CHAPTER XII.

THE MORE DEVELOPED DOCTRINES.

§ 103. The Cosmical Significance of Christ.

The eternal purpose of salvation, on which the salvation of the world depends, was made in Christ, who, as the first-born Son of love, was before all creatures (a). It is by Him that the world was created, and He is the end of the development of the world as a whole, which points in this direction, that all things are summed up in Him as the central point of the universe (b). The realization of this object of the world was conditioned on His descending to the earth, which is an act of free, willing self-surrender and humiliation (c). As the reward for this, He has been raised to full participation in the divine honour and dominion of the world, so that He, in whom all the fulness of the Godhead dwells bodily, now fills the universe governing all (d).

(a) The teaching of Christian wisdom merges before everything else in the depths of the divine purpose of salvation. That this latter is a purpose before all time, a πрóðeσis τŵv alovov (Eph. iii. 11), is taught in our Epistles in complete harmony with the earlier ones. But these latter go a step farther, even to include the election of the individual to be the object for the realization of salvation in this purpose, so that it first comes to be in them an electio aeterna. In the heavenly world (ἐν τοῖς ἐπουρανίοις), God has blessed us with every spiritual blessing, in that He hath chosen us before the foundation of the world (i. 3, 4); and the calling, by which this election is realized, because it proceeds from God, is a heavenly calling (Phil. iii. 14: √ åvw кλñois). And if it is said, Eph. iii. 9, that the mystery of salvation was hid from eternity in God, who created the universe, it is indicated by this characteristic of God, that the purpose of salvation is connected in the closest way with the plan of the world, which began to be realized in creation; and that purpose having been formed by the Creator before the creation of the world, was regulative even in its creation. If, even in the

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earlier Epistles, the inference backwards from what Christ has become by His exaltation, led to His heavenly origin (§ 79, b), then the same inference flows here à priori from the thought of the eternal purpose of salvation as having been already formed in Christ (ver. 11). If Christians are chosen in Christ before the foundation of the world (i. 4), and are thereby already blessed in Him in the heavenly world (ver. 3), then the Mediator of salvation, in whom the election and the blessing could be grounded at a time when the objects of these did not exist, must have Himself existed before the world. For us, this line of thought would lead only to an ideal pre-existence of the Redeemer in the divine purpose; for Paul, there is at once an eternal divine existence of the Christ who in His earthly life has become the Mediator. As the elect are now to be in Him sharers in the love of God, which was guaranteed to them when destined to sonship (Col. iii. 12; Eph. i. 5), then must He Himself be the Beloved Kaт' ¿§oxýv (ver. 6), the highest object of this love (Col. i. 13: ó viòs Tŷs ȧɣáπηs aνтοû); and here also, as § 77, c, the name of Son designates Him as such (Eph. iv. 13: ó viòs TOû Ocoû; comp.

Θεὸς πατήρ : Phil. ii. 11 ; Col. i. 3, iii. 17; Θεὸς καὶ πατήρ: Eph. i. 3, v. 20, only in doxologies). He must be before all (Col. i. 17: πрò πáντшv), as, in conformity to His relation with God as the First-born, He rises far above every creature (ver. 15: πρωτότοκος πάσης κτίσεως).

(b) If the divine purpose of salvation was already regulative for the creation of the world, then must salvation as well as creation be grounded on the original Mediator. His position

1 Even in a purely linguistic point of view, this expression cannot mean that He was the first-born creature among all creatures, as Usteri, p. 315; Reuss, ii. p. 75 [E. T. ii. 64]; Baur, p. 257, understand, for then rárns riosws would be a partitive genitive: for only a plural or collective notion could designate a category or a universality to which an individual belongs. But as ons Tíos indicates each single creature, the genitive can only be understood as a comparative genitive, and can mean only that He in comparison with any other creature was the first-born (comp. Immer, p. 372). There is implied in paróToxos, therefore, at any rate, something which distinguishes Him above every creature, as He is equally put by vv. 16, 17, in a relation to the whole creation, which excludes the very possibility of regarding Him as in any sense a creature. That He is called, not the only Son, but the First-born, can therefore have no reference to this, that the creature is, in a certain sense, conceived as later born (comp. Schmidt, p. 212), but, according to what is said in the text, only to His

