Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of 1 Timothy 5:6
But she that liveth in pleasure is dead while she liveth.
6. liveth in pleasure ] The word occurs only once besides in N.T., Jas 5:5; where it is coupled with ‘living delicately,’ and is translated by R.V. ‘have taken your pleasure,’ consistently with its rendering here ‘giveth herself to pleasure.’ But surely all the connexion and derivation of the word points to a worse meaning, the rioting of a prodigal; as e.g. its use by the LXX. (as Bp Ellicott points out) in Eze 16:49, ‘this was the iniquity of thy sister Sodom, pride, fulness of bread, and abundance of idleness was in her and in her daughters.’ It is reproduced in the cognate ‘wax wanton’ of 1Ti 5:11. Render perhaps she that liveth a prodigal’s life. Stress is laid on this being brought out, because St Paul is painting the two pictures, for contrast, in the strongest colours, one all saint, one all sinner.
is dead while she liveth ] Has no ‘hold on the life which is life indeed,’ as urged 1Ti 6:19.
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
But she that liveth in pleasure – Margin, delicately. The Greek word ( spatalao) occurs nowhere else in the New Testament, except in Jam 5:5, Ye have lived in pleasure on the earth. It properly means to live in luxury, voluptuously; to indulge freely in eating and drinking; to yield to the indulgence of the appetites. It does not indicate grossly criminal pleasures; but the kind of pleasure connected with luxurious living, and with pampering the appetites. It is probable that in the time of the apostle, there were professedly Christian widows who lived in this manner – as there are such professing Christians of all kinds in every age of the world.
Is dead while she liveth – To all the proper purposes of life she is as if she were dead. There is great emphasis in this expression, and nothing could convey more forcibly the idea that true happiness is not to be found in the pleasure of sense. There is nothing in them that answers the purposes of life. They are not the objects for which life was given, and as to the great and proper designs of existence, such persons might as well be dead.
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
1Ti 5:6
But she that liveth in pleasure.
A life of pleasure a life of death
If this be true–and, being part of the Word of God, it must be true–then the world of pleasure is a region of death, and a life of pleasure is a living death. These are strange tidings for those who live only for pleasure, and who boast that they alone, of all mankind, enjoy life.
I. Who is meant by the person that liveth in pleasure? And this point does require explanation; for the word pleasure, is one strangely abused; it has quite a different meaning in different companies, and among different men. There are pleasures in science, pleasures in sin; pleasures in holiness here, and in heaven, we know, there are pleasures for evermore. Now, she that is a widow indeed, and desolate, trusteth in God, and continueth in supplications and prayers night and day. But she that liveth in pleasure is dead while she liveth. Now this is evidently a character just the reverse; that of one who trusteth not in God, who neglects supplication and prayers. The same character is further described more at length in the eleventh and the thirteenth verses: wantonness, idleness, wandering about from house to house, tattling, the spirit of busy-bodies, speaking things which they ought not–are given as characteristics of her that liveth in pleasure. The original word, liveth in pleasure, is very peculiar, and is used in only one other place in the New Testament, namely, in Jam 5:5. Now, in that passage of St. James, he is addressing the wealthy, and the luxurious: Go to now, ye rich men, weep and howl for your miseries that; shall come upon you. Your riches are corrupted, and your garments are moth-eaten. Then, in the fifth verse, Ye have lived in pleasure on the earth, and been wanton; ye have nourished your hearts as in a day of slaughter: where the word that is translated ye have been wanton, is the very same word with that which, in our text, is rendered liveth in pleasure: and the whole passage strikingly describes what kind of character is intended. Thus it is plain already, that to live in pleasure, is to live without trust or faith in God, without constant prayer; in wantonness, idleness, trifling, the pride of wealth; in luxury, sensuality, and self-indulgence. This is the life of worldly pleasure. But there are yet many other Scriptures which describe the life of pleasure; and I am anxious you should feel the Scriptural force of the subject. Thus, in the prophet Ames, in the sixth chapter: Woe to them that are at ease in Zion, and trust in the mountain of Samaria, which are named chief of nations, to whom the house of Israel came, etc. Again you see the spirit of the child of pleasure, he makes himself at ease, he puts far away the evil day: he is self-indulgent, luxurious, gay, and jovial; he feels not for the affliction of Gods afflicted people. In the book of Job, we have another description of men living in worldly pleasure–in his twenty-first chapter: Wherefore do the wicked live, become old, yea, are mighty in power? Their seed:is established in their sight with them, and their offspring before their eyes. Their houses are safe from fear, neither is the rod of God upon them. Here, again, you see the life of pleasure to be a life of unsanctified prosperity, festivity, mirth, wealth; with the spirit of infidelity mocking at religion, asking, what good in prayer–what end to serve God? Oh, ye that have lived in pleasure, does not your conscience feel, My life is detected; my character has been described? So in our Lords parable; the rich man, who fared sumptuously every day, and was clothed in purple and fine linen, was evidently a man of pleasure–luxurious, self-indulgent, fond of dress. The city of Sodom was a city of pleasure. Then think of Babylon, once filled with the gayest of the gay; see that city of pleasure described in the prophet Isaiah: Come down and sit in the dust, O virgin daughter of Babylon, sit on the ground: there is no throne, O daughter of the Chaldeans: for thou shalt no more be called tender and delicate. Take the mill-stones, and grind meal: uncover thy locks, make bare the leg, uncover the thigh, pass over the rivers, etc. And let none think that the Scriptural description of one that liveth in pleasure applies only to the rich and the great of this world. But the temptation is common to all ranks, persons in middle life, and persons in the lowest walks of life, may be found to live continually in pleasure. This do all the intemperate. Oh, what sums the poor and labouring classes spend in the present day on needless, noxious, inflammatory drink!
II. Then this is Gods judgment of the state of such She that liveth in pleasure–whoever liveth in pleasure–is dead while alive. Now that is the sentiment, or rather the sentence, of God Himself. What does it mean? She that liveth in pleasure is dead while she liveth:–how can one be dead while alive? Think of that serious, pious Christian, once in the circle of your acquaintance, once a friend, and even a brother; but now he seems as one dead to all your pleasures, dead to the world, dead indeed unto sin. You say in scorn, that you might as well ask a dead man as ask him to join your worldly pleasure, he has become what you term a poor lifeless creature; he is buried alive. How true, how just, how striking that description! The dead neither move, nor see, nor hear, nor smell, nor feel. Your heart moves not in love to God; your minds eye sees no suitableness in the Saviour; you hear not His voice, you perceive no fragrance in His name, like that of ointment poured forth; you feel not the constraining force of His dying love. Then death is, further, a state of insensibility and helplessness. But further still, She that liveth in pleasure, is dead while she liveth, because under sentence of death. If a criminal were convicted of murder, or some capital crime, and sentenced to death, in the interval between his sentence and his execution he is considered as dead in the eye of the law. But are you afraid that you shall now lose all pleasure? You will lose the phantom, and gain the substance; you will throw away the counterfeit, and receive genuine gold; you will drop worldly pleasure, which is connected with death, which has death inseparably tied to it, and enjoy spiritual pleasure, which is connected with eternal life. But I had not meant to say much more which might seem harsh to those who will still be of the world; I was endeavouring to lead those who are desirous of coming out of the world to come into new life. Her ways are ways of pleasantness, and all her paths are peace. Then how noble, sublime, and glorious, are the objects with which religion is conversant. I add but another thought. Religious pleasures are the best, for they have the approving smile of God on them now, and they can be carried with the soul into another world, and there be ripened into perfection. (J. Hambleton, M. A.)
