1 Timothy 2:9

Rec. text is ὡσαύτως καὶ τὰς γυναῖκας. τάς (added in D2bcKL) and most cursives) is omitted by אAD2*GP. καί is found in אcD2GKL and all the versions, but א*AP omit it. Westcott and Hort read ὡσαύτως γυναῖκας.

κοσμίῳ. So the bulk of authorities; but κοσμίως is found in אcD2*G and is given a place in Westcott and Hort’s margin.

χρυσῷ. So rec. text with אD2KL. AGP have χρυσίῳ.

9. ὡσαύτως κ.τ.λ. We must understand βούλομαι. Some commentators take the words down to σωφροσύνης as referring to the demeanour of women at public prayer, προσεύχεσθαι being supplied: “I wish likewise that women pray in modest apparel with shamefastness and sobriety,” κοσμεῖν ἑαυτάς going with what follows. Such directions would be similar to the rule laid down in 1 Corinthians 11:13, that women should be veiled at the assemblies of the faithful, when prayer is being offered. But this would be a very unnatural arrangement of the words; and the position of κοσμεῖν especially would be awkward. It is better to suppose that St Paul, beginning his sentence with ὡσαύτως as if he were going to add directions about the public devotions of women, goes off in a different direction and supplies principles for their general deportment and dress. This is quite in his manner. We take κοσμεῖν ἑαυτάς, then, as co-ordinated with προσεύχεσθαι of 1 Timothy 2:8.

The introductory ὡσαύτως occurs with peculiar frequency in the Pastorals (see 1 Timothy 3:8; 1 Timothy 3:11; 1 Timothy 5:25; Titus 2:3; Titus 2:6); it is only used twice elsewhere by St Paul (Romans 8:26; 1 Corinthians 11:25).

καταστολῇ. A word only found in the Greek Bible here and in Isaiah 61:3. It means dress; κατάστημα of Titus 2:3 is a more general word, equivalent to ‘demeanour’ or ‘deportment.’

μετὰ αἰδοῦς καὶ σωφροσύνης. With shamefastness and sobriety. This, the rendering of both A.V. and R.V., is as near to the Greek as we can go in English. The Greek words have a long history behind them, and have no exact equivalents in modern speech. Both together well describe the discretion and modesty of Christian womanhood.

αἰδώς is almost = verecundia; it is a nobler word than αἰσχύνη, inasmuch as it implies (1) a moral repugnance to what is base and unseemly, and (2) self-respect, as well as restraint imposed on oneself from a sense of what is due to others; neither (1) nor (2) enters into αἰσχύνη. Thus αἰδώς here signifies that modesty which shrinks from overstepping the limits of womanly reserve. Wiclif’s felicitous rendering shamefastness has been retained in nearly all the English versions, although both etymology and meaning have been obscured by the corrupt spelling ‘shame-facedness’; shamefastness is really that which is established and held fast by an honourable shame[520]. αἰδώς is a common term in philosophical writers, but in the LXX. it is found only 3Ma 1:19; 3Ma 4:5; it does not occur elsewhere in the N.T.

[520] See Trench, Synonyms of N.T., 20. (First Series).

σωφροσύνη is a word of much wider meaning. It was one of the four cardinal virtues in the Platonic philosophy, the others being φρόνησις, δικαιοσύνη, and ἀνδρεία (cp. Philo, Leg. Alleg. i. 19). Primarily it signifies (as in Aristotle) a command over bodily passions, a state of perfect self-mastery in respect of appetite. It marked the attitude towards pleasure of the man with a well-balanced mind, and was equally opposed to asceticism and to over-indulgence. Sobriety is perhaps its nearest equivalent in English, but this fails to do justice to the high place which the idea of ‘moderation’ occupied in the Greek mind. The old etymology given by Chrysostom, σωφροσύνη λέγεται�, shews how intimately it was connected with the sense of self-control.

The word does not occur in the older books of the LXX., for there is nothing corresponding to it in Hebrew moral systems. To the Hebrews ethics had always a religious basis, the revealed will of God supplied an objective standard of right and wrong; and thus the self-regarding aspect of Greek philosophy had no place in their thoughts. And for a somewhat similar reason—though qualifications would here be necessary—it can never occupy as high a place in Christian ethics as it did in Greek[521]. See note on φίλαυτος, 2 Timothy 3:2.

[521] And this is true, despite the fact that σωφρισύνη has a much wider sphere in modern Christendom than it ever had in Greece, and is really conceived of as 2. nobler virtue. Cp. Green, Prologomena to Ethics, p. 289 ff.

But, in the later books of the LXX., as soon, indeed, as Hebraism came into contact with Hellenism, the word σωφροσύνη and its cognates make their appearance. Thus we have σωφρόνως in Wis 9:11, and σωφροσύνη in Wis 8:7 and 2Ma 4:37, both σώφρων and σωφροσύνη occurring repeatedly in 4 Macc., where (4Ma 1:31) σωφροσύνη is defined as ἐπικράτεια τῶν ἐπιθυμιῶν (see further on Titus 1:8). In St Paul’s writings this group of words is applied to sobriety and self-command of mind as well as of body. Thus 2 Corinthians 5:13 σωφρονεῖν is used (as in Mark 5:15 || Luke 8:35) of being sane in mind; and in Romans 12:3 it is contrasted with ὑπερφρονεῖν; cp. Acts 26:25 (in a speech of St Paul), ἀληθείας καὶ σωφροσύνης ῥήματα. In the Pastorals the words occur with peculiar frequency. We have σωφροσύνη here and 1 Timothy 2:15; σώφρων, 1 Timothy 3:2; Titus 1:8; Titus 2:2; Titus 2:5; σωφρονεῖν, Titus 2:6; σωφρονίζειν, Titus 2:4; σωφρονισμός, 2 Timothy 1:7; and σωφρόνως, Titus 2:12. The writer’s marked preference for this group of words is indeed one of the unsolved problems of the vocabulary of the Pastoral Epistles. See Introd. p. xxxvii.

ἐν πλέγμασιν, with plaitings; this finds its explanation in the ἐμπλοκῆς τριχῶν of 1 Peter 3:3, a passage strictly parallel to this in its warnings against excessive finery. There is probably no literary connexion between these two passages, similar as they are; they both breathe the same spirit, inasmuch as they deal with the same topic from the same point of view.