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This is parallel with Eph. 2: Circumcision in the flesh made with hands erected a middle
wall of partition; but Christ viewed as risen from death, as the One in whom the
reconciliation found its fullest scope (2: 16), where the new creation was expressed in the
new man ("for to create in Himself"), is above and beyond all these "old things". In the
dispensation of the Mystery they have "passed away", new things have come into being.
Christ in the flesh was a minister of the circumcision; Christ in the spirit is Head over all
things in the new creation.
So it will be observed that the enmity was in His flesh, and that so long as Christ
according to the flesh was preached the enmity between Jew and Gentile remained. The
Gentile believers had been "in the flesh", and in that sphere were aliens and strangers
"without Christ". During the period covered by the Acts of the Apostles, we see the
gradual opening of the door of faith to the Gentiles.
What were these "ordinances"? Looking at the modern use of the word some have
interpreted this passage almost exclusively as of Baptism and the Lord's Supper. We
cannot see anywhere in the Scriptures that either of these ordinances stood as the "middle
wall of partition", for believers from either Jews or Gentiles were baptized and partook of
the Lord's Supper. The fact that the word here translated ordinances is the same which is
rendered decrees in Acts 16: 4 does not by any mean prove that they are one and the
same, for those decrees were delivered to the church by Paul, and the record continues,
"and so were the churches established in the faith". The epistle to the Colossians uses
very similar words to those in Ephesians, and there these ordinances are more particularly
indicated:--
"And ye are in Him filled full, who is the Head of all principality and authority, in
whom ye have also been circumcised with a circumcision not made by hand, in the
putting off of the body of flesh in the circumcision of Christ, having been buried together
with Him in baptism, wherein also ye have been raised together, through the faith of the
inworking of God, who raised Him from among the dead; and you, being dead to
trespasses and to the uncircumcision of your flesh, He hath made alive together with
Him, having freely forgiven us all trespasses, having blotted out that which was contrary
to us, and removed it out from the midst, having nailed it to His cross; having put off the
principalities and authorities, He made a public example of them, triumphing over them
by it" (Col. 2: 10-15).
The decrees or ordinances of Eph. 2: constituted a middle wall and enmity. This
wall was destroyed. The parallel reference in Col. 2: shows these decrees as being
"against us" and "contrary to us"; they were "taken out of the midst" and "nailed to His
cross"; there need be no mystery about the matter, for the passage goes on to define these
ordinances for us:--
"Let no man therefore judge you in meat, or in drink, or in respect to a feast, or new
moon, or Sabbath, which are a SHADOW of things to come, but the BODY is of Christ"
(Col. 2: 16, 17).
Heb. 10: 1 tells us that the law had the shadow of good things to come, and here all the
ordinances or decrees of the law, which so emphasized the difference between Jew and