For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come,
For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, х oute (G3777) dunameis (G1411)]. This last clause ("nor powers") - if we are to be guided by external authorities alone-ought certainly to stand, not here, but at the close of the verse, which will then read thus: "nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers" [Thus read 'Aleph (') A B C D E F G, six cursives, four copies of the Old Latin, and the Vulgate (not the Clementine edition). So Lachmann, Tischendorf, and Tregelles; also most recent critics, while the received order is supported only by K L, most cursives, the Syriac, and some later versions, with (apparently) most of the Greek fathers.] But who can bring himself to believe that the apostle so wrote-that one of the harshest and baldest collocations of the conceivable enemies of believers was placed there by one who has here drawn up a catalogue otherwise perfect? How to account for this arrangement having found its way into so many manuscripts may be very difficult to say; but in the meantime we must hold the received order of the clauses as that of the apostle himself.
Nor things present, nor things to come - no condition of the present life, and none of the unknown possibilities of the life to come;