I am thinking of writing a commentary on Ephesians. Thus, I have been looking at other commentaries, both popular and scholarly, to see what is already available.
That has led me to type this short rant:
The first thing any and every commentator on Ephesians 2:1 should note is the cleanliness code dealing with corpses in the Pentateuch.
The LORD spoke to Moses, saying, “Command the people of Israel that they put out of the camp everyone who is leprous or has a discharge and everyone who is unclean through contact with the dead. You shall put out both male and female, putting them outside the camp, that they may not defile their camp, in the midst of which I dwell.”
Numbers 5:1–3 ESV
Paul addresses Christians as “saints”—holy ones (Ephesians 1:1). That means, like the Israelites generally and the Levites and priests especially, they had access to God’s presence. They are “in Christ” and thus “in the heavenly places” (1:3). Christians were chosen to “be holy and blameless before Him” (1:4). Christians have “redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses” (1:7), an obvious reference to the Mosaic system of blood atonement, trespass, and redemption—which sometimes involves money (Numbers 18:15, 16) and thus is “according to His graciously bestowed riches” (1:7).
So, of course, the background to being dead in one’s trespasses is found in the same background that Paul has been utilizing all along to understand and explain salvation in Christ.
Paul continues to utilize this background, explaining how Jew and Gentile are brought together as one household and building (2:11-22)—“a holy temple in the Lord” (v. 21 ESV). Any claim that Gentile believers don’t care about the “Old Testament background,” and any pretense that Paul would be engaging in generic metaphors and not appealing to the Hebrew Scriptures, is falsified by 2:11-22.
So what possible excuse could there be for Evangelical Bible scholars to write commentaries on Ephesians that cover 2:1 without any mention of the laws regarding sanctuary access and the uncleanness of death? While the opposite of “dead in your trespasses and sins” is “made us alive together with Christ” (2:5 ESV), it is also opposite of being made “fellow citizens with the saints” (2:19 ESV). The dead are outside the camp but Christ has brought us near.