Romans 11:11-12 - Exposition

I say then, Have they stumbled that they should fall? i.e. in such wise as to fall, rightly given in the Vulgate as sic ut caderent. There is no need here to press the telic use of ἵνα in ἵνα πέσωσι , so as to require the translation, "that they might fall." It is rather the use of contemplated result. £ God forbid. But by their fall (rather, trip, or false step ) . The word is παράπτωμα , suitably used here in view of the figure of stumbling. The idea is that they had stumbled over the "stumbling-block" above spoken of, but not so as to lie hopelessly prostrate. Calvin translates well, "Num impegerunt ut corruerent?" and "eoram lapsu." Alford adopts "lapse" for παράπτωμα . But the word, as used in English, is not equivalent. If we retain the rendering "fall," we must understand a partial or temporary fall, not prostration from which there is no recovery. Salvation is come unto the Gentiles, for to provoke them to jealousy. (The word παραζηλῶσαι with the idea conveyed by it, is from Deuteronomy 32:21 , which see.) Now if the fall ( πράπτωμα , as above) of them be the riches of the world, and the diminishing of them the riches of the Gentiles, how much more their fulness? The words ἥττημα and πλήρωμα , rendered in tile Authorized Version " diminishing " and " fulness, " have been variously understood. They are in contrast with each other, and must evidently be understood with reference to the same idea. Now, πλήρωμα , as used afterwards in Romans 11:25 ἄχρις οὖ τὸ πλήρωμα τῶν ἐθνῶν ἐσέλθῃ ) , seems plainly to mean the full complement of the Gentiles; and so here must surely be meant the full complement of the Jews, pointing to the same idea as ,as ἰσραὴλ in Romans 11:26 . If so, ἥττημα must mean the defect from such full complement—not. indeed (as some have explained), the small number ( i.e. of believers) now opposed to the full number in the future, but abstractedly, defect, or fewness, as opposed to fulness. This interpretation agrees with the meaning of ἥττημα in the only other place where it occurs in the New Testament, viz. 1 Corinthians 6:7 , where it seems to signify "defect," though used in that passage with a moral reference. The reason why the present ἥττημα of the Jews is the riches of the Gentiles is that the refusal of the Jews to accept the gospel had been the occasion of its being offered to the Gentiles (cf. Acts 13:46 ; Acts 28:28 ; also Matthew 15:24 ; Matthew 22:9 ). It is not, of course, meant that the gospel was not originally intended for all the world, but only that the present and immediate promulgation of it to the Gentiles had been due to the Jews' refusal. Otherwise, we may conceive, it would have been after the fulness of the Jews had come in that it would have been extended through them to the Gentiles (el. Romans 15:8 , Romans 15:9 ). Cf. Isaiah 60:1-22 , where, as in other prophetic passages, the vision presented is that of the scattered sons of Israel being first brought into the glorified holy city, and the Gentiles gathering round them through the ever-open gates.