Let no one rob you of your prize by self-abasement and worshiping of the angels, dwelling in the things which he has not seen, vainly puffed up by his fleshly mind, and not holding firmly to the Head, from whom all the body, being supplied and knit together through the joints and ligaments, grows with God’s growth.
If you died with Christ from the elements of the world, why, as though living in the world, do you subject yourselves to ordinances, “Don’t handle, nor taste, nor touch” (all of which perish with use), according to the precepts and doctrines of men? These things indeed appear like wisdom in self-imposed worship, humility, and severity to the body; but aren’t of any value against the indulgence of the flesh.
John Calvin 1540 · Public Domain On vv18–23 18. Let no one take from you the palm.…
18. Let no one take from you the palm. He alludes to runners, or wrestlers, to whom the palm was assigned, on condition of their not giving way in the middle of the course, or after the contest had been commenced. He admonishes them, therefore, that the false apostles aimed at nothing else than to snatch away from them the palm, inasmuch as they draw them aside from the rectitude of their course. Hence it follows that they must be shunned as the most injurious pests. The passage is also carefully to be marked as intimating, that all those who draw us aside from the simplicity of Christ cheat us out of the prize of our high calling. (Philippians 3:14.)
Desirous in humility. Something must be understood; hence I have, inserted in the text id facere, (to do it.) For he points out the kind of danger which they required to guard against. All are desirous to defraud you of the palm, who, under the pretext of humility, recommend to you the worship of angels. For their object is, that you may wander out of the way, leaving the one object of aim. I read humility and worship of angels conjointly, for the one follows the other, just as at this day the Papists make use of the same pretext when philosophizing as to the worship of saints. For they reason on the ground of man’s abasement, that we must, therefore, seek for mediators to help us. But for this very reason has Christ humbled himself — that we might directly betake ourselves to him, however miserable sinners we may be.
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I am aware that the worship of angels is by many interpreted otherwise, as meaning such as has been delivered to men by angels; for the Devil has always endeavored to set off his impostures under this title. The Pope at this day boasts, that all the trifles with which he has adulterated the pure worship of God are revelations. In like manner the Theurgians of old alleged that all the superstitions that they contrived were delivered over to them by angels, as if from hand to hand. They, accordingly, think that Paul here condemns all fanciful kinds of worship that are falsely set forth under the authority of angels. But, in my opinion, he rather condemns the contrivance as to the worshipping of angels. It is on this account that he has so carefully applied himself to this in the very commencement of the Epistle, to bring angels under subjection, lest they should obscure the splendor of Christ. In fine, as he had in the first chapter prepared the way for abolishing the ceremonies, so he had also for the removal of all other hinderances which draw us away from Christ alone. In this class is the worship of angels
Superstitious persons have from the beginning worshipped angels, that through means of them there might be free access to God. The Platonists infected the Christian Church also with this error. For although Augustine sharply inveighs against them in his tenth book “On the City of God,” and condemns at great length all their disputations as to the worship of angels, we see nevertheless what has happened. Should any one compare the writings of Plato with Popish theology, he will find that they have drawn wholly from Plato their prattling as to the worship of angels. The sum is this, that we must honor angels, whom Plato calls demons, χάριν τὢς εὐφήμου διαπορείας (for the sake of their auspicious intercession.) He brings forward this sentiment in Epinomis, and he confirms it in Cratylus, and many other passages. In what respect do the Papists differ at all from this? “But,” it will be said, “they do not deny that the Son of God is Mediator.” Neither did those with whom Paul contends; but as they imagined that God must be approached by the assistance of the angels, and that, consequently, some worship must be rendered to them, so they placed angels in the seat of Christ, and honored them with Christ’s office. Let us know, then, that Paul here condemns all kinds of worship of human contrivance, which are rendered either to angels or to the dead, as though they were mediators, rendering assistance after Christ, or along with Christ. For just so far do we recede from Christ, when we transfer the smallest part of what belongs to him to any others, whether they be angels or men.
Intruding into those things which he hath not seen. The verb ἐμβατεύειν, the participle of which Paul here makes use of, has various significations. The rendering which Erasmus, after Jerome, has given to it, walking proudly, would not suit ill, were there an example of such a signification in any author of sufficient note. For we see every day with how much confidence and pride rash persons pronounce an opinion as to things unknown. Nay, even in the very subject of which Paul treats, there is a remarkable illustration. For when the Sorbonnic divines put forth their trifles respecting the intercession of saints or angels, they declare, as though it were from an oracle, that the dead know and behold our necessities, inasmuch as they see all things in the reflex light of God. And yet, what is less certain? Nay more, what is more obscure and doubtful? But such, truly, is their magisterial freedom, that they fearlessly and daringly assert what is not only not known by them, but cannot be known by men.
This meaning, therefore, would be suitable, if that signification of the term were usual. It is, however, among the Greeks taken simply as meaning to walk. It also sometimes means to inquire. Should any one choose to understand it thus in this passage, Paul will, in that case, reprove a foolish curiosity in the investigation of things that are obscure, and such as are even hid from our view and transcend it. It appears to me, however, that I have caught Paul’s meaning, and have rendered it faithfully in this manner — intruding into those things which he hath not seen. For that is the common signification of the word ἐμβατεύειν — to enter upon an inheritance, or to take possession, or to set foot anywhere. Accordingly, Budaeus renders this passage thus: — “Setting foot upon, or entering on the possession of those things which he has not seen.” I have followed his authority, but have selected a more suitable term. For such persons in reality break through and intrude into secret things, of which God would have no discovery as yet made to us. The passage ought to be carefully observed, for the purpose of reproving the rashness of those who inquire farther than is allowable.
Puffed up in vain by a fleshly mind. He employs the expression fleshly mind to denote the perspicuity of the human intellect, however great it may be. For he places it in contrast with that spiritual wisdom which is revealed to us from heaven in accordance with that statement —
Flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee. (Matthew 16:17.)
Whoever; therefore, depends upon his own reason, inasmuch as the acuteness of the flesh is wholly at work in him, Paul declares him to be puffed up in vain. And truly all the wisdom that men have from themselves is mere wind: hence there is nothing solid except in the word of God and the illumination of the Spirit. And observe, that those are said to be puffed up who insinuate themselves under a show of humility. For it happens, as Augustine elegantly writes to Paulinus, by wonderful means, as to the soul of man, that it is more puffed up from a false humility than if it were openly proud.
John Calvin's Commentaries (1540-1563) — public domain. Text from the Calvin Translation Society English edition (1840s-50s) via the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (ccel.org). Calvin's coverage is partial (roughly two-thirds of the Bible); uncommented books and verses are honest gaps, never fabricated. The 19th-century editor's footnotes and remarks are omitted so the notes are faithfully Calvin's own voice.
Geneva Bible translators 1599 · Public Domain On vv18–23 He disputeth against the first kind of corruptions, and…
He disputeth against the first kind of corruptions, and setteth down the worshipping of Angels for an example: which kind of false religion he confuteth, first this way: because that they which being in such a worship, attribute that unto themselves which is proper only to God, to wit, authority to bind men’s consciences with religion, although they seem to bring in these things by humbleness of mind.
By a foolish humbleness of mind: for otherwise humbleness is a virtue. For these Angel worshippers blamed such of pride, as would go straight to God, and use no other under means besides Christ.
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Secondly, because they rashly thrust upon them for oracles, those things which they neither saw nor heard, but devised of themselves.
Thirdly, because these things have no other ground, whereupon they are built, but only the opinion of men, which please themselves without all measure in their own duties.
Without reason.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain On vv18–23 18 Let no man beguile you of your reward…
18 Let no man beguile you of your reward in a voluntary humility and worshipping of angels, intruding into those things which he hath not seen, vainly puffed up by his fleshly mind,
Ver. 18. Let no man beguile you] Gr. βραβευετω, brave it over you. Confer Exo 8:9; "Glory over me," Gloriam assume supra me, as thou hast done over thy sorcerers; I give thee this liberty. See also Jdg 7:2; Isa 10:15.
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In a voluntary humility] A proud humility. They would not dare to worship God, but angels, &c., yet were vainly puffed up by their fleshly minds. And something like this was that of the Baptist in refusing to wash Christ, and of Peter in refusing to be washed by him, Joh 13:8.
And worshipping of angels] Setting them up, as Papists do, for mediators of intercession. Let not us acknowledge any other master of requests in heaven but Christ alone, 1Jn 2:1. But what a piece of knavery is that in Surius and Caranza, who rendering that passage of the Laodicean Council, chap. xxxv., ου δει χριστιανους αγγελους ονομαζειν, Christians may not pray to angels; they make the words to be, Non oportet Christianos ad angulos congregationes facere, Christians may not be corner creepers; and the title they make, De iis qui angulos colunt, of those that worship (not angels, but) corners; against all sense. What! will they put out the eyes of God’s people? as he said, Num 16:14. Or do they not rather, Festucam quaerere unde oculos sibi eruant, as Bernard hath it, seek straws to put out their own eyes also?
Intruding into those things] εμβατευων, or invading those things, blind and bold, busy about such matters, as whereof there is neither proof nor profit. Of this sort of seducers was that daring Dionysius, that writeth so confidently of the heavenly hierarchy; the schoolmen also with their curious speculations and new niceties, as Scotellus and others.
Vainly puffed up by his fleshly mind] Corruption is the mother of pride, as the devil the father. "He is the king of all the children of pride," Job 41:34.
John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Poole 1685 · Public Domain On vv18–23 Let no man beguile you of your reward: the…
Let no man beguile you of your reward: the original compound word, peculiar in the New Testament to Paul, and that in this Epistle only, (and not very frequent in other authors), hath occasioned interpreters here to render it variously, some joining the next following word with it, and some (as we read it) to that which follows after. The simple word is, Col 3:15, read rule, or judge, and it may be rendered intercede. Yet Paul doth not elsewhere use this word simply or in composition where he speaks of judging and condemning, Rom 2:1; however, it is borrowed from those who were judges or umpires in their games, the apostle most likely alluding to those, who through favour or hatred determined unjustly, to the defrauding those victors of their prize or reward to whom it was due. Hence some would have the import to be agreeable to our translation; Be careful these unjust arbiters do not defraud you of gaining Christ, and deceive you, ,{ as Mat 24:4; Eph 5:6; 2Th 2:3} by prescribing false lists and giving you wrong measures, and so judging against you. One renders it: Let no man deceive you with subtle argument, who pleaseth or delights himself in humility; another: Let no man take your prize; others: Let no man master it or bear rule over you at pleasure; let none take upon himself, or usurp to himself, the parts or office of a governor or umpire over you. The apostle labours to fortify the true followers of Christ against such superstitious subtle ones, who by their artifice did assume a magisterial authority (without any sure warrant from God) to impose their traditionary and invented services upon them, and determine of their state, accordingly as the papists do at this day. One learned man thinks the apostle had not used this word here, but for some notable advantage, viz. because the simple word may signify to intercede as well as to judge; it made wonderfully to his purpose in this composition, (as he uses concision, Phi 3:2), to disparage those seducers who did, from some notions of the Platonists, labour to gain credit to that opinion that the angels were intercessors between God and man.
In a voluntary humility, and worshipping of angels; covering their imperious spirit by being volunteers in humility, or by a pretence of voluntary, uncommanded humility, alleging it would be presumption in them to address themselves immediately to God, and therefore they would pay a religious homage to angels, as of a middle nature between God and them, presuming they would mediate for them: an instance to express all that invented worship, which, how specious soever it may seem to be, hath no warrant from Christ, who alone can procure acceptance of our persons and services. He expects that his disciples should assert his rights, and the liberty with which he hath made them free, against the traditions of self-willed men, and no more to solemnize for worship, than teach for doctrines, the traditions of men, Mat 15:2,6,9. We must not, under any pretext of humility, presume to know what belongs to our duty and God’s service better than Christ doth, showing us that he alone is the true and living way, and we may come boldly by him, Mat 11:28; Joh 14:1,6; Eph 3:12; Heb 4:16; Heb 10:19,20. And therefore the adoring and invocating of angels as heavenly courtiers, whatever the papists out of a show of humility do argue, is not after Christ, but against him.
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Intruding into those things which he hath not seen: yea, and for any one to assert it, and the like, is to be a bold intruder upon another’s possession, a thrusting a man’s self into the knowledge and determination of that which is above his reach, Psa 131:1, and he hath no ground at all for, but doth pry or wade into a secret which a man cannot know. The apostle useth a Platonic word against those who did indulge themselves out of curiosity in the opinions of the Platonists about angels, the worshippers of which, amongst those who were professed Christians in Phrygia, were so tenacious of their error that they were not rooted out after the third century, when a canon was made against them under the name of Angelici, in the council of Laodicea near Colosse.
Vainly puffed up by his fleshly mind; the first rise of such foolish presumption, was a being rashly puffed up with the sense of their flesh, a deluded mind moved by some carnal principle, setting out things with swelling words of vanity, wherewith in truth they have no acquaintance, and whereof they have no experience, 1Ti 1:7.
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
William Burkitt 1703 · Public Domain On vv18, 20 Our apostle having warned the Colossians against the errors…
Our apostle having warned the Colossians against the errors of the Judaizing teachers, comes next to warn them against the practice of the Paganizing Christians, who were directd by their guides to worship the angels, covering their error with a plausible shew of humility, pretending it was presumptuous to go to God immediately, without the mediation of those excellent creatures; but this the apostle tells them was a bold intruding into things they knew nothing of, God having neither revealed nor taught any such thing; and argued, that they were vainly puffed up with the foolish imaginations of their own fleshly minds.
Next he shews, that these angel-worshippers do not acknowledge Christ for the Head of the church, while they apply themselves to angels as mediators; whereas he alone discharges the office of the Head, completely giving life and growth to his whole church, and to every member therof; which members being furnished with spiritual life from him, and knit to him, and one another by the joints and bands of charity and other graces, they grow and increase with such an increase of holiness as is from God, and tends to his glory.
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Note here, 1. That the nature of man is prone, extremely prone, to idolatry and false worship.
2. That it is a really idolatry to worship an angel, as it is to worship a worm; for divine worship is only due to a divine person.
Note, 3. That it is a renouncing of Christ, to make use of angels, or any other mediator, besides Christ, unto the Father: not holding the head. It was a notion that the minds of mankind, that God was not to be immediately approached to by sinful men; but that their prayers were to be presented by certain mediators and intercessors, who were to procure for them the favour of God, and the acceptance of their prayers.
Hence they worshipped angels, and the souls departed of their heroes, whom they canonized, and translated into the number of their inferior gods, by whom they addressed their supplications to their superior gods. With this notion Almighty God was pleased to comply so far, as under the Jewish institution to appoint Moses a mediator betwixt him and them; and now under the Christian dispensation to appoint Jesus Christ to be the only Mediator betwixt God and man.
