05_Biblica_1_A_Ferda_Layout 1 30/01/13 13:17 Pagina 563 05_B “SEALED” WITH THE HOLY SPIRIT (EPH 1,13-14) AND CIRCUMCISION 563 II. Syntax, Context, and Logic of Eph 1,13-14 Exegetes since Tertullian have disputed the significance of the pro- noun change from “we” to “you” in verse 13. Does the change simply distinguish between the senders (“we”) and the recipients (“you”) 22, or does it highlight an ethnic distinction between Jews and Gentiles 23? Tertullian took “we who were the first to have hoped in the Christ” (v. 12) to refer to Jews expecting the Messiah, and then (v. 13) “(Paul draws) a distinction with respect to the Gentiles” 24. For Tertullian the pronoun shift demonstrated, contra Marcion, that both Jews (“we”) and Gentiles/Christians (“you”) shared the same God. Tertullian’s claim that vv. 13-14 focus on Gentile readers in particular is correct and supported by the following: (i) verses 13-14 detail the initial ac- ceptance of the gospel and the “conversion-initiation” of the Eph- esians, and later in the epistle AE specifies that “you Gentiles” (u`mei/j ta. e;qnh, 2,11) were “formerly far off” 25; (ii) the assurance of future “inheritance” (from klhronomi,a) and of being God’s “possession” (v. 14) evokes to, musthrion that AE proclaims (3,1-3) that “the Gentiles , are co-heirs (sugklhronoma), members of the same body and sharers , of the promise” (3,6); (iii) a similar pronoun change from “we” to “you” occurs at the end of Chapter 2: “both of us have access in one Spirit to the Father” (2,18) and then “you also (kai. u`mei/j) are built into a residence of God by the Spirit” (2,22). AE specifies in the next For this view see CALVIN, Commentaries on the Epistles of Paul to the 22 Galatians and Ephesians, 207; BEST, A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on Ephesians, 145, 148; E. WOODCOCK, “The Seal of the Holy Spirit”, BSac 155 (1998) 157; THIELMAN, Ephesians, 78. R.A. WILSON, “‘We’ and ‘You’ in the Epistle to the Ephesians”, SE II. Papers Presented to the Second Interna- tional Congress on New Testament Studies held at Christ Church Oxford, 1961 (eds. F.M. CROSS – F. ZUCHER et al.) (Berlin 1964) 676-680, argues that the change to “you” intends to address the newly baptized in the audience. Cf. ERASMUS, Paraphrase on Ephesians, 308; J. WESLEY, Explanatory 23 Notes upon the New Testament (New York 1857) 490; C. GORE, St. Paul’s Epistle to the Ephesians (New York 1898) 71. DIBELIUS, An die Kolosser, Epheser. An Philemon, 62, says that the author here addresses “die heidnis- chen Leser”. Others who agree include BARTH, Ephesians, 92; A.S. WOOD, Ephesians (EBC 11; Grand Rapids, MI 1978) 26-27; BRUCE, Ephesians, 264; R.P. MARTIN, Ephesians, Colossians, and Philemon (Interpretation; Atlanta, GA 1991) 19; MACDONALD, Colossians and Ephesians, 204. Tertullian, Marc. 5.17 (ANF 3,465). 24 J.D.G. Dunn used “conversion-initiation” in his Baptism in the Holy Spirit. 25 A Re-Examination of the New Testament Teaching (Philadelphia, PA 1970) 90. © Gregorian Biblical Press 2012 - Tutti i diritti riservati