The woman of pleasure
It is a strong way of putting the truth, that a woman who seeks in worldly advantage her chief enjoyment, will come to disappointment and death. My friends, you all want to be happy. You have had a great many recipes by which it is proposed to give you satisfaction–solid satisfaction.
1. And, in the first place, I advise you not to build your happiness upon mere social position.
2. I go further, and advise you not to depend for enjoyment upon mere personal attractions.
3. Again, I advise you not to depend for happiness upon the flatteries of men.
4. Again, I charge you not to depend for happiness upon the discipleship of fashion. (T. De Witt Talmage.)
True living
A Persian monarch asked an aged man, How many of the suns revolutions hast thou counted? Sire, said the old man, I am but four years of age. What! interrupted the king, fearest thou not to answer me falsely, or dost thou jest on the very brink of the tomb? I speak not falsely, replied the aged man; eighty long years have I wasted in folly and sinful pleasures and in amassing wealth, none of which I can take with me when I leave this world. Four only have I spent in doing good to my fellow-men, and shall I count those years which have been utterly wasted?
A living death
Alas! many a man is dead while he liveth; yea, all are dead who live in impenitence and presumptuous sins. God is the soul of our soul, and the life of our life; and Christ must dwell in our heart by faith, and be the heart of our heart, to enable us to say with St. Paul, I live, yet not I, but Christ liveth in me. Just as the heart is the workshop of the soul, from which it distributes natural heat and vital energy into all the veins and members, even so must the Lord Jesus generate in us spiritual life, and diffuse His spirit into all our powers, senses, desires, thoughts, and motions. The ungodly man is a living corpse; the worm of sinful desire consumes his conscience; he is an abomination in the eyes of the Saviour, and offensive to God and the holy angels. (J. Gotthold.)
Fuente: Biblical Illustrator Edited by Joseph S. Exell
Verse 6. But she that liveth in pleasure] She that liveth delicately-voluptuously indulging herself with dainties; it does not indicate grossly criminal pleasures; but simply means one who indulges herself in good eating and drinking, pampering her body at the expense of her mind. The word is used in reference to what we term petted and spoiled children; and a remarkable passage, is produced by Kypke, from an epistle of Theanus to Eubulus, found in Opusc. Myth. Galaei, page 741, where he says: “What can be done with that boy, who, if he have not food when and as he pleases, bursts out into weeping; and, if he eats, must have dainties and sweetmeats? If the weather be hot he complains of fatigue; if it be cold, he trembles; if he be reproved, he scolds; if every thing be not provided for him according to his wish, he is enraged. If he eats not, he breaks out into fits of anger. He basely indulges himself in pleasure; and in every respect acts voluptuously and effeminately. Knowing then, O friend, , , , that boys living thus voluptuously, when they grow up are wont to become slaves; take away, therefore, such pleasures from them.” I have introduced this long quotation, the better to fix the meaning of the apostle, and to show that the life of pleasure mentioned here does not mean prostitution or uncleanness of any kind, though such a life may naturally lead to dissolute manners.
Is dead while she liveth.] No purpose of life is answered by the existence of such a person. Seneca, in Epist. 60, says of pleasure-takers, and those who live a voluptuous life: Hos itaque animalium loco numeremus, non hominum: quosdam vero ne animalium quidem, sed mortuorum-mortem antecesserunt. “We rank such persons with brutes, not with men; and some of them not even with brutes, but with dead carcasses. They anticipate their own death.” Such persons are, as the apostle says elsewhere, dead in trespasses, and dead in sins.
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
, she that is wanton, Jam 5:5, she that spends her money in needless costs, as to meat, drink, or apparel, is spiritually dead, dead in sin, while she liveth a temporary voluptuous life, in vanity, and luxury, and impurity of flesh and spirit.
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole
6. she that liveth in pleasuretheopposite of such a widow as is described in 1Ti5:5, and therefore one utterly undeserving of Church charity. TheGreek expresses wanton prodigality and excess[TITTMANN]. The rootexpresses weaving at a fast rate, and so lavish excess (see onJas 5:5).
dead while she livethdeadin the Spirit while alive in the flesh (Mat 8:22;Eph 5:14).
Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
But she that liveth in pleasure,…. Voluptuously, and deliciously; lives a wanton, loose, and licentious life, serving divers lusts and pleasures:,
is dead while she liveth; is dead in trespasses and sins, while she lives in them; is dead morally or spiritually, while she lives a natural or corporeal life. There is a likeness between a moral and a corporeal death. In a corporeal death, the soul is separated from the body; and in a moral death, souls are separated from God, and are alienated from the life of God; and are without Christ, who is the author and giver of spiritual life; and have not the Spirit, which is the Spirit of life: death defaces and deforms the man, and a moral death lies in the defacing of the image of God, first stamped on man, and in a loss of original righteousness; for as death strips a man naked of all, as he was when he came into the world, so sin, which brings on this moral death, has stripped man of his moral righteousness, whereby he is become dead in law, as well as in sin: and as in death there is a privation of all sense, so such who are dead, morally or spiritually, have no true sense of sin, and of their state and condition; are not concerned about sin, nor troubled for it, but rejoice in it, boast of it, plead for it, and declare it: between such persons and dead men there is a great similitude; as dead men are helpless to themselves, so are they; they can do nothing of, nor for themselves, in matters of a spiritual nature; and as dead men are unprofitable unto others, so are they to God, and man; and as dead men are hurtful and infectious to others, so they by their evil communications corrupt good manners; and as dead bodies are nauseous and disagreeable, so are such persons, especially to a pure and holy Being; and as dead men are deprived of their senses, so are these: they are blind, and cannot see and discern the things of the Spirit of God; they have not ears to hear the joyful sound of the Gospel, so as to understand it, approve of it, and delight in it; they have no feeling, nor are they burdened with the weight of sin; nor have they any taste and savour of the things of God, but only of the things of men; so that in a spiritual sense they are dead, while they are alive. It is a common, saying to be met with in Jewish writers,
, “the wicked while alive are said to be dead” s. And they say t also, that men are called , “dead”, from the time they sin; and that he that sins is accounted , “as a dead man” u.
s T. Bab. Beracot, fol. 18. 2. & Hieros. Beracot, fol. 4. 4. Midrash Kohelet, fol. 78. 2. Tzeror Hammor, fol. 58. 3. Caphtor, fol. 79. 1, 2. & 84. 1. Jarchi in Gen. xi. 32. & Baal Hatturim in Deut. xvii. 6. t Tzeror Hammer, fol. 5. 9. u lb. fol. 6. 2. & 127. 2.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
She that giveth herself to pleasure ( ). Present active participle of , late verb (Polybius) from (riotous, luxurious living). In N.T. only here and Jas 5:5.
