Now if their fall [paraptoma] is the riches of the world, and their loss [hettema, that loss or diminution which an army suffers by defeat, also moral loss, impoverishment, to be defeated, to be reduced, or made inferior. "A reduction in one aspect to a race of scattered exiles, in another to a mere remnant of 'Israelites indeed'"--Moule] the riches of the Gentiles; how much more their fulness? [Pleroma, the full number, the whole body, the totality. To emphasize the situation and impress it upon his readers, Paul makes use of the Hebrew parallelism, presenting two clauses which express substantially the same thing. If there be any difference, we would say that "world" indicates sinners, and "Gentiles" the uncovenanted races. If paraphrased thus, it would read, Now, if the sin or offence of godly Israel enriched the ungodly, sinful world, and if the loss or spiritual impoverishment and numerical diminution of the covenanted people enriched and multiplied the covenanted among the hitherto uncovenanted people, how much more would both the sinful world and its uncovenanted inhabitants have been blessed every way, had Israel been of the right spirit, so as to have received enrichment instead of being cast off and diminished. Because Israel had a proud, narrow, inimical spirit (1 Thessalonians 2:15-16), its depletion worked blessing to the world and the Gentiles; but if Israel had yielded to Christ so as to be transformed like that persecuting Saul who became Paul, the apostle to the Gentiles, who can measure the fullness of blessing which would have come to the inhabitants of the earth by the enlargement, enrichment and full spiritual endowment of every son of Abraham dispersed through the world! With millions of Pauls in all lands throughout all generations, we should have measured our heavenward progress by milestones instead of inches. "Goodness," says Thomas Aquinas, "is more capable of bearing blessing than is evil; but the evil of the Jews brought great blessing to the Gentiles; therefore much more should their goodness bring greater blessing to the world."]

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Old Testament