For the legalistic among us, Deuteronomy 5:21 could provide some stumbling blocks.
In that verse, Moses gives a list of different things not to covet: wife, house, field, servants, animals, or anything that “belongs” to our neighbor. The last clause is a nice “catch-all” to cover every other item of your neighbor’s, but let’s say you were able to find a loophole. Would it still be okay to covet that?
The answer is no. And the reason goes back to what it actually means to covet in the first place.
Our modern definitions claim that coveting is nothing more than “wishing for earnestly,” or “desiring inordinately” something.
But that’s not where the Hebrew stops. The word hamah is used for coveting, and speaks of making somewhat-concrete plans to obtain it.
This is exactly what Jezebel did with Naboth’s vineyard. Her husband Ahab coveted it, tried to acquire it, and when he didn’t get it, threw a massive temper tantrum (seriously—check it out in 1 Kings 21).
In walks Jezebel, who schemes a way to get Naboth killed and allow her husband to take the vineyard. It works to perfection—until Elijah steps in. But that’s a story for another time.
The commandment against coveting is originally in Exodus, but Deuteronomy defines it further by saying that you are not to covet…and “not desire” what your neighbor has.
The Hebrew for desire (hit’avvah) talks about a repeated longing for something. You don’t just covet it for a short time, you covet it over and over again. It never leaves your brain, never stops being an idol in your mind.
It’s fascinating that Paul lists this commandment specifically when talking about the usefulness of the Law in Romans 7. He says that he would not have known coveting if it had not been for the commandment to not covet, so he’s thankful (and also distressed) by having a specific temptation identified.
But why does he mention coveting? Is it because he has a personal problem with it?
That’s not totally out of the question. After all, Paul was a career-minded Pharisee whose conversion to Christianity came in the midst of a high-stakes diplomatic mission to Syria to extradite Jews, which would have netted him a lot of cachet among his superiors.
And then, in Philippians 3, he names his Jewish credentials. Of all his peers, he was the one with the most to lose by becoming a Christian.
I don’t bring this up to cast unfair accusations at Paul; instead, I think it makes him extremely relatable. As a man of boundless ambition, he most likely wanted—maybe even coveted—those jobs that others obtained. Maybe he wanted the big house and the corner office. Maybe he even schemed to obtain them.
Coveting is more prevalent in our lives if we’re willing to be honest with ourselves. It’s not something hidden in the annals of Jewish teaching, but a very real problem that we can grapple with today.