Bible Commentaries
Titus 1

Verse 1

The Epistle of Paul to Titus

The precise period of St. Paul’s visit to Crete for the purpose of preaching the gospel and organizing Christians, as already stated in the INTRODUCTION, is not certainly known. But from the great similarity between certain parts of this epistle and the First Epistle to Timothy, the probability is, that the visit took place some time during the later operations of the apostle in Asia Minor and Greece, and that consequently this epistle to Titus, who had been left behind to complete the work begun by the apostle, must have proceeded from his pen at no great interval from the time when he indited the first to Timothy. The Second Epistle to Timothy belongs to a period considerably later, and presents us with the last record we have of the apostle’s thoughts and experiences. In a consecutive exposition, therefore, the Epistle to Titus fitly takes precedence of the Second to Timothy.

Chapter I

Ver. 1. Paul, a servant of God, also and apostle of Jesus Christ, for the faith of God’s elect, and full knowledge of the truth that is according to godliness; 2. in hope of eternal life, which God, that cannot lie, promised before eternal times; 3. but in its own seasons manifested His ward in preaching, which was entrusted to me, according to the commandment of our Saviour God; 4. to Titus, [my] true son in respect to the common faith: Grace and peace from God our Father, and Christ Jesus our Saviour.

St. Paul’s mode of designating himself here does not exactly coincide with his form of expression in any other epistle. Elsewhere he calls himself a servant, or bondman of Christ (Romans 1:1; Galatians 1:10; Philippians 1:1; Colossians 4:12), but here only of God: a noteworthy variation, not on its own account, but as a mark of genuineness; for it is impossible to conceive what motive could have induced any imitator to depart in such a manner from the apostle’s usual phraseology. The δὲ coupling his calling as an apostle of Christ with his relation to God as a servant, cannot be taken in an adversative sense, for there is really no opposition; but it is used, as not unfrequently, “to subjoin something new, different, and distinct from what precedes, though not strictly opposed to it” (Winer, Gr. § 53, 7). The rendering of Ellicott, and further, while giving the proper shade of meaning, seems somewhat too formal, broadening more than is natural in a brief introductory description, the difference between God’s servant and Christ’s apostle. But what is to be understood by this apostolical calling being κατὰ πίστιν ἐκλεκτῶν Θεοῦ ? If one were to render, with the A.V., after the Ital., Vulg., and many modern commentators, “ according to the faith of God’s elect,” it is difficult to understand why this should have presented itself to the apostle’s mind as anyhow the measure or rule of his apostleship. It appears, indeed, so understood, to invert the proper order of things; for there can be no doubt that he received his apostleship with a view to promote or bring into exercise the faith of God’s elect, and in connection therewith the knowledge of the truth, and not inversely. The preposition, therefore, must here (with Winer, Gr. § 49, d. c, and many of the best commentators, Theodoret, ὥστε πιστῦσαι τῆς ἐκλγῆς ἀξίους , Huther, Ellicott, Alford, etc.) be taken in the sense of destination for or to as, in classical Greek, κατ ʼ ἀτιμίαν λέγω means, I speak for dishonour with a view thereto (Her. ii. 152; Thuc. 5:7, vi. 31). The apostle indicates the faith of God’s elect and the special knowledge of divine truth, on which it is grounded, as that with respect to which he had been made an apostle, and toward which, therefore, all he did in this character must be mainly directed. For the elect’s sake, he elsewhere tells us (2 Timothy 2:10), he endured all things, and for their sake too he held his commission as a divinely authorized teacher of the gospel, that God’s purpose concerning them might reach its end. As the elect, or genuine people of God, not only have a knowledge, but a special or peculiar knowledge of the truth, so the word used is ἐπίγνωσιν knowledge intensified, or in the fuller sense (see at 1 Timothy 2:4). And it is said to be κατ ʼ εὐσέβειαν knowledge that has respect to, or tends in the direction of, godliness. So that the sense of the preposition here is much the same as in the preceding clause. True Christian or saving knowledge is thus sharply distinguished from all that is of a merely speculative kind, or is without any moral aim; this throughout bears on the cultivation and exercise of holy principle. And the fact is of importance for the preachers of the gospel now, as well as for the apostle then; their preaching is not what it should be, except and in so far as it aims at the same practical result.

Verse 2

Ver. 2. In hope of eternal life ἐπ ʼ ἐλπίδι , on this as the basis. But to what did it form the basis? Was it St. Paul’s office as an apostle, or that which it ministered to namely, the faith and knowledge of God’s elect? Manifestly, this latter is the more natural reference. That faith and knowledge were doubtless great things in themselves, but they stood connected with something that might be called greater still; they rested on a background of promise and hope, which, in a manner, stretched from eternity to eternity, having God’s primeval promise for its origin, and a participation in His everlasting life for its end. What an elevated thought! And how peculiarly fitted, both to enhance the spiritual attainments which carried with them the realization of such a hope, and to exalt the ministry which was appointed to bring them, instrumentally, within the reach of men! The expression πρὸ χρόνων αἰωνίων can scarcely be rendered otherwise than before eternal times, though being connected with a promise, not with a purpose simply or decree, of God, it must be understood of eternity in the looser sense; that is, of a period indefinitely remote before the ordinary historical epochs of the world. So Calvin, substantially, and in this expressly differing from Augustine and Jerome, who would carry the matter up beyond all temporal epochs, and lose themselves in the thought of ages strictly eternal. “Here, however (says Calvin), because the discourse is of a promise, it does not comprise all ages, so as to lead us beyond the creation of the world; but it teaches that many ages had elapsed from the time that the promise of salvation was given.” Or, as he again puts it, that the promise “in the long order of ages is very ancient, because it began presently after the foundation of the world.” In short, it might be said to date from beyond the ages, which to man’s view seem to stretch into a kind of interminable past. The characteristic of God as in His nature the antithesis of all that is false or deceptive ἀψευδὴς incapable of lying, is designed to inspire confidence in the word of promise: though given so long beforehand, it is fresh and living still, having its root in the unchangeable, ever-faithful Jehovah.

