Bible Commentaries
Titus 3

Verse 1

Chapter III

Ver. 1. Passing from the more direct and spiritual obligations of the gospel, the apostle proceeds now to indicate the proper bearing of Christians toward the constituted authorities. It is not improbable, though it cannot be held certain, that he may have been led to give such prominence to this, from a known tendency on the part of the Cretans to insubordination and turmoil. Before their subjugation to Rome, which was accomplished by Metellus, B.C. 67, they had the reputation of being somewhat quarrelsome and seditious (Polybius, vi. 46: στάσεσι καὶ φόνοις καὶ πολέμος ἐμφυλίοις ἀναστρεφομένους ); the different tribes and free cities displaying a good deal of jealousy in regard to their respective rights, and a readiness to take up arms in vindication of them. The Jews also, who are known to have existed in considerable numbers throughout Crete, were everywhere beginning to show signs of insubordination towards the Roman yoke about the closing period of St. Paul’s labours, and the storm was already gathering among them, which, in a few years more, was to burst forth with terrible fury. In such circumstances, it can readily be supposed that there might have been special, as well as general, reasons for the apostle here pressing the duties of civil obedience: Put them in mind to submit themselves to magistrates, to authorities, (The καὶ of the received text between ἀρχαῖς and ἐξουσίαις is wanting in א , A, C, D, F, G, and should therefore be omitted.) to obey rulers, to be ready to every good work. There is a striking redundancy in the terms indicative of the kind of obedience required, as if to exclude all possibility of evasion: the civic rulers are designated ἀρχαῖς and ἐξουσίαι , as in Luke 12:11, intended, doubtless, to include all classes of governing powers, but without meaning, apparently, to denote by the one a lower, and by the other a higher grade. And, besides being required to submit themselves to these, the people were also to be enjoined πειθαρχεῖν , a term which of itself comprehends the entire circle of obedience: it may be taken either generally, to be obedient, or more specifically, to obey rulers; in the former it occurs at Acts 5:29, Acts 5:32; but here, considering the connection, the kind of obedience as to persons in authority may perhaps be indicated. That the being ready to every good work should follow on such precepts respecting civil subjection, was probably suggested by the thought of the magistrate’s office having for its professed object the repression of evil, and the encouragement of well-doing (Romans 13:3); so that the possession of a mind ready for every good work would in ordinary circumstances render civic obedience comparatively easy, would make the yoke in a manner unfelt. Of course, the requirement had then, as it has still, its limitations: the duties of rulers and ruled are reciprocal; and absolute unrestricted authority on the one side is no more to be contemplated than unqualified submission on the other, for neither is in accordance with the essential principles of truth and rectitude. Obedience to external authority can be due only in so far as that authority has a right to command; when it oversteps this, and issues injunctions which reach beyond its proper line of things, the higher principles of obligation come in: “We must obey God rather than men;” “Be not partaker in other men’s sins.”

Verse 2

Ver. 2. A quiet, inoffensive demeanour in the more private relations of life is now inculcated: to revile no man, to be not contentious, forbearing, showing all meekness unto all men. The first verb, βλασφημεῖν , imports more than to speak evil in the ordinary sense; it is to act the part of a reviler or slanderer; and when used of conduct from one man toward another, always betokens the exercise of a very bitter and malignant spirit. Titus was to charge the Christians of Crete to give no exhibition toward any one of such a spirit, nor to show a quarrelsome disposition, but, on the contrary, to cultivate a mild, placable, and gentle temper.

