1 Timothy 1:3-4

1 Timothy 1:3-4

As I besought thee to abide still at Ephesus.

Timothy’s charge

Our translators have supplied two words at the close of the fourth verse, in order to complete the sentence which the apostle left unfinished; but it would have been better had they inserted them earlier, for the meaning is more clear if we read, “As I besought thee to abide still at Ephesus when I went into Macedonia, so I beseech thee now to remain there.” It is an example of the way in which Paul’s living thoughts leaped ahead of the words which might have clothed them.

I. The period to which he refers in the phrase, “when I went into Macedonia,” cannot be certainly fixed. There was, indeed, one occasion mentioned in Acts 20:1, when, in consequence of the peril in which he was placed through the uproar raised by Demetrius, he did leave Ephesus for Macedonia; but in the chapter preceding that narrative we read that he had already sent Timothy and Erastus thither; and we know that he joined them there, because in the First Epistle to the Corinthians, written thence, he mentions Timothy as being then with him.

II. The mode of address to Timothy demands a word or two. “I besought thee”--not I commanded thee. No doubt this is expressive of the gentleness and affection with which Timothy was regarded, but it is also an indication of the kind of authority which was exercised by the apostles over their fellow-workers. There was nothing dictatorial about it, nothing of the military discipline which is so popular and effective in an aggressive section of the Church in our day. Influence then was that of character; authority was the outcome of inspiration; and even the chosen twelve were better pleased to rule by love than fear. It must be admitted this may give rise to abuses and perils.

III. The purport of Paul’s entreaty was that Timothy should check the progress of false doctrine in the Ephesian Church. There was a ferment going on in the minds of men at that time, such as usually accompanies or follows a great religious movement. False notions of God, and of His law, arising from an imperfectly understood Judaism, combined with a speculative heathen philosophy, were threatening to destroy the simplicity of the gospel A sort of cabalistic system was being constituted in the Church, by an incongruous mixture of Jewish fancies with heathen speculations, and this threatened disaster--just as the ivy, climbing slowly but surely, thrusts in a root here and a tendril there, till the once strong wall has every stone loosened, and in the storm it falls.

IV. The reason given for opposing such teaching is, that it “ministered questions rather than godly edifying.” The Revised Version adopts another reading, and rightly so. The meaning is, that these questionings did not subserve God’s “dispensation “mills specific plan for admission to His kingdom, His method of salvation unfolded in the Gospel; for that dispensation consists “in faith.” And as a matter of experience we know that questions which merely excite the fancy, or even the intellect, tend to make the objects of faith distasteful. For example, a course of sensational novel reading, which peoples the mind with unrealities, does extrude earnest thoughts on spiritual realities. And this which is true of the rites of the Church is equally true of its organizations, and we have constantly to be on our guard lest the occupation of the mind with the details of Church work should divert us from the cultivation of personal Christian life. But the apostle here condemns chiefly the unhealthy practice of giving prominence to unimportant questions, whether it be in the sphere of philosophy or of religion. When a settler has to grow his own corn to provide himself with daily bread, he will let speculation on the strata beneath the surface wait till he has found time to sow and to reap. (A. Rowland, LL. B.)

The doctrine condemned in the Pastoral Epistles a Jewish form of Gnosticism: the Gnostic’s problem

It is of more importance to inquire what was the nature of the “different doctrine” which Timothy was to endeavour to counteract. And on this point we are not left in serious doubt. There are various expressions used respecting it in these two letters to Timothy which seem to point to two factors in the heterodoxy about which St. Paul is anxious.

1. The heresy is Jewish in character. Its promoters “desire to be teachers of the Law” (1 Timothy 1:7). Some of them are “they of the circumcision” (Titus 1:10). It consists in “Jewish fables” (Titus 1:14). The questions which it raises are “fightings about the Law” (Titus 3:9).

