dial shall not judge?

To judge means: to separate, to pick out, select, choose. By implication, it means to condemn, punish—avenge, conclude. It also carries the idea of having discernment. The passage where Jesus said, “Do not judge, or you too will be judged” (Matthew 7:1) goes on to show us how to have discernment. Love is the proper motivation for not judging and for using good judgment.

The Bible says we can’t judge what is in someone’s heart. We may assign bad motives to someone who ignores us when, in reality, he is fighting hidden battles. He may have just learned his spouse is unfaithful or his child has leukemia—or both. Or we may project good motives on someone in order to avoid conflict.

To judge another person shows pride. Only God knows what is in a person’s heart and the effort it takes to function where they are. We may assume the late mom is irresponsible. But she may be a single mother working two jobs and tending a special needs child.

A conference speaker said he misjudged a man who sat on the front row and slept through most of his lectures. Obviously, this man lacked spiritual interest. That assessment flipped 180 degrees when the man’s wife told him her husband was very ill and heavily medicated. He’d begged his doctor for permission to come that weekend to hear his favorite speaker.

We aren’t to judge believers who practice their faith in ways different than us. We may decide someone is spiritually immature because they don’t pray, dress, or practice faith in the way we do. Maybe you don’t like the Scripture tattoo she wears on her ankle or that he won’t pray aloud in groups.

When we stand before God, He won’t ask us why our friend or family member did what they did. He will ask us to give an account of ourselves. To manage ourselves is a full-time job. The Holy Spirit doesn’t need us to do His job.

God is the only one who knows the best way to deal with someone. We might be too harsh or too lax. If I judge them by carrying out vengeance God will deal with me. Do I want God to discipline me or them? We are not to judge or discriminate for or against people based on their race, gender, wealth, or status (James 2:2-9; 4:11-12; 5:9).

We are not even to judge ourselves. Sometimes people have super-sensitive consciences while others are less sensitive (1 John 3:20; Psalm 139:23-24).

Paul said that the works we do in this life will be judged (1 Cor. 3:10-15). This includes the time and energy we spent judging others with our words and thoughts (Matthew 5:22). And as seen in James 2:9 above, when we judge others, we break God’s law and are convicted by the law as lawbreakers. Those who criticize others invite criticism. When I complained to my children about leaving their dishes out, they began to point out whenever I left something out! What we dole out comes back to us.

While the Bible denounces faultfinding, it applauds fruit inspecting (Matthew 7:15-20). “By their fruit you will recognize them” (Matthew 7:17). If a person has a pattern of wrong or hurtful behavior, that information helps us make sound decisions.  “Take no part in the worthless deeds of evil and darkness; instead, expose them” (Ephesians 5:11, NLT)

When a church member was involved in sexual sin Paul said “For my part, even though I am not physically present, I am with you in spirit. As one who is present with you in this way, I have already passed judgment in the name of our Lord Jesus on the one who has been doing this” (1 Cor. 5:3). In other words, Paul didn’t need to interview the man to find out why he was doing what he did. He judged the man’s behavior based on the Scriptures.

Many people suffer because they suppress the negative vibes they pick up. They don’t want to appear judgmental. Yet Jesus said, “be shrewd as serpents and innocent as doves” (Matthew 10:16, NASB).

While we are to “judge not” as in belittle, punish, or condemn, we are to use sound judgment as in be discerning, evaluating, and shrewd. The rest of Matthew 7 explains how to do this.

We know “judge not” doesn’t negate right judgment because God’s laws are summed up four-letters—LOVE (Romans 13:10). The Bible says, “Love must be sincere. Hate what is evil; cling to what is good” (Romans 12:9). Love is stronger than tolerance. It seeks the eternal good of the one loved. It protects even when it uncomfortable to do so. If something is harmful (evil in the above verse), love stays away from it. Good parents monitor their children’s diets, friends, hobbies, and screen time to protect their bodies, hearts, and minds.

A woman told me a tragic story of the peril of ignoring discernment. A neighbor came to her apartment late one night and asked to come in. Her internal alarm sounded, and she said, “No.” But when he told her he was depressed and needed to talk with someone and she was the nicest person he knew, a debate raged in her mind. This man has been drinking; it is late; I don’t feel good about this… On the other hand, this may be my opportunity to win him to Christ. How can I call myself a Christian and turn him away? She let him in, and he raped her. Don’t let the fear of being judgmental cause you to throw away your God-given discernment. Satan misused Scripture when he tempted Jesus in the wilderness (Matthew 4:1-10). He uses the same tricks today. Adolf Hitler said, “What luck for leaders that men don’t think.” May that not be true of us.

It crushes tender spirits and causes people to hide their spiritual gifts. Discernment protects the church and us. When we sense something is wrong, we must not let a distorted view of “judge not” guilt us into ignoring this radar, even if it concerns a family member, coworker, or ministry leader we care about or who is respected by others. With practice and the help of the Holy Spirit we can train our senses to discern good and evil (Hebrews 5:14).

“Judge not,” like all of Jesus’ commandments, is summed up in love. “Love does no harm to a neighbor. Therefore love is the fulfillment of the law” (Romans 13:10).

Drawing from her personal walk with Christ, twenty-four years as a Christian counselor, and decades as a Bible teacher, Debbie W. Wilson helps people live in God’s grace so they can enjoy fruitful and full lives. She is the author of Little Women, Big God and Give Yourself a Break. Her latest book, Little Faith, Big God, is to be released February 2020. She and her husband Larry founded Lighthouse Ministries, a nonprofit ministry offering counseling, life and relationship coaching, and Bible studies. She is an AWSA (Advanced Writers and Speakers Association) certified speaking and writing coach. Debbie enjoysa good mystery, dark chocolate, and the antics of her two standard poodles. Share her journey to refreshing faith at debbieWwilson.com.

The horoscope, penned by syndicated astrologer Jeraldine Saunders, clarified the meaning of the cryptic verse in the next sentence. “It’s not for you to say,” wrote Saunders, “if someone wants to do something that you consider foolish or silly.”

In this digestible, secularized gloss of the verse, Jesus’s imperative suddenly feels like a tolerationist bromide on par with “to each her own” and “live and let live.” Or, as one education scholar in 1964 called it, a “harmless aphorism.”

But is that really all it is? Judging by the array of sources and intellectual byways opened up by the JSTOR Understanding Series for the King James Version of the Bible, the answer to this question is a definitive “No.”

Best to begin at the beginning. Even in the early days of Christian thought, this verse proved tricky. It was one that second-century Christian theologian Tertullian returned to many times throughout his life. According to historian Jaroslav Pelikan’s article on the early church father, Tertullian wrestled with Jesus’s proscription in an eschatological frame. Given the close connection between ethics and eschatology in Jesus’s teachings, Tertullian concluded that the command to “judge not” is a reminder to us that judgement and punishment are not ours to mete, but God’s.

Yet even if judgement ultimately resides with a power greater than ourselves, for centuries Bible readers have struggled with putting that interpretation into practice, given how naturally judgement comes.

Nineteenth-century American Christians were especially torn. Poet John Greenleaf Whittier wrote that the verse had “an awful import” because it so definitively placed judgement not with “blind & weak” people but with “Him to whom judgement belongeth.” And Abraham Lincoln famously used the verse to great effect in his Second Inaugural address when he noted of the South, “it may seem strange that any men should dare to ask a just God’s assistance in wringing their bread from the sweat of other men’s faces; but let us judge not that we be not judged.” Scholars have debated whether Lincoln meant the verse to be a gesture of mercy or a satiric jab. If contemporaneous reports are any indication, the audience that day thought the latter, since this part of the speech elicited from them “a half laugh.”

Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints prophet Joseph Smith attempted to answer the verse’s difficulties in his translation of the Bible by rendering the saying as, “Judge not unrighteously, that ye be not judged.” Here, the critical interjection of the adverb “unrighteously” changes the character of the verse. No longer are we prevented from judgement in every instance. Instead, Jesus places constraints on how we judge.

To an extent, this view is in accordance with that of former president of the American Philosophical Society, Jeffrie G. Murphy, although Murphy adopts a secular approach. In his view, the passage is not, in fact, “a prohibition against making any critical moral judgments at all but is rather a caution against making final judgments of deep character.” In this reading, the verse calls us to self-reflection and introspection, not quietism. We can still pass judgement, but before we do we must exercise extreme restraint, scrutinizing ourselves in such a way as to close the gap between ourselves and the person upon whom we want to pass judgement.

Clearly, Jesus’s maxim is one that lends itself to a variety of interpretations. It has been used to justify a broad-minded toleration towards the actions of others, as a recognition of our own moral limitations, or as a call for deep and sustained self-analysis. A definitive answer eludes us. What is clear is that it demands we pay attention to one of the most consequential activities in our moral life–how we view and assess our fellows–one that is too often exercised like an unconscious reflex.