Vessels of Wrath and God’s Pathos: Potter/Clay Imagery in Rom 9:20–23

Abstract

Starting from the concept of divine patience in Rom 9:22, this article argues that Paul employs the potter/clay metaphor not (as often interpreted) to defend God’s right to arbitrary choice but rather as an appeal to what Abraham Heschel called divine pathos—the idea that God’s choices are impacted by human actions. The potter/clay imagery in Rom 9:20–23 thus serves to highlight the dynamic and improvisational way the God of Israel interacts with Israel and, by extension, all of creation.

Introduction

After spending the first eight chapters of Romans arguing that the uncircumcised are receiving the righteousness promised to Israel through the indwelling holy spirit, Paul begins Rom 9 at pains to explain how this surprising development does not ultimately undermine the promises to Israel but paradoxically and surprisingly represents God’s continued faithfulness to Israel—and, by extension, the power and fidelity of Israel’s God. This new section begins with the argument that God’s promises have never applied to all the descendants of the patriarchs; just as not all Abraham’s descendants in the past have inherited the Abrahamic promises, so also not all who are descended from Israel will receive the promises (9:6–13). ¹ But Paul recognizes that this does little to quell the potential charge of divine injustice, asking: “What then? There is no injustice () with God, is there?” to which he replies, (9:14). Citing Exod 33:19, Paul explains that God has a right to show mercy to whomever he chooses ² —by implication not solely to those descended from Abraham (9:15–16)—while “hardening” ()the others as he did Pharaoh in the Exodus (9:17–18). ³

Such an appeal to God’s choice, however, raises the even thornier problem of portraying God as arbitrary and capricious, and Paul anticipates the objection: “Why does he still find fault? For who has resisted his will?” (Rom 9:19). ⁴ To address this question, Paul turns to a traditional analogy comparing God’s interaction with humanity to that of a potter working with clay (9:20–24). Remarkably, Paul’s use of the potter/clay analogy has frequently been read not as a rebuttal of the implied accusation that God is capricious and therefore unjust but rather as a defense of God’s sovereign right to arbitrary choice. ⁵ That is, just as a potter has the right to make vessels specifically to be smashed to demonstrate his sovereignty and power, God has a right to define justice however he chooses. Nils Dahl, for example, asserts: “Paul’s reply does not even attempt a rational explanation. It simply recalls that God is God and man is a sinner who has no right to make complaints against his creator.” ⁶ The ubiquity of this interpretation is reflected in most popular English translations of verse 22 (see Table 1).

Table 1: Rom 9:22

The end of this verse is especially noteworthy, as each of these translations makes specific interpretive choices suggesting that God’s choices are predetermined and arbitrary. The NRSV, for example, renders not as “vessels” or “instruments” but as “objects” specifically “made for destruction.” For its part, although rendering with “vessels,” the ESV translates with the more predestinarian language of “prepared,” resulting in “vessels of wrath prepared for destruction.” The NIV doubles down on the ESV’s approach, employing both “objects” and “prepared,” thereby removing all doubt about the predestinarian nature of Paul’s argument. The same predestinarian sense also appears in the popular German (ertragen … bestimmt waren; bereiteten … ertragen hat), Spanish (soportó … preparados), and French (a supporté … formés) versions listed in Table 1. The gist of the potter/clay analogy as rendered in all seven translations—and as widely interpreted in modern scholarship—is simple: God has indeed arbitrarily predestined some people for destruction, but this is not unjust, because it is God’s sovereign right to do so. ⁷

This reading, however, runs counter to the understanding of God’s justice in other early Jewish material, where the opposite of justice is not mercy but arbitrariness or partiality. ⁸ That is, in contrast to the notoriously capricious deities familiar throughout the ancient Mediterranean, YHWH’s judgment is not arbitrary but impartial, based on each person’s behavior. ⁹ More importantly, many interpreters have noted a disconnect between this passage’s apparent defense of God’s arbitrary choice and the arguments about God’s justice and impartiality throughout the rest of Romans, particularly in Rom 2. ¹⁰ Reinhard Feldmeier, for example, asks, “How can the God whose devotion and fidelity are so consistently unfolded in Romans 1–8, be reconciled with the arbitrary potter?” ¹¹ Others have complained about the inadequacy of the analogy itself, suggesting, for example, that the analogy of the potter is not naturally suited for “the dissimilar area of human responsibility.” ¹² I contend, however, that such complaints about this passage are the result of reading Paul’s appeal to the potter/clay analogy in Rom 9:20–24 backwards, as interpreters have misunderstood the implications of clay as an analogy, the emphasis Paul places on the patience of the divine potter, and the passage’s function in its larger context.

