For he said to Moses, “I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.”
Parallel Translations
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For he said to Moses, “I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.”
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For he sayth to Moses: I will shewe mercye to who I shewe mercy: and will have compassion on whom I have compassion.
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For he saith to Moses, I wil haue mercy on him, to whom I wil shew mercie: and wil haue compassion on him, on who I wil haue copassion.
Examined in Scripture Analysis
Contradictions (1)
Questions where the Bible appears to say two different things, with the passages on each side set together.
Cross-references (6)
Passages linked to Romans 9:15 in the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge, ordered by reader-vote popularity; verse text shown in World English Bible.
- Exodus 33:19 He said, “I will make all my goodness pass before you, and will proclaim Yahweh’s name before you. I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will show mercy on whom I will show mercy.”
- Romans 9:16 So then it is not of him who wills, nor of him who runs, but of God who has mercy.
- Micah 7:18 Who is a God like you, who pardons iniquity, and passes over the disobedience of the remnant of his heritage? He doesn’t retain his anger forever, because he delights in loving kindness.
- Romans 9:18-19 So then, he has mercy on whom he desires, and he hardens whom he desires. You will say then to me, “Why does he still find fault? For who withstands his will?”
- Exodus 34:6-7 Yahweh passed by before him, and proclaimed, “Yahweh! Yahweh, a merciful and gracious God, slow to anger, and abundant in loving kindness and truth, keeping loving kindness for thousands, forgiving iniquity and disobedience and sin; and who will by no means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children, and on the children’s children, on the third and on the fourth generation.”
- Isaiah 27:11 When its boughs are withered, they will be broken off. The women will come and set them on fire, for they are a people of no understanding. Therefore he who made them will not have compassion on them, and he who formed them will show them no favor.
Cross-references from openbible.info (CC BY 4.0)
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John Calvin 1540 · Public Domain 15. For he saith to Moses, etc. With regard…
15. For he saith to Moses, etc. With regard to the elect, God cannot be charged with any unrighteousness; for according to his good pleasure he favors them with mercy: and yet even in this case the flesh finds reasons for murmuring, for it cannot concede to God the right of showing favor to one and not to another, except the cause be made evident. As then it seems unreasonable that some should without merit be preferred to others, the petulancy of men quarrels with God, as though he deferred to persons more than what is right. Let us now see how Paul defends the righteousness of God.
In the first place, he does by no means conceal or hide what he saw would be disliked, but proceeds to maintain it with inflexible firmness. And in the second place, he labours not to seek out reasons to soften its asperity, but considers it enough to check vile barkings by the testimonies of Scripture.
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It may indeed appear a frigid defence that God is not unjust, because he is merciful to whom he pleases; but as God regards his own authority alone as abundantly sufficient, so that he needs the defence of none, Paul thought it enough to appoint him the vindicator of his own right. Now Paul brings forward here the answer which Moses received from the Lord, when he prayed for the salvation of the whole people, “I will show mercy,” was God’s answer, “on whom I will show mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion.” By this oracle the Lord declared that he is a debtor to none of mankind, and that whatever he gives is a gratuitous benefit, and then that his kindness is free, so that he can confer it on whom he pleases; and lastly, that no cause higher than his own will can be thought of, why he does good and shows favor to some men but not to all. The words indeed mean as much as though he had said, “From him to whom I have once purposed to show mercy, I will never take it away; and with perpetual kindness will I follow him to whom I have determined to be kind.” And thus he assigns the highest reason for imparting grace, even his own voluntary purpose, and also intimates that he has designed his mercy peculiarly for some; for it is a way of speaking which excludes all outward causes, as when we claim to ourselves the free power of acting, we say, “I will do what I mean to do.” The relative pronoun also expressly intimates, that mercy is not to all indiscriminately. His freedom is taken away from God, when his election is bound to external causes.
The only true cause of salvation is expressed in the two words used by Moses. The first is חנן, chenen, which means to favor or to show kindness freely and bountifully; the other is רחם, rechem, which is to be treated with mercy. Thus is confirmed what Paul intended, that the mercy of God, being gratuitous, is under no restraint, but turns wherever it pleases.
John Calvin's Commentaries (1540-1563) — public domain. Text from the Calvin Translation Society English edition (1840s-50s) via the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (ccel.org). Calvin's coverage is partial (roughly two-thirds of the Bible); uncommented books and verses are honest gaps, never fabricated. The 19th-century editor's footnotes and remarks are omitted so the notes are faithfully Calvin's own voice.
Geneva Bible translators 1599 · Public Domain I will be merciful and favorable to whom I…
I will be merciful and favorable to whom I list to be favorable.
I will have compassion on whomsoever I list to have compassion.
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He answereth first touching them which are chosen to salvation in choosing of whom, he denieth that God may seem unjust, although he choose and predestinate to salvation, them that are not yet born, without any respect of worthiness: because he bringeth not the chosen to the appointed end, but by the means of his mercy, which is a cause next under predestination. Now mercy presupposeth misery, and again misery presupposeth sin or voluntary corruption of mankind, and corruption presupposeth a pure and perfect creation. Moreover mercy is showed by her degrees: to wit, by calling, by faith, by justification and sanctification, so that at length we come to glorification, as the Apostle will show afterward. Now all these things, orderly following the purpose of God, do clearly prove that he can by no means seem unjust in loving and saving his.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain 15 For he saith to Moses, I will have…
15 For he saith to Moses, I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion.
Ver. 15. I will have mercy, &c.] Dei voluntas est ratio rationum, nec tantum recta, sed regula. The will of God is the rule of his plan, neither only right but his rule.
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.
Matthew Poole 1685 · Public Domain q.d. God is not chargeable with any injustice in…
q.d. God is not chargeable with any injustice in electing some, and not others; for this is an act of mere mercy and compassion, and that can be no violation of justice. To prove this, he cites a testimony out of Exo 33:19, which see. There he tells Moses, that the good pleasure of his will was the only rule of all his favourable and merciful dealings with the children of men. The same thing is intended and expressed in two several phrases: and the ingemination imports the freeness of God’s mercy; nothing moves him thereunto, but his own gracious inclination; and also the arbitrariness thereof; it depends only upon his good will and pleasure. The sum is, if God show mercy to some, and not to others, he cannot be accused of injustice, because he injures none; nor is he obliged or indebted to any.
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain So then it is not of him that willeth,....…
So then it is not of him that willeth,.... This is not a consequence drawn by an adversary, showing that if this be the case, it signifies nothing for men to will or do, they may even sit still and do nothing, but depend on the mercy of God; but this is a conclusion of the apostle's from the above cited testimony, inferring from thence, that election, which is what he is discoursing of, is "not of him that willeth",
nor of him that runneth: that is, is not owing to the will or works of men, to the desires, inclinations, and affections of their minds, or to the actions of their lives; these are not the motives, conditions, or causes of this act:
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but of God that sheweth mercy; in a free sovereign way and manner, which he is not obliged to by anything the creature wills or works; he is at full liberty, notwithstanding whatever they will or do, to give his grace and mercy, when, where, and to whom he pleases; and therefore to give it to some, and deny it to others, can never be accounted an act of injustice, since he is not bound to give it to any. Some make the it to be the blessing of Isaac, which was not of the will of any of the parties concerned; not of Isaac who willed it to Esau; nor of Esau who willed it to himself, but had it not; nor of the will of the persons who had their desires, not of the will of Rebecca, who was desirous of it for her son Jacob, nor of the will of Jacob, who desired it for himself, though he had it; nor of either of them that ran, not of Esau, who made haste to hunt for, and prepare venison for his father, nor of Jacob, who ran to the flock, for two kids of the goats; but of God that showed mercy to him, who, according to his sovereign will and pleasure, had signified before to Rebecca, that "the elder should serve the younger", Gen 25:23, as the apostle had mentioned this so lately, it might still be in his thoughts, and he may allude to it; but election being what he is discoursing of in the context, that is the "it" here designed; and what is true of that, is true of salvation in all its parts, and therefore some understand it in the large sense of salvation; though by others so qualified and limited, as to spoil the glory of the text: some saying that the sense is, it is not of him that willeth and runneth wrong, but of the grace and mercy of God; but as no man would ever assert, that salvation is of him that wills and runs wrong, so the apostle had no occasion to deny it: others say, that it is not only of him that wills, and only of him that runs, but also of God that shows mercy; making man's will and works joint causes with the mercy of God in man's salvation; and besides, as Austin (k) long ago observes, according to this sense, the words might as well be read, it is not only of God that shows mercy, but of him that willeth, and of him that runneth, which no Christian would dare to say: the true sense is, that as election, which is the leading step to salvation, is not owing at all to the will of men, but to the good pleasure and will of God; and not at all to the works of men, that being done before them, and they being the fruits and effects of that, but to the free love, grace, and good will of God; so salvation in all its parts and branches, as redemption, justification, regeneration, calling, and conversion, faith, repentance, hope, love, &c. and eternal life, is not to be ascribed at all to the will of men, nor at all to the works of men, but entirely and alone to the love, grace, and mercy of God through Christ.
