Romans 9–11, Israel’s restoration, and the mercy that gathers the nations
By Mark Douglas Warr
“And in this way all Israel will be saved.”
—Romans 11:26, ESV
Few sentences carry more weight in discussions about Israel, the church, and the end of the age. Yet the sentence is often quoted before its two central questions have been answered: Who is “all Israel,” and what does Paul mean by “in this way”?
The answers affect how we read Israel’s prophets, understand the inclusion of Gentiles, pray for Jewish people, and evaluate expectations about Christ’s return. They also affect whether our theology produces gratitude or superiority.
This study begins with Paul’s argument, follows its Old Testament foundations, considers the strongest competing interpretations, and then examines what early Christian writers and related prophetic passages can contribute.
My present judgment is that “all Israel” most likely refers to historical Israel brought corporately into salvation through Jesus Christ. Believing Gentiles already share fully in the same saving fellowship. I also tentatively expect a widespread turning of Jewish people beyond the present pattern of a believing remnant, although that further conclusion is less certain than the identification of the people Paul is discussing.
That judgment must remain open to the substantial evidence for other readings. In particular, the argument that Gentile incorporation belongs within Israel’s restoration is strong and deserves considerably more attention than it often receives.
Unless otherwise identified, extended Scripture quotations are from the Berean Standard Bible (BSB), a public-domain translation. Short ESV excerpts are marked. Translations of individual Hebrew and Greek expressions are identified in the discussion.
1. Four questions we need to distinguish
Much of the confusion comes from combining questions that Scripture allows us to consider separately.
Who belongs to God’s redeemed people? Jewish and Gentile believers share salvation in Christ.
Whom does Paul call “all Israel” in Romans 11:26? This is the particular question of the phrase’s referent.
Does Paul anticipate a distinct future turning of historical Israel? Identifying Israel does not by itself establish when or how extensively such a turning occurs.
What does this imply for the kingdom, resurrection, and final events? Even a future corporate conversion does not supply an entire end-times chronology.
Agreement on the first question does not resolve the other three. Someone can affirm one people in Christ while expecting future mercy toward Jewish people. Someone can interpret “all Israel” inclusively while also expecting many more Jews to believe. Someone can anticipate Jewish conversion without believing in a future earthly millennium.
We should therefore avoid deciding the meaning of the passage by attaching a theological label to its interpreter.
Paul’s controlling concern is God’s faithfulness. Has the gospel’s reception by Gentiles, alongside widespread Jewish unbelief, exposed a failure in God’s promises? His answer will include election, judgment, mission, faith, restoration, and mercy. The phrase “all Israel” belongs within that answer.
2. Read the promise in its own paragraph
Paul writes:
I do not want you to be ignorant of this mystery, brothers, so that you will not be conceited: A hardening in part has come to Israel, until the full number of the Gentiles has come in.
And so all Israel will be saved, as it is written:
“The Deliverer will come from Zion;
He will remove godlessness from Jacob.
And this is My covenant with them
when I take away their sins.”Regarding the gospel, they are enemies on your account; but regarding election, they are loved on account of the patriarchs. For God’s gifts and His call are irrevocable.
Just as you who formerly disobeyed God have now received mercy through their disobedience, so they too have now disobeyed, in order that they too may now receive mercy through the mercy shown to you.
For God has consigned everyone to disobedience so that He may have mercy on everyone.
—Romans 11:25–32, BSB
Several observations should govern everything that follows.
The hardening is partial. Gentile ingathering matters to the outcome. Salvation involves the Deliverer removing ungodliness and sins. The patriarchal promises remain relevant. Jewish and Gentile experiences of mercy are connected.
Paul also tells us why he is disclosing this mystery: he wants to prevent Gentile conceit. Any interpretation that encourages contempt for Jewish people has already failed to honor the paragraph’s stated purpose.
The presence of now in the final mercy clause of verse 31 involves a textual variation, considered below. It should neither be ignored nor made to carry the whole chronology.
3. Romans 9–11 is one sustained argument
Romans 9 begins with Paul’s grief over his own people. He identifies them as Israelites and recalls their adoption, covenants, worship, promises, patriarchs, and the Messiah’s human descent from them (9:1–5).
His distress makes sense because these people remain the historical recipients of extraordinary divine privileges. He does not resolve their unbelief by deciding that they never mattered.
Yet he immediately qualifies how the promise operates:
For not all who are descended from Israel are Israel.
—Romans 9:6, BSB
Physical descent does not guarantee participation in the saving promise. Paul’s examples of Isaac and Jacob develop God’s freedom in election. The statement initially distinguishes within Abraham’s and Israel’s descendants; it does not, by itself, define every later use of Israel as the whole church.
Romans 9:24–26 then brings Gentiles directly into the argument through Hosea. Romans 9:27–29 speaks of a remnant of Israel. These movements belong together: God calls people from the nations while preserving a people from historical Israel.
Romans 10:1 makes Paul’s continuing desire explicit: he prays for Israel’s salvation. Romans 10:9–13 connects salvation with confessing Jesus as Lord, believing in His resurrection, and calling on the Lord. The same Lord is generous to everyone who calls.
Romans 11 then asks whether God has rejected His people. Paul’s answer is emphatic: certainly not. His own existence as a believing Israelite from Benjamin is evidence against total rejection. Elijah’s experience supplies another example of a remnant preserved by grace.
The chapter moves beyond the existence of that remnant. Israel’s stumbling has benefited the Gentiles; Gentile salvation is intended to provoke Israel to jealousy; natural branches can be grafted in again.
Paul is already participating in this process. In Romans 11:13–14 he explains that his ministry to Gentiles aims to provoke his own people and save some of them.
The argument therefore concerns a saving work already underway, with a completeness still to be explained. An interpretation that postpones all Jewish salvation to the future, or treats Gentile salvation as unrelated to Israel’s story, misses Paul’s present ministry.
4. “Jew,” “Israelite,” and “all Israel” require careful definitions
The distinction between Jew and Israelite matters, but we should not make it absolute.
The word associated with Jew derives historically from Judah and can carry geographical, ancestral, political, and religious associations. Its meaning depends on period and context. It cannot simply be restricted to biological descendants of the tribe of Judah or described as an identity that only outsiders imposed after the exile.
Paul calls himself an Israelite from Benjamin in Romans 11:1. In Galatians 2:15 he speaks of himself and Peter as Jews by birth. His own usage shows that these identities overlap.
Consequently, we cannot decide Romans 11 by arguing that Paul would necessarily have written Jews if he meant historical Israelites. Nor can we say that Israel has no ancestral meaning in Paul. Romans 9:3–5 and 11:1 make that untenable.
The twelve-tribe horizon nevertheless matters. Israel includes a history larger than the southern kingdom of Judah. The prophets’ promises to Israel and Judah raise questions that cannot be answered merely by substituting the modern word Jewish everywhere.
At the same time, the northern tribes should not be treated as a population whose identity had completely vanished. Luke identifies Anna with Asher (Luke 2:36). Paul speaks of the hope of the twelve tribes in Acts 26:6–8. These references do not resolve every historical question about the tribes, but they rule out building an interpretation on universal disappearance.
What about all Israel?
