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Colossians 1

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1 Παῦλος ἀπόστολος Χριστοῦ Ἰησοῦ διὰ θελήματος θεοῦ καὶ Τιμόθεος ὁ ἀδελφὸς 2 τοῖς ἐν Κολοσσαῖς ἁγίοις καὶ πιστοῖς ἀδελφοῖς ἐν Χριστῷ: χάρις ὑμῖν καὶ εἰρήνη ἀπὸ θεοῦ πατρὸς ἡμῶν. 3 Εὐχαριστοῦμεν τῷ θεῷ πατρὶ τοῦ κυρίου ἡμῶν Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ πάντοτε περὶ ὑμῶν προσευχόμενοι, 4 ἀκούσαντες τὴν πίστιν ὑμῶν ἐν Χριστῷ Ἰησοῦ καὶ τὴν ἀγάπην ἣν ἔχετε εἰς πάντας τοὺς ἁγίους 5 διὰ τὴν ἐλπίδα τὴν ἀποκειμένην ὑμῖν ἐν τοῖς οὐρανοῖς, ἣν προηκούσατε ἐν τῷ λόγῳ τῆς ἀληθείας τοῦ εὐαγγελίου 6 τοῦ παρόντος εἰς ὑμᾶς, καθὼς καὶ ἐν παντὶ τῷ κόσμῳ ἐστὶν καρποφορούμενον καὶ αὐξανόμενον καθὼς καὶ ἐν ὑμῖν, ἀφ' ἧς ἡμέρας ἠκούσατε καὶ ἐπέγνωτε τὴν χάριν τοῦ θεοῦ ἐν ἀληθείᾳ: 7 καθὼς ἐμάθετε ἀπὸ Ἐπαφρᾶ τοῦ ἀγαπητοῦ συνδούλου ἡμῶν, ὅς ἐστιν πιστὸς ὑπὲρ ὑμῶν διάκονος τοῦ Χριστοῦ, 8 ὁ καὶ δηλώσας ἡμῖν τὴν ὑμῶν ἀγάπην ἐν πνεύματι. 9 Διὰ τοῦτο καὶ ἡμεῖς, ἀφ' ἧς ἡμέρας ἠκούσαμεν, οὐ παυόμεθα ὑπὲρ ὑμῶν προσευχόμενοι καὶ αἰτούμενοι ἵνα πληρωθῆτε τὴν ἐπίγνωσιν τοῦ θελήματος αὐτοῦ ἐν πάσῃ σοφίᾳ καὶ συνέσει πνευματικῇ, 10 περιπατῆσαι ἀξίως τοῦ κυρίου εἰς πᾶσαν ἀρεσκείαν, ἐν παντὶ ἔργῳ ἀγαθῷ καρποφοροῦντες καὶ αὐξανόμενοι τῇ ἐπιγνώσει τοῦ θεοῦ, 11 ἐν πάσῃ δυνάμει δυναμούμενοι κατὰ τὸ κράτος τῆς δόξης αὐτοῦ εἰς πᾶσαν ὑπομονὴν καὶ μακροθυμίαν, μετὰ χαρᾶς 12 εὐχαριστοῦντες τῷ πατρὶ τῷ ἱκανώσαντι ὑμᾶς εἰς τὴν μερίδα τοῦ κλήρου τῶν ἁγίων ἐν τῷ φωτί: 13 ὃς ἐρρύσατο ἡμᾶς ἐκ τῆς ἐξουσίας τοῦ σκότους καὶ μετέστησεν εἰς τὴν βασιλείαν τοῦ υἱοῦ τῆς ἀγάπης αὐτοῦ,

1 From Paul, by God’s purpose an apostle of Jesus Christ, and Timothy who is their brother, 2 to the saints at Colossae, our brethren who believe in Jesus Christ; 3 Grace be yours and peace from God, our Father, and the Lord Jesus Christ. We give thanks to God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, continually in our prayers for you, 4 when we are told of your faith in Jesus Christ, and the love which you shew to all the saints; 5 such hope have you of what awaits you in heaven. Hope was the lesson you learned from that truth-giving message of the Gospel 6 which has reached you, which now bears fruit and thrives in you, as it does all the world over, since the day when you heard of God’s grace and recognized it for what it is. 7 Your teacher was Epaphras, for us, a well-loved fellow bondsman, and for you a loyal minister of Jesus Christ;[1] 8 and it is he who has told us of this love which you cherish in the Spirit. 9 So, ever since the news reached us, we have been praying for you in return, unceasingly. Our prayer is, that you may be filled with that closer knowledge of God’s will which brings all wisdom and all spiritual insight with it. 10 May you live as befits his servants, waiting continually on his pleasure; may the closer knowledge of God bring you fruitfulness and growth in all good. 11 May you be inspired, as his glorious power can inspire you, with full strength to be patient and to endure; to endure joyfully, 12 thanking God our Father for making us fit to share the light which saints inherit,[2] 13 for rescuing us from the power of darkness, and transferring us to the kingdom of his beloved Son.

1 Paulus Apostolus Jesu Christi per voluntatem Dei, et Timotheus frater: 2 eis, qui sunt Colossis, sanctis, et fidelibus fratribus in Christo Jesu. 3 Gratia vobis, et pax a Deo Patre nostro, et Domino Jesu Christo.

Gratias agimus Deo, et Patri Domini nostri Jesu Christi semper pro vobis orantes: 4 audientes fidem vestram in Christo Jesu, et dilectionem quam habetis in sanctos omnes 5 propter spem, quæ reposita est vobis in cælis: quam audistis in verbo veritatis Evangelii: 6 quod pervenit ad vos, sicut et in universo mundo est, et fructificat, et crescit sicut in vobis, ex ea die, qua audistis, et cognovistis gratiam Dei in veritate, 7 sicut didicistis ab Epaphra carissimo conservo nostro, qui est fidelis pro vobis minister Christi Jesu, 8 qui etiam manifestavit nobis dilectionem vestram in spiritu. 9 Ideo et nos ex qua die audivimus, non cessamus pro vobis orantes, et postulantes ut impleamini agnitione voluntatis ejus, in omni sapientia et intellectu spiritali: 10 ut ambuletis digne Deo per omnia placentes: in omni opere bono fructificantes, et crescentes in scientia Dei: 11 in omni virtute confortati secundum potentiam claritatis ejus, in omni patientia et longanimitate cum gaudio, 12 gratias agentes Deo Patri, qui dignos nos fecit in partem sortis sanctorum in lumine: 13 qui eripuit nos de potestate tenebrarum, et transtulit in regnum filii dilectionis suæ,

14 ἐν ᾧ ἔχομεν τὴν ἀπολύτρωσιν, τὴν ἄφεσιν τῶν ἁμαρτιῶν: 15 ὅς ἐστιν εἰκὼν τοῦ θεοῦ τοῦ ἀοράτου, πρωτότοκος πάσης κτίσεως, 16 ὅτι ἐν αὐτῷ ἐκτίσθη τὰ πάντα ἐν τοῖς οὐρανοῖς καὶ ἐπὶ τῆς γῆς, τὰ ὁρατὰ καὶ τὰ ἀόρατα, εἴτε θρόνοι εἴτε κυριότητες εἴτε ἀρχαὶ εἴτε ἐξουσίαι: τὰ πάντα δι' αὐτοῦ καὶ εἰς αὐτὸν ἔκτισται, 17 καὶ αὐτός ἐστιν πρὸ πάντων καὶ τὰ πάντα ἐν αὐτῷ συνέστηκεν. 18 καὶ αὐτός ἐστιν ἡ κεφαλὴ τοῦ σώματος, τῆς ἐκκλησίας: ὅς ἐστιν ἀρχή, πρωτότοκος ἐκ τῶν νεκρῶν, ἵνα γένηται ἐν πᾶσιν αὐτὸς πρωτεύων, 19 ὅτι ἐν αὐτῷ εὐδόκησεν πᾶν τὸ πλήρωμα κατοικῆσαι 20 καὶ δι' αὐτοῦ ἀποκαταλλάξαι τὰ πάντα εἰς αὐτόν, εἰρηνοποιήσας διὰ τοῦ αἵματος τοῦ σταυροῦ αὐτοῦ, δι' αὐτοῦ εἴτε τὰ ἐπὶ τῆς γῆς εἴτε τὰ ἐν τοῖς οὐρανοῖς. 21 καὶ ὑμᾶς ποτε ὄντας ἀπηλλοτριωμένους καὶ ἐχθροὺς τῇ διανοίᾳ ἐν τοῖς ἔργοις τοῖς πονηροῖς, 22 νυνὶ δὲ ἀποκατήλλαξεν ἐν τῷ σώματι τῆς σαρκὸς αὐτοῦ διὰ τοῦ θανάτου, παραστῆσαι ὑμᾶς ἁγίους καὶ ἀμώμους καὶ ἀνεγκλήτους κατενώπιον αὐτοῦ, 23 εἴ γε ἐπιμένετε τῇ πίστει τεθεμελιωμένοι καὶ ἑδραῖοι καὶ μὴ μετακινούμενοι ἀπὸ τῆς ἐλπίδος τοῦ εὐαγγελίου οὗ ἠκούσατε, τοῦ κηρυχθέντος ἐν πάσῃ κτίσει τῇ ὑπὸ τὸν οὐρανόν, οὗ ἐγενόμην ἐγὼ Παῦλος διάκονος.

