ACC ~ Colossians 2 v6 - 15

OVERVIEW:

At the center of Paul’s admonitions is the importance of tradition, of remaining faithful to what has been taught and received. Christ is the way to the Father; by no means may angels play that role (CHRYSOSTOM). The Colossians are to stand firm, not yielding to any observances other than what they have been taught by Epaphras. They are to recognize that in Christ and through baptism, mortality has been “put off” and the life of immortality embraced (THEODORE). In Christ there has been a reversal of the history of sin and bondage contained in the Old Testament history (CHRYSOSTOM, THEODORE, THEODORET, SEVERIAN) and that it is specifically in the full divinity and full humanity of the Son, particularly in his cross and death, that this reversal takes place (CYRIL OF JERUSALEM, AMBROSE, CYRIL OF ALEXANDRIA). Since there will be many corrupters to lead the Colossians astray, they must remain firm on the foundation of faith in the triune God (AMBROSIASTER). The gracious gift of salvation in Christ is always by means of the divine initiative, freely willed as an expression of the divine sovereignty (AUGUSTINE).

2:8 | Empty Deceit

ORTHODOXY AND ORTHOPRAXY. CYRIL OF JERUSALEM: True religion consists of these two elements: pious doctrines and virtuous actions. Neither does God accept doctrines apart from works, nor are works, when divorced from godly doctrine, accepted by God. … The knowledge of doctrines is a precious possession. There is need of a vigilant soul, since there are many who would deceive you by philosophy and vain deceit. CATECHETICAL LECTURES 4.2.

“VAIN” DECEIT. CHRYSOSTOM: Then because the term philosophy has an appearance of dignity, Paul added, “And vain deceit.” For there can also be a pious deceit, such as many have been deceived by, that one should not consider a genuine deception. Jeremiah notes that even God can seem to deceive. “O Lord, you have deceived me, and I was deceived”; in this example we have nothing we can describe as deceit. For Jacob also deceived his father, but that was not finally a deceit but the proper way to act in the situation. HOMILIES ON COLOSSIANS 6.

HUMAN CONTRIVANCE. THEODORET OF CYR: “Philosophy” is smooth argumentation that persuades. “Empty deceit” refers to superfluous and noxious human tradition, that is, not the divine law itself but its intemperate and skewed observance.“Elements of the world” are the observation of cultic days. INTERPRETATION OF THE LETTER TO THE COLOSSIANS.

AMBROSIASTER: He calls that philosophy worldly by which men who desire to be wise in earthly terms are seduced. COMMENTARY ON THE LETTER TO THE COLOSSIANS.

PELAGIUS: The enemy here is philosophy that believes that the power of God rises from natural things, that nothing can be made from nothing, that the soul cannot have a beginning or be mortal, that a virgin cannot conceive, or God be born of a man or die and rise again. PELAGIUS’S COMMENTARY ON THE LETTER TO THE COLOSSIANS.

2:9 | In Him the Whole Fullness of Deity Dwells Bodily

IN CHRIST IS THE FULLNESS. CHRYSOSTOM: “For in him dwells,” that is, for God dwells in him. But that you may not think him enclosed, as in a body, Paul writes, “All the fullness of the Godhead bodily: and you are made full in him.” Others say that Paul means the church filled by his Godhead, as he elsewhere says, “of him that fills all in all,” and that he employs the term bodily here, as the body in the head. But if this interpretation is true, why did he not add “which is the church”? HOMILIES ON COLOSSIANS 6.

THEODORE OF MOPSUESTIA: This “fullness” is said of the whole creation restored by him, for, in the sense that has been established earlier, all creation dwells in him, that is, is joined to him, so that he contains it in a bodily way. COMMENTARY ON COLOSSIANS.

THEODORET OF CYR: Some teachers say that Christ is here being called the church, since the fullness of his divinity dwells in it. I am unsure, however, whether this interpretation suits the term bodily. I think that since he calls Christ the head of the church, it is clear that this refers to his humanity, by which he is our head, and that this is said about his human nature, which contained complete divinity within itself. INTERPRETATION OF THE LETTER TO THE COLOSSIANS.

