Romans 11 and the Resurrection of Israel with Jason Staples

[00:00:00] There are very few sections in the Bible more controversial than Romans 9 to 11. What does Paul mean when he says that all Israel will be saved? And why does the apply it passages the Bible reserved for the reunification of Israel? The northern and southern tribes coming back together?

[00:00:16] Why does he take those passages and apply them to the Gentiles? And how does this affect the way that we understand Israel today? Well, Jason Staples joins us in this episode to tackle those questions head-on.

[00:00:29] We're going to talk about the difference between being an Israelite and being a Jew, the overlook details in Jose's prophetic words, and the mind-bending way that God purposes even the disobedience of His people for their good. You're not going to want to miss this episode.

[00:00:52] Welcome to the show! We have a guest on today, Dr. Jason Staples. Jason is a professor at NC State University, teaches in the Department of Philosophy and Religious Studies. And I want to marnish this podcast because he's written a really fascinating book,

[00:01:08] Paul in the Resurrection of Israel, which is a book that has a very challenging aspect. But I think it's just a really fascinating look at a subject matter that we could always have more research on and talk a little bit more about.

[00:01:25] Jason, thanks for jumping on the show with us. Thanks for the invitation. It's good to talk to you. I'm also going to talk to somebody with some roots in Talahasi, where I've not been able to get back nearly enough over the past few years.

[00:01:40] Yeah, no, I mean, I enjoyed our talk about the seminals right before we sort of press and record. And obviously, we'll put a link to your podcast and I have to see football because there's a lot of fascinating stuff there.

[00:01:52] And I don't know, I mean, you're writing books, you're teaching classes and you're like a genius when it comes to FSU football. So I don't know how you put it all in the schedule, but that's a remarkable output.

[00:02:04] But I'm just trying not to sleep too much as the main thing. Yeah, yeah, that's that's out of words. It might be a bit of a stretch, but I'll take it for now. There you go, there you go. It's all for the marketing.

[00:02:15] But yeah, I read your book because I have always been interested with Rome as 9th or 11. And one of the things that's interesting about that is, our church is we're formed

[00:02:28] in this issue, we're kind of like that Stan or even Jolk-Ole, like John Pipe, we're kind of thing. And when you're in those streams, you sort of like there's like the dis, when you talk about Israel, you think about dispensationally.

[00:02:39] So you think about the secret third temple being built in Jerusalem, you think about all those, the left behind series always types of stuff. And then that's often a foil against more reformed views of the church's spiritual Israel.

[00:02:50] And so the question of Israel kind of goes in that direction. But I always found that some of the reformed visions of how Israel interacts with the church, and what Paul's doing in Rome as 9th or 11, it seemed like it just kind of bulldozed over a lot of

[00:03:08] fine details. And I remember when I picked a beer book and some of things you were talking about, like one thing that always bugged me was the new covenant promises. One of the central parts of it is an illusion to the reunification of the House of Israel,

[00:03:22] and how's the Judah? And I'm like, wow, that's not in the background. That's like when they think of restoration, that's at the center. And other dominance started coming in with the Josea quotation in Romans 9.

[00:03:35] And how does that work with Gentiles and all this kind of stuff, the olive tree, all these fastening things in that section of scripture. So all that to say, I found your book to be very, very stimulating. And I'm just curious, what got you interested on this topic?

[00:03:51] Because it is a really important topic. But I know you've spent a lot of time in it and I'm just curious, just your own personal story with what got you engaged with the topic of Israel and Paul within the context of Judaism.

[00:04:05] Yeah, it actually goes back to an undergrad class at Florida State. So when I was taking a class on the Hebrew Bible prophets with Bill Lyons many, many years ago. So those the spring of 2003.

[00:04:24] We all had to choose our specific prophet to focus on for a term paper and I'd chosen Jeremiah. And that actually is the very thing that stood out to me when I was going through Jeremiah with this problem.

[00:04:41] And actually there was a, we used actually the, and one of the, one of the textbooks we used for that class. So we used Abraham Heshel's The Prophets, which has been one of the most influential books on me as a, as a scholar.

[00:04:54] But another book that we used was the IVP is one of the IVP exploring the old testament of volumes. It's you know, short little intermediate level introduction. There's the volume on the prophets by Gordon Macanville who I think is by the way a very underrated scholar.

[00:05:10] And someone that a lot more people should read. But Macanville did a really good, that's a good volume. And there were a few places in there where he made some observations that I never really considered before

[00:05:26] as a, as a reader of the of the Hebrew Bible, as a reader of the New Testament. And I remember I think it was in the Isaiah, you know, in his discussion of Isaiah where he's talking about the passages in second Isaiah, you know, chapters 40 to 55

[00:05:42] and particular where he mentions that Isaiah talks about the restoration of Israel here. And Jacob, et cetera. And then he comments that, but in the wake of, you know, the exile two centuries earlier of the Northern Kingdom and the destruction of the Northern Kingdom.

[00:06:03] And then, you know, this isn't the wake of the scattering of of all that. And then the Babylonian exile of Judah, he just sort of offhandedly asked this question and I

[00:06:15] remember the exact wording, but it was something like, you know, but after all this, who exactly is Israel? And that was a question that stuck with me. And then when I made my, when I did my turn paper on Jeremiah,

[00:06:29] I ended up focusing on the book of consolation, which is chapters really 30 to 33. And it's focused on the restoration of Israel. And one of the things that I noticed there is that

[00:06:39] first of all, the sort of centerpiece of that whole section is the new covenant passage in Jeremiah 31, whereas you said, it's the new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah.

