Colossians 2

Colossians 2:1

For I am willing ye should be advertised how earnestly I contend for you in desire to come to visit you, and in prayer and zeal and solicitude for you, and for those of Laodicea, whose conversion wrought by Epaphras, who was sent by me, I look upon with much comfort, though I never saw any of them, (as not being able to go to either of those cities either in my first or second passage through Phrygia, (of which Laodicea is the metropolis, and Colossæ another city,) Acts xvi. 6, and xviii. 23.)

Colossians 2:2

That they may receive the joy and true comfort which the doctrine of Christ truly taught and practised will yield every one, that being first united together in the Christian charity, they may be filled with all graces in all abundance, and come to know the bottom of this great secret or mystery of God, viz. of the gospel, or Christianity, that is, of the course which hath more obscurely been taken by God the Father under the Old Testament, and more clearly now by God in Christ under the New, to bring sinners to salvation;

Colossians 2:3

In which course is wrapped up all the depth of divine wisdom imaginable.

Colossians 2:4

And this care of mine and solicitude for you I mention, that it may make you cautious that no cunning impostor seduce you, by saying things that look like truth, but are not.

Colossians 2:5

For though I am not personally present among you, yet by the advertisements I received from Epaphras I understand how all things go with you, and so am in heart or spirit present with you, (as when Elisha’s heart is said to have gone with his servant when he knew what he did, 2 Kings v. 26,) and rejoice much to see the regularity of ecclesiastical affairs among you, and your constancy in the truth, in despite of all that have tried to lead you out of the way.

Colossians 2:6

And therefore all that I have to add is only this, that as you have received commands from Christ for the regulating of your lives, so ye be careful to do accordingly;

Colossians 2:7

As having not only received the faith at first, but having been further instructed and improved in it, as when walls are superstructed on a foundation, yea, and confirmed in it, and therefore go on according to these beginnings and abound in all Christian practices, and let that be your way of returning thanks to God for his great mercies of revealing the gospel to you.

Colossians 2:8

And take care that nobody plunder you, rob you, cheat you of all that you have, your principles of Christian knowledge, by that vain, empty, frothy, pretended knowledge and wisdom which the Gnostics talk of, 1 Tim. i. 4, and vi. 20, taken out of the hea-

[a] spoil] Συλᾶν is to strip or rob, as the pillagers in war are wont to do; ἐκδύειν ὅπλων τὸν κείμενον, “to strip one, as he lies, of his armour,” saith Phavorinus; and agreeably to this, ἀφαιρεῖν, αἰχμαλωτίζειν, to carry away captive. Hence συλαγωγεῖν is both ἀπογυμνοῦν, to divest, to strip; and being here applied to the Gnostics, it belongs to their divinity, which mixes all the heathen gods (under the title of αἴωνες, a word corrupted from the Hebrew חיות, living creatures, which is set to signify angels, Ezr. i. 5. See note [d] on 1 Tim. 1.) with Christ, and makes use of all the theology of Orpheus and Hesiod and Pythagoras, which is called ἀπίραντοι γενεαλογίαι, endless genealogies, 1 Tim. i. 4, ματαιολογία, idle speaking, ver. 6, and here philosophy and vain deceit; and also by bringing others to them συλαγωγεῖ, either carries them captive to their own heathenish errors, or else robs them, despoils them of all their Christian ornaments and weapons, leaving them naked, as it were, of all that rich provision which Christ had laid in for them, depriving them of all the advantages of the gospel. But that of carrying captive seems rather to be the notion of it.

[b] rudiments] Στοιχεία signifies elements, rudiments, first principles, the letters of the alphabet, among grammarians; the first principles, or elements, of which the body is compounded, among the naturalists. And

Colossians 2:9

For the whole will of God is by Christ really made known to us, as his divinity really dwells in him; and therefore there is little need of the additions of the Gnostics, which they borrow out of the heathen and Jewish theology to supply the defects of the evangelical doctrine.

[c] bodily] Σωματικῶς may denote, not corporeity, but essence, ac-

Colossians 2:10

And by him you have knowledge sufficient to satisfy and complete you without such supplies as these from the doctrines and divinity of the Gnostics, about their Æones, (see note [d] 1 Tim. i,) looked on by them as divine, immortal powers, of which, whatsoever they are, (if they be not idol-things,) be they angels of a superior or second degree, Christ is the head, and they which have Christ need not trouble themselves with these accessions.

Colossians 2:11

And as you need not take in these fragments of heathen theology into the Christian, so is there as little need of the Judaical observations, circumcision, &c., which are urged by the Gnostics also, Christ having in his gospel helped you to the true, gainful circumcision, not that outward, the cutting off the foreskin with a knife, but the inward, spiritual, the putting off, throwing away all those carnal sins which the Gnostics again do so abound in; and this is the true Christian circumcision.

Colossians 2:12

And to all this you are engaged (and have undertaken it) in your baptism: whereof one part, referring to the burial of Christ, denotes not only your dying to your sins, forsaking the impurities of your heathen lives, but also the abrogation of, and liberty from, the Mosaical performances, Ephes. ii. 15, and your laying all down in the grave, to be buried with Christ, never to live or have power in or over you again; and another part, (that of coming out of the water,) referring to the resurrection of Christ, denotes your vow and engagement to rise to all evangelical performances, and to all purity of life, by the virtue of your faith in that God whose power and sufficiency to make good all his promises to you is demonstrated by his raising up Jesus from the dead.

Colossians 2:13

And you being heathens and uncircumcised (and so without requiring those legal performances of

Colossians 2:14

Having by that proclamation of pardon to all penitent believers, Gentiles as well as Jews, (which is a doctrine of Christ’s now peculiarly revealed in the gospel,) blotted out that bill which the Jews were bound by, having as it were signed it with our own hands against ourselves, (by professing to expect justification by the law,) a bill indeed contrary to our peace, destructive to us, and having taken it away, cancelled it, and that (as bonds are wont to be cancelled) by striking a nail through it, viz. nailing it to his cross, that is, cancelling it by his death, undergoing a vile death for us, and obtaining pardon of sins for us by that means.

[d] handwriting] Χειρόγραφων is a bill or writing under a man’s hand, whereby he binds himself to some payment of money or duty, a band or obligation, and which stands in force against him, to bring any forfeiture or penalty upon him upon nonperformance of the condition to which he is bound; that which the rabbins call שטר and שטר חוב, cautio debitoris, “an obligation,” scriptura vel literæ quibus continetur potestas quam alius alii tradit, saith “Elias Levita,” a writing in which is contained

ᵇ Thisbi, p. 244.

Colossians 2:15

By which means also of his death he hath divested the evil spirits of their power, thrown them out of their temples, silenced their oracles, &c., and hath made it publicly discernible to all men, carried them as it were in triumph, as those that he had taken captive victoriously, (see note [a] John vii,) brought them from their idolatrous practices to the true Christian religion. 16, 17. Let no man therefore impose on you their doctrines of Mosaical abstinencies, &c. and condemn or sentence Christians (see note [i]) for eating or drinking things prohibited by the Jewish law, nor observing those things which are set down in their section of feasts, or new moons, or sabbaths, which were all but types of Christianity, and therefore now in the presence of Christianity itself are not obligatory.

Colossians 2:16

[e] in respect] The meaning of μέρος here, which Jos. Scaliger and Isa. Casaubon, Ep. 24, have pitched on, is, that by it is noted, פרק, חלק, a chapter or tract of the Talmudists upon that subject. For the lesser parts of the Talmud are called פרקים, divisions or parts. Among their writings there is now one called מסכת יום טוב, the tract of a good day, that is, a feast, and in it many chapters or פרקים, μέρη, or sections. From thence is the mention of ἀρχιφερικίαι in Justinian. Novel. de Heb. 146. By which it appears, that among the expositors of the law there were some called φερικίαι, as it were μερισταί, that expounded their heads of doctrine severally, and the chief of them ἀρχιφερικίαι. And so the meaning of the place will be, Let no man pass sentence on you by what you do in eating or drinking, by that section of the rabbins about feasts, new moons, sabbaths, that is, by your observing or not observing of those things; which were required indeed by the Jews, but merely as shadows and types of that ὁλόκληρος καὶ ἀδιάλειπτος ἑορτὴ, entire and continual feast, that a Christian’s life ought to be now under the New Testament. See Origen. Cont. Cels. 1. 8. p. 404. That μέρει should be mistaken for ἡμέρα, a day, is a conjecture of some, which it is sufficient to have named, having no authority of any MS. to countenance it.

Colossians 2:18

Let no man please himself and condemn you in point of worshipping angels, as mediators to God, as if there were some special humility in so doing, undertaking to search into those things which he knows nothing of, having no other ground for his doctrine but his own carnal phantasy;

[f] beguile] Καταβραβενίτω, κατακρινίτω, saith Phavorinus, the word signifies to condemn, βραβεντής and κριτής being all one, (only the former peculiar to the ἀγώνες or Grecian games, the other common to all judicatures,) and proportionably the notion of the κατὰ in composition being the same too: and so the word will have the same significance here that κρινίτω, ver. 16, of judging or condemning.

