Ephesians 4:22

22. That Depending on have been taught, in Ephesians 4:21. The verb is, indeed, in the infinitive, and the connexion would have been better preserved had the infinitive been retained. Having pictured the depravities of old Gentilism, 11-19, Paul contrastively adds: But not such the lessons you have received from Christ, if ye have indeed learned, as truth is embodied in him, to put off the old man of Gentile depravation, and put on the new man after God’s image.

Concerning… conversation In regard to your former mode of moral behaviour.

Old man Inherited from Adam, and manifested pre-eminently in Gentilism. Not merely, as Ellicott, the “personification of our whole sinful condition before regeneration;” but the personification of all our sinward tendencies derived from the fall and progressively put off by our regeneration, sanctification, and final resurrection. The term regeneration, used ordinarily and properly to designate an instantaneous act by which we are made “children of God,” does in its larger sense comprehend the entire process by which we are brought from our deepest ruin in sin to our complete final renewal in glory. This last process passes through a series of stages and progressions. In that sense our regeneration is a gradual work. Notes on 23, 24.

Is corrupt Is being ever corrupted, sinking from inborn sinwardness to an ever deeper and deeper progression in corruption a corruption implying ultimate utter perdition. And this becoming more and more corrupt is according to, that is, in compliance and accord with, the impulses of deceit, τας επιθυμιας της απατης , very incorrectly translated deceitful lusts. The word we render impulses designates, in Greek, any appetance or eagerness, either for good or evil, and usually has no special reference to sexual lust. The word translated deceitful is a genitive noun: of deceit. The entire phrase, then, designates the eager promptings of a natural deceitfulness within. It corresponds with gain-greed, in Ephesians 4:19, and the lying they must put away in Ephesians 4:25; and is antithetic with truth in Ephesians 4:21; Ephesians 4:25.