To make this case, the first half of this article engages in a close grammatical and lexical analysis of 9:22b, arguing that rather than depicting God as enduring objects arbitrarily destined for damnation, this verse emphasizes God’s patience while responsively forming instruments for different purposes. The second half of the article builds on this foundation by reexamining the analogy in its larger context, first showing that given the nature of clay and the function of the potter analogy in Jeremiah and Isaiah, a reader should expect the metaphor to signal an appeal to divine pathos rather than an argument for the immutability or irresistibility of the divine plan. The article concludes by assessing the analogy’s function in the historical argument Paul is making about God’s dealings with Israel, arguing that the apostle employs this analogy not to defend God’s right to arbitrary choice but rather to rebut the idea that God’s choices are capricious or arbitrary.

Reexamining the Potter at Work

The passage itself is highly allusive in both theme and vocabulary, connecting closely with key sections of Rom 1–8 and other early Jewish literature. Beverly Gaventa, for example, has noted that 9:19–23 has strong thematic and vocabulary connections to Rom 1:18–32, which has already made the points “that God has the prerogative to do what God wills, and that humanity is not entitled to question God’s designs,” and that “humanity has put in God’s place things that are not God.” ¹³ The theme of God’s impartiality in Rom 2 also stands in the background of the question in verse 19, and the vocative address in the reply echoes Rom 2:1, while the “vocabulary of wrath and power and patience and glory” calls back not only to 1:18–32 but also to 2:4–11. ¹⁴ The rebuke of Rom 9:20 evokes numerous potter-clay analogies in biblical and other early Jewish literature, ¹⁵ especially recalling Isa 29:16/45:9, Job 9:12/33:13, and Dan 4:35, ¹⁶ and the image of a potter making different kinds of vessels from the same clay (9:21) borrows heavily from Wis 15:7–8. ¹⁷

The primary interpretive difficulties arise in verses 22–23, as the grammar and vocabulary of these verses are troublesome. The grammatical construction of these verses is, as Paul William Meyer succinctly summarizes, “severely elliptical,” ¹⁸ and at least three solutions have been offered. ¹⁹ All three grammatical solutions, however, arrive at essentially the same meaning, so the more significant questions concern how to construe the two clauses of 22b, chiefly the words and

Produced, Not Endured

The phrase has proven especially difficult, partly because Paul nowhere else uses the verb . ²⁰ As seen in the translations above, is typically rendered as “endured” or the synonym “bore,” a decision apparently influenced by the nearby , as translators and interpreters try to make sense of the concept of patience in the passage, resulting in “endured/bore with much patience.” But the idea of “enduring” pottery makes little sense—it is unclear what it would mean to “endure” a clay vessel. Such a reading is even more problematic in the context of Paul’s larger argument, as highlighted by John Battle’s complaint:

[I]t is difficult to account for the expression Paul uses: God bears with much longsuffering unbelieving Jews, who are fitted for destruction. How does this patience toward the Jews display God’s wrath or power? Would it not be better to say: he judges, punishes, or oppresses vessels of wrath? ²¹

On the contrary, rather than deriving the sense of from the nearby , it helps to recognize that Paul has lifted this phrase—including the verb he nowhere else uses—from Jer 27:25 LXX (MT 50:25), in which God brings out his instruments of wrath with which he will destroy the land of the Chaldeans. ²² The language here is as close to a direct quotation of scripture as appears in 9:19–24 (see Table 2).

Table 2: Jer 27:25 LXX and Rom 9:22

Recognizing this intertextual reference opens at least two interpretive options. The first is to understand as “carrying” or “conveying” the vessels, thus conforming closely to the sense in the source passage in Jeremiah. But Paul has altered Jeremiah’s “bring out” by removing the prefix from the verb, which brings into play another meaning of more suited to the context of the creation of clay vessels, namely, “to produce” or “form,” a common meaning for the verb in a range of contexts. ²³

Understanding as “produced with much patience” is certainly more coherent within the context of the metaphor, ²⁴ as the potter is not idly awaiting a change in the clay but actively—and patiently—involved. That the question that spurs the analogy so strongly echoes Wis 12:12 (“For who will say, ‘What have you done?’ or who will resist your judgment?”) further reinforces such a reading, as the surrounding context in Wis 12 emphasizes that God delayed his judgments to give the Canaanites space for repentance (esp. 12:9–11, 15–21). ²⁵ Even more significantly, this reading coheres with Paul’s own arguments about God’s justice elsewhere in the letter, particularly his explanation in Rom 2:4 that God’s (and ) is intended to lead to repentance.

Objects or Instruments?

