Biblical Commentary

Ecclesiastes, Part 5: Wisdom and the Power of Sin

Presenting our commentary on Ecclesiastes chapter 6, we discussed the vanity of poverty and wealth. The Preacher had presented us with three examples of circumstances in the lives of men, and the evils that befall two of them. The first example was of the man who, having been blessed with riches, was blessed by Yahweh in his later years to enjoy the fruits of his life’s labors. Then there was the man who accumulated riches and was bereaved of them so that he lived his later years in want. Finally, there was the man who worked a long life and had many children, but who had never enjoyed any luxuries all of the time that he lived.

While it was apparent that the men of the latter two examples were undergoing trials imposed on them by Yahweh, whether or not they had sinned, it is also evident from other Scriptures that the man in the first example, the rich man who enjoyed his wealth, was also being tested. But this is not evident unless we examine the Law and the Gospel. In the Law we learn that wealth is given to men by Yahweh so that He may establish His covenant, in Deuteronomy chapter 8. Understanding that, wealthy men should abide the Gospel of Christ and employ their wealth in a manner so as to build His Kingdom, seeking to store treasure in heaven rather than to increase their earthly treasures even further. So this might be the most difficult of these three examples for a man to live up to.

Ecclesiastes, Part 4: The Vanity of Both Wealth and Poverty

Resuming our presentation of Solomon’s Ecclesiastes here with chapter 6, as we have already explained, there are going to be times when we shall necessarily repeat ourselves, because the work itself is quite repetitive in nature. But we have also explained that as he repeats his themes, the Preacher adds different perspectives or new elements to his subjects. With this we have concluded that the repetitious nature of the work is one of its teaching methods, just as the skepticism which is often expressed is also a teaching method. Making repetitive remarks, the author expresses and addresses skeptical concerns in different ways.

The labors of life, the vanity of those labors, the trials which man must undergo only to die in the end empty-handed. And regardless of whether he had been impoverished or wealthy, the oppressed or an oppressor, his fate is the same as all other men, and with this he has no comforter. That was the theme which the Preacher had employed in chapter 4 of Ecclesiastes, that man has no comforter to succour him in his trials, while all of his own labors are vanity. However the antithesis to the skepticism and the dismal outlook of the Preacher is found in Christ, since He is the Comforter of men, as He described Himself, as it is recorded in John chapter 14, and as Paul had also described Christ in the opening passage of his second epistle to the Corinthians. Ultimately, the Preacher will answer his own skepticism in this same manner, that all things are in the hand of God and that He shall judge every good or evil work. But he does not make that conclusion explicit until the very last chapter of the work.

Ecclesiastes, Part 3: The Comforter

Proceeding through our presentation of Solomon’s Ecclesiastes, it is evident that there are going to be times when we shall be compelled to repeat ourselves, because the work itself is quite repetitive in nature. We have also discussed, as our writer himself had explained, why we believe that this preacher is indeed Solomon, the ancient king of Israel. But we have called him the Preacher because that is what he had called himself as he wrote this work. As he repeats his themes, the Preacher also uses different perspectives or adds new elements to his subjects. Therefore we can see that the repetition of the work is one of its teaching methods, just as the skepticism that the Preacher often expressed is also a teaching method. Making his repetitive remarks, the Preacher expresses and addresses skeptical concerns in different ways throughout this work.

The transience, or vanity, of man, the cyclical nature of worldly existence, the fact that man ultimately dies without any apparent reward for his labors, or any ability to enjoy them once he is gone and therefore he must leave them to the enjoyment of others, these have been the primary subjects of the Preacher. And even though he laments such vanity, where he exhorts men to keep the commandments of God we realize that while all may appear to be vanity, all is vanity without God. Therefore with God, it becomes evident that all is not in vain, that there must be something greater in the end, some greater purpose underlying man’s apparent vanity. Realizing this, we must admit that for man, for the Adamic man which Yahweh created to be immortal, the skepticism of the Preacher is unwarranted because there certainly is a God.

Ecclesiastes, Part 2: Vanity and Deliverance

Presenting the opening chapters of Ecclesiastes, we showed how this work was attributed to King Solomon from the earliest times, and also how it accords very well with the life of Solomon, once we realize that it must have been written in the later part of his life. Only in the life of Solomon do we find someone who could have had the experiences of this writer, who called himself the Preacher but who also claimed to be a son of David and king over all Israel. Then in addition to these assertions, there is also the confession of an abundantly opulent lifestyle which the historical Scriptures describe for us in the life of Solomon. Writing this book, the Preacher is now reflecting back on that life and assessing its value.