Note, 4. That it is usual for idolaters, and false worshippers, to cover themselves sith a more than ordinary show of humility: Let none beguile you in a voluntary humility.
True it is, that all duties of worship ought to be voluntary, as voluntary is opposed to constrained; but they must not be voluntary, as voluntary is opposed ot instituted or appointed; God doth no more approve of that worship we give him according to our will, than he doth approve of our neglect of that which is according to his own will. But man, vain man, likes any way of worshipping God which is of his own framing, much better than that which is of God’s own appointing.
William Burkitt's Expository Notes on the New Testament (1700–1703) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain On vv18–23 Let no man beguile you of your reward,.... Or…
Let no man beguile you of your reward,.... Or prize; the allusion is to the Olympic games, one of which was running races; in which the stadium, or race plot was fixed, a mark set up to look and run unto, a corruptible crown proposed to be run for, and which was held by one who sat as judge, and determined who got the victory, and to whom the crown belonged; these judges sometimes acted the unfair part, and defrauded the victors of their proper right, and to such the apostle compares the false teachers: the Christian's reward, or prize he is running for, is the incorruptible and never fading crown of glory, life, and righteousness; the race plot is the Christian life, spent in the exercise of grace, and discharge of duty, and in holding fast, and holding out in a profession of faith unto the end; the mark he looks at, and presses towards, is Jesus Christ; and his great concern, the apostle by this metaphor suggests should be, lest by false teachers he should be defrauded of the prize of the high calling of God, through their removing the mark Christ from him, by denying his person and Godhead; or by intercepting his sight of him, placing other objects before him, such as angels, to be worshipped and adored; or by darkening of it, joining Moses and Christ, law and Gospel, works and grace together, in the business of salvation; whereby he might seem to come short, or be in danger of coming short of the heavenly glory:
in a voluntary humility and worshipping of angels; these things the apostle instances in, as in what lay their danger of being beguiled of their reward, or prize. True humility is an excellent grace; it is the clothing and ornament of a Christian; nor is there anything that makes a man more like Christ, than this grace; but in these men here respected, it was only the appearance of humility, it was not real; it was in things they devised and willed, not in things which God commanded, Christ required, or the Scriptures pointed at; they would have been thought to have been very lowly and humble, and to have a great consciousness of their own vileness and unworthiness to draw nigh to Christ the Mediator immediately, and by him to God; wherefore in pretence of great humility, they proposed to make use of angels as mediators with Christ; whereby Christ, the only Mediator between God and man, would be removed out of sight and use; and that humble boldness and holy confidence with God at the throne of grace, through Christ, which believers are allowed to use, would be discouraged and destroyed, and the saints be in danger as to the outward view of things, and in all human appearance of losing their reward: "worshipping of angels" was a practice which very early prevailed among some that were called Christians, and for a long time continued in Phrygia and Pisidia; some make Simon Magus, and others Cerinthus, the author of this idolatry; but was not only a branch of the Platonic philosophy, and so a part of that philosophy and vain deceit before mentioned, Col 2:8, which these men might have borrowed from the Gentiles, but was a notion and practice of the Jews: before the Babylonish captivity, the names of angels were not known, nor are they ever mentioned by name in Scripture; hence they say (s), that "the names of angels came up with them, or by their means from Babylon:
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after this they began to talk much of them, and to have too high a veneration for them, and ascribe too much to them; and observing that the law was ordained, spoken, and given by them, and that the administration of things under the former dispensation was greatly by their means, they fell to worshipping of them (t); and the believing Jews were hereby in great danger of falling into the same practice: hence the author of the epistle to the Hebrews, writing to the Jewish church, largely insists on the proof of Christ being superior to angels; showing that he has a more excellent name than they had; that he was the Son of God in such sense as they were not the sons of God; that they were worshippers of him, yea, that they were creatures made by him, and even ministering spirits to his saints, the heirs of salvation: and very rightly, is worshipping of angels condemned here by the apostle, since God only is the object of worship; since these are creatures, and so not to be adored; are worshippers of God and Christ themselves, and have refused adoration when it has been offered to them: that the Jews did, and do worship angels, and make use of them as mediators and intercessors, is clear from their liturgy, or prayer books, where they say (u).
", "O ye angels of mercies", or ye merciful angels, ministers of the most High, entreat now the face of God for good:
and elsewhere (w),
"they say three times, let Juhach keep us, let Juhach deliver us, and let Juhach help us:
now Juhach was the name of an angel, who they supposed had the care of men, and is taken from the final letters of those words in Psa 91:11, "for he shall give his angels charge over thee": so they speak of an angel whom they call Sandalphon, who they say is appointed over the prayers of the righteous (x): with this notion the judaizing and false teachers seem to have been tinctured, and against which the apostle here cautions the saints, lest, under a show of humility, they should be drawn into it: and to preserve them from it, he observes, that such an one who should spread and propagate such a notion, was one that was
intruding into those things which he hath not seen; thrusting himself in a bold and daring manner into an inquiry and search after, debate upon, and affirmation of things he could have no certain knowledge of; as of angels, whose nature, qualities, works, and ministrations, he had never seen with his bodily eyes; nor could ever discern with the eyes of his understanding any such things in the Scriptures, which he ascribed to them; but they were the birth of his own mind, the fruits of his own fancy and imagination, things devised in his own brain: being
vainly puffed up by his fleshly mind; judging of things not according to the word of God, and with a spiritual judgment, and according to a spiritual sense and experience, but according to his own carnal reason, and the vanity of his mind; being puffed and swelled with an high opinion of himself, of his great parts and abilities, of his knowledge of things above others, and of his capacity to penetrate into, and find out things which were not seen and known by others: this shows that his humility was forced, and only in outward appearance, and was not true and genuine,
(s) T. Hieros. Roshhashanah, fol. 56. 4. (t) Vid. Clement. Alex Stromat. l. 6. p. 635. (u) Seder Tephillot, Ed. Basil fol. 222. 2. (w) Ib. fol. 335. 1. (x) Zohar in Gen. fol. 97. 2. & in Exod. fol. 24. 3.
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Wesley 1765 · Public Domain On vv18–23 Out of pretended humility, they worshipped angels, as not…
Out of pretended humility, they worshipped angels, as not daring to apply immediately to God. Yet this really sprung from their being puffed up: (the constant forerunner of a fall, (Prov. xvi, 18) so far was it from being an instance of true humility.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain On vv18–23 Verse 18. Let no man beguile you] μηδειςυμαςκαταβραβευετω. Let…
Verse 18. Let no man beguile you] μηδειςυμαςκαταβραβευετω. Let no man take the prize from you which the βραβευς, brabeus, or judge in the contests, has assigned you, in consequence of your having obtained the victory. This any reader will see, is an allusion to the Olympic and Isthmian games, and to the prizes assigned to these who had obtained the victory in one or more of the contests which there took place. The Colossians had fought and conquered under the direction of Christ, and he, as the sole judge in this contest, had assigned to them the prize; the false teachers, affecting great modesty, humility, and sanctity, endeavoured to turn them aside from the Gospel, and to induce them to end in the flesh who had begun in the Spirit. Against these the apostle warns them.
In a voluntary humility and worshiping of angels] This is a difficult passage, and in order to explain it, I shall examine the meaning of some of the principal terms of the original. The word θελειν, to will, signifies also to delight; and ταπειμοφροσυνη signifies not only lowliness or humility of mind, but also affliction of mind; and ταπεινουν την ψυχην, Le 16:20; Le 16:31, and in many other places, signifies to afflict the soul by fasting, and self-abnegation; and θρησκεια signifies reverence and modesty. Hence the whole passage has been paraphrased thus: Let no man spoil you of the prize adjudged to you, who delights in mortifying his body, and walking with the apparent modesty of an angel, affecting superior sanctity in order to gain disciples; intruding into things which he has not seen; and, notwithstanding his apparent humility, his mind is carnal, and he is puffed up with a sense of his superior knowledge and piety. It is very likely that the apostle here alludes to the Essenes, who were remarkably strict and devout, spent a principal part of their time in the contemplation of the Divine Being, abstained from all sensual gratifications, and affected to live the life of angels upon earth. With their pretensions all the apostle says here perfectly agrees, and on this one supposition the whole of the passage is plain and easy. Many have understood the passage as referring to the adoration of angels, which seems to have been practised among the Jews, who appear (from Tobit, xii. 15; Philo, in lib. de Somn.; Josephus, War. lib. ii. cap. 8, sec. 7) to have considered them as a sort of mediators between God and man; presenting the prayers of men before the throne; and being, as Philo says, μεγαλου βασιλεως οφθαλμοι και ωτα, the eyes and ears of the great King. But this interpretation is not so likely as the foregoing.
Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Joseph Benson 1811 · Public Domain On vv18, 20 Col 2:18-19. Let no man beguile you of your…
Col 2:18-19. Let no man beguile you of your reward — Of future glory, however eagerly or artfully he may attempt it. According to Pierce, who pleads the authority of Demosthenes, the word καταβραβευετω, here rendered beguile you of your reward, should be translated condemn you: others, because the verb βραβευω, without the preposition, is translated to rule, (Col 3:15,) are of opinion that the expression may be translated enslave you. But as the original word comes from βραβειον, a reward, the compounded verb certainly more properly signifies to hinder a reward from being bestowed, an evil which the worshipping of angels, here guarded against, as more powerful mediators than Christ, would have occasioned. For if on any pretence these Colossian believers had forsaken Christ, and attached themselves to angels, they must have lost the whole benefit of Christ’s mediation. In a voluntary humility — Θελων εν ταπεινοφροσυνη, an expression which Whitby renders, pleasing himself in his humility; or affecting humility, and so not addressing God immediately, but only by the mediation of angels. In proof of which interpretation, the same author refers to several passages of the LXX., in which the word θελω means to be pleased with, or to delight in, a person or thing: there are also passages in the New Testament in which the word seems to bear the same meaning. See Mat 20:26-27; Mar 12:38. And worshipping of angels — It evidently appears, from several passages in Philo, to have been the opinion of that learned Jew, that angels were messengers who presented our prayers to God, as well as brought down his favours to us. He represents this view of the matter as most humble and reverential, and there is no doubt but it prevailed among other Jews. See Tob 11:14; Tob 12:12; Tob 12:15. It was undoubtedly because the Jews entertained so great a respect for angels, on account of their supposed agency in human affairs, that the apostle, in this epistle, and in that to the Hebrews, took so much pains to show that the Son of God is greater than all angels. It is justly remarked by Bishop Burnet, that had it been the apostle’s intention to give the least encouragement to any religious addresses to saints and angels, this would have been a very natural occasion of introducing the subject, and adjusting its proper boundaries. Intruding into things which he hath not seen — With great presumption, and pretending to discover wonderful secrets, relating to their various ranks, subordinations, and offices. “The apostle’s meaning,” says Macknight, “is, that the false teachers, of whom he speaks, presumptuously penetrated into the secrets of the invisible world, and talked of them with an air of certainty, without having any knowledge of the things which they affirmed; particularly that the angels intercede with God for men, and that to worship them is acceptable to God.” Vainly puffed up by his fleshly — His corrupt and carnal; mind — With the conceit of things which it is impossible he should understand, and a desire of introducing novelties into religion. And not holding the Head — Not adhering to, and relying on Christ, the Head of his church, by whom all the true members of it are not only guided and governed, but from whom, having spiritual nourishment ministered by joints and bands — By various means of instruction and grace, or by the several talents and gifts of its members, employed for the good of the whole; and knit together — By love and mutual sympathy; increaseth — In knowledge, holiness, strength, stability, and usefulness; with the increase of God — That increase which comes from him, is approved by him, and tends to his glory. What the apostle here says against the worshipping of angels, concludes equally against the worshipping of saints. Indeed, it is absurd to suppose that any being can be a proper object of worship, which is not both omniscient and omnipresent, which certainly neither angels nor saints are. It is a just remark of a judicious divine, that the apostle’s exhortation in this verse is a good caution to us to beware of all refinements in Christianity, which have any tendency to derogate from the authority, office, and honour of Christ, as Head of the church.
Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Albert Barnes 1834 · Public Domain On vv18–23 Let no man beguile you of your reward -…
Let no man beguile you of your reward - Margin, judge against you. The word used here - καταβραβεύω katabrabeuō - occurs nowhere else in the New Testament. It is a word which was employed with reference to the distribution of prizes at the Grecian games, and means, to give the prize against anyone, to deprive of the palm. Hence, it means to deprive of a due reward: and the sense here is, that they were to be on their guard lest the “reward” - the crown of victory to which they looked forward - should be wrested from them by the arts of others. That would be done if they should be persuaded to turn back, or to falter in the race. The only way to secure the prize was to hold on in the race which they then were running; but if they yielded to the philosophy of the Greeks, and the teachings of the Jews, they would be defrauded of this reward as certainly as a racer at the games would if the crown of victory should be unjustly awarded to another. In this case, too, as real injustice would be done, though the apostle does not say it would be in the same manner. Here it would be by art; in the case of the racer it would be by a wrong decision - but in either case the crown was lost. This exhortation has the more force from this consideration. Against an unjust judge we could have no power; but we may take care that the reward be not wrested from us by fraud.
In a voluntary humility - Margin,” being a voluntary in humility.” Tyndale renders this,” Let no man make you shoot at a wrong mark, which, after his own imagination, walketh in the humbleness of angels.” The word used here (ταπεινοφροσύνη tapeinophrosunē) means “lowliness of mind, modesty, humbleness of deportment;” and the apostle refers, doubtless, to the spirit assumed by those against whom he would guard the Colossians - the spirit of modesty or of humble inquirers. The meaning is, that they would not announce their opinions with dogmatic certainty, but they would put on the appearance of great modesty. In this way, they would become really more dangerous - for no false teachers are so dangerous as those who assume the aspect of great humility, and who manifest great reverence for divine things. The word rendered “voluntary” here - θέλων thelōn - does not, properly, belong to the word rendered “humility.” It rather appertains to the subsequent part of the sentence, and means that the persons referred to were willing, or had pleasure in attempting, to search into the hidden and abstruse things of religion. They were desirous of appearing to do this with an humble spirit - even with the modesty of an angel - but still they had pleasure in that profound and dangerous kind of inquiry.