Verse 3

Ver. 3. As a reason for the manifestation of this mild and benignant spirit toward others, even degraded and ignorant heathen, the apostle refers to their own similar state in the past, and the marvellously kind and compassionate treatment they had, notwithstanding, experienced from their heavenly Father: For we also (we, namely, who are now Christians) were once foolish (or void of understanding; see Galatians 3:1, Ephesians 4:18), disobedient, going astray., serving diverse lusts and pleasures, living in malice and envy, hateful, and hating one another. It is a dark picture of the natural state of men, and must be understood in the general, as more or less applicable to all who are left to the workings of corrupt nature, especially when that nature has developed itself amid the manifold temptations and pernicious examples of heathenism, but not without a measure of exemplification also even in such as, like St. Paul himself, have been brought up amid the decencies of a religious profession, so long as the heart has remained a stranger to the renewing grace of God. If, therefore, we may justly enough say that Paul was not thinking of himself primarily here, was thinking rather of those in whom, up to the period of their conversion to the faith of Christ, the propensities and dispositions of nature had taken their free course, there is no reason, on the other hand, for supposing that the apostle could have dreamt of excepting himself, as if he had not been conscious of possessing the same elements of character in his natural state. Elsewhere he has expressly affirmed as much of men universally, including himself (Romans 1:18 sq., Romans 2:0, Romans 3:9-20, Romans 7:0, etc.); and it can scarcely be characterized otherwise than as absurd in Schrader to speak of the writer here forgetting the representation given of the apostle at 2 Timothy 1:3 as a man who from his forefathers had served God with a pure conscience. For in our passage, in so far as he contemplates himself, it is as lying in the corruption and following the tendencies of nature; while in the other he thinks only of what he was from the time that the sense of religion had been awakened in him, and he entered intelligently into the faith and spirit of his believing ancestry. The particular expressions are all simple enough. It may be doubted whether πλανώμενοι should be taken in the neuter or the passive sense going astray, or led astray, deceived. It occurs in both senses in New Testament Scripture: comp. Matthew 22:29, Mark 12:27, Galatians 6:7, with Joh 7:47 , 1 Corinthians 6:9, 2 Timothy 3:13; but here, where the whole tenor of the passage has respect to evil in its more active manifestations, the neuter sense seems to be the more suitable. So the Vulg. errantes; also the Syriac, Ellicott, Huther, and others. The term here used for pleasures pleasures, namely, of a grovelling or sinful kind ἡδοναῖς , is not elsewhere found in St. Paul’s writings, but occurs in other books, Luke 8:14; James 4:1, Jas 4:3 ; 2 Peter 2:13; and the idea of doing service or being in bondage to such things is employed more than once by our apostle, Romans 6:6, Romans 6:16, Romans 16:18. It cannot therefore with any justice be called an un-Pauline form of expression. Living, spending life ( διάγοντες , sc. βιόν ), in malice and envy, expresses only what is implied of men in their natural state at Ephesians 4:31, Colossians 3:8. The term στυγητοί is found only here, but is of the same import as μισητοι ́ (Hesych.): it indicates the possession of qualities which are fitted to awaken the dislike of others selfishness in some one or other of its aspects; and in proportion as this existed there could not fail to be exhibitions of the remaining quality, hating one another. Comp. Galatians 5:15. In regard to all the qualities, the degrees of strength and forms of manifestation might be infinitely diversified; but of this the apostle says nothing.

Verse 4

Ver. 4. But when the kindness and the love toward man of our Saviour God was manifested: it might almost be put kindness and philanthropy, for our philanthropy is but the English form of the original, and bears much the same sense. The Vulg. has humanitas. In New Testament Scripture it occurs again only in Acts 28:2, where it is employed to characterize the humane and kindly behaviour of the people of Malta. In reply to De Wette’s remark on the word, that “it is an unusual mode of expressing the idea of χάρις ,” Huther properly states that “the reason why Paul here uses this word is given in Titus 3:2, where he exhorts believers to show meekness ( πραΰτητς ) toward all men; χρηστότης corresponds [nearly at least] to meekness, and with reference to the ‘all men’ φιλανθρωπία is added by the apostle. The goodness and man-ward love of God, in which our salvation is grounded, should impel us to the exercise of meekness and gentleness toward all men.” In John 3:16, the pregnant expression, “God so loved the world,” corresponds to the φιλανθρωπία here; and m this passage as well as in the other, the love to man which is celebrated as appearing in the procedure of God is strictly associated with redemption; it is the love of our Saviour God (see at Titus 2:11, 1 Timothy 1:1). That it must here also be understood of God the Father, seems plain from the mention afterwards of Christ as the instrumental agent “through Jesus Christ.”