of dignity in relation to every creature (Col. i. 15) depends on the fact that the universe was created in Him (ver. 16: öTI ἐν αὐτῷ ἐκτίσθη τὰ πάντα). But that all creation should be thus grounded in Him includes a twofold idea, namely, that not only were all things created by Him (di' avтoû), which the earlier Epistles teach (§ 79, c), but also that all was created for Him (eis avτóv), who is to bring to completion both the saving purpose of God, as also the whole development of the world, which tends towards the realization of the purpose of God. And because the world has not yet reached. this goal, then all things have progressively their existence in Him (ver. 17), and it cannot fail, because the goal of the world established in Him must be realized. But how this goal of the world is conceived of, Eph. i. 10 shows, when it is mentioned as the final goal of the institution of God's grace, that all things may be gathered together in Christ as in a centre (ανακεφαλαιώσασθαι τὰ πάντα ἐν τῷ Χριστῷ). He has been appointed to be this central point of the universe, as the universe was created in Him; but here it is pointed out that He must again become so, because a dislocation in the original constitution of the world has taken place by sin, whose removal again the dispensation of grace must have in view. By this conception of Christ as the principle and also the goal of the world, which latter, according to the earlier Epistles (§ 99, d), is God Himself, the Christology of our Epistles goes beyond that of the earlier Epistles. It is connected with this idea, that the goal of the world is no longer regarded as the perfected kingdom of God, in which

relation to those who in Him are destined to attain similarly to sonship with God. But that He is for all creatures the First-born, i.e. the Opener of the divine life, the Mediator of the divine love, is arbitrarily imported into the idea of próτoxos by Gess, p. 274 ff. (comp. also Schenkel, p. 280 ff., who, moreover, finds no pre-existence in our Epistles; comp. p. 289).

I see no reason, with Schmidt, p. 185 (comp. Hofmann in loc.), to weaken or deny the force of the composite word, as it is not the original goal of the world which is here referred to, but that which is to be reached by the institution of grace; and that, according to Col. i. 20, is reached in Christ by a restoration removing the whole alienation wrought by sin. It was very easy, no doubt, to suppose that the sinful development of the world foreseen by God was à priori included in the world's plan; but as both passages refer exclusively to the actual realization of the purpose of salvation, this thought is not indicated.

the absolute universal Lordship of God is realized, in contrast to the earthly mediatorial lordship of Christ, which the latter gives back to the Father, according to § 99, c (comp. § 76, c), but as the βασιλεία τοῦ Χριστοῦ καὶ Θεοῦ (Eph. v. 5), and that the exaltation of Christ is extended over everything which has a name both in this world and in the future (i. 21; comp. Schmidt, p. 198). One cannot think of the goal of the world without Him in whom even creation has its root.

(c) In order to lead the world created in Him to the goal appointed for it in the pre-temporal purpose of salvation, Christ has to become the Redeemer, and as such to descend from His heavenly existence to the earthly (Eph. iv. 10).3 But His descent is at the same time a transition from the form of existence corresponding to His heavenly existence to the earthly-human, in which form alone He could perform the office of a Redeemer. As ἐπουράνιος He was in the form of God (ev poppy coû: Phil. ii. 6), i.e. He possessed the divine Sóğa, the form of manifestation corresponding to the divine spiritual nature, consisting of supersensual light-substance (§ 76, d). In this His glory He might have appeared in the

3 It is He who xaraßás; and it is a mistake when Baur, p. 260, asserts that this descending is a deduction from the ascension of Christ, while in simple contradiction the proof that the passage from the Psalm (lxviii. 19) cited in Eph. iv. 8, which speaks of an ascending, applies to Christ, depends on this, that (on the supposition that the words refer to a heavenly being) only from a καταβάς can anything be said of an ἀνίβη (ver. 9). For, moreover, the κατέβη sis rà xarúrspa ras yns cannot refer, as he supposes, to the descent of Christ to hell,‚—an idea, however, which Gess, p. 248 ff., and Schenkel, p. 290, hold fast, --but to the descent to the earth, which is designated the lower region in opposition to the isos of the Psalm (comp. Schmidt, p. 202 ff.; Pfleiderer, p. 439, footnote [E. T. ii. 170]; Immer, p. 378).

