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Eph_3:16. Ἵνα δῷ ] (see the critical remarks) introduces the design of the κάμπτω κ . τ . λ ., and therewith the contents of the prayer. Comp. on Eph_1:17.
κατὰ τὸ πλοῦτος τῆς δόξης αὐτοῦ ] i.e. in accordance with the fact that His glory is in so great fulness. Comp. on Eph_1:7. It may be referred either to δῷ ὑμῖν or to what follows. The former is the most natural; comp. Eph_1:17. According to His rich fulness in glory, God can and will bestow that which is prayed for. The δόξα , namely, embraces the whole glorious perfection of God, and can only with caprice be limited to the power (Grotius, Koppe, and others) or to the grace (Beza, Calvin, Zachariae, and others; comp. Matthies, Holzhausen, Olshausen).
δυνάμει κραταιωθῆναι ] instrumental dative: with power (which is instilled) to be strengthened; opposite of ἐκκακεῖν , Eph_3:13. That which effects this strengthening is the Holy Spirit ( διὰ τοῦ πνεύματος αὐτοῦ ). Comp. Rom_15:13. According to Harless, it is dative of the form (comp. ἰσχύειν τοῖς σώμασι , Xen. Mem. ii. 7. 7), so that the being strengthened in power is regarded as opposed to the being strengthened in knowledge, or the like. But to what end would Paul have added εἰς τὸν ἔσω ἄνθρ ., if he had meant such special strengthening? The strengthening is to concern the whole inner man; hence the reference to a single faculty of the mind (Olshausen refers δυνάμει primarily to the will) has no ground in the context. Others have explained it adverbially: in a powerful manner (Beza, Vater, Rückert, Matthies). See Bos, ed. Schaef. p. 743; Matthiae, p. 897. In this way δύναμις would be power, which is applied on the part of the strengthener. Comp. Xen. Cyr. i. 2. 2. But our interpretation better accords with the contrast of ἐκκακεῖν , which implies a want of power on the part of the readers.
εἰς τὸν ἔσω ἄνθρωπον ] εἰς , not for ἐν (Vulgate, Beza, and others), but in reference to the inner man, containing the more precise definition of the relation. See Kühner, II. § 557, note I. The inner man (not to be identified with the καινὸς ἄνθρωπος ) is the subject of the νοῦς , the rational and moral ego,—the essence of man which is conscious of itself as an ethical personality,—which is in harmony with the divine will (Rom_7:16; Rom_7:25); but in the case of the unregenerate is liable to fall under bondage to the power of sin in the flesh (Rom_7:23), and even in the case of the regenerate[186] needs constant renewing (Eph_4:23; Rom_12:2) and strengthening by the Spirit of God, whose seat of operation it is ( δυνάμει κραταιωθῆναι διὰ τοῦ πνεύματος ), in order not to be overcome by the sinful desire in the σάρξ , of which the ψυχή , the animal soul-nature, is the living principle (Gal_5:16 f.). The opposite is ὁ ἔξω ἄνθρωπος (2Co_4:16), i.e. the man as an outward phenomenon, constituted by the σῶμα τῆς σαρκός (Col_2:11), which, by reason of its psychical quality (1Co_15:44), is the seat of sin and death (Rom_6:6; Rom_7:18; Rom_7:24). The inner man in and by itself is—by virtue of the moral nature of its νοῦς , as the Ego exerting the moral will, and assenting to the divine law (Rom_7:20; Rom_7:22)—directed to the good, yet without the renewing and strengthening by the Holy Spirit too weak for accomplishing, in opposition to the sinful principle in the σάρξ , the good which is perceived, felt, and willed by it (Rom_7:15-23). We may add, it is all the less an “absurd assertion” (Harless), that the conceptions ὁ ἔσω and ὁ ἔξω ἄνθρωπος are derived from Plato’s philosophy (see the passages from Plato, Plotinus, and Philo, in Wetstein, and Fritzsche on Rom_7:22), inasmuch as for the apostle also the νοῦς in itself is the moral faculty of thinking and willing in man; inasmuch, further, as the Platonic dichotomy of the human soul-life into πνεῦμα ( νοῦς ) and ψυχή is found also in Paul (1Th_5:23; comp. Heb_4:12), and inasmuch as the Platonic expressions had become popular (comp. also 1Pe_3:4), so that with the apostle the Platonism of that mode of conception and expression by no means needed to be a conscious one, or to imply an acquaintance with the Platonic philosophy as such.
[186] It must be decided exclusively by the connection on each occasion, whether (as here and 2Co_4:16; comp. 1Pe_3:4) the inner man of the regenerate is intended, or that of the unregenerate (Rom_7:22). The man is regenerate, however (in opposition to the evasive view in Delitzsch, Psych. p. 380 f.), only of water and the Spirit (Tit_3:5).