Verse 5

Ver. 5. Here the apostle carefully guards the divine benignity and loving-kindness with respect to the freeness of its actings: not of works works in righteousness which we did, (There is a diversity of reading here: the received text has ὧν ἐποιη ́ σαμεν the ὧν by attraction for ἁ ́, as very commonly in the New Testament with E, K, L, and many later MSS.; but the reading of א , A1,C1,D1, F, is ἁ ́ ἐποιη ́ σ., which is adopted by Tisch., Lachm., Ηuther, Alford, who regard the other as a correction of the scribes in accordance with the law of attraction. It may have been so; but apart from that, this is the reading of our best MSS., and on that ground should be adhered to.) but according to His mercy He saved us. The act of God, though expressed only at the close, covers the whole of the passage: He saved us, not on one ground, but on another. Not of works that is, out of them ( ἐξ ) as the formal or meritorious cause. And then the works are more exactly defined as τῶν ἐν δικαιοσύνῃ those, namely, done in righteousness as the state or sphere in which we moved, or, with Winer ( Gr. § 48. 3, e), in the spirit of a righteous person; and to make the meaning plain in English, we require either to repeat works, or to insert some such word as done or wrought. Bengel rightly states that “the negative belongs to the whole announcement: We had not been in righteousness; we had not done works in righteousness; we did not possess works through which we could be saved.” The works of righteousness, in respect to which salvation is denied, are contemplated as past with reference to God’s saving act: they were non-existent when that act came into effect, consequently had no influence in calling it forth; it proceeded entirely irrespective of them. And then, in contrast to this negation as to things on our part works that we had not done there is introduced the real ground of action God’s own mercy. The connection is expressed by κατὰ , which in such a case denotes the occasion or reason, and is much the same as “in consequence of,” “by reason of” (see Winer, Gr. § 49. d. b, and similar examples in Acts 3:17, 1 Peter 1:3, Philippians 2:3). So that the wellspring of salvation is here represented as lying in the kind and loving propensions of God toward men, and these coming forth in the character of provisions and overtures of mercy in behalf of the undeserving, the sinful (comp. Luke 1:72, Luke 1:78; Romans 9:23; Ephesians 2:4). As the apostle, however, is speaking of the actual experience of salvation, the mercy of God is contemplated mainly in connection with the application of the provisions of grace to individual souls. For, as well noted by Wiesinger, “it is only the part which God performs in our salvation that is held up to view; and so it did not admit of that being mentioned which is required on the part of man, as the subjective instrument or condition of his entrance on salvation. Hence it is not said, διὰ τῆς πίστεως (as in other passages); for the apostle’s aim here is not to describe the new state of the man, but to point to the act and saving agency of God in regard to the individual, by which the new state is brought about, and which shows, more than anything else, that this new state does not rest on man’s merit or his own doing.”

