Live for God’s Eternal Values

Live for God’s Eternal Values

1 Peter 1:13–2:3

Live Wholly for God (1:13–16)

1:13

In light of this, keep your minds ready and disciplined! Stake all your future expectation on the grace that you’ll receive when Jesus Christ is revealed.

1:14

Like obedient children, don’t follow the pattern of the passions you used to indulge when you were ignorant.

1:15

Instead, in all your behavior be consecrated as holy to God, just as the one who called you is holy.

1:16

Do this because the Bible says, “You shall be consecrated to me as holy, because I am holy.”

In 1:13–2:3, Peter grounds moral exhortations in God’s action in Christ. For example:

1:13

The Greek phrase rendered as keep1 your minds ready can be rendered more directly as “girding up the waist of your minds.” Its mention of the mind emphasizes cognitive readiness, thus keeping the Lord’s coming in mind. Keeping in mind the Lord’s coming includes the recognition that all must give account for their works (1 Pet. 4:5), and thus urges a perspective that evaluates the present in light of its eternal significance.2

Girding up the waist reflects the image of pulling up a long garment so one can move more quickly and freely, such as running without tripping (e.g., 2 Kings 4:29; 9:1).3 Thus, for example, soldiers would gird up their cloaks before battle.4 It is relevant to God’s service (Eph. 6:14) such as urgent prophetic missions (2 Kings 4:29; 9:1; figuratively, Jer. 1:17).5 It also fits a Passover context (haste in Exod. 12:11),6 where the Israelites’ preparedness, with sandals and staff also ready, displayed faith in God’s promise. Here it especially applies to readiness for Christ’s coming, as in Luke 12:35.

The term rendered as disciplined (nēphō) involves self-control. Gentile intellectuals often commended such “sobriety.”7 Thus, when one suddenly taken with philosophy describes himself as “drunk with the wine of” the philosopher’s words, his companion replies, “Why, that isn’t drunkenness, it is sobriety and temperance!”8 Jewish thinkers also praised the virtue,9 sometimes in implied contrast to gentile practices!10 Peter uses it in connection with watching out for danger (1 Pet. 5:8) and in an eschatological context (4:7), as here. It was easily paired with being watchful, on guard and ready for action (4:7; 1 Thess. 5:6) and elsewhere appears in eschatological contexts (1 Thess. 5:6–8).11

Peter’s use of the Greek word teleiōs (which I rendered merely by adding an emphatic all) in connection with expectation suggests that believers’ full expectation is in Christ’s coming;12 we depend on it as our only ultimate hope. One could coordinate the participles translated as keep ready and disciplined in various ways with the imperative “hope” (stake expectation); they could function as three related commands,13 but much more likely one expresses hope by keeping ready and disciplined.14 Since all the ideas fit the same hope, some close relationship, at the least, is evident, in contrast to the serial exhortations of typical paraenesis. As in 1:10, the promised grace here refers to promised salvation (cf. also 3:7), although believers already experience an abundance of grace (1:2; 4:10; 5:5, 12). The fulfillment of hope or expectation at the revelation of Jesus Christ (1:13) recalls 1:7.

1:14

The theme of obedience in 1:14 revisits its mention in 1:2 and anticipates it in 1:22. Obedient children15 (1:14) imitate and become like their parents (1:15–16), here like their Father, God (1:17). The Greek term translated here as follow the pattern16 may be either middle or passive; because the context of obedience and the hortatory nature of Peter’s remark probably entail the hearers’ involvement, I treat it here as a middle—that is, “conform yourselves.”17

Their former behavior (1:14) recalls their past ways inherited from their ancestors (1:18). Some gentiles understood the concept of conversion from a former life;18 thus Diogenes the Cynic, reproached for his past life, retorted, “That was the time when I was such as you are now; but such as I am now, you will never be.”19 Jewish people could also envision pagan converts turning from “the terrible custom we have received from our ancestors.”20

Their passions and ignorance contrast with the cognitive element in 1:13.21 The passions once indulged when you were ignorant refer to their pre-Christian experience, especially as gentiles ignorant of God’s standards (4:2–3; cf. Acts 17:30; esp. the preconversion, gentile ignorance in Eph. 4:18).22 Ignorance could mitigate guilt but did not eliminate it. Biblical law specifically provided atonement only for sins done in ignorance (Lev. 4:2–3, 22–23, 27–28; 5:15–19; 22:14; Num. 15:22–31; 35:11, 15).23 Early Judaism widely recognized this principle.24 Gentiles also viewed ignorance as mitigating guilt;25 ignorance of facts thus reduced legal liability,26 and even greater ignorance of law could invite more lenient treatment for various groups.27

For fuller discussion of these passions, to which they should now be aliens, see extended comment at 2:11. Peter may reflect here some common early Christian language: Eph. 4:22 reports that new believers were taught to “put off” (apotithēmi [cf. 1 Pet. 2:1]) their former (proteros, as here [cf. 1 Tim. 1:13]) way of behavior (anastrophē, as in 1 Pet. 1:15) dominated by passions (epithumiai, as here).

1:15

Instead of being conformed to a pattern formed by passions (1:14; cf. 2:11), one should be conformed to the pattern of God (1:15–16), also exemplified as the pattern of Christ (3:17–18; 4:1, 13). God’s holiness separates him from what is profane;28 for God’s people to be holy means that they are consecrated to him, separate from the profane world.29 In context, this separation entails especially resistance to the world’s patterns of indulging passions (1:14), which Peter later elucidates more fully (4:2–4). God, who foreknew believers (1:2, 20), also called them (cf. 2:9, 21; 3:9; 5:10).30

Because no English word fully corresponds to the semantic range of the Greek term translated as behavior, it is easy for English readers to miss the connections here with the following context. Their behavior (anastrophē) must be holy (1:15), so they behave (anastrephō) honorably (1:17), rather than in the form of behavior (anastrephō) inherited from their gentile ancestors (1:18). The goal of such distinctive behavior is to win over nonbelievers, or at least vindicate God’s justice in the final time (anastrophē in 2:12; 3:1–2, 16).

1:16

In 1:16, Peter provides the biblical basis for his imperative in 1:15 (be consecrated as holy): in Scripture, God summons his people to be holy as he is holy (Lev. 11:44–45; 19:2; 20:26).31 As in the Levitical passages quoted here, this holiness entails behavior that distinguishes them from the world.32 A life consecrated to God means a life set apart for his service. In today’s terms, this would not look like a Christian who simply attends church weekly (or monthly) and tithes (or donates a portion of) her income like a member paying dues to an elite club. Every day and all one’s resources belong to God. This does not mean that one does not work or live in “secular” environments; it means that one functions as God’s ambassador there, treating others and speaking according to kingdom values such as love, gentleness, and concern for the weakest. Separated for God, we are like his consecrated priests (1 Pet. 2:5, 9) in the midst of a world that we also serve like Christ did (2:12–3:9).

As in the Levitical passages on which Peter draws here, imitation of God is essential; one can hardly act consecrated to his ways if one does not know what he is like. Most people in antiquity would have been astonished at the sort of divine example that Peter will go on to provide: Christ’s model of humility, servanthood, embracing suffering when needed, and not defending one’s honor (2:21–23; 3:18; 4:1, 13).

The idea of imitating deity, however, was widespread; it is the definition of divine character that Peter’s letter challenges. Many Greek and Roman thinkers spoke of imitating the supreme God.33 For example:

Jewish thinkers could draw on biblical and/or Hellenistic thought when encouraging imitation of God.43

Because the Bible says renders the Greek expression gegraptai, often translated as “it is written.” This quotation formula “as it is written” appears already even in Scripture itself,49 but grew more popular in time, in the Qumran scrolls50 and elsewhere.51 A formula like “as it is written” also remained common in later rabbinic52 and related53 texts; these are instructive, although they are sometimes less close than the earlier Qumran examples.54 Sources also often employed analogous quotation formulas such as “it is said.”55 Naturally, “it is written” became common in early Christian literature.56 Although, as we have seen, some of these citation formulas are quite early, Greek use of citations may have further disposed Jewish people to their abundant use of them in this period.57

Ransomed from the World by the Precious Lamb (1:17–21)

1:17

If you call on the Father who fairly judges the actions of each individual, behave with reverence during your stint as resident foreigners in this world.

1:18

Do this because you know how you were ransomed from the empty way of behavior passed down from your ancestors. You weren’t ransomed with perishable things such as silver or gold.

1:19

Instead, you were ransomed at the cost of Christ’s priceless blood. He was like an unblemished, ritually acceptable lamb.

1:20

1:21

It was for the sake of you, who through him trust in God who raised him from among the dead and glorified him, with the result that your trust and expectation are in God.

1:17

Not only has God called them (1:15), but also they call on God (1:17).58 The expression “call on the Lord’s name” was familiar in Jewish texts, where it could involve praise (Jdt. 16:1) and especially prayer to God.59 “Calling on” the Father reflects wide use of the term epikaleō (“call on”) for invoking God or Christ (e.g., Acts 2:21; 22:16; Rom. 10:12–14; 1 Cor. 1:2). If they bear the name of God and of Christ (1 Pet. 4:14, 16), they must live accordingly, as those consecrated to (1:15–16) God and Christ. As an impartial judge, God will judge each person according to their work,60 so believers should live in reverence—that is, the biblical fear of the Lord (see comment on 2:17). In this context (cf. 1:13), such reverence entails always keeping in mind the future judgment, behaving always in the recognition that God the just judge takes account of all of one’s behavior. Certainly many people who claim to be Christians would spend their time and resources differently if they lived their daily lives cognizant of God’s presence and values.

God’s impartiality (fairly judges) was a common motif. People expected and praised a ruler’s61 or judge’s impartiality;62 Greeks and those influenced by them could also apply this impartial judgment to the activity of Zeus.63 Jewish people recognized that judges should be impartial64 and affirmed that God is impartial; he does not play favorites.65 Deuteronomy 10:17 was foundational for Jewish teaching on the subject.66 Elsewhere Paul and other early Christians appeal to God’s impartiality specifically to welcome Jews and gentiles on the same footing (Acts 10:34; Rom. 2:11), as well as regarding slaves and free persons (Eph. 6:9; Col. 3:25) and rich and poor (James 2:9).

Children (1:14) typically behave like their fathers; those who invoke God as Father (1:17) should follow his ways (1:15–16). Peter again urges separation from values pervasive in his audience’s surrounding culture by reminding them that they are resident foreigners (evoking, albeit using a different Greek term than in, 1:1 [cf. 2:11], where Peter links the title from 1:1 with a cognate of the term here). Those consecrated to God must recognize that they do not belong to the world system and its values. Although they should submit to the world’s various structures (2:13–14), they are resident aliens in any earthly nation or culture, ultimately belonging to another people consecrated to God (2:9). Because they belong to another realm, they should make use of their time as resident aliens in light of the eternal future hope.67 For fuller comment on the nature of resident alienship, see comment on 1:1; for its figurative use, see comment on 2:11.

A CLOSER LOOK

The Supreme Deity as Father in Ancient Thought

Claiming that God or Zeus was the father or begetter of humanity was a common Greek idea.68 Zeus or Jupiter appears as “the Father” in both Greek69 and Latin70 texts; is addressed as “Father” in invocations;71 is “Father of all”;72 is father of the gods;73 is father of humanity;74 and is often “father of humans and gods.”75 He could also be portrayed as father of kings76 or of the virtuous.77 Human feelings toward mortal parents could give them a way to approach their ultimate parent, the Zeus of their ancestors;78 human fathers were reflections of the universal father.79 While Zeus’s kingship was linked with strength, his fatherhood could be linked with gentleness and kindness.80

Because their pantheon was polytheistic, Greeks and Romans also assigned the respectful title to other deities, such as Time,81 Janus,82 Neptune,83 Pluto,84 Oceanus,85 Ouranos,86 Saturn,87 Apollo,88 Mars,89 Bacchus,90 Heracles,91 and in some sense the emperor.92 (The emperor was often “father of his country,” an honorary title.)93

Stoic thinkers also spoke of God as a father94—that is, “father of all,”95 father of human beings,96 and father of humans and deities,97 by virtue of creation. As in Gal. 4:6, Greeks sometimes claimed that the gods loved humanity on account of kinship with them.98 They could also argue that kinship to deity should free people from superstition.99

Most relevant for monotheists such as Christians, Jewish people called God “father” (also an occasional OT title for God),100 though not all with equal sympathy for the Greek usage. Philo speaks of the “supreme father of deities and people” acknowledged by both Greeks and barbarians;101 Josephus, however, condemns the Greeks’ “father” who rules heaven as a tyrant, rejecting the identification of Zeus with the true God.102

Greek-speaking Jews were united, in any case, in regarding God as Father of all,103 from Philo104 to the Sibylline Oracles;105 Jewish magical texts could also invoke God as “father of all creation.”106 God was “begetter of gods and humans.”107 Greek-speaking church fathers agreed.108 A variety of other Jewish sources also called God “father.”109 The liturgical title that came to dominate in later rabbinic Judaism was “father in heaven.”110 Corporate Jewish and Christian prayers to God as Father are nearly identical.111 Because Jewish culture generally perceived fathers as wise, benevolent, and authoritative protectors, “father” offered a useful image for God.112

For most Jewish sources, God is especially Israel’s Father;113 for most Christian sources, God is the Father of believers in Jesus. Scripture already declared Abraham’s descendants to be God’s own children (Exod. 4:22–23; Deut. 14:1; Isa. 43:6; 45:11; Jer. 31:20; Hosea 1:10; 11:1, 10).114 In Philo, by adoption a possessor of wisdom becomes God’s “only son”;115 one becomes a child of God by God’s divine imprint.116 More importantly in Judean texts such as the Dead Sea Scrolls,117 Psalms of Solomon,118 and other texts less dominated by Hellenistic philosophy,119 God’s people are his children. (The Hellenistic Wisdom of Solomon declares both the righteous120 and Israel121 to be children of God.) Sometimes sonship language applies especially to Israel’s eschatological status.122 The later but more abundant rabbinic texts offer a greater number of examples. Torah may in some sense make people God’s children,123 presumably through their obedience to it. Following imagery in the Hebrew Bible,124 rabbinic expositions and parables frequently identify Israel as God’s child125 or his children.126 In the late second century, some rabbis debated whether Israel were God’s children only when they obey, or all the time.127

1:18

Reverence for God (1:17) means consciousness of his reign, not fear as if of a tyrant. God purchased us for himself at enormous cost (1:18–20), a precious cost that displays our preciousness to him.128 Not only our faith (1:7), but his sacrifice, is worth far more than silver or gold (1:18). Moreover, the life from which he has delivered us was, Peter insists, based on an empty falsehood.

Jewish polemic often used words such as empty (mataios) to describe idols, not only in the Septuagint129 but also in other expressions of Diaspora Judaism130 and in early Christianity (Acts 14:15; Rom. 1:21).131 Although this is not the only use of such language (e.g., 1 Cor. 15:17), and intra-Jewish polemic might occasionally use similar language for the practices of other Jews (Gal. 4:9–10), 1 Peter lacks signs of intra-Jewish polemic. Instead, Peter denounces pagan activities in language that Jews often used for such behaviors (1 Pet. 4:3). Peter’s mention of the way of behavior passed down from your ancestors probably includes their gentile heritage as venerators of deity statues.132 Such statues, which Christians lacked, could be worth much money in worldly terms (cf. Acts 19:24–25), but they could not compare in true worth with the blood of the genuine Lord (1 Pet. 1:19).

Although the negated ransom price is silver and gold generally, Peter might also allude to the worthlessness of their previous cultic practices. Scripture denounced idols made of silver or gold (e.g., Deut. 29:17; Pss. 115:4; 135:15; Isa. 2:20; 31:7; Hosea 8:4; Rev. 9:20). Gold133 and silver134 statues were well known, and Jews continued to denounce them:

Other Jewish texts also speak of turning from ancestral ways. For example:

Peter will ask for them to turn away from other preconversion behaviors as well, though the behaviors he mentions in 2:1 (such as slander and envy) are not exclusively gentile practices. Their specifically gentile past included sexual immorality and wild parties, though his list climaxes in lawless idolatries (4:3).

