2 Corinthians 3:18

2 Corinthians 3:18. But we all, with unveiled face, reflecting as a minor the glory of the Lord the Lord Christ, are transformed into the same image, from glory to glory, even as by the Lord the Spirit. In the 12th verse the apostle had said, “We are not as Moses, who put a veil on his face, that the children of Israel should not look stedfastly to the end of that which was passing away.” And we naturally expect he will next tell us what we are in contrast with Moses, in his veiled and transitory economy. And here at length, after several parenthetical explanations, we have it. Moses' face was veiled, but ours is unveiled. And as Moses was in this but the visible expression of the economy he represented, and of all under it, so the “we” here are all who, believing, see this veil “done away in Christ.” [1] But the next clause involves some difficulty. For it must be admitted that the Authorised Version, “beholding,” gives the classical sense of the Greek word, when used, as here, in the middle voice; and some of the best interpreters (as Meyer) not only insist on this here, but judge any other to be unsuitable to the context. But if this last test is to decide the question, we think Dean Stanley has shewn that “beholding” here is quite unsuitable. Certainly Chrysostom, who takes “reflecting as a mirror” to be the true sense here, and who knew Greek usage, was not deterred from so taking it on account of the customary usage of the word; and since the word is used nowhere else either in the LXX. or N. T., we ought to be guided by what suits the context: so Erasmus, Luther, Bengel, Olshausen, Billroth, take it, are transformed (as in Romans 12:2; in Matthew 17:2, “transfigured”) into the same image from glory to glory. If anything could justify the rendering we have adopted, of “reflecting as a mirror the glory of the Lord,” it seems to be this. The allusion plainly is to Moses, whose face, beholding without a veil the glory of Jehovah, shone with such brightness that the people were afraid to come near him, and he had to veil himself when he spoke to them. He “mirrored” the glory which he beheld; he was “transformed” into it. But that was a purely visible and transitory glory, whereas we who believe, beholding with unveiled face the glory of Christ “in whom it hath pleased the Father that all fulness should dwell, and in whom dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily” mirror forth that glory; we are transformed into His image, not, however, all at once: it proceeds from stage to stage; the assimilation is a progressive one, until the transformation is complete. [2] But how is it carried on? The answer follows; even as from the Lord the Spirit. The “even as” here is not that of similitude, but of congruity; it is not ‘ like what the Lord the Spirit effects,' but ‘this transformation advances majestically in a style befitting the Lord the Spirit to effect in us.' Compare 2 Corinthians 2:17, “ as of sincerity, as of God, in the sight of God speak we in Christ;” and John 1:14, “The Word was made flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, glory as of (such as became) the only begotten of the Father.” [3]

[1] Many expositors take the “we” here to mean the preachers of Christ, as contrasted with Moses personally as the giver forth of the law (so Erasmus, Estius, Bengel). But the fatal objection to this is, that in the very next clause the same “we” are said to be “transformed into the same image from glory to glory.” and this surely will not be restricted to the preachers of Christ

[2] The Greek expositors, followed by Estius. Bengel, Meyer, etc., take this to mean ‘from the glory of Christ to its imprint on us,' which to us teems tame.

[3] Excellent interpreters vindicate the rendering of our Authorised Version “even as by the Spirit of the Lord” (the Vulgate, Erasmus, Calvin, Bengel). But this is not the usual sense of two genitives, neither having the article.

Another rendering “ the Lord of the Spirit” makes good Greek, and is advocated by Meyer, De Wette, Ostander, etc. But, as a title of Christ, it is totally unexampled; and though an appeal is made in support of it to Christ's being the Giver or the Spirit, the two phrases are not similar, and it is incongruous with N. T. usage. The only other rendering, “the Lord the Spirit,” while it is the usual sense of two nouns so placed (such as “from God the Father,” Galatians 1:3, Gr.), is in more strict consistency with the immediate context than the others.