THE TRIBES OF ISRAEL (1)
THE TRIBES OF ISRAEL (1)
JT For the account of the birth of the sons of Jacob we must revert to chapters 29 and 30. In those two chapters we have a record of eleven of them, and Benjamin’s birth is recorded in chapter 35. Chapters 29 and 30 are important as furnishing the conditions into which the heads of the tribes are born; these conditions were very incongruous for the development of right family feelings and affections, for there were four mothers, two of whom were maid-servants. Obviously, God allowed all this unsuitability to show that He can develop love in spite of adverse conditions. I think it is well to bear this in mind, because the subject before us really involves the working out of love to a full result as seen in the heavenly city; so that we should not be discouraged when special contrariety arises, for God can work in spite of it — even using it to develop love in His people.
What is particularly important in chapter 30 is that Jacob proposed to leave Padan-Aram when Joseph was born; that is to say, that there was one child in the family who suggested Christ. Joseph, in a sense, is the spiritual link between God and the family, so that there was spiritual movement as soon as Joseph was born. If we keep this in mind I think we shall get help all through this subject; it is Christ coming in in the type, and later actually. In Joseph there is movement and ultimate recovery to a spiritual standard.
FL With reference to what you said as leading up to love, would the word, “... I loved Jacob, and I hated Esau” (Malachi 1:2), have a [p. 316] bearing?
JT It would indeed. That is where the work of God was, as over against Esau whom He hated.
AFM Would you say that obedience is another feature that runs along with love? Jacob “obeyed his father and his mother” (Genesis 28:7), in going to Padan-Aram, and therefore was a right father of these tribes.
JT Exactly. That comes out where Esau and Jacob are contrasted. They were both tested; Esau became exposed as the natural, but Jacob comes into view as the spiritual progenitor of these tribes; and this develops out of his obeying his father and his mother.
ANW Would that verse, part of which you quoted in prayer, confirm what you say, “... bearing with one another in love”, (Ephesians 4:2)? The unity of the Spirit is worked out in conditions that are uncongenial to love.
JT Yes. The extraordinary conditions that appear at the birth of these children would call forth the necessity for bearing with one another in love; and so, subsequently in the Scriptures, you will find that there is great variation in the order in which the tribes are mentioned — one put before others in certain instances, meaning that love being there, the tribes are capable of divine manipulation.
AP What about the conditions under which Benjamin was born?
JT That enters into what we were just saying. Chapter 35 is one of deaths and burials. At the birth of Benjamin, Rachel dies. The thought indicated in her is that she possessed the spirit of the mother. As Rachel died she called Benjamin, “Benoni”, or “Son of my affliction”. “Rachel weeping for her children” (Matthew 2:18), identifies her, as mother, with the sorrows of Israel. Chapters 29 and 30 show that Padan-Aram was the seed plot of the tribes. The moral element enters into those chapters, very [p. 317] much like ploughing — there were adverse conditions to be met, and a bickering between the mothers to be overcome; but God was there in some sense, for He had not left Jacob. If there is one thing especially in which God is with a believer, it is in relation to his family. He promised to be with Jacob, and He was with him, but necessarily at a distance on account of his state of soul; still, the seed was being sown. The names given to his children would indicate the potentiality in them, the first-born is named “a son”.
AR Rueben is born in adverse circumstances, for Leah was hated.
JT That would cause her most bitter exercise day after day, but Jehovah looked upon her affliction and gave her a son. Rachel was loved, but had no children at first; so that she did not escape balancing discipline — a feature of God’s school.
WFK Would you say that Rebecca had spiritual instincts in sending Jacob to Laban?
JT In Jacob you have “wholly a right seed”, (Jeremiah. 2:21). Rebecca, his mother, was a remarkable woman; in chapter 27, in spite of her scheming in order that Jacob should be blessed, she says to Jacob, “On me be thy curse, my son!” The spirit of Christ was thus exhibited before his eyes in his mother’s acceptance of his curse; showing how much Rebecca valued the purpose of God.
AAT The twelve tribes are often spoken of as a nation in contrast to the other nations surrounding them; are you developing the family features rather than what pertains to them as a nation?