Verse 3

Ver. 3. The structure of the sentence here has a somewhat irregular appearance; but it is better to leave it so, and give a natural interpretation of the words as they stand, than for the sake of a formal correctness to put a strain upon the meaning. It would have seemed to us, perhaps, the most orderly and consecutive way of speaking to say, “the eternal life which God promised before eternal times, but in its own seasons manifested through the word; “and it is much in this way that Beza (quam promiserat Deus ante tempora seculorum, manifestam autem fecit praestitutis temporibus suis, [videlicet] sermonem illum suum) and others have explained the passage; while some again, including Calvin, by the word understand Christ Himself: from primeval time God had promised eternal life, but since the gospel era He manifested His Word. Such explanations are manifestly of too artificial a cast. But taking the expression His word in its ordinary sense, and as the object of the manifesting which distinguishes the gospel from all preceding times, we are to regard the apostle as here introducing an independent sentence contrasting the manifestation now, in its own seasons (see at 1 Timothy 2:6), with the period of promise preceding, but not precisely of the eternal life, which was the subject of the promise for it still is in great part future and, therefore, instead of saying which, or which life He manifested, he says, manifested His word, in which everything pertaining to the nature of the life, and the means of attaining it, is brought clearly to light. (See, for other instances, Winer, § 63, 1) By the addition in preaching coupled with the word, the preaching with which Paul was entrusted, it is plainly intimated that the word meant is the gospel, the word emphatically, as declaring God’s mind, not by dark intimations merely, or distant promises, but in great facts and blessed assurances as to the present and eternal good of His people. In regard to the expression, according to the commandment of our Saviour God, see at 1 Timothy 1:1, where it also occurs with only a slight variation in the order of the last words.

Ver. 4. In the address itself to Titus there is nothing calling for much remark. He is called, like Timothy, a true child, and that according, or rather in respect, to the common faith. He may have been, and very probably was, a convert of the apostle’s; but that is nowhere distinctly stated, nor does the language here necessarily imply it (see at 1 Timothy 1:2). The designation child is indicative partly of endearment, and partly of comparative youth, in relation to the apostle. The received text has grace, mercy, peace, as at 1 Timothy 1:2, 2 Timothy 2:2, with A, K, L, Philox., Theodoret; but the reading grace and peace, the same that is found in all the other epistles of St. Paul, except the two to Timothy, has the support of א , C, D, F, Ital., Vulg., Syr., Pesh., Copt, Chrysos., etc. The latter must therefore be regarded as the preferable reading, and is now generally followed. The other was probably adopted to assimilate the text to the other two Pastoral epistles.

Verse 5

Ver. 5. For this cause I left thee behind in Crete, that thou shouldst further set in order the things which are wanting general indication of the work which had been assigned to Titus in Crete, which the apostle, for want of time to do it himself, left him behind ( ἀπέλιπόν ) (The best supported reading being that at first hand of א , A, C, D, F, I, the received has κατε ́ λιπον.) to carry forward. In the verb ἐπιδιορθώσης , the ἐπί “does not serve the purpose of strengthening = omni cura corrigere, but expresses the idea of addition: still further bring into order” (Huther). Matters had been so far put in a right condition by Paul himself; what further remained to be done was left to the charge of Titus. The kind of rectification meant can only be learned from what follows; but the first, and apparently the most prominent point, concerned the official organization of the churches: and mightest appoint elders in every city, as I directed thee. This was virtually to say that each church or Christian community was to have its governing body of elders; for in the very infancy of the Christian cause in Crete, it is not to be imagined that each town could have more than one such community. Even that, in most cases, must have been comparatively small. Not only was the appointment of elders to each several congregation to be made, but it was to be done in accordance with the instructions which had been given by the apostle the main part of which are doubtless embodied in the description, which immediately follows, of the qualifications to be sought in the persons who were to receive the appointment.

Verse 6

Ver. 6. If any one is blameless that is, such an one only as is blameless husband of one wife, having faithful children, not accused of profligacy (lit. not in accusation of it, in a position that such accusation could be brought), or unruly. The qualifications have already been considered at 1 Timothy 3:2 sq.

Appendix B Page 139. On the Meaning of the Expression “Husband of One Wife,” in 1 Timothy 3:2 ; 1 Timothy 3:12 , Titus 1:6

The explanation given of this expression, under the first of the passages referred to, restricts the qualification indicated by it to an existing relationship, irrespective of the question whether a previous relationship mayor may not have existed, which had been dissolved by death. It simply required that when one was called to office in the Christian church, there should be but one living woman to whom he stood related as husband. And as the expression of itself does not import more there are various considerations which appear to shut us up to this meaning as the only one that is properly tenable.

1. First of all, let the place be noted which the qualification holds in the apostle’s delineation of fitness for office in the Christian church. In both the epistles (1 Timothy and Titus) it stands second in the list of qualifications for the pastorate, in each also occurring immediately after the epithet blameless or irreproachable, as if, among the characteristics of a life free from any palpable stain, the first thing that might be expected to start into notice was, whether the individual stood related in marriage to one person only, or to more than one. Now, supposing this latter alternative had respect merely to the contracting of a second marriage after the death of a first wife, is the qualification one that, in the circumstances, we could imagine to have been so prominently exhibited, and so stringently imposed? Or is it what we have reason to think would have been borne up by the moral sense of the community? Quite the reverse in both respects. The legislation and the practice of Old Testament times were notoriously of a different kind. They went to an extreme, indeed, in the opposite direction; and even our Lord, when correcting that extreme, gave no indication of His purpose to introduce a restriction of the nature in question, or to make monogamy, in this sense, a condition either of office or of sanctity. St. Paul himself had explicitly declared, in his earlier writings, that death dissolved the marriage tie, so as to leave the survivor free to enter into another union, if such might be deemed advisable or expedient (Romans 7:1-3; 1 Corinthians 7:8-9). And in the laws and usages of the Greeks and Romans no hindrance was ever known to be put upon men in respect to their use of this freedom; no stigma attached to their doing so, unless it might be in connection with the time and mode of their going about it. Such being the case, is it in the least degree probable, or does it seem to accord with the wisdom we are wont to associate with the apostle (apart altogether from his inspiration), that he should now, for the first time, and in so brief and peremptory a manner, without even a note of explanation, have pronounced more than a single marriage-union absolutely incompatible with the ministerial function? nay, should have set it in the very front of admitted disqualifications? and should even have extended the rule to deacons, whose employment was rather about, than in, spiritual things, serving tables, not ministering in word and doctrine? Unquestionably, if such were the import of the apostle’s instruction, a new thing was now introduced into the discipline of God’s house, and introduced in a very extraordinary way. A principle of sanctity was enunciated which was without warrant in any prior legislation or recognised usage; a principle, moreover, which, in contrariety to the whole spirit of the apostle’s writings, must have given to caste distinctions and ascetic notions of excellence a legitimate footing in the church of Christ. In point of fact, when the sense we contend against began to be put upon his words, it did work powerfully both in the ritualistic and the ascetic direction. And if that sense could be established as the natural and proper one, a difficulty of a very formidable kind would be raised against the Pauline authorship of the Pastoral epistles.

