579. Thus they interpreted Ephes. iii. 21 εἰς πάσας τὰς γενὲας τοῦ αἰῶνος τῶν αἰώνων as referring to their generated æons: Iren. i. 3. 1. Similar is the use which they made of expressions in the opening chapter of St John, where they found their first Ogdoad described: ib. i. 8. 5.
580. R. H. viii. 10 (p. 267).
581. ib. viii. 9.
582. ib. viii. 10 (p. 266).
583. R. H. v. 8.
584. R. H. v. 12.
585. See Köstlin in Theolog. Jahrb. Tübingen 1854, p. 185.
586. Pistis Sophia p. 3 sq.
587. ib. p. 15 sq.: comp. pp. 4, 60, 75, 187, 275.
588. ib. p. 28 sq.: comp. p. 56. On p. 7 πλήρωμα is opposed to ἀρχή, apparently in the sense of ‘completion’.
589. Matt. v. 18.
590. R. H. viii. 13.
591. The work of Anger, Ueber den Laodicenerbrief (Leipzig 1843), is very complete. He enumerates and discusses very thoroughly the opinions of his predecessors, omitting hardly anything relating to the literature of the subject which was accessible at the time when he wrote. His exposition of his own view, though not less elaborate, is less satisfactory. A later monograph by A. Sartori, Ueber den Laodicenserbrief (Lübeck 1853), is much slighter and contributes nothing new.
592. ad loc. τινὲς λέγουσιν ὅτι οὐχὶ τὴν Παύλου πρὸς αὐτοὺς ἀπεσταλμένην, ἀλλὰ τὴν παρ’ αὐτῶν Πάυλῳ· οὐ γὰρ εἶπε τὴν πρὸς Λαοδικέας ἀλλὰ τὴν ἐκ Λαοδικείας .
593. Rab. Maur. Op. VI. p. 540 (Migne) ‘Non quia ad Laodicenses scribit. Unde quidam falsam epistolam ad Laodicenses ex nomine beati Pauli confingendam esse existimaverunt; nec enim erat vera epistola. Æstimaverunt autem quidam illam esse, quæ in hoc loco est significata. Apostolus vero non [ad] Laodicenses dicit sed ex Laodicea; quam illi scripserunt ad apostolum, in quam aliqua reprehensionis digna inferebantur, quam etiam hac de causa jussit apud eos legi, ut ipsi reprehendant seipsos discentes quæ de ipsis erant dicta’ (see Spic. Solesm. I. p. 133) etc.
594. After repeating the argument based on the expression τὴν ἐκ Λαοδικείας, Theodoret says εἰκὸς δὲ αὐτοὺς ἢ τὰ ἐν Κολασσαῖς γενόμενα αἰτιάσασθαι ἢ τὰ αὐτὰ τούτοις νενοσηκέναι.
595. This however may be questioned. On the other hand Beza (ad loc.), Whitaker (Disputation on Scripture pp. 108, 303, 468 sq., 526, 531, Parker Society’s ed.), and others, who explain the passage in this way, urge that it is required by the Greek ἐκ Λαοδικείας, and complain that the other interpretation depends on the erroneous Latin rendering.
596. Or, ‘that which was written from Laodicea.’ The difference depends on the vocalisation of ܠܕܝܩܝܐldikia which may be either (1) ‘Laodicea,’ as in vv. 13, 15, or (2) ‘the Laodiceans,’ as in the previous clause in this same ver. 16.
597. Calvin is very positive; ‘Bis hallucinati sunt qui Paulum arbitrati sunt ad Laodicenses scripsisse. Non dubito quin epistola fuerit ad Paulum missa.... Impostura autem nimis crassa fuit, quod nebulo nescio quis hoc prætextu epistolam supponere ausus est adeo insulsam, ut nihil a Pauli spiritu magis alienum fingi queat.’ The last sentence reveals the motive which unconsciously led so many to adopt this unnatural interpretation of St Paul’s language.
