2 Corinthians 4:3Meaning & Commentary from the Church Fathers

Thus it calls “mammon” lord, κύριον (Mt 6:24), and the belly god (Phil 3:19). Yet the belly is not therefore god, nor is mammon lord. They are so named because of those who subject themselves to them.

We, however, think this is spoken not of the devil, but of the God of all. The passage should be read in this way: “God has blinded the minds of the unbelievers of this age” (τών απιστων του αιώνος τούτου ετύφλωσεν ο Θεός τά νοήματα).

For it is not the age to come, but only the present age, that has unbelievers.

But if someone also reads it this way, “the God of this age” (ο Θεός τού αιόνος τόύτου), this reading presents no difficulty. It does not show that He is God only of the present age.

He is also called the God of heaven, yet He is not God of heaven alone. We also call Him the God of the present day, but in saying this we do not confine His authority to this day alone.

Likewise He is called the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob. Yet He is not God of them alone. Many other similar proofs may be found in Scripture.

How, then, did He blind them? Not by cooperating in their blindness. May it not be! He did so by abandonment and permission. Such expressions are often used in Scripture.

Thus it says, “God gave them over to a debased mind” (Rom 1:28). Since the Gentiles first refused to believe and made themselves unworthy of the knowledge of the mysteries of God, God afterward abandoned them.

What else should have been done with them? Should He drag them by force and reveal the mysteries to those unwilling to know them? They would have despised them still more and refused to know them.

Therefore the Apostle added, “lest the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ should shine upon them.” This was not so that they should not believe in God, but so that unbelievers, being incapable, should not see the inner mysteries.

The Lord commanded the same to us when He ordered us not to cast pearls before swine (Mt 7:6). Otherwise, if He had revealed them even to unbelievers, the sickness of unbelief would only have increased in them.

If someone forced a man with diseased eyes to look at the sun, he would only intensify the sickness. This is why physicians keep such patients in darkness, so that they may not make the disease worse.

Understand the matter here in exactly the same way. Unbelievers became such by their own will. Having become unbelievers, they could no longer behold the ineffable mysteries of the Gospel, since God had already hidden from them the radiance of the evangelical light.

The Lord also said this to His disciples: “Therefore I speak to them in parables, because seeing they do not see, and hearing they do not hear” (Mt 13:13).

To explain more clearly by example what I am saying, imagine some Greek who considers our mysteries fables. Would he receive more benefit by coming to us and seeing our mysteries than by not entering at all?

In this same sense the Apostle says, “lest the light should shine upon them,” still continuing to keep to the history of Moses.

What happened to the Jews under Moses also happens to all unbelievers in the times of the Gospel.

As for what is hidden from them and unknown to them, listen to the Apostle himself. He says, “lest the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine upon them.”

That is, that the Cross is the salvation of the universe and His glory. The very One crucified upon it will again come with great glory.

This includes everything else, present and future, visible and invisible, and the ineffable glory of the good things awaited.

This is why he said, “shine,” so that you may not seek everything here in this life. The glory given now is only a certain radiance of the Spirit.

The Apostle indicated this above when he mentioned the fragrance and also the pledge. By these he showed that the greater things remain there, in the life to come.

All this is hidden from unbelievers. It is hidden because they themselves first refused to believe.

Then, to show that those who have not known the glory of Christ know not only Christ’s glory but also the Father’s glory, he added, “who is the image of God.”

One cannot stop at Christ alone. Just as through Christ you see the Father, so if you do not know the glory of Christ, you do not know the glory of the Father.

This light is the gentle light of the holy glory of the Immortal One. Or, what is the same, it is the image of God, invisible in essence, Who illumined the Apostles through Jesus Christ, and then all believers.

Although the essential thoughts in all that has been said concern the glory and greatness of Christianity in general, they also concern the Apostles as representatives of Christianity. This is especially so because certain accusations were made against them.

That is why the Apostle often speaks of himself: we do not lose heart, but have renounced the hidden things of shame, not walking in craftiness, nor falsifying the word of God, cf. 2:17.

Concerning these last words, St. John Chrysostom remarks: "The false apostles boasted as if they were free from love of money, while they took gifts, only secretly.

"They were regarded as holy, but in reality they had many vices. We, says the Apostle, have rejected everything, that is, what he calls the hidden things of shame."

"We are in deed what we are in word. We have nothing ambiguous, hidden, or crafty, either in our life or in our preaching."

"It is not our fault that our Gospel is veiled for some. The cause is their own blindness and their perishing condition."

"What happened to the Jews under Moses also happens to all unbelievers during the Gospel. Because of the fattening of their heart, the light of the Gospel of Christ's glory is hidden from them.

"That is, they do not see that the Cross is the salvation and glory of the world. They do not see that He Who was crucified upon it wishes to come again with great glory.

"Everything else also remains hidden from them: present and future things, visible and invisible things, and the ineffable manifestation of the expected blessings.

"It is hidden because they themselves first did not wish to believe this.

"To show that those who have not known Christ's glory do not know only Christ's glory, but also the Father's glory, the Apostle added: Who is the image of the invisible God.

"Yet one cannot stop at Christ alone. As through Christ you see the Father, so if you do not know Christ's glory, you do not know the Father's glory either."

"By the shining of this light, we too see not things subject to the senses, but God Himself."

As though continuing this, blessed Theodoret writes: "Since the divine nature is invisible, it becomes visible, as far as possible, through the assumed humanity, illumined by divine light and emitting lightning-like radiance."

The Apostle calls them perishing, not because they were condemned to destruction, but because, by their way of life as it had formed up to then, they placed themselves in such a condition that the Gospel could not fit within them.

It was veiled to them. They could understand nothing in it. In no way did it cleave to their soul, and the soul found nothing in it that could interest it.

For this reason the soul does not accept it. Since salvation is possible only on the condition of this acceptance, it remains outside the realm of those being saved, among those perishing.

This is whom the Apostle means by those who are perishing.

Yet today or tomorrow, somehow, their spirit too may awaken, attend to the Gospel, and enter the company of those being saved.

St. Chrysostom says that in these words the Apostle expresses the same thought that he had previously expressed in the words: "to the one an aroma of death unto death, to the other an aroma of life unto life" (2 Cor 2:16).

Oecumenius puts this speech into the Apostle's mouth: "It is not our fault that our Gospel is veiled for some. The cause is their own blindness and perishing condition."