The Message Must Outlast the Messenger

“Be strong” is passive in Greek, be strengthened, the verb of 1 Timothy 1:12, where Christ “enabled” Paul: the strength is received, not summoned up. “Thou therefore” sets Timothy against the deserters of 1:15 and beside Onesiphorus, who has just been praised.

“Commit” is paratithemi, the verb form of the “deposit” of 1:12 and 1:14: what was entrusted to Timothy is now to be entrusted onward. “Among many witnesses” may mean in their presence, perhaps at his commissioning, when he “professed a good profession before many witnesses” (1 Timothy 6:12). “Men” is anthropoi, people.

The best manuscripts have the compound verb of 1:8, “share in suffering”, which later copies simplified to the verb the King James renders “endure hardness”. Paul gives the soldier’s title to his co-workers elsewhere: Epaphroditus is his “fellowsoldier” (Philippians 2:25), and so is Archippus (Philemon 2).

“Entangleth” is empleko, to be woven or braided into something. Roman soldiers on active service were barred from legal marriage until the reforms of Septimius Severus around AD 197, and discouraged from trade. “Chosen him to be a soldier” is one word, stratologeo, to enlist: the soldier’s aim is to satisfy the officer who signed him up.

“Strive for masteries” is athleo, to compete in the games, from which athlete comes. “Lawfully” is nomimos, the adverb of 1 Timothy 1:8. At Olympia competitors swore an oath before the statue of Zeus that they had trained for ten months and would keep the rules (Pausanias 5.24.9). The prize was a wreath.

The Greek puts “labouring” first for weight: it is the farmer who works hard who has first claim on the crop. Deuteronomy 20:6 released from battle the man who had planted a vineyard and not yet eaten of it, and Paul had argued in 1 Corinthians 9:10 that “he that ploweth should plow in hope”.

Paul leaves the three pictures unexplained and asks Timothy to think them through. “Consider” is noeo, to perceive, work out the sense. The oldest manuscripts read a promise, “the Lord will give thee understanding”, where later copies, followed by the King James, turned it into a prayer.

“Raised” is a perfect participle: raised and still living. The pairing of David’s line and resurrection is the same as in the opening of Romans (1:3-4), “made of the seed of David according to the flesh; and declared to be the Son of God with power... by the resurrection from the dead”. “My gospel” also occurs in Romans 2:16.

“Evil doer” is kakourgos, a criminal, the word Luke 23:32-33 uses for the two men crucified beside Jesus. Paul is classed with them. The Greek pivots on one verb: Paul is in bonds, but the word “is not bound”, dedetai, the same root.

“For the elect’s sakes” is the reason Paul gives for his endurance, and Colossians 1:24 says the same of his sufferings “for his body’s sake, which is the church”. “Obtain” is tynchano, to hit the mark or attain. “Eternal glory” recalls 2 Corinthians 4:17, “a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory.”

The fourth faithful saying in these letters, and the only one set out in lines of verse. “Be dead with him” is a past tense, pointing most naturally to baptism, as Romans 6:8 puts it: “if we be dead with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with him.”

“Suffer” is hypomeno, to endure or hold out, not the usual verb for suffering. “Reign with him” is a single compound verb, to be king together. The last line echoes Jesus in Matthew 10:33: “whosoever shall deny me before men, him will I also deny before my Father.”

“Believe not” is apisteo, to be unfaithful, and the line turns on the contrast with Christ, who remains pistos, faithful. The final clause breaks the pattern of the hymn: no “if”, and a reason instead of a result, which suggests Paul’s own comment on the lines he has quoted. Numbers 23:19: “God is not a man, that he should lie.”

“Strive about words” is logomacheo, the verb of the word-battles of 1 Timothy 6:4. “Subverting” is katastrophe, from which catastrophe comes, the word the Greek Old Testament uses for the overthrow of Sodom (Genesis 19:29), as 2 Peter 2:6 does after it. Many manuscripts read “before God” instead of “before the Lord”.

“Workman” is ergates, a hired labourer, the “labourer” of 1 Timothy 5:18 who is worthy of his hire. “That needeth not to be ashamed” is one word, anepaischyntos, found only here, closing the theme of the first chapter: Paul was not ashamed, Onesiphorus was not ashamed, and the worker should have no cause to be.

“Shun” is periistemi, to go round something to avoid it, giving it a wide berth. “Increase” is prokopto, to make progress, the word used of Timothy’s “profiting” in 1 Timothy 4:15; here it is ironic. These men will advance, but in ungodliness, and 3:9 and 3:13 return to the same verb.

“Canker” is gangraina, gangrene, a medical term found only here. “Eat” is literally “will have pasture”, nome, the word Greek doctors used for an ulcer spreading into healthy flesh. Hymenaeus was named in 1 Timothy 1:20; Philetus appears only here.

“Overthrow” is anatrepo, to turn upside down, used in Titus 1:11 of men who “subvert whole houses”. The claim may have made resurrection a purely spiritual event already undergone in baptism; later writings found at Nag Hammadi, like the Treatise on the Resurrection, teach something similar. That link is a comparison, not a report of what these two men taught.

The first inscription quotes Moses in Numbers 16:5, “the LORD will shew who are his”, in the Greek wording, spoken during Korah’s rebellion; the second echoes Numbers 16:26, “Depart, I pray you, from the tents of these wicked men.” Hymenaeus and Philetus are quietly cast as a new Korah. Foundation stones often carried an inscription marking ownership.

The great house takes up the “house of God” of 1 Timothy 3:15. The image recalls Romans 9:21, the potter making “one vessel unto honour, and another unto dishonour”. Wood and earthenware were the everyday vessels, used for kitchen work and for waste; gold and silver came out for guests.

“Purge” is ekkathairo, to clean out thoroughly, the verb of 1 Corinthians 5:7, “Purge out therefore the old leaven”. “Meet” is euchrestos, useful, the word Paul puns on in Philemon 11 about Onesimus, whose name means useful. “Master” is despotes, the owner of the house and its vessels.

“Flee” and “follow” are the same pair of verbs, run from and run after, given to Timothy in 1 Timothy 6:11. “Youthful” is neoterikos, found only here. “Call on the Lord” is the Old Testament description of the worshippers of God (Joel 2:32), which Paul uses in 1 Corinthians 1:2 for Christians everywhere.

“Unlearned” is apaideutos, uneducated or undisciplined: questions that pass for learning are in fact untrained. “Gender” is the 1611 short form of engender, the Greek gennao, to beget. Quarrels are pictured as the offspring such questions produce.

“Servant of the Lord” is a title with a history: Moses bore it (Joshua 1:1), and Isaiah’s Servant “shall not strive, nor cry” (Isaiah 42:2, quoted in Matthew 12:19). “Patient” is anexikakos, literally “putting up with evil”, patient under wrong, found only here. “Apt to teach” repeats the overseer’s qualification of 1 Timothy 3:2.

“Instructing” is paideuo, to train, the verb used of Hymenaeus and Alexander in 1 Timothy 1:20, where they were to “learn” not to blaspheme. “Oppose themselves” is antidiatithemi, to set oneself in opposition, found only here. “Peradventure” is meposte, “if perhaps”, leaving the outcome in God’s hands.

“Recover themselves” is ananepho, found only here, to come back to sobriety after a drunken stupor: the captives are pictured as people who have been drugged. “Taken captive” is zogreo, to take alive, the verb of Luke 5:10, “thou shalt catch men.” The Greek uses two different pronouns for “him” and “his”, so some read “to do God’s will”.