Eph 5:22-33--The Bride vs. The Body

A brother in the faith claimed that Paul calls us believers His bride or wife. This, he said, was in addition to the ecclesia (church--the out called lot of believers today) being called the body of Christ. He founded his argument on Eph 5:22-33, and especially on verse 32. 

But if we look at the passage closely, at best accurately translated, we will soon find out that Paul does not use the figure of the bride for the body of Christ. 

The graphic I inserted here shows the text of Eph 5 and is formated in such a way as to show the corresponding parts of the text. The indented and unindented bits correspond topic-wise respectively. The unindented ones give us the relationship between man and wife (human perspective), whereas the indented lines describe the relationship between Christ and his out-called people ('the church') (divine perspective). 

Throughout the text we learn through the little Greek words for 'as' and 'according as' how the relationship of man and wife relates to the relationship between Christ and His church: 

This is how the two relationships relate, clearly stated in vv. 23, 28, and 30. Please note the fact that the ecclesia is not denoted as the wife of the Christ anywhere here in this passage. Rather, Christ, the head, and the husband correspond, and the ecclesia, the body of Christ, and the wife correspond. 

Now, my friend in the faith claimed that the quote from Gen 2:24 proves that the imagery of the bride/wife is used of the body of Christ as well. But this is not in the text. The whole scope of the passage disproves it. 

If we take even just a brief look at the context of the Genesis text, we will notice that the man leaves his parents because the woman was part of his body once and he wants to be rejoined to her. The body or the flesh is in view, not the fact that the person for whom the man is leaving his parents is a woman or his wife. 

Again, verse 31 corresponds with the other verses that give us the human perspective or relationship. In this sphere, and according to the context of the quoted Genesis verse, the man loves his wife because she was part of his body, and, initially, the man leaves his parents to love and be joined to her for the same reason. In other words, the love, or the desire to become one flesh with the woman, which is an expression of love, of the husband is in view in verse 31, just as it is in verses 25a, 28, 29a, and 33. 

What about verse verse 32 then? 'This secret' seems to refer to the expression of the love of the man towards  the woman. The being one flesh of the man and the woman apparently foreshadows the being one flesh of the Christ and His ecclesia. And exactly here is the point where the relation stops: Only the "one-fleshness" of man and woman corresponds with Christ and His ecclesia. Just as the man is head of the woman, and the woman part of the body of the man, thus also is Christ Head of the ecclesia, and the ecclesia is part of the body of Christ. 

The body (of Christ) is not denoted as bride or wife of Christ in this and no other passage of the bible. The body of Christ is a distinct group of believers; it does not belong to the bride, which is saved and protected Israel in the time of restoration of the Kingdom to Israel on this earth (cp. Isa 49(:18), 61(:10), 62(:5), best read in context! Also Jn 3:29, Rev 19:7, 21:2,9). 

Rotherham vs. The Concordant Version

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/082543601X/sr=1-1/qid=1156419031/ref=sr_1_1/002-5108174-0736800?ie=UTF8&s=books

Check out this link. It is 'Rotherham's Emphasized Bible' on Amazon.com. Scroll down to the 9th review of Nathaniel Merritt and read it! He's got it right on the spot. 

Rotherham's is already an accurate translation, as it appears, I have never put my hands on it, but the CV goes way above it, just as Nathaniel states in his review, and with which I agree. You who are reading this, if you are revering God, the creator of this universe, and want to know about all His thoughts for all of his creatures, get a copy of the Concordant Version at www.concordant.org, if you haven't already! Do it now! You will not regret it! 

The Beauty of God's Will

Jesus declares: 

"All was given up to Me by My Father. 

And no one is recognizing the Son except the Father; 

neither is anyone recognizing the Father except the Son 

and he to whom the Son should be intending to unveil Him." 

(Mt 11:27, CV) 

Have we done anything for our knowledge of the Father? None at all. It was Jesus Himself who unveiled the Father to us, He intended it in the first place, we didn't seek God, the Father (Ro 3:11). Let us always remember that our salvation from death does not spring from our own deserts, our own initial decision, or our own morally good constitution. God alone! All that we are in Christ was the work of God alone (cp. Eph 2:8-10, CV)! 

