6:1 Those who are under the yoke as slaves 3 must regard their own masters as deserving of full respect. This will prevent 4 the name of God and Christian teaching 5 from being discredited. 6
5:1 Do not address an older man harshly 7 but appeal to him as a father. Speak to younger men as brothers, 8 5:2 older women as mothers, and younger women as sisters – with complete purity.
4:1 Now the Spirit explicitly says that in the later times some will desert the faith and occupy themselves 11 with deceiving spirits and demonic teachings, 12
1 tc ‡ Most witnesses, some of them important (א2 A D H 1881 Ï lat sy bo), have σοι (soi, “you”) after παραγγέλλω (parangellw, “I charge [you]”), a predictable variant because the personal pronoun is demanded by the sense of the passage (and was added in the translation because of English requirements). Hence, the omission is the harder reading, and the addition of σοι is one of clarification. Further, the shorter reading is found in several important witnesses, such as א* F G Ψ 6 33 1739 pc. Thus, both internally and externally the shorter reading is preferred. NA 27 places σοι in brackets, indicating some doubts as to its authenticity.
2 tn Grk “testified the good confession.”
3 tn Traditionally, “servants.” Though δοῦλος (doulos) is normally translated “servant,” the word does not bear the connotation of a free individual serving another. BDAG notes that “‘servant’ for ‘slave’ is largely confined to Biblical transl. and early American times…in normal usage at the present time the two words are carefully distinguished” (BDAG 260 s.v.). The most accurate translation is “bondservant” (sometimes found in the ASV for δοῦλος), in that it often indicates one who sells himself into slavery to another. But as this is archaic, few today understand its force.
4 tn Grk “that the name…may not be slandered” (a continuation of the preceding sentence).
5 tn Grk “the teaching.”
6 tn Or “slandered.”
7 tn Or “Do not speak harshly to an older man.”
8 tn No verb “speak” is stated in this clause, but it continues the sense of the preceding.
9 tn This phrase uses a compound form of the same verb as in v. 14a: “deceived” vs. “deceived out, completely deceived.” The two verbs could be synonymous, but because of the close contrast in this context, it seems that a stronger meaning is intended for the second verb.
10 tn Grk “has come to be in transgression” (with an emphasis on the continuing consequences of that fall).
11 tn Or “desert the faith by occupying themselves.”
12 tn Grk “teachings of demons” (speaking of the source of these doctrines).