Just as Jannes and Jambres opposed Moses, so also these teachers oppose the truth. They are men of depraved minds, who, as far as the faith is concerned, are rejected.
2 Timothy 3:8 (NIV)
In our regular morning perusal of the news over breakfast, Wendy and I have been reading a lot of conversations regarding the erosion of institutions that were once trusted. The government, main stream media, and academia are typically the trinity of institutions most often named and discussed.
I have dear friends who have spent their entire careers in the world of academia. They will often share with me how much things have changed across their careers and how the academic world looks far different than the one they entered in their graduate school years. As they share their stories, it is often done with hesitation and fear knowing that their career will be in jeopardy if anyone finds out that they are in any way critical of the institutional powers or speaking their honest thoughts and concerns.
I thought about the conversation regarding academia and my friends fearful critiques as I read the chapter this morning and Paul’ prescient description of a world in which individuals are “always learning but never able to come to a knowledge of the truth.”
Speaking of always learning, Paul references two dudes named Jannes and Jambres who opposed Moses. The Bible nerd in me geeked out a bit this morning because the passage that Paul is referencing is Exodus 7:11-12 when Pharaoh’s “sorcerers and magicians” were able to make their staffs turn into snakes before Moses’ snake devoured theirs. But Exodus doesn’t name Pharaoh’s sorcerers. Yet Paul references them as if Timothy well knows who they are by name.
So, where did the names come from?
There is a whole group of books and writings that were widely read for centuries along side the books of the Bible. In fact, the Bible used by Roman Catholic and Orthodox believers still contain some of these books even though they have been excluded from Protestant Bibles for the last few hundred years. At the time of Jesus and Paul, these writings were read, studied, and well-known. Among them were works like The Targum of Jonathan, which was an Aramaic paraphrase of the Torah and The Book of Jannes and Jambres. Jesus, the apostles, and the early Christian fathers all read these works, commented on them, and quoted them just as Paul is doing to Timothy.
Jewish tradition from these works added that Jannes and Jambres were sons of Balaam. Yes, that Balaam. The same Seer for Hire and his donkey from the book of Numbers. Fascinating. I learned something new this morning.
To Paul’s point, however, it’s one thing to learn interesting facts but another thing to absorb and embrace the truth that’s sitting there in plain sight. Jannes and Jambres the sorcerers were archetypes of the type of false teachers Paul is warning Timothy to avoid. People who possess knowledge and perform spiritual theater but lack genuine transformation of the heart. Paul’s point is profoundly moral: just as Jannes and Jambres’ power was exposed as fraudulent before all Egypt, so too the vanity of false teachers who are ever learning but resistant to Truth and common sense will ultimately “be clear to all.”
So, in the quiet this morning I find personal whisper tucked in Paul’s allusion: Beware the inner magician—the one who can perform piety but resists obedience. The soul is capable of counterfeiting light, of dazzling others while existing within an inner darkness. But as in Pharaoh’s court, truth will always swallow imitation.
I find inside my heart and mind this morning a desire to be anchored not in performance, but in presence—rooted in the quiet, honest power of a heart that doesn’t need illusion.
If you know anyone who might be encouraged by today’s post, please share.