[00:06:50] And by that point, I knew that that was standard terminology for the two halves of Israel for the Northern Kingdom and the Southern Kingdom. And then I took a little bit more of an expansive view,

[00:07:03] brought in down a little bit and went, wait, the beginning of chapter 31 is all about the restoration of Ephraim, the northern part of Israel, you know, Ephraim is my, is my beloved son, you know, and this whole thing, the Rachel is weeping for her children passage,

[00:07:21] is all about that. So that got me thinking and then as I'm working through that material, it occurred to me that I mean, I was familiar with some of these passages because they were they were quoted in the New Testament. I mean, the new covenant passage, Jeremiah 31, 31,

[00:07:39] 34, is the longest passage quoted continuously in the New Testament when it's quoted verbatim of the Septuagint version of it is quoted in Hebrews. So I knew the passage from the New Testament as

[00:07:52] well that the thing that stood out to me was in the New Testament, it doesn't seem to be connected with the restoration of the 10 northern tribes. It's applied to the Gentiles and why are they

[00:08:04] doing that? So that sort of opened up the whole puzzle for me was thinking through it in the context of that class and really working with it in the prophets first trying to figure out what's happening

[00:08:16] there in the prophetic books. And then thinking about how that then sort of is used afterwards and trying to square the various circles that that came up and all of that, that's really where

[00:08:29] that started. And in the process, when I was doing that paper on Jeremiah, my conclusion was that ultimately the Christian, early Christians at least understood the northern kingdom as having been assimilated among the nations and that this is why they apply it this way. So that

[00:08:50] that thesis is there as early as 2003 and I sort of started working at that from that point forward and pretty quickly concluded, and somebody needs to write on this because I couldn't find any

[00:09:00] materials on this. Nobody had said this in scholarship that I could find. It's like, well, somebody needs to fix this and I just decided, I'll do it. I'll jump in and fill this whole

[00:09:11] and figure eight, ten years from then, I'd be able to get that out and then move on with the rest of life. And 20 years later, I finally got the main book of that project done and

[00:09:22] I've spent the better part of my life on it now. So I remember reading through your book, I'm like, yeah, I see the first one to think of this like how it like and I'm sure when you are researching,

[00:09:37] you're looking at all the different ways that they're trying to solve. What I think is a fairly plainly seen kind of issue. Like you're talking about that all these passage that they're looking toward the reunification of the tribes but who are these northern tribes? What what happened

[00:09:56] to them and why are these passages applied to Gentiles? So in your survey, what were some of the answers that you saw? How have people traditionally tried to handle this tension?

[00:10:09] There have been a lot of options. So first things first, I'm not the first person to see this. So I think that's important to mention. There are actually a few sort of passing references

[00:10:24] and a few church fathers that suggest that they understood this connection, but they just didn't spend time on it. I have to go and look a couple of those up now, but I do remember coming across

[00:10:38] one, it was a third or fourth century when it's been a while. I'd have to remember where it was and I've got it down somewhere. But I remember finding it going, oh wow, okay, so this is,

[00:10:49] you know, we've got evidence that people are still reading this way at least that late. And certainly that early, which matters to me because as a general rule, I tend to be very skeptical about the kind of interpretive moves that get made where it's like,

[00:11:07] okay well we've been reading this text for 20 centuries and you know it's been studied over in the tradition starting with people who are trained by the author of this text itself and now that we're 20 centuries removed, I can solve all the problems and show you why nobody

[00:11:28] really understood this from the beginning. And I tend to be very skeptical of those kinds of readings. More often those readings just are the sorts of things that demonstrate that the modern interpreter has different lenses that are not the same lenses as the early audiences would

[00:11:45] have. Maybe the most obvious example that's on my brain right now is there's a recent article arguing, so chapter in a book that argues that in Revelation when when Jesus who appears to John and is giving the seven letters to the seven churches says that he will cast

[00:12:07] the woman Jezebel onto a bed. There's been a recent argument that this is basically this is Jeze saying that he is going to sexually violate this person. Wow, not a single reader for 20 centuries came up with that reading but a 21st century scholar for whom that

[00:12:29] kind of language has a very different meaning than it did in the first century that then is the interpretation. I think that's an entirely implausible reading for several reasons but number one, nobody else read it that way. Who is a native speaker who is within the tradition?

[00:12:48] That makes me skeptical. I'm not the first person and I want to emphasize that to say this. There have been a few other modern folks in scholarship and then I think churches, various

[00:13:05] groups or whatever, I've had people reach out to me going, I saw this 30 years ago and finally so it's not like I came up with this out of nowhere. There is something there but in general

[00:13:22] the early Christian understanding of this, the sort of patristic position on all of this, on understanding who Israel is and how this all works in terms of that. By the time you get a gentile dominated church in the second, third, fourth centuries, they're not actually as concerned

[00:13:42] about the nuanced question of okay well what about the restoration of the 12 tribes? They are simply reading the church as the proper continuation of and restoration of Israel and they just all say like

[00:13:58] you know well the church is Israel and that's just taken as a default. The question is how you get there, right? By and large they don't show their work once they get to the third century, once they

[00:14:10] get to the fourth century on that it's just a settled question in the church so that work isn't really shown and what I'm doing to some degree is showing how they actually got there. Why is it that

[00:14:21] by the second, third century this is where things are going because this is the kind of argument that Paul is making and then once you get a gentile dominated church that's how they would read it.

[00:14:34] So that becomes sort of the default reading for the majority of Christians for about at least 16 centuries is just basically the reading it. Well when God went when the Messiah came when Israel's

[00:14:52] Messiah came both Jews and Gentiles together in the Messiah is Israel that becomes that sort of default reading. In a more modern time period especially since the rise of dispensationalism with John Nelson Darby and some others you had alternative readings come in specifically arguing that

[00:15:14] well no Jews are to be identified with you know, Israel is Jews and not non-Jews so the church is some other thing. This especially caught on within scholarship since the Holocaust which was

[00:15:29] I mean it's a good reason to reconsider a lot of theological questions especially given many Christians role in that sort of thing and the Christian anti-judiism through the past 20 centuries that's a

[00:15:42] serious thing to consider and it has to be something that we discuss. So by the end of the 20 century it actually become sort of scholarly default was that Paul understood the church is sort

[00:15:58] of an heir to Israel in some sense but that he also held out hope for ethnic Israel by which they understood that to be the Jews in some way and then there are a variety of different ways that

