Really good.

Sola Fide,
Steve
Col. 1:9-14

The word “teleios” means (1. brought to its end, finished, 2. wanting nothing necessary to completeness 3. perfect 4. that which is perfect) according to Thayer.
You said, “…in all of the New Testament the word refers to a finishing, completing, or maturing.” (in other words it’s not used to mean totally perfect in the NT) What about Matt. 5:48 “Be ye therefore perfect (τελειος-teleios), even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect (τελειος).” The first occurrence of the word perfect is defined by the second occurrence of the word which refers to the Father. (Perfect “even as” your Father.) Is the Father God merely mature, finished, or even just complete? I believe he is totally, sinlessly perfect in every way and this is the way Jesus is using the word. The standard of perfection required for heaven is measured by God himself. This humanly unattainable requirement of perfection explains why no one can save themselves. We’re not and can’t be perfect, we’re sinners. Only the sacrifice of Jesus can, “present you holy and unblamable and unreprovable (perfect) in his sight:” Col. 1:22 (parenthesis added) I believe this is the same perfection spoken of in Heb 10:14 “For by one offering he hath perfected forever them that are sanctified.” I must point out that the word “perfected” used here is “τελειοω-teleioo” (to make perfect, complete-Thayer) which is derived from “teleios”. We are required to be as prefect (τελειος) as the Father is and the sacrifice of Jesus has perfected (τελειοω -made perfect) us forever to meet that requirement. The sacrifice of Jesus causes us to “be… perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven in perfect.” Your point about “τελειος-teleios” never meaning “perfect” in NT does not hold. Your interpretation of the perfect as meaning only the completion of the Bible is not necessarily correct. Other interpretations of the word perfect are possible and I will post my view on this passage shortly.

Yours in Christ,
Riley

I still have this nagging question though from both Acts 2 and now this. Acts 2 is unclear about how long precisely the gifts will last. 1 Cor 13 is unclear about how long the gifts will last.

This, at the very least would imply that we should have an “open” position to the gifts. (And I argue the rest of Scripture makes clear that if we are open to the gifts then the proper action is to pursue them.) Yet the position you advocate is one of them ceasing. To say they have ceased requires and additional piece of information.

Now, I am aware that this series is not yet done, so I can only assume that that is what you are leading up to. I just want to clarify that to say the gifts have ceased is still no where found in Scripture.

I am interested to see what further items are discussed as this series continues.

I love you, Nate

Seriously

Commentary

The main point of this passage is a contrast between the never failing of love and the now vs. then aspects of the special revelatory ministries. Verses 8 and 9 declare this contrast while verses 10 through 12 illustrate it in three analogous examples. And finally verse 13 communicates Loves superiority over the other temporal blessings of faith and hope which will out last the revelation ministries but not Love which never fails.

Verse 8

Love never fails, but prophecy, tongues, and knowledge will be put away. Several points of observation must be made at this point. First there is in the grammar a distinction between the putting away of tongues and the putting away of both prophecy and knowledge. ei;te glw/ssai( pau,sontai (if there are tongues, they will cease) the word pau,sontai which is translated “they will cease” is a future middle indicative third person plural verb, which indicates that they (the special ministry of tongues) will cease on their own or on behalf of themselves in future time. It is believed by many that this future time would be when the ministry had served the purpose for which God gave it to the Church. Paul declares the purpose of this ministry in 1Co. 14:21-22, which says. In the law it is written: “With men of other tongues and other lips I will speak to this people; and yet, for all that, they will not hear me,” says the Lord. Therefore tongues are for a sign, not to those who believe but to unbelievers; but prophesying is not for unbelievers but for those who believe. The words “this people” are a direct reference to unbelieving national Israelites, Paul celebrates the use of tongues within this gentile church because he sees it as an evangelical outward call to his kinsmen according to the flesh. And not only an evangelical call but also a warning of soon coming destruction (Is. 28:9-15). It should be noted that Paul calls tongues a sign; this gives us a clue as to when it’s purpose would be complete. In 70 AD just a few years after this letter was written the unbelieving nation of Israel was destroyed, thus this evangelical sign to warn unbelieving Israelites had hit it’s target, thus we can conclude that tongues ceased to be given as a ministry by the Holy Spirit around 70 AD. And even though many will reject any appeal to Church history as evidentiary based upon the fact that many items in early church history are disputable it seems however important to mention that Church history records no accepted use of the ministry of tongues after 70 AD.
Another key observation in regard to the nouns profhtei/ai, (prophecy) glw/ssai, (tongues) and gnw/sij (knowledge) in this verse is that they represent ministries or gifts in the context not prophecy, languages, and knowledge in general. Thus due to the context one should read the passage like this, Love never fails, but the ministries or gifts of special knowledge, tongues and prophecy will fail. All three of these nouns are identified as ministries or gifts in the list given by Paul in chapter 12. A professor I had while a student in Bible College taught with utter sarcasm, that since knowledge has not ceased none of the gifts have ceased. The error of his interpretation lies in the fact that he divorced the word gnw/sij) (knowledge) from it’s context and thus used the word in a way in which the text never intended it to be used. This fact will become more important as we examine Paul’s further usage of these words.

