1 Timothy 6:16

1 Timothy 6:16. Who only hath immortality. Other beings, His creatures, are immortal by the appointment of the great Creator. He only has it as the very essence of His being. The words have been much quoted of late years, as supporting the doctrine of the annihilation of the lost. They are, however, obviously inconclusive on a point which does not seem to have been in the apostle's thoughts at the time he wrote the words, and can only be alleged as proving, what no one ever denied, that the soul of man is not necessarily immortal.

Dwelling in the light which no man can approach unto. The symbolism is perhaps the highest that man's thoughts can fashion, and has abundant sanction in Psalms 104:2. But we must remember that after all it is but symbolism, and that from another point of view God Himself is the Light in which He is here said to dwell, 1 John 1:5.

Whom no man hath teen or can see. Better, ‘whom no man ever saw.' A comparison of this verse with John 1:18 shows that the whole passage refers to the Father and not to the Son, and the two taken together serve to show the harmony between the two great apostles on this common point of their theology. The whole passage has in the Greek a rhythmical, almost metrical character, and may have been, as many commentators think, a quotation from some liturgical hymn.