Significantly, the “vessels of wrath” in Jer 27:25 LXX are not objects of God’s wrath but rather instruments used for dispensing God’s wrath. A similar instrumental sense–in which these still serve a function in God’s redemptive plan–also fits well in the immediate context of Paul’s analogy, ²⁶ particularly since the immediately preceding verse explicitly depicts a potter making different kinds of vessels for distinct functions, whether honorable or dishonorable. ²⁷ Remarkably, the verbal parallel to Jer 27:25 LXX has typically been dismissed as “interesting but of doubtful relevance here,” ²⁸ as interpreters have nevertheless insisted that Paul’s vessels of wrath should be understood as objects of God’s wrath. For example, although James Dunn recognizes that in verse 21, “the more natural sense of the metaphor is of vessels put to differing uses within history,” ²⁹ he immediately drops this instrumental reading of the vessels in the next verse, concluding:

The genitive construction of allows various senses—vessels made in anger or made to experience eschatological wrath. But since the following phrase has more clearly in view final destruction and its cause, here is probably intended in the sense “vessels which are objects of God’s wrath now.” ³⁰

Charles Cranfield likewise suggests that “ … is used in vv. 22 and 23 … without any special thought of the literal use of the word in v. 21,” which seems implausible given the grammatical () and thematic connections between the two verses. ³¹ Similarly, despite acknowledging that “ ‘Of wrath’ is certainly a genitive of quality, ‘vessels characterized by wrath,’ ” Battle asserts that “in Paul’s context the thought predominates that these vessels will receive God’s wrath, just as the ‘vessels of mercy’ will receive his mercy.” ³²

On the contrary, just as no English speaker requesting a “vessel of water” would mean “a vessel which is the object of water now,” nonpossessive instances of the + genitive construction typically refer either to the function performed by the in question (e.g., to carry water or employ in battle) or the material from which it is made. That is, a “ of something” is a vessel or instrument comprised of, filled with, conveying, or for the purpose of something but is not the object on which that thing works. Indeed, I have yet to find an example outside this passage of such an objective sense of the + genitive construction (that is, “ which is the object of X”), while examples of the instrumental sense abound. ³³ On this point, I suspect that some interpreters have been led astray by the verbal quality of , thereby interpreting the phrase as though it were an objective genitive even when categorizing it as a genitive of quality. ³⁴ But an objective genitive requires that the head noun include or imply a verbal idea; a verbal noun in the genitive is irrelevant. ³⁵ Since the head noun here () is not a verbal noun, this genitive should therefore be understood as attributive rather than verbal. ³⁶ The instrumental sense also corresponds with the earlier admonition in Romans to present the body’s members not as but as (6:13), phrases universally understood as instrumental. ³⁷ Elsewhere, Paul presents himself and his coworkers as “clay vessels” () containing “the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ” (2 Cor 4:6–7), similarly employing to refer to a functional instrument used by God. ³⁸ Given the grammar, scriptural undertones of the phrase, and Paul’s use of elsewhere, would be an odd choice to represent objects for God’s wrath in this passage.

Moreover, the metaphor itself depends on the potter having a reasonable function in mind for the vessels being formed. As George Caird explained decades ago, “A vessel may in the end have to be discarded, but the potter does not make vessels for the ghoulish delight of hurling them against a wall,” ³⁹ let alone to demonstrate his power over them—nor could an ancient potter have afforded to do so. ⁴⁰ An instrumental reading of also better sets up Paul’s concluding arguments about interdependent redemption in Rom 11, namely, that God has used Israel’s unfaithfulness to bring about the salvation of both Israel and the nations. ⁴¹ As such, together with the grammar and the close correspondence to scriptural language, the logic of the passage suggests that the of verse 22 should be understood primarily in light of the functions of the prior verse rather than as a reference to the vessels as “objects of wrath.” ⁴² Similarly, the “vessels of mercy” in verse 23, though surely also recipients of God’s mercy, should therefore be understood as instruments of God’s mercy, fulfilling Israel’s role as a “light to the nations.” ⁴³ The emphasis therefore falls on the qualities of the God is forming—each serves God’s purposes in the larger plan of redemption, with some bringing destruction and others mercy. Or, to use fuller Jeremianic language, some function “to uproot, tear down, destroy (), and overthrow,” while others function “to rebuild and to plant” (Jer 1:8).

Reshaped, Not Prepared

God’s instruments of wrath in the Hebrew Bible, however, frequently wind up being destroyed themselves, particularly if they arrogantly supersede their proper boundaries as instruments of wrath. Assyria and its king, for example, are used as “rod of my anger” (Isa 10:5; LXX: ) and sent as “my wrath against a lawless nation” (), but the king will be destroyed for his own insolence (10:12), having imagined himself to be above the one wielding him as though an “axe [that] boasts over him who cuts with it” (10:15). ⁴⁴ Similarly, Nebuchadnezzar had been the “servant of YHWH” (Jer 27:6) and Babylon had been used as a mace against the whole earth (50:23), but YHWH will repay Babylon for its violence and “all the evil they have done in Zion before your eyes” (Jer 51:24; 28:24 LXX). ⁴⁵ Similarly, in Rom 9:22, whereas is best understood in an instrumental sense, the next phrase, , is probably best taken otherwise: is a standard way to denote the fate of a given object. ⁴⁶ As such, this phrase suggests that the final outcome of these may be—much as it was for the kings of Assyria and Babylon as well as Pharaoh after he was fully hardened and his purpose complete—their own destruction.

