4. Here the apostle, drawing towards the close of his epistle, gives some general exhortations of peculiar importance, and he urges them with peculiar force; but in most of them he has a view to the principles, the temper, and the practices of the Gnostics.

Whatever be your difficulties from abroad, or among yourselves, rejoice in the faith and hope of the gospel. All that you can suffer is but for a time, and will be infinitely overbalanced by the infinite rewards to which your proper conduct under them will entitle you.

5. This moderation, or rather gentleness, is properly opposed to the pride of the Gnostics. But it may also be understood of a proper indifference to all earthly things, the propriety of which is evident from the consideration of the shortness of life, and the dissolution of all things at the coming of Christ to judgment. We should, therefore, [1 Cor. vii. 30,] rejoice as though we rejoiced not, and weep as though we wept not, since the fashion of this world passeth away.

6. That is, be not oppressed with anxiety about any thing in this world, but in the practice of your duty, refer yourselves to the overruling providence of God.§

7. Peace signifies happiness in general, and the peace of God may mean great happiness, as the river of God signifies a large river, or the peace of God may signify such peace or happiness as God alone can bestow. The apostle here prays that, continuing in the profession of the gospel, they may be possessed of this happiness, and that their hearts may feel the influence of it. It is, in other words, praying that they may always rejoice in the faith and hope of the gospel.

8. We see here the great object and end of Christianity. It is to make us good men and useful citizens. What is good, useful, and praise-worthy, we all know, and the principles of the gospel should engage us to practise it.

9. It is happy when the preachers of the gospel can thus propose their own example for the imitation of their hearers, and certainly none ought to preach the gospel but those who, besides understanding the principles of it, can likewise

Bengelins in Bowyer.
Harwood, N. T.

* "Rejoice in the Lord; I say, always rejoice." "Referring to the destruction of Jerusalem." See Lardner (Serm.), X. pp. 579, 580. § "The Christians at Philippi are directed in every thing to make known their requests, pos Toy Ocov, to God. But had it been possible for St. Paul to entertain the doctrine of a Trinity, he would no doubt have directed his own prayers, and [those of] the Philippians, to the Sacred Three, as is the common language of the present age." Cardale, p. 107, Note.

recommend and enforce it by their own conduct, whose lives are at least not flagrantly contrary to it.

The apostle concludes his epistle with mentioning particular circumstances, relating to himself and the persons to whom he wrote, and with salutations from and to particular persons; all which are the most unequivocal marks of the genuineness of the epistle. Indeed, there are no epistles remaining, from all antiquity, which bear such indisputable marks of genuineness as these of Paul; and, as I have observed, the genuineness of these epistles sufficiently proves the truth of Christianity. For, it is impossible to account for the writing of such epistles as these, without admitting the reality of the principal facts on which the truth of Christianity depends, and these epistles were writen prior to any of the gospels.

10. The Christians at Philippi had been particularly attentive to the circumstances of the apostle, and had contributed to the supply of his wants. That they did not send to his relief immediately upon his arrival at Rome, he attributes to their having had no opportunity of doing it, till the coming of Epaphroditus. It is observable, however, that the apostle thanks God for their generosity to him. Men are only the instruments in the hands of Providence. The first and proper cause of all good, is God. But I would observe also, that God works only by second causes, and not immediately, for that would be by miracles, which we are not now authorized to expect.

11*-13. Not that I complain of any state of want that I have been in., I am so much a Christian, so well initiated in the principles of Christianity, that I can acquiesce and even rejoice in all conditions, adverse as well as prosperous. The principles and motives of the gospel are abundantly sufficient for this purpose. Here again, as on many former occasions, I would observe, that, by the term Christ, we are not to understand the person of Christ, but his doctrine,† or the principles of the Christian religion, which alone, without any other supernatural aid, can enable men to overcome the world, and behave with propriety in it.

* Content. "Self-sufficient to my own happiness." Harwood, N. T. See his Note. ↑ "Through him who strengtheneth me." Impr. Vers. See Belsham's Inquiry, p. 328.

"If the Scriptures speak of any agency of Christ, now that he is in heaven, it is either the extraordinary power which was given in the apostles' times, for the support of the gospel, in its feeble infant state, or else, it is to be understood of the doctrines and powerful motives of the gospel, and their effect upon mankind, which, in a figurative and not unusual sense, may be called Christ himself." Com. and Ess. I. pp. 28, 29..

15. The beginning of the gospel means the apostle's beginning to preach the gospel in Greece, Philippi being the first place in which he preached after he left the Continent of Asia.

16. Both at Thessalonica and at Corinth, Paul had subsisted chiefly by the labour of his hands. This the Christians at Philippi had probably heard of, and on that account had sent to his relief.

17. This is a sentiment worthy of an apostle, negligent with respect to himself, and attentive only to others. He rejoiced not that his own wants were relieved, but in the generosity and virtue which had been manifested in that relief.