Peter explains that gentile believers were ransomed from their former, ancestral form of behavior to follow a new way of behavior (1:14–17). The verb translated as ransomed (lutroō) can refer to liberation more generally,141 but sometimes involves a price,142 as it clearly does here. In 1 Pet. 1:7, Peter has already declared gold perishable (using a different Greek term) and counted its worth negligible compared to undying trust in God; now he notes that it is worthless compared to the redemptive sacrifice of Christ’s blood. Because of gold’s worldly value, Scripture often used it in contrasts with what was much more valuable, such as God’s word (Pss. 19:10; 119:72, 127) and wisdom (Job 28:19; Prov. 3:14; 8:10, 19; 16:16; 20:15; cf. 25:12) and even an honorable reputation (Prov. 22:1). (See fuller background on such comparisons at comment on 1:7.)

1:19

After noting in 1:18 what their ransom price was not, Peter turns in 1:19 to what the ransom price was.143 The cost was not mere gold, but something far more valuable. The incomparable cost was that of the predestined, unblemished Lamb. To offer an alternative to the usual translation “precious blood,” I have rendered the expression priceless blood, although the term I rendered as priceless would simply mean “extremely valuable” were it applied to something other than Christ’s blood. Peter explains further how priceless Christ is in 1:20.

Gentiles knew of sacrificial animals,144 including lambs,145 as well as the need for sacrifices to be first-rate (such as unblemished) rather than second-rate.146 Scripture frequently mandated the sacrifice of lambs (or certain other animals) for guilt or sin offerings147 and for Passover.148 Such lambs were to be unblemished, ritually acceptable149 sacrifices (in rendering it this way, I blend Greek terms for unblemished and spotless, requirements for ritually acceptable sacrifices). Many early Christians understood Jesus as the lamb, entailing some dimension of sacrifice (John 1:29, 36; 1 Cor. 5:7; Rev. 5:6; 7:14).150

1:20

The ancient world valued antiquity151 and would resent calls to abandon the ways of ancestors, as in 1:18. Here, however, Peter appeals to something far older and more universal than any ancient tradition. That Christ was known before the world’s beginning suggests that God had designed this plan for redemption even before sin began (cf. 2 Tim. 1:9; Rev. 13:8). The term here for known before (proginōskō) can be used for any prior knowledge. Although Paul associates it with God’s choosing of his people (Rom. 8:29; 11:2), the term also applies to humans who knew but did not cause the foreknown events,152 though in a number of these cases they knew them by divine revelation.153

Jewish tradition developed a list of entities that existed before creation, some only in God’s mind.154 They often believed that God created especially Wisdom or Torah before or from the beginning.155 Peter here speaks of Christ’s mission only as foreknown, but presumably he shared wider early Christian beliefs of Christ’s actual preexistence,156 especially as he is revealed rather than “created” later in this verse.157

The term rendered as revealed (phaneroō) differs from the language used for revealing in 1:5, 7, 12–13; 4:13; and 5:1, which in all cases except one (1:12) refer to Jesus’s future coming, but the present term can also carry that sense (5:4).158 Peter is not the only early Christian author to apply this term to Jesus’s first coming (e.g., 1 Tim. 3:16; 2 Tim. 1:10; Titus 1:3).

Although phrases such as the “final time” (kairos eschatos) can apply to Jesus’s future coming (in this context, in 1 Pet. 1:5), Peter shared the “already but not yet” eschatology of other Jesus-followers. The coming Messiah had already come, and therefore they had come to the end of the (promised) eras (eschatos tōn chronōn), probably alluding to prophecies about the kingdom (e.g., Dan. 2:21, 28, 37–45; 7:17–18). “The last days,” “last times,” and similar language was biblical phraseology for the period of Israel’s restoration, which Jewish hopes now fixed in the eschatological time (Isa. 2:2; Hosea 3:5; Mic. 4:1; Dan. 2:28).159 This title for the eschatological period of restoration also applied to a period of great suffering just before that restoration (Jer. 23:20; 30:24; Ezek. 38:16; Dan. 10:14).160 Thus the phrase means, roughly, “the period of fulfillment of biblical promises,” “the eschatological time.”

Early Christians consistently viewed this time as their own,161 as in the Qumran scrolls.162 God would expose the wickedness of Israel’s compromising leaders in the end time.163

1:21

The term translated as trust in also connotes faithfulness and loyalty. Their trust in God was through him (Christ); these former gentile polytheists believed in the true God not through other monotheistic alternatives but through Jesus (1:21)—that is, through the gospel (1:23–25, esp. 1:25b). Glorified him refers to resurrection (1:11; cf. 5:1, 4, 10; also Luke 24:26; 1 Cor. 15:40–43; Phil. 3:21) and also implies attendant honor (cf. 1 Pet. 1:7–8; 2:12; 4:11, 16). The result is trust and expectation in God.164

Transformed by God’s Eternal Message (1:22–2:3)

1:22

You purified your souls by obeying the truth, so as to sincerely love the rest of God’s family. So always love each other from the bottom of your hearts!

1:23

Love like this because you have been reborn. This rebirth comes not from perishable seed but from imperishable. The seed it comes from is God’s living and enduring message.

1:24

We recognize this because the Bible says, “Everyone is like grass, and all their glory is like a blossom of grass. The grass dries up, and the blossom falls off,

1:25

but the Lord’s message endures forever.” This message is the message that was preached as the good news to you.

2:1

2:2

And like just-born babies, crave the pure, mind-engaging milk, so that by it you may grow toward salvation,

2:3

if you’ve tasted that the Lord is kind.

1:22

Purification stems from a biblical ritual image of making someone able to stand before God. It may reevoke the image of blood found in 1:19, since sacrificial blood consecrates and purifies (Exod. 29:21; Lev. 8:15, 30; 16:19; Heb. 9:13–14, 22; 10:29; 13:12; 1 John 1:7).165 (Peter has already connected obedience with sprinkling of Christ’s blood in 1 Pet. 1:2.) Such consecration also entails holiness (1 Pet. 1:15–16). Ancient thinkers often spoke of purifying the soul. Greek thinkers could apply related expressions for moral and intellectual purity.166 Jewish tradition emphasized cleansing the heart from all sin (Sir. 38:10). One could purify the soul by learning and piety,167 or promise to keep one’s soul pure from desiring unholy gain.168 The present term (hagnizō) could signify purification for cultic use, hence consecration (cf. 1 Pet. 1:15–16; 2:5, 9).169

Obeying the truth (1:22; cf. 1:8) depicts their conversion through the truth of the gospel (cf. 1:2);170 thus Peter elaborates how that gospel message has changed them (1:23–25). For Peter, the highest expression of obeying the truth is to love one another.171 The supremacy of love is consistent with Jesus’s teaching (Mark 12:30–31) that undoubtedly stands behind this unanimous and distinctive emphasis in early Christianity (Rom. 13:8–10; 1 Cor. 13:13; Gal. 5:14; James 2:8; Did. 1:2–3).172 That Peter’s focus is love for fellow believers matches another emphasis attributed to Jesus (John 13:34–35) and found widely in early Christianity (Rom. 12:10; 1 John 2:10; 3:11, 23; 4:11).173 Some Jewish thinkers emphasized love,174 occasionally as the greatest commandment,175 but nowhere else did the supremacy of this virtue characterize an entire movement.

Their purification and consecration to God through embracing the gospel (1 Pet. 1:22a) brought about, or may have been for the goal of,176 their love of fellow believers; this is because they have been transformed by that gospel (1:23). It is therefore natural and appropriate for them to continue this devoted love (1:22b);177 it flows from being born from God (cf. 1 Thess. 4:9; 1 John 4:7; 5:1).178

Those born from the same Father (1 Pet. 1:23; cf. 1:3) should love one another as siblings (1:22), as well as being obedient children (1:14; hence obedience to the truth, 1:22; cf. 1:2). The first term of affection Peter uses in 1:22 (philadelphia, rendered here as love the rest of God’s family) refers to familial love, specifically, love for brothers and sisters.179 Ancient sources highly value sibling harmony,180 imagery that covenant monotheists could also apply to God’s people as siblings.181 Moralists urge siblings to work together,182 condemning sibling rivalry183 (frequent though reports of the latter were).184

Patterns of fictive kinship language vary throughout the world.185 For example, many societies apply sibling language to certain parallel cousins;186 in some societies spouses apply sibling terms for each other;187 and so forth. In many cultures those who describe others with kinship terms feel as close to them as to natural kin.188 In Greco-Roman antiquity, intimate friends considered each other to be like brothers.189 Just as friendship language was employed in military alliances, allies190 sometimes used the language of “brotherhood.”191 Mystery cults spoke of fellow initiates as “brothers”;192 the language was also common in many other associations.193 Greek intellectuals spoke of all humanity,194 or at least one’s fellow citizens,195 as sharing kinship on a general level.196 More important here, Jewish people could address fellow Jews as brothers.197 As rabbis called their masters “fathers” and their disciples “children,”198 they naturally could call another rabbi “brother.”199

Embracing Christ entails a new family (cf. Mark 3:34–35; 10:29–30), in which all believers are spiritual siblings with consequent claims on one another (cf. philadelphia in Rom. 12:10; 1 Thess. 4:9; Heb. 13:1). The emphasis on philadelphia seems particularly prominent in Petrine literature (1 Pet. 1:22; 3:8; 2 Pet. 1:7).200

That the love is done sincerely means that it is genuine,201 not faked; one would not, for example, pretend to be loving when present with another person and later gossip behind that person’s back (see 1 Pet. 2:1; cf. Prov. 27:6). Literally, the term is anupokritos, “without hypocrisy.” This, too, may reflect a wider motif in early Christian thought;202 Paul applies this adjective to love (Rom. 12:9; 2 Cor. 6:6), although it also applies to faith (1 Tim. 1:5; 2 Tim. 1:5) and peaceable living (James 3:17). The noun hupokritēs originally designated actors in the theater,203 but both wider Greco-Roman204 and Jewish205 circles now used this word group for moral pretense. Refusing to deny one’s true convictions, as one would do by hypocritically acting like the world, was honorable.206

The more general language of Christian love [agapaō] . . . from the bottom of your hearts also entails sincerity. Literally, the expression reads, “from heart” or “from a pure heart,” depending on the textual variant.207 In either case, “from the heart” presumably signifies sincere, whole-hearted commitment.208 This is clear not least from Peter’s use of another Greek word here, ektenōs, which can mean “fervently” or “continually” (NIV and NRSV render it as “deeply”). Peter applies this term and a cognate adjective in 4:8 only to love.209

1:23

Peter’s particular term for rebirth (anagennaō)210 is distinctive to him in the NT (1 Pet. 1:3, 23), but functions synonymously with analogous early Christian expressions, such as “born from God” (John 1:13; 1 John 3:9; 4:7; 5:1, 4, 18), “born from above” (John 3:3, 7), and “born from the Spirit” (John 3:5–6, 8; Gal. 4:29).211 This rebirth explains the purification and sibling love in 1:22: those also spiritually born from the same Father are spiritual siblings. It apparently also explains why and/or how one can love deeply (1:22): it flows from the new character one receives in being born from God’s seed, the gospel.212 Hence it might mean, “You can love this way because you have been born from God” (cf. 1 John 4:7).

The OT occasionally broaches the image of spiritual transformation by the Spirit (1 Sam. 10:6), especially as a promise for the era of restoration (Ezek. 18:30–31; 36:25–27), although not with this wording. It may reflect imagery regarding how God became Israel’s “father,” evident especially in passages such as Deut. 32:18: “the rock that bore you . . . the God who birthed you.”213 But whereas Israel constituted God’s children corporately, the early Christian image suggests a further ontological dimension. Many people believed that character was inborn and immutable,214 but Christians demurred.215 For further comment on rebirth, see comment on 1 Pet. 1:3.

In 1:23, Peter adds another element in his depiction of rebirth, that of the seed (cf. 1 John 3:9).216 A man’s sperm was considered human “seed.” Ancient thinkers often commented also on what they envisioned as divine seed.217 For example, the supreme God created the universe by his seed.218 More relevant is the ancient image of God’s seed in people, as in many of the following examples (though early Christians would have differed from gentile philosophers’ idea of innate divinity in people).

Everything that springs from a seed shares its nature (cf. Gen. 1:11–12, 21, 24–25; John 3:6), so that, as one Stoic thinker suggests, “good does not spring from evil, any more than figs grow from olive-trees. Things which grow correspond to their seed.”225 Since seed bears fruit according to its character, those born of divine seed reflect the character of divine love (thus the relation between 1 Pet. 1:22 and 1:23).

In 1 Pet. 1:23, the most explicit characteristic of the seed is that it is imperishable, thus suggesting in general terms that those born from it have eternal life (cf. 1:4).226 This seed is not mortal, as from humans.227 As Peter has noted, even precious metals, which melt at a high temperature, are ultimately perishable (1:7, 18).228 Rather, the seed is imperishable, from the immortal God.229 The seed here is God’s word (cf. Luke 8:11), in this case specifically the gospel message that converted and began transforming them (1 Pet. 1:25).230 Peter’s message is about Jesus, through knowledge of whom they are being conformed to God’s holy image.231

1:24–25

Peter now shows why he can be confident that believers are born from imperishable seed. He goes on to demonstrate that this message is eternal and imperishable (1:23), invoking the agreement of Scripture on this point (1:24–25a, citing Isa. 40:6–8).232

Most believers who inherited their faith from the synagogue would have already recognized the eternality of God’s word, which included Scripture and anything else that God spoke.233 Nor would they need much persuasion about the perishability of humanity:234

More authoritatively, Peter cites a text of Scripture, Isa. 40:6–8, that emphasizes this truth: human beings (and thus their seed) are perishable and temporary, like grass (1:24).241 God’s message242 is a sort of seed that differs radically from grass: it endures forever (1:25).243 This is why Peter speaks of the message as living and enduring in 1:23. This is the message that was preached to believers as good news (1:25).

Applications of Scripture often work through varying degrees of analogy between situations. To what extent does Peter expect the gospel message of his day (1:12) to correspond to the message to which Isaiah referred (cf. 1:10–11)? It seems likely that he believes that the gospel message fulfills Isaiah’s message. After all, he has already identified the gospel message with the message preached in advance by the prophets (1:10–12).

Our earliest extant Gospel, which tradition assigns largely to Petrine recollections, opens by connecting Jesus’s good news of the kingdom with Isaiah’s (Mark 1:14–15; cf. Isa. 52:7), recalling the direct context of the passage cited here (Isa. 40:3 in Mark 1:3).244 After mentioning the divine message that remains forever (Isa. 40:8), Isaiah speaks of good news (40:9), as here (1 Pet. 1:25), good news that announces salvation, peace, and God’s reign (Isa. 52:7); early Christians spoke of the good news of salvation (Rom. 1:16; 1 Cor. 15:2; Eph. 1:13; cf. Mark 8:35), peace (Acts 10:36; Eph. 2:17; 6:15), and God’s reign (Matt. 4:23; 9:35; 24:14; Mark 1:15; Luke 4:43; 8:1; 16:16; Acts 8:12). Like most NT writers, Peter understands the promised eschatological restoration as being proleptically fulfilled in Christ (cf. 1 Pet. 2:6–10). Peter will soon reveal significant elements of his christological understanding of Isaian oracles (1 Pet. 2:6, 8), especially from this section of Isaiah (1 Pet. 2:22–25).

2:1

So (“therefore”) in 2:1 predicates new behavior on the birth from God’s seed in 1:23.245 Again, this fits common early Christian moral teaching, which exhorts hearers to reject vices on the basis of their new status or identity in Christ (e.g., Col. 3:3–5, 8–10). This rejection is often expressed as “putting off,”246 using a clothing metaphor (Rom. 13:12; Eph. 4:22, 25; Col. 3:8; James 1:21; cf. Heb. 12:1) that is then matched with “putting on” the new ways (Rom. 13:12, 14; Gal. 3:27; Eph. 4:24; Col. 3:10, 12). “Putting off” also follows rebirth in Eph. 4:20–24; Col. 3:3–10; and probably James 1:18–21. For the complementary idea of “putting on” or being clothed (probably related to earlier biblical language),247 see comment on 1 Pet. 5:5.

In 2:1, Peter provides a vice list typical of early Christian letters (e.g., Rom. 1:29–31; 1 Cor. 5:10–11; 6:9–10; Gal. 5:19–21; Eph. 5:3–5; Col. 3:5, 8),248 most relevantly one that speaks of putting off such sample vices (Col. 3:8). Ancient vice lists typically list various sins, usually only loosely connected with the audience’s setting.249 They appear in both Jewish250 and gentile sources; Stoics251 (and other philosophers)252 were among those with a predilection for them, as were (for different reasons) rhetoricians.253 These range from short lists of several elements to a list of over a hundred in Philo.254

Each of the more specific vices listed here addresses relationships, in ways antithetical to the love expressed in 1 Pet. 1:22. The first vice, kakia, rendered here as “evil,” is often translated as “malice”; as “badness” it may summarize wickedness of various kinds (cf. Wis. 4:11), and it appears in many early Christian vice lists.255 Believers’ behavior needs to refute false accusations of evildoing (kakopoiōn, 1 Pet. 2:12).

The second vice, dolos, rendered here as “deceit,” can involve trickery or treachery (also listed in Mark 7:22; Rom. 1:29; Did. 5:1; Barn. 20:1). Peter shows that Jesus avoided such deceit (1 Pet. 2:22), as should all who want blessing (3:10). Apart from exceptional (especially life-and-death) circumstances, lying was condemned by most Jewish256 and gentile257 moralists alike.

Acts of hypocrisy contrasts with to sincerely love in 1:22, where sincerely is literally “un-hypocritical” (anupokritos). Jewish teachers often condemned Jewish hypocrisy,258 and the charge was frequent in intra-Jewish polemic.259 See further comment at 1 Pet. 1:22.

Envy (phthonos) appears in other vice lists (Rom. 1:29; Gal. 5:21; Titus 3:3; cf. the conceptually related term zēlos in 2 Cor. 12:20). “Jealousy” (zēlos, Gal. 5:20)260 and “envy” were common in the agonistic, honor-shame society of ancient Mediterranean cities.261 Philosophers and moralists often addressed the issue of envy,262 even in entire essays.263 Both gentile264 and Jewish265 authors often condemned envy.

The sin of slanders appears in a number of early Christian vice lists (e.g., Rom. 1:30; 2 Cor. 12:20).266 Because Peter’s audience is the potential object of slander in 1 Pet. 2:12 and 3:16, they surely ought to detest this vice!267 People viewed negatively those who always spoke ill of others.268 It was customary to use invective to shame enemies,269 and this practice often misrepresented enemies.270 Rhetoricians could invent false reports if these suited their purpose.271 By contrast, the accused would often counter with the charge that their enemies are malicious slanderers.272 Sometimes entire philosophic sects felt that they were the object of slander, and sometimes they believed that slanders led to their persecution.273

Slander was common,274 but both Jews275 and gentiles276 regarded it negatively, and it occasionally appears in vice lists, both Jewish277 and gentile.278 Sages opined that the virtuous would not commit slander;279 Jewish people knew that the wicked spoke against the righteous.280 Likewise, both Jewish281 and gentile282 moralists despised gossip (which usually overlaps with slander). Indeed, libel and slander could be prosecuted if proven.283

2:2

Although adults in antiquity derived many dairy products from sheep and goats,284 newborn infants received milk from their mother (or sometimes a paid or slave nurse).285 Maternal milk was considered best,286 though various other sources (camels, goats, sheep, cows) had their respective advantages.287 As the source of believers’ birth (1:23), God is here the source of the milk.288 In 1 Cor. 3:2 and 1 Thess. 2:7 Paul compares himself to a mother or nurse breastfeeding a baby, and such feminine images for males were neither extremely rare nor, even in antiquity, necessarily demeaning.289

This milk is pure,290 literally “without deceit” (adolos, contrasting with dolos in 2:1; cf. 2 Cor. 4:2). In the case of milk, this means unadulterated.291 The term in 2:2 translated as crave (epipotheō) normally implies not only desire but also actual need (so BDAG), which is true of milk in the case of an infant. The milk enables those who consume it to grow, just as infants need milk to grow.292 The ultimate result293 is salvation, which Peter elsewhere envisions eschatologically (1:5, 9–10).294 Thus believers mature toward ultimate deliverance, although the ultimate deliverance is still envisioned not as a merely gradual outcome but as the direct effect of Christ’s coming (1:7).

Infants need to learn, and milk was often used to represent learning. A Greek could speak of drinking the milk of Homer from infancy.295 Some used milk as a figure for mere elementary studies,296 but the image could also be more positive, for God’s Word.297

The adjective that I have rendered as mind-engaging (logikos) most often means “rational” (as in Rom. 12:1),298 but also can connote figurative as opposed to literal and physical.299 Probably both senses are in play here. This milk is clearly milk only figuratively, but other authors used milk figuratively without having to explicitly identify their usage as figurative, since this usage was normally obvious. So Peter’s explanation probably implies more than that the milk is figurative; it helps the audience understand what the figure represents.

The form of nourishment is thus likely also rational, as believers, like children, must mature cognitively. For Stoics, any act that is not appropriate is wrong for a “rational” (logikos) being,300 by which they meant humans.301 Some Stoics viewed “only logikos,” or rational, “worship” as genuine worship, in contrast to the masses’ superstitions.302

Here logikos probably entails engaging content. In this context, it very likely reflects a wordplay on logos (the message) in 1:23.303 Stoics saw a relation between humans as logikos and God as logos—that is, between human reason and the reason that structured the cosmos.304 Philo was also happy to play on logikos with logos,305 although his understanding of logos is much more exclusively rational than Peter’s.306 (Hellenistic Judaism depicted God’s law as the arbiter and substance of true reason.)307 The same gospel that initiated them by a new birth (1:23–25) now nurtures them in maturing in the new life. This verse in a sense encapsulates how Peter envisions the relationship between the indicatives and imperatives of the Christian life,308 and underlines the force of Petrine paraenesis. For example, in 1:22 believers who have already learned to love are apparently yet exhorted to love.

2:3

Tasted (2:3) continues the image of milk in 2:2. Some ancient thinkers believed that a baby ingested its mother’s flesh through the milk.309 A child would become bonded with the mother once tasting her milk.310 After a woman’s milk, the sweetest was considered the camel’s;311 sheep’s milk was sweeter, richer, and healthier than that of goats, but correspondingly harder to digest.312 Believers’ tasting begins with initiation into the faith (cf. likewise Heb. 6:4–5)313 through the gospel (1 Pet. 1:23–25); subsequent maturation depends on ingesting more of the same message.

In tasted that the Lord is kind (egeuasthe hoti chrēstos ho kurios), Peter plainly evokes LXX Ps. 33:9 (ET 34:8): “Taste and see that the Lord is kind” (geusasthe . . . hoti chrēstos ho kurios).314 Peter knows the context; he continues with the psalm’s next line in the LXX in 2:4a, and resumes quoting from this psalm in 3:10–12 (Ps. 34:12–16 [LXX 33:13–17]).315 The word group for “kindness” applies in the NT to God (Luke 6:35; Rom. 2:4; 11:22; Eph. 2:7; Titus 3:4), Christ (Matt. 11:30), believers (Eph. 4:32), and others (negatively, Rom. 3:12), especially in virtue lists as here (2 Cor. 6:6; Col. 3:12).316 Stoics, for whom it was a key element of virtue,317 define it in connection with justice318 or as the skill of sharing and giving.319 Hellenistic Judaism emphasized this virtue.320

1. I translate keep not because of verb tenses (not relevant to the aorist and present participles of 1:13 in any case) but because Peter addresses believers who may need more to be exhorted to “stay ready” than to “get ready.”

2. On this theme in Paul’s letters, see Keener, Mind, 154–55, 176–79, 235, 254.

3. As typically noted (e.g., Best, Peter, 84; Kelly, Peter, 65; Mounce, Peter, 18). Jewish circles continued to use this idiom (2 Bar. 10:8). A Latin phrase for “higher girt” seems to refer to these who can travel faster (Horace, Sat. 1.5.5 [H. R. Fairclough in LCL, p. 65]). Tavern keepers wear their belts girded high up (Dio Chrysostom, Or. 72.2). On the long tunics of ancient Israel, see Harrison and Yamauchi, “Clothing,” 324. Cf. Peter himself doing something somewhat analogous in John 21:7.

4. Plutarch, Cor. 9.2. Figuratively, the Lord commands Job to, “Gird up your loins like a man” (Job 38:3; 40:7).

5. For running as a metaphor for Christian life or service, see, e.g., Acts 20:24; Rom. 9:16; 1 Cor. 9:24, 26; Gal. 2:2; 5:7; Phil. 2:16; 3:12–14; 2 Tim. 4:7; Heb. 12:1; Ignatius, Eph. 3:2; 4:1; Magn. 7:2; Pol. 6:1; Phld. 2:2; Polycarp, Phil. 9:2; 2 Clem. 7:3. Other ancient speakers in the Greco-Roman world commonly employed athletic images (e.g., Aeschines, Ctes. 179; Isocrates, Ad Nic. 11; Rhet. Her. 4.3.4; Cicero, Att. 13.21; Seneca Y., Lucil. 80.3; Ben. 5.3.1; Dial. 1.2.3; 4.15.2; Epictetus, Diatr. 1.2.25–26; 1.4.13; 1.18.21–23; 2.5.15–17; 2.17.29; 2.18.27–29; 3.20.9–10; 3.22.52; 4.4.30; Dio Chrysostom, Or. 9.11–12; Diogenes Laertius, Lives 6.2.27; Plutarch, Luc. 38.4; Maximus of Tyre, Or. 1.4–6; Marcus Aurelius, Medit. 6.20; Chariton, Chaer. 1.2.2; Philo, Worse 32; Good Person 88; 4 Macc. 17:12, 15; Sib. Or. 3:738–39; see further Pfitzner, Agon Motif, 23–72, esp. 28–35; Garrison, “Athlete Metaphor”; Schwankl, “Lauft”; Cagniart, “Attitude”), including running (Diogenes in Dio Chrysostom, Or. 9.10–12 and Diogenes Laertius, Lives 6.2.34; Cicero, Brut. 67.236; Menander Rhetor, Treat. 2.7, 406.14–24; Porphyry, Marc. 32.500).

6. Cf. also Philo, Alleg. Interp. 3.154; Sacrifices 63 (trans. Colson and Whitaker, LCL, 2:141: “Passover . . . ‘with our loins girded’ ready for service”). Cf. a possible paschal connection in 1 Pet. 1:19, and a clear new-exodus connection in 2:9. Cf. girding for service generally in Luke 17:8; spiritually, Polycarp, Phil. 2:1.

7. E.g., Plutarch, Educ. 17, Mor. 13A; Pseudo-Anacharsis, Ep. 3.6; Marcus Aurelius, Medit. 1.16.3; 6.31.

8. Lucian, Nigr. 5–6 (trans. Harmon, LCL, 1:105).

9. E.g., Let. Aris. 209.

10. Josephus, Ag. Ap. 2.195. Here it means “not drunk,” as often—e.g., Philo, Alleg. Interp. 3.210; Planting 101, 166; Josephus, Ant. 6.306; 11.42; J.W. 5.229 (but Josephus also applies it to rashness, in J.W. 2.225); or to figurative application of nondrunkenness, as in, e.g., Philo, Posterity 175–76.

11. Certainly the paired verb in 1 Pet. 4:7 can suit eschatological contexts; see, e.g., Mark 13:34–37 (though these also impinge on the present, as in Mark 14:34, 37–38).

12. Perhaps playing on telos (“outcome”) in 1:9; but the sense of the cognate is quite different here.

13. On imperatival participles, see comment at 1:14. Campbell (Honor, 59) notes that the participles “are either adjectival or imperatival,” but even if the former, “their connection” to hope provides them a hortatory dimension.

14. Elliott, Peter, 355; Dubis, Peter, 23.

15. Here the Greek noun for “obedience” is genitive, but genitives qualify other nouns in various ways. “Children of disobedience” in Eph. 2:2 means “disobedient ones,” understood in a Semitic way (cf. LXX Isa. 57:4; Hosea 10:9), but 1 Pet. 1:14 probably means “obedient children” (see 1:17, 23), a Greek objective genitive (Beare, Peter, 71), not simply “obedient ones” generically.

16. Perhaps an independent imperatival participle (Dubis, Peter, 25–26); this may be the first of several in 1 Peter (Elliott, Peter, 357, citing also 2:1, 18; 3:1, 7, 9; 4:8, 10; and suggesting further Rom. 12:9–21; 13:11; Eph. 4:2–3; 5:21; Col. 3:12–17; Heb. 13:5). Many attribute imperatival use of participles to Semitic influence, whether on the writers (e.g., Daube, New Testament and Judaism, 102; Moule, Idiom Book, 31, 179–80; Davies, Paul, 130ff.; Kanjuparambil, “Participles”; Kelly, Peter, 67–68; Achtemeier, Peter, 117) or the language (Turner [Insights, 166–68] argues for a Jewish Koine, questioning the relevance of later rabbinic evidence). But Greek already used imperatival infinitives (Blass, Debrunner, and Funk, Grammar, §391, pp. 197–99; Allan, “Infinitivus”; cf. Balch, “Household Codes,” 45) and probably occasionally imperatival participles (Dubis, Peter, 25; see full discussion in Prasad, Foundations, 130–46).

17. It contrasts with the probably deponent imperative in 1:15 and implicitly the future indicative verb in 1:16 that functions imperativally. My choice here is uncertain; in Rom. 12:2, I treated the imperative of the same verb (its only other NT use) as passive (Keener, Mind, 152; cf. 215n274). The compound form suschēmatizō appears elsewhere in biblical or extant early Jewish Greek only in Rom. 12:2. Given the term’s rareness, these two verses provide the only context for early Christian use of the verb, leaving a burden of proof on scholars who interpret them differently. The regular form schēmatizō is more common (most relevantly, Philo, Creation 9; Dreams 2.45), and Paul often uses another compound form, metaschēmatizō (1 Cor. 4:6; 2 Cor. 11:13–15; most relevantly, Phil. 3:21; cf. 4 Macc. 9:22; T. Reu. 5:6; T. Job 6:4; 23:1).

18. See Nock, Conversion, esp. for philosophic conversion; MacMullen, “Conversion”; cf. Talbert, “Conversion.” For sociological and other studies, cf. Segal, Convert, esp. 288–99; Lamoreaux, “Identity”; Keener, Acts, 2:1603–5, 1615–17; in 1 Peter, cf. Green, Peter, 49–52.

19. Diogenes Laertius, Lives 6.2.56 (trans. Hicks, LCL, 2:59).

20. Sib. Or. 5:494 (trans. Collins, OTP 1:404).

21. For the contrast between the passions and reason in ancient thought, see comment at 1 Pet. 2:11.

22. Stoics associated passions generally with ignorance; they were “mistaken opinions” about what matters (Hockey, Role of Emotion, 71).

23. If one repented, one’s sins would be counted as if “sins of ignorance” (Tg. Hab. on 3:1). Cf. lack of intention as a mitigating factor (Laws of Eshnunna 37; Code of Hammurabi 266; for homicide, Xenophon, Anab. 4.8.26; Apollodorus, Bibl. 2.3.1; Seneca E., Controv. 4.3, excerpts, intro.; 6.2).

24. E.g., Tob. 3:3; Pss. Sol. 13:7 (cf. 3:8; 18:4); Philo, Unchangeable 134; L.A.B. 22:6; Jos. Asen. 6:7/4; 13:11–13; T. Jud. 19:3–4; m. Hor. 1:1; m. Ned. 9:8; t. Šabb. 8:5; Sipra V. D. Dehob. par. 12.65.2.1; Sipre Deut. 155.1.1.

25. Cf. Valerius Maximus, Mem. 5.5.4; Philostratus, Her. 8.18. For attention to intention in legal reasoning, see, e.g., Hermogenes, Issues 61.16–18; 72.14–73.3. Greek philosophy tended to identify ignorance as the cause of wrong behavior (Musonius Rufus, 10, p. 78.27–31; Epictetus, Diatr. 1.18.4–6; Maximus of Tyre, Or. 12.9).

26. Robinson, Criminal Law, 16; e.g., BGU 5.65.164–5.67.170.

27. Robinson, Criminal Law, 17. Cf. T. Reu. 1:6; 2:9; 3:8.

28. Affirmations of God’s holiness are too many to enumerate, but cf., e.g., Ps. 99:5, 9; Isa. 6:3; Hosea 11:12; Tob. 12:15; 4Q405 f20.2 22.12; 1 En. 9:10; 91:7; 93:11; 104:9; 108:3; 3 En. 1:2; Sib. Or. 3:478; Philo, Rewards 123.

29. For this and other imperatives in this section, cf. Bony, “Lecture III”; for conformity to God’s holiness in Christ, see Barbarick, “Holy.”

30. Cf. also Mark 2:17; Rom. 8:30; 9:24; 1 Cor. 1:9; Gal. 1:6; 5:8; 1 Thess. 2:12; 5:24; 2 Thess. 2:14; 2 Tim. 1:9; 2 Pet. 1:3; probably Isa. 51:2.

31. Other passages also summon Israel to be holy (Exod. 22:31; Lev. 20:7; Num. 15:40). In Exod. Rab. 15:24, God sanctified Israel that they may sanctify him.

32. In these passages Israel’s ritually pure diet (Lev. 11:1–47; 20:24–25) and more generally their obedience to all God’s commandments (20:22–23) provide ways to show their consecration to the Lord, distinguishing them from the nations.

33. Seneca the Younger, Musonius, and Epictetus are all Stoics, but Maximus and Apuleius stand more in the Platonic tradition. Others speak of physicians imitating Asclepius (Eunapius, Lives 498) or (by way of erotic exhortation) hetairai imitating Aphrodite (Aristaenetus, Erot. Let. 2.1.9). The ideal may have been less widespread in ancient Israel’s original context (Walton, Thought, 155).

34. Cicero, Tusc. 5.25.70 (trans. King, LCL, 18:497).

35. Seneca Y., Dial. 1.1.5 (trans. Basore, LCL, 1:7).

36. Musonius Rufus, 8, p. 64.14 (trans. Lutz, “Musonius,” 65).

37. Musonius Rufus, 17, p. 108.15–16. Plutarch (Borrow 7, Mor. 830B) also notes Musonius’s ideal of emulating Zeus.

38. Epictetus, Diatr. 2.14.12–13 (trans. Oldfather, LCL, 1:309).

39. Pseudo-Heraclitus, Ep. 5 (trans. Worley, in Malherbe, Cynic Epistles, 194–95).

40. Dio Chrysostom, Or. 3.82 (trans. Cohoon, LCL, 1:143).

41. Maximus of Tyre, Or. 35.2 (trans. Trapp, Maximus, 276). Maximus here ignores Zeus’s bad behavior in myths.

42. Apuleius, Doct. Plat. 23 (as quoted in Rives, Religion, 41, regarding Platonic philosophy).

43. A king should imitate God’s benevolent attributes in Let. Aris. 188, 190, 192, 208–10, 254, 281, an idea that appears in the Greek tradition at least as early as Xenophon, Cyr. 6.2.29.

44. Philo, Creation 139.

45. Philo, Spec. Laws 4.73.

46. T. Ash. 4:3.

47. Sipra Qed. par. 1.195.1.3 (trans. Neusner, 3:87).

48. Trans. Maher, pp. 190–91, also noted in McNamara, Targum, 118; Bruce, Time, 22–23; see also Mekilta Shirata 3.43–44 (Lauterbach, 2:25). Cf. Luke 6:36; Jeremias, Theology, 215n4.

49. Referring to the law of Moses, it appears in, e.g., Josh. 8:31; 2 Kings 23:21; 2 Chron. 23:18; 25:4; 31:3; 35:12; Ezra 3:2, 4; 6:18; Neh. 8:15; 10:34, 36; Dan. 9:13. Cf. 2 Sam. 1:18 (referring to Jashar).

50. E.g., CD 1.13; 5.1; 7.10; 11.18, 20; 1QS 5.15, 17; 8.14; cf. possibly 1QM 15.5–6. On the formulas and their resemblance to NT forms, see Fitzmyer, Essays, 7–16; Fitzmyer, “Christianity,” 252–53.

51. E.g., T. Zeb. 3:4; m. Giṭ. 9:10; m. Sanh. 10:1; Mek. Pisha 1:76–77; Sipre Deut. 56.1.2b; y. Meg. 1:5, §1; y. Suk. 2:10, §1; 3:5, §1; y. Taʿan. 3:11, §5; 3 En. 5:14; 18:7, 18, 24; 28:4, 9, 10; 31:2. Cf. “as it is written” (Jub. 50:12; T. Levi 5:4) and “it is written” (Jub. 4:5; 5:18; 32:28; 33:10, 12) in the heavenly tablets. For the legal use of such a phrase in Hellenistic papyri, see Deissmann, Studies, 249–50.

52. E.g., m. ʾAbot 6:10; m. Giṭ. 9:10; m. Sanh. 10:1; Mek. Pisha 1:76; 1:77; Sipre Deut. 56.1.2b; y. Meg. 1:5, §1; y. Sukkah 2:10, §1; 3:5, §1; y. Taʿan. 3:11, §5; Gen. Rab. 1:4; Num. Rab. 19:8; cf. Sandmel, Judaism, 112.

53. In the semi-rabbinic apocalypse 3 Enoch, for biblical quotations by the narrator (5:14; 18:7, 18, 24; 23:1–18; 24:1–23; 28:4, 9, 10; 31:2; 35:4, 5; 38:2, 3; 40:3, 4; 42:3, 5, 6; 44:9; 46:13; 48A:3, 6; 48B:2; 48C:9–12; 48D:4; cf. 43:3; 48A:7) or heavenly beings (2:4, except A and E texts).

54. So Fitzmyer, “Quotations.” The rabbis’ “it is written” usually literally translates “it is said,” but “written” appears in 4Q266 frg. 11, 2.4–6 (Alexander, “IPSE DIXIT,” 120).

55. For “said” instead of “written,” see, e.g., CD 4.19–20; 19B.15; 1QpHab 6.2; m. ʾAbot 1:18; 2:13; Mek. Pisha 1:70–71; ʾAbot R. Nat. 36A; cf. related formulas in 1QM 11.5–6; CD 4.13; 5.8; 6.7–8, 13; 7.8, 14; 8.9, 14; 9.7–9; 10.16.

56. Outside the NT, see 1 Clem. 4:1; 14:4; 29:2; 36:3; 39:3; 46:2; 48:2; 50:4, 6; Ignatius, Eph. 5:3; Magn. 12:1; Phld. 8:2; Barn. 4:14; 11:1; 14:6; 16:6; Herm. 7:4; Papias, Frag. 2:1.

57. Cf. Bovon, Studies, 115. In Roman court settings, citing laws, see, e.g., Quintilian, Decl. 315.3, 5 (Scriptum est).

58. The term differs but is similar enough to allow the possibility of a wordplay.

59. E.g., Gen. 4:26; 12:8; 13:4; Pss. 79:6 = LXX 78:6; 99:6 = LXX 98:6; Let. Aris. 226; Gen. Rab. 39:16. Cf. also T. Mos. 1:18 (literal reading). Gentiles also used such language for invoking divine heroes (e.g., Philostratus, Her. 31.7; 53.6, 11, 16) or divine kings (Jdt. 3:8). A later Targum interprets Joel’s “calling on the name of the Lord” as prayer in his name (Tg. Joel on 3:5 [on ET Joel 2:32]).

60. This reflects the language of LXX Ps. 61:13 (ET 62:12); Prov. 24:12 (also behind Rev. 2:23; 20:12–13; 22:12), albeit changing apodidōmi (“repay”) to krinō, as in the wording’s adaptation in Sir. 16:12 (kata ta erga autou krinei; 16:14 is closer to the psalm and proverb by including ekastos, “each one”).

61. E.g., Isocrates, Ad Nic. 18; Menander Rhetor, Treat. 2.10, 416.8–9, 15.

62. E.g., Demosthenes, Crown 1–2; Cicero, Quint. fratr. 1.2.3.10. In different wording, e.g., Cato the Elder 13, in Plutarch, S. Rom., Mor. 198F; Philostratus, Vit. soph. 2.27.616.

63. E.g., Aeschylus, Suppl. 403–4. In different wording, e.g., Silius Italicus, Pun. 6.467.

64. Besides LXX texts above, see, e.g., 4Q364 frg. 21a–k (reproducing Deut. 1:17); Jub. 40:8; Sir. 42:2; Ps.-Phoc. 9–12, 137. In different wording, e.g., Josephus, Ag. Ap. 2.207.

65. Jub. 5:16; 21:4; 33:18; Pss. Sol. 2:18; Wis. 6:7; L.A.B. 20:4; 2 Bar. 13:8; 44:4; T. Job 4:7–8; 43:13; Sipre Num. 42.1.2; Sipre Deut. 304.1.1; Rom. 2:11; cf. similar ideas in Wis. 12:13. In the Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha more fully, see Bassler, Impartiality, 17–44; in rabbinic literature (where it often is used for theodicy), see Bassler, Impartiality, 45–76; in Philo (where it retains nationalistic overtones), Bassler, Impartiality, 77–119.

66. Despite the absence of this specific term, the concept of impartiality is frequent in the LXX (e.g., Exod. 23:3; Lev. 19:15; Deut. 1:17; 10:17; 16:19; 2 Chron. 19:7; Job 13:8, 10; 32:21; Ps. 81:2 [ET 82:2]; Prov. 18:5; 24:23; 28:21; Mal. 2:9; Sir. 4:22, 27; 7:6; 35:13 [ET 35:16]; 1 Esd. 4:39). Sometimes these texts describe God (2 Chron. 19:7; Job 34:19; Sir. 35:12 [ET 35:15]) or truth (1 Esd. 4:39); the sense is different in Mal. 1:8. For divine impartiality in Scripture, see in more detail Bassler, Impartiality, 7–17 (focusing on 2 Chron. 19:7; Deut. 10:17; Job 34:19; Ps. 82:1–4).

67. So Ambrose of Milan, Let. Priests 59.10 (FC 26:353; Bray, Peter, 78); cf. perhaps Eph. 5:16; Col. 4:5; Marius Victorinus, Ep. Gal. 2.6.10 (on Gal. 6:10).

68. I borrow here especially from Keener, Acts, 3:2661–64. I provide briefer surveys of the “father” title for God or deities in Keener, Matthew, 217–18; Keener, John, 401–2, 877–79. Probably unrelated cultures employ the image in various ways; cf. Mbiti, Religions, 63.

69. E.g., I.Eph. 101–4; Homer, Il. 2.371; 8.69, 245, 397; 10.154; 11.66, 80, 201, 544; 14.352; 15.637; 16.250, 253; 17.46, 645 (quoted in Longinus, Subl. 9.10); 22.60, 209; 24.461; Od. 4.340; 5.7; 7.311; 12.63; 13.51; 14.440; 15.341; 16.260; 17.132; 18.235; 24.376, 518; Hesiod, Op. 169; Aeschylus, Prom. 40, 53, 947, 984; Suppl. 139; Euripides, Med. 1352; frg. 1082; Dan. frg. 1132.27; Aristophanes, Wasps 652 (“our father”); Hipponax frg. 62; Pindar, Nem. 5.33; Ol. 1.57a; 2.28; 7.87–88; 14.12; Pyth. 3.98; 4.23; Aratus, Phaen. 15; Pliny Y., Ep. 1.7.1 (quoting Homer, Il. 16.250); Dio Chrysostom, Or. 12.75; Maximus of Tyre, Or. 11.12; Orph. H. 15.7; 19.1.

70. E.g., Virgil, Aen. 1.691; Georg. 1.121, 283, 328, 353; 2.325; Valerius Flaccus, Argon. 1.498; 3.249; Catullus, Carm. 64.21; Silius Italicus, Pun. 3.137, 163; often as “omnipotent father,” Virgil, Aen. 1.60; 3.251; 4.25; 6.592; 7.141; 7.770; 8.398; 10.100; 12.178; Ovid, Metam. 1.154; 2.304, 401; 3.336; 9.271; as genitor, Virgil, Aen. 12.843; Valerius Flaccus, Argon. 1.531; Silius Italicus, Pun. 4.417; 17.475; Statius, Silv. 5.3.207; Theb. 5.146; Fronto, Fer. Als. 3.8.

71. E.g., Homer, Il. 3.276, 320, 350, 365; 7.179, 202, 446; 8.236; 12.164; 13.631; 15.372; 17.19, 645; 19.270; 21.273; 24.308; Od. 12.371; 20.98, 112, 201; 21.200; 24.351; Sophocles, Oed. tyr. 202; Aristophanes, Ach. 223–25; Menander, Dysk. 192; Pindar, Nem. 8.35; 9.53; 10.29; Isth. 6.42; Apollonius Rhodius, Argon. 4.1673; Aratus, Phaen. 15–16 (esp. 15); Silius Italicus, Pun. 10.432; Dio Chrysostom, Or. 36.36; see further discussion in Keener, Matthew, 217–18. So addressed by other gods, e.g., Homer, Il. 8.31; 22.178; Od. 8.306; 12.377 (even when they are his siblings, because it remains his title—e.g., Il. 5.757, 762; 19.121; Od. 13.128).

72. E.g., Homer, Il. 8.31 (“father of us all,” by a deity); Pseudo-Dionysius, Epid. 2.262; Horace, Odes 1.12.13–18; Alexander 15, in Plutarch, S. Kings, Mor. 180D; Dio Chrysostom, Or. 74.27 (supplying “father” from the context); cf. Or. 36.35; Macrobius, Sat. 4.5.4 (using Virgil, Aen. 6.123; van der Horst, “Macrobius,” 226); syncretistically, PGM 22b.1–5. Among the philosophically inclined, see Plato, Tim. 28C; Plutarch, Plat. Q. 2.1, Mor. 1000E–1001C (esp. 2.1, 1000E); Table T. 8.1.3, Mor. 718A; Maximus of Tyre, Or. 2.10; 11.5, 9; Proclus, Poet. 6.2, K164.16–17 (cf. 6.1, K107.16–17; 134.23–24).

73. E.g., Homer, Il. 1.503, 534, 578–79; Euripides, Pir. frg. 4.7; Phaedrus, Fab. 1.2.13; Virgil, Aen. 9.495; Ovid, Metam. 2.848; 9.245; Valerius Flaccus, Argon. 4.1; Catullus, Carm. 64.298, 387; Ovid, Fasti 3.285; Silius Italicus, Pun. 5.70; 17.342; Libanius, Speech 11.3. Thinkers could also call God “father of himself” (Iamblichus, Myst. 8.2), i.e., “self-begotten” (cf. PGM 1.342–43; 13.62; Sib. Or. 1:20; 3:12). He is also “god of fathers” (Epictetus, Diatr. 3.11.5).

74. Horace, Odes 1.12.49; Plutarch, Alex. 27.6; Dio Chrysostom, Or. 12.74; Maximus of Tyre, Or. 41.2. Among Stoics, see Cleanthes, Hymn to Zeus (Stobaeus, Ecl. 1.1.12). The trees could also call Zeus their “father,” as their creator (Babrius, Fab. 142.3).

75. E.g., Homer, Il. 1.544; 4.68; 5.426; 8.49, 132; 11.182; 15.12, 47; 16.458; 20.56; 22.103, 167; Od. 1.28; 12.445; Hesiod, Op. 59; Theog. 457, 468, 542; Shield 27; Euripides, Chrys. frg. 839.1–2; Ovid, Metam. 14.807; Diodorus Siculus, Libr. Hist. 1.12.1; Dio Chrysostom, Or. 2.75; Philostratus, Vit. Apoll. 4.30; even Philo, Spec. Laws 2.165; cf. Phaedrus, Fab. 3.17.10; for “father of gods and king of humans,” Virgil, Aen. 1.65; 2.648; 10.2. Philosophers, perhaps especially Platonists, gave a philosophic interpretation of Homer’s phrase (Cornutus, Summary of Greek Theology 9, p. 9.1 Lang [Grant, Gods, 78]; Maximus of Tyre, Or. 35.1; Iamblichus, Vit. pyth. 8.38; Proclus, Poet. 6.2, K164.29). The conjunction of fatherhoods appears pre-Homeric, paralleled at Ugarit (Gordon, Civilizations, 233).

