In Greek these two verses are one sentence, and it is in a different order from that of the Good News Translation. In the Good News Bible the sentence is restructured so as to make the meaning clearer for English readers. This arrangement makes it impossible to indicate a point where verse 11 ends and verse 12 begins.
But in order that the choice of one son might be completely the result of God’s own purpose is actually the second element in the Greek sentence structure. A literal translation of this clause is difficult, but an analysis of it will help to explain the Good News Translation rendering. The subject is “God’s purpose” and the verb is “in order that it might remain.” The subject is modified by an adjective phrase “according to choice.” Thus the entire clause reads “in order that the according-to-choice purpose of God might remain.” And the entire phrase, “the according-to-choice purpose of God,” refers to the purpose of God which expressed itself in a particular choice, in this context the choice of one son. The verb “remain” has the force of “continue to be,” so that the entire clause may be rendered: “in order that the purpose of God might continue to exist on the basis of the choice that he himself made.”
Last in the Greek sentence is the clause God said to her, “The older will serve the younger,” which comes from Genesis 25.23. Actually, God said to her represents a passive construction, “it was said to her,” but God is clearly the agent of speaking.
Even with the reordering of clause in verses 11 and 12 and the repetition of the expressions of choosing, there are still a number of difficulties involved in reproducing these verses in certain languages. In the first place, it may be necessary to place a purpose clause after the clause of means—for example, “God said to Rebecca, Your older son will serve your younger son. He said this in order to show that the choice of one son and not the other depended entirely upon God’s own plan,” or “… in order to show that God selecting one son and not another was because God planned it that way,” or “… God wanted it that way.”
The clause he said this before they were born may need to be somewhat more specific because of the particular context—for example, “he said this to Rebecca before her children were born” or “… before she gave birth to her two sons.”
Before they had done anything either good or bad may require slight modification in order to indicate that this is not any collective activity of the two—for example, “before either one had done anything, whether good or bad.”
So God’s choice was based on his call, and not on anything they did (the third element in the Greek sentence) is literally “not from works but from the one who called.” The term “works” must be taken in the broadest sense possible (not as a specific reference to the works of the Law). “The one who called” is a Semitic way of speaking of God. The New English Bible translates this part of the Greek text as “based not upon men’s deeds but upon the call of God”; Moffatt has “which depends upon the call of God, not on anything man does.”
The transitional particle so must be rendered in some languages as “hence” or “thus, as it can be seen,” since what follows is a conclusion.
It is extremely difficult in some languages to say God’s choice was based on his call, since this would imply that God called one or the other of the sons before he had even made a choice. This, of course, is not what is intended. The text itself indicates simply that the selection of one son in preference to another is a matter of God’s calling one rather than the other and not a matter of what either one of them did. It may be better, therefore, to translate: “what happened depended entirely upon God’s calling one rather than the other; it did not depend on anything that either one had done.”
Quoted with permission from Newman, Barclay M. and Nida, Eugene A. A Handbook on Paul’s Letter to the Romans. (UBS Handbook Series). New York: UBS, 1973. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .