§ 7 Qualifications for Overseers ( 1 Tim. 3:1–7 )
§7 Qualifications for Overseers (1 Tim. 3:1–7)
To this point, Paul has addressed some concerns related to the community at worship and corrected some abuses generated by the activities of the erring elders. Now he turns to the elders themselves and sets forth some qualifications for “office.”
He begins, in verses 1–7, with a group called episkopoi (“overseers”); then moves in verses 8–13 to a group called diakonoi (“servants,” “deacons”), with a note also about some “women” in verse 11. It is altogether likely that both “overseers” and “deacons” come under the larger category presbyteroi (“elders”). In any case, the evidence from Acts 20:17 and 28 and Titus 1:5 and 7 indicates that the terms episkopoi, “overseers” (Acts 20:28; Titus 1:7), and presbyteroi, “elders” (Acts 20:17; Titus 1:5), are partially interchangeable. Thus at least the overseers (episkopai) of this first paragraph are church elders. (For some brief comments on early church order see the Introduction, pp. 20–23).
It must be noted that in contrast to Titus (1:5), Timothy has not been left in Ephesus to appoint elders. Indeed, everything in 1 Timothy, as well as the evidence from Acts 20, indicates that there already were elders in this church. Why, then, this instruction? Again, the evidence points to the character and activities of the false teachers. In this regard two things must be noted: First, many of the items in the list stand in sharp contrast to what is said elsewhere in the letter about the false teachers. Second, the list itself has three notable features: (1) It gives qualifications, not duties; (2) most of the items reflect outward, observable behavior; and (3) none of the items is distinctively Christian (e.g., love, faith, purity, endurance; cf. 4:12; 6:12); rather, they reflect the highest ideals of Hellenistic moral philosophy. Since the whole passage points toward and concludes with verse 7, that is, concern for the overseer’s (and thus the church’s) reputation with outsiders, this suggests that the false teachers were, by their behavior, bringing the gospel into disrepute. Therefore, Paul is concerned not only that the elders have Christian virtues (these are assumed) but that they reflect the highest ideals of the culture as well.
If our identification of the false teachers as elders is correct, then Paul’s reason for this set of instructions is that Timothy must see to it that elders are living according to their appointment, that is, by these standards. At the same time, of course, the whole church will be listening in and will thus be given the grounds for discipline of erring elders as well as for their replacement (cf. 5:22, 24–25).
3:1 / The section begins with our second trustworthy saying (see 1:15). Because the saying itself has seemed rather pedantic, and because the word “save” (cf. 1:15) appears in 2:15, some have argued that the preceding verse is the trustworthy saying. But 2:15 does not have the characteristics of a “saying,” and 3:1 does—despite its noncreedal content. Perhaps too much has been made of the concept “saying,” as though all these “trustworthy sayings” were in wide circulation in the church (as 1:15 probably was). More likely, this became for Paul a kind of reinforcement formula: “What I am about to say has special import” or “can be generally accepted as true.”
The saying itself, if anyone sets his heart on being an overseer, he desires a noble task, appears to lend some credence to the commonly held view that people were “running for office.” But there is no other evidence in the NT that people “aspired to” positions of leadership in the church. The little evidence we do have implies that heads of households from among the earliest converts were normally appointed to such positions (Acts 14:23; cf. 1 Cor. 1:16 and 16:15–16).
The saying in fact focuses less on the person than on the position. Thus Paul is not commending people who have a great desire to become leaders; rather, he is saying that the position of overseer is such a significant matter, a noble task, that it should indeed be the kind of task to which a person might aspire. Thus, despite the activities of some, he does not for that reason negate the position itself.
3:2–3 / Because being an overseer is such a noble task, Paul is concerned that the elders in Ephesus manifest truly exemplary lives. The overseer, therefore, must be above reproach. That would seem to default any aspiring person! The term above reproach, however, which is repeated regarding the widows in 5:7 and of Timothy himself in 6:14 (in an eschatological context), has to do with irreproachable observable conduct. Here it seems to be intended as the general, covering term for the following list of eleven virtues, or qualities (mostly single words in Greek), that should characterize an overseer.
The first item on the list, the husband of but one wife, is one of the truly difficult phrases in the PE (cf. 3:12; 5:9, of the “true” widows, and Titus 1:6). There are at least four options: First, it could be requiring that the overseer be married. Support is found in the fact that the false teachers are forbidding marriage and that Paul urges marriage for the wayward widows (5:14; cf. 2:15). But against this are that it emphasizes must and wife, while the text emphasizes one, that Paul, and most likely Timothy, were not married, and that it stands in contradiction to 1 Corinthians 7:25–38. Besides, it was a cultural presupposition that most people would be married.
Second, it could be that it prohibits polygamy. This correctly emphasizes the one wife aspect; but polygamy was such a rare feature of pagan society that such a prohibition would function as a near irrelevancy. Moreover, it would not seem to fit the identical phrase used of the widows in 5:9.
