2 Peter 1:14

knowing that shortly I must put off this my tabernacle Better, knowing that swift will be the putting off of my tabernacle. He speaks not so much of the nearness of his death, as of the suddenness with which it would come upon him, and he is therefore anxious to make all necessary preparations for it. In the word for "putting off" we have, as in 2 Corinthians 5:1-3, a blending of the two closely connected ideas of a tent and a garment. Comp. a like association of ideas in Psalms 104:2.

even as our Lord Jesus Christ hath shewed me Better, shewed me, the aorist pointing to some time definitely present to his mind. The only extant record of any such intimation in the Gospels is that in John 21:18-19, and, assuming the genuineness of this Epistle, it is obvious that it supplies an interesting testimony to the truth of that narrative. It will be remembered that we have already seen an interesting allusive reference to it in 1 Peter 5:2. Even on the other hypothesis it is, at least, evidence of the early date of a tradition corresponding to that which St John has recorded.