things to be but loss for the excellent knowledge of Jesus Christ my Lord: for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them but as dung, that I may gain Christ: and may be found in him, not having my justice, which is of the law, but that which is of the faith of Christ Jesus, which is of God, justice in faith: ’
Here, then, we see this second defect of the Jews’ ‘justice’: — the thinking that we are just by our own merit; which defect makes such virtue impure, and — as St Paul calls it — nothing but dung, because it is nothing but pride. Let us, then, make it our study to avoid this spirit, by humbly attributing to God whatever little good we may do.
But the third defect of justice in the Jewish people was that its actual works were exceedingly imperfect in comparison with the perfection to which man is raised by the Gospel. We are bound by this to reach a greater height of virtue than was even reached by those of the old law who did really well. And wherefore? On account of that 1 excellent knowledge ’ which St Paul says we have of Jesus Christ. And this is one of the truths that our Lord includes in the saying: ‘unless your justice abound more than that of the Scribes and Pharisees — ’ &c.
