Ephesians, Epistle to the
EPHESIANS, EPISTLE TO THE
This epistle was written by Paul, at Rome, probably A. D. 62. The ablest modern critics are not agreed as to the church to whom it was addressed, whether to that in Ephesus, that in Laodicea, or to both of these in connection with the other churches in that region. It does not appear, however, that any important point of doctrine or instruction depends on the decision of this question. The epistle is now addressed to and is intelligible be every one who studies it. The first part of it is a grateful discourse upon the vast scheme of divine grace, and blessings flowing from it. The latter part inculcates Christian consistency and steadfastness, and a faithful discharge of all relative duties. It is one of the richest and most valuable of the epistles, having a singular fullness of matter, depth of doctrine, sublimity of style, and warmth of emotion, which render it precious to the Christian of every land.
Fuente: American Tract Society Bible Dictionary
Ephesians Epistle To The
1. Date and place of writing.-From internal evidence, there is little difficulty in determining the circumstances under which Ephesians was written. St. Paul is a prisoner at the time (Eph 3:1; Eph 4:1; Eph 6:20), and writes from prison to the saints which are in Ephesus. His imprisonment has lasted long enough to give rise to grave anxiety among the Christian communities (Eph 3:13; Eph 6:22). He speaks or himself as the prisoner (Eph 3:1; Eph 4:1), as though that were a title of honour consecrated by long use. This in itself makes it natural to date the Epistle from Rome rather than from Caesarea. Other internal evidence, though slight, points in the same direction. St. Pauls captivity permits least some liberty in preaching (Eph 6:19-20; cf. Act 28:30-31, Php 1:13-14). The phrase I am a chained ambassador (Eph 6:20) certainly has more point after the appeal to Caesar, and suggests that St. Paul has reached Rome to bear witness for the gospel before kings. And the grand, almost imperial, width of outlook which the Epistle shows may well have been inspired in the provincial citizen from Tarsus when he came at fast to see with his own eyes the city which ruled the world, with its centralized authority and its citizenship open to every land and race (cf. Lock, article Ephesians in Hasting’s Dictionary of the Bible (5 vols) ). It is thus natural to date the Epistle c. [Note: . circa, about.] a.d. 60.
This result would be quite inevitable if it could be maintained that Eph. is a later work than Phil., which must certainly have been written from Rome (Php 1:13, etc.). This has been argued by such writers as Bleek, Lightfoot (Philippians4, 1878, p. 30ff.), Sanday (Smiths Dict. of the Bible 2 i. [1893] 627), Hart (Judaistic Christianity, 1894, p. 115f.), Lock (loc. cit.). It is true that Phil. resembles the earlier Epistles in style and manner more than do the other Captivity Epistles. But it is impossible to postulate an orderly development in these things in such a writer as St. Paul. There is nothing in Eph. or Col. more startling as a development of Pauline doctrine than Php 2:11-25. And the note of urgency and anxiety in Phil. marks it out as dating from the last days of the captivity at Rome (cf. Moffatt, Introd. to Literature of the New Testament (Moffatt)., pp. 168-170; Ramsay, St. Paul the Traveller and the Roman Citizen, 1895, p. 357f.).
A more certain result as to Eph. is given by its relation to Col. and Philemon. The three Epistles are all sent by the hand of Tychicus to the same district. Col. and Philem. at least were sent together, and the literary connexion between Col. and Eph. is so close that it seems inevitable to associate Eph. with the other two. Philem. at least must have been sent from Rome, despite the arguments of Reuss and Meyer; and this carries with it the conclusion that Eph. was sent from the same place (see article Colossians).
2. Occasion and purpose.-This Epistle stands alone among the Pauline literature. The other twelve writings ascribed to St. Paul have all some special and more or less urgent occasion and purpose, whether personal or controversial. Here neither purpose nor occasion can he clearly traced. The writer is not concerned to press his claims against rivals or opponents. The bitter controversy with Judaizing teachers lies in the past, and only faint echoes of the battle can be heard (Eph 2:11; Eph 2:14; Eph 2:17). The troubles at Colossae are in the background (Eph 1:10; Eph 1:21; Eph 2:2; Eph 2:8; Eph 3:10; Eph 6:12), but do not ruffle the serenity of the writers mind. No special dangers seem to lie before the readers. Apart from the address, indeed, it would be difficult to see that any special readers are intended, though in the main the Epistle is addressed to Gentile converts (Eph 1:13; Eph 2:1; Eph 2:11; Eph 2:13 etc.). Some danger of false teaching is perhaps suggested in Eph 4:14; Eph 4:18, but the references are quite general in character. Controversy is laid aside for the time being, and the writer deals with the problems of the Gentile Church in a spirit at once detached and lofty. Two special points emerge, half the Epistle being devoted to each. Chs. 1-3 deal with the respective positions of Jew and Gentile in the unity of the Church, from which we may conjecture that this was one of the main difficulties in the churches founded by St. Paul. It was, indeed, inevitable that it should be so, as the controversies of a few years. before had shown. But now the position is changed. The danger is no longer that of the Judaizing teacher, but rather lest the growing Gentile communities should tend to despise the Jewish Christians in their midst (Eph 2:1; Eph 2:8; Eph 2:11-15; cf. Eph 1:12-14). Chs. 4-6 deal with the most constant danger of the Gentile convert-the danger of relapse into the vices of paganism.
But neither of these dangers has come to the front in any special form, and the dominant note of the Epistle is not one of warning, but one of praise and thanksgiving. The writers mind is full of one great theme-the unity of the Church in Christ, predestined from all eternity to all eternity, bound together in faith and love. And, as he takes up his argument, the style rises in dignity and strength until we seem to be listening to a Eucharistic hymn. Against the dangers of the hour he sets the inspiration of a great ideal, the One Body of Christ who died for Jew and Gentile alike, the One Church, ordered by Christ Himself, in which every man, if he will, may lead the life of the Spirit.
3. Analysis.-(A) Chs. 1-3. The unity of the Church, regarded as that in which Jew and Gentile are at last one. The whole of this section is an expansion of the typical thanksgiving and prayer with which St. Paul usually opens his letters.
(1)Eph 1:1-2. Salutation.
(2)Eph 1:3-14. Thanksgiving for the privileges bestowed in Christ upon the Church. This section falls into three strophes, marked by the refrain unto the praise of his glory, and corresponding to the three Persons of the Trinity.
(a)Eph 1:3-6. Thanksgiving for the adoption as sons, predestined by the Father before the foundation of the world.
(b)Eph 1:7-12, Thanksgiving for the revelation or Gods good pleasure in Christ, in whom we have redemption from sin, grace to live anew, and knowledge of our place in Gods purpose to sum up all things in Him.
(c)Eph 1:13-14. Thanksgiving that in the Holy Spirit both Jew and Gentile have even here and now an earnest of that great heritage.
(3)Eph 1:15-23. Prayer that the readers may grow to a fuller understanding of the work of Christ.
(a)Eph 1:15-19. Prayer that they may realize more fully the threefold Messing or Eph 1:3-14 -their adoption as sons their heritage in Christ, their new life in the Spirit.
(b)Eph 1:20-23. Prayer that they may come to see Christ as He really is, the consummation of all things in heaven and earth, and supreme Head of His Church.
(4)Eph 2:1-22. A further thanksgiving for all that is implied in this conception of the Church, worked out especially in relation to the position of Jews and Gentiles therein.
(a)Eph 2:1-10. The power of God which was shown in Christ has been shown too upon all individual Christians, whether Gentile (Eph 2:1-2) or Jew (Eph 2:3), raising them from the death of sin (Eph 2:5; contrast Eph 2:20), causing them to ascend with Christ into the heavenly sphere (Eph 2:6; cf. Eph 2:20), and giving them a place in the Church, through which God has purposed to work (Eph 2:7-10; cf. Eph 1:21; Eph 1:23).
(b)Eph 1:11-22. Thus the divisions or humanity are healed. The Gentile who was once far off is made nigh in the blood of Christ (Eph 1:11-13). The barriers set up by the Jewish Law are broken down (Eph 1:14-15). Jew and Gentile now stand together in one fellowship, both having their access to the Father through Christ in one Spirit (Eph 1:16-18). So is the Temple of God built, with Christ as its chief corner stone (Eph 1:19-22).
(5)Eph 3:1-21. A further prayer that the readers may apprehend the fullness of this great life in Christ, in which all the saints join (Eph 1:1-19), and a doxology, closing this section of the Epistle (Eph 1:20-21).
This section is interrupted by a passage (Eph 1:2-13) in which the writer dwells upon his own position as the chosen vessel through whom this mystery of the Church was to be preached to the Gentiles. The appointed time and means had been fixed by the purpose of God, and the revelation given in the Church affected not only earth but also all heaven. The sufferings of the writer are thus no cause for discouragement. They too lie in the purpose of God.
(B) Chs. 4-6. The unity of the Church, regarded as a principle of conduct, enabling all to lead the higher life.
(1) Eph 4:1 to Eph 5:21. A general appeal addressed to the whole Church.
(a)Eph 4:1-3. Exhortations to lead the life of love, which is the life of the Spirit.
(b)Eph 4:4-16. The unity of the Church, upon its practical side, which rests upon the unity of God (Eph 4:4-6). It is by Gods gift that the organization of the Church exists in diverse ministries (Eph 4:7-11). And the purpose of it all is the perfecting of saints, that each may take his place in the living whole of the Body of Christ, perfect in faith and knowledge and love (Eph 4:12-16).
(c)Eph 4:17-24. The old Gentile life, based upon ignorance and resulting in impurity, contrasted with the new life, based upon knowledge of Christ and resulting in righteousness and holiness of truth.
(d)Eph 4:25 to Eph 5:21. A more detailed description of the Christian life as it should be lived by members of the Church.
(i.)Eph 4:25. Truthfulness-a lie to another Christian is a lie to oneself.
(ii.)Eph 4:26-27. Control of temper, for fear of the accuser, i.e. either of the Satan in heaven, or of calumniators on earth.
(iii.)Eph 4:28. Honesty, as the basis of right giving.
(iv.)Eph 4:29-30. Pure conversion, lest others, be injured, and the Holy Spirit be grieved.
(v.)Eph 4:31-32. Gentleness, as God was gentle in Christ.
(vi.)Eph 5:1-2. Love, as Christ loved.
(vii.)Eph 5:3-14. Purity of speech and action, even to the avoidance of the foolish word and Jest, as unworthy of our calling (Eph 5:3-4), as incurring Gods wrath (Eph 5:5-6), as wholly foreign to the life of light in Christ (Eph 5:7-14).
(viii.)Eph 5:15-17. Wise use of time, since the days are evil.
(ix.)Eph 5:18-21. Temperance and orderly thanksgiving in public worship, and in particular at the love-feasts (in the spirit of 1 Corinthians 11-14).
(2)Eph 5:22 to Eph 6:9. An exhortation to members of Christian families. The writer takes the family as the type of the Church (cf. Eph 3:15), and applies the general principles of the unity of the Spirit to the details of family life.
(a)Eph 5:22-24. Wives, are to recognize the position of the husband as head of the family, as Christ is head of the Church.
(b)Eph 5:25-33. Husbands are to love their wives, with whom they have been made one, as Christ loves the Church, with which He is one.
(c)Eph 6:1-3. Children must obey their parents, as is naturally right, and an God has commanded.
(d)Eph 6:4. Parents ought to train their children wisely.
(e)Eph 6:5-8. Slaves are to obey loyally, since their obedience is to God Himself.
(f)Eph 6:9. Masters must treat their slaves justly, since they themselves are but slaves of a Master in heaven.
(3)Eph 6:10-24. A general exhortation to all Christians to fight Gods battle in His strength (Eph 6:10) and clad in His armour (Eph 6:11; Eph 6:13-17), seeing that the enemy is more than man (Eph 6:12). The section passes into a request for prayer for the writer in prison (Eph 6:19-20), and thus it naturally leads up to a commendation of Tychicus, the bearer of the letter, and then to a final greeting.
4. Authorship.-The above analysis will make it clear how carefully constructed and worked out Ephesians is. The long sentences, cumbrous and difficult to follow as they are, are yet almost rhythmic in their balance. Everything is connected and co-ordinated with the one great idea, and the result is a composition quite unlike any other writing assigned to St. Paul. Yet the claim to Pauline authorship is quite explicit. It not only occurs in the address (Eph 1:1) and in the final messages (Eph 6:20), but is woven into the very structure of the Epistle in Eph 3:1 and Eph 4:1. Either we have a genuine work by the Apostle or else a pseudonymous writing, composed at a very early date by a disciple upon whom had fallen a double portion of the Apostles spirit. And of such a disciple we have no other trace.
(1) Internal evidence.-The very simplicity of the references to St. Paul is a strong argument for the authenticity of the Epistle. There is a great contrast between Eph. and 2 Pet. in this respect. The laboured allusions of the latter to St. Peters life are not convincing; but could even a close disciple have coined the beautiful and simple phrase, I Paul, the prisoner of Christ Jesus? Or would he have been likely to refer to his great master as less than the least of all saints (Eph 3:8) even with 1Co 15:9 before him? On the other hand, there are one or two phrases, apart from questions of style and doctrine, which will he discussed later, which seem to some critics to be watermarks of a later age (Moffatt, Introd. to Literature of the New Testament (Moffatt)., p. 386). Such is the phrase, built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets (Eph 2:20), an expression not very suspicious in itself, but rendered suspect by the phrase his holy apostles and prophets (Eph 3:5). Such language would certainly be natural at a later date, and it is hardly like St. Paul to include himself under the term holy apostles. Two explanations have been given. (a) It is suggested that the word is not part of the original text. It is true that Origen and Theodoret show traces of a text which omitted the word, but this is not very strong evidence. Yet it might easily have been added at an early date by a reverent scribe, or have crept in by dittography from (TOICATIOICATIOCT…), or by confusion with Col 1:26. (b) It is pointed out, e.g. by Salmond (Ephesians in Expositors Greek Testament , pp. 223 and 304), that does not mean holy in our modern sense, but simply consecrated to Gods service. This is its sense in the Pauline salutations and in Eph 3:8, and it is thus possible to conceive St. Paul including himself under the phrase in Eph 3:5. But (c) it is not obvious that he does do so. St. Paul had always stood apart from the original Twelve, and though sometimes, as in Gal. and 2 Cor., he is concerned to defend his commission, he was fully aware of a real difference of position (1Co 15:9). Here some real point seems to lie in the distinction. St. Paul is arguing that he was specially chosen of God for this ministry. Humble though he was, he had shared the revelation given to the Twelve (cf. St. Peter and Cornelius), and he, and not they, had been called to proclaim the mystery of the Church to the Gentiles (Eph 3:8). The words in Eph 3:7-8 seem to distinguish him from the holy apostles of Eph 3:5, where St. Paul is not thinking of himself at all. If this is Son 3:5, though certainly unique, is not unnatural. In any case, whatever be the explanation of Eph 3:5; Eph 3:8 remains a watermark of St. Paul himself, as indeed does the whole passage, Eph 3:2-14, in its abrupt intrusion into the sequence of thought. The passage whereby, when ye read, ye can perceive my understanding (Eph 3:4) also sounds to Moffatt characteristic of a disciple of St. Paul rather than of St. Paul himself, but the conclusion is not at all necessary.
(2) External evidence.-This preliminary investigation, then, rather favours the authenticity of the Epistle than otherwise, and this result is entirely borne out by the external evidence of early writers. Ephesians is one of the best-attested books of the NT. By the middle of the 2nd cent. it was widely known. Both the Old Latin and the Syriac Versions had it. The evidence of Hippolytus shows that it was used by the Ophites (Philosophoumena, v. 8), the Valentinians (vi. 34, 35), and perhaps by Basilides (vii. 25, 26). Marcion included it in his Pauline Canon, under the title to the Laodiceans (see below). It seems to be quoted by Hermas (cf. Eph 4:4 with Sim. ix. 13). Earlier still Polycarp quotes Eph 2:8-9 in Phil. i. 3, and, still more definitely, Eph 4:26 in Phil. xii. 1 (Lat.). The evidence of Ignatius is almost equally certain: Polyc. v. 1 is a definite quotation of Eph 5:25, and allusions may be seen to Eph 1:23 and Eph 2:16 in Smyrn. i. 4, to Eph 4:2-3 in Polyc. i. 2, to Eph 5:1 in Eph. i. 1, x. 3. The passage in Eph. xii. Paul cannot be translated as a definite reference to our Epistle, and is indeed evidence (see below, 5) that the traditional address is in error. Traces of Eph. have been found in Clement of Rome and in the Didache, but they cannot be called certain.
