3. The Person of Christ in the Letter to the Ephesians

As there is little agreement on the theme of the Letter to the Ephesians, so too there is some dispute as to the central nature of the Christology of the Letter and its relation to the soteriological and ecclesiological teaching given there. Hammer, for example, finds part of the reason for the lack of the word κληρον?μο? in Ephesians to lie in the fact that it is with ecclesiology and the role of the Church in God's plan for cosmic unity rather than with Christology that the Letter is primarily concerned. 80 Others find that it is the Christology and the soteriology which govern the ecclesiology. 81

3.1 The Historical Basis of Christology

The historical nature of the man Jesus, implied in the use of the term "Son of God" (4:15) 82 and in the reference to the sarx of Christ (2:14), which in the Pauline letters is constantly related to his redemptive death, 83 is the underlying assumption to the interest of Ephesians, which concentrates on the risen and exalted Christ. 84 As the historical life of Jesus interprets history both from fulfilment to promise (where his earthly life is the promise of the fulfilment of history) and from promise to fulfilment (where his earthly life is the fulfilment of the promise of past history) 85 so too the risen Christ, identical with the historical Jesus, is both fulfilment and promise. He is the cornerstone, 86 and, as cornerstone, is the promise upon which the Church is built. The Spirit which Christ gives is the fulfilment of prophecies 87 and the fulfilment of the promise made by Jesus (cf. Jn 14:16), but the Spirit is also a promise (earnest, αρραβ?ν) (1:13). An insight into the nature of fulfilment as promise may allow us to see this fulfilment in Christ as the basis for the change from the "fullness of time (χρο??)" in Gal 4:4 to the "fullness of times" (καιρ??) in Eph 1:10. Where χρο?? reflects a concern for Jewish chronological history, 88 καιρ?? seems to be more concerned with the ανακεφαλαι?σι? in Christ, the fulfilment of all promises. Christ, at the end of the χρο?? of the history of the promises becomes the καιρ??, giving meaning to every disparate καιρ?? and indeed to the totality of χρο?? and hence becomes, in his fulfilment, the final promise. 89 This would allow us to see no contradiction between Paul's use of κληρονομ?α and the lack of this term and concept in Ephesians. 90

A dehistoricizing tendency is found in Ephesians by Hammer, especially in its Christology and ecclesiology, in that historical means tend to non-historical ends. 91 An understanding of 4:21, however, may allow us to question this finding, and so perhaps we would need to discuss further whether meta-historical would not be a better description than non-historical. There is, first of all, the use of the name "Jesus" without addition. This is of infrequent occurrence in Paul, and usually refers to the Jesus of history, reflecting anti-Gnostic polemic. 92 There is also the rather difficult expression καθ?? εστιν αλ?θεια εν τω Iησου, the only time in the Pauline corpus that the notion of truth is directly linked to the person of Jesus. 93 De la Potterie concludes that αλ?θεια is to be taken as the complement of ? Χριστ??, and that the point of the expression is that Christ cannot properly be called "truth" except in Jesus, the object of the kerygma. 94 This close association of "truth" and the Jesus of history, a Johannine trait in the theology of the Letter to the Ephesians, should raise the question of historical means and non-historical or meta-historical ends in the Letter. The same questioning of Hammer's thesis should be derivative of the intrinsic nature of resurrection theology to the Christology of Paul 95 and of Ephesians.

This question of the historical basis to Christology touches also the question of the person of Jesus. If what constitutes Christ as a real person is the fact of being God's image 96 and if εικων is missing from Ephesians, still the implication of the Trinitarian structure of 1:3-14 and the relation of 1:20-23 to the Christological hymns of Phil 2:6-11, Col 1:15-20, 1Tim 3:16, 1Pet 3:18 and Heb 1:397, allow us to see the divinity of the person of Christ through being the image of God (Col 1:15) and being given the name above every other name (cf. Phil 2:9). In Ephesians the personality of Christ as individual is highlighted by the increased explicitation of a distinction between the personal Christ and the total Christ, 98 reflected in the clearer distinction between Christ and his Church. 99 It is only in the letters of the Captivity that there is elaborated this distinction, which eliminates from the major Pauline concept of Christ the head of the body-Church the danger of including Christ within the Church as another member, and allowing him to insist on that altereity which is the basis of love (cf. Eph 4:15; 5:25).100

