air.  Such, said the apostle, were `by nature children of wrath, as the rest'.

The use of this word `nature' has caused a great deal of heart searching

on the part of teachers and preachers.  Phusis, the word so translated, occurs

in the New Testament fourteen times, and apart from Ephesians 2:3 it is

innocuous.  When Paul said that certain practices were `against nature' (Rom.

1:26), and when he said to the Corinthians `doth not even nature itself teach

you?' (1 Cor. 11:14), the word is used of something that is right and proper.

The selfsame word is used of the `Divine nature' (2 Pet. 1:4).  We must not

confuse this with the word psuchikos (1 Cor. 15:44,46), which refers to the

`soul' as contrasted with the `spirit'.

Those who were `Jews by nature' (Gal. 2:15), or those who were

`uncircumcision ... by nature' (Rom. 2:27), were not esteemed to be wrong

because they were thus Jews and Gentiles.  Yet here in Ephesians 2:3 those who

`were by nature children of wrath even as others, or the rest', will not fit

into this category.  To discover, as some have, an answer to the problem by

saying the `ye' of verse 2 refers to the Gentiles and the `we' of verse 3 to the

Jews, does not alter the fact that the Jews as well as the Gentiles were `by

nature' children of wrath.  Josephus in his Antiquities, says of David `but

David fell into a very grievous sin, though he was otherwise naturally a

righteous and religious man' (Ant. 7:7,1).  The laboured comment of Barnes in

his commentary, is a testimony both to his extreme sensitiveness to the thorny

points of the problem, his great reluctance to admit what is known as the

depravity of our nature, yet his conviction at the close, seems worth repeating

`"And were by nature".  By birth, or before we were converted.  By

conversion and adoption they became the children of God; before that, they were

all the children of wrath.  This is, I think, the fair meaning of this important

declaration.  It does not affirm when they became to be such, or that they were

such as soon as they were born, or that they were such before they became moral

agents, or that they became such in virtue of their connection with Adam --

whatever may be the truth on these points; but it affirms that before they were

renewed, they were the children of wrath.  So far as this text is concerned,

this might have been true at their very birth, but it does not directly and

certainly prove that.  It proves that at no time before their conversion were

they the children of God, but that their whole condition before that was one of

exposure to wrath.  Compare Romans 2:14,27; 1 Corinthians 11:14; Galatians 2:15.

Some men are born Jews, and some heathen; some free, and some slaves; some

white, and some black; some are born to poverty, and some to wealth; some are

the children of kings, and some of beggars; but, whatever their rank or

condition, they are born exposed to wrath, or in a situation that would render

them liable to wrath.  But why this is the apostle does not say. Whether for

their own sins, or for the sins of another; whether by a corrupted soul, or by

imputed guilt; whether they act as moral agents as soon as born, or at a certain

period of childhood, Paul does not say.  The children of wrath, exposed to

wrath, or liable to wrath.  They did not by nature inherit holiness; they

inherited that which would subject them to wrath.

`The meaning has been well expressed by Doddridge, who refers it "to the

original apostasy and corruption, in consequence of which men do, according to

the course of nature, fall early into personal guilt, and so become obnoxious to

the Divine displeasure".  Many modern expositors have supposed that this has no

reference to any original tendency of our fallen nature to sin, or to native