Colossians 2:5

εἰ γὰρ καὶ τῇ σαρκὶ ἄπειμι. “For even though I am absent in my flesh.”

γὰρ gives a further reason for τοῦτο λέγω. My interest in you, encouraged too as I am about you, is a reason for my writing.

ἀλλὰ. Strengthening the apodosis in a conditional sentence, as often, e.g. Romans 6:5; 2 Corinthians 4:16.

τῷ πνεύματι. Here, as often, contrasted with σάρξ, and designating St Paul’s spirit. Yet Meyer-Haupt appears right in saying that “πνεῦμα, with at most the exception of 1 Corinthians 2:11, is never in St Paul a merely psychological but always a religious conception,” St Paul is with the Colossians not so much in mind and thought as in that higher spiritual region wherewith we primarily hold communion with God and with His people.

σὺν ὑμῖν εἰμί. This perhaps marks “a fellowship far closer and more intimate” (cf. Colossians 2:13) than μεθʼ ὑμῶν, which if used of a person would seem to chiefly regard nearness of locality; cf. Galatians 2:1; Galatians 2:12; 2 Timothy 4:11 (bis).

χαίρων καὶ βλέπων, “rejoicing and beholding.” The analogy of κράζοντες καὶ λέγοντες, Matthew 9:27; ἀποταξάμενος καὶ εἰπών, Acts 18:21, suggests that χαίρων is a general statement which καὶ βλέπων specialises, and, in doing so, explains. It is thus not strictly causative, “rejoicing because seeing,” much less a hendiadys, “cum gaudio cernens” (Beng.). The two things, his joy and his beholding, were synchronous, though not coordinate, and each reacted on the other.

ὑμῶν. At the beginning and the end of this clause. The threefold ὑμῖν, ὑμῶν, ὑμῶν indicate that St Paul is thinking especially of the Colossians, in contrast perhaps to other communities (e.g. Laodicea) where the false teachers had wrought more actual mischief. Among the Colossians serious harm had not yet been done.

τὴν τάξιν, “your order.” The same figure occurs in 2 Thessalonians 3:6; 2 Thessalonians 3:11, ἀτάκτως, and 7, ἠτακτήσαμεν. Compare also 1 Corinthians 14:40.

The word points to there being no breaks in their ranks, as though they were soldiers drawn up in battle array or on the march.

καὶ τὸ στερέωμα†, “and the close phalanx (?).”

(1) The LXX. employs στερέωμα (a) often to translate râḳi‘a “firmament” (Vulg. firmamentum, as even here), and (b) twice to translate sela‘ “cliff” (“the Lord is my sela‘”), Psalms 18:2; Psalms 71:3. In these respects “fastness” is exactly parallel, originally being that which is firm, and employed in Anglo-Saxon to translate “firmamentum,” and later, of course, often meaning a place of refuge inaccessible to the enemy.

(2) In Ezekiel 13:5, LXX. οὐκ ἔστησαν ἐν στερεώματι = a firm and steady condition, and so apparently in “another” translation in the Hexapla of Exodus 14:27, “the sea returned ἐπὶ στερέωμα αὐτῆς.” So also probably 1 Esdr. (3 Esdr.) 1Es 8:82 (78), δοῦναι ἡμῖν στερέωμα ἐν τῇ Ἰουδαίᾳ καὶ Ἰερουσαλήμ.

(3) But it is also used of the firm and solid part of an army, 1Ma 9:14, καὶ ἴδεν Ἰούδας ὅτι Βακχίδης καὶ τὸ στερέωμα τῆς παρεμβολῆς ἐν τοῖς δεξιοῖς, and as τάξιν lends itself so readily to being a military metaphor it is on the whole probable that στερέωμα is here to be interpreted in the same way. But no English rendering is in this case satisfactory, “solid formation” or even “close phalanx” being very imperfect.

Chrys. says, οὐκ εἷπε, τὴν πίστιν, ἀλλὰ τὸ στερέωμα, καθάπερ πρὸς στρατιώτας εὐτάκτως ἑστῶτας καὶ βεβαίως.

τῆς εἰς Χριστὸν πίστεως ὑμῶν. τῆς πίστεως can hardly be possessive as though στερέωμα were a structure raised by their faith, but is in apposition to στερέωμα and epexegetic of it. Your faith itself has become solid and firm. Cf. 1 Peter 5:9; Acts 16:5.

Observe that the peculiar order (contrast Colossians 1:4) of the clause emphasizes both εἰς Χριστὸν and ὑμῶν. Πίστις εἰς comes here only in St Paul’s epistles, but twice in his speeches, Acts 20:21; Acts 26:18; cf. Acts 24:24.