5, 6. (a) Why were the priests especially reprehensible? (b) How did Jehovah voice contempt for the priests?

⁵ Why were the priests especially reprehensible? Mal 2 Verse 7 gives a clear indication: “The lips of a priest are the ones that should keep knowledge, and the law is what people should seek from his mouth; for he is the messenger of Jehovah of armies.” More than a thousand years earlier, God’s laws that were given to Israel through Moses said that the priests had the duty “to teach the sons of Israel all the regulations that Jehovah [had] spoken.” (Leviticus 10:11) Sadly, at a later point, the writer of 2 Chronicles 15:3 reported: “Many were the days that Israel had been without a true God and without a priest teaching and without Law.”

⁶ In the time of Malachi, in the fifth century B.C.E., the situation with the priesthood was the same. They were failing to teach God’s Law to the people. So those priests deserved to be called to account.

11. Who especially need to be cautious?

¹¹ As to those who have the privilege of teaching God’s Word in the congregations today, Malachi 2:7 should serve as a caution. It says that their lips “should keep knowledge, and the law is what people should seek” from their mouths. Heavy responsibility comes upon such teachers, for James 3:1 indicates that they “shall receive heavier judgment.” While they should teach with vigor and enthusiasm, their teaching must be soundly based on God’s written Word and the instruction that comes through Jehovah’s organization. In that way they will be “adequately qualified to teach others.” Thus, they are counseled: “Do your utmost to present yourself approved to God, a workman with nothing to be ashamed of, handling the word of the truth aright.”​—2 Timothy 2:2, 15.

12. Those who teach need to exercise what care?

¹² If we are not careful, we could be tempted to weave personal preferences or opinions in with our teaching. That would especially be a risk for a person tending to be confident in his own conclusions even when these contradict what Jehovah’s organization is teaching. But Malachi chapter 2 shows that we should expect congregation teachers to hold to knowledge from God and not to personal ideas, which could stumble the sheep. Jesus said: “Whoever stumbles one of these little ones who put faith in me, it is more beneficial for him to have hung around his neck a millstone such as is turned by an ass and to be sunk in the wide, open sea.”​—Matthew 18:6.