Bible Commentaries
2 Timothy 3

Verse 1

Chapter III

Ver. 1. This know, ( It is scarcely worth while to advert to the plural reading of A, F, γινω ́ σκετε, strangely preferred by Lachmann and Huther; for γι ́ νωσκε has the support of א , C, D, K, L, Vulg., Syr., and Coptic versions.) however, that in the last days grievous times shall set in. The introduction of the mournful topic discussed in this section of the epistle is made with a but, or a however, because forming a sort of contrast to the hopeful issue indicated at the close of the preceding chapter respecting the opponents there referred to. Timothy, and those following him in the administration of the affairs of the church, are warned against entertaining too sanguine expectations admonished to bear in mind that, however they may succeed with particular persons in repressing incipient disorders, and winning men back to sobriety of mind, there was to be a great development of evil in the approaching future, not only of the outlying world, but also of the Christian church. This gloomy prospect is associated with the last days ( ἐν ἐσχάταις ἡμέραις ; without the article, because the expression itself is sufficiently individualizing as to the time meant; Winer, Gr. § 19). But while in one sense this term is specific enough, in another it is attended with a considerable amount of vagueness. In prophecy it was often used for the far distant future, especially as connected with Messianic times (see the Sept., for example, at Numbers 24:14; Isaiah 2:2, Isaiah 9:1; Jeremiah 23:20; Daniel 2:28, Daniel 10:14, etc.). And about the gospel age, it would appear that the expression, with some slight variations such as John’s ἐσχάτη ὥρα (1 John 2:18) had become appropriated generally to the period or dispensation of Messiah. So, in Hebrews 1:1 and 1 Peter 1:23, this whole period is distinguished from the times of the fathers and the prophets which preceded, by being designated “the last days,” or “the last of the days;” and we learn from other sources that the Jews of later times familiarly used the same mode of speech (Schöttgen, Hor. Heb., on this passage). It does not appear that in this respect they were wont to distinguish between the “latter” days and the “last” days (see at 1 Timothy 4:1). And it is somewhat doubtful how far the apostles attempted to go beyond their countrymen in any more discriminating use of such expressions. They were discouraged by our Lord from expecting to get definite revelations of the times and the seasons pertaining to the future of His kingdom (Acts 1:6); and while they throw out, from time to time, prophetic intimations of events, both of an adverse and a prosperous kind, which should mark its progress, they leave us much in the dark as to either the absolute or the relative times of their occurrence. In particular, the deplorable manifestation of corruption and godlessness which here, for example, and at 2 Peter 3:3, also in 1 John 2:18, and 2 Thessalonians 2:1-12, is coupled with the last days, appears from the descriptions to deepen as those days proceed, and to reach, one is apt to think, a culmination not far from their close in the second advent; while yet the evil is represented as either actually begun in the apostolic age, or just on the eve of beginning to develope itself The grievous times or seasons ( χαλεποί , grievous in a moral respect; difficult, hence perilous) which the apostle in this passage associates with the last days, are at the same time said to be pressing on ἐνστήσονται , aderunt (Bengel), they will immediately be present, are even now close at hand so that all should be on the outlook for them. Indeed, consisting as they do in spiritual defections from the life of the gospel, and consequent moral depravations, they are never wholly wanting in any age of the church, though at certain periods and in particular localities they become more rife and rampant than in others. “I think,” says Theodoret, “that it was our time which is here predicted. For our life is full of these evils; and while we bear about us an aspect of piety, it is the image of wickedness which we produce by our works.” So, many have in substance said, of their particular time, both before and since; so, doubtless, they will say in the future; and what is written of the evil in the epistolary or apocalyptic portions of New Testament Scripture, is but an expansion of the prophetic glimpses given by our Lord in some of His parables (such as the Wheat and Tares, the Wise and Foolish Virgins), and in His discourse on the last times, which speaks of false teachers and prophets, delusions, iniquity abounding, and the love of many waxing cold (Matthew 24:0). It was not that Christianity was in any measure to produce the corruptions and disorders that were in prospect, but simply that they should exist in spite of the divine grace and reformatory agencies it was bringing into play, and to some extent also should take advantage of its hallowed name under which to cloak, or more effectually prosecute, the work of evil.

