I say then, Have they stumbled in order that they might fall? Far be the thought but by their fall [there is] salvation to the nations to provoke them to jealousy.
Paul asks whether Israel's stumbling over Christ was meant to end in ruin. His answer is no. Their failure became the moment salvation went out to the nations, and God aims that salvation back at Israel.
Paul is not asking whether Israel tripped — that much is agreed. He is asking what the trip was for, and "fall" here carries the weight of a final, unrecoverable end.
The second question must now be answered: "Did they stumble in order that they might fall?" They have indeed stumbled at the stumbling stone, the stone laid in Zion. Was it for their everlasting ruin? That is the sense in which "to fall" seems to be used here. Their ruin, we learn, is not God's purpose. His purpose is the blessing of Gentiles, to provoke Israel to jealousy. God has cast Israel off only for a time. The nation will be saved, and saved as a nation.
Commentators press the difference between a slip and a crash. That distinction carries the whole argument.
Had Israel then stumbled that they might fall? By no means! By their slip, salvation has come to the Gentiles to provoke them to jealousy. God had merciful thoughts in store for Israel. He judged their sin and used it as the occasion to call the Gentiles. He did not do this as if He had abandoned the Jews for ever as His people. He did it to stir them up to holy longing. Israel had slipped, not finally fallen.
You cannot make a stranger jealous. The very method God chose to reach Israel gives away His intentions toward them.
They stumbled over Him in whom they saw no beauty and whom they did not desire. They did not receive Him, though He had come to His own. But this did not result in their complete fall. In His infinite wisdom and all-wise purpose, God used their fall to bring salvation to the Gentiles and to provoke them to jealousy. In this statement we see again that God has not cast away His people Israel. If He had cast them away, why should He wish to provoke them to jealousy? And He provokes them to jealousy so that some of them may be saved.
The word "jealousy" is not Paul's invention. He is quoting a much older warning.
Paul points back to the words of Deuteronomy 32. Their bearing on the question is clear, and to a Jew their authority could not be disputed. It was not Paul but Moses who said the Jew provoked the LORD to jealousy and forgot the Rock who gave him birth... "They have made me jealous with what is no god; they have provoked me to anger with their idols. So I will make them jealous with those who are no people; I will provoke them to anger with a foolish nation." This is God's sure and solemn threat of displeasure. He turns from Israel to the Gentiles, just as surely as Israel used to turn from the LORD to false gods. But the threat itself contains the no less sure hint of restoring mercy in the end.
If jealousy is the goal, then God has not written the nation off. He is waiting for something from them — though only He can produce it.
They had stumbled, but not in order to fall for good. We see this clearly: the salvation of the Gentiles was meant to provoke them to jealousy. God still then was expecting from them what His own grace alone could produce. But if such blessings came from their fall, will not their fulness, when it comes, bring even greater blessing to people at large?
Gentiles gained from Israel's fall. But that gain comes with a condition and a warning.
As a people, the Jews have stumbled at the stumbling stone of Messiah's humiliation. But they did not stumble in order to fall. Through their trespass salvation has come to the Gentiles, to provoke Israel to jealousy — not to cast Israel off. Again, the figure of the olive tree teaches the same lesson... the Gentile is only a wild olive. God grafted him in after breaking off some of the branches. He is called not to be proud but to fear. If he does not remain in God's goodness, he too will be cut off.
- Stumble — Israel tripped over Christ, the stone laid in Zion. But the trip was never aimed at a final fall. A slip, not a collapse.
- Occasion — God did not cause their sin. He judged it, then used it as the opening for salvation to reach the nations.
- Jealousy — The stated goal of Gentile blessing is to stir Israel. The method itself proves God still counts them as His.
- Moses — The jealousy language comes from Deuteronomy 32. It warns that God will turn away, and it carries the promise of His return.
- Fulness — If Israel's stumbling brought the world this much, their restoration promises far more. Meanwhile the grafted-in Gentile must fear, not boast.
But if their fall [be the] world's wealth, and their loss [the] wealth of [the] nations, how much rather their fulness?
Paul has just asked whether Israel stumbled so as to fall, and answered with a flat denial. Now he reasons forward. If the nation's failure already poured wealth into the world, what will their recovery bring?
Where the ESV says "trespass" and "failure", older translations say "fall". One writer shows that this one English word covers two different Greek words:
The word "fall" is used three times here as though it were the same word in the original each time. The second and third are the same word, but not the first... To fall down after a stumble is the meaning! The stumble in this chapter was the rejection of Christ. In the wilderness they fell, never to rise again. Here, though, we learn that Israel has stumbled but has not fallen for good. They will yet rise again. The other word, translated twice as "fall", is paraptomati = transgression... Israel has stumbled and offended, but they have not fallen. As branches they will once more be grafted in.
The proof that God has not finished with them is buried in His own stated motive — He means to make them jealous.
They stumbled over Him in whom they saw no beauty and whom they did not desire. He had come to His own, and they did not receive Him. But this did not result in their complete fall. In His infinite wisdom and all-wise purpose, God used their fall to bring salvation to the Gentiles, to make them jealous. In this statement we see again that God has not cast away His people Israel. If He had cast them away, why should He wish to provoke them to jealousy?
The "riches" are not vague. One writer names what the world received, and at whose expense:
The ministry of reconciliation, with all the blessings that come with it and flow from it, has come to us through the cutting off of the natural branches.
And the effect has spread far beyond those who believe:
The nations hardly realize how much they owe to the gospel. Yet everywhere Christianity has spread its blessed influence, it has lifted civilization to a higher, more honourable and sensible level. Only blindness can ignore this.
The force of Paul's argument comes from a fact easy to miss:
The transgression of Israel has opened the treasures of divine mercy to the world. The shrinking of Abraham's now disowned descendants has made the Gentiles rich. But if so, he argues, how much more will these blessings flow from their restoration... The apostle argues from the lesser to the greater. His argument draws its force from this: the present time of grace to the Gentiles has limited effects, and it could end at any time.
So the blessing Christianity has brought, real as it is, is not the ceiling:
The believer's portion is so magnificent that, left to our own thoughts, we might well suppose these blessings fulfil all God's purposes of grace. But Scripture teaches otherwise... Only the "fulness" of Israel, then, brings in the world's complete measure of blessing.
