The life and work of St. Paul

PHBASEOLOGY OF THE EPHESIANg, 739
EXCURSUS XXV. (p. 637V
PHRASEOLOGY AND DOCTBINES or THE Erisrun TO
IT i admitted that there are some new and rare expressions in this Epistle ;* but they
are sufficiently accounted for by the idiosyncrasy of the writer, and the peculiarity of the
subjects with which he had to deal. It is monstrous to assume that, in the case of one so
fresh and eager as St. Paul, the vocabulary would not widely vary in writings extending
over nearly twenty years, and written under every possible variety of circumstances, to
very different communities, and in consequence of very different controversies. The
wide range of dissimilarity in thought and expression between Epistles of admitted
authenticity ought sufficiently to demonstrate the futility of overlooking broad probabilities
and almost universal testimony, because of peculiarities of which many are only
discoverable by a minute analysis. It must be remembered that at this period the
phraseology of Christianity was still in a plastic, it might almost be said in a fluid,
condition. No Apostle, no writer of any kind, contributed one tithe so much to its
ultimate cohesion and rigidity as St. PauL Are we then to reject this Epistle, and that
to the Colossians, on grounds so flimsy as the fact that in them for the first time he
speaks of the remission (a(ns, Eph. i. 7; CoL i. 14) instead of the prsetermission (irapeais,
llom. iii. 25) of sins; or that, writing to a Church predominantly Gentile, he says
" Greeks and Jews" (CoL iii. 11) instead of "Jews and Greeks" (Rom. L 16, &c.) ; or
that he uses the word "Church" in a more abstract and generic sense than in his former
writings ; or that he uses the rhetorical expression that the Gospel has been preached in
all the world (CoL i. 6, 23) ? By a similar mode of reasoning it would be possible to
prove in the case of almost every voluminous author in the world that half the works
attributed to him have been written by some one else. Such arguments only encumber
with useless d&yrit the field of criticism. There is indeed one very unusual expression,
the peculiarity of which has been freely admitted by all fair controversialists. It is the
remark that the mystery of Christ is now revealed " to the holy Apostles and Prophets"
are doubtless those of the New Testament
(iii. 5). The Prophets (as in ii. 20; iv. 11)
those who had received from the Spirit His special gifts of illumination ; but the epithet
is unexpected. It can only be accounted for by the general dignity and fulness (the
o-efivonp) of the style in which the Epistle is written ; and the epithet, if genuine, is, it
need hardly be said, official and impersonal.
It would be much more to the purpose if the adverse critics could produce even one
decided instance of un-Pauline theology. The demonology of the Epistle is identical
with that of Paul's Rabbinic 2
training. The doctrine of original sin, even if it were by any
means necessarily deducible from Eph. ii. 3 which is not the case, since the word