2. A second ground of confirmation to the view we advocate is the general concurrence in its favour on the part of the earlier interpreters; and this in spite of a prevalent feeling and usage tending to produce a bias in the contrary direction. Thus Chrysostom: “He (St. Paul) speaks thus, not imposing a law, as if it were not allowed one to become [an episcopos ] without this condition [viz. unless he had one wife], but to restrain undue licence ( τὴν ἀμετρίαν κωλύων ); since among the Jews it was lawful to enter into double marriages, and have two wives at the same time.” (His comment on Titus 1:6, though less explicit, is to the same effect when rightly interpreted. It speaks merely of a double marriage relationship as incompatible with the pastoral office: “chastising the wanton, and not permitting them with a second (or twofold) marriage to assume the governing power,” οὐκ ἀφει ̀ ς ματα ̀ δευτε ́ ρου γα ́ μου τη ̀ ν ἀρχη ̀ ν ἐγχειρι ́ ζεσθαι, not after the marriage in question, but with it standing in the twofold relationship at the same time guilty of a moral wrong, though practised under the forms of law. See Suicer, under Διγαμι ́ α, vol. i. p. 897.) So, too, Theodoret: “Concerning that saying, the husband of one wife, I think certain men have said well. For of old both Greeks and Jews were wont to be married to two, three, and more wives at once. And even now, although the Imperial laws forbid men to marry two wives at one time, they have commerce with concubines and harlots. They have said, therefore, that the holy apostle declared that he who dwells in a becoming manner with a single wife is worthy of being ordained to the episcopate. For, they say, he (that is, Paul) does not reject a second marriage, who has often commanded it to be used.” Then, on the other side: “If he have put away his former wife, and married another, he is worthy of blame and deserving of reprehension; but if force of death has deprived him of his former wife, and nature has prompted him to become united to another, the second marriage is to be attributed, not to choice, but to casualty. Having respect to these and such like things, I accept the interpretation of those who so view the passage.” Theophylact is briefer, but to the same effect: “ If he be a husband of one wife; this he said because of the Jews, for to them polygamy was permitted.” Even Jerome, with all his ascetic rigour, speaks favourably of this interpretation (in his notes on the passage in Titus); states that, according to the view of many and worthy divines, it was intended merely to condemn polygamy, and not to exclude from the ministry men who have been twice married. Now, considering the general prevalence of ascetic feeling at the time, and the virtue commonly attached to celibacy as a qualification for the proper discharge of priestly functions, the interpretation thus either expressly put upon the expression under consideration by those fathers, or held at least to be allowable, cannot but seem entitled to the greatest weight. It presents a series of testimonies to what may be fairly called the natural sense of the expression, and to what appeared the just and reasonable nature of the qualification demanded by the apostle, in spite of a strong current of feeling, and a very prevalent usage, tending to incline them in the opposite direction.

3. The commencement and growth of the other view the view which understands the expression to exclude from the offices of pastor and deacon in the church any one who might have re-married after having lost a wife by death furnishes an additional argument in favour of our interpretation. For the history of church opinion and practice on the subject puts it beyond a doubt, that the more natural view was abandoned only when a false asceticism began to flow in upon the church, and an ideal of piety unwarranted in Scripture, and at variance with the flesh and blood relations which God has established for men in this life. It is hot till near the end of the second century that the ascetic spirit makes its appearance as a disturbing element in this particular line; and when it does so, the perverting influence discovers itself in respect to the members generally of the Christian church, not specifically to those who were called to discharge any spiritual function. It may be questioned whether the Plea of Athenagoras or The Shepherd of Hermas had, in point of time, precedence of the other. Probably they were nearly contemporaneous; and they are the earliest extant of the Patristic writings which can be referred to on the present subject. Athenagoras is often erroneously adduced as a witness for the other view; for when the passage in his Plea is correctly explained, it has respect to bigamy in the proper sense. “A person (he says) should either remain as he was born, or be content with one marriage; for the second marriage ( ὁ δεύτερος γάμος ) is only a specious adultery. ‘For whosoever puts away his wife (says He), and marries another, commits adultery,’ neither permitting a man to put her away whose virginity he has made to cease, nor to marry another ( ου ̓ δε ἐπιγαμεῖν ). For he who deprives himself of his first wife, even though she be dead, is a veiled adulterer, resisting the hand of God” (c. 33). The thought is somewhat loosely expressed, but the reason assigned for the judgment given clearly shows that the second marriage contemplated by the writer is one contracted under the forms of law, after an improper divorce had been effected against a first wife. In such a case a second marriage was justly held to be from the first vitiated essentially adulterous; and this for all Christians alike, without respect to official distinctions. The passage in The Shepherd is more to the point: “If a wife or husband die, and the widower or widow marry, does he or she commit sin? There is no sin in marrying again, said he; but if they remain unmarried, they gain greater honour and glory from the Lord; yet if they marry, they do not commit sin” (Com. iv. c. 3). This also has respect to the Christian life generally, and makes but a slight advance upon the teaching of Scripture; for there both our Lord and St. Paul speak of the resolution to abstain from marriage as, in certain circumstances, and with a view to more entire devotedness to the service of God, an indication of spiritual excellence beyond what would be exhibited by a different course. Only here the married state is apparently contemplated more apart, as in itself, especially when entered into a second time, incompatible with the higher degrees of honour in the divine kingdom. It was still but an incipient indication of the leaven which had begun to work. A stage further on, and we meet with greatly more marked symptoms of its operation.

