Ephesians 2:16

καὶ ἀποκαταλλάξῃ τοὺς ἀμφοτέρους : and that He might reconcile them both. Further statement of object, the καί continuing and extending it. Only at this point is the prior and larger idea of the reconciliation to God introduced, and even now it is in connection with the idea of the reconciliation of Jew and Gentile. For τοὺς δύο we now have τοὺς ἀμφοτέρους, not “the two” but “both of them together,” unity being the aspect in which they are now presented. The ἀπο - in such compounds has sometimes simply an intensive meaning (ἀποθαρρεῖν, ἀποθαυμάζειν, ἀποκαραδοκεῖν, ἀπεκδέχεσθαι, etc.); sometimes, though less frequently, the sense of again (ἀποδίδωμι, ἀποκαθίστημι, ἀποκατορθόω, ἀποκαταλαμβάνω). It is doubtful which is the force of the ἀπο - here. In the context, it is true, so far as the relations of Jew and Gentile to each other are dealt with, we have simply the idea of a state of separation into two hostile camps giving place to a state of unity. But in the present clause the larger truth of a reconciliation to God is in view, and this favours the idea of a restoration to a condition which had been lost. The form ἀποκαταλλάσσειν occurs in the NT only here and in Colossians 1:20-21. In the LXX and once in the NT (Matthew 5:24) we have also διαλλάττεσθαι. But the two appear to be practically indistinguishable. As derivatives of ἀλλάσσειν they both convey the idea of a change, not primarily in feeling (which is expressed by ἱλάσκεσθαι and its compounds), but in relation, and in mutual relation, on the side of God to man and on the side of man to God (cf. Romans 5:9-11; 2 Corinthians 5:18-20). ἐν ἑνὶ σώματι διὰ τοῦ σταυροῦ; in one body through the cross. This cannot refer to Christ's body (Chrys., Beng., Harl., Hofm.), as if the point were either the reconciliation of two parties by one body, or the one offering of Christ that needed no repetition (Hebrews 7:27, etc.), or, again, the one sacrifice as contrasted with the multitude of the Levitical oblations. These are ideas alien to the context, and they are the less appropriate because Christ Himself is the subject of the ἀποκαταλλάξῃ. The reference is to the Jews and Gentiles now making one body; cf. the ἒν σῶμα in 1 Corinthians 10:17; Ephesians 4:4; and especially in Colossians 3:15. His object was to bring the two long-sundered and antagonistic parties as one whole, one great body, into right relation to God by His cross. The διὰ τοῦ σταυροῦ belongs rather to the ἀποκαταλλάξῃ than to the following ἀποκτείνας (von Soden). ἀποκτείνας τὴν ἔχθραν ἐν αὐτῷ : having slain the enmity thereby. For ἐν αὐτῷ there is a variant reading ἐν ἑαυτῷ, slenderly supported (F 115, etc.); and some propose ἐν αὑτῷ (von Soden). But this ἐν αὐτῷ refers to the σταυροῦ, and the idea is not that Christ slew the enmity in Himself, but that He did it “by the cross,” or, as some take it (Alf., etc.), “on the cross”. The ἔχθρα here, again, is not the Law itself, nor the enmity of Jew and Gentile to God (though most take it so), but rather the ἔχθρα previously mentioned the enmity between Jew and Gentile. Further, the ἀποκτείνας which might denote an action coincident with that denoted by the main verb, or might define the way in which the latter was made good, seems to have its proper sense of priority “after He had killed”. He had first to kill this enmity between the two before He could bring them both into right relations to God in the way indicated, viz., in one body, as one great, united whole.