Introduction to Colossians: Authorship, Date, Audience - Crain Home

Interpretation 1
thanksgiving for the Colossians because of their positive
response to the gospel (1:3-8), coupled with a prayer for them
to grow in knowledge and productivity (1:9-14). This prayer
deals, though very subtly, with the heart of the epistle: the
heretics claim to have a superior knowledge, yet their very
philosophy chokes out any productivity for God (cf. 2:20-23).
(2) Without so much as an “Amen” to the prayer, Paul
continues with a recital of an early Christian hymn in which
Christ is magnified as Deity in the flesh, the Creator incarnate
(1:15-20). (3) The hymn, which ends with a note on Christ as
reconciler of “all things,” serves as a bridge to Paul’s next
theme: Christ has reconciled the Colossians to God—a
ministry of reconciliation which Paul has proclaimed (1:21-
23). (4) Finally, Paul addresses his own ministry in greater
detail: (a) he has been commissioned with proclaiming “the
mystery” (again, borrowing terms of his opponents)—“Christ
in you, the hope of glory” (1:27)—so that “we may present
everyone perfect in Christ” (1:24-29); (b) he is presently
concerned about the believers in the Lycus Valley, especially
that they might not be “deceived by fine-sounding
arguments” (2:4) which deny the sufficiency of Christ (2:1-7).
http://www.bible.org/docs/soapbox/colotl.htm
The Catholic Encyclopedia divides Colossians into two main parts, the first
being dogmatic-polemical:
http://crain.english.mwsc.edu/colossians/interpretation_1.htm (2 of 20)6/17/2003 8:17:40 AM
The Epistle consists of two parts the first two chapters being
dogmatico-polemical and the last two practical or moral. In
the first part the writer shows the absurdity of the errors by a
direct statement of the supereminent dignity of Christ, by
Whose blood we have the redemption of sins. He is the
perfect image of the invisible God, begotten before all
creatures. By Him and for Him were created all things in
heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, spiritual as well as
material, and by Him are all things upheld. He is the Head of
the Church and He has reconciled all things through the blood
of His cross, and the Colossians "also he hath reconciled . . .
through death". St. Paul, as the Apostle of the Gentiles and a
prisoner for their sakes, exhorts them to hold fast to Christ in
Whom the plenitude of the Godhead dwells, and not to allow
themselves under the plausible name of philosophy, to be reenslaved
by Jewish traditions based on the Law of Moses,