Biblical collective language must be read in context. In 1 Kings 12, Israel-language shifts within the account of the divided kingdom: the wider assembly, the seceding northern people, and Judah’s separate allegiance all matter. “All Israel” is not a technical formula that mechanically supplies the same geographical membership in every passage.
It can describe a people considered as a whole without functioning as a census of every individual. But corporate cannot become an excuse to make all mean an unspecified few.
Our interpretation must explain both the identity of Israel and the completeness Paul intends. A numerical claim about how often the phrase occurs, without a defined textual corpus and examination of each context, cannot do that work.
5. Israel’s restoration was always connected to the nations
The story begins before the division of Israel into northern and southern kingdoms.
God promises that the families of the earth will be blessed through Abraham (Genesis 12:1–3). Genesis 17 expands the horizon to a multitude of nations. Paul explicitly connects Abraham’s promise with Gentile blessing, the Spirit, and belonging to Christ (Galatians 3:8, 14, 26–29).
The nations’ inclusion therefore does not originate as an emergency response to Jewish unbelief.
Israel’s later covenant history joins judgment to promised restoration. Leviticus 26:40–45 speaks of confession, covenant remembrance, and God’s refusal utterly to destroy His people. The land remains part of that passage’s historical covenant setting.
Deuteronomy 30:1–6 joins return from dispersion to a renewed heart. Restoration requires more than relocation: God must enable His people to love Him. Paul uses language from this chapter when discussing the accessible word of faith in Romans 10:6–8. We must consider that apostolic use alongside the original restoration setting.
Deuteronomy 32:21 also matters. Israel’s provocation of God leads to God provoking Israel through a people described as no people. Paul quotes this in Romans 10:19 and develops the jealousy theme in Romans 11.
Jeremiah 31 promises a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah, including internalized instruction, knowledge of God, and forgiveness. Hebrews 8 and 10 apply that promise to the saving work of Jesus and the life of His people.
Jeremiah immediately adds an assurance about Israel’s continuing identity. After describing the established order of the sun, moon, and stars, God declares:
“Only if this fixed order departed from My presence, declares the LORD, would Israel’s descendants ever cease to be a nation before Me.”
—Jeremiah 31:36, BSB
The following verse rejects the prospect of casting off all Israel’s descendants because of their sins. A restoration reading must account for that continuing people as well as for the new covenant’s fulfillment in Christ.
This strengthens the case against a simple abandonment of historical Israel. It does not, by itself, define every person included in “all Israel,” guarantee individual salvation through ancestry, or identify a modern government with the fullness of the promise. An incorporation reading must also explain how its expanded account of Israel preserves the people whose descendants Jeremiah names. Jeremiah 31:35–37.
These passages establish two necessary commitments. We must take seriously the people to whom God spoke. We must also take seriously the way the New Testament presents their promises as being fulfilled through Christ and shared with Gentile believers.
Present fulfillment does not automatically exhaust every aspect of a prophecy. Future expectation does not justify overlooking what the apostles say God has already done.
6. The olive tree gives us the basic shape of belonging
Romans 11:16–24 portrays a cultivated olive tree, natural branches, and wild branches.
Some natural branches have been broken off because of unbelief. Others remain. Wild branches have been grafted among the remaining branches and now share the nourishment of the root.
This is a powerful picture of Gentile inclusion. The Gentiles do not support the root; the root supports them.
The patriarchs and the promises given through them provide a strong contextual explanation of the root, especially in light of verses 16 and 28. The metaphor need not make root a technical definition of every aspect of Israel’s identity. Its central point is shared dependence on God’s covenant mercy.
Paul’s distinctions remain visible inside the image. Natural and wild branches have different histories, but both belong in the same cultivated tree. The picture neither requires Gentiles to become genealogical Israelites nor makes ancestry sufficient for continued participation.
The governing contrast is faith and unbelief:
And if they do not persist in unbelief, they will be grafted in, for God is able to graft them in again.
—Romans 11:23, BSB
Several conclusions follow.
There is one shared saving fellowship. Gentiles participate fully rather than receiving a lesser salvation. Jewish unbelief can be overcome. Regrafting does not require the removal of believing Gentiles.
Paul also warns Gentiles about continuing in God’s kindness. That warning must retain its seriousness; it should not be emptied out merely to protect a preferred account of perseverance.
The olive tree gives substantial support to an incorporation reading of restoration. It also supports continuing hope for the historical people represented by the natural branches. The image contains both truths, so it cannot be recruited to erase either one.
7. Hosea gives the incorporation argument its greatest force
Hosea addresses the covenant breakdown of the northern kingdom. The names of the prophet’s children dramatize judgment: Israel will experience the terrible consequences of becoming “not My people.”
Yet the same prophecy promises reversal:
Yet the number of the Israelites will be like the sand of the sea, which cannot be measured or counted. And it will happen that in the very place where it was said to them, “You are not My people,” they will be called “sons of the living God.”
Then the people of Judah and of Israel will be gathered together, and they will appoint for themselves one leader, and will go up out of the land. For great will be the day of Jezreel.
—Hosea 1:10–11, BSB
Hosea 2:23 likewise promises renewed mercy and belonging.
Paul’s use of these promises is striking. After speaking of those God calls “not only from the Jews but also from the Gentiles” in Romans 9:24, he quotes Hosea’s reversal of the not-my-people judgment.
How can a promise concerning Israel’s restoration apply to Gentiles?
One explanation is an analogy or extension: the God who restores rejected Israelites also welcomes those who were formerly outside Israel.
A stronger incorporation interpretation argues that Paul is doing more than drawing a parallel. The inclusion of Gentiles actually participates in the restoration Hosea promised. God reconstitutes His people through His Messiah and Spirit, gathering those who formerly stood outside covenant belonging.
This deserves serious attention. It gives Gentile inclusion a place inside Israel’s restoration rather than treating it as a disconnected project.
However, the argument does not require Gentile converts to be unsuspecting biological descendants of the northern tribes. Their transformation and incorporation are theological realities, not discoveries about hidden ancestry. It should not be confused with British-Israelism, racial superiority claims, or a theory that only disguised Israelites can be saved.
Nor should it depend on the assertion that God could restore Israel only by admitting Gentiles because every northern Israelite had disappeared. Scripture itself preserves evidence of continuing tribal identity.
The strongest version says something more substantial: God’s promised restoration can include the creation of renewed belonging through the Spirit. That claim must then be tested against Paul’s continued distinction between Israel and Gentiles in Romans 11.
Hosea 1; Hosea 2; Romans 9:24–29.
8. Does Ephraim’s blessing predict “the fullness of the Gentiles”?
Genesis 48:19 says that Ephraim’s descendants will become a multitude of nations. The Hebrew expression, mĕlōʾ haggôyim, can be rendered quite literally as a fullness of nations.
That sounds close to Romans 11:25, where Paul speaks of the fullness of the Gentiles. Since Ephraim became a prominent designation for the northern kingdom, the connection attracts interpreters who place Gentile ingathering within the restoration of dispersed Israel.
The correspondence is worth investigating. It should not be overstated.
The Greek wording differs:
Genesis 48:19 in the Septuagint
Greek wording: eis plēthos ethnōn
Basic sense: Into a multitude of nations.
Romans 11:25
Greek wording: to plērōma tōn ethnōn
Basic sense: The fullness of the nations/Gentiles.
Paul is not reproducing the Septuagint’s phrase word for word, and he does not introduce Genesis 48 as a quotation.
