Testament, it is used actively—that which does fill. Matt. 9, 16, The piece put into an old garment is called its fulness, i. e. ‘that which is put in to fill it up.’ Mark 6, 48, The fragments which filled the bas- kets, are called their fulness. John 1, 16, ‘ Of his ful- ness,’ means the plenitude of grace and truth that is in him. Gal. 4, 4, The fulness of the time, is that which renders full the specified time. Col. 2, 9, The fulness of the Godhead, is all that is in the Godhead. Eph. 3, 19, The fulness of God, is that of which God is full—the plenitude of divine perfections. 1 Cor. 10, 26, The fulness of the earth, is that which fills the earth. The common usage of the word in the New Testament is therefore clearly in favour of its being taken in an ac- tive sense here. The church is the fulness of Christ— in that it is the complement of his mystic person. He is the head, the church is his body.
In favour of the other interpretation it may be urged,—1. That πλήρωμα has in the Classics, in Philo, in the writings of the Gnostics, at times, a passive sense. 2. The meaning thus afforded is preferable. It is a more scriptural and more intelligible statement, to say that Christ fills his church, as the soul pervades the body—or as the glory of the Lord filled the tem- ple, than to say that the church in any sense fills Christ. 3. Πλήρωμα must be taken in a sense which suits the participle πληρουμένου ; ‘the church is filled by him who fills all things.’ The second and third of these reasons are so strong as to give this interpretation the preference in the minds of those to whom the wsug