1 Peter 4:3

For the time past, etc. Compare Romans 13:13. Us [η μ ι ν]. The best texts omit.

Of our life [τ ο υ β ι ο υ]. The best texts omit.

Will (boulhma, the better reading for qelhma). Desire, inclination. See on Matthew 1:19.

When we walked [π ε π ο ρ ε υ μ ε ν ο υ ς]. Rev., rightly, ye walked. Construe with to have wrought. The time past may suffice for you to have wrought the desire, etc., walking as ye have done; the perfect participle having an inferential reference to a course of life now done with.

Lasciviousness [α σ ε λ γ ε ι α ς]. The following enumeration of vices is characteristic of Peter's style in its fulness and condensation. He enumerates six forms of sensuality, three personal and three social :

(1) 'Aselgeiaiv, wantonness. See on Mark 7:22. Excesses of all kinds, with possibly an emphasis on sins of uncleanness.

(2) 'Epiqumiaiv, lusts. See on Mark 4:19. Pointing especially to fleshly lusts, "the inner principles of licentiousness" (Cook).

(3) Oijnoflugiaiv, excess of wine. Only here in New Testament. The kindred verb occurs in the Septuagint, Deuteronomy 21:20; Isaiah 46:12. From oinov, wine, and flew or fluw, to teem with abundance; thence to boil over or bubble up, overflow. It is the excessive, insatiate desire for drink, form which comes the use of the word for the indulgence of the desire - debauch. So Rev., wine - bibbings. The remaining three are revellings, banquetings, and idolatries.

Revellings [κ ω μ ο ι ς]. The word originally signifies merely a merry - making; most probably a village festival, from kwmh, a village. In the cities such entertainments grew into carouses, in which the party of revellers paraded the streets with torches, singing, dancing, and all kinds of frolics. These revels also entered into religious observances, especially in the worship of Bacchus, Demeter, and the Idaean Zeus in Crete. The fanatic and orgiastic rites of Egypt, Asia Minor, and Thrace became engrafted on the old religion. Socrates, in the introduction to "The Republic," pictures himself as having gone down to the Piraeus to see the celebration of the festival of Bendis, the Thracian Artemis (Diana); and as being told by one of his companions that, in the evening, there is to be a torch - race with horses in honor of the goddess. The rites grew furious and ecstatic. "Crowds of women, clothed with fawns' skins, and bearing the sanctified thyrsus (a staff wreathed with vine - leaves) flocked to the solitudes of Parnassus, Kithaeron, or Taygetus during the consecrated triennial period, and abandoned themselves to demonstrations of frantic excitement, and dancing and clamorous invocation of the God. They were said to tear animals limb from limb, to devour the raw flesh, and to cut themselves without feeling the wound. The men yielded to a similar impulse by noisy revels in the streets, sounding the cymbals and tambourine, and carrying the image of the God in procession" (Grote, " History of Greece "). Peter, in his introduction, addresses the sojourners in Galatia, where the Phrygian worship of Cybele, the great mother of the gods, prevailed, with its wild orgies and hideous mutilations. Lucretius thus describes the rites :

"With vigorous hand the clamorous drum they rouse, And wake the sounding cymbal; the hoarse horn Pours forth its threatening music, and the pipe, With Phrygian airs distracts the maddening mind, While arms of blood the fierce enthusiasts wield To fright the unrighteous crowds, and bend profound Their impious souls before the power divine. Thus moves the pompous idol through the streets, Scattering mute blessings, while the throngs devout Strew, in return, their silver and their brass, Loading the paths with presents, and o'ershade The heavenly form; and all th' attending train, With dulcet sprays of roses, pluct profuse, A band select before them, by the Greeks Curetes called, from Phrygian parents sprung, Sport with fantastic chains, the measured dance Weaving infuriate, charmed with human blood, And madly shaking their tremendous crests." De Rerum Natura, 2, 618 - 631.

Banquetings [π ο τ ο ι ς]. Lit., drinking - bouts. Rev., carousings.

Abominable [α θ ε μ ι τ ο ι ς]. Only here, and by Peter in the Acts 10:28. More literally, unlawful, emphasizing the idolatries as violations of divine law.