2 Corinthians 3:6Meaning & Commentary from the Church Fathers

It was spiritual, but it did not give the Spirit, because Moses brought not the Spirit but writings, whereas we are confident that we give the Spirit. Showing this more clearly, he next says, “The letter kills, but the Spirit gives life.”

He says this not without purpose, but in order to rebuke those who were vainglorious over the fulfillment of Jewish rites. By “letter” he here means the Law, which threatens punishment to sinners. By “Spirit” he means grace, which through the mystery of baptism gives life to those slain by sins.

Having shown the difference between the two tablets from their very essence, he does not stop there. He goes on to disclose this difference further, and precisely from the side that can most strongly draw the hearer, namely, from the side of the life-giving power and ease of the latter.

“The New Covenant,” he says, “is not difficult, and it grants greater grace.” When he speaks of Christ, he especially sets forth what belongs more to His love for mankind than to His dignity, or what belongs to both together.

How much more must he speak this way when discussing His covenant. What then do the words “the letter kills” mean? Earlier he said that one covenant was written on tablets of stone, the other on tablets of fleshly hearts.

But this distinction seemed to him still not great enough. Therefore he added that the former Covenant was written with letters and ink, but the New with the Spirit. Since even this distinction could not fully rouse his hearers, he finally points to something that could give them wings: “the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life.”

What does this mean? Under the old Law, the sinner is subjected to punishment. Here, under the new, the sinner runs to baptism and becomes righteous. Having become righteous, he lives and is freed from the death of sin.

If the Law catches a murderer, it condemns him to death. If grace overtakes a murderer, it sanctifies and gives him life. But why do I speak of a murderer?

The Law even seized and stoned the man who gathered sticks on the Sabbath (Num 15:32-36). This is what “the letter kills” means. By contrast, grace catches countless murderers and robbers.

Washing them in the waters of baptism, it releases them from former evils. This is what “the Spirit gives life” means. Whomever the Law catches, it makes dead from living. Grace makes the transgressor alive from being dead.

“Come to Me,” it says, “all who labor and are heavy laden, and I,” it does not say, “will punish you,” but “will give you rest” (Mt 11:28). In baptism sins are buried, former iniquities are blotted out, a man comes to life, and every grace is imprinted on his heart as on a tablet.

Consider, then, how great the superiority of the Spirit is. His tablets are more excellent than the first, and He displays something even higher than resurrection itself.

Indeed, the death from which He frees us is far more dangerous than the first death, and more dangerous to the degree that the soul is superior to the body. Natural life depends upon that life which the Spirit gives.

If He can grant this higher life, much more can He give the lower. The prophets also gave the latter, but never the former, because no one can forgive sins except God alone (Lk 5:21).

Yet even the lower life the prophets could not impart without the same Spirit. What is wondrous is not only that the Spirit gives life, but also that He granted to others the power to give life.

“Receive the Holy Spirit,” the Lord says (Jn 20:22). For what purpose? Could this not be done without the Spirit? God says this in order to show that the Spirit has the highest authority, the same royal essence, and the same power.

Therefore He also adds, “If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven. If you retain the sins of any, they are retained” (Jn 20:23). And so, since the Holy Spirit has given us life, let us preserve this life and not return again to our former deadness.

“Christ,” says the Apostle, “dies no more. For the death He died, He died to sin once for all” (Rom 6:9-10). He does not want us always to expect salvation only from grace, for otherwise we shall be deprived of everything.

He wants something to be brought from our side as well. Let us therefore take care to bring something, and let us preserve the life of the soul.

Holy are those who fulfill the law of God by the gift of God. The law can command, but it cannot help.

The Spirit comes as helper, and then God's commandment is fulfilled with joy and delight. Certainly many keep the law out of fear.

Those who hold to the law out of fear of punishment would prefer that the thing they fear did not exist.

Those who keep the law out of love for righteousness rejoice even then, because the law is not hostile to them.

Therefore, you who fear the Lord, praise Him. To honor Him not as slaves but as free men, learn to love Him whom you fear.

Then you will be able to praise what you love. Fearing God, the people of the old covenant, by the force of the letter that terrifies and kills, lacked the Spirit who gives life.

They fled to the Temple with sacrificial offerings and offered bloody sacrifices. They did not know what was prefigured by these sacrifices: the coming blood of Christ, by which we are redeemed.

