{"commentary":{"id":"jamieson-fausset-brown","name":"Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary","website":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jamieson-Fausset-Brown_Bible_Commentary","licenseUrl":"https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/","licenseNotes":null,"licenseNotice":null,"englishName":"Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary","language":"eng","textDirection":"rtl","sha256":"db3d4c8b3c1f32ef9d1430a57392e02bda3a17aac1f9bbe398461de021a3cb13","availableFormats":["json"],"listOfBooksApiLink":"/api/c/jamieson-fausset-brown/books.json","listOfProfilesApiLink":"/api/c/jamieson-fausset-brown/profiles.json","numberOfBooks":66,"totalNumberOfChapters":1187,"totalNumberOfVerses":17056,"totalNumberOfProfiles":0,"languageName":"English","languageEnglishName":"English"},"book":{"id":"EPH","commentaryId":"jamieson-fausset-brown","name":"Ephesians","commonName":"Ephesians","introduction":"THE headings (Eph 1:1, and Eph 3:1, show that this Epistle claims to be that of Paul. This claim is confirmed by the testimonies of IRENÆUS, [Against Heresies, 5.2,3; 1.8,5]; CLEMENT OF ALEXANDRIA, [Miscellanies, 4, P. 65, and The Instructor, 1.8]; ORIGEN, [Against Celsus, 4,211]. It is quoted by VALENTINUS, A.D. 120, namely, Eph 3:14-18, as we know from HIPPOLYTUS [The Refutation of All Heresies, p. 193]. POLYCARP [Epistle to the Philippians, 12], testifies to its canonicity. So TERTULLIAN [Against Marcion, 5,17]. IGNATIUS [Epistle to the Ephesians, 12], which alludes to the frequent and affectionate mention made by Paul of the Christian state, privileges, and persons of the Ephesians in his Epistle.\n\nTwo theories, besides the ordinary one, have been held on the question, to whom the Epistle is addressed. GROTIUS, after the heretic Marcion, maintains that it was addressed to the Church at Laodicea, and that it is the Epistle to which Paul refers in Col 4:16. But the Epistle to the Colossians was probably written before that to the Ephesians, as appears from the parallel passages in Ephesians bearing marks of being expanded from those in Colossians; and Marcion seems to have drawn his notion, as to our Epistle, from Paul's allusion (Col 4:16) to an Epistle addressed by him to the Laodiceans. ORIGEN and CLEMENT OF ALEXANDRIA, and even TERTULLIAN, who refers to Marcion, give no sanction to his notion. No single manuscript contains the heading, \"to the saints that are at Laodicea.\" The very resemblance of the Epistle to the Ephesians, to that to the Colossians, is against the theory; for if the former were really the one addressed to Laodicea (Col 4:16), Paul would not have deemed it necessary that the churches of Colosse and Laodicea should interchange Epistles. The greetings, moreover (Col 4:15), which he sends through the Colossians to the Laodiceans, are quite incompatible with the idea that Paul wrote an Epistle to the Laodiceans at the same time, and by the same bearer, Tychicus (the bearer of our Epistle to the Ephesians, as well as of that to Colosse, Eph 6:21; Col 4:7); for who, under such circumstances, would not send the greetings directly in the letter to the party saluted? The letter to Laodicea was evidently written some time before that to Colosse, Archbishop USHER has advanced the second theory: That it was an encyclical letter headed, as in Manuscript B., \"to the saints that are . . . and to the faithful,\" the name of each Church being inserted in the copy sent to it; and that its being sent to Ephesus first, occasioned its being entitled, as now, the Epistle to the Ephesians. ALFORD makes the following objections to this theory: (1) It is at variance with the spirit of the Epistle, which is clearly addressed to one set of persons throughout, co-existing in one place, and as one body, and under the same circumstances. (2) The improbability that the apostle, who in two of his Epistles (Second Corinthians and Galatians) has so plainly specified their encyclical character, should have here omitted such specification. (3) The still greater improbability that he should have, as on this hypothesis must be assumed, written a circular Epistle to a district, of which Ephesus was the commercial capital, addressed to various churches within that district, yet from its very contents (as by the opponents' hypothesis) not admitting of application to the Church of that metropolis, in which he had spent so long a time, and to which he was so affectionately bound. (4) The inconsistency of this hypothesis with the address of the Epistle, and the universal testimony of the ancient Church. The absence of personal greetings is not an argument for either of the two theories; for similarly there are none in Galatians, Philippians, First and Second Thessalonians, First Timothy. The better he knows the parties addressed, and the more general and solemn the subject, the less he seems to give of these individual notices. Writing, as he does in this Epistle, on the constitution and prospects of Christ's universal Church, he refers the Ephesians, as to personal matters, to the bearer of the Epistle, Tychicus (Eph 6:21-22). As to the omission of \"which are at Ephesus\" (Eph 1:1), in Manuscript B., so \"in Rome\" (Rom 1:7) is omitted in some old manuscripts: it was probably done by churches among whom it was read, in order to generalize the reference of its contents, and especially where the subject of the Epistle is catholic. The words are found in the margin of Manuscript B, from a first hand; and are found in all the oldest manuscripts and versions.