That the words here refer to Christ in His pre-temporal existence, Schmidt, p. 163 ff., Gess, p. 311 ff., have afresh decisively proved, against Beyschlag, p. 233 ff. The identification of the mopon so with the doğa depends on this, that here also the dia, which the perfected attain to (§ 101, c), and which belongs to the glorified body of Christ (Phil. iii. 21), belongs originally to God, who is called, Eph. i. 17, the rarǹp rus dóğns, and therefore on that account it belongs to the Son of His love (note a) in His original heavenly existence. Besides this technical use of dóza, it occurs here also, to be sure, to denote the fulness of the divine glory generally (Col. i. 11; Eph. i. 12, 14, iii. 16), and is then applied to everything which belongs to Him (i. 6) or comes from Him (i. 18; comp. Phil. iv. 19). Connected with this, it is spoken of, as § 76, d, footnote 8, as honour and praise (Eph. iii. 21; Phil. i. 11, ii. 11, iii. 19, iv. 20). But it is incomprehensible how Pfleiderer, p. 139, footnote [E. T. i. 139], can identify the μορφὴ Θεοῦ with the σῶμα τῆς δόξης, in order hence to infer that the pre-existent

world, to obtain the divine honour and devotion, by which alone the position assigned to Him towards the world (rò elvai loa e) is realized; but He considered not this position of godlike dignity a thing to be seized (ovx åρπаɣμòv nyńoaτo), i.e. something to be selfishly and arbitrarily laid hold on (ver. 6). He rather emptied Himself and divested Himself of whatever it was He possessed, namely the μopon Θεοῦ, while He assumed the μορφή δούλου (ver. 7). Here also, therefore, that doğa is regarded as the form of existence which belonged to Him as the Son (§ 77, d), and the giving up of it as the entrance upon that servantship which is inadequate to His original position as Son (comp. § 79, b), which He assumed in submission to the divine will, in contradistinction to any obstinate åpπayuós. He would, no doubt, have stood in such a position had He entered on any other higher order of God's creatures, and so the form in which He took servantship had to be more closely defined, that He came in human likeness (ver. 7: ἐν ὁμοιώματι ἀνθρώπων yevóμevos), from which it is brought forward in what follows, as the final result of the Kévwois and the condition of the Christ is regarded as a heavenly man (comp, on the other hand, § 79, a, footnote 3, and Biedermann, p. 241, who finds, to be sure, in the later Pauline Epistles a tendency to the idea of a Divine Being, who takes a human form of existence). For nowhere is rapa attributed to God; and the assertion that the image of God referred to here includes the idea of a human archetype, lacks every sort of proof. Schenkel, p. 296, thinks only of the image of God in Adam, while here also he denies any pre-existence.

The correct interpretation of this passage, which Schmidt and Pfleiderer maintain, depends on the correct distinction between rò sivas loa Oi, which was only appointed for Christ, and the μopon so, which He already possesses in His pre-temporal existence, and this is necessarily required by any exact interpretation of ȧprayμós. When Hofmann in loc. again makes the latter to be but the manifestation of the former, and Gess, p. 317, inclines so far to an identification of the two, the former must take ȧprayuós in the sense of actus rapiendi, which, without an artificial insertion, gives no sense, and with the sense "selected by Him " leads to a quite empty antithesis. As for that violent acquisition, no object is imaginable, and the latter (as also Schenkel, p. 296 ff.) takes ἁρπαγμός = ἅρπαγμα, which is acknowledged to be contrary to the meaning of the word, and requires an arbitrary filling up of the main thought (p. 315 ff.).

It is not therewith certainly to be said that He was not a true human subject, but that He took only for a time a human form (Baur, p. 269), which is certainly excluded by the continuance of the μορφὴ ἀνθρώπου in His σῶμα τῆς dégns; it is rather implied that, although He became man, yet, in contrast to the human race descended from Adam, He came as the Second Man, in whom a