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"Israel hath not obtained that which he seeketh for; but the election hath obtained it,
and the rest were blinded" (11: 7).
The branches that were broken off were the unbelieving among Israel, the remaining
branches constituting a remnant. Into the place from which the unbelieving of Israel had
been broken off, the Gentile believer had been grafted, "contrary to nature".
Why does the Apostle use the expression "contrary to nature"? The root and fatness
of the olive tree belonged to Israel, and if Israel had repented and had been restored at
that time, no Gentile would ever have shared it with them, even temporarily. It was
something exceptional that was in view. It is clear that Paul cannot be referring to the
great promise of justification by faith for two reasons. In the first place, he warns the
believing Gentile that he might be "cut off"--a warning that cannot refer to justification
by faith, for Rom. 8: makes separation for ever impossible; and secondly, Abraham
himself was an uncircumcised Gentile when he was justified by faith, and so can be the
father of all who believe, whether Jews or Gentiles, without any necessity for a grafting
in "contrary to nature". So far as justification was concerned, the oneness of all
believers, whether Jews or Gentiles, was so close that many have taken the words of
Gal. 3: 27-29 as though they were written in Ephesians. "Contrary to nature" cannot,
therefore, be used of the great doctrine of Rom. 1:-8:; it can only apply to the
dispensational teaching of Rom. 9:-11: The doctrinal truth remains; the dispensational
aspects change, and pass away.
We have now seen enough, we trust, to convince us that "Church" truth is not in view
in Rom. 11: Before passing on to the great conclusion, however, we must examine more
carefully the Apostle's figure of the olive tree, and to discover why he speaks of the
process as engrafting into the true olive tree, branches of the wild olive, contrary to
nature.
To provoke unto jealousy.
If the reader will glance at the structure of Rom. 11: 11-32, he will see that the word
"provoke" is given three times. Two of these references actually occur (in verses 11 and
14) while in verses 17-24, instead of stating the fact for the third time, we find that the
Apostle uses the figure of the olive tree. It is the usual custom in grafting to take a slip of
the choice variety, whether it be apple, or pear, or rose, and graft it into the stock of some
stronger, though not so choice, a variety. For example, in the case of the standard rose,
the tall stem is the briar, and upon this is budded the more fragile flower. Paul appears to
reverse all this, and there are many who bluntly say that he did not know anything about
the culture of trees, and must not be taken literally. This, however, cannot be. He hangs
the whole argument of Rom. 11: upon this figure, and if he is wrong in this, he may be
wrong altogether. Paul himself recognizes that the process is "contrary to nature", but
those who criticize, and suggest that he is using a far-fetched illustration, are themselves
in error. While the engrafting of a wild olive into the true was "contrary to nature", it
was by no means contrary to practice. Lucius Junius Moderatus Columella, a Latin
writer on Agriculture, Gardening and Trees, deals with the cultivation of the olive tree,
and speaks of the very practice under consideration. It was found that when an olive tree