Third, it could be prohibiting second marriages. Such an interpretation is supported by many of the data: It would fit the widows especially, and all kinds of inscriptional evidence praises women (especially, although sometimes men) who were “married only once” and remained “faithful” to that marriage after their partner died. This view would then prohibit second marriages after the death of a spouse, but it would also obviously—perhaps especially—prohibit divorce and remarriage. Some scholars (e.g., Hanson) would make it refer only to the latter.
Fourth, it could be that it requires marital fidelity to his one wife (cf. NEB: “faithful to his one wife”). In this view the overseer is required to live an exemplary married life (marriage is assumed), faithful to his one wife in a culture in which marital infidelity was common, and at times assumed. It would, of course, also rule out polygamy and divorce and remarriage, but it would not necessarily rule out the remarriage of a widower (although that would still not be the Pauline ideal; cf. 1 Cor. 7:8–9, 39–40). Although there is much to be said for either understanding of the third option, the concern that the church’s leaders live exemplary married lives seems to fit the context best—given the apparently low view of marriage and family held by the false teachers (4:3; cf. 3:4–5).
The next word, temperate, often means with regard to alcoholic beverages. However, since that is specifically said in verse 3, temperate is probably used figuratively to mean “free from every form of excess, passion, or rashness” (cf. 2 Tim. 4:5). The overseer must also be self-controlled and respectable, words that often occur together in pagan writings as high ideals of behavior. A Christian leader is to be more than, and therefore certainly not less than, such ideals.
The church leader must also be hospitable. This, too, was a Greek virtue, but it also was a thoroughgoing expectation of all Christians in the early church (cf. 5:10; Rom. 12:13; 1 Pet. 4:9; Aristides, Apology 15). Likewise he must also be able to teach. This is the one item in the list that also implies duties, a matter that will become clear in 5:17. This adjective recurs in 2 Timothy 2:24 and Titus 1:9, whose contexts suggest that able to teach means the ability both to teach the truth and to refute error.
In adding that the overseer must … not be given to drunkenness, is Paul also setting out a contrast to the false teachers? Perhaps not, in light of their asceticism noted in 4:3. But they may have been ascetic about certain foods and overindulgent about wine. In any case, drunkenness was one of the common vices of antiquity; and few pagan authors speak out against it—only against other “sins” that might go along with it (violence, public scolding of servants, etc.). The overseer is not necessarily to be a total abstainer (5:23), but neither is he to be given to drunkenness (cf. 3:8; Titus 1:7); this is uniformly condemned in Scripture.
The next three qualities probably go together, and do indeed seem to reflect the false teachers’ behavior. The overseer is not to be violent but gentle, not quarrelsome. The description of the false teachers in 6:3–5, as well as in 2 Timothy 2:22–26 (cf. Titus 3:9), suggests that they are given to strife and quarrels. The true elder is to be gentle, even in correcting opponents (2 Tim. 2:23–25).
The list concludes with not a lover of money. According to 6:5–10, greed turns out to be one of the “deadly sins” of the false teachers, being directly responsible for their ruin. Thus a word against avarice appears in every list of qualifications for leadership (3:8; Titus 1:7; cf. Acts 20:33). On this matter, see especially discussion on 6:5–10 and 2 Timothy 3:6–7.
3:4–5 / Paul now moves on in verses 4–7 to address three further concerns. The church leader must have an exemplary family (vv. 4–5), must not be a new convert (v. 6), and must be a person of good reputation with outsiders (v. 7). These, too, probably reflect the situation in Ephesus.
This passage also assumes the episkopos will be married (but does not thereby require it; cf. v. 2). Not only so, but first-century sociology also makes it most probable that those who were appointed “overseers” in the early churches, especially since we are dealing with house churches, were in fact the heads of the “houses” where the churches met. Thus, as verse 5 implies, there is the closest kind of relationship between family and church. The man who is a failure at one (family) is thereby disqualified for the other (church). Indeed, as 3:15 and 5:1–2 indicate, the word oikos (“household”; NIV, family) is for Paul a pregnant metaphor for church.
The overseer, then, must manage his own family well, because he must also take care of God’s church. The word for manage is used again of the elders in 5:17 (NIV, “direct”) as it was earlier in 1 Thessalonians 5:12 (NIV, “are over”). It carries the sense of either “to rule, govern,” or “to be concerned about, care for” (cf. “devote themselves to” in Titus 3:8). The clue to its meaning here lies with understanding the companion verb about the church in verse 5, to take care of, which carries the full force of that idiom in English. That is, to take care of implies both leadership (guidance) and caring concern. In the home and church neither has validity without the other.
Such a person will be known to give the kind of leadership at home that will see that his children obey him (lit., “have children in submissiveness,” as 2:11). The force of the phrase with proper respect probably means not so much that they will obey with respect but that they will be known for both their obedience and their generally good behavior. In Titus 1:6 this is further elaborated to include their being believers, along with a concern for their reputation with outsiders. There is a fine line between demanding obedience and gaining it. The church leader, who must indeed exhort people to obedience, does not thereby “rule” God’s family. He takes care of it in such a way that its “children” will be known for their obedience and good behavior.
