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2Co_5:2. Confirmation of the certainty expressed in 2Co_5:1, not an explanation why he should precisely mention the fact that he has such comfort in the prospect of death (Hofmann)—as if, instead of οἴδαμεν , λέγομεν or some similar verbum, declarandi had precede.
καὶ γάρ ] does not here any more than elsewhere mean merely for (see, on the other hand, Hartung, Partikell. I. p. 138), but it means for also, so that καί is connected with ἐν τούτῳ . Previously, namely, the case was supposed: ἐὰν … καταλυθῇ ; to which this καὶ γὰρ ἐν τούτῳ now corresponds, so that the train of thought is: “we know that, in case our present body shall have one day been destroyed, we have a body in heaven; for if this were not so, we should not already in the present body be sighing after the being clothed upon with the heavenly.”[208] This longing is an inward assurance of the fact that, if our earthly house, et.
καὶ γὰρ ἐν τούτῳ ] The emphasis is on ἐν : for also in this. Not merely perhaps after the κατάλυσις supposed as possible (2Co_5:1) shall we long for the heavenly body, but already now, while we are not yet out of the earthly body but are still in it, we are sighing to be clothed upon with the heavenly. This is proved to be the right interpretation by the parallel in 2Co_5:4, where our ἐν is represented by οἱ ὄντες ἐν . On καί , also, in the sense of already or already also, see Hartung, l.c. p. 135; Stallbaum, ad Plat. Gorg. p. 467 B; Fritzsche, ad Lucian. p. 5 ff. With τούτῳ , according to the supposition of Grotius and others, including Fritzsche and Schrader, σώματι is to be mentally supplied, so that, as is often the case in the classic writers, the pronoun is referred to a word which was contained only as regards the sense in what preceded. See Fritzsche, Diss. I. p. 47; Hermann, ad Viger. p. 714; Seidler, ad Eur. El. 582. Rückert wrongly thinks that Paul in that case must have written ἐν αὐτῷ . This prevalent phenomenon of language applies, in fact, equally in the case of all demonstrative and relative pronouns; see the passages in Matthiae, p. 978 f. Seeing, however, that the following τὸ οἰκητήριον ἡμ . τὸ ἐξ οὐρανοῦ proves that Paul also, in ἐν τούτῳ , was regarding the body under the figure of a dwelling, and seeing that he himself in 2Co_5:4 has expressly written τῷ σκήνει instead of τούτῳ , the supplying of τῷ σκήνει is to be preferred (so Beza and others, including Olshausen, Osiander, Neander, Ewald[209]). Others take ἐν τούτῳ as propterea (see on Joh_16:20; Act_24:16), and refer it partly to what was said in 2Co_5:1, as Hofmann: “on account of the death in prospect” (comp. Estius, Flatt, Lechler, p. 138), or Delitzsch, p 436: “in such position of the case;” partly to what follows, which would be the epexegesis of it (Erasmus, Usteri, Billroth, the latter with hesitation). So also Rückert: in this respect. But the parallel of 2Co_5:4 is decidedly against all these views, even apart from the fact that that over which we sigh is in Greek given by ἐπί with the dative or by the accusative, and hence Hofmann’s view in particular would have required ἐπὶ τούτῳ or τοῦτο .