Fuente: Robertson’s Word Pictures in the New Testament
Liveth in pleasure [] . Only here and Jas 5:5. See note. Twice in LXX, Sir. 21 15; Ezekiel. xvi. 49.
Is dead while she liveth [ ] . Comp. Rev 3:1; Eph 4:18. “Life in worldly pleasure is only life in appearance” (Holtzmann).
Fuente: Vincent’s Word Studies in the New Testament
1) “But she that liveth in pleasure” (he de spatalosa) “But the widow living wantonly, loosely, to gratify her own desires.” The modern term is “she that liveth fast,” in wastefulness and prodigality, “spending all in riotous living,” Luk 15:13.
2) “Is dead while she liveth” (zosa tethneka) “Has died while still living,” The term “dead” is used in the sense of barren, empty, unfruitful, or unproductive of good or holy fruit, — Luk 15:32; 2Pe 1:8-9; Jas 2:17; 1Co 9:27.
” TRUE LIVING”
A Persian monarch asked an aged man, “How many of the sun’s revolutions hast thou counted?” “Sire,” said the old man, “I am but four years of age.” “What!” interrupted the king. “Fearest thou not to answer me falsely, or dost thou jest on the very brink of the tomb?” “I speak not falsely,” replied the aged man; eighty long years have I wasted in folly and sinful pleasures and in amassing wealth, none of which I can take with me when I leave this world. Four only have I spent in doing good to my fellow-man, and shall I count those years which have been utterly wasted?
-Gray & Adams Commentary
Fuente: Garner-Howes Baptist Commentary
6 . She who is in luxury. After having described the marks by which real widows may be known, he now contrasts them with others that ought not to be received. The Greek participle which he employs, σπαταλῶσα, means one who allows herself every indulgence, and leads an easy and luxurious life. Accordingly, Paul (in my opinion) censures those who abuse their widowhood for this purpose, that, being loosed from the marriage yoke, and freed from every annoyance, they may lead a life of pleasant idleness; for we see many who seek their own freedom and convenience, and give themselves up to excessive mirth.
Is dead while she liveth When Paul says that such persons “are dead while they live,” this is supposed by some to mean that they are unbelievers; an opinion with which I do not at all agree. I think it more natural to say that a woman “is dead,” when she is useless, and does no good; for to what purpose do we live, if it be not that our actions may yield some advantage? And what if we should say that the emphasis lies in the word liveth? For they who covet an indolent life, that they may live more at their ease, have constantly in their mouth the proverbial saying: —
“
For life is not to live, but to be well.” (89)
The meaning would therefore be: “If they reckon themselves happy, when they have everything to their heart’s wish, and if they think that nothing but repose and luxury can be called life, for my part, I declare that they are dead.” But as this meaning might seem liable to the charge of excessive ingenuity, I wished merely to give a passing glimpse of it, without making any positive assertion. This at least is certain, that Paul here condemns indolence, when he calls those women dead who are of no use.
(89) Non est vivere, sed valere vita.
Fuente: Calvin’s Complete Commentary
WOMANS RIGHTS IN SOCIETY
1Ti 5:6.
AS most of you know, this is the second in the series addressed especially to the sisters, a series begun with much fear and trembling on my part for two reasons.
First of all, faithfulness in telling women the truth about themselves is a hazardous experiment for the man who attempts it; and then again, these subjects have been so little sermonized that I expected difficulty in the work of finding any help in preparation. This last apprehension was well grounded. In Chicago, some time since, I went to the Baptist Publication Society, the Methodist Book Concern, and the Fleming H. Revell in search of sermons to women, but not one such could I find in any, or all of them. As I suggested a week ago, there were sermons to young men, sermons to old men, sermons to men only, sermons of today addressed to the men of tomorrow, etc., but not one sermon addressed to the gentler sex. That circumstance imposes the more work, but it also proves the dire necessity of such discourse.
Surely it is worth a preachers effort to effect the conversion and consecration of women. Our text looks in the direction of social life and is a word of warning. She that liveth in pleasure is dead while she liveth.
This text is no judgment against social privileges, but it is a timely admonition against that worldliness which strangles the soul; and we know that society, as at present constituted, has both its privileges and its perils. In some measure I want to speak to both for it is impossible to answer the query, What are womans rights in society? without discussing both the use of them and their abuse.
First of all shall we say,
HER SEX DOES NOT DEBAR HER FROM SOCIETY
When God was putting the capstone on His holy creation, He made man, and woman was finished as his equal, his help-meet, his friend, his associate, his perfect companion. Male and female created He them. In the Garden of Eden they walked together, talked together, and neither knew any sense of superiority, nor felt any need of shame until Satan came. He is the fellow whose evil work resulted in Eves desire to enter some closet of seclusion; that, wherever this disposition has been found in all the ages, is the Devils work. In India, zenanas out of heathen prejudice; in Europe, England and the Americas, it erects nunneries out of papal superstitions, and in every instance sets itself against the Scriptures which declare the perfect equality of the sexes, saying, There is neither male nor female * * in Christ Jesus. In other words, in Christ Jesus the one sex has no right which is not accorded to the other. There is no one characteristic of Christian civilization more marked and desirable than is that of its elevation of women to a social level with men; and the woman who does not honor Christ is either ignorant of how her privileges came to her, or else is an ingrate who has no thought of God. As you hate dark caverns, my sisters, and love the light; as you tire of seclusion and long for the fresh open street; as you detest prisons and esteem the privilege of perfect freedom, you should love that Son of God whose pierced hands have opened every right social door before your faces, saying, Enter in!
Yes, woman has a right to society at large. Satan and his emissaries only set themselves against this statement.
HER SOCIAL PLEASURES SHOULD BE CONSISTENT WITH SACRED DUTIES
Home, friends, and God have first claims. The world that lieth, in the wicked one has the last claim if any claim at all! The sister who does not brighten for her brothers the blessed spot where both of them live is coming short of her fundamental duty, and despising her first privilege. No, perhaps I should not say that, for the sister is commonly a daughter, and her first privilege is to serve her parents, showing unceasing affection for the father and unstinted love for the mother. She that is given to sin and pleasure is dead while she liveth, and the deadest of the dead is an ungrateful, self-seeking sister, an indifferent, society-loving, parent-forgetting daughter.
As a boy, I used to be irritated sometimes when my father would say, My son, you dont appreciate how much your father and mother have done for you. As a father, I have found out what he meant, and how unutterly true were his words, and each one of you will one day understand, in all likelihood, what paternity is, and when you do, you will of necessity appreciate, as never before, what were your obligations to those who bore you and gave you breeding and bestowed upon you every gift possible to them, and bore you about as their hearts first affection.
Sisters and daughters, see to it that your social pleasures are consistent with the sacred duties of the home.
But there is a woman whose duties to home are more sacred still, more precious, and that is the wife and mother. I do not believe that men have any moral rights to make drudges of the women they are sworn to love, nor can I excuse the husband or brother for penuriousness with the gentler sex touching social privileges. Because we seldom go shopping is no sufficient ground for objections to wives making a tour of the down-town stores. Because duty demands that we work six days in the week is no moral warrant compelling wife to do the same. Because engagements often keep us from places of innocent pleasure, it does not follow of necessity that our wives should remain at home, nor that we should even desire it. But the woman who thinks more of beautiful dresses and balls than of her beloved; of operas and theaters than of domestic obligations; of card parties than of children; of the dance than of sacred duties, is false to the vows of the marriage day, and unfit for the high office to which God and man have called her.
