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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.comJamieson Fausset Brown Commentary - 1 Timothy 6:9 - 6:9
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This Chapter Verse Commentaries:
will be rich - have more than “food and raiment.” Greek, “wish to be rich”; not merely are willing, but are resolved, and earnestly desire to have riches at any cost (Pro 28:20, Pro 28:22). This wishing (not the riches themselves) is fatal to “contentment” (1Ti 6:6). Rich men are not told to cast away their riches, but not to “trust” in them, and to “do good” with them (1Ti 6:17, 1Ti 6:18; Psa 62:10).
fall into temptation - not merely “are exposed to temptation,” but actually “fall into” it. The falling into it is what we are to pray against, “Lead us not into temptation” (Jam 1:14); such a one is already in a sinful state, even before any overt act of sin. The Greek for “temptation” and “gain” contains a play on sounds - porasmus, peirasmus.
snare - a further step downwards (1Ti 3:7). He falls into “the snare of the devil.”
foolish - irrational.
hurtful - to those who fall into the snare. Compare Eph 4:22, “deceitful lusts” which deceive to one’s deadly hurt.
lusts - With the one evil lust (“wish to be rich”) many others join themselves: the one is the “root of all evils” (1Ti 6:10).
which - Greek, “whatever (lusts).”
drown - an awful descending climax from “fall into”; this is the last step in the terrible descent (Jam 1:15); translated “sink,” Luk 5:7.
destruction ... perdition - destruction in general (temporal or eternal), and perdition in particular, namely, that of body and soul in hell.