Then follows an indication of the means through which the divine mercy realizes itself in experience: through the laver of regeneration, and [through] renewing of the Holy Ghost. Such appears to be the proper rendering of the text. The word λουτρόν , which in New Testament Scripture occurs only here and in Ephesians 5:26, has been very variously understood. Washing is the sense adopted by Wycliffe and the Authorized Version; but Tyndale, Cranmer, and the Geneva have fountain; the Rheims, after the Vulgate ( lavacrum), has laver. This last is the only ascertained sense of the word: taken literally, it signifies not the act of washing, but the vessel or bath in which the act was performed. And the only question is, how the expression, when coupled here with regeneration, is to be explained. Some have taken it in an altogether figurative sense, as emblematically representing the spiritual change; some, again, of the Holy Spirit, or of the word the one as the efficient, the other as the instrumental, cause of regeneration. But these cannot be termed quite natural explanations; and neither here nor at Ephesians 5:26 do they seem to have once occurred to the ancient interpreters. They all apply the expression to the baptismal ordinance: thus Theodoret, by the complex phrase λουτρόν παλιγγενεσίας , understands τὸ σωτήριον βάπτισμα , saving baptism; Greg. Naz., “We call baptism λουτρόν , as being an ablution” ὡς ἔκπλυσιν (see further in Suicer, Thes., under the words λουτρόν and παλιγ .). “I do not doubt (says Calvin) but that he at least alludes to baptism; nay, I readily admit that the passage is to be explained of baptism, not because salvation is included in the outward symbol of water, but because baptism seals to us the salvation procured by Christ. . . . But the apostles are wont to deduce an argument from the sacraments to prove the reality sealed therein; since that beginning ought to convince pious minds that God does not mock us with empty figures, but by His own power inwardly accomplishes what He exhibits by an external sign. That man will rightly hold the proper use and virtue of the sacraments, who shall thus connect the sign and the thing signified, so as neither to make the sign empty or inefficacious, nor yet, with the view of extolling it, detract from the Holy Spirit what is His own.” When interpreted thus, the passage yields no countenance to a ritualistic and superstitious use of the ordinance, such as became common with the Fathers, when they regarded the very waters of baptism as being, when rightly administered, impregnated with the power of the Spirit trans-elemented, as it was called so as by a kind of sacred magic to produce the spiritual result. (It was a source of inextricable confusion in the Patristic theology, and the occasion of much practical error and superstition, that the Fathers identified, in the unqualified manner they did, the ordinance of baptism with regeneration. Mr. Mozley’s endeavour to justify them in so doing (in his Primitive Doctrine of Baptismal Regeneration), though containing much valuable matter, cannot be regarded as satisfactory; for their usual style of representation was clearly fitted to mislead, and in Augustine particularly was inconsistent with his doctrine of grace. But occasionally they could distinguish well enough. Augustine, for example, speaks of the possibility of the laver of regeneration being unaccompanied with the grace of regeneration (Enar. in Psalms 77:0), and of conversion of heart being sometimes where there is not baptism, and of baptism being where conversion of heart is not (De Bap. 4:25). So Jerome speaks of persons who do not receive baptism with a full faith, and says of them that “they have received the water, but have not received the Spirit” (Com. in Ezekiel 16:4-5).) It is simply as an ordinance of God an ordinance that has specially connected with it the promise of God’s Holy Spirit that the apostle here speaks of it; implying that, if entered into with the same sincerity on man’s part that it is appointed on God’s, the promise will assuredly be made good; while to the hypocritical and unbelieving it may not less certainly prove, in common with other divine ordinances, altogether fruitless. If, therefore, we say that the natural import of St. Paul’s words here obliges us to hold that he speaks of baptism, it is of baptism, we must remember (to use the words of Ellicott), “on the supposition that it was no mere observance, but that it was a sacrament, in which all that was inward properly and completely accompanied all that was outward. He thus could say, in the fullest sense of the words, that it was a laver of regeneration, as he had also said (Galatians 3:27) that as many as were baptized into Christ had put on Christ entered into vital union with Him.” The most exact parallel, however, is 1 Peter 3:21, where, with reference to the salvation wrought for Noah through the deluge and the ark, the apostle says that “baptism now also saves us; “but then baptism of what sort? Not that (he presently adds) which is simply outward, and which could avail only to the purifying of the flesh, but that which carries with it “the answer (or interrogation) of a good conscience toward God through the resurrection of Jesus Christ.” It was baptism of such a kind as involved an earnest and conscientious dealing with God in respect to salvation, and an appropriation of the new life brought in for believers by the death and resurrection of Christ.

In our passage, what is said of baptism is further guarded and defined by what follows respecting the work of the Spirit: through the laver of regeneration, and renewing of the Holy Ghost ( καὶ ἀνακαινώσεως Πν . ἁγίου ). So far as grammatical construction is concerned, ἀνακαινώσεως might be made dependent either on λουτροῦ or on διὰ : it might be rendered either “through the laver of regeneration and of the Holy Ghost’s renewing,” or “through the laver of regeneration, and through renewing of the Holy Ghost.” With the view of securing the latter rendering, several MSS. insert a second διὰ (D, E, F, G); Jerome also expresses it, per renovationem, though the Vulgate has renovationis: hence connecting renovation as well as regeneration with laver. By renovation, however, as used in New Testament Scripture, is meant a progressive change to the better a growing advancement in the divine life, of which the Holy Spirit, indeed, is the efficient agent, but in which also there is a concurrent action of the regenerated soul. The grace that works in it is not converting, but co-operating and strengthening grace. And while baptism is the seal of the new birth, and gives assurance of the Spirit for all redemption blessings, it is never formally represented as the seal of spiritual progress, nor could it with propriety be so. For it has respect to our introduction into a new state, but not to any future and successive advances thereafter to be made in it. The ordinance of the Supper, in a sacramental point of view, stands related to this, not baptism. There are therefore two things marked here first baptism (as the laver of regeneration), and then the renewing of the Holy Ghost, which is but another name for progressive sanctification. And as the apostle, in predicating salvation, or an experimental acquaintance with the saving mercy of God in Christ, speaks only of such as have partaken alike of baptism and of the Spirit’s renewal partaken not of one of these merely, but of both it is a departure from the precedent of apostolic teaching to use language indicative of a saved condition, where one only of the two can be said to have come into play. If people will speak of baptismal regeneration, let them take care, as Alford has justly cautioned, to bear in mind what baptism in such a case should be understood to mean: “not the mere ecclesiastical act not the mere fact of reception by that act among God’s professing people; but that, completed by the divine act, manifested by the operation of the Holy Ghost in the heart and through the life.” Precisely similar language, it may be added, is often used regarding the word which is here applied to baptism: it, too, is coupled with regeneration, or a saving change (John 1:12-13; 1 Corinthians 1:18, 1 Corinthians 1:21; Romans 10:9; James 1:18; 1 Peter 1:23; 1 John 5:1); but then it is always on the understanding, expressed or implied, that the word has been received into the heart, and produced through divine grace its proper effect.