He could still be drawing on the Hebrew wording or a broader scriptural pattern. A conceptual echo does not require identical Greek. But an echo must be argued; it cannot be assumed because two English translations use similar language.
Genesis 48 therefore contributes a possible connection between Ephraim and the nations. It does not independently prove that every Gentile believer is Ephraim, or that “all Israel” must include Gentiles in precisely the way a particular reconstruction proposes.
Genesis 48 in the Septuagint; Romans 11:25.
9. Edom, Amos 9, and the Jerusalem council
Amos 9 is especially important because Acts 15 shows an apostolic application of Israel’s restoration prophecy to the Gentile mission.
In the Hebrew-based rendering of Amos, God promises:
“In that day I will restore the fallen tent of David. I will repair its gaps, restore its ruins, and rebuild it as in the days of old, that they may possess the remnant of Edom and all the nations that bear My name,” declares the LORD, who will do this.
—Amos 9:11–12, BSB
Edom descends from Esau in the biblical account and frequently appears as an adversary of Israel. In prophetic contexts it can contribute to a wider portrayal of hostile nations. But Edom is not simply a dictionary synonym for all Gentiles.
The ancient Greek form of Amos differs from the surviving Masoretic Hebrew form. It speaks of the remnant of humanity seeking, rather than Israel possessing the remnant of Edom.
James’s quotation in Acts 15 closely follows that Greek form:
“After this I will return and rebuild the fallen tent of David.
Its ruins I will rebuild, and I will restore it,
so that the remnant of men may seek the Lord,
and all the Gentiles who are called by My name,
says the Lord who does these things
that have been known for ages.”—Acts 15:16–18, BSB
The difference involves both Edom/humanity and possess/seek. It is more than changing the vowels of one word. Acts also explicitly supplies the Lord as the one sought, so its wording should not be described as an exact reproduction of every word of the surviving Greek Amos text.
The textual history raises questions about translation and underlying Hebrew readings. The argument here does not depend on proving which surviving form preserves the earliest wording. The decisive point for this discussion is available in both forms: the restored Davidic order includes nations bearing God’s name.
What is James doing with the passage?
The council is considering whether Gentile believers must be circumcised and required to keep the law of Moses. Peter has described God giving them the Spirit and cleansing their hearts through faith. James says the prophetic words agree with this Gentile inclusion.
His argument recognizes the Gentile mission as consonant with the restoration of David’s fallen tent. It gives no warrant for treating present Gentile salvation as unrelated to Israel’s promises.
It also resists a reading that turns “after this” into an automatic schedule in which God finishes an entirely separate Gentile program before beginning any Davidic restoration. James is using the prophecy to explain what God is already doing among Gentiles.
Nevertheless, Acts 15 does not expressly define Paul’s phrase “all Israel.” Nor does it say that every feature of Amos 9:13–15—abundance, rebuilt cities, and secure planting—has already reached its fullest realization.
The appropriate conclusion is substantial but bounded: Gentile inclusion belongs within the fulfillment of Israel’s restoration promises. Whether that makes Gentiles part of the particular group called “all Israel” in Romans 11:26 remains a further question.
Amos 9, BSB; Amos 9, Septuagint; Acts 15.
10. The prophets envision restored Israel and welcomed nations
Other prophetic passages reinforce this relationship.
Ezekiel 37:15–28 joins the sticks associated with Judah and Joseph/Ephraim. The divided people become one under a Davidic ruler. Cleansing, covenant peace, and God’s dwelling accompany their reunion.
The promise concerns Israel’s historic division. Its fulfillment cannot responsibly be discussed as though Judah and the northern kingdom were never part of its meaning.
Yet Ezekiel’s restoration vision also makes room for outsiders. Ezekiel 47:21–23 assigns resident foreigners an inheritance among Israel’s tribes. This is unusually strong evidence that sharing Israel’s promised inheritance need not be limited to genealogical Israelites.
Zechariah 2:11 anticipates many nations joining themselves to the Lord and becoming His people. Isaiah 56:3–8 includes foreigners and eunuchs in worship and belonging. Isaiah 49:5–6 joins the servant’s restoration of Israel to his mission as a light to the nations; Acts 13:47 applies that international vocation to the apostolic mission.
Isaiah 19:23–25 offers a particularly illuminating pattern. Egypt and Assyria join Israel in blessing. Egypt can be called God’s people and Assyria the work of His hands while Israel remains His inheritance.
Shared blessing does not require every historical name to disappear. Neither does the continued use of different names imply separate ways of salvation.
Romans 15:8–12 draws together the same themes: Christ confirms the promises to the patriarchs, and the Gentiles glorify God for mercy. Paul supports that claim with passages from the Law, Psalms, and Prophets.
The cumulative picture is richer than either an exclusively ancestral restoration or a story in which Israel simply vanishes. Israel’s Messiah fulfills God’s promises and draws the nations into their blessings.
That is a major reason the incorporation argument must remain central to this inquiry.
11. Shared identity in Christ does not settle every use of “Israel”
Ephesians 2:11–22 describes Gentiles who were formerly alienated from Israel’s commonwealth and strangers to the covenants of promise. Through Christ they are brought near, reconciled with Jewish believers in one body, and made fellow citizens and members of God’s household.
Galatians 3:26–29 teaches that those who belong to Christ are Abraham’s offspring and heirs according to promise. Gentile believers do not need an inferior category of inheritance.
Romans 2:28–29 emphasizes inward Jewishness and circumcision of the heart by the Spirit. Whether that passage directly includes believing Gentiles or principally defines the faithful Jew is debated. It cannot be used without argument as a universal rule that Israel always means the church.
Philippians 3:3 likewise identifies the worshiping, Christ-boasting community with true circumcision. These passages contribute to a profound account of identity reshaped around Christ and the Spirit.
Galatians 6:16 introduces another disputed expression: “the Israel of God.” The Greek kai can be understood as adding a group—peace upon those who follow Paul’s rule and upon God’s Israel—or as explanatory, identifying the same people, even God’s Israel.
On the first reading, Paul may distinguish Jewish believers within the wider redeemed community. On the second, he may apply Israel-language to that community as a whole. The grammatical debate cannot be resolved merely by choosing the English word that best supports a prior position.
The twelve-tribe imagery also continues in the New Testament: Jesus’ promises concerning the tribes in Matthew 19:28 and Luke 22:30; James’s address to the twelve tribes in the dispersion; and the tribal and apostolic imagery of Revelation 7 and 21.
These passages show the continuing importance of Israel’s restoration and wholeness. They do not turn every symbolic reference into a demographic census, identify the 144,000 as converts of the two witnesses, or automatically determine Romans 11:26.
The whole redeemed people share Israel’s messianic blessings. Whether Paul calls that entire people “all Israel” at this particular point must still be decided from his argument.
NET translation note on Galatians 6:16.
12. What Heiser, Staples, and Zoccali actually contribute
These writers should be heard accurately rather than placed under one label.
Michael Heiser emphasizes that Gentile inclusion belongs to Israel’s restoration and reads Romans 11 against the Old Testament’s wider Israel-and-nations story. His 2016 Naked Bible episode 102 develops the argument in conversation with Jason Staples’s earlier work. His Edom/Amos discussion in episode 107 also expressly leaves room for a further role for historical Israel.