(k) Enchiridion, c. 32.
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Wesley 1765 · Public Domain Exod. xxxiii, 19.
Exod. xxxiii, 19.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain Verse 15. For he saith to Moses, I will…
Verse 15. For he saith to Moses, I will have mercy, c.] The words of God to Moses, Ex 33:19, show that God has a right to dispense his blessings as he pleases for, after he had declared that he would spare the Jews of old, and continue them in the relation of his peculiar people, when they had deserved to have been cut off for their idolatry, he said: I will make all my goodness pass before thee; and I will proclaim the name of the Lord before thee; and I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy; and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion. As if he had said: I will make such a display of my perfections as shall convince you that my nature is kind and beneficent; but know, that I am a debtor to none of my creatures. My benefits and blessings are merely from my own good will: nor can any people, much less a rebellious people, challenge them as their due in justice or equity. And therefore I now spare the Jews; not because either you, who intercede for them or they themselves have any claim upon my favour, but of my own free and sovereign grace I choose to show them mercy and compassion. I will give my salvation in my own way and on my own terms. He that believeth on my Son Jesus shall be saved; and he that believeth not shall be damned. This is God's ultimate design; this purpose he will never change; and this he has fully declared in the everlasting Gospel. This is the grand DECREE of reprobation and election.
Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Albert Barnes 1834 · Public Domain For he saith to Moses - Exo 33:19.
For he saith to Moses - Exo 33:19.
I will have mercy - This is said by God when he declared expressly that he would make all his goodness pass before Moses Exo 33:19, and when, therefore, it was regarded, not as a proof of stern and inexorable justice, but as “the very proof of his benevolence,” and the highest which he thought proper to exhibit. When people, therefore, under the influence of an unrenewed and hosthe heart, charge this as an unjust and arbitrary proceeding, they are resisting and perverting what God regards as the very demonstration of his benevolence. The sense of the passage clearly is, that he would choose the objects of his favor, and bestow his mercies as he chose. None of the human race deserved his favor; and he had a right to pardon whom he pleased, and to save people on his own terms, and according to his sovereign will and pleasure.
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On whom I will have mercy - On whom I choose to bestow mercy. The mode he does not explain. But there could not be a more positive declaration of these truths,
That he does it as a sovereign, without giving an account of the reason of his choice to any.
(2)That he does it without regard to any claim on the part of man; or that man is regarded as destitute of merit, and as having no right to his mercy.
(3)That he will do it to any extent which he pleases, and in whatever time and manner may best accord with his own good pleasure.
(4)That he has regard to a definite number and that on that number he intends to bestow eternal life; and,
That no one has a right to complain.
It is proof of his benevolence that any are saved; and where none have a claim, where all are justly condemned, he has a right to pardon whom he pleases. The executive of a country may select any number of criminals whom he may see fit to pardon, or who may be forgiven in consistency with the supremacy of the laws and the welfare of the community and none has a right to complain, but every good citizen should rejoice that any may be pardoned with safety. So in the moral world, and under the administration of its holy Sovereign, it should be a matter of joy that any can be pardoned and saved; and not a subject of murmuring and complaint that those who shall finally deserve to die shall be consigned to woe.
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary 1859 · Public Domain I will have mercy, &c. Then it is not…
I will have mercy, &c. Then it is not of him that willeth, &c. By these words he again teaches that God’s call and predestination of those whom he has decreed to save, in not upon account of any works or merits in men, but only to be attributed to the mercy and goodness of God. See St. Thomas Aquinas on this chap. lect. iii. See St. Augustine, Encher. chap. xcviii. Epis. 194. in the new Ed. Ep. 105. ad Sixtum de lib. Arbit. chap. xxv. &c. (Witham)
George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).
Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset & David Brown 1871 · Public Domain For he saith to Moses-- (Exo 33:19).
For he saith to Moses-- (Exo 33:19).
I will have mercy on whom I will have--"on whom I have"
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mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have--"on whom I have"
compassion--"There can be no unrighteousness in God's choosing whom He will, for to Moses He expressly claims the right to do so." Yet it is worthy of notice that this is expressed in the positive rather than the negative form: not, "I will have mercy on none but whom I will"; but, "I will have mercy on whomsoever I will."