Unfortunately, the participle has frequently been read in this passage as though it “expresses a nuance of predestination (damnation),” ⁴⁷ suggesting that the potter had planned all along to make these vessels for destruction. On the contrary, in contrast to the parallel in verse 23—which Paul obviously could have used had he intended to express a nuance of predestination in verse 22—the verb lacks any sense of foreordination. ⁴⁸ That is, whereas the prefix added to the verb in verse 22 clearly pulls forward a prospective sense, the prefix does not carry a nuance of predestination but rather denotes the “completion of the action of the verbal idea.” ⁴⁹

This conclusion is confirmed by an examination of the use of outside this passage. Rather than denoting planning or preparation in a prospective sense, the meaning of the word centers on a concept closer to the English idiom “to fix up,” often with a nuance of repair, restoration, or “making good.” ⁵⁰ That certainly is the case in every other Pauline usage of the term, such as his exhortation that those who are “restore” () anyone caught in trespass (Gal 6:1) or his desire to “fix” what is lacking in the faith of the Thessalonians (1 Thess 3:10). ⁵¹ Elsewhere in the New Testament, the term is used to denote the disciples of Jesus “fixing” their nets (Mk 1:19), a disciple becoming “fully trained” (Lk 6:40), and the final work of God to “establish” those who have “suffered for a little while” (1 Pet 5:10) or “equip” believers to do his will (Heb 13:21).

In the LXX, is the word used to translate the Aramaic in reference to the rebuilding of the walls of Jerusalem (LXX Ezra 4:12, 13, 16; 5:3, 9, 11; 6:14) and appears ten times in LXX Psalms, translating words such as (“restore/repair” or “fix solidly”; 67:10; 73: 16; 88:38), (“restore” or “repair”; 79:15). ⁵² One use of the term in later Christian literature intriguingly similar to Rom 9:22 is found in a prayer that God “fix holy vessels () for your service” (Ap. John 22:7) specifically through raising two persons from the dead. One nuance that does not appear, however, is that of foreordination; the closest thing to that concept across its use is the idea of “fitting out” ships or fleets (e.g., Polybius, History, 1.21, 29, 36) or “making ready” (= “fixing up”) something in anticipation of a future necessity (e.g., Hdt. 9.66; Heb 10:5). But even in these cases, the concept refers to finishing the “fixing up” process rather than planning or foreordination.

The Latin translator of Rom 9:22 also rendered with aptata, which carries the same nuance of adaptation or adjustment, suggesting that the ancient translator also understood in this sense. ⁵³ Understanding this adaptive nuance of is critical for understanding the passage. Rather than denoting predestination, this participle suggests the image of the potter remaking or fixing a vessel as part of the process of patiently working with stubborn clay. Whereas the instruments of verse 23 have been shaped in accordance with the original plan, the same cannot be said of the ; in verse 22, despite the patient efforts of the potter. A better representation of these concepts in the passage therefore looks something like this:

Or does the potter not have a right over the clay to make from the same lump a vessel for honorable use and another for dishonorable? And ⁵⁴ if God produced with much patience vessels of wrath reshaped for destruction, wishing ⁵⁵ to demonstrate his wrath and to make his power known so that he might also make known the riches of his glory toward vessels of mercy, which he prepared beforehand for glory—us whom he also called not only from Jews but also from gentiles. ⁵⁶ (Rom 9:21–24)

This reading obviates many attempts to grapple with the seeming non sequitur of Paul’s logic here, as there is no longer any need “to imagine God hardly being able to contain himself because he so badly wants to destroy these vessels!” ⁵⁷ Nor need we complain about “the extent to which Paul is willing to bend the analogy of the potter and the vessel … for one would not ordinarily speak of being ‘patient’ with a clay pot on the premise that it will have time to change its shape,” ⁵⁸ as Paul does not speak of patience with a finished clay pot but rather of a potter still at the wheel patiently molding a lump of not-yet-fired clay. Rather than being the point at which the analogy breaks down, the reference to the potter’s patience is the point on which the entire analogy hinges.

