9:1Truth I say in Christ, I lie not, my conscience bearing testimony with me in the Holy Spirit,
9:2that I have great grief and unceasing pain in my heart --
9:3for I was wishing, I myself, to be anathema from the Christ -- for my brethren, my kindred, according to the flesh,
9:4who are Israelites, whose is the adoption, and the glory, and the covenants, and the lawgiving, and the service, and the promises,
9:5whose are the fathers, and of whom is the Christ, according to the flesh, who is over all, God blessed to the ages. Amen.
9:6And it is not possible that the word of God hath failed; for not all who are of Israel are these Israel;
9:7nor because they are seed of Abraham are all children, but -- `in Isaac shall a seed be called to thee;'
9:8that is, the children of the flesh -- these are not children of God; but the children of the promise are reckoned for seed;
9:9for the word of promise is this; `According to this time I will come, and there shall be to Sarah a son.'
9:10And not only so, but also Rebecca, having conceived by one -- Isaac our father --
9:11(for they being not yet born, neither having done anything good or evil, that the purpose of God, according to choice, might remain; not of works, but of Him who is calling,)
9:12 it was said to her -- `The greater shall serve the less;'
9:13according as it hath been written, `Jacob I did love, and Esau I did hate.'
9:14What, then, shall we say? unrighteousness is with God? let it not be!
9:15for to Moses He saith, `I will do kindness to whom I do kindness, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion;'
9:16so, then -- not of him who is willing, nor of him who is running, but of God who is doing kindness:
9:17for the Writing saith to Pharaoh -- `For this very thing I did raise thee up, that I might shew in thee My power, and that My name might be declared in all the land;'
9:18so, then, to whom He willeth, He doth kindness, and to whom He willeth, He doth harden.
9:19Thou wilt say, then, to me, `Why yet doth He find fault? for His counsel who hath resisted?'
9:20nay, but, O man, who art thou that art answering again to God? shall the thing formed say to Him who did form it, Why me didst thou make thus?
9:21hath not the potter authority over the clay, out of the same lump to make the one vessel to honour, and the one to dishonour?
9:22And if God, willing to shew the wrath and to make known His power, did endure, in much long suffering, vessels of wrath fitted for destruction,
9:23and that He might make known the riches of His glory on vessels of kindness, that He before prepared for glory, whom also He did call -- us --
9:24not only out of Jews, but also out of nations,
9:25as also in Hosea He saith, `I will call what is not My people -- My people; and her not beloved -- Beloved,
9:26and it shall be -- in the place where it was said to them, Ye are not My people; there they shall be called sons of the living God.'
9:27And Isaiah doth cry concerning Israel, `If the number of the sons of Israel may be as the sand of the sea, the remnant shall be saved;
9:28for a matter He is finishing, and is cutting short in righteousness, because a matter cut short will the Lord do upon the land.
9:29and according as Isaiah saith before, `Except the Lord of Sabaoth did leave to us a seed, as Sodom we had become, and as Gomorrah we had been made like.'
9:30What, then, shall we say? that nations who are not pursuing righteousness did attain to righteousness, and righteousness that is of faith,
9:31and Israel, pursuing a law of righteousness, at a law of righteousness did not arrive;
9:32wherefore? because -- not by faith, but as by works of law; for they did stumble at the stone of stumbling,
9:33according as it hath been written, `Lo, I place in Sion a stone of stumbling and a rock of offence; and every one who is believing thereon shall not be ashamed.'
10:1Brethren, the pleasure indeed of my heart, and my supplication that is to God for Israel, is -- for salvation;
10:2for I bear them testimony that they have a zeal of God, but not according to knowledge,
10:3for not knowing the righteousness of God, and their own righteousness seeking to establish, to the righteousness of God they did not submit.
10:4For Christ is an end of law for righteousness to every one who is believing,
10:5for Moses doth describe the righteousness that is of the law, that, `The man who did them shall live in them,'
10:6and the righteousness of faith doth thus speak: `Thou mayest not say in thine heart, Who shall go up to the heaven,' that is, Christ to bring down?
10:7or, `Who shall go down to the abyss,' that is, Christ out of the dead to bring up.
10:8But what doth it say? `Nigh thee is the saying -- in thy mouth, and in thy heart:' that is, the saying of the faith, that we preach;
10:9that if thou mayest confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and mayest believe in thy heart that God did raise him out of the dead, thou shalt be saved,
10:10for with the heart doth one believe to righteousness, and with the mouth is confession made to salvation;
10:11for the Writing saith, `Every one who is believing on him shall not be ashamed,'
10:12for there is no difference between Jew and Greek, for the same Lord of all is rich to all those calling upon Him,
10:13for every one -- whoever shall call upon the name of the Lord, he shall be saved.'
10:14How then shall they call upon him in whom they did not believe? and how shall they believe on him of whom they did not hear? and how shall they hear apart from one preaching?
