Expositor's Greek Testament (Nicoll)

Ephesians 5:33

πλὴν καὶ ὑμεῖς οἱ καθʼ ἕνα : nevertheless ye also severally. πλήν, connected probably with πλέον and meaning primarily further, besides, is used both for unfolding (= moreover); and for restricting (= howbeit, nevertheless; cf. Thayer-Grimm, ut sup., p. 517; Donaldson, Greek Gram., § 548). Here probably it has the latter application, = “nevertheless, not to say more of that higher union, see that ye, all of you, fulfil the obligation of love to your wives”. The distributive phrase οἱ καθʼ ἕνα, “ye one by one,” individualises the ὑμεῖς, and excludes all exceptions. The καί conjoins the ὑμεῖς with Christ, = “in you also, as in Christ, love is to be fulfilled”. ἕκαστος τὴν ἑαυτοῦ γυναῖκα οὕτως ἀγαπάτω ὡς ἑαυτόν : let each one of you love his own wife as himself. The sentence, which has begun with the plural ὑμεῖς, when it reaches its verb follows the nearest ἕκαστος, and gives ἀγαπάτω instead of ἀγαπᾶτε. The ἕκαστος expresses still more emphatically the absoluteness and universality of the Christian duty of conjugal love a duty from which no single husband is exempt. As in Ephesians 5:28 the ὡς means not merely that each husband is to love his wife as he loves himself, but that he is to love her as being himself, part and parcel of himself according to the Divine idea of the marriage union. ἡ δὲ γυνὴ ἵνα φοβῆται τὸν ἄνδρα : and the wife let her see that she fear her husband. ἡ γυνή is a nom. absol. of a simple kind and emphatic; the δέ is metabatic and slightly adversative; = “so much has been said of the husband, and as to the wife now, reverence is her part”. The change in the construction from the usual imperative to the form ἵνα φοβῆται is explained by some by supplying βλεπέτω, as βλέπετε stands in Ephesians 5:15. But ἵνα with the conj. is used elsewhere in the NT (Mark 5:23; 2 Corinthians 8:7) as an imperative formula, originally no doubt an elliptical form for “I bid you that you do,” or “see you that you do”. It occurs also in later Greek prose (e.g., Arrian, Epict., iv., 1, 41), as the corresponding formula ὅπως is used in the same way in classical Greek with the fut. indic. (Aristoph., Nubes, 823), and more occasionally with the conj. (Xen., Cyr., i, 3, 18). So in Latin, ibi ut sint omnia parata, Cic., Fam., xiv., 20 (cf. Donaldson, Greek Gram., p. 602; Win.-Moult., p. 396). φοβῆται, fear, in the sense of reverence, spontaneous, obedient regard; cf. the frequent application of the verb to the fear of God (Luke 1:50; Luke 18:2; Luke 18:4; Acts 10:2; Acts 10:22; Acts 10:35, etc.); and its use in the case of Herod (Mark 6:20).

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Expositor's Greek Testament (Nicoll)

Ephesians 5:33

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