Romans 9:17Meaning & Commentary from the Church Fathers

So also in those whom God condemns, unbelief and impiety become the beginning of punishment. By this very punishment they are permitted to do evil.

As the Apostle says above: “And since they did not see fit to have God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a debased mind, to do what is improper”; Rom 1:28.

In the same way, ancient physicians practiced the dissection of the bodies of men who deserved death while they were still alive.

They did this to discover the causes of disease, and by such punishment of those who were perishing, to bring benefit to the healthy who were living.

The opposite example of the Lord’s wrath and the future rejection of unworthy people is indicated by the Apostle in Pharaoh. Scripture says to him in God’s name: “For this very purpose I raised you up, that I might show My power in you”; Rom 9:16-18.

Setting forth this prominent position of Pharaoh, brought forward from among others by a special divine action as an example to others, blessed Theophylact writes as follows.

“For this very purpose, says God, I raised you up. That is, I set you forth, Pharaoh, in view, so that My power might become known through you.

Thus many would restrain themselves when they heard of My name as just and mighty.”

Concerning the hardening of Pharaoh’s heart, he observes: “At first sight this seems absurd. But it is said of God that He hardened Pharaoh’s dirty heart as the sun hardens mud.

How? By longsuffering. He made it hard by showing longsuffering toward him,” through the removal of the plagues.

“Here something happened like what occurs when someone has a wicked servant and treats him humanely.

The more humanely he treats him, the worse he makes him. This is not because he himself teaches him vice, but because the servant uses his longsuffering to increase his own wickedness.”

Applying Pharaoh’s example to the Hebrews stubborn in their unbelief in the Savior, His Eminence Theophan writes:

“In the present case they, the Jews, show themselves unworthy because they do not believe. If they had believed and were alienated, the promise would have failed.

But since they are alienated because of unbelief, the promise stands and has not failed. Let them believe and enter into their inheritance.

Yet from the fact that they persist in unbelief, it does not follow that the promise has failed.

Let them not lull themselves with the promise. Rather, let them consider the dreadful example of Pharaoh, whose obstinacy led to the punishment of drowning in the sea.

Let them fear lest they themselves live to see something similar.”

Or "I raised you up" means that God set him up against Himself and caused him to keep resisting Him. This would be the same as in the following verse: whom God wills, He hardens. God did not harden Pharaoh by His power or stir him up to resist Himself. On the contrary, He did everything to dispose Pharaoh freely to let the Jews go, while Pharaoh kept resisting.

God sent punishment after punishment upon him and upon Egypt. For a moment he softened, and then hardened himself again, saying: "I do not know your God, and I will not let Israel go"; compare Ex 5:2. His hardness grew, and the punitive signs increased, until this hardened fighter against God was submerged in the depths of the sea. The power of God was triumphantly manifested in him. The glory of God's name passed through all the earth, as Rahab confessed when she said: we have heard how God dried up the sea, and so forth; see Josh 2:10.

Oecumenius says: "Pharaoh suffered what he suffered because of his own evil character. God wished to save him, and therefore endured him so long, giving room for repentance. Who would not marvel at God, Who endured so long?"

Blessed Theophylact writes: "For this very reason, God says, 'I raised you up,' that is, I set you, Pharaoh, in view, so that through you My power might become known and many might restrain themselves when they hear of My name throughout all the earth, as just and mighty."

Ambrosiaster reasons thus: "This Pharaoh was guilty of so many evils that he was unworthy even to live. He became so hardened in evil that he did not wish to be corrected. He thought that, despite everything, he would live, or that God, against Whom he had sinned so much, did not dare repay him with a terrible recompense. Therefore he heard from God: 'For this very purpose I raised you up, that I might show My power in you, and that My name might be proclaimed in all the earth.' That is, so that all nations might understand that there is no other God except Him Who is the God of the Jews. He is called raised up, suscitatus, as though resurrected, because before God he was already dead. He received a short time in which to seem alive, so that there might be someone upon whom so many plagues and so many different astonishing torments could fall, ending in his death. All the nations that did not know the true God, struck with fear through this, confessed with great amazement that this alone is the true God, from Whom such blows proceeded. So also ancient physicians learned on men condemned to death how to help the living. They opened and investigated what is hidden within man, in order to learn the causes of diseases and turn the punishment of the dying to the salvation of the living."

The meaning of this passage is clear in itself. What is not clear is why the Apostle mentioned this circumstance. Blessed Theophylact writes: "Just as, of those who cast the calf, some were saved and others punished, when God alone knew who was worthy of salvation and who of punishment, so also, although there were many other wicked men, one Pharaoh fell under the wrath of God."

He sees here also a new example of one being separated from many, only not for mercy, but for punishment. This is fully in agreement with the course of the discourse. The example could have come to the Apostle's mind by itself, in contrast with the preceding discourse. He spoke of mercy, and punishment came to mind.

Yet it seems that the Apostle deliberately chose the example of Pharaoh, in order to lead the unbelieving Jews to the thought of what awaits those who resist God's arrangements. From the previous examples it is clear that God chooses the worthy and rejects the unworthy. This should have shown the Jews that if some among them are alienated from the promised blessings given by the Savior, the cause of this is they themselves. They themselves make themselves unworthy of it through their stubborn unbelief.

Now, by the example of Pharaoh, he leads them to perceive what can and will happen to them if they remain in their obstinacy. Pharaoh was obstinate and perished. See that the same does not happen to you. Saint Paul does not interpret this in such a way, but compels the Jews themselves to conjecture it. If he himself had interpreted it in this way, it would have had less effect on the Jews than when they conjecture it themselves. Not all, of course, but those who do conjecture it.

The whole discourse of the Apostle proceeds in such a way that he points only to what comes from God. He is almost silent about the fact that His decrees correspond to the disposition of men. He does this so that, by pointing this out and thereby plainly convicting the Jews themselves of blame, he may not repel them from himself or arm them against the truth. If they themselves think through what the Apostle intended to suggest, they cannot fail to take it into account and reflect. This is a great step toward faith. We mean the unbelieving. The believing, of course, drew from this the greatest confirmation in faith.