You say it is wrong to commit adultery, but do you commit adultery? You condemn idolatry, but do you use items stolen from pagan temples?
Parallel translations
- WEB You who say a man shouldn’t commit adultery. Do you commit adultery? You who abhor idols, do you rob temples?
- KJV Thou that sayest a man should not commit adultery, dost thou commit adultery? thou that abhorrest idols, dost thou commit sacrilege?
- BSB You who forbid adultery, do you commit adultery? You who abhor idols, do you rob temples?
- NKJV You who say, “Do not commit adultery,” do you commit adultery? You who abhor idols, do you rob temples?
- NASB You who say that one is not to commit adultery, do you commit adultery? You who loathe idols, do you rob temples?
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Quick answer
You who forbid adultery, do you commit it? You who detest idols, do you rob temples? Hidden sin contradicts outward religious claims.
Overview
Paul continues exposing the contradiction between profession and practice with the examples of adultery and idolatry. Even those who abhor idols may profit dishonestly from idolatry ('rob temples'). The point is not that every Jew did these specific sins, but that all fall short of the law they claim to uphold, undermining any boast in mere possession of it.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 12
- Mal 3:8Will a man rob God? Yet you rob me! But you say, ‘How have we robbed you?’ In tithes and offerings.
- Matt 12:39But he answered them, “An evil and adulterous generation seeks after a sign, but no sign will be given to it but the sign of Jonah the prophet.
- Mark 11:17He taught, saying to them, “Isn’t it written, ‘My house will be called a house of prayer for all the nations?’ But you have made it a den of robbers!”
- Mal 1:14“But the deceiver is cursed, who has in his flock a male, and vows, and sacrifices to the Lord a defective thing; for I am a great King,” says Yahweh of Armies, “and my name is awesome among the nations.”
- Ezek 22:11One has committed abomination with his neighbor’s wife; and another has lewdly defiled his daughter-in-law. Another in you has humbled his sister, his father’s daughter.
- Acts 19:37For you have brought these men here, who are neither robbers of temples nor blasphemers of your goddess.
- Jer 9:2Oh that I had in the wilderness a lodging place of wayfaring men; that I might leave my people, and go from them! For they are all adulterers, an assembly of treacherous men.
- Matt 16:4An evil and adulterous generation seeks after a sign, and there will be no sign given to it, except the sign of the prophet Jonah.” He left them, and departed.
- Jer 5:7“How can I pardon you? Your children have forsaken me, and sworn by what are no gods. When I had fed them to the full, they committed adultery, and assembled themselves in troops at the prostitutes’ houses.
- Jer 7:9–10Will you steal, murder, and commit adultery, and swear falsely, and burn incense to Baal, and walk after other gods that you have not known,
- Jas 4:4You adulterers and adulteresses, don’t you know that friendship with the world is hostility toward God? Whoever therefore wants to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God.
- Mal 1:8When you offer the blind for sacrifice, isn’t that evil? And when you offer the lame and sick, isn’t that evil? Present it now to your governor! Will he be pleased with you? Or will he accept your person?” says Yahweh of Armies.
Themes, concepts, people & topics
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Christ at the center
Paul unfolds the gospel in full: Christ our righteousness received by faith, the second Adam in whom many are made righteous, in whose death and resurrection we are buried and raised.
How Romans 2:22 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.
Original language
Each word below is tagged with its Strong’s number — tap one to see the underlying Greek word, its meaning, and every verse that uses it.