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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.com | DownloadCambridge Greek Testament for Schools and Colleges - Philippians 3:2 - 3:2
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This Chapter Verse Commentaries:
2. βλέπετε. “Comp. Mar 4:24, βλέπετε τί ἀκούετε: 2Jn 1:8, βλέπετε ἑαυτούς: so frequently βλέπετε ἀπὸ (e.g. Mar 8:15) and βλέπετε μὴ (e.g. Luk 21:8)” (Lightfoot).—Latin Versions, videte.
τοὺς κύνας. “The dogs”; a known class or party; evidently the Judaistic teachers within the Church, to whom he has referred already in another tone and connexion (Php 1:15) as active at Rome. These Pharisee-Christians perhaps called the uncircumcised converts κύνες, as the Pharisees proper called all Gentiles. See e.g. Joh. Lightfoot (Hor. Hebr. on Mat 15:26): “By this title the Jews disgraced the Gentiles … אומות עולם נמשלו ככלבים. The nations of the world [that is the heathen] are likened to dogs [Midr. Tillin, fol. 6. 3].” The habits of the dog suggest ideas of uncleanness; and its half-wild condition in Eastern towns makes it a simile for an outcast. In Scripture, the “dog” appears in connexions almost always of either contempt or dread; e.g. 1Sa 24:14; 2Ki 8:13; Psa 22:16; Psa 22:20; Mat 7:6; Rev 22:15. St Paul here “turns the tables” on the Judaistic rigorist. The Judaist, and not the simple believer who comes direct from paganism to Messiah, is the real outcast from Messiah’s covenant. The same view is expressed more fully, Gal 5:2-4 : κατηργήθητε ἀπὸ Χριστοῦ, οἵτινες ἐν νόμῳ δικαιοῦσθε.
τοὺς κακοὺς ἐργάτας. “The evil workers” (R.V.). Or possibly, “the bad,” i.e. unskilful, “workmen.” These are the same persons under another view. Possibly, by a sort of verbal play, he alludes to their doctrine of salvation by “works,” ἔργα, not by faith (see e.g. Rom 3:27; Rom 11:6; Gal 2:16; Gal 3:2); as if to say, “They are all for working, to win merit. But they are bungling workmen, spoiling the fabric of the Gospel.” See 2Co 11:13 for the same apparent double meaning of this word; ψευδαπόστολοι, ἐργάται δόλιοι.
See Php 2:12 above for the precept to work in the right sense and direction.
τὴν κατατομήν. Latin Versions, concisionem. “The mutilation”; i.e. the persons who teach it. By this harsh word, kindred to περιτομή, he condemns the Judaist’s rigid zeal for bodily circumcision. In the light of the Gospel, to demand circumcision as a saving ordinance was to demand a mere maltreatment of the body, no better than that of the Baal-priests (1Ki 18:28, κατετέμνοντο κατὰ τὸν ἐθισμὸν αὐτῶν, LXX.).
See Lightfoot on Gal 5:12 (ὄφελον καὶ ἀποκόψονται) for a somewhat similar use of words in a kindred connexion. Lightfoot’s interesting note here gives other instances of St Paul’s play on words; e.g. 2Th 3:11, ἐργαζόμενος, περιεργαζομένους; Rom 12:3, φρονεῖν, ὑπερφρονεῖν, σωφρονεῖν. Cp. Act 8:30, γινώσκεις ἃ ἀναγινώσκεις;
Wyclif curiously renders, “se ye dyuysioun”; Tindale and ‘Cranmer,’ “Beware of dissencion (dissensyon).”