Psalm 12

A Davidic Psalm 

1 Do save, O Yahweh, for the benign one has reached an end, 

For the faithful ones have disappeared 

from the sons of humanity; 

2 They speak hypocrisy, each one with his associate; 

With a lip of slick words, 

with a double-minded heart they speak. 

3 May Yahweh cut off all lips of slick words, 

The tongue speaking great things: 

4 Who say, With our tongue we shall have mastery; 

Our lips are our own; who is lord over us? 

5 Because of the devastation of the humbled, 

Because of the groaning of the needy, 

Now I shall arise, says Yahweh; 

I shall set him in safety; 

I shall shine forth for him. 

6 The words of Yahweh are clean words, 

Silver refined in a kiln, 

Fine gold cupelled seven times. 

7 You O Yahweh, You shall guard them; 

You shall preserve us from this generation for the eon. 

8 The wicked walk round about, 

As the squanderings of the sons of humanity are exalted. 

Permanent 

This psalm is beautiful if studied in its entirety. Quite common is the practice among believers to take scriptures out of its immediate or remote context, which has lamentable consequences. There are buckets full of erroneous teachings among Christians - so many that you can't be wary enough when reading or listening to sermons or talk with believers. Let us, therefore, give the structure of these few lines in order to get an idea of the scope of this psalm: 

A1 | 1. The faithful one calls for salvation (General)

B1 | 2. The unfaithful

A2 | 3. The faithful one calls for salvation (Specific) 

B2 | 4. The unfaithful 

A3 | 5-7. Yahweh (answer) and the faithful one (reaction)

B3 | 8. The unfaithful 

From this we can see that the psalm follows an extended alternation. There are only two topics in this psalm, faithfulness and unfaithfulness. These are treated in an alternating manner; in the diagram indicated by the indented B and the letter A, which respectively correspond with each other in topic. 

Let us note the unfaithful one's traits: hypocrisy, double-mindedness, denial of God's lordship. These are common traits of those who are unfamiliar with God, who have no faith, and live in the world. The Psalm juxtaposes the wicked and the faithfulness of Yahweh in such a way that especially the words in v. 6 shine out. The words of Yahweh - clean, refined, and cupelled seven times - are the exact opposite of the impure, hypocritical, and boastful words of those who don't know God. God holds on to what He says, there is no lie or impurity in a single one of His utterances, He doesn't say the one thing in one instance and the other or complete opposite in another. 

All this wouldn't be too bad, as long as we are only speaking of unbelievers in verses 2, 4, and 8, and not about believers, or the righteous or faithful one's. But scripture also declares, with a special view to us, the body of Christ, that even among believers such practices would be common: 

Now the spirit is saying explicitly, that in subsequent eras some will be withdrawing from the faith, giving heed to deceiving spirits and the teachings of demons, in the hypocrisy of false expressions, their own conscience having been cauterized (1Tim 4:1,2) 

Certainly, the unbelievers described in Psalm 12 have a cauterized conscience; else, how could they speak hypocritical? Just as they, so the believers. As I have already mentioned, a lot of erroneous teaching among Christians has arisen because of taking scripture out of context. But that is not the only means by which false teachings are introduced into the body of Christ. 

If we consult christian commentaries, many expressions are used that are unscriptural, expressions that are not found in the scriptures anywhere. This isn't surprising because God Himself predicted such confusion and heeding of demonic teachings. One source of wrong doctrinal teaching is mistranslation. Many translations are either inconsistent or simply incorrectly translated. These false expressions, which are put upon the original (Hebrew or Greek) text, lead to many teachings that are contrary to God's revelation. The idea about humanity having a free will is a good example for that. 

In the light of the original texts, we must say that teachings of demons have found entrance into many commonly used translations. This is a fact verifiable by studying the scriptures faithfully, preferably with an accurate translation (e.g. the Concordant Version).