One argument in Heiser’s presentation requires qualification: Paul’s use of Israel cannot be settled by asserting that he would otherwise have written Jews, or that Israel lacks an ethnic sense. Paul’s own language prevents that simplification. Correcting this point does not eliminate the larger restoration argument.
Jason Staples relates Gentile incorporation to the restoration of dispersed Israel. He argues that Israel is a broader category than Jews, not that Jews cannot be Israelites. Paul’s Benjaminite ancestry therefore does not refute this distinction.
He describes Gentile incorporation as an actual Spirit-worked transformation of ethnic belonging. His published 2024 clarification rejects the idea that converts merely discover hidden Israelite ancestry: actual Gentiles are transformed and incorporated into Israel. The question is whether this reconstruction best explains Paul’s argument.
Christopher Zoccali reaches a different conclusion in his 2008 article. The publisher’s abstract identifies his preferred reading as the total elect from historical Israel across time. He should therefore be included as a significant alternative voice, not presented as another witness to the same conclusion as Heiser and Staples.
These contributions sharpen the questions. None should substitute for examining Paul’s text, and disagreement with one supporting argument should not be treated as a refutation of an interpreter’s entire case.
Sources: Heiser, episode 102 transcript; episode 107 transcript; Staples’s explanation of his 2011 argument; Staples’s 2024 clarification; Zoccali’s 2008 publisher abstract.
13. Four principal readings deserve a fair hearing
The main interpretations overlap at points. They should be compared in their strongest forms.
1. Historical Israel saved corporately
Who is “all Israel”? The historical people Paul has been discussing, restored through Christ. This reading often includes a future widespread turning of Jewish people to faith.
Principal strength: It preserves Paul’s distinction between Israel and the Gentiles and explains his movement toward Israel’s fullness and acceptance.
Principal difficulty: It must explain the scope of “all” and establish a future corporate turning from Paul’s argument rather than assume it.
2. The complete elect from Israel
Who is “all Israel”? All Israelites whom God saves throughout history, considered together as a complete company.
Principal strength: It gives sustained weight to election, the believing remnant, and the salvation already occurring in Paul’s ministry.
Principal difficulty: It must explain whether Paul anticipates something beyond the continuing pattern of remnant salvation.
3. The whole redeemed people
Who is “all Israel”? Jewish and Gentile believers together as God’s completed people in Christ.
Principal strength: It fits their shared inheritance, their participation in one olive tree, and the wider biblical inclusion of the nations.
Principal difficulty: It must explain how this inclusive meaning relates to the Israel distinguished from Gentiles immediately around Romans 11:26.
4. Restoration through incorporation
Who is “all Israel”? Restored Israel constituted through Jewish believers and Gentiles incorporated by the Spirit, understood within the wider story of dispersed Israel.
Principal strength: It brings Hosea, the restoration of Israel and Judah, and Gentile inclusion into one coherent account.
Principal difficulty: It must substantiate that reconstruction and explain Paul’s continuing distinctions without overstating word meanings or claims about ancestry.
Historical Israel brought into salvation
This reading has strong immediate contextual support. Israel appears in Romans 11:1, 7, and 25 as the historical people among whom there is both belief and unbelief. Verses 28–31 continue to contrast their condition with the Gentiles’ experience of mercy.
Its strongest version does not equate salvation with political restoration or assert that ancestry saves. It understands Israel’s salvation through the Deliverer, forgiveness, faith, and regrafting.
A widespread future turning is one explanation of the promised corporate outcome. It is an additional inference, not the dictionary definition of the word Israel.
The completed company of elect Israelites
This reading takes Romans 9:6 and 11:5 seriously. God has always preserved His people through election and grace. “All Israel” could name the complete company finally gathered from historical Israel, rather than a later period in which the pattern of response changes dramatically.
It should not be dismissed as saying merely that a few Jews will always believe. Its claim is that the whole saved company will be complete.
The question is whether that fully accounts for Paul’s language of fullness, acceptance, and the reversal of stumbling.
The whole redeemed people
This reading emphasizes that Jews and Gentiles belong to one people under one Messiah. It can interpret the sequence as the gathering of the Gentiles together with believing Israelites, resulting in the completed Israel of God.
The immediate Israel/Gentiles distinction creates a real challenge. Yet its best reply is stronger than an arbitrary change of vocabulary: a people can retain its identity while its membership expands through incorporation.
That response deserves consideration. Pointing out a distinction in verse 25 does not, by itself, make an inclusive sense in verse 26 impossible.
Restoration through incorporation
This version locates Gentile inclusion within the promises concerning the restoration of Israel itself. It gives Hosea and the dispersed tribes substantial explanatory weight.
Its strength is the coherence it seeks between Israel’s restoration and the Gentile mission. Its vulnerability lies in any step that exceeds the evidence: rigid definitions of Jew, claims of total tribal disappearance, or treating a possible scriptural echo as a decisive quotation.
The stronger, carefully qualified version remains a serious alternative to the historical-Israel preference expressed here.
What about salvation apart from Christ?
A further proposal holds that Jewish people can be saved through their covenantal relationship with God without faith in Jesus, while Gentiles are saved through Christ.
Such proposals vary and should not all be reduced to one caricature. Nevertheless, they face substantial difficulties in Romans 9–11. Paul grieves, prays, preaches, seeks to save his people, and connects regrafting to the end of unbelief. Romans 10 presents one Lord and a shared gospel.
God’s enduring election provides grounds for hope. Paul does not use it to make the Messiah, faith, or forgiveness unnecessary.
14. What exactly does “in this way” mean?
The Greek expression in Romans 11:26 is kai houtōs. The ESV renders it “and in this way”; other translations use “and so.”
The natural force of houtōs concerns manner or the result of a described process: thus, so, in this way. It should not automatically be replaced with “and then,” as though Paul had simply supplied the next item on a timetable.
But manner and temporal development are not mutually exclusive. A process can operate across time and reach a future completion. The grammar alone neither proves nor excludes a climactic future turning.
What process has Paul described?
Israel’s stumbling has become an occasion for mercy reaching Gentiles.
Gentile salvation is intended to provoke Israel to jealousy.
Paul pursues that purpose through his present ministry.
Those who cease persisting in unbelief can be grafted in again.
God brings His saving purpose to its intended completeness through this interconnected mercy.
That is the strongest immediate background for “in this way.”
Calling this a mystery does not mean that every element was absent from earlier revelation. Paul immediately appeals to the prophets. The mystery concerns the saving purpose he is now explaining: partial hardening, Gentile ingathering, and mercy toward Israel are connected within God’s faithfulness. The term by itself does not decide between a future corporate turning and the other accounts of completion.
Jealousy here should not be reduced to resentment or a manipulative Christian program. Paul hopes that the blessings received through Israel’s Messiah will move his own people to seek the same salvation. Gentiles are witnesses and beneficiaries of mercy; they are not Israel’s savior.
The Deliverer, the gospel, faith, and forgiveness remain central. Romans 10:14–17 places hearing the proclaimed word within Paul’s account of coming to faith.
Each major interpretation relates the process to its understanding of “all Israel”:
On the corporate historical-Israel reading, Gentile inclusion serves the eventual restoration of the people whose unbelief troubles Paul.
On the cumulative-elect reading, this process gathers the complete saved company from Israel throughout history.
