Ephesians 2:4

πλούσιος. See note on τὸ πλοῦτος, Ephesians 1:7.

ἐν ἐλέει. Cf. Romans 15:9; Titus 3:5; Luke 1:78; and esp. 1 Peter 1:3 and the declaration of the Name of the Lord to Moses in Exodus 34:6. Mercy is not inconsistent with wrath. They are both aspects of the same love.

διὰ τὴν πολλὴν�. In his earliest Epistles (1 Thessalonians 1:4; 2 Thessalonians 2:13) St Paul notes that the love which Jehovah had lavished on His Israel (Deuteronomy 33:12) was now shared by Gentile Christians. In 2 Thessalonians 2:16 this love is connected with the gift of ‘eternal consolation and good hope in grace.’ Elsewhere the only passages outside the Johannine writings in which the phrase occurs are in Romans 5:5; Romans 5:8; Romans 8:39; 2 Corinthians 13:13; Jude 1:21; cf. Titus 3:4 ἡ φιλανθρωπία.

ἣν ἠγάπησεν. Cognate acc. as in John 17:26 ἡ�. ἡμᾶς clearly here used inclusively.