Ecclesiastes was written to lament the plight of man, that none of the works of man seem to be of any benefit to him at the end of his life, because he must leave the fruits of them to others. Realizing this, the Preacher turned to mirth and decadence, but neither did he find any satisfaction in those things. Making our own assessment of his words, we explained that the Preacher had purposely employed skepticism as a teaching method throughout his discourse. All is vanity, he proclaimed, but what he really meant to say is that all is vanity without God, something which is further revealed to us as we make our way through these subsequent chapters of his work.

Ecclesiastes, Part 1: Methods of The Preacher

Before beginning a commentary on Ecclesiastes, let me first make the confession that none of my commentaries on Scripture are founded on worldly learning. I never went to Bible school, I never studied other mens’ commentaries, and I have little idea what the supposedly learned men say about most aspects of Scripture, or about individual books of Scripture. Neither am I going to research any of them for any particular commentary. With only a few exceptions, on the infrequent occasions where I have tried to read a popular commentary on a portion of Scripture, I have been disappointed, and sometimes even angered by what I have seen. For the most part, my only experience with the popular commentaries is through the editing work which I have done for Clifton Emahiser, who quotes from them frequently.

So when I write my own commentaries, I seek out only what information I can glean from or about the oldest available manuscripts, and I base my commentaries on what I have come to understand from Scripture itself and from classical histories and whatever I remember from my own readings of these and other works, such as the apocryphal literature or the ancient inscriptions of the neighboring cultures. Therefore, whether I say anything new, or whether I repeat anything old, for me to contend with or to mimic any of the traditional commentaries is not premeditated. Rather, I only seek to provide a discussion of Scripture through the lens of that proper covenant theology which is found in our Christian Identity understanding.

Paul's Second Epistle to Timothy, Part 5: Censure and Exhortation

This will be the 121st presentation in our commentaries on the Epistles of Paul of Tarsus, and, at least for now, it shall be the final segment of the series. Here we conclude an endeavor which we began on March 28th, 2014, with our first presentation on the epistle to the Romans. We praise Christ for having had the opportunity to do this, and we pray that all of those unrighteous skeptics of Paul’s epistles take the time to read or listen to this work. As we have said many times in the past, Paul’s epistles were the glue by which the message of reconciliation in the Gospel of Christ was adhered to the lost sheep of the Houses of Judah and Israel – the anciently scattered tribes who are those for whom Christ had come. The importance of this within the greater history of our Adamic race cannot be overlooked. In the history of Israel, Paul was every bit as important as any of the ancient prophets – for it is he who truly understood and taught the relevance of the prophecies and histories of the children of Israel in the light of the Gospel of Christ, even if the world has been blind to the truth of this message for at least the last 1800 years. In the formative years of the Roman Church, imperialism prevailed over identity.

But as we have explained elsewhere, and in diverse ways, while this is the last epistle in our presentation, it is not the last of Paul’s surviving epistles in the order of their writing. We have not presented these epistles in the order in which they were written. Rather, we adhered to the order found in the King James Version of the Bible, with a couple of exceptions. We moved Hebrews to precede the pastoral epistles, as we believe that it belongs with the nine epistles which Paul had written to other Christian assemblies. We also moved Philemon and presented it along with Colossians, since Philemon was a Colossian and Paul wrote to him individually concerning his slave Epaphras at the same time that he wrote his letter to the Colossians.

Aside from the first three presentations of this epistle, perhaps last Saturday’s program, The Gospel of Goddard? Or the Gospel of Christ?, would be a good prerequisite for this program, as there is a fair amount of convergence in the subject matter.

Paul's Second Epistle to Timothy, Part 4: No Mercy for Narcissists

So far in our presentations of this second epistle to Timothy, we have focused on Paul’s declaration of The Nullification of Death which is in Christ Yahshua, an understanding of which should in turn lead us to Rejecting the Religion of Fear. Then we discussed his admonition in regard to Rightly Dividing the Word of Truth, especially in relation to those earlier subjects. While there are other topics which Paul has discussed here, we chose to illustrate these themes to a greater extent because they are representative of some of the most important components of Paul’s messages throughout all of his epistles. For example, he explains in Romans chapter 5 and 1 Corinthians chapter 15 both what the nullification of death means to our Adamic race, and why and how it shall be effected. Then he adds to those explanations with certain statements and allegories which he had made in 1 Corinthians chapters 3 and 5 and elsewhere. So here we have endeavored to show that Paul’s message is consistent from the beginning of his ministry to the end, and that it is also consistent with the oracles of Yahweh found in both the prophets and in the Gospels.

