Romans 11:1-21 ▼

1 I 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:

2 God 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,

3 'Lord, Thy prophets they did kill, and Thy altars they dug down, and I was left alone, and they seek my life;'

4 but what saith the divine answer to him? 'I left to Myself seven thousand men, who did not bow a knee to Baal.'

5 So then also in the present time a remnant according to the choice of grace there hath been;

6 and 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.

7 What then? What Israel doth seek after, this it did not obtain, and the chosen did obtain, and the rest were hardened,

8 according 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,

9 and David saith, 'Let their table become for a snare, and for a trap, and for a stumbling-block, and for a recompense to them;

10 let their eyes be darkened -- not to behold, and their back do Thou always bow down.'

11 I 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;

12 and 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?

13 For to you I speak -- to the nations -- inasmuch as I am indeed an apostle of nations, my ministration I do glorify;

14 if by any means I shall arouse to jealousy mine own flesh, and shall save some of them,

15 for if the casting away of them is a reconciliation of the world, what the reception -- if not life out of the dead?

16 and if the first-fruit is holy, the lump also; and if the root is holy, the branches also.

17 And 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 --

18 do not boast against the branches; and if thou dost boast, thou dost not bear the root, but the root thee!

19 Thou wilt say, then, 'The branches were broken off, that I might be graffed in;' right!

20 by unbelief they were broken off, and thou hast stood by faith; be not high-minded, but be fearing;

21 for if God the natural branches did not spare -- lest perhaps He also shall not spare thee.