This evidence is sufficient to throw the Epistle into the 1st cent., and provides at least a strong presupposition that it is Pauline.
5. Destination.-An immediate difficulty arises with the acceptance of Eph. as the work of St. Paul. He was very well known in Ephesus. He had spent over two years of his ministry there (Act 19:8-10). The leaders of the Church there had been his close friends, and had parted from him at Miletus with every display of affection (Act 20:36-38). And yet Eph. conveys no personal greetings. There is no hint that St. Paul was known to the readers, or they to him. All that we can gather from the letter is that they are Gentile Christians (Eph 1:13; Eph 2:1; Eph 2:11; Eph 2:13; Eph 2:17; Eph 3:1). St. Paul has heard of their faith in Christ (Eph 1:15). He does not seem certain, whether they all know how definitely and specially he had been commissioned to preach to the Gentiles (Eph 3:2, and hence the whole digression Eph 3:2-13). If the letter was actually sent to Ephesus (so Schmidt in Meyer5; Alford), this is incredible. And even if the Pauline authorship is given up it remains quite impossible to think that a disciple of St. Paul should have written in his masters name so cold a letter to St. Pauls friends. The evidence of Ignatius raises a further difficulty, since he definitely writes to Ephesus about all the letters of St. Paul (Eph. xii.), without any hint that the most sublime of them all had been definitely addressed to the Ephesians themselves.
This being so, it is a relief to find that the address is very doubtful. The title to the Ephesians, though known to Tertullian (adv. Marc. v. 11) and given in the Muratorian Canon, does not go far back into the 2nd century. There is very little doubt that the original test of Eph 1:1 had no allusion to Ephesus at all. The vast majority of Manuscripts have , but the words are absent in the first hand of and B. They are cancelled by the corrector of 67, who had access to very good textual material. The more ancient copies known to Basil omitted the words. Origen evidently did not read them in his text, since he translates those that have real existence, illustrating the meaning from the use by Christ of the phrase I am. Jerome and others repeat this interpretation, which was also known to Basil. Most important of all, Marcions copy evidently lacked the words, since he regarded the Epistle as addressed to the Laodiceans. And that Tertullians text was the same is shown by the fact that Tertullian only abuses Marcion for changing the title, but says nothing about corruption of the actual text (adv. Marc. v. 11, 17).
This evidence makes it almost impossible to think that any place-name, whether Ephesus, or Laodicea, or another, stood in the original text of Eph 1:1, since no reason is apparent for its wide-spread omission and corruption. The evidence of Basil shows that our present reading grew up only shortly before a.d. 370. And in any case it is most unnatural Greek. Harnack (Die Adresse des Epheserbriefs des Paulus, 1910) has recently argued that Eph. was originally addressed to Laodicea, being in fact the letter from Laodicea of Col 4:16. He conjectures that the change in the address took place about the beginning of the 2nd cent., with the decline of the Church of Laodicea (Rev 3:14-15), on the grounds that such a church had no claim to own a Pauline letter. The conjecture is certainly brilliant, but there is no parallel for such treatment of the NT books, and the Manuscripts with no place-name at all remained unexplained (see Moffatt, Expositor, 8th ser. ii. [1911] 193f.). What then may be inferred from the textual evidence? Three alternatives are possible.
(a) It is suggested that the words should be omitted, and that our present text is then correct (so e.g. Moffatt, and the majority of those who reject the Pauline authorship). Unfortunately, as indeed Origens attempt at explanation shows, the reading so obtained gives rather poor sense. The translation the saints who are also believers (Meyer) is hardly possible, and the saints who are also faithful (Lightfoot, Salmond) is still difficult. It is very hard to suppose that St. Paul would make so pointed an allusion at this stage to saints who were unfaithful. The difficulty arises not so much from the meaning of , which here, as in Eph 3:5, has the Jewish sense of consecrated, as from the general force of the passage.
(b) Again, omitting the words , we may suppose that a blank was left after in which Tychicus could insert the names of different churches. This view presupposes, with Beza, that Eph. was sent not to any one church, but to the group of churches in Asia founded, like Colossae, Laodicea, and Hierapolis, not by St. Paul, but by such agents as Epaphras. This would account for the impersonal tone of the Epistle, and for the absence of any clear trace of special local problems. The view that Eph. is such a Pastoral, with a blank left for the address, is due to Archbishop Ussher, and has been held by most conservative critics (e.g. Hort). In its broad outline this theory is probably right. The whole character of the Epistle shows that it is addressed to a wide circle of readers, and not to any one church. That the readers addressed lived in the neighbourhood of Ephesus is suggested (1) by the relations, especially in thought, with Col.; (2) by the fact that Eph. is sent by the hand of Tychicus; and above all (3) by the tradition associating it with Ephesus, where the original was probably preserved (Haupt and Zahn). This view relieves the difficulty as to the Pauline authorship due to the impersonal tone of the letter.
It does not, however, solve the problem of Eph 1:1 (see Zahn, Introd. to NT, i. 479-483, 488f.), for (1) there is no parallel for such a method of correspondence; (2) if the blanks had been filled in with different names in different copies, we should not have had Manuscripts with no name at all; (3) the order in the Greek is unnatural. The place-name should come elsewhere (cf. Col 1:1, Php 1:1).
(c) These difficulties have driven many scholars to think that the text of Eph 1:1 is unsound, whether, as P. Ewald suggests, through the wearing of the papyrus or otherwise. Ewald himself suggests , those who are beloved and faithful. Zahn prefers to follow the reading of D, , those who are holy and faithful. This is at least easy, but hardly accounts for the corruptions (though dittography might have brought in the second ). Others think that St. Paul, in accordance with his general custom, must have mentioned some definite destination. The most ingenious conjecture of this kind is that of R. Scott (The Pauline Epistles, p. 182)- for , i.e. the saints among the Gentiles. This, however, is not free from some of the above objections, and is wholly without supporting evidence.
Holtzmanns effort to explain Eph 1:1 as a bungling attempt by the writer to adapt Col 1:1 to his more general purpose is effectively refuted by Zahn (op. cit. p. 517f.).
As a result of the above discussion, Eph 1:1 remains an unsolved problem, but it is clear that the traditional address of Eph. is no part of the text of the Epistle. Its existence is best explained on the hypothesis of a circular letter, sent by the hand of Tychicus to the churches in the neighbourhood of Ephesus. To explain the early title to Ephesians, as does Baur, from Eph 6:21 and 2Ti 4:12 (Tychicus have I sent to Ephesus) is far-fetched. Whether, as Harnack thinks, Eph. should be identified with the letter from Laodicea to be brought, presumably, by Tychicus to Colossae, must remain doubtful (see article Colossians). Whatever be the exact facts, no objection to the Pauline authorship of Ephesians remains on the score of the destination of the Epistle.
This view of Ephesians as a Pauline pastoral has been held (with varying theories of Eph 1:1) by, e.g., Bengel, Reuss, Lightfoot, Hort, Weiss, Abbott, Salmond, Zahn, Peake. Nevertheless, its authenticity has been widely disputed since the time of Schleiermacher, on three main grounds: (a) the doctrinal standpoint; (b) the vocabulary and style; (c) the connexion with Col. and with other NT writings.
6. The doctrine of the Epistle.-Few scholars still support the view-of the Tbingen School that Eph. shows traces of both Montanism and 2nd cent. Gnosticism. Schwegler saw Montanism in the emphasis on the Holy Spirit (e.g. Eph 1:13; Eph 2:18, and especially Eph 3:5; Eph 4:4), and in the position given to the prophets (Eph 2:20; Eph 3:5; Eph 4:11). Gnosticism was said to be the source of such terms as pleroma and aeon. Baur argued that Eph. was not written against Gnosticism, but that it showed signs of its early phases. As we now know, the date (a.d. 130-140) which he gave on this hypothesis would be much too late. Gnosticism was fully developed before the middle of the century. Hilgenfeld and O. Pfleiderer see in both Eph. and Col. a polemic against Gnosticism. Pfleiderer, e.g., sees in Eph 4:20 f. an allusion to a Gnostic theory which separated the Christ of speculation from the Jesus of the evangelical tradition (Primitive Christianity, iii. 303). He finds that the quotation of Psa 68:18 in Eph 4:8 f. depends on the Gnostic myth of the victorious descent to hell and ascent to heaven of the Saviour-god to which allusion is also made in Col 2:15 (p. 311). He traces the use of pleroma to Gnosticism, ignoring the fact that it was a good Pauline word (e.g. Rom 11:25), and that it is certainly not used in any Gnostic sense.
The external evidence alone is sufficient to rule out such theories, throwing the Epistle back to a date before the technicalities of Valentinianism had been developed. More plausible is the view of Holtzmann, who regards Ephesians as written at about the end of the 1st cent., in view of incipient Gnosticism and of ecclesiastical needs. He thinks that an old letter to Colossae by St. Paul existed and that Eph. and Col. were composed by a single writer, in the one case using its ideas and in the other expanding it. The proof, however, that there is nothing necessarily un-Pauline in Col. (see article Colossians) does away with the need for this theory, which is in any case hampered by two difficulties: (a) that of finding a writer capable of composing such a work and at the same time of being so servile in his adherence to the language of Colossians; and (b) that of finding a historical setting for the Epistle. There must surely be a greater gulf between it and Ignatius with his violent attacks on Judaizers and Docetists and his emphasis on the monarchical episcopacy.
It is, therefore, more common nowadays among those who find difficulties in the Pauline authorship to assign Eph. to a Paulinist writing quite soon after St. Pauls death (see e.g. Moffatt, op. cit. p. 388). It is argued that the theology of the Epistle marks a transition stage between St. Paul and the Johannine literature.
This does not involve the assumption that Paul was not original enough to advance even beyond the circle of ideas reflected in Colossians, or that he lacked constructive and broad dideas of the Christian brotherhood. It is quite possible to hot that he was a fresh and advancing thinker, and yet to conclude, from the internal evidence of Ephesians, that he did not cut the channel for this prose of the spiritual centre (Moffatt, op. cit. p. 389).
Upon this view, the theology of Eph., though quite continuous with that of St. Paul, is a later development, under the influence of Johannine, and possibly Lucan, ideas.
Such a view is too intangible to admit of very easy refutation. At the same time, it should be noted that it provides very little ground for disputing the strong and early tradition of the Pauline authorship of the Epistle. A discussion of the doctrinal standpoint of Eph. will serve to put the matter in a clearer light.
(a) The Church.-The whole Epistle turns upon the doctrine of the unity of the Church. This is made the key both to the relations of Jew and Gentile (Eph 2:11-22) and to the problems of the Christian life (4 and 5). Its unity is not merely that of any human organization, but rests directly upon the unity of God-Father, Son, and Holy Spirit (Eph 4:4-6). That unity is derived from the Father (Eph 3:15), by whom it was fore-ordained in Christ (Eph 1:4; Eph 1:9 f.). It is ideally complete in Christ and in Him is to become actually complete (Eph 1:9; Eph 1:22-23; Eph 2:15; Eph 4:12-16). Even now it has as its principle of life the One Spirit (Eph 1:14; Eph 2:18; Eph 3:16; Eph 4:3). In some sense it is the completion of the Incarnation (Eph 1:23; cf. Armitage Robinson, On the meaning of in Ephesians, p. 255ff.), for in it Christ comes into all the saints (Eph 3:17) and all the saints into Him (Eph 2:6; Eph 2:13; Eph 4:12-16). The organization of the Church is simply the expression of this unity, and the means, given by Christ Himself, whereby it is being actualized (Eph 4:7-12). Baptism is the door of the Church (Eph 4:5; Eph 5:26), faith its bond of union (Eph 4:5), love the expression of that union (Eph 4:2; Eph 5:2, etc.). The unity even extends beyond this earth into the heavenly regions (Eph 2:6; cf. Eph 1:20; Eph 3:10).
Such an emphasis upon the Church is certainly not found elsewhere in St. Paul. Yet there is no one feature which is specifically un-Pauline, and no reason can be given why St. Paul should not in a time of leisure, undisturbed by the clash of controversy, have set down for the churches he had founded those principles which had underlain all his ministry.
It has been urged that St. Paul dealt only with individual churches, and that the use of the term church () in Eph. is foreign to his writings. But as a matter of fact the idea of one Church Universal underlies all St. Pauls thought. Especially in 1 Cor. he appeals throughout to general church practice (e.g. 1Co 10:32; 1Co 11:16; 1Co 14:33; 1Co 14:36). He speaks of the churches as a whole (Rom 16:16, 1Co 4:17; 1Co 7:17). They are one body in Christ, with an articulated, organized membership (Rom 12:5), and this conception is expanded in 1Co 12:12 ff. They form one Church (, in the singular; cf. 1Co 12:28, Gal 1:13). The same conception and usage are repeated in the later Epistles (Php 3:5, Col 1:16; Col 1:24). The statements in Col. are, indeed, quite as full in idea as those in Ephesians. The conception of Christ as awaiting fulfilment or completion in some sense in His Body, the Church, is present in Col 1:24. The organic unity of Christ with the Church as its Head is in Col 1:18. The conception of the Church as extending into the heavenly regions is directly involved in St. Pauls answer to the Colossian heretics (Col 1:19-20). This adaptation of his thought is quite natural, though its first clear formulation in his mind may have been due to the troubles at Colossae, leading him to correlate his views on angelology (see article Colossians) with his views on Christ and the Church. The thought is present, in an unapplied form, in Php 3:20 (with which also cf. Eph 2:19, Php 1:27).
It is urged that it is new in St. Paul to find the unity of the Church traced back to Christs cosmic position (Moffatt, op. cit. p. 393). But this is really rather a question of Christology than of the doctrine of the Church. Solidarity in Christ is the most characteristic part of St. Pauls teaching. The thought of the early chapters of Romans is simply its application to anthropology, the problem of sin. In Eph., with a wider purpose in view, it is applied to the problems of humanity regarded as a whole in its relation to God. The cosmological form which the argument takes is doubtless due in part to the situation at Colossae. But Rom 8:20-21 is a hint that there were similar elements in St. Pauls thought at an earlier date.
The fact that in Eph. the writer seems to pose as the defender of Jewish against Gentile Christians has been regarded as proof that he is not the St. Paul of the Galatian controversy. But it may well have been that by a.d. 60 there was danger that the Gentile Christians in the churches of Asia might outnumber and tend to despise their Jewish brethren. St. Pauls concern was always to secure the position of both Jew and Gentile in the Church. His argument in Eph. is really exactly like that in Romans. Both Jew and Gentile are brought down to one level by sin (Rom 3:9-20, Eph 2:1-5; cf. Gal 3:22), and are therefore joined in one redemption (Rom 10:12; Rom 11:32, Eph 2:16-18). In Romans 11 we find the same attitude of apology for the Jews as in Ephesians 2 (cf. also Rom 7:7; Rom 9:1 ff.). Gal 3:23-28 also gives an argument practically identical in substance with that of Ephesians.
Some have thought that the interest in church organization is un-Pauline, and that the details mentioned involve a later date. It would be possible to argue that the very reverse is the case. The mention of apostles and prophets as fore-most in the ministry of the Church (Eph 4:11) is exactly paralleled by 1Co 12:28. Thus there is nothing un-natural in the special position given to them in Eph 2:20; Eph 3:5. From the earliest days the ministry of prophets had existed in the Church, and it is very doubtful whether by the end of St. Pauls life the beginnings of the organization which superseded them were not beginning to appear. By the time the Didache was written the position of the prophet was becoming equivocal, and the allusions in Eph. could hardly have been written. The mention of evangelists (Eph 4:11) is no mark of a later date, since no such office became definitely established. The general interest in church order shown in Eph. is no greater than in 1 Cor. (especially 1 Corinthians 12).
It has been noted as curious, in the light of 1Co 10:17, that the Eucharist is not mentioned in connexion with church unity. The reference to 1 Cor., however, is not quite in point, since the passage is concerned not with unity but with the dangers of idolatry. And there is no other hint either in St. Paul or in Acts that the Eucharist was regarded as a bond of union among the churches.