Verses 9 & 10

Paul uses this passage to declare a limit upon the revelatory nature of the ministries of knowledge and prophecy at his time. There is no great mystery in the word (me,rouj) translated “part” it simply means fragment or piece, in other words the ministries of knowledge and prophecy used in this early church only produced a fragment or fraction of the full revelation. For we know in part and we prophesy in part.

Verse 10 starts with the two words o[tan de which is translated “but when”, these words let us know that there is a link coming between the two verses, and that this link expresses a measure of time. When the complete thing comes the thing in part will be put away.

Our first key observation of grammar is the word te,leion, which is, translated “a perfect thing” without the article or “the perfect thing” with the article. This word is a nominative neuter singular pronominal adjective, and thus being with out a noun matching in case gender and number we translate the word the perfect or complete thing. Dr. Robert Thomas of Masters Theological Seminary has written in regards to this word, that it should not be translated “perfect.” The reason he gives is that it damages the reader of the New Testaments ability to properly understand the meaning of the word; this is because the English word perfect means much more then the Greek word intended to convey. Today’s English word “perfect” implies a theoretical non-attainable state of perfection. And although some modern scholars might try to say that this is an expectable interpretation for the Greek word te,leion The problem however lies in the fact that this word did not mean perfection in this sense in the first century AD when this letter was written, In fact in all of the New Testament the word refers to a finishing, completing, or maturing. According to Dr. Thomas the word did not take on the Greek philosophical meaning of theoretical non-attainable perfection until much later in the Roman culture. This combined with the use of the word me,rouj “part” helps define tevleion in the context as “the complete thing” in contrast to the thing in part. Thus it should read, “But when the complete thing comes, the thing in part will cease.”

Recently I was challenged by a charismatic friend on this point. He asked me to show him any place in scripture where the word “perfect” or “tevleion” clearly applied to the scriptures themselves. In response I took him to 2Timothy 3:16-17 where we see the concept that the scriptures are sufficient to completely train the man of God for all aspects of Christian life and duty, and James 1:25 where James through the inspiration of the Holy Spirit applies the adjective “tevleion” to the scriptures themselves. From passages such as these we derived the doctrine of the sufficiency of scripture. It is also this doctrine that is under attack when anyone seeks to promote a continuation of revelation beyond scripture. God’s special revelation is sufficient and complete, it is able in itself to be the measuring rod for all matters of faith and practice.
Therefore it is the contention of this student that a compilation of the evidence provided by this text (1Co 13:8-13) shows that the best interpretation of the concept in verse 10 is that the “complete” is in fact the finished cannon of scripture.

The word katarghqh,setai is the same word translated in verse 8 “to be put away” in reference to prophecy and knowledge. It is important to note that this word is a future, passive, indicative, 3rd, singular verb. To emphasize the passive sense I use the English word “put” rather then the more common word “done” in my translation of the passage. The word (katarghqh,setai) 6means to render inactive, to do away with or to abolish. So in an even clearer way we could read the verse this way; “When the complete prophesy and knowledge comes, the in part or partial prophesy and knowledge will be put away.”

Verse11

It has been said that verse 11 is a reference to the ministry of tongues and that Paul is making speaking in tongues equal to “baby talk.” It has also been said that this verse is a reference to the immature state of the church. And when the church reaches a state of maturity it would no longer need those gifts. The first view seeks to contextually interpret without a good grammatical reason to limit the verse to the ministry of tongues. The Second seeks to deal with the analogy yet ads elements, which are not found in the context. It would seem therefore that better reasoning would be to look at the analogy in terms of Paul’s syllogism (Our special ministries of knowledge and prophecy are in part, when the complete thing is here, the thing in part is put away, Therefore when the complete thing is here the special ministries of knowledge and prophecy will be put away). It seems therefore that Paul is through symbolism restating his proposition as an analogy, which helps to capture the sense in which the partial is put away. The statement “When I was a child” is speaking of the nature of the things, which are partial; they are not yet full, complete, or mature. For added emphasis Paul declares the natural out flow of the child, he will speak, understand, and think as a child. Due to the context and Paul’s use of the word (kath,rghka) “to put away,” it would seem as though the words think, understand and speak are a direct reference to the 3 mentioned gifts in their incomplete, unfinished, or immature state. The statement “When I became a man I put away childish things” is an analogous way of repeating the truth of verse 10. When the Complete thing comes the thing in part is put away. The analogy is not intending to say that the ministries were childish; rather it is making a comparison between the incomplete understanding of a child and the clearer understanding of an adult.