This stage had its commencement with the rise of that pretentious Gnosticism which, especially from about the middle of the second century, in the hands of the Encratites (Tatian and Marcion), sought to elevate the tone of Christianity, and raise the ideal of Christian perfection higher than was done by the acknowledged teachers of Christianity. According to this school, true perfection consisted in working one’s self free from the ordinary relations and enjoyments of life: marriage, which formed the common basis of these, was esteemed a kind of service of the devil, utterly at variance with the higher aims of the spiritual life; the “elect “spirits must have nothing to do with it, and must also abstain from the use of flesh and wine, and give themselves to fastings and other kinds of bodily mortification. The real tendency of this Gnostic spiritualism did not quite immediately discover itself; it pressed at various points as a reforming influence into the church; and in some of its more characteristic features it ere long burst forth with great power among the excitable and enthusiastic Christians of Phrygia in the guise of Montanism. Montanus and his followers did not profess, indeed, to stand in any proper affinity to Christians of the Gnostic type; but they so far coincided with them as to aim at introducing a new and higher style of Christianity, and one that partook largely of Gnostic elements. Having received (as they imagined) the fuller afflatus of the Spirit promised by Christ, they had attained to the position of right truly spiritual Christians; were the pneumatics ( πνευματικοί ), while others, if Christians at all, were but psychical or carnal ( ψυχικοί ); and, in proof of their nobler elevation, they renounced not only the pleasures and luxuries, but also most of the comforts of life fasted oft, and rigidly; courted indignities, self-denials, persecutions; disparaged marriage, and stigmatized second marriages as fornication. Though the movement was opposed by all the leading authorities in the church, and the claim to supernatural guidance was on every hand rejected, yet many were impressed by the apparent elevation and moral strength of the party; and the opinion grew, that the more select class of Christians should cultivate the ascetic virtues, and should either remain in cœlibacy, or at most be but once married. The tendency of Christian thought and practice in this direction received a great impulse from Tertullian, who not only imbibed the distinctive principles of Montanism, but threw himself into the advocacy of them with zeal and energy. On the subject of marriage he occupied what he called middle ground between those (the Encratites) who repudiated marriage altogether, as a thing inherently evil, and the Psychical party, who maintained the lawfulness of the married state, even when entered into anew after the death of a previous wife. He contended for the absolute singleness of the marriage union, pressing all sorts of considerations into his argument; such as that the first Adam had but one spouse (Eve), the second also but one (the church); that death does not entirely destroy the union of married parties, since the soul still lives, in which the more vital seat of the union resides; that at the resurrection, though there shall be no more marrying, but an angelic state of being, yet those who have been married on earth shall recognise each other as such, etc. ( De Monog., and Ad Uxorem, L. i.). By considerations like these, Tertullian reaches the conclusion that in no case is more than a single marriage allowable for a Christian, while the state of cœlibacy is to be preferred as one of higher sanctity. He admits that in 1 Corinthians 7:39 the apostle grants liberty of re-marrying to those who had been deprived of a spouse by death, if only they married in the Lord; but he thinks this had respect to such merely as had been first married in heathenism, so that their union was no marriage in the Christian sense. He also admits that the principle laid down at the beginning of Romans 7:0 as to death severing the marriage tie, and leaving the survivor free to marry again without being guilty of adultery, is at variance with the view maintained and advocated by him; but finds his escape in the new revelation of Montanism, that as Christ had taken away the liberty which Moses allowed to the Israelites because of the hardness of their hearts, so the Paraclete now takes away what Christ and Paul allowed on account of the infirmity of the flesh, in order that the original ideal of marriage might be restored. So that he concludes second marriages are contrary to the will of Christ not lawful next thing to adultery ( juxia adulterium; De Monog. c. xi.-xv.).

In the course of this strange piece of argumentation, the passages 1 Timothy 3:2, Titus 1:6, are naturally brought into consideration, and the expression husband of one wife is held, without question, to denote a person only once married: those who married a second time are termed digami, bigamists the first time that such an explanation, followed by such an application of the term, occurs in any Christian writing. (The word is found in Justin’s Apology, c. i. 15, but in the usual sense of separating from one wife and marrying another.) Tertullian’s argument from the passages is this: The apostle requires of those who hold clerical functions in the church, that they be no more than once married; but this cannot be confined to them, no more than any of the other moral qualifications mentioned in the same connection: if the rest are common to them with believers generally, why should not this also? Or if the clergy alone have to do with this, then they, too, alone must be subject to the discipline of the rest. And is it not the doctrine of Scripture, that all genuine believers are of priestly rank, having one and the same spiritual standing, the same high and holy calling, with official distinctions only for orderly administrations? Here, undoubtedly, Tertullian got hold of a right principle, though he utterly misapplied it; for it is against the fundamental principles of the gospel (as already indicated) to have class distinctions as to moral attainments to set up one type of purity or holiness for the pastor, and another for the flock. And it betrayed a departure from the simple faith and true spirit of Christianity when the authorities in the church began, as they did about or shortly after Tertullian’s time, to hold that it was allowable for common believers, but not for Christian ministers, to enter a second time into a marriage relationship. This was really to change the constitution of Christ’s spiritual kingdom.

The influence of Tertullian’s writings on this subject, as on many others, operated far and wide throughout the church, though he failed to carry the formal sanction of his views. In various quarters, second marriages, even among the laity, came to be viewed with disfavour, and were occasionally subjected to a measure of disciplinary treatment. Thus, in one of the canons of the provincial synod of Neo-Caesarea (A.D. 314), priests are forbidden to countenance the festivities of second marriages by their presence, “since the bigamus needed penitence.” (Thus early did the ecclesiastical use of the word bigamus become distinguished from the civil, in which it always denotes one married to two spouses still living.) The Council of Nicæa sought to interpose a check on this foolish restriction, and required (in its 8th canon) that the cathari, or purists, on being received into the church, should formally consent to communicate with such as had been married a second time. Yet a provincial council at Laodicea, held about a quarter of a century later (A.D. 352), ordained, in its very first canon, that persons legally marrying a second time should be received into communion only after fasting and prayer, and juxta indidgentiam. The general sense of the church, however, successfully withstood the ascetic tendency in this form of its manifestation; but only that it might be made to concentrate itself upon the select class of the priesthood, in respect to whom the feeling continued to grow that the normal condition was one of entire separation from married life, and that disqualification for clerical ministrations was consequent on a second marriage, especially if the second had been entered into after baptism. A rule to this effect is laid down in the so-called Apostolical Canons, which, though bearing a false title, undoubtedly expressed the general mind of the church about the close of the fourth century. They ordained, among other grounds of exception, that no one who had become involved in second marriages after baptism, or who had married a widow (this being also on one side a second marriage), could be admitted to any grade of priestly standing (Can. 17, 18). In like manner Ambrose, while distinctly asserting that the -apostolic precepts do not condemn second marriages ( De Vid. c. 2, § 10), yet maintains that they were rightly held to be inconsistent with priestly functions (according to the prescription in 1 Timothy 3:2), and for this among other reasons, that there should not be one rule for the clergy and the people; that the former, as they stood on a higher spiritual eminence, should be held bound to a more perfect mode of life ( Ep. ad Vercell. Ecclesiam, § 62-64. To the same effect also Innocent of Rome, De Cr. 13; and Epiphanius, Haer. 48).

