Colossians 1:20

To this verse Ephesians 1:10; Ephesians 2:16, are partially parallel. It supplies the basis for the Son's pre-eminence (Colossians 1:18) in His reconciling death. διʼ αὐτοῦ : through the Son. ἀποκαταλλάξαι τὰ πάντα εἰς αὐτόν. The choice of ἀποκατ. instead of the more usual καταλλ. is for the sake of strengthening the idea, and by insisting on the completeness of the reconciliation accomplished to exclude all thought that reconciliation by angels is needed to supplement that made by Christ. The reconciliation implies previous estrangement. It is the universal sweep of this passage that makes it at once fascinating and mysterious. Numerous expedients have been devised by exegetes to avoid the plain meaning of the words. The natural sense is that this reconciliation embraces the whole universe, and affects both things in heaven and things on the earth, and that peace is made between them and God (or Christ). The point which creates difficulty is the assertion that angels were thus reconciled. Some have evaded this by interpreting τὰ πάντα of the things in heaven below the angels and those on earth below man. It might be possible to parallel the latter reconciliation with Paul's prophecy of the deliverance of animate and inanimate nature (excluding man) from the bondage of corruption (Romans 8:19-23). But the two are not identical, for one is and the other is not eschatological, and reconciliation is not deliverance from the bondage of corruption. And this helps us little to explain what the reconciliation of all things in heaven is. Nor is any such limitation legitimate; on the contrary, it is precisely in the opposite direction that any limitation would have to be made; for in its full sense reconciliation can only be of beings endowed with moral and spiritual nature. In Colossians 1:16-17 angelic powers are explicitly included in τὰ πάντα. It is plain that εἰς αὐτὸν excludes the view that a reconciliation of angels and men is intended. This is so even if with Chrysostom and others (including apparently Abbott) we make τὰ ἐπὶ τ. γῆς and τὰ ἐν τ. οὐραν. depend on εἰρηνοπ. For this still leaves unexplained ἀποκ. τ. πάντα εἰς αὐτόν, which makes the reference to angels undeniable. Bengel's note, “Certum est angelos, Dei amicos, fuisse inimicos hominum Deo infensorum,” may be perfectly true. But it is irrelevant here, for only by forcing the words can εἰρηνοπ … οὐραν. be regarded as other than epexegetical of the preceding clause, and in particular τ. ἐπὶ τ. γῆς and τὰ ἐν τ. οὐραν. as a resolution of τ. πάντα. Abbott's suggestion that τὰ ἐν. τ. οὐραν. may be inhabitants of other worlds may be true, though for Paul the thought is far-fetched, but does nothing towards excluding the angels. He urges that ἐν τοῖς οὐρανοῖς is not necessarily equivalent to “in heaven”. But not only did Jewish angelology place the angels in the heavens, but Paul did so too, and has done so only just before in this passage, defining τὰ ἐν τοῖς οὐραν. as the various orders of angels (Colossians 1:16). Further, not only is this exclusion of the angels from the scope of reconciliation inconsistent with the terms of the passage, it omits a very important point in Paul's polemic. To the angels the false teachers probably ascribed the function of procuring the reconciliation of men with God. (Cf. Enoch xv. 2, “And go, say to the watchers of heaven, who have sent thee to intercede for them: you should intercede for men, and not men for you”.) How effective is Paul's reply that these angels needed reconciliation themselves! Assuming, then, that angels are included among those reconciled, and that this is also referred to in the words “having made peace through the blood of His cross,” the question arises, What did Paul mean by this? Meyer says that in consequence of the fall of the evil angels the angelic order as a whole was affected by the hostile relation of God to them, and the original relation will be fully restored when the evil angels are finally cast into hell. But apart from the speculative nature of this explanation, and the injustice it imputes to God, the reference is certainly not eschatological. Godet lays stress on εἰ αὐτὸν, and suggests that the reconciliation is not to God but with reference to God. He thinks that the passing over of sins by God (Romans 3:25) might cause the angels, who had been mediators in the giving of the law, difficulties as to the Divine righteousness. This was met and removed by the cross, which revealed God's attitude to sin and reconciled them to His government. We do not know that the angels needed this vindication, which, of course, it was a function of Christ's death to give, though it is possible (Ephesians 3:10; 1 Peter 1:12). But this interpretation seems to be excluded by the explanation of reconciliation as making peace. And εἰς αὐτὸν was probably chosen instead of αὐτῷ on account of εἰς αὐτὸν (Colossians 1:16), and because it was stronger and expressed the thought of God or Christ as the goal. The explanation that the angels were confirmed, and thus made unable to fall, is altogether inadequate. Harless, Oltramare and others admit a reconciliation of men and angels to God, but without asserting that τὰ ἐν τ. οὐρ. needed reconciliation. Wherever it was