Ephesians 1:5

1:5 He did this by predestining ¹  us to adoption as his ²  sons ³  through Jesus Christ, according to the pleasure ⁴  of his will –

Ephesians 1:20

1:20 This power ⁵  he exercised ⁶  in Christ when he raised him ⁷  from the dead and seated him ⁸  at his right hand in the heavenly realms ⁹ 

Ephesians 2:5

2:5 even though we were dead in transgressions, made us alive together with Christ – by grace you are saved! ¹⁰  –

Ephesians 2:20

2:20 because you have been built ¹¹  on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, ¹²  with Christ Jesus himself as ¹³  the cornerstone. ¹⁴ 

Ephesians 3:4

3:4 When reading this, ¹⁵  you will be able to ¹⁶  understand my insight into this secret ¹⁷  of Christ.

Ephesians 3:6

3:6 namely, that through the gospel ¹⁸  the Gentiles are fellow heirs, fellow members ¹⁹  of the body, and fellow partakers of the promise in Christ Jesus.

Ephesians 4:7

4:7 But to each one of us grace was given according to the measure of the gift of Christ.

Ephesians 4:15

4:15 But practicing the truth in love, ²⁰  we will in all things grow up into Christ, who is the head.

Ephesians 4:32

4:32 Instead, ²¹  be kind to one another, compassionate, forgiving one another, just as God in Christ also forgave you. ²² 

Ephesians 5:14

5:14 For everything made evident is light, and for this reason it says: ²³ 

“Awake, ²⁴  O sleeper! ²⁵ 

Rise from the dead,

and Christ will shine on you!” ²⁶ 

Ephesians 5:20

5:20 always giving thanks to God the Father for each other ²⁷  in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ,

Ephesians 5:23-24

5:23 because the husband is the head of the wife as also Christ is the head of the church – he himself being the savior of the body. 5:24 But as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit to their husbands in everything.

Ephesians 5:32

5:32 This mystery is great – but I am actually ²⁸  speaking with reference to Christ and the church.

Ephesians 6:6

6:6 not like those who do their work only when someone is watching ²⁹  – as people-pleasers – but as slaves of Christ doing the will of God from the heart. ³⁰ 

[1:5]  ¹ tn Grk “by predestining.” Verse 5 begins with an aorist participle dependent on the main verb in v. 4 (“chose”).

[1:5]  ² tn Grk “to himself” after “through Jesus Christ.”

[1:5]  ³ tn The Greek term υἱοθεσία (Juioqesia) was originally a legal technical term for adoption as a son with full rights of inheritance. BDAG 1024 s.v. notes, “a legal t.t. of ‘adoption’ of children, in our lit., i.e. in Paul, only in a transferred sense of a transcendent filial relationship between God and humans (with the legal aspect, not gender specificity, as major semantic component).” Although some modern translations remove the filial sense completely and render the term merely “adoption” (cf. NAB, ESV), the retention of this component of meaning was accomplished in the present translation by the phrase “as…sons.”

[1:5]  ⁴ tn Or “good pleasure.”

[1:20]  ⁵ tn Grk “which” (v. 20 is a subordinate clause to v. 19).

[1:20]  ⁶ tn The verb “exercised” (the aorist of ἐνεργέω, energew) has its nominal cognate in “exercise” in v. 19 (ἐνέργεια, energeia).

[1:20]  ⁷ tn Or “This power he exercised in Christ by raising him”; Grk “raising him.” The adverbial participle ἐγείρας (egeiras) could be understood as temporal (“when he raised [him]”), which would be contemporaneous to the action of the finite verb “he exercised” earlier in the verse, or as means (“by raising [him]”). The participle has been translated here with the temporal nuance to allow for means to also be a possible interpretation. If the translation focused instead upon means, the temporal nuance would be lost as the time frame for the action of the participle would become indistinct.

[1:20]  ⁸ tc The majority of mss, especially the Western and Byzantine mss (D F G Ψ Ï b r Ambst), have the indicative ἐκάθισεν (ekaqisen, “he seated”) for καθίσας (kaqisa", “when he seated, by seating”). The indicative is thus coordinate with ἐνήργησεν (enhrghsen, “he exercised”) and provides an additional statement to “he exercised his power.” The participle (found in Ì^92vid א A B 0278 33 81 1175 1505 1739 1881 2464 al), on the other hand, is coordinate with ἐγείρας (egeiras) and as such provides evidence of God’s power: He exercised his power by raising Christ from the dead and by seating him at his right hand. As intriguing as the indicative reading is, it is most likely an intentional alteration of the original wording, accomplished by an early “Western” scribe, which made its way in the Byzantine text.

[1:20]  ⁹ sn Eph 1:19-20. The point made in these verses is that the power required to live a life pleasing to God is the same power that raised Christ from the dead. For a similar thought, cf. John 15:1-11.

[2:5]  ⁹ tn Or “by grace you have been saved.” The perfect tense in Greek connotes both completed action (“you have been saved”) and continuing results (“you are saved”).

