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1Ti_4:14. Μὴ ἀμέλει τοῦ ἐν σοὶ χαρίσματος ] Timothy is not to let the χάρισμα lie unused; he is to apply it diligently and faithfully to the purpose for which it was imparted to him. This exhortation does not imply blame, nor does that given in 2Ti_1:6.
The word χάρισμα may be applied to every gift of God bestowed on man by God’s χάρις . In the N. T. it denotes both generally the new spiritual life wrought in the believer by the Holy Spirit, and also specially every faculty imparted for special Christian work ( ἱκανότης , comp. 2Co_3:5). Here, where he is speaking of Timothy’s official work, it can only mean the faculty given him for the office (not simply “the gift of teaching,” as Hofmann thinks), in regard both to the κυβέρνησις and specially to the παράκλησις and διδασκαλία (not, however, as Chrysostom explains it, the διδασκαλία itself). It is not to be taken as denoting the office itself; the ἐν σοί is against this, and nowhere in the N. T. has the word this meaning.[164]
Ὃ ἘΔΌΘΗ ΣΟΙ ] not as Heinrichs says: a me, Apostolo, but, as a matter of course, by the Holy Spirit (1Co_12:4).
διὰ προφητείας μετὰ ἐπιθέσεως τῶν χειρῶν τοῦ πρεσβυτερίου ] διά is here “by means of,” so that the ΠΡΟΦΗΤΕΊΑ is to be regarded as the means through which the ΧΆΡΙΣΜΑ was given to Timothy (by the Holy Spirit). It is arbitrary to weaken this, the proper meaning of the preposition, as Beza does when he explains it: per prophetiam i. e. ita jubente per os prophetarum spiritu sancto;[165] and as Otto also does, when he finds here the thought that the ordination was occasioned by the προφητεία . Though Hofmann in his Schriftbeweis (II. 2, pp. 278 f.) had explained it: “The word of prophecy pointed out Timothy as the one to be appointed the apostle’s colleague,” he now says: “ διὰ προφητείας does not mean by means of prophecy, but in consequence of prophecies.” This latter explanation, however, agrees with the one which he disputes, since the expression “in consequence of” gives not merely the relation of time, but also the relation of cause. We must reject even the qualification of the meaning which Matthies demands: “The fundamental meaning of the preposition διά , which may be shortly defined as means, may be so modified in many cases as to give the manner in which something is done, or the intermediating form under which something comes into life.” We must reject this, because, as de Wette rightly remarks, there would otherwise be no indication of a relation of cause. Besides, such passages as Act_8:17-18; Act_9:17; Act_19:6, 2Ti_1:6, prove that we must keep by the proper meaning of ΔΙΆ . The ΠΡΟΦΗΤΕΊΑ is mentioned as the means, but in close connection with ἘΠΊΘΕΣΙς ΤῶΝ ΧΕΙΡῶΝ . ΠΡΟΦΗΤΕΊΑ (1Ti_1:18) is not equivalent to “foretelling,” but is more generally the word proceeding immediately from the Holy Spirit—whether the word of promise, or of exhortation, or of prayer. This word was spoken at the time ( ΜΕΤΆ ) when the presbytery laid their hands on Timothy and appointed him to his ministry. ΜΕΤᾺ ἘΠΙΘΈΣΕΩς Τ . Χ . is to be taken in close connection with ΔΙᾺ ΠΡΟΦΗΤΕΊΑς ; the laying on of hands is to be regarded as part of the means; comp. 2Ti_1:6.[166] Otto wrongly says: “The laying on of hands is not a coefficient of the ordination, but an act connected with the ceremony of ordination; the ΧΆΡΙΣΜΑ was imparted to Timothy along with the laying on of hands, not by means of the laying on of hands.” Wherein, then, did the ceremony of ordination consist? It is curious that Hofmann, influenced by 2Ti_1:6, says regarding μετά , that “it was of course the apostle’s business to impart the gift to Timothy by laying on of hands,” but then grants that “the presbytery of Timothy’s home-church took part in the laying on of hands,” without telling us what then signified the presbytery’s laying on of hands. The hands were imposed by the presbytery, but Paul does not say who uttered the προφητεία . Leo remarks: “adfuerunt fortassis, quum manus imponebantur Timotheo, prophetae Christiani, qui praesagiebant faustissima quaevis, et dignum eum fore dicebant ecclesiae doctorem” (similarly Wiesinger, van Oosterzee, and others). It is, however, most probable to assume that they who uttered the ΠΡΟΦΗΤΕΊΑ were the same as they who laid their hands on Timothy,[167] so that we cannot think here of prophets, in the narrower sense of the word, as present at the ordination.