There are hundreds of husbands in every city, possibly some men in Minneapolis, that are going to hell for the want of faithfulness on the part of the women who promised, at the marriage altars, unutterable and endless love. It is a serious thing when a wifes economies are still beyond her husbands best earnings; when her flirtations fatten his jealousy; when her self-love despises his passion of paternity, and her social obligations are such that he has no heart to tell her about his business, or professional troubles and trials.
Such a one is Satans best agency in breaking up the home, sending the husband to bankruptcy, to harlots houses, to drink, possibly to suicide.
Perhaps there has been no time in the last half century when wives and sisters had better opportunity to be Gods agents of good to men than the last year or two have afforded.
This financial depression under which many men have struggled, with loosening hope, has given Satan special opportunities. He has said to the unemployed, It is no use; to men whose debts were crushing them, There is no hope, and to those threatened with failure and assignments, Your time is come.
If the social duties and desires of wives and sisters have not admitted of reduced expenses, brought willingness to live in cheaper houses, if needful, and a heart tender toward him who has been in the grip of financial failures, and a hand ready to help him in every possible way, and a spirit that has inspired him in spite of circumstances, then Satan has been satisfied with you.
Among all the depressed and despairing men of our cities, there is scarce a one who is sane, that will not stand up against all diversities, face every evil circumstance and fight manfully against every imminent failure, if only he is sure that his wife loves him, sympathizes with him, seeks to sustain and cheer by saying, Husband, dont fret, we were happy once with nothing in the world but each other, and Id rather share a hovel with you now than live in the palace of a king; and if I must wear this hat another season, and this jacket another year, and dismiss the girl, and go back to work, it wont hurt me a bit, or lessen my happiness. I will be all the more glad if, by so doing, I can help you, and have your love!
The man who wouldnt rally and succeed after such a speech, sincerely made, would not be worth saving.
A WOMANS SOCIAL RIGHTS ARE NO FEWER THAN THOSE OF THE STRONGER SEX
Whatever I may enjoy, or you may, righteously, our wives may share equally. That man who having money, expends much on himself, while skimping his wife and daughters on the plea that he earns it, is unfit to be either a husband, or a father.
My wife has a right to her share of all I earn. I dont know but Dr. Henson was almost correct, when some one asked him if he gave his wife the marriage fees? He answered, No, I give her the salary, and keep the fees for myself.
What I spend on coats should be duplicated to her. For every dollar I put into hats, she ought to have $2, for hers must be trimmed, you know; and if I put a dollar into tobacco, she ought to have $10 for toilet articles; and one into whiskey, she ought to have $20 to put into pins and perfumery.
There are a lot of husbands who behave toward their wives as one countryman did. He had unwillingly brought her to town in a road wagon, and once in the store, the old lady espied a pretty dress pattern, and asked her man, as she called him, if she could not have it; but when the clerk said the dress would cost $6 for the pattern, the old man sighed and said, Sally, these are pretty hard times, and I guess your old one is good enough for another year, and the old lady said, Well, but before he left town, he found a keg of fine black tobacco, and, fearing it would go up, he ordered the keg and paid $10 for it!
If there is ever a time when I am ashamed of my sex, and wish in my heart I had been born a girl, it is when I see men drinking up the meat that children cry for, chewing up the calico that wives need against the cold, smoking up the silks that ought to adorn their darlings, spattering their shirt-fronts with needless expense (I should say injurious expense) while their wives wear the summer hats when the snow flies.
In many matters it is a womans social right to spend as much upon herself as her husband does.
In morals, what is right for a man is equally right for a woman. Sauce for the gander ought to be good for the goose. If a man is to drink, his wife has an equal right. If he swears at her, she has an equal right to swear at him, and if the social sin is excusable in him, it is no more worthy of condemnation when committed by her. That false standard of society which spits scorn on the unfortunate woman while welcoming her betrayer into the first circles deserves, and in the end will receive, the blast of Gods judgment.
I have read somewhere of a woman, who had pled in vain to keep her husband from the saloon. At last she bethought herself of the homeopathic theory, Similis curanter similibuslike is cured by like, so she put on her bonnet, walked straight to his frequent resort and ordered a drink, quaffing it off before his eyes. Then she sat down with her feet against the stove and lighted a cigar, and started in for the evening. At first sight, he was amazed. At second thought, he was ashamed. Going up to her he asked, Wife, what does this mean? Why, she answered, there cant be anything wrong in it, or you would not be doing it. The arrow sped to its mark. He took her by the hand, and led her out, and once beyond the saloon he said, I will not be guilty of this again. I do not say she did right. Wrong can never be right under any circumstances; but I do say that it was no more wrong for her than for him. In this instance, the end seemed to justify the means.
HER SOCIAL BEHAVIOUR SHOULD HONOR HERSELF
And there are quite a few directions in which this statement looks.
First of all, in her costume, for that enters into her social impressions. I think I may say, without the fear of being successfully contradicted, that there is almost a shameless drift among women today touching the matter of dress. The devil never saw anything too good for him to lay his hands upon, and unless I am mad or beside myself, Satan has a vast deal to do with the over-abbreviated costume. There can be no moral objection to shortening a skirt to a point where it will escape the sweep of street. There is no moral defense under heaven for cutting it to the knee, or even three inches above, as is the increasing style. A friend of mine, a county clerk, faced a couple at the County Clerks Office, who had come to secure a marriage license, and looking up from his work, and learning that they were about to enter upon this holy estate, said, All right, which one is the man?
Did you ever read in the Bible these words, written in Deu 22:5, The woman shall not wear that which pertaineth unto a man, neither shall a man put on a womans garment: for all that do so are abomination to the Lord thy God?
It may not have occurred to you, young women, that when you forget that Scripture, and take on the attire of a man, as far as possible, you attack and destroy the respect that men have held you in.
I read a story, some time ago, of an old colored man, named Jacob, familiarly called Professor. His work was to white-wash walls and fences, cut grass and saw wood. One day he took in a young fellow named Tom as partner. Tom was quick handed and most competent, and the business of the new firm increased. The Professors shovel and cart bore the sign of Jacob & Co. in large charcoal letters. In a comparatively short time, however, Tom disappeared and the Co. was scraped off the signs. Wheres Tom? asked a friend of the old professor. I know nufiin about Tom, he answered. Dont want any sich pardner as dat.
What was wrong, Jacob? He seemed to me to be an industrious, clever fellow.
Clever enough, sir; can saw, and mow, and handle a brush as well as I kin, but he got too smart. He got to smoking my pipe and calling himself de actin pardner in the firm, and las of all, sir, he took to wearing my does, and then, sir, I broke the pardnership. Trouble with Tom, he dont know his place. He just got on my does, and he thought he war me, sir!