Their "fulness" — what the ESV calls their "full inclusion" — is their restoration as a nation. With it comes a complete reversal of character:
God will restore His ancient people and use them as the very means of blessing to the nations in the millennium. How much more blessing will earth see then than it has ever seen before! Israel will then be a fit representative of God. Under the law they grabbed every blessing for themselves; then they will hand blessing out to the nations with all their heart.
This verse settles an argument about the phrase "the fulness of the Gentiles" a few verses later:
The coming in of the fulness of the Gentiles cannot mean the conversion of all the Gentiles. The earlier part of the chapter itself speaks of fuller blessing to the Gentiles — to the world — through the receiving of Israel than through its fall. Suppose God has brought all the Gentiles into blessing before He restores Israel. How then could the apostle speak this way about Israel's restoration and its effects on the Gentiles — and in this very chapter?
- Stumble — the English wording hides a distinction. Israel stumbled and transgressed, but did not fall beyond recovery. They will rise, and be grafted in again.
- Riches — because God set Israel aside, the ministry of reconciliation reached the nations. Whole civilizations rose without knowing whom to thank.
- How much more — Paul argues from lesser to greater. The present flow of grace to the nations has limits, and it could end at any time. It is not God's final measure.
- Fulness — Israel restored stops hoarding blessing and starts distributing it. The nation once disowned becomes the channel that carries God's full blessing to the earth.
- Therefore — the world's best days lie ahead of Israel's recovery, not behind the gospel's spread. That is why "the fulness of the Gentiles" cannot mean every Gentile converted first.
For I speak to you, the nations, inasmuch as *I* am apostle of nations, I glorify my ministry;
Here Paul turns and speaks straight to the nations. Two questions follow. What is this office that he makes so much of? And why would a man who aches for Israel take pride in a ministry aimed away from her?
The words mark a shift in audience. One writer notes that the group in view is not the same thing as the assembly of believers:
The apostle starts his subject of the olive tree by writing, "Now I am speaking to you Gentiles." He does not speak to the Church as such, although his teaching is for the Church. He has in view the present period, in which God is dealing with the Gentiles.
Paul did not appoint himself apostle to the nations. His commission traces back to the moment the risen Christ stopped him on the road, and the order of the words spoken to him then is itself instructive:
Notice that bearing Christ's name before Gentiles comes first. The sons of Israel come last, with "kings" between them. He was to be "apostle of Gentiles" (Rom. 11:13). For this, the call of the Lord from heaven was most fitting. On earth He had sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. When He sends from heaven, Israel ceases to have any such place. Before this, all mankind had joined together and been lost in one common guilt. The Jews had even led the Gentiles to crucify Him. So Israel's superiority in the flesh was completely gone. Sovereign grace alone governs from now on. If anyone is to be named prominently, it is those who are most needy.
To magnify the ministry is to hold it up high. And the work Paul holds up was the clearest sign that his own nation stood rejected:
He magnifies his office as the apostle of the Gentiles. His heart always longs for his own people. So he seeks comfort in the very work that witnessed most clearly to the nation's rejection. Some, he hoped, might still be saved this way... Meanwhile he knew that Israel was rejected in fact. But she was not forgotten in God's purposes, which from long ago were faithfulness and truth.
The blessing of the nations was never meant to be the end of the story. God arranged it so that Israel would see what she had refused and want it back — which is exactly why Paul threw his weight behind the work:
This is the second proof that God had no final purpose to cast them off. He arranged it to provoke them to jealousy — that is, not to cast them off. And so the apostle laboured. He magnified his service to the Gentiles as tending to this; so far was he from thinking little of Israel.
The same words that lift up the office also humble the reader. Gentile believers learn what their blessing rests on, and it is not themselves:
The apostle magnifies his office of apostle to the Gentiles by showing how it bears on the Jews. In this way he puts the Gentiles in their place and guards them against the pride of supposed superiority in the flesh. And here comes the solemn warning to them. The stock of promise began with Abraham and ran on naturally in this world through the Jews. The root bore the branches, and the Gentiles had no ground for pride.
Making much of a ministry is not the same as making much of yourself. Paul held both together:
Such strangely perverse creatures are we, that unless the flesh is kept under, service, instead of making us humble, tends to puff us up. The publicity, which to a great extent cannot be separated from service, the position it gives the servant, and the many things that tempt the servant to think something of himself, arising from the very nature of the work — all these may tend to self-exaltation... Humility in the apostle did not mean weakness — when the occasion called for it, he knew how to magnify his office, and he could write to another and say, "Let no man despise thy youth"; but of himself as a worker he could say, "Unto me who am less than the least of all saints is this grace given."
- Sent — the office began with a call from heaven, and that call named the nations first. On earth Christ had sent only to Israel. Now sovereign grace governs, not natural descent.
- Addressed — "Now I am speaking to you Gentiles" marks out the place the Gentiles hold in God's dealings, not the Church as such.
- Magnified — Paul holds his ministry high, yet the man stays low. He calls himself the very least of all the saints.
- Aimed — he magnified it because it worked back toward Israel. It stirred his own people to want what they had refused, and some might yet be saved.
- Levelling — the honour of this ministry leaves no room for Gentile boasting. The root carries the branches, so there is no ground for pride.
if by any means I shall provoke to jealousy [them which are] my flesh, and shall save some from among them.
Paul has just told the Christians at Rome that Israel's stumble opened the door to the nations. Now he explains why he makes so much of his work among the Gentiles. His eye has never left his own people. Blessing for one is meant to bring back the other.
Paul does not praise his own work for its own sake. He makes much of it because of what it may do back home in Israel.
This is the second proof that God's purpose was never to cast them off for good. It was arranged to provoke them to jealousy — that is, not to cast them off. And so the apostle worked. He made much of his service to the Gentiles because it worked toward this. He was far from thinking little of Israel.
This is also why Paul brings the Gentiles into a discussion about Israel's future at all.
