Ephesians Chapter 2

Children of disobedience is synonymous with בְּנ֣וֹת הָֽאָדָ֔ם (benot haadam) [Gen. 6:2], daughters of man (Adam). In other words, daughters (those who give birth to progeny) of the evil inclination of humanity. Both Children of disobedience, and בְּנ֣וֹת הָֽאָדָ֔ם (benot haadam) are the opposite of בְנֵי־הָֽאֱלֹהִים֙ (b’nai HaElohim), children of the God (Judge), also known in the latter Jewish tradition as בְּנִי מְהֵימְנוּתָא (beniy meheiymenuta), children from faithfulness (Zohar Bereshit 83:230)

Ephesians 2 [Author’s Translation]
 
1And you who are now to be (the body 1:22-23), were dead in your deviation from the truth and missing the mark set by God’s holiness, 
2 in which, in the past, you walked according to the age of this world, according to the ruler of the power permitted over the lower air, the spirit who is now active in the children of the disobedience/obstinate opposition/wilful rebellion, 
3 among whom we (Jews/Paul & the other Apostles & those first to believe) too once lived (overturning ourselves) in the lusts of our flesh (physical body, evil inclination), acting out the desires of the flesh and of the mind (inner thoughts), and were by nature children of wrath, just like the rest.
4 But the God, Who is rich in mercy, by means of His great love which He loved us with, 
5 even when we were dead in our deviation from the truth, He made us alive together with the Messiah. [By grace/loving kindness you have been saved/rescued/kept safe], 
6 and raised us up together, and sitting us down together in the heavens in Messiah Yeshua, 
7 In order to show in the ages that are to arrive, His surpassing riches, His grace in moral purity/integrity/kindness toward us in Messiah Yeshua. 
8 For by the grace/loving kindness you have been saved through faith/trust/belief (in conviction of the truth), and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, 
9 not by works/deeds/actions, in order that no one should boast. 
10 For we are His workmanship, created in Messiah Yeshua unto (upon) good works, which God prepared beforehand in order that we should walk in them.
11 Therefore remember that you, formerly Gentiles in the flesh (physical body)—who are called Uncircumcision (Pagans) by those called the Circumcision (Jews) made in the flesh (body) by hands— 
12 that at that time you were without Messiah, being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel and foreigners (pagans without access) to the covenants of the promise, having no hope and without God in this world. 
13 But now in Messiah Yeshua you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Messiah.
14 For He Himself is our peace, Who has made both (Jews & Gentiles) one (echad [H]), and has broken down the wall/partition, the barrier/fence, 
15 in order to loose the hostility in His flesh (body, nature), the Torah, the commandment in doctrine, which is to be unemployed/idle/inactive, so as to create in Himself one new person/human being from the two, thus making peace, 
16 Indeed, that He might reconcile them both in one body to God through the cross, thereby putting to death that which caused the hostility. 
17 And He came to speak the good news of peace to you who were far off (Gentiles) and to those who were near (Jews). 
18 For through, and of Him (Messiah) we both have access by one Spirit to the Father.
19 Now, therefore (based on what has already been stated), you are no longer foreigners (pagans without access) and neighbours without citizenship, but fellow citizens with the holy ones kedoshim[H] (saints, specifically Messiah essential Jews) and members of the household of God, 
20 having been built on the foundation of השליחים (ha-sh’lichim[H]) the sent ones (Apostles: all of whom are Jews) and prophets (of the TaNaKh [OT], Jews with the possible exception of Job), Yeshua the Messiah Himself being the highest corner/pinnacle, 
21 in Him the whole building, joined together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord/LORD (Κυρίῳ  [kyrio] YHVH, Both the Father and the Son), 
22 in Whom you together are also being built toward the dwelling place of God in the Spirit.
 
