RSV ~ Romans 11 Notes

Rom 11:1 | ISB Notes

rejected his people?: A question emphatically denied. For Paul, the faithlessness of Israel does not cancel the faithfulness of God, who refuses to abandon his people (1 Sam 12:22; Ps 94:14). Paul is living proof of this as an Israelite who has experienced the grace and mercy of Christ.

Rom 11:2-4 | ISB Notes

Scripture shows that God preserves a remnant of Israel even when most of the nation goes astray.

• This was the case in Elijah’s day, when nearly all of the Northern Kingdom of Israel abandoned Yahweh for the idolatrous cult of Baal (1 Kings 16:30-32). The prophet despaired that he alone was left, but the Lord had preserved a remnant of believers 7,000 strong that escaped his notice.

Rom 11:8-10 | ISB Notes

Paul summons the Law, the Prophets, and the Psalms to witness against hardened Israel.

• Moses describes how Yahweh withheld the gifts of spiritual understanding (eyes and ears) from the wilderness generation of Israel because of its faithlessness, thanklessness, and idolatry (11:8; Deut 29:4). The same scenario was repeated in Isaiah’s day when the Lord disciplined Israel with a spirit of stupor, making it numb and unresponsive to his warnings and causing it to stagger around in spiritual darkness (11:8; Is 29:10). David invoked such a curse on his enemies in Israel for their injustices (11:9; Ps 69:22-23).

Rom 11:11 | ISB Notes

to make Israel jealous: The stumbling of Israel is temporary for itself and beneficial for the Gentiles. Until Israel regains its footing, a window has been opened for gathering other peoples and nations into the Church (11:17-24).

Rom 11:13 | ISB Notes

to you Gentiles: Paul addresses his Gentile readers directly, cautioning them against pride. Some Gentile converts looked disdainfully upon Israel, as though they had replaced the covenant people in the messianic age. Paul not only rejects this (11:1); he warns that Gentiles, too, can be rejected as easily as they have been accepted. They should rather marvel that God has given them a share in Israel’s spiritual blessings (15:27). Pagan anti-Semitism was pervasive in Roman antiquity.

Rom 11:14 | ISB Notes

my fellow Jews: Literally, “my flesh”. Paul is thinking of Israelites related to him by race (9:3-4).

Rom 11:15 | ISB Notes

life from the dead?: Like the OT prophets, Paul envisions the spiritual recovery of Israel as a national resurrection (Is 26:19; Ezek 37:1-12; Hos 6:2).

Rom 11:16 | ISB Notes

first fruits: The initial meal offering made to the Lord from each year’s grain harvest (Num 15:17-21).

the root: Anticipates the olive tree metaphor that follows in 11:17-24. The first fruits and the root probably symbolize the patriarchs, who are the founding ancestors of Israel (9:5) and for whose sake Israel is a people beloved by God (11:28). Others interpret the images as references to Christ (15:12; 1 Cor 15:23) or to Jewish Christians (Rom 16:5; 1 Cor 16:15).

Rom 11:17-24 | ISB Notes

Paul pictures the messianic people as an olive tree that is partly natural (believing Israel), partly engrafted (believing Gentiles), and partly dismembered (unbelieving Israel). The horticultural procedure of grafting wild shoots onto a cultivated trunk was meant to reinvigorate an old, exhausted tree that was yielding less and less fruit each season. The analogy shows that Israel is not being demoted from its favored-nation status so much as the Gentiles are being promoted to share in its blessings (15:27).

• The picture of Israel as an olive tree comes from Jer 11:16-17.

Rom 11:20 | ISB Notes

because of their unbelief: Just as Gentiles are grafted into the covenant through faith, so fallen-away Israelites will be regrafted onto the tree through belief in Jesus Christ.

Rom 11:22 | ISB Notes

the kindness and the severity of God: God’s justice and mercy are held in delicate balance: he neither withholds forgiveness from the contrite heart nor overlooks the hardness of an impenitent heart.

