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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.com | DownloadCambridge Greek Testament for Schools and Colleges - Philippians 1:6 - 1:6
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This Chapter Verse Commentaries:
6. πεποιθὼς. “Feeling confident.” The word sometimes denotes reliance, on sure grounds, expressed or not (so e.g. Mat 27:43; 2Co 1:9; below, Php 2:24, Php 3:3-4); sometimes a more arbitrary assurance (Rom 2:19); in every case, a feeling of personal certainty. This expression of “confidence” about their future is perhaps occasioned by the words just previous, about their preserving consistency “until now.”
αὐτὸ τοῦτο. A characteristic Pauline expression; the firm touch of an intent mind. See e.g. Rom 9:17; Rom 13:6; 2Co 2:3; 2Co 5:5; Gal 2:10; Eph 6:18; Col 4:8. Elsewhere in N. T. it appears only in 2Pe 1:5, in a disputed reading.
ὁ ἐναρξάμενος. We may perhaps render, “He who did inaugurate.” Ἐνάρχεσθαι in Greek of the golden age (e.g. Eurip., I. A. 435) habitually means the solemn opening of the sacrificial ritual, the taking the barley from the basket. And in the Apocrypha it seems to tend on occasion to a certain solemnity; e.g. Sir 38:16, τέκνον, ἐπὶ νεκρῷ … ὡς δεινὰ πάσχων ἔναρξαι θρήνου. But there are cases enough to justify the simpler rendering “He who did begin,” if it is otherwise preferred.—The aorist participle points of course to the biographical crisis of their evangelization and conversion, when the Giver of grace made His message effectual in them. Cp. Gal 3:3, ἐναρξάμενοι πνεύματι νῦν σαρκὶ ἐπιτελεῖσθε; There the crisis of conversion is viewed from the convert’s side.
ἔργον ἀγαθὸν. We may perhaps render “the good work”; so plainly is “the work of works” in view, defined by its own greatness.
ἐπιτελέσει, “Will complete it.” The verb, like ἐνάρχεσθαι, has occasionally a religious solemnity of meaning; e.g. Hdt. ii. 63, θυσίας ἐπιτελέουσι. But Biblical Greek usage hardly warrants our pressing such a meaning here. Cp. again Gal 3:3 : “are ye now being completed, ἐπιτελεῖσθε, by the flesh?”—The thought here is that of Psa 138:8, where it appears as the individual believer’s personal assurance. (Aquila and Symmachus there have ἐπιτελέσει.)
ἄχρις ἡμέρας Χ. Ἰ. I.e., the process issuing in “completion” will go on till then, and be then summed up. “The day” is the goal, because not till then will the whole being of the Christian, body (Rom 8:23) as well as spirit, be fully “redeemed” from the results of sin. The mention of “the day” is thus equally in point, whether or not the Lord should be coming soon. In either case it, and no previous date, is the point of “completion.”—“The day” is mentioned below, Php 1:10, Php 2:16, and altogether, in St Paul, about twenty times. The Lord uses the word of His own Return, Mat 7:22, and in some fourteen other places in the Gospels, including Joh 6:39-40; Joh 6:44; Joh 6:55.