thorities, have отaσσέowσav. However, all these deviations seem to have arisen only through the difficulty of inоraoσóμevo (verse 21). Probably the case stands thus with the passage: verse 21 declares the principle of subordination quite comprehensively for all the relations which are afterwards treated of singly, to which then, first, in verse 22, the exhortation to married women is subjoined. Thus the participle Tотаσσóμevo is most simply explained in accordance with the context by the assumption of an ellipsis: "all believers are subordinate one to another in the fear of Christ."-The limiting clause ev póẞ Xplorov excludes all slavish fear; the fear of Christ is the tender timidity that follows in the train of love. (Cf. verse 33.) Finally, the reading XpσTo is guaranteed by A.B.D.E.F.G., and is no doubt preferable to the readings Θεοῦ, κυρίου, Ἰησοῦ. Το exclude all severity, ver. 22 adds dc τ kupiw, for which the parallel passage Col. iii. 18 has ŵç ávñkeV EV KVρíw. Wives are, therefore, to be subject not to their husbands as such, but to God's ordinance in the institution of marriage; just as the Christian in his relation to government serves not man, but the ordinance of God, of which men are the representatives. Finally, the addition idios cannot with Meier be referred to the right of property, which, according to the view of the whole ancient world, the husband had over the wife; the following representation does not imply such a conception of marriage. Men are designated by it as married men. (See the passages quoted by Harless at p. 490.)

Vers. 23, 24.-The necessity of this subordination of the wife to the husband is deduced from the divinely ordained relation of the two parties to each other. The man is the head, i. e., the directing, determining power of the wife, as Christ is of the church. (See on 1 Cor. xi. 3, seq.; Eph. i. 22, iv. 15.) As, therefore, the latter is subject to Christ, consequently is determined and guided in its will by him, so the wife by the husband. All idle dreams of an anticipated emancipation of women are annihilated by this energetic declaration of Paul. With these dreams must also be reckoned Rückert's (ad h. 1.) supposing that in this declaration of Paul, as to the relation of the wife towards her husband, there is expressed a remnant of still unsubdued Judaism in him, as if that alone, not God's ordinance, had introduced the subjection of the wife to her husband. Only the v navri, in everything, scil. vñотασσéσ0wσav, might be viewed as an exaggeration. The church is, it is true, subject to Christ absolutely in everything, because only holy claims on her proceed from him; but the husband, as being a sinner, cannot require of his wife obedience to unholy demands. Nor is this the apostle's meaning. As the unconditional command to obey those in authority (see on Rom. xiii. 1) involves of course the condition that those in authority enjoin nothing against God's commandments, and

therefore the law "to obey God more than men" always has precedence of all others, so also here. Precisely because wives are to be subject to their husbands as to the Lord, they cannot obey their husbands against the Lord's will. But, as Paul has Christian marriages in view, it was needless to insist particularly on that self-evident restriction. Undoubtedly, however, the commandment relates not to kind husbands only, but also to the unreasonable and wayward; as long as the demands of the husband keep within the domain of things morally indifferent-contravene no objective Divine commands it is the wife's duty to obey them. The clause avròç σωτὴρ τοῦ σώματος, with ἀλλά following, alone requires particular notice in these verses. For, that in this clause kai and orí are, with Lachmann, to be erased, the MSS. A.B.D.E.F.G. decidedly prove; but certainly orí must be supplied. The main question, however, is what is the object of the entire observation which seems to interrupt the connexion, and how is this strange-seeming d2λá to be taken? Harless (p. 488, seq.) thinks that Paul, in the entire section down to ver. 33, "shews himself controlled by a double purpose." He intends, according to Harless, to give instruction not merely on the relation of man and wife, but also on that of Christ to the church, without however asserting between the two an absolute parallel. Harless accordingly takes dλλá (ver. 24) and λýv (ver. 33) as particles used to recall the reader from a digression to the main subject. But although this seems quite suitable in the case of λ, in ver. 33, because the thought in ver. 32 manifestly interrupts the parallel, yet the clause avròs owτp Tov owμatos can scarcely be taken as a digression. Why this observation, that Christ is the Saviour of his body, if it is to be supposed a digression, as it was already known to the readers from i. 22, and why, after this rhapsodical digression, a formal resumption of the main subject with an dλλá? Winer (Gr., § 53, 10, 1) has correctly explained the conjunction ảλλá in this connexion. 'Aλλá here simply introduces the proof drawn from what precedes. In ver. 23 it was said, "the husband is the head of the wife, as Christ is the head of the church." Now from this parallel the apostle infers the necessity of the subordination of the wife; "but, as the church is subject unto Christ, so now must wives also be subject to their husbands." Only, we must supply here not ὑποτάσσονται, but ὑποτασσέσθωσαν ; from the actual subordination of the church to Christ, Paul deduces the obligation of the subordination of the wife to her husband. According to this, then, the clause avròç owτip тоυ owμaroç appears by no. means as a digression, but merely as an apposition to Kepaλ TIS EKKλŋoías, which has the sole object of setting forth Christ more clearly as kepaλń, by denoting the church as the oua which he gov

