Commentary on Ephesians 2.1–2.21

“And you, when you were dead in your trespasses and sins, in which you once walked according to the age of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit who works in the sons of unbelief.” This whole thought must be taken together: both what concerns the Ephesians, that they were in sins, and what concerns Paul himself, that he was in the desires of the flesh and in fleshly counsels. To all these, I say, must be joined this: that God, who is rich in mercy, has saved them all, both Paul himself and the Ephesians. For so he concludes: “by whose grace you have been saved,” when you walked dead in trespasses; and you, when you walked dead in your trespasses and sins. I have often warned that death is taken in two ways: the one well known, when at the end of living in the world the soul is separated from the body; the other, when the soul, placed in the body itself, carries out the desires of the flesh and lives in sins. “You,” he says, “when you were dead”; and he indicated the kind of death: “in your trespasses and sins, in which you once walked according to the age of this world.” He shows what the sins are: namely desires in the world and about the world—for riches, or for pleasure, or for worldly knowledge, or for a worldly religion—and the rest of the things of this world which destroy the mind as it wanders from the knowledge of the truth. And he said “the age of this world” because there are also higher ages, those eternal ages, and how they are to be understood and what meaning they have I have unfolded in other books. The age of this world is every worldly region, or the whole world: in the world the motion of things producing and enfolding time. An age is not in the same way in the eternal realm; yet that there are ages of eternal things Paul too declared, and all the prophets, since it is said, and often said, “Blessed be God to the ages of ages.” For an age comes to an end; but the ages of ages are both of the eternal realm and forever. “According to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit who now works in the sons of unbelief.” Whoever walks according to the age of this world walks according to the prince of the power of the air, who is the spirit of the sons of unbelief. Since there are two things, light and darkness, truth and falsehood, good and wickedness—not, however, as if they were on equal terms, for it is impious for anything to be compared with God, even as a contrary—so let us also take two spirits, one of faith, the other of unbelief. This spirit, Satan and his devil, has his substance from the air, that is, from hylē and matter, and has power in matter itself, or over those who think materially. He is, then, the prince of that power which is in the air, that is, in matter: a prince who is a spirit, but, as I said, a spirit of matter; and he now works in material things, “in the sons of unbelief,” that is, he holds their minds and rules there. So whoever lives according to the age of this world lives according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit who now works in the sons of unbelief. There is a double reading: “of the spirit who works” and “the spirit who now works.” We have said that the prince or spirit of the air is the spirit of matter; but there is a strong reason for it: that the air is the prince among the elements. For fire is agitated air, water is moistened air, earth is dry and solid air; and if the air holds all these together within itself, it is chaos, that is, darkness and the matter of darkness. Fire, on the other hand, is purer air, and heaven is air shaken by agitation. For when the poet described the power of the winds, by which they could throw everything into confusion unless they were ruled, he said that all things would be turned into air if the winds had free power. The separation of these elements one by one is the ordering of the world, as Moses taught, who in the beginning separated the waters by the word of God; he separated the earth too, and he separated the spirit. So the spirit of matter is rightly called the spirit of the air.

“Among whom we too all once lived.” So as not to wrong the Ephesians—having said, “when you were dead in trespasses and sins, walking according to the spirit of the air”—he added himself too and the rest, so that all once lived according to this life which he goes on to describe: “in the desires of our flesh, doing the will of our flesh and of our counsels.” These are the things over which the prince of the power of the air exercises his working, but upon the sons of unbelief, so that they have the desires of the flesh, do the will of the flesh and the counsels of the flesh. Whoever has cast these away now both knows God and follows him, thinking nothing about the works of the flesh. “And we were by nature sons of wrath, like the rest.” Since we lived both by the counsels of the flesh and from its desires, “we were,” he says, “sons of wrath by nature”; that is, begotten according to the nature of flesh and matter; for that is nature. For we do not mean the divine nature, but that which is worldly; and wherever there is birth, there one speaks of nature. So in the higher realm, since all things there are unbegotten, when certain things are said to be begotten, they are understood as begotten by a kind of mystery, not in the way things are begotten in the world. For where there is nature, there is generation; and generation is when from what was not something begins to be, or from what was otherwise something begins to be different; as a human being from seed, or other plants from seed, and the other animals. But in the eternal realm, since all those divine things begin to appear as if by a kind of distinction, they are therefore said to be as it were begotten; yet since they are of the same power and the same substance as they were, they are for that reason not begotten. For God did not make by nature all things, even the eternal things which he made from the eternal, as he had them; but he only, as it were, separated them and established each one; how great and of what kind they are we understand from other books. Now we take Christ, or the angels, or souls, and all other things that are eternal, as as it were begotten in the eternal realm, whereas the generation that is in the world is far different. So “we were,” he says, “sons by nature,” that is, made through nature. But sons of whom? Not of God, but of wrath: for the adversary himself, who is wrath, had claimed us for himself from matter. So, he says, “we were sons of wrath, like the rest.” For they are properly sons of wrath who are also of this world; as of those of whom he said “like the rest,” as we, who being from that world were living badly—that is, we lived according to the flesh, like sons of wrath, as the sons of wrath live; that is, “like the rest.”

“But God, who is rich also in mercy, because of his great love, has had mercy on us.” For truly God’s riches in mercy are great. For when we had made ourselves strangers to God by our sins, though we were from the higher world, he, by his grace forgiving sins and pardoning even trespasses, redeemed us to himself through his Son; and since he did not spare him in order to free us, his riches are without doubt great, and his love great too. For how much love has he for us, when for our sake he emptied his Son, so that he might redeem us by his passion? This, then, is the love.

“And when we were dead in sins, he made us alive together in Christ.” Because, he says, the love of God remains. This, he says, is the love; these are the riches: that although our substance was from the eternal realm, and although we were dead in sins, he redeemed us through the passion of Christ and saved us. And since the passion of Christ is the putting to death of sins, and the resurrection of Christ is our resurrection, he says, “he made us alive together in Christ,” that is, he restored us to eternal life; but through Christ, “by whose grace you have been saved.” He concluded with what was most necessary both for all and for the Ephesians: that we accept nothing outside Christ, since we are saved by his grace. So you too, Ephesians, saved by the grace of Christ, ought to accept nothing outside, and to hold nothing external in religion and faith.

“And he raised us together, and seated us together in the heavens.” This is a holy and full mystery, for us to have faith in Christ: not that we now earn resurrection or the heavenly kingdoms, but that when Christ was raised, we were raised then. For this is what he says: “he raised us together.” Likewise, “and seated us together in the heavenly places.” For when he seated Christ, he seated together with him also those who are and will be in Christ. “In the heavenly places,”

“That he might show in the ages to come the overflowing riches of his glory, in kindness toward us, in Christ.” For he did not pay us what we had earned, since we do not receive this by merits, but by the grace and kindness of God. He raised us, then, together in Christ, because of his kindness and the grace that is in Christ, so that he might show to future and coming ages his riches. What riches? The grace of his kindness toward us. But all this, as he often warns and as I impress upon you, is in Christ. For there is the whole mystery of the resurrection, both ours and that of all. For through Christ all things are reconciled: he himself is the door, he himself the resurrection, he himself the life, and the way to the Father. “For by grace you have been saved through faith.” He has explained plainly that faith is owed by us; and only this is owed: that we believe in Christ. If this is so, this alone is ours; we are saved not by our merit, but by the grace of God. Accordingly he adds: “and this not from yourselves; it is the gift of God.”

“Not from works, lest anyone perhaps should boast.” That we are saved, he says, is of God’s grace. So you too, Ephesians: that you are saved is not from yourselves; it is the gift of God; nor is it from your works, but it is God’s grace and God’s gift, not our merit. Works are one thing, our merit another; hence he separated them, saying “not from yourselves” and “not from works”: for besides the works that must be offered daily in duties toward the poor, and the other good deeds, there can also be merit from duty and religion, from chastity and abstinence; … these are works. So he concluded both: “not from yourselves,” and “not from works,” and he added, “lest anyone should boast.” For somehow one who thinks that merit is paid back for his works wants it to be his own, not the giver’s; and this is boasting.

