TWO KINDS OF JEWS
Once we learn to interpret the Bible symbolically, we see that words can have two or more meanings. Knowledge and Wisdom, for example, can be either worldly or Godly. And there are religious laws and spiritual laws. Therefore, great discernment is required to know the difference between good and evil.

STUDY TIP: See Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil and Tree of Life for understanding of these two concepts.

In his letter to Roman Jews, the Apostle Paul reveals what it means to be a spiritual Jew:

Romans 2:23-29 You who boast in the law, do you dishonor God by breaking the law? 24 For, as it is written, “The name of God is blasphemed among the Gentiles because of you.” 25 Circumcision indeed is of value if you obey the law; but if you break the law, your circumcision becomes uncircumcision. 26 So, if a man who is uncircumcised keeps the precepts of the law, will not his uncircumcision be regarded as circumcision? 27 Then those who are physically uncircumcised but keep the law will condemn you who have the written code and circumcision but break the law. 28 For he is not a real Jew who is one outwardly, nor is true circumcision something external and physical. 29 He is a Jew who is one inwardly, and real circumcision is a matter of the heart, spiritual and not literal. His praise is not from men but from God.

COMMENTARY: Boasting in the law means boasting about personal obedience to religious laws. God does not want people to obey religious laws written down by men because they lead to spiritual death.  He wants them to obey his spiritual laws written on their hearts because they lead to spiritual life. People who have God’s laws written on their hearts have no need or desire to boast because they know that what they possess is a gift from God that they did not earn through human effort.

The book of Romans is written to Jews who live in Rome. If true Jewishness is a matter of where you live, ethnic Jews who live in Rome and anywhere else outside of Israel, would not and cannot be true Jews. If they are not true Jews, what are they? The answer is that they are cultural, religious, ethnic Jews. They are not real Jews because their hearts have not been circumcised. They observe Jewish traditions and receive praise from other Jews for their faithfulness, but God does not acknowledge them as true Jews because he judges them by their hearts — not their religious activity.

The book of Romans is also written to Christians and followers of other religions. Christians believe that saying they are followers of Christ, embracing a few basic beliefs, and obedience to a few guidelines for Christian living are what they need to do to get to heaven. These attitudes are the same as religious Jews who believe that their ethnicity and obedience to Jewish religious rules are their qualifications for righteousness.

The main point of this scripture is that the status of being a real Jew is not fixed in the flesh, where flesh may refer to circumcision or ethnicity, or any external, physical feature, label (i.e. Jew, Christian, etc.), or religious activity. Paul uses the example of circumcision because it is the key attribute of ethnic Jews. But he says clearly that the condition of being spiritually circumcised depends on obedience to God’s spiritual laws — not on where Jews live or what they do to observe religious laws with their bodies (i.e. their flesh.)

Because the book of Romans was written to all Romans (i.e. to both Jews and Gentiles), it has application for all religious people because boasting about faithfulness to observe religious laws is always a feature of religion. Jews, therefore, symbolically represent all religious people because all religious people boast in one way or another about their religious activities.

STUDY TIP: See Pride, Arrogance, Boasting, Power and Humility for understanding of how these characteristics are intertwined with religion.

Scripture uses the example of Jews and their rigid adherence to circumcision to make the point for all religious people that all religious laws lack any spiritual value. Paul makes his point by saying that such boasting is the equivalent of blasphemy.

The relationship between Jewish and Gentile believers that Paul addresses here continues to exist today. Jews boast that they have favor with God because they are faithful to keep all the points of the law of Moses — including circumcision. For Jews, their righteousness is based on keeping the letter of the law. Gentile believers — which includes Christians — also believe that righteousness depends on obedience to religious laws, doctrines and rituals, but the difference between them and Jews is that, with the exception of the Ten Commandments, they focus on a different set of laws. Both religions err for lack of understanding that God’s view of righteousness is based on the condition of the heart and not on external, physical facts — not on literal application of any human religious law.