Rom 11:25 | ISB Notes

mystery: The plan of worldwide salvation hidden in the Scriptures (16:25-26) but now made known through the Spirit (Eph 3:4-6).

part of Israel: Those in Israel who are unresponsive to the gospel (11:7). Only some in Israel are hardened in this way, since a remnant of ethnic Israelites has come to believe in Jesus as the Messiah (11:5). Paul himself is among this believing remnant (11:1).

the full number of the Gentiles: The many people and nations of the world who will come to faith in Christ. Paul played a monumental role in launching the Church’s pursuit of this missionary goal (1:5; 11:13). It is not specified when the conversion of the Gentiles will reach the point of fullness determined by God (CCC 674).

Rom 11:26 | ISB Notes

and so: The Greek can mean “and in this way” (modal) or “and then” (temporal).

all Israel: The entire tribal family of Israel. The point is not that every individual Israelite will be saved, but that a collective group representing all twelve tribes will be saved (Rev 7:1-8).

See essay: The Salvation of All Israel at Rom 12.

it is written: Paul combines citations from Is 59:20–21 and Is 27:9.

• Isaiah envisions the restoration of Jacob-Israel from exile and sin. Yahweh’s new covenant will bring his people a new abundance of mercy and forgiveness (11:27; Jer 31:31-34). The expression from Zion is worded differently in Is 59:20 (“to Zion”) and may be taken from Is 2:3, which foresees the word of the Lord going out to the nations from Jerusalem (15:19; Lk 24:47).

Rom 11:28 | ISB Notes

enemies: Temporarily, until their salvation (11:26).

beloved: God will never revoke his promises to Israel on account of the patriarchs (9:5) but loves his people with an “everlasting love” (Jer 31:3).

Rom 11:32 | ISB Notes

all men to disobedience: God allows all to sin that all might taste salvation (3:9, 23). His saving plan moves forward despite man’s rebellion.

Rom 11:33-36 | ISB Notes

Paul’s concluding doxology extols the infinite wisdom of God. Overwhelmed and amazed, he gasps at the unsearchable and inscrutable plan of God to save the world in Christ.

• Citations from Is 40:13 (in 11:34) and Job 41:11 (in 11:35) portray God’s designs as beyond our comprehension and his greatness as independent of any need or earthly gift.

Rom 11:1. | ISB Notes

Romans 9-11 is dominated by the terms “Israel” (eleven times) and “Israelite” (two times). This is in marked contrast to Rom 1-8, where Paul speaks only of “Jews” (nine times). The shift from using “Jews” exclusively to using “Israel” and “Israelite” almost exclusively points to a subtle but significant distinction between these terms. The distinction originated when the tribes of Israel split into two kingdoms after the reign of Solomon (1 Kings 12). Ten tribes from the north broke away and formed the “house of Israel”, while the two southern tribes of Judah and Benjamin became the “house of Judah”. Over the next several centuries, the northern tribes and then the southern tribes were forced into exile, and most of them never returned. The small remnant that eventually returned from Babylonian captivity and resettled in Palestine in the sixth century B.C. became known as “Jews”, taking their name from the dominant tribe (Judah) and occupying the land around Jerusalem in the south (Judea). By Paul’s day, the term “Jew” was used more broadly to mean someone who followed the Mosaic religion of Judaism and looked to the Temple of Jerusalem as the focal point of spiritual life, regardless of whether he lived in Judea or abroad. Most religious Jews traced their lineage to the tribes of Judah, Benjamin, and Levi. It seems, then, that when Paul begins talking about “Israel” in Rom 9-11, he is shifting to a larger historical perspective that stretches beyond the compass of “Jews” and evokes memories of “all Israel” as a national family of twelve tribes (Deut 27:9; Josh 3:17; 2 Sam 5:5; 1 Chron 9:1; Ezra 6:17; Tob 1:4-6, etc.). Paul seems aware, in other words, that the classical notion of “Israel” is more inclusive and far-reaching than the contemporary notion of “Jews”.

Rom 11:2. | ISB Notes

As Paul develops his argument in Rom 9-11, he draws from passages of the Old Testament that promise salvation for all the tribes of Israel. Tribes from the Northern Kingdom of Israel are in view in several passages (e.g., Is 10:22-23 at Rom 9:27-28, and 1 Kings 19:10 at Rom 11:4), and tribes from the Southern Kingdom of Judah are in view in others (Is 1:9 at Rom 9:29, and Joel 2:32 at Rom 10:13).