\n\nPaul's first visit to Ephesus (on the seacoast of Lydia, near the river Cayster) is related in Act 18:19-21. The work, begun by his disputations with the Jews in his short visit, was carried on by Apollos (Act 18:24-26), and Aquila and Priscilla (Act 18:26). At his second visit, after his journey to Jerusalem, and thence to the east regions of Asia Minor, he remained at Ephesus \"three years\" (Act 19:10, the \"two years\" in which verse are only part of the time, and Act 20:31); so that the founding and rearing of this Church occupied an unusually large portion of the apostle's time and care; whence his language in this Epistle shows a warmth of feeling, and a free outpouring of thought, and a union in spiritual privileges and hope between him and them (Eph 1:3, &c.), such as are natural from one so long and so intimately associated with those whom he addresses. On his last journey to Jerusalem, he sailed by Ephesus and summoned the elders of the Ephesian Church to meet him at Miletus, where he delivered his remarkable farewell charge (Acts 20:18-35).\n\nThis Epistle was addressed to the Ephesians during the early part of his imprisonment at Rome, immediately after that to the Colossians, to which it bears a close resemblance in many passages, the apostle having in his mind generally the same great truths in writing both. It is an undesigned proof of genuineness that the two Epistles, written about the same date, and under the same circumstances, bear a closer mutual resemblance than those written at distant dates and on different occasions. Compare Eph 1:7 with Col 1:14; Eph 1:10 with Col 1:20; Eph 3:2 with Col 1:25; Eph 5:19 with Col 3:16; Eph 6:22 with Col 4:8; Eph 1:19; Eph 2:5 with Col 2:12-13; Eph 4:2-4 with Col 3:12-15; Eph 4:16 with Col 2:19; Eph 4:32 with Col 3:13; Eph 4:22-24 with Col 3:9-10; Eph 5:6-8 with Col 3:6-8; Eph 5:15-16 with Col 4:5; Eph 6:19-20 with Col 4:3-4; Eph 5:22-33; Eph 6:1-9 with Col 3:18; Eph 4:24-25 with Col 3:9; Eph 5:20-22 with Col 3:17-18. Tychicus and Onesimus were being sent to Colosse, the former bearing the two Epistles to the two churches respectively, the latter furnished with a letter of recommendation to Philemon, his former master, residing at Colosse. The date was probably about four years after his parting with the Ephesian elders at Miletus (Acts 20:6-38), about A.D. 62, before his imprisonment had become of the more severe kind, which appears in his Epistle to the Philippians. From Eph 6:19-20 it is plain he had at the time, though a prisoner, some degree of freedom in preaching, which accords with Act 28:23, Act 28:30-31, where he is represented as receiving at his lodgings all inquirers. His imprisonment began in February A.D. 61 and lasted \"two whole years\" (Act 28:30) at least, and perhaps longer.\n\nThe Church of Ephesus was made up of converts partly from the Jews and partly from the Gentiles (Act 19:8-10). Accordingly, the Epistle so addresses a Church constituted (Eph 2:14-22). Ephesus was famed for its idol temple of Artemis or Diana, which, after its having been burnt down by Herostratus on the night that Alexander the Great was born (355 B.C.), was rebuilt at enormous cost and was one of the wonders of the world. Hence, perhaps, have arisen his images in this Epistle drawn from a beautiful temple: the Church being in true inner beauty that which the temple of the idol tried to realize in outward show (Eph 2:19-22). The Epistle (Eph 4:17; Eph 5:1-13) implies the profligacy for which the Ephesian heathen were notorious. Many of the same expressions occur in the Epistle as in Paul's address to the Ephesian elders. Compare Eph 1:6-7; Eph 2:7, as to \"grace,\" with Act 20:24, Act 20:32 : this may well be called \"the Epistle of the grace of God\" [ALFORD]. Also, as to his \"bonds,\" Eph 3:1, and Eph 4:1 with Act 20:22-23. Also Eph 1:11, as to \"the counsel of God,\" with Act 20:27. Also Eph 1:14, as to \"the redemption of the purchased possession,\" with Act 20:28. Also Eph 1:14, Eph 1:18; Eph 2:20; Eph 5:5, as to \"building up\" the \"inheritance,\" with Act 20:32.\n\nThe object of the Epistle is \"to set forth the ground, the course, and the aim and end of THE CHURCH OF THE FAITHFUL IN CHRIST. He speaks to the Ephesians as a type or sample of the Church universal\" [ALFORD]. Hence, \"the Church\" throughout the Epistle is spoken of in the singular, not in the plural, \"churches.