76. Dio Chrysostom, Or. 4.27.

77. Dio Chrysostom, Or. 4.19–21.

78. Dio Chrysostom, Or. 12.42. Zeus was patron deity of fathers (Epictetus, Diatr. 3.11.5). For Zeus “of the ancestors” (cf. the biblical “God of our ancestors”), see, e.g., Sophocles, Ajax 387; Aristophanes, Clouds 1468, 1469.

79. E.g., Plutarch frg. 46 (from Scholiast on Hesiod, Op. 327–34, in F. H. Sandbach, LCL, 15:132–35); Josephus, Ant. 4.262. On parents as the divine image, see, e.g., Hierocles, Parents 4.25.53 (in Malherbe, Moral Exhortation, 91); Philo, Spec. Laws 2.2; for the aged, SP 3, pp. 476–77, §116; for parents as representatives of deity, see Aeschines, Tim. 28; Valerius Maximus, Mem. 5.6.pref.; Dio Chrysostom, Or. 12.42; SP 1:320–21, lines 27–28; cf. Philo, Decalogue 51, 106–7, 120; Spec. Laws 2.224–25; Josephus, Ag. Ap. 2.206; b. B. Meṣ.32a, bar.; b. Qidd. 30b, bar.; Pesiq. Rab. 23/24:2.

80. Dio Chrysostom, Or. 1.40; 12.77.

81. Pindar, Ol. 2.17 (“father of all”).

82. Martial, Epigr. 10.28 (father of years and of the world).

83. Valerius Flaccus, Argon. 1.651, 659.

84. Valerius Flaccus, Argon. 1.828 (of subterranean regions); Fronto, Ver. imp. 2.1.4.

85. Silius Italicus, Pun. 5.395; note also “Father Tiber” in Statius, Silv. 1.6.100.

86. Orph. H. 4.1 (in mythology, the father of Cronos, the Roman Saturn).

87. Silius Italicus, Pun. 11.458 (in mythology, he merited the title before Jupiter, whose father he was).

88. Iamblichus, Vit. pyth. 8.35. Cf. also, syncretistically, Father “Adonai” in PGM 1.305, identified with Apollo in PGM 1.298. “Paternal Apollo” had a temple in Athens (Pausanias, Descr. 1.3.4; cf. also Lang and Eliot, Athenian Agora, 48), but this means “Apollo of our ancestors.”

89. Valerius Maximus, Mem. 1.8.6; Fronto, Bell. parth. 1.

90. Valerius Flaccus, Argon. 2.256. Antony allegedly wished to be a new “Father Liber” (Velleius Paterculus, Comp. 2.82.4).

91. Orph. H. 12.6 (but the Orphic Hymns are notoriously syncretistic).

92. Augustus is father of mortals, as Jupiter is of immortals (Ovid, Fasti 2.130–32). See further Res gestae divi Augusti (in deSilva, Honor, 195; Judge, Pattern, 32–33).

93. E.g., Res gest. 35.1 (Sherk, Empire, §26, p. 50); ILS 5863 (Sherk, Empire, §112, p. 155); Pliny Y., Ep. 8.6.10; Herodian, Hist. 2.2.9; 2.6.2; Kent, Inscriptions, #77 (p. 40; Claudius); #99 (Trajan); #104 (Hadrian); #111 (Commodus); IG 3176 (M. Aurelius). For the abbreviation, see Kent, Inscriptions, ##77, 104, 111, 113. This title fit well with his claimed patronage of the empire (Lampe, “Patrons,” 493–94).

94. E.g., Musonius Rufus, 8, p. 64.14; Epictetus, Diatr. 1.6.40.

95. Stoics in Diogenes Laertius, Lives 7.1.147; Marcus Aurelius, Medit. 10.1 (“begetter” of all).

96. E.g., Cleanthes, Hymn to Zeus (Stobaeus, Ecl. 1.1.12); Seneca Y., Lucil. 110.10; Epictetus, Diatr. 1.9.4–5, 6, 7; 1.13.3–4; 3.22.82. Cf. Musonius Rufus, 18A, p. 112.23–25 (in van der Horst, “Musonius,” 309). Seneca Y., Dial. 1.1.5, refers specifically to a good man (cf. Epictetus, Diatr. 1.19.9).

97. Musonius Rufus, 16, p. 104.30; Epictetus, Diatr. 1.3.1; 1.19.12; Dio Chrysostom, Or. 4.22.

98. Dio Chrysostom, Or. 30.26; cf. Or. 12.27, 29, 39, 43, 47, 61, 75, 77 (Balch, “Areopagus Speech,” 78).

99. Pliny E., Nat. 2.5.26.

100. See Jeremias, Prayers, 12; Chen, Father, 73–111.

101. Philo, Spec. Laws 2.165.

102. Josephus, Ag. Ap. 2.241.

103. E.g., Apoc. Mos. 35:2 (God so addressed by angels).

104. Philo, Creation 135; Confusion 170; Moses 2.238; Decalogue 32, 51, 105, 107; Spec. Laws 1.14, 22, 32, 41, 96; 2.6, 165; 3.178, 189; Virtues 64, 77, 218; Rewards 24; Contempl. Life 90; Eternity 13; Embassy 115, 293; cf. perhaps QG 2.60. For the Logos as father of humanity, cf. Confusion 41.

105. God as “begetter” in Sib. Or. 3:296, 604, 726; 5:284, 328, 360, 406, 498, 500.

106. PGM 22b.1–26 (Pr. Jac. 4–5).

107. Sib. Or. 3:278; cf. Philo, Spec. Laws 2.165.

108. E.g., Theophilus, Autol. 1.4; Athenagoras, Leg. 13; 27.

109. See Wis. 2:16; 3 Macc. 5:7; 6:8; 7:6. For one survey, see Chen, Father, 113–43.

110. E.g., m. Soṭah 9:15; t. Ber. 3:14; t. B. Qam. 7:6; t. Ḥag. 2:1; t. Peʾah 4:21; Sipra Qed. pq. 9.207.2.13; Behuq. pq. 8.269.2.15; Sipre Deut. 352.1.2; b. Ber. 30a, bar.; 30b; 32b; 35b; 57a; b. Šabb. 116a; 131b; b. Pesaḥ. 85b; 112a; b. Roš Haš. 29a; b. Yoma 76a; b. Sukkah 45b; b. Meg. 13a; 14a; b. Soṭah 10a; 12a; 38b; b. B. Bat. 10a; b. Sanh. 94a; 101b; 102a; 102b; b. ʿAbod. Zar. 16b; b. Zebaḥ. 22b; y. Sanh. 10:2, §8; Pesiq. Rab Kah. 24:9; Lev. Rab. 1:3; 7:1; 35:10; Song Rab. 7:11, §1; Tg. Neof. 1 on Deut. 33:24; Tg. Ps.-J. on Exod. 1:19 (with note in Maher, 163n38). The phraseology must predate later rabbinic sources (cf. Mark 11:25; Luke 11:13), but in the NT appears especially in Matthew, the source closest to rabbinic usage (Matt. 5:16, 45, 48; 6:1, 9, 14 [= Mark 11:25], 26, 32; 7:11 [= Luke 11:13], 21; 10:32–33; 12:50; 15:13; 16:17; 18:10, 14, 19, 35; 23:9).

111. Goshen-Gottstein, “God the Father” (excepting Jesus’s special sonship).

112. Boer, Fatherhood, 25.

113. Jub. 1:25, 28; Tob. 13:4; Wis. 11:10; Jos. Asen. 12:14 MSS; T. Job 33:3 MSS, 9; cf. T. Ab. 16:3; 20:12, 13 A; Pr. Jac. 1. For the righteous as a child of God, see Wis. 2:13, 16.

114. Not that they always acted as such (Deut. 32:5, 19–20, 43; Isa. 1:2, 4; 30:1, 9; Jer. 3:14, 19, 22; 4:22).

115. Philo, Sobriety 55–56, 62–63 (trans. Colson and Whitaker, LCL, 3:472–73).

116. Hagner, “Vision,” 83–85; Argyle, “Philo,” 385.

117. E.g., 4Q504 3.4–10 (in Vellanickal, Sonship, 31); 1QH 9.35–36 (often applying only to the true remnant of Israel, not to ethnic Israel as a whole). Cf. “son” in Jub. 2:20; 19:29; and God as Israel’s father in Jub. 1:25.

118. Pss. Sol. 17:27.

119. Perhaps Tob. 13:4. Cf. Hengel, Son, 51, on Wis. 2:18 (the righteous); 18:13 (Israel). Cf. God as “the Father” in T. Job 33:3 P (vs. S, V); 33:9 (P, S, V); T. Ab. 16:3; 20:12 A.

120. Wis. 2:13, 16, 18; 5:5. At least the latter applies especially to Israel as well. See also 4Q416 frg. 2 (+4Q417) 1.13 (in Wise et al., Scrolls, 384); 4Q418 frg. 81, line 5.

121. Wis. 11:10.

122. Cf., e.g., Wis. 5:5; Pss. Sol. 17:30; Sib. Or. 3:702–4 (second century BCE); Jub. 1:28. Even here, however, the title is not conferred, but recognized eschatologically (e.g., cf. Jub. 1:25). Israel’s sonship in the OT also had eschatological associations; see in Vellanickal, Sonship, 25–26.

123. Cf. m. ʾAbot 3:15. Later rabbis contended that one who teaches his neighbor Torah is as if he begot him (e.g., b. Sanh. 19b). In Pesiq. Rab. 21:21, God gave Torah to his children Israel.

124. E.g., Exod. 4:22; Deut. 32:6; Isa. 64:8; cf. Ladd, Theology, 85; Jeremias, Prayers, 11–15.

125. Sipre Deut. 43.8.1; b. Šabb. 31a; b. Yoma 76a; Exod. Rab. 15:30; Lev. Rab. 10:3; Num. Rab. 16:7; Deut. Rab. 2:24; 10:4; Lam. Rab. proem 2; Lam. Rab. 1:17, §52; Song Rab. 2:16, §1; Pesiq. Rab. 15:17 (often in parables); cf. Gen. Rab. 86:2 (modeled after Exod. 4:22, but the tradition is attested early in Jub. 19:29).

126. E.g., ʾAbot R. Nat. 35, §77; 44, §124 B; Sipra Behuq. pq. 2.262.1.9; Sipre Deut. 43.16.1; 45.1.2; 352.7.1; b. Šabb. 31a, 128a; Pesiq. Rab Kah. 9:5; 14:5; Exod. Rab. 46:4–5; Num. Rab. 5:3; 10:2; Deut. Rab. 1:6; 3:15; Lam. Rab. proem 23; 3:20, §7.

127. Sipre Deut. 96.4.1; cf. similarly 308.1.2; later, Deut. Rab. 7:9; Pesiq. Rab. 27:3; cf. Bonsirven, Judaism, 48–49, citing Sipre Numbers on 15:41.

128. Greater cost also invites greater appreciation; so Bede, On 1 Peter on 1:18 (PL 93:46; Bray, Peter, 79).

129. Lev. 17:7 (LXX only); 1 Kings 16:2 (LXX only), 13, 26; 2 Kings 17:15; 2 Chron. 11:15 (LXX); Isa. 2:20 (LXX); 44:9; Jer. 2:5; 8:19 (LXX); 10:3, 14–15; 51:17–18 (LXX 28:17–18); Ezek. 8:10 (LXX); Jon. 2:9; Wis. 13:1; 15:8; 3 Macc. 6:11; using a different term, Wis. 14:14. The language applied to any kind of deception in which people trusted (e.g., LXX Ezek. 13:6–9, 19; 21:29 [ET 21:24]; 22:28; Sir. 34[31]:5). Cf. also Kelly, Peter, 74, on LXX background for 1 Pet. 1:18.

130. E.g., Sib. Or. 3:29 (probably pre-Christian), 547–48 (probably second century BCE). Cf. also “dead” used for the old “gods,” which were really mortal rulers (3:551–54, esp. 554; a euhemeristic interpretation, as for the mortal Zeus reared in Phrygia in 3:140–41). Idols lead to mataia phronein, thinking vain things (3:555).

131. Cf. discussion in Keener, “Monotheism.”

132. Cf. the cognate paradidōmi for passing down traditional practices from ancestors in Thucydides, Hist. 1.85.1. Some thought that, like ignorance, dependence on ancestral devotion in idolatry reduced culpability (Pesiq. Rab Kah. 4:9).

133. E.g., Pliny E., Nat. 33.24.82–83 (although 83 also includes a statue of a mortal). For Egyptians painting deity portraits on silver, see Pliny E., Nat. 33.46.131.

134. Pliny E., Nat. 33.54.151 (who knows of these only as early as 190 BCE).

135. 1 En. 99:7 (trans. Isaac, OTP 1:80).

136. 3 En. 5:7 (trans. Alexander, OTP 1:260).

137. Jos. Asen. 10:12 (trans. Burchard, OTP 2:216); see also 13:11.

138. 4Q271 f2.9.

139. Sib. Or. 5:494 (trans. Collins, OTP 1:404; probably late first- to early second-century CE Egypt).

140. Sipre Deut. 87.3.1, on Deut. 13 (trans. Neusner, 1:239).

141. Passages that depict the exodus in such language (Exod. 6:6; 15:13; Deut. 7:8; 9:26; 13:5 [LXX 13:6]; 15:15; 21:8; 24:18; 2 Sam. 7:23; 1 Chron. 17:21; Neh. 1:10; Add. Esth. 13:16; and passim) highlight the element of liberation (but cf. Isa. 43:3). For ransom redemption, or liberation with a price, see, e.g., Josephus, Ant. 12.27; cf. Morris, Preaching, 11–64; Dunn, Romans, 1:169, 180; Schreiner, Romans, 189; Johnson, Romans, 56–57, 88; McKnight, Community, 88; cf. Lyall, Slaves, 153–75. This includes liberating slaves for a new master, as in Daube, New Testament and Judaism, 272ff. Jewish people spoke of how God “purchased freedom” for, or redeemed, his people from captivity in Egypt (with various terminology, see, e.g., Exod. 6:6; 15:13; Deut. 7:8; 9:26; 13:5; Mic. 6:4; 4Q158 f14.i.5; 11Q19 54.16–17; y. Sanh. 2:1, §3; Pesiq. Rab. 15:22); Israel was thus the Lord’s redeemed people (Isa. 35:9; 51:10; 1QM 1.12; 14.10; 17.6; 4Q266 f11.13), and they also looked for future redemption (e.g., 1QM 1.12; 15.1–2; 18.1; 4Q176 f3.2; 11Q19 59.12; later, Exod. Rab. 1:5; 3:4; 15:11; coins associated Judean revolts in Carmon, Inscriptions, 80, 97, 179, 211, §§179, 180, 199; Sherk, Empire, §152, p. 192; Avi-Yonah, “Archaeological Sources,” 60; the seventh benediction of the Amidah in Oesterley, Liturgy, 63).

142. E.g., Exod. 13:13, 15; Lev. 25:25–54; 27:13–33; Num. 18:15, 17; Philo, Sacrifices 89, 114; Spec. Laws 2.116, 121; Josephus, Ant. 14.371; J.W. 1.274. Rensburg (“Ransomed”) discusses ransom imagery in the presumed social context of 1 Peter’s audience. Ancient Christians often believed that Christ bought us back from the devil (Chrysostom, Catena on 1 Pet. 1:19 [CEC 47; Bray, Peter, 79]).

143. Practicing rhetorical alliteration, 1:19 includes five words (of nine) that begin with alpha (five m- sounds also appear). Peter’s theology here might reflect Isa. 52:3: sold for nothing and redeemed without money (but by the lamb of Isa. 53:7?) (Elliott, Peter, 14).