14 In the Son of God, in his blood, we find the redemption that sets us free from our sins. 15 He is the true likeness of the God we cannot see; his is that first birth which precedes every act of creation.[3] 16 Yes, in him all created things took their being, heavenly and earthly, visible and invisible; what are thrones and dominions, what are princedoms and powers? They were all created through him and in him; 17 he takes precedency of all, and in him all subsist.[4] 18 He too is that head whose body is the Church; it begins with him, since his was the first birth out of death; thus in every way the primacy was to become his.[5] 19 It was God’s good pleasure to let all completeness dwell in him,[6] 20 and through him to win back all things, whether on earth or in heaven, into union with himself, making peace with them through his blood, shed on the cross.[7] 21 You, too, were once estranged from him; your minds were alienated from him by a life of sin; 22 but now he has used Christ’s natural body to win you back through his death, and so to bring you into his presence, holy, and spotless, and unreproved. 23 But that means that you must be true to your faith, grounded in it, firmly established in it; nothing must shift you away from the hope you found in the gospel you once listened to. It is a gospel which has been preached to all creation under heaven, and I, Paul, have been brought into its service.

14 in quo habemus redemptionem per sanguinem ejus, remissionem peccatorum: 15 qui est imago Dei invisibilis, primogenitus omnis creaturæ: 16 quoniam in ipso condita sunt universa in cælis, et in terra, visibilia, et invisibilia, sive throni, sive dominationes, sive principatus, sive potestates: omnia per ipsum et in ipso creata sunt: 17 et ipse est ante omnes, et omnia in ipso constant. 18 Et ipse est caput corporis Ecclesiæ, qui est principium, primogenitus ex mortuis: ut sit in omnibus ipse primatum tenens: 19 quia in ipso complacuit, omnem plenitudinem inhabitare: 20 et per eum reconciliare omnia in ipsum, pacificans per sanguinem crucis ejus, sive quæ in terris, sive quæ in cælis sunt. 21 Et vos cum essetis aliquando alienati, et inimici sensu in operibus malis: 22 nunc autem reconciliavit in corpore carnis ejus per mortem, exhibere vos sanctos, et immaculatos, et irreprehensibiles coram ipso: 23 si tamen permanetis in fide fundati, et stabiles, et immobiles a spe Evangelii, quod audistis, quod prædicatum est in universa creatura, quæ sub cælo est, cujus factus sum ego Paulus minister.

24 Νῦν χαίρω ἐν τοῖς παθήμασιν ὑπὲρ ὑμῶν, καὶ ἀνταναπληρῶ τὰ ὑστερήματα τῶν θλίψεων τοῦ Χριστοῦ ἐν τῇ σαρκί μου ὑπὲρ τοῦ σώματος αὐτοῦ, ὅ ἐστιν ἡ ἐκκλησία, 25 ἧς ἐγενόμην ἐγὼ διάκονος κατὰ τὴν οἰκονομίαν τοῦ θεοῦ τὴν δοθεῖσάν μοι εἰς ὑμᾶς πληρῶσαι τὸν λόγον τοῦ θεοῦ, 26 τὸ μυστήριον τὸ ἀποκεκρυμμένον ἀπὸ τῶν αἰώνων καὶ ἀπὸ τῶν γενεῶν νῦν δὲ ἐφανερώθη τοῖς ἁγίοις αὐτοῦ, 27 οἷς ἠθέλησεν ὁ θεὸς γνωρίσαι τί τὸ πλοῦτος τῆς δόξης τοῦ μυστηρίου τούτου ἐν τοῖς ἔθνεσιν, ὅ ἐστιν Χριστὸς ἐν ὑμῖν, ἡ ἐλπὶς τῆς δόξης, 28 ὃν ἡμεῖς καταγγέλλομεν νουθετοῦντες πάντα ἄνθρωπον καὶ διδάσκοντες πάντα ἄνθρωπον ἐν πάσῃ σοφίᾳ, ἵνα παραστήσωμεν πάντα ἄνθρωπον τέλειον ἐν Χριστῷ: 29 εἰς ὃ καὶ κοπιῶ ἀγωνιζόμενος κατὰ τὴν ἐνέργειαν αὐτοῦ τὴν ἐνεργουμένην ἐν ἐμοὶ ἐν δυνάμει.

