Ephesians 2:1

CHAPTER II.

The character of the Ephesians previously to their conversion

to Christianity, 1-3.

By what virtue they were changed, and for what purpose, 4-7.

They were saved by faith, 8, 9.

And created unto good works, 10.

The apostle enters into the particulars of their former

miserable state, 11, 12.

And those of their present happy state, 13.

Christ has broken down the middle wall of partition between the

Jews and Gentiles, and proclaims reconciliation to both, 14-17.

The glorious privileges of genuine believers, 18-22.

NOTES ON CHAP. II.

Verse Ephesians 2:1. And you hath he quickened] This chapter should not have been separated from the preceding, with which it is most intimately connected. As Christ fills the whole body of Christian believers with his fulness, (Ephesians 1:23,) so had he dealt with the converted Ephesians, who before were dead in trespasses, and dead in sins. DEATH is often used by all writers, and in all nations, to express a state of extreme misery. The Ephesians, by trespassing and sinning, had brought themselves into a state of deplorable wretchedness, as had all the heathen nations; and having thus sinned against God, they were condemned by him, and might be considered as dead in law-incapable of performing any legal act, and always liable to the punishment of death, which they had deserved, and which was ready to be inflicted upon them.

Trespasses, παραπτωμασι, may signify the slightest deviation from the line and rule of moral equity, as well as any flagrant offence; for these are equally transgressions, as long as the sacred line that separates between vice and virtue is passed over.

Sins, αμαρτιαις, may probably mean here habitual transgression; sinning knowingly and daringly.