Online Resource Library
Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.com | DownloadHeinrich Meyer Commentary - 1 Peter 5:3 - 5:3
(Show All Books | Show All Chapters)
This Chapter Verse Commentaries:
1Pe_5:3. μηδʼ ὡς κατακυριεύοντες τῶν κλήρων ] i.e. “not as those, who,” etc. With κατακυρ . cf. for meaning and exprestion Mat_20:25-28; 2Co_1:24; it is not equal to κυριεύειν (Steiger), but the prefixed κατα intensifies the idea of κυριεύειν : “to exercise a sway, by which violence is offered to those who are under it.”[269]
κλῆρος , properly speaking, the lot, then that which is apportioned by lot, then generally, that which is allotted or assigned to any one, whether it be an office, a possession, or anything else. Here it is the congregation ( τὸ ποίμνιον ) that is to be understood; not as though κλῆρος in itself meant the congregation, but the churches are thus designated, because they are assigned to the elders as a possession, in which to exercise their official duties. The plural is put, because different elders filled offices in different congregations (Calov, Steiger, de Wette, Wiesinger, Schott, etc.). Compare the passage in Act_17:4, where it is said of those converted by Paul and Silas: προσεκληρώθησαν τῷ Παύλῳ καὶ τῷ Σίλᾳ . It is incorrect to supply τοῦ Θεοῦ , as is done by Beza, etc., and to derive the expression from the O. T., where the congregation of Israel is termed the κλῆρος ( ðÇçÂìÈä ) of God, Deu_9:29, LXX. But it is equally incorrect when Hofmann applies κατακυριεύοντες , not to the πρεσβύτεροι , but to others, and, taking ὡς as instituting a comparison, understands κλῆροι to signify “the estates belonging to some one himself,” translating accordingly: “not as those who exercise rule over estates belonging to themselves.” The apostle’s idea thus would be: “the elders are not to treat the church as an object over which they exercise right of possession, and do with as they please.”
How should the apostle have thought of bringing forward a comparison so far-fetched?—and how arbitrary it appears to interpret ὡς differently in this passage from in chap. 1Pe_1:14, 1Pe_2:2; 1Pe_2:5; 1Pe_2:11-13, etc.; to allow the article τῶν to take the place of the possessive pronoun, and to attribute a meaning to κλῆροι which it often has in profane Greek, but never either in the O. or in the N. T.![270]
ἀλλὰ τύποι γινόμενοι τοῦ ποιμνίου ] The antithesis here is a different one from that in the passage quoted from Matt. The elders, as the leaders of the church, necessarily possess a kind of κυριότης over it; but they are not to exercise this in a manner opposed to the character of Christian life in the church (which would be a κατακυριεύειν ), but by being examples to the congregations, shining before them in every Christian virtue (1Ti_4:12; Tit_2:7); cf. 2Th_3:9; Php_3:17.
[269] Thus Hofmann interprets, correctly. He is mistaken, however, in maintaining that κατα here does not imply an hostile antithesis, since a violent rule is one by which he who is ruled over is injured in his rights.
[270] The opinion of Oecumenius: κλῆρον τὸ ἱερὸν σύστημα καλεῖ , ὥσπερ καὶ νῦν ἡμεῖς (i.e. the priesthood), which many Catholic commentators have followed, requires no refutation; and as little does that of Dodwell, who understands κλῆροι to mean church property.