Romans 9:1Meaning & Commentary from the Church Fathers

Many usually act this way when they are about to speak of something incredible to most people, but of which they themselves are firmly convinced. “I speak the truth,” he says, “I do not lie.” In this my conscience is my witness.

Blessed Paul was appointed a minister of the divine Gospel (cf. Rom 1:1), and he proclaimed Christ to the Gentiles. Everywhere he said that those who came from the blood of Israel had fallen away.

He also affirmed that those once in demonic darkness had become servants called according to God's preordination and foreknowledge. Therefore he spoke a necessary word in his defense.

He did this lest any untaught person think that he was almost trampling on the fallen of Israel's race and mocking those who had stumbled. He says, "I speak the truth in Christ, I do not lie," and what follows.

Yet one may grieve over those who reached such folly that they departed from love for God, and then suffered punishments for it. It would not be without reason to shed tears for them out of kindred love.

Rather, in this lies the fullness of love. But for a man to desire that he himself be separated from Christ for them is already beyond love.

No one, if he is of sound mind, would dare to oppose God for the salvation of others. Nor would he count his own life as nothing, while preferring that it should belong to others.

What, then, does he mean by offering his own salvation as a ransom for the salvation of the Jews? Clearly, this speech is hyperbolic and contains a declaration of the most perfect love.

"I could wish," he says, "that I myself were accursed from Christ for my brethren, my kinsmen according to the flesh." It is as though he were saying this.

"If Israel were to be saved again through my opposition to Christ, I myself would choose to take upon myself so terrible an evil. I would go alone to destruction for all."

"I am the one who said to those justified by faith, 'For I determined not to know anything among you except Jesus Christ and Him crucified' (1 Cor 2:2)."

"I am the one who proclaims to all, 'Who shall separate us from the love of God? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword?' (Rom 8:35)."

By this he was catching the Jews into obedience, and he was repelling the slander of the senseless. For some of the Jews thought that the divine Paul had lost his mind and opposed the laws given through Moses.

For this reason, writing to those who believed, he said, "For if we are beside ourselves, it is for God; if we are of sound mind, it is for you" (2 Cor 5:13).

Thus, he says, I would most gladly prefer to be separated from Christ, if only I might again save those who came from the blood of Israel.

Nor does he stop here. He shows, as it were, that the cause of his grief for them is by no means slight. It could produce in him such a disposition that this statement would not seem burdensome or absurd to him.

He could say that he offers his own life as the ransom for the life of others. For first of all, he says, they are Israelites. To them belong adoption, glory, and the covenants.

From them, according to the flesh, is Christ Himself. If they had been among those who only recently came to know Him who is God by nature and in truth, his grief might have been more moderate.

So too, if they had not possessed the Law given through Moses, which crowned them with nearness to Him, his grief might have been less. If they had not sprung from the root of the holy fathers, it might have been less.

If they had not been appointed heirs of their glory, and if they had not first been instructed in the ways of serving God, sorrow over them could have become more restrained.

But if these are their fathers, and the other things are theirs as well, then their calamity is truly dreadful. For when their affairs were almost carried by a favorable wind, they swerved toward an unexpected end.

They did not attain what they hoped for. Is not what happened to these wretched ones truly terrible?

The course of thought in unfolding this subject is as follows. After expressing his great sorrow and the continual anguish of his heart over the rejection of his kinsmen, despite the high privileges given to them (Rom 9:1-4), and even despite the fact that “from them, according to the flesh, is Christ, who is over all, God blessed forever. Amen” (Rom 9:5), the Apostle makes this observation: “But it is not as though the word of God has failed. For not all who are of Israel are Israel, and not all are children of Abraham because they are his seed.” That is, “the children of the flesh are not the children of God, but the children of the promise are counted as the seed,” the true seed of Abraham (Rom 9:6-8).

Only one son of Sarah was born by the power of the promise (Rom 9:9). This means that Abraham’s other children, for example by Hagar and Keturah, were only his children according to the flesh. Concerning them God decisively promised nothing. From this it follows, although the Apostle does not state it literally, that the Jews, though descended from Abraham, still may not be counted by God’s judgment as true descendants of Abraham, the forefather of the Jews.

The Apostle explains this vividly by the example of Rebecca’s sons. Although both were born from her by one father, Isaac, and were even conceived at one time (Rom 9:10), God chose only one, and indeed the younger. He did this even before their birth, “so that,” the Apostle adds, “God’s purpose according to election might stand, not of works, but of Him who calls,” whether to one destiny or another, “as it is written, ‘Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated’” (Rom 9:11-13; cf. Mal 1:2).

He also gives them such counsels as are possible, and through them consolations as well (chs. 9-10). Earlier, by many different arguments, the Apostle had proved the necessity of the Hebrews' conversion to Christ.

Here, so to speak, he places Judaism before the face of Christianity. Having presented its former meaning and its present futility, he points to Christianity as its most natural and necessary outcome.

Entering wisely and from the heart into judgment on this important and difficult matter, the conversion to Christ of his stubborn countrymen, the Apostle declares that the conversion of the Hebrews is so desired by him that it constantly troubles him.

This is because salvation is possible only through Christ. Presenting the whole greatness of the divine works accomplished among the Hebrews, his own people, the Apostle so grieves over their error in turning away from their salvation that he would be ready to sacrifice himself entirely.

He would even sacrifice his eternal life, if only he could somehow draw them to Christ and so save them. Here the Apostle expressed his great spirit of devotion to his countrymen.

At the same time he showed a special zeal for the faith of Christ, equal to the zeal of Moses. Moses too was ready to perish himself, if only the Hebrews might be saved (Ex 32:32).

What especially pained the Apostle's heart was that the Messiah had been born among the Hebrews, and they did not wish to receive Him. Yet both before and now the Hebrews passionately and impatiently awaited the coming of the Messiah.

They did not always understand Him as "He Who Is," that is, consubstantial with God the Father. Therefore they did not always understand Him as worthy of the same eternal glorification, as Creator and Provider.

Why this rejection of the Messiah by the Hebrews occurred, and what will come of it, the Apostle explains further. Pausing over the words, "For I could wish that I myself were accursed," and so on, St. John Chrysostom says this.

"The Apostle did not say these words without cause. He said them because, accusing God, they said that those who were deemed worthy to be called sons of God were being expelled and deprived of honor."

"They had received the Law, known God before other nations, enjoyed special glory, and served God when no one else served Him. They had received the promises and, most importantly, had become the forefathers of Christ Himself."

"They said that in their place people from the Gentiles were being brought in, people who had never known God. Since those who spoke this way blasphemed God, Paul, hearing this, was torn and grieved for the glory of God."

"He desired to be accursed, if it were possible, if only the Jews might be saved and the blasphemy cease... Paul desired to be accursed so that you might know how deeply he was crushed by the thought that could lodge in many minds."

"That thought was that God's promise had supposedly remained unfulfilled... Moses seemed to intercede for the Jews, but he did everything for the glory of God."

"He said, 'Turn from Your wrath, lest they say that You could not save them, and brought them out to destroy them in the wilderness' (Deut 9:28). So Paul also says, 'I could wish to be accursed.'"

"He says this only so that they should not say God's promise had remained unfulfilled... Let us delight in the sea of the Apostle's love. Let us set before our thoughts this ineffable flame."

"Whatever one says of it, one will not say anything worthy. For Paul's love was wider than the sea and stronger than any fire." Blessed Theodoret, noting the Apostle Paul's portrayal of the Jews' advantages, writes this.

"The Apostle is like women who weep. In their lamentations over the dead whom they mourn, they describe the beauty of the body, the bloom of age, the renown of ancestors, wealth, and power."

They were rejected for their unbelief in the promised Savior, who had already appeared. In this he expressed his great love for his brethren. Therefore one may suppose that he directly assures them of this love.

Such assurance of love was fitting for the person of the Apostle Paul, for the Jews thought that he had ceased to love them and their faith. Even if the Apostle had spoken of ordinary love, such assurance would have been appropriate.

But when he expresses a love so extraordinarily powerful that he would be ready even to be separated from Christ for those he loved, such assurance became altogether necessary.

Believers from among the Jews could have believed his simple word. Yet the Apostle, setting forth the Christian teaching in full, had in view not only believers, but unbelievers as well.

To overcome their prejudice, both the display of extraordinary love and a great testimony to it were needed. Thus the Apostle directly assures them of his love by such witnesses.

Yet the assurance of love itself was needed to smooth the path toward faith in what he had to say about the unbelieving Jews. Therefore there is no doubt that those confirmatory testimonies also extend their force to this latter matter.

All our commentators understand these testimonies chiefly in this sense. Blessed Theophylact writes that, in the following discourse, the Apostle intends to show why not all believed.

He does this by saying that not all who are of Abraham are Abraham's seed. Therefore, "lest anyone think that he says this in great agitation of spirit, that is, in anger against the Jews, he removes such a supposition."

"He declares that he loves them greatly." Are the witnesses he brought forward convincing? The assurance by the name of Christ the Savior and by the Holy Spirit plainly had force.

For everyone knew that for the Apostle Paul to live was Christ (cf. Phil 1:21). Everyone also knew his confession that whatever he did was not done by him, but by the grace of the Spirit dwelling in him.

For this reason he would never have agreed to grieve the Spirit by a lie. But is there force in assurance by the testimony of conscience? In the person of the Apostle, there is.

A sinful conscience can limp, either because some advantage appears before it or because threatening calamities press upon it. But a conscience torn by the Holy Spirit from the bonds of the passions does not bend the knee before these idols.

That this was so in the Apostle is witnessed by his whole life. Yet even before his conversion his conscience showed its full strength. If he was so zealous for Judaism, it was because he conscientiously believed that truth was in it.

Then, when the same conviction, on incontestable grounds, passed over to Christianity, he was drawn by the power of that same conscience. With his whole soul he surrendered himself to Christ the Lord.

He offered Him in sacrifice everything that had been dear to him as a Jew. After this, nothing could shake his conscience. A thousand deaths threatened him, yet he remained unshakably faithful to what his conscience assured him in the Holy Spirit.

One could rely without hesitation on a man with such a conscience, knowing that he did not lie. Ambrosiaster expresses the force of the proposed testimonies in this way.

"Since above the Apostle had seemed to speak against the Jews, who hoped to be justified by the Law, he now expresses strong love and goodwill toward them."

"He assures them that he speaks according to a sincere conscience, in Christ Jesus and in the Holy Spirit. Thus, ceasing to see him as their enemy, they might give full faith to his words."

"He gives Christ Jesus and the Holy Spirit as witnesses, because nothing is hidden from Them. Their testimony cannot fail to be accepted, after They had so many times already borne witness to him by working signs through him."