erns. (In ver. 24 idios is decidedly spurious, and is erased from the text by the better critics.)

Vers. 25, 26.-After this exhortation to wives, Paul subjoins the one to husbands (comp. Col. iii. 19), on their side, not to abuse their power, but to love their wives, and that so as Christ loves the church, i. e., in self-devoting, self-sacrificing love, which had for its object the sanctification of the church. This self-sacrificing, sanctifying love, Paul requires of husbands also in marriage. (See ver. 28, OTWs [i. e., as Christ's sanctifying work was before described] ὀφείλουσιν, κ. τ. λ.)

It might be said that surely the wife also is to practise this selfsacrificing, sanctifying conduct towards her husband; but from the normal position of the sexes the positive influence must always proceed from the man; and therefore the exhortation finds its appropriate place here, not in depicting the relation of the wife to her husband. It is finally self-evident, and inherent in the nature of such a parallel, in which every trait does not accurately fit, that the separate expressions have each their bearing, indeed, but must not be pressed. Thus, while it is said of Christ: avròv naqédwkev vñèo av Tis, "He gave himself up to death as a vicarious sacrifice for her;" τῆς, in reference to marriage, Paul would have understood by this merely a love capable of self-sacrifice even unto death. So kκalapíσaç τ λоvтOĢ TO ❝daToç refers, in the case of Christ, to baptism, and the new birth effected by it; in reference to marriage, it merely designates love bent upon moral purification. To refer this language to the Jewish custom of the bathing of the bride before the nuptial night, reduces it to insipidity. Still less can a digression be supposed here; the essential ideas, so far as they can be referred to marriage, are, in Paul's purpose, to apply to it also, so far as they are applicable. The closing words alone of ver. 26 require a particular consideration. In the combination ἵνα αὐτὴν ἁγιάση καθαρίσας we are to take ἁγιάζειν as a consequence of Kalapíšεv: “that he may sanctify her, after he had previously purified her by the bath," i. e., baptism (comp. Tit. iii. 5, where baptism is called λούτρον παλιγγενεσίας). But the explanation of ἐν part is uncertain. Most of the interpretations exhibit themselves as false at the first glance; e. g., that of Koppe, which unites v pýμati iva, which, as he thought, stands for the Hebrew, which phrase, however, is never so rendered by the LXX. Again, its position forbids our uniting it with dyiáon; otherwise the analogy of dyιášev ev d2n0ɛía (cf. John xvii. 7) would warrant the combination. It can be joined only with λovтρòv Tоv datos. In this connexion it has been usually referred either to the ordinance of Christ in the institution of baptism, by which the bath receives its purifying power, or to the word of reconciliation and forgiveness of sins. But in both relations the article could scarcely be wanting before

pnuari, as, according to them, Paul would have had a definite word in his mind. 'Ev pnuari rather stands here equivalent in sense to Ev πνεúμaтi (ii. 22), intimating that baptism is no mere bath, but a bath in the Word, i. e., one by which man is born again of water and of the Spirit (John iii. 5). Thus, in 1 Pet. i. 23; James i. 18, the Word of God is represented as the seed of the new birth. 'Pμа accordingly is here, as in Heb. i. 3, xi. 3, a designation of the Divine power and efficacy in general, which, from its nature, must be a spiritual one. But in Christianity the Word does not appear in the indeterminate form of universal spiritual efficacy, as in the creation, but the Spirit manifests himself only in the Word of Truth, which is in Christ. On this union of the Spirit with the Word of Christ, nay, on their respective identity, see particulars at vi. 17.

