Commentaries:
Jamieson, Fausset, and Brown
But--Though they err in this, there is a sense in which "piety is" not merely gain, but "great means of gain": not the gaining which they pursue, and which makes men to be discontented with their present possessions, and to use religion as "a cloak of covetousness" (1 Thessalonians 2:5) and means of earthly gain, but the present and eternal gain which piety, whose accompaniment is contentment, secures to the soul. WIESINGER remarks that Paul observed in Timothy a tendency to indolence and shrinking from the conflict, whence he felt (1 Timothy 6:11) that Timothy needed cautioning against such temptation; compare also the second Epistle. Not merely contentment is great gain (a sentiment of the heathen CICERO [Paradox 6], "the greatest and surest riches"), but "piety with contentment"; for piety not only feels no need of what it has not, but also has that which exalts it above what it has not [WIESINGER]. The Greek for contentment is translated "sufficiency" (2 Corinthians 9:8). But the adjective (Philippians 4:11) "content"; literally, "having a sufficiency in one's self" independent of others. "The Lord always supplies His people with what is necessary for them. True happiness lies in piety, but this sufficiency [supplied by God, with which moreover His people are content] is thrown into the scale as a kind of overweight" [CALVIN] (1Ki. 17:1-16; Psalms 37:19; Isaiah 33:6, Isaiah 33:16; Jeremiah 37:21).
Other commentary entries containing this verse:
Psalms 37:26
Proverbs 15:16
Ecclesiastes 6:9
Philippians 4:11
1 Timothy 4:8
1 Timothy 6:5
1 Timothy 6:9
1 Timothy 6:20-21
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