(4) Where is the promise?--Not meaning, of course, "In what passages of Scripture is any such promise to be found?"--but, "What has come of it? where is there any accomplishment of it?" (Comp. Psalm 42:3; Psalm 79:10; Jeremiah 17:15; Malachi 2:17.)
Of his coming.--"His" instead of "the Lord's" indicates not merely that only one Person could be meant, but also the irreverent way in which these scoffers spoke of Him.
Since the fathers fell asleep.--What fathers are meant? Four answers have been given to this question: (1) The ancestors of the human race; (2) the patriarchs and prophets; (3) the first generation of Christians; (4) each generation of men in relation to those following. Probably nothing more definite than our remote ancestors is intended. The expression "fell asleep" is used of St. Stephen's death in Acts 7:60 (comp. Matthew 27:52; 1 Corinthians 7:39, where the word is not literally translated; 1 Corinthians 15:6; 1 Corinthians 15:18, &c). The thoroughly Christian term "cemetery" (=sleeping-place), in the sense of a place of repose for the dead, comes from the same Greek root.
There is a passage quoted by Clement of Rome (circ. A.D. 100) which seems at first sight to contain a reference to this verse: "Far be from us this Scripture where He saith, Wretched are the double-minded, who doubt in heart and say, These things we heard in the times of our fathers also, but behold, we have grown old, and none of them has happened to us" (Epistle to the Corinthians, xxiii.). But the remainder of this "Scripture," as quoted by Clement, is so utterly unlike the verse before us, that one suspects some other source. And this suspicion is confirmed when we find the same passage quoted in the so-called Second Epistle of Clement (xi.) as "the prophetic word." (See on 2 Peter 1:19 and on 2 Peter 2:9). The differences between the two quotations are such that the pseudo-Clement appears to be quoting independently, and not merely borrowing from the true Clement. In neither case does close inspection encourage us to believe that our present verse is the source of the quotation. But the quotation by the true Clement is important as a complete refutation of the objection that "the fathers" means the first Christians, and consequently no such scoffing argument as this would be possible in the lifetime of St. Peter This very argument was not only in existence, but was condemned in a document which Clement before the close of the first century could quote as "Scripture." Comp. Epistle of Poly carp, chap. vii.: "Whosoever perverts the oracles of the Lord to his own lusts, and says there is neither resurrection nor judgment, he is the firstborn of Satan."
All things continue as they were.--Rather, as they are. The error has probably arisen from a desire to get rid of the slight difficulty of two dates being given: (1) from the death of "the fathers," and (2) from the beginning of the creation. The suggestion that "the fathers" are the first progenitors of the human race is another attempt to get rid of the difficulty by making the two dates virtually one and the same. But the second date is an after-thought, frequent in Thucydides, intensifying and strengthening the first. Since the fathers fell asleep all things continue as they are--nay, more, since the beginning of the creation.
This sceptical argument is used with increased force as each generation passes away. It will be at its strongest just before the fallacy of it is irrefragably exposed--on the eve of the day of judgment.
Verse 4. - And saying, Where is the promise of his coming? (comp. Malachi 2:17, "Where is the God of judgment?"). The Lord had prophesied of his coming; St. Paul had spoken more than once as if that coming were very near at hand (1 Corinthians 15:51; 2 Corinthians 5:4; 1 Thessalonians 4:15). Yet he came not. Already men were beginning to mock, and to question whether the long-delayed promise would ever be fulfilled. For since the fathers fell asleep; better, from the day that. By "the fathers" must be meant here the fathers of the Christian Church. St. Peter was writing more than thirty years after the Ascension. The first generation of Christians was rapidly passing away. Stephen "fell asleep" first, then James the son of Zebedee, the other James the Lord's brother, and many others who had looked, it may be, to see the coming of the Lord among those "which are alive and remain" (1 Thessalonians 4:17). But they had died, and he came not; and from the day of their death things went on as they were. Should men look for him still, the mockers asked, when the fathers looked in vain? The mockers adopted, in mockery, doubtless, the Christian phrase for death. The Lord first had said, "Our friend Lazarus sleepeth ;" then the holy Stephen "fell asleep;" and so "they which are asleep" became the recognized name for the dead in Christ. Death is like sleep; the holy dead rest from their labours. They "sleep not idly," for they are at home with the Lord, and they are blessed; but yet the quiet rest of Paradise, though "far better" than this earthly life, is sleep compared with the perfect consummation and bliss, both in body and soul, which the redeemed of the Lord shall enjoy at last in his eternal glory. All things continue as they were from the beginning of the creation; literally, all things continue thus, as they are, and as they have been from the beginning. There has been no sudden catastrophe; the world has gone on as it was; the laws of nature are still working with their changeless uniformity" (see a remarkable parallel in Clement, I, 23, which is important also as an independent proof that this argument of the scoffers is as old as the end of the first century).
