Who then is this “remnant” in Paul’s day, and how do they
come to have escaped the fate of the rest of the nation, so graphically
portrayed in 9:6-10:21? Can it be that, despite 2:17-3:20; 7:7-25; and
9:6-10:21 there are some ethnic Jews who have succeeded in obeying Torah,
attaining “their own righteousness” (10:3), and establishing a status of
covenant membership based on their belonging to Abraham’s physical family and
maintaining its distinctive outward markers? NO. These two verses make it clear
that this “remnant” (λειμμα leimma; the only
use of this word in the NT) is not a small minority for whom the way of
national status actually worked, a tiny group who found that Israel’s
privileges could after all (in terms of Phil 3:4-7) be counted as “gain” rather
than “Loss.” No: the present “remnant” is “chosen by grace.” Paul has already
spoken of God’s εκλογη
(eklogē, “selection,” “choice,” 9:11), and will return to it in summing
up the chapter and section (11:28). In the present passage he can use the word
both for the act of choosing, as here, and the ones so chosen, as in 11:7. This
remnant, he emphasizes, is “not according to works,” otherwise the whole
principle of grace would be violated. This cannot, then, be a small number for
whom “works” are after all effective.
Paul’s
doctrine of the remnant in this passage is thus significantly different from
that of some of his contemporaries. The best example of an opposite view comes
from Qumran: the sect regarded itself as the small minority who had remained
true when all others had fallen away, the diminishing number who were still holding
lighted candles as the night got darker and darker. Paul, characteristically,
sees it the other way around: those who believed in Jesus, those who are called
by God’s grace, are the small but increasing number who are awake, and lighting
their lamps, before the coming dawn (this is how his metaphor works in 13:11-14
and 1 Thess 5:5-10). And part of the point about this image is that if there
are already some who are waking up, the other side of the dark night, then
there can be more. If Paul and the other Jewish Christians are a new kind of
“remnant,” called by God’s grace in the gospel of Jesus, there is no reason why
others should not join them. This is the argument of 11:11-16 and beyond. (N. T. Wright, “The Letter to the Romans,” in The
New Interpreter’s Bible, 12 vols. [Nashville: Abingdon Press, 2002], 10:676)