ON
THE CONSTRUCTION OF TITUS II. 13.
[From the Journal of the Society of Biblical
Literature and Exegesis, 1881]
The Greek reads as follows: PROSDECOMENOI
THN MAKARIAN ELPIDA KAI EPIFANEIAN THS DOXHS TOU MEGALOU QEOU KAI SWTHROS HMWN
IHSOU CRISTOU (or CRISTOU IHSOU).
Shall we translate, "the appearing of our great
God and Saviour Jesus Christ"? or, "the
appearing of the glory of the great God and our Saviour
Jesus Christ"?
It was formerly contended by Granville Sharp, and
afterwards by Bishop Middleton, that the absence of the Greek article before SWTHROS
in Tit. ii. 13 and 2 Pet. i. I, and before QEOU
in Eph. v. 5, is alone sufficient to prove that the two appellatives connected
by KAI belong to one subject.
[ftn. Sharp
applied his famous rule to 2 Thess. i. 12, but
Middleton thinks that this text afford no certain evidence in his favor. Winer disposes of it summarily as merely a case in which KURIOU
is used for O KURIOU taking, in a measure, the character of a proper
name. In 2 Thess. i. 11, O QEOS HMWN denotes
God in distinction from "our Lord Jesus" (ver. 12); it is therefore
unnatural in the extreme to take this title in the last clause of the very
same sentence (ver. 12) as a designation of Christ. We may then reject
without hesitation Granville Sharp's construction, which in fact has the
support of but few respectable scholars.
As to I Tim. v. 21 and 2 Tim. iv. 1, it is enough to
refer to the notes of Bishop Middleton and Bishop Ellicott on the former
passage. Compare the remarkable various readings in Gal. ii. 20, adopted by Lachmann and Tregelles (text),
but not by Tischendorf or Westcott and Hort, - EN PISTEI ZW TH TOU QEOU KAI CRISTOS.
In Eph. v. 5, EN TH BASILEIA TOU CRISTOU KAI QEOU,
the CRISTOU and QEOU are regarded as being distinct by a large
majority of the best commentators, as De Wette,
Meyer, Olshausen, Meier, Holzhausen,
Flatt, Matthies, Baumgarten-Crusius, Bleek, Ewald, Schenkel, Braune and Riddle (in Lange's Comm., and Prebendary Meyrick in "the
Speaker's Commentary" (1881).
In the Revised New Testament, the construction
contended for so strenuously by Middleton in Eph. v. 5, and Sharp in 2 Thess. i. 12, has not been deemed worthy of notice.]
"It is impossible," says Middleton
in his note on Tit. ii. 13, "to understand QEOU and SWTHROS otherwise
than of one person." This ground is now generally abandoned, and it is
admitted that, grammatically, either construction is possible. I need
only refer to Winer, Stuart, Buttman,
T.S. Green, and S.G. Green among the grammarians, and to Alford, Ellicott,
Bishop Jackson, and other recent commentators.
[ftn. See Winer. Gram. 19, 5, Anm.
I, p. 123, 7te Aufl (p. 130 Thayer's trans., p. 162
Moulton); Stuart, Bibl. Repos. April, 1834, vol. iv. p. 322 f.; A. Buttman, Gram. 125, 14-17, pp. 97-100, Thayer's
trans.; T.S. Green, Gram. of the N.T. Dialect (1842), pp. 205-219, or
new ed.(1862), pp. 67-75; S.G. Green, Handbook to the Gram. of the Greek
Text., p. 216; and Alford on Tit. 11. 13. Alford has some good remarks on
the passage, but I find no sufficient proof of his statement that SWTHR
had become in the N.T. "a quasi proper name."]
It will be most convenient to assume,
provisionally, that this view is correct; and to consider the exegetical
grounds for preferring one construction to the other. But as some still think
that the omission of the article, though not decisive of the question, affords
a presumption in favor of the construction which makes TOU MEGALOU QEOU a
designation of Christ, a few remarks upon this point will be made in Note A, at
the end of this paper. It may be enough to say here that QEOUhas
already an attributive, so that the mind naturally rests for a moment upon TOU
MEGALOU QEOU as a subject by itself; and that the addition of IHSOU
CRISTOU to SWTHROS HMWN distinguished the person so clearly from TOU
MEGALOU QEOU, according to Paul's constant use of language, that
there was no need of the article for that purpose.