JT You do not get the word ‘tribe’ until you come to chapter 49; that is to say, we have to view chapter 49 from the standpoint of Moses, who in that chapter is dealing with the tribes. For the moment we are considering the sons of Israel as persons; later we shall deal with them as tribes. We are at the source of the river now, but shall see [p. 318] it broadening out majestically as we proceed. It rises in a jungle, so to speak, but it gradually widens out. The lineage is traced down from Abraham and Sarah, Isaac and Rebecca. The seed was there, as in chapters 29 and 30, and showed itself in time; but in those chapters the seed plot is full of weeds.
FHL You get the full thought in the heavenly city; the names of the twelve tribes being inscribed on its gates.
JT Exactly; we see there what God brings out in that connection. The names are those of the twelve tribes of the sons of Israel. On the breastplate of the high priest the names were engraven according to the tribes. On the shoulder-pieces of the high priest the names were engraven in the order of their birth. They are loved as tribes, and supported according to their birth.
TA The collective thought is seen in the twelve names being in the breastplate.
CAM It is remarkable that the sons of Jacob received such suggestive names under the mixed conditions mentioned; and the names were not changed, as if the value attaching to each one should remain.
JT Each name would furnish material for a spiritual address. First you have a son in Reuben; then hearing, in Simeon; then the being united, in Levi; and finally, praise, in Judah.
CAM It would seem as though adverse conditions helped as to giving the names.
JT The circumstances of the birth furnished the name in each case, and they are intended as a background for the development of God’s thoughts. God overrules evil conditions, and makes them work for good.
AFM Would you say that chapter 46 represents the river to which you referred, as becoming [p. 319] defined?
JT Yes. You will notice, as we remarked, in chapters 29 and 30, we get a record of the names, and Joseph is the last mentioned, even coming after Dinah. And then Jacob moves; that is, the spiritual touch comes in at the end, and that is the link right through. In chapter 36 we have the generations of Esau given in full length. In chapter 37:2 we have: “These are the generations of Jacob. Joseph, being seventeen years old, fed the flock with his brethren; and he was doing service with the sons of Bilhah, and with the sons of Zilpah, his father’s wives”. That is all you get in that chapter as to the generations of Jacob. As was remarked, in chapter 46 we have the river, but it does not come into view in chapter 37. It is just one son loved of his father, and he is feeding the flock in adverse conditions, for the conversation of the sons of Bilhah and Zilpah was damaging, but Joseph was an overcomer; he represents the generations of Jacob until we come to chapter 46, where the river, as it were, is taking form. All the sons of Jacob are there, but grouped under their mothers.
FL Reference has been made to Revelation 21. What is the divine idea in bringing in the twelve tribes there?
JT I think it is to maintain the links of the work of God. The heavenly city is the full result of the work of God, and they have their place in it. They represent the primary work of God in a collective sense, because it is a matter of what is collective; so they have their place, as angels, too, have theirs. The tribes were in God’s hands, as the angels had been, in the maintenance of His government. The great idea of the city is government, but as the product of the work of God, and that work in its completeness coming into administrative service, so that the agencies He before employed are necessarily found there.
FL So it is the concentration of all the work [p. 320] of God that has gone before, headed up in the heavenly city.
JT Yes. It is a solid, as we have often remarked, but not an abstract idea; as a figure, the city represents the work of God substantially.
WB-w The stream of love begins in Joseph.
JT Yes. In chapter 30 he represents Christ, though in a small way, but quite enough to move Jacob towards his country. Then in chapter 37 at the age of seventeen more of Christ is seen, so to speak. Indeed, he becomes a remarkable type of Christ, for he is loved by his father, who makes him a vest of many colours; and in that same chapter he tells his brethren of his dream and that their sheaves bowed down to his sheaf. He thus furnishes light in a collective way, in that the tribes bowed down. What a fine lesson it is, to learn to bow down to Christ. Then he sees the sun, the moon, and the eleven stars doing obeisance to him. What light shines in all this! Personally Joseph represents “the generations of Jacob”; but when we come to chapter 46 we have them all, but grouped under their mothers.
JS Jacob and Joseph stand out distinctly in chapter 37.
JT Yes; it is the suggestion of the father and the son. Jacob loved Joseph, and made him a vest of many colours, what follows discloses the light of God in that young man of seventeen!
WB-w Joseph’s sheaf “remained standing”. All the others bowed down.
JT The position the tribes occupy in the heavenly city shows the great objective to which God is working.
