Verse 4
4. Carnal Such as are used in secular and bodily wars. They are neither wood, nor iron, nor brass; neither shield, nor sword, nor spear.
But mighty Let not the opposer triumph because these weapons are of no human armory. They are mighty; mighty enough to vanquish the mightiest material forces.
Through God More exactly, to God. Material arms are mighty to man; these dim weapons are mighty to God. God knows how mighty they are, for they are God’s own weapons.
Pulling down One implement of ancient war was called the crow, (see next page,) and its use was to pull down the walls of an assaulted city. But the weapons of divine truth are often mightier than the crow pulling down false philosophies, false religions, great systems, and great empires.
Strongholds Military positions with massive walls, and, perhaps, inaccessible, by nature, to the assailant. Cilicia, the hilly province of the apostle’s birth, had been the locality of powerful tribes of pirates, who, entrenching themselves in the mountain fastnesses, were able, for a while, to defy the power of Roman arms. Cicero, the Roman orator, led an army against them with some success, and was honoured on his return to Rome with a triumph. The pirates were finally destroyed by Pompey a generation before St. Paul was born, but he was, doubtless, familiar with not only the story of the war, but with its traditional localities and strongholds.
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