As we have mentioned, another theme of this epistle is found in Paul’s warnings to his younger companion concerning the character of many of the men who were at one time or another associated with his ministry. In the closing verses of this epistle, in chapter 4, he will make brief mention of a few others. But now, as we proceed with 2 Timothy chapter 3, Paul issues a more general warning concerning character, and evidently while he is speaking of the “last days” this also serves as a warning to Timothy, and to Christians in general, to be wary of men who display certain types of behavior, when such men are encountered.

Paul's Second Epistle to Timothy, Part 3: Rightly Dividing the Word of Truth

In the first two presentations of this epistle, we discussed at length the nullification of death which is promised in Christ, and the need to reject the religion of fear which was first taught by the Pharisees, then capitalized upon by the Roman Catholic Church, and which is now being used for advantage throughout all of the denominational churches, to keep the people in bondage to sin and death. But each and every member of our White Adamic race has a promise of eternal life, because it was for that reason that we were created, and Yahweh our God cannot fail. For that same reason, however, we must cease from sin, lest our eternal life be an existence spent in a state of everlasting contempt – as it is described in Daniel chapter 12.

However if we love our God, we shall love one another, and then even if we do sin, we have a propitiation in Christ, as the apostle John also explained where he wrote in chapter 2 of his first epistle: “1 My little children, these things write I unto you, that ye sin not. And if any man sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous: 2 And he is the propitiation for our sins: and not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world.” Of course, the sins of the world can only be the sins of the children of Israel, as only the children of Israel possessed both the law and these promises of forgiveness, mercy and grace. But John’s world, the world that mattered to him, was the society of the children of Israel. So he distinguished between those who loved God, and those who could not love God, and he said “4 He that saith, I know him, and keepeth not his commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him. 5 But whoso keepeth his word, in him verily is the love of God perfected: hereby know we that we are in him. 6 He that saith he abideth in him ought himself also so to walk, even as he walked.” As Christ had said in the Gospel to certain of His adversaries, in John chapter 8, “ye seek to kill me, because my word hath no place in you.” Those men were completely disassociated from Him, simply because their origin was not His origin, and because their father was not His Father, as He had explained to them.

Paul's Second Epistle to Timothy, Part 2: Rejecting the Religion of Fear

Contrasting the religion of the Sadducees with that of the Pharisees in his Wars of the Judaeans, Book 2, the Judaean historian Flavius Josephus had said “164 But the Sadducees are those who compose the second order, and take away fate entirely, and suppose that God is not concerned in our doing or not doing what is evil; and they say, that to act what is good, or what is evil, 165 is at men's own choice, and that the one or the other belongs so to everyone, that they may act as they please. They also take away the belief of the immortal duration of the soul, and the punishments and rewards in Hades.” Of course, the Pharisees which Josephus wrote about were the successors of those who rejected Christ, and while Christ despised the Sadducees completely, and while for many reasons He had also criticized the doctrines of the Pharisees, the Pharisees nevertheless believed in the eternal spirit of man which the Sadducees had rejected, and the judgement of good and evil.

A few centuries later, following after the model of the Pharisees, the Roman Catholic Church continued the doctrine concerning punishments and rewards in Hades. Then they used that doctrine not only to put fear in the hearts of the people, but to reap profits from them. However speaking of His ἐκκλησία, Christ had said in Matthew chapter 16 that “the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.” Christ was not speaking of an institution when He said that. Rather, the word ἐκκλησία describes those whom He had called, which are the body of the people of Israel, as it was also used throughout the Greek Scriptures. So in Brenton’s Septuagint we read from Psalm 21, which speaks prophetically of Christ Himself: “20 Deliver my soul from the sword; my only-begotten one from the power of the dog. 21 Save me from the lion's mouth; and regard my lowliness from the horns of the unicorns. 22 I will declare thy name to my brethren: in the midst of the church will I sing praise to thee. 23 Ye that fear the Lord, praise him; all ye seed of Jacob, glorify him: let all the seed of Israel fear him.” In that passage the word church is from the plural form of ἐκκλησία, and it refers to the collective masses of the children of Israel. In the King James Version of the Psalms, the corresponding Hebrew word is translated as congregations.