598. ad loc. ‘Multo fœdius errarunt qui ex hoc loco suspicati sunt quandam fuisse epistolam Pauli ad Laodicenses ... quum potius significet Paulus epistolam aliquam ad se missam Laodicea, aut potius qua responsuri essent Laodicenses Colossensibus.’
599. Works II. p. 326.
600. Ann. Eccl. s. a. 60, § xiii.
601. e.g. Tillemont Mem. Eccl. p. 576.
603. e.g. Storr Opusc. II. p. 124 sq.
604. So for instance Corn. à Lapide, as an alternative, ‘vel certe ad ipsos Colossenses, ut vult Theodor.’; but I do not find anything of the kind in Theodoret. This view also commends itself to Beza.
605. Op. II. p. 214 (ed. Lequien) τὴν πρὸς Τιμόθεον πρώτην λέγει. But he adds τινὲς φασὶν ὅτι οὐχὶ τὴν Παύλου πρὸς αὐτοὺς ἐπεσταλμένην ... ἀλλὰ τὴν παρ’ αὐτῶν Πάυλῳ ἐκ Λαοδικείας γραφεῖσαν.
606. ad loc. τίς δὲ ἦν ἡ ἐκ Λαοδικείας; ἡ πρὸς Τιμόθεον πρώτη· αὕτη γὰρ ἐκ Λαοδικείας ἐγράφη. Τινὲς δέ φασιν ὅτι ἣν οἱ Λαοδικεῖς Παύλῳ ἐπέστειλαν, ἀλλ’ οὐκ οἶδα τί ἂν ἐκείνῃς ἔδει αὐτοῖς πρὸς βελτίωσιν.
607. ad loc. ‘Propter eam quæ est ad Timotheum dixit.’
608. It is adopted by Erasmus in his paraphrase; ‘vicissim vos legatis epistolam quæ Timotheo scripta fuit ex Laodicensium urbe’: but in his commentary he does not commit himself to it. For other names see Anger p. 17, note k.
609. Catal. Bibl. Bodl. Cod. Æthiop. p. 23.
610. In the editio princeps (Vienna 1555) the latter part of this colophon, ‘and was sent by the hand of Tychicus,’ is wanting.
611. Catal. Bibl. Bodl. Cod. Æthiop. p. 23.
612. Bloch, quoted in Anger p. 17 note l.
613. A conjecture of Lightfoot’s (Works II. pp. 326, 339, London 1684), but he does not lay much stress on it. He offers it ‘rather then conceive that any epistle of Paul is lost.’ See also Anger p. 17, note m.
614. Baumgarten Comm. ad loc., quoted by Anger p. 25, note g.
615. Philippians p. 136 sq.
616. Hær. lxxxix ‘Sunt alii quoque qui epistolam Pauli ad Hebræos non adserunt esse ipsius, sed dicunt aut Barnabæ esse apostoli aut Clementis de urbe Roma episcopi; alii autem Lucæ evangelistæ aiunt epistolam etiam ad Laodicenses scriptam. Et quia addiderunt in ea quædam non bene sentientes, inde non legitur in ecclesia; et si legitur a quibusdam, non tamen in ecclesia legitur populo, nisi tredecim epistolæ ipsius, et ad Hebræos interdum. Et in ea quia rhetorice scripsit, sermone plausibili, inde non putant esse ejusdem apostoli; et quia factum Christum dicit in ea [Heb. iii. 2], inde non legitur; de pœnitentia autem [Heb. vi. 4, x. 26] propter Novatianos æque. Cum ergo factum dicit Christum, corpore, non divinitate, dicit factum, cum doceat ibidem quod divinæ sit et paternæ substantiæ filius, Qui est splendor gloriæ, inquit, et imago substantiæ ejus [Heb. i. 3]’ etc. Oehler punctuates the sentence with which we are concerned thus: ‘alii autem Lucæ evangelistæ. Aiunt epistolam etiam ad Laodicenses scriptam,’ and in his note he adds ‘videlicet Pauli esse apostoli.’ Thus he supposes the clause to refer to the apocryphal Epistle to the Laodiceans: and Fabricius explains the reference similarly. Such a reference however would be quite out of place here. The whole paragraph before and after is taken up with discussing the Epistle to the Hebrews; and the interposition of just six words, referring to a wholly different matter, is inconceivable. We must therefore punctuate either ‘alii autem Lucæ evangelistæ aiunt epistolam, etiam ad Laodicenses scriptam’, or ‘alii autem Lucæ evangelistæ aiunt; epistolam etiam ad Laodicenses scriptam.’ In either case it will mean that some persons supposed the Epistle to the Hebrews to have been written to the Laodiceans.
