The Expositor's Bible: The Epistles of St. Peter

by J. Rawson Lumby

There may have been in St. Peter's thought that solemn scene depicted in Zech. iii., where, in the presence of the angel of the Lord, that highest angel who is Jehovah's special representative, Joshua the high-priest appears, and at his right hand Satan standing to be his adversary, and to charge him, and the nation through him, with their remissness in the work of the restoration of God's temple. There the angel of the Lord, full of mercy, as Satan was full of hate, checked the adversary's accusation, saying, "The Lord rebuke thee, Satan." The same application of the words "against them" is suggested by the apocryphal illustration in St. Jude (ver. 9), where in the contention about the body of Moses no greater rebuke is administered to the devil by the archangel Michael.

This exposition does not remove all difficulty. For as the angels in the verse appear to be spoken of as superior in might and power to these corrupt teachers, it seems natural at first sight to refer to them the indefinite expression, and to explain that the angels, though they be so exalted, bring no railing judgement before God against these teachers and their evil doings. But from what Scripture tells us of the angels, it is not easy to understand how or why they should bring such a judgement. Nowhere is such an office assigned to, or exercised by, these spiritual beings, nor are we anywhere told that the observance of the deeds of the wicked is in their province. They rejoice over one sinner that repenteth; they stand in God's presence as the representatives of spotless innocence; they are sent forth by God as His messengers of judgement and of love; but we never find them as accusers of the wicked. That office Satan has taken for his own.

But the words which the Apostle uses seem hardly to make it necessary that the comparison should be between angels and these teachers of destruction. In the passage of Zechariah which we judge to have been in St. Peter's mind when he wrote, the angel is that mightiest spirit among the angelic host who is identified in the language of the prophet with Jehovah Himself; and the angel in St. Jude's illustration is the archangel Michael. Conceiving that by "angels" St. Peter intends these chief members of the celestial powers, the sentence may be taken to mean that the most glorious beings among the angelic throng, those who are greater in might and power than the "dignities" of whom he has spoken, bring no railing judgement even against the fallen angels, whereas these men presume to blaspheme beings of an order far above themselves. Such a conception of subordination in the spirit-world as is here suggested is not foreign to New Testament thought. St. Paul speaks of the angels in heaven as representing "principality, power, might, and dominion" (Eph. i. 21); and in the same Epistle the evil angels are mentioned in like terms: "the principalities, the powers, the world-rulers of this darkness" (vi. 12). Similar language is found also in Col. i. 16. Taking this view of St. Peter's meaning, the daring and presumption of these false teachers are set in a stronger contrast. Whereas the highest angels, those who stand first among the heavenly host and dwell in the immediate presence of the Lord, though they might accuse Satan and his angels of rebellion, yet refrain; these bold transgressors among the race of men cast forth their blasphemy against the whole spiritual world.

But these, as creatures without reason, born mere animals to be taken and destroyed, railing in matters whereof they are ignorant, shall in their destroying surely be destroyed. The glory of man in creation is his reason. It is bestowed that he may freely, and not by constraint, consent unto the will of God, and also may by it discipline the body and hinder it from becoming his master. For the soul tabernacling in the flesh there is ever this peril, and by it these false teachers in the Asian Churches had been ensnared. Thus they were degraded, and were frustrating the end for which the light of reason was given. They were become like the horse and mule, which have no understanding. When the serpent tempted Eve, he set before her his own elevation through the fruit which to her was forbidden.

"I of brute human, ye of human gods,"

was his tempting speech. These men had given themselves up for a less noble bribe. The bait of sensual indulgence was offered, and their acceptance of it had brought them down to the level of creatures without reason. Their conduct and their lessons merited such a comparison, and showed how their nobler part had been warped by excess. To blaspheme against the powers of the spirit-world is conduct which can only be paralleled by that of the senseless animals, which, with utter ignorance of consequences, will rush upon objects whose strength they know not, and perish in their blind onslaught. But the beasts were born to be taken and destroyed; no higher fate was in their power. Men were meant for a nobler end, and it is only when the rein is given to appetite that they become from human brutish in their knowledge, more brutish than to know. Thus in their ignorance they rail at all loftier thought, and of their railing make a show of knowledge. Here they are more noxious than the unreasoning brutes. Their blinding lessons gain a hearing; and those who listen are drawn on by the same lust, and willingly follow after ignorance. But the work of all carries condemnation with it. Man, whose gaze was meant ever to be upward, is bowed down to earth like the beasts of the field, which are meant only for capture and destruction. On such perversion God will surely visit. They shall reap the fruit of their bold self-will, and in the time of their visitation they shall perish.

Suffering wrong as the hire of wrong-doing. The Authorised Version translates a somewhat different text (κομιούμενοι), "and shall receive the reward of wrong-doing." This is the easier sentence, and connects itself well with what precedes; but it has not the strongest support. By the text which the Revised Version has adopted (ἀδικούμενοι) the Apostle does not mean that these sinners meet a punishment which they have not deserved, and in that sense suffer wrong; but that they are themselves brought under the penalties of the wrong into which they are leading others. As the Psalmist says, their wickedness comes down on their own pate, and in the net which they hid privily is their own foot taken. They differ from Balaam, whose example St. Peter is soon about to instance. These men secure the reward they seek, larger resources to squander on their lust; yet this, their success, as they would call it, proves their overthrow.

Men that count it pleasure to revel in the daytime. They that are drunken are drunken in the night, and the same holds ordinarily of other excesses. They come not to the light because their deeds are evil. But these men have cast aside all such timorousness. They find a zest in outrage and in going beyond others, so as to add the daytime to the night for their indulgences. The sense of "luxury that lasts but for a day," that is ephemeral, and perishes in the using, is hardly to be extracted from the Greek; but with St. James (v. 5) in mind, where the verb is connected with the noun of this verse, "Ye have lived delicately on the earth and taken your pleasure," it may perhaps be allowable, as some have done, to interpret ἐν ἡμέρα as signifying "the time of this present life." The men live as though life were bestowed for no other object than their revelry.