Line by Line:
 
1And you who are now to be (the body 1:22-23), were dead in your deviation from the truth and missing the mark set by God’s holiness, 
 
“You who are now to be the body,” as alluded to in the previous two verses (1:22-23):
 
“22 And He put all under His foot, and gave Him headship over all the assembly (ecclesia: body of believers), 23 which is His body, the fullness of the all in all to completion.”
 
-Ephesians 1:22-23 [Author’s translation]
 
Those in the Ephesian community of faith who are truly Messiah essential people are being affirmed as having joined the body of Messiah even though at this point in time many of them are not Jews. At the same time they’re being reminded where they have come from, having once been spiritually dead in their sinful deviation, the missing of the mark set by God’s holiness.
 
Jewish tradition sees the descriptors deceiver, idolater, and a dead man, as synonymous:
 
“Perhaps my father will feel me, and I will be in his eyes as a deceiver כִּמְתַעְתֵּעַ
[kimetatei’a]” – like a dead man/corpse כְּמֵת [kemeit], an aberration וּכְתוֹעֶה [ukheto’eh], and an idolater.”
 
-Bereshit Rabbah 65:15 [Sefaria]
 
2 in which, in the past, you walked according to the age of this world, according to the ruler of the power permitted over the lower air, the spirit who is now active in the children of the disobedience/obstinate opposition/wilful rebellion, 
 
“The age of this world,” reflects the sin affected created order and the death that has resulted.
 
The Ephesian believers once walked according to the evil inclination, a practice that was seeded by the “Ruler of the power permitted over the lower air.” This refers to Satan as having been cast down into the earth’s atmosphere and permitted to have temporal power within the earth’s atmosphere (Rev. 12:9). Its (his) spirit is at work influencing those who rebel against God. Satan is not omnipresent but has a host of fallen angelic beings with it (him) in service of its (his) self-deifying rebellion.
 
Ruler/Prince of the Air
 
בַּעַל־זְבוּב (Baal-zevuv/Beelzebub), meaning Master/Husband/Lord of the Flies (Matt. 12:24), is, based on the airborne ability of the fly, another title reflecting the Prince of the Air, Satan. The flies it (he) is lord over are of course the fallen angels/demons who are aligned with it (him).
 
Babylonians/Chaldeans, Greeks (Pythagoras, and Plato), and Jews all believed that demonic forces were in the air באויר (bavir).
 
Jewish tradition calls the Prince of the Air רַבְּהוֹן דְּרוּחָיָא (Rabehon Deruchaya), Prince of the spirits:
 
“He went to kindle the lamp and a demon, the prince of the spirits, accosted him.”
 
-Vayikra Rabbah 5:1 [Sefaria]
 
Children of the disobedience
 
Children of disobedience are those who by their own wilful and continued rejection of God, continue to walk in unrepentant pride (self-deification), in line with the modus operandi of the Prince of the Air, Satan.
 
Children of disobedience is synonymous with בְּנ֣וֹת הָֽאָדָ֔ם (benot haadam) [Gen. 6:2], daughters of man (Adam). In other words, daughters (those who give birth to progeny) of the evil inclination of humanity. Both Children of disobedience, and בְּנ֣וֹת הָֽאָדָ֔ם (benot haadam) are the opposite of בְנֵי־הָֽאֱלֹהִים֙ (b’nai HaElohim), children of the God (Judge), also known in the latter Jewish tradition as בְּנִי מְהֵימְנוּתָא (beniy meheiymenuta), children from faithfulness (Zohar Bereshit 83:230)
 
3 among whom we (Jews/Paul & the other Apostles & those first to believe) too once lived (overturning ourselves) in the lusts of our flesh (physical body, evil inclination), acting out the desires of the flesh and of the mind (inner thoughts), and were by nature children of wrath, just like the rest.
 