Paul's Second Epistle to Timothy, Part 1: The Nullification of Death

Here we begin our presentation of Paul’s second epistle to Timothy. This is the last in our series of commentaries on the epistles of Paul of Tarsus which we had begun with the epistle to the Romans in the Spring of 2014, and it is now the 117th presentation in this series. Undertaking this endeavor, we did not present Paul’s epistles in chronological order, but rather we found it appropriate, with a couple of exceptions, to present the pastoral epistles to Timothy and Titus last in order of Paul’s epistles, and also present the other epistles as they are ordered in most Bibles. One exception was the epistle to Philemon, which is not truly a pastoral epistle and which in its historical context is connected to the epistle to the Colossians, so we presented it along with that epistle. Another is the epistle to the Hebrews, which was certainly written by Paul although most Bibles order it to follow Paul’s pastoral epistles, preferring to separate it because they are not certain of the authorship. So we moved it to precede Paul’s pastoral epistles, because we are confident that Paul was its author.

If we had presented the epistles of Paul in chronological order, we would have had to begin with the epistles to the Thessalonians which were both written during Paul’s sojourn in Corinth, around 50 or 51 AD as it is recorded in Acts chapter 18. Then the epistle to the Galatians was written during Paul's stay in Antioch which is described in Acts 18:22-23. The first epistle to the Corinthians was written as Paul was planning to end his three-year sojourn in Ephesus in 56 AD, described in Acts chapter 19. As we know from 1 Corinthians, there was another epistle written to the Corinthians which preceded it, but which is now lost, and that was probably also written from Ephesus.

Paul's First Epistle to Timothy, Part 8: The Path of our Plight

In our last presentation of Paul’s first epistle to Timothy, which discussed 1 Timothy chapter 5, we saw the apostle address the issue of “younger widows” who were apparently not “really widows”, referring to unmarried women who must have been married at one time, but who no longer had husbands. Paul advised such women to find husbands, and to have children and raise families, explaining that doing so, they would not be a burden on the assembly while being tempted into acting wantonly towards married men. Here it is evident that Christian mercy invites even those who may have had a sinful past to return to a natural role within the Christian community.

So if a woman who had been previously married, but who was not really a widow, has found herself alone then it is not necessarily a sin for her to remarry. Rather, it is a greater sin, as Paul explained in that same chapter, for her to turn to a lewd lifestyle because of her natural urges and her unmarried condition. Even the Law supports this to some degree, in spite of the fact that Yahweh our God despises divorce, and Yahshua Christ had indeed professed that those remarrying after divorce are committing adultery.

Paul's First Epistle to Timothy, Part 7: Women Noble and Naughty

There is a part of the story of Genesis chapter 3 that is missing, so perhaps we may fill in a few of the blanks for ourselves. The reason why Eve was so easily seduced can only be that Adam had left her alone, where she was unguarded and vulnerable. Adam was the first feminist, leaving Eve to make it on her own. Now, I can imagine that the Devil set up a football game between two teams of negros, and Adam was fascinated with how well they can run with a pigskin. So he was off watching it all while Eve was left at home. One fallen angel opened a beer concession, and another ran a gambling counter. With Eve left at home and planning her first Tupperware party, along comes the Serpent a-knocking at the door, and the rest is history…. Later, Adam came home half inebriated from a mixture of musk, testosterone and Bud Lite, and the woman “gave also unto her husband with her; and he did eat.” The next morning, the man refused to accept any of the consequences for his actions, and when he was called into account, he tried to blame his wife for all of their sin. So he was punished “because thou hast hearkened unto the voice of thy wife,” which was yet another feminist act on his part. Then as they and their descendants toiled in their punishment, within just a few generations the bastards were everywhere and began race-mixing with their great-great grandchildren. Soon the only men left who did not have season tickets was Noah and his sons, and all of them were outcasts at the lunch rooms and office parties because they didn’t know the scores. Thus it is once again today, just it is as it was in the days of Noah.