(b) God the Father.-This doctrine receives no peculiar expansion in Eph., though it is certainly emphasized, the title Father occurring eight times as against four in Romans. It is brought into direct connexion with the ideal unity of the Church (Eph 4:6), which springs from the eternal purpose of the Father acting through and in the Son (Eph 1:4-5; Eph 1:22-23; Eph 2:10-11). The unique Fatherhood of God is the principle underlying all human or angelic solidarity (Eph 3:15), and it is for this reason that St. Paul treats the family, in which this solidarity is exhibited on a small scale, as an exemplar of the Church itself. There is no real inconsistency, as has been alleged, between the view of family life in Eph 5:22-23 and the personal preference for celibacy expressed in 1Co 7:8.
The emphasis on Gods eternal purpose is also found in Romans. Its effect in the ultimate restoration of all creation appears in Rom 8:18 ff., its effect in uniting Jew and Gentile in Romans 9-11.
(c) Christology.-The Christology of Eph. is closely akin to that of Colossians. In both Christ is presented as being, in the eternal purpose of God, the bond of union for a divided creation, including within His unity heaven and earth alike, which were created not only in Christ but also for Him (Eph 1:10, Col 1:16-17). This consummation and restoration of all things, including the angelic world, in Christ is to come about through the restoration of man in the Church, which is His Body, His fullness (Eph 1:4; Eph 1:21-23; Eph 3:9-11, Col 1:18-20). The emphasis on Christs pre-existence is much more clearly marked in Col. (Col 1:15(?), Col 1:16-17), though in Eph. it is perhaps implied in Gods purpose in him (Eph 1:4; Eph 1:11; Eph 3:11; cf. also Eph 2:12; Eph 4:9(?)), and in the title Beloved (Eph 1:6). In this, however, there is nothing really new, except that the Pauline angelology, of which traces appear in the earlier Epistles, is here clearly correlated to the doctrine of Christ. It was at Colossae that the angels were being exalted almost to the position of Christ Himself, and it is in Col. that the statements of Christs eternal supremacy take their highest form. But the restoration in Christ of the dislocated creation appears in Rom 8:18 ff. The share of the angels in this is alluded to in 1Co 6:3-4; 1Co 15:24. The pre-existence of Christ finds expression in Rom 8:3; Rom 9:5 (probably), 1Co 10:4; 1Co 15:47 (and context), 2Co 8:9, and is clearly connected with His relation to the Creation in 1Co 8:6, where the emphasis on unity closely resembles the thought of Ephesians. At a slightly later date, almost every point in the Christology of Col. and Eph. is embodied in Php 2:5-11.
It has been noted as un-Pauline that the result of the Cross should be seen in the reconciliation of Jew and Gentile rather than in relation to sin. But this objection is due to imperfect exegesis. It is because the Cross frees all, both Jew and Gentile, from sin that they are able to come into the unity of Christ. The emphasis on individual redemption is just as much present in Eph 2:1-10 as in Romans 1-7. The Pauline doctrine is stated directly in Eph 1:7 (cf. Eph 2:13). The annulling of the Law by the Cross (Eph 2:15) is the very point of St. Pauls argument in the Galatian controversy (Gal 3:13, etc.; cf. also the parallel passage in Col 2:14). The thought in Ephesians may be carried rather further, but it is wholly Pauline. That there is no definite allusion to expiation or propitiation is not of any real significance. The idea was unnecessary to the purpose of Ephesians.
Again it is said that there is in Eph. no hint of the Parousia, the coming of Christ in the near future, and that the idea is replaced, on Johannine lines, by a vista of long ages before the final judgment (Eph 2:7, Eph 3:21). But the reference in Eph 2:7 is probably to ages after the Second Coming, as is perhaps shown by the parallel in Eph 1:21 (see 3 above), and this may also be the meaning in Eph 3:21. In any case, the same language occurs in Rom 1:25; Rom 9:5 and in Gal 1:5, a close parallel to Eph 3:21. References to the Parousia may perhaps be seen in Eph 4:30; Eph 5:6. It is true that there is no emphasis on the doctrine, but St. Paul was never a fanatic about it, as 2 Thess. shows (cf. Rom 11:25).
Other points which are said to be rather Johannine than Pauline also find parallels in the earlier Epistles. Love is emphasized as the relation of Christ to us (Eph 2:4; Eph 5:2; Eph 5:25; cf. Gal 2:20, Rom 8:35; Rom 8:37), as our relation to Christ (Eph 6:24; cf. 1Co 16:22) and to one another (Eph 4:2; Eph 4:15; Eph 5:2; Eph 5:25; cf. 1Th 5:13). Cf. the Hymn to Love in 1 Corinthians 13. The emphasis on the light of Christ amid the darkness (Eph 5:8-14; cf. Eph 4:18), while typical of St. John, is found in 1Th 5:4-5, 2Co 6:14, Rom 13:12.
(d) The Holy Spirit.-Great stress is laid in Eph. upon the Holy Spirit as inspiring the life of the Church (Eph 1:13; Eph 2:18; Eph 3:5; Eph 3:16; Eph 4:3-4; Eph 4:30; Eph 5:18; Eph 6:17). This is quite Pauline (cf. Eph 1:13-14 with 2Co 1:22; 2Co 4:3-4 with 1Co 12:4-13; see also Gal 5:16; Gal 5:24, Rom 15:13).
(e) Man and sin.-This is the special subject of Rom. and not of Ephesians. Yet the hints in Eph. are quite in accordance with St., Pauls earlier teaching. The doctrine of the , the root-idea in the conception of original sin, appears in Eph 2:3. The characteristic emphasis on the grace of God which saves man by faith and not by works is found in Eph 2:5-8 (cf. Eph 3:12). Predestination to life is the theme of Eph 1:4; Eph 1:11-14, though the problem of free-will is not raised, being unessential to the matter in hand.
It has been suggested that there is an un-Pauline emphasis on knowledge, more on the lines of the Fourth Gospel (e.g. Joh 17:3), in Eph 1:8; Eph 1:17; Eph 4:13. But this does not really conflict with St. Pauls opposition to the wisdom of this world in 1 Corinthians 1-4, from which the knowledge alluded to (; cf. Armitage Robinson, Ephesians, p. 248ff.) is a very different thing. Cf. also Rom 10:2, 1Co 1:24; 1Co 2:6-7, Php 1:9, Col 1:9-10; Col 2:2; Col 3:10
This sketch of the doctrine of Eph. will serve to show how closely it resembles in most of its details the doctrine not only of Colossians, but of the earlier Pauline Epistles. It is only in emphasis and in the sustained, almost lyrical, exposition that there is any real contrast. And this may well be explained by a difference of circumstances both in St. Pauls own position and in the audience to which he is writing.
7. Style and language
(1) Language.-The vocabulary as a whole presents phenomena very similar to those of the other Pauline letters. There are 37 words not used elsewhere in the NT (as compared with 33 in Gal., 41 in Phil., 95 in 2 Cor.), and 39 which occur elsewhere, but not in the recognized Pauline writings (Holtzmann, Kritik der Epheser- und Kolosserbriefe, p. 101f., whose list is critically discussed by Zahn, op. cit. pp. 518-522; cf. also Moffatt, op. cit. p. 385f.). This number is not in itself suspicious, and Zahns analysis has shown that the majority of the words are of little significance. Some are due to the occasion and the turn of the metaphor, e.g. those that occur in the account of the Christian armour. Some-e.g. (Eph 4:14), (Eph 5:26)-are terms for which no synonym was readily available. Some are cognate to forms used elsewhere by St. Paul, e.g. ) (Eph 4:12), (Eph 6:18), (Eph 4:18). And against these are to be set about 20 words found only, outside Eph., in the earlier Pauline Epistles.
Some special cases have been thought suspicious The phrase holy apostles (Eph 3:5) has been dealt, with above ( 4). The use of (Eph 4:27; Eph 6:11 cf. 1Ti 3:6, 2Ti 2:26) is curious, as St. Paul elsewhere employs the name Satan (also in the Pastorals, 1Ti 1:20). But there is no reason why he should not have varied in his usage in this way (as happens in 1 Tim.). And, indeed, the reference in Eph 4:27 may not be to Satan but to human calumniators; or perhaps both ideas may be present, and the usage here may also have affected Eph 6:11. The phrase in the heaven-lies, which occurs 5 times, is curious, but might well have been coined by St. Paul in working out the theme of Eph. (cf. 1Co 15:40; 1Co 15:48-49). The word mystery is difficult in Eph 5:32, but is used in the ordinary Pauline manner in Eph 1:9; Eph 3:3-4; Eph 3:9. has a somewhat changed sense in Eph 3:9. The unique use of in Eph 1:14 is paralleled by other transferences of words from an abstract to a concrete sense. On the whole, then, the peculiarities of language are no more than might be expected in any one short document.
(2) Style.-This problem presents more difficulty. The sentences are unusually long and cumbrous, subordinate clauses being strung together in a loose connexion which is frequently difficult to analyze, e.g. Eph 1:3-14; Eph 2:1-7; Eph 3:2-7. Yet they are most carefully wrought and in places are almost poetical in form and balance (esp. Eph 1:3-14, which falls into three stanzas). There are one or two elaborate parentheses (Eph 2:11-12; Eph 3:2-13). These features are only partially paralleled in Col., and present a wide contrast to the impassioned rhetoric of the earlier letters. In this respect Eph. stands by itself. To many critics the general impression produced by the style and tone of the letter is the strongest argument against its authenticity. Yet it is very rash to make assumptions as to the possibilities of so mobile and powerful an intellect as that of St. Paul. In none of his other writings is the clash of controversy or the appeal of friendship wholly absent. At leisure in his prison he may well have looked back over the triumphs of his life and have sat down to write in a mood of quiet yet profound thanksgiving for which his earlier career had seldom given opportunity.
8. Relation to other NT writings
(a) Relation to Colossians.-The relation of Eph. to Col. is, from the point of view of literary criticism, its most striking feature. It has been estimated that 78 out of the 155 verses of Eph. contain phraseology which occurs in Colossians. This is not merely due to the connexion of ideas, which is also close (see above), but is of a character to show that the two Epistles are closely connected in their composition. The details have been elaborately worked out by Holtzmann, De Wette, and others (for a good summary of the facts see Moffatt, op. cit. pp. 375-381; Holtzmanns results are criticized by Sanday, article Colossians in Smiths Dict. of the Bible 2 and by von Soden in JPTh [Note: PTh Jahrbcher fr protestantische Theologie.] , 1887; cf. his Hist. of Early Christian Literature. The writings of the NT). Results differ widely. Holtzmanns discussion went to show that neither Epistle could he regarded as wholly prior, and therefore he postulated a Pauline Col., expanded at a later date by a writer who also composed Eph. upon its basis. But the evidence for the division of Colossians has very largely broken down, with the wider view of the Pauline angelology (see article Colossians). The tendency among scholars is now to assert the authenticity of Col. (so, among those who reject Eph., von Soden [in the main], Klpper, von Dobschtz, Clemen, Wrede, Moffatt). This, if Holtzmanns results are accepted, proves the authenticity of Eph. also. The two Epistles must have been written by one author at about the same time. The alternative is to regard Eph., with De Wette, as a weak and tedious compilation from Col. and the earlier Epistles-a position which will appeal to few-or, more sympathetically, with Moffatt, as a set of variations played by a master hand upon one or two themes suggested by Colossians (op. cit. p. 375). But this does no justice to the real independence of thought in Ephesians. The two main themes-the reconciliation of Jew and Gentile in the Church, and the fact of the Church as influencing Christian life-do not appear in Colossians at all, or only by allusion. The theology is the same, the application very different. Further, it is hard to think that so original a writer would have followed the very structure of Colossians. The rules for family life, e.g., are an integral part of Eph., but have no very clear connexion with the rest of Colossians. It is most natural to suppose, e.g. in Col 3:18-21, that the writer is summarizing what he has written in Eph 5:22-33; Eph 6:1-4, even at the risk of some obscurity. So, too, Col 2:19 has no clear connexion with its context, and must depend upon the fuller Eph 4:15-16 for its explanation.
No parallel for the curious inter-connexion of language is to be found in the employment of sources by Matthew and Luke or of Jude by 2 Peter. There we have frank copying. Here there is nothing of the kind. Again and again phrases are used in Eph. to express or illustrate ideas with which they are not connected at all in Col. (cf. Eph 2:15-16 || Col 2:14; Col 1:20, Eph 3:19; Eph 4:13 || Col 2:9, Eph 2:16; Eph 1:4; Eph 5:27 || Col 1:22). The writers mind is steeped in the language and thought of Col., but he is writing quite independently. The only probable psychological solution of the problem is that one writer wrote both Epistles, and at no great interval. And if so, that writer must have been St. Paul. It is quite likely, indeed, that Col. was composed while Eph. was still unfinished, since the latter is clearly the careful work of many hours, perhaps of many days.
(b) Relation to 1 Peter.-There is a considerable amount of resemblance of thought, structure, and language between Eph. and 1 Peter. This is especially obvious in the directions for family life (note the curious phrase your own husbands in 1Pe 3:1, which seems to depend on Eph 5:22). Other parallels quoted are Eph 1:3 with 1Pe 1:3; 1Pe 3:5 f. with 1Pe 1:10 f. (where it is quite unnecessary to argue that 1 Pet. is prior: the two passages may be independent), Eph 1:4 with 1Pe 1:19-20; 1Pe 2:21 with 1Pe 2:4; 1Pe 1:14 with 1Pe 2:9 (the use of in Eph. is not dependent on that in 1 Pet., being quite different; the former is concrete, the latter not), Eph 1:20 f. with 1Pe 3:22; 1Pe 5:10 f. with 1Pe 5:8-9; 1Pe 4:9 with 1Pe 3:19; 1Pe 4:6. These analogies are not unnatural, on the assumption that St. Peter knew Eph., and certainly do not demand the priority of 1 Pet., as Hilgenfeld and others have argued.
(c) Relation to the Lucan and Johannine writings.-Numerous analogies, mainly of thought, have been found in Eph. to almost every book of the NT, but especially to those connected with the names of St. Luke and St. John. Parallels of language and idea have been seen in the farewell address at Miletus (Act 20:18-35; cf. Moffatt, op. cit. p. 384); and Lock (loc. cit.) draws out the parallels of thought with the Eucharistic prayer in John 17. It is true that many of the conceptions of Eph. are found in the Fourth Gospel, but this is not at all unnatural. The parallels of language are by no means striking. The connexion with Rev., emphasized by Holtzmann, is very slight, and that with Heb. is not much more definite (details in Salmond, Ephesians, in Expositors Greek Testament , p. 212ff.).
The general impression made on the present writer by the study of these various affinities is the outstanding resemblance in general thought, and even in expression, between Eph. and Romans-a resemblance which the difference of style does not obscure. This in itself is a strong witness to the authenticity of the Epistle.
Literature.-The following is only a small selection from a very voluminous literature. I. Commentaries.-Besides the older Commentaries, such an E. W. E. Reuss (1878), H. Alford (71874) and C. J. Ellicott (31864), the most notable are those of A. Klpper (1891), G. G. Findlay (Expos. Bible, 1892), H. von Soden (Hand-Kommentar, 1893, also articles in JPTh [Note: PTh Jahrbcher fr protestantische Theologie.] , 1887, and Hist. of Early Christian Literature. The Writings of the NT, Eng. translation , 1906), T. K. Abbott (International Critical Commentary , 1897 largely linguistic), E. Haupt (in Meyers Krit.-exeg. Kommentar ber das NT, 1902, very valuable exegetically), J. Armitage Robinson (1903, exegetical and philological, no introduction), S. D. F. Salmond (Expositors Greek Testament , 1903) B. F. Westcott (1906), P. Ewald (in Zahns Kommentar zum NT, 1910). Fundament for modem critical studies is H. J. Holtzmanns Kritik der Epheser- und Kolosserbriefe, 1872.
II. Against Pauline authorship.-Besides Baur, Schwegler, Hitzig, are S. Davidson, Introd. to NT3, 1894; C. v. Weizscker, The Apostolic Age, Eng. translation , 1894-95; E. von Dobschtz, Christian Life in the Primitive Church, Eng. translation , 1904; O. Pfleiderer, Primitive Christianity, Eng. translation , 1906-11; R. Scott, The Pauline Epistles, 1909; J. Moffatt, Introd. to Literature of the New Testament (Moffatt).2, 1912.
III. For Pauline authorship.-F. J. A. Hort, Prolegomena to Romans and Ephesians, 1895; A. Robertson, article Ephesians in Smiths Dict. of the Bible 2, 1893; W. Lock, article Ephesians in Hasting’s Dictionary of the Bible (5 vols) ; T. Zahn, Introd. to NT, Eng. translation , 1909 (a storehouse of facts): A. S. Peake, Crit. Introd. to NT, 1909.
