Efesus 5:31

5:31 For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and will be joined to his wife, and the two will become ¹  one flesh. ² 

Efesus 3:3

3:3 that ³  by revelation the divine secret ⁴  was made known to me, as I wrote before briefly. ⁵ 

Efesus 4:8

4:8 Therefore it says, “When he ascended on high he captured ⁶  captives; he gave gifts to men.” ⁷ 

[5:31]  ¹ tn Grk “the two shall be as one flesh.”

[5:31]  ² sn A quotation from Gen 2:24.

[3:3]  ³ tn Or “namely, that is.”

[3:3]  ⁴ tn Or “mystery.”

[3:3]  ⁵ tn Or “as I wrote above briefly.”

[3:3]  sn As I wrote briefly may refer to the author’s brief discussion of the divine secret in 1:9.

[4:8]  ⁶ tn Grk “he led captive captivity.”

[4:8]  ⁷ sn A quotation which is perhaps ultimately derived from Ps 68:18. However, the wording here differs from that of Ps 68 in both the Hebrew text and the LXX in a few places, the most significant of which is reading “gave gifts to” in place of “received gifts from” as in HT and LXX. It has sometimes been suggested that the author of Ephesians modified the text he was citing in order to better support what he wanted to say here. Such modifications are sometimes found in rabbinic exegesis from this and later periods, but it is also possible that the author was simply citing a variant of Ps 68 known to him but which has not survived outside its quotation here (W. H. Harris, The Descent of Christ [AGJU 32], 104). Another possibility is that the words here, which strongly resemble Ps 68:19 HT and LXX (68:18 ET), are actually part of an early Christian hymn quoted by the author.