Ok. Here's the 1st commentary on Eph 2:20. Apologies where my OCR software has messed up the Greek words. I've highlighted the parts relevant to our discussion.
Ephesians: An Exegetical Commentary (2002)
By Harold W. Hoehner
Commentary: 2:20. έποικοδομηθέντες επί τώ θεμελίω, "having been built on the foundation." Paul makes a transition in his metaphor from those who belong to a household (oikeios) in verse 19 to that of a building in which the Spirit of God dwells (eitol Ko&oumbévites . . . οικοδομή . . . συνοικοδομείσθε. . . κατοικητήριον) in Verses 20-22. The aorist passive participle èTolkoöoun0évteg may signify a temporal idea, indicating that the readers of this letter have already built on the foundation at the time of their conversion, or, more likely, it may denote cause, namely, the reason we are fellow citizens with the saints and members of God's household is because we have been built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets. The passive emphasizes that we who are in one body are recipients of the action. God is the subject of the building. The following preposition éIt with the accusative would imply motion (1 Cor 3:12; Rom 15:20) but with the genitive or dative, as here, it denotes place - "on" or "upon" which the structure is built. The word beuélo, means "foundation," which speaks of the beginnings of something that is coming into being, a term that is synonymous to KatoBoxń in 1:4. The nature of the foundation is explained next.
töv diroo to cov kori repoontów, "of the apostles and prophets." Five items need to be considered. First, there is only one article for both nouns. This "does not necessarily identify the Apostles and Prophets as one and the same persons," but the one article may indicate that "groups more or less distinct are treated as one for the purpose in hand."
Second, the genitives have been interpreted in various ways. (1) Some think they are possessive genitives: "the apostles' and prophets foundation." But Ellicott has pointed out that this would mix up the Beué)tos, "foundation" and cKpoyovicios, "cornerstone." It states that the foundation belongs to the apostles and yet, on the other hand, Christ is the cornerstone, the main stone of the foundation. Therefore, Christ belongs to the apostles! (2) Others see these as subjective genitives or genitives of agency or originating cause: "the foundation laid by the apostles and prophets." This refers to doctrine preached by the apostles and prophets with Christ as the cornerstone of that doctrine. Those who propound this use of the genitive suggest that two passages support this view: 1 Cor 3:10-11, where Paul, as a wise architect, laid the foundation which is Christ; and Rom 15:20, where Paul specifically states that he will not build on another person's foundation. However, there are some problems with this view. First, it makes Christ both the foundation and the cornerstone. If the foundation is the apostolic doctrine about Christ, what is the content of the cornerstone's teaching? It would appear to be the same teaching, making Christ redundant as the cornerstone." Also, to make Christ personal, as Ellicott does, seems to be inconsistent and confusing with the nonpersonal (teaching). Second, the parallel passages mentioned above do not support this view of the genitive. The first parallel passage is 1 Cor 3:10-11, which states that each believer builds his or her works on the foundation of Christ. However, in the present context there is nothing about building works on the foundation. The second parallel text is Rom 15:20 where Paul states that he will not build on another person's foundation. But this text refers to the establishment of new local churches, whereas in the present context Paul is not speaking about the foundation of a local church. Aside from this, if one uses Rom 15:20 as a text to support the view that the foundation is the doctrine taught by the apostles and prophets, then why would not Paul want to build on it? Did he have a different doctrine? Third, in 1 Cor 3:10-11 Paul specifically states that he laid (temko) the foundation, whereas in Ephesians he does not. Ultimately, the interpretation of one passage cannot be imposed on another, especially when they are not addressing the same issue. (3) Still other interpreters regard these as genitives of apposition: "the foundation consisting of the apostles and prophets." This view is the most consistent. First, the imagery depicted in the present context is that Christ, as a person (or Toi Xplo to Troot - Christ Jesus himself and not Christ's own teaching), is the cornerstone, the apostles and prophets, as persons, are the foundation, and the saints, as persons, are the building. Second, this coincides with 4:11 and more specifically 1 Cor 12:28 which states, "God placed or appointed (see to) in the church first apostles, second prophets, ..." as foundations for ministry. Third, the aorist rather than a present passive participle is used to indicate a summarizing aspect normally referring to past time (aorist participles usually indicate antecedent time to that of the main verb) rather than a repeated action. If it were talking about the doctrine on which the church is built, then there ought to be a present or perhaps a perfect tense to indicate a repeated action representing a continuing effect of the teaching throughout the readers' lives and throughout the centuries of the church. However, if it is referring to persons, it is fitting for the aorist to be used to indicate past time of the apostles and prophets as that first foundation. Fourth, this view corresponds well with Rev 21:14 where the twelve apostles, along with the twelve tribes of Israel, are the foundations of the new city of Jerusalem. In the end, it seems best to view these genitives as appositional, indicating that the apostles and prophets are the historic persons who first formed the universal church. The relationship of this concept to Christ as the cornerstone will be discussed below.