Verse 6

Ver. 6. Having named the Holy Spirit as the efficient author of the renovation accomplished in believers, the apostle goes on to indicate, in further proof of the lovingkindness and mercy of God in the matter of our salvation, the copiousness of the gift; it is bestowed, not with a grudging, but with a free and benignant hand: which He poured out ( οὗ ἐξέχεεν , the οὗ by attraction with the preceding Πνεύματος ἁγίου , not in any way dependent on λουτροῦ ) on us richly through Jesus Christ our Saviour. The form of expression is derived from the language of Old Testament prophecy (Joel 2:28; Zechariah 12:10), adopted by the apostles at the commencement of the New Testament church (Acts 2:17, Acts 2:33, Acts 10:45) language proceeding on the similitude of the Spirit’s grace to quickening and refreshing streams of water. As such He is represented, not simply as given, but as poured out, nay, poured out richly, in order to convey some idea of the plenteous beneficence of the gift. This rich bestowal is peculiar to New Testament times; and here, as elsewhere, it is expressly connected with the mediation of Christ, who as Saviour has opened the way for it, and Himself sends forth the Spirit as the fruit of His work on earth, and the token of its acceptance with the Father (John 14:16, John 14:26, John 16:7; Luke 24:49; Galatians 4:6; Ephesians 4:7-11). So that the whole Trinity appears here as concurring in the blessed work of our salvation: we are saved by God the Father, through the ministration of His life-giving ordinances, rendered such by the presence and agency of the Holy Spirit; and this, again, proceeds on the ground of what was done for us by Christ as our Saviour, and what He still does in mediating between us and the Father respecting the bestowal of the Spirit. Such a style of representation could never have been used unless Father, Son, and Spirit had been co-ordinate agents in the work of salvation. And as regards the more specific topic in this verse the, rich outpouring of the Spirit there can be no doubt that, as the apostle is speaking more immediately of the salvation of individuals, it must be primarily understood with reference to this, though still of this only as a part of that general effusion of the Spirit’s grace which commenced on the day of Pentecost. The individual, in such a case, cannot be viewed apart from the general; and it is needless here to distinguish minutely between the two.

Verse 7

Ver. 7. In this verse we have the important practical design of the salvation-work described in the three preceding verses: in order that, being justified by His grace, we might become heirs according to the hope of eternal life. The expression by His grace ( τῇ χάριτι ἐκείνου ) must be connected with God the Father, since it is He always who is represented as conferring the grace which justifies the ungodly. Concurrently, however, with the Father’s procedure in respect to justification, there is an indispensable action of the Holy Spirit, uniting the sinner to Christ, and so establishing a vital bond between the guilty and the righteous. For, however gratuitous the act of justification is as bestowed on its objects, not only without any good deeds on their part, but in spite of many bad deeds, there is nothing arbitrary in it. It proceeds upon such a connection between the soul and Christ as secures for it a participation in His infinite worth and sufficiency, so that God is just even when He justifies the ungodly (Romans 3:26). When it is said, further, that this justification is effected that we might become κληρονόμοι γενηθῶμεν κατ ʼ ἐλπίδα ζωῆς αἰωνίου , the explanation may run, either heirs in respect to hope of eternal life heirs of that life, yet meanwhile having it only in hope; or heirs in conformity with the hope of eternal life of all that such a hope entitles to. Grammatically, the one explanation is as admissible as the other. But I think, with Alford, against Huther and Ellicott, that considering the expression used by the apostle at the commencement of this epistle, ε ̓ π ʼ ἐλπίδα ζωῆς αἰωνίου , it is more natural here to couple hope directly with eternal life, and regard the heirship spoken of as comprehending all that is conformable to, or is embraced in, the hope of eternal life. But the difference between the two modes of exposition is of a philological rather than a doctrinal kind: in substance the meaning is much the same either way; and to the popular apprehension, it will matter extremely little whether we say of the justified that he is heir of eternal life, as to hope, or that he is heir of whatever the hope of eternal life warrants him to look for. Niceties of this description in the interpretation of Scripture, if they may be noticed, should certainly not be dwelt upon.

