Romans 9:4

9:4 who are Israelites. To them belong ¹  the adoption as sons, ²  the glory, the covenants, the giving of the law, the temple worship, ³  and the promises.

Romans 9:8-9

9:8 This means ⁴  it is not the children of the flesh ⁵  who are the children of God; rather, the children of promise are counted as descendants. 9:9 For this is what the promise declared: ⁶  “About a year from now ⁷  I will return and Sarah will have a son.” ⁸ 

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¹ tn Grk “of whom.” Because of the length and complexity of the Greek sentence, a new sentence was started here in the translation.

² tn The Greek term υἱοθεσία (Juioqesia) was originally a legal technical term for adoption as a son with full rights of inheritance. BDAG 1024 s.v. notes, “a legal t.t. of ‘adoption’ of children, in our lit., i.e. in Paul, only in a transferred sense of a transcendent filial relationship between God and humans (with the legal aspect, not gender specificity, as major semantic component).” Although some modern translations remove the filial sense completely and render the term merely “adoption” (cf. NAB, ESV), the retention of this component of meaning was accomplished in the present translation by the phrase “as sons.”

³ tn Or “cultic service.”

⁴ tn Grk “That is,” or “That is to say.”

⁵ tn Because it forms the counterpoint to “the children of promise” the expression “children of the flesh” has been retained in the translation.

sn The expression the children of the flesh refers to the natural offspring.

⁶ tn Grk “For this is the word of promise.”

⁷ tn Grk “About this time I will return.” Since this refers to the time when the promised child would be born, it would be approximately a year later.

⁸ sn A quotation from Gen 18:10, 14.