[00:16:10] that's understood whether it's you know all Jews alive when he returns whether that's all Jews alive throughout history whether that's some Jews that you know specifically get converted at the end and there's a variety of different explanations for this in all of them end up having problems

[00:16:26] explaining how that interfaces with sort of other parts of Paul's letters and then that became that's become over the past generation really of scholarship for last 100 years of scholarship a big problem is how does Paul how do Paul statements about Israel where he says and thus all

[00:16:44] Israel will be saved how does that accord with you know there is no difference right so how do we how do we put those things together becomes a bit of a problem once you start to to define

[00:16:57] things the way that they came to be defined in the in the 20th century in particular and then in early 21st century what I'm trying to do essentially is explain how all that stuff makes sense together and

[00:17:08] that Paul's not actually saying one thing over here and then another thing over here this is all part of an integrated vision for the restoration of Israel on the one hand and the fulfillment of the promise

[00:17:22] to the nations through Israel on the other that's a helpful way to put it I mean one of the things that I think is so challenging about reading Paul is he's not operating in the

[00:17:37] way that we like typically people come in they have sort of vision of Christianity and then they go and read Romans and they're not you know what I'm saying like and and but they're not they're

[00:17:50] not thinking that Paul is writing in a thought world and a way of viewing the world that is there's very very different from ours and so you know we we have that new covenant promise

[00:18:01] which is the basis of the church I mean the new covenant promise and we focus on the new heart the new mind and that's great and it's wonderful and forgiveness of sins but we we put in the

[00:18:12] background again that that implication of the house visitor in the house of Judah will be and think about the prophets how often they view reunification as part and parcel with all those promises

[00:18:24] and that that must have been on Paul's mind and so we mentioned a little bit about Hebrews and I- sorry with Jose and I pulled it up on Romans 9 where you know Paul talks about those who

[00:18:34] me he's called not only from the Jews only but also from the Gentiles and then he says in Jose those who know my people I'll call my people who is not my beloved I'll call beloved and I think

[00:18:42] you made mention this passage and I remember when I read that I'm like oh yeah old Testament thing churches is real you know the end and I'm remember being like wait a minute that's about reunification of the northern and southern tribes why is he applying that to Gentiles

[00:18:59] and and then so I think that's and it seems like in your book and Kirkman Vormon you're arguing that the Gentiles are in a sense that missing tribe I mean you you you get there through

[00:19:12] whole host of uh of steps but I think that's a very fascinating way of looking at where you there is a distinction but you still hold the continuity of of the people of God together and

[00:19:25] so maybe we could step back a little bit and just talk about because you mentioned as a lot in your book about understanding Paul within Judaism and that's kind of like the first step

[00:19:36] before the other things kind of fall into place can you talk a little bit about that what what do we need to understand about Paul the guard as as as as a Jew if we want to if we want to

[00:19:46] understand some of these things in Rome as 9 to 11 well yeah I mean I think one of the hardest things about this is when we're reading the New Testament and in particular the epistles

[00:19:56] we're not reading stuff that was written to us right we are reading stuff that was written 20 centuries ago to people who were were culturally an entirely different world right I just was reading a thing on Twitter where somebody posted up uh you know the past is

[00:20:17] a different the past is a different planet and it was a thing about you know the probably what 200 years ago some some a man wrote in started chopping wood with the woman's father one's father's

[00:20:32] like what so what you're doing here he's like I came to ask for your daughter's hand and marriage you know whether you give her to me and marriage you goes well you know she's 15 so she's a little

[00:20:39] young so as well that doesn't bother me and you know about half an hour later they walk inside they you know father helps them you know do their vows and everything and then he takes the

[00:20:50] takes the woman home that's a different world from the world we live in right for us like we look at that we're all horrified right but that's just the world that that that was that world

[00:21:03] right there's a whole set of assumptions practices and all of those things that are baked into that world it's different from ours in the world that Paul's living and is even more removed

[00:21:15] that you know 20 centuries ago is a long time and they're pre they're speaking a different language most of these people are familiar with animal sacrifice on a daily basis in their towns

[00:21:27] if not on a daily basis at least regularly right think about how different that is from our world so this is this is just a completely different thing we have so we're reading someone else's

[00:21:39] male who comes from a completely different background talking a different language with all sorts of different canonical sort of cultural understanding so for us it's very easy to sort of go online

[00:21:56] and if you're sort of vaguely plugged into you know western media culture you can go online and there's all sorts of memes or you know text conversations with people there's all sorts of gifts and memes or whatever

[00:22:05] that the meaning is embedded there in a way that all of us just sort of natively inhabit but if you haven't seen any of the movies listen to any of the music watch any of the TV

[00:22:17] art familiar with the sort of norms that go with that and they're sort of canonical in the air material that is being pulled on for all that stuff none of it's going to make sense

[00:22:27] it's going to be hard to make sense of it they have an entirely different set of cultural canon and for the people that Paul's writing to many for many of them the cultural canonical material

[00:22:38] that is the equivalent of Star Wars Marvel popular music and you know all of the television and everything else that they that they know that they know to be entertained by and all of that

[00:22:50] plus their national history you know they're fourth of July type stuff you know their paper turkeys at Thanksgiving all of that stuff is wrapped up in their knowledge of what we would call

[00:23:03] the the Bible the Hebrew Bible and you know sort of pair of the local material in traditions that's all of that for them so a whole lot of things can be put in shorthand that for us we just don't

[00:23:19] have the same ears to hear that they would that they did right you know for me if I said inconceivable right many of you start laughing right because you know exactly what i'm talking about

[00:23:31] only one word set a specific way and you've got it that's from the princess bride and this whole carries an entire set of of of statements with it that okay well maybe he doesn't mean actually

[00:23:45] inconceivable maybe that means that you know you keep saying that word you know i do not think it means what you think it means right so all of these things are embedded in that one

[00:23:55] little thing and for them all of that is the same in terms of how they have scripture sort of embedded in them that's just their cultural matrix and so when he comes in and he you know he peppers