L. W. Grensted.
Fuente: Dictionary of the Apostolic Church
Ephesians, Epistle to the
The name of one of the didactic books of the New Testament, written from Rome by Saint Paul sometime during his first Roman captivity (A.D. 61-63). The right of this epistle to a place in the canon of inspired books has never been contested, while its Pauline authorship is proclaimed both by its style and contents, and by the universal testimony of antiquity. The explicit statement of 1:1 would seem to indicate that the letter was written to the Christians who dwelt at Ephesus , but the absence of any allusion to time or place or definite persons, together with the omission of the words “at Ephesus ” from some manuscripts, have led many even conservative scholars to regard the work as a circular letter rather than a message to a particular church. These same reasons make it difficult to determine the precise purpose for which the letter was written. The subject of the letter is “the union of all the faithful, both Jew and Gentile, with Christ and in Christ, as members of the one mystical Body of which Christ is the Head.” In the first three chapters, this theme is presented under a three-fold aspect:
the union of all men in Christ is a plan of God, conceived with infinite love from all eternity,
carried out in fact by the establishment of the Church , the Body of Christ, and
revealed to the Gentiles by the preaching of Paul.
The remaining three chapters are taken up with moral precepts in keeping with the dogma just explained. The words “to reestablish all things in Christ” (1:10) were the battle-cry of the pontificate of Pius X. The description of the Church in 4:4-17, helped to convert Cardinal Manning. In 5:32, the Council of Trent assures us, Paul hints at the sacramental character of matrimony. A section of the third chapter forms part of the Mass and Office of the Sacred Heart, while a passage from the fifth chapter is read as the epistle of the Nuptial Mass.
Fuente: New Catholic Dictionary
Ephesians, Epistle to the
This article will be treated under the following heads: I. Analysis of the Epistle; II. Special Characteristics: (1) Form: (a) Vocabulary; (b) Style; (2) Doctrines; III. Object; IV. To Whom Addressed; V. Date and Place of Composition; Occasion; VI. Authenticity: (1) Relation to other books of the New Testament; (2) Difficulties arising from the form and doctrines; (3) Tradition.
I. ANALYSIS OF THE EPISTLE
The letter which, in the manuscripts containing the Epistles of St. Paul, bears the title “To the Ephesians” comprises two parts distinctly separated by a doxology (Ephesians 3:20 sq.). The address, in which the Apostle mentions himself only, is not followed by a prologue; in fact, the entire dogmatic part develops the idea which is usually the subject of the prologue in the letters of St. Paul. In a long sentence that reads like a hymn (Ephesians 1:3-14), Paul praises God for the blessings which He has bestowed upon all the faithful in accordance with the eternal plan of His will, the sublime plan by which all are to be united under one head, Christ, a plan which, although heretofore secret and mysterious, is now made manifest to believers. Those to whom the Epistle is addressed, having received the Gospel, have, in their turn, been made participants of these blessings, and the Apostle, having recently learned of their conversion and their faith, assures them that he ceases not to give thanks to Heaven for the same (Ephesians 1:15, 16) and that, above all, he prays for them. The explanation of this prayer, of its object and motives, constitutes the remainder of the dogmatic part (cf. Ephesians 3:1, 14). Paul asks God that his readers may have a complete knowledge of the hope of their calling, that they may be fully aware both of the riches of their inheritance and the greatness of the Divine power which guarantees the inheritance. This Divine power manifests itself first in Christ, Whom it raised from the dead and Whom it exalted in glory above all creatures and established head of the Church, which is His body. Next, this power and goodness of God was evidenced in the readers, whom it rescued from their sins and raised and exalted with Christ. But it shone forth, above all, in the establishment of a community of salvation welcoming within its fold both Jews and Gentiles without distinction, the Death of Christ having broken down the middle wall of partition, i.e. the Law, and both sections of the human race having thus been reconciled to God so as thenceforth to form but one body, one house, one temple, of which the apostles and Christian prophets are the foundation and Christ Himself is the chief cornerstone. (Ephesians 1:16-2:20) Paul, as his readers must have heard, was the minister chosen to preach to the Gentiles of this sublime mystery of God, hidden from all eternity and not revealed even to the angels, according to which the Gentiles are made coheirs with the Jews, constitute a part of the same body, and are joint partakers in the same promises (Ephesians 3:1-13). Deeply imbued with this mystery, the Apostle implores the Father to lead his readers to the perfection of the Christian state and the complete knowledge of Divine charity (Ephesians 3:14-19), continuing the same prayer with which he had begun (Ephesians 1:16 sq.).
Having praised God anew in the solemn doxology (Ephesians 3:20 sq.), Paul passes on to the moral part of his letter. His exhortations, which he bases more than is his wont on dogmatic considerations, all revert to that of chapter iv, verse 1, wherein he entreats his readers to show themselves in all things worthy of their vocation. First of all, they must labour to preserve the unity described by the author in the first three chapters and here again brought into prominence: One Spirit, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God. There is, of course, a diversity of ministries, but the respective offices of apostles, prophets, etc. have all been instituted by the same Christ exalted in glory and all tend to the perfection of the society of saints in Christ (Ephesians 4:2-16). From these great social duties, Paul proceeds to the consideration of individual ones. He contrasts the Christian life that his readers are to lead, with their pagan life, insisting above all on the avoidance of two vices, immodesty and covetousness (Ephesians 4:17-5:3). Then, in treating of family life, he wells on the duties of husbands and wives, whose union he likens to that of Christ with His Church, and the duties of children and servants (v, 21-vi, 9). In order to fulfil these duties and to combat adverse powers, the readers must put on the armour of God (vi, 10-20).
The Epistle closes with a short epilogue (vi, 21-24), wherein the Apostle tells his correspondents that he has sent Tychicus to give them news of him and that he wishes them peace, charity, and grace.
II. SPECIAL CHARACTERISTICS
(1) Form
(a) Vocabulary
This letter like all of those written by St. Paul, contains hapax legomena, about seventy-five words which are not found in the Apostle’s other writings; however, it were a mistake to make this fact the basis of an argument against Pauline authenticity. Of these works nine occur in quotations from the Old Testament and others belong to current language or else designate things which Paul elsewhere had had no occasion to mention. Others, again, are derived from roots used by the Apostle and besides, in comparing these hapax legomena one with another, it is impossible to recognize in them a characteristic vocabulary that would reveal a distinct personality. (Cf. Brunet, De l’authenticité de l’épître aux Ephésiens; preuves philologiques”, Lyons 1897; Nägeli, “Der Wortschatz des Apostels Paulus”, Göttingen, 1905.)
(b) Style
This Epistle, even more than that to the Colossians, is remarkable for the length of its periods. The first three chapters contain hardly more than three sentences and these are overladen with relative or participial causes that are simply strung together, frequently without being connected by the logical particles that occur so frequently in St. Paul. Each particular clause is itself encumbered with numerous prepositional modifiers (especially with en and syn) of which it is difficult to state the exact meaning. Often, too, several synonyms are in juxtaposition and in very many cases a noun has an explanatory genitive, the sense of which differs but very slightly from that of the noun itself. For all of these reasons the language of the Epistle, heavy, diffuse, and languid, seems very different from the dialectical, animated, and vigorous style of the Apostle’s uncontested letters. It is important to note that in the moral part of the Epistle these peculiarities of style do not appear and hence they would seem to depend more on the matter treated than on the author himself; in fact, even in the dogmatic expositions in the great Epistles, St Paul’s language is frequently involved (cf. Romans 2:13 sq.; 4:16 sq.; 5:12 sq.; etc.). Moreover, it must be observed that all these peculiarities spring from the same cause: They all indicate a certain redundancy of ideas surging in upon a deep and tranquil meditation on a sublime subject, the various aspects of which simultaneously appear to the author’s mind and evoke his admiration. Hence also the lyric tone that pervades the first three chapters, which constitute a series of praises, benedictions, thanksgivings, and prayers. A sort of rhythmic composition has been pointed out in chapter i (cf. T. Innitzer, “Der ‘Hymnus’ im Eph., i, 3-14” in “Zeitschrift fur katholische Theologie”, 1904, 612 sq.), and in chapter iii traces of liturgical hymnology have been observed (Ephesians 3:20), but they are no more striking than in I Cor. and are not to be compared with the liturgical language of I Clement.
(2) Doctrines
The doctrines on justification, the Law, faith, the flesh, etc., that are characteristic of the great Pauline Epistles, are not totally lacking in the Epistle to the Ephesians, being recognizable in chapter ii (1-16). However, the writer’s subject does not lead him to develop these particular doctrines. On the other hand, he clearly indicates, especially in chapter i, the supreme place which, in the order of nature and grace, is allotted to Christ, the author and centre of creation, the point towards which all things converge, the source of all grace, etc. Although, in his great Epistles, St. Paul sometimes touches upon these doctrines (cf. 1 Corinthians 8:6; 15:45 sq.; 2 Corinthians 5:18 sq.), they constitute the special object of his letter to the Colossians, where he develops them to a much greater extent than in that to the Ephesians. In fact this Epistle treats more of the Church than of Christ. (On the doctrine of the Church in the Epistle to the Ephesians see Méritan in “Revue biblique”, 1898, pp. 343 sq., and W. H. Griffith Thomas in the “Expositor”, Oct., 1906, pp. 318 sq.) The work church no longer means, as is usual in the great Epistles of St. Paul (see, however, Galatians 1:13; 1 Corinthians 12:28, 15:9), some local church or other, but the one universal Church, and organic whole uniting all Christians in one body of which Christ is the head. Here we find the systematized development of elements insinuated from time to time in the letters to the Galatians, Corinthians, and Romans. The author who has declared that there is now neither Jew nor Greek but that all are one in Jesus (Galatians 3:28); that in each Christian the life of Christ is made manifest (Galatians 2:20; 2 Corinthians 4:11 sq.); that all are led by the Spirit of God and of Christ (Romans 8:9-14); that each one of the faithful has Christ for head (1 Corinthians 11:3), could, by combining these elements, easily come to consider all Christians as forming but one body (Romans 12:5; 1 Corinthians 12:12, 27), animated by one spirit (Ephesians 4:4), a single body having Christ for head. To this body the Gentiles belong by the same right as the Jews. Undoubtedly this mysterious dispensation of Providence was, according to the Epistle to the Ephesians, made manifest to all the Apostles, a declaration which, moreover, the Epistle to the Galatians does not contradict (Galatians 2:3-9); however, this revelation remains, as it were, the special gift of St. Paul (Ephesians 3:3-8), The right of pagans seems to be no longer questioned, which is easily understood at the close of the Apostle’s life. At the death of Christ the wall of separation was broken down (cf. Galatians 3:13), and all have since had access to the Father in the same spirit. They do not meet on the Jewish ground of the abolished Law but on Christian ground, in the edifice founded directly on Christ. The Church being thus constituted, the author contemplates it just as it appears to him. Besides, if in the extension of the Church he beholds the realization of the eternal decree by which all men have been predestined to the same salvation, he is not obliged to repeat the religious history of mankind in the way he had occasion to describe it in the Epistle to the Romans; neither is he constrained to explore the historical privileges of the Jews, to which he nevertheless alludes (Ephesians 2:12) nor to connect the new economy to the old (see, however, Ephesians 3:6) nor indeed to introduce, at least into the dogmatical exposition, the sins of the pagans, whom he is satisfied to accuse of having lacked intimate communion with God (Ephesians 2:12). For the time being all these points are not the main subject of meditation. It is rather the recent, positive fact of the union of all men in the Church, the body of Christ, that he brings into prominence; the Apostle contemplates Christ Himself in His actual influence over this body and over each of its members; hence it is only occasionally that he recalls the redemptive power of Christ’s Death. (Ephesians 1:7; 2:5-6) From heaven, where He has been exalted, Christ bestows His gifts on all the faithful without distinction, commanding, however, that in His Church certain offices be held for the common welfare. The hierarchical terms used so constantly later on (episkopoi, presbyteroi, diakonoi) are not met with here. The apostles and prophets, always mentioned together, in the Epistle to the Ephesians, play a like part, being the founders of the Church (Ephesians 2:20). Thus placed on an equality with the prophets, the apostles are not the chosen Twelve but, as indicated in the letters of St. Paul, those who have seen Christ and been commissioned by Him to preach His Gospel. It is for the same purpose that the prophets in the Epistle to the Ephesians used the charisma, or spiritual gifts described in I Cor., xii-xiv. The evangelists, who are not noticed in Eph, ii, 20, or iii, 5, are inferior in dignity to the apostles and prophets in connection with whom they are, nevertheless, mentioned (Ephesians 4:11). In his first letters St. Paul had no occasion to allude to them, but they belong to the Apostolic age, as at a later epoch they are never referred to. Finally the “pastors and doctors” (A. V. pastors and teachers), who are clearly distinguished (Ephesians 4:11) from the apostles and prophets, founders of the churches, seem to be those local authorities already indicated in I Thess., v, 12; I Cor., xvi, 15 sq.; Act, xx, 28. While the attention given to these different ministers forms a distinctive note in the Epistle to the Ephesians, we cannot therefore admit (with Klöpper, for example) that the author is preoccupied with the hierarchy as such. The unity of the Church, a point that he clearly emphasizes, is not so much the juridical unity of an organized society as the vital unity that binds all the members of the body to its head, the glorified Christ. Nor is it true that the author already predicts centuries of future existence for this Church (Klopper) as, properly speaking, the ages to come, referred to in the Epistle to the Ephesians (ii, 7) are to come in the Kingdom of Heaven (cf. ii, 6). On the other hand we know that St. Paul’s hope of soon witnessing Christ’s second coming kept constantly diminishing, and therefore, in the latter years of his life, he might well define (Ephesians 5:22 sq.) the laws of Christian marriage, which at an earlier period (1 Corinthians 7:37 sq.) he regarded only in the light of the approaching advent of Christ.
The exposition that we have given of the doctrines proper to the Epistle to the Ephesians has been so made as to show that none of these doctrines taken separately contradicts the theology of the great Pauline Epistles and that each one individually can be connected with certain elements disseminated in these Epistles. It is nevertheless true that, taken in its entirety, this letter to the Ephesians constitutes a new doctrinal system, the Pauline authenticity of which can only be critically defended by pointing out the circumstances in consequence of which the Apostle was able thus to develop his first theology and profoundly to modify his manner of setting it forth. Naturally this leads us first of all to try to ascertain the object of the letter to the Ephesians.
III. OBJECT
It has been said that St. Paul combated immoral doctrines and an antinomian propaganda that especially endangered those to whom the letters were addressed (Pfleiderer), but this hypothesis would not explain the dogmatic part of the Epistle, and even in the hortatory part nothing betokens polemical preoccupation. All the warnings administered are called forth by the pagan origin of the readers, and when the author addresses his prayers to Heaven in their behalf (Ephesians 1:17 sqq; 3:14 sqq.) he does not mention any particular peril from which he would have God deliver their Christian life. Klopper thought that the author had Judeo-Christians in view, still denying converted pagans their full right in the Church, and Jacquier gives this as an additional motive. Others have said that the Gentile-Christians of the Epistle had to be reminded of the privileges of the Jews. But not one word in the letter, even in the section containing exhortations to unity (Ephesians 4:2 sq.), reveals the existence of any antagonism among those to whom the Apostle writes, and there is no question of the reproduction or re-establishment of unity. The author never addresses himself to any save converted pagans, and all his considerations tend solely to provide them with a full knowledge of the blessings which, despite their pagan origin, they have acquired in Christ and of the greatness of the love that God has shown them. If, in chapter iii, St. Paul speaks of his personal Apostleship, it is not by way of defending it against attacks but of expressing all his gratitude for having been called, in spite of his unworthiness, to announce the great mystery of which he had sung the praises. Briefly, nothing in the letter allows us to suspect that it responds to any special need on the part of those to whom it is addressed, nor that they, on their side, had given the author any particular occasion for writing it. In so far as either its dogmatic or moral part is concerned, it might have been addressed to any churches whatever founded in the pagan world.
