Ephesians 4:23

ἀνανεοῦσθαι δέ : and that ye be renewed. For ἀνανεοῦσθαι a few MSS. ([446] 2 17, 47, etc.) and some Versions (Syr., Copt., Vulg.) read ἀνανεοῦσθε, while δέ is omitted by [447]. In such connections δέ expresses both addition and contrast. It introduces a statement connected with the foregoing but giving the other side of that. Here it is the positive change which must follow the putting off. As the middle of this verb has the active sense, ἀνανεοῦσθαι must be taken as passive here, = “be renewed,” not “renew yourselves” (Luth.). The verb expresses a spiritual change, a transformation from old to new. Whether it also conveys the idea of restoration to a former or a primal state is doubtful, so many compounds with ἀνά (ἀναπληροῦν, ἀνακοινοῦν, ἀνισοῦν, ἀνιεροῦν, etc.) expressing nothing more than change. For the supposed distinction between ἀνανεοῦσθαι as expressing renovation, making new, or giving a fresh beginning, and ἀνακαινοῦσθαι as referring to regeneration or change of nature, see Haupt and Ell. in loc., and Meyer on Colossians 3:10. τῷ πνεύματι τοῦ νοὸς ὑμῶν : in the spirit of your mind. The position of the ὑμῶν gives it a measure of emphasis, “ your mind,” “the mind that is in you,” unless it be taken (with Haupt) to be placed last because it qualifies not the νοὸς only but the whole idea in τῷ πνεύματι τοῦ νοός. This difficult sentence has been understood to refer to the Holy Spirit, the νοός being dealt with as some form of the poss. gen. or the gen. subj., and the πνεύματι as dat. instr. Thus the sense would be “renewed by the Holy Spirit bestowed on, or possessed by, your mind” (Œc., Theophy., Bull, Waterland, Fritz., etc.). This proceeds on the NT doctrine that it is by the Spirit of God that we are regenerated or renewed. But it leaves the point of the addition of τοῦ νοός obscure. This ancient interpretation has been adopted by some recent exegetes with certain modifications. Thus Ellicott is of opinion that the πνεύματι refers not to the Holy Spirit distinctly and separately as the Divine Agent, but to that Spirit as united with the human spirit. In this way he thinks the poss. gen. is in point, and the introduction of the νοός accounted for as the receptaculum of the πνεῦμα. But, while it is true that it is often difficult to say whether the regenerated mind of man or the Divine Spirit is particularly in view in the Pauline use of πνεῦμα, there seems to be no case in which the NT speaks of the Holy Spirit as man's Spirit, or attaches to πνεῦμα in the sense of the Divine Spirit any such defining term as ὑμῶν or τοῦ νοὸς ὑμῶν. Nor can it be said that πνεῦμα, in the sense of the Divine Spirit in union with man's spirit, has anywhere else any such designation as the one in the text. Nor, again, does the interpretation which turns upon this idea of union between God's Spirit and our spirit, and not simply on the indwelling of the Divine Spirit in us, really account in any satisfactory way for the νοός. It is necessary, therefore, to take πνεῦμα here as = our spirit, and that as at once distinguished from and related to the νοῦς. The πνεῦμα, then, appears to be the higher faculty in man, the faculty that makes him most akin to God, the organ of his spiritual life and his fellowship with God, under the bondage of sin by nature, but set free from that and made fit for the purposes of the Divine life by the Holy Spirit. The νοῦς (cf. on Ephesians 4:17 above) is the faculty of understanding, feeling, and determining, distinguished by Paul from the πνεῦμα (1 Corinthians 14:14), represented as capable of approving the law, but incapable of withstanding the motions of sin (Romans 7:23), and itself the subject or seat of renewal (ἀνακαίνωσις, Romans 12:2). Further the regenerate human spirit and the Divine Spirit are described as distinct and yet co-operant (Romans 8:16). Here then the πνεύματι must be taken not as the instrumental dative (for renewal does not take effect by means of our spirit), but as the dat. of ref., and the νοός will be the gen. subj. Thus the sense becomes “renewed in respect of the spirit by which your mind is governed” (Mey.), that is, in respect of the spiritual faculty, the moral personality whose organ is the mind or reason. Some, holding by the interpretation of πνεῦμα as our spirit, take the νοός to be the gen. of appos. (e.g., August., de Trin., xiv., 16, spiritus quae mens vocatur), or the part. gen., = “the governing spirit of your mind” (De Wette). But the above construction is better, and it is the one adopted substantially by the AV and the other old English Versions, the RV, Mey., Haupt, Abb., and most commentators.

[446] Codex Claromontanus (sæc. vi.), a Græco-Latin MS. at Paris, edited by Tischendorf in 1852.

[447] Codex Augiensis (sæc. ix.), a Græco-Latin MS., at Trinity College, Cambridge, edited by Scrivener in 1859. Its Greek text is almost identical with that of G, and it is therefore not cited save where it differs from that MS. Its Latin version, f, presents the Vulgate text with some modifications.