Online Resource Library
Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.com | DownloadHeinrich Meyer Commentary - Colossians 1:6 - 1:6
(Show All Books | Show All Chapters)
This Chapter Verse Commentaries:
Col_1:6. In what he had just said, ἣν προηκούσατε … εὐαγγελίου , Paul now desires to make his readers sensible of the great and blessed fellowship in which, through the gospel, they are placed, in order that they may by this very consciousness feel themselves aroused to faithfulness towards the gospel, in presence of the heretical influences; ἐπειδὴ μάλιστα οἱ πολλοὶ ἐκ τοῦ κοινωνοὺς ἔχειν πολλοὺς τῶν δογμάτων στηρίζονται , Chrysostom. Comp. Oecumenius: προθυμοτέρους αὐτοὺς περὶ τὴν πίστιν ποιεῖ ἐκ τοῦ ἔχειν πάντας κοινωνούς .
εἰς ὑμᾶς ] not ἐν ὑμῖν , because the conception of the previous arrival predominates; 1Ma_11:63. Often so with παρεῖναι in classical authors (Herod. i. 9, vi. 24, viii. 60; Polyb. xviii. 1.1; comp. Act_12:20). See Bornemann and Kühner, ad Xen. Anab. i. 2. 2; Bremi, ad Aeschin. p. 320; and generally, Nägelsbach, z. Ilias, p. 158 f., ed. 3. Observe, moreover, the emphasis of τοῦ παρόντος : it is there! it has not remained away; and to the presence is then added the bearing fruit.
καθὼς καὶ ἐν παντὶ τ . κόσμῳ ] A popular hyperbole. Comp. Rom_1:8; Act_17:6, and see Col_1:23. The expression is neither arbitrarily to be restricted, nor to be used against the genuineness of the Epistle (Hilgenfeld), nor yet to be rationalized by “as regards the idea” (Baumgarten-Crusius) and the like; although, certainly, the idea of the catholicity of Christianity is expressed in the passage (comp. Rom_10:18; Mar_14:9; Mar_16:15; Mat_24:14).
καὶ ἔστι καρποφ . κ . τ . λ .] Instead of continuing: καὶ καρποφορουμένου κ . τ . λ ., Paul carries onward the discourse with the finite verb, and thus causes this element to stand out more independently and forcibly:[14] “and it is fruit-bearing and growing” (see Maetzner, ad Lycurg. Leocr. p. 108; Heindorf, ad Plat. Soph. p. 222 B; Winer, p. 533 [E. T. 717]), by which is indicated the fact, that the gospel, wherever it is present, is also in course of living dynamical development, and this state of development is expressed by ἔστι with the participle. This general proposition based on experience: καὶ ἔστι καρποφ . κ . αὐξαν ., is then by ΚΑΘῺς Κ . ἘΝ ὙΜῖΝ confirmed through the experience found also among the readers; so that Paul’s view passes, in the first clause ( τοῦ παρόντος … κόσμῳ ), from the special to the general aspect, and in the second, from the general to the special. With ΚΑΡΠΟΦΟΡ . (not occurring elsewhere in the middle) is depicted the blissful working in the inward and outward life (comp. Gal_5:22; Eph_5:9); and with αὐξανόμ . the continuous diffusion, whereby the gospel is obtaining more and more adherents and local extension. Comp. Theodoret: καρποφορίαν τοῦ εὐαγγ . κέκληκε τὴν ἐπαινουμένην πολιτείαν · αὔξησιν δὲ τῶν πιστευόντων τὸ πλῆθος . Huther and de Wette groundlessly refrain from deciding whether ΑὐΞ . is intended to refer to the outward growth or to the inward (so Steiger), or to both. See Act_6:7; Act_12:24; Act_19:20. Comp. Luk_13:19; Mat_13:32. The μᾶλλον στηρίζεσθαι , which Chrysostom finds included in αὐξ ., is not denoted, but presupposed by the latter. Comp. Theophylact. The figure is taken from a tree, in which the καρποφορία does not exclude the continuance of growth (not so in the case of cereals).
ἈΦʼ Ἧς ἩΜΈΡ . Κ . Τ . Λ .] since the first beginning of your conversion which so happily took place (through true knowledge of the grace of God), that development of the gospel proceeds among you; how could ye now withdraw from it by joining yourselves to false teachers?
ΤῊΝ ΧΆΡΙΝ ΤΟῦ ΘΕΟῦ ] contents of the gospel, which they have heard; the object of ἠκούσ . is the gospel, and Τ . ΧΆΡΙΝ Τ . ΘΕΟῦ belongs to ἘΠΈΓΝΩΤΕ ; and by ἘΝ ἈΛΗΘΕΊᾼ (2Co_7:14), equivalent to ἈΛΗΘῶς (Joh_17:8), the qualitative character of this knowledge is affirmed: it was a true knowledge, corresponding to the nature of the χάρις , without Judaistic and other errors. Comp. on Joh_17:19. Holtzmann hears in ἠκούσατε … ἀληθῶς “the first tones of the foreign theme,” which is then in Col_1:9-10 more fully entered upon. But how conceivable and natural is it, that at the very outset the danger which threatens the right knowledge of the readers should be present to his mind!
[14] If καί is not genuine, as Bleek, Hofmann, and others consider (see the critical remarks), the passage is to be translated: as it also in the whole world is fruit-hearing, by which Paul would say that the gospel is present among the readers in the same fruit-bearing quality which it developes on all sides. But in that case the following καθὼς καὶ ἐν ὑμῖν would necessarily appear as very superfluous. No doubt we might, after the preceding παρόντος , take the ἐστί , with F. Nitzsch, as equivalent to πάρεστι (see Stallb. ad Plat. Phaed. p. 59 B); and to this comes also the punctuation in Tisch. 8, who puts a comma after ἐστίν . But how utterly superfluous would this ἐστί then be!