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1Pe_2:10. A reference to Hos_2:23, linking itself on to the end of the preceding verse, in which the former and present conditions of the readers are contrasted. This difference the verse emphasizes by means of a simple antithesis. The passage in Hosea runs: åÀøÄçÇîÀúÌÄé àÆúÎìÉà øËçÈîÈä åÀàÈîÇøÀúÌÄé ìÀìÉàÎòÇîÌÄé òÇîÌÄéÎàÇúÌÈä , LXX.: ἀγαπήσω τὴν οὐκ ἠγαπημένην καὶ ἐρῶ τῷ οὐ λαῷ μου · λαός μου εἶ σύ (the Cod. Alex. and the Ed. Aldina have at the commencement the additional words: ἐλεήσω τὴν οὐκ ἠλεημένην ).
οἱ ποτὲ οὐ λαός ] Grotius, Steiger, Weiss incorrectly supply: Θεοῦ . λαός is here used absolutely (Bengel: ne populus quidem, nedum Dei populus). οὐ belongs not to ἦτε to be supplied, but is closely connected with λαός , equivalent to “no-people.” In like manner οὐκ ἠλεημένοι as equal to “not-obtained mercy.” “The meaning is not that they once were not what they now are, but that they were the opposite of it” (Wiesinger). But οὐ … λαός is a people who, in their separation from God, are without that unity of life in which alone they can be considered by Him as a people; or, more simply, who do not serve God who is the true King of every people; cf. Deu_32:21, and Keil in loc. De Wette is hardly satisfactory: “they were not a people, inasmuch as they were without the principle of all true nationality, the real knowledge of God,” etc.; now they are a people, even a people of God, inasmuch as they not only serve God, but are received also by God into community of life with Himself.
οἱ οὐκ ἠλεημένοι , νῦν δὲ ἐλεηθέντες ] The part. perf. denotes their former and ended condition. Standing as it does here not as a verb, but as a substantive, like οὐ … λαός , it cannot be taken as a plusquam-perf. part. (in opposition to Hofmann). The aorist part. points, on the other hand, to the fact of pardon having been extended: “once not in possession of mercy, but now having become partakers of it” (Winer, p. 322[130] [E. T. 431]).
[130] In the original passage these words apply to Israel; but from this it does not follow that Peter writes to Jewish-Christians. For if Paul—as he clearly does—applies the passage (Rom_9:25) to the calling of the heathen, then Peter surely, with equal right, could use it with reference to the heathen converts. They had been, in its full sense, that which God says to Israel: ìÉàÎòÇîÌÄé ; and they had become that to which He would again make Israel, His people. It must be observed, however, that God in that passage addresses Israel as ìÉàÎòÇîÌÄé only because it had forsaken Him and given itself up to the worship of Baal, and consequently incurred punishment. Apart from this, Israel had always remained the people of God.—If only Jewish converts were meant here, then Peter would assume that they in their Judaism had been idolaters, which is absolutely impossible, or at least Peter must then have said why they, who as Israelites were the people of God, could not in their former state be regarded as such. Accordingly, οὐ λαός is here in no way applicable to Israel, but only to the heathen; and it is not (as Weiss maintains, p. 119) purely arbitrary to apply the passage, in opposition to its original sense, to heathen Christians. Whilst Brückner says only that the words cannot serve to prove the readers to have been Jews formerly, Wiesinger rightly and most decidedly denies the possibility of applying them to Jewish converts; so, too, Schott.—Weiss’s assertion is by no means justified by his insisting (die Petr. Frage, p. 626) that nothing tenable has been brought forward against it.