Therefore if you be dead with Christ from the rudiments of the world, why, as though living in the world, are you subject to ordinances,
All Commentaries on Colossians 2:20 Go To Colossians 2
John Chrysostom
AD 407
You are not in the world, Paul says. How is it you are subject to its elements? And note how he pokes fun at them, “touch not, handle not, taste not,” as though they were cowards and keeping themselves clear of some great matters, “all which things are to perish with the using.” … So that even though they appear to be wise, let us turn away from them. For one may seem to be a religious person, and modest, and to have a contempt for the body…. They dishonor the flesh, Paul writes, depriving it and stripping it of its liberty, not allowing them to rule it with their will. But God has honored the flesh.
