Ver. 1. Now we beseech you, brethren] Christ’s spokesmen must be fair spoken, so wooing for him that they may win upon men’s hearts, leading by the hand those that are willing, and drawing after a sort those that are less willing, that they may present them as a chaste virgin to Christ, 2 Corinthians 11:2. This earnest obtestation imports that it is both easy and dangerous to be carried away by seducers; for the Scripture doth not use to “cleave straws with beetles” to be so serious in a slight matter. “We beseech you,” of all loves, ερωτωμεν (from ερως, love). Brethren, womb brethren, as near in nature as is possible. “By the coming of our Lord Jesus,” whom you love, look and long for; “and by your gathering together,” επισυναγωγη, as ever you desire and hope to hover under his wings, as the chick ens under the hen’s, that the infernal kites catch you not at that day. By the coming of our Lord] He draweth an argument from the matter underhand wherewith their hearts were now heated beforehand. It must be an elaborate speech that shall work upon the heart. And by our gathering together unto him] In that last and great day, when all the eagles shall be gathered to that once dead, but now all-quickening carcase, Matthew 24:28; when the sign of the Son of man shall be lifted up as an ensign, and all the saints shall repair to it, as the soldiers do to their colours, Ephesians 1:10. Αδελφος, from α and δελφυς uterus: fratres uterini.
Ver. 2. That ye be not soon shaken] Σαλευθηναι (a nomine σαλος, salum). As seamen are tossed by a tempest, and even brought to their wits’ ends, Psalms 107:27. That ye be not shaken out of your wits, and put beside yourselves; so the words may be rendered. And indeed errors and heresies sanam tollunt de cardine mentem, drive men out of their little wits; as we see by woeful experience at this day. Or be troubled] Or, terrified, θροεισθαι, as with a sudden hubbub, alarm, tumult, uproar. It imports such perturbation as ariseth from rumour, Mark 13:5-27, or relation of something troublesome. Neither by spirit] Pretended revelations, such as was that whereby the old impostor deceived that young prophet into a lion’s mouth. Nor by word] Traditions, unwritten verities, &c. Nor by letter] Counterfeited, supposititious, spurious, such as were those Gospels that went under the names of St Thomas, St Bartholomew, &c. Or by wresting and writhing that passage of his former letter, 1 Thessalonians 4:17, to another meaning than ever the apostle intended it. So St Austin was served, and he foresaw it: I believe, saith he, that some of my readers will imagine me sensisse quod non sensi, aut non sensisse quod sensi, that I was in many things of another mind than ever I was indeed. And it happened accordingly; for as Baronius witnesseth, after St Austin’s death there arose up divers, Qui ex eius scriptis male perceptis complures invexerunt errores, who by mistaking of what he had written, brought in many pernicious errors, and vouched him for their author. (Baron. Annal. tom. 6.) As that the day of Christ] Peter’s scoffers asked, “Where is the promise of his coming?” as if Christ would never come. These were afraid he would come too soon, and take them with their task undone. The devil usually tempteth by extremes, as he did our Saviour, Matthew 4:1-11, and as he did Mr Knox upon his deathbed, first to despair, by setting his sins before him; and then to presumption, by reminding him of his reformations. Is at hand] Just now, this present year, for so the Greek ενεστηκεν signifieth. This fear racked a nd almost wrecked their minds, as a storm forceth a ship riding in the road to cut cable.
Ver. 3. Except there come a falling] Gr. αποστασια, an apostasy, viz. of people from the truth, when the whole world went a wondering and a wandering after the beast, Revelation 13:3. To the fathers these prophecies of Antichrist were riddles. The prophecy is sealed to the end, Daniel 12:9, till unsealed by event. Austin saith ingenuously, he understood not this text. And herein he did better than those other of the Latin Fathers that interpreted it of the falling away of various nations from the Roman empire. Daniel set forth Antichrist typically, in that little Antichrist, Antiochus; Paul topically, in this chapter. John writeth the mystery of Antichrist, in his Revelation; Paul sets a commentary upon him, and graphically describeth him, calling him apostasy in the abstract here, as some will have it; and in the next verse, “that man of sin,” that is, meram scelus, sheer wickedness, as Beza hath it. And that man of sin] That breathing devil, so portentously, so peerlessly vicious, Ut eius nomen non hominis, sed vitii esse videatur (as Lipsius saith of one Tubulus, a Roman praetor), that sin itself can hardly be more sinful. The son of perdition] Destined to destruction, even to be cast alive into the “lake of fire burning with brimstone,” Revelation 19:20. Well might Pope Marcellus II strike his hand upon the table, and say, Non video quomodo qui locum hunc altissimum tenent, salvari possunt, I see not how any pope can be saved. (Onuph. in Vita.) When I was first in orders (said Pope Pius Quintus) I had some good hopes of salvation; when I was made a cardinal, I doubted; but now that I am pope, I do almost despair. (Cornel. a Lapide in Numbers 11:11)