\" The Church's foundation, its course, and its end, are his theme alike in the larger and smaller divisions of the whole Epistle. \"Everywhere the foundation of the Church is in the will of the Father; the course of the Church is by the satisfaction of the Son; the end of the Church is the life in the Holy Spirit\" [ALFORD]. Compare respectively Eph 1:11; Eph 2:5; Eph 3:16. This having been laid down as a matter of doctrine (this part closing with a sublime doxology, Eph 3:14-21), is then made the ground of practical exhortations. In these latter also (from Eph 4:1, onward), the same threefold division prevails, for the Church is represented as founded on the counsel of \"God the Father, who is above all, through all, and in all,\" reared by the \"one Lord,\" Jesus Christ, through the \"one Spirit\" (Eph 4:4-6, &c.), who give their respective graces to the several members. These last are therefore to exercise all these graces in the several relations of life, as husbands, wives, servants, children, &c. The conclusion is that we must put on \"the whole armor of God\" (Eph 6:13).\n\nThe sublimity of the STYLE and LANGUAGE corresponds to the sublimity of the subjects and exceeds almost that of any part of his Epistles. It is appropriate that those to whom he so wrote were Christians long grounded in the faith. The very sublimity is the cause of the difficulty of the style, and of the presence of peculiar expressions occurring, not found elsewhere. \n\n\n\nNext: Ephesians Chapter 1\n\n","order":49,"numberOfChapters":6,"sha256":"cb26c51e1fc677d14f8ded4d2ec1526889ff5f790f6c8c41adec962f0416769a","firstChapterNumber":1,"firstChapterApiLink":"/api/c/jamieson-fausset-brown/EPH/1.json","firstChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"jamieson-fausset-brown","book":"EPH","chapter":1},"lastChapterNumber":6,"lastChapterApiLink":"/api/c/jamieson-fausset-brown/EPH/6.json","lastChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"jamieson-fausset-brown","book":"EPH","chapter":6},"totalNumberOfVerses":148},"chapter":{"number":2,"content":[{"type":"verse","number":2,"content":["the course of this world--the career (literally, \"the age,\" compare Gal 1:4), or present system of this world (Co1 2:6, Co1 2:12; Co1 3:18-19, as opposed to \"the world to come\"): alien from God, and lying in the wicked one (Jo1 5:19). \"The age\" (which is something more external and ethical) regulates \"the world\" (which is something more external). \n\nthe prince of the power of the air--the unseen God who lies underneath guiding \"the course of this world\" (Co2 4:4); ranging through the air around us: compare Mar 4:4, \"fowls of the air\" (Greek, \"heaven\") that is, (Eph 2:15), \"Satan\" and his demons. Compare Eph 6:12; Joh 12:31. Christ's ascension seems to have cast Satan out of heaven (Rev 12:5, Rev 12:9-10, Rev 12:12-13), where he had been heretofore the accuser of the brethren (Job 1:6-11). No longer able to accuse in heaven those justified by Christ, the ascended Saviour (Rom 8:33-34), he assails them on earth with all trials and temptations; and \"we live in an atmosphere poisonous and impregnated with deadly elements. But a mighty purification of the air will be effected by Christ's coming\" [AUBERLEN], for Satan shall be bound (Rev 12:12-13, Rev 12:15, Rev 12:17; Rev 20:2-3). \"The power\" is here used collectively for the \"powers of the air\"; in apposition with which \"powers\" stand the \"spirits,\" comprehended in the singular, \"the spirit,\" taken also collectively: the aggregate of the \"seducing spirits\" (Ti1 4:1) which \"work now (still; not merely, as in your case, 'in time past') in the sons of disobedience\" (a Hebraism: men who are not merely by accident disobedient, but who are essentially sons of disobedience itself: compare Mat 3:7), and of which Satan is here declared to be \"the prince.\" The Greek does not allow \"the spirit\" to refer to Satan, \"the prince\" himself, but to \"the powers of the air\" of which he is prince. The powers of the air are the embodiment of that evil \"spirit\" which is the ruling principle of unbelievers, especially the heathen (Act 26:18), as opposed to the spirit of the children of God (Luk 4:33). The potency of that \"spirit\" is shown in the \"disobedience\" of the former. Compare Deu 32:20, \"children in whom is no faith\" (Isa 30:9; Isa 57:4). They disobey the Gospel both in faith and practice (Th2 1:8; Co2 2:12).\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":3,"content":["also we--that is, we also. Paul here joins himself in the same category with them, passing from the second person (Eph 2:1-2) to the first person here. \n\nall--Jews and Gentiles. \n\nour conversation--\"our way of life\" (Co2 1:12; Pe1 1:18). This expression implies an outwardly more decorous course, than the open \"walk\" in gross sins on the part of the majority of Ephesians in times past, the Gentile portion of whom may be specially referred to in Eph 2:2. Paul and his Jewish countrymen, though outwardly more seemly than the Gentiles (Act 26:4-5, Act 26:18), had been essentially like them in living to the unrenewed flesh, without the Spirit of God. \n\nfulfilling--Greek, doing. \n\nmind--Greek, \"our thoughts.