3:1-4 The purified minds of Christians are to be stirred up, that they may be active and lively in the work of holiness. There will be scoffers in the last days, under the gospel, men who make light of sin, and mock at salvation by Jesus Christ. One very principal article of our faith refers to what only has a promise to rest upon, and scoffers will attack it till our Lord is come. They will not believe that he will come. Because they see no changes, therefore they fear not God, Ps 55:19. What he never has done, they fancy he never can do, or never will do.
And saying, Where is the promise of his coming?.... That is, of the coming of the Lord and Saviour, 2 Peter 3:2; the object of their scorn and derision, and whom they name not, through contempt; and the meaning is, what is become of the promise of his coming? where the accomplishment of it? The prophets foretold he would come; he himself said he would come again, John 14:3; the angels, at his ascension, declared he would come from heaven in like manner as he went up, Acts 1:11; and all his apostles gave out that he would appear a second time to judge both quick and dead, Acts 10:421 Peter 4:5, and that his coming was at hand, Philippians 4:5; but where is the fulfilment of all this? he is not come, nor is there any sign or likelihood of it:
for since the fathers fell asleep; or "died": which is the language of the Scriptures, and here sneered at by these men, who believe them so fast asleep as never to be awaked or raised more; and by "the fathers" they mean the first inhabitants of the world, as Adam, Abel, Seth, &c. and all the patriarchs and prophets in all ages; the Ethiopic version renders it, "our first fathers":
all things continue as they were from the beginning of the creation; reasoning from the settled order of things, the constant revolution of the sun, moon, and stars, the permanency of the earth, and the succession of the inhabitants of it, to the future continuance of things, without any alteration; and consequently, that Christ would not come, as was promised, to raise the dead, judge mankind destroy the world, and set up a new state of things: the fallacy of which reasoning is exposed by the apostle in the following words.
Of his coming.--"His" instead of "the Lord's" indicates not merely that only one Person could be meant, but also the irreverent way in which these scoffers spoke of Him.
Since the fathers fell asleep.--What fathers are meant? Four answers have been given to this question: (1) The ancestors of the human race; (2) the patriarchs and prophets; (3) the first generation of Christians; (4) each generation of men in relation to those following. Probably nothing more definite than our remote ancestors is intended. The expression "fell asleep" is used of St. Stephen's death in Acts 7:60 (comp. Matthew 27:52; 1 Corinthians 7:39, where the word is not literally translated; 1 Corinthians 15:6; 1 Corinthians 15:18, &c). The thoroughly Christian term "cemetery" (=sleeping-place), in the sense of a place of repose for the dead, comes from the same Greek root.
There is a passage quoted by Clement of Rome (circ. A.D. 100) which seems at first sight to contain a reference to this verse: "Far be from us this Scripture where He saith, Wretched are the double-minded, who doubt in heart and say, These things we heard in the times of our fathers also, but behold, we have grown old, and none of them has happened to us" (Epistle to the Corinthians, xxiii.). But the remainder of this "Scripture," as quoted by Clement, is so utterly unlike the verse before us, that one suspects some other source. And this suspicion is confirmed when we find the same passage quoted in the so-called Second Epistle of Clement (xi.) as "the prophetic word." (See on 2 Peter 1:19 and on 2 Peter 2:9). The differences between the two quotations are such that the pseudo-Clement appears to be quoting independently, and not merely borrowing from the true Clement. In neither case does close inspection encourage us to believe that our present verse is the source of the quotation. But the quotation by the true Clement is important as a complete refutation of the objection that "the fathers" means the first Christians, and consequently no such scoffing argument as this would be possible in the lifetime of St. Peter This very argument was not only in existence, but was condemned in a document which Clement before the close of the first century could quote as "Scripture." Comp. Epistle of Poly carp, chap. vii.: "Whosoever perverts the oracles of the Lord to his own lusts, and says there is neither resurrection nor judgment, he is the firstborn of Satan."
All things continue as they were.--Rather, as they are. The error has probably arisen from a desire to get rid of the slight difficulty of two dates being given: (1) from the death of "the fathers," and (2) from the beginning of the creation. The suggestion that "the fathers" are the first progenitors of the human race is another attempt to get rid of the difficulty by making the two dates virtually one and the same. But the second date is an after-thought, frequent in Thucydides, intensifying and strengthening the first. Since the fathers fell asleep all things continue as they are--nay, more, since the beginning of the creation.
This sceptical argument is used with increased force as each generation passes away. It will be at its strongest just before the fallacy of it is irrefragably exposed--on the eve of the day of judgment.
for since the fathers fell asleep; or "died": which is the language of the Scriptures, and here sneered at by these men, who believe them so fast asleep as never to be awaked or raised more; and by "the fathers" they mean the first inhabitants of the world, as Adam, Abel, Seth, &c. and all the patriarchs and prophets in all ages; the Ethiopic version renders it, "our first fathers":
all things continue as they were from the beginning of the creation; reasoning from the settled order of things, the constant revolution of the sun, moon, and stars, the permanency of the earth, and the succession of the inhabitants of it, to the future continuance of things, without any alteration; and consequently, that Christ would not come, as was promised, to raise the dead, judge mankind destroy the world, and set up a new state of things: the fallacy of which reasoning is exposed by the apostle in the following words.