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
Daniel D. Whedon 1874 · Public Domain 15. For—The two fors in this and the seventeenth…
15. For—The two fors in this and the seventeenth verse show that Paul gives a reason in each case for maintaining God’s rectitude; first for the bright side, and next for the dark side of the divine dealings in his system of free-agency.
The predestinarian view makes Paul’s answer to the question, Is God unrighteous? be simply this: God is an absolute sovereign, and can do as he pleases, and will as he will, and therefore what he does is right. He can choose men to sin and death “for nothing in them,” and for no fault of theirs; and, because He is almighty, it is right. But,
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1. Such a reply is not Pauline, as we have shown, (see note on Rom_3:4-5.) Paul’s doctrine is not that a thing is right because the Absolute One does it; but the Absolute does that which is intrinsically right.
2. The supposed answer is no answer at all. When I ask, Is a given act right? it is no reply to say the actor could do what he pleased, and could will as he willed, and therefore it was right. Power increased infinitely cannot change right. A creature can be supposably wronged by even an infinite being.
3. The predestinarian interpretation makes Paul pretend to give a reason, but really resort to force, and seek to frighten his opponent out of reasoning. Now even if thus silencing instead of convincing were not very mean, the pretending to give a reason when he gives no reason at all would be very mendacious.
4. Mr. Barnes (on Rom_9:15) argues that where all are guilty and worthy of death an executive may pardon a definite number without any just complaint from the unpardoned. Not, we reply, where his own previous decree has plunged the unpardoned into the sin and misery for which he condemns them.
5. Mr. Barnes argues that to predestinate unconditionally a man to sin and damnation is no more unjust than to make him inferior to his fellow “in regard to talents, health, beauty, prosperity, and rank.” It is just as right for God to make me a sinner, and send me to hell for being what he has decretively made me, as it is for him to make me less than a Solomon. (See his notes on Rom_9:12; Rom_9:21.) But,
(1.) These temporal inferiorities are compensated by a large surplus of happiness that renders life desirable in spite of them; but for eternal damnation there is no compensation. Defenders of God’s benevolence, like Paley, point us to the great surplus of happiness over misery diffused by God among all living beings. Life itself is a happiness; and its cessation, death, is dreaded and avoided as the greatest of evils. Thus do all living beings, however inferior, consent, agree, and covenant with God gladly to accept life as long as he will graciously bestow it upon them. But who ever consents to be brought into existence a necessary sinner—just as necessarily as a sparrow is not an eagle, or a zany is not a sage—and for that necessity be sent to an eternal hell?
(2.) These varieties of rank and advantage, of superiority and inferiority, are necessary to a grand system of creation. The result is that, while there is disadvantage in the various parts, the highest advantage is attained for the whole, and such a degree of happiness is secured for every part as that part is glad to accept. But to produce one class of beings upon whom sin and damnation are resistlessly fixed ages before they are born, predetermining their wills to sin, and their souls to hell for that sin, is an awful crime to charge upon God. It is only when by wilful, persistent, undecreed, and unnecessary sin, a free agent violates the divine order, and thus deserves eternal expulsion and reprobation, that such a destiny can be justifiable.
(3.) Omnipotently to create an innocent being supremely miserable would be an act of unspeakable despotism; but there may be discerned in it a certain infernal frankness and magnanimity. But to take an innocent nature, such as man is before he is decreed a sinner, and decretively smear sin upon him as a ground of justly damning him to an eternal hell, is as mean and mendacious as it is despotic. The calling such dealings righteousness, justice, is what our moral nature, with all its intensity, pronounces a truly execrable falsity.
(4.) We offer no solution to the problem that amiable and clear intellects, like Albert Barnes, can not only advocate doctrines which are morally so abominable, but can advocate them with reasonings so futile. But we are almost compelled to believe, from such specimens of logic, that the divine penalty imposed upon the ablest intellects for holding the abhorrent dogma, is to be smitten with collapse in defending it.
Saith unto Moses—(Exo_33:19.) Moses coming down from Sinai, where he had received the law, finding the people immersed in idolatry, exclaims, Who is on Jehovah’s side? Forthwith the tribe of Levi step forth, draw swords, and execute upon the spot three thousand transgressors.
