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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.com | DownloadCambridge Greek Testament for Schools and Colleges - 1 Peter 5:10 - 5:10
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10. πάσης χάριτος. The God of all grace or of every grace. St Peter’s readers might be tempted to doubt God’s favour towards them because of their sufferings. He therefore assures them that the same loving favour, which called the Gentiles (cf. 1Pe 1:10 τῆς εἰς ὑμᾶς χάριτος), is being exercised even in their sufferings, because they are to culminate in eternal glory, and in the meanwhile God’s favour will be shewn in equipping His followers with all needful strength.
εἰς τὴν αἰώνιον αὐτοῦ δόξαν probably points forward to the consummation of the glory as it will be finally revealed. But just as Christians share in eternal life here and now, so also they share in eternal glory. They have been called “out of darkness into God’s marvellous light” (1Pe 2:9), and even in their sufferings something of the glory already rests upon them, 1Pe 4:14.
ἐν Χριστῷ is probably used, as in the final salutation, of the incorporation of Christians in Christ. It is as “members of Christ” that they are called to share God’s glory. The expression “in Christ” is intensely Pauline but we have no warrant for supposing that the idea was peculiar to St Paul. It underlies much of St John’s language in his Epistles and sums up numerous sayings of our Lord recorded in the fourth Gospel.
ὀλίγον παθόντας, for ὀλίγον cf. 1Pe 1:6. Here it probably means for a little while as contrasted with eternal glory, but the brevity of the Christian’s sufferings is only one aspect of their slightness.
Westcott and Hort join ὀλίγον παθόντας with the verbs which follow, that God will perfect, stablish and strengthen them after they have suffered a little while. But stablishing and strengthening at any rate would be more necessary during the time of suffering rather than after it. Therefore, if the words are to be thus connected, the aorist participle might be explained as summing up as one idea the whole period of suffering during which God’s help will be given. The A.V. and R.V. place a comma both before and after the words “after ye have suffered for a little while” leaving it uncertain whether they are to be joined with the preceding clause or with the verbs which follow. It seems better however to take ὀλίγον παθόντας with καλέσας, that God has called them to eternal glory after a brief discipline of suffering, because (a) this gives the most natural meaning to the aorist participle, viz. after you have suffered, (b) it is somewhat characteristic of St Peter’s style to put an emphatic participle at the end of a clause, e.g. πάσχων ἀδίκως, 1Pe 2:19; βλασφημοῦντες, 1Pe 4:4.
αὐτὸς, shall Himself, etc. Besides the mutual support which members of the brotherhood may give to one another they have the assurance of God’s own support.
καταρτίσει either restore R.V. marg. or perfect R.V. The verb is used in Mat 4:21; Mar 1:19 of the disciples mending their nets; in Gal 6:1 of restoring one who has been overtaken by a fault; in 1Th 3:10 of making good deficiencies. Again in 1Co 1:10; 2Co 13:11 it may refer to the restoration needed by the Corinthian Church in consequence of their party factions, etc. So here it may mean that the Christian when bruised and battered by persecution will be refitted and restored by God’s grace.
Elsewhere however the word means to fit out or equip perfectly; so Luk 6:40 “everyone when he is perfected shall be as his Master”; and this may be the meaning here, that God will not leave His followers insufficiently equipped for the fray.
στηρίξει, shall stablish you. The word is used of fixing a thing firmly, making it stable. St Peter when warned of his fall was bidden “when once thou hast turned again stablish thy brethren” (Luk 22:32). St Paul uses it frequently of God, Rom 16:25; 2Th 2:17; 2Th 3:3, while it is used of men in 1Th 3:2; Jam 5:8; Rev 3:2.
σθενώσει, shall strengthen you. The verb occurs nowhere else in the Greek Bible and σθένος is only found three times in the LXX. and never in the N.T., though ἀσθενής, ἀσθένεια and ἀσθενεῖν are frequently used of bodily or moral weakness.
[θεμελιώσει], shall settle you, give you a firm foundation, is added by nearly all MSS. except AB Vulg. Aeth. and is retained in the R.V. marg.
In all the above verbs the T.R., following most of the later MSS., instead of the future indicative, reads the 3rd person 1st aorist optative καταρτίσαι κ.τ.λ. = may he perfect (or restore) you, etc.