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1Ti_3:3. The positive characteristics are now followed by two that are negative (or three, according to the Rec.): μὴ πάροινον ] This word occurs only here and in Tit_1:7. Though it is used (comp. παροινέω , LXX. Isa_41:12) also in the wider sense, as equivalent to contumeliosus (Josephus, Antiq. vi. 10, where it stands opposed to the word σωφρονεῖν ), yet there is here no sufficient ground for departing from its original sense. It is true that, as Bengel indicates, the ἀλλʼ ἐπιεικῆ afterwards seems to be in favour of the wider meaning here, without special reference to drunkenness; but the contrast is the same in the other case, if we only remember that πάροινος does not mean simply “drunken,” but “impudent, arrogant in intoxication.”[119]
μὴ πλήκτην ] This word also may be taken in a narrower and a wider sense. Here, as in Tit_1:7, it denotes the passionate man who is inclined to come to blows at once over anything. With these two ideas there are three placed in contrast; not, however, in exact correspondence, for in that case the reading of the Rec., μὴ αἰσχροκερδῆ , would be indispensable, and for this reading there is too little testimony; but in such a way that the conduct denoted in the one case is opposed to that in the other.
ἀλλʼ ἐπιεικῆ , ἄμαχον ἀφιλάργυρον ] In Tit_3:2, as here, the first two expressions stand together. Ἄμαχος does not occur elsewhere in the N. T. Ἐπιεικής does not mean “yielding,” for it does not come from εἴκω , but from εἰκός ( ἔοικα ).
The nearest meaning is “beseeming.” As used, however, it has mostly the sense of moderateness and gentleness (in Plutarch, Pyrrh. 23.
ἐπιεικῶς is used along with πρᾴως ). Luther rightly: “mild.” Ἄμαχος is equivalent to peaceful; Luther: “not quarrelsome.”
ἀφιλάργυρον (only here and in Heb_13:5; φιλάργυρος , 2Ti_3:2 and Luk_16:14; the substantive φιλαργυρία , 1Ti_6:10) lays stress on a point of which no hint was given before. It is joined with ἄμαχος , since avarice necessarily brings strife with it.
[119] Comp. Aristophanes, Acharnians, 981, where the scholiast explains it μέθυσος καὶ ὑβριστής ; see Pape on the word.