathan; (2 Sam. 12:1-6). Thus, also kings and emperors have enacted severe laws against the very crimes which they have constantly committed themselves. Nero executed the laws of the Roman Empire against the very crimes which he was constantly committing; and it was a common practice for Roman masters to commit offences which they punished with death in their slaves.

(3) We also need to note that remarkable zeal against sin may be no proof of innocence; (compare Matt. 7:3). The zeal of persecutors, and often of pretended reformers, may be far from proof that they are free from the very offences which they are condemning in others. It may all be the work of the hypocrite to conceal some base design; or of the man who seeks to show his hostility to one kind of sin, in order to be a salvo to his conscience for committing some other.

Many self-sanctified, blind Jews who read these words of Paul would immediately have concluded that what he said did not apply to them. Like the rich young ruler (Luke 18:21), they were convinced they had done a satisfactory job of keeping God’s commandments (cf. also Matt. 15:1-3). It was that self-righteous spirit that Jesus repeatedly undermined in the Sermon on the Mount. After declaring, “unless your righteousness surpasses that of the scribes and Pharisees, you shall not enter the kingdom of heaven,” He charged that the person who is angry at or insults his brother is as surely worthy of punishment as the murderer and that the person who lusts is guilty of adultery or fornication just as surely as the person who physically commits those immoral acts (Matt. 5:20-22, 27-28). Many Jewish men tried to legalize their adultery by formally divorcing their wives and then marrying the women they preferred. Because divorce had become easy and commonplace, some men repeatedly divorced and remarried. But Jesus warned: “I say to you that everyone who divorces his wife, except for the cause of unchastity, makes her commit adultery; and whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery” (v. 32). If one has enough knowledge to judge others, he is thus self-condemned, for he has enough to judge his own true condition.

Oh oh We note that the heart is deceitful. When we judge others we should make it a rule to examine ourselves on that very point. Such an examination might greatly mitigate the severity of our judgment; or might turn the whole of our indignation against ourselves.