IV. TO WHOM ADDRESSED
To whom, then, was the Epistle addressed? This question has evoked a variety of answers. There are critics who maintain the traditional opinion that the Epistle was written to the Ephesians exclusively (Danko, Cornely), but the greater number consider it in the light of a circular letter. Some maintain that it was addressed to Ephesus and the churches of which this city was, so to speak, the metropolis (Michelis, Harless, and Henle), while others hold that it was sent to the Seven Churches of the Apocalypse (H. Holtzmann) or to the circle of Christian communities within and around Colossae and Laodicea (Godet, Haupt, Zahn, and Belser); or again to the faithful of Asia Minor (B. Weiss) or to all the Gentile-Christian Churches (Von Soden). The question can only be solved by comparing the Epistle with the knowledge possessed of the life and literary activity of the Apostle. Those who deny the authenticity of the letter must certainly grant that the Pseudo-Paul (i, 1) was careful to conform to literary and historical probabilities, and if not, since the letter vouchsafes no direct indication as to the correspondents whom he supposed the Apostle to be addressing, it would be idle to imagine who they were.
The words en Epheso, in the first verse of the Epistle, do not belong to the primitive text. St. Basil attests that, even in his day, they were not met with in the ancient MSS.; in fact they are missing from the Codices B and Aleph (first hand). Moreover, the examination of the Epistle does not warrant the belief that it was addressed to the church in which the Apostle had sojourned longest. When St. Paul writes to one of his churches, he constantly alludes to his former relations with them (see Thess., Gal., Cor.), but here there is nothing personal, no greeting, no special recommendation, no allusion to the author’s past. Paul is unacquainted with his correspondents, although he has heard them spoken of (Ephesians 1:15), and they have heard of him (Ephesians 3:2; cf. 4:21). When addressing himself to any particular church, even be it at the time still a stranger to him as, for instance, Rome or Colossae, the Apostle always assumes a personal tone; hence the abstract and general manner in which he treats his subject from the beginning to the end of the Epistle to the Ephesians can best be accounted for by beholding in this Epistle a circular letter to a group of churches still unknown to Paul. Bur this explanation, founded on the encyclical character of the Epistle, loses its value if the Church of Ephesus is numbered among those addressed; for, during his three years’ sojourn in this city, the Apostle had had frequent intercourse with the neighbouring Christian communities, and in this case he would have had Ephesus especially in view, just as in wring to all the faithful of Achaia (2 Corinthians 1:1) it was chiefly to the Church of Corinth that he addressed himself.
Nevertheless, it was to a rather restricted circle of Christian communities that Paul sent this letter, as Tychicus was to visit them all and bring news of him (Ephesians 6:21 sq.), which fact precludes the idea of all the churches of Asia Minor or of all the Gentile-Christian churches. Moreover, since Tychicus was bearer of the Epistle to the Colossians and that to the Ephesians at one and the same time (Colossians 4:7 sq.), those to whom the latter was addressed could not have been far from Colossae, and we have every reason to suppose them in Asia Minor. However, we do not believe that the Epistle in question was addressed to the churches immediately surrounding Colossae, as the perils which threatened the faith of the Colossians virtually endangered that of the neighbouring communities, and wherefore, then, two letter differing in tone and object? Having had no personal intercourse with the Colossians, the Apostle would have been satisfied to address to them and their Christian neighbours an encyclical letter embodying all the matter treated in both Epistles. Hence it behooves us to seek elsewhere in Asia Minor, towards the year 60, a rather limited group of churches still unknown to St. Paul. Now, in the course of his three journeys, Paul had traversed all parts of Asia Minor except the northern provinces along the Black Sea, territory which he did not reach prior to his captivity. Nevertheless, the First Epistle of St. Peter shows us that the Faith had already penetrated these regions; hence, with the historical data at our disposal, it is in this vicinity that it seems most reasonable to seek those to whom the Epistle was addressed. These Christians must have been named in the authentic text of the inscription of this Epistle, as they are in all of St. Paul’s letters. Now, whenever the substantive participle appears in one of these inscriptions, it serves the sole purpose of introducing the mention of locality. We are therefore authorized to believe that, in the address of the Epistle to the Ephesians (Ephesians 1:1: tois hagiois ousin kai pistois en Christo Iesou), this participle, so difficult to understand in the received text, originally preceded the designation of the place inhabited by the readers. One might assume that the line containing this designation was omitted owing to some distraction on the part of the first copyist; however, it would then be necessary to admit that the mention of locality, now in question, occurred in the midst of qualifying adjectives applied by the Apostle to his readers (hagiois tois ousin . . . . . pistois), and this is something that is never verified in the letters of St. Paul. Hence we may suppose that, in this address, the indication of place was corrupted rather than omitted, and this paves the way for conjectural restorations. We ourselves have proposed the following: tois hagiois tois ousin kat Irin tois en Christo Iesou. (Ladeuze in Revue biblique, 1902, pp 573 sq.) Grammatically, this phrase corresponds perfectly with the Apostle’s style (cf. Galatians 1:22; 1 Corinthians 1:2; Philippians 1:1) and palaeographically, if transcribed in ancient capitals, it readily accounts for the corruption that has certainly been produced in the text. The Epistle to the Ephesians was, therefore, written to distant churches, located perhaps in various provinces [Pontus, Galatia, Polemonium (the kingdom of Polemon)] and, for this reason, requiring to be designated by the general term, but all situated along the River Iris.
These churches of the north-east of Asia Minor played rather an obscure part in the first century. When the first collection of the Apostle’s letters was made, a collection on which the entire textual tradition of these letters depends (cf. Zahn, Geschichte des N. T. Kanons, I, ii, p. 829), it was Ephesus that furnished the copy of this Epistle, having obtained it when Tychicus landed at that port, thence to set out for Colossae and in the direction of Pontus, and in this copy the text of the address had already been corrupted. Having come from Ephesus, this letter quickly passed for one to the Ephesians, the more so as there was no other written by the Apostle to the most celebrated of churches. This explains why, from the beginning, all except Marcion, even those who did not read the words en Epheso in the first verse (Origen, Tertullian), look upon this letter as an Epistle to the Ephesians, and why in all MSS., it is transcribed under this title.
V. DATE AND PLACE OF COMPOSITION; OCCASION
Like the Epistles to the Colossians, to the Philippians, and to Philemon, that to the Ephesians was written during the leisure hours of one of the Apostle’s imprisonments (Ephesians 3:1; 4:1; 6:20), when he had but little reason to resort to the services of a disciple to write in his name (De Wette, Ewald, and Renan). Lisco (Vincula Sanctorum, Berlin, 1900) is the only one nowadays who claims that these letters antedate the great captivity of St. Paul, maintaining that the Apostle must have written them while a prisoner in Ephesus in 57 and prior to those which he sent to the Corinthians and Romans. But we are not acquainted with any of the details of this captivity at Ephesus. Moreover, the doctrine set forth in the letters in question belongs to an epoch subsequent to the composition of the Epistle to the Romans (58); hence they were not written previously to the captivity in Caesarea (58-60). On the other hand, they are anterior to the first persecution, to which the author makes no allusion when describing the armour and combats of the faithful; wherefore they cannot be assigned to the last captivity. It consequently remains for them to be ascribed to a period between 58 and 63, but whether they were produced in Caesarea or in Rome (61-63) is still a much mooted question. The information gleaned here and there is very vague and the arguments brought forward are very doubtful. However, the freedom allowed Paul, and the evangelical activity he displays at the time of writing these letters, would seem more in keeping with his captivity in Rome (Acts 28:17-31) than in Caesarea (Acts, xxiii, sq.). One thing, however, is certain, once the authenticity of the Epistles to the Colossians and to the Ephesians is admitted, and that is that they were written at the same time. They both show fundamentally and formally a very close connection of which we shall speak later on. Tychicus was appointed to convey both Epistles to those to whom they were respectively addressed and to fulfil the same mission in behalf of them (Colossians 4:7 sq.; Ephesians 6:21 sq.). Verse 16 of chapter iv of Colossians does not seem to allude to the letter to the Ephisians, which would need to have been written first; besides, the Epistle here mentioned is scarcely an encyclical, the context leading us to look upon it as a special letter of the same nature as that sent to the Colossians. If, moreover, Paul knew that, before reaching Colossae, Tychicus would deliver the Epistle to the Ephesians to the Christians at Laodicea, there was no reason why he should insert greetings for the Laodiceans in his Epistle to the Colossians (Colossians 4:15). It is more probable that the Epistle to the Ephesians was written in the second place. It would be less easy to understand why, in repeating to the Colossians the same exhortations that he had made to the Ephesians, for instance, on remarriage (Ephesians 5:22 sqq.), the author should have completely suppressed the sublime dogmatic considerations upon which these exhortations had been based. Moreover we believe with Godet that: It is more natural to think that, of these two mutually complemental letters, the one provoked by a positive request and a definite need [Col.] came first, and that the other [Eph.] was due to the greater solicitude evoked by the composition of the former.”
How, then, admitting that St. Paul wrote the Epistle to the Ephesians, shall we explain the origin of this document? The Apostle, who was captive at Rome, was informed by Epaphras of the dogmatic and moral errors that had come to light in Colossae and the neighbouring cities, in churches of which he was not the founder. He also learned that he had been censured for not bringing to the perfection of Christianity those whom he had once converted, and for not taking sufficient interest in churches that had sprung up side by side with his own, although without his personal intervention (Colossians 1:28-2:5). At the same time that Paul received the news concerning Colossae, and its surroundings, he also heard (Ephesians 1:15) that in a distant part of Asia Minor Christian communities had been brought to the Faith, perhaps by evangelists (Ephesians 4:11). Impressed by the accusations made against him, Paul took advantage of the departure of Tychicus for Colossae, to enter into communication with those Christians who had heard of him (Ephesians 3:2) and to address them a letter in which he had to limit himself to general considerations on Christianity, but he wished to prove his Apostolic solicitude for them by making them realize not only the dignity of their Christian vocation, but the oneness of the Church of God and the intimate union by which all the faithful, no matter what their history, are constituted a single body of which Christ is the head.
VI. AUTHENTICITY
If one would only remember to whom the Epistle was addressed and on what occasion it was written, the objections raised against its Pauline authenticity could be readily answered.
(1) Relation to Other Books of the New Testament
The letter to the Ephesians bears some resemblance to the Epistle to the Hebrews and the writings of St. Luke and St. John, in point of ideas and mode of expression, but no such resemblance is traceable in the great Pauline Epistles. Of course one of the Apostle’s writings might have been utilized in these later documents but these similarities are too vague to establish a literary relationship. During the four years intervening between the Epistle to the Romans and that to the Ephesians, St. Paul had changed his headquarters and his line of work, and we behold him at Rome and Caesarea connected with new Christian centres. It is, therefore, easy to understand why his style should savour of the Christian language used in these later books, when we recall that their object has so much in common with the matter treated in the Epistle to the Ephesians. Whatever may now and then have been said on the subject, the same phenomenon is noticeable in the Epistle to the Colossians. If, indeed, the Epistle to the Ephesians agrees with the Acts in more instances than does the Epistle to the Colossians, it is because the two former have one identical object, namely, the constitution of the Church by the calling of the Jews and Gentiles.
The relationship between the Epistle to the Ephesians and I Peter is much closer. The letter to the Ephesians, unlike most of the Pauline Epistles, does not begin with an act of thanksgiving but with a hymn similar, even in its wording, to that which opens I Peter. Besides, both letters agree in certain typical expressions and in the description of the duties of the domestic life, which terminates in both with the same exhortation to combat the devil. With the majority of critics, we maintain the relationship between these letters to be literary. But I Peter was written last and consequently depends on the Epistle to the Ephesians; for instance, it alludes already to the persecution, at least as impending. Sylvanus, the Apostle’s faithful companion, was St. Peter’s secretary (1 Peter 5:12), and it is but natural that he should make use of a letter, recently written by St. Paul, on questions analogous to those which he himself had to treat, especially as according to us, those addressed in both of these Epistles are, for the greater part, identical (cf. 1 Peter 1:1).
The attacks made upon the authenticity of the Epistle to the Ephesians have been based mainly on its similarity to the Epistle to the Colossians, although some have maintained that the latter depends upon the former (Mayerhoff). In the opinion of Hitzig and Holtzmann, a forger living early in the second century and already imbued with Gnosticism used an authentic letter, written by Paul to the Colossians against the Judeo-Christians of the Apostolic Age, in composing the Epistle to the Ephesians, in conformity to which he himself subsequently revised the letter to the Colossians, giving it the form it has in the canon. De Wette and Ewald looked upon the Epistle to the Ephesians as a verbose amplification of the uncontroversial parts of the letter to the Colossians. However, it is only necessary to read first one of these documents and then the other, in order to see how exaggerated is this view. Von Soden finds a great difference between the two letters but nevertheless holds that several sections of the Epistle to the Ephesians are but a servile paraphrase of passages from the letter to the Colossians (Ephesians 3:1-9 and Colossians 1:23-27; Ephesians 5:21-6:9 and Colossians 3:18-4:1) and that still more frequently the later author follows a purely mechanical process by taking a single verse from the letter to the Colossians and using it to introduce and conclude, and serve as a frame, so to speak, for a statement of his own. Thus, he maintains that in Eph., iv, 25-31, the first words of verse 8 of Col., iii, have served as an introduction (Ephesians 4:25) and the last words of the same verse as a conclusion (Ephesians 4:31). Evidently such methods could not be attributed to the Apostle himself. But, neither are we justified in ascribing them to the author of the Epistle to the Ephesians. For instance, the duties of husband and wife are well set forth in Col., iii, 18, 19, but in these verses there is no comparison whatever between Christian marriage and that union of Christ with His Church such as characterizes the same exhortation in Eph., v, 22 sq.; consequently, it would be very arbitrary to maintain the latter text to be a vulgar paraphrase of the former. In comparing the texts quoted, the phenomenon of framing, to which von Soden called attention, can be verified in a single passage (Ephesians 4:2-16, where verse 2 resembles Colossians 3:12 sq. and where verses 15-16 are like Colossians 11 and 19). In fact, throughout his entire exposition, the author of the Epistle to the Ephesians is constantly repeating ideas and even particular expressions that occur in the letter to the Colossians, and yet neither a servile imitation nor any one of the well-known offences to which plagiarists are liable, can be proved against him.
Moreover, it is chiefly in their hortatory part that these two letters are so remarkably alike and this is only natural if, at intervals of a few days or hours, the same author had to remind two distinct circles of readers of the same common duties of the Christian life. In the dogmatic part of these two Epistles there is a change of subject, treated with a different intention and in another tone. In the one instance we have a hymn running through three chapters and celebrating the call of both Jews and Gentiles and the union of all in the Church of Christ; and in the other, an exposition of Christ’s dignity and of the adequacy of the means He vouchsafes us for the obtaining of our salvation, as also thanksgiving and especially prayers for those readers who are liable to misunderstand this doctrine. However, these two objects, Christ and the Church, are closely akin. Besides, if in his letter to the Ephesians, St. Paul reproduces the ideas set forth in that to the Colossians, it is certainly less astonishing than to find a like phenomenon in the Epistles to the Galatians and to the Romans, as it is very natural that the characteristic expressions used by the Apostle in the Epistle to the Colossians should appear in the letter to the Ephesians, since both were written at the same time. In fact it has been remarked that he is prone to repeat typical expressions he has one coined (cf. Zahn, Einleitung, I, p. 363 sq.). Briefly, we conclude with Sabatier that: “These two letters come to us from one and the same author who, when writing the one, had the other in mind and, when composing the second, had not forgotten the first.” The vague allusions made in the Epistle to the Ephesians to some of the doctrinal questions treated in the Epistle to the Colossians, can be accounted for in this manner, even though these questions were never proposed by those to whom the former Epistle was addressed.
(2) Difficulties Arising from the Form and Doctrines
The denial of the Pauline authenticity of the Epistle to the Ephesians is based on the special characteristics of the Epistle from the viewpoint of style as well as of doctrine, and, while differing from those of the great Pauline Epistles, these characteristics although more marked, resemble those of the letter to the Colossians. But we have already dwelt upon them at sufficient length.