Paul acknowledges that the Jewish believers were also once given over to sinful rebellion against God, acting out the same lusts of the fallen nature that the Gentiles perform. We note that both the sinful lusts of the physical body and the sinful lusts of the mind are addressed. We’re reminded that the Torah speaks against physical acts of sin (You shall not murder [Ex. 20:13]) and against thought sin (You shall not covet your neighbour’s wife [Ex. 20:17]). Yeshua reaffirms this when He says, “If a man lusts after a woman in his heart (core being) he has committed adultery with her.” (Matt. 5:28)
 
Paul goes on to affirm that the Jewish people were also once children of wrath just as the Gentiles are.
 
“Children of wrath,” is synonymous with “Children of disobedience,” (v.2) and refers to those who are under God’s righteous judgement condemned to just punishment except for the remission of sin purchased through blood atonement.
 
“2 YHVH (Mercy) the LORD looks down from the heavens
    on all humanity
to see if there are any who understand,
    any who seek God.
3 All have turned away, all have become corrupt;
    there is no one who does good,
    not even one.”
 
-Tehillim (Psalms) 14:2-3 [Author’s translation]
 
“for all have missed the mark set by God’s holiness (sinned) and fall short (have failed to meet the standard) of the glory of God”
 
-Romans 3:23 [Author’s translation]
 
“how can you say that you have not sinned? and behold your first father has sinned, and he is the first man, for man מוטבע בחטא (mutba bechatei) [imprinted in sin], ‘is naturally in sin’;”
 
-Rav David Kimchi RaDaK [Sefaria]
 
“And seeing, יהוה  HaShem, what  רַבָּה רָעַתrabah ra’at great evil humanity perpetuated in the earth, and that all the inclination and the thoughts of their core being לִבּוֹ libo were only evil all the day.”
 
-Bereishsit (Genesis) 6:5 [Author’s translation]
 
“The believer in, on, toward, for Him is not separated, condemned, put asunder: but the disbeliever, one who has chosen disbelief, is separated, condemned, put asunder already, because he has not believed, trusted in, become convinced of the Name (identity, character, nature) of the One only begotten (Singular in kind) the Son of the God.”
 
-John 3:18 [Author’s translation]
 
4 But the God, Who is rich in mercy, by means of His great love which He loved us with, 5 even when we were dead in our deviation from the truth, He made us alive together with the Messiah. [By grace/loving kindness you have been saved/rescued/kept safe], 6 and raised us up together, and seated us down together in the heavens in Messiah Yeshua,
 
The good news that Paul is reiterating to the Ephesian community of faith is that God has had mercy on the Jewish people and so can be trusted to have mercy on all people who come to Him in Messiah by grace through faith.
 
God’s great love is eternally present. This is why the text says, “by means of His great love which He loved us with.”
 
So great is God’s love that even when we were in a state of wilful rebellion, hating Him and His holiness, reaping death, He came to make us alive in Messiah the sacrificial Lamb, God with us. Paul interjects, “By grace/loving kindness you have been saved/rescued/kept safe,” and concludes, “and raised us up together, and seated us down together in the heavens in Messiah Yeshua,”
 
“Seated us down together in the heavens in Messiah Yeshua.” Some misuse this part of the text to claim that we go to heaven when we die. Scripture teaches that when we die, we who are in Messiah go to Sheol and into Paradise where we await the resurrection and the Judgement, and following the Judgement that we who are in Messiah enter the World to Come (New Earth) where we dwell in and with God forever (Luke 16:19-31; John 3:13; Hebrews 9:27). It does not teach that we go to heaven when we die.
 
The present text is not saying we literally go up to heaven and sit beside Yeshua. How can it mean that, given that Paul uses the past tense making our position in Messiah a completed reality, and yet Paul is still alive on earth when writing the text and the recipients are still alive reading, and hearing the text.
 
Therefore, Paul is emphasizing the fact that through Messiah’s death and resurrection we are delivered from death into life and our eternity is established with Him in His reign and authority at the right hand of the Father. A reign and authority that will be made fully manifest at His return when He will descend to reign over the New Earth, bringing our established life in Him, with Him. We are at present together with Messiah in spirit in the same way meant when Paul says elsewhere “I am with you in spirit” (1 Corinthians 5:3-4; Colossians 2:5).
 