18. We see how familiar to the Jews were the rites of their religion, and how they supplied them with a constant source of figures of speech. If a present of money was called a sacrifice well pleasing to God, can we be surprised that so heroical an act of virtue as that which Christ manifested in his death, should also be called a sacrifice well pleasing to God? How then can we be authorized from such phrases as these, to suppose that the death of Christ was a sacrifice, in any other sense than that in which this contribution of the Christians at Philippi to Paul was called a sacrifice, or than prayer, or any other part of our duty, may be called a sacrifice; and yet the death of Christ has been considered so much a sacrifice, as by this means alone, the anger of God against sin has been appeased, and that by this means only, he has become propitious to offending sinners.

19. That is, his glorious riches, or that glory and happiness which God reserves for the righteous in a future state, to which Christ will receive all his followers, when he shall come with power and great glory at the last day.

20.* Here again I would observe, what is conspicuous through all the New Testament, that God and the Father are synonymous terms, neither Christ nor any other person being so much as called God; and that to the Father alone is glory in the highest sense ascribed, he being the author of all good, and Christ his minister or servant, in communicating blessings to mankind.

22.† By saints, in this place, we are not to understand

"Unto God, even our Father." Clarke (S. D.), 489.

+ "Some of the Emperor's domestics. Liberti quidam, ut credibile est, says Grotins. It is agreeable to find Christianity in the Emperor's palace, even in the second century. Irenæus, who flourished in the year of Christ 178, mentions this. Hi, qui in regali aulâ sunt fideles. Opera, p. 351. Edit. Grabe. Oxon." Harwood, N. T. Gr.

what was meant by that term in after ages, persons of greater sanctity than others, and least of all, persons abstracted from the world and the duties of it; but simply Christians, persons professing Christianity, and thereby constituting the church and people of God, as the Jews had been before, who were called an holy and peculiar people, as standing in a nearer relation to God than other nations. 33. That is, may you partake of all the blessings of the gospel, here and hereafter, and may this be the happy lot of us all; and this we may be assured will be the case, if we diligently study the principles of Christianity, and above all, be careful to practise the duties which it incul

cates.

COLOSSIANS.

Colosse was a considerable city of Phrygia, in Asia Minor, where there appears to have been a Christian church pretty early; but by whom it was planted is unknown; but it was probably by some of Paul's fellow-labourers, during his long residence at Ephesus, in that neighbourhood. This epistle to the Christians in that place, appears to have been written sometime before the end of the year 62, and to have been sent, along with that to Philemon, by Tychicus and Onesimus, while Paul was yet a prisoner at Rome, but when he had a prospect of being released.*

The general strain of this epistle is very much the same as that to the Ephesians. In both of them, the object of the apostle is to establish those to whom he wrote, in the true faith of the gospel, in opposition to the corruptions of it by the Jewish Gnostics, and to urge the practice of moral duties, which the Gnostics, too much occupied as it might seem in matters of speculation, probably neglected, and some of which they explained away.

CHAP. I. 2,† 3.‡ We see how in each of these verses the term God is appropriated to the Father, when Christ is mentioned at the same time, which is a clear proof that the writer did not consider Christ himself as God, or in any sense entitled to that appellation. In the last of these

See Lardner, VI. pp. 377, 378; Doddridge's Introd. V. pp. 291, 292; Michaelis's Introd. Lect. (Sect. cxxxiv. cxxxvi.), pp. 296-300.

+ And our Lord Jesus Christ. "Not in the Syriac, Ethiopic, &c. Erasmus says, no doubt 'tis an interpolation." N. T. 1729.

God and the Father; "or the God and Father." Clarke (S. D.), 213, 490.

verses God is called the God and Father* of Christ himself. What more could have been said by any Unitarian? It is the same being that is called God our Father, and to whom our Saviour himself always prayed under the character of his God and Father. Where, therefore, is the evidence of Christ having any nature superior to ours?

4. It does not follow from this expression, that Paul had not himself been at Colosse, or that he had not even planted the gospel there, for the same language is found in the epistle to the Ephesians [i. 15]; but it appears from other circumstances. Paul had been long absent from that part of the world, and therefore required to be informed by others of the state of the churches in it, some of them adhering to the pure faith of the gospel, and others deviating from it, by adopting the notions of the Judaizing Gnostics.

5. The meaning probably is, that the apostle gave God thanks, or rejoiced in the prospect of the great happiness that was reserved for the faithful disciples of Christ; the fourth verse and part of the third being to be read as in a parenthesis.

6. That is, were instructed in the true principles of the gospel.

7. Epaphras appears to have been of Colosse, and sent to Rome to visit the apostle in his imprisonment, and perhaps for his officious zeal in his behalf to have been confined himself, for in the epistle to Philemon [23] Paul calls him his fellow-prisoner.

9. It is not necessary to distinguish nicely between the meaning of these different words, as the apostle does not appear to have given much attention to his language. He meant only to express his wish that those Christians might have a perfect knowledge of the gospel in all its extent. This is called spiritual wisdom, in opposition to that which is carnal, or has no connexion with Christian virtue.

10. The great object of this wisdom or spiritual understanding, was to lead them to a life of virtue and holiness, having such a knowledge of God and of the gospel, as would produce the fruits of righteousness, with which God is always well pleased.

11. That is, may your knowledge of Christianity, and your steady faith in the great principles of it, enable you to bear with cheerfulness all the sufferings to which you may be exposed.

As Doddridge corrects the common Translation, which mentions, "God and the Father, as if they were different persons." See his Note.