Ephesians 1:18

The eyes of your understanding being enlightened, viz. by that

spirit of revelation: and so this clause explains the former. What the eye is to the body, that the understanding is to the soul. He prays for a further degree of illumination for them.

That ye may know what is the hope of his calling; either:

1. The object of hope, the thing hoped for, as Colossians 1:5; Galatians 5:5; and then the meaning is, what it is to the hope of which God hath called you by the gospel. Or:

2. The grace of hope: q.d. That ye may know how great, and sure, and well grounded that hope is, which by the gospel is wrought in you.

And what the riches of the glory; the glorious riches, or the abundant glory; riches of glory, and riches of grace, Ephesians 1:7, and riches of glory, Romans 6:23.

Of his; because he is the Father of it: he gives this glory as the Father of glory. As men give inheritances suitable to their estates, so God, as the God of glory, and Father of glory, gives a glorious inheritance.

Inheritance; heaven, called an inheritance both in respect of believers’ title to it by virtue of their adoption, being heirs of God; and in respect of the perpetuity of their enjoying it, on which account it is called an eternal inheritance, Hebrews 9:15.

In the saints; or, among the saints, those, namely, that are perfect, who alone are possessed of the inheritance, which saints on earth have only in hope.