EPHESIANS, Epistle to the. Addressed to °the saints that are at [Ephesus? by Paul the Apostle when a Roman prisoner (i, 1; iii, 1 ; iv, 1; vi, 20), linked in time and place of composition with °Colossians" and °Philemon" by the mention of the same bearers, Tychicus uof Asia" (Acts xx, 4; Eph. vi, 20; Col. iv, 7) and Onesimus of Colossm (Col. iv, 9; Philem.
v, 12) and the same five persons sending salu tations (Col. iv, 10-14; Philem. 23-24). As the words °at Ephesus" are wanting in our oldest MSS. (Sinaiticus and Vaticanus), a fact known to Origen (A.D. 186-254), Basil of Caesarea (329 379), and probably to Marcion (150?) who named the epistle assent to another city of Asia, Laodicea, the original may have borne the ad dress: °to the saints that are in Asia" (1 Cor. xvi, 19; Act; xix, 10), like °the saints that are in the whole of Achaia" (2 Cor. 1) so as to in clude the province as well as the capital. That °the epistle" which Paul in Col. iv, 16 asks to have brought °from Laodicea" for public reading was our °Ephesians" is a common and plausible conjecture. Its suitability in form and contents to serve thus as a circular letter has been recog nized since the time of Beza (1589) and Arch bishop Ussher (1673). Personal greetings and messages, like those in Col. iv, 10-17 (to be given orally, Eph. vi, 21-22), and controversial matter like Col. ii, 8-23, would necessarily be omitted. There would remain, however, a large residue of apostolic teachings, having vital and common significance to all °the churches of Asia." Origin and Content —Answering to their simultaneous origin, the phenomenal paral lelism between Colossians and Ephesians in thought and diction presents a psychological and literary problem of exceptional interest, as no fewer than 78 of the 155 verses of the latter epistle contain phraseology which occurs in the former. The prevailing penchant of the 19th century for literary dissection, however, has failed to produce, even with the critical acumen of a Holtzmann, anything better than a com plicated and preposterously artificial theory of secondary imitation and compilation. Here is
no patched garment, but a seamless robe. In its profundity, sublimity, spiritual and ethical intuition and in structural symmetry, Cole ridge's eulogium is well-nigh justified: °the div:nest composition of man." In the back ground of both epistles there looms the august person of the Cosmic Christ (Col. i, 14-16; Eph. i, 22-23) ; supreme in the heavenly realm (Col. i, 16; Eph. i, 10-16) ; vitally and cre atively present everywhere in his Church (Col.
i, 6, 18-19, 27; Eph. i, 22-23) ; the living bond of union between Jew and Gentile (Col. i, 20; Eph. i, 10; ii, 15f) ; the perennial source of transcendent spiritual knowledge (Col. i, 9; Eph. i, 17), and ethical vigor (Col. iii, 12-13; Eph. iv, 2, 32). If the mood of Colossians is that of discussion, that of Ephesians is medi tation. Actual residence in Rome (Phil. iv, 22) the ruling capital of "all the world" (Col.
i, 6), sets °the kingdom of Christ and God" (Eph. v, 5) in age-long and world-wide per spective. Calm meditation upon the cosmic im plications of the Gospel message, unvexed by controversial stress, leaves its impress upon the vocabulary and style of one who• could speak of having been °caught up into Paradise" (2 Cor. xii, 4). Thus in i, 3-iii, 21 the greater elabora tion of the conventional epistolary divisions of Address, Thanksgiving and Prayer, fore shadowed in passages like Rom, i, 1-15, flowers forth in full luxuriance, and in like manner the effort (manifest in Col. ii, 8-23) to gain greater fulness of expression by means of lengthy sentences built up of many subordinate clauses, and the employment of an ampler vo cabulary, has freer scope. The resulting super ficial aspect of aimless discursiveness is ap parent rather than real; for faith and love, the dominant elements of all of Paul's Christo logical teaching, form the obvious warp and woof throughout.