For the scripture says to Pharaoh, Paul quoted (Table below), “For this very purpose I have raised you up, that I may demonstrate my power in you, and that my name may be proclaimed in all the earth.”^[1]  It occurred to me in the previous essay how much the larger section in which this quotation is found influences my thinking on the lost son of perdition.  I want to begin to consider that here.

This section of Paul’s letter is ostensibly about Israel: For not all those who are descended from Israel are truly Israel, nor are all the children Abraham’s true descendants; rather “through Isaac will your descendants be counted.”^[2]  John the Baptist had warned, don’t think you can say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham as our father.’  For I tell you that God can raise up children for Abraham from these stones!^[3]

The Gospel implications of this section are still evident, however, through this relatively transparent surface: it is not the children of the flesh who are the children of God; rather, the children of promise are counted as descendants.^[4]  For all who are led by the Spirit of God are the sons of God,^[5] Paul had written previously.  Now this is what I am saying, brothers and sisters, he had written elsewhere, Flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God…^[6]

In this section Paul, apostle to the Gentiles, worked through a deep emotional problem over what he saw with his own eyes:^[7] For I could wish that I myself were accursed—cut off from Christ—for the sake of my people, my fellow countrymen [Table], who are Israelites. To them belong the adoption as sons, the glory, the covenants, the giving of the law, the temple worship, and the promises.  To them belong the patriarchs, and from them, by human descent, came the Christ, who is God over all, blessed forever!  Amen.^[8]

And he worked through the more urgent theological issue his limited perspective had engendered: It is not as though the word of God had failed.^[9]  The Holy Spirit’s solution to this issue was immediate and direct: God’s purpose in election (κατ᾿ ἐκλογὴν πρόθεσις τοῦ θεοῦ).  God has his own reasons why (and when from our limited perspectives) He does what He does.

God’s purpose in election engendered its own issue which Paul addressed next.  And here is where his quotation (Table below) from Exodus is found (Romans 9:14-18 NET):

What shall we say then?  Is there injustice with God?  Absolutely not!  For he says to Moses: “I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.”  So then, it does not depend on human desire or exertion, but on God who shows mercy [Table].  For the scripture says to Pharaoh: “For this very purpose I have raised you up, that I may demonstrate my power in you, and that my name may be proclaimed in all the earth.”  So then, God has mercy on whom he chooses to have mercy, and he hardens whom he chooses to harden.

Certainly, Paul addressed his concerns for Israel here.  He made that explicit later: A partial hardening has happened to Israel until the full number of the Gentiles has come in.^[10]  But the very nature of his concern for Israel allows the Gospel implications to show through.  Now, I am so grateful that receiving the Gospel of the grace of God in Jesus Christ doesn’t depend on the uncertainty of human desire or exertion, but that wasn’t always true for me.

There was a time when I feared the idea that I should flee my “sure and certain” desire and exertion to have a righteousness of my own derived from the law, all the commands of the New Testament and Church doctrine for something as whimsical as the mercy of God and a righteousness from God that is in fact based on Christ’s faithfulness.^[11]  Obviously, I didn’t understand it that clearly at the time.  As I began to understand it I began to repent of my unbelief.  Jeremiah wrote:

And in answer to his deep emotional problem, Paul wrote: For God has consigned all people to disobedience so that he may show mercy to them all.^[12]

It is reasonable to assume here that the Greek words τοὺς πάντας (a plural form of πᾶς) translated all people are equivalent to the Greek words τοὺς πάντας translated them all.  It is not reasonable to assume that he may show mercy to means “he might show mercy to.”  Yes, ἐλεήσῃ is a form of ἐλεέω in the subjunctive mood.

The subjunctive mood indicates probability or objective possibility.  The action of the verb will possibly happen, depending on certain objective factors or circumstances…However if the subjunctive mood is used in a purpose or result clause, then the action should not be thought of as a possible result, but should be viewed as a definite outcome that will happen as a result of another stated action.^[13] 

The clause ἵνα τοὺς πάντας ἐλεήσῃ (so that he may show mercy to them all) is clearly the result of συνέκλεισεν γὰρ ὁ θεὸς τοὺς πάντας εἰς ἀπείθειαν (For God has consigned all people to disobedience).

It would have been misleading to have translated ἐλεήσῃ he will show mercy to.  It is not in the future tense but the aorist.  What is telling to me is that no one has translated it as “simple past tense,” he showed mercy to.  Paul was not referencing Jesus’ crucifixion directly here.

John Gill seemed to have a firm grasp on Paul’s intent, coupled even with the earlier conclusion it does not depend on human desire or exertion, but on God who shows mercy, regarding those:

for whom [God] has mercy in store, and will bestow it on them; and in order to bring them to a sense of their need of it, and that he may the more illustriously display the riches of it, he leaves them for a while in a state of unbelief, and then by his Spirit thoroughly convinces them of it, and gives them faith to look to, and believe in, the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ, unto eternal life.^[14]

God’s mercy, according to Mr. Gill however, was “not upon all the individuals of Jews and Gentiles,” but only “God’s elect among the Jews” and “God’s elect among the Gentiles” “for all are not concluded in, or convinced of the sin of unbelief, but only such who are eventually believers.”^[15]  In other words, he understood τοὺς πάντας as God’s elect Jews and Gentiles: For God has consigned his elect to disobedience so that he may show mercy to his elect, e.g., so that his elect and only his elect will better recognize “the riches” of his mercy, some Jews and some Gentiles.