JT The city is the great end in view, as the gathering up of all His work. It is not an abstract thought, but a substantial one which a cube implies. It displays the fullness of God’s work, but as measurable;
[p. 321] it is not love in Christ in infinitude, but love in the subjects of God’s work. We see how it begins, typically, here. If we get our hearts touched with the thought of Christ in Joseph — first as a babe, moving Jacob toward Canaan, and then as a young man, denoting Christ in supremacy, and furnishing light for all — we shall be helped as we pursue this subject.
WB-w Why did you begin to read, in chapter 46, about the sons of Israel going down to Egypt?
JT Well, I thought we ought to see the river broadening out, as it were; They are all Jacob’s sons, but grouped under their mothers; the number of the children of each mother is given separately, and then the total. They all went down to Egypt. As it says, “... with Jacob had they come”, (Exodus 1:1). Joseph and his family were already there. When you come to Exodus, they are in Egypt in relation to their father, there is no mention of the mothers.
ARS Why do the groups of children get less and less as we go down chapter 46?
JT God’s sovereignty enters into it. Leah was hated, and God took account of this and gave her a large number of children; she represents in a sense, the assembly, as over against Israel (Rachel), who is first loved but last obtained. Genesis 30:22 says, “God remembered Rachel”.
ANW What element do the daughters suggest?
JT Just the family side. You have to distinguish between the family and the tribe, the latter being official and more extensive. The tribe involves rule. The word ‘tribe’ involves sceptre, or rod of authority.
AEM Would you say that we now have a family introduced in Scripture that is to subsist according to God’s will?
JT Yes. The promise as to this family was primarily to Abraham, who was to be a father of a [p. 322] multitude. Abram and Isaac, we may say, are merged in Jacob. First, his name was Abram, which means “high father”; that is to say, moral elevation. One has to be morally elevated before he is worthy of children, just as a wife should learn to keep house before she is a mother of children; (Psalm 113). And then Abram is called Abraham, “Father of multitudes”. He was worthy of this change of name: “For I know him”, says Jehovah, “that he will command his children and his household after him, and they shall keep the way of Jehovah, to do righteousness and justice, in order that Jehovah may bring upon Abraham what he hath spoke of him”, (Genesis 18:19). That is the great idea of father, and this goes down to Isaac and on to Jacob, and all is merged in the twelve tribes. Abraham “dwelt in tents with Isaac and Jacob, the heirs with him of the same promise” (Hebrews 11:9), which confirms what we are saying.
AP There was a scattering of the human family in Babel, and now God lays a foundation for gathering, in Jacob, on spiritual lines.
JT Yes. All the families of the earth are to be blessed in Abraham; God never loses sight of that. But the idea of gathering comes in in Judah, as we shall see: “And unto him shall the gathering of the people be”, (Genesis 49:10). This is, typically, Christ. In the final gathering the great principle seen in the twelve tribes will remain, for God never loses sight of it. Paul said, “... our whole twelve tribes serving incessantly day and night hope to arrive”, (Acts 26:7).
TA The apostle James wrote his epistle to the twelve tribes.
JT Which shows they were in the mind of God at all times.
WB-w I notice in Revelation 7, the sealing begins with Judah. The gathering principle would be seen in him as [p. 323] head.
JT That is what you might expect: “And Jehovah shall save the tents of Judah first” (Zechariah 12:7); so that when He moves in relation to Israel by and by, He will begin with Judah.
WB-w Why did not Jacob move when Judah was born?
JT It was clearly a question of God’s sovereignty; He waited for Joseph because Christ was presented in him. It is for us to look for touches of Christ in each other. When you get a touch of Christ in a brother, however many or few there may be in a meeting, you get a special link with God, and the result is a spiritual movement.
ANW You would expect that, as the suggestion of Christ comes in so early through Joseph; but why does Christ come of the tribe of Judah?
JT It is again a question of the sovereignty of God, which Judah often represents: “Our Lord has sprung out of Juda”, (Hebrews 7:14).
WB-w Judah is over against the breakdown in Reuben, Simeon and Levi?
JT Yes; Reuben, the first-born, represents the natural side. “Thou shalt have no pre-eminence”, Jacob says to him.
AAT In this history, it seems to me quite acceptable to God to have four mothers and one father in a family, but in Christianity that does not seem to be countenanced. How do you explain that?
