Romans 11:14

provoke to emulation Same word as that rendered "provoke to jealousy," Romans 11:11.

save some of them The phrase implies that he looked for conversions only one by one, through his own ministry. Probably he suggests the contrastof results hereafter, when the crisis predicted in Romans 11:25 should come. Or again, he may mean that to save evensome, in any event, was worth any effort. (A striking commentary on the import of the word "to save.") Cp. 1 Corinthians 9:22 for this intense desire to "save some," whether Jews or Gentiles. It is instructive to see that St Paul never allows the promise of a glorious futureto divert him from practical efforts in the present, however ill-requited such efforts might seem. And observe that he looks on present and future as in organic connexion: the results were to be vastly different in degree, but the means was to be the samethroughout; the "provocation" of Israel to holy "jealousy" by the coming of blessing on the Gentiles. Cp. 2 Corinthians 3:15-16, for an important parallel. There, in Romans 11:16, perhaps render "whensoever it" (i.e. the Jewish heart in any individual case) "turneth to the Lord."