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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.com | DownloadHeinrich Meyer Commentary - 2 Corinthians 3:15 - 3:15
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2Co_3:15. Ἀλλʼ ] opposite of the μὴ ἀνακαλ ., ὅτι ἐν Χ . καταργ ., but no longer connected with γάρ , 2Co_3:14 (Hofmann), since the apostle does not again mean the particular veil (that of Moses) to which the confirmatory clause introduced with γάρ , 2Co_3:14, referred. It is not disclosed, that, etc.; till to-day, on the contrary, there lies a veil, etc.; till to-day, whenever ( ἄν , in whatsoever case) Moses is publicly read, their insight (comp. previously ἐπωρώθη , etc.) is hindered and prevented. The figurative expression does not again represent the veil of Moses, for otherwise τὸ κάλυμμα must necessarily (in opposition to Hofmann) have been used, but generally a veil, and that one placed over ( ἐπί with acc.) the heart (here regarded as the centre of the practical intelligence, comp. 2Co_4:6; Rom_1:21; and see on Eph_1:18; Krumm, de not. psych. P. p. 50; Delitzsch, Psychol, p. 248 f.; Hahn, Theol. d. N. T. I. p. 460) of the hearers. The impersonal μὴ ἀνακαλυπτόμ . of 2Co_3:14 induced the apostle very naturally and with logical suitableness, not to use again in the contrast of 2Co_3:15, with its emphatic stress laid on the point ἕως σήμερον , that historical image of the veil of Moses, but to express the conception generally of a veil hindering perception (lying on the heart). The same thing, therefore, is expressed in two forms of one figure; the first form gives the figure historically (the veil of Moses on the ἀνάγνωσις τ . παλ . διαθ .); the second form, apart from that historical reference, gives it as moulded by the apostle’s own vivid imagination (a veil upon the heart at the public reading). Fritzsche (comp. Al. Morus in Wolf) assumes that Paul imagines to himself two veils, one on the public reading of the Old Covenant, the other on the hearers’ own hearts, by which he wishes to mark the high degree of their inaptitude for perceiving. But, in order to be understood, and in keeping with a state of things so peculiar, he must have brought this out definitely and emphatically, and have at least written in 2Co_3:15 : Ἀλλʼ … Μωϋσῆς , καὶ ἐπὶ τὴν καρδίαν αὐτῶν κάλυμμα κεῖται .
ἡνίκα ] at the hour when, quando, after Hom. Od. 22:198 frequent in the classic writers, but in the N. T. only here and at 2Co_3:16. Often used in the Apocrypha and the LXX. also at Exo_34:34; and perhaps the word was suggested by the recollection of this passage.
On ἀναγινώσκ . Μωϋσ . comp. Act_15:21.