1 Timothy 3:7

Rec. text after δεῖ δὲ inserts αὐτόν with D2KLP and Latin Vss.; om. אAGH.

7. δὲ καί The καί serves to connect this with 1 Timothy 3:6; but he must also &c.

μαρτυρίαν. Not μαρτύριον as in 1 Timothy 2:6; there the reference is to the witness to the truth of facts and doctrines, here to the character of persons.

ἀπὸ τε͂ν ἔξωθεν. οἱ ἔξω is St Paul’s regular description (1 Corinthians 5:12; Colossians 4:5; 1 Thessalonians 4:12) for those who are not Christians and so οἰκεῖοι τῆς πίστεως (Galatians 6:10). Far from being a new convert, it is desirable that a bishop should be a Christian of standing and repute among his heathen neighbours.

εἰς ὀνειδισμὸν κ.τ.λ. Again, the important words are τοῦ διαβόλου, which are evidently here gen. subjecti, not gen. objecti. The context of παγὶς τοῦ διαβόλου in 2 Timothy 2:26 determines τοῦ δ. to refer there to the devil; but here as plainly the context requires us to take it in the more general sense of the slanderer or accuser. 1 Timothy 3:6-7 refer to the reputation of the ἐπίσκοπος, an important matter, for he must be ἀνεπίλημπτος (1 Timothy 3:2), and not to the snares set for him by Satan. We thus take both ὀνειδισμός and παγίς with τοῦ διαβόλου, and translate … the reproaches and snares prepared by slanderers. An ὀνειδισμός from οἱ ἔξω is a thought familiar to St Paul: cp. Romans 15:3 (Psalms 69:9) οἱ ὀνειδισμοὶ τῶν ὀνειδιζόντων σὲ ἐπέπεσαν ἐπʼ ἐμέ, and also Romans 11:9 (Psalms 69:22).

A comparison of the qualifications of ἐπίσκοποι enumerated above with the characteristics of the Stoic σοφός (Diog. Laert. VII. 116 ff.) is interesting. We cannot think it impossible that the Apostle was acquainted with the latter list, which was one of the commonplaces of Stoic teaching of the day. And, although there are wide divergences, as might be anticipated, between the teaching of Zeno and of St Paul (cp. for instance the Stoic thesis that the σοφός should be pitiless (§ 123)), yet the coincidences are striking. The ἐπίσκοπος is to be a married man and his family is spoken of as an object of his affection (1 Timothy 3:2; 1 Timothy 3:4-5); so too with the σοφός (§§120, 121). The ἐπίσκοπος is not to be a novice ἵνα μὴ τυφωθείς &c. (1 Timothy 3:6); the σοφός is to be ἄτυφος. The ἐπίσκοπος is not to be πάροινος (1 Timothy 3:3) and yet Timothy is advised (1 Timothy 5:23) to use wine in moderation; for the σοφός it is prescribed καὶ οἰνωθήσεσθαι μέν, οὐ μεθυσθήσεσθαι δέ (§ 118). Two attributes of the ἐπίσκοπος are given in the order σώφρονα, κόσμιον (1 Timothy 3:2); in connexion with the virtues of the σοφός it is said τῇ δὲ σωφροσύνῃ [ἕπεται] κοσμιότης (§ 126). And lastly the instructions to Timothy about bodily exercise (1 Timothy 4:8) recall the practice of the σοφός in the same matter: τὴν ἄσκησιν� (§ 123).