Colossians 2:18Meaning & Commentary from the Church Fathers

Having stirred up in them a feeling of indignation by the word “deceive,” he then begins: “By voluntary humility,” he says, “and worship of angels, intruding into what he has not seen, vainly puffed up by his fleshly mind.”

How is it “humility”? How is it “being puffed up”? He shows that all this comes from vainglory.

What do all these words mean? Some said that we must be brought to God not through Christ, but through angels, because being brought through Christ is more than is needful for us.

Therefore Paul explains from every side what was said about Christ. We have been reconciled “by the blood of His Cross” (Col 1:20), “because He suffered for us” (1 Pet 2:21), and because He “loved us” (Eph 2:4).

“Which are a shadow of things to come.” By “things to come” he means the blessings of the New Testament. They were future in relation to the Old Testament, which existed so long as its time endured.

“But the body is Christ’s.” “Let no one deceive you.” Some place the punctuation after “Christ’s,” so that the meaning is this: the Old Testament was a shadow, but the body, that is, the truth, is Christ’s.

What need is there to grasp at the shadow when the body is present? Others join these words to what follows, so that it may be understood thus: “the body of Christ,” that is, you, “let no one deprive.”

The Greek word is katabrabeueto, that is, “let no one deprive you.” For katabrabeuein means that one person wins the victory while another receives the prize.

Who is condemned by the Apostle in the words, "self-willed humility and worship," and so forth? Answer: I think that what the Apostle adds makes clear the meaning sought in this passage. For shortly afterward the Apostle points to "severity to the body" (Col 2:23). Such are the Manichaeans and those like them.

Let no one come to you, perhaps wishing to imitate the humility of our spirit, and deceive you or draw you away to the law of angels, that is, to the teaching of the priests. Such a man acts as though he has seen something not from Scripture itself, but by his own contemplation. For he is vainly puffed up by his own inventions, which are inventions of the mind of his fleshly mind.

“Let no one deceive you,” katabrabeueto. Those appointed to judge the contestants in the stadium are called prize-awarders, brabeutai, because they give their verdict concerning those who have won.

To award wrongly means to deceive. Therefore, since those who mixed legal observances with the Gospel were bringing the Colossians down from what is higher to what is lower, the Apostle rightly said, “Let no one deceive you.”

Then he shows more clearly the harm being done. “By voluntary humility and worship of angels, going about in what he has not seen, vainly puffed up by his fleshly mind.”

The defenders of the law urged them to give honor to angels, saying that the law had been given through them. This attachment long persisted in Phrygia and Pisidia.

What sort of humility? It is to say that we are humble, while God is great and surpasses our worship. Since we do not reach Him, let us entreat Him through angels and come to Him through them. Above, the Apostle said, "Who is the head of every principality and power" (Col 2:10). And now he says: why do you go to the elements and angels, having left their Head, Who is Christ?

“Let no one deceive you,” katabrabeueto. According to the explanation of Saint John Chrysostom, this word is used when one person wins the victory and another receives the prize, when the victor is deceived; compare Gen 27:35-36.

The Christian, as victor over sin, must beware lest the reward due to him be seized beforehand by someone else, as in the case of Jacob in Gen 27.

This can easily happen if he gives himself into the hands of false teachers. By showing an outward appearance of humility, they draw him into false worship of angels and thereby deprive him of his reward.

The worship of angels to which the Apostle points here is nowhere spoken of in the Old Testament. In general, references to them in the sacred books provide nothing definite.

The second warning is not to be deceived by the false teachers’ affected humility and by worship of angels.

“Let no one deceive you by voluntary humility,” that is, by an artificial, false, and cunning humility, “and by worship of angels, intruding into what he has not seen, vainly puffed up by his fleshly mind, and not holding fast the Head.”

This means turning away from the Lord and Savior, “from whom the whole body,” the Church, and so forth.

Saint Chrysostom and Theophylact interpret this place as follows. Apart from the Head of the Church, Christ the Savior, the false teachers taught that union with God was attained through the mediating assistance of invisible spirits.

The Apostle repeatedly gives warning against false humility and the worship of Angels, which is incompatible with the Christian spirit. He plainly does this because of the special significance the heretics gave to it.

They were proud of knowledge of this unknowable realm, which for some reason they placed outside all dependence on Christ. Yet in Christianity every progress is chiefly accomplished through Him, for "of His fullness we have all received, and grace upon grace" (Jn 1:16).

All interpreters see in the heretics troubling the Colossians the Gnostics, who taught about a multitude of beings mediating between God and man. They thought man unworthy of direct communion with God, even through the becoming man of the Son of God.