[00:24:10] he writes and he's got little phrases in here and here and here that are really cleverly inserted three or four word phrases that are taken from a couple key places in the Hebrew Bible they're

[00:24:22] going to know this they're going to notice this at least the more literate of them and and enough of those people are there that they're going to be able to explain some of this to the others

[00:24:30] so that makes it really really hard for modern readers and and this is why like when someone you know someone converted to Judaism the last thing that's going to be done is for people to say

[00:24:40] here's the mission go and go and read and you learn what it's what it's like to be a Jew uh yeah you know even if it's in translation can you explain to me what the term is and like

[00:24:52] why it's talking about like who can or can't offer it like what does this have to do with like what I'm doing it you know on shabapha this week you know oh just read the mission uh no there's a there's

[00:25:03] enormous amount of assumed material that's there and that's that's certainly there in Romans if you don't know dooderonomy leviticus if you don't know Exodus Genesis extremely well it's going to be hard to understand Romans oh and by the way when you know those you also need to

[00:25:23] know Isaiah Jeremiah the Psalms you need to know Psalms inside now because so much of this is just embedded in there and he's presuming that you that the reader should know this stuff

[00:25:34] hard so taking all that into account I mean how so when we look at again Paul taking Hosea applying it to Gentiles and and just the the the the stinctions even between because I think

[00:25:46] a big key point you bring up is that is real light and Jew are related but they're not exactly the same thing can you open that up because I think that was a helpful terminology thing in your book

[00:26:00] it kind of sets the stage for where you're going yeah so I mean even sort of early readers of the Bible pretty quickly come into the problem of like wait who's his real

[00:26:14] because when you get into first and second kings you get this divided kingdom and the northern kingdom takes the name they keep the name Israel and the southern kingdom takes the name Judah

[00:26:25] based on the the ruling tribe of of Judah which is David's tribe and so when we're talking about Israel we could be talking about the the full 12 tribe combination of all of them or we could be talking

[00:26:39] about the northern Israel the house of Israel as distinct from Judah as from that as distinct from the kingdom of Judah and both of those are used oftentimes in the same books so that gets complicated

[00:26:55] and then when you get when you get to the profits and again when you're reading somebody like Ames or Hosea it's not giving you the history lesson of okay so Ames is coming here and he's

[00:27:07] coming coming to coming and he's talking to this group of people who's not this group of it's not giving that full explanation everybody you just read Hosea and it's Hosea from to come from

[00:27:18] where is Hosea from got got tether I think I don't know that's a that's a is it even Jonah or now that's Ames is from from to Kowa anyway doesn't matter and it gives us a little bit of

[00:27:36] information on where they're from but none of very few of us have it in our head of okay that's right over here you know in this part of the northern kingdom and so on you know one of the things

[00:27:47] one of the things that I do on the side periodically is I'll edit other people's work to make a little bit of extra money and I was editing a pastor's book that was going to be published and

[00:28:00] he was commenting on one of the one of these profits to the northern kingdom I think was Ames he's talking about you know he's talking about oh he's prophesying against Jerusalem or whatever it's like

[00:28:09] no no no no not there that's he's talking about Samaria here right but for a lot of modern readers we don't have the way of differentiating between those so when Hosea is prophesying

[00:28:23] he's prophesying we have to read that together with first and second kings and know that you have okay you've got the northern kingdom which has it's eventually its capital in Samaria you've got the southern kingdom of Judah which has its capital in Jerusalem and Hosea is in northern

[00:28:37] prophet he's born and raised in the north unlike Ames who's from the south and then goes north to prophesying Hosea is born and raised in the north and he prophesies specifically about 95% of his prophecies are about the northern kingdom prophesies about Israel he sometimes

[00:28:55] called them Ephraim and he specifically prophesies that stuff about that people but he's not talking about the people down south when he's referring to these when he does he specifies Judah and so the thing to remember then is when he says you are not my people

[00:29:17] he's not saying that to Judah he's saying that to these other to this other kingdom not Judah in the north and they for what it's worth within a generation get essentially wiped out by the by the

[00:29:31] of the Assyrians now there are survivors naturally many of them you know become refugees in the south but significant portions of that population of the north get scattered among the various places around the ancient Mediterranean and ancient Near East you have some foreigners that are resettled

[00:29:50] in some of the more advantageous areas by the Assyrians all of that's happening with the thing to remember he is not saying you are not my people to Jews that is people from Judah which is what

[00:30:03] Jew ultimately comes or ultimately means that that that comes from people of Judah and so when you're reading Josea you have to understand that difference all understood that difference right he recognized this partly and you see this in rabbinic literature they understand

[00:30:24] not no rabbinic literature there's not a place in any rabbinic literature where the not my people passage is applied to Jews they know the difference because this is part of that whole

[00:30:38] larger framework the question is whether or not you know the people who become not my people actually ever are going to be my people again and there's debate about that you go to mission uh send

[00:30:48] 110 3 and there's actually a debate between two of the uh first second century rabbis who have differing opinions on this matter Paul has his opinion on this and what he concludes is when Josea says

[00:31:01] you are not my people and talks about them being taken out by Assyria and scattered and so on Josea means what he says that this is essentially a divine divorce and that those people from the northern

[00:31:14] kingdom of Israel are not going to be Israelites and like they're they're descendants the people who are left you're not Israelites anymore you're not my people you're not in the covenant and Paul takes that seriously he says that happened but he also takes the second part of that

[00:31:33] seriously and says well but Josea also says I will say I will then one day I will say and the very place where it was said to them not my people I will say my people and and I will adopt you again

[00:31:44] and Paul says look we're seeing Gentiles being filled with the spirit how is that not exactly what what Josea referred to isn't this the fulfillment of what Josea promised to those very people the northern kingdom they get assimilated among the nations and now God's going to bring

[00:32:02] in the nations and thereby bring in what remnant of those people got sort of melted into the nations as well and to me that's extraordinarily elegant that that's actually where he goes but

