First and Second Timothy, Titus (Catholic Commentary on Sacred Scripture)

Montague, George T., Williamson, Peter S., Healy, Mary

• Publisher: Baker Academic
• Year: 2008
• ISBN:
  9781441201973
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Biblical Commentary

In the second volume of the Catholic Commentary on Sacred Scripture (CCSS), George Montague offers a Catholic pastoral commentary on the letters to Timothy and Titus, presenting sound exegesis followed by reflection on the pastoral, theological, and practical applications of the text. The CCSS offers readable, informative commentaries from the best of contemporary Catholic scholarship to help readers rediscover the Word of God as a living word in which God himself is present. Each commentary relates Scripture to life, is faithfully Catholic, and is supplemented by features designed to help readers understand the Bible more deeply and use it more effectively in teaching, preaching, evangelization, and other forms of ministry. This series is perfect for professional and lay leaders engaged in parish ministry, lay Catholics interested in serious Bible study, and Catholic students.

The First Letter to Timothy

Timothy is Paul’s number one collaborator. The Acts of the Apostles (16:1–3) tells us that on Paul’s second missionary journey he recruited young Timothy from his native town of Lystra, in Asia Minor, and thereafter the two were rarely separated. We often think of Paul as single-handedly converting Asia Minor and Greece, like a Lone Ranger. Not so. It was team ministry from the start. The apostle mentions Timothy as cosender of six of his letters: 1–2 Thessalonians, 2 Corinthians, Philippians, Philemon, and Colossians. Three of these letters are written from prison, although we cannot be sure whether Timothy was in prison with Paul when he wrote any of them. In the list of persons who send their greetings with Paul to Rome, Timothy ranks first (Rom 16:21). Paul sent him on at least two important missions, one to Thessalonica (1 Thess 3:2) and the other to Corinth (1 Cor 4:17). In his plans to send him on a mission to Philippi, he writes, “I have no one comparable to him for genuine interest in whatever concerns you. . . . You know his worth, how as a child with a father he served along with me in the cause of the gospel” (Phil 2:20, 22). In 2 Tim 4:9–21 Paul, imprisoned in Rome, asks Timothy to come to him soon. If Timothy came and was also imprisoned, it may be about his release from prison that Heb 13:23 refers: “Our brother Timothy has been set free.” More details of Timothy’s life will emerge as the commentary unfolds. But this thumbnail sketch suffices to show that if anyone could be considered Paul’s chief confidant, if anyone could carry on where Paul left off or replace him in his absence and speak with his authority, it would be Timothy, the recipient of this letter. The apostolic Tradition must carry on.

What elements of that apostolic Tradition may we expect to find in this letter? Among them are the following: (1) the critical importance of orthodox teaching, (2) the primacy of liturgy in the Church’s life, (3) the oneness of God and the mediation of Christ, (4) the call of all to holiness, but especially those who have a ministry in the Church, (5) the ordination of presbyters, whom we call priests today, and (6) the second coming of Christ (called in this letter his “appearance”).

What lies before us is a directive letter of Paul to his delegate and collaborator. It bears similarities with what was known in the Roman world as the mandata principis, a letter giving directives by a superior to his subordinate, of which the letters of Trajan to Pliny are good examples.1 Although addressed to individuals, these letters were often to be read publicly, both as confirmation of the authority given to the delegate to carry out the superior’s directives and also as warrant for the audience to hold the delegate to his assigned duties. This is exactly what we find in 1 Timothy and Titus, which conclude with a greeting to all who hear the letters read (1 Tim 6:21; Titus 3:15). Timothy, of course, is not a servant or an employee of Paul. He is his dear “child.” And yet he is set in authority over the church of Ephesus, a church that was probably composed of various households, some of which may well have been outside the city itself. The Ephesian church has reached a certain level of maturity and organization, for there are deacons and presbyters under Timothy’s authority, the widows are organized, and it is not a question of establishing those institutions but rather of strengthening them and setting standards for candidates to the offices. The primary qualifications are virtues that should be found in every Christian. Thus today we can find addressed to us the challenges Paul addresses to the candidates and to Timothy himself. This is particularly so if we have a ministry in the Church.

The reader will find numerous echoes of themes from Paul’s earlier letters. The themes that stand out in this letter are (1) the importance of forming the faithful in sound doctrine and of disciplining those teachers who would lead the faithful astray, (2) the primary importance of the liturgy and of the demeanor it merits, (3) the qualifications needed for those who aspire to the various ministries, and (4) a warning against false asceticism. Timothy himself has to be told to take a little wine for his stomach’s sake and because of his frequent sicknesses. Timothy needs to take his authority seriously, to be emboldened to act vigorously, and to find strength in the grace of his ordination.

With the possible exception of the fourth item, these are themes that in recent years have been stressed by Popes John Paul II and Benedict XVI. The Church cannot survive on a dilution of its doctrine or on a mixture of it with deceptive alloys like the New Age movement or on succumbing to the mire of relativism (“one religion is as good as another”). The liturgy has been renewed in the spirit of Vatican II, giving it pride of place and stressing more active participation of the laity. And candidates for the priesthood and diaconate have been given greater scrutiny, to help avoid the kind of scandals that surfaced at the end of the last century.

