Biblion Bible Commentary
Read the introduction to Titus · About this commentary
Servants Who Adorn the Doctrine
Titus 2:9-10
9 Exhort servants to be in subjection to their own masters and to be well-pleasing in all things, not contradicting, · WEB
The people with the least standing in the household are given the largest reason for what they do: they make the teaching look like what it is.
The last group in the code is the one with no legal standing at all. Servants are to be subject, well-pleasing, not contradicting, not pilfering, but showing all good fidelity. As with Philemon, the letter directs conduct inside a structure whose ground the gospel removes elsewhere — a slave and a master who are brothers are already something the arrangement cannot describe Philemon 1:16.
What is remarkable is the reason attached: that they may adorn the doctrine of God our Savior in all things. The verb is kosmeō G2885, to arrange and set off to advantage — the word behind ordering a room or a woman's dress. Teaching is treated as something that can be well or badly displayed. And the display is entrusted here to household slaves. In a world where such people were counted as furniture, the letter makes them the setting in which the gospel is shown. That is a larger dignity than the code's opening groups receive.
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