7 In order to show in the ages that are to arrive, His surpassing riches, His grace in moral purity/integrity/kindness toward us in Messiah Yeshua. 
 
Our salvation, resurrection and life everlasting are established now in Messiah in order to show what is to come. That is, “His surpassing riches, His grace in moral purity/integrity/kindness toward us in Messiah Yeshua” in the עולם הבא )Olam Haba(, World to Come.
 
We note that the Greek text reads ages/worlds plural, denoting worlds/ages everlasting. Perhaps meaning that, at the return of the Messiah, distinct ages unfold within the day/season of the Judgement and the transition to the World to Come. We are reminded that in a transcendant view of time a day is as a thousand years to HaShem. Meaning time is relative in eternity. In eternity where there is no beginning or end, how would one establish a measure for time? If one were to count time passing where would one begin? If there were a beginning (there is neither beginning or end in eternity), what end is one counting toward in a world without end?
 
8 For by the grace/loving kindness you have been saved through faith/trust/belief (in conviction of the truth), and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, 9 not by works/deeds/actions, in order that no one should boast. 
 
We see that neither grace nor faith are of ourselves but are a unity and converge as the gift of God, grace being the impartation of unmerited favour through the faith given by God.
 
All are saved by God’s grace through the faith אמן (aman) given to us by God in Messiah, Who is the faith agreement, the “Amen” (Rev. 3:14) of every believer. Our salvation is eternally established in Salvation (Yeshua) Himself and cannot be established or disestablished by our actions. Once received (freewill), because our salvation is not our work but His (decided beforehand), it cannot be lost! It is the gift of God. And, in order to receive the benefit of a gift one must open it (freewill). Therefore, salvation is pre-established (decided beforehand) because God knows the end from the beginning, and it is received by a choice of will (freewill) by those who acknowledge their need and open the gift. Thus, predestination and freewill are distinct parts of a whole and not, as some foolishly continue to insist upon, a debate over “this or that!”
 
In order to be absolutely clear Paul states explicitly “and that not of yourselves!” And again, “not by works/deeds/actions, in order that no one should boast.” In short, don’t say “I have changed my standing before God by doing what’s right” because the very ability to do what’s right and the clean slate afforded you prior to your turning from evil toward God, are all the work of God. Therefore, He alone is worthy of the credit, and in Messiah the faith He has given you, which you have received, is accredited to you as righteousness. Messiah is your righteousness (1 Cor. 1:30; 2 Cor. 5:21).
 
10 For we are His workmanship, created in Messiah Yeshua unto (upon) good works, which God prepared beforehand in order that we should walk in them.
 
We are His workmanship, and not our workmanship. This reinforces the fact that we are saved by grace through faith.
 
We are not “created for good works” as some mistranslate, rather we are “created in Messiah Yeshua unto (upon) good works.” The good works are the fruit of Messiah in us the hope of glory (Col. 1:27). In Messiah we do not do for God but in and from Him. We are created in Messiah upon His good deeds and unto good deeds that originate with Him. Therefore, being in Him we walk in His good works.
 
We are not created for good works, worship or any other thing, rather we are created in relationship unto right relationship, worship and good deeds being the acts of returning to God that which He has given us.
 
The good works are prepared beforehand so that we might walk in them, and not so that we might invent or create them. Therefore, the good works we do in Messiah are received, an opportunity to walk in God’s established will. We don’t manufacture deeds, rather we look for what God is doing and we agree with it and join in it, in Messiah. None of this is done in our own strength but in His strength. Thus in Him we become Messiah essential versions of ourselves, redeemed, rescued from the perversion of self that we once engaged in.
 