144. Bulls and cows were most expensive, hence rarest (Klauck, Context, 16).

145. E.g., Ovid, Tristia 1.10.43. They were more wholesome than adult sheep (Galen, Foodstuffs 3.1, K.663).

146. Klauck, Context, 16.

147. E.g., Lev. 4:32; 5:6–7; 14:12–13, 21, 25; Num. 6:12, 14.

148. E.g., Exod. 12:21; 2 Chron. 30:15–17; cf. 1 Cor. 5:7. Some find a Passover allusion here, connected with girding up loins in 1 Pet. 1:13 (see Exod. 12:11). Cf. the apparent connection between the paschal lamb and a ransom price for life in Exod. 12:3–13; 13:13–15; 34:18–20; also Gen. 22:7–8, for Isaac.

149. Unblemished (amōmos) applies to sacrifices in Exod. 29:1, 38; Lev. 1:3, 10; 3:1, 6; and passim; albeit with a different term in the LXX, cf. the Passover lamb in Exod. 12:5. The term for “spotless” (aspilos), which would overlap in meaning with unblemished, does not appear in the LXX, but related language apparently came to circulate in early Christian sources (Eph. 5:27; 1 Tim. 6:14; James 1:27; 3:6; Jude 12; 2 Clem. 8:6; Herm. 24:5; 59:7; 83:4; 85:7; 103:2). Related terms are linked similarly in 2 Pet. 2:13; 3:14.

150. Cf. Minear, Images, 102–3. I include Passover as a sacrifice, which it was viewed as by this period (see, e.g., Josephus, Ant. 2.313; 3.248, 294; 9.271; 11.110; J.W. 6.423). Cf. Keener, “Lamb.”

151. E.g., Manetho, Aeg. frg. 1.6; Dionysius of Halicarnassus, Rom. Ant. 1.8.2; Cicero, Verr. 2.4.45.99; 2.4.46.102; Pliny Y., Ep. 8.24.2–3; Suetonius, Aug. 93; Hermogenes, Issues 87.2–9; Menander Rhetor, Treat. 1.2, 354.1–8; 355.2–11; Josephus, Ant. 19.283, 290; Ag. Ap. 1.1–2, 7, 196, 215–18, 227; 2.1, 154–56, 279, 288; Justin, 1 Apol. 44; Tertullian, Apol. 47.14.

152. E.g., Acts 26:5; 2 Pet. 3:17; Josephus, Ant. 1.311; 7.57; 13.175; 16.214; J.W. 1.55, 608; 3.484; 4.236; 6.8; Life 106.

153. Jdt. 11:19; Wis. 18:6; Josephus, Ant. 2.86; 4.121; 5.358; 6.54, 348; 8.419; J.W. 2.159; for pagan revelation, Josephus, Ant. 18.218; Ag. Ap. 1.204, 256. Cf. the cognate adjective in Philo, Dreams 2.1; Moses 2.190; it applies to a demon in the later T. Sol. 5:12.

154. Such as the plan for Moses, in T. Mos. 1:14–15; or for the Messiah, b. Ned. 39b, bar.; b. Pesaḥ. 54a, bar.; Gen. Rab. 1:4. See further discussion and sources in Keener, John, 367–68.

155. Sir. 1:4; 24:9; L.A.B. 32:7; Sipre Deut. 37.1.3.

156. E.g., Rom. 8:3; 1 Cor. 1:24, 30; 8:6; 10:4; Gal. 4:4; Phil. 2:6–7; Col. 1:15–17; see, e.g., Byrne, “Pre-existence”; Fee, Pauline Christology, 213–16; Fee, Jesus the Lord, 38–40; Gathercole, Pre-existent Son; Tilling, Christology; Loke, Origin.

157. We may also infer this from Peter’s application of OT texts about YHWH to Jesus; see comment on 1 Pet. 2:4; 3:15.

158. The terms can be used together, as in Mart. Pol. 22:3; Herm. 9:2; Diogn. 8:11.

159. Also 11Q13, 2.4; 1 En. 27:3–4 (after the final judgment); cf. 4Q509 2.19; 2 Bar. 76:5; T. Zeb. 8:2; 9:5. Jewish interpreters would also so understand Deut. 4:30; 31:29; cf. others’ restoration in Jer. 48:47; 49:39. “The last days” or “last generation” is a natural feature of the pesharim (e.g., 1QpHab 1.2; 2.5–6). Cf. also comment in Patte, Hermeneutic, 138.

160. 1Q22, lines 7–8; 4Q169 3.3; 4Q162, 2.1 in its context; 4Q163 frg. 23, col. 2.3–11; 4Q176 frg. 12 + 13, col. 1.9; 4QMMT section C.21–22; T. Dan 5:4; T. Zeb. 9:5; T. Iss. 6:1; cf. Sib. Or. 5:74; Apoc. El. 1:13. Writers could also apply the phrase to a person’s “last days”—i.e., on their deathbed (T. Dan 1:1).

161. Acts 2:17; 1 Tim. 4:1; 2 Tim. 3:1; Heb. 1:2; James 5:3; 1 Pet. 1:20; 2 Pet. 3:3; 1 John 2:18; Ignatius, Eph. 11:1.

162. E.g., 4Q162, 1–2, esp. 2.1–10; 4Q163 frg. 23, col. 2.10–11. The Qumran scrolls used their pesher interpretation (psalms, etc.) to apply much of Scripture to the special situation of the last days, a special era of fulfillment (e.g., 4Q162, cols. 1–2; 4Q176 frgs. 12 + 13, col. 1.7–9; 4Q169 4.3; see also 1 En. 108:1); in Acts 2–3, Luke’s Peter does the same, believing the time of fulfillment has come (Acts 3:18–26). The Peter of 1 Peter is consistent with this portrait, though so is most of earliest Christianity.

163. 4Q169 3.3.

164. Grammatically, hōste (here translated as with the result that) more often suggests result than intention (Dubis, Peter, 35), though the context does imply that God purposed this result.

165. Using the unrelated Greek term katharizō, the LXX sometimes speaks of purifying people by blood from a guilt offering (Lev. 8:15; 14:14, 17, 25, 28) or purifying the altar with a sin (Lev. 16:19) or guilt (Exod. 30:10) offering. (In 4 Macc. 6:29, a martyr’s blood could count as atoning purification.) In this case I have left souls in the translation in light of 1 Pet. 2:11, and in light of the verb’s parallel use with “hearts” in James 4:8.

166. E.g., Musonius Rufus, 3, p. 40.17, 28; 4, p. 44.25; 16, p. 104.35; 18B, p. 118.4–5; Epictetus, Diatr. 4.11.8; Ench. 33.6, 8; Menander Rhetor, Treat. 2.10, 416.7–8; Iamblichus, Ep. 13, frg. line 7; 16, frg. 2, lines 1–2 (Stobaeus, Anth. 3.1.49); Acts 15:9; 1 Cor. 6:11; 2 Cor. 7:1; 2 Tim. 2:21; Heb. 9:14; 10:22; 2 Pet. 1:9. I draw here from Keener, John, 996. Judgment could also purge (e.g., 1 En. 106:17; by the Messiah in Pss. Sol. 17:30).

167. Let. Aris. 2.

168. Josephus, J.W. 2.141.

169. So also Macrobius, Sat. 5.19.5, on the Greek term. Its LXX use is primarily cultic, though this term is less common than hagiazō (cf. the noun hagiasmos in 1:2).

170. Cf. Rom. 2:8; Gal. 5:7; obedience in Acts 6:7; Rom. 6:17; 10:16; 2 Thess. 1:8; truth in Gal. 2:5, 14; Eph. 1:13; Col. 1:5; 2 Thess. 2:10–12; James 1:18. Despite the past reference, that they remain believers assumes their continued obedience to the truth of the gospel (1 Pet. 1:14)—that is, that they continue in the faith (1:5). Against the earliest Egyptian manuscripts, some manuscripts over a wider geographic range add “through the Spirit.” The addition is consistent with Petrine (1 Pet. 1:2) and early Christian theology, but its explanatory addition is more easily explained textually than its omission.

171. For this emphasis in 1 Peter, see further Giesen, “Gemeinde.”

172. Peter includes also Jesus’s first commandment, love for God (Mark 12:30), in love for Christ (1 Pet. 1:8).

173. Cf. Ignatius, Magn. 6:2; Trall. 13:2; 2 Clem. 4:3; 9:6.

174. E.g., m. ʾAbot 1:12, attributed to Hillel; Jub. 36:4, 8. See further Söding, “Feindeshass”; Neudecker, “Love.”

175. Sipra Qed. pq. 4.200.3.7; Gen. Rab. 24:7.

176. Dubis, Peter, 37, supporting purpose rather than result in eis here, in view of the following imperative.

177. Cf. Heb. 13:1: let familial Christian love continue. Nearly all translations take the perfect participle in 1:22 as antecedent in action to the aorist imperative. Although agapē is higher than philadelphia in 2 Pet. 1:7, Peter probably does not make agapaō (the imperative verb) a level higher than philadelphia earlier in 1 Pet. 1:22 (cf. adelphotēta agapate in 1 Pet. 2:17 and philadelphoi in the epitomization of Peter’s paraenesis in 1 Pet. 3:8), so the sense of the imperative may be to continue or increase what one is doing, doing it ektenōs, fervently or continually, or one must render eis with respect to purpose, as already noted. As paraenesis, Peter’s exhortations need not presuppose his hearers’ prior neglect; indeed, assurances that the speaker trusts the state of his hearers are conventional (cf., e.g., Rom. 15:14–15; Heb. 6:9; Demosthenes, Lept. 167; Cicero, Fam. 2.4.2; 13.44.1; Quinct. 2.1; Dio Chrysostom, Or. 18.20; 32.29; Galen, Grief 79b; Let. Aris. 5; see Aune, Environment, 214; Stowers, Letter Writing, 128–30).

178. Goppelt (Peter, 123) titles 1:22–25 as “Mutual Love as Sign of the New Birth.”

179. This is more particular than philanthropia, also praised in antiquity (Musonius Rufus, 10, p. 78.33–34; 14, p. 92.31; 17, p. 108.14–16; Lucian, Dem. 11; Portr. 11; Menander Rhetor, Treat. 1.3, 363.6; 2.10, 416.6; 2.13, 423.7–10; Let. Aris. 208).

180. E.g., Justinus, Epit. 2.10.11; Plutarch, Luc. 1.6; Fronto, Nep. am. 2.8. DeSilva (Honor, 166) notes Aristotle, Eth. nic. 8.12.3, 1161b 30–35; Plutarch, Br. Love 2, Mor. 478E; 5, Mor. 480 BC; 13, Mor. 484D–485BC; 16, Mor. 487AB. Cf. discussions in Klauck on brotherly love in Plutarch and 4 Maccabees (Klauck, “Brotherly Love”; cf. Thompson, “Family”).

181. Jub. 46:1; 2 Macc. 15:14.

182. Xenophon, Mem. 2.3.18–19; Seneca E., Controv. 1.1.7. It could include even dying for one another’s honor (4 Macc. 13:23–27).

183. DeSilva (Honor, 167) cites Plutarch, Br. Love 17, Mor. 488A.

184. E.g., Isaeus, Menec. 28–29; Apollodorus, Bibl. 2.2.1; Gen. 37:8; 1 Sam. 17:28; Jub. 35:12; even murder in Apollodorus, Bibl. 3.12.6; Justinus, Epit. 8.3.10; 11.2.3; Cicero, Off. 3.10.41; Livy, Hist. 1.7.2; Horace, Epod. 7.17–20; Plutarch, Cic. 10.2; Lucian, Z. Rants 52; Apuleius, Metam. 10.8.

185. E.g., Murdock, “Patterns”; Vatuk, “Reference”; cf. Barnard, “Universal Systems.” I borrow in this paragraph from Keener, Acts, 2:1663–64.

186. E.g., Fields and Merrifield, “Kinship,” 27.

187. Haas, “Sibling Terms”; cf. Song 4:9; Tob. 5:21; 8:4, 7; Jub. 27:14, 17; Ovid, Metam. 1.351 (but she was his cousin); Seneca Y., Phaed. 611; P.Oxy. 528.1–2; 744.1; P.Hamb. 86.2; PSI 209.1.

188. E.g., Ballweg, “Extensions.”

189. E.g., Euripides, Iph. Taur. 497–98; Cicero, Fam. 13.1.5; Plutarch, Friends 2, Mor. 93E; Pliny Y., Ep. 7.23.1; Marcus Aurelius, Medit. 1.14; cf. Ahiq. 49, col. 4.

190. Or potential allies (cf. 1 Kings 20:32–33; 1 Macc. 10:18).

191. 1 Macc. 12:6, 10, 21; 14:20, 40. Curty (“Parenté”) suggests that the language might stem from the ambiguity of the Hebrew term for “brother” as “relative” (comparing 2 Macc. 5:9), but it makes sense on Greek premises also. For ancient Near Eastern application to fellow kings, see, e.g., 1 Kings 20:32; kings writing to Pharaoh in Pfeiffer, Tell el Amarna, 45–46.

192. Burkert, Mystery Cults, 45; Deissmann, Studies, 87–88.

193. Harland, Associations, 31–33; Harland, “Familial Dimensions (I)”; for parental language, Harland, “Familial Dimensions (II).”

194. Diodorus Siculus, Libr. Hist. 1.1.3; Libanius, Anec. 2.2 (Diogenes); Philostratus, Apoll. ep. 44.

195. Menander Rhetor, Treat. 2.4, 394.21–23.

196. Zeno held that only “the good” (the wise) were relatives (Engberg-Pedersen, Paul and Stoics, 74–75, citing Diogenes Laertius, Lives 7.32–34); but, in general, Greek philosophic schools tended to relate more as friends than with kinship language (Stowers, “Resemble Philosophy?,” 100). Cf. Vearncombe, “Kinship,” 30.

197. E.g., Tob. 5:10; 6:11; 7:3; 2 Macc. 1:1; 1QS 6.22; 1QSa 1.18; 1QM 13.1; 15.4.

198. E.g., Sipre Deut. 34.3.1–3, 5; 305.3.4; cf. 4 Bar. 7:24; Porphyry, Marc. 1.6–8; see further Keener, John, 922.

199. Sipre Deut. 34.5.3; b. ʿAbod. Zar. 18a, bar.

200. These constitute half of NT uses. In the Apostolic Fathers, see 1 Clem. 47:5; 48:1; Ignatius, Phld. preface; Mart. Pol. 19:1. Although absent from the earlier LXX, this Hellenistic virtue appears in Jewish sources in Greek by this period; see, e.g., 2 Macc. 15:14; 4 Macc. 13:23, 26; 14:1; 15:10; Philo, Joseph 218; Embassy 87, 92; Josephus, Ant. 2.161; 4.26; 12.189; J.W. 1.275, 485.

201. Others in antiquity valued genuineness, e.g., Fronto, Amic. 2.7.7; Iamblichus, Vit. pyth. 9.49; 31.188. For loving one another with a “true” heart, see also T. Dan 5:3.

202. The uses of the term in Wis. 5:18; 18:15 are not relevant, and it does not appear earlier in the LXX. In Philo, cf. QG 3:29. The cognate adverb appears in 2 Clem. 12:3.

203. E.g., Aristotle, Poet. 18.19, 1456a; Diodorus Siculus, Libr. Hist. 37.12.1; Herodian, Hist. 3.8.9; cf. Let. Aris. 219.

204. Epictetus, Diatr. 2.9.20; Plutarch, Educ. 17, Mor. 13B; Demosth. 29.3; Lucian, Icar. 29–30; Appian, Hist. rom. 12.8.55; Marcus Aurelius, Medit. 1.11; 3.7; 9.2.

205. Sir. 1:29; 35[32]:15; 36[33]:2; cf. Mark 7:6; 12:15; Matt. 7:5 // Luke 6:42; Gal. 2:13; 1 Tim. 4:2.

206. 2 Macc. 6:21, 24; 4 Macc. 6:15, 17.

207. “From a pure heart” has the wider geographic attestation and appears early (esp. 𝔓72 and א*). A scribe may have assumed that it should fit the standard pairing of the terms in early Christianity (Matt. 5:8; 1 Tim. 1:5; 2 Tim. 2:22; 2 Clem. 11:1; Herm. 17:8; 25:7; 49:5; 54:5; 63:6; 66:6; 69:8; 72:2; cf. Heb. 10:22), following LXX usage (Gen. 20:5–6; Pss. 23:4 [ET 24:4]; 50:12 [51:10]; Job 33:3; see Barn. 15:1, 6; esp. 1 Clem. 18:10). It may also originally reflect that pairing, although its subsequent omission is more difficult to explain.