ATHANASIUS: In the past Christ the Word was accustomed to come to the saints individually and to sanctify those who rightly received him. But neither, when these individuals were first born did people assert that he had become man in any of them, nor when they suffered, did anyone say that God himself suffered in them. But then he came among us from Mary once at the end of the ages for the abolition of sin (for so it was pleasing to the Father to send his own Son “made of a woman, made under the law”). And then it was said, that he took flesh and became man. It was in that flesh he suffered for us. His intention was to show, so that all might believe, that whereas he was ever God, and sanctified those to whom he came, and ordered all things according to the Father’s will, afterwards for our sakes he became man, and “bodily,” as the apostle says, the Godhead dwelt in the flesh. This was as much as to say, “Being God, he had his own body, and using this as an instrument, he became man for our sakes.” DISCOURSES AGAINST THE ARIANS 3.26.31.

GREGORY OF NYSSA: Since then it was impossible that our life, which had been estranged from God, should of itself return to the high and heavenly place, for this reason, as the apostle says, he who knew no sin is made sin for us and frees us from the curse by taking on him our curse as his own. Having taken up and, in the language of the apostle, “slain” in himself “the enmity” which by means of sin had come between us and God (in fact sin was the “enmity”) and having become what we were, he through himself again united humanity to God. For having by purity brought into closest relationship with the Father of our nature that new man which is created after God, in whom dwelled all the fullness of the Godhead bodily, he drew with him into the same grace all the nature that partakes of his body and is akin to him. AGAINST EUNOMIUS 12.1.

CYRIL OF ALEXANDRIA: Neither do we say that the Word of God dwelled, as in an ordinary man, in the one born of the holy Virgin, in order that Christ might not be thought to be a man bearing God. For even if the Word both “dwelt among us,” and it is said that in Christ “dwells all the fullness of the Godhead bodily,” we do not think that, being made flesh, the Word is said to dwell in him just as in those who are holy, and we do not define the indwelling in him to be the same. But united kata phusin, and not changed into flesh, the Word produced an indwelling such as the soul of man might be said to have in its own body. LETTERS 17.9.

AMBROSE: The law has proved God’s oneness. It speaks of one God, as also the apostle when he says of Christ: “In whom dwells all the fullness of the Godhead bodily.” For if, as the apostle says, all the fullness of the Godhead, bodily, is in Christ, then must the Father and the Son be confessed to be of one Godhead. Or if one desired to sunder the Godhead of the Son from the Godhead of the Father, as long as the Son possesses all the fullness of the Godhead bodily, what is supposed to be further reserved, seeing that nothing remains over and above the fullness of perfection? Therefore the Godhead is one. OF THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 3.12.102.

AMBROSIASTER: All that the Father has, he has given to the Son when he begot him bodily in the fullness of divinity, so that as he is the head, the creation is his body. Therefore, whatever can be supposed to be a heavenly creature must be seen as fully subordinate to Christ, so that no lesser being may be thought worthy of worship. COMMENTARY ON THE LETTER TO THE COLOSSIANS.

AUGUSTINE: Speaking of him as our Head, the apostle says: “For in him dwells all the fullness of the Godhead corporally.” He does not say “corporally” because God is corporeal, but he either uses the word in a derived sense as if he dwells in a temple made by hands, not corporally but symbolically, that is, under prefiguring signs … or else the word corporally is certainly used because God dwells, as in his temple, in the body of Christ which he took from the Virgin. LETTERS 187.39.

LEO THE GREAT: Embracing then, dearly beloved, the sole pledge of the Christian hope, let us not be torn from our faithful bonding to the body of Christ, in whom, as the apostle says, “dwells the fullness of divinity in bodily manner, and you have been filled out in him.” Since the substance of God is incorporeal, how does it dwell in bodily manner in Christ unless the flesh of our race has been made the flesh of the divinity? We filled out in that God in whom we have been crucified, in whom we have been buried, in whom we have been even raised up. SERMONS 66.5.

IN THE CHURCH IS THE FULLNESS. SEVERIAN OF GABALA: He calls the church that which is filled with the Father’s divinity. The church is full by dwelling bodily in Christ, that is, as the body is completed in the head, he says that Christ is everywhere the head of the church. And you are fulfilled in him, fulfilled for his sake and through him. PAULINE COMMENTARY FROM THE GREEK CHURCH.