Patient Potter, Stubborn Clay, and Divine Pathos

Unfortunately, the significance of the potter’s patience has not been appreciated, because most interpreters have presumed that the analogy serves to illustrate the irresistible power of the artisan over the inanimate substance being shaped. But this is not how the metaphor would be understood by anyone with experience throwing clay, nor is it how the analogy functions in its context. The first problem is that many biblical scholars seem to insufficiently understand or appreciate the difficulty of throwing clay, not recognizing that clay would be an especially poor choice of substance to illustrate the unilateral and irresistible power of the artisan. Indeed, those who work with clay regularly comment on the temperamental willfulness of that material. A sampling of comments from modern potters is instructive:

The funny thing about clay is it kind of has a mind of its own…. You can start out making one thing and sometimes it turns into something completely different. ⁵⁹

I learned how to throw a pot by first learning about the nature of the clay.

Clay is very temperamental. It has a mind of its own. To shape it into something useful you have to know how it will behave under the pressure of your fingers. ⁶⁰

It took two years of serious wheel experience before I could readily translate the image in my mind to the lump of clay, and I still sometimes find that the clay has a mind of its own. ⁶¹

Once you’ve learned that clay has a mind of its own, the next step is to convince it to behave. ⁶²

One modern potter’s more extended reflection on the relationship between potter and clay is especially noteworthy:

The difference is that rather than something specific and circumscribed by our will we can also have intentions that are open ended…. Having intention does not simply mean that we are absolutely in control. It can also mean that we are in egalitarian association with something outside ourselves. The intention to be in a relationship doesn’t mean that we make sure things unfold entirely to a script of our own devising. Rather, we enter into a partnership and learn to accommodate the new circumstances and desires of that other. Making pots with this kind of intention means that we are constantly willing to learn from the clay and respond to it at every turn of the wheel….

Sometimes [it’s] entirely appropriate that the clay is allowed to express itself…. With the right intentions we can turn the “energy” and “will” of the clay into something harmonious. ⁶³

In contrast to the complaints of many modern biblical interpreters (many of whom seem strangely allergic to metaphor) that the potter/clay analogy is poorly suited to represent human willfulness, these potters speak of clay as though it has a “mind of its own” and emphasize that clay has a reputation for behaving as though it were willful and stubborn, requiring patience and dynamic improvisation to produce a good outcome. In this light, the potter/clay relationship provides an especially apt analogy for God’s dynamic and responsive interaction with willful and stubborn humanity. This is, of course, precisely the function of the potter analogy in Jer 18, the earliest, longest, and most famous of the scriptural potter passages, ⁶⁴ where the potter/clay relationship serves as an object lesson for how God dynamically and responsively interacts with willful and stubborn humanity with exactly the sort of open-ended intention practiced by master potters, being both sovereign and relationally responsive to the clay. ⁶⁵ In this passage, Jeremiah is instructed to watch a potter at work, where he observes a vessel ⁶⁶ () fall apart () in the potter’s hands only to be reworked into another vessel, “as it seemed good to the potter to make it” (18:4), at which point the word of YHWH explains: “ ‘Can I not do the same to you as this potter, O house of Israel?’ YHWH declares: ‘See, you are in my hand like the clay in the potter’s hand, O house of Israel’” (Jer 18:6).

The following verses (18:7–10) explain that although YHWH is indeed free to do as he chooses, his plans are malleable and responsive to his creations—that is, YHWH operates interactively and according to justice. If YHWH declares blessing or destruction upon a nation and that nation changes its behavior, YHWH can and does change the final outcome (cf. also Ezek 18). That Jeremiah’s application of the potter/clay metaphor has attracted essentially the same complaints that have been lodged against Paul’s notion of patient endurance in Rom 9:22 ironically reinforces the thematic connections between these passages. ⁶⁷ The lesson is that although YHWH does shape the destiny of people and nations, YHWH does not do so unilaterally or arbitrarily, nor is the impending destruction (18:11) of Jerusalem the result of an immutable plan of YHWH but is instead his response to their insolent and stubborn behavior. ⁶⁸ Abraham Heschel argues that this understanding of a responsive God who is affected by his creation is not only brought into focus in this oracle but is a distinctive emphasis throughout the biblical prophets:

The divine pathos represents a sharp antithesis to the belief in destiny, or the idea of the inevitable necessity controlling the affairs of man. Pathos, a dynamic category which makes every decision provisional and contingent upon what man does with his existence, conquers fate. The ultimate power is not an inscrutable, blind, and hostile power, to which man must submit in resignation, but a God of justice and mercy, to Whom man is called upon to return, and by returning he may effect a change in what is decreed. ⁶⁹

The upshot of Jer 18 is the disturbing warning that the benefits of YHWH’s covenant are contingent on Israel’s obedience. ⁷⁰ Moreover, what is true for Israel in this regard is equally true for any nation or kingdom (18:7–10). ⁷¹ God’s judgment may fall upon Israel as a result of disobedience, and conversely, blessing may fall upon the nations if they repent from their evil ways.

