Warwick

....thought seed 20

Fragrance Part 2 of 3

2 Corinthians 2: 14-17 NASB

But thanks be to God, who always leads us in triumph in Christ, and manifests through us the sweet aroma of the knowledge of Him in every place.

For we are a fragrance of Christ to God among those who are being saved and among those who are perishing; to the one an aroma from death to death, to the other an aroma from life to life And who is adequate for these things?

For we are not like many, peddling the word of God, but as from sincerity, but as from God,we speak in Christ in the sight of God.

The term in verse 14 for fragrance (osme) is used of both pleasant and unpleasant odors. In verse 15, however, Paul shifts to euedia, which refers only to agreeable smells, and further defines this odor as an aroma of Christ to God. A number of backgrounds that Paul may be drawing on have been proposed. For the Jew, Paul's language would immediately bring to mind the scent of burnt offerings, which in the Old Testament are described as a "pleasing aroma to the Lord" (for example, Lev 23:18; Num 28:2-6), while to the Gentile euedia would recall the smell of incense being burnt as a fragrant offering to the gods. (words from a commentary)

Think on these meanings for a while, it starts to place the meaning and reality of it as Paul intended:

osmē
1) a smell, odour

euōdia
1) a sweet smell, fragrance
2) a fragrant or sweet smelling thing, incense, on odour or something sweet smelling
a) an odour of acquiescence, satisfaction
b) a sweet odour, spoken of the smell of sacrifices and obligations, agreeably to the ancient notion that God smells and is pleased with the odour of sacrifices
3) metaph. a thing well pleasing to God

Both words come from the word – ozō
1) to give out an odour (either good or bad), to smell, emit a smell
a) of a decaying corpse