Verse 2

Ver. 2. For men ( οἱ ἄνθρωποι , men, not universally indeed, yet, as the article seems to indicate, in large numbers) shall be selfish ( φίλαυτοι , self-lovers, each seeking his own, comparatively regardless of another’s good), covetous, boastful, haughty ( ὑπερήφανοι , carrying themselves with a lofty and supercilious air), slanderers ( βλάσφημοι , offensively speaking evil of others, vilifying them), disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy.

Verse 3

Ver. 3. Without natural affection ( ἄστοργοι , wanting the instinctive sense of endearment which links together parents and children, στοργή ), implacable ( ἄσπονδοι , not truce-breakers, as in the Authorized Version, but such as would not enter into a truce; sine pace, as the Vulgate, or as Luther, unversöhnlich, not to be appeased see Lexicons), false accusers, incontinent ( ἀκρατεῖς , without moral power or self-control, unbridled), fierce, haters of good ( ἀφιλάγαθοι , the opposite of the φιλάγαθον commended and required in Titus 1:8).

Verse 4

Ver. 4. Betrayers, headlong ( προπετεῖς , ready to precipitate matters by hasty speech or action), carried truth conceit (see at 1 Timothy 3:6), lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God ( φιλήδονοι , φιλόθεοι , both ἅπαξ λεγόμ ., but quite natural compounds, and found in Philo; see Wetstein).

Verse 5

Ver. 5. Having a form ( μόρφωσιν , an outward show or appearance) of godliness, but denying the power thereof that is, by their immoral lives and wicked deeds belying their profession practically disowning that godliness was an actual power in their experience.

It is a dreadful picture, and from the very darkness of the characteristics it delineates, plainly requires to be understood with some limitations. If such characteristics were to become general in any particular age or country, society could not long continue to exist; it would fall to pieces by the weight of its own corruptions. We must therefore suppose the apostle to mean, that in the coming future there would be ever and anon persons appearing with those vicious qualities more or less characterizing their behaviour not that all of them should meet in the same individuals, and still less that any entire community should be pervaded by them. But in proportion as the spirit of selfishness should at any time prevail, the others might be expected in a corresponding ratio to follow. That spirit fitly stands at the head of this black catalogue of moral evils, being in a manner the root-quality out of which the rest will, as circumstances admit, inevitably spring, and being that also, which more almost than any other bespeaks the disregard of Christian verities, and the absence of their influence on the heart. And if, from being simply a negation, there should come to any extent to prevail an antagonism to the fundamental truths and love-inspiring influences of the gospel, one can easily understand how the barriers which restrain the selfish spirit, and oblige it to maintain a certain moderation and formal decency, would one after another give way, and a fierce, unscrupulous, reckless opposition to whatever is pure, lovely, and of good report, rise to the ascendant. In such a case the reigning spirit of the time would necessarily be, if not avowed, at least virtual atheism; and the atheist, as has been justly said, “holds all mankind in contempt, and would be ready with a jest to blot out life from the world. Let but the day come, when it shall be fearlessly and commonly professed that death is annihilation, and that therefore the pleasures of appetite, graced by intelligence, are the best portion of man, and this horrible opinion shall quickly become parent to a giant cruelty, loftier in stature, and more malign, than any the earth has hitherto beheld. Even the most sanguinary superstitions have had some profession of sanctity and of mercy to maintain; a reserve, a saving hypocrisy, a balance of sentiments, which has set bounds to their demands of blood. But atheism is a simple element: it has no restraining motive, and must act, like itself, with a dreadful ingenuousness.” (Isaac Taylor’s Saturday Evening, chap. xiii.) The nearest approach to this on a large scale which the world has seen since the diffusion of Christianity, was the state of France at the close of the last and the beginning of the present century. But the disturbing elements which brought on that terrible state of things, there can be no doubt, are again actively at work in many parts of Christendom; and it can scarcely be said to be beyond the bounds of probability that “the last days” of the present dispensation are destined to witness, in certain quarters, a realization of the prophetic picture before us more appalling than has yet been exhibited in the history of the past.

And from these turn away. Such an exhortation clearly implies that the state of moral pravity described was not regarded by the apostle as belonging entirely to the future; that persons were even then to be found in whom its features partially at least appeared; and consequently, that what was said at the outset of “the last days” as inclusive generally of Christian times, holds also here.