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And worshipping of angels - θρησκείᾳ τῶν ἀγγέλων thrēskeia tōn angelōn. This does not mean, as it seems to me, that they would themselves worship angels or that they would teach others to do it for there is no reason to believe this. Certainly the Jewish teachers, whom the apostle seems to have had particularly in his eye, would not do it; nor is there any evidence that any class of false teachers would deliberately teach that angels were to be worshipped The reference is rather to the profound reverence; the spirit of lowly piety which the angels evinced, and to the fact that the teachers referred to would assume the same spirit, and were, therefore, the more dangerous. They would come professing profound regard for the great mysteries of religion, and for the incomprehensible perfections of the divinity, and would approach the subject professedly with the awful veneration which the angels have when they “look into these things;” 1Pe 1:12. There was no bold, irreverent, or confident declamation, but the danger in the case arose from the fact that they assumed so much the aspect of modest piety; so much the appearance of the lowly devotion of angelic beings. The word rendered here “worship” - θρησκεία thrēskeia - occurs in the New Testament only here, in Act 26:5; and Jam 1:26-27, in each of which places it is rendered “religion.” It means here the religion, or the spirit of humble reverence and devotion which is evinced by the angels; and this accords well with the meaning in Jam 1:26-27.
Intruding into those things which he hath not seen - Or inquiring into them. The word used here (ἐμβατεύων embateuōn) means to go in, or enter; then to investigate, to inquire. It has not, properly, the meaning of intruding, or of impertinent inquiry (see Passow), and I do not see that the apostle meant to characterize the inquiry here as such. He says that it was the object of their investigations to look, with great professed modesty and reverence, into those things which are not visible to the eye of mortals. The “things” which seem here to be particularly referred to, are the abstruse questions respecting the mode of the divine subsistence; the ranks, orders, and employments of angelic beings; and the obscure doctrines relating to the divine government and plans. These questions comprised most of the subjects of inquiry in the Oriental and Grecian philosophy, and inquiries on these the apostle apprehended would tend to draw away the mind from the “simplicity that is in Christ.” Of these subjects what can be known more than is revealed?
Vainly puffed up by his fleshly mind - Notwithstanding the avowed “humility,” the modesty, the angelic reverence, yet the mind was full of vain conceit, and self-confident, carnal wisdom. The two things are by no means incompatible - the men apparently most meek and modest being sometimes the most bold in their speculations, and the most reckless in regard to the great landmarks of truth. It is not so with true modesty, and real “angelic veneration,” but all this is sometimes assumed for the purpose of deceiving; and sometimes there is a native appearance of modesty which is by no means an index of the true feelings of the soul. The most meek and modest men in appearance are sometimes the most proud and reckless in their investigations of the doctrines of religion.
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary 1859 · Public Domain On vv18, 20, 21, 23 Let no man seduce you.[5] In the Greek, hinder…
Let no man seduce you.[5] In the Greek, hinder you from getting the prize. --- Willing [6] (by their own will) in humility, and religion of Angels, practising a wrong and mistaken humility in regard of the Angels, when you pay them a worship not due to them, pretending them to be the mediators and saviours of mankind, as if they were equal, or greater than Christ, our only Redeemer; walking in things your understand not, these men being deceived by their vain philosophy, and pride of their own imaginations. By this means not holding, (ver. 19.) but having shaken off their only true invisible head, Christ Jesus, who is the head of his Church. It is admitted that these false doctors, among the Colossians, had introduced an undue and superstitious worship of Angels, and gave to them even a greater honour than to Christ. They worshipped them as the creators of the world, as mediators with God, even above Jesus Christ, which St. Paul here expresseth by these words, not holding the head. These seem to have been some disciples of Simon, and their heresies continued in some churches of Asia even to the fourth age [fourth century A.D.], as we may find by a canon of the council of Laodicea. But there is nothing here nor in that council against a due, i.e. an inferior honour and veneration, nothing like a divine honour, nor injurious to Christ, our chief mediator and only Redeemer, which the Church, from the first ages [first centuries A.D.], paid to saints and Angels. We do not ask grace, we do not offer up sacrifice, we hope not for salvation, but from God only, from Christ, God and man. (Witham) --- Willing, &c. That is, by a self-willed, self-invented, superstitious worship, falsely pretending humility, but really proceeding from pride. Such was the worship that many of the philosophers (against whom St. Paul speaks, ver. 8.) paid to Angels or demons, by sacrificing to them, as carriers of intelligence betwixt God and man; pretending humility in so doing, as if God was too great to be addressed by men, and setting aside the mediatorship of Jesus Christ; who is the head both of Angels and men. Such also was the worship paid by the ancient heretics, disciples of Simon and Menander, to the Angels, whom they believed to be the makers and lords of this lower world. This is certain, that they whom the apostle here condemns, did not hold the head, (ver. 19.) that is, Jesus Christ, and his mediatorship; and therefore what he writes here no ways touches the Catholic doctrine and practice, of desiring our good Angels to pray to God for us, through Jesus Christ. St. Jerome, (Epist. ad Algas) understands by the religion or service of Angels, the Jewish religion given by Angels; and shews all that is here to be directed against the Jewish teachers, who sought to subject the new Christians to the observances of the Mosaic law. (Challoner) --- Walking in the things which he hath not seen. These false teachers pretended to know the number and names of the Angels, and how to distribute them into different orders and classes, with as much precision as if they had walked through heaven. Instead of following the revelation of the holy Spirit in the gospel, they followed their own spirit, boasting of what it was impossible for them to know. (Calmet) --- But let no one snatch from you the glory of heaven, which should be the reward of your career, and the recompense of your fidelity, deceiving you by an outward show of false piety and affected humility. (Bible de Vence)
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[BIBLIOGRAPHY]
Seducat, Greek: katabrabeueto. See Mr. Legh’s Crit. Sacra.
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[BIBLIOGRAPHY]
Volens, Greek thelon; religione, Greek: threskeia. --- Walking, ambulans, Greek: embateuon, superbe se ingerens.
George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).
Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset & David Brown 1871 · Public Domain On vv18–23 beguile--Translate, "Defraud you of your prize," literally, "to adjudge…
beguile--Translate, "Defraud you of your prize," literally, "to adjudge a prize out of hostility away from him who deserves it" [TRENCH]. "To be umpire in a contest to the detriment of one." This defrauding of their prize the Colossians would suffer, by letting any self-constituted arbitrator or judge (that is, false teacher) draw them away from Christ," the righteous Judge" and Awarder of the prize (Ti2 4:8; Jam 1:12; Pe1 5:4), to angel-worship.
in a voluntary humility--So "will-worship" (Col 2:23). Literally, "Delighting ([WAHL]) in humility"; loving (so the Greek is translated, Mar 12:38, "love to go in long clothing") to indulge himself in a humility of his own imposing: a volunteer in humility [DALLÆUS]. Not as ALFORD, "Let no one of purpose defraud you," &c. Not as GROTIUS, "If he ever so much wish" (to defraud you). For the participle "wishing" or "delighting," is one of the series, and stands in the same category as "intruding," "puffed up," "not holding"; and the self-pleasing implied in it stands in happy contrast to the (mock) humility with which it seems to me, therefore, to be connected. His "humility," so called, is a pleasing of self: thus it stands in parallelism to "his fleshly mind" (its real name, though he styles it "humility"), as "wishing" or "delighting" does to "puffed up." The Greek for "humility" is literally, "lowliness of mind," which forms a clearer parallel to "puffed up by his fleshly mind." Under pretext of humility, as if they durst not come directly to God and Christ (like the modern Church of Rome), they invoked angels: as Judaizers, they justified this on the ground that the law was given by angels. This error continued long in Phrygia (where Colosse and Laodicea were), so that the Council of Laodicea (A.D. 360) expressly framed its thirty-fifth canon against the "Angelici" (as AUGUSTINE [Heresies, 39], calls them) or "invokers of angels." Even as late as THEODORET'S time, there were oratories to Michael the archangel. The modern Greeks have a legend that Michael opened a chasm to draw off an inundation threatening the Colossian Christians. Once men admit the inferior powers to share invocation with the Supreme, the former gradually engrosses all our serious worship, almost to the exclusion of the latter; thus the heathen, beginning with adding the worship of other deities to that of the Supreme, ended with ceasing to worship Him at all. Nor does it signify much, whether we regard such as directly controlling us (the pagan view), or as only influencing the Supreme in our behalf (the Church of Rome's view); because he from whom I expect happiness or misery, becomes the uppermost object in my mind, whether he give, or only procure it [Cautions for Times]. Scripture opposes the idea of "patrons" or "intercessors" (Ti1 2:5-6). True Christian humility joins consciousness of utter personal demerit, with a sense of participation in the divine life through Christ, and in the dignity of our adoption by God. Without the latter being realized, a false self-humiliation results, which displays itself in ceremonies and ascetic self-abasement (Col 2:23), which after all is but spiritual pride under the mock guise of humility. Contrast "glorying in the Lord" (Co1 1:31).
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intruding into . . . things which he hath not seen--So very old manuscripts and Vulgate and ORIGEN read. But the oldest manuscripts and LUCIFER omit "not"; then translate, "haughtily treading on ('Standing on' [ALFORD]) the things which he hath seen." TREGELLES refers this to fancied visions of angels. But if Paul had meant a fancied seeing, he would have used some qualifying word, as, "which he seemed to see," not "which he hath seen." Plainly the things were actually seen by him, whether of demoniacal origination (Sa1 28:11-20), or phenomena resulting from natural causation, mistaken by him as if supernatural. Paul, not stopping to discuss the nature of the things so seen, fixes on the radical error, the tendency of such a one in all this to walk by SENSE (namely, what he haughtily prides himself on having SEEN), rather than by FAITH in the UNSEEN "Head" (Col 2:19; compare Joh 20:29; Co2 5:7; Heb 11:1). Thus is the parallelism, "vainly puffed up" answers to "haughtily treading on," or "setting his foot on"; "his fleshly mind" answers to the things which he hath seen," since his fleshliness betrays itself in priding himself on what he hath seen, rather than on the unseen objects of faith. That the things seen may have been of demoniacal origination, appears from Ti1 4:1, "Some shall depart from the faith, giving heed to seducing spirits and doctrines of devils" (Greek, "demons"). A warning to modern spiritualists.
puffed up--implying that the previous so called "humility" (Greek, "lowliness of mind") was really a "puffing up."
fleshly mind--Greek, "By the mind of his own flesh." The flesh, or sensuous principle, is the fountain head whence his mind draws its craving after religious objects of sight, instead of, in true humility as a member, "holding fast the (unseen) Head."
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
Daniel D. Whedon 1874 · Public Domain On vv18–23 b. Caution against angel-worship, Col_2:18-19.
b. Caution against angel-worship, Col_2:18-19.
18. Beguile—The marginal judge against you, is more accurate. The allusion is to the judge who, presiding at the games, fraudulently deprives him of the prize to whom it should be awarded. The false teacher would deprive them of their rightful reward of the incorruptible crown by misleading them in the way of attaining it. His character is described in four particulars. 1. He wills, or delights in, a pretended humility which held God to be so unapproachable and incomprehensible that the mediation of inferior spiritual beings was necessary. Worshipping of angels would readily fall in with this theory. Notwithstanding the apostle’s labour and caution, this evil took so deep root in Phrygia and Pisidia, that three centuries later the Council of Laodicea forbade the practice by a special decree, condemning it as idolatry and an abandonment of Christ. 2. He stands upon what he has seen, and pretends to a profound knowledge of the heavenly world by wonderful visions. Most recent critics omit the word not. 3. Believing that he has fathomed the mysteries of the spiritual world, he is, though pretending to humility, really but without reason inflated by his own spiritualized sensualism.
Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges 1878 · Public Domain On vv18–23 18. Let no man] Another parallel but distinct caution…
18. Let no man] Another parallel but distinct caution after that of Col_2:16.
beguile you of your reward] Rob you of your prize, R.V. The verb is compounded with the noun brabeion (used Php_3:14), an athletic prize. Here, as in Philippians, it means the life eternal, “the crown of life” (Jas_1:12; Rev_2:10). The Colossians were tempted to forsake their position and privilege in Christ, found and retained by faith; and, so far, they were tempted to lose their “hold on the eternal life” (1Ti_6:12; 1Ti_6:19) which is in Him alone (1Jn_5:12). Cp. Rev_3:11.—What their Lord would do to save them from the fatal step was altogether another matter; their one duty was not to take the step.
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The alien teachers are represented here (having regard to the classical usage of the verb) “not as umpires, nor as successful rivals, but simply as persons frustrating those who otherwise would have won the prize” (Lightfoot).
Tyndale and Cranmer curiously render, “Let no man make you shote at a wronge marke,” probably influenced by Luther, who has Lasset euch Niemand das Ziel verrücken; an untenable paraphrase. Geneva, “Let no man … beare rule over you.”
in a voluntary humility] The Greek means, quite literally, “willing in humility”; and some questions arise about the construction. These may be reduced to two main alternatives, (a) Is “willing” to be connected with the verb just previous, and to be rendered, “let no one rob you of your prize willingly,” “meaningly,” “of malice prepense”? (b) Is “willing” to be connected with the words just following, and explained, “taking pleasure in humility”? Of these (a) is easier grammatically, but Ellicott urges the grave objection that it attributes a Satanic and almost incredible malice to the teachers in question. It may be answered that St Paul need not be charging them with “meaning” to rob their followers of heaven, but with “meaning” to rob them of a faith with which as a fact the hope of heaven was bound up. Lightfoot advocates (b), and proves that it is a construction supported by the LXX., where it is not used “only with personal pronouns” (as Ellicott says), but with ordinary nouns; see Psalms 110. (Heb. and Eng. 111.) 1, 146. (Heb. and Eng. 147.) 10. The strong Hebraism, without any N.T. parallel, is certainly startling, however; and we recommend (a), though doubtfully, with the explanation given above. The rendering would be somewhat thus, in paraphrase: Let no man have his own way in robbing you &c.
humility] “Humility is a vice with heathen moralists but a virtue with Christian Apostles.… In this passage which (with Col_2:23) forms the sole exception to the general language of the Apostles, the divergence is rather apparent than real” (Lightfoot). An artificial, gratuitous, humility is not humility but its parody. And such was the thing in question; an abasement of man before unlawful objects (see next words) of worship; a prostration self-chosen, and also self-conscious.
worshipping of angels] A practice highly developed in later Judaism, while entirely absent from the apostolic teaching, and indeed clearly condemned here, and Rev_19:10; Rev_22:9, and implicitly in Hebrews 1—It is noticeable that the Council of Laodicea (a.d. 394), so near Colossæ, forbids (c. 35) Christians to leave the Church and go away “to name angels” in secret assemblies, calling this a “secret idolatry,” and apparently connecting it with Jewish influences. Theodoret in his Commentary here speaks of the existence in his time (cent. 5) of Oratories (euctêria) to the Archangel Michael in the region of Laodicea and Colossæ, and of their popularity, apparently as rivals to the regular Churches. At this day in Abyssinia Michael has his holyday every month.—See further Introd., pp. 15, 31, 33.
