St. Paul's Epistle to the Ephesians Part 2

[14] Col. iv. 2-4; Philemon 22; Phil. i. 12-14.

[15] Ramsay, _Paul the Traveller_ (Hodder and Stoughton, 1895), pp. 130 ff.

[16] Ramsay, _l.c._ p. 132.

[17] See Mommsen, _Provinces of Roman Empire_ (Eng. trans.), i. 344 ff.; Lightfoot, _Ign. and Polyc._ iii. pp. 404 ff.

[18] App. note A, p. 251.

[19] Tatian, _Ad Graecos_, 28, 32.

[20] Ramsay, _l.c._ p. 135.

[21] Rom. xiii. 1-7; cf. ii. Thess. ii. 6.

[22] 1 Tim. ii. 1, 2.

[23] Acts xxv. 12.

[24] Ramsay, _l.c._ p. 147.

[25] Lightfoot, _Galatians_, 'St. Paul and Seneca,' pp. 287 ff.

[26] See app. note B, p. 253.

[27] 'The zeal of its inhabitants for philosophy and general culture is such that they have surpa.s.sed even Athens and Alexandria and all other cities where schools of philosophy can be mentioned. And its pre-eminence in this respect is so great because there the students are all townspeople, and strangers do not readily settle there.' Strabo, xiv. v. 13. I do not suppose that St. Paul received any formal education in Greek schools at Tarsus. But I think we must a.s.sume that at some period St. Paul had sufficient contact with Gentile educated opinion, whether at Tarsus or elsewhere, to be acquainted with widely-spread religious and philosophical tendencies.

[28] Cf. Hort, _Christian Ecclesia_, p. 143.

[29] Acts xix. 21.

[30] Rom. i. 15, 16.

[31] Acts xxiii. 11.

[32] Acts xxvii. 24.

[33] Acts xxviii. 15.

[34] Acts xx. 29, 30.

[35] Among other articles of commerce, tents made in Ephesus had a special reputation, and St. Paul and Aquila had special opportunities there for the exercise of their trade. Acts xx. 34.

[36] Strabo. xiv. 1, 25.

[37] Migne, _P. L._ xxvi. 441.

[38] Acts xvi. 6-10.

[39] Acts xviii. 19.

[40] Hort, _Prolegomena_, p. 83.

[41] Acts xix. 1-7.

[42] Ramsay, _l.c._ p. 143.

[43] 'From the fifth to the tenth hour' (11 a.m. to 4 p.m.), an early addition to the text of the Acts tells us; i. e. after work hours, when the school would naturally be vacant and St. Paul would have finished his manual labour at tent-making. Ramsay, _l.c._ p. 276.

[44] 1 Cor. xv. 32.

[45] Acts xix. 23 ff.

[46] Prof. Ramsay a.s.serts that instead of 'robbers of temples' (Acts xix. 37), we should translate 'disloyal to the established government.'

_l.c._ p. 282. But the word is used in the former sense in special connexion with Ephesus by Strabo, xiv. 1, 22, and Pseudo-Heracleitus, _Ep._ 7, p. 64 (Bernays).

[47] See app. note B, p. 253, on the contemporary 'letters of Heracleitus.'

[48] Acts xx. 17 ff.

[49] Col. iv. 16.

{48}

THE EPISTLE TO THE EPHESIANS

CHAPTER I. 1-2.

Salutation.

[Sidenote: _Salutation_]

St. Paul begins this, in common with his other epistles, with a brief salutation to a particular church or group of churches, in which is expressed in summary the authority he has for writing to them, the light in which he regards them, and the central wish for them which he has in his heart.

Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus through the will of G.o.d, to the saints which are at Ephesus, and the faithful in Christ Jesus: Grace to you and peace from G.o.d our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.

Here, then, we have three compressed thoughts.

1. The particular person Paul writes this letter because he is not only a believer in Christ but also an 'apostle of Christ Jesus through the will of G.o.d.' The word apostle is a more or less general word for a delegate, as when St. Paul {49} speaks of the 'apostles (or messengers) of the churches[1];' but by an apostle in its highest sense, 'an apostle of Jesus Christ,' St. Paul meant one of those, originally twelve in number, who had received personally from the risen Christ a particular commission to represent Him to the world. This particular and personal commission he claimed to have received, in common with the twelve, though later than they--at the time of his conversion. 'Am I not an apostle?' he cries. 'Have I not seen Jesus our Lord[2]?' 'He appeared to me also as unto one born out of due time[3].' 'In nothing was I behind the very chiefest apostles[4].'

And as his claim to the apostolate was challenged by his Judaizing opponents he had to insist upon it, to insist that it is not a commission from or through Peter and the other apostles, or dependent upon them for its exercise, but a direct commission, like theirs, from the Head of the Church Himself. He is, he writes to the Galatians, 'Paul, an apostle, not from men, nor (like those subsequently ordained by himself or the other apostles, like a Timothy, or a t.i.tus, or like the later clergy) through man,' but directly through, {50} as well as from, the risen Jesus whom his eyes had seen, and His eternal Father[5].

It is surely a consolation to us of the Church of England, who belong to a church subject to constant attack on the score of apostolic character, to remember that St. Paul's apostolate was attacked with some excuse, and that he had to spend a great deal of effort in vindicating it, and was in no way ashamed of doing so, because he perceived that a certain aspect of the life and truth of the Church was bound up with its recognition.

2. And he writes to the Asiatic Christians as 'saints' and 'faithful in Christ Jesus.' 'Saint' does not mean primarily what we understand by it--one pre-eminent in moral excellence; but rather one consecrated or dedicated to the service and use of G.o.d. The idea of consecration was common in all religions, and frequently, as in the Asiatic wors.h.i.+ps at Ephesus and elsewhere, carried with it a.s.sociations quite the opposite of those which we a.s.sign to holiness. But the special characteristic of the Old Testament religion had been the righteous and holy character which it ascribed to Jehovah. Consecration to Him, therefore, is seen to require {51} personal holiness, and this requirement is only deepened in meaning under the Gospel. But still 'the saints' means primarily the 'consecrated ones'; and all Christians are therefore saints--'called as saints' rather than 'called to be saints,' in virtue of their belonging to the consecrated body into which they were baptized; saints who because of their consecration are therefore bound to live holily[6]. 'The saints' in the Acts of the Apostles[7] is simply a synonym for the Church. St. Paul then writes to the Asiatic Christians as 'consecrated' and 'faithful in Christ Jesus,' i. e. believing members incorporated by baptism; and he writes to them for no other purpose than to make them understand what is implied in their common consecration and common faith.