“For we are his handiwork, created in Christ.” By a certain mystery he fashioned and formed us in Christ, so that we might rise with him and be able to be heirs with him, believing in Christ. “For good works which God prepared.” God prepared, created, formed in Christ, he says, good works: those that are to come, or these that we do here now? But whether we understand those that are to come or those that are now, they are surely good; they are witnesses in Christ. And he can be seen to have spoken of present works, since he adds, “that we should walk in them”;

“Mindful,” he says, “in those very works”: so that we may now live in the same way and do the same works, which are good. For God has now created us in Christ as his handiwork so that we may be mindful, and therefore, keeping faith, may now walk in those works. “And you who were once Gentiles in the flesh.” Because he had said “that we should walk,” he added, “and you,” that is, may you walk “in the good works which God prepared.” “You,” he says, “who were once Gentiles in the flesh,” that is, you thought as Gentiles, and therefore in a fleshly way, that is, carrying out the desires of the flesh. The contrary of this is to be in Christ, that is, to live spiritually and to think everything according to the spirit. I have often explained this. It is, namely, to think about God, to hope in God, to have one’s mind toward God, to strive toward the Father, to know Christ as the way of our eternity, to believe that through his resurrection we have risen. “Who are called uncircumcision by that which is called circumcision, made by hand in the flesh.” You, he says, were Gentiles in the flesh, so called by those who are circumcised, that is, the Jews, whose circumcision is made by hand. By this circumcision, then, that is, by the Jews, you are called uncircumcision, that is, those who are not circumcised. But when he said that it is the circumcision made by hand that names you uncircumcision, he meant it to be understood that the circumcision made by hand is not the one given by God, but that there is another circumcision, which is of the mind, of all desires and all sins, so that one truly cuts the world away from oneself and separates all the desires of the flesh. For what does it profit to circumcise the flesh, when rather every vice grows through the mind from the flesh? It is those sins, then, that come from the flesh that must be circumcised; and this circumcision will not be made by hand, but by soul and spirit. This was said so that they would not be ashamed of being called uncircumcision: for this is neither outside the religion of God, nor is it truly said, since it is said by the Jews, and said by that circumcision which is made by hand; whereas the better and truer circumcision is that which soul and spirit have made, cutting away all the sins of the flesh.

“Because you were at that time without Christ.” For when you were Gentiles, you were surely without Christ; for Christ always exists; but whoever has received Christ and has taken up faith in him is then as it were circumcised, and will then be in the circumcision, but not that made by hand. So you were uncircumcision because you were not with Christ. And he adds this: you were not true Jews, “alienated from the commonwealth of Israel.” For its true commonwealth is if we think according to the spirit, live according to the spirit, and are circumcised by Christ from fleshly desires. “And strangers to the covenants, not having hope of their promise, and without God in this world.” That is, you were Gentiles; and because you had nothing to do with Christ and were without Christ, therefore, he says, you were not in the commonwealth of Israel; therefore you were strangers to the covenants, that is, alienated from the covenant. What is the covenant? [Strangers] from the promise of the covenants, that is, not having hope of the promise of the things God had promised through his covenants, that is, through the prophets: namely, not having hope of their promise. For when you were without Christ, you did not promise yourselves the hope of the promise of those covenants, since you were strangers and aliens from them, and were without God, that is, without Christ. For so he said, “when you were without Christ.” See, here too he has called Christ God. Then “without God” can also be understood because God is from Christ. You were, then, in this world without God. He lives without God, and is a stranger to the promises of the covenants, and other than the true Israel, to whom heaven and the kingdoms of heaven have been promised in eternal life and the glory of God.

“But now in Christ you who were once far off have been brought near in the blood of Christ.” Every discourse that contains exhortation, after a general discussion, brings the thought back to those to whom the letter is written, that is, to the Ephesians. So, he says, you too who were once far off, that is, Gentiles, have now been brought near in Christ, in the blood of Christ: since it is not our works, nor the Ephesians’ own works, that make them near and in Christ, but, he says, the blood of Christ.

And he explains what it means that through the blood of Christ we are in Christ—yet through faith. “For he himself is our peace.” For through his mystery we have been reconciled to God and are no longer strangers or enemies. For when we worshiped others and served idols, we were as it were at war with the Father, that is, with God. But Christ, standing in the middle, by his mystery and passion reconciled us in himself. So he is “our peace, who has made both one, and broke down the middle wall of partition, the enmities, in his flesh.”

