2 Corinthians 3:18

ἡμεῖς δὲ πάντες κ. τ. λ.: but we all, sc., you as well as I, all Christian believers, with unveiled face (and so not as Moses under the Old Covenant), reflecting as a mirror the glory of the Lord, sc., of Jehovah (see reff.), which is the glory of Christ (cf. John 17:24), are transformed into the same image, sc., of Christ (see reff.), from glory to glory (i.e., progressively and without interruption, and so unlike the transitory reflection of the Divine glory on the face of Moses; cf. Psalms 84:7, and on chap. 2 Corinthians 2:16 above), as from (not “by” as the A.V.) the Lord the Spirit; sc., our progress in glory is continuous, as becomes the work of the Spirit from whom it springs (John 16:14; Romans 8:11). The meaning of κατοπτρίζεσθαι (which is not found elsewhere in the Greek Bible) is somewhat doubtful, (i.) The analogy of 1 Corinthians 13:12, of Philo, Leg. All., iii., 33 (a passage where Exodus 33:18 is paraphrased, and which therefore is specially apposite here), and of Clem. Rom., § 36, would support the rendering of the A.V., “beholding as in a glass” (i.e., a mirror). This is also given in the margin of the R.V., and is preferred by the American Revisers. But such a translation is not appropriate to the context, for the Apostle's thought is not of any indirect vision of the Divine glory, but of our freedom of access thereto and of perception thereof. It seems better therefore (ii.) to render with the R.V. (following Chrysostom) reflecting as in a mirror. And so the image conveyed is “that Christians having, like Moses, received in their lives the reflected glory of the Divine presence, as Moses received it on his countenance, are unlike Moses in that they have no fear, such as his, of its vanishing away, but are confident of its continuing to shine in them with increasing lustre (cf. 2 Corinthians 4:6 below); and in this confidence present themselves without veil or disguise, inviting enquiry instead of deprecating it, with nothing to hold back or to conceal from the eager gaze of the most suspicious or the most curious” (Stanley). The words Κυρίου πνεύματος will bear various renderings: (a) the Lord of the Spirit, which is not apposite here, (b) the Spirit of the Lord, as the A.V. takes them and the Latin commentators generally, (c) the Spirit, which is the Lord, the rendering of Chrysostom, which is given a place in the R.V. margin, and (d) the Lord, the Spirit, πνεύματος being placed in apposition to Κυρίου, neither word taking the article, as the first does not after the prep. ἀπό. We unhesitatingly adopt (d), the rendering of the R.V., inasmuch as it best brings out the identification of Κύριος and πνεῦμα in 2 Corinthians 3:17. It is worth noticing that the phrase in the “Nicene” Creed τὸ πνεῦμα … τὸ Κύριον τὸ ζωοποιόν is based on the language of this verse and of 2 Corinthians 3:6 above.