2 Timothy 2:9

wherein I suffer trouble, as an evil doer Hardship rather than -trouble," the same word as in 2 Timothy 2:3; malefactor rather than -evil doer," the same word as of the thieves on the cross, Luke 23:32, these being the only N.T. occurrences.

even unto bonds -Even" need not have been italicised in A.V., much less omitted by R.V.; for the force of the preposition is more fully given with than without it. In the similar passage, Philippians 2:8, the -obedient unto death" of A.V. has actually been altered by R.V. into -obedient evenunto death." Vulg. -usque ad."

-Over the blackened ruins of the city (the firing of which had been falsely set down to the Christians) amid the squalid misery of its inhabitants, perhaps with many a fierce scowl turned on "the malefactor" he passed to his gloomy dungeon. There as the gate clanged upon him, he sat down, chained night and day, without further hope, a doomed man. His case was far more miserable than it had been in his first imprisonment, two or three years earlier. He was no longer permitted to reside "in his own hired room." He was in the custody, not as before of an honourable soldier like Burrus, but of the foul Tigellinus, whose hands were still dripping with Christian blood." Farrar, Messages of the Books, p. 388.

but the word of God is not bound Not his own preaching power, but the power of the Gospel at large. The Church is more than the individual, however eminent. The perfect passive tense here represents the state, -is not in a bound state," is not -cribbed, cabin'd and confined"; according to the proper force of the perfect, as in 1 Timothy 6:17, nor have their hope set on," 2 Timothy 4:8, -who have their love set on his appearing."