Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Romans 11:23
And they also, if they abide not still in unbelief, shall be grafted in: for God is able to graft them in again.
23. graff them in again ] Every Jewish convert from the first age till now has been an example of this statement. St Paul is not yet dealing with the question of a conversion of Israel en masse; he has in view individual Gentile faith and individual Jewish faith; and he regards each Jew as (ideally) once a branch in the sacred Tree, but cut out of it, and awaiting a gracious re-ingrafting.
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
And they also – The Jews.
If they bide not … – If they do not continue in willful obstinacy and rejection of the Messiah. As their unbelief was the sole cause of their rejection, so if that be removed, they may be again restored to the divine favor.
For God is able … – He has,
- Power to restore them, to bring them back and replace them in his favor.
(2)He has not bound himself utterly to reject them, and forever to exclude them.
In this way the apostle reaches his purpose, which was to show them that God had not cast away his people or finally rejected the Jewish nation; Rom 11:1-2. That God has this power, the apostle proceeds to show in the next verse.
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
Verse 23. If they abide not in unbelief] So, we find that their rejection took place in consequence of their wilful obstinacy: and, that they may return into the fold, the door of which still stands open.
For God is able to graft them in again.] Fallen as they are and degraded, God can, in the course of his providence and mercy, restore them to all their forfeited privileges; and this will take place if they abide not in unbelief: which intimates that God has furnished them with all the power and means necessary for faith, and that they may believe on the Lord Jesus whenever they will. The veil now continues on their heart; but it is not a veil which God has spread there, but a veil occasioned by their own voluntary and obstinate unbelief: and, when they shall turn to the Lord, (Jesus,) the veil shall be taken away. See what the apostle has said, 2Co 3:6-18.
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
Here he adds another argument, to repress the arrogance and insulting of the Gentiles; and it is taken from the hope of the Jews restoration. Though for the present they seem to be in a desperate and forlorn condition, yet the restoring and re-ingrafting of them into the church is not impossible. The great obstacle is their unbelief, which God is able to remove. The same God that rejected them is able to restore them; to him all things are possible, he can cause dead and dry bones to live. An argument from the power of God (and that in the very words of this text) is frequently made use of in Scripture, to excite hope and assurance. Rom 4:21; 14:4; 2Co 9:8; 2Ti 1:12; Heb 2:18; 11:19.
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole
23. And they also“Yea,and they”
if they abide not still inunbelief, shall be grafted in: for God is able to graft them inagainThis appeal to the power of God to effect therecovery of His ancient people implies the vast difficulty ofitwhich all who have ever labored for the conversion of the Jewsare made depressingly to feel. That intelligent expositors shouldthink that this was meant of individual Jews, reintroducedfrom time to time into the family of God on their believing on theLord Jesus, is surprising; and yet those who deny the nationalrecovery of Israel must and do so interpret the apostle. But this isto confound the two things which the apostle carefully distinguishes.Individual Jews have been at all times admissible, and have beenadmitted, to the Church through the gate of faith in the Lord Jesus.This is the “remnant, even at this present time,according to the election of grace,” of which the apostle, inthe first part of the chapter, had cited himself as one. But here hemanifestly speaks of something not then existing, but to belooked forward to as a great future event in the economy of God, thereingrafting of the nation as such, when they “abide notin unbelief.” And though this is here spoken of merely as asupposition (if their unbelief shall cease)in order to set it overagainst the other supposition, of what will happen to the Gentiles ifthey shall not abide in the faiththe supposition is turned into anexplicit prediction in the verses following.
Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
And they also, if they abide not still in unbelief,…. The apostle suggests that the Jews also might be recovered and brought into a Gospel church state, provided they did not continue in infidelity; but inasmuch as they seem to lie under invincible ignorance, obstinacy, and unbelief, and were such bitter enemies to the Gospel, and abhorrers of Gospel ordinances, and a Gospel church state; yea, that they must and will abide in unbelief, unless the Spirit of God convinces them of it, and it is given to them to believe in Christ, and they are powerfully drawn by the Father to come to the Son, there is no possibility or likelihood that they
shall be grafted in, or taken into a Gospel church state; to which the apostle answers, and argues for their ingrafting, and the possibility of it from the power of God:
for God is able to graft them in again; as many of them were in the times of the apostles, and some since, for nothing is impossible with God; he can remove their unbelief, knock off the shackles and fetters in which they are held, and bring, them out of the prison of infidelity, in which they are shut up; he is able to take away the blindness of their minds, and the hardness of their hearts, the veil that is over them, and turn them to the Lord; he can by his mighty power work faith in them, and cause them to look on him whom they have pierced, and mourn in an evangelical manner; he can bring them to Christ, and into his churches, and among his people, and fold them with the rest of his sheep; so that there one fold of Jew and Gentile, under one shepherd, Jesus Christ.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
If they continue not in their unbelief ( ). Third class condition with the same verb used in verse 22 of the Gentile. Locative case of here (same form as the instrumental in verse 20).
For God is able ( ). See this use of in 4:21 rather than . This is the of the whole matter. God is able.
Fuente: Robertson’s Word Pictures in the New Testament
Able [] . See on ch. Rom 4:21.
Fuente: Vincent’s Word Studies in the New Testament
1) “And they also”, (kakeinoi de) “and those also,” and even those, national Israel, Isa 2:1-5; Dan 12:1-12.
2) “If they abide not still in unbelief,” (ean me epimenosin the apistia) “if they go not on, continue, or linger not in unbelief,” if they repent and return, unless they remain on in their unbelief. The willful hardening described Rom 11:7-10 is not to be taken as absolutely beyond remediable measures.
3) “Shall be graffed in,” (egkentristhesontai) “Will be grafted in, again, Eze 37:11-14.
4) “For God is able,” (dunatos gar estin ho theos) “For the true God is able, dynamic, powerful enough;” when the Jews, as a nation and as individuals, turn from unbelief they will be again used, recognized as the true people of God, Rom 14:4; Eze 38:8.
5) “To graff them in again,” (egkentrisai autous) “To graft them in again;” to attach them to the olive tree of his first will, 2Co 3:16. This will occur when the vail of blindness of the law is removed, Eze 39:25-29.
The Jewish people have since 1918, in the 20th century, been returning to Palestine, their homeland in fulfillment at least in part of this Scripture. Since 1948 in Palestine they have functioned as an organized nation, with a flag. And since 1967 they have overrun Jerusalem, but have not trodden down all Jerusalem, started rebuilding the ancient temple, or restoring the ancient morning and evening oblations of worship, but the day of this prophecy also seems to be drawing very near, not far away, Luk 21:24; Dan 9:26-27.
Fuente: Garner-Howes Baptist Commentary
23. For God is able, etc. Frigid would this argument be to the profane; for however they may concede power to God, yet as they view it at a distance, shut up as it were in heaven, they do for the most part rob it of its effect. But as the faithful, whenever they hear God’s power named, look on it as in present operation, he thought that this reason was sufficient to strike their minds. We may add, that he assumes this as an acknowledged axiom, — that God had so punished the unbelief of his people as not to forget his mercy; according to what he had done before, having often restored the Jews, after he had apparently banished them from his kingdom. And he shows at the same time by the comparison, how much more easy it would be to reverse the present state of things than to have introduced it; that is, how much easier it would be for the natural branches, if they were again put in the place from which they had been cut off, to draw substance from their own root, than for the wild and the unfruitful, from a foreign stock: for such is the comparison made between the Jews and the Gentiles.
Fuente: Calvin’s Complete Commentary
CRITICAL NOTES
Rom. 11:25. is a word specially applied to ships. The full complement of the Gentile world shall enter the sacred vessel of the Church, the ark of salvation.
