Textual Harassment: Vol II

Judge not, that you be not judged. For with the judgment you pronounce you will be judged, and with the measure you use it will be measured to you. Why do you see the speck that is in your brother's eye, but do not notice the log that is in your own eye? Or how can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ when there is the log in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your brother's eye. (Matthew 7:1-5)

This has to be the favourite passage in all of the Bible for those have bad theology or live in sin. The command "judge not" is usually taken to mean "form no conclusions about the right-ness or wrong-ness of another person's beliefs/practices." It certainly is a handy verse to throw out when you feel conviction of any sort is on its way - a quick "judge not" can speedily send the attacker on a hasty retreat.

Many Christians have actually bought into the lie that they aren't supposed to make any kind of judgments about other people. It's a seductive lie, because it sounds as if it comes straight from the lips of Jesus. But it is truly a lie - Christians are to judge.

The modern interpretation of the words "judge not," essentially assumes that Jesus said nothing important after the first two words of verse 1. It might reference more of the passage, but it isn't really necessary, because the conclusion depends on reading only the first two words. If we would stop and ponder the phrase "that you be not judged," we might ask ourselves: is Jesus teaching that if we do not judge others that God will not judge us?

Of course He isn't! We know from the testimony of Jesus Himself that everyone will be judged, in such verses as John 12:48; we also read it in the testimony of the apostles in Acts 10:42. Jesus' second coming will be one of judgement. He will judge each and every person who has ever lived. So Jesus' statement simply cannot mean that God will refrain from judging us if we refrain from judging others - we know we will be judged when Jesus comes again, whether we ourselves judge others or not. This underscores an important point: there is a difference between saying what the Bible says and meaning what the Bible means. You can quote Scripture perfectly and still not have the Bible on your side if you refuse to interpret it properly.

But I digress. I think the key phrase in interpreting the passage is verse 2: "For with the judgment you pronounce you will be judged, and with the measure you use it will be measured to you." The issue Jesus addresses is not whether one should make judgments at all; the issue is the standard used to judge. Jesus does not command us to not judge at all, but to judge with the same standard for everyone, ourselves included. 


This becomes clearer still in verse 5: "You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your brother's eye." Notice three things:

1. Hypocrisy is the issue, not judgment. The issue is whether we judge others more harshly than we are willing to judge ourselves.
2. Jesus is focusing on the standard by which we judge. Our natural inclination is to judge everything in our brother's eye as being a log, and everything in ours as a mere speck. But Jesus reverses this and says, "you have a double standard - you judge others harshly when they have specks, but all the while you do not acknowledge your own logs. Again, hypocrisy is what He condemns, not judging. 
3. Notice that Jesus, in an imperative tense no less, says we should first remove the log from our eye and then take out the speck from our brother's eye. Taking specks out of our brother's eye is a good thing; judging others is a good and a necessary thing. The issue is not whether we should do it; the issue is how we do it. 

We can say that it is a necessary thing because of what follows in verse 6:

Do not give dogs what is holy, and do not throw your pearls before pigs, lest they trample them underfoot and turn to attack you. (Matt. 7:6)

Who is a dog? Who is a pig? What are the holy things that we shouldn't give to these people? Judgments, one and all.

It is also helpful to look at the same statement as it's recorded in Luke's gospel:

Judge not, and you will not be judged; condemn not, and you will not be condemned; forgive, and you will be forgiven; give, and it will be given to you. Good measure, pressed down, shaken together, running over, will be put into your lap. For with the measure you use it will be measured back to you. (Luke 6:37-38)

Look at the parallelism used, especially in regards to "forgive, and you will be forgiven," which I wrote about here. Notice: we are each of us going to be judged, regardless of whether we have judged others; we will be condemned on the basis of rejecting the gospel, not on the basis of condemning others; we will be forgiven on the basis of believing the gospel, not on the basis of our forgiveness. The point is, "with the measure you use it will be measured back to you." Jesus is talking about what standard we use.

Coming back to the common misinterpretation, it should be obvious that the use of Matthew 7:1 to teach that a Christian cannot hold anyone else up to a standard is simply false; it ignores both the immediate context and the rest of the testimony of Scripture.

The question is therefore not, "am I judging such-and-such a person?", but  "by what standard am I judging this person?" In judging our brother (and ourselves) we must appeal to the only trustworthy standard - the Word of God. It is when we hold others to a standard higher than that of the Bible that we become guilty of judging others.

So, I won't tell you not to judge me. I will tell you to judge me only by the words of Scripture. As David said in 1 Chronicles 21:13: "Let me fall into the hand of the Lord, for his mercy is very great, but do not let me fall into the hand of man."