Epistle to the Ephesians

“ And to the Christian believer these books are not only documents of great historical importance as illustrative of a unique period: they also represent to us in different forms the highest level of that action of the divine Spirit upon the mind of man which we call inspiration. St. Paul for instance, in this Epistle to the Ephesians claims, as we shall find, to be an 'inspired' man, a recipient of divine revelation, and makes a similar claim for the apostles and prophets generally. ”

“ It is an epistle that bears date out of a prison: and some have observed that what this apostle wrote when he was a prisoner had the greatest relish and savour in it of the things of God. When his tribulations did abound, his consolations and experiences did much more abound, whence we may observe that the afflictive exercises of God's people, and particularly of his ministers, often tend to the advantage of others as well as to their own. The apostle's design is to settle and establish the Ephesians in the truth, and further to acquaint them with the mystery of the gospel, in order to it. ”

“ Still, beyond these there rises in the distance a further end for man and the Church: the reception of the entire fulness of God. Human desire and thought thus reach their limit; they grasp at the infinite.
In this Chapter we will strive to follow the apostle’s prayer to the end of the eighteenth verse, where it arrives at its chief aim and touches the main thought of the epistle, expressing the desire that all believers may have power to realize the full scope of the salvation of Christ in which they participate. ”

“ The persons to whom this epistle is sent: To the saints who are at Ephesus, that is, to the Christians who were members of the church at Ephesus, the metropolis of Asia. He calls them saints, for such they were in profession, such they were bound to be in truth and reality, and many of them were such. All Christians must be saints; and, if they come not under that character on earth, they will never be saints in glory. He calls them the faithful in Christ Jesus, believers in him, and firm and constant in their adherence to him and to his truths and ways. ”

“ The great end to be attained is likeness to Christ (2:5) .
Time of Writing.—This epistle is generally regarded as the latest of the letters written during the first imprisonment in Rome, and in the same year with those to the churches at Colossæ, and Ephesus. It was probably sent to Philippi shortly after the other Epistles (Colossians, Philemon, and Ephesians) had been dispatched to Asia Minor. ”

“ In the sixth chapter this will be more fully unfolded; but he cannot altogether reserve it so long. As he has advanced from the law-aspect of our acceptance to its love-aspect, so now with this latter he gives us at once the life-aspect, our vital incorporation with our Redeemer, our part and lot in His resurrection-life. Nowhere in this whole Epistle is that subject expounded so fully as in the later Epistles, Colossians and Ephesians; the Inspirer led His servant all over that region then, in his Roman prison, but not now. ”

“ In classifying the New Testament writings, three things might be considered—the reception they met with from the first, their authenticity, above all, their internal excellence. The subject is not easy, because critics are not universally agreed about the proper rank and authenticity of a few documents. The Epistle to the Colossians, for example, creates perplexity; that to the Ephesians is less embarrassing, its post-Pauline origin being tolerably clear. ”

“ On the other hand, the characteristics of the thought in Ephesians give some strong evidence confirmatory of the epistle’s own claim to be by Paul. (a) The writer of Eph. ii. 11-22 was a Jew, not less proud of his race than was the writer of Rom. ix.-xi. or of Phil. iii. 4 ff. (b) The centre in all the theology of the epistle is the idea of redemption. The use of Alexandrian categories is wholly governed by this interest. (c) The epistle shows the same panoramic, pictorial, dramatic conception of Christian truth which is everywhere characteristic of Paul. ”

“ Now in these things also this Epistle bears great resemblance to that to the Ephesians, either [2] because it was not fitting to write about these things to men now [3] at peace, who needed to be instructed in high doctrines as yet lacking to them, or because that for persons who had been comforted under trials, it were superfluous to hear on these subjects. ”

“ But, apart from possibilities of this kind, it does appear that the Epistle was on the whole too serious an effort for the forger, more liable to detection, perhaps, as a fraud, and not so likely to gain the desired popularity as a narrative or an Apocalypse. Certain it is that our apocryphal Epistles are few and not impressive. By far the most considerable is that Epistle of the Apostles which has only become known in recent years; and the greater part of this is not an Epistle but a dialogue. ”

“ And if the author were not a forger, but the presbyter who was for some years a contemporary of the apostle, it is hardly likely that he would have been content to write this diminutive letter, which does little more than sum up part of the First Epistle. The language of the Second Epistle bears almost the same relation to that of the first as the first bears to that of the Gospel. There is a fundamental likeness combined with a few fresh expressions, such as "walk according to," "coming in the flesh" instead of "come in the flesh," "to have God." ”

“ St. Paul had written to seven particular Churches—Thessalonica, Corinth, Rome, Galatia, Philippi, Colossæ, and Ephesus; and here were seven Epistles without any address to a particular Church; therefore they might fitly be called "General Epistles." Clement of Alexandria uses this term of the letter addressed to the Gentile Christians "in Antioch and Syria and Cilicia" (Acts xv. 23) by the Apostles, in the so-called Council of Jerusalem (Strom. IV. xv.) ; and Origen uses it of the Epistle of Barnabas (Con. Celsum I. lxiii.) ”

“ They are involved in the most intricate questions about the reproduction of the Gospel in the Epistle or of the Epistle in the Gospel. For those who do not believe in a diversity of authorship the problem is far less vital. The apostle was evidently advanced in years. ”