“Angels,” says the saintly Jansenist Quesnel here, “will always win the day over Jesus Christ despised (anéanti) and crucified, if the choice of a mediator between us and God is left to the vanity of the human mind.”
For a (doubtful) early sanction of angel-worship see a difficult sentence in Justin, Apology, 1. c. 6. Irenæus, Justin’s contemporary, says (ii. 57) that the Church “does nothing by the invocation of angels.”
Whatever its origin and details, such a worship inevitably beclouds the Christian’s view both of the majesty and of the nearness and tenderness of Christ his living Head.
“Worshipping”:—thrêskeia; a word akin perhaps in etymology to “tremble,” and denoting religious devotion mainly in its external aspect; a cultus. The word or its cognate occurs elsewhere in N.T. Act_26:5; Jas_1:26-27. Lightfoot quotes a sentence from Philo, the Jewish contemporary of the Apostles, where it is expressly distinguished from piety (hosiotês); and he says that “generally the usage of the word exhibits a tendency to a bad sense.” Such a sense is quite in point here; an unauthorized and abject cultus was the natural expression of a counterfeit “humility.”
intruding into those things which he hath not seen] Quœ vidit ambulans (Old Latin); Quœ non vidit ambulans (Vulgate); “Dwelling in the things which he hath seen” (R.V.). Here are serious differences of reading and translation, which must be briefly discussed.
(a) Shall we render “Intruding into,” or, “Dwelling in”? Classical usage of the Greek verb favours the latter rendering; the word is used e.g. of a god’s haunt in a region or a spot. The usage in LXX. and Apocrypha slightly favours the former rendering; the word is used there of the invasion or new occupation of a country (Jos_19:51; 1Ma_12:25; 1Ma_14:31). The balance must be struck by our conclusions on the rest of the phrase.
(b) “Things which he hath not seen”: “Things which he hath seen.” Is the negative to be omitted or not? “Many authorities, some ancient, insert ‘not’ ” (margin, R.V.). Ellicott approves the insertion of “not”; Lightfoot advocates the omission. It is difficult to discuss the evidence in a note, and we have attempted to state it in outline in Appendix J. Here it must suffice to say that we venture to recommend the reading which he hath not seen. It seems to us more likely, on a view of the facts, that the negative should have dropped out early than that it should have been deliberately inserted.
If we reject “not,” the meaning will most probably be that the erring teacher “dwells in, or dwells on, what he has seen,” his alleged visions and revelations, the “manifestations” which he says, and perhaps thinks, he has witnessed, and which he prefers to the apostolic Gospel. If we retain “not,” the meaning will be that he invades the region of the Unseen with a presumptuous confidence of assertion, as if he had seen it. In either case he might assert his enjoyment of angelic or other visions; but in the latter case the Apostle denies such a claim if made. Cp. Eze_13:3; “Woe unto the foolish prophets, that follow their own spirit, and have seen nothing.”
vainly] The Greek word means “at random,” without reason or cause. Cp. Rom_13:4; 1Co_15:2. (This meaning in some passages glides into that of “without result”; Gal_3:4; Gal_4:11.) The true Gospel is not so; its loftiest assertion springs from deepest fact and truth.
puft up] A present participle, indicating habit and development. For the word in a similar connexion cp. 1Co_8:1.
by his fleshly mind] Lit., “by the mind of his flesh.”—“The mind” (nous) here is the merely reasoning faculty as distinguished from spiritual intuition. “The flesh” is, as often in St Paul, the unregenerate state, in which the sinful principle dominates. See Eph_2:3 and note there in this Series.—In that verse “flesh” and “mind” are somewhat similarly collocated; but the word rendered (in A.V.) “mind” is lit. “thoughts”; “the mind” in particular action.—He is “puffed up” by an exercise of thought characteristic of the unregenerate state.
L. THE VARIOUS READINGS OF Col_2:18
Must we read (a) “The things which he hath not seen,” or (b) “The things which he hath seen?”
The documentary evidence may be briefly stated thus:
i. For the omission of “not”:
Uncial MSS.:—אABD, the first three of which are, with C, the oldest copies we possess. אB were probably written cent. 4, A cent. 5. D probably belongs to cent. 6.
Cursive MSS.:—those numbered 17, 28, 67 in the list of cursive copies of St Paul’s Epistles. These belong to centt. 10 and 12. MS. 67 omits “not” by correction only; the correction is perhaps as late as cent. 15.
Versions:—the Old Latin (perhaps cent. 2) in three of its texts out of the five which contain the Epistle; the Coptic Version called the Memphitic (perhaps cent. 2); and two others.
Fathers:—Tertullian (cent. 2, 3); Origen (cent. 3), but somewhat doubtfully[119]; the commentator Hilary (cent. 4), quoted as Ambrosiaster, as his work is included with the works of Ambrose. Jerome and Augustine (cent. 4, 5) both notice both readings.
[119] He cites the text three times. Two of these occur where his Greek is known only through a Latin Version, and one of these two gives “not.” In the third, we have the Greek. Μὴ is inserted by the (last) critical Editor, De la Rue.
ii. For the retention of “not”:
Uncial MSS.:—C K L P, the first of cent. 5, the others of cent. 9. Besides, the reading οὐ (not μὴ) is given by a corrector of א, who dates perhaps cent. 7, and by correctors of D, who date perhaps cent. 8.
Cursive MSS.:—all with the three exceptions given above; i.e. more than 290 known copies, ranging from cent. 9 to cent. 15 or 16.
Versions:—the Syriac Versions (the earliest is probably of cent. 2); one text of the Old Latin; the Vulgate (Jerome’s revision of the Latin); the Gothic, Æthiopic, and others.
Fathers:—Origen (in one place; see further above); Chrysostom; Jerome (with deliberate preference); Augustine (likewise); Theodore of Mopsuestia; Theodoret, “and others” (Lightfoot).
The late Dean Burgon (The Revision Revised, p. 356, note), thus summarizes the evidence, and remarks upon it:
“We have to set off the whole mass of the copies—against some 6 or 7: Irenæus (i. 847), Theodorus Mops. (in loc.), Chrys. (xi. 372), Theodoret (iii. 489, 490), John Damascene (ii. 211)—against no Fathers at all (for Origen once has μὴ [iv. 655][120]; once has it not [iii. 63]; and once is doubtful [i. 583]). Jerome and Augustine both take notice of the diversity of reading, but only to reject it.—The Syriac versions, the Vulgate, Gothic, Georgian, Sclavonic, Æthiopic, Arabic, and Armenian—(we owe the information, as usual, to Dr Malan)—are to be set against the suspicious Coptic. All these then are with the Traditional Text: which cannot seriously be suspected of error.”
[120] See just above on this point, in our statement of the evidence for “not”. (Editor.)
It must be added that Lightfoot (in loco), and Westcott and Hort (N.T. in Greek, ii. 127), suspect the Greek text of Col_2:18 of corruption, and suggest or adopt ingenious emendations. The rendering of the clause in question thus altered would be, “treading the void in airy suspension,” or, “treading an airy void.” We venture to think the reasons for suspicion inadequate.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers 1878 · Public Domain On vv18–23 (18) Beguile you of your reward.—The original is a…
(18) Beguile you of your reward.—The original is a word used, almost technically, for an unfair judgment in the stadium, robbing the victor of his prize. The prize here (as in 1Co_9:24; Php_3:14) is the heavenly reward of the Christian course. In St. Paul’s exhortation there seems to be a reference back to Col_2:16. There he says, “Let no man arrogate judgment over you;” here, “Let no man use that arrogated judgment so as to cheat you of your prize. There is one Judge, who has right and who is righteous; look to Him alone.”
In a voluntary humility and worship.—This rendering seems virtually correct, though other renderings are proposed. The original is, willing in humility and worship, and the phrase “willing in” is often used in the LXX. for “delighting in.” Other translations are here possible, though not without some harshness. But the true sense is shown beyond all doubt to be that given in our version, by the words used below to describe the same process, “will-worship and humility.”
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In this passage alone in the New Testament “humility “is spoken of with something of the condemnation accorded to it in heathen morality. The reason of this is obvious and instructive. Humility is a grace, of which the very essence is unconsciousness, and which, being itself negative, cannot live, except by resting on some more positive quality, such as faith or love. Whenever it is consciously cultivated and “delighted in, ”it loses all its grace; it becomes either unreal, “the pride that apes humility,” or it turns to abject slavishness and meanness. Of such depravations Church history is unhappily full.
Worshipping of angels.—This is closely connected with the “voluntary humility” above. The link of connection is supplied by the notice in the ancient interpreters, of the early growth of that unhappy idea, which has always lain at the root of saint-worship and angel-worship in the Church—“that we must be brought near by angels and not by Christ, for that were too high a thing for us” (Chrysostom). With this passage it is obvious to connect the emphasis laid (in Hebrews 1, 2) on the absolute superiority of our Lord to all angels, who are but “ministering spirits, sent forth to minister to them who are heirs of salvation;” and the prohibition of angel-worship in Rev_22:9, “See thou do it not; for I am thy fellow-servant . . . worship God.”
It might seem strange that on the rigid monotheism of Judaism this incongruous creature-worship should have been engrafted. But here also the link is easily supplied. The worship of the angels of which the Essenic system bore traces, was excused on the ground that the Law had been given through the “ministration of angels” (see Act_7:53; Gal_3:19), and that the tutelary guardianship of angels had been revealed in the later prophecy. (See Dan_10:10-21.) For this reason it was held that angels might be worshipped, probably with the same subtle distinctions between this and that kind of worship with which we are familiar in the ordinary pleas for the veneration of saints. It has been noticed that in the Council of Laodicea, held in the fourth century, several canons were passed against Judaising, and that in close connection with these it was forbidden “to leave the Church of God and go away to invoke angels”; and we are told by Theodoret (in the next century) that “oratories to St. Michael (the ‘prince’ of the Jewish people) were still to be seen.” The “angels” in this half-Jewish system held the same intermediate position between the Divine and the human which in the ordinary Gnostic theories was held by the less personal Æons, or supposed emanations from the Godhead.
Intruding into those things which he hath not seen.—(1) There is a remarkable division here, both of MSS. and ancient versions and commentators, as to the insertion or omission of the negative. But the balance of MS. authority is against the negative, and certainly it is easier to suppose it to have been inserted with a view to make an easier sense, than to have been omitted if it had been originally there. (2) The general meaning, however, of the passage is tolerably clear, and, curiously enough, little affected by either alternative. It certainly refers to pretensions to supernatural knowledge by which (just as in 1Co_8:1) the mind is said to be “puffed up.” We note that, even in true visions of heavenly things, there was danger lest the mind “should be exalted above measure” (2Co_12:7). Now the knowledge here pretended to is that favourite knowledge, claimed by Jewish and Christian mystics, of the secrets of the heavenly places and especially of the grades and functions of the hierarchy of heaven. St. Paul brands it as belonging to the mind, not of the spirit, but “of the flesh;” for indeed it was really superstitions, resting not on faith, but on supposed visions and supernatural manifestations. It “intruded” (or, according to another rendering, it “took its stand”) upon the secrets of a region which it said that it “had seen,” but which, in truth, it “had not seen.” If we omit the negative, the Apostle is quoting its claims; if we insert it, he is denying their justice.
