Romans 11:2

Predestination is sometimes designated by the name of foreknowledge, as here, where "he foreknew" can only mean "he predestined," as the context of what follows demonstrates.

This is what the Savior says: "Father, I have kept those whom thou didst give to me, and none of them is lost but the son of perdition."

"He hath not cast off His people, whom He foreknew." As though he said, I have with me three, five, or ten thousand. What then? has the people come to be three, five, or ten thousand? that seed that compared with the stars of heaven for multitude, or the sand of the sea? Is this the way you deceive us and put a cheat upon us, by making the whole people thyself and the few that are with thee; and didst thou inflate us with idle hopes, and say that the promise has been fulfilled, when all are lost, and the salvation comes down to a few? This is all bombast and vanity! we cannot away with such sophistry as this. Now, that they may not say this, see how in the sequel he proceeds to the answer, not giving the objection indeed, but before it grounding the answer to it upon ancient history. What then is the answer? "Wot ye not," he says, "what the Scripture saith of Elias? how he maketh intercession to God against Israel, saying, Lord, they have killed Thy prophets, and digged down Thine altars; and I am left alone, and they seek my life. But what saith the answer of God unto him? I have reserved to Myself seven thousand men, who have not bowed the knee to the image of Baal. Even so then at this present time also, there is a remnant according to the election of grace." What he means is nearly this. "God hath not cast off His people." For had He done so, He would have admitted none of them. But if He did admit some, He hath not cast them off. Still it is said, if He had not cast off, He would have admitted all. This does not follow; since in Elijah's time the part to be saved had come down to "seven thousand:" and now also there are probably many that believe. But if you do not know who they are, this is no wonder, for that prophet, who was so great and good a man, did not know. But God ordered things for Himself when even the prophet knew them not. […]

Since from the things said above the Jewish people might perhaps seem to have been cast off by God and to bear no hope, seeing that God has led them into jealousy by a no-nation, and into anger by a foolish nation, and has been made manifest to those who did not seek him, and has been found by those who did not ask after him — therefore the Apostle, wishing to remedy these things and to show that a way of salvation remains for the people of Israel if they believe, and that they were not cast off for the reason that they are of the race of Israel, but because they were unbelieving, says: "God has not cast off his people whom he foreknew." And that he might prove this by a present example, he adds: "For I also am an Israelite, of the seed of Abraham, of the tribe of Benjamin" — and yet I teach the faith of Jesus, and announce that he is the Christ. But if it has not been a hindrance to me that I am an Israelite of the seed of Abraham, so as to keep me from believing in Christ and being justified by faith in him, it is certain that "God has not cast off his people whom he foreknew." And in what sense "whom he foreknew, them he also called; and whom he called, them he also justified," has already been said above; and that for God to foreknow is set down in the Scriptures as meaning not only to know beforehand things future (which cannot even be doubted), but to approve, and to deem worthy of his knowledge.

Second, when he says: God has not cast away, he shows that his people has not been rejected by God in regard to many chosen ones. First, he states his proposition; second, he recalls a similar situation, saying do you not know; third, he adapts …