1 Timothy 6:10 - Exposition

A root for the root, A.V.; all kinds of for all, A.V.; some reaching after for while some coveted after, A.V.; have been led astray for they have erred, A.V.; have pierced for pierced, A.V. Love of money ( φιλαργυρία ); only here in the New Testament, but found in the LXX . and in classical Greek. The substantive φιλάργυρος is found in Luke 16:14 and 2 Timothy 3:2 . A root . The root is better English. Moreover, the following πάντων τῶν κακῶν (not πόλλων κακῶν ) necessitates the giving a definite sense to ῥίζα , though it has not the article; and Alford shows dearly that a word like ῥίζα , especially when placed as here in an emphatic position, does not require it. Alford also quotes a striking passage from Diog. Laert., in which he mentions a saying of the philosopher Diogenes that "the love of money ( ἡ φιλαργυρία ) is the metropolis, or home, πάντων τῶν κακῶν ." Reaching after ( ὀρεγόμενοι ). It has been justly remarked that the phrase is slightly inaccurate. What some reach after is not "the love of money," but the money itself. To avoid this, Hofmann (quoted by Luther) makes ῥίζα the antecedent to ἦς , and the metaphor to be of a person turning out of his path to grasp a plant which turns out to he not desirable, but a root of bitterness. This is ingenious, but hardly to be accepted as the true interpretation. Pierced themselves through ( περιέπειραν ); only here in the New Testament, and rare in classical Greek. But the simple verb πείρω , to "pierce through," "transfix," applied 'especially to "spitting" meat, is very common in Homer, who also applies it metaphorically exactly as St. Paul does here, to grief or pain. ̓Οδύνησι πεπαρμένος, "pierced with pain" ('Il.,' 5:399).