COLOSSIANS
133
COLOSSIANS
tiirr early in the second century, by Marcion, the Val-
iiitinians, and by other heretics mentioned in the
" I'hilosophoumena"; and they would not have ac-
copted it had it originated among their opponents
after they broke away from the Church.
Internal Evidence. — The Epistle clauns to have been written by St. Paul, and the internal evidence shows rliise connexion with Philippians (von Soden) and Phil- oiiion, which are admitted to be genuine letters of St. Paul. Renan concedes that it presents several traits "hicli are opposed to the hypothesis of its being a for- il'Tv, and of this number is its connexion with the I]pistle to Philemon. It has to be noted, too, that the moral portion of the Epistle, consisting of the ! i-t two chapters, has the closest affinity with similar pillions of other Epistles, while the whole admirably lit. in with the known details of St. Paul's life, and throws considerable light upon them.
t 'lijECTiONS. — As the historical evidence is much >tri merer than that for the majority of classical writ- 1' ^-. it may be asked why its genuineness was ever
Hi d in que-stion. It was never doubted until 18.38, V t' II Meyerhoff, followed by others, began to raise ohj.'c-tions against it. It will be convenient to deal with these objections under the following four heads: (I ) Style; (2) Christologj-; (.3) Errors dealt with; and I 1 ' Similarity to Ephesians.
1 ) Sliih'. — (a) In general, on comparing the Epistle \W']i Corinthians, Romans, and Galatians, it will be -' 1 ;i that the style, especially in the earlier part, is 1;' i\ y and cnmiilicated. It contains no sudden ques- \ ]•«<<. Tio crushing dilemra.as, no vehement outbursts of swiiping Pauline eloquence. Some of the sentences ail long and involved, and though the whole is set forth in a lofty and noble strain, the presentment is niiifonn, and not quite in the manner, say, of Gala- ti MIS. Hence it is objected that it could not have
I "I II written by St. Paul. But all this can be very
II iturally explained when it is borne in mind that the l^l'istle was written after several years of monotonous roiilinement, when Christianity had taken firm root, wlicii the old type of Judaizerhad become extinct and .■^1 Paul's position securely established. His advanc- iiii: years, also, should be taken into account. It is 1 1' •!! r, moreover, to compare this Epistle, or but parts
■t it, with onli/ certain portions of one or two of the r irlicr ones. There are long and involved sentences sr, ttcred throughout Romans, I and II Corinthians, ainl Calatians, and the generally admitted Epistle to tin' I'hilipiiians. It has also to be observed that n.iny of the old Pauline expressions and methods of
II Manning are most naturally and inextricably inter- wi .\cn with the very tissue and .substance of the Epis- tli , .\mple proofs for all these statements and others tlinnighout this article, are given in works mentioned in the bibliography. Dr. Sanday has voiced the opinion of fair-minded critics when he says that no- li I'iy can view the Epistle as a whole, without being inn.rcssed by its unbreakable unity and genuine Paul- ino I haracter.
li) Many of St. Paul's favourite expressions are
w lilting. From eight to a dozen words not unfre-
ipiiiitly u.sed by him in earlier writings are absent
from this short Epistle; and about a dozen connecting
particles, which he employs elsewhere, are also miss-
iiii; ( )ne or two instances will show how such objec-
1 1' IK may readily be solved, with the aid of a concord-
The worcLs Sf^aios, (rojrtjpta, .and ci/ws are
found in the Epistle. Therefore, etc. — But
- is waritiiig both in I Cor. and I Thess. ; {roirrjpia
- roiitainid either in I Cor. or Gal.; pdfwi is not
toil at all in 1 The.ss. or II Cor. In the same way
(u nil regard to connecting particles) ipa, which is not
III this Epistle, is not found either in Philipp. or the lii-t hundred verses of I Cor., a space much longer thin the whole of th<! Epistle; ipa oin, which is fre- |Mrnt in Romans, is not met with in I and II Cor. and
only once in Gal. (See the details of the argument in
Abbott and Jacquier.)
