Romans 9:6 - Coke's Commentary on the Holy Bible

The word of God— The word of promise. See Romans 9:9 and chap. Romans 3:3. St. Paul urges, that they are not all Israel which are of Israel, as a reason to prove that the promise of God failed not to have its effect, though the body of the Jewish nation had rejected the Lord Jesus Christ, and therefore were naturally rejected by God from being any longer his people. The reasoning stands thus: "The posterity of Jacob, or Israel, were not those alone who were to make that Israel, or that chosen people of God, who were intended in the promise made to Abraham, Genesis 17:7-8. Others, besides the descendants of Jacob, were to be taken into this Israel, to constitute the people of God under the Gospel; and therefore the calling and coming-in of the Gentiles was a completion of that promise:" and then he adds in the next verse, "Neither were all the posterity of Abraham comprehended in that promise; nor were those who were taken-in in the time of the Messiah to make the Israel of God, taken-in because they were the natural descendants from Abraham; nor did the Jews claim it for all his race:" and this he proves by the limitation of the promise to Abraham's seed by Isaac only. He does all this to shew the right of the Gentiles to that promise, if they believed; since that promise did not concern only the natural descendants either of Abraham or Jacob, but those only who were of the faith of their father Abraham, of whomsoever descended. See chap. Romans 4:11-17 and Locke. We may read the last clause of this verse, For not all they that are of Israel, are Israel.