A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Pulpit Commentary 1880 · Public Domain On vv18–23 Let no one defraud you of your prize (Col_1:5,…
Let no one defraud you of your prize (Col_1:5, 23 3:15; Php_3:14; Gal_5:7; 1Co_9:24; 2Ti_4:7, 2Ti_4:8; Jam_1:12; 1Pe_5:4; Rev_2:10 Rev_3:11) These eight words represent but three in the Greek. (On katabrabeuw, see Meyer"s elaborate note.) Brabouw is used again in, Col_3:15 (see note) meaning primarily" to act as brabeuv," arbiter of the prize in the public games; brabeion, the prize, is also figuratively used in Php_3:14, and literally in 1Co_9:24, and is synonymous with the "crown" of other passages. Kata gives the verb a hostile sense; and the present tense, as in vers. 4, 8, 16, 20, implies a continued attempt. Let no one be acting the umpire against you, is the literal sense. The errorist condemns the Colossian Christian for his neglect of Jewish observances (ver. 16), and warns him that in his present state he will miss the heavenly prize, "the hope" he had supposed to be "in store for him in heaven". (ver. 5: comp. notes on Col_1:5 Col_3:15; also Eph_1:13, Eph_1:14) Delighting in lowliness of mind and worship of the angels (ver. 23; Rev_19:10 Rev_22:8, Rev_22:9; Jud_1:13:17, 18) By these means the false teacher impressed his disciples. His angel worship commended itself as the mark of a devout and humble mind, reverent towards the unseen powers above us, and made purely Christian worship seem insufficient. "Delighting in" is the rendering of qelwn ejn given by Bengel, Hofmann, Lightfoot, Klopper, and is preferable to that of Meyer and Ellicott, who, with several Greek interpreters, supply the sense of the previous verb "desiring (to do so) in lowliness etc.; and to that followed in the Revisers" margin,which puts a sort of adverbial sense on qelwn his mere will, by humility," etc. This latter rendering underlies the paraphrastic" voluntary humility" of the A.V, and agrees with the common interpretation of ejqeloqrhskeia in ver. 23 (see note). Qelwn ejn is, no doubt, a marked Hebraism, and St. Paul"s language is "singularly free from Hebraisms" (compare, however, the use of eijdenai to know, inw (1Th_5:12; the similar eujdoke) ejn is well established, (1Co_10:5; 2Th_2:12) This very idiom is frequently used in the LXX, and occurs in the "Testament of the Twelve Patriarchs," a Christian writing, of the second century. The apostle may surely be allowed occasionally to have used a Hebraistic phrase, especially when so convenient and expressive as this. Westcott and Hort, with scrupulous purism, mark the reading on this account as doubtful. Tapeinofrosunh ("lowliness of mind"), a word, perhaps, compounded by St. Paul himself (see Trench"s "Synonyms"), is almost confined to the Epistles of this group (comp. ver. 23; Col_3:12; Eph_4:2; Php_2:3; also Act_20:19; 1Pe_5:5) This quality is ascribed ironically to the false teacher (compare the "puffed up" of the next clause, and for similar irony see (1Co_8:1, 1Co_8:2; Gal_4:17) Qrhskeia is "outward worship" or "devotion:" comp. note on ver. 23; elsewhere in New Testament only in Act_26:5 and Jam_1:26, 27 (see Trench"s "Synonyms") "Worship of the angels" is that paid to the angels; not "offered by them," as Luther and Hofmann interpret, supposing that the errorists pretended to imitate the worship of heaven. "Investigating (or, dwelling on) the things which he hath seen"! vainly being puffed up by "the reason" of his flesh (2Co_12:1, 2Co_12:7; 1Co_8:1; 1Ti_6:3-5; 2Pe_2:18; Jud_1:16) For ejmbateuwn, we adopt the sense which it bears in RAPC 2Ma 2:30; in Philo, "On the Planting of Noah," and in patristic and later Greek generally, viz. "to search into," "examine," "discuss" (see Suicer"s "Thesaurus"). The rendering "proceeding" or "dwelling on," though near the radical sense of the word ("to step on" or "in"), wants lexical support. The same may be said of the rendering "intruding into," which suits the Received reading, "which he hath not seen." The "not" of the relative clause is wanting in nearly all our eldest and best witnesses, and is cancelled by the Revisers, with Tregelles, Tischendorf, Lightfoot, Westcott and Hort, etc. Its appearance in two different forms (oujc and mh) in the documents that present it, makes it still more certain that it is a copyist"s insertion. The common reading gives, after all, an unsatisfactory sense; it is not likely the apostle would blame the errorist simply for entering into things beyond his sight (comp. 2Co_4:18 2Co_5:7) Meyer, after Steiger and Huther, gives the best explanation of "which he hath seen," supposing the writer to allude ironically to pretended visions of angels or of the spiritual world, by which the false teacher sought to impose on the Colossians. This view is suggested by Tertullian in the passage cited under ver. 16. Such visions would be suitable for the purpose of the errorist, and congenial to the Phrygian temperament, with its tendency to mysticism and ecstasy (see Theodoret, quoted under ver. 15, who also says that angel worship was specially forbidden by the Council of Laodicea, A.n. 364). If the false teacher were accustomed to say with an imposing air, "I have seen, ah! I have seen!" in referring to his revelations, the apostle"s allusion would be obvious and telling. The language of 2Co_12:1 (R.V) suggests a similar reliance on supernatural visions on the part of the apostle"s earlier opponents. This pretentious visionary is, however, a "philosopher" and a "reasoner" first of all (vers. 4, 8). Accordingly he investigates what he has seen; inquires into the import of his visions, rationally develops their principles, and deduces their consequences. So far, the apostle continues in the ironical vein in which the first words of the verse are written, setting forth the pretensions of his opponent in his own terms, his irony "restraining itself till, after the word ejmbateuwn, the indignation of truth breaks forth from it" (Steiger) in the caustic and decisive "vainly." Eijkh qualifies the foregoing participle (so Origen, apparently, in Cramer"s "Catena," vol. 4. p. 69; Steiger, De Wette, Hofmann, Conybeare) more suitably than the following. Thus it signifies "idly," "to no purpose," as everywhere else in St. Paul (Rom_13:4; 1Co_15:2; Gal_3:4 Gal_4:11) not "without cause," as joined to fusioumenov ("puffed up"), whose "force it could only weaken. "Vainly" stigmatizes the futility, "puffed up" the conceit, and "by the reason of his flesh" the low and sensuous origin of these vaunted revelations and of the high-flown theosophy which they were used to support. (For the sarcastic force of "puffed up," comp. (1Co_4:6, 19 5:2 8:1 13:4) The "reason" (nouv) is, in Greek philosophy, the philosophical faculty, the power of supersensible intuition; and in Plato and Philo, the organ of the higher, mystical knowledge of Divine things (see Philo, "Who is Heir of Divine Things?" 20, and passim). The Colossian "philosopher" (ver. 8) would, we may imagine, speak of himself as "borne aloft" in his visions "by heavenly reason," "lifted high in angelical communion," or the like. Hence the apostle"s sarcasm, "Exalted are they? say rather, inflated: lifted high by Divine reason? nay, but swollen high by the reason of their flesh. Some such allusion to the language of the errorists best accounts for the paradoxical nouv thv sarkov (see Lightfoot); contrast with, Rom_7:25, and compare the disparaging reference to dianoi Col_1:21 (note). Difficult as this passage is, we hesitate to follow Lightfoot, and Westcott and Herr, who have given their weighty sanction to the perilous remedy of conjectural emendations; the latter editors for the second Lime in this verse, and again in ver. 23. The line of interpretation here adopted is advocated in the Expositor, first series, vol. 11. pp. 385-398.
Vers. 18, 19.
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A warning against angel worship.
The apostle now notices the theological error of the false teachers, which was the interposition of angelic mediators between God and man. "Let no man rob you of your prize by a voluntary humility and worshipping of angels, dwelling in the things he hath seen, vainly puffed up by his fleshly mind.
I ANGEL WORSHIP IS CLEARLY CONDEMNED.
1. The angel whom John would have worshipped, said, "See thou do it not, for I am thy fellow servant.., worship God". (Rev_22:9)
2. God will not share his rights with another. "I the Lord thy God am a jealous God." The first commandment forbids all other worship.
3. There is but one mediator between God and men, the Man Christ Jesus. (1Ti_2:5, 1Ti_2:6) Papists say that the apostle merely condemns such worship of angels as excludes Christ, but the condemnation is most absolute and simple. Besides, Christ is declared to be the one single and only way to the Father, to the exclusion of all angelic mediators. "No man cometh unto the Father but by me;" "If ye shall ask anything in my Name, I will do it". (Joh_14:6, Joh_14:14) "We offer up spiritual sacrifices, acceptable to God, by Jesus Christ". (1Pe_2:5)
1. The worship of angels implies an omniscience on their part which belongs only to God. God only knows the hearts of men. (2Ch_6:30)
2. Our Lord"s superiority to all angels, as asserted in Hebrews 1. and it implies the same condemnation; for they are merely "ministering spirits, sent to minister to the heirs of salvation.
II THE MOTIVE OF THIS ANGEL WORSHIP. "A voluntary humility." The idea of the false teachers, like that of modern Papists, was that God was so high and inaccessible that he could only be approached through the mediation of inferior beings. It was remembered that the Law was given "by the ministration of angels", (Act_7:53) and that angels exercised a certain tutelary guardianship. (Dan_10:10-21) But it was, after all, a mere parade of humility to approach God through the mediation of such inferior creatures. It implied, besides, a serious misrepresentation of the fitness of the one Mediator, of whom it was said, "It behoved him to be made like to his brethren, that he might be a merciful and faithful High Priest in things pertaining to God". (Heb_2:17) He surely can sympathize with us even more closely than angels, for he shared our human nature. It was, therefore, a false and perverted humility that sought the intercession of angels.
III THE SPIRIT THAT SHAPED THIS DOCTRINE OF ANGEL WORSHIP. "Dwelling in the things he hath seen, vainly puffed up by his fleshly mind.
1. The false teachers claimed to have visions of the heavenly world and a knowledge of angels which they could not possibly possess. They claimed to know the secrets of a region which they had never seen.
2. They were filled with great self conceit, notwithstanding their parade of excessive humility. "Vainly puffed up by his fleshly mind." The Gnostic tendency was always associated with an assumption of superior knowledge, but it was an utterly groundless assumption. It was "in vain." It was without reason or ground. God would resist it; (Jam_4:7) men would not regard it; (Pro_11:2) and they themselves would inherit nothing by it but folly (Pro_14:8; 1Ti_6:4) Even where real visions are vouchsafed, there is a temptation to self elation, as in the case of the Apostle Paul. (2Co_12:7) But, in the case of false visions, the tendency would be still more manifest. The mind would be "the mind of the flesh," as it is literally; not "the mind of the Spirit." It was "the carnal mind that is enmity with God." Let us rather seek to become "fools that we may be wise", (1Co_3:18) and not be "puffed up one against another." It is knowledge that puffeth up; (1Co_8:1) it is only love that edifieth.
IV THE NEGATIVE SOURCE OF THE HERESY OF ANGEL WORSHIP. "Not holding the Head from whom the whole body, being supplied and knit together through the joints and bands, increaseth with the increase of God." The Colossian errorists invented angel worship because they did not see in Christ the true and only Mediator who was to bridge the chasm between God and men. They put inferior beings in the place of him who is the only Source of spiritual life. They did not "hold the headship" doctrinally; they had no individual or vital adherence to the Head as the Source of life to them.
1. Jesus Christ, as the Head, is the true Source of spiritual life and energy. He who is "at once the lowest and the highest," who is "the Word made flesh," "raises up man to God, and brings God down to man" The fulness of the Godhead resides in him bodily, and out of that fulness he communicates freely to us.
2. The relation of the body to the Head. "From whom the whole body, being supplied and knit together through the joints and bands.
(1) The care of Christ extends to every member of the body. We must likewise learn to extend our love to all the saints.
(2) There is a double effect produced by the relation of Head and members.
(a) The supply of nutriment. Christ is the sole Source of supply to our souls the joints." God calls us "to this fellowship with his Son". (1Jn_1:7)
(a) We can have no spiritual nutriment from Christ till we have believed in him.
(b) The joints through which our supply of grace comes cannot be broken. "Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?". (Rom_8:39)
(c) It is through these joints we receive Christ"s "unsearchable riches"; (Eph_3:9) all spiritual blessings in heavenly places"; (Eph_1:3) so that we come behind in no spiritual gift.
(b) The compacting of the frame into a perfect unity together by bands." Christ is the Source of the Church"s unity. "He hath made both. (Eph_2:14) There is a unity of faith, a unity of spiritual life, a unity of ordinance, a unity of love, a unity of final destiny, in the Church, by virtue of her connection with her Head.
3. The end of this relation. "Increaseth with the increase of God;" that is, with the increase which he supplies.
(1) The body grows extensively, by the addition of new members; it grows intensively in grace, knowledge, and the practice of all holy duties.
(2) he First Cause of all this growth is God. Paul may plant, and Apollos water, but "it is God who gave the increase". (1Co_3:6) Thus through Christ, God and man are linked together; the finite and the Infinite are reconciled; the great problem of speculation has been at last practically solved.
V THE DANGER OF ANGEL WORSHIP. "Let no man rob you of your prize." The apostle implies that the prize of eternal life prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus would be lost by turning aside from the Head to angelic mediators. We must not "lose what we have wrought" in this way. (2Jn_1:10) "Let no man take thy crown". (Rev_3:11) Let us, therefore, avoid "profane babblings and oppositions of science falsely so called", (1Ti_6:20) and hold fast "the faith once delivered to the saints". T.C. (Jud_1:4)
The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Biblical Illustrator 1887 · Public Domain On vv18, 20 Let no man beguile you of your reward in…
Col_2:18-19
Let no man beguile you of your reward in a voluntary humility.
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It is evident that humility here is degraded and discoloured by the tinge which is given it by its close connection with the words in a voluntary. This is a rendering in the LXX. of a Hebrew word signifying taking a delight in, having ones own inclination gratified in. θέλω is used of that which a man does of his own notion, and passes over into the notion of sheer self-will and arbitrariness. Thus we learn the important lesson that virtues and graces are too delicate for the rough admeasurement of mere hard and fast moral lines. Their beauty and acceptability depart, and may even turn into their opposites. Wilful self-complacency in humility is censured by St. Paul as inconsistent with the sweet unconsciousness of true humility. It becomes the worst pride, or the most abject meanness--the pride or the meanness which apes humility. The word will worship in Col_2:23 shows that a strong sense of θέλω, as intense self-will, was present to St. Pauls mind. There as here, self-will imparts a contamination to the virtue with which it is associated. Humility and worship themselves become pride and superstition. Hence in Luk_1:48 the word should be rendered low estate, not humility. One who says, I am humble, is not humble. Mary does not profess humility, she practices it. (Bp. Alexander.)
Speculative and practical error
I. The speculative side of the Colossian heresy. In the Authorized Version the apostle is made to bring a charge of presumption against the false teachers intruding into the things which he hath not seen. But this is a strange argument for one whose whole walk was by faith and not by sight, and who would hardly count it an answer to a professed revelation to say you are intruding into that which you have not seen, and therefore you cannot know with modern materialists. But this difficulty is removed in the Revised Version, which, on high authority, omits the not, and inverts the argument. Again, the Greek word intruding into means dwelling in or taking his stand upon, and the charge now becomes that of self-complacent self-conceit.
1. This man has seen things, the exact equivalent of our a man has views, a phrase of which obscure thinkers are very fond. The Colossian speculator may have professed to see visions and revelations of the Lord, and to bare come back from the third heaven to reveal them; or, if not this, to have seen things in the tone of an arrogant thinker, who gives his notions the style of certainties, verified with the eye of the mind, dwelling in them with complacent satisfaction as the whole of truth.
2. Or we may take the marginal reading, taking his stand upon his views; regarding them as land which he has won with his intellectual bow and spear, and from which he can go on to move or conquer the universe.
3. These new thinkers spoke much of the mind, made knowledge the bait of their enticements, endeavoured to establish an aristocracy of intellect within that Christian society which was free to all comers, and in which the wise and prudent are set side by side with babes. How striking is St. Pauls language, idly inflated with the mind of his flesh. So far from being edified into the spiritual realm it was merely puffed up, and had its moving power in the repudiated sphere of matter. That Paul would so describe all so-called modern thought which sets aside Christ is certain.
II. We pass on to verse 23 to the practical side of the new heresy.
1. Here we have its treatment of matter, how its teachers sought by ceremonial prohibitions (verse 21) to counteract the deadly influence of sense in spirit, and to mortify the body as an enemy of the spiritual life. It was a plausible, and perhaps, in its origin, a well-intentioned effort. It was nobler than that which treats matter as of no moment. But the two perversions have one root. Asceticism and licence both rob the body of its dignity as the servant of the spirit.
2. St. Paul admits that the ascetic rules have a show of wisdom; they speak plausibly, and promise largely by their will worship, i.e., their religion of self-imposed observances; by their humility, i.e., their obsequiousness; and by their severity to the body, i.e., their mortifying restrictions.
3. Thus far both versions agree. But now the Authorized Version says, not in any honour to the satisfying of the flesh. This leaves out a particle which demands a contrast. But without this is it in accordance with St. Pauls teaching to blame a system for not satisfying the flesh? Indeed, the Greek word is indulgence. But the Revised Version has inserted the particle of antithesis, and reads, but are not of any value against the indulgence of the flesh. The language is borrowed from the medical profession. What is good for it? What is a valuable remedy for such and such a disease? Indulgence of the flesh is the disease; can asceticism cure it? St. Paul says no! It sounds well, professes loudly, but has no real value.
4. Rules of abstinence, regulations as to food or drink--lawful, indeed, but from which it is an act of religion to abstain--have a show of wisdom; they point to a terrible evil and profess to cure it; they are well sounding words, temperance and the like; they talk of the value of humility in bending the neck to discipline. St. Paul does not deny that the conquest of the body is good, and that the means have something to say for themselves; but he declares as a man of large experience who has tried all means, and who is taught of God that all such regulations will fail.
