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2Co_5:11. Οὖν ] in pursuance of what has just been said, that we all before the judgment-seat of Christ, etc., 2Co_5:10.
τ . φόβον τ . κυρίου ] The genitive is not genitivus subjecti (equivalent to τὸ φοβερὸν τ . κυρ .), as Emmerling, Flatt, Billroth, Osiander, and others hold, following Chrysostom and most of the older commentators (comp. Lobeck, Paralip. p. 513; Klausen, ad Aesch. Choeph. 31); for the use of the expression with the genitive taken objectively is the standing and habitual one in the LXX., the Apocrypha, and the N. T., according to the analogy of éÀäÉåÈä éÄøÀàÇú (2Co_7:1; Eph_5:21; comp. Act_9:31; Rom_3:18); and the context does not warrant us in departing from this. Hence: since we know accordingly the fear of Christ (as judge); since holy awe before Him is by no means to us a strange and unknown feeling, but, on the contrary, we know how much and in what way He is to be feared. The Vulgate renders rightly: timorem Domini; Beza wrongly: “terrorem illum Domini, i.e. formidabile illud judicium.”
ἀνθρώπους πείθομεν ] we persuade men, but God we do not need to persuade, like men; to Him we are manifest. The ἀνθρ . πειθ . has been interpreted of the gaining over to Christianity (Beza, Grotius, Er. Schmid, Calovius, Emmerling, and others); or of the apostolic working in general (Ewald); or of the correction of erroneous and offensive opinions regarding Paul (Chrysostom, Theodoret, Theophylact); or of the striving to make themselves pleasing to men (Erasmus, Luther, Elsner, Wolf, Hammond, Flatt, and others);[221] or of the persuadere hominibus nostram integritatem (Estius, Bengel, Semler, Olshausen, de Wette, Osiander, Neander). Billroth also, with quite arbitrary importation of the idea, thinks that πείθομεν is meant of illegitimate, deceitful persuasion: “I can indeed deceive men, but to God withal I am manifest.” Raphel takes it similarly, but with an interrogative turn. But this assumed meaning of πείθω must of necessity have been given by the context (which is not the case even in Gal_4:10); and the idea of being able would in this view of the meaning be so essential, that it could not be conveyed in the mere indicative, which, on the contrary, expresses the actually existing state of things, as well as the following πεφανερ . Olshausen erroneously attempts to correct this explanation to the effect of our understanding the expression in reference to the accusations of the opponents: “As our opponents say, we deceitfully persuade men, but before God we are manifest in our purity.” The “as our opponents say” is as arbitrarily invented,[222] as is the conception of deceit in πείθομεν . In defining the object of πείθομεν , the only course warranted by the context is to go back to the immediately preceding self-witness in 2Co_5:9, φιλοτιμ . εὐάρεστοι αὐτῷ εἶναι . Of this we bring men to the conviction through our teaching and working, not: of the fact, that we fear the Lord (Zachariae, Rückert), since εἰδότες τ . φόβ . τ . κυρ . is only of the nature of a motive and a subsidiary thought; hence also not: “eundem hunc timorem hominibus suademus” (Cornelius a Lapide, Clericus, and others). Comp. Pelagius: “ut caveant;” and again Hofmann: we convince others of the duty and the right mode of fearing the Lord. After ἀνθρώπους there is no omission of μέν (Rückert); but the putting of the clause ἀνθρ . πείθ . without indicating its relation makes the following contrast appear surprising and thereby rhetorically more emphati.
ἐν ταῖς συνειδ . ὑμῶν ] Calvin aptly says: “Conscientia enim longius penetrat, quam carnis judicium.” In the syllogism of the conscience (law of God—act of man—moral judgment on the same) the action of a third party is here the minor premiss. The individualizing plural of συνείδ . is not elsewhere found; yet comp. 2Co_4:2.
πεφανερῶσθαι ] The perfect infinitive after ἐλπίζω , which elsewhere in the N. T. has only the aorist infinitive coupled with it, is here logically necessary in the connection. For Paul hopes, i.e. holds the opinion under the hope of its being confirmed, that he has become and is manifest in the conscience of the readers (present of the completed action). Comp. Hom. Il. xv. 110: ἢδη γὰρ νῦν ἔλπομʼ Ἄρηΐ γε πῆμα τετύχθαι , Od. vi. 297; Eurip. Suppl. 790.
[221] Luther: “We deal softly with the people, i.e. we do not tyrannize over nor drive the people with excommunications and other wanton injunctions, for we fear God; but we teach them gently, so that we disgust no one.”
[222] It is different with ἐξέστημεν , ver. 13, where the literal sense in itself points to an accusation of the opponents; but this is not the case with πείθομεν .