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2Co_3:16. When, however, it shall have turned to the Lord, shall have come to believe on Christ, the veil, which lies on their heart (2Co_3:15), is taken away; i.e., when Moses is read before them, it will no longer remain unperceived by them that the Old Covenant ceases in Christ. The subject to ἐπιστρέψῃ is ἡ καρδία αὐτῶν , 2Co_3:15 (Luther in the gloss, Beza, Grotius, Bengel, and several others, including Billroth, Olshausen, de Wette, Hofmann), not ὁ Ἰσραήλ (Chrysostom, Theodoret, Theophylact, Pelagius, Erasmus, and many others, including Osiander), nor Μωϋσῆς (Calvin, Estius[173]), nor the general ΤΊς (Origen, Storr, Flatt).
The common supposition, that in 2Co_3:16 there is an allegorical reference to Moses, who, returning from the people to God, conversed unveiled with God (Exo_34:34), is in itself probable from the context, and is confirmed even by the choice of the words (Ex. l.c.: ἡνίκα δʼ ἂν εἰσεπορεύετο Μ . ἔναντι κυρίου … περιῃρεῖτο τὸ κάλυμμα ), though the same veil with which Moses was veiled ( ΤῸ ΑὐΤῸ ΚΆΛ ., 2Co_3:14) is no longer spoken of, but a veil on the hearts of the Jew.
ἩΝΊΚΑ with ἌΝ and the subjunctive aorist[174] denotes: then, when it shall have turned (Luther wrongly: when it turned itself), and that as something conceived, thought of, not as an unconditioned fact. The πρὸς κύριον , however, does not affirm: to God, who is now revealed in the Lord (Hofmann), but, in simple accordance with ἐν Χριστῷ of 2Co_3:15 : to Christ. The conversion of Israel which Paul has in view is, now that it is wholly relegated to the experience of the future, the conversion as a whole, Rom_11:25. It was, however, obvious of itself that what is affirmed finds its application to all individual cases which had already occurred and were still to be expecte.
περιαιρ . has the emphasis, both of its important position at the head of the clause (removed is the veil) and of the future realized as present. The passive is all the more to be retained, seeing that the subject of ἐπιστρ . is the heart; the sense of self-liberation (Hofmann) may not be imported on account of Exo_34:34. The conversion and deliverance of Israel is God’s work. See 2Co_3:17 and Rom_11:26 f. The compound corresponds to the conception of the veil covering the heart round about. Comp. Plato, Polit. p. 288 E: δέρματα σωμάτων περιαιροῦσα , Dem. 125,26: ΠΕΡΙΕῖΛΕ ΤᾺ ΤΕΊΧΗ , 802, 5 : ΠΕΡΙῌΡΗΤΑΙ ΤΟῪς ΣΤΕΦΆΝΟΥς , Jdt_10:3 : ΤῸΝ ΣΆΚΚΟΝ , Bar_4:34; Bar_6:58; Act_27:40.
[173] Calvin thinks that Moses is here tantamount in meaning to the law, and that the sense is: When the law is referred to Christ, when Christ is sought in the law by the Jews, then will the truth dawn upon them. Estius, who refers κύριον to God, says: “Moses conversus ad Dominmuatque retectam habens faciem, typum gessit populi Christiani ad Deum conversi et revelata cordis facie salutis mysteria contemplantis.”
[174] See Ellendt, Lex. Soph. I. p. 773.