He was speaking to the believers at Rome: "Now I am speaking to you Gentiles." He then adds, "Inasmuch then as I am an apostle to the Gentiles, I magnify my ministry." So how or why should he forget God's mercy to them? That mercy hangs on God's ways with Israel, which were his subject here.
The plan goes back to Moses, long before Paul.
Moses speaks of the Lord provoking Israel to jealousy by their seeing Gentiles coming into blessing. Paul also sought to do the same, that they might be saved. Deuteronomy 32:21; Romans 10:19; Romans 11:11, 14.
There is a reason this method works on the heart.
One discovery stirred up the fierce anger of the Jews. The riches of the gospel, which in their insane folly they had despised, were now going to the Gentiles. If they had truly thought the gospel a worthless fable, they would not have minded it going out to the nations. When a man rejects something and then grows jealous because another receives it, his jealousy is a powerful witness. Deep down he feels that it is of real value.
Paul is not talking about strangers. He works among Gentiles, but his heart stays with his own people.
He magnifies his office as the apostle of the Gentiles. His desire is to stir to jealousy those who are his own flesh. His heart always longs for his own people. So he finds comfort in the very work that showed most plainly that the nation had been set aside. He hoped some of them might still be saved this way. The Spirit of God was bearing witness among the Gentiles, backed by signs and mighty wonders of apostolic power. That witness might work on the conscience and the heart of an individual Israelite.
Paul's hope here is limited: some saved out of the nation, not the whole nation at once. A far greater day still lies ahead.
Paul was the apostle to the Gentiles, and he magnified his office as such. But he would not have the Gentiles think for a moment that he had lost his interest in Israel. He wanted to see them stirred to jealousy, so that many of them might be saved as they watched the grace of God go out to the Gentiles… Think what that means. They wander among all the nations, a disappointed and weary people, under the judgment of the God of their fathers. Meanwhile the message of grace goes out to the Gentiles, and a chosen number of them receive it. What will it mean for the whole world when Israel as a nation turns back to the Lord?
Paul aims these words at Gentile readers, and they carry a caution.
Peter may have had a Gentile danger in view here, the very danger Paul warns Gentiles against in Romans 11:13 to 29. If Gentiles misunderstand and misuse God's truth, and so become wise in their own eyes, they are very near destruction.
- Office — Paul magnifies his work among the nations because it aims at Israel. It proves he thought much of them, not little.
- Method — Jealousy is God's own plan. Moses announced it in Deuteronomy 32:21, and Paul now works it out.
- Motive — "My flesh" means his own countrymen. His heart still longs for them, and he finds comfort in the very work that marked their rejection.
- Measure — His hope now is "some," saved out of the nation. The greater day comes when Israel as a nation turns back to the Lord.
- Caution — Paul speaks to Gentiles. The mercy they enjoy warns them not to grow wise in their own eyes.
For if their casting away [be the] world's reconciliation, what [their] reception but life from among [the] dead?
Paul has just said that Israel's stumbling brought salvation to the Gentiles. Now he presses further. If the loss of one nation enriched the world, what will their return bring? Two phrases carry the verse: "the reconciliation of the world" and "life from the dead."
God once dealt with one nation while the rest of the world stood outside. Setting Israel aside changed who God now addresses.
"World" here clearly means the Gentile world as distinct from Israel. God brought this reconciling about by changing His dealings. That change led Him to set Israel aside from their special place of national favour. It also led Him to bring the Gentile world before Him for blessing. Before, the Gentiles had turned their faces away from God on purpose, and He had turned His face from them. Now He has turned toward them; and as Paul said elsewhere, "this salvation of God has been sent to the Gentiles; they will listen" (Acts 28:28). This change in God's dealings has taken place. Paul was the chosen servant sent to offer salvation to the Gentile world.
Some read this verse to mean that God Himself was reconciled to the world. One writer rejects that and gives the phrase a different sense.
There is no such idea in the Bible as "God being reconciled to the world." The Church, or the saints, are said to be reconciled to God — never the world... The true meaning of the phrase in Romans 11 I take to be that God is now turning the fall of Israel into blessing for the Gentiles, and instead of overlooking the times of heathen ignorance, He is now dealing with the world by the word of reconciliation.
The change is one of position before God. He now speaks to a world that once stood outside every relationship with Him.
The Jews had been in an ordered relationship with God, though unfaithful to it; the world was out of all relationship. Men were completely without God in the world. They were shut out from the community of Israel and strangers to the covenants of promise, with no hope and without God in the world. When Israel fell, this state of things ended. God now called everyone everywhere to repent. God took up the world again, no longer overlooking the ignorance.
The phrase pictures Israel as a nation now dead and waiting to rise. Ezekiel saw a valley of dry bones, and God Himself explained what the vision meant.
Ezekiel saw the bones live, and the men stand on their feet. But then God gives us the real meaning and proper use of it... Here the same God uses resurrection as a picture of the blessing He is going to give the people of Israel. Luke 15 uses the picture in the same way for the conversion of the prodigal son: "this my son was dead, and is alive again; he was lost, and is found." Paul uses the same picture for the blessing that will come to the world one day through the restoration of Israel.
Some read the phrase as the literal resurrection of believers at that same moment. One writer expects both risings in that period, yet keeps them apart.
When God receives Israel back into His favour, it will be an event of a resurrection character, as Ezekiel 37 has shown us. We fully believe that in the short "end of the age" period there will be both the literal resurrection of saints and the figurative resurrection of Israel.
The verse rests on a comparison. That comparison rules out the idea that all nations are won before Israel returns.
The coming in of the fullness of the Gentiles cannot mean the conversion of all the Gentiles. The earlier part of the chapter itself speaks of fuller blessing to the Gentiles — to the world — through the reception of Israel than through its fall.
The blessing now reaching the world is not the last word.
If the casting away of the nation leads to the gospel of reconciliation going out to the world, then indeed, when they are received back into blessing as a nation, it will be life for the world. All the prophecies of millennial blessing for a world under the curse await the restoration of Israel as the centre of blessing for the earth.
- Cause — God set Israel aside from their place of national favour, and that opened His dealings to the wider world.
- Gift — the reconciling of the world is a change in God's dealings, not the world's conversion. Scripture never says God was reconciled to the world.