Next day (Exo_22:22) Moses prays that if Jehovah will not spare the people, his own name may be blotted out from God’s book. Jehovah respects the profound unselfishness of the mistaken prayer, but sternly replies,” Whosoever hath sinned against me, HIM will I blot out of my book.” Such was the conditional rule and reason of the Divine will in inflicting wrath, (Exo_32:15-33.) And this explains the dark side of the antithesis in Rom_9:18.
Moses again stands to intercede with God, (xxxiii, 12-19,) and, meeting a gracious reception, beseeches God, Show me thy glory. God consents, declaring, (the words quoted by Paul,) “I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious,” etc. And this explains the bright side of the antithesis in Rom_9:18.
God thus willed, in spite of Moses’ wish, to punish the guilty, and THE GUILTY ONLY; and he willed, in accordance with Moses’ wish, to show him his glory. Thus did God will as he was supremely pleased to will. Yet let four things be noted: First, this willing as he will does not mean willing without a reason, motive, or rule, but willing with a perfect right, reason, motive, and rule. Second. It does not mean that the reason, motive, or rule is an incomprehensible, mysterious, unrevealed, unknown one, but the fully revealed and perfectly just rule of impartially dealing with men as free agents. Third. The peremptoriness of this willing as he will, while it does not exclude either reason, rule, or a publication of reason or rule, does override the small caprice of the man who (as Moses) would doubt, cavil, or rebel against the infinite reason; and, Fourth, This willing as he will is a willing to deal with men, not “for nothing in them,” but according to their faith, and subsequently to their faith, and conditionally upon their faith. The wrongly praying Moses is the type of the weeping Paul, or even of the cavilling Jew, humanely wishing that God would spare the unfaithful people; yet God will inflexibly act on the known and universally published rules of righteous judgment. He will disregard human dictation, whether in form of prayer, weeping, or cavil, and so will have mercy on whom he will have mercy. And human reason, being finitely in the type of divine reason, when it comes to an understanding of the divine rules and reasons, does in its highest exertions profoundly approve the principles on which they are based. So that Paul’s logic is a full reply to his Jewish opponent.
In this interpretation we make no mistake. We have rightly interpreted God’s words to Moses as they are in the Old Testament. And on the perfectly just rule that, where possible, a quotation in the New from the Old Testament must be taken in its original sense, the passage means from the pen of Paul just what it means from the mouth of Jehovah.
Alford makes the apostle here teach “Divine sovereignty” solely and regardless of human freedom, (freedom, he says, is fully taught in other places,) from Paul’s habit of “insulating the one subject under consideration.” But, 1. Alford entirely mistakes the “subject” which the apostle here “insulates.” “Divine sovereignty” is not the “subject,” nor the question, in any part of the chapter. It is God’s “unrighteousness,” (Rom_9:14, as there said in our note,) namely, Has not God the right, overruling the Jews, to sink the old narrow Judaic particularism in a new broad conditional universality? Has not God the right to do right? And, 2, Alford’s exposition not only makes the apostle leave human freedom out of view, but forces it out of existence by completely contradicting it, and making any assertion of freedom elsewhere to be false. 3. Alford forgets that in this very chapter the apostle takes care to assert human freedom, and so to assert it as to run it through all these instances, and so deny the absolutist interpretation in each and every case. (See notes on 30-33.)
I will… on whom I will—This simple assertion, that God will accept whom he pleases, decides not the question, Whom does he please or will to accept? But, taken in its connexions, it plainly means that whereas the Jew wills that God should accept all Jews, God wills—and will do as he wills—to accept all true believers. Paul thus peremptorily asserts not the divine Will in disregard of reason, or in disregard of “anything in the individual,” or in regard to some unknown reason, or in absolute “divine sovereignty” over all things, but in entire independence of Jewish pedigree, merit, or dictation. The Jew prefers a system of predestinated birth-salvation; God prefers an equalized system of free-agency—and will have his way. He will have his way in spite of the cavils of predestinarians, whether Judaistic or Calvinistic.
The rules by which God thus wills, and absolutely pleases, to have mercy, are abundantly revealed in Scripture. To reveal and publish them is, indeed, the great object of Scripture. The decalogue proclaims him a God “showing mercy to thousands that love me and keep my commandments.” “Let the wicked forsake his way, and return to the Lord, and he will have mercy. (Isa_55:7.) The pretence, therefore, that this verse presupposes some no-reason, or some unknowable reason, for his gracious preferences, is a figment and a folly.
Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges 1878 · Public Domain 15. For] The connexion is; “The thought of injustice…
15. For] The connexion is; “The thought of injustice in these acts of the Eternal Judge is all the more to be rejected because they follow a principle expressed in His own words; for He says to Moses, &c.” That the principle, so expressed, is absolutely right, is taken for granted. To the Apostle, God’s word is final and absolute. With Him nothing indeed can be capricious, but none the less His “judgments” must, to a vast degree, be “past finding out,” just because He is the Eternal.
I will have mercy, &c.] Exo_33:19. Verbatim from LXX.—The English exactly represents the Hebrew, if it is noted that “will” throughout this verse might equally well be “shall.” In both Hebrew and Greek there is no explicit reference to “willing,” in the sense of “choosing.” However, the general sense plainly is, “In any case, through human history, wherein I shall be seen to have mercy, the one account I give of the radical cause is this—I have mercy.” It is to be thankfully remembered, by the way, that close to this awful utterance occurs that other equally sovereign proclamation, (Exo_34:6, &c.) “The Lord, the Lord God, merciful and gracious, &c.”
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 (15) For he saith to Moses.—In the most characteristic…
(15) For he saith to Moses.—In the most characteristic period of the Old Testament the divine favour was promised in this way to Moses and denied to Pharaoh. The original of the first quotation has reference to the special revelation vouchsafed to Moses on Sinai, “I will show grace to whom I will show grace.”
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 15. I will have mercy upon whom I will…
15. I will have mercy upon whom I will have mercy. This is in Exod. 33:19, and is in answer to a request of Moses for a high privilege. The Lord grants it, not because he merits it, but of grace, because he “will be gracious to whom he willeth, and will have mercy where he will.” The passage, as applied by Paul, asserts that God favors nations according to his pleasure. He exercises free choice.
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.
William B. Godbey 1900 · Public Domain 15. “For he says to Moses, I will have…
15. “For he says to Moses, I will have mercy on whom I do have mercy, and will compassionate whom I do compassionate” (Exo 3:19). This progenitorship was a great and signal mercy, yet it did not exclude the reprobated from grace and glory but does imply from a place in the honored Messianic progenitorship.
William B. Godbey, Commentary on the New Testament (1896–1900) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
J. W. McGarvey 1914 · Public Domain For he saith to Moses [ Exo_33:19 . Surely…
For he saith to Moses [ Exo_33:19 . Surely if the Scripture generally was final authority to the Jew, that part of it would be least questioned wherein God is the speaker and Moses the reporter], I will have mercy on whom I have mercy [God chooses both the occasion and the object of mercy, and it is not regulated by anything external to him. That which is bestowed upon the meritorious and deserving is not pure mercy; for, as Shakespeare expresses it, "The quality of mercy is not strained"], and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion . [Compassion is a stronger term than mercy; it is mercy with the heart in it. The words quoted were spoken to Moses when he requested to see God, and his request was in part granted. In expounding Exo_33:19 ; Keil and Delitzsch speak thus: "These words, though only connected with the previous clause by the copulative vav, are to be understood in a causal sense as expressing the reason why Moses' request was granted, that it was an act of unconditional grace and compassion on the part of God, to which no man, not even Moses, could lay any just claim." This interpretation is strengthened by the Old Testament reading, which runs thus: "I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will show mercy on whom I will show mercy," for the act was one of grace rather than of compassion. Let us remember that Paul is here addressing a hypothetical Jewish objector. The Jew, influenced by false reasoning on his law, held a theory that man's conduct regulated God's and that man took the initiative and that God's actions were merely responsive. Such might, in some measure, have been the case had any man ever kept the law; but as things actually stood, to the subversion of all such things, it was evident from Scripture that Moses, the great lawgiver, himself had never been able to merit a favor at God's hands, but, on the contrary, God granted that to him as a matter of gracious mercy which he could never claim as a matter of right; viz., not eternal life with God, but the mere momentary glimpse of the passing of God's glory. Surely, with such a precedent before him, the rational, thoughtful Jew, whether of Paul's day or of our own, could and can have small hope of gaining heaven by the works of the law. Since it is true that Abraham obtained favor by faith and Moses received it solely by grace, who shall win it by merit under the law?]
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.
Tyndale Open Study Notes 2022 · CC BY-SA 4.0 9:15 This quotation from Exod 33:19 focuses on God’s…
9:15 This quotation from Exod 33:19 focuses on God’s nature: God is free from obligation or constraint in bestowing mercy on people.
Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.