Not many of you should consider yourselves teachers brothers, knowing that teachers will incur a greater judgment.  James 3:1

There is principle in scripture regarding the accountability of all human beings in accordance with the knowledge that they have received.

Jesus said that the servant who knew his master’s will and didn’t do it will be beaten with many stripes, but the servant who didn’t know his will and didn’t do it will be beaten with few. (Luke 12:47-49)

A teacher of God’s word… whether they are accurate or not…Will be held to a higher accountability than one who is ignorant and makes no pretense of knowing anything.

We instinctively know the concept.  For example, if a 17 year old high school dropout violated a tax code. law because they didn’t report some money they made as a baby sitter, we get that they would be ignorant of the various self employment tax forms.  However, if a very sharp tax attorney failed to report money they received from a client, we are comfortable with the insinuation that tax fraud is going on.  Why?  Simply because we know that tax attorney simply knew better.  The tax attorney is guilty, but the high school dropout, although still in arrears, is guiltless.

Implicit in this is an answer to one of the most common questions asked by non-christians about the faith.  I refer to it as the “pygmy question”‘.   It is “what about all the people (ie. Pygmies in Africa) who have never heard the gospel?”

Simply put, God holds those who are in the “know” to a higher standard than those who are ignorant of his word and his ways.