[2:20]  ¹³ tn Grk “having been built.”

[2:20]  ¹⁴ sn Apostles and prophets. Because the prophets appear after the mention of the apostles and because they are linked together in 3:5 as recipients of revelation about the church, they are to be regarded not as Old Testament prophets, but as New Testament prophets.

[2:20]  ¹⁵ tn Grk “while Christ Jesus himself is” or “Christ Jesus himself being.”

[2:20]  ¹⁶ tn Or perhaps “capstone” (NAB). The meaning of ἀκρογωνιαῖος (akrogwniaio") is greatly debated. The meaning “capstone” is proposed by J. Jeremias (TDNT 1:792), but the most important text for this meaning (T. Sol. 22:7-23:4) is late and possibly not even an appropriate parallel. The only place ἀκρογωνιαῖος is used in the LXX is Isa 28:16, and there it clearly refers to a cornerstone that is part of a foundation. Furthermore, the imagery in this context has the building growing off the cornerstone upward, whereas if Christ were the capstone, he would not assume his position until the building was finished, which vv. 21-22 argue against.

[3:4]  ¹⁷ tn Grk “which, when reading.”

[3:4]  ¹⁸ tn Grk “you are able to.”

[3:4]  ¹⁹ tn Or “mystery.”

[3:6]  ²¹ sn The phrase through the gospel is placed last in the sentence in Greek for emphasis. It has been moved forward for clarity.

[3:6]  ²² tn Grk “and fellow members.”

[4:15]  ²⁵ tn The meaning of the participle ἀληθεύοντες (alhqeuonte"; from the verb ἀληθεύω [alhqeuw]) is debated. In classical times the verb could mean “to speak the truth,” or “to be true, to prove true.” In the LXX it appears five times (Gen 20:16; 42:16; Prov 21:3; Isa 44:26; Sir 34:4) and translates four different Hebrew words; there it is an ethical term used of proving or being true, not with the idea of speaking the truth. In the NT the only other place the verb appears is in Gal 4:16 where it means “to speak the truth.” However, in Ephesians the concept of “being truthful” is the best sense of the word. In contrast to the preceding verse, where there are three prepositional phrases to denote falsehood and deceit, the present word speaks of being real or truthful in both conduct and speech. Their deceit was not only in their words but also in their conduct. In other words, the believers’ conduct should be transparent, revealing the real state of affairs, as opposed to hiding or suppressing the truth through cunning and deceit. See H. W. Hoehner, Ephesians, 564-65, and R. Bultmann, TDNT 1:251.

[4:32]  ²⁹ tc ‡ Although most witnesses have either δέ (de; Ì⁴⁹ א A D² Ψ 33 1739^mg Ï lat) or οὖν (oun; D* F G 1175) here, a few important mss lack a conjunction (Ì⁴⁶ B 0278 6 1739* 1881). If either conjunction were originally in the text, it is difficult to explain how the asyndetic construction could have arisen (although the dropping of δέ could have occurred via homoioteleuton). Further, although Hellenistic Greek rarely joined sentences without a conjunction, such does occur in the corpus Paulinum on occasion, especially to underscore a somber point. “Instead” has been supplied in the translation because of stylistic requirements, not textual basis. NA²⁷ places δέ in brackets, indicating some doubt as to its authenticity.

[4:32]  ³⁰ tn Or “forgiving.”

[5:14]  ³³ sn The following passage has been typeset as poetry because many scholars regard this passage as poetic or hymnic. These terms are used broadly to refer to the genre of writing, not to the content. There are two broad criteria for determining if a passage is poetic or hymnic: “(a) stylistic: a certain rhythmical lilt when the passages are read aloud, the presence of parallelismus membrorum (i.e., an arrangement into couplets), the semblance of some metre, and the presence of rhetorical devices such as alliteration, chiasmus, and antithesis; and (b) linguistic: an unusual vocabulary, particularly the presence of theological terms, which is different from the surrounding context” (P. T. O’Brien, Philippians [NIGTC], 188-89). Classifying a passage as hymnic or poetic is important because understanding this genre can provide keys to interpretation. However, not all scholars agree that the above criteria are present in this passage, so the decision to typeset it as poetry should be viewed as a tentative decision about its genre.

[5:14]  ³⁴ tn Grk “Rise up.”

[5:14]  ³⁵ tn The articular nominative participle ὁ καθεύδων (Jo kaqeudwn) is probably functioning as a nominative for vocative. Thus, it has been translated as “O sleeper.”

[5:14]  ³⁶ sn A composite quotation, possibly from Isa 26:19, 51:17, 52:1, and 60:1.

[5:20]  ³⁷ tn Grk “for all.” The form “all” can be either neuter or masculine.

[5:32]  ⁴¹ tn The term “actually” is not in the Greek text, but is supplied in the English translation to bring out the heightened sense of the statement.

[6:6]  ⁴⁵ tn Grk “not according to eye-service.”

[6:6]  ⁴⁶ tn Grk “from the soul.”