Gentiles

The Gentiles are the nations beyond Israel — the families of the earth taken as a whole, set off from Abraham's seed and the commonwealth that grew from it. Scripture speaks of them as the nations whom Yahweh cast out from before the sons of Israel, and at the same time as the peoples to whom Yahweh's name will yet be made great. The arc runs from a single promise to Abram that all nations would be blessed in him (Gen 12:3), through the long stretch in which the nations stand outside the sanctuary and against Israel's life, to the prophetic vision of nations streaming up to Zion, and on into the apostolic good news that the Gentiles are fellow-heirs in Christ.

The Nations Outside the Covenant

In the Hebrew narrative the nations are first the peoples whose customs Israel must not imitate. Of king Ahaz the chronicler writes that "he walked in the way of the kings of Israel, yes, and made his son to pass through the fire, according to the disgusting behaviors of the nations, whom Yahweh cast out from before the sons of Israel" (2Ki 16:3). The northern kingdom collapsed for the same reason: it "walked in the statutes of the nations, whom Yahweh cast out from before the sons of Israel" (2Ki 17:8). Returning exiles in Ezra's day are marked off from this same world: "the sons of Israel who had come again out of the captivity, and all such as had separated themselves to them from the filthiness of the nations of the land, to seek Yahweh, the God of Israel, ate" the Passover (Ezr 6:21).

The Psalter sets the same boundary in cosmic terms. "Why do the nations rage, And the peoples meditate a vain thing?" (Ps 2:1). Their gods are nothing — "The idols of the nations are silver and gold, The work of man's hands" (Ps 135:15) — and their schemes recoil on themselves: "The nations are sunk down in the pit that they made" (Ps 9:15). Yet even there the nations are made witnesses to what Yahweh has done in Israel: "Then was our mouth filled with laughter, And our tongue with singing: Then they said among the nations, Yahweh has done great things for them" (Ps 126:2). Ezekiel sets the same logic into the eschaton: "I will set my glory among the nations; and all the nations will see my judgment that I have executed, and my hand that I have laid on them" (Eze 39:21).

The Pressure of the Nations on Israel

The Maccabean record narrows this to the moment when Israel's life was almost lost to the surrounding world. The crisis begins at home, with Israelites who "went to the king: and he gave them license to do after the ordinances of the nations" (1Ma 1:13), and who "built a place for men to prey upon naked boys in Jerusalem, according to the customs of the nations" (1Ma 1:14). The decree spreads outward — "all nations accepted according to the word of the king" (1Ma 1:42), and "the king sent letters by the hands of messengers to Jerusalem, and to the cities of Judah: that they should follow the foreign customs of the land" (1Ma 1:44) — and the sanctuary itself is overrun: "look, our sanctuary, and our beauty, and our glory is laid waste, And the nations have defiled them" (1Ma 2:12).

The military picture matches the religious one. Judas tells his men, "look, the nations have come together against us to destroy us: You know what they intend against us" (1Ma 3:52); "they saw the camp of the nations that it was strong, and the men in breastplates, and the horsemen round about them, and these were trained up to war" (1Ma 4:7). At Gilead "the nations that were in Gilead, assembled themselves together against the Israelites who were in their quarters to destroy them" (1Ma 5:9); the encircled altar provokes the surrounding peoples — "Now it came to pass, when the nations round about heard that the altar was built up and the sanctuary was dedicated as before, that they were exceedingly angry" (1Ma 5:1) — and Judas's brothers say to one another, "Let's also get ourselves a name, and let's go fight against the nations that are round about us" (1Ma 5:57). The garrisons in Jerusalem are not neutral: "those who were in the castle, had shut up the Israelites round about the holy places: and they were continually seeking their hurt, and to strengthen the nations" (1Ma 6:18). Even the renegade Alcimus is judged by this measure: he "did to the sons of Israel, much more than the nations" (1Ma 7:23).

The combat with the nations turns finally on their idols. At Azotus, the routed enemy "fled into Bethdagon their idol's temple, there to save themselves" (1Ma 10:83); Jonathan "set fire to Azotus, and the cities that were round about it, and took the spoils of them, and the temple of Dagon: and all those who had fled into it, he burned with fire" (1Ma 10:84). The strangers who held Bacchides' fortresses simply "fled away" (1Ma 10:12). The picture is unsentimental: in this stretch of history the nations are the world that Israel must survive.

The same posture surfaces in Ben Sira's prayer for deliverance: "Save us, O God of all, And cast your fear upon all the nations. Shake your hand against the strange people, That they may see your power" (Sir 36:1-3). This is not a prayer that the nations be destroyed but that they be made to see — the same hinge that opens onto the prophetic stream.

Gentile Vice and Alienation in the Apostolic Frame

The apostolic letters carry this picture into the reader's own life. Paul writes to Corinth, "You⁺ know that when you⁺ were Gentiles [you⁺ were] led away to those mute idols, however you⁺ might be led" (1Co 12:2). To the Thessalonians he names the appetites: walk "not by immoral sexual passion, even as the Gentiles who don't know God" (1Th 4:5). Peter expands the same catalogue: "the time past may suffice to have worked the desire of the Gentiles, and to have walked in sexual depravity, erotic desires, winebibbings, revelings, carousings, and horrible idolatries" (1Pe 4:3).

Paul puts the alienation in covenantal terms. "Therefore remember, that once you⁺, the Gentiles in the flesh, who are called Uncircumcision by that which is called Circumcision, in the flesh, made by hands; that you⁺ were at that time separate from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers from the covenants of the promise, having no hope and without God in the world. But now in Christ Jesus you⁺ who once were far off are made near in the blood of Christ" (Eph 2:11-13). When he speaks alongside Peter at Antioch he flags the same line, only to undo it: "We being Jews by nature, and not sinners of the Gentiles" (Ga 2:15). Jesus' word about the Gentile age sits inside the same picture — "Jerusalem will be trodden down of the Gentiles, until the times of the Gentiles be fulfilled" (Lu 21:24).

The Promise That the Nations Would Be Brought In

The promise that this estrangement would not be the end is ancient. To Abram: "and I will bless those who bless you, and him who curses you I will curse: and in you will all the families of the earth be blessed" (Ge 12:3). And again to Abraham after the Aqedah: "And in your seed will all the nations of the earth be blessed. Because you have obeyed the voice of [my Speech]" (Ge 22:18).

The Psalter spreads this promise out. "Ask of me, and I will give [you] the nations for your inheritance; And for your possession, the uttermost parts of the earth" (Ps 2:8). "All the ends of the earth will remember and turn to Yahweh; And all the kindreds of the nations will worship before you. For the kingdom is Yahweh's; And he is the ruler over the nations" (Ps 22:27-28). "Bronze will come out of Egypt; Ethiopia will bring her hands [with tribute] in a hurry to God" (Ps 68:31). "All nations whom you have made will come and worship before you, O Lord; And they will glorify your name" (Ps 86:9). The Davidic king's reign reaches the same horizon: "Yes, all kings will fall down before him; All nations will serve him" (Ps 72:11) — "All nations will call him happy" (Ps 72:17). The new song that Yahweh's deeds open up is sung outward: "Declare his glory among the nations, His marvelous works among all the peoples" (Ps 96:3); "Say among the nations, Yahweh reigns" (Ps 96:10). Ben Sira makes the same observation in retrospect: "His wisdom will the Gentiles declare, And his praise will the congregation tell forth" (Sir 39:10).

The prophets press this further. "It will come to pass in the latter days, that the mountain of Yahweh's house will be established on the top of the mountains, and will be exalted above the hills; and all nations will flow to it" (Is 2:2). The earth filled with knowledge of Yahweh "as the waters cover the sea" (Is 11:9). The Servant "will bring forth justice to the Gentiles" (Is 42:1) and "will not fail nor be discouraged, until he has set justice in the earth; and the isles will wait for his instructions" (Is 42:4). Yahweh's universal call sounds: "Turn to my [Speech], and be⁺ saved, all the ends of the earth; for I am God, and there is no other. [By my Speech] I have sworn, the word has gone forth from my mouth [in] righteousness, and will not return, that to me every knee will bow, every tongue will swear" (Is 45:22-23). And the Servant's commission widens past Israel: "It is too light a thing that you should be my slave to raise up the tribes of Jacob, and to restore the preserved of Israel: I will also give you for a light to the Gentiles, that you may be my salvation to the end of the earth" (Is 49:6); "Kings will see and arise; princes, and they will worship; because of Yahweh who is faithful, the Holy One of Israel" (Is 49:7). "Yahweh has made bare his holy arm in the eyes of all the nations; and all the ends of the earth have seen the salvation of our God" (Is 52:10) — "So he will sprinkle many nations; kings will shut their mouths at him" (Is 52:15).