The question presented derives additional
interest from the fact that, in the recent Revision of the English translation
of the New Testament, the English Company have adopted in the text the first of
the constructions mentioned above, placing the other in the margin; while the
American Company, by a large majority, preferred to reverse these positions.
I will first examine the arguments of
Bishop Ellicott for the construction which makes TOU MEGALOU QEOU an
appellation of Christ. They are as follows:-
"(a) EPIFANEIA is a term
specially and peculiarly applied to the Son, and never to the Father." The
facts are these. In one passage (2 Tim. 1. 10) the word EPIFANEIA is
applied to Christ's first advent; in four to his second advent (2 Thess. ii. 8;
1 Tim. vi. 14; 2 Tim. iv. 1, 8); and as EPIFANEIA denotes a visible
manifestation, it may be thought that an EPIFANEIA of God, the Father,
"whom no man hath seen nor can see," could not be spoken of.
But this argument is founded on a
misstatement of the question. The expression here is not "the appearing of
the great God," but "the appearing of the glory of the
great God," which is a different thing. When our Saviour
himself had said, "The Son of man shall come in the glory of his Father,
with his angels" (Matt. xvi. 27, comp. Mark viii. 38), or as Luke
expresses it, "in his own glory and the glory of the Father, and
of the holy angels" (ch. ix. 26), can we doubt
that Paul, who had probably often heard Luke's report of these words, might
speak of "the appearing of the glory" of the Father, as well as of
Christ, at the second advent?
[ftn, Even if
the false assumption on which the argument were correct, that is, if the
expression here used were THN EPIFANEIAN TOU MEGALOU QEOU KAI SWTHROS HMWN
IHSOU CRISTOU, the argument would have little or no weight. The fact that EPIFANEIA
is used four times of Christ in relation to the second advent would be very
far from proving that it might not be so used of God, the Father, also.
Abundant examples may be adduced from Jewish writers to show that any
extraordinary display of divine power, whether exercised directly and known
only by its effects, or through an intermediate visible agent, as an angel,
might be called an EPIFANEIA, an "appearing" or
"manifestation" of God. The word is used in the same way in heathen
literature to denote any supposed divine interposition in human affairs,
whether accompanied by a visible appearance of the particular deity concerned,
or not. See Note B.]
This view is confirmed by the
representations of the second advent given elsewhere in the New Testament, and
particularly by 1 Tim. vi. 14-16. The future EPIFANEIA of Christ was not
conceived of by Paul as independent of God, the Father, and more than his first
EPIFANEIA or advent, but as one "which in his own time the blessed
and only Potentate, the King of kings and Lord of lords, who only hath
immortality, dwelling in unapproachable light, whom no man hath seen nor can
see, shall show" (DEIXEI). The reference is to the joint
manifestation of the glory of God and of Christ at the time when, to use the
language of the writer to the Hebrews (i. 6), he again
bringeth [or shall have brought] his
first-begotten into the world, and saith, Let all the
angels of God pay him homage."
[ftn. "See
also Acts iii. 20: "-and that he may send the Christ who hath been
appointed for you, even Jesus."]
That God and Christ should be associated
in the references to the second advent, that God should be represented as
displaying his power and glory at the EPIFANEIA of Christ, accords with
the account given elsewhere of the accompanying events. The dead are to
be raised at the second advent, a glorious display of divine power, even as
Christ is said to have been "raised from the dead by the glory of
the Father" (Rom. vi. 4). But it is expressly declared by Paul that,
"as Jesus died and rose again, even so shall GOD, through Jesus, bring
with him them that have fallen asleep" (1 Thess. iv. 14; comp. Phil. iii.