By making this particular point regarding circumcision, Paul makes the general point regarding literal obedience to the Law of Moses which God considers to be the Old/First Covenant. In many places, the bible compares Old/First Covenant religion to the New Covenant (i.e. where the law is written on the hearts of people). Paul says that anyone (not just ethnic Jews) who is physically circumcised as a matter of religious obedience (i.e. keeps the written code of the law regarding circumcision, and all other religious doctrines) actually breaks God’s spiritual law. This principle is made clearly in the following scripture:

1-Corinthians 7:18-19: Was any one at the time of his call already circumcised? Let him not seek to remove the marks of circumcision. Was any one at the time of his call uncircumcised? Let him not seek circumcision. 19 For neither circumcision counts for anything nor uncircumcision, but keeping the commandments of God.

What we read here is that being a Godly Jew is not a matter of ethnicity, legal citizenship, geographical residency or of circumcision, or of obedience to religious laws or activities which are designed by, enforced by, and observed by men. People who do such outward things receive praise for their religious behaviors from men — not from God. This is a hard principle for any religious person to accept.

When we read the bible carefully, we see that Godly Jewishness is a spiritual condition that is a matter of having a circumcised heart which only God can see. With this spiritual understanding we can then see that ethnic Jews can be spiritual Jews or not — depending on the condition of their hearts. Similarly, ethnic Gentiles can also be spiritual Jews or not — depending on the condition of their hearts. In other words, God only looks at the condition of the heart — not at the external person, his/her ethnicity, nor his/her religious beliefs and practices (e.g. circumcision, etc.).

Religion that is displayed in the flesh, (e.g. circumcision, obedience to  the Mosaic law, baptisms, rituals, singing, going to church, paying tithes, etc.) and done in public where it can be observed by others, does not matter to God. He calls all these activities flesh. Religion is also represented in labels by which people self-identify themselves so that they will gain acceptance in religious communities. All of these external markers that people invent and use to create a public, religious identity and an image of holiness have meaning to other people, but they have no meaning to God — except to the degree that they break the Third Commandment.  What matters to God is the condition of the heart. In fact, he hates all religious rituals.

STUDY TIP: Biblical references to the heart are always symbolic of the New Covenant where the law is written on the heart. See Faith, Grace, Mercy, Peace, Love, Heart, Glory, Blessing, Spirit and Truth for understanding of code words that refer to the heart.

See Circumcision for the spiritual meaning of this physical event.

The spiritual understanding of circumcision confirms that neither ethnicity nor religious beliefs and practices matter to God. Therefore, when Gentile Christians read about Israel and Jews, they should not think of them as ethnic or religious identities. At times they are true/spiritual Jews and at times they are simply ethnic Jews who are no more righteous in God’s eyes than Gentiles. The same is true for spiritual Israel and ethnic Israel which is are aggregations of Jewish individuals.

Because the bible does not give any clues as to when Jewish biblical characters, and Israel, are  spiritual or ethnic, bible readers who do not have God’s spiritual laws written on their hearts will always wrongly interpret biblical Jews and Israelites as being both spiritual and ethnic Jews. This default interpretation leads to gross misunderstanding of the bible that leads to the formation of religion. New Covenant disciples do not make these mistakes because Godly wisdom written on their hearts informs them about the heart motives of bible characters.

In modern times it is impossible discern cultural Jews from true spiritual Jews. Jews who make a big deal out of their ethnicity and their religion will always be just ethnic/religious Jews. True Jews, on the other hand, are impossible to identify because they do not identify themselves as being Jewish or as adherents to any other religion. They are New Covenant disciples who will not do anything to make religious names (i.e. Jew, Christian) for themselves. They understand that God knows their hearts and rest with that knowledge. They have no need or desire to advertise the condition of their hearts. They are content to let their words and deeds testify about their righteousness.

Ethnic Jews teach and believe that their righteousness is established and confirmed by their ethnicity and religious practices. They believe this because they do not understand that God is only interested in the condition of their heart — not on their ethnicity or their religious practices (e.g. circumcision and observance of the letter of the law).

Christians make the same mistake because they also do not understand that God is only interested in the condition of their hearts. Both Christians and Jews believe that their righteousness is established in them because they were born into Jewish or Christian cultures that permit them to call themselves Christian or Jew and/or because they observe religious practices and claim to have certain beliefs that are commonly associated with Judaism or Christianity. They ignore what God says about the condition of their hearts and focus on their religious beliefs and traditions.

