1 I speak the truth in Christ: I lie not, my conscience bearing me witness in the Holy Ghost:
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VERS. 1.-- *I speak the truth.* Now nothing can separate me, but once I was separated; whence now I grieve, and thus evils are now turned unto good. *I speak the truth.* Because he seemed to speak against the Jews, etc., *as far as* yet Job was the fifth of the sons of Esau, namely from Abraham, that is, a grandson of Esau.
2 That I have great sadness and continual sorrow in my heart.
3 For I wished myself to be an anathema from Christ, for my brethren: who are my kinsmen according to the flesh:
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VERS. 3.-- *For my brethren.* The Jews, or also for the drawing back of those who are now brethren in the faith, who are also my kinsmen: and so I sinned the more grievously. So perfect an eminence of the Son is here declared, etc., *as far as: The mediator of God and men, the man Christ Jesus*.
4 Who are Israelites: to whom belongeth the adoption as of children and the glory and the testament and the giving of the law and the service of God and the promises:
5 Whose are the fathers and of whom is Christ, according to the flesh, who is over all things, God blessed for ever. Amen.
6 Not as though the word of God hath miscarried. For all are not Israelites that are of Israel.
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VERS. 6.-- *But not that the word hath fallen away.* The Apostle comforts his own grief. For who should bewail him who was long ago held for dead; these, foreknowing, God decreed long ago were not to be saved, being no accepter of persons. For he damns none before he sins, he crowns none before he conquers; but he has determined in his foreknowledge what the will of each shall be, out of which he is damned or crowned. Because he grieved over the Jews, he comforts himself, finding it written: that not all are to be saved, but only such as are like Isaac. In these he shows that the grace of God alone will make sons of God. *But not that the word of God hath fallen away.* From this, that he said that the promise of the eternal inheritance was made to the Jews, who themselves for the greater part did not believe, the word of God seemed not to have been fulfilled. To which he answers: Even if in certain men it is not fulfilled, yet in others, namely in the believing Gentiles, it has been fulfilled, who are now the true sons of Abraham. *But not that it hath fallen away.* As if he should say: Even though he so laboured; even though not all believe, yet the word of God has not fallen away; or, I do not say that it has fallen away. For the word of God to fall away is for the promises not to be fulfilled.
7 Neither are all they that are the seed of Abraham, children: but in Isaac shall thy seed be called.
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VERS. 7.-- *In Isaac.* That is, they are gathered in Christ, grace calling them. In Isaac they were prefigured by the promise, not those who make themselves just, but those whom God makes; these are the sons of the free woman which is above, who is our mother. The children of the flesh are of the earthly Jerusalem, which is in bondage with her children. As Isaac did not deserve that he should be promised as one to be born, so also these; but by grace alone was the adoption of sons promised and given to them.
8 That is to say, not they that are the children of the flesh are the children of God: but they that are the children of the promise are accounted for the seed.
9 For this is the word of promise: According to this time will I come. And Sara shall have a son.
10 And not only she. But when Rebecca also had conceived at once of Isaac our father.
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VERS. 10.-- *And not only she.* Sara had a promise, but Rebecca also had a promise, having namely two sons *by one conception of Isaac our father.* He says "by one conception," lest the merits of the parents should seem to make a difference in those begotten, but of the father, that is, of our instructor, whom we should imitate, if we wish to be sons of God. The promise made to Sara shows that no one is saved on account of race. But this promise made to Rebecca shows that on account of no merit of his own or of his parents is anyone chosen, but by grace alone.
11 For when the children were not yet born, nor had done any good or evil (that the purpose of God according to election might stand):
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VERS. 11.-- *For when they were not yet born.* Rebecca had this promise: *The elder shall serve the younger,* that is, Esau, by persecuting Jacob, shall profit him.
12 Not of works, but of him that calleth, it was said to her: The elder shall serve the younger.
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VERS. 12.-- *Not of works.* Of future works, which were not to be good or evil, save by grace bestowed or withdrawn. But if the divine judgment is said to have discerned their future manners, etc., *as far as* for how are those things called future, which shall be nothing?
13 As it is written: Jacob I have loved: but Esau I have hated.
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VERS. 13.-- *The elder shall serve the younger.* This according to the letter: because the Idumeans, who are of Esau (who is also called Edom), were made subject to the children of Israel; but rather in this prophecy it is intended that the Jewish people, the elder, that is, the earlier in the worship of the one God, should serve the younger, that is, the later Christian people. *Jacob I have loved,* etc. In Jacob he found nothing to be loved, save the gift of his own mercy. In Esau he hated nothing, save original sin. But how is this rightly done, since they had done nothing? Because the matter is astounding, he objects to himself: *What then shall we say?* To will and to run is of mercy; which appears in others of the same lump, to which perdition is due.