\" Mental suggestions and purposes (independent of God), as distinguished from the blind impulses of \"the flesh.\" \n\nand were by nature--He intentionally breaks off the construction, substituting \"and we were\" for \"and being,\" to mark emphatically his and their past state by nature, as contrasted with their present state by grace. Not merely is it, we had our way of life fulfilling our fleshly desires, and so being children of wrath; but we were by nature originally \"children of wrath,\" and so consequently had our way of life fulfilling our fleshly desires. \"Nature,\" in Greek, implies that which has grown in us as the peculiarity of our being, growing with our growth, and strengthening with our strength, as distinguished from that which has been wrought on us by mere external influences: what is inherent, not acquired (Job 14:4; Psa 51:5). An incidental proof of the doctrine of original sin. \n\nchildren of wrath--not merely \"sons,\" as in the Greek, \"sons of disobedience\" (Eph 2:2), but \"children\" by generation; not merely by adoption, as \"sons\" might be. The Greek order more emphatically marks this innate corruption: \"Those who in their (very) nature are children of wrath\"; Eph 2:5, \"grace\" is opposed to \"nature\" here; and salvation (implied in Eph 2:5, Eph 2:8, \"saved\") to \"wrath.\" Compare Article IX, Church of England Common Prayer Book. \"Original sin (birth-sin), standeth not in the following of Adam, but is the fault and corruption of the nature of every man, naturally engendered of Adam [Christ was supernaturally conceived by the Holy Ghost of the Virgin], whereby man is very far gone from original righteousness, and is of his own nature inclined to evil; and therefore, in every person born into this world, it deserveth God's wrath and damnation.\" Paul shows that even the Jews, who boasted of their birth from Abraham, were by natural birth equally children of wrath as the Gentiles, whom the Jews despised on account of their birth from idolaters (Rom 3:9; Rom 5:12-14). \"Wrath abideth\" on all who disobey the Gospel in faith and practice (Joh 3:36). The phrase, \"children of wrath,\" is a Hebraism, that is, objects of God's wrath from childhood, in our natural state, as being born in the sin which God hates. So \"son of death\" (Sa2 12:5, Margin); \"son of perdition\" (Joh 17:12; Th2 2:3). \n\nas others--Greek, \"as the rest\" of mankind are (Th1 4:13).\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":4,"content":["God, who is rich--Greek \"(as) being rich in mercy.\" \n\nfor--that is, \"because of His great love.\" This was the special ground of God's saving us; as \"rich in mercy\" (compare Eph 2:7; Eph 1:7; Rom 2:4; Rom 10:12) was the general ground. \"Mercy takes away misery; love confers salvation\" [BENGEL].\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":5,"content":["dead in sins--The best reading is in the Greek, \"dead in our (literally, 'the') trespasses.\" \n\nquickened--\"vivified\" spiritually, and consequences hereafter, corporally. There must be a spiritual resurrection of the soul before there can be a comfortable resurrection of the body [PEARSON] (Joh 11:25-26; Rom 8:11). \n\ntogether with Christ--The Head being seated at God's right hand, the body also sits there with Him [CHRYSOSTOM]. We are already seated there IN Him (\"in Christ Jesus,\" Eph 2:6), and hereafter shall be seated by Him; IN Him already as in our Head, which is the ground of our hope; by Him hereafter, as by the conferring cause, when hope shall be swallowed up in fruition [PEARSON]. What God wrought in Christ, He wrought (by the very fact) in all united to Christ, and one with Him. \n\nby grace ye are saved--Greek, \"Ye are in a saved state.\" Not merely \"ye are being saved,\" but ye \"are passed from death unto life\" (Joh 5:24). Salvation is to the Christian not a thing to be waited for hereafter, but already realized (Jo1 3:14). The parenthetic introduction of this clause here (compare Eph 2:8) is a burst of Paul's feeling, and in order to make the Ephesians feel that grace from first to last is the sole source of salvation; hence, too, he says \"ye,\" not \"we.\"\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":6,"content":["raised us up together--with Christ. The \"raising up\" presupposes previous quickening of Jesus in the tomb, and of us in the grave of our sins. \n\nmade us sit together--with Christ, namely, in His ascension. Believers are bodily in heaven in point of right, and virtually so in spirit, and have each their own place assigned there, which in due time they shall take possession of (Phi 3:20-21). He does not say, \"on the right hand of God\"; a prerogative reserved to Christ peculiarly; though they shall share His throne (Rev 3:21). \n\nin Christ Jesus--Our union with Him is the ground of our present spiritual, and future bodily, resurrection and ascension. \"Christ Jesus\" is the phrase mostly used in this Epistle, in which the office of the Christ, the Anointed Prophet, Priest and King, is the prominent thought; when the Person is prominent, \"Jesus Christ\" is the phrase used.