Relative to the historical basis of Christology and to the theology of the person of Christ, there is the theology of the Incarnation, which reaches a new height in Colossians and Ephesians through the use of the Heavenly Man theology to supplement the deficiencies of the Son of Man theology. 101 There is here an insistence on the eternal nature of the plan of God (1:5-6; 3:11) that dissociates the Incarnation from the Fall. 102 The mediating, reconciliatory and restorative functions of Christ are linked with the Incarnation, for references to the cross (2:16) and to the blood of Christ (1:7, 2:13) are not merely theological affirmations: they are also references to the historical event of the death of the earthly Jesus. 103

3.2 The Power and the Glory

In the theology of Paul, power and glory are so associated that he can speak of "the glory of his power" (απο τη? δ?ξη? τη? ισχυ?? αυτου, 2Thes 1:9) or "the power of his glory" (το κρ?το? τη? δοξη? αυτου, Col 1:11). To this we may compare "the riches of his glory" ( κατα το πλουτο? τη? δ?ξη? αυτου Eph 3:16). 104 In the Letter to the Ephesians, both the δ?ξα and the δ?ναμι? of God are closely linked with the mystery of Christ and may be said to be attributed to him, thematically if not textually (cf. 1:6).

△?ξα as we have seen, is in Paul essentially an attribute of the Father, reflecting his divine majesty (cf. Rom 1:23; Eph 1:17). In the resurrection, this δ?ξα is given to the risen Christ so that it becomes one of his essential properties, 105 and in him, the Beloved, it is given to us as a free gift (1:6). In this, Ephesians belongs to the Pauline exposition of the theme of δ?ξα. 106

Power is conferred on Christ in the enthronement. The continued operation of God's power in the enthroned Christ 107 means that all God's power is made available to humanity in him. 108 Thus it is that, while in chapter 1 (e.g. 1:6-8) it is God who is the giver of gifts, in chapter 4 (4:11) it is the enthroned Christ who is the giver. 109 In the enthronement there is thus conferred on Christ that universal dominion which is a uniquely divine prerogative, 110 equivalent to that name which is above every name (Phil 2:6-11), so that in his humanity he is associated with the Father. 111

3.3 Μυοτ?ριον and Οικονομ?α

Since most of the examples of οικονομ?α in Paul occur in association with the word μυστηριον, 112 the understanding of the one will aid the understanding of the other.

Reumann 113 affirms that οικονομ?α refers to the actual carrying out, administration, management, of the mystery rather than the plan or intention to carry it out. This is true both when there is reference to God's οικονομ?α of the mystery and when there is reference to Paul's οικονομια of the same mystery. There is a question of Heilsgeschichte rather than Heilsplan, and it is linked up with both creation (3:9) and the Church (3:10).

As it is in Christ that the divine μυστ?ριον is fulfilled, brought to execution ( οικονομ?α ) by God himself, so in him the creation and the consummation of the world are comprised, and times come to an end in him, the revelation of the mystery (1:10). 114

However, the question remains: What is the meaning of μυστ?ριον in Ephesians? For Stanley, 115 Christ himself, as Son of God, constitutes the mystery, for the goal of the Church's growth is the perfection of unity and the knowledge of the Son of God, and moreover Christ in the dimension of his body, the Church. 116 For Cerfaux, 117 the mystery is no different from the Gospel (cf. 6:19). Bornkamm 118 and Sanders 119 think of it as the joining of the Gentiles with the Jews to enter into the inheritance and form the Church. As Bornkamm points out, however, this would imply no contradiction with Colossians, where the μυστ?ριον is the eschatological Christ, for the gathering in of the Gentiles is itself an eschatological event. There is thus a distinction, but no contradiction. 120

In 5:32, μυστ?ριον refers to an inspired exegesis 121 or to the allegorical meaning of the OT text, the mysteriously concealed prophecy of the relation of Christ to the εκκησ?α. 122 Bornkamm, however, insists that μυστ?ριον here also be understood in the light of the other texts in Ephesians where the word occurs. For the mystery of the relation of Christ and the Church which is prefigured in Genesis 2:24 (cited in Eph 5:3l) is an eschatological one.

