Blasphemed Among the Gentiles

What Your Bible Says

Thou that makest thy boast of the law, through breaking the law dishonourest thou God? For the name of God is blasphemed among the Gentiles through you, as it is written.

Romans 2:23–24 KJV

Paul is speaking to those who boast in the Law but break it. He says the nations mock Yahuah’s name because of them, and he says Scripture already said so.

What the Jewish Bible Says

Now therefore, what have I here, saith Yahuah, that my people is taken away for nought? they that rule over them make them to howl, saith Yahuah; and my name continually every day is blasphemed.

Isaiah 52:5 KJV

The Name is mocked all day long. But the verse does not say where, and it does not say because of whom.

What Changed

The Greek has two things the Hebrew lacks: “on account of you” and “among the Gentiles.” Paul’s whole point rests on those words. The people who carry the Name and break the Law give the nations their reason to mock it.

Without them, Isaiah 52:5 reads as a wrong done to Israel by its captors. With them, it is also a shame Israel brought on the Name before the nations.

Which One Is Right?

The Greek Bible, translated before Messiah, has both phrases.

Paul quotes them and says, “as it is written.”

Hebrew scrolls of Isaiah from Qumran read like the Masoretic here. The two phrases are not in any known Hebrew copy.

Ezekiel, in the Hebrew, says the very thing the Greek says: Israel “profaned my holy name, when they said to them, These are the people of Yahuah” (Ezekiel 36:20). The Greek words are not in Isaiah’s Hebrew, but their message is Hebrew Scripture.

Purpose of the Change

No motive evident: wording variation only. The pair still matters because Paul quoted the Greek wording as Scripture, and Ezekiel’s Hebrew says the same thing.