2:11-13 | Circumcised, Buried and Made Alive

THE NEW LIFE IN CHRIST AND THROUGH BAPTISM. CHRYSOSTOM: Circumcision is no longer performed with a knife, Paul says, but in Christ himself; for no human hand circumcises … but the Spirit. The Spirit circumcises the whole man, not simply a part. … When and where? In baptism. And what Paul calls circumcision, he again calls burial. … But it is not burial only: for notice what he says, “Wherein you were also raised with him, through faith in the working of God, who raised him from the dead.” HOMILIES ON COLOSSIANS 6.

THEODORE OF MOPSUESTIA: “Circumcision” refers to the life of immortality embraced through baptism, just as “uncircumcision” is the old life of mortality. COMMENTARY ON COLOSSIANS.

SEVERIAN OF GABALA: Through baptism comes the stripping away and circumcision of sins. … Those being baptized in the blood of Christ confess that they share in his death through baptism and that following this they enjoy the resurrection. Resurrection is used here in a twofold sense, the one spiritual and the other physical. All persons will rise through the resurrection of Christ from the dead. Those, however, who have not been baptized in Christ but have died without faith will share in the general resurrection. However, they will not enjoy the promise of redemption. … As many as were baptized into Christ, these have freely benefitted before the general resurrection from the spiritual resurrection, for they have already risen from the death of sins. Thus, Paul also says: “in whom you were raised,” not “in whom you will be raised.” PAULINE COMMENTARY FROM THE GREEK CHURCH.

AMBROSE: This, too, is plain, that in him who is baptized the Son of God is crucified. Indeed, our flesh could not eliminate sin unless it were crucified in Jesus Christ. … And to the Colossians he says, “Buried with him by baptism, wherein you also rose again with him.” This was written with the intent that we should believe that he is crucified in us, that our sins may be purged through him, that he, who alone can forgive sins, may nail to his cross the handwriting which was against us. CONCERNING REPENTANCE 2.2.9.

AMBROSE: Therefore, the Lord permitted mortality to steal in [as an atonement], that guilt might cease. But so that the end set by nature might not also be in death, there was granted a resurrection from the dead, that the guilt might fail through death but the nature be continued through resurrection. And so death is a passage for all men, but you must pass with virtuous steadfastness—a passage from corruption to incorruption, from mortality to immortality, from disquiet to tranquillity. … What indeed is this death but the burial of vices and the awakening of virtues? For this reason “may my soul depart among the souls of the righteous,” that is, “may it be buried together with them,” that it may lay down its sins and take up the grace of the just, who “bear about the dying of Christ in their body” and soul. DEATH AS A GOOD 4.15.

AMBROSIASTER: [Paul] says that the Gentiles were dead, because they refused to receive the law, which had been given as a witness to the Creator, and then as a means of condemning vice. With Christ has come the forgiveness of sin, since freedom from sin is impossible without this gift, which saves us from the “penalty of death.” COMMENTARY ON THE LETTER TO THE COLOSSIANS.

AUGUSTINE: After all, if we find these passing days, in which we recall Christ’s passion and resurrection with special devotion and solemnity, so exhilarating, how blessed and blissful will that eternal day make us, when we shall actually see him and stay with him, the one we now rejoice in merely by desiring and hoping for him! What exultant joy God will give to his church, from which as it is born again through Christ he has after a fashion removed the foreskin of its fleshly nature, that is, the reproach of its natural birth! That is why it says, “And you, while you were dead in transgressions and the foreskin of your flesh, he made alive in him, forgiving us all our debts.” SERMONS 229D.2.

2:14 | Canceling the Bond, Nailing It to the Cross

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.

2:15 | Disarming Principalities and Powers

STRIPPING OFF THE DEMONIC POWERS. ORIGEN: Although Jesus was one, he had several aspects; and to those who saw him he did not appear alike to all. … Moreover, that his appearance was not just the same to those who saw him, but varied according to their individual capacity will be clear to people who carefully consider why, when about to be transfigured on the high mountain, he did not take all the apostles but only Peter, James, and John. … Accordingly, as we hold that Jesus was such a wonderful person, not only as to the divinity within him which was hidden from the multitude, but also as to his body which was transfigured when he wished and before whom he wished, we affirm that everyone had the capacity to see Jesus prior to the time when he had not “put off the principalities and powers” and had not yet died to sin. But after he put off principalities and powers, all those who formerly saw him could not look upon him, as he no longer had anything about him that could be seen by the multitude. AGAINST CELSUS 2.64.

