Ephesians 3:1

τούτου χάριν ἐγὼ Παῦλος ὁ δέσμιος τοῦ Χριστοῦ Ἰησοῦ : for this cause I Paul, the prisoner of Christ Jesus. The τούτου χάριν is referred by some (Mey., etc.) to the immediately preceding sentence; the fact that they are destined to make a habitation of God, and are being built together with a view to that end, being Paul's reason for pleading with them and praying for them. It is best referred, however, to the purport of the whole statement just brought to its conclusion; the fact that they are now what God's grace has made them and are meant by Him to form a spiritual habitation for Himself, being His reason for what He urges on them and what He does for them. ἐγὼ Παῦλος, a solemn and emphatic designation of the writer by himself, expressive rather of his personal interest in them than the consciousness of his authority (Mey.). For similar occurrences of the emphatic personal designation, with different shades of meaning, see 2 Corinthians 10:1; Galatians 5:2; Colossians 1:23; Philemon 1:19. The article with the δέσμιος expresses simply the character in which Paul appears at present or the class to which he belongs (cf. Τιμόθεος ὁ ἀδελφός, Philemon 1:1); not his pre-eminence among the Lord's prisoners, as if it = the prisoner par excellence (Mey.) a claim surely which would neither be like Paul nor in harmony with the thought of the paragraph. The gen. Χριστοῦ Ἰησοῦ is probably that of originating cause one who has been made a prisoner by Christ; cf. 2 Timothy 1:8; Philemon 1:9, as also Ephesians 4:1. The Ἰησοῦ is omitted by Tisch. on the authority of such MSS. as [198] [199] [200] * [201]; but it is rightly retained by most as found in [202] [203] -corr. [204] [205] [206] 2, 3, Vulg., etc. ὑπὲρ ὑμῶν τῶν ἔθνων : on behalf of you the Gentiles. Paul was called specially to be a minister of Christ to the Gentiles (Acts 21:21; Acts 21:28; Acts 22:21), and his preaching Christ as for the Gentiles equally with the Jews provoked that enmity of the Jews which led to his imprisonment. It was thus for the Gentiles that he was a prisoner; and there is probably also the further thought in the ὑπὲρ ὑμῶν that Paul's imprisonment was to be for their good, helpful to their Christian life. For the idea with which the paragraph closes is that his afflictions were their glory (Ephesians 3:13). But what of the construction and connection here? The simplest adjustment is to insert εἰμί after ὁ δέσμιος Χριστοῦ Ἰησοῦ : “I Paul am the prisoner,” etc. So the Syr., Chrys., Mey. and others. But this takes the point from the ὑπὲρ ὑμῶν and makes Paul assert and exalt himself as a sufferer in a way unlike him. It is best to take it as a broken construction, the statement with which Paul begins being, as in so many other cases, diverted into a different channel by the introduction of some subsidiary remark. Here he is turned off from what he meant to say by the polite reference in the εἴγε clause. Where then have we the resumption? Not at chap. Ephesians 4:1 (with the AV, Mich., Winer, etc.), for chap. 3. is not part of a parenthesis, but a paragraph complete within itself; nor at Ephesians 3:13, which is of too limited scope and fails to meet the full force of the τούτου χάριν; but at Ephesians 3:14, where the τούτου χάριν is repeated.

[198] Autograph of the original scribe of א.

[199] Autograph of the original scribe of א.

[200] Codex Claromontanus (sæc. vi.), a Græco-Latin MS. at Paris, edited by Tischendorf in 1852.

[201] Codex Boernerianus (sæc. ix.), a Græco-Latin MS., at Dresden, edited by Matthæi in 1791. Written by an Irish scribe, it once formed part of the same volume as Codex Sangallensis (δ) of the Gospels. The Latin text, g, is based on the O.L. translation.

[202] Codex Vaticanus (sæc. iv.), published in photographic facsimile in 1889 under the care of the Abbate Cozza-Luzi.

[203] Codex Sinaiticus (sæc. iv.), now at St. Petersburg, published in facsimile type by its discoverer, Tischendorf, in 1862.

[204] Codex Alexandrinus (sæc. v.), at the British Museum, published in photographic facsimile by Sir E. M. Thompson (1879).

[205] Codex Ephraemi (sæc. v.), the Paris palimpsest, edited by Tischendorf in 1843.

[206] Codex Claromontanus (sæc. vi.), a Græco-Latin MS. at Paris, edited by Tischendorf in 1852.