The third thing to be considered is the identity of the apostles and prophets. Since the term "apostle" was discussed in greater detail at 1:1, only a brief discussion is in order here. An apostle is one who is sent out on a mission with fully delegated authority by his master Jesus Christ, as the original disciples whom Jesus selected were sent out to minister (cf. also 4:11). Three kinds of apostles in the NT have been mentioned: those who had been with Jesus in his ministry and had witnessed his resurrection (Acts 1:21–22), Paul who was born out of season (1 Cor 15:8-9), and those who received the gift of apostleship as mentioned in 4:11. The first two categories are to be regarded as offices, whereas the last as a spiritual gift to the church. In the present context Paul is most likely referring to all three categories. Regarding who and what function they had, it was concluded in the study in 1:1 that an apostle was an official delegate of Jesus Christ, commissioned for the specific tasks of proclaiming authoritatively the message in oral and written form and establishing and building up churches. The prophets are listed along with other gifts to the church (1 Cor 12:28; Eph 4:11; cf. Rom 12:6). There is much debate on this subject and it is beyond the scope of this work to go into great detail. After a study of prophets, Forbes concludes that the prophets of the Hellenistic world were quite different from the prophets of early Christianity, and the more likely background for the term is to be found in the Septuagint and the Judaism of the synagogues. Briefly, it seems that the prophet is one who is endowed by the Holy Spirit with the gift of prophecy for the purpose of edification, comfort, and encouragement (1 Cor 14:3, 31), as well as for the purpose of understanding and communicating the mysteries and revelation of God to the church (12:10; 13:2; 14:6, 22, 30–31). As was true with the OT prophets, the NT prophetic gift also included a predictive element (1 Thess 3:4; 4:6, 14-18; Gal 5:21) that was not a part of the other gifts such as teaching. In the NT the prophet was not to be overcome by some uncontrolled estatic force, but he was to control himself when he received revelation (1 Cor 14:29-32; Rev. 1:9-11). In light of an incomplete canon, the prophets may well have received revelation to complete what was needed so that every person could be presented perfect before God (Eph 4:12; Col 1:28). In conclusion, it seems that both the apostle and the prophet were involved in revelation.