III. The true principle of Christian thinking and living.
1. In Christ Jesus are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. They who do not hold fast the Head therefore, whatever they may think or see or dream, cannot but be puffed up and not edified.
2. In Christ with whom our life is hid in God (chap. 3:1) can alone be found the secret of the victory over the flesh which is the professed object of every system of ethics. If ye are dead what need of touch not, etc.? If ye are risen the chains of flesh shall fall off by the influence of the spiritual life. (Dean Vaughan.)
The angels and the Head
I. The warning.
1. Let no man rob you of your prize. The metaphor is that of the race or wrestling ground; the judge is Christ, the reward is the crown, not of fading bay leaves, but of sprays from the tree of life which dower with blessedness the brows round which they are wreathed. The tendency of the heresy is to rob them of this. No names were mentioned, but the portrait of the robber is drawn with four rapid but accurate strokes of the pencil.
(1) Delighting in humility and the worshipping of angels--
(a) The humility has not a genuine ring about it. Self-conscious humility in which a man takes delight is not the real thing. A man who knows that he is humble and is self-complacent about it, glancing out of the corners of his downcast eyes at any mirror where he can see himself, is not humble at all. The devils darling vice is the pride that apes humility.
(b) So very humble were these people that they would not venture to pray to God. The utmost they could do was to lay hold of the lowest link of a long chain of angel mediators in hope that the vibration might run upwards through all the links, and perhaps reach the throne at last. Such fantastic abasement which would not take God at His word, nor draw near to Him through Christ, was the very height of pride.
(2) Dwelling in the things he hath seen, i.e., by visions, etc. The charge against the false teachers was of walking in a vain show of unreal imaginations.
(3) Vainly puffed up by his fleshly mind. The self-conscious humility was only skin deep, and covered the utmost intellectual arrogance. The false teacher was like a blown bladder, dropsical from conceit of intellectual ability which was after all only the instrument of the flesh, the sinful self. Of course, such could have no grip of Christ, from whom such tempers were sure to detach.
(4) Therefore, the damning indictment closes with not holding the head.
2. The special forms of these errors are gone; but the tendencies which underlay them are as rampant as ever.
(1) The worship of angels is dead, but we are often tempted to think that we are too sinful to claim our portion of the promises. The spurious humility is by no means out of date, which knows better than God whether He can forgive, and grasps at others as well as Christ, the one Mediator.
(2) We do not see visions and dream dreams, except that here and there some one is led astray by spiritualism, but plenty of us attach more importance to our speculations than to the clear revelation of God in Christ. The unseen world has for many an unwholesome attraction. The Gnostic spirit is still among us which despises the foundation truths of the gospel as milk for babes, and values its baseless artificial speculations about subordinate matters which are unrevealed because they are subordinate, and fascinating to some minds because unrevealed, far above the truths which are clear because they are vital, and inspired because clear.
(3) And a swollen self-conceit is, of all things, the most certain to keep a man away from Christ. We must feel our utter helplessness and need before we shall lay hold of Him; and whatever slackens our hold of Christ tends to deprive us of the final prize. Hold fast that thou hast; let no man take thy crown.
II. The source and manner of all true growth is set forth in order to enforce the warning and to emphasize the need of holding the head.
1. Christ is not merely represented as supreme and sovereign, but as the source of spiritual life.
2. That life which flows through the head is diffused through the whole body by the various and harmonious action of all the parts. The body is supplied and knit together, i.e., the functions of nutrition and compaction into a whole are performed by the joints and bands, in which last word are included muscles, nerves, tendons. Their action is the condition of growth, but the Head is the source of all. Churches have been bound together by other bonds, such as creeds, polity, nationality; but an external bond is only like a rope round a bundle of faggots.
3. The blessed results of supply and unity are effected through the action of the various parts. If each organ is in healthy action the body grows. There is diversity in offices; the same life is light in the eyes, beauty in the cheek, strength in the hand, thought in the brain. The effect of Christianity is to heighten individuality, and to give to each man his own proper gift from God. The perfect light is the blending of all colours.
4. A community where each member thus holds firmly by the Head will increase with the increase of God. There is an increase not of God. These heretical teachers were swollen with dropsical self-conceit. The individual may increase in apparent knowledge, in volubility, in visions and speculations, in so-called Christian work; the Church may increase in members, wealth, influence, etc., and it may not be sound growth, but proud flesh that needs the knife. (A. Maclaren, D. D.)
The seductive peril of a false philosophy
A false philosophy--
I. Threatens to rob the reliever of his reward. Many erroneous opinions may be held without invalidating salvation; but any error that depreciates our estimate of Christ, and interrupts the advance of our Christian life, is a robbery.
II. Advocates the most presumptuous and perilous speculations.
1. It affects a spurious humility. God is unknowable to the limited powers of man, so it reasons. But this humility was voluntary, self-induced, and was in reality another form of spiritual pride.
2. It invents a dangerous system of angelolatry.
3. It pretends to a knowledge of the mysterious. Locke says a work in the drawer of a cabinet might as well pretend to guess at the construction of the universe, as man venture to speculate about the unseen world.
III. Ignores the Divine source of all spiritual increase.
1. Christ is the great Head of the Church--the centre of its unity, the source of its life, authority, and influence.
2. The Church is vitally and essentially united to Christ.
3. The vital union of the Church with Christ is the condition of spiritual increase. Lessons: A false philosophy--
1. Distorts the grandest truths.
2. Substitutes for truth the most perilous speculations.
3. Against its teachings be ever on your guard. (G. Barlow.)
Angel worship
I. The apostle brands the seducers and concludes that no regard is to be paid to them.
1. Because in sacred things they arrogated to themselves, by no right whatever, a power of determining as the judges were accustomed in contests. These voluntary umpires decreed the reward of eternal life to none who were unwilling to subscribe to their doctrines. Therefore, as St. Paul struck at this usurpation, we must understand that no such power is granted to man that he should determine anything in religion of his own will; but is bound to judge according to Scripture (Isa_8:20). Hence estimate Romish tyranny which claims this very power.
2. They abused their power to deceive Christians. A director of the games, if he should order any one to run outside the course, would deprive him of his prize; because he would never that way arrive at the goal. So they who direct Christians to seek salvation apart from Christ, endeavour to beguile them of their reward (Heb_3:14). This condemnation rests on all who would lead us from the simplicity of Christ.
II. He shows in what instance they abused their usurped authority. The foolish lowliness of mind which would seek the mediation of angels rather than that of Christ, is rebuked because Christ is more united to us than the angels (Rom_5:2; Heb_4:16; Eph_3:12).
1. Because from this and similar places there arises between us and the Papists a great controversy about the worship of angels and deceased saints who are equal to the angels (Luk_20:36); let us see with whom the truth lies.
(1) Religious worship, whether it be called latria or dulia, is given to God alone, and not to angels or saints. Religion, says Cicero, is that which is comprised in the pious worship of the gods, and Hilary says that religion paid to the creature is accursed. With this Scripture agrees (Deu_6:13; Gal_4:8; Rev_19:10). The foundation of religious worship is infinite excellence apprehended under the consideration of our first cause and chief good; it is not a sufficient reason therefore, for offering to them, that angels and saints are endowed with supernatural gifts, or procure for us many good things, unless they are the first and chief cause to us of our chief good.
(2) The Papists ascribe to angels and even to saints supreme religious worship no less than these seducers here censured.
(a) Prayer is an act of latria or highest worship; for where we pray we acknowledge that its object can hear, deliver, and answer (Psa_50:15). But this is offered to saints.
(b) To make a vow to another is an act of latria, due to God alone (Isa_19:21; Psa_50:14). But vows are made to angels and saints.
(c) To erect a house of prayer, to raise altars and offer incense upon them to any one is to pay Divine honour to him (Exo_30:37; Mat_21:13). But this is done wholesale by Rome to the angels and saints.
2. Paul rejects this doctrine, because
(1) it proceeded from those who are accustomed rashly to invent and speak about matters unknown to them (1Ti_1:7). For they cannot trace angel or saint worship to the Word of God, or learn it from the example of prophets or apostles. Hence we may infer--
(a) That their bold curiosity is not to be endured who intrude themselves into the determining of things, the investigation of which surpasses human wit (Rom_12:3).
(b) Concerning religious matters nothing should be determined without a sure foundation, i.e., the Word of God, for whatever things we see relating to our salvation we find here. He who obtrudes anything not found there, hath not seen it but imagined it.
(c) They, therefore, exercise tyranny over the Church who anathematize all who reject commandments of men for articles of faith.
(2) The authors of this doctrine are puffed up with pride, and thence presume that their inventions are the dictates of truth. The fleshly mind denotes the animal man, or perspicacity, unenlightened by the Spirit (1Co_2:14). (Bp. Davenant.)
False confidences
One of the saddest incidents connected with the disastrous fire at Chicago is that so many trusted not only their goods, but their lives, to buildings that were regarded as fireproof, and that they perished together. Dr. Goodall records similar incidents connected with the great fire at Constantinople in 1831, and makes a suggestive reflection: We, like many others, fared the worse for living in houses which were considered fire-proof. In the great burning day may no such false confidence prove our ruin. (Christian Age.)
Humility before God
Thomas a Becket wore coarse sackcloth made of goats hair from the arms to the knees, but his outer garments were remarkable for splendour and extreme costliness, to the end that, thus deceiving human eyes, he might please the sight of God. (Hoveden.)
How self-will may be lost
A person who had long practised many austerities, without finding any comfort or change of heart, was once complaining to the Bishop of Alst of his state. Alas! said he, self-will and self-righteousness follow me everywhere. Only tell me when you think I shall learn to leave self. Will it be by study, or prayer, or good works? I think, replied the bishop, that the place where you lose self will be that where you find your Saviour.
Not holding the Head.--
The union between head and body
The discoveries of modern physiology have invested the apostles language with far greater distinctness and force than it can have worn to his own contemporaries. Any exposition of the nervous system more especially reads like a commentary on his image of the relations between the body and the head. At every turn we meet with some fresh illustration which kindles it with a flood of light. The volition communicated from the brain to the limbs, the sensations of the extremities telegraphed back to the brain, the absolute mutual sympathy between the head and the members, the instantaneous paralysis ensuing on the interruption of continuity, all these add to the completeness and life of the image. Bearing in mind the diversity of opinion among ancient physiologists, we cannot fail to be struck in the text, not only with the correctness of the image, but also with the propriety of the terms; and we are forcibly reminded that among the apostles most intimate companions at this time was one whom he calls the beloved physician (Col_4:14). (Bp. Lightfoot.)
The Head and the body
I. The head supplies all things necessary to its members. In worshipping angels the seducers diminished the dignity of Christ, for they took away from Him the prerogative of the Head, and incorrectly judged of His virtue and sufficiency. For Christ, the God Man, is Head of the Church. If they acknowledged Him as God they would seek from Him alone grace and salvation; if as man, they would not solicit angels to intercede for them, since Christ, our Elder Brother, sits continually at the right hand of God. Hence we may infer--
1. That they who are concerned about their salvation, ought never to turn their eyes from their Head in whom alone is salvation.
2. Christians are seduced to do so, and do not hold the Head, whenever they embrace new doctrines, worship, means of salvation never prescribed by Christ and His apostles (1Ti_6:3-4).
II. The head binds and knits together the same. To itself and to each other.
1. The effect obtained from cleaving to Christ is that the whole body has by joints nourishment ministered.
(1) The joints are
(a) The Spirit of Christ (Rom_8:9). As that member is not united to the head which is not animated by the same essence as the head itself, neither is that Christian united to Christ who lacks His Spirit.
(b) The gifts of the Spirit, e.g., faith by which as a secondary mean we are united to Christ, and receive the remission of sins and all the grace promised in the gospel (Joh_6:35).
(2) The whole body thus adhering to Christ hath nourishment ministered. The Greeks called him minister who supplied all the apparatus to the leaders of the sacred dances. By a metaphor derived from this he is said to supply the expenditure who furnishes to another the things necessary for any particular object; and the word used by Paul signifies the doing of this copiously and abundantly by Christ, who supplies all the means of salvation. For whether we regard the grace making grateful, or grace gratuitously given, Christ abundantly supplies both to His Church by His Spirit.
(a) Of that grace which has reference to justification and sanctification, Paul testifies (Rom_8:10; 2Co_8:9) that it is ministered to all His members by Christ.
(b) The same with that which relates to the edification of the Church (1Co_12:7, etc.; Eph_4:11).
(3) We may here observe--
(a) That in the whole body of the Church is not a single dry member, but all are watered by streams of grace flowing from the Head.
(b) To adhere to the Pope as a visible head, does not constitute membership, but adherence to Christ. Therefore the ungodly are not true members, to whatever visible Church joined, unless by the joints of the Spirit and faith they are united to Christ.
(c) As to doctrine and salvation the Church is supplied from its. Head, not one member from another.
(d) The Papists err, who will have the Church to draw the doctrine of salvation, not alone from Christ, but from tradition; who will have her receive holiness, merit, etc., not from Christ alone, but the saints. If this be so, the text is not true.
2. By virtue of the Head, the whole body is knit together (Rom_12:5). The bands are the same- the Spirit and the gifts of the Spirit. For the same Spirit who unites us to Christ is the principal band by which we are united to each other (1Co_12:13), and after He is infused into all the ligaments of the Church, He enkindles in every one that excellent gift of charity which is also the firmest bond of cohesion. The other ties are diversities of gifts and callings emanating from the same Spirit (Eph_4:11-12).
III. The fruit of this union.
1. While united to Christ by faith, and knit together by love, the whole body of the Church increaseth in faith, love, holiness, and all saving grace. This growth is said to be of God as He is the primary agent (1Co_3:6), and because it tends to His glory as the ultimate end.
2. Observe of this increase--
(1) As there is a growth in the natural body in all its parts, so in the mystical body all the members increase spiritually.
(2) Not every increase is approved. A member of the body is not said to increase when it is inflated with any bad humour. So the piety of a Christian man is not increased when his mind is filled with tradition and will worship, which proceed not from the Spirit, but from the empty mind of ignorance and pride.
(3) Be not deceived by that incongruous mass of opinions of the Romish Church. The kingdom of the Pope may be increased, viz., by temporal things, traditions, superstitions, not by the knowledge of God and piety. (Bp. Davenant.)
(See also on chap. 1:18, and Eph_4:16.)
The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Expositor's Bible 1887 · Public Domain On v20 Chapter 2 Part 7
Chapter 2 Part 7
TWO FINAL TESTS OF THE FALSE TEACHING
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Col_2:20-23 (R.V.)