21); and again, "GOD both raised the Lord, and he will raise up us by his
power" (1 Cor. vi. 14). There is to be a general judgement
at the second advent; but Paul tells us that "God hath appointed a day for
which HE will judge the world in righteousness by a man whom he hath
ordained" (Acts xvii. 31), or, as it is elsewhere expressed, "the day
in which He will judge the secrets of men, through Jesus Christ."
(Rom. ii. 16, comp. ver. 5, 6); and that "we shall stand before the judgement seat of GOD" (Rom. xiv. 10). So the day
referred to is not only called "the day of the Lord Jesus" (1 Cor. i. 8, v. 5; 2 Cor. i. 14), or
"the day of Christ Jesus" (Phil. i. 6), or
"the day of Christ" (Phil. 1. 10, ii. 16), but "the day of
GOD" (2 Pet. iii. 12). Here, as throughout the economy of salvation, there
is EIS QEOS O PATHR EX OU TA PANTA KAI HMEIS EIS AUTON KAI EIS KURIOS IHSOUS
CRISTOS DI OU TA PANTA (1 Cor. viii. 6).
It appears to me, then, that Bishop
Ellicott's "palmary argument," as he calls it, derives all its
apparent force from a misstatement of the question; and when we consider the
express language of Christ respecting his appearing in the glory of his Father,
the express statement of Paul that this EPIFANEIA of Christ is one which
God, the Father, will show (1 Tim. vi. 15), and the corresponding
statement of the writer to the Hebrews (i. 6, when he
bringeth," etc.); when we consider that in the concomitants
of the second advent, the resurrection of the dead, and the judgement
of men, in which the glory of Christ will be displayed, he is everywhere
represented as acting, not independently of God, the Father, but in union with
him, as his agent, so that "the Father is glorified in the Son," can
we find the slightest difficulty in supposing that Paul here describes the
second advent as an "appearing of the glory of the great God and
our Saviour Jesus Christ"?
(b) Bishop Ellicott's second
argument is "that the immediate context so specially relates to our
Lord." He can only refer to ver. 14, "who gave himself for us,"
etc. The argument rest on the assumption, that when a writer speaks of two
persons, A and B, there is something strange or unnatural in adding a predicate
to B alone. If it is not instantly clear that such an assumption contradicts
the most familiar facts of language, one may compare the mention of God and
Christ together in Gal. 1. 3, 4, and 1 Tim. ii. 5, 6, and the predicate that in
each case follows the mention of the latter. The passage in Galatians reads:
"Grace to you and peace from God the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who
gave himself for us, that he might deliver us to God," etc.
(c) The third point is "that
the following mention of Christ's giving Himself up for us, of His abasement,
does fairly account for St. Paul's ascription of a title, otherwise unusual,
that specifically and antithetically marks His glory." - "Otherwise unusual"!
Does Bishop Ellicott mean that "the great God" is an unusual title of
Christ in the New Testament? But this is not an argument, only an answer to an
objection, which we shall consider by and by. It is obvious what is said in
ver. 14 can in itself afford no proof or presumption that Paul in what precedes
has called Christ "the great God." He uses similar language in many
passages (e.g. those just cited under b from Gal. i. 3, 4, and 1 Tim. ii. 5, 6), in which Christ is clearly
distinguished from God.
(d) The fourth argument is
"that MEGALOU would seem uncalled for if applied to the
Father." It seems to me, on the contrary, to have solemn impressiveness,
suitable to the grandeur of the event referred to. It condenses into one word
what is more fully expressed by the accumulation of high titles applied to God
in connection with the same subject in 1 Tim. vi. 14-16, suggesting that the
event is one which the power and majesty of God will be conspicuously
displayed. The expression "the great God" does not occur elsewhere in
the New Testament, but it is not uncommon in the Old Testament and later Jewish
writings as a designation of Jehovah. See Note C, p. 456
(e) Bishop Ellicott's last
argument is that "apparently two of the ante-Nicene (Clem. Alexand. Protrept. 7 [ed. Pott.] and Hippolytus quoted by
Words.) and the great bulk of post-Nicene writers concurred in this
interpretation."-As to this, I would say that Clement of Alexandria does
not cite the passage in proof of of the deity of
Christ, and there is nothing to show that he adopted the construction which
refers the TOU MEGALOU QEOU to him.