[00:32:15] all of this requires that we not make the terminal logical mistake that Paul himself does not make and that's to say oh of course Israel and and Judah are the same no they're not Judah is part of

[00:32:29] Israel but if not all of his rule right and so what commonly is seen as just a condemnation of all Israelites in general is really just one subsection and Paul would have understood that distinction

[00:32:42] and I guess this is why you call the resurrection of Israel because there was a death I mean they were they literally stopped being a people and yet the resurrection is through a new form I guess you could say

[00:32:53] through the Gentiles and now are you saying though that these Gentiles have to be is this a subset of Gentiles that have some indistent I don't think so I just love it so in the book I specifically and explicitly argue against that sort of genetic position

[00:33:11] the idea that you know only genetic descendants of Israel and some sense have a wave of coming in and I suppose you know the more predestinary and oriented people around there

[00:33:25] could you know try to find a way to make that work but I actually think this might be what first Timothy is referring to when it says when it when it reboots people for you know spending all

[00:33:36] their time wasting all their time looking deep into you know useless genealogies yeah why are they so concerned about genealogies well maybe they're trying to determine you know this is speculation but I mean it would make some sense given this or they trying to determine who their

[00:33:52] long lost Israelite ancestor was way back in the past and you know my understanding of this is that Paul basically understands it as Israel was assimilated among the nations they melted

[00:34:05] in right so the nations become alloid as it were and so now the only real way to get at that you know part of Israel that God made the promise to is to bring in the whole alloid bit

[00:34:21] like it's not to melt that down and then separate out like this whole right I and so that becomes actually the way in which the Abrahamic promise gets fulfilled as well right because then yeah

[00:34:33] well yeah so Israel was set aside you you mentioned the Abrahamic promise it's not just that it's also Israel was selected as a people to be a nation of priests right they were to be the priests between

[00:34:47] the God of Israel and the nations and to bring light to the nations right this is this is Isaiah you know I've I've set you at such a part as a light to the nations this notion is really still

[00:35:00] central to Jewish identity for religious Jews that there is a responsibility within the Abrahamic covenant to bring light to the nations but Paul's essential understanding of this is that Israel it's it's it's it's it's it was elected it was chosen for that purpose and Israel refused to

[00:35:21] obey to bring about that purpose so what did God do God said you're gonna fulfill my purpose anyway even through your disobedience which is yeah how I worried gets it yeah I'm going to use

[00:35:33] your disobedience yeah right to bring to bring light to the nations and to bring the nations in and in the process I'm going to restore and redeem both you and them all at once

[00:35:48] through your disobedience and that becomes you know sort of the the the theme to some degree of Romans 9 to 11 is how God has actually found a way to use the disobedience the stubbornness

[00:36:03] of his own people for their redemption and not only their redemption but for the redemption of the whole world through them even though they refuse to do to be obedient to do to produce

[00:36:16] the redemption that he had set them aside to do so they were elect they were chosen not for their own sake right and they rejected their election so you know what their election still stands

[00:36:29] he's still going to use them for the very purpose that he selected them for it may not go as well for some of them in the process but he's gonna get the redemption of the whole world out of it

[00:36:40] that he intended and so then the nations come in the God of Israel takes authority over all the nations because Israel has been scattered among all the nations and now since he has a covenantal

[00:36:54] relationship with those people and he has promised to redeem them from the nations well if they're inevitably if they're if they're completely mixed among the nations in a way that can't be undone

[00:37:08] then well the nations come into so this is the rabbis are having a question and and and Paul they're all the the question and Judaism is how or how we're gonna have a reunification

[00:37:21] how all Israel gonna be saved right in that sense if part of Israel has been assimilated into the nations and Paul goes here's my answer which which would be the right answer right they are they are coming in through these Gentiles and that's a fascinating wrinkle there because

[00:37:38] you know I this kind of makes sense with with an 1128 rooms 1128 regarding the gospel their enemies for your sake I'm assuming he's talking about Judah there right Jews right but regarding their election they're beloved for the for the sake of their forefathers for the gifts in the

[00:37:55] time God are irrevocable so even though Judah is rejecting Christ nevertheless because of their status as the vessel through which God's gonna bring that blessing they're that their actual rejection is still serving that purpose of God had

[00:38:11] purpose for them is that is that is that kind of so I've also given by that one passage yeah so I do think that basically Paul's principle here is is the fundamentally prophetic principle that God's discipline is fundamentally at its bottom restorative

[00:38:26] that it's that ultimately the purpose of that discipline is to bring about redemption and and Paul seems to be fully in keeping with that idea that even for those who reject

[00:38:43] and then their rejection is you know it causes all sorts of problems God finds a way to continue to use even disobedience redemptively now the real question when we come when we come down to it is the

[00:38:58] question of individual you know if we want to talk about individual salvation okay what what's the fate what then is the fate of any individual who disobeyes or whatever does this you know become a

[00:39:09] universalism I do think that Paul sort of has a kind of hopeful universal streak universalist streak to him I'm not sure he concludes that's where that actually goes on the individual level I think he has a place in which those who the individuals who disobey are maybe

[00:39:30] irreparably shattered but on the whole the redemption is inevitable because God has made a promise to the whole people and this is where I think even that section in Romans 11 that you're referring to

[00:39:43] has to be read in light of the the olive tree metaphor where the promise is that the tree itself the whole tree will be preserved is going to be saved that may require the pruning of some branches

[00:40:01] on occasion some of those branches are cut off and they may be it's possible that they be reintegrated but whether Jewish or Gentile branches whether natural or unnatural branches if they do not persist

[00:40:17] in fidelity then they may be cut off but the reality is that they still remain those branches and that never changes and God has promised to save the whole tree so how do we take that well

[00:40:34] I think Paul at the end of Romans 11 kind of leaves it a little bit open but but I think what he is emphasizing is the the general redemptive quality of how even God's discipline works

[00:40:46] that when northern Israel is cast out among the nations as a rejected vessel to use the language of of of Jose other that even after that even after they're shattered even after the