Rom 11:3. | ISB Notes

When Paul describes himself as an “Israelite” in Rom 11:1, he does so with explicit reference to his tribal affiliation (the tribe of Benjamin).

Rom 11:4. | ISB Notes

Paul’s hope for the salvation of “all Israel” is in line with the prophetic hopes of the Old Testament, where the spiritual restoration of all twelve tribes, after centuries of division and exile among the Gentiles, is one of the towering expectations for the messianic age (Sir 36:11; 48:10; Is 11:11-12; 49:6; Jer 3:18; 50:17-20; Ezek 37:15-28; 48:1-35; Zech 8:13, etc.). The same hope for a restoration of the twelve tribes is expressed in ancient Jewish sources outside the Bible (e.g., 4 Ezra 13:39-48; Psalms of Solomon 17:28, 44; Testament of Benjamin 9:2; 10:11; 2 Baruch 78:4-7).

HOW IS ALL ISRAEL SAVED?

At least two different views of how Israel comes to salvation are current today.

Rom 11:1. | ISB Notes

The two-covenant view, developed in modern times, holds that Israel will be saved apart from Christ and apart from any acceptance of the gospel. In other words, proponents of this view envision a bi-covenantal arrangement where the Mosaic covenant continues in force alongside the New Covenant, with the former intended to save the Jews and the latter to save the Gentiles. In support, advocates contend that “Christ” is never explicitly mentioned in Romans 11, that “the Deliverer” foretold by Isaiah refers to Yahweh rather than the Messiah (Is 59:20 cited in Rom 11:26), and that the “covenant” of forgiveness mentioned by Isaiah is the Mosaic covenant rather than the New Covenant (Is 27:9, alluded to in Rom 11:27).

Rom 11:2. | ISB Notes

The New Covenant view, held by the vast majority of interpreters through the ages, holds that Israel will be saved by the grace of Jesus Christ. This second view is far more probable than the first, as it alone is consistent with the immediate context of Rom 9-11 and the wider context of Paul’s theology and writings. In point of fact, the bi-covenantal view collides with the whole message of Romans, namely, that the gospel of Jesus Christ brings “salvation” to Jews and Gentiles alike (Rom 1:16), that one must confess faith in Jesus to be “saved” (Rom 10:9), and that Paul thinks of his missionary efforts among the Gentiles as a means to “save” his Israelite kinsmen (Rom 11:14). There is every reason to suppose, moreover, that Paul is thinking of Christ and the New Covenant when he quotes the words of Isaiah in Rom 11:26-27. For Paul, the risen Jesus is our Deliverer (1 Thess 1:10) and the one who takes away sin through the sacraments of the New Covenant (Rom 6:1-11). By contrast, the Mosaic covenant is something that condemns rather than saves (Acts 13:38-39; Rom 3:20; 2 Cor 3:4-11). In Paul’s mind, then, there is no “alternative way” of salvation for Israel apart from the grace of Jesus Christ that comes through the preaching and acceptance of the gospel (Rom 10:14-17; CCC 765; 839-40).

THE CLIMAX of Paul’s discussion is the revelation that Israelites from all twelve tribes will be saved by the Messiah through the mercy and forgiveness of the New Covenant (Rom 11:26-27). Seen in this way, the teaching of Paul simply echoes the teaching of Jesus, who not only selected twelve apostles to signify the messianic restoration of Israel (Mt 10:2-5), but sent them out to recover the “lost sheep” of Israel (Mt 10:6) and promised to seat them on twelve thrones over “the twelve tribes of Israel” (Mt 19:28). None of this is surprising when we consider that the Church, which is the messianic kingdom of Jesus (Mt 16:17-19; Lk 22:28-30), is modeled on the ancient kingdom of David, which unified all twelve tribes under the anointed king (2 Sam 5:1-5; 1 Kings 11:42), even as it stretched beyond the borders of Israel to encompass the Gentiles (1 Kings 4:21; Ps 2:8; 72:8-11). For further details on this theme in the New Testament, see note on Lk 1:33, essay: Kingdom Restoration at Acts 15, and related passages in Acts 26:7, Jas 1:1, and Rev 7:18; 21:10-14. «