[Winstanley
well remarks, in his valuable essay on the use of the Greek article in the New
Testament, the "the observation of Whitby that
Clem. Alex. quotes this text of St. Paul, when he is asserting the divinity of
Christ, if it mean that he quotes it as an argument, or proof, is a mistake.
Clemens is all along speaking of a past experience only, and therefore begins
his quotation with a former verse, H CARIS TOU QEOU...etc., and then
proceeds TOUTO ESTIN TO SWMA KAINON [I omit the quotation], etc., so
that his authority inclines the other way; for he has not appealed to this
text, though he had it before him, when he was expressly asserting the divinity
of Christ, as QEOS, and O QEOS LOGOS, but not as O MEGAS QEOS."
(Vindication of certain passages in the Common English Version of the N.T., p.
35f., Amer. ed., Cambridge 1819.)
The supposition of Wordsworth and Bishop Jackson that
Ignatius (Eph. c. 1) refers to this passage has, as far as I can see, no
foundation.]
Hippolytus (De Antichristo, c. 67), in an allusion to
the passage, uses the expression EPIFANEIAN TOU QEOU KAI SWTHROS HMWN of
Christ, which may seem to indicate that he adopted the construction just
mentioned. But it is to be observed that he omits the THS DOXHS, and the
MEGALOU, and the IHSOU CRISTOUafter SWTHROS HMWN, so that
it is not certain that if he had quoted the passage fully, instead of merely
borrowing some of its language, he would have applied all the terms to one
subject. My principal reason for doubt is, that he has nowhere in his writings
spoken of Christ as O MEGAS QEOS, with or without HMWN, and that
it would hardly have been consistent with his theology to do this, holding so
strongly as he did the doctrine of the subordination of the Son.
It is true that many writers of the
fourth century and later apply the passage to Christ. At that period, and
earlier, when QEOS had become a common appellation of Christ, and
especially when he was very often called "our God" or "our God
and Saviour," the construction of Tit. ii. 13
which refers the QEOU to him would seem the most natural. But the New
Testament use of language is widely different; and on that account a
construction which would seem most natural in the fourth century, might not
even suggest itself to a reader in the first century. That the orthodox Fathers
should give to an ambiguous passage the construction which suited their theology
and the use of the language in their time was almost a matter of course, and
furnishes no evidence that their resolution of the ambiguity is the true one.
The cases are so numerous in which the
Fathers, under the influence of dogmatic bias, have done extreme violence to
very plain language, that we can attach no weight to their preference in the
case of a construction really ambiguous, like the present. For a notable
example of such violence, see 2 Cor. iv. 4, EN OIS O QEOS TOU AIWNOS TOUTOU
ETUFLWSEN TA NOHMATA TWN APISTWN, where fear of Gnosticism or Manichaeism, Iranaeus (Haer. iii. 7, /
1; comp., iv. 29 (al. 48), / 2), Tertullian (Adv. Marc. v. 11), Admantius or Pseudo-Origen (De recta in Deum fide,
sect. ii. Orig. Opp. i. 832), Chrysostom, Theodoret, (Ecumenius, Theophylact, Augustine, Primasius,
Sedulius Scotus, Haymo, and others make TOU AIWNOS TOUTOU depend on APISTWN
instead of O QEOS, a construction which we should hardly hesistate to call impossible.
[ftn., For many
of these writers see Whitby, Diss. de Script.
Interp. secundum Patrum Commentarios, p. 275 f. Alford's note on this passage
has a number of false references, copied without acknowledgement from Meyer,
and ascribes this interpretation (after Meyer) to Origen, who opposes it (Opp.
iii 497, ed. De la Rue).]