On the inclusive and incorporation readings, the connected gathering of Jews and Gentiles constitutes the restored people in its fullness.
The expression therefore contributes more to how salvation unfolds than to settling who is named by the phrase that follows.
Paul is not describing a completely Gentile phase during which no Jews are saved, followed by a completely Jewish phase during which Gentile mercy becomes irrelevant. Jewish salvation is occurring now, and Gentile mercy serves it now.
A future culmination may belong within this process. The words “in this way” neither prove that culmination by themselves nor rule it out.
15. “Fullness,” “until,” “now,” and “all” do not supply a hidden calendar
Romans 11:25 describes partial hardening continuing until Gentile fullness comes in.
Fullness can express completeness or a full number. Paul does not give the number, identify a modern institution that can count it, or provide a list of political conditions that will announce its arrival.
The hardening is already qualified by the believing remnant. Israel is not uniformly unbelieving. Until introduces a limit in relation to Gentile ingathering, but the word alone does not explain everything that happens afterward.
The case for reversal depends on the wider argument: fullness in verse 12, acceptance in verse 15, possible regrafting in verses 23–24, and salvation in verses 26–27.
One linguistic clarification matters. English translations often supply future expressions in verses 12 and 15, but the relevant Greek clauses do not contain an explicit future verb. Their future orientation is an interpretation of the argument. Verse 26 does contain the future “will be saved.”
This does not eliminate future expectation. It prevents us from claiming that every part of the case is settled by a future verb where none occurs.
The final now in Romans 11:31 also deserves care. Significant manuscripts include it; others omit it; a few have a form meaning later. The NET textual note acknowledges the difficulty and slightly prefers now.
Where now is read, the present availability and operation of mercy should receive full weight. But present mercy does not logically exclude a future enlargement or completion. Conversely, omitting that word does not establish a delayed conversion event.
What about verse 32?
For God has consigned everyone to disobedience so that He may have mercy on everyone.
—Romans 11:32, BSB
Some readers see this as support for the eventual salvation of every individual. Others understand the two groups under discussion—Jews and Gentiles—together subjected to disobedience and dependent on mercy.
The verse certainly rejects any claim that one group stands outside the need for mercy or beyond its reach. Whether it teaches universal individual salvation requires a wider argument that accounts for Paul’s warnings about unbelief and judgment. It cannot simply be assumed from the English word everyone.
Similarly, “all Israel” must receive a meaningful account of completeness. It cannot be diluted into “some Israelites,” but neither should it be expanded without argument into every Israelite who has ever lived.
NET textual note on Romans 11:31.
16. The Deliverer’s coming: first advent, final advent, or completed salvation?
Paul grounds the promise in Scripture:
“The Deliverer will come from Zion;
He will remove godlessness from Jacob.
And this is My covenant with them
when I take away their sins.”—Romans 11:26–27, BSB
The quotation draws chiefly on Isaiah 59:20–21 and 27:9. The wording matters.
The Hebrew form of Isaiah 59:20 speaks of a Redeemer coming to Zion, to those in Jacob who turn from transgression. The Septuagint speaks of His coming for Zion’s sake and turning ungodliness away from Jacob. Paul has the Deliverer coming from Zion, with the removal of ungodliness.
Paul’s form places strong emphasis on the Deliverer’s saving action. Israel’s restoration involves forgiveness and transformed allegiance, not merely an improvement in national circumstances.
Does this describe Christ’s first coming or His return?
A first-advent reading emphasizes that Jesus has already accomplished the decisive work that removes sin and inaugurates the new covenant. The gospel goes outward from the setting of His death, resurrection, and exaltation.
A future-oriented reading emphasizes Paul’s “will be saved,” the anticipated removal of unbelief, and the possibility of a climactic application of the Messiah’s saving work.
An inauguration-and-completion reading combines these: the saving covenant is established through Christ’s first coming and reaches its intended fullness through the continuing mission and final consummation.
Christopher Bruno’s study, The Deliverer from Zion, argues for a first-advent emphasis and proposes that Isaiah 2:3’s movement of God’s word from Zion helps explain Paul’s wording. From this he argues against the prevailing future-national reading and emphasizes Gentile inclusion as part of fulfillment. His Isaiah 2:3 connection is a significant proposal, not an independently established third quotation that all interpreters recognize.
Even if the quotation’s foundation is the first advent, its application to further people can still lie in the future. Conversely, expecting future Jewish faith does not require a new atonement or a second saving covenant.
The secure center is the removal of sins through the Messiah. The precise timing of the corporate outcome remains part of the interpretive question.
Isaiah 59, Septuagint; Bruno’s study.
Historical and prophetic connections. The following sections test related evidence. They supplement the reading of Romans 9–11 rather than supply a calendar Paul does not give.
17. What early Christian writers add to the question
The fathers help us understand how early Christians received these texts. Their evidence is most useful when we distinguish direct exposition of Romans 11 from broader statements about Israel, the church, and the kingdom.
Irenaeus: a direct quotation, with limited conclusions
Irenaeus, writing in the second century, actually quotes Romans 11:26 in Against Heresies 4.2.8. His surrounding argument concerns the law’s relationship to faith in Christ and includes Israelites and Samaritans who responded to Jesus.
This directly connects Paul’s promise with coming to Christ and receiving salvation. Irenaeus quotes the opening promise of Romans 11:26 here, without reproducing its following clause about the Deliverer removing ungodliness. This paragraph does not define the precise extent of “all Israel” or supply a conversion timetable.
Irenaeus also expected an earthly kingdom associated with resurrection, especially in Book 5. That broader expectation should not be silently inserted into every detail of his brief Romans quotation.
Irenaeus, Against Heresies 4.2.8.
Justin Martyr: Israel-language applied to believers
Justin, another second-century writer, applies Israel-language to those brought to God through Christ in Dialogue with Trypho 123. This is meaningful early evidence for understanding the Christian people, including Gentiles, through Israel’s identity.
It is not a direct exposition of Romans 11:26 and does not establish that Justin held every element of a modern incorporation argument.
Justin also expected a future thousand-year reign in Jerusalem, while acknowledging that other faithful Christians disagreed. His combination of views reminds us that inclusive Israel-language and a future earthly kingdom were not necessarily competing options.
Justin, Dialogue 123; Dialogue 80–81.
John Chrysostom: explicit hope for Jewish belief
Chrysostom’s late-fourth-century Homilies on Romans, especially Homily 19, directly connects Paul’s promise with Jewish belief and salvation. He recognizes Jews already coming to faith while expecting further fulfillment, and relates the passage to the end and Christ’s coming.
His Homilies on Matthew, Homily 57, also connects Elijah’s coming before the second advent with persuading the Jews then living to believe.
This supplies real historical support for reading Romans 11 as promising further salvation for historical Israel. It does not establish every modern claim about the size of the converted company, its political circumstances, or its relationship to a particular millennial scheme.
Chrysostom, Romans, Homily 19; Matthew, Homily 57.
Augustine: future Jewish faith without a future earthly millennium
In The City of God 20.29, Augustine anticipates Jewish belief in the true Christ through Elijah’s explanation of the law before the final judgment.
The same book interprets the thousand years of Revelation 20 in relation to the church’s present history and reign with Christ, rather than requiring a future earthly thousand-year period after Christ’s return.
