“Blindness in part is happened to Israel, until the fulness of the Gentiles be come in.” (Romans 11:25)

In Romans 11, Paul explains a marvelous outcome from Israel’s unbelief: many Gentiles would hear the gospel and be saved. The word “blindness” has caught readers’ attention. What does it mean and how does this blindness happen?

The King James Version translates the Greek word porosis as “blindness” or “hardness.” It means to grow calloused through stubbornness. The most famous biblical example is surely the pharaoh of Exodus. “When Pharaoh saw that there was respite [from the plague of frogs], he hardened his heart” (Exodus 8:15). He hardened his own heart when he refused to submit to God. Then he did it again! “And Pharaoh hardened his heart at this time [after the plague of flies] also” (Exodus 8:32). It is after the fifth and sixth plagues that Scripture says, “The LORD hardened the heart of Pharaoh, and he hearkened not unto them; as the LORD had spoken unto Moses [in Exodus 7:3]” (Exodus 9:12).

This historical king provides an example of how one becomes blind to truth, which Romans 1 outlines. At first, “when they knew God, they glorified him not as God” (Romans 1:21). Next, “wherefore God also gave them up to uncleanness through the lusts of their own hearts” (Romans 1:24). In the same way, God gave pharaoh and the pharisees of Jesus’ day up to the hardening of their own hearts. “Because of unbelief they were broken off” (Romans 11:20).

And yet Jesus stands ready to soften the heart, bring spiritual sight to the blind, and rebuild the seared conscience of any who “will hear his voice” and “harden not your hearts” (Hebrews 4:7). Therefore “let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience” (Hebrews 10:22). BDT