It's worth noting that human beings receive the wages of sin because we have worked for those wages by sinning. Whereas, we receive the gift of Salvation, not by our work, but according to the works of God. Wages are earned, the gift is received.
 
Put concisely, God created us in Messiah. We are created upon Messiah’s good works. Our right actions result from Messiah in us. All of which is established before the foundation of the world (Eph. 1:4) in order that the fullness of God’s love might be revealed to us in eternity.
 
11 Therefore remember that you, formerly Gentiles in the flesh (physical body)—who are called Uncircumcision (Pagans) by those called the Circumcision (Jews) made in the flesh (body) by hands— 12 that at that time you were without Messiah, being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel and foreigners (pagans without access) to the covenants of the promise, having no hope and without God in this world. 
 
Like the prior warning Paul had given the Gentiles in the Roman community of faith (57 CE), the present warning reminds the Gentile believers in Ephesus that without the Jewish Messiah Yeshua they cannot access the covenant promises of God (Rom. 11:13-36). Likewise, Paul alludes to his former rebuke of the arrogance of certain Jewish believers in the Roman community of faith (Rom. 2:17-29)
 
Paul adds to this an explanation of spiritual conversion beyond physical circumcision. He is alluding to the circumcision of the heart, which God had demanded of Israel from her earliest days of disobedience (Deut. 10:16; 30:6; Jer. 4:4). By inference Paul now reminds the Gentile believers of Ephesus that in Messiah they have received circumcision of the heart.
 
Prior to the revelation of Messiah, the Gentile believers were aliens, pagans who worshipped false gods or had no god and were therefore in either case not part of the commonwealth of Israel. They were foreigners, idol worshippers who had no access to the covenants and therefore were devoid of hope for eternal life and without the comfort of God in the present age.
 
We note that “commonwealth” here is like the commonwealth of Great Britain. Paul is referring to both ethnic religious Israelites and those Gentile foreigners who submitted to the God of Israel and the Jewish people and thus lived among the commonwealth of Israel, even as early as the Exodus from Egypt. Paul is not inferring that Gentiles who receive Messiah become “Spiritual Jews” (an oxymoron that mixes an ethnic noun with a spiritual paradigm). In order to understand this in simple terms one need only know that Israel is an ethnic noun referring uniquely to blood descendants of Jacob and his twelve sons. Post Babylonian exile when all the tribes returned to Judea, the locational use of the noun Judah became a synonym for Israel and is now the ethnic noun that describes all Israel’s tribes. Therefore, Jews and Israel are synonymous today, both being ethnic nouns describing the 12 tribes of Israel, the blood descendants of Jacob the historical human being.
 
Therefore, a converted Gentile is invited to join the commonwealth of Israel but does not lose their ethnic uniqueness in order to do so. The converted Gentile is a converted soul and not a converted ethnicity. Likewise, the converted Jew remains a Jew because it is his soul that is turned from sin toward God (conversion), while his ethnicity, sex, skin colour etc do not change.
 
13 But now in Messiah Yeshua you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Messiah.
 
In Messiah Gentiles are welcomed into the commonwealth of Israel and afforded access to the covenants of God that are not ethnically specific.  
 
14 For He Himself is our peace, Who has made both (Jews & Gentiles) one (echad [H]), and has broken down the wall/partition, the barrier/fence, 15 in order to loose the hostility in His flesh (body, nature), the Torah, the commandment in doctrine, which is to be unemployed/idle/inactive, so as to create in Himself one new person/human being from the two, thus making peace,  
 
Messiah Yeshua is our peace, wholeness and wellbeing, and has made both Jews and Gentiles who receive Him, one people, diverse and unified.
 
“Even the name of the Messiah is called שלום, "peace"; as it is said, (Isa. 9:6) ‘the everlasting Father, the Prince of peace’;”
 
-Rabbi Yosef the Galilean (Contemporary of Rabbi Akivah) [Sefaria]
 
“Who has made both (Jews & Gentiles) one (echad [H]), and has broken down the wall/barrier, the partition/fence, 15 in order to loose the hostility in His flesh (body, nature),”
 
The Greek text does not say “dividing wall” but “wall/partition.” While it’s true that walls divide, the text does not say that specifically but infers it.
 