“Making void the law of commandments in decrees.” Christ, he says, is our peace: whom elsewhere too he calls mediator. For he placed himself between the divided realms, since souls born from the fountain of God are held, or were held, in this world, so that a middle wall stood between them, like a hedge and a fence, through the allurements of the flesh and worldly desires. Christ by his mystery, by flesh and passion and teaching, broke down this middle wall; that is, conquering the flesh and teaching that it must be conquered, and dissolving the desires of the world and teaching that they must be dissolved, he took away the middle wall; yet in the flesh, he says, surely dissolving its enmities. So it is not of our labor, as I often warn, that we dissolve them; but faith in Christ alone is our salvation. For he dissolved all enmities in his flesh. Likewise he dissolved the law of commandments, making it void in decrees, so that it is not through works nor through sabbaths. For the decrees are in the law, and the commandments themselves: now, I say, Christ has made void precepts of observances of this kind, which were understood in a fleshly way. When these were made void, what had stood in the middle was taken away: and souls are no longer hindered, as if by the world set against them, that is, by worldly desires and understandings and fleshly desires, from seeing God, knowing him, and following him, even being joined to him. For this is what he teaches: “that he might create the two in himself, into one new man, making peace.” I have said which two: souls, and those higher things, namely the eternal and spiritual. When the Savior himself, who is spirit and the Holy Spirit, descended into souls, he joined the two, the higher spiritual things, and made souls to be spiritual, and created them in himself “into one,” he says, “new man.” And who is the new man? The spiritual man; for the old man is the animal man, and from there the fleshly man. “Making peace,” he says: that is, for those torn apart, separated, and fighting—that is, for souls that had slipped down to earthly things and followed earthly things, and therefore fought against heavenly and spiritual things—he made peace, he says, when he reconciled the spiritual things and God, so that now they think one thing in mind, worship one, and are one, namely spiritual.

“And that he might present and reconcile both in one body to God.” Joining, he says, as we said, both souls and spirit, he made peace, so that he might present those two, once separated, as joined, and reconcile them to God. “In one body,” he says: that is, so that, since the soul itself was now spirit, and the spirit itself now claimed the soul for itself, there would be one body which had before been separated. But here let us take “body” likewise as a coupling, as one substance; which is a heavenly body and in the eternal realm. How is “body” said? Of our Lord Jesus Christ; because Christ is a bodily substance and a bodily majesty. “Through the flesh, killing the enmities in himself.” This is the mystery of the cross: that all things hostile to our souls and spirit should be taken away to punishment, that is, worldly desires, the cravings of the flesh, and the flesh itself, in a way corrupt and defective. Through the flesh, therefore, Christ killed the enmities, that is, all things opposed to souls. And where did he kill them? “In himself.” For this is why he took flesh: to conquer the flesh in himself; and so through flesh to benefit flesh, by killing the corruption of the flesh; and, through the resurrection, by taking up a pure and eternal flesh and the whole body of the deity; since all things become spirit, as Paul teaches in many places and as the fact itself has made manifest. In this also is what I would like to show everywhere: that our Lord Jesus Christ in a way conquered and overcame this very battle of the flesh and the world. Almost nothing is now ours except only to believe in him who overcame all things. For this is full salvation: that Christ conquered these things, that for this Christ was lifted up on the cross, that for this Christ rose again, so that for us who believe in him salvation, eternity, and the glory … might be prepared.

“And coming, he preached peace to us who were far off, and peace to those who were near.” He expresses the whole action and coming of the Lord Savior through the things that are done and are to be done. For the coming of the Lord preached peace, that is, that people should be reconciled, and that the whole world, looking to God through souls, should feel nothing hostile and have peace. As to his saying that God, that is, the Savior, coming, preached the gospel: whatever is well, and proclaims what is good, is called gospel. For to announce God, to teach that God may be known, and to announce conversion to God is to preach the gospel; and this is to preach peace: so that we do not, with minds in discord and corrupted by error, while we serve the hylic powers, wage war, as it were, against God. This, I say, is to preach peace. Again, his saying “to those far off and to those near” is to be referred to the Jews and the Gentiles. For the Jews, of course, are near, but the Gentiles far off. But since the Savior himself received the gospel to proclaim God to the Gentiles, he put that first: so that Christ, truly coming, should proclaim peace also to those who are far off, that is, to the Gentiles, as is shown in many things. For those who come to belief from the Gentiles are even called better sons than those from the Jews. Yet so that it would not be denied to the others either, “and to those who are near” was added.

