In these two verses the writer lists several Christian virtues which should characterize his readers’ conduct; all of these have to do with behavior within the Christian fellowship. First he lists three nouns, “humility, gentleness, patience,” which are the last three nouns in the list of Colossians 3.12.
Humble describes the attitude of the person who recognizes that all are of equal value in God’s sight (see especially Phil 2.3), which makes it impossible for a Christian to be arrogant in his relation with a fellow Christian. In some languages this is best represented by a negative expression such as “do not ever be proud” or “do not think that you are somebody big.”
Gentle (Revised Standard Version “meekness”) is closely allied to the previous virtue and is a consequence of it (see Gal 6.1; 2 Tim 2.25). It may be translated as “treat others in a gentle way.” But a negative expression may be more effective, such as “do not be hard on people.”
Patient is the quality of forbearance and tolerance, and it is regularly listed as one of the prime Christian virtues (2 Cor 6.6; Gal 5.22; Col 3.12; 2 Tim 3.10; 4.2). It may be expressed as “be willing to wait.” In some languages, however, the concept of patience is expressed in a negative fashion and frequently in an idiomatic way, such as, “do not always be jumping up” or “do not always imagine that the time is already past.”
The next quality, being tolerant, is expressed by the participle of a Greek verb meaning “endure, put up with.” Colossians 3.13 uses the same language (Good News Translation being tolerant with one another, and see the verb also in 2 Cor 11.19). “In love” (Revised Standard Version) gives the means or the basis for this Christian tolerance.
Show your love by being tolerant with one another may be expressed as “show how much you love one another by receiving them as they are” or even “… without trying to make them like yourself.”
Verse 3 is one injunction, governed by the Greek participle “making an earnest effort, doing your best to, endeavoring”; the verb has an element of urgency (see Barclay “Be eager”), of haste, of a sense of crisis. Do your best may be expressed as “do whatever you can” or “do with all your strength” or “use all your strength to….”
The object of the participle is “to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.” The genitive phrase “the unity of the Spirit” is the unity which the Spirit gives (Good News Translation, New English Bible; see Translator’s New Testament “The Spirit has made you one”). The Greek noun for “unity” (from the word “one”) is used also in 4.13. To preserve the unity may be expressed as “to continue to be like one” or “to continue to be joined together with others.”
It seems fairly certain that “spirit” here is not the human spirit but God’s Spirit. The phrase which the Spirit gives must sometimes be rendered as “which the Spirit of God makes possible” or “… makes to happen.” A literal rendering of gives may be misleading since there is no actual gift which is being handed out.
The following prepositional phrase “in the bond of peace” qualifies either “the unity given by God’s Spirit” or else the injunction “Do your best to preserve.” Good News Translation, Barclay take it in the former sense; the peace that binds you together is the way in which the Spirit gives unity to the church, and peace is seen as a gift of the Spirit. But most translations take it to qualify the verb: “Do your best to preserve … by maintaining the peace which binds you together” (so New English Bible, Translator’s New Testament, and others). Die Bibel im heutigen Deutsch makes another injunction out of this: “The peace which comes from God must bind you together.” It does not seem likely that the Greek allows this interpretation.
It may be necessary to employ a new sentence in translating by means of the peace that binds you together, for example, “God’s Spirit does this by giving you the peace which binds you together” or “… which brings you together as one.” It is also possible to translate the final part of verse 3 as “God causes you to have this peace that makes you one” or “… to be at peace and this ties you together as one.”
The Greek word for “bond” (from a verb meaning “to tie together”; see Heb 13.3) is used in Colossians 3.14, where love is called the bond of perfection. In the genitive phrase “the bond of peace,” peace is the bond (genitive of apposition).
In many languages, if the translation follows the order of the ideas of this verse as they are in the Revised Standard Version or Good News Translation, the result is a somewhat awkward sentence. If one follows the interpretation of Good News Translation and Barclay, the ideas are: (1) You are united; (2) you should do your best to preserve the unity; (3) the Spirit of God gives you this unity; (4) the Spirit gives you this by means of peace that binds you together. A way to handle these ideas in many languages is to start with the main verb, so that the translation goes something like this: “The Spirit of God gives you peace that binds you together, and you should do your best to preserve this unity.” One translation has said, “Use the links of peace to guard the unity that the Holy Spirit gives.”
Some translators prefer the interpretation of New English Bible, Bible de Jérusalem, Jerusalem Bible, and others, so that sentence 4 is “The way you preserve that unity is by maintaining the peace that holds you together.” For these translators the translation might be something like this: “God’s Spirit has given you unity, and you should work to preserve it by maintaining the peace that binds you together.”
Quoted with permission from Bratcher, Robert C. and Nida, Eugene A. A Handbook on Paul’s Letter to the Ephesians. (UBS Handbook Series). New York: UBS, 1982. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .