Titus 1:12

εἷπέν τις. So the rec. text with the majority of MSS.; א*G f g and the Bohairic version insert δὲ after εἷπεν.

12. εἶπέν τις ἐξ αὐτῶν ἴδιος αὐτῶν προφήτης, one of themselves, sc. the Cretans, a prophet of their own, said. The philosopher here quoted by St Paul is Epimenides, a Cretan who flourished about 600 B.C.; Plato calls him θεῖος�, and Diogenes Laertius (I. X. 11) reports that the Cretans used to offer sacrifice to him ὡς θεῷ.

For the gen. αὐτῶν after ἴδιος, which might be thought redundant (but the usage is classical), cp. Acts 24:23; 2 Peter 3:3; 2 Peter 3:16.

Κρῆτες�, κακὰ θηρία, γαστέρες�. This hexameter comes from the περὶ χρησμῶν of Epimenides; it is quoted by Callimachus in his Hymn to Zeus, and (as Farrar observes) was a well-known verse in antiquity, because it gave rise to the syllogistic puzzle known as ‘the Liar’ (Farrar, St Paul, p. 661).

The Cretans had a bad reputation and were reckoned among the τρία κάππα κάκιστα of the Greek world, the Cappadocians and Cilicians being associated with them in this unenviable notoriety. Polybius (VI. 47. 5) speaks of their mendacity; indeed, κρητίζειν was a euphemism for ‘to lie,’ as Suidas records.

γαστέρες�, idle gluttons. Tyndale’s rendering “slow bellies,” which has been reproduced in many English versions, does not indicate the true sense of ἀργαί, idle, as at 1 Timothy 5:13 (see note thereon). Cp. “venter tardus” of Juvenal (Sat. iv. 107).

St Paul elsewhere quotes Aratus (Acts 17:28) and Menander (1 Corinthians 15:33), but it is plain that these references, along with the one before us, are quite insufficient to establish the wide acquaintance with Greek literature which some have claimed for him in consequence. It is by no means improbable that he was a man of liberal education, as well as large experience and profound intellect, but two or three hackneyed quotations will not go far to prove it. The skilful application of the quotations in each case is the interesting point to notice.