1 Peter 2:8

And a stone of stumbling, and a rock of offense . St. Peter combines Isaiah 8:14 with his first quotations, as St. Paul also does (Ram. 9:33), both apostles quoting from the Hebrew, not from the Septuagint, which is quite different, inserting two negatives. The living Stone is not only made the Head of the corner to the confusion of the disobedient, but becomes also to their destruction a Stone of stumbling; they fall on that Stone, and are broken ( Matthew 21:44 ). That Stone is a Rock ( πέτρα ), the Rock of Ages, the Rock on which the Church is built; but to the disobedient it is a Rock of offense ( πέτρα σκανδάλου ). σκάνδαλον ( in Attic Greek σκανδάληθρον ) is properly the catch or spring of a trap, which makes animals fall into the trap; then a stumbling-block—anything which causes men to fall. We cannot fail to notice how St. Peter echoes the well-remembered words of our Lord, recorded in Matthew 16:18 , Matthew 16:23 . Peter was himself then a πέτρα σκανδάλου , a rock of offense. Even to them which stumble at the Word, being disobedient ; literally, who being disobedient stumble at the Word—the relative referring back to "them which be disobedient" in Matthew 16:7 . This seems better than (with Huther and others) to take τῷ λόγῳ with ἀπειθοῦντες , "who stumble, being disobedient to the Word." ἀπειθοῦντες , literally," unbelieving," contains here, as frequently, the idea of disobedience, willful opposition. St. Peter seems to come very near to St. John's use of λόγος for the personal Word, the Lord Jesus Christ. Whereunto also they were appointed . "Whereunto" ( εἰς ὄ ) cannot refer back to verse 5; God had appointed them to be built up in his spiritual house, but they were disobedient. It must refer either to ἀπειθοῦντες —sin is punished by sin; for sin in God's awful judgment hardens the heart; the disobedient are in danger of eternal sin ( Mark 3:29 , according to the two oldest manuscripts)—or, more probably, to προσκόπουσιν ; it is God's ordinance that disobedience should end in stumbling; but that stumbling does not necessarily imply condemnation (see Romans 11:11 ). The word, the preaching of Christ crucified, was to the Jews a stumbling-block ( 1 Corinthians 1:23 ). But not all stumbled that they might fall. Nevertheless, perseverance in disobedience must end in everlasting death.