MAIN HOMILETICS OF THE PARAGRAPHRom. 11:23-28
Dual aspects.The gifts and calling of God are without repentance, and therefore God is unchangeable. There is no change in God, though there may appear change to men. God joins, then separates, then joins again. But faith is the cementing clay by which the branches are united to the vine. Faith lost, the sap ceases to flow and the branches fall off. Divine purposes work along the lines of human faith and human obedience. God is able to graft without faith, for we must not limit His abilityif we did, we might suppose Him grafting without faith, and yet not being able to make such branches fruitful. They might be united to the good olive tree, and yet not be possessed of any spiritual fatness. The promise is to faith; the blessing is obtained by believing. Let us be afraid of continuing in unbelief. Be not high-minded, but fear. If the natural branches were cut off, how careful should we be who were once branches wild by nature!
I. A dual method of working.Gods ability is such that He can work both contrary to nature and in harmony with nature. God has grafted contrary to nature; how much more in accordance with nature! Many wild oleaster branches have been grafted, and have been wondrous specimens of the power of divine grace. Some of the noblest branches of the Christian tree have been wild Gentile branches. The ecclesiastical tree, primitive, medival, and modern, is crowded with many glorious branches of Gentile origin that suggest the most honoured names in the roll of the Churchs history. God can work contrary to nature, as nature is seen and described by short-sighted men. Miracles are contrary to naturecontrary to mans nature, not contrary to Gods nature. Mans nature is a circumscribed sphere, cribbed, cabined, and confined by mens petty notions, which they call laws, and declare to be immutable and inexorable. Gods nature is a boundless sphere. His footsteps tread the vast unknown. The laws of men are only inductions from a part of the divine ways. The laws of God are hidden away in the infinite abyss. The laws of God, like the ways of God, like the sublime being of God, are unknowable. Our laws of nature are limited, for they are the expressions of limited mindsthe readings of natures methods by finite intellects. For aught we know the laws of God are unlimited, being the expressions of an unlimited intellect. We do not know all the laws of God, even those expressed in natures operations. It does not become finite man to be wise in his own conceits. He should seek to be wise in the light of divine teaching and divine revelation.
II. A dual method of concealing and revealing.God has His divine arcana. We remember a preacher discoursing in order to show that it was not to the glory of God to conceal a thing. Perhaps the proverbs of Solomon contained more wisdom than the utterances of the modern popular preacher. The glory of the Infinite is concealment. How can an infinite Being reveal Himself in fulness to a finite creature? What glory would there be about a God whom I could comprehend and reduce to my own level? The hero-worshipper ceases his homage when the hero appears to be stripped of transcendent and almost super humanqualities. Some ask for a knowable Goda being without any secrets, any mysteries, any hidden purposes. The reverent aspirations of my worshipping nature go out and up towards an unknowable God. The God of mystery is the God of sublime glory. The expanding and inquiring soul, even through eternal cycles, will fail to comprehend all the mysteries of the divine nature and the divine purposes. This is but to say that our littleness cannot contain Gods greatness, that the finite cannot receive and possess the Infinite. But God has mysteries which He reveals and explains; and the revelation tends to unfold the greatness of God, and to impress the receptive mind with a feeling of its own littleness. The revelation of one mystery opens out a wide prospect. Part of the divine ways is known, and we consider the dark unknown with profound awe. We ascend one mountain peak. It is very high, and its immensity subdues us with the sense of our own littleness as we see vaster heights beyond, as we consider that alps of divine nature on alps arise, and that it is hopeless for us to attempt to scale the divine altitudes. For I would not, brethren, that ye should be ignorant of this mystery, lest ye should be wise in your own conceits. The mystery of partial blindness to Israel is in a measure explained by the fact that it tends to the enlightenment of the Gentiles. The blindness is not final. The rejection of the Jews has two endsthe proximate and the final. The proximate end was to facilitate the conversion of the Gentiles; the final end is to restore the Jews themselves by means of the converted Gentiles, and that to bring down at length on the latter the fulness of the divine blessing.
