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2Co_13:3. I will not spare you; for ye in fact will not have it otherwise! Ye challenge, in fact, by your demeanour, an experimental proof of the Christ that speaks in me. Thus ἐπεί , before which we are to conceive a pause, annexes the cause serving as motive of the οὐ φείσομαι , that was under the prevailing circumstances at work. Emmerling begins a protasis with ἐπεί , parenthesizes ὃς εἰς ὑμᾶς κ . τ . λ ., and the whole fourth verse, and regards ἑαυτοὺς πειράζετε in 2Co_13:5 as apodosis. So, too, Lachmann, Olshausen, Ewald, who, however, treat as a parenthesis merely 2Co_13:4. This division as a whole would not yield as its result any illogical connection, for, because the readers wish to put Christ to the proof, it was the more advisable for them to prove themselves. But the passage is rendered, quite unnecessarily, more complicated and cumbrou.
ἐπεὶ δοκιλὴν ζητεῖτε κ . τ . λ .] That is, since you make it your aim that the Christ speaking in me shall verify Himself, shall give you a proof of His judicial working. To take τοῦ … Χριστοῦ as genitive of the subject (comp. 2Co_9:13; Php_2:22) better suits the following ὃς καὶ ὑμᾶς κ . τ . λ ., than the objective rendering (Billroth and Rückert, following older expositors): a proof of the fact that Christ speaks in me.
ὃς εἰς ὑμᾶς οὐκ ἀσθενεῖ κ . τ . λ .] who in reference to you is not impotent, but mighty among you. By this the readers are made to feel how critical and dangerous is their challenge of Christ practically implied in the evil circumstances of the church (2Co_12:20 f.), for the Christ speaking in the apostle is not weak towards them, but provided with power and authority among them, as they would feel, if He should give them a practical attestation of Himself. A special reference of δυνατεῖ ἐν ὑμῖν to the miracles, spiritual gifts, and the like, such as Erasmus, Grotius,[394] Fritzsche,[395] de Wette, and others assume, is not implied in the connection (see especially 2Co_13:4); and just as little a retrospective reference to 2Co_10:10 (Hofmann).
Of the use of the verb ΔΥΝΑΤΕῖΝ no examples from other writers are found, common as was ἈΔΥΝΑΤΕῖΝ . Its use in this particular place by Paul was involuntarily suggested to him by the similar sound of the opposite ἀσθενεῖ . Yet he has it also in Rom_14:4; as regards 2Co_9:8, see the critical remarks on that passag.
ἘΝ ὙΜῖΝ ] not of the internal indwelling and pervading (Hofmann), which is at variance with the context, since the latter has the penal retribution as its main point; but the Christ speaking in Paul has the power of asserting Himself de facto as the vindex of His word and work in the church, so far as it is disobedient to Him and impenitent.
[394] Grotius: “Non opus habetis ejus rei periculum facere, cum jampridem Christus per me apud vos ingentia dederit potentiae suae signa.”
[395] Fritzsche, Diss. II. p 141: “qui Christus χαρίσματα largiendo, miracula regundo, religionis impedimenta tollendo, ecclesiam moderando, ipse vobis se fortem ostendit.” This emphatic ipse is imported,—which arose out of Fritzsche’s regarding the apostle, not Christ, as the subject of δοκιμήν .