Verses 6-7

Vers. 6, 7. The apostle now not only presupposes the existence of parties to whom his description in a measure applied, but also points to a specific line of operations carried on by them. For of these are they who creep into houses, and take captive silly women, laden with sins, led away by diverse lusts. A sly and cunning mode of procedure is indicated, as of persons in a low moral condition, watching their opportunities, and ready to take advantage of the infirmities and troubles of others to compass their own selfish ends. They creep into houses: ἐνδύνοντες , not necessarily more than entering into, but here, as also sometimes in classical writers, with the collateral idea of doing so by secret, stealthy movements; so that, as Chrysostom states, “something dishonourable is implied deceit, cozening.” Their object in this is said to get thoroughly under their power ( αἰχμαλωτίζοντες , a word said to be of Macedonian origin, meaning literally, to take captive Luke 21:24; figuratively, to get dominion over, or bring under one’s control Romans 7:23; 2 Corinthians 10:5) γυναικάρια (a diminutive, ἅπαξ λεγόμ ., expressive of contempt), little, or silly women. And these are further described as laden ( σεσωρευμένα , heaped up, hence laden) with sins, led away, or borne along ( ἀγόμενα ), by various kinds of lusts: in 2 Timothy 3:7 further characterized as ever learning, and never able to come to the full knowledge ( ἐπίγνωσιν , knowledge in the true and proper sense) of the truth.

It is not quite easy to get a perfectly satisfactory view of the sort of women here referred to, or why the designing and corrupt characters spoken of should have especially sought to win their confidence. It may naturally be supposed that they were possessed of wealth, though of small worth as to personal qualities, and that it was this the intriguers were mainly intent on acquiring. Such, probably, was the case, but it can only be matter of inference: the fact is not directly stated. Reference has been made to the well-known circumstance that the Gnostic leaders sought to lay hold of females, used them as instruments for the propagation of their false doctrines, and not unfrequently carried on with them, under high-sounding pretensions, the most licentious practices. Irenaeus ( Haer. i. 13), Epiphanius ( Haer. xxvi. 12), and others, have given special notices of these; and Baur finds, in the supposed allusion here to those wily and corrupt proceedings of the second century heresiarchs, a proof of the sub-apostolic origin of this epistle ( Pastoralbr. p. 36). But the character of the women as described here is not such as we are given to understand were chiefly sought after by the Gnostic leaders.: these were, as might be expected from the Gnostic pretensions, and as Irenaeus expressly tells us, “the well-bred, elegantly attired, and very wealthy; “and it was rather (if we except the fables of a later age about Simon and Nicolaus) the fascinating and corrupting influence which the Gnostic teachers contrived to exert over women hitherto reputed honourable and good, that the accounts in question complain of, than their intercourse with women of loose character, carried away by sinful lusts. But it is of such the apostle speaks women, not sinners merely, but laden with sins (which we have no right to interpret, with De Wette, whom Alford follows, burdened in their consciences with a sense of sins, labouring under convictions of guilt; for such were not the indications of silliness in the early church, nor was it customary then any more than now to represent people as laden with sins in any other than an objective sense). And, finally, it is not said by the apostle that the persons who acted this treacherous and ensnaring part to the women in question were teachers: they were adversaries and opponents of the gospel, because agents of deceit and corruption, while it was all intent on the interests of truth and purity; but nothing more is known of them, and the allusion that follows to the Egyptian magicians, and a little after to others of a like description now (2 Timothy 3:12), rather leads us to suppose that they were of the class generally called sorcerers or magicians the class to which Simon the Samaritan, Elymas, and the sons of Sceva belonged (Acts 8:0, Acts 13:0, Acts 19:0) men of bloated consciences and reprobate minds, who, for merely selfish ends, played upon the weakness and credulity of mankind, and pre-eminently upon certain portions of the female section of them. We have undoubted evidence of persons of that description abounding in apostolic times about Ephesus and its neighbourhood; and from what is known of them, nothing seems more likely than that they should have presented themselves to the apostle as the prototypes of the most worthless and depraved characters of the latter days.