I have now considered all the arguments
of Bishop Ellicott, citing them in full in his own language. It seems to me
that no one of them has any real weight; and that a consideration of his
"palmary argument," which is the onemainly
urged by the advocates of his construction of the passage, really leads to the
opposite view. The same is trus also, I conceive, of
his reference to the expression "the great God."
But there is a new argument which it may
be worth while to notice. In the English translation of the second edition of
his Biblico-Theological Lexicon of N.T.
Greek, Cremer has added to the article QEOS a long note on Tit. ii.
13 which is not in the German original, and has made other alterations in the
article. He here contends that TOU MEGALOU QEOU refers to Christ. He
gives up entirely the argument from the want of the article before SWTHROS, on
which he had insisted in the German edition. Nor does he urge the argument from
the sense of EPIFANEIA. His only arguments are founded on assertion that
ver. 14 "by its form already indicates that in ver. 13 only one subject is
presented" - an argument which has already been answered (see p. 443,
under b), and to which, it seems to me, one cannot reasonably attach the
slightest weight - and the fact that ver. 14 contains the expression LAON
PERIOUSION, "a peculiar people," an expression used in the O.T.
to denote the Jewish nation as the chosen people of God. The argument rests on
the assumption that because in ver. 14 that Apostle has transferred this
expression to the church of Christ, "the great God" in ver. 13 must
be taken as a predicate of Christ.
The case seems to me to present no
difficulty, and to afford no ground for such an inference. The relation of
Christians to God and Christ is such that, from its very nature, the servants
of Christ are called the servants of God, the church of Christ the church of
God, the kingdom of Christ the kingdom of God (1 Pet. ii. 9, 10).
[ftn., Comp. Clement
of Rome, I Ep. ad Cor. c. 64 (formerly 58): "May the All-seeing God and
Master of Spirits and Lord of all flesh, who chose the Lord Jesus Christ and us
through him for a peculiar people (EIS LAON PERIOUSION), grant,"
etc.]
If Christians belong to Christ, they must
also belong to God, the Father, to whom Christ himself belongs (1 Cor. iii. 23,
"ye are Christ's and Christ is God's"). To infer, then, that because
in ver. 14 Christians are spoken as Christ's peculiar people, the title "great
God" must necessarily be understood as applied to him in ver. 13 is a very
extraordinary kind of reasoning.
Such are the arguments which have been
urged for the translation, "the appearing of the glory of our great God
and Saviour Jesus Christ." Let us now consider what
is to be said for the construction which makes TOU MEGALOU QEOU and IHSOU
CRISTOU distinct subjects.
In the case of a grammatical ambiguity of
this kind in any classical author, the first inquiry would be, What is the
usage of the writer respecting the application of the title in question? Now
this consideration, which certainly is a most reasonable one, seems to me here
absolutely decisive. While the word QEOS occurs more than five hundred
times in the Epistles of Paul, not including the Epistle to the Hebrews, there
is not a single instance in which it is clearly applied to Christ.
[ftn., The
passages in the writings of Paul in which the title QEOS has ever been given to
Christ are very few, and are all cases of very doubtful construction or
doubtful reading. Alford finds it given to him only in Rom. ix. 5; but here, as
is well known, many of the most imminent modern scholars make the last part of
the verse a doxology to God, the Father. So, for example, Winer,
Fritzsche, Meyer, De Wette,
Ewald; Tischendorf, Kuenen and Cobet, Buttmann, Hahn (ed. 1861); Professor Jowett, Professor J.H.
Godwin, Professor Lewis Campbell of the University of St. Andrews, the Rev. Dr.
B. H. Kennedy, Regius Professor of Greek in the
University of Cambridge, and Dr. Hort. Of the other passages, Eph. v. 5 and 2
Thess. i. 12 have already been considered. In 1 Tim.
iii. 16 there is now a general agreement among critical scholars that OS
EFANERWQH and not QEOS EFANERWQH is the true reading. In Col. ii.