In many ways the NT apostle, including the apostle Paul (1 Cor 13:9; 14:6)," functioned much like an OT prophet. However, Grudem takes this a bit further when he proposes that the apostles rather than the NT prophets correspond more closely with the OT prophets. He claims that OT prophets and NT apostles spoke with divine authority, whereas NT prophets, who were not apostles, did not prophesy with absolute divine
authority, and their prophecy could even be in partial error (e.g., errors in Agabus' prophecy Acts 21:10–11)). The problem with Grudem's view is threefold. First, it would be more natural that OT prophets correspond with NT prophets than with apostles. The recipients of this epistle would likely make this correspondence. This would be a consistent use of "prophet" throughout the Bible, whereas "apostles" are distinct though they may have overlapping functions. Further elaboration regarding the identity of NT prophets and apostles is given below. Second, Grudem's bifurcation of the NT prophets into two groups: (1) those who were also apostles and spoke with absolute authority, as did OT prophets or Scripture; and (2) those who were not also apostles whose words, although not absolutely authoritative, were for encouragement has no tenable basis in the NT. Third, it seems strange that Christ would give the prophetic gift which lacked authority and, in fact, could be in error. In the OT anyone who gave nonauthoritative prophecy was considered a false prophet (Deut 13). In the NT prophets were to be tested: if true, then their words would be deemed authoritative; if not true they were considered false prophets (1 Cor 14:29-31; 2 Pet 2; 1 John 4:1; Jude 11-16). Thus, it is best to consider that there were overlapping functions with reference to NT prophets and apostles, much like many ministries today. However, each had a different emphasis. The emphasis for the apostle was more of the divine commission to a specific task; for the prophet, however, it was the communication of divine revelation.
The fourth thing to be considered is the relationship between the apostles and prophets. Grudem lists four ways in which they are related to each other: (1) the teachings of apostles and prophets; (2) apostles who are also prophets; (3) apostles and OT prophets; and (4) apostles and NT prophets. View (1) refers not to the apostles and prophets themselves but to their teaching, and this is incongruent with the present context since it speaks of persons and not teaching. Grudem rightly assesses that this view may be tenable for 1 Cor 3:1015 but inappropriate for the present context. View (2), favored by Grudem, proposes that rather than two groups (NT apostles and NT prophets), it is one group (NT apostle-prophets). He argues that this is possible grammatically since there is only one article for both nouns, but as pointed out above, that does not necessarily make them one and the same. In fact, Wallace remarks that to make them one and the same would be suspect because there is no other example in the NT where two nouns (in a noun + noun construction) refer to two identical groups. Furthermore, in the NT there is no indication that an apostle is necessarily a prophet or vice versa. Certainly, when Paul instructs the Corinthians regarding the conduct of the prophets, there is no indication that they were apostles (1 Cor 14:29–32). If these prophets were apostles, then Paul is instructing apostles how to conduct themselves! In addition when Paul lists the gifts in Eph 4:11, he mentions that there are "some apostles and some prophets," indicating that these are two different groups as opposed to "some apostles and prophets," indicating that they are one and the same. Thus option (2) is not convincing. View (3) suggests that this refers to apostles and OT prophets but it is problematic for the following reasons. First, the order is wrong, for if he meant OT prophets, it would have been logical to list them first. Second, the same order, first apostles and then prophets, is given when Paul lists the various gifted individuals who are to benefit the church (4:11; cf. 1 Cor 12:28, 29). Third, in the context Paul states that before Christ there was a great gulf between Jews and Gentiles, but by Jesus' death God created a new person called the church and made the law inoperative. Hence, if this refers to the OT prophets it confuses the issue, for it implicates an OT institution with an entirely new entity, thus blurring the distinction Paul is making. Fourth, in Eph 3:5 Paul speaks of the mystery (i.e., the church = believing Jews and believing Gentiles in one body) which was hidden in former generations but is now revealed to "his holy apostles and prophets by the Spirit." Certainly, this statement makes it clear that the prophets were contemporaries with the apostles, both receiving from the same Spirit the revelation of the former hidden mystery.' Fifth, it negates the metaphor of Christ as the cornerstone in relationship to the rest of the foundation. The cornerstone is the first stone laid in a building to be followed by the foundation. If this refers to OT prophets, it would imply that they were a part of the foundation before the cornerstone was laid. View (4) proposes that these are apostles and NT prophets. This is the most plausible view for the following reasons. First, the order of apostles before prophets suggests it. Second, the present context discusses God's creation of the "new person" (v. 15), that is, the church, and this is completely distinct from the old order where the law caused hostility between Jews and Gentiles. Now with the law inoperative, the new person is built, not on prophets from the old order, but on the apostles and prophets of the new order. Third, the mystery of believing Jews and Gentiles incorporated into one body was hidden to former generations, which would include the OT prophets, but now is revealed to Christs holy apostles and prophets (3:5). The words in 3:5 are listed in the same order as the present verse, that is, apostles before the prophets. Fourth, Eph 4:11 states that the apostles and prophets were given to the church as foundational gifted people who were to prepare saints for ministry and to build up this new body, the church. Again, the apostles are mentioned before prophets in 4:11 as in the present verse. Also, since the apostles and prophets are given for the effective function of the new order, it is inconceivable that these refer to OT prophets. Fifth, since in this metaphor Christ is the cornerstone in the context of his suffering, the first stone of the foundation, it must refer to NT prophets who are a part of the foundation of this new work called the church. In conclusion then, the prophets mentioned here must be NT prophets who form the foundation along with the apostles.