JT It exists, however, today. Christendom represents a variety of mothers, and this makes the work of God exceedingly difficult. Every system is suggestive of a mother; Roman Catholic, the Anglican, the Lutheran, the Greek, the Presbyterian, the Wesleyan, etc. Mother represents a system, as we learn from Galatians and elsewhere; and if that system is of man it makes the work of God very difficult. The Father idea is clear enough. God is recognised as Father in the systems I have named,
[p. 324] but the mother according to God is lacking. The mother in the true sense is the assembly (Galatians 4:26), and no sect can represent the assembly. God’s children may be, and are, in these sects, and the Lord knows every one of His own who is in these denominations, but then they have a great disadvantage because of the systems in which they are found. Yet God never lost sight of the tribes — now the assembly — and wherever His work is unhindered in a soul, that soul recognises the assembly as presented to him.
AFM There is a strong element of bondage in these mothers, and if one has been brought up in a religious system, and would move out of it he has, so to speak, to “cast out the maid-servant and her son”, (Galatians 4:30).
JT Exactly; that is the language of Paul to the Galatians; we are sons of the free woman — Jerusalem above is our mother. Jerusalem above is not exactly heaven; it implies moral elevation.
JS In the present difficult condition of things, you would seek to present some fresh feature of Christ that it might direct the people of God to Him, and thus to the assembly.
JT If you come to the Lord, He will tell you about the assembly; He will give you to understand that He loves the assembly, that it has the first place in His heart, and that He wants us as in relation to it.
AP Are the religious systems illustrative of the jungle you spoke of?
JT Yes. There is great difficulty in ministering now, because all these isms are in the way; yet God is working. Jacob represents the father side. No ‘denomination’ would be Christian if it did not recognise the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, involving the Deity of the Son; it would be apostate, such as Christian Science and Unitarianism. Every ‘orthodox’ Christian denomination recognises [p. 325] the Father. Thank God for that! But the mother, in the true sense, is wanting. They have not that thought at all; not one of them has it. In view of this, room has to be made for the Holy Spirit who gives the idea of the unity of the saints: “There is one body and one Spirit, as ye have been also called in one hope of your calling; one Lord, one faith, one baptism; one God and Father of all”, (Ephesians 4:4 - 6) That is how the truth stands to which God has graciously recovered many of His own.
AR The first four sons of Leah bring out these features — son, hearing, united and praise, the last two answering to Ephesians.
JT Then the fifth son, Dan, is judgment. That is an element so necessary always, but wanting in the “denominations” — the power to judge and refuse evil. It says, chapter 49:16, “Dan will judge his people, as another of the tribes of Israel”.
GMcP Does Joseph maintain the link as being of the same mother as Benjamin?.
JT The moon associated with the eleven stars in Joseph’s dream (Genesis 37:9), indicates that in the mind of God the tribes had but one mother. Jacob says, “Thy mother and thy brethren”.
FL What you say as to the many mothers represented in Christendom convinces us that not one of them is big enough to represent the assembly; not one of them is catholic and therefore does not embrace all. On that account we are obliged to leave the systems, so as to stand on a right basis.
JT The nearer you get to the Lord the more He will impress you with what the assembly is to Him: “Christ also loved the assembly, and has delivered himself up for it”, (Ephesians 5:25).
RWS Does the mixed seed become wholly right? A river purifies itself. You expressed the importance of the seed being wholly right. Now, it is [p. 326] mixed.
JT The divine nature underlies the truth of the tribes and is sure to extricate itself. In John 9, you see the man who had been blind, whose eyes the Lord opened, with no one to help him as he was challenged by the Pharisees; but he extricated himself, and stands out at the end as a worshipper of the Son of God. This well illustrates the work of God. The Lord evidently had purposely left him so as to bring him to this point.
AR Is that what you look for in spite of incongruities — that assembly features should come to light in us?
JT Yes; you have hardly anything of the four mothers later. It is Rachel and Leah that build the house of Israel according to Ruth 4. The two maid-servants are left out. The further on you get in the work of God, the more the true idea comes to light of the father and the mother; Jacob understands this, and says to Joseph in relation to his second dream: “I and thy mother and thy brethren”, (chapter 37:10).
CAM The mother heart of Israel seems to be typified in Rachel: “Rachel weeping for her children”, (Jeremiah 31:15).
JT Yes; Leah is not mentioned after Ruth, but Rachel is brought into the New Testament and merges in the great principle of the mother there.
JTJr Chapter 30 speaks of Rachel envying her sister. It seems that the handmaids became mothers on the principle of envy.
