Timothy to Hebrews - The Preterist Archive

First Timothy I. 18. 41
two significatioDS. It appears to me better that alojveg should be
taken in the same sense as afterwards in elg rovg aidvaq tCov aicovojv
= navrag aicJvag (comp. on Phil. iv. 20). He is a king of the ages,
which together make up the idea of eternity, as His kingdom (comp.
Ps. cxlv. 13) is an everlasting kingdom. Huther takes aicjveg =
world, as Heb. i. 2, xi. 3. To this the apostle is led by the foregoing
expression, ver. 16, elg ^ojrjv aioyviov, with which the expression
in ver. 17 is immediately connected, as also the rest of the epithets
in this verse represent God, not so much in his relation to the world
as in the infinite fulness and majesty of his being. Honour and
praise are due to Him, the king of the ages, the immortal, invisible,
the only Grod ; for He it is in whom all fulness dwells, who has
come nigh to us in Christ Jesus to save us. It is altogether wrong,
therefore, to refer the doxology to Christ ; the epithet invisible is
decisive against this. On d^ddpTU)^ comp. Eom, i. 23 ; on dopdrw,
CoL i. 15 ; Heb. xi. 27 ; Rom. i. 20. Moj^gj few, not novio aocpoj few,
which has A.D.'''-F.G., etc., against it, and appears to be a gloss
from Eom. xvi. 27, as also Jude 25. 'Ajxrjv is also added elsewhere
in the same way (Gal. i. 5 ;
Phil. iv. 20, etc.). Finally, comp. on
Phil. iv. 20. Dr. Banr thinks that the epithets here applied to God
are of a Gnostic cast. The parallel passages to which we have referred
show how little necessity there is for such an opinion.
Ver. 18.—The apostle, after this explanation of o emorevdijv ey6
upon which his heart has poured itself forth in an ascription of praise
to God, now turns again to Timothy, comp. ver. 3. We have seen
how in that verse there was a protasis without an apodosis. Have
we not the apodosis here, if not formally, at least substantially ?
Let us in the first place inquire to what the ravT7]v r/jv TrapayyeXiav
refers ?
It cannot be referred to the immediately-foregoing/aiW/w?
saying, for -napayyeXia, as we have seen, denotes an injunction or
charge, and what we read in ver. 15 and the context is not given in
the form of a charge. It will not even do to refer the ravrrjv r. n.
directly to TrapayyeiXrig, ver. 3, or TrapayyeXiagj ver. 5, as De Wette
has shewn ; for against the former it is to be observed that the import
of the charge is there definitely stated in the words, /orSic?
some to teach otherwise, against the latter, that it is not a certain
injunction or charge, but precept in general that is spoken of in ver.
5. Thus the ravrrjv rijv tt. can be explained only as pointing to the
following Lva (so also Huther), where it is to be observed that the
form of the sentence beginning with lva has been modified by the
words, according to former prophecies regarding thee, to which it is
referred. The apostle therefore writes thus : this charge I commit
to thee, my son Timothy, according to the prophecies which went
before on thee, that thou dost war in them the good warfare.
Without the Kard in the foregoing clause, the, apostle would have