Taking this view of the deceivers, we can scarcely hesitate where to find the deceived. They were, as the words of the apostle naturally import, the loose, the frivolous, worldly-minded ladies, who lived for the most part in fulness and pleasure, but, as frequently happens with such persons, were visited at times with recoils of feeling, guilty compunctions, fears of a judgment to come; and yet, when casting about for relief, and desirous of learning what might be for their good, continued still too light-hearted and unstable to embrace a life that aims at conformity to the example of Christ; hence they were peculiarly in danger of being caught by the arts of those who pretended, by some heaven-taught secret, to charm away from their disciples the powers of evil. It is precisely among such that impostors of that stamp have ever found their readiest dupes and their richest harvest.

Verse 8

Ver. 8. Now in the same manner ( ὃν τρόπον δὲ ) that Jannes and Jambres withstood Moses, so do these also withstand the truth. The reference to these ancient magicians shows, as already stated, the class of corrupt opponents more immediately in the eye of the apostle. It appears that a very old tradition among the Jews had handed down the two names here mentioned as those of the leading magicians who endeavoured to rival the miracles of Moses, and foil him in his mission. The names appear in the Chaldee paraphrast, at Exodus 1:15, very nearly the same as here Janis and Jimbres; and again as Janis and Jambres at Exodus 7:11. Other modes of spelling the names in the Rabbinical writings (such as Jonos and Jombros, Janos and Jambrinos), with various, evidently fabulous, accounts respecting them, are given by Schöttgen on this passage; also by Wetstein. It is needless to go into these tales, which apparently belong to different periods, and are not always consistent with each other. But there is no reason to doubt the correctness of the tradition as to the names and the persons they represented, there being no conceivable temptation in such a case to depart from the truth, and a very great probability that the truth so far should have found some place in Jewish memorials of the past. As regards the substance of the historical allusion, nothing depends on the specific names; for the action ascribed here to Jannes and Jambres is the same that in the narrative of Exodus is associated with the magicians generally; nor can it be doubted that a body so peculiar in the powers they professed to exercise, and so influential in their position, would have their recognised heads and leaders, by whatever names they might be called. In proud reliance on their thaumaturgical skill, and doubtless supposing that Moses and Aaron were only members of a similar craft with their own, they withstood the claim to a divine commission and a strictly supernatural power which was put forth by those men of God, entered with them into a competitive trial, and so completely failed in the attempt that they were obliged to own themselves vanquished. Such, too, the apostle affirms, would be the issue of the trial which was then proceeding between the ministers of the gospel and the adversaries not false teachers, properly so called, but deceitful workers, the professors of secret lore and magical art. The conflict now, as of old, was essentially one between God’s truth on the one side, and the devil’s lie on the other; between the one grand remedy of Heaven for the ills of humanity, and the wretched devices of self-seeking, fraudulent men, men, it is added by the apostle, corrupted in their mind, reprobate (or worthless) concerning the faith. Such was generally the condition of the class of persons who assumed the delusive pretensions referred to, and plied the infamous traffic connected with them. From the very nature of things, their consciences must have been entirely sophisticated, and a moral state induced strongly repellent to the faith of the gospel.

Verse 9

Ver. 9. But (such is the conclusion of the matter) they shall not make progress ( οὐ προκόψουσιν ἐπὶ πλεῖον , lit. shall not advance to more, or rise to a stronger position); for their folly shall become manifest to all, as THEIRS also came to be. The triumph of truth over error, of reality over presumption, should now, as of old, become apparent. An opposition has been thought to exist between this passage and 2 Timothy 2:16, where it is said of the teachers of profane and vain babblings, that they would advance to more of ungodliness. But the cases are really very different, for the persons spoken of here were not of the same class as the others; and having become already thoroughly corrupt and reprobate, an advance in this direction was impossible. The advance, however, which is denied respecting them has reference not to their personal state, but to the godless cause they were seeking to promote: in this they should not make progress; the course of events would expose their folly, and leave them, like the old wonder-workers of Egypt, exposed to obloquy and shame.

