In Romans 10:2 we see that Paul is describing Israel's relationship with God. However, without identifying the definition of some keywords in these few verses we may miss something important. Let's read the first few verses here in chapter 10.
1 Brothers and sisters, my heart’s desire and my prayer to God for Israel is for their salvation.
2 For I testify about them that they have zeal for God—but not based on knowledge.
3 For being ignorant of God’s righteousness and seeking to establish their own, they did not submit themselves to the righteousness of God.
4 For Messiah is the goal of the Torah as a means to righteousness for everyone who keeps trusting.
5 For Moses writes about the righteousness that is based on Torah, “The man who does these things shall live by them.”
The first word that I would like to focus on is in verse 2. Knowledge. What knowledge is Paul talking about here? Knowledge of messiah? Knowledge of righteousness as found in the next verse? Let's do some digging in scripture and see if we can let scripture do the talking.
The fear of YHVH
How does one attain knowledge according to the scriptures? Let's look at the book of Proverbs. We find a verse in chapter 1 that seems to paint a fairly good picture:
7The fear of YHVH is the beginning of knowledge, but fools despise wisdom and discipline.
This seems pretty straight forward, but now we need to determine what fear of YHVH means? Lets look back a few books and see what YHVH's definition is. We find our answer in Deuteronomy 6.
1 “Now this is the commandment, the statutes and ordinances that YHVH your God commanded to teach you to do in the land you are crossing over to possess—
2 so that you might fear YHVH your God, to keep all His statutes and mitzvot that I am commanding you and your son and your son’s son all the days of your life, and so that you may prolong your days.
The context of these few verses in deuteronomy comes directly after we receive a recap of the entire Torah (law) that Moses and Israel received at mount Sinai. They were told to keep Torah to show that they fear YHVH and they would prosper and receive blessings. What was the attitude toward this? Were they upset and feeling like they were under bondage to "The LAW" ? No, please read verses 24-25.
24 YHVH commanded us to do all these statutes, to fear YHVH our God—for our good always, to keep us alive, as is the case this day.
25 It will be righteousness to us, if we take care to do all this commandment before YHVH our God, just as He has commanded us.’
Here we see very plainly that these people did not see this as a curse but that it is for their good always! And that keeping the commands of God would be their righteousness. Let's reread some of our other verses for some clarity. Please reread Proverbs 1:7.
7The fear of YHVH is the beginning of knowledge, but fools despise wisdom and discipline.
So putting this in context means keeping His commandments (Torah) is the beginning of knowledge. This is getting good! Now lets reread our passage from Romans and see if it fits in the narrative.
Putting it Together
1 Brothers and sisters, my heart’s desire and my prayer to God for Israel is for their salvation.
2 For I testify about them that they have zeal for God—but not based on knowledge.
3 For being ignorant of God’s righteousness and seeking to establish their own, they did not submit themselves to the righteousness of God.
Paul is saying here that Israel has zeal but they aren't fearing YHVH by keeping his commands.
He says they are ignorant of God's righteousness (Torah) and they sought to establish their own. This sounds oddly familiar doesn't it. Consider the words of Yeshua in Matthew 15. emphasis mine
1 Then some Pharisees and Torah scholars came to Yeshua from Jerusalem. They said,
2 “Why do Your disciples transgress the tradition of the elders? For they do not do the ritual hand washing when they eat bread.”
3 And answering, He said to them, “Why do you also transgress the commandment of God for the sake of your tradition?
4 For God said, ‘Honor your father and mother’ and ‘He who speaks evil of father or mother must be put to death.’
5 But you say, ‘Whoever tells his father or mother, “Whatever you might have gained from me is a gift to God,”
6 he need not honor his father.’ On account of your tradition, you made void the word of God.
7 Hypocrites! Rightly did Isaiah prophesy about you, saying,
8‘This people honors Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me.
9 And in vain they worship Me, teaching as doctrines the commandments of men.’”
Traditions of Men
It seems if Paul and Yeshua are trying to get the same point across here... They are both teaching against the "commandments of men"(bold emphasis) we know them now as the oral law (talmud) certainly there Are a lot of good things in the talmud! However, Yeshua is teaching that these men are holding tradition above the commands of God (red emphasis)! And in doing so are nullifying the word of God. This seems to be the same thing going on in today's day and age..... Let's continue in Romans.
4 For Messiah is the goal of the Torah as a means to righteousness for everyone who keeps trusting.
5 For Moses writes about the righteousness that is based on Torah, “The man who does these things shall live by them.”
Life and Blessings
This lines up directly with what we read out of Deuteronomy 6. In verse 6 we are told that He that does these things(Torah) shall have life (blessings) by them. This is an incredible picture Paul and Yeshua have laid out for us here!
Thank you all for reading I hope you learned something new and were blessed! Shalom