1st Peter Chapter 3 verse 6 Holy Bible

Pulpit Commentary

Pulpit CommentaryVerse 6. - Even as Sara obeyed Abraham, calling him lord. St. Peter singles out Sarah, as the mother of the chosen people. She obeyed her husband habitually (the imperfect ὑπήκουεν is the reading of some of the oldest manuscripts; the aorist, also well supported, would represent her obedience as a whole, the character of her life now past); she called him lord (comp. Genesis 18:12, ὁ δὲ κύριος μου πρεσβύτερος.) Whose daughters ye are; literally, whose children ye became. This is another indication that the Epistle is addressed, not only to Jewish Christians, but also, and that in large measure, to Gentile converts. Gentile women became by faith the daughters of Sarah; just as we read in St. Paul's Epistles that "they which are of faith, the same are the children of Abraham" (Galatians 3:7); and that Abraham is "the father of all them that believe, though they be not circumcised" (Romans 4:11); comp. Galatians 4:22-31, where St. Paul tells us that we, like Isaac, are the children of promise; children, "not of the bondwoman, but of the free." As long as ye do well. This clause represents one Greek word ἀγαθοπιοῦσαι ("doing good"). Some commentators regard the words from "even as Sara" to "whose daughters ye are" as a parenthesis, and refer the participle to "the holy women" mentioned in ver. 5. This does not seem natural. It is better to regard the second half of this verse as a continuous sentence, and to understand the participle as meaning "if ye do well." The doing well, etc., is a mark that Christian women have become children of Sarah by faith. And are not afraid with any amazement. The Greek word for "amazement" (πτόησις) does not occur in any other place of the New Testament, though we meet with the corresponding verb in Luke 21:9; Luke 24:87. There seems to be a reference to Proverbs 3:25, "Be not afraid of sudden fear ' (καὶ οὐ φοβηθήσῃ πτόησιν ἐπελθοῦσαν), Πτσήσις is "dismay, scared terrified excitement," very different from the calm thoughtful φόβος, the fear lest they should fail in proper respect for their husbands, and that out of the holy fear of God, which St. Peter inculcates upon wives (ver. 2). The Christian wife might often experience cruel treatment from an unbelieving husband, but she was not to live in a flutter of excited terror; she was to be calm and quiet, trusting in God. As to the construction, the accusative may be cognate, as the Authorized Version takes it; or the accusative of the object, as in Proverbs 3:25. The last view is, perhaps, the -most suitable: "And are not afraid of any sudden terror."

Ellicott's Commentary

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers(6) Even as Sara.--A definite example of the general fact just alleged. St. Peter seems rather to have argued from what every one would feel must have been the case than from explicit records. Sara's usual subjection is clearly seen in the one instance to which St. Peter refers (Genesis 18:12), where Sara, though not addressing Abraham, but speaking to herself, calls him "my lord." People show their usual habits of mind more freely in speaking to themselves.Whose daughters ye are.--A very misleading version, following the Vulgate. What St. Peter says is, whose children ye became, or were made. There was a definite period in their past lives at which they came to be--what they were not before--children of Sara. Have we not here, therefore, a distinct proof that these readers of the Epistle were Gentiles and not Jewesses? Not so. The phrase, "which hoped in God," pointing as it does to the coming of the Messiah, prepares us to understand how these Hebrew women became Sara's children. It was only by entering into her hope and attaching themselves to Jesus Christ, for whose coming she had looked. St. Peter has already been insisting on the nothingness of the fleshly descent, the "corruptible seed." As has been pointed out on 1Peter 1:24, this doctrine was not first taught by St. Paul, for St. Peter had heard it from the Baptist (Matthew 3:9) and from our Lord Himself (John 8:39). Whether persons were naturally Jews or Gentiles, they could not be children of Abraham without voluntarily becoming so by embracing his principles--i.e., by becoming Christians. The participial clauses which follow will need no change of translation, for they express not the act or process by which these ladies became children of Sara, but the condition on which they would remain her children. A very similar passage occurs in Hebrews 3:14 : "We have become partakers of the Christ, if (for the future) we hold," &c. (Comp. also 1Thessalonians 3:8; Hebrews 3:6.) . . .