It seems to me that the question which Calvinists and Arminians seek to answer (the question of God's sovereignty versus freewill, in individual salvation) is a question that St Paul himself never directly addressed.
Romans 9-11 was Paul's defence of the doctrine of salvation by faith. These chapters don't seem to me to have been intended as a lecture on the question of God's sovereignty versus man's freewill in individual salvation.
Paul had just finished stating his premise that salvation is by faith (Romans chapters 1-8). Now in chapters 9-11 Paul addresses certain questions which arise because of that premise.
If salvation is by faith, does that not mean God's promises to Israel have failed? many were asking. Paul demonstrates that it is in keeping with God's nature, and not without precedent in Scripture, that God should do such a thing - that God should, of His own sovereign prerogative, extend His mercy upon His own basis - on the basis of grace through faith - rather than on the basis of nationality or works of the Law.
It is in this context that Paul's statements are to be understood. He wasn't answering the same question that Calvin and Armenius were asking.
To fail to understand Paul's statements in this light is to create an issue that Paul never directly addressed in Romans 9-11.
It's like, if I asked my sister to tell me how I could prevent a cake from flopping in the oven - and she wrote her answer to me. And then, many years later, two people begin to argue over how to change a flat tyre, and both of them use the text of my sister's letter to me years before in order to try to make a case for their own view about how to change a flat tyre. But my sister's letter was never about how to change a flat tyre - it was about how to prevent a flat cake! Failing to understand the original question that my sister's letter was addressing, wouldn't help anyone with the question of how to change a flat tyre.
In the same way, using the text of Paul's answer to one question in order to try to answer a completely different question isn't going to help much!
This doesn't mean the question asked by Calvin and Armenius should never be asked. It just means that if someone is going to look for proof texts in order to answer such a question, they will need to source their proof texts elsewhere than in Romans 9-11 since Romans 9-11 is not about that topic.
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