CHRYSOSTOM: “Having put off from himself the principalities and the powers.” He means the diabolical powers; because human nature had arrayed itself in these, or because they had, as it were, a hold on human nature. When he became man he put away from himself that hold. What is the meaning of “he made a show of them”? Paul speaks well in these words. Never yet was the devil in so shameful a plight. For while expecting to have him, he lost even those he had; and when Christ’s body was nailed to the cross, the dead arose. At the cross death received his wound, having met his death stroke from a dead body. And as an athlete, when he thinks he has hit his adversary, himself is caught in a fatal grasp, so truly does Christ also show, that to die with arrogance is the devil’s shame. HOMILIES ON COLOSSIANS 6.

THEODORE OF MOPSUESTIA: It is in the putting off of mortality that the demonic powers are overcome. COMMENTARY ON COLOSSIANS.

SEVERIAN OF GABALA: Through the exposing and putting off of the flesh Christ subdued the opposing powers. … For until his cross and death it was not clearly known that Christ was their Lord, that he was both God and Son of God. This was because he exercised his wonder-working powers in a way that was hidden in his body. This is why Satan made an attempt on him, wishing to learn if he was truly the one proclaimed by the prophets. This was with the intention that if it was so, Satan might hinder the outworking of salvation [i.e., the “economy”]. But the evil one accomplished nothing, nor was he able to learn anything; for a while the Christ escaped his notice. But when Christ was beaten and died and was buried and rose, God’s plan of salvation was completed, his being unnoticed was over, his divinity became visible and was seen in his head and body. PAULINE COMMENTARY FROM THE GREEK CHURCH.

THEODORET OF CYR: Since through the bodily affections the demons have power over us, he, clothed with the body, was more powerful than sin, and he overturned the power of the adversaries. He made their stupidity known to all, since through his body the victory was given to all of us against them. INTERPRETATION OF THE LETTER TO THE COLOSSIANS.

ATHANASIUS: But if a man is gone down even to Hades and stands in awe of the heroes who have descended there, regarding them as gods, yet he may see the fact of Christ’s resurrection and victory over death. He may infer that among them also Christ alone is true God and Lord. For the Lord touched all parts of creation and freed and undeceived all of them from every illusion. As Paul says, “Having put off from himself the principalities and the powers, he triumphed on the cross”; that no one might by any possibility be any longer deceived but everywhere might find the true Word of God. ON THE INCARNATION 45.

AUGUSTINE: And where the devil could do something, there he met with defeat on every side. While from the cross he received the power to slay the Lord’s body outwardly, it was also from the cross that the inward power, by which he held us fast, was put to death. For it came to pass that the chains of many sins in many deaths were broken by the one death of the One who himself had no previous sin that would merit death. And, therefore, for our sake the Lord paid the tribute to death which was not his due, in order that the death which was due might not injure us. For he was not stripped of the flesh by any obligation to any power whatsoever, but he willed his own death, for he who could not die unless he willed doubtless died because he willed; and therefore he openly exposed the principalities and the powers, confidently triumphing over them in himself. ON THE TRINITY 4.13.17.

PELAGIUS: He triumphed not by killing but by dying, not by bringing force to bear on people but by providing them with sustaining power, so that, for us, all pride having been broken, he might give an example of true conquest. PELAGIUS’S COMMENTARY ON THE LETTER TO THE COLOSSIANS.

THE CROSS A POWERFUL DISPLAY. CYRIL OF JERUSALEM: Let us not be ashamed to confess the Crucified. Let the cross, as our seal, be boldly made with our fingers upon our brow, and on all occasions; over the bread we eat, over the cups we drink; in our comings and in our goings; before sleep; on lying down and rising up; when we are on the way and when we are still. It is a powerful safeguard; it is without price, for the sake of the poor; without toil, because of the sick; for it is a grace from God, a badge of the faithful, and a terror to devils; for “he displayed them openly, leading them away in triumph by force of it.” For when they see the cross, they are reminded of the Crucified. CATECHETICAL LECTURES 13.36.

LEO THE GREAT: As renowned victor over the devil and most powerful conqueror of hostile spirits, in an admirable spectacle, he carried the trophy of his “victory.” On the shoulders of his unconquered endurance, he bore the sign of salvation to be worshiped in every kingdom. Even then he encouraged all his imitators by the sight of his labor, saying, “Any who do not take up their cross and follow me do not deserve me.” SERMONS 59.4.