Of course, all of this may be dismissed as a conjectural fantasy. But the core ideas expressed here are certainly true, and they are evident from Scripture. Adam did leave Eve alone, and when Adam returned to her and found her in a state of sin, he let her lead him into that sin and willfully joined her. Then Adam blamed her once he was called to account for it by Yahweh his God, rather than taking responsibility for his actions. Adam had also neglected his God, as he even attempted to elude him before being questioned for his crime. As a result, by the time of Noah the entire culture was corrupted, and even with Noah’s obedience the entire race was soon once again taken off into paganism, out of which Abraham alone was called.

The opening remarks for this program are posted under the topic Summer Travels in the Christogenea Forum.

Paul's First Epistle to Timothy, Part 6: Exercise for Piety

We have already discussed the first five verses of 1 Timothy chapter 4 at length in the last segment of our presentation of this epistle, in Part 5 of this series, which was subtitled Rome Pagan and Catholic. Because much time has elapsed since we made that presentation, and because as we proceed here in verse 6 we see that Paul refers back to what he had said in those first five verses, we will read those verses once again and summarize a few of the statements we had made concerning them.

In the opening verses of 1 Timothy chapter 4 Paul wrote: “1 Now the Spirit specifically states that in the latter times some will withdraw from the faith, cleaving to wandering spirits and teachings of demons, 2 speaking lies in hypocrisy, their own consciences having been branded with iron, 3 forbidding to marry, to abstain from foods, things which Yahweh has established for participation with gratitude for those with faith and knowledge of the truth.”

Discussing these statements in Rome Pagan and Catholic, we cited many of the earliest surviving Christian writers to establish the fact that these heresies began to manifest themselves amongst the Christian assemblies as early as the second century of the Christian era. We also hope to have established that these heresies were brought into Christianity to one degree or another from the ancient pagan sects, and that the Roman Catholic Church had adopted these various pagan practices as the institution itself was developing. It continues to cleave to them unto this very day. So the Roman Church forbid its priests to marry, and for many generations it has attracted the basest sort of men into its numbers, and, in turn, it is these base men who have guided Church policy for many centuries.

Paul's First Epistle to Timothy, Part 5: Rome Pagan and Catholic

Discussing 1 Timothy chapter 3 we took a lengthy digression to explain that in the many places where Paul of Tarsus referred to the various mysteries of the Christian faith, none of these things should any longer be mysteries to Christians, because Paul himself had explained them wherever he had mentioned them. Once Paul explained them, it is only common sense that they should be mysteries no longer. But in its doctrines, the Roman Catholic Church still considers them to be mysteries, in spite of the fact that Paul explained them as he mentioned them in his epistles. But the very essence of Christianity informs us that certain tenets of the faith should remain mysteries to outsiders, for which reason Christ had spoken in parables. However they should not be mysteries to Christians.

To Christians there is no “mystery of the church”, since Paul taught that the church was to consist of the people of the nations of those Israelites who were scattered in antiquity, and he brought the Gospel to those same people as he was commanded to do. Furthermore, to Christians there is no mystery to the “mystery of God”, because Paul had taught that Yahshua (Jesus) Christ is Yahweh God manifest in the flesh, and there should be nothing too difficult to understand about that. Paul was not alone, as these same things are also taught in the writings of the prophets and in the Gospel itself. In the Revelation of Yahshua Christ, we learn that by our own time the mystery of God was to be finished, and it is, because as Identity Christians we announce it’s fulfillment in spite of the denials of the Roman Catholics and the other denominational churches.

Paul's First Epistle to Timothy, Part 4: The Mysteries of the Faith

Throughout the first part of 1 Timothy chapter 3, Paul discussed guidelines for the selection of qualified supervisors and servants in a Christian assembly – which are in most translations referred to as bishops and ministers – and we made some summary statements concerning Paul’s mention of the “mystery of the faith” in verse 9, where he had instructed that reverent servants of the assembly should “not be double-tongued, not addicted to much wine, not shamefully desirous of gain, holding the mystery of the faith in a pure conscience.” Ostensibly, a sinful man should not be able to hold the mystery of the faith with a clear conscience, where we see Paul infer that a clear conscience is the product of a moderate lifestyle and keeping of the law. Now in the closing verses of the chapter Paul will mention the “mystery of piety”, or as the King James Version has it, the “mystery of godliness”, and so that we may understand what it is that Paul means by referring to these mysteries, we shall discuss them as he has referred to them throughout his epistles, because they should really not be mysteries any longer.