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":7,"content":["Greek, \"That He might show forth (middle reflexive voice; for His own glory, Eph 1:6, Eph 1:12-14) in the ages which are coming on,\" that is, the blessed ages of the Gospel which supersede \"the age (Greek, for 'course') of this world\" (Eph 2:2), and the past \"ages\" from which the mystery was hidden (Col 1:26-27). These good ages, though beginning with the first preaching of the Gospel, and thenceforth continually succeeding one another, are not consummated till the Lord's coming again (compare Eph 1:21; Heb 6:5). The words, \"coming on,\" do not exclude the time then present, but imply simply the ages following upon Christ's \"raising them up together\" spiritually (Eph 2:6). \n\nkindness--\"benignity.\" \n\nthrough Christ--rather, as Greek, \"in Christ\"; the same expression as is so often repeated, to mark that all our blessings center \"IN HIM.\"\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":8,"content":["For--illustrating \"the exceeding riches of His grace in kindness.\" Translate as in Eph 2:5, \"Ye are in a saved state.\" \n\nthrough faith--the effect of the power of Christ's resurrection (Eph 1:19-20; Phi 3:10) whereby we are \"raised together\" with Him (Eph 2:6; Col 2:12). Some of the oldest manuscripts read, \"through your (literally, 'the') faith.\" The instrument or mean of salvation on the part of the person saved; Christ alone is the meritorious agent. \n\nand that--namely, the act of believing, or \"faith.\" \"Of yourselves\" stands in opposition to, \"it is the gift of God\" (Phi 1:29). \"That which I have said, 'through faith,' I do not wish to be understood so as if I excepted faith itself from grace\" [ESTIUS]. \"God justifies the believing man, not for the worthiness of his belief, but for the worthiness of Him in whom he believes\" [HOOKER]. The initiation, as well as the increase, of faith, is from the Spirit of God, not only by an external proposal of the word, but by internal illumination in the soul [PEARSON]. Yet \"faith\" cometh by the means which man must avail himself of, namely, \"hearing the word of God\" (Rom 10:17), and prayer (Luk 11:13), though the blessing is wholly of God (Co1 3:6-7).\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":9,"content":["Not of works--This clause stands in contrast to \"by grace,\" as is confirmed by Rom 4:4-5; Rom 11:6. \n\nlest--rather, as Greek, \"that no man should boast\" (Rom 3:27; Rom 4:2).\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":10,"content":["workmanship--literally, \"a thing of His making\"; \"handiwork.\" Here the spiritual creation, not the physical, is referred to (Eph 2:8-9). \n\ncreated--having been created (Eph 4:24; Psa 102:18; Isa 43:21; Co2 5:5, Co2 5:17). \n\nunto good works--\"for good works.\" \"Good works\" cannot be performed until we are new \"created unto\" them. Paul never calls the works of the law \"good works.\" We are not saved by, but created unto, good works. \n\nbefore ordained--Greek, \"before made ready\" (compare Joh 5:36). God marks out for each in His purposes beforehand, the particular good works, and the time and way which tie sees best. God both makes ready by His providence the opportunities for the works, and makes us ready for their performance (Joh 15:16; Ti2 2:21). \n\nthat we should walk in them--not \"be saved\" by them. Works do not justify, but the justified man works (Gal 5:22-25).\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":11,"content":["The Greek order in the oldest manuscripts is, \"That in time past (literally, once) ye,\" &c. Such remembrance sharpens gratitude and strengthens faith (Eph 2:19) [BENGEL]. \n\nGentiles in the flesh--that is, Gentiles in respect to circumcision. \n\ncalled Uncircumcision--The Gentiles were called (in contempt), and were, the Uncircumcision; the Jews were called, but were not truly, the Circumcision [ELLICOTT]. \n\nin the flesh made by hands--as opposed to the true \"circumcision of the heart in the Spirit, and not the letter\" (Rom 2:29), \"made without the hands in putting off the body of the sins of the flesh by the circumcision of Christ\" (Col 2:11).\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":12,"content":["without Christ--Greek, \"separate from Christ\"; having no part in Him; far from Him. A different Greek word (aneu) would be required to express, \"Christ was not present with you\" [TITTMANN]. \n\naliens--Greek, \"alienated from,\" not merely \"separated from.