A few practical advices to Titus now close the hortatory part of the epistle, followed up by some personal notices and salutations.

Verse 8

Ver. 8. Faithful is this saying (that, namely, contained in the immediately preceding verses respecting God’s method of procedure in respect to salvation; for the form of expression, see at 1 Timothy 1:5); and concerning these things I would have thee strenuously affirm ( διαβεβαιοῦσθαι , make asseveration; see at 1 Timothy 1:7), to the end that they who have believed God be careful to practise good works προΐστασθαι , set forward, practise such works. The governing verb φροντίζειν , which is sometimes, though rarely, as here, followed by an infinitive, nowhere again occurs in Scripture; but it denotes the application of earnest and continued thought, a careful striving of soul in this direction, that the belief in the doctrines of the gospel should be substantiated by a steady performance of its commanded duties. These things namely, the things involved in this practical teaching and concern are good and profitable to men: in themselves good ( καλὰ ), and in their tendency and results profitable ( ὠφέλιμα ) to others.

Verse 9

Ver. 9. In contrast to such sound teaching, he again warns against that frivolous and disputative sort of teaching which he had previously characterized (Titus 1:10-14): but foolish questionings, and genealogies, and strifes, and contentions about the law, avoid περιΐστασο , keep out of the way of, turn from them. And on this account, for they are unprofitable and vain utterly wanting in the practical element which so remarkably characterizes the true doctrine of the gospel.

Verse 10

Ver. 10. A heretical man, after one and a second admonition, shun. The word αἱρετικὸν only in part corresponds to our term heretical; perhaps schismatical or factious would more nearly approach to it. It denoted one who set himself to make a αι ̔́ ρεσις or party, separate from the community of the faithful. In the history of the Acts the designation is applied to the sectional divisions among the Jews the sects (as the word is rendered) of the Pharisees and the Sadducees (Acts 5:17, Acts 15:5). On one occasion Paul applies it to himself, and his former co-religionists, in a good sense; he spoke of it as a thing creditable to them that they formed “the strictest sect of their religion” (Acts 26:5). This, however, might be called an exceptional use; for, shortly before, Paul himself confesses that, in a way which his countrymen called heresy ( αἱρέσιν ), he worshipped God, and was stigmatized by his accusers as a ringleader of the Nazarene heresy or sect (Acts 24:5, Acts 24:14). Also in St. Paul’s own writings the expression is similarly used Galatians 5:20, 1 Corinthians 11:19; the latter of which passages especially throws light on the import of the word in the apostolic church. In the preceding verse he had mentioned with grief that he heard there were schisms or divisions among them; and then he adds, “for there must be also αἱρέσεις among you, that they who are approved may be made manifest among you.” It is clear that the persons who taught the αἱρέσεις were just those who caused the schismatical divisions formed some kind of separate interest by unduly elevating a human mode of teaching, or teaching what was in itself at variance with the principles of the gospel. I conclude, therefore, with Campbell ( Preliminary Dissertations on the Gospels, ix. 4), that the heretical man of our text “must mean one who is the founder of a sect, or at least has the disposition to create sects in the community, and may properly be called a factious man. The admonition here given to Titus is the same, though differently expressed, with what Paul had given to the Romans when he said, ‘Mark them which cause divisions, and avoid them’” (Romans 16:7). (The dissertation on this point is in general good, but carries to an extreme the idea of false doctrine having nothing to do with heresy in the gospel age. False or erroneous teaching must certainly have been an element.) A person of this conceited, opinionative stamp Titus is counselled not summarily to cast off, but to deal with him as an offender against the peace and good order of the church to give him one and even a second admonition; and then, if these failed to reclaim him from his waywardness, to shun him as an evil-doer. The apostle does not carry the matter further; he does not advise formal excommunication, the course he had himself adopted in the case of others (1 Timothy 1:20); but the kind of shunning or avoiding enjoined was a virtual excommunication, as it plainly involved a resolution not to recognise him as a Christian brother so long as he pursued his divisive and factious course. And the reason given in the next verse for the action recommended confirms this view.