12, the only remaining passage, the text is uncertain; but if we adopt the
reading TOU MUSTHRION TOU QEOU CRISTOU, the most probable construction
is that which regards CRISTOU as in apposition with MUSTHRION, which
is confirmed by Col. i. 27. This is the view of
Bishop Ellicott, Bishop Lightfoot, Wieseler (on Gal.
i.1), and Westcott and Hort. Others, as Meyer, Huther,
and Klopper, translate "the mystery of the God
of Christ" (comp. Eph. i. 3, 17, etc.). Steiger takes CRISTOU as in apposition with TOU
QEOU, and thus Christ here called God; but to justify his interpretation
the Greek should rather be CRISTOU TOU QEOU (comp. De Wette).
The habitual, and I believe uniform, usage of
Paul corresponds with his language 1 Cor. viii. 6.
Here and elsewhere I intentionally pass by the
question whether Paul's view of the nature Christ and his relation to the
Father would have allowed him to designate Christ as O MEGAS QEOS KAI
SWTHROS HMWN. This would lead to a long discussion of many passages. My
argument rests on the undisputed facts respecting his habitual use of language.]
In the case then of a question between
two constructions, either of which is grammatically possible, should we not
adopt that which accords with a usage of which we have five hundred examples,
without one clear exception, rather than that which is on opposition to it? The
case is made still stronger by the fact that we have here not only QEOU,
but MEGALOU QEOU.
Even if we do not regard the Pastoral
Epistles as written by Paul, and confine our attention to them only, we reach
the same result. Observe how clearly God, the Father, is distinguished in 1
Tim. i. 1,2; ii. 3-5; v. 21; vi. 13-16; 2 Tim. i. 2, 8, 9; iv. 1; Tit. 1, 3 (comp. for the KAT EPITAGHN
1 Tim. i. 1, Rom. xvi. 26), 4; iii. 4-6. Observe,
particularly, that the expression "God our Saviour"
is applied solely to the Father, who is distinguished from Christ as our Saviour; God being the primal source of salvation, and
Christ the medium of communication, agreeably, to the language of Paul, 2 Cor.
v. 18, TA DE PANTA EK TOU QEOU TOU KATALLAXANTOS HMAS EAUTW DIA CRISTOU;
comp. 1 Cor. viii. 6. See 1 Tim. i. 1; ii. 3-5; iv.
10; Tit. i. 1-4; iii. 4-6; compare also Jude 25. Such
being the marked distinction between QEOS and CRISTOS in other
passages of these Pastoral Epistles, should we not adopt the construction which
recognizes the same here?
An examination of the context will
confirm the conclusion at which we have arrived. I have already shown that the
title "God our Saviour" in the Pastoral
Epistles belongs exclusively to the Father. This is generally admitted; for
example by Bloomfield, Alford and Ellicott. Now the connection of ver. 10 in
which this expression occurs, with ver. 11 is obviously such, that if QEOU
denotes the Father in the former it must in the latter. Regarding it then as
settled that QEOU in ver. 11 denotes the Father (and I am not aware that
it has ever been disputed),* is it not harsh to suppose that the QEOU in
ver. 13, in the latter part of the sentence denotes a different subject from
the QEOU in ver. 11 at the beginning of the same sentence?
[ftn., *It
should be questioned, all doubt will probably be removed by a comparison of the
verse with Tit. iii. 3-7 and 2 Tim. i. 8, 9.]
It appears especially harsh, when we
notice the beautiful correspondence of
EPIFANEIANin ver. 13 with the EPEFANH of ver.
11. This correspondence can hardly have been undesigned.
As the first advent of Christ was an appearing or visible manifestation
of the glory of God, as well as of Christ.
To sum up: the reasons for which are urged for giving
this verbally ambiguous passage the construction which makes "the great
God" a designation of Christ, are seen, when examined, to have little or
now weight; on the other hand, the construction adopted in the common English
version, and preferred by the American Revisers, is favored, if not required,
by the context (comparing ver. 13 with ver. 11); it perfectly suits the
references to the second advent in other parts of the New Testament; and it is
imperatively demanded by a regard to Paul's use of language, unless we
arbitrarily assume here a single exception to a usage of which we have more
than five hundred examples.