There are many men like Uncle Jacob. They are willing that young women shall saw, or mow, or handle any of their tools so long as they remain in their own spheresgentle, affectionate and pure; but when they take to acting like men and talking like men, and walking like men, and putting on mans costume, then it is that the men lose their respect for them.
In customs, dont unsex yourself. A few years since, it was reported that seven of the queens and princesses of the world smoked either cigars or cigarettes, or both. Now seven million young women ape that mannish and filthy act.
Gambling has long been the custom of a certain class of women. It is well not to be unmindful of the fact that it is equally the custom in the eyes of state law of all those women who engage in progressive card games for prizes.
Wine has played a wicked role with society women, and it was a most pitiable sign of the times that before our 18th Amendment, in greater cities of America and more and more in our lesser ones as well, we could see over the door to every saloon, Ladies Entrance. If such things must exist, let the man who has been cursed by them keep his close corporation on such customs. Find out which side the devil is on in these social customs, and, as you respect your sex and esteem your soul, stand on the other side.
In character be a woman; nothing in this world is nobler.
Socrates used to thank the gods daily that he was not born a slave, neither a woman. But you sympathize with Socrates, for it is likely that he indulged in that sentiment more extensively after his marriage to Xantippe.
As Dr. Talmage once said, Stay, oh, woman, stay a woman; you belong to a very respectable sex indeed and should never attempt to be a man, for that effort will only result in a nondescript.
There are a good many of us who feel as the small boy who heard a certain preacher say, Man is the noblest work of God, and he flashed fire in reply, My mother is the noblest work of God.
HER SOCIAL LIFE SHOULD NOT DESTROY HER SOUL
Sinful society she should loathe. To have any other sentiment toward it is to be a silly fly for that spiders web. In every city in the land there are hundreds of our sisters suffering hell on earth today because they dared to disregard Gods counsels in this matter. It is pathetic to watch the candle fly in its silly work of scorching itself until it is dead; but the profoundest pathos possible to human eyes or the eyes of angels or of God, is to see young women, naturally sweet, singe themselves in the flames of vice until they are twice dead, destroyed body and soul.
Questionable society avoid! It is a good deal better to miss some of the possible pleasures of this world than it is to enjoy them at too great a cost. It is a great deal better not to live in the upper classes at all than to mingle in certain social circles in the hope of accomplishing that circumstance. Topmost society is sometimes the society furtherest from Heaven.
Baron Stowe, that great and good Bostonian preacher, Dr. A. J. Gordons predecessor, tells of having been invited to a reception of one of our Presidents in Washington, D. C. During the evening he met some of the most famous men of his day and enjoyed his conversation with them, but when the time of home-going came, the wines being drunk, and the dance done, Stowe went to his home and wrote in his memoirs, Intellectually, I enjoyed this evening, but it was not a place of spiritual good. My soul has lost something in that society, and I will seek it no more.
Questionable society avoid. Sacrifice any and all society that promises spiritual destruction. I find in a clipping from a newspaper a statement to the effect that some time ago, one of the most frivolous of society women was suddenly called into the eternal world. The physician summoned when the sickness came, upon examination, said to her, Madam, you have but a half hour to live. She covered her face and was silent, and presently began to sob. Trying to comfort her, he said, Have no fear, you will have no pain. To which she replied, Oh, sir, I am not thinking of that; I am thinking of the years that are wasted.
It is in vain to think of them after they are gone. Think of them now, while opportunities remain so that you will never be compelled to say in the hour of your departure,
Oh, the years of sin wasted!Could I but recall them now,I would give them to my Saviour.To His will Id gladly bow.
No possible pretty surroundings, no accumulation of silver and gold, no congregation of fixed friends can comfort her who, in deaths hour, has such a memory.
No possible poverty, pain, position, or place can impoverish her who, when the last hour comes, knows that her soul is redeemed by the Son of God, and that to Him she has given her service and love.
In the city of New Albany, Ind., I went one day, to see a girl die in a wretched tenement. Her father and brothers were drunk at the time. She was in an uncarpeted room, and the flowers that stood on the bare table had been borne to her by girls from our church, and the very meats that had sustained her life for some days had reached her in the same way. But in spite of the long sickness to which she had been subject; the repugnant surroundings of the degraded father and bloated brothers, of the pinched face of the now to be bereaved mother, her Spirit was exultant and never since I first looked upon the dying babe, sixty years ago, and came to understand what death meant, have I seen one so gloriously victorious in the last hour. Her face shone with a radiance that seemed to be born from above. Her spirit was buoyant beyond expression, and death was defeated when doing his very worst! She hailed him with delight as the dark messenger who had come to carry her home. She that liveth in pleasure is dead while she liveth, but she that liveth in the Son of God shall live again after death has done his worst!
Fuente: The Bible of the Expositor and the Evangelist by Riley
THE SPECIAL TEMPTATIONS OF WOMEN
1Pe 3:1-6; 1Ti 5:6.
DR. TALMAGE, when he was yet alive, said, There are men who conclude that because man was made first and woman afterward, that woman was an incident in the universe, a sort of side issue. He might have added that inasmuch as she was made from a mere rib from a mans side, her secondary station was thereby suggested. But there is a positive argument which any woman suffragist would never forget, and the force of which even dexterous men would pause to deny, namely thisthe order of creation in the Bible is from the lower to the higher, from grass to a man.
Gods later work is in every instance His better work, and if that be true, man is not the climax of creation, but woman, for she was the last Divine endeavor.
Again, it is more honorable to be made from the rib of a man than from the mud of the earth, hence women orators have the best of the argument.
But whether one holds to the evolution theory or to the more biblical explanation of a direct creation, the one fact confirmed by either and each of them is voiced by Jesus when He said,
Have ye not read, that He which made them at the beginning made them male and female,
And said, For this cause shall a man leave father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife: and they twain shall be one flesh? (Mat 19:4-5).
If that statement be accepted as absolutely accurate, then our question is answered. If they are one flesh, women are as much tempted as men, and by nature would yield to exactly the same temptations; but by breeding, education, domestic and social environment, their temptations become different and special.
I have chosen to apply our first text to
THE TEMPTATIONS OF GIRLHOOD
Youth is a hungry thing: its appetite for meats is not greater than its lust for emotional excitement. It pants for pleasure as the hart pants after the water brooks.
Girlhood has a natural love of pleasure. That fact invites no condemnation whatever. It is a pure result of human health and a natural expression of life in excelsis. The lamb is quite as frisky as the kid, although sheep are the Bible symbols of saints, and goats equally so of sinners. And the wholesome, high-minded girl has within her very physical, mental, and emotional nature the same gleeful spiritleaping for expressionthat plays in the heart and life of her vicious contemporary. Jane Adams is right in reminding us that this very force will either lift up and transform those who are really within its grasp, and set them in marked contrast to those who are either playing a game with it or losing it for gain, or else this beneficent current will carry them in wrong channels and take them to death and destruction when it should have carried them into the safe port of domesticity. He is an unwise father, and she is an unwise mother, who seeks for ever to suppress the emotion, and curb, and possibly destroy, the natural expression of adolescence. The Apostle does not say that she that loves pleasure is doomed therebylet us not misinterpret him; he says, She that liveth in pleasure is dead while she liveth; by which he means, of course, makes it the end and object of living.
