Romans 11:25

οὐ γὰρ θέλω ὑμᾶς ἀγνοεῖν : cf. Romans 1:13; 1 Corinthians 10:1; 1Co 12:1, 2 Corinthians 1:8, but especially 1 Thessalonians 4:13, where as here it is used to introduce a revelation. An often-repeated phrase tends to be formal, but the thing of which Paul would not have his readers ignorant is usually important. As the phrase is invariably followed by ἀδελφοί, the latter also tends to be formal: it is at least a mistake to see anything of peculiar intimacy or affection in it in such connections. As Romans 11:28 and Romans 11:30 prove, in which they are contrasted with the Jews, the ἀδελφοί are Gentiles, and they are practically identical with the Roman Church. τὸ μυστήριον τοῦτο : the word μυστήριον only occurs once in the Synoptical Gospels (Mark 4:11 and parallels) and not at all in John; but Paul uses it often (twenty-one times, including two in 1 Tim.). It always refers to something which though once hidden, or in its nature a secret, is now revealed. In some passages it is applied to the Christian revelation as a whole (e.g., in Romans 16:25; 1 Corinthians 2:1; Ephesians 1:9; Colossians 2:2 : in the last it is identified simpliciter with Christ). In others it is applied to the Christian revelation as a whole, but with some special aspect of it in view: thus in Ephesians 3:3 the special aspect of “revelation” or “mystery” for it is all one in the Gospel is the destined inclusion of the Gentiles among the people of God, while in Colossians 1:26 f. it is the indwelling Christ, as the pledge of immortality. In others, again, any particular element in the great revelation is called a “mystery”. Thus in 1 Corinthians 15:51 the truth communicated about those who live to see the second advent is described by this name, and it might have been used in the similar passage in 1 Thessalonians 4:15, where Paul says instead that he speaks ἐν λόγῳ κυρίου. This is merely to claim for his words the authority of revelation in another way. The passage before us comes under this last head. It is a piece of revelation something which has been communicated to Paul ἐν ἀποκαλύψει for the good of the Church that hardening in part has come upon Israel until the fulness of the Gentiles has come in. The new ideas in this revelation are the limits in extent (ἀπὸ μέρους) and in time (ἄχρι οὗ). ἵνα μὴ ἦτε ἐν ἑαυτοῖς φρόνιμοι : it would tend to self-conceit if the Gentiles in ignorance of this Divine appointment concluded off-hand that the Jews could never be converted as a whole, and that they themselves therefore were in a place of permanent and exclusive privilege. For ἐν ἑαυτοῖς ([11] [12]) πορʼ ἑαυτοῖς is found in [13] [14] [15] [16], etc. Both occur in LXX but the former is much more likely to have been changed. τὸ πλήρωμα τῶν ἐθνῶν = the full number, totality, of the Gentiles. It does not mean a number pre-determined beforehand, which has to be made up, whether to answer to the blanks in Israel or to the demands of a Divine decree, but the Gentiles in their full strength. When the Gentiles in their full strength have come in, the power which is to provoke Israel to jealousy will be fully felt, with the result described in Romans 11:26.

[11] Codex Alexandrinus (sæc. v.), at the British Museum, published in photographic facsimile by Sir E. M. Thompson (1879).

[12] Codex Vaticanus (sæc. iv.), published in photographic facsimile in 1889 under the care of the Abbate Cozza-Luzi.

[13] Codex Sinaiticus (sæc. iv.), now at St. Petersburg, published in facsimile type by its discoverer, Tischendorf, in 1862.

[14] Codex Ephraemi (sæc. v.), the Paris palimpsest, edited by Tischendorf in 1843.

[15] Codex Claromontanus (sæc. vi.), a Græco-Latin MS. at Paris, edited by Tischendorf in 1852.

[16] Codex Angelicus (sæc. ix.), at Rome, collated by Tischendorf and others.