Some Jews believed Jesus already?^[16]  How could the realization that some Jews would be shown mercy wean Paul from his wish that he were accursed—cut off from Christ—for the sake of his people, his fellow countrymen who are Israelites?  Would Mr. Gill’s knowledge inspire Paul to eulogize (Romans 11:33-36 NET)?

Oh, the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God!  How unsearchable are his judgments and how unfathomable his ways!  For who has known the mind of the Lord, or who has been his counselor?  Or who has first given to God that God needs to repay him?  For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be glory forever!  Amen.

I could be wrong.  Perhaps Paul wasn’t weaned from his desperate, aberrant to the point of sinful, concern for those God didn’t care enough to consign to disobedience, much less to show them any mercy.  But it seems much less tortured to take τοὺς πάντας (literally: the all, plural, or in a common American Southern dialect: all y’all) at face value.  What other Greek words could Paul or the Holy Spirit have chosen to actually mean all?

I found no other usage of τοὺς πάντας in the New Testament.  Matthew, Mark, Luke, Paul, the writer of Hebrews and Jude used πάντας τοὺς x to limit πάντας in a variety of ways.  (John had a different way of expressing all alive at a certain time.)

I think a tendency to judge before the time those who reject any particular presentation of the Gospel, to condemn them prematurely to an eternity in the lake of fire, was evident in Mr. Gill’s analysis.  Paul wrote (Romans 9:22 NET):

But what if God, willing to demonstrate his wrath (Romans 1:18-32) and to make known his power, has endured with much patience the objects of wrath prepared for destruction?

Mr. Gill commented:^[17]

so these are said to be “fitted for destruction”, that is, eternal damnation; not by God, for this does not respect God’s act of ordination to punishment; but by Satan, the god of this world, that blinds them, who works effectually in them, and leads them captive at his will; and by themselves, by their own wickedness, hardness of heart, and impenitence, do they treasure up to themselves wrath, against the day of wrath, so that their destruction is of themselves:

Paul didn’t write about “eternal damnation” here but the temporal effects of God having mercy on whom he chooses to have mercy, and (more directly to the point) hardening whom he chooses to harden, at the present time.  His primary concern was God’s hardening (Isaiah 6:8-13) of Paul’s own people, his fellow countrymen, who are Israelites.  And even after he described them as objects of wrath prepared for destruction, he wrote (Romans 10:1 NET Table):

Brothers and sisters, my heart’s desire and prayer to God on behalf of my fellow Israelites is for their salvation.

Tucked between the former statement and the latter he quoted two passages from the prophet Hosea (Romans 9:25, 26) which foreshadowed the glorious conclusion of this particular argument (Romans 11:11-32).

For the children of Judah and the children of Israel to be gathered together and then come up out of the earth (a likely non-Rationalist translation of both the Hebrew and the Greek) sounds like a gathering, not of this world, and a resurrection back into it: for great shall be the day of Jezreel (Ezekiel 37:11-14).

The Greek word translated destruction in the phrase prepared for destruction was ἀπώλειαν (a form of ἀπώλεια).  The first two occurrences in the Septuagint follow.

The first occurrence of אֲבֵדָ֛ה (‘abedah) in Exodus 22:9 was similar, and was translated ἀπωλείας, another form of ἀπώλεια, in the Septuagint.

What many of Paul’s contemporaries lost was the opportunity to begin to live the life they will lead for all eternity in their then present, to be freed from their sinfulness, their anger and hatred and live a new life through the faithfulness of Jesus Christ, who prayed (John 17:3 NET):

Now this is eternal life—that they know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you sent.

He became a human being so that they could have known Him and the only true God though Him.  They could have experienced his love, his joy, his peace, his patience his kindness, his goodness, his faithfulness, his gentleness and his self-control^[18] like a fountain of water springing up in them to eternal life.^[19]

Lest it seem that I minimize the earthly consequence of this loss: everyone not led by the Holy Spirit is led by someone much less: less loving, less joyful, less peaceful, less patient, less kind, less good, less faithful, less gentle, less self-controlled, less wise, less knowledgeable, less truthful and less true.  Ten to fifteen years after Paul wrote his letter to Roman believers, those of his fellow countrymen who did not heed Jesus’ warning (Luke 21:20-24) were led by religious zealots who made catastrophic political and military blunders, hoping apparently that the God whose salvation they had rejected would help them somehow establish their own.  All who remained in Jerusalem suffered horrifically under their leadership.

Paul, however, found comfort in the Holy Spirit, not in human desire or exertion, but in the irrevocable (ἀμεταμέλητα, a form of ἀμεταμέλητος) gifts and…call of God.^[20]

A table comparing Paul’s quotation from Exodus and the Septuagint follows.

A table comparing Paul’s quotation from Genesis and the Septuagint follows.

I tend to see the following as an allusion to Hosea from the Septuagint.

The following is a more direct quotation from Hosea in the Septuagint.

Tables comparing Genesis 21:12; Lamentations 3:22; 3:23; 3:24; 3:25; 3:26; Hosea 2:23 (2:25); 1:10; 1:11; Leviticus 6:2 (5:21); 6:3 (5:22); 6:4 (5:23) and 6:5 (5:24) in the Tanakh, KJV and NET, and Genesis 21:12; Lamentations 3:22; 3:23; 3:24; 3:25; 3:26; Hosea 2:23 (2:25); 1:10 (2:1); 1:11 (2:2); Leviticus 6:2 (5:21); 6:3 (5:22); 6:4 (5:23) and 6:5 (5:24) in the Septuagint (BLB and Elpenor) follow.