Philippians 4:11

I have learned. — The “I” is here emphatic. There is evident reference to the habit peculiar to St. Paul, and made by him his especial “glory” (1 Corinthians 9:14), of refusing that maintenance from the churches which was his of right. Compare his words to the Ephesian presbyters, “I have coveted no man’s silver, or gold, or apparel. Yea, ye yourselves know, that these hands have ministered unto my necessities” (Acts 20:33).

Content. — The word (like the corresponding substantive in 2 Corinthians 9:8; 1 Timothy 6:6) properly means, self-sufficing. Such self-sufficiency was the especial characteristic claimed by the Stoics for the ideal wise man of their philosophy — a characteristic full of nobleness, so far as it involved the sitting loose to all the things of the world, but inhuman in relation to human affections, and virtually atheistic if it described the attitude of the soul towards the Supreme Power. Only in the first relation does St. Paul claim it here. It is difficult not to suppose that he does so with some reference to a philosophy so essentially Roman in practical development.