A remnant of Israel has been saved
1 And so I ask: Has God re jected his people? Of course not. I myself am an Israelite, a descendant of Abraham, from the tribe of Benjamin.
2 No, God has not rejected the people he knew beforehand. Don’t you know what the Scripture says of Elijah when he was accusing Israel be fore God?
3 He said: “Lord, they have killed your prophets, destroyed your altars, and I alone remain; and now they want to kill me.”
4 What was God’s answer? “I kept for myself seven thousand who did not worship Baal.”
5 In the same way now there is a remnant in Israel, those who were chosen by grace.
6 It is said: by grace, not because of what they did. Otherwise grace would not be grace.
7 What then? What Israel was looking for, it did not find, but those whom God elected found it. The others hardened their hearts,
8 as Scripture says: God made them dull of heart and mind; to this day their eyes cannot see nor their ears hear.
9 Da vid says: May they be caught and trapped at their banquets; may they fall, may they be punished.
10 May their eyes be closed so that they cannot see and their backs be bent forever.
Do not despise those who stumbled
11 Again I ask: Did they stum ble so as to fall? Of course not. Their stumbling allowed salvation to come to the pagan nations and this, in turn, will stir up the jealousy of Is rael.
12 If Israel’s short coming made the world rich, if the pagan nations grew rich with what they lost, what will hap pen when Israel is restored?
13 Listen to me, you who are not Jews: I am spending myself as an apostle to the pagan nations,
14 but I hope my ministry will be successful enough to awaken the jealousy of those of my race, and finally to save some of them.
15 If the world made peace with God when they re mained apart, what will it be when they are welcomed? No thing less than a passing from death to life.
16 When the first fruits are consecrated to God, the whole is consecrated. If the roots are holy, so will be the bran ches.
17 Some branches have been cut from the olive tree, while you, as a wild olive tree, have been grafted in their stead, and you are benefiting from their roots and sap.
18 Now therefore, do not be proud and despise the branches, because you do not support the roots, the roots support you.
19 You may say, “They cut off the branches to graft me.”
20 Well and good. But they were cut off because they did not believe, while you stand by faith. Then do not pride yourself on this too much, rather beware:
21 if God did not spare the natural branches, even less will he spare you.
22 Admire at the same time both the goodness and severity of God: he was severe with the fallen and he is generous with you, as long as you remain faithful. Otherwise you will be cut off.
23 If they do not keep on rejecting the faith they will be grafted in, for God is able to graft them back again.
24 If you were taken from the wild olive tree to which you belonged and, in spite of being a different species, you were grafted into the good olive tree, it will be much easier and natural for them to be grafted into their own tree.
Israel will be saved
25 I want you to understand the mys terious decree of God, lest you be too confident: a part of Is rael will remain hardened until the majority of pagans have entered.
26 Then the whole of Israel will be saved, as Scripture says: From Zion will come the Liberator who will purify the descendants of Jacob from all sin.
27 And this is the covenant I will make with them: I will take away from them their sins.
28 Regarding the Gospel, the Jews are opponents, but it is for your benefit. Regarding election, they are beloved because of their ancestors;
29 because the call of God and his gifts cannot be nullified.
30 Through the disobedience of the Jews the mercy of God came to you who did not obey God.
31 They in turn will receive mercy in due time after this disobedience that brought God’s mercy to you.
32 So God has submitted all to disobedience, in order to show his mercy to all.
33 How deep are the riches, the wis dom and knowledge of God! His decisions can not be explained, nor his ways un derstood!
34 Who has ever known God’s thoughts? Who has ever been his ad viser?
35 Who has given him something first, so that God had to repay him?
36 For everything comes from him, has been made by him and has to return to him. To him be the glory for ever! Amen.
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Comments Letter to the Romans, Chapter 11
• 11.1 THE DESTINY OF THE JEWISH PEOPLE
The two paragraphs 11-24 and 25-32 speak of the destiny of the Jewish people. As Jesus had announ ced, the Jews were dispersed through out the world, becoming a nation without territory, united only through its Law, its traditions and the certitude of it being God’s chosen people.
In times that still ignored the respect of those of other religions, a great number of Jews formed minority groups in Christian countries. It is a fact that people convinced of being the faithful of the one and only God quite naturally become insupportable to others (Esther 9). The Jews then have suffered from Christian fanaticism equal to their own. Christians did not see that their faith condemned religious fanaticism. They thought Israel was being punished for the crime of its ancestors in condemning Jesus: they saw in the tragedy of Israel, as in the survival, a sign from God.
In the course of this century Christians have become conscious of the non-violent character of the Gospel and that their vocation is to be a minority in the world: this has been a big step forward. It is time then to re-evaluate the role of the Jewish people, another minority given a place in history by God. They have not ceased being active in the world, often in saying what we ourselves should have said and did not and do not say. It seems that God willed this emulation between Jews and Christians, as Paul understands it. He clearly affirms that at the end of the world Israel would be reconciled with Christ and that Jews and Christians would recognize that their separate histories are one.
• 25. The destiny of the Jewish people is of great interest to us since we have the same ancestors. The first Christians never thought they were breaking away from the Jewish people (Acts 13:26-32; 26:22). On the contrary, they were the ones who had welcomed the Savior for whom they were all waiting. A new people, not a different one, had started with them (Ps 22:32) since they were the remnant of Israel.
Our faith is rooted in historical events, in the Old Testament as well as in the New. This is why the Gospels give a prominent place to the national catastrophe and the destruction of Jerusalem in 70, as Jesus had announced. According to Luke, this tragedy of the rejected Savior will mark the destiny of the Jewish people until the time of the pagans is fulfilled, that is to say, until the end of history (Lk 21:24). The Gospel does not say more.
Here, however, Paul is asking us not to confuse two things. On one hand, God is calling those he wants to know Christ and to believe in him, anywhere in the world; and to them, God entrusts his greatest and most secret works. God may multiply the calls to a given people, as it happened in Christian lands for ten centuries and then God can leave this people outside the great current of faith. In this sense, most Jewish people eschewed that call. However, that cannot cancel God’s promises to the Jewish people. God has made them into a special people with a unique mission that they continue to fulfill for the salvation of the world.
This should serve to invite us to rethink our own experience of the Church. Even if there are not many Christians who are conscious of being called by God and of their evangelical vocation, the Church as the Christian people, continues to fulfill its mission: it is necessary for the salvation of the world and the’“powers of death will not prevail over it.”