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The parallelism of these verses is worth noticing:--
A | Eph. 1: 21-23. Principalities, authorities, powers, lordships.--
Christ, Head of the body the church. Fulness.
B | Eph. 3: 10. Principalities, authorities.--The church linked with the principalities.
C | Eph. 6: 12. Principalities, authorities, world rulers,
spiritual things of wickedness.--The believers' conflict.
A | Col. 1: 16. . Principalities, authorities, thrones, lordships.--
Christ, Head of the body the church. Fulness.
B | Col. 2: 10. Principalities, authorities.--The church linked with the principalities.
C | Col. 2: 15. Principalities, authorities.--The Saviour's triumph.
As we read these passages together it seems difficult to think that the different
references are all to the same spiritual powers. Some we find are placed beneath the
Lord's feet (Eph. 1: 22), and this position is not the place of the members of His body--
to them He is Head. These same subjected powers (being guided by the parallel in
I Cor. 15: and the emphasis there on enemies) seem to be the antagonizing spirits of
Eph. 6: 12, and the ones over whom the Lord triumphed by reason of the cross. Others
seem to be more closely associated with the church. Some are learning by the church the
manifold wisdom of God (Eph. 3: 10), and are linked with the church of the one body by
having Christ as a common Head (Col. 2: 10). The believer has been delivered from the
authority (exousia) of darkness by the Lord who is the image of the invisible God,
First-born of every creature. The meaning of the term "First-born" is defined by the
reason given in the next sentence. He is First-born of every creature because by Him
were the all things created. As we ponder the creations enumerated in verse 16, and their
relation to the pre-eminence of the Son of God, it becomes manifest that we are not
dealing with such creatures as are enumerated in Psalm 8::--
"All sheep and oxen, yea, and the beasts of the field, the fowl of the are, and the fish
of the sea, and whatsoever passeth through the paths of the sea,"
but with mighty powers and beings over whom the Lord Jesus Christ is pre-eminent. The
whole enumeration has reference to visible and invisible dominions and spiritual powers,
and by comparison with the other passages referring to the principalities it would seem
that some of these mighty beings not only antagonized the church (Eph. 6: 12), and Israel
(Dan. 10:), but also the pre-eminence of the Lord Jesus Christ Himself, and it is the
reconciliation of these "all things" with which Col. 1: is particularly concerned.
Chapter 2: also shows that the opposition of these angelic powers in reference to "holding
the Head" is still prominent in the inspired writer's mind.
It will be further observed that man is not mentioned in verse 16, nor is he included in
the all things enumerated in the verse; he is treated quite separately in verse 18, as
included in the church. The reconciliation of the all things (ta panta) looks back to those
spiritual powers on earth, or in heaven, and man is introduced into the subject of
reconciliation quite separately in verse 21. I Pet. 3: 22 emphasizes the subjection of
angelic and spiritual powers to the risen Lord:--