JT It shows, as we were remarking, the incongruous state of the mothers of these children, seen in the bickering and envying. One might ask, How can God develop anything out of that condition? We often hear such a remark made with regard to a meeting! It may be in a low condition, the brethren biting and devouring one another as in Galatia, but God can work love out to a result even there. Therefore [p. 327] we must not be discouraged in such circumstances, although humbly feeling them as before God.
CB Is this river still flowing?
JT Yes; it is the work of God in His people, seen tribally, and now in relation to the assembly.
ABP There is unity in the sheaves bowing down.
JT Yes; they “came round about and bowed down” to Joseph’s sheaf.
ABP The first thing Jesus did, according to Luke, after He had chosen the apostles, was that he descended with them. The first lesson He would teach them was how to go down.
WGT This second dream of Joseph’s is the complement of the first.
JT Quite; it brings in the father and the mother as well as the brethren. It is a heavenly view. One dream is the earthly view; and the other, the heavenly.
A.F.M. Why eleven stars?
JT Well, that was necessary from the fact that he was one of the brethren. I suppose it is Christ making up the fulness. He is the first-born among many brethren.
AFM In Revelation 12 the twelve stars were the woman’s crown, and she was clothed with the sun. That would be Israel in another position.
JT The full thought of Israel as mother is in Revelation, but in Genesis Christ is owned as supreme among the brethren; with Him present nothing is lacking. The number eleven is emphasised at the endings of the gospels, but Christ being there, there is nothing wanting. After He ascended the need of the twelfth apostle was expressed.
JS Peter stood up with the eleven (Acts 2:14), the number was complete.
AR The sheaf standing up represents Christ in resurrection, the sun, the moon, and the stars, the heavenly position.
TA [p. 328] Peter and John going up to the temple together would show the workability of love.
JT Exactly; a broken number is no hindrance to going on, for Christ makes up the loss, as in Mark 9:8, “Jesus alone with themselves”. He came up to the eleven on the mountain, and some doubted even there; He did not stop to question or correct them but went on. He “spoke to them, saying, All power has been given me”, (Matthew 28:18). Whether there be eleven or one, it matters not, for all power is given to Him in heaven and on earth.
AP Does not the fact that the twelve tribes are mentioned in Ezekiel 48 show that the thought goes through even the very darkest days?
JT It does. Besides the idea of the tribes, each has a portion in the land, “And the gates of the city shall be after the names of the tribes of Israel” (verse 31). We are on the verge of all this now, being of the heavenly city; although living in a very dark day outwardly.
ANW What did Paul mean particularly when he spoke of “our whole twelve tribes”, (Acts 26:7)?
JT Well, I think he had the concrete thought before him in some sense. He could refer to himself as of the tribe of Benjamin, and was serving God. Others of the tribes were serving God also.
FL Anna, in the temple, represents what is now called one of the lost tribes — the tribe of Asher; showing that there is no tribe lost in the sight of God.
JT James wrote to the twelve tribes, not to imaginary ones.
AAT Are those twelve tribes merged into the assembly?
JT The idea is in the assembly. Spiritually, it is a question of the work of God in its results. It is now a question of the unity of the assembly — the body of Christ. James and Paul were in a transitional period. They spoke of twelve tribes, but we [p. 329] do not now, save as typically representing unity proper to the assembly.
AAT Israel will be carried through into the millennium as an earthly nation.
JT Yes; but it exists, spiritually, now. Paul speaks in Galatians 6:16 of Christians as “the Israel of God”.
AP Is it not just as possible to embrace all saints in our minds today, as it was for Paul when he embraced the twelve tribes in his affections?
JT That is the lesson. The saints, whether in the ‘denominations’ or not, belong to the assembly, and we must embrace them in our affections, although most of them are not gathered in the recognition of Christ and the assembly. In Josiah’s passover “the children of Israel that were present” (2 Chronicles 35:17), got the gain of the great occasion. We, in principle, send letters, as Hezekiah did, to others and invite them as far as able, but though they fail to respond we go on, through grace, and the Lord does not fail us.
TA There may be only two or three in a local company, but, in affection, they would embrace all.