His combination matters: an expectation of future Jewish conversion does not belong exclusively to premillennialism.
Augustine’s testimony establishes an ancient expectation. His appeal to a widespread Christian belief is evidence about reception, not proof that every earlier Christian agreed or that the expectation came directly from an apostle.
Augustine, The City of God 20, especially chapters 7–9 and 29.
Together these witnesses make two points clear. Future Jewish faith is an ancient Christian expectation, and the use of Israel-language for believers in Christ is also ancient. The evidence does not reduce to one unanimous interpretation of Romans 11.
18. How much weight should early dates and apostolic proximity carry?
Early testimony deserves more than a passing mention. A writer closer to the apostles may preserve interpretations, practices, or memories that later readers should take seriously.
Irenaeus provides a notable example. In a letter preserved by Eusebius, he remembers hearing Polycarp as a boy and recalls Polycarp’s accounts of his contact with John and others who had seen the Lord.
That is a meaningful personal link. It is more careful to describe it as Irenaeus hearing and remembering Polycarp than to imagine a fully documented course of formal instruction on every later doctrinal question.
Irenaeus was not himself John’s pupil. Nor does the surviving testimony establish that every detail of Irenaeus’s eschatology came through Polycarp from John. The chain strengthens the historical interest of his testimony; it does not make every conclusion apostolic by definition.
Eusebius, Church History 5.20.
Papias supplies another early link. Irenaeus describes him as a hearer of John and companion of Polycarp. Papias’s own work survives principally through quotations and reports in later writers.
Eusebius interprets Papias’s references to John as distinguishing the apostle from another John, the elder, and disputes the idea that Papias directly heard the apostles. The identity and relationship remain debated.
Papias is significant evidence for the antiquity of an earthly millennial expectation. His surviving testimony does not give us an equally clear, direct definition of Paul’s “all Israel.”
Eusebius himself criticized Papias’s millennial reading as a misunderstanding of figurative teaching. That criticism shows disagreement over interpretation; its dismissive tone should not be mistaken for a demonstration that Papias was wrong.
Irenaeus, Against Heresies 5.33.3–4; Eusebius, Church History 3.39.
The Didache also preserves early Christian instruction about watchfulness, deception, trial, resurrection, and the Lord’s coming. Its final chapter does not define “all Israel” or explicitly set out a thousand-year kingdom. Questions about the work’s composition mean we should not assume that every section has the date assigned to its earliest possible material.
These distinctions suggest a responsible method. Give early testimony genuine weight, especially where the author addresses the relevant passage directly. Ask what relationship is actually documented. Distinguish an author’s own claim from a later report. Notice when several writers depend on the same earlier tradition.
Antiquity strengthens the importance of evidence. It does not eliminate the need to interpret that evidence or test its claim against Scripture.
19. Does Zechariah anticipate a turning of Jerusalem to the pierced Messiah?
Zechariah 12:10 promises an outpouring of a spirit of grace and prayer upon the house of David and Jerusalem’s inhabitants. It then describes looking upon the one pierced and mourning deeply.
Zechariah 13:1 follows with a fountain opened for the house of David and Jerusalem to cleanse sin and impurity.
The connection between particular people, divine initiative, mourning, and cleansing gives a future Jewish-conversion reading substantial material to consider.
Yet the New Testament requires us to begin with Jesus’ crucifixion. John 19:37 applies the piercing text to what happened at the cross. We cannot treat the prophecy as having no fulfillment until an event still future to us.
Revelation 1:7 also draws on the pierced-one imagery in its announcement of Christ’s coming and the mourning of the tribes of the earth. Its use contributes to the possibility of a further climactic realization.
A responsible synthesis can therefore recognize the cross as the decisive event and still consider a later widespread response to the pierced Messiah. That is different from claiming that Zechariah supplies an exact conversion date or explicitly identifies its mourners as the company Paul calls “all Israel.”
The passages belong in conversation. Their relationship must be argued, including the significance of mourning and the scope of the people involved.
Zechariah 12; Zechariah 13; John 19:31–37; Revelation 1:7.
20. Could the two witnesses help bring Jewish people to faith?
Revelation 11 offers a possible connection worth exploring. Two witnesses prophesy, face violent opposition, are killed, are raised, and are vindicated before their enemies. The narrative culminates in a response to divine judgment.
Could their ministry contribute to a turning of Jewish people?
Yes, that is a plausible theological proposal, especially if the city in the vision is understood as Jerusalem. It is not an explicit identification supplied by Romans 11 or Revelation 11.
We should first understand the witnesses on the terms Revelation provides.
Two lampstands
Revelation 1:20 identifies the seven lampstands of its opening vision as seven churches. That gives real grounds for associating lampstands with communities bearing Christ’s testimony.
Revelation 11:4 calls the witnesses two lampstands. The shared imagery supports considering a corporate or representative interpretation: the witnesses may portray the church’s prophetic testimony, or actual prophets who represent that testimony.
It does not force that conclusion. Symbolic descriptions can apply to individuals, communities, or individuals representing communities. Revelation 11’s portrayal also gives serious grounds for reading the witnesses as two particular prophets.
The text does not establish a rule that every lampstand always means exactly one church in every vision. It does, however, make the connection between lampstands and public witness worth taking seriously.
Two olive trees
Revelation identifies the same two witnesses as two olive trees. These are two descriptions of the same pair, not four separate witnesses.
The primary background is Zechariah 4, with its lampstand, seven lamps, and two olive trees. The vision emphasizes the Spirit’s provision for God’s work. Its two anointed figures are commonly understood against the ministries of Joshua and Zerubbabel, although the closing identification of the trees does not expressly name them.
Jeremiah 11:16–17 also uses olive-tree imagery for God’s covenant people, with Israel and Judah in view. Romans 11 makes the olive tree central to Gentile participation in covenant blessing.
These associations make a Jewish identity for two individual witnesses quite plausible. The imagery is rooted in Israel’s Scriptures and restoration.
But an olive tree is not an automatic ethnic identification. Romans 11 itself includes grafted Gentiles within the tree. Zechariah’s emphasis on anointing and Spirit-supplied service is at least as important as genealogy.
The warranted conclusion is therefore: two Jewish prophets are a credible interpretation, but the words “two olive trees” do not prove their ethnicity.
Moses, Elijah, or another identification?
The witnesses’ powers recall Moses and Elijah: plagues and water becoming blood, drought, and consuming fire. Those echoes characterize their prophetic authority.
They do not name the witnesses. The possibilities include Moses and Elijah themselves, prophets ministering in comparable roles, or a symbolic portrayal of the witnessing people of God.
John the Baptist further complicates a simple Elijah timetable. Luke 1:17 and Matthew 17:10–13 connect his ministry with Elijah’s anticipated role. A further appearance of Elijah remains an interpretation requiring argument, not something established by ignoring John’s fulfillment.
Revelation 11; Zechariah 4; Jeremiah 11.
21. Whom do the witnesses address, and does anyone repent?
Revelation 11 places the witnesses’ bodies in the great city symbolically called Sodom and Egypt, where their Lord was crucified.
The crucifixion reference strongly points toward Jerusalem. The symbolic names expose the city’s opposition to God. Some readings also understand the city as representing the wider rebellious world. The local and representative dimensions should both be considered.
