And here the objector means by λaòr avrou, the whole of the nation, as the sequel, which exhibits the answer, evidently shews. In reply to the question thus put, Paul answers, that a universal rejection of the Jews was not meant to be affirmed by what he had said. He adduces himself as an exception to such a rejection, and a proof that it was not meant to be asserted by him.—I am an Israelite, i. e. a descendant of Israel; Ek oñéρμаτos 'Aßpaáμ, is only a synonyme with the preceding expression, for the purpose of amplification, or with particular reference to the same phrase which is often repeated in the Old Testament.—Hvλñs Beriaμív, so he describes himself in Phil. iii. 5. It is merely a circumstance of particularity in description, which serves to make it more impressive. (2) Ovк.... πроéуνш, God hath not cast away his people whom he foreknew, i. e. whom he before determined or decided should be his people. In other words, he has not utterly rejected the Jewish people, whom he from the first ordained to be his people. See on the word Tроéуνw, in chap. viii. 29; and compare ver. 29 below. To render #polyvw, formerly acknowledged, does not accord with the design of the passage. .... Η οὐκ . . . . ἡ γραφή, know ye not what the Scripture says in Elijah ? i. e. in that part or portion of it which is cited by the name of Elijah, because it contains his history. The division of the Scripture into chapters and verses, is a modern thing; nothing of this kind occurs in the writings of the ancient Fathers. Such a division of the Hebrew Scriptures was made by Hugo Cardinalis in the twelfth century; and of the New Testament, by the famous printer and editor, Robert Stephens. Of course, reference to the Scriptures in ancient times was in a very different way from that now practised; and was, for the most part, such as we see in the verse before us. So the Rabbies cite, in the Mishna; and so the Greek authors were accustomed to cite Homer; e.g. Ev TO TWY VE@V Karaλóyy, in the catalogue of the ships, i.e. the passage which contains such a catalogue, &c.; comp. Mark xii. 26, εñì toũ Bárov, i. e. in the passage which gives an account of the burning bush. Ως, when; so it often signifes. Ἐντυγχάνει .... κατά, means to plead against, to make intercession against; as ivTVYXáνELV.... VÉρ means, to intercede for. (3) Kúpiɛ .... pov, cited from 1 Kings xix. 10, ad sensum and with contractions; also not exactly in the order of the Hebrew text which runs thus: "And he [Elijah] said, I am very jealous for Jehovah, the God of hosts; for the children of Israel have forsaken thy covenant, they have destroyed thine altars, and killed thy prophets; and I only am left, and they seek my life to take it away." The prophet complains, in these words, of what he supposed to be the universal apostasy of Israel. Karéokayav, lit. digged down; for altars were usually made with stones and earth or turf, so that digging down characterises the kind of effort necessary to destroy them.—Tǹv uxhv, natural or animal life; so, often, in the Hebrew; comp. Matt. ii. 20. (4) Xpηuarioμóc, divine response, from xpnuariw, to do public business, to give public responses, &c. In the New Testament, it is applied only to the response or warning of the true God. 'Epavry, Dativus commodi, as grammarians say, viz. the person or thing to which any thing is, or is done, is put in the Dative; for myself means, for my service.— Επτακισχιλίους ἄνδρας the number seven is probably employed here in the way of a round number, i. e. a definite instead of an indefinite number. So the Romans were wont to use sexcenti; and in like manner 70 and 40 are frequently used in the Scripture. So much, however, is to be understood by it here, viz. a very considerable number. "Ekaμlar yóvu, bowed the knee, a part of the religious service rendered to idols. Bowing the knee is the attitude of reverence and supplication. Ty Báal, with the fem. article 7 and so also in the Sept., in Hos. ii. 8. Jer. ii. 8. xix. 5. Zeph. i. 4, also Tobit i. 5. To solve this singular appearance, (for Baal generally has the masc. article,) Erasmus, Beza, and Grotius suppose that i ɛikóv is understood, so that the full expression would be τn ɛikóvɩ Báaλ. Others (e. g. Brais, Beyer, C. Schmid) suppose that there was a female deity by the name of Baal, i.e. the moon; like and ♫ (Jer. xxxii. 35. xliv. 17, 18, 19, 25), which were symbols of the sun and moon. But the objection to this is that in Jer. xxxii. 