2. Its Gnostic character is also indicated. We are told both in the text and in the Epistle to Titus (Titus 1:14; Titus 3:9) that it deals in “fables and genealogies.” It is, “empty talking” (verse 6), “disputes of words” (1 Timothy 6:4), and “profane babblings (1 Timothy 6:20). It teaches an unscriptural and unnatural asceticism (1 Timothy 4:3; 1 Timothy 4:8). It is “Gnosis falsely so called” (1 Timothy 6:20). A heresy containing these two elements, Judaism and Gnosticism, meets us both before and after the period covered by the Pastoral Epistles: before in the Epistle to the Colossians; afterwards in the Epistles of Ignatius. The evidence gathered from these three sources is entirely in harmony with what we learn elsewhere--that the earliest forms of Christian Gnosticism were Jewish in character. It will be observed that this is indirect confirmation of the genuineness of the Pastoral Epistles. The Gnosticism condemned in them is Jewish; and any form of Gnosticism that was in existence in St. Paul’s time would almost certainly be Jewish. Professor Godet has pointed out how entirely the relation of Judaism to Christianity which is implied in these Epistles, fits in with their being the last group of epistles written by St. Paul. At first, Judaism was entirely outside the Church, opposing and blaspheming. Then it entered the Church and tried to make the Church Jewish, by foisting the Mosaic Law upon it. Lastly, it becomes s, fantastic heresy inside the Church, and sinks into profane frivolity. “Pretended revelations are given as to the names and genealogies of angels; absurd ascetic rules are laid down as counsels of perfection, while daring immorality defaces the actual life.” This is the phase which is confronted in the Pastoral Epistles: and St. Paul meets it with a simple appeal to faith and morality. It is quite possible that the “fables,” or “myths,” and “genealogies” ought to be transferred from the Gnostic to the Jewish side of the account. And thus Chrysostom interprets the passage. “By fables he does not mean the Law; far from it; but inventions and forgeries, and counterfeit doctrines. For, it seems, the Jews wasted their whole discourse on these unprofitable points. They numbered up their fathers and grandfathers, that they might have the reputation of historical knowledge and research.” The “fables” then, may be understood to be those numerous legends which the Jews added to the Old Testament, specimens of which abound in the Talmud. But similar myths abound in Gnostic systems, and therefore “fables” may represent both elements of the heterodox teaching. So also with the “endless genealogies.” These cannot well refer to the genealogies in Genesis, for they are not endless, each of them being arranged in tens. But it is quite possible that Jewish speculations about the genealogies of angels may be meant. Such things, being purely imaginary, would be endless. Or the Gnostic doctrine of emanations, in its earlier and cruder forms, may be intended. By genealogies in this sense early thinkers, especially in the East, tried to bridge the chasm between the infinite and the finite, between God and creation. In various systems it is assumed that matter is inherently evil. The material universe has been from the beginning not “very good” but very bad. How then can it be believed that the Supreme Being, infinite in goodness, would create such a thing? This is incredible: the world must be the creature of some inferior and perhaps evil being. But when this was conceded, the distance between this inferior power and the supreme God still remained to be bridged. This, it was supposed, might be done by an indefinite number of generations, each lower in dignity than the preceding one, until at last a being capable of creating the universe was found. From the Supreme God emanated an inferior deity, and from this lower power a third still more inferior; and so on until the Creator of the world was reached. These ideas are found in the Jewish philosopher Philo; and it is to these that St. Paul probably alludes in the “endless genealogies which minister questionings rather than a dispensation of God.” (A. Plummer, D. D.)

Speculations condemned

St. Paul condemns such speculations on four grounds.

1. They are fables, myths, mere imaginings of the human intellect in its attempt to account for the origin of the world and the origin of evil.

2. They are endless and interminable. From the nature of things there is no limit to mere guesswork of this kind. Every new speculator may invent a fresh genealogy of emanations in his theory of creation and may make it any length that he pleases. If hypotheses need never be verified--need not even be capable of verification--one may go on constructing them ad infinitum.

3. As a natural consequence of this (αἵτινες) they minister questionings and nothing better. It is all barren speculation and fruitless controversy. Where any one may assert without proof, any one else may contradict with out proof; and nothing comes of this see-saw of affirmation and negation.

4. Lastly, these vain imaginings are a different doctrine. They are not only empty but untrue, and are a hindrance to the truth, they occupy the ground which ought to be filled with the dispensation of God which is in faith. Human minds are limited in their capacity, and, even if these empty hypotheses were innocent, minds that were filled With them would have little room left for the truth. But they are not innocent: and those who are attracted by them become disaffected towards the truth. The history of the next hundred and fifty years amply justifies the anxiety and severity of St. Paul. The germs of Gnostic error, which were in the air when Christianty was first preached, fructified with amazing rapidity. It would be hard to find a parallel in the history of philosophy to the speed with which Gnostic views spread in and around Christendom between a.d. 70 and 220. Throughout the Christian world, and especially in intellectual centres such as Ephesus, Alexandria, and Rome, there was perhaps not a single educated congregation which did not contain persons who were infected with some form of Gnosticism. Jerome’s famous hyperbole respecting Arianism might be transferred to this earlier form of error, perhaps the most perilous that the Church has ever known: “The whole world groaned and was amazed to find itself Gnostic.” However severely we may con demn these speculations, we cannot but sympathize with the perplexities which produced them. The origin of the universe, and still more the origin of evil, to this day remain unsolved problems. No one in this life is ever likely to reach a complete solution of either. (A. Plummer, D. D.)