And this is my covenant [lit. the covenant from me] unto them, When I shall take away their sins. [Isaiah 27:9. (Comp. Jeremiah 31:31-34) Verse 26 is quoted from the LXX., but Paul changes "come in favor of Zion" to read, "come out of Zion," following a phrase found at Psalms 14:7. None can say why he made this change, but it prevents confusion as to the first and second advent. Christ's second advent will be out of heaven, not out of Zion. Bengel calls attention to the fact that as Paul in Romans 3 combines Isaiah 59 and Psalm 14, to prove the sinfulness of mankind, especially of the Jews, so he here seems to combine the same two parts of Scripture to prove the salvation of Israel from sin. Moreover, as in chapter 9 he lets Isaiah describe Israel as reduced to a remnant (Romans 9:27-29), so he here appeals to the same inspired penman as the foreteller of the salvation of all Israel. Christ the Deliverer had already come, so that part of the prophecy had been fulfilled, but the future effects of the gospel were yet to accomplish the salvation of the Jews as a nation in two ways: (1) By turning them from their ungodly infidelity; (2) by forgiving their sins. Jewish unbelief will not be removed by any change in the gospel: it is complete and unalterable. The changes which will work upon the Jews will be those wrought in the world by the gospel. "And this is the covenant from me," etc., signifies, My covenant unto them shall be executed and completed on my part when I forgive their sins. To the Jews, therefore, there was, on God's part, in Paul's day, a present attitude of rejection manifesting itself in hardening, and a future attitude of acceptance sometime to manifest itself in forgiveness, and these attitudes are thus described]

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Old Testament