1I ask then: Did God reject his people? Absolutely not! For I too am an Israelite, from the seed of Abraham, of the tribe of Benjamin.
2God did not reject his people whom he foreknew. Or do you not know what the Scripture says in the passage about Elijah—how he pleads with God against Israel?
3“Lord, they have killed your prophets, they have torn down your altars, and I alone am left, and they are seeking my life.”
4But what does the divine reply say to him? “I have kept for myself seven thousand men who have not bent the knee to Baal.”
5So in the same way, at the present time too, there has come to be a remnant chosen by grace.
6But if by grace, then no longer on the basis of works; otherwise grace would no longer be grace.
7What then? What Israel was seeking, this it did not obtain, but the elect obtained it; and the rest were hardened,
8just as it is written: “God gave them a spirit of stupor, eyes not to see and ears not to hear, down to this very day.”
9And David says: “Let their table become a snare and a trap, a stumbling block and a repayment to them;
10let their eyes be darkened so that they cannot see, and bend their backs forever.”
11I ask then: Did they stumble so as to fall permanently? Absolutely not! Rather, by their trespass salvation has come to the Gentiles, to make them jealous.
12But if their trespass means riches for the world, and their loss riches for the Gentiles, how much more will their fullness mean!
13Now I am speaking to you Gentiles. Inasmuch, then, as I am an apostle to the Gentiles, I magnify my ministry,
14in the hope that I may somehow provoke my own flesh to jealousy and save some of them.
15For if their rejection means the reconciliation of the world, what will their acceptance mean but life from the dead?
16If the firstfruits are holy, so is the whole batch; and if the root is holy, so are the branches.
17But if some of the branches were broken off, and you, being a wild olive shoot, were grafted in among them and became a sharer in the root of the olive tree’s richness,
18do not boast over the branches. But if you do boast, remember: it is not you who support the root, but the root that supports you.
19You will say then, “Branches were broken off so that I might be grafted in.”
20True enough. They were broken off because of unbelief, and you stand by faith. Do not be proud, but be afraid.
21For if God did not spare the natural branches, neither will he spare you.
22Consider, then, the kindness and severity of God: severity toward those who fell, but God’s kindness toward you—provided you continue in his kindness; otherwise you too will be cut off.
23And they too, if they do not persist in unbelief, will be grafted in, for God is able to graft them in again.
24For if you were cut off from what is by nature a wild olive tree and, contrary to nature, grafted into a cultivated olive tree, how much more will these, the natural branches, be grafted back into their own olive tree!
25For I do not want you to be ignorant of this mystery, brothers, so that you may not be wise in your own estimation: a partial hardening has come upon Israel until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in,
26and so all Israel will be saved, as it is written: “The Deliverer will come from Zion; he will turn away ungodliness from Jacob.
27And this is my covenant with them, when I take away their sins.”
28As concerns the gospel, they are enemies for your sake; but as concerns election, they are beloved for the sake of the fathers.
29For the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable.
30For just as you were once disobedient to God, but now have received mercy through their disobedience,
31so also these have now been disobedient, in order that by the mercy shown to you they also may now receive mercy.
32For God has confined them all in disobedience, in order that he might have mercy on them all.
33Oh, the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments and untraceable his ways!
34For who has known the mind of the Lord? Or who has become his counselor?
35Or who has first given to him, that it should be repaid to him?
36For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be the glory forever. Amen.
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