The fifth item to be considered is the makeup of the foundation. In 1 Cor 3:11 Jesus Christ is the foundation, whereas in the present verse the apostles and prophets are the foundation. This is not an insurmountable problem and can be answered in several different ways. First, it is not unreasonable for Paul to use a building metaphor "in two different ways for two different purposes." Second, it is possible that the apostles who laid the foundations (1 Cor 3:10; Rom 15:2) thought of themselves as the foundation stones." Third, this may be a development of Pauline thought, that is, though earlier Christ is portrayed as the foundation, later he is portrayed as the cornerstone, the most important stone of the foundation and the building as a whole (see the following comments). This is analogous to the development of Christ's relationship with the church. In the earlier letters the church is the body of Christ (Rom 12:4-5; 1 Cor 12:12-13, 27), whereas in the later letters Christ is the head of the body (Eph 1:2223; 4:15-16; 5:23; Col 1:18, 24; 2:19). In the present context the church's foundation consists of apostles and prophets and the main stone of the foundation is the cornerstone, Christ himself. Thus, this passage is not in contradiction to 1 Cor 3: 1 1 but is a complement, a fuller development of thought.
όντος άκρογωνιαίου αυτού Χριστου Ιησού, "Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone." This is a genitive absolute, which means that it has "no syntactical connection with any part of the sentence." It does connect to the idea of a foundation of apostles and prophets by giving further information about the foundation's construction, namely, that Christ Jesus is the cornerstone. The meaning of word (Kpoyovicios has been greatly debated. The word does not occur in classical literature but is found in the LXX only in Isa 28:16 where it translates E. It has the basic meaning of "corner," as the corner of a street (Prov 7:8, 12), corner of a roof (Prov 21:9; 25:24), corner of a house (Job 1:19), corner of an altar (Exod 27:2; 38:2), and corner of a city wall (Neh 3:24, 31), but in the Isaiah context it most likely means "cornerstone" (cf. 1 QS 8:7; 4Q259 2:16). Besides the present context, this word occurs in the NT only in 1 Pet 2:6, which is a quotation of Isa 28:16. The older commentators have rendered it "cornerstone," but because of a proposal by Jeremias that it should be rendered "capstone, topstone," some recent commentators have followed suit. Jeremias' main support for his theory is the apocryphal work Testament of Solonzo! (22:7-23:4) which speaks about the stone at the top of a gateway to the temple. Further attestation that the word di Kpoyovicios means "topstone" can be found in two places in the OT translation by Symmachus. One of these is 2 Kgs 25:17 where it is translated three times from , meaning "capital" of a column, which the LXX does not translate but transliterates (goBop). The other occurrence is in Ps 118:22 [ LXX 1 17:22] from te vix 7 and is translated literally in the LXX as Keoohv Yovics meaning "head of a corner." Its application in the present context would be that the apostles and prophets are the foundation and Christ is the capstone of the church, similar to another metaphor where he is the head of the body.
