Commentary on the Epistle to the Romans John Calvin (continued)
John Calvin indeed ought to be the ministry of our salvation, as that we may feel that the whole power and efficacy of it depends on God, and that we may give him his due praise: we ought at the same time to understand that preaching is an instrument for effecting the salvation of the faithful, and though it can do nothing without the Spirit of God, yet through his inward operation it produces the most powerful effects.
15. For if their rejections, etc. This passage, which many deem obscure, and some awfully pervert, ought, in my view, to be understood as another argument, derived from a comparison of the less with the greater, according to this import, "Since the rejection of the Jews has availed so much as to occasion the reconciling of the Gentiles, how much more effectual will be their resumption? Will it not be to raise them even from the dead?" For Paul ever insists on this, that the Gentiles have no cause for envy, as though the restoration of the Jews to favor were to render their condition worse. Since then God has wonderfully drawn forth life from death and light from darkness, how much more ought we to hope, he reasons, that the resurrection of a people, as it were, wholly dead, will bring life to the Gentiles. 353 It is no objection what some allege, that reconciliation differs not from resurrection, as we do indeed understand resurrection in the present instance, that is, to be that by which we are translated from the kingdom of death to the kingdom of life, for though the thing is the same, yet there is more force in the expression, and this a sufficient answer.
Romans 11:16-21
Romans 11:16-21
16. For if the firstfruit be holy, the lump is also holy: and if the root be holy, so are the branches.
16. Quod si primitiae sanctae, etiam conspersio; et si radix sancta etiam rami:
17. And if some of the branches be broken off, and thou, being a wild olive tree, wert graffed in among them, and with them partakest of the root and fatness of the olive tree;
17. Si vero ex ramis quidam defracti sunt, tu vero oleaster quum esses, insitus es pro ipsis, et particeps factus es radicis et pinguedinis oleae; 353Some view the last words, "life from the dead," as understood of the Jews and not of the Gentiles. But the antithesis seems to require the latter meaning. The rejection or casting away, {ἀποβολὴ} of the Jews was the occasion of reconciliation to the world, that is, the Gentiles; then the reception, {πρόσληψις}, of the Jews will be "life from the dead" to the Gentiles or to the world. He expresses by stronger terms the sentiment in Romans 11:12, "the riches of the world," only intimating, as it appears, the decayed state of religion among the Gentiles; for to be dead sometimes means a religious declension, Revelation 3:1,2; or a state of oppression and wretchedness, as the case was with the Israelites when in captivity, Ezekiel 37:1-14; Isaiah 26:19. The phrase is evidently figurative, and signifies a wonderful revival, such as the coming to life of those in a condition resembling that of death. The restoration of the Jews unto God's favor will occasion the revival and spread of true religion through the whole Gentile world. This is clearly the meaning. Some of the fathers, such as Chrysostom and Theodoret, regarded the words as referring to the last resurrection: but this is wholly at variance with the context. — Ed.