208. E.g., Rom. 6:17; 2 Clem. 9:8; Herm. 103:5; cf. “in my spirit” (Rom. 1:9); “from a pure heart” (1 Tim. 1:5; 2 Tim. 2:22); though esp. “from a whole heart” (Deut. 4:29; 6:5; 10:12; 26:16; 30:2, 6, 10; 1 Sam. 7:3; 2 Chron. 15:12; Jer. 3:10; 24:7; Joel 2:12; Zeph. 3:14; 4 Macc. 7:18; 13:13; Wis. 8:21; Philo, Flight 142; T. Levi 13:1; Mark 12:30, 33; 1 Clem. 8:3; 34:4; 2 Clem. 3:4; 17:1, 7; 19:1; Herm. 3:2; 6:4; 20:3; 21:4; 23:5; 33:7; 35:5; 39:2; 48:2; 49:1–2; 66:4; 72:2; 77:3; 91:6; 110:3).

209. The few other NT uses apply to prayer and worship (Luke 22:44; Acts 12:5; 26:7; cf. LXX Joel 1:14; Jon. 3:8; Jdt. 4:9, 12; 3 Macc. 5:9).

210. Cf. a nontheological sense in Josephus, J.W. 4.484; a cognate noun for Stoic regeneration of the world in Philo, Eternity 8.

211. Possibly also James 1:18, by God’s message, as here, contrasted with an image in 1:15; Diogn. 11:3–4; cf. the figurative use of gennaō, negatively, in Did. 3:2–6; positively, in Herm. 16:7. See further Sinton, “Word.”

212. Given the grounding of the exhortation to love in purifying of hearts (1:22), it seems likely that the notice of rebirth in 1:23 provides a reason and even enablement. Thus I translate the perfect participle anagegennēmenoi as a causal clause.

213. In the LXX, the second line’s “travail” becomes instead “feeding.” Cf. reapplication of the image to Abraham and Sarah in Isa. 51:2.

214. Euripides, frg. 1068 (from Stobaeus, Anth. 4.30.3); frg. 1113 (from Stobaeus, Anth. 4.29.35); Phoen. frg. 810; Dict. frg. 333 (from Stobaeus, Anth. 4.30.5); Pindar, Ol. 11.19–20; 13.12; cf. Galen, Grief 60.

215. E.g., Didymus the Blind, Comm. 1 Pet. (PG 39:1761; Bray, Peter, 83).

216. Seeds and harvest often appear in Jesus’s teaching, as was natural in addressing a largely agrarian audience. Because of other allusions to Jesus, I suspect that this may be one of 1 Peter’s sources here (cf. esp. parables in Mark 4:20, 27, 31), although the image was widespread so it is difficult to pinpoint a single source with great confidence.

217. Cf. seeds of inspiration from indwelling deity in Ovid, Fasti 6.6. More generally, “seeds” were used figuratively as causes (Plutarch, Cor. 16.2; Tacitus, Hist. 4.80) or, for the mind, academic subjects (Philo, Prelim. Studies 16; Pliny Y., Ep. 7.9.7). For male vs. female “sperm,” see Aristotle, Generation of Animals 728A18, cited in Batten, “Gender,” 146.

218. Dio Chrysostom, Or. 36.57; Plutarch, Table T. 8.1.3, Mor. 718A (cf. Plato, Tim. 28C); continuing generation in Philo, Giants 11.

219. Seneca Y., Lucil. 73.16 (trans. Gummere, LCL, 2:113).

220. Musonius Rufus, 2, p. 38.14. Cf. Philo, Spec. Laws 2.29; Rewards 172.

221. Epictetus, Diatr. 1.9.4, quoting an earlier thinker. Thus people become God’s children (1.9.6). Like Seneca the Younger and Musonius, Epictetus is a Stoic.

222. Maximus of Tyre, Or. 10.4 (trans. Trapp, Maximus, 88). Maximus argues, in Platonic style, that learning is simply embracing innate seeds of truth.

223. Philo, Moses 1.279 (trans. Colson, LCL, 6:421). Like Maximus, Philo is a Middle Platonist. God has planted radiant seeds in the soul (Alleg. Interp. 3.40; cf. Rewards 10), including hope (Rewards 11); God’s seed in the soul bears fruit (Posterity 171). For God’s seed in creation, see Drunkenness 30.

224. 4 Ezra 9:31, 33 (trans. Knibb, in Coggins and Knibb, Esdras, 220–21). In 4 Ezra the image is agrarian, not like the more anthropomorphic procreative image in Maximus or Philo.

225. Seneca Y., Lucil. 87.25 (trans. Gummere, LCL, 2:337). Cf. Matt. 7:16–18 // Luke 6:43–44; James 3:12.

226. On imperishability, see Feldmeier, Peter, 73–76.

227. For humans as mortal/perishable, see, e.g., 2 Macc. 7:16; Philo, Creation 82, 134; Rom. 1:23; for the body as perishable, Wis. 9:15; 1 Cor. 15:53–54; Josephus, J.W. 2.154; 3.372.

228. The adjective phthartos corresponds to the verb phtheirō and the noun phthora; the noun appears nowhere in 1 Peter, but 44 percent of its NT uses appear in 2 Peter (1:4; 2:12, 19), and its use with the image of seed appears in 1 Cor. 15:42 and Gal. 6:8.

229. On God as imperishable, see, e.g., Philo, Alleg. Interp. 1.51; Sacrifices 95, 101; Embassy 118 (Philo uses this term for imperishable more than one hundred times); 1 Tim. 1:17; Josephus, Ant. 3.88; 10.278; cf. Wis. 12:1. Many held that souls were imperishable, as in Josephus, J.W. 2.163; 7.347; cf. 1 Pet. 3:4.

230. Dunn (Baptism, 164) is correct that rhēma in 1 Pet. 1:25 must refer not to a baptismal formula but to the gospel (rhēma as in Rom. 10:8, 17; Heb. 6:5; logos as in 1 Cor. 1:17–18; 14:36; 15:2; 2 Cor. 2:17; 4:2; 5:19; Phil. 1:14; 2:16; 1 Thess. 1:6; 2:13; and in 1 Pet. 1:23), as is clear from the verb preached as the good news (from euangelizō) as the end of 1:25. Many have taken logos in 1:23 in the more Johannine sense of Christ himself (see Prasad, Foundations, 364–73, including for the extensive history of interpretation).

231. On this transformation, cf. Barbarick, “Holy.”

232. The citation from Isaiah supports reading the genitives as God’s living and enduring message (cf. Heb. 4:12) rather than as “the message of the living and enduring God,” although Peter surely accepted the latter concept theologically.

233. E.g., Philo, Migration 76; Josephus, Ag. Ap. 2.277; ʾAbot R. Nat. 3A; b. ʿAbod. Zar. 18a; cf. God’s logos as immortal in Philo, Confusion 41; Migration 199.

234. Among gentiles, cf. Aristaenetus, Erot. Let. 2.1.29–43; all things in Cornutus, Summary of Greek Theology 5, §5.7–9. Note also the contrast in Dio Chrysostom, Or. 54.4, between the popular teachings of sophists, long perished, and Socrates’s eternal message.

235. Sir. 14:17 (AT); “You will surely die” quotes LXX Gen. 2:17, its construction echoing the underlying Semitic emphasis.

236. L.A.B. 7:3 (trans. Harrington, OTP 2:313), echoing Isa. 40:15.

237. L.A.B. 12:4 (trans. Harrington, OTP 2:320).

238. 4 Ezra 6:56 (trans. Metzger, OTP 1:536).

239. 2 Bar. 82:3–9.

240. Pesiq. Rab Kah. 4:2, on Ps. 12:7 (trans. Braude, 60).

241. Elsewhere, for humanity, cf. Job 14:1–2; LXX Ps. 102:15 (ET 103:15); Isa. 51:12; for particular groups or person, 2 Kings 19:26; LXX Pss. 36:2 (ET 37:2); 101:5, 12 (102:4, 11); 128:6 (129:6); Isa. 28:1, 4; 37:27; cf. also Matt. 6:30 // Luke 12:28; James 1:10–11. Cf. the idea in LXX Pss. 38:12 (ET 39:11); 48:9–10, 13, 21 (49:8–9, 12, 20; but cf. also 48:16 = ET 49:15); 89:5–6 (90:5–6); 143:4 (144:4); perhaps 61:10 (62:9). The flowering of grass passes quickly; for flowers generally, see Hepper, Plants, 43–51, and here esp. 54.

242. Using logos (1:23) and rhēma (1:24–25) interchangeably, as often in NT Koine.

243. The idiom rendered as endures forever appears both in the LXX (e.g., 1 Esd. 4:38; Pss. 9:8 [9:7]; 32:11 [33:11]; 88:37 [89:36]; 101:13 [102:12]; 110:3, 10 [111:3, 10]; 111:3, 9 [112:3, 9]; 116:2 [117:2]; Sir. 42:23; 44:13) and in early Christian sources (John 8:35; 12:34; 2 Cor. 9:9; Heb. 7:24; 1 John 2:17; 2 John 2).

244. For Peter’s assumption of context here, see further Sargent, “Middah,” rightly understanding the principle in t. Sanh. 7:11. Ancient speakers could presume audience knowledge of context in some cases; see, e.g., L.A.B. 16:1; m. ʾAbot 3:2; b. Sanh. 38b; y. Qidd. 4:1, §2; Instone-Brewer, Techniques, esp. 167; among gentiles, cf. Dionysius of Halicarnassus, Isaeus 14; Menander Rhetor, Treat. 2.9, 413.30–31; Apuleius, Apol. 82.

245. As newborn infants, born from God, they lack malice; cf. (from Bray, Peter, 83–84) Hilary of Arles, Comm. 1 Peter (PL Supp. 3:88); Bede, On 1 Peter (PL 93:47); Andreas Presbyter, Catena (CEC 50–51).

246. On imperatival use of participles, see comment on 1:14.

247. LXX Judg. 6:34; 1 Chron. 12:18; 2 Chron. 24:20.

248. Outside letters, see also, e.g., Mark 7:21–22; Rev. 21:8; 22:15.

249. See more fully Charles, “Vice Lists” (including the four “cardinal” virtues of Plato and Aristotle, 1252–53); Aune, Rhetoric, 89–91; Aune, Environment, 195–96, 201; Nock, Christianity, 100; Deissmann, Light, 316; Engberg-Pedersen, “Vices.” I borrow here from Keener, Acts, 3:2269–70.

250. E.g., Jer. 7:9; Ezek. 18:6–8, 11–13; Hosea 4:2; 4Q477 frg. 2, col. 2, line 4; Wis. 14:22–27 (esp. 14:25–26); Philo, Posterity 52; cf. Charles, Virtue, 119–21. Cf. also eschatological vice lists (e.g., 1QS 4.9–11; Sib. Or. 2:255–82; T. Levi 17:11; 2 Tim. 3:1–5; for gentile equivalents, Hesiod, Op. 181–201; Lucian, Men. 11–12).

251. E.g., Seneca Y., Dial. 9.2.10–12 (in a chain, as in James 1:14–15); Epictetus, Diatr. 2.8.23; Arius Didymus, Epit. 2.7.5b, p. 12.2–12; 2.7.10b, pp. 58.32–60.1; 2.7.10b, p. 60.1–7; 2.7.10e, p. 62.14–19; 2.7.11e, p. 68.17–20; Diogenes Laertius, Lives 2.93. Stated negatively, cf., e.g., Musonius Rufus, 3, p. 40.17–22.

252. E.g., Plato, Leg. 1.649D; Aristotle, Eth. eud. 2.3.4, 1220b–1221a; Virt. vit. 1249a–1251b; Pseudo-Diogenes, Ep. 36; Philostratus, Apoll. ep. 43; Iamblichus, Vit. pyth. 17.78.

253. E.g., Rhet. Alex. 36, 1442a.13–14; Cicero, Pis. 27.66; Cat. 2.4.7; 2.5.10; 2.10.22, 25; Cael. 22.55; Phil. 3.11.28; 8.5.16; Mur. 6.14 (negated); Pseudo-Cicero, Invect. Sall. 6.18; Dio Chrysostom, Or. 1.13; 3.53; 4.126; 8.8; 32.28, 91; 33.23, 55; 34.19; Fronto, Nep. am. 2.8; Lucian, Posts 4; Charon 11, 15; Tim. 28; Nigr. 17; Maximus of Tyre, Or. 5.7; 36.2.

254. Philo, Sacrifices 32.

255. Rom. 1:29; Eph. 4:31; Col. 3:8; Titus 3:3; James 1:21; Did. 5:1; Barn. 20:1.

256. E.g., Tob. 7:10–11; 1 Macc. 7:18; 1QS 10.22; Let. Aris. 206, 252; Josephus, Ag. Ap. 2.79; Ps.-Phoc. 7; Sib. Or. 3:38, 498–503; T. Dan 3:6; 5:1–2; Eph. 4:25.

257. E.g., Philodemus, On Anger col. 28.31–33; Plutarch, Educ. 14, Mor. 11C; frg. 87 (in Sandbach, LCL, 15:190–91); Diogenes Laertius, Lives 1.60; Phaedrus, Fab. 4.13; Cornelius Nepos, Gen. 25 (Atticus), 15.1.

258. E.g., ʾAbot R. Nat. 48, §132 B.

259. See Dunn, “Echoes”; cf. Johnson, “Slander.”

260. I borrow here from Keener, Galatians (2019), 513–14.

261. Cf. Seeman, “Zeal.” Plutarch (Profit 10, Mor. 91E) counts it both endemic in humanity and characteristic of the base (citing Pindar, frg. 212). See further comment in Keener, Acts, 2:1206–7.

262. E.g., Horace, Sat. 1.1 (e.g., status in 1.1.61–62; wealth in 1.1.70–79); Seneca Y., Dial. 5.31.1; Musonius Rufus, 17, p. 108.13; Epictetus, Diatr. 1.9.20; 2.19.26; Arius Didymus, Epit. 2.7.5f, p. 30.28; 2.7.10e, p. 62.15; Dio Chrysostom, Or. 34.19; Pseudo-Anacharsis, Ep. 4.13; Plutarch, Flatterer 24, Mor. 65B; Lect. 5, Mor. 39DE; Profit 8, Mor. 91AB; Diogenes Laertius, Lives 6.1.5; 10.117.

263. E.g., Dio Chrysostom, Or. 77–78; Plutarch, Envy, Mor. 536E–538E (hate was worse, since it desired the other’s destruction).

264. E.g., Hesiod, Op. 195; Xenophon, Mem. 3.9.8; Cyr. 1.4.15; Ovid, Metam. 2.760–64, 768–69; Valerius Maximus, Mem. 2.8.4; Plutarch, Is. Os. 27, Mor. 361C; Fronto, M. Caes. 4.1.

265. E.g., Wis. 6:23; Let. Aris. 224; Sib. Or. 3:660–64; T. Iss. 4:5; T. Gad 7:2; T. Sim. 3; Philo, Good Person 13; Sacrifices 20–21, 32; Posterity 138, 140, 150; Josephus, Ant. 2.13; 18.255; J.W. 1.77; m. ʾAbot 4:21; T. Sol. 6:4 (MSS); 2 En. 70:23.

266. See further 1 Clem. 30:1; 35:5, 8; 2 Clem. 4:3; Polycarp, Phil. 2:2; 4:3; Barn. 20:2; Herm. 38:3; 92:3; cf. Ps. 15:3.

267. The rest of this paragraph is borrowed from Keener, Acts, 3:3125–26.

268. Theophrastus, Char. 28.

269. Marshall, Enmity, 46–69; e.g., Sallust, Jug. 96.3.

270. Marshall, Enmity, 56–61. E.g., Libanius, Encom. 5.14; cf. anti-Jewish slanders in Diodorus Siculus, Libr. Hist. 34.3; Tacitus, Hist. 5; Josephus, Ag. Ap.; the later anti-Christian charges of cannibalism (Athenagoras, Leg. 3; Theophilus, Autol. 3.4, 15; Grant, Paul, 111, citing Justin, 1 Apol. 1.26.7; Minucius Felix, Oct. 9.5), incest (Minucius Felix, Oct. 31.1; Theophilus, Autol. 3.4; Tertullian, Apol. 2.5, 20; 4.11; 7.1; cf. Bamberger, Proselytism, 235).

