1 Timothy 4:7

1 Timothy 4:7. Refuse. Better, ‘ avoid.'

Old wives' fables. The adjective is found here only in the New Testament, and takes its place among the strong colloquial phrases which characterize these Epistles. In the absence of any more distinct evidence, it is reasonable to assume that the fables were of the same kind generally as those mentioned in 1 Timothy 1:4; 1 Timothy 1:9. It does not follow, however, that they belonged to the same school of opinion. The apostle might well apply the same word to deviations from the truth, on the right hand or the left, whether in the direction of Jewish asceticism or the Gnosticism afterwards systematically developed by Valentinus and Basilides.

Exercise thyself rather. The last word has nothing answering to it in the Greek, and is better omitted. The ‘exercise' is primarily that of the gymnasium, but is here used figuratively of any systematic discipline.