[The] close relationship between
Christ and the ecclesia, which the author derives from Gen. 2:24, he transforms
into a paradigm for marriage. Although his ideas on marriage may, in fact, have
affected this view on the relationship between Christ and the ecclesia, he does
not in principle explain the Christ-ecclesia relationship on the basis of the
marriage pattern; on the contrary, the reverse is true and he frames his
ethical directives for marriage by analogy with the relationship between Christ
and the ecclesia.
A very important factor which
comes into play into the love which Christ bears the ecclesia, is the sacrament
of baptism, mentioned in 5:26. As is made clear by the εν βαπτισμα of 4:5, the author recognises but
one baptism and that is the baptism in which all the faithful partake. And
because there is but one baptism and because the ecclesia is a unity (εν σωμα), he can, in 5:26, speak of baptism
as a single event that embraces the entire ecclesia.
Baptism is described as a
sanctifying or cleansing act of Christ. But it also has a positively active
function; it is, after all, the purpose of Christ’s death that the ecclesia
should become not merely spotless, without wrinkle and without blemish, but
also glorious and holy. In 5:26s, the negative aspect of baptism is inseparable
from the positive. The words αγια
and αμωμος are mentioned in one breath.
Christ’s act of cleansing, of which baptism is the embodiment, is indissoluble
from that activity which makes the ecclesia holy and glorious. Thus the words αγιαση and καθαρισας are linked most closely in 5:26.
We may picture this as follows:
through the sacrament of baptism, Christ bestows part of his death and the cleansing
of the ecclesia, which is what he intended by his death and moreover gives the
glory and sanctity to the ecclesia which was also the purposes of his death.
There is but one baptism for the whole ecclesia which is a unity. Each believer
who undergoes baptism partakes both in the baptism of Christ, the cleansing of
the ecclesia and the sanctification and glorification of the ecclesia. He is
part of the unity (μελος του σωματος) and partakes in the cleansing
and holiness of it all. (A. Van Roon, The Authenticity of Ephesians [Supplements
to Novum Testamentum 39; Leiden: Brill, 1974], 306)
In R. 6:6, as in Eph. 4:22-24, the
faithful have finished with the old man by grace of the death of Christ. R.
does not speak of putting on the new man. On the other hand, it strikes us as
an obvious conclusion that in the teaching to which, in our opinion, the
apostle refers in R. 6:2, ο καινος ανθρωπος as the opposite number to the old
man, must have played a part.
Besides R. 6:4 talks of a newness
of life (καινοτης ζωης). It would seem that this καινοτης has been bestowed on the faithful
and that it is God’s intention that they should also follow in its path. They
who partake in this newness of life are, as 2 C. 5:17 and Gal. 6:15 put it, a
new creature (καινη κτισις).
The term “put on” also occurs in
Gal.; the baptized have “put on” Christ (3:27). To have put on the new man entails
(in Eph. and Col.) that the faithful have become new men. In Gal., the putting
on of Christ should not be interpreted to mean that the faithful have become
Christ. There is no question of Χριτος ειναι. For there is but the Χριστου ειναι. See Gal. 3:29. (Ibid., 340)