Romans 9:22

What if God, &c. The Gr. construction in Romans 9:22-23 is broken and peculiar. Rendered nearly lit., the verses run: But if God, choosing to demonstrate His wrath, and make known what He can do, bore with much longsuffering vessels of wrath, fitted unto ruin; and that He might make known the wealth of His glory on vessels of mercy, which He fore-prepared unto glory? The general drift of the passage, though thus grammatically peculiar, is yet clear. The "but" suggests a certain difference between the potter's work and that of the Creator and Judge; q. d., "If the potter's right is so absolute, while the clay is mere matter and so has no demerit, the right of God over guiltyhumanity is at least as absolute; and meantime, even so, it is exercised with longsuffering."

willing having the will to. The Gr. verb is frequent of the sovereign Divine will and pleasure. See e.g. Mat 8:3; 1 Corinthians 12:18.

to shew to demonstrate. Same word as Romans 9:17 (" shewmy power"), and Romans 3:25 ("to declare," &c.). The justice and energy of His wrath against sin are both demonstrated in the doom of the impenitent.

endured, &c. The special case of Pharaoh is in St Paul's view, and is to be taken as an example. There we see on the one hand the sovereign will permitting sin to run its course, but on the other hand, in equal reality, warnings and appeals are addressed by God to a human conscience and will, time after time. From our point of view the two things are incompatible; but the Apostle assures us that both are real, and therefore compatible.

the vessels Lit. vessels. But the article is rightly supplied. The two classes of "vessels" are exhaustive of mankind. The word "vessel" is doubtless suggested here by the language of Romans 9:21. See next note.

of wrath i.e. "connected with, devoted to, wrath." So below, "connected with, marked out for, mercy." The genitive need not imply a metaphor, as if the "vessels" were "filled with" wrath or mercy; such an explanation would be needlessly remote. The same word in same construction occurs Acts 9:15, where lit. "a vessel of choice;" and probably the metaphor does there appear in the next words "to bearmy Name." Cp. also 2 Corinthians 4:7; 1 Thessalonians 4:4, (where "vessel" = "body";) 1 Peter 3:7. In those passages the metaphor is traceable to the idea of the body as the receptacle and casket, as it were, of the spirit. Here, as above said, the wholereference appears to be to the imagery of the potter's work.

fitted Made ready, suitable. Such indeed every "vessel of wrath" will prove to have been. It is remarkable that St Paul does not say "which Hefitted." A seemingly rigid logic may say that the lost must be as truly predestined to death as the saved to life; but such logic is faulty in its premisses: we do not know enoughof the Eternal Mind and the nature of things to reason so [42]. It is at least to be noted that here, while the "preparation" of the saved for glory is expressly ascribed to God, that of the lost for ruin is so stated as to avoid such ascription. Meanwhile the deepest consciousness of human hearts, awakened to eternal realities, acquits God and accuses self. St Paul, however, does not dwellon this. To relieve mysteryis only a passing aim with him here.

[42] See further, Appendix H.

destruction Ruin, perdition, the loss of the soul. See note on Romans 2:12 (on the word "perish;" where the Gr. is the verb cognate to the noun here).