Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 8.djvu/485

Rh EPHESIANS 465 them ; and could it te shown that such terras came first into existence with the Gnostics of the second century we should at once give up the argument. The whole question is thus one of date. Had such ideas or words existence in the apostolic age or had they not? Answer must be made in the affirmative. Some of the expressions referred to, &quot;mystery,&quot; &quot;reon,&quot; &quot;knowledge,&quot; &quot;full knowledge,&quot; &quot;wisdom,&quot; occur with remarkable frequency in St Paul s undisputed epistles to the Romans, Corinthians, and Galatians. &quot; The prince of the power of the air &quot; combined with &quot; the world- rulers of this darkness&quot; (Eph. vi. 12) presents only an unmistak able parallel to &quot;the prince of this world&quot; in the gospel of St John (xii. 31, xiv. 30, xvi. 11), a gospel which, in the present state of criticism upon the point, it would be absurd to bring down to the middle of the second century. Speculations, again, regarding the different orders of the celestial hierarchy, in regard to its thrones and dominions and principalities and powers, in regard also to the worshipping of angels, can be traced to the very confines of the apostolic age ; and from the masterly dissertation on the word pleroma attached by Canon Lightfoot to his epistle to the Colossians, it will be seen what a high probability there is that that word belonged to the apostolic age itself (comp. Burton s Lectures on the Gnostic Heresies, Lect. v.). It thus appears that these Gnostic ideas were in circulation before the apostolic age was out. That it was later before they were combined and elaborated into the systems now known as the Gnostic systems, and that the elaboration of these systems may itself have been promoted by the use in the sacred writings of the terms men tioned, is no doubt true ; but that is no proof that the ideas them selves did not possess at the earlier date a powerful hold over the minds of men. If so, then the province of Asia was one of the great centres of their influence. Its cities were the meeting place of all eastern as well as western thought ; and in them, far more than in Rome or Corinth or Thessalonica or Galatia, Gnosticism found at once a home and a starting-point for further progress. What, then, was an apostle to do when he went to places where such thoughts prevailed, and where they were injuriously affecting the life of the church ? Exactly what St Paul did in the epistles to Laodicea and Colossrc. The new terms used by him came from the new teaching made necessary by the places and the time. As he thought of the wants of those to whom he wrote, he saw that the truth committed to him could meet their more speculative errors, could satisfy their more speculative wants, as fully as it had met and satisfied necessities of a still earlier and simpler kind. He learned to see more clearly, to estimate more highly, the grandeur of his trust. He hastened, therefore, with it to the rescue ; and, like any one on whom a new vision of divine truth has dawned, he did it with an exuberance of language, with a power of expression, with a swing of exultation, such as he had only on rare occasions exhibited before. Nor only so. The very form of his teaching was modified, and took traces of the speculations it was designed to counteract. The spectacle is a most interesting one, and ought to be most encouraging and quickening to Christian faith. The truth does not differ in the epistles to which we allude from what it was in earlier epistles by the same author. But there is growth, development. There is a theology in the proper sense of the term even in the New Testament itself a spur to theologians of every age to adapt in like manner the eternal truth to the wants of their own times, and to construct a theology which shall be living, because, while founded on the great facts of the gospel, it is cast in the mould which their times demand. 011 . (3.) Hilgenfeld s view as to the harmonizing tendency of the Xll. epistle, as to its effect in uniting opposing parties into one catholic church, has also been substantially met. The epistle is throughout addressed to one class of persons, not to two classes ; and there is no allusion whatever to any factious spirit exhibited by the former. That the church of Christ is one was surely a truth which sprang, not out of the controversies of hostile parties, but out of the teach ing of Christ Himself in the gospels (comp. esp. John x.), and which is nowhere more strenuously insisted on than in the acknowledged epistles of St Paul (Rom. xii., 1 Cor. x. xi. xii.). The peculiarity here is not in the thought itself, but in the mode in which the thought is presented ; and the explanation of this is to be found in the considerations already adduced. ar (4.) Other objections to the authenticity of our epistles, such as its aa-o! fy6fj.eva and its un-Pauline statements, may be passed over in a few words. The former are certainly not more numerous than may its. be expected when we remember the peculiar state of circumstances to which the apostle addresses