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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.com | DownloadCambridge Greek Testament for Schools and Colleges - Ephesians 5:8 - 5:8
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8. ἦτε γάρ ποτε σκότος. St Paul has come back now to the broad contrast between the New and the Old with which he started in Eph 4:17. Just as he contrasted their present with their former position in point of spiritual privilege (Eph 2:12), so here he points the contrast from the side of moral responsibility. The figure that he employs is that of light and darkness. It is a figure of frequent occurrence in Isaiah, especially in the later chapters, where the world both Jewish and Gentile is described as lying in darkness, and Jehovah (Isa 60:19) and the Servant (Isa 42:6, Isa 49:6) and Zion (Isa 60:2) are in various ways sources of light. The figure had passed into general currency, the Pharisees regarding themselves as in a special sense called to be the light of those in darkness (Rom 2:19). Hence the bitter irony of our Lord’s description of them as ‘blind guides’ and His warning Mat 6:23; Luk 11:35. At the same time He claims the figure of light for Himself (Joh 8:12; Joh 9:5; Joh 12:46), and for His disciples (Mat 5:14), and describes the condition of men apart from Him as darkness (Joh 12:35; Joh 12:46) and the force opposed to Him as ‘the power of the darkness’ (Luk 22:53). In the same way the figures are applied in direct dependence on Isaiah in Luk 1:79; Luk 2:32; Mat 4:16. The figure is first found in connexion with St Paul at the critical moment in the evangelization of Antioch in Pisidia, Act 13:47, where Isa 49:6 is boldly claimed as supplying decisive guidance to Paul and Barnabas in turning to the Gentiles. How fundamental the thought was in St Paul’s conception of his office is clear from Act 26:18. From this point of view he speaks of the world apart from Christ as ‘this darkness’ (Eph 6:12, cf. 2Co 6:14). The men belonging to it are ‘darkened in mind’ (Eph 4:18), blinded by the god of this world (2Co 4:4), and do the works of darkness (Rom 13:12; Eph 5:11). For this darkness is a dominion (Col 1:13; cf. Act 26:18) and spiritual powers of evil exercise authority within it (Eph 6:12). The deliverance effected by the Gospel is a transference of men to a new allegiance in the kingdom of the Son of His Love, which is another name for the inheritance of the Saints in light. It is the work of God Himself (Col 1:13) and is strictly parallel to the original creation of light out of (physical) darkness (2Co 4:6). It is effected as God Himself shines in our hearts to enable us to see His Glory in the face of Christ. The result is a moral transformation. Christians become sons of light (1Th 5:5; cf. Joh 12:36). They put on the armour of light (Rom 13:12). They become themselves luminaries, spreading light and life in the world (Php 2:15; cf. Mat 5:14). Bearing these passages in mind the sequence of thought here can be followed without difficulty.
νῦν δὲ φῶς ἐν κυρίῳ. In union with and in loving obedience to their Lord they had become luminous. Cf. Mat 5:14; Joh 8:12; Rev 21:11.
ὡς τέκνα φωτὸς περιπατεῖτε. Cf. Luk 16:8; Joh 12:36; 1Th 5:5 and note on Eph 2:3. They were moulded and transformed by the light that shines from Him into its own likeness, and the consequence must be seen in their daily life.
περιπατεῖτε. This picks up Eph 4:17, Eph 5:2 and is picked up in Eph 5:15. Joh 12:35 supplies an interesting parallel emphasizing as Joh 9:4, Joh 11:9 the fact that the possession of the light is a call to work.