Thus God commands us to be continent and gives us continence. He commands through the law and gives through the Spirit.

For the law without grace leads to the increase of transgression (cf. Rom 5:20), and the letter without the Spirit kills (cf. 2 Cor 3:6).

He commands in order to teach us to ask for the help of grace when we try to keep His commandments and, through our weakness, fall exhausted under the law.

He also teaches us to be thankful to Him who helps us when we succeed in doing any good work.

Is the law not from God? Only an ungodly man could think such a thing.

But the law commands through the letter and does not help through the Spirit. Thus a man may hear the law and think he sufficiently understands what it prescribes or forbids.

He may also believe in the power of his free will as sufficient to fulfill the law. He may not seek refuge in faith, so as to obtain help in approaching the Spirit who gives life.

He then stands guilty before the letter that kills. Such a man has zeal for God, but not according to knowledge.

If you take away the Spirit, what benefit will there be from the law? It makes a transgressor. Therefore it is said: the letter kills.

The law commands, but you do not follow it. Something is commanded by the law, and you do not do it. Something is forbidden by it, and you do it. From this, the letter kills.

More than this, who will deny that to give life is a property of eternal Majesty? Therefore let us see whether the Spirit is given life or Himself gives life.

But it is written: "The letter kills, but the Spirit gives life." Therefore the Spirit gives life.

So that you may understand that the life-giving action of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit is indivisible, remember that there is one giving of life, since God Himself gives life through the Spirit.

Paul said this: "If the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, then He who raised Christ from the dead will give life also to your mortal bodies through His Spirit who dwells in you" (Rom 8:11).

The Spirit gives life because, in fulfilling the Law, the believer is guided and assisted by the Spirit of God, not by his own powers.

The Spirit gives life because the believer stands firmly on the spiritual foundation, love for God and neighbor. He determines all his actions by it and can never fall.

But the letter killed because it demanded punishment for the slightest nonfulfillment of the Law. Meanwhile it did not give man inward strength to fulfill it, and did not even point out examples for imitation.

"For," the Apostle says, "if the ministry of deadly letters," deadly because they not only threatened death to violators of the law but also could not turn it away from them, "engraved on stones," meaning the tablets of the law. "was so glorious that the sons of Israel could not look at the face of Moses because of the glory of his face, which was passing away. " since the light of Moses' face shone only for a time and then faded, "will not the ministry of the Spirit be much more glorious?" (2 Cor 3:7-8), and the ministry "of justification" (2 Cor 3:9)?

According to the Apostle, the superiority of the New Testament ministry over the Old Testament one is so great that the glory of the ministers of the latter cannot even be compared with the glory of the ministers of the New Testament.

This is true even if one speaks of Moses himself, whose face shone with light.

"That which was made glorious," that is, the Old Testament ministry, "has not been made glorious in this respect, because of the glory that surpasses it" (2 Cor 3:10).

For the New Testament ministry is not passing away, as the Old Testament religion was, but abiding (2 Cor 3:11).

Very characteristic are Saint Chrysostom's words about the deadliness of the letters of the Old Testament law and the life-giving power of New Testament grace.

"If the law catches a murderer, it condemns him to death. But if grace catches a murderer, it sanctifies and gives him life.

Yet why do I speak of a murderer? The law also seized and stoned the man who gathered sticks on the Sabbath. This is what it means that the letter kills.

By contrast, grace catches countless murderers and robbers, washes them in the waters of baptism, and releases them from their former evils. This is what it means: the Spirit gives life!"

“God made us sufficient, filled us with His power, and made us ministers fit for such a great and divine work, ministers of the New Covenant, not of the letter but of the Spirit. The Law too was spiritual, but it did not give the Spirit as the New does.

To us, he says, has been entrusted the imparting not of the letter, as to Moses, but of the Spirit. The Apostles not only imparted teaching about spiritual and divine things, but gave the Spirit by laying hands on believers” (Theophylact).

Here is the essence of the New Covenant: the spiritualization of believers. The word that came from the mouths of the Apostles was the same kind of word as that of the Old Testament.

If the apostolic ministry had been limited to preaching alone, the New Covenant would not have been higher than the Old, even if the concepts communicated by the preaching were higher than those of the Old Testament.