needed Christ effected it. But Paul's division of τὰ π. into two categories marked by εἴτε … εἴτε shows that the statement has reference not simply to these classes taken together as a whole, but to each taken singly. Alford, in his suggestive note, after saying that such a reconciliation as that between man and God is not to be thought of, since Christ did not take on Him the seed of angels or pay any propitiatory penalty in the root of their nature, gives as his interpretation “all creation subsists in Christ: all creation therefore is affected by His act of propitiation: sinful creation is, in the strictest sense, reconciled from being at enmity: sinless creation, ever at a distance from His unapproachable purity, is lifted into nearer participation and higher glorification of Him, and is thus reconciled, though not in the strictest, yet in a very intelligible and allowable sense”. Unfortunately this cannot be accepted, for the strict is the only allowable sense. But it is on the right lines, and indicates the direction in which a solution must be sought. This, as several recent scholars have urged (Kl [9], Gess, Everling and others), is through taking account of the Biblical and Jewish doctrine of angels. That the angels are divided into the sharply separated classes of sinless and demoniacal is a view on which this passage remains inexplicable. Nor is it the Old Testament or the Jewish doctrine, or, it may be added, the doctrine of Paul. Perhaps we need not, with Gess, think of an intermediate class, or, with Ritschl, of the angels of the Law. To Jewish thought angels stood in the closest relations with men, and were regarded as sharing a moral responsibility for their acts. The angelic princes of earthly kingdoms in Daniel, and the angels of the Churches in the Apocalypse, are Biblical examples of this. A large number of Pauline passages harmonise with the view that the angelic world needed a reconciliation. The detailed proof of this cannot be given here; it belongs to the discussion of the angelology of the Epistle. (See Introd., section ii.) But if the angels needed it, how could it be effected through the blood of the cross? It is not enough to answer with Haupt that the reconciliation of men affected the angels who were closely united with them. A direct effect seems to be intended, and the difficulty is that stated by Holtzmann, that with the flesh all capacity is absent from the angels of Paul, to share in the saving effects of the death of God's Son, which was made possible through the assumption of the flesh, and in which sin in the flesh is condemned. In answer to it these considerations may be urged. The Son is Head of the angels, as He is Head of humanity; therefore His acts had an effect on them independently of their effect on men. His death must not be narrowly conceived as physical only, as the destruction of the material flesh. It was the destruction of the sinful principle; and therefore is independent in its effects of the possession of material bodies by those whom it saves. And this cannot be set aside by the fact that Paul uses such a physical term as blood of the cross, for the death of Christ was surely more to him than a mere physical incident. So far, then, as the angel world was affected by sin, it needed reconciliation, and received it in the atoning and sin-destroying death of Christ its Head. That in this reconciliation evil angels are not included is clear from the fact that Paul does not regard it as having had effect on them corresponding to that on men. Lueken points out that Paul adds “through Him” to the words “through the blood of His cross,” and refers the latter to the reconciliation of men and the former to that of angels, so that they are simply said to be reconciled through Christ. But the διʼ αὐτοῦ is an emphatic resumption of διʼ αὐτοῦ at the beginning of the verse. εἰς αὐτόν. It is uncertain whether this should be referred to God or Christ. The former is possible, for αὐτός may be reflexive, and reconciliation is usually to God (so Ephesians 2:16, also 2 Corinthians 5:18-20; Romans 5:10). We should also have expected διʼ αὐτοῦ καὶ εἰς αὐτόν if Christ had been meant. On the other hand, the reference to Christ is favoured by the fact that elsewhere in this passage αὐτός always refers to Christ, and by the parallel with Colossians 1:16, ἐν αὐτῷ … διʼ αὐτοῦ … εἰς αὐτόν. Decision is difficult; it is perhaps safest to let the Pauline usage determine the reference, and interpret “unto Himself”. εἰρηνοποιήσας. In Ephesians great emphasis is laid on the peace between Jew and Gentile, established by the cross, an emphasis quite to be expected where the unity of the Church is the leading thought; but not to be found here, for the peace is obviously between God on the one side and men and angels on the other; besides which the thought would have no relevance in this connexion. διὰ τ. αἵματος τ. σταυροῦ αὐτοῦ. The combination of the two terms is perhaps for the sake of insisting on the historical fact of the reconciling death against the tendency to seek peace with God through angelic mediators. τὰ ἐπὶ τ. γῆς, probably governed by ἀποκατ., rather than εἰρηνοπ., since it and the companion phrase seem to be epexegetical of τὰ πάντα.

[9] Klöpper.