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Php_2:27. Confirmation of that ἠκούσατε , ὅτι ἠσθ .
καὶ γὰρ κ . τ . λ .] for he has also (really, see Hartung, Partikell. I. p. 132; Baeumlein, p. 150) been sick.
παραπλ . θανάτῳ ] adds the specification of the mode: in a way almost equivalent to death. There is neither an ellipsis (de Wette: ἀφίκετο or some such word is to be understood before παραπλ .; comp. van Hengel) nor a solecism (van Hengel); παραπλ . is adverbial (equivalent to παραπλησίως , see Polyb. iv. 40. 10, iii. 33. 17; Lucian, Cyn. 17; comp. παραπλησιαίτερον , Plat. Polit. p. 275 C), and the dativus congruentiae (instead of which the genitive might also have been used, Bernhardy, p. 148) is governed by it.
λύπην ἐπὶ λύπην ] grief upon grief (superadded). LXX. Ezr_7:26; Psa_68:28; Isa_28:10. Comp. expressions with the dative (as Sir_26:15) in classic Greek, e.g. ὄγχνη ἐπὶ ὄγχνῃ (Hom. Od. vii. 120), ἐσλὰ ἐπʼ ἐσλοῖς (Pind. Ol. viii. 84), φόνος ἐπὶ φόνῳ (Eur. Iph. T. 197); Polyb. i. 57. 1. See also Eur. Hec. 586: λύπη τις ἄλλη διάδοχος κακῶν κακοῖς , Soph. El. 235: ἄταν ἄταις , Eur. Troad. 175: ἐπʼ ἄλγεσι δʼ ἀλγυνθῶ . The first λύπην refers to the dreaded death of his friend; the second, to the apostle’s affliction over the painful position in which he found himself, as a prisoner, and also through the doings of the adversaries (Php_2:20 f., Php_1:15; Php_1:17; Php_1:30), not over the sickness of Epaphroditus (Chrysostom, Oecumenius, Theophylact, Erasmus, Estius, and others, also Weiss), to which would be added that for his death. Ἀλυπότερος in Php_2:28 is fatal to the latter view, for it appears that, even after Epaphr. had been sent away, a λύπη still remained, which, therefore, could not be referred to the latter’s sickness. Van Hengel errs in understanding the affliction as pain concerning this sickness, and the first λύπην as “cogitatio anxietatis vestrae.” See, in opposition, on Php_2:28. Calvin’s remark suffices to justify the double λύπη : “Non jactat Stoicorum ἀπάθειαν , quasi ferreus esset et immunis ab humanis affectibus.” Comp. Joh_11:35 f.
σχῶ ] not optative. See Winer, p. 270 [E. T. p. 359].