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12. οἷς ἀπεκαλύφθη. In answer to their searching enquiry the prophets, says St Peter, though “it was not for them to know the times and seasons which the Father set within His own authority,” were nevertheless permitted to realize that the messages which they were delivering as God’s ministers (διηκόνουν) were not for their own times or their own people only, but that the manifestation of Messiah belonged to the far future and to all mankind. The teaching of the prophets had of course a primary message for their own times, but this did not exhaust its meaning.
νῦν means the Christian dispensation as contrasted with the earlier age of the prophets.
ἀνηγγέλη. The word occurs in Isa 52:15, οἶς οὐκ ἀνηγγέλη περὶ αὐτοῦ ὄψονται, a passage which St Paul applies to his own missionary work among the Gentiles, Rom 15:21, and so here St Peter, in thinking of the announcement to Gentiles, perhaps borrowed the word from St Paul. The verb ἀναγγέλλειν in the N.T. retains its proper classical meaning of announcing in detail. So here the several facts of the Gospel and the implicit teachings and hopes involved in them are announced by Christian teachers.
ὑμῖν. The T.R. reads ἡμῖν, which would mean “us Christians,” but all the best MSS. read ὑμῖν, which suggests the Gentiles.
διὰ τῶν εὐαγγελισαμένων ὑμᾶς, by the agency of those who gladdened you with good tidings. εὐαγγελίζεσθαι is used with an acc. of the person in Lk. and Acts, where the subject of the message is not given, otherwise the dative is used. The preachers referred to would include St Paul, Barnabas, Silas, Timothy, Epaphras (see Col.), and others whose names are unknown, but St Peter does not definitely claim any personal share in the work, and we have no evidence that he had ever visited Asia Minor.
πνεύματι ἁγίῳ ἀποσταλέντι ἀπʼ οὐρανοῦ. The T.R. has ἐν, an early Alexandrian interpolation, and the simple dative is almost unique. The “dynamic” dative describes that in virtue of which a thing exists or is done. The “instrumental” sense is only one aspect of this. πνεῦμα ἅγιον without the article might mean one who is none other than a spirit of holiness (cf. Heb 1:2, ἐλάλησεν ἡμῖν ἐν υἱῷ = one who is a Son and no mere prophet). It was the same Holy Spirit who “spake by the prophets,” but the mode of His operation was different. The outpouring of the Spirit, His mission to the world as sent (ἀποσταλέντι) by the Son from the Father did not take place until after the Ascension, cf. Joh 7:39, οὔπω γὰρ ἦν πνεῦμα ὅτι Ἰησοῦς οὔπω ἐδοξάσθη.
παρακύψαι. κύπτειν and its compounds are used of bending the body up, down, or forwards, e.g. κύψας = stooping down, συγκύπτειν = to be bowed together, ἀνακύπτειν = to straighten oneself or look up. So παρακύπτειν means to stretch the head forward to look into or down upon something. It is used of St John “peeping into” the tomb (Joh 20:5) and again in Jam 1:25 of a man who “glances into the perfect law of liberty.” So in the Book of Henoch (IX. i. p. 83, ed. Dillm.), from which St Peter may be borrowing here, it is used of the four archangels “looking down” upon the earth out of the sanctuary of heaven.
The angels are described as spectators of the Christian’s conflict in 1Co 4:9, θέατρον ἐγενήθημεν … ἀγγέλοις. They rejoice over one sinner that repents, Luk 15:10. They were watching the unfolding of the mystery of God’s loving purpose for the world in the Incarnation (ὤφθη ἀγγέλοις, 1Ti 3:16). So here the admission of the Gentiles is a further unfolding of that mystery pointing forward to “the final consummation of all things,” and each stage is watched with eager longing eyes by God’s angels as they “look down” upon the world. Similarly in Eph 3:10 St Paul says that the admission of the Gentiles into the Church is a making known of the manifold wisdom of God to principalities and powers in heavenly places.
This thought adds dignity to the position of Christians as God’s “chosen people.” Their “election” is due to the Father’s foreknowledge, it is effected by the sanctifying influence of the Holy Spirit, and sealed by the sprinkled blood of Christ as the covenant victim. They are begotten to a new life by the resurrection. A glorious inheritance is theirs. Their salvation was no new thing—no afterthought. It was the subject of anxious search on the part of the prophets who foretold it, and its future development is watched by angels with eager anticipation.