\" The Israelites were cut off from the commonwealth of God, but it was as being self-righteous, indolent, and unworthy, not as aliens and strangers [CHRYSOSTOM]. The expression, \"alienated from,\" takes it for granted that the Gentiles, before they had apostatized from the primitive truth, had been sharers in light and life (compare Eph 4:18, Eph 4:23). The hope of redemption through the Messiah, on their subsequent apostasy, was embodied into a definite \"commonwealth\" or polity, namely, that \"of Israel,\" from which the Gentiles were alienated. Contrast Eph 2:13; Eph 3:6; Eph 4:4-5, with Psa 147:20. \n\ncovenants of promise--rather, \". . . of the promise,\" namely, \"to thee and thy seed will I give this land\" (Rom 9:4; Gal 3:16). The plural implies the several renewals of the covenant with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and with the whole people at Sinai [ALFORD]. \"The promise\" is singular, to signify that the covenant, in reality, and substantially, is one and the same at all times, but only different in its accidents and external circumstances (compare Heb 1:1, \"at sundry times and in divers manners\"). \n\nhaving no . . . hope--beyond this life (Co1 15:19). The CONJECTURES of heathen philosophers as to a future life were at best vague and utterly unsatisfactory. They had no divine \"promise,\" and therefore no sure ground of \"hope.\" Epicurus and Aristotle did not believe in it at all. The Platonists believed the soul passed through perpetual changes, now happy, and then again miserable; the Stoics, that it existed no longer than till the time of the general burning up of all things. \n\nwithout God--Greek, \"atheists,\" that is, they had not \"God\" in the sense we use the word, the Eternal Being who made and governs all things (compare Act 14:15, \"Turn from these vanities unto the living God who made heaven, and earth, and the sea, and all things therein\"), whereas the Jews had distinct ideas of God and immortality. Compare also Gal 4:8, \"Ye knew not God . . . ye did service unto them which are no gods\" (Th1 4:5). So also pantheists are atheists, for an impersonal God is NO GOD, and an ideal immortality no immortality [THOLUCK]. \n\nin the world--in contrast to belonging to \"the commonwealth of Israel.\" Having their portion and their all in this godless vain world (Psa 17:14), from which Christ delivers His people (Joh 15:19; Joh 17:14; Gal 1:4).\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":13,"content":["now--in contrast to \"at that time\" (Eph 2:12). \n\nin Christ Jesus--\"Jesus\" is here added, whereas the expression before (Eph 2:12) had been merely \"Christ,\" to mark that they know Christ as the personal Saviour, \"Jesus.\" \n\nsometimes--Greek, \"aforetime.\" \n\nfar off--the Jewish description of the Gentiles. Far off from God and from the people of God (Eph 2:17; Isa 57:19; Act 2:39). \n\nare--Greek, \"have been.\" \n\nby--Greek, \"in.\" Thus \"the blood of Christ\" is made the seal of a covenant IN which their nearness to God consists. In Eph 1:7, where the blood is more directly spoken of as the instrument, it is \"through His blood\" [ALFORD].\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":14,"content":["he--Greek, \"Himself\" alone, pre-eminently, and none else. Emphatical. \n\nour peace--not merely \"Peacemaker,\" but \"Himself\" the price of our (Jews' and Gentiles' alike) peace with God, and so the bond of union between \"both\" in God. He took both into Himself, and reconciled them, united, to God, by His assuming our nature and our penal and legal liabilities (Eph 2:15; Isa 9:5-6; Isa 53:5; Mic 5:5; Col 1:20). His title, \"Shiloh,\" means the same (Gen 49:10). \n\nthe middle wall of partition--Greek, \". . . of the partition\" or \"fence\"; the middle wall which parted Jew and Gentile. There was a balustrade of stone which separated the court of the Gentiles from the holy place, which it was death for a Gentile to pass. But this, though incidentally alluded to, was but a symbol of the partition itself, namely, \"the enmity\" between \"both\" and God (Eph 2:15), the real cause of separation from God, and so the mediate cause of their separation from one another. Hence there was a twofold wall of partition, one the inner wall, severing the Jewish people from entrance to the holy part of the temple where the priests officiated, the other the outer wall, separating the Gentile proselytes from access to the court of the Jews (compare Eze 44:7; Act 21:28). Thus this twofold wall represented the Sinaitic law, which both severed all men, even the Jews, from access to God (through sin, which is the violation of the law), and also separated the Gentiles from the Jews. As the term \"wall\" implies the strength of the partition, so \"fence\" implies that it was easily removed by God when the due time came.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":15,"content":["Rather, make \"enmity\" an apposition to \"the middle wall of partition\"; \"Hath broken down the middle wall of partition (not merely as English Version, 'between us,' but also between all men and God), to wit, the enmity (Rom 8:7) by His flesh\" (compare Eph 2:16; Rom 8:3). \n\nthe law of commandments contained in--Greek, \"the law of the commandments (consisting) in ordinances.