[00:41:04] vessel is is irreparably broken that vessel is actually not not fully rejected because now it's being brought back in a different form so even that has redemptive purpose that I think is a huge

[00:41:18] part of what he's doing in Romans 9 to 11 so are you saying that because you mentioned he's not explicitly being like it doesn't necessarily have to lead to a kind of universalism but you seem like you're saying

[00:41:31] no but there are aspects in which I guess he's he's hopeful yeah I think so so you know I do not at least at this stage of my life I don't read Paul as a you know full universalist

[00:41:45] on the individual level I don't see that as where he goes but I do think if you look at his hopes for his ministry he says he preaches you know and he makes much of his ministry in order

[00:42:01] that you know in the hopes that he might save some right now the sun there I think is telling he doesn't say the noted I might save all but I think he holds out hope I think he's someone who has

[00:42:16] has such faith in the God of Israel as the God who brings life from the dead that death itself is not necessarily the end of all this and that God will have mercy on who he has mercy and you know

[00:42:31] Paul's gonna preach his message and that this is how God is showing his mercy but I do think he's got he's putting that sort of point of emphasis there on that aspect of who God is so when we go to

[00:42:45] the olive tree house because that is so key and man there are so many permutations of how to take the olive tree but you have you have this general you have this tree and it seems like it's

[00:42:59] roughly talking about I guess the the lineage from the patriarchs or the people of God I mean there's there's different views of what the tree is but there's three and then there are

[00:43:12] natural branches that are caught up which I'm assuming I guess on your reading it would be the natural branches cut off with those be the jute heights that did Jews so in Paul's day yeah that

[00:43:23] would be that would be one that would be beginning cut off now I think actually Paul is alluding to something that goes on throughout Israel's history and that that is that the tree has undergone quite a few abouts of pruning which includes you know eight centuries prior

[00:43:39] you've got the house of Israel virtually all of it is pruned I mean you get the same pruning metaphor in Isaiah 10 you get the same pruning metaphor in what is it Jeremiah Jeremiah Jeremiah

[00:43:57] Jeremiah 15 I think are 16 which actually calls it an olive tree and you know in each of these cases you have this notion and this remnant theology where the disobedient parts of the tree are cut off

[00:44:10] and you know those who are faithful remain and in Paul's take of this he's saying look this is always the way it's been natural branches get cut off and I think in Paul's day he's saying yes there

[00:44:23] are Jewish branches being cut off for their infidelity they're unwillingness to to obey the the teachings of Jesus and to you know commit to the authority of Jesus and the thing that he adds to

[00:44:36] that is that there are others that are being grafted in from outside to supplement and further the you know the growth and the the robustness of that tree which is something by the way Paul's not the only

[00:44:48] first century Jewish author that we have discussing that very notion phylovalics Andrea talks about how God prunes his people and cuts off the sinful and disobedient people and then he uses proselites that's

[00:45:03] Josephus I mean not just if but that's phylo's discussion he uses proselites people from outside to come in to supplement and bring new life to revitalize the the tree as it gets down to the root

[00:45:16] that's that's phylo in the first century writing very similarly so this is this is not an uncommon you know Paul didn't invent this so the the tree though if we're just like kind of assigning names at at his time the natural

[00:45:30] branches that are cut off are the Jews that he's in turmoil over at the beginning of Romans nine the ones that I think that's probably right yeah yeah I think he's he's talking about that but

[00:45:40] again the whole metaphor goes further back than then the present he's just talking about how this works okay okay got you and then so the then the wild branch they're grafted on which are the Gentiles

[00:45:53] but I guess by implication it would also be those the as if be the assimilated northern tribe now an alloy among the nations are now grafted onto the tree and yes you know the the nations that are

[00:46:05] coming in who may or may not have specific you know genetic material or whatever that is you know that goes back to some you know ancient Israelite ancestor whatever but the point is that that

[00:46:18] from the nations God is bringing in and and grafting in these these new branches and Paul's point in this you know you get the the the verse that introduces the olive

[00:46:28] olive tree metaphor has to do with with two mixtures it's an it's a halocic ruling or a ruling about illegal interpretation that he he does where he says you know you take a little bit a a little bit of

[00:46:48] 11 or not a little 11 a little bit of of you know the if the lump is if the portion is the first roots are holy then the whole lump is holy and this has to do with if you integrate the holy portion that's set aside for

[00:47:05] the priests if that comes into contact with other dough it automatically makes the rest of the dough holy and it can only be consumed by the priests at that point this is not a matter of like if you

[00:47:18] take out the first fruits from the dough then that sanctifies or makes the other dough holy that that first of all that doesn't make any sense secondly that's not the halocic

[00:47:30] practice in Paul's day or at any other time and thirdly that would require that the way to make Gentiles holy is by removing them weirdly so that that actually doesn't work for what he's doing there's a really good article on this by Ben Gordon from maybe 2016 but

[00:47:49] the second thing is that if the if the root is holy then so are the branches and the idea here is that when branches are grafted into the tree they transform they actually become part of a new tree

[00:48:04] they are not they're no longer something else they actually become like that's they're part of the tree and so that's the point of the of the metaphor that he's using of the imagery is

[00:48:19] the graft that if you cut the branches of the tree out they're no longer branches of the tree and if you put branches in then they become actual parts of the tree they are set aside they are

[00:48:31] set and if this is a sacred tree then the branches become sacred which by the way was a ruling that that was known for trees that would be dedicated like if you had fields it would be dedicated as

[00:48:42] holy to the temple that would then produce like the olives for the olive oil of the temple and that olive oil was holy it could only be used for the temple the question then was

[00:48:55] well what happens if the tree gets a little sickle or whatever and you bring in branches from another tree from outside that field and you put them into the holy tree is that is the

[00:49:06] product that those branches produce is that holy and dedicated to the temple or is it common and you know consume away anybody and the the the the ruling is that if it is part of the tree

[00:49:20] that is rooted in the holy field it's holy so you were saying if you grafted on it it's now part of the tree if you cut off it's no longer part of the tree but it seems like Paul saying that