The circumstances under which the Apostle must have written the Epistle to the Ephesians seem to account for the development of the doctrine and the remarkable change of style. During his two years’ captivity in Caesarea, Paul could not exercise his Apostolic functions, and in Rome, although allowed more liberty, he could not preach the Gospel outside of the house in which he was held prisoner. Hence he must have made up for his want of external activity by a more profound meditation on “his Gospel”. The theology of justification, of the Law, and of the conditions essential to salvation, he had already brought to perfection, having systematized it in the Epistle to the Romans and, although keeping it in view, he did not require to develop it any further. In his Epistle to the Romans (viii-xi, xvi, 25-27) he had come to the investigation of the eternal counsels of Providence concerning the salvation of men and had expounded, as it were, a philosophy of the religious history of mankind of which Christ was the centre, as indeed He had always been the central object of St. Paul’s faith. Thus, it was on Christ Himself that the solitary meditations of the Apostle were concentrated; in the quiet of his prison he was to develop, by dint of personal intellectual labour and with the aid of new revelations, this first revelation received when “it pleased God to reveal His Son in him”. He was, moreover, urged by the news brought him from time to time by some of his disciples, as, for instance, by Epaphras, that, in certain churches, errors were being propagated which tended to lessen the role and the dignity of Christ, by setting up against Him other intermediaries in the work of salvation. On the other hand, separated from the faithful and having no longer to travel constantly from one church to another, the Apostle was able to embrace in one sweeping glance all the Christians scattered throughout the world. While he resided in the centre of the immense Roman Empire which, in its unity, comprised the world, it was the one universal Church of Christ, the fulfilment of the mysterious decrees revealed to him, the Church in which it had been his privilege to bring together Jews and pagans, that presented itself to him for contemplation.
These subjects of habitual meditation are naturally introduced in the letters that he had to write at that time. To the Colossians he speaks of Christ’s dignity; to the Ephesians, and we have seen why, of the unity of the Church. But in these Epistles, Paul addresses those who are unknown to him; he no longer needs, as in preceding letters, to combat theories which undermined the very foundation of the work and to refute enemies who, in their hatred, attacked him personally. Accordingly, there is no further occasion to use the serried argumentation with which he not only overthrew the arguments of his adversaries but turned them to the latters’ confusion. There is more question of setting forth the sublime considerations with which he is filled than of discussions. Then, ideas so crowd upon him that his pen is overtaxed; his sentences teem with synonyms and qualifying epithets and keep taking on new propositions, thus losing the sharpness and vigour of controversy and assuming the ample proportions of a hymn of adoration. Hence we can understand why, in these letters, Paul’s style grows dull and sluggish and why the literary composition differs so widely from that of the first Epistles. When writing to the Colossians he at least had one particular church to deal with and certain errors to refute, whereas, in the Epistle to the Ephesians, he addressed himself at one and the same time to a group of unknown churches of which he had received but vague information. There was nothing concrete in this and the Apostle was left entirely to himself and to his own meditations. This is the reason why the special characteristics already indicated in the Epistle to the Colossians appear even more pronounced in that to the Ephesians, particularly in the dogmatic part.
(3) Tradition
If we thus keep in mind the circumstances under which Paul wrote both of these letters, their peculiar character seems no obstacle to their Pauline authenticity. Therefore, the testimony which, in their inscriptions (Colossians 1:1; Ephesians 1:1), they themselves render to this authenticity and the very ancient tradition which unanimously attributes them to the Apostle preserve all their force. From the traditional viewpoint the Epistle to the Ephesians is in the same class as the best attested letters of St. Paul. Used in the First Epistle of St. Peter, in the Epistle of St. Polycarp, in the works of St. Justin, perhaps in the Didache and I Clement, it appears to have been already well known towards the end of the first century. Marcion and St. Irenaeus ascribe it to St. Paul and it seems that St. Ignatius, when writing to the Ephesians, had already made use of it as Pauline. It is also to be noted that if the authenticity of this Epistle has been denied by most of the liberal critics since Schleiermacher’s day, it is nevertheless conceded by many modern critics, Protestants among them, and held at least as probable by Harnack and Julicher. In fact the day seems to be approaching when the whole world will recognize as the work of St. Paul, this Epistle to the Ephesians, of which St. John Chrysostom admired the sublime sentences and doctrines: noematon meste . . . . . . . hypselon kai dogmaton.
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Consult Introductions to the New Testament. We shall content ourselves here with indicating the latest commentaries, in which the earlier bibliography is mentioned. Catholic Commentaries: Bisping, Erklarung der Briefe an die Epheser, Philipper und Kolosser (Munster, 1866); Henle, Der Epheserbrief des hl. Apostela Paulus erklart Augsburg, 1908); Belser, Der Epheserbrief ubersetzl und erklart (Freiburg im Br., 1908); Maunoury, Commentaire sur l’epitre aux Galates, aux Ephesiens, etc. (Paris, 1881). Non-Catholic Commentaries: Oltramare, Commentair sur les epitres de S. Paul aux Colossiens, aux Ephesiens et a Philemon (Paris, 1891); Von Soden, Die Briefe an die Kolosser, Epheser, Philemon in Hand-Commeniar sum N. T., ed. Holtzmann (Freiburg im Br., 1893); Haupt, Die Gefangenachaftsbriefe in Krit.-exeg. Kommentar, ed. Meyer (8th ed., Gottingen, 1902); Ewald, Die Briefe des Paulus an die Epheser, Kolosser, und Philemon in Kommentar zum N. T. , ed. Zahn (Leipzig, 1905); Baljon, Commentaar op de briven van Paulus aan der Thess., Ef., Kol. en aan Philemon (Utrecht, 1907); Abbott, A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on Epistles to the Ephisians and to the Colossians in International Critical Commentary (Edinburgh, 1897); Robinson, St. Paul’s Epistle to the Ephesians (London, 1903); Westcott, St. Paul’s Epistle to the Ephesians (London, 1906); Gore, St. Paul’s Epistle to the Ephesians (London, 1907).
P. LADEUZE
The Catholic Encyclopedia, Volume VCopyright © 1909 by Robert Appleton CompanyOnline Edition Copyright © 2003 by K. KnightNihil Obstat, May 1, 1909. Remy Lafort, CensorImprimatur. +John M. Farley, Archbishop of New York
Fuente: Catholic Encyclopedia
Ephesians, Epistle to the
I.Authenticity
1.External Evidence
2.Internal Evidence
II.Place and Date of Writing
III.Destination
1.Title
2.The Inscription
3.The Evidence of the Letter Itself
4.Conclusion
IV.Relation to Other New Testament Writings
1.Peter
2.Johannine Writings
3.Colossians
V.The Purpose
VI.Argument
VII.Teaching
Literature
I. Authenticity
1. External Evidence
None of the epistles which are ascribed to Paul have a stronger chain of evidence to their early and continued use than that which we know as the Epistle to the Ephesians. Leaving for the moment the question of the relation of Eph to other New Testament writings, we find that it not only colors the phraseology of the Apostolic Fathers, but is actually quoted. In Clement of Rome (circa 95 ad) the connection with Ephesians might be due to some common liturgical form in xlvi.6 (compare Eph 4:6); though the resemblance is so close that we must feel that our epistle was known to Clement both here and in lxiv (compare Eph 1:3-4); xxxviii (compare Eph 5:21); xxxvi (compare Eph 4:18); lix (compare Eph 1:18; Eph 4:18). Ignatius (died 115) shows numerous points of contact with Ephesians, especially in his Epistle to the Ephesians. In chap. xii we read: Ye are associates and fellow students of the mysteries with Paul, who in every letter makes mention of you in Christ Jesus. It is difficult to decide the exact meaning of the phrase every letter, but in spite of the opinion of many scholars that it must be rendered in all his epistle, i.e. in every part of his epistle, it is safer to take it as an exaggeration, in all his epistles, justified to some extent in the fact that besides Ephesians, Paul does mention the Ephesian Christians in Rom (Rom 16:5); 1 Cor (1Co 15:32; 1Co 16:8, 1Co 16:19); 2 Cor (2Co 1:8 f); 1 Tim (1Ti 1:3) and 2 Tim (2Ti 1:18). In the opening address the connection with Eph 1:3-6 is too close to be accidental. There are echoes of our epistle in chap. i (Eph 6:1); ix (Eph 2:20-22); xviii (oikonoma, Eph 1:10); xx (Eph 2:18; Eph 4:24); and in Ignat. ad Polyc. v we have close identity with Eph 5:25 and less certain connection with Eph 4:2, and in vi with Eph 6:13-17. The Epistle of Polycarp in two passages shows verbal agreement with Eph: in chap. i with Eph 1:8, and in xii with Eph 4:26, where we have (the Greek is missing here) ut his scripturis dictum est. Hermas speaks of the grief of the Holy Spirit in such a way as to suggest Ephesians (Mand. X, ii; compare Eph 4:30). Sim. IX, xiii, shows a knowledge of Eph 4:3-6, and possibly of Eph 5:26 and Eph 1:13. In the Didache (4) we find a parallel to Eph 6:5 : Servants submit yourselves to your masters. In Barnabas there are two or three turns of phrase that are possibly due to Ephesians. There is a slightly stronger connection between II Clement and Ephesians, especially in chap. xiv, where we have the Ephesian figure of the church as the body of Christ, and the relation between them referred to in terms of husband and wife.
This early evidence, slight though it is, is strengthened by the part Ephesians played in the 2nd century where, as we learn from Hippolytus, it was used by the Ophites and Basilides and Valentinus. The latter (according to Hip., Phil., VI, 29) quoted Eph 3:16-18, saying, This is what has been written in Scripture, while his disciple Ptolemais is said by Irenaeus (Adv. Haer., i.8, 5) to have attributed Eph 5:13 to Paul by name. According to the addenda to the eighth book of the Stromateis of Clement of Alexandria, Theodotus, a contemporary of Valentinus, quoted Eph 4:10 and Eph 4:30 with the words: The apostle says, and attributes Eph 4:24 to Paul. Marcion knew Ephesians as Tertullian tells us, identifying it with the epistle referred to in Col 4:16 as ad Laodicenos. We find it in the Muratorian Fragment (10b, l. 20) as the second of the epistles which Paul wrote following the example of his predecessor John. It is used in the letter from the church of Lyons and Vienne and by Irenaeus, Tertullian, Clement of Alexandria, Origen and later writers. We can well accept the dictum of Dr. Hort that it is all but certain on this evidence that the Epistle was in existence by 95 ad; quite certain that it was in existence by about fifteen years later or conceivably a little more (Hort, Judaistic Christianity, 118).
2. Internal Evidence
To this very strong chain of external evidence, reaching back to the very beginning of the 2nd century, if not into the end of the 1st, showing Ephesians as part of the original Pauline collection which no doubt Ignatius and Polycarp used, we must add the evidence of the epistle itself, testing it to see if there be any reason why the letter thus early attested should not be accredited to the apostle.
(1) That it claims to be written by Paul is seen not only in the greeting, Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus through the will of God, to the saints that are at Ephesus, but also in Eph 3:1, where we read: For this cause I Paul, the prisoner of Christ Jesus in behalf of you Gentiles, a phrase which is continued in Eph 4:1 : I therefore, the prisoner in the Lord. This claim is substantiated by the general character of the epistle which is written after the Pauline norm, with greeting and thanksgiving, leading on to and serving as the introduction of the special doctrinal teaching of the epistle. This is the first great division of the Pauline epistles and is regularly followed by an application of the teaching to practical matters, which in turn yields to personal greetings, or salutations, and the final benediction, commonly written by the apostle’s own hand. In only one particular does Ephesians fail to answer completely to this outline. The absence of the personal greetings has always been marked as a striking peculiarity of our letter. The explanation of this peculiarity will meet us when we consider the destination of the epistle (see III below).
(2) Further evidence for the Pauline authorship is found in the general style and language of the letter. We may agree with von Soden (Early Christ. Lit., 294) that every sentence contains verbal echoes of Pauline epistles, indeed except when ideas peculiar to the Epistle come to expression it is simply a mosaic of Pauline phraseology, without accepting his conclusion that Paul did not write it. We feel, as we read, that we have in our hands the work of one with whom the other epistles have made us familiar. Yet we are conscious none the less of certain subtle differences which give occasion for the various arguments that critics have brought against the claim that Paul is the actual author. This is not questioned until the beginning of the last century, but has been since Schleiermacher and his disciple Usteri, though the latter published his doubts before his master did his. The Tbingen scholars attacked the epistle mainly on the ground of supposed traces of Gnostic or Montanist influences, akin to those ascribed to the Colossians. Later writers have given over this claim to put forward others based on differences of style (De Wette, followed by Holtzmann, von Soden and others); dependence on Colossians (Hitzig, Holtzmann); the attitude to the Apostles (von Soden); doctrinal differences, especially those that concern Christology and the Parousia, the conception of the church (Klpper, Wrede and others). The tendency, however, seems to be backward toward a saner view of the questions involved; and most of those who do not accept the Pauline authorship would probably agree with Jlicher (Encyclopedia Biblica), who ascribes it to a Pauline Christian intimately familiar with the Pauline epistles, especially with Colossians, writing about 90, who sought in Ephesians to put in a plea for the true catholicism in the meaning of Paul and in his name.
(3) Certain of these positions require that we should examine the doctrinal objections. (a) First of these is the claim that Ephesians has a different conception of the person and work of Christ from the acknowledged epistles of Paul. Not only have we the exaltation of Christ which we find in Col 1:16, but the still further statement that it was God’s purpose from the beginning to sum up all things in Christ, the things in the heavens, and the things upon the earth (Eph 1:10). This is no more than the natural expansion of the term, all things, which are attributed to Christ in 1Co 8:6, and is an idea which has at least its foreshadowing in Rom 8:19, Rom 8:20 and 2Co 5:18, 2Co 5:19. The relation between Christ and the church as given in Eph 1:22 and Eph 5:23 is in entire agreement with Paul’s teaching in Rom 12, and 1 Cor 12. It is still the Pauline figure of the church as the body of Christ, in spite of the fact that Christ is not thought of as the head of that body. The argument in the epistle does not deal with the doctrine of the cross from the standpoint of the earlier epistles, but the teaching is exactly the same. There is redemption (Eph 1:7, Eph 1:14; Eph 4:30); reconciliation (Eph 2:14-16); forgiveness (Eph 1:7; Eph 4:32). The blood of Christ shed on the cross redeems us from our sin and restores us to God. In like manner it is said that the Parousia is treated (Eph 2:7) as something far off. But Paul has long since given up the idea that it is immediately; even in 2 Thess 2 he shows that an indeterminate interval must intervene, and in Rom 11:25 he sees a period of time yet unfulfilled before the end. (b) The doctrine of the church is the most striking contrast to the earlier epistles. We have already dealt with the relation of Christ to the church. The conception of the church universal is in advance of the earlier epistles, but it is the natural climax of the development of the apostle’s conception of the church as shown in the earlier epistles. Writing from Rome with the idea of the empire set before him, it was natural that Paul should see the church as a great whole, and should use the word ekklesia absolutely as signifying the oneness of the Christian brotherhood. As a matter of fact the word is used in this absolute sense in 1Co 12:28 before the Captivity Epistles (compare 1Co 1:2; 1Co 10:32). The emphasis here on the unity of Jew and Gentile in the church finds its counterpart in the argument of the Epistle to the Romans, though in Ephesians this is urged on the basis of God’s purpose and Christian faith, rather than on the Law and the Promises. Neither is it true that in Ephesians the Law is spoken of slightingly, as some say, by the reference to circumcision (Eph 2:11). In no case is the doctrinal portion of the epistle counter to that of the acknowledged Pauline epistles, though in the matter of the church, and of Christ’s relationship to it and to the universe, there is evidence of progress in the apostle’s conception of the underlying truths, which none the less find echoes in the earlier writings. New doctrinal ideas, or a new proportion of these ideas, is no evidence of different authorship. (c) In the matter of organization the position of Ephesians is not in any essential different from what we have in 1 Cor.
(4) The linguistic argument is a technical matter of the use of Greek words that cannot well be discussed here. The general differences of style, the longer turgid sentences, the repetitions on the one hand; the lack of argument, the full, swelling periods on the other, find their counterpart in portions of Romans. The minute differences which show themselves in new or strange words will be much reduced in number when we take from the list those that are due to subjects which the author does not discuss elsewhere (e.g. those in the list of armor in Eph 6:13). Holtzmann (Einl, 25) gives us a list of these hapax legomena (76 in all). But there are none of these which, as Lock says, Paul could not have used, though there are certain which he does not use elsewhere and others which are only found in his accepted writings and here. The following stand out as affording special ground for objection. The phrase heavenly places (ta epourania, Eph 1:3, Eph 1:10; Eph 2:6; Eph 3:10; Eph 6:12) is peculiar to this epistle. The phrase finds a partial parallel it in 1Co 15:49 and the thought is found in Phi 3:20. The devil (ho diabolos, Eph 4:27; Eph 6:11) is used in place of the more usual Satan (satanas). But in Acts Paul is quoted as using diabolos in Act 13:10 and satanas in Act 26:18. It is at least natural that he would have used the Greek term when writing from Rome to a Greek-speaking community. The objection to the expression holy (hagois) apostles (Eph 3:5) falls to the ground when we remember that the expression holy (hagios) is Paul’s common word for Christian and that he uses it of himself in this very epistle (Eph 3:8). In like manner mystery (musterion), dispensation (oikonomia) are found in other epistles in the same sense that we find them in here.