[g] voluntary humility] The notion of the word θέλω in the Greek translation of the Old Testament, for taking delight in any thing, hath been mentioned in note [g] on Matt. xxvii, and may be judged of by these examples not recited there, psalm i. 2, ἐν τῷ νόμῳ Κυρίου θέλημα αὐτοῦ, his delight is in the law of the Lord; τεθεληκάς με, psalm xli. 12, thou favourest, or lovest, or delightest in me. And so being here joined with ἐν ταπεινοφροσύνη, in humility, it is most reasonably to be taken and rendered, delighting in humility, or, as St. Hierome explains it, superbus ficta humilitate, “proud of a feigned humility;” but yet so, that ἐν ταπεινοφροσύνη, in humility, may be joined with μηδεὶς καταβραβενίτω,

[h] intruding] The word ἐμβατεῖσαι is explained by ἐπιβῆναι, τὰ ἔνδον ἐξερεύνησαι ἡ σκοπῆσαι, to enter into, to search and spy what is within; and again, ἐξετάξειν, to inquire, in Phavorinus; by ζητήσαι, to seek and go as far as one can, ἐπιβαθμῶσαι in Hesychius. It signifies to seek, or search, or pry into that which is secret, and hardly to be discovered; and so belonging here to the doctrine concerning angels, it is fitly applied, because no man hath ever seen them, nor can speak upon knowledge concerning those points, when angels are present, what they can do, what they have done, what use hath been continually made of them by God, what hath been wrought by their ministry, &c. Now of the Gnostics it is known how great a part of their theology was made up of conceits concerning the angels, of which, as they had much from the theologi poetæ, the fictions of the heathens, so had they therein gratified the Judaizers also, who, affirming that the law was given by angels, were very favourable to the worship of them, (see note [d] on 1 Tim. i.) This sort of men are said to have continued long in Pisidia and Phrygia, and therefore to have been forbidden by canon in the Council of Laodicea, the chief city of Phrygia. Among them there still are oratories remaining, wherein they were wont to pray to angels. And the heresy of these angelitæ or angelici was, under a show of humility, that God was to be looked on with reverence, as invisible and inaccessible, and to be sued to by the intercession and mediation of angels, first the lower, then the higher, till at last the request was presented unto God himself. And this of the mediatorship of angels was among the Platonists a special part of doctrine. Πᾶν τὸ δαιμόνιον, saith Plato in Sympos., μεταξύ ἐστι Θεοῦ καὶ θνητοῦ, ἑρμηνεῖον καὶ διαπορθμεῖον θεοῖς τὰ παρ’ ἀνθρώπων, καὶ ἀνθρώποις τὰ παρὰ θεῶν· τῶν μὲν τὰς δεήσεις καὶ θυσίας, τῶν δὲ τὰς ἐπιτάξεις τε καὶ ἀμοιβὰς τῶν θυσιῶν, “Every demon or angel is betwixt God and man, declaring and delivering to God the things of men, and to men the things of God; the prayers and sacrifices of the one, and the commands and returns to their sacrifices from the other.” And again, Θεὸς ἀνθρώπῳ οὐ μίγνυται, ἀλλὰ διὰ τούτου πᾶσά ἐστιν ἡ ὁμιλία καὶ ἡ διάλεκτος θεοῖς πρὸς ἀνθρώπους, καὶ ἐγρηγορότας καὶ καθεύδοντας, “God converseth not with man, but all the conversation and discourse betwixt God and man is by angels, both in time of waking and sleep.” And this and the like being the doctrine of those philosophers, may well be referred to ver. 8, under the style of philosophy and vain deceit.

Colossians 2:19

Which they that are guilty of do disclaim

⁹ Having by his doctrines blotted out the handwriting against us. ¹⁰ despoiled, or,

divested, ἀπεκβυσάμενος. ¹¹ with authority, ἐν παρρηοίᾳ. ¹² by it, αὐτῷ. ¹³ by

the particular of feast, or new moon, or sabbaths. ¹⁴ condemn you, pleasing himself in

humility. ¹⁵ searching. ¹⁶ without cause puffed up by the imagination of his own

flesh, εἰκῇ φυσιοῦμενος ὑπὸ τοῦ νοῦς τῆς σαρκὸς αὐτοῦ.