Ver. 27. The idea of the iva dyiáon is further carried out and described in its results. Christ wishes to present the church for himself, i. e., for his joy and glory, in splendour and without spot. In portraying the spotless beauty Paul plainly has in view the image of the bride; for a proof that we have here not to do with a digression. As Christ purifies and cleanses the church, so likewise a faithful husband wishes to deliver his wife from every moral stain. (On пaριστávεiv, in such a combination, see at Rom. vi. 13, xii. 1 ; 2 Cor. xi. 2; Col. i. 22.-A.B.D.E.F.G. read avróç for avrýv, whence Griesbach and Lachmann have properly received it into the text.Enikos is found nowhere again but at 2 Pet. ii. 13.-'Purís does not occur again in the New Testament.)

Vers. 28, 29. This description of the love of Christ is applied to the love which the husband owes to his wife. Ovros thus refers back to what precedes, embracing the two points of self-sacrifice and of sanctification; neither can be wanting in a really Christian marriage, in which love rests not merely on a sensual attachment, but is to have a moral basis. This retrospective reference shews clearly that vers. 26, 27 contain no digression; Paul refers the individual traits of the love of Christ to marriage, of course so far as they are applicable to human conditions. But here a progress in the chain of argument is shewn in the fact that Paul will have the wife loved by her husband " as his own body." As the church is called Christ's body, thus also man and wife form an unity (ver. 31). But here the antithesis of "body" is not "spirit," but "head" (ver. 23), which is certainly the organ of the spirit; in ver. 33 s kavróv stands directly. The intimateness of the connexion in a genuine marriage is therefore such that the wife is a part of self; "whoever loves his wife loves himself." As, therefore, care of the flesh naturally proceeds from self-love, thus too is it with the love of the husband, and with the relation of Christ to the church; the opposite of this, the want of love in the husband, is accordingly something unnatural. Finally

"flesh" (oáps) in ver. 29 has by no means the subordinate idea of something sinful; oua might have been indifferently employed; oáps is chosen merely to make the physical neediness of the owμa more apparent. It might seem, finally, that too much is asserted when it is said in ver. 29: ovdεíç TOTE, K. T. 2. Paul himself warns (Col. ii. 23) against false asceticism, which deprives the body of what is necessary for it. Meyerhoff (on the Ep. to the Colossians, p. 144) declares himself strongly on this point. He finds, without any foundation, in the whole section about marriage an attack upon false asceticism which rejected marriage, and in ver. 19 he lays a stress on TоTÉ, and refers it to past ages under Heathenism. "Then no one did such a thing as hate his own flesh," with which we are to supply : "but some do now." This view of the passage requires no refutation; there is not the slightest trace of controversy in the whole comparison between the matrimonial relation and the relation of Christ to the church. Besides, there are found also before Christ, among Gentiles and Jews, traces of strict asceticism; although more rarely in the West, yet certainly in the East. We can only say, Paul makes the statement, οὐδεὶς γάρ ποτε ἐμίσησε τὴν ἑαυτοῦ σáρxa, thus generally, because cases of an opposite description are at bottom only aberrations of the mind; the love of one's own body and life is an essential natural instinct; it may, indeed, be led astray by false theories, but never annihilated.

Ver. 30.—In what follows Paul proves in detail that the unity of Christ with the church is not a merely figurative, metaphorical, nor even a purely spiritual one, but also a truly bodily one, and that too so that in it he has again before his eyes the comparison of marriage. The relation of Christ to the church is also described after Gen. ii. 23, which passage refers immediately to the relation of man and wife. Because the wife is taken from the man, and in marriage becomes one flesh with him (verse 31), the man in his wife loves himself; thus Christ also loves in the church his own body, since we are taken from him. This &K TIS σаρкÒÇ аνтOU, K. T. 2., cannot, of course, be referred, as by Chrysostom, Augustine, and others, to Christ's incarnation, for it must have been said of that conversely : "He took on him our flesh and bone;" but to the imparting his glorified corporeity to believers through the communion of his flesh and blood. It is not primarily spiritual birth which is here mentioned; the corporeal aspect is both here and in verse 31 made too emphatically prominent; it is the self-communication of his Divinehuman nature, by which Christ makes us his flesh and bone. He gives to his followers his flesh to eat, his blood to drink, ¿kтpépɛ kaì θάλπει τὴν ἐκκλησίαν. The reference of the phrase, ἐκ τῆς σαρκὸς αὐτοῦ καὶ ἐκ τῶν ὀστέων αὐτοῦ, of his flesh and of his bones, merely to the general idea of an inward communion, would leave the depth of