Romans 9:19. An objection supposed by the apostle (comp. Romans 11:19) which might be raised against Romans 9:18, not merely by a Jew, but generally.

οὖν] in pursuance of the ὃν δὲ θέλει σκληρύνει.

ἔτι] logical, as in Romans 3:7, and frequently: If He hardens out of His own determination of will, why does He still find fault? That fact surely takes away all warrant from the reproaches which God makes against hardened sinners, since they have been hardened by the divine will itself, to which no one yet offers opposition (with success).

τῷ γὰρ βουλ. κ.τ.λ.] ground assigned for the question, τί ἔτι μέμφ.

ἀνθέστηκε] Who withstands? whereby, concretely, the irresistibility of the divine decree is set forth. The divine decree is exalted above any one’s opposition. According to the present opinion of Hofmann (it was otherwise in the Schriftbew. I. p. 246 f.), the opponent wishes to establish that, if the words ὃν θέλει, σκληρύνει be correct, no one may offer opposition to that which God wills, and therefore God can in no one have anything to censure. But thus the thought of the question τίς ἀνθέστηκε would be one so irrational and impious (as though, forsooth, no sinner would be opposed to God), that Paul would not even have had ground or warrant to have invented it as an objection. That question is not impious, but tragic, the expression of human weakness in presence of the divine decree of hardening.

On the classical βούλημα (more frequently βούλευμα), the thing willed, i.e. captum consilium (only here in Paul), see van Hengel, Lobeck, ad Aj. 44. Comp., as to the distinction between βούλομαι and θέλω (Ephesians 1:11), on Matthew 1:19.

Romans 9:19-21. Third part of the Theodicée: But man is not entitled to dispute with God, why He should still find fault. For his relation to God is as that of the thing formed to its former, or of the vessel to the potter, who has power to fashion out of a single lump vessels to honour and dishonour.

Romans 9:19 ff. But human nature is not so easily silenced. This interpretation of all human life, with all its diversities of character and experience, through the will of God alone, as if that will by itself explained everything, is not adequate to the facts. If Moses and Pharaoh alike are to be explained by reference to that will—that is, are to be explained in precisely the same way—then the difference between Moses and Pharaoh disappears. The moral interpretation of the world is annulled by the religious one. If God is equally behind the most opposite moral phenomena, then it is open to any one to say, what Paul here anticipates will be said, τί ἔτι μέμφεται; why does he still find fault? For who withstands his resolve? To this objection there is really no answer, and it ought to be frankly admitted that the Apostle does not answer it. The attempt to understand the relation between the human will and the Divine seems to lead of necessity to an antinomy which thought has not as yet succeeded in transcending. To assert the absoluteness of God in the unexplained unqualified sense of Romans 9:18 makes the moral life unintelligible; but to explain the moral life by ascribing to man a freedom which makes him stand in independence over against God reduces the universe to anarchy. Up to this point Paul has been insisting on the former point of view, and he insists on it still as against the human presumption which would plead its rights against God; but in the very act of doing so he passes over (in Romans 9:22) to an intermediate standpoint, showing that God has not in point of fact acted arbitrarily, in a freedom uncontrolled by moral law; and from that again he advances in the following chapter to do full justice to the other side of the antinomy—the liberty and responsibility of man. The act of Israel, as well as the will of God, lies behind the painful situation he is trying to understand.

(B) Is Man responsible?

19. Thou wilt say then] St Paul is still, as so often before, writing as if an opponent were at his side. How vividly this suggests that he had himself experienced the conflicts of thought which indeed every earnest mind more or less encounters! But conflicts do not always end in further doubts. Difficulties, often most distressing ones, must meet us in any theory of religion that is not merely evolved from our own likings; and difficulties are not necessarily impossibilities. At one point or another we must be prepared to submit to fact and mystery.

yet] Q. d., “why, after such statements of His sovereignty, does He go on to treat us as free agents?” Here is the second head of objection. God’s justice was the first; now it is man’s accountability.

who hath resisted] This is not the place to discuss the profound problem here suggested. It must be enough to point out (1) that St Paul makes no attempt to solve it. He rests upon the facts (a) that God declares Himself sovereign in His mercy; (b) that He treats man’s will as a reality: and he bids us accept those facts, and trust, and act. (2) The contradiction to the hint that “no man hath resisted” lies, not in abstruse theory, but in our innermost consciousness. We know the fact of our will; we know the reality of moral differences; we know that we can “resist the Holy Ghost.” On the other hand, the truth of God’s foreknowledge is alone sufficient, on reflection, to assure us that every movement of will, as being foreseen, could not be otherwise than in fact it is. And this is exactly as true of the simplest acts and tenderest affections of common life, as of things eternal: in each emotion of pity or joy we move along the line of prescience, a line which thus may be regarded as, for us, irrevocably fixed beforehand. But meanwhile in these things we feel and act without a moment’s misgiving (except artificial misgiving) about our freedom. Just so in matters of religion; but the special relations of sinful man to God compel these plain and even stern statements of the truth of God’s action in the matter, even in the midst of arguments and pleadings which all assume the reality of our will.

Romans 9:19. Ἔτι, as yet) even still. This particle well expresses the peevish outcry. To the objection here put, Paul answers in two ways. I. The power of God over men is greater than the power of the potter over the clay, Romans 9:20-21. Then II. He answers more mildly: God has not exercised His power, not even over the vessels of wrath, Romans 9:22.—αὐτοῦ, His) It is put for, of God, and expresses the feeling, by which objectors of this description show their aversion from God.

Verse 19. - Thou wilt say then unto me, Why doth he yet find fault? For who resisteth his will? Having shown that injustice cannot be imputed to God in hardening as well as having mercy on whom he will, the apostle now meets the supposed difficulty of understanding why men should be held guilty before God for but being as he wills them to be. It is immediately suggested by Pharaoh's case, which led to the conclusion, ὅν θέλει σκληρύνει; but the apostle foresees that an objection might be raised on this ground to his finding fault with the Jews for rejecting Christ, and them he especially has in view in what follows. It may be observed here that there is undoubtedly a difficulty to the human mind in reconciling theoretically Divine omnipotence with human free-will and responsibility. (On the general question, see notes on ch. 8.) St. Paul here, after his manner, does not attempt to solve the general problem, confining himself for the present to the Divine side of it. His answer, in vers. 20, 21, is simply to the effect that God has the absolute right as well as power to deal with his own creation as he pleases, and that man is in no position to "contend with the Almighty" (see Job 40:2). He brings in from the prophets the illustration of the potter's power and right over the clay, which he fashions and deals with as he chooses. It will be seen, however, as we go on, that this illustration by no means involves, as by some it has been supposed to do, the idea of rejection and condemnation irrespectively of desert. Romans 9:19Hath resisted (ἀνθέστηκεν)

Rev., more correctly, with-standeth. The idea is the result rather than the process of resistance. A man may resist God's will, but cannot maintain his resistance. The question means, who can resist him?

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