\" This law was \"the partition\" or \"fence,\" which embodied the expression of the \"enmity\" (the \"wrath\" of God against our sin, and our enmity to Him, Eph 2:3) (Rom 4:15; Rom 5:20; Rom 7:10-11; Rom 8:7). Christ has in, or by, His crucified flesh, abolished it, so far as its condemning and enmity-creating power is concerned (Col 2:14), substituting for it the law of love, which is the everlasting spirit of the law, and which flows from the realization in the soul of His love in His death for us. Translate what follows, \"that He might make the two (Jews and Gentiles) into one new man.\" Not that He might merely reconcile the two to each other, but incorporate the two, reconciled in Him to God, into one new man; the old man to which both belonged, the enemy of God, having been slain in His flesh on the cross. Observe, too, ONE new man; we are all in God's sight but one in Christ, as we are but one in Adam [ALFORD]. \n\nmaking peace--primarily between all and God, secondarily between Jews and Gentiles; He being \"our peace.\" This \"peace-making\" precedes its publication (Eph 2:17).\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":16,"content":["Translate, \"might altogether reconcile them both in one body (the Church, Col 3:15) unto God through His cross.\" The Greek for \"reconcile\" (apocatalaxe), found only here and in Col 1:20, expresses not only a return to favor with one (catallage), but so to lay aside enmity that complete amity follows; to pass from enmity to complete reconciliation [TITTMANN]. \n\nslain the enmity--namely, that had been between man and God; and so that between Jew and Gentile which had resulted from it. By His being slain, He slew it (compare Heb 2:14). \n\nthereby--Greek, \"therein\"; \"in\" or \"by the cross,\" that is, His crucifixion (Col 2:15).\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":17,"content":["Translate, \"He came and announced glad tidings of peace.\" \"He came\" of His own free love, and \"announced peace\" with His own mouth to the apostles (Luk 24:36; Joh 20:19, Joh 20:21, Joh 20:26); and by them to others, through His Spirit present in His Church (Joh 14:18). Act 26:23 is strictly parallel; after His resurrection \"He showed light to the people ('them that were nigh') and to the Gentiles ('you that were afar off'),\" by His Spirit in His ministers (compare Pe1 3:19). \n\nand to them--The oldest manuscripts insert \"peace\" again: \"And peace to them.\" The repetition implies the joy with which both alike would dwell again and again upon the welcome word \"peace.\" So Isa 57:19.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":18,"content":["Translate, \"For it is through Him (Joh 14:6; Heb 10:19) that we have our access (Eph 3:12; Rom 5:2), both of us, in (that is, united in, that is, \"by,\" Co1 12:13, Greek) one Spirit to the Father,\" namely, as our common Father, reconciled to both alike; whence flows the removal of all separation between Jew and Gentile. The oneness of \"the Spirit,\" through which we both have our access, is necessarily followed by oneness of the body, the Church (Eph 2:16). The distinctness of persons in the Divine Trinity appears in this verse. It is also fatal to the theory of sacerdotal priests in the Gospel through whom alone the people can approach God. All alike, people and ministers, can draw nigh to God through Christ, their ever living Priest.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":19,"content":["Now, therefore--rather, \"So then\" [ALFORD]. \n\nforeigners--rather, \"sojourners\"; opposed to \"members of the household,\" as \"strangers\" is to \"fellow citizens.\" Phi 3:19-20, \"conversation,\" Greek, \"citizenship.\" \n\nbut--The oldest manuscripts add, \"are.\" \n\nwith the saints--\"the commonwealth of (spiritual) Israel\" (Eph 2:12). \n\nof God--THE FATHER; as JESUS CHRIST appears in Eph 2:20, and THE SPIRIT in Eph 2:22.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":20,"content":["Translate as Greek, \"Built up upon,\" &c. (participle; having been built up upon; omit, therefore, \"and are\"). Compare Co1 3:11-12. The same image in Eph 3:18, recurs in his address to the Ephesian elders (Act 20:32), and in his Epistle to Timothy at Ephesus (Ti1 3:15; Ti2 2:19), naturally suggested by the splendid architecture of Diana's temple; the glory of the Christian temple is eternal and real, not mere idolatrous gaud. The image of a building is appropriate also to the Jew-Christians; as the temple at Jerusalem was the stronghold of Judaism; as Diana's temple, of paganism. \n\nfoundation of the apostles, &c.--that is, upon their ministry and living example (compare Mat 16:18). Christ Himself, the only true Foundation, was the grand subject of their ministry, and spring of their life. As one with Him and His fellow workers, they, too, in a secondary sense, are called \"foundations\" (Rev 21:14). The \"prophets\" are joined with them closely; for the expression is here not \"foundations of the apostles and the prophets,\" but \"foundations of the apostles and prophets.\" For the doctrine of both was essentially one (Pe1 1:10-11; Rev 19:10). The apostles take the precedency (Luk 10:24). Thus he appropriately shows regard to the claims of the Jews and Gentiles: \"the prophets\" representing the old Jewish dispensation, \"the apostles\" the new. The \"prophets\" of the new also are included. BENGEL and ALFORD refer the meaning solely to these (Eph 3:5; Eph 4:11). These passages imply, I think, that the New Testament prophets are not excluded; but the apostle's plain reference to Psa 118:22, \"the head stone of the corner,\" proves that the Old Testament prophets are a prominent thought. David is called a \"prophet\" in Act 2:30. Compare also Isa 28:16; another prophet present to the mind of Paul, which prophecy leans on the earlier one of Jacob (Gen 49:24). The sense of the context, too, suits this: Ye were once aliens from the commonwealth of Israel (in the time of her Old Testament prophets), but now ye are members of the true Israel, built upon the foundation of her New Testament apostles and Old Testament prophets. Paul continually identifies his teaching with that of Israel's old prophets (Act 26:22; Act 28:23). The costly foundation-stones of the temple (Kg1 5:17) typified the same truth (compare Jer 51:26). The same stone is at once the corner-stone and the foundation-stone on which the whole building rests. Paul supposes a stone or rock so large and so fashioned as to be both at once; supporting the whole as the foundation, and in part rising up at the extremities, so as to admit of the side walls meeting in it, and being united in it as the corner-stone [ZANCHIUS]. As the corner-stone, it is conspicuous, as was Christ (Pe1 2:6), and coming in men's way may be stumbled over, as the Jews did at Christ (Mat 21:42; Pe1 2:7).\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":21,"content":["In whom--as holding together the whole. \n\nfitly framed--so as exactly to fit together. \n\ngroweth--\"is growing\" continually. Here an additional thought is added to the image; the Church has the growth of a living organism, not the mere increase of a building. Compare Pe1 2:5; \"lively stones . . . built up a spiritual house.\" Compare Eph 4:16; Zac 6:12, \"The Branch shall build the temple of the Lord,\" where similarly the growth of a branch, and the building of a temple, are joined. \n\nholy--as being the \"habitation of God\" (Eph 2:22). So \"in the Lord\" (Christ) answers to \"through the Spirit\" (Eph 2:22; compare Eph 3:16-17). \"Christ is the inclusive Head of all the building, the element in which it has its being and now its growth\" [ALFORD].\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":22,"content":["are builded together--Translate, \"are being builded together.\" \n\nthrough--Greek, \"in the Spirit.\" God, by His Spirit in believers, has them for His habitation (Co1 3:16-17; Co1 6:19; Co2 6:16).\n\n\n\n\nNext: Ephesians Chapter 3\n\n"]}],"introduction":"GOD'S LOVE AND GRACE IN QUICKENING US, ONCE DEAD, THROUGH CHRIST. HIS PURPOSE IN DOING SO: EXHORTATION BASED ON OUR PRIVILEGES AS BUILT TOGETHER, AN HOLY TEMPLE, IN CHRIST, THROUGH THE SPIRIT. (Eph. 2:1-22)\n\nAnd you--\"You also,\" among those who have experienced His mighty power in enabling them to believe (Eph 1:19-23). \n\nhath he quickened--supplied from the Greek (Eph 2:5). \n\ndead--spiritually. (Col 2:13). A living corpse: without the gracious presence of God's Spirit in the soul, and so unable to think, will, or do aught that is holy. \n\nin trespasses . . . sins--in them, as the element in which the unbeliever is, and through which he is dead to the true life. Sin is the death of the soul. Isa 9:2; Joh 5:25, \"dead\" (spiritually), Ti1 5:6. \"Alienated from the life of God\" (Eph 4:18). Translate, as Greek, \"in your trespasses,\" &c. \"Trespass\" in Greek, expresses a FALL or LAPSE, such as the transgression of Adam whereby he fell. \"Sin.\" (Greek, \"hamartia\") implies innate corruption and ALIENATION from God (literally, erring of the mind from the rule of truth), exhibited in acts of sin (Greek, \"hamartemata\"). BENGEL, refers \"trespasses\" to the Jews who had the law, and yet revolted from it; \"sins,\" to the Gentiles who know not God.\n\n"},"thisChapterLink":"/api/c/jamieson-fausset-brown/EPH/2.json","thisChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"jamieson-fausset-brown","book":"EPH","chapter":2},"nextChapterApiLink":"/api/c/jamieson-fausset-brown/EPH/3.json","nextChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"jamieson-fausset-brown","book":"EPH","chapter":3},"previousChapterApiLink":"/api/c/jamieson-fausset-brown/EPH/1.json","previousChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"jamieson-fausset-brown","book":"EPH","chapter":1},"numberOfVerses":21}