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§27 The Salvation of Israel and the Glory of God (Rom. 11:25–36)

So far in chapters 9–11 Paul has advanced his argument with care and deliberation. He has shown that from all peoples on earth God separated one people to receive his promise by faith. When the chosen people refused to believe and held fast to righteousness by law, God extended the promise to the Gentiles who received it by faith. But Israel’s rejection of God did not force God to a countermove of rejecting Israel. “God’s gifts and his call are irrevocable,” says Paul (v. 29). From unbelieving Israel God produced a remnant of faith, and this remnant became a firstfruits of the salvation of Israel as a whole. The inclusion of Gentiles in salvation would arouse hardened Israel to faith, “and so all Israel will be saved” (v. 26).

That final triumph of Israel’s salvation is celebrated in 11:25–36. In reaching the crest of his argument Paul himself is borne by its wondrous force. The previously guarded development of his argument gives way to a summary of the themes in chapters 9–11. The place of Israel in the plan of salvation is anchored to two points—mystery and mercy. This is revealed by reviewing Paul’s original sequence of salvation, “first for the Jew, then for the Gentile” (1:16). Now, however, the order is reversed. The “full number of the Gentiles” must first enter salvation, and then “all Israel will be saved” (vv. 25–26). This is not something strictly discernible to the mind. It is a mystery which can be known only through revelation and apprehended only by faith. Paul’s faith soars to a hymnic doxology in verses 33–36, not unlike the end of chapter 8. But there the doxology was a hymn to God’s love in Christ; here it is a hymn to God’s wisdom in salvation.

11:25–27 / I do not want you to be ignorant of this mystery, brothers, begins Paul. At critical junctures of thought the apostle often employs solemn avowals like this one to underscore the importance of his argument (1:13; 10:1; 2 Cor. 1:8; 1 Thess. 4:13). The governing word in this section is mystery (v. 25). In the NT “mystery” generally means the purpose of God for salvation in Jesus Christ (Mark 4:11; Eph. 1:9). It is a mystery not because God desires to keep it hidden, but because if it is to be apprehended it must be made known by God. Contrary to all reasonable expectations, God loves this world and commits himself sacrificially to its redemption. This mystery is personified and supremely knowable in Jesus Christ, the “visible expression of the invisible God” (Col. 1:15, Phillips).

Mystery means all this and more in verse 25. Its specific reference is to the salvation of Israel. The hardening of Israel belongs to the plan of salvation until the full number of Gentiles has come in. And so all Israel will be saved (vv. 25–26). It may seem an odd way of redeeming Israel, but it leaves no doubt about God’s mercy and omnipotence. God accomplishes his purposes in uncommon ways. It is, quite literally, a mystery which cannot be penetrated by human observation or by the most enlightened reason, but is received only as a revelation from God himself. Who would have supposed that God would include Gentiles in salvation and, moreover, that their salvation would precede that of the chosen people? This accounts for Paul’s warning that you Gentiles may not be conceited (v. 25). The salvation of Gentiles is entirely a matter of God’s grace, not of their merits—and the same will be true for Jews.

The reference to Israel’s hardening in part (v. 25) probably does not mean a temporal hardening of limited duration, since Paul nowhere else uses the expression in this way. Rather, it should be understood quantitatively as that part of Israel (albeit the larger) which remains outside salvation until the full number of Gentiles has come in. Not the least remarkable aspect of Romans 9–11 is Paul’s refusal to write off unbelieving Israel. He remains confident that God has not rejected unbelieving Israel (11:1), and therefore he continues to consider it as a unified whole. Israel’s (mis)fortunes may be perplexing, but they are not a nightmare of the absurd or a betrayal by God. They are the result of God’s plan. The so in verse 26 is a little word with great force: in this way—and only in this way—will Israel be saved. The progression of events is clear: Israel’s hardness, the Gentiles’ inclusion, Israel’s jealousy, and finally Israel’s acceptance of Christ and salvation. Paul does not elaborate why God ordains this so, but the result is that all Israel, like the Gentiles, will be saved by grace alone (cf. v. 26).