- Reach — God now calls a world once outside all relationship with Him to repent, and the gospel goes out to all.
- Result — "life from the dead" is the language of Ezekiel's dry bones: Israel raised as a nation, told in picture form.
- Reversal — today one nation's fall enriches the many. Later, that nation's restoration will bring blessing to the whole earth.
Now if the first-fruit [be] holy, the lump also; and if the root [be] holy, the branches also.
Paul is arguing that God has not finished with Israel. He proves it with two pictures — a first portion of dough, and a tree with its root — and both raise the same questions: who is the first-fruit, who is the root, and what does "holy" mean here?
Paul reasons from the smallest part to the whole nation.
The godly remnant of Israel at the present time is the first-fruit of the restored nation. If the firstfruit is holy, so will the lump be — the nation as a whole. If the fruit of the tree is holy, so are the branches. Israel is thus likened to an olive tree planted to produce fruit.
Commentators differ. Others read the first-fruit as the nation's beginning:
By the words "first-fruit" I understand the apostle to mean the nation of Israel in its first calling and honour... So the apostle's argument is that the nation's final destiny will be worthy of that first calling.
The second picture turns on the root. One writer tests the options:
Is it Christ? How could that be? No one was ever joined to Him by natural birth... Again, if any are cut off who seemed on the outside to be joined to Christ... there is no hint, no suggestion that they are ever grafted in again. On the contrary, we are told that nothing but final ruin awaits them. Christ, then, is not the root of the olive tree. He is the Vine. Can it be Abraham?... What, then, can the root be but Abraham? God made the promises to him (Gal. 3:16), and Israel belonged to him by natural birth, as his descendants.
The word "holy" here does not describe an inner state. It describes a position.
There seems no doubt that "the firstfruit" and "the root" in verse 16 refer to Abraham. He was the father of all Israel, the first man God openly chose to bless and to make a blessing to others (Gen. 12:2). Israel are then the natural branches, and for this reason they are "holy" — not in themselves, of course, but in their outward position, just as the children of believers are. Compare 1 Cor. 7:14.
Why an olive tree? One writer names what the picture stands for, and where it can fail:
The olive naturally speaks of what the Spirit is found in, for oil is a picture of the Spirit. But it carries the same responsibility. What is looked for may not be there in fact. The branches are broken off for lack of a faith they never had. A person can share the richness of the olive tree and still not have it... When the apostle speaks of the lump being holy as the firstfruit was, he means Abraham, who was set apart to God. Israel had the same setting apart, but it was not necessarily more than outward.
The next verses speak of branches broken off. So what does the tree stand for?
It is astonishing that people who believe in the eternal life of the believer can apply the olive-tree, of which we next hear (Rom. 11:16-24), to salvation or the Church... Take these branches as the Jews, the natural heirs of the promise to Abraham, and all is plain. They have been broken off in part... The unbelieving Jews were in the olive-tree: who will say that they were ever in the Church?
If "holy" means position, not possession, the warning that follows makes sense.
God had promised Abraham, "In your offspring shall all the nations of the earth be blessed." So that this promise should not fail, the branches of the wild olive tree — the Gentiles — were grafted in among the remnant of Israel. Believing Jews and Gentiles now share the root and richness of the olive tree together. But the grave danger is that the Gentile rests on outward privileges alone. He is linked with the children of the promise, yet may fail to value the gospel of God for himself, and so prove unreal.
The warning is sharper than it looks, because the two sides are not treated alike:
Now to Gentiles, if cut off, remember, no restoration is promised. For Israel there is a hope held out, on the condition stated with it.
- Root — the root is Abraham, the man God gave the promises to. It cannot be Christ, since branches in Him are never broken off and grafted back.
- Firstfruit — a first portion given to God stands for the whole. Some take it as the believing remnant now, some as the nation in its first calling. Either way it guarantees the rest.
- Lump — God set the first portion apart, so the whole nation has a future. Israel's end will be worthy of its beginning.
- Branches — "holy" here means outward position, not inward reality, like the children of believers. A branch can share the tree's richness and still lack faith.
- Warning — the tree is the line of privilege, not the church. Those grafted in are told to fear, not boast. Privilege with nothing real behind it does not last. Gentiles cut off have no promise of return; Israel does.
Now if some of the branches have been broken out, and *thou*, being a wild olive tree, hast been grafted in amongst them, and hast become a fellow-partaker of the root and of the fatness of the olive tree,
The apostle turns from argument to picture. An olive tree loses some of its branches, and a wild shoot from outside comes in among the rest. What is the tree? Who is the root? And on what terms does a Gentile stand where Israel once stood?
Many read this image as a picture of salvation or of the church. Then comes the worry: can a believer be lost? Commentators here say the subject is something else.
Some argue that the olive tree is the Church, the natural branches are Jews, and the wild ones Gentiles. But notice how such handling of God's word obscures all true understanding of Scripture. Are true members of the body of Christ broken off? And do others keep their place only as long as they stay faithful?... But how simple it all is when we see not the Church, but the privileges of grace. The olive tree is the line of privilege throughout the world's history. It began with Abraham. It carried on in those who came after him, though they were "broken off" because of their unbelief. It has now passed on to Christendom, where crowds of Gentiles enjoy privileges they had never known before... The Church is not touched, but profession and responsibility are. Unfaithful Christendom will be "broken off," and repentant Israel restored again.
Where the ESV says "the nourishing root," older translations say "the root and the fatness" of the olive tree. Two things are in view: where the tree starts, and what flows up through it.
The olive tree represents the line of promise and testimony ("by nature" Israel, the descendants of promise who came from Abraham)... If we take Israel at the root, we must take it in Abraham, for before him there was no question of Israel. The nation began in the person of Abraham himself. So the root of the promises is Abraham. The fatness is the sap that springs from the root and flows through the tree. It answers to the promises that God placed, as it were, in Abraham.
Commentators differ on how far back the root reaches. One writer traces it past Abraham:
In the fullest sense the root is Christ Himself. Abraham got his blessing from Christ, though unknown to him on earth, for the Son of God had not been revealed... The fatness, that is, spiritual enrichment, did not come to a man because he was descended from Abraham as a Jew. It came because he shared Abraham's faith, and shared in the blessing Abraham enjoyed. This is open to Gentiles as well.
