{"commentary":{"id":"jamieson-fausset-brown","name":"Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary","website":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jamieson-Fausset-Brown_Bible_Commentary","licenseUrl":"https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/","licenseNotes":null,"licenseNotice":null,"englishName":"Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary","language":"eng","textDirection":"rtl","sha256":"db3d4c8b3c1f32ef9d1430a57392e02bda3a17aac1f9bbe398461de021a3cb13","availableFormats":["json"],"listOfBooksApiLink":"/api/c/jamieson-fausset-brown/books.json","listOfProfilesApiLink":"/api/c/jamieson-fausset-brown/profiles.json","numberOfBooks":66,"totalNumberOfChapters":1187,"totalNumberOfVerses":17056,"totalNumberOfProfiles":0,"languageName":"English","languageEnglishName":"English"},"book":{"id":"1PE","commentaryId":"jamieson-fausset-brown","name":"1 Peter","commonName":"1 Peter","introduction":"ITS GENUINENESS is attested by Pe2 3:1. On the authority of Second Peter, see the Introduction. Also by POLYCARP (in EUSEBIUS [Ecclesiastical History, 4.14]), who, in writing to the Philippians, quotes many passages: in the second chapter he quotes Pe1 1:13, Pe1 1:21; Pe1 3:9; in the fifth chapter, Pe1 2:11. EUSEBIUS says of PAPIAS [Ecclesiastical History, 3.39] that he, too, quotes Peter's First Epistle. IRENÆUS [Against Heresies, 4.9.2] expressly mentions it; and in [4.16.5], Pe1 2:16. CLEMENT OF ALEXANDRIA [Miscellanies, 1.3, p. 544], quotes Pe1 2:11-12, Pe1 2:15-16; and [p. 562], Pe1 1:21-22; and [4, p. 584], Pe1 3:14-17; and [p. 585], Pe1 4:12-14. ORIGEN (in EUSEBIUS [Ecclesiastical History, 6.25]) mentions this Epistle; in [Homily 7, on Joshua, vol. 2, p. 63], he mentions both Epistles; and [Commentary on Psalm 3 and on John], he mentions Pe1 3:18-21. TERTULLIAN [Antidote to the Scorpion's Sting, 12], quotes expressly Pe1 2:20-21; and [Antidote to the Scorpion's Sting, 14], Pe1 2:13, Pe1 2:17. EUSEBIUS states it as the opinion of those before him that this was among the universally acknowledged Epistles. The Peschito Syriac Version contains it. The fragment of the canon called MURATORI'S omits it. Excepting this, and the Paulician heretics, who rejected it, all ancient testimony is on its side. The internal evidence is equally strong. The author calls himself the apostle Peter, Pe1 1:1, and \"a witness of Christ's sufferings,\" and an \"elder,\" Pe1 5:1. The energy of the style harmonizes with the warmth of Peter's character; and, as ERASMUS says, this Epistle is full of apostolic dignity and authority and is worthy of the leader among the apostles.\n\nPETER'S PERSONAL HISTORY.--Simon, Or Simeon, was a native of Bethsaida on the Sea of Galilee, son of Jonas or John. With his father and his brother Andrew he carried on trade as a fisherman at Capernaum, his subsequent place of abode. He was a married man, and tradition represents his wife's name as Concordia or Perpetua. CLEMENT OF ALEXANDRIA says that she suffered martyrdom, her husband encouraging her to be faithful unto death, \"Remember, dear, our Lord.\" His wife's mother was restored from a fever by Christ. He was brought to Jesus by his brother Andrew, who had been a disciple of John the Baptist, but was pointed to the Saviour as \"the Lamb of God\" by his master (Joh 1:29). Jesus, on first beholding him, gave him the name by which chiefly he is known, indicative of his subsequent character and work in the Church, \"Peter\" (Greek) or \"Cephas\" (Aramaic), a stone (Mat 4:18). He did not join our Lord finally until a subsequent period. The leading incidents in his apostolic life are well known: his walking on the troubled waters to meet Jesus, but sinking through doubting (Mat 14:30); his bold and clear acknowledgment of the divine person and office of Jesus (Mat 16:16; Mar 8:29; Joh 11:27), notwithstanding the difficulties in the way of such belief, whence he was then also designated as the stone, or rock (Mat 16:18); but his rebuke of his Lord when announcing what was so unpalatable to carnal prejudices, Christ's coming passion and death (Mat 16:22); his passing from one extreme to the opposite, in reference to Christ's offer to wash his feet (Joh 13:8-9); his self-confident assertion that he would never forsake his Lord, whatever others might do (Mat 26:33), followed by his base denial of Christ thrice with curses (Mat 26:75); his deep penitence; Christ's full forgiveness and prophecy of his faithfulness unto death, after he had received from him a profession of \"love\" as often repeated as his previous denial (Joh 21:15-17). These incidents illustrate his character as zealous, pious, and ardently attached to the Lord, but at the same time impulsive in feeling, rather than calmly and continuously steadfast. Prompt in action and ready to avow his convictions boldly, he was hasty in judgment, precipitate, and too self-confident in the assertion of his own steadfastness; the result was that, though he abounded in animal courage, his moral courage was too easily overcome by fear of man's opinion. A wonderful change was wrought in him by his restoration after his fall, through the grace of his risen Lord. His zeal and ardor became sanctified, being chastened by a spirit of unaffected humility. His love to the Lord was, if possible, increased, while his mode of manifesting it now was in doing and suffering for His name, rather than in loud protestations. Thus, when imprisoned and tried before the Sanhedrim for preaching Christ, he boldly avowed his determination to continue to do so. He is well called \"the mouth of the apostles.\" His faithfulness led to his apprehension by Herod Agrippa, with a view to his execution, from which, however, he was delivered by the angel of the Lord.\n\nAfter the ascension he took the lead in the Church; and on the descent of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost, he exercised the designed power of \"the keys\" of Christ's kingdom, by opening the door of the Church, in preaching, for the admission of thousands of Israelites; and still more so in opening (in obedience to a special revelation) an entrance to the \"devout\" (that is, Jewish proselyte from heathendom) Gentile, Cornelius: the forerunner of the harvest gathered in from idolatrous Gentiles at Antioch. This explains in what sense Christ used as to him the words, \"Upon this rock I will build my Church\" (Mat 16:18), namely, on the preaching of Christ, the true \"Rock,\" by connection with whom only he was given the designation: a title shared in common on the same grounds by the rest of the apostles, as the first founders of the Church on Christ, \"the chief corner-stone\" (Eph 2:20). A name is often given in Hebrew, not that the person is actually the thing itself, but has some special relation to it; as Elijah means Mighty Jehovah, so Simon is called Peter \"the rock,\" not that he is so, save by connection with Jesus, the only true Rock (Isa 28:16; Co1 3:11). As subsequently he identified himself with \"Satan,\" and is therefore called so (Mat 16:23), in the same way, by his clear confession of Christ, the Rock, he became identified with Him, and is accordingly so called (Mat 16:18). It is certain that there is no instance on record of Peter's having ever claimed or exercised supremacy; on the contrary, he is represented as sent by the apostles at Jerusalem to confirm the Samaritans baptized by Philip the deacon; again at the council of Jerusalem, not he, but James the president, or leading bishop in the Church of that city, pronounced the authoritative decision: Act 15:19, \"My sentence is,\" &c. A kind of primacy, doubtless (though certainly not supremacy), was given him on the ground of his age, and prominent earnestness, and boldness in taking the lead on many important occasions. Hence he is called \"first\" in enumerating the apostles. Hence, too, arise the phrases, \"Peter and the Eleven,\" \"Peter and the rest of the apostles\"; and Paul, in going up to Jerusalem after his conversion, went to see Peter in particular.