2 Corinthians 10:4Meaning & Commentary from the Church Fathers

See how far he is from pride. He did not say, "we are mighty," but, "our weapons are mighty through God." We did not make them such, but God Himself did.

Since they were tormented, driven out, and endured countless and most grievous sufferings, all this revealed their weakness. Wishing to show the power of God, he says, "but mighty through God."

"His power is especially revealed in this, that He conquers by these weapons. Therefore, even if we carry these weapons, God Himself fights and acts through them."

Then the apostle expands in praise of this weapon, saying, "for the destruction of strongholds." And lest anyone, hearing of strongholds, imagine something material, he adds, "by them we overthrow reasonings."

By metaphor he gives force to his speech. By explaining the metaphor, he shows that their warfare is spiritual. These strongholds strike souls, not bodies. Since they are much stronger than material strongholds, a better weapon is also required.

By strongholds he means the pride of the Greeks and the power of their sophistries and syllogisms. Yet God cast down all these instruments used against them.

In what are they mighty? In the destruction of strongholds. What strongholds these are, he says below.

"By them we overthrow reasonings." By these weapons, he says, we cast down the reasonings of the Greeks and their pride. Or, we draw their minds and souls out of the error by which they are infected, and subject them to the truth.

Thus the mind and arrogance of the Areopagite were drawn away from impiety and subjected to piety. Notice that he did not say, "we use battering engines," but simply, "we destroy." This shows the ease of the victory and the power of the weapons.

From Him alone we must expect help, instruction, and victory. There is no faith where there is no hope in the One in Whom one believes.

Therefore one must despair of one's own strength in order to have good hope in the power of Christ. Thus Saint Paul says: "Most gladly I will rather boast in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may dwell in me" (2 Cor 12:9).

The Psalmist also trusts in His power and says boldly: "Through God we shall do valiantly, and He shall bring down those who oppress us" (Ps 60:12).

He girds His servants with strength (Ps 18:32). He teaches their hands for war and their fingers for battle (Ps 144:1), for "the Lord is strong and mighty, the Lord mighty in battle" (Ps 24:8).

The Holy Church commands her children to trust and be bold in this all-powerful Champion: "We have as Champion the Lord born of her, the Virgin Theotokos.

"Take courage, then, take courage, people of God. For He will conquer the enemies, since He is all-powerful."

Elsewhere the Church sings to Him: "Thou art my strength, O Lord, Thou also art my power," and so forth.

Yet in this we ourselves must not be despondent or lazy, but must be sober and watchful, as Saint Peter exhorts: "Be sober, be watchful" (1 Pet 5:8).

Christ helps those who labor, not those who lie down and sleep. Warfare requires struggle. Therefore the lazy and sleepy man hopes in vain for Christ the Helper.

2. The word of God, the spiritual sword, according to the Apostle's word: "And the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God" (Eph 6:17), is also a weapon against the enemies.

Christ Himself struck Satan with this weapon when He was tempted by him in the wilderness. Against the snares proposed by him, He brought forward Scripture and put the tempter to shame (cf. Mt 4:1-11).

Thus He gave us an example, so that in necessary cases we too may fight against him with the same weapon, with God's help.

If he drives us toward despair, let us apply the mercy of God promised to repentant sinners. If he lifts us up into pride, let us answer that we are earth and ashes.

Let us answer that "everyone who exalts himself will be humbled" (Lk 18:14), and that "God resists the proud" (1 Pet 5:5).

If he wishes to wound us with love of money, love of pleasure, and other arrows, let us take fitting remedies against his arrows from the same Scripture.

3. Against the proud spirit, the spirit of malice, envy, and hatred, a strong and effective weapon is humility, meekness, and love. By these weapons he is put to shame and gives way.

It is praiseworthy to be proud against him, to hate him, and to be malicious against him alone, as the adversary of God and enemy of the human race.

But to humble oneself before God and men, to forgive the man who has wronged us, and to love the brother who hates us, this is a weapon that wounds him.

Christ exhorts us to this: "Love your enemies, bless those who curse you, do good to those who hate you, and pray for those who mistreat you and persecute you" (Mt 5:44).

The Apostle also says: "Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good" (Rom 12:21).

4. A strong and effective weapon against this adversary is humble, fervent, and pure prayer. We must always guard ourselves by it and prepare and arm ourselves against the enemy's assault.

This is needed especially when he attacks us with evil thoughts and wishes to wound our heart and conscience with them as with fiery arrows.

By prayer the all-powerful help of God is sought. A man, despairing of his own strength, hopes in the almighty power of God.

