2nd Corinthians Chapter 1 verse 22 Holy Bible

2nd Corinthians 1 : 22 Bible Verse Songs

• Victory (Say Yes) by Seyi Weli

Pulpit Commentary

Pulpit CommentaryVerse 22. - Who hath also sealed us. We cannot be deconsecrated, disanointed. Still less can the confirming seal be broken. He continues to dwell on the conception of the unchangeableness of God and of the gospel into which he had been incidentally led by the charge of "lightness." The earnest of the Spirit. The promises which we have received are not mere promises, they are already so far fulfilled to us and in us as to guarantee hereafter their plenary fruition. Just as in money bargains "earnest money," "money on account," is given, in pledge that the whole will be ultimately discharged, so we have "the earnest of the Spirit" (2 Corinthians 5:5), "the firstfruits of the Spirit" (Romans 8:23), which are to us "the earnest" or pledge money that we shall hereafter enter upon the purchased possession (Ephesians 1:13, 14). We now see the meaning of the "and." It involves a climax - the promise is much; the unction more; the seal a still further security (Ephesians 4:30; 2 Timothy 2:19); but beyond all this we have already a part payment in the indwelling of the Present of God (Romans 5:5; Romans 8:9; Galatians 4:6). The word arrabon, rendered "earnest," has an interesting history. It is very ancient, for it is found (עַרָבון) in Genesis 38:17, 18, and comes from a root meaning "to pledge." It seems to be a Phoenician word, which had been introduced into various languages by the universality of Phoenician commerce. In classical Latin it is shortened into arrha, and it still exists in Italian as aura, in French as arrhes. The equivalent Hebrew figure is "firstfruits" (Romans 8:23).

Ellicott's Commentary

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers(22) Who hath also sealed us.--Better, who also sealed us. The thought thus expressed is that the gift of the Spirit, following on baptism or the laying on of hands, is as the seal of the covenant which God makes with His people, attesting its validity. (Comp. Ephesians 1:13; Ephesians 4:30; and, for the Jewish use of seals, Jeremiah 32:10.)And given the earnest of the Spirit.--Better, for the same reason as before, gave. The Greek word for "earnest" (arrhabon), which occurs here for the first time, and is used only by St. Paul in the New Testament (2Corinthians 5:5; Ephesians 1:14), has a somewhat interesting history. Originally a Hebrew word, from a verb meaning "to mix," "to change," "to pledge," and so used, as a cognate noun, with the last of the three senses, it appears simply transliterated in the LXX. of Genesis 38:17-18. It would seem to have been in common use among the Canaanite or Phoenician traders, and was carried by them to Greece, to Carthage, to Alexandria, and to Rome. It was used by the Greek orator Isaeus, and by Plautus and Terence among the earlier Latin writers. The full form came to be considered somehow as pedantic or vulgar, and was superseded in Roman law by the shortened "arrha," the payment of a small sum given on the completion of a bargain as a pledge that the payer would fulfil the contract; and it has passed into Italian as "arra;" into modern French, as "les arrhes;" into popular Scotch even, as "arles." As applied by St. Paul, it had the force of a condensed parable, such as the people of commercial cities like Corinth and Ephesus would readily understand. They were not to think that their past spiritual experience had any character of finality. It was rather but the pledge of yet greater gifts to come: even of that knowledge of God which is eternal life (John 17:3). The same thought is expressed, under a more Hebrew image, in the "firstfruits of the Spirit" in Romans 8:23. Grammatically, the "earnest of the Spirit" may be taken as an example of the genitive of apposition, "the earnest which is the Spirit." . . .