The assertion that all Israel will be saved (v. 26) is no less problematic in our day than in Paul’s. The various interpretations which have been suggested fall into two camps. One camp attempts a figurative interpretation. Augustine and Luther understand it as a reference to “spiritual Israel” (so Gal. 6:16) or the church. Similarly, Calvin and Barth take Israel to refer to the elect portion of both Gentiles and Jews (9:11; 11:5, 7), whereas Bengel understands it to refer to the Jewish Christian remnant (11:5). In one way or another, however, all these views surrender the one thing in Romans 9–11 that Paul refuses to surrender—unbelieving Israel. Such views may accord with the historical facts that greater Israel has not responded to the gospel, but they cancel the offense of unbelieving Israel (9:2ff.; 11:25–26) and discount the clear context of verse 26 that all Israel consists of the believing remnant plus those Jews who were hardened (11:7, 25).

The second camp attempts a literal interpretation, understanding all Israel to include every Israelite, the numerical total of Jews. This might appear to be the sense of the Mishnah, “All Israelites have a share in the world to come” (m. Sanh. 10.1; elsewhere, T. Benj. 10.11). Even the Mishnah, however, does not mean that every single Jew would be saved, for it proceeds to enumerate a considerable list of exceptions (e.g., deniers of the resurrection, deniers of the law, readers of heretical books, magicians, certain kings of Israel [Jeroboam, Ahab, Manasseh], the generation of the flood, the generation of the wilderness, inhabitants of an apostate city, and so on). “All Israelites” here, as elsewhere in Jewish literature, means Israel as a people, a collective unit, without specifying that every Jew will be saved.

This is surely Paul’s meaning in verse 26. Throughout chapters 9–11 the apostle has been thinking less of individual salvation than of Jews and Gentiles as a whole. He does not say that every Jew will be saved anymore than he says that every Gentile will be saved. Indeed, were Paul to assert that Jews would be saved simply because they were Jews, he would assert the very position which he earlier combatted, that circumcision alone (2:28–29), or descent from Abraham (4:1ff.), qualified one for salvation. That would compromise the meaning and necessity of faith (“and if they [Jews] do not persist in unbelief, they will be grafted in,” 11:23). Paul’s thought rather is of salvation of the Gentile world as a whole (the full number of Gentiles, v. 25, also Acts 13:48), and of Israel as a whole (i.e., all Israel, v. 26). The apostle thus envisions a point in the future when by grace greater Israel will embrace the gospel by faith, as have Gentiles in the past.

This is supported by a quotation in verses 26–27, whose first three lines come from Isaiah 59:20–21, and the fourth from Isaiah 27:9. Whether or not “The deliverer who will come from Zion” was understood messianically in Paul’s day (see Cranfield, Romans, vol. 2, p. 578), Paul applies the quotation to Christ Jesus as a reminder that the messianic hope is fulfilled in him. Paul is silent about when and how this will happen, but it is clear that he does not link it to the reestablishment of the Jewish nation (or state of Israel). Neither does the apostle suggest that there are two ways of salvation, one for Gentiles through Jesus Christ, and one for Jews through Torah. Paul teaches that there can be no deliverance for Israel (as there could be none for Gentiles) apart from Christ. For both Jews and Gentiles, salvation is wholly dependent on a common faith in their common savior (1:16–17; 3:21–24).

Furthermore, the opening line of the quotation in verse 26 reveals a change from the original. Both the Hebrew and Greek texts of Isaiah 59:20 read that a deliverer will come to Zion, whereas Paul says the deliverer will come from Zion. How this change occurred is anyone’s guess, but it is worth considering that Paul altered the text to emphasize that the savior to Israel would come from Israel, thus persuading Jews that Jesus was their savior foretold in the OT.

11:28–32 / C. K. Barrett sees the following two parallelisms in this passage:

A—Enemies on your account (v. 28)

B—Loved on account of the patriarchs (v. 28)

C—For God’s gifts … (v. 29)

A′—You were at one time … have now (v. 30)

B′—They too have now … that they too may now (v. 31)

C′—For God has bound … (v. 32; Barrett, Romans, pp. 224–25).

These balanced statements give the passage a definite rhetorical structure and reveal the finesse with which Paul concludes chapters 9–11. The passage repeats and culminates two contrasts already mentioned: “objects of wrath” and “objects of mercy” (9:22–23), and “the kindness and sternness of God” (11:22).

Israel is both God’s enemy and God’s friend. Israel is an enemy as far as the gospel is concerned, but loved on account of the patriarchs (v. 28; so Jub. 15:30; 22:9; 4 Ezra 3:13; 5:27). Gentiles once were objects of wrath (1:18ff.), but they are now objects of mercy because of their faith in the gospel. For Jews the issue is exactly the opposite: they once were objects of mercy because of their election and knowledge of the law, but they are now objects of wrath because of their disbelief in the gospel. Thus, God comes to his people in only one of two ways, in wrath or mercy. There is no third way. If we will not receive the mercy of God then we must face the wrath of God which would drive us to his mercy (Isa. 63:10–14). God’s mercy is the final word, for God’s gifts and his call are irrevocable (v. 29).

As we come to the end of Romans 9–11 we realize how clearly this verse has charted Paul’s course all along. Israel’s calling was discussed at length in 9:6–29, but even Israel’s antagonism to that calling could not cancel the purpose of God. God does not pull down the olive tree and plant another because its branches are worthless. He cuts off the fruitless branches, grafts others onto the tree, and eventually regrafts the faithless branches back onto the tree as well. The end result? An unpromising sowing yields an unimaginable harvest, “thirty, sixty, or even a hundred times,” according to the parable of the sower (Mark 4:1–9).

What has lain beneath the surface of Romans looms inescapably before us in verses 31–32. Disobedience leads to obedience; disbelief to faith, wrath to mercy. Human disobedience—in whatever form, from whatever people—does not jeopardize sovereign grace. The Gentiles cannot boast in their blessing, nor can Jews despair in their hardness. The blessing of the former results from grace, the judgment of the latter leads to grace. In both cases, grace triumphs.

The second parallelism is concluded, and with it the argument of Romans 9–11, in verse 32, For God has bound all men over to disobedience so that he may have mercy on them all. All does not imply universalism, but, with reference to verses 25–26, it suggests that God’s salvation is offered to and appropriated by Jews and Gentiles alike. The Greek term for bound over, synkleiō, means to “shut up” or “imprison” and is a close parallel of Galatians 3:22. Gaugler likens verse 32 to a master key which opens all the doors to Paul’s gospel (Der Römerbrief, vol. 2, pp. 209–13). That may be an overstatement, but it certainly is the master key to Romans 9–11. What a breathtaking conclusion: God goes so far as to hand over all peoples to disobedience—Jews to pride in the law and Gentiles to rebellion against the law—in order to show mercy to both. At long last comes the answer to the dreary rehearsal of sin in Romans 1–3. “There is no difference, for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (3:22–23). God has locked sinners in their own rebellion and barred and bolted the doors, eliminating any way of escape except through his mercy.

It is now apparent that Paul applies the same lines of argument to world history which he applied to the justification of sinners in chapters 3–5. For the sinful world as well as for the sinful individual, the only access to mercy is from condemnation. This is assuredly a great mystery (v. 25), which apart from revelation would be sheer folly. God does not work with merely unserviceable material, he works with enemies. In 5:10 the enemies were individuals, here (v. 28) they are entire peoples. Before they can be justified they must all be condemned. God creates and redeems out of nothing.

11:33–36 / Eastern Orthodoxy has always taught that worship begins where theology ends. Where the legs of reason grow weary, the heart may yet soar on wings like eagles. Verse 33 marks the frontier between theological argumentation and sublime worship. Paul’s long and difficult philosophy of history now yields to a doxology to God’s wisdom. A lesser soul than Paul, having plunged into the labyrinth of divine sovereignty and human sin, might, like Job, have emerged shaking his head in despair. Not so the apostle. The severity of the problem magnifies the greatness of God. Oh, the depth of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God! (v. 33). What the mind cannot know, the heart, as Pascal recognized, may know by other reasons. The limits of reason lead not to defeat and despair but to the threshold of faith.

The doxology at 11:33ff. does not follow the normal pattern of Jewish doxologies. It is patterned rather after the end of chapter 8, though here the doxology exalts God’s wisdom rather than his love. This doxology is not the result of Paul’s argument in chapters 9–11, but the assumption which underlies it. Paul begins with God’s unsearchable judgments (v. 33), just as he began chapter 9 with God’s sovereign judgments in Israel. He concludes with God’s inscrutable ways (v. 33), just as he concludes chapter 11 with the mystery of God’s redemption of Israel. Unfathomable love governed God’s work of redemption at the end of chapter 8; unspeakable wisdom directs God’s course in history at the end of chapter 11. Where the mind cannot know God’s thoughts (v. 34), the heart may yet trust his character. If God’s love spelled salvation by surprise, his wisdom results in sovereign acts in history leading to mercy. All things, says Paul, are from him and through him and to him (v. 36). This verse finds a close parallel in 1 Corinthians 8:6, though whereas the prepositions there refer to Christ, here they refer to God, who is at once creator, sustainer, and goal of creation. To him be the glory forever! Amen.