Forasmuch as ye are manifestly declared
But lest it should be thought that the apostle attributed too
much to himself, by saying that the Corinthians were our epistle;
here he says, they were "manifestly declared"
to be the epistle of Christ ministered by us;
so that the apostles and ministers of the word were only
amanuenses, Christ was the author and dictator; yea, he himself
is the very matter, sum, substance, and subject of the epistle;
he is formed in the hearts of his people in conversion, his image
is stamped, his grace is implanted, his word, his Gospel dwells
richly, his laws and ordinances are written here; he also is the
exemplar, believers are but copies of him, in grace and duty, in
sufferings, in the likeness of his death and resurrection: and
they are "manifestly declared" to be so, by the impresses of
Christ's grace upon them; by the fairness of the copy; by the
style and language of the epistle; by their likeness to Christ;
by their having not the form only, but the power of godliness;
and by their lives and conversations: now in writing these
epistles, the ministers of the Gospel are only instruments,
"ministered by us". They are made use of to show the sinner the
black characters which are written upon him, and that what is
written in him, and to be read by him, by the light of nature is
not sufficient for salvation; they are employed as instruments in
drawing the rough draught of grace in conversion, and in writing
the copy over again, fairer and fairer; being the happy means
blessed by God, for the building up of souls in faith and
holiness, in spiritual knowledge and comfort. These epistles are
not written with ink;
of nature's power, or of rhetorical eloquence and moral
persuasion;
but with the Spirit of the living God:
every grace that is implanted in the soul is wrought there by the
Spirit of God; or he it is that draws every line, and writes
every word and letter; he begins, he carries on and finishes the
work of grace on the soul; and that as "the Spirit of the living
God": hence saints become the living epistles of Christ; and
every letter and stroke of his making, is a living disposition of
the soul in likeness to him; and such are written among the
living in Jerusalem, and shall live and abide for ever as the
epistles of Christ: again, the subjects of these epistles, or
that on which they are written, are
not tables of stone;
such as the law was written upon, on Mount Sinai: of these tables
there were the first and second; the first were the work of God
himself, the latter were hewed by Moses, at the command of God, (
Exodus
32:16 ) ( 34:1 ) the former being
broken when he came down from the mount, which by the Jewish
writers are said to be miraculously made, and not by the means
and artifice of men F12; yea, that they were made before
the creation of the world F13, and which, they commonly
say, were made of sapphire; (See Gill on
2 Corinthians 3:7) these, as the latter, were two stones,
which, Jarchi says F14, were of an equal size; and were,
as Abarbinel says F15, in the form of small tables, such
as children are taught to write upon, and therefore are so
called: some pretend to give the dimensions of them, and say
F16, that they were six hands long, and
as many broad, and three thick; nay, even the weight of them,
which is said F17 to be the weight of forty "seahs",
and look upon it as a miracle that Moses should be able to carry
them; on these stones were written the ten commands; and the
common opinion of the Jewish writers is, that five were written
on one table, and five on the other; this is the opinion of
Josephus F18, Philo F19, and the Talmudic
writers F20; and the tables are said to be
written on both sides, ( Exodus 32:15
) . Some think that the engraving of the letters perforated and
went through the tables, so that, in a miraculous manner, the
letters were legible on both sides; others think, only the right
and left hand of the tables are meant, on which the laws were
written, five on a side, and which folded up like the tables or
pages of a book; though others are of opinion, that they were
written upon, both behind and before, and that the law was
written twice, both upon the fore part and back part of the
tables, yea, others say four times; and some think the phrase
only intends the literal and mystical, the external and internal
sense of the law: however, certain it is, as the apostle here
suggests, that the law was written on tables of stone, which may
denote the firmness and stability of the law; not as in the hands
of Moses, from whence the tables fell and were broken, but as in
the hands of Christ, by whom they are fulfilled; or else the
hardness of man's heart, his stupidity, ignorance of, and not
subject to the law of God:
but fleshly tables of the heart:
alluding to ( Ezekiel
36:26 ) and designs not carnal hearts, but such as are made
soft and tender by the Spirit of God. The table of the heart is a
phrase to be met with in the books of the Old Testament; see (
Proverbs
3:3 ) ( 7:3 ) (
Jeremiah
17:1 ) and very frequently in the writings of the Jews
F21.
F12 R. Levi ben Gersom in Pentateuch, fol. 113. 2.
F13 Zohar in Exod. fol. 35. 1.
F14 Perush in Exod. xxxi. 18.
F15 In Pentateuch, fol. 209. 2. & 211. 3.
F16 T. Hieres Shekalim, fol. 49. 4. Shemot Rabba, c. 47. fol. 143. 2. Bartenora in Misn. Pirke Abot, c. 5. sect. 6.
F17 Targum Jon. in Exod. xxxi. 18. & in Deut. xxxiv. 12.
F18 Antiqu. l. 3. c. 5. sect. 8.
F19 De Decalogo, p. 761, 768.
F20 T. Hieros. Shekalim, fol. 49. 4. Shemot Rabba, sect. 47. fol. 143. 2. Zohar in Exod. fol. 35. 1.
F21 Vid. Targum Jon. in Dent. vi. 5, & in Cant. iv. 9.