The danger is in abnormal development. The trouble is not that she loves pleasure; the trouble is that godless men and women, knowing that fact, have come to traffic in it. That is the explanation of dance halls and low theaters. The dance hall and the theater are not, and never were, a necessity born of youths love of pleasure. On the contrary, they represent solely the greed of gain. They were organized, not so much to meet a demand of the physical being, as to cultivate an appetite, and then fill the purse by feeding the same.
It is a positive amazement to hear men speak of the drink-house as a social and physical necessity. The social life of the saloon was never acceptable to any living mortal until his nature had first been vitiated; and it never catered to a natural appetite, but to a manufactured one. Not one boy in ten thousand is born with a lust for liquor; ninety-nine out of every hundred have been brought into such a lust by the vendors of beer and other intoxicants. It exists, then, not to meet the necessity of its patrons, but to provide the luxuries for its owners; and as young men often take their first fatal steps in the saloon, so the majority of girls more often have their first suggestions of evil in the devilish dance-hall and the sensual show-house.
If pleasure loving, then, is natural, pleasure living is peril. We have in this day some professed philosophers whose opinions are popular enough, who make up that crowd of near-eloquent, who are for ever discoursing upon living according to the natural bents of life. They are the fellows that have favored affinities instead of marriage; defended the saloon as the poor mans club room; discoursed eloquently about the dance hall as the social center for the tenement house district, and the cheap theater as the school of art for the submerged; and all that, and all that!
Why dont they go the limit and say, Since greed is a natural passion, gambling is to be the commercial order; since lust is a natural passion, pure love is to be abrogated; since anger is a natural passion, murder is but slightly immoral, if at all, and may be justified. God pity the young woman who ever gives ear to such philosophies, or ever gives her thought over to the domination of such devilish suggestions. For awhile she may be going the giddy round, and it may look to the world as if she were having a good time; but the invariable end for her is written into the Apostles speech, She that liveth in pleasure is dead while she liveth.
Our second text looks more largely to
THE MARITAL ENTICEMENTS
It is addressed to women who live in the married relation, and the Apostle speaks particularly of three thingsillicit love, foolish pride, and failing religion.
Illicit love!
Likewise, ye wives, be in subjection to your own husbands.
Society is not as badly smitten today in its youth as it is in its adult life. The recklessness of the girl in the dance hall does not so much menace the state and nation as does the more covered, yet accomplished, flirtation of wives and mothers who have forgotten the biblical law of subjection to their own husbands.
To be sure, the frivolities of the former make possible the fickleness of the latter; and the man who finds his helpmate in a dance-hall or ball-room, should not even be surprised when in later life she develops other affinities. He took her from the school of deception, where the black arts were at the head of the curriculum, and that which was begun as a comedy will terminate as a tragedy, and neither the solemn ritual of the Episcopal service, the sacred vows voluntarily assumed, nor the earnest prayer of the performing preacher can save the happiness of the contracting parties.
Bobby Burns, when he was ready to plight his troth to Mary Campbell, met her at the brook Ayr. They bathed their hands in the water and put them on the boards of a Bible and took their solemn vows. On the cover of the Old Testament of that Book to this day is Roberts hand-writing, and the very words of Lev 19:12, Ye shall not swear by My Name falsely, * * I am the Lord.
And on the cover of the New Testament, in his own writing, the words of Mat 5:33, Thou shalt not forswear thyself, but shalt perform unto the Lord thine oaths.
But Bobby went his way in dissoluteness and must have broken the heart of the girl who gave him her hand under the spell of so holy a promise.
And yet, dissoluteness upon the part of a man is certainly not worse than that upon the part of the woman; and when the day comes that she forgets to obey Peters injunction, to be in subjection to your own husbands, and adopts an illicit love, attempt deception as she may; and though she seek by every art of feminity to keep up the outward appearances of loyalty, the day of judgment is at hand; domestic affection is slain, the evidences of the true home are undermined, and destruction will speedily sit before its hearth in full possession of the whole house. This is one of the temptations of marital life.
But Peter speaks of another:
Foolish pride!
Whose adorning let it not be that outward adorning of plaiting the hair, and of wearing of gold, or of putting on of apparel.
From time immemorial most ministers have treated this Scripture as if Peter objected to the braiding of the hair, or to the wearing of jewels of gold, or to the putting on of apparel. Not at all; Peter is not saying you should not do these things. He is saying you should not be foolish enough to imagine that they are your chief adornment when you have put them on. It may be possible that the woman who braided her hair in that time was like the woman who blondeens hers now. The very act was a hint of her character. If so, then Peter would enjoin against it. And in that day, as in this, the way a woman wears her jewels is but a hint of what she is at heart, and the way she puts on her apparel is almost a positive proof of her purity or impurity. I passed a girl in the street. She had on a long and flashy black coat, and a white dress under it. The combination was striking to say the least. She had on a black and white hat that was a marvel of modern creative geniusor folly. It was set on the back of her head in order that nothing might escape her vision. She had a pure white dog at-the end of a black chain, and every fellow she passed turned and looked and made remark. The two nearest me, as she went by, said, My, what a beautiful dog! And positively they were not to be blamed. The meaning of her whole makeup was unmistakable, and any woman who puts up her hair after such a manner, puts on her jewels after such a manner, and puts on her apparel after such a manner as to make her a passing mark, should not be surprised if she receives insult; and, as a rule, she is neither surprised nor displeased.
But that is not the most insiduous and objectionable feature of feminine pride. Any sin that is sufficiently stamped is more harmless in consequence. Positively the modern style of womans dress, approved now by the largest circle of the sex, raises the question as to whether much social sanity remains. Take the abbreviated skirt, as an instance. Respect for the American woman has been depreciated by her adoption of this French importation. I am not saying that the woman of this day should be forced back to the long skirt of forty summers since; but I am saying that when a woman cannot sit down in a street car or even in the holy sanctuary without exposing the nether portion of her body, she is coming powerfully near the transgression of the Divine law, The woman shall not wear that which pertaineth unto a man (Deu 22:5). We have long had a saying that one might as well be out of the world as out of style. If this folly in womans dress goes much further, we will soon have a new oneOne might as well be in hell as in the style.
I know the folly of trying to bring the world to do the right thing. I might as well argue with the flesh and the devil, for these three are commonly classed together in Scripture. But it would seem that Christian women need the injunction of the Apostle, for after all our squirming and twisting and arguing and explaining away our Bible, still we have it in plain language and we cannot get away from it.
I would that women adorn themselves in modest apparel, with shamefacedness and sobriety; not with braided hair or gold or pearls of costly array; but, which becometh women professing Godliness, with good works. We cannot help putting the question asked by the writer, Is any womans apparel modest that exposes her person like the apparel of some church women does? Is it any use for a woman to claim and profess purity whose scant apparel is shockingly suggestive of impurity, or costly array destructive of good works of Godliness? Shamefacedness does not spell brazen facedness. Will any question the truth of what the Christian Standard once said:
It is no more probable that the time is coming when it will be learned with amazement and sorrow of more than one professed Christian that the Holy Spirit was not joking when He prescribed the kind of dress the Godly should wear. There may be some serious dress accounts to settle in the day of the great Assize Court.