But it would be a mistake to judge that this letter is all about discipline. Placed at its very center (3:16) and shedding its light on the entire letter is a lyrical celebration of the “mystery of devotion,” the union of Christ and his Church in the drama of salvation history, from the incarnation of the Word to the exaltation of all the faithful with him in glory. Discipline and moral expectations are not legalistic chains. They are simply the natural consequences for a community that has been superabundantly graced by the love of God in Christ Jesus.

1 . For further details, see Johnson, Letters to Paul’s Delegates, 106–8. Johnson cites Tebtunis Papyrus 703, in which an Egyptian senior official instructs a subordinate in some of his responsibilities, a very close parallel to the literary form of 1 Timothy. Johnson also shows evidence of these letters as early as the first century BC.

Timothy’s First Charge

1 Timothy 1

Why does Paul write this letter? He is not in prison, as he will be in his second letter to Timothy, so there is no need for him to dwell on his own situation.

Rather he is very concerned that his blueprint for the church in Ephesus guide Timothy’s building of it while Paul is away. “Living the truth in love” was the foundation for all growth when Paul wrote to the Ephesians (4:15), and now the first part of that principle seems to be threatened: the pure truth of the gospel.

What should Timothy do about it? And whose example should he follow?

Address and Greeting (1:1–2)

¹ Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by command of God our savior and of Christ Jesus our hope, ²to Timothy, my true child in faith: grace, mercy, and peace from God the Father and Christ Jesus our Lord.

OT: Isa 43:3; Jer 14:8

NT: Acts 16:1; 1 Cor 9:1; Phil 2:20, 22; Col 1:27–28

Catechism: Jesus as Savior God (594)

Paul begins most of his letters by underlining his title as apostle. It was a title dear to him because, although he had not known Jesus during the Master’s earthly life, his vision of the glorified Christ Jesus accredited him with authority equal to that of the Twelve (1 Cor 9:1). Only in Philippians and Philemon does he omit the title, probably because he wishes to appeal there to bonds of affection more than to his authority. Why, then, in this letter to his cherished disciple, should he use such strong affirmations of his divinely given authority? The answer lies in this letter, like the other Pastorals, being not merely a personal one. Like the “Chief ’s Orders” (mandata principis), it was a letter to be read publicly, authorizing and commanding Paul’s representative to do or not do certain things. When Timothy executes Paul’s directives, the listeners will know he is exercising not merely his own authority but that of Paul himself. In fact, the authority comes from God, for Paul is an apostle by order of God. The Greek word used here for command (epitagē) means more than simply the will (thelēma) of God, which he elsewhere invokes to ground his apostolate (1 Cor 1:1; 2 Cor 1:1; Eph 1:1; 2 Tim 1:1). Epitagē connotes a published decree, command, or injunction that countermands any other custom or order, used often in secular Greek for a mandate of the highest authority, in some cases that of a god or goddess.

[Image not included because of rights restrictions.]

ZevRadovan/www.BibleLandPictures.com

Fig. 1. Artemis, the major deity of Ephesus, was the nurturing mother-goddess represented with multiple breasts. Paul clashed with her worship there.

The God who thus authorizes Paul is savior. This title appears in the Pastorals ten times (only fourteen times in the rest of the New Testament). It was a designation that would sound familiar to both Jew and Gentile. To the Jew it would evoke the whole history of Israel, rooted in God’s saving act in the exodus and experienced by the Israelites individually and collectively throughout their history (Ps 24:5; 95:1; Sir 51:1). It is especially favored in the book of Isaiah, where it appears eight times, describing the Lord as the savior of Israel,1 besides whom there is no other (Isa. 43:11), and one who will send a savior even to non-Jews who cry out to him “to defend and deliver them” (19:20). Paul’s Gentile readers had heard the term since childhood applied to emperors, kings, and divinities. It was common throughout the empire, and Ephesus, the destination of this letter, was the center of the worldwide worship of the goddess “Artemis the Savior.”

In perfect parallel with “God our savior,” Christ Jesus our hope shows the way God has been savior, that is, through Jesus. In Paul’s earlier epistles, hope is usually directed toward Christ’s second coming. Far from having abandoned interest in the parousia in these later years of his ministry, Paul is still looking for “the appearance of our Lord Jesus Christ” (1 Tim 6:14) and finds in it a powerful motive for living a life of Christian witness (2 Tim 4:8). While the time of that coming is unknown, Christ is in any case the basis of Christian “hope of eternal life” (Titus 1:2), which the faithful may attain already upon their death, a prospect that Paul faced early in his ministry (Phil 1:21–23) and will face once again near the end (2 Tim 4:6). The theme of hope is so strong in the Pauline literature that “hope” can stand for the very message of the gospel itself: the mystery that Paul proclaims is “Christ in you, the hope for glory” (Col 1:27–28). Nonbelievers are those “who have no hope” (1 Thess 4:13). Hope’s connection with salvation, which we see in these opening lines of the letter, builds on a long Jewish tradition, of which perhaps the best expression is Jer 14:8: “O Hope of Israel, O LORD, / our savior in time of need!”

1:2

Paul had earlier described Timothy as his brother (1 Thess 3:2) and coworker (Rom 16:21), but in the Pastorals he calls him his child (1 Tim 1:2, 18; 2 Tim 1:2; 2:1). The Greek word use...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Endorsements
• Series Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Contents
• Illustrations
• Editors’ Preface
• Abbreviations
• Introduction to the Pastoral Letters
• The First Letter to Timothy
• The Second Letter to Timothy
• The Letter to Titus
• Suggested Resources
• Glossary
• Map
• Back Cover