Two small words guard against overstatement. Paul does not say all the branches went, and he does not say the wild shoot took an empty tree.
On the one hand some, not all of the branches, have remained, and do remain in connection with the root. Naturally they were part of the tree. Other natural branches have been broken off and cut away from the tree. Yet if God pleased to do it, He could graft them back into their own olive tree. Meanwhile something else has happened. A wild olive tree has been grafted in among the natural branches. So together with the branches that have always stayed joined to the stem, it shares in the root and fatness of the olive tree.
In gardening the procedure runs the other way, and the apostle knows it.
But in nature the graft is good and the root is wild. The sapling is a crab apple — wild and sour, and the fruit small. The gardener grafts in a cultivated variety, and there you have an apple that is large and sweet. But here the graft is wild and the root cultivated — "contrary to nature," as the apostle is careful to point out. So the branches do not bear the root, but the root bears the branches, and the only thing that will cause the branches to remain and prosper is belief.
Being grafted in is a place of privilege, and the verses that follow show that privilege can be forfeited — which is why the tree must not be read as the body of Christ.
No doubt those who make up the church, Christ's body, come in as branches. They stand through faith in the place of the broken-off Jewish ones. But others come in too, who only profess to be Christ's. They do not value God's goodness. They abandon it for forms, or scepticism, or open evil... This is no question of saving grace, but of earthly responsibility, according to the testimony given first to Israel and then to Christendom.
- Root — the tree begins with Abraham, the man God gave the promises to. Some writers trace the root deeper still, to Christ Himself.
- Fatness — the sap rising from the root stands for those promises. A branch shares that richness; no branch owns it.
- Break — only some branches came off. Others stayed in place, so the tree was thinned, not felled.
- Graft — the wild shoot went in "contrary to nature." The branch does not carry the root; the root carries the branch.
- Terms — this line of privilege is not the church and not personal salvation. It is responsibility. Faith puts a branch there, and faith alone keeps it there.
boast not against the branches; but if thou boast, [it is] not *thou* bearest the root, but the root thee.
Paul has just told his Gentile readers that they stand in a tree that was never theirs by nature. Now he bans the pride such a place breeds — a branch cannot feed the tree that feeds it, so who is the root, and what is the tree?
Everything hangs on who the root is. One writer tests the options by watching what Paul says about the branches. Some branches belong to the tree by nature; others get cut out, and cut branches can go back in. That rules out one answer and points to another:
What, then, is this root? Is it Christ? How could that be? No one was naturally connected to Him... Christ, then, is not the root of the olive tree. He is the Vine. Can it be Abraham?... So what can the root be but Abraham? God made the promises to him, and Israel was naturally connected to him as his physical descendants.
In ordinary gardening the point of grafting is to improve a poor stock with a good shoot. Paul reverses it, and that reversal is exactly why the branch has nothing to boast about:
In nature the graft is good and the root is wild. The sapling is a crab apple, as we say — wild and sour, with small fruit. The gardener grafts in a good variety, say a Cox's orange pippin, and the tree then bears a cultivated apple, large and sweet. But here the graft is wild and the root cultivated — "contrary to nature," as the apostle is careful to point out. So the branches do not bear the root; the root bears the branches. And only one thing will keep the branches there and make them prosper: belief.
Some read the olive tree as the church. Commentators here reject that reading. One of them shows why the text will not allow it: branches in this tree can be cut out.
It is argued that the olive tree is the Church, the natural branches are Jews, and the wild ones Gentiles. But see how such handling of God's word blocks all true understanding of Scripture. Are true members of the body of Christ broken off? And does the standing of others depend only on their faithfulness?... The olive tree is the line of privilege running through the world's history. It began with Abraham and continued in those who came after him. They, however, were "broken off" because of their unbelief, and the line has now passed on to Christendom.
Another writer agrees. He adds how far this tree reaches in time, and what it never erases:
It is the tree of testimony on earth, God's separated witness that carries responsibility. It reaches into the millennium, the thousand-year age to come, when all Israel will be saved. It does not wipe out the difference between Jew and Gentile. It keeps the Jews as the natural branches, though Gentiles may be grafted in for a time.
The warning was not theoretical. One writer sees the boast Paul forbade in how Christendom — the professing Christian world — has spoken about the Jewish people:
The natural branches of the olive tree were broken off, and the wild olive, or Gentile, grafted into the old stock of profession. And here is the warning: "Then you will say, 'Branches were broken off so that I might be grafted in.'" Has this not been exactly the feeling of Christendom? Contempt for the Jews. Shock at their wickedness. And total blindness about their own condition.
The ban on boasting rests on a plain fact: the Gentile did not earn his place.
The reason why Israel lost its position for a time, as a nation, was its unbelief and pride. The Gentile has been brought in only as a favour from God; not because he is any better than the other. If therefore he develops the same pride and unbelief that marked the Israelite, shall he not also be cut off? Indeed he will.
Israel's failure and the Gentiles' entrance belong together. So do the reversals of both:
The Gentiles' admission to privilege is linked with the failure of Israel. In the same way, the taking up of the Jews again for blessing is linked with the falling away of the Gentiles. A solemn fact for Christendom!
The two cases are not equal, though. One writer marks where the hope stops:
Remember this: if Gentiles are cut off, no restoration is promised to them. For Israel a hope is held out, on the condition stated with it.
- Root. The root is Abraham, the man who received the promises. It is not Christ, since no one was ever naturally joined to Him.
- Reversal. Normal grafting puts a good shoot into a wild stock. Here a wild shoot goes into a cultivated root, so life flows one way only.
- Reach. The tree is the line of privilege and testimony on earth from Abraham onward. It is not the body of Christ, which is why branches in it can be cut out.
- Restraint. Contempt for the Jewish people, with no look at oneself, is the boast Paul banned. The Gentile stands there by God's favour, not by merit.
- Result. Israel's fall opened the door to the Gentiles. Gentile unfaithfulness will open it again to Israel.
Thou wilt say then, The branches have been broken out in order that *I* might be grafted in.
