Zeal Without Knowledge

“Brothers, my heart’s desire and prayer to God for them is that they may be saved. For I bear them witness that they have a zeal for God, but not according to knowledge.” -Romans 10:1–2

Paul further testifies that while the Jews failed to believe on Christ and did not attain the righteousness of God, it was not for a lack of zeal. The Jews indeed have a zeal fo God, he argues, but it was not a zeal that was approximated to knowledge of God’s plan of redemption.

To the Jews, a zeal for God was not unimportant. It had a long tradition in Israel. In their zeal, Simeon and Levi killed Shechem and his tribe for raping their sister Dinah (Genesis 34). Phinehas, in his zeal, killed the Israelite and the Midianite woman in a brazen sexual liaison that undermined the purity of Israel (Numbers 25). There was also the zeal of the prophets of God (1 King 19 & 2 Kings 9-10), and the zeal of the Maccabean revolt against Antiochus Epiphanes. There were zealots in the midst of Israel during Christ’s ministry (Matthew 10:4).

And Paul himself had been zealous of the Lord “circumcised on the eighth day, of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews; as to the law, a Pharisee; as to zeal, a persecutor of the church; as to righteousness under the law, blameless” (Philippians 3:5–6 Cf. Acts 8-9, 22:3).

But zeal without knowledge doesn’t render salvation. As St. Augustine noted, “It is better to limp in the right way than to run with all our might out of the way.”