The attack on the epistle fails, whether it is made from the point of teaching or language; and there is no ground whatever for questioning the truth of Christian tradition that Paul wrote the letter which we know as the Epistle to the Ephesians.
II. Place and Date of Writing
The time and place of his writing Ephesians turn on the larger question of the chronology of Paul’s life (see PAUL) and the relation of the Captivity Epistles to each other; and the second question whether they were written from Caesarea or Rome (for this see PHILEMON, EPISTLE TO). Suffice it here to say that the place was undoubtedly Rome, and that they were written during the latter part of the two years’ captivity which we find recorded in Act 28:30. The date will then be, following the later chronology, 63 or 64 ad; following the earlier, which is, in many ways, to be preferred, about 58 ad.
III. Destination
To whom was this letter written?
1. Title
The title says to the Ephesians. With this the witness of the early church almost universally agrees. It is distinctly stated in the Muratorian Fragment (10b, 1. 20); and the epistle is quoted as to the Ephesians by Irenaeus (Adv. Haer., v.14, 3; 24, 3); Tertullian (Adv. Marc., v.11, 17; De Praesc., 36; De Monag., v); Clement of Alexandria (Strom., iv.65; Paed., i.18) and Origen (Contra Celsum, iii.20). To these must be added the evidence of the extant manuscripts and VSS, which unite in ascribing the epistle to the Ephesians. The only exception to the universal evidence is Tertullian’s account of Marcion (circa 150 ad) who reads Ad Laodicenos (Adv. Marc., v.11: I say nothing here about another epistle which we have with the heading ‘to the Ephesians,’ but the heretics ‘to the Laodiceans’…(v.17): According to the true belief of the church we hold this epistle to have been dispatched to the Ephesians, not to the Laodiceans; but Marcion had to falsify its title, wishing to make himself out a very diligent investigator).
2. The Inscription
This almost universal evidence for Ephesus as the destination of our epistle is shattered when we turn to the reading of the first verse. Here according to Textus Receptus of the New Testament we read Paul unto the saints which are at Ephesus (en Epheso) and to the faithful in Christ Jesus. When we look at the evidence for this reading we find that the two words en Epheso are lacking in Codex Sinaiticus and Codex Vaticanus, and that the corrector of the cursive known as 67 has struck them out of his copy. Besides these a recently described MS, Cod. Laura 184, giving us a text which is so closely akin to that used by Origen that the scribe suggests that it was compiled from Origen’s writings, omits these words (Robinson, Ephesians, 293). To this strong manuscript evidence against the inclusion of these two words in the inscription we must add the evidence of Origen and Basil. Origen, as quoted in Cramer’s Catena at the place, writes: In the Ephesians alone we found the expression ‘to the saints which are,’ and we ask, unless the phrase ‘which are’ is redundant, what it can mean. May it not be that as in Exodus He who speaks to Moses declares His name to be the Absolute One, so also those who are partakers of the Absolute become existent when they are called, as it were, from non-being into being? Origen evidently knows nothing here of any reading en Epheso, but takes the words which are in an absolute, metaphysical sense. Basil, a century and a half later, probably refers to this comment of Origen (Contra Eun., ii.19) saying: But moreover, when writing to the Ephesians, as to men who are truly united with the Absolute One through clear knowledge, he names them as existent ones in a peculiar phrase, saying ‘to the saints which are and faithful in Christ Jesus.’ For so those who were before us have handed it down, and we also have found (this reading) in old copies. In Jerome’s note on this verse there is perhaps a reference to this comment on Origen, but the passage is too indefinitely expressed for us to be sure what its bearing on the reading really is. The later writers quoted by Lightfoot (Biblical Essays, 384 f) cannot, as Robinson shows (Eph, 293), be used as witnesses against the Textus Receptus. We may therefore conclude that the reading en Epheso was wanting in many early manuscripts, and that there is good ground for questioning its place in the original autograph.
But the explanations suggested for the passage, as it stands without the words, offend Pauline usage so completely that we cannot accept them. To take which are in the phrase the saints which are (tos ousin) as absolute, as Origen did; or as meaning truly, is impossible. It is possible to take the words with what follows, and faithful (ka pistos), and interpret this latter expression (pistois) either in the New Testament sense of believers or in the classical sense of steadfast. The clause would then read either to the saints who are also believers, or to the saints who are also faithful, i.e. steadfast. Neither of these is wholly in accord with Paul’s normal usage, but they are at least possible.
3. The Evidence of the Letter Itself
The determining factor in the question of the destination of the epistle lies in the epistle itself. We must not forget that, save perhaps Corinth, there was no church with which Paul was so closely associated as that in Ephesus. His long residence there, of which we read in Acts (chapters 19; 20), finds no echo in our epistle. There is no greeting to anyone of the Christian community, many of whom were probably intimate friends. The close personal ties, that the scene of Acts 20:17-38 shows us existed between him and his converts in Ephesus, are not even hinted at. The epistle is a calm discussion, untouched with the warmth of personal allusion beyond the bare statement that the writer is a prisoner (Eph 3:1; Eph 4:1), and his commendation of Tychicus (Eph 6:21, Eph 6:22), who was to tell them about Paul’s condition in Rome. This lack of personal touch is intensified by the assumption underlying Eph 3 and 4 that the readers do not know his knowledge of the mysteries of Christ. In Eph 3:2 and Eph 4:21, Eph 4:22 there is a particle (ege, if indeed) which suggests at least some question as to how far Paul himself was the missionary through whom they believed. All through the epistle there is a lack of those elements which are so constant in the other epistles, which mark the close personal fellowship and acquaintance between the apostle and those to whom he is writing.
4. Conclusion
This element in the epistle, coupled with the strange fact of Marcion’s attributing it to the Laodiceans, and the expression in Col 4:16 that points to a letter coming from Laodicea to Colosse, has led most writers of the present day to accept Ussher’s suggestion that the epistle is really a circular letter to the churches either in Asia, or, perhaps better, in that part of Phrygia which lies near Colosse. The readers were evidently Gentiles (Eph 2:1; Eph 3:1, Eph 3:2) and from the mission of Tychicus doubtless of a definite locality, though for the reasons given above this could not well be Ephesus alone. It is barely possible that the cities to whom John was bidden to write the Revelation (Rev 1 through 3) are the same as those to whom Paul wrote this epistle, or it may be that they were the churches of the Lycus valley and its immediate neighborhood. The exact location cannot be determined. But from the fact that Marcion attributed the epistle to Laodicea, possibly because it was so written in the first verse, and from the connection with Colossians, it is at least probable that two of these churches were at Colosse and Laodicea. On this theory the letter would seem to have been written from Rome to churches in the neighborhood of, or accessible to, Colosse, dealing with the problem of Christian unity and fellowship and the relations between Christ and the church and sent to them by the hands of Tychicus. The inscription was to be filled in by the bearer, or copies were to be made with the name of the local church written in, and then sent to or left with the different churches. It was from Ephesus, as the chief city of Asia in all probability, that copies of this circular letter reached the church in the world, and from this fact the letter came to be known in the church at large as that from Ephesus, and the title was written to the Ephesians, and the first verse was made to read to the saints which are in Ephesus.
IV. Relation to Other New Testament Writings
Ephesians raises a still further question by the close resemblances that can be traced between it and various other New Testament writings.
1. Peter
The connection between Ephesians and 1 Peter is not beyond question. In spite of the disclaimer of as careful a writer as Dr. Bigg (ICC) it is impossible to follow up the references given by Holtzmann and others and not feel that Peter either knew Ephesians or at the very least had discussed these subjects with its author. For, as Dr. Hort tells us, the similarity is one of thought and structure rather than of phrase. The following are the more striking passages with their parallels in 1 Peter: Eph 1:3 (1Pe 1:3); Eph 1:18-20 (1Pe 1:3-5); Eph 2:18-22 (1Pe 2:4-6); Eph 1:20-22 (1Pe 3:22); Eph 3:9 (1Pe 1:20); Eph 3:20 (1Pe 1:12); Eph 4:19 (1Pe 1:14). The explanations that 1 Peter and Ephesians are both from the pen of the same writer, or that Ephesians is based on 1 Pet, are overthrown, among other reasons, by the close relation between Ephesians and Colossians.
2. Johannine Writings
The connection with the Apocalypse is based on Eph 2:20 as compared with Rev 21:14; Eph 3:5 and Rev 10:7; Eph 5:11 and Rev 18:4, and the figure of the bride of the Lamb (Rev 19:7; compare Eph 5:25). Holtzmann adds various minor similarities, but none of these are sufficient to prove any real knowledge of, let alone dependence on Ephesians. The contact with the Fourth Gospel is more positive. Love (agape) and knowledge (gnosis) are used in the same sense in both Ephesians and the Gospel. The application of the Messianic title, the Beloved (Eph 1:6), to Christ does not appear in the Gospel (it is found in Mat 3:17), but the statement of the Father’s love for Him constantly recurs. The reference to the going up and coming down of Christ (Eph 4:9) is closely akin to Joh 3:13 (No man hath ascended into heaven, but he, etc.). So, too, Eph 5:11, Eph 5:13 finds echo in Joh 3:19, Joh 3:20; Eph 4:4, Eph 4:7 in Joh 3:34; Eph 5:6 in Joh 3:36. Eph 5:8 f is akin to 1Jo 1:6 and Eph 2:3 to 1Jo 3:10.
3. Colossians
When we turn to Colossians we find a situation that is without parallel in the New Testament. Out of 155 verses in Ephesians, 78 are found in Colossians in varying degrees of identity. Among them are these: Eph 1:6 parallel Col 1:13; Eph 1:16 parallel Col 1:9; Eph 1:21 parallel Col 1:16; Eph 2:16 parallel Col 2:20; Eph 4:2 parallel Col 3:12; Eph 4:15 parallel Col 2:19; Eph 4:22 parallel Col 3:9; Eph 4:32 parallel Col 3:12; Eph 5:5 parallel Col 3:5; Eph 5:19 parallel Col 3:16; Eph 6:4 parallel Col 3:21; Eph 6:5-9 parallel Col 3:22 through 4:1. For a fuller list see Abbott (ICC, xxiii). Not only is this so, but there is an identity of treatment, a similarity in argument so great that Bishop Barry (NT Commentary for English Readers, Ellicott) can make a parallel analysis showing the divergence and similarity by the simple device of different type. To this we must add that there are at least a dozen Greek words common to these two epistles not found elsewhere. Over against this similarity is to be set the dissimilarity. The general subject of the epistles is not approached from the same standpoint. In one it is Christ as the head of all creation, and our duty in consequence. In the other it is the church as the fullness of Christ and our duty – put constantly in the same words – in consequence thereof. In Ephesians we have a number of Old Testament references, in Colossians only one. In Ephesians we have unique phrases, of which the heavenly spheres (ta epourania) is most striking, and the whole treatment of the relation of Jew and Gentile in the church, and the marriage tie as exemplified in the relation between Christ and the church. In Colossians we have in like manner distinct passages which have no parallel in Ephesians, especially the controversial section in chapter 2, and the salutations. In truth, as Davies (Epistles of St. Paul to the Ephesians, Colossians, and Philippians.) well says: It is difficult indeed to say, concerning the patent coincidences of expression in the two epistles, whether the points of likeness or of unlikeness between them are the more remarkable. This situation has given rise to various theories. The most complicated is that of H. Holtzmann, who holds that some passages point to a priority of Colossians, others to that of Ephesians; and as a result he believes that Colossians, as we have it, is a composite, based on an original epistle of Paul which was expanded by the author of Ephesians – who was not Paul – after he had written this epistle. So Holtzmann would give us the original Colossians (Pauline), Ephesians (based on it), and the present Colossians (not Pauline) expanded from the former through the latter. The theory falls to the ground on its fundamental hypothesis, that Colossians as it stands is interpolated. The most reasonable explanation is that both Colossians and Ephesians are the work of Paul, written at practically the same time, and that in writing on the same subjects, to different people, there would be just the differences and similarity which we have in these epistles. The objection that Paul could not repeat himself and yet differ as these two letters do is purely imaginary. Zahn shows us that men do just this very thing, giving an account of Bismarck’s speaking on a certain subject to a group of officers and later to a large body of men, and yet using quite different language. Moreover, Paul is not averse to repeating himself (compare Romans and Galatians and 1 Timothy and 2 Timothy) when to do so will serve his purpose. Simultaneous authorship by one writer, and that writer Paul, is the only explanation that will satisfy all the facts in the case and give them due proportion.
V. The Purpose
If our interpretation of the circumstances, composition and destination of Ephesians be right, we are now in a position to look beneath the surface and ask why the apostle wrote it. To understand its central theme we must remember that Paul, the prisoner of the Lord, is writing in the calm of his imprisonment, far from the noise and turmoil, the conflict and strife, that marked his earlier life. He is now able to look out on the church and get a view of it in its wholeness, to see the part it is to play in God’s scheme for the restoration of the human race, to see God’s purpose in it and for it and its relation to Him. With this stand-point he can write to the churches about Ephesus on the occasion of Tychicus’ return to Colosse, not to correct false views on some special point, but to emphasize the great central truth which he had put in the very forefront of his letter. God’s eternal purpose is to gather into one the whole created universe, to restore harmony among His creatures and between them and Himself. The apostle’s whole prayer is for this end, his whole effort and desire is toward this goal: that they may have full, clear knowledge of this purpose of God which He is working out through Christ Jesus, who is the head of the church, the very fullness of Him who is being fulfilled all over the world. Everything, for the apostle, as he looks forth upon the empire, centers in the purpose of God. The discord between the elements in the church, the distinction between Jew and Gentile , all these must yield to that greater purpose. The vision is of a great oneness in Christ and through Him in God, a oneness of birth and faith and life and love, as men, touched with the fire of that Divine purpose, seek to fulfil, each in himself, the part that God has given him to play in the world, and, fighting against the foes of God, to overcome at last.
It is a noble purpose to set before men this great mystery of the church as God’s means by which, in Christ, He may restore all men to union with Himself. It is an impossible vision except to one who, as Paul was at the time, is in a situation where the strife and turmoil of outside life can enter but little, but a situation where he can look out with a calm vision and, in the midst of the world’s discord, discern what God is accomplishing among men.
VI. Argument
The Argument of Ephesians is as follows:
Eph 1:1, Eph 1:2
Greeting.
Eph 1:3-10
Hymn of praise to God for the manifestation of His purpose for men in Christ Jesus, chosen from the beginning to a holy life in love, predestined to adoption as sons through Jesus Christ, in whom as the Beloved He has given us grace (Eph 1:3-6). Redeemed by the blood of Christ by whom we have forgiveness of sins through His grace abounding in us and making us know the mystery of His purpose, namely, to unite all in one, even the entire universe (Eph 1:7-10).
Eph 1:11-14
For this Israel has served as a preparation, and to this the Gentiles are come, sealed unto salvation by the Holy Spirit of power.
Eph 1:15, Eph 1:16
Thanksgiving for their faith.
Eph 1:16-21
Prayer that they may, by the spirit of wisdom and revelation, know their destiny and the power of God to fulfill it.
Ephesians 1:22 Through 2:10
Summary of what God has done in Christ. Christ’s sovereignty (Eph 1:22, Eph 1:23), and headship in the church (Eph 1:22, Eph 1:23); His work for men, quickening us from a death of sin into which man has sunk, and exalting us to fellowship with Christ by His grace, who has created us for good works as part of His eternal purpose (Eph 2:1-10).
Eph 2:11-13
The contrast between the former estate of the Gentiles, as strangers and aliens, and their present one, near by the blood of Christ.
Eph 2:14-18
Christ, who is our peace, uniting Jew and Gentile and reconciling man to God through the cross; by whom we all have access to the Father.
Eph 2:19-22
This is theirs who as fellow-citizens of the saints, built up on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, become a sanctuary of God in the Spirit.
Ephesians 3:1-21
A digression on the mystery, i.e. the revelation to Paul, together with a prayer that men may grasp it. The mystery is that all men, Jews and Gentiles, are partakers of the promise. Of this Paul is a minister, to whom has been given the stewardship of that mystery, unfolding to all creatures God’s wisdom, in accord with His eternal purpose (Eph 3:1-13). Prayer that they may live up to their opportunities (Eph 3:14-19). Doxology (Eph 3:20, Eph 3:21).