While it seems clear that the writings of Qumran enter into the background of the Letter to the Ephesians in some way, 123 the significance of the term μυστ?ριον is quite different from that of the Hebrew term ??. The term ?? occurs almost always in the plural in Qumran, while the term μυστ?ριον in Ephesians is always in the singular. 124 In the plural, ?? refers to all the marvels of the divine plan, such as creation and the eschatological time; 125 in the singular, when it does occur, it refers either to the mystery of the abjection in which God momentarily holds the Community and its leader or to the "mystery to come". 126 Further, there is missing in Qumran any hint that the mystery is, at least under one aspect, concerned with the Gentiles and their admission into the eschatological community 127 of the Messiah, which would necessarily in the New Testament be the Church. What is new in Ephesians in relation to Qumran is thus the Christology, 128 in which time, space, the cosmos, all, is related to Christ. 129

3.4 Christ as Hope, Peace and Wisdom

Christ, as salvation, is present as the object of faith and future as the object of hope. 130 According to the Septuagint, Is 42:4 reads "And in his name the nations shall hope." 131 In Eph 2:12b, Paul reminds his hearers that there was a time when they had no hope and were without God in the world. This lack of hope is different from that which he refers to in 1Thes 4:13, for in that passage lack of hope is synonymous with ignorance concerning the dead and the resurrection. The object of hope is generically the messianic promises, and specifically that of resurrection, a necessary consequence of the resurrection of Jesus (cf. Eph 1:18 etc). Though Ephesians does not in so many words call Christ our hope, as Col 1:27 and 1Tim 1:1 do, there are two passages in which the association of hope with other ideas leads us to affirm that Christ is our hope. In 2:18-19, the hope our vocation brings is closely associated with the riches promised as an inheritance and with the power exercised by God in raising Jesus from the dead. In 4:1-6, the one hope into which we have all been called is linked with the one Body and the one Spirit, the source of unity.

From this, the idea of Christ our hope links up with that of Christ our peace, specifically stated in Eph 2:14. The whole passage 2:13-17 alludes to the Servant Songs; Is 57:19 and 52:7 are also alluded to. In the greeting, Eph 1:2, the two words "grace and peace" are more than an adaptation of the Greco-Roman χα?ρειν and the Jewish shalom. They derive from the old priestly blessing of Nm 6: 24-26, and are the sum, for Paul, of the messianic blessings. 132

The Christian identification of Wisdom with Christ also occurs in Ephesians. 133 In 1:22, Christ is both transcendent to and active among humankind, as is Wisdom (Job 28:12-14, 21-22; Wis 9:16-17; Sir 24:28-29). 134 The use of the verb κατοικειν in relation to Christ (3:17) is also indicative of an association with Wisdom (cf. Wis 1:4, 7:27-28). 135

80. Hammer, P.L., A Comparison of Kl?onomia In Paul and Ephesians. Journal of Biblical Literature, 79(1960) p. 27.

81. Thus Martin, art. cit., p. 298; in note 5 he supports Feuillet's interpretation, NRT 78(1956)458, and rejects K?emann's dictum: "die Christologie fast ausschliesslich von der Ekklesiologie hier interpretiert wird" [Theologische Zeitung, 86(1961)3].

82. Grassi, JBC 56:31.

83. Stanley, Christ's Resurrection, op. cit., p. 237.

84. Grassi, JBC 56:7.

85. Cf. Balthasar, Hans Urs von, A Theology of History (translated from the second German edition of 1959 by Benet Weatherhead). NY, Sheed and Ward. (1963), p. 86.

86. Eph 2:20. References to prophetic texts: Zech 4:7, Job 38:6, Ps 119:22; and especially Is 28:16. Cf. Dacquino, art. cit., 344, note 3; on the exact meaning of cornerstone, cf. McKelvey, R.J., Christ, the Cornerstone. New Testament Studies 8(1961-1962) pp. 352-359.

87. Joel 3:1-5, cf. Is 2:2; Acts 2:16ff.

88. Hammer, art. cit., 269, cf. note 16, pp. 269f; cf. also Reumann, J., OIKONOMIA-Terms in Paul in Comparison with Lucan Heilsgeschichte. New Testament Studies 13(1966-1967) p. 164.

89. Cf. Balthasar, op. cit., p. 86. We could perhaps link this to Gal 3:16, where the singular shows that Christ is both the content and the means of klhronomia, cf. Hammer, art. cit., p. 272.

90. In contrast to Hammer, art. cit., p.272, who finds a contradiction and, inevitably, concludes to Deuteropauline authorship.

