Romans 10: Believing Gentiles and Unbelieving Jews. In Romans chapter 10, Paul continues his process of further explaining the key points he has already made. He approaches several of his key points from different angles. Four of these key points that he re-examines are the following: Point 2. The Law of Moses is unable to save or justify Jews, let alone Gentiles. Neither circumcision nor obedience to the Law of Moses are necessary any longer. Point 3.
All humans, Jews and Gentiles alike, are saved and justified only by God's grace through faith in Jesus Christ. Point 4. There is no partiality with God. Jews and Gentiles stand as equals before Him. Believing Jews and believing Gentiles together make up the new Israel of God. God has not been unfair to the Jews in bestowing grace and salvation on the Gentiles.
Paul patiently tries to help the Jews to see that the unbelieving Jews have fallen short of salvation because they continue to seek it through the Mosaic Law instead of through faith in Christ. He shows how uncomplicated Christ has made it for all mankind to find salvation. However, most of the Jewish people continued to reject Christ's salvation, and to resent that salvation has been offered to the Gentiles, apart from the law.
In the last half of this chapter, Paul continues his dialogue with his fictional Jewish opponent, who seeks to excuse the Jews' unbelief. Romans chapter 10 verses 1 through 4. The folly of seeking righteousness in the Law. Verses 1 and 2," Brothers, my heart's desire and prayer to God for Israel is for their salvation. For I testify about them that they have a zeal for God, but not according to knowledge." Once more, Paul testifies about his deep love and concern for the nation of Israel.
He will be expressing some hard truths concerning the Jews in this chapter. So Paul again emphasizes that he is not their enemy. In fact, as Chrysostom puts it, Paul strives to find at least a shadow of an excuse for them. To that end, Paul points to the zeal the unbelieving Jews have for God. Sadly, however, their zeal is not according to knowledge. Paul himself once had such zeal.
In describing his past life, he told the Philippians," Concerning zeal, persecuting the church." Such misguided zeal led the Jews to reject and blaspheme Christ. Verse 3," For being ignorant of God's righteousness and seeking to establish their own righteousness, they have not submitted themselves to the righteousness of God, seeking to establish their own righteousness." What does Paul mean when he says the Jews were seeking to establish their own righteousness?
The person who can best explain this phrase is Paul himself. He uses a similar expression in Philippians, where he writes," Not having my own righteousness, which is from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which is from God by faith." So when Paul talks about the Jews seeking their own righteousness, he is talking about their trying to find righteousness through the Mosaic Law. Tertullian comments," Indeed, the Jews had a zeal for God, but it was not zeal according to knowledge.
In fact, they were ignorant of Him, for they were oblivious of His plan to bring about the fulfillment of the law through Christ. As a result, they maintained their own righteousness in opposition to Christ. Accordingly, the Creator testifies to their ignorance concerning Him. Israel has not known Me. My people have not understood Me, Isaiah 1:3. And as to their preferring the establishment of their own righteousness, he says," Teaching for doctrines the commandments of men." Isaiah 29:13 Septuagint.
Theodoret adds," Their unreasonable adherence to the law is what he here calls their own righteousness.
For they were still zealous to observe it, even though it had now come to an end." Chrysostom concurs, saying," Paul calls it their own righteousness, either because the law was no longer in force or because it was one of trouble and toil." Constantius writes," By their own righteousness," Paul means" the law of the Pharisees, for the sacrifices of the law and the other things which were a shadow of the truth, which were to be fulfilled in Christ, ceased to operate once he had come." But they did not want to
believe this.
The apostle was right to talk of their own righteousness, because it was not of God, but of themselves. In summary, the law was now obsolete, and God had given mankind a new way of righteousness through Christ. The Jews were going about to establish their own righteousness by insisting on following an obsolete path to righteousness. Instead of following God's new direction, they have not submitted themselves to the righteousness of God. What does it mean to submit to the righteousness of God?
Chrysostom applies this to our initial salvation, and he comments," Paul designates that which comes from faith as God's righteousness, for it comes entirely through the grace from above." However, as we have already seen multiple times, the early Christians recognized that we must maintain an obedient love-faith relationship with Christ after our initial justification. So Origen understands God's righteousness to include the righteousness that comes from a humble, obedient walk with Christ after baptism.
Origen writes," Because they were ignorant of God's righteousness, the Jews tried to establish their own righteousness." That is, the righteousness that was seen by men. Of course, instead, they should have obeyed the righteousness of God who is Christ. Is Paul teaching imputed righteousness? Many Christians today take Paul's words in this passage out of context and teach that we believers have no righteousness of our own. Instead, Christ's righteousness is imputed to us in the books of heaven.
Some Christians even say it is wrong for us to try to obtain personal righteousness by faithfully obeying Christ. They say we can never have any righteousness of our own. However, there are over a hundred verses in the Bible, in both the Old and New Testaments that describe individuals as being righteous. For example, Luke writes," There was in the days of Herod the king of Judea, a certain priest named Zacharias, of the priestly division of Abijah.
He had a wife of the daughters of Aaron, and her name was Elizabeth. They were both righteous before God, walking blamelessly in all the commandments and ordinances of the Lord.
Furthermore, Jesus said," I tell you that many prophets and righteous men desired to see the things which you see and did not see them, and to hear the things which you hear and did not hear them." In chapter 3 of this commentary on pages 83-85, I provide a much fuller list of the Scripture passages that designate various humans as being righteous. Of course, no human is righteous in an absolute sense. Thankfully, God in His loving-kindness does not expect perfection from us.
He only requires the faithfulness and obedience that fallen humans can give. Romans 10: 4," For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes." Here Paul clarifies what he meant when he said the Jews were seeking to establish their own righteousness. The law had ended with Christ. Jesus completed the law and brought it to fulfillment.
That is why the Jews were guilty of trying to establish their own righteousness when they insisted on finding righteousness through the law after it had been fulfilled. The end of the law. The Greek word" telos"" end" has several meanings, as does its English counterpart. First, it can mean determination or conclusion of something. In that sense, as we have discussed, Christ is the end of the law in that He brought it to a conclusion. Novatian writes," Christ has now come, and He is the end of the law.
He has revealed all the obscure parts of the law, all those things that antiquity had covered with clouds of mystery. Thus, all those things, i.e. clean and unclean animals, have returned to their original blessedness now that the law is completed. At the same time, the Greek word" telos end" can mean the object or purpose of something. In this sense, Christ is the object or end to which the law pointed. The law was always intended to lead people to Christ.
As Paul told the Galatians," The law has become our guardian to bring us to Christ." Galatians 3:24 Theodoret writes," The law has directed us to the Lord Christ, so the person who trusts in Christ fulfills the intention of the law." Chrysostom adds," If Christ is the object of the law, he who does not have Christ, even if he seems to have the righteousness of the law, does not really have it." On the other hand, if someone has Christ, even though He has not correctly fulfilled the Law, He has received the whole of
righteousness