Romans 2:22

‘You who say that a man should not commit adultery, do you commit adultery?'

Another sin central to the covenant was adultery. Again Paul probably knew that adultery was fairly widespread among Jews, even the most strict. The pull of the flesh is strong.

‘You who abhor idols, do you act as temple-robbers?'

The point here is that they claimed to abhor idols, and indeed in many cases did so, and yet themselves in some way benefited from heathen temples by illicitly making gains out of temple possessions. It is quite possible that Paul knew of instances where Jews, in areas where they had a strong community, had attacked heathen Temples, seeing them as a kind of sacrilege, possibly in retaliation for what was done to synagogues, and that they had then appropriated for themselves what they found there on the grounds that it was defiled, but could become undefiled in the hands of Jews. Indeed writing to Rome it is just possible that he had in mind the incident in 19 AD when a rich Roman lady converted to Judaism and was persuaded to give gifts to the Temple at Jerusalem, only to have her gifts misappropriated by the Jews concerned (Josephus ‘Antiquities' 18:81 ff), thus robbing the Temple. It resulted in the expulsion of Jews from Rome. But the parallel with abhorring idols really requires the temples to be heathen ones. However, there may indeed have been incidents where Jewish traders handled goods stolen from temples in the course of business, and did a thriving trade, thus sharing in the guilt. Businessmen are notorious for excusing doubtful behaviour on the grounds that it is ‘good business' ‘Temple-robbers' simply suggests that they made illicit gains in some ways out of the temples, but its mention here suggests wide-scale practises. Acts 19:37 may indeed suggest that there were Jews who were temple-robbers.

Some, however, do see the temple in mind as the Temple in Jerusalem and relate it to the first part by making it mean that they abhor false religion, seeming to be very holy, but take dishonest advantage of their own Temple, revealing that they are unholy. This could then refer to robbing God by withholding tithes (Malachi 3:8) or by dishonest practises in the Temple like the ones that aroused the anger of Jesus (Mark 11:15).