Strengthened by this power, he stands against his enemy. Weak in his own power, but strong in God's, he puts the proud and arrogant spirit to shame.

He does this while being flesh and blood, which wounds that spirit more than any torment. Therefore Christ strongly exhorts us to prayer: "Watch and pray, lest you enter into temptation" (Mt 26:41).

He also showed how to pray: "Lead us not into temptation, Father, but deliver us from the evil one" (Lk 11:4). And the Apostle says: "Pray without ceasing" (1 Thess 5:17).

Behold the weapons of Christian warfare. With these weapons all the saints armed themselves against the common enemy of Christians, the devil.

With them they resisted him and conquered him by the power of their King and Lord. With these we too must gird ourselves, "that we may be able to withstand in the evil day" (Eph 6:13), that is, at the hour of his assault upon us.

Calling it sound, solid, righteous, and great, he uses it to remove obedience to Christ.

As an example of the flattery and craft by which the devil draws the human will to cast off the good yoke of Christ, Saint Macarius the Great gives the following noetic warfare.

"Someone, quarreling with his brother, is troubled within himself and thinks: Shall I say this or that to him? No, I will not say it. He insults me so. Shall I speak against him?

"Better to be silent. True, we have the commandments of God, but one must also preserve one's honor. Thus it is difficult to deny oneself completely."

Therefore the Apostle commands decisive and complete self-denial. He commands us to put on the whole armor of God, not to gird ourselves with one weapon only.

Fasting alone is insufficient. Prayer alone is insufficient. Almsgiving alone is insufficient. Chastity alone is insufficient. The whole armor of God is all the commandments of the Gospel.

He who tramples one of them has trampled the whole assembly of them, the whole law. He who tramples one of them "shall be called least in the Kingdom of Heaven" (Mt 5:19), and will be sent into fiery Gehenna.

"I directed myself toward all Thy commandments; every way of unrighteousness I hated" (Ps 119:128). "Take up the whole armor of God, that you may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand" (Eph 6:13).

Only the one who has taken up all "the weapons of God" can "withstand in the evil day." Only the one who fulfills all the commandments without exception can stand against the enemy.

The "evil day" is the hour of fierce diabolical temptation and assault. Courageous warriors of Christ undergo it during their earthly pilgrimage, and through it the victors pass from eternal death to the resurrection of the soul.

For other Christians, the "evil day" is the day of the soul's separation from the body, the day of passage through the aerial toll-houses.

The saints of God clothed themselves in the whole armor of God. The rule of their life was the Gospel. Their word, the word of mouth, mind, and heart, was "the word of God" (Eph 6:17), the name of the Lord Jesus Christ.

With this spiritual sword they struck and crushed the revolving fiery weapon of the enemy. The words uttered by the devil and the fantasies depicted by him could not penetrate the soul, but were reflected from it in vain.

In the strictest watchfulness and sobriety, the servants of God attended to the mind and heart. Illumined by divine grace, from afar they already sensed noetic thieves and murderers approaching them.

In their attentive vigilance, as in a mirror, they saw the dark faces of the noetic Ethiopians. Having rejected communion with them here, they deprived them of every right over themselves.

After death, they passed unhindered by the aerial powers, whom they had trampled down in good time.

"Only the man who has truly renounced the world," says Saint Macarius, "who struggles, has cast off the earthly burden, freed himself, and sincerely withdrawn from vain desires, fleshly passions, authority, and human honors,

"who has secretly received help from the Lord in the hidden struggle, abides firmly in service to Him, and has finally surrendered his whole soul and body to the Lord,

"only such a man, I say, finds opposition, hidden passions, invisible snares, secret war, and inward battle.

"Standing in the midst of this warfare and praying unceasingly to God, he receives from heaven the spiritual weapons described by the blessed Apostle: the breastplate of righteousness, the helmet of salvation, the shield of faith, and the spiritual sword.

"Girded with these, he can withstand the hidden hostile devices directed against him.

"Having acquired these weapons through prayer, patience, supplication, fasting, and faith, he can wage war courageously against principalities, powers, and world-rulers.

"By conquering the opposing powers through the help of the Spirit and through his own virtues, he becomes worthy of eternal life."

When the devil sees someone unwilling to sin, he is not so senseless as to propose obvious evil to him. He does not say, "Go, commit fornication," or, "Go, steal."

He knows that we do not want this, and he does not labor to tell us what we do not want. Instead he tries to find in us some desire or some justification, and by these he harms us.

Therefore Scripture says: "The evil one does evil when he joins himself to the righteous" (Prov 11:15). The evil one is the devil. He does evil when he joins his righteousness to our righteousness.

Then he is strengthened, then he harms more, then he acts. When we are led by our own desires and follow our own righteousness, then, as though doing good, we lay snares for ourselves.

We do not even notice how we are perishing. This is from the instruction of Abba Dorotheus on not composing one's own understanding.

This is according to Blessed Theophylact of Bulgaria's interpretation. It is also clear from the lives of Saint Anthony the Great, Saint John the Much-Suffering of the Caves, and others.

He also teaches that "whoever is confident in himself that he is Christ's can judge by himself that Paul also is Christ's." Apostolic authority was given to him not for disorder, but for edification.

"And let anyone who doubts our power and authority know," the Apostle adds, "that as we are in word by letters when absent, so we are also in deed when present."

"Enveloped in such reasonings, they are confident that they sit firmly and are secure not only from destruction, but even from attack.

"But then the Apostle comes with a grace-filled word. Unbelief with impiety flees before the face of the fear of God. Sin with egotism and passions flees before the face of conscience.

"The spirit that had been in captivity, made alive by the grace of God, rises to freedom and joyfully gives itself over into the captivity of obedience to Christ.

"This is the captivity of the mind in obedience to Christ. The mind gives itself in obedience to Christ, in the confidence that by this alone true life and true freedom are preserved.

"This obedience embraces the whole moral and religious order of the Church. Whoever acts against it in anything is a transgressor and draws righteous vengeance upon himself.

"This is precisely what the Apostle now says: that with us authority and power are always ready to avenge every disobedience. I will use it among you as soon as the obedience of the obedient is fulfilled, and the disobedient distinguish themselves of their own accord" (Bishop Theophan).

"We did not make them such. God Himself did. Since they were tormented, driven out, and endured countless and most grievous sufferings, all this revealed their weakness.

"Therefore, wishing to show the power of God, he says, 'but mighty through God.' For His power is especially revealed in conquering by these weapons.

"Although we bear these weapons, God Himself fights and acts through them. After this the Apostle enlarges in praise of the weapons, saying, 'for the pulling down of strongholds.'

"Lest anyone, hearing of strongholds, imagine something material, he adds, 'casting down imaginations.' By the metaphor he gave force to the discourse, and by explaining it he shows that their warfare is spiritual.

"These strongholds strike souls, not bodies. Since they are much stronger than material strongholds, a better weapon is required.

"By strongholds he means the pride of the Greeks, the force of their sophisms and syllogisms, and also all the weapons used against the Apostles" (Chrysostom).

The weapons of apostolic warfare are all the things with which the holy Apostles were armed for overcoming error, impiety, and sin.

All these were contained in the exceedingly abundant outpouring upon them of the grace of the All-Holy Spirit. Filling them, He both taught and strengthened them how to act in each circumstance.

Sometimes they acted by word alone, and sometimes, beyond this, by the manifestation of extraordinary powers.

Theodoret writes: "Our weapons, says the Apostle, are spiritual gifts. By their help we become victorious and subject those who resist to the Master."

Yet in this action of the apostolic weapons, despite all their extraordinary and divine power, there is nothing mechanical. They do indeed destroy, but through the self-edification of our spirit.

They take captive, but through free submission to the truth of God. The Apostle expressed this manner of action as "for the pulling down of strongholds, casting down imaginations."

"As the Apostle called the saints temples of God, so he calls those enslaved to impiety strongholds of the devil" (Theodoret).

Unbelief with impiety, and sin with egoism and the passions, build a fortress around themselves. It is formed from thoughts by which they intend to justify both their manner of thinking and their manner of life.

Wrapped in such thoughts, they are confident that they sit firmly and safely, not only from destruction, but even from attack.

But then the Apostle comes with a grace-filled word and begins to speak. The ear receives the sounds of the word. The mind receives the thought expressed by the word.

The grace that comes in the word overshadows the spirit, which had been asleep or buried under a heap of thoughts.

The awakened spirit receives the fear of God, and by this fear awakens the conscience. Together, strengthened by the grace of God, they scatter the stronghold that oppressed them and lay upon them.

Not one of those thoughts that once seemed so firm and securely established remains standing. Everything is destroyed.

Unbelief with impiety flees before the face of the fear of God. Sin with egoism and the passions flees before the face of conscience.

When these powers of the spirit alone remain in authority, they are then mysteriously clothed in Christ. And behold, a Christian appears.

This is what always comes from the destruction of the strongholds of the soul, through the casting down of thoughts by a spirit filled with grace.