617. Laodicenerbrief p. 29 sq.
618. If indeed the Greek text of F was not copied immediately from G, as has been recently maintained by Mr Hort in the Journal of Philology III. p. 67. The divergent phenomena of the two Latin texts seem to me unfavourable to this hypothesis; but it ought not to be hastily rejected.
619. Volkmar, the editor of Credner’s Geschichte des Neutestamentlichen Kanon p. 299, with strange carelessness speaks of ‘the appearance (das Vorkommen) of the Laodicean Epistle in both the Codices Augiensis and Boernerianus which in other respects are closely allied.’ There is no mention of it in the Codex Augiensis.
620. It is curious that this MS, which was written by an Irish scribe, should give the same corrupt form, Laudac- for Laodac-, which we find in the Book of Armagh; see below p. 348.
621. See p. 352. It occurs also in this position in the list of Aelfric (see below p. 362), where the order of the Pauline Epistles is ... Col., Hebr., 1, 2 Tim., Tit., Philem., Laod.
622. See especially Schneckenburger Beiträge p. 153 sq.
623. Some earlier writers who maintained this view are mentioned by Anger, p. 25, note f. It has since been more fully developed and more vigorously urged by Wieseler, first in a programme Commentat. de Epist. Laodicena quam vulgo perditam putant 1844, and afterwards in his well known work Chronol. des Apostol. Zeit. p. 450 sq. It may therefore be identified with his name. He speaks of it with much confidence as ‘scarcely open to a doubt,’ but he has not succeeded in convincing others.
624. See the introduction to the Epistle to Philemon.
626. So at least I find the number given in my notes. But in Bentl. Crit. Sacr. p. xxxvii it is 3561.
627. The epistle has been critically edited by Anger Laodicenerbrief p. 155 sq. and Westcott Canon App. E. p. 572. I have already expressed my obligations to both these writers for their collations of MSS.
In the apparatus of various readings, which is subjoined to the epistle, I have not attempted to give such minute differences of spelling as e and ae, or c and t (Laodicia, Laoditia), nor is the punctuation of the MSS noted.
628. e.g. Anger Laodicenerbrief p. 142 sq., Westcott Canon p. 454 sq. (ed. 4). Erasmus asks boldly, ‘Qui factum est ut hæc epistola apud Latinos extet, cum nullus sit apud Græcos, ne veterum quidem, qui testetur eam a se lectam?’ The accuracy of this statement will be tested presently.
629. Anger, p. 165.
630. Canon Murat. p. 47 (ed. Tregelles). The passage stands in the MS, ‘Fertur etiam ad Laudecenses alia ad Alexandrinos Pauli nomine fincte ad heresem Marcionis et alia plura quæ in catholicam eclesiam recepi non potest.’ There is obviously some corruption in the text. One very simple emendation is the repetition of ‘alia’, so that the words would run ‘ad Laudicenses alia, alia ad Alexandrinos’. In this case fincte (= finctæ) might refer to the two epistles first mentioned, and the Latin would construe intelligibly. The writing described as ‘ad Laodicenses alia’ might then be the Epistle to the Ephesians under its Marcionite title, the writer probably not having any personal knowledge of it, but supposing from its name that it was a different and a forged writing. But what can then be the meaning of ‘alia ad Alexandrinos’? Is it, as some have thought, the Epistle to the Hebrews? But this could not under any circumstances be described as ‘fincta ad hæresem Marcionis’, even though we should strain the meaning of the preposition and interpret the words ‘against the heresy of Marcion’. And again our knowledge of Marcion’s Canon is far too full to admit the hypothesis that it included a spurious Epistle to the Alexandrians, of which no notice is elsewhere preserved. We are therefore driven to the conclusion that there is a hiatus here, as in other places of this fragment, probably after ‘Pauli nomine’; and ‘finctæ’ will then refer not to the two epistles named before, but to the mutilated epistles of Marcion’s Canon which he had ‘tampered with to adapt them to his heresy’. In this case the letter ‘ad Laudicenses’ may refer to our apocryphal epistle or to some earlier forgery.
