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Eph_5:32. For the understanding of Eph_5:31 in the sense of the apostle an exegetical gloss was necessary, which is here given: This mystery is great, is important and exalted in its contents, but I say it, adduce it (namely, this mystery, by which is meant just the declaration of Gen_2:24), in reference to Christ and the church.
τὸ μυστήριον τοῦτο ] So Paul terms those Old Testament words just employed by him, in so far as they have a hidden meaning not recognised without divine enlightenment. With the Rabbins, too, the formula mysterium magnum (Jalkut. Rub. f. 59, Ephesians 4 : ãà øæà é÷éøà ) is very common. See Schoettgen, Horae, p. 783 f.
ἐγὼ δέ ] ἐγώ , which Holzhausen even declares to be superfluous, has emphasis: I, however ( δέ metabatic), opposed to the possible interpretations which might be given to the mysterious utterance.[289]
εἰς Χριστὸν καὶ εἰς τὴν ἐκκλησίαν ] so that we have thus under ἌΝΘΡΩΠΟς to understand Christ, and under ἡ γυνὴ αὐτοῦ the church. This has been rightly discerned already by the Fathers (see Chrysostom, Theodoret, Theophylact, Jerome), only they should not have thought of the coming of Christ in the flesh (in connection with which Jerome interpreted τὴν μητέρα of the heavenly Jerusalem; comp. Estius), but of the Parousia. See on Eph_5:31. Lastly, it is worthy of notice simply under a historical point of view, that Roman Catholics (but not Erasmus, Cajetanus, or Estius), on the ground of the Vulgate, which translates ΜΥΣΤΉΡΙΟΝ by sacramentum, proved from our passage[290] that marriage is a sacrament. It is not this that is conveyed in the passage, as indeed in general marriage “non habet a Christo institutionem sacramentalem, non formam, non materiam, non finem sacramentalem” (Calovius, and see the Apol. Conf. Aug. p. 202), but it is rather the sacredly ideal and deeply moral character, which is for ever assured to marriage by this typical significance in the Christian view. We may add that monogamy is presupposed as self-evident, but does not form the set purpose of the passage, which would be purely imported (in opposition to Schwegler, p. 387).
[289] Later Rabbinico-mystical interpretations of marriage may be seen in Schoettgen, Hor. p. 784. Philo, p. 1096, allegorizes those words in reference to reason, which forsakes wisdom and follows the senses.
[290] See also Catech. Rom_2:8; Rom_2:16 f.