<p>11:25 <em>Brothers, I would not have you ignorant of this mystery, lest you be wise in your own conceits, that a hardening in part has befallen Israel, until the full number of the Gentiles is made up</em>- The partial hardening doesn't mean that their hearts were a bit soft and partly hard; for :8-10 is clear that they were indeed hardened and blinded. The &quot;in part&quot; refers to Israel as a whole; part of God's &quot;Israel&quot;, the full number of the saved, had been hardened. The numbers of ethnic Jews in the final number of &quot;Israel&quot; had been diminished (see on :12) and so the Gentiles were being brought in to make up the numbers. This was no reason for Gentile boasting; the repeated warnings against this could suggest that there was friction in the Roman church over this matter. The Gentiles were as the street people dragged in to make up the numbers at the wedding feast, being invited to something they had not been searching for.</p><p>Although Paul was the apostle to the Gentiles, I understand Rom. 11:25,26 to mean that he preached to the Gentiles motivated by the knowledge that when the full number of the Gentiles had &ldquo;come in&rdquo;, then &ldquo;all Israel&rdquo; would be saved by the Jews then turning to Christ. Paul understands &quot;Israel&quot; as the full number of those who shall be finally saved. Once the allotted number of Gentiles had come in, Paul seems to see the final number of &quot;Israel&quot; being made up by the latter day conversion of some ethnic Israelites. This alone indicates how we should preach to Israel in the last days. Paul thought he was in the last days and so he did so.</p>