631. See the introduction to the Epistle to the Ephesians.
632. Timotheus, who became Patriarch of Constantinople in 511, while still a presbyter, includes in a list of apocryphal works forged by the Manicheans ἡ πεντεκαιδεκάτη [i.e. τοῦ Παύλου] πρὸς Λαοδικεῖς ἐπιστολή, Meurse p. 117 (quoted by Fabricius, Cod. Apocr. N. T. I.. p. 139). Anger (p. 27) suggests that there is a confusion of the Marcionites and Manicheans here. I am disposed to think that Timotheus recklessly credits the Manicheans with several forgeries of which they were innocent, among others with our apocryphal Epistle to the Laodiceans. Still it is possible that there was another Laodicean Epistle forged by these heretics to support their peculiar tenets.
633. Vir. Ill. 5 (II. p. 840) ‘Legunt quidam et ad Laodicenses, sed ab omnibus exploditur’.
635. τινὲς ὑπέλαβον καὶ πρὸς Λαοδικέας αὐτὸν γεγραφέναι· αὐτίκα τοίνυν καὶ προσφέρουσι πεπλασμένην ἐπιστολήν.
636. Anger (p. 143) argues against a Greek original on the ground that the Eastern Church, unlike the Latin, did not generally interpret Col. iv. 16 as meaning an epistle written to the Laodiceans. The fact is true, but the inference is wrong, as the language of the Greek commentators themselves shows.
637. Act. vi. Tom. v (Labbe viii. p. 1125 ed. Colet.) καὶ γὰρ τοῦ θείου ἀποστόλου πρὸς Λαοδικεῖς φέρεται πλαστὴ ἐπιστολὴ ἕν τισι βίβλοις τοῦ ἀποστόλου ἐγκειμένη, ἣν οἱ πάτερες ἡμῶν ἀπεδοκίμασαν ὡς αὐτοῦ ἀλλοτρίαν.
638. A Greek version is given in Elias Hutter’s Polyglott New Testament (Noreb. 1599); see Anger p. 147 note g. But I have retranslated the epistle anew, introducing the Pauline passages, of which it is almost entirely made up, as they stand in the Greek Testament. The references are given in the margin.
641. Greg. Magn. Mor. in Iob. xxxv. § 25 (III. p. 433, ed. Gallicc.) ‘Recte vita ecclesiæ multiplicata per decem et quattuor computatur; quia utrumque testamentum custodiens, et tam secundum Legis decalogum quam secundum quattuor Evangelii libros vivens, usque ad perfectionis culmen extenditur. Unde et Paulus apostolus quamvis epistolas quindecim scripserit, sancta tamen ecclesia non amplius quam quatuordecim tenet, ut ex ipso epistolarum numero ostenderet quod doctor egregius Legis et Evangelii secreta rimasset’.
642. Patrol. Lat. CXVII. p. 765 (ed. Migne) ‘Et eam quæ erat Laodicensium ideo præcipit Colossensibus legi, quia, licet perparva sit et in Canone non habeatur, aliquid tamen utilitatis habet’. He uses the expression ‘eam quæ erat Laodicensium’, because τὴν ἐκ Λαοδικείας was translated in the Latin Bible ‘eam quæ Laodicensium est’.
643. See Galatians p. 232 on the authorship of this commentary.
644. A third Epistle to the Corinthians being perhaps reckoned as the 15th; see Fabric. Cod. Apocr. Nov. Test. II p. 866.