91. Hammer, art. cit., 269f., 272

92. De la Potterie, art. cit., p. 53.

93. De la Potterie, art. cit., p. 45.

94. De la Potterie, art. cit., pp. 48-59.

95. Koch, R., L'aspect eschatalogique de l'Esprit du Seigneur d'apr? saint Paul. Stud.Paul.Cong. Int.Cath., II, p. 132; Smyth, K., Heavenly Man and Son of God in St. Paul. Ibid., II, p. 229.

96. Cerfaux, Christ., op. cit., p. 514 [French, 387], citing M.J. Lagrange, Les Origines du Dogme Paulinien de la Divinite du Christ, Revue Biblique, 45(1936) pp. 20-25.

97. Sanders, art. cit., p. 220.

98. Benoit, L'Horizon, art. cit., p. 512.

99. Benoit, L'Horizon, art. cit., p. 356.

100. Stanley, Christ's Resurrection, op. cit., pp. 205, 206.

101. Smyth, art. cit., p. 230.

102. Trinidad, J.T., The Mystery Hidden in God. A Study of Eph 1:3-14. Biblica 31(1950) pp. 14-15.

103. Cambier, art. cit., p. 270; cf. Dacquino, art. cit., p. 343.

104. Koch, art. cit., p. 133.

105. Stanley, Christ's Resurrection, op. cit., pp. 134, 248.

106. Hooke, S.H., Alpha and Omega, p. 256, cited by Bruce, art. cit., p. 304, note 1.

107. Cf. Stanley, Christ's Resurrection, op. cit., p. 221, for the relevance of the perfect tense in 1:20.

108. Grassi, JBC 56:18.

109. Hermans, H. and L. Geysels., Efesi?s 1:23: Het Pleroma van Gods Heilswerk. Bijdragen 28(1967) p. 291.

110. Stanley, Christ's Resurrection, op. cit., p. 221.

111. Grassi, JBC 56:18.

112. Reumann, art. cit., p. 157.

113. Reumann, art. cit., pp. 164-165; cf. O. Michel, article οικο? κτλ, TDNT 5:119-159, especially the references to Ephesians 1:9,10, 3:2, s.v. οικονομ?α. Thus Grassi, JBC 56:15, would appear to have missed the meaning of οικονομ?α; cf. Kobelski, NJBC 55:17.

114. Bornkamm, G., article μυστ?ριον, TDNT 4:819-824 (C2: The Mystery of Christ). p. 820.

115. Stanley, Christ's Resurrection, op. cit., p. 267.

116. Stanley, Christ's Resurrection, op. cit., p. 219, citing Schlier.

117. Cerfaux, Christ, op. cit., p. 403 (French, p. 304).

118. Bormkamm, TDNT 4:820 and note 145.

119. Sanders, art. cit., p. 231, note 79.

120. Bornkamm, TDNT 4:820, note 145.

121. Cerfaux, Christ, op. cit., p. 372, note 4 (French, p. 281, note 1).

122. Bornkamm, TDNT 4:823.

123. Detailed analysis in Kuhn, art. cit. Cf. Benoit, P. Qumr? et le Nouveau Testament. New Testament Studies 7(1960-1961) p. 287.

124. Kuhn, art. cit., p. 336; Benoit, Qumran, art. cit., p. 291; Sanders, art. cit., p. 231, note 79.

125. Benoit, Qumran, art. cit., p. 291. Kuhn, art. cit., p. 336.

126. Benoit, loc. cit.

127. Sanders, loc. cit.

128. Kuhn, loc. cit.; Benoit, Qumran, art. cit., p. 292.

129. Mussner, F., Die Geschichtestheologie des Epheserbriefes. Stud.Paul.Cong.Int. Cath., II, p. 59.

130. Grundmann, W., article ετοιμο? κτλ, TDNT 2:705.

131. On the relation of the Servant Songs to the theme of hope and judgement in Paul, cf. Kerrigan, A., Echoes of Themes from the Servant Songs in Pauline Theology. Stud.Paul.Cong.Int.Cath., II, pp. 219-222.

132. Fitzmyer, JBC 47:8A, NJBC 45:8A.

133. Cf. Feuillet, A., Nouvelle Revue Th?logique 78(1956) pp. 449-472, 593-610.

134. Bogdasavich, art. cit., p. 123.

135. Dacquino, art. cit. p. 345, note 2.