14 What shall we say then? Is there injustice with God? God forbid!
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VERS. 14.-- *What then.* Because without merit he chose this one and reprobated that one, shall God be called unjust? No, because he chose this one through mercy, that one he reprobated through justice. In neither of which is there iniquity; this one through mercy, because so says Moses; this one through justice, because so says the Scripture bringing in God speaking to Pharaoh. *God forbid.* It is certain that none is delivered save by gratuitous mercy; none is damned save by most equitable justice. But why he should deliver this one rather than that one: let him who can search out so deep a judgment, yet let him beware of the precipice.
15 For he saith to Moses: I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy. And I will shew mercy to whom I will shew mercy.
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VERS. 15.-- *I will have mercy on whom I have had mercy.* That is, on him on whom I foreknow that mercy is to be shown, and who shall abide with me: this is to give to him to whom it is to be given, not to give to him to whom it is not to be given; that he may call him whom he knows will hearken; as David, who after pardon so well persevered. Saul, not heard in his prayer, did not persevere, but was turned to idols; whence he seems justly to have been reprobated by him who foreknew.
16 So then it is not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of God that sheweth mercy.
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VERS. 16.-- *Therefore it is not of him that willeth,* etc. As though he should say: The will of man alone suffices not, if there be not also the mercy of God. To which it is said, on the contrary: Neither does the mercy of God suffice, if there be not the will of man; and by this, if that was rightly said, why is not the contrary also rightly said: It is not of God that showeth mercy, but of man that willeth? It remains therefore that this be understood as rightly said, so that the whole be given to God: who both prepares the good will of man to be helped, and helps it when prepared: he goes before him that willeth that he may will, he follows after him that willeth lest he will in vain. Moreover, who is so impiously foolish as to say that God [makes] the evil wills of men, etc., *as far as* even as out of his own mercy he bestows grace.
17 For the scripture saith to Pharao: To this purpose have I raised thee, that I may shew my power in thee and that my name may be declared throughout all the earth.
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VERS. 17.-- *I have raised up.* Or, I have stirred up, or, I have preserved. For this very thing I have preserved thee, etc., *as far as* but that, thou being hardened, I may show my power by the signs of Egypt.
18 Therefore he hath mercy on whom he will. And whom he will, he hardeneth.
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VERS. 18.-- *Therefore on whom he will.* The merit of mercy is none; the merit of hardening is the sin of the whole condemned lump. Nor does he harden by imparting malice, but by not imparting mercy, even as neither are they worthy, which he does by a hidden equity, and one removed from human senses, because the Apostle does not open it, but wonders: O the depth of the riches. *He hardeneth.* Not as though he compelled any man to sin, but only because to certain sinners he does not bestow the mercy of his justification: for this cause he is said to harden them, because he has not mercy on them, not because he impels them to sin. But he has not mercy on those to whom he judges, by a most hidden equity and one most remote from human senses, that grace is not to be given.
19 Thou wilt say therefore to me: Why doth he then find fault? For who resisteth his will?
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VERS. 19.-- *Why doth he yet.* Since it is certain that it is of the will of God, why is it inquired whence one is good, another evil? There is no need, because each will be such as God wills him to be, and therefore he unjustly damns one and saves another: or, why doth he complain, that is, why does anyone strive to act well, when he can do nothing save what God wills?
20 O man, who art thou that repliest against God? Shall the thing formed say to him that formed it: Why hast thou made me thus?
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VERS. 20.-- *O man.* This not from want of a reason to be rendered, but he calls man back to himself.
21 Or hath not the potter power over the clay, of the same lump, to make one vessel unto honour and another unto dishonour?
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VERS. 21.-- *Of the same lump.* So the whole lump of the human race is justly corrupted and become clay: if from it a vessel unto honour, it is mercy; if unto dishonour, it is just, because this was of nature: behold justice in those who have not time for working; but of those who have time he subjoins: *what if God, willing,* namely, what wouldst thou answer to God. *Another unto dishonour.* A vessel unto honour, but unto dishonour: if it is vile, it has the clay from itself, not from the potter. *What if God,* etc. As if he should say: It has already been shown that even if God give nothing of good, yet he is not unjust, etc., *as far as* but they abused this grace.
22 What if God, willing to shew his wrath and to make his power known, endured with much patience vessels of wrath, fitted for destruction,
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VERS. 22.-- *He endured.* God endures the wicked, that he may destroy them in order; and he uses them as an instrument for the salvation of the good. For God would create none, either of angels or of men, whom he foreknew would be evil, unless he likewise knew them, for what uses of the good he would make them serviceable.