The polemical part of the Epistle is now coming to an end. We pass in the next chapter, after a transitional paragraph, to simple moral precepts which, with personal details, fill up the remainder of the letter. The antagonist errors appear for the last time in the words which we have now to consider. In these the Apostle seems to gather up all his strength to strike two straight, crashing, final blows, which pulverise and annihilate the theoretical positions and practical precepts of the heretical teachers. First, he puts in the form of an unanswerable demand for the reason for their teachings, their radical inconsistency with the Christians death with Christ, which is the very secret of his life. Then, by a contemptuous concession of their apparent value to people who will not look an inch below the surface, he makes more emphatic their final condemnation as worthless-less than nothing and vanity-for the suppression of "the flesh"- the only aim of all moral and religious discipline. So we have here two great tests by their conformity to which we may try all teachings which assume to regulate life, and all Christian teaching about the place and necessity for ritual and outward prescriptions of conduct. "Ye are dead with Christ." All must fit in with that great fact. The restraint and conquest of "the flesh" is the purpose of all religion and of all moral teaching-our systems must do that or they are naught, however fascinating they may be.
I. We have then to consider the great fact of the Christians death with Christ, and to apply it as a touchstone.
The language of the Apostle points to a definite time when the Colossian Christians "died" with Christ. That carries us back to former words in the chapter, where, as we found, the period of their baptism, considered as the symbol and profession of their conversion, was regarded as the time of their burial. They died with Christ when they clave with penitent trust to the truth that Christ died for them. When a man unites himself by faith to the dying Christ as his Peace, Pardon, and Saviour, then he too in a very real sense dies with Jesus.
That thought that every Christian is dead with Christ runs through the whole of Pauls teaching. It is no mere piece of mysticism on his tips, though it has often become so, when divorced from morality, as it has been by some Christian teachers. It is no mere piece of rhetoric, though it has often become so, when men have lost the true thought of what Christs death is for the world. But to Paul the cross of Christ was, first and foremost, the altar of sacrifice on which the oblation had been offered that took away all his guilt and sin; and then, because it was that, it became the law of his own life, and the power that assimilated him to his Lord.
The plain English of it all is, that when a man becomes a Christian by putting his trust in Christ Who died, as the ground of his acceptance and salvation, such a change takes place upon his whole nature and relationship to externals as is fairly comparable to a death.
The same illustration is frequent in ordinary speech. What do we mean when we talk of an old man being dead to youthful passions or follies or ambitions? We mean that they have ceased to interest him, that he is separated from them and insensible to them. Death is the separator. What an awful gulf there is between that fixed white face beneath the sheet and all the things about which the man was so eager an hour ago! How impossible for any cries of love to pass the chasm! "His sons come to honour, and he knoweth it not." The "business" which filled his thoughts crumbles to pieces, and he cares not. Nothing reaches him or interests him any more. So, if we have got hold of Christ as our Saviour, and have found in His cross the anchor of souls, that experience will deaden us to all which was our life, and the measure in which we are joined to Jesus by our faith in His great sacrifice, will be the measure in which we are detached from our former selves, and from old objects of interest and pursuit. The change may either be called dying with Christ, or rising with Him. The one phrase takes hold of it at an earlier stage than the other; the one puts stress on our ceasing, to be what we were, the other on our beginning to be what we were not. So our text is followed by a paragraph corresponding in form and substance, and beginning, "If ye then be risen with Christ," as this begins, "If ye died with Christ!"
Such detachment from externals and separation from a former self is not unknown in ordinary life. Strong emotion of any kind makes us insensible to things around, and even to physical pain. Many a man with the excitement of the battlefield boiling in his brain, "receives but recks not of a wound." Absorption of thought and interest leads to what is called "absence of mind," where the surroundings are entirely unfelt, as in the case of the saint who rode all day on the banks of the Swiss lake, plunged in theological converse, and at evening asked where the lake was, though its waves had been rippling for twenty miles at his mules feet. Higher tastes drive out lower ones. as some great stream turned into a new channel will sweep it clear of mud and rubbish. So, if we are joined to Christ, He will fill our souls with strong emotions and interests which will deaden our sensitiveness to things around us, and will inspire new loves, tastes, and desires, which will make us indifferent to much that we used to be eager about, and hostile to much that we once cherished.
To what shall we die if we are Christians? The Apostle answers that question in various ways, which we may profitably group together. "Reckon ye also yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin". {Rom_6:11} "He died for all, that they which live should no longer live unto themselves". {2Co_5:14-15} "Ye are become dead to the law." {Rom_7:6} By the cross of Christ, "the world hath been crucified unto me, and I unto the world." So then, to the whole mass of outward material things, all this present order which surrounds us, to the unrenounced self which has ruled us so long, and to the sin which results from the appeals of outward things to that evil self-to these, and to the mere outward letter of a commandment which is impotent to enforce its own behests or deliver self from the snares of the world and the burden of sin, we cease to belong in the measure in which we are Christs. The separation is not complete; but, if we are Christians at all, it is begun, and henceforward our life is to be a "dying daily." It must either be a dying life or a living death. We shall still belong in our outward being-and, alas! far too much in heart also-to the world and self and sin-but, if we are Christians at all, there will be a real separation from these in the inmost heart of our hearts, and the germ of entire deliverance from them all will be in us.
This day needs that truth to be strongly urged. The whole meaning of the death of Christ is not reached when it is regarded as the great propitiation for our sins. Is it the pattern for our lives? Has it drawn us away from our love of the world, from our sinful self, from the temptations to sin, from cowering before duties which we hate but dare not neglect? Has it changed the current of our lives, and lifted us into a new region where we find new interests, loves, and aims, before which the twinkling lights, which once were stars to us, pale their ineffectual fires? If so, then, just in as much as it is so, and not one hairs breadth the more, may we call ourselves Christians. If not, it is of no use for us to talk about looking to the cross as the source of our salvation. Such a look, if it be true and genuine, will certainly change all a mans tastes, habits, aspirations, and relationships. If we know nothing of dying with Christ, it is to be feared we know as little of Christs dying for us.
This great fact of the Christians death with Christ comes into view here mainly as pointing the contradiction between the Christians position, and his subjection to the prescriptions and prohibitions of a religion which consists chiefly in petty rules about conduct. We are "dead," says Paul, "to the rudiments of the world,"-a phrase which we have already heard in verse 8 {Col_2:8} of this chapter, where we found its meaning to be "precepts of an elementary character, fit for babes, not for men in Christ, and moving principally in the region of the material." It implies a condemnation of all such regulation religion on the two grounds, that it is an anachronism, seeking to perpetuate an earlier stage which has been left behind, and that it has to do with the outsides of things, with the material and visible only. To such rudiments we are dead with Christ. Then, queries Paul, with irresistible triumphant question-why, in the name of consistency, "do you subject yourself to ordinances" (of which we have already heard in Col_2:14) such as "handle not, nor taste, nor touch"? These three prohibitions are not Pauls, but are quoted by him as specimens of the kind of rules and regulations which he is protesting against. The ascetic teachers kept on vehemently reiterating their prohibitions, and as the correct rendering of the words shows, with a constantly increasing in tolerance. "Handle not" is a less rigid prohibition than "touch not." The first says, Do not lay hold of the last, Do not even touch with the tip of your finger. So asceticism, like many another tendency and habit, grows by indulgence, and demands abstinence ever more rigid and separation ever more complete. And the whole thing is out of date, and a misapprehension of the genius of Christianity. Mans work in religion is ever to confine it to the surface, to throw it outward and make it a mere round of things done and things abstained from. Christs work in religion is to drive it inwards, and to focus all its energy on "the hidden man of the heart," knowing that if that be right, the visible will come right. It is waste labour to try to stick figs on the prickles of a thorn bush-as it the tree, so will be the fruit. There are plenty of pedants and martinets in religion as well as on the parade ground. There must be so many buttons on the uniform, and the shoulder belts must be pipe clayed, and the rifles on the shoulders sloped at just such an angle - and then all will be right. Perhaps so. Disciplined courage is better thancourage undisciplined. But there is much danger of all the attention being given to drill, and then, when the parade ground is exchanged for the battlefield, disaster comes because there is plenty of etiquette and no dash.
Mens lives are pestered out of them by a religion which tries to tie them down with as many tiny threads as those with which the Liliputians fastened down Gulliver. But Christianity in its true and highest forms is not a religion of prescriptions, but of principles. It does not keep perpetually dinning a set of petty commandments and prohibitions into our ears. Its language is not a continual "Do this, forbear from that,"-but "Love, and thou fulfillest the law." It works from the centre outwards to the circumference; first making clean the inside of the platter, and so ensuring that the outside shall be clean also. The error with which Paul fought, and which perpetually crops up anew, having its roots deep in human nature, begins with the circumference and wastes effort in burnishing the outside.
The parenthesis which follows in the text, "all which things are to perish with the using," contains an incidental remark intended to show the mistake of attaching such importance to regulations about diet and the like, from the consideration of the perishableness of these meats and drinks about which so much was said by the false teachers. "They are all destined for corruption, for physical decomposition-in the very act of consumption." You cannot use them without using them up. They are destroyed in the very moment of being used. Is it fitting for men who have died with Christ to this fleeting world, to make so much of its perishable things?
May we not widen this thought beyond its specific application here, and say that death with Christ to the world should deliver us from the temptation of making much of the things which perish with the using, whether that temptation is presented in the form of attaching exaggerated religious importance to ascetic abstinence from them or in that of exaggerated regard and unbridled use of them? Asceticism and Sybaritic luxury have in common an overestimate of the importance of the material things. The one is the other turned inside out. Dives in his purple and fine linen, and the ascetic in his hair shirt, both make too much of "what they shall put on." The one with his feasts and the other with his fasts both think too much of what they shall eat and drink. A man who lives on high with his Lord puts all these things in their right place. There are things which do not perish with the using, but grow with use, like the five loaves in Christs hands. Truth, love, holiness, all Christlike graces and virtues increase with exercise, and the more we feed on the bread which comes down from heaven, the more shall we have for our own nourishment and for our brothers need. There is a treasure which faileth not, bags which wax not old, the durable riches and undecaying possessions of the soul that lives on Christ and grows like Him. These let us seek after; for if our religion be worth anything at all, it should carry us past all the fleeting wealth of earth straight into the heart of things, and give us for our portion that God whom we can never exhaust, nor outgrow, but possess the more as we use His sweetness for the solace, and His all-sufficient Being for the good, of our souls.
The final inconsistency between the Christian position and the practical errors in question is glanced at in the words "after the commandments and doctrines of men," which refer, of course, to the ordinances of which Paul is speaking. The expression is a quotation from Isaiahs denunciation {Isa_29:13} of the Pharisees of his day, and as used here seems to suggest that our Lords great discourse on the worthlessness of the Jewish punctilios about meats and drinks was in the Apostles mind, since the same words of Isaiah occur there in a similar connection. It is not fitting that we, who are withdrawn from dependence on the outward visible order of things by our union with Christ in His death, should be under the authority of men. Here is the true democracy of the Christian society. "Ye were redeemed with a price. Be not the servants of men." Our union to Jesus Christ is a union of absolute authority and utter submission. We all have access to the one source of illumination, and we are bound to take our orders from the one Master. The protest against the imposition of human authority on the Christian soul is made not in the interests of self-will, but from reverence to the only voice that has the right to give autocratic commands and to receive unquestioning obedience. We are free in proportion as we are dead to the world with Christ. We are free from men not that we may please ourselves, but that we may please Him.
"Hold your peace, I want to hear what my Master has to command me," is the language of the Christian freedman, who is free that he may serve, and because he serves.
II. We have to consider one great purpose of all teaching and external worship, by its power in attaining which any system is to be tried.
"Which things have indeed a show of wisdom in will worship, and humility, and severity to the body, but are not of any value against the indulgence of the flesh." Here is the conclusion of the whole matter, the parting summary of the indictment against the whole irritating tangle of restrictions and prescriptions. From a moral point of view it is worthless, as having no coercive power over "the flesh." Therein lies its conclusive condemnation, for if religious observances do not help a man to subdue his sinful self, what, in the name of common sense, is the use of them? The Apostle knows very well that the system which he was opposing had much which commended it to people, especially to those who did not look very deep. It had a "show of wisdom" very fascinating on a superficial glance, and that in three points, all of which caught the vulgar eye, and all of which turned into the opposite on closer examination.
It had the look of being exceeding devotion and zealous worship. These teachers with their abundant forms impose upon the popular imagination, as if they were altogether given up to devout contemplation and prayer. But if one looks a little more closely at them, one sees that their devotion is the indulgence of their own will and not surrender to Gods. They are not worshipping Him as He has appointed, but as they have themselves chosen, and as they are rendering services which He has not required, they are in a very true sense worshipping their own wills, and not God at all. By "will worship" seems to be meant self-imposed forms of religious service which are the outcome not of obedience, nor of the instincts of a devout heart, but of a mans own will. And the Apostle implies that such supererogatory and volunteered worship is no worship. Whether offered in a cathedral or a barn, whether the worshipper wear a cope or a fustian jacket, such service is not accepted. A prayer which is but the expression of the worshippers own will, instead of being "not my will but Thine be done," reaches no higher than the lips that utter it. If we are subtly and half unconsciously obeying self even while we seem to be bowing before God; if we are seeming to pray, and are all the while burning incense to ourselves instead of being drawn out of ourselves by the beauty and the glory of the God towards whom our spirits yearn, then our devotion is a mask, and our prayers will be dispersed in empty air.
The deceptive appearance of wisdom in these teachers and their doctrines is further manifest in the humility which felt so profoundly the gulf between man and God that it was fain to fill the void with its fantastic creations of angel mediators. Humility is a good thing, and it looked very humble to say, We cannot suppose that such insignificant flesh-encompassed creatures as we can come into contact and fellowship with God; but it was a great deal more humble to take God at His word, and to let Him lay down the possibilities and conditions of intercourse, and to tread the way of approach to Him which He has appointed. If a great king were to say to all the beggars and ragged losels of his capital, Come to the palace tomorrow; which would be the humbler, he who went, rags and leprosy and all, or he who hung back because he was so keenly conscious of his squalor? God says to men, "Come to My arms through My Son. Never mind the dirt, come." Which is the humbler: he who takes God at His word, and runs to hide his face on his Fathers breast, having access to Him through Christ the Way, or he who will not venture near till he has found some other mediators besides Christ? A humility so profound that it cannot think Gods promise and Christs mediation enough for it, has gone so far West that it has reached the East, and from humility has become pride.