“ The lost fragment of the Epistle of Clement is thus recovered, and with the aid of a recently discovered version of the name Epistle, learned men can now restore almost in its entirety the most venerable of uninspired Christian writings. [9]
Read that Epistle, and you find that it teaches plainly the doctrines of the Trinity, the Atonement, Justification by faith, and other distinctive doctrines of our Church. It is important for what it teaches; but it is almost equally important for what it does not teach. Silence is sometimes more eloquent than words ”

“ One, called the Apostolic Church Order, is couched in a series of speeches each pronounced by an apostle. This we have in Greek. Another notable member of the group is the Testament of the Lord (Syriac) which is a fairly recent discovery. It differs from the rest in beginning with an apocalyptic portion—a prophecy uttered by Christ—part of which is embodied in another Testament of the Lord which is prefixed, in the Ethiopic version, to the Epistle of the Apostles. ”

“ Are we forbidden to suppose that this witness to their faith gladdened their own glorified spirits, and calmed their eager expectation of the day when the promise would be fulfilled? For, after all, their reward was not the testimony of Scripture, but their own perfection. Now this perfection is described through out the Epistle as a priestly consecration. It expresses fitness for entering into immediate communion with God. This was the final fulfilment of the promise. This was the blessing which the saints under the old covenant had not obtained. ”

“ Hort labours to throw suspicion on “the Passover” (τὸ πάσχα) ,—in defiance of every known Manuscript,—every known Version,—and every Father who quotes or recognizes the place.790 We find nine columns devoted to his vindication of this weak imagination; although so partial are his Notes, that countless “various Readings” of great interest and importance are left wholly undiscussed. Nay, sometimes entire Epistles are dismissed with a single weak annotation (e.g. 1 and 2 Thessalonians) ,—or with none, as in the case of the Epistle to the Philippians. ”

“ The Epistle has the nature of a letter sent by a spiritual father to his children rather than of a doctrinal treatise with an argument carefully built up. Its value for us lies chiefly in the vivid reality with which it reflects the personality of the writer, his love for his converts, his intense conviction that his apostolic commission and power are entirely genuine—a conviction which is set off by his wish always to associate himself with the weakness and fragility of ordinary human nature. ”

“ The second Epistle is, in our judgment, a letter to an individual. Certainly we are unable to find in its whole contents any probable allusion to a Church personified as a lady. [349] It is, as we read it, addressed to Kyria, an Ephesian lady, or one who lived in the circle of Ephesian influence. It was sent by the Apostle during an absence from Ephesus. That absence might have been for the purpose of one of the visitations of the Churches of Asia Minor, which (as we are told by ancient Church writers) the Apostle was in the habit of holding. ”

“ Ye are our epistle, written in our hearts, known and read of all men; being made manifest that ye are an epistle of Christ, ministered by us, written not with ink, but with the Spirit of the living God; not in tables of stone, but in tables that are hearts of flesh."—2 Cor. ”

“ Epistilbite, ep-i-stil′bīt, n. a whitish hydrous silicate of aluminium, calcium, and sodium.
Epistle, e-pis′l, n. a writing sent to one, a letter: esp. a letter to an individual or church from an apostle, as the Epistles of Paul: the extract from one of the apostolical epistles read as part of the communion service.—v.i. (Milt.) to preface.—ns. Epis′tler, Epis′toler, a letter-writer; Epis′tler, one who reads the liturgical epistle in the communion service.—adjs. ”

“ The epistle itself is entirely different in its complexion from all those in the sacred canon; the style and manner are more that of a Jewish prophet than a Christian apostle. It scarcely touches on any subject purely Christian. ”

“ Hence we may determine what genuine Christian doctrine or preaching is. If the Gospel is to be preached, it must concern the resurrection of Christ. Whoever does not preach this is no Apostle; for it is the head article of our faith. And those books are truly the noblest which teach and enforce such doctrine, as was said above. So that we may easily discover that the Epistle of James is no true Apostolic Epistle* for it contains scarcely a letter of these things in it, while the greatest importance belongs to this article of faith. ”

“ It is well known to literary students of the Epistle that some phenomena in the text, from the close of ch. xiv. onwards, have raised important and complex questions. It has been asked whether the great Doxology (xvi. 25-27) always stood where it now stands; whether it should stand at the close of our ch. xiv.; whether its style and wording allow us to regard it as contemporary with the Epistle as a whole, or whether they indicate that it was written later in St Paul's course; whether our fifteenth and sixteenth chapters, while Pauline, are not out of place in an Epistle to Rome ”

“ Fourthly, This being considered, as also how positive and plain once and again the same apostle is in that very epistle, as in divers places above cited, is it equal or rational to strain this one place, presently after so qualified and subsumed in the time past, to contradict not only other positive expressions of his, but the whole tendency of his epistle, and of the rest of the holy commands and precepts of the scripture?
[Obj. 2.] Secondly, Their second objection is from two places of scripture, much of one signification: the one is, 1 Kings viii. 46. For there is no man that sinneth not. ”

“ The design of this epistle was to persuade and press the believing Hebrews to a constant adherence to the Christian faith, and perseverance in it, notwithstanding all the sufferings they might meet with in so doing. In order to this, the apostle speaks much of the excellency of the author of the gospel, the glorious Jesus, whose honour he advances, and whom he justly prefers before all others, showing him to be all in all, and this in lofty strains of holy rhetoric. ”