iv. Situation implied at Ephesus.— (a) Tht False Teachers. — The primary purpose of the letter is to remind Timothy of the charge given to him to check certain false teachers ; but, as he is assumed to know them, they are described in such general terms that it is dithcult for us to identify them. It is not, indeed, necessary to assume that all the descriptions apply to one set ; Ephesus supplied a great variety of forms of religion, heathen, Jewish, and Christian (Ac 19) : and 4''' (cf. Tit 1", 2 Ti 3') perhaps implies a separate development in the future ; yet the probability is in favour of one main tendency. The teachers were prominent in the Church (1") : they may have held olHce [cf. the stress on the discipline over presbyters (5**"^), and the need of more care- ful choice of ministers (3'"")] : two of them had already been 'handed over to Satan' (l'") : and they may have attempted to attack St. Paul's own apostleship (I' 2' 1* ^7) ^Xao-^ij^"")- They are untrue to the central Christian temper (1"), they do not listen to the dictates of their own con- science (1'* 4'), are ignorant (1'), influenced by the desire of making gain out of their religion (6*""), living in a state of feverish excitement (6^ vosuv), suggesting curious disputations and investigations which are 'other' than the deposit (P 6*'), and producing an atmosphere of strife, jealousy, and suspicion (6*). In the substance of their teaching a few details emerge.
(1) They claimed to be 'teachers of law' (!') : misinterpreting the OT in some way for purposes other than those for which it was intended (cf. 2 Ti 316. 17) . possibly depreciating law in an antinomian spirit, so that the writer has to insist on its real value (l**'") : or, more probably, exaggerating its value, so that he has to point out its limitations, as intended only for diiicoi (ib.).
(2) They laid stress on ^Ctfoi koI 7e>'eaXo7lcu (1* 4'). The reference of this is also ambiguous. The words would be applicable to the speculative theories of Gnosticism, with its legends about the creation of the world and the relationships of the various a;ons which separated God from matter ; and the Christian ^Titers of the 2nd cent, con- stantly made this application (Irena?us, adv. Hcer. Pricf. ; Tertullian, e. Valent. 3, de Anima, 18, de Praiscriptione, 33, adv. Marcionem, i. 9 ; JEpi- phanius, Hwr. 33. 8).
Rut the context connects them •n-ith teaching about the Law (1') : Titus speaks of 'lovSaixoi iiv9oi {V*), and connects 7c>'eaXo7iai with /idxa< fOfUKOi (3') ; and Ignatius (arf Magn. 8) uses exactly similar language of the Judaizers of his day. Thejir are therefore Jewish in origin, and were probably speculations based upon the legendarj' history of tlie patriarchs and their descendants, akin to the Jewish Haggadoth, and illustrated by the Book of Enoch, the Book of Jubilees, and the treatise on Biblical Antiquities attributed to Pliilo [cf. Hort, Judaistic Christianity, pp. 130-146]. The
TIMOTHY, FIEST EPISTLE TO
TBIOTIIY, FIKST EPISTLE TO 771
referenc* to Jannes and Jambres (2 Ti 3'-*) -n-ill thou be a balf-ironical ad hominem illustration from one of tlieir own favourite myths.
(3) They laid a special claim to knowledge {&"). This ajraiu would have a iicculiar applicability to any form of Gnosticism, and it is so applied by Heuesippus ap. Euseb. iii. 32 ; but it is equally applicable to the Kabbinic claim to special know- letlge (Lk 11", Jn 7*", Ko 2=»). The word d^-ritft^is in 6* offers an easy sui,';,'estion to tlie ivTiBiadt, 'Contradictions between OT and NT,' of Marcion ; but such an allusion is inconsistent with the stress on .(ewisli law (of. 2), and imijossible in date, unless the verse be a subsequent interpolation. It may either refer to ' Kival theses,' i.e. con- flicting deci^ion3 of the Jewish Kabbis on the application of the Law, the Jewish Halakha, the * tradition of the elders' (so Hort, I.e.) ; or it may be translated 'oppositions' (cf. 2 Ti 2^), and if so, gives no clue to the nature of the opposition.
(4) They taught a false ascctkism, prohibiting marriage, requiring abstinence from certain foods (4'"*), and perhaps from wine (5^), and that on the ground that matter was evil (4'- », cf. 4'- * 6"). This particular teaching is ascribed to Soi/ii"", and so probably came from a heathen source ; and it is quoted as a prophecy of the future, and so is per- haps separable from the rest. IJut the writer is probably quoting a, past prophecy as being fullilled in the present, and it is placed in close connexion with the 'myths' (4'). This teaching, again, is exactly parallel to the teaching of later Gnostics (of. Clem. Alex. Strom, iii. 3 ; Tert. adv. Mareionem, I. 14 ; Irenajus, Hcer. i. 2«) ; but it may equally have ari.sen from an exa;;geration of the Jewish law, with a mixture of Oriental speculation, coming perliaps through Essenism (cf. 1 Co 7 and 8, Ro 14, Col '2, He 13).
It is perhaps legitimate to read allusions to the false teachers in the regulations of clis. 2. 3, which follow so directly upon the w aming against llieni. If 80, their teaching was characterized by an ex- clusiveness, limiting God's universal salvation, whether from a Gnostic or a Jewish standpoint, and perhaps denying the salvation of women ; perhaps also by a low standard of morals.