The Hebrew equivalent to the Greek text is מחיצה (m’chitzah), “the middle wall of the boundary fence.”
 
This is without doubt the wall חיצה (chitzah) surrounding the first century Temple, on which there was a sign “which forbade any foreigner to go on pain of death.” Josephus Antiquities of the Jews 15:11:5; War of the Jews 5:5:2, 6:2:4.
 
In a similar way to the tearing of the veil at the entry to the Holy of Holies, which opened access to intimacy with God to all who would receive Yeshua’s atoning work, so too the wall separating Gentiles from Jews has been torn down by Messiah.
 
We note that just as there was a dividing wall that kept Gentiles from entering into the court of Israel, there was also a wall of separation preventing women from entering beyond the court of women.
 
In modern orthodox synagogues there is a מחיצה (m’chitzah) separating the women from the men. This reflects the first century Temple. No such wall existed in the synagogues of the first century, where men and women worshipped together, an ancient Jewish equivalent to a community centre, with the added component of Scripture readings and worship rites.
 
Paul’s teaching to the Galatians seems to allude to a diaspora synagogue practice of separating women from men. Concerning salvation through faith in Messiah Paul writes, “There is neither Jew nor Gentile… male nor female” (Galatians 3:28)
 
Therefore, Messiah has torn the veil, broken down the wall separating the Gentiles and the wall separating the women, and the wall separating the Israelite from the priests, and has opened clear access to all who receive Him, right through to the Holy of holies and intimacy with the Father God.
 
Note that where the wall in the synagogue which separates men and women is taken down in the reformed or progressive synagogue of today, and men and women sit together as in the first century synagogues of the land of Israel, that they sit together but do not lose their unique physiology. Their sex doesn’t change based on their location. So too, when the wall separating out Gentiles is removed the Gentiles come in toward the Holy of holies and join in worship with their Jewish brothers and sisters but do not change their ethnicity. In Messiah Jews remain Jews and Gentiles remain Gentiles. We are one in the Spirit of Messiah, a diverse unity. A commonwealth. Paul is not teaching Gentiles to appropriate Jewish life but to be the Messiah essential persons that God has created them to be.
 
As a Messiah follower and a Jew I ask you not to appropriate our culture, or God forbid, claim to be a Jew when you are not, but instead according to Scripture, I welcome you in Messiah to Join with us, and honour Messiah by being your Messiah essential self.
 
Put concisely, through His blood atoning substitutionary sacrifice and resurrection Messiah has made it possible for Jews and Gentiles to come together without the hostility of the sinful inclination that took advantage of the indictment of Torah, getting in the way.
 
The wall was viewed as divisive, causing hostility between Jews and Gentiles in the sense that the Jews were seen as having special access to YHVH that Gentiles didn’t have. However, the hostility or enmity is not concerning the wall alone but also “the Torah, the commandment in doctrine, which is to be unemployed.”
 
Jewish commentators describe the Torah figuratively as a “Wall”:
 
“When Reish Lakish came before Rabbi Yoḥanan and reported the exchange to him, Rabbi Yoḥanan said to him: What is the reason that you did not quote this verse to him: “I am a wall and my breasts are like...towers”, which may be explained as follows: “I am a wall”; this is referring to the Torah.”
 
-Bava Batra 7b:16 [Sefaria]
 
“The Gemara interprets another verse: “I am a wall and my breasts are like towers” . Rabbi Yoḥanan said: “I am a wall”; this is a reference to the Torah....“And my breasts are like towers”; these are the Torah scholars, who, by disseminating their Torah and influencing the masses protect them like watchtowers....And Rava said: “I am a wall”; this is the Congregation of Israel....“And my breasts are like towers”; these are the synagogues and study halls in which the Congregation of Israel is nurtured by the Torah, from which it draws its spiritual strength.”
 