"Let no one cheat you," katabrabeueto. Brabeion is the reward for victory in the arena, what today would be called a prize. "Judges over those who compete are called brabeutas, for they determine who has gained the victory. Katabrabeuein means to brabeuein wrongly, to judge wrongly to whom the victory belongs" (blessed Theodoret). "This word is used when one person gains the victory and another receives the reward, when the victor is wronged and deprived" (Saint Chrysostom).

This may otherwise be expressed as making someone fail to receive the reward. In its formation, katabrabeuein resembles katargein. The latter means to undo or destroy what has been done. The former means to deprive of reward, to make someone not receive the reward. The Colossians are presented as running in the arena. The Apostle warns them: take care lest someone cause you not to receive the reward. You will run, but when you reach the end, the reward will not be given to you.

How could they do this to them? By teaching them to run not as they ought. For one who runs wrongly, and competes unlawfully, is not crowned (see 2 Tim 2:5). And how could they do this? By disturbing the faith of the Colossians, turning them away from the right faith, and teaching them to believe wrongly.

The Colossians were running rightly, hoping to receive the Kingdom of Heaven. They were running rightly because they were running after the Lord Jesus Christ, relying on Him alone by their faith and hope. If someone suggests to them, and they accept it, that they should rely by faith and hope on someone else or something else, then they will begin to run wrongly. They will still run, and undertake the labor of running, and have the expectation that they will receive a crown. But when they reach the end, they will not receive what they expected. They will be told: go to the one on whom you placed your hope, and receive crowns from him.

But no one has these crowns except the Lord. The Kingdom is His, and the crowns are His. All others, whoever anyone might propose in His place, are nothing. Then there will be a bitter, most bitter deception. Saint Paul impresses this whole picture upon the mind of the Colossians with one word: let no one katabrabeueto you, let no one cheat you.

How strongly this should have repelled them from the false teachers, once their minds pictured what intrigue and what malicious craft against them were hidden in their teaching. Among other things, Saint Chrysostom explained this word by epereazeto, which means to ruin, to harm, to pour in evil. He concluded that by this word Saint Paul intended to rouse indignation in the Colossians against the false teachers. Success was certain. He wanted to impress on them: do not allow yourselves to be seduced or deceived by such a bitter and destructive deception.

Who would consciously go into deception and destruction? Yet the Apostle would not have done everything needed if, after saying "do not yield to deception," he had not indicated who approaches them with deception, and how. Who is it? The one who approaches with a humility pleasing to him and with worship of angels.

"With humility pleasing to him," thelon en tapeinophrosyne, is a difficult expression to translate. Oecumenius writes: "Let no one cheat you, wishing to do this, that is, to deceive by humility." Theophylact paraphrases the whole passage in this way: "After filling them with indignation by showing that others wish to act wickedly toward them and deprive them of the reward. The Apostle sets forth the heretical doctrine itself, saying: they wish to deprive you of the reward by deceiving you with humility."

The meaning is: let no one cheat you, wishing to deceive you with humility. They connect thelon with the preceding words, not with "humility." One may also connect thelon with "no one," in the sense: no one, whoever he wishes to be, should be allowed to deceive you. However, the force of the phrase is not in the word thelon, and therefore one need not insist on its exact translation. The force of the phrase is in "humility."

What sort of humility is this? Perhaps these deceivers also appeared outwardly as humble men, poorly clothed, poorly fed, living poorly, uncombed, unwashed, speaking quietly and timidly, with downcast eyes. All this, and similar things, may be supposed in them, knowing that among their convictions there stood harsh treatment of the body. Such an appearance truly deceives, fastening attention on the speeches of those who appear in it, because people suppose something higher in such persons.

Yet our commentators all understand this humility as part of the teaching of these deceivers, and as its starting point. They began in this way: it is too much for us that the Son of God should have descended to us in order to bring us to the heavenly Father. It is enough for us to be brought to Him through angels. As a consequence of this principle, they arranged some special worship of angels, threskeia.

Saint Chrysostom says: "What does 'humility' mean? Some said that we must be brought to God not through Christ, but through angels. Because being brought through Christ is more than is necessary for us." The same is read in blessed Theophylact: "They said that it is unworthy of the majesty of the Only-begotten to teach that the Only-begotten brings us to the Father, for this is more than accords with human lowliness. Therefore it is more fitting to suppose that angels served in bringing us to the Father. Starting from this thought, they also introduced a special worship of angels and persuaded the simpler people to turn to them as though to our saviors."