Paul’s Patient Potter in Context

These themes are obviously picked up in Romans, as Paul argues for the incorporation of gentiles and exclusion of some Israelites on the basis of God’s patience (2:4; 9:22) and impartiality (2:11) in response to human rebellion (1:18–32). Faced with the accusation that God is therefore unjust, Paul appeals to the same potter/clay analogy used by Jeremiah to argue against an image of an arbitrary, capricious, and impassive deity in favor of a God who not only can be impacted and affected by human actions but also mercifully and patiently improvises with obstinate “clay” while still working toward the larger plan of redemption. That is, like Jeremiah, Paul employs the potter/clay analogy to argue that:

though [YHWH] is sovereign, the people have a will of their own which they exert against him…. [YHWH] is capable of both uprooting and demolishing on the one hand, and of building and planting on the other. He may intend the one, but if the response of the people demands it, he will do the other.

This is the lesson of the potter. Some pots turn out fine the first time. Some do not, so the potter changes his tactics. It is a striking presentation of divine sovereignty and human freedom. ⁷²

Unfortunately, Paul’s modern interpreters have mostly missed this appeal to divine pathos, struggling to make sense of God’s patience () in this passage, perhaps because it never enters their mind that Paul—like the Hebrew prophets—is actually arguing for a God of pathos who can suffer or be affected by human actions. ⁷³ But Paul seems not to share his modern interpreters’ compunctions about divine impassivity, instead employing the image of a long-suffering potter amending clay against the idea of an arbitrary and capricious deity who sets out to condemn those he is forming. ⁷⁴ For both Jeremiah and Paul, God is by no means impassive but is impacted and affected by human actions, mercifully and patiently improvising like a potter working with stubborn clay. ⁷⁵ Indeed, to say that God has demonstrated inherently implies pathos, since that very word means that one is not simply getting one’s way but must rather interact with and respond to something outside oneself—thus the common rendering “long-suffering.” ⁷⁶ Thus, although the divine potter has the final say over the end product, those decisions are not arbitrary but depend in part on interaction with the clay. The clay has no right to complain to the potter precisely because, in seeking to produce the most useful vessel, the potter has improvised as necessitated by the clay’s resistance to the potter’s hand and tendency to become misshapen.

Israel’s Resistance and God’s Patient Fidelity

God’s faithfulness in spite of Israel’s stubbornness is, of course, a core theme of Rom 9–11. Unfortunately, the historical resonance of Paul’s argument in 9:20–23 has too often been overlooked, as many interpreters have assumed that in these verses Paul has suddenly expanded his vision beyond Israel such that the lump of 9:21 represents all humanity rather than Israel. Dunn, for example, dismisses Paul’s mention of the lump as irrelevant, suggesting that “Paul’s point could be made without this emphasis … he no doubt intends a reminder that all humanity, Israel included, is made of the same common (lump of) clay.” ⁷⁷ It seems best, however, not to ignore or dismiss as unnecessary the few details we do have, especially since there is no question that the lump () of 11:16 represents Israel. ⁷⁸

Moreover, despite Dunn’s assertion of what Paul “no doubt intends,” ⁷⁹ the potter/ clay metaphor appears in the context of a larger argument in Rom 9 about God’s dealings with Israel, coming at the end of a chronological retelling of the narrowing of the heirs of the promise to Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Moses, and then the nation of Israel, which divided into two parts, one of which (northern Israel) was rejected and cast among the nations (cf. Hos 8:8). Thus when Paul states that not all “from the same lump ()” (9:21) are made into the same kind of vessel, this analogy is best understood as further developing the thesis of 9:6, a difficult statement that obviously requires clarification, ⁸⁰ explaining how God’s choice to make dishonorable use of a portion of Israel squares with the covenantal promises of Israel’s redemption. ⁸¹

The historical context is further reinforced by the question of verse 19, the import of which is frequently overlooked by interpreters. In contrast to the analogous questions of Job 9:19 and Wis 12:12, which use the future (“who will resist”) to cast doubt on the potential of human resistance, Paul asks an empirical question, “Who has resisted?” (). ⁸² Unfortunately, most interpreters have assumed that “the perfect tense has no past-referring significance here,” ⁸³ with most English translations either glossing with the present (NASB) or a statement of capacity, “Who can resist his will?” (NRSV, ESV, TEV, NEB, REB) or “Who is able to resist his will?” (NIV). But the use of the perfect is indeed significant here; the force of the “empirical perfect” as opposed to other gnomic options is precisely that the general truth claim is “expressly based on a fact of experience,” with the present truth dependent on past observation. ⁸⁴

