< Romans 2 >
1 You are therefore inexcusable, O man, whoever you are, that sits in judgment; for in judging another you are condemning yourself. You, the judge, are habitually practising the very same things.
2 "We know that God’s judgment against those who practise such vices is in accord with the truth," you say?
3 Very well; and do you suppose, you who judge those that practise such vices, and are doing the very same, that you will elude the judgment of God?
4 Or do you despise the riches of his kindness and forbearance and long patience? Do you not know that the kindness of God is leading you to repentance?
5 In your hardness and impenitence of heart you are treasuring up for yourself wrath on the Day of Wrath, when the righteous judgment of God is revealed.
6 For He will render to every man according to his works;
7 eternal life to those who by patience in well-doing strive for glory and honor and immortality; (aiōnios )
8 but anger and wrath upon those who are self-willed and disobey the truth, but obey unrighteousness.
9 Anguish and calamity will be upon every soul of man who practises evil, upon the Jew first, and also upon the Gentile;
10 but glory and honor and peace to every man who does good, to the Jew first, and also to the Gentile.
11 For there is no partiality with God.
12 For all who have sinned without law will also perish without law; and all who have sinned under law will be judged by law.
13 For it is not the hearers of law who are righteous in the eyes of God; nay, it is the doers of law who will be accounted righteous.
14 For when Gentiles, who have no law, obey by natural instinct the commands of the Law, they even though they have no law, are a law to themselves.
15 For they show that the work of the Law is written in their hearts, while their conscience bears them witness, as their reasonings accuse, or it may be defend, them,
16 in the day when God will judge the secrets of men by Jesus Christ, according to my gospel.
17 Now if you bear the name of a Jew, and rely upon law, and boast yourself in God,
18 and know his will, and can test the things that differ; if you are instructed out of the Law,
19 and are confident that you yourself are a darkness,
20 an instructor of the foolish, a teacher of the young, because you have in the Law the form of knowledge and of the truth - well then, you who are teaching others, do you ever teach yourself?
21 You who are preaching that a man should not steal, do you practise theft?
22 You who keep saying that a man should not commit adultery, do you commit adultery? You who hold idols in abhorrence, are you plundering their temples?
23 You who are making your boast in the Law, do you habitually dishonor God through your transgressions of the Law?
24 For the name of God is continually blasphemed among the Gentiles because of you, even as the Scripture itself says.
25 Circumcision does indeed profit, if you are obedient to the Law; but if you habitually break the Law, your circumcision is become uncircumcision.
26 So if the uncircumcised keeps the ordinance of the Law, shall not his uncircumcision be reckoned equivalent to circumcision.
27 And shall not those who are physically uncircumcised, but who keep the Law, condemn you who are a breaker of the Law, although you have a written law and circumcision?
28 For the real Jew is not the man who is one outwardly, and the real circumcision is not outward in the flesh;
29 but the real Jew is one inwardly, and real circumcision is heart- circumcision, spiritual, not literal, praised not by men, but by God.
