This is probably the meaning of the terra in 2 P 3^° : ' The day of the Lord shall come as a thief ; in Avhich . . . the elements shall be dissolved Avith fervent heat' (crrotxeia 5^ Kavcro6fieva XvOrjaerai [or \v9ri(TovTai]) ; and v.^^: 'the elements shall melt (TTjKerai) with fervent heat.' Here RVm gives the alternative ' heavenly bodies,' Avhich is a mean- ing the Avord came to have in early ecclesiastical Avriters. The stars Avere called a-Toixela either aa tlie elements of the heavens, or — a less likely ex- planation— because in them the elements of man's life and destiny were supposed to reside. Justin speaks of ra ovpdvia ffroLxela (Apol. ii. 5). Theoph. of Antioch has a-Toix^ia 0eov (ad Atitol. i. 4), and the Avord bears the same meaning in Ep. ad Diog. vii. 2. In 2 P 3^" the situation of (XToixeia betAveen oiipavol and yrj favours this interpretation ; the universe seems to consist of the vault of heaven, the heavenly bodies, and the earth. But as the AATiter of the Epistle is not methodical, and as, in painting a lurid picture of final destruction, he evidently uses the strongest language at his com- mand, it is probable that the aroix^ia whose burn- ing he contemplates are the elements of the whole universe.
The Gr. word frequently denoted the rudiments or principia of a science, art, or discipline. The a-Toixeia. of geometry, grammar, or logic are the first principles ; aroixe'^a- t^s X^^ewy are the parts of speech (Aris. Poet. xx. 1) ; ffroixela t^s dperrjs, the elements of virtue (Plut. de Lib. Educ. xvi. 2). The Avord unquestionably has this meaning in He 5^-, 'the rudiments of the first principles (to, (XTOLxela T??s dpxv^) of tbe oracles of God ' — the A B C of Christian education, Avhat is milk for babes but not solid food for men (v.^^).
The phrase in regard to Avhich there is most division of opinion is rd ffroLX^M roD Kda/iov (Gal 4', Col 28- 2»; rod Kda-fiov is clearly implied in Gal 4^). (i.) Many take a-roixe'ia in the intellectual sense: ' the elementary things, the immature beginnings of religion, Avhich occupy the minds of those who are still without the pale of Christianity ' (Meyer
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on Gal 4') ; ' the elements of religious training, or the ceremonial precepts common alike to the wor- ship of Jews and of Gentiles' (Grimm-Thayer, s.v.). To this view there are strong objections. Those who are in bondage to the (rroixeia. of the world are compared with heirs who are still under guardians and stewards (Gal i^'^), where the parallel suggests the personality of the crroix^Ta. To serve the (jToixeta. is the same thing as serving them that by natui'e are no gods (4^) — a statement by no means evident if the (TToixela are the rudiments of religious instruction. The relapse from God to the crrotxera (4^) can scarcely be a return to a mere abstraction. The observance of times and seasons is according to the ffToixeta of the world, not according to Christ (Col 2*) — a contrast which suggests that the (TToixeta- and Christ are personal rivals. When men died with Christ from the crrot%era of the world (v.^"), this was more than a death to rudimentary teach- ing. The aTOix^ia are apparently identical with the principalities and powers of which Christ is Head and over which He triumphs (vv.i'*"^^). Finally, a man's knowledge of tlie (rro£x«a is not approved as his beginning of religious education, but con- demned as his 'philosophy and vain deceit' (v.*).
(ii.) Those interpreters come nearer the facts of the case who suggest that the o-rotxeia to which the Galatian and Colossian Christians were reverting were the heavenly bodies conceived as animated and therefore to be worshipped. Such worship was certainly common enough among the Gentiles. ' They say that tlie stars are all and every one real parts of Jove, and live, and have reasonable souls, and therefore are absolute gods' (Aug. de Civ. Dei, iv. 11). Nor was the belief in astral spirits confined to pagans. In the Prcedicatio Petri (ap. Clem. Alex. Strom, vi. 5) the Jews are represented as Xarpevovres dyy^Xoti Kal dpxo-yye^ots, /x-qvl Kal (reXiji/p, and this worsliip is classed with that of the heathen. Clear evidence of this belief is found in Philo {de Mundi Op. i. 34) and in the Book of Enoch (xli. xliii.). The animated heavenly bodies, however, would rather be described as to. ffroixeia tov ovpavoD, and the crTotxe'^a. of the ' cosmos ' must include those of earth as well as those of heaven.
(iii.) Many recent expositors therefore maintain that the a-Toixf^O' are the angels or personal elemental spirits which were supposed to animate all tilings. There is evidence that tliis view was wide-spread. The Book of Enoch (Ixxxii. 10 f.) speaks of the angels of the stars keeping watch, the leaders dividing the seasons, the taxiarchs the months, and the chiliarchs the days. Stars are punislied if they fail to appear when due (xviii. 15). The Book of Jubilees (ch. ii.) refers to the creation of the angels of the face (or presence), and the angels who cry ' holy,' the angels of the spirit of wind and of hail, of thunder and of lightning, of heat and of cold, of each of the seasons, of dawn and of evening, etc. The same species of animism is found in the As- cension of Isaiah (iv. 18), 2 Es 8-^^*, Sibyll. Orac. (vii. 33-35). In the Testament of Solomon (Migne, Patr. Gr. cxxii. 1315) the spirits who come before the king say : ' We are the aroLxeta, the rulers of this under world ' (ol Kocr/xoKpaTope? rod ctkotovs toijtov). The belief survives in modern Greek folk-lore, in which the tutelary spirit who is supposed to reside in every rock, stream, bridge, and so forth, is called a cTToixe^ov.