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2Co_12:3-4. And I know such a man … that he, namely, was caught away, etc. The expression is here the well-known attraction οἰδά σε τίς εἶ . Most expositors consider the matter itself as not different from what is mentioned in 2Co_12:2, so that τρίτος οὐρανός and ὁ παράδεισος would be one and the same. But it is decisive against this view, that ὁ τρίτος οὐρανός cannot without arbitrariness be taken otherwise than of a region of heaven comparatively low (see on 2Co_12:2). Besides, the whole circumstantial repetition, only with a change in designating the place, would not be solemn language, but battology. This also in opposition to Hofmann, who imports the modification: “The one time emphasis is laid only on the surroundings, into which he found himself transported away from the earth; the other time on the contrast of the fellowship of God, into which he was transported away from the church of God here below.” Clemens Alexandrinus, Irenaeus, Origen, Athanasius, and several Fathers and schoolmen (see Estius and Bengel on the passage), also Erasmus[362] and Bengel,[363] have rightly distinguished paradise from the third heaven. Comp. also Hahn, Theol. d. N. T. I. p. 246; Osiander, Hilgenfeld, and others. Still we are not, with Bengel (comp. de Wette), to regard (see on 2Co_12:2) paradise as interius quiddam in coelo tertio, quam ipsum coelum tertium (comp. Cornelius a Lapide); but Paul relates first how he was caught up into the third heaven, and then adds, as a further point in the experience, that he was transported further, higher up into paradise, so that the ἕως τρίτου οὐρανοῦ was a break, as it were, a resting-point of the raptus. Thus, too, the repetition of the same words, as well as the repetition of the parenthesis, obtains its solemn character; for the incident is reported step by step, i.e. in two stages.
The paradise is here not the lower, i.e. the place in Sheol, in which the spirits of the departed righteous are until the resurrection (see on Luk_16:23; Luk_23:43), nor as Hofmann, Schriftbew. II. 1, p. 489, substitutes in place of this historical conception the abstraction: “the present communion of the blessed dead with God, as it is on this side of the end of things;” but the upper, the paradise of God (Rev_2:7; Enoch 35:1) in heaven, where God’s dwelling is. This distinction is one given historically, and necessary for the understanding of the passage, and is rightly maintained also by Osiander, Hahn, and others. Comp. the Rabbinical passages in Eisenmenger, entdeckt. Judenth. I. 296 ff., and generally, Thilo, ad Ev. Nic. 25, p. 748 ff.; Gfrörer, Jahrh. d. Heils, II. p. 42 ff. The idea, however, that Christ has carried the believing souls out of Hades with Him to heaven (Delitzsch, Psychol. p. 414) goes beyond Scripture, and is not presupposed even in this passag.
ἄῤῥητα ῥήματα ] an oxymoron:[364] dicta nefanda dictu, speakings, which may not be spoken (Dem. 1369. 25, 1370. 14; Soph. O. R. 465; Eur. Hel. 1370; and Pflugk in loc.), i.e. which may not be made the subject of communication to others. The revelations which Paul received were so sublime and holy, that the further communication of them would have been at variance with their character; what was disclosed to him was to be for him alone, for his special enlightenment, strengthening, comforting, with a view to the fulfilment of his great task; to others it was to remain a mystery, in order to preclude fanatical or other misuse; comp. Calvin. That ἄῤῥητα here does not mean quae dici negueunt (Plato, Soph. p. 238 C), as Beza, Estius, Calovius, Wolf, and many others, including Billroth and Olshausen, hold (Rückert is not decided), is shown by the solemn epexegetical ἃ οὐκ ἐξὸν ἀνθρώπῳ λαλῆσαι , in which ἐξόν means licet, fas est, and is not—as Luther and many older and later commentators, including Billroth and Olshausen, wish to take it, quite at variance with the signification of the word—equivalent to δύνατον . The Vulgate aptly renders: “et audivit arcana verba, quae non licet homini loqui,” i.e. which a man may not utter aloud. Lucian, Epigr. 11 (Jacobs, Del epigr. VII. 66): ἀῤῥήτων ἐπέων γλώσσῃ σφρηγὶς ἐπικείσθω , Soph. El. 1000, Aj. 213. Comp. Rev_10:3 f.
ἀνθρώπῳ ] for they are reserved only for divine communication; a man, to whom they are revealed, may not utter them.
As to what it was that Paul heard for himself, the Fathers and schoolmen made many conjectures after their fashion. See Cornelius a Lapide and Estius. Theodoret well says: αὐτὸς οἶδεν ὁ ταῦτα τεθεαμένος .[365] From whom as the organ of communication he heard it, remains veiled in apocalyptic indefiniteness. Revealing voices (comp. Rev. l.c.) he did hear.
[362] “Raptus est in tertium usque coelum, hinc rursum in paradisum,” Erasmus in his Paraphr. Comp. Clemens Alex.: ἕως τρίτου οὐρανοῦ , κἀκεῖθεν εἰς παράδεισον (Strom. v. p. 427).
[363] Who as to the repetition of the same words judges very rightly: “Non solum suaviter suspendunt acuuntque lectorem, et gloriationi consideratae pondus addunt, sed etiam plane duplex rei momentum exprimunt.”
[364] See regarding similar juxtapositions in general, Lobeck, Paralip. p. 229 f. Comp. Plat. Conv. p. 189 B: ἄῤῥητα ἔστω τὰ εἰρημένα , Soph. Oed. Col. 1005: ῥητὸν ἄῤῥητον , Aj 213: λόγον ἄῤῥητον .
[365] It is most natural (comp. the Apocalypse) to think of disclosures regarding the end of the world, which, however, must have gone further than what occurs in the Epistles of the apostle (as 1 Thessalonians 4; 1 Corinthians 15; Rom_11:25 f.). More definite statements (see Ewald) must be left in abeyance.