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2Co_6:11. Our mouth stands open towards you, Corinthians; our heart is enlarged.
τὸ στόμα ἡμῶν ἀνέῳγε ] This expression is in itself nothing further than a picturesque representation of the thought: to begin to speak, or to speak. See, especially, Fritzsche, Dissert. II. p. 97, and the remark on Mat_5:2. A qualitative definition may be added simply through the context, as is the case also here partly through the general character of the previous passage, 2Co_6:3-10, which is a very open, unreserved utterance, partly by means of the parallel ἡ καρδία ἡμῶν πεπλάτυνται . Thus in accordance with the context the opposite of reserve is here expressed. Comp. Chrysostom 1. Had Paul merely written λελαλήκαμεν ὑμῖν , the same thought would, in virtue of the context, have been implied in it (we have not been reserved, but have let ourselves be openly heard towards you); but the picturesque τὸ στόμα ἡμῶν ἀνέῳγε is better fitted to convey this meaning, and is therefore purposely chosen. Comp. Eze_33:22; Sir_22:22; Eph_6:19; Aeschylus, Prometh. 612. This at the same time in opposition to Fritzsche, who adheres to the simple haec ad vos locutus sum, as to which, we may remark, the haec is imported. Rückert (comp. Chrysostom 2) finds the sense to be: “see, I have begun to speak with you once, I have not concealed … from you my apostolic sentiments; I cannot yet close my mouth, I must speak with you yet further.” But the thought: I must speak with you yet further, is imported; how could the reader conjecture it from the simple perfect? Just as little is it to be assumed, with Hofmann, that Paul wishes only to state that he had not been reserved with what he had to say, so that this expression is only a resumption of the παρακαλοῦμεν μὴ εἰς κενὸν κ . τ . λ . in 2Co_6:1. Only in an arbitrary and violent manner can we reject the reference to 2Co_6:3-10, where such a luxuriance of holy grandiloquentia has issued from his mout.
ἀνέῳγα , in the sense of ἀνέῳγμαι , is frequent in later Greek (in Il. xvi. 221, ἀνέῳγεν is imperfect), and is rejected by Phrynichus as a solecism. See Lobeck, ad Phryn. p. 157 f.
Κορίνθιοι ] Regarding this particular form of address without article or adjective (it is otherwise in Gal_3:1) Chrysostom judges rightly: καὶ ἡ προσθήκη δὲ τοῦ ὀνόματος φιλίας πολλῆς καὶ διαθέσεως καὶ θερμότητος , καὶ γὰρ εἰώθαμεν τῶν ἀγαπωμένων συνεχῶς γυμνὰ τὰ ὀνόματα περιστρέφειν . Comp. Php_4:15. Bengel: “rara et praesentissima appellatio.”
ἡ καρδία ἡμῶν πεπλάτυνται ] cannot here mean either: I feel myself cheered and comforted (comp. Psa_119:32; Isa_60:5), as Luther, Estius, Kypke, Michaelis, Schleusner, Flatt, Bretschneider, Schrader, and others hold, or I have expressed myself frankly, made a clean breast (Semler, Schulz, Morus, Rosenmüller, de Wette, comp. Beza), because 2Co_6:12-13 are against both ways of taking it; but, with Chrysostom, Theodoret, Oecumenius, and the majority, it is to be taken as an expression of the love which, by being stirred up and felt, makes the heart wide, while by the want of love and by hate the heart is narrowed and contracted. The figurative expression needed no elucidation from the Hebrew, and least suitable of all is the comparison with Deu_11:16 (Hofmann), where the figurative meaning of éôúä is of quite another kind. See, however, the passages in Wetstein on 2Co_6:12.
The two parts of the verse stand side by side as parallels without a connective particle ( καί ), in order that thus the second thought, which outweighs the first, might come into more prominent relief,—a relation which is indicated by the emphatic prefixing of τὸ στόμα and ἡ καρδία . The meaning accordingly is: We have (2Co_6:3-10) spoken openly to you, Corinthians; our heart has therein become right wide in love towards you—which, however, may not be interpreted of readiness to receive the readers (Hofmann), for they are already in his heart (2Co_7:3; comp. Php_1:7). The relation of the two clauses is taken differently by Emmerling, who inserts a because between them, and by Fritzsche, who says: “quod vobis dixi ejusmodi est, ut inde me vos amare appareat.” But it may be urged against both that we are not justified in taking the two perfects as different in temporal import, the one as a real praeterite, and the other with the force of a present. In πεπλάτυνται it is rather implied that Paul has felt his love to the Corinthians strengthened, his heart towards them widened, during his writing of the passage 2Co_6:3-10 (by its contents)—a result, after such an outpouring, intelligible enough, psychologically true, and turned to account in order to move his readers.