If Jerusalem is the setting, Jewish inhabitants would naturally be among those reached by the witnesses’ ministry and its consequences. But the narrative’s audience extends farther: people from different peoples, tribes, languages, and nations observe their bodies, and the earth’s inhabitants celebrate their deaths.
The testimony therefore has both a local setting and an international horizon. Revelation does not give us a transcript of their preaching or a census of their hearers.
Modern television and the internet make widespread observation easy to imagine. They are possible mechanisms within a future literal scenario. The passage does not predict those technologies, require a broadcast, or explicitly say that every individual on earth watches simultaneously.
The survivors’ response
After the witnesses ascend, an earthquake destroys a tenth of the city and kills seven thousand people. The remaining people become afraid and give glory to the God of heaven (Revelation 11:13).
There is a substantial case for reading this as repentance. Revelation 14:6–7 calls people to fear God and give Him glory. Revelation 16:9 describes people who refuse to repent and give Him glory. The positive response in chapter 11 can be read against those negative responses.
Nevertheless, the expression alone should not become a formula proving saving faith in every context. Joshua 7:19 uses glory-to-God language when Joshua calls Achan to truthful confession.
The combined fear-and-glory response in Revelation 11 makes genuine repentance a serious interpretation. The text does not explicitly label every survivor a believer or call this group “all Israel.”
Nor does the fall of one tenth of the city mean that exactly ninety percent of the whole world converts. A fraction of a city, a stated death toll, and a surviving group do not supply a worldwide conversion percentage.
An early Christian connection
Hippolytus, in On Christ and Antichrist 43 and 46–47, identifies the witnesses as Enoch and Elijah and connects their ministry with repentance, signs, and proclamation to people and nations.
This is useful evidence that an early Christian interpreter understood the witnesses as agents of a call to repentance. His identification and timetable remain interpretations.
His choice of Enoch also prevents us from using his testimony as proof that both witnesses must be Jews: Enoch belongs to the biblical history before Abraham and Israel.
Hippolytus, On Christ and Antichrist.
The proposal can now be stated carefully: God may use the witnesses’ testimony and vindication to bring Jewish and Gentile observers to repentance. If Romans 11 anticipates a future widespread Jewish turning, this could be one means within it.
We should not turn that possibility into the assertion that Paul’s “in this way” specifically means “through the two witnesses.” Paul’s immediate explanation concerns Gentile mercy, jealousy, faith, and regrafting. Revelation may illuminate a possible development within God’s saving work without becoming Paul’s unspoken definition.
22. Three “until” statements do not identify one calculable date
Three passages are frequently connected:
Luke 21:24 — Jerusalem’s subjection
What continues: Jerusalem’s trampling by Gentiles.
The stated boundary: The fulfillment of the times of the Gentiles.
Romans 11:25 — Israel’s partial hardening
What continues: Israel’s partial hardening.
The stated boundary: The coming in of Gentile fullness.
Matthew 23:39 — Jerusalem’s future sight of Jesus
What is withheld: Seeing Jesus again.
The stated boundary: Jerusalem’s acknowledgment of the one coming in the Lord’s name.
The subjects are related, but different. Luke addresses Jerusalem’s subjection; Paul addresses hardening and saving mercy; Matthew speaks in the setting of Jesus’ lament over the city.
Their themes could converge in the consummation. None explicitly tells us that the three boundaries are one identical date.
Matthew 23:39 can be read as anticipating a believing welcome. Another interpretation emphasizes acknowledgment when Jesus appears in judgment. The statement does not independently specify the full character and scope of a corporate conversion.
Matthew has already narrated the same Psalm 118 acclamation at the triumphal entry in 21:9. That earlier welcome cannot simply exhaust the expectation Jesus subsequently expresses in 23:39.
Luke 21’s language about armies, flight, killing, and captivity has a direct historical setting in Jerusalem’s Roman destruction in AD 70. Interpretations that also see a final horizon must account seriously for the generation statement in verse 32. They cannot silently change predicted fulfillment into merely the beginning of fulfillment.
A real first-century judgment together with a future consummation is a viable synthesis, but its details must be argued. Revelation 11’s forty-two months of trampling does not by itself measure the entire period Luke calls the times of the Gentiles.
One chronological point is clear: Gentile inclusion began before AD 70. Cornelius, the mission of Paul and Barnabas, the Jerusalem council, and Romans itself establish that sequence.
Neither 1948 nor 1967 is named in these texts. Modern political events cannot define the completion of saving mercy simply because they concern Jerusalem.
Luke 21; Matthew 23; Acts 10; Acts 13; Acts 15.
23. Israel’s salvation does not by itself settle the millennium or its population
Romans 11:15 associates Israel’s acceptance with life from the dead.
Bodily resurrection is a serious possible reference, especially within Paul’s wider theology. Another reading understands the expression as a vivid description of restoration’s extraordinary blessing.
The phrase alone does not place Israel’s conversion before, during, or after the resurrection and gathering. It does not establish a complete sequence of later conversions.
The same caution applies to the two witnesses. Revelation narrates their resurrection and ascent before the seventh trumpet, but identifying their ascent with the gathering of every believer requires further argument.
A particular constraint matters for any proposed kingdom population: Jewish believers belong to Christ and share the transformation promised to His people. Their ancestry does not exempt them from Paul’s teaching that living believers will be changed (1 Corinthians 15:22–23, 51–53; 1 Thessalonians 4:13–18).
Consequently, a future Jewish conversion cannot automatically supply a group of believing mortals for a subsequent earthly millennium. A proposal must establish when their conversion occurs in relation to the gathering, transformation, and judgments.
Neither Revelation 11’s survivors nor the sealing of the 144,000 supplies those missing steps by itself.
Theological traditions differ here. Covenantal interpreters can affirm one people in Christ while expecting a future Jewish turning. Dispensational interpreters commonly affirm one way of salvation through Christ while distinguishing Israel’s national promises. Progressive dispensational accounts emphasize present participation in messianic blessing alongside further fulfillment.
These are varied interpretive families. The questions should be answered from their actual arguments and texts rather than from assumptions about what a label must mean.
Romans 11 profoundly affects our account of God’s faithfulness. It does not remove the need to examine the prophets, resurrection passages, and Revelation on their own terms.
24. So who is “all Israel”?
After weighing the evidence, I find the historical-Israel reading somewhat more persuasive in Romans 11:26 itself.
The people Paul identifies as Israel at the beginning of the chapter remain identifiable throughout the argument. They include the present believing remnant and those natural branches removed through unbelief. They are the people whose stumbling benefits the Gentiles and who remain beloved on account of the patriarchs.
That continuity gives considerable weight to understanding “all Israel” as this historical people brought into salvation as a restored whole through Christ.
In ordinary language, Paul is expressing hope for the people whose widespread unbelief grieves him. God’s mercy toward the nations does not mean that He has abandoned them. The same Messiah who welcomes Gentiles removes ungodliness from Jacob.
Believing Gentiles remain full participants in the same tree, covenant blessings, and body of Christ. This particular identification of “all Israel” does not diminish their belonging.
The strongest objection is the incorporation argument. A restored people can include new members without ceasing to be the people God promised to restore. Hosea, Amos, and the wider prophetic welcome of the nations give that objection substantial force.
