even so these also have now been disobedient, that by the mercy shown to you they may also obtain mercy.
Parallel Translations
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even so these also have now been disobedient, that by the mercy shown to you they may also obtain mercy.
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even so now have they not beleved the mercy which is happened vnto you that they also maye obtayne mercy.
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Euen so nowe haue they not beleeued by the mercie shewed vnto you, that they also may obtaine mercie.
Cross-references (3)
Passages linked to Romans 11:31 in the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge, ordered by reader-vote popularity; verse text shown in World English Bible.
- Romans 10:16 But they didn’t all listen to the glad news. For Isaiah says, “Lord, who has believed our report?”
- Romans 11:15 For if the rejection of them is the reconciling of the world, what would their acceptance be, but life from the dead?
- Romans 11:25 For I don’t desire you to be ignorant, brothers, of this mystery, so that you won’t be wise in your own conceits, that a partial hardening has happened to Israel, until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in,
Cross-references from openbible.info (CC BY 4.0)
Explain this verse (9 sources)
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John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain 31 Even so have these also now not believed,…
31 Even so have these also now not believed, that through your mercy they also may obtain mercy.
Ver. 31. That they also] It noteth not the cause, but the event, as 1Co 11:19.
John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain Even so have these also now not believed,.... Now…
Even so have these also now not believed,.... Now is the time of the Jews' unbelief, blindness has happened to them, the vail is over their hearts; as the Gentiles formerly did not believe God, so the Jews do not now; though they believe there is a God, and that there is but one God, yet they do not believe God in Christ; nor that he is the Father of Christ; or that Christ is the Son of God, the true Messiah, and Saviour of the world: they do not believe, as some read the words, connecting them with the next clause, and so they stand in the original text, "in your mercy"; meaning either Christ, in whom the Gentiles obtained mercy; or the Gospel, the means of it; or the sense is, that they do not believe that mercy belongs to the Gentiles, having entertained a notion, treat the Messiah, and the blessings of mercy and goodness by him, are peculiar to Israel: but our version after Beza, who follows Theophylact, connects the clause with the following,
that through your mercy they may obtain mercy; not through the mercy the Gentiles show to others, but which they have received of God; and principally intends faith, which springs from the mercy of God, and is a gift of his pure, free, rich grace; and stands opposed to the unbelief of the Jews, through which the Gentiles are said to obtain mercy; and the meaning: is, that in time to come, the Jews, observing the mercy obtained and enjoyed by the Gentiles, will be provoked to jealousy, and stirred up to an emulation of them, to seek for the same mercy at the same hands, and in the same way, they have had it; see Rom 11:11; The apostle's argument in favour of the call and conversion of the Jews, upon the whole is this, that since the unbelief of the Gentiles was no bar to their obtaining mercy, and that through the infidelity of the Jews; then it cannot be thought, that the present blindness, hardness of heart, enmity, and unbelief, which now attend the Jews, can be any obstacle to their obtaining mercy in the same way the Gentiles have; but as the one has been, the other also will be.
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain Verse 31. Even so have these also] In like…
Verse 31. Even so have these also] In like manner the Jews are, through their infidelity, shut out of the kingdom of God:-
That through your mercy] But this exclusion will not be everlasting; but this will serve to open a new scene when, through farther displays of mercy to you Gentiles, they also may obtain mercy - shall be received into the kingdom of God again; and this shall take place whenever they shall consent to acknowledge the Lord Jesus, and see it their privilege to be fellow heirs with the Gentiles of the grace of life.
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As sure, therefore, as the Jews were once in the kingdom, and the Gentiles were not; as sure as the Gentiles are now in the kingdom, and the Jews are not; so surely will the Jews be brought back into that kingdom.
Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Albert Barnes 1834 · Public Domain Even so have these ... - That is, the…
Even so have these ... - That is, the Jews.
That through your mercy ... - The immediate effect of the unbelief of the Jews was to confer salvation on the Gentiles, or to open the way for the preaching of the gospel to them. But its remote effect would be to secure the preaching of the gospel again to the Jews. Through the mercy, that is, the compassion or deep feeling of the converted Gentiles; through the deep and tender pity which they would feel for the blinded and degraded Jews: the gospel should be again carried to them, and they should be recalled to the long lost favor of God. Each party should thus cause salvation to come to the other - the Jews to the Gentiles by their unbelief; but the Gentiles, in their turn, to the Jews by their belief. We may here learn,
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That the Jews are to be converted by the instrumentality of the Gentiles. It is not to be by miracle, but by the regular and common way in which God blesses people.
(2)That this is to be done by the mercy, or compassion of the Gentiles; by their taking pity on the lost and wretched condition of the Jewish people.
(3)It is to be when the abundance of the Gentiles - that is, when great numbers of the Gentiles - shall be called in.
It may be asked here whether the time is not approaching for the Gentiles to make efforts to bring the Jews to the knowledge of the Messiah. Hitherto those efforts have been unsuccessful; but it will not always be so; the time is coming when the promises of God in regard to them shall be fulfilled. Christians shall be moved with deep compassion for the degraded and forsaken Jews, and they shall be called into the kingdom of God, and made efficient agents in extending the gospel through the whole world. May the time soon come when they shall feel as they should, for the rejected and forsaken children of Abraham, and when their labors for their conversion shall be attended with success.
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset & David Brown 1871 · Public Domain Even so have these--the Jews.
Even so have these--the Jews.
now not believed--or, "now been disobedient"
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that through your mercy--the mercy shown to you.
they also may obtain mercy--Here is an entirely new idea. The apostle has hitherto dwelt upon the unbelief of the Jews as making way for the faith of the Gentiles--the exclusion of the one occasioning the reception of the other; a truth yielding to generous, believing Gentiles but mingled satisfaction. Now, opening a more cheering prospect, he speaks of the mercy shown to the Gentiles as a means of Israel's recovery; which seems to mean that it will be by the instrumentality of believing Gentiles that Israel as a nation is at length to "look on Him whom they have pierced and mourn for Him," and so to "obtain mercy." (See Co2 3:15-16).
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges 1878 · Public Domain 31. have these also now not believed] Better, did…
31. have these also now not believed] Better, did these disobey.
through your mercy] Connect these words with “have these not obeyed.” The verse will then read;—Thus these also now disobeyed through your mercy, that they also, &c.—The “mercy of the Gentiles” is the mercy of God in Christ to them, not any mercy of theirs to the Jews.—The statement of this verse is the almost exact converse of that of Rom_11:30. Jewish unbelief was, in a certain sense, the instrumental cause of Gentile salvation; so, in a certain sense, Gentile salvation was the final cause of Jewish unbelief. In the Divine Plan the call of the Gentiles was to hinge upon the unbelief of the Jews when they should reject Messiah; and thus the grand act of Jewish unbelief was, in a guarded sense, “caused” by the promise of the call of the Gentiles.
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that they also may obtain mercy] Q. d., “that their reception again (in single cases, and at length in a mass,) may be as remarkably an act of sovereign compassion as your own call was.” The emphatic idea throughout this section is mercy.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers 1878 · Public Domain (31) Through your mercy—i.e., through the mercy vouchsafed to…
(31) Through your mercy—i.e., through the mercy vouchsafed to you. The sight of the admission of the Gentiles is to act as a stimulus upon the Jews, and so lead to a renewal of their faith and obedience.
A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
B. W. Johnson 1891 · Public Domain 31. Even so have these also now not believed.…
31. Even so have these also now not believed. These Jews who were now in unbelief. Their disobedience had opened the door for the Gentiles. But the mercy shown the Gentiles, the fact that they are honoring and worshiping God, shall be a means of converting the Jews. Thus shall they also (the Jews) may also obtain mercy.
B. W. Johnson's The People's New Testament with Notes (1889–1891) — public domain. Electronic text from the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (CCEL) ThML edition.
J. W. McGarvey 1914 · Public Domain even so have these [the Jews] also now been…
even so have these [the Jews] also now been disobedient, that by the mercy shown to you they also may now obtain mercy . [How the Gentile received blessing by reason of the casting off of the Jew has already been explained at verse 15. As the Gentile went through a season of disobedience, from which he was saved by severity shown to the Jew, so the Jew was to have a like season of disobedience, from which he in turn is to be eventually saved by God's mercy to the Gentiles. Some construe the "mercy" to mean that the Gentiles are to have a continuous, ever-increasing spiritual prosperity until finally the very excess of the flood of it sweeps Israel into belief, and therefore into the kingdom. But such a construction plainly denies the New Testament prophecies which speak of a "falling away" ( 2Th_2:3 ) in "the last days" ( 2Ti_3:1-9 ), and do not accord with the effects of gospel preaching as announced by Christ ( Mat_24:14 ). The meaning is that God's mercy to the Gentiles in Paul's day preserved the gospel in the world for the ultimate blessing of the Jews, and God's continued mercy to the Gentiles through the centuries, and even through the latter days of their acute apostasy, will still keep the gospel till the Jews are ready to accept it. God's mercy to the evil, Gentile earthen vessel preserves the truth wherein lies salvation, and will continue to preserve it till the Jew drinks of the water of life which it conserves ( 2Co_4:7 ). In short, the cases are reversed. The Jewish dispensation ended in a breakdown, but not until the Gentiles became receptacles of the truth. Mercy was shown to the Jew till this Gentile belief was assured. So the Gentile dispensation shall likewise terminate in failure, but not until Jewish belief is assured. We are even now obtaining mercy waiting for the consummation of that part of God's plan. As God once spared the Jew till his blessings were transferred without loss to the Gentiles, so will he now spare the Gentile till the truth now stored in him has time to pass safely to the Jew. And as surely as he shifted his Spirit and mercies from Jew to Gentile, just so surely will he in turn shift back and re-endow the Jew. The apostle is here giving, his whole attention to the acts of God, and omits for the time all reference to that human agency which paved the way for the divine action. However, it is indicated in the word "mercy." The change in either case was in justice long overdue before it came.]
J. W. McGarvey (with Philip Y. Pendleton), Commentaries on the New Testament (The Fourfold Gospel, 1914; Acts; and the epistles) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.