2 Peter 1:9Meaning & Commentary from the Church Fathers

Hearing this, let us strengthen ourselves in every way, attending to what has been said and cleansing ourselves from the worldly. Nothing remains for us except to do this and to disregard that. If we do not, we shall perish in another way. What difference does it make if we perish not through wealth, but through negligence? Or if not through negligence, then through faintheartedness? The farmer grieves equally whether he loses his crop in one way or another.

“Blind” (μυωπάζων). This expression suggests mice (μυων), which remain constantly in blindness underground. The saying of the Apostle Peter is like what the Apostle James says: whoever hears the word and does not do it is like a man observing the natural features of his face in a mirror (Jas 1:23). Having learned that through purification in holy baptism he has been washed from a multitude of sins, he ought to know that together with purification he also received holiness. He ought to be watchful, so as to preserve that sanctification without which no one will see the Lord. But he has forgotten.

If someone mixes the letter of the law, the manifestation of visible things, and his own sense perception, intertwining them with one another, then he is blind, has closed his eyes (2 Pet 1:9), and is sick with ignorance of beings.

As we eat, drink, speak, and hear, so by nature we must also repent. One who is worthy of death according to the law is put to death once. But whoever lives, lives by faith for the sake of repentance. Even if not from our own sin, we have been cleansed through baptism from the sin of transgression. Having been cleansed, we received the commandments. But the one who does not fulfill the second thing has defiled the first. He has forgotten the cleansing of his former sins, from which no one is free every day, even if he never neglects anything commanded.

For this man also knew that, having been purified through holy baptism, he had washed from himself a multitude of sins. He ought to have remembered that, having been purified, he also received sanctification. He should have been watchful, so as to preserve forever the holiness without which no one will see the Lord. But he forgot this.

The eye signifies knowledge, and the hand signifies action. The one who tries to act without knowing what should be done is blind. Lacking the light of truth, he as it were puts his hand to a work he does not understand. He follows a path he does not see as a whole, so that later, miserable as he is, he unexpectedly perishes in a terrible fall he could not foresee. Such is everyone in whom these things are absent, the one of whom Peter speaks.

“He is blind, closing his eyes.” In Russian: “he has shut his eyes.” “This expression is taken from mice, which remain constantly in blindness underground,” says Theophylact.

But he in whom these things are not, that is, in whose soul and life such qualities and virtues are absent, shows himself to be blind. Like the false teachers, he may think and be convinced that he sees.

Such a man knows neither himself, nor God, nor Christ. He walks in darkness. Compare 1 Jn. 2:9, 11; Rev. 3:17; Prov. 4:19.

He has shut his eyes. The Greek word properly denotes a person who can see only what is near, a short-sighted man. He closes his eyes in order to see distant objects.

Thus it denotes a man who sees badly both far and near. He is blind with respect to the present and with respect to the future.

Directing his speech against the erroneous moral teaching of the heretics, the Apostle places Christian knowledge in the closest connection with the wholeness of Christian life, and in dependence upon it.

Finally, he teaches that one who is not perfected in the moral life cannot be perfected in Christian knowledge. Such a person lacks those moral foundations of life in which the Apostle counsels Christians to grow.

Only in the light of faith, love, and the other Christian virtues can the great mysteries of Christian teaching be grasped more fully and perfectly.

Whoever does not use them is like one who has shut his eyes. Such a man cannot be trusted at all, for he is the most unreliable guide, and he himself does not know where to go.