(c) It is objected that the Epistle contains many strange words, nowhere else used by St. Paul. That, however, is precisely what we should expect in an Epistle of St. Paul. Every Epistle written by him contains many words employed by him nowhere else. Alford gives a list of thirty-two &wa^ \ey6p.€va in this Epistle, and of these eighteen occur in the second chapter, where the errors are dealt with. The same thing occurs in the earlier Epistles, where the Apostle is speaking of new subjects or peculiar errors, and there fiiral \ey6fj.(m most abound. This Epistle does not show more than the ordinary proportion of new words and in this respect compares favourably with the genuine II Cor. Furthermore, the compound words found in the Epistle have their analogues in similar passages of the authentic Epistle to the Ro- mans. It would be most absurd to bind down to a narrow and set vocabulary a writer of such intellec- tual vigour and literary versatility as St. Paul. The vocabularj' of all writers changes with time, place, and subject-matter. Salmon, Mahaffy, and others have pointed out that similar changes of vocabulary occur in the writings of Xenophon, who was a traveller like St. Paul. Compare the earlier and later letters of Lord Acton (edited by Abbot Gasquet) or of Cardinal Newman.
(2) Christologtf. — It has been objected that the ex- alted idea of Christ presented in the Epistle could not have been written by St. Paul. In answer to this it will be sufficient to quote the following passage from the genuine Epistle to the Phili|ipiaiis: "Who [Christ Jesu.s] being in the form of God, tliciut;ht it not robbery to be equal with God: but emptied himself, taking the form of a servant" (ii, 6, 7, etc. See Romans, i, 3, 4; Gr. text, viii, 3; I Cor., viii, 6; II Cor., viii, 9; Gal., iv, 6, etc.). That the Christology of the Epistle does not differ in any essential point from that of St. Paul's other Epistles is seen from an impartial study of these latter. The subject has been scientifically worked out by Pere Rose (Rev. bibl., 1903), M. Lepin (Jesus Mes- sie, 341), Sanday (Criticism of the Fourth Gospel, lect. vii, Oxford, 1905), Knowling (The Testimony of St. Paul to Christ, London, 1905), Lacey (The Historic Christ, London, 1905), etc. Nor can the words (i, 24) : I ... "fill up those things that are wanting of the sufferings of Christ, in my flesh, for his body, which is the church", present any difficulty when it is remem- bered that he had just said that Christ had reconciled all through the blood of His cross, and that the correct meaning of duTauaTrX-qpOi ra va-rep-^fiara tCiv dXl^euiv toO XpiffTou iv TTj ffapKi fjLou inr^p rod aufiaros avroO, S iariv 71 iKKX-qala is: "I am filling up those Christian sufferings that remain for me to endure for the sake of the Church of Christ", etc. Compare II Cor., i, 5, "For as the sufferings of Christ abound in us" (tA iradrifjiaTa ToO \pt<TTOu).
(3) Errur.i dealt with. — The objection under this heading need not detain us long. Some years ago it was freiiuently a.sserted that the errors combated in this Epistle were Gnostic errors of the second century, and that the I'^pistle was therefore written many years after St. Paul's death. But this opinion is now con- sidered, even by the most advanced critics, as ex- ploded and antiquated. Nobody can read the writ- ings of these Gnostics without becoming convinced that terms employed by them were used in a quite dif- ferent sense from that attached to them in the Epis- tle. Haur himself appears to have had considerable misgivings on the point. The errors of Judaic Gnos- ticism, condemned in the Epistle, were quite embry- onic when compared with the full-blown Greek Gnos- ticism of the second century (.see Lightfoot, Coloss., etc.).
(4) Similnritu to Epiieaianx. — The principal objec- tion to the Epistle is its great similarity to Ephesians.