The question therefore fits well in the context of the historical argument to this point in Rom 9, and Paul responds by “drawing on a traditional metaphor for God’s relationship to creation, and, more specifically, to his people Israel.” ⁸⁵ Specifically, through this metaphor, Paul argues that Israel has in fact resisted God, but despite Israel’s past disobedience, God is accomplishing his redemptive purposes through and for Israel by unexpected means. In this respect, Paul’s application of the metaphor is again consistent with the potter/clay passages in the prophets, particularly those of Isaiah. J. Ross Wagner points out that the potter passages in Isaiah 29:16/45:9 (particularly the latter) are in the context of restoration promises, continuing:

Both of these Isaianic passages set the clay’s challenge to the potter in the context of Israel’s confrontation with God over his chosen means of redemption. Israel is portrayed as blind and deaf, doubting God’s wisdom and resisting his appointed means of redemption, either by relying on their own schemes for salvation or by questioning God’s plan of deliverance. ⁸⁶

Significantly, the clay is not portrayed as passive in these passages but rather as challenging its maker, serving as a satirical image for Israel’s rebellion and accusations against YHWH. In this context, as with Jeremiah, the potter/clay images in Isaiah do not suggest that YHWH works irresistibly—the very rebellion that has prompted these oracles demonstrates Israel’s capacity to resist. Instead, these passages rebuke the stubbornness of the people, who should submit to their creator rather than resisting him. ⁸⁷ In the same way, Paul’s (slightly amended) quotation of Isa 29:16 in Rom 9:20 is not an assertion of unilateral divine fiat but instead calls attention to the foolishness of humans imagining they could rightly impugn God’s justice, a point he further reinforces by appealing to God’s pathos in the next verses. ⁸⁸

Paul follows his version of the potter/clay analogy in 9:31–33 by making precisely the same point as Isaiah about Israel’s resistance to God’s appointed means of redemption, arguing that Israel thereby stumbled over the stumbling stone (9:32). ⁸⁹ Consequently, some of Israel was even discarded among the nations; indeed, the language in 9:20–23 recalls Hosea’s lament that northern “Israel is swallowed up; they are now in the nations like a worthless vessel (LXX: )” (Hos 8:8) and Jeremiah’s declaration that recently exiled king Jeconiah/ Jehoiachin “is dishonored () like a useless vessel, for he is hurled out and cast into a land which he did not know” (Jer 22:28 LXX). ⁹⁰ But dishonor and wrath are not God’s final word either for Jehoiachin’s descendants or for the northern tribes, a point Paul highlights in 9:24–25.

These echoes and the potter/clay metaphor itself remind the reader not only that the divine potter has the right to make vessels of dishonor from disobedient Israel but that God has always reserved the right to respond to Israel’s disobedience in this manner. Indeed, God has previously made an unfaithful portion of Israel into a vessel for dishonorable use and cast that worthless vessel among the nations. Not coincidentally, God is now calling instruments of mercy from among the nations where Israel was sown (Zech 10:9; cf. Hos 2:23), redeeming the not-people from their useless state (9:24–26). ⁹¹ The master potter has therefore used even the disobedience of his people to bring about mercy and redemption (cf. Rom 11:25–26), a purpose that has paradoxically been facilitated even by disobedient instruments of wrath. By implication, if God has made redemptive use even of Israel’s past disobedience, the same can be expected of any disobedience in the present. The incorporation of transformed gentiles therefore serves not as evidence of God’s unfaithfulness but rather as proof that God’s faithfulness to unfaithful Israel extends even further than previously imagined. God’s mercy ultimately supersedes his wrath, completing the circle of redemption (cf. Rom 11:28–36).

Hardening and Destruction

Nevertheless, the passage warns that despite the potter’s great patience in reshaping the obstinate clay, the end result of these vessels may be—as was the case with Jehoiachin and northern Israel in the eighth century—their own destruction (). This was also the result in Jeremiah’s case, as the people rejected the prophet’s appeal for repentance in Jer 18, at which point Jeremiah takes up a complaint before YHWH. The next chapter of Jeremiah proceeds to demonstrate what happens with a hardened vessel that is no longer useful, as the prophet is this time instructed to buy a clay jar () and break it in the sight of the elders and priests as a declaration that YHWH would similarly shatter Jerusalem (19:1–15).