23 That he might shew the riches of his glory on the vessels of mercy which he hath prepared unto glory?
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VERS. 23.-- *That he might show.* As if he should say: For this he suffers the wicked, and shows his wrath beforehand, and draws them to the knowledge of himself, that he might show upon the vessels of mercy, that is, in the elect through mercy, the riches of glory, that is, how rich and how great and glorious mercy is; for this he gives so many good things to the wicked, that he may convince them that they are justly damned, and that the faithful, for whom he has kept that same grace, may love him the more.
24 Even us, whom also he hath called, not only of the Jews but also of the Gentiles.
25 As in Osee he saith: I will call that which was not my people, my people; and her that was not beloved, beloved; and her that had not obtained mercy; one that hath obtained mercy.
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VERS. 25.-- *As in Osee.* Since it has been shown that they are sons of grace alone, he begins to prove through the prophets that these are of both peoples.
26 And it shalt be in the place where it was said unto them: you are not my people; there they shall be called the sons of the living God.
27 And Isaias cried out concerning Israel: If the number of the children of Israel be as the sand of the sea, a remnant shall be saved.
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VERS. 27.-- *If it shall be.* Behold, the salvation of the Jews is so spoken of that the greater part is blinded.
28 For he shall finish his word and cut it short in justice: because a short word shall the Lord make upon the earth.
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VERS. 28, 29.-- *For the word.* The prophet subjoins by what they are made safe, namely by the word of the Gospel, that the glory of the works of the law may be excluded. For the word of the Gospel, which is called consummating, leads to perfection, and abridges all the things of the law in the one Christ: yet it is equal to the former word of the law; whence is added, *in equity,* that is, that nothing be wanting to justice out of all the things prefigured, or because it retains those things which are equitable, as the moral precepts; and those which it is right should be taken away, as are the figures, it cuts off. *And abridging in equity.* That he may save by the compendium of faith through grace, not by innumerable observances. But lest anyone doubt, the Prophet adds: *Unless the Lord of sabaoth.* The Lord made the word, which was so necessary that unless there were a seed, that is, the word, etc. Or by the seed are understood the remnant to be saved, that is, the apostles and other good men, and unless the word of God had been preached through them, the nations would have perished. And this is: Unless the Lord of hosts, when he blinded the others, had left us, that is, for our profit, a seed, that is, the apostles, from whom the harvest of Christ grew. *And we had been like unto Gomorrha.* He set down both, that he might note the likeness of the fault and of the penalty, as if he should say: We should be equal in penalty, because we should be like in fault.
29 And Isaias foretold: Unless the Lord of Sabbath had left us a seed, we had been made as Sodom and we had been like unto Gomorrha.
30 What then shall we say? That the Gentiles who followed not after justice have attained to justice, even the justice that is of faith.
31 But Israel, by following after the law of justice, is not come unto the law of justice.
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VERS. 31.-- *Israel.* But Israel followed the law as it were backwards, because he never attains to the spiritual understanding. *Following after justice.* The law of Moses is the law of justice, if it be well understood. Or, following after the justice of the law, that is, which is of the fear of punishment, not of the love of justice, he did not attain, etc.
32 Why so? Because they sought it not by faith, but as it were of works. For they stumbled at the stumblingstone.
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VERS. 32.-- *Because not of faith.* For he did not seek to be justified of faith, and because he did not ask justice from God, he did not believe in him who justifies the ungodly, not believing that God works in man that whereby he is justified. But whence it came about that they did not believe, he subjoins. *They stumbled.* After the likeness of a small stone, against which no heed is taken, Christ was apt to cause stumbling, lying hidden in humility. To which Isaias bears witness. *Behold,* in what is manifest, *I place,* that is, I cause to be born, *in Sion,* that is, among the Jews, Christ *a stone of stumbling,* against which, being small, no heed is taken, and *a rock of scandal,* that is, one wholly crushing the wicked in the time to come, and grieving them. But Christ is called a stone of stumbling according to the state wherein he appeared here to the wicked. But a rock of scandal, according to what he shall do to the wicked in the time to come.
33 As it is written: Behold I lay in Sion a stumbling-stone and a rock of scandal. And whosoever believeth in him shall not be confounded.
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VERS. 33.-- *And a rock of scandal.* It is called a rock before the polishing, and a stone after the polishing. But the polishing of Christ was his passion, whereby he laid aside the misery of infirmity. Christ therefore before the passion was a rock of scandal, at which time the Jews were scandalized, being angry and indignant, because he made himself the Son of God. A stone through the polishing, Christ in the passion, when the same Jews most of all stumbled, and were blinded, not believing him to be God whom they saw dead. *He shall not be confounded.* For he that shall have believed in him shall not have his own justice which is of the law, although the law be good, but shall fulfil that same law, not by his own justice, but by that given by God. For thus he shall not be confounded.