III. A dual method of salvation.Salvation for the Gentiles through the Jews; salvation for the Jews through the Gentiles. There shall come out of Zion a Deliverer. A mighty Deliverer has come out of the heavenly Zion to the earthly plains. He spoke in righteousness, travelling in the greatness of His strength, for He was mighty to save. And again in manifest and more victorious manner shall the Deliverer come out of the heavenly Zion and turn away ungodliness from Jacob; and Jew and Gentile shall embrace each other beneath the banner of mediatorial love. The Deliverer came with noiseless tread, with the silent but pervasive power of nature. And it may be that in the final ingathering there will be no miraculous interventions. All things will seem to be moving as before, until one day the Church will wake up to find herself pressed on all sides with ingathering adherents. Gladsome time when Jews and Gentiles shall love and worship the worlds great Kingwhen the vast races of humanity shall bow, as one great army of the living God, beneath the spell of omnipotent and redeeming love!
IV. A dual emotional aspect.Enemies for your sakes. Beloved for the fathers sakes. God is not a series of cold abstractions. God is emotional. Let us not be wise in our own conceits by pretending to explain the motions of hatred and love in a God. Perhaps, however, we may say divine hatred is the projection of human wrongdoing. Divine love is the projection of the divine attribute into humanity, removing human enmities, and filling the world with a new light. Let us fear lest we invoke divine enmity. Let us supplicate divine love. Beloved for the fathers sakes. Good fathers are a blessed heritage to their children. Here learn the greatness of man. He possesses a dual nature: one aspect stirs the divine enmity; another aspect elicits the divine love. God looks at the man and drives him from the divine presence. God looks again at the man and embraces him as beloved. Even in the expulsion there is a force of outreaching love. Is it not thus that we often appear to ourselves? We shrink with utmost loathing from one aspect, and then we taste some little comfort by the contemplation of another aspect. But oh to be beloved for the Sons sake! The fathers of the race, the elected of God, were noble and beloved; but rising above all, and nobler than all, and more beloved than all, is the only begotten Son. Beloved for the Sons sake! He that spared not His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not with Him also freely give us all things!the needful, ofttimes more than the needful, in the present; the pleasant, the joy-inspiring, in the blessed future.
SUGGESTIVE COMMENTS ON Rom. 11:23-28
Providence a school of virtue.That the fulfilment of these prophecies is still to come, it appears pretty obvious that a great national movement towards Christianity on the part of the Jews, and their actual adoption of a faith which they have so long held in detestation, must tell with mighty and decisive effect on the rest of the world. If the very existence of the Jews as a separate people be in itself the indication of a providence, a singular event in history which demonstrates the part taken by Him who overrules all history in the affairs of men, how much more impressive will the evidence become when this same people shall describe the actual evolution which it was predicted they should do more than two thousand years ago, shall after the dispersions and the desolations of many generations reach at last the very landing-place to which the finger of prophecy has been pointing from an antiquity so high as that of the patriarchal ages! We know not if this splendid era is to be ushered in by palpable and direct miracle. But should there be no such manifestation of the divine power conjoined with this marvellous fulfilment, there will at least be such a manifestation of the divine knowledge as will incontestably prove that God has had to do with it, and so as that history shall of itself perform the office of revelation, or men will trace the finger of the Almighty in the events which are sensibly passing before their eyes. And besides we have reason to believe of these converted Jews that they will become the most zealous and successful of all missionaries; or, like Paul before them, the preachers of that faith which they persecuted in times past and once laboured to destroy. It is said of a single Christian that he may be the light of the world. How much more will be a whole nation of Christians! Verily, like Paul, the great prototype of the Jews, they will pre-eminently be the apostles of the Gentiles; and there will be a light to lighten these Gentiles in the very glory of the people of Israel. We must look to futurity for this great accomplishment, for, most obviously, it has not yet been realised. It will be in the last days, that the mountain of the Lords house shall be established in the top of the mountains, and shall be exalted above the hills; and all nations shall flow unto it. And many people shall go and say, Come ye, and let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob; and He will teach us of His ways, and we will walk in His paths: for out of Zion shall go forth the law, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem. This is all yet to come, else how could it be spoken, as an immediate sequence of its fulfilment, that