ACC ~ Colossians 2 v14

THE NATURE OF THE BOND AND THE MEANS OF RELEASE. CHRYSOSTOM: What bond? He means either that which they said to Moses, namely, “All that God has said will we do, and be obedient,” or, if not that, this, that we owe to God obedience; or if not this, he means that the devil held possession of it, the bond which God made for Adam, saying, “In the day you eat of the tree, you shall die.” This bond then the devil held in his possession. And Christ did not give it to us, but himself tore it in two, the action of one who joyfully remits what we owe. HOMILIES ON COLOSSIANS 6.

CHRYSOSTOM: See to it that we do not again become debtors to the old contract. Christ came once; he found the certificate of our ancestral indebtedness which Adam wrote and signed. Adam contracted the debt; by our subsequent sins we increased the amount owed. In this contract are written a curse, and sin, and death and the condemnation of the law. Christ took all these away and pardoned them. St. Paul cries out and says: “The decree of our sins which was against us, he has taken it completely away, nailing it to the cross.” He did not say “erasing the decree,” nor did he say “blotting it out,” but “nailing it to the cross,” so that no trace of it might remain. This is why he did not erase it but tore it to pieces. BAPTISMAL INSTRUCTIONS 3.21.

THEODORE OF MOPSUESTIA: The decree, or bond, was the demand contained in the old law that we fulfill all of its provisions. Since, however, not to sin is impossible, punishment is necessitated. Thus the law’s bond was against us in not allowing us to pursue righteousness because of its detailed demands. … Only in the resurrected life are we freed from sin, and then the law becomes superfluous. When Christ nails it to the cross, he makes death the end of this life and its domination by sin. In the resurrection, therefore, to which we pass through baptism, the law is not needed. COMMENTARY ON COLOSSIANS.

SEVERIAN OF GABALA: When the law was given as a curse on transgressors, all the people of Israel stood crying aloud. For there was deposited with what was said a bond that bound them, as they received these things. This “bond” was the binding character of the law, which Christ transcended in his teachings, when he decreed against the observances of the law. … Retroactively he abolished the punishments of the law against sinners through the forgiveness of sins and repentance for salvation. PAULINE COMMENTARY FROM THE GREEK CHURCH.

THEODORET OF CYR: This decree or bond may be understood, some say, as the law, but it is better to equate it with the human body, since it is here that every evil action is conceived. Thus, it is the senses and their tendency to sin that are nailed to the cross, when God the Word assumes our human nature. INTERPRETATION OF THE LETTER TO THE COLOSSIANS.

AMBROSE: But Christ was sold because he took our condition upon himself, not our sins themselves; he is not held to the price of sin, because he himself did not commit sin.And so he made a contract at a price for our debt, not for money for himself; he took away the debtor’s bond, set aside the moneylender, freed the debtor. He alone paid what was owed by all. We ourselves were not permitted to escape from bondage. He undertook this on our behalf, so that he might drive away the slavery of the world, restore the liberty of paradise and grant new grace through the honor we received by his sharing of our nature. This is by way of mystery. JOSEPH 4.19.

AMBROSIASTER: Paul expounds here the nature of God’s gracious care through its various sources. He recalls the many deeds by which God has brought rescue to the human race, so that he has not only remitted our transgressions but also lifted that sin, which from Adam’s disobedience (which he calls the signed bond) did not allow us to rise from the dead. … Because death came from sin, when sin in fact was overcome, the resurrection of the dead became a reality. Indeed this could not have been done, if he had not nailed it to the cross. While the Savior conquers sin by not sinning, he holds man to be culpable and, being innocent, is killed by him: thus he crucifies sin. Sin being overcome is said to be put to death; the cross is not the death of the Savior, but of sin. COMMENTARY ON THE LETTER TO THE COLOSSIANS.

PELAGIUS: Some say that the bond was, as it were, a written memorial before God of sins. This, then, was destroyed on the cross, when, sins being forgiven, the memorial of transgressions was abolished. PELAGIUS’S COMMENTARY ON THE LETTER TO THE COLOSSIANS.

AUGUSTINE: She [i.e., his mother, Monica] did not ask for such things but simply requested that remembrance be made for her at Thy altar, which she had attended without missing a single day. She knew that on it the Holy Victim is offered; by means of which “the decree against us, which was hostile to us” is canceled; by means of which the Enemy, adding up our offenses and seeking something to charge against us, and finding nothing in him in whom we conquer, was overcome. CONFESSIONS 9.13.36.

AUGUSTINE: With good reason do we celebrate the Passover wherein the blood of the Lord was poured out, by which we are cleansed of every offense. Let us be assured; the devil was holding the bond of slavery against us, but it was blotted out by the blood of Christ. HOMILIES ON 1 JOHN 1.5.3.

AUGUSTINE: This is the whole scheme of our salvation, by which the one who as God had made man himself became man, for the sake of finding lost man. This is the whole matter of Christ shedding for the forgiveness of our sins true, not false, blood, and with his blood, “obliterating the bond of our sins.” All this these damnable heretics strive to drain of all meaning. All this, so the Manichaeans believe, as it appeared to human eyes, was spirit and not flesh. SERMONS 237.1.

EPHREM THE SYRIAN: At the birth of the Son the King was enrolling all men for the tribute money, that they might be debtors to him: the King came forth to us who blotted out our bills and wrote another bill in his own name that he might be our debtor. HYMNS ON THE NATIVITY 4.

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