Verse 10

Ver. 10. Thou, however, hast closely followed ( The received text has παρηκολουθηκα ́ ς, the perfect, with D, E, K, L, the great majority of cursives, Chrys., Theod., Damas.; but א , A, C read παρηκολούθησάς; also F, G, the simple verb ἠκολου ́ θησας. Tischendorf now adopts the second, as do also Alford, El licott, Huther, chiefly on internal grounds, which are referred to in the text.) my instruction, my manner of life, my purpose, my faith, my long-suffering, my love, my patience, etc. In contrast to the selfish and crafty proceedings of the parties just referred to, the apostle now reminds Timothy of the very different line of conduct he had been made familiar with in the apostle’s own case what proofs it had afforded of sincere devotion to the truth, self-denial, and all the higher graces of a pure and earnest life. Thou hast closely followed my course, says Paul, in all this, hast gone along with me therein as a sympathizing and approving disciple (see at 1 Timothy 4:6). The aorist, or indefinite past, is thought by some preferable to the perfect here: not that the reading, as stated in the note, is the better supported, but that it affords a fitter sense, conveying, as it would do, a kind of latent admonition to Timothy to take heed that it was as well with him now in this respect as it was in the past; or, as Alford more strongly puts it, the aorist bears something of reproach with it, virtually implying that Timothy was not the man now he had formerly been. In an earlier part of this epistle the same meaning was extracted from certain things said by the apostle, but without any just grounds, as we endeavoured to show; see at 2 Timothy 1:3-7. If the aorist were ascertained to be the correct reading, it would still convey no such reproach; it would only indicate that for some reason the apostle thought fit to refer specially to the earlier trials he had undergone, and the spirit he had manifested under them, rather than to those of a later period. Some explanation has been given of it by Paley and others, when tracing the coincidences between this epistle and the narrative in the related chapters of the Acts (Acts 13:14, Acts 13:16); the old scenes of persecution and trial which took place at and around Timothy’s earthly home naturally presenting themselves afresh here, and this in the very order in which they occurred: 2 Timothy 3:11. My persecutions, my sufferings, such as befell me in Antioch, in Iconium, in Lystra; such persecutions as I endured: and out of them all the Lord delivered me. “We have thus the strongest reasons for believing that Timothy was a witness of St. Paul’s injurious treatment; and this, too, at a time of life when the mind receives its deepest impressions from the spectacle of innocent suffering and undaunted courage. And it is far from impossible that the generous and warm-hearted youth was standing in the group of disciples who surrounded the apparently lifeless body of the apostle at the outside of the walls of Lystra” (Howson). We can thus sufficiently account for the peculiar stress laid by the apostle here on matters connected with his first and second mission tour in Asia Minor, and for the reference being couched in the indefinite past, if so be that the aorist is the correct reading. But the other, the perfect, appears to me fully as natural (though the aorist has been retained in the text), because the reference of the apostle is not by any means exclusively to his remote experiences at Antioch, Iconium, and Lystra, but rather to the spirit, temper, and behaviour exhibited by him during the whole of Timothy’s acquaintance with him, but especially so in connection with what may be called the formative period of Timothy’s Christian life and ministerial agency. Commonly as an eye-witness, always in intimate fellowship and sympathy of spirit, Timothy had made common cause with him in all; and could thus judge at how high a moral elevation he stood above the low and worthless impostors against whom he was warning yea, had himself shared in it.

The article prefixed to the several items in the apostle’s delineation of his course τῇ διδασκαλίᾳ , τῇ ἀγωγῇ , etc. individualizes them much in the same manner as our possessive pronoun, and may be said to carry forward the μου , which stands at the beginning: the teaching of me, the conduct, namely, of me = my conduct, and so on.

