Paul and Jesus

The Romans divided the world into “Greeks” and “barbarians,” that is, those who were civilized through exposure to the language and culture of Greco-Roman society, and those on the frontiers of the empire who “babbled” in a foreign tongue. The Jews had their own sharp, twofold division of humankind—themselves and all who were non-Jews. If one was not Jewish, either by birth or conversion, one was classified as among the “nations”—which meant the rest of the world. The word “nation” in Greek (ethnos) meant “Gentile” for the Jews.

For the Jews such a division of humankind was not merely a matter of ethnic or cultural solidarity. Jews were scattered throughout the Roman Empire and beyond, speaking various languages, and many Jews living under Roman rule were thoroughly “Greek” in both language and culture. What separated Jews from all the other “nations” was a double claim. First, that they served the only true and living God, so that the so-called gods of the nations were mere idols—which meant “no gods,” or even false gods. Second, that God had chosen Abraham and his descendants, had made a special covenant with them, and had revealed to them the Law, or Torah, of Moses, the observance of which set them apart from all the other nations. Not all Jews believed or accepted these claims in the same way, or agreed on what it meant to live as a Jew according to the Torah. Jews, and the forms of “Judaism” they practiced, or chose to ignore, were as varied in Roman times as they are today.⁴

Non-Jews were not left out of this Jewish vision of humanity, since God was the Creator of all humankind and on the Day of Judgment would hold Jews and non-Jews alike accountable for their behavior.⁵ Righteous Gentiles were to shun the worship of idols, turn to the one true God, and live by the universal ethical precepts revealed in the Torah as applicable to all humankind. This did not make one a Jew, and conversion to Judaism was neither required nor expected. Such Gentiles were known as “God-fearers” who, alongside the people of Israel, stood as witness to the one God and his ethical standards of righteousness. At Jewish synagogues, spread through all the cities of the ancient Roman world, one would find non-Jews gathered alongside the Jewish worshippers to hear the reading of the Torah and the Prophets and to listen to the preaching of Moses.⁶ In the gospels, Jesus once commended a Roman centurion at Capernaum in Galilee as having more faith than he had found in all of Israel—warning the people that the kingdom of God would include those from all nations, gathered alongside Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, with Jews who were unrighteous cast out (Luke 7:1–10; Matthew 8:5–13). Paul shared this perspective, contrasting one who is “uncircumcised” but lives a moral life with one who is “circumcised” but lives immorally (Romans 2:25–29). It was his view that the non-Jew would have favor with God while the Jew would be condemned at the Judgment.

If Paul had left it at that, his position would have been acceptable to other Jews, including James, Peter, and the Jerusalem church. But he said things that they found unacceptable. To say that a “righteous” Gentile is more acceptable to God than an “unrighteous” Jew is one thing, but then to go on to affirm that such a Jew, without Christ, is not a “real Jew” while the righteous Gentile is actually the true Jew is quite another. That would imply that the Gentile has thus “replaced” the Jew, an idea that would have been repudiated by most Jews.

What Paul’s Jewish teachers would have said is that Jews remain Jews no matter what their level of adherence to God’s covenant with Israel, while Gentiles remain Gentiles, whether righteous or unrighteous—but that both will be judged by the moral standards applicable to each. In other words faith in God and living a moral life are not the determiner of Jewishness, but rather participation in the special covenant made with Abraham is. One became part of that Abrahamic covenant by birth, since God had made the covenant with Abraham and his descendants. One could also become a Jew through conversion to Judaism. If a Gentile underwent such a formal conversion he or she was considered thereafter a Jew, or member of the house of Israel, and no longer a Gentile. Even a Jewish figure as illustrious as the great second-century A.D. rabbi Akiva ben Joseph was from a family of converts to Judaism. Indeed the rabbis say it is forbidden, once one has converted to Judaism, even to refer to the person’s past.⁷ From a Jewish perspective Jews remain Jews, Gentiles remain Gentiles, and God will judge both accordingly.