Commentaries:
Jamieson, Fausset, and Brown
new-born babes--altogether without "guile" (1 Peter 2:1). As long as we are here we are "babes," in a specially tender relation to God (Isaiah 40:11). The childlike spirit is indispensable if we would enter heaven. "Milk" is here not elementary truths in contradistinction to more advanced Christian truths, as in 1 Corinthians 3:2; Hebrews 5:12-13; but in contrast to "guile, hypocrisies," etc. (1 Peter 2:1); the simplicity of Christian doctrine in general to the childlike spirit. The same "word of grace" which is the instrument in regeneration, is the instrument also of building up. "The mother of the child is also its natural nurse" [STEIGER]. The babe, instead of chemically analyzing, instinctively desires and feeds on the milk; so our part is not self-sufficient rationalizing and questioning, but simply receiving the truth in the love of it (Matthew 11:25).
desire--Greek, "have a yearning desire for," or "longing after," a natural impulse to the regenerate, "for as no one needs to teach new-born babes what food to take, knowing instinctively that a table is provided for them in their mother's breast," so the believer of himself thirsts after the word of God (Psa. 119:1-176). Compare TATIUS' language as to Achilles.
sincere--Greek, "guileless." Compare 1 Peter 2:1, "laying aside guile." IRENÆUS says of heretics. They mix chalk with the milk. The article, "the," implies that besides the well-known pure milk, the Gospel, there is no other pure, unadulterated doctrine; it alone can make us guileless (1 Peter 2:1).
of the word--Not as ALFORD, "spiritual," nor "reasonable," as English Version in Romans 12:1. The Greek "logos" in Scripture is not used of the reason, or mind, but of the WORD; the preceding context requires that "the word" should be meant here; the adjective "logikos" follows the meaning of the noun logos, "word." James 1:21, "Lay apart all filthiness . . . and receive with meekness the engrafted WORD," is exactly parallel, and confirms English Version here.
grow--The oldest manuscripts and versions read, "grow unto salvation." Being BORN again unto salvation, we are also to grow unto salvation. The end to which growth leads is perfected salvation. "Growth is the measure of the fulness of that, not only rescue from destruction, but positive blessedness, which is implied in salvation" [ALFORD].
thereby--Greek, "in it"; fed on it; in its strength (Acts 11:14). "The word is to be desired with appetite as the cause of life, to be swallowed in the hearing, to be chewed as cud is by rumination with the understanding, and to be digested by faith" [TERTULLIAN].
Other commentary entries containing this verse:
Song of Solomon 5:1
Hosea 1:8
James 1:21
1 Peter 1:3
1 Peter 1:22
1 Peter 2:1
1 Peter 2:5
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