Paul imagines a Gentile answering back: God removed Israel to make room for me, so surely I count for more. Paul states that boast plainly here, and then answers it — everything turns on why the old branches fell, and on what the new branch stands on.
Paul says the boast out loud before anyone can make it. One writer traces the same attitude through the later history of Christendom.
The Jews are meant by the natural branches. They had held the promises of old, and so they had the responsible place of witness for God on the earth. That is why they were the original branches of the olive tree, the line of promise and witness on earth which began with Abraham. And here is the warning: "Then you will say, 'Branches were broken off so that I might be grafted in.'" Has this not been exactly the feeling of Christendom? It has shown contempt for the Jews, shock at their wickedness, and complete unconcern about its own condition.
Paul answers by naming the cause on each side.
Unbelief had broken off the natural branches. Faith was the means that brought the foreign shoot in. Faith is the condition of their standing. Just naming it silences the self-congratulating boast he had just warned them against.
Faith looks to God, not to self.
Faith makes everything of God. So let the Gentiles beware of pride that makes something of self. They too may fall into unbelief.
Which tree does Paul mean? It is the tree of promise and witness on earth, and its branches change over time.
The reference to the grafting of trees in Romans 11 shows that the practice existed then. It speaks of Gentiles, the wild olive branches, grafted into the good olive tree. Scripture calls this "contrary to nature." Gentiles have now been grafted into the tree of witness on earth, and of promise. But later the natural branches, Israel, will be grafted again into "their own olive tree." It does not refer to individual salvation.
The two must not be mixed up. Branches come and go on the olive tree; the body of Christ is another thing entirely.
It is very important not to confuse two things. One is the continuous line of the inheritance of the promise on earth, the olive tree. The other is the mystery of Christ and the church, where everything is new and above nature. No member is ever broken off the body, and the Jew is no more a natural limb of it than the Gentile.
The warning falls on Gentile Christianity as a whole. It is not a threat to an individual believer's salvation.
All such stand by faith, or not at all. He did not spare the natural branches, so we cannot expect Him to spare the grafts if they do not value His goodness. So comes the threat in verse 22: "you also will be cut off." This is not a question of individual salvation, which the failure of an age cannot touch. The point is that God will reject Gentile profession as a whole, just as He rejected Israel in an earlier age, if it is not faithful.
This danger did not end with Paul's first readers.
Paul anticipates such an attitude in Romans 11:19 and 25. There is the danger of being wise in our own eyes, as if all our resources are in our own hands. That would despise the lessons of Israel's history and failure, which are there to instruct and warn us.
- Boast. The Gentile reads Israel's fall as proof of his own importance. Christendom later showed the same attitude.
- Cause. Paul corrects the reason. Unbelief broke Israel off; faith brought the Gentile in; and faith leaves nothing to boast about.
- Tree. The olive tree is the line of promise and witness on earth that began with Abraham. It is not the body of Christ, and grafting into it is not the same as being saved.
- Standing. The grafted branch keeps its place only by faith. If it does not value God's goodness, it is cut off too.
- Hope. Israel is not finished. The natural branches will be grafted again into their own olive tree.
Right they have been broken out through unbelief, and *thou* standest through faith. Be not high-minded, but fear
Paul is writing to Gentile believers who boast over Israel's fall, and his answer is a warning: the old branches fell through unbelief, and the new branch holds its place only by faith. That raises two questions — what does God break off, and why must someone who stands by faith also fear?
The cutting off was not a decision made over Israel's head. One writer keeps the cause where the verse puts it:
But the Gentile must not boast. He says, "you do not support the root, but the root supports you." And note this: it was because of unbelief they were broken off. It was not because God willed to break them off, but because of their own unbelief. And the Gentile stands by faith.
That one fact ruins the boast. If unbelief emptied the place, the newcomer did nothing to earn it.
Standing "through faith" tells us how the place is held, not only how the Gentile got it. One commentator reads it as the terms of a lease:
The place of the Gentile Church as a branch grafted into the olive root has already been stated. Now we are told the only terms on which that place is kept. Unbelief had broken off the natural branches. Faith was the way the foreign shoot came in. Faith is the condition of their standing, and the very mention of it silences the self-congratulating boast he had just warned them against.
Another writer widens the principle to the whole Christian life:
We receive the gospel on the basis of faith. The believer's whole life from that moment on rests on faith too. What we receive by faith produces faith. This principle of faith rules out all efforts of the flesh.
Paul's command is not "be less confident" but "do not become proud." Faith and pride look in opposite directions:
Let the Gentile then beware. Israel was cut off because of unbelief. The Gentiles come into blessing only through faith in God. Faith makes everything of God. Let the Gentiles beware of the pride that makes something of self, in case they too fall into unbelief.
Faith does not compete with the fear Paul commands. Faith produces it:
Over-confident claims and a self-righteous spirit are no evidence of faith, and where faith is missing we should expect the cutting off. Faith gives the spirit of godly fear — a healthy reverence for God's just rule.
Many readers hear a threat to a believer's salvation here. Commentators answer with care. The olive tree, they argue, is the line of privilege on earth, not the body of Christ:
But how simple it all is when we see not the Church, but the privileges of grace. The olive tree is the line of privilege throughout the world's history. It began with Abraham and continued in his successors. They were "broken off" because of their unbelief. The line has now passed on to Christendom, where great numbers of Gentiles enjoy privileges they once had no share in. All is clear. The Church is not touched, but profession and responsibility are.
Another writer makes the same distinction from the other side. Real believers stand as branches. So do others who only profess Christ:
No doubt those who make up the church, Christ's body, come in as branches standing through faith in the place of the Jewish ones broken off. But so do others who only profess Christ. They do not value God's goodness. They abandon it for religious forms, or scepticism, or open evil. This is no question of saving grace. It is a question of responsibility on earth, according to the testimony given — first to Israel, then to Christendom.
The verse is not a general caution. One writer turns it into a question that Christian profession must answer:
So the Gentile gets a full warning. He is shown the principle of God's dealings — the goodness and severity of God toward those who fell, the Israelite branches cut off. "Toward you goodness, if you continue in His goodness." Otherwise the Gentile branches would be broken off, as the Jewish ones were. Have they so continued? Has Gentile profession continued in the faith and walk once delivered to the saints?
