04_Reasoner_388-404 28/10/14 10:43 Pagina 394 394 MARK REASONER acter of first fruits when wrongly consumed. But Paul focuses on the sanctifying power of the first fruits themselves. The holiness that inheres in the first fruits, which brings guilt to erring consumers in both Leviticus and Jeremiah, is viewed by Paul as potent to bring holiness to the whole batch of food from which the first fruits sam- ple is taken. Holiness transferred to erring consumers who then be- come guilty is inverted in Romans 11,16 to holiness that passes from the first fruits to the whole lump from which the first fruits are taken, with no mention of guilt 21. The possibility that Romans is performing an inverse allusion to Jeremiah is made more proba- ble when one notices that the next image in Romans 11, the culti- vated olive tree, is an allusion to the olive tree of Jeremiah 11 that gets burned up and possibly also echoes the description of Israel as a wild vine in Jeremiah 2. Sixth, against Jeremiah’s word that his people have become an olive tree that God will burn up, making its branches useless (Jer 11,16), Rom 11,17.23-24 assert that Israel is a cultivated olive tree whose excised branches will be readily grafted in again 22. Jere- miah’s use of the olive tree is based on Hos 14,7, a prophet that Paul also quotes in this section of Romans. While Rom 11,17-24 may simply be based on Hos 14,7, it is just as likely, in view of the connections between Romans 9–11 and Jeremiah 1–20 mentioned above, that the olive tree metaphor in Romans 11 is inverting Jer 11,16. This inversion might be prompted by Hos 14,7, which is a more positive picture of Israel as an olive tree than that offered in Jer 11,16. LXX Hos 14,7 begins by describing Israel’s growing branches: poreu,sontai oi` kla,doi auvtou/( kai. e;stai w`j evlai,a kata,karpoj… This would help to explain why the metaphor in Romans 11,16.24 draws attention to the holy and natural branches of a cultivated (more fruitful) olive tree. This is also the place to acknowledge that 21 Holladay’s (Jeremiah 1, 84-85) suggestion that Jer 2,3 matches his own emendation of Amos 6,1, in which those of Zion are “the pick of the first (fruits) of the nations, the cream of the crop of the house of Israel” is espe- cially attractive for understanding how Paul may be playing with the topos of Israel as first fruits. While he wants to retain the language of first fruits for Israel (Rom 11,16), the realities of his missionary efforts lead him to sug- gest that the nations come in first, then the Jews (Rom 11,25-26). 22 This connection has already been observed by A. T. HANSON, Studies in Paul’s Technique and Theology (London 1974) 121-124, who suggests that Rom 11,17-24 offers a midrash on Jer 11,16-19.