[00:49:32] when you cut off the natural branches and they're lying on the floor there's still natural branches so why are they still why aren't they just called why are they now called wild olive branches

[00:49:42] well first of all they haven't had they haven't they're not in a situation where they've grown up as wild wild they're cultivated and you can tell the difference now today I mean you could

[00:49:51] tell the difference between a sort of wild olive bush you know with its own branches and so on and it's not normally going to produce the kind of olives that you're going to want to you know

[00:50:04] get to you know make salad dressing or whatever it is you use olives for but you know those they develop right and actually if you're an interesting thing is that most olives trees whether wild or otherwise actually develop from cuttings they're not the sort of tree that

[00:50:24] that is planted what you do to plant a new tree as you cut off branches from a living tree and you plant that in the ground and you you know cultivate that and then that grows into its own

[00:50:38] new tree so they're they're not wild because they came out of a cultivated tree these are cultivated branches but it just now origin not not there yeah do they have a present status as

[00:50:54] is there anything meaningful that they are still natural like I'm thinking I think so yeah I think one of means that they're more easily reintegrated right so if you are going to graph them back

[00:51:05] in like that's their native tree right the grafting process just like if you you know anybody who has a transplant you know a human who has a transplant that person's going to be on drugs the

[00:51:18] rest of their life to keep their body from rejecting the transplant because the body recognizes it as something foreign right so you have to continue to tell your body like no no don't like don't kill this foreign entity in here you'll kill yourself these are not foreign branches

[00:51:37] right these are native and so that you know it's just much more easily integrated into the trees I think that's the that's the case right and and also the not my people was again spoken to northern

[00:51:48] Israel not to the Jews which is why they're not considered in this they are never divorced the Judah is never divorced the way that that Northern Israel is there there's no place in the Hebrew

[00:52:03] Bible or anywhere else where you have a divorce like that now how does that apply to the how I mean this is another I feel like every line of Romans 11 is like controversial you know

[00:52:12] I mean but what what what is your take on the partial hardening because there's you know because now now you're dealing with the actual roots on the ground and and pulsing like I agree he's holding out hope that it seems like these Jews will be re-graphed at in

[00:52:32] any speaking about a particular group he's talking about his own flesh the the fairs says all you know and but then he has this mysterious partial hardening and and what what how does that fit into

[00:52:46] the framework yeah so first of all that's a very hard past a very hard phrase to translate because it could mean a few different things so this is an opa medus and it could be taken as

[00:53:07] an adjective together with Israel so that an insensibility has come upon a part of Israel or a hardness has come upon a part of Israel so you could read it that way it could also be taken

[00:53:24] as an adverb together with with a geagonum and there which would then mean that it's a a partial hardening or a partial insensibility has come upon Israel or you could try to read it as sort of a little bit above you know some interestingly some biblical scholars

[00:53:51] mean go back to crantfield in his commentary which is generally pretty good one he argues for the adverbial usage and then in his own translation he translates it he translates it agitively really yeah

[00:54:05] so that shows you kind of how difficult that can be my my take is that it's probably best taken adverbially so that it's you know basically the insensibility there's been a sort of

[00:54:21] insensibility in part upon Israel something like that so that part is the the basic the basic concept I think it's sort of working as a um it's partitive in the sense that

[00:54:45] the hardening I see is both temporary and partial so Israel has there there's a portion of Israel that has experienced an insensibility or that is undergoing an insensibility for a time

[00:55:06] for a while so it's something like both and I think that the idea there is that first of all Paul does not think that Israel itself as a whole has in any way been rejected so anytime you have

[00:55:20] something like this he's referring to Israel as you know there's there's the remnant of Israel that is faithful and then there's the part of Israel that is hardened and at the same point he is of

[00:55:34] the view that those branches that have been cut off or are being cut off in the present can be re-graphed it in so that their their their insensibility or their their callousness

[00:55:48] can be healed and they can then and therefore temporary so I think both of those sorts of things are going on in that passage altogether well this kind of leads to how do we think about

[00:56:01] modern Jews and Israelites regarding this you know are they you know part of that partially hardened subsection that are they the branches on the ground you know that are natural versus like somebody from India becomes a Christian there are a while all of the shoe that's

[00:56:22] crafted in how do we view these Israelites today in five seconds well I mean as I understand it Paul thinks that Israel in the in the wake of the death and resurrection of Jesus Israel ultimately

[00:56:42] is you know sort of in the end the people who are in Christ and who are completely committed to and faithful to the authority of Israel's Messiah that's what he's that's what he he argues

[00:57:01] that said I think he also understands that an argues that even though that's kind of the ask pedological outcome that the the remnant of people who are in Christ that that is Israel in the end from the perspective of the judgment when it comes to

[00:57:24] judgment day that's who is going to be judged as Israel in the present though there are people from Israel who are not actually included in the group that would be judged right now if the

[00:57:41] judgment were right now who would not be judged as Israel in that future time but they can come into Israel and be integrated and incorporated in Israel again at that before that that happens so you have

[00:57:57] there is an Israel and then there's an Israel and they're not the same in Paul's understanding so the ask pedological the restored Israel that is going to be judged as Israel in the future

[00:58:09] is not necessarily the same thing as all of the people who could you know justifiably be called Israelite today but they could be part if they go into them if they become part of the Messiah

[00:58:22] they're incorporating the Christ but I guess like you were saying with the the all-fury analogy it like as is a sense in which it would be easier for them I mean that's I don't know that's the best way

[00:58:36] because he was saying that the with the transplant analogy if it's your own body part being reattached it's better than if someone else's body part or if it's you know it's is Paul kind of saying that

[00:58:48] there is a he seems to be highlighting Jewish heritage in some way and that's it you know and I'm not sure how we'll go back to to Romans 3 where you know what's the advantage

[00:59:06] you know what what advantages therefore the Jew he asks and he says much in every way right why well because to them was given the very oracles of God and you know there and