\n\nOnce only he again betrayed the same spirit of vacillation through fear of man's reproach which had caused his denial of his Lord. Though at the Jerusalem council he advocated the exemption of Gentile converts from the ceremonial observances of the law, yet he, after having associated in closest intercourse with the Gentiles at Antioch, withdrew from them, through dread of the prejudices of his Jewish brethren who came from James, and timidly dissembled his conviction of the religious equality of Jew and Gentile; for this Paul openly withstood and rebuked him: a plain refutation of his alleged supremacy and infallibility (except where specially inspired, as in writing his Epistles). In all other cases he showed himself to be, indeed, as Paul calls him, \"a pillar\" (Gal 2:9). Subsequently we find him in \"Babylon,\" whence he wrote this First Epistle to the Israelite believers of the dispersion, and the Gentile Christians united in Christ, in Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia.\n\nJEROME [On Illustrious Men, 1] states that \"Peter, after having been bishop of Antioch, and after having preached to the believers of the circumcision in Pontus, &c. [plainly inferred from Pe1 1:1], in the second year of Claudius went to Rome to refute Simon Magus, and for twenty-five years there held the episcopal chair, down to the last year of Nero, that is, the fourteenth, by whom he was crucified with his head downwards, declaring himself unworthy to be crucified as his Lord, and was buried in the Vatican, near the triumphal way.\" EUSEBIUS [Chronicles, Anno 3], also asserts his episcopate at Antioch; his assertion that Peter founded that Church contradicts Act 11:19-22. His journey to Rome to oppose Simon Magus arose from JUSTIN'S story of the statue found at Rome (really the statue of the Sabine god, Semo Sanctus, or Hercules, mistaken as if Simon Magus were worshipped by that name, \"Simoni Deo Sancto\"; found in the Tiber in 1574, or on an island in the Tiber in 1662), combined with the account in Acts 8:9-24. The twenty-five years' bishopric is chronologically impossible, as it would make Peter, at the interview with Paul at Antioch, to have been then for some years bishop of Rome! His crucifixion is certain from Christ's prophecy, Joh 21:18-19. DIONYSIUS OF CORINTH (in EUSEBIUS [Ecclesiastical History, 2.25]) asserted in an epistle to the Romans, that Paul and Peter planted both the Roman and Corinthian churches, and endured martyrdom in Italy at the same time. So TERTULLIAN [Against Marcion, 4.5, and The Prescription Against Heretics, 36, 38]. Also Caius, the presbyter of Rome, in EUSEBIUS [Ecclesiastical History, 2.25] asserts that some memorials of their martyrdom were to be seen at Rome on the road to Ostia. So EUSEBIUS [Ecclesiastical History, 2.25, and Demonstration of the Gospel, 3.116]. So LACTANTIUS [Of the Manner in Which the Persecutors Died, 2]. Many of the details are palpably false; whether the whole be so or not is dubious, considering the tendency to concentrate at Rome events of interest [ALFORD]. What is certain is, that Peter was not there before the writing of the Epistle to the Romans (A.D. 58), otherwise he would have been mentioned in it; nor during Paul's first imprisonment at Rome, otherwise he would have been mentioned in some one of Paul's many other Epistles written from Rome; nor during Paul's second imprisonment, at least when he was writing the Second Epistle to Timothy, just before his martyrdom. He may have gone to Rome after Paul's death, and, as common tradition represents, been imprisoned in the Mamertine dungeon, and crucified on the Janiculum, on the eminence of St. Pietro in Montorio, and his remains deposited under the great altar in the center of the famous basilica of St. Peter. AMBROSE [Epistles, 33 (Edition Paris, 1586), p. 1022] relates that St. Peter, not long before his death, being overcome by the solicitations of his fellow Christians to save himself, was fleeing from Rome when he was met by our Lord, and on asking, \"Lord, whither goest Thou?\" received the answer, \"I go to be crucified afresh.\" On this he returned and joyfully went to martyrdom. The church called \"Domine quo vadis\" on the Appian Way, commemorates the legend. It is not unlikely that the whole tradition is built on the connection which existed between Paul and Peter. As Paul, \"the apostle of the uncircumcision,\" wrote Epistles to Galatia, Ephesus, and Colosse, and to Philemon at Colosse, making the Gentile Christians the persons prominently addressed, and the Jewish Christians subordinately so; so, vice versa, Peter, \"the apostle of the circumcision,\" addressed the same churches, the Jewish Christians in them primarily, and the Gentile Christians also, secondarily.\n\nTO WHOM HE ADDRESSES THIS EPISTLE.--The heading, Pe1 1:1, \"to the elect strangers (spiritually pilgrims) of the dispersion\" (Greek), clearly marks the Christians of the Jewish dispersion as prominently addressed, but still including also Gentile Christians as grafted into the Christian Jewish stock by adoption and faith, and so being part of the true Israel. Pe1 1:14; Pe1 2:9-10; Pe1 3:6; Pe1 4:3 clearly prove this. Thus he, the apostle of the circumcision, sought to unite in one Christ Jew and Gentile, promoting thereby the same work and doctrine as Paul the apostle of the uncircumcision. The provinces are named by Peter in the heading in the order proceeding from northeast to south and west. Pontus was the country of the Christian Jew Aquila. To Galatia Paul paid two visits, founding and confirming churches. Crescens, his companion, went there about the time of Paul's last imprisonment, just before his martyrdom. Ancyra was subsequently its ecclesiastical metropolis. Men of Cappadocia, as well as of \"Pontus\" and \"Asia,\" were among the hearers of Peter's effective sermon on the Pentecost whereon the Spirit decended on the Church; these probably brought home to their native land the first tidings of the Gospel. Proconsular \"Asia\" included Mysia, Lydia, Caria, Phrygia, Pisidia, and Lyaconia. In Lycaonia were the churches of Iconium, founded by Paul and Barnabas; of Lystra, Timothy's birthplace, where Paul was stoned at the instigation of the Jews; and of Derbe, the birthplace of Gaius, or Caius. In Pisidia was Antioch, where Paul was the instrument of converting many, but was driven out by the Jews. In Caria was Miletus, containing doubtless a Christian Church. In Phrygia, Paul preached both times when visiting Galatia in its neighborhood, and in it were the churches of Laodicea, Hierapolis, and Colosse, of which last Church Philemon and Onesimus were members, and Archippus and Epaphras leaders. In Lydia was the Philadelphian Church, favorably noticed in Rev 3:7, &c.; that of Sardis, the capital, and of Thyatira, and of Ephesus, founded by Paul, and a scene of the labors of Aquila and Priscilla and Apollos, and subsequently of more than two whole years' labor of Paul again, and subsequently censured for falling from its first love in Rev 2:4. Smyrna of Ionia was in the same quarter, and as one of the seven churches receives unqualified praise. In Mysia was Pergamos. Troas, too, is known as the scene of Paul's preaching and raising Eutychus to life (Act 20:6-10), and of his subsequently staying for a time with Carpus (Ti2 4:13). Of \"Bithynia,\" no Church is expressly named in Scripture elsewhere. When Paul at an earlier period \"assayed to go into Bithynia\" (Act 16:7), the Spirit suffered him not. But afterwards, we infer from Pe1 1:1, the Spirit did impart the Gospel to that country, possibly by Peter's ministry, In government, these several churches, it appears from this Epistle (Pe1 5:1-2, \"Feed,\" &c.), were much in the same states as when Paul addressed the Ephesian \"elders\" at Miletus (Act 20:17, Act 20:28, \"feed\") in very similar language; elders or presbyter-bishops ruled, while the apostles exercised the general superintendence. They were exposed to persecutions, though apparently not systematic, but rather annoyances and reproach arising from their not joining their heathen neighbors in riotous living, into which, however, some of them were in danger of falling. The evils which existed among themselves, and which are therefore reproved, were ambition and lucre-seeking on the part of the presbyters (Pe1 5:2-3), evil thoughts and words among the members in general, and a want of sympathy and generosity towards one another.