35, i Báaλ (fem.) is the same as ó Moλóx (masc.). Others suppose that Baal was avèpoyúvns, a hermaphrodite divinity, and so might take either ò or ; like the Latin Deus Lunus and Dea Luna; and this seems most probable. Others solve it by supposing the fem. article to be applied in the way of contempt; just as Mohammed (Koran. Sur. LIII.) speaks with contempt of the heathen Arabians, who had gods with fem. names; and so in Arabic, the name of an idol is, God (in the fem.); and so the Rabbins call idol gods, nibs, gods (fem.) .... (5) Οὕτως καὶ ... yéyover, in like manner now, even at the present time, there is a remnant according to the election of grace; i. e. as in ancient times, when it appeared to the prophet Elijah as if apostasy was universal among his countrymen, and yet there were not a few sincere worshippers of the true God, although unknown to him; so at the present time, although the unbelief of the Jews appears to be nearly universal, yet God has a people among them, viz. all such as he has of his mercy chosen to eternal life; comp. viii. 28, seq. ix. 15, 16, 23, 27. -Aɛiμμa, a remnant, i. e. a small number, a part, which though considerable in itself, is small compared with another part. So here, the number of Jewish believers, although then considerable and important, was small compared with the whole number of unbelievers. Consequently λeipua may be used to designate it; comp. ix. 27.-Kar' ἐκλογὴν χάριτος, according to an election which is not made on the ground of merit, but of mercy. God has not chosen Jewish believers unto salvation, because their obedience first made them the objects of his choice; but he chose them because he had mercy on them. Comp. the texts cited above from Rom. ix., and the commentary on them. That the apostle means fully to convey such a sentiment, is plain from the verse that follows; viz. (6) Ei dè.... Epywv, but if it be of grace, then it is not at all of works ; i. e. if God's ikλoy, his choosing this Aeippa to salvation, be gratuitous on his part, and wholly unmerited on the part of man, it follows that it is not pywv, i. e. that it is not meritorious, it is not on account of any desert on the part of men either seen or foreseen, that he makes them the objects of his mercy.—'Eπεì .... xapis, otherwise grace would no longer be grace; i. e. if this were not so, then it would be improper to speak of grace in our salvation; for if men are chosen on account of any merit or desert, then grace is not the ground of their being chosen, but merit; which would contradict the very idea of grace. This must be true; for men are saved either because they have wholly obeyed the divine law, or on the ground of grace merely; i. e. they are saved either because they are able to advance claims which meet the demands of the law, or else it must be on the ground of pure gratuity. Now as all men have sinned, it is not the first; of course it must be the second. If you ask: May it not be partly by grace, and partly by merit?' Then our text lies directly in the way of an affirmative answer, (as do many others also); and it is, moreover, a conclusive answer in the negative to this, that "every one is cursed, who continueth not in all things written in the book of the law to do them;" "the soul that sinneth shall die." Ei dè.... Epywv, but if of works, then it is not at all of grace, otherwise work is no more work; the mere converse of the preceding sentiment, and most probably a gloss from the margin. It is omitted in Codices A. B. C. D. E. F. G. 47, and in the Coptic, Armenian, Æthiopic, Vulgate, and Italic versions; also in Chrysostom, Theodoret, Damascenus, Jerome, and generally in the Latin Fathers. Erasmus, Grotius, E E Wetstein, Griesbach, Tholuck, Flatt, and others, regard it as spurious. At all events, it adds nothing to the sentiment of the passage; but is merely an echo, in another form, of the preceding sentiment. (7) Tì ovv; what then, i. e. what is the sum and substance of that which I have been saying?—"O Ešntet̃.... éxétuxe, that which Israel sought after, he hath not obtained; i. e. the justification which he sought to obtain by his own merit (comp. x. 3), he has not obtained.-Touro is, in many manuscripts and copies, τούτου ̇ for ἐπιτυγχάνω almost always governs the Genitive in Greek, poetry only being excepted, where it sometimes takes the Accusative. Still, the weight of authority, in the present case, is in favour of Touro' and accordingly Dr. Knapp receives it into the text. 