Yet, with all this countenance from some of the more prominent authorities of the church, and the steady growth of public sentiment in the same direction, the practice in many places but slowly conformed to what the ascetic spirit, in this alliance with caste distinctions and ritualistic services, demanded as right and proper. Theodoret (whose comment on St. Paul’s expression was formerly given) mentions, in a letter to Domnus of Antioch (Ep. 110), that he had ordained one Irenaeus, though he had entered into marriage a second time; and that in doing so he had but “followed the footsteps of those who had gone before him.” He refers also to various examples of the same kind. And the frequency of the practice, coupled with the impropriety, or rather the palpable indecency, of the church’s commonly recognised procedure in excluding from sacred ministrations those who had lawfully entered into wedlock a second time, while persons guilty of concubinage and the grossest immoralities were freely admitted, is denounced by Jerome, in his own peculiar style, when commenting on a case of the former description in his letter to Oceanus. “I wonder,” says Jerome to his correspondent, “that you should think of dragging forth one bishop as having transgressed the apostolic rule, since the whole world is full of these ordinations: I don’t mean of presbyters, or those of inferior grade, but I come to bishops, of whom I could unroll such a list as would exceed in number the members of the synod of Ariminum.” He then refers to a disputation he had with an eloquent man at Rome on the subject, whose syllogistic reasoning he met by a counter reasoning of the same kind; and then he adds: “It is a new thing I hear, that what was not sin shall be reckoned for sin. All sorts of prostitutions, and the filth of public abominations, impiety towards God, acts of parricide, of incest, etc., are purged away in the font of Christ. Shall the stains of a wife still inhere, and brothels be preferred to the marriage-bed? I do not cast up to you troops of harlots, lots of catamites, shedding of blood, and swinish indulgences at every feast; and you bring up to me from the sepulchre a wife long since dead, whom I received lest I should do what you have done! Let the Gentiles hear it; let the catechumens, who are candidates for the faith, lest they marry wives before baptism, lest they enter into honourable matrimony, but may have wives and children in common nay, may shun the term wife in every form, lest, after they have believed in Christ, it shall prove to their detriment that they had wives, and not concubines or harlots.”

Such were the factitious distinctions and the mischievous results which grew out of this unscriptural mode of teaching which the church received mainly at the hands of Tertullian, after he had assumed the heretical position of a Montanist. The view ultimately became associated nearly as much with false notions of the ministry and of the sacraments, as with unwarranted restrictions regarding marriage. And as the development in that direction could not be deemed otherwise than natural, if the principle had been sound on which it proceeded, that a species of sanctity incompatible with second marriages was required of pastors and deacons which is not required of believers generally, the development itself may fairly be regarded as a proof of the unsoundness of the principle. Doctrinally, it was wrong; but in a practical respect also, the view could not fail to be accompanied with serious embarrassment or trouble of a domestic kind. Pastors bereaved by death of their wives, and without any female relative to supply the blank, would often find it impossible to have their children properly cared for, and their households ruled well (according to apostolic precept), except by entering anew into married life. And to interdict this would necessarily have forced on them the painful alternative of either perilling the moral well-being of their family, or, to avoid that, renouncing their position as ministers of God’s word.

4. There remains still another line of reflection to strengthen the interpretation given this, namely, that in addition to the objections which have been urged against understanding the expression of absolute monogamy, the other view affords a perfectly good and appropriate meaning. Recent interpreters have sometimes denied this, and laid considerable stress on the opposite allegation. Thus Alford: “The apostle would hardly have specified that as a requisite for the episcopate or presbyterate which we know to have been fulfilled by all Christians whatever; no instance being adduced of polygamy being practised in the Christian church, and no exhortation to abstain from it.” If this were anything like a fair and full representation of the matter, it would be hard to account for so many of the early interpreters (conversant, as they were, with the circumstances of the time) taking the other view of the passage, and thinking that, as matters then stood alike among the Jews and Gentiles, ample grounds existed for insisting on monogamy in the ordinary sense monogamy in contradistinction simply to polygamy and divorce as a qualification for office in the church. A certain proportion of its membership consisted of converts from Judaism; and though divorce, perhaps, on insufficient grounds, and subsequent marriage, or the undisguised practice of polygamy, might not be very common in the gospel age among the Jews, yet there is not wanting evidence to show that usages of that description did exist, and continued for ages after the Christian era, Justin Martyr charges it as matter of just reproach against the teachers of the Jewish people, that even till now they permitted each man to have four or five wives ( Tryphio, c. 134). And in the year A.D. 393 a law was passed by Theodosius, enjoining that “none of the Jews should retain their own custom in marriage, nor enter into diverse marriage relationships at one time” ( nec in diversa sub uno tempore conjugia conveniat), a law which is not likely to have been enacted without adequate reasons for it, and still less to have been re-enacted, as it was by Justinian a century and a half later. It will readily be understood, that if persons, who in their unchristian state had become entangled in such double or treble marriage relationships, might be admitted, on their conversion, to the communion of the church, they should still not be entrusted with the spiritual administration of its affairs: there was a flaw in their condition which unfitted them for being unexceptionable guides and overseers of the flock. It is notorious, also, that among the Greeks and Romans, although polygamy was not formally sanctioned, yet it virtually prevailed prevailed under the connivance or sanction of law; and that the most deplorable and wide-spread laxity in this respect existed, both previous to the apostolic age and for long after it. In the later stages of the Republic, with the influx of wealth and luxury, a fearful degeneracy of manners made way among the higher classes of society; many shunned the restraints of marriage, and with those who entered into the bond it was often little more than a temporary contract. Divorce was so common, that “public opinion ceased to frown on it; it could be initiated by husband or wife with almost equal freedom: there was a ready consent of both parties to the separation, in the prospect of marrying again; and this facility was open to all classes who could contract marriage.” (Dr. Thos. D. Woolsey On Divorce and Divorce Legislation, p. 41.) It was even open to them to do it without any legal process; for, as another authority on the subject tells us, “among the Romans divorce did not require the sentence of a judge; no judicial proceedings were necessary. It was considered a private act, though some distinct notice or declaration of intention was usual.” (Lord Mackenzie On Roman Law, part i. c. 6.)

This great social evil, instead of abating, grew with the introduction of the Empire, and received a powerful stimulus from the scandalous excesses of persons in high places. The two first Cæsars set here an example which was only too closely followed by many of their successors and underlings. Female manners became so loose, that no woman (Seneca could say) “was now ashamed of divorce; and illustrious and noble ladies counted their years, not by the number of consuls, but by the number of their husbands.” Hence also the bitter sarcasm of Juvenal:

Sic fiunt octo mariti

Quinque per autumnos. vi. 229.