645. Patrol. Lat. CLXXXI. p. 1355 sq. (ed. Migne) ‘et ea similiter epistola, quæ Laodicensium est, i.e. quam ego Laodicensibus misi, legatur vobis. Quamvis et hanc epistolam quintamdecimam vel sextamdecimam apostolus scripserit, et auctoritas eam apostolica sicut cætera firmavit, sancta tamen ecclesia non amplius quam quatuordecim tenet, ut ex ipso epistolarum numero ostenderet etc.’ At the end of the notes to the Colossians he adds ‘Hucusque protenditur epistola quæ missa est ad Colossenses. Congruum autem videtur ut propter notitiam legentium subjiciamus eam quæ est ad Laodicenses directa; quam, ut diximus, in usu non habet ecclesia. Est ergo talis.’ Then follows the text of the Laodicean Epistle, but it is not annotated.
646. A Saxon Treatise concerning the Old and New Testament by Ælfricus Abbas, p. 28 (ed. W. L’Isle, London 1623).
647. Ioann. Sarisb. Epist. 143 (I. p. 210 ed. Giles) ‘Epistolæ Pauli quindecim uno volumine comprehensæ, licet sit vulgata et fere omnium communis opinio non esse nisi quatuordecim, decem ad ecclesias, quatuor ad personas; si tamen illa quæ ad Hebræos est connumeranda est epistolis Pauli, quod in præfatione ejus astruere videtur doctorum doctor Hieronymus, illorum dissolvens argutias qui eam Pauli non esse contendebant. Cæterum quintadecima est illa quæ ecclesiæ Laodicensium scribitur; et licet, ut ait Hieronymus, ab omnibus explodatur, tamen ab apostolo scripta est: neque sententia hæc de aliorum præsumitur opinione sed ipsius apostoli testimonio roboratur. Meminit enim ipsius in epistola ad Colossenses his verbis, Quum lecta fuerit apud vos hæc epistola, etc.’
648. Patrol. Lat. CL. p. 331 (ed. Migne) on Col. iv. 16 ‘Hæc si esset apostoli, ad Laodicenses diceret, non Laodicensium; et plusquam tredecim essent epistolæ Pauli’. We should perhaps read xiiii for xiii, ‘quatuordecim’ for ‘tredecim’, as Lanfranc is not likely to have questioned the Pauline authorship of the Epistle to the Hebrews.
649. The proportion however is very different in different collections. In the Cambridge University Library I found the epistle in four only out of some thirty MSS Which I inspected; whereas in the Lambeth Library the proportion was far greater.
651. The Codex Fuldensis, which was written within a few years of the Codex Amiatinus.
653. An account of this MS, which is at Lyons, is given by Reuss in the Revue de Théologie v. p. 334 (Strassb. 1852). He ascribes the translation of the New Testament to the 13th century, and dates the MS a little later.
654. This version is printed by Anger, p. 170 sq.
655. See Anger, p. 149 sq., p. 166 sq.
656. These two versions are printed in Lewis’s New Testament translated by J. Wiclif (1731) p. 99 sq., and in Forshall and Madden’s Wycliffite Versions of the Holy Bible (1850) IV. p. 438 sq. They are also given by Anger p. 168 sq. (1843), who takes the rarer form from Lewis and the other from a Dresden MS. Dr Westcott also has printed the commoner version in his Canon, p. 457 (ed. 4), from Forshall and Madden.
Of one of these two versions Forshall and Madden give a collation of several MSS; the other is taken from a single MS (I. p. xxxii). Lewis does not state whence he derived the rarer of these two versions, but there can be little doubt that it came from the same MS Pepys. 2073 (belonging to Magd. Coll. Cambridge) from which it was taken by Forshall and Madden (I. p. lvii); since he elsewhere mentions using this MS (p. 104). The version is not known to exist in any other. Forshall and Madden give the date of the MS as about 1440.
657. From Forshall and Madden, IV. p. 438. The earliest MSS which contain the common version of the Laodicean Epistle (to which this prologue is prefixed) date about A.D. 1430.
658. Printed from Forshall and Madden l.c. I am assured by those who are thoroughly conversant with old English, that they can discern no difference of date in these two versions, and that they both belong probably to the early years of the 15th century. The rarer version is taken from a better Latin text than the other.