Verse 12

Ver. 12. Yea, and all ( καὶ πάντες δὲ , or, and all too) who are minded to live piously in Christ Jesus, shall be persecuted. The apostle had spoken of his own persecutions, how he himself bore them, and how God delivered him out of them; but he now generalizes, in a manner, his own experience: others may look for a measure of the same. None, indeed, are excepted; all who are minded ( οἱ θέλοντες , having their will set) to live piously in Christ Jesus in Him, or in union with Him, as the one true source of living godliness shall be persecuted. He does not say how or to what extent; but merely states the fact, that persecution in some form or another shall be their portion. And even this general announcement obviously presupposes as its ground, the existence in the world around of a spirit of alienation and hostility with respect to vital godliness. But that might not be always and everywhere the same; it could not but vary as Christianity itself rose to power, or the reverse; and so, as regards quantity and force, a certain conditional element necessarily enters into the statement, which may be put thus: In so far as the world retains its native character, those who are bent on leading in it lives of piety shall have to meet persecution. If through the diffusion of the gospel the old has to a considerable extent passed away, and a better order of things taken its place, then the persecution may narrow itself to taunts, reproaches, spiteful or contemptuous treatment, when at the behest of holy principle a stand is made against worldly compliances or fashionable vices. In these, however, the persecuting spirit breathes, only less coarsely and vehemently than when fire and sword are its weapons (Galatians 4:29). So that the apostolic utterance still has its application to the Christian life; and they who would prosecute this life must be ready to brave such persecution. But they should never court it; they are as much bound to avoid provoking it by indiscretions, as to bear it meekly when excited by their virtues.

Verse 13

Ver. 13. But evil men and deceivers shall grow worse and worse, deceiving, and being deceived. We have here, by way of contrast to the life and experience of such as live piously in Christ, a return to the wretched characters formerly discoursed of the modern representatives of the Egyptian magicians. For the language employed is strictly applicable only to such: evil men and γόητες we have no precise synonym for it; deceivers is too general, though we must take it for want of a better; but the word is expressive of a specific class of deceivers the class of magicians, sorcerers, thaumaturgists, or wonder-workers, as they were variously called, who by dexterous sleight of hand, mysterious incantations, and consummate hypocrisy, wrought upon the hopes and fears of the credulous. In naming these, the apostle is plainly not to be understood as introducing a new class, for they bear the very lineaments of those already described and denounced; but their course of life and its fruits are now placed over against those of the true followers of Christ. How different! Living in an element of deceit, they come to be themselves deceived; their sin becomes their snare and their punishment: so that, in so far as they are capable of progress, the progress is from bad to worse; and if their manner of life is such as to save them from persecution at the hand of others, it brings recompenses of evil far more to be dreaded, and these prepared by their own hands. The assertion of Huther, that the term γόητες in this passage is only in a kind of secondary or figurative sense applied to the parties in question, that it merely represents them as exercising a sort of magical power over their weak, especially female, followers, is without foundation. The unqualified use of such a term cannot justly be understood otherwise than as identifying them with the wily and unscrupulous professors of the magical art.

Verse 14

Ver. 14. But do thou ( σὺ δὲ emphatic, in contrast to the deceivers in the preceding verse) continue in the things which thou didst learn (lit., in what things thou didst learn), and wert assured of ἐπιστώθης not, were committed to thee, as the Latin and Gothic versions, which would have required ε ̓ πιστευ ́ θης . Hesychius, ἐπιστώθη : επληροφορήθη , persuasus est, certum et exploratum habuit. (See much more to the same effect in Suicer, in voce.) The things had not only been learned by Timothy, but learned in such a way as to give them a firm place in his belief. Knowing of whom thou didst learn them namely, of persons who were entitled to the fullest confidence, utterly incapable of practising the deceit, by which others are misled to their ruin. The reference must primarily be to his mother Lois, and his grandmother Eunice.

Verse 15

Ver. 15. And that from a very child ( ἀπὸ βρέφους , from an infant, the youngest period of childhood) thou knowest the holy Scriptures, which are able to make thee wise unto salvation. This is only a further specification and enhancement of the preceding statement, bringing out more distinctly the kind of learning Timothy had received, and from what period it dated. The expression τὰ ἱερὰ γράμματα for the divine word is peculiar, so far as the New Testament is concerned; but it occurs in Philo and Josephus (see in Wetstein), and always in the definite sense, the sacred writings, or the Holy Scriptures, namely, of the Old Testament. Here also, of course, it is Old Testament Scripture that is meant. And the things contained in them are represented as still possessed of saving virtue possessing it even for such a believer as Timothy: which are able ( δυνάμενά , the present, not the past, as the οἶδας , knowest, virtually is) to make thee wise unto salvation σοφίσαι εἰς σωτηρίαν (the verb used in this sense also, Septuagint, Psalms 19:7, Psalms 105:22); yet not now as apart from the revelation of Christ in the gospel, but through the faith which is in Christ Jesus (or, through faith that, namely, which is in Christ Jesus). When ability to such an extent is ascribed to the Old Testament Scriptures, instrumental agency is all that can be meant available means in regard to salvation when intelligently and faithfully used; which they can be now only as handmaids to the faith in Christ the end to which they all more or less pointed; not when employed as a barrier to keep men at a distance from Christ, as if they were in themselves God’s perfected revelation. It was necessary that the apostle should thus guard himself in respect to Old Testament Scripture, considering the abuse to which the unbelieving Jews were ever applying it. But having so guarded himself, he proceeds in the next two verses to give a fuller deliverance of his sentiments respecting the value and importance of sacred Scripture.