'H dè ékλoyń, but the election, i. e. the elect, the abstract (as grammarians say) being put for the concrete, as is often the case; e. g. Rom. ii. 26, 27, &c. The meaning is: Although the Jews, who have sought justification by their own merit, have altogether failed as to obtaining this end; yet those who are called, according to the gracious purpose of God (viii. 28), are justified by his mercy through Christ Jesus; they have obtained justification in a way which others rejected, and therefore have not failed in the accomplishment of their object.' Oi de Xoroì, i. e. the unbelieving part of the Jews, those who did not belong to the έκλογή. —Ἐπωρώθησαν, were blinded. The word πωρός is equivalent to rupλóc and the verb wpów, in the active voice, means to make blind, in the passive, to be blind, to become blind, &c. It is applied, in a secondary sense, to the mind; and so the apostle here employs it. It indicates state or condition; but not necessarily the cause or agent by which that state or condition is produced. Thus of MOTO EπwρWOŋrav may mean merely, that the remainder (the unbelieving part of the Jews) were in a state of blindness. In itself, also, it is capable of designating the idea, that they were made blind, by the agency of another; and in this case, if this be the idea, the implication would be, that the agency was God's. If there be difficulty in admitting this sentiment, there is no more than is contained in chap. ix. 17, 18; and I must refer the reader to what is said on those verses, in order to avoid repetition here.-To all those who contend vehemently against such an exegesis, and regard it as dishonourable and reproachful to God, and as utterly unfounded, I can only say: Tell us ingenuously, whether the gloss you put on ix. 17, 18 is not an explaining away of the text, rather than an explanation of it? Can the conclusion be avoided, by any candid philologist, that the text does there assert, that in some sense or other the agency of God is concerned with the hardening of ner. sup sinners? In what sense? is a very serious and very important question, and one which I have endeavoured there to answer in a scriptural manAnd in the case now before us, if έлwρú0ŋσav merely designates state or condition, (as Bretschneider, Wahl, Tholuck, Flatt, and many others maintain,) then to what purpose, I would ask, is the quotation in the next three following verses? Do these also designate no agent? If you say: These are only examples for illustration, but not predictions;' I grant it. But then, how will these examples illustrate the case before the writer, unless they exhibit a principle which is the same as that avowed by the writer? And can ver. 8 be construed without the position that an agent is designated, who is, in some way or other, concerned with the ὀφθαλμοὺς τοῦ μὴ βλέπειν, i. e. with the πώρωσις οἱ Israel? This is impossible, unless we do away by violence the most obvious sense of the apostle's words. The question whether some agency on the part of God is asserted to be concerned with all this, seems to be one which cannot receive a negative answer, salvo textû et salvá fide bonâ. But the question whether such an agency is concerned, as makes God the proper author of men's moral blindness and sins, or whether men are free agents and altogether accountable for their own actions, is a very different one, and about which the Bible leaves us no room to doubt; see James i. 13, 14. (8) Kalws уέураnтaι does not of necessity mean, that what follows is a prediction, in the appropriate sense of the word. It is a clear case, that nothing can be decided from the mere formula of quotation; for very different formulas precede one and the same text, quoted for one and the same purpose. Here I take the force of kabús to fall upon sameness of principle, in the two cases which are brought into the comparison; i. e. as in ancient times God declares respecting Israel (Is. xxix. 10. Deut. xxix. 4), that he gives them the spirit of slumber, blind eyes, and deaf ears; so now, the same thing is true respecting unbelievers among the Jews; for they are blinded, inwpw0noav. .... Εδωκεν . . . . κατανύξεως, God hath given to them a slumbering spirit, or the spirit of deep sleep, . The original Hebrew runs thus, which the Seventy have rendered ; כִּי נָסַךְ עֲלֵיכֶם יְהוָה רוּחַ תַּרְדֵּמָה thus: "Οτι πεπότικεν ὑμᾶς Κύριος πνεύματι κατανύξεως" but the apostle, in rendering by dwkɛ, has translated ad sensum, not ad verbum. The Hebrew designates the idea of pouring out, on the hardened Jews, the spirit of profound sleep; while Paul retains only the generic idea of communicating such a spirit to them, dropping the particular image which the Hebrew presents. It is plain, that in this case, as in many others, the apostle makes his own translation de novo from the Hebrew. |