Rom 2:17-29, Rom 3:1-20.  Here, Paul has to walk a tightrope.  How can he badmouth something which was not only good, but God-ordained?  But the universe has changed within the last few years:  the Law has become an impediment to salvation, instead of a means to it.  No longer can it be used as a tool for Gentile-bashing.  What Paul was trying to get people to see, especially the Jews who had an ingrained attachment to the Law, was that the entire legal/sacrificial mode of doing religion had been superseded in the Kingdom of God.  Now one became part of the family of God through rebirth from above by the Holy Spirit -- righteousness was relational rather than behavioral.

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           "A man is not a Jew if he is only one outwardly, nor is circumcision merely outward and physical.  No, a man is a Jew if he is one inwardly; and circumcision is circumcision of the heart, by the Spirit, not by the written code. Such a man’s praise is not from men, but from God" (Rom 2:28-29).

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            One can almost hear the Temple walls collapsing at these words.  In a sense, he takes the entire Old Testament and spiritualizes it.  It is not the Law that works righteousness in a man because of good deeds, but the Spirit who works it in him (through faith).

         

He then appears to backtrack to list advantages of being a Jew (Rom 3:1).  However, he finds only one advantage: Jews were entrusted with the words of God.  But he immediately reverts to the sin problem:

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        "Jews and Gentiles alike are all under sin" (Rom 3:9).

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          He uses the Old Testament Scriptures to show that "there is no one righteous, not even one" (Ps 14:3).   He restates his prior conclusion:
    
        "Therefore no one will be declared righteous in his sight by observing the law; rather, through the law we become conscious of sin " (Rom 3:20).

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In this last phrase, he gives another jolt to the traditional reading of the Old Testament.  The Law does have its use, after all -- it brings before us the awareness of our own lack of holiness.  It shows us that we are liable to God's judgment.  It does not make us right with God.