The ἘΠΊΘΕΣΙς ΤῶΝ ΧΕΙΡῶΝ is well known as a symbolic action of the early Christians; it was the symbol and means not only of imparting the Holy Spirit in general (Act_8:17; Act_19:6; Heb_6:2), but also of bestowing the inward equipment for a special Christian ministry (Act_6:6; Act_13:3; comp. also Act_14:23). By the presbytery, we must understand the college of presbyters belonging to the church in which the hands were imposed. What church this was, we are not told. Ecclesiastical tradition, followed by Mack, makes it the church at Ephesus; Matthies, Leo, de Wette, Wiesinger, and others think it more probable that the ordination took place at Lystra, where Paul assumed Timothy as his companion, and that the ordination was held for this very purpose.[168] To this latter view we must object, that there is no passage in the N. T. to prove that the reception into the number of the colleagues of the apostles was made with such a solemn ceremony. It is more natural to suppose that such a reception took a freer form, and that a regular ordination was only held after a more independent position had been assigned to the colleague, a position not merely of carrying out certain instructions, but of representing the apostle in a more complete way, viz. in a particular church, such as Timothy now held. Perhaps, therefore, this ordination of Timothy had taken place when Paul on his departure for Macedonia left Timothy behind him in Ephesus as his substitute (1Ti_1:3); still it is also possible that it had been done on some earlier occasion.[169]
It is strange that in 2Ti_1:6 the laying on of hands is mentioned only as the act of the apostle. Paul might certainly be speaking there of some other occasion than here, for the consecration by laying on of hands might be imparted on different occasions to the same man. It is more probable, however, that he is speaking of the same occasion in both passages, and “that Paul imposed hands along with the elders, but as the first” (de Wette).
It is further to be remarked that the word πρεσβυτέριον occurs elsewhere in the N. T. only as a name for the Jewish Sanhedrim (Luk_22:66; Act_22:5), and that it is used here only of the college of the Christian presbyters of a church.
[164] Otto grants, indeed, that χάρισμα never stands exactly for office, but thinks that χάρισμα may be used, as a predicate of the idea, office, which is certainly right. Otto, however, does not wish to take χάρισμα here as the office generally speaking, but (distinguishing in the office—(1) the rights of office; (2) the occupations of office) as the rights of office: “A position of power working out from within.” To ἐν he assigns the meaning “resting upon some one;” but, whatever Otto may say against it, the ἀναζωπυρεῖν (2Ti_1:6) does not accord with that idea. So long as any one holds the office, the rights of office remain to him undiminished; for these lie not in the person, but in the office, in the person only as holding the office. For such a meaning of ἐν , Otto has produced some passages from classic Greek, but none from the N. T.
[165] Beza goes still farther wrong when he continues: “Potest tamen etiam sic accipi, ut idem valeat εἰς προφητείαν , i. e. ad prophetandum; vel ἐν προφητείᾳ , ita ut quod sit hoc donum exprimat apostolus.”
[166] De Wette rightly: “The προφ . is only named as a part of the whole act of consecration by which the χαρ . was imparted, and the preposition διά is not to be referred in strictness only to προφ ., but also to the next words.”
[167] Bengel is wrong: “Constr. prophetiam presbyterii, nam manus imposuit Paulus Timotheo; impositio manus proprie fit per unam personam et quidem digniorem; prophetia vero fiebat etiam per aequales, per plures.”
[168] So also Hofmann, in whose opinion the “precedent” here alluded to (which, however, he is not willing to recognise as an ordination) must have taken place in Timothy’s “home-church.”
[169] Otto, in accordance with his whole view, places Timothy’s ordination in the last period of Paul’s three years at Ephesus. The reasons by which he seeks to establish this period as the one most exactly corresponding in Timothy’s life, are anything but sufficient.