Therefore, the continued mention of Jews and Gentiles does not decisively disprove an inclusive referent. The question is which reading best explains Paul’s repeated movement between Israel’s condition and Gentile mercy. I judge that movement to favor historical Israel as the immediate referent, while recognizing that the inclusive reconstruction remains a serious alternative.
A separate judgment concerns a future widespread turning. Paul’s movement from stumbling toward fullness, from rejection toward acceptance, and from unbelief toward regrafting suggests more than the indefinite repetition of the present situation.
I therefore tentatively expect a culmination in which Jewish faith in Jesus becomes widespread beyond the present remnant pattern. This is less certain than the identification of historical Israel as Paul’s continuing concern.
The cumulative-elect reading can also explain future completion, and an incorporation reading can include further Jewish salvation. Neither alternative has been eliminated simply because a future turning seems persuasive.
What does all include, exactly?
On the reading preferred here, Paul anticipates the salvation of Israel considered as a restored people. The cumulative-elect reading also affirms completeness, but locates it in the full company of Israelites saved across history. The word alldoes not by itself decide between those accounts, specify a percentage, list every member, or guarantee the salvation of every Israelite of every generation. Calling the outcome corporate describes the people being considered together; it does not supply an otherwise unstated number.
The boundaries of the saved company remain a real difficulty for each interpretation. A final believing generation, the completed elect across time, and the whole restored people including Gentiles are different ways of accounting for that completeness. Each requires an argument.
My conclusion is therefore a reasoned preference, not a claim that Paul has given us demographic precision.
“All Israel,” on the reading preferred here, is historical Israel restored through faith in its Messiah. “In this way” refers to God’s connected work of mercy: the gospel reaches the Gentiles, Gentile mercy serves Israel’s good, and those who leave unbelief are grafted into the one saving fellowship. A future widespread Jewish turning is a plausible culmination of that work.
This is not a promise of salvation through ancestry, an identification of the redeemed people with a modern government, or an additional route around Christ. The Deliverer and the removal of sins define the salvation Paul promises.
25. The interval has a missionary purpose
The international scope of salvation belongs to the Bible’s story from Abraham onward.
Genesis places Abraham’s calling after the scattering associated with Babel. Reading the promised blessing to the families of the earth as an answer to that scattering is a compelling canonical connection, although Genesis does not explicitly label it a reversal of Babel.
At Pentecost, Jews and proselytes from many regions hear God’s works in their own languages. The event crosses linguistic boundaries while retaining linguistic diversity. It anticipates the gospel’s international movement without depicting the immediate conversion of every nation.
Luke’s mission of seventy or seventy-two disciples may likewise evoke the nations associated with Genesis 10. Both numbers occur in the manuscript tradition. Luke does not explain the symbolism, so the possible connection should remain a proposal rather than a foundation for a numerical prophecy scheme.
Acts then shows actual Gentile households receiving the Spirit, and the Jerusalem council recognizes their belonging. Romans locates their mercy within God’s faithfulness to Israel.
Matthew 24:14 connects gospel testimony among the nations with the end. It gives the church a mission, but it does not provide a modern checklist by which we can calculate Christ’s return.
Second Peter 3:8–15 interprets apparent delay through God’s patience and the opportunity for repentance. The comparison between a day and a thousand years works in both directions. It does not supply a universal prophetic formula.
Hosea 6:1–3 concerns healing and restoration, followed by a rebuke of fleeting loyalty. Turning its two days into precisely two thousand years exceeds what the passage states. Ancient expectations of six thousand years followed by a millennial Sabbath also remain interpretations rather than revealed calendars.
The proper response to Gentile fullness is participation in the gospel’s mission. We can pray for further Jewish faith, welcome people from every nation, and trust God with the completion He has not given us the ability to calculate.
26. Mercy should determine how we treat one another
Paul’s warning against boasting is a moral test of our interpretation.
Gentile believers have received something they did not create and could not claim by ancestral entitlement. They stand by faith and share nourishment from a root that precedes them.
Jewish people must not be treated as a discarded population or as props in a prophetic scenario. Paul’s sorrow, prayer, kinship, and hope point toward patient love and a desire for their good.
The description “enemies” in Romans 11:28 concerns their relationship to the gospel within Paul’s argument; it is no instruction for Christians to become their enemies. Paul immediately insists that they remain loved on account of the patriarchs. God’s irrevocable gifts and calling ground hope in His faithfulness without making unbelief harmless or ancestry sufficient for salvation.
This also governs how we use the fathers. Some ancient Christian writings contain harsh anti-Jewish polemic. Their historical importance does not make that rhetoric an example to imitate. We should examine their interpretations while rejecting contempt and collective hostility.
At the same time, respect does not require emptying Paul’s gospel of its claim. He believes that his people need the Messiah’s saving mercy, just as Gentiles do. His hope is expressed through prayer, proclamation, and confidence in God’s ability to graft in again.
Micah closes with the same union of covenant faithfulness and forgiveness:
He will again have compassion on us;
He will vanquish our iniquities.
You will cast out all our sins
into the depths of the sea.
You will show faithfulness to Jacob
and loving devotion to Abraham,
as You swore to our fathers
from the days of old.—Micah 7:19–20, BSB
The preceding verse celebrates God’s mercy toward the remnant of His inheritance. God’s promises and His removal of sins belong together.
That is also where Romans brings us. The nations are welcomed through Israel’s Messiah. Historical Israel remains the object of divine faithfulness and saving concern. No group can boast, and no group is beyond the reach of mercy.
We may differ about the exact scope of “all Israel” or the form of its future completion. We should be clear about the center: salvation comes through the Deliverer who takes away sins, and God’s faithfulness is greater than the disobedience through which His mercy works.
Paul ends his argument in worship:
For from Him and through Him and to Him are all things.
To Him be the glory forever! Amen.—Romans 11:36, BSB
Sources and reading notes
The biblical references and primary-source links throughout the article identify the passages behind the argument. The following distinctions govern the use of the modern and early Christian material:
Heiser: The discussion uses the official transcripts of Naked Bible episodes 102 and 107 from 2016. Episode 102 addresses Romans 11; episode 107 supplies the related Edom/Amos discussion. A later video repost should not be confused with a later revision of his argument.
Staples: The description rests on his own explanation of the 2011 argument and his published 2024 clarification. It does not claim to summarize every argument in his later books.
Zoccali: His preferred interpretation is identified from the publisher’s abstract of “And so all Israel will be saved: Competing Interpretations of Romans 11.26 in Pauline Scholarship,” published in the Journal for the Study of the New Testament 30.3 (2008), 289–318. The abstract is distinguished from a full review of the article.
Bruno: “The Deliverer from Zion: The Source(s) and Function of Paul’s Citation in Romans 11:26–27,” Tyndale Bulletin 59.1 (2008), supplies the first-advent argument and proposed Isaiah 2:3 connection discussed above.
Early Christian writers: Direct comments on Romans 11 are distinguished from broader statements about Israel, future Jewish belief, the witnesses, and the millennium. Personal proximity to an apostolic witness is weighed without claiming undocumented transmission of particular interpretations.
Scripture quotations marked BSB are from the Berean Standard Bible, dedicated to the public domain. The brief quotation marked ESV is from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version®, copyright © 2001 by Crossway.
Continue the investigation
This article can be read on its own. The complete When Christ Returns study develops the related questions in a wider biblical sequence: