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.”Footnote 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.Footnote ¹⁴ The rebuke of Rom 9:20 evokes numerous potter-clay analogies in biblical and other early Jewish literature,Footnote ¹⁵ especially recalling Isa 29:16/45:9, Job 9:12/33:13, and Dan 4:35,Footnote 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.Footnote 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,”Footnote ¹⁸ and at least three solutions have been offered.Footnote 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 . ^{Footnote 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:

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. ^{Footnote 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. ^{Footnote 23}

Understanding as “produced with much patience” is certainly more coherent within the context of the metaphor, ^{Footnote 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). ^{Footnote 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, ^{Footnote 26} particularly since the immediately preceding verse explicitly depicts a potter making different kinds of vessels for distinct functions, whether honorable or dishonorable. ^{Footnote 27} Remarkably, the verbal parallel to Jer 27:25 LXX has typically been dismissed as “interesting but of doubtful relevance here,” ^{Footnote 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,” ^{Footnote 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.” ^{Footnote 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. ^{Footnote 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.” ^{Footnote 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. ^{Footnote 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. ^{Footnote 34} But an objective genitive requires that the head noun include or imply a verbal idea; a verbal noun in the genitive is irrelevant. ^{Footnote 35} Since the head noun here () is not a verbal noun, this genitive should therefore be understood as attributive rather than verbal. ^{Footnote 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. ^{Footnote 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. ^{Footnote 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,” ^{Footnote 39} let alone to demonstrate his power over them—nor could an ancient potter have afforded to do so. ^{Footnote 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. ^{Footnote 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.” ^{Footnote 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.” ^{Footnote 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). ^{Footnote 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). ^{Footnote 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. ^{Footnote 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),” ^{Footnote 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. ^{Footnote 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.” ^{Footnote 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.” ^{Footnote 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). ^{Footnote 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). ^{Footnote 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. ^{Footnote 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:

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!” ^{Footnote 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,” ^{Footnote 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:

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

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, ^{Footnote 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. ^{Footnote 65} In this passage, Jeremiah is instructed to watch a potter at work, where he observes a vessel ^{Footnote 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. ^{Footnote 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. ^{Footnote 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 upshot of Jer 18 is the disturbing warning that the benefits of YHWH’s covenant are contingent on Israel’s obedience. ^{Footnote 70} Moreover, what is true for Israel in this regard is equally true for any nation or kingdom (18:7–10). ^{Footnote 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:

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. ^{Footnote 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. ^{Footnote 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. ^{Footnote 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.” ^{Footnote 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.” ^{Footnote 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. ^{Footnote 78}

Moreover, despite Dunn’s assertion of what Paul “no doubt intends,” ^{Footnote 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, ^{Footnote 80} explaining how God’s choice to make dishonorable use of a portion of Israel squares with the covenantal promises of Israel’s redemption. ^{Footnote 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?” (). ^{Footnote 82} Unfortunately, most interpreters have assumed that “the perfect tense has no past-referring significance here,” ^{Footnote 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. ^{Footnote 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.” ^{Footnote 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:

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. ^{Footnote 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. ^{Footnote 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). ^{Footnote 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). ^{Footnote 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). ^{Footnote 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, ^{Footnote 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. ^{Footnote 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. ^{Footnote 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. ^{Footnote 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. ^{Footnote 96} The destiny of these vessels is not yet determined; they are still being “fixed,” as one second-century Christian explains:

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.” ^{Footnote 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,” ^{Footnote 98} the essential thrust of Paul’s argument here is that the God of Israel nevertheless does not act arbitrarily but interactively and responsively. ^{Footnote 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.” ^{Footnote 100} In this respect, Heschel’s description of the God of the prophets applies equally well to Paul’s argument in Romans:

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. ^{Footnote 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:

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. ^{Footnote 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). ^{Footnote 105}