Falling religion! It calls upon them to reveal
the hidden man of the heart, m that which is not corruptible, even the ornament of a meek and quiet spirit, which is in the sight of God of great price.
The daughters of this generation can say what they like about the queer looks and homely appearance of the Puritan mothers, but we ask in all candor whether they expect to equal in character or in desirable accomplishments Harriet Newell, who gave herself to the redemption of India; Elizabeth Harvey who left her bright New England home for the life of Bombay, and the darkened heathenism, that she might illumine it; or Mrs. Lennox who breathed her last at Smyrna and cried as she faced her end, Oh, how happy! Or Mrs. Sarah D. Comstock, who sacrificed that she might save Burma, and who, when she gave up her children that they might come to America to be educated, kissing them, said, Oh, Jesus, I do this for Thee. Or even the mothers of the Wesleys, the Spurgeons, the Dwight Moodys, or the mothers of our Washington, our Jefferson, and Clay.
It is an excellent thing that women have such character as to command respect under any and all environments, and such a religious purpose as to incite reverence in even Godless men.
I stood in the chapel of Helen Chalmers in the most abandoned part of the city of Edinburgh, and I said as I looked upon the fearful surroundings, Do you come here to hold services at night? O yes, she said. And do you never meet with an insult while performing this Christian: service?
To which she answered, Never. That young woman who has her father by her side, walking down the street with armed police at each corner, is not so well defended as that Christian woman who goes forth bearing in her very appearance the sign of the Cross, carrying in her heart the Word of God, and in her hand the Bread of Life.
After all, the Apostle has struck the adornment that makes a woman the most blessed and safe in this world and gives promise of the next. It is that incorruptible apparel of a meek and quiet spirit, which is in the sight of God of great price.
THE OLD TIME EXAMPLE
For after this manner in the old time the holy women also, who trusted in God, adorned themselves, being in subjection unto their own husbands.
The ancient womans example! As Sarah was an ensample to the women of Peters day, so the Godly mothers of yesterday are an ensample to the daughters of this hour. When I speak of yesterday I do not mean that all good women are in their graves; God forbid. But I do mean that the generation which gave us birth, however much we may have surpassed them in intellectual attainments, are yet our ensample in moral character and Christian accomplishments. One week I was called to visit three such women, members then of this body of believers, each of them upon a bed of affliction, and each perhaps nearing the end by reason of age. I speak of Mother Mears, Mother Russell and Mother Daniels. The mention of these names puts the spirit of reverence upon every youthful woman of this congregation who ever came into contact with them; and if she have a virtue left, compels her to say, Let my last days be like theirs, so far as character and righteous conduct are concerned. Deborahs description is applicable here, Mothers in Israel, ensamples to younger women they were.
Their adornment has been of the diviner sort.
Trusting in God, they have
adorned themselves, being in subjection unto their own husbands:
Even as Sara obeyed Abraham, calling him lord: whose daughters ye are.
I went once upon a time into a house, the fortunes of which represented millions, and met there the mother and daughter. When the dinner was over and the evening had passed, and I was at my home, I was compelled to say, That young woman was well dressed and good looking and an excellent conversationalist; but the true adornment of that house was in the mothers quiet spirit, evident character and unquestioned accomplishments.
And just as there is many a lad who thinks his father is an old fogy because he does not speak first class English, notwithstanding the fact that that fathers truer education is the outcome of sixty summers and his accomplishments have made the lads blessings possible, so there is many a lass or youthful married woman who laughs at the old time ideas of the grandmother in the home, when for her own sake she should be sitting at her feet, and learning of her how to be clothed in the incorruptible apparel of a meek and quiet spirit, which is in the sight of God of great price.
I believe, as Dr. Talmage said, that such accomplishment is a certain product of allowing Christ to take full possession of the soul, remembering, He would be your Friend in every perplexity, would comfort in every trial, would defend in every strait. And I do not ask you to bring, like Mary, the spices to the sepulcher of a dead Christ, but to bring your all to the feet of a living Jesus. His Word is peace. His look is love. His hand is help. His touch is life. His smile is Heaven. O come then, in flocks and groups! Come like the morning light tripping over the mountains. Wreathe all your affections on Christs brow; set all your gems in Christs coronet; let this Sabbath hour rustle with the wings of rejoicing angels and the towers of God ring out the news of souls saved.
This world its fancied pearl may crave,Tis not the pearl for me;Twill dim its luster in the grave,
Twill perish in the sea.But theres a pearl of price untold Which never can be bought with gold;O thats the pearl for me.
Fuente: The Bible of the Expositor and the Evangelist by Riley
(6) But she that liveth in pleasure is dead while she liveth.This is a thoroughly Pauline thought, set forth in other language in the Roman Epistle, Rom. 8:13 : For if ye live after the flesh ye shall die. The word in the Greek rendered she that liveth in pleasure is very remarkable, and in the New Testament is found only in one other place (Jas. 5:5). The widow-woman who could so forget her sorrow and her duty is spoken of as a living corpse, and sharply contrasted with her far happier sister, who, dead to the pleasures of the flesh, living a life of prayer and of self-denial, in the true sense of the word, may be spoken of as living. A very different estimate of life was held by the greatest of Greek poets, who writes thus of men giving up pleasures: I do not consider that such a one lives, but I regard him as a living corpse (Antigone of Sophocles, 1166-7, Dindorf). Comp., too, Rev. 3:1.
Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)
6. The spurious widow, that liveth in pleasure not necessarily unchaste, but gay and prodigal is dead to all Christian life, while she liveth a free secular life.
Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
‘But she who gives herself to pleasure is dead while she lives.’
As this is in contrast with the widow who regular attends daily prayer, ‘giving herself to pleasure’ probably indicates a lack of willingness to join the church in prayer, which could only indicate that she was busy with seeking other kinds of pleasure elsewhere. Such revealed that they were spiritually dead (compare Jas 2:17). It does not necessarily refer to what we would call ‘illicit pleasure’. The point was rather that she did not exhibit signs of spiritual life by regularly meeting up with the church. The early church had high standards (se Act 2:46). For the idea of being dead while still alive compare Rom 7:10; Rom 7:24.
Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett
1Ti 5:6. But she that liveth in pleasure The Jews had a common saying among them, “that wicked men, while they live, are to be reckoned among the dead.” The Pythagoreans built empty tombs for those who had revolted from philosophy; and it was reckoned a beautiful thought in Pythagoras, and other ancient heathens, “that a worthless man is a dead man.” That the same thought is not as much admired in St. Paul’s writings, in which it is to be taken in a deeply spiritual sense, and is very frequentlyused, can proceed from nothing but an unreasonable partiality for what is of heathen extraction, and a most ungenerous contempt of what is Jewish or Christian, and, above all, from a total ignorance of all genuine religion, and the whole plan of redemption by our Lord Jesus Christ. But, for spiritual remarks on this passage, see the Inferences and Reflections.
Fuente: Commentary on the Holy Bible by Thomas Coke
1Ti 5:6 . ] The opposite of the who has dedicated her life to piety. , “revel, be wanton,” occurs elsewhere only in Jas 5:5 (Wisd. 21:15). There is nothing to show that the apostle was here thinking of the squandering of the support received.