Further, this system has a show of wisdom in "severity to the body." Any asceticism, is a great deal more to mens taste than abandoning self. They will rather stick hooks in their backs and do the "swinging poojah," than give up their sins or yield up their wills. It is easier to travel the whole distance from Cape Comorin to the shrine of Juggernaut, measuring every foot of it by the body laid prostrate in the dust, than to surrender the heart to the love of God. In the same manner the milder forms of putting oneself to pain, hair shirts, scourgings, abstinence from pleasant things with the notion that thereby merit is acquired, or sin atoned for, have a deep root in human nature, and hence "a show of wisdom." It is strange, and yet not strange, that people should think that, somehow or other, they recommend themselves to God by making themselves uncomfortable, but so it is that religion presents itself to many minds mainly as a system of restrictions and injunctions which forbids the agreeable and commands the unpleasant. So does our poor human nature vulgarise and travesty Christs solemn command to deny ourselves and take up our cross after Him.
The conclusive condemnation of all the crowd of punctilious restrictions of which the Apostle has been speaking lies in the fact that, however they may correspond to mens mistaken notions, and so seem to be the dictate of wisdom, they "are not of any value against the indulgence of the flesh." This is one great end of all moral and spiritual discipline, and if practical regulations do not tend to secure it, they are worthless.
Of course by "flesh" here we are to understand, as usually in the Pauline Epistles, not merely the body, but the whole unregenerate personality, the entire unrenewed self that thinks and feels and wills and desires apart from God. To indulge and satisfy it is to die, to slay and suppress it is to live. All these "ordinances" with which the heretical teachers were pestering the Colossians have no power, Paul thinks, to keep that self down, and therefore they seem to him so much rubbish. He thus lifts the whole question up to a higher level and implies a standard for judging much formal outward Christianity which would make very short work of it.
A man may be keeping the whole round of them and seven devils may be in his heart. They distinctly tend to foster some of the "works of the flesh," such as self-righteousness, uncharitableness, censoriousness, and they as distinctly altogether fail to subdue any of them. A man may stand on a pillar like Simeon Stylites for years, and be none the better. Historically the ascetic tendency has not been associated with the highest types of real saintliness except by accident, and has never been their productive cause. The bones rot as surely inside the sepulchre though the whitewash on its dome be ever so thick.
So the world and the flesh are very willing that Christianity should shrivel into a religion of prohibitions and ceremonials, because all manner of vices and meannesses may thrive and breed under these, like scorpions under stones. There is only one thing that will put the collar on the neck of the animal within us, and that is the power of the indwelling Christ. The evil that is in us all is too strong for every other fetter. Its cry to all these "commandments and ordinances of men" is, "Jesus I know, and Paul I know, but who are ye?" Not in obedience to such, but in the reception into our spirits of His own life, is our power of victory over self. "This I say, Walk in the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfil the lusts of the flesh."
William Robertson Nicoll, ed., The Expositor's Bible (London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1887–1910) — public domain. 65 of 66 books (1 Corinthians is not separately keyed, as that volume carries no machine-parseable verse references); section-level commentary keyed to the opening verse. Introductory and overview sections not keyed to a specific passage are excluded.
B. W. Johnson 1891 · Public Domain On vv18–23 18. Let no man beguile you. Rob you of…
18. Let no man beguile you. Rob you of your reward by his guile. He will do so if you become unworthy of it by a voluntary humility. By a humility that is willed, and therefore is affected rather than real. It is probable that the false teachers made a great pretence of humility, and taught a self-abasement, like that of monks clad in sackcloth, or who go barefoot. And worshiping of angels. One feature of the heresy against which Paul warned them was angel worship. See Rev. 19:10. Angel worship, the worship of saints, dead or living, of pope, or any created thing, is forbidden. “Worship God,” said the angel before whom John bowed. Church history states that at a later period Michael the archangel was worshiped. Dwelling in the things which he hath seen (Revision). Claiming special revelations. He refers to “no man.”
B. W. Johnson's The People's New Testament with Notes (1889–1891) — public domain. Electronic text from the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (CCEL) ThML edition.
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary 1892 · Public Domain On vv18, 20 Col_2:18. Let no man beguile you of your reward.—R.V.…
CRITICAL AND EXPLANATORY NOTES
Col_2:18. Let no man beguile you of your reward.—R.V. “let no man rob you of your prize.” There seems to be implied some such thought as this: Do not allow these heretical teachers to lay down for you the conditions on which the prize shall be yours; for when they pronounce in your favour, “the Lord, the righteous Judge,” pronounces against you. In a voluntary humility and worshipping of angels.—In acts of self-imposed abasement in the presence of invisible beings. St. John tells us of the rebuke administered by the angel before whom he prostrated himself: “See thou do it not: … worship God.” But there are men who would say, “Nay, my Lord,” and continue their forbidden worship. Intruding into those things which he hath not seen.—The change in the R.V. is considerable: “dwelling in the things which he hath seen.” The apostle is apparently speaking ironically of the boasted manifestations made to the Gnostic teachers.
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MAIN HOMILETICS OF THE PARAGRAPH.—Col_2:18-19
The Seductive Peril of a False Philosophy.
The apostle had warned the Colossians against the dangerous consequences of attaching too much importance to the ceremonial in religion, inasmuch as it was the substitution of the shadow for the substance. He now reveals the peril of being seduced by the theological error that insisted on interposition of angel mediators, which was the preference of an inferior member to the Head. In this verse the writer distinctly warns the Colossian Christians against the peril that threatened them, and exposes the presumptuous speculations of a false philosophy.
I. That the teachings of a false philosophy threaten to rob the believer of his most coveted reward.—“Let no man beguile you of your reward” (Col_2:18). The Christian’s career is a race; the present world is the stadium, or racecourse; Christ is the umpire—the dispenser of rewards; eternal life is the victor’s prize. The Colossians were in a fair way for winning the prize; they had duly entered the lists; they were contending bravely; but the false teachers unhappily crossed their path, sought to impede their progress, and to rob them of their reward. Error is subtle in its influence and pernicious in its effects. Many erroneous opinions may possibly be held without invalidating the salvation of the soul; but any error that in any degree depreciates our estimate of Christ and interrupts the advance of our Christian life is a robbery. It may be said that the dangerous speculations of a false philosophy are confined only to a few—the higher circle of thinkers. That is bad enough. But what is damaging the higher order of intellects will by-and-by reach the lower and work its mischief there. There is need for uninterrupted vigilance.
II. That a false philosophy advocates the most presumptuous and perilous speculations.—
1. It affects a spurious humility. God is unknowable to the limited and uncertain powers of man; He is too high to be accessible, and too much absorbed in loftier matters to concern Himself about individual man. He can be approached only through inferior beings, and their assistance should be humbly sought. So it reasons. But this humility was voluntary, self-induced, and was in reality another form of high spiritual pride. Humility, when it becomes self-conscious, ceases to have any value.
2. It invents a dangerous system of angelolatry.—“Worshipping of angels” (Col_2:18). The Jews were fond of philosophising about the dignity, offices, and ranks of the angelic powers; and many held the opinion that they were messengers who presented our prayers to God. The false teachers made the most of the authority they could derive from Jewish sources. They would tell how the law was given by the disposition of angels—that angels conducted the Israelites through the wilderness, and on various occasions appeared to patriarchs, prophets, and apostles. They would dwell on the weakness of man and his distance from God, and insist that homage should be paid to these angelic messengers as necessary mediators. Alas, how fatal has been the influence through the centuries of this delusive angelolatry! The apostle here condemns it, and thus sweeps away all ground for the Christ-dishonouring practices of invocation of saints and the worship of the Virgin.
3. It pretends to a knowledge of the mysterious.—“Intruding into those things which he hath not seen” (Col_2:18). Man is everywhere circled with mystery. It is one of the saddest moments of life when he first becomes conscious of the limitation of his own powers, and of his utter inability to fathom the mysteries which seem to invite his inquiry while they baffle his attempt. Locke somewhere says, a worm in the drawer of a cabinet, shut up in its tiny enclosure, might as well pretend to guess at the construction of the vast universe, as mortal man venture to speculate about the unseen world, except so far as revealed for purposes of salvation. But fools will rush in where angels fear to tread. The boast of possessing a profound knowledge of the mysterious is one of the marks of a false philosophy.
4. It is inflated with an excessive pride.—“Vainly puffed up by its fleshly mind” (Col_2:18). The carnal mind, which is enmity against God, rises to a pitch of reckless daring in its inventions, and, revelling in its own creative genius, is vainly puffed up with a conceit of novelty and with a fancied superiority over the humbler disciple. There is no state more dangerous than this or more difficult to change. It is proof against every ordinary method of recovery. The proud man lives “half-way down the slope to hell.” God only can break the delusive snare, humble the soul, and revoke its threatened doom.
III. That a false philosophy ignores the divine source of all spiritual increase.—
1. Christ is the great Head of the Church. He is the centre of its unity, the primal source of its life, authority, and influence. He founded the Church, and gave it shape, symmetry, and durableness. He alone is supreme—the Alpha and Omega—the living and only Head. To ignore Him is to forfeit the substantial for the shadowy—the rock for the precarious footing of the crumbling shale.
2. The Church is vitally and essentially united to Christ.—“From which all the body by joints and bands having nourishment ministered and knit together” (Col_2:19). As the members of the human frame are joined to the head, and derive life, motion, and sensation from it by means of arteries, veins, nerves, and other attachments, so the spiritual members of Christ are knit to Him by invisible joints and bands, and depend on Him for sustenance, character, and influence.
3. The vital union of the Church with Christ is the condition of spiritual increase.—“Increaseth with the increase of God” (Col_2:19). Christ is the divine source of increase, and the Church can grow only as it receives nourishment from Him. The growth corresponds with its nature—it is divine; it increaseth with the increase of God. There may be a morbid increase, as there may be an unnatural enlargement of some part of the human body; but it is only the excessive inflation of worldly splendour and ecclesiastical pretension. Like Jonah’s gourd, such a growth may disappear as rapidly as it came. The true increase is that which comes from God, of which He is the source, and active, sustaining influence, and which advances in harmony with His will and purpose. Such an increase can be secured only by vital union with Christ.
Lessons.—
1. A false philosophy distorts the grandest truths.
2. A false philosophy substitutes for truth the most perilous speculations.
3. Against the teachings of a false philosophy be ever on your guard.
GERM NOTES ON THE VERSES
Col_2:18. Philosophic Vagaries—
I. Making pretence of superior knowledge.
II. Affecting a spurious humility in worship.
III. Inflated with pride.
IV. Dangerous to those sincerely seeking the truth.
Col_2:19. How a Church lives and grows.
I. The source of all the life of the body.—Christ is the Head, therefore the source from which all parts of the body partake of a common life. There are three symbols employed to represent the union of Christ with His Church—the vine, the body, and the marriage bond.
II. The various and harmonious action of all the parts.—
1. From Jesus comes all nourishment of the divine life, even when we think that we instruct or stimulate each other.
2. From Jesus comes the oneness of the body.
III. The consequent increase of the whole.—
1. The increase of life in the Church, both as a community and in its separate elements, depends on the harmonious activity of all the parts.
2. Is dependent on the activity of all, and sadly hampered when some are idle.
3. Depends on its vitality within and on the concurrent activity of all its members.
4. Depends not only on the action of all its parts, but on their health and vitality.
5. There is an increase which is not the increase of God.
IV. The personal hold of Jesus Christ which is the condition of all life and growth.—A firm, almost desperate clutch in which Love and Need, like two hands, clasp Him and will not let Him go. Such tenacious grip implies the adhesive energy of the whole nature—the mind laying hold on truth, the heart clinging to love, the will submitting to authority.—A. Maclaren.
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary (gen. ed. Joseph S. Exell; Funk & Wagnalls, c. 1892) — public domain (pre-1929). A full-Bible homiletical/sermon-outline anthology covering 65 of 66 books (2 John is absent from the source module). Text from a community e-Sword module.
C. I. Scofield 1917 · Public Domain On vv18, 20, 23 intruding into those things
intruding into those things
The errorists against whom Paul warns the Colossians, and against whom, in principle, the warning has perpetual significance, were called "Gnostics," from gnosis, "knowledge." These Gnostics "came most keenly into conflict with the exalted rank and redeeming rank of Christ, to whom they did not leave His full divine dignity, but assigned to Him merely the highest rank in the order of spirits, while they exalted angels as concerned in bringing the Messianic salvation."--H.A.W. Meyer. Paul’s characteristic word in Colossians for the divine revelation is epignosis, i.e. "full knowledge." Col 1:9; Col 1:10; Col 3:10 as against the pretended "knowledge" of the errorists. The warnings apply to all extra-biblical forms, doctrines, and customs, and to all ascetic practices.
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angels (See Scofield "Heb 1:4").
The Scofield Reference Bible (1917 edition), notes by C. I. Scofield — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
unfoldingWord translationNotes 2017 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On vv18, 20 Let no one ... judge you out of your…
Let no one ... judge you out of your prize
Here Paul refers to false teachers as if they were corrupt judges at an athletic contest who would unjustly disqualify the believers from winning the prizes they deserve, and he speaks of Christ saving a person as if Christ were giving a prize to the winner of such a contest. AT: "Let no one ... disqualify you from winning a prize" (See: Metaphor)
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who wants humility
The word "humility" is a metonym for actions one does to make others think that one is humble. AT: "who wants you to do things to show that you are humble" (See: Metonymy)
enters into the things he has seen
Here Paul speaks about people who claim to have dreams and visions from God and who talk proudly about them. (See: Metaphor)
becomes puffed up by his fleshly thinking
Here Paul says that sinful ways of thinking make a person arrogant. AT: "puffs himself up by means of his fleshly thinking" (See: Active or Passive)
puffed up
Here a person who boasts is spoken of as if he were an object into which someone had blown air to make it larger than it should be. (See: Metaphor)
his fleshly thinking
Here the idea of flesh stands for the sinful human nature. "the sinful thoughts he naturally thinks" (See: Metaphor)
He does not hold on to the head
A person not trusting in Christ is spoken of has if they do not hold firmly to the head. Christ is spoken of as if he were the head of a body. AT: "He does not firmly grasp Christ, who is like the head of a body" or "He does not cling to Christ, who is like the head of a body" (See: Metaphor)
It is from the head that the whole body throughout its joints and ligaments is supplied and held together
Paul speaks of the church, which is ruled and empowered by Christ, as if it were a human body. AT: "It is from the head that God supplies the whole body throughout its joints and ligaments and holds it together" (See: Metaphor)
translationWords
humble
worship
angel
flesh
head
unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.
Tyndale Open Study Notes 2022 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On vv18, 20, 23 2:18 the worship of angels: People in the first…
2:18 the worship of angels: People in the first century were fascinated with spiritual beings. Some Jews believed that angels were present during their times of worship, and some might even have worshiped them. • The false teachers were evidently saying they had had visions that established certain rituals as requirements for the community.
Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.