\n\nHIS OBJECT seems to be, by the prospect of their heavenly portion and by Christ's example, to afford consolation to the persecuted, and prepare them for a greater approaching ordeal, and to exhort all, husbands, wives, servants, presbyters, and people, to a due discharge of relative duties, so as to give no handle to the enemy to reproach Christianity, but rather to win them to it, and so to establish them in \"the true grace of God wherein they stand\" (Pe1 5:12). However, see on Pe1 5:12, on the oldest reading. ALFORD rightly argues that \"exhorting and testifying\" there, refer to Peter's exhortations throughout the Epistle grounded on testimony which he bears to the Gospel truth, already well known to his readers by the teaching of Paul in those churches. They were already introduced \"into\" (so the Greek, Pe1 5:12) this grace of God as their safe standing-ground. Compare Co1 15:1, \"I declare unto you the Gospel wherein ye stand.\" Therefore he does not, in this Epistle, set forth a complete statement of this Gospel doctrine of grace, but falls back on it as already known. Compare Pe1 1:8, Pe1 1:18, \"ye know\"; Pe1 3:15; Pe2 3:1. Not that Peter servilely copies the style and mode of teaching of Paul, but as an independent witness in his own style attests the same truths. We may divide the Epistle into: (I) The inscription (Pe1 1:1-2). (II) The stirring-up of a pure feeling in believers as born again of God. By the motive of hope to which God has regenerated us (Pe1 1:3-12); bringing forth the fruit of faith, considering the costly price paid for our redemption from sin (Pe1 1:14-21). Being purified by the Spirit unto love of the brethren as begotten of God's eternal word, as spiritual priest-kings, to whom alone Christ is precious (Pe1 1:22; Pe1 2:10); after Christ's example in suffering, maintaining a good conversation in every relation (Pe1 2:10; Pe1 3:14), and a good profession of faith as having in view Christ's once-offered sacrifice, and His future coming to judgment (Pe1 3:15; Pe1 4:11); and exhibiting patience in adversity, as looking for future glorification with Christ, (1) in general as Christians, Pe1 4:12-19; (2) each in his own sphere, Pe1 5:1-11. \"The title \"Beloved\" marks the separation of the second part from the first, Pe1 2:11; and of the third part from the second, Pe1 4:12\" [BENGEL]. (III). The conclusion.\n\nTIME AND PLACE OF WRITING.--It was plainly before the open and systematic persecution of the later years of Nero had begun. That this Epistle was written after Paul's Epistles, even those written during his imprisonment at Rome, ending in A.D. 63, appears from the acquaintance which Peter in this Epistle shows he has with them. Compare Pe1 2:13 with Ti1 2:2-4; Pe1 2:18 with Eph 6:5; Pe1 1:2 with Eph 1:4-7; Pe1 1:3 with Eph 1:3; Pe1 1:14 with Rom 12:2; Pe1 2:6-10 with Rom 9:32-33; Pe1 2:13 with Rom 13:1-4; Pe1 2:16 with Gal 5:13; Pe1 2:18 with Eph 6:5; Pe1 3:1 with Eph 5:22; Pe1 3:9 with Rom 12:17; Pe1 4:9 with Phi 2:14; Rom 12:13 and Heb 13:2; Pe1 4:10 with Rom 12:6-8; Pe1 5:1 with Rom 8:18; Pe1 5:5 with Eph 5:21; Phi 2:3, Phi 2:5-8; Pe1 5:8 with Th1 5:6; Pe1 5:14 with Co1 16:20. Moreover, in Pe1 5:13, Mark is mentioned as with Peter in Babylon. This must have been after Col 4:10 (A.D. 61-63), when Mark was with Paul at Rome, but intending to go to Asia Minor. Again, in Ti2 4:11 (A.D. 67 or 68), Mark was in or near Ephesus, in Asia Minor, and Timothy is told to bring him to Rome. So that it is likely it was after this, namely, after Paul's martyrdom, that Mark joined Peter, and consequently that this Epistle was written. It is not likely that Peter would have entrenched on Paul's field of labor, the churches of Asia Minor, during Paul's lifetime. The death of the apostle of the uncircumcision, and the consequent need of someone to follow up his teachings, probably gave occasion to the testimony given by Peter to the same churches, collectively addressed, in behalf of the same truth. The relation in which the Pauline Gentile churches stood towards the apostles at Jerusalem favors this view. Even the Gentile Christians would naturally look to the spiritual fathers of the Church at Jerusalem, the center whence the Gospel had emanated to them, for counsel wherewith to meet the pretensions of Judaizing Christians and heretics; and Peter, always prominent among the apostles in Jerusalem, would even when elsewhere feel a deep interest in them, especially when they were by death bereft of Paul's guidance. BIRKS [HorÃ&brvbr EvangelicÃ&brvbr] suggests that false teachers may have appealed from Paul's doctrine to that of James and Peter. Peter then would naturally write to confirm the doctrines of grace and tacitly show there was no difference between his teaching and Paul's. BIRKS prefers dating the Epistle A.D. 58, after Paul's second visit to Galatia, when Silvanus was with him, and so could not have been with Peter (A.D. 54), and before his imprisonment at Rome, when Mark was with him, and so could not have been with Peter (A.D. 62); perhaps when Paul was detained at CÃ&brvbrsarea, and so debarred from personal intercourse with those churches. I prefer the view previously stated. This sets aside the tradition that Paul and Peter suffered martyrdom together at Rome. ORIGEN'S and EUSEBIUS' statement that Peter visited the churches of Asia in person seems very probable.\n\nThe PLACE OF WRITING was doubtless Babylon on the Euphrates (Pe1 5:13). It is most improbable that in the midst of writing matter-of-fact communications and salutations in a remarkably plain Epistle, the symbolical language of prophecy (namely, \"Babylon\" for Rome) should be used. JOSEPHUS [Antiquities, 15.2.2; 3.1] states that there was a great multitude of Jews in the Chaldean Babylon; it is therefore likely that \"the apostle of the circumcision\" (Gal 2:7-8) would at some time or other visit them. Some have maintained that the Babylon meant was in Egypt because Mark preached in and around Alexandria after Peter's death, and therefore it is likely he did so along with that apostle in the same region previously. But no mention elsewhere in Scripture is made of this Egyptian Babylon, but only of the Chaldean one. And though towards the close of Caligula's reign a persecution drove the Jews thence to Seleucia, and a plague five years after still further thinned their numbers, yet this does not preclude their return and multiplication during the twenty years that elapsed between the plague and the writing of the Epistle. Moreover, the order in which the countries are enumerated, from northeast to south and west, is such as would be adopted by one writing from the Oriental Babylon on the Euphrates, not from Egypt or Rome. Indeed, COSMAS INDICOPLEUSTES, in the sixth century, understood the Babylon meant to be outside the Roman empire. Silvanus, Paul's companion, became subsequently Peter's, and was the carrier of this Epistle.\n\nSTYLE.