The influence of such a state of things at headquarters must have told disastrously throughout the empire. The States of Greece are known to have been lax enough even before such an influence began to work upon them; there was little of a high moral tone in the relations of domestic life. Along with marriage, the practice of concubinage was everywhere tolerated, and actions of divorce were effected by common consent, and on the weakest grounds. Even in Sparta, which was probably the least licentious State of Greece, what a light is thrown on the prevailing sentiments and habits of the people by such a fact as this: “To bring together the finest couples was regarded by the citizens as desirable, and by the lawgiver as a duty. There were even some married women who were recognised mistresses of two houses, and mothers of two distinct families, a sort of bigamy strictly forbidden to the men, and never permitted except in the remarkable case of King Anaxandrides, when the royal Herakleidan line of Eurystheus was in danger of becoming extinct.” (Grote’s History, vol. ii. p. 520.) But without going further into detail, there can be no doubt that corruption in this particular line held its course generally throughout the Roman Empire for centuries after the Christian era, only partially checked by the introduction of the Christian element; so partially, indeed, that “divorce ex communi consensu kept its ground all the way down to Justinian” (Woolsey, p. 101). The legislative attempt of Constantine to grant liberty of divorce only on the proof of such heinous crimes as poisoning and adultery, failed from the impossibility of carrying it into effect. It had to be first relaxed, and by Honorius was almost abrogated. “A Christian writer, at the beginning of the fifth century, complains that men changed their wives as quickly as their clothes, and that marriage chambers were set up as easily as booths in a market. At a later period still, when Justinian attempted to prohibit all divorces except those on account of chastity, he was obliged to relax the law on account of the fearful crimes, the plots and poisonings, and other evils, which it introduced into domestic life.” (Milman’s History of Christianity, vol. iii. p. 290.)

Taking, then, all the known circumstances of the time into account, we see only too ample reason for such a qualification as that specified by the apostle for pastors and deacons if by that qualification is understood simply fidelity to the marriage vow, or relationship to no more than one living woman as a spouse. The question was not (as put by Alford) whether, after being received into the Christian church, a looser practice might be held compatible with Christian obligations, a wife and a concubine, or two wives at a time, but whether those who had in these respects followed the too common practice of the world, should, on becoming Christians, be admitted to office in the church. Had they been so, the church might have seemed to take too light a view of the prevailing immorality; embarrassing complications also might have arisen for the parties themselves in the discharge of duty; so that the part of Christian wisdom with the church evidently was to stand entirely clear, in her administrative capacity, from having any participation in the abounding corruption. It is the very course which missionaries of the gospel are obliged in heathen lands to pursue still. They can often receive parties into church fellowship, because apparently sincere in the profession of the faith, whom yet, on account of essentially adulterous connections contracted in their heathenish state, they have felt it necessary to exclude from positions of honour, especially from functions of government in the church. (The comment of Conybeare and Howson on the passage under consideration, though brief, is in perfect accordance with the view we have given. “The true interpretation seems to be as follows: In the corrupt facility of divorce allowed both by Greek and Roman law, it was very common for man and wife to separate, and marry other parties during the life of one another. Thus, a man might have three or four living wives. An example of the operation of a similar code is unhappily to be found in our own colony of Mauritius. There the French revolutionary law of divorce has been suffered by the English Government to remain unrepealed; and it is not uncommon to meet in society three or four women who have all been the wives of the same man, and three or four men who have all been the husbands of the same woman. We believe it is this kind of successive polygamy, rather than simultaneous polygamy, which is here spoken of as disqualifying for the presbyterate.”)

It has been thought by some Protestant writers (by Vitringa, for example, Synag. Vet. P. i. c. 4; also by Ellicott, Alford, and some others), that the corrupt state of matters prevailing at the time may have induced the apostle to lay down the rule of absolute monogamy for rulers in the church to provide a more efficient check against the evil but that, as the same motive no longer operates now, the rule is fitly regarded as having had only a temporary significance, and as no longer in force. This, however, is a quite arbitrary supposition. The qualification, as given by the apostle, is coupled with no temporal limitation. It stands, in that respect, on the same footing as the other prescriptions alike valid, apparently, for all times. Besides, the extremely lax state of morals then prevalent, while it undoubtedly called the church, especially in its official representatives, to be examples of a truly chaste and becoming behaviour, could never have justified the application of tests which went beyond the requirements of God’s law and the dictates of sound reason; for this would have been to make one evil the occasion of opening the door to another. It would have been an attempt, as the ascetic discipline in every form is, to improve upon God’s institutions by setting up a higher ideal of purity than is proper to them, and which always ends in bringing on worse evils than those it seeks to correct. In the form now under consideration, it would have given apostolic sanction to false views of marriage, and, against the whole spirit of the gospel, would have formally authorized gradations of sanctity in the membership of the church a lower that might have sufficed for common believers; and another and higher, as not only proper, but indispensable, for those who should be called to bear rule in the congregation. A distinction certainly not of apostolic origin, and the fruitful parent, when originated, of grievous errors and perversions!

Special stress is laid, in this connection, by the writers in question on the corresponding qualification prescribed for widows, who were to be admitted to the kindly oversight and benefactions of the church: these were, among other moral characteristics, to be known as having each been the wife of one man, 1 Timothy 5:9, How, it is asked, could this be understood otherwise than as descriptive of a woman who had been only once married? And if such is the kind of oneness indicated in this case, how can it justly be regarded as different in the other? The facts already stated, however, show that the necessity supposed for so understanding the expression in the woman’s case by no means existed; and the very circumstance of a qualification of this sort being necessary to entitle a poor widow to become merely the recipient of the church’s charity, may surely be regarded as no mean evidence that the qualification in both cases could have involved nothing of an ascetic nature could .have required only what is due to the claims of decency, and is in accordance with the essential nature and design of marriage. But this is shown more fully in the annotations on 1 Timothy 5:9.

Verses 7-8

Vers, 7, 8. For a pastor must be blameless δεῖ εἶναι , ought to be so, should not be a pastor unless he is blameless as Gods steward: showing at once the original identity of elder and episcopos, by the substitution here of the one name for the other, and the weighty reason why he should be of irreproachable character, since by the very nature of his office he has to manage the things of God (Luke 12:42; 1 Timothy 3:15). The statement of Pearson, quoted here with approbation by Ellicott, that “Episcopal government was under the apostles, from the apostles, in the apostles,” is peculiarly out of place in connection with this passage, which speaks only of a constitution by presbyters settled over each church, and these presbyters, each and all, bearing the name of bishop pastor, or overseer of the flock. But see at 1 Timothy 3:1, 1 Timothy 3:10; also the Essay of Lightfoot, appended to his commentary on Philippians, on The Christian Ministry.

