Charles Hodge on Ephesians 4:11

V. 11. Καὶ αὐτὸς ἔδωκε, and He gave. He, the ascended Saviour, to whom all power and all resources have been given—he gave, some, apostles; and some, prophets; and some, evangelists; and some, pastors and teachers. These were among the gifts which Christ gave his church; which, though implying diversity of grace and office, were necessary to its unity as an organized whole. These offices are mentioned in the order of their importance. First the apostles the immediate messengers of Christ, the witnesses for him, of his doctrines, his miracles, and of his resurrection; infallible as teachers and absolute as rulers in virtue of the gift of inspiration and. of their commission. No man, therefore, could be an apostle unless—1. He was immediately appointed by Christ. 2. Unless he had seen him after his resurrection and had received the knowledge of the Gospel by immediate revelation. 3. Unless he was rendered infallible by the gift of inspiration. These things constituted the office and were essential to its authority. Those who without these gifts and qualifications claimed the office, are called "false apostles."

2. Prophets. A prophet is one who speaks for another, spokesman, as Aaron was the prophet of Moses. Those whom God made his organs in speaking to men were prophets, whether their communications were doctrinal, preceptive, or prophetic in the restricted sense of the term. Every one who spoke by inspiration, was a prophet. The prophets of the New Testament differed from the apostles, in that their inspiration was occasional, and therefore their authority as teachers subordinate. The nature of their office is fully taught in 1 Cor. 14, 1-40. As the gift of infallibility was essential to the apostolic office, so the gift of occasional inspiration was essential to the prophetic office. It is inconceivable that God should invest any set of men with the authority claimed and exercised by the apostles and prophets of the New Testament, requiring all men to believe their doctrines and submit to their authority, on the pain of perdition, without giving the inward gifts qualifying them for their work. This is clearly stated by Calvin in his comment on this verse; to a certain difficulty, he says, "Respondeo, quoties a Deo vocati sunt homines, dona necessarie conjuncta esse officiis; neque enim Deus, apostolos aut pastores instituendo, larvam illis duntaxat imponit; sed dotibus etiam instruit, sine quibus rite functionem sibi injunctam obire nequennt. Quisquis ergo Dei auctoritate constituitur apostolus, non inani et nudo titulo, sed mandato simul et facultate praeditus est."

And some, evangelists. There are two views of the nature of the office of the evangelists. Some regard them as vicars of the apostles—men commissioned by them for a definite purpose and clothed with special powers for the time being, analogous to the apostolic vicars of the Romanists; or to the temporary superintendents appointed after the Reformation in the Scottish church, clothed for a limited time and for a definite purpose with presbyterial powers, i. e. to a certain extent, with the powers of a presbytery, the power tc ordain, install and depose. Evangelists in this sense were temporary officers. This view of the nature of the office prevailed at the time of the Reformation.CALVIN in his comment on this verse, says: Apostolis proximi erant Evangelistae, et munus affine habebant; tantum gradu dignitatis erant dispares; ex quo genere erant Timotheus et similes. Nam quum in salutationibus illum sibi adjungit Paulus, non tamen facit in apostolatu socium, sed nomen hoc peculiariter sibi vindicat. Ergo, secundum Apostolos, istorum subsidiaria opera usus est Dominus.—And in his Institutes IV, 3, 4, he says: Per Evangelistas eos intelligo, qui quum in dignitate apostolis minores, officio tamen proximi erant, adeoque vices eorum gerebant. Quales fuerunt, Lucas, Timotheus, Titus, et reliqui similes.

According to the other view, the evangelists were itinerant preachers, οἱ περιΐοντες ἐκήρυττον, as Theodoret and other early writers describe them. They were properly missionaries sent to preach the Gospel where it had not been previously known. This is the commonly received view, in favour of which may be urged—1. The signification of the word, which in itself means nothing more than preacher of the Gospel. 2. Philip was an evangelist, but was in no sense a vicar of the apostles; and when Timothy was exhorted to do the work of an evangelist, the exhortation was simply to be a faithful preacher of the Gospel. Acts 21, 8; Eph. 4, 11; and 2 Tim. 4, 5, are the only passages in which the word occurs, and in no one of them does the connection or any other consideration demand any other meaning than the one commonly assigned to it. 3. Εὐαγγέλισθαι and διδάσκειν are both used to express the act of making known the Gospel; but when as here, the εὐαγγελιστής is distinguished fromr the διδάσκαλος, the only point of distinction implied or admissible is between one who makes known the Gospel where it had not been heard, and an instructor of those already Christians. The use of εὐαγγέλισθαι in such passages as Acts 8, 4; 14, 7; 1 Cor. 1, 17, and 2 Cor. 10, 16, serves to confirm the commonly received opinion that an evangeli1st is one who makes known the Gospel. That Timothy and Titus were in some sense apostolic vicars, i. e. men clothed with special powers for a special purpose and for a limited time, may be admitted, but this does not determine the nature of the office of an evangelist. They exercised these powers not as evangelists, but as delegates or commissioners.

And some pastors and teachers, τοὺς δὲ ποιμένας καὶ διδασκάλους. According to one interpretation we have here two distinct offices—that of pastor and that of teacher. The latter, says Calvin, "had nothing to do with discipline, nor with the administration of the sacraments, nor with admonitions or exhortations, but simply with the interpretation of Scripture." Institutes IV, 3, 4. All this is inferred from the meaning of the word teacher. There is no evidence from Scripture that there was a set of men authorized to teach but not authorized to exhort. The thing is well nigh impossible. The one function includes the other. The man who teaches duty and the grounds of it, does at the same time admonish and exhort. It was however on the ground of this unnatural interpretation that the Westminster Directory made teachers a distinct and permanent class of jure divino officers in the church. The Puritans in New England endeavoured to reduce the theory to practice, and appointed doctors as distinct from preachers. But the attempt proved to be a failure. The two functions could not be kept separate. The whole theory rested on a false interpretation of Scripture. The absence of the article before διδασκάλους proves that the apostle intended to designate the same persons as at once pastors and teachers. The former term designates them as ἐπίσκοποι, overseers, the latter as instructors. Every pastor or bishop was required to be apt to teach. This interpretation is given by Augustin and Jerome; the latter of whom says: Non enim ait: alios autem pastores et alios magistros, sed alios pastores et magistros, ut qui pastor est, esse debeat et magister. In this interpretation the modern commentators almost without exception concur. It is true the article is at times omitted between two substantives referring to different classes, where the two constitute one order—as in Mark 15, 1, μετὰ τῶν πρεσβυτέρων καὶ γραμματέων, because the elders and scribes formed one body. But in such an enumeration as that contained in this verse, τοὺς μὲν ἀποστόλους, τοὺς δὲ προφήτας, τοὺ δὲ εὐαγγελιστάς, τοὺς δὲ ποιμένας, the laws of the language require τοὺς δὲ διδασκάλους, had the apostle intended to distinguish the διδάσκαλοι from the ποιμένες. Pastors and teachers, therefore, must be taken as a two-fold designation of the same officers, who were at once the guides and instructors of the people.