Romans 11:31

have these also now not believed Better, did these disobey.

through your mercy Connect these words with "have these not obeyed." The verse will then read; Thus these also now disobeyed through your mercy, that they also, &c. The "mercy of the Gentiles" is the mercy of God in Christ to them, not any mercy of theirs to the Jews. The statement of this verse is the almost exact converse of that of Romans 11:30. Jewish unbelief was, in a certain sense, the instrumental causeof Gentile salvation; so, in a certain sense, Gentile salvation was the final causeof Jewish unbelief. In the Divine Plan the call of the Gentiles was to hinge upon the unbelief of the Jews when they should reject Messiah; and thus the grand act of Jewish unbelief was, in a guarded sense, "caused" by the promise of the call of the Gentiles.

that they also may obtain mercy Q. d., "that their reception again (in single cases, and at length in a mass,) may be as remarkably an act of sovereign compassion as your own call was." The emphatic idea throughout this section is mercy.