The power of the New Covenant lies not in concepts, but in the grace of the Spirit. The word of the good tidings only prepared people to receive the Spirit. But the work of the New Covenant was accomplished by the Spirit, received through the divine mysteries, of which the Apostles were the first ministers.

When the Spirit entered the heart, He did not merely write the New Covenant. He accomplished it, transforming the inner man according to the spirit of the New Covenant. The Spirit did everything.

He formed faith. He ordered the new life. He directed the paths of life. Here the Apostle is not proclaiming something new, but pointing to the fulfillment of what had long ago been foretold by the prophets.

The prophet Jeremiah foretold: “Behold, the days are coming, says the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah, not according to the covenant which I made with their fathers. I will put My laws into their minds, and I will write them upon their hearts” (Jer 31:31-33).

The prophet Ezekiel completes this prophecy: “I will give them another heart, and I will put a new spirit within them. I will take the heart of stone out of their flesh and give them a heart of flesh, that they may walk in My commandments, and keep My ordinances and do them. They shall be My people, and I will be their God” (Ezek 11:19-20).

These predictions were fulfilled when the Lord poured out His Holy Spirit upon the holy Apostles, and then through them, by means of the mysteries established by God, upon all believers.

All believers received the Spirit and became new in the very sources of life. This always happens with all who sincerely believe and walk the path of faith without hypocrisy. This is the covenant, he says, whose ministers God has made us sufficient to be: not of the letter, but of the Spirit.

“For the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life.” “The Apostle spoke of both by looking to the end, because the Law punished transgressors, while grace gives life to believers” (Theodoret).

“By letter he here means the Law, which threatens punishment to transgressors of the Law. By Spirit he means grace, which through the mystery of baptism gives life to those dead in sins.

Earlier he said that one covenant was written on tablets of stone, and the other on tablets of fleshly hearts. But it seemed to him that this distinction was still not great enough.

Therefore he added that the former Covenant was written with letters and ink, but the New with the Spirit. Yet since even this distinction could not fully rouse his hearers, he points out something else that was powerful enough to give them wings: the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life.

What does this mean? Under the old Law the sinner is subjected to punishment. Under the new, he runs to baptism and becomes righteous. Having been made righteous, he lives, freed from the death of sin.

If the Law catches a murderer, it condemns him to death. If grace overtakes a murderer, it sanctifies and gives him life. But why do I speak of a murderer?

The Law even seized and stoned the man who gathered sticks on the Sabbath (Num 15:32-36). This is what ‘the letter kills’ means. By contrast, grace catches countless murderers and robbers, washes them in the waters of baptism, and releases them from former evils.

This is what ‘the Spirit gives life’ means. Whomever the Law catches, it turns from living into dead. Grace makes the transgressor alive from being dead spiritually. By the grace of baptism sins are washed away and former iniquities blotted out.

The man comes to life, and every grace is imprinted upon his heart as upon a tablet” (Chrysostom).

By the present time, Christianity too has all been enclosed in writings. The Spirit-moved apostolic word constitutes our New Testament revelation. The Spirit-bearing mysteries are surrounded by beautiful rites. The guiding gestures of the Spirit are fulfilled in the relations of pastors and flock.

All this is defined by rule. But rule is writing, letter. Its performance is an outward form. In all this there may be no spirit of life. One may move within the forms of life without life.

One may know by heart and understand the whole New Law, and not have the Spirit who enlightens by living faith. One may strictly fulfill all church rites and not have the life-giving Spirit, or have no spiritual life.

One may also remain in full submission to the pastorate, without encountering guidance that truly proceeds from the Spirit. True spiritual life moves within all these orders, but it is not necessarily presupposed by them.

We all live according to the established order, but some are spiritualized and others are not. Of two people standing in church, and even serving, one may be Spirit-bearing and the other not.

What then? Does the letter kill here too? The writing, the letter, the form, has the same value everywhere. When the Spirit is not with them, they are nothing.

But “the Spirit breathes where He wills,” and you do not know whence He comes or how. He does not come without faith and the mysteries. Yet even these may be performed only according to form, without the manifestation of inner power.

Everywhere experience assures us that all this is so. It stands before our eyes. But how and why it happens, we cannot apply our mind to discover. The Lord has enclosed the generation and ripening of life from the Spirit in a great mystery.

So it is pleasing to His will, and His will is holy, righteous, and good. One consolation remains: seek, and you shall find.