τὸ οἰκητήριον … ἐπιποθοῦντες contains the reason of the sighing: because we long for, etc. Paul himself gives further particulars in 2Co_5:4. Hofmann wrongly thinks that Paul explains his sighing from the fact, that his longing applies to that clothing upon, instead of which death sets in. The latter point is purely imported in consequence of his erroneous explanation of ἐν τούτῳ . It is the sighing of the longing to experience the last change by means of the being clothed upon with the future body. This longing to be clothed upon with the heavenly body (not, as Bengel and many of the older expositors would have it: with the glory of the transfigured soul, to which view Hofmann also comes in the end, since he thinks of the eternal light in which God dwells and Christ with Him lives) extorts the sighs. Against the reference of ἐπενδύσ . to an organ of the intermediate state, see on 2Co_5:3, Remark. According to Fritzsche, the participle is only a continuation of the discourse by attaching another thought: “in hoc corpore male nos habentes suspiramus et coeleste superinduere gestimus.” But in that case no logical reference would be furnished for καί ; besides, it seems unwarrantable to supply male nos habentes, since Paul himself has added quite another participle; and in general, wherever the participle seems only to continue the discourse, there exists such a relation of the participle to the verb, as forms logically a basis for the participial connection. Comp. Eph_5:16. According to Schneckenburger, στενάζομεν ἐπιποθοῦντες stands for ἐπιποθοῦμεν στενάζοντες , so that the chief fact is expressed by the participle (Nägelsbach on the Iliad, pp. 234, 280, ed. 3; Seidler, ad Eur. Iph. T. 1411; Matthiae, p. 1295 f.). An arbitrary suggestion, against the usage of the N. T., which is different even in the passages quoted by Buttmann, neut. Gr. p. 275 [E. T. 320], and to be rejected also on account of 2Co_5:4, στενάζομεν βαρούμ .
The distinction between οἰκία and οἰκητήριον is rightly noted by Bengel: “ οἰκία est quiddam magis absolutum, οἰκητήριον respicit incolam,” house—habitation (Jud_1:6; Eur. Or. 1114; Plut. Mor. p. 602 D; 2Ma_11:2-3; 2Ma_2:15).
τὸ ἐξ οὐρανοῦ ] that which proceeds from heaven; for it is ἐκ θεοῦ , 2Co_5:1. God furnishes from heaven the resurrection-body (1Co_15:38) through Christ (Php_3:21), in the case of the dead, by means of raising, in the case of the living, by means of transforming (1Co_15:51). The latter is what is thought of in the present passag.
ἐπενδύσασθαι ] With this Paul passes to another but kindred figure, namely, that of a robe, as also among the Rabbins (Schoettgen, Hor. p. 693) and the Neo-Platonists (Gataker, ad Anton. p. 351; Bos, Exercit. p. 60; Schneckenburger, Beitr. p. 127) the body is frequently represented as the robe of the soul. See also Jacobs, ad Anthol. XII. p. 239. But he does not simply say ἐνδύσασθαι , but ἐπενδύσασθαι , to put on over (which is not to be taken with Schneckenburger of the succession; see, on the contrary, Plut. Pelop. 11 : ἐσθῆτας ἐπενδεδυμένοι γυναικείας τοῖς θώραξι , Herod. i 195: ἐπὶ τοῦτον ἄλλον εἰρίνεον κιθῶνα ἐπενδύνει ), because the longing under discussion is directed to the living to see the Parousia and the becoming transformed alive. This transformation in the living body, however, is in so far an ἐπενδύσασθαι , as this denotes the acquisition of a new body with negation of the previous death (the ἐκδύσασθαι ). This is not at variance with 1Co_15:53, where the simple ἐνδύσασθαι is used of the same transformation; for in that passage τὸ φθαρτὸν τοῦτο is the subject which puts on, and, consequently, τὸ φθαρτὸν τοῦτο ἐνδύεται is quite equivalent to ἐπενδυόμεθα , because in the latter case, as at the present passage, the self-conscious Ego[210] is the subject.
Regarding ἐπιποθεῖν , in which ἐπί does not make the meaning stronger (ardenter cupere), as it is usually taken, but only indicates the direction of the longing ( πόθον ἔχειν ἐπί τι ), see Fritzsche, ad Rom. I. p. 30 f.
[208] If that οἰκοδομὴν ἐκ θεοῦ ἔχομεν were not correct, it would be absurd, instead of being contented with the earthly habitation, to be longing already in it after being clothed upon with the heavenly habitation. Quite similar is the argument in Rom_8:22.
[209] See also Klöpper in the Jahrb. für deutsche Theol. 1862, p. 13.
[210] The inward man. He is put on with the earthly body, and sighs full of longing to put on over it the heavenly body.