--Fervor and practical truth, rather than logical reasoning, are the characteristics, of this Epistle, as they were of its energetic, warm-hearted writer. His familiarity with Paul's Epistles shown in the language accords with what we should expect from the fact of Paul's having \"communicated the Gospel which he preached among the Gentiles\" (as revealed specially to him) to Peter among others \"of reputation\" (Gal 2:2). Individualities occur, such as baptism, \"the answer of a good conscience toward God\" (Pe1 3:21); \"consciousness of God\" (Greek), Pe1 2:19, as a motive for enduring sufferings; \"living hope\" (Pe1 1:3); \"an inheritance incorruptible, undefiled, and that fadeth not away\" (Pe1 1:4); \"kiss of charity\" (Pe1 5:14). Christ is viewed less in relation to His past sufferings than as at present exalted and hereafter to be manifested in all His majesty. Glory and hope are prominent features in this Epistle (Pe1 1:8), so much so that WEISS entitles him \"the apostle of hope.\" The realization of future bliss as near causes him to regard believers as but \"strangers\" and \"sojourners\" here. Chastened fervor, deep humility, and ardent love appear, just as we should expect from one who had been so graciously restored after his grievous fall. \"Being converted,\" he truly does \"strengthen his brethren.\" His fervor shows itself in often repeating the same thought in similar words.\n\nIn some passages he shows familiarity with the Epistle of James, the apostle of special weight with the Jewish legalizing party, whose inspiration he thus confirms (compare Pe1 1:6-7 with Jam 1:2-3; Pe1 1:24 with Jam 1:10; Pe1 2:1 with Jam 1:21; Pe1 4:8 with Jam 5:20, both quoting Pro 10:12; Pro 5:5 with Jam 4:6, both quoting Pro 3:34). In most of these cases Old Testament quotations are the common ground of both. \"Strong susceptibility to outward impressions, liveliness of feeling, dexterity in handling subjects, dispose natures like that of Peter to repeat afresh the thoughts of others\" [STEIGER].\n\nThe diction of this Epistle and of his speeches in Acts is very similar: an undesigned coincidence, and so a mark of genuineness (compare Pe1 2:7 with Act 4:11; Pe1 1:12 with Act 5:32; Pe1 2:24 with Act 5:30; Act 10:39; Pe1 5:1 with Act 2:32; Act 3:15; Pe1 1:10 with Act 3:18; Act 10:43; Pe1 1:21 with Act 3:15; Act 10:40; Pe1 4:5 with Act 10:42; Pe1 2:24 with Act 3:19, Act 3:26).\n\nThere is, too, a recurrence to the language of the Lord at the last interview after His resurrection, recorded in Joh 21:15-23. Compare \"the Shepherd . . . of . . . souls,\" Pe1 2:25; \"Feed the flock of God,\" \"the chief Shepherd,\" Pe1 5:2, Pe1 5:4, with Joh 21:15-17; \"Feed My lambs . . . sheep\"; also \"Whom . . . ye love,\" Pe1 1:8; Pe1 2:7, with Joh 21:15-17; \"lovest thou Me?\" and Pe2 1:14, with Joh 21:18-19. WIESINGER well says, \"He who in loving impatience cast himself into the sea to meet the Lord, is also the man who most earnestly testifies to the hope of His return; he who dated his own faith from the sufferings of his Master, is never weary in holding up the suffering form of the Lord before his readers to comfort and stimulate them; he before whom the death of a martyr is in assured expectation, is the man who, in the greatest variety of aspects, sets forth the duty, as well as the consolation, of suffering for Christ; as a rock of the Church he grounds his readers against the storm of present tribulation on the true Rock of ages.\" \n\n\n\nNext: 1 Peter Chapter 1\n\n","order":60,"numberOfChapters":5,"sha256":"d7037e855735a967e617907b75a342b80b3a52dbe6bc27a42d2b46c8013e4bca","firstChapterNumber":1,"firstChapterApiLink":"/api/c/jamieson-fausset-brown/1PE/1.json","firstChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"jamieson-fausset-brown","book":"1PE","chapter":1},"lastChapterNumber":5,"lastChapterApiLink":"/api/c/jamieson-fausset-brown/1PE/5.json","lastChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"jamieson-fausset-brown","book":"1PE","chapter":5},"totalNumberOfVerses":99},"chapter":{"number":2,"content":[{"type":"verse","number":2,"content":["new-born babes--altogether without \"guile\" (Pe1 2:1). As long as we are here we are \"babes,\" in a specially tender relation to God (Isa 40:11). The childlike spirit is indispensable if we would enter heaven. \"Milk\" is here not elementary truths in contradistinction to more advanced Christian truths, as in Co1 3:2; Heb 5:12-13; but in contrast to \"guile, hypocrisies,\" &c. (Pe1 2:1); the simplicity of Christian doctrine in general to the childlike spirit. The same \"word of grace\" which is the instrument in regeneration, is the instrument also of building up. \"The mother of the child is also its natural nurse\" [STEIGER]. The babe, instead of chemically analyzing, instinctively desires and feeds on the milk; so our part is not self-sufficient rationalizing and questioning, but simply receiving the truth in the love of it (Mat 11:25). \n\ndesire--Greek, \"have a yearning desire for,\" or \"longing after,\" a natural impulse to the regenerate, \"for as no one needs to teach new-born babes what food to take, knowing instinctively that a table is provided for them in their mother's breast,\" so the believer of himself thirsts after the word of God (Psa. 119:1-176). Compare TATIUS' language as to Achilles. \n\nsincere--Greek, \"guileless.\" Compare Pe1 2:1, \"laying aside guile.\" IRENÆUS says of heretics. They mix chalk with the milk. The article, \"the,\" implies that besides the well-known pure milk, the Gospel, there is no other pure, unadulterated doctrine; it alone can make us guileless (Pe1 2:1). \n\nof the word--Not as ALFORD, \"spiritual,\" nor \"reasonable,\" as English Version in Rom 12:1. The Greek \"logos\" in Scripture is not used of the reason, or mind, but of the WORD; the preceding context requires that \"the word\" should be meant here; the adjective \"logikos\" follows the meaning of the noun logos, \"word.\" Jam 1:21, \"Lay apart all filthiness . . . and receive with meekness the engrafted WORD,\" is exactly parallel, and confirms English Version here. \n\ngrow--The oldest manuscripts and versions read, \"grow unto salvation.\" Being BORN again unto salvation, we are also to grow unto salvation. The end to which growth leads is perfected salvation. \"Growth is the measure of the fulness of that, not only rescue from destruction, but positive blessedness, which is implied in salvation\" [ALFORD]. \n\nthereby--Greek, \"in it\"; fed on it; in its strength (Act 11:14). \"The word is to be desired with appetite as the cause of life, to be swallowed in the hearing, to be chewed as cud is by rumination with the understanding, and to be digested by faith\" [TERTULLIAN].\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":3,"content":["Peter alludes to Psa 34:8. The first \"tastes\" of God's goodness are afterwards followed by fuller and happier experiences. A taste whets the appetite [BENGEL]. \n\ngracious--Greek, \"good,\" benignant, kind; as God is revealed to us in Christ, \"the Lord\" (Pe1 2:4), we who are born again ought so to be good and kind to the brethren (Pe1 1:22). \"Whosoever has not tasted the word to him it is not sweet it has not reached the heart; but to them who have experienced it, who with the heart believe, 'Christ has been sent for me and is become my own: my miseries are His, and His life mine,' it tastes sweet\" [LUTHER].