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5. ’A ■roSwo'outf/ \6yo\), shall give account) in particular of their evil speaking: Jude ver. 15. — rp) to Christ. — sroifiug sxovTb w^° is ready) The apostles, when they do not professedly treat of the time of Christ’s coming, set forth that coming as close at hand to their expectation and piety : hence it is that Peter comprehends those who then reviled under the living , as though shortly about to be judged.
6. Tap, for) The particle connects ready and is at hand , ver. 5,
7. The Judge is ready ; for now that the Gospel is preached, nothing but the end remains. — xa / vexpoTg, even to the dead) Peter calls those dead who lived through the whole period of the New Testament, from the time that the Gospel was preached by the apostles after the ascension of Christ, especially concerning Christ the Judge , Acts x. 42, and those whom the J udge, who is at any moment about to come, will find dead , and will restore to life, ver. 5. The Gospel is preached also to the living ; but he mentions the dead , because the saying, that they might he judged , etc., is especially accomplished in death. And from this very thing it is plain that the preaching of the Gospel which is meant, is before that death, and not subsequent to it. When the body is put off in death, the condition of the soul is alto- gether fixed, either for evil or for good. The Gospel is preached to no one after death. Christ Himself preached to those who had for- merly lived, ch. iii. 20. In the New Testament there is preaching in abundance to those who are alive. The Lord sees respecting those to whom that preaching does not come in their life. — zvriyyeXivQri) He , that is, Christ, was declared in the Gospel. While they were alive, He caused Himself to be preached to them by the Gospel. The Gospel is always preached at the present day : but Peter speaks in past time, for [i.e. having respect to] the time of judgment [in rela- tion to which the preaching will have been past ] ; which, as we have said, he sees as it were close at hand. — ha, that) The end and effi- cacy of the Gospel is, that men may be made like Christ in death and in life, ch. iii. 18. The way of salvation through Christ is both secured and made known to all : they who have believed are saved, and ought to be objects of imitation, not of reproach, to others ; they who have not believed, nay, have even used reproaches, are justly punished. — xpiOuffr tyoi, might he judged : might live) They who receive the Gospel become like the death of Christ through repent- ance ; and successively through (by means of ) all adversities, even until the death of the body. That death is called a judgment , with reference to the old man ; and to this judgment, distinguishing evil
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