But before we undertake that endeavor, here we see that Paul addresses Timothy on a personal note. We left off just short of the closing verses of 1 Timothy chapter 3, where Paul had concluded his summary of the credentials which he thought necessary for a man to have before being selected for the leadership of a Christian assembly, that, as Paul had explained, he should have conducted his life in an exemplary manner and Paul gave examples of such conduct. Now we shall continue our discussion where Paul tells his younger companion:

Paul's First Epistle to Timothy, Part 3: Leadership Credentials

As we have already explained, Paul of Tarsus was writing Timothy while en route from the Troad through Macedonia, as he traveled to Nicopolis in Epirus where he had planned on spending the winter before a visit to Corinth in the Spring of 57 AD. Timothy is still in Ephesus, from where Paul had recently departed, and Paul is exhorting him in areas which he must of felt needed special attention, hoping that Timothy would pass these things on in the course of his teachings to the Ephesians. Paul’s comments supporting our interpretation are found in chapter 4 of this letter.

In the last presentation of our commentary on this first epistle to Timothy, in chapter 2, we saw that the apostle passed on to his younger companion a brief sketch depicting the demeanor which he hoped would be born by all Christian men, that they should endeavor to lead quiet and peaceful lives and be found in supplications, prayers, intercessions and thanksgiving on behalf of their fellows. Here it should be noted, that this does not mean that Paul expects Christian men to be merely passive keepers of the Faith, sitting around all day and passing the time in prayer. Rather, Paul has described the attitude of Christian men and not their activity. He has explained how they should be found carrying themselves as they toil and struggle in their Christian walk, for the objective of accomplishing good deeds, works resulting in the accumulation of treasure in heaven – things which he mentions here in chapters 4 through 6 of the epistle. The true Christian activity is proactive, and neither sedentary nor pacifist.

Paul's First Epistle to Timothy, Part 2: Gender Roles in Apostolic Christianity

This program is subtitled Gender Roles in Apostolic Christianity, which is a discussion for the end of the presentation. We wanted to subtitle it When All is not ALL, and that is a theme as we present the opening verses of 1 Timothy chapter 2. We opted for the subtitle which we did only because of the current war against traditional gender roles in modern society which is now coming to a crescendo. In the end, God will not be mocked. There are only two genders, and they are determined by the biology of one’s birth. Those genders are given peculiar roles assigned to them byt the Creator, and in the end they will once again assume those roles. Everything else is a sickness spawned by the minds of devils.

Paul of Tarsus having had both Timothy and Titus (the Titus Justus of Corinth) in his company for long periods of time, which is evident in Acts chapters 16 through 18 and in various of his other epistles, we may be confident that these men had learned first-hand how Paul believed that a Christian assembly should be organized, and how Christians should conduct themselves in their daily lives and interactions with one another and with the world outside. We may also imagine that these pastoral epistles among Paul’s letters are very likely not the only epistles which Paul had written to his younger companions, but rather, that they are the only ones which survived.

Paul's First Epistle to Timothy, Part 1: Yahshua [Jesus] Christ is God and His Gospel is for Israel

Now we are going to begin a presentation of Paul’s first epistle to Timothy, as we near the completion of a commentary on the epistles of Paul of Tarsus which we had begun with the epistle to the Romans in the Spring of 2014. This is now the 109th presentation in the series. It may be fitting that the pastoral epistles to Timothy and Titus are presented last in order of Paul’s epistles, as they are in most Bibles. However one error that most Bibles make is not to count Hebrews amongst Paul’s other epistles. Furthermore, Philemon belongs with Colossians, and it is not really a pastoral epistle in the sense of those which were written to Timothy and Titus. Going one step further, we have decided to put both of the epistles to Timothy last in order here because we find it appropriate to present 2 Timothy at the very end of our presentation of Paul’s epistles, although 2 Timothy was not actually the last of Paul’s epistles chronologically. When we do finally present 2 Timothy, we hope to make a full explanation of our reasons for that. If we had chosen to make our entire presentation in the order in which Paul wrote his epistles, 1 Timothy would follow Titus, and it in turn would be followed by 2 Corinthians. 2 Timothy would come later, as Paul was under house arrest in Rome when it was written (see Ordering and chronology of the epistles of Paul).

