The Armor Ends with an Ambassador in Chains

“Right” is dikaios, just or due: the first reason given is that obedience is owed, before any Scripture is quoted. “In the Lord” is missing from a few early manuscripts. That children are addressed at all assumes they sat in the congregation when the letter was read aloud.

The command is Exodus 20:12, repeated in Deuteronomy 5:16. Calling it “the first commandment with promise” is puzzling, since the second commandment already speaks of “shewing mercy unto thousands” (Exodus 20:6). Paul may mean first in weight, or the first commandment a child learns.

The quotation stops short. Exodus ends “upon the land which the LORD thy God giveth thee”; Paul drops the reference to Canaan and leaves ges, which means both land and earth. “That it may be well with thee” comes from the Deuteronomy form of the command, not the Exodus one.

“Fathers” is pateres, which can mean parents in general, as it does of Moses’ parents in Hebrews 11:23. Roman law gave a father power even over his grown children’s lives. “Nurture” is paideia, training that includes discipline; “admonition” is nouthesia, correction by words, literally putting in mind.

“Masters” is kurioi, the same word as “Lord”, and “according to the flesh” quietly limits them: masters only as far as bodies go. “Fear and trembling” is Paul’s phrase for his own posture before God (1 Corinthians 2:3; Philippians 2:12). “Singleness” is haplotes, undivided, without a hidden motive.

“Eyeservice” is ophthalmodoulia, work done only while the master is watching, a word not found in any Greek writing before Paul and perhaps coined by him. “Menpleasers” is its partner. “From the heart” is literally from the soul, psyche.

“Good will” is eunoia, a word used in letters and contracts of the period for a servant’s loyalty to a household. “Doing service” is douleuo, the ordinary verb for slavery; the hearers are still slaves, but the Lord is named as the one they serve.

“Receive” is komizo, to get back what is owed, used of recovering a deposit or collecting wages. The reckoning is not arranged by rank: “whether he be bond or free” echoes Galatians 3:28, “there is neither bond nor free”.

“Do the same things” tells owners to meet their slaves with the same goodwill, an instruction hard to find in any other ancient household code. “Forbearing” is aniemi, to loosen or let go, used of slackening ropes (Acts 27:40). “Respect of persons” is prosopolempsia, literally face-receiving, the Hebrew idiom for favouring someone by their appearance.

“Finally” is literally “for the rest”. “Be strong” is present and passive, be made strong, go on being strengthened. Two of the four power-words from 1:19 return here, kratos and ischus, so the strength asked for is the resurrection power described at the start of the letter.

“Whole armour” is panoplia, the full kit of a heavy infantryman, from which panoply comes. “Wiles” is methodeia again, the scheming of 4:14, now traced to its source. Paul, under house arrest, lived chained to a Roman soldier (Acts 28:16), so a guard’s equipment was always in sight.

“Wrestle” is pale, grappling at close quarters, the sport of every Greek gymnasium, not a battle fought at a distance. “Rulers of the darkness of this world” is one word, kosmokratores, world-rulers, used in astrology for the planets and in inscriptions for gods. “High places” is the “heavenly places” of 1:3, its fifth and last appearance.

“The evil day” may be a particular hour of pressure or the whole present time, since 5:16 says “the days are evil”. “Having done all” is katergazomai, which can mean having accomplished everything or, in a military sense, having overpowered every opponent. Either way the last word is stand.

“Loins girt about” pictures gathering the long tunic into a belt for action. Isaiah 11:5 says of the coming king that “righteousness shall be the girdle of his loins, and faithfulness the girdle of his reins”, so even the belt comes from a portrait of God’s chosen ruler.

“Preparation” is hetoimasia, readiness, though in the Greek Old Testament it can mean a firm base, as in Psalm 89:14, where justice and judgment are the “habitation” of God’s throne. The feet recall Isaiah 52:7, the messenger “that publisheth peace”. Roman soldiers wore hobnailed sandals for grip.

“Shield” is thureos, from thura, a door: the large oblong shield that covered the whole body, not the small round one. Roman shields were leather-covered and could be soaked in water to put out fire arrows. “The wicked” is literally the evil one, a person rather than a principle.

“Take” is dechomai, to receive, as from someone’s hand, not to pick up for oneself. “Sword” is machaira, the short sword used at close range, the only offensive piece in the list. “Word” is rhema, a spoken word, the same as in 5:26.

“Praying” is a participle, not a new command, so prayer describes how the armour is worn. The Greek says “all” four times: at all times, with all prayer, in all perseverance, for all saints. “Watching” is agrupneo, to go without sleep, as a sentry does through the night watch.

Paul, after decades of preaching, asks for words to be given him. “Open my mouth” is a Hebrew way of introducing weighty speech, as in Matthew 5:2 before the Sermon on the Mount. “The mystery of the gospel” closes the thread of mystery that began in 1:9.

Ambassadors were legally inviolable in the ancient world, and to chain one was an insult to the ruler who sent him. “In bonds” is en halusei, in a chain, singular, the word Paul uses in Acts 28:20: “for the hope of Israel I am bound with this chain”. 2 Corinthians 5:20 also calls him an ambassador.

Tychicus came from the province of Asia (Acts 20:4). Colossians 4:7–8 sends him with nearly the same words, the longest stretch of identical wording between the two letters, which suggests he carried both. “Ye also” may hint that others, the Colossians perhaps, were getting the same news.

“For the same purpose” is literally for this very thing. “Comfort” is parakaleo, to call alongside, to encourage as well as console. Tychicus appears again later as Paul’s messenger to Ephesus (2 Timothy 4:12) and as a possible replacement for Titus on Crete (Titus 3:12).

The blessing is in the third person, “to the brethren”, where Paul usually writes “with you”, and it names no one. For a church where Paul had lived for years, the absence of greetings to individuals is striking. “Love with faith” joins the two things he heard of them in 1:15.

“In sincerity” is en aphtharsia, literally in incorruption, the word 1 Corinthians 15:42 uses for the resurrection body: “it is raised in incorruption”. It may describe a love that does not decay, or place the grace itself in immortality. It is an unusual final word for a letter.