He shall judge among the nations, and shall rebuke many people? In a school of virtue one chief end were the enforcement of great moral lessons; and this perhaps were best effected by bringing out in boldest possible relief the evil of sin, and in all their beauty and brightness the characteristics of highest moral perfection, or, which is tantamount to this, the high and holy attributes of Him in whom all perfection, as well as all power, have had their everlasting dwelling-place. Now providence is pre-eminently a school of virtue; and we may therefore expect that history, and in a more especial manner sacred history, where the manifestations of providence are seen in nearest connection with the designs of grace, will abound in such lessons. And accordingly such is the manifest purpose of many revealed evolutions or passages in the history of the divine administration, of Gods dealings with the world. One main end of the divine policy in the government and final destiny of men seems to be manifestation, that both heaven and earth might learn thereby the more to hate all evil, to love and admire all worth and goodness and true greatness, whether in themselves or as exemplified by Him in whom all greatness and goodness are personified. In harmony with this view we read of the Lord Jesus being revealed with His mighty angels on that dread occasion when the glory of His power and sacredness shall be displayed in the destruction of sinners, and the glory of His infinite love for the holy in the triumph and happiness of the saints. And so His disposal of the Church does not terminate in but has an ulterior object to itself, even to the intent that now unto the principalities and powers in heavenly places might be known, by the Church, the manifold wisdom of God.Chalmers.
ILLUSTRATIONS TO CHAPTER 11
Rom. 11:24-25. Beholding the deliverer.On the occasion of President Lincolns visit to Richmond, as soon as his arrival became known, the coloured people whom he had delivered from bondage crowded around in wild enthusiasm. They gazed upon the wonderful man; they shouted, they danced; waved their handkerchiefs and hats; they cheered enthusiastically. Some cried, Glory, glory! others, Thank you, dear Jesus, for this! others, God bless you, Massa Linkum! others, Bless de Lord! What triumphal entry into Rome ever equalled this entry into Richmond by our delivering President? But ere long we shall all gaze on a Greater than he, with even greater satisfaction than those redeemed ones experienced.
Rom. 11:24-25. Let us pray for the restoration of Israel.Oh, shall we not lament the long rejection of the ancient people of God? Their seventy years in Babylon was nothing to this; yea, their four hundred and thirty years bondage in Egypt was nothing to this. Alas! how longhow long shall Gods anger last against that people? How long shall they be under the guilt of the blood of Christ, which they imprecated upon themselves and their posterity, saying, His blood be upon us and our children? Oh, praypray for that ancient people of God! Oh, pray that the blood of Shiloh may cleanse them from blood-guiltiness! When they were in favour with God, the believers among them had mind of us poor Gentiles, when we were the little sister that had no breasts; and now, when we are sucking at the breasts of gospel ordinances and sacramental solemnities, oh! shall we not mind them when their breasts are cut off, and we that were of the wild olive tree, are grafted in to partake of the root and fatness of the good olive tree? Oh, let us not boast against the branches!for if thou boastest, thou bearest not the root, but the root thee. Let us not boast, but let us beg that they may be grafted in; for if the casting away of them be the reconciling of the world, what shall the receiving of them be but life from the dead? The day of the return and conversion of the Jews will be a day of greater gathering to Shiloh, even among the Gentiles, than we have yet seen; and it would fare better with us if we were more employed in praying for them.
Rom. 11:28-32. Providence always at work.Gods work of providence is His most holy, wise, and powerful preserving and governing of all His creatures and all their actions. It has no Sabbath, no night suspends it, and from its labours God never rests. If, for the sake of illustration, I may compare small things with great, it is like the motion of the heart. Beating our march to the grave since the day we began to live, the heart has never ceased to beat. Our limbs grow weary; not it. We sleep; it never sleeps. Needing no period of repose to recruit its strength, by night and day it throbs in every pulse, and constantly supplying nourishment to the meanest as well as to the noblest organs of our frame, with measured, steady, untired stroke, it drives the blood along the bounding arteries without any exercise of will on our part, and even when the consciousness of our own existence is lost in dreamless slumber
Fuente: The Preacher’s Complete Homiletical Commentary Edited by Joseph S. Exell
23. Abide able The exertion of God’s ability to graft them again into the true Church depends upon their not abiding in unbelief. The future restoration of the Jews is, therefore, intrinsically contingent. It is not absolutely secured by God, but being foreknown by God as future is recognized in his plan of his own divine conduct.
Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
‘And they also, if they do not continue in their unbelief, will be grafted in, for God is able to graft them in again.’
And the inference is that if those Jews who have been cut off through unbelief begin to have faith in the Messiah, they will be regrafted in. They will become a part of the true Israel. And consequently they will be saved. All is dependent on the electing grace of God.
Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett
23 And they also, if they abide not still in unbelief, shall be graffed in: for God is able to graff them in again.
Ver. 23. God is able ] He can fetch heart of oak out of a hollow tree, and of carnal make a people created again, Psa 102:18 ; Eph 2:10 .
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
23. ] And they moreover, if they continue not (not exactly the same meaning as before: the before being external and objective, this, as in ch. Rom 6:1 , a subjective state) in their (see on Rom 11:20 ) unbelief, shall be grafted in: for God is able to graft them in again . Some, e.g. Grot., represent this last clause as implying, that God’s power to graft them in again has always been the same, but has waited for their change of mind, to act: ‘Nihil est prter incredulitatem quod Deum impediat eos rursum pro suis assumere et paterne tractare:’ but surely De W.’s interpretation is far better: ‘The Apostle obscurely includes in the . the removal of their unbelief and the awakening of faith, and this last especially he looks for from above:’ for, as he observes, the power of God would not be put forward, if the other were the meaning.
Fuente: Henry Alford’s Greek Testament
Rom 11:23 . : and they too, they on the other hand, viz. , the un-believing Jews. . . ., unless they remain on in their unbelief. It is assumed that they need not do this. The hardening spoken of in Rom 11:7-10 , though it is a judgment upon sin, and may seem from the nature of the case to be irremediable, is not to be so absolutely taken. Even in the most hardened rejector of the Gospel we are not to limit either the resources of God’s power, or the possibilities of change in a self-conscious, self-determining creature. All things are possible to him that believeth, and we are not to say that in this man or that, Jew or Gentile, unbelief is final, and belief an impossibility. If the Jews give up their unbelief they will be incorporated again in the true people of God. . . . The phrase implies not only the possibility but the difficulty of the operation. Cf. Rom 14:4 . With man it is impossible, but not with God. Nothing less than the thought of God could keep Paul from despairing of the future of Israel.
Fuente: The Expositors Greek Testament by Robertson
abide = continue, as above.
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
23.] And they moreover, if they continue not (not exactly the same meaning as before: the before being external and objective, this, as in ch. Rom 6:1, a subjective state) in their (see on Rom 11:20) unbelief, shall be grafted in: for God is able to graft them in again. Some, e.g. Grot., represent this last clause as implying, that Gods power to graft them in again has always been the same, but has waited for their change of mind, to act: Nihil est prter incredulitatem quod Deum impediat eos rursum pro suis assumere et paterne tractare:-but surely De W.s interpretation is far better:-The Apostle obscurely includes in the . the removal of their unbelief and the awakening of faith, and this last especially he looks for from above:-for, as he observes, the power of God would not be put forward, if the other were the meaning.
Fuente: The Greek Testament
Rom 11:23. , if not) Therefore their conversion will not be [the effect of] irresistible [grace].-, [able] powerful) it might be a principal objection: how will the Jews be converted, who for so many ages act so as to withdraw themselves from the faith, separate [draw aside] the Old Testament revelations from the true Messiah, and snatch them out of the hands of believers? Paul answers, God has power: comp. the, powerful [able], ch. Rom 14:4 : and He will show the glory of this power, against which no one in the Gentile world can strive. There will then be a great work!-, again) not only in [with] a smaller [comparatively small] number, as now, but in [with] a greater number, as formerly, when they were the people of God.