659. On Col. iv. 16. Erasmus is too hard upon the writer of this letter, when he charges him with such a mass of forgeries. He does not explain how this hypothesis is consistent with the condemnation of the Epistle to the Laodiceans in Hieron. Vir. Ill. 5 (quoted above p. 359).
660. Pauli Apostoli ad Laodicenses Epistola, Latine et Germanice, Hamburg, 1595, of which the preface is given in Fabricius Cod. Apocr. Nov. Test. II. p. 867. It is curious that the only two arguments against its genuineness which he thinks worthy of notice are (1) Its brevity; which he answers by appealing to the Epistle to Philemon; and (2) Its recommendation of works (‘quod scripsit opera esse facienda quæ sunt salutis æternæ’); which he explains to refer to works that proceed of faith.
661. See Bp. Davenant on Col. iv. 16: ‘Detestanda Stapletonis opinio, qui ipsius Pauli epistolam esse statuit, quam omnes patres ut adulterinam et insulsam repudiarunt: nec sanior conclusio, quam inde deducere voluit, posse nimirum ecclesiam germanam et veram apostoli Pauli epistolam pro sua authoritate e Canone excludere’. So also Whitaker Disputation on Scripture passim (see the references given above, p. 341, note 595).
662. Ovid. Met. vii. 626 sq. ‘Jupiter huc, specie mortali, cumque parente Venit Atlantiades positis caducifer alis’ etc.
663. Acts xiv. 11 οἵ θεοὶ ὁμοιωθέντες ἀνθρώποις κατέβησαν πρὸς ἡμᾶς κ.τ.λ. There are two points worth observing in the Phrygian legend, as illustrating the Apostolic history. (1) It is a miracle, which opens the eyes of the peasant couple to the divinity of their guests thus disguised; (2) The immediate effect of this miracle is their attempt to sacrifice to their divine visitors, ‘dis hospitibus mactare parabant’. The familiarity with this beautiful story may have suggested to the barbarians of Lystra, whose ‘Lycaonian speech’ was not improbably a dialect of Phrygian, that the same two gods, Zeus and Hermes, had again visited this region on an errand at once of beneficence and of vengeance, while at the same time it would prompt them to conciliate the deities by a similar mode of propitiation, ἤθελον θύειν.
664. Aristoph. Av. 762 εἰ δὲ τυγχάνει τις ὢν Φρὺξ ... φρυγίλος ὄρνις ἐνθάδ’ ἔσται, τοῦ Φιλήμονος γένους.
665. Compare Col. iv. 9 with Philem. 11 sq.
666. Theodoret in his preface to the epistle says πόλιν δε εἶχε [[ὁ Φιλήμων] τὰς Κολάσσας· καὶ ἡ οἰκία δὲ αὐτοῦ μέχρι τοῦ παρόντος μεμένηκε. This is generally taken to mean that Philemon’s house was still standing, when Theodoret wrote. This may be the correct interpretation, but the language is not quite explicit.
667. ver. 19.
670. ver. 1 συνεργῷ ἡμῶν.
671. Col. iv. 15.
672. ver. 2 τῇ κατ’ οἶκόν σου ἐκκλησίᾳ. The Greek commentators, Chrysostom and Theodoret, suppose that St Paul designates Philemon’s own family (including his slaves) by this honourable title of ἐκκλησία, in order to interest them in his petition. This is plainly wrong. See the note on Col. iv. 15.
673. 3 Joh. 5 sq.
674. I take the view that the κυρία addressed in the Second Epistle of St John is some church personified, as indeed the whole tenour of the epistle seems to imply: see esp. vv. 4, 7 sq. The salutation to the ‘elect lady’ (ver. 1) from her ‘elect sister’ (ver. 15) will then be a greeting sent to one church from another; just as in 1 Peter, the letter is addressed at the outset ἐκλεκτοῖς Πόντου κ.τ.λ. (i. 1) and contains at the close a salutation from ἡ ἐν Βαβυλῶνι συνεκλεκτή (v. 13).
675. vv. 5, 7.