Verse 12

This verse contains the words a;rti (now) and to,te (then) twice. These two time indicators reveal present and consecutive states. The present state was the very minute, hour, day, year, or generation to which Paul wrote. Paul’s purpose was to show contrast between the present and the consecutive (that which was and that which was to come). The first two clauses state “For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face;” In many of the commentaries I have consulted these two clauses have been interpreted in a way which determines the meaning of these word pictures based upon the their normal meanings outside of context rather then exploring the context to determine if there is a more accurate interpretation. With that said let us now examine the three levels of Context. First we have the syntax of the immediate clause (ble,pomen ga.r a;rti diV evso,ptrou evn aivni,gmati). It begins with the verb blepp-oh-men which means to see, understand, or perceive, and it ends with the noun en-ig-ma-ti from which we get our word enigma, the idea according to Bauer, Arndt, and Ginrich, and the Friburgs is that of a revelation obscurely expressed. We can read the clause like this “For now we understand(see through a mirror) in obscurely expressed revelation (dimly).” This is the only way this verse can fit the immediate context, which is making a contrast between ministries of revelation and ministering to one another in love to the abandonment of self. The next clause says (to,te de. pro,swpon pro.j pro,swpon) pro-soh-pawn, pros, pro-soh-pawn a figure of speech, which says literally face to face, according to Bauer, Arndt, and Ginrich it means “the seat of understanding”. This idea is also seen in Numbers 12:8 which uses the Hebrew equivalent (hP,ú-la, hP,) “face to face”. In this passage God explains to Aaron and Miriam the meaning of this figure of speech when he says “With him (Moses) I speak face to face, clearly, and not in riddles”. The figure of speech is not difficult to understand in Numbers (which means to speak clearly) or in 1Corinthians 13, which means to understand with clarity. The passage should then be understood in this way “For now we understand in obscurely expressed revelation, but then we will understand with great clarity.” Moving on to the next level of context makes this truth even clearer. The next level of context is the “general” context, this refers to the context of the whole book or books if the author wrote more then one to the same group, for example 1&2 Timothy, 1&2 Peter, 1,2&3 John, 1&2 Thessalonians, and 1&2 Corinthians. In the second epistle of Paul to the Corinthians, Paul uses the same word picture (that of looking through a mirror). It is also significant that this is the only other time in the New Testament that this figure of speech is used. Paul most likely used this expression to identify with the members of the Corinthian church since Corinth was a major production center for mirrors. In 2Cor. 3:14-18 Paul draws a contrast between Old Testament revelation (in which the ministry of Messiah had to be understood as with a vail over the face) and NT revelation of Messiah (which was easier to understand like looking in a mirror). The phrase, “to see through a mirror” in this passage, is to understand the clearer unveiled revelation of Jesus Christ. In contrast to the Old Testament understanding of the Messiah, which would be to see (understand) with a veil over the face. Paul’s use of similar language helps us to understand the meaning of the figures of speech used in our text 1Cor. 13:12a. Paul seems to like word pictures that help his readers to see with their minds eye the idea he wants to convey, this is seen through out his writings e.g. his vivid pictorial description of the creatures (vessels for wrath or mercy) relationship to the creator (potter) in Romans 9.

Part “b” of verse 12 contains two additional clauses also containing the time indicators “now” and “then.” To help explain the meaning of these clauses it is important to explain a basic rule of biblical hermeneutics (The art and science of interpretation). This rule is sometimes described with the phrase “context is key.” This means that context is the tool by which a word’s meaning is determined; this contextual meaning can often overrule a lexical definition. In verse 12 Paul writes the phrase “now I know in part.” This is the very same word structure as verse 9, which says “now we know in part.” Thus it is clear that the lexical word “know” (ginw,skw) should be rather “a ministry of special knowledge.” As has been established as the sense in verse 9, and thus the clause should be understood like this, “Now my (Paul’s) ministry of special knowledge is in part.” This consistent understanding of the word (ginw,skw) should be applied to the following clause as well. And should be understood, “then I shall understand just as my ministry of special knowledge has been understood.” In other words Paul is describing a future time when rather then one or two letters being read in a church (as was the case in Corinth), there would come a time possibly in Paul’s very lifetime when a complete revelation to the church would be available even for him to see, read, and understand.