] These words have been taken as exhorting Timothy to consider the wanton widow as dead, and not to support her; but this takes away all point from the words. The right meaning is obtained by comparing such passages as Eph 4:18 , Rev 3:1 , and others similar. While the widow who conducts herself as a widow should, lives in God, the wanton widow leads a life given up to the desires of the world, a life only in appearance, the very opposite of the true life. Theophylact: , .
Fuente: Heinrich August Wilhelm Meyer’s New Testament Commentary
6 But she that liveth in pleasure is dead while she liveth.
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. . The delicate dame, such as were those wanton daughters of Sion, those mincing minions mentioned Isa 3:16-26 , as also those of Tyre and Sidon, those of Phoenicia, so called from the Syriac phinneck, delicate: the Greeks call them , such as lie melting in sensual delights and sinful pleasures, in the froth whereof groweth that worm that never dieth, Jas 5:5 . I have read of a gallant addicted to uncleanness, who at last meeting with a beautiful dame, and having enjoyed his fleshly desires 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 , a cold armful of her at length (as Lycophron 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,Hos 4:11Hos 4:11 .
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
6 .] Contrast ( ) to the character just described: and that certainly with a view to point out that this kind of widow is no object for the charity of the Church, as not being at all a partaker of the life unto God.
] Wetst. from the glossaries, gives , , . In the Anthol., iv. 28. 14, we have coupled . . It appears to be allied to ( ), see Aristoph., Nub. 53, and Schol. (in Wetst.); and Ellic., here.
] while alive in the flesh, has no real life in the Spirit: see ref. and Mat 8:22 ; Eph 5:14 . Wetst. quotes many such expressions from profane writers: one, as compared with this passage, remarkably illustrative of the moral difference between Christianity and heathenism: Soph. Antig. 1183, | , | , . The very expression is found in Stobus; see reff. I cannot help regarding the idea as in the background, ‘and, if devoid of spiritual life, then not to be taken into account by the Church.’
Fuente: Henry Alford’s Greek Testament
1Ti 5:6 . : The modern term fast , in which the notion of prodigality and wastefulness is more prominent than that of sensual indulgence, exactly expresses the significance of this word. The R.V., she that giveth herself to pleasure , is stronger than the A.V. A somewhat darker force is given to it here by the associated verb in 1Ti 5:11 , . The Vulg. is felicitous, Quae in deliciis est, vivens mortua est . The expression is more terse than in Rev 3:1 , “Thou hast a name that thou livest and thou art dead”. Cf. Rom 7:10 ; Rom 7:24 , Eph 4:18 . Wetstein quotes in illustration from Stobaeus (238), as descriptive of a poor man’s life of anxiety, , .
Fuente: The Expositors Greek Testament by Robertson
liveth in pleasure. Greek. spatalab. Only here and Jam 5:6.
liveth. See App-170.
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
6.] Contrast () to the character just described: and that certainly with a view to point out that this kind of widow is no object for the charity of the Church, as not being at all a partaker of the life unto God.
] Wetst. from the glossaries, gives , , . In the Anthol., iv. 28. 14, we have coupled . . It appears to be allied to (),-see Aristoph., Nub. 53, and Schol. (in Wetst.); and Ellic., here.
] while alive in the flesh, has no real life in the Spirit: see ref.-and Mat 8:22; Eph 5:14. Wetst. quotes many such expressions from profane writers: one, as compared with this passage, remarkably illustrative of the moral difference between Christianity and heathenism: Soph. Antig. 1183,- | , | , . The very expression is found in Stobus; see reff. I cannot help regarding the idea as in the background,-and, if devoid of spiritual life, then not to be taken into account by the Church.
Fuente: The Greek Testament
1Ti 5:6. ) She that liveth in pleasure (luxuriously). Jam 5:5, . Hesychius explains , as .- , though living, she is dead) This remark may be applied to any ungodly man, although he may be actively engaged in the business of life, but especially to a widow devoted to pleasure. Although she seems to her own self still to enjoy life, yet she is dead while she lives, because she is now no longer of benefit (profitable or serviceable), either naturally or spiritually, and therefore she deserves no honour (1Ti 5:3, i.e. no share in the public maintenance).
Fuente: Gnomon of the New Testament
1Ti 5:6
But she that giveth herself to pleasure is dead while she liveth.-In contrast with her who feels her bereaved condition and draws near to God, the widow who lives for pleasure is dead. [Her frivolous, selfish, sensual existence is not true life; it fills none of lifes true ends; and, as to any real value to herself or to others, she is practically dead. While alive in the flesh, she has no real life in the Spirit.]
Fuente: Old and New Testaments Restoration Commentary
she: 1Sa 25:6, Job 21:11-15, Psa 73:5-7, Isa 22:13, Amo 6:5, Amo 6:6, Luk 12:19, Luk 15:13, Luk 16:19, Jam 5:5, Rev 18:7
in pleasure: or, delicately, Deu 28:54, Deu 28:56, 1Sa 15:32, Pro 29:21, Isa 47:1, Jer 6:2, Lam 4:5, Luk 7:25
dead: Mat 8:22, Luk 15:24, Luk 15:32, 2Co 5:14, 2Co 5:15, Eph 2:1, Eph 2:5, Eph 5:14, Col 2:13, Rev 3:1
Reciprocal: Gen 2:17 – surely Num 12:12 – as one dead Pro 21:17 – loveth Luk 9:60 – Let 1Ti 2:10 – with 2Ti 3:4 – lovers of God
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
1Ti 5:6. This verse is a specific instance of one’s being dead and alive at the same time. It means she is living in sin and hence is alive to pleasure. But that knid of life separates her from the favor of God which causes her to be “dead in trespasses and sins” (Eph 2:1).
Fuente: Combined Bible Commentary
1Ti 5:6. She that liveth in pleasure. The English words give the sense, but not the terseness or the vigour of the Greek verbs. She that plays the wanton comes somewhat nearer, but implies one form of evil too definitely.
Is dead. Spiritually dead, and therefore to be treated as such for the purpose in band, and her name to be struck off the register of those entitled to support.
Fuente: A Popular Commentary on the New Testament
Verse 6
Is dead; dead to the cause of Christ. Perhaps the meaning is, that she is to be excluded from all share in the charities of the church.
Fuente: Abbott’s Illustrated New Testament
1Ti 5:6 But she that liveth in pleasure is dead while she liveth.
The dead refers to her spiritual condition. She is living in this world for the pleasures that it can give and she is not responsive to God nor to things of the Lord, thus she is not worthy of help from the church.
The church should not ignore this group of widows for they do need the Lord and need to be reached with the Gospel. If, on the other hand, they are carnal Christian women, then they need to be rebuked for their sins, BUT AS MOTHERS and sisters.
Fuente: Mr. D’s Notes on Selected New Testament Books by Stanley Derickson
5:6 {8} But she that liveth in pleasure is dead while she liveth.
(8) The third rule: let widows that live in pleasure, and neglect the care of their own family, be held and considered as fallers away from God and his religion, and worse than the unfaithful themselves.