This contrast between clay still being shaped on the wheel and that which has already been hardened is fundamental to understanding the imagery in Romans as well, ⁹² as the potter/clay analogy grows out of the “hardening” () language in 9:18, which calls back to YHWH hardening Pharaoh’s heart in Exodus. ⁹³ Notably, the nominal form of the root appears elsewhere in Greek literature in reference to clay hardened in a kiln, providing a linguistic link to the potter/clay metaphor in the succeeding verses. ⁹⁴ The potter/clay metaphor therefore clarifies the sense in which God “hardened” Pharaoh: in the context of clay pottery, hardening () does not involve reshaping but instead involves permanently fixing the clay in its final shape and is therefore best understood as the final step of judgment, after which there is no repentance available or reshaping possible. ⁹⁵

But in 9:20–23, the potter is still shaping the clay, which has not yet been hardened. God’s mercy entails showing patience with the clay, trying to form it into a better vessel prior to hardening it in its final state. ⁹⁶ The destiny of these vessels is not yet determined; they are still being “fixed,” as one second-century Christian explains:

For we are clay in the hand of the craftsman. As in the case of a potter: if he makes a vessel that is turned or crushed in his hands, he can reshape it again.

But if he has already put it into the kiln, he can no longer rescue it. Thus also with us. As long as we are in this world, we should repent from the evil that we did in the flesh. (2 Clem. 8:2)

Unlike Pharaoh, the vessels of Rom 9:20–23 have not yet been hardened and are still subject to the potter’s patient mercy with the potential to be reshaped. Their future remains open-ended. Those that stubbornly persist in disobedience, however, will eventually be hardened and destroyed. In light of God’s pathos and mercy, the potter/clay imagery serves as a call to repentance for those vessels that are as yet unfinished and unhardened, who are reminded that “God’s good purposes may be relied upon absolutely, but neither Israel nor any other entire community can be guaranteed participation in the reality of fulfillment irrespective of their response.” ⁹⁷

Conclusion: Paul’s God of Pathos

We can therefore conclude that, contrary to the prevailing interpretation of Rom 9:20–23, Paul does not employ the potter/clay metaphor to defend God’s right to arbitrary choice. Indeed, due to its reputation for having a “mind of its own,” clay is precisely the wrong material to use for such an argument, but it does make for an excellent analogy for how even a skilled artisan must interact with input from the material, improvising to produce the most desirable outcome. Although Paul would surely agree with his modern interpreters that “God has absolute autonomy to show mercy to any person he chooses,” ⁹⁸ the essential thrust of Paul’s argument here is that the God of Israel nevertheless does not act arbitrarily but interactively and responsively. ⁹⁹ For Paul, the God of Israel is not only sovereign but is also a God of pathos and justice. The potter/clay metaphor therefore serves to demonstrate that God’s sovereignty over the final outcome in no way eliminates human freedom or responsibility, because God’s decisions are relational and responsive to human agents. As Paul Gooch explains, “We end up with a Pauline notion of divine sovereignty which includes the powerful will of a creator who could be arbitrary but is not, who could be irresistible but who may grant us scope for our own free response.” ¹⁰⁰ In this respect, Heschel’s description of the God of the prophets applies equally well to Paul’s argument in Romans:

There is a biblical belief in divine grace, in a mercy which is bestowed upon [humanity] to a degree greater than he deserves. There is no belief in divine arbitrariness, in an anger which consumes and afflicts without moral justification. ¹⁰¹

In the process, Paul gives a surprising answer to the question “Who has resisted his will?” (Rom 9:19): We have. This answer underscores the importance of the empirical perfect () in 9:19b; whereas the future tense (as in Job 9:19 and Wis 12:12) sets up the obvious “no one,” the use of the perfect sets up the argument that Israel has in fact resisted God’s will. The upshot is that humans have no right to question God not because they are unable to resist God’s will but rather because they can and do resist God’s will. ¹⁰² Perhaps this answer should not be so surprising. After all, Paul has opened this very epistle with an account of humans rebelling against God in 1:18–32, and Israel repeatedly resists God’s will throughout the biblical narratives. As Heschel points out, the prophets admonished Israel precisely because God’s plans were being frustrated:

Israel’s history comprised a drama of God and all men. God’s kingship and man’s hope were at stake in Jerusalem. God was alone in the world, unknown or discarded. The countries of the world were full of abominations, violence, falsehood. Here was one land, one people, cherished and chosen for the purpose of transforming the world. This people’s failure was most serious. ¹⁰³

Unfortunately, most commentators have been led astray by the assumption that the only possible answer to the question of who has resisted God is “no one.” But Paul subverts this expectation, explaining that Israel has in fact resisted God’s purposes, and like a master potter, God has used even Israel’s past disobedience for redemptive purposes and will continue to do so. Paul does not therefore use the image of a potter working with clay to present an irresistible, capricious deity who predetermines the fate of each individual by fiat but rather a God of pathos who patiently and responsively crafts stubborn clay. ¹⁰⁴ Those who have resisted God therefore have no right to complain about God’s decisions (cf. 9:20), as God’s plans are dynamic and characterized by justice, rendering “to each according to his works” (Rom 2:6). ¹⁰⁵