The Zion-vision in Isaiah 60 gathers the picture into a single image of streaming peoples: "your seed will possess the nations" (Is 54:3); "a nation that didn't know you will run to you" (Is 55:5); "nations will come to your light, and kings to the brightness of your rising" (Is 60:3); "your sons will come from far" (Is 60:4); "the abundance of the sea will be turned to you, the wealth of the nations will come to you" (Is 60:5); "foreigners will build up your walls, and their kings will minister to you" (Is 60:10); "you will also be nursed with the milk of the nations" (Is 60:16); "The little one will become a thousand, and the small one a strong nation" (Is 60:22). The horizon is universal worship: "from one new moon to another, and from one Sabbath to another, all flesh will come to worship before me, says Yahweh" (Is 66:23). Daniel sets it in the imperial register: "in the days of those kings will the God of heaven set up a kingdom which will never be destroyed" (Da 2:44), the stone "cut out of the mountain without hands" that breaks the kingdoms in pieces (Da 2:45); to the Son of Man "was given dominion, and glory, and a kingdom, that all the peoples, nations, and languages should serve him" (Da 7:14). Hosea names the surprise inside this: "I will say to those who were not my people, You are my people; and they will say, [You are] my God" (Ho 2:23). Zechariah closes the loop on the very nations that warred against Jerusalem: "everyone who is left of all the nations that came against Jerusalem will go up from year to year to worship the King, Yahweh of hosts" (Zec 14:16). And Malachi: "from the rising of the sun even to the going down of the same my name [will be] great among the Gentiles; and in every place incense [will be] offered to my name, and a pure offering: for my name [will be] great among the Gentiles, says Yahweh of hosts" (Mal 1:11).

Jesus and the Other Sheep

Inside the gospels the same arc shows up first as a small surprise. The centurion who sends elders to Jesus on behalf of his slave is met without comment about his Gentile birth: "And when he heard concerning Jesus, he sent to him elders of the Jews, asking him that he would come and save his slave" (Lu 7:3). At the cross another centurion gives the verdict the disciples were slow to give: "And when the captain, who stood by across from him, saw that he so breathed his last, he said, Truly this man was the Son of God" (Lu 23:47).

Jesus himself names the wider flock. "And other sheep I have, which are not of this fold: I must also bring them, and they will hear my voice; and they will become one flock, one shepherd" (Joh 10:16). The kingdom he describes grows by the same logic: it is "like a grain of mustard seed, which, when it is sown on the earth, though it is less than all the seeds that are on the earth, yet when it is sown, grows up, and becomes greater than all the herbs, and puts out great branches; so that the birds of the heaven can lodge under its shadow" (Mr 4:31-32). The mission follows: "the good news must first be preached to all the nations" (Mr 13:10).

The Apostolic Realization

Paul reads Israel's hardening as the lever by which the Gentiles are reached. "I say then, Did they stumble that they might fall? God forbid: but by their fall salvation [has come] to the Gentiles, to provoke them to jealousy. Now if their fall is the riches of the world, and their loss the riches of the Gentiles; how much more their fullness. But I speak to you⁺ who are Gentiles. Inasmuch then as I am an apostle of Gentiles, I glorify my service" (Ro 11:11-13). The horizon is paired: "a hardening in part has befallen Israel, until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in" (Ro 11:25). Inside the new arrangement the line that ran through Eph 2 is gone: "you⁺ are no more strangers and sojourners, but you⁺ are fellow-citizens with the saints, and of the household of God" (Eph 2:19) — "the Gentiles are fellow-heirs, and fellow-members of the body, and fellow-partakers of the promise in Christ Jesus through the good news" (Eph 3:6).

Paul reads the Hebrew Scriptures as having said this all along. There is "no distinction between Jew and Greek: for the same [Lord] is Lord of all, and is rich to all who call on him: for, Whoever will call on the name of the Lord will be saved" (Ro 10:12-13). The list of the called includes "us, whom he also called, not from the Jews only, but also from the Gentiles" (Ro 9:24). "The Gentiles might glorify God for his mercy; as it is written, Therefore I will give praise to you among the Gentiles, And sing to your name" (Ro 15:9). "The blessing of Abraham" comes "on the Gentiles… in Christ Jesus; that we might receive the promise of the Spirit through faith" (Ga 3:14). And the cosmic confession follows: "every knee should bow, of [those] in heaven and [those] on earth and [those] under the earth, and that every tongue should confess, The Lord Jesus Christ, to the glory of God the Father" (Php 2:9-11) — "to me every knee will bow, And every tongue will confess to God" (Ro 14:11).

The End Picture

The closing visions take this to its limit. The seventh trumpet announces, "The kingdom of the world has become [the kingdom] of our Lord, and of his Christ: and he will reign forever and ever" (Re 11:15). Another angel flies in mid-heaven, "having eternal good news to proclaim to those who dwell on the earth, and to every nation and tribe and tongue and people" (Re 14:6). The song before the throne picks up Psalm and Isaiah at once: "Who will not fear, O Lord, and glorify your name? For you only are holy; for all the nations will come and worship before you; for your righteous acts have been made manifest" (Re 15:4). And the false claim — "those who say they are Jews, and they are not, but lie" (Re 3:9) — is undone at the feet of those they once excluded, where the worship is finally one. The Gentiles are no longer the boundary outside which the people of God live; in the UPDV's reading they are inside the household, on the strength of a promise that was always reaching for them.