Verse 11

Ver. 11. Knowing that such an one is perverted, and sinneth, being self-condemned. The language throughout is very strong: first he is perverted the rendering of Tyndale, Cranmer, and Gen., and upon the whole better than the Authorized Version, subverted: the compound verb ἐκτρέπω ) signifying to turn out of, namely, the proper way or course; and when used, as here, in the passive of one who, notwithstanding even a second admonition, persists in following his self-willed line of action, “denotes a complete inward corruption and perverseness of character” (Ellicott). Then, he sinneth ἁμαρτάνει , lives in sin, or errs knowingly and deliberately, because he cleaves to his own way, after having been expostulated with about its erroneousness by an authorized messenger of God. And so, finally, he is said to be self-condemned: not as if he formally pronounced judgment against himself, or was conscious of acting a part which he consciously knew to be wrong, but because his conduct was such as of itself to betray a desert of condemnation. The meaning is much the same as that expressed of similar characters at 1 Timothy 4:2 both alike spoken of persons whose inward sense or conscience has got into a state which is palpably at variance with the mind of God, as made known through His authorized representatives.

Verse 12

Ver. 12. When I shall send Artemas to thee, or Tychicus, make haste to come to me at Nicopolis. Artemas is nowhere else mentioned; but Tychicus is described at Colossians 4:7 as “a beloved brother, and a faithful minister and fellow-servant in the Lord; “and very nearly the same expressions are employed respecting him at Ephesians 6:21. He was an Asiatic (Acts 20:4), but we want materials for a closer determination. The Nicopolis at which St. Paul intended to pass the winter is uncertain. Three towns of that name are well known to have existed at the time, within the sphere of the apostle’s labours: one in Cilicia, another in Thrace, and a third in Epirus. Each of these has been fixed on by different commentators as the one probably meant in the passage before us; but it is impossible to adduce anything of a decisive nature in favour of either. If the epistle was written from Macedonia or some part of Greece, then it would likely be Nicopolis in Epirus, which was by much the more important of the two in that quarter; but if from some place in Asia Minor, then Nicopolis in Cilicia should rather be understood. But whichever it might be, when the apostle states his intention to spend the winter there ( ἐκεῖ ), it is clear he was not at Nicopolis when he wrote the epistle.

Verse 13

Ver. 13. Zealously forward on their journey Zenas the lawyer, and Apollos, that nothing may be wanting to them. The σπουδαίως πρόπεμψον evidently means that Titus should hasten the departure of the brethren mentioned, and do it, as the context shows, by furnishing them with things needful for their journey. This is the only passage in which the name of Zenas occurs; nor is it certain whether the designation lawyer is to be taken in the Jewish sense (one who had been skilled in Hebrew law, and from former times still retained the name), or with reference to the study and practice of law in a civil sense. The majority of commentators prefer the former view. But the mention of Apollos here along with Zenas, as one whom Paul wished to have beside him, so near the close of his earthly labours, is a clear proof of the good understanding which subsisted between these two eminent servants of God, and how little ground there is for the serious differences in respect to their doctrinal teaching which have sometimes been alleged by modern rationalists. As Apollos commenced preaching when still but imperfectly taught in the gospel, and then received fuller instruction from some of Paul’s most intimate friends (Acts 18:26), the probability is, that whatever divergence might appear was confined to the earlier part of his labours: and even of that we know next to nothing.

Verse 15

Ver. 15. The conclusion is brief and simple; All that are with me (that is, probably, such as were labouring with him in the ministry of the gospel) salute thee; salute those that love us in the faith; the grace (namely, of God) be with you all. No other epistle of the apostle’s ends quite similarly. The mode of salutation may be said to be Pauline in spirit; but in form it differs too much from those found in the other epistles, to have been at all likely to occur to any one but the apostle himself. But including, as it did, all who loved the apostle in the faith, it implies that the epistle was to be made known to the churches in Crete.