Let us assume that this very reasonable and attractive conjecture is correct, and that St. Paul is here quoting from some well-known form of words. Then the "Who" with which the quotation begins will refer to something in the preceding lines which are not quoted. How natural, then, that St. Paul should leave the "Who" unchanged, although it does not fit on grammatically to his own sentence. But in any case there is no doubt as to the antecedent of the "Who." "The mystery of godliness" has for its centre and basis the life of a Divine Person; and the great crisis in the long process by which the mystery was revealed was reached when this Divine Person "was manifested in the flesh." That in making this statement or quotation the Apostle has in his mind the Gnostics who "teach a different doctrine" (i. 3), is quite possible, but is by no means certain. The "manifestation" of Christ in the flesh is a favourite topic with him, as with St. John, and is one of the points in which the two Apostles not only teach the same doctrine, but teach it in the same language. The fact that he had used the word "mystery" would be quite enough to make him speak of "manifestation," even if there had been no false teachers who denied or explained away the fact of the Incarnation of the Divine Son. The two words fit into one another exactly. "Mystery," in Christian theology, implies something which once was concealed but has now been made known; "manifest" implies making known what had once been concealed. _An historical appearance of One Who had previously existed, but had been kept from_ _the knowledge of the world_, is what is meant by, "Who was manifested in the flesh." "Justified in the spirit." Spirit here cannot mean the Holy Spirit, as the A.V. would lead us to suppose. "In spirit" in this clause is in obvious contrast to "in flesh" in the previous clause. And if "flesh" means the material part of Christ's nature, "spirit" means the immaterial part of His nature, and the higher portion of it. His flesh was the sphere of His manifestation: His spirit was the sphere of His justification. Thus much seems to be clear. But what are we to understand by His justification? And how did it take place in His spirit? These are questions to which a great variety of answers have been given; and it would be rash to assert of any one of them that it is so satisfactory as to be conclusive.