- Cause: the natural branches fell through their own unbelief, not by a bare decree. The empty place says nothing good about whoever fills it.
- Tenure: faith is not only how the wild branch got in. It is the condition on which it stays. What faith receives, faith carries on.
- Posture: faith makes everything of God; pride makes something of self. That is why the warning against pride ends in a call to fear.
- Limit: the olive tree is the line of privilege on earth, not the body of Christ. Profession and responsibility can be cut off. Saving grace is not the subject here.
- Question: the warning ends in a test. Has Christian profession continued in God's goodness? Fear, not boasting, is the fitting reply.
if God indeed has not spared the natural branches; lest it might be he spare not thee either.
When God turned to the nations, He did not promote them above Israel. Paul argues from what God has already done to what He may yet do. God cut out branches that belonged to the tree by birth. So no grafted branch can claim a safer place.
The phrase "natural branches" names one people, marked out by birth.
The Greek phrase kata phusin means "according to nature." The name natural branches belongs to the Israelites, branches of the olive tree which God planted on earth. Rom. 11:21, 24.
Their removal was not random. The root set a standard, and the branches failed to match it.
The Jew came from Abraham, the man first chosen and called out so that the promises would run in his line (though their effects reached everyone else). So the Jew had been the natural trunk, or branches, of the olive tree. The Gentile grew wild outside. But God must have branches that match the root, and because the Jews did not, judgment went out against them. It was clear, then, that the Gentiles had the most reason to fear. If God had dealt with the failure of Abraham's descendants, no one could imagine that He would tolerate Gentile wickedness.
Older English Bibles soften the ending into a caution — take heed, in case He does not spare you either. One commentator reads it as a flat statement instead:
"For if God did not spare the natural branches, neither will He spare you" — this is most likely how we should read the clause.
Much confusion clears once we see which tree is in view. It is not the church.
The unbelieving Jews were broken off because of unbelief. Now in no sense could anyone say that the Jews were broken off from the church, for they were never in it. The apostle also speaks of breaking off the Gentile branches. That cannot be the church either, because in no sense can anyone say that the church of the living God, in its true sense, is broken off. The whole wording of the chapter proves that the olive tree refers to the line and channel through which God administers His promises on the earth.
A place of blessing is not the same as new life. It still brings real responsibility.
Notice another important principle here. Enjoying privileges because of your position makes you responsible for them, though it does not mean the person was born again. The Jewish branch stood in the tree of promise and was broken off; the same holds for the Gentiles. There was nothing living or real in them, but they stood in the place of blessing.
What decides the matter is unbelief on one side and faith on the other.
Israel was cut off because of unbelief, and only through faith in God do the Gentiles come into blessing. Faith makes everything of God. So let the Gentiles beware of the pride that makes something of self, in case they too fall into unbelief.
Fear here is a mark of real faith, not its opposite.
Proud claims and a self-righteous spirit are no evidence of faith. Where faith is missing, expect the cutting off. Faith gives the spirit of godly fear — a healthy reverence for the just government of God.
The address is corporate. It reaches the whole body of people who bear the Christian name.
It is impossible to apply this to the believer as such. The apostle is speaking of the general professing body. This is the danger facing what people commonly call Christendom — everyone baptized to the name of the Trinity. God warns them here that He will cut them off if they do not continue in the goodness He is now displaying.
So the verse leaves the security of the individual Christian untouched.
This does not touch the question of individual salvation, which Christ secures forever. It is a matter of responsibility in God's present dealings on earth. Who will pretend that Christendom has continued in the goodness of God?
Severity is not the end of the story. Removing the unfruitful Gentile branches opens the way for the first branches to return.
Should we not take warning? The time is near when the unfruitful branches will be torn out of the olive tree, and the natural branches, turning back to God at last, will be grafted in again to their own olive tree.
- Root — God planted the tree and set its standard. He removed the branches that did not match it. Birth alone shielded no one.
- Graft — Gentiles came in with no natural claim. They stand by faith alone, and faith makes everything of God and nothing of self.
- Place, not life — the tree is the line of God's promises on earth, not the church. You can hold a place of privilege without being born again.
- Fear — the right response to a place you did not earn is reverent fear. Boasting takes its place, and that is the first sign of the cutting off.
- Return — the severity that removes faithless branches also clears room. Israel will be grafted back into their own olive tree.
Behold then [the] goodness and severity of God upon them who have fallen, severity; upon thee goodness of God, if thou shalt abide in goodness, since [otherwise] *thou* also wilt be cut away.
The verse sets severity and kindness side by side, then adds a condition. Commentators press hard on two questions: who is the "you" here, and what does "continue" mean? (Older translations render the word here as "goodness" where the ESV has "kindness"; the quotes below use "goodness.")
Both halves of the verse come from one unchanging character in God.
Look at both the goodness and the severity of God. He shows us His unchangeable character as the God of judgment, and with it the riches of His kindness. He cut off those who had fallen in order to maintain His own glory as the righteous avenger of His name. That same line of righteousness applies to the professed people of His name — Gentiles who hold the title of Christ as their own. It would condemn, with equal impartiality, whatever failed to meet the one condition of continuance.
The subject of the whole chapter decides who the warning speaks to.
Who is addressed here? It is either one person who professes Christ, or a whole body of people that the apostle pictures as one person and speaks to in that way. The context shows it is not the first, but the second. The grand subject of the chapter is the partial, temporary setting aside of Israel. In their place God brings in the present body that professes His name, mainly Gentile, to carry the responsibilities of God's people on the earth… But what has taken their place? The body that professes His name — Christendom. That is the body the apostle addresses here.
Does the warning mean a believer can lose salvation? The tree in view is not the church, Christ's body.
It is very important not to confuse two things. One is the continuous line of the promised inheritance on earth: the olive tree. The other is the mystery of Christ and the church, where everything is new and above nature. Members are never broken off from the body… No doubt those who make up the church, Christ's body, come in as branches. They stand through faith in the place of the broken-off Jewish ones. But so do others who only profess the name of Christ. They do not value God's goodness. They give it up for forms, or scepticism, or open evil… The question here is not saving grace. It is responsibility on earth, according to the testimony entrusted first to Israel and then to Christendom.
So what is this goodness, and what does continuing in it look like?
The goodness of God now revealed in the gospel is Christ. He is the propitiation for human sin and the display, in grace, of the righteousness of God… Who then continues in the goodness of God? Only those who once received the knowledge of that goodness by faith and have never moved away from Christ, the true and only hope of the gospel. Putting works in the place of grace. Letting justification by faith alone decay into self-righteousness and outward forms. Keeping the name of Christ and the letter of the gospel, while denying or never knowing the life-giving power of the Holy Spirit. All of these are departures from the goodness of God, which He expresses and gives in Christ alone.
This passage attacks one assumption: that the present order of things is bound to last.
Romans 11 calls it a fatal presumption to think that the church, as God's present order on earth, cannot fall away. That presumption leads the Gentile Church to its ruin. The Holy Spirit condemns those who think this way as wise in their own eyes. He teaches us instead that God would act toward the present order as He did toward the one before it.
The verse offers no way back for a profession that has already failed.
Scripture says nothing about being restored. That will not do: what is needed is to "continue." It is like a man who has broken the law saying, "I will do right from now on." That does not meet the law's claims.
The cutting off is not the end of the story. It opens the way for the branches removed first.
When the true Church has been caught up to be with the Lord, judgment will fall on unfaithful Christendom. Then God will turn back in grace to Israel, if they do not continue in unbelief, and He will graft them back into their own olive tree, according to the power of God.
- Note. God shows both sides at once. The same righteousness that cut off the fallen branches will judge whatever fails the one condition.
- Goodness. The goodness is Christ Himself, given as the propitiation for sin and as the display of God's righteousness.
- You. The "you" is not one believer. It is the professing body, mainly Gentile, standing where Israel stood. What is at risk is a place on earth, not saving grace.
- Continue. Continuing means never moving away from Christ to works, to outward forms, or to a gospel that keeps the letter and denies the Spirit's power. Thinking this order of things cannot fall is the very presumption that ruins it.
- Otherwise. Scripture promises no repair for a failed profession — only cutting off. That cutting off opens the way for God to graft Israel back into their own olive tree.
And *they* too, if they abide not in unbelief, shall be grafted in; for God is able again to graft them in.
God's warning to the Gentile in the previous verses is not the end of the story for the branches He cut off. Paul now turns to them. He gives one condition for their return, and one reason it can happen at all. Both raise the question of what this tree is, and who stands in it today.
Everything in this verse depends on identifying the tree correctly. Commentators here insist it is not the church. God can break its branches off and graft them back in. Scripture never says that of members of Christ's body.
Some argue that the olive tree is the Church, the natural branches are Jews, and the wild ones Gentiles. But see how such handling of God's word blocks all true understanding of Scripture. Are true members of the body of Christ broken off? And does the position of others depend only on their faithfulness? ... The olive tree is the line of privilege throughout the world's history. It began with Abraham and continued in those who came after him. But they were "broken off" because of their unbelief, and the line has now passed on to Christendom.
One thing put Israel out, and the same thing keeps them out: unbelief. The choice was theirs, not God's.
And note this: unbelief is what broke them off. It was not because God chose to break them off, but because of their own unbelief. And the Gentile stands by faith.
If unbelief is what excludes them, then the end of unbelief is what restores them. Kelly ties that turn to repentance, and places it outside the present gospel age.
The Jews will not continue in unbelief. They will truly repent and bless Him who is coming in the name of Jehovah. Then, in sovereign mercy, God will graft them once more into their own olive tree. This will not happen under the gospel. As far as the gospel goes, they are enemies for our sakes.
Paul does not point to anything in Israel. He points to God's power. One writer traces how that argument builds from this verse into the two that follow. (Older translations read "God is able to graft them in again," where the ESV has "God has the power to graft them in again.")
They were cut out of the olive tree because they turned away, but they will be brought in once again. Verse 23 shows that this is possible: "God is able to graft them in again." Verse 24 shows that it is probable: "How much more will these … be grafted into their own olive tree?" Then the apostle rises higher still and shows it to be certain: "Blindness in part has happened to Israel, until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in."
The word "again" matters. They return to the place they once held, not to some new position.
But the tree of promise remains. The Jewish branches will be grafted in again into their own olive tree — the original place of the promise made to Abraham, "for God is able to graft them in again." They will not be grafted into the church. Far from being in it, they were broken off when the church was founded.
Yet they will not come back the way they left. They will come back the way the Gentiles came in — by grace alone.
When God restores Israel, He will lift them from a condition much like the one the Gentiles were in when His grace took them up as His chosen ones. Yet the tree He grafts them into will be their own (verse 24). They will never be removed from it again, but will flourish in everlasting righteousness.
Paul writes this to Gentiles, not to Jews, and it carries a sharp edge. Unbelief cost Israel its place. The same failure will cost Christendom its place.
And I ask, Has the church continued in God's goodness? Is what we now see in Christendom what God set up in His church at the beginning, or anything like it? ... They have not continued in God's goodness. You can see that most plainly. We are conscious of it ourselves. But if they do not continue in God's goodness, the apostle says, the whole of Christendom will be cut off, and the Jews will be grafted in again. ... As soon as the Lord has gathered the real church of God and taken them up to heaven, He sets up the Jews again.
- Tree — the olive tree is the line of privilege on earth that began with Abraham. It is not the church. So this verse is about a place of privilege, not about whether a believer can lose salvation.
- Cause — unbelief broke the branches off. God did not simply decide to remove them. Take away the unbelief, and the removal ends.
- Power — the reason given is not Israel's worth but God's ability. Verse 23 calls it possible, verse 24 probable, verse 25 certain.
- Place — "again" means back into their own tree of promise, not into the church. This time they will never be removed.
- Warning — what cut Israel off now hangs over Christendom. God cuts off the unfaithful Gentile profession, and that makes room for Israel's return.
For if *thou* hast been cut out of the olive tree wild by nature, and, contrary to nature, hast been grafted into the good olive tree, how much rather shall they, who are according to nature be grafted into their own olive tree?
Commentary for this verse has not been generated yet.