1 Peter 3:19

1 Peter 3:19. in which also he went and preached to the spirits in prison. Here, again, the A.V., following the Genevan alone among these earlier English Versions, wrongly renders ‘ by which.' The sense is, ‘in which,' i.e in the spiritual form of life which has just been noticed. The verb ‘preached' is used absolutely here. It is not to be taken, however, in the vague sense of making proclamation, showing Himself, or bearing witness to Himself (Schott, etc.), far less in the sense of preaching judgment, but in the sense which it elsewhere has in the New Testament, where it occurs, both with the object expressed (e.g. the gospel, the kingdom of God, Christ, etc.), and with the object unexpressed (e.g. Matthew 11:1; Mark 1:38, etc.), of Christ's earthly ministry of preaching, which was a message of grace. The word ‘spirits' is used here, as in Hebrews 12:23, in the sense of disembodied spirits. Elsewhere (e.g. Revelation 6:9; Revelation 20:4) the term ‘souls' is used to designate the departed. On the ground of the statement in 2 Peter 2:4, and the application of the word ‘spirit' in such passages as Luke 9:39; Acts 16:18, etc., some have strangely supposed a reference here to the angels who sinned, which is entirely inconsistent with the historical notice which follows. The phrase ‘in prison' has the definite force which it has in 2 Peter 2:4; Jude 1:6; Revelation 20:7, and is not to be explained away as merely equivalent to ‘in safe-keeping,' or ‘in the world of the dead' generally.