Not self-willed, not soon angry (irascible, ὀργίλον ), not a brawler, not a striker, not greedy of gain; ver. 8, but hospitable, a lover of good, discreet, righteous, holy, temperate. Again, very much the same qualifications as were associated with the pastoral office in the First Epistle to Timothy. They indicate one possessed of that prudence and self-control, that uprightness of character, that kind, generous, disinterested, gracious disposition, which were fitted to command the respect, and secure the confidence and affection of a Christian community, one altogether such as might serve for a pattern to the flock over whom he was appointed to preside, and guide their affairs with discretion.

Verse 9

Ver. 9. Then follows at the close what more especially pertained to the teaching function of his office: holding fast the faithful word according to the teaching, in order that he may be able with the sound doctrine both to exhort and to convince (or reprove) the gainsayers. There can be no reasonable doubt as to the faithful word which the true Christian pastor is to hold fast: the expression is often used in these epistles (1 Timothy 1:15, 1Ti 3:1 , 1 Timothy 4:9; 2 Timothy 2:11; 2 Timothy 3:8), and always means the word which is entitled to our confidence, the word which is in itself the proper ground of trust and hope God’s word. The only question is, in what sense or respect is it said to be according to the teaching? Does this mean, what the person has been taught, or what he himself teaches? Of itself the expression might be taken either way, and has been so taken by commentators, though both the more natural, and the more generally received view, is that which understands it of the teaching imparted by the apostles, and which constituted by way of eminence the teaching the church’s normal instruction and rule in spiritual things. The Authorized Version gives unambiguous expression to this, by rendering “the faithful word as he hath been taught,” putting, however, the other view on the margin (“in his teaching”). It was natural that the apostle, when he was going to refer to a sort of teaching that was unsound and perilous, should not only point attention to that which was of another character, and might fitly serve as a corrective, but should also give some hint of its nature should indicate the source whence it came, and the authority on which it rested. This is what he does, briefly yet not uncertainly, in the expression: “the faithful word according to the teaching;” that, namely, which is recognised as true and authoritative in the apostolic church. Hence, as standing on this solid foundation, and having such choice materials to handle, he should be able by his own sound doctrine both to exhort and to convince the gainsayers. But as the pastor is supposed here to accomplish the end in question by his own sound doctrine or teaching, this confirms the view taken of the preceding statement that the teaching there spoken of was what he had previously received, and by which he was qualified for giving forth a teaching that should be at once sound and effective. This teaching is presented under a twofold aspect one having respect to those within, and the other to those without the Christian community. It was the first part of the duty of the overseers of such a community to exhort, that is, to instruct and edify its own members; and only secondarily, and as occasion required, to resist and expose the false teaching of those who assailed the Christian faith, if so be they might be able to convince them of their errors. So that the qualification here associated with the true Christian pastor corresponds to the aptness to teach mentioned in 1 Timothy 3:2; only here it is more specifically described, and its importance indicated with reference as well to the hostile as to the friendly elements, amid which the church in Crete was placed. Having there very pragmatical and troublesome disputants to deal with, much necessarily depended on the men who stood at the helm of affairs being possessed both of enlightened views and strong convictions; as they might otherwise, even with the best motives and intentions, misrepresent and embarrass the cause of the gospel. But both duties had to be discharged; therefore, “he is the true bishop who holds the right faith, and who properly uses his knowledge to edify the people, and check the wantonness of the adversaries” (Calvin).

Verses 10-11

Vers. 10, 11. The apostle now, taking occasion from the last clause in the preceding verse, proceeds to discourse of the peculiar character of the adversaries whom the infant church in Crete had to contend against: For there are many unruly vain talkers and deceivers, especially they of the circumcision. It would appear, from various incidental notices, that many Jews had settled in Crete; but it is sad to learn that the most noted for troublesome wranglings and practices of deceit were of that class. Perhaps it is not meant that they were absolutely the worst in Crete, but the worst only of those with whom the Christian church came into contact; for, the most depraved portions of the people would as yet be but little touched by the apostolic movements around them. I should, however, hesitate to say that “those of the circumcision” were (as many expositors hold) not simply Jews, but rather Jewish Christians. They must have been, one would suppose, more or less favourably disposed toward the Christian cause; but as yet scarcely won over to its side. It is by no means probable, considering what Jewish converts had everywhere to encounter, that at so early a period after the introduction of Christianity into the island of Crete there should have been great numbers of the more reprobate class of Jews, who were ready to brave the risk, and, for any considerations likely to be appreciated by them, should have actually pressed into the Christian fold. Some better evidence would be required for this than the present passage affords. For the characters here described are introduced simply as a specific portion of the opponents or gainsayers mentioned in Titus 1:9, and the most insidious and pestilent section of them. The more probable supposition regarding them is, that they did, indeed, somehow place themselves alongside the Christian communities, feigned, perhaps, a measure of sympathy and goodwill toward them, but mainly for the purpose of insinuating their objections to the truth of the gospel, ventilating their own frivolous and fanciful conceits, and prosecuting with advantage their selfish aims. Their whole spirit and conduct, as depicted by the apostle, ran counter to a genuine, or even credible, profession of Christianity: instead of children of peace, they were sowers of strife and discord; sedulous pliers of the arts of seduction, not lovers of truth and righteousness; and so intent on worldly pelf, that for the sake of base gain they subverted whole houses, teaching things which they ought not. As it was by word of mouth that they sought to compass their ungodly ends by teaching things which they ought not the subverting ascribed to them must be taken in a spiritual sense: they perverted the views, overthrew the faith and that of whole houses or families (comp. 2 Timothy 2:18). The precise form of representation differs from what we find in 1 Timothy 1:4 sq.; but the relation in which the respective parties stood to the law on the one side, and to the gospel on the other, appears to have been much the same; and so, in both places alike, the apostle charges his evangelists to see that an uncompromising opposition be given to them: there, they were to be testified against and shunned; here, where the evil apparently was more rampant, their mouths must be stopt they must be reduced to silence.