\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":4,"content":["coming--drawing near (same Greek as here, Heb 10:22) by faith continually; present tense: not having come once for all at conversion. \n\nstone--Peter (that is, a stone, named so by Christ) desires that all similarly should be living stones BUILT ON CHRIST, THE TRUE FOUNDATION-STONE; compare his speech in Act 4:11. An undesigned coincidence and mark of genuineness. The Spirit foreseeing the Romanist perversion of Mat 16:18 (compare Mat 16:16, \"Son of the LIVING God,\" which coincides with his language here, \"the LIVING stone\"), presciently makes Peter himself to refuse it. He herein confirms Paul's teaching. Omit the as unto of English Version. Christ is positively termed the \"living stone\"; living, as having life in Himself from the beginning, and as raised from the dead to live evermore (Rev 1:18) after His rejection by men, and so the source of life to us. Like no earthly rock, He lives and gives life. Compare Co1 10:4, and the type, Exo 17:6; Num 20:11. \n\ndisallowed--rejected, reprobated; referred to also by Christ Himself: also by Paul; compare the kindred prophecies, Isa 8:14; Luk 2:34. \n\nchosen of God--literally, \"with (or 'in the presence and judgment of') God elect,\" or, \"chosen out\" (Pe1 2:6). Many are alienated from the Gospel, because it is not everywhere in favor, but is on the contrary rejected by most men. Peter answers that, though rejected by men, Christ is peculiarly the stone of salvation honored by God, first so designated by Jacob in his deathbed prophecy.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":5,"content":["Ye also, as lively stones--partaking of the name and life which is in \"THE LIVING STONE\" (Pe1 2:4; Co1 3:11). Many names which belong to Christ in the singular are assigned to Christians in the plural. He is \"THE SON,\" \"High Priest,\" \"King,\" \"Lamb\"; they, \"sons,\" \"priests,\" \"kings,\" \"sheep,\" \"lambs.\" So the Shulamite called from Solomon [BENGEL]. \n\nare built up--Greek, \"are being built up,\" as in Eph 2:22. Not as ALFORD, \"Be ye built up.\" Peter grounds his exhortations, Pe1 2:2, Pe1 2:11, &c., on their conscious sense of their high privileges as living stones in the course of being built up into a spiritual house (that is, \"the habitation of the Spirit\"). \n\npriesthood--Christians are both the spiritual temple and the priests of the temple. There are two Greek words for \"temple\"; hieron (the sacred place), the whole building, including the courts wherein the sacrifice was killed; and naos (the dwelling, namely, of God), the inner shrine wherein God peculiarly manifested Himself, and where, in the holiest place, the blood of the slain sacrifice was presented before Him. All believers alike, and not merely ministers, are now the dwelling of God (and are called the \"naos,\" Greek, not the hieron) and priests unto God (Rev 1:6). The minister is not, like the Jewish priest (Greek, \"hiercus\"), admitted nearer to God than the people, but merely for order's sake leads the spiritual services of the people. Priest is the abbreviation of presbyter in the Church of England Prayer Book, not corresponding to the Aaronic priest (hiereus, who offered literal sacrifices). Christ is the only literal hiereus-priest in the New Testament through whom alone we may always draw near to God. Compare Pe1 2:9, \"a royal priesthood,\" that is, a body of priest-kings, such as was Melchisedec. The Spirit never, in New Testament, gives the name hiereus, or sacerdotal priest, to ministers of the Gospel. \n\nholy--consecrated to God. \n\nspiritual sacrifices--not the literal one of the mass, as the Romish self-styled disciples of Peter teach. Compare Isa 56:7, which compare with \"acceptable to God\" here; Psa 4:5; Psa 50:14; Psa 51:17, Psa 51:19; Hos 14:2; Phi 4:18. \"Among spiritual sacrifices the first place belongs to the general oblation of ourselves. For never can we offer anything to God until we have offered ourselves (Co2 8:5) in sacrifice to Him. There follow afterwards prayers, giving of thanks, alms deeds, and all exercises of piety\" [CALVIN]. Christian houses of worship are never called temples because the temple was a place for sacrifice, which has no place in the Christian dispensation; the Christian temple is the congregation of spiritual worshippers. The synagogue (where reading of Scripture and prayer constituted the worship) was the model of the Christian house of worship (compare Note, see on Jam 2:2, Greek, \"synagogue\"; Act 15:21). Our sacrifices are those of prayer, praise, and self-denying services in the cause of Christ (Pe1 2:9, end). \n\nby Jesus Christ--as our mediating High Priest before God. Connect these words with \"offer up.\" Christ is both precious Himself and makes us accepted [BENGEL]. As the temple, so also the priesthood, is built on Christ (Pe1 2:4-5) [BEZA]. Imperfect as are our services, we are not with unbelieving timidity, which is close akin to refined self-righteousness, to doubt their acceptance THROUGH CHRIST. After extolling the dignity of Christians he goes back to CHRIST as the sole source of it.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":6,"content":["Wherefore also--The oldest manuscripts read, \"Because that.\" The statement above is so \"because it is contained in Scripture.\" \n\nBehold--calling attention to the glorious announcement of His eternal counsel. \n\nelect--so also believers (Pe1 2:9, \"chosen,\" Greek, \"elect generation\"). \n\nprecious--in Hebrew, Isa 28:16, \"a corner-stone of preciousness.\" See on Isa 28:16. So in Pe1 2:7, Christ is said to be, to believers, \"precious,\" Greek, \"preciousness.\" \n\nconfounded--same Greek as in Rom 9:33 (Peter here as elsewhere confirming Paul's teaching. See Introduction; also Rom 10:11), \"ashamed.\" In Isa 28:16, \"make haste,\" that is, flee in sudden panic, covered with the shame of confounded hopes.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":7,"content":["Application of the Scripture just quoted first to the believer, then to the unbeliever. On the opposite effects of the same Gospel on different classes, compare Joh 9:39; Co2 2:15-16. \n\nprecious--Greek, \"THE preciousness\" (Pe1 2:6). To you believers belongs the preciousness of Christ just mentioned. \n\ndisobedient--to the faith, and so disobedient in practice. \n\nthe stone which . . . head of . . . corner-- (Psa 118:22). Those who rejected the STONE were all the while in spite of themselves unconsciously contributing to its becoming Head of the corner. The same magnet has two poles, the one repulsive, the other attractive; so the Gospel has opposite effects on believers and unbelievers respectively.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":8,"content":["stone of stumbling, &c.--quoted from Isa 8:14. Not merely they stumbled, in that their prejudices were offended; but their stumbling implies the judicial punishment of their reception of Messiah; they hurt themselves in stumbling over the corner-stone, as \"stumble\" means in Jer 13:16; Dan 11:19. \n\nat the word--rather, join \"being disobedient to the word\"; so Pe1 3:1; Pe1 4:17. \n\nwhereunto--to penal stumbling; to the judicial punishment of their unbelief. See above. \n\nalso--an additional thought; God's ordination; not that God ordains or appoints them to sin, but they are given up to \"the fruit of their own ways\" according to the eternal counsel of God. The moral ordering of the world is altogether of God. God appoints the ungodly to be given up unto sin, and a reprobate mind, and its necessary penalty. \"Were appointed,\" Greek, \"set,\" answers to \"I lay,\" Greek, \"set,\" Pe1 2:6. God, in the active, is said to appoint Christ and the elect (directly). Unbelievers, in the passive, are said to be appointed (God acting less directly in the appointment of the sinner's awful course) [BENGEL]. God ordains the wicked to punishment, not to crime [J. CAPPEL]. \"Appointed\" or \"set\" (not here \"FORE-ordained\") refers, not to the eternal counsel so directly, as to the penal justice of God. Through the same Christ whom sinners rejected, they shall be rejected; unlike believers, they are by God appointed unto wrath as FITTED for it. The lost shall lay all the blame of their ruin on their own sinful perversity, not on God's decree; the saved shall ascribe all the merit of their salvation to God's electing love and grace.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":9,"content":["Contrast in the privileges and destinies of believers. Compare the similar contrast with the preceding context. \n\nchosen--\"elect\" of God, even as Christ your Lord is. \n\ngeneration--implying the unity of spiritual origin and kindred of believers as a class distinct from the world. \n\nroyal--kingly. Believers, like Christ, the antitypical Melchisedec, are at once kings and priests. Israel, in a spiritual sense, was designed to be the same among the nations of the earth. The full realization on earth of this, both to the literal and the spiritual Israel, is as yet future. \n\nholy nation--antitypical to Israel. \n\npeculiar people--literally, \"a people for an acquisition,\" that is, whom God chose to be peculiarly His: Act 20:28, \"purchased,\" literally, \"acquired.\" God's \"peculiar treasure\" above others. \n\nshow forth--publish abroad. Not their own praises but His. They have no reason to magnify themselves above others for once they had been in the same darkness, and only through God's grace had been brought to the light which they must henceforth show forth to others. \n\npraises--Greek, \"virtues,\" \"excellencies\": His glory, mercy (Pe1 2:10), goodness (Greek, Pe1 2:3; Num 14:17-18; Isa 63:7). The same term is applied to believers, Pe2 1:5. \n\nof him who hath called you-- (Pe2 1:3). \n\nout of darkness--of heathen and even Jewish ignorance, sin, and misery, and so out of the dominion of the prince of darkness. \n\nmarvellous--Peter still has in mind Psa 118:23. \n\nlight--It is called \"His,\" that is, God's. Only the (spiritual) light is created by God, not darkness. In Isa 45:7, it is physical darkness and evil, not moral, that God is said to create, the punishment of sin, not sin itself. Peter, with characteristic boldness, brands as darkness what all the world calls light; reason, without the Holy Spirit, in spite of its vaunted power, is spiritual darkness. \"It cannot apprehend what faith is: there it is stark blind; it gropes as one that is without eyesight, stumbling from one thing to another, and knows not what it does\" [LUTHER].\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":10,"content":["Adapted from Hos 1:9-10; Hos 2:23. Peter plainly confirms Paul, who quotes the passage as implying the call of the Gentiles to become spiritually that which Israel had been literally, \"the people of God.\" Primarily, the prophecy refers to literal Israel, hereafter to be fully that which in their best days they were only partially, God's people. \n\nnot obtained mercy--literally, \"who were men not compassionated.\" Implying that it was God's pure mercy, not their merits, which made the blessed change in their state; a thought which ought to kindle their lively gratitude, to be shown with their life, as well as their lips.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":11,"content":["As heretofore he exhorted them to walk worthily of their calling, in contradistinction to their own former walk, so now he exhorts them to glorify God before unbelievers. \n\nDearly beloved--He gains their attention to his exhortation by assuring them of his love. \n\nstrangers and pilgrims-- (Pe1 1:17). Sojourners, literally, settlers having a house in a city without being citizens in respect to the rights of citizenship; a picture of the Christian's position on earth; and pilgrims, staying for a time in a foreign land. FLACIUS thus analyzes the exhortation: (1) Purify your souls (a) as strangers on earth who must not allow yourselves to be kept back by earthly lusts, and (b) because these lusts war against the soul's salvation. (2) Walk piously among unbelievers (a) so that they may cease to calumniate Christians, and (b) may themselves be converted to Christ. \n\nfleshly lusts--enumerated in Gal 5:19, &c. Not only the gross appetites which we have in common with the brutes, but all the thoughts of the unrenewed mind. \n\nwhich--Greek, \"the which,\" that is, inasmuch as being such as \"war.\" &c. Not only do they impede, but they assail [BENGEL]. \n\nthe soul--that is, against the regenerated soul; such as were those now addressed. The regenerated soul is besieged by sinful lusts. Like Samson in the lap of Delilah, the believer, the moment that he gives way to fleshly lusts, has the locks of his strength shorn, and ceases to maintain that spiritual separation from the world and the flesh of which the Nazarite vow was the type.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":12,"content":["conversation--\"behavior\"; \"conduct.\" There are two things in which \"strangers and pilgrims\" ought to bear themselves well: (1) the conversation or conduct, as subjects (Pe1 2:13), servants (Pe1 2:18), wives (Pe1 3:1), husbands (Pe1 3:7), all persons under all circumstances (Pe1 2:8); (2) confession of the faith (Pe1 3:15-16). Each of the two is derived from the will of God. Our conversation should correspond to our Saviour's condition; this is in heaven, so ought that to be. \n\nhonest--honorable, becoming, proper (Pe1 3:16). Contrast \"vain conversation,\" Pe1 1:18. A good walk does not make us pious, but we must first be pious and believe before we attempt to lead a good course. Faith first receives from God, then love gives to our neighbor [LUTHER]. \n\nwhereas they speak against you--now (Pe1 2:15), that they may, nevertheless, at some time or other hereafter glorify God. The Greek may be rendered, \"Wherein they speak against you . . . that (herein) they may, by your good works, which on a closer inspection they shall behold, glorify God.\" The very works \"which on more careful consideration, must move the heathen to praise God, are at first the object of hatred and raillery\" [STEIGER]. \n\nevildoers--Because as Christians they could not conform to heathenish customs, they were accused of disobedience to all legal authority; in order to rebut this charge, they are told to submit to every ordinance of man (not sinful in itself). \n\nby--owing to. \n\nthey shall behold--Greek, \"they shall be eye-witnesses of\"; \"shall behold on close inspection\"; as opposed to their \"ignorance\" (Pe1 2:15) of the true character of Christians and Christianity, by judging on mere hearsay. The same Greek verb occurs in a similar sense in Pe1 3:2. \"Other men narrowly look at (so the Greek implies) the actions of the righteous\" [BENGEL]. TERTULLIAN contrasts the early Christians and the heathen: these delighted in the bloody gladiatorial spectacles of the amphitheater, whereas a Christian was excommunicated if he went to it at all. No Christian was found in prison for crime, but only for the faith. The heathen excluded slaves from some of their religious services, whereas Christians had some of their presbyters of the class of slaves. Slavery silently and gradually disappeared by the power of the Christian law of love, \"Whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them.\" When the pagans deserted their nearest relatives in a plague, Christians ministered to the sick and dying. When the Gentiles left their dead unburied after a battle and cast their wounded into the streets, the disciples hastened to relieve the suffering. \n\nglorify--forming a high estimate of the God whom Christians worship, from the exemplary conduct of Christians themselves. We must do good, not with a view to our own glory, but to the glory of God. \n\nthe day of visitation--of God's grace; when God shall visit them in mercy.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":13,"content":["every ordinance of man--\"every human institution\" [ALFORD], literally, \"every human creation.\" For though of divine appointment, yet in the mode of nomination and in the exercise of their authority, earthly governors are but human institutions, being of men, and in relation to men. The apostle speaks as one raised above all human things. But lest they should think themselves so ennobled by faith as to be raised above subordination to human authorities, he tells them to submit themselves for the sake of Christ, who desires you to be subject, and who once was subject to earthly rulers Himself, though having all things subject to Him, and whose honor is at stake in you as His earthly representatives. Compare Rom 13:5, \"Be subject for conscience' sake.\" \n\nking--The Roman emperor was \"supreme\" in the Roman provinces to which this Epistle was addressed. The Jewish zealots refused obedience. The distinction between \"the king as supreme\" and \"governors sent by him\" implies that \"if the king command one thing, and the subordinate magistrate another, we ought rather to obey the superior\" [AUGUSTINE in GROTIUS]. Scripture prescribes nothing upon the form of government, but simply subjects Christians to that everywhere subsisting, without entering into the question of the right of the rulers (thus the Roman emperors had by force seized supreme authority, and Rome had, by unjustifiable means, made herself mistress of Asia), because the de facto governors have not been made by chance, but by the providence of God.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":14,"content":["governors--subordinate to the emperor, \"sent,\" or delegated by CÃ&brvbrsar to preside over the provinces. \n\nfor the punishment--No tyranny ever has been so unprincipled as that some appearance of equity was not maintained in it; however corrupt a government be, God never suffers it to be so much so as not to be better than anarchy [CALVIN]. Although bad kings often oppress the good, yet that is scarcely ever done by public authority (and it is of what is done by public authority that Peter speaks), save under the mask of right. Tyranny harasses many, but anarchy overwhelms the whole state [HORNEIUS]. The only justifiable exception is in cases where obedience to the earthly king plainly involves disobedience to the express command of the King of kings. \n\npraise of them that do well--Every government recognizes the excellence of truly Christian subjects. Thus PLINY, in his letter to the Emperor Trajan, acknowledges, \"I have found in them nothing else save a perverse and extravagant superstition.\" The recognition in the long run mitigates persecution (Pe1 3:13).\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":15,"content":["Ground of his directing them to submit themselves (Pe1 2:13). \n\nput to silence--literally, \"to muzzle,\" \"to stop the mouth.\" \n\nignorance--spiritual not having \"the knowledge of God,\" and therefore ignorant of the children of God, and misconstruing their acts; influenced by mere appearances, and ever ready to open their mouths, rather than their eyes and ears. Their ignorance should move the believer's pity, not his anger. They judge of things which they are incapable of judging through unbelief (compare Pe1 2:12). Maintain such a walk that they shall have no charge against you, except touching your faith; and so their minds shall be favorably disposed towards Christianity.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":16,"content":["As free--as \"the Lord's freemen,\" connected with Pe1 2:15, doing well as being free. \"Well-doing\" (Pe1 2:15) is the natural fruit of being freemen of Christ, made free by \"the truth\" from the bondage of sin. Duty is enforced on us to guard against licentiousness, but the way in which it is to be fulfilled, is by love and the holy instincts of Christian liberty. We are given principles, not details. \n\nnot using--Greek, \"not as having your liberty for a veil (cloak) of badness, but as the servants of God,\" and therefore bound to submit to every ordinance of man (Pe1 2:13) which is of God's appointment.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":17,"content":["Honour all men--according to whatever honor is due in each case. Equals have a respect due to them. Christ has dignified our humanity by assuming it; therefore we should not dishonor, but be considerate to and honor our common humanity, even in the very humblest. The first \"honor\" is in the Greek aorist imperative, implying, \"In every case render promptly every man's due\" [ALFORD]. The second is in the present tense, implying, Habitually and continually honor the king. Thus the first is the general precept; the three following are its three great divisions. \n\nLove--present: Habitually love with the special and congenial affection that you ought to feel to brethren, besides the general love to all men. \n\nFear God . . . the king--The king is to be honored; but God alone, in the highest sense, feared.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":18,"content":["Servants--Greek, \"household servants\": not here the Greek for \"slaves.\" Probably including freedmen still remaining in their master's house. Masters were not commonly Christians: he therefore mentions only the duties of the servants. These were then often persecuted by their unbelieving masters. Peter's special object seems to be to teach them submission, whatever the character of the masters might be. Paul not having this as his prominent design, includes masters in his monitions. \n\nbe subject--Greek, \"being subject\": the participle expresses a particular instance of the general exhortation to good conduct, Pe1 2:11-12, of which the first particular precept is given Pe1 2:13, \"Submit yourselves to every ordinance of man for the Lord's sake.\" The general exhortation is taken up again in Pe1 2:16; and so the participle Pe1 2:18, \"being subject,\" is joined to the hortatory imperatives going before, namely, \"abstain,\" \"submit yourselves.\" \"honor all men.\" \n\nwith--Greek, \"in.\" \n\nall--all possible: under all circumstances, such as are presently detailed. \n\nfear--the awe of one subject: God, however, is the ultimate object of the \"fear\": fear \"for the Lord's sake\" (Pe1 2:13), not merely slavish fear of masters. \n\ngood--kind. \n\ngentle--indulgent towards errors: considerate: yielding, not exacting all which justice might demand. \n\nfroward--perverse: harsh. Those bound to obey must not make the disposition and behavior of the superior the measure of the fulfilment of their obligations.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":19,"content":["Reason for subjection even to froward masters. \n\nthankworthy-- (Luk 6:33). A course out of the common, and especially praiseworthy in the eyes of God: not as Rome interprets, earning merit, and so a work of supererogation (compare Pe1 2:20). \n\nfor conscience toward God--literally, \"consciousness of God\": from a conscientious regard to God, more than to men. \n\nendure--Greek, \"patiently bear up under\": as a superimposed burden [ALFORD]. \n\ngrief--Greek, \"griefs.\"\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":20,"content":["what--Greek, \"what kind of.\" \n\nglory--what peculiar merit. \n\nbuffeted--the punishment of slaves, and suddenly inflicted [BENGEL]. \n\nthis is--Some oldest manuscripts read, \"for.\" Then the translation is, \"But if when . . . ye take it patiently (it is a glory), for this is acceptable.\" \n\nacceptable--Greek, \"thankworthy,\" as in Pe1 2:19.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":21,"content":["Christ's example a proof that patient endurance under undeserved sufferings is acceptable with God. \n\nhereunto--to the patient endurance of unmerited suffering (Pe1 3:9). Christ is an example to servants, even as He was once in \"the form of a servant.\" \n\ncalled--with a heavenly calling, though slaves. \n\nfor us--His dying for us is the highest exemplification of \"doing well\" (Pe1 2:20). Ye must patiently suffer, being innocent, as Christ also innocently suffered (not for Himself, but for us). The oldest manuscripts for \"us . . . us,\" read, \"you . . . for you.