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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.comVincent Word Studies - Ephesians 6:14 - 6:14
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This Chapter Verse Commentaries:
Having your loins girt about (περιζωσάμενοι τὴν ὀσφὺν)
The verb is middle, not passive. Rev., correctly, having girded. Compare Isa 11:5. The principal terms in this description of the christian armor are taken from the Septuagint of Isaiah.
Truth (ἀληθείᾳ)
The state of the heart answering to God's truth; inward, practical acknowledgment of the truth as it is in Him: the agreement of our convictions with God's revelation.
The loins encircled by the girdle form the central point of the physical system. Hence, in Scripture, the loins are described as the seat of power. “To smite through the loins” is to strike a fatal blow. “To lay affliction upon the loins” is to afflict heavily. Here was the point of junction for the main pieces of the body-armor, so that the girdle formed the common bond of the whole. Truth gives unity to the different virtues, and determinateness and consistency to character. All the virtues are exercised within the sphere of truth.
Breastplate of righteousness (θώρακα τῆς δικαιοσύνης)
Compare Isa 59:17. Righteousness is used here in the sense of moral rectitude. In 1Th 5:8, the breastplate is described as of faith and love. Homer speaks of light-armed warriors armed with linen corsets; and these were worn to much later times by Asiatic soldiers, and were occasionally adopted by the Romans. Thus Suetonius says of Galba, that on the day on which he was slain by Otho's soldiers, he put on a linen corset, though aware that it would avail little against the enemy's daggers (“Galba,” 19). Horn was used for this purpose by some of the barbarous nations. It was cut into small pieces, which were fastened like scales upon linen shirts. Later, the corset of metal scales fastened upon leather or linen, or of flexible bands of steel folding over each other, was introduced. They appear on Roman monuments of the times of the emperors. The Roman spearmen wore cuirasses of chain-mail. Virgil mentions those in which the linked rings were of gold (“Aeneid,” iii., 467). The stiff cuirass called στάδιος standing upright, because, when placed upon its lower edge it stood erect, consisted of two parts: the breastplate, made of hard leather, bronze, or iron, and a corresponding plate covering the back. They were connected by leathern straps or metal bands passing over the shoulders and fastened in front, and by hinges on the right side.
The breastplate covers the vital parts, as the heart.