Verse 12

Ver. 12. The apostle now passes on to the Cretans generally. They had in a measure been referred to already; for while persons of the Jewish race had been more particularly noticed, it was only as forming the most troublesome and dangerous class of adversaries to the cause of Christ in Crete. But the Cretans at large were noted for characteristics akin to those charged upon the Jews; and he brings in proof an unimpeachable witness: One of them has said their own prophet The Cretans are always liars, evil beasts, idle bellies ( Κρῆτες ἀεὶ ψεῦσται , κακὰ θηρία , γαστέρες ἀργαί ). This passage, which is a regular hexameter line, has been ascribed by some to Callimachus, a Cyrenaean, but improperly; the better informed of the Fathers (Jerome, Chrysostom, Epiphanius) associate the words with Epimenides, who was a native of Phaestus or Cnossus, in Crete, and who had the name and repute of a prophet (Diog. Laertius; Cicero, de Civ. i. 18; Plato also calls him θεῖος ἀνήρ , Legg. i. 642). He lived about 600 years before Christ. It was a dreadful testimony for him to bear against his countrymen, when he charged them with being addicted to falsehood, ferocity ( κακὰ θηρία , wild, fierce like beasts), and gluttony ( γαστέρες ἀργαί , lit. idle bellies, but used of persons given to luxurious living, and through that growing into a corpulent habit of body). The first characteristic was so notorious, that it was the subject of frequent remark; the very expression here used of it is also found in a hymn to Zeus by Callimachus; and Hesychius in his Lex. explains Κρητίζειν by the synonymous words, ψεύδεσθαι and ἀπατᾷν : to play the Cretan, was just to lie and deceive. (See in Wetstein an immense array of quotations on all the expressions, and on the first with special reference to the Cretans.) The description, of course, is to be understood as applying only in the general to the Cretan population, while admitting, doubtless, of many individual exceptions. But being so general, as to have become a kind of byword and reproach to the island, it was to be expected that the noxious qualities would not be long in making their appearance in the Christian church; on the side especially of these qualities danger was to be looked for to the cause of a pure and healthful Christianity.

Ver. 13. Hence in this verse the apostle calls for sharp reproofs against the prevailing evils: This testimony is true; wherefore reprove them sharply, that they may be sound in the faith. It were wrong to infer from such words, though it is sometimes done, that the members of the church generally in Crete had already given way to the common vices, or had not abandoned them when they assumed the Christian profession; just as in regard to the early church at Corinth, the outbreak of licentious tendencies in one or two individuals by no means argued a general corruption. But happening where licentious practices so fearfully abounded, even a very partial appearance of the evil was sufficient to awaken apprehensions, and called for instant repression. It would naturally be the same in Crete in regard to the corrupt tendencies which had obtained such wide and continued prevalence there; and the purport of the exhortation given to Titus on the subject, was simply that he should maintain a firm protest against practices of such a nature, and in so far as they appeared among the members of the Christian church, subject the doers of them to admonition and rebuke. And when the apostle presents it as the object of such dealing, that the offending parties become sound or healthy in the faith, he as much as says, that faith, when in a state of health, fulness, and vigour, cannot ally itself to such corrupt practices as were prevalent in Crete: such practices betoken either the total absence of faith, or faith in a very feeble and sickly condition.

Verse 14

Ver. 14. Further, and with the view especially of securing real soundness of faith, the apostle would have them exhorted not to give heed to Jewish fables and commandments of men, who turn away from the truth. The same exhortation substantially was given at 1 Timothy 1:4 and 1 Timothy 4:3. The lying and deceptive tendency which had obtained such prevalence in Crete seems to have begotten a fondness for those fables, and have led also to the introduction or pressing of merely human commandments, as if they were divine. These probably related very much to distinctions in food and punctilios of outward observance, and from their nature necessarily indisposed both teachers and taught toward the truth of God. In such a case deceivers and deceived could only present different shades of what was essentially the same radical error.

Verse 15

Ver. 15. To the pure all things are pure: a great counter principle set over against that on which those Jewish semi-Gnostic sciolists were trading to the perversion of their own and other people’s consciences, Judaism in part, and Gnostic asceticism still more, associated moral good and evil with certain outward distinctions: “Touch not or take not this, and you are holy; touch or take it, and you are defiled.” No, the apostle virtually replies, these are but superficial distinctions; and even when they were to some extent of God, it was only as temporary and provisional arrangements supplying for a season the lack of clearer light. All things which lie outside a man, the things of whatever kind which he can use as articles of food, or turn into instruments of service, these are in themselves indifferent; there is no power of intelligent and voluntary choice in them, and therefore no element of sanctity or corruption: this can only be where moral qualities reside, in the region of thought, desire, will; let there be but purity there, and then those external things assume a corresponding character, because they receive an impress and a direction from the spirit of him who uses them. It is but a fresh enunciation of the truth long before uttered by our Lord, and laid by Him as an axe to the root of the mistaken ceremonialism of the Pharisees. He told them that washed or unwashed hands, clean or unclean in food, had of themselves nothing to do with religious or moral purity: that for this everything depended on the state of the heart, from which proceed, as to good or evil, the issues of life (Matthew 15:11-20; Mark 7:14-16). It is obvious, from the mere statement of this principle, that in the all things spoken of as pure to the pure, errors of doctrine and corrupt practices cannot be included, for these come from an impure source: they are what they are in spirit and character, as the soul is which gave them birth; they are not of God, but of the evil one. It is also obvious that the converse of the statement must hold equally good with the statement itself; as, indeed, the apostle expressly affirms: but to them that are defiled and unbelieving is nothing pure. Surely a solemn thought for persons of this class, who are not wholly steeled against conviction! They have within a fountain of pollution, which spreads itself over and infects everything about them. Their food and drink, their possessions, their employments, their comforts, their actions all are in the reckoning of God tainted with impurity, because they are putting away from them that which alone has for the soul regenerating and cleansing efficacy. The apostle, however, carries it even further; he brings out the evil more distinctly on its positive side: but both their mind and conscience are defiled. In saying this, he no doubt indicates the reason why nothing external is pure to them: but he does not give it formally as a reason; he rather advances it as an additional disclosure of their defilement, showing how it embraces both the intellectual and moral parts of their nature, and lays alike the powers of thought and the workings of conscience under bias to evil.

Verse 16

Ver. 16. The description is wound up by a fearful announcement of their morally shipwrecked and hopeless condition: they confess that they know God, but in works deny [Him] being abominable and disobedient, and unto every good work reprobate. The description, it must be borne in mind, relates to those who have come within the sphere of religious truth, who have had their minds instructed in its principles and obligations, and have withal not formally renounced the profession of godliness which they naturally involve; but who have all along, from sinister motives, withstood the truth in their hearts, have talked big and done little; nay, have become adepts in evading the plainest calls of duty, and following courses at variance with the great principles of morality and religion. Of persons who have pursued such a career it may justly be said, that the very foundations of their moral being are out of course; and according to God’s ordinary methods of dealing, there is no hope of recovering them to truth and righteousness. By calling them reprobate in regard to every good work ἀδόκιμοι the apostle means that they are of no worth or account in that respect: when the question is about a good work, such persons may be rejected as having no proper affinity to it.