271. E.g., Menander Rhetor, Treat. 2.4, 390.10–13, albeit for epideictic purposes; in forensic rhetoric, cf. Rhet. Alex. 15, 1432a.4–9.

272. Aeschines, Leg. 144–45; Libanius, Declam. 36.1–2, 10; 44.68–70 (esp. 70); cf. Rhet. Alex. 15, 1432a.9–11.

273. Epicurus, in Diogenes Laertius, Lives 10.131–32; Iamblichus, Vit. pyth. 35.258–61.

274. E.g., Pseudo-Tibullus 3.20.1, 4; Martial, Epigr. 3.28 (and passim).

275. E.g., 1QS 7.15–17; 4Q501 frg. 1.6; 4Q525 frg. 2.ii + 3.1; Sib. Or. 1:178; Josephus, Ant. 13.294–95; 16.81; J.W. 1.77, 443, 447–48, 532, 564; Ag. Ap. 2.89; T. Ab. 12:6 B; t. ʿArak. 2:10; ʾAbot R. Nat. 9, 40A; 41, §116B; Pesiq. Rab Kah. 4:2; b. ʿArak. 15a; b. B. Bat. 39a–39b; b. Pesaḥ. 118a; b. Taʿan. 7b; y. Peʾah 1:1, §§19–27; Gen. Rab. 79:1; 98:19; Exod. Rab. 3:13; Lev. Rab. 16:6; 26:2; Num. Rab. 16:6; Deut. Rab. 5:10; 6:8, 14; Eccl. Rab. 9:12; 10:11, §1; Song Rab. 4:4, §5; Tg. Neof. 1 on Lev. 19:18; Tg. Ps.-J. on Gen. 1:16; Tg. Eccl. on 10:11. Its penalty is Gehinnom in Gen. Rab. 20:1; Eccl. Rab. 3:9, §1; cf. t. Peʾah 1:2; b. Ḥag. 12b (with the Soncino note); Sanh. 103a; y. B. Qam. 8:7, §1.

276. E.g., Theophrastus, Char. 28; Pindar, Pyth. 2.76; Polybius, Hist. 1.36.2–3; 29.1.1–3; Horace, Sat. 1.4.81–82; Dio Chrysostom, Or. 37.32–33; frg. 4 (Stobaeus, Flor. 3, 42.12 p. 762 Hense; 42.12 Meineke); Lucian, Slander 12 (and passim); Marcus Aurelius, Medit. 6.30.2; Iamblichus, Vit. pyth. 27.125. In laws, see, e.g., Lysias, Or. 9.6, §114; 10. Earlier, ANET 425–27 (Akkadian proverbs, e.g., 6).

277. E.g., t. Peʾah 1:2; b. ʿArak. 16a; Gen. Rab. 70:4; Lev. Rab. 37:1.

278. E.g., Philostratus, Apoll. ep. 43.

279. Arius Didymus, Epit. 2.7.11s, p. 100.13–23.

280. E.g., 1 En. 102:6 (cf. 101:3).

281. E.g., Philo, Abraham 20; Spec. Laws 4.59–60; Sipre Deut. 1.8.2–3; 275.1.1; b. ʿAbod. Zar. 3b; y. Peʾah 1:1, §§19–27. (Some of these references constitute slander; I have usually chosen to follow the translators’ distinctions rather than create new ones.)

282. E.g., Livy, Hist. 44.34.4–5.

283. See, e.g., Lysias, Or. 10; Schiemann, “Libel”; Thür, “Kakegoria.” Lachs (Commentary, 92) notes that Jewish courts could levy fines for offenses like slander and shaming another (cf. m. B. Qam. 8:6; b. B. Qam. 86a–87a); see penalties in 1QS 7.17–18. Insulting a teacher could warrant both legal and postmortem punishment (see b. Ber. 19a). Philosophers would, however, prefer forgiveness (Musonius Rufus, 10, p. 78.16–19; cf. deSilva, Honor, 71–72).

284. Virgil, Ecl. 3.3–6; Priap. 2.10–11; Longus, Daphn. 1.23 (esp. cheeses); Alciphron, Farm. 13 (Phyllis to Thrasonides, his son), 3.16, ¶1; 18 (Eunapē to Glaucē), 3.21, ¶2; see Cary and Haarhoff, Life, 93; Lewis, Life, 131–32; Ruffing, “Sheep,” 283; Gutsfeld, “Milk”; esp. goats, b. Šabb. 19b, in Harrison and Yamauchi, “Husbandry,” 57. Along with fish and eggs, milk and cheese were major sources of protein (Grmek, Diseases, 111).

285. On nurses, see further Bradley, “Wet-Nursing.” Although used regularly by the upper classes (Dixon, Roman Mother, 3, 120–26; Treggiari, “Jobs for Women,” 87), nurses were also used by others (Dixon, Roman Mother, 146). In aristocratic homes the nurses were often slaves (e.g., Homer, Od. 1.435; 19.354; Chariton, Chaer. 1.12.9; CPJ 2:19 [citing BGU 1085; P.Oxy. 91; P.Tebt. 399; BGU 1109]; Garnsey and Saller, Empire, 139); in Egypt they were often impoverished peasants (CPJ 2:15–19, §146; Horsley, Documents 2, §1, pp. 7–8, [citing BGU 4.1058, 1106, 1107, 1108, 1109, 1153; P.Rein. 2.103, 104; PSI 9.1065]; Lewis, Life, 146–47; for risks, cf., e.g., P.Oxy. 37), and elsewhere some took the position only through financial necessity (Demosthenes, Or. 57). On nurses, see also Gaventa, Mother, 21–23.

286. Goat’s milk could be substituted if human milk was unavailable (Pliny E., Nat. 28.33.123; Soranus, Gynec. 2.11.18).

287. Pliny E., Nat. 28.33.123–34, here esp. 123–24; Galen, Foodstuffs 3.14.681–84. Contrary to the claim of some scholars, cow’s milk was often used (Pliny E., Nat. 28.34.124, 131–34; b. Šabb. 143b). Greeks in particular disliked it, however (Forbes, Technology, 3:98; Lewis, Life, 131).

288. Appeal to later associations of milk with baptism (Cross, Peter, 32–33) is anachronistic and unnecessary, given the image’s wider usage in antiquity.

289. E.g., Homer, Il. 8.271–72; Od. 20.14–16; cf. Malherbe, “Nurse.”

290. It applies to what is guileless and/or unmixed in, e.g., Philo, Creation 136; Alleg. Interp. 1.77; Posterity 133; Heir 95; Dreams 2.133; Joseph 148; Spec. Laws 4.194; Virtues 124. Milk could be mixed with honey, salt, or other substances (Galen, Foodstuffs 3.14.683–84, 695); Galen regarded milk itself as a compound of fluid and solid substances (3.14.683, 688, 694).

291. With, e.g., Deissmann, Studies, 256 (citing BGU 290.13); BDAG (citing, e.g., P.Hib. 85.16–17; 98.19; P.Oxy. 729.19; SIG 736.100). Pure milk was supposed to be white like snow (Galen, Hygiene 16K).

292. For Christian maturation as growing, see, e.g., corporately or individually, 1 Cor. 3:6–7; 2 Cor. 10:15; Eph. 4:15; Col. 1:10; 2 Pet. 3:18; for the best milk’s wholesomeness, see Galen, Foodstuffs 3.14.685.

293. The Greek eis sōtērian can mean simply “with respect to salvation” (cf. perhaps Rom. 1:16), but Peter’s eschatological use elsewhere (see esp. 1 Pet. 1:5) suggests that here it involves what promotes ultimate salvation (cf. 2 Cor. 7:10; 2 Tim. 3:15).

294. Cf. also, e.g., Rom. 13:11; 1 Thess. 5:8–9; 2 Pet. 3:15.

295. Heraclitus, Hom. Prob. 1.5, not entirely favorably.

296. Heb. 5:12–13; Philo, Agriculture 9; Prelim. Studies 19; Migration 29; Dreams 2.10; Good Person 160; Quintilian, Inst. 2.4.5–6.

297. Note the Torah in Sipre Deut. 321.8.5; b. ʿErub. 54b; b. Taʿan. 7a; cf. teaching in Hilary of Arles, Comm. 1 Peter (PL Supp. 3:88; Bray, Peter, 84). Cf. Keener, “Milk.” This common usage is more relevant here than eschatological milk (Isa. 60:16; Joel 3:18), though Peter might have appreciated the latter connection had someone suggested it.

298. See Keener, Mind, 150–52.

299. When translations render this term as “spiritual,” they do not refer to the divine or human spirit, but mean “nonliteral.”

300. Arius Didymus, Epit. 2.7.8a, p. 52.21–22. Only an appropriate act can have “a reasonable defence” (2.7.8, pp. 50.36–52.1). Cf. 2.7.10a, p. 56.23–25 (though noting that Stoic technical usage of terminology differs from common usage).

301. Epictetus, Diatr. 4.7.7; Arius Didymus, Epit. 2.7.6, p. 36.25; cf. 2.7.11m, p. 90.9–10.

302. Moo, Romans, 752, cites here Kittel, “Λογικός,” 142; Ortkemper, Leben, 28–33.

303. With, e.g., Michaels, Peter, 87; Achtemeier, Peter, 147; Elliott, Peter, 400–401 (noting the semantic relation between logikos and speech and thus the connection with 1:23–2:1); Schreiner, Peter, 100. Differently, Toit (“Γαλα”) takes it more generally as the Christian life; cf. Jobes, “Milk”; Jobes, Peter, 136.

304. Thorsteinsson, “Stoicism,” 23; cf., e.g., Cornutus, Summary of Greek Theology 27, §49.7–8. Jewett (Romans, 730) rightly follows Cranfield (Romans, 2:602, citing Epictetus, Diatr. 1.16.20; 2.9.2; Marcus Aurelius, Medit. 2.16) in translating with respect to reason in Rom. 12:2, as in Stoicism, but unfortunately Jewett (731) then applies this too narrowly to the mission in Spain; contextually, it could apply more generally to unity (as in Rom. 12:4–6).

305. Philo, Creation 119; Alleg. Interp. 2.22; Cherubim 39; Sacrifices 46–47; Worse 38, 82–83; Confusion 9; Migration 3, 47, 78; Heir 132; Prelim. Studies 17; Flight 90; Dreams 1.215; Virtues 13.

306. Cf. also, e.g., Athenagoras, Leg. 10; Epictetus, Diatr. 1.27.6.

307. 4 Macc. 2:23; see also Campbell, Deliverance, 564. For law providing self-mastery over passions in Josephus and Philo, see Stowers, “Self-Mastery,” 532–34.

308. Although intelligible to others (Pindar, Pyth. 2.72; see Engberg-Pedersen, Paul and Stoics, 233), imperatives based on a prior indicative, or commandments based on prior redemption, fit an OT model of exhortation (Rosner, Ethics, 86–89, citing, e.g., Deut. 7:5–6; 14:1–2; 27:9–10).

309. Martin, “Tasting,” arguing for a eucharistic reading of ingestion here. Not surprisingly, later Christians sang Ps. 33 (ET 34) during the Eucharist (Goppelt [Peter, 133n58] cites Apost. Con. 8.13.16 [ANF 7:491]; Cyril of Jerusalem, Cat. Myst. 5.20 [NPNF2 7:156]; Jerome, Ep. 71.6 [NPNF2 6:154]). Cf. Aristotle, Gen. An. 777a7–12, in Nutton, Medicine, 47.

310. Philostratus, Vit. soph. 2.4.569.

311. Pliny E., Nat. 28.33.123.

312. Pliny E., Nat. 28.33.124. Milk was also sweet and desirable mixed with honey (Pindar, Nem. 3.77–78; cf. Exod. 3:8, 17; Maximus of Tyre, Or. 21.6; Galen, Foodstuffs 3.14.683–84). The quality of milk also varied by pasturage (Galen, Foodstuffs 3.14.686). Galen reports that cow’s milk is the fattiest, with that of sheep and then goats next and that of asses least (Foodstuffs 3.14.682, 684); that from horses and camels was also less fatty (3.14.681); breast meat from sows can also retain milky sweetness (3.4.674). He also opines that milk harms the teeth and gums but can be washed down with wine and honey (3.14.688)!

313. For figurative use of “taste,” sometimes as preliminary but sometimes as fuller experience, see, e.g., Homer, Od. 21.98; Musonius Rufus, 19, p. 122.1; Longus, Daphn. 1.19; Fronto, M. Caes. 4.3.1; Marcus Aurelius, Medit. 9.2. Hebrews uses “taste” for “experience” (Heb. 2:9; 6:4–5), though in the first case in the idiom “taste death” (cf. Mark 9:1; John 8:52; Sib. Or. 1:82 (of Adam); Tg. Neof. 1 on Gen. 40:23; Tg. Neof. 1 on Deut. 32:1; Gen. Rab. 21:5; Lev. Rab. 18:1; Pesiq. Rab. 48:2). A newborn infant who died had merely “tasted life” (IG 14 [1890] 1607 + 2171, in Horsley, Documents 4, §12, p. 40); cf. Longus, Daphn. 1.19; Musonius Rufus, 19, p. 122.1.

314. For taste as an empirical test, see Galen, Foodstuffs 2.59.647. Campbell (Honor, 83) understands this allusion’s rhetorical function as that of a concluding maxim; on such epiphonemes, see also Anderson, Glossary, 55; Watson, “Speech,” 206; Keener, Acts, 3:3063–64. For God’s kindness or benevolence (chrēstotēs), see also, e.g., 1 Esd. 5:61; Pss. 25:7–8 (LXX 24:7–8); 52:9 (51:11); 68:10 (67:11); 69:16 (68:17); 86:5 (85:5); 100:5 (99:5); 106:1 (105:1); 107:1 (106:1); 119:68 (118:68); 136:1 (135:1); 145:7, 9 (144:7, 9); Jer. 33:11 (LXX 40:11); Nah. 1:7; Wis. 15:1; Pss. Sol. 2:36; 5:2; 10:2, 7; 18:1; Luke 6:35; Rom. 2:4; 11:22; Eph. 2:7; Titus 3:4; Diogn. 8:8; 9:1–2, 6; 10:4.

315. The psalm also speaks of God saving (using sōzō) the poor and humble (LXX Ps. 33:7, 19 [ET 34:6, 18]), as Peter speaks of salvation (sōtēria) in 1 Pet. 2:2; still, neither the psalmist’s nor Peter’s use of this word group is rare enough to suggest a necessary connection. Many find considerable influence from LXX Ps. 33 [ET 34] in 1 Peter (Goppelt, Peter, 132; Achtemeier, Peter, 225–27; Gilmour, “Casualty”; Gréaux, “Examination”; Christensen, “Solidarity”; more reservedly, Donelson, Peter, 96; cf. Zwemstra and Cornelius, “Funksie[s]”).

316. Elsewhere in early Christian sources, in 1 Clem. 9:1; 14:4; 2 Clem. 15:5; 19:1; Ignatius, Magn. 10:1; Smyrn. 6:2; Diogn. 8:8; 9:1–2, 6; 10:4. Cf. Luke 5:39; 1 Cor. 15:33; Eph. 4:32; Sib. Or. 1:159.

317. Musonius Rufus, 14, p. 92.31; cf. the virtue list in Musonius Rufus, 16, p. 104.33.

318. Arius Didymus, Epit. 2.7.5b2, p. 14.18–20; “a knowledge which is disposed to do good” (p. 16.14; trans. Pomeroy, 17); cf. Epictetus, Diatr. 3.10.3 (the cognate adjective). It appears in lists of attributes for ideal rulers (Musonius Rufus, 8, p. 66.11).

319. Arius Didymus, Epit. 2.7.5 L, p. 36.6 (hence, generosity).

320. It appears 26 times in the LXX (the cognate adjective 38 times), 22 times in Josephus (the adjective 52 times), and 9 times in Philo (the adjective 77 times).

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