“Since through him we both have access in one spirit to the Father.” Both, as I said, Jews and Gentiles, we have access to the Father through Christ himself. But how? “In one spirit,” which is Christ: when we believe in him, he flows into us, and we perceive God, know God, and worship God. So, that we may come to the Father in that very spirit, we shall both be able to come through Christ. And so the Jews cannot come to the Father except through Christ, just as the Gentiles cannot through any other outside thing, whether idol or power or any “majesty,” as they call it.

“So you are no longer guests and sojourners, but you are fellow citizens of the saints and members of God’s household.” He concludes with the particular case, the Ephesians, that they are no longer aliens, nor sojourners, nor guests. For those who are abroad from God, since they remain among God’s works, that is, in the world, are guests and sojourners [until they] can be members of the household. For even if they sacrifice to demons, afterward, believing and following God, they are members of the household, but in the world. Now those who do not believe are guests and sojourners. Then, as he concludes to the Ephesians: whoever believes God, and knows that through Christ he belongs to God, is neither guest nor sojourner; so you, Ephesians, he says, are fellow citizens of the saints and members of God’s household. For all gather into one city, that is, that eternal city of the higher riches which they call Jerusalem, and they are fellow citizens of the saints and members of God’s household; since in that same city God is, as it were, ruler and lord and prince. So they are likewise members of God’s household. But how are we to understand “fellow citizens of the saints”? As though those called citizens were one thing and the saints another. If that is so, who are the saints and who the citizens? I think it must be understood that he put “saints” for the apostles, the prophets, and the rest who either experienced God or saw him; that is, those who, with the spirit dwelling in them, spoke divine things, or saw him present in some way; “in some way,” I said, whether through the flesh or through the spirit, like Abraham, like the apostle, like the rest; or through the flesh and through the spirit, like all the apostles. These, then, are the saints. But those who believe in Christ without any of these things are fellow citizens of the saints and members of God’s household.

“Built upon the foundation of the apostles.” He himself has declared clearly enough that the saints are one thing and the citizens another, since he said that these are built upon the foundation of the apostles. Likewise [he shows] what precepts they ought to observe, whether for the knowledge of God or for worship and religion. Jesus Christ and his precepts are the foundations of the apostles: and these foundations have a superstructure, from life and morals and manner of living and discipline. The first foundation, however, is for life; the rest is for adorning and building up. The first foundation, he says, is to believe Christ, to have hope in him, and to put faith in God. This the apostles teach; and this is the foundation of the prophets too, in good order, according to the division I made above, so that I called saints both those who saw and those who bore the spirit. For the apostles saw, the prophets had the spirit. According to the precepts of the apostles and prophets, then (which are the precepts of Christ), there is the proclamation, and it is the foundation of all eternity and hope. “You have been built,” he says, “on the cornerstone itself, Jesus Christ.” Every middle thing is always placed between two. It either joins or separates the two. But where there is separation for souls, there the world is called phragmos, that is, a fence. But where there is joining for souls, there is Christ, and he is called the cornerstone, since he is truly the cornerstone: he is the one placed first; a foundation truly set at the corner joins two sides. This stone he called akrogōniaios: for not only a corner stone, but the one that is first and highest, where the foundation of the corner begins, which joins and couples two and renders them one. For the two, as we said, are either the higher souls, which also were with Christ, and these souls here that are holy and have Christ in the mysteries; or all those souls of Christ, even the souls of the Gentiles, which are joined to that cornerstone, Jesus Christ.

“In whom the structure, fitted together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord.” For all souls gathered together, and all people made spiritual through Christ, are built into a place where God may dwell, as a holy temple; so that, since Christ is in all, and God is in Christ, all may be a temple of God through Christ. “In whom you too are built together into a dwelling place of God in the spirit.” As I have often taught, he calls the matter back to the particular case, that is, to the Ephesians, so that they too may be built on the same corner, that is, in the spirit of Christ, so that they too may be a dwelling of God. And with great restraint, so as to make it an exhortation: for he does not say they have already been made so, but that they are still being built; for something is lacking in them; and therefore he warns and exhorts. And when he calls them a dwelling of God in the spirit, what else is he doing but excluding from their souls anything else whatever, and saying that Christ alone is still building souls together there, so that they may become a temple of God?