to take the verse as referring to the pre- vious ἐδόθη ἡ χάρις αὕτη, etc. (Ell, Alf. ; and. substantially De Wette, Hofm., etc.). The main idea in the paragraph from ver. 7 onwards is unmistakably that of the marvellous call and commission of Paul, and the wonder of the grace that made an Apostle and preacher of him is magnified the more by the Divine pur- pose revealed in that commission, to wit, the making known the manifold wisdom of God in His ways with sinful men and with the outcasts of the Gentile world in particular. It is objected indeed that this is to make Paul claim for his own preaching and as his own special work what belonged to other Apostles and preachers no less than to him. But all that is stated here goes in point of fact to enhance the i of Paul’s own personal insignificance, the extraordin
and unmerited nature of his call, and his absolute indebtedness to grace. ‘ For this sublime cause,” as Alford admir- ably expresses it, “the humble Paul was raised up—to bring about—he, the
Io—II,
u
309
ἐκκλησίας ἡ " πολυποίκιλος “copia τοῦ θεοῦ, 11. κατὰ ” πρόθεσιν u Ch. i. 22 τε.
- , A aA ~ ~ τῶν "αἰώνων ἣν ἐποίησεν “ἐν χριστῷ Ἰησοῦ! τῷ κυρίῳ ἡμῶν, v Here
w=Rom., xi. 33; 1 Οὐσ. ἱ. 21, εἴς, ; Rev. ν. 12 ἃ].
only.
x Ch. i. 11 reff. γα Tim. i.9. z=Col. i. τό reff.
Before Χριστω insert τω Ν ΑΒΟ 17, 37, 116, etc. ; omit ΜΟ ΡΕ ΚΙ, most mss., Ath., Chr., Thdrt., Dam. ; FG om. Χ. Ino. ; Clem. om. Ino.
least worthy of the saints—that to the heavenly powers themselves should be made known, by means of those whom he was empowered to enlighten ’—the manifold wisdom of God. The ἀρχαί and ἐξουσίαι can only mean good angels (cf. under i, 21 above) ; and these names of dignity (the term ἄγγελος is not used in this Epistle) are appropriate here as suggesting again the greatness of Paul’s commission, and perhaps also (as Mey. thinks) the glory put upon the ἐκκλησία. That the ἀρχαί and ἐξουσίαι cannot mean any orders of earthly powers—Jewish, Gentile or Christian rulers or the like, is shown by the ἐν τοῖς ἐπουρανίοις. Nor can they refer to demonic powers, whether by themselves alone or as part of the angelic world, for this would scarcely be * consistent with the mention of the Church, and further the Divine power would in that case be more in point than the Divine wisdom. Nor again is there any- thing in the context to suggest that Paul has in view the angels that ministered the law and the elemental powers honoured by the heathen (V. Soden). The ἐν τοῖς ἐπουρανίοις here, as elsewhere in the Epistle, has the sense = in heaven ; see under 1. 3 above. The ἐν, therefore, has its proper local sense, and is not = in re- spect of, as if the clause meant “in the case of the heavenly things”. As the phrase makes one idea, too, with the ἀρχαῖς and ἐξουσίαις, defining them as heavenly, it requires no ταῖς after the ἐξουσίαις.---διὰ
πο σης ἐκκλησίας : through the Church. The
Church, therefore, that is, as is evidently meant here, the whole body of believers in the unity in which Jew and Gentile are now made one, is the means by which the Divine wisdom is to be made known and Paul’s commission in that respect made good. The Church, which it was his high Apostolic vocation to build up by bringing multitudes of Gentile believers into its membership—the Church in which the breaking down of ancient bar- riers and the removal of the old enmity were now seen, was itself the living wit- ness to the Divine σοφία, the “ mirror,” as Calvin puts it, “in which angels con- template the wonderful wisdom of God”. And that Divine wisdom is described as