Verse 16

Ver. 16. Every scripture [ is ] given by inspiration of God, and [ is ] profitable for teaching, etc.; or, Every scripture, given by inspiration of God, [ is ] also profitable for teaching, etc. It is now admitted by all competent scholars that either of these translations is grammatically admissible; no valid objection can be urged against either from the construction. Take the one or the other, and it will be found quite easy to support it by parallel examples; so that it is from the subject, and the connection in which it stands, that our grounds of preference must be drawn. Indeed, it matters little for the interpretation which we adopt, if the subject itself be rightly determined. What precisely is meant by πᾶσα γραφὴ ? Every scripture, as it must be rendered, since there is no article after πᾶσα . Can this, as some would have it, be taken in the sense of scripture, or written production of any sort? If it could, then the nearest adjective ( θεόπνευστος ) should have to be regarded as an attributive of the subject, distinguishing between one kind of writing and another: Every writing God-inspired not writings of all sorts, but whatever writing has this origin and character is also profitable, etc. The expression, however, cannot be so taken. The usage is against it. There are as many as fifty passages in the New Testament in which γραφὴ occurs; and in every one of them, whether it has the article or not, whether, also, it is in the singular or the plural (the singular, besides here, in John 19:37, 2 Peter 1:20), the word has but one meaning: it signifies uniformly sacred Scripture, which virtually determines the meaning here. But the context conclusively fixes it; for there the subject of discourse is not writings generally, but specially the sacred writings those which Timothy had as a child been instructed in. These alone were in the eye of the apostle at the time; and so the πᾶσα γραφὴ , which follows, cannot fairly have any other sense attached to it than that of every part of the previously mentioned whole. He spoke first collectively of the Holy Scriptures; now he speaks individually of the component writings. So Chrysostom: “ All, of what sort? That of which, says he, I said all holy; of which he was just declaring that from a mere child thou hast known the Holy Scriptures.”

Holding this, then, to be the subject in hand Holy Scripture in one and all of its parts it is plainly of no moment, as regards the substantive import of the passage, whether we say. Every scripture given by inspiration of God is also profitable; or, Every scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable. For in the former the theopneustic or divinely-inspired character is made to extend to every part of the sacred volume as well as in the other. In both, indeed, there is a virtual predication of the divine element; only, according to the first, the quality is assumed under a specific attribute or title, stamped, as it were, on the formal character of the writings; while, according to the second, it is directly affirmed of them. That is really the whole amount of the difference when you limit the reference in γραφὴ to sacred Scripture alone, and make the attribute of divine inspiration associated with it co-extensive with each and all of the component parts of Scripture. For in that case the expression, Every scripture given by inspiration of God, is equivalent to, Every scripture being given by inspiration of God; which, as already said, is a predicate in the form of an assumption. Such, precisely, is the way Origen explains, who is commonly represented as denying the predicative force of the θεόπνευστος here. He says: “Let it be to us according to our faith, whereby we have trusted, that every scripture, being God-inspired ( θεόπνευστος οὖσα ), is profitable. For one alternative you must admit regarding those scriptures either that they were not God-inspired, since they are not profitable; or that, since they are profitable, they are God-inspired” ( Op. vol. ii. p. 443, ed. De Larue). Clearly, therefore, Origen attached a predicative force to the θεόπνευστος ; not less (only with a slight difference in the mode of exhibition) than Chrysostom, when, after explaining the “every scripture” here to be inclusive of all the sacred writings, he adds: “The whole of this, therefore, is divinely inspired; doubt not, then,” says he namely, as to the truly divine character of Scripture “in every part it is of God.”