himself. The most important examples of the latter are ii. 20, &quot;apostles and prophets&quot; as the foundation, the citation in v. 14, which it is said cannot be identified, and the mode in which justification is alluded to in ii. 8, while Hilgenfeld, not satisfied with these examples from Baur, finds a proof that we have a Pauline disciple rather than St Paul himself before us in iii. 8, &quot; the least of all saints,&quot; instead of * the least of the apostles &quot; as in 1 Cor. xv. 9. It is hardly possible to follow such minute objec tions here. For the first compare 1 Cor. xii. 28 ; for the second we may compare Isa. Ix. 1, 2, and may remember the freedom with which the Old Testament is often quoted in the New ; for the third it may be noticed that in a statement which Baur finds unfavourable to Pauline authorship, Hilgenfeld finds a clear proof of Pauline dis- cipleship (p. 677) ; and for the fourth that, in the verse in Corinthians immediately preceding that referred to, the apostle designates him self &quot;an abortion,&quot; a much more humbling expression than &quot; the least of all saints.&quot; Those who allow force to what has been said on the first three objections will not be stumbled by such minor difficulties. Those who refuse it will feel that what they consider their unanswered objections are sufficient to justify their position. We may omit further notice of them, and may simply urge upon the point before us that, the field being thus cleared of the objec tions, we are thrown back upon what is really the main ground upon which the New Testament books are to be accepted, the tradition of the church. It is quite a possible thing that in a particular case, whether relating to the Old or New Testament, that tradition may be incorrect. All fair criticism, therefore, is to be welcomed ; but, when no good objection to an accepted opinion of the church has been established, there is everything to lead us to acquiesce in it with confidence. The early church was not so thoughtless upon these points as she is often said to have been. She guarded her treasures with great care, and was very watchful lest anything should be placed amongst them in whose genuineness she had not every confidence. What the tradition of the church is in the present instance is not doubted ; and it is unnecessary to enter here into detail. The ordinary introductions to the New Testament and the prologomena of the different commentators on the epistle contain all the facts. .. V. Occasion, Place, and Date of tlie Epistle. It will Occasion, not be necessary to say much upon these points. The p occasion was evidently afforded by the despatch of Tychicus and Onesimus to Colossse (Col. iv. 7-9 ; comp. Eph. vi. 21). By them St Paul would send letters to the Colossian church and to Philemon, one of its members. He embraced the opportunity of writing also to the Gentile converts of Loadicea, and of the neighbouring church at Colossse ; and that epistle, not being written to a church, but being primarily intended for a section of the Christian communities of the two cities, had no name of a place inserted in it as the object of its destination. In this respect it resembles, and may be regarded as a counter part of, the epistle to the Hebrews. As to the place where it was penned, the question lies between Rome and Gesarea, for St Paul was a prisoner at the time (iii. 1, iv. 20), and his imprisonment in one or other of these two cities must be referred to. The ques tion has been decided by some in favour of Caesarea on such grounds as the following : that Ctesarea was nearer Asia than Rome was, and that thus the spiritual condition of the Asiatic churches would be more easily known to the apostle at the former than the latter city; that for the same reason Onesimus, who we know from the epistle to Phile mon was met by the apostle in the place of his imprison ment, would be more likely to flee from his master to Caesarea than to Rome ; that the words of the epistle to Philemon &quot;departed for a season&quot; (v. 15) imply a shorter absence than is involved in the thought of Rome, and there fore point to Csesarea, because it is not likely that St Paul would have so many of his friends beside him at Rome as he had when he wrote the three letters of which the epistle to the Ephesians is one Tychicus, Aristarchus, Mark, Jesus Justus, Epaphras, Luke (see the epistles); because if the apostle wrote from Rome, Tychicus and Onesimus would pass through Ephesus or Laodicea on their way to Colossce, and we ought therefore to find Onesi mus commended to the church there, whereas, if the apostle wrote from Ciesarea, his two friends would be at Colossre first, and Tychicus, leaving Onesimus behind, would pro ceed thence alone; because the words &quot;that ye also may know&quot; (vi. 21) lead to the inference that others had been told of the apostle s state, who can only be the Colossians, visited on the way between Cajsarea and Ephesus; because it would seem that the apostle intended at the close of his imprisonment to visit Phrygia (Philemon i. 22), whereas we learn from Phil. ii. 24 that at the close of the Roman VIII. -- 59