JT Returning to Genesis 49:1 it says: “And Jacob called his sons, and said, Gather yourselves together, and I will tell you what will befall you at the end of the days”. That is the responsible side — Jacob and his sons; but then it says in verse 2: “Assemble yourselves, and hear, ye sons of Jacob, and listen to Israel your father”. That is the spiritual side. Then in verse 28: “All these are the twelve tribes of Israel, and this is what their father spoke to them; and he blessed them: every one according to his blessing he blessed them”. We must bear in mind that Moses is writing this from the standpoint of the tribes, not simply the persons, although Jacob’s sons are addressed. God blesses every one of the tribes. Although he speaks of apostasy in Dan, yet Dan is [p. 330] blessed. That is a principle of great encouragement at the present time. Whatever exists as unsuitable, the assembly goes through in its entirety as blessed.
FHL Is the suggestion of sons of a prince carried through from the beginning?
JT That is the idea — the sons of Israel. Jacob got his name as wrestling with God, by it he was a prince. He obtained power with God and with men, so that the thought of tribes, as some of us may know, implies rule, a sceptre, or rod. It is a question of rule, but in a tribal or collective sense.
AFM Why does Jacob refer to “the end of days”?
JT It is a prophetic outlook. God declares the end from the beginning, see Isaiah 46:10, having blessing in view. Blessing appears three times in Genesis 49:28, applying to each of the tribes.
AP Would there not be much opposition between the utterance and the fulfilment of this prophecy?
JT The details of the chapter show this. Each tribe is mentioned, and the details evidence much positive evil, but when the work of God is seen at the end — the blessing is there.
WB-w In going through the wilderness, do you view the Israelites as tribes or rather in families?
JT Principally as tribes; the family idea subserves the tribal.
FL In connection with “the end of days”, we might think of what the end of the prophet Ezekiel brings out, as already alluded to. Abraham could see “the city which has foundations” (Hebrews 11:10), and Jacob had light as to what God was going to do.
JS Would the idea of tribe, meaning rule or sceptre, indicate the place Israel will have in the world to come?
JT I think so; the place they have in the city.
ANW How does the use of the sceptre work out [p. 331] today?
JT It is the moral authority that God gives that is found amongst the people of God.
A.N.W. To deal with evil?
JT Quite so; what could we do without that authority?
TA 1 Corinthians would represent the sceptre?
JT Quite so; the power to maintain the rights of God.
AFM Some of the twelve tribes are mentioned very discreditably by Jacob; these would have to judge themselves in order to take up positions around the tabernacle.
JT That would be the value of Jacob’s ministry to hand the tribes on to the ministerial book. Genesis is the family book. Exodus is the ministerial book, but one book ministers to another, and Jacob ministers to Exodus; that is, the tribes came down with him. It says, “With Jacob had they come”, (Exodus 1:1). He brings them down, and then prophesies to them. The prophecy, with the other service he rendered them, was preparatory to the ministry of Moses. Spiritually it was for the tribes to judge and regulate themselves in the light of this chapter.
AP Is Numbers the working out of the idea of the sceptre?
JT Numbers is the kingdom of God, answering to Romans and 1 Corinthians; it is a wilderness position; that is to say, God is king in the midst of His people, and they are all around Him — three tribes in the east under the tribal head of Judah; three in the south under Reuben; three in the west under Ephraim; and three in the north under Daniel You can see how the principle of rule is there, the blessed God Himself being in the midst of tribes.
AP Is the family idea the greatest and highest?
JT Yes; but in relation to administration it subserves the tribal thought. Characterised by twelve, the tribes represent the great collective idea;
[p. 332] that is, all formed in the divine nature and under God’s hand for the administrative thoughts of His love.
AAT The heavenly city is spoken of as the bride, the Lamb’s wife, of which the saints form part today; why does the thought of the twelve tribes come in? — we are not Jews!
JT Well, it is there; the names of the twelve tribes of the sons of Israel are on the gates. It is a spiritual thought, and shows that God incorporates all His earlier thoughts in the heavenly city. We can take in these thoughts of the tribes, they are not foreign to us; we understand them even better than Israel ever did.
CB “For he is not a Jew who is one outwardly”, (Romans 2:28).
JT That is right, “but he is a Jew who is so inwardly ... whose praise is not of men, but of God” (verse 29).
APT Timothy is an example of a Jew inwardly; he is going to be in the heavenly city.
JT It is remarkable that in the address to the assembly at Philadelphia the Lord refers to the Jews in a spiritual sense: “... who say that they are Jews and are not”, (Revelation 3:9). In Philadelphia they are all true Jews, spiritually. They are able to take in all the divine thoughts set out in Israel and the tribes.