Colossians 2:20

If therefore ye have received the Christian faith, and, as ye ought to do, made that use of the death of Christ, as to have forsaken all other doctrines and practices to receive his, and so to look upon the rites of the Jews and the philosophy of the Gentiles as abolished and outdated; why do you now subject yourselves to such abstinencies, as either out of the heathen or Jewish practices are brought in among you,

Colossians 2:22

[d] body of his flesh] The body of his flesh signifies no more than his flesh, according to the Hebrew notion of צָצָא, which, as it signifies body, so it is oft applied to things which have no body, and signifies essence or being.

Colossians 2:23

Which observances are indeed (as it was before intimated vv. 4. and 8.) set off by some specious fair shows; as, that they are voluntary services or freewill offerings to God; that there is great humility in them, (as in that of worshipping angels, ver. 18;) that they are a great austerity and punishing of the body; that they are quite contrary to the placing any honour in the satisfying the desires of the flesh, though it be by conjugal enjoyments: (but for all this, are but specious, and not real services, have nothing of true worship in them.) ¹⁷ being supplied, ἐπιχορηγούμενον. ¹⁸ elements: see note [b]. ¹⁹ come not near: see note [i]. ²⁰ to corruption by the abuse of them, εἰς φθορὰν τῇ ἀποχρήσει. ²¹ austerity to, ἀφειδίᾳ.

[i] will-worship] The word ἐθελοθρησκεία, voluntary worship, is not elsewhere used in the New Testament; and being not at all to be found among the Greek translators or apocryphal writers of the Old, and by other later writers taken particularly from this one place, it will be worthy our inquiry how it is used here, whether in an ill or a good sense; and that will be done best by a full view of the whole place. The occasion of the apostle’s discourse here is, the dogmatizing of some, ver. 20, that is, teaching some things to be forbidden by God which were not now forbidden by him, (nor by any under God which had authority to command,) and so by their ἐντάλματα, commands or precepts, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men, (their own heretical fancies,) Matt. xv. 9. The matter of these dogmata is here

HAMMOND ANNOTT. VOL. II. R

Colossians 2:25

And a minister of his church, appointed immediately by God to bear his word, to preach the gospel to the Gentiles, and particularly to you, (to whom, by Epaphras, I have done so, ver. 7.) and to leave no place (whither I can come by myself or others) without preaching the gospel to them.

[e] fulfil the word] Πληρῶσαι τὸν λόγον, to fulfil his word, is a phrase which we meet with 1 Macc. ii. 55, spoken of Joshua, that for fulfilling the word he was made a judge in Israel: where, as the word signifies the will and pleasure of God revealed to him, so πληρῶσαι, to fulfil it, is to perform it in a very eminent manner. But in this place ὁ λόγος being by the context confined to another notion, the preaching or publishing the gospel of Christ peculiarly, πληροῦν τὸν λόγον Θεοῦ, to fulfil the word of God, will be, to fulfil that preaching, that is, to proceed as far in the preaching of it as by all his diligence and care, by himself and others, he could do, and so belongs to the preaching it to these Colossians, to whom, being out of his way, he yet had sent Epaphras, ver. 7. Thus we have a like phrase Rom. xv. 19. πληρῶσαι τὸ εὐαγγέλιον τοῦ Χριστοῦ, to fill up the preaching or gospel of Christ, that is, to preach it from city to city, from Jerusalem as far as to Illyricum.

Colossians 2:26

That gospel, I mean, or revelation of the will of God, which was not revealed so clearly in former ages, but kept under shadows and dark prefigurations, but now is freely preached to all that receive the faith of Christ:

Colossians 2:27

God being willing to exhibit to such (and no longer to keep close) this illustrious mercy of his to the Gentiles, so long concealed, viz. Christ preached, the gospel revealed to these, and in it hope of pardon and of bliss afforded them upon reformation of their former lives, and receiving and practising the commands of Christ.

Colossians 2:28

Whose doctrine we now publish to the world, his precepts of divine purity and his glorious promises, first preaching the fundamental heads of the truth of Christ, and then superstructing all further knowledge of Christian duties, and this to Gentiles as well as Jews, that by this means we may bring in servants to God, as many as possibly we can, to serve him in all that holiness of life that Christ Jesus himself exemplified and prescribed.

Colossians 2:29

Of which number I am one who endure some travail and toil, and withal some persecutions and afflictions, (see note [b] 1 Thess. ii,) according to the measure of that grace which he hath effectually bestowed upon me to the end.

CHAP. II.