Ver. 1. Rebuke not an elder] Lash him not with the scourge of the tongue, as a puny boy, μη επιληξης. Ne plagam inflixeris. Jerk him not as the pope did Henry IV of France in the person of his ambassador, or as the bishops and their shavelings did Henry II of England till the blood followed. This is not civil usage for an elder.
Ver. 2. With all purity] Not with some only, but “with all purity,” for fear of the worst, εν παση αγνεια: and lest any impure motion therewhile creep into the heart unawares. The souls of ministers should be purer than the sunbeams, saith Chrysostom. They are by their office the lights of the world: let no snuff abide in them, they are fullones animarum, fullers of men’s souls, to make and keep them white; let them take heed of a smutch. Turpe est doctori, &c. Nihil turpius est Peripatetico claudo. It is a shame for a teacher to be found faulty.
Ver. 3. Honour widows indeed] That is, such as are widows not by divorce, but by the death of their husbands, and loss of their children; such as was Naomi. Honour them, that is, take them into the college of widows, to be maintained at the Church’s charge. In this sense ministers are to have double honour, [see 1 Timothy 5:17] which is therefore so termed, because they testified thereby the virtues of those so sustained.
Ver. 4. Let them learn first to show] Such any one is in truth, as he is at home, Psalms 101:2. The hypocrite’s virtues (as that of the Sarmatians) run all outward. Something he seems abroad, but follow him home, and you shall soon see what he is: follow stage players into their attiring house where they disrobe themselves, and then it will appear they are vile varlets. Like unto this apostolic precept, was th at of Chile, one of the wise men of Greece, της αυτου οικιας καλως προστατειν to govern honestly a man’s own family. (Laert. in Vita.) And to requite their parents] [See Trapp on “Mt 15:4”] The storks feed their dams when old; though the young kites expel their dams, and with their bills and wings beat them out of their nest. Boughs bend toward their root, &c. A man or lad acting as an attendant or servant; a menial, a groom. Now arch. ŒD
Ver. 5. Trusteth in God] Whereas while she had a husband and children, she trusted overmuch in them. The αιμαρροουσα sought not to our Saviour till all her money was gone. Zephaniah 3:12, they are an afflicted poor people, therefore they trust in the name of the Lord. When the apostle saith of the widow indeed, that she is desolate, he seemeth to allude to the Greek word for a widow, which comes of a verb that signifies to be desolate and deprived, χηρα α χηρω, desolor, destituo. So the Latin vidua a viduando, widow from breaved of her husband, and the Hebrew almanah of alam, to be dumb; because death having cut off her head, she hath none to speak for her. And continueth in supplications, &c.] As Anna the prophetess did, Luke 2:36-38. A noble woman of Savoy, mother to John Galeaz, duke of Milan, after her husband’s decease, caused a coin to be made, upon the one side whereof she drew these words, Sola facta, solum Deum sequor, Being left alone, I follow God alone.
Ver. 6. Is dead while she liveth] Cum careat pura mente, cadaver agit. Pamphilius in Terence saith the like of a light housewife. Sane hercle homo voluptati obsequens fuit dum vixit. St Paul’s Greek cannot well be rendered but by Terence’s Latin, and Terence’s Latin cannot well be put into other Greek. But she that liveth in pleasure] Gr. σπαταλωσα. The delicate dame, such as were those wanton daughters of Sion, those mincing minions mentioned Isaiah 3:16-26, as also those of Tyre and Sidon, those of Phoenicia, so called from the Syriac phinneck, delicate: the Greeks call them τρυφεροι, such as lie melting in sensual delights and sinful pleasures, in the froth whereof groweth that worm that never dieth, James 5:5. I have read of a gallant addicted to uncleanness, who at last meeting with a beautiful dame, and having enjoyed his fleshly de sires of her, found her in the morning to be the dead body of one that he had formerly sinned with, which had been acted by the devil all night, and left dead again in the morning. Sure he had but ψυχρον παραγκαλισμα, a cold armful of her at length (as Lyc ophron saith of an evil wife), and if God had given grace, it might have brought him to better courses; but where that is wanting, no warning will serve turn. Jeroboam had as great a miracle wrought before him in the drying up of his hand, as St Paul at his conversion, yet was he not wrought upon, because the Spirit did not set it on. Besides, grace is seated in the powers of nature. Now carnal sins disable nature, and so set men in a greater distance from grace, as taking away the heart, Hosea 4:11.
Ver. 7. And these things give in charge] Often inculcate and set on with a great deal of vehemence, that religion suffer not.