Ver. 12. Both ἥττημα and πλήρωμα are difficult words, but it is not necessary to suppose that they answer mathematic- ally to one another, though Wetstein explains them by -- and +. ἥττημα may mean (as in Is. xxxi. 8) defeat, or (as in 1 Cor. vi. 7) loss; it can hardly mean diminutio eorum, or paucitas fud@orum credentium; τὸ πλήρωμα αὐτῶν must mean the making up of them to their full numbers. There is an exhaustive study of the word πλήρωμα by Prof. J. Armitage Robinson in The Expositor, April, 1898. His paraphrase of this verse is very good. ‘If the Gentiles have been enriched in a sense through the very miscarriage and disaster of Israel, what wealth is in store for them in the great Return, when all Israel shall be saved—' when God hath made the pile complete!’’? The enrichment referred to is in both cases that which comes through participating in the blessings of the Gospel.
10----16.
βωμα αὐτῶν;
67ο
13. Ὑμῖν yap! λέγω τοῖς έἔθνεσιν ' ἐφ᾽ ὅσον µέν εἰμι
- , ἐγὼ ἐθνῶν ἀπόστολος, τὴν διακονίαν pou δοξάζω, 14. εἴ πως παρα-
{ηλώσω µου τὴν σάρκα, καὶ σώσω τινὰς ἐξ αὐτῶν.
15. εἰ γὰρ ἡ
» ἀποβολὴ αὐτῶν καταλλαγὴ κόσμου, τίς ἡ πρόσληψις, εἰ μὴ ζωὴ ἐκ h Acts xxvil νεκρῶν; 16. εἰ δὲ ἡ ἀπαρχὴ ἁγία, καὶ τὸ φύραμα ᾽ καὶ εἰ ἡ pifaiCh. xiv. 3
Ίψμιν γαρ DFL; υμιν ουν C; υμιν δε NABP 47, all edd. εφ οσον µεν L, vulg.,
5 lat.
Ver. 13 4. ὑμῖν δὲ λέγω τοῖς ἔθνεσιν. Paul does not here address a new class of readers. He has been speaking all along to a Gentile church, and speaking to it in that character (see above, pp. 561 ff.); and he feels it necessary to show the relevance, in such circumstances, of bestowing so much attention on the con- dition and prospects of the Jews. His mission to the Gentiles has an indirect bearing on his own countrymen; the more successful he can make it, the greater is the prospect that some of the Jews also may be provoked to jealousy and saved. Every Jew, again, who is saved, goes to make up the πλήρωμα of ver. 12, and so to bring on a time of unimaginable blessing for the Gentile world. ἐφ᾽ ὅσον Mt. xxv. 4Ο. μὲν οὖν is printed in all the critical editions, but Sanday and Headlam would read μενοῦν as one word, and discount the restrictive force of the pév, which suggests that apostleship to Gentiles was but one part of Paul’s mission. éy®: the pronoun expresses not merely a noble conscious- ness of vocation, but Paul’s feeling that in his particular case at all events a mission to the Gentiles could not but include this ulterior reference to the Jews. His devotion, accordingly, to his Gentile ministry, never let them fall out of view. “As far then as apostleship to Gentiles is represented by me|(as no doubt it is) I glorify my ministry (by faithful dis- charge of it), if by any means I may save some of the Jews.” For the interpretation of δοξάζω see 2 Thess. iii. 1, John xvii. 4. For et πως see Buttmann, p. 255 f. τινὰς ἐξ αὐτῶν: disenchanting experience taught him to speak thus. Cf. 1 Cor. ix. 22. ,
Ver. 15 £ From the personal explana- tion of ver. 13 f., which interrupts the argument, Paul reverts to the ideas of ver. 12. To save any Jew was a great object, even with an apostle of the Gen- tiles: εἰ yap ἡ ἀποβολὴ αὐτῶν κ.τ.λ. Their ἀποβολὴ is their rejection by God on the ground of unbelief. καταλλαγὴ κόσμον: a world’s reconciliation. In 2
For µεν SABCP have µεν ουν, and so all edd.
Cor. v. το the world’s reconciliation is the act of God in Christ; but it was an act which for the mass of mankind only took