3:6 / The church leader, therefore, also must not be a recent convert, a metaphor in Greek that literally means “no newly planted person.” As will be repeated in a different way in 5:22, an episkopos must be mature in the faith. The reason for this is the great danger of swelled-headedness, he may become conceited. Since this is precisely what is said of the false teachers in 6:4 (cf. 2 Tim. 3:4), one wonders whether some of them were recent converts, whose “sins … trail behind them” (5:24 = “are seen only later”).
In any case, to become conceited means also to fall under the same judgment as the devil. Although Paul’s Greek is a bit ambiguous (lit., “fall into the judgment of the devil”), he is probably reflecting the common theme that in Christ’s ministry, especially in his death and resurrection, Satan was dealt his decisive defeat, to be realized fully at the End (cf. Rev. 12:7–17 and 20:7–10).
3:7 / Finally, he comes to the concern that the church leader be a person who has a good reputation with outsiders. As noted in the discussion on 2:2, this is a genuinely Pauline concern in the NT. Indeed, this concern is what puts the foregoing list into perspective. That list has to do with observable behavior of a kind that will be a witness to outsiders. As in verse 6, Paul’s Greek is not altogether clear, but the emphasis seems to be that a bad reputation with the pagan world will cause the episkopos to fall into disgrace, or be slandered, and thus the church with him; and that would be to fall … into the devil’s trap. It is a trap set by the devil when the behavior of the church’s leaders is such that outsiders will be disinclined to hear the gospel. One wonders again whether the greed and abusive conduct of the false teachers is not bringing disgrace to God’s household in Ephesus, especially when one considers that Paul himself had been so accused in Thessalonica (1 Thess. 2:1–10) and that pagan moralists in particular condemned such activities among the “false” philosophers (see esp. Dio Chrysostom, Oration 32 and Lucian’s Philosophies for Sale).
3:1 / There are some who favor a textual variation that reads “This is a popular saying” (NEB). But that variant is found only in a few so-called Western sources that are not known for their reliability. Furthermore, the very noncreedal nature of the saying accounts for the change. See the discussion in Metzger, TCGNT, p. 640.
3:2–3 / The fact that ton episkopon (“the overseer”) is singular here has led some to argue that this office represents the monepiscopacy (single person as pastor) whereas the plural diakonoi (“deacons”) serve under him (as in most contemporary Protestant churches). However, the singular here is almost certainly generic, as “the woman” is in 2:11–12. The sure clue for such a view, besides the plural at 5:17; is Titus 1:5 and 7, where the plural “elders” appears in v. 5, then shifts to the generic singular in vv. 6 and 7. Furthermore, the “if anyone” clause in v. 1, which has led to the singular in this verse, is a nonlimiting, or generalizing, conditional sentence. It recurs in 1 Tim. 5:8 and 6:3, and in both cases—esp. 6:3—refers to a group of more than one.
Many scholars see this list of twelve qualities as “bourgeois,” containing very little specifically Christian. Thus it is argued that an alleged pseudepigrapher had a “schema” of such virtues, as one finds in Onosander’s Strategikos for the qualities desired in a general, and adapted them for his purposes (see esp. D-C, pp. 158–60). The correspondences with Onosander are indeed striking; however, they are very likely coincidental, as are the equally striking correspondences between 1 Thess. 2:1–10 and Dio Chrysostom’s Oration 32. The language belongs to the milieu; the presence of the false teachers explains the specifics. The lack of “a specifically Christian element” is to be explained as something Paul assumes for elders. Such an element is hardly missing from 1 Timothy (see 4:12 and 6:11).
For a more thorough presentation of the view taken here on having “but one wife,” see C. H. Dodd, “New Testament Translation Problems II,” pp. 112–16. On the several options, see Hanson, pp. 77–78. For the tacit assumption of marital infidelity in Greco-Roman culture, see Demosthenes, Oration 59:122: “Mistresses we keep for the sake of pleasure, concubines for the daily care of the body, but wives to bear us legitimate children” (Loeb, VI, 445, 447, slightly modified).
Kelly thinks that both hospitality and teaching reflect official duties. But since hospitality is expected of all believers, it is difficult to see anything “official” here.
It is possible that since drunkenness often leads to violence, these two go together in the list (cf. GNB), and that the mention of violence then reminds him of the false teachers and leads to the contrasts, gentle and not quarrelsome.
3:4 / Some think that with proper respect modifies he (the father) and should be translated “he must manage his own family well, with all seriousness,” or “true dignity.” But the order of words favors the interpretation given here.
3:6 / The phrase “fall into the judgment of the devil” could refer to some form of judgment that Satan metes out and thus correspond to v. 7, where the devil’s trap is a snare he sets. But that is highly unlikely in this case. The NT is thoroughgoing that God metes out judgment, not Satan.