1 Timothy 5:24

The connexion of this general statement is especially with 1 Timothy 5:22. The solemn warning against the awful consequences of an ill-considered moral judgment on those condemned was calculated to overwhelm a weak man with anxiety. Here the apostle assures Timothy that in actual practical experience the moral diagnosis of men's characters is not so perplexing as might be supposed antecedently. The exegesis of προάγουσαι and ἐπακολουθοῦσιν depends on the view we take of κρίσις; vis., whether it refers to a judgment passed by man in this world, or to the final doom pronounced by God in the next. κρίσις is used of such a judgment as man may pass, in John 8:16; 2 Peter 2:11; Jude 1:9; though the word is more frequently used of the Great final Judgment. If, as is generally allowed, these verses, 24 and 25, are resumptive of 1 Timothy 5:22, the κρίσις here indicated is that of the Church ruler, Timothy in this case, deciding for or against the admission of men to communion (or to ordination). It is evident that the final Judgment of God, which no one can certainly forecast, cannot help or hinder a decision made in this life by one man about another. The meaning, then, of the clause is as follows: In the case of some men, you have no hesitation as to your verdict; their sins are notorious and force you to an adverse judgment. With regard to others, your suspicions, your instinctive feeling of moral disapproval, comes to be confirmed and justified by subsequent revelation of sins that had been concealed. This is, in the main, the explanation adopted by Alford.

πρόδηλοι : Not open beforehand (A.V.), but evident (R.V.), manifesta sunt (Vulg.) as in Hebrews 7:14 (neut.). The προ is not indicative of antecedence in time, but of publicity, as in προεγράφη, Galatians 3:1.

προάγουσαι : It is best to take this in a transitive sense, as in Acts 12:1; Acts 17:5; Acts 25:26, of bringing a prisoner forth to trial. Here the object of the verb is understood out of τινῶν ἀνθρώπων. The men are in the custody of their sins, which also testify against them. In the other case, the witnesses the sins do not appear until the persons on trial have had sentence pronounced on them. We supply εἰς κρίσιν after ἐπακολουθοῦσιν.