PURPOSE
PURPOSE
There is no unanimity in understanding the letter’s aim. Clearly it is meant to give instruction to the readers, but the instruction is not given in the way with which we are familiar from the Pauline writings generally. Most of Paul’s letters are occasional, written for a specific purpose on a specific occasion, but it is not easy to see any particular occasion that called forth this letter. 20 Indeed, some question whether it should be called a letter at all. 21 N. A. Dahl rejects such views: "It belongs to a type of Greek letters—genuine and spurious—which substitute for a public speech rather than for private conversation.” 22
But what is the occasion of this public speech? Some point to a possible tension between Jewish and Gentile Christians and think Paul is trying to secure unity. Another suggestion is that the letter is meant to instruct Gentile converts in important aspects of their new faith. Some who date the writing later than Paul propose that it was written to further the ecclesiastical interests of early catholicism. Others have suggested that it is an attempt to set out some of the greatest truths for which the early Christians stood. Faced with such diversity, some scholars give up altogether the attempt to find "one” aim and think there are several purposes behind the letter.
All this means that there is a solemnity about the letter and an absence of specifics that show it is devoted to a general articulation of what is profitable for believers. We must not specify a concrete situation or a concrete problem and say that the letter is addressed exclusively to this. By contrast, we may discern a heresy that is being countered by the epistle to the Colossians, but there is no specific false teaching against which Ephesians is aimed. We can say that it is an important statement of Christian truth that may well have been greatly needed in more than one first-century situation.