Since nothing, then, as to the import of the passage depends on the mode of construing it, the only question touching the construction is, which of the two modes seems the more natural. Was it more likely that St. Paul would seek to confirm the soul of Timothy in his early-imbibed regard to Scripture, and appreciation of its value, by directly asserting the divinely-inspired character of each of its parts, and then indicating what, as possessing such a character, were the important uses which it was calculated to serve? or that, on the assumption of its divinely-inspired character, he should simply point attention to those various uses? I cannot but think (after all that Huther. Ellicott, Alford, and others have advanced on the other side) that the former was the more natural. The inspired character of particular portions of Old Testament Scripture, it is alleged, was not then called in question by those who acknowledged an inspired element in any. But are we sufficiently acquainted with all the phases of opinion then afloat, to be sure that such was the case? No one can be sure; and besides, Timothy was coming into contact with modes of thought which set light by the very heart and substance of the Old Testament revelations. Even apart from such things, might not Timothy himself not the less, one might almost say all the more, that he had been familiar with the Scriptures from his very childhood be the better for having his mind thus arrested on the higher element in their composition? Would it not serve to bind him the more closely to them, and render him disposed to apply them to the uses for which they were designed? Surely, if it was not unnecessary or out of place to press on him such simple exhortations as to remember that Jesus Christ, of the seed of David, was raised from the dead, and that St. Paul was a minister of His truth and an apostle to the Gentiles, it could not be superfluous to impress upon him a sense of the divine character of Old Testament Scripture. And then, as to the objection that on this view “the καὶ , being copulative, would seem to associate two predications, one relating to the essential character of Scripture, the other to its practical applicabilities, which appear scarcely homogeneous” (Ellicott), the simple reply is, that according to the structure of the passage, the καὶ is to be taken as καὶ consecutivum, presenting what follows as a consequence growing out of what precedes (Winer, Gr. liii. 3): Every scripture is given by inspiration of God, and hence is profitable; because it is that, then, as a matter of course, it is also this. The ancient versions, it may be added, omitted the καὶ . Thus the Vulgate: Omnis scriptura divinitus inspirata utilis est; so also the Syriac; and both Origen and his Latin translator, in the passage formerly referred to. But this probably arose from a desire merely to evade what was felt to have a measure of difficulty in it they thought it enough to give the substance.

In regard to the subject itself of the inspiration of Scripture, the field is too wide and varied for discussion here. I simply refer to my article on the subject in the Imp. Bible Dictionary, and the works noticed there. The quality expressed by θεόπνευστος is primarily and strictly applicable only to men, employed as the instruments of the Spirit in making known His will to the world, writing as they were guided, or speaking as they were moved by the Holy Ghost (2 Peter 1:21). But it is in accordance with common usage to apply the same epithet to the words or writings that came from them under such an influence: the product of divine inspiration, they might justly enough be said to be themselves inspired.

The things mentioned in connection with the profitableness of Old Testament Scripture call for no special illustration: it is profitable for instruction ( διδασκαλίαν , or teaching in the things of God), for conviction (or reproof, ἐλεγμόν ), for correction, for discipline ( παιδείαν , see at 2 Timothy 2:25, Titus 2:12) in righteousness; that is, for such a moral training as will lead those who submit to it to live in righteousness. All this, be it observed, is affirmed of the Old Testament Scriptures, even after the fuller light of the gospel had come. They have such uses still to fulfil to the church of Christ.

Verse 17

Ver. 17. Then follows the practical aim and result of this profitableness, when turned to proper account: in order that the man of God may be perfect ( ἄρτιος , aptus in officio, Bengel; every way complete), thoroughly furnished for every good work. This explains more fully what is meant by ἄρτιος denoting one who, by the study of the Scripture, and the intimate acquaintance thereby obtained with the mind and Spirit of God, is well equipped for every good work to which he may be called. The minister of God’s word should be this in a pre-eminent sense; what should be found generally in such as can be called men of God, should be found more especially in him. And we can scarcely doubt the apostle had persons of that class peculiarly in view: in an emphatic sense, they are men of God; but the expression is not to be limited to such it must be extended in a measure to all true believers in Christ (see at 1 Timothy 6:11).