Coupled with arche in Ephesians 1:21 and elsewhere, is the word translated

power, exousia which is better rendered `authority' and which we shall more

fully consider presently.  They occur together in Luke 20:20, where we read of

`the power (arche) and authority (exousia) of the governor'.  In like manner,

Luke 12:11 translates arche by `magistrate'.  Turning our attention now to those

heavenly and spiritual spheres with which Ephesians 1:21 is concerned, we read

in Jude 6 that angels kept not their `first estate' (arche); `abandoned their

own domain' (Moffatt).  In the book of the Revelation arche is never used except

as a title of Christ:

`I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the ending (in the Received

Text), saith the Lord, which is, and which was, and which is to come, the

Almighty' (Rev. 1:8).

Here it will be observed the title `beginning and ending' is placed in

correspondence with the great name Jehovah, the name of God in covenant,

redemption and purpose, thereby revealing how it is that a word which primarily

indicates time, can be a title of the Lord, for He gathers all time to Himself,

`Jesus Christ, the same, yesterday and today, and for ever'.  In the second

occurrence, the Lord is called `The beginning of the creation of God', a title

that cannot be ignored when reading Genesis 1:1.  This takes us to our epistles,

and in Colossians 1:18 we read of Christ `He is the Head of the Body, the

church: Who is the beginning, the Firstborn from the dead; that in all things He

might have the pre-eminence'.

From the way in which these principalities and powers are introduced in

the New Testament, it appears that most of them are evil powers, but whether we

can say as Dr. Bullinger does in his Lexicon,

`Used of supra-mundane powers, probably evil powers',

remains to be seen.  The first reference is that of Romans 8:38, which arises

out of the fact that there can be no condemnation to those who are in Christ

Jesus.  `Who is even at the right hand of God, Who also maketh intercession for

us'.  These principalities and powers are classed with angels, and are included

among those invisible powers like death itself, which shall not be able to

separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.  From this

it would appear that these principalities and powers may be inimical to the

believer.  In 1 Corinthians 15:24, we are taken to `the end' or to the goal of

the ages, when `all rule and all authority and power' shall be `put down' (a

term yet to be examined), and to continue the quotation from Dr. Bullinger's

Lexicon commenced above:

`In 1 Corinthians 15:26 we read of eschatos echthros, the last enemy,

which may imply that these names (Col. 1:16, etc.) designate mutual rank

of evil supra-mundane powers, so far as they relate to men'.

This brings us to the Prison Epistles where these supramundane powers are

mentioned six times.  The six references are distributed as follows and their

interrelation is made evident by the parallelism here exhibited:

A

Eph. 1:21.

Christ above all principality and power.

In this world and world

to come.