Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)

The claim of the Jew—and its problems

¹⁷ But supposing you call yourself a “Jew.” Supposing you rest your hope in the law. Supposing you celebrate the fact that God is your God, ¹⁸ and that you know what he wants, and that by the law’s instruction you can make appropriate moral distinctions. ¹⁹ Supposing you believe yourself to be a guide to the blind, a light to people in darkness, ²⁰ a teacher of the foolish, an instructor for children—all because, in the law, you possess the outline of knowledge and truth.

²¹ Well then: if you’re going to teach someone else, aren’t you going to teach yourself? If you say people shouldn’t steal, do you steal? ²² If you say people shouldn’t commit adultery, do you commit adultery? If you loathe idols, do you rob temples? ²³ If you boast in the law, do you dishonor God by breaking the law? ²⁴ This is what the Bible says: “Because of you, God’s name is blasphemed among the nations!”

The badge, the name and the meaning

²⁵ Circumcision, you see, has real value for people who keep the law. If, however, you break the law, your circumcision becomes uncircumcision. ²⁶ Meanwhile, if uncircumcised people keep the law’s requirements, their uncircumcision will be regarded as circumcision, won’t it? ²⁷ So people who are by nature uncircumcised, but who fulfill the law, will pass judgment on people like you who possess the letter of the law and circumcision but who break the law.

²⁸ The “Jew” isn’t the person who appears to be one, you see. Nor is “circumcision” what it appears to be, a matter of physical flesh. ²⁹ The “Jew” is the one in secret; and “circumcision” is a matter of the heart, in the spirit rather than the letter. Such a person gets “praise,” not from humans, but from God.