1 Therefore you have nothing to say in your own defence, whoever you are who set yourself up as a judge. In judging others you condemn yourself, for you who set yourself up as a judge do the very same things. 2 And we know that God’s judgment falls unerringly upon those who do them. 3 You who judge those that do such things and yet are yourself guilty of them — do you suppose that you of all men will escape God’s judgment? 4 Or do you think lightly of his abundant kindness, patience, and forbearance, not realising that his kindness is meant to lead you to repentance? 5 Hard-hearted and impenitent as you are, you are storing up for yourself Wrath on the ‘Day of Wrath,’ when God’s justice as a judge will be revealed; 6 for ‘he will give to every man what his actions deserve.’ 7 To those who, by perseverance in doing good, aim at glory, honour, and all that is imperishable, he will give Immortal Life; 8 while as to those who are factious, and disobedient to Truth but obedient to Evil, wrath and anger, distress and despair, 9 will fall upon every human being who persists in wrong-doing — upon the Jew first, but also upon the Greek. 10 But there will be glory, honour, and peace for every one who does right — for the Jew first, but also for the Greek, 11 since God shows no partiality. 12 All who, when they sin, are without Law will also perish without Law; while all who, when they sin, are under Law, will be judged as being under Law. 13 It is not those who hear the words of a Law that are righteous before God, but it is those who obey it that will be pronounced righteous. 14 When Gentiles, who have no Law, do instinctively what the Law requires, they, though they have no Law, are a Law to themselves; 15 for they show the demands of the Law written upon their hearts; their consciences corroborating it, while in their thoughts they argue either in self-accusation or, it may be, in self-defence — 16 on the day when God passes judgment on men’s inmost lives, as the Good News that I tell declares that he will do through Christ Jesus.
17 But, perhaps, you bear the name of ‘Jew,’ and are relying upon Law, and boast of belonging to God, and understand his will, 18 and, having been carefully instructed from the Law, have learned to appreciate the finer moral distinctions. 19 Perhaps you are confident that you are a guide to the blind, a light to those who are in the dark, an instructor of the unintelligent, 20 and a teacher of the childish, because in the Law you possess the outline of all Knowledge and Truth. 21 Why, then, you teacher of others, do not you teach yourself? Do you preach against stealing, and yet steal? 22 Do you forbid adultery, and yet commit adultery? Do you loathe idols, and yet plunder temples? 23 Boasting, as you do, of your Law, do you dishonour God by breaking the Law? 24 For, as Scripture says — ‘The name of God is reviled among the Gentiles because of you’! 25 Circumcision has its value, if you are obeying the Law. But, if you are a breaker of the Law, your circumcision is no better than uncircumcision. 26 If, then, an uncircumcised man pays regard to the requirements of the Law, will not he, although not circumcised, be regarded by God as if he were? 27 Indeed, the man who, owing to his birth, remains uncircumcised, and yet scrupulously obeys the Law, will condemn you, who, for all your written Law and your circumcision, are yet a breaker of the Law. 28 For a man who is only a Jew outwardly is not a real Jew; nor is outward bodily circumcision real circumcision. The real Jew is the man who is a Jew in soul; 29 and the real circumcision is the circumcision of the heart, a spiritual and not a literal thing. Such a man wins praise from God, though not from men.