Verse 13

Paul opens the verse with “nuni. de. me,nei” meaning “but now remains.” The word “nuni.” meaning “now” reminds us of the now vs. then time aspects being contrasted in the passage while the word “de.” an adversative conjunction meaning “but” points out a contrast, and the word “me,nei” meaning “to remain” is a present active indicative verb which expresses a continual remaining. The idea of the first clause is this, “but now faith, hope, and love remain and will keep on remaining past the coming of the complete thing of versec10.

Paul views it as necessary to emphatically limit that which will remain by using the phrase, “ta. tri,a tau/ta\” meaning “these three” or “just these three.” We have seen that Paul expected the partial prophesy and partial knowledge to cease in his own lifetime, in contrast we now see that the heart motivation by which these partial ministries were to be exercised, namely faith, hope and love, would continue even after the complete prophecy and knowledge had arrived.

Finally Paul closes the verse with another adversative clause stating that in contrast love is the greater then faith and hope. The text does not explicitly declare how love is superior to faith and hope, for the answer to this we are bound to the context. In this context the verb meaning “to remain” is our key to understanding how love is superior to faith and hope. While it may be argued that love is superior in general to faith and hope the scope of the text limits love’s superiority to that of duration of remaining. Paul has just communicated that faith, hope, and love will remain beyond the time of the coming of the complete prophecy and knowledge, now he seeks to expand even further into the future the remaining of love past that of faith and hope. Paul is here communicating that both faith and hope while remaining past the time of the completed prophecy and knowledge will at some point themselves cease and this in contrast to love which he has already declared will never cease.

Scripture tells us that faith and hope are temporal and that they will cease when their object is revealed. The Object of our faith (1 Corinthians 15:14; Galatians 2:16; 3:14; 5:5; Hebrews 11:1) and hope (Romans 8:24-25; 2 Corinthians 1:10) is Christ and His promise to resurrect His people. When Christ returns and the dead are raised those who are his will no longer hope in his coming

Now

The church now (in the time in which the letter was written) possessed ministries of partial prophecy and partial knowledge, they were “now” like children in understanding, they were “now” only able to comprehend the mysteries of their revelations as through a dim mirror, “now” Paul only possessed partial knowledge, and “now” remained and will keep on remaining faith, hope and love.

Then

The church will “then” (at the coming of the complete prophesy and knowledge) posses a full prophecy and knowledge, they will be like adults in understanding, they will understand the mysteries of the revelations clearly as looking face to face not in a dim mirror, “Then” even Paul if he lived to that point will know fully being able to read the writings of the other authors of the NT just as his writings have been read and embraced by all the church as scripture.

Thanks for your comment. Sorry for the surprise. Viewing the “perfect” as something beyond this life is not an unusual cessationist view, from John Chrysostom to Thomas Edgar to John MacArthur to Richard Gaffin to many others.

In this particular passage, if the emphasis is on partial knowledge versus complete knowledge (rather than the gifts themselves); and if Paul is writing in terms of his own personal experience (as verse 12 seems to indicate) rather than in terms of church history; then he leaves the question of when the gifts cease in church history unanswered in this passage.

Thus, I believe we must look to other passages to answer the when question.

Having said that, I certainly recognize that there are some compelling arguments for the other views of the “perfect.” As I noted in the article, any of the six views of the “perfect” can be adopted and still fit within a cessationist framework.

Thanks again for your comment.
- NB

Although I don’t agree, I really like your explanation and how you presented it and am still thinking about it. I always enjoy good insights, even on opposing view points.

A couple of real fast examples of how I as a cessationist believe in #6 is that those things knowledge, gifts, and tongues are not over, just the gifting of them.

I believe Dr. MacArthur once said (don’t quote me but I’m pretty sure) that tongues could happen in an extreme situation. Dr. S. Lewis Johnson says the same thing that knowledge, tongues, and prophecy are not over with ie banned forever from this world never to return, but individuals possessing specific gifting of knowledge, prophecy and tongues are. This is a very important distinction.

I personally believe that in the tribulation there will be a return of those gifts (well at least 1/3 ) b/c that’s a different dispensation (and that’s another story).