[00:59:19] he makes a whole list of of advantages that are in place and you know I think again if I were to channel Paul for today and that can be pretty dangerous but if I were going to channel Paul and say okay

[00:59:33] you know transplant Paul 20 centuries and after he gets over the shock that you know here we still are and this is what's going on and maybe you know he should have rephrased some things because it turns out

[00:59:43] that not everybody who he was writing who has been writing reading his stuff actually had the background that he kind of presumed once he's gotten over that shock if you asked in the question I think he would still say

[00:59:54] that the person who you know grows up not only learning but doing to the best of their abilities the the Torah keeping Sabbath doing all those things is at an advantage when it comes to then

[01:00:10] being able to understand and and apply that to life in the Messiah once they come to recognize that Jesus is the Messiah and so on I think he would say that's an advantageous and that you know

[01:00:24] proper understanding of the of the Torah and practicing the Torah in these ways actually better and more easily lead someone to the knowledge that to the knowledge of God and to the you know

[01:00:38] to position in the people of God I think he I think he thinks that I think he I mean I think he says that I have a friend of mine who he's ethically Jewish

[01:00:50] he he was think a he and he's a Christian and he was he looks at that verse and he thinks the partial hardening is that observing Jews today affirm the Old Testament it's just the second part

[01:01:02] there they're hard and towards I don't know how much weight there but that is interesting where even a practical level and not the more you say them like I'll actually make sense if they're kind of like

[01:01:12] already on board with God and the Old Testament and even just the expectation of a Messiah and all these things that is a closer distance practically speaking than if you're talking somebody in the

[01:01:23] Amazon who you're trying to work with someone who's part of the world from which the Messiah makes any sense right right so so that that's that's part of it I also by the way I mean and I think

[01:01:35] this should be emphasized and this is something I tried to emphasize at different points in the book Paul thinks that people are going to be judged by what they do right so you know when you win a

[01:01:48] person stands before God what is the basis on which that person is going to be judged Paul does not say oh you better have the right password you better be able to you know to repeat the the sinner's prayer

[01:02:00] or you know you better be able to say the nice scene creed or whatever else he doesn't say that he says you will be judged based on what you've done what you do so you know if you have people

[01:02:15] his objection by the way in Romans 2 is not to people who are legalists and you know focused on doing the Torah and like they shouldn't be worried about doing the Torah no his complaint

[01:02:25] his his his his argument is essentially asserting that those who proclaim the efficacy of the Torah and of circumcision and of you know birth as you know a juteite birth writer is your life birthright

[01:02:43] that if they do not actually obey the Torah fully and do it the proper way from the heart then none of the rest of it benefits them because when they stand before God they will be judged by

[01:02:56] what they do not buy those other things now here's the question what happens if that person actually does do the Torah correctly Paul seems to think that that person will be judged as a righteous person

[01:03:11] and that that person will be will be a part of the people of God now he also thinks that in order to do those things rightly that person is going to have to do it by the help of the spirit through

[01:03:22] following Jesus specific definition of the of what obedience is which is love God and love neighbor so you know that opens up a whole whole host of other questions that frankly I'm not in you know

[01:03:38] our way above my pay grade to answer but when it comes down to it you know if we're talking about the current day we ask the question of okay well who when they stand before God is going to be judged righteous

[01:03:51] all I can really say is Paul thinks that it's going to be the people who do right but they would only be able to do that by the by divine help yeah by divine help now the question is

[01:04:03] who then has divine help how do we get it and so and Paul spends a lot of time on that but I do think we kind of have to come back there and and and rest on the on the justice of God in this

[01:04:14] respect because that's where Paul hangs his hat he says this is how this is going to work that is a huge can of words but maybe I'll be come on again to talk about that but man I mean there's

[01:04:30] there's so much that that you cover and I appreciate you writing the book and putting all the time and effort into it I mean this is you know a long time coming of of research and looking at

[01:04:43] the original sources and all the types of things so I appreciate that work and yeah we'll put a link to your book and to your podcast and I mean there's there's a whole lot more I mean maybe as we

[01:04:57] conclude it is anything if someone's interested on this topic aside from obviously your book are there any good resources of people like you know what this is you know I'm very interested

[01:05:07] by this topic where some good books to get started on understanding is real the church things like that so you know mine I would put in there for sure also I think the Brant Petri

[01:05:23] John Kincaid and Michael Barber book Paul a new covenant Jew is a good is a good book and is worth reading there's a book that's coming out next year it's so it's not even out yet but I've been

[01:05:37] working through it and also giving some feedback and so on as as is done in this you know in scholarly enterprises that I'm really excited about I think it's going to be one of the most important books

[01:05:52] put out in a while and that's a book by Paul Sloan it's called Jesus and the the Law that'll be with Baker should be out next year so that one would be would be one for sure

[01:06:07] I would say if you can get your hands on it that article by Ben Gordon on Romans 11 is absolute dynamite I mean that is fire let's see I got to think about other I can ask this all the

[01:06:27] time about recommended books and all of this and you know it always gets me a little bit of trouble John Barclays Paul Paul and the gift is another one that I would put up there

[01:06:43] Sarah Ruden who's a classicist and not a not a Paul scholar wrote a book it's more of a popular level book called Paul what called Paul among the people that's probably worth a read I would say

[01:06:52] anybody who can read Abraham Heshel's the prophets should then Josh Jip the Messianic Theology the New Testament is another one that I would suggest Matt Bates say by faith or say by allegiance

[01:07:11] alone I believe is the is the title is another one that's a fun one there's there's there's books and resources out there if you if you kind of go through those ones that would be a that would be

[01:07:23] a good place to start but yeah I think I'll I'll leave it at that those those would be sort of the first first for first ports of call I would put out there great well Jason thanks again for the time

[01:07:36] appreciate your scholarship on this and thanks for coming on the show thank you so much for the invitation it's just fun thanks we're listening to this episode if you liked it please support the

[01:07:47] show and consider becoming a patreon supporter you can find all the links to our YouTube channel and our Instagram account in the show notes thank you guys for joins