Blessed Theodoret expresses the same thought more generally: "Being led by humility, they said that the God of all is invisible, unapproachable, and incomprehensible, and that one must acquire God's good favor through angels. This is what the Apostle means by the words: 'humility and worship of angels.'"

This position, that God is unapproachable and that between Him and creatures, even in the work of creation, there must be intermediaries, was the starting point for the Gnostics, and later for Arius. If this truly was the false humility of the Colossian deceivers, then one cannot fail to see in them the beginnings of the Gnostics, who developed in force in the second century. From the known teaching of the Gnostics about the heavenly powers, one may explain what the unknown teaching about angels among the Colossian wise men consisted in.

The Gnostics taught that God is infinitely powerful. Creation cannot endure His action. Therefore, in order for creation to come into being, a whole series of heavenly powers had first to come forth. Beginning from those nearest to God, they diminished more and more in dignity and power, and approached more and more closely the creatures known to us on earth. In their series the names Christ, Jesus, Church, and demiurges, the builders of the world, occur. They called them aeons, but it is obvious that these are heavenly powers, or angels, whose meaning in the chain of creation was misunderstood.

If one acknowledges kinship between the Gnostics and the Colossian speculators, then these positions may somewhat explain how they viewed angels and why they taught people to turn preferably to them. Whatever this worship of angels consisted in, history shows that it became strongly rooted in those regions and continued there for a long time. For this reason the Fathers of the local Council of Laodicea in Phrygia, in the year 365, had to direct attention to it and forbade it in the thirty-fifth canon.

This canon reads as follows: "Christians must not forsake the Church of God, and go away, and name angels, and hold assemblies. This is rejected. Therefore, if anyone is found practicing such secret idolatry, let him be anathema, because he has forsaken our Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, and has approached idolatry."

In our edition of the canons, this note is attached to it: "Heretics are condemned who do not pray to God and Christ, but only to angels. As though they were creators and governors of the world." Blessed Theodoret points to the kinship of these angel-worshippers with the Colossians in his commentary on the Epistle to them: "This attachment to angel-worship remained for a long time in Phrygia and Pisidia. For this reason the Council that gathered in Laodicea of Phrygia legally forbade prayer to angels."

The canon of the Council calls the angel-worship existing there secret. Probably the assemblies were secret too, and in them something was performed by which they expected to enter into communion with angels. Was this not something like the meetings of our spiritists, with certain methods and actions resembling those practiced by them? In every way the spirit is one and the same there and here. Those people led away from Christ the Savior, and these do the same.

If we thus place our spiritists in kinship with the angel-worshippers condemned at the Council of Laodicea, and these with the worshippers of angels whom Saint Paul condemns in the Epistle to the Colossians, then here is the apostolic judgment against spiritists.

"Intruding into those things which he has not seen." "Has not seen," me heoraken, means what he did not see. "Intruding," embateuon, means entering into it. Embateuein means to enter: to enter something with the mind means to investigate and teach. To enter something with speech means to recount it.

The Colossian wise men, if they were of one kind with the Gnostics, said that at first such and such a power proceeded from God. From this one, another proceeded. From their conjunction came this and that. From the conjunction of these came still others and others. They supposedly walked through heaven and described what they had seen there, when in fact they had seen nothing. Saint Paul exposes them, saying that "though they have never seen angels, they assert this and that about them as if they had seen them" (blessed Theophylact, in agreement with Saint Chrysostom).

"Vainly puffed up by his fleshly mind." "Vainly," eike, means to no purpose. He is puffed up when there was nothing with which to be puffed up, "not being puffed up by anything real, but by his own empty opinion" (Saint Chrysostom). "By the mind of the flesh" means "by a fleshly and not a spiritual mind" (Saint Chrysostom). It is a mind reasoning according to fleshly principles, made fleshly and coarse. It cannot rise to the height of contemplating Christian doctrines, namely how the Son of God, who is God and consubstantial with the Father, became incarnate and arranged the salvation of our race.

"Does not the coarseness of their mind expose itself in the fact that they cannot contain and accept the truths clearly spoken about the Lord?" "God so loved the world that He gave His Only-begotten Son" (Jn 3:16). And again: "For their sake I sanctify Myself" (Jn 17:19). Again: "I lay down My life for My sheep" (see Jn 10:15-17). There are many other similar passages (see blessed Theophylact).

They cannot contain such truths, yet they are puffed up. The inventions of their mind seemed to them higher than divinely revealed truths. They were swollen with their own speculation, looking down from above on those who believed in simplicity of heart, without intellectual curiosity. Pride led to stubbornness, and they probably resisted every correction. "They were puffed up like stubborn dogmatizers, who did not even permit the true teaching to be offered to them" (blessed Theophylact).