Online Resource Library
Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.com | DownloadJohn Bengel Commentary - 1 Timothy 3:2 - 3:2
(Show All Books | Show All Chapters)
This Chapter Verse Commentaries:
1Ti 3:2. Δεῖ, must) Paul shows what Timothy ought to look to in the appointment of bishops, 1Ti 3:15; wherefore he so in particular describes the virtues as they meet the eye.-οὖν, therefore) A good office must be entrusted to good men.-τὸν ἐπίσκοπον, the bishop) Deacons are directly opposed to bishops, 1Ti 3:8; therefore the presbyter is included in the bishop; Act 20:28, note.-ἀνεπίληπτον, blameless) without crime, bad report, and just suspicion; comp. Tit 1:6.-εἶναι, be) not only during the time of discharging his duty, but at the time when he is being appointed: 1Ti 3:10. The order of the virtues, which follow, should be attended to.-μιᾶς γυναικὸς ἄνδρα, the husband of one wife) So 1Ti 3:12, ch. 1Ti 5:9; Tit 1:6. This element of the blameless man’s character is put in the first place. It is the ancient nature of marriage, that one man should have one woman. The husband (man) of one wife (woman) is therefore a simple periphrasis of husband; ch. 1Ti 5:9, note. The opinion as to successive polygamy[20] being forbidden here to bishops, seems formerly to have been drawn from “the Canons of the Apostles;”[21] since the 17th Canon runs thus: “Whosoever after baptism enters into a second marriage[22] or keeps a concubine, he is disqualified from being a bishop.” Some have understood it, as if second marriages were forbidden, and certainly the old translation gives this meaning:[23]If any one after baptism is joined in wedlock for the second time, etc.; whence the unfavourable interpretation of the Canon was easily transferred to Paul. But of what importance is it, whether a man has for his help one woman during twenty years, for example, or two after a term of widowhood? But why does Paul, rather taking for granted than requiring that the bishop should have one wife, not add ἢ ἄγαμον, or be unmarried? Unmarried persons were then rare, nor does he exclude the latter from the sacred office, but yet he assumes that the father of a family was somewhat better fitted for the discharge of these duties: and that, of two candidates, if they be equal in other respects, he who has a wife and virtuous family, is to be preferred to a bachelor, who has less testimony from actual practice (experience), 1Ti 3:4-5; for he who is himself bound to discharge the domestic duties, which are here so frequently mentioned, is likely to be more attractive to those who are in like manner attached by ties to the world, and is of advantage to the community by a more popular example: 1Ti 3:4. It is to be added to this, that indiscriminate celibacy has rendered many open to blame. The Jews also teach, that a priest should be neither unmarried nor childless, lest he should be unmerciful.-νηφάλιον) vigilant in mind; so 1Ti 3:11 [νηφαλίους, which Engl. Vers. renders sober]; Tit 2:2; for νήφω is to watch. See on Chrys. de Sacerd., p. 428. This is opposed to slumbering and sloth, which are sins in defect. Νήφω, when it is used alone, denotes both watchfulness and sobriety, and by Metonymy the one is put for the other (comp. 1Th 5:8, Let us be sober, νήφωμεν); but when ΓΡΗΓΟΡΈΩ and ΝΉΦΩ are joined (as at 1Th 5:6), the latter verb has the strict signification, to be sober, and is opposed to μεθύσκεσθαι, to be drunk. σώφρονα) of sound mind [‘sober’,] under self-control. It is opposed to vehemence (impetuosity) of mind, which sins in excess. The derivatives, σωφρονῶ, ΣΩΦΡΟΣΎΝΗ, Κ.Τ.Λ., have a consonant signification. Comp. Tit 1:7-8, where ΠΆΡΟΙΝΟς (which in Greek implies a bold and rash man, such as drunkards usually are) and ΣΏΦΡΩΝ are opposed to each other.-ΚΌΣΜΙΟΝ, decorous, orderly [of good behaviour]) What the σώφρων is within, the ΚΌΣΜΙΟς is without. Hesychius defines ΚΟΣΜΊΟΥς as ἈΝΕΠΙΛΉΠΤΟΥς; Plato, ΚΌΣΜΙΟΙ ΚΑῚ ΕὔΚΟΛΟΙ, men moderate and good-natured. The new man bears somewhat of a sacred-festival character, and is at variance with every species of pollution, confusion, disorder, excess, violence, laxity, assumption, harshness, depravity, mutilation, meanness; he sparingly and in private obeys the necessity of nature, and of the material food, which is put in motion by ingestion, digestion, and egestion, and keeps all the traces of the corruptible body concealed; Php 4:8.-φιλόξενον, hospitable) to strangers, especially to the needy and exiles, whom many treat with disdain.-διδακτικὸν, apt to teach) See 2Ti 2:24, note.
[20] That is, the marrying a second time after the death of the first wife, which was forbidden by the subsequent canons of the Church in less pure ages.-ED.
[21] A work of later ages, wrongly so called.-ED.
[22] ὁ δυσὶ γάμοις συμπλακεὶς.
[23] Si quis post baptisma secundis fuerit nuptiis copulatus.