Eph 4:1-6
The outcome of this privilege, the fulfillment of the Divine purpose, must show itself in unity of life in the Christian fellowship.
Eph 4:7-16
The different gifts which the Christians have are for the upbuilding of the church into that perfect unity which is found in Christ.
Eph 4:17-24
The spiritual darkness and corruption of the old Gentile life set over against the enlightenment and purity and holiness of the new life in Christ.
Ephesians 4:25 Through 6:9
Special features of the Christian life, arising out of the union of Christians with Christ and making for the fellowship in the church. On the side of the individual: sins in word (Eph 4:25-30); of temper (Eph 4:31, Eph 4:32); self-sacrifice as opposed to self-indulgence (Eph 5:1-8); the contrast of the present and the past repeated (Eph 5:9-14); general behavior (Eph 5:15-20); on the side of social relations: husband and wife exemplified in the relation of Christ and the church (Eph 5:23-33); children and parents (Eph 6:1-4); servants and masters (Eph 6:5-9).
Eph 6:19-20
The Christian warfare, its foes and armor and weapons.
Eph 6:21-24
Conclusion.
VII. Teaching
The keynote to the doctrinal basis of the epistle is struck at the very outset. The hymn of praise centers in the thought of God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. It is to Him that the blessing is due, to Him, who had chosen us from the beginning, in whom there is redemption in Eph (Eph 1:3-7). God as the very heart and soul of everything, is over all, and through all, and in all (Eph 4:6). He is the Father from whom all revelation comes (Eph 1:17), and from whom every human family derives its distinctive characteristics (Eph 3:15). But He is not only Father in relation to the universe: He is in a peculiar sense the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ (Eph 1:3). The eternity of our Lord is distinctly asserted (Eph 1:4, Eph 1:5) as of one existing before the foundation of the world, in whom everything heavenly as well as earthly is united, summed up (Eph 1:10; compare Eph 2:12; Eph 4:18). He is the Messiah (the Beloved (Eph 1:6) is clearly a Messianic term, as the voice from heaven at Christ’s baptism, This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased, shows (Mat 3:17)). In Him we are quickened (Eph 2:5). He is made flesh (Eph 2:15). He died on the cross (Eph 2:16), and by His blood (Eph 1:7) we have redemption (Eph 4:30), and reconciliation with God (Eph 2:16). He whom God raised from the dead (Eph 1:20), now is in heaven (Eph 1:20; Eph 4:8) from which place He comes (Eph 4:8), bringing gifts to men. (This interpretation makes the descent follow the ascent, and the passage teaches the return of Christ through His gifts of the Spirit which He gave to the church.) He who is in heaven fills all things (Eph 4:10); and, from a wealth which is unsearchable (Eph 3:8), as the Head of the church (Eph 1:22), pours out His grace to free us from the power of sin (Eph 2:1). To this end He endues us with His Spirit (Eph 3:16). This teaching about God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, is no abstract theorizing. It is all intensely practical, having at its heart the purpose of God from the ages, which, as we saw above, is to restore again the unity of all things in Him (Eph 1:9, Eph 1:10); to heal the breach between man and God (Eph 2:16, Eph 2:17); to break down the separation between Jew and Gentile , and to abolish the enmity not only between them, but between them and God. This purpose of God is to be accomplished in a visible society, the one church, built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets (Eph 2:20), of which Jesus Christ is the head of the corner, into which men are to be admitted by holy baptism, where they own one Lord, hold to one faith, in one God and Father of all who is above all and through all (Eph 4:4-7).
The teaching as to the church is one of the most striking elements of the epistle. In the first place we have the absolute use of the term, which has been already discussed. The apostle sees the whole Christian community throughout the world bound together into a unity, one fellowship, one body. He has risen to a higher vision than man had ever had before. But there is a further teaching in the epistle. Not only is the church throughout the world one body, but it is the body of Christ who is its Head (Eph 1:21 f). He has, as Lightfoot suggests, the same relation to the church which in Eph 1:10 He has to the universe. He is its Head, the inspiring, ruling, guiding, combining, sustaining power, the mainspring of its activity, the center of its unity, and the seat of its life. But the relation is still closer. If, as the evidence adduced would necessitate, one accepts J. Armitage Robinson’s explanation of pleroma, as that without which a thing is incomplete (Eph, 255 f), then the church, in some wonderful mystery, is the complement of Christ, apart from which He Himself, as the Christ, lacks fullness. We are needed by Him, that so He may become all in all. He, the Head of restored humanity, the Second Adam, needs His church, to fulfill the unity which He came upon earth to accomplish (compare Stone, Christian Church, 85, 86). Still further, we find in this epistle the two figures of the church as the Temple of ;the Spirit (Eph 2:21, and the Bride of Christ (Eph 5:23). Under the latter figure we find the marriage relation of the Lord to Israel, which runs through the Old Testament (Hos 3:1-5 :16, et al.), applied to the union between Christ and the church. The significance is the close tie that binds them, the self-sacrificing love of Christ and the self-surrender of obedience on the part of the church; and the object of this is that so the church may be free from any blemish, holy and spotless. In the figure of the Temple, which is an expansion of the earlier figure in 1Co 3:16; 2Co 6:16, we see the thought of a spiritual building, a sanctuary, into which all the diverse elements of the churches grow into a compact unity. These figures sum up the apostle’s thought of that in which the Divine purpose finds its fulfillment. The progress forward to that fulfillment is due to the combined effort of God and man. The church, the society of Christian men … is built and yet it grows. Human endeavor and Divine energy cooperate in its development (Westcott). Out of this doctrinal development the apostle works out the practical life by which this Divine purpose can find its fulfillment. Admitted into the fellowship of the church by baptism, we become members one of another Eph (Eph 4:25). It is on this basis that he urges honesty and patience and truth in our intercourse with each other, and pleads for gentleness and a forgiving spirit (Eph 4:25-32). As followers of God we are to keep free from the sins that spring from pride and self-indulgence and any fellowship with the spirit of evil (Eph 5:1-14). Our life is to be lived as seeking the fulfillment of God’s purpose in all the relationships of life (Eph 5:15 through Eph 6:9). All is to be done with the full armor of the Christian soldier, as is fitting for those who fight spiritual enemies (Eph 6:10). The epistle is preminently practical, bringing the significance of the great revelation of God’s will to the everyday duties of life, and lifting all things up to a higher level which finds its ideal in the indwelling of Christ in our hearts, out of which we may be filled with all the fullness of God (Eph 3:17-19).
Literature
J. Armitage Robinson, St. Paul’s Epistle to the Ephesians; Westcott, Epistle to the Ephesains; Abbott, Ephesians and Colossians, International Critical Commentary; Moule, Ephesians, Cambridge Bible; Salmond, Ephesians, Expositor’s Greek Testament; Macpherson, Commentary on Ephesians; Findlay, Epistle to the Ephesians, Expositor’s Bible; Alexander, Colossians and Ephesians, Bible for Home and School; Haupt, Meyer’s Exeget. und krit. Kommentar; von Soden, Handcommentar; Hort, Prolegomena to the Epistles to the Romans and Ephesians; Dale, Lectures on the Ephesians.
Fuente: International Standard Bible Encyclopedia
Ephesians, Epistle to the
This Epistle expressly claims to be the production of the Apostle Paul (Eph 1:1; Eph 3:1); and this claim the writer in the latter of these passages follows up by speaking of himself in language such as that Apostle is accustomed to use in describing his own position as an ambassador of Christ (Eph 3:1; Eph 3:3; Eph 3:8-9). The justice of this claim seems to have been universally admitted by the early Christians, and it is expressly sanctioned by several of the fathers of the second and third centuries.
The question to whom was this Epistle addressed has received different answers. Grotius, reviving the opinion of the ancient heretic Marcion, maintains that the party addressed in this Epistle was the church at Laodicea, and that we have in this the Epistle to that church which is commonly supposed to have been lost; while others contend that this was addressed to no church in particular, but was a sort of circular letter, intended for the use of several churches, of which Ephesus may have been the first or center.
Without entering into a minute consideration of these theories, which our limits will not permit, we may remark that both are unsupported by satisfactory evidence, and that we fully concur in the common opinion that the party to whom this Epistle was sent was the church at Ephesus.
The Epistle is so much the utterance of a mind overflowing with thought and feeling that it does not present any precisely marked divisions under which its different parts may be ranked. After the usual apostolic salutation Paul breaks forth into an expression of thanksgiving to God and Christ for the scheme of redemption (Eph 1:3-10), from which he passes to speak of the privileges actually enjoyed by himself and those to whom he was writing, through Christ (Eph 1:11-23). He then reminds the Ephesians of their former condition when they were without Christ and of the great change which, through divine grace, they had experienced (Eph 2:1-22). An allusion to himself as enjoying by divine revelation the knowledge of the mystery of Christ leads the Apostle to enlarge upon the dignity of his office and the blessed results that were destined to flow from the exercise of it to others (Eph 3:1-12). On this he grounds an exhortation to his brethren not to faint on account of his sufferings for the Gospel, and affectionately invokes on their behalf the divine blessing, concluding this, which may be called the more doctrinal part of his Epistle, with a doxology to God (Eph 3:13-21). What follows is chiefly hortatory, and is directed partly to the inculcation of general consistency, stedfastness in the faith, and propriety of deportment (Eph 4:1; Eph 5:21), and partly to the enforcement of relative duties (Eph 5:22; Eph 6:9). The Epistle concludes with an animated exhortation to fortitude, watchfulness and prayer followed by a reference to Tychicus as the bearer of the Epistle, and by the usual apostolic benediction (Eph 6:10-24). This Epistle was written during the earlier part of the Apostle’s imprisonment at Rome, at the same time with that to the Colossians [COLOSSIANS, EPISTLE TO THE].
Fuente: Popular Cyclopedia Biblical Literature
Ephesians, Epistle to the
[Ephe’sians]
Paul first visited Ephesus on his way from Corinth to Syria: he did not stay then, but left Priscilla and Aquila there, who were afterwards joined by Apollos. Act 18:18-24. Paul soon returned and stayed there two years. There was thus time for the saints to be grounded in the truth. The opposition was so great in the synagogue that Paul separated the disciples, and they met daily in the school of Tyrannus. The word grew mightily and prevailed. Act 19:1-20.
In 1Co 15:32 Paul speaks of having fought with beasts at Ephesus, doubtless alluding to the strong opposition manifested towards him there by the Jews. In Act 20:17, etc., Paul exhorts the elders of Ephesus, as overseers, to feed the church of God. He warns them that grievous wolves would enter in, and some from among themselves would speak perverse things to draw away disciples after them. As their resource he commends them to God and the word of His grace. Following this was the Epistle he wrote to them during the two years he was a prisoner at Rome.
In 1Ti 1:3 Paul says he had besought Timothy to abide at Ephesus, and to exhort them to teach no other doctrine, and not to give heed to fables and endless genealogies. In 2Ti 1:15 there is the sad intelligence that ‘all they which are in Asia’ (which must have included Ephesus) had ‘turned away from’ Paul, doubtless signifying that they had given up the truth as taught by Paul, and settled down with a lower standard. In 2Ti 4:12 Tychicus had been sent to Ephesus. The great care and watchfulness with which Paul laboured for their welfare is very manifest. In Rev 2:1-7 we have the address to this church, in which much is said in their favour, though the solemn charge had also to be made that they had left their first love, and the warning is given that if they did not repent their candlestick would be removed.
The Epistle to the Ephesians is remarkable in setting forth the counsels of God with regard to His people as connected with Christ. It is from this standpoint that they are viewed, rather than that of their need as sinners, and how it has been met. This latter is developed in the Epistle to the Romans. The state of the Ephesian believers enabled them to receive a communication of such a nature as this Epistle, in which glorious unfoldings of the mind of God about His own are given in the greatest fulness.
The key note is struck in Eph 1:3, where God is blessed as “the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ” – the God , when our Lord Jesus Christ is looked at as man; the Father, when He is viewed as Son of God. Christians are brought in Christ into these very relationships, as stated by the Lord Himself when risen from the dead, “Go to my brethren, and say unto them, I ascend unto my Father, and your Father; and to my God, and your God.” It will be seen that the prayer at the close of Eph. 1 is founded on the title ‘the God of our Lord Jesus Christ,’ while that in Eph. 3 is on the title ‘Father.’ The God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ has blessed believers with every spiritual blessing in the heavenlies in Christ. He has marked them out for adoption to Himself, that is, their being brought into the full position of sons in Christ Jesus, according to the good pleasure of His will. Brought into favour in the Beloved, they have in Him redemption, the forgiveness of sins. The mystery of God’s will is set forth – to head up all things, whether heavenly or earthly, in the Christ for the administration of the fulness of times. Jews and Gentiles are the subjects of salvation according to the purpose of God, believers from among both being sealed by the Holy Spirit, who is also the earnest of their inheritance – an inheritance which will be to the praise of God’s glory when everything is headed up in Christ.
The prayer at the close of Eph. 1 is that the saints might have the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the full knowledge of the God of the Lord Jesus Christ: that they might know the hope of His calling, His inheritance in the saints, and the greatness of the power towards them which He wrought in raising Christ (a Man) from the dead, and setting Him at His right hand in the heavenly places (cf. Psa 8.). He being head over all things to the body, which is the fulness of Him who fills all in all.
Eph. 2. This same power had wrought toward the saints (as shown by the subject being continued without a break from Eph. 1: to Eph. 2.), in that having been dead in sins they had been quickened with Christ, had been raised up together (Jew and Gentile), and made to sit down together in the heavenlies in Christ Jesus. There is a new creation in Christ by God as regards His people. The apostle would have the Gentile Christians contrast their present privileges with their former hopeless state. Jew and Gentile believers had access by one Spirit to the Father, while the latter were now fellow-citizens of the saints, and were of the household of God, being part of the holy temple He was building. They were also built together for a habitation of God in the Spirit.
Eph. 3. This chapter, in a parenthesis, unfolds the administration of the mystery, hid in God, but now revealed by the Spirit, namely, that the Gentiles should be joint heirs and a joint body and joint partakers of His promise in Christ Jesus. A mystery is that which is understood only by the initiated. In the public dealings of God with men this mystery had no place; it is connected (though administered upon earth) with Christ while hid in the heavens, and the saints united to Him there; by its administration would be made known to principalities and powers in heavenly places the all various wisdom of God. A prayer follows that the saints might be strengthened inwardly by the Spirit; that the Christ might dwell through faith In their hearts; that they might apprehend the breadth, and length, and depth, and height and might know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge, so as to be filled unto all the fulness of God. Christ is here presented as the centre of all the counsels of God, and His love is to be known in all its fulness by the hearts of His people.
Eph. 4. The apostle applies what is given in the earlier part of the epistle, particularly at the close of Eph. 2 – the bringing together in one in a new and heavenly manner of those who on earthly ground had been at enmity. The saints were to endeavour to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. Gifts are alluded to as given by the Head, for the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ, till we all arrive at the unity of the faith, and the full knowledge of the Son of God, at the full grown man, and at the measure of the stature of the fulness of the Christ. Everything necessary for the body is derived from the Head. All is to grow up into Christ. Practical exhortations follow in Eph 4:17. The truth ‘in Jesus’ is the having put off the old man and having put on the new: consequently all that characterised the old man must be put off, and what is of the new cultivated.
Eph. 5 and Eph. 6. Believers are to be imitators of God as dear children. They are light in the Lord, and are to walk as children of light. They are to be filled with the Spirit. Earthly relationships are now referred to: wives, husbands, children, fathers, bondmen, masters. Each relationship is to be taken up as in the Lord. Blessed instruction as to the mystery of Christ and the church is given in connection with the word to wives and husbands.
In view of the nature of the spiritual conflict waged in heavenly places, Christians are exhorted to put on the panoply of God. Without this they cannot stand. The apostle asks the prayers of the saints that he might make known the mystery of the glad tidings with boldness; and closes this remarkable epistle with a benediction.
The ‘heavenlies’ characterise the epistle: cf. Eph 1:3; Eph 1:20; Eph 2:6; Eph 3:10; Eph 6:12. In the Epistle to the Romans man is taken up as alive in his sins, and grace meets his need: in Ephesians it is God’s quickening power on behalf of those dead in sins, as displayed in raising Christ up from among the dead. In Colossians the saints are looked at as risen with Christ, but on earth with their hope in heaven: in the Ephesians the saints are seated in Christ in the heavenlies.