10:15and how shall they preach, if they may not be sent? according as it hath been written, `How beautiful the feet of those proclaiming good tidings of peace, of those proclaiming good tidings of the good things!'
10:16But they were not all obedient to the good tidings, for Isaiah saith, `Lord, who did give credence to our report?'
10:17so then the faith is by a report, and the report through a saying of God,
10:18but I say, Did they not hear? yes, indeed -- `to all the earth their voice went forth, and to the ends of the habitable world their sayings.'
10:19But I say, Did not Israel know? first Moses saith, `I will provoke you to jealousy by that which is not a nation; by an unintelligent nation I will anger you,'
10:20and Isaiah is very bold, and saith, `I was found by those not seeking Me; I became manifest to those not inquiring after Me;'
10:21and unto Israel He saith, `All the day I did stretch out My hands unto a people unbelieving and gainsaying.'
11:1I say, then, Did God cast away His people? let it not be! for I also am an Israelite, of the seed of Abraham, of the tribe of Benjamin:
11:2God did not cast away His people whom He knew before; have ye not known -- in Elijah -- what the Writing saith? how he doth plead with God concerning Israel, saying,
11:3`Lord, Thy prophets they did kill, and Thy altars they dug down, and I was left alone, and they seek my life;'
11:4but what saith the divine answer to him? `I left to Myself seven thousand men, who did not bow a knee to Baal.'
11:5So then also in the present time a remnant according to the choice of grace there hath been;
11:6and if by grace, no more of works, otherwise the grace becometh no more grace; and if of works, it is no more grace, otherwise the work is no more work.
11:7What then? What Israel doth seek after, this it did not obtain, and the chosen did obtain, and the rest were hardened,
11:8according as it hath been written, `God gave to them a spirit of deep sleep, eyes not to see, and ears not to hear,' -- unto this very day,
11:9and David saith, `Let their table become for a snare, and for a trap, and for a stumbling-block, and for a recompense to them;
11:10let their eyes be darkened -- not to behold, and their back do Thou always bow down.'
11:11I say, then, Did they stumble that they might fall? let it not be! but by their fall the salvation is to the nations, to arouse them to jealousy;
11:12and if the fall of them is the riches of a world, and the diminution of them the riches of nations, how much more the fulness of them?
11:13For to you I speak -- to the nations -- inasmuch as I am indeed an apostle of nations, my ministration I do glorify;
11:14if by any means I shall arouse to jealousy mine own flesh, and shall save some of them,
11:15for if the casting away of them is a reconciliation of the world, what the reception -- if not life out of the dead?
11:16and if the first-fruit is holy, the lump also; and if the root is holy, the branches also.
11:17And if certain of the branches were broken off, and thou, being a wild olive tree, wast graffed in among them, and a fellow-partaker of the root and of the fatness of the olive tree didst become --
11:18do not boast against the branches; and if thou dost boast, thou dost not bear the root, but the root thee!
11:19Thou wilt say, then, `The branches were broken off, that I might be graffed in;' right!
11:20by unbelief they were broken off, and thou hast stood by faith; be not high-minded, but be fearing;
11:21for if God the natural branches did not spare -- lest perhaps He also shall not spare thee.
11:22Lo, then, goodness and severity of God -- upon those indeed who fell, severity; and upon thee, goodness, if thou mayest remain in the goodness, otherwise, thou also shalt be cut off.
11:23And those also, if they may not remain in unbelief, shall be graffed in, for God is able again to graff them in;
11:24for if thou, out of the olive tree, wild by nature, wast cut out, and, contrary to nature, wast graffed into a good olive tree, how much rather shall they, who are according to nature, be graffed into their own olive tree?
11:25For I do not wish you to be ignorant, brethren, of this secret -- that ye may not be wise in your own conceits -- that hardness in part to Israel hath happened till the fulness of the nations may come in;
11:26and so all Israel shall be saved, according as it hath been written, `There shall come forth out of Sion he who is delivering, and he shall turn away impiety from Jacob,
11:27and this to them is the covenant from Me, when I may take away their sins.'
11:28As regards, indeed, the good tidings, they are enemies on your account; and as regards the choice -- beloved on account of the fathers;
11:29for unrepented of are the gifts and the calling of God;
11:30for as ye also once did not believe in God, and now did find kindness by the unbelief of these:
11:31so also these now did not believe, that in your kindness they also may find kindness;
11:32for God did shut up together the whole to unbelief, that to the whole He might do kindness.
11:33O depth of riches, and wisdom and knowledge of God! how unsearchable His judgments, and untraceable His ways!
11:34for who did know the mind of the Lord? or who did become His counsellor?
11:35or who did first give to Him, and it shall be given back to him again?
11:36because of Him, and through Him, and to Him are the all things; to Him is the glory -- to the ages. Amen.