As a result, both Jews and Christians are deceived in to thinking that their righteousness is based on their religion. They do not realize that their respective religions are Defiled Religions and not Pure Religion. In other words, true spiritual Jews area New Covenant disciples with clean, pure hearts who practice Pure Religion, and do not practice Defiled Religion.

The Jews of the bible, of course, should have always been faithful practitioners of Pure Religion but they were not always faithful. To their credit, the bible reports that they were faithful some of the time but they also had  seasons of backsliding when they slipped into practicing Defiled Religion. Applying the definition of a spiritual Jew to the Israel’s back-and-forth transitions between Pure Religion and Defiled Religion, we must conclude that in God’s eyes, being a spiritual Jew is not a condition that is absolutely fixed. It changes when a spiritual Jew slips back into Old/First Covenant religious behaviors.

We find this principle in the following scriptures in Deuteronomy:

Deuteronomy 30:1-6 “And when all these things come upon you, the blessing and the curse, which I have set before you, and you call them to mind among all the nations where the LORD your God has driven you, 2 and return to the LORD your God, you and your children, and obey his voice in all that I command you this day, with all your heart and with all your soul; 3 then the LORD your God will restore your fortunes, and have compassion upon you, and he will gather you again from all the peoples where the LORD your God has scattered you. 4 If your outcasts are in the uttermost parts of heaven, from there the LORD your God will gather you, and from there he will fetch you; 5 and the LORD your God will bring you into the land which your fathers possessed, that you may possess it; and he will make you more prosperous and numerous than your fathers. 6 And the LORD your God will circumcise your heart and the heart of your offspring, so that you will love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul, that you may live.

COMMENTARY: When Israel sinned, God exiled it to foreign nations where Old/First Covenant religion was practiced. But, although Israel had broken its covenant relationship with God, he remained faithful to his part of the covenant by returning them from exile and restored them to their possession in the  Promised Land which is back to the New Covenant.

Matthew 22:36-40: 36 “Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?” 37 Jesus replied: “ ‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ 38 This is the first and greatest commandment. 39 And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ 40 All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.”

STUDY TIP: See How to Love Your Neighbor

Deuteronomy 10:12-16 “And now, Israel, what does the LORD your God require of you, but to fear the LORD your God, to walk in all his ways, to love him, to serve the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul, 13 and to keep the commandments and statutes of the LORD, which I command you this day for your good? 14 Behold, to the LORD your God belong heaven and the heaven of heavens, the earth with all that is in it; 15 yet the LORD set his heart in love upon your fathers and chose their descendants after them, you above all peoples, as at this day. 16 Circumcise therefore the foreskin of your heart, and be no longer stubborn.

COMMENTARY: It is not a good practice to reduce God to a list of do’s and don’ts. The result of this practice is laws which are the essence of Old/First Covenant religion. Nevertheless, we find in this series of verses a succinct summary of God’s expectations for his people:

The above scriptures reinforce the fact that ethnicity is not the unique, singular condition for being part of chosen Israel.  Deuteronomy 10:12-16 summarizes what is necessary to accomplish all of the other conditions in the list: Circumcise the foreskin of the heart. Obviously the human heart does not have a literal foreskin like the male sexual organ with which literal circumcision is associated. We must conclude, therefore, that circumcision is a spiritual event in which both men and women can participate and not an act meant exclusively for men.

Just as obviously, we conclude from this scripture that anyone, regardless of ethnicity, can satisfy God’s qualifications for being a true Jew. Thus, it is not necessary to bear the label Jew or Christian in order to be one of God’s chosen people. Anyone, regardless of ethnicity or religious heritage, who circumcises the foreskin of his or her heart is a descendant of Abraham and therefore a true/spiritual Jew. People who do not have the foreskin of their hearts circumcised can call themselves anything they want, but this self-labeling is only useful for creating a public identity that others recognize. Labels mean nothing to God.

STUDY TIP: See Religious Rituals and Traditions: Circumcision, Baptism, Communion for an in-depth discussion of circumcision.