-Pesachim 87a:8 [Sefaria]
 
The Torah itself is not hostility/enmity, nor is it the cause of the hostility/enmity (Rom. 7:5-14), rather, as an indictment against sin the Torah’s existence means sin has an opportunity by misusing Torah as a trigger for the idea of acting on the sin which is commanded against (Rom. 5:12-21).
 
For the Messiah essential person Torah becomes unemployed in the sense that our nature is being transformed and sanctified to reflect the Person of Messiah. There is no need for a law that says “You shall not steal” if by nature a person doesn’t steal. Therefore, the law exists only as an indictment against the one who steals. The law is a warning that points to Messiah. Once Messiah is met, and as long as the believer’s eyes are set on Him, there is no need of Torah. Torah remains until the fullness of all things as a measure against sin (Matt. 5:18).
 
Therefore, in Messiah, having been made new creations, the old sin nature gone, the new Messiah nature come, we sin when we forget who we are. Thus the Torah points us back to Messiah and the knowledge of who we are in Him. The result of right relationship in Messiah is right action without Torah. After all, in the Olam Haba where there is no sin there is no need of commandments against sin. Thus, Messiah is not Torah but the Author of Torah. Messiah is the דבר Davar Word essence and not Torah the Instruction. The perfect Instructor is not subject to the instruction but is the Author of it.
 
In Messiah Jews and Gentiles are made one new human being. Again, this is not literal. We do not become a transgender multi-ethnic blob of humanity. To the contrary, we are one in spirit in Messiah and remain unique parts of the body of Messiah. Not all are hands, not all are feet, not all are heart or brain, but all are one body.
 
It is more than foolish, it is satanic to say as some do, “See, being Jewish or Navajo, or Britain, or Celt, or Maori doesn’t matter anymore because we are all one new man.” What utter nonsense! To steal the uniqueness of ethnic identity and assimilate it into a collective soup is to oppose Scripture:
 
“9 After this I looked, and there before me was a great multitude that no one could count, from every nation, tribe, people and language, standing before the throne and before the Lamb. They were wearing white robes and were holding palm branches in their hands. 10 And they cried out in a loud voice:
“Salvation (Yeshua) belongs to our God,
who sits on the throne,
and to the Lamb.”
 
-Revelation 7:9-10 [Author’s translation]
 
The Kingdom of God is a unique and diverse unity and not an assimilating empire.
 
The peace that is in Messiah comes through His blood and establishes a celebration of all that is godly in every ethnicity and culture. Peace is not the denying of uniqueness but the celebrating of it.
 
16 Indeed, that He might reconcile them both in one body to God through the cross, thereby putting to death that which caused the hostility. 
 
Messiah comes to reconcile us through His sacrifice, first to God and also to one another. His saving work puts to death the cause of the hostility between us. Messiah’s sacrificial death has put to death idolatrous rebellion, which is the root of all sin.
 
In Messiah we are no longer seeking our own elevation, rather, because Messiah is elevated above all, and we are submitted to God in Him, we elevate one another in Him. The one who has received the fullness of God’s love in Messiah is tasked with allowing that love to overflow toward others in perfect unity. Being your unique Messiah essential self is a gift to the body of faith. Don’t steal that gift by pretending to be something or someone you are not. Be tribal, but don’t practice tribalism.
 
17 And He came to speak the good news of peace to you who were far off (Gentiles) and to those who were near (Jews). 
 
The good news of Messiah is for all, perpetually first to the Jew and also perpetually to the nations (Romans 1:16).
 
18 For through, and of Him (Messiah) we both have access by one Spirit to the Father.
 
Messiah alone gives as access to the father, Jew and Gentile.
 
19 Now, therefore (based on what has already been stated), you are no longer foreigners (pagans without access) and neighbours without citizenship, but fellow citizens with the holy ones kedoshim[H] (saints, specifically Messiah essential Jews) and members of the household of God, 
 
Now, in Messiah, the Gentile believers of Ephesus, and by extension all Gentile followers of Yeshua, are no longer pagans and foreigners estranged from God’s people but are now grafted into the commonwealth of Israel by grace through faith and have become fellow citizens with the Jewish believers and members of God’s household/family. Heirs in His House/Temple (heavenly).
 
20 having been built on the foundation of השליחים (ha-sh’lichim[H]) the sent ones (Apostles: all of whom are Jews) and prophets (of the TaNaKh [OT], Jews with the possible exception of Job), Yeshua the Messiah Himself being the highest corner/ pinnacle, 21 in Him the whole building, joined together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord/LORD (Κυρίῳ  [kyrio] YHVH, Both the Father and the Son), 
 
Paul reminds the Gentile believers again that all this has been made possible through Messiah and built on the foundational work of God established through the Jewish Apostles and their predecessors the Prophets of Israel (Jews). All these being established in Messiah Who is the highest Corner, the top point of the House/Temple of God (alternatively, the foundational cornerstone of the Temple of God).
 
In Messiah both Jew and Gentile grow together into an everlasting metaphysical Temple. Not a Temple made of stone but a living Temple made up of unique people who are one in Messiah to the glory of God (1 Peter 2:4-9; 1 Cor. 3:16-17; 6:19). Thus, the New Jerusalem will have no Temple, because God Himself and the Lamb are its Temple (Rev. 21:22).
 
“Yeshua the Messiah Himself being the highest corner,” refers to Psalms 118:22, which reads:
 
“The stone which the builders rejected has become the head of the corner”
 
-Tehillim (Psalms) 118:22 [Author’s translation]
 
We note that while many versions translate “cornerstone,” neither the Greek nor the Hebrew text explicitly say this. While it’s possible the corner foundation stone of certain ancient buildings might be meant (Isa. 28:16; Matt. 21:42; 1 Peter 2:6-8), it seems more likely that in the context of Paul’s letter to the Ephesian community, in keeping with Paul’s description of Yeshua as being above all things, that he is in fact referring to the highest panicle of the Temple and Yeshua’s headship over the body of believers, who are being referred to here as the living stones of the Temple which is Messiah’s body.
 
There is at very least a remez (hint) here at a connection between Messiah’s headship over the living temple of the body of believers and the attempt by Satan to get Yeshua to throw Himself down from the pinnacle of the Temple in Jerusalem. The symbolism is clear. The Enemy is tempting Yeshua to put God to the test and to throw down His headship and authority over the ecclesia (coming body of believers) [Matt. 4:5].
 
That being said, there is a mystical Jewish tradition that speaks of the world being founded through the foundation stone האבן (Ha-even) in the Holy of Holies, which is also said to be the stone on which Jacob lay his head on the night he received the vision of the stairway to the heavens, the same stone being said to be the place where Abraham was to sacrifice Isaac and the stone through which man was created (M. Yoma 5:2; T. Yoma 2:14; B. Yoma 54b; Lev. Rabah 20:4 etc.). While this is a mystical tradition and not Scripture, it’s nonetheless consistent with the creating Word, God with us, Yeshua the King Messiah, through Whom all things are created (John 1:3; Colossians 1:16).
 
22 in Whom you together are also being built toward the dwelling place of God in the Spirit.
 
And where will the manifest dwelling place of God be in the future fullness of the World to come? It will be on the New Earth in the New Jerusalem, the city being the sum of its inhabitants (Rev. 21).
 
Therefore, this last verse of chapter 2 is ultimately pointing to eternal life in God for all who receive and are bound together in Messiah.
 
Copyright 2025 Yaakov (Brown) Ben Yehoshua