1 Timothy 6:13

Tischendorf follows א*G and some Latin authorities in omitting σοι; ins. אcAD2KLP &c.

Before θεοῦ AD2GKLP insert τοῦ, but Tischendorf following אrejects the article.

Rec. text has ζωοποιοῦντος with אKL; but ζωογονοῦντος is the reading of AD2GP 17.

Χριστοῦ Ἰησοῦ. So AD2KLP d and Harclean Syriac; Ἰησοῦ Χρ. is read in אG f g, the Peshito Syriac and Egyptian versions. See critical note on 1 Timothy 1:16.

13. παραγγέλλω σοι ἐνώπιον τοῦ θεοῦ τοῦ ζωογονοῦντος τὰ πάντα. St Paul charges Timothy in the face of a more awful Witness than those who stood by and heard his baptismal confession at the first. ζωογονεῖν (see crit. note) is ‘to preserve alive’; the thought of the prize of eternal life leads up to the thought of Him who is the Source of all life, who preserveth all things alive. The word is perhaps suggested by the thought of Timothy’s baptism, when he was ‘born again’ of water and the Spirit. He who gives spiritual life in baptism also ‘preserves it alive.’ ζωογονεῖν does not occur again in St Paul, but it is found in LXX. (Exodus 1:17-18; Judges 8:19; 1 Samuel 27:9) and was known to St Luke (Luke 17:33 and Acts 7:19). In medical writers it is common in the sense of ‘to endue with life’ or ‘to produce alive[533].’

[533] See Hobart, Medical Language of St Luke, p. 155.

καὶ Χρ. Ἰη. τοῦ μαρτυρήσαντος ἐπὶ Ποντίου Πειλάτου τὴν καλ. ὁμολ., and of Christ Jesus who under Pontius Pilate attested the good confession, sc. the Revelation which He came to bring. Jesus is ὁ μάρτυς ὁ πιστός (Revelation 1:5) and He came that He might bear witness to the truth (John 18:37); He was thus, strictly, the First Martyr. ἐπί followed by a gen. may mean either (a) in the presence of (as in Mark 13:9), or (b) in the time of (as in Mark 2:26); and thus ἐπὶ Ποντίου may be taken as equivalent (a) to coram Pontio, the publicity of the witness delivered before the imperial authority being the emphatic matter; or (b) to sub Pontio, as it has been taken in the Apostles’ Creed, in the days of Pontius Pilate, the reference being merely to the time when the witness in question was given. Taking into account the change of preposition from ἑνώπιον to ἐπί, and the fact that μαρτυρήσαντος is the emphatic word, in contrast with ὡμολόγησας of the preceding verse, we decide for (b). Timothy at his baptism had confessed the good confession of the Faith of Jesus Christ, which the Lord Himself attested with power in the days of Pontius Pilate, not only by His words before His judge, but by His Death and Resurrection.

It seems not improbable that the words of this verse rehearse the phrases of some primitive form of baptismal creed, in which mention was made of God as the Sustainer of Life, of the Passion of Jesus Christ under Pontius Pilate, and of His Second Coming in judgement; cp. 2 Timothy 2:8; 2 Timothy 4:1.