24 Even as I write, I am glad of my sufferings on your behalf, as, in this mortal frame of mine, I help to pay off the debt which the afflictions of Christ still leave to be paid, for the sake of his body, the Church.[8] 25 When I entered its service I received a commission from God for the benefit of you Gentiles, to complete the preaching of his word among you.[9] 26 This was the secret that had been hidden from all the ages and generations of the past; now, he has revealed it to his saints, 27 wishing to make known the manifold splendour of this secret among the Gentiles—Christ among you, your hope of glory.[10] 28 Him, then, we proclaim, warning every human being and instructing every human being as wisely as we may, so as to exhibit every human being perfect in Christ Jesus. 29 It is for this that I labour, for this that I strive so anxiously; and with effect, so effectually does his power manifest itself in me.

24 Qui nunc gaudeo in passionibus pro vobis, et adimpleo ea quæ desunt passionem Christi, in carne mea pro corpore ejus, quod est Ecclesia: 25 cujus factus sum ego minister secundum dispensationem Dei, quæ data est mihi in vos, ut impleam verbum Dei: 26 mysterium, quod absconditum fuit a sæculis, et generationibus, nunc autem manifestatum est sanctis ejus, 27 quibus voluit Deus notas facere divitias gloriæ sacramenti hujus in gentibus, quod est Christus, in vobis spes gloriæ, 28 quem nos annuntiamus, corripientes omnem hominem, et docentes omnem hominem, in omni sapientia, ut exhibeamus omnem hominem perfectum in Christo Jesu: 29 in quo et laboro, certando secundum operationem ejus, quam operatur in me in virtute.

[1] ‘Fellow bondsman’; that is, probably, in the service of Christ, but the word may imply that Epaphras was sharing, in a manner, the Apostle’s imprisonment.

[2] ‘Fit’, according to the Latin, means ‘worthy’, but the Greek has rather the sense of ‘capable’.

[3] ‘His is that first birth’; literally, ‘he is the first-born of all (or, every) creation’; the rendering given assumes that St Paul is talking of Christ as God. It is possible he meant that Christ as Man enjoys primacy over the rest of creation.

[4] ‘In him’, at the end of the verse, should rather be translated ‘for him’ (literally ‘into him’) if we follow the Greek.

[5] ‘His was the first birth out of death’; literally, ‘he is the first-born from the dead’. Christ as Man is the Head of a new creation, the Church of the redeemed.

[6] ‘All completeness’; it is not certain whether we should understand this of the Divine essence, or of a plenitude of graces, or of mankind, and indeed creation as a whole, as mystically identified with Christ.

[7] ‘With himself’ may refer to God the Father, or (like the other pronouns in the sentence) to our Lord.

[8] ‘The afflictions of Christ’ have been understood by some commentators as being those which he suffers in his members, i.e. the Church (cf. Ac. 9.4), and particularly in St Paul himself. But the Greek verb shews that St Paul only represents himself as taking a share in the afflictions here referred to; and probably the metaphor is that of a poor man contributing to pay off a sum which a richer man has paid in advance. Thus the obvious meaning is that Christ’s sufferings, although fully satisfactory on behalf of our sins, leave us under a debt of honour, as it were, to repay them by sufferings of our own.

[9] The word ‘Gentiles’ is not expressed in the Greek or in the Latin, but has been supplied here in order to bring out what is clearly the sense; St Paul is not thinking of the Colossians in particular, who were not his own converts. ‘To complete the preaching’, that is, to supplement the teaching of other missionaries, who had gone to the Jews only; cf. Rom. 15.19.

[10] The Greek here is usually rendered ‘to whom he wished to make known the manifold splendour of this secret among the Gentiles’; but this is to repeat what has already been said in the preceding verse, and the words ‘among the Gentiles’ have no real force, since the secret (that of the universality of Christ’s Church) obviously applied to them, not to anybody else. The same Greek words may also be taken as meaning ‘(the saints) whom he wished to publish among the Gentiles the manifold splendour of this secret’, which seems to give a better sense.

Knox Translation Copyright © 2013 Westminster Diocese
Nihil Obstat. Father Anton Cowan, Censor.
Imprimatur. +Most Rev. Vincent Nichols, Archbishop of Westminster. 8th January 2012.
Re-typeset and published in 2012 by Baronius Press Ltd