Paul had apparently written his first epistle to the Corinthians not long before he left Ephesus, in what was most likely the Spring of 56 AD, which we had explained in part 3 of our presentation of that epistle. He had initially planned on going to Achaia by way of Makedonia, and spending the winter in Corinth, as he wrote in chapter 16 of that epistle. But some time during the initial stage of his travels Paul decided instead to winter in Nicopolis, which is in Epirus and northwest of Corinth. As we had explained earlier in this series, such as in the opening segment of our commentary on the epistle to Titus, Paul must have received a letter from Corinth in answer to the epistle which we know as 1 Corinthians, and he then decided to delay going to Corinth and spent the subsequent winter at Nicopolis instead. He gave his reasons for that decision in the opening chapters of 2 Corinthians, which was written as he wintered in Nicopolis, and both Titus and Timothy were with him.

The Epistles of Paul – Titus, Part 4: The Mercy of God and Justification in Christ

The opening remarks to the podcast have been published separately under the title Dating the Passover.

In the last portion of this commentary on Titus, we had made a few brief remarks on the closing verses of Titus chapter 2, and promised to elaborate on a few things when we resumed. So to begin this evening, we shall repeat those verses, beginning from Titus 2:11 where Paul wrote:

11 For the delivering favor of Yahweh [א interpolates “the Savior”; the text follows A, C, D, and the MT which varies slightly] has been displayed to all men, 12 teaching us that, rejecting impiety and the lusts of this Society, discreetly and righteously and piously we should live in this present age,

Paul’s words seem to take it for granted that men should understand the favor of Yahweh once they hear the message of the Gospel. But the lesson to be learned is not merely a personal lesson in admonitions to do or not to do certain things. Christ would not have had to die on the Cross for that, and it is unlikely that His enemies would have even killed Him for that. Rather, the message of the Gospel is much deeper than that: in large part it is a historic lesson, that the children of Israel were alienated from Yahweh their God for their sins, and they were oppressed and ruled over by the enemies of God and man because of their alienation. But they were reconciled to God in Christ when He died on their behalf, which made their reconciliation possible according to His law. All of the nations to which Paul had brought the Gospel were descended from those ancient Israelites who had been alienated from Yahweh their God, and who have to learn the lesson which Paul describes.

Paul's Epistle to Titus, Part 3: The Cleanliness of God

As we have already discussed at length in the opening segments of our presentation of Paul’s epistle to Titus, when the apostle arrived in the Troad he must have been informed that Titus was in Crete, and that there were some problems there among the assemblies. So in the opening verses of chapter 1 of this epistle we had observed where Paul addressed Titus as a true member of his race, according to the common belief. We interpret that statement to mean that even though Titus was a Greek by race, perceptibly he was of the race of the ancient Israelites, and therefore should be accepted as such. Then after reminding Titus of why he was sent to Crete in the first place, in order to organize the Christian assemblies there, Paul advised him to ensure that elders, which are the overseers or bishops of each assembly, were established, and that the offices be filled by men who had endeavored to maintain a virtuous way of life. The foremost of the examples of virtue which Paul gave was that they were to have been the husbands of one wife, and that they had children without the possibility that they themselves could be accused of disobedience. We also perceive this to mean that men who would be leaders of Christian assemblies should have experience raising families of their own, they should be committed to those families, and that their children in turn must also be true members of the race, since otherwise the men would be chargeable.

Making these admonitions to Titus, Paul advised him that the “Cretans are always liars”, evidently quoting the Cretan poet Epimenides. Since Epimenides was a Cretan, modern commentators interpret the statement paradoxically, but we have asserted that Paul and other early Christian writers did not interpret it in that manner. Rather, they accepted it at face value. The early 2nd century Greek writer Plutarch also accepted the statement of Epimenides as being true, and it seems to have been a common observation, as he even used the term κρητισμός, or Cretan behavior, to describe the act of lying. Paul himself had said of the saying of Epimenides that “13 This testimony is true, for which cause you must censure them relentlessly, that they would be sound in the faith, 14 not giving heed to myths of Judaism and injunctions of men turning themselves away from the truth.” So Paul seems to be using the line from Epimenides as a rhetorical device in order to warn Titus of how important it is that he make certain that the most pious and virtuous men among the Christians in Crete were given the responsibility of supervising each assembly, men who exhibited piety in the conduct of their lives, and not merely men who professed piety with their lips.