Fuente: Gnomon of the New Testament
Rom 11:23
Rom 11:23
And they also, if they continue not in their unbelief, shall be grafted in:-While he warns the Gentiles that if they did not continue in his goodness they would be cut off, he holds out the assurance to the Jews that if they will turn from their unbelief which broke them off, then God would graft them in again.
for God is able to graft them in again.-[They have not so sinned but that God can consistently with his moral attributes restore them.]
Fuente: Old and New Testaments Restoration Commentary
abide
See, Jer 3:21-25; Jer 50:4; Jer 50:5; 2Co 3:16.
Fuente: Scofield Reference Bible Notes
Zec 12:10, Mat 23:39, 2Co 3:16
Reciprocal: Lev 26:45 – for their Deu 30:3 – then the Jer 31:17 – General Eze 16:53 – in the midst Mar 13:20 – for Rom 11:19 – that Rom 14:4 – he shall
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
Rom 11:23. And they also, i.e., the unbelieving Jews, who are like wild olive branches. The verse should not be joined too closely with Rom 11:22, since it presents a further thought.
Continue; the same word as in Rom 11:22.
Their unbelief; as in Rom 11:20.
For God is able, etc. When unbelief ceases, His power will be manifested. It is implied that even when broken off it is easy for God to graft them in again, as it was to graft in the wild olive branches. The next verse shows that such a result is more to be expected, not that it is easier for God to do this.
Fuente: A Popular Commentary on the New Testament
Vv. 23, 24. And they also, if they abide not still in unbelief, shall be grafted in; for God is able to graft them in again. For if thou wert cut out of the olive tree which is wild by nature, and wert grafted contrary to nature into a good olive tree, how much more shall these, which be the natural branches, be grafted into their own olive tree!
Severity to the Jews was a threat to the Gentiles; so the goodness displayed to the Gentiles is a pledge, as it were, of mercy to the Jews. Let them only give up persisting in their unbelief (a contrast to the non-persistence of the Gentiles in faith, Rom 11:22), and on this one condition the power of God will restore them their place in His kingdom. It will engraft them on Christ, who will become to them a vivifying stem, as well as to the Gentiles. And this transplantation will be effected more easily still in their case than in the case of the Gentiles.
Fuente: Godet Commentary (Luke, John, Romans and 1 Corinthians)
And they [the unbelieving mass of Israel] also [together with you], if they continue not in their unbelief [for it is not a question of any comparative lack of legal merit on their part], shall be grafted in: for God is able to graft them in again. [There is no insuperable reason why they can not be grafted in, and that blessed event will take place whenever the unbelief which has caused their severance shall cease. In Paul’s day individual Jews were being grafted in (the “some” of verse 14); but in the glad future of which the apostle here speaks, the nation (or the “all Israel” of verse 26) shall be grafted in. However, the word “able” suggests the extreme difficulty of overcoming the obdurate unbelief of Israel. It is a task for God’s almightiness, but, though difficult, yet, as verse 24 shows, most natural, after all.]
Fuente: McGarvey and Pendleton Commentaries (New Testament)
Verse 23
They also; the unbelieving Jews.
Fuente: Abbott’s Illustrated New Testament
11:23 {12} And they also, if they abide not still in unbelief, shall be graffed in: for God is able to graff them in again.
(12) Many are now for a season cut off, that is, are without the root, who in their time will be grafted in: and again there are a great number who after a certain manner, and with regard to the outward show seem to be ingrafted, who nonetheless through their own fault afterwards are cut off, and completely cast away: which thing is especially to be considered in nations and peoples, as in the Gentiles and Jews.
Fuente: Geneva Bible Notes
Belief is what resulted in God grafting in believing Gentiles (Rom 11:17), and belief could result in Him grafting in believing Jews in the future. In the illustration the whole trunk of the cultivated olive tree represents Israel and the natural branches are Jews.