Tag: Israelology

John Calvin’s interpretation of Romans 11:26 (“and so all Israel will be saved”)—understanding “all Israel as the complete people of God (the spiritual Israel comprising believing Jews and Gentiles throughout history, forming the church)—was highly influential in early Reformed theology. He extended “Israel” to encompass the whole elect body gathered from both groups which he believe was grounded in his understanding of Galatians 6:16.

Featured Blog: Selwin Christian

It is often said that if you want to understand a clear distinction in Israel and Church terminology Pauline letters are a wonderful insight, particularly Romans. When I first came across the Covenantal idea of Church and Israel, I was bewildered by the fact that this idea would affect not just new testament reading, but Old testament reading. And I came about reading Romans 11, and that was the final knell to my struggle in understanding this issue. I do not know how any scholar would come to the conclusion that the Church is equal to Israel after reading this chapter. Let me go through short and small interpretive insights that help us to understand this ever-debated issue. Grammatical structure is so clear in this chapter that there is no other way to understand this chapter differently. I will not be going into big commentary since this topic is huge to deal with in the blog. I am considering few linch-pin clauses to latch onto,

Here is my exegetical analysis examining another common proof text used by Covenant Theologians. This text is often “assumed” to mean that Gentiles and Jews are both referred to as the “Israel of God”. There is no good reason to include Gentiles in the term “Israel of God” as that merely makes the words “Israel” and “Gentiles” mean something other than there normal usage. In my exegesis I hope to show and explain the proper rendering of the text.