\" Christ's sufferings, while they are for an example, were also primarily sufferings \"for us,\" a consideration which imposes an everlasting obligation on us to please Him. \n\nleaving--behind: so the Greek: on His departure to the Father, to His glory. \n\nan example--Greek, \"a copy,\" literally, \"a writing copy\" set by masters for their pupils. Christ's precepts and sermons were the transcript of His life. Peter graphically sets before servants those features especially suited to their case. \n\nfollow--close upon: so the Greek. \n\nhis steps--footsteps, namely, of His patience combined with innocence.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":22,"content":["Illustrating Christ's well-doing (Pe1 2:20) though suffering. \n\ndid--Greek aorist. \"Never in a single instance did\" [ALFORD]. Quoted from Isa 53:9, end, Septuagint. \n\nneither--nor yet: not even [ALFORD]. Sinlessness as to the mouth is a mark of perfection. Guile is a common fault of servants. \"If any boast of his innocency, Christ surely did not suffer as an evildoer\" [CALVIN], yet He took it patiently (Pe1 2:20). On Christ's sinlessness, compare Co2 5:21; Heb 7:26.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":23,"content":["Servants are apt to \"answer again\" (Tit 2:9). Threats of divine judgment against oppressors are often used by those who have no other arms, as for instance, slaves. Christ, who as Lord could have threatened with truth, never did so. \n\ncommitted himself--or His cause, as man in His suffering. Compare the type, Jer 11:20. In this Peter seems to have before his mind Isa 53:8. Compare Rom 12:19, on our corresponding duty. Leave your case in His hands, not desiring to make Him executioner of your revenge, but rather praying for enemies. God's righteous judgment gives tranquillity and consolation to the oppressed.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":24,"content":["his own self--there being none other but Himself who could have done it. His voluntary undertaking of the work of redemption is implied. The Greek puts in antithetical juxtaposition, OUR, and His OWN SELF, to mark the idea of His substitution for us. His \"well-doing\" in His sufferings is set forth here as an example to servants and to us all (Pe1 2:20). \n\nbare--to sacrifice: carried and offered up: a sacrificial term. Isa 53:11-12, \"He bare the sin of many\": where the idea of bearing on Himself is the prominent one; here the offering in sacrifice is combined with that idea. So the same Greek means in Pe1 2:5. \n\nour sins--In offering or presenting in sacrifice (as the Greek for \"bare\" implies) His body, Christ offered in it the guilt of our sins upon the cross, as upon the altar of God, that it might be expiated in Him, and so taken away from us. Compare Isa 53:10, \"Thou shalt make His soul an offering for sin.\" Peter thus means by \"bare\" what the Syriac takes two words to express, to bear and to offer: (1) He hath borne our sins laid upon Him [namely, their guilt, curse, and punishment]; (2) He hath so borne them that He offered them along with Himself on the altar. He refers to the animals upon which sins were first laid, and which were then offered thus laden [VITRINGA]. Sin or guilt among the Semitic nations is considered as a burden lying heavily upon the sinner [GESENIUS]. \n\non the tree--the cross, the proper place for One on whom the curse was laid: this curse stuck to Him until it was legally (through His death as the guilt-bearer) destroyed in His body: thus the handwriting of the bond against us is cancelled by His death. \n\nthat we being dead to sins--the effect of His death to \"sin\" in the aggregate, and to all particular \"sins,\" namely, that we should be as entirely delivered from them, as a slave that is dead is delivered from service to his master. This is our spiritful standing through faith by virtue of Christ's death: our actual mortification of particular sins is in proportion to the degree of our effectually being made conformable to His death. \"That we should die to the sins whose collected guilt Christ carried away in His death, and so LIVE TO THE RIGHTEOUSNESS (compare Isa 53:11. 'My righteous servant shall justify many'), the gracious relation to God which He has brought in\" [STEIGER]. \n\nby whose stripes--Greek, \"stripe.\" \n\nye were healed--a paradox, yet true. \"Ye servants (compare 'buffeted,' 'the tree,' Pe1 2:20, Pe1 2:24) often bear the strife; but it is not more than your Lord Himself bore; learn from Him patience in wrongful sufferings.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":25,"content":["(Isa 53:6.) \n\nFor--Assigning their natural need of healing (Pe1 2:24). \n\nnow--Now that the atonement for all has been made, the foundation is laid for individual conversion: so \"ye are returned,\" or \"have become converted to,\" &c. \n\nShepherd and Bishop--The designation of the pastors and elders of the Church belongs in its fullest sense to the great Head of the Church, \"the good Shepherd.\" As the \"bishop\" oversees (as the Greek term means), so \"the eyes of the Lord are over the righteous\" (Pe1 3:12). He gives us His spirit and feeds and guides us by His word. \"Shepherd,\" Hebrew, \"Parnas,\" is often applied to kings, and enters into the composition of names, as \"Pharnabazus.\"\n\n\n\n\nNext: 1 Peter Chapter 3\n\n"]}],"introduction":"EXHORTATIONS. (1Pe. 2:1-25)\n\nlaying aside--once for all: so the Greek aorist expresses as a garment put off. The exhortation applies to Christians alone, for in none else is the new nature existing which, as \"the inward man\" (Eph 3:16) can cast off the old as an outward thing, so that the Christian, through the continual renewal of his inward man, can also exhibit himself externally as a new man. But to unbelievers the demand is addressed, that inwardly, in regard to the nous (mind), they must become changed, meta-noeisthai (re-pent) [STEIGER]. The \"therefore\" resumes the exhortation begun in Pe1 1:22. Seeing that ye are born again of an incorruptible seed, be not again entangled in evil, which \"has no substantial being, but is an acting in contrariety to the being formed in us\" [THEOPHYLACT]. \"Malice,\" &c., are utterly inconsistent with the \"love of the brethren,\" unto which ye have \"purified your souls\" (Pe1 1:22). The vices here are those which offend against the BROTHERLY LOVE inculcated above. Each succeeding one springs out of that which immediately precedes, so as to form a genealogy of the sins against love. Out of malice springs guile; out of guile, hypocrises (pretending to be what we are not, and not showing what we really are; the opposite of \"love unfeigned,\" and \"without dissimulation\"); out of hypocrisies, envies of those to whom we think ourselves obliged to play the hypocrite; out of envies, evil-speaking, malicious, envious detraction of others. Guile is the permanent disposition; hypocrisies the acts flowing from it. The guileless knows no envy. Compare Pe1 2:2, \"sincere,\" Greek, \"guileless.\" \"Malice delights in another's hurt; envy pines at another's good; guile imparts duplicity to the heart; hypocrisy (flattery) imparts duplicity to the tongue; evil-speakings wound the character of another\" [AUGUSTINE].\n\n"},"thisChapterLink":"/api/c/jamieson-fausset-brown/1PE/2.json","thisChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"jamieson-fausset-brown","book":"1PE","chapter":2},"nextChapterApiLink":"/api/c/jamieson-fausset-brown/1PE/3.json","nextChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"jamieson-fausset-brown","book":"1PE","chapter":3},"previousChapterApiLink":"/api/c/jamieson-fausset-brown/1PE/1.json","previousChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"jamieson-fausset-brown","book":"1PE","chapter":1},"numberOfVerses":24}