I might add, though I would not lay much
stress on the fact, that the principal ancient versions, the Old Latin, the
Vulgate, the Peshito and Harclean
Syriac, the Coptic, and the Arabic, appear to have
given the passage the construction which makes God and Christ distinct
subjects. The Aethiopic seems to be the only
exception. Perhaps, however, the construction in the Latin versions should be
regarded as somewhat ambiguous.
Among the modern scholars who have agreed
with all the old English versions (Tyndale, Coverdale, Cranmer, the Genevan, the Bishop's Bible, the Rhemish,
and the Authorized) in preferring this construction are Erasmus, Calvin,
Luther, Grotius, LeClerc, Wetstein,
Moldenhawer, Michaelis,
Benson, MacKnight, Archbishop Newcome,
Rosenmuller, Heinrichs,
Schott, Bretschneider, Neander
(Planting and Training of the Christian Church, Robinson's revised
trans., p. 468,) De Wette, (and so Muller in the 3d
ed. of De Wette, 1867), Meyer (on Rom. ix. 5), Fritzsche (Ep. ad Rom. ii. 266 ff.), Grimm, Baumgarten-Crusius (N.T. Gr. ed. Schott, 1839), Krehl, H. F. T. L. Ernesti (Vom Ursprunge der Sunde, p. 235 f.),
Schumann (Christus, 1852, ii. 580, note), Messner (Die Lehre der Apostel, 1856, p. 236
f.), Huther, Ewald, Holtzmann (in Bunsen's Bibelwerk,
and with more hesitation in his Die Pastoralbriefe,
1880), Beyschlag (Christol.
des N.T., 1866, p. 212, note), Rothe (Dogmatik, II. i. (1870), p. 110,
note 3), Conybeare and Howson,
Alford, Fairbarn, with some hesitation (The
Pastoral Epistles, Edin. 1874, pp. 55, 282-285),
Davidson, Prof. Lewis Campbell (in the Comtemp.
Rev. for Aug., 1876), Immer (Theol. d. N.T.,
1877, p. 393). W.F. Gess (Christi Person und Werk, Abth. II. (1878), p.
330), in opposition to the view expressed in his earlier work, Die Lehre von der Person Christi (1856),
p. 88 f., Reuss (Les Epitres
Pauliniennes, Paris, 1878, ii. 345), Farrar (Life
and Work of St. Paul, ii. 536, cf. p. 615, note 1); and so the grammarians Winer and T.S. Green (comp. his Twofold N.T.). In
the case of one or two recent writers, as Pfleiderer
and Weizsacker, who have adopted the construction,
there is reason to regard them as influenced by their view on the non-Pauline
authorship of the Epistle, disposing them to find in its Christology a doctrine
different from that of Paul.
Very many others, as Heydenreich,
Flatt, Tholuck (Comm. zum Brief an die Romer, 5te Ausg., 1856, p. 482), C. F. Schmid
(Bibl. Theol. des N. T., 2te Aufl., p. 540), Luthardt, leave the matter undecided. Even Bloomfield, in
the Addenda to his last work (Critical Annotations, Additional and Supplementary,
on the N.T., London, 1860, p. 352), after retracting the version given in
his ninth edition of the Greek Testament, candidly says: "I am ready to
admit that the mode of interpreting maintained by Huther
and Al[ford] completely satisfies all the grammatical requirements of the
sentence; that it is both structurally and contextually quite as probable as
the other, and perhaps more agreeable to the Apostle's way of writing."
The view of Lange (Christliche
Dogmatik, Heidelb.
1851, ii. 161 f.), Van Hengel (Interp. Ep. Pauli
ad Romanos, ii. 358, note), and Schenkel (Das Christusbild der Apostel, 1879, p. 357),
that IHSOU CRISTOU is here an apposition to THS DOXHS, the words which
precede (TOU MEG. QEOU KAI SWT. HMWN) being referred to the Father, has little
to commend it that it may be passed over without discussion.
[ftn., The
punctuation in the margin in Westcott and Hort's N.
T. in Greek is also intended to represent this view.] Click
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