Ephesians 3:19

γνῶναί τε τὴν ὑπερβάλλουσαν τῆς γνώσεως ἀγάπην τοῦ Χριστοῦ : and to know the love of Christ which passeth knowledge. Literally, “the knowledge-surpassing love of Christ”. The gen. γνώσεως is due to the ὑπερβάλλουσαν having the force of a comparative (cf. Aesch., Prom., 944; Hom., Il., xxiii., 847; Bernhardy, Synt., iii., 48 B). That the Χριστοῦ is the gen. subj., Christ's love to us, is made clear by the description of it as surpassing knowledge, which could not be said of our love to Him. The repetition of the same idea in contrasting senses in the γνῶναι and the γνώσεως has its point not in any antithesis between theoretical or discursive knowledge (Ell.) and practical knowledge, or between false knowledge and true (Holz), or between human knowledge and divine (Chrys.), but in the simple fact that there is a real knowledge of Christ's love possible to us, a knowledge that is capable of increase as we are the more strengthened by power in the inner man, while a complete or exhaustive knowledge must ever remain beyond our capacity. This petition for the gift of a true and enlarging knowledge (a knowledge which is obviously not a matter of mere intellect but of conscious, personal experience) is connected with the former petition for spiritual comprehension by τε, and this is presented in the character, not of a climax, but of an adjunct, an additional statement in supplement of the former. The simple τε (as distinguished from τε … καί) occurs rarely in the Gospels, with greater comparative frequency in Romans and Hebrews, but oftenest by far in Acts. It is used to connect single ideas in Greek poetry (seldom in Greek prose), and is occasionally so used in the NT (cf. Acts 2:37; Acts 2:40; Acts 27:4; and see Bernh., Synt., xx., 17). In this case it seems to indicate a “closer connection and affinity” than καί (cf. Blass, Gr. of N. T. Greek, p. 263). ἵνα πληρωθῆτε εἰς πᾶν τὸ πλήρωμα τοῦ Θεοῦ : that ye may be filled unto all the fulness of God (or, into the whole fulness of God). The great Vatican Codex (followed by 17, 73, 116) has an interesting variety of reading here, viz., πληρωθῇ for πληρωθῆτε, the εἰς being also dropped. This reading gets a place in the margin of WH. On the difficult term πλήρωμα see under Ephesians 1:10 and especially Ephesians 1:23 above. The interpretation of this clause is much disputed. The εἰς cannot mean with or in, as it is taken by some, but must = “into” or “unto,” expressing the measure up to which the being filled is to take effect, the limit of the filling, or the goal it has before it. The AV and the other Old English Versions erroneously give “with”; except Wicl., who makes it “in,” Cov., who renders “into,” and Rhem., “unto”. The Θεοῦ may be the gen. of originating cause, = the fulness bestowed by God; or, better, the poss. gen., = the fulness possessed by God. The main difficulty is the sense of the πλήρωμα itself. Some explanations may be set aside as paraphrases rather than interpretations; e.g., that πλήρωμα = the Church (Koppe, etc.); the gracious presence of God, the Divine δόξα, filling the people (Harl.); the perfection of God, in the sense of the highest moral ideal that can be presented to him “in whose heart Christ dwells” (Oltr.), etc. Nor can any good sense be legitimately got by taking it as = πλήρωσις “that ye may be filled with the gifts with which God is wont to furnish men” (Grot.) an interpretation that cannot be adjusted to the εἰς. The choice lies between two views, viz., (1) that πλήρωμα has its primary, pass, sense the fulness that is in God, or with which God Himself is filled; or (2) that it has the sense derived from this, viz., fulness, copia, πλοῦτος, πλῆθος. The latter is preferred by Meyer, who appeals to such passages as Song of Solomon 5:12; Romans 15:29; Ephesians 4:13, etc., in support of it, and understands it to convey the special idea of charismatic fulness as bestowed by God. So he renders it, “in order that ye may be filled with Divine gifts of grace to such extent that the whole fulness of them (πᾶν has the emphasis) shall have passed over upon you”. So also substantially De Wette, Abbott, and others, who refer to 2 Peter 1:4. But there are weighty reasons for preferring the former view with Alf., Ell., Haupt, etc. It gives πλήρωμα the largest and profoundest sense, not restricting it to gifts of grace bestowed, but taking it to express the sum of the Divine perfections (so substantially Chrys., Rück., etc.), the whole ἀρετή or excellence that is in God; cf. Chrysostom's ὥστε πληροῦσθαι πάσης ἀρετῆς ἧς πλήρης ἐστὶν ὁ Θεός. It brings the whole paragraph to a conclusion worthy of itself, lifting us to a conception which surpasses all that has preceded it, and carrying us from the great idea of the fulness in Christ to the still greater idea of the fulness in God. Nor is it any valid objection to it that what is thus put before us is what can never be attained in this life. It is an ideal, essentially the same as that contained in the injunction to be perfect as our Father in heaven is perfect (Matthew 5:48). This interpretation also is most in harmony with the great idea of the indwelling of Christ in our hearts, expressing indeed what is implied in that. In Christ the πλήρωμα of God dwells; so far as Christ dwells in us the πλήρωμα of God is in us. In that indwelling lies the possibility of our growing in moral excellence on to the very limit of all that is in God Himself. That they might be strengthened in the inner man so as to have Christ's living and abiding presence in them, and be lifted thereby to the comprehension of His love and the